White Christmas in Dry Creek

Rusty nodded and the slight action made him wince. “I was just looking around. No harm in that.”

“An ambulance is on its way,” the sheriff said as he stood up and put the notebook back into his pocket.

The sheriff had a gray Stetson on his head and it shaded his eyes, but there was no doubt where he was focused next. “I recognize you now. You were a scrawny little kid last time I saw you. That ranch of your father’s was bigger than the Elkton ranch here. Got put up for sale by the bank in the past month or so. Some corporation bought it. It wasn’t handled right—I’ll give you and your brother that much.”

Rusty tried to answer, but the pain in his head stopped him from doing more than giving a slight nod. He was surprised anyone from Dry Creek would remember him. He’d joined the army when he turned eighteen and hadn’t come back until he’d gotten off the plane in Billings early this morning. That was eight long years and he’d changed.

“I keep track of your brother,” the sheriff continued, his broad face looking almost sympathetic. He pushed the brim of his hat back so his eyes were no longer hidden.

Rusty nodded. “Eric is supposed to be staying with the Morgans and going to school. But they said he got temporary work on another ranch, so he wasn’t there. He thinks I’m coming next week.”

He heard another feminine gasp from behind his shoulder. He tried to turn, but his shoulder twisted in pain. He could barely hear what the sheriff was saying.

“I don’t know about any job, but your brother’s been causing trouble,” the lawman continued. “Claimed the bank cheated you all somehow. Seems your dad had a heart attack and died before he could prove he paid off the mortgage on that ranch of his. That might make your brother mad enough to steal cattle.”

Rusty didn’t say anything. He’d talked several times on the phone these past weeks with his brother and he had his own suspicions about what was happening around here. He knew his brother would never steal anyone’s cattle. Rustling had prompted their father’s need for the loan that had ultimately taken the ranch away from them all. But he feared the boy was in deeper trouble than he had thought.

“If my father says he made the payment, he did,” he finally said. That much he knew for certain. His father might have been a mean, cantankerous man, but he was honest to the point of plain stubbornness.

The sheriff looked at Rusty some more, as if weighing the words Rusty was holding back as well as the few he’d spoken. Finally, the lawman squinted at the notebook in his hand. “Anyone we can contact for you, son?”

“Just my brother, Eric. He’s the only family I have.”

Rusty felt the sweat collecting on his forehead—which made no sense, because the air was chilly.

Another shadow flitted over him, and when he blinked, he saw the woman again. He hoped he wasn’t going to pass out.

“Your brother’s Eric? Eric Calhoun?” the woman demanded, clearly upset.

The woman’s eyes were wide and he couldn’t help but notice they were the color of warm honey with flecks of cinnamon in them.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said.

“You tell your brother to stay away from Karyn McNab,” the woman said with some steel in her voice. “She’s too young to get married.”

“Married?” Rusty repeated, stunned. “Who’s getting married?”

“Your Eric wants to marry my Karyn,” the woman said, the challenge obvious in her voice even before she added, “and I’m doing my best to stop them from making the worst mistake of their lives.”

He looked at the woman, trying to form a reply. His mouth wouldn’t work, though.

“It didn’t help that Mrs. Hargrove said they could be Mary and Joseph in the church pageant,” the woman added, putting her hands on her hips just as her daughter had done earlier. “They promised to come up with a donkey.”

Rusty closed his eyes. He used to know a Mrs. Hargrove. But now he’d lost so much blood he must be light-headed. The odd thing was that the series of sharp pains had pushed away from him, leaving the constant dull pain behind.

“Must be some other Eric,” he managed to mutter. Eric had spoken indignantly about people hinting he was involved in the cattle disappearing around Dry Creek, but he’d never said anything about a girl. “We don’t have a donkey.”

Of course, Rusty thought to himself, they didn’t have a ranch now, either.

The woman frowned at him. “Will you tell your brother what I said?”

Suddenly, Rusty tried to answer, but hesitated and then couldn’t seem to remember the question. He thought he might be going under again. He couldn’t do that. Eric needed him.

Rusty took another look at the woman as he started to fall back into the darkness. She had such a sweet face, especially now that her frown was gone and she looked as if she cared whether he faded away or not.

“Look after Annie for me,” he pleaded. “My horse. She’s pregnant.”

He wanted to see the woman again, but he couldn’t find the words to say that. He wondered if she could see inside his mind and know that he was drawn to her.

“I’ll do what I can,” she said, her voice growing increasingly distant as he felt the room tilt.

“And my dog, too?”

Rusty tried to stay conscious to hear her answer and he thought he caught a faint echo of a yes. She might not want to do a favor for him, but he was pretty sure she would go to the aid of a pregnant animal and a dog, even one who was part wolf. He would see her again, he told himself in satisfaction as he started to drift away. Now if he could only figure out what his brother was doing.

Chapter Two

Renee stared at the man, willing his chest to rise with another breath. A thick Persian rug lay beneath him—the one she’d used to help pull him inside. It had been under the man this whole time, keeping his back warm and giving him some softness. She exhaled when she saw him inhale. She hadn’t even realized she was holding her breath until then.

She wondered what kind of trouble he had known. Had it all been from Afghanistan or had he gotten some of those bruises closer to home?

Not that it was her business, she reminded herself. She braced herself and turned to the sheriff. “I suppose you’re going to arrest him now?”

The man was unconscious again, so she didn’t think he’d mind her asking.

“Arrest him?” The sheriff looked over in surprise. “We can’t do that. Even if cattle are missing—and it looks like they are—there’s no proof Rusty Calhoun has done anything wrong. It’s all circumstantial.”

The front door was still open, but Renee barely noticed the sting of the cold air. The snowflakes had slowed. Earlier, there had been a full moon, but the clouds had come out since then to make everything dark except where the porch light came through the windows and door of the house. The stranger’s horse was standing patiently by the porch rail. The man’s black Stetson had been pushed against the corner post by the wind. There was no sign of his dog.

“I didn’t think you needed all that much proof around here to arrest someone,” Renee finally said. She tried not to let her feelings show. “He was shot in a place where cattle are almost certainly missing. Ranchers are going out on patrol—like as not with their rifles. It’s circumstantial, sure, but you didn’t have that much more when you arrested me.”

The sound of a distant television let her know Tessie was securely in the bedroom and would not hear them. Yet neither she nor the sheriff said anything for a good minute.

Finally, the lawman shook his head. “You still hold that against me? I don’t know how many times I’ve explained that I arrested you for your own protection. You had been part of the theft at that gas station. We didn’t know at first that you’d been forced into it by your abusive husband. A blind man could see that he was setting you up to take the fall on those armed robberies he was pulling off. Even after we picked him up, that accomplice of his was still running around free and he was dangerous. I wanted to keep you safe from him. You were never even brought to trial. And it all happened a year ago. It’s not like you have a record from it or anything to hold you back.”

Renee nodded, but she didn’t meet the sheriff’s eyes. “I’d just never been arrested before. Not even a parking ticket.”

She had no quarrel with the law. The legal system might be a little black-and-white at times, but every criminal had some sad story in his background. She’d certainly had hers. And this man wouldn’t be the first wounded veteran to do something impulsive. All people needed to be held accountable for their actions. Except that she hadn’t done the crime.

“I don’t go around arresting people for no reason,” the sheriff continued gruffly, his face turning slightly pink.

“Well, I suppose I could have done better, too.” Renee had to give him that. “I didn’t help my ex-husband with those robberies, but I sure didn’t know how to stop him, either.”

When Renee had seen that her husband was robbing gas stations, she’d finally been desperate enough to come look for her father. She’d ended up at Gracie Stone’s nearby house, in as bad shape as this man was tonight.

“That doesn’t make you guilty of anything,” the sheriff said. “Stopping him was my job. What you should have done was come tell me what he was doing. Sooner than you did.”

Renee nodded. After Gracie and her father married, they welcomed her and Tessie into their family along with Gracie’s three grown sons. But Renee wouldn’t let herself lean on the Stone family. She needed to find strength inside herself if she and her daughter were ever going to have a good life. Now that she was a Christian, she believed she could do that.