Breaking the Bad Boy (8 page)

Poaching was rare, but she remembered when she was a kid there was a group of men who would take chain saws to any livestock close to a forest service road where the cattle spent the summer in the high country. They’d have the cow gutted and quartered and in the back of the pickup in something close to twelve minutes, with nothing left but the offal, which didn’t last long either. She didn’t remember the particulars, like what they’d do with the meat, most likely they ate it, bone chips and all, but she remembered being pretty horrified at the thought.

Brent’s ranch didn’t do any of the meat processing; they just raised happy beef and sent them away for someone else to do the dirty work. As children, she and her brother were spared knowledge of that part of the process. They spent their days on dirt bikes and horseback under the big sky, it was an idyllic childhood. When Joss made the connection between what they raised and what they had for dinner almost every night, she became a vegetarian. It didn’t last long, mostly because her mother had little patience for that sort of behavior, and most anything else, she thought.

Her mother was alive. It shouldn’t have surprised her, but it did. The fantasies she’d had about her mother were mostly how she died tragically, Joss’s name on her final breath, and that was why she never came back. In retrospect, Joss realized how ridiculous she was in assuming she was dead, but for her mental health there was simply no other option. Cassidy Erickson was dead, that would be the only reason she wouldn’t come back to her daughter. Joss didn’t remember the day Cassidy left, but her feelings, although complicated, were not so much unhappiness that she left, but relief.

Brent had been relieved, too, so why on earth would she not give him a divorce? Was she holding out for a piece of Brent’s substantial pie? Did she still love Brent? Or was she doing the only thing she could that would torment him? Joss had to think it was torment over tenderness.

Cassidy had never been a nurturing presence, in fact, Joss and Brand had avoided her as much as possible, and that seemed to suit her just fine. Cassidy was small and pretty, and by the age of twelve, Joss towered over her, making it easy for her mother to shame her about her freakish size. At twenty eight, Joss was no longer bothered by her height, she figured she’d find someone who wasn’t threatened by it, or not, she wasn’t going to waste time or energy worrying about her genetics. Joss was tall, like she had blonde hair and blue eyes, how was she going to change that?

She sat back in Brent’s chair and looked around his office. The walls were covered with pictures of her and Brand. The pictures spanned the period from infancy to last Christmas when Joss came up for a few days. She didn’t remember anyone taking pictures that night, but there she was, not looking at the camera, her expression was quite sad, she thought. Why would he have this on his wall? Joss wanted to cry looking at it. It suddenly seemed like it had been a long time since Joss had been really happy. She loved her job, it was a challenge that she found very fulfilling, and she enjoyed her friends, but she realized looking at the candid picture of herself on Brent’s wall that she wasn’t happy, and she hadn’t been in some time. Did she just miss Brand? Was that the emptiness in her life needing to be filled? Fourteen years was a long time.

She shrugged off the surprisingly morose feeling that settled over her like a mantle and looked at the other photos.

Her favorite one was a picture of her and Brand sitting on the fence with their backs to the camera, but they were looking at each other and laughing about something. Brand’s hand was grasping her arm and they leaned into each other like they had a secret. Their horses were in the distance, heads up and alert. She and Brand looked a lot alike; their profiles were almost mirror images. They had the same straight nose and large mouth, and the exact same round blue eyes. Joss’s hair was braided, and Brand’s was short, and at that time in their lives the color was almost white.

What a loss, he would have been twenty six this year, and he would have been so happy, he was always so very happy. She stood up. Brand was here, she never felt him anywhere else but here in this house and at the hidden pool where they spent so much of their childhood making ridiculous plans.

Her favorite plan was the ride across
Australia
. They would take camels because of the heat, and pack salt pills so they would retain water. She wasn’t sure where the salt pill idea came from, maybe an episode of
Get Smart,
but it sounded logical to them at the time, ridiculous to her now.

They were going to have the adventure of a lifetime, they had it all planned out. They wanted to do it when they were young, not paying any mind to the fact that they weren’t going to get very far as minors. That wasn’t in the plan. Her second favorite was the plan to walk across the country of
Andorra
. This wasn’t as romantic as the red sands of
Australia
, but they would be walking without benefit of camels. The Pyrenees weren’t as difficult as the
Rockies
; it would have been a piece of cake.

“God, Brand, I wish you were here.” Her voice in the silence gave her goose bumps. This trip she was going to go into his room, just not today. She turned off Brent’s computer and went downstairs into the vast kitchen.

Brent was a beer drinker, but Joss preferred vodka, very cold. She put a bottle in the freezer for later, and walked outside to the barn with her new hula hoop.

There was a soft wicker from the back stall, and Joss went back to it.

“Hello Butterscotch,” she said rubbing the mare’s nose. “Oh my, you’re more like Butterball, aren’t you?” She asked her brother’s horse. “Come here, old girl.” She undid the latch and clipped a long line on to her halter, taking the horse out to the round pen. She slowly introduced the hula hoop to the horse, and after confirming it wasn’t edible Butterscotch lost interest. Joss put it over the mare’s head so that it sat on her shoulders. Clicking her tongue she swung the end of the lunge line over her head to get Butterscotch’s attention and the horse began to trot clockwise around her. Joss gave her more line and clucked again bringing her to a canter.

The hula hoop was tapped every time Butterscotch lifted her knees, and it made its rattlesnake like sound, but the horse seemed blithely disinterested.

“She doesn’t get too much attention these days,” a voice said from the rail. Joss looked at her old friend and smiled.

“No, that much is obvious. What are you feeding her? Big Macs? She’s huge,” Joss said. Fernando laughed.

“We’re not allowed to ride her, the only love she gets is when we feed her,” he said.

“As soon as I can get my legs around her I’m taking her out,” she said.

“Joss, if you do that it will surely kill your father, if it doesn’t kill you, too.” Joss made the horse come to her and change directions. Butterscotch was now cantering counter-clockwise around her.

“She didn’t do it on purpose, and you know it,” Joss said wondering again what the hell happened that day her brother died. “She isn’t, nor has she ever been, a skittish horse. If she were any less sensitive she’d be in a coma,” they looked at each other and grinned. “You and I both know Brand was a better rider than anyone else here.” She took a deep breath. Figuring out what happened wasn’t going to bring him back, why was she torturing herself? It would always haunt her; she should have been with him. “Tell me what’s going on, Nando.”

“Your father should be the one,” he said.

“Have you seen him?” She asked.

“Yes,” Nando said.

“Then you’ve seen how weak he is; I don’t want to stress him out. He told me you would know.”

“Weird things, vandals mostly. Like the fence being opened and losing six hundred head that were getting auctioned off in a week, Jesu,” he said.

“The fence was opened? It wasn’t just broken from decay?”

“It was opened, the rails were stacked neatly to one side, and the cattle herded out.”

“Why do that? To take people away from the house, do you think? A diversion of sorts?”

“Maybe, you should lock up while Buck’s gone,” she huffed out her breath. She should lock up when he’s here, she thought. Fernando watched her curiously.

“The big house was broken into three months ago, and last month poison was left out for the dogs.”

She looked at the dogs lying in the shade. Everyone was accounted for. “Anybody hurt?”

“Pablo nearly died. I think because he was a stray he still thinks he has to eat any food he finds, even if it tastes funny. But he’s a tough one; he’ll survive a nuclear holocaust. Him and the cockroaches. Rex and Fly were merely sick everywhere.”

“Was anything taken from the house?”

“Not that Brent would say, but he was acting squirrelly about it.”

“Is it drugs?”

“Drugs? No, I don’t think so,” he was genuinely surprised by the question.

“On the drive in three of my tires were punctured, I found pointy metal things in two of them. Why do you think someone would do that?” She asked him and he looked ill for a second and then shook his head.

“Be careful, Joss,” he said.

“Buck picked me up shortly after the flats, but I did notice another car come from behind me, but no one was here when we showed up. Do you trust Buck?” She asked.

“Yes, I do. That’s why he’s bunking in the big house. Brent likes him, too. But I can tell by your small mouth that you don’t.”

“I’m not making small mouth,” she said putting her hand to her mouth.

“Yes, you are, cita. What are you thinking?” Fernando said.

“You and Brent think you know me so well,” she said. Nando laughed.

“Because we do. We raised you, and you were not an easy child to raise. Stubborn, spoiled, and pampered, you were, and the boys came sniffing around early. What were you fourteen when that first kid came round asking you for help with chemistry homework?” He rolled his eyes. “And math and history…”

“I was a good student,” she said and Fernando laughed. “My looks are merely an accident of birth.”

“And you never used them to get what you wanted?”

“Well, you have to wonder if there wasn’t some divine plan, Nando,” she smiled sweetly at him.

“Jesu. You got anyone at home waiting for you in
Denver
?”

“No one special, I have a cat, he is as demanding as I can handle,” she said. “Easy girl,” she said to the horse getting her to walk off the sweat.

“Then who are the flowers from?” He teased. “Your cat?”

“Very funny, Nando,” she ignored his question.

“But you’re interested in Buck?” Fernando said. Joss looked around for people who might have heard him, Buck in particular; he could be right behind her for all she knew.

“Why do you say that? He is singularly annoying; I am not interested in anyone.”

“Uh-huh,” he said and walked away. “Hey Joss, stay away from my barn, find a better place.” Fernando laughed at his mediocre wit.

“How about the yard? Is that better?” She called back.

“Find a room with a lock. Ay, ay, ay,” he ducked into the barn.

When did I become so transparent?

***

The dogs announced the arrival of a brand new pickup truck coming down the drive. Joss didn’t recognize it and figured Nando would take care of it and continued to prep the giant lasagna she would eat all week, freezing it in sections. She would never be a vegetarian, but she tried not to eat a lot of meat.

There was a knock at the door and she looked up from her chopping. It was Jake.

“Come on in, Jake,” she said turning the heat off underneath the onions and washing and drying her hands on a dish towel. Before she started cooking she put her hair up in an artfully tousled knot which had begun to fall around her face.