by Carol Arens
All of a sudden he felt heat suffuse his face.
“You’re not a whore?” What a colossal blunder he had made.
The woman paled.
“I beg your pardon?” she gasped and clutched one hand to her throat.
“No, I beg yours.”
“What could possibly have led you to believe that I was...of that profession?”
Her cheeks were now flushing with anger, he reckoned, and rightly so.
He was an ass...a moron. No wonder she thought he belonged in bedlam.
“You were a woman alone in Coulson, for one.” He had to at least try and explain his mistake.
“I didn’t know that was an offense.”
“I offered you money and you took it.”
“And why not. I don’t mend shirts for free...and by the saints, I’d like my dollar back since your addled state of mind is not my fault after all.”
“So when you wanted to take off my shirt, it was to mend it?”
It’s a damn good thing he hadn’t acted on the urgings of his body and stripped off his shirt and everything else.
“Why else would I have asked—? Oh, my glory... You thought— I can’t even say it out loud. I only meant to mend your rip.”
Her face was as red as his felt.
“So—” once more, she pinned the needle to her collar “—you are not a lunatic?”
“And you are not—?” Clearly, she was not. He was an idiot to have assumed so in the first place. “In danger of catching some fatal disease?”
“Not in that way, by the saints.”
With nothing left to say that did not make him sound a bigger fool than he was, he stood looking down, but not too far down, at her, silent as a stone.
He had to look like a big lump of stupid. No whore that he had ever treated, regardless of her age, had ever looked luminous. He should have seen the truth from the beginning.
All at once the seamstress’s lips twitched at the corners. She covered her mouth with the back of her hand, then let it drop while she let out a full, joyous-sounding laugh.
He braced his hands on his knees, bent at the waist and laughed along with her. It felt good to laugh so freely. He couldn’t recall the last time he had done that.
“So,” he said when he caught his breath, “I well and truly apologize for assuming the worst of you. Please forgive me.”
“It only makes us even when you think about it.” She dabbed a tear from the corner of one eye. “I assumed that you were a ruffian out to do me and Mike harm. I truly apologize to you, as well.”
He extended his hand and she took it. The shake of truce was slower and more intimate than it might have been, because her hand met his, dainty, sweet...and not swallowed whole.
That was something... So different from how Eloise’s hand had ever felt. Eloise had been delicate, like a pretty porcelain cup that he had to be careful not to chip. Even if his fiancée hadn’t walked out, she would never have fit in the life he lived now.
For all that this woman was tall and, he thought, fit of frame, a woman was a woman and this land was hard.
Unbidden, thoughts of courting her flitted across his mind. He dashed them out quick.
Hell, he might fantasize until Kingdom Come and it wouldn’t matter. A wife was someone who would need protecting and that was one big responsibility that he didn’t want.
But there it came again, a vision of her and him, as irritating as a fly buzzing about the head. Mentally, he swatted at it, but it stuck to him. What might he do if things were different? He couldn’t help but imagine.
He would spend some time getting to know this lady, work up to giving her a kiss.
He shook his head. Things were what they were.
“I can’t help but wonder, knowing what I do now, what you were doing out here with Mike.”
“Oh, that.” Her expression sobered. “I hired him to take me to my grandfather’s ranch. I’m in a bit of a morass now, I suppose.”
“Who is your grandfather?” Maybe he knew the man and could be of help.
“Hershal Moreland, of Moreland Ranch.” She sighed and shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe you know a guide who would be willing to take me there for four...oh, all right, three dollars.”
Well, hell if it hadn’t felt like the earth had swallowed him whole.
Here was the mysterious, and in his mind selfish, granddaughter, come at last. He had long doubted that she would. What was she after, was what he wanted to know.
The old man’s land, maybe. Or had the mayor of Coulson somehow discovered her existence and convinced her to come and persuade Moreland to sell his trees? Was the money that Mike took perhaps payment from Smothers?
If so, she would be one sorry young woman. As long as Lantree had a breath in him, she would not cheat her grandfather out of his ranch or sell the trees that Catherine Moreland had so loved.
Hell and double damn. Why couldn’t Miss Moreland have simply been a whore?
Chapter Four
While it was true that Mr. Lantree was not a lunatic, it was equally true that he was sullen, stone-faced and, in spite of his handsome appearance, not enjoyable company.
While Rebecca could only be grateful for the good fortune that had landed her with Grandfather’s foreman and that he happened to be on the way to Moreland Ranch, it was regrettable that she was spending endless hours sitting on the wagon bench beside a great Viking of a fellow who seemed dedicated to pointing out this and that danger.
Why, to hear him go on, one would think he didn’t appreciate the majestic beauty all around. The Good Lord’s creative hand was everywhere, from the great snowcapped mountains to the delicate blue flower that Mr. Walker had just rolled the wagon over and crushed.
“Do you mind if we make a short stop?” she asked when he paused in his description of how boulders rolled down from hillsides without warning and if one were lucky enough to get out of the way one must still be quick-footed enough to escape the nest of poisonous snakes that the dislodged rock had exposed.
“I mind,” he snapped. “It will be a good long time before we find a suitable place to rest.”
She suspected he was lying because just to the right was a lovely green meadow with a clear pool created by a waterfall tumbling down the mountainside.
“I believe, Mr. Walker, that you are trying to scare me away. I can’t imagine why, but I do believe it.”
“Why would I want to prevent the tender reunion between you and your grandfather?” He glanced at her from under a frown.
“I can’t imagine.” She squirmed on the wood bench. She really did need a moment of privacy. “Not that it is any of your concern, but it will not be a reunion. I’ve never met my grandfather before.”
“What makes you want to meet him now?”
“Also none of your business.” She would have gladly carried on a pleasant conversation, telling him about how she had never fit in at home and did not wish to marry the butcher. And most of all, that she hoped to find the family link she had been missing.
She would have liked to pass the time becoming acquainted, but ever since he’d discovered who she was he’d been as sour as curdled milk.
“Anything to do with Moreland is my business.”
That was a telling statement. Either he was devoted to her grandfather or he dominated him.
“Are you related to Grandfather? Are we perhaps distant cousins?”
“We are not.”
That was a relief. She had no wish to be related to such a scowler.
“I really do need to stop for a few moments.”
“Later.”
“If you aim this wagon at one more bump in the path, Mr. Fount of Joy, things will get messy.”
It was a forward th
ing to say but she was desperate.
He hauled the team up short, leaped off, then stomped to her side of the wagon to help her down.
His hand under her elbow was firm, its strength and support not unpleasant as he helped her down. She wasn’t used to being in the presence of a man who was bigger than she was. The humbling fact was that she had never allowed a man to help her down from anything for fear that she would topple him.
As soon as her boot touched the ground he let go of her.
“Watch out for falling rocks,” he advised.
What a shame that such a handsome face was wasted on scowls.
“While I’m at it, I’ll be sure to sidestep snakes.”
Seeking a private spot, she lifted the hem of her skirt and hurried across the small green meadow. What a shame to step on the tiny flowers dotting the ground, but there were so many of them it was difficult not to.
There was a large, dense bush growing beside the water so she stepped behind it. Glancing up the side of the mountain she listened to the rush of the waterfall. If only it were possible to capture the melody with her violin.
Had her grandmother ever managed it? It broke her heart that she had not been able to meet her father’s mother. Sadly, the first time she had ever heard from her grandfather, was when he sent the violin after Grandmother’s passing. That had been three years ago.
Sometimes she could not help but wonder what her life would have been like if her mother had been respectable and her father not a rolling stone. Perhaps she would have grown up the apple...or at least the pineapple...of her grandparents’ eye.
The love of a parent was something she had missed as a child...and still did. It was her daily prayer that she would find something of that with her grandfather.
He’d given her Grandmother’s violin, an item that must be precious to him. Surely that indicated that he wanted a loving relationship, too.
Still, Aunt Eunice had warned that she was going to live with the devil and that he could not possibly be anything else, given that he had produced Rebecca’s father. But by that reasoning, it might be said that her grandfather could believe that Rebecca was a young woman of loose morals since that was what her mother had been.
That was certainly the first impression she had made on the grumpy Viking, and all because she had been sitting on a trunk lid.
Well, by George, she was here to find out what was truth and what was fear. For better or worse she was going to get to know her grandfather.
And why not? She had nothing to lose but everything to gain.
With her bladder finally relieved, she straightened her clothing and stepped out from behind the bush.
She had to take two quick steps backward to avoid trampling on a kitten. The water in the pond dampened her boots.
Oh, my, but it was a sweet-looking thing with its blue eyes and fuzzy, buff-colored fur.
Looking up, it meowed and swiped at her skirt.
“My goodness, you brave little thing.”
She squatted and reached her hand toward it. A rough, pink tongue licked her palm.
“Where’s your mama, little one?” She waggled her fingers. “You haven’t gotten lost...or become an orphan, I hope.”
That was entirely possible if this land was as untamed as folks said.
“Poor little lamb.”
The kitten nudged her finger with its pink nose. By the saints, one could hardly let the dear creature perish. Although if she took it with her, she couldn’t imagine what she would do with it when it was fully grown.
In spite of the fact that it looked as cuddly as a house cat, it was a pint-size cougar. Perhaps if it were raised with love from infancy, it would grow up tame.
On the other hand, it might turn one day and eat her.
All she did know was that here in the moment, there was a lost baby in need of mothering, and since she would never be a mother to a human, perhaps fate had given her a cub to care for.
Or maybe she was a fool and the cub’s mother was hidden in the trees ready to tear her to—
A shotgun blast rocked the tranquil meadow. Bits of tree bark fell on her hair. The kitten scurried into the brush.
Startled, she fell backward, rump-first, into the water.
The pool could only be a degree short of icing over. She shot to her feet, shivering and breathing in the scent of gunpowder.
Mr. Walker strode forward, his long, angry-looking strides convincing her that he had indeed come from Vikings...and history notwithstanding, not so long ago.
He snagged her about the waist and dragged her roughly across the meadow.
She had never been handled roughly by a man. The fact was, for good or ill, she had never been handled by a man at all.
It was odd. For all the power those large hands exerted dragging her toward the wagon, his touch caused her no pain. She would not be bruised.
For a spinster to feel the arms of a hulking male clamped about her middle...by glory, it was a thing to remember.
What a shame he was cursing in her ear.
He tossed her onto the wagon bed as though she weighed no more than Melinda did. She landed on a large bag of coffee beans, belly-first.
Why, the colossal nerve! Why, the—
Why did she suddenly feel so warm?
Anger, naturally, she deduced when her heart quit galloping like a horse outrunning a prairie fire.
In no way was it because she seemed caught in his intense blue gaze, unable to look away even though she ought to.
“Did you want me to have to explain to the old man that I let his tenderfoot granddaughter get mauled by a mountain lion?”
She scrambled to her knees. Frowning down at him, she swiped at her soaking bodice.
Mr. Walker bounded aboard the wagon in a single leap.
“Have you ever known anyone to be mauled by a kitten?”
“Where there’s a cub, there’s a mother cat.”
“Not this time. It was an orphan and you frightened the life out of it.”
“Reckon you didn’t notice that Mama was about to leap down on your head.”
“Surely not!” Shocked, her mouth sagged open. A shiver trembled through her, scalp to toe.
“Creeping across the branch over your head.”
She ought to say something in self-defense but she couldn’t imagine what.
“Hold on tight. That’s one angry predator.”
He cracked a whip in the air several inches over the team’s heads. The wagon jolted and she clutched the coffee bag to keep from tumbling backward.
The horses raced down the path. She glanced back.
The cougar followed for a short distance then turned back, probably to tend to her cowering baby.
Screech, his cage tucked between a bag of flour and a crate, fell off his perch, squawking in a panicked flash of green feathers.
* * *
Huddled beside the campfire and staring silently at the flames, Miss Moreland seemed to be contrite.
He couldn’t be sure, though. From what he had seen of her so far, contrition would not be something that came naturally.
Could be she was too cold to say anything. Possibly the shivering kept whatever was on her mind locked in her head.
The blamed woman had objected to removing her clothing and letting it dry by the fire like any sensible person would do, even though he had offered his oiled canvas to cover her.
It had taken his comment about her lips turning blue for her to do the smart thing and dry her clothes, the outer ones, anyway.
She wasn’t unintelligent as far as he could tell, which had to mean she was stubborn.
That might not be a bad thing. She’d need some stubborn to make it in Montana since she seemed to be lacking in go
od sense.
Even little children knew to give a wide berth to a cougar cub.
He’d do his duty and see Miss Moreland safely to Hershal. After that it would be up to the old man to make sure she survived.
A wildcat’s cry cut the dusk.
Miss Moreland glanced at him across the fire, her eyes widening in fear. At least he hoped it was fear.
“That won’t be your cat, Miss Moreland.”
She breathed out a short huff of relief. That, and the way her shoulders slumped, made him want to comfort her.
Of all the things he wanted to be feeling, sympathy wasn’t one.
With a grunt to indicate his displeasure, he got up and crossed to her side of the fire. He sat down beside her.
“My last name is Lane,” she murmured.
Why was that? he couldn’t help but wonder. Couldn’t say that it didn’t make him uneasy. An unmarried lady ought to be carrying her family name of Moreland.
As it was, an unmarried woman coming to this part of the country all alone made him uneasy. No doubt, she wanted something from Hershal.
Moreland Ranch was a prime piece of property. With the railroad on the way, bringing settlers by the hundreds, the ranch would be sought after. With all the building that would be going on, the trees alone would be worth more than gold.
It was possible that Miss Lane had only good intentions, but it was his job to be suspect.
For three years Hershal had been writing, asking the girl to come to see him, and for three years she hadn’t. So why now when the ranch and its resources had become so valuable?
His boss paid him generously to look after the spread, making sure the cattle were cared for and the buildings well kept.
Years ago, when Lantree had felt like a ship lost at sea, Hershal had listened to his story, then offered him a home and a job. In doing that, he had given him back his self-respect.
He would protect the old man, be it from the greedy mayor of Coulson or the lovely Miss Lane.
“I can’t help but wonder why you don’t carry your family name.” He probably shouldn’t have stated that so boldly, but there it was. Let’s see if she gives an honest answer.