Jenna Kernan - Hunter Moon

She extended an arm in invitation. He continued, walking the highway, scanning the ground.

“Do you think the police are done investigating up there?” she asked, indicating the site of the shooting. “I didn’t see any activity.”

“For the day, maybe. But I’m not poking around in their crime scene.”

Clay already had his eyes on the ground; she kept hers on the trees far above them, perhaps two miles away. For a shot you would need a scope and some luck to make the target. But still she held her rifle ready as she searched for more gunmen.

She followed behind him as he walked the highway. No one drove past. This road was too far from anything or anyone and was rarely used, except for today, of course.

Clay headed toward the pasture, and all the curious cows that had crowded the fence line fled in the opposite direction. She resisted the urge to count them.

He had already stepped through the fencing and stood lifting the upper strand of barbed wire to make her passage less difficult. Then he continued on, following some trail clear only to himself. She could see the routes the cows took along the fence line. She followed until he stopped and then glanced past him at the knee-high yellowing grass. The parallel tracks of a small vehicle were clear even to her.

“What the heck is that?” she said.

“ATV. Came from up there where the fence was cut. Saw the tracks this morning, but with the shooting, it slipped my mind until you showed up in my driveway. He rode down this way, in a circle, gathering your herd. Cattle tracked that way.” He pointed.

“He?” she said.

“Could be a she. Won’t know unless they get out of the vehicle.”

They walked a bit farther on. The grass was flat by the fence. She could imagine her cattle pressed up against the barbed wire.

“Stopped here and then headed that way.” He pointed back the way the vehicle had come.

“What was it doing on my land?” She had a sick feeling in her stomach as she looked at the grass flattened on both sides of the fence line. They’d exited there. But how?

Clay advanced to the fence and touched one of the wires. It fell, snagging the one below it and bringing that down, as well. Clay pointed to the splice, where someone had reconnected the cut line exactly beside one of the barbs using thin pieces of wire.

“You’ve been rustled,” said Clay.

“But they didn’t steal them.”

“No. Just drove them to the road and called the livestock manager so we’d come scoop up your cows.”

“Who made the call?”

“Don’t know. But you best ask and take a few photos of this. You got a phone that does that?”

She shook her head. Clay withdrew an older model smartphone and began photographing the line and the break and the one remaining patch. Then he photographed the pasture and, for good measure, took a short movie.

“That should do it.”

“I’m calling the cops again,” she muttered.

“Let’s check up top first.”

She nodded glumly. Then realized something and stopped.

“I can get my cows back. If someone cut the fences and drove them out, I shouldn’t have to pay the fine.”

“If you can prove it.”

“You just did.”

Now he looked glum.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said, continuing back the way they came, exiting through the broken fence and replacing the small bits of wire.

“Why didn’t they fix the upper one?” she asked pausing as Clay took more photos.

Clay tucked away his camera. “Don’t know. Maybe they ran out of time or someone saw them. Where were you this morning?”

Chapter Four

Izzie stilled at Clay’s accusation as heat flooded her face. Indignation rose with the pitch of her voice.

“You think I did this?”

“What? No! I just asked where you were.”

Now her face flamed with embarrassment.

“I don’t accuse folks of things, Izzie. That’s Gabe’s job.”

She touched his arm and felt his bicep flex beneath the worn cotton. “I’m sorry.”

He nodded his acceptance.

“I was with the ferrier. Biscuit and the other horses were getting their feet trimmed and teeth filed.”

“So the ferrier was here. I wonder who else knew you’d be with him.”

She started to compile a list in her mind. When she got to ten people she sighed and gave up. Clay trailed back out on to the road. Izzie went to her truck to grab some wire to fix the gaping hole.

“I wouldn’t do that until after they have a look. The police, I mean.”

Izzie wasn’t leaving a hole between two posts, so Clay helped her rig a temporary closure.

When they got back to the truck Clay got her door again. After she climbed up into the cab, he hesitated before closing the door.

“Somebody is after your herd, Izzie. You need to watch your back.”

Izzie met the concern in his gaze and tried to look brave. But inside her fears gobbled her up. Keeping the herd was hard. Keeping them while under attack...

She reached out and Clay took her hand. He gave a squeeze.

“Thank you for helping me.”

He flushed and released her, stepping back, closing the door. She watched him round the front of her truck.

She started the engine and waited as he climbed in. She was so darn lucky that he was a big enough man to put aside her snub and help her when she really needed him. Would she have done the same?

Izzie swallowed her uncertainty as these questions made her shift with discomfort.

The motor idled, and Clay glanced her way, his hat in his hands and brows raised in an unspoken question.

“I don’t know what I would have done if you didn’t agree to help me.”

His voice was quiet. Intimate. “I’ll always help you, Izzie.”

“Maybe we can be friends again.”

His brows lifted higher. “Is that what we are?”

Was he thinking of what she had been? How could you ever be friends after you loved someone? Was it even possible to mend the fences cut between them?

“We could be,” she whispered.

Clay faced forward and said nothing as she drove them up the hill.

“There is cell service at the top of the mountain here. I can call the police from up there.” She hoped the gunmen and the police were gone. Really, she wanted nothing more than to wake up and find this day was all a nightmare. But then she looked at Clay sitting beside her again and wondered if it was all worth it just for these few minutes together.

At the top of the pasture, she turned onto the improved road. The sun shone through the tall pines to the west in flashing bands of brilliance, but it was starting to go down now. Clay directed her where to park and then exited the truck. Izzie followed, just as she always had. What would he do if he knew the reason she’d dated Martin? Would he be flattered or angry?

It had been a stupid, childish idea, and it had blown up in her face.

The entire episode was embarrassing. Funny that Martin had charmed her mother into believing he was a good guy. A good Christian boy, Carol Nosie had called him. He’d fooled a lot of folks with his manners. But she’d known what he was, and she’d still agreed to go out with him, for a while.

She could see nothing on the gravel that Clay studied, so she watched him, enjoying the way the light gilded his skin and the stretch of denim and cotton as he stooped and rose.

On the gravel road the rocks crunched beneath his feet. He walked slowly, his eyes scanning back and forth. At last they reached the wide bulldozed stretch that had been muddy the last time she’d been up here but now was packed earth. Clay made a sound in his throat, and Izzie wanted to ask him what he saw, but she cultivated patience. He walked back and forth, ventured into the woods, knelt a few times, lifted a stone, and examined a branch. The only thing Izzie saw for sure were the prints of her cattle that had made it up this far. She tried to count the number of cows, but they circled back on themselves, so she gave up.