Page 7 of One in a Million

The voices grew louder. Now he could see Darrin, Frank’s son, blocking the way as two of the crime lab staff attempted to carry a body bag on a stretcher outside to the van. Jasmine stood behind him. Seeing Roper, she ran to him.

“Do something, Roper! These people are taking Dad away. They’re going to lay him out on a table and c-cut him open! I’ve seen it on TV—it’s horrible.” Her voice shook. Tears welled in her eyes. Time to step back, Roper told himself. Way back.

“There’s nothing I can do, Miss Culhane.” Roper eased her away from him. “The police have the right to investigate your father’s death. Since he died with no evident cause, that requires an autopsy. Your brother’s a lawyer. He should know that. So should you.”

In his gray designer suit, Darrin Culhane looked as if he’d stepped out of an ad fromGQ. Only the sweat beads glistening on his forehead betrayed his anxiety.

He’d been raging at the older officer. Now he turned on Roper. “McKenna, did you give these people permission to come on the property and take my father’s body?”

“I didn’t realize the police needed my permission.” Roper kept his tone reasonable. Darrin could be a pompous ass, but this time, he’d just lost his father. He deserved some slack.

“You didn’t ask to see a warrant?” Darrin demanded.

“I saw no reason to interfere with police officers doing their duty. But now that you’re here, you can deal with them yourself. I’ve got horses to exercise—including the ones your father was training. So if you’ll excuse me, I’ll leave you and get back to work.”

Jasmine had latched onto Roper’s arm again. Loosening her grip, Roper turned to walk away. Darrin’s voice brought him up short.

“I’ll tell you when you can leave, McKenna,” Darrin snapped. “Right now, I’ve got more to say to you.”

“I’m listening.” Roper recognized a power play when he saw one. But he wasn’t in the mood for games. All he really wanted was to get back to the horses.

“Before today, you worked for my father,” Darrin said. “As long as the clients were happy, he let you call the shots. But there’s a new boss in town, and he doesn’t like your attitude. Starting now, you’re under orders to show me some respect. That means you’re not to take so much as a piss without my say-so. If that doesn’t suit you, you can pile your gear in your truck and get your ass off my property. Do you understand?”

Roper counted silently to ten. “I understand.”

“Wrong answer.” Darrin’s voice dripped sarcasm. “Try this. ‘I understand,Mr. Culhane.’ Now, repeat that after me, and you can go back to work.”

Roper felt the rage seething inside him. This job had its advantages, and he was fond of the horses in his care. But Darrin Culhane had just crossed the line.

“I understand, Mr. Culhane,” he said. “And now it’s your turn to understand something. Your father was fair with me. We respected each other. But I won’t work for a boss who thinks he can treat his employees like livestock. I quit.”

He unhooked the ring of ranch keys from his belt loop and tossed it into the dust at Darrin’s feet. “One more thing,” he said. “As long as you’re running this ranch, there’s a stable full of horses behind you, waiting to be fed, groomed, and exercised. You might not give a damn about them, but it’s paying clients that keep this stable running—and there’s a bunch of working kids who won’t know what to do unless you tell them. So I suggest you pick up those keys and take some responsibility—or find somebody who can.”

* * *

Since Roper kept his gear in his truck, there was no need to take anything from the stable. With anger surging in his veins, he forced himself to walk calmly out to the parking lot, unlock his truck, and climb into the cab, where he released his breath in a torrent of profanity.

Starting the engine and punching the AC, he headed past the row of luxury stock trailers emblazoned with the Culhane logo. For a trainer with his reputation, finding another job wouldn’t be a problem. But until today, he’d been happy at the Culhane Stables. The operation wasn’t gigantic, like the nearby Four Sixes, but the facility was state-of-the-art, the help dedicated, and the horses top quality. Frank had been a decent boss, not a friendly sort, but passionate about horses, just as Roper was. The two men had understood and trusted each other.

Damned shame, Frank gone like that, and neither of his kids fit to run the place. A spoiled, man-hungry actress and a country lawyer in eight-hundred-dollar shoes, neither of them with a lick of interest in the horses except as a way to make money. What’s going to become of this place?

But that was no longer his problem. Roper opened the ranch gate with a click of the remote control, drove through, and closed it behind him. As an afterthought, he stopped, got out of the cab, and flung the small device back over the gate, onto the driveway. With luck, it would be crushed to pieces by the next vehicle coming through.

The sun was a blinding glare through the truck’s windshield. It was barely midmorning, but the air was already like a furnace. He would go home, cut himself a slab of his mother’s chocolate cake, and wash it down with ice-cold milk. Then he’d do some work around the home place, maybe mend a broken gate or two, while he weighed his options. The younger McKenna siblings, Stetson, Rowdy, Chance, and Cheyenne, were competing at a big weekend rodeo in Fort Worth. They wouldn’t be home until late Sunday night or Monday. At least that should give him some peace and quiet to think.

The McKenna Ranch was about fifteen miles from the Culhane spread. The family had bought the land two years ago at a good price because the previous owners were in foreclosure. The sprawling frame house had needed a new roof and a fresh coat of paint, but the McKennas had agreed that even in its run-down condition, it was better than their old place in Colorado.

The most urgent repairs had been made, but the family’s rodeo needs had to come first—new stalls for Cheyenne’s barrel-racing mares, as well as the horses that Rowdy and Chance used in team-roping, and a few spare animals for general work. The ranch operation had needed a new horse trailer, a round pen for exercise and training, repairs to the barn, and fields of hay and grass to be plowed and planted. A couple of bucking bulls and a small herd of calves and steers were kept around to give the young rodeo stars plenty of practice. These, too, needed food, water, shelter, and care.

In the off-season everybody pitched in to help with the work. But when Cheyenne and the boys were out on the circuit, most of the responsibility fell to Roper.

He parked in the front yard, gathered up the cooler with his lunch, and strode into the house. His mother and stepfather were in the kitchen, Rachel icing a chocolate sheet cake and Kirby in his wheelchair, drinking coffee at the table.

Rachel, her face worn by time, childbearing, sorrow, and hard work, had married twice. Roper was the son of her first husband, a truck driver who’d died in a crash so long ago that Roper barely remembered him. A few years later she’d married Kirby, a small-time rodeo rider who’d sired the rest of the McKenna brood before a two-thousand-pound bull had crushed his lower back. The injury had left him unable to walk and in constant pain, which he dulled with alcohol. Kirby was never really drunk—but then again, he never seemed to be quite sober.

Rachel McKenna had never had it easy, but she’d been raised to believe in the sanctity of the family. She’d stuck by her husband, raised God-fearing children, and provided the strength that held all their lives together.

Without being asked, she cut two generous squares of cake and scooped them onto saucers, which she set on the table. “Well, Roper, what are you doing home so early?” she asked. “Maybe you can tell us while you’re eating your cake.”

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