Back at the house, Colt called up the cameras that would show them the tack room on his laptop as his brothers walked through the front door. He queued up the footage to the previous day, after he and Mason had returned from their ride and Mason had put his saddle back on its rack.
The four of them gathered around the laptop on the kitchen table and watched raptly as Colt hit Play.
The screen was split into two video feeds that showed the interior of the barn. One was aimed at the stalls and included the main doors. The other was inside the tack room, up in the corner, where they had a nearly full view of the space. The footage was black-and-white and a little grainy but otherwise clear. Nothing moved on the screen for a couple of minutes, so Colt pressed fast forward until they caught movement that wasn’t barn cats or the horses moving about in their stalls. A beam of light flickered in the image. It was directional, so Colt knew right away it was a flashlight and this was their vandal. He sat straighter in his chair, his breath speeding up.
“How did they get in the barn?” Levi asked.
“Must have come in through a paddock door,” Mason supplied. “I didn’t put a camera on that side of the barn.”
The light moved toward the tack room, and Colt followed the image as it went from one frame to the other. Light caught on saddles and bridles, and bits of steel and silver flashed like tiny diamonds before the screen went black. The overhead light flooded the room a second later. Whoever it was knew lights in the tack room wouldn’t alert anyone outside since there were no windows.
A man stepped into the frame. He had on a cowboy hat, but from the angle of the camera, they couldn’t make out his face. He pulled a hunting blade from his pocket and stood still for a moment with his head down, as though he was psyching himself up. Then he walked over to the wall of saddles on racks, grabbed the first one he came to with gloved hands, and slashed the cinch.
“Son of a bitch,” Wes said low and dangerous.
The man on the screen attacked a few more cinches, tossing the cut ends over his shoulder, where they landed haphazardly on the floor before moving on to the next one. Colt felt the tension radiating off Mason in tangible waves. He hated that Mason had to see this, that this was happening at all, but identifying this person would hopefully put an end to the troubles Mason had been having.
And the reason for Colt being there.
Colt shoved that thought away and focused on the video. Their culprit got to the end of the first row of saddle racks and turned to work his way back along the next row. In doing so, he tipped his hat up to rub a hand across his forehead—which was the perfect angle for the camera to capture his face.
Mason gasped. “No.”
It was John.
The disbelief and heartbreak in that single word cut into Colt as if John had slashed his hunting knife through Colt’s chest.
“I’m so sorry, Mason,” Colt said softly.
Mason staggered backward, flopped down onto a chair, and dropped his head into his hands.
Colt looked at his brothers. They both looked as crushed as he felt. Not so much because the person who had been harassing and threatening Mason was one of his own trusted hands, but because of how devastated Mason looked from learning the truth.
“I’ll call Nick,” Wes said quietly.
“Thank you,” Colt said.
Wes tipped his chin at Levi to follow him out. They both gave Mason’s shoulder a squeeze as they walked past him, and then it was just him and Mason.
John.
Mason couldn’t believe it. John had worked on the ranch for nearly twenty years. He’d been a loyal hand, a friend. How could he do something like this? He was the one who’d spray-painted Cuervo. The one who’d cut the truck’s brake lines with the intention to . . .
Raw anger shot through him—jagged and stabbing—and fury roared through his mind.
He could have been killed.
Thad could have been killed.
And for what? He had no idea.
Adrenaline-laced rage burned up Mason’s spine and into the back of his throat. He was vaguely aware Colt was talking to him, but he couldn’t see him, couldn’t hear him. He shot from his chair so abruptly it tipped over and crashed to the floor. He didn’t care. He spun away from the table and stormed for the front door. He had a few choice words for John. And a couple of fists too.
He reached the door, and suddenly, Colt was there, tall and solid and preventing him from leaving.
“Move,” Mason bit out, his own voice sounding foreign to his ears.
Colt shook his head. “Can’t let you do that.”
