The summer of 1884 had forgotten how to rain.
For nearly three months, the sky above Red Hollow had remained the same pale, merciless blue. The grass had faded from green to yellow, then from yellow to the dull brown of old straw. Creek beds cracked beneath the heat. Fence posts stood crooked in the hardened earth. Even the cottonwood trees along the river seemed tired, their leaves hanging motionless in the windless afternoons.
Clara Whitmore had stopped looking at the sky.
There was no point.
Rain could not be ordered.
Cattle could not be persuaded to drink from empty troughs.
And men like Silas Rourke could not be convinced to leave simply because a woman told them to.
Clara stood on the porch of her ranch house with one hand resting against the railing and watched six riders approach through a cloud of dust.
She knew five of them.
The sixth was a stranger.
That alone was enough to make her reach down and touch the revolver at her hip.
The gun had belonged to her father.
It was old, scratched, and heavier than she preferred, but it had never failed her.
She had needed it more often than she liked to admit.
The riders stopped outside the fence.
Silas Rourke sat in the center.
He was a broad man with silver beginning to show at his temples and the kind of expensive black coat that looked ridiculous in the summer heat.
He removed his hat.
Not because he was being polite.
Because Silas Rourke liked people to see his face when he smiled.
“Morning, Mrs. Whitmore.”
“Mr. Rourke.”
“I've come to talk again.”
Clara stepped down from the porch.
“We've talked.”
“Not enough.”
“I disagree.”
One of Rourke's men laughed.
Rourke did not.
His eyes traveled over the ranch.
The barns.
The pasture.
The water tower.
The distant creek.
Finally, they returned to Clara.
“You're down to fifty-eight head.”
“Fifty-six.”
His eyebrow rose.
“You lost two?”
“They died.”
“Drought?”
“Heat.”
He nodded slowly.
“That's unfortunate.”
Clara knew that tone.
He sounded sympathetic.
He was not.
“You've got two months,” he said.
“For what?”
“To sell.”
“No.”
His smile disappeared.
“Clara.”
She hated when he used her first name.
It made his threat sound personal.
“This ranch belonged to my husband,” he continued.
“It belongs to me now.”
“You can't manage it alone.”
“I've been managing it for three years.”
“Barely.”
She stepped closer.
“You're welcome to leave.”
Rourke looked past her.
Three ranch hands were standing near the barn.
Amos Reed, her foreman, was nearly sixty.
Tommy and Ben were barely nineteen.
They were good workers.
They were also outnumbered.
Rourke knew it.
“You think those boys can protect you?”
“I don't need protecting.”
“Everyone needs protecting.”
Clara's hand remained near her revolver.
“Not from you.”
Silence fell.
Rourke smiled again.
“You've become difficult.”
“I was difficult when you first asked.”
“You'll regret that.”
“I've regretted plenty of things.”
She looked directly into his eyes.
“Selling to you won't be one of them.”
Rourke put his hat back on.
“Then I'll see you again.”
He turned his horse.
Before riding away, he stopped.
“Oh, one more thing.”
Clara waited.
“You might want to inspect your western fence.”
He smiled.
“Things have been wandering through there lately.”
Then he rode away.
The others followed.
Clara watched until the dust disappeared.
Only then did Amos come from the barn.
“You should've let me shoot him.”
“No.”
“He's going to keep coming.”
“I know.”
“He's not after the ranch.”
Clara looked at him.
“What do you mean?”
“He's after the water.”
She glanced toward the dry creek.
Amos nodded.
“Rourke knows something we don't.”
That afternoon, Clara rode to the western pasture.
The fence had indeed been cut.
Not broken.
Cut.
She dismounted.
Six sets of hoofprints crossed the dry ground.
She crouched.
There were fresh tracks.
Then she noticed something else.
A seventh trail.
One horse had approached from the north.
Stayed near the fence.
Then left toward the mountains.
Clara stood.
She heard a horse behind her.
She turned.
A rider was coming slowly across the valley.