Chapter Four
Jake sat high in the saddle, silhouetted against a bruised sky that pressed low on the horizon.
He did a quick head count, eyes narrowing as a gust of wind rustled the wheat in the distance, bringing in the distant scent of rain.
The herd moved sluggishly, anxious. He didn’t like that they’d be stuck way out here during a storm, exposed and vulnerable, but there wasn’t much he could do about it now.
This was the highest parcel on their property except for the main house, and they were safest here.
The southern boundary of the property had a rise—barely a hill, but high enough. If the low fields flooded, the cattle would drift uphill. They always did. That hill hadn’t flooded since his grandfather was born. Still, that was history. Every storm was different, and the ground was already wet.
There was a run-in at the top of the knoll.
They’d expanded and reinforced the structure several years ago, but a large section of the roof had been damaged by hail.
Mateo was working to repair the roof while Jake focused on inspecting the cattle.
The three-sided shelter wouldn’t keep the herd completely dry once the wind kicked up, but it would offer some protection—especially from hail.
That was the real threat. Last weekend, a dozen cows had been bruised from the pounding ice.
No lasting damage, but Jake was glad they weren’t going to market anytime soon so they would have a chance to fully heal.
Two troughs ran along the back of the run-in, one for water and one for feed. While the cattle primarily fed through grazing, they supplemented their diet with grains.
He scanned the edges of the field and spotted four cows clustered under a wind-raked tree, and a fifth one lying oddly apart from the others.
Jake nudged his horse forward. He was about to raise his hand to wave them on when something about the fifth “cow” felt wrong. Too lean, too small, too still.
As he got closer, his gut twisted. It wasn’t a cow at all. It was a dog, Timber. Greg Baldwin’s massive German shepherd.
Jake quickly swung down from the saddle, boots hitting the muddy ground with a muffled thud. Timber raised his head weakly, eyes glassy but locked on Jake with recognition. His tail thumped once. He stood, but favored one leg and staggered.
“What happened, boy?” Jake asked, crouching low. Timber’s thick coat was matted with mud and blood, dark smears streaking his muzzle and hindquarters.
Jake’s stomach dropped.
“Easy now.” His voice softened. “I need to check you out. Stay still.”
Timber let him inspect the wound. “Good dog,” Jake murmured as he carefully looked at Timber’s leg. Embedded in the dog’s leg were small, dark pellets—buckshot. Just a few, not too deep but wedged into his muscle. Painful, but not deadly if he got treatment.
Jake’s mind flashed back five years, to Timber as a puppy chasing his brother Titan around Uncle Travis’s yard.
Back when Jake’s dad was still alive, when Baldwin was still a fixture in their lives, before he sold out to Verdacorp.
When Travis and Baldwin had adopted the two dogs from another farmer and agreed to get the German shepherds together for “playdates.”
Jake reached for his radio. “Mateo, I’ve got Timber by the oak tree. He’s injured—buckshot. I’m going to take him back to Baldwin’s place.”
“Hold up a sec, I’ll be right there.”
He was about to object, but then saw Mateo in the distance riding toward him at near full gallop.
Jake continued to pet the dog, who looked at him with both pain and hope. What asshole would shoot a dog? Jake tried to keep his anger in check, because both the dogs and horse were likely to pick up on his agitation and get nervous.
“You’re a good boy,” Jake told him. “Good, good boy. We’re going to get you fixed up right quick, I promise.”
Mateo arrived only moments later and dismounted. “What happened?” he asked, his face filled with the same concern that Jake felt.
“I thought he was a cow lying in the grass,” Jake said, motioning to the four other cows standing under the tree only a few feet away. “Found Timber instead.”
“Damn,” Mateo said. “I should go with you; you might need help with him.”
“Is the roof done?”
“Not yet, but—”
“Finish the roof,” Jake said. “The storm isn’t going to wait for us. Plus, someone needs to bring these four lazy cows back to the herd.”
Mateo wanted to object, but nodded and said, “Okay, I’ll meet you at Baldwin’s when I’m done. Shouldn’t take longer than thirty minutes.”
“Thanks,” Jake said.
“Want me to help you get him on the saddle?”
“No, I think he’ll be nervous up there, and I don’t have anything to safely secure him.”
“All right. If you see anything weird, you radio me, got it? I’ll be right there.”
Mateo used his horse to urge the four cows back toward the herd and the run-in.
Mateo was more than twice Jake’s age and had started working for the Whisper Creek Ranch more than a decade ago, around the time that Jake’s little brother, Bobby, was born.
Jake generally deferred to the more experienced ranch hand, but this time they had too much to do and not enough time.
Over the last year that Jake had taken on more responsibility on the ranch, he had grown into his role.
It’s why he planned on postponing college.
He wanted to be a vet. But they couldn’t afford it, and even if they had the money or he could get a scholarship, he couldn’t leave his mom for so many years.
He’d take classes at NCTC in Gainesville, a good two-year college, focusing on classes that would help him be a better farmer and a better businessman.
They also had an equine program that sounded interesting, and Jake loved working with horses.
He could go to NCTC and work on the farm at the same time.
He’d think about vet school down the road.
Jake glanced toward Baldwin’s house; a pale shape barely visible across the fields. Home lay in the opposite direction, beyond the pasture and crops. Had Timber been trying to get help? Heading toward their house—or to Uncle Travis’s, who lived just across the road from them?
“Smart boy,” Jake murmured. He tilted his water bottle, and Timber lapped it up, tongue flicking weakly.
They’d have to walk. Jake patted his thigh. “C’mon. We’re going back to your house.”
Timber followed, limping but determined. He wasn’t bleeding anymore, which was good—if he were, Jake wouldn’t have let him walk. But he was holding his own.
Something tickled at the back of Jake’s thoughts.
Why hadn’t Baldwin come looking for Timber?
Baldwin loved this dog—fondly calling him his shadow since both his daughters had moved to Dallas. One married, the other still in college. His wife had left the family years ago. Jake hardly remembered the woman, except for her perpetual sour expression and harsh voice.
He’d trusted Baldwin once. Jake’s dad and Baldwin had talked about the McKennas’ expansion plan, and Baldwin opened his fields to their cattle for grazing when they needed the extra space.
They shared water rights to part of Whisper Creek, a stretch of which formed the boundary between their land.
Baldwin wasn’t a farmer—he showed horses.
He didn’t need all his acres and had long ago promised that when the McKennas could buy him out, he’d sell to them.
The McKennas needed Baldwin’s property because it was rich in nutrients, having lain fallow for so long. Plus, they shared a large border, which made that plot a natural extension of the McKenna land.
Then Verdacorp had come calling. And Baldwin had sold to them, not the McKennas.
A dishonorable man, Jake thought. A man who couldn’t be trusted to his word, which was something Jake’s father had lived by.
A man is only as good as his word, son. Remember that.
His mom still talked to Baldwin; Jake avoided being in the same room.
The closer they got to the farm, the more Jake’s sense of unease grew. The only sound was the wind whistling through the trees. Then, as the house came into view, he saw the front door gaping open.
Jake reached behind the saddle and pulled his rifle free.
As soon as the weapon was out, Timber froze and growled low in his throat, ears up, body taut.
“What happened here, buddy?” Jake whispered. He wished he had a lead—anything to hold the dog back. Something was wrong.
Baldwin’s remodeled two-story house had a wide porch and tall windows. Fresh white paint, black trim, stained porch. Every detail seen to. A gentleman’s ranch.
As they approached the porch, Timber began to whimper, a low, keening sound that made Jake’s skin crawl. His fur rose, tail stiff.
Jake raised his rifle.
“Stay,” he told Timber, his voice barely audible over the building wind.
Bloody paw prints trailed from the house through the open doorway. Something bad had happened here.
Jake stepped over the threshold, walking softly, his boots barely making a sound on the hardwood floor. The house smelled of pipe tobacco, the woodsy, almost sweet scent baked into the walls. He followed Timber’s prints down the hall, past Baldwin’s family portraits, to the library at the far end.
Greg Baldwin lay crumpled on the floor, a ragged red stain spread across his shirt, pooled beneath him.
Jake dropped to his knees beside him. He pressed fingers to Baldwin’s neck. Nothing.
Then a flutter. A faint rise and fall in the chest.
“Shit,” Jake breathed. He fumbled for his phone and dialed 911, voice shaking as he gave the address and told the dispatcher that Greg Baldwin was unconscious and bleeding.
“Gunshot wound. He’s alive. Barely.”
He looked back at Timber, who now stood at the door, watching with wide, mournful eyes.
“Who is this?” the dispatcher said.
“Jake McKenna, from Whisper Creek Ranch.”
“Jake? It’s Sally North. I’ve dispatched the ambulance, but I don’t know the ETA, the main road leading out to your neck of the woods is still broken up from the hailstorm.”
Jake remembered going to and from school this past week and how he’d nearly broken an axle going over the ruts.
“Send the sheriff,” he said as he looked around the library. The file cabinet was open, papers strewn about. A painting missing. The computer gone. “Greg Baldwin was robbed and shot.”
Timber walked in and now lay next to his master, his head on his chest, his brown eyes pleading for Jake to fix everything.
“Help is coming, Timber. Help is coming.” Jake said to Sally North, “Sally, help me. What do I do?”
Jake listened to Sally and followed her instructions to the letter.
He didn’t know if he had arrived in time to save his neighbor. He didn’t like Greg Baldwin, but he didn’t want him to die. He wanted to be angry with him, not grieving his death. Jake knew his daughters … and knew the pain of losing a father.
He didn’t want Baldwin’s girls to suffer as he had.