High Desert Haven (The Shepherd's Heart)

by Lynnette Bonner

  He nodded. “Yes, I can see there are a great many things to be thankful for in this situation.” He glanced over at the innocently sleeping toddler and shuddered. “Things could be worse. Much worse. But still,” Jason rubbed his palm across the wet patch again, his frown deepening, “things could be better, too.”

  Nicki couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped as she rose to hand him a towel. “Thank you for watching him. And,” she indicated the spot he was vigorously rubbing with the towel, “I’m sorry.”

  “Hey, I had fun. Really. He wasn’t a big help in putting up the corral, but we had fun nonetheless.” He grinned at her with a wink that sent a tremor racing down her spine into her boots.

  “Yes, I can just imagine. I was surprised to see Ron and Conner putting up the last pole when I rode in. I had pictures of the three of you in the house trying to determine which end of the boy to diaper.”

  “Hey! We would have at least known that. Tilly told us.”

  She smirked and sank back down at the table, her weary legs not wanting to hold her up for another minute. At that moment, she would have liked nothing more than to fall into bed with Sawyer. Instead she said, “I really appreciate you watching him. We had a nice ride.”

  His head snapped up and he looked deep into her face, all traces of humor gone. “You did, did you?” There was more than a little inference in his tone, and Nicki felt herself blush to the roots of her hair.

  “It’s not what you think. William has simply been a good friend to me since John’s passing.” She carefully omitted the fact that William had been pressuring her to marry him.

  “So…you and William? There’s nothing between you?”

  “Not that it is any of your business, Señor, but no. We are just friends. He has helped me a lot since John’s death.”

  He studied her for a long moment, holding her gaze as he moved across the room and dropped the towel on the table next to her. She started to look away, but he reached out with one finger and touched her chin, his eyes still searching her face. Her heart pounded uncontrollably at the undisguised fire in his eyes. She couldn’t help but meet him, gaze for gaze. She felt the need to say something witty to expel the sudden connection between them, but with him looking at her that way, she couldn’t breathe, much less put two coherent thoughts together.

  A smile twitched the corner of his mouth before he dropped his hand and said, “Good.”

  He spoke the one word with such finality that Nicki wondered what he meant by it. Good that William had been a friend to her, or good that they were only friends?

  His next words explained. “I don’t like the man.”

  She tightened her fists, suddenly annoyed. Why would anyone dislike William? “You don’t even know him.”

  “I know his type. He wants something from you. I’d watch myself around him if I were you.”

  Her anger flared. William had gone out of his way to help her since John’s death. He’d done nothing to make her question him or his reasons for helping her. He had even warned her that there could be trouble over her land.

  What about your questions over John’s death? She shoved the thought aside. Those had merely been passing doubts that had evolved out of the stress of John’s injuries. William wouldn’t do anything to harm anyone. He and John had been friends, for goodness’ sake.

  And she certainly didn’t need this know-it-all telling her who to trust. Why, if he had his way, she supposed he would have her fall into his arms and beg him to take care of her for the rest of her days.

  Would that be such a bad thing? She tossed her head, refusing to acknowledge the answer to that thought, and took out the brunt of her frustration on him. “I don’t need you telling me how to handle myself or my relationships!”

  He arched a golden eyebrow in her direction. “I wasn’t trying to tell you how to handle anything. Just that I would watch William Harpster closely where my stock and money were concerned if he were buddying up to me.”

  “Well, he’s not buddying up to you, is he?” She folded her arms.

  “No. Of course not. I don’t own five thousand acres, and I’m not beautiful.”

  Her eyes were riveted to his.

  His face serious, he reached toward her.

  She held her breath, steeling herself against the desire to lean closer.

  His fingers were almost touching her cheek when he must have thought better of the action and dropped his hand back to his hip. “All I’m asking is that you watch him closely. If he does anything that makes you uneasy, be doubly careful. All right?”

  She sighed in resignation, wondering at the disappointment that coursed through her when he decided against touching her again. “Fine. I’ll watch him.” Whatever that means. “Are you happy now, Señor?”

  “Sí.”

  She blinked, his Spanish answer taking her off guard.

  He continued, putting her off balance yet again, “You look tired. Ron said you haven’t been feeling well since the funeral. Are you all right?” He squatted before her and gently took one of her feet in his hands, unlaced her boot, and eased it off. Then did the same with the other.

  All anger at his outspoken brazenness fled. Nicki nodded. She couldn’t find her voice.

  Looking up into her face he asked, “You’re sure?” She nodded again.

  “Why don’t you lay down with Sawyer? I’m going to ride out and scout your land. I’ll be gone for a few days.”

  Nicki’s heart constricted, and she wondered that the same words from two different men could have such contrasting effects on her heart. When William had spoken those words to her, she’d felt something akin to relief.

  But now, with Jason, she felt only…what? It certainly wasn’t relief. She couldn’t quite unscramble her tangled emotions and wasn’t sure if she wanted to. But a thought occurred and she started to rise. “You’ll need food.”

  “That’s all taken care of.” He took her by the arm and led her over to the bed. “I had Tilly pack me some grub before she left.”

  Nicki sat on the edge of the bed as he moved to put on his heavy vest, pulling his black Stetson from the peg beside it.

  Opening the door, he turned to look at her one more time. “You take care. I’ll be back in a couple of days, hopefully with some good news.” She nodded. “I’ll pray for you.”

  He pulled on the brim of his hat as he dipped his chin. “Thanks.” With that, he eased out, shutting the door quietly behind him.

  Nicki lay back, wondering where the empty feeling had come from.

  Tom Roland, the banker, tapped the ash from his cigar into the crystal ashtray as he eyed his wife across the elaborately decorated room. He had come back to his Portland residence for a while and had decided to send for William to meet him here. It wouldn’t do for Prineville’s residents to see them together too often.

  His gaze narrowed as Vanessa provocatively sipped her drink. She knew the eyes of every man in the room were on her. Her dress, low-cut as usual, showed off her voluptuous figure to the fullest, and she used this fact to her advantage as she floated from one cluster of chatting socialites to the next.

  Tom sighed as he watched her giggle flirtatiously with the town mayor. She leaned over provocatively to whisper something for the mayor’s ears alone and then stood, sipping her sherry as though nothing were out of the ordinary.

  And nothing was. This was how Vanessa always behaved.

  Someone cleared their throat. Tom turned to see William dressed in the height of fashion. His black suit coat hung casually open to reveal a matching black vest. Across the expanse of his broad chest dangled the intricately woven gold chain of an expensive pocket watch. The lights from overhead caught the chain, glittering off it like the sun’s reflection on still water. At his throat, the high collar of his pristine, white shirt just turned down at the points accentuated the coal black of a very thin bow tie. His perfectly tailored slacks ended in highly polished, black snakeskin boots that added at least two inches to
his height. The man cut a striking picture.

  Tom cast one more glance in his wife’s direction before he spoke around the cigar in his mouth. “Glad to see you made it. You got my message?”

  William scanned the room as though their conversation were not important. “Yes. I need to get back, though. Let’s make this as brief as possible.”

  Tom nodded. “My office. Eleven o’clock tonight.”

  William didn’t reply, but Tom knew he would be on time. Whether or not William would like what he had to say was yet to be determined. He watched as William straightened his coat and made his way over to a beautiful young woman who was batting her cobalt eyes boldly in his direction. Bowing over her hand, he smiled up at her and said something, gesturing to the dance floor. The young debutante fanned herself coquettishly, allowing him to lead her onto the floor with an exhibition of reluctant embarrassment. Tom’s eyes scanned the girl from head to toe, and a small smile played across his mouth.

  William knew how to pick them.

  “Really, Tom.” His wife’s quiet but strident voice made him jump a little. “Must you gawk at the girl so? It’s embarrassing.”

  Tom turned to her with a snort, making sure to keep a false smile on his face. They must keep up appearances. “Really, Vanessa,” he mimicked her, “the way you have been throwing yourself at every man in the room tonight, I would think that my looking at another woman wouldn’t cause you to worry about your reputation. Any damage that could be done has already been inflicted by you.” He patted her cheek gently, as though the quiet words he spoke were tender endearments, but he couldn’t keep the spark from his eyes that told her maybe she had gone too far this time.

  Her tone changed immediately. “Oh, Tom, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you still cared so much. Why, you’re jealous!” She smiled coyly up into his face, placing one hand across her breast. “That positively makes my heart flutter. We really need to get away. It’s all the pressure of this city living. We don’t have time to spend together anymore. You know what we need? We need to spend some time at our place in the country. We can go just to spend time with each other. Maybe next time you need to go to your Prineville bank. Wouldn’t that be nice?” She tucked her arm possessively through his.

  Tom eyed her, wondering. Some of the anger left his eyes as he looked down on her. Had she meant what she said? He could hope so. Yet he often wondered whether she stayed with him because she loved him or his money. It wasn’t the first time she had made the comment about getting away to their place in the country. Yet she rarely came with him when he visited their 30,000-acre ranch, managed by Ted Koerling near Prineville. Thinking of his ranch caused his mind to wander to William, and he glanced at his pocket watch.

  He still had some time.

  He glanced back into his wife’s emerald eyes. He knew Vanessa loved to flirt. It gave her existence meaning.

  There had been a time when she had suffered from deep depression. She had even tried taking her own life once, but he had been there to stop the flow of blood. He gave an involuntary shudder as he remembered the deep red in the bottom of the claw-foot tub upstairs. He had been shocked. Hadn’t he given his young wife everything she asked for? Yet he had come home to find her leaning against the tub, both wrists slit, and a trail of blood leading from the knife on the floor beside her, up into the white bath. He had staunched the blood and pulled her fiercely into his arms, begging her never to do that to him again. It was soon after that she had begun her little games.

  For a time he had ignored her debauched sport as it had seemed to renew her vigor for life. After all, she kept him happy, too. Without him, there would be no money for her little parties, and without her parties there would be no men to toy with. Vanessa was walking on a fence. Below her were a pack of hungry wolves, each wanting her to please them. And she loved every minute of being the center of attention, dangerous though it might be.

  It wasn’t until recently that Tom had realized how much Vanessa’s little game had hurt their relationship. Yet he was still trying to please her. If it weren’t for her, he would care nothing about ranching in the high desert of central Oregon. He was a banker, not a rancher. But Vanessa liked to brag to her friends about their property in the country. He kept it for her, to keep her happy. Insurance that she wouldn’t try to…leave him again.

  He glanced at his watch once more and patted Vanessa’s hand resting on the crook of his arm. “I have a meeting I need to see to, dear. We may take that trip to the country before you know it.”

  “Really?” Her eyes sparked with interest. “Oh, Tom, that would be so nice. It really would.” A glint of mischief flickered in her green eyes, and she leaned forward to whisper in his ear, “I’ll bid the guests farewell and then be waiting for you in my room.” Her breath wafted warm on his ear, and Tom’s body heated with the remembrance of why he cared. At times she really could be very pleasing.

  10

  His office felt a trifle chilly, but Tom didn’t build a fire in the fireplace. He only had a couple of things to discuss with William. Their meeting would be brief. Pulling his watch from his vest pocket, he examined it. Five after eleven. William was late.

  Just then, a tap sounded on the door, and William stepped into the room. He was out of breath. Inhaling deeply, he shook his head as he glanced at Tom, a slight twinkle in his eye. “You give a woman one dance, and she thinks she can claim you for them all!”

  Tom chuckled dryly. “Had a hard time getting away from Miss Stubben, did you?”

  William nodded in exasperation.

  “Well, I trust it wasn’t too unpleasant for you.”

  “I’ll live to see another day.” William made an hour-glass gesture in the air, rolling his eyes in pleasure.

  Tom’s laugh was hearty this time. “I’ll just bet you will!”

  William sat in the leather wingback chair across from Tom’s desk and crossed one ankle over the other. “So, what did you want to see me about?”

  Tom glanced at the door to make sure it was shut before lighting himself a cigar and extending the box toward William.

  William shook his head. “No thanks.”

  Tom took several puffs on his cigar, then propped his boots on the corner of his mahogany desk. Reaching into the top drawer, he withdrew a paper and shoved it toward William across the desktop.

  William eyed the paper for a beat, then leaned forward and picked it up. After a moment he blinked up at Tom in surprise. “You’re not serious.”

  Tom had never been more so. He did not reply, only took a pull on his cigar and watched William’s face through the cloud of haze.

  William glanced again at the paper in his hands. It was a plot map of Crook County. It showed all the sections of land in the county and who owned what. Outlined in the center of the county was not only the five-thousand-acre spread of the Hanging T but also many other spreads around it, large and small.

  He looked up at Tom. “And what did these others do to deserve the eye of the Association?”

  Tom shrugged. “The Jeffries fellow was talking about going into sheep the other day. We all know how sheep graze the grass to the dirt, leaving nothing to grow back.”

  “And the Snows?”

  Tom tapped his cigar against the ash tray. “He’s a friend of Rolf Jeffries.

  Besides, he’s running sheep already. We have to give them some incentive to try their operations somewhere else.”

  As William stared in rapacious incredulity at the paper in his hands, he realized that greed, like a stray dog once fed, had come back for more. Even as he looked at the properties, he realized this plan must have been laid well ahead of time for almost all the owners of the properties indicated, for one reason or another, owed Tom’s bank money. It irked him that The Association often made decisions without consulting him, but that was the price he’d known he would pay even before he was accepted onto the board. He wouldn’t even be a member were it not for Tom. But because of his past and what Tom knew,
he was a member. The lowest one.

  Shoving aside his irritation, he glanced up, caught Tom’s eye, and allowed a slow smile to spread across his face. His day would come, and then they would all be sorry they hadn’t treated him with a little more respect. Especially Tom. William hated doing another man’s dirty work. “Same deal as before? Equal shares for all?”

  Tom nodded. “The Association has agreed.”

  William sat up straight and stared down at the paper in his hands once more. “We might be biting off more than we can chew.”

  Tom stubbed his cigar out. “We never have.”

  William scratched the back of his head in a sudden quandary. He wanted his share of the land represented before him. His ranch was meager compared to some of the ranches in the valley, and he could certainly use the boost in income. Yet he was afraid that if they scared too many people off their land it would become quite obvious what they were up to. He had no desire to spend the last minutes of his life with the scratchy feel of a hemp rope around his neck.

  But if the plot map in his hands was correct, he would stand to receive at least twenty-five-hundred acres more. That was not counting the lush acres he would get when Nicki finally decided that she should quit her ranch—her ranch with the only easy access to the Deschutes River for miles along the canyon. His cattle wouldn’t lose so much weight traveling to water then. Fatter cattle meant better prices at market, and better prices meant he would reach his goals that much sooner.

  He stared at a spot on the floor, seeing acres and acres in his mind’s eye. All of them lush and green, dotted with thousands of fat, well-watered cattle. Twenty-five-hundred acres were to be his from the small-time settlers they had previously discussed, twenty-five hundred of Nicki’s acres would be his when she married him, and now twenty-five hundred more from this new proposal. Seven-thousand-five-hundred acres in total! Added to his own three-thousand acres, that would make quite a sizable ranch. He would be that much closer to his aspiration. The one thing that grated on him was that he got stuck with all the grunt work.