Colton 911: Caught In The Crossfire. Linda O. Johnston

sideways toward him, her long black ponytail swayed. “I can tell you what I heard, but I’m a relative newcomer here. The other hands have been here longer.”

      She wasn’t looking at him now, but somehow her expression had hardened.

      Where had she lived before? Why had she decided to become a ranch hand, and why here?

      Was she unhappy about being the least experienced of the ranch hands here? He was highly curious all of a sudden, especially considering that oddly defensive look on her face. He asked, “So where did you come from? Is this your first job as a ranch hand?”

      She again looked at him. Her brow creased and her mouth tightened. He assumed she was going to tell him where to go, to stop asking questions.

      Maybe she didn’t want to think of the past, either.

      “Er… I’m sorry,” he began, wanting to back off. “I didn’t mean to be nosy.”

      But she responded…kind of. “I came from Texas. And, no, this isn’t my first job as a ranch hand. I learned all about it there.” She turned her attention toward where she was walking, as she should on this uneven area. “And one of the things I know well is that this kind of grass, this terrain, supports cattle well.” She began a description of how she had studied different kinds of grasses and that these pastures seemed to incorporate several, although she wasn’t certain. “Whatever they are, the grasses here seem to feed some pretty healthy cattle.” She started talking about fescue and rye and stuff he really didn’t care about, but she made it sound noteworthy.

      “Interesting” was all he said. And in a way it was—considering the source.

      He was finding Melody much too interesting… Which had to stop.

      He started examining the topography more closely. It was flat in some areas, then rose to low hills and was flat again.

      “Hey.” Melody had suddenly stopped talking about grasses. “We’re finally approaching where they got out.”

      She kept walking as she pointed out a spot in the distance…and then tripped. He instinctively reached out to grab her and hold her up, although he quickly realized she’d regained her balance on her own.

      “Thanks,” she said, anyway, her voice hoarse as she pulled her arm from his hand quickly. She immediately looked away from him and began to walk fast again.

      He had an urge to hold her hand—to help her keep her balance. But that would be a bad idea.

      A very bad idea.

      He had a sense that if he tried it, he’d be the one to trip over his own feet and fall onto his knees.

      And he’d be the one to look bad.

      She was the ranch hand, not him. She could most likely wrangle a steer with her eyes closed. Even tie knots a lot better than him.

      Instead of holding on to her, he’d take a different kind of advantage of her company now, since he’d be on his own for the actual investigation, at least initially, and possibly until another deputy or two was assigned to work with him. And being in Melody’s presence…well, asking her questions related to what had happened here would be a whole lot easier for him than holding any other kind of conversation with her.

      Like a flirtation? No way. There were no women in his life now. He didn’t want any, despite how attractive she was. And especially not until he’d learned enough to be sure she wasn’t involved in stealing the cattle.

      So—who’d taken them, and why? They could certainly talk about that. It wasn’t something he had much of a notion about on his own yet, not without investigating first—though he did have one potential suspect in mind that wasn’t Melody.

      According to local news, Edison’s wife, Hilda, had left him last year and was no longer in town—or so Casey believed, but that didn’t mean she was innocent. Hilda Edison was surely getting up in years, like her ex, so she probably couldn’t have done this herself. But had she arranged for the rustling for her own financial gain, or revenge…or both?

      Melody started responding to what he’d asked before, relaying her knowledge about the origins of OverHerd Ranch, which she had already admitted was limited since she’d moved here fairly recently. She understood that Clarence, who had grown up in Phoenix with a wealthy family, had moved to Cactus Creek after college and started the ranch. Then he’d married and he and his wife had a couple of kids, who were grown now and living elsewhere. She didn’t know much about the ranch’s development, which was fine since it probably had nothing to do with the current situation, although it might have been interesting to hear.

      Casey could ask Clarence about that, if necessary, or maybe even look it up online. But for now, he interrupted gently and asked instead who she and the other ranch hands suspected in this, and why.

      Unsurprisingly, she mentioned Hilda first. The other hands were already gossiping that their boss’s ex might be involved. No one knew how much Hilda had gotten from the divorce, but if she didn’t consider it enough, that could be a motive for her to steal some cattle.

      Their kids? From what she’d gathered, Clarence had remained fairly generous with them, so while they were possible suspects, they didn’t rank high on the others’ lists.

      Who else? Again, there were rumors, sometimes about political opponents or other townsfolk who didn’t always agree with how Clarence ran things, but no one person stood out as having anything particularly against the man. No, the ranch hands seemed to think it was somewhat random.

      “You might check in other areas around here to see if there’ve been other rustling situations lately, and if any of them seem at all similar,” Melody said. A good idea, one he’d already thought of and would make sure Sheriff Krester had someone work on while Casey conducted his on-site investigation here.

      “Will do” was all he said to Melody. And for the next few minutes both of them remained quiet. They were getting close to the clearly damaged fence, and Casey, at least, was studying the rolling hillside, mostly covered in grass and patches of other kinds of plant life, but with several other areas of bare soil. There were more pasture areas beyond the broken fence that seemed to stretch forever.

      And no sign of cattle anywhere.

      He glanced at his watch. It was nearing three o’clock. They’d been out for more than half an hour, and the walk back would also take that long. He wanted to spend some time at the broken-fence site first, too.

      There would still be a few hours of daylight after their return, on this late fall day. Still, even if he found something around here, darkness might drop before he could deal with it. It would make more sense to return tomorrow. On horseback, maybe.

      On his own, with whatever it took to track the cows’ GPS signals.

      Suddenly feeling the urge to stop wasting time and get to the fence already, Casey began sprinting forward. And he noticed that Melody was keeping up with him.

      The fence consisted of oblong wooden stakes of moderate height, anchored into the ground, with three rows of straight metal piping connecting each pair of those stakes.

      Here, though, four of the stakes had been knocked from their anchors and damaged, with gouges in the splintered wood indicating that some kind of tool had been used. The piping had been removed and stacked in rows off to the side. And the grassy ground beneath the opening was tamped down unevenly, as if cattle had walked through it—not a surprise.

      This was clearly not some kind of accident or natural phenomenon. Someone had done it. Probably several someones, since removing the stakes could not have been easy.

      Casey emitted a low whistle. “Wow. What a mess.” He kneeled and started examining some of the splintered wood and the pipes, looking at the ground, as well.

      “With no tools left here, either, to show how it was done,” Melody said.

      “Yeah,” he responded. “I’ll request that my department send