by Rita Hestand
About to untether her horse, Hershel Walker strode up to her. “Jodi?” he called to her.
Jodi whipped about to see another piece of dirt littering the street. She spat and climbed on her horse as he jerked the reins from her hands.
She stared down into his handsome young face and kicked him with her boot. She took the reins and tried to whip at him. He laughed.
“Now wait a minute, honey. We got things to talk about. I told you I was coming back for a visit. It might as well be now.” He grabbed the reins from her hands again.
“Take your hands off me, Hershel, before I blow your head off.” She raised her voice to an almost screaming pitch.
“Now, honey,” he cajoled sarcastically. “Is that a way to talk to your fella? I know what you been hiding under all them clothes, don't I, honey? Yes sir, and I like what you been hiding, too.” He came closer and whispered the words with a sneer.
“You come near me again and I'll kill you, Hershel!” She spit in the road and tried to grab the reins from his hands. Ready to gun him down in broad daylight, she reached for her shotgun. She wouldn't wrestle him, she'd kill him. If facing Hunter Johnson was bad, facing Hershel, after what he'd done to her, was even worse.
But suddenly, a low and dangerous sounding voice yelled, “Take your hands off my woman.”
“Your woman?” Hershel yelled with laughter as he twisted about to see who he was talking to. Hershel seemed surprised when he saw Hunter. And when he recognized him, he laughed aloud.
Hunter stood in the doorway of the saloon, his legs spread, and his gun hand ready. “That's right, Jodi Parker and I are going to be married.”
“Married?” Hershel shouted again with laughter in his voice.
Jodi's mouth moved to rebuke his words, but something in Hunter's expression seemed to warn her not to say a word. She held her tongue. Two snakes fighting it out, maybe they would kill each other, she pondered as she watched them.
“Well now, I wouldn't think any man would want used goods, but then come to think of it, a man like you probably wouldn't care.” Hershel laughed lowly.
“That's right,” Hunter said as though totally ignoring what Hershel had just said. “She's my woman. But if I hear you utter one ill word about my intended, I'll kill you before the sun sets.” Hunter's hand edged toward his gun.
Hershel stood very still, and then glanced up at her. His smile broadened. “Well, she ain't worth...” he began to shout so everyone in town would hear.
“One more word...” Then came the cock of a gun.
Hershel glanced up at Jodi, then swiping the sweat from his chin, he shot Hunter another disbelieving glance. “We'll take this up later,” he laughed and walked down the street, not looking back.
Tears sprang in Jodi's eyes, but she forced them not to fall as she stared at the man who had taken complete control of her life. If she hadn't hated him, she might have thanked him, but pride kept her from it.
“Go home. I'll meet you at Round Rock in four days,” Hunter said, and went back into the saloon.
Unable to voice her feelings at the moment, Jodi nudged her horse into a slow gallop.
It was a long ride home.
CHAPTER THREE
Hunter stretched himself just before getting out of bed, and then as he struggled awake, he stood and washed his face in the basin, noticing the chip in the top of the bowl and fingering it for a second. It reminded him of better days, days he'd nearly forgotten. He smiled for a second. He'd traded his deer hide coat for the room for the night.
He shook himself. He didn't dry off. Instead, he held his head for a minute as the sun filtered through the room.
He thought seriously about the little lady that had offered him a job. She had startled him with her sharp tongue and offer of work. The last thing he thought he'd hear, a job…driving cattle!
She was one tough little hombre. Any woman agreeing to marry him had to be flat out of their mind, though. And him too. Why had he made such an offer? The answer was clear. She wouldn't survive two nights on the trail. They'd have her for supper. Not that drovers were obliged to treat a woman badly on the trail. It was the opposite, in fact, but an unmarried lady, with no man appointed to protect her, well, it just wasn't done. The men would be all over themselves trying to please her and forget they were herding cows. What a calamity that would be. What had she been thinking, driving a herd up north? She was a woman, for goodness sake...and men of any worth knew that a woman on a cattle drive was asking for trouble.
But despite it all, he admired her spunk. Her courage hadn't failed her. He remembered that look on her face, as though it pained her to ask him. He hadn't seen pride like that since before the war.
He knew how much courage it took to come and talk to him. He wasn't blind to his reputation. So why had the woman bothered?
The stench of whiskey wafted through the room and Hunter glanced about for the bottle someone had left in the room the night before. There was no place to put it, though, so he left it sitting on the dresser by the bed. He hated smelling whiskey, wondered why anyone would want to poison themselves with it. But he knew it wasn't his business.
Jodi Parker thought he was a drunk. Probably most people in Esser Crossing thought that, but they didn't know him. No one in this town knew Hunter Johnson.
His mind was running rampant this morning, flitting from one thing to the next. Yet, he had to admit, he was excited.
He was dead broke and he'd taken a job to herd cattle of all things. If Bonnie hadn't made the trade, he wouldn't have gotten a good night's sleep.
The trip to Round Rock would be long and hard, but not half as long as the herd would make. Jodi Parker had no idea what she was in for. Storms, Indians, mean-hearted towns, and cattle. Dang cattle were enough to contend with.
Still, he'd taken the job, and he'd see it through. He needed the money.
He missed his deer hide jacket, but a good night's sleep was more important if a man had to work, and sleeping in the hay sometimes didn't cut it.
After washing up as best he could, he went to the livery stable for his horse.
The blacksmith had shoed his horse. He owed him. He couldn't pay. Surely he could work something out.
“I'm driving a herd through to Kansas. I'll pay you when I get back,” Hunter said as he brushed aside the blacksmith and went straight to his horse.
“I am not running a credit store, friend. You'll pay before you leave,” the big man said with a strong accent, and eyed Hunter with every intention of that promise.
“Can't. I don't have it.” Hunter figured his honest candor was the only way to solve the issue.
“Then you'll work it off,” the man insisted, coming to stand beside him and the horse, his mere physical presence speaking for him.
“Can't, I tell you. I've got to be in Round Rock in two days,” he insisted, trying to side-step the man.
“You'll work it off or you won't be riding.” The man grabbed the reins and pushed Hunter to the other side of the stall.
Hunter sized the man up. He was much bigger, but he had tackled such before and it seemed logical that he could do it again. He made the first swing and was cut quickly to the ground with a right hook. Hunter never saw it coming. He'd misjudged his opponent.
He saw stars before he was able to stand on his feet again. “Reckon I'll work it off. Think a day would do it?”
The Swede looked him up and down, sent him a toothless grin, and nodded. “That will be fine, friend.”
Hunter nodded and took the pitch fork from the man's big hands. “I guess a man's word isn't good any longer.”
“Depends on the man, maybe.” The Swede laughed heartily and slapped him on the back. “Work is good for the soul, friend.”
By the end of the day, Hunter was aching in places he forgot worked. But the debt was paid and he would sit the saddle the entire night to get to Round Rock on time. He'd forgotten what an honest day's work would do to him, and he was now reminded of
a schedule he had to keep.
He could see by the trail they left that all must have gone well. Fresh tracks proved that Jodi had gotten the herd on the move. Satisfied that she held up her end of the bargain, he traveled onward.
Traveling by moonlight, it was cool and the thought of the brewing coffee made his stomach growl. It would warm him, but he had to use it sparingly because it had to last a long time.
He stopped long enough to build a small fire. Getting his pot out of his saddle bag, he made the coffee as he pulled his jacket tighter, a jacket that had seen better days. He wished he still had his deer hide coat.
He sang to himself, pleasing himself greatly. God had given him a voice like no other and he enjoyed belting out one song after another.
The one tool a cowboy always used was his voice, he thought with merriment, and he had developed quite a bass. At least cows seemed to appreciate it.
He thought again of the woman, Jodi Parker. He remembered wisps of blonde hair poking out of a flop hat, blue eyes that seemed to look right through him, and blatant honesty that stared him in the face. She wasn't little, nor big, but rounded like a fully grown woman. Her hips had given her away as she headed for the door, he remembered. Her face was sweet and innocent, yet years of hard work had seasoned her. But she wasn't that old, barely twenty, he'd expect. She was somehow appealing or he would never have offered marriage. She might be all right in the hay if he gentled her a bit. He'd think on that a while. She was like a wild filly, full of spunk, and nerves.
Then he thought of Hershel Walker. Truth be known, he hadn't heard what Walker had said that day, but the way he’d been manhandling the little gal made Hunter angry. He wondered why a woman like Jodi would know a man like Hershel, if you could call him a man.
Hershel was well known in Esser Crossing. He was the town bully during the years of the war, but he was still wet behind the ears. He'd been nowhere, done nothing, and learned absolutely nothing of life. Oh, he'd killed a few people, but no one in their right mind would have called them fair fights. The kid was trigger happy, and didn't use his head before he started a fight.
It was easy to be a bully in a town full of old men and young boys just back from the war.
The war was an ugly word in any man's books these days, best forgotten. From the looks of the men that came back, it took more than life itself; it took the soul of some, and possibly their livelihoods. Broken men, physically and mentally, and for what? The glory of the south?
He sighed.
No, Hunter had another idea about that stinking war. It wasn't all about freeing men; it was about the inability to understand each other. It was a known fact that the south and the north didn't even speak the same language. How could they agree when they were so opposite? The southern men were gentlemen, the northern men were intellects. One had less pride and more brains, the other had more pride and not enough brains. The black people were somewhere in the middle.
Hunter never understood why they couldn't have settled their differences. After all, the northern people brought the Negro over on ships to sell for labor, not realizing that they would somehow have to train these people to work in industry. And the south, thinking they'd found a gold mine, bought the slaves and put them to work in the fields where the work came natural to the black man.
The north never understood that the south didn't always treat the slaves badly. Some actually treated them as family. A lot of southern girls grew up with Mammies that were as close to them as any mother. Yet there were many injustices that outweighed the arguments.
It was no secret that black people didn't get a fair shake, because in Hunter's book, they were just that, people. However, that wasn't a common belief. He had learned early on in life, when he'd had a best friend growing up, that black was just another color. And he remembered with bitterness when his friend, Jacob, had been hung from a tree for stealing an apple pie from Mrs. Douglas' window. Jacob had only been eleven. Hunter never got over that. It still managed to bring a tear to his eye when he thought of it.
Perhaps that's what had caused him to be a spy for the union army under the guise of being a southern officer. He'd been pulled by the people he grew up with and loved, and what he thought was right and wrong. But never in all his life could he justify Jacob's death to himself. A mob of angry men had killed him to set an example for all, they had said. Jacob's father, a real thief, had sat there in the dirt, crying as his son swung from a rope…dead.
Hunter, on the other hand, had been pulled into a vortex from which there was no escape…none but God given. The war ended abruptly for him when a shell had knocked half his hearing out and caused him to be responsible for one of the bloodiest of battles of the war. It had given him an out of a situation where there was none. For now, he carried a brand all his own, the brand of a coward. But God had made him strong, and he could hold up.
Again, the war had come to invade his thoughts. But if the army had taught him anything, it was how to survive even a war with oneself. He could and would go on living, and no one would be the wiser.
But this time…this time…he didn't make excuses for his actions as those memories haunted him. This time, he faced them and tucked them away into a small part of his mind for another time. A tear slid unattended down his cheek as he forced his thoughts to other things.
He had a job, and that was something.
He wondered about the little lady who’d walked into that broken down shed with such a bold request. What did he know about the Parkers?
Old Man Parker had been a pretty fair cow-man in his day, but he couldn't stay away from the bottle. Once he had started drinking, it had been the end of the cattle days for him. He'd joined the Confederate Army when the war broke out, but he managed to get himself in a heap of trouble not two years into the war. Some said he was with a troop down by Camp Verde that hung a bunch of ranchers on their way to Mexico. The leader of that group hadn't been seen since, and anyone with him was either dead or hiding for the rest of their lives. Hunter wondered if the money those men had been carrying to Mexico to buy supplies and stock had been worth it to the soldiers who decided to hang them. Yeah, war had a displeasing taste to it, even the parts that weren't concerned with the fighting.
His mind flitted back to Jodi Parker. He couldn't recall anything about there being a Mrs. Parker, but she must have died early on. Maybe that was why Old Man Parker took to drinking. The word was that the foreman had taken over the Parker place the last few years, and had made a fair ranch out of it. Clem Morton was a good man with cows, a fair man, too. The old Riding R Ranch would have a hard time replacing Clem.
There had been a brother, too, but Hunter knew all too well about him. He'd been there when he fell. He was partly responsible for his death, and he'd never forget it. He owed the Parkers, he reckoned, and this little chore might help settle a few things. For everything there was a purpose. He smiled to himself.
However, having Jodi as a bride sure hadn’t played into his hands. What was he going to do with her? A woman, especially a permanent one, was not what he needed.
From the way she had acted, Jodi Parker wanted nothing at all to do with Hershel, and that was good. Hershel was a no-good, snot-nosed kid who used his gun instead of his head. He was trigger happy and had a mean streak. But he was obviously interested in the Parker girl. Hunter wondered why. It wasn't that she wasn't tolerable to look at, but as green as Hershel was about being a man, Jodi was about being a woman, Hunter decided, and in her innocence lay her value. Hunter stopped singing and nudged his horse faster.
He stopped a time or two to pour himself some coffee from his flask where he'd saved it, and he pulled some jerky from his saddle bag, then he took off again. He knew he'd have to keep a steady pace to make it on time. He crossed a couple of streams along the way, and his horse actually balked at having to cross them, shallow as they were. They were bone cold, Hunter noted. Spring wasn't entirely in the picture yet. That wasn't good for a cattle drive. Deali
ng with heat would be better, to his way of thinking.
It was a long, lonely ride, but he'd made it by sunup.
CHAPTER FOUR
Jodi twisted a bit in the saddle and her mouth fell open as Hunter rode up to her, startling her. She hadn't expected him to make it, at least not on time. But he was here, just like he said he would be.
Hunter reached the distance and closed her mouth. His touch was gentle and unexpected. Jodi felt it to her toes, but for nothing would she speak of it. Disoriented, she spurred her horse onward, determined not to have a conversation till she could clear her mind.
Why had she let a man like Hunter Johnson affect her so? His hand, though calloused, was gentle against her chin.
He'd shaved and cut his hair. He'd actually cleaned up, and she was shocked beyond words at how handsome he was. None of her men were shaved or clean. Why had he done it? Most men she knew grew beards, or at least a mustache early, and rarely, if ever, shaved. To Jodi it was like he wasn't wearing any clothes. He was just too darn good-looking.
Not only that, but when he’d touched her chin, he’d smiled and looked at her enigmatically. It seemed as though the touch had softened something deep inside him.
Jodi squirmed, wondering if he had forgotten about his proposal. She'd hoped so. She wasn't up to a hot conversation this morning. It had taken two days to get the cattle this far and they’d swam half of that.
He rode along side of her and she wanted to let loose with her horse and give him rein.
“Guess you didn't recognize me since I shaved and got a haircut,” he said, peering openly at her with a smile.
“I can see that. But what for?” She couldn't stop the question in time.
“A man should clean up if he's going to get married,” Hunter said matter-of-factly.
Jodi cringed. Married. To Hunter Johnson. Surely, he wouldn't hold her to that bargain.
She stopped and turned her full attention to him, unable to stop the little flurries of excitement skittering through her when he turned that smile full blast on her. His face dimpled, making him appear harmless. But she knew better. He was lethal.