by Cait London
She’d come after him. Maybe she was a hunter, too. That thrilling thought launched her out of the plain Shelly and into Shelly-the-desirable-woman.
A wonderful game, she thought, advance, retreat, entice, feel…oh, she wanted to feel him so badly—
Then Roman’s mouth was on hers again as he lifted her and carried her to his bed, following her down upon it, holding her tight against him. Shelly dug her nails into his shoulders as Roman’s hands skimmed her body, finding her warmth, tormenting her, and then he was a part of her, slowly easing to lock them together.
And then the storm began—
He’d hated this land, and now it called to him. He wanted to refuse the beckoning, yet it wouldn’t let him go. Mitchell kicked the old stove pipe, rusted and overgrown with weeds and lying in the rubble of the burned house. The trees beside the rubble had once shielded the house from the heat and the fierce wind. The treetrunks were blackened, some of the trees dead, limbs broken, others alive with foliage and birds. The surviving trees had made the choice to grow and live, despite their scars.
He circled one tree and found the telling branch where a child’s swing had hung. There was the old garden place, the fence to keep livestock out, looking like jagged, worn teeth. His mother had whitewashed that fence-
Mitchell pivoted toward the old barn, mounds of rusted metal roofing and burned wood, and in the silence of the morning heard the echoes of the horses screaming in fear.
He turned again and found the garage where Pete Jones had been found. The doors yawned open, the shadows inside echoing with Fred’s curses as he tried to woo a tractor past its time into life.
Without hesitating, Mitchell took the gas he used for his lawn mowers from the back of his truck and poured it around the building. A lit match took the fire snaking around the weathered wood; rats and mice fled into the brush.
Mitchell watched the flames shoot up into the sky, gray smoke churning against the white clouds. In the distance, the oil rigs pecked slowly at the ground, while others remained still. Lonny’s buffalo were grazing on the horizon, huge brown mountains of animals past their time.
Mitchell turned to the old house, seeing it through the years to when it looked like any average country home, a woman’s touch in the roses and the gardens, the washed clothes flapping white in the hot sun, his mother hurrying to bring them in when the much-needed rain began.
A woman’s touch. Uma’s touch had curled inside him, easing the darkness. He’d come through time, back to where he started, because Uma made him feel. He could feel the other woman, Lauren, when he was in the house, the softness in her and the aching for a child, for a man to love only her. He could feel her sadness and her quiet joy.
He could hear a whisper even now, when he thought of how he felt about Uma. Oneness…the women were wrapped together, through lifetime friendship and that moment of death, and Lauren wanted Uma to be happy.
“I’ll do my best, Lauren,” Mitchell whispered unevenly.
The wind stirred around him, heat from the flames burning as Fred’s words whispered through the sunlight. I loved that woman with all my heart…tell Gracie that I’ve always loved her…
Mitchell took off his western hat and tried to understand why he would want anything to do with this land.
He tried to understand how Grace and Fred could love each other so much, then let themselves be torn apart.
But Mitchell knew…he knew he had a choice to move on as the old trees had done, or he could lose…lose Uma. Behind him, the burning garage collapsed. Taking his time, Mitchell hefted his water jug high in the air and let the icy water trickle over him. He poured water into a jar and sat on the back tailgate of his pickup, watching the flames devour themselves just as bitterness could devour any heart.
Uma. Oneness. Together. Man and woman…
He wanted to keep the best of the past, this small piece of worthless land, because it was a part of him, in his blood, given to him by his homesteading ancestors, kept by his father against all odds.
Fred was right to keep the land, but he wasn’t right to put it above letting Grace work, or spending time with his family. He could have made a good enough living through the garage, focusing on that, and just living on the land, instead of trying to bring it to life…
Mitchell kicked the hard-packed dirt. Well, then, but Fred wasn’t a manager, was he? His father had felt deeply about keeping a deathbed promise to his father, and about his marriage vows. He didn’t see the land in a bookkeeper’s figures, black and white, or debtor’s red. He was just a man trying to do his best and losing at life, pushing away those who loved him, too proud to tell them what was in his heart. And then life got too twisted and too much, and everyone lost. In his shame, Fred refused help from his wife, striking out at her…
Tell Gracie that I’ve always loved her…
When the flames died into coals, Mitchell began shoveling dirt onto the rubble, killing any chance of the fire spreading.
He’d fought his way off this land into offices and good paychecks and respect. Now here he was, a yard man, and a happy one when at his craft. He found peace in working with his hands and growing thorny old roses that scratched him when they could. He wanted a garden, and tomatoes to challenge Orley Long Trees’ blue ribbons. A champion backyard gardener at ninety, Orley needed a little competition. Mitchell wanted a woman more than money, more than his pride…Uma…
He was soaked with sweat and feeling as if he’d been kicked by a mule, not the fear that if he didn’t change, he’d hurt Uma, just as Fred had hurt Grace.
Then, out on the crest of a rolling hill, a stray horse raised his head, and gleaming like the devil, pawed the dirt, and Mitchell knew him for a wild one, escaped from some pasture, feeling his pride and freedom and full of himself.
Mitchell took a rope from the back of his truck, expertly fashioned a noose, and began walking toward the horse. There were some things he didn’t want Uma to see, and one was him working off the past.
“Come here, you knothead,” he murmured softly as the horse stomped and whinnied, and wide-eyed, rolled an ear toward him. The quarter horse was black and sleek and powerful and mean as hades and just what Mitchell wanted…he thought of cool, sleek boardrooms and masked discussions, threats and compromises. But he’d rather do his fighting on the back of a horse, the honesty and truth beating into his bones. “Come here, you black son of a buck, let’s have this out, you and me.”
SEVENTEEN
Pearl crushed the delicate petals of a rose in her fist. If Uma had her way, she would turn the Warrens into one big happy family. She’d brought Grace back to Madrid, a woman of such style and class that Pearl wouldn’t be recognized for everything she had done. Still beautiful, soon Grace would be the leader of style and the center of the women’s circles, replacing Pearl. The ladies would want Grace to head their thrift shop drives and power charities—
Uma wouldn’t be forgiven for tampering with Pearl’s social standing—Uma and her mother must have falsified records, because Pearl knew her bloodline was spotless. Uma had to die for interfering, for making Grace comfortable in Everett’s home, and for taking a low-class Warren to her bed.
Pearl swept up the stairs of her home, furious with the roses she hated. While Walter slept, snoring heavily in his early morning “siesta,” a drug and alcohol haze, she’d worked to tear at the roses, digging them, cutting them, destroying the blooms beneath her shoes.
She paused at the bedroom, watching him drool as he slept. Her hand tightened around the garden snippers and she thought how badly she wanted to drive it into his throat. He told her he’d spawned a child with Shelly, taunting Pearl about how good Shelly was in bed.
It wasn’t just time yet for Walter to be even more addicted. If he couldn’t function as she needed, she had to plan his removal to make Madrid feel sorry for her. The way he was taking to the drug she routinely placed in his afternoon drink, he could be managed easily when she wanted. Pearl pushed at her
hair, controlling the anger within her as she had since childhood.
Until she’d become Clyde, she’d been powerless, but now she knew how to make them all pay.
She entered the room and crouched by Walter, disdaining the heavy alcoholic smell. “You will buy that Warren property, Walter. You have to have it. Mitchell Warren is no good. He’s got Uma in his bed, and they are doing it all night. You have to buy that old land, force him to show how unfit he is for Madrid. They are doing it all night, Walter, rubbing all over each other, Uma hot for him. Get him out before he starts a business here and people look up to him, not you. He’s not your equal, Walter, and he’s doing it to Uma every day and night.”
Satisfied as Walter stirred restlessly, taking her subliminal coaching, Pearl stood and smiled coldly. She swept from the room and into the small feminine room that was all her own, her retreat within the house where no one, not even her daughters, dared enter.
Her daughters, pale, lifeless girls. She felt no maternal instincts for them, and they would do as they were told.
Her hands were bloody, her designer silk blouse and slacks torn. She tore off her clothing, kicking it aside as she went to scrub her hands. In the ornate bathroom mirror, leaves stuck in her hair.
She had to move quickly, to confine and disarm Uma before she could do more damage to the release of Pearl into the powerful woman handling her own destiny. Clyde was merely an end to changing herself and handling the problems of a lifetime.
Pearl plucked the leaves from her hair and talked softly, outlining her plans as she changed into the hidden softer, flowing 1930s style clothing of Bonnie Parker. She studied herself clinically in the full-length mirror. After her obvious grief over Uma’s and Shelly’s death eased, she might adopt the style; it suited her.
Lonny’s Oklahoma drawl traveled lazily over the telephone lines to Uma. “Looks like someone is handling a big problem. Mitchell just asked LeRoy Stein if he could help him break horses. LeRoy does that in the early morning, and it’s hot as hades now. Mitchell didn’t care. He’s out there now, busting broncs just like his old man did when he was fighting losing everything…and I’m stuck with pigsitting the Ferris’s Rosy. I’ll be glad when this is all over and they aren’t scared for her. A pig really shouldn’t be riding in the back seat of a patrol car.”
Uma’s hand went to her throat. With Grace’s arrival came a fresh blast of old memories, and Mitchell was dealing with a gut-wrenching reaction. She pressed the save button on her computer, praying that her fussy client would like her new design. She’d promised herself she’d return Pearl’s call in a few minutes, but for now, Uma had to get to Mitchell.
She called Dani. “Your uncle. That man. He’s breaking horses and I’ve got to stop him from breaking his neck. Could you please take Grace to Everett’s and help her with what she needs? She wants to spend the night and should have everything she needs—just change the sheets in the guestroom—”
“Grace says she could use a nap. I want to come. I want to see how to handle a horse, because someday I’m going to have one. Can I?”
At LeRoy’s ranch, a big hound dog chasing a yellow cat ran in front of Uma’s car. She braked, the car skidded, turned sideways, slowly slid, and then bumped into Mitchell’s big Dodge pickup. The bump wasn’t enough to jar her anger at Mitchell. The screech of metal against metal sounded as she put her car in reverse just enough to be able to open the door.
Dani leaped out of the passenger side and hurried at Uma. “Wow, Uma. You just don’t get all lit up like this.”
“Call me ‘fireball,’” Uma gritted through her teeth and smoothed her sleeveless loose dress, trying to grip whatever calm Mitchell was intent upon destroying. “Your uncle needs some sense knocked into him. If the horse doesn’t do it, I may.”
“You love him, don’t you? He’s the only one who’s ever gotten you so riled and on edge. You never used to talk like that. Such violence. Not your usual ‘let’s talk about it reasonably’ mode,” Dani teased.
“Mitchell understands action, not logical conversation, give and take. If that’s how I have to reach him, I will.”
Mitchell was in the corral, easing down onto a gleaming red horse called “Devil.” The scrawny little ancient cowboy holding Devil’s reins wasn’t winning the battle. Devil had broken more bones in the local rodeo than any other horse. With a long-sleeved shirt rolled back at the cuffs, leather gloves, jeans, and workman’s boots, Mitchell looked as if he’d been jerked out of drover times. The expression on his face said he was in a fighting mood and the bad-tempered horse was his choice for a battle.
Images of Fred doing the same thing slid across Uma’s mind as she hitched up her skirt and kicked off her sandals. She hefted herself up on the corral boards and over the fence, marching toward Mitchell.
LeRoy started a jagged-toothed smile that died at her cold stare. “Don’t you dare let him do this, LeRoy.”
From the dust on Mitchell’s face and clothes, he’d already been in the horse’s saddle several times—and had been tossed. The horse skittered and sidewalked as LeRoy held him, and Mitchell’s hard voice cut across the early afternoon air. “Get out of the corral, Uma.”
He was beautiful, macho, sweaty, stubborn, and outlined in the hot, burning sun as the only man she both loved and wanted to kill. “What’s this going to prove?”
LeRoy’s panicked expression didn’t matter to her. “Ms. Uma, you can get hurt. Old Devil here isn’t high on manners. I can’t hold him much longer. Once I let go, he’s a sidewinder.”
She pointed to another docile horse tied to the side of the corral. “What about him?”
“Old Sweetheart? You know that most of my stock are for the rodeos. He’s fine until you put some weight on him—”
Uma looked up at Mitchell. “If you do not get down off that horse this minute, I am going to ride that one.”
He swung down, almost vaulting off the horse. “When are you going to learn to stop messing in my business?”
Mitchell glanced at Dani who was now in the corral. “Get out of here.”
“I want to pet the horses. You’re probably just mean to them. You should try some animal psychology. That’s what I’m going to do,” Dani said.
Mitchell jerked back to Uma, glaring down at her as he ripped off his gloves. “I’ve had a bellyful of everything this morning. Don’t you start on me. And by the way, you’re a bad example to Dani. Dani, take Uma’s car back to town. We’ll be back later.”
He had that stiff-backed, male-ordering command sound to his voice that raised Uma’s temper a notch higher. “Gee, Mr. Man. You’re so…so—bull-headed, thoughtless, ignorant, lowdown—”
The disbelieving sound coming from LeRoy said he was shocked. “Ms. Uma!”
“Oh, LeRoy. We just haven’t figured out this relationship business yet. He’s the problem.”
“Let’s not share our problems, dear,” Mitchell said in a warning tone. When she opened her mouth again, ready to tell him exactly how much he had terrified her, Mitchell scooped her up on his shoulder. He walked through the gate LeRoy had just opened, carrying her to his pickup.
Mitchell stopped near at the new dent and scrapes on his pickup, then rounded it with her in his arms. He dumped her into the passenger side and closed the door. “Well, at least you put the dent on the same side.”
Uma settled into the seat and crossed her arms over her chest. No one had ever handled her so—so improperly. She must have looked like a sack of grain, slung over his shoulder. It just wasn’t seemly. “One who is strong does not have to demonstrate that strength for it to be known. That…was…not…very…nice.”
He drove down the dusty road toward the cottonwood creek, stopping abruptly in a shady spot. Leaving Uma in the pickup, he strode down to the water, tore off his clothes, and hurled himself into the water.
In Uma’s entire life, she’d never gone skinny dipping. As a child, she and her friends used the city pool, then later, occasionally swimmi
ng at Pearl’s luxurious one.
She picked her way over the path in her bare feet, lifting her skirt away from the bushes. In the water, Mitchell was diving and coming up, throwing back his hair in a spray of water. The water wasn’t deep in August, but shaded by tall cottonwood trees.
“Are we over our snit now, dear?” she asked as the golden leaves caught the hot sun searing through the trees. She wondered what had set Mitchell off, to pit himself against a beast who had already broken more men’s bones than she wanted to count. “You know, Tommy Eagle is still nursing his ribs from the last time that animal was in the rodeo. George and Lyle and all the rest have tried to break him.”
Mitchell turned over on his back and floated, ignoring her.
Last night and this morning, he’d—
If he could swim buck-naked in the middle of the day, so could she. Uma wondered what Uma the controlled, sensible woman must think of her as she removed her loose dress and bra and briefs. Mitchell’s eyes didn’t leave her as she eased into the water quickly, shy of the bold daylight, and quickly lowered until only her head was exposed. “If this is the only way to talk with you, Mitchell Warren, then I suppose the end justifies the means. What happened to upset you?”
“I’m not upset.”
“Ohhh! Of course you are. No one in his right mind would try horse breaking in one hundred-degree heat—”
“I thought I stood a better chance of wearing him down,” Mitchell said logically.
“You’re a skilled businessman. You hated ranch work. You said you never intended to do anything with that land. Why in heavens name would you just up and decide to break horses again?”
“Because I can.”
His tone said he wasn’t giving information freely. Uma closed her lips and decided to play his game her way. Conscious of her nude body, and bracing herself against a lifetime of modesty, Uma eased into a floating position, her hair spreading out around her. She gave herself to the sensual movement of the water, gently ebbing against her breasts.