Hellrakers by Paul Lederer

Author:Paul Lederer
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781480487543
Publisher: Open Road Media

SIX

The morning was bright with color spraying through the patchy clouds when Randy Staggs stepped out of the house. Kate had been up for an hour, starting a fire to take the chill off the stone house. He stepped off the porch and walked to the pole corral. Two of the horses there came to meet him and thrust their muzzles over the rails hopefully. The black backed away to the farthest corner of the pen, eyeing him with suspicion.

‘Not this morning,’ Randy muttered, unhooking the wire loop holding the gate shut. ‘I’m not in the mood for it.’

He was in fact planning to saddle the black horse and reluctantly ride west once more. The past few days had been lived as he would like to live them. Hot breakfast early in the morning, a solid day’s work on various projects around the ranch and a large, if not fancy dinner with Kate Lynch sitting across the table from him. All things must pass, he reminded himself, and this was the morning he must leave that comfortable life.

‘You are going to take this,’ he threatened the black, approaching it with bridle and bit in hand. The black tossed its head and trotted along the side rails of the corral, forcing Randy to trek after it, cursing beneath his breath.

‘You should have been riding him every day,’ Randy heard Kate say behind him. She was just slipping through the gate, the other two horses nuzzling her. ‘He’s going wild again. Such a beautiful animal, he is,’ she commented, moving toward the black which watched her approach with a sort of horse astonishment, its eyes rolling.

‘So beautiful,’ Kate said again as she reached the horse, which did not shy from her hand as she raised it to stroke its neck.

‘Watch it,’ Randy warned, ‘he bites.’

‘Why would he bite me?’ she answered. To the horse: ‘You wouldn’t bite me, would you, big boy?’ She stroked its muzzle and asked across her shoulder. ‘Do you mind if I ride him for a bit – just around the corral?’

‘If you can get this on him,’ Randy said, holding up the bridle.

‘Oh, I don’t need that for a short ride,’ she said and then, astonishing Randy, she gripped the black’s mane and swung aboard almost effortlessly. As he stood watching in amazement, she heeled the black and started it forward at an easy trot. There was no bucking, no biting, no reluctance to mind this rider on the black’s part.

They circled the pen twice and then Kate halted it in front of Randy Staggs, patting the horse’s neck. ‘He’s some animal,’ Kate said, slipping down from its glossy back.

Randy only muttered, ‘He sure is.’ He wasn’t sure if he was angry with the black or jealous of Kate’s horse skills. Maybe he had been right – the little dark-haired girl rode as if she were part Indian.

‘Want me to slip him the bit?’ she asked, smiling at Randy.

‘I’ll manage,’ he replied dourly.

‘Where are you going this morning?’ Kate asked, for they hadn’t discussed his departure.

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