One of the other drivers at Eaton Trucking, when Ty had told him the story, had stated strongly that such an act would have,shouldhave, earned that little girl a spanking. To which Ty had unwisely taken umbrage because Bea was a little girl, for Pete’s sake, and no child deserved to have such a hand raised to them.
He’d not quite punched the other driver, but it had been a close call, and only the fact that the company had been sold and everybody would be without a job come the end of the year hadprevented them both from being written up and put on unpaid leave.
If he could turn around at Ranchette’s, he could probably drive no further south than just south of Cheyenne, and be stuck there anyway, so there was, in effect, no point in turning around. The only way to go was to head up Highway 211 and pretend it wasn’t snowing, that it wasn’t about to turn into a blizzard.
He knew the road, after all, as he’d driven it several times over the last year, delivering tattoo equipment to a tattoo parlor in Torrington, or delivered a set of wooden boxes to hold skeins of wool for a small craft shop just down the street from the tattoo parlor. Taking Highway 211, either north or south, was a pretty drive, well worth the extra time it took.
He knew the way to the ranch. He had no other option but to drive until he could deliver the pony. All he had to do was make it through the stand-still traffic to Ranchette’s, gas up, water the pony, clear the windshield, and notify Eaton Trucking as to his plans.
After he made the delivery, he’d shelter overnight somewhere, wait out the storm, and head back to Eaton as soon as was humanly possible.
He didn’t think the company would dock his pay for returning his truck, keys, and company credit card late, but like the rest of his life, anything was possible, only none of what was possible was good.
CHAPTER 2
Ranchette’s had been a major turning-around spot for pretty much everybody on the highway, so by the time Ty made it there, and pulled over to water the pony, the parking lot, though thick with slush, had been mostly empty.
He went inside the convenience store to buy some cans of Red Bull and two small bags of Bugles for the journey and, on impulse, bought a touristy blanket emblazoned with a wolf, thinking in the back of his mind that Cinders’ ears might be getting cold and he just didn’t want that.
Now that he had slunk past the cop cars, their blue and white lights spiraling as they huddled together end to end by the side off ramp from the highway while their occupants in the drivers’ seats discussed whether to close down Highway 211 as well as the main highway, he’d passed over I-25 on the recently constructed bridge, and was on his way.The cops couldn’t stop him, but the snow could.
The blizzard had let up briefly, the clouds thin overhead, but any fool familiar with the area and the crazy weather knew thatthe clouds would be coming down white and thick and it would start snowing not only harder, but also sideways.
Ty was no fool. He was also feeling a little crazy at the way his life had turned out and so he was going to keep going. Stuck in the cab of his truck, his only concern was Cinders and Bea and that they should have the kind of Christmas someone had planned for them. Focusing on that helped him forget everything else.
As he trundled along the low foothills to the west, snow snakes slithered across the two-lane road, covering the yellow dotted line in the center as well as the white lines to either side. What saved Ty from driving off the road when the snow started to come down again in white, lumpy loads, was the glittery, almost-invisible mile markers, that and his familiarity with the road.
He kept his hands on the wheel at the ten and the two, being as careful as he could while the forty-five minute or so drive turned into an hour’s drive, and then an hour and a half. By the time he took the slanted, slippery curve turning from Highway 211 to the 103 that led to Farthing, he’d been on the road from Ranchette’s Stop ’n Go for over two hours.
For any other delivery, he might have stopped in Farthing, might have parked and knocked on someone’s door to ask for shelter for the night. It was that kind of town.
But from the horse trailer, he could almost feel Cinders’ anxiousness and her desire to get where he was taking her. She wanted a quiet stall out of the weather, a basin of water, hay beneath her hooves, and the warmth of a little girl’s hand on her muzzle to welcome her.
He was going to do his best to see that the mare got it.
Main Street, which went straight through Farthing, was plowed, but the side roads were thick with snow, and more was coming down. He paused at the edge of town to scrape the hard slush from his windshield wipers. Then he went back to checkon Cinders and, rubbing his hands together, climbed back up into the truck and made his way steadily along the road to Farthingdale Ranch.
By that time, the snow was coming down at an angle, a solid, slanted curtain of white, and the snow came up to the tires’ rims. The sides of the road were covered in white, and visibility was only twenty feet, maybe less. He drove on.
When he got to the gateway to the ranch, marked by a large iron sign above and a green-painted gate below, he paused the truck, intending to park and get out.
Just as he put the gear into idle and pushed on the parking brake, the truck slid sideways, jouncing over the edge of the road and into the ditch. From the back, Cinder’s whinnied, a horrible, high-pitched sound that made his heart lurch.
He held onto the steering wheel until the truck slowed to a stop, grabbed his gloves, and flew out of the truck, lumbering through the knee deep snow to the horse trailer. Which, thankfully, while it was at an angle on the sloped shoulder, had not been pitched over on its side.
Inside the trailer, Cinders was jerking her head back, tugging on the leather tie on her halter. When her dark eyes caught sight of Ty through the side grill, she whinnied again, not so sharply pitched this time, but still uncertain, still afraid.
“Hey, girl,” he said to her through the grill.
He didn’t know a lot about horses, or ponies, for that matter, but he knew enough, had seen enough cowboys in action when he’d delivered horses to various barns and rodeos, that he knew to move slowly, to speak softly.
If you were scared, the horse would be scared. If you were calm, the horse would be calm. It was all up to the human to set the tone, and since he was the only human for miles, it was up to him to keep her calm until he figured out what to do.
“You okay, Cinders?” he asked her. She nickered at him, soft and low.
He looked at the rig, truck and trailer both, as the wind swirled around them and the temperature seemed to drop with each beat of his heart.
He’d started from Greeley around one, and should have arrived back in Eaton by three, or three thirty at the latest. Even without checking his phone, he knew it was coming onto five o’clock, and that his lack of ability to see the details he needed to see was because the sun was already setting, turning the curtain of blowing white snow into a dark gray cloak of coldness.
