Forsaken. B.J. Daniels

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СКАЧАТЬ he said. “A neighbor of yours saw a young man come out of the mountains a little while ago.... The man who called thought your employee might have been in trouble.”

      His words brought back the full force of the unease she’d awakened with last night. “What kind of trouble? I don’t know anything about—” She took a step to the edge of the porch stairs then stopped as her gaze slid past him to the faded red barn in need of fresh paint.

      Her breath caught as she recognized the lathered-up horse standing next to it. The horse was still saddled, but there was no sign of its rider. Even from the distance she could see that the mare needed tending to at once.

      She shoved off the porch steps and sprinted toward the barn. When she got hold of Dewey Putman she’d tan his hide for treating a horse like that. Even as she thought it, though, she felt that sliver of worry dig in deeper.

      What was her tender doing back at the ranch? And what had a neighbor seen that would make him call a deputy instead of her?

      Maddie reached the horse, her heart breaking at the shape it was in. The mare had been ridden hard. Her fingers brushed over a four-inch cut along one flank, and she saw that the mare was favoring one leg.

      She dug her cell phone from her jeans pocket and tapped in the veterinarian’s number, then shoved open the barn door and called Dewey’s name.

      Behind her, she was only vaguely aware that the sheriff’s deputy had followed her. In the dim light of the barn, dust motes twirled in the early-morning light as she called Dewey’s name again before the vet came on the line.

      “I’ve got a horse that needs attention right away,” she said into the phone. “If you can’t come out...” She let out a relieved sigh. “Thanks, Doc. I appreciate it.”

      As she disconnected, she heard a rustling sound deeper in the barn, then a whimper and what sounded like sobbing. She felt her chest tighten. Stuffing her cell phone back into her jeans pocket, she grabbed up a pitchfork as she followed the sound to a back stall.

      A few feet from the muffled noise she felt the deputy’s large hand drop to her shoulder. He’d unsnapped his weapon and now motioned for her to stand back and let him handle it.

      As a groan came from inside the stall, Maddie gave a shake of her head and banged the stall door open with the pitchfork.

      “What the hell is wrong with you, Dewey Putman?” she demanded then froze as she saw her sheep tender cowering in the corner. Her gaze took in his bloodstained clothing, the scratches on his face and the terror in his eyes before he dropped his head into his folded arms again and wept.

      “Come out of there, son,” the deputy said as he pushed past her.

      She let out the breath that had caught in her throat at the sight of Dewey like this and slowly lowered the pitchfork. “You heard him. Come out.”

      Dewey looked up. A lock of his dark hair had fallen over one bloodshot brown eye. She felt her stomach roil.

      “Come on,” she said, gentling her voice the way she would have for a spooked horse. She dropped the pitchfork over the partial wall into the next stall and held out her hand.

      But before Dewey could take it, the deputy stepped between them.

      “I’m going to have to handle this,” he said to her then turned to Dewey. “What’s your name?”

      “His name is Dewey Putman. He’s my sheep tender.” Then turning to Dewey, she said, “What I need to know is what you’re doing here, and where are Branch and my sheep?”

      The deputy shot her a look that said he’d prefer to do this his way.

      Before she could remind him that he was on her ranch or that she had two thousand sheep and possibly no herder, he said, “Could you please make some tea?”

      Bristling, Maddie raised a brow. “Tea?”

      “Or coffee if you prefer. Something to warm him up. Also, he’ll need a change of clothing. His clothes are soaked. If he isn’t suffering from hypothermia, he will be.”

      Ready to do what came naturally and take care of things herself, she had to bite her tongue as she shot another look at Dewey. He was trembling like a dog cornered by a grizzly and in as bad shape or worse than his horse.

      Something had happened in the sheep camp back in the Beartooth Mountains. Even before she’d seen the blood on his clothing, she’d known by the look in the young man’s eyes that he was in trouble. The deputy knew it, too.

      Dewey was her employee, her responsibility. While her first instinct was to help him, she knew from the warning look the deputy had given her that Dewey’s welfare was now out of her hands.

      “I’ll see to his horse,” she said. “There’s a pot of coffee on the stove. Help yourself.”

      CHAPTER TWO

      DEPUTY SHERIFF BENTLEY JAMISON watched the ranch woman stride off, before turning back to the young man cowering in the corner of the stall. He’d seen his share of young men with blood on their hands. None, though, had looked as terrified as this one.

      “Son, I’m going to have to ask you to stand up now,” he said.

      As Dewey Putman stumbled to his feet, Jamison searched him for a weapon or any sign of an injury that could account for the blood on the boy’s clothing. The tender was little more than a kid, late teens at most. He had no weapon and had no visible wounds. So there was a good chance the blood on his clothing wasn’t his.

      “Let’s go up to the house,” Jamison said. “I’m going to need to call your parents. Can you tell me that number?”

      The boy shook his head.

      He figured Mrs. Conner must have it as he led the young man through the dimly lit barn.

      As they neared the open barn door, Dewey balked. He shook his head, hugging himself and moaning under his breath as he looked toward the bright daylight outside.

      It was one of those beautiful early June days in southwest Montana. A blinding sun hung in a cloudless blue sky. The breeze smelled of spring, but its cold bite was a reminder that summer in these parts was weeks off.

      “It’s all right,” he told the boy. “It’s not that far to the house. I won’t let anything happen to you.” Still, he had to take Dewey’s trembling arm to get him to cross the patch of sunlit earth to the house. What, he wondered as an icy chill settled over him, had frightened this kid so badly?

      At his patrol SUV, he took out the investigation kit he’d been given when he’d started as deputy. So far, he’d had no use for it. Crime in this part of the world was barking dogs, an occasional barroom brawl and traffic control when a semi blew over on the pass. It was a far cry from his job as a homicide detective in New York City.

      On the porch, he had the boy strip off his wet, soiled clothing down to his underwear. He led him into the house and was looking for the bathroom when he heard Madison Conner come up the porch steps.

      “Don’t touch those,” he said through the screen door as she knelt to pick up the boy’s dirty clothing.

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