One Texas Night

by Jodi Thomas

  “No,” he said, then backtracked when he saw her frown. “I can’t make coffee. No supplies around here. All my father left was the pot, but I could wash up.”

  She watched as he went to the well and drew up water. “I’m surprised the rope and bucket are still here,” he mumbled as he washed.

  “I put them there last year,” she said. “I ride this way often and I like to stop to water my horse. Hope you don’t mind.”

  It hadn’t occurred to him to mind. “You happen to bring a towel too?”

  She laughed and tossed him the towel she’d spread over the basket of muffins.

  He dried and placed the towel on the nail by the well. “Great, I got the towel wet so now I guess I’ll have to eat all the muffins.” He took the first one from her hand and asked, “Now tell me how come you own this horse?” If she had horses and maybe even cattle, she’d have no use for half the herd they might win.

  They walked toward her mount. A lead rope had been tied to the saddle horn. A chestnut mare was at the other end of the rope. At first glance it appeared ordinary, but Rowdy didn’t miss the look in the animal’s eyes. Intelligent, he thought. He downed another muffin while he circled the horse.

  “I don’t own him,” she said when he returned to her side. “You do.”

  When he showed no sign of believing her, she added, “When the sheriff came to get the stock after your father died, she was only a colt limping around the corral. The sheriff didn’t figure she’d last to town so he turned her loose.” Laurel brushed the roan’s neck. “I found her the next day and knew she’d be coyote dinner if I didn’t put her in the barn for a few weeks.”

  The horse pushed her with its nose as if playing.

  “I checked on her every day until she was big enough to run the land. Whenever I was home from school, I rode by to check on her. The wound on her leg healed with a little help from the whiskey I found in the cabin and she began to grow. I was afraid someone might ride by and see her, so I moved her down to the little canyon by the stream. There’s water and grass there year-round along with plenty of shallow caves to get out of the worst weather.”

  Rowdy ran his hand along the horse’s withers and back, feeling strong muscles. “Looks like she’d have had the sense to run.”

  “I thought that too, but every time I came back, she was somewhere on your place.” Laurel pulled an apple from her pocket. “I taught her to come when I whistle.” She offered the apple to Rowdy. “Here, you feed her. She’s yours.”

  “No.” Just because the horse survived here didn’t make the mare his.

  “You need a better horse than one of the livery mounts. Cinnamon can be that horse.”

  “Cinnamon? Don’t tell me you named her?” He’d called a few horses names over the years, but nothing he’d want to repeat in her company.

  She laughed at the face he made, then handed him the basket and moved away. “You two share breakfast and get acquainted. I have to get back.”

  He set the basket down and followed her to her horse. He offered her a step up, but she didn’t take it. She hadn’t needed it. Her long legs flew over the saddle with ease.

  “Good luck tonight.”

  “Thanks,” he said, realizing he didn’t want her to leave.

  “When will I see you again?”

  “I’ll be around. My father insists we all go every night. He goes for the rodeo and my sisters go for the dance afterward.”

  “And why do you go?” he asked as he took the lead rope from her hand.

  She looked down at him. “I’ll go to watch my partner win.” Kicking her horse, she was gone before he had time to answer.

  He watched her ride away. With her height and lean form, she rode like a man, one with the horse, not bumping along like most women he’d seen ride. He decided she probably wouldn’t think that a compliment, even though he meant it as such.

  He tossed the apple in the air and caught it, proud of the way he’d handled himself. He’d managed to talk to her, even made her laugh. It was only a guess, but he thought that Laurel laughed very little in her life. She’d been different this morning, but he couldn’t put his finger on why. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that they were alone, out of sight of any prying eyes or ears.

  Winning this rodeo might prove great fun with her as his partner.

  Walking back to the mare, Rowdy swore when he realized the horse had eaten the basket of muffins and left him with the apple.

  Laughing, he patted the horse’s neck. “Well, Cinnamon, since you’ve had my breakfast it looks like we’d better go to work. I got about ten hours to turn you into a cow horse.”

  Chapter 4

  The rodeo started with little more than an hour until sunset. Men drew for events and nights. Since the celebration lasted four nights, one-fourth of the men did each event each night. That way anyone coming only to one night got to see all the rodeo had to offer even if he got to watch only one out of four of the men compete for any one event.

  Laurel checked the charts. Rowdy had drawn saddleback riding the first night. Good. That would give him at least one more day to work with the horse on steer roping. She was so excited she couldn’t wait for the buggy, so she’d insisted on riding in with her father. He didn’t talk to her, but it didn’t matter. In four days, she would have the money to leave.

  Deep down she hoped that if she had the means to leave, he might tell her he wanted her to stay. She knew she was only fooling herself. Since the day he’d married Rosy when Laurel had been four, the captain had always tried to make his oldest daughter disappear. Leftover children never mattered much when the new batch came along. Laurel had a feeling that when she left the ranch Sunday night after Rowdy won, her father would be more angry about losing a free bookkeeper than a daughter.

  When they arrived at the rodeo, she stood just behind him listening to the men talk and hoping to learn something that might help Rowdy. As usual, no one noticed her.

  After an hour, Laurel moved behind the row of wagons and buggies pulled in a circle. She’d sat quietly waiting for her chance. Finally, her father had stepped into a crowd of men who were placing bets on a horse race to be run in the morning and passing around a bottle. Her sisters were flirting with half a dozen cowhands who’d stopped by for a cool drink from the pitcher of lemonade in the back of their rig. No one would miss her.

  She found Rowdy off by himself in the shadows of a barn. Since he’d drawn bronc riding as his first challenge, he’d be part of the last group to compete.

  Without a word, she moved beside him, leaned her back on the barn only a few inches from his arm and handed him a canteen. She could feel the tension in his body.

  “A fellow named Dan O’Brien offered to ride drag for me during the calf roping.”

  “He’s all right, I guess,” she said without looking at Rowdy. “He owns a little farm to the south of here.” She hesitated, then added, “I’m not sure he’s much of a cowhand. I think he raises mostly hogs at his place.”

  “I’ve already told him I’d trade the favor off for him. He only entered calf roping, so he must feel like he can handle his own.”

  Laurel nodded once. “All right.” She could have suggested a few others who might have been better, but he hadn’t asked.

  While he drank, she decided to tell him what she knew before he made another mistake, “I’ve been watching the black you drew for tonight. He goes to his left more than his right and fires up easy even in the pen. I think you should—”

  “I know how to ride,” he snapped as if resenting her advice. “I’m no greenhorn.”

  Silence hung still and heavy between them.

  “Fine. Good luck.” She planted a quick, hard kiss on his cheek and walked away.

  She thought he might catch up to her and say he was sorry, but he didn’t. A tiny part of her knew she’d done it wrong. She could have said something to him first, maybe let him tell her what he thought. But Laurel would never be like her sisters.
She couldn’t have conversations that made no sense. She couldn’t giggle at nothing and bat her lashes. It wasn’t her. It never would be.

  “Where you been, girl?” Her father’s voice made her jump.

  “Looking at the stock,” she said in a whisper. She didn’t mention that she’d met a cattle buyer from Fort Worth who told her to pass the word along that he’d be willing to buy off the winner’s cattle if the all-around cowboy wanted cash.

  “That’s better than hiding in some corner, I guess.” Her father took her elbow in a tight grip. “You remind me more of your mother every day.”

  Laurel knew better than to think that was a compliment. Her father had often told her that his first wife was a mouse of a woman, plain and boring. Laurel knew he’d married her for money; he’d even joked once that he’d talked her father into paying more just to get her out of the house.

  Her father let go of her arm and climbed on the wagon bench. “I’m going home after the saddle bronc riders. You stay and see that your sisters get home in the wagon after the dance.”

  “But I rode in,” she protested. “One of the men will be happy to.”

  He looked at her with his usual bothered expression. “All right, see that James or Phil drives the girls home. You can ride back alone, but try to stay for at least one dance. You never know, someone might actually ask you to dance.”

  Laurel knew he didn’t care what she did. He probably didn’t care if she danced; he just wanted her to stay behind long enough so that she didn’t ride back with him. If he hadn’t needed her to do the books, he probably would have left her at school until she was thirty. She was a reminder of a time in his life when he’d settled for something far less than what he’d wanted.

  She stood silently and watched the competition. The first rider fell off his horse coming out of the shoot. The second rode, but his horse didn’t buck enough to earn many points. The third and fourth started well but didn’t make the clock. Rowdy’s horse came out fighting with all his might to get the saddle and the man off his back.

  The crowd rose to their feet. Several people cheered as the animal kicked dust every time Rowdy’s spurs brushed his hide.

  Laurel watched, mentally taking each jolt with Rowdy. His back bowed back and forth, but his left hand stayed in the air.

  When the ride ended, he jumped from the black horse and landed on his feet. The crowd went crazy, yelling and clapping. Laurel only smiled, knowing she’d invested her ten dollar gold piece wisely.

  Her father cussed and demanded to know who number forty was. Five minutes later, when his men gathered round him, he said that Rowdy Darnell was the man to beat in this rodeo and there would be an extra month’s pay to the man who topped his final score.

  Laurel felt proud. She stood and watched the young people move to the dance floor as the last light of the day disappeared. Her father and a few of his men rode off toward the saloon talking of plans for tomorrow. Every night the rodeo would end with saddle bronc riding and they planned to have the captain’s men shatter Darnell’s score.

  When she knew no one was watching, she climbed on her horse and rode into the darkness. She didn’t need much light, for she knew the trail by heart. In fact, she knew the land for miles around. For as long as she could remember, she’d saddled up before dawn and rode out to watch the sunrise, crisscrossing the land before anyone else was up and about.

  When she was in sight of her home, she remembered what her father had said about staying long enough to dance. If he got home and found her already there, he’d probably yell at her.

  Laurel turned toward the cottonwoods along the creek that separated the captain’s land from the Darnell place. She rode through the shallow water until she reached a spot where cliff walls on either side of the creek were high enough to act as fence. There, twenty feet into the walled area, she found the slice in the rocks just big enough for a horse to climb up out of the water and through. No one watching from either ranch could have seen her, but one minute she was on Hayes’ land and the next on Rowdy’s property.

  She knew he’d still be at the rodeo grounds. Everyone would want to shake his hand. She’d even heard several say that his ride was the best they’d ever seen.

  As the land spread out before her, Laurel gave her mount his head and they began to run over the open pasture. Rowdy’s place had always been so beautiful to her. The way the ground sloped gently between outcroppings of rock colored like different shades of brick lined up. The landscape made her feel like every detail had been planned by God. Almost as if He’d designed the perfect ranch. Rich earth and good water. Then, He had set it down so gently in the middle of the prairie that no one had even noticed it.

  She rode close enough to the ranch house to see that no light shone, then decided to turn toward home.

  At the creek’s edge, she thought she heard another horse. Laurel slipped down and walked between the trees until she saw a man standing shoulder deep in the middle of the stream.

  Her first thought was that she might have been followed. But most of the men who worked for her father were at the dance and someone following wouldn’t be a quarter mile away from the pass-through wading in the deepest part of the stream.

  She stood perfectly still in the shadows and listened. The sound of a horse came again not far from her. As her eyes adjusted, she spotted Cinnamon standing under a cottonwood with branches so long they almost touched the water.

  Rowdy had to be the man in the water.

  Laurel wanted to vanish completely. She couldn’t get to her land, he stood in between her and the passage. If she moved he might spot her, or worse, shoot her as a trespasser for she was on his property.

  Closing her eyes, she played a game she’d played when she was a child. If I can’t see him, he can’t see me, she thought.

  “Laurel?” His low voice was little more than a whisper. “Is that you?”

  She opened one eye. He’d walked close enough to her that the water now only came to his waist. His powerful body sparkled with water. “It’s me,” she admitted, trying not to look directly at him because there was no doubt that he was nude.

  “I was . . . I was . . .”

  “Turn around,” he ordered.

  “But . . .”

  He took a step closer. “I don’t plan to come out until you turn around.”

  She nodded and whirled. “I didn’t mean to interrupt you. I swear. I was just riding and I thought you’d be at the dance, so you wouldn’t be home and I could ride on your land without anyone bothering me.” She was rambling, but she couldn’t seem to stop. She didn’t want him to think that she was looking for him, or worse, spying on him. “I know I’m trespassing, but you’ve been gone so long I didn’t think about anyone being on the place.”

  “Laurel.” He barely whispered her name, but he was so near she jumped. “You can turn around now.”

  Squaring her shoulders, she faced him. He’d pulled on his jeans and had a towel wrapped around the back of his neck. The same towel she’d given him that morning. She couldn’t say another word. She could only stare. Until this moment she’d thought she saw the boy she remembered from school when she looked at Rowdy, but no boy stood before her.

  “I’m glad you came.” He shoved his wet hair back. “I looked for you after the rodeo. I wanted to say I was sorry I snapped at you. I was nervous about the ride and didn’t feel much like talking.”

  “You were right. You did know what you were doing. That ride was magnificent.”

  He didn’t seem to hear her as he continued. “I’m not used to much conversation, but you had a right. We’re partners after all.” He smiled at her and she swore he could see her blush. “If you ride by here often, I might want to change my bathing habits.”

  “I’m sorry . . .”

  He reached behind her and grabbed his shirt off the cottonwood. “How about we stop apologizing to each other and relax? Deal, partner?”

  “Deal,” she managed. “Why aren�
��t you at the dance?”

  “Why aren’t you?” he countered as he buttoned his shirt.

  “I . . . I . . .” She could think of no answer but the truth and she didn’t want to tell him that. He could figure it out for himself. She wasn’t the kind of girl anyone asked to dance. First, she was taller than half the men. Second, she was so shy she couldn’t talk to them and, third, everyone knew she was the captain’s plain daughter. The old maid.

  “I can’t dance either,” he said.

  She smiled. He’d given her a way out.

  Without a word, he took her hand and led her to a spot of moonlight shining near the water’s edge. She sat on a log and he stretched out in the grass as if they were old friends settling down for a long visit.

  Somehow the shadows made it easier to talk. She told him everything she’d heard about the stock and the other riders. He said he’d drawn calf roping for tomorrow. She mentioned all the extra things going on around the rodeo. Besides the dance, there was a box supper one night and a horse race, as well as a sharpshooting contest.

  When they talked of the competition, she told him of her dreams of working in a bank and maybe buying her own little house one day on a quiet street. With the money they’d get if he won, she might have enough for a down payment. Though she planned to put most of the money away for a rainy day. A woman alone has to prepare for that.

  He told her of living on a ranch, a busy, productive one, not a dead one like his father’s place. She had the feeling as he talked of what he wanted to do that he was voicing a boy’s dreams he’d tucked away at fifteen and hadn’t brought out again until tonight.

  They settled into an easy silence, listening to the sounds around them. Finally, he said, “I talked with Dan O’Brien after I rode. He said he’d heard I’d been in prison and wanted to know if it was true.”

  “What did you say?” She knew it wouldn’t be a secret for long, but she thought they might make it through the rodeo without everyone knowing.

  “I said I had.” Rowdy stared up at her. “No matter what folks say I’ve done, I’m not in the habit of lying, Laurel. Not now, not ever.”