Prairie Song

by Cheryl Anne Porter

  Cole wanted nothing more than to hold her in his arms, but she wouldn’t allow it. Twice now she’d shied away from his touch. He couldn’t for the life of him figure out what was wrong with her this morning. “Kate, honey, I was just thinking of you. There’s something wrong—”

  “There’s nothing wrong with me. Nothing to keep you from making the land run. So don’t you go thinking any different.”

  Her denials and her insistence just plain angered Cole. “I’ll think what I will, Kate. And that means seeing that you and my niece and nephews are safe. Because, the truth is, we don’t know where in hell Edgar Talmidge is. Or what he’s up to this morning. He could be anywhere.” Suddenly, to Cole, it was as if he’d only just heard himself. He put his hands to his waist and shifted his weight to his bent knee. “Dammit, Kate, if I had any sense, I’d hitch up the two wagons and get us as far away from here as I can—and right now.”

  He’d expected her to soften, to maybe at least see his side. But she obviously didn’t—because her eyes narrowed with stubbornness. “You do that. You go on and take the wagons and the kids. They belong to you, anyhow. Just leave me the roan and that stake because I’ve got land to go claim. After that, I’ll see that your horse gets back to you.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Cole hitched his thumbs in his gunbelt and considered her—her stance, her words, her determination. He knew what drove her, what ate at her. And he respected all that. But it was time she faced the truth. “I’m not worried about my horse, Kate. It’s you I’m worried about. You honestly think you can make the land run yourself?”

  “I do. I’m a married woman now, remember? The law says a married woman—”

  “I know the law, Kate. I’m the one who told you about it. And you also know that’s not what I mean.”

  A nod of her head accompanied her words. “I know. But if I have to, Cole, if you force me to, I will. I’ll make the run myself. Somehow.”

  “Somehow?” Stubbornness to match hers rose up in Cole. This was not the time for a battle of wills—especially one he appeared to be losing. He gestured sharply her way, pointing out her own fragile stance to her. “You can’t even let go of that wagon to stand on your own.” Instantly she let go of the wagon and put her hands to her waist … and wobbled in place. Cole exhaled sharply. “Look at you, will you? You’re beat to hell and weak as a kitten. You couldn’t run that horse race across open land—even if you did know how to ride a horse.”

  Defiantly she said, “I’ll do what I have to. I always do.”

  In an effort to calm himself, Cole concentrated on breathing in and out. Finally, he spoke quietly, firmly to her. “Yes, you do, Kate. You do what you have to do. I admire that about you. But it doesn’t always work out like you planned, does it?”

  Her chin quivered, her gaze wavered … but then she looked him in the eye. Her expression mirrored her pleading words. “Help me, Cole. Please. It’s all I’ve got left.… that land. I can’t lose it, too.”

  His heart suddenly melting for her, Cole could only stare her way, and give in to his own suspicion that he’d move heaven and earth to get her anything she wanted. Before he’d met her, he’d never known such a strong, determined, yet warm and loving woman as she was. In fact, he’d never admired another woman, except his sister, as much as he did Kate. One minute she was as strong as an oak, and in the next, she was as fragile as a weeping willow. But either way, she didn’t hesitate to stand against a world at odds with her. Cole understood that; he’d had to do much the same thing his whole life.

  When he didn’t say anything, and she perhaps misinterpreted his silence, Kate turned away, showing him her slender back with a cascade of shiny black hair draped around her shoulders. Again she held on to the wagon and appeared to look around as she waited for him to give her his answer. Cole wanted nothing more than to reach out to her and take her in his arms and tell her everything would be okay. But he couldn’t. Because there was a war going on inside him—not just the question of whether he should make the run or make their getaway. He felt he needed to understand and then win this bigger battle inside himself before he could help her with hers.

  Before I can help her? Cole didn’t like the cowardly feel of that. Why at this late date, he asked himself, was he hesitating about helping her? Especially given all she’d already done for him. What all she’s done for me? What does that mean? Surprised to learn that he’d obviously been holding back, if not harboring actual doubts, Cole tried to think his way through this. He directed his gaze away from Kate’s back, settling it instead on the ground, the better to concentrate on what was inside him, driving him. What has she done to help me—except with the kids? He gave his mind a chance to go where it would … and suddenly the truth burst before his eyes like fireworks. Cole’s breath left him in a sharp exhalation of sound.

  Kate immediately turned to face him. “What’s wrong, Cole?”

  Staring into her face, seeing his salvation there in her green eyes, and feeling his heart racing, Cole shook his head and said, “I don’t know, Kate. I need some time to think.”

  Concern edged her eyes. “How long, Cole? The race begins at—”

  “I know. At noon. I don’t need long, Kate. Just a few minutes. Please.” He’d never said please in his life that he could remember. But he was saying it now.

  Kate considered him a moment, managing to look as if she still feared he’d take off the minute her back was turned and leave her pregnant and stranded with three kids. But then she agreed. “All right. I’ll go check on the kids, while you think about … whatever it is that’s troubling you.” With that, she turned around and walked away, slowly making her way through the tangle of underbrush that would eventually lead her to the creek and the children.

  Cole watched her go. He watched the swing of her hair and of her hips. He watched the way she held her shoulders so straight and square. He watched the sway of her steps, the very way she walked—until she was out of sight, swallowed up by the tangled oaks she passed through. Only then did he admit to himself exactly how she’d helped him. Only then did he allow himself to consciously think what only a moment ago had surprised him so.

  What Kate had done was make him realize that he—Cole Everett Youngblood, a thirty-year-old hired killer—could feel love. The truth of it nearly crushed his chest. Cole suddenly wrenched around, setting his hand to any task he could find—banking the fire, straightening the scattered belongings they’d pulled out of the wagons—anything mindless that allowed him to concentrate on his thoughts.

  If he felt love for Kate—and he did—then didn’t that mean he was worthy of such love in return? He’d never before thought such a thing. Cole let drop from his hand the tin dishes he’d been stacking, and concentrated as hard as he could on the message taking shape in his head. A message that suddenly and clearly told him that the miracle of Kate, for him, was that never before—before her—had he thought he was someone a woman like her could love. Before her, he’d always kept his heart closed off, hadn’t allowed anyone to get close to him.

  Absently, Cole ran a hand over his mouth … and wondered if he’d kept himself shut off because everyone he’d ever loved—his mother, his sister, and of course his father—had been lost to him. His mother and his sister had died. But his father had abandoned him and Charlotte. Cole frowned and wondered if it was when his father left that a tender heart, a heart not afraid to love and to hurt and possibly even to lose, was just too painful? Had he decided then that it was better to tell yourself you didn’t care—rather than to risk caring at all?

  “Son of a bitch.”

  Cole stared now into the distance, seeing the horizon and the rising sun as a new day in more than one way. Suddenly, to him, his old way of doing things seemed downright cowardly. As it turned out, he hadn’t been the tough loner all his life. No, he’d been the hurting little boy afraid to love. He now glanced in the direction Kate had gone—as if he could still see her there—and knew. Never ag
ain would he shut himself off. He knew that no matter how she felt about him—because she’d never really said—he loved her and would risk everything to win her love in return. It was that simple. And that hard.

  He marveled now that all it had taken for him to understand this miracle of a tender heart was forgiving his father for leaving him and his sister like he had. Cole’s knees stiffened. Forgive him? Forgive my father? The old hardness in his heart reared its head. Cole fought it, telling himself no, telling himself he had to forgive and try to understand. He owed the old man that much. Cole put a hand to his forehead and rubbed there as if trying to erase the notion that he owed his father anything. Could it be true? Had he been inflicting wound after wound, all these years, on his father’s memory? He now realized yes, that was exactly what he’d been doing. Inflicting wounds.

  And for that, he needed to ask for and to beg forgiveness. I do? Cole had trouble grasping this. Would seeking and offering forgiveness be easier to do since he now truly understood—in ways he never had before—his father’s desperation and his fears? Could it be that Abel Youngblood, all those years ago, had simply done what he’d felt he had to in order to secure a better life for his family? Cole found he could now accept that it might be so. After all, wasn’t that exactly what faced him today with his own little put-together family?

  Yes, it was. Always before, Cole now realized, his father’s decision to leave his children behind while he searched for a way for them all to be together had been to Cole a bad decision, one that had never made any sense. Only now did he grasp another outcome to that long-ago decision. If he and Charlotte had been with their father and something had happened to him, then they could have been killed, as well.

  Cole frowned, looking inside himself … and suddenly knew in his heart that was what had happened to his father. The man had been killed by someone. Or had suffered some fatal accident. He’d always meant to come back for his children but had been prevented from doing so. For the first time since he’d watched Abel Youngblood ride off twenty-three years ago, Cole allowed himself to accept that perhaps his father’d had no choice—just as Cole now had no choice in this matter of the land run. Either he made the run, or he lost Kate because she’d never forgive him if he didn’t.

  So wasn’t he preparing to do the same thing he’d held such a grudge against his own father for doing: leaving his family behind? And couldn’t he be killed while hunting for that plot of land or when trying to stake it? Yes, he could. So how, Cole asked himself, was his father’s plight any different from his own today? The answer was simple—it wasn’t. What was different was Cole’s adult understanding of his father’s reasons for what he’d done, for how he’d gone about things. He realized now, from having to explain himself to three little kids—a first in his life—that they couldn’t always understand the reasons behind what he did. But he knew why he did things the way he did. And he always acted with their best interests at heart. Just as his father had done.

  Cole shook his head. Son of a bitch. The old man didn’t leave because he didn’t care. He left because he did care. With that conclusion, one Cole had never before accepted because he’d never before today risked his own heart, a great weight was lifted from him. He suddenly felt strong and whole. And he had Kate Chandler Youngblood to thank for that. At once overcome with what he felt for her, with his fears for her, with his love and respect for her—no matter how she might feel in return—Cole saw again, in his mind’s eye, her warm and loving face. He looked up now to the blue sky above the tree-lined horizon … and saw a wheeling eagle high overhead.

  He watched it a moment and then said, softly, directing his words skyward, “I’ve been wrong. Can you forgive me, Dad?”

  Then … he waited. Within moments, a warm beam of sunshine seemed to settle on him, bathing him in its yellow glow.

  Almost immediately upon its heels, he heard someone coming through the underbrush. Cole quickly swiped a hand under his nose, denying the emotion clogging his throat, and turned to see Kate coming back his way. Straining for composure, not wanting to be seen like this, Cole adjusted his Stetson and then sought her gaze, latching on to those green eyes that had set his world on fire.

  “Are the kids doing what they’re supposed to be doing?” he asked, managing to impose a gruff tone into his voice, one that didn’t betray him.

  She nodded. “They are. Like always.” She stopped a number of feet from him and stood there, looking everywhere but at him as she twisted her fingers together … and waited.

  Cole smiled, his heart going out to her. He knew for what she waited. Still, right now he wanted nothing more than to stroke her cheek with his fingers and tell her how much he loved her. But he did none of those things, instead staying where he was as he softly called out her name. “Kate?”

  She jerked her attention back to him as if he’d yelled. Her eyes were rounded with expectancy. “Yes?”

  “I did my thinking.”

  “And?”

  “And you win. I’ll keep my promise to you. I’ll make the run and get you that land.”

  Closing her eyes, as if immensely relieved, Kate nodded and exhaled. Finally, she opened her eyes, smiling shakily as she stepped up to him and went into his embrace … at last allowing him to hold her close. “Thank you, Cole. That’s all I’ve ever asked you to do.”

  * * *

  So it had all come down to this. The land run of 1889. About an hour away, as best Kate could figure it. And in the end, she was going to miss it. A humorless chuckle escaped her. Life sure seemed to turn in funny ways, she decided, thinking now of life as a living, breathing thing that purposely set out to throw your plans and dreams right back into your face—when you least expected it.

  She felt she had proof of that fanciful notion, too. Because, less than a week ago, when she’d finally arrived in Arkansas City, she now recalled, she’d wanted nothing more than to claim her own land herself. But then she’d found out how impossible that was—and had forced Cole to marry her before he made the run for her. But once she’d gotten married, she’d decided again to make the run herself, thinking that was the only way she had to spare the children, should some hired gunman come looking for her and take out his wrath on them, too. Only that killer turned out to be Cole.

  But he hadn’t been the only one. She’d become a killer, too.

  Kate swallowed, overcome again with the horror of what she’d done last night. She could never have foreseen that she’d take the life of anyone, much less Norah Talmidge. Kate scrubbed her hands over her face, barely able to withstand the words—“I killed Norah Talmidge”—or the thought of the act behind them. For as long as she lived, Kate didn’t think she’d ever forget the sound of that rock thunking against Norah’s skull. Or the sight of all the blood. There’ll be a price to pay for all that, she reminded herself.

  Because the murder of someone of Norah Talmidge’s wealth and social prominence wouldn’t simply go unremarked. Even if she survived Mr. Talmidge’s wrath—he may have fancied her in his bed, but he’d not forgive her for taking his wife’s life—then surely the law out here would have something to say about murder, even if it was committed in self-defense. But who would believe her, a penniless maid on the run from New York City?

  Kate finally lowered her hands and turned her face up to the sun, gulping into her starved lungs great draughts of fresh air. It was all falling apart—her plans, her life, maybe even her sanity. She wasn’t sure she could stand here another minute, atop the crest of this gentle slope of a hill where they’d made camp last night, and do nothing. Especially in light of all the activity going on below. Down there, on the plains for as far as the eye could see, was all the excitement and pageantry she’d been used to seeing in the huge parades in New York City. Only out here on the plains, with nothing as witness but the open land itself, it was all too much to take in.

  Kate didn’t know where to look first. She could scarcely believe the sheer numbers of would-be settlers here f
or this event. Thousands upon thousands of folks milled about below as they readied themselves for the run. Even up here she could hear their noise and bustle, could almost taste their excitement. Somewhere among them was Cole. Kate wondered what that was like, being him and sitting there atop that tall, long-legged roan and taking in everything. She wondered if he thought of all the other folks surrounding him as his adversaries, since any one of them might end up trying to stake the same hundred and sixty acres he meant to claim for her.

  That thought frightened Kate. She sure as heck hoped he was the first one to stake that section close to Guthrie Station that they’d talked about. Already in her heart that plot of earth was her home. She wasn’t sure she could stand it if she lost that, too. Kate fought back the tears. No. I won’t think about that now. Later. Not now. She ought to rest, to lie down, she knew that. Her body needed the quiet time to heal. But she just couldn’t bring herself to do it. Even as tired and wrung out as she was, why should she? There was no more point to conserving her energy.

  Besides, right now she had too much else to worry about. She looked behind her and saw a sprawling campsite chock-full of three kids playing, four mules grazing, two wagons hunkered down low to the ground, and a napping dog named Kitty. An unexpected and perhaps lifesaving chuckle escaped Kate. She decided that maybe she’d been looking at this all wrong. She should—instead of counting the tragedies—be counting her blessings. That seemed like such a hard thing to do. Especially today of all days. But maybe she should try. Because she had many blessings in her life. Many.