“I first met Tim Carpenter seven years ago, not long after the state reimbursed me for the small ranch I owned. They needed the property to put in a new freeway, and I needed a new ranch. Lucky for me, the Martinson place came on the market. It was bigger than the one I gave up, with a lot of potential. The Martinsons were about to go into foreclosure and asked a fair price, so I bought it.”
“Then you’ve always been a rancher?”
Sly shook his head. “I never made a conscious decision to make it a career. When I was in college, I needed a job and found work at a ranch. It’s in my blood now, though, and I feel I was born to do it. After I bought the Martinson place, I learned that your cousin had figured on cutting a deal and buying the land dirt cheap. He wasn’t happy that I offered the asking price.”
“I remember hearing him talk about that at a Fourth of July family barbecue,” Lana said.
Unable to imagine a worse man to spend a holiday with, Sly made a face. “That must’ve been a real fun get-together.”
“Cousin Tim isn’t the nicest guy, but at holiday gatherings he’s usually in a pretty decent mood.” Pausing, she munched a chip. She seemed to really like them. “I enjoy hanging out with family,” she went on. “If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have dinner at my parents’ house every Sunday. My sister and her husband and kids go, too. Sometimes my mom gets on my nerves—well, okay, a lot of the time—but the kids make it fun.”
Sly wondered what it was like to be part of a family that got together for dinner once a week and attended big family barbecues. He had a few memories of his parents grilling, and friends and neighbors coming over for a meal. His family had lived in a pretty little house with a nice yard in a neighborhood filled with families just like theirs.
“The day I moved to Pettit Ranch, I made a point of going over to the Lazy C and meeting Tim,” he said. “He was never what I’d call friendly, but we nodded when we saw each other. Then three months ago, I lost three cattle. Over the next few days, several more got sick, and two of my pregnant heifers miscarried. A cow will usually bear four to five calves over her lifetime, but those two will never be able to conceive again.” The loss of ten calves meant a bundle of lost revenue.
“That’s terrible.” Lana grimaced. “My mom ran into Cousin Tim a few weeks ago and he mentioned you’d lost some cattle, but he didn’t share the details.”
“It sucks, all right. My crew and I had no idea about the poison at first. We tested for all the usual diseases, but the results were negative. The vet couldn’t figure out what was wrong. He ordered autopsies. They showed that my animals had been poisoned.”
Sly had entered Big Mama’s a hungry man. His burger was delicious, but suddenly he couldn’t eat another bite.
Lana wasn’t going after the chips anymore, either. Her face had paled and she looked shocked. “I’ve never heard of anything like that before. It’s horrific.”
Sly agreed. He’d spent more than a few sleepless nights wondering what kind of person would poison an animal and fearing that even more might sicken and die. The feeling of powerlessness had settled in his chest like a dark weight, just as it had after his father had passed, leaving him and his siblings alone.
“What makes you believe my cousin did it?” Lana asked.
“Long story short, there’s a private service road along the north side of my ranch that runs between my land and Tim’s. The only people with access to it are me and my crew, and Tim and his. Remember that freakish warm weather in January that melted all the snow? By sheer chance, my foreman was driving a truck of feed down that road and happened to notice a piece of a bag label and a small pile of white powder just inside the fence of one of our pastures. We weren’t sure what it was and sent a sample of the powder to a lab. It turned out to be arsenic.”
Every time Sly thought about that, a slow burn started in his blood. His fingers curled into fists.
Lana stared at his hands with wide eyes. “I have no idea what to say.”
With effort, he forced his hands to relax. “Yeah, it’s kind of a conversation stopper. Accidents happen, and at first, I kept an open mind. You hit a bump, or drive over a pothole, and things can fall off a flatbed without the driver realizing. By some fluke, it could’ve landed inside the fence.
“None of my men had transported arsenic in their trucks. I decided to ask Tim about it. Hell, he might have had a legitimate reason for buying the stuff. I tried to talk to him twice, but he refused to even discuss the matter. He got downright belligerent, even aimed a gun at me. I figured bringing in someone elsemight encourage him to help clear up a few questions. So, I hired an attorney.”
Sly shook his head. “Fat lot of good that did. Tim was just as stubborn and closemouthed with him. He’s been so ornery and nasty that I can’t help but think he deliberately put that arsenic on my land.”
Lana frowned. “But why would he do it?”
Sly had given that a lot of thought. “I wish to hell I knew. To get back at me for buying the ranch? Or maybe because I’m turning a profit and he isn’t.”
“My cousin can be a real jerk, but I can’t imagine him doing something like that.”
“I’m sorry it had to be your cousin,” Sly said, and he genuinely was.
Lana looked every bit as unsettled. “My family sticks together through thick and thin. Once, when my mother’s cousin Millie lost her job at a farm supply store due to cutbacks, the entire family bombarded the owner with calls and letters, asking that he reinstate her. He didn’t have the resources to rehire her or any of the other people he laid off. Our family took out an ad in the paper, asking people in Prosperity to please patronize that store to increase business and help the laid-off employees get their jobs back. The ad generated a ton of new business, and eventually the owner was able to rehire cousin Millie and several other former employees.”
Sly couldn’t imagine having a family so tight. He envied Lana. “That’s impressive.”
She nodded. “What are you asking for in the lawsuit?”
“An apology and a reimbursement for what the poisoning cost me—thirty thousand dollars.”
“That’s a lot of money.”
“Raising cattle is expensive. The feed, the vaccines and vitamins, the costs of maintaining all that fencing. Plus losingthe unborn calves, as well as the future calves of the cows who died and the two who are now sterile—it adds up. The tests and autopsies alone cost me a small fortune. That money was earmarked for a new drainage system.” Sly sipped his coffee, which had grown cold. “That’s my story.”
