“An association? Is that what they call it now?” His blue eyes narrowed into slits. “I believe I explained the same was true for me and Lola.”
A flush climbed her face. “You can go to hell, too, right along with Caldwell!”
“I expect I will. That’s a given.” He stared down into her eyes. “Fancy honey.”
On his lips, her stage name sounded cheap and foolish, more like a name for a soiled dove. Heat throbbing in her face, she pushed past him to fetch her bedroll, then carried it well away from the fire and climbed inside.
She wouldn’t have imagined that it would be this upsetting to have Dal learn that she and Jack had been friendly. And she knew that associating with Jack would only confirm the popular perception that actresses were of low moral character. Even Ward Hamm was more respectable than Jack Caldwell. Decent women didn’t invite gambling men into their parlors.
Rolling onto her stomach, Freddy buried her hot face in the crook of an arm. Her impulse was to seek out Dal and explain that she had been lonely, and Jack had been the first to come calling as if she were the Freddy Roark she had been before she ran off with the acting company. From the first minute, she’d known he was no good, but she’d given in to loneliness.
She was still castigating herself when two thousand steers simultaneously jumped to their feet and the ground started to shake. This time Dal would expect her to help control the wild run.
Terrified and trembling, Freddy hopped around pulling on her boots, then ran through a cloud of dust to climb into the saddle and race after the stampeding cattle. It required every ounce of frail courage that she possessed.
Chapter 12
The moon was bright enough that Freddy couldn’t later claim that she was unable to see where she was going. It was sheer terror that drove Dal’s instructions out of her mind and led her to the right of the herd, where the dust and heat wasn’t as intense. Only the most experienced men worked the right. By the time she recalled that her assigned position was on the left, it was too late to make a correction.
Freddy’s heart lurched. Once the point men turned the lead steers, the herd could circle around, stampeding right toward her. Since she wasn’t experienced enough to turn the panicked steers into the next circle, the only thing to do now was take herself out of the action or risk ending up trapped in the center of a mill.
An image of the two dead steers who’d been trampled in the last stampede flashed through her mind as she jerked the reins of her horse hard, heading away from the terrible noise of clashing, clacking horns and pounding hooves. Digging her heels into her horse’s flanks, she galloped full out toward the dark emptiness of the open range, praying the stampede wouldn’t overtake her.
When her horse stumbled and went down, Freddy screamed, but she now had enough experience to roll out of the stirrups and off the saddle. In a flash she and her horse were both on their feet, Freddy almost sobbing with gratitude that she wasn’t injured. But when she dashed toward her horse, he bolted, speeding away in the darkness. Frozen in horror, she stood stock still, feeling the ground begin to shake beneath her boots.
The drovers had turned the point and the wild, uncontrolled herd was pounding straight toward her.
Relief flooded Dal’s chest when he grasped they’d caught this stampede early enough that they would bring it under control relatively quickly. Caleb Webster had already begun to turn the lead steers into a mill.
The big question was, where were Freddy and Les? They should be on the left helping to hold the herd together, but things had a way of going wrong during stampedes.
Leaning over his horse’s neck, he caught up with Caleb and the lead steers, and started to press them into a turn. At the head of the run there wasn’t much dust and the moon was bright enough that when he glanced ahead, he saw a figure on foot running toward the open range. When he saw the drover fall, he knew the man was as good as dead. He was directly in the path of the oncoming steers and couldn’t jump to his feet and run fast enough to avoid getting trampled.
Baring his teeth, Dal spurred his horse and hoped the buckskin could fly, hoped he didn’t go down, too. He wasn’t confident of anything until Bill and Daniel loomed in front of him, shouting and riding straight at the lead steers. The steers bore left to avoid the men and galloped into the mill. But the drover on foot was still in trouble. The drift of momentum would sweep the herd right over him.