Chapter 1

1

“I guess that’s it then. You’re refusing??”

Roy Wortham glared up at his father. The older man had that Lord-of-the-Manor expression on his face. That expression had started many an argument, especially when it accompanied one of his high-handed orders. Like the one he’d just handed down.

Roy crossed his arms. “Yes, I’m refusing. I’m nearly twenty. You can’t make me do it.”

“You are nearly twenty.” Thomas Wortham frowned. “I’d just hoped you’d be a more mature nineteen after all that private schooling I paid for. Instead, you’re even more spoiled than when you went away. I don’t know what you did at that damned school, but it wasn’t growing up.”

“That he’d paid for—” Roy resisted the urge to roll his eyes. As if dear old Dad hadn’t jumped at the opportunity to send Roy to the best Eastern boarding school, especially when Mrs. Foster explained that Roy had already mastered everything their rural Texas schoolhouse could offer. You’d think a man would be proud his son could graduate at such a young age instead of insulting him.

“I didn’t go to school to be a cowboy,” Roy countered. “I’m plenty mature enough to start running the ranch.”

“And I say you’re not.” Wortham, Senior turned his back on his son and crossed to stare out the parlor window, looking out over the rolling grass that covered the Tumbling W Ranch. “I say you’ll go on this drive. You’ll learn about running the ranch from the bottom up, the same way I did.”

“You did it that way because you didn’t have a choice. You didn’t have enough help back when you started.”

“Because I didn’t have the money. I had to build up the herd before I hired hands.”

“Well, now you’ve got a good herd. And you can pass on the reins without worrying about me. That’s why I took all those business classes, after all.”

“Classes!” Thomas Wortham snorted. “You don’t learn about running a ranch by sitting at a school desk. You need to learn how to do more than add up a row of figures. You’ve got to earn the respect of your men, for one thing.”

“You were all for those classes four years ago. The men will respect me once they see what I can do for this place.”

“That’s not how it works, son. You can’t just sit around giving orders. Those men need to know you’ll work right alongside of them to make this ranch a success. Why do you think I still ride out as often as I can?”

Roy didn’t say what he really thought, which was that the man just liked surveying his domain and seeing the peons bow before him, figuratively speaking. Not that any of the rough-and-tumble crew that worked the cattle would even know how to be respectful. They were just as apt to clap his father on the back with a filthy hand and offer him a five-cent beer.

His father didn’t seem to expect Roy to answer, which was just as well. “The day I start sitting around barking orders is the day I’ll lose the respect of my men,” he said. “To them, you’re still a kid, still wet behind the ears. You’ll have to prove yourself.”

“Not by going on a cattle drive, I don’t. Frank is more than capable of handling the drive.”

“He wouldn’t be my foreman if he wasn’t capable. That’s not what I’m talking about.”

“I said I wouldn’t go, and I meant it.”

Thomas Wortham turned a narrow-eyed glare on his son. “I reckon I see what you’re getting at. You don’t think you can do the job. Why didn’t you just say so in the first place?”

“What? I did not say that at all.”

“It’s no shame to admit your shortcomings, son. You’re worried you’ll mess up in front of Frank and have the boys laugh at you. I should have realized that four years in that fancy school would make you too soft for a cattle drive.”

“I am not soft!” Why, they’d ridden every day at school, albeit with an Eastern rig instead of the Western get-up he’d grown up with. He’d had to learn that from scratch, but he’d done as well with his riding classes as with all of his other studies. And he’d been on the boxing team, too. And let’s not forget the sharpshooting team. Soft, was he? “I’m hardly afraid of anything Frank Malone could say to me.”

Thomas Wortham tutted and waved the thought away. “It’s fine, son. I’ll just tell them you’re not up to a drive, not in your condition.”

“My condition? What condition is that?”

“Why, I didn’t mean anything by it. In fact, I admire you for admitting your shortcomings instead of trying to bluster through it. I’m sure the men will understand.”

“There’s nothing to understand, darn it.”

“Of course not. Just because you can’t handle a drive—”

“Who says I can’t handle it? Blast it all—”

“Now son, let’s not curse at each other. I’ll tell your mother you’re not going. She’ll be relieved. She was trying to tell me it’s too dangerous for you to go along, young as you are.”

“What? You’ve got cowboys younger than me. Are they going?”

“Why, of course they are. They’re working men, doing an honest day’s job for the ranch.”

“And I’m not, you mean.”

“Now, son, I didn’t say that. Your mother will be happy, that’s all I meant to say. We’ll get you started on the accounts tomorrow, what say? After the drive heads out.”

“Blast the accounts! I’m perfectly capable of driving a herd of cattle to Kansas.”

“No, no. I said I understand, son. You can sleep in, then get started learning the books.”

Roy had always heard the expression, but it was interesting to note that he literally did see red. Damn the old man for his insults. He’d show his father a thing or to, see if he didn’t. “Not only am I going on that drive, but I’ll see to it that we arrive with more healthy cattle than any of your other drives.”

“Now, son—”

“Don’t patronize me, Father. If you’re letting that teenager they call Slim ride along, you’re letting me.”

Thomas Wortham crossed his arms, studying his son from narrowed eyes. “I suppose if Slim is going, I can’t in good conscience claim you’re too young, no matter what your mother says.”

“Hang Mother and her ideas. I’m no mama’s boy.”

“Nobody said you were, son. If you want to ride along with the boys, I’m willing to let you.”

“And I’m not ‘riding along.’ You be sure Frank Malone knows he’s going to be following my orders onthis drive.”

“Well…”

“If I’m going to run the ranch, the men had better get used to doing what I tell them.”

“I suppose you’re right, son. I’ll go break the news to Frank.”

Roy stomped upstairs to his bedroom, where he threw his oldest clothing into a couple of saddlebags and rolled up his blankets into a bedroll. Damn both of his parents, thinking he was still a green kid. He’d show them, that was for certain.