Sunrise Canyon (New Americana 1)

CHAPTER ONE

The sky was still dark above the high gate of the Flying Cloud Ranch. The desert foothills lay pooled in shadow. Stars were fading above the Santa Catalina Mountains, which rose to the east. Beyond their rocky ridges, the coming sunrise burnished the sky with streaks of pewter.

The narrow trail wound downhill among stands of paloverde and towering giant saguaros. Razor-spined chollas glistened like cut crystal in the silvery light. A kangaroo rat darted across the path, the flash of movement causing the mare to flinch and snort.

“Easy, girl,” Kira Bolton murmured, soothing the animal with a gentle touch of her hand. “It’s all right. You’re fine.”

Too bad she couldn’t calm herself with the same words. These dawn rides usually brought her peace. But Kira felt no peace this morning. She’d been in turmoil since last night, when her grandfather had given her the news she’d hoped never to hear.

“That investigator I hired has found Jake. He’s in Flagstaff, working at a garage. I’ll be driving up there tomorrow to get him and bring him back.”

“What if he doesn’t want to come?” Kira had asked, hoping she was right.

“He’ll come. I’m not leaving without him. Jake needs this ranch, and Paige needs her father.”

Kira had known better than to argue with the determined old cowboy—even though the last person she wanted to see again was Jake O’Reilly. After three years, she was still coming to terms with her cousin Wendy’s death. Jake’s presence would rip open all the old wounds—wounds that were still raw below the surface.

But this wasn’t about her, Kira reminded herself. This was about Jake. More important, it was about the vulnerable five-year-old girl who still kept his and Wendy’s wedding photograph on the nightstand next to her bed.

Halting the mare on a level ridge, she watched the morning shadows flow like water across the desert below. Here and there, small ranches and luxury estates dotted the landscape. Farther to the west, in the blue distance, Kira could see the outskirts of Tucson and the network of roads leading into the city.

The day promised to be a showstopper. Spring in Arizona’s Sonoran Desert was a time of renewal—a time when the cactuses burst into glorious bloom and the earth teemed with life. Now, as dawn broke, the air rang with birdsong. A family of quail called from the branches of an ironwood tree. A cactus wren piped its song from a clump of blooming golden brittlebush. A tiny elf owl settled into its home—an old woodpecker hole in a giant saguaro—and closed its eyes.

Kira loved this country, and the ten-acre ranch that perched on a plateau at the crest of a small, hilly canyon—a canyon known only by the name she and Wendy, as children, had given it years ago. They had called it Sunrise Canyon, for its magnificent view to the east and for the way the dawn painted the rocky cliffs with rose-gold light.

All too soon, the sunrise faded. It was time to go back, Kira told herself. Anytime now, the ranch would awaken, the horses needing to be fed, her teenage students, as she liked to call them, waking up in the guest cabins and needing attention. On this, their first morning here, the three girls and four boys would be tired, hungry and probably cranky. They would need a lot of guidance and a healthy measure of discipline to get them through the day. It would be Kira’s job, as a licensed equine-assisted therapist, to give it to them.

Tucker, the ranch’s nine-year-old Australian shepherd mix, came wagging out of the gate as Kira rode in. Dismounting, she reached down and scratched his shaggy head. A friendly, mellow dog, Tucker played his ow

n vital role in the ranch’s therapy program. Now he followed Kira as she led her mare toward the stable.

The aromas of coffee, bacon and eggs wafted from the kitchen. Consuelo, the Mexican cook, stepped onto the back porch and struck the metal triangle that hung on a chain. The clanging sound echoed across the yard, a signal that breakfast was ready.

The seven students, most of them barely awake, trudged out of the three guest cabins—three girls in one, two boys in each of the others. None of them looked happy about being rousted out at six a.m. But as her grandfather—Dusty, as he liked to be called—had told them in last night’s welcome speech, if they didn’t get up, they would miss breakfast. If they didn’t work, they wouldn’t eat. They were to keep their cabins clean, do their own personal laundry and change their own beds with the sheets provided. If they broke the rules, their parents would be called to come and take them home.

The rules, as Dusty had explained, were simple. Anybody who harmed an animal or another person, left the ranch without permission, took what didn’t belong to them, used alcohol or drugs, or fooled around sexually (hanky-panky, he’d called it), would be gone the next day. The youngsters had raised their hands to show they understood and accepted the rules.

They weren’t bad kids, but each one, in his or her own way, was in pain. That pain could manifest itself in any number of behaviors—bullying, withdrawal, self-mutilation, night terrors and other problems. Kira had read each of their files and spoken with the parents before admitting them to the program. They would be here for four weeks. All of them had been excused from school on the recommendation of doctors or counselors for the session. Most had brought homework assignments to do on their laptops or tablets.

Kira gave them a smile and a friendly wave as they trooped into the dining room for breakfast. Then she turned her attention to unsaddling Sadie and brushing her down. Dusty’s big Jeep Wrangler was gone from its place in the parking shed. Her grandfather would already be headed north to Flagstaff, to pick up Jake—and bring a whole new set of complications to their lives.

She would miss Dusty today, and likely tomorrow as well. Together, the two of them made a perfect team—Kira with her master’s degree and experience in counseling, and her grandfather with his imposing presence, his no-nonsense approach to kids and his deep knowledge of ranching and horses. She could—and would—make it through the day without him. But things wouldn’t be as easy, for her or for her students.

“Hi, Aunt Kira.” The little girl had climbed the paddock fence and was perched on the top rail, next to the gatepost.

“Hi, yourself.” Kira led the mare into the grassy paddock and closed the gate. “Have you had breakfast?”

“Not yet. I was waiting for you. Where did you go?”

At five, with her mother’s fiery curls and her father’s intense dark eyes, Paige was a small bundle of stubborn independence. Only in quiet moments did her sadness flicker through—for Wendy, the mother she barely remembered, and for Jake, the father who’d gone to fight for his country and had never come back for her. After three years, she still mentioned her parents in her bedtime prayers.

How would it affect her if Jake returned—especially if the war had changed him from the gentle, fun-loving father her imagination had built around his picture?

“Where did you go, Aunt Kira?” she asked again.

“Just for a ride, to see the sun come up.”

“Why didn’t you take me with you?”

“You were asleep. I checked.” Kira boosted Paige off the fence and lowered her to the ground. “Come on, let’s go chow down.”

By the time they arrived in the dining room, the teens were refilling their plates. Good food, and plenty of it, was part of the ranch experience. Kira gave them a smile as she took her place, with Paige next to her, and filled their plates. “Eat up,” she said. “You’re going to need your energy today.”

“What are we going to do?” a husky boy named Mack asked her. “My folks told me we’d get to ride horses!”

“So you will,” Kira said. “But not right away. First you’ll be learning how to take care of a horse—feed it, groom it and keep its quarters clean. Then you’ll learn how to work with it on the ground. Next will come things like putting on the saddle and bridle. After that, if you’ve learned your lessons and your horse trusts you, you get to ride. But keep one thing in mind. Nobody rides until the whole group is ready. That means if one person is slow catching on, the rest will help them. We go forward together or not at all. Got it? Raise your hand if you understand.”

Seven hands went up.

“How long does that part usually take?” Lanie was petite and dark-eyed, her sleeves buttoned at the wrists to hide the razor cuts on her arms.

“A couple weeks, at least,” Kira said. A mutter went around the table. She smiled and shook her head. “Riding your horse is a privilege—one you’ll be expected to earn. At the end of every day, we’ll sit down in a group and talk about our experiences and what we’ve learned from them. You’ll also have weekly one-on-one sessions with me to talk privately about anything that concerns you. Any questions?”

Heather, a plump, freckle-faced girl, raised her hand. “When do we start?”

Kira glanced at the clock on the wall. “You’ve got twenty minutes to finish eating, bus your dishes and go back to your cabins to brush your teeth, use the bathroom and whatever else you need to do. Then meet me out front at seven fifteen sharp.”

Kira waited until everyone had scraped their plates and carried their dishes to the plastic tub on the side counter. Then, as her charges scattered to their cabins, she went outside. With Paige and the dog tagging along, she filled the feeders in the paddock with hay, and turned the stabled horses out with Sadie. All the horses were older animals, patient and wise. In the weeks ahead, they would have much to teach the troubled youngsters who’d come here to heal.

Today the students would get a chance to observe the horses from outside the fence—their body language, how they interacted, supported each other and resolved differences. If this group of teens was typical, they would already be picking out their favorites.

But their first lesson would be the one waiting when they came outside this morning—a reality that anyone working with animals had to deal with. Forcing her worries to the back of her mind, Kira set out two wheelbarrows, seven sets of gloves and seven shovels. It was time to muck out the stable.