Free Whisperer by Jeanne Harrell Page A

and Jesse were particularly adept at this, having done it
all their lives. The riders and horses worked as one, separating
the calf, working it into the corral, leaving and getting another
one. She couldn’t imagine how they did it, but over and over, they
did, until all the calves were separated from the mature
cattle.
    And then
everything started happening at once. Many hands appeared. Colt
lassoed a calf and Jesse jumped down to inoculate it. Meg had
already dismounted and moved around Jesse to brand the calf. In
another corral, Sandy lassoed a calf and Jason inoculated it. A
hired hand ran over to brand it. Over and over the process went.
Inoculation and branding… In yet another corral, Sam lassoed a calf
that was running, trying to escape, and pulled his rope tight, so
Joey could grab it to inoculate. Miles stepped up to brand the
calf. Everyone had a turn at lassoing, inoculating and branding.
There was plenty of work to go around.
    “Want to give
it a try, Mandy?” smiled Lily. “Nothing to it, when you’ve done it
a few million times.”
    Mandy laughed.
“Absolutely. Show me.”
    Lily steered
her into a corral. Colt lassoed a calf and Lily showed Mandy how to
hold the big inoculation needle and then give the calf the shot.
She picked up the process fast and started helping. Pretty soon,
everyone was nodding their heads at what a fast learner Mandy was
and what a natural she seemed to be at it. And it wasn’t easy – the
calves did their utmost to escape the needles and the branding
irons. They bellowed and snorted and tried their hardest to get out
of the corrals. It was definitely hard work, and, after a few
rugged hours, Mandy was breathing deeply and nursing sore muscles.
Lily and Sandy were impressed. She was no lightweight -- that was
for sure.
    After all the
calves in the corrals had been branded, Sandy threw up his hands.
That was the signal for everyone to quit and leave the area. Mandy
was happy to finally leave. It had been a hard day, but pleasant
enough, being with his family.
    When everyone
was outside the corrals, he yelled, “Good work, everybody! Thanks!
We’ll leave the others for tomorrow. Go clean up and then come back
to the ranch house. We promised to feed you.”
    Lily said,
“Sandy, tell them about the party, okay?”
    “Oh, yeah. One
more thing – my wife wants me to tell you it’s my birthday party.
So let’s rip it up tonight.” Everyone laughed and took off. Lily
and Meg took Mandy back to the ranch house to clean up. Jeanne and
Sam went back to their house, Jesse and Audrey headed back to his,
while Jason and his family went home. All the extra hands headed to
their bunkhouses, while everyone else also headed for the Johnson
ranch house to clean up before the birthday dinner.
    Mandy was
changing clothes in one of the guest bedrooms when she checked her
phone for voice messages. She was pissed – two from her mother. Not
going there at all right now. She also had one from Stacy and one
from a number she didn’t recognize. What the…? She deleted the
messages from her mother, knowing what she would be saying anyway
and clicked on Stacy’s message.
    “Hi Mandy. This
is Stacy. Hope you’re having a great time and don’t listen to this
message until you start home. Ah…bad news…Eddy’s trying to find
you. I put off calling about this for as long as I could, but he’s
been pretty insistent. I wanted to let you know that he might be
calling. So sorry…call me.” And she hung up. Oh, great. Just
what she didn’t need in her life right now was that asshole
ex-boyfriend calling and ruining her wonderful new life. Curious
now, she listened to the unidentified message. It was probably from
him.
    “Hi Amanda.
Eddy here. I’ve wanted to apologize for the things I said to you. I
haven’t been able to reach you and Stacy said you’d left town. I
got this number from your mom and would like to come see you,
wherever you are. Call me back when you can.”
    Mandy