Billy Bob handed his trail canteen over to her.
Abby put a few drops of water on the unconscious man’s cracked lips and took a couple of swallows of the metallic-tasting water herself. Then Billy Bob did the same.
Abby finished packing her saddlebags. “We’d better figure a way to get him out of the sun,” she told Billy Bob. “Line shack twenty-three isn’t far away, is it?”
“’Bout a half mile back up the fence line,” Billy Bob answered over his shoulder. He was rigging up the stretcher behind her horse, Patsy, in the old Indian-squaw style.
“Good thing, too,” he said. “Don’t rightly think those branches will hold together for much farther than that.”
Abby agreed wholeheartedly. Their lashing ability left a lot to be desired. But the makeshift rig should remain in one piece just long enough. She hoped.
The line shack turned out to be only a quarter mile away, but it took them much longer than she’d thought to reach it. By the time she dismounted and opened up the shack, the harsh, late-spring sun hung low in the sky, casting long shadows from every tree and rock. The stretcher, which had surprisingly held together until now, began to unravel and would soon be in tatters.
The heat in the little cabin was intense. She quickly threw open the front door and all the windows except the one that had been broken and boarded up. A dry, dusty breeze finally blew through the one room and dropped the temperature, but not nearly enough to make it comfortable.
While Billy Bob struggled to untie the stretcher from Patsy, Abby unpacked the blanket rolls that served as bedding for the cabin’s one cot and one bunk. Then, despite the extreme temperature in the cabin, she started a fire in the cookstove. She wanted to heat some water so she could clean the man’s wounds first thing.
“Well, ain’t that a kick in the britches.” Billy Bob elbowed open the door that had blown shut in the hot breeze. He half carried, half dragged the injured man inside and lowered him onto the cot.
It was the first time that Billy Bob had stopped long enough to get a good look at the man he’d helped save. The sight of an American Indian in this part of Texas was pretty rare these days. Rarer still to see one on Gentry Ranch land. Billy Bob just stood and stared down at him.
The injured man groaned once and opened his eyes, trying to come out of his groggy fog. Abby got only a momentary glance at the deep, black eyes. But that was enough.
For sure, it was her high school heartthrob. She’d all but forgotten.
No, that wasn’t quite right. She’d never forgotten those mesmerizing eyes. Put them out of her mind maybe. Buried the uneasy sensual feelings way down, deep enough not to be consciously remembered. But never totally forgotten.
“That there’s the Injun who lives on the Skaggs Ranch, ain’t it?” Billy Bob scratched his stubbled chin and squinted up his eyes in thought.
Indeed. He most certainly was the “Injun” who was the stepson of the man who owned the ranch next door. Abby searched her subconscious for shreds of memories.
“Yep. His name is Gray Wolf Parker and he’s Skaggs’s stepson. Abby hadn’t seen him since she’d been a high school freshman and he was the new senior. But the rest of her memories had to wait for a moment alone.
“Billy Bob, you know the cell phone won’t work out here, don’t you?” she asked the old man.
Billy Bob looked her way and nodded.
“You think you can watch Gray while I ride back toward the big house?” she asked shortly. “I figure it’s only twenty miles or so to where the cell phone will be in range. I’ll give the helicopter paramedics aerial directions to the line shack when I can reach them.”
Billy Bob frowned at her, shuffled his feet and tried to knock the accumulated dust off his work hat by slapping it against the side of his even dustier chaps-covered thigh. Maybe she shouldn’t have sounded so demanding with her request. After all, her goal was to become his boss soon. She really needed him, as well as the rest of the men, to be on her side and start seeing her as the new foreman.
Billy Bob shook his head. “Look, missy. You already went down that wash when it was too dangerous. I wasn’t there to stop you, but Jake and Cinco would have my hide if I let you go riding off across the ranch alone in the dark of night. Cinco gave me strict orders to keep you safe.” Before she could make any reply, he’d stepped outside the door, and she heard him spitting out the chewing tobacco.
Dang. Several thoughts flashed through her head at once. In the first place, he’d called her missy again. She hated that little-girl term. When would she ever make it to just plain ol’ Abby? Even the old-lady term “ma’am” would sit easier with her.
And secondly, why had her brother been talking to the men about her safety? He had no right to meddle in her business.
“I’ll ride back toward the ranch,” Billy Bob mumbled when he reentered the room. “I know this part of the ranch better ’n you. The man’s out cold and you’re a better nurse ’n me, anyhow. You stay here with him.”
Fighting with all kinds of emotions, she hesitated. She wanted to be the decision maker now. But it was too soon to force the issue. Yes, she was a Gentry. And yes, technically she owned a third of the ranch. But she still hadn’t proven she was worthy of the respect it would take to make the hands, young and old alike, follow her lead.
She swallowed her pride and realized Billy Bob was probably right. He did know this part of the ranch better than she did. He had the best chance of getting within phone range in the fastest time. He was the logical choice to go.
But she surely didn’t want to be the one stuck here alone with the sexy and potent Gray Parker.
Whew! Where did that silliness come from? Her injured neighbor was probably in shock and should remain out cold for most of the night. She really had nothing to fear except her own uncalled-for lusting. Besides, he needed her to finish the job she’d started and see to it that he got home alive.
Handing Billy Bob the phone, she gave him instructions and kept reminding herself she had nothing to worry about.
Billy Bob mounted his mare and stared down at her. “You done a right fair job of saving Parker’s life today. Your father would’ve been mighty proud of you, Abby Jo. But I’m reserving judgment on whether you’ll survive as foreman when the time comes.”
It was the longest speech she’d ever heard from the man.
Billy Bob nudged his horse, turning to head up the fence line toward home. “Take care of yourself and the young buck. The chopper’ll be here by dawn.” He tipped his hat toward her. “You have my word, ma’am.”
Ma’am? He’d actually called her ma’am. Well, that was at least a beginning.
When Abby returned to the cabin, she discovered the cool shadows of nightfall had finally reached them, relieving the oppressive heat. It was already so dark that she had to light a couple of kerosene lanterns.
The water pot she’d set on the stove had begun to boil, so she started getting down to work. She put a little of the hot water in the sink and washed her hands and face. It felt so good to scrape off the trail
