Read Online Sharp Shootin' Cowboy by Victoria Vane - Free Book Online

talk her into it.”
    â€œGood luck,” Bill said. “She’s a very stubborn girl, especially when she sets her sights on something.”
    Reid grinned. “Me too. So I s’pose that’s one thing more we have in common. Thanks again. It was a pleasure meeting you both.”
    Reid had planned only to spend Thanksgiving at home, but now, unless Haley decided to return, he’d probably stay in Wyoming until after Christmas. He wasn’t certain how to proceed with her after that. Maybe he should just abandon his Haley campaign? He quickly discarded that defeatist strategy. Her grandparents weren’t very encouraging, given their obvious differences, but they didn’t actively discourage him either. He wasn’t ready to concede, not yet anyway. Not until he saw her again. The Marine Corps’ campaign in al-Anbar had been based on patient and persistent presence. Reid’s personal campaign would be no different. Today he’d made inroads by forging a connection with her family. He left with the satisfaction that he’d at least won them over to his side.

Chapter 7
    Juneau, Alaska
    What the hell was she thinking? Here she was, a Southern California girl, marching in circles and waving a severed wolf paw in the ass-freezing cold. She’d planned to return home before the first snowfall, but the death of several of their study subjects, under the guise of predator control, had changed everything. Chased to exhaustion by hunters with high-powered rifles in low-flying aircraft, the animals had had no chance of escape. And now the governor was preparing to take this travesty to a whole new level by offering a bounty for wolf kills—a hundred fifty dollars for a left forepaw and hundreds more for a full pelt.
    Haley had stayed on to join the confederation of wildlife activists who gathered at the state capital. They’d stood vigil outside the Department of Fish and Game, offering the same wolf hunters two hundred dollars for the paws that they now used as a visual symbol of the slaughter. But after weeks of protests, the governor still refused to meet them or to be interviewed. Adding insult to injury, the media had paid the protest minimal attention.
    â€œHow are you holding up?” Jeffrey appeared by her side bearing an encouraging smile and a steaming cup of coffee.
    She needed both. Her frustration was growing, along with her fear of losing her fingers and toes to frostbite. She chided herself that the fight against aerial gunning was far more important than her discomfort. And she was incredibly lucky to be working with someone like Jeffrey Greene. The association with him would surely open new doors to her.
    â€œN-not v-very well, I’m afraid,” Haley answered through chattering teeth. “The only people who seem to care are the ones marching with us.”
    â€œThe people here aren’t apathetic,” Jeffrey argued. “But they’re feeling defeated. Alaska has already voted this issue down twice, only to be overridden. If the hunting lobbyists had their way, they’d turn Alaska into a giant game park. That’s why we have to stop this now.”
    â€œHow? We don’t have money or legislative support.”
    â€œPerhaps not here, but we have other options. We have a strong conservation base in California and sympathetic legislators. All we need to do is prove we have public support and money, and new federal legislation will follow.”
    â€œBut how can we do that when we can’t even get any local news coverage?”
    â€œWe have to find a way to get national attention. All we need to do is capture this brutality on video and show the world the ugly truth. The documentary Wolves and the Wolf Men led to the Federal Airborne Hunting Act in the seventies.” Jeffrey’s jaw was set with determination. “It worked once before. It’ll work again.”
    â€œThat sounds easier said than done,”