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foot hit something slippery and shot out from under me. Next thing I knew, I had landed on the seat of my pants in a pile of very fresh, very wet and very smelly cow manure. Slowly, I picked myself up, wiped off the thickest of the stinking mess and then washed my hands off on the dew-wet grass. I kept thinking that if I had just minded my own business, that blue roan mare might be in a can by now.
    I set my teeth and started after her again. She was standing in the corner by the barn. By now I’d lost all idea of the smart way to catch her. I just plodded straight toward her. She didn’t move. I knew she was waiting until the last second for a flashy getaway. I kept plodding. She kept standing. I was within reaching range. Slowly, my hand went out. She didn’t move as I slipped the halter over her head and fastened the buckle. That’s when I took my first breath in quite a while. I had her.
    I stood glaring at her. No horse had ever put me through anything like that before.She deserved…What did she deserve? A good beating? Or maybe she’d had a few too many good beatings. Maybe that was why she wasn’t about to trust anybody. But one thing was for sure, abusing a hard-to-catch horse wasn’t going to make her any easier to catch next time.
    â€œAtta girl,” I whispered, swallowing my fury. “See, nothin’ bad happens to you when you get caught.” I turned to run a soothing hand along her neck. As I did, something caught my eye. A beat-up old black truck parked halfway down the lane. Cole McCall’s truck. And the great Cole McCall himself was sitting on the hood watching me. He looked like he was taking in the wild-horse race at the Calgary Stampede. And he was laughing.

Chapter Six
    For a minute I was too stunned to do anything but stare at him as he strolled over to the fence. By the time he got to me, I wasn’t stunned any longer. I was furious. “What do you think you’re doing here?” I blurted out.
    He checked his watch. “Working. In about ten minutes, if the job starts at eight like you said it did.”
    â€œJob?” I echoed. “You said you didn’t want the job.”
    He shook his head. “Wrong again, Blue Jeans. I said I didn’t like your reasons for offering it. I didn’t say I wouldn’t take it.” He gave me a strange look and sniffed the air. “Interesting perfume you’re wearing. What’s it called? Cow Pasture Memories?”
    I felt my face do an instant replay of the recent sunrise. “Cole, if you don’t get out of my sight in the next…” But before I could finish he bent over and ran his hand down the mare’s left front leg, the one she limped on. The mare laid back her ears and I could see she was getting ready to take a bite out of his backside—and I was going to cheer when she did. But Cole read her mind and straightened up in time to catch her with her teeth bared and nowhere to bite. He gave her a slap on the neck. “Knock it off, horse. You’ve got a worse disposition than your owner. Part owner, that is. How much did we pay again, Blue Jeans?”
    I glared at him. “I paid $680 and you’re taking your lousy $8.75 back.”
    He shook his head. “Uh-uh. I think we could’ve done worse. I’m stayin’” He started back toward his truck. “That’s just a strained muscle in her leg. She’ll heal up pretty fast.”
    Oh, right, now Mr. Know-It-All was a horse doctor, too. I ignored him and started for the corral with the horse. Halfway there his voice stopped me again. “Hey, Blue Jeans, aren’t you supposed to wear the picture on the front of your shirt?”
    I soon found out that having Cole working for Dad didn’t mean that I was going to spend the summer polishing my nails. Dad found plenty of work for both of us. Actually, I was glad he did.
    I’d spent seventeen years being Dad’s