Roz Denny Fox - Mom's The Word

“Crazy woman,” he growled. “Acts like she’s at a resort, instead of smack-dab in the middle of the wilderness.” He watched her read for the better part of an hour. Suddenly she glanced up and straight at his hiding place. Jake found himself yanking off his white hat, lest she spot him and get it into her head to take another shot. This time with her rifle.

Common sense told him he was too well hidden to be seen by the naked eye. Her naked eye. And brother, what eyes they were. So dark a blue they were almost purple. Still staring through his powerful binoculars, Jake all but drooled on the bandanna around his neck. He didn’t relax until she returned her interest to the book.

That didn’t last. She soon tossed it aside, stood and shaded her eyes, staring hard in his direction. She turned slowly as if searching the hills for something in particular. Or someone.

Jake realized the sun had shifted and was probably reflecting off the lenses of his binoculars. “Crap.” He dropped the glasses and scooted back on his belly until he was safely into the trees. “Why don’t I just send up a flare and announce I’m snooping?” he muttered disgustedly.

Lifting his head, Charcoal barked.

“Shh.” Jake raised a hand. “Sound carries down these ravines, boy. And we don’t want the lady to know the Triple C plans to keep her under surveillance for a while.”

The dog cocked his head, gazing at Jake intelligently before slithering to his side.

Grinning, Jake rubbed a hand between the dog’s ears. “I know. You think I’ve taken leave of my senses. Which is precisely what Dillon will say if I don’t hightail it out of here.”

Dillon was expecting him to report the total number of strays between the ranch and Hell’s Gate, where they were to meet. He’d been at the number-five line shack all week, moving half the herd into summer pastures. Jake was due to connect with him at three o’clock to exchange head counts and…Jake winced. The produce he’d left with Hayley had been meant to replenish his brother’s dwindling supplies. Dillon would have a fit when he learned Jacob had given away the food Eden had fixed for him.

Of course, Dillon would be grumpy, anyway, having spent four nights without his wife. They’d be apart a week all told. Hell, that wasn’t Jake’s fault. He’d offered to move the herd. It was a chore he used to do with his dad while Dillon oversaw the ranch. Last winter, though, Wade Cooper had tangled with a rogue cow and his bum hip hadn’t fully healed. His doctor recommended Wade let the boys handle fall roundup alone. Dillon didn’t have a good eye for spotting strays in the canyons. Not like Jake did. As a result, Dillon got stuck driving the steers to pasture.

Taking a last look through his binoculars, just to verify that Hayley Ryan had gone about her business, Jake climbed into the saddle again and set off to complete the job he’d started.

HAYLEY COULDN’T SHAKE the notion she was being watched. She’d closed her book once and let her gaze roam the nearby hills. Nothing moved and nothing appeared to be amiss. Refilling her teacup, she’d returned to her reading. The feeling persisted. Finally she felt so uneasy that she rose and walked to the edge of the clearing. Shading her eyes against the morning sun, she concentrated on a rocky promontory where she thought she’d seen a flash—like the sun reflecting off a mirror.

Hayley stared at the spot so long she became dizzy. Or had she gotten dizzy from self-imposed fright? Her heart was certainly beating fast.

When she could see no sign of any human presence, Hayley gave herself a stern mental shake. She decided that sitting around doing nothing but reading was making her paranoid. Why would anyone skulk around spying on her? No one other than that cowboy even knew she was here. He’d said his piece last night and had made amends today. She’d been perfectly honest about her reasons for being here.

As for the possibility of someone else keeping an eye on her, well, this wasn’t exactly a people watcher’s paradise. And it was too early for hunters to be combing the hills.

“There, see?” she exclaimed, marching back to her trailer, “You have an overactive imagination, Ms. Ryan. Get over it.”

The best way she knew to allay her fears was through physical labor. Rather than digging willy-nilly when she had no information about what to look for or where to search, Hayley elected to conduct a survey of the site. Gramps must have left, if not an open shaft, then at least test holes that might give her an idea of what he was after.

She loaded a day pack with a rock hammer and a cigar box divided into small compartments to serve as a collection box for specimens. She slapped together a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich and added sunglasses and a baseball cap to her stash, before she filled a canteen at the spring. Despite the growing heat, the water was cool and sweet.

“This water could be lifeblood to a rancher,” she said to no one. No one except two squirrels who frolicked on a nearby branch. Their presence, and the melodious trill of songbirds flitting about, dispelled the last of Hayley’s anxiety.

Who needed human companionship when there was all this wonderful wildlife to serve as company and an early-warning system? Hayley took a measure of assurance from the fact that birds squawked and squirrels fled at the mere sound of her footsteps.

She trudged through the trees, walking a blanket of pine needles. For a time she was more interested in the flora and fauna all around her than in settling down to look for test holes in the pockmarked granite hills. She climbed steadily for the better part of two hours before she came to a man-made depression in the facer rock. Bits of broken rock lay strewn about. Hayley paused to inspect the dynamited debris. Quartz and pyrite were all she found. Obviously her grandfather hadn’t wasted much time on this spot.

Hayley continued upward. Eventually the trail petered out and the going got tougher. She could tell that Ben hadn’t taken his search this high. But now that Hayley had climbed all the way up here, she wanted to examine her claim from the ridge a little above her. Even if getting there appeared more suited to mountain goats than humans.

She was winded by the time she reached the sheared-off granite table. The view was everything she’d anticipated. Spectacular hills and valleys stretched out on all four sides. The binoculars she’d found in Gramps’s trailer were old and one lens was scratched; however, they served her purpose and helped her pinpoint his dig sites.

Four were visible to the right and below her. All seemed to follow one deep arroyo. Shedding her backpack, Hayley dusted off a wide flat rock. She clambered onto it, then pulled out her sandwich and a pad and pencil. While she ate, she drew a rough map, sketching in significant trees and boulders and other pertinent features around the test holes, so she could find them again.

As she turned her attention farther afield, a splash of moving color caught her interest. Cattle. The undulations of rock-strewn arroyos were dotted with white-faced steers. Beyond them were square cultivated fields of hay. It seemed strange to see signs of human habitation interspersed with miles of palo verde, ocotillo, yucca and prickly pear. Near the edge of what Hayley judged to be her line of demarcation, were piles of volcanic rock, many with a green tint. Copper. Had her grandfather been drawn to this site by such blatant evidence of copper—before prices plummeted?

A horse and rider came into view over a grassy knoll. The glasses brought him to within seeming arm’s length of Hayley. Her breath did a funny hitch. Jacob Cooper. He, too, had field glasses raised to his face. For a moment Hayley had the oddest feeling that they were staring at each other. But no, Cooper’s head rotated downward. He’d zeroed in on a group of wandering steers. As she studied him, he dragged a pad from his shirt pocket, similar to the one fluttering on her lap. He withdrew a pencil from his pocket and made notations on his pad. Hayley watched until he returned the items to his pocket and let the binoculars swing free around his neck. He nudged the bay’s flanks, and as quickly as he’d appeared, he rode out of sight. The collie trotted complacently at his side.