Page 121 of Dusty Spur Ranch Cowboys

My jaw aches from grinding my teeth, and I roll it once before rubbing both hands across my face.

I’ve spent enough nights hoping sleep will come back to know better.

I pull on yesterday’s jeans, shove my feet into my boots, grab my jacket, and head outside.

The cold catches me the second I step onto the porch, and I pull my jacket tighter before crossing the yard. Most of the ranch has turned in for the night, leaving only the porch light burning behind me while the horses shift lazily in the pastures beyond the fences.

One lets out a soft nicker as I pass, then drops its head back to the grass.

I’ve walked this route almost every night for years. My granddad started the habit long before I was born, insisting a ranch would tell you when it needed attention if you bothered paying enough attention.

A loose hinge, a nervous horse, water where it had no business running. Little things always showed themselves before they grew into bigger ones.

Tonight, the unease starts before I’ve even reached the equipment shed.

The door sits slightly ajar.

I stop.

I latched it before supper. I remember pulling on the handle to make sure it caught, the same way I always do.

Every muscle in my body tightens as I cross the last few yards and push the door open.

Moonlight reaches through the far window, giving me enough light to see the shelves inside, and I know before I take another step that somebody’s been here.

The shovel rack stands half empty. A toolbox has been dumped across the floor, sockets and spanners scattered beneath the workbench, while one of the storage cabinets hangs crooked from a single hinge.

“What the hell…”

The words barely leave my mouth before I crouch beside the scattered tools, picking up a spanner and setting it back where it belongs.

Whoever came in here tipped half the toolbox across the floor but never bothered taking any of it, which tells me they weren’t interested in anything they could sell.

I head straight for the inventory shelves instead.

The fuel cans are exactly where I left them, and the spare bridles still hang from their hooks, but the hardware shelf tells a different story.

Three gate chains are missing. The bolt cutters that usually hang beside them have disappeared too, and the box of heavy-duty fence staples sits open with only a handful left scattered across the shelf.

I reach for the baling wire out of habit, only to find the hook sitting empty.

I let my gaze travel around the shed again, taking in the overturned toolbox, the hanging cabinet door, and the gaps left behind on the shelves.

This wasn’t a thief grabbing whatever looked valuable. They came here with a list.

I step outside and scan the ranch, letting my eyes work their way across the barns, the corrals, and the tree line beyond them. Horses wander through the pasture, stopping every so often to tear another mouthful of grass from the ground, but I don’t catch a single sign of anybody else.

Whoever walked onto Dusty Spur finished what they came to do hours ago, and I’m standing here looking at the trail they left behind.

I pull the shed door closed, lock it, and give the handle a firm tug before turning back toward the house. My boots carry me across the yard on instinct, but I never make it inside.

Instead, I lower myself onto the porch steps with a mug of coffee cradled between both hands and watch the ranch wait for morning.

The coffee cools long before I drink half of it.

A few horses drift toward the water troughs as the eastern sky begins to brighten. The chickens start raising hell before the sun clears the mountains, and somewhere inside the house I hear a floorboard creak as the rest of the ranch slowly comes back to life.

I’ve always liked these hours, they usually settle my head.