“Get out of here.” He waved them out, but they’d get their bonus. It was a great job, and done quickly and efficiently.
He opened the sack and breathed on Precious, so he knew who was handling him. Precious relaxed. John lifted him into the enclosure, still in the sack. He put Precious down, opened the sack carefully and quickly closed the door. There were airholes to vent the big cage made of plexiglass, so he breathed in one of them to reassure the scaly newcomer.
Precious lay very still at first. But his tongue came out, testing the air for information. Slowly, he moved toward the water, and his head went in. Then he explored the wood and the litter. Finally, he propped himself a little on the wood and was very still.
“Happy?” John asked.
Precious moved his head, just a little.
“That’s what I thought,” John chuckled. “Well, you’re rooming with me, so you’ll know you’re safe. Later, I’ll get you some freeze-dried food. So you know you’re home. Welcome, old fellow. You’re safe here.”
Precious moved, the tiniest bit. John smiled.
Heather and Josie were talking about weather, of all things.
“...was dry as a bone, and then one of the men said he knew a Cheyenne man who worked as an anthropologist but could also bring rain. We were skeptical, but we didn’t have much to lose. So Cole flew up to Wyoming to get him and brought him down here. He asked us about Paleo-Indian artifacts in the area and after we told him we hadn’t found any yet, he asked if he could come back and look for them. It seemed a nice trade, so we said yes. He got out some things from an old parfleche bag, said some words, made a prayer. And, it rained.” Heather looked mystified. “Nobody understood how he did it. But it rained for three glorious days. My chrysanthemums had almost dried up but they came back to life.” She shook her head. “It seems that modern people don’t know everything after all,” she added.
“No, we don’t,” Josie agreed. Inside, she was hoping that the rainmaker wasn’t the same Cheyenne man she knew, who lived near her dad in Wyoming.
Because he’d recognize Josie in a heartbeat. And she couldn’tafford for him to. He knew too much about her. She also had to hope that Heather, who’d seen her at the Grammy Awards, didn’t recognize her. But that had been a brief introduction, and a long time ago.
“It was a lovely meal. Thank you so much. I’m sorry to have put you to the trouble, but he—” she indicated John in the doorway “—insisted.”
“Of course I did. I can’t afford to lose precious calves to invaders,” John said with a sting in his tone.
“John!” Heather said firmly.
“Sorry,” he said to his mother. “It was unavoidable.”
“I was sort of invading,” Josie admitted, with a side glare at John.
“Stealing is a better choice of words,” John said. “Oh. I forgot. You’d better have this back.” He pulled out her pistol and handed it to her.
Heather’s eyes grew wider.
“It’s just for snakes and stuff,” she said quickly, as she replaced it in her cross-draw holster at her waist. “A friend of mine taught me how to use it.”
“A friend?” John asked. “Is he hungry for a steak, too? You might warn him that all our cowboys go armed, and they shoot first if it’s after dark. Just a thought.”
“Thank you so much,” she said with sizzling sarcasm.
“John!” Heather repeated.
“Sorry,” he said again. “I was just anticipating problems.” He glanced at Josie. “After all, if she has a lot of friends—which I doubt—they might all be hungry.”
“John!” Heather and Josie chorused, and then they looked at each other and both laughed.
John glared at them.
Josie got up. “If you’ll give me a lift, I’ll get out of your hair,” she told John. She turned back to Heather. “It was nice meetingyou,” she said softly. “And your cook is wonderful. Thank you for the best meal I’ve had since...” She choked, because the last had been her late mother’s cooking and the loss was still fresh. “In a long time,” she finished on a forced smile.
“You’re very welcome,” Heather said, getting up to walk their guest and John to the front door. “I hope we’ll meet again.”
Josie looked back at her with real longing. She smiled. “It isn’t likely. But thank you.”
“Yes, the next time she might actually use that peashooter she carries...” John began.
Josie ran for the truck. Heather threw up her hands.
