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Lonestar Sanctuary

By Colleen Coble

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Prologue
The rodeo crowd, reeking of beer and peanuts, finally reeled off into the night. Allie Siders heard their good-bye calls faintly through the faded cotton curtains. The twin bed sagged under her weight as she sat down and slipped off her worn cowboy boots. She smelled like horse—not a bad smell, but pungent nevertheless. A hot shower would ease her muscles, taxed with riding around barrels all day.
Her five-year-old daughter, Betsy, slept with one fist curled under her cheek in the youth cot next to Allie’s bed, and Allie watched her sleep for a moment. So innocent, so beautiful.
So damaged by the blows life had dealt.
But things would get better soon. They could hardly get worse. Once Allie won the barrel racing championship, the money would come rolling in, and they’d have a better place to live than this old broken-down trailer.
Allie dreamed of the day she and Betsy would have a real home again. They had one once upon a time, until the rough seas washed the sand castle away. But she’d find a way somehow. Betsy deserved more.
Allie slipped out of her dusty jeans and padded to the hall in her bare feet. The floors of the tiny travel trailer creaked and groaned under her weight as she tiptoed toward the bathroom. She left the door open a crack in case Betsy called out for her, though the chance was unlikely. The little girl hadn’t spoken a word in nearly a year.
The tiny bathroom was spotless except for the rust stains Allie couldn’t get off the worn fixtures. The Lysol she’d sprayed still lingered in the air, and she resisted the urge to sneeze.
She stared at her reflection in the mirror. The rodeo queen’s smile was one that vanished with the crowds.
She went to the tub and turned on the shower. The hot spray sputtered from the rusty showerhead and struck her sore arm, soothing it, enticing her to step fully into the welcoming warmth.
Straightening, she tugged her shirt over her head. A creak like someone stepping on the weak floor came from beyond the door. She whirled in time to see it slam shut. Allie jerked her shirt back down. Gooseflesh pebbled on her arm when the creak came again.
“Yolanda, is that you?” she called.
Her friend’s cheery voice didn’t answer. Allie wet her lips. She was being a nervous Nellie tonight. The noise was probably the old trailer settling. Her hand gripped the bottom of her shirt again to remove it.
Something scratched at the door, and she caught her breath.
“Aaaallieee,” the taunting voice whispered through the door. The scrape sounded once more. “Aaaallieee.”
A man’s voice, low and guttural, maybe even deliberately pitched so she wouldn’t recognize it. A sharp edge under the low, cruel voice vibrated. That voice could cut to the bone without a weapon.
Allie took a step away from the menace, her back pushing away the wet shower curtain until water sprayed her neck. It was like a wet slap, bringing her back to what mattered most.
Betsy!
She grappled with the embrace of the wet shower curtain and managed to disentangle herself from it. She leaped to the door and grabbed the doorknob, yanking hard, but the door didn’t move. With her hand on the cold metal knob, she could feel his movements on the other side.
“Let me out!” she screamed, pounding and kicking at the door.
“You want out?” He chuckled, the razor edge of his voice contrasting with the smooth laugh. “Your sister wanted out.”
The room felt close, airless. Her lungs strained to pull in enough oxygen. She wanted to scream for Betsy but didn’t dare call the man’s attention to the fact her daughter was in the bedroom.
“You sure you want out, Allie?” he whispered.
Terror whirled inside like a mounting tornado. She forced it deep, down to the dark place where she kept all the things she feared. For Betsy’s sake she had to keep herself together.
Maybe she could get out, circle around to Betsy’s window, and get to her. She spun around and ran to the bathroom window, but it was too small to allow even her tiny frame to exit. She turned back to the door and tried to open it again. It moved a crack against the force of his hand holding it to on the other side, then slammed shut before she could get it wide enough to get her leg through.
“Let go of the door!” She tugged harder, kicked at it. Her fear morphed into a cold anger. If she could face him, she’d tear at his face with her nails. She would allow no one to hurt her baby girl.
The man’s laugh—if such an evil sound could be called laughter—whispered through the door again. “Your sister was so pretty. Not nearly as pretty as you, though. Especially not now.” A knife poked through the crack. “She screamed when she saw the knife. Are you going to scream, Allie?”
Allie stared at the blade slicing through the door. It wasn’t true, couldn’t be true. He was just trying to scare her.
Tammy had walked in on a burglar.
The knife blade danced in the crack, moving forward, then pulling back long enough to make her think he was leaving. Then it reappeared, the edge sharp and dangerous.
She pulled on the knob again. “You coward,” she yelled. “Face me like a man! Quit hiding behind whispers and phone calls.”
“You might faint if you saw my face,” he whispered. “Just like Tammy did.”
The fear tried to surge out of the box she’d stuffed it into, but Allie tightened her control. Her sister’s face flashed through her mind, and sorrow welled in her eyes. Had this man really been the one? She couldn’t let herself believe it.
Allie laid her head against the door. “What do you want?”
“I want you to pay,” he said, his whisper harsher. “I’m going to take everything you love, just like you destroyed the things that mattered to me. What matters most to you, Allie?”
Betsy, he would take Betsy!
Allie’s frantic gaze ran around the room. What could she do? Though she knew it was so late, no one would be out there to hear, she ran to the window and screamed, “Help, somebody help me!” Her cries fell into the silent yard. No one answered her scream.
“Don’t do that,” he growled.
Allie ignored his commanding tone and raised her voice so loud it hurt her throat. “Help! Please, someone help me!”
Then she heard the sweet sound of another voice. A shout answered her, feet shuffled through the dust toward her trailer. Help was on its way. She whirled and leaped back to the door. The knife was gone. This time the knob turned easily under her fingers, and the door flew open.
The hallway was empty.
Allie bounded from the bathroom and raced across the hall. “Please, oh please, God, let Betsy be all right.” She rushed into the room and saw Betsy’s tousled dark curls on the pillow. “Bets?” she whispered.
Betsy stirred and rubbed her eyes, then rolled over and went back to sleep.
Allie sagged against the doorframe. Her legs trembled and she wanted to crawl into the bed herself, pull the covers over her head like she used to when she was afraid of the boogeyman.
But this was a real-life monster.
Someone pounded on the front door hard enough to make the whole trailer shake. She tottered down the hall and threw open the door.
Her best friend, Yolanda Fleming, stepped through the door. “Allie, what’s wrong?”
Allie clutched her. “He was here, in my house!” Aware she wore only her shirt and underwear, she backed down the hall. “My sister. He said he killed Tammy!”
Horror began to dawn on Yolanda’s face. But even as Yolanda hugged her, Allie knew none of her friends would be able to protect her and Betsy. There was only one thing she could do.
One
His boss drove with both hands on the wheel, slow and steady as a tortoise. Some days Elijah DeAngelos’s attention to detail drove Rick Bailey crazy, but today wasn’t one of them. He had other things to worry about.
Interstate 10 stretched out east, straight and nearly empty of traffic. Sage and creosote had greened up with the winter rains. The old man turned the steering wheel in his gnarled hands, and the truck rolled down a narrow dirt path toward a broken-down barn a quarter of a mile back.
“Look there,” Rick said. His hand gripped the door handle, wishing he could wring someone’s neck. The call had come in two hours ago about these horses, but he’d hoped the caller was wrong about how bad their condition was. Everyone in the area knew to call Bluebird Ranch when a horse was in danger.
The two horses, one a pinto and the other a dun, stood on the other side of a gate that hung cockeyed on its post, their heads down. They could easily have gotten out, but they didn’t have the strength. The ribs of both animals showed through their rough, dull coats. They barely mustered the will to turn to look at the vehicle.
They were so far gone, it would be a battle to save them.
Rick flung open his door and strode to the trailer they’d hauled here. Opening the back, he reached in for the bucket of high-protein dog food and sweet feed, a combination of oats, steamed cracked corn, and cottonseed pellets, all covered with molasses. The quick energy would be crucial to saving the mares. He carried the mixture to the animals. Elijah followed with a bucket of water.
Rick watched the feeble horses try to feed, and he fisted his hands. If he could find the man who had starved these horses, Rick would bloody his nose. He told himself to take a few deep breaths. Getting mad wouldn’t help these animals.
He stepped to the dun and ran his hand over her patchy coat, wincing at the protruding bones. “I’m not sure we can save them,” he admitted.
“I fear you might be right.” Elijah held the bucket of water under the pinto’s lips, but the mare refused to drink.
Rick heard the sound of an engine and turned to look. “The vet’s here.” He stepped to meet Grady O’Sullivan. “Thanks for coming all this way.” The ranch was two hours from town, and Grady was the only vet he trusted to come this far.
The large man had red hair that stuck up like Woody Woodpecker’s crest. About Rick’s age, his big hands and feet matched his bulk. Dressed in jeans and a T-shirt with feet thrust into sandals, he could have been at home on the Gulf beach.
He was also the pastor of the church Rick attended. He knew more about Rick than any man except Elijah.
Grady’s gaze was on the horses, and he just nodded as he got out his bag. “They look bad, Rick.”
“They are.” Rick followed the vet to the two mares.
The dun’s front legs buckled, and she went down. Rick knelt on one side, and the vet on the other. Grady ran his hands over her, checked her eyes and mouth, then prodded on her stomach.
Rick knew the verdict before the man said anything. His gut clenched in a painful spasm, and he exhaled until it released. He’d hoped to reach her sooner.
Grady shook his head. “They’re too far gone. I doubt they have the strength to make the trip. This one will die in the next couple of hours. She’s just been starved too long.”
“What about the pinto?” Elijah asked. The other mare had managed to get down some water and a handful of sweet feed and dog food. She stood swaying, her head down.
“Maybe, but it will take a miracle,” the vet said.
“Those we have had before,” Elijah said.
“Do what you can, Grady,” Rick pleaded. “For both of them.”
The vet heaved a sigh and opened his bag. “I’ll start an IV of electrolytes and add in some B12. Then all we can do is pray.”
Rick had already started that, and he knew the other men had as well. He watched the vet insert the IV and get the fluid going. The minutes ticked by, and he swatted at the horseflies congregating around the desperately ill mares. Squatting by the dun, he rubbed her head and neck, but half an hour later, she blew a final puff of breath into his palm, then . . . nothing.
No, no! He couldn’t lose her. He blew in her nostrils and massaged her stomach, but the great chest stayed motionless. His head dropped. Pain pulsed behind his eyes. “She’s gone,” he said.
Feeling older than his thirty-four years, he stood and went to check on the pinto. Elijah was at her side, coaxing her into eating another handful of the high-calorie feed. “She looks a little stronger,” he said.
Elijah nodded. “This one, she will make it.”
“Another hour and the prognosis would have been different,” Grady said. “She’s a nice mare. Small, but good lines. The kids at the ranch will love her.”
Rick looked back at the dun. He’d failed that one though. “Can we take her home now?”
“Give her another hour and some more feed, then see how strong she is. Wait until she’s not wobbly. And leave the IV in until the second bag is empty.” He closed his supply case. “Call me if you need me.”
“Thanks, Grady. Tell Dolly I appreciate her sparing you on your day off.”
“No problem.” Grady carried his bag to the car, and Rick walked with him.
Over an hour later, Rick and Elijah decided the mare was strong enough to attempt the trip. The men got her loaded into the trailer, then climbed into the truck.
“We’ll have to stop and feed her a few times,” Rick said.
For now Rick could be glad Elijah was a slow and careful driver. The mare couldn’t handle much jarring. “How can men be so cruel?” he asked softly once they were out on I-10 again. “We see so much of this neglect. People think they want a horse but don’t stop to realize how much care one requires. When they’re tired of it all, they just abandon their responsibilities.”
Elijah gave him a quick glance. “Somehow I do not think you are speaking of the man who did this to the horses. It brings back memories of your mother, sí?”
The scars on Rick’s back throbbed at the word mother. The woman didn’t deserve the title. His thoughts raced to the woman who’d scarred him. It was her fault the county had taken his brother, Chad—Rick had never found him again. If he’d had a real dad like Elijah, and a loving mom, what might he have done with his life?
Those kinds of doubts could drive him crazy. Rick was doing what he wanted, saving the horses he loved and helping kids turn out right.

***

The sun had already converted the trailer into a sauna, though a slight breeze relieved the heat a tad. Allie swiped away the sheen of perspiration on her forehead with the back of her hand before tossing a handful of socks into the suitcase.
“But where are you going?” Yolanda blocked the doorway.
About Allie’s age, Yolanda was a pretty African American who could ride like Dale Evans and rope like Roy Rogers. Yo would go far in the rodeo. Ice curled around Allie’s veins at the realization she wouldn’t be around to see it.
She glanced up from packing and forced a smile. “It’s better if you don’t know,” she told Yolanda. “You’re safer that way.”
Familiar sounds and smells wafted in through the window: shouts from the stock crew, steers bellowing, the jingle of horse tack, the good scent of horse and cattle. Allie would miss the rodeo. And El Paso. Even this little trailer had come to feel like home after so many years.
Yolanda flopped onto the bed, her black cornrows bouncing on her shoulders. “I’m scared for you, girl. You’ll be alone, without anyone to help you with Betsy. Let me tag along for luck.”
“You’re going to win the barrel race this year, Yo. I can’t take that away from you. We’ll be fine.” Allie’s purse sat on the nightstand with only a hundred dollars in it, and she prayed it would be enough to get them to the Big Bend. Yolanda would give her anything she had, but Allie couldn’t ask.
It was bad enough that she had to give up her dream of winning the barrel race this year herself. She wouldn’t dream of torpedoing Yo’s chances as well.
“Did you talk to the cops?” Yolanda asked.
“What good would it do? The police have done nothing to stop whoever this guy is.” A lump crept up her throat, but she swallowed it down and focused on her packing.
“They’re trying. The guy is slick.”
Allie zipped her old green suitcase closed. “I have to disappear.”
The worry in Yolanda’s dark eyes intensified. “I know we’ve gone over this before, but girl, you have to have some idea who could hate you so much.”
“Hernandez is the only one with something against me, and he’s dead.”
“What if it’s someone he met in the clink?”
Allie set her suitcase on the cracked linoleum floor. “Why would someone take on his vendetta? Whoever this guy is, he’s killed three people, Yo. That takes a lot of hatred. And I’m not waiting around for him to get to Betsy.”
After her parents died when her father’s plane went down, the calls started. An eerie voice taunted her on the phone, telling her he had killed her parents and would take everything she loved. She’d been sunken in despair and grief, bowed down with more than she could bear until the guy started calling.
Strangely, his calls infused her with the determination to protect the rest of her family. The threats gave her purpose.
Only one person could help her now. She hadn’t wanted to go to him—not with him working for the one man she wanted to avoid—but now he was her best chance.
“How do you think Betsy will handle the change?”
Allie glanced out the open curtains to the melee going on outside. Her daughter stood on the first rung of the fence watching the cowboys practice throwing their ropes at the stationary stands. Dust billowed from the horse’s hooves. “I hope the place where I’m taking her will make her well.”
Yolanda’s forehead wrinkled. “Some place that will make her talk? What kind of place would that be?”
Allie wagged her finger at her friend. “Don’t try to find out any more.”
“What if Betsy’s grandparents show up? What should I tell them?”
“The truth. That you don’t know where I am. If they can’t find me, they can’t serve me with custody papers.” She picked up her suitcase and dragged it toward the door. “I packed too much,” she panted.
“Let me help.” Yolanda sprang toward her.
“Just get the door.”
Yolanda opened the door, and Allie dragged the bulky luggage out onto the dirt. She opened the tailgate of her old pickup and heaved it into the back with the ragtag assortment of rope, bridles, empty Pepsi cans, and old blankets.
“What if the police have questions?” Yolanda followed Allie toward the paddock. “And all your friends from church will want to know you’re okay. Girl, it scares me to think about you being off on your own with no support.”
“I’ll call and check in occasionally. I can’t let that guy find me and Betsy.” Allie slammed shut the tailgate and stepped to where Betsy stood at the fence. She scooped up her daughter and inhaled the scents of red licorice and little girl.
Betsy was all she had left of Jon. Allie would give her every possible reason to talk again. “Ready to go, Bets?”
Betsy shook her head so hard her ponytails flipped against her cheeks. She set her chin, and her lips quivered. Even the threat of leaving everything she knew and loved didn’t break the wall of silence that had encased her for a year.
Allie set her on the ground and took her hand. “We’ll come back for a visit. Come along, honey.” Betsy’s feet scuffed along the dirt, but she followed her mother to the truck.
“Call me, girl.” Yolanda grabbed Allie in a tight hug.
Allie clasped Yo back, closing her eyes and imprinting the musky scent her friend wore in her memory. It would be all she’d have to hold her until they met again.
She was going into hostile territory.
“I’ll call when I get there.” Allie’s eyes burned, and she knew she had to get out of there. Tears would upset Betsy. She got in the truck and buckled her seatbelt, just a lap belt, the thing was so old. “Fasten up, Bets.”
As the truck pulled away from the stockyard, Allie forced herself not to look in the rearview mirror and watch her ten-year dream dissolve in the distance.

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