She frowned. “I hope I’m here then. Now that school’s out, I sometimes go with Doc when he makes house calls.”
Silas gave her one last kiss. A kiss that lingered because she sure liked kissing him. Hard to ride away from that.
But he had to.
He mounted up and she stayed to watch him. “Be seein’ you soon, Dinah.”
Chapter Nine
Tuesday morning while Dinah was out weeding the garden, she heard hoofbeats. Hopeful, she peered around the tomato plant to see Silas reining his horse to a stop right outside the fence line.
For a moment she let herself admire the masculine glory of him on horseback. A rugged man in full control of the massive animal beneath him. Even from where she stood, she noticed the powerful muscles in Silas’s thighs. His mastery in directing his horse with his knees rather than just yanking on the reins. Not to mention how mesmerizing his backside was as he dismounted with balance and grace.
As he tied up his horse, he called out, “Good morning, sweetheart.”
“Good morning.” She stepped out of the garden. “Please tell me you’re not here to see Doc because you broke, burned or sliced a body part?”
Silas laughed.
That husky, warm sound enveloped her like a summer breeze.
“No, I’m here to see my girl. Made a special trip to town and everything.”
Dinah cocked her head in challenge. “Really.”
“Well…no. But I had to come into Robinette’s to pick up a few things for Henrikson, since he’s feelin’ poorly, and I thought I’d swing by to see your pretty face.”
They were close enough to touch but separated by the chicken-wire fence.
Silas’s intense gaze roamed over her, from her hat to her work boots. When his blue eyes met hers again, she felt as if he’d stripped her bare and run his hands across her skin.
Suppressing a shiver, she flipped her braid over her shoulder. “Do I pass inspection?”
“Sugar pie, as always, you look good enough to eat.”
“Silas.”
“Come around the fence and give me a proper kiss.” He flashed her his devilish smile. “Or better yet…a very improper kiss.”
Dinah removed her hat and set it in the basket before she lifted the metal loop that served as the handle for the outer gate.
As soon as she was within touching distance, Silas cupped her face in his hands. His kiss was softer than she’d anticipated. A few teasing brushes of his mouth across hers. Then his happy sigh gusted across her lips as he rested his forehead to hers, his hat keeping them in shadow.
“That was very proper,” she whispered.
“Mmm. You needed it sweet.” He angled her head to press his lips to her temple. “I’ll save improper for when Mrs. Agnes ain’t gawkin’ out the window at us.”
When Dinah tried to turn around to see if he was pulling her leg, he held fast.
“Nope. She can have your attention later. I want you all to myself since I can’t stay long.” He nuzzled her hairline. “Walk with me.” He took her hand.
“Where to?”
“Show me your outdoor classroom.”
It pleased her immensely that he’d remembered that.
They strolled hand in hand through the long grass, still soaked with dew. It felt completely natural being with Silas, even when the anticipation of his improper kisses caused her belly to churn.
“What’s going on at the McKay Ranch today?”
“I’m roundin’ up cows, five or so at a time, and puttin’ them in one of the two bullpens.”
“How many bulls do you have?”
“Six. I’ve been buildin’ a new pen closer to the creek, where the grass grows faster. I had two big bulls born this spring and as soon as they’re weaned, they’ll move into the bullpen and I’ll rotate the oldest bull out.”
“Rotate him out. Meaning?”
“He’ll be butchered.”
“Do you butcher it yourself?”
“Yeah. It ain’t the best meat so I keep it for myself. It’s messy work.”
Dinah stopped and looked at him. “Is that hard? Killing an animal that you’ve cared for?”
Once again Silas curled his hands around her face. The wariness in his eyes caused her heart to skip a beat. “Will you look at me differently if I say no?”
“Not if you explain it to me so I have a better understanding of it.” She placed her hand over his. “And a better understanding of you.”
“Okay.” Silas lowered his mouth to hers for another sweetly chaste kiss. “Come on.” He led her to a fallen log and crouched down to inspect it.
“What are you doing?”
“Lookin’ for ants. Them little buggers love this kinda wood. It’d be just my luck to sit down, we’d get to talkin’ and then the next thing I’d see is you jumpin’ up and down, ants crawlin’ all over you. Then I’d have to strip off your clothes…” He stood. His dimpled grin sent her blood racing. “Maybe I oughta look for an ant-covered log, because I surely would like to see what’s under that day dress.”
Her cheeks warmed. “That’s a little forward.”
“Mmm-hmm. I want you forward and backward and every way in between.”
I want that too.
Silas emitted a low rumble. “Dinah. You lookin’ at me that way ain’t helpin’ me keep my hands to myself.”
She glanced down to see he’d balled his hands into tight fists. The veins in his forearms bulged. The thought of tracing those pulsing veins with her fingers or her mouth sent a lick of heat down her spine.
“Sit.” He closed his eyes and exhaled. “Please.”
But after she settled herself, he silently paced in front of her.
So much for the ease of companionship between them.
“Ranchin’ is a hard life. Ranchin’ in Wyoming is harder yet because of the isolation and the harsh winters. It’s back-breaking work. Depending on the cattle market, some years will be lean, some will be flush. I care for these animals, only to send them to slaughter. Lots of folks don’t understand that, even when they’re happy to have the benefits of my hard work in their butcher shop.”
“I appreciate you explaining this to me.”
He quit pacing for a moment and wiped the sweat from his brow. “I’m impressed that you asked the question.” Then he returned to walking and talking. “This is the life I’ve been workin’ toward since I was thirteen and on my first cattle drive. After four years here, I feel a connection to the land and a need to build something meaningful with it, something I can pass on. I can only share that life with a woman who understands that. A woman who accepts that I’m a man content raisin’ cattle and ridin’ the range and I don’t aspire to be anything else. A woman with softness and resilience who can stand next to me and go toe to toe with me as we face life’s challenges side by side. A woman who’ll let me take care of her even when I know she’s capable of takin’ care of herself.” He stopped in front of her and waited until she looked up at him. “That woman is you.”
Then he removed his hat, clasping it to his heart as he dropped to one knee and reached for her hand.
Dear lord. The fierce look in his eyes made her lightheaded.
“Dinah Thompson. I intend to marry you.”
She forgot how to breathe.
“I know it seems sudden to you—”
“It is sudden!” she practically yelled. “You officially started courting me on Saturday. It is Tuesday, Silas.” But Jonas’s warning that Silas wouldn’t see the difference between courting her and marrying her rang true.
“Are you tellin’ me no?”
“I’m telling you that I don’t know! I like you. I like getting to know you.”
He flashed her a cocky grin. “You like kissin’ me too.”
An annoyed noise burst forth—part growl, part sigh. “Why are you pushing me on this?”
“Because I’ve been half in love with you since the first time you yelled at me during the blizzard.”<
br />
She scowled. “I didn’t yell at you.”
“Yes, darlin’, you did.” Another smile danced on his lips. “I deserved it though. Then you were sweet as you took care of me. You ate with me and read to me and fussed over me. I’ve never had that. Never wanted it, to be honest. But you changed that for me. I imagined havin’ that kinda care from you all the time. I even imagined you lettin’ me care for you in the same way. So this ain’t a sudden thing for me.”
How was she supposed to respond to that? When her heart was both melting and in her throat?
“Besides, I want everyone to know we’re together.” He kissed her knuckles. “I want everyone to know that you’re mine.”
“Then maybe you oughta just whip out your branding iron and sear your cattle brand into my backside,” she retorted.
Both his eyebrows raised. “You’d let me do that?”
“Blast your ornery hide, Silas McKay, I was joking!”
He laughed. “I know, sugar pie. But I’m not joking when I say I’d like to call you my intended.”
She opened her mouth, but he’d had enough of her protests. He brought her face to his, devouring her mouth in a kiss so delightfully improper that her entire body tingled.
Silas broke the kiss to rest his forehead above her bosom, his own chest heaving. “And then there’s that.”
Yes, the passion between them grew the more time they spent together.
Dinah ran her fingers through his inky black hair, loving how he trembled when she scratched her nails across his scalp and down the muscles in his neck.
He expelled a resigned sigh. “I’ve gotta head home.”
“Can you at least stay for lunch?”
“No. It’s a thirty-minute ride back.” He nuzzled the rise of her breasts and she felt the heat of his breath through the thin calico fabric. If that small amount of contact sent warmth between her legs, how would she react when they were skin to skin?
Like you’re burning up from the inside out.
He pushed to his feet, settled his hat on his head and reached down to help her up.
Neither spoke until they were back to the fence where he’d left his horse.
“Now that you’re my intended, there’s two things we need to talk about.”
“Absolutely I’ll let you buy me a betrothal ring,” she teased.
“Sassy mouth.” He kissed her. “Right now I’m responsible for runnin’ two ranches. My time is limited, and we have distance separating us. I know you turned down that randy old goat’s marriage offer because he didn’t intend to woo you. I am gonna woo you, darlin’. I’m gonna woo you hard. But to be clear…it ain’t gonna be a traditional courtin’.”
“Well, it wasn’t a traditional proposal, so I’m not surprised.”
Silas smiled. “I aim to be memorable.”
“That you are. What kind of wooing should I expect?”
“I’d like to come and get you on Saturday afternoon. You’d spend the night with me, and we’d be together Saturday night and all day Sunday. Now before you go getting that panicked look in your eyes, I don’t expect to turn my bed into our marriage bed…until you’re ready.” He traced her jawline with tenderness that belied the roughness in his hands. “I want you with me, Dinah, as much as possible. With us livin’ this far apart that’s the only way we can spend more than Sunday afternoons together.”
Maybe she should care what others in the community might think, but she didn’t. She said, “Okay. I’ll let Doc know I won’t be around to assist him Saturday night.”
Silas’s answering smile was something to behold.
“What about Jonas? Will he be there?”
“Jonas spends maybe one or two nights at the ranch house. It’s like he don’t live there.”
“Where is he sleeping when he’s not on duty?”
Silas shrugged. “He ain’t had to arrest anyone lately, so probably the empty jail cell. His job is his life.” He ambled to the saddlebag on the right side of his horse. As he undid the buckle he said, “I brought you something. Hang on, it might take a bit to sort through this other stuff to find it.”
“While you’re looking for it, I’ll make you a quick lunch you can eat on your way home.”
Before she could turn away, Silas’s hands were on her hips and his mouth was plundering hers to the very depths of her soul. Lord, the man could kiss.
The horses’ snort broke them apart.
Silas planted a kiss below her ear. “I like how sweetly my intended takes care of me. Will you let me do the same for you?”
“Within reason.”
He laughed and she opted not to point out she hadn’t been joking. One of her favorite things about Silas was he saw her as capable, not as a fragile thing to be coddled.
Dinah still had a smile on her face when she entered the kitchen. She’d just sliced four pieces of bread when Mrs. Agnes slammed her cane on the floor, giving Dinah a fright. The woman had perched herself in the chair next to the window.
“Good morning, Mrs. Agnes. I didn’t see you sitting there.”
“Well I saw you kissing that McKay fella in broad daylight.”
“That’s to be expected when we’re together since he is courting me,” she said cheekily as she arranged roasted chicken pieces on the bread.
“He’s dangerous. More trouble than he’s worth with all the fighting and whatnot. You’re a pretty girl. You should set your cap for a man without those violent tendencies. You never know if he might turn them on you.”
That blanket statement about Silas’s character rankled. Mrs. Agnes didn’t know Silas at all. “Silas is a good man. In fact, I agreed to marry him.”
“When did this come about?” she demanded.
“Just today.”
“Did he give you a ring?”
“Not yet. But his promise of intent is enough for me.”
“Which is all good and well, but you made a promise to my husband in writing to help him out as his nursing assistant and as a teacher for another year. You gonna run into the arms of the first man who offers to take care of you?”
Was that how she saw it? Would everyone else in the community think the same thing?
Is she wrong though?
Yes. And she’d prove it to Mrs. Agnes and any other busybodies who questioned her strength of purpose by keeping her word to Doc—and her promise to herself. If anyone would understand, it’d be Silas.
She sliced three chunks of cheese and aligned them on the bread. Then she wrapped both sandwiches in a cotton dish towel. She popped a wax stopper in the bottle of milk from this morning’s milking and snagged it on her way out. “I’ll be back to make you lunch.”
“If you haven’t given all our food to your intended,” Mrs. Agnes grumbled.
Dinah refused to let that grumpy woman ruin her day—even when her words were something she’d chew over before she shared them with Silas.
Silas’s backside rested against the fence and he held the horses’ reins in his left hand. He grinned when he saw the bottle. “Milk too?”
“I fear it might churn into butter before you get it home if it’s bouncing around in your saddlebag.”
“Maybe. But then I’d have butter to enjoy. Thanks, darlin’. Now c’mere. Close your eyes and hold out your hands.”
Feeling strangely shy, she complied. She felt a tiny flutter in her belly when Silas’s soft lips touched the center of each of her palms. Then he curled her fingers around the items he’d placed there. “Okay. Now you can look.”
In her right hand was a metal tin of lemon drops. In her left hand was a wide band of grosgrain ribbon the color of a robin’s egg. “Silas. This is so thoughtful. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I also bought you a pie tin, but that’s for our household.”
Again, her heart stuttered at his casual use of our household. “Are you sure…”
His gaze snapped to hers. “Are you questioning whether I can afford to buy you little tokens?”
Lord, he was touchy about money. But then again, so was she, since she’d bristled at the very idea of not earning her own living. “No, I was going to say I’m sure you’re hoping I’ll put that pan to good use by learning to bake that sugar pie you’ve been telling me is your favorite.”
It took a moment for his tension to leave and that devil-may-care smile to reappear. “Yes, I sure hope that pie is in my future. Now gimme a kiss that’ll hold me over until I fetch you on Saturday.”
Dinah wreathed her arms around Silas’s neck, kissing him with every bit of joy in her heart. She whispered, “I’ll miss you,” and slipped away, without looking back to watch him leave.
Friday night Dinah was cleaning up the exam room after Doc had reset a broken arm when she heard, “Look who’s been left all alone, cleaning up after the misdeeds of men again.”
She whirled around to see Zeke West leaning in the open doorway, as if posing for a tintype.
If she’d seen him out and about, she might’ve considered him an attractive man. He wore the finest clothes, in the latest style, on his lean frame. He kept his dark beard neatly trimmed and he’d slicked his hair back in the fashion preferred by a railroad muckety-muck, and carried himself in the same manner.
But his eyes had no light in them, the eerie brown giving the impression of endless black holes. When he bothered to show his straight white teeth, he resembled a territorial wolf baring his canines, not a man merely offering a smile.
He flat-out scared her, and that was before she’d seen the aftereffects of his violent nature.
An unwelcome chill snaked up her spine. “If you’ll wait right there, Mr. West, I’ll get Doc so he can find out what’s ailing you.”
“No need to do that. I already know what’s ailing me.” He pushed off the doorjamb and stalked toward her.
Dinah retreated, putting the exam table between them. “I’m not actually comfortable with you—”
He slammed his hands on the table, cutting off her response and causing her to jump. “You know what I’m not comfortable with? Know what’s ailing me and makin’ me sick? The rumor I heard that you’re lettin’ that weaselly bastard Silas McKay court you.”
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