by A Western Family Christmas Christmas Eve; Season of Bounty; Cowboy Scrooge
He probably didn’t care. No man had ever really cared for her. Maybe he was just kissing her to forget, or because he’d been alone so long. Maybe he was just using her because he sensed that she had a checkered past.
There was nowhere she could escape what she had just done. No escaping the burning, knowing look in Justin’s eye.
“I have to leave,” she said in a rush.
He laughed softly, a deep sound that sent a shiver right through her. She jerked her hand away and nearly fell backward when he let her go. “Where are you going?”
“Back to Boston!” The words were out before she could think the answer through. But once said, the answer had a comforting effect on her. Home! Someplace at least where the discomforts were all familiar. If she could just get away from here, from those eyes of his, from that haunted look she’d seen on his face last night. From those arms she wanted to leap right back into.
He stepped forward and she jumped back in a dance of wills. “Back to Boston?” He scoffed. “That’s the most preposterous thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Why?” she asked.
“You said you wanted to start a brand-new life.”
“Well, right now I’ll settle for my stale old one!”
“Last night you told Joe Junior you were staying here,” he said. “You promised him.”
She looked up into his face, her cheeks burning. “So now you admit to having overheard us!”
He ignored her comment. “You can’t go now. How would you get back to Boston? It’s a foolish notion!”
They glared at each other, both building up steam.
She didn’t know when, in the past two minutes, Justin’s look of heated desire had turned into heated anger, but it certainly had. And frankly, she was relieved. Kisses were perplexing; rage she could handle.
“I have means,” she replied, tilting her chin upward. “I’ve had the means all along, only I didn’t want to use it unless it was an emergency.”
“What are you talking about?”
She reached into her pocket and proudly pulled out her trump, the ring the odious people of Otis had given her. “This!” she proclaimed proudly, holding up the ring. “I could sell it for train fare. At least it would get me as far as Fort Worth!”
As Justin stared at her prize, he did not seem impressed by her resourcefulness. In fact, his face went white and he staggered back a step. “Where did you get that?”
She looked down at the ring, trying to understand his reaction. “The mayor in Otis gave it to me. He said they found it on Josiah when he died.” She frowned as a terrible thought occurred to her. “Did you think I stole it?”
“No!” His voice was ragged. “I just hadn’t seen it since…”
Since…?
“It was Mary’s,” he choked out. “I gave it to her.”
The ring suddenly felt like an iron weight in her hand. Mary had kept it all those years, and she had been about to pawn it.
Ivy felt remorseful, ashamed. “Take it,” she said. “It should be yours.”
He stepped away farther, his hands stiffly in front of him. “No, keep it. Use it like you said.”
She recoiled. Then he did want her to leave. Or did he? She felt more confused than ever, and more trapped. Because she knew that she could never hock the ring now. There was no way out. She would be stuck on this prairie with Justin till the end of time, and right now he looked like he wanted her there less than ever.
She felt ashamed and hurt. He’d been willing to kiss her, but it was obvious he was still pining for Mary.
She shot him a pitying look. “You have forgotten how to love,” she told him. “You’re living in the past and there’s no hope for you ever to find comfort or happiness there!”
She turned on her heel and fled inside the house.
Though what they jokingly referred to as the parlor always felt more crowded in the winter than at other times, never before had it felt as crowded as this. The three hands and Ivy pulled the chairs up from the wall and placed them in a semicircle near the stove. On the rug, the children sat at Arnie’s feet while he picked at his three stringed banjo and sang old miner’s songs in a croaky but loud voice. Parts of the songs weren’t fit for mixed company, not to mention young ears, but Arnie didn’t seem to notice, and neither did the kids. Wink, on the other hand, turned purple with discomfort.
Justin barely heard the music, and he really wasn’t watching all the people clustered around the stove, either. All he could see, no matter where he looked, was Ivy’s face from that afternoon. The hurt she’d showed him, the pity, hadn’t left him for a single second. He just couldn’t shake that expression.
“Don’t sit so close, Linus,” Ivy said, dragging the child a safe distance from the hot iron stove.
At her voice, Justin flinched.
Ivy was facing stiffly away from him. He could see only her profile. From the way she refused to meet his eye, he guessed that she couldn’t forget their kiss any more than he could.
Justin didn’t know how to handle himself now. He fidgeted more than he should have, and fiddled with his pipe while the others listened attentively to Arnie’s songs. He wanted to leave but felt as bound to his desk chair as if he had a rope tying him down. He doubted he could have moved if his boots had caught fire. He couldn’t force himself away from Ivy.
Still pining for Mary? No, he wasn’t, he should have said again. But the ring had startled him. The ring he’d given Mary on the day she’d promised to be his forever.
Forever hadn’t lasted past two weeks after his brother had come back from a trip out to Arizona, broker than he’d ever been and ready to leech off Justin’s charity. Justin had been willing to give his brother bed and board in exchange for work at the fledgling Bar M. He hadn’t bargained on giving his brother his girl as well.
But Josiah had probably been hard for a girl to resist back then. He was tall and dark, with a loud, lusty laugh and eyes that always seemed to shine with some sort of mischief. A girl like Mary probably thought she’d be in for a lifetime of adventure with a man as brash and open as Josiah. Mary had fallen for him, and they had left Justin flat.
He’d never heard from his brother again till after Mary had died. Josiah had written him, asking for money. He’d sent it.
He wished now he’d sent more. And along with the money, he wished he’d sent some forgiveness. Maybe it would have made a difference.
Justin looked at Ivy, who was so different from Mary but who tugged at his heart in the same way Mary had all those years ago. Now she wanted to leave him flat, too. The thought made him feel as if an aching canyon had opened in his chest.
It was as if he was in love with her.
Justin frowned. He had to shift in his chair, readjust himself, get used to the odd breathless feeling in his chest. He was in love with her.
He was in love with Ivy Ryan.
It wasn’t just the kiss that had told him so, either. The feeling went deeper than that, right down to the way he could admire her even when she annoyed the tarnation out of him. Or the way his heart picked up when he heard her laugh or looked into her eyes. It was the caring in her voice when she spoke to Joe Junior, Linus and Sophie. It was the way his feet seemed to dance along instead of trudge as they so often used to.
He was in love. But he was also in trouble. Ivy wouldn’t even spare him a glance now. He’d kissed her and her first reaction was to declare she wanted to put half a continent between them.
Then there was that damn ring. Seeing it had surprised the wits out of him. Like a ghost coming back to haunt him. But he wasn’t living in the past. Ivy might not believe it, but that part of his life was over.
Maybe he should just drop down on his knee and beg her not to go. He feared, however, that she’d simply laugh in his face. She’d considered him an ogre for so long, a heartless curmudgeon, that she probably wouldn’t believe his sincerity. Or maybe she would think that he was using her to forget Mary. But that wasn’t true
. He loved Ivy for herself. He loved her, and if it took him forever, he was going to find a way to prove it.
He shot to his feet so suddenly that Arnie’s fingers stilled. When the music stopped, everybody in the room seemed to gape at him. Expect for Ivy, of course.
“I’m going to bed,” he announced awkwardly. “But keep playing as long as you like, Arnie.”
“Sure thing,” Arnie said with a grin. “I could play all night.”
How could he prove to Ivy that he was a changed man?
He pondered this problem as he moved around his room and crawled into bed. Ivy thought he was heartless, which was utterly unfair. Hadn’t he taken in the children? Fed them? He hadn’t blown his stack at them in days.
But when he pictured them now, trying to prove to himself that he’d done right by them, he saw the three youngsters huddled around that stove. His face felt drawn suddenly, as if all the blood had drained out of his cheeks. Why were they huddled? Because it was freezing outside and they were wearing the patched rags they had been wearing when they came here three weeks ago!
He cringed beneath the covers. He felt ashamed of himself. Truly ashamed.
Ivy was right. All these years, he’d been obsessed with how Mary had hurt him. He had thought about how much better a husband he would have been to her than Josiah. How much better a father he would have been than Josiah. And yet look at what he’d done. Taken in her children, then let them practically freeze to death.
Was it too late now to become that better man he’d always assumed he was? He prayed it wasn’t. Desperately.
Most of all he prayed it wasn’t too late to prove to Ivy that he wasn’t a lost cause after all.
Chapter Six
“Ivy! you’d better get outside, quick!”
Ivy, who was standing in the kitchen, turned to Joe Junior, shocked by his panicky command. “What’s the matter?”
“He’s sending us back!”
At the back door, Sophie peeked around her brother, aiming an owl wide gaze at Ivy. Ivy could hear Linus screaming hysterically.
She took off the towel she had pinned to her dress front and wiped her hands on it. Then she ran to fetch her coat. She didn’t have to ask who he referred to. The same he she had been trying unsuccessfully not to think about for an entire day…the same man she had been foolish enough to kiss.
Justin was sending the children back? Back to where?
She hurriedly returned to the kitchen and gave John an exasperated glance as she stormed out the back door. Sure enough, Justin was sitting at the front of his wagon, looking impatient.
He turned his gaze on her, and despite the fact that she was mightily perturbed at the man, she felt her stomach flip crazily at the sight of his brown eyes. Oh, she was a fool, all right.
“What’s going on?” she demanded.
“I told the children to get into the wagon,” he informed her. “I’m taking them to town.”
She crossed her arms, ready to stand her ground and do battle. “Why? What have they done?”
“Not a thing.”
“Then why—?”
His eyes glittered hard at her. “Come to think of it, you’d better come, too.”
No doubt! If the children were being packed off, there was absolutely no reason for her to be here. In fact, she half suspected the children were being disposed of so he could get rid of her. “Believe me, Mr. Murphy, there’s nothing I’d like better than to get off this confounded ranch of yours, but where are you sending these children?”
“I told you, I’m taking them to town. I’m not saying any more than that.”
“Does the stage stop today?” she asked, still trying to puzzle this out. Was he going to trundle them all onto the stage and say good riddance? “Where are you sending us?”
“I didn’t mention sending anyone anywhere, did I?” he asked defensively. “Good Lord, Ivy, don’t you ever just do what someone asks?”
She fumed silently. He was being evasive, and in her experience, evasions usually meant bad news ahead. “All right, let me get my things!”
“Never mind that, Ivy.”
“But my things—”
“Don’t worry about things.”
She swallowed a scream of frustration. Probably her belongings seemed insignificant to him. It was true, she didn’t own much. Just a change of dress, the book Carol had given her, and a cheap comb set she’d bought with her first wages as a maid. No, she wasn’t going to make a fool of herself by causing a stink about her pitiful possessions. If Justin Murphy was in such an all fired hurry to get rid of her, she’d oblige him.
She lifted her head proudly and turned to the children. “All right, climb on. We’re leaving.” She tried to make it sound as if it were her idea.
Joe Junior and Sophie clambered into the wagon wordlessly, but Linus threw himself weeping on John Tall Tree, who looked even more stoic than usual. He plucked Linus off his leg, then placed the boy next to his siblings. “I will see you again, young friends. Very soon, I think.”
“Bye, John Tall Tree,” Sophie said. Linus howled. Joe Junior’s face burned red.
Justin sighed restlessly. “All right, climb up,” he told Ivy.
She bridled resentfully and tried to step up. When she fell back, Justin grabbed her upper arm and hauled her up next to him. She landed on the seat with a surprised gasp. She felt amazed anew by the strength in him, and by her reaction to his mere touch. Her cheeks flamed and she faced forward quickly, hoping he wouldn’t notice.
Maybe he didn’t, because without more ado, he tapped the reins against his team of sleek mares and they were off. Ivy didn’t look back, even though she felt a strange tug of sadness that they might be leaving the Bar M forever. For all its critters and dust and strangeness, the ranch had been the most comfortable home she had ever had. She felt a moment of panic when she realized she was leaving without a word of goodbye to Arnie, Wink and Sam. But she couldn’t bring himself to beg Justin for anything just now. She would write the men a letter when she got to where she was going, wherever that was. They would be able to read it by the stove some night.
At the thought of anyone missing her, she sniffed back a wistful tear. Linus was still blubbering behind her, a sound that could be heard over the hollow clop clop of the horse’s hooves against the hard trail.
Justin bristled with astonishment. “I thought you wanted to go back to Boston.”
“I do!” she insisted. Only her voice didn’t have the vehemence of a heartfelt declaration. What had seemed warm and comforting in the spur of the moment a week ago, now made her feel a dull ache inside, as if she would be crawling back in defeat.
“Do you have a sweetheart in Boston?” Justin asked.
The question was practically the first personal information he’d tried to get out of her. Why would he be curious now, when he was packing her off to God knows where? “If I had, do you think I would have taken Josiah up on his marriage bargain?”
Justin’s expression tightened. “Some bargain. Why did you take him up on it? A pretty gal like you…surely you could have found someone in all of Massachusetts to marry you.”
Pretty? She blushed in confusion. It was the first compliment he’d paid her…only he hadn’t actually made it sound like a compliment, somehow. More like a veiled insult for not being able to snag a man despite a certain physical appeal. She detected a hint of suspicion in his tone.
Of course, he had every reason to be suspicious of her. She was a sham, a fraud, a jailbird. Not that it was her fault she’d landed in jail, but she shouldn’t have taken up with Zack to begin with.
“I guess I couldn’t find any man demented enough to want me,” she said with forced levity.
Justin didn’t laugh at her attempt at a joke. He looked at her again with those dark, glittering eyes of his, and for a moment she felt his raw curiosity. “So you’re Little Miss Innocent, are you?”
She was sure her face was red as a ripe tomato. “In some ways, yes.
”
That, at least, was the truth. She might not have the most sterling character, but when it came to men, she was pure as the driven snow. Well…mostly. Certainly she’d let Zack kiss her a little more exuberantly than she should have, and a walk in the park had once turned into a pitched battle. But she certainly wasn’t a soiled dove.
Just slightly soiled.
The rest of the trip went faster than she’d remembered it taking even on a runaway horse. Somehow, when she least wanted it to, the landscape slipped away before her, and before she knew it Wishbone was on the horizon and they were rushing toward it. Justin remained silent, but he had an almost gleeful determination about him that provoked Ivy more than anything he could have said.
He stopped the team in front of Tomlin’s Mercantile—just where she’d come in, she thought miserably—and turned to her with a smug grin.
“All right, you win,” she said. “Do you have to be so happy about it?”
“Why shouldn’t I be? I’ve never done this before,” he said.
“Never kicked four human beings out in the cold?” Ivy asked, even though it wasn’t actually cold. They would be out in the cool at worst. Still, she wanted to make him sound as much the ogre as she’d always known he was, except for the few days she was foolishly blinded by sympathy for him.
He laughed. Laughed! That took a nerve.
She turned on him in a huff. But before she could speak, Joe Junior piped up from behind them. “I ain’t goin’ nowheres.”
Justin and Ivy turned, surprised by the red look of determination on the young face.
“What?” Ivy asked.
“I ain’t goin’ back to Otis,” Joe Junior said. “I’ll work for my keep.” His chin stuck up proudly. “I can, too. I won’t make trouble. I can ride just as well as…” His boast dissolved unspoken. “Well, I can help out the others, at least. That’s got to be worth something to you, Mr. Murphy.”
There was a moment of tense silence as Justin stared at the boy, who despite his big talk seemed younger and more vulnerable than ever.
Justin didn’t reach out to Joe Junior, but his voice seemed to. When he spoke, it was in a softer, more kindly tone than Ivy had ever heard from him. “I’m Uncle Justin, Joe, not Mr. Murphy.”