Rain Forest Rose Read Free

beaten.
    â€œDown deep, this filly hasn’t forgiven you for stealing her freedom.”
    Darby couldn’t contradict him, because sometimes she thought the same thing. She was working at giving Hoku the best life a captive mustang could have. But sometimes Hoku stared west for motionless minutes, only to turn back to Darby with unforgiving eyes.
    The filly was learning to trust, but she still yearned for the boundless range of home.
    Darby looked back over her shoulder. Hoku raised her head to return the girl’s gaze.
    Maybe someday, Darby told Hoku silently, you’ll run as far and fast as you want, and still come back to me.
    But they had a long way to go before that happened. As Darby thought of schooling Hoku, she remembered the bag Megan had slipped into her backpack. Then she recalled what Megan had said about her own horse.
    â€œWhich horse is Megan’s?” Darby asked.
    â€œWhat do you mean?” Jonah replied, without looking at her.
    â€œShe told me she was training a horse with her dad. Was it Biscuit?” Darby knew Megan’s dad, Ben, had ridden the buckskin named Biscuit.
    â€œNo, Megan had a wild horse. A pink one.”
    â€œPink?” Darby was surprised such a thing existed.
    â€œA rose roan, they call ’em, but yeah, Tango pretty much looked pink.”
    Tango. Darby pictured Megan on a high-steppingmare with hooves clattering like castanets.
    â€œWas she sold?” Darby asked, but Jonah was shaking his head before she finished.
    â€œMegan’s horse was in a bad accident.”
    â€œWhat happened?” Darby pressed him.
    â€œYou know on the map, it shows the kipuka ? It’s sort of an island within an island, yeah? Lava flows around a piece of earth and a rain forest grows up on that earth in the middle. This kipuka you’re going to,” Jonah explained, “you’ve got to cross some ‘a’a —the rough kind of lava. After the accident, she took off that way. We found blood,” he said grimly.
    â€œWhy didn’t someone go after her?” Darby gasped.
    â€œIt was the same day Ben died. We kinda had our hands full,” Jonah said.
    Darby sucked in a breath, glad that Jonah hadn’t let her rattle on thoughtlessly.
    â€œAfter things settled down, Mekana said to let the mare go back to the wild. She didn’t want to ride ever again, she told everyone.”
    Jonah gave her a grateful smile after he said that, crediting Darby with Megan’s return to riding, so Darby didn’t say what she was thinking.
    You let her have her way? Jonah must be leaving something out.
    If Megan didn’t want to ride, if she’d lost her nerve after her father died in a horseback accident, okay. But finding the horse—especially if it wasinjured—was the humane thing to do. Besides, every animal on the ranch was valued in dollars. There must be more to Tango’s escape and Ben’s death than Jonah was telling her.
    They rode in silence until Jonah muttered, “Look at that.” He pointed out a haphazard gouge through the grass, cut through to the damp earth. “Pigs. Like Cathy told you, be careful.”
    â€œI will.”
    â€œAnd if you think you hear them, you probably do.”
    â€œOkay,” she said. “But I’m not such a city girl that I wouldn’t recognize a pig.”
    â€œThese are different from pigs in kids’ books,” Jonah said. “They’re not cute. They gobble up birds. They’re bristly and black. They go rooting day or night.”
    The gash through the grass had looked like a furrow dug by a drunken plowman. Swiveling in her saddle, Darby looked back and asked, “Why do they do that?”
    â€œLooking for food, like the rest of us,” Jonah said, “but they’re a menace. How’d you like to be on a running horse when he stepped in a rip like that?”
    Darby didn’t want to think about it. She was still