Return to Marker Ranch
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Claire McEwen
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Chapter One
LORI ALLEN TUGGED at the brim of her hat in a futile attempt to shade her eyes from the relentless blue sky. It was way too hot for this late in the fall. She scanned the granite ridges that towered behind her ranch. Heat waves shimmered between her and the peaks. No clouds. Again.
But heat or no heat, Lori couldn’t put it off any longer. She needed to get this pasture ready. The cattle she’d summered up in the high Sierra meadows had to come down. The Bureau of Land Management didn’t care that summer never seemed to end anymore. They’d fine her if she let the herd stay beyond the terms of the lease.
Leaning forward in the saddle, Lori nudged her mare up the rutted dirt road that bordered her upper pasture. She glanced at the neat rows of barbed wire with pride. There’d been plenty of time to mend fences last winter when the snow never came. Though she’d happily trade this perfect fence line for a few snowstorms.
Thanks to the drought, the only forage up here was brush and brown stubble. Maybe if she turned on the irrigation for a few days she could get some new grass started before she brought the cattle down. She glanced at the sky again. It was her only choice. Irrigate or pray for rain. And she’d been praying to deaf ears for a while now.
Dakota’s short, choppy gait took them quickly up the hill toward the well and the irrigation valves. The flaking gray metal of the storage tank came into view. Lori veered the mare alongside it and peeked at the gauge. And felt her heart stutter. “No...” she breathed, staring at the gauge. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Dakota’s ears flicked back instantly, as if the little quarter horse was trying to comprehend the sudden change in her rider’s mood.
Lori blinked, looked and blinked again. But nothing changed. The tank was empty.
No. No, no, no. The words hammered along with her heart. She’d heard of wells running dry a little south of here, but this one was supplied by mountain runoff, and there had been some snow up on the highest peaks last winter. It would make sense for the well to be low...but empty? Impossible.
The gauge had to be stuck. Lori reached over and tapped its thick, clear surface with her knuckles, waiting for the numbers to jump. Nothing. She smacked the gauge hard with the palm of her hand, wincing as the impact jarred her wrist. She willed the numbers to change. They didn’t.
Four-letter words she rarely said hung ugly in the afternoon silence. She couldn’t deal with this. Couldn’t afford this. The threatening heat of tears slicked behind her eyes, but she blinked them back. She wouldn’t cry. Not even up here, alone in the most remote part of her ranch.
Solutions. Focus on solutions. She knew how to handle his. She slid off Dakota’s back and led the mare in a circle around the tank, looking for broken pipes, dripping water, cracks in the tank, anything that would explain what was going on.
Everything looked just fine.
“Okay,” she said to Dakota, her voice sounding foreign in the deep mountain silence. “We’ll ride up closer to the mountains.” She put her foot in the stirrup and swung up onto the saddle. “Let’s take a look at the creek up here. Maybe we can see what’s going wrong.” It was silly to talk to her horse, but it kept the panic at bay.
Maybe a new spring had pushed its way out somewhere. The east side of the Sierra Nevada was known for its hot springs. Water wandered deep under the still-forming peaks and met up with all kinds of heat and pressure, then popped out of the earth in unpredictable places. If a new spring had surfaced, it could change everything.
A flicker of hope had her urging Dakota through the brush behind the tank, following deer trails until they were in the shadow of the higher peaks. There’d been an earthquake last week. Not a big one, but maybe enough to shift things around. If that was the cause of the problem, it might be an easy fix.
It was probably wishful thinking, but she could allow herself a few hours of wishing before she went home and called up Bill Cooper, the local driller.
She let Dakota have a loose rein so the horse could pick her own way up the hill. Arching her back, Lori stretched in the saddle, trying to let some of the stress go. A ride on a hot fall afternoon would normally relax her. The drone of insects and the crunch of dry brush under Dakota’s hooves melded in a soothing rhythm that should have made everything feel hopeful and okay. But the tension that had been buzzing in the back of her brain ever since her father moved away clamped claws onto her shoulders, making them ache.
Taking over the ranch had been so much harder than she’d ever imagined. She had a lifetime of experience and a degree in animal husbandry, but that hadn’t prepared her for the pressure of making all the decisions, every day. She’d always respected her father, but that respect had grown tenfold since she’d tried to fill his shoes these past couple of months. She rolled her shoulders, wincing at the stabbing pain. Her well was dry and damn, she needed that water.
Dakota took them over a rise, and Lori turned her onto a faint path that meandered along the summit. From up here, Lone Mountain Ranch looked tiny, a distant patchwork quilt rather than the busy operation it really was. But it wouldn’t be busy if she didn’t have water. Panic threatened again and Lori bit it back. She looked up at the mountains instead, their fierce grandeur a reminder to keep her problems in perspective.
And then she saw it, on the next hill over. Something white and shining—and unfamiliar. The closer she got, the more it took shape—a large metal water tank, brand-new and gleaming in the sun.
“What the...” She stood up in the stirrups, trying to get a sense of the size and scope of the thing. And then she jerked Dakota to a halt at the sight of barbed wire. They’d reached the rusted old fence marking the far northern boundary of her family’s ranch. The new tank was on the other side. On Marker Ranch. The Hoffmans’ land, abandoned for the past decade.
But apparently not abandoned anymore. She stared at the overgrown pasture. Native shrubs had overtaken most of the grass. Marker Ranch hadn’t been maintained when the Hoffmans lived here, and ever since they’d run off, nature had been busy reclaiming the land.
But now they were back. Or someone was. She glanced down the hill. Far below, she could see the top of her tank, downstream from this new one. Typical Hoffman underhanded behavior. They’d drilled a well and stolen her water.
She stared out over the parched landscape. It didn’t make sense. Why would the Hoffmans come back? Everyone said they were hiding down in Mexico ever since they fled arrest for drug dealing years ago. They couldn’t come back.
Could it be Nora or Wade? The two younger Hoffman kids had stayed away from the shady family business. Nora had left for college and Wade had followed his older sister a few years later.
Lori shivered despite the heat. She wasn’t going down that road—wasn’t going to think about Wade Hoffman. She made a habit of not thinking about him every day. The jerk had stolen her heart, her pride and her happiness. She’d often wished he’d just followed family tradition and swiped her car instead.
The tank squatted in the field, all shiny and new. If she had her gun, she’d shoot it. Lori ran a hand over her eyes, but when she opened them, the tank was still there. This was really happening.
No. It wasn’t happening. Memories and old hurt turned to outrage. This couldn’t happen—wasn’t going to happen. She wouldn’t allow it. Lori turned Dakota and pressed her into a jog, heading back along the ridge.
Thoughts swirled in circles of fury. She’d worked for years so she’d be ready to take over Lone Mountain Ranch. She’d pushed herself on every exam, every paper and every lab in college. She’d handled all the challenges life had thrown her way. And worst of all, she’d put herself through a heartbreak so big that it still ached. All so she could achieve her dream of running this ranch and her father could retire and finally find some peace.
And now that dream was in serious peril. No water on her upper pastures meant half her grazing land would be useless. Which meant she’d have to sell off her cattle. Which would mean that all she’d gone through, all she’d sacrificed, would have been for nothing.
They passed her empty storage tank and picked their way back down the hill. Lori asked Dakota for a lope the moment the mare’s hooves hit the packed dirt road at the bottom. She was going to take care of this today. Somehow.
I can do this. It had been her mantra for months, but this was her biggest test. No way was she going to fail it. She faced down bulls, delivered calves and took care of herds of cattle every day. She dealt with disapproving ranch hands who questioned her every move. Compared with all that, a little chat with the lowlife, water-stealing Hoffmans would be easy.
