Dark Sunshine

by Terri Farley

  Brynna might get the wrong idea.

  When Gram called from the porch that dinner was ready, Sam felt relieved. Dad would return to acting normal as soon as they sat around the kitchen table.

  “Slip on out,” Sam said to Mikki.

  Popcorn followed the girl three steps toward the gate.

  “I don’t think he’s mad at me,” Mikki said, and her face said even more. Mikki’s blue eyes danced, her mouth wore a real little-kid smile, and her cheeks flushed with satisfaction. She was actually happy.

  Then something made both Mikki and Sam look across the ranch yard. Near the house, Brynna patted Dad on the back. That wouldn’t have been so bad if Dad hadn’t stopped and faced Brynna as if she’d meant something by it.

  What’s going on? Sam wondered. Whatever it was, it was not all business. Sam tried to make an excuse, but she couldn’t say anything. If only Mikki hadn’t noticed…but she had.

  “Ha ha.” Mikki gave a fake laugh like a donkey’s bray. “You thought your dad was so perfect.”

  Too forcefully, Sam bolted the gate.

  What did Dad’s expression mean? Would Dad and Brynna start dating? Aunt Sue had gone out occasionally. Hair upswept and formal, she’d attended the symphony with men in stuffy-looking suits. But Dad and Brynna were looking at each other as if something had changed.

  What if they fell in love? Would they marry and expect her to make room for a stepmother? No. She’d only just come back home. Dad wouldn’t shut her out of a decision that big.

  Sam started back to the house without giving Mikki the satisfaction of a reply.

  Still, Mikki kept talking. “Just watch. For the rest of the night, they’ll have no time for either of us. First, they’ll stare at each other with goo-goo eyes.” Mikki made a sappy face to demonstrate. “Then, after dinner, they’ll tell us to get lost.”

  Mikki sounded like a specialist on selfish adults. But the expert status didn’t make her happy. Mikki’s lips drooped as if her satisfied smile had never been there.

  “Thanks so much for inviting us, Grace,” Brynna said as the five sat down for dinner.

  It took Sam a second to realize Brynna was talking to Gram. Had Brynna ever called her Grace before? Was Gram part of this romantic conspiracy?

  Without thinking, Sam glanced at Mikki. She turned away when Mikki flashed a told-you-so smirk.

  Though she loved tacos, Sam chewed slowly, as if the tortillas were filled with sawdust.

  Conversation bumped along. Gram and Brynna did most of the talking, and Brynna claimed she had no information about Dark Sunshine or the rustlers. What she did say was so boring, Sam nearly dug the bill of sale out of her pocket and flaunted it.

  But then she’d get in trouble, and Mikki would be delighted. If there was ever a case of misery-loves-company, Mikki was it.

  In fact, Sam did everything she could to avoid meeting Mikki’s gloating eyes.

  She even studied Brynna. This time yesterday, Sam would have assumed Brynna was telling the truth about not knowing anything. Or, at worst, that Brynna had official government reasons for not telling all she knew.

  Now, Sam figured Brynna just had a giddy crush on Dad and her high-powered brain had conked out.

  Dinner ended and Sam couldn’t wait for Brynna and Mikki to go, but Gram wasn’t done playing hostess.

  “Coffee will be ready in a few minutes,” Gram said. “Sam, please set out cream and sugar.”

  Sam told herself she wasn’t depressed. She was simply tired. After all, she’d stayed up most of the night with Dark Sunshine. Still, she felt as if she moved in slow motion, carrying the creamer and sugar bowl with underwater slowness.

  Mikki looked so fascinated by the sugar cubes, Sam thought the girl might snatch one and pop it into her mouth.

  “Who wants fudge cake?” Gram asked.

  Sam didn’t moan. She resigned herself to believing this torture would never end.

  Hands went up, including Mikki’s. “I do, but please, can I run out to see if Popcorn will take a sugar cube from me? I’ll be back before you serve dessert. I promise.”

  Since Gram always thought the best of everyone, Sam looked at Dad. He was watching Brynna smile at Mikki as if she hadn’t noticed the girl smirking all through dinner.

  “Hurry,” Brynna said. “We’ll wait for you.”

  Sam cleared dinner plates and wondered why she was the only one who heard phoniness in Mikki’s voice. She rinsed the plates at the sink and looked toward the barn. She couldn’t see Mikki.

  Sam took a guilty glance toward Gram. Pleased at having company, Gram hummed as she sliced extra-thick slabs of cake.

  Sam scolded herself. She’d promised to give Mikki another chance, but she wasn’t doing a very good job of it. She carried the cake plates to the table before Gram could ask.

  Mikki returned right away, and if anyone else noticed that the girl reeked of cigarette smoke, they didn’t say anything.

  Why not? Sam knew that if Dad thought she’d smoked anywhere, let alone near the barn and horses, she’d be grounded for life.

  Gram invited Brynna and Mikki to stay and watch television, or play Scrabble, but Brynna was already standing.

  She looked uneasy, as if she’d just noticed Mikki’s too-sweet temperament. Brynna sounded strained as she said good-bye and herded Mikki toward the door.

  Dad beat her to it. With a gentlemanly bow, he opened the door, then stood there, blocking it.

  He froze, hands gripping the doorframe.

  “Wyatt?” Gram said. “What is it?”

  Even then, Sam knew she’d never forget the awful despair in her father’s voice.

  “Oh, Lord, phone Luke Ely and have him call out the volunteers. The bunkhouse is on fire and the flames are reaching for the barn.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  RIVER BEND RANCH was burning.

  Dad ran and Sam followed.

  Black smoke corkscrewed into the evening sky. There wasn’t much smoke yet. In fact, the yard was bright as noon and popping filled the air.

  Sam hesitated in the middle of the yard and stared around. On her left, the horses in the ten-acre pasture ran in a tight, nervous herd. Ahead stood the barn, full of horses and winter’s hay. No smoke. No fire.

  She felt relieved, then even more relieved as she saw that Dad was right—black smoke came from the old bunkhouse.

  Sam took off after Dad, and her relief ended the instant she came face-to-face with a sheet of orange flame three times taller than the ruined old building it consumed.

  A wall of heat stopped her.

  “Hose!” Dad shouted, and Sam jumped as he jerked the hose leading to the barn. It stretched behind him as he shot water on the blaze.

  At least the old bunkhouse is empty. That’s what Sam thought, until an arm of flame reached toward the barn and sparks peppered the air overhead.

  The other hose was by the ten-acre pasture. She usually used it to fill the troughs, but would it reach this far?

  “What can I do?” Brynna demanded.

  Sam had left her manners in the kitchen. “Nothing,” she yelled, and brushed on past.

  She felt an illogical rage toward the woman. Brynna had brought Mikki here. Brynna hadn’t watched her. Worse than that, Brynna had distracted Dad so that even he, so careful and slow to trust, had missed the threat in Mikki.

  Only Jake had noticed. Sam missed his solid common sense. She wished he were there. But Jake was in Darton, along with Dallas and Pepper and Ross.

  Saving the barn was up to her and Dad.

  Sam grabbed the hose, cranked the handle on, and ran. She hit the end of the hose so hard she was nearly jerked off her feet.

  The hose was way short of the old bunkhouse. The arcing stream of water barely reached the new one.

  “Wet it down,” Brynna said, pointing.

  “Good idea,” Sam admitted. If she watered the new bunkhouse, it might not catch fire from the sparks swarming over the roof.

  Even as Sa
m aimed for the bunkhouse roof, the water pressure lagged and fear yanked at her heart.

  Dad’s complaints about the well had always sounded like background noise. Now, his words made sense. Though they’d bought the new pump part, they hadn’t dug the well deeper. That job cost thousands of dollars.

  This wasn’t like the city. Once these hoses used up all the water in the well, she and Dad would have to wait for the pump to suck up more.

  They couldn’t wait.

  From the barn pen, Popcorn neighed nervously. Ace and Sweetheart answered from the adjoining pasture.

  This smoke didn’t smell like a fireplace; it was acrid and bitter. If it burned her eyes and nose, what was it doing to the animals? Sam wanted to comfort them, but she couldn’t leave the hose.

  Nearby, Dark Sunshine’s hooves hammered in the round pen, trying to flee whatever lurked outside, frightening the other horses.

  “You’re all right, girl,” Sam shouted, but the hooves ran on and on.

  “The roof!” Suddenly Gram was beside Sam, pointing.

  The old bunkhouse roof buckled into a vee and quaked. There was a plastic smell as something inside burned hotter, then the roof collapsed and vanished.

  That old roof had been built of wood. The barn roof was covered with tin. The house and new bunkhouse roofs wore some sort of shingles. Not wood. Would that make them safer?

  One spark through the barn window into the hay loft could mean disaster, Sam thought, and that’s when the water stopped. Sam shook the nozzle. She looked behind, but no kink in the hose had stopped the water flow.

  She threw the hose aside, detoured around Brynna and Gram, who were dragging bunks, clothes, and cooking pots out of the new bunkhouse, and ran toward Dad.

  He strode toward her, his face so red it looked sunburned. The fire had outlasted his attempts to quench it. Now it rose behind him in a wavering red-orange tower. Instead of crackling, the flames roared like a huge truck speeding down on them.

  “What are we going to do?” Sam shouted.

  “Pray for Luke to hurry.” Dad stared at the front gate, as if he could will the red volunteer fire truck to appear.

  Sam looked, too, but there was no truck with Luke Ely at the wheel and Jake’s brothers piled in the back, and no sound of the siren that would bring neighbors to help.

  Dark Sunshine began screaming. For days, the mare had pushed back her terror, trying to understand. Now the smoke and shouting and confinement freed her fear. The little buckskin whinnied for help, and Sam knew she’d lied to the horse. She’d told Dark Sunshine that she was all right, but nothing was all right.

  “Make her stop!” Mikki stood on the front porch, hands pressed to her ears.

  “You stupid little brat! Do you see what you did? My home is burning and it’s your fault!” Sam lunged toward Mikki.

  “Sam!” Dad’s voice was like a slap. “Don’t waste time.”

  Sam turned away from the crying girl. Dad was right. Nothing she did to Mikki would help.

  Suddenly the siren wailed over the fire’s roar. Nothing had ever sounded so good. The truck sped over the bridge and through the gate with mere inches on each side. The tires scuffed to a stop, and Jake’s brothers, dressed in the yellow suspendered pants and coats called “turnouts” were everywhere. They worked levers and unrolled hose, moving with an efficiency that said they’d need every second to beat this fire.

  Gram and Brynna paused by the mound they’d hauled out of the bunkhouse to watch Luke Ely jump down from the fire truck.

  Luke’s long jaw looked as if his teeth were set together as he approached Dad. “Where do you want to start?”

  “The barn and the bunkhouse.” Dad pointed index fingers in two directions.

  Luke gave a quick shake of his head. “Can’t do that.”

  “We’ve got to do that,” Dad snapped. “The bunkhouse is practically new, and the barn has the winter’s hay and—”

  Luke clamped a hand on Dad’s shoulder. The two tall men stood eye-to-eye. Dad didn’t shrug off Luke’s hand. He would have, if he’d been angry.

  Dad was scared. The realization made Sam feel as if the earth had crumbled beneath her feet.

  “Wyatt, this is just a five-hundred-gallon tanker.” Luke pointed at the fire truck. “We can fight this fire for ten minutes. Fifteen, if there’s a miracle.”

  “The Darton fire department should be here by then,” Dad said.

  “Maybe,” Luke said. “But this is the deal right now. If you try to save them both, you’re going to lose them both.”

  Sam’s throat closed in panic, but Dad didn’t falter for even a second.

  “Let’s get some water on that barn.”

  Every time the wind blew hard, Sam had heard a corner of the barn’s tin roof creak, blowing up and down as the wind tried to peel it loose.

  The fire found it right away. In spite of the two fire hoses, a streamer of flame swirled on the roof. It started small, but in a single minute it became a red line of fire. So straight someone might have drawn it there with a marker, the flame licked down the corner of the barn.

  Although they’d given the old bunkhouse up as a lost cause, the fire thrived there, creating its own whirring wind. All at once, the wind shifted.

  Sparks hit the ten-acre pasture, and Sam heard Buddy cry. When Buddy bucked and bawled, Sam knew the calf had been singed. Luke and Dad shouted over the fire’s roar. Sam ran closer to hear what they were saying, in time to hear one of Jake’s brothers curse at a hose.

  Water from Luke Ely’s hose kept coming, but it flowed in pulses. It wouldn’t last.

  Sam looked at her watch. The fire truck had been there for ten minutes, but there was no sign of the big tanker from Darton. Every horse on the ranch was screaming as the ten-acre pasture began to burn. Dad shot one last, demanding look toward the gate, then turned to Sam.

  “We’ve got to set the horses loose. Seth”—Dad pointed at the closest Ely brother—“unlatch these two corrals.” Dad gestured toward the ten-acre pasture, but Gram was already waving her arm in the air, signaling she knew what to do.

  Dad turned to Sam. “Sam, get on Ace and make sure the horses get through the gate. When the truck comes from Darton, we don’t want a bunch of crazed horses milling around, getting in the way. Forget the saddle,” he shouted.

  Sam shook her head. What had she been thinking? She’d actually started toward the barn, headed for the tack room to get Ace’s saddle and bridle. Instead, she unsnapped a lead rope draped over a fence. Out in the barn pasture, Ace wore a halter. That would have to be enough.

  “Sam, can you do this?” Dad was already looking over the Ely boys, ready to choose one to take her place.

  Sam took a deep breath, and it hurt.

  “I can do it,” she insisted, then scrambled over the fence before she could change her mind.

  Ace trotted toward her, head tossing so that his black forelock flew away from his white star. He didn’t care if she carried a halter rope. He wanted the reassurance a human could bring.

  The grass brushed damp around her ankles, and Sam told herself she was foolish to worry. She had ridden bareback all during her childhood. One terrible accident hadn’t robbed her of all her skills. She could do this.

  Ace ducked his head. She snapped on the lead and flung herself toward his back. She scrambled up, closed her legs around Ace’s warm body, and headed him toward the pasture gate Seth Ely had swung open.

  Sweetheart bolted past, her pinto body bright in the firelight. Ace jogged through the gate, head pulling left, then right, snorting and grunting. Then Popcorn joined Sweetheart, and the ranch yard was filled with horses.

  Gram and Brynna waved their arms, trying to haze the horses toward the gate. Banjo took the lead. The bald-faced bay ran with his mouth open, body lean and lowered to the ground. He headed for open range. The others galloped after him.

  Sam had decided it was time to free Ace, too, when a pale shape separated from the bunch of saddle horse
s. Popcorn was doubling back.

  The confused mustang ran a zigzag path, returning to the barn pen. And the fire.

  “No!” Sam shouted.

  Ace whirled on his haunches, cutting Popcorn off as if he’d been a rebellious cow.

  For a minute they were so close together that Sam saw the puzzlement in Popcorn’s crystal-blue eyes. First Mikki’s panicky punishment, now the fire. Poor Popcorn. How could he trust when things kept going so wrong?

  Even with Ace pushing against him, Popcorn tried to shove past, toward the fire.

  “No!” Sam shouted again, but this time she spun the end of the halter rope, shooing him back.

  It worked. In two long leaps, Popcorn joined the other horses. In another leap, he’d caught Banjo. Sam kept Ace at a lope, but as soon as all of the horses were out of the ranch yard, running toward the open range, she pulled him to a stop.

  Ace danced in place, head tossing, barely under control. Smoke and dust whirled around them as Sam slipped off and planted her feet. She tugged on the halter rope, but Ace didn’t settle down. With short, fearful neighs, he bumped her. Sam fumbled with the snap on the halter rope. Her hands were shaking, and though affection kept Ace from knocking her flat on purpose, he would, sooner or later.

  There. The gelding felt his freedom. He wheeled away from her, following the other horses.

  Sam didn’t watch them run away. She glanced down the dark and empty road, then turned toward the ranch yard, toward the fire. She jogged, though her smoke-tortured lungs protested.

  Please don’t let it take the barn. Please save the house. Sam didn’t know if she muttered the words or just thought them, but her pleas were interrupted by shrill cries.

  Dark Sunshine. No one had freed the mare. The round pen shuddered from the impact of her body as she tried to batter her way out.

  Panting, wondering where everyone else had gone, Sam slid the latch free. Before she could open the gate, the buckskin mare exploded through. Once in the open yard, she stood amazed and disoriented.

  “That way!” Sam shouted, and ran at the mare. The horse jumped back, and Sam felt an instant’s regret that last night’s gentling had been wasted. Then her eyes fell on her own shadow, cast black and perfect by the fire behind her.