“Enough foolishness,” Ida said after a while. “Mr. Nolan will think we’re very silly people.”
“I think you’re a very happy family,” Bret said.
“I hope so. Now if you don’t mind, we’d like you to tell us about Boston. It must be exciting to live in a city like that.”
Emily got the feeling Bret would rather have talked about the ranch, but he launched into a description of life in Boston that fascinated the children as well as the adults. Much to her surprise, he didn’t hesitate to make fun of himself by telling a few funny stories about his first days in the city. She was certain he exaggerated a little, but she only had to see the laughter and excitement in the children’s eyes to forgive him.
“That’s all for tonight,” he said after telling a story about getting an entirely inedible dish because the waitress couldn’t understand his Texas drawl. “Maybe I’ll tell you some more stories when I come back through.”
“When will that be?” Clara asked, her eyes wide with undisguised admiration.
“That depends on Miss Abercrombie,” Bret said, glancing at Emily. “She might get tired of me after a single day.”
“She won’t,” Joey said confidently. “She’s crazy about horses, and you know everything about them.”
Bret winked at Joey. “You weren’t supposed to tell her that. Now she’ll expect me to chase cows.”
That led to a few more jokes at Bret’s expense before Charlie took him off to smoke and talk about the ranch. He sent the boys to make sure all the stock was fed and watered for the night, and told Clara and Becky to help their mother clear the table.
Ida ordered Emily to sit down and enjoy her coffee. She started putting food away while the girls cleared the table. “What do you think of your young man now?”
“Every time I think I know him, he surprises me,” Emily said. “I would never have guessed he had a sense of humor.”
“I think he’s wonderful,” Clara pronounced as she spun around, a beatific smile on her face.
“You won’t feel so wonderful if you spill those peaches,” her mother said as she rescued the bowl from her daughter.
“He makes me laugh,” Becky said as she deposited two dirty plates in the dishpan. “I want to live in Boston when I grow up.”
Emily got up from her chair. “I’ll help your mother with the washing up.”
“You don’t have to do that,” Ida said.
“I can’t sit here drinking coffee while you work. Besides, I can’t talk in front of the girls. They’re certain to repeat the one thing I don’t want anybody to know I said.”
Ida laughed. “I have to bite my tongue every time Charlie makes me mad. I know one of them will tell him everything I’ve said, because they tell me everything he says.”
They both laughed, but Emily sobered quickly. “Do you and Charlie fight?”
“No. If one of us is impatient or tired, we might get snappish.”
“But you do love Charlie, don’t you?”
Ida washed the dish in her hands, rinsed it with cold water, then laid it on the sideboard. “Why do you ask that? You’ve known us most of your life.”
Emily concentrated on the plate she was drying, then set it on the table. “I can hardly remember Mama when she wasn’t sick. I never got the chance to see a normal marriage.”
“You don’t think my marriage is normal?”
“I was too young, too preoccupied with taking care of the house, and too worried about Dad to think about it. I never remember you and Charlie even getting upset with each other.”
“You really didn’t pay attention, did you?”
“I guess not.”
Ida turned back to the dirty dishes. “You’re a young woman now. It’s time to be thinking of such things.”
“But why am I doing it now? I don’t have time to worry about something like that with Dad being sick.”
“Being captivated by a man doesn’t follow any timetable. In fact, it usually happens at the most inconvenient times.”
“I’m not captivated by Bret.”
Ida directed a penetrating look at her. “Aren’t you?”
“No. I didn’t want him here. I told Daddy to tell Mr. Abbott not to send him, but he’d already left Boston by then.”
Ida’s smile was broad and knowing. “That’s not what I’m talking about. Aren’t you interested in him? The man, not his mission.”
“I’m not interested in him, but I am curious about him.”
Ida laughed. “It could be the same thing.”
Emily paused with a serving bowl in her hands. “I probably wouldn’t be so curious if I didn’t keep making so many mistakes about him. I thought I knew all about men, but he’s not like any I’ve known before.”
“I thought I knew all about men, too, when I was your age,” Ida said, rubbing hard to remove the berry juice cooked onto the pie pan. “All I had to do was marry one to find out I didn’t know anything at all. I love berry pies,” she said as she scrubbed, “but I hate having to clean the pan. I was going to cook a peach pie, but the boys found these berries and begged so hard I couldn’t say no.”
“If I have children, I hope mine are like yours.”
“Well, there’s one thing you need to learn about men,” Ida said, triumphantly prying the last bit of crust from the pan. “They learn early how to look charming and helpless. They also learn that a woman will crawl over burning sand if she thinks a man needs her, and they’ll use it against you.” She rinsed the pie pan and handed it to Emily.
“I can’t imagine Charlie doing that,” Emily said, seeing his impish smile in her mind. “And I don’t think Bret knows how.”
Ida turned to her, a look of amazement on her face. “Are you blind? I’ve never seen a more masterful display of charming but helpless than your Mr. Nolan. The boys think he knows everything. Clara thinks he’s wonderful. He’s charmed everyone around here, and he had you convinced he was so helpless he couldn’t even ride a horse.”
“I just made a lot of incorrect assumptions about him.”
“You’re missing the point. That man knows exactly what he’s doing. Nothing he did was accidental. I don’t pretend to know what he’s like. I get the feeling the real Mr. Nolan is kept carefully out of sight. I do know he’s handsome, personable, and he’s willing to use his charm to get what he wants.”
“You make him sound dangerous.”
“I expect he is. The question is, dangerous to whom and in what way?”
Emily respected Ida’s opinion, but she didn’t see Bret as dangerous. She did agree he revealed very little about himself, but any man who’d seen his father hanged, had been abandoned by his family, been an orphan living on the streets, adopted by strangers, and then tried to force his way into the heart of the family that had rejected him, couldn’t afford to let his emotions control him. He would have had to become practically impervious to suffering, his feelings shut down, his sensitivity dulled until nothing had the power to hurt him. A child with no power would have had to learn how to take advantage of the weaknesses of others just to survive.
She didn’t believe Bret was a heartless manipulator of everyone around him, using others for his own ends with no concern for their feelings or well-being. Children could sense goodness or evil in a person. Ida’s children had taken to Bret just as fast as that orphan in Fort Worth. She didn’t know why he was hiding his true self, but she was convinced that somewhere inside that very attractive body was an equally attractive man. The question in her mind was, could she bring him out? And if she could, should she? Whatever lines of defense he’d set up, he must have thought they were necessary. She had no right to breech them, then turn away and leave him vulnerable.
Yet it was hard to think of Bret as being vulnerable. He appeared too strong, too in control of himself.
“Whatever he’s really like,” Ida said, “everybody seems to like him, especially the children.”
“Everybody except Lonnie.”
<
br /> “Lonnie’s jealous.”
“Why?”
Ida looked at her as if she’d lost her mind. “I’m starting to worry about you. Lonnie’s been in love with you since you were fifteen.”
“I don’t love Lonnie.”
“I know that. I expect Lonnie does, too.”
Lonnie had worked for her father for ten years. Emily had grown up thinking of him as she did all the men who worked for her father—as nice men who were kind to her because she was a young girl who’d lost her mother. No one had said anything suggestive or done anything inappropriate. She’d tried hard to make sure she didn’t do anything that would lead them to think of her in any way except as the boss’s daughter. Her father had made it clear that encouraging them in any way would be very unfair to the men.
“Then why would he be in love with me?”
Ida smiled. “Let’s get some coffee. It’s obvious your education has been neglected. You apparently don’t know anything about men.”
Ida’s look was so sympathetic, so patient—and so superior—Emily felt like arguing, but she accepted the coffee and settled down at the small kitchen table opposite Ida.
“Have you ever heard of the idealized beloved?” she asked.
“Do you mean men who fall in love with someone who is above them?”
“Not quite. The man just thinks the woman is above him, but that’s okay because it’s necessary to his love of her, his worship of her.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“The woman has to be perfect. Any flaw would ruin the illusion and destroy his love. He might even want her to be unaware of his love. That way he doesn’t have to share it. Or prove it.”
“Are you saying this is the way Lonnie feels about me?”
“Maybe. He wouldn’t want to see you fall in love with anyone else. He’d be jealous, might even fight to drive him away.”
“I’m not in love with Bret.”
“But you’re intrigued by him, and Lonnie sees that as a threat.”
“Are you sure of this?”
“No, but I do know Lonnie thinks you’re perfect.”
Emily shook her head, trying to reject the idea, the responsibility. “I never wanted anything like that to happen. What can I do about it?”
“Nothing except be very careful around Lonnie. He might do something stupid, even dangerous, to attract your attention.”
Great. Her father was dying, rustlers were attacking her herds, Bret was trying to convince her to move to Boston, and now she had Lonnie trying to turn her into some kind of goddess.
“Most of all, be careful of your relationship with Bret.”
“I don’t have a relationship with Bret.”
Ida finished her coffee and got up. “Not yet, but you will.”
Bret watched as Joey and Buddy pulled their bedrolls from their hiding place under the bed.
“I really wish you’d sleep in the house,” Ida said to him.
“We want him to sleep out with us.” Joey hefted his bedroll onto his shoulder.
“I’m sure the last thing Bret wants is to be saddled for the night with two brats,” their father said.
“I don’t mind,” Bret said. “I grew up with two brothers even younger than these two. I ought to feel right at home.”
“Come on.” Buddy slung his bedroll on his shoulder just like his big brother. “Joey and me have picked out the perfect spot.”
“You’d better hope Lonnie and Jem haven’t picked out the same spot,” Charlie called after them.
“We already told them it was ours.” Joey pushed his brother along ahead of him. “We got rocks for a campfire and everything.”
“No fires,” Charlie ordered.
“The bed will be here in case you can’t get to sleep with them around,” Ida called to Bret as he followed the boys.
“Let Becky and Tim use it,” Bret said. “After a day in the saddle, I’ll have no trouble falling asleep.”
Bret wasn’t sure why he’d decided to sleep out rather than take advantage of the bed. Maybe he was trying to prove he wasn’t the tenderfoot Emily thought he was. He suspected he was also trying to prove to himself he wasn’t the tenderfoot he was afraid he had become since leaving Texas. During his years on Jake’s ranch, he’d taken pride in his physical strength, his ability to do difficult and exhausting jobs. He never stopped trying to keep up with Sean even though Sean was four inches taller and carried fifty more pounds of muscle. He was never as good with horses as Luke or Chet, nor could he ride broncos as well as Matt or Night Hawk. But he could do it all, and he could do it well.
Then he’d moved to Boston, and his life had gone from a physical challenge to a mental one. It had been exciting at first. There was so much to learn, so much to understand, that it was two years before he realized he wasn’t happy. That was when he’d let his cousin Rupert talk him into taking up boxing. Except for visits with his grandmother, boxing was all that kept him sane as it became increasingly clear that Silas intended to keep him on the sidelines while he promoted Joseph into a position to take over when he retired.
Over the last year Bret had thrown himself into developing the plan to reorganize the company. After it was done, he’d asked Rupert to look it over and offer suggestions. They’d even discussed it with their grandmother, who’d forced Silas to agree to look at it. He’d thought of the plan as the beginning of his future in Abbott & Abercrombie. But now that he was back in Texas, he wasn’t so sure.
The changes had started the moment he’d crossed the state line. They’d continued when he smelled the stench from the Fort Worth cattle pens, when he’d met Jinx, when he’d spent a day astride a horse for the first time in six years. The last six years seemed to drop away.
“This is it,” Joey announced proudly. “It’s the best spot on the whole ranch.”
Actually it was a poor spot. It was flat and relatively free of rocks and thorny plants, but it was along the crest of a ridge which would have exposed them and their campfire to anyone miles away. They would have had no protection from wind or rain, but the boys had a clear view of the ranch on one side and the hills on the other. Nothing obstructed their view of a star-studded sky that seemed to go on forever.
“Put your bedroll in the middle,” Buddy said to Bret. “Joey and I will sleep on either side.”
“What if I snore?” Bret asked.
“I’ll punch you to make you stop,” Joey said, laughing.
“Daddy snores.” Buddy dropped his bedroll on the ground. “Mama says she has to punch him or she wouldn’t get any sleep.”
“I’m just kidding,” Bret said. “I don’t snore, but don’t punch me. I might think you’re rustlers and go for my gun.”
“You’re not wearing a gun,” Buddy reminded him.
Bret dropped his bedroll on the ground. He untied it, then gave it a kick. It unrolled, and out fell a pistol.
“Gosh!” Buddy exclaimed.
“Have you ever shot any bad men with that?” Joey asked.
“No, but I’ve scared off a few with my rifle.”
“Where’s that?” Joey asked.
“In my trunk.”
Bret hadn’t intended to bring his rifle. He’d even considered leaving his bedroll behind. He wasn’t entirely sure why he’d brought either of them. He just knew it didn’t feel right being in Texas without them. A better question would be why he’d hung on to all this stuff for six years when he’d never intended to use them again.
“Daddy taught us how to use a rifle for hunting,” Joey said, “but he said we didn’t need a gun.”
“I hope you never do,” Bret said. “Now we’d better see about getting to sleep. I don’t know about you two, but I’m worn to the bone. I wouldn’t want Lonnie and Jem to have to tie me to the saddle tomorrow to keep me from falling off my horse.”
The boys insisted that would never happen to Bret. He entertained them with a couple of funny stories about his days on Jake’s ranch as they
undressed and crawled into their bedrolls. Both boys said they were too excited to sleep, but barely fifteen minutes had passed before Bret heard soft, steady breathing coming from each of them.
He lay awake trying to figure out why he felt content to sleep on the ground on the open Texas plain. The ground was hard, the night too warm, and he had nothing to shelter him from the weather. On top of all that, he was wondering if Jinx was okay. He hadn’t given a single thought to Abbott & Abercrombie all day, but he couldn’t stop thinking about Emily.
The trouble was, he wasn’t sure of the nature of his thoughts.
She was a very lovely woman. No man could look at her without being attracted to her, without memorizing her smile. He could understand attraction. After all, he wasn’t dead. What he didn’t understand was the feeling that he liked her, too. That kind of appeal could be dangerous to his future. He’d been sent to Texas with only one job—to take her back to Boston. Uncle Silas had made it clear that his future at Abbott & Abercrombie depended on his being successful.
He’d come to the conclusion that Silas had no intention of implementing his plan or giving him a more important position in the company. If Bret somehow managed to gain the voting rights to Sam Abercrombie’s stock, the situation would be different. Other members of the family were unhappy with the shrinking dividends. Even his uncle’s own mother thought he was running the company into the ground. Bret had a plan for gaining the voting rights to Sam’s stock, but that brought him up against another problem.
He couldn’t in good conscience convince Emily to go back to Boston when he knew Silas would put pressure on her to marry Joseph. The bastard had been writing her for the last couple of years, making her believe he was her only friend in the family. There was no love lost between the cousins, and Bret was certain that Joseph had told her not to trust him. Joseph had an exaggerated opinion of his ability, but he was smart enough to know that Bret and Rupert were threats to his future leadership of the company. Bret had no doubt that Joseph thought Emily was beneath him, but he would marry her if it was to his advantage. He was certain that Joseph would treat Emily very much as his father had treated Bret. And that was something Bret couldn’t allow.
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