A Fire in the Blood

by Shirl Henke

  "Yeh, a hired killer with a big reputation. But more than that, he's a breed and a greaser to boot." Jonah's youthful face suddenly looked harsh and old beyond his years. "I reckon you're right. He just wanted to protect you."

  "I had more than a little part in my own downfall. No one could blame it all on Jess," she said candidly, meeting his troubled gray eyes. "He wanted me to go East, where I could pose as a respectable widow and pass Johnny for white."

  "But you decided to come here instead," he said, a slow smile beginning to creep across his face.

  Relief washed over her. She had an ally. "Yes, I did. I love your brother, and I don't want his son to grow up without him. Have you heard from him lately?" she asked worriedly.

  "Not for several months—but that's not unusual," he hastened to add. "He's up in Indian Territory, chasing some pack of outlaws with big bounties on them. We need the money. We've been working real hard on improving our breeding stock, even selling some horses to the Army up at Fort Seaton."

  "You must've noticed the cawy we brought. When I sold J Bar, I kept a few of the best saddle horses."

  "Yes, real beauties," Jonah said excitedly. Then her words registered. "You sold that huge ranch?"

  She faced him determinedly. "It would always have stood between Jess and me. I put the money in trust for Johnny when he grows up, and no one can touch it until then." She smiled nervously and shrugged. "So I guess you and Jess are sort of stuck with us."

  He looked at her in amazement, then threw back his head and laughed. "Lissa, you are something!" His eyes danced. "Really burned your bridges good. Jess'll have a real Injun fit."

  "Yes, I imagine he will."

  Johnny began to squirm, wanting to get down to explore. Lissa took him from Jonah and set him on the floor. Immediately he raised a chubby hand from the dusty plank. It was blackened with dirt.

  "I think a woman's touch is long overdue here. Do you have a scrub bucket or rag mop?" she asked, once more eyeing the bleak little cabin.

  He reddened. "Got a bucket, but no mop. I reckon I kind of let the house go, there's so much outdoor work to do."

  "Tate will help you with that, if you'd be willing to take him on. He's done with guns." If only Jess will do the same now.

  "I'd be real glad of the help, but we can't pay much."

  "He'll work for food and shelter until the place starts showing a profit." At Jonah's relieved look, she smiled. "Why don't you go take a closer look at those horses while I unpack our things and see about a bit of straightening up before I start dinner."

  "You can cook?" The joyous expression on his face was amusing, but at the same time touching. Had Jess ever been this open and guileless? Somehow she doubted it.

  Just as Jonah stepped out the door, Cormac picked that moment to return from his foray down at the creek. "Jeezus! I knew you brought horses, but I never saw one built like this!"

  The wolfhound cocked his head to one side, sniffing undecidedly as Jonah stood frozen against the door sash.

  Lissa chuckled. "This is Cormac. He's an Irish wolfhound. They use them to kill timber wolves and coyotes up in Wyoming."

  "I believe it," Jonah replied, still plastered to the door. "I'd bet on him against a pair of grizzlies!"

  Cormac gave another sniff and then, to Jonah's horror, rose on his hind legs and planted his enormous forepaws on the young man's broad shoulders, giving him a generous slurp across the face.

  "He likes you. It took him a moment to recognize the scent, but you must smell like Jess to him. Odd, he usually doesn't take to strangers at all, but he acted the same way the first time he met your brother. And Jess reacted just like you have," she added, laughing.

  When Cormac dropped his front paws back to the porch, Jonah began to relax and gingerly stroked the dog's ears. The wolfhound's tail wagged so hard the floorboards vibrated. "He really could be a help with varmint control around here."

  "He's also a good nanny," she said, as she picked up her filthy little boy. Until she did some work around here, Johnny would stay cleaner if he played outside in the dirt!

  * * * *

  The following months saw some dramatic changes at the Double R ranch. Lissa quickly scrubbed up the small cabin and unpacked such amenities as table linens, a variety of cook pots, a set of crockery dishes, most of which had miraculously survived the bouncy ride from Wyoming, and a bolt of brightly checked yellow cotton, which she stitched into window curtains.

  She had Tate and Jonah build doors for the two bedrooms, and once the latest bunch of horses was sold at the fort, they promised to begin felling timber to build an addition onto the cabin. The flowers she had planted around the house and the vegetable garden in the back were coming up nicely.

  Getting used to the far more humid heat of West Texas was Lissa's biggest adaptation, but as the weeks sped by, even that paled in comparison to her fears for Jess, who had not written Jonah since riding into the deadly no-man's-land known as the Nations.

  Her fears were kept at bay by her young brother- in-law, who had been forced to accept Jess's dangerous occupation over the years. She and Jonah grew as close as sister and brother during that long summer.

  "You're nothing like Jess led me to expect," Jonah said easily one evening as Lissa was rolling out biscuit dough on an immaculate new table Tate had made for her baking.

  She rubbed a smudge of flour from her nose with the back of her forearm. "Let me guess—he said I was a fineborn lady who was used to being waited on hand and foot. A princess."

  "Something like that. He sure never said you could fry the crispest catfish in the whole blame state or fix up a dingy old place like this." He gestured to the brightly curtained windows, which now had shiny glass in them, courtesy of their last trip to Terlingua. A pot of fresh daisies decorated the kitchen table, and a pretty braided rug lay in front of the hearth. The floors had been sanded, scrubbed, and then waxed to a decent shine and the walls whitewashed.

  Lissa finished arranging the biscuits in a tin pan and set them aside to rise, then went to the fireplace to check on the fat she was rendering in a big iron skillet on the grate. "Cooking over an open fire took some mastering. I'm still far from perfect."

  "Aw, you're great, Liss, and besides, next time we go into town that cookstove we ordered should be there. Don't know why Jess never thought to buy one before."

  "I imagine he never figured there'd be a woman here to use it," she said sadly.

  The specter of her husband was always present. Every day that passed without word from him made them grow more worried. No one ever voiced aloud the possibility that he had died up in the Nations, but each secretly feared that Jesse Robbins might never come home.

  Jonah had shared a great deal of their past with her, explaining things that enabled her to understand her husband better. One evening she had found a set of discharge papers from the Union Army for John Jeremiah Robbins, dated 1863, hidden away in the family Bible.

  "Pa was shot up pretty bad at Gettysburg and sent home," Jonah said, looking at the yellowed papers that mutely bore testimony to his father's suffering.

  "It must've been hard being Federal sympathizers in Texas," Lissa said.

  Jonah gave a sharp bark of mirthless laughter. "I was just a baby when it all happened. We lived down near Brownsville then. Our ma's folks worked for the Running W."

  "Richard King's ranch. I know," Lissa said. "Jess told me Mr. King was kind to him."

  "He was a dyed-in-the-wool Reb, but he honored our pa's convictions. We had a pretty nice spread back then. House was a lot fancier than this one." His face hardened. "Night riders burned it to the ground back in '69. We lost everything. Pa was too crippled up to start over again. He died a month later. If they'd put a bullet in his heart, it would have been easier on him. Jess was barely fifteen, but he became the man of the family then. He got help from Mr. King for ma and me. Once a Kinero, always a Kinero. She went back to work as a housekeeper for Mrs. King.

  "Funny, everyw
here else the Rebs lost their homes because they couldn't pay the back taxes. Here my pa fought for the Federals, and we lost out just the same," he said bitterly. "That was when Jess had a price put on his head. He found out who done the burning. Couple of fellows from Brownsville were the ringleaders. Called themselves the White Knights," Jonah said tightly. "Some knights, dressed in bedsheets to hide their ugly faces."

  "So he killed them."

  "He shot them in a fair fight—hell, one sixteen- year-old boy with a cap-and-ball pistol against two grown men with fancy Colt revolvers. But they had friends—powerful Anglo friends—who were Rebs. They put a price on his head for murder. That's when Jess went to New Orleans."

  "And took a ship to North Africa where he joined the French Legion?"

  "We didn't hear from him for over a year. Ma was plenty worried, but then he started sending money." Jonah shrugged. "I don't know how he earned it if they pay anything like our army does. Maybe cards—or maybe he started taking jobs like he does now. Ma died before he came back. When he did, Mr. King had gotten the murder charges dropped, but we had to start over. Then there was just Jess and me. Been that way ever since."

  "He's never talked about his time in North Africa, has he?" Somehow she knew this was true.

  "It changed him, even more than what happened here, I think. But, no, he wouldn't talk about it."

  How many secret hurts did Jesse Robbins hold behind those cool silver eyes? Lissa only prayed that one day soon she would be able to unlock his heart and free all that pain once and forever.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The searing heat of summer at last gave way to cooler days. Roundup was done, with a tidy profit realized from the sale of their four-year-old steers. The three-room cabin had now been substantially enlarged with the sprawling addition of a large new bedroom with a smaller nursery adjacent to it. Jonah and Tate had even built two sturdy new corrals beside the stable. If the Double R was not an imposing kingdom such as J Bar, it did have the look of a prosperous small ranch.

  As she watched her young brother-in-law bring up the wagon from the stable, Lissa looked at her home. "All it needs is Jess to return and run it."

  At last they had received word that he was still alive. A bank draft for three thousand dollars had arrived the preceding week from the Nations. Jess had collected his bounty money. If the job there was done, why did he not come home? Or at least write to his brother, telling him about his plans?

  "Penny for your thoughts," Jonah said, then chuckled. "Maybe I should say a dollar, now that we're becoming so prosperous we can afford a maid."

  Not wanting to discuss her fears about Jess, Lissa responded to his mention of Lucita. "We're lucky to have hired her from the Valasquez family. They were really gracious in offering us such an experienced worker."

  Jonah shrugged. "They're the biggest hacendados in Coahuila. What's one more maid to them, more or less."

  "Still, you're looking forward to the trip over there to pick her up." She eyed his new shirt and cleanly shaven face. "Couldn't have anything to do with Don Hernan's pretty youngest daughter, Ursula, could it?" She knew he was smitten with the girl.

  His face reddened. "She's a fancy lady. They'll arrange a marriage for her with some rich criollo. I don't stand a chance. What have I got to offer her?"

  "Honestly, Jonah, what is it about you Robbins men? You sound just like your brother. It seems life here has agreed tolerably well with me—or don't you consider me the lady Dona Ursula is?" She could not resist teasing.

  "You know better than—" Jonah stopped in mid-sentence as he caught sight of the rider on the ridge.

  Lissa immediately turned and looked across the valley to the big black stallion with the blaze face. Jess!

  The rider sat motionless, looking down with burning silver eyes at the transformed ranch. Jess could scarcely believe the changes. Their cabin was double its original size and sparkled with whitewash. Window boxes filled with bright fall flowers graced every glass-paned window. The yard was green with grass, and several saplings had been transplanted around the building. Two corrals filled with prime horseflesh had been added to the stable.

  Then the breath was squeezed from his lungs when he saw her. At first she had been hidden by the wagon Jonah had pulled up beside the house. Now he could see her hair gleaming like cherry flame in the sunlight. Lissa. Here in Texas! His heart slammed against his ribs as he rode to meet his wife.

  Lissa felt her knees turn to water. At last, after nearly six months of waiting, he had returned. She was scared to death. "Please, do me a favor, Jonah. You and Tate take Johnny along with you to the Valesquez ranch."

  "They love to spoil him. Be my pleasure," Jonah replied easily. "Of course, he'll insist Doggie-Dog come along, too."

  Lissa smiled in spite of the nerves twisting her insides. "By all means, take Cormac along. He's down at the stable with Johnny now."

  Jonah jumped back on the wagon and headed to the stable, where the lively little boy was "helping" Tate with chores. He gave his brother a salute and a grin as he swung the team around and headed off. "We'll be back tomorrow," he called out to Lissa.

  She nodded but could not speak. Her heart was caught in her throat. More than anything, she longed to run across the distance separating her from Jess and fling herself into his arms. Instead, she stood in front of the house, waiting as he slowly rode toward her. Don't lose your nerve now, she admonished herself.

  "Welcome home, Jess." Damn, her voice cracked!

  Jess looked down at her, sun-gilded, even more golden than she had been in the north. Her hair was plaited in a fat braid that hung over one bare shoulder. She wore a low-cut Mexican camisa, a sheer white cotton drawstring blouse. A full, dark- green skirt of lightweight cotton came barely to her slim ankles. On her feet she wore huaraches. The simple peasant woman's clothes looked oddly right on her slender, golden body.

  As he swung down from Blaze, he winced, then quickly straightened up, but she could tell he was hiding something.

  "All this your doing?" He gestured around to the flower boxes and saplings.

  "Yes, and there's a big vegetable garden out back, too. Your brother's partial to my snap beans." What an idiotic thing to say! She approached him, noting the way he favored his left arm. "You're hurt," she said, almost accusingly.

  "Just a scratch. It's healing." He ignored her protest and went on the attack before the joy of seeing her permeated his reeling senses. "How the hell did you find this place? Cammie?"

  She nodded. "She gave us good directions."

  "You endangered not only yourself but Johnny, too."

  "Tate came with us. We were safe enough. He's still here, working with Jonah."

  "I can see they've been busy. I told you I wouldn't live off your money, Lissa."

  She drew herself up angrily, then stopped short and made herself calm down. "We didn't use my money. Profits from Double R's fall roundup were pretty good. With Tate helping Jonah, they did really well. All I brought were my personal belongings and half a dozen horses to add to your breeding stock. Call it a dowry."

  She studied him, the stubborn set of his jaw, the way he hooked his thumbs arrogantly in his gunbelt. He needed a shave. Were there a few gray hairs sprinkled in his sideburns and temples? She ached to reach up and touch his cheek.

  "You shouldn't have come, Lissa. This place will destroy you," he said in a low, intense voice.

  "It hasn't yet. I've been here six months, and I love it."

  "I'm talking about six years—sixteen years—not a few months." He stepped forward angrily, as if he were going to reach out and shake her, then dropped his hands with a grimace.

  "You are hurt. We can argue just as well inside while I'm tending that 'scratch'." She turned and walked into the house.

  He followed. "Isn't this where we started?"

  "No. It started when I interrupted your bath. Speaking of which . . ." She turned around and sniffed him, then added, "You could certainly use
one."

  "I'll go down to the creek after a while."

  "We have a tub now, and the pump out back's been fixed." She watched him from the corner of her eye as he looked around the room. Then he took a seat at the table, appearing haggard and weary.

  She turned and reached for the simple medical supplies sitting in a basket on the hutch. "Take off your shirt and let me see what new scars you've collected."

  "Who's running J Bar for you? Cy Evers?"

  She almost dropped the basket. "No, I sold it to Lemuel Mathis. I made quite a good deal with Cy's help. Cy told me he was wrong about you." She faced his wary expression hopefully.

  He brushed the remark aside. "What did you do with the money? There must've been quite a bit of it."

  "It's in a trust fund, in St. Louis. My uncle has invested it for Johnny's future."

  "And you came here with nothing but a wagon- load of pretties and high hopes," he said harshly. "I could've been killed. Left you stranded here all alone."

  "The thought did cross my mind from time to time over this summer. Jonah and I were both relieved when you wired the money. At least we knew you were alive." She looked at the tender red skin healing over the bullet hole in his left bicep. "Too bad it wasn't your right arm."

  "I can shoot almost as good with my left hand," he said as she examined the wound. The instant her cool, soft fingers touched him, he felt a jolt that made him flinch.

  "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you." She reveled in the heat of his body, the rough, familiar texture of his skin. And she began to tremble.

  "It's all right," he replied, trying not to smell her orange blossom essence.

  "We made a good living this year. With the new Army contract Jonah just signed, it should be even better next year. You don't need to risk your life anymore, Jess. Hang up the gun and become a rancher."

  "It's not that easy. There are always things that can go wrong. Drought, disease, Indian raids from Mexico."