C Box - Blue Heaven

Hearne nodded, went to the gun cabinet, and pulled out another shotgun. “Should I take this?”

“Yup.”

Jess turned to Villatoro and the Taylors. “I’m not running. This is my place. I’ll know if they try to come because there’s only one way in with a vehicle.”

No one said a word. They were waiting for more from him, he realized.

“I know every inch of this ranch, and they don’t,” Jess said. “That’s our only advantage. We’re going to hold our ground. Don’t worry, I’ve been preparing for it all of my life.”

“But you’re old, Jess.” It was Annie, who sounded concerned. He didn’t even know she was there.

“Annie!” Monica said.

“Hell, let her be.” Jess laughed. “She may be right.”

AS JESS pulled Chile’s flank strap tight and adjusted the stirrups for the shorter-legged Hearne, the banker said, “Jess, let’s make a pact.”

Jess finished, turned.

Hearne said, “If I don’t make it, promise me you’ll take care of Annie and see her through. William and Monica, too.”

Jess tried to read Hearne’s face, but couldn’t get past the resolve in it.

“I’ll do the same if something happens here to you,” Hearne said.

“You trying to tell me something?” Jess asked.

Hearne simply looked at him, said, “I mean it, Jess.”

“Then okay,” Jess said after a beat. The pact seemed noble and worthwhile, he thought. He held out his hand, and Hearne shook it.

“Remember,” Jess said, “trust your horse to find the way in the dark.”

OUTSIDE, JESS stood with Villatoro on the front porch and watched Jim Hearne wheel on Chile and ride off into the dark. He could hear hoofbeats drum and recede into the meadow.

Jess handed the weapon he had taken from Swann to Villatoro. “You probably know more about handguns than I do.”

“I never shot anyone,” Villatoro said.

“You mean you can’t, or you never have?”

“I never have.”

“But you can do it if you need to?”

Villatoro didn’t hesitate. “Absolutely. Emphatically. Yes, I’m willing. I vowed to myself up in those trees that if I had another chance, I would fight.”

“Good.” Jess placed his hand on the man’s shoulder in an effort to reassure him.

Villatoro said, “My wife will never believe this. All those years, and I never had a gun pulled on me. I always wondered what I’d do if that happened, and now I know. I just stood there and waited for the bullet. I’m ashamed of myself.”

Jess looked up at the saddle slope hill where the access road was, saw no headlights, said, “Don’t be. Everybody freezes up sometime. Look at the bright side-you may get a second chance to get it right.”

Villatoro chuckled uncomfortably. “Some bright side,” he said.

MONICA FOUND JESS in the barn, sitting on an upturned bucket, the Winchester across his knees, a lantern hissing and throwing out warm yellow light. In the stall in front of him was a hugely pregnant cow, legs splayed, tail twitching with pain. She could hear the cow’s shallow breathing.

“I was wondering where you went,” she said. “I got the kids down again and realized you weren’t in the kitchen. Then I saw the light out here.”

She wore a heavy canvas ranch coat she had found hanging from a peg in the mudroom. It smelled of campfire smoke and hay.

Jess looked over at her. “These cows, they don’t pay much attention to the news of the day or our situation. They just keep having little ones no matter what I think about it or how much else I have to do.”

“I don’t know how you can concentrate on this right now.”

Jess shrugged. “Doing something normal helps me think.”

Monica stepped inside the barn, pulling the coat tight against the damp chill. “Is she okay?”

Jess squinted at the stall. “I’m worried about a breech with this one,” he said. “She had a breech baby last year, so I’m afraid it might happen again.”

“How close is she?”

“Any minute,” he said.

“And if the baby is breech?”

He held up a long rubber glove. “Then I have to reach in there and pull the calf around so it can come out. If that won’t work, I need to pull it out piece by piece.”

She flinched and nodded, looking at the moist and inflamed birth canal, then back at the glove.

“It’s a messy business,” he said, in response to her facial expression, which had given her away. Then he nodded at a bucket near him. “You can sit down, if you’d like. Annie used that bucket last night to watch the same thing.”

“Annie watched a cow being born?” Monica asked, moving toward the rancher. “How’d she take it? She didn’t say anything to me.”

“She’s pretty tough,” the rancher said. “She’s a good kid, if you don’t mind me saying that.”

Monica smiled and sat down. The bucket rocked a little, and she reached out for his arm to steady herself. She noticed how he stiffened at her touch.

“Of course I don’t mind,” she said, righting her balance. “She really likes you. So does William. He said you should come live with us when this is over.”

She looked over to gauge his reaction, and was rewarded with a look of surprise that almost made her laugh.

“He said that ?”

“Yes. He told me when I tucked him in.”

Jess shook his head, looked down at his dusty boots. She couldn’t tell what he was thinking, whether he was flattered or horrified.

“Jess,” she said, screwing up her courage, “what I wanted to talk to you about before…”

“Yes?”

She took in a breath and held it, then blew it out long. “I’ve known a lot of men in my life. I can’t think of one of them who would have done what you did.”

He wouldn’t look over at her, and she noticed how his ears turned red. He mumbled, “There’s a couple more. One inside the house, and the other on horseback right now.”

“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it,” she continued. “You’ve risked everything for me, and you never even met me. Annie and William have never had a man like you in their lives before.”

He continued to stare at the cow. The vein in his temple pulsed. She noticed the wetness in his eyes.

“Jess, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” he said.

“What do you think of what I just said?”

He shook his head slowly. “It’s real nice.”

There was a beat of silence while she waited for more.

“My wife always said talking was a problem for me,” he said sheepishly.

She was touched, and she reached for his arm again. “I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable. Especially after all you’ve done for us. You brought me together with my children. You don’t need to talk.”

“I don’t mind talking to you,” he said, his face red. “It’s just that I can’t think of the right words to say.”

It took her a few moments to summon the courage for what would come next. He picked up on the hesitation, and glanced at her but didn’t stare, making it easier for her. She said, “Jess, there’s something you might want to know. I know there’ve been rumors over the years about me, and I want to clear them up.”

She said, “Thirteen years ago”-he turned to her as she said the number, a puzzled look on his face-“I was seventeen and I thought I was a pretty hot little number. Actually, I was a hot little number. I wanted to grow up fast. So, along with three friends, we went to Spokane on a Friday night, to the university because we’d been invited to a frat party. At the time, it sounded incredibly adult and exciting… college boys , you know.”

Jess nodded. It was obvious he was a little uneasy with the story thus far but was too polite not to hear it out to see where it went.