by Vivi Holt
Before she knew what she was doing, she was back on her feet and following him. She did it quietly so he wouldn’t notice, and she wasn’t even sure why she felt the need to follow him, but it was as though she were following an instinct she couldn’t fight. I can’t stay there. I can’t go through with it. Quincey is horrible and mean and old and I despise him. I can’t be married to him. Just thinking about going home with him to that ramshackle old place he calls a house makes my stomach churn.
The cowboy sauntered down the street. He stepped from the covered sidewalk onto the dusty road with a hop and ducked between wagons and buggies to cross it. The road they were following was the main thoroughfare for the dusty Texas town, edged on both sides by tall false storefronts. Covered boardwalks joined them to keep boots and slippers up out of the dust and manure that coated the potholed road with a layer of grime.
I can’t do it. I can’t do it. Genevieve’s mind was blank apart from a single thought that repeated itself over and over in time with the slap of her feet on the road. I can’t do it. I can’t do it.
She knew, if she dared think about it, that Quincey would come after her. As soon as he saw she’d left her place outside Tandy’s, he’d come looking and he wouldn’t stop until he found where she was. Then she’d pay. She’d seen the way he’d collected a toll from his workers, the animals on his farm and the sporting women who crept from his bed in the early hours of the morning. She’d seen it all from her home on the opposite side of the lane from his shanty. She knew how he treated anyone who had the misfortune to be included in his life, and she knew what she’d have to bear when he caught up with her.
The knowledge made her insides quake with fear, but it didn’t cause her to stop. She kept going, creeping along behind the cowboy, shivering inside, and all the while the thought flew around and around in her head. I can’t do it. I can’t do it. I can’t do it.
They soon passed by the dusty, little church where Genevieve had recently become Mrs. Ewing. She saw Quincey’s wagon parked out front where they’d left it earlier, and peered over the lip of the wagon bed. A dingy carpet bag sat in the back of the wagon. She reached inside and deftly pulled it from the wagon. It fell in the dirt at her feet with a thump, raising a cloud of dust to swirl about her skirts. With a frown, she bent and opened the latch, lifting the lid gingerly to look inside.
She gasped. It was full of her clothes and personal items!
Fred must have packed it when she wasn’t looking earlier that morning. He’d asked her to feed the shoats after breakfast, and when she’d carried their food scraps out to the yard he must have packed her things and slipped them into Quincey’s wagon. She snapped the carpet bag closed again, and hefted it over her shoulder. The cowboy had almost disappeared from view, she’d have to hurry. She picked up her skirts and scampered down the street after him, the bag clenched firmly under her arm.
They came to the Fort Worth Stockyards. A large sign to announce that fact hung directly above her head with big block letters all in red. Behind the sign, paling fences marked off small squares of dirt and enclosed hundreds of cattle. They bawled and clashed their long horns against the railings, jousting with each other in the small enclosures. Browns, whites, tans and creams – their coats were dull with dust, and they shivered against the onslaught of flies that hovered thick above them, darting in to land on a hide before being swatted away by a heavy tail or chased off by a moist nose.
The cowboy paused by the stockyards, raising one foot to rest on a low railing as he surveyed the cattle. He pulled a toothpick from his mouth and flicked a piece of food into the grass. Genevieve stood in silence, waiting. She didn’t have a plan; she was just following the man with kind eyes.
He set off again, past the yards, the rowels of his spurs spinning and tinging with each step he took. Beyond the yards he came to a clearing. Past the clearing Genevieve could see the dry plains spread as far as the eye could see to the distant horizon under the enormous Texan sky that pulled itself taut and hazy above the dusty landscape.
On the edge of those plains, in the clearing, an enormous herd of longhorns milled around. Around them on horseback sat a few covered wagons and a group of cowboys watching the cattle closely. The cowboy climbed onto the back of a bay horse that stood saddled and tied to the back of one of the wagons. He tipped his hat at another man who walked between the wagons toward Genevieve, then drew the reins and trotted off.
Genevieve squinted as the dust borne on a warm wind came in gusts off the plain and hit her full in the face. What should she do now? The cowboy had disappeared around the outside of the herd and she could follow no further. The man walking toward her was closer now and she could see his brow furrowed in concentration. He had a handsome, darkly tanned face with chiseled features. Several chestnut curls escaped the tight fit of his black Stetson, and when he glanced her way she caught her breath. His eyes were pale blue and sparkled under the brim of his low-drawn hat.
Without thinking, Genevieve ducked behind the closest covered wagon. Her heart raced and she held her breath. The canvas that covered the wagon was joined to the timber frame directly in front of her eyes, and she noticed as she hid there that it had popped open on one side. She pulled it away from the wagon frame and poked her head up through the gap. The schooner was chock-full of food stuffs and kitchenware: cured meats, wheels of cheese, flour, eggs, pickled and canned fruits and vegetables, as well as containers of things she couldn’t make out. All were stacked up in the midst of frying pans, pots, utensils and spices.
Her eyes widened in surprise and delight. She had never in her life seen so many good things to eat, and in fact it had been a number of years since she’d had a hearty meal. Since Ma died, Fred had always insisted she cook for him, never leaving her enough to eat herself. She felt her mouth moisten at the sight of all that delectable food and her stomach growled, twisting tightly as she considered how it might taste. She climbed up on a step that jutted out at the base of the wagon bed, then pushed herself over the edge and inside, pulling the carpet bag behind her.
She landed with a grunt on a wheel of cheese. She’d never seen so much cheese! If only she had a knife. There must be one around here somewhere. No, what was she thinking? That would be stealing, and there was no way she could get away with slicing into a full wheel of cheese without anyone finding out about it.
If she was going to steal – which she wasn’t – it would make a lot more sense to take one of those delicious-looking red apples in the barrel beside the cheese. No one would ever notice that an apple was missing from a barrel that size. But of course that was still stealing, and hungry as she was, she knew Ma would never approve of such behavior, God rest her soul.
Her stomach growled again and she licked her lips. It was just a tiny little apple. Surely there wasn’t a person on this Earth who would object to her taking one teeny apple.
She reached out and plucked one from the top of the barrel. It felt cool to the touch, and as she pushed it into her mouth and bit down hard into its crisp flesh, the juice ran down her chin and dripped onto her skirts. She leaned back against the hard, rounded side of the barrel and put her feet up on top of the cheese as she munched.
Just then, the wagon jolted and moved forward. She stopped chewing and sat upright, listening intently. She could hear the bellowing of the cattle and the whistles and calls of the cowboys – they were moving out. She wondered where they were headed. Never mind – wherever it was she hoped it was as far from Fort Worth and Quincey Ewing as she could get. She lay back down and took another bite.
Chapter Two
With a grunt, Thomas O’Reilly heaved a large sack of oats from his shoulder onto the dry ground, causing a cloud of dust to halo around the sack and hover a moment before slowly resettling again. He reached for the place where the canvas cover joined the timber bed of the chuck wagon to untie it, but the canvas flapped open, revealing a gaping hole where it should have been secure.
He frowned and s
hook his head. He’d only hired Cookie two days ago and already he was beginning to wonder whether it had been a wise decision. The cook’s attention to detail was a little lacking, and he hadn’t seen the man at all between breakfast and when they’d set out from Fort Worth just before noon. He wondered where Cookie had been all that time, and thought he’d smelled liquor on the man’s breath when he took the reins of the chuck wagon. Now that they’d stopped to rearrange the supplies since the chuck wagon was leaning heavily to one side, Cookie had disappeared yet again. He’d have to keep an eye on him during the cattle drive.
Not for the first time, Tom thought about the woman he’d seen earlier. She’d locked eyes with him and the look had sent his heart racing. It made him tingle all over now just thinking about her. But then she’d ducked behind the chuck wagon and disappeared. He’d followed her back there, just to see where she’d gone to, but he hadn’t been able to find hide nor hair of her. She was beautiful, with long dark hair and wide blue eyes. Her skin was a touch too pale and she looked as though she might break in her worn clothing, but her eyes had caught him with their magnetism. He wished he could see her again, just to ask her name.
Thomas pulled the canvas back away from the frame of the wagon and bent to lift the sack of oats onto his shoulder once more. With a grimace, he pushed up under the canvas and was about to throw the sack into the wagon bed when his eyes fell on the girl. She was asleep in the back of the chuck wagon with a tattered bag beside her. A trail of food scraps lay in a circle around her torso on the cheese wheel beneath her – apple cores, bread crumbs and even drips of jam. The look of contentment on her face was sealed with the slightest trace of a smile around the corners of her mouth.
He stared at her a moment in astonishment. What was she doing back here? They’d left the stockyards four hours ago. She must have climbed into the chuck wagon there and fallen asleep, not realizing they were leaving town. He frowned in consternation when he realized the predicament he was now in. He’d have to escort her back to the stockyards and they’d lose hours of travel time. It seemed as though nothing was going right for him today.
He dropped the bag of oats back on the ground, cleared his throat and watched for her response. She shifted without opening her eyes and rolled onto one side, slipping her hands beneath her head and gathering her knees up toward her chest. One long leg protruded from beneath her full skirts, and he saw pale skin above her knee-high stocking that sent a flush of heat to his cheeks.
He coughed, more loudly this time and she sat upright with a start and quickly pulled her skirts close around her ankles. “Excuse me! I’m sorry, I must have fallen asleep.” Her cheeks reddened. At the same time her eyes flashed, almost daring him to admonish her.
“Never mind that – what are you doing in the back of my chuck wagon?” he asked with one eyebrow arched.
“I … well, that is to say, I … I guess I was just hoping to catch a ride. That’s all.”
“A ride?” His eyebrow rose higher still. “To where, pray tell?”
“San Francisco.”
“Is that so? I hate to be the one to bring bad tidings, but we’re not going to San Francisco. And even if we were, it’s highly unlikely we’d want a young girl such as yourself tagging along for the journey.”
“I’m not a girl – I’m eighteen. And I’m not afraid to work for my keep. I’ll ride north with you – you’re going north, aren’t you? – and I’ll find a way to get myself to San Francisco. You won’t have to worry about me.”
“I’m not worried about you, apart from the fact that you’ve mightily inconvenienced me now. I’ll have to return you to Fort Worth, and you’ve apparently already eaten your weight in my food supplies.”
“Well, I’m sorry about that, truly I am – I didn’t mean to. I knew I shouldn’t do it and I wasn’t going to, only I tried one of the apples since they’re so small and you have plenty of them and it really seemed to just whet my appetite more than anything. Anyway, I’ll work off the cost of what I ate, I promise you that. You just tell me what I’m to do and I’ll do it.”
Her eyes narrowed and she moved past him to climb out of the wagon. He offered her his arm, and she leaned on it as she stepped down, her eyes on his. He felt his pulse quicken at her touch, and moisture broke out on his brow.
“Thank you.” She stood in front of him and dropped her gaze to the ground below.
He folded his arms over his chest and surveyed her with his head tipped to one side. He pulled his hat from his head and scratched absently at his thick chestnut locks. “Well, now, I don’t think that’ll be necessary. Let’s just forget about the food. You’ve got to get back to town and I suppose that means I’ve got to take you. It’ll set back my cattle drive at least half a day and I’m none too pleased about that, but there’s nothing can be done about it now. You can ride with me and I’ll tell the men to continue on for a bit until they find a place to set up camp for the night.”
She crossed her arms to match his and stamped a foot in the dust. “I’m not going back and you can’t make me.” She glared daggers at him.
He took a step backward, his hands raised. “Whoa there, what’s the problem? Aren’t you from Fort Worth? Isn’t that where you live? And what’s all this about San Francisco? I’m sure your folks won’t be any too keen on you traveling there alone, or with a bunch of rowdy cowboys. You’d best head back on home and fix whatever rift you have with your loved ones. The trail is no place for a young lady.”
Her face fell and she lowered her voice to almost a whisper, her eyes downcast. “I don’t have any folks, and my problems are my business, I believe. I’m meeting someone in California, and all I’m asking from you is a chance to work my way north. You can leave me wherever you wish, and if it doesn’t work out you can send me home.” She lifted her eyes to his, and the sadness there sent a chill through his chest. “Please, I’m just asking you to give me a chance.”
Thomas knew what kind of trouble a young woman traveling alone could bring to his drive. This was his first time heading up a cattle drive and it was a big one. He had bought three thousand head of longhorn cattle with a large portion of the twenty thousand dollars’ worth of gold he’d found mining in Alder Gulch, Montana the year before. This was his big chance to make something of his life, something Pa would be proud of. He didn’t want anything, or anyone, to make a mess out of all he’d worked so hard to achieve.
Pa was a hard man who’d never given him a word of encouragement in his life. He expected Thomas to make something of himself under his own steam, and he wouldn’t settle for less – he’d told him so a hundred times. The family ranch in Ohio was one of the most successful and prosperous in the entire region. His older brother Harold would inherit it one day, and Pa expected Thomas to build his own business; one hide at a time, as he always said. This drive was his chance to show Pa he could do it. He could make it on his own. And maybe Pa would finally be proud of him, the way he was of Harold.
He swallowed and considered his options. If he took her back to Forth Worth, she might turn right back around. There was no way he could physically stop her from coming back or following them. Then there was the time he’d lose – every day they spent on the trail cost him money and time, lowered the condition of the cattle and raised the likelihood of something going wrong. He had to get this entire herd bedded down in Paradise Valley before the cruel weather of the cold Montana winter hit hard.
That gave them only three months to get there. They’d left much later in the season that he’d hoped to, and though he estimated they’d be able to travel fifteen miles per day and still keep the stock in good shape, they’d be pushing it to make it in time. In fact, it was highly unlikely they’d make it before the first snow fell even at that rate. They couldn’t afford to miss even one day of travel if they wanted to reach Montana Territory before the weather changed.
“All right, I’ll give you a chance. I hope you can cook, since you’ll be working with Cookie to
feed a crowd of hungry cowboys – but so help me, you cause me any trouble at all, you’re going back.” He slapped his hat with his hand to emphasize the point, then pressed it firmly on his head.
“Oh, I can cook, don’t you worry about that. Thank you so much … Mister …?”
“O’Reilly – Thomas O’Reilly. And you are?”
“I’m Genevieve Waters, but you can call me Genny. I’m pleased to meet you, Mr. O’Reilly. You won’t regret this, I promise you – I’ll cause no trouble at all and I’ll work hard.” She stretched out her hand and Thomas shook it.
Her touch sent a pulse of electricity through him, and he quickly withdrew his hand. He nodded and lifted the heavy bag of oats into the back of the chuck wagon, settling it beside the wheels of cheese, then fixed the canvas back in place, pulling it taut against the timber frame. “You’d best come with me to meet Cookie, then.”
She followed him to the front of the wagon.
What in heaven’s name have I gotten myself into now? He shook his head silently and grimaced. It was likely they’d have any number of trials ahead of them on this journey. The last thing he needed was a pretty young woman to distract the men and potentially cause division. Well, there was nothing he could do about it now – and truth be told, he was relieved she’d be helping Cookie. There was something that felt not quite right about that man, and it would be good to have a backup, just in case.
He turned his head to take in her profile – she really was very pretty.
I can’t think of her that way. I can’t afford to be distracted. This cattle drive is my chance, an opportunity to really make something of myself. I can’t let anyone, not even a beautiful woman who makes my breath catch in my throat and my skin tingle with a single touch, get in the way of that.
Chapter Three
Cora Hapsberg pulled the door to her room closed and turned the key in the lock. Mr. and Mrs. Cole had been so kind as to allow her a padlock on the door to the room she rented from them, and she took every opportunity to ensure she used it. Not that she didn’t trust them, but their teenage son Harris had been caught snooping in her room on more than one occasion, and his pimpled face and vacant eyes gave her the chills.