Home on the Ranch: Wyoming Cowboy Ranger

by Rebecca Winters

  “We’ve learned the butts were only a week or two old, and we have saliva samples to provide DNA. All the butts came from the same person. It turns out they were Captain Black cigarillos, not something most people smoke here in Wyoming.”

  Porter blinked. “I know that brand.”

  “I’ve never seen you smoke.”

  “I don’t, but when I was back in New York, I worked with a female ranger who planned to buy some Captain Black cigarillos for her brother for Christmas. Odd how that memory has stuck with me.”

  Holden leaned back in his chair. “Not odd if she was the special woman in your life you can’t forget.” His dark eyebrows lifted. “Is she the reason you’re still single? I don’t mean to pry, but I have wondered. Anytime you want to talk about it, I’m available.”

  No one had a better friend than Porter did in Holden. “I know you’ve had questions. How much time do you have?”

  “I’m off duty and we’re alone.”

  Porter looked around, realizing there’d never be a better moment. “I’ll start at the beginning. A year before I was transferred out here, there was a female ranger with the forest service in the Adirondacks.

  “She’d been working three years in other regions, but because of problems with her male coworkers I was never told about, she’d been transferred to various units before coming to mine in the Adirondacks High Peaks.”

  “What time period was that?” Holden asked.

  “Let me think. I’ve been out here in Wyoming a year. She’d been assigned to my unit in November prior to my leaving New York the next June, so I knew her about six months in all.”

  “What was her name?”

  “Melissa Reiver,” Porter replied. “She was a good-looking woman, maybe five foot three, long dark hair, brown eyes, an expert marksman.” A shiver of revulsion shot down Porter’s back when he thought about what she’d done to him.

  “That’s it?” He smiled. “Come on, man, you can’t leave me hanging.”

  Porter sucked in his breath. It was time to tell his friend why Porter had been immediately hired by the forest service here in Wyoming.

  “What I’m about to reveal is something no else knows about except for my boss, Stan. There’s a reason I’ve kept the details of my arrival in Wyoming a secret from everyone, even from you and the guys. You see, my former boss, Martin Kroger, put my case under seal for everyone’s protection, particularly mine.”

  “Case?” Holden’s smile faded and he studied him hard. “This sounds serious.”

  “Very.” He took a deep breath. “You want to know the reason why I’m here? From the moment she arrived, Melissa did everything but stand on her head to get my attention. I had to train her for the first month, but her desire to be alone with me became so obvious, I was suspicious. I knew there was something wrong with her from the start.”

  He hesitated for a moment. “I’m afraid it’s a long story.”

  “I’m listening. Go on.”

  “I kept avoiding her the best I could. Finally, I put in a transfer application in order to get away from her without pointing to her as the reason. In the meantime, I had to keep doing my job waiting for my transfer to go through.

  “One night in January, there were three of us snowed in. Ranger Archuleta, a good man, had already gone to his pup tent. We each had one. Melissa used the excuse that she was frightened so I’d sleep in her tent with her.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me!” Holden exclaimed.

  “Nope. I knew what she was trying to do and had it out with her. I told her that she should get assigned to another sector ASAP or I’d report her. She shouted several profanities at me before crawling in her tent alone. To my relief, the next thing I knew she was gone from my area.”

  “Thank heaven.”

  “I didn’t hear about her again until my boss Martin told me to come in to headquarters. I thought it was about my transfer request and I planned to tell him I’d changed my mind.

  “To my shock he asked me if I’d had relations with Ranger Reiver the night of the snowstorm. You can imagine my reaction.”

  Holden nodded. “I know I would have exploded.”

  “I almost did. I let him know under no uncertain terms how uninterested I’d ever been in her. Of course, I knew the rules against employees getting involved and I would never have broken them. Anything like that was grounds for dismissal.

  “Martin looked at me for a long moment and said, ‘Ranger Reiver came to my office yesterday claiming she’s pregnant with your baby.’”

  “Holy hell—” Holden blurted.

  “She told Martin that her doctor had said she’d have to go on maternity leave by August at the latest and she was giving me a chance to own up to my responsibility.”

  Holden just sat there, shaking his head.

  “Of course, I denied everything. I knew it couldn’t be my baby, but if there was one, a paternity test would prove I wasn’t the father.”

  “Did you have to take the test?”

  “No. Thank God, Martin believed me, but asked if I knew of a compelling reason why Melissa wanted to get me into that kind of trouble. I had to conclude that this was her revenge on me for rejecting her. She had to know it would put me in the worst possible light and could cost me my job. At that point I told Martin I believed she was seriously unstable.

  “He agreed and said he now understood why I’d put in a transfer several months earlier, but he chastised me for not reporting her behavior at that time.”

  Holden nodded in agreement. “You should have, Porter.”

  “I realize that now, but I didn’t like doing that to her if I didn’t have to.”

  “In your case trying to be a gentleman didn’t help you,” his friend reminded him.

  A muscle ticked in Porter’s jaw. “You’re not kidding. To my everlasting gratitude, Martin arranged with Stan to transfer me here to Wyoming, far from her reach. I flew out here the next day.”

  “That was lucky for us.”

  “For me, too,” Porter said. “Martin started an investigation and kept me informed.”

  “Did he dig up any dirt?”

  “Heck yeah. He discovered that for the three years Melissa had worked for the forest service prior to coming to the High Peaks, she’d been transferred four times for hitting on some of her male coworkers in order to be alone with them. That told us both she’d exhibited a pattern of disturbing behavior that had gone on for years.”

  “Well, as you said, something was clearly very wrong with that woman,” Holden said.

  “Last August he phoned to tell me the results of the official inquiry. They proved she wasn’t pregnant and had been lying the whole time she’d been with the forest service. The powers that be fired her without the chance of being hired again, and they stripped her of her pension because of the seriousness of the charges.”

  “Well, at least she got what was coming to her.”

  “I suppose, but the damage had already been done,” he said. “She’d lied under oath and caused me to leave a job I loved with the forest service.” He slanted a glance the other man’s way. “So now you know the whole sordid story of the ‘special woman’ in my life. Ranger Reiver wasn’t only unstable and vindictive, she was dangerous.”

  Holden let out a whistle. “She could very well be behind what happened to you here in order to carry out her revenge.”

  Porter took a deep breath. “I suppose it’s possible.”

  “I need to talk to your Commissioner Kroger and ask him to send me a photo of her to be distributed.”

  “He’ll cooperate, but it seems a stretch, Holden. It happened in another part of the country and was a long time ago.”

  “Not that long, Porter,” he said solemnly. “Remember Jessica’s story? The man who was ultimately responsible for her husband’s death was bid
ing his time waiting for her since high school. Even after his death, the lowlife didn’t make his move until recently and had been planning her kidnapping. When they go mental like that, there’s no telling what they’re capable of.”

  Porter hissed out a breath. “You’re right. There was something strange about Melissa from the start.”

  “This culprit could be a hired gun for her.”

  “Maybe he’s a boyfriend,” he interjected, “but I don’t see how she could know I’m here, of all places.”

  Holden leaned forward. “Tell me what happened after you left Martin’s office that morning. Go step by step.” Holden wasn’t a great detective for nothing.

  “His assistant, Ranger Michael Denny, drove me and my rig to a car rental in Lake Placid and dropped me off. I drove to the family home. My mother had rented it, and I went over there in order to get some of my belongings from the basement. I was there about an hour, then I drove to the airport in New York that very day and dropped off the rental car.”

  Holden’s eyes gleamed with interest. “Do you think Melissa had been hanging around afterward, stalking you? Maybe she saw you at headquarters. Do you think she might have questioned the ranger who drove you to Lake Placid? Or is it possible she followed you there?”

  “I guess anything could have happened.”

  Holden grimaced. “I want to talk to Ranger Denny as well as Martin. Her fury must have been severe when she discovered you’d disappeared from sight within a day. No doubt her fantasies had included marrying you and having your child. It’s been a year since you left. Since her firing and loss of pension, she could have been making other kinds of plans for you.”

  “I don’t doubt that, but if there is a connection to her and the culprit here, I’m still amazed she could have found out where I was sent. The commissioner put everyone in his employ under strict orders to say nothing about me or they’d be fired.”

  “Did Melissa know where you lived in New York?” Holden asked.

  “I never had conversations like that with her,” he replied. “However, a lot of people knew the Ewing home was in Lake Placid because my father was a legend around there. He’d worked for the forest service for years before I joined.”

  “But you said you sold the home in order to buy your ranch here.”

  “Yes, but not for a few months.”

  “Maybe she tracked you to Lake Placid hoping to find you home and ended up talking to the renters.” Holden leaned back in his seat, and laced his fingers behind his head. “What information did they have on you?”

  Porter let out a sound of self-disgust. “I was in such a hurry and so angry, I wasn’t thinking except to get away as soon as possible. Before I left in the rental car, I wrote down my new address of the barracks here in Whitebark and asked them to ship the rest of my belongings.”

  Holden nodded. “If she did approach them, then they would probably have told her what she wanted to know, thinking she was your girlfriend or something.”

  Hell.

  “What are the names of the renters?”

  “The Elkins. They moved out when the house was sold. I don’t know where they live now, but I can find out.”

  “We’ll locate them if you give me all the information you’ve got on them,” Holden said.

  “I’ve papers at the ranch and will fax them to you the second I get home.”

  “Sounds good,” he murmured. “And as soon as the commissioner sends me a photo of her, I’d like to send it to the renters and have a talk. Let’s hope they can tell us if a woman under an assumed name or disguise who resembled her came looking for you wanting a forwarding address. It’s worth pursuing.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Porter agreed. “When I look back on it, I wouldn’t put anything past that woman. If she was that bent on destroying me, she could definitely have talked to them, then hired someone to come looking for me wanting revenge when I least expected it.” He exhaled roughly. “So far you’ve gotten no feedback from the criminal data base after testing the cigarette butts?”

  “That’s correct. But the second I know, I’ll tell you.”

  One recurring thought nagged at Porter. “When Melissa told me about wanting to buy those cigarillos for her brother, I didn’t know she even had one and—”

  “Porter—” Holden said, cutting him off. “Maybe the culprit is her brother.”

  He stared at the other man. “I suppose it’s possible, but there have to be thousands of people who buy that brand.”

  “Well, I’m going to find out! I’m running those prints through the database again, but this time I’ll add the name Reiver and see what comes up.”

  “That’s a long shot,” Porter said.

  “It’s usually the one that works.” He finished off his shake. “How soon before you’re back in the saddle?”

  For the next few minutes Porter told him what would be happening.

  “A Trotter, huh?”

  “Yup. I’m going to try one and see how it feels.”

  “Why not? Cole’s a convert.” He collected his trash and got to his feet. “I wish you luck, buddy, and thanks for the sandwich. Now I’d better get home and let you get back to work.”

  Porter flashed him a smile. “Thanks for the company and the shake. When I get a clean bill of health, I’ll be helping you on the manhunt if that deadbeat still hasn’t been caught.” That day couldn’t come soon enough for several reasons.

  “I’m counting on it.”

  * * *

  Porter kept busy in the office and managed to fill his time until late Friday afternoon, when Helen picked him up from headquarters. Being careful, he climbed in front with her and they left for the Owens ranch, three miles away.

  “Lily says you’ve been out there before.”

  “A few times to deliver and pick up patients. If you think she’s a great therapist, you haven’t seen anything until you see her helping folks get back in the saddle again. She’s an expert equestrian.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me.” He recalled Lily telling him that her grandmother had taught her how to ride. She’d also divulged that her grandfather had been a big hunter.

  Soon they came to the entrance with a sign hanging below the antler archway. Owens Ranch. Missouri Fox Trotters sold here.

  His gaze went to the idyllic two-story ranch house set back in the trees, with a well-kept lawn and flowers. Helen drove them past the tree-lined drive of elms and poplars to the rear of the house. From there it opened up to a cluster of outbuildings and equipment, a barn, a covered corral and two other open corrals, all in perfect condition.

  Helen wound around farther to a grassy paddock, where he saw Lily in a white Stetson holding the reins of two saddled Trotters. His focus on her blotted everything else from his mind.

  He’d never seen her without her lab coat. This evening she wore jeans with cowboy boots and a tan Western shirt with fringe. The shape of her curvaceous body took his breath away.

  “Porter? Are you all right?” Helen had come around to help him out of the car.

  “Yes. I was just looking at the...chestnut she’s holding. That’s a beautiful horse.” For that matter, so was the pinto. Not until then did he notice a wooden three-legged stool placed next to the chestnut. Porter grimaced. He really was a baby to need that to get on a horse, but would go along with it this once.

  Helen stood by as he got out of the car the way she’d shown him. “Thanks for the ride.”

  “I’ll be back in an hour.” He heard her shut the door.

  Much as he wanted to tell her to show up much later, he held back and walked carefully toward Lily. She glanced at him beneath the brim of her cowboy hat. “Right on time, Ranger, and proceeding with caution I see.”

  “I’ve been counting the minutes until I could get back on a horse.”

  “I know th
at. So come on over and meet Dash.”

  Porter chuckled. “I like the name.”

  “I’ve told him all about you. He’s a four-year-old gelding who’s eager to belong to someone who really knows how to ride. Out of all our horses, Dash would be the perfect fit for you in size and temperament. He loves the mountains and has the sweetest disposition under pressure.”

  He walked over to the pinto first and patted her hind end. “What’s this one’s name?”

  “Trixie. She’s my mare. The best horse I ever owned.” Lily smiled up at him. “It’s nice to see you on your feet and walking almost normally. You weren’t in the best shape when you were brought in to the hospital.”

  His lips twisted in amusement. “Tell me about it.”

  “Let’s get you started. This isn’t so different from climbing on the table. I’ll hold the reins while you grip the pommel and get on the stool. Don’t worry about Dash. He’ll remain steady.”

  Her phenomenal faith in the chestnut horse gave him confidence and he did her bidding. The stool made all the difference to reduce the strain.

  “Now put your left foot in the stirrup. When you’re ready and have thought out the movement, carefully move your right leg to get in the saddle. I want to know if you feel any pain. All right?”

  “Got it.” After visualizing the motion, he took care as he lifted his leg and sat down in the saddle.

  She looked up at him with concern in those gorgeous violet eyes. “What’s the verdict?”

  “I expected to feel pain, but it didn’t come, only a twinge.”

  “Nothing worse?” she prodded.

  He shook his head. “No. I’m fine now that I’m sitting.”

  “Then so far so good.”

  “After my accident that night in the mountains, I couldn’t have imagined being on a horse again.”

  “You’re making a marvelous recovery.” She handed him the reins and moved the stool out of the way. Then she mounted her pinto in a fluid movement that revealed years of experience. “We’ll simply ride around the paddock with no sudden turns. This will give Dash time to get used to you, too.”