Big Game: Hunted Love #1

Big Game

Hunted Love #1

By Aden Lowe

© 2014 by Aden Lowe
All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of Aden Lowe or his legal representative.

Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

**Translation: If you make a copy of this file and share it with friends, whether it is one or one million friends, you are breaking the law, even if you receive nothing in return. If you receive this file from a friend, both you and your friend are breaking the law. No readers' clubs, groups or associations are authorized to distribute this book on behalf of the authors. Amazon.com is the only authorized online distributor. If you need a different format, please contact the author.

Author's Notes:

This series contains explicit scenes of sexual activity. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, by any of the characters within is entirely accidental.

Finally, I genuinely hope you enjoy reading "Big Game" as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Acknowledgements:

Lucian, thanks, man, for talking me into giving this writing thing a try. You were right, it's a fucking blast.

Thanks to all the members of the Dom Warriors Street Team, and now to the Aden Lowe's Huntresses Street Team, and all the associated groups and teams. Angela Peters, thanks for naming Kate's Southern Sunrise, Sunny. Rae Stanford, thank you for naming Jakob's Ajax. As I've said, if it were up to me, all horses would be called Joe ;)

Ashley Wheels, thanks for all you do. You're a great friend and an outstanding assistant, and I truly appreciate everything you do to make my job easier. Not to mention you're one tough lady. Keep on kicking ass, my friend.

Elyse, you know what you mean to me.

Kate Holt let the horse slow to walk and headed him for the gate, where the next ride in her morning string stood waiting with Alan. The blood bay snorted and rolled his eyes. Dread shot her pulse rate up. If ever a horse hated her, it was that one. Every second working it was a fight.

One of the hands ran up from the main barn, presenting the possibility of a delay. A few minutes longer before she’d have to grab the blood bay tiger by the tail and hang on tight. Memory of her father’s old play on the tiger by the tail phrase shot a familiar pang of grief through her as she swung down from the saddle. She wiped sweat from her eyes while she waited to see what might need her attention. A break, without a crisis, would make the day pass a little faster.

The boy stopped, heaving to catch his breath. "Miss Kate, Ray sent me up. He'd like you to come to the barn, something he wants you to see." Just like that, the boy gave her a valid reason not to have to work the blood bay.

Something like glee tried to creep into Kate's voice. "Alan, you want to work that idiot? I'll take this one back down as I go." At the man's nod, she held the bay horse for him to mount and closed the gate for him, then set off with the boy—what was his name again?—toward the main barn. "Did Ray say what he needed?" The horse she’d just finished working came along easily, keeping his muzzle at the small of her back.

"No ma'am, just asked me to fetch you, something you needed to see." The boy—if a six-foot something nineteen year-old could be called 'boy'—shortened his long stride to allow her to keep up.

Ray's influence, no doubt. The foreman was forever reminding the men of little ways to make things easier for her without being obvious about it. Not that she didn't appreciate the effort. The necessity was what pissed Kate off. At least the men didn't openly pity her like her father had.

The sloping trail down to the main barn presented its usual challenge and reminded her once more why she was more comfortable on horseback. Her shorter left leg forced her to use a slightly sideways gait to compensate. Mostly out of habit, she silently cursed the drunk driver that had plowed into the family car when she was baby. Bad enough he'd taken her mother and turned her father into a bitter shell, but the injuries Kate sustained resulted in a left leg that refused to grow at the same rate as her right.

The trail leveled off a hundred yards from the barn, allowing Kate to resume a more normal walk. A handful of men gathered at the front of the barn drew her attention and took her mind off of self-consciousness. A riderless horse stood tethered nearby, blowing heavily and dripping sweat, while the men looked at something on the ground in their midst.

Approaching the group, Kate handed her horse's reins to the boy. "Put him in the paddock, if you don't mind, and get that animal seen to." Better be something serious for all those able men to leave a horse standing there shaking with exhaustion.

Nodding, the boy led her horse away, freeing Kate to join the group of men in time to catch the tail-end of what one was saying.

"…too much blood. It was definitely a kill site."

"What's going on?" She slipped between two of the men, their grim expressions warning her she wouldn't like whatever was on the ground. Glancing down, she couldn't contain her hiss of combined fear and anger. Lying there in the dust, a bloody horse skull, with fragments of tissue still clinging, and a ragged patch of hide bearing a distinctive white patch on the dark chocolate-brown.

The foreman, Ray, shook his grizzled head. "Looks like a lion, Miss Kate. Brady found it." He nodded to a dust-covered man to his left.

Brady ran a forearm over his face, leaving a trail of skin visible through the caked dust. "I found two others, Miss Kate, older kills. This one looks like it was in the last twenty-four hours." He lowered his head. "I figured you would want his remains."

Kate choked back the tears that wanted free. "You figured right. We'll bury him. You think this was a cat? Not wolves?" It would take a fearsome predator to bring down the big Paint stud horse who'd roamed the ranch for the last twelve years. A cougar was bad news, of course, but Chaser was his own brand of bad news.

Brady nodded once more. "I found tracks, hair, and scat. No doubt. It's a bold fucker, too. He was laid up not far away when I found Chaser. Had the balls to roar at me. Scared the piss out of my horse and nearly got me thrown." No one noticed Brady’s rough language, testament to how deeply the news impacted them all.

Ray turned his faded blue gaze on Brady. "That's not normal. Should have either attacked or just stayed quiet." He turned to Kate. "I don't mind saying we might need expert help on this."

Kate swallowed the cold knot in her throat. "You're right. I'm not risking any of the crew going after an animal that's lost its fear of man. Do you know anyone?"

"I might. If he has time. Frank Barger is in pretty high demand, though. We'll be lucky to get him." Ray turned as if to leave, then paused. "Maybe you should call. He might be more inclined to help if you mention me instead of your dad, though."

The remaining men quickly dispersed to return to work, one calling for help digging a grave for what was left of the dead horse.

Kate turned toward the house and her office there despite her general dislike of recordkeeping. Unlike breeding records and accounts, getting a hunter to get rid of the mountain lion eating her horses couldn't wait couldn’t wait for dark. The hound currently using the back porch as a nursery rose from her blanket when Kate pushed through the screen door. Pups dropped to the blanket and whimpered as their mother wagged and pushed her head into Kate's hand.

"Hey, old girl." Kate paused to stroke the dog's velvety ear. "Those kids keeping you busy?" The dog gave a toothy grin and wagged harder. Laughing, Kate patted the dog and went on inside.

The darkened kitchen served as a painful reminder. She would have to find a cook and housekeeper soon. The crew grumbled constantly about the stop-gap measures of cold cuts and frozen meals she'd put in place when Mandy could no longer manage the demands of feeding them all. No need to continue misleading herself and the men that Mandy would be back to normal soon. She wouldn't.

The little ranch office just off the kitchen had once served as quarters for the cook, but her grandfather had ended that custom when the ranch operation grew too large to fit in a single cardboard box. She found Frank Barger's home number written her father's neat block print in the old clothbound journal that had been used to record important phone numbers and addresses since her grandfather moved into the office. All that stuff needed to be updated and put in the computer, but she kept finding herself going back to the tried and true. Bad enough the accounts and breeding records were on the hard drive.

She even preferred the old rotary phone over the sleek new cordless that still waited in its box. Dialing, she dropped into her chair and put her feet up on the desk. Maybe her friend Chelsea was right and she really
was
afraid of change. No, that wasn’t it. Kate just preferred a solid connection to the past.

"Yeah?" The gruff voice on the line didn't sound at all like she'd expected an old hunter to sound like.

"Uh, hi. This is Kate Holt, owner of Holt Cutting Horses.
One of my men came in a little while ago after finding the remains of three mountain lion kills on my land. My foreman, Ray Johnson, gave me your name as the best man to get rid of the problem."

Nothing but silence on the other end.

"Hello? Mr. Barger?" The impulse to roll her eyes became too much. Figures. She got the wrong number and the guy didn't even have the decency to let her know, just hung up.

"Sorry. I think you're looking for my uncle, Frank."

"Oh. Is he available?" Kate fought back the impatience threatening to make her say something rude. "Or could you have him call me back?"

"Yeah, give me your number."

Kate rattled off the number and other information she thought the hunter might need and hung up. She'd probably never hear from Barger, if she had to depend on that guy to pass the message along. He didn't seem exactly helpful.

With a sigh, she got to work wasting the rest of the day. Neighbors had to be notified of the mountain lion on her land, in case it decided to have a snack on their dime as well. And she really needed to find someone capable of hunting the damn thing down, since it seemed unlikely Frank Barger would ever call back. Then there was the matter of finding a new cook, too.

The sun hung low on the horizon by the time she hung up the phone. The neighbors were all warned, and Kate was full up on gossip, and more than a little annoyed that even business calls had to be derailed for small talk and catching up on the latest. She'd managed to search out three hunters, but all were away, hunting predators elsewhere, and couldn't get to her anytime soon.

Should she call Frank Barger's number again, on the off chance of actually speaking with him? It certainly couldn't hurt. Except the number just rang endlessly, no answer, which served to aggravate her even more. Finally, she gave up and concentrated on finding a replacement for Mandy. She'd never considered how time consuming it could be just to put 'help-wanted' notices on local websites. Fatigue gnawed at her shoulders and her bad hip ached as much as if she'd spent a hard day in the saddle.

She decided to call it an early night, but no matter how tired, she refused to forego her habitual nightly trip to the stables.

Two weeks before a highly anticipated sixty-day leave, the word had come down through Jakob Barger's chain of command. Due to the nature of his mission, the only reason he'd been notified at all was because his Uncle Frank was listed as his next of kin. Fortunately, he was already wrapping things up, so Command had allowed a compassionate leave immediately so he could attend his uncle's funeral.

When Kate Holt's call came in, he'd been sitting there, trying to figure out what the hell to do with the old man's horses and dogs. The rest could wait, but the animals had to be settled before he had to head back to the sand box. Unless, of course, he decided not to go back.

Too damn many options for a soldier who rarely slept more than two hours at a stretch. Miss Holt's call offered the perfect opportunity to get out into the wilderness and get his head straight. A few days or a week with no one but his dogs and horses would be a welcome break from all the pressures of the decisions he needed to make.

When he returned her call, he intended to offer to do the hunt himself, and if she refused, that would be that. He'd find a different way to deal.

An hour passed without a reply from her. The hell with it. He'd just load up and hit the road. She could hardly turn away a free hunter sitting in her driveway. Not with a lion eating her horses.

***

Her feet knew every particle of dust along the trail to the main barn, so Kate didn’t bother with a flashlight. As she approached, the yearlings stood impatiently at the gate, waiting for their goodnight scratches. With every muzzle patted, she continued into the barn and worked her way down the aisle, stopping at each stall to check on the occupants. Most of the horses stood watching eagerly for her, and she quickly visited all twelve stalls on that side of the barn.

On the other side of the barn, the stalls were occupied with project horses, including the blood bay who hated her. Most of them belonged to other people, just visiting her for training, but even they had come to anticipate her evening visits. The blood bay eyed her suspiciously as Kate made her way up the aisle toward him. Finally, she told his neighbor goodnight and moved toward him.

The blood bay followed his usual pattern and retreated to the far side of his stall when she stopped at his door. Kate leaned there for a minute. “You know, one of these days, you’re going to get over this silliness. I’m going to come down here one night, and you’ll stand instead of running to the far corner.”

The horse flicked his ears and made no further reply, just glared silently.

Kate sighed and left his treat on the top rail of his stall door, then moved to the next horse. From the corner of her eye, she watched the bay stretch and gingerly lip the treat up. That was real progress. When she first started, he always left them.

With all the horses tucked in for the night, she went back up to the house. Before her dad died, he always met her on the back porch to sit and discuss the day’s work, and make plans for the following day. Now, crossing that porch without stopping to talk with him was painful. In the eight months since his death, the back porch was a constant reminder of her loss.

Chaser’s death brought a fresh wave of grief to pull her under the black waters of depression again. Her dad had loved that horse, almost more than life. The big Paint was the only surviving foal of her mother’s mare, and training Chaser and working with him seemed to make her dad feel closer to his beloved wife after her death.

The decision to turn him free to roam about the ranch at will had been a hard one. A serious leg injury had ended the horse’s impressive competition career. Without his work, the big animal turned aggressive and hard to handle, dangerous to anyone who came near. After one of the hands was severely injured just moving Chaser to another paddock, it seemed the horse would have to be put down. He’d become too big of threat to be handled.

Kate had come up with the idea to just turn him loose. They already had several small herds of brood mares ranging wild over the several thousand acres of land they owned, and even on the leased government range land. Each herd had its own stallion to breed the mares, and every fall, the hands went out and caught the mares up, administered vaccinations and parasite control, culled out any unfit to continue living wild, and separated the weanling aged foals out. Over the coming winter, the foals would begin to become acquainted with humans.

That year, when a herd came in without a stallion, Chaser was allowed to take over the harem. It had been the perfect solution, and it was the first time her father took Kate seriously on anything related to the ranch operations. Afterward, she became less Daddy’s Little Angel and more his protégé, in serious training with the full expectation she would take over running the ranch when the time arrived. And so she had.

Chaser’s death seemed like the end of an era. Even though she had taken over operating the ranch for the most part a few years ago, her father had always been there for backup. When he died, of course that changed and she had no one to fall back on. But as long as Chaser roamed, she had a connection with him, no matter how tenuous. Now it was gone, and she was truly on her own.

She sighed, and forced herself to open the porch door. The momma hound pushed her way past Kate’s legs, anxious to get back her pups after going out to stretch her legs and relieve herself while Kate tucked the horses in. Hearing their mother, the pups set up a cacophony of baby howls, forcing a smile to Kate’s lips. Very soon they would be ready to learn to be ranch dogs.

And Kate would continue her lonely existence, with only horses and dogs and gossipy neighbors for company. The prospect hadn’t seemed so bleak even just a few hours ago. Now the future stretched before her in an endless black hole. She wouldn’t have a husband and children, of course. No man wanted a disfigured woman, especially one who couldn’t have babies.

One of the pups squalled in fear, having wondered too far from the blanket to find his way back the dinner table. Momma dog
huff
ed
,
but didn’t move from where she was already nursing her other five pups. The pup squalled louder and Kate took pity on him and scooped him up by his scruff and deposited him where he could find his mother again. Whimpering, the pup crawled the two feet and settled in contentedly to nurse with his siblings.

Kate sighed, pushed the depression away forcefully, and continued on into the house. The answering machine on the utility counter flashed a new message. She almost walked on by and left it, but guilt dictated she check.

“Uh, Miss Holt? Jakob Barger here. You asked about my uncle Frank hunting a lion for you. Frank won’t be able to, but if it’s okay with you, I can come track it down for you. Give me a call back as soon as possible. If I leave tonight, I can be at your place in the morning and get started.”

That was it. And of course she had no choice if she wanted to stop that mountain lion from eating her horses. Her hand shook slightly as she hit the caller ID and returned his call. At least one advantage for the modern phone. The thought made her smile and she was a bit unprepared with Jakob Barger answered.

“Miss Holt?”

“Uh, yes. You’re willing to come track the lion down?”

“I am. In fact, I already have my dogs loaded and my horses caught up.”

“Good. We’ll see you in the morning then?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Great, I’m…” she trailed off. Dead air. The bastard had hung up already, not bothering with directions, or to negotiate price. What if he got here and she wasn’t willing to pay his price? Guess he’d have a drive back for nothing then.