"No touching either."
"I'm not sure it can be avoided, like when we're working together, maybe riding the same horse--"
"I never ride double!"
"--when we're sitting next to each other in front of a fire in the evenings. We could also go for walks if you were of a mind. People usually hold hands when they walk. I could lift you across streams--"
"The washes are dry in the summer."
"--help you climb up on a rock or into a tree to escape a rattlesnake."
"I shoot rattlesnakes."
"Suppose there's rustlers about and you don't want them to know you're watching."
"Then I'll let the snake bite you. That ought to finish off the poor critter."
"You think I'm poison?"
"Not to me. You're not even a bad rash."
"What am I?"
"I haven't decided. I thought you were awful at first, but there are some occasional flashes of decency."
"Tell me and I'll get rid of them immediately."
"You're making fun of me again."
"I'm just trying to get you into a good mood before we discuss the last rule."
"What's that?"
"Where we sleep. You see, I figure--"
"I'll go back to the hotel before I let you share my bedroll," she said, interrupting him.
"I wasn't going to suggest that, but if you're considering it--"
"I'm not."
She was a fool to think he would want to sleep with her. Her father had told her no man would bother a gal as homely as she was.
"It did cross my mind, but if you're dead set against it--"
"I am."
"--I guess I'll have to go with my second plan."
She wanted to know why he was teasing and friendly again. She needed to know because his behavior was having an unexpected effect on her. She was having difficulty remembering he was the enemy, that she shouldn't believe anything he said. Lately he'd been acting like a friend, but he must want something. She didn't know what that might be, but she couldn't imagine he was doing this out of pure friendship or even guilt.
"What's your second plan?"
They had reached the ruins of the ranch house. The roof on the kitchen and porch had been completely destroyed. Charred beams arched across the parlor--if the lowly room could justify such a name--and the bedroom. But the log room hadn't been damaged. She could use it as her bedroom.
"Were you planning for me to sleep outside?" he asked.
"Why not?"
"I did more than enough of that during the war."
"There's only room for one person."
Owen dismounted and walked over to the house. He walked straight through the ruins to the log room. That irritated Hetta. That was her room. By entering it he invaded her privacy. Not that she thought he concerned himself much with privacy. But this wasn't like being in the army and working with a group of men. Just her staying at the ranch with him would be enough to start everyone in Pinto Junction speculating. She had to convince him to set up his own camp, or she might as well announce she was a loose woman.
Owen emerged from the cabin. "There's room enough for two. We can share."
Chapter Sixteen
"I can't sleep in the same room with you."
"Do you think I'm going to attack you?"
"No, but what would everybody think? I don't have to ask. I know. They'd think I was a strumpet."
"Are you?"
"Or course not!"
"Then don't pay them any attention."
She slid out of the saddle. "Maybe you're used to ignoring what people think, but I'm not."
"I developed a thick skin. You can probably guess some of the things people said about my mother."
Damn him! Here she was preparing to scold him for being indifferent to her reputation, and he had to throw something like that at her. It hadn't been easy having a father like hers, but she was certain it was nothing compared to having a mother like his. Men and women were held to different standards when it came to immoral conduct.
"My reputation will be in shreds overnight."
"I can't protect you if I can't see you."
"I don't need your protection."
"You can't be sure."
"I am."
"I'm not, and since I'm bigger than you, what I say goes."
Damn him! Why did he think he could get away with things just because he was big? "If you touch me, I'll shoot you."
"I plan to touch you a lot. I might even kiss you if I can talk you into it, but I won't dishonor you."
"If you sleep in the same room with me, nobody will believe that."
"We'll worry about that when the time comes. For now, let's figure out what we're going to do first. When does your lumber arrive?"
"I don't know. William said Reconstruction has made it nearly impossible to predict schedules."
"Then we might as well see if you have enough cows to worry about."
As he began to unbuckle the straps that held his bedroll and bulging saddlebags, she realized she was about to make a decision that would change her life forever. If she stayed here with Owen, she could never go back to town. But that was merely symbolic. The important changes, the changes in her mind and heart, had already made it impossible for her to go back to being the person she used to be. Where she lived was incidental. It didn't matter that she would have to sleep on the floor, cook over an open fire, wash wherever she could. The only thing that really mattered was that she had decided what to do with the rest of her life. What unnerved her was the possibility that Owen might have something to do with that decision.
"Want me to help you unpack?" Owen asked.
She was startled out of her distraction. Owen had taken everything from his horse and stowed it in the log room.
She hurried to loosen the straps and carry her bags into the log room. It looked smaller than she remembered, much too small to give her the space she needed to feel safely separated from Owen. But that really had nothing to do with the size of the room. She hadn't felt safely separated from Owen in Ida's house, and they had occupied rooms on different floors. They'd passed the point where awareness of each other had anything to do with space. She couldn't separate herself from him or the ideas and emotions he'd planted in her head and heart.
Nobody else had ever made her feel special. That applied to William as well. She hadn't done anything to make him feel special, either. She wondered why.
Because she'd never expected feeling special to be part of a relationship.
Owen had changed all that. From the very first evening, he'd talked to her, argued with her, even shouted at her, but their awareness of each other was almost tangible. He hadn't been stupid enough to tell her she was beautiful, but he'd convinced her that a man who truly loved her would grow to love her features, to think she was beautiful because of the love he felt for her, because of who she was.
No one would ever feel that way about her, but Owen had made it impossible for her to settle for less.
"You're not exactly rich," Owen said to Hetta, "but you've got a fair amount of stock."
They were riding back after a day spent counting cattle.
"I don't understand it. Where did they come from?"
"Well, mama cows get together with daddy cows--I won't explain exactly how because I don't want to offend your innocence--but pretty soon you have bunches of little cows."
"Will you stop talking to me like I'm an idiot?"
She pretended to be angry, but her smile peeped through. Owen didn't know whether she was smiling because she had hundreds of cows instead of dozens, or because she was back in the saddle on her own land. He didn't care as long as she was happy.
"Where did you learn so much about cows?" she asked.
"My cousin's ranch. For every hundred cows you have, he has a thousand."
She pummeled him with questions about himself, Virginia, the war, his cousin, even the Randolphs. She'd particularly enjoyed the stories about Hen and Monty Rand
olph, the twins who were seasoned warriors at seventeen.
"When we took the herd to St. Louis, it was almost like the war again."
"How?"
"Some farmers didn't want us in Missouri. They thought we would either destroy their crops or infect their cattle with tick fever. Others tried to steal our herd or demanded a cut in exchange for letting us through. We had a few gun battles along the way, but we didn't give up a single steer. I'm not sure we'd have made it without those Randolph twins. They were hell on wheels. I was scared of them myself."
She laughed. "You attacked three men by yourself, and you're trying to tell me you were afraid of teenagers?"
"Always be a little bit afraid," he said. "It keeps you careful."
They were riding across one of the grassy savannahs that punctuated the dense tangle of trees and thorny plants where longhorns hid during the day. Owen couldn't understand why he was starting to like this part of Texas. It was as flat as a saucer and hotter than any battlefield he'd ever been on. There were no hills to offer a view, nothing to see if there had been. No greens so rich and deep they looked almost blue. No meadows covered in a carpet of yellow or blue flowers so thick you could hardly see the plants that bore them. No singing birds or buzzing bees. It was a quiet land, slumbering, waiting, stunted.
Yet there was something here that drew him. Maybe it was the openness. After growing up in the mountains where every vista was blocked by another mountain, the ability to ride for miles in a straight line fascinated him. It was wild, free, untamed, and much to his surprise, he was finding he liked that very much.
He couldn't explain his fascination with Hetta, either. When she made it plain she held no liking for his sort of man, he'd determined to make her eat her words. A totally unexpected change had occurred in him. He wanted to be different so she would be wrong.
He'd never meddled with engaged women, so why had he broken the pattern with Hetta? Maybe his fascination with her was a result of their common background; they'd both grown up with one parent lacking moral fiber, the other lacking the backbone to do anything about it. Great! A friendship whose only basis was two badly scarred lives. Well, friendships had been founded on less.
"You know I can't pay you to work for me," Hetta said.
"We can barter, I give you something you want, you give me something I want."
She eyed him much like a bird would a snake crawling up a tree toward its nest. "And just what might that be?"
"Right now I'd settle for you smiling a few times a day and not distrusting every word I say."
"After that?"
"See, that's exactly what I mean. You think I'm going to ask for something you don't want to give."
She seemed a little embarrassed, but she didn't back down.
"Let's just say I'm helping you so I have a reason to stay in Pinto Junction a little longer."
"Why would you want to do that?"
"Because sooner or later, Laveau will come back. I mean to be here when he does."
"Do you really plan to hang him?"
"I know you don't think he's guilty--"
"I believe he betrayed your troop, but he betrayed them to the Union. If you hang him, they'll hang you."
"That ought to make you happy."
"I may not agree with you about a lot of things, but I don't want to see you hanged."
"I wonder if William feels that way."
"Why do you care what he thinks?"
"I don't, but there he is at the ranch house." He pointed ahead. "My guess is he's come to take you back to town."
Owen didn't want Hetta to leave the ranch. They'd been more at ease with each other today than at any other time. He felt that they might become real friends. He wanted her to like him. To approve of him, too.
Right now he wanted to separate her from William Tidwell forever. William wasn't a bad person. He was just the wrong man for Hetta. He would try to turn her into the grande dame of Pinto Junction. That would be fine for Ida Moody, but it would suffocate Hetta. Still, he'd had his say, played his cards. It was time for Hetta to make her decision.
But he would stay close by, just to make sure William didn't take unfair advantage. Hetta had a kind heart. He wouldn't allow anybody to take advantage of her.
Hetta was surprised by how irritated she was at William's appearance. She wondered whether his coming was Ida's idea or his.
"I don't want you to say anything," she said to Owen. "Let me do the talking."
"Believe it or not, that's exactly what I'd intended to do. I'll unsaddle our horses, give them a rubdown, and then find a good place to picket them for the night."
Hetta dismounted and watched Owen lead their horses away. Somehow she felt deserted. Maybe it was because she and Owen were in agreement for a change, and she knew she and William wouldn't be.
She looked at him now, pacing back and forth next to his buggy. He hadn't changed one iota from what he'd always been, but it was as if she was seeing him for the first time. No, William hadn't changed. She'd been the one to change. Owen had made her realize she wasn't in love with William, only in love with the idea of being married.
No, that wasn't right. She'd been afraid no one would ever want to marry her. So when the most eligible man in Pinto Junction showed an interest in her, she'd been anxious to believe she was in love. Looking back, she could see that having lost her father to the war, her mother to a broken heart, her cows to rustlers, and her home to fire had probably played a big part in her feelings so.
Then Owen had kissed her. It was like waking up, coming out of a trance, a dream that didn't exist. Now she saw things as they really were.
"I expected to find you at the hotel," William said when she reached him.
No "hello," no lover's greeting, not even a smile. In fact, he looked hot, peeved, and out of temper.
"Come out of the sun. You must be burning up," she said.
"When I found you'd left the hotel, I was certain you'd gone back to Ida's. I didn't realize you had come out here until she came by the store."
He hadn't cared enough to find out for himself. He'd only left his precious store when Ida told him she wasn't at home. It was as though he couldn't think of her without Ida being there to prod him, to remind him of her existence. Not the signs of a man in love.
"I told you I was coming out here."
"I didn't believe you. I certainly had no idea you would come out here with him." He pointed to Owen, who was unsaddling the horses under a shed a few feet from the house.
"I tried to make him stay in town, but he insisted I needed protection."
"And who's going to protect you from him?"
"I don't need protection from Owen."
William paced agitatedly. "What if he tries to kiss you again?"
"He won't."
"Ida said he forced you."
"The next time I kiss her, it'll be because she wants me to."
Neither of them had heard Owen approach.
"I need my curry comb," he said, taking the item out of his saddlebags. "Horses love it." He sauntered off as if he didn't know he'd dropped a bomb into their conversation.
"What does he know about cows?"
"A lot, as it turns out."
"You still can't stay here with him."
"Somebody's got to help me. I can't work this place by myself."
"You shouldn't be trying. You don't even have a place to live," William said, gesturing to the house. "It's nothing but a burned-out ruin."
"I can live in the log room. The fire didn't touch it."
"And where is he going to sleep?"
She hoped she didn't blush. "Why do you want to know? Don't you trust me?"
"Of course I do," he said, visibly ruffled by her question, "but I don't trust him."
"Did you know he stood guard outside my hotel room door last night?"
William looked shaken. She'd have given a lot to know whether he was sorry he hadn't thought of it or embarrassed someone else had.
"I suppose he's the one who told you."
"No, Myrl told me. He was watching early this morning so Owen could get some sleep. I nearly stumbled over him."
"Do you think I should have stood guard?" William was clearly defensive.
"No. I just told you about Owen so you'd stop thinking I wouldn't be safe. He's much more of a gentleman than I would expect of a man who's so attractive and charming."
"I wondered how long it would take you to notice that."
He seemed so petulant, she couldn't help laughing, even though she knew it was the one thing she shouldn't do. "I'm not blind, William."
"I suppose you're acting cold to me and moving out of town because I'm not charming and attractive."
Now she'd hurt his feelings. She felt a spurt of impatience, but she'd been spurned far too often not to understand how much it hurt. She put her hand on his arm. "Neither one of us is charming. You're not handsome and I'm not beautiful. You're an honest, dependable, intelligent, fine man. Once you give your word, I know you'll keep it. You'll make a wonderful husband and father, a pillar of the community, a man others will look up to and respect."
"They won't respect me if my wife never does anything I want."
That was the first time he'd actually referred to her as his wife. It was also the first time she wished he hadn't. "We're not engaged, William. You haven't even talked to your parents."
"Things are too unsettled. Business is bad. With Pa being in such poor health, I don't want to upset them."
"Then it's a good time for me to turn my attention to my ranch. That will allow you to devote all your time and attention to your parents and the store. Once everything is better and you know what you want--"
"I know what I want. I want--"
She put her hand over his mouth. "Don't say it. For the next few weeks, don't even think about me."
"Don't you want to marry me?"
She wondered if he was upset because she might be rejecting him or just having trouble coping with a new idea. "It's the wrong time for both of us. You need to devote your attention to your work and getting your father well. I need to brand my calves and try to rebuild my ranch."
"I'm finished with the horses," Owen said. The sound of his voice, his sudden appearance, broke the tension between her and William. For once she was relieved to have Owen around.
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