The Trailblazer

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  Ry turned in surprise, and his eyes widened. “Lavette! Where did you come from? Why didn’t you let us know you were heading in?”

  “Thought I’d surprise you.” He shook Ry’s hand.

  Freddy assessed the man’s clothes, dusty but new, and smiled. Another urban cowboy had arrived. He looked less than thirty years old, with a devilish gleam in his green eyes and a dimple in his cheek. Thick dark hair reached to his collar. She was already figuring out which horse to put him on, when Ry turned to her.

  “Chase Lavette, I’d like you to meet Freddy Singleton, the foreman,” he said.

  “Glad to meet you.” He offered his hand in a firm grip.

  “And Freddy’s sister, Leigh Singleton, the head wrangler,” Ry added.

  Leigh responded to his handshake with a smile. “Welcome to the True Love. Do you speak French, Mr. Lavette?”

  “Nope.” His grin was disarming. “I only know how to kiss that way.”

  “Easy, Lavette,” Ry said, winking at Leigh. “These women can rope and hog-tie you in under thirty seconds if you’re disrespectful.”

  Chase touched the brim of his hat. “No disrespect intended. Can’t afford it with my back.”

  “How’s the healing coming along?” Ry asked.

  “Pretty well. Sometimes I have good days, sometimes not so good. Today’s been good, so far.”

  “What’d you do, walk from New York?” Ry asked, peering at the dust on his friend’s clothes.

  “Just from the main road. Hitched from the airport, for the fun of it. If I’d had a saddle on my shoulder, it would’ve been perfect.” Chase laughed. “I see what you mean about the way the city’s moving in this direction, McGuinnes. This land is solid gold.”

  As if in slow motion, Freddy looked at Ry. She saw the flash of panic in his eyes and her heart began to freeze. Then he turned from her and put his hand on Chase’s shoulder, as if to guide him away.

  But Chase seemed determined to deliver his observations, oblivious to the dead silence that had settled over the room. “I’m sure that before long, this will be a subdivision, like you predicted, T.R., so I figured bad back or not, I’d better get out here and enjoy the place while I can.”

  15

  FREDDY BROKE and ran. She and Ry had left the truck parked in front of the ranch house, and the keys were on the floor, where she always put them. She heard a shout as she gunned the engine to life. Slamming her foot to the floor, she peeled out, glancing in the rearview mirror. She’d covered Ry in a shower of dust. She considered backing up and running him over.

  The tears didn’t start until she reached the corrals and started saddling Maureen. Fortunately, she could saddle and bridle the mare blindfolded, so it didn’t matter that she was crying so hard she couldn’t see. Duane came over when she was nearly done.

  “Freddy, darlin’, what’s the matter?” he asked, more tenderly than she’d remembered Duane ever speaking in his life.

  “Sorry,” she said, her voice choked. “Can’t talk about it.”

  “Gonna ride it out?”

  “Yep.”

  “Be careful. Don’t poke Maureen’s leg in no gopher holes ’cause you’re not lookin’. And hold on. Don’t want to hafta scrape you off no barrel cactus, neither.”

  “I’ll be careful.” Freddy vaulted into the saddle and slapped Maureen’s rump with the reins. As if the little mare understood the need for haste, she took off at a lope.

  Freddy sent Maureen down the path leading toward the wash. Branches whipped past, and Freddy ducked under them, anchoring her hat to her head with one hand as she drove her heels into Maureen’s sides, urging her on. Maybe if she rode fast enough, she could outrun her thoughts. Maybe if she cried hard enough, her tears would wash away the pain of betrayal.

  Maureen took the descent to the sandy wash in one graceful leap. A less experienced rider might have pitched forward and sent the mare to her knees, throwing the rider headfirst into the wash. Freddy anticipated the weight change and glided with Maureen to the dry bed. She leaned over and whispered into Maureen’s velvet ear, “Run like hell, baby.”

  Maureen’s haunches bunched and she bolted as if from a racetrack gate. Freddy kept her body low over the horse’s neck, relishing the snap of the mare’s mane against her wet cheeks. Her hair worked its way loose from the clip, which tumbled to the sand as her tresses rippled like a flag in the wind. Maureen’s hooves pounded the dry creek bed, sending up grainy geysers as she stretched her legs in a dead run.

  The hot wind dried Freddy’s tears as soon as they fell, and the fierce joy of riding full speed partly replaced the pain in her heart. But the late-afternoon sun beat down on her shoulders, and she realized that no matter what she needed, she couldn’t expect Maureen to continue at this pace for long. Already the mare’s breathing was labored, her neck dark with sweat. The wash narrowed, and Freddy pulled gently on the reins, slowing the animal to a lope. A hundred yards farther on, she guided Maureen into a trot, and finally slowed her to a walk.

  “Thanks, girl.” Freddy cleared the residue of emotion from her throat and patted the horse’s lathered neck. “I’ll make it up to you. I promise I will.” Then, with a whimper, she laid her cheek on the wind-whipped mane. “Once a city slicker, always a city slicker, Maureen. Don’t ever forget it.” New tears threatened, and she sniffed them back. “No more tears. No more tears for Mr. T.R. McGuinnes.”

  But she had to think what to do. He would buy the ranch, he and his city slicker friends. She couldn’t stop it now. She’d even helped him do it.

  She reined Maureen to the right, back up the bank and along a trail that led toward the old homestead. She had always been able to think better there.

  Still excited by the run, Maureen pranced and blew through her nostrils as they navigated the trail. Her gyrations startled a family of quail—mother, father and six little babies the size and shape of golf balls. As the parents herded their charges to safety in the underbrush, Freddy’s heart wrenched with a new wave of pain. With a cry of anguish, she faced the death of dreams she hadn’t even known she’d had until she saw the quail. Ry had awakened urges for a family of her own, children to teach in the ways of the ranch, to instruct in the legacy of the True Love.

  “The place is cursed!” she shouted, causing Maureen to throw back her head in alarm. “And I’m a fool for trying to hold on,” she said, gazing sightlessly at the trail ahead as she quieted her horse.

  Maureen picked her way without guidance along the familiar trail she’d taken countless times with her mistress. Eventually, she halted in the clearing across from the ruins of the small adobe homestead. Freddy roused herself and dismounted, letting the reins drop to the ground so Maureen was free to graze.

  As Freddy approached the crumbling adobe building, a green-collared lizard scurried across her path. She checked for spiders and scorpions before sitting on a portion of the ruined wall shaded by a large palo verde.

  Taking off her hat, she ran the back of her sleeve across her face and sighed. Apparently, Ry and his partners only wanted the land the True Love occupied, not the ranch itself. She’d feared the dangers of a failed love affair, but this was worse, so much worse. She’d vowed to stay on the ranch until she was tossed off, but she couldn’t imagine continuing as foreman knowing that Ry and his co-owners would sell to the first big developer who came along. Leigh might choose to stay on for a while, and Belinda might have no choice, considering Dexter’s needs.

  Dexter. Freddy’s hands closed into fists and she longed to punch Ry in the face. Had he considered what destroying the ranch would do to Dexter? The old man would be dead within a year. And Duane. Where would he keep his precious herd now? He’d planned to use what money he earned with that herd to send his kids to college. His life would be in shambles if the ranch disappeared.

  How could Ry do this? Yet, to be fair, she had to admit he’d never promised to preserve the ranch, only to buy it. She’d been blinded by lust into believing he had only the
best of intentions toward her and the True Love. And he’d taken advantage of that attraction. God, how she hated him for that.

  She gazed out at the desert—the prickly pear decorated in yellow, blossoms wide open, drinking in the afternoon sun. She’d opened herself like that for Ry, thinking to sun herself in his warmth. And she’d been burned.

  She thought of Clara Singleton, a woman who’d known how to survive, how to give sexual favors without surrendering her heart, until she found a man like Thaddeus, who offered true love. Then Clara had reaped her reward, perhaps sitting near this very spot and admiring the cactus flowers. She must have appreciated the triumph of a cactus flower, beauty thriving amid harsh conditions, like Clara herself. Clara would most likely have pointed a 30-30 at a land grabber like Ry and ordered him off her spread.

  Freddy’s jaw clenched. So what was she doing? Meekly handing in her resignation and scuttling away? Giving up?

  No, by God!

  Freddy leaped to her feet and slapped her hat on her head. This homestead was a proven historical site, and somebody might give Mr. McGuinnes and his partners a really hard time about destroying it. And what about the John Wayne Room? What about the other famous people, some still alive, who had stayed there? There might be enough public sentiment attached to the entire ranch to hold up his development plans for years!

  “We’ll fight him all the way, Clara,” she muttered, glancing at the old house. “You and I.”

  As she started toward Maureen, a rumble of thunder sounded in the distance. She glanced up into the cloudless sky. Probably a squadron of fighter jets from the air base, she thought, continuing toward her horse.

  The rumble grew louder, and Maureen’s head came up.

  “What is it, girl?” Freddy asked, reaching for the mare’s bridle.

  Uncharacteristically, Maureen jerked her head away from Freddy’s outstretched hand.

  “Hey, it’s probably a bunch of helicopters on maneuvers,” Freddy said, following her uneasy horse. “It’s probably—”

  A Hereford crashed through the brush and headed straight for Maureen. The horse bolted just as another cow thundered past, and the ground began to shake.

  “Maureen!” Freddy cried, running after the horse. But Maureen was gone, plunging wildly down the trail away from the stampeding herd. A heifer bumped Freddy from behind, almost sending her to the ground. She scrambled erect as a powerful shoulder brushed against her and spun her around to face a wall of russet-and-white faces surging toward her.

  She lost a precious second as she stood paralyzed. Then she turned and ran for the edge of the clearing, grabbing a branch of the first mesquite she reached. Thorns bit into her palms as she braced a foot in the crotch of the tree and hauled herself up, losing her hat in the process. Just as she got her other foot off the ground, the first wave rushed past, shaking the trunk and rattling the branches. Her hands slipped, and she tightened her grip despite the thorns. Blood trickled down her wrist and soaked into the cuffs of her shirt.

  She hauled herself higher, praying the tree was strong enough to hold her weight. A branch cracked but didn’t fall as the cattle surged beneath her. Then the massed animals began banging into the trunk, jolting her with each impact.

  Slowly, the tree began to lean.

  “Help!” she shouted, knowing it was no use, knowing she was absolutely alone. But she shouted, anyway. “Help me! Please help me!”

  “Freddy!”

  Someone was there. She squinted through the dust as the tree leaned closer to the trampling herd. “Over here!”

  Then she saw him, riding low over Red Devil’s neck as the big horse plowed through the river of cattle. No, it should not be Ry. He wasn’t a good enough rider to make it through a stampede. He would die trying to save her. “Go back!” she screamed. “I’ll make it!”

  She glimpsed the grim set of his mouth. He was coming for her. Her heart swelled in response to this show of courage. Foolish, foolish courage. Oh, Ry! Please go back, she begged silently, knowing it was no use. If she allowed him to pick her off the tree, as he obviously intended, they’d probably both fall under the churning hooves and be killed. But if she held back, he’d probably fall off trying to reach her and then they’d both die. A no-win situation.

  He veered toward the tree, his arm extended. She poised herself for the pickup.

  “Now!” he shouted, grabbing her by the belt.

  She landed facedown across the front of his saddle, the impact knocking the air from her lungs. She stared straight into the wild eyes of a Hereford running beside Red Devil as she started to slip forward headfirst into the herd.

  “No, dammit!” Ry shouted, jerking her back by her belt. “No!”

  Gradually, Red Devil’s pace slowed. The herd thinned, until Ry was able to rein the horse in. Red Devil stood snorting and shaking as Ry hauled Freddy upright and settled her facing him, her thighs resting across his.

  Freddy gasped for breath. Ry’s face was a mask of dust, and his chest heaved. He picked up one of her blood-encrusted hands and examined her palm. Then he placed a soft kiss there.

  Tears welled in her eyes, and she was about to blubber out her gratitude, when she recalled why she’d ridden out here in the first place. Taking an unsteady breath, she lifted her chin and looked him square in the eye. “I hate your guts,” she said.

  “I know.” He smiled.

  “Furthermore, you’re not getting away with this, you and your pack of thieves from the big city. I’m fighting you every inch of the way, buster. You haven’t seen the last of Freddy Singleton!”

  His smile widened.

  “What are you doing, sitting there grinning like an idiot? Don’t you realize what I’m saying? This is war!”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”

  “So what’s the big smile for, mister?”

  “You’re alive.”

  She stared at him, then cleared her throat. “Thank you for saving my life,” she said stiffly.

  “No thanks necessary. You did me a favor.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  He reined Red Devil in a circle and started toward the homestead. She was forced to grab hold of his waist to keep from falling off. Even worse, the movement of the horse, balanced as she was up against Ry’s crotch, awakened some potent memories she would rather forget.

  He held her gently with one arm around her waist, his chin hovering just above the crown of her head. “You see, Freddy, I came to Arizona feeling like a failure. Maybe I’d done well in the paper world of stocks and bonds, but I had no confidence I could make it in the nitty-gritty of real life. Deep down I was afraid that if I’d been faced with those punks who killed Linda, I might not have known what to do. It sounds corny, but my manhood had never been tested.”

  Ry was a lot harder to hate up close like this, she thought. She found herself hugging him tighter, and then she had to remember to relax her arms and back away as much as possible in this confining position.

  “I think that’s part of what buying this ranch was all about,” he continued. “I wanted to come out here and test myself.”

  That statement helped renew her fury. “So we were a proving ground for you? How nice. Now you can turn the True Love into a suburban housing development because it’s served your purpose.”

  He tightened his grip around her waist. “We need to talk about that.”

  “I’m not much in the mood for talking. I think I’d rather cut your heart out.”

  He sighed. “You may get your chance at that, too. But I—” He paused and pulled back on Red Devil’s reins. “My God.”

  “What?” Glancing up, she saw him staring over Red Devil’s head. She swiveled to follow the direction of his gaze, and her breath became trapped in her lungs.

  Where the little homestead had once stood as a silent tribute to Clara and Thaddeus Singleton, nothing remained but a pile of rubble. Only the concrete slab had survived in one piece. A lump rising in her throat, Freddy
held on to Ry as she wiggled her way out of the saddle and down to the ground. Slowly, she approached the trampled ruins as tears made tracks through the dust caking her face.

  She leaned over, picked up a piece of an adobe brick and held the fragment tight in her fist as she imagined Thaddeus building the wooden forms for the adobe, hauling the sand, mixing the straw and the mud. Brick by brick he’d forged his place in the wilderness, built it for his beloved Clara. Freddy searched the debris for the lintel and found it smashed beyond repair. The heart with an arrow through it was in two pieces.

  She picked them up and tried to fit them together, putting a splinter through her finger for her efforts. She’d always meant to have the site stabilized, meant to erect some barrier around it. Now it was too late. The home Thaddeus had built, the home Clara had risked her life fighting for, was gone.

  “I’m sorry.” Ry put an arm around her shoulders.

  She wrenched away and whirled to face him. “How dare you say you’re sorry? You want to bulldoze the whole place someday!”

  Agony was etched on his face. “No, I don’t.”

  “Really?” She saw him through a red film of rage. “Then where were you planning to put the subdivision? What about the golf course? Now I know why you were so interested in the water supply and landscaping. You, you rapist!”

  He stepped forward and grabbed her. “Listen to me!”

  “No!” She tried to twist away and the two pieces of wood fell from her grasp.

  “Yes! I meant to do those things when I came here. I admit it! But I’ve changed, Freddy. You’ve changed me. Just now, I risked my life to save yours. And I succeeded.” He gave her a little shake. “I succeeded! Do you understand how that makes me feel?”

  “No,” she said tightly.

  His touch gentled. “For the first time in my life, I feel like a man. You gave me that. You and the True Love.” He released her. “I don’t want it to disappear any more than you do.”