Maverick protested, “But, Joe, this is your chair!”
He shook his head and smiled. “It’s yours now, Maverick. I hand over both the reins and the welfare of this clan to your hands.”
Maverick saw Cayenne blink back tears as she seated herself at the far end opposite him. All up and down the table were relatives, friends. Somehow, he suddenly felt Annie’s presence. She would be with him always, in spirit and through his children. Without thinking, Maverick whispered, “God moves in mysterious ways. . .”
“Amen!” Joe nodded. “Amen! And now, I’ll bless this food, this family.”
Family. Maverick bent his head, struggling with the lump his throat. His family. The first of many meals at the long table Annie had talked about so many dreams ago. He looked up as old Rosita brought in steaming platters of fried chicken and chocolate cake. Yes, this was all the way the two of them had dreamed it would be.
He looked down the table at Cayenne and she smiled at him. A great peace came into his heart as he thought of Annie Laurie and the flame-haired girl he loved.
Later they all sat before the stone fireplace, the fire crackling merrily on scented mesquite wood, driving away the chill. He snuggled down next to his bride in a big chair, staring into the fire and remembering a cold, shivering kid who always hoped for and pictured a room like this.
Cayenne leaned closer. “What are you thinking about?” she whispered.
He thought of Annie but the memories weren’t painful anymore. “Some time, I’ll tell you,” he said softly, patting her hand.
And finally, it was late enough for the bridal couple to excuse themselves and go up to the big bedroom at the top of the stairs, leaving the rest of the family and visitors still chatting before the roaring fireplace.
Cayenne put a dab of vanilla behind each ear after she had changed into a pale green nightdress. Then she brushed her hair until it shone like burnished copper and went into the big bedroom where her husband sat smoking, looking into the cozy fire. He had not undressed.
“Come here to me, baby,” he said, pulling her down on his lap as he tossed the cigarette into the fireplace. She lay her face against his wide chest as he stroked her absently, both content for the moment to hold each other, hear the other’s heartbeat.
After a while, Cayenne stood up, caught his hands, and pulled him to his feet. She looked up into his adoring eyes as his big, rough hands came down to cup her small face, turn it up to his, kiss the tip of her nose. “And to think I almost rode off without you!” he whispered.
“My stars! You don’t think I would have let you do that!” She stared up into the wide gray eyes, and when he smiled, she realized how his face lit up, how handsome he was.
“You mean I didn’t have any choice, you feisty little terrier?” His lips kissed her eyelids as she swayed in his embrace.
She grinned, winking at him. “They don’t call me Cayenne for nothing!” she reminded him.
“By damn, I hope you can pass that kind of spirit on to children,” he laughed under his breath, tangling his hands in her long hair. “I’d like little Sam to be as fiery, as peppery as his mama.”
Her green eyes widened in shock. “Sam? Sam?” She pushed him away. “Why, it’ll be a cold day in hell before I name one of my sons after that ornery old rumpot!”
“Now, Cayenne, I thought we agreed—”
“Agreed?” She backed away from him, gesturing in a fury. “I don’t remember agreeing to no such thing! I just took it for granted we’d name the first one Jefferson Davis like I said. . . .”
“Jefferson Davis!” He took a deep breath and his face turned red with anger. “Now, little Reb, you aren’t gonna name no son of mine after that traitor to his country!”
“Traitor, is he?” She had been tricked by this blasted, hardheaded Texan! She looked around frantically for something to fend him off with as he advanced on her.
“Come here, baby”—he held out both hands as if he were attempting to soothe a wild mustang—“now let’s just cuddle up and talk about this a little. . . .”
“You’re not going to change my mind, you ornery Yankee sympathizer! I’ve been tricked and I won’t have it! You hear! We’re going to get this straightened out before I get into bed with you!”
He kept advancing on her, and she grabbed up her hairbrush and threw it. It hit the wall behind him. She started backing away.
“Cee Cee,” he admonished, unbuttoning his shirt as he moved toward her, “everyone downstairs will hear you shouting!”
“Who’s shouting, you—you—”
He started toward her, and she picked up her face powder jar off the dresser and threw it at him. It crashed with a shattering sound.
“Enough, baby,” he said softly, and his gray eyes flashed sparks. “Stop that and come here to me!”
“Damned if I will!” And she took off around the room, running barefooted across the floor to keep the bed between them. He stalked her around the bed like a hunter after wild game. When she scampered around the bed, he tried to intercept her. But she was quick and smart as well as angry. She couldn’t help but smile at his frustration as he chased her around and around the big four-poster.
She picked up a flower vase. “Stay away from me until you promise I can name him Jefferson!”
He stopped, sighed, and stuck his thumbs in his belt. “If you don’t let me catch you, there’ll never be a child to name!”
She paused, putting the vase down slowly on the bedside table. She studied him across the bed, considering his words. And in that moment, he made a sudden dive across the middle of the bed, caught her in his arms, and kissed her ’til she was breathless. “Maverick, you’re an untrustworthy rascal!” she gasped.
“That’s why you love me, baby.” He nibbled at the edge of her lips, running his hand down to cup the creamy globe of her breast. “We’ll talk about it later,” he muttered.
“Now,” she demanded, “we’ll talk now!”
He swung her up easily in his powerful arms and looked down into her face. “No, baby. I got better ideas for now.”
She couldn’t hold out any longer. Her arms slipped up around his neck and she kissed the strong line of his jaw. “Maybe you’re right,” she whispered as he carried her to the big four-poster feather bed. “We’ll talk about that some other time. . . .”
The old Don held Angel on his expansive lap. He had paused in his storytelling at the sudden noise of angry shouts, of something thrown against a wall in the upstairs room. He grinned a little. “I believe the newlyweds are having a difference of opinion.”
Joe coughed, an expression of embarrassment on his features. “Maybe I should have warned your son that my daughter is rather—ah, shall I say, she is sometimes a handful?”
Gracious put her hands over her mouth, giggling in delight. “What he means is, We don’t call her ’Cayenne’ for nothin’!”
The little girls all laughed with merriment while Joe coughed in confusion. “Gracie, you shouldn’t have told him about Cee Cee’s temper!”
From upstairs came the sound of glass crashing, the sound of running feet as if one of them might be chasing the other around the room.
Don Diego leaned back in his chair and smiled expansively, remembering his own younger days, his beautiful wife. “And we don’t call our stubborn renegade ’Maverick’ for nothing, young lady. I imagine they’re about evenly matched!” And suddenly the upstairs grew very quiet.
Lynnie pushed her spectacles back up her freckled nose, looking at her little sisters and back to her father. “It’s awfully quiet up there. Do you suppose some of us ought to go up there and find out what’s happening—?”
Joe reached out and caught her arm. “I don’t think that’s necessary, honey. It’ll be all right.”
Lynnie looked at him and back to Don Diego. “But what are they doing? It’s so quiet. . . .”
“Someday, when you’re a big girl, you’ll understand.” The Don stroked his mustache, smiling
reassuringly at her.
Joe nodded. “It’s past your bedtime, girls; go on to bed.”
The littlest one had gone to sleep on Don Diego’s lap. His pants felt damp where she sat but he decided not to mention it as old Rosita came in and he handed the toddler over.
Steve’s eyes half closed and she jerked awake. “I’m not sleepy yet.”
“Girls,” Joe said gently, “go to bed.”
Diego smiled as he watched the weary, cake-smudged little girls stumble out of the room.
Trace and Sanchez were nowhere about, and he wondered if they were out in the bunkhouse playing poker with Juan and the vaqueros, but he didn’t say anything. Joe looked like a good sport but he was, after all, a preacher. Trace’s beautiful wife had taken her children to bed.
They sat in silence a long moment, enjoying each other’s company, and then a thought struck Diego. “In all the excitement, I forgot! Senor, I had a birthday this past week. I’m seventy-five years old!”
Joe had brought out his pocket knife but now he stopped and considered, dropping it back in his pocket. “I don’t usually drink, Senor,” he said, “but I think we need to toast this happy ending, your birthday.” He gestured toward the dining room. “If you’ll look in the sideboard, I think you’ll find some fine old brandy, a couple of glasses.”
Diego got them each a drink, settling back down before the fire with a satisfied sigh. “I suppose we are both useless, Joe; you blind, me too old to do much.”
Joe shook his head. “That’s not true, Diego. If you hadn’t taken the bull by the horns, come in on that stage, no telling what might have happened. Don’t count us down and out yet. We’re still useful. What is it that poet, Milton, wrote. ’He also serves who only stands and waits.’?”
Don Diego tasted his fine brandy, remembering the poem Sonnet on His Blindness. “Maybe you’re right, Joe.” He thought about generations passing into generations in a long, unbroken line. “You’ve got lovely daughters.”
Joe sipped his brandy. “Aren’t they, though? I’ve been so worried about how long I could keep this place running with me blind and not much money. I’m relieved to be able to hand it over to Maverick’s capable hands. Remember the gun I won? ”
The Don glanced up at the fine prize rifle hanging over the fireplace. “Si, I remember. A one-in-a-thousand Winchester ’73. That’s a priceless weapon, Joe.”
“I’m gonna give it to Maverick,” Joe smiled, stroking his red beard. “Let’s say it’s a wedding gift.”
“Do you mind if I smoke?”
Joe grinned. “When you’re in my house, Diego, you smoke as many cigars as you want!”
“I think we’re going to be great friends,” Diego said, sipping the savory brandy and enjoying the strong taste of his cigar as he bit off the tip and lit it. “Of course Maverick has an inheritance from me and he’ll be able to pay off your mortgage, fix this place up a little.” He looked around at the threadbare furnishings.
Joe sipped his brandy. “The McBrides don’t take charity,” he said firmly.
“Charity?” the Don snorted. “He’s family, man! To accept help from family is not charity, and besides, you’d offend him by refusing.”
Joe stroked his beard. “Maybe you’re right. And after all, I do intend to take him in as a full partner on the Lazy M since I don’t have a son.”
“Oh, but you do!” Don Diego smiled and nodded.
The other man’s face lit up in a smile. “That’s right, isn’t it? I finally got a son.” He fumbled in his pocket for a handkerchief and blew his nose. “I enjoy your company, Diego; I hope you’ll come visit often.”
Don Diego blew smoke, nodding happily. “I was just about to suggest that very thing! And, of course, you must come visit the Triple D!”
“I play the whistle, but not very well,” Joe said, fumbling in his pocket.
“All the grandchildren would like that,” Don Diego said. “And I’ve got a lot of stories from the old days I can’t get anyone to stop and listen to anymore.”
“Isn’t it the truth?” Joe exclaimed. “Why, they’re just all so busy I have a hard time even getting my little girls to sit very long while I tell them how it used to be when I first come to Texas. Why, one time I was rounding up mustangs on the Brazos—”
“You, too?” The Don leaned forward. “I did that years ago. And hot, Dios! Such weather!”
Joe leaned closer. “These kids don’t know what real heat is! Do you remember that summer of? . . . ”
Upstairs, Cayenne pulled Maverick down to her and offered him her breasts, gasping with pleasure and shivering as his lips kissed there.
“Mmm. You smell just like sugar cookies.” Maverick sniffed along the hollow of her throat. “Don’t ever stop wearing that vanilla perfume.”
She shivered as he nibbled up to her ear, ran his tongue inside. “I won’t,” she said, “as long as that scent gets me attention like this!”
“It’s nice snuggled down in this feather bed,” Maverick whispered, running his hands over her warm skin. “This is the way to spend the winter, curled up making love to you.”
She giggled, tousling his black hair, loving him as she had never dreamed she could love a man. “We can’t spend the whole winter in bed, silly!”
He pulled her to him, kissing the edges of her mouth. “I’d like to know why not?” he murmured.
“Well, I don’t know why not,” she shrugged, closing her eyes as his hands stroked her skin. Comanche caress. She shivered at the sensation. “No one ever has, that’s all!”
He rolled over on his back, pulling her on top of him. Her breasts hung over his face and he reached up with his tongue, kissing the pink circles around her nipples. “At least we could try,” he whispered.
She gasped as she slid down on the throbbing hardness of his staff, felt his hands grasp her small waist to hold her there. “I don’t think even you could do this all winter, Maverick.”
He chuckled, beginning to move rhythmically under her, pushing up deep into her body. “Try me, baby,” he whispered, “just try me!”
Her mounting excitement took over as she rode his lean body, bringing them both to fulfillment. She had a sudden feeling of going over the edge as she opened her lips to moan, and he put his hot tongue deep in her mouth to muffle her cry of pleasure.
Eagles, she thought as the hot waves swept her under, sent her falling through space. She felt his virile seed surge deep into her womb and he gasped as he pulled her hard against him. She seemed to remember a day on a Kansas creek bank—giant, majestic eagles locked together, hurtling through space as they meshed. Eagles mate for life, she remembered. Oh, to spend the rest ot hers in Maverick’s arms! And in her mind and soul, she locked her wings about her love, joining him in eagles’ flight. . . .
Chapter Twenty-five
Maverick finished his breakfast, enjoying the sound of birds singing in the June stillness of the ranch yard. Everyone else had left the long table where he now leisurely sipped a second cup of coffee and reread the headline in the McBride Monthly Gazette: Uprising Finally Ends! Quanah Parker surrenders!
He glanced at the date, June, 1875, before he took another sip of coffee and read the article.
At long last, the Red River Uprising ended this month as Quanah Parker led his hungry, defeated people into Fort Sill to surrender, the last of the warring bands to do so.
Colonel Ranald Mackenzie, hero of Palo Duro, now the new commander at Fort Sill, says Quanah will not be punished because since he signed no treaties, he is not guilty of breaking any. However, the other chiefs will not be so lucky. Seventy-two leaders of the Comanche, Kiowa, and Cheyenne renegades will be shipped off to prison at Fort Marion, Florida to make sure they start no more rebellions.
One prisoner wore yellow satin sleeve garters and a telegraph operator’s green eyeshade as he boarded the train. We can only wonder what hapless white men died so he could own those. But on hearing his fate, one Comanche leader, Little Fox, co
mmitted suicide by slashing his wrists with a lady’s silver and pearl comb he had evidently sharpened against the stone walls of his cell.
The four little German girls have all been found now and Colonel Miles has announced he will adopt these pitiful orphans. In the meantime, all the Indians have been forced back to their reservations and there are complaints there’s not enough government food provided to keep them from starving and that the few supplies they do get are inferior. Charges of widespread graft and corruption among government contractors providing for the tribes are becoming a scandal.
“Poor devils,” Maverick shook his head. He could feel pity for all the tribes now, even the Comanche. He had buried the scalp from his stallion’s bridle along with the rawhide thong from his gun belt when he closed the door on his revenge. Love had softened his heart toward all mankind. He thought for a moment about Molly, Pat Hennessy, all the white and Indian victims of the Red River War.
Another item caught his eye: New Invention Changing Ranching.
That new invention, barbed wire, is coming to Texas as word of this cheap fencing spreads across the whole southwest. Farmer Joseph Glidden from Illinois patented the wire and some say it spells the end for the open range and the cattle drive. . . .
Maverick smiled as he turned to the Local Happenings column.
Congratulations to Mr. & Mrs. M. Durango on the new baby at the Lazy M Ranch. Joe McBride, well-loved local preacher, is busting his buttons over that first grandchild.. . .
The noise of giggling little girls running down the stairs interrupted his quiet morning coffee and Maverick looked up, smiling as the four came into the dining room.
“Hello, girls, all set for that trip to town?”
Gracie turned her back to him. “Tie my sash.”
“Please,” he corrected gently as he tied it. “Angel, quit sucking your thumb.”
The red-haired toddler took her thumb from her mouth reluctantly.
Steve looked him over skeptically. “You’re not getting to go to town? Have you been bad?”
Comanche Cowboy (The Durango Family) Page 43