32. Red
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Red
I watch Beau carry another sack of feed into the barn while Arizona tells me what she heard outside the equipment shed.
Every strange thing that’s happened over the past few months has carried Travis’s shadow somewhere behind it. I kept telling myself there wasn’t enough to connect the dots.
Now Arizona hands me another one.
He returns to the truck, grips the next sack, and swings it over his shoulder without glancing toward us.
Six years he’s worked this ranch. Six years I’ve trusted him with keys, records, and horses worth more than most trucks parked in town.
Now I can’t decide whether I’m watching a loyal ranch hand… or a man who’s been lying to my face.
“What happened when he saw you?” I ask.
Arizona tracks Beau across the yard. “He asked how long I’d been standing outside, and I hinted I’d just walked up.”
“You think he believed you?”
“He wanted to, because he stopped asking.”
Beau disappears through the barn doors as I consider what she heard. A supplier dispute would have been easy to explain, yet he cared more about how much Arizona overheard than why he was arguing.
He had told someone that they were taking things too far, the deal had changed, and he had already kept another person away from Dusty Spur twice.
Emmett joins us after steering Sadie toward the chicken coop, where she can stay busy without hearing a conversation she’ll repeat at supper.
“You’re sure those were his words?” he asks.
Arizona nods. “Close enough that I’d testify to them.”
Willy stops beside us with fencing wire braced against his shoulder. “That doesn’t sound like a feed order gone wrong.”
“It doesn’t prove the call involved Travis,” I say.
Willy looks toward the barn. “Are you going to ask Beau?”
Emmett answers before I can. “If he’s involved, a warning gives him time to cover it.”
“That assumes he has anything to cover,” I say, though I no longer trust the defense as much as I want to.
Beau earned my trust the hard way, over years of busted fences, calving season, winter storms, and rodeo weeks where everybody runs on too little sleep and too much coffee. He shows up before sunrise, stays until the work’s done, and never asks for credit because he doesn’t need it.
Men like that don’t usually end up on the wrong side of suspicion, which is exactly why Arizona’s story keeps digging under my skin. I want to believe there’s another explanation, but every accident we’ve dealt with keeps circling back to the same question, and I’m running out of answers.
Arizona folds her arms. “The way he looked at me had nothing to do with an ordinary call.”
I watch Beau emerge from the barn and return to the truck. “Did he use Travis’s name?”
“No.”
“Did he mention the fire or the damaged gates?”
“No, but he sounded afraid of whoever was on the other end.”
Emmett shifts beside me. “Hank confirmed Travis has been seen in neighboring towns, and now Beau’s talking about a deal that went too far.”
“I want them to be unrelated.”
Willy adjusts the wire. “That answer made more sense before everything else started piling up.”
I follow Beau’s progress across the yard while the past few months rearrange themselves in my head. The trailer fire spread faster than anyone expected, chains were cut, gates were damaged, and Arizona chased a trespasser into the trees.
Each incident carried enough uncertainty to keep us from proving intent, but together they look less like bad luck.
Arizona watches me long enough to read exactly where my thoughts have gone. “You’re thinking about the shed.”
“I should’ve checked the inventory months ago.”
Beau fixed a system I’d let fall apart. After that, I stopped looking as closely as I should have.
The shelves stayed labeled, the paperwork remained current, and I stopped questioning a system that appeared to work.
“I’ll check it after everyone leaves,” I say.
“You should involve Hank before you confront Beau.”
“I’m checking records, not confronting anyone.”
Beau finishes unloading the feed and carries the empty pallet toward the equipment shed. He unlocks the side door, steps inside, and remains there while the driver secures the truck.
Arizona watches the doorway. “Why would he need to go in there now?”
“He could be checking straps or storing paperwork.”
Willy looks at the pallet. “He didn’t take anything inside.”
Beau comes out, locks the door, and returns the key to the office before helping the driver close the tailgate.
Speculation won’t give us anything we can use, so I turn back to the others. “Keep this between us, and make sure nobody treats him differently.”
Arizona nods. “I won’t say anything.”
Emmett glances toward Sadie, who is drawing in the dirt beside the chicken run. “I’ll keep the crew working near the central yard.”
“Do it without making them wonder why.”
Willy carries the wire toward the west fence, and Emmett follows him, leaving Arizona beside me.
“If Beau speaks to you again, stay where someone can see you,” I tell her.
“I can handle him.”
“I know, but he already suspects you heard enough to cause trouble.”
I spend the rest of the afternoon pretending nothing has changed.
It has.
Beau gives me nothing else to question. He repairs a latch near the foaling stalls, checks the south trough, and helps Emmett replace damaged wire along the west pasture.
When one of the younger hands grips the fencing pliers wrong, Beau takes them, demonstrates the proper angle, and hands them back without embarrassing him.
He works exactly as he has for six years, which makes the doubt harder to dismiss and harder to accept.
Arizona crosses the yard with her bag over one shoulder near sundown. I meet her beside her truck while Beau washes up in the bunkhouse.
“Text me when you reach town,” I say.
She sets her bag on the passenger seat. “You’re still checking the shed tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Call Hank if you find anything.”
“I will.”
She braces one hand against the open door. “Trusting Beau doesn’t make you responsible for whatever he might have done.”
“I gave him access to the ranch and stopped checking the records.”
“You gave a dependable employee responsibility after he spent years earning it. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
I close her door before she can continue. “Drive safely.”
She starts the engine and pulls away. I don’t head back inside until her taillights disappear beyond the trees.
Lately, watching people leave has become a habit.
At the end of the work day, I find Beau beside his pickup, tightening a strap across the truck bed.
He looks up as I approach. “You need anything else tonight?”
“No.”
“The tractor’s starting rough, so I’ll service it before I head north tomorrow.”
“Take care of it before anyone uses it.”
He secures the strap and closes the tailgate. “Will do.”
I keep all my questions to myself because Beau would deny everything, and whoever he may be working with would know I’ve started looking.
Before I accuse a man who’s spent years earning my trust, I need enough proof to leave him nowhere to hide.
Beau tips his cap. “See you tomorrow, boss.”
“Drive safe.”
He climbs into his truck and leaves with the rest of the crew. I remain beside the barn until every set of taillights disappears down the road.
Inside the house, Sadie finishes a glass of milk while Emmett clears the dinner dishes and Willy changes television channels from the couch. The shed key digs into my palm hard enough to leave an imprint.
“You want me with you?” Emmett asks.
I shake my head. “Stay here with Sadie. If this goes sideways, I want her in the house where she’ll be safe.”
“You think Beau might return?”
“I don’t know what he’ll do if Arizona’s suspicion is right.”
Willy turns off the television and crosses to the front window. “I’ll watch the gate.”
I pocket the key and cross the yard alone.
The security lights cover the main buildings. I watch the road and tree line as I approach, but the ranch remains still aside from horses moving inside the nearest barn.
I unlock the side door, step into the shed, and secure it behind me before switching on the desk lamp near the back wall. The light reaches the vinyl cabinet and nearby shelves without spilling across the windows.
Beau’s labels mark every shelf and storage bin, while the tools hang in assigned spaces along the wall. He created the system after our old records became a collection of loose receipts and unreliable counts, and I gave him control because he fixed a problem I had neglected.
I open the cabinet and begin with the receipts.
The figures don’t add up, so I run through them again before checking every withdrawal against the equipment logs. The total stays the same.
Two hundred eighteen gallons are missing, and nobody misplaces that much fuel without making damn sure nobody notices.
I run the figures again, then compare each withdrawal against the equipment logs in case Beau recorded a transfer elsewhere.
The shortage remains two hundred eighteen gallons.
I work backward through the ledger and find smaller discrepancies spread across several weeks. Each one is minor enough to escape a quick review, but together they account for more fuel than anyone could misplace through careless bookkeeping.
Whoever took it knew exactly how much could disappear before anybody noticed.
That somebody knew this ranch.
The trailer fire comes back whether I want it to or not. I can still see Arizona running straight toward the flames while the rest of us fought to catch up, and every accident since then has pulled somebody I care about into Travis’s path.
He isn’t after Dusty Spur or the rodeo. He’s after me, and every person standing beside me keeps paying the price for a score he refuses to let die.
I move on to the tack inventory, and it doesn’t take long to find more discrepancies. Buckles, rigging plates, bolts, and strips of repair leather are all missing while the ledger still shows full counts.
On their own, any one of them could pass as a counting mistake or a forgotten repair, but stacked together with the missing fuel, they stop looking like oversights and start looking like sabotage.
Beau’s initials sit at the bottom of every page, and I keep reading them as though they’ll suddenly belong to somebody else. They never do.
I close the ledger and brace my hands against the desk while the truth settles deeper than I want it to.
Travis came after me because he believes I ruined his life, and now Sadie, Emmett, Willy, Arizona, and everybody else tied to Dusty Spur keeps getting pulled into a fight that should’ve ended years ago.
I won’t stand by and let him take one more thing from people who never deserved any part of this.