With so little experience with people in general, and with the long-ago memories of Matty’s childhood cruelty, she didn’t know how to respond. Was he laughing at her?
“Let me get you a plate,” the cowboy said, not noticing or not caring about her discomfort. “We’ll attend to that stomach of yours.”
She splashed her face with water from the washbowl and washed her hands, then patted dry with the well-worn towel.
The cowboy was waiting when she perched on the end of the bed, a plate heaped high with flour-battered fish and golden fried potatoes and onion resting on the table before him. He slid it across to her, moving only his arm, she noticed. Probably so he wouldn’t tweak his collarbone. She took it with both hands, but he didn’t release it.
When he tugged slightly, her eyes flew to his face. Something of her uncertainty about his motives must’ve shown on her face because his expression softened the slightest amount.
“You’re welcome,” he said softly.
He let go of the plate and it scraped the table as her pull lost its counterpoint.
Her insides twisted. Was he making fun of her?
“You’ve got—” And then he reached one hand and touched her cheek. “Mud.”
She jerked away from the unexpected touch but that didn’t stop him from coming away with a clump of brown mud on his fingertip. She swiped the back of her wrist against her cheek, but it came away clean.
Shaken, she scooted back on the bed, until her back hit the wall and she was able to pull her knees up in front of her. She balanced her plate there, aware of the cowboy’s continued attention.
Until Pop gruffed, “Got me a plate yet, boy? I’m hungry, too.”
Matty scooped fish and potatoes from the pan onto Pop’s plate, smiling a little and shaking his head.
Pop shoveled in a heaping bite, pushing it off the plate and into his mouth, before the cowboy had made his own plate.
Pop groaned. For a moment, a frisson of worry arced through Catherine, but then her own forkful hit her tongue and she realized that Pop had made the noise out of pure enjoyment.
“Not bad, right?” The words could have been arrogant, but the cowboy didn’t seem to be looking for praise. He was too busy eating. “Better than anything you ate out there on the battlefields?”
Her breath caught in her chest; she opened her mouth to interrupt, but Pop just shook his head, unperturbed. “Miles better.”
Gaping a little, Catherine’s eyes darted between the two men. They both ate with abandon, focused on their plates. Men.
The cowboy looked up, his eyes landing directly on her. “What’s a matter?”
She returned to her own plate, shrugging, but the cowboy’s gaze didn’t move off. Finally, she gave in. Stubborn man. “Pop doesn’t usually talk about his time in the war.”
“Hmm,” Matty said over a bite. He glanced at Pop, who was still engrossed in his plate. “Well, it wasn’t like he opened up and shared every detail.”
Pop grunted.
Matty grinned up at her and her stomach gave a funny little flip. “I told you about my family the other night. I figure it’s your turn. Tell me about your parents.”
This time she choked on a chunk of potato.
She coughed and gasped, and the cowboy pressed a mug of coffee into her hands. She sipped as soon as she had the potato dislodged. Eyes still watering, she asked, “What?”
*
Catherine went silent. That wasn’t what he’d intended.
He would do anything in his power to distract the both of them from the powerful bolt of attraction that had flared through him when he’d touched her. The clump of mud had been sliding down her cheek and it had been a natural thing to do. He’d meant it in a perfectly innocent way, but the shock of his fingers against her petal-soft skin had arced through him like one of the lightning bolts striking outside.
He hadn’t been expecting the attraction that had rumbled through him like too-close thunder.
Catherine was pretty enough, even though she was nothing like Luella. Luella enjoyed being the life of the party, a lot like him. At socials, she was always flitting from one group of friends to another, like some kind of butterfly or something.
But quiet Catherine, with her hair chopped short… Well, the cut actually made the structure of her face stand out more—made him notice the curve of her cheekbones and point of her chin. Catherine made him curious.
And he needed to be worrying about getting back to civilization, back to his life, not sparking the independent young woman he was stuck with.
“I’d like to hear more about your parents. If you’d be willing to tell me.” He said it with his eyes on his now-empty plate, knowing that Catherine was so gun-shy that if she sensed his interest, she’d clam up.
But tonight she’d had to come in early thanks to the rain, and after days of being subjected to the quiet, he couldn’t face another evening without some communication.
And she was silent for a long moment, finally asking, “Why?”
He should’ve known she wouldn’t just talk to him. “Because I’d like to know you.” He couldn’t help the irritation leaking into his words.
He pulled a pail of water he’d asked Pop to bring in earlier and set it on the stove to heat, ignoring the pull of pain across his chest.
She questioned every motive. If he brought her a cup of water while she worked the fields, she squinted into the cup as if to see whether he’d poisoned her.
Now he held up the spoon, using the gesture to ask if Catherine and Pop wanted seconds. They both held out their plates. Silently, of course.
He sighed as he dished out the last of the flaky pieces of fish and crumbly potatoes. And then as his eyes flicked over Catherine’s head, an idea coalesced.
“Let’s play a game,” he said.
Catherine’s skeptical gaze skewered him, but he poured the warming water from the pail into the now-empty skillet, then grabbed the bar of soap from the nearby shelf and shaved some off into the water.
“My sister loves this one,” he said. “It’s called Eye Spy.”
Pop grunted, and that meant either he wanted to play or he was done with his food.
Matty went on as he dunked his plate and utensils in the soapy water. “My family plays our own house rules. I’ll choose something visible to all of us and tell you what color it is. You’ve got five chances to guess what it is. If you guess the item, you win, and it’s your turn to ‘spy’ something. If you don’t guess my item in the five chances, you owe me a boon. In this case, you answer one question.”
Her eyes sparkled with interest, but she bit her lip. “And if you don’t guess the thing I’ve ‘spied’?”
“Same.”
He had her interest. But he couldn’t let her know. He pretended that he needed his full focus on scrubbing out the frying pan.
“Fine,” she agreed hesitantly. “Since we’re stuck inside anyway…”
Yes. At least for tonight, he wouldn’t have to bear the silence.
“Do you want to go first?” he asked.
“You go ahead. That way I’ll make sure I understand the rules as you’ve laid them out.”
“All right.” He allowed himself to gaze around the room once, for a few seconds, even though he already knew what he was going to choose. “Eye spy something red.”
Her eyes darted quickly around the room, but she hesitated before saying, “The radishes.”
He glanced up at the two withered vegetables in a basket above their heads, then shook his head with a grin.
“Your bandanna,” she said, much more quickly this time.
“No, ma’am.”
He was starting to enjoy this. Catherine’s eyes had narrowed slightly. She was competitive. He filed the information away.
It wasn’t her Pop’s faded shirt on a shelf, or the jar of strawberry preserves, either, and he’d finished scrubbing all three plates and forks in the cooling dishwater as she hesitated over the last g
uess.
Her lips pinched slightly. What exactly did she think he was going to demand for his boon?
“Do you give up?” he asked, teasing quietly. “Or you’ll have to take your guess.”
“There’s a cardinal that lives in the pine tree.” She nodded out the window, streaking with rain. “Did it flit past the window?”
He shook his head. “It only counts if it’s something we can all see.”
She ducked her head. “So I owe you an answer? What was your red thing?”
“If you don’t guess it, I don’t have to tell you.” He winked at her. “How did your parents meet?”
A flash of emotion crossed her expressive features before her eyes shuttered. Had she expected a more difficult question?
She laid her cheek on her knee, turning her gaze to the wall. When she spoke, her words were stiff. “They met at a social. My father asked her for an introduction and then to dance.”
So her family hadn’t always been antisocial. If her parents had attended a social, they mustn’t have had a total aversion to being around people. What had happened since Catherine and Pop had been on their own?
She turned her head in his direction, again resting her cheek against her knee. “Eye spy something black.”
The obvious answer was the skillet, so he knew she wouldn’t have chosen that, not with the flash of competitiveness he’d seen in her eyes.
“The soles of my boots,” he guessed.
“No.”
“The inner circle of my eyes.” He waggled his eyebrows at her flirtatiously and she flushed, a beautiful pink rising in her cheeks.
“Definitely not,” she said firmly.
“The stovepipe.”
“No.”
He let a smile pull up one side of his mouth. “I give up.”
Her lips pursed.
“You’ve won your boon. What do you want to know?”
She opened her mouth, but then hesitated on a breath. “How did your parents meet?”
That hadn’t been her original question. He knew it in his gut. Why had she changed her question?
“My ma was the preacher’s daughter, and my pa was a lowly cowboy riding for a rancher in the area. She had a lot of beaus, but he was a stubborn cowpoke and won her over.”
Her lashes fluttered as she lowered her eyes.
They played two more rounds where she correctly guessed the buttons on Pop’s shirt and Matty gave up his middle name—Patrick—before she stood up. “I should dump the dishwater out.”
He envied the ease of her movements as she shrugged into a long leather coat that would prevent her from being drenched again and moved to pick up the frying pan and then ducked outside.
Pop had been quiet while they’d played their rounds of Eye Spy, but now Matty asked, “You wanna enlighten me why she doesn’t like talking about her parents?”
Pop’s eyes flicked to Matty and then away, but he didn’t acknowledge the question. Even Catherine’s answer had been factual and short.
What didn’t they want him to know?
As Catherine reentered the room, Pop grunted and poked a grizzled finger at Matty. “You need a shave, boy.”
Matty made to raise a hand and rub a palm against the bristle on his face, but just the action of crossing his arm over his chest made him wince. There was no way he could reach up to his jaw, not without pulling the injury and paining himself fiercely. “Don’t think that’s gonna happen anytime soon.”
“Catherine can help ya out.”
Matty’s eyes flew to Catherine’s, and she shook her head frantically, eyes almost panicked.
If that was her reaction, he didn’t want her anywhere near his throat with a razor. “Maybe not tonight.”
*
Later that night, Matty lay flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling where Catherine had forced dirt down on his head. Remembering it had a smile twitching at his lips.
Soft rain still fell outside, but so far Catherine’s patches kept the soddy dry.
He couldn’t get a good read on her, and it irritated him. Enough to cost him his sleep.
Folks in Bear Creek trusted him. Maybe because of his badge or maybe because his family was well established and held a good reputation.
So facing off with Catherine’s continued mistrust rubbed him the wrong way. He’d been polite since he’d landed here. Even helped out, cooking supper.
If it took him two or three weeks to heal up enough to get out of here, he didn’t want to live in silence. He’d go crazy!
What did it take to make a friend out of Catherine Poole?
And why did it matter so much?
Though he stared up at the dark ceiling, an image of an eight-year-old Catherine staring up at him with tear-washed eyes flitted through his mind.
That was why. He needed to make up for the past before he went home.
Chapter Seven
Early the next morning, Catherine stood on the bank of the little stream, just around the bend from home. A patchy fog curled through the woods and made her feel isolated from everything and everyone.
She shivered in the chill air, craning her neck back and stretching to look at the pale gray expanse of sky. Elsie was no doubt waiting for her morning milking, but Catherine needed these moments to find her sense of balance again.
The cowboy’s game last night, as simple and childlike as it was, had stirred up a whole hornet’s nest of emotion in her chest.
His innocent questions over supper had brought her shame to the forefront. She was illegitimate. Born out of wedlock.
If she hadn’t been so worried about him finding out, it might have been…fun.
Instead, she’d remembered how her mama had been treated on that last day in Bear Creek.
Mama had picked her up after school in the wagon, with their old plow horse in the harness.
“I’ve a surprise for you,” Mama said as Catherine scrambled over the wheel and joined her in the bench seat.
Catherine sat her lunch pail at their feet with a clatter. “What is it?”
Mama flipped the reins and the plow horse began plodding away from the schoolhouse. “I raided my egg-money jar. We’re going to the store and buying you some fabric for a new dress.”
Catherine had been unable to hide her tears yesterday, after the other children had sung their awful rhyme at her. She’d tried to hide in the barn, but Mama had found her and demanded to know what was wrong.
“A new dress?” Catherine couldn’t keep the hope and anticipation from her voice. If she had a dress made from store-bought material, surely the other girls would want to be friends with her!
A few minutes later, Mama set the brake and tied off the horse to the hitching post outside the mercantile. They didn’t visit the store often—hardly ever—so this was a rare treat.
Catherine didn’t know why they mostly stayed out of town. She’d never questioned Mama’s statement that Pop didn’t like most folks and just liked staying on the homestead.
But she’d begged to attend school, and now here they were. Surely a new dress would help her to fit in.
She followed slightly behind Mama, fingering a bolt of blue-sprigged calico when she heard the first whisper.
“There’s Anna Poole. No, don’t look at her!”
Catherine peeked around Mama’s side and saw two women together standing behind a barrel of pickles. One had her fingers over her mouth. Both looked slightly horrified.
“Which do you like better, this darker blue or the pink?” Mama drew her attention back to the bolts of fabric, but a glance at Mama’s face showed pink high in her cheeks.
“The blue,” Catherine answered. Her palms were moist; her pulse raced. She couldn’t wait to have her new dress!
But there was a part of her that was conscious of the two women still whispering, though she couldn’t make out their words.
Mama walked to the counter to fetch the proprietor, leaving Catherine for a moment. Her eyes went to the beauti
ful white lace gloves displayed on a shelf behind the fabric. They must be for decoration only—they would never last on the homestead.
Behind her, the whispers started again.
“That’s the girl.”
“Illegitimate.”
Now her face burned. She knew what the word meant. Mama had explained it to her when they’d talked about why Catherine didn’t have a papa.
Mama came back and the whispers stopped, but now Catherine’s tummy hurt.
She’d thought the teasing at the schoolhouse had been cruel. But were these two grown women whispering about her?
The proprietor approached, the man’s steps heavy on the boards of the floor. “I cain’t sell to ya. I won’t. Cain’t besmirch the reputation of my store.”
Mama’s hand fell on her shoulder even as Catherine didn’t understand his words.
“Come along, Catherine,” Mama said. “We’d best go.”
“But my dress—”
There had been no dress. Mama cried the whole way home, driving their horse and wagon, though she’d tried to hide the tears from Catherine.
And Catherine had refused to go back to school. If the adults in Bear Creek were intentionally cruel, who would teach the children differently? How could she expect acceptance with a background like hers?
She’d deemed it safer to stay on the homestead, just like Mama.
And last night, she’d been afraid the friendly spark in the cowboy’s eyes would disappear if he knew the truth.
She shouldn’t care.
Because if she dared to open herself up to the cowboy further, she could expect the same thing to happen again.
A branch snapping and the crunch of fallen, desiccated leaves brought her head up. That hadn’t come from the direction of the homestead.
Slowly, a shadowy form separated from the fog. Taller than the cowboy, with stringy black hair falling below a floppy hat.
Ralph again.
Why must he continue his unwanted pursuit?
She stood straight, aware that she was out of shouting distance from the soddy, and that she had nothing in hand that could be used as a weapon, if needed. No spade, no pitchfork. Nothing.
She could only pray she wouldn’t need defending.
“Good seein’ you again so soon,” he said.
Love Inspired Historical October 2015 Box Set Page 7