Deborah Camp Read Online Free PDF Page A

Drew promised. He went down the stepsand crossed the yard to where he’d left Dynamite.
    “Don’t be surprised if your other neighbors don’t welcome you home.”
    Atop Dynamite, Drew cocked his head to the side, struck by that remark. “Why? I’m innocent.”
    “I always knew that, but folks around here might think different. We haven’t had any cattle missing since you’ve been away.” Monroe sent him a hard wink. “If anybody gives you any trouble, you be sure and let me know. I’ll set ‘em straight right quick.”
    “Is Carlsbad still the sheriff?”
    “No, it’s Amos Nelson now. He’s a good man. Tries to be fair.”
    “So you think the folks around here won’t trust me? Even though I was released from prison?”
    “People are funny, Drew. Until they’re sure about you—well, just watch out for yourself.”
    “I don’t have to prove anything to anybody.” Drew jerked on the reins and spun the stallion around. “Be seeing you.” He set in his spurs, and Dynamite broke into a wind-slicing run across the flat land.
    He hoped there wouldn’t be any more trouble. He’d had himself a bellyful of it.
    “Just why didn’t y’all ever tell me that A.J. had another son?” Cassie demanded of T-Bone and Gabe.
    The two men stood under the boiling sun and wiped their sweaty faces with grime-streaked handkerchiefs.
    “Truth to tell, we didn’t neither one know whether Drew wanted anybody to know he existed,” T-Bone said. “He ain’t had a rosy life and he mighta wanted to disappear. The old man sure never mentioned him after he left.”
    “Only in his dagburned will!” Cassie huffed and threw the sack of biscuits and sausage at Gabe. “There. Something for y’all to eat.”
    “And about time, too.” Gabe looked around. “Let’s go grab some shade under that there oak tree and gobble this down, Tee.”
    “Sounds like heaven to me.”
    Cassie followed the two bow-legged men to the shady spot, where they hunkered down and swallowed the sandwiches. Gabe was the taller and as thin as a rail. He had a boyish face full of freckles. T-Bone was older. Cassie figured he was at least fifty, while Gabe was around thirty. T-Bone’s beard and mustache were grizzled, but he was spry and quick when he wanted to be.
    “Does Drew aim to stay awhile?” Gabe asked.
    “He aims to take over the ranch,” Cassie answered crossly. “But I won’t let him.”
    “How you gonna stop him?” T-Bone asked, wiping sausage grease from his mustache.
    “By digging in my heels,” Cassie retorted. “He might be bigger and meaner, but I’m not moving off this land. I earned every last acre of it.”
    “But the old man willed it to Andrew James Dalton Junior and—”
    “And who is to say that A.J. didn’t mean
my
Junior? You said yourself that he never mentioned his firstborn, so why would he think to leave his ranch to him? A.J. named Andy, not me.”
    Gabe scratched at his chin stubble. “She’s got a point.”
    “Maybe, but I don’t think a judge would see it that way,” T-Bone said.
    “Judge? Who says we’re going to court?” A tingleof alarm feathered through Cassie. Lord God, if Blue Eyes took this to court, would she have a leg to stand on? She felt the world wobble underneath her. “There won’t be any judge deciding
my
future. It’s in my hands and I’m staying put. Seems to me that Blue Eyes isn’t too interested in the place, or he would have showed up months ago. Where’s he been all this time anyway?”
    Gabe and T-Bone exchanged a long glance that made Cassie take notice.
    “You two know where he’s been?”
    T-Bone ducked his head. “I reckon you should ask him.”
    “I reckon I will.” Cassie smoothed the work gloves over her hands.
    “How come you call him Blue Eyes?” Gabe asked.
    The question brought her up short, and she felt her cheeks heat up. ‘“Cause his eyes are blue,” she said, trying to make the least of it.
    Gabe grinned. “So are mine.”
    Cassie whirled