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wasn’t enough.
    â€œWe’re missing ten cows,” Brett told Pepper as he looked over the ledger page for the hundredth time. An ancient system according to today’s standard, but Pappy was old school and he’d resisted the automation craze. Even the laptop Brett had bought him for Christmas a few years back still sat in the original packaging in the back of the old man’s closet.
    â€œI don’t need some hifalutin’ machine to tell me how to do my business,” Pappy had said. “Why, I got all the computer I need right here,” he’d tapped his temple. “Up here in the old noggin’.”
    But things had changed and Pappy’s noggin’ wasn’t performing the way it once had. He was slower. Forgetful. Sick.
    Brett swallowed against the sudden tightening in his throat and focused his attention on Pepper.
    â€œAccording to this,” he told the foreman, “they were branded last year and turned out along with the other three hundred and fifty-five, but they weren’t rounded up for the sale this past week. That means they’re still out there.”
    â€œLet’s hope.” Pepper shrugged. “That hurricane that blew in at Port Aransas sent a mess of weather our way about six months ago. Blew the roof off the barn and the debris even took out some of the hogs. Those cows could have gotten separated from the herd and caught in the weather.”
    â€œMaybe.” And maybe they had a cattle thief among them.
    The thought struck, but Brett pushed it aside. The ranch was in a sad state because of Pappy’s poor business decisions.
    Because of the Alzheimer’s.
    A man who had once documented every egg that had come out of the henhouse could barely write his own name now. Hell, forget writing, the man could barely remember his own name.
    A complete one-eighty from the Pappy Sawyer he’d been just five years ago when he’d sat in the audience and watched Brett win his first gold buckle. He’d been lucid then. Coherent. Happy.
    But then the symptoms had started. The moments of forgetfulness. The whispers of confusion. Pappy had written them off as old age, but then he’d gone for his physical two years ago and the doctor had delivered the diagnosis.
    Not that Pappy had believed it.
    â€œI don’t care what that quack says. I feel fine. Ain’t nothing wrong with me that a bottle of castor oil can’t fix.”
    A teaspoon a day and he’d still taken a nosedive straight into Alzheimer’s Hell. Most of the time, he was stuck in the past, searching for his boots or digging outside in a tomato garden that he’d abandoned four decades ago.
    â€œ Par for the course. ” That’s what Doc Meyers had told Brett. “ Just be patient and understanding and know that it’s probably going to get worse. ”
    Brett knew that, but he also knew that his pappy still had good days. Days where he walked and talked and acted like himself. And while Brett couldn’t turn things around for his grandfather, he could turn things around for the old man’s pride and joy—the ranch itself. So that on those good days, when Pappy was lucid and aware, he would know that everything was fine.
    That his grandson had fixed everything instead of tearing it apart.
    Then Brett could go back to his life with peace of mind because he’d done the one thing his father had never been able to do—the right thing.
    That meant dealing with the endless pile of bills first and foremost. Even forking over every cent of his rodeo winnings—minus an overdue tuition bill for his sister, Karen—hadn’t been enough to push Bootleg out of the red.
    They needed to sell all three hundred and sixty-five cattle they had on hand in order to buy some time to find a permanent fix.
    And once they were in the clear?
    He wasn’t sure. He only knew that he had to deal with the cattle first, then he could turn his