Masked Cowboy (Men of the White Sandy)

by Anderson, Sarah M.

  “I wanna go. I really do. But Ronny needs me at the café. Our parents died a while back, and Randy and Ricky went off and married white chicks.” Mary Beth winced, but Robin kept going. “They don’t come back around much anymore, so it’s like it’s just me and Ronny. I really worry about the big lug.”

  “Robin,” Mary Beth said, sounding a whole lot like her mother again, “you should go to college. If Jacob can do it, so can you.”

  She beamed, her eyes blinking at slightly different speeds. “You really think?”

  Okay, I’m just guessing, Mary Beth thought as she emphatically nodded. She knew next to nothing about Jacob Plenty Holes, and not a whole lot about the sloshing young woman sitting before her. But it was obvious that Robin wanted to go, and who was she not to help her?

  “Well,” she murmured into her beer, “I do have the forms for Sinte Gleska University.”

  It sounded tribal. Not Ivy League, Mary Beth mused, but not everyone needed Ivy League in this world. “Perfect. I’ll help you fill them out.”

  “Really?” Her eyes popped wide open in excitement. “You will?”

  “Sure. That’s what big-sister types do. We nag little-sister types until they do what we think they should.”

  “Deal.” Robin grinned.

  This was the Robin who had watched Jacob’s show, humming in pleasure next to her. But there was that other Robin, the one who’d bolted in terror the moment one Buck McGillis had showed up. “Robin,” she asked the goofily grinning young woman, “why did you bring me dessert tonight?”

  The grin died as she got up and got the last beer, swigging half of it before she sat back down. “No one says no to Buck McGillis,” she said, her eyes scrunched up tight.

  No one says no to Brian Greevy. The words slipped out of the small box in her mind where she kept them locked away, and she remembered the way he’d said it as he backhanded her. She’d been sixteen when she’d come home from a date to find Skeevy Greevy alone in the house, Mom out buying more beer for him. He’d pinned her down and hit her, but Mary Beth had refused to go down without a fight. She’d kneed him in the crotch and then done it again, just for good measure, before she’d gotten a kitchen knife and called 911.

  She’d gotten rid of Skeevy Greevy. Mom had finally found the backbone to leave him after that. They’d bounced around for a while before Mom had gotten a job as a nurse and finally got her life back under control—all because Mary Beth had dared to say no to Skeevy Greevy.

  Mary Beth had thought that she’d left all that behind her. But now? Jesus, what the hell have I gotten myself into here?

  Robin was still sitting there, her eyes shut. Mary Beth’s heart broke for her. Mary Beth might have fought her way out of a shitty situation, but Robin hadn’t been able to. That much was clear. “Jacob came by to do the show and saw the bruises under the makeup. He’s a smart fellow. You’ll like him a lot,” she repeated. “He figured what had happened, and since then he’s kind of kept an eye on me. God, I wish he didn’t look at me like I was his kid sister.” She took another drink.

  “Christ on a crutch, Robin, are you okay?”

  “Sure. Just a few beers. No biggie,” Robin said, answering the wrong question. “I don’t have to work until eleven tomorrow. Say…” her eyes popped open, “…you want me to go get some more? Won’t take me long at all.”

  “No, you’re going home now,” Mary Beth said as firmly as she could while she hoisted Robin up. “You need to sober up and get your college applications together, and I need to unpack.” And figure out what the hell I’m going to do about this fine mess I landed in.

  “I guess.” Robin pouted. “Hey, you’ll come to the show tomorrow, right?”

  Despite the long-buried memories and Buck McGillis—despite the damn fine mess she’d walked into—Mary Beth couldn’t help but smile. “I wouldn’t miss the show for the world.”

  Chapter Three

  Mary Beth spied the slightly stooped older man standing on the steps, his grey hair blending with the grey morning light. For a second, she hesitated but decided against carrying the knife in with her. Somehow, packing a blade didn’t seem to be a part of making a good first impression, so she shoved it in the glove box and hopped out of the truck.

  “Dr. Coleman?” she asked, although the answer was obvious.

  “Dr. Hofstetter, so glad to meet you in person.” He smiled as he held out his hand. While he looked a bit frail, his grip was still the grip of a man who held onto animals for a living. “Please, call me Bill. Did you like the house?”

  Mary Beth thought back to the shag rug, lava lamp, and avocado-green appliances. “It’s a little Brady Bunch, but otherwise, I love it, Bill. Perfect. Do I have you to thank for the groceries?”

  “My wife wanted to make sure you were comfortable.” Bill leaned in close, an impish grin on his face. “Leslie is looking forward to Florida this winter. Our son and his family are down outside of Tampa.”

  “I like what I’ve seen so far. I imagine that she’ll get there before Christmas. And call me Mary Beth.”

  “Of course. Come in and meet Fran. She’s my everything assistant.”

  A grumpy-looking older woman, her hair in a permanently curled helmet and her orthopedic shoes peeking out from behind a low desk, scowled when Mary Beth walked in. The scowl looked familiar, and Mary Beth realized that Fran had been at the show.

  “Hello,” Mary Beth said as she stuck out her hand. “I’m Mary Beth Hofstetter.”

  “I know that,” Fran snipped as she stared at Mary Beth’s hand. “You made quite a scene at the café last night. I told Bill all about it.”

  Whoa, unpleasant. Mary Beth winced as she pulled her hand back.

  “Now, Fran, be generous. She didn’t know who she was talking to.”

  “She does now,” Fran snipped again as she answered the phone.

  “Bill, I can explain,” Mary Beth stuttered as they headed back to his cramped office off the small operating room.

  “No need.” He motioned to an empty chair. “While Fran is a bit of a sourpuss, she’s a darned good assistant. You’ll be surprised how fair she is. She told me you handled yourself quite well.”

  “Well, if you call insulting the biggest client handling myself, then yeah, I handled myself well.”

  Bill gave her a kind smile. “You’ll get the hang of it. Now, Fran does all the scheduling and secretarial stuff. She’s in charge of billing, but you need to tell her what you did. She knows what we charge. Costs are different for cattle, horses and buffalo.”

  “Buffalo? We care for buffalo?”

  “Didn’t I mention that? The Lakota keep a small herd on the edge of their reservation. There’s not a lot I can do for them—the buffalo aren’t what you call tame, you know. But every now and then one gets wrapped in barbed wire or the like,” he explained. “If they are properly sedated, it’s just like working on a big, hairy cow.”

  Maybe Bill wasn’t quite as sharp in his old age as his grip foretold. How could he forget to mention buffalo?

  “Now,” he continued as if buffalo were no big deal, “Friday is the small-animal day at the clinic. The one day of the week we see dogs and cats and the like. Can you handle ferrets?”

  “In the plural?”

  “Mike Nolan raises ferrets. Sells some for pets to stores in Rapid City. Ranchers like to have them in the barns too. I see a lot of ferrets.”

  Suddenly, she wished she’d taken that exotic pet class. But she was a large-animal vet. Who knew she’d need to know ferrets? “What do you do for a ferret?”

  “A lot of neutering and de-scenting. I’ll walk you through the operations. Not terribly complex. Mike does a good job raising them. Saturday I’m on call, but I only go to the office for emergencies. Mondays are at-large days. Everyone else’s horses, any buffalo emergencies and the like. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are at the McGillis ranch. Over 10,000 head of cattle.”

  Mary Beth whistled. “That should keep me out of t
rouble.” For years to come.

  “Actually, I spend more time with the ranch horses than the cattle. Jacob’s got the skills to do almost everything the cattle need, but the horses require a higher level of care. They get a lot of work, and we do a lot of preventative maintenance. Everyone’s got horses out here. Best way to get around.”

  “I have no problem riding. But…about Buck.” She hated the feeling of having opened her big mouth a bit too far. Even more, she hated how damn familiar that feeling was. Would she ever be able to keep quiet? “How badly did I stick my foot in it last night?”

  “Seems pretty clear. He came onto you, you rebuffed him—what was it Fran said? ‘I don’t sleep with clients, I castrate calves’?”

  “Yeah.” She couldn’t stop the blush that moved up. “Best I could do on short notice.”

  “It’s a good stance. Men outnumber women five to one in this town.”

  “But he’s our biggest client, and I insulted him.”

  “Well, yes,” he chuckled, “I’d not do that a whole lot more, but frankly, I rarely deal with him. Haven’t much for the last seven, eight years. He spends most of the day either holed up in his house with some shady lawyer or riding the boundary of his property. Jacob Plenty Holes basically runs the place.”

  Mary Beth blushed again.

  “Fran said you met him as well.” Bill smiled, looking just like a grandfather should.

  “It is a small town, Bill.”

  “His land management is a step up from McGillis’s last guy too. That dope was grazing the place flat, but Jacob keeps the fields irrigated and rotates the herd. We use a lot less wormers now. It keeps the parasites manageable.”

  “So he really is smart,” she marveled before she shut her mouth. You sound like a smitten teenager, her brain scolded her.

  His eyes wisely smiling, Bill replied, “He keeps better books too. He pays on a monthly basis,” he added. “The McGillis check on the thirtieth, and Jacob’s check is on the fifteenth. After we get those, we pay bills, put some aside for Fran’s weekly paycheck and order the next round of supplies.”

  She was missing something, she just knew it. “His check?”

  “Jacob is quite a businessman,” he said, the admiration undisguised. “He breeds mustangs for rodeos. Pays McGillis for some of the land, keeps the rest on the tribe’s land next to the ranch. His horses are as tough as nails and quick too. The Lakota are big horse people.”

  Mary Beth’s mouth opened—force of habit—but for once, nothing came out. She was having a little trouble reconciling the man in the mask and the ratty T-shirt and the holey jeans with someone who had an MBA and ran a horse-breeding business on the side. Again, she was struck by the thought that he was hiding. Not necessarily from her—she’d barely met him—but from someone. Or something.

  “It’s a small town. Everyone knows everything about everyone.” Bill sighed, picking up a picture of him and what had to be his wife a good twenty years ago. “Leslie’s looking forward to Tampa. Says no one will know who we are. I have trouble imagining that though.”

  A perfect opening to talk about something other than the fool she’d made of herself last night. “When are you leaving?”

  “Two weeks before Christmas, if we can get everything squared away.”

  “It’s seven thirty!” Fran screeched from the front.

  “Going!” Bill hollered back. “Come on. It’s a ranch day. I’ll show you around.”

  By the time Bill drove through the formidable stone gate with the name McGillis worked in iron at the top, Mary Beth knew the names, birthdays and favorite toys of all seven of his grandchildren. Clearly, Leslie wasn’t the only one excited about Tampa.

  Bill pulled up in front of a large barn abutted against several huge lots. Jacob Plenty Holes stood against the barn door, his paint horse drop-tethered next to him, and two other horses tied to the fence nearby.

  Indian perfection next to a horse. He looked every inch the cowboy he was, his hat pulled down low to shade his eye, one boot kicked back and resting on the door, thumbs stuck in his belt loops. The only difference was that instead of a six-shooter, there was a knife that had to be close to nine inches long tied to his leg.

  Her thoughts spun as they walked up to him. At least he’s dressed this time. The maroon flannel shirt was cuffed up to his elbows, revealing muscular forearms tanned from long hours in the sun. At the sound of their footsteps on the gravel, he slowly lifted his head, his eye trained on her the whole way up.

  The mask seemed bigger now, but Mary Beth reasoned that it was just because she was really looking. There were three straps holding it to his face—one where it began at the left temple, one that continued the diagonal back under his right ear and another strap that went just below his right eye and over his right ear. He didn’t need a whole lot of help to look rugged and mysterious, but the mask sealed the deal.

  I wonder what a man with no face looks like. I wonder if he’s wearing underwear. I wonder if he knows I’m picturing him naked. Her thoughts cascaded as he spoke.

  “Morning, Bill, Dr. Hofstetter,” he said coolly as he tipped his hat towards her.

  “Morning, Jacob.”

  “Please,” she added, trying not to think of his underwear status. “Call me Mary Beth.”

  “Where’s your knife?” he demanded.

  That shook her brain firmly back to reality. “What?”

  Jacob angrily cocked his eyebrow as Bill chuckled. “Your knife. You should have one.”

  “I didn’t tell her she needed one on the first day, Jacob. I imagine she’s just going to get the lay of the land.”

  Jacob pursed his mouth into a narrow line, his long face growing harder. There wasn’t a whole lot of his face visible, but the parts she could see said nothing but barely contained anger. “You should have one.”

  “I do,” she defended. “I just left it in my truck.”

  Glaring at both of them, he undid the ties at his thigh in one quick gesture. “Wear mine.”

  “Now, Jacob,” Bill scolded.

  “No, she needs one. McGillis isn’t the only jerk around here. You know some of those guys he hired are barely better than thugs. Someone as beautiful and delicate as she is?” Jacob scowled at Bill, completely ignoring the high scarlet blush that swamped Mary Beth.

  Holy cow, that may be the best line I’ve ever heard—even if he didn’t say it to me. Her brain swooned.

  “She’s got to draw the line in the sand early before any of Buck’s knuckleheads get the wrong idea,” Jacob continued.

  “You sound like my father,” she snipped as she grabbed the blade from him. God bless her mouth. It always covered for her, and she had the feeling that it was going to be doing a lot more of that today. Even if she didn’t exactly remember what her father sounded like, Jacob was being more patronizing than her uncle Hank had ever been.

  His knife was a lot heavier than hers, with a beefy handle she could barely wrap her hand around. She nearly dropped it as she tried to fit it along her leg.

  “I’ll do it,” he grumbled, kneeling before her. Aside from the beautiful comment, he showed absolutely no awareness that she was particularly female in any aspect. It was almost like he was mad that she’d shown up.

  Mary Beth held her breath as he completely encircled her thigh with his fingers, drawing the rawhide cord between her legs. But for a man who seemed as gruff as he did, Jacob’s touch was surprisingly gentle, like he was used to handling fragile things. The mere thought made Mary Beth start sweating as he pulled the cord taut.

  He stood and stepped back just as three cowboys emerged from the side of the barn. “Whooee! Looks like Doc Coleman brought us a present,” the tall one with red hair whooped. The two other cowboys hung back, already looking uncomfortable as the redhead winked and blew a kiss to Mary Beth.

  Ugh, she mentally recoiled. This would have to be one of Buck’s knuckleheads, for no honest cowboy would talk to a woman like that. Mary Beth had spent a l
ong time on farms and ranches, and not once had any man ever treated her like a party favor. The most she normally got out of a cowboy was ma’am. At least the other two hands looked like they were watching a car wreck.

  Jacob shot her a look before he turned to the men. But before he could open his mouth, Mary Beth asked loudly, “Dr. Coleman, are those the ones?”

  “The ones?” Bill asked, eyeing her warily.

  Jacob pivoted back towards her, the look of amusement she’d briefly caught last night outside the café dancing at the edge of his mouth. “The ones?”

  “Yeah.” Mary Beth nodded, taking a step in the direction of the confused cowboys. Don’t drop it, she thought as she unsheathed the knife. “The ones you wanted castrated this morning. You said you needed to fix a couple of animals. They fit the bill.”

  All three cowboys froze. The one who looked like an Indian turned beet-red as the other white man took a panicked step back. Mary Beth could see they weren’t the problem. Not Buck’s knuckleheads, and she felt bad for grouping them with the redhead.

  She didn’t feel bad for the redhead. The blood drained from his face as his eyes shot wide with a real fear. “You’re the new vet?” he mumbled, seeming to shrink before Mary Beth’s eyes.

  She slid the knife back in the sheath, amazed her shaking hand hadn’t dropped the heavy blade. “Dr. Hofstetter, gentlemen.” She quickly crossed the distance between them, firmly shaking their hands as she glowered at them. “I look forward to your cooperation.”

  The Indian almost smiled as the other two quickly scurried back to the barn. “Jacob, awánič’iglaka yo,” he said over her head as he turned and disappeared behind his cohorts.

  “Níš-eyá tanyán awánič’iglaka yo, Tommy,” Jacob shouted back.

  “Wait, what?” she asked as Jacob led the palomino over to her. She saw that Bill had slung a pair of huge nylon saddlebags over both horses. “What did he say? What did you say? What language is that?” Mary Beth stiffly mounted up, hoping she wouldn’t stab herself in the leg doing so.