Never the Twain

by Judith B. Glad

  "As soon as I know anything," Rock agreed. "McConnell out."

  She wasn't the city girl he'd originally thought, but he still hadn't much faith in Genny's ability to make the right moves when the chips were down. How much experience could she have, growin' up where neighbors and family were always nearby? She hadn't had to learn self reliance like folks out here in Owyhee Country did, where your nearest neighbor might be fifty miles away. All she had was a lot of nerve--he had to give her that--and a misguided belief that she could do anything she had to do.

  He couldn't fault her spunkiness, but he didn't think much of her common sense.

  The airstrip--a level stretch of desert with a ragged windsock and nothing else--was empty. Why wasn't he surprised?

  Rock hung above it, peering toward Cricket Creek, but not seeing the dust tail that would indicate vehicular movement. Damn woman. Like as not she was trying to be a hero. More likely she'd break her fool neck. He aimed the 'copter for a narrow gash in the plateau.

  He saw Genny's truck first, parked at the second switchback down from the top. Its door was open and she was nowhere in sight. Rock became aware of a dryness in his mouth. Where was she?

  Then he saw the camper. It was a large motorhome, lying on its side, precariously balanced on a ledge, about halfway down the almost vertical canyon wall. He couldn't be sure, but it looked like there was a body sprawled next to it.

  How the hell had that guy figured he could take that big rig to the bottom? He'd probably had to back and fill, just to get around the switchbacks.

  "Shee-it!" He guided the helicopter close to the canyon wall, gauging his chances of landing on the road at one of its wider switchbacks. The closest he could get to the accident site--assuming he could set down safely--was about a quarter mile.

  Sweat was stinging his eyes when he finally felt solid ground under the skids. That had been some of the fanciest flying he'd done for a long time.

  Why hadn't that fool woman met him at the airstrip, like he'd said?

  Speaking of fool women, where was she?

  After letting the Rescue Team know where he was and securing the helicopter, Rock headed down the hill toward Genny's red pickup. If she was injured, he'd wring her neck!

  He followed her tracks to a point close to where the camper had gone off the cliff. A rope, tied to a sagebrush, stretched down across the rocky hillside. It wasn't as steep here as farther down, but he'd still not want to try to go down without being belayed.

  "Genny?" he called. "Genny Forsythe?" His voice bounced off the opposite wall, "...Forsythe...sythe...ythe."

  "Down here." Her reply was faint, but only due to distance. She didn't sound hurt.

  Thank God! "Where are you?"

  Words lost to the soughing wind and the echoes. A faint whisper of sound. "...us up. Pull...too much weight."

  His hands were already on the rope, taking the strain off the sagebrush. He didn't take time for any of the safety measures that usually were second nature. He just set his heels and pulled.

  Genny was on the other end of that rope.

  He thought his arms were going to be jerked out of their sockets before a very frightened, half dressed young woman moved out from behind a juniper. Genny was pushing her, talking her along, taking most of her weight. Rock redoubled his efforts, knowing the rope around Genny's waist must be feeling as if it were cutting her in half.

  The two women struggled the last few feet, falling to their knees as they reached the relative level surface of the road. The girl was sobbing; Genny took deep, gasping breaths.

  Quickly Rock checked the girl for injuries. Nothing evident, except a blossoming bruise on her right shoulder, where she probably hit the side of the rig as it rolled.

  He slipped his shirt off, wrapped it around her, gently removing her clinging fingers as they grabbed at his hands. "You're safe now, little lady. Sit right there now, and rest. You'll be fine." He kept his voice gentle and soothing, even though he wanted to turn his back on her and tend to Genny, still sitting hunched on the road. Finally the girl stopped clutching at him, seemed to relax.

  He turned to Genny. "Are you okay?"

  She nodded. Her fingers struggled with the knot in the too-light line around her waist. At least she'd had sense to run it through her belt loops. Otherwise it would have cut right through her light cotton shirt, into the tender white flesh beneath, if she'd slipped coming up that steep hillside.

  "Yes. Yes, I'm fine. Just winded." She was still breathing deeply. "But we've got to get back down. His leg is broken, and he may have hurt his back. I didn't move him. All I had was the little first aid kit, and I didn't really know what else to do, anyway. Rock, have you got a bigger rope? I don't trust this one." As she spoke, she was coiling the line neatly.

  Suddenly she stopped and looked at him. Really looked at him.

  "What are you doing here?"

  "Trying to get a word in edgewise. Gimme that." He snatched the rope from her. The sheer, stark terror he'd felt when he saw her all but dangling at the end of a rope, overwhelmed him. "Goddam it, woman! Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

  "No. No, I was trying to do what I could to help...."

  "Did it ever occur to you that you could have..." He gestured at the void beyond the road's edge. "If the rope had...the sagebrush let go. Oh, God, Genny, don't you ever pull a fool stunt like that again!" He pulled her to him, holding her as close as he could, breathing her delicate scent, overlain with sweat and the acrid odor of fear, feeling her slim and rounded body against him. Feeling her alive in his arms.

  "Rock, let me go." She struggled in his embrace. "We've got to get back down."

  Rock was ashamed. He'd forgotten that an injured man was waiting for rescue, that the young woman, still sobbing into trembling hands needed comfort and care.

  "We aren't going anywhere. Do you know how to use the radio in my 'copter?"

  "I don't know. I've never used anything but the one in the pickup."

  "Never mind. Look, can I trust you to stay here--stay here--while I call in?"

  "But what about...?"

  "Can I trust you? Yes or no?"

  "Yes. Yes, I'll stay here." She avoided his eyes.

  He jerked her chin up, forcing to look at him. "Genny?"

  "All right! Now, will you get a move on!"

  Rock indicated the young woman with a jerk of his chin. "She could use a hug," he said, before heading up the road at a fast lope. But Genny already had her arms around the woman, and was making the sort of comforting noises only a woman could make.

  * * * *

  It was long past dark before Genny pulled into Vale. The Rescue Team had arrived about two hours after Rock, landing on top where she met them with her pickup. They had made it all look so easy, pulling Jack McMahon up the hill on a kind of sled-like stretcher. They'd carried him to the top of the grade, then loaded him into the LifeFlight helicopter. Rock had taken Mary Beth to Ontario just behind them, while the rest of the team strung cables to the overturned camper to prevent it from slipping off the ledge and falling the rest of the way to the bottom of the canyon.

  She supposed some of its contents were salvageable. The motorhome itself looked like a total loss.

  Poor Mary Beth. She'd finally stopped sobbing and had responded to Genny's attempts to distract with the story of her life. Newly married and completely new to camping, she hadn't realized what kind of adventure she'd let herself in for. Her shy admission that she had wanted to go to the Oregon Coast for their honeymoon, but had let herself be convinced that a week alone in the desert would be romantic had amused Genny, even as it angered her.

  Jack had sounded familiar as Mary Beth had talked about her new husband. He'd sounded like a lot of the men in her own life. Mary Beth's account had shown him to be as insensitive to his wife's feelings and needs as Pop and her brothers had always been to Genny's.

  As Rock was to Genny's?

  Why else had he torn a strip off her? A man who real
ly cared about her would have been relieved to have her safe. Rock had been furious because she hadn't obeyed his orders.

  She slammed around the kitchen, driving Marmalade into hiding under the table, admitting her anger was as much with herself as it was with Mary Beth. She recognized the symptoms of a passive woman, and she hated how it made her feel.

  Damn him! Why did he make her feel so...so incompetent? Just like Avery and Carlyle and Everett. All they had to do was quirk an eyebrow or flash one of their superior smiles and she felt all thumbs, inept, and gawky. All Rock had to do was yell at her and she immediately let him take over, even though she had been in control of the situation.

  She wasn't a heck of a lot smarter than Mary Beth, when you got right down to it. She let Rock have his way most of the time.

  No, she let him have his way all of the time. It was easier than fighting him.

  "Just as soon as the party is over and I have time," she told the cowering Marmalade, "I've got to decide. I just don't need another overbearing man in my life."

  Her words sounded determined and brave, competent. She just wished she really, deep down inside, believed she'd be able to do anything but go on seeing Rock. Cutting off her right hand might be easier. Less painful.

  Marmalade forgave her for her tantrum when Genny fed him most of the leftover pork chop. The cat was sitting on a kitchen chair, washing his face and purring, when the back door opened.

  "Hello, darlin'."

  Genny spun around. "I thought I'd locked that door." She frowned, wishing his arrival hadn't accelerated her heartbeat and kindled a glow in her middle.

  "You should have. I could have been almost anybody." Disapproval was all too evident in his frown and voice.

  "Maybe I was expecting company," she countered. "Other company," she added, when his smile grew smug. "You aren't the only man in my life."

  Suddenly she was hard against him, held in unbreakable bonds, feeling his breath against her face and the regular throb of his heart vibrating through her body.

  "I'd better be, or there's gonna be fur a'flyin'."

  Genny reared back, glaring up at him. She struggled, pushing against his shoulders, wanting free of his viselike embrace. "You don't own me!"

  "No ma'am, I surely don't. But as long as I'm sharin' your bed, there's no room for company." He kissed her, gently at first, but with increasing force.

  Her recent resolve melted under his ardent demand. After the party, she told herself, giving in to sizzling needs and immediate desires.

  He skimmed his lips along the edge of her jaw before he covered her mouth with his. As his arms encircled her, Genny curved herself against him, wanting to feel him along the length of her. Wanting body to body, flesh to flesh. She forgot what she was going to say as his tongue explored the insides of her teeth, the soft tissue of her inner lips. When he circled her tongue with his, she sparred, advancing, retreating, loving the taste of him. Losing herself in him.

  "D'you hear me?" he demanded in a hoarse whisper, a few moments--an eternity--later.

  "Hmmm? What did you say?" She honestly had no idea what they'd been talking about.

  "I said there's gonna be no other men in your life so long as I'm here," he said. "Right?" His thumbs found her budded nipples, circled them, teasing, until Genny wanted to scream at him to get on with it and stop torturing her.

  "Right?" he said again, against her mouth.

  "Um-hmmm." She had managed to free the top two buttons on his Levi's and was working on the third. "Sure."

  One instant she was held so closely in his arms that they might have shared a single body; the next she was held away from him, at arm's length, and was being shaken slightly.

  "Pay attention, darlin'," he growled. "Are there any other men in your life?"

  "Oh, for pity's sake," she said. "Can't you tell a joke when you hear one? When would I have time for another man?"

  "All week. How do I know what you do when I'm out at the ranch?"

  "Oh sure. Is that before or after we talk on the phone for an hour or two?" She twisted free of his hands. It was hard enough for her to deal with his insistence on running everything when they were together--she was more or less used to that, what with her brothers and all. But when he started getting possessive, well he was going beyond the limits of her forbearance.

  The next thing she knew, he'd be wanting her to keep a log of her time, just to prove to him what she'd done every minute of every day. Before she knew it, she wouldn't have an ounce of independence or freedom left to her.

  Pulling back was beginning to sound better all the time. She just had to keep reminding herself how old fashioned, possessive, and domineering Rock could be.

  Holding her ground, she looked up at him, letting her bottom lip tremble a bit as she did so. "Rock, I'm really tired. Can we discuss this later?" She even put one hand to her forehead and closed her eyes, doing her best to look pitiful. "I hope I never have a day as frightening as this one, ever again in my whole life." Was that laying it on too thick?

  No, because his voice was immediately concerned. "Yeah. Sure, darlin'. I just wanted to make sure you were all right, before I head home."

  "I'm fine, Rock. Just tired and a little bit stressed." She'd hated pulling one of her mother's tricks, but sometimes one had to stoop to deception.

  He quickly took her into his arms. With strong hands he massaged her back, stroking along the line of her spine. "What you need is a good night's sleep."

  "I really do. And that's where I'm heading, right now."

  "Want me to tuck you in?" He dropped a gentle, almost impersonal kiss on her nose.

  "No, thanks. I'll sleep better if I'm not distracted."

  She turned away, suddenly aware that her act was no act at all. She was exhausted, stressed, and unaccountably in the verge of tears. If he'd just go, before she lost it entirely.

  He did, without kissing her again, with only a soft, "Sleep well, darlin'" to mark his departure.

  After she staggered to her bed, Genny found it cold, lumpy, hard, and lonely.

  * * * *

  "That oughta' do it, Rock. If you can find a speck of dust in this house, I'll pay you ten dollars." Lizzie Kelpin wound the vacuum cord around the handle. "There wasn't all that much to do. You and Pancho are pretty good housekeepers, for a couple of old bachelors." She cackled, her wrinkled face creasing until her eyes all but disappeared.

  "I'll pay you the ten dollars instead, Liz," Rock promised. "I really appreciate you comin' down like this. I got stuck down in Wells for a couple of days, and everything fell behind." Lizzie wasn't really a cleaning lady, but she'd always been willing to help out. Like when Pa was so sick, there at the last. She'd nursed him, because Selma had claimed it upset her too much to see the man she loved so gaunt and wasted. Rock believed she'd been too lazy and too selfish. Besides, Lizzie was quiet and gentle, not shrill and jittery like Selma. Much better for Pa.

  "Glad to do it. Now, I've got a little something for Pancho and his bride here, and then I'll be ready to go home."

  "I'll be in the shed. Give a yell." He waved to her as she cut across the yard toward Pancho's house.

  He'd give his eyeteeth to be there when Sophie opened her "little something" from Lizzie. Some sort of antimacassar, he'd bet, crocheted out of a gawdawful color of string, and full of errors, because Lizzie's eyesight wasn't as good as it once was. He'd never forget Pa's description of the afghan she'd crocheted for him and Selma. "Looks like a sheep with mange, 'cept the sheep fell in a vat of grape juice." But he'd insisted Selma keep the afghan in the front room, no matter how she complained. "'Twouldn't do to hurt Lizzie's feelins'," he'd said, "her bein' a neighbor and all."

  They were all ready for the party tomorrow. The freezer was full--Pancho had insisted on doing a lot of the food, even though Rock told him it wasn't right for him to cook when he was the guest of honor. Rock had drawn the line at Sophie's cleaning the house. It was his dirt; he could see that it got taken care
of.

  Genny would be here early this evening. She was bringing the cake. But she wouldn't be staying. Her folks were arriving in Boise tomorrow morning and she was planning to meet them, to lead them down to the Rock and Rye. She hadn't told him how many had decided to come, but he reckoned there'd be a bunch.

  She hadn't told him much of anything the last two weeks, for all of that. She'd been a tad cool ever since the rescue, but he figured it was because she had a lot to do at work. That and she was mad at him for yelling at her.

  She'd deserved to be yelled at, damn it! She could have killed herself, goin' down that hillside, relying on that light little line and that half-dead sagebrush. He still felt sick every time he remembered how the shrub was pulled half out of the ground by the time Genny and Mary Beth McMahon had reached the road. Maybe he should have pointed it out. He was pretty sure she hadn't noticed.

  For a tenderfoot she'd been damn lucky. No, that wasn't fair. Genny was no longer a tenderfoot. Just because she didn't know beans about climbing didn't mean she hadn't shown a lot of sand in going down that hill after the McMahons. He knew a lot of big, strong men who'd have waited for the Rescue Team instead of risking their necks.

  But if she ever pulled a damfool stunt like that again, he'd shake her 'til her teeth rattled.

  * * * *

  Genny turned off the highway and checked her rearview mirror. One. Two. Three. Yes, the rented vans carrying her family had all made it this far. She smiled at her mother, sitting beside her in the VW. "Well, what do you think of Owyhee Country?"

  "I've never seen anything so desolate," Margaret Forsythe said, staring out the window. Normally a quiet woman, she'd become even more silent as they'd left the green fields of the Snake River Valley behind and climbed the winding grade into the high desert. Pop had been equally quiet, and even Avery had kept his comments on her driving to a minimum. If it hadn't been for Linda's incessant comments on how dry, how empty, how treeless the landscape was, most of the trip would have passed in silence. Genny mentally thanked her sister-in-law.

  Genny, already dreading the time alone with her family, had found conversation just as hard going. They still didn't approve of the way she chose to live her life, but at least they refrained from criticizing her as much. If she could just keep her temper when Pop started telling her what was wrong with her apartment, her friends, her job...thank God they were only staying a week. Her stomach was already knotting in anticipation.