Cowboy retribution, p.1
Cowboy Retribution, page 1
Cowboy Retribution
Barb Han
TorJake Publishing
Copyright © 2020 by Barb Han
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Editing: Ali Williams
Cover Design: Jacob’s Cover Designs
To my family for unwavering love and support. I can’t imagine doing life with anyone else. I love you guys with all my heart.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Also by Barb Han
About the Author
1
“Come on, Bear. Let’s get out of here.” A.J. McGannon called out to his hundred and fifty-pound Newfie. The dog was unfazed. Bear might be loyal to a fault but when he made up his mind about investigating a noise, he conveniently lost his hearing. Making kissing noises got A.J. just as ignored. But since Bear had an uncanny ability to uncover a cow or bull in trouble, A.J. had learned to trust his dog’s instincts.
Nose to soil, Bear was hot and heavy on a trail. For a massive and strikingly large dog, he had the best disposition of any animal on the ranch.
The memory of finding a wounded and scared bear of a dog in the creek bed they were nearing still clenched his back teeth, even three years after the fact. The animal’s back leg had been in bad shape. It was obvious based on his other wounds that he’d been in a fight or two, but he must’ve held his own. He’d returned to the water where he was most comfortable. A puncture wound in his left hindquarters had given him a limp. He’d been too heavy to carry, so A.J. had been forced to call for help. Ranch foreman, Hawk, brought a large wagon.
Normally, A.J. would think twice about approaching an injured animal as fierce looking as Bear. But this animal seemed to have a sixth sense and understood that A.J. was there to help.
Bear had come by his name honestly with his thick, black coat and long snout. His fur had been matted and he was all big teeth and weary eyes on the morning A.J. had found the one-year-old. The minute he’d laid eyes on the dog, A.J. had known the two of them belonged together. Life with Bear was interesting and A.J. couldn’t have asked for a better animal to show up like he had three years ago.
This morning, the air was warm. Early October in Texas could bring anything from pavement scorching temperatures to long johns wearing weather.
There were the usual sounds, a breeze blowing in the trees and Ginger’s, his bay mare, hooves pounding the unforgiving earth. Bear had gone ahead, and he was onto something. The dog had a sixth sense about trouble, and he was presently making a beeline for the creek, A.J. feared there might be something going wrong.
He’d pulled countless cows and bulls from a gulley not too far from here. But that wasn’t the direction Bear was headed in at the moment.
A.J. had learned a long time ago to let Bear take the lead when he was onto something. There wasn’t much in life worse than an animal suffering in its last few hours on earth. A.J. took his role as cattle rancher seriously. The land wasn’t just part of his heritage, it was a piece of his soul and the animals along with it.
There was no reason to suffer needlessly and getting stuck in a water ditch and slowly drowning ranked right up there. He’d seen the aftereffects and him, his brothers and his father always took it seriously.
A.J. listened for any sounds of a struggling animal. The trees were dense on this part of the ranch and since finding Bear here in the creek ahead almost three years ago, he’d made this section of the ranch part of his morning routine.
Checking fences and doing paperwork were the bane of a cattle rancher’s existence but both were important. Since there were no calves to help birth or tag in the fall, making sure all the areas of the fence were secure in case the herd managed to make its way onto the outer boundaries of the property were a huge priority.
A.J. leaned forward and made a ck-ck noise before saying, “He-ya!”
Bear was bolting toward something in the creek. A.J. listened for the tell-tale sounds of a dying animal to brace himself for what he might encounter but there was nothing unusual.
“Whoa,” A.J. calmed Ginger down to a walk.
Water splashed ahead and Bear was shoulder deep and charging forward. He would need a bath later; A.J. could only imagine the mud and dirt that was about to be caked in his fur. Letting him sleep at the foot of his bed had probably been a mistake but one he would repeat. Bear hadn’t let A.J. out of his sight since the two had met, and to this day he refused to ride inside a vehicle.
The reason for that sent fire shooting through A.J.’s veins. The trauma of being abandoned in the country had left its marks.
“What did you find, boy?” A.J. slowed Ginger to a stop and slid off the side. He tucked the reins behind the saddle’s horn. Ginger didn’t spook easily, and he could trust her to stay put.
A.J. followed Bear to where he had stopped. It looked like a small tree had been knocked over, and maybe broken in the last storm. A trunk that had been carried down the creek.
“It’s okay,” he soothed.
Bear was sniffing something on that muddy trunk. From this distance it was hard to see what had captured his dog’s interest.
As he walked closer, his pulse ramped up. The tree moved and his first thought was that it could possibly be a massive snake. That possibility was quickly quelled when a hand reached toward Bear.
Now, it was A.J.’s turn to bolt through the water and splash pretty much everything around him.
He had no idea what or who had been dumped out on his property. Normally, farmers complained of finding bodies that had been driven out and dumped from crime in bigger cities like Houston, Austin, or San Antonio. The victims were hidden in the crops and sometimes not found until harvest.
Cattle ranchers had problems with people using more remote parts of their land for trafficking. Then, there were poachers to deal with.
“My name is A.J. McGannon and you’re on my family’s land. I’m here to help you.” He figured it couldn’t hurt to identify himself to the person who was face down in the muddy bank.
As he neared, the person on the ground turned her head to the side and for the first time, he got a good look at a face.
“Tess?”
“Help me.”
Those words nearly gutted A.J. and he dropped beside his neighbor. It wasn’t so much the words as it was the helplessness in her tone. Tess Clemente was as fiery as she was beautiful. She was also trouble and had caused her fair share of disputes on everything from land boundaries to water supply. She had pretty much made a career out of annoying him and his family.
Her father owned Clemente Cattle and she ran the family business alongside him. She had been two years behind him in school, despite being three years younger than him. Tess was tall, five-feet-seven-inches if he had to guess. She was all legs and could most likely be found wearing a minidress and boots.
Today, she had on jeans and a spaghetti strap shirt. She looked like she’d been rolled in mud.
“I’m here.” Sworn enemy or not, he wouldn’t turn his back on anyone who needed help.
“Is he gone?” Tess barely had enough energy to speak but she needed to know if the person who’d attacked her from behind and slipped a bag over her head was still out there. A ripple of fear shot through her.
Exhausted and thirsty beyond belief, she’d managed to make her way to the creek bed where she rolled around in the mud to blend in with the environment. She hadn’t exactly been sure where she’d ended up after breaking free from her kidnapper and running away. She hadn’t looked back and that meant she didn’t have a good description of the man who’d attacked her.
Seeing A.J., the one McGannon who usually got so far on her nerves she would rather stomp out of a room than look at him, was an oddly welcomed relief.
She might not generally like to be in his presence, but he was a good person. He wouldn’t let anyone hurt her. He would get her to safety.
A.J. surveyed the area as his hand went to the pistol that was holstered in his belt. It was common practice for ranchers to carry weapons in these parts. Wild hogs roamed and there were other dangers, both animal and human.
Again, poachers were a real problem for ranchers and had become even more ruthless since poaching penalties had become stiffer. A person with everything to lose wasn’t a good person to run into out on land that stretched out for hundreds of acres.
And yet, Tess wished it had been a poacher who’d attacked her. Something hinted that would have been far less dangerous.
“I don’t see anyone.” A.J. returned his pistol to his holster. “Let’s get you out of here.”
She nodded, and then he helped her up. Her limbs felt like concrete weights. Thankfully, A.J. was strong. He had that whole muscled and toned bit down to a T. There weren’t many men she could think of off-hand that were more attractive than A.J.; if only his personality matched that outside. Or he would actually listen to reas
Right now, though, she couldn’t be happier to see a McGannon. Bear had scared the bejesus out of her when she first opened her eyes to see the huge black dog.
Her knees were like rubber bands, so standing on her own was going to be impossible. When she nearly went down again, his strong hands held her upright.
“I don’t want to hurt you. Mind if I pick you up?” he asked.
Her body was too weak to make it all the way to his horse. She’d lost track of how long she’d been out here alone. Torrential rain had made it impossible to know when it was day or night and she’d lost her phone when she’d been attacked.
“What day is it?” she managed to ask but darkness was tugging at her. She’d used up all her remaining energy talking and trying to walk.
“Thursday. What happened?”
“Sheriff. My father.” Those were the last words she remembered saying before everything went dark again.
Tess blinked open blurry eyes. A headache raged. The kind that hurt the backs of her eyes.
“Drink this.” A.J. McGannon sat at her bedside, holding a glass of water in his hands.
She managed to sit up.
“Thank you.” Her mouth was as dry and cracked as East Texas soil. A few sips helped ease some of the dryness. Talking made her lips hurt. “Do you have any ChapStick?”
“My sister-in-law put together a few things she thought you could use.” He picked up a small basket from the nightstand and then set it on the bed.
She looked through the lotion, breath mints and found something for dry lips. She applied it and picked up a granola bar.
Didn’t A.J. tell her that it was Thursday?
“My father will be worried sick. Has anyone tried to reach him?”
A.J.’s face twisted up like he was offended. “We might have our differences, but we wouldn’t hold something like this from your family.”
“I didn’t mean—”
He waved her off as he picked up his phone and fired off a text.
“The sheriff asked me to let her know when you were awake. She’s been trying to reach your father, but he hasn’t returned her calls,” A.J. supplied.
“Oh, right. I almost forgot that he’s in Dallas. My dad and cell phones never were a good match, so he might not remember to check.” Technology and her dad weren’t friends. They weren’t even acquaintances. He only carried a cell because she practically forced him to. As he was getting older, she didn’t want him out on the ranch by himself, as he often was, with no way to contact home if something happened. “He’s a good man but he can be so stubborn.”
“What happened to you? How’d you get lost and end up on our property?” Based on the sharp words they’d had in the past, A.J. would know she hadn’t crossed the boundary on purpose.
“I didn’t realize I’d been taken here in the first place.” She needed to get a grip on her defensiveness. It was foreign having a conversation with A.J. that didn’t start as an argument. The concern lines etched in his forehead reminded her that he wasn’t there to make her life harder.
In fact, he’d probably just saved her life.
“Thank you,” she said quickly. “If you hadn’t shown when you did, I’m not sure what might have happened.”
“You can thank Bear for that. I might’ve ridden right on past.”
She must’ve made a face without realizing because he put a hand up.
“Hold on. I didn’t mean that I wasn’t glad to find you. I’d just like to know how you ended up there and in the condition you’re in.”
“Someone jumped me from behind. I have no idea who. Locking the door to the barn is the last thing I remember before waking up with some kind of bag over my head. Everything was dark and,” her voice broke, “sorry. I don’t mean to get emotional.”
“Don’t be. You’ve been through one hell of an experience. A less strong person wouldn’t be here right now.” His words had a calming effect despite the fact the two of them usually threw verbal jabs at each other. This was a nice change.
“Thank you, A.J.” She hesitated. “That’s really nice coming from someone like you.”
Okay, she didn’t mean to light a fire in him but that’s exactly what happened. A storm brewed behind those hazel and brown eyes of his. To most, he would be intimidating with his six-feet-four-inch frame and muscles that had muscles. His hair was so dark brown that it was almost black.
So, yeah, he could seem threatening.
Tess also knew the man had principles and honor, something that seemed missing in too many of the men she’d dated in the past couple of years. Most of her dates seemed more interested in what was happening on the phone’s screen than in her. Phones came out at the dinner table, at the lake, and in the car. One guy leaned in for a goodnight kiss while they were still in his vehicle and a text caught his attention first. He’d stopped mid-lean.
So, as much as she would never be attracted to A.J. McGannon, she had to admit that it was nice to be around someone who knew how to put his phone down and pay attention in a conversation.
He hadn’t once checked his cell except to let the sheriff know she was awake. And then he’d set it down without looking twice.
It was probably because he’d shown up in her time of crisis that she was seeing so many things to appreciate about A.J. and not the niggle of attraction she felt toward him the minute he’d looked into her eyes.
At least, that was the lie she tried to sell herself while her heart pounded in her chest.
2
Miss Penny knocked on the open door to the guest suite.
“Come in.” A.J. glanced at Tess before turning to the family’s lifeline. Miss Penny had taken care of A.J., his brothers and cousins after his mother had died. They’d been a handful, but she’d kept everyone in line.
The woman who’d become a second mother had to be in her mid- to late-sixties despite having the energy of a twenty-five-year-old. The best description he’d heard of her was that she was tiny but mighty.
Miss Penny also came with a warning label. She might be petite and have a natural skip to her step when she walked, but everyone knew better than to cross her. Of course, she was the kind of person who’d earned their respect long ago.
Her salt and pepper hair had been in the exact same style for A.J.’s entire life, short and feathered to one side. But it was Miss Penny’s clear green eyes that could see right through a person. For most of his life, he’d seen her in a blouse with jeans, often wearing her favorite apron that spelled out the word, BOSS.
“The sheriff is here. She said you called.” Miss Penny’s gaze held on Tess and there were questions dancing in those green eyes of hers.
“Thank you. I’ll explain later, or you’re welcome to sit in while Tess gives her statement,” he said to Miss Penny.
“No explanation needed. I’m headed to the hospital with Hawk.” Hawk was the ranch foreman. His nickname came from the fact nothing got past him. He was fairly close in age with Miss Penny, a few years younger, and it hadn’t gotten past any of A.J.’s brothers the two had been spending a lot of time together since their dad’s hospitalization. “Any friend of yours is always welcome here.”
Miss Penny had placed careful emphasis on the word, friend.
“I appreciate it, but—”
Before he could explain that Tess wasn’t his friend, Miss Penny lifted a hand up to stop him. It was probably for the best anyway. He’d already stuck his boot in his mouth and offended her once.
“It’s nice to see neighbors who step in to help each other and actually get along,” Miss Penny said almost under her breath.
