Free That Dog Won't Hunt by Lou Allin Page B

punch. “So tell me about yourself, Rick. We’ve got some road to cover. You look like the real thing, not some rhinestone cowboy like the song.”
    The leather seat was cooling off. I breathed deeply and settled back like I owned the world. She listened, not like a lot of girls I’d met.
    I told her how I grew up in a double-wide in Escalante, Utah. Tires on the top to keep the roof on. Daddy was a heavy-equipment mechanic for a local mine until it shut down. Same year Mama died from a snakebite. She had been planting flowers by the house. Just wanted a little color. I was only ten.
    “That must have been hard. A boy needs his mother.” She patted my shoulder. “Go on.”
    I said that a couple of weeks later, Daddy gave me a hug and put the bone-handled knife in my hand. “I called your Uncle Seth in Salt Lake. He’ll come get you. You’re okay, kid, but I’m not cut out to be a father. Maybe you will be. It’s an important job. Never forget that.” I waved as that Mustang headed down the road. Children’s Aid came instead of Uncle Seth. Foster homes. Back of the hand or a leather belt for any smart talk. I quit school at sixteen and went to work on a ranch. But I was always looking for Daddy to come around that curve. Christ, he was probably dead now.
    I found myself opening up like a cactus flower. Something wet touched my eye. I hadn’t never told no one about all this. Thirty years old and I felt like a kid again. Gladys had the bottle half gone. When I crushed the empty can I’d been holding, she passed me another brew.
    “Last one for now. You’re driving. By the way, I’m going to Vegas. That suit you?” Her words were losing their edge.
    No one would be looking for me in a cherry Mustang. Once in Vegas, truckers headed for Salt Lake could take me across to Utah.
    “Perfect.”
    “So what’s a nice country boy like you doing out in the middle of nowhere?” she asked, as the vodka bottle clinked at her feet. “You sound like you’re fresh off the ranch.”
    “Guess you might say I’m seeing the world.” I didn’t add that when my last wrangling job ended, I took a bus to LA with a buddy. Got in deeper than I reckoned, looking for some fast money. The coke shipment I was sent to deliver got stolen on the way. A couple of homeboys with guns left me in a vacant lot with a killer lump on my head. I was pretty sure the guys I was working for wouldn’t appreciate losing forty thousand. But I didn’t wait around to find out.
    She looked over at me and her eyelids fluttered. “I’m a good judge of character. Sort of a sixth sense.”
    We were on Route 40, a mile from Needles. The sooner we were away from cities, the better. In the wide-open spaces, you could see who was coming.
    People were funny about drugs. Especially her age group. I took a silent breath and tried to sound casual. “I’ve worked on a few ranches. Thought California might be my style. The San Joaquin Valley has lots of farms. Fruit and nuts mainly. I was getting good at repairing equipment. Then the economy tanked. Back in Utah I can always get stock work. Doesn’t pay much, but it’s steady.”
    “Leave a woman behind?” she asked.
    “No, but I left a good horse. Nufflo’s running pasture at a friend’s.”
    From the center of Needles, I took Route 95 north.
    The desert flew by as we crossed into Nevada. I held the wheel loose and easy but ready for action. Like the reins on Nufflo. He was my bud. We’d seen some times together out on the range.
    “What’s your dream, Gary? You’re a young man.”
    I didn’t bother to correct her about my name. But what a funny question. No one had ever asked me that. And I had to think a bit before opening my yap.
    “Oh, a few acres between Church Wells and Big Water outside Escalante. Not far from the Arizona border. Nothing special. A cabin and enough room for a horse.” I was through with big plans. Being greedy was plain stupid.
    “Wells and water. Sounds like the desert