Into the Storm
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Helen DePrima
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HarlequinChapter One
THE CHUTE GATE flew open and the big red bull erupted into the arena. Jake Cameron swayed forward in his third-row seat, reflexively matching his son’s moves on the bull’s back, counting the seconds from zero to eight. He surged to his feet when the horn sounded, yelling along with the sold-out crowd. The bull gave a final buck as Tom Cameron loosened his grip, slamming him hard to the dirt. Cheers turned to groans as a hoof came down on Tom’s thigh.
Jake pushed to the end of the aisle, muttering apologies and earning a sharp “Watch it, mister!” as he trod on a woman’s foot.
Tom had scrambled to his feet by the time the sports medicine team reached him. The announcer’s voice boomed over the applause. “He’s fine, folks, and his score’s going to make him feel even better. That’s ninety-two points and the event win for Tom Cameron!”
Jake climbed over the railing to the chute area in a rain of confetti and watched his son accept a silver buckle and a Stetson hatbox. Tom limped back to the exit gate and then let the two burly paramedics half carry him to the sports medicine room.
Jake followed. Yeah, that stomping would leave Tom lame for a bit, but he had left the arena upright, and winning thirty grand plus for the weekend would ease his pain considerably.
“The kid did all right.” Jake’s older son, Luke, caught up with him, pulling his electric-blue bullfighter’s jersey over his head. “Sorry we couldn’t get to him before Sidewinder did.”
“Could have been a lot worse,” Jake said. “He walked out—couldn’t have done that if he’d broken his leg again.”
They made their way to the locker room, past the organized confusion of dismantling pens and chutes. The bulls had already been herded back to the big cattle trucks waiting to haul them away for a few days’ rest before the next event.
“Just a bruise, Doc thinks,” Tom said, shifting the ice pack on his leg, “but he wants me to go for an X-ray. We’ll stay here in town overnight.”
“What a wuss!” Luke shrugged out of his protective vest. “I got butted half a dozen times and stomped twice, but you don’t see me running to the ER.”
“You would if Doc said to,” Tom said, throwing a towel at his brother’s head.
Jake chuckled. Their sparring meant no more than two colts play-fighting. Luke had been watching over his younger brother since Tom had taken his first steps, ridden in his first roundup, straddled his first bull. Stood to reason he would take up bullfighting when Tom got into serious competition.
“Well, dang!” Deke Harkins blew into the room with a cell phone clamped to his ear. “You snatched that win right out from under me, Tom, but I’ll take the next event for sure.” Catcalls went up from the cowboys changing out of jeans stained with arena dirt and bull slobber. Deke was a little hard to take just now, new to the big-time and pumped after a series of good rides. A string of buck-offs would settle him down to the gritty business of riding bulls for a living.
“Catch up with you later, sweet thing,” Deke said into the phone and stuffed it into his pocket. “Well, let’s party—I’m buying. You, too, Jake.”
“Can’t do it,” Jake said with a smile. “I’ve got a long drive ahead—my little girl’s waiting at home.”
“Hot stuff, I guess,” Deke said, elbowing him.
Tom slapped at Deke with his black felt hat. “Watch your mouth—he’s talking about my baby sister.” He turned to his father. “Why don’t you stay over? Tell Lucy to sleep at the Farleys’. You can bunk with Luke and me.”
Jake gave it a long thought, recalling the post-event rowdiness from his own rough stock days—war stories inflated by beer and testosterone and blown-off adrenaline.
“Guess I won’t,” he said, “but thanks. Tom, make sure you get that X-ray.”
The last cars and pickups were streaming out of the parking lot when Jake reached his silver Ram crew cab. The air had been springlike several hours earlier, but now the wind came out of the north and carried the scent of snow. He studied the deep-bellied purple clouds straddling his route northward—new snow over the high country for sure and maybe at lower elevations before he got home.
He pulled out his cell phone and punched his neighbor’s number. “Mike around?” he asked when Bob Farley answered.
“Out bringing the horses into the barn pasture,” Bob said. “Nothing happening yet, but it’s looking to snow like a sonofagun.”
“I figured that. I’m just leaving Albuquerque. Could Mike pick Lucy up at work? I dropped her off this morning because her Jeep’s laid up. Better than even money I won’t make it back before she gets off.”
“’Course he will. I’ll send him down as soon as he gets in—could be she’ll get off early if it’s coming down hard. Just plan for her to stay with us unless you make better time than likely. Bed down here yourself if your road’s too bad.”
“Thanks, I might if I make it that far.”
Jake keyed off, grateful for his daughter’s boyfriend, although boyfriend seemed too feeble a word—best friend and confidante came closer. He just hoped Lucy appreciated Mike’s devotion and that Mike could hold her steady long enough to finish high school. She certainly had no use for anything her father said.
He squeezed his eyes shut. “Annie, I don’t know how to talk to her. Why’d you go and leave me?” He bowed his head against the steering wheel. “I didn’t mean it, girl—I know you hung on as long as you could.”
No pressure now to get on the road—he could go back inside but reckoned he wouldn’t. He’d seen too many dads hanging around behind the chutes acting like jerks, treating their sons like kids still riding in high school rodeos. Luke and Tom had done a man’s work on the ranch before they could shave. They didn’t need him riding herd on them.
And he wanted to go home. Not to the empty house, but to the ranch just north of the New Mexico border. The land sustained him like breath and blood.
His hand brushed the bottle in its brown paper bag when he stuck his phone in the center console. With Annie gone, sleep eluded him like a rope-wise old horse endlessly dodging a loop. He could generally drop off at a decent hour by timing sips of bourbon through the evening—better than pills, he supposed.
He’d bought two bottles in Albuquerque, cheaper than close to home. Jake had gone to school with the clerk at the local liquor store and didn’t need Alma gossiping about how much he bought in a month. The bag rustled seductively under his hand. A Bud with a plate of nachos had been hours ago—a little taste now couldn’t hurt, just to take the edge off the lonely drive.
He peered over his shoulder—no one watching. He broke the seal on the quart of Beam, admiring its warm amber translucency, anticipating its sweet fiery slide down his throat, and tipped the bottle to his lips. Before the first drop hit his tongue, he lowered it and screwed the cap on. Through all the heartache with Annie, he had developed a fanatical reverence for life, hard and painful as it might be. Be damned if he would take to the road liquored up, landing at the bottom of a canyon or drifting into oncoming traffic, maybe taking innocent lives with him. He thrust the bottle away and followed the last vehicles out of the parking lot.
