They kissed again.
“Too bad we can’t be alone,” Jake lamented.
“You’ll just have to wait until we get back home, Mr. Harkner.”
“And you’re still too beautiful to resist, Mrs. Harkner.”
“Well, that isn’t going to last much longer,” Randy answered with a smile. “I’m working hard at preserving what’s left.”
“And you’re doing a good job. You are very well preserved.”
They both laughed and headed into Randy’s room, where Tricia and Sadie Mae slept sideways in the bed. Randy shook her head.
“I couldn’t get back into that bed now if I wanted to.” She grabbed extra blankets and pillows she’d ordered earlier, certain this could happen. She threw them on the floor. “Not the most comfortable bed in the world, but let’s try to get some sleep.” She and Jake managed to make a bed out of blankets and rugs and finally settled in together.
“I’m not sure I can do this two nights in a row,” Jake complained. “I am going to try to get an extra room for tomorrow night. This family is getting too damn big.”
Randy snuggled her back against him, and Jake pulled her close.
“This is just as comfortable as that wagon we were in the first night you made love to me,” Randy told him, smiling at the memory.
“Yeah? Well, there are two little girls nearby, so don’t remind me of that first night, woman. It’s too hard on me.”
Randy kissed his arm. “Then go to sleep.”
“Easier said than done.” Jake sighed deeply. “Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“The silence.” He kissed her hair, thinking how thick and golden it still was, and brushed out long, the way he liked it. “Back in the old days, we would have heard the tinkling of barroom piano music, the screeching laughter of whores, and the yelling and fighting of drunks—maybe even shooting in the streets.” He hugged her closer. “Things sure have changed out here, haven’t they?”
“It’s called law and order, Jake.”
“Yeah. I used to set my own laws and had my own ways of keeping order.”
“You certainly did, and it usually got you into trouble. I’m enjoying the peace and quiet of the normal life we have now. After the last couple of years, I don’t think I could take much more, so leave the law to men who wear badges.”
“I used to wear one. And Boulder still wants me to be their sheriff.”
“Jake! You promised—”
He leaned over and cut off her words with a kiss. “Don’t worry. I’m too damn happy with you and the family on the J&L. Last winter I thought I might never see Colorado or my family again.” He kissed her neck, her hair. “Go to sleep.”
Randy settled against him, wondering if she would ever get over the glory of being in his arms again…where she was always, always safe. The whole family was safe, as long as “Grandpa Jake” was around.
Seven
“Are you crazy?”
“Poor choice of words, son. You already know I’ve been a little bit crazy my whole life. Must be from getting my brain knocked around so much as a kid.” Jake spoke with a cigarette between his lips as he headed for the jailhouse.
“Pa!” Lloyd reached out and grabbed his father’s arm. “Slow down!”
Jake turned to face him, taking the cigarette from his lips.
“You know what I meant,” Lloyd told him. “That kid in there is huge trouble! He’ll be getting into fights with my son and with young Jake and very likely Ben every five minutes. They won’t put up with his shit and neither will the men.”
“Good! That’s what he needs. Besides that, when young Jake is mad, he can beat up a grizzly. Stephen is already growing practically as tall as you, and he wrestles down steers. He can hold his own. And I don’t need to tell you about Ben. He could probably beat up both of us! The kid is a moose. There isn’t a person alive who’d believe he’s only fourteen. All three of those boys have been toughened up by ranch life, and they have the Harkner spirit of defense—even Ben, in spite of not having a drop of my blood in him.” Jake turned and started walking again. “Besides, I don’t intend to let that little bastard Tommy get close to a gun or the houses. He’ll live out at the bunkhouse, and you know damn well how fast the men out there will shake his tail out. They’ll have him wetting his pants.”
“Damn it, Pa, why? Why are you doing this?”
They stepped up onto a boardwalk and Jake faced his son again, taking another drag on his cigarette before explaining. “Because it’s a way for me to atone for my past. For once I’m going to help a shit-bag outlaw instead of shooting him, which he’s very lucky I haven’t already done.”
Lloyd closed his eyes and sighed. “Pa, sit down on this bench over here before you go into that jail. Will you do that? The J&L is mostly mine, so I think I have a say in this, don’t you?”
Jake buttoned his wool jacket closer around his neck, studying his very brave and loyal son’s dark eyes. He couldn’t imagine any father being more proud of his son. He sighed deeply and put the cigarette between his lips again. “All right. I’ll grant you have a point.” Jake walked over and sat down, stretching his left leg out to relieve some of the pain. “I already know what you’re going to say.”
“Do you?” Lloyd sat down beside him, resting his elbows on his knees. He removed his gloves and set them aside, then rubbed his hands together to get the circulation going. “Pa, why in hell do you think you need to atone for anything? You’re almost sixty-three years old and you quit your outlaw ways over thirty years ago. You paid for it with four years in prison and just about that many more years as a U.S. Marshal in the most hellish and dangerous country a man could ask for. You saved Mom’s life when you two first met. You shot it out with seven men to keep them from killing me and Mom when I was a baby. You still have pain in your hip from taking a bullet then. And later, after I abandoned the family and went kind of crazy, you literally risked your neck to save me. You risked your life again to save Evie at Dune Hollow.”
“So did you. You were shot.”
“That doesn’t matter. We’re talking about you now. I know you hate that, but I’m not done yet.” Lloyd stopped to light his own cigarette while his father sat quietly smoking. He took a long drag before continuing. “You saved young Ben from being beaten near to death by his father, and then you adopted him and have treated him like your blood son ever since. Evie and I couldn’t ask for a better father or a better grandfather to our kids. And in Denver you nearly got yourself hanged for killing the man who shot me. You didn’t even know if I was dead or alive. You just reacted out of your love for me. Then you stuck by Mom with a patience I never knew you had after what she suffered two years ago. No man could have been kinder or more loving to his wife.”
“What’s your point, Lloyd?”
“My point is that you have nothing to atone for. You’ve already done it, over and over. You risked your ass again foiling that bank robbery in Boulder—probably saved some innocent lives.”
“That’s just because they had hold of your mother and my granddaughter.”
“No, it isn’t. You would have done it anyway, even if they weren’t involved. Don’t say you wouldn’t have. And then you truly did nearly lose your life going to Mexico to rescue a young girl you didn’t even know, and you did it for the highest-paid prostitute in Denver—a woman few men would bother helping. But her daughter was in a horrible state and you couldn’t stand it, so you went down there and ended up with a broken leg and beaten with a bull whip and you’re still in pain from that. So don’t be talking about how you have to atone for anything. What’s the real reason you want to hire on Tommy Tyler?”
Jake took one last drag on his cigarette and threw the stub onto the boardwalk, then stepped it out. “Because in all the things I’ve done, I’ve always killed or hurt the bad guy, if that’s
what you want to call them. They all deserved it, but I was hardly any different from them the first thirty years of my life. I never gave any of them one chance to change his ways…the way your mother gave me the chance to do the same. And in this case, the bad guy is only eighteen. By the time I was eighteen, I’d killed my father and was running with the worst of them.”
“You didn’t have any choice when you killed your father.”
“Maybe not, but that damn legacy has been with me all my life. I finally shed myself of the ugly memories when I went down to Texas and saw that my mother and little brother got a proper burial and a proper headstone. But I don’t think that was the end of it. I think God wants me to do one more thing. And yes, those words came out of Jake Harkner’s lips. I have a chance to save a young man from going down the road I took, and I’m going to try. For one thing, if I don’t face this head on, that little bastard might decide to backtrack on me and still come back and try to bring harm, to me or someone I love. I’m going to cut him off at the pass and surprise him by offering him a job…with some damn hard-set rules.”
“He’ll laugh in your face.”
“Maybe. But unless he wants to sit in jail and then have no money and no place to go when he gets out, he’ll take my offer. I saw something in his eyes, Lloyd. I saw myself…the little boy who really wanted nothing more than for someone to care about him and offer him a little help. And in that moment I saw my father beating up on me, like I was beating up on him. It stopped me, and I felt something…someone…telling me to do something about it. I don’t know how else to explain it.”
Lloyd finished his own cigarette, stepping it out as he rubbed at his eyes. “All right. But I’d better never see that little sonofabitch anywhere close to Sadie Mae or Tricia—or trying to pick a fight with one of the boys. And I’ll tell the men not to go easy on him, so don’t expect any forgiveness or kind treatment from Cole or Terrel or any of the rest of them.”
“I don’t want them to treat him kindly. I just want them to treat him like they treat each other, unless he steps out of bounds. If he smarts off or tries to start something, he deserves whatever they do to him. If anybody can make a man out of a smart-mouthed little troublemaker like Tommy Tyler, it’s the men on the J&L. He’ll soon learn to stay straight or wish he had.”
Lloyd leaned back and stretched out his legs. “Fine. Go get the little bastard. Tell him when we leave in the morning, he’s going with us…tied up in the back of one of the wagons. I won’t let him sit a horse and try riding off scot-free.”
“Agreed.” Jake leaned forward, watching a snowflake drift down to his boot. “Lloyd, maybe the kid has never had a decent family Christmas. I want him to see what our family Christmases are like. If he straightens up enough by Christmas, we’ll let him join us for presents and dinner.”
Lloyd removed his hat and ran a hand through his hair. “I can hardly believe Jake Harkner is talking.” He rose, pulling his long hair out from under his jacket before putting his hat back on. “Please let me be the judge of that. We want this to be the happiest Christmas possible. Do you agree he can’t be there if I say so? He hasn’t even seen Evie or Katie yet. You know how beautiful they will look to a wild little eighteen-year-old like that. If he says one word to make them uncomfortable or looks at them wrong, I’ll beat the shit out of him myself. You won’t have to feel guilty for being the one to do it. Hell, you’re the one who jumped all over him back at the ranch for making that remark about Mom. You’re expecting an awful lot to happen in just a little under three weeks.”
Jake rose and faced him. “I know. It might not work at all, but at least I’ll know I tried.”
“Yeah, well, I’d better get back to Katie. Today I get the joy of watching Donavan and Jeffrey while she shops with her mother and Evie. Jeffrey is already trying to walk and Donavan is into running off on me, so I’ll have my hands full. I’ll let you talk to the sheriff.”
Jake nodded, smiling a little. “Thanks for agreeing to this.”
“I just hope I don’t regret it.”
“You think I don’t feel the same way?”
Lloyd studied his father and the lines in his face that spoke of too many hard years. “I love you, Pa. If not for being so damn glad to know you’re alive, I’d object to this, but I can tell it’s important to you.”
They shared a look that said, I’d die for you in an instant—no hesitation—if it came to that. The bond was set hard and fast.
“Thanks,” Jake told his son.
They gave each other a quick hug and pat on the back before Lloyd left. Jake took a deep breath and stepped into the jailhouse.
Eight
It was quite a parade heading home. The night before they left, a choir from the local Methodist church went caroling about town, stopping in front of the hotel to sing carols to the entire Harkner brood. Jake’s very Christian, faithful daughter Evie joined in the singing, as did Tricia, Sadie Mae, Katie and Randy, who all joined the choir when they left to sing elsewhere.
Today the two supply wagons were stuffed with Christmas presents and winter supplies…and one Tommy Tyler, who sat with one wrist chained to the wagon bed, his lips tight with indignation. He glanced at Jake whenever he rode into sight, trying to figure out why in hell the man had decided his punishment should be to come and work at the J&L. The rules were stiff, and he wasn’t so sure he’d abide by them. Then again, the look in Jake Harkner’s eyes when he talked about taking him to the ranch was enough to make a man queasy. He had no doubt that if he disobeyed, either Harkner or his men would set him straight.
I’m doing this to give you a chance at a good life, Jake had told him. I was just like you at one time, and if I can stop one young man from going through the hell I’ve been through in my life, it’s worth the chance.
Tommy had never known a decent family life. His mother had run out on him and his father when he was only two, and his alcoholic father had beat him often, telling him he was the reason his mother left. You worthless little bastard, the man often called him. You probably ain’t even mine!
What did he need with family? What did he know about living straight and holding a job for longer than a couple of weeks? And why in God’s name should someone who hardly knew him and who didn’t even like him take him to his own home and take a chance on him? He hated to admit it, but deep down inside he was impressed by the Harkners, the way they all seemed so close, the fact that their patriarch was the infamous Jake Harkner himself, the very man he’d been stupid enough to draw on when he first rode onto the J&L.
Jake’s grandsons rode up alongside the wagon then, the younger one who was also called Jake handing out a canteen.
“My grandfather said you should take a drink,” the young man told Tommy.
A disgruntled Tommy reached for the uncorked canteen with his free hand.
“Grandpa says you better not say or do anything against my little sister and my cousins—or my mom or aunt Katie or my grandma. You better remember that.”
Tommy handed back the canteen after taking a swallow of water. “Those are big words for a little kid,” he sneered.
“I’m not a little kid,” young Jake declared. “You make a wrong move and it won’t be just me. My cousin Stephen will be on you, and my uncle Ben. He’s big and strong. And then my uncle Lloyd will probably join up and so will Grandpa and some of the men. You don’t know how mean they all can be.”
“I hear Ben isn’t your legal uncle at all.”
“He sure is. My grandpa legally adopted him.”
“Why?”
“’Cuz he was being beat on with a belt by his father. Grandpa beat up his father and he took Ben away from him and adopted him. Grandpa knows about bein’ beat on by your pa. It makes him real mad. That’s why he’s helpin’ you.”
“Why should he care?”
“He just does, that’s all. But he won’t
put up with you bein’ disrespectful to the men or any of the women.”
Tommy grinned. “I hear one of the men married a high-class prostitute, and she lives on the ranch with him. You sure your grandpa doesn’t sneak over there and pay her visits? I hear he has a soft spot for wild women.”
“Gretta is a nice lady and our friend. My grandpa helped her daughter down in Mexico and he was almost killed. Gretta is Cole Decker’s wife now. Even if she wasn’t, my grandpa loves my grandma an awful lot. Him and Gretta are just friends ’cuz women like that were good to him when he was little. He just likes to help people is all.”
Tommy shook his head. “Boy, oh boy, that sure doesn’t sound like the Jake Harkner I’ve always heard about. I’ve always heard he likes wild women and is mean as a snake and sneaky as one. He’s killed a lot of men and never regretted any of it. Why would a man like that want to help people?”
“’Cuz a lot of people helped him over the years. He told us he just wants to do somethin’ to make up for it, but don’t take that for granted. He’ll turn on you in a minute, if you talk bad or do somethin’ to anybody in the family.”
“Jake!” Young Jake heard his grandfather yell out to him. “Get away from Tommy and mind your business.”
“I’m just makin’ sure he knows not to make trouble,” Jake told his grandfather, sitting a little taller in his saddle and adjusting his hat.
Big Jake grinned. “He knows it. Ride on ahead and watch for holes and such so we don’t lose a wheel and get stuck out here in the cold.”
“Sure, Grandpa.” Young Jake rode off, and Big Jake kicked his horse into a gentle lope and rode closer to Tommy.
“I’ll unchain you as soon as we get onto J&L land. If you choose to run off, you’ll be in a bad way. A storm is coming and we’re trying to hightail it home before it hits. You might as well make up your mind to stay at the bunkhouse and be glad you’re inside and warm.”
Stephen and Ben rode up to Jake then.
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