Wyatt planned to work for a few years and save enough money to buy the land he had his heart set on. He’d been up-front with Half Pint from the start, and Half Pint had said he could use him for as long as he wanted to cowboy for him. Gilman had showed him the bunkhouse and the layout of the place. To Wyatt’s utter surprise, he found Blue grazing in one of the pastures. The gray roan had to have been close to twenty-five.
“Where’d you get that horse?” Wyatt had asked in awe.
Gilman’s bandanna had ruffled in the breeze and he pushed his towering Stetson deeper onto his forehead. “Turned up one day in the pasture, with no brand. He was a good son of a bitch for many years. He still can work with the best of ’em, but I don’t pick on him too much. I figure he’s earned his oats.”
Blue had slowly plodded to the fence, looking for a scratch on the side of his neck. Gilman obliged, and Wyatt had put his hand out to stroke an old friend. A flood of bygone memories had hit Wyatt then, and it was just like yesterday that he’d been saying good-bye to Blue to ride out of Eternity.
With a shove, Wyatt slid the lip of the shovel beneath the dried horse apples and hefted a load full into the wheelbarrow. The rattle of a buckboard resounded in the distance. Barely lifting his head, Wyatt kept on with what he was doing. As the vehicle approached, he sank the shovel into the earth and rested his gloved hand on the top of the handle.
The driver wasn’t too sharp from the looks of his posture in the seat and the way he hunched over the reins. With the sun in his eyes, Wyatt couldn’t make out who was heading his way. Could be somebody from Corn’s Hardware with a delivery.
Putting himself into his work, Wyatt kept his back to the trail that led up to the big house and the stables. If it was a delivery, that’d be the direction the driver would take. And sure enough, the sound of the wheels took a turn away from him.
A few minutes later, footsteps closed in from behind and Wyatt was ready to tell the foreman that he could help unload whatever it was that needed it.
Pivoting with the shovel still in his grasp, Wyatt stopped short, feeling the slam of a fist to his stomach without actually being hit.
Leah walked toward him, her skirt spattered with trail mud. Her right shoe was untied and her bonnet was tilted askew with wisps of hair falling at the sides of her eyes. Her appearance was reminiscent of the first time he’d seen her as a woman. Disheveled and breathtakingly beautiful. Even now, she had a smudge on her cheek.
She affected him still, his pulse quickening and his body tensing. After a month’s separation, he would have thought he could keep his emotions in check, but his love for her had intensified and the simple fact remained: He wanted her. He had from the start.
The closer Leah came, the more Wyatt resolved to lay into Leo real good for not keeping his mouth shut. Whatever reason she had come, it surely wasn’t to welcome him back with open arms.
“Hello, Wyatt.” The fragrance of carnations drifted to his nose.
Suddenly, Wyatt grew painfully aware of how dirty and smelly his skin and clothing were. Of how rock-bottom he must look to her for having gone from washing dishes to shoveling horse manure for a living.
Not trusting himself to speak without her hearing the tender tone that came from his heart, he dropped his voice in volume and said, “Good to see you, Leah.” And it was. He never thought the chance would be his again. “Leo told you I was out here.”
“Yes.”
Wyatt set the shovel on top of the wheelbarrow and took several steps away from it, needing a moment to lock up his feelings. With his gaze fastened on the mountains instead of her, he asked, “You drove yourself out here?”
“Mr. Tinhorn said he’d drive me, but I wanted to come alone. It was my first time behind the reins.”
He faced her. “Looked to be that way.” Despite his uncertainty over why she’d come, he cracked a soft smile.
Gazing down at the lace string of her shoe, Leah tented her fingers, then lifted her warm brown eyes to his. He sensed she was nervous by the way she clicked her fingernails together. He was just as nervous, but he didn’t show it.
“I read in the newspaper,” she said softly, “that somebody abandoned close to sixty thousand dollars in the Silverton Miners Bank.” Her expression was earnest when she held his eyes. “It was you who brought that money back, wasn’t it?”
Wyatt didn’t answer. He gripped the wheelbarrow handles, rolled the load toward the large pile of dried manure outside the corral, and dumped the contents.
To his discomfort, Leah followed him. “If you don’t want to say, then you don’t have to. But I know it was you.”
A stretch of silence loomed between them as if she were giving him another opportunity to admit to what she claimed. When he didn’t, she added, “You did a good thing.”
He kept his unflinching gaze leveled on the empty bed of the wheelbarrow, not wanting her to glorify his decision. Leaving all that money had been hard for a reformed convict. There was no sense in making him out to be a hero for having done so. He was far from one.
Brushing his hat up his forehead, Wyatt wiped his brow with the rawhide of his gloves. “You shouldn’t have driven out here by yourself. Too many miles between town and this place. Something could happen to you.”
Leah moved to stand in front of him so he’d have to look at her. His insides were in knots, staring into her eyes, gazing at her face. “I can take care of myself pretty much.”
“I reckon you can.”
“Just in case of trouble, I brought Tug’s pocketknife with me.
Wyatt pressed his back into one of the corral posts and put his arm across the railing. “Trouble better be small to fend it off with a small knife.”
“The only desperadoes I saw were jackrabbits.”
“A desperado is still a desperado.”
Leah made no reply.
Sinking his boot heel into the damp ground, Wyatt said, “I don’t think we’re really talking about rabbits.” He bent his head slightly and cut to the chase. “What can I do for you, Leah?”
She bit her lower lip, its fullness caught between her straight white teeth. “You don’t have to do anything but listen.”
He braced himself for her words.
Fidgeting with the jet button on her jacket cuff, she began with a drawn-in breath, “I can’t hate you, Wyatt. I know you as you. I don’t know Harlen. I never did. He’s somebody that you used to be, but you’re not anymore.”
Wyatt had never imagined she’d concede to that. It had taken him the past few weeks to draw that very conclusion, ever since he’d left Silverton with a clear conscience. What wasn’t clear was why Leah had driven out this way to tell him. The last time they’d spoken, she hadn’t seen him in a good light. Whatever had happened to make her change her mind had him trying to weigh the whole structure of events. “I appreciate you telling me that, Leah.”
She nodded, the silk ribbons on her hat twirling in the breeze. “I could never call you Harlen, even though . . . even though that’s your real name. To me, you’ll always be Wyatt.”
“I am Wyatt.”
Smoothing her sleeve, Leah swept her gaze across the paddock and the surrounding corrals and pens. “Leo said you were working out here now.”
“Yep.”
“Have you given up on your ranch?”
“No. It’ll just take me longer to get it.”
Blue moseyed over and nudged Wyatt in the shoulder, knocking his arm from the railing. Without a backward glance, he ran his palm over Blue’s nose, letting the roan sniff him.
Leah gazed at Wyatt, her eyes reflecting glimmers of light. He couldn’t believe that she’d be close to tears over him. Not after what he’d done to her. A new anguish seared his heart and he felt a deep sense of shame for ever having belonged to the Loco Boys. But he couldn’t go back in time and undo what had been done.
Her mouth opened in dismay and she whispered, “I’m sorry, Wyatt. You were hurting just as much as me. I didn’t
see how everything was affecting you, because I was feeling so badly for myself.” She shuddered and drew a sharp breath.
Bitter cold came over his soul at the raw confession she gave him. Pushing away from the fence, he longed to draw her into his arms, but held back, afraid she would reject him. To keep himself from reaching out to her, he shoved his hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders forward. “You don’t have to say all this.”
“I . . . I had to.” Her body trembled, and a tear slipped down her cheek. “I’m . . . I’m just sorry is all.”
She turned away from him, dashing the moisture in her eyes.
“I have to go.” Then she started for the house in a blind walk that had her stumbling next to him. Their shoulders touched in electric contact, and he caught her hand in his, both of them standing tall and facing opposite sides of the yard.
He sighed heavily, his voice breaking, “Leah, don’t go.”
A sob rose in her throat as her fingers squeezed his, and her cheek lowered to rest on his upper arm. She stood there, immobile, neither fleeing or resigning herself fully to him. When he could bear the silence no longer, Wyatt made the decision for her, knowing he risked losing her once again by overstepping the line. But he loved her too much not to try. He slipped his hand across the slender column of her neck and brought her flush against his chest.
She offered no resistance. Pressing her hands over his shoulders, she clung to him. With a moan, Wyatt lowered his face into her hair, holding her tightly despite his being filthy.
“I’m getting you dirty,” he murmured next to her ear.
“I don’t care,” she replied in a low, trembling voice. “I’ve been thinking about you—this—for too long. I’ve missed you, Wyatt.”
“I’ve missed you, too, Leah.”
He ran his hand across her back, up into the nape of her warm neck where her hair was silky and soft. “How are Tug and Rosalure?”
“They’re getting along, but it’s been hardest on Tug.”
Wyatt thought about the boy in woolly chaps, rigged out with a pair of wooden six-shooters. Trying to hide his bleakness, he dared to slice open a newly healed wound. “Did you tell him the truth about me?”
“No.” Leah lifted her face and gazed at Wyatt through tear-spent eyes. “I didn’t tell anyone. Not even Leo. There wasn’t any sense to it. I thought you were gone for good, and I . . .”
“But I’m back, so where does that leave us?” He dared to hold out hope that Leah could love him once more.
She didn’t readily answer him; rather, she said, “I spoke with Alfred Stieglitz this afternoon.”
“Your famous photographer.”
A light of fragile happiness caught her face. “Yes. I won the New York Amateur Photography contest. Mr. Stieglitz himself telephoned to tell me.”
“Leah!” Wyatt breathed her name in awe.
“He wants me to go to New York and study with him at his studio.”
Wyatt’s thoughts went jagged. He’d barely gotten her back, and he’d be losing her to the big city. He forced disappointment to stay out of his expression. “I’m happy for you. That’s what you wanted.”
Staring blankly with her mouth open, she asked, “You want me to go?”
“Sure,” he lied.
Leah settled back in his arms, dropping her lashes quickly.
Wyatt became uncertain. “You still want to go, don’t you?”
“I turned him down because I thought . . .” She shook her head and broke away from him. “Never mind what I thought. It doesn’t matter now.”
“Hell yes, it matters.” Wyatt caught her gently by the elbow. “Ever since I met you all you talked about was Stieglitz this, Stieglitz that. Now you have the opportunity to go to New York and study with him. If you turned him down, you must have had one damn good reason. What was it?”
Leah gave him a resigned shrug. “Foolish sentiment. I guess I thought five thousand dollars might make a difference.”
“What are you talking about?”
“My prize money. Five thousand dollars. I was going to offer it to you so you could buy some land and get your ranch going.”
“Well, I wouldn’t take a penny from you, Leah,” Wyatt said in a caustic tone that marked his humiliation. “A decent man has to start slow, build himself up, and know that what he made of himself, he made on his own. You keep your money.”
“I will.”
“Good.”
“If we’re finished, then, I have to be heading back to town.”
“No, I don’t believe we are finished. You wouldn’t have come out here to offer me five thousand dollars if you didn’t go along with it.” Wyatt assessed her face for her reaction. Her eyebrows shot up and her mouth clamped shut. “Do you still love me, Leah?”
Her voice was hoarse with frustration, and with both hands on her hips, she confronted him. “Any woman with half a mind would say no.”
He gave her a smile as intimate as a kiss. “But you’ve got a good, sound mind, Leah. And I think I know the answer, because it’s the same as mine.” His arms encircled her, and he held her snugly. “Maybe loving each other is the medicine we need to cure all the hurt we’ve felt in our lives.”
Her mouth curved into a soft smile. “I do love you, Wyatt.”
His hands locked against her spine, keeping her close. “You sure you want to hook up with a cowboy who couldn’t afford to buy you supper at the Happy City until payday?”
“I can afford to buy us supper.”
“I’d have to insist on paying you back.”
Her gentle laughter rippled through the air.
Wyatt smiled easily, cupping her face with his gloved hands. “You’ve got a cute smudge on your cheek, darlin’.”
She gazed at him with love and affection. “I believe you’ve said that to me before.”
“I have, only before, I didn’t do what I was thinking when I said it.”
Wyatt caught her chin between his fingers and tilted her head. His mouth pressed next to the moist, sensual bow of her lips. As he kissed her with all the emotions welling in his heart, he knew true freedom at last.
Epilogue
To understand your parents’ love you must raise children yourself.
—Chinese proverb
June 9, 1911
Moab, Utah
The 1909 black Cadillac roadster with its isinglass shades rambled over the dusty back road and kicked up clouds of fine talc in its wake. Sitting on the plush front seat, Leah glanced over at Wyatt. The angle of his Stetson was low, his eyes focused. He gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles, and had ever since they’d left Eternity. He had argued hard against driving to Utah in Leo’s new automobile instead of taking the train, but Leah and the children had won the family vote.
Rosalure and Tug sat in the tonneau wearing white dusters and hats just like Leah, gazing out at the endless sea of sage and periodically asking when they would be at their grandparents’ farmhouse.
The journey had been longer than the road traveled from Eternity to Moab. It had only been two years since Wyatt had confided in her that he had family in Utah, and another year for her to convince him to contact them. She had helped him pen that first painful letter telling his parents he was alive. She and Wyatt had waited weeks for a reply, and when one came, Wyatt had been so consumed with emotion, he’d been unable to open the envelope. She’d grasped his hand and told him that whatever lay ahead, they would face it together. Then she had broken the seal and read the words of Dora Riley aloud.
A crop of buildings came into view that looked to have been standing for quite some time. Leah noted a small general store that displayed a sign in the window: U.S. Mail Sent and Delivered Here. A livery and feed were next to it, and one brick hotel had been built across the street. Down the block, a Baptist church boasted a spire higher than the two-story land office.
Moab was nothing fancy, but the town gave Leah a picture of why a spirited young man would want to find e
xcitement elsewhere. Those first nights after they’d been married, she and Wyatt had lain awake in each other’s arms while he’d told her about his life and how he’d first gotten into trouble and the spiral down he’d taken after.
“Where’d you go to school, Wyatt?” Rosalure asked, her eyes traveling over the near-deserted street.
“My ma taught us kids at home.” Wyatt craned his neck to view the weathered building. “I wonder if they ever built a proper school?”
Tug rested his hand on the back of the front seat and leaned forward. “Is grandfather’s house far from here, Dad?”
“Not too far.”
Leah smiled at Tug. The transition had been an easy one for him to make thinking of Wyatt as his father. Rosalure held no ill feelings for Wyatt, but she preferred to call him his given name out of respect for her father’s memory. Wyatt and Leah had never pressed her to address him in a way she wasn’t comfortable. Rosalure and Wyatt got along wonderfully. He’d proudly escorted her to receive her diploma this month on her graduation from the Eternity Normal School. This fall, Rosalure would be going to college in Denver. Leah could almost cry whenever she thought of her daughter grown and living away from home.
Last year, she’d told her children about who Wyatt had been, but hadn’t gone into detail. Only that he’d been in trouble with the law for stealing, and had gone to prison for a while. She’d said that his name used to be Harlen, and that’s what his family would call him. Leah had never told Rosalure and Tug about the outlaws who’d shot their Nanna Evaline, so they made no connection between Harlen and Wyatt. And as for telling Geneva and Hartzell about Wyatt’s past, Leah had decided against it. There was no point in their knowing, since they’d come to think of Wyatt as a member of the family.
As Wyatt turned down a narrow road with washboard ruts, Leah’s mind drifted to those they’d left behind in Eternity. She had every faith in their foreman at Blue’s Ranch to handle things in their absence. After working for Half Pint Gilman for nearly two years, Wyatt had relented to Hartzell’s insistence he take out a loan to secure the land he wanted. Wyatt had spent the last five years overseeing the building of their modest home, buying stock, and working alongside the cowboys to pay back the bank. Leah got an automobile, a Waverley International that she drove between Blue’s Ranch and town.
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