Cowboy Come Home Read Free

money without thinking things through first. For the first time in his life, he’d saved up a fair amount of money.
    Yet as it stood now the end result was the same.
    While he had been laid up in El Paso, the deadline to claim his shares passed. He’d lost the Crown Seven. And without the money he’d worked for, he wouldn’t be able to buy a ranch either.
    Hell, he didn’t have any money. With the drought burning West Texas to a crisp, ranchers were laying off cowboys, so he could damn well forget about getting work in these parts either.
    “I didn’t know this was in here,” Daisy said, as she brought the worn ledger out and laid it on the desk.
    Had she just stepped in here and not given the papers a thorough inspection? Had she any idea of half the deals her old man had made with his hands, ranchers, and buyers?
    Nope, he’d bet she left those details in Ned’s hands. That explained why she was losing money. Why she was clueless about the deal Trey was calling her on.
    Her fingers fumbled to untie the worn leather thong holding the ledger together. She turned the pages slowly, scanning each one, her frown deepening as she went through the book.
    Surprise and shock registered on her face. When she got to the pages that the old man had devoted to Trey’s dealings with him, she downed her head and bowed her shoulders.
    He started to reach for her again and just barely quelled the yearning. Damn if he’d let history repeat itself with her.
    “The amount Daddy held for you matches what you’re asking.” She closed the book, and her hands fluttered nervously over the leather. “I don’t have the cash, but I can give you the equal value in stock.”
    Prime stock too, or they had been before the weather took a toll on them. Still it was a tempting offer and likely would be his only chance to amass a sizable herd and recoup some of his losses.
    “With the market as tight as it is and the cattle in poor condition, I’d need twice as many to get my price out of them,” he said, not about to question why he was being straight with her. “I couldn’t do that alone, and every man I hired would need to be paid. Fact is, I don’t have a place to hold stock until the conditions get better.”
    She bit her lower lip, as if thinking something over. “You can keep them here.”
    He laughed at that notion. “Ain’t no way I’d do that.”
    Her chin came up, and pure hurt shadowed her eyes. “Are you arguing just to be contrary? There are only two choices. Take your cattle or leave them here with JDB stock.”
    He wanted to think she was just being sassy, but it was clear she believed her own words. “Why didn’t Ned move any of the herd to Barton’s old homestead?”
    “He told me the trail would be too hard on them in these conditions,” she said.
    “Harder than them dying of thirst here?” He shook his head that she’d caved to Ned so easily, but then Ned had been the old man’s foreman for ten years. She’d likely not seen that Ned was out to gain control of the ranch little bit by little bit. “If money is so tight, how are you paying the hands?”
    “They’re working for room and board with a promise I’ll pay them back wages plus bonuses once I get back on my feet. All except Ned. He wanted stock up front instead of money later.”
    “How many head has Ned taken off your hands?”
    A frown pulled at Daisy’s smooth brow as she opened a different ledger and ran a slender finger down the line of entries, her lips silently moving as she ciphered the sum. “A hundred and ten head.”
    “What’d he do with them?”
    “Kept them here, I suppose,” she said. “I didn’t ask.”
    He settled his hat on more firmly. “Maybe you’d best find out what your foreman is doing with his herd and yours before he owns all of your daddy’s stock. Hell, I doubt you have enough cattle to cover what’s due me.”
    He turned to leave, knowing a losing hand when he’d been dealt one. He’d lost it all but