“Let me get that,” Chris said, stepping forward.
Calla wanted to yank back from him. But he was about to own the saddle along with Prissy, so that was stupid. She handed over the heavy tack and he took it without complaint.
“I’ll help you load her up.” Calla made a clicking noise and Prissy fell into step behind her as she led her toward Chris’s trailer.
After she got Prissy trailered, Chris pulled his wallet out of his back pocket and handed her a check. Calla wanted to shove it back at him the second her fingers closed around it.
Prissy let out an anxious, high-pitched neigh and shifted in the trailer, ears flicking back and forth. She knew something was wrong.
Calla’s mouth went dry as she stared down at the check in her hands. Five-thousand dollars. Was she really going to sell her best friend, even for so much money?
After putting away money for Dad’s care, she did have a little bit to live on. Maybe if she really scrimped, she could—
But then she forced her eyes shut as she shoved the check into her pocket. She’d already been over this a thousand times. Even if she didn’t need the money to live on, she couldn’t afford the boarding fees and all the other costs that came along with owning a horse. There was no way to justify spending six to seven hundred dollars a month when it wasn’t an absolute necessity. Not if she wanted Dad to stay in the best nursing home around. It was the same reason she’d sold her truck earlier in the week.
So she squared her shoulders. “Could you drop me in town? I need to deposit this.”
And then go get a stiff drink. Or ten.
She’d gone to the bank, then walked down to Bubba’s where she’d been warming a barstool all night.
Calla stood up straight and swiped at her eyes when she saw Carl pulling up in his Honda Odyssey. Lord, she couldn’t believe she’d let herself stand here in the dark and wallow like a little baby. So she’d had a crap run of luck lately. So what? Plenty folks had it harder.
She was young. Healthy, at least for now. And she had a place to stay and a good job for the foreseeable future.
No more pity parties. She took one more deep breath and jogged over to the back seat of the van.
“Where to?” Carl asked after she pulled open the back door and got inside. He was a bald guy in his late fifties who used to play poker with her dad.
“The Kent ranch.”
Carl nodded and pulled onto Main Street. “I heard you was gonna go work out there after losing your dad’s place.” Carl was also one of the prime movers of gossip in Hawthorne. She’d often thought he might be a driver for the gossip as much as for the extra income.
Calla’s mouth went tight but she nodded as Carl went on.
“Kent’s a good man. None of us was too sure about him when he bought up the old resort and moved here. What with his face all mangled like it is.”
Calla looked out the window, hoping to dissuade conversation but Carl wasn’t put off.
“But he and that wife of his are good folks. Just look at ‘em helping you out.” Carl nodded, glancing back toward Calla. “Good folks.”
Calla kept her gaze trained out the window. “It’s been a long day. I’m just going to close my eyes till we get there.”
“I bet. Heard you even had to sell your horse to the Mendoza boy. Awful sad. I remember seeing your picture in the paper with her when you won those first-place ribbons back in high school. Your daddy was so proud he carried a cutout from the Gazette and showed anybody who would give him five minutes.”
Okay, Carl was clearly getting up there in years if he thought that had been her dad bragging on her. Yeah she and Prissy had won ribbons—first place in the regional rodeo her senior year— but Carl must be mixing her up with someone else’s daughter. If her dad ever had anything to say about her, it was complaining how she wasn’t keeping up with chores, no matter how hard she worked her butt off. It was never enough for him.
She leaned back into the seat and shut her eyes. Carl eventually got the picture and stopped talking.
She must have actually fallen asleep because it felt like only moments later when the car was pulling to a stop.
Calla sat up, looking around. The big ranch house was dark. Little wonder since most ranchers woke up before dawn. She pulled out her phone and glanced down. It was ten-forty-five going on eleven.
She tipped Carl and then got out. She’d moved her stuff in and gotten the key yesterday. It was probably foolhardy and sentimental to have gone back to her own place last night. But she hadn’t been able to say goodbye knowing she could have one more night there. It wasn’t any easier to do it today, though, so she might as well have gotten it over with yesterday.