Wild West Christmas

by Jenna Kernan

  My flower bed was turning into a most intriguing mélange of colors and patterns; the beds were not separated, as Mama’s gardens always were, but mixed together all which-a-way, like one of those Impressionistic paintings Mama had brought back from Paris where the paint all washed together in a riot of hues. If my orange fence was causing talk around town, my haphazard swirly carpet of flowers would bring the gossip to a crescendo.

  Just imagine, being the subject of gossip not because of a relationship with the opposite sex, but because of the indiscriminate mating of red nasturtiums and golden-yellow black-eyed Susans!

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Gale

  I could see she had something on her mind when she pushed open the screen door and came out on the porch. I could see it in the way she held her shoulders. She settled at the far end of the lawn swing, reached over and lifted her orange cat out of my lap and sat petting it without saying a word. Real quick it got hard to watch her hands like that, stroking that ball of fur slow and gentle-like, back and forth, back and forth, and not in any kind of hurry.

  She had a kind of faraway look on her face, and she kept staring over at the flowers I’d planted for her. They looked real pretty, all mixed up like that, like a Persian carpet I’d seen once in my daddy’s front parlor.

  I sure wanted to ask what she was thinking, but I figured if it was any of my business she’d tell me. And if it wasn’t, maybe she’d tell me anyway. Don’t know why I thought that; guess I wanted it to be true.

  My stomach was getting all knotted up just being close to her, smelling her hair and the scent of her skin. She didn’t have to say a single word to keep me interested. To be honest, I was more than interested. And when I realized that, my heart kicked like an unbroke stallion.

  Must be it was time for me to go. But just when I made that decision she said something that took all the vinegar out of me.

  “I write love stories.”

  “Huh?”

  “You know, stories about handsome heroes and beautiful girls.”

  I swallowed twice. “You get any of these stories published?”

  “No, not yet. I send them out, but I don’t receive much encouragement.”

  “How come? Aren’t they any good?”

  “No, not very.” She looked at me kinda funny.

  “Why not? What’s wrong with them?”

  She was quiet for so long I thought maybe she’d decided not to answer. Then she opened her mouth and blew me out of the corral again.

  “The truth is that I don’t know much about it. What makes a love story, I mean.”

  Whoa. It was my turn to be quiet. Couldn’t think for a minute, I guess. Everyone on God’s earth knows about love, don’t they?

  “Lilah, are you saying you haven’t had much, uh, experience?”

  She nodded, but she kept her head down, staring at her cat, and I couldn’t see her eyes.

  “I’m gonna tell you a secret,” I said. “You know all those dime novels about cowboys and bank robbers and sheriffs? They’re mostly made up. Anybody that knows diddly about life out here in the West knows what’s printed in those books isn’t real.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Gale. Those stories feel true. The reader is convinced because of the setting and the details. Gunfights and train wrecks are easier to imagine.”

  “So maybe…” Aw, hell, for sure that wasn’t an invitation to take her upstairs and do some research. That’d be the dumbest thing since ginger beer. Instead I sucked in my breath and asked, “Why are you telling me this?”

  “I wanted you to know what I wrote about.”

  “Why? You think it matters to me what you write? You think I’m gonna look at you any different because you write love stories?”

  “I thought you would think it was frivolous. My mother thinks it is.”

  “Well, I sure ain’t your mother.”

  “No. And I thank the Lord for that.”

  I had to laugh at her words, and then she laughed, and before I knew what I was doing I leaned over and kissed her. Damn near squashed her cat, but it was worth it.

  She tasted like wine, and I couldn’t get enough of her. Couldn’t get close enough to her either, with that cat between us. Maybe that was a good thing. I was starting to ache so bad I wasn’t sure how I was gonna mount my horse and ride the six miles back to the ranch.

  I shouldn’t have worried. She didn’t move an inch to make it easier for me to get any closer, so I figured she’d had enough of a randy cowboy with a lot of giddy-yap and no manners. I got to my feet and walked to the edge of the porch.

  “I’d best say good-night, Lilah. Thanks for havin’ supper with me.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Lilah

  He hesitated at the top step, his broad shoulders hunched over a bit, both his hands jammed in his back pockets.

  “Gale?”

  He half turned toward me, but he kept his hands where they were. “Yeah?”

  “I liked the steaks. I liked playing poker with you.”

  I brushed Mollie off my lap, stood up and took three steps to where he stood. “But most of all, I like that you listened to me.”

  I stretched up on tiptoe and kissed his cheek. He didn’t move, didn’t say a word, just stood there looking at me. I stepped back, but he caught me, bent his head and covered my mouth with his.

  His kiss was long and deep and very thorough, so thorough that my knees turned to jelly as his lips moved on mine. A hot, delicious light bloomed inside my body. Never, never had I felt anything so exquisite.

  After a long time he lifted his head. “Gotta stop this,” he murmured.

  “No, don’t.” My automatic protest shocked me.

  “Yes, dammit.” He curved his fingers around my shoulders and moved me away from him. His hands were shaking.

  My heart was fluttering like a hummingbird’s wings. I watched him snag his wide-brimmed gray hat off the porch railing and tramp off behind the house where he had tied up his horse. I waited, scarcely able to draw breath.

  Finally he appeared, the reins held loosely in his hand and his hat tipped low.

  “I’m not gonna apologize,” he said from the shadows. His voice was low and careful. “Won’t happen again.”

  I felt like weeping. I wanted it to happen again. And I wanted to tell him that.

  But of course I couldn’t. No lady told a man what she really wanted.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Gale

  I talked Charlie into letting me ride out to round up another herd of mustangs for delivery to Fort Hall. I took Ernesto with me. The Mexican was good at finding wild horses and rounding them up, and even better, he didn’t flap his tongue like Jase or Skip. Didn’t think I could stand any more words in my head than the ones already rattling around in there.

  We rode hard and worked ourselves to exhaustion, and that suited me just fine. At the end of long, dusty days in the saddle I hunkered down by the campfire, nursing a full cup of Ernesto’s double-boiled coffee and my empty helping of good sense when it came to Lilah Cornwell. It was getting cold now as fall got closer, but even sleeping right next to the campfire, I was hot all night.

  Two weeks later, when we drove seventeen new mustangs through the Rocking K corral gate, I’d pretty well sorted things out. Lilah wasn’t the kind of woman a man played fast and loose with. More than that, I wasn’t a man who could risk getting beat all to hell again. I figured I could learn to live with the situation.

  I figured that until the first night back at the ranch when Alice Kingman blindsided me at supper.

  “Lilah Cornwell is coming to dinner again on Sunday. I think she’s ready to learn to ride.”

  I managed to finish my beef stew and corn bread, but as soon as I could escape I headed across the meadow to my cabin and some 90-percent-proof comfort and some more clear-headed thinking.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Lilah

  The prospect of Sunday dinner at the Kingman ranch
had me so nervous I couldn’t eat or sleep for three days. My blue denim split riding skirt had been ready for weeks; my nerves were not.

  It wasn’t the prospect of mounting the horse Alice said she had picked out for me or having to make conversation at the dinner table. Plain and simple, I was nervous about seeing Gale again.

  Alice had mentioned that he’d been gone these past few weeks on ranch business. I was surprised how unsettled I was by his absence, but I knew I would be even more unsettled at his presence. By the time Sunday afternoon came and Ernesto rolled the buggy to a stop at my front gate, I felt as giddy as a schoolgirl.

  “Señorita Cornwell.” The old Mexican man tipped his hat.

  “Hello, Ernesto. I hoped it would be you.”

  A flush darkened his wrinkled cheeks, and he helped me onto the hard leather seat beside him without a word. The horse trotted along the road past fields of wildflowers and tall gray-green grass and maple trees shimmering in the sunlight. The countryside always took my breath away, but it was almost fall, and today everything seemed especially lovely with the soft glow of the afternoon sun.

  “Oh, Ernesto, just look! What are those brilliant yellow flowers?”

  “Gold weed.” He halted the buggy, climbed down and waded into the sea of blooms. He returned with a single flower held gently in his fingers, and as soon as he settled himself beside me he took my hand and shook the bloom over my cupped palm. Tiny black seeds sifted down.

  “Grow in hot sun,” he said. He closed my fingers over the seeds. “You plant in garden.”

  Too soon we left the road through the wildflower fields and turned in at the Rocking K gate. More nervous than I ever remembered being at one of Mama’s soirees, I smoothed the skirt of my rose-pink lawn dress and tucked the loose tendrils of hair back into my bun. Mama always said a redhead should never wear pink, but I didn’t care. Pink was my favorite color.

  Ernesto drove the buggy off to the barn just as Consuelo came sailing out onto the porch to bang her metal spoon against the triangle of steel that served as the dinner gong. Alice came out to welcome me, and the ranch hands gathered in silence as I climbed up the porch steps.

  “Haven’t heard them this quiet since they all had the grippe last spring,” Alice whispered. “They don’t know what to say to you.”

  “As little as possible, I hope. I find conversing with strangers difficult.”

  She sent me a twinkly look. “Then you must come out to the ranch more often.”

  I tried not to look for Gale.

  In the dining room, Charlie Kingman rose and took my hand in both of his and the cowhands tumbled in and jostled each other for the empty chairs. A few minutes later Ernesto entered with a quiet smile.

  “How come he gets to drive the buggy?” sandy-haired Skip blurted out.

  “Because he’s an old man,” the young blond one, Jason, offered.

  “Because I am muy amable,” Ernesto said, his grin widening. “Polite.”

  That brought silence until a familiar voice spoke from the hallway. “Because he’s trustworthy with horses and other living things.”

  Gale stepped into the room and my pulse skipped. He nodded at Alice. “Mrs. Kingman.” Then at Charlie, who grunted something unintelligible in return but lifted a hand in greeting.

  Finally he looked at me. “Miss Cornwell.”

  Miss Cornwell? This from the man who had kissed me until I was dizzy?

  “Gale,” I responded. I watched his eyes grow even greener.

  “Lilah,” he said at last.

  Mr. Kingman cleared his throat. “Gale’s been rounding up some more wild horses for me.”

  “I see.”

  “You might like to watch him work with them tomorrow morning.”

  “Yes, thank you, I—”

  “No, she wouldn’t,” Gale interrupted.

  Every head swiveled toward him as he seated himself across from me. Even Consuelo, who had just entered with a platter piled high with fried chicken, stopped short and stared at him.

  An imp took over my good sense. “I wouldn’t?”

  He caught my gaze and held it. “It’s too early in the morning,” he said.

  I lifted an eyebrow in his direction. “How early is too early?”

  “Yeah, Gale, what d’you know?”

  “Shut up, Jase.”

  At that, Consuelo plunked the chicken platter down on the table and stalked toward the kitchen. “Ay de mi,” I heard her mutter.

  Ernesto calmly picked up his knife and rapped it across Gale’s knuckles. “No más, mi amigo.”

  “Gentlemen,” Alice Kingman announced, “let us say grace.”

  All heads bowed but mine. I had not said grace since I was a girl and Aunt Carrie went off to the War. Across from me, Gale met my eyes with steady purpose, and while Alice spoke the words of grace, he gave me an almost imperceptible shake of his head.

  I knew what he meant. For some reason he didn’t want me to watch him work the horses in the corral.

  * * *

  The next morning I was up and dressed long before the breakfast gong sounded. Gale and the other hands stood up when I entered the dining room, but he glared at me until I was seated and Consuelo began pouring the coffee. I was not going to allow myself to be intimidated by his disapproval. My imp was even more obstreperous this morning, so I sent him a smile I hoped would melt his disdain into a puddle of chagrin.

  After breakfast was over, the ranch hands excused themselves and disappeared. Mr. Kingman escorted me out the front door, down the porch steps and over to the fenced-in corral where a handful of restless horses were penned. I leaned against the split-pole barrier and adjusted my felt hat to keep the sun out of my eyes. I didn’t want to miss one minute of whatever activity it was Gale did not want me to watch.

  Alice joined me at the fence. “Watching Gale break a horse always brings tears to my eyes,” she confessed.

  “It must be terrible for the horse,” I answered.

  She looked over at me as if I had just recited the multiplication tables in Greek. “I don’t mean tears over the horse, Lilah. Over Gale.”

  “What? What about Gale makes you cry?”

  “Just watch,” she replied with a slow smile. “You’ll see.” So I propped my elbows on the top rail and settled in to watch.

  Ernesto and his nephew, Juan, shooed all the animals but one into a holding pen, and then Ernesto dropped a rope around the neck of a shiny chocolate-brown horse with a black mane and tail. While he held the rope taut, Juan slapped a saddle onto the fence, then laid a plaid blanket and something that looked like a leather cat’s cradle on top. A noose of some sort, I gathered. I decided I would cry over the horse, not Gale.

  Then Gale climbed through the fence and lifted the rope out of Ernesto’s gloved hand. He wore boots and tight jeans like the other cowhands, but his head was bare and he wore no gloves.

  One by one, Jase and Skip and Juan joined the Kingmans and me at the fence. Apparently watching Gale was a source of entertainment for the entire ranch.

  Ernesto came to stand next to me, saying nothing in his usual fashion, but giving my split skirt a nod of approval.

  The horse stood snorting and pawing the ground, watching Gale with one rolling black eye as he wound the rope around one bent arm and moved steadily closer. The animal whinnied and tossed its head, but Gale kept on walking.

  Suddenly the horse reared. Gale waited, keeping the rope snugged about his elbow and when the animal stood still, Gale stepped forward and leaned in.

  “Bueno,” Ernesto muttered.

  Then Gale moved in close and dropped the rope. I stiffened, expecting the horse to rear or kick him, but I heard Gale’s voice speaking soft and low, words I couldn’t hear. But the horse seemed to. It sent shivers up my spine.

  He began touching the animal, running his hands over its muzzle, down its legs, all the time crooning whatever he was saying over and over in gentle tones. He kept touching and talking for a good quarte
r of an hour, never in a hurry and never letting his hands break contact with the horse’s twitching hide.

  “You see?” Alice whispered.

  I did see. Watching Gale, I understood things about him I might never have known. He was gentle. Patient. And completely in command. My throat tightened into an ache.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Lilah

  Gale stepped to one side of the horse. The animal followed him and then curved its neck toward him. He returned to stand directly in front of the animal, smoothed his palms over its muzzle, talking softly, then stepped away again. The horse shifted to follow him.

  Gale walked farther away and the horse followed at his shoulder. He reversed direction and the animal followed; he even walked the perimeter of the corral and the horse stayed with him. It was almost as if he had hypnotized the beast.

  They began a sort of game where Gale would run to one side and then quickly reverse direction. The horse stayed with him. Finally, he stopped, smoothed the animal’s withers and spoke in its twitching ear.

  “Now it comes,” Ernesto murmured.

  Gale moved to the corral fence and lifted the saddle blanket and the leather halter off the top rail. With slow, deliberate motions he spread the blanket on the animal’s back, talking all the time, then slipped the harness over its head. The horse stood perfectly still.

  Beside me, Alice clasped her hands together. “Now watch.”

  Gale moved to the fence. The horse followed. He hoisted the saddle off the rail and settled it atop the blanket and rocked it into place. Then he leaned against the animal and kept leaning. Finally he reached underneath and buckled the strap, the cinch, Ernesto called it, and pulled it tight.

  Again he pressed his body flat against the animal’s shoulder, still talking, rubbing himself against the withers, and finally he placed one boot in the stirrup and grabbed the dangling reins.

  Ernesto pursed his lips and nodded. “Sí, sí,” he said, and Gale swung himself up into the saddle. The horse stood motionless for a long moment, then suddenly arched its back and twisted, kicking out its hind legs. Gale’s arm went up for balance, but he kept his seat and held on to the reins.