Cool Hand Hank / A Cowboy's Redemption: Cool Hand Hank / A Cowboy's Redemption

“We get kids out here sometimes helpin’ out. Volunteers come and go. You’ll be better off in the house.” Hoolie shrugged. “I snore.”

“We’re hoping to add on to the bunkhouse to give Hoolie more privacy.” Sally and Hoolie exchanged looks. “Definitely on the to-do list.”

“Definitely,” Hoolie said. “Sally’s used to having Annie around. And Zach, too, since he come along. We don’t want Sally rattlin’ around here alone at night.”

“She could get into trouble?” Hank set his cup down. “Hell, whatever works. I just figured…”

“It’s a big house,” Hoolie said. “And you’re a guest more than anything. I’m the hired man.”

Hank looked at Sally. He had something she wanted, and she’d decided it was hers for the taking. She’d try to tease it out of him, would she? He gave a suggestive smile. Game on, woman. Your house, my play.

“Do you snore?” he asked her.

“I’ve never had any complaints.”

Hoolie took Sally’s unspoken hint and begged off the after-supper tour. “I’ll let you take my pickup.” He offered Hank two keys and a metal Road Runner trinket on a key ring.

Ignoring the handoff, Hank nodded at Sally. “She’s giving the tour.”

“This thing he offers is a great honor,” Sally quipped, B-movie style. “To refuse would be an insult.”

“She’s a 1968 C10,” Hoolie boasted. “She’s a great little go-fer pickup. Short box with a six-pony engine. Overhauled her myself.”

“Classic,” Hank said appreciatively. “My dad had one when I was a kid. Got her used, ran her into the ground. He was on the road a lot.”

“Don’t know how many times the odometer’s turned over on this one, but she runs like a top. You gotta try ‘er out.”

“My pleasure.”

Watching Hank handle the big steering wheel and palm the knob on the gearshift was Sally’s pleasure. She’d stopped driving altogether after proving she really could hit the broad side of the barn. It was the first time she’d lost all feeling in her right leg, the one that gave her the most trouble. She’d been backing up to the barn with a load of mineral blocks when suddenly the leg was gone. Might as well have been lopped off at the hip. By the time she’d moved the dead weight by hand, her tailgate had smashed through the tack-room wall.

The damage to the barn had been easy to repair. Her pickup, like her pride, had become an early victim of her unpredictable body. But her independence had begun to erode that day, and with it went bits of confidence. Dealing with the disease wasn’t as difficult as plugging up holes in her spirit. During bad times she’d start springing holes right and left, and she could feel herself draining away. She’d learned to take advantage of the very thing that made MS so cruel—its capricious nature. When the symptoms ebbed, she dammed up all her leaks and charged ahead, full speed, total Sally. She took pleasure in the little things, like the way it felt to get up and walk whenever the spirit moved her, the feel of water lapping against bare skin, the smell of a summer night and the look of a man’s hands taking charge.

Phoebe was sitting pretty in the pickup box behind the back window, her blond ears flapping in the breeze. They plied the fence line at a leisurely pace, following tire tracks worn in the sod. Sally pointed out the “geriatric bachelor band” grazing in a shallow draw. They were too old for the adoption program, and some of them had spent years in holding facilities—essentially feedlot conditions—before finding a home at the Double D. Heads bobbed, ears perked at the sound of the engine, and they moved as one, like a school of fish.

“They have no use for us, especially this time of year,” she said with a smile. “Which means we’re doing something right.” She nodded for a swing to the west, punched the glove-compartment button and felt around for the binoculars. “From the top of that hill we might get a look at some of the two-year-olds. There are some beauties in that bunch. Do you like Spanish Mustangs?”

He swung the big steering wheel. “I don’t see too many.”

“They don’t come shoe shopping?”

“I work mostly rodeos, so I see a lot of quarter horses.” The engine growled as he downshifted for the hill. “I did shoe a couple of mustangs at an endurance ride last fall. They had real pretty feet.”

“We need to interest more people in adopting these horses. The BLM had an auction out in Wyoming last month and sold less than half the number they projected. If they don’t find any more takers and we can’t make room for them, some of them will end up…” She glimpsed movement below the hill and to the right, but she had to turn her head to see what it was. Her right eye was going out on her again. Damn. “Look!” She pushed the binoculars against his arm. “Stop! Hurry, before they get away.”

“Look, stop, hurry?” He complied, chuckling. “How about hurry, stop, look? Or—”

“Shh!” She tapped him with the binoculars again, and he took them and focused. “How many? Can you tell?”

“Eight. Nine.”

“See any you like?”

“Nice red roan. Three buckskins. Aw, man, would you look at that bay.”

He offered her a turn with the binoculars, but she shook them off. “I can’t use those things. But I know which one you mean. He looks just like his daddy. Fabulous Spanish Sulphur Mustang stallion we call Don Quixote.” She nodded as he put the binoculars up to his face again. Stop, take a look, really see. “Give that boy another year, and you’d have yourself an endurance racer, a cutting horse, whatever your pleasure.”

“You won’t have any trouble finding him a good home.” He glanced at her. “If you’re having trouble with numbers, show me what’s left after the next auction.”

“We can usually place a few more with special programs. Police units, military, youth programs, even prisons.”

“After all’s said and done, show me what’s left. Never met a horse I didn’t like.” He handed her the binoculars. “I’d sure like to see that bay up close.”

“You will. They’re getting cut this week.”

“All of them?”

“Only the ones with balls. If you like the bay when you see him up close, he could be spared.” She smiled at him as she snapped the glove compartment shut. “Which puts his balls in your court.”

“Damn.” He chuckled as he lifted his hand to the key in the ignition.

“He’d make a wonderful stud.” She stayed his hand with hers and slid to the middle of the bench seat. “This is my favorite time of day. Between sunset and dusk. Late meadowlarks, early crickets.”

He said nothing. The enigmatic look in his eyes wasn’t what she expected. Maybe she’d misread his signals. Maybe her receptors were on the blink. Life’s ultimate joke. Just when she was getting the go light on all major systems except her troublesome right eye, which wasn’t a major system at the moment.

She would not take this lying down.

Who was she kidding? She’d take him any way she could get him, but in a small pickup, lying down wasn’t gonna happen.

Alternatives?

“Did you ever go parking in your father’s C10?” she asked.

“He was dead and the pickup was gone by the time I started meetin’ up with girls after sunset.”

“Where did you meet them?”

“Down by the river. You’re fifteen and you get a chance to be with a girl, you’re not lookin’ to take the high ground.”

“Fifteen?”

“Late bloomer.” He moved the seat back as far as it would go and put his arm around her. “I like this time of day, too, Sally.”

He leaned over her slowly, fingers in her hair, thumb grazing her cheek, lips moistened and parted just enough to make hers quiver on the cusp of his kiss. He made her feel dear and delicate, and she was having none of it. She slipped her arm around his neck and answered his sweet approach with her spicy reception. She was no weak-kneed quiverer. She could match him slam for bam and thank you, man. She didn’t need coddling, and she told him as much with a heat-seeking kiss.

The catch in his breath pleased her. The new-found need in his kiss thrilled her. She answered in kind, kissing him like there was no time like the present. Because there wasn’t. Deep, caring kisses like his were rare. She drew a breath full of the salty taste and sexy scent of him and grazed his chest with her breasts. They drew taut within her clothing. She pushed her fingers through his hair, curled them and rubbed it against the center of her palm. She would fill her senses with him while she could, because she could. She slipped her free hand between them, found his belly, hard and flat as his belt buckle. She took the measure of both.

He nuzzled the side of her neck and groaned. “I’m not fifteen anymore,” he whispered. “I can wait.”