Claire McEwen - Wild Horses

“I just don’t get it.” She was casting around in her mind for solutions. As if she could, tonight, solve a problem he’d apparently been working on for a while now. “There has to be a way to help them, legally.”

“If there is, I couldn’t find it. And even if the DRM makes better rules eventually, these horses would still suffer. I’m truly sorry that you got caught up in our plan. But can you understand that sometimes you have to do a little bad to make something good happen?”

“In theory.” It was all she could say to reassure him. How many times had she listened to her dad’s excuses for his criminal behavior? There was always someone who wouldn’t give him a break, a deal that was too good to be true—one excuse after another for stealing, and conning and dealing.

“Will you keep my secret?” He leaned forward, elbows on the table. Negotiating now for his safety. For her silence.

“That you’re a horse thief?”

“Or a horse liberator,” he smiled faintly.

“Semantics.” She couldn’t let him off the hook.

Todd studied her for a moment, as if pondering how to respond. “We always had this thing, you know. This banter. This way of talking. I’ve missed it.”

She stared at him, trying to figure out if he was serious or if he was only trying to make her feel special so she’d keep quiet about the horses. “We’re bantering? I’m pretty sure we’re disagreeing.”

But he was right. They did have a connection. And she’d loved it. Because she was usually shy and serious, and for some reason he was the only person she’d been witty with. The only person who’d brought that out in her.

“Maybe it can still be our thing.”

Warning sirens, flashing lights and stop signs filled her mind. He was throwing out these offers of connection like candy. But he was a stranger to her now. “Whoa, cowboy, there is no our. No thing.”

“If you say so.”

The cocky demeanor really did suit him. But he was wielding it like a hypnotist with a watch. “I know why you’re doing this.”

“Doing what?”

“Reminiscing. Reminding me about all the good stuff in our relationship—a relationship that you happily walked away from.”

“You could have come with me,” he said softly, leaning back, looking at her squarely. “I wanted you to.”

“And I couldn’t.” Her stomach was in knots, her brain almost hurting from trying to figure out his motive. “Please don’t bring up all this old stuff. Don’t use our past to get what you want now. I won’t say anything about last night.”

He looked relieved. “Thank you.”

“But I hate that I’m a part of your deception. By asking me to keep quiet about what you did, you make me a part of your illegal activities.”

He nodded. “I get it. And I appreciate your help.”

They sat in silence for a few moments. Then Todd leaned forward. “Tell me what you were doing out there.” He took a sip of his beer, and his gaze on her was as intense as she’d remembered it.

She forced herself to remember that this was just a onetime drink. A conversation—nothing more. “You won’t like it. I’m working for the government, for the Department of Range Management.”

“So that’s why you were at the station. I couldn’t figure it out.”

Nora couldn’t help a wry smile. “Must have been like seeing the Ghost of Relationships Past.”

“It was pretty shocking.”

She took a deep breath and said the last words he’d want to hear. “I was hired to do a study on the impact of wild horses on native plant populations.”

He flinched, just as she’d expected. “And I take it the impact isn’t exactly positive?”

“I’ve only been working on it for a few weeks. But from what I’ve seen so far, that’s putting it mildly.”

“But you know the reasons the land is so overgrazed, right?” Todd leaned forward eagerly and in an instant he was the idealistic boy she’d known in college. Time seemed to jump back years again.

Nora caught her breath, momentarily disoriented. “I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“There are too many horses for the land provided. But that’s because the government is opening up all their grazing lands for fracking, for cattle, for minerals. So the mustangs have been crammed into a smaller space than can sustain them, and of course the native plants suffer. All the plants do. If we’d give them back their range, you wouldn’t see these kinds of impacts.”

“Well, sadly, I’m not able to give back their land. And, frankly, there won’t be too many native plants left if we keep the horses at the current population.”

“But the horses aren’t the real problem.”

She glared at him. “Todd, I know all this. But the fact is, at this time, the DRM has a certain amount of land allotted for the horses. And the native plants on that land are being destroyed. My job is to go in and study the damage. Once my study is finished, the department will use the data to figure out how many horses can be allowed to roam free.”

“And you didn’t feel bad signing on to this study knowing it’s based on a false premise? Because they’ve already taken away the horses’ normal rangeland?”

She bristled. “I was hired to do a study on their current range, and I’m doing that study.”

His voice was tinged with bitterness. “You never could get out of that scientific side of your head, could you? It’s all data and facts with you.”

“It’s not just that,” she protested.

“Well, what is it? The money?”

Nora’s stomach did a sticky, nauseating flip. “You didn’t just say that.” At least her rising outrage steadied her voice. “Some things never change.”

“What are you talking about?” Todd looked genuinely confused.

Was it really possible that he was this dense? “You have no right to judge me.”

“I’m not judging. I just think you’re working for the wrong side on this issue.”

The words were spinning like a tornado in her head, there were so many she wanted to throw at him. “How’s your family, Todd?” she spat out.

His eyes went wide. “What does my family have to do with anything?”

“Because they’re wealthy. You’re wealthy. And you sit there, safe in the lap of your moneyed family, and you judge people like me. People who need to have a regular job.”

“I’m not—”

She cut him off, spewing words that she’d wanted to say years ago. Back then she hadn’t had the courage. “Has it ever occurred to you that some of us need steady work to make a living? Or that jobs for a plant biologist aren’t easy to find? We don’t all have enough money in our trust funds to run off and work for free in the rain forest.”

Nora stood up, feeling shaky and sick. She shouldn’t have come here, shouldn’t have thought she’d have the self-control to keep the past in the past.

Understanding dawned in Todd’s eyes. But she didn’t want to hear his reasons why she was wrong. Or to feel the weight of his judgment for one more second. “I need to go. I’ve got to work early. To get some more of that money I’m in it for. Thanks for the drink.”

“Nora, hang on.” He stood up, too, leaned a little across the table with his hand out, palm open, as if pleading for her to stay.

“No.” She took a deep breath and forced herself to look right at him and end this conversation for good. “Look. It’s a strange coincidence that we ran into each other like we did, and that we’re in the same town. But that doesn’t mean we have to be friends. Let’s just agree to be polite and we’ll both be fine. I won’t be in Benson forever anyway.”

“But...”

“I’ll see you around, Todd.” There was all that old anguish in her—burning deep and low—that she didn’t want to feel and, most of all, didn’t want him to see.