At Whit's End (Wells Ranch, #4)(7)

“Betty is a high-class lady. Kibble isn’t enough for her.” I lean forward in my saddle, adjusting the way my straw hat sits to cut the glare of mid-morning sun. “The puppuccinos add up fast.”

Red raises an eyebrow and stares at me, saying everything and nothing.

“She likes a special little treat after a long, hard day, so she gets a puppuccino—a little whipped cream swirled in a coffee cup with a bone-shaped biscuit on top.”

Without a word, he nudges the side of his mare to walk away.

Betty bounds ahead, nipping at the back leg of a stray heifer to encourage it toward the rest of the herd, and glances over her shoulder as if expecting instruction from me. We both know she doesn’t need it. We’ve practiced the basic commands, but between natural instinct and years of experience, we rarely use them.

Under the summer skies, on a ranch so sprawling I’ll likely never step foot on every piece of it, I lick my dry lips and watch other guys move Austin’s preselected cattle into a pen. My calluses catch on the looped rope in my hand, while I stare down a particularly ornery pair of steers holding firm ground as Betty barks and nips at their noses. Before I can get to them, Betty forces them through the gate and comes happily trotting back.

“You could at least pretend I’m in charge,” I call to her.

With the clang of the closing gate, Betty flops onto a shady patch of grass underneath the cattle-hauling trailer. Backdropped by a clear blue sky, the ground radiates visible heat waves—this time of year, we won’t start loading until sundown. Then the semi truck will haul the cattle the next province over in the cool cloak of night.

Right when other ranch hands start making plans for a quick dip in the shallow, man-made wading pool by the river, my phone chimes with a ringtone belonging to one of my bosses. Wells Ranch is run by three brothers, plus Red, and somehow I’ve gotta answer to all of them. In the few years I’ve been here, I’ve worked my way up the food chain. I like to think the only reason they haven’t given me an official title is because they don’t need five bosses. Honestly, four feels like too many most days.

Shifting in my saddle, I tug my phone from the leather holster on my belt. The middle-aged-dad-style phone holder looks dumb as hell, but after breaking three phones while trying to chase after cattle with it in my pocket, I needed a solution.


Denny: Need you to go pick something up for me.

Colt: Right now? What is it?

Denny: A 10-year-old up in Wells Canyon. Bring him to the ranch and give him some chores to do.

Colt: That sounds like a crime.

Denny: Don’t make it creepy, and you’ll be fine. It’s Blair’s nephew.

My knowledge of how to take care of kids extends as far as the goat kids I raised in 4-H. Turns out, I can bottle-feed like a son of a gun. By the time I was done, I earned enough money to buy a little tin fishing boat when I sold them at auction. Pretty sure none of my vague goat knowledge is going to help me here, though.


Colt: He doesn’t need a car seat?

Denny: He’s 10…so, no.

Denny: Get him mucking stalls or something.



* * *



? ? ?

Betty’s head hangs out the open passenger window, tongue lolling and lapping up summer air for the entire drive into Wells Canyon.

Main Street is lined with quaint flower boxes, and overflowing floral baskets hang from the small handful of street lamps. Despite the normal population of Wells Canyon being only a few thousand full-time residents, we always seem to acquire a lot of tourists during the summer months. And a sunny, hot Friday in July? The tiny downtown is swarming with them.

I slow to let a family of four cross the road, giant ice cream cones in hand. I’d planned on stopping at the café for an iced coffee—and the promised puppuccino—but between the RVs and the motorcycles, there isn’t an available parking spot in sight.

Whether she sees or smells the café first, Betty barks: shrill and pointed, glancing over her shoulder as she begins to froth at the mouth in anticipation.

“No treats right now, Betty Spaghetti. We’ll circle back after we pick up this kid.”

When I turn off Main Street, the out-of-towners dissipate quickly, and soon I’m parked in front of a white Craftsman home. I glance at my phone to confirm I have the right address and leave the truck running for Betty.

It’s hotter than a witch’s tit outside, so I grab the hem of my shirt and wiggle it to encourage a breeze up my back on my walk to the front steps. My knuckles rap against the black door, doing my best to minimize contact with the scorching hot surface.

Then I wait. Knock again. Wait.

There’s a commotion happening inside, and if I weren’t apprehensive about pissing off Denny, I’d be hightailing it out of here. A feminine voice shouts something I can’t quite make out. She grows louder, though the words are still indistinguishable, right before the front door swings open.

“Hi,” she says with an exasperated sigh. “You must be Colt?”

The woman clutches the door’s edge like it’s the singular thing holding her up. Tall and pretty, there’s no doubt she’s Blair’s sister, with the same brown hair and fair complexion. But she seems harsher than Blair—dressed in a fitted black suit, with a sullen expression twisting the corner of her mouth into a slight frown.

Must be going to a funeral. That’s why she needs a babysitter.