A Cowboy Unmatched (3 page)

“You shoulda heard him howl. Travis and Crock thought we were under attack. They snatched up their guns and ran across the yard while I stumbled to the porch, bent over with laughter. Jim staggered out of his workshop, took one look at me, and lunged for the railing. I never ran so fast in my life. I didn't venture back till well after dark.”

Neill chuckled and shook his head. “Jim stank so bad, Travis made him sleep in the barn for a week. 'Course, he made me scrub down the workshop from floor to ceiling and take over Jim's chores for the week, too. But it was worth it.”

He winked at her, and Clara couldn't resist a smile over his antics, even as she ducked her head to focus her attention on her bowl.
Empty.
She chanced a glance at Neill's bowl. It was empty, as well. But she wasn't ready for the meal to end. Slipping quietly to her feet, Clara retrieved the coffeepot from the stove and refilled both of their cups, hoping to manufacture a reason for them to linger.

Neill had fallen quiet, though, and she worried he'd leave if she didn't find a way to prolong the conversation, so as she eased back into her chair, she gave voice to the first thing that popped into her head.

“I wish I'd had older brothers to lean on after my parents died. Maybe then I wouldn't have felt pressured to marry the first man who asked.” Clara bit down on her wayward tongue. She couldn't believe she'd just blurted that out. Yet a defiant part of her was glad she had. It was true. And no amount of fanciful thinking could change it. She should know. She'd tried for two years.

“How old were you?” His deep voice melted over her, free of accusation, and in that moment, she knew she was going to tell him.

He was safe, she rationalized. A stranger passing through. And she'd been carrying the burden too long alone.

“Eighteen. Papa ran a trading post out here when all that existed were a handful of ranches.” The words poured out of her as she stared at the dregs of chowder at the bottom of her bowl. “He was half Comanche, so people weren't all that happy to do business with him,
but his was the only outfit around, so they did.” She stole a glance at Neill. He didn't appear shocked by the revelation of her heritage.

“I imagine he came to earn their respect,” he said, lifting his coffee to his mouth, “since he was able to keep his business even after the town started growing.”

“He did.” Clara sat a little straighter, pride lifting her chin to face Neill Archer fully. “He ran an honest store and understood the ranchers' needs better than anyone else. Extended credit in hard times, too, when other businessmen refused.”

“But his generosity left you without a way to support yourself when he died, didn't it.”

Clara nodded. “It wasn't his fault. He and Mama got the fever during the winter and died before the spring crops could be harvested and the debts repaid. I had to sell the remaining inventory to Claasen's General Store in order to pay Papa's suppliers. There hadn't been much left after that. So when Matthew Danvers, son of the wealthiest rancher in Dry Gulch, starting courting me, I thought my troubles were over. Turns out, they were just beginning.”

 
 Chapter 4 
 

Neill's hands clenched into fists beneath the table. “He didn't beat you, did he?”

If he had, Neill would dig the fella up, shoot his no-good carcass full of holes, and then spit on his bones and leave them for the wild animals to carry off.

“No.” Clara shook her head, a sad little smile curving her lips. “Matthew was more neglectful than cruel. After our wedding, he set me up in this . . . house.” The word emerged as if she weren't quite sure the structure qualified for the description. “I think he won it in a card game. One of the few things he managed to hang on to. I tried to make it a home, but he rarely spent more than a night or two under this roof at any one time. He much preferred the hotel in town. It was closer to the saloon. And the card games.”

How could a man be married to this exotic princess and not want to spend every moment of the day with her? Neill couldn't fathom such stupidity.

“He just left you out here . . . alone?”

She laughed softly at the disbelief in his voice. “I didn't understand it at first, either. I thought perhaps I had angered or disappointed him. But then his father paid a visit, and everything became clear.”

Neill's jaw tightened. “Mack Danvers.”

Clara nodded, looking down to her lap. “Apparently Matthew had been bucking his father's orders most of his life. Not surprising, really, what with Mack being such a hard man. Matthew refused to take his place as the heir to the Danvers ranch, shirking his duties in favor of carousing in town. If Mack wanted him to attend church, Matthew opted for an all-night binge in the saloon on Saturday night. If Mack told him to buy thirty Herefords from a rancher in Amarillo, Matthew would return with two dozen longhorns.

“And when Mack threatened to cut Matthew off if he didn't marry and produce a son, Matthew married the one woman in town most likely to stick in Mack's craw. Me.” A brittle laugh escaped her, the sound cutting through Neill's heart like broken glass. “It's rather humbling for a bride to realize she was chosen not for her beauty
or intelligence or even her cooking skills, but because she was the woman most likely to be disdained by her husband's father.”

Neill couldn't stop himself. He reached out and covered her hand where it lay fiddling with the edge of her empty bowl. She startled slightly but did not pull free of his touch.

“There is nothing about you to disdain, Clara,” he asserted fiercely. “I've only known you a day, but I can see evidence of your hard work, your care and concern for your animals and the babe that will be born soon. You are beautiful and strong, and I admire you more than any woman I've come across.”

A sheen of tears misted her eyes, but she blinked them away and shook her head. “There's plenty in me to disdain as far as Mack Danvers is concerned. The Comanche killed his wife, you see. His wife and his oldest son, the one who was supposed to be his heir. All they left him was his grief and a boy so full of anger and hurt that rebellion was his only outlet.”

Clara tried to ease her fingers from his hold, but Neill tightened his grip. “You're not responsible for the actions of a handful of renegade warriors any more than I am responsible for the actions of the whites who slaughtered Comanche women and children in retaliation. Mack Danvers is wrong.”

“He might be wrong,” Clara said, tugging her hand free at last and pushing to her feet, “but he's a force to be reckoned with in this county. He sits on the city council and is well respected not only for his wealth but for his dedication to town growth. It's because of his money and influence that Dry Gulch has a school, a sheriff. People listen to him.”

She wrapped a protective arm around her stomach for the briefest of moments before reaching to collect the dirty dishes. It was a motion so instinctual, Neill doubted she was even aware she had done it. But he was. More than aware. The telling gesture set off alarms in his gut.

Mack Danvers wasn't through making trouble for Clara.

Clara was amazed at how quickly she'd grown accustomed to Neill Archer's presence. After only three days, they'd fallen into such an easy routine, it felt as if he'd been working on her place for years.

He'd surprised her the first morning by milking Hester and leaving the full bucket inside the back door for her to find when she emerged
from the bedroom. He'd mucked the stalls, too, and replaced two broken rungs on the loft ladder before carting it over to the edge of the house and climbing onto her roof. All before breakfast.

The man knew how to work.

Yet it was the evenings she would miss the most when he left, not the labor. For at the end of the day, they'd linger over dinner and coffee, talking about the day and about deeper, more personal matters. Matters they'd probably never have had the courage to put voice to if they didn't know their time together was so fleeting.

She'd told him the tale of how her Comanche grandmother had arrived at her grandfather's trading post with a half-dozen moccasins to barter for food and blankets and how her grandfather had slipped a handful of penny candy into her supply sack when she wasn't looking in hopes that the sweet treat would bribe her into returning. It did. In the course of a summer, he'd managed to teach her English, a few Bible stories, and what it meant to fall in love with a white man.

Neill had spoken about leaving home two years ago, and about how that leaving had hurt his oldest brother, Travis. The man was more father than brother to him and didn't understand why Neill felt compelled to buy his own spread when the family ranch was his home. Clara suspected that leaving had hurt Neill, as well, though he didn't say so. Instead he talked of the land he hoped to buy. About trees that stretched to the sky and lush pastures where his cattle would graze. About his best friend, Josiah, a local sharecropper's son, and their dream of running the ranch together. Josiah had stayed behind to accumulate a starter herd while Neill traveled from place to place, earning the funds necessary to purchase the land.

When he talked about his friend, a light came to his eyes that signaled more than a casual camaraderie. It seemed a deep bond existed between the two. Neill claimed he wanted the spread as a way to prove he was his own man, yet Clara couldn't help wondering if his motives had more to do with Josiah. Sharecroppers had a rough lot—working another man's land for only a fraction of the profit. Few men escaped such a life, never able to save enough from their meager earnings to invest in land of their own. She'd seen Neill's compassionate side, his altruistic nature. There might have been a part of him that chose to leave home in order to escape the shadow of his brothers, but she'd bet her new roof that his leaving had more to do with creating opportunities for his friend than for himself.

Clara leaned back in her bedroom rocker and allowed her eyes to slide closed. Her hands went lax, and the tiny gown she'd been sewing pooled in her lap. The rhythmic pounding overhead lulled her as Neill fastened shingles to the roof. Such a comforting sound. The sound of a man nearby. The sound of protection, provision. Her baby pushed against her womb, a tiny knee or foot bulging against the place where her palm rested on the shelf of her belly. A smile curved her lips. She never tired of feeling her baby move. Such a miracle.

Gently, she nudged the rocker into motion with her foot and rubbed slow circles over the area where she imagined the baby's back was. She caressed her child and hummed one of the tunes Neill played after retiring to the barn each night.

With her eyes closed, she could almost imagine it was night now, the soft refrains of his fiddle offering her a lullaby sweeter than any bird's song.

She'd taken to sitting in this very chair, a wrapper covering her nightdress, the lantern extinguished as she waited for the soft, lilting music—music that touched her soul like a tender caress—to float to her through the propped-open window.

He said the music eased his loneliness. She feared when he left, the memory of it would magnify hers.

Clara fell into a light doze until the sound of an approaching rider brought her head up with a jerk. Her heart thumped against her chest, as it always did when unexpected visitors paid a call. Until Neill, she'd never experienced a favorable outcome from such a visit.

Neill
.

Her pulse steadied. She wasn't alone.

Yet as she moved from the bedroom to the main part of the house, she noticed an absence of hammering. Had Neill left while she dozed to see to some other chore, or had he just paused in his work to take stock of her caller?

Praying it was the latter, Clara took Matthew's shotgun down from above the doorframe and cracked the door open.

A dull pain ripped across her abdomen at the same time she recognized the horse and rider coming to a halt in her yard. She winced and immediately sent her prayers reeling in the opposite direction.
Please let Neill be
far away
. For his sake, as well as hers.

Mack Danvers had little patience for men who interfered in his business. And right now,
she
was his business.