(Part 2 of CHAPTER 1
“Just two more days.” Cale patted the steering wheel of his faithful, yet older-than-dirt red Ford pickup, urging it toward home past a slow-moving green combine. He was eager to be done for the day.
Of course, ‘done’ wouldn’t happen for a few more hours. He still had to make sure the cows got milked, the horses stabled, and do at least twenty other things before he slid into his bed for the night. But done sounded good.
Cale grimaced. After five days of juggling housework, ranch chores, and refereeing his three younger brothers, he looked forward to his folks’ return. Being the adult in charge hadn’t been as cool as he had thought it would be.
No way am I doing this again. This is your deal, Dad. You can have it. I’ll catch ya in a decade or two. Until then, I’m gonna have a real life.
His truck wheezed a complaint while going around the combine. Cale guided it in front of the tractor, only to have a white-tailed doe leap into the lane.
“Hey!” Cale pumped the brake and swerved. The pickup’s tires crunched the gravel before he jerked the truck back onto the black top. He slammed his fist on the steering wheel. “No problem, Bambi. Just make your own crosswalk.”
The doe bounded across the county road, seeming unconcerned with her near miss. She sprang into the Van Hoose’s pumpkin patch, deftly jumping over the orange orbs dotting the field.
Remembering the combine, Cale glanced in his rear-view mirror and froze for exactly one point three seconds before stomping on the accelerator.
The combine grew huge in the mirror, its enormous reel and cutter bar mimicking a ravenous mouth.
Cale had no desire to be chomped to bits and spit out like a mouthful of Brussel sprouts. He scanned the road ahead, waved an apology to the driver, and exited at his turnoff.
Two giant red maple trees stood as sentinels welcoming him home to Recompense Ryder Ranch, just as they had for the last five generations of Ryders.
He down-shifted over the protests of his pickup and drove it to the dirt lane. His belly rumbled. He ignored his growing hunger, knowing Luke had planned to start dinner before Cale left on a quick errand to the feed store.
Mom’s ham-and-cheese potato casserole was the best. Cale licked his lips. The food Mom had prepared and frozen before she’d left almost made the stress of the last few days worthwhile.
Well, the casserole and her homemade caramel-apple pie. That was worth a little heap of tension.
But not the whole pile of stress served up during yesterday’s fiasco when Jesse left the east pasture gate open. The three ranch hands, Luke, and Cale spent nearly three hours rounding up their herd of two hundred Angus and Herefords after they stampeded halfway to the next county. A calf got stuck in a ravine and the mama wasn’t too happy about it.
Neither was Cale.
It wouldn’t have been so bad if Cale hadn’t also split the back of his favorite jeans. Of course Sheriff Miller showed up just as they were coming in for dinner and had to tease him about having his own personal air-conditioning system while his red boxers hung out for everybody and their cow dogs to whistle at.
“Yeah, welcome home, Dad,” Cale muttered. “I’m done.”
If it hadn’t been for Mom’s culinary skills, Cale might not have agreed to oversee the ranch while his parents vacationed. Like I ever had a choice.
Cale forced a laugh and up-shifted. Things don’t work like that. Dad does the commanding … his children and ranch hands do the obeying.
Dad would listen to a reasonable compromise on occasion, but everyone knew he had the final say, except of course, when Mom took him aside and changed his mind.
Cale chuckled. He liked that Dad could be flexible, at least at Mom’s urging—if you could consider a six-foot three-inch length of rebar flexible. Cale had learned from an early age that the quickest way to get on the wrong side of Dad was to sass Mom. So he didn’t . . . mostly.
Life was so much easier on the right side of Dad.
Dad was funny like that—built solid like a refrigerator, and yet he melted like warm butter when Mom smiled.
When Dad decided to take Mom on the honeymoon that they couldn’t afford as newlyweds, he’d been a man on a mission.
The week-long hiking, fishing, and camping trip Cale and his three best friends had planned for fall break did a five-hundred-mile-an-hour header into the dumpster.
And once Dad asked their neighbor to keep Brandi, there would be neither discussion nor going back. The deal was sealed. The only thing left to do was tell his friends to go on without him. Just because Dad had ruined Cale’s plans, didn’t mean he had to ruin theirs.
Leaving Brandi with the Tenneys had been Dad’s only concession. Which I’m okay with. She’s a one-child hurricane. Recalling how his kid sister had almost waylaid the honeymooners’ bliss by hiding in Dad’s over-sized duffle, Cale laughed in spite of his frustration.
It must be good to be “the princess.”
He made a wide arc around the corner of the one-story farmhouse and slammed on the brakes, sliding to a stop on the dirt less than a foot from the sheriff’s black-and-white.
“Again, Sheriff Miller? Three times isn’t enough?” Cale muttered. Remembering the lawman’s teasing smile yesterday revved up Cale’s ire.
He backed up and drove around the sheriff’s car and parked in his dad’s spot. Cale slipped off his leather gloves and tossed them onto the seat.
After putting the keys on top of the visor, he slid out of the cab and bent to offer their blue heelers, Duke and Biscuit, a quick pat. “Back up, Duke.”
He pushed the black dog away from the white-and-rust door. Duke rewarded him with a large dose of dog breath. “Geez, Duke, you been chewing on a skunk?”
Biscuit leaped up, pressing his muddy prints on Cale’s red T-shirt. “Thanks a lot, Biscuit.” He scratched the younger dog behind the ears, before pushing both down. “Sit. Stay. Mom will have your hide, and mine, if you get mud all over her floors.”
With a wave of his hand, Cale sent both dogs tearing across the field.
Cale caught his unruly mess of dark blond curls poking out from under his Reds cap in the glass of the kitchen door. He lifted the cap and hid as many curls under it as he could, then opened the door, hoping to smell dinner baking.
Before he could get a proper sniff to assess the dinner situation, he heard his youngest brother yell, “Cale’s home!” Phoenix lunged at him and gripped him with a strength he hadn’t known his little brother possessed.
“What’s the matter?” Cale reached a stiff arm to Phoenix, his gaze darting around their home. Through the kitchen archway, the sheriff rose from one of the living room couches. Cale strode forward, bulldozing Phoenix along as he moved.
The sheriff’s somber face quickened Cale’s heartbeat.
Turning toward their cranberry-colored sofa, Cale realized that Mrs. Miller, a kind-hearted woman who baked the best chocolate cookies he’d ever tasted—next to Mom’s of course—had accompanied her husband. She sat next to a nervous Jesse, who whined, “We don’t know. They won’t tell us. They want to talk to you.”
Sheriff Miller swallowed hard, then opened his mouth.
Fear stabbed at Cale. He glanced at Luke, hoping for a clue. Luke clamped his lips together, shook his head, and turned his face toward the fireplace.
“What gives?” Cale asked, then shook Phoenix slightly, trying to loosen his brother’s grip.
Luke crooked a finger at their twelve-year-old brother. “Come here.” The quiet whisper reminded Cale of Mom.
Phoenix ran into Luke’s arms, spearing a betrayed look at Cale before burying his face in Luke’s blue T-shirt.
“There’s no easy way to say it.” The sheriff placed a firm hand on Cale’s shoulder. “There’s been an accident.”
The air punched out of Cale’s lungs. His thoughts landed on the youngest, missing Ryder. “What happened to Dolly?” Mom’ll never forgive herself if Dolly’s hurt bad.
A pained expression crossed Mrs. Miller’s face.
Sheriff Miller shook his head. “Nothing, Cale. She’s fine.”
“So what’s going on?”His eyes darted from Sheriff Miller to Luke, and came to rest on the sheriff.
Sheriff Hardee stepped closer and lowered his voice. “Son, it’s your folks. They’re ... gone.”
“I know that.” Cale blinked and backed up a step. “They’ll be home on Saturday.”
Luke’s mouth dropped open.
Mrs. Miller and Luke shook their heads in unison. The sheriff let out a slow breath. “No, son. I’m so sorry.” Sheriff Hardee cleared his throat and steadied his voice. “I wish they were. Their rental plane crashed.”
Cale crumpled into the recliner cushions, barely registering the rest of the man’s words bouncing off the wall behind him.
“There were no survivors.”
(Please stay tuned--CH 2 is up) Thanks. :)