He still looked serious, but without the gravity she was accustomed to seeing.
“I also have to make sure that liking you owes nothing to my fear of the future and my relief at finding a place where I’m happy and safe.”
“I didn’t know about the happy part.” He sounded like that surprised him.
Without warning he’d put her on unsafe ground. “I told you I wanted my husband to respect me, to give my opinions equal consideration with his own, to consider my wishes and happiness as important as his own. I still do, but I’ve discovered I could have all of that without feeling accepted, wanted, valued as a person. I feel that here. It’s like I’ve found the place where I fit.”
“Somehow I feel there’s a qualification coming.”
“I need to make sure I’m not so comfortable I forget the rest.”
“Did anyone ever tell you that you think too much?”
“My father told me no woman was worth being treated the way I wanted to be treated.”
“Was that when you decided to leave home?”
“No. It was only after my father was killed and my uncle tried to force me to marry his son, a man who thought less of women than he did his hunting dogs.”
Russ squeezed her hands. “I’m glad he’s a fool. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here now.”
“Are you really glad I’m here? I’ve been an awful lot of trouble.”
He took her in his arms and kissed her, but she broke away almost immediately.
“You’ll have to find another way to convince me. When you kiss me, I could believe anything.”
“What’s bad about that?”
“You can’t be kissing me all the time.”
“I can try.”
“Be serious.”
“I am.”
“No, you’re not. You might want to kiss me all the time, and I might be willing to let you, but there’s a lot more to life than kissing.”
“I consider that bad planning on Mother Nature’s part.”
“We have to make sure we’re compatible under more ordinary circumstances.”
“If we kiss all the time, wouldn’t that become our ordinary circumstances?”
Tanzy got to her feet, only pretending to be annoyed. “If you’re going to talk nonsense, I’m going back to the house.”
“You’ve blessed my poor cabin by calling it a house. See, you’ve made everything I own seem better just by your being here.”
Tanzy’s gaze narrowed. “You know, if you talked like this to the ladies in town, I’m surprised at least half a dozen didn’t try to drag you before the justice of the peace.”
His expression turned serious. “Just one, and she hasn’t forgiven me for escaping.”
“I want to make sure my feelings for you are honest. I want you to feel the same way about your feelings for me.”
“I already do.”
Tanzy felt uncomfortable, as though Russ was crowding her to make a decision she wasn’t ready to make. Her change of heart had been so recent, so unexpected, she hardly knew what she thought. She needed time to order things in her mind, to bring her heart and mind into conjunction. Right now everything was overshadowed by her desire to be in his arms, to have him kiss her again. As nice as that was, she knew it was only part of being in love.
“We’d better go back.”
Russ stood and reclaimed her hands. “I’ll give you all the time you need, but I’ve waited a long time to find someone like you. I’d actually given up on the idea. Now I don’t want to waste any more time.”
“Thank you. Now I’d better become reacquainted with that sidesaddle.”
He brought the horses but stopped when he’d lifted her halfway in the air to the saddle. “It’s only fair to warn you I’m going to use every means at my disposal to convince you to stay.”
“Is holding me suspended in the air one of them?”
“Would it work?”
“Not when the boys show up and there’s no supper ready.”
He lifted her into the saddle and she struggled with her skirts. “You have to promise you won’t make me ride sidesaddle. I’ll never get used to one of these things.”
“I’ll buy the prettiest buggy and the fastest horse to pull it.”
“Bribery will not work.”
“You can’t blame a guy for trying.”
“It’s going to take me a while to get used to this side of your personality.”
“I’m afraid I can be rather impetuous, even foolish. My mother and sister certainly were.”
“I can’t see you being either. Now I’ve got to hurry back or supper will be late.”
“If you’re not careful, I’ll think you like the boys better than you like me.”
“Why settle for one when I can flirt with five?”
“You’re looking mighty pleased about something,” Welt said when he rode in to find Russ at the corral, his foot on the lower rail and an expression of bemused happiness on his face. “Anything I ought to know?”
“Just that I may decide to forgive you for writing those letters to Tanzy.”
“I gather you’ve changed your mind about her.” He dismounted and began to strip the saddle from his horse.
“I never changed my mind about her. It was just about her suitability to be my wife.”
“Are you telling me you wanted to marry this woman and you nearly beat me to death anyway?”
“Something like that.”
“I have a good mind to knock you senseless.”
“You know you can’t do that. You like me too much.”
Welt attacked his friend, and the two men enjoyed a brief tussle until Welt ended up on the ground.
“Don’t fool yourself,” Welt said as he got to his feet. “It’s not because I like you too much. It’s because you’re stronger and a better fighter.” Welt removed the saddle blanket from his horse and began to rub him down. “Explain yourself. I thought you decided she wasn’t wife material.”
“I did,” Russ said. He held the horse’s head while Welt curried him. “But I knew the minute I set eyes on her I wanted to marry her anyway.”
“Why didn’t you tell me, you hardheaded cuss?”
“For once I thought it was my business and not yours.”
“So you let me go around feeling miserable, cussing myself for writing her.”
“Yeah. I wanted to teach you not to meddle in other people’s business.”
Welt finished currying the horse and turned him into the corral. “Since it’s turned out right, I can keep interfering in your life,” he said with a self-satisfied grin. “For your own good, of course.”
“Don’t try it again. You were lucky this time.”
“If she wants to marry you, so were you.”
Russ’s expression changed.
“She does want to marry you, doesn’t she?”
“I don’t know. I feel like she does, but she’s got a lot of questions she’s trying to answer.”
“God help us,” Welt moaned. “Another person who thinks too much. If you two don’t stop thinking all the time, you’ll never have time to do anything.”
“Tell Tanzy. I’ve done all the thinking I need.”
Russ had finally figured out why he’d been desperate enough to ask Tanzy to teach him to read. He was looking for an excuse to be with her. That he was willing to open so much of himself to her was an indication that his feelings for her were more than momentary attraction. He’d never considered asking a woman to come to his ranch, but when he’d found she was leaving town, it was the only way he could think of to keep her close.
Now he was willing to admit he’d fallen in love with her, had probably been in love with her from the first. He’d been fighting his attraction at the same time he was fighting for ways to keep seeing her. It was almost like two halves of him were playing a game with each other, but there was no need for that any longer. He knew he wanted Tanzy to be his wife. Both parts of him agreed on that.
Today he’d gone outside after lunch. She’d decided the inside of the cabin was too dark and the walls needed to be whitewashed. Russ had already agreed to buy whitewash the next time they went to town. She was cleaning every surface of the grease and dust that had collected over the years. It wasn’t an easy task, but it was made lighter by knowing this might soon become her home, the home she intended to make for her husband and her future children.
She’d have to talk to Russ about adding on or building a house. There was no space in the cabin for children. Tanzy’s home in Kentucky hadn’t been big or comfortable, but it had been built with a family in mind, with places of privacy as well as places for everyone to gather. She wanted that for her family.
She hadn’t said anything to him yet. He’d said he had to catch up on the men’s back wages. They had given him unstinting labor and unquestioned loyalty for five years. It was only fair that he reward them first.
Living in cramped quarters seemed a small price to pay for the happiness she foresaw. As much as she wanted the men to find happiness in their own lives, she couldn’t look forward to their leaving the valley. It wouldn’t seem right without them.
And that included Tardy.
She didn’t know what was best for him, but the boy had blossomed since he’d been living at the ranch. His cheerfulness and energy were—
A gunshot shattered her thoughts. Before she had time to wonder what could cause Russ to have fired a rifle so close to the cabin, he rushed inside.
“Stay away from the window,” he said. “Some gunmen have come across the mountains. I think they’re trying to kill me.”
Chapter Twenty-two
“Who are they?” Tanzy asked. It seemed crazy that someone would just start shooting at Russ for no reason.
“I didn’t stop to ask.” Russ had rushed to a rifle rack, taken down one of the rifles, then hurried back to the doorway to fire at the approaching gunmen.
“Why should strangers want to kill you?” Tanzy asked as she picked up two boxes of ammunition and placed them next to Russ.
“Check the window and see if anybody is on the back side of the cabin,” Russ said. “It could be the rustlers are trying to kill me because it’ll make it easier for them to steal the herd.”
Tanzy could see a man approaching the house from the corrals. She got a rifle from the rack, checked to make sure it was loaded, opened the window, took careful aim, and fired.
“What happened?” Russ asked, turning quickly at the sound of the rifle shot.
“I shot at a man trying to reach the house from the corrals. I think I hit him.”
“I didn’t know you could shoot.”
“I spent most of my life living through a feud. We all learned to use a rifle as soon as we were big enough to lift one.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in feuds.”
“I don’t, but I don’t believe in letting people just come in and shoot you either. Now pay attention to your side of the house. I can handle this one. How many are out there?”
“Three on my side. How many on yours?”
“One. They can keep us pinned down.”
“The boys will have heard the gunfire. I expect they’re riding hell-for-leather right now.”
Tanzy fired again. Apparently she’d missed the man the first time. He sprinted from his position at the corrals to a big ponderosa pine that gave him more protection.
“They could be thieves who think living in an isolated valley makes us easy pickings,” Russ said, “but thieves don’t usually go to so much trouble without knowing there’s something here worth the trouble.”
“Is there?”
“Just the normal stuff anybody would find on a ranch.”
The sound of a rifle being fired exploded inside the house.
“One down” Russ said.
Minutes passed. Tanzy managed to hit the man hiding behind the ponderosa pine, but she was certain it was only a graze. He returned her fire, breaking the panes in the window. Tiny pieces of flying glass punctured her skin like so many pinpricks. Drops of blood oozed to the surface and quickly dried.
“One of them has disappeared,” Russ said. “Keep a look out on your side.”
“He’s not on my side,” Tanzy said.
Silence reigned for a few moments.
“I think he’s on the roof,” Russ said. “Maybe he’s hoping to force us outside. Come over here and cover me.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to throw myself through the door and get a shot at him before he can take a shot at us. You’ve got to keep the guy in the trees ducking for cover so he won’t have time to get a clean shot at me. Think you can do that?”
“If he sticks his head out, he’ll lose it.”
Russ chuckled. “Sounds like you’ve got a little bit of mountain lioness in you.”
“I don’t like being shot at. It makes me real mad.” She took her position by the doorway. “Ready?”
“Whenever you are.”
Tanzy aimed a series of rifle shots into the trees. Having exchanged his rifle for a gun, Russ dashed through the door, threw himself on the ground, rolled over, and fired rapidly in the direction of the roof. Tanzy heard a rifle fall, then the thud of a body. The man in the trees jumped from cover to take a shot at Russ, and she put a bullet through his hat. He jumped back under cover as Russ dived back through the doorway.
Two down,” he said. “Check the other window.”
“He’s leaving,” Tanzy said when she saw the man moving through the trees away from the corrals. “He’s trying to get away.”
“Maybe the boys will get here in time to catch him. Stay here. I’m going after the guy in the trees.”
Russ ran through the door and around the corner of the cabin.
Tanzy hurried to the doorway but couldn’t see Russ or the gunman. She turned back to the window, but the man at the corrals had disappeared. For one indecisive moment she stood still, but she couldn’t remain inside doing nothing while Russ faced two gunmen alone. She put extra shells in her rifle and went outside.
The eerie silence made it seem as if she’d imagined the gunfight. The body on the ground, however, was proof it was no illusion.
Where had Russ gone? She walked around the corner of the cabin toward the corrals but saw no one. She returned to the front. Still, no one. A faint sound attracted her attention and she rounded the far corner of the cabin. She thought she could make out Russ working his way through the trees in the direction of the path they’d taken several days earlier. The trees were thick along that side. She caught some slight movement out of the corner of her eye and turned in time to see a man raise his rifle and aim at Russ.
A fifth gunman! Acting so quickly she was unaware of the individual motions, Tanzy raised the rife to her shoulder and fired immediately. She didn’t kill the gunman, but she hit him in the shoulder, causing him to drop his rifle.
“Damned good shot,” Oren said as he galloped past Tanzy straight into the woods. Tanzy heard a gunshot behind the cabin. Before she could round the cabin to see what was happening, Tardy rode his horse into the yard at a gallop. He threw himself off, grabbed Tanzy, and started toward the cabin.
“Welt said he’d take every piece of skin off my hide if I didn’t make sure you stayed inside,” he said. Tanzy tried to resist, but Tardy was insi
stent. “I’m not taking any chances. Welt can be real mean when he’s crossed.”
“So can I,” Tanzy said, angry at being treated like a woman.
“Yeah, but you won’t hurt me. Welt will.”
“If anything happens to Russ, you’ll find out how wrong you are.”
Tardy pushed her inside and closed the door. “You love him?” Tardy asked, his thoughts momentarily deflected from the conflict outside.
“I like him enough not to want him shot.”
“Hot damn! I told Welt you were going to marry him.”
“I haven’t decided what I’m going to do,” Tanzy said, irritated that Tardy and Welt had been discussing her relationship with Russ. A gunshot recalled her attention to the attack. “Who’s guarding the pass?”
Tim. He can’t leave his position until someone comes to relieve him. He’s going to be mad as hell he missed the fun.”
Tanzy didn’t see anything fun about the situation. She just wanted to know Russ and the others were safe, but she couldn’t see through the door or the single window. When she had a house, she was going to have windows on all four sides. Tardy cracked the door and peered out.
“Can you see anything?” she asked.
“Naw. I expect they’ve got them tied up by now.”
She wished she had as much faith in Russ’s invincibility as Tardy, but she’d seen too many men die.
“Buck’s at the corrals. Now he’s riding off through the woods.”
“Probably following the man who was hiding there.”
Thoroughly disgusted with her inability to do anything useful, Tanzy put her rifle back on the rack. “Since everybody is determined I won’t be allowed to help, I guess I’ll clean up the glass.”
“You’d better clean up yourself first,” Tardy said. “Russ will have a heart attack if he sees you with blood all over your face.”
Tanzy had forgotten about the tiny glass fragments. A look in the mirror revealed a few spots of blood on her cheek and chin. More on her neck and arms. A quick swipe with a damp cloth was sufficient to remove them. The tiny pinpricks were too small to notice. Fortunately, none of the glass slivers were embedded in her skin.
“Here comes Oren with one,” Tardy called.
The Reluctant Bride Page 25