Beth waited until he rode off, then galloped Cheyenne home, wanting to be sure Gabe didn’t return and surprise Trey. He came out of the cabin when he heard her in the yard. “Beth, you look like you ran into a pack of wolves. What’s the matter?”
Seeing him, hearing his voice, made reaction set in. When she got off her horse, Beth’s legs would hardly hold her. She walked into Trey’s arms and laid her head on his shoulder. “Not a pack of wolves, only one. Trey, I just fired Gabe.”
She’d expected him to be angry, but he only held her closer. His warmth and familiar scent worked like magic to calm her. “What happened?”
Beth repeated what the Bakers had told her.
Trey stepped back. “Beth, what were you thinking?”
“I was afraid that if you fired him, it would come to a fight, and he isn’t worth it. I took your revolver with me–”
“You what?”
Beth shivered at the memory of Gabe’s face as he tried to pull her off her horse. “I needed it. I had to fire a shot at his feet to convince him to leave.”
Before she could blink, Trey caught her shoulders in a painful grip and gave her a sharp shake. “Jesus, Beth! You need a bloody keeper! If you’d let me handle it, it would be over and done with, but now it’s anyone’s guess what he’ll do.”
With her own temper rising, Beth pulled free. “He insulted both of us. I had as much right to do it as you.”
Trey swore, swung his leg over Cheyenne and sent her down the lane at a gallop.
Beth watched him out of sight, then ran to saddle Chance. He’d be furious with her, but she’d started this and she wasn’t about to wait tamely at home while he finished it.
CHAPTER 10
John looked up from the stove he was repairing when Trey stepped into the forge yard. “Hey. I thought you were staying put for a few more days.”
“I changed my mind.”
When Trey told him what Beth had done and why, John let out a low whistle. “That would have been something to see. She’s got nerve, I’ll give her that.” He closed the stove door and took off his leather apron. “You aren’t ready for this right now, Trey.”
“Maybe not, but it looks like now’s the time.”
With a gleam in his eyes, John nodded. “Mind if I come along?”
“That’s why I’m here.”
John wove his way through the collection of stoves, boilers, and scrap metal that filled the yard. Anticipation lightened Trey’s anger. Now he’d be able to concentrate on Gabe without worrying about his back.
A man who despised women as much as Gabe clearly did wouldn’t let one run him off without retaliation. He needed to be found and sent packing, or he might well sneak back to the homestead and wait to catch Beth alone and unprepared.
Trey walked out of the forge yard and stopped dead when he saw Beth tying Chance in front of the store. He swore under his breath and went to meet her. “Why couldn’t you stay home?”
Beth lifted her chin and looked him in the eye. “Because I couldn’t. Save your breath, Trey. I’m already here. Hello, John.”
The grin on John’s face as he returned Beth’s greeting only made Trey angrier. He spun on his heel and walked into the store.
Frank Baker came out from behind the counter. “Good to see you, Trey. Hope you’re feeling better.”
“I am. Frank, Beth told me what you heard at Neil’s the other night.”
“I knew you’d want to know.” Frank cast a nervous glance out the front window. “Is your hand in town? I guess you’ve fired him.”
“He’s been fired. I don’t know if he’s in town, but I’m going to find out. I want to know who he was talking to.”
“Three of Dale Turner’s new hands. I don’t know their names.” Frank shrugged his beefy shoulders. “I got the impression that your hand didn’t know them very well, either. He was a stranger, so he caught my attention.”
“I’m damn well going to catch his attention if I see him. If he comes in here, tell him I’m looking for him.” Trey stepped back outside, where John waited with Beth. Her eyes dared him to try to send her home, but he ignored her, beckoned to John, and started down the street toward Neil’s. One argument at a time.
A few regulars sat in their usual places at the saloon’s battered tables. As Trey had hoped, Gabe was there, standing at the bar with a beer. He wore no polite mask now. He looked furious.
All right, better make this quick. Trey motioned to John to wait just inside the door, then walked up behind Gabe and tapped him on the shoulder. When he turned around, Trey knocked him down with a right to the jaw. Gabe hit the floor and got up cursing. Before he could get set, Trey hit him in the belly, sending him sprawling again. “There’s your wages, Gabe. If I hear of you mentioning my wife’s name again or if I see you within a mile of my place, I’ll shoot you on sight.”
Winded and dazed, Gabe grabbed a toppled bar stool and sat up. Neil reached under the bar and pulled out his shotgun. Trey’s head buzzed from the punches he’d thrown, but it felt good to release some of the frustration he’d been carrying since Beth arrived.
Gabe struggled to his feet, steadied himself against the bar and held Trey’s gaze. “That was a cheap trick, McShannon. I’ll see you again.”
Trey grinned, planted his feet and readied his fists. “There’s no time like the present.”
John crossed the room to stand beside Trey. “You won’t see him again if I see you first. He and his wife are good friends of mine. Where’s your horse?”
Neil cocked an eyebrow and gestured toward the door with his shotgun.
With a last glare at Trey, Gabe left, John at his heels.
Neil watched them go out, then turned back to Trey. “So, how’s married life treating you, anyway?”
Trey chuckled and shook his head. He knew Neil’s opinion of married life. “It isn’t boring.”
Before he could say more, another customer walked in. Trey’s voice failed him. Sandy blond hair, gray eyes, broken nose… Through the shock of recognition, he dimly heard Neil’s voice. “Coffee, Nate? It’s on the house.”
* * *
Beth had followed Trey and John to the saloon, slipped into the alley after they went in, and eavesdropped at the open side window. She laughed when Gabe hit the floor, and breathed a sigh of relief when John herded him out the door. Trey hadn’t been hurt. She giggled again when he told Neil married life wasn’t boring. Beth could only imagine what he would have liked to say, angry as he was with her right now.
In the next moment, a blond stranger came in, saw Trey and stopped dead. “Well now, if this isn’t like old times.”
The man spoke with a more pronounced drawl than Trey’s.
Neil had laid his shotgun on the bar when John and Gabe left, but he picked it up when Trey replied in a tone that ran through Beth like ice water. “Small world, Nate. I can’t say you haven’t changed.”
The stranger smiled; a genuine smile. Beth remembered to breathe. Whoever he might be, he didn’t seem to be looking for trouble. “That’s partly thanks to you, but I’ll allow I asked for it. No hard feelings on my side.” He glanced at the barstools on the floor. “Trouble, Neil?”
“Not for me. Trey–”
But Trey was almost at the door. Beth dashed out of the alley in time to meet him.
He looked like he’d been sucker-punched. Jaw tight, he started down the street.
Beth hurried to keep up with his long strides. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah. Let’s go home.”
He wouldn’t look at her. That stranger – no stranger to Trey, obviously – had clearly upset him to the core, but Beth shelved her questions for later. They separated to get their horses, then rode home together in silence. Trey took Chance and Cheyenne to the barn. A few minutes later, without a word, he rode off on Cloud.
Beth watched him from the cabin doorway. All the stress of the day caught up with her at once. She blinked away tears as Trey disappeared around the ben
d in the lane. At the moment, she’d rather fight with him than wait here alone.
Beth, this isn’t about you. He’s hurting, and he doesn’t want your help.
As she turned away from the door, Beth’s gaze fell on her trunk. She’d wired Graham to send it, and Trey had picked it up on his last trip to town before his accident. Since then, she’d been too busy to think about it. It stood against the back wall of the cabin, still waiting to be unpacked. Feeling the need to do something, Beth opened it.
She hadn’t bothered to ask Graham to pack her mother’s china or most of her dresses, but her bedroom lamp was there, carefully wrapped in newspaper. He’d also sent an embroidered tablecloth and set of napkins, a daguerreotype of Uncle Robert and Aunt Abigail, a few of Beth’s books, and a couple of small paintings she’d had framed before leaving Philadelphia. She’d been looking forward to having some of her own things here, but she couldn’t enjoy them right now, with this ache of loneliness at her heart.
Beth took the clothes up to the loft, set the lamp back in the trunk, paused, then took it out again. She hadn’t sent for her things so she could keep them packed away. While she was here, why shouldn’t she do what she could to be comfortable? She filled the lamp and put it on the kitchen dresser, put the tablecloth on the table, hung the paintings on the walls, and stacked her books on the shelf next to Trey’s.
What if he thought she was overstepping her bounds? He was already angry with her, already finding her difficult to live with, and that man at the saloon had only upset him more, dredged up what seemed to be painful memories. Memories Trey hadn’t seen fit to share.
His right, but Beth intended to be there for him when he came home, if he’d let her. She refused to run from what she felt growing between them.
* * *
Trey rode home just after sunset, still on edge. It had to be Nate, here, now – a living reminder of things that weren’t fit to see the light of day.
He’d never be able to face the man without recalling their last meeting, on a fine spring evening a couple of days after his mother’s funeral. He’d gone for a walk, trying to find some solace in the woods and fields, and on the way home he’d met Nate on the road, on horseback. He’d leaned down, smiling. “Well, now. Are you all packed? If not, you’d best get home and start. You need to be out of the house by the end of the week.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Didn’t your father tell you? He sold your place to Dad today. He paid too much, I’d say, but it’s worth it to get a family of traitors out of the county.”
“You’re lying, Nate. Go to hell.”
Nate laughed. “Go home and ask your father yourself. Now you can all turn tail and run to England, and good riddance. If you haven’t got the spine to fight for your home, you don’t deserve one. No one here will miss you.”
Since Georgia had seceded from the Union, Trey had seen his friends fall away from him one by one, as they realized he didn’t believe in the Confederacy. All but Justin Sinclair. Only Justin had held onto the hope that Trey would join him and the others in the local troop.
Months of veiled insinuations and open taunts boiled up in Trey as rage. He reached up and pulled Nate out of his saddle with one jerk. “You’ve wanted this for a while, Nate. Now you’ve got it. Come on!”
Nate got to his feet, a reckless light in his eyes. They circled each other for a moment, then Trey charged in, took a solid punch to the gut and landed one of his own. Nate was a tough and canny fighter. Trey had fury on his side, but he would have been in trouble if he hadn’t managed to flatten his opponent’s nose a minute or so into the fight.
The thought still brought a bitter smile to Trey’s face.
But he hadn’t spent the last few hours thinking about Nate. For years, Trey had wondered if he wasn’t the coward and traitor the man had called him, but he didn’t have an eighteen-year-old’s definitions of those words anymore.
No, Trey hadn’t been thinking about Nate this afternoon. He’d ridden to a favorite spot of his, an abandoned Arapaho camp beside the river that ran through his grazing land, and stayed there until the tree shadows grew long, thinking about Beth. There were things about him she could never know, parts of himself he could never share with her, but he’d known that when he sent for her.
So why did I send for her?
Because I’d been alone too long. I hoped she’d be someone I could live with, but…
But what? Trey only knew that he came home every night looking forward to seeing Beth, and that he was very tired of shaking off a web of half-formed longings every time he looked at her.
Those longings had as much to do with emotions as with the physical attraction between them. He wanted to make love to Beth, and he wanted to hold her as they fell asleep afterwards. He’d never felt that way about a woman before. Nate couldn’t make Trey question his courage anymore, but Beth did, every time he thought about her leaving.
She stood by the front window now in a glow of lamplight, furious with him, no doubt. Trey smiled at the thought. Beth in a temper was enough to make him forget his fears. Enough to make him think that maybe, if he gave her all of himself that was worth having, it might be enough. What she didn’t know couldn’t hurt her.
He put Cloud away, glanced into Shiloh’s stall, and stopped in his tracks. The mare lay stretched out on her side, bulging with her foal, her rich chocolate-colored coat dark with sweat. She groaned with the pain of a contraction as Trey hurried to her side.
Her water had broken a while ago, but there was no sign of the foal. Damn. Damn. He’d been sure she’d go another few days. Cursing himself, Trey grabbed a bucket and ran for the house.
Beth got up from the table as he slammed the door behind him. She looked like she’d shed some tears, but apologies would have to wait.
“Beth, Shiloh’s foaling and she’s in trouble. I’m going to need your help.”
She didn’t waste time punishing him. “What do you want me to do?”
Trey filled the bucket with warm water at the stove and looked over his shoulder as he hurried out. “Bring some soap. I won’t know what we’ll have to do until I find out what the problem is.”
Beth followed him and watched while he took off his shirt, lathered an arm, and felt inside Shiloh for the foal. The first thing his fingers touched was a small tail. A biggish foal, coming rear-end first, stuck like a cork in a bottle and getting dry. He should have been in here helping the mare hours ago. “Damn. It’s breech.”
Beth stepped by him, knelt in the straw and stroked Shiloh’s damp neck. “So, what do we do?”
Trey got up and stretched his back. Good question. Losing this foal would be a major setback. He didn’t want to even think about losing the mare. “The foal can’t be born this way. We’re going to have to turn it around.”
Beth looked up, eyes mirroring his concern. “Have you ever done that before?”
Trey shook his head, wishing with all his heart that he could answer differently. “No, but I’ve seen it done once, the night Cloud was born. He was breech, too. We’ve got to get ropes on the foal’s front feet and muzzle, then one of us has to push on the foal’s backside while the other pulls on the ropes. I’ll do the pushing.”
“All right.” At least Beth had the grace to hide her doubts. She stayed by Shiloh while Trey found a soft cotton rope, cut it into two lengths, and tied a slipknot at the end of one piece.
“Hold her head and keep her down. I don’t want a broken arm.”
Beth held the mare’s halter and kept stroking her. “You’re going to be fine, Shiloh. In a little while you’re going to have a beautiful foal.”
Trey rested his hand on Shiloh’s sleek flank. She was a fine young mare with a sweet temperament, and she deserved better than he’d given her today. “She will, if I have any say about it. She’s too good to lose.” He got down on the straw again, reached into Shiloh, and started feeling his way along the foal’s side. It twitched as his hand moved ov
er its ribs. The knot that had formed in his stomach eased a little. “It’s still alive.”
An instant later, the mare squeezed his arm numb with a powerful contraction. As soon as enough feeling returned, Trey reached further and got his fingers around a front hoof. The loop slid over it, then slipped off again before he could pull it tight. He used a couple of words he hadn’t said in years and tried again.
Hallelujah. This time the noose held. Trey flashed Beth a grin. “Got it. Now for the other one.”
Vital minutes ticked away before he managed to snare the second leg.
Sitting by the mare’s head, Beth kept up a flow of soft, encouraging words.
Getting the last rope on the foal’s muzzle took more precious time. At last Trey got to his feet, caught his breath, and handed the ropes to Beth. “We’re in business. Pull when I tell you.”
By timing their efforts with the mare’s contractions, they turned the foal until it was coming head and front feet first. By that time, Shiloh had decided she’d had enough. Two more contractions had the foal on the ground. The little filly’s coat looked like crumpled black velvet. Her muzzle had been scraped pink in places by the rope, and she wasn’t breathing.
“Clear her nostrils.” As Beth wiped the remaining membrane away, Trey pushed sharply a few times on the filly’s ribs. They both cheered when she sucked in air with a convulsive jerk.
Shiloh got to her feet, shook bits of straw from her coat, and nudged Trey out of the way so she could get close to her foal. The little black filly trembled as her mother’s rough tongue dragged over her. Trey and Beth stood back and let Shiloh finish cleaning up her baby.
Beth’s voice hovered on the edge of tears, hushed with amazement. “I’ve never seen anything born before.”
Trey felt the wonder, too. It never got old, and Beth’s reaction made it even better. “What do you think?”
She shook her head. “I can’t describe it, so I won’t try.”
He stood there, blood-smeared, sweating, flushed with success, and with the glow in Beth’s eyes. It took a stern effort of will to step away. “I’d better go clean up.”
To Capture the Sky (Choices of the Heart, book 2) Page 11