by Debra Cowan
“It was so fast. And vague.” She huffed out a breath in frustration.
“Try closing your eyes,” Michal suggested.
Deborah did. “All right.”
“How tall is he?” Jordan asked.
“Taller than Bram, I think.”
“Was he wearing or holding a hat?”
Deborah thought hard. “No.”
“You said he had dark hair,” Michal prompted. “Could you tell if it was black or dark brown?”
“Black, I think. I’m not sure. That was just the first thing that came to mind when you asked me.”
She heard the rattle of paper and opened her eyes.
Jordan made a few strokes on the paper. “Hair short or long?”
“Nicely trimmed and reaching the top of his shirt collar.” She searched her mind. “No sideburns.”
This might work. There was more to the impression than she had realized.
“That’s good,” Jordan said. “What else?”
“His eyes were light, I think. Black shirt, black trousers. Wearing a gun belt.”
“That could be any number of men around here,” Michal said.
“True.” Her shoulders sagged.
“Still, you’re doing great.” Jordan gestured to the sketch. “Anything else you can tell me?”
She frowned, closing her eyes again. “There’s something...a scar or some kind of mark on the left side of his face.”
“Oh!” Michal exclaimed.
Deborah’s eyes flew open. “What?”
“I might know who it is,” Michal said.
Jordan continued to draw. “Where’s the scar? Cheek? Jaw? Eye?”
“High on his left cheekbone.”
A smile stretched across Michal’s face and she fairly vibrated with excitement.
Jordan quickly moved the pencil across the paper, then turned the sketch toward Deborah. “Does this look anything like who you saw?”
She studied the man’s stern chiseled features softened by the lightness of his eyes and a half smile. “Yes, that’s him!”
“It’s our brother, Jericho.”
“Our brother?” She stared at the drawing. Now that his face was defined, he looked familiar. Hope rose inside her.
Jordan set the pencil aside. “It makes sense that you would get an image of him, since you’ve spent a lot of time in that house.”
Michal rose and hugged her. “You remembered something!”
Now she had another memory! She couldn’t wait to tell Bram. Excited, she squeezed Jordan’s hand. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Maybe it won’t be long now before you get your whole memory back.”
“I hope you’re right.” Then she would know why she had gone with Cosgrove. If she’d taken his horse in an attempt to escape him or someone else. If he was the man she’d heard yelling after her when she had ridden out of Monaco.
Michal hurried out of the room. “I’m going to tell Mother.”
Deborah again looked at the sketch. “You really are very good, Jordan.”
Her sister shrugged. “I like doing it.”
“Thank goodness you can. It’s because of you that I figured out Jericho was a real memory. Have you sketched other things?”
“Quite a few.”
“I’d like to see them, if you don’t mind.”
“All right.” Her sister looked pleased.
The sound of hooves interrupted them and Deborah’s gaze eagerly went to the window.
Jordan laughed. “Maybe you’d rather see Bram first.”
She flushed. “No, that’s okay.”
Her sister grinned. “Go ahead. It’s fine.”
“All right. Thank you.” As she left the bedroom with her sister, her heartbeat sped up when she heard the low timbre of his voice.
“Ladies.”
“Good evening, Bram,” Jessamine said.
“H-hello.” That was Michal. “D-did you eat supper?”
“That depends. Did you make those molasses cookies I like?”
“I can make some.”
“Not on my account, though I appreciate it,” he said kindly. “I’m still full from supper.”
“All right.”
Jordan stepped out as Deborah paused in the doorway, something inside her shifting at the sight of him. Holding his mount’s reins, he stood with his back to her as Marah stroked his gelding’s nose. A white shirt and denims molded his powerful body. He’d removed his hat, revealing his strong tanned nape and the slight wave in his black hair.
Had she felt like this around him before she had lost her memory? As if she couldn’t get a full breath. As if she had a constant flutter in her stomach.
Marah looked away from the dun to Bram. “Duffy found a covey of quail out behind the barn and I saw them!”
“Good thing I brought my rifle,” Bram drawled. “I’ve been hankerin’ for some quail.”
“You are not shooting them!”
“You didn’t tell me about them because you wanted some for supper?” he teased.
“Hmmph, you know what I think about killing those birds.”
He chuckled. “I reckon I do and so does the whole of Whirlwind.”
Marah made a face at him, then her gaze shifted to Deborah, her eyes lighting up. “Deborah has something to tell you.”
“That right?” He turned, his broad shoulders blocking most of the view of his horse. His smile faded, his gaze sliding over her.
She was startled by the prickling sensation of his mouth on her shoulders, her neck. Feeling her face heat, she said softly, “Hi.”
“Hey.”
Jessamine herded the other girls inside. “Let Deborah tell him.”
“But—” Marah began.
“C’mon, Marah.” Jordan hooked an arm through her sister’s and tugged her inside.
Deborah smiled as Michal followed their mother.
Bram hung his hat on his saddle horn and shoved a hand through his hair, leaving furrows in the dark thickness. “Your sister seems excited about something.”
“Yes. I am, too.”
“You can talk while I brush Scout down.”
“All right.” Disheartened that he didn’t immediately ask about her news, she followed him around the house to the barn.
“After our trip to Whirlwind today, I wrote down everything I learned.”
“That’s good. I talked to both Duffy and Amos Fuller. Fuller’s the one who flapped his gums to Millie. If he says anything else out of turn, he’s gone from the Circle R.”
She nodded, wondering if Bram’s only reason for warning the ranch hand was that he didn’t want gossip spreading. Or if he didn’t want anyone to think he and Deborah might still be courting.
She couldn’t keep her gaze from trailing down his strong back or admiring the muscular thighs gloved by his jeans. He led the gelding to the barn and lit the lantern hanging outside the door before unsaddling his mount.
Beneath his white shirt, the muscles in his shoulders and arms bunched. Her gaze went to his hands, bronzed and big. Hands that had locked her to him earlier, held her as if he would never let her go.
Heat moved under her skin. Just looking at him made her go soft inside.
He walked into the barn, settling the saddle over a sawhorse. “What was it you wanted to tell me?”
His tone gave her pause. She wasn’t imagining the hint of coolness in his words. “Did something happen at your ranch? Something bad?”
“No.” He returned and removed the horse blanket. The black stripe down his dun’s back was dark with sweat.
Something was wrong. Something Bram obviously didn’t want to discuss with her. Still, she wouldn’t let
it dim her enthusiasm over what she had remembered.
“When we were at my brother’s—”
“Listen.” He slipped the bridle off with one hand, his gaze leveling on hers. “If you want to talk about that kiss, it never should’ve happened.”
Even as her heart sank, anger flashed through her. Along with hurt. “Yes, that’s all I’ve thought about since it happened,” she snapped, because it was true. “My goodness, I don’t know how I managed not to swoon when you got here.”
“All right, I get your point,” he growled, taking a brush out of a nearby bucket and beginning to sweep the horse with it. “What do you want to tell me?”
“When we were at Jericho’s, an image flickered in my mind. It was brief, though it was enough of a picture that I could tell it was a man coming into the house.”
Bram straightened, interest flaring in his eyes. He rested an arm on his gelding’s back.
Ah, now he was listening to her.
“Why didn’t you mention this?”
“I wasn’t sure if what I saw meant anything, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it.” Thank goodness he didn’t know she also hadn’t been able to stop thinking about kissing him.
“I told Jordan and she suggested I try to describe what I could. When I did, she was able to sketch him. Here it is.”
She held out the paper, now curled into a roll.
He took it, his fingers brushing hers as he pulled away quickly and straightened the drawing. His gaze dropped to the paper. “I’ll be,” he muttered. “It’s your brother.”
She nodded. “And there are other things I may remember.”
“Like what?” He returned the sketch.
Should she tell him? He’d all but said he didn’t want to talk about that kiss. Well, she didn’t really want to talk about it either, but there were things she needed to know. “Things like other times, um, places, you kissed me.”
He turned away, tossing the brush into a bucket holding other brushes, a hoof pick, hoof knife and a rasp. Uncertain now, she wrapped her arms around herself. Was she really going to ask him? She certainly couldn’t ask her family.
He smacked the gelding’s rump and sent it loping into the corral. He faced her, impatience crackling in his eyes.
She swallowed hard. She couldn’t just come out and ask him if they knew each other in the biblical sense. “I think I remember you kissing me in other places.”
Hunger darkened his eyes and his gaze did a slow slide to her breasts.
Oh, my.
When he looked back up, his face was shuttered against her. “I assume you don’t mean kissing you in different locations, like in town or behind the church.”
Embarrassed, hardly able to speak, she nodded. “Yes. I mean, no.”
He arched a brow.
He wasn’t going to make it easy on her, and for a moment she thought about dropping the subject. He obviously wanted her to. And that was why she wasn’t going to.
“Well?” he demanded.
Hand trembling, she pointed to a spot on the side of her neck. “Did you kiss me here?”
He nodded, his eyes glittering in the shadows. She could clearly see the desire on his face, the scar that looked harsher in this light. Which meant he could probably tell that she was blushing.
She lifted her braid and touched her nape. “And...here?”
“Yeah.” His voice was rough.
A phrase skipped through her mind. Here, there or anywhere.
It tugged at her memory, then vanished. She had no idea what the words meant, if anything.
“Deborah?”
She shifted her attention back to him. Her hand flattened on the plane of her chest and his gaze followed. The heat in those blue eyes made her knees weak. She couldn’t ask if he had kissed her there, but when she met his gaze, she knew his mouth had been there and lower.
Where hadn’t he kissed her? “Just how intimate were we?”
“Your virtue is intact.” He bit out the words.
Any acceptance she’d seen in him earlier was gone. He was angry. Why? What did he have to be angry about?
She was afraid she knew. “You regret kissing me.”
“In point of fact, you kissed me.”
She froze, her mind calling up what had happened. At the time, she had felt he was kissing her because he wanted to. Almost needed to. Horrified, she could barely push out the words. “Did you only do it because I asked you?”
“Yes.”
Temper flaring, she said, “You didn’t seem to mind while we were doing it.”
“You may have forgotten what happened between us, but I haven’t.”
The bitterness in his voice sent a sharp pain through her. She couldn’t stay out here with him any longer. Somehow she managed to choke out, “I see. I’m glad to have that sorted out. And thank you so much for your help today. Sorry to have troubled you. Good night.”
Tears blurring her vision, she turned and walked back toward the house.
Behind her, she heard him curse, but she kept walking. Her chest felt hollow and tight. She had thought he was softening toward her. She’d been wrong.
Chapter Eight
Bram had just lied through his teeth. He watched Deborah turn in a whirl of skirts and walk away, her shoulders as rigid as a wagon brace.
The hurt that had flared in her eyes made him want to kick himself. He should apologize, but he didn’t. Already he was more involved than was smart. He had to leave things be.
He didn’t see her again until supper the next evening. Mrs. Blue had invited him, and though he had started to decline, his parting conversation with Duffy changed his mind.
The Circle R ranch hand had reported that Mitchell Orr, the store clerk, had driven out today and stayed a good long while. Though Orr was friendly with the entire family, the man had spent most of his time with Deborah.
Bram had been on edge since last night, the news about her visitor setting his jaw—and not because he feared Orr might be a threat to Deborah’s safety.
The last glaring rays of the sun had softened and now Bram sat opposite Mrs. Blue at one end of her walnut dining table. Jordan and Marah sat to his left, while Deborah and Michal had taken the places to his right. Deborah had barely spared him a glance. Bram had spared her more than his share.
Tonight she looked cool and fresh in a pale blue dress that set off her ivory skin and raven hair. Tendrils escaped from her upswept hair, curling at her nape and around her face. He tore his gaze from the elegant line of her neck.
More than once, his gaze wandered to her soft pink mouth and he would find himself thinking about their kiss yesterday. Then he wondered if Orr had tried to kiss her.
By the time dessert was served, Bram’s muscles were as taut as new rope. There could be no more kissing. He was having a devil of a time forgetting the one they’d shared.
All the women except Deborah asked after his family, glad to hear how well his uncle and cousin were progressing.
Deborah rose to help Jordan clear the table while Michal brought in a pecan pie from the kitchen. The sweet scent of sugar and nuts made Bram’s mouth water.
“Deborah made pie,” Marah said.
Whether she had remembered how or someone had helped her, Bram knew it would be excellent.
He took the dessert served by Jordan, waiting until all the women sat before asking, “Any word from Jericho?”
“We had a wire from him a couple of days ago telling us that he and Catherine had left New York City,” Mrs. Blue said.
Jordan’s eyes sparkled. “They should be home in another week or so.”
“They’ve been gone so long,” Marah said. “I hope Evie still remembers me.”
“S-she will,” Michal reassured h
er.
“Better than I did,” Deborah quipped.
Bram chuckled, irritated when her smile faded. He bet she had smiled all day for Orr. Were any of these females going to mention the store clerk’s visit?
He knew Deborah wouldn’t, so he would bring it up himself.
He took a sip of coffee. “Anything happen today?”
“Mitchell came out,” Marah said.
“That right?” Bram kept his gaze on Deborah, who stared at her pie. She wouldn’t look at him.
Her sisters’ gazes went to her expectantly, but it was Jordan who finally answered, “Yes.”
“Was he making a delivery?”
“No,” Marah said.
Jordan glanced across the table at her older sister, who took a dainty bite of her dessert. “He just came to see Deborah.”
“I thought he was sweet on somebody.” Bram barely kept from growling the words.
“A widow in Merkel,” Marah supplied. “Mitchell said they had decided to go their separate ways.”
Which meant Orr was free to make his separate way to Deborah. Bram gripped his fork tight enough to bend it. Was the store clerk planning to court her? What were his intentions?
Last night Bram had told her that he hadn’t forgotten how she’d planned to leave him. That their kiss never should’ve happened. Still, he couldn’t seem to dismiss the burning need to know everything that had passed between Deborah and Orr.
He tried to make his voice casual, which was difficult since he spoke through gritted teeth. “How long did he stay?”
“A couple of hours,” Jessamine answered.
Two hours!
Marah wiped her mouth with one of Mrs. Blue’s fancy cloth napkins and said indignantly, “He almost stepped on Felix.”
“That was an accident,” Deborah said, still not looking at him. “He apologized.”
She hadn’t made eye contact with Bram once since he’d arrived. It went all over him. Determined to change that, he pushed away his empty dessert plate. “You outdid yourself on the pecan pie, Deborah.”
“Thank you.” She aimed a smile his way, a polite blank smile that made him want to haul her outside and kiss her until she got mad or gave in.
He had questions for her, questions he didn’t want to ask in front of the others. The conversation turned to a wounded bird Marah had found, then to illustrations Jordan had drawn for the youngest of Deborah’s future students.