Chapter 5 Stormy Detour #2
Ahead of them, the doors flew open to the nearest barn, and a pair of ranch hands emerged from its well-lit interior. Waving light sticks like airport runway attendants, they guided Tucker to park against the right side of the barn.
It took the next ten to fifteen minutes to unload the bellowing steers from the trailer. Mr. Cavender’s ranch hands helped Mallory, Chip, and Cruz herd them into a massive indoor grazing room, where various groups of cattle were clustered behind sturdy silver fences.
Hay was strewn across the floor, and a pair of water troughs were easily accessible. Despite the generous provisions, Mallory’s cattle refused to settle down. With each crack of thunder, they stamped their hooves and sent up mournful wails.
Mallory walked among them, patting their necks and speaking in a soothing voice. “You’re all right.”
But they weren’t.
She could feel their fright and discomfort way down deep. Normally, they acted this spooked only when a predator was lurking nearby. However, they were safe from both predators and the elements. Sure, the thunderstorm outside was a little noisy, but her steers’ reaction to it felt excessive.
Chip and Cruz weren’t doing squat to help her calm them down. Both cowboys were perched atop one of the silver fences, glued to their gaming devices. From the looks and occasional elbow jabs they were giving each other, she could only assume they were competing in whatever game they were playing.
Disappointment flooded her. If she hadn’t been pretending to be somebody she wasn’t, she would’ve been tempted to fire them on the spot.
“Something’s wrong.” She didn’t realize she’d spoken the words aloud until Tucker answered her.
“I think you’re right, Brat.”
She made a face at him. “You enjoy calling me that. It shows.”
He waggled his dark eyebrows at her. “If the shoe fits…”
She bristled. “You enjoy having an excuse to say all the nasty things you’ve always wanted to say to me. No filter necessary.”
He glared at her, but he kept his voice down. “I’m playing a part, the same as you.”
“Are you?” She glowered back at him as she squatted down beside the smallest steer in her herd.
He was normally brimming with so much frisky energy that she’d named him Skip.
To her alarm, Skip wasn’t showing much enthusiasm today.
He was swinging his head from side to side and lolling his eyes around the room.
She’d never seen anything like it before.
“Yep.” Tucker squatted down beside her to palpate Skip’s gut.
His nonchalance rankled. She was nowhere near ready to let him off the hook for the way he’d been treating her. “Get real! You despised me long before this trip started.” It wasn’t true. She knew that now, but she couldn’t resist goading him to witness his reaction.
He gave her an incredulous look. “I never said that. ”
“You didn’t have to.” His expression made her heart race. “I bet you can’t say one nice thing about me.” She was enjoying taunting him more than she should have.
He frowned harder at the steer. “You really care about your livestock. Otherwise, you’d have never become a stowaway.”
She rolled her eyes at him. “You’ve made your feelings on that topic clear enough.”
He spread his hands. “Would you rather I lied to you?”
“I’d rather you quit dragging your heels with my case.” It was hard to infuse much venom into her voice now that she knew the truth about him.
His jaw tightened. “I’ve been doing more behind the scenes than you know. I’d say this trip is proof of that.”
I know, Tuck. I know. But she felt compelled to keep pretending she didn’t. “The only reason I don’t know stuff,” she spat, “is because you refuse to tell me. You ignore most of my text messages and go out of your way to make me feel like some melodramatic?—”
“I’m sorry,” he growled.
She sucked in a breath. She’d been prepared to keep steaming at him, but his apology stopped her cold. “Did you just apologize?” To me?
“Yeah.” An echoing apology glinted in his dark gaze.
“I’m accustomed to working undercover with some of the seediest folks on the planet, so my table manners might’ve suffered a bit.
” He leaned closer to her. “I should’ve been more upfront with you about everything.
If I had, you wouldn’t be in the danger you’re currently in. ”
No sooner had the words left his mouth than Skip wilted to the floor. The young steer landed with a resounding thud that Mallory felt all the way to her soul .
She dropped to her knees and leaned closer to the twitching creature, but Tucker yanked her back.
“Careful, Brat! Those hooves will slice you to pieces.”
She didn’t care. She was too distraught.
“He’s having a seizure!” Glancing wildly around them, she discovered four hardened cowboys sprinting in their direction.
To her astonishment, they looked familiar.
One of them was Heart Lake’s recently retired sheriff, Gil Remington.
The dark-haired guy with a military high-and-tight haircut running beside him was former Army Ranger Gage Hefner—Tucker’s boss, if she wasn’t mistaken.
Flanking them were Gage’s brother Rock, a sketch artist, and Lonestar Security’s newest business partner, Dave Phillips.
She was betting Dave had flown the helicopter parked outside the barn.
She swung a thumb in their direction. “What are they doing here?”
“Their jobs,” Tucker barked, ducking his head to speak directly into her ear. “They’re our backup.”
Conrad Cavender was on the heels of the security guys, with a medical bag in hand. “I just sent a 911 message to my vet, Dr. Ridley. He and his son, the younger Dr. Ridley, are on their way.”
He helped them hold Skip down, careful to keep out of the young steer’s kicking range.
Mallory hated the familiar feeling of helplessness that swept over her. First, the disappearing cattle. Then, a steer taken during a highway holdup. Now, a sick steer. It felt like her whole life was cursed!
She glanced toward Chip and Cruz again and was disheartened to find Cruz snapping yet another photo, this time of her. Are you serious? She didn’t know what had gotten into him, but it was something she intended to address soon. He’d be lucky if he still had a job afterward .
Dr. Ridley arrived and ran a stethoscope over the underside of the downed steer.
He was a white-headed fellow in camouflage hunting gear.
He was assisted by his son—a carbon copy of him, but younger with wind-blown tawny hair.
While they examined Skip together, the steer started vomiting and shaking uncontrollably.
She soon discovered why as the father-son team proceeded to extract an oblong bag from the steer’s nether cavity. The bag was split at the seams, and a white powdery substance drizzled out of it.
“Cocaine,” the older Dr. Ridley intoned bleakly. “I’ll bet my boots on it.”
The younger Dr. Ridley went to work pumping Skip’s stomach.
Mallory slid bonelessly to the floor. “Drugs?” She rasped out the word, trying to wrap her brain around the implications.
Tucker’s expression was stony. “Narco ranching is on the rise, I’m afraid. The closer you get to the border towns, the worse it gets.”
Narco ranching? She’d heard of the term before now, but that was it.
She had no firsthand experience with it.
Not in her wildest imagining had she considered that someone might be using her cattle as drug mules.
It explained so much while opening a slew of new questions.
It also pointed a rather ugly finger at Martina and Dex. And Chip along with them.
She glanced dizzily in the direction she’d last seen their son, but she couldn’t locate him above the tops of the cattle standing between them.
“Chin up, Brat!” Tucker’s harsh voice in her ear made the room stop spinning. “Looks like we intercepted the packages in time to save your cattle. ”
You mean there’s more? She scanned the room, looking for any signs of other steers falling ill. Most were acting normally. Only one other steer was rolling his eyes and flicking his tail uncomfortably like Skip had been doing. Still bawling mournfully. Still not eating. Still not drinking.
She pressed a hand to her heart at the realization that neither Skip nor the other eye-rolling steer had been passing the usual cow patties, probably because they couldn’t.
You poor, poor, pitiful thing!
All she could do was help soothe the agitated steer as the two veterinarians extracted several more packages of drugs from its rectal cavity. They tossed the packages into an empty metal trough resting nearby.
Unlike Skip, the second steer was soon back on his feet.
Wobbly at first, but he was going to be alright.
It was a miracle. According to the conversations Mallory overheard flying between the ranch hands and veterinarians, most animals didn’t recover from their injuries and the infections they often caused.
As a precaution, the father-son vet team started him on a round of antibiotics.
Mr. Cavender offered to board the steer while he continued his treatments, and Mallory agreed. It would put her shipment of cattle down by yet another head, but it was the right thing to do.
It was still unclear whether Skip would pull through. He was lying on the floor motionless, with his eyes closed.
It was all Mallory could do to hold in her tears as she made her round of the rest of the herd. They responded normally to her voice and touch, assuring her they were unharmed.
Tucker worked in tandem with her, sticking as close as a cocklebur by her side. She read concern and anger in his gaze, but his lack of surprise caught her off guard.
It took a moment for the reason to sink in. As a former police detective, Tucker Pratt must have seen this before. He’d probably worked on more than one case exactly like this one.
“I, er…” she choked.
“Just breathe,” he ordered.