Finally, she turned to him, all business. “There’s a storm coming in. I can feel it in the air. We ride the borders of the ranch until dark.”
His body had taken a beating on the horse yesterday, but this morning when he’d climbed back on for more torture, he’d found the ride easier. Thanks to her constant shouting, he’d learned to distribute his weight more evenly and control the animal with far less effort. She’d told him it was probably far more comfortable for the horse, but to his surprise it was also more comfortable for him. His new heavy twill trousers and boots protected his legs, and the gloves buffered the blisters on his palms.
When she shot off toward the west, he was only a few lengths behind. They rode what she called
the border
, as though Whispering Mountain were its own country. They looked for breaks in the fence or places where the animals might get themselves in trouble. They stopped three times to mend a fence and once to check out tracks. She told him that once in a while big cats would come down from far back in the hills looking for food in winter.
Lewt didn’t like to think about what one of the mountain lions could do to a newborn horse. He was starting to understand why she cared so much for the beautiful animals and why she wore a gun to keep them safe.
When he bumped her for the third time as he straightened the fence, he stopped suddenly and dropped the pole he’d been holding.
“What are you doing? We don’t have it in place yet.” She straightened, angry at their wasted effort.
“I’ve had enough,” he said simply. “Every time I accidentally touch you, I feel you freeze in panic or bristle like a porcupine. Em, I’m not going to attack you or hurt you. Even if I thought about it you’d shoot me, so why would I even try?”
“We need to get this fence fixed.”
“We need to get this settled between us.” Neither of them moved. “Hit me, Em. Hit me hard. Get some of that anger out. I don’t know if you’re mad at all men or just me, but I’m here. I’m your target.”
“I don’t want to hit you.” She straightened.
“Yes, you do. I got a feeling you want to hit every man in the world, so you might as well start with me.” He widened his stance. “Hit me. We’re not finishing this fence until you get this out of your system, and I seem to be the only male near enough for you to hate.”
She glared at him, raised her hand, and slapped his shoulder.
He didn’t budge. “Hit me hard!”
All the anger she’d stored since she was a child huddled in a corner of her parents’ bedroom exploded, and she swung hard into his shoulder.
He staggered a half step backward and waited for another blow.
Memories of the way her real father had hurt her mother came rolling back. She’d watched him attack her and bed her. She’d heard her mother choke down screams so she wouldn’t wake her daughters. But Em had been awake. She’d witnessed it all.
Suddenly, she was slamming her fist against Lewt’s chest as if he were somehow to blame. He made no effort to block a single blow. The wall of his chest was solid against her assault and she guessed she must be planting bruises, but she didn’t stop.
Finally a sob broke from her throat, and she would have collapsed if he hadn’t held her up. She gulped down tears as rage settled inside her, no longer burning.
“It’s all right, Em,” he finally whispered. “I don’t know if I’ll be here beyond this week or if we’ll ever see each other again, but I want you to know and believe that I’m never going to hurt you. If I come too close you can pound on me again, but don’t be afraid of me.” He looked down at her. “Em, never be afraid of me again.”
She straightened and pulled away. “Why’d you let me do that to you? It must have hurt.”
“I don’t know. Half the time I look at you, I get the feeling you’re fighting to keep from clobbering me.” He studied her, wondering if she was even aware of how she watched every step when he was near. “You all right now?”
“I’m all right,” she answered. He offered his hand, and she took it for a moment. “Thank you,” she whispered as they turned back to the fence.
“You’re welcome,” he whispered back, already tackling the job at hand.
The sun was melting in the west when they rode into the huge barn. A north wind had been whipping up all afternoon, and he was thankful once again for his new coat and gloves. They unsaddled their horses, brushed them down, and filled the feeders.
When he reached to put his coat back on, Em stopped him. “Come over here.” She walked toward the tack room. “You’ve got blood on that new vest.”
“Forget it,” he said as he followed.
She shook her head. “No way. If you’re going courting, you need to look your best. What will the fine ladies say if they see blood?”
He grinned at her. “You do care. Helping me out just a little, are you, Em?”
She shrugged. “I figure you need all the help you can get.”
“Not really. You should see the other two guys. One’s little more than a boy, and he’s a mama’s boy at that. The other is a pompous ass. I’ll be surprised if he’s still around at dinner tonight. The only thing good about that reverend visiting is that he keeps Boyd from constantly bragging. I figure with me staying away a few days, the ladies will have had enough of them and be waiting to spend some time with me.”
Reaching for a rag and a bar of soap, she began working on the blood spilled near the third button of his vest. She stood so close all he would have had to do was lean forward a few inches to kiss her cheek. The idea that he was even thinking about such a thing shocked him.
Em wasn’t the kind of woman he wanted. In truth, she wasn’t much of a woman at all. She rode like a man, talked like a man—hell, half the day she swore like a man. She wasn’t like the girls he’d known in saloons, but she wasn’t the soft female he wanted for a wife.
But right here, right now, with her only inches away, she certainly didn’t smell like a man. Her small kindness touched him in an odd way.
Lewt laughed. He’d been around horses so long today he was starting to act like one. Smelling out for a mate didn’t seem like a good plan.
“What are you laughing at?” she asked.
“You don’t want to know,” he answered.
“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”
Her bluer-than-blue eyes reminded him of fragile Wedgwood china. “I was thinking I’d like to say thanks for helping by kissing you on the cheek.”
“Don’t even think about it or I’ll—”
He took a step back. “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t. Between your attitude and your looks I wouldn’t imagine many men would.”
He saw the hurt in her eyes and wished he could take his words back before the echo of them settled in the barn. He hadn’t meant to hurt her. He’d taken her insults all day without a word, but when he’d tossed one back, he felt lower than slime in a dirty horse trough.
“I’m sorry,” he said, fighting the urge to touch her and brush away the pain he’d caused.
“Forget it.” She turned her back to him. “Go do your courting and stop bothering me.”
He tried to think of something else to say but was afraid he’d only cause more damage. This tough woman who did a man’s work all day wasn’t quite as hardened as she wanted everyone to believe. Somehow, if it took him the rest of the week he had here, he’d make it up to her.
“Where do you eat supper, Em?” It occurred to him that she couldn’t join the hands in the bunkhouse, and she couldn’t join the McMurrays. “Do you ride home first?” She’d said she lived at home, but he’d never thought to ask how close home was.
“I’ll eat in the kitchen with the two girls who clean,” she answered. “When the weather’s bad like this, I can bunk in with them.”
He knew he’d be prying if he asked more, but he was glad she didn’t eat alone. “Well,” he said. “Enjoy your dinner.”
Lewt grabbed his hat and coat and walked toward the house. The temperature had dropped with the sun, but he barely felt it. He went in the front door of the big ranch house and met the others in the huge living area they called the great room. They were all having a drink before the meal. Boyd, still wearing his riding clothes, seemed to be in the middle of a story about how he’d fought off horse thieves a few years ago. All the others circled around him and listened to every word, but Lewt didn’t buy all the details of the rancher’s story.
Lewt poured himself a glass of water and joined them. The subject moved from horse thieves to being scarred as a child to who knows what else. Lewt stopped paying attention. Davis nodded at him when he entered and the ladies smiled at him when he caught their eye, but not one of them made a comment about where he’d been or what he’d done all day. No one noticed his new clothes even after he’d taken his time making sure he was dressed appropriately for a change.
Lewt decided he was a six-foot invisible man standing in the center of the room. When he moved in to dinner, it didn’t get much better. The place cards for the evening put him between Mrs. Watson, the chaperone, and Mrs. Allender, Davis’s mother. Both ladies had the habit of talking to him at the same time.
After turning his head back and forth a dozen times trying to keep up with both their conversations, he finally just looked down at his food and ate. They didn’t seem to mind; they both kept talking.
Mrs. Allender was a dear whose only topic of conversation seemed to be her children and grandchildren. Mrs. Watson’s speech slowed with each glass of wine and her laugh grew louder. For the most part Lewt had no idea what she was laughing at . . . the volume just hit him at hurricane force every now and then.
Rose circled the table a few times and asked if he needed anything, but she didn’t put her hand on his shoulder while she talked as she did when she stopped behind Boyd and Davis.
When the meal was finished and the others moved in to sing around the piano, Lewt slipped out onto the porch. He didn’t care if he froze; he needed silence.
He had it for about a minute before he realized someone else was on the long porch.
Em. She sat sideways in a cushioned porch swing, her long legs filling the seat.
Lewt walked up, stared down at her boots on the cushion, and waited.
With a grumble, she moved her feet and sat up straight.
He didn’t bother to speak to her. He just sat down in the swing next to her and began to rock back and forth.
She ignored him, as if hoping he’d go away without noticing her, for as long as she could, then finally turned to him and said, “How’s the courting doing?”
Lewt chewed up the first dozen words he thought of saying and finally said, “When I came here, I thought I might have a hard time picking the girl I wanted. When I saw them, I figured it would be almost impossible to pick out which one was the prettiest. They were all grand. No matter which one I chose, any would make me a grand wife.”
“So,” Em cut in. “What’s your problem, cowboy?”
He glared at her, thinking the
cowboy
comment was probably her idea of a joke. On the dark porch he could barely make out her face, but he didn’t have to see. He knew she was laughing at him.
“The problem is—” He pushed hard, almost swinging them off the porch. When the swing settled, he finished. “It never occurred to me that they might not want me.”
“Not one?”
He didn’t like the way she asked. It sounded like she’d suspected the possibility all along.
He had a feeling Em was just playing him. “Oh, two of the ladies in there just love me. They won’t stop talking to me. You could say they fought for my attention all through dinner.”
“So, what’s your problem?”
“The two were Mrs. Allender and Mrs. Watson.”
Em laughed. Not just a kind laugh to show she was following his troubles, but a falling-over, holding-her-ribs laugh. She laughed so hard she shook their seat.
When she finally settled enough that they could continue swinging, he said, “You think my heartbreak is funny?”
“You’re not heartbroken. You’ve spent more time looking at the McMurray girls’ assets than you have at their eyes.”
“Damn it! I’m pouring out my troubles to you and you’re making fun of me. You’re the one person on the ranch, apparently, who knows even less about courting than I do, and here I am telling my problem to you.”
She seemed to take pity on him. “Oh, come on, you must have met many a girl. I bet you know the words to sweet-talk them. Maybe you just haven’t tried. I can’t believe you’re giving up after two days. Turn their heads with words. You must know how.”
He stared out at the night. “Not unless you count ‘How much do you charge for the night?’ as sweet talk. That’s about all I usually say to a woman.” He looked into the night, wishing he hadn’t told her that. She’d probably think he visited ladies of the night every chance he got. In truth, he rarely even bought one of the girls a drink in the saloons. He learned early from watching that those kinds of workingwomen value friends far more than customers.
He pushed the swing. “Until now I hadn’t realized how very little I knew about the fairer sex.”
“You’re kidding. Don’t tell me that family of yours never lets you out to go to dances and dinners with proper young ladies.”
“My family’s dead.” Lewt spoke the truth before he thought to stop. Not that it mattered; the girl who took care of the horses wasn’t likely to tell the group inside.
“All of them?”
“All of them,” he said slowly. “They have been for a long time.”
She didn’t say anything for a long while. They just rocked back and forth. He thought she might get up and leave, but she stayed. She probably figured he’d go back inside, but he had no plan to as long as he could hear voices and music coming from inside. They were singing silly songs that made even less sense than the saloon songs.
Finally, he pulled a big quilt from the table against the wall. “Want to share? If we’re staying out here we might as well try not to freeze.”