Night Flower (Gone-to-Texas Trilogy) (20 page)

      
“And I've shot rattlesnakes since I was a boy,” Lee replied matter-of-factly.

      
“You dirty Mex—” the ranger's hand flashed, but he never pulled the revolver from its holster. Lee vaulted across the water trough and kicked him squarely in the solar plexus. Brocker was knocked backward to the dust and Lee landed on top of him, knife drawn and strategically placed at the big man's jugular. “Any more slurs on my ancestry,
rinche
?” he asked in a harsh whisper.

      
Brocker only wheezed, struggling to regain his breath.

      
Just then a loud blast ripped the air, sending the already chastened mob into frenzied retreat. Wash Oakley's enormous girth loomed over the edge of the crowd as he stood at the corner of Commerce Street with a shotgun aimed at the center of the mob. Obedience, only slightly less formidable, appeared at the opposite end of the street from behind the newspaper office.

      
“We got us a Mexican standoff, gents,” Wash said genially.

      
“An’ I'll plug th' first feller, Mex er gringo, whut moves anyways but away from thet buildin',” Obedience added. “Jeehosaphat, skedaddle!”

      
By now the mob had erupted into blind panic and was scattering up and down the street, evaporating between buildings. Soon the area; was deserted except for the Oakleys, Lee, and the semiconscious Zeb Brocker.

      
Melanie, Amos, and Clarence slowly emerged from the building. Before Wash and Obedience could reach the
Star
office, Lee whirled on Melanie and grabbed her roughly away from the two men. “You belong at the boardinghouse, little miss, not here inciting a riot!”

      
“You're the one who nearly got yourself killed! Why blame me? I was only doing my job in my own place of work,” she responded furiously, jerking her arm free of his bruising grasp.

      
“Your place of work—your place seems to be anywhere there's trouble,” he retorted.

      
“And I suppose I should be sitting in the parlor knitting, huh? I happen to be a reporter and I write about trouble. I don't make it.” She looked into his narrowed black eyes, daring him to bring up the subject of her story about him.

      
He didn't. Instead, he turned to Pemberton and said, “You're all three lucky to be alive—and that bastard French who started the whole thing isn't even around. You ought to fire this girl and hire a gun hand if you want him to keep writing about downtrodden Indians.”

      
Melanie let out a furious hiss of breath, too angry to speak.

      
Observing the heated exchange between the young pair, Obedience warned Wash to silence when he started to speak up. She turned to Lee and said, “Why don't yew take this here gal back home whilst me 'n' Wash see ta gettin th’ trash off th' street.”

      
Eyeing Brocker, Wash reached down and hauled his six-foot-two frame up as if lifting a rag doll. Tossing the coughing man over his shoulder, Oakley whistled cheerfully down the street, calling out, “Fetch me th' horses, woman, 'n' I'll dump this garbage clear o' town.”

      
Shrugging at the Oakleys, Lee once more grabbed Melanie's arm and began to drag her away from the amazed pair of old men standing in the
Star's
doorway.

      
“I'm not going anywhere with you, Leandro Velasquez!” Unsuccessfully, she attempted to yank her arm free. Looking to Clarence and Amos for help, she was amazed when they both vanished precipitately back into their ink-stained lair.

      
Melanie gritted her teeth as he hustled her along the sidewalk. “Why don't you shower all this chivalrous attention on Larena Sandoval? I'm certain your fiancée would be more appreciative.” The instant the words escaped her lips she hated herself. The smirk that twitched at his sculpted lips was positively infuriating.

      
“Why, Miss Fleming, don't tell me you're jealous? Larena told me what a perfectly lovely article you wrote about our betrothal fiesta.”

      
“And I'll be even happier to write about your wedding ceremony—if only you take your demure little bride off to Night Flower Ranch and—pollinate!” she finished in an infuriated huff.

      
He threw back his head and laughed. “Why, Melanie, what a perfectly indelicate thing for a lady to say. But then, I keep forgetting you're a reporter, not a lady.” He looked down distastefully at her ink-stained nose and rumpled clothes. “Don't you own anything that fits?”

      
“How do you know whether or not my clothes fit—unless you've been peeking through keyholes while I dress!” she shot back defiantly.

      
He recalled how delectable she had looked in a silk shirt and riding skirt that day in Austin over six years ago. Angry at the unwanted stirring evoked by the memory of her curvaceous little body, he stopped short and pulled her suddenly into his arms. “Have you ever been well and truly pollinated, Miss Fleming? It begins something like this.” He bent down suddenly and kissed her startled, opened lips, holding her head prisoner in one hand while his other arm pressed her body tightly to his.

      
They were alone on the deserted street and it was full dark now. Melanie was so startled by his mercurial mood changes from anger to humor to this unexpected passion that she did not protest when his mouth closed over hers. His tongue ravaged inside, sending strange darts of warm, liquid pleasure through her body. She could feel the way his hard chest flattened her breasts as he pressed her closer to him, molding their bodies together in a shockingly intimate fashion.

      
Having been kissed by a variety of beaus, from the young cowboy Micah Torrance to the intellectual swains in Boston, Melanie had thought herself rather sophisticated about men. None of them had dared take the liberties Lee Velasquez was taking. But then, why shouldn't he do with her as he wished? He considered her no lady, merely a mongrel with despised Indian blood in her veins! She tore her mouth free of his bruising kiss and pushed with surprising strength against his chest. Lee freed her so quickly she almost lost her balance.

      
Humiliation washed over her for the way he had made her feel. Even now, she could sense the male triumph radiating from him as he looked with amusement at her heaving breasts and flushed face. She stumbled backward, braced herself, and delivered a stinging slap that wiped the arrogant grin from his face. “I’m not your plaything, Leandro Velasquez! Go inflict your attentions on your fiancée.”

      
He was rubbing his jaw when he caught up with her as she stomped up the street. “For such a little bit, you sure pack a wallop. Just a lesson—be careful who you talk to about risqué subjects, Melanie.”

      
“I certainly won't talk to you about anything, ever again,” she retorted as his long-legged strides easily overtook her far shorter ones.

* * * *

      
“This is the best corn bread I've ever eaten, Obedience,” Charlee Slade said, wiping the golden-brown crumbs from her mouth as she savored the last morsel of one of Obedience's famous corn dodgers.

      
The two women sat in the big boardinghouse kitchen late one afternoon, catching up on the past week's gossip. “Yew ever miss runnin' this here place, Charlee?” Obedience asked.

      
“Oh, sometimes, when Will and Sarah are fighting or little Lee's just broken half the dishes in the china cupboard, but mostly, no. I have more than enough to do at Bluebonnet. Speaking of past proprietresses of this establishment, you and Deborah ought to be getting together shortly. That baby's due any day now, and I know she's dying to come for a visit. Wait till you see how Adam has grown.”

      
“The Flemings got them quite a brood now, ain't they?” Obedience said fondly. “I wuz worried somethin' fierce when Deborah's first letter come from thet ranch, sayin' she 'n' her Frenchman wuz back together.”

      
Charlee laughed. “So was I, but obviously it's worked out rather well for her and Rafe. You'll like him, Obedience. He reminds me of Lee in some ways—all that fierce Latin arrogance on the surface; but beneath it, they're both good men with a lot of love to give the woman strong enough to stand up to them.”

      
“Jeehosaphat, Deborah fills thet bill, fer shore!” Obedience said with a chuckle.

      
“Larena Sandoval doesn't,” Charlee replied darkly. “She's too much like Dulcia. Oh, Obedience, Lee's trying to recapture the past. That's no way to build a future.”

      
Obedience's shrewd countenance reflected her agreement. “Purty gal 'n' right nice, but no grit. She'll be bowin' ‘n scraping’ ta him th' rest o’ their lives.”

      
“When she isn't in a ‘delicate condition’ and unable to submit to him,” Charlee said cryptically. Then, seeing her friend's confusion, she told her the tale of Dulcia's distaste for her marital duties.

      
“Why ‘n hell would a feller as bright as Lee want ta get hitched up ta sech a unnatural female a second time?” Obedience looked baffled.

      
Charlee signed. “He's full of Hispanic pride and still cherishes his boyhood notions about a fairy tale romance that never really existed. He's a man now and ought to have more sense, but last week he was lecturing Jim about exercising more control over me while I was in town to help Father Gus with the new school!”

      
Obedience guffawed. “Fer as long's thet boy's knowed yew, he shore ain't figgered much out! I reckon it takes a good tussle with words now ‘n agin afore a man ‘n woman get a good tussle in bed.”

      
Charlee laughed out loud. “Jim used to say unless a man's mad enough to strangle a woman, he's not really in love with her.” She paused and then added darkly, “Of course, when I consider how near Jim came to marrying Tomasina Carver, I'm really concerned about Lee. Men are such jackasses.”

      
Obedience said cheerfully, “All men's purely worthless—”

      
“ ‘Cept fer one thing,” Charlee finished for her. “Deborah passed your sage words on to me years ago.”

      
Both women shared a chuckle as they thought about the past. “Yew ‘n Deborah ‘n me, we done real good pickin' menfolk—not countin' my second and third husbands, o' course. Shore wish we could do somethin' ‘bout thet youngun o’ Deborah's, though.”

      
“Melanie?” Charlee asked in surprise.

      
“I been watchin’ her ‘n Lee. ‘Pears ta me they fight like cornered bobcats ever’ time they meet up.” Obedience proceeded to tell Charlee about Melanie's first encounter with Lee in Galveston, the interview for the
Star
, and the dangerous episode of the near riot a few weeks earlier.

      
Charlee listened in rapt attention, turning over in her mind the idea of the two of them together. She definitely liked it! “Lee's mentioned her to me, as well,” she said when Obedience had finished. “After he came back from Galveston—hell, it must've been ten years ago. Even as a little girl, she got under his skin. I remember it now. And you should've seen how they reacted to one another in Austin. Of course, she looked like a woman then, not a crusader.” Charlee sighed, recalling her own painful metamorphosis from tomboy to belle.

      
“I was just as ignorant as Melanie. My mother wanted me to dress and act properly, and I looked as bad as Melanie does now. Deborah's had a fit over the wardrobe Melanie came home with from Boston.”

      
Obedience scratched her chin in consideration. “Didn't Deborah teach yew how ta dress ‘n act ‘n sech so's yew cud ketch Jim Slade?”

      
Charlee chuckled. “I'm way ahead of you. Now I owe her one for her daughter.”

Chapter Eleven

      
“Absolutely not! I refuse to break my neck in high-heeled shoes or mince around in dresses so tight-waisted that I swoon for lack of oxygen.” Melanie glared across the big desk at Charlee when she broached the subject of more fashionable clothing. They confronted each other in the boardinghouse office, where Charlee had taken Melanie after dinner for a private talk.

      
“If you could have heard me ten years ago, that's exactly how I felt about looking like a female.” Charlee chuckled, then turned serious. “Melanie, look at yourself. At least I had a reason for the breeches and shirts and bare feet. I was comfortable that way in the Texas heat.” She let the vision of an adolescent Charlee McAllister dressed scandalously like a boy register with Melanie, then continued, “But you're overdressed. That jacket and skirt must weigh twenty pounds, not to mention the soles on those mud clompers you call ‘sensible shoes.’ I'd guess we're about the same size, but those shoes are so big I could get both feet in one of them!”

      
Melanie looked a little sheepish. “Well, they are too big—”

      
“Too big! Hell, Obedience could wear them with room to spare!”

      
“They don't come in small sizes. They're made back east for women with bunions,” Melanie retorted, as if that explained everything.

      
“Well, heavens be praised, you'll never have to worry about bunions, just blisters!” Charlee exclaimed in disgust.

      
Melanie's lips curved in an unwilling smile. “You sound like Grandpa when you say ‘heavens be praised.’ He was always yelling that at me—at Mama, too, when she was a girl.”

      
Charlee had her opening now. “Whatever else she did to stir him up, I know Deborah Manchester always looked lovely; and she taught you how to dress as well. These hot, ugly clothes you've adopted are a disguise, young lady.”