Before she ran out the door, she grabbed the pencil and in tiny letters added to the bottom of the note.
PS, Please tell Julián I love him dearly too and I’ll call you from the road when I can.
Love, Elmer
She prayed her pickup truck could handle the trip as she backed it up to her now-empty trailer, secured it to the hitch, and hauled ass.
* * * *
Julián signaled and carefully pulled the truck and horse trailer off of the road and parked on the gravel shoulder. “What do you mean she took off?” He did his best to sound calm because he’d never heard Chris this upset. He kept switching back and forth between English and Italian and talking in fits and spurts like he was about to have a conniption.
Chris finally roared on the other end of the phone as if getting it out of his system. “She left a note. It says Roger told her that he didn’t win her ranch at auction but that he has Zephyr. He told her that if she doesn’t show up at his ranch by one o’clock on Sunday afternoon, he sends the horse to the processors.”
“That’s bullshit—at least the part about the horse. I have Zephyr—and her old rig. I mean her new rig. I mean the rig she was—”
“You what?” Julián held the phone away from his ear. “You didn’t think that might be a good piece of information for me to have?” He switched from English to Italian and Julián had a feeling that Chris had just called him the son of a pig-fucking whore.
“I didn’t know if it would work out, Chris. I couldn’t build up your hopes if I couldn’t deliver. The ranch went for considerably more than it was worth but you should’ve seen the way Roger Bedford gloated. You’d have thought he’d won it. That son of a bitch was getting even with her for turning his proposal down.”
“So he didn’t get her ranch for her? Damn, Julián. She must be so upset.”
“He didn’t even really try. But the winning bidder was really determined.”
“Did Roger see you at the auction?”
“No. I’m not stupid. I bid by proxy.”
“Maybe we can contact the new owner and see if there’s any way to buy it back for her.”
“That’d be an interesting call since you’re talking to the new owner of the Bucking H.” There was a clatter on the phone, as though Chris had dropped it and Julián could hear him cursing in Italian again.
“Motherfucker, you just love fucking with me, don’t you? I’m pounding you the next time I see you.”
“No you won’t. I might put Nair in your shampoo bottle. You wouldn’t be so pretty without all those curls.”
Chris burst into laughter. “I’d let Gwen deal with you. Damn, man. What a fucking relief.”
“When did she leave?”
“I don’t know. I was at the store between twelve and one. I guess her note blew off the counter when she shut the front door and I found it on the floor when I came in the kitchen. I was wondering where she’d gotten to.”
Julián checked the clock on the truck’s information system. “It’s three o’clock. She’s in the middle of Buttfuck by now. I doubt she even has a cellular signal. I didn’t have one until this morning and by then I figured I’d just pull up at the bunkhouse and surprise her.” He never would’ve thought that Roger would resort to such a heinous ploy to get her to Colorado.
“I already tried calling her. Would her GPS work?”
“Probably,” he said absently as his mind went into overdrive. “Chris, did she say how much Roger was asking her for the horse? I doubt she had enough money to buy her back on the spot. Shit—”
“What?” Chris lapsed into Italian again and Julián heard another reference to a pig. “Would you slow down? What are you talking about? I’m asking about GPS!”
Julián took a deep breath. “How would she pay for the horse? It’s obvious Bedford doesn’t care about money. She rejected him…for us. How did he expect her to pay?”
More Italian that sounded like threats of dismemberment and death. Chris was scary when he got started with that shit. “Chris. Chris. Chris! Shut the fuck up.”
“What?”
“Get in your truck and head west. When you hit Fort Stockton head north on Highway 285. That’s the way she’d take to go home. Keep your eyes peeled for her truck and horse trailer.”
“It’s gonna be dark in a few hours.”
“She’d have to drive at a slower pace so you might be able to catch her if you push the speed limit. Make sure and look for her at any of the roadside stops. There’s not that many.”