Chapter 1
San Joaquin Valley, California, Spring 1883
I thought I was well on my way to outgrowing my penchant for finding trouble. Not so. Ever since Levi showed up at the ranch a month ago, I’ve discovered that keeping him out of trouble usually backfires and plunges us both smack dab into the middle of a muddle.
Fourteen-year-old Andrea Carter scanned the miles of gullies and scrub-dotted rifts cutting the Sierra foothills and grunted. “Where’s that boy got to now?” Not for the first time this month, Andi was glad she had older brothers. Younger ones were too much trouble. Levi wasn’t her brother, but her sister Kate’s son was close enough in age to pester Andi like a little brother might.
Or to get lost?
Her heart skipped at the thought. “Levi!” she hollered for the third time, shading her eyes against the sunshine. “What’s taking you so long? Are you lost back there?”
Surely not. The valley was only a mile long and maybe a quarter mile wide, with only one way in or out. Andi sat on Taffy, her palomino mare, near the main trail. The April sun blazed hot and bright, and the brushy thickets lining the creek bottom offered little in the way of shade. The gully did, however, abound with countless hidey-holes for cows and their new calves.
It also held a boy who didn’t know as much about being a cowboy as he thought he did.
Anxious to be included in the spring roundup, Andi had offered to help out on Saturdays, promising she’d do anything her brothers asked. Chad had snapped up her offer quicker than a frog after a fly. “Sure, little sister. You and Levi can scout around the draws and root out stragglers. I want to get the last of the calves branded before the drive.”
The cattle drive. Andi chewed her lower lip and slumped in the saddle. She had always wanted to go along on a real dust-in-your-face, gone-for-weeks, eat-on-the-trail cattle drive. With at least two thousand cattle. But no matter how often Andi begged, cajoled, and pleaded, Mother and her brothers said no.
This year will be different, she vowed. I’m not a little girl anymore. I don’t have to be looked after. Andi would convince her family she was well able to take care of herself, and also help take care of her family’s interests.
She set her jaw in a stubborn line. Mother might as well get used to the fact that Andi was not like her sister Melinda. Ladies’ Aid Society meetings and helping out at the orphanage—or finding a beau—were not what Andi wanted to do when she finished school. She wanted to help run the ranch.
Andi shook herself free of her musings. “I better get my head out of the clouds and back to business.” She hiked up in her stirrups and hollered, “Levi!”
Levi yahooed his reply from deep inside the canyon, and Andi rolled her eyes. He must have found a cow and her calf. Now, if he would only remember to take it slow and easy, to drive the cow gently and not chase her like he was going after a wild mustang. “Then maybe we can bring them in before sundown,” Andi muttered.
She glanced over her shoulder, where a couple dozen shorthorns and their unbranded calves rested in the shade of an oak grove a hundred yards away. They chewed their cuds and swished their tails, while their babies frolicked or napped. Andi had cleared the last of them from their hiding places twenty minutes ago without her horse breaking a sweat. The mamas had plodded ahead of Taffy and settled right down with the rest of Andi’s little herd.
Too bad Chad and Mitch can’t see me in action. Andi smirked. They’d have to admit she and Taffy were easier on Circle C cattle than some of the rough cowhands. And she always knew where the cows with new calves were hiding.
The thought of her brothers turned Andi’s gaze toward the rest of the rounded-up herd. Half a mile away, a wisp of smoke from the branding fire rose into the afternoon sky. Hundreds of cattle milled around in temporary corrals, a dark, lowing smudge against the pale-green foothills.
Andi gritted her teeth. Spring roundup was nearly over, and she’d only helped for three Saturdays. Chad had told her she could brand the calves she brought in today, but now the afternoon was slipping away. She sat astride Taffy waiting for slowpoke Levi, who acted like he didn’t know one end of a cow from—
“Levi!” she shouted. “I’m taking my cows to the fire. You can come along when you’ve a mind to.”
Levi didn’t answer. He’d either lost his catch and was backtracking up the draw to try again, or he was out of earshot. “It’s not like I haven’t taught him how to flush strays,” she told Taffy. “You’d think he’d—”
A yell loud enough to be heard clear back at the ranch house erupted from the narrow canyon. A large brindle cow burst into view. She splashed across the creek with a days-old calf tight at her flank. Bawling, she threw her head. And no wonder. A rope was looped around one horn.
Levi gripped the other end. “Help!”
Andi jabbed her heels into Taffy’s sides and raced toward her nephew. “Let go!” she screamed.
No response. The cow barreled past, dragging Levi along the ground. He was soaking wet, his face set in a look of grim determination mixed with terror. Each time the cow tossed her head, Levi left the ground then landed hard, to be towed farther along.
Horror slammed into Andi, making her gasp. Levi was clutching the rope with both hands, but a good portion of it had somehow entangled itself around one arm. He couldn’t free himself, and he dared not loosen his grip. His arm could be torn from its socket.
Just then the spooked cow turned and headed straight for the small herd Andi had spent the last three hours rounding up. They rose and scattered, bellowing their fright. Calves bawled. In no time, most of the cattle had vanished right back into the little canyon. The brindle cow whirled and followed.
Levi shrieked his fear and pain. “Andi! Help!”
In a heartbeat, Andi swiveled her horse and snagged her catch rope. Taffy knew what to do. She edged close to the runaway while Andi circled her lasso. Please, God, she prayed as she twirled, I’ve got to get her on the first throw. No time for second tries. If the cow made it back into the draw, Levi might be dragged a full mile through the underbrush and rocky creek bed.
The rope settled neatly over the cow’s head, and Andi yanked. The loop tightened. She dallied the rope around the saddle horn, dropped the reins, and clutched the roped horn with both hands.
Taffy stepped back and planted her feet. The catch rope went taut, and mama cow jerked to a bone-jarring stop. Her weight wrenched Andi’s rope harder than expected, throwing the mare off balance.
Andi lost her grip on the saddle horn and flipped over Taffy’s rump. Oof! She landed hard on the ground with the wind knocked out of her. Her heart thudded. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe.
The world spun. Andi lay still, gasping for breath. Except for the roaring in her ears and the distant mooing of distraught cows scurrying back up the draw, all was still.
Andi lifted her head a minute later when she could finally take a deep breath. Less than twenty feet away, the big brindle cow stood quietly near Taffy, who kept the catch rope taut and waited for instructions. The calf was nursing.
Mama cow turned her head and looked at Andi as if to say, Now what? Levi’s rope hung down from one horn and trailed a little way along the ground, ending where a crumpled bulge of brown and blue lay sprawled in the grass.
“Levi!” Andi pushed herself to her hands and knees and crawled over to her nephew. Anger flared. She shook his shoulder. “What were you doing? I’ve told you a dozen times! You’re supposed to find the cows then let Patches take over. Slow and easy. Your horse knows what to do.” She looked around. “Where is he, anyway?”
Levi sniffled and sat up. The rope, now limp, unwrapped easily from his arm. He tossed it aside, and Andi noticed rope burns on his hands. She winced. They probably burned like fire. Where were his gloves?
“I left Patches in the draw,” he confessed. “That dumb ol’ cow”—he jerked his chin toward the brindle—“was far back in a thicket. I couldn’t get her to budge, no matter what. So I got the rope from Patches and figured I’d—”
“You figured wrong,” Andi snapped. She looked around at the empty spot under the oak trees, and her heart sank clear to her dusty boots. “All my hard work today is gone.” She whirled, ready to give Levi another piece of her mind. He had it coming.
Levi hung his head. “I’m sorry.”
Andi’s temper cooled. A few years ago, her unruly nephew would have responded by lighting into her with both fists. He’d clearly grown up some. Right now, he looked beat up. A gash ran across his forehead, dripping blood. His cheeks were grass-stained and crusted with mud. One eye had begun to swell. Andi marveled that he was still in one piece.
“Are you all right?” she asked in a kinder tone. “Anything broken?”
“I don’t think so. Just banged up.” Levi staggered to his feet with only a little help from Andi. “But I bet I really feel sore tomorrow.” He brushed the dirt clods from his britches and looked at her with dark-brown, pleading eyes. “You won’t tell Uncle Chad, will you?”
Andi shook her head. “No.” She didn’t add that Chad would have no trouble figuring it out for himself. It would be mighty hard to cover up this botched job. During each of the past two Saturdays, Andi and Levi had brought in a couple dozen cows and their calves for branding. There was hardly time left in the afternoon to make it up now. Chad probably already wondered where today’s quota was.
“Ranch work is harder than I thought,” Levi muttered. He kicked at the ground.
“It takes time,” Andi reassured him. She didn’t have to look down to talk to her nephew. Levi had shot up the past year and matched Andi in height. He probably outweighed her now too. Last month when Kate brought him to the ranch, Levi had been a tall, scraggly-thin scarecrow. A chronic winter cough due to the damp San Francisco air had robbed the twelve-year-old of his energy and appetite.
In no time, the dry, valley climate had cured Levi’s cough and restored his health. He followed his uncles everywhere, pestering them to teach him to be a cowhand. Levi worked hard, but apart from the fact he could ride like the wind, most other ranch skills eluded him.
He’s a hopeless greenhorn, Andi admitted with a sigh. It was probably the reason Chad saddled her with Levi whenever they weren’t in school. “Come on,” she said. “We’d best find Patches and round up those . . .” She paused and frowned.
Not far away, a rider on a large, black horse galloped toward them from the direction of the temporary pens and branding fire. Andi shaded her eyes. It wasn’t Chad—thank goodness. His horse, Sky, was a showy buckskin.
Andi wasn’t ready to face her brother with the news that her little herd had scattered. She’d rather work double time to salvage as many of the cows and calves as she could. They couldn’t have strayed far into the canyon. She saw a few drinking at the creek.
The rider drew closer, and Andi groaned. Uh-oh.
It was worse than Chad.