Texas Pride: Night Riders (18 page)

“Then put this in your pipe and smoke it. You can forget my feelings for you. Whatever they are, I’m not going to let them lead me into making the biggest mistake of my life. You’re a fascinating man spilling over with charm and a devastating smile, which you don’t hesitate to use. However, you’re going back to Poland as soon as you can. From what you’ve told me about it, I’d be foolish to consider marrying and going back with you.”

“You have thought of doing that?” He was shocked.

Carla ignored his question. “You need a wife who understands your customs, your history, preferably one who’s rich so you can go back to being a prince.”

“I place no value in that title.”

Carla shook her head. “You can’t not value it because everyone else in your country does. It would be the same as saying Kesney doesn’t value the money that makes him the richest and most influential man in Overlin.”

“A title can’t buy anything. Money can.”

“A title gives you social position money could never buy. Now it’s time to put an end to this conversation. I shouldn’t have let you kiss me, but my feelings are out in the open as you wanted. Now we won’t speak of them again because that’s what I want. Are you sure your arm is well enough for you to ride? I’m going into town. I need to hire someone to help you until Danny comes back.”

Ivan didn’t want to turn his back on their conversation. He didn’t know what to do about his feelings for Carla, but he didn’t want to pretend they didn’t exist. Yet he could tell from Carla’s compressed lips that she would stop talking to him if he persisted. “I will finish working on the pipes to bring the water into the house.”

“That’ll be even harder on your arm.”

“I can manage.”

“Do you want to interview any man I might hire?”

“No. I trust your judgment.”

Carla lingered, apparently trying to decide whether to say something more. Finally, with a shrug, she turned and walked away.

Ivan felt like she was pulling something out of him, that each step separating them added to his emptiness. He didn’t understand how his feelings for her could have developed so deeply so suddenly, but there was no point in denying that they had. How could he figure out what to do when Carla refused to talk about it? He thought he could get her to change her mind, but was that fair? Could he, in good conscience, encourage her to explore her feelings for him when he knew he was leaving and there was no chance she would go with him?

He knew the answer to that question, but he didn’t know whether he could stop himself from falling even more deeply in love. It had been so long, he’d forgotten that falling in love wasn’t something you did out of choice. It was something that happened whether or not you were ready. He was ready. It was the time and situation that were all wrong.

***

Carla poured the peaches out of the jar into a bowl and placed it on the table. She checked the biscuits and stirred the beef stew. She placed the butter on the table and reached for the bucket to get water before remembering she never had to go to the well again. Ivan had installed a pump inside the kitchen. He’d promised to build a water tower before he left, so all she had to do was turn a knob, and water would flow into her kitchen on its own. He also said something about an indoor bathroom, but she couldn’t imagine that such a contraption as he described could work.

She stopped pacing to rub her hands on her apron. Her palms were sweating but not from the heat. Ivan would soon come in for supper. It would be the first time she’d faced him since that morning. Just thinking about it made her want to hide. She’d almost hired an unsatisfactory cowhand just to have someone to keep her from being alone with Ivan. Fortunately she wasn’t that much of a coward. At least not yet.

She was kidding herself if she thought she could put Ivan out of her mind. She
might
have succeeded before she knew the nature of his feelings. Now that was all she could think of. She found herself comparing every potential cowhand to him. Even Kesney and Maxwell Dodge slipped a few notches. When it came to Ivan, objectivity, logic, even common sense, flew out the window. That’s what had her so upset. She’d never acted like this. Her thinking had always been methodical and logical, never clouded by her feelings. But ever since Ivan had arrived, she was a bundle of emotions, all out of control.

Making a determined effort to calm her nerves, she checked the biscuits. They were almost ready so she went to the door and opened it. Ivan was sitting in a chair in a tiny band of shade cast by the house and drawing on a piece of paper. He looked up when he heard the door open, smiled when he saw her. It didn’t seem to matter how many times he smiled at her. It affected her just as powerfully as the first time. It erased any desire to behave rationally or think unemotionally. In that moment, nothing mattered but that he loved her. It wasn’t logical, and it wasn’t rational, but she didn’t care.

“It’s time to eat,” she said. “I’m taking the biscuits out.” She didn’t give him time to respond before she went back inside. If merely seeing him could affect her so strongly, it was going to take every bit of her self-control to get through supper without throwing herself into his arms. As satisfying as that would be… it would only make things worse.

She didn’t realize how badly his smile had flustered her until she burned her hand taking out the biscuits. She had done that hundreds of times. How could she have been so clumsy?

“What’s wrong?”

She hardly realized she’d uttered an expletive she’d picked up from Danny until Ivan spoke. “I just burned my hand.” She dumped the biscuits into the waiting bowl, but Ivan stepped between her and the table, took the bowl out of her hands.

“Let me see.”

“It’s nothing.”

“Let me see.” He spoke softly, even respectfully of her right to refuse, but he was like a large boulder, a force that could not be deflected. He seemed to surround her, to encompass her, to absorb any desire to refuse. The small burn was on the side of her thumb, a single line where her skin had brushed against the biscuit pan, but it stung. It was red, a blister already forming. She held out her hand.

He took it in his. His hand was so much larger, the fingers so much longer and broader, that her hand looked like that of a child. She felt embarrassed, somehow inferior. His touch was gentle, but his skin was rough from working without gloves.

“We need some ice.”

Did he really ask for ice? She felt like she was in some kind of daze, maybe suspended animation. Thoughts floated through her head with the sluggish movement of clouds on a hot summer afternoon, their meaning often staying just beyond her grasp. “This is south Texas. We don’t have ice, not even in the winter.”

“Then cold water will have to do. I will find some.” He flashed a quick smile then it was gone.

When he walked out the door, she felt like the air had been sucked out of her lungs, the strength out of her body. She felt so weak she was tempted to sit down, but she wasn’t going to give in to weakness no matter how enervating. She was not a silly girl even if she sometimes felt like it. He didn’t need to leave when supper was on the table and getting cold. She didn’t need cold water. Anyway, where could he find cold water when it was like an inferno outside?

She put her mouth on the burn. The moisture made it feel better. Her reflection in the window surprised a laugh out of her. She looked like she was sucking her thumb, something her mother said she’d never done even as a baby. With a shake of her head, she took her thumb out of her mouth and walked to her place at the table. She wondered how long it would be before Ivan returned. She wondered if she should put everything back on the stove to keep warm, or if she should begin without waiting for him. She had a strong dislike of cold stew, even in summer. She heard Ivan’s footsteps before he opened the kitchen door. He carried the water in a large jug.

“If this is creek water, it’ll be as hot as if I had heated it on this stove,” she said.

“This did not come from the creek. It came from a spring that is below water level except when the creek falls to almost nothing. I found it when I was building the water line to the kitchen. Put your hand in.”

Carla was prepared for slightly cool water, but the liquid in the jug felt icy cold. “It feels like ice.”

“You would not say that if you had grown up in Poland. Some winters are so cold ice will burn your skin.”

Carla didn’t understand how that could happen, but she wasn’t interested in the explanation. Ivan was looking at her in a way that made everything else seem insignificant—even her burned thumb. Her mother had once told her a fairy tale about a little girl who stared too long into the eyes of an evil serpent and became hypnotized. That’s how she felt now, as though she was slowly losing touch with reality, that nothing existed except Ivan. She fought off the feeling with a determined shake of her head. “My hand feels better now. We should eat before everything gets cold.”

“Let me see.”

Ivan lifted her hand out of the water and patted it dry with the tail of his shirt. He turned it one way in the light and then the other. He touched the small blister with his fingertip. “Does that hurt?”

“No.” It probably did, but she couldn’t feel anything. Her whole body was numb.

He lifted her hand to his lips and blew gently on her blistered thumb. “Does this make it feel better?”

Carla was sure she was either going to faint or suffer some kind of stroke. Her whole body was feeling out of sorts. Hot and cold chased each other through her veins. Her nerve endings were so inflamed Ivan’s fingers felt like hot coils pressed against her skin. Her pulse thrummed in her temples, yet she felt like the blood was draining away from her brain. She felt unable to breathe.

“Are you all right?”

She answered without conscious thought. “Of course. Why do you ask?”

“You look a little pale.”

“It’s just the heat.”

“Are you sure?”

She wasn’t sure of anything, least of all why she should look pale when her face felt flushed with heat. She couldn’t think when her hand was clasped in Ivan’s, when he was so close she could feel his breath on her cheek, when the urge to move closer, to reach up and pull him down into a kiss, was so powerful it obliterated nearly everything else. She had been prepared to face him across the supper table. She wasn’t prepared for this. Any of it.

“You should sit down.”

“No.” She didn’t know why she said that. Ivan would have let go of her hand, and she would have been able to regain her senses, but she couldn’t make herself say the words because she didn’t want to be released.

Ivan must have understood what she was thinking, what she was feeling, because his hold on her hand grew firmer. His look of concern turned to something quite different. Carla had seen that look in the eyes of many men and learned to be wary of it, but she felt none of that with Ivan. Rather it reached out to kindle a similar feeling inside her.

She had granted only a few men the privilege of a chaste kiss and a quick hug. The moments she’d spent in Ivan’s arms earlier that morning had proved she would accept a lot more from him, that she
wanted
more. That fact that their relationship was impossible didn’t change that. She willingly moved into Ivan’s embrace. She welcomed his arms as they embraced her. She breathed in his nearness. She forgot her burned finger. She didn’t care if supper got cold. All that mattered was that she was in his arms, that in the next moment he would kiss her.

A series of loud knocks on the front door shattered the moment.

Carla didn’t know a word of Polish, but she was certain the words Ivan uttered were profane. She felt much the same way, but the knock on the door had the effect of restoring her to her senses. She extricated herself from Ivan’s embrace. “I’d better see who’s at the door.”

“Send them away. Your supper is getting cold.”

She was surprised he remembered food was on the table. She hadn’t, and she’d cooked it. She was not pleased to open the door and find Beth standing on her porch.

“Is Danny back?” Beth marched inside without waiting to be invited.

“No. He’s not.”

“When do you expect him?”

“I have no idea when Riley plans to leave, where he’ll go, or when he might return.”

Beth appeared on the verge of tears. “I’ve got to talk to him,” she said, wringing her hands.

“Is anything wrong?”

“No. I just have to talk to him.”

For an instant, Carla wondered if Beth might be pregnant, but the only time she and Danny had been together was at the dance. “You’ll have to wait for him to come back just like I do. Does your father know where you are?”

“I told him I was coming to see you.” Beth turned to Ivan. “Do you know where he’s gone?”

“Nobody knows except Riley.”

“Can you take me to his camp? Papa said it’s on your land.”

“You can’t go there now,” Carla said. “It’s nearly dark, and their camp is hours away.”

“Will you take me tomorrow?” Beth asked Ivan.

“I will not take you,” Ivan told her, “but I will ride there tomorrow and see if I can find Danny.”

“Why haven’t you asked your father to take you?” Carla asked.

“You know he doesn’t want Danny and me to be together.”

“You can’t expect Ivan to help you do something your father has forbidden,” Carla said. “He would have every right to be furious with us.”

“I don’t care. I want to see Danny.” With that, she flopped into the nearest chair and burst into tears.

Carla was on the verge of making a sharp retort when she looked at Ivan. He looked so flummoxed she nearly burst out laughing. “She’s overemotional,” she whispered. “She’ll be okay once she has a good cry.”

“Are you sure?”

“If she’s not, you can get her father and let him deal with her.”

Beth stopped crying abruptly. “I don’t want to see my father. He’s cruel and heartless. He doesn’t understand what it means to be in love.”

“He loved your mother very much,” Carla said. “I doubt he’s forgotten that.”

“If he remembered, he wouldn’t try to keep Danny and me apart.”

Carla realized it was useless to attempt to reason with Beth until she calmed down. “We were about to sit down to supper. Why don’t you join us? You’ll feel better after you eat something.”

“I couldn’t eat a thing,” Beth proclaimed.

“Then sit with me while Ivan eats. I’m sure he’s about to starve.”

Beth got up with a pettish flounce. “My father can eat no matter what happens. I don’t know how men can be so insensitive.”

Carla winked at Ivan. “I don’t know either, but it’s a cross all women have to bear.”

“Danny is not insensitive,” Beth declared. “He understands my feelings exactly.”

Carla knew Danny was just as insensitive to women’s whims and moods as any other man, but that was something she would leave Beth to discover for herself.

It amused her that not only was Beth quick to take a seat at the table, but once she had placed food on Beth’s plate despite her protests, the young woman managed to overcome her momentary distress sufficiently to eat a substantial meal. In-between chewing and swallowing, she treated them to a virtual sermon on Danny’s virtues and how he was so different from other inferior men.

“You should be getting home,” Carla said when Beth swallowed the last of her second buttered biscuit. “I’m sure your father is worried about you.”

“He won’t be home until late. He went into Overlin on some business.”

“I will ride with you,” Ivan offered.

“I can ride by myself. I’m not a baby.”

“It is not safe for a young lady to ride alone at night.”

“Why not?”

“We have rustlers,” Carla said. “Have you forgotten they tried to run off your father’s herd a while ago?”

“If they’re after cows, they won’t bother me.”

“What they want is money,” Ivan said. “You are worth far more to your father than his cows.”

Apparently Beth hadn’t thought of it in that light. “Okay, but you’ve got to tell me as soon as you find Danny.”

“I don’t expect to hear from him for several days. Maybe even a week.”

“I’m sorry you got caught up in this,” Carla whispered to Ivan. “I hate to think of you riding out to Riley’s camp for nothing.”

Rather than say anything, Ivan gave her hands a gentle squeeze.

“Time to go,” he said to Beth. “If I have to be up early to look for Danny, I have to go to bed early.”

While Ivan went to saddle his horse, Beth told Carla one more time that she had to tell her the instant they found Danny. She put forward several plans for relaying the information as quickly as possible, none of which took into consideration the time and effort these plans required of other people. Carla listened and nodded, aware that in Beth’s present mood, she wasn’t capable of thinking of other people. She felt sorry for Ivan. She was certain Beth would go over all her plans on their ride home and try to drag a whole string of promises from him. But Ivan would likely know exactly what to say to mollify her.

Carla wondered how Ivan managed to hold to his own principles without angering people who didn’t agree with him. She’d always considered herself a reasonable woman, but nearly everybody had been angry with her at one time or another. Everybody seemed to adore Ivan. Even Lukey had started to trust him. It made her feel good that such a special man had fallen in love with her. Unfortunately, it was a love that couldn’t have a happy ending.

***

Several days later, Carla was sitting at the kitchen table, grateful she’d gotten through another morning without yielding to her desire for Ivan and planning how to present her case against Laveau diViere to the judge in two days. The kitchen door opened without a warning knock. All thoughts of Laveau flew out of her head, and her heart leapt in anticipation. Had Ivan come back?

But it was Danny who strode through the door. Caught between disappointment that Ivan was still behaving as a gentleman and the shock of Danny’s unexpected return, Carla couldn’t move.

“I know I said some terrible things before I left,” Danny told his sister, “but I never thought Ivan would be happier to see me than my sister.”

The sound of his voice having released her from her paralysis, Carla jumped up from her chair, ran to her brother, and threw her arms around his neck. The force of her attack threw him backward against Ivan.

“I’m glad you’re happy to see me,” Danny said with a laugh, “but you don’t have to knock me down.”

Carla gave her brother a hard hug before she released him and stood back. “You deserve to be knocked down and stomped on for leaving me without a word of where you were going or when you were coming back.”

“I told Ivan.”

“Ivan’s not your family. I am.”

Danny glanced back at Ivan standing in the doorway who gave him a supportive smile. “I was feeling you were more like my mother,” Danny said to his sister. “Ivan never lectures me.”

Carla was too glad to see Danny home safely to start a brother-sister argument. “Come in, and tell me where you’ve been and what you’ve done. Are you hungry? It won’t take a minute to heat something up.” She was relieved he looked healthy and appeared to be in good spirits.

“I’m not hungry, and I can’t stay long. I just came to tell you what I’ve been doing.”

It was against Carla’s instincts to allow anyone to sit down at the table without at least a cup of coffee, but she was too eager to learn what her brother had been doing. “Why did you go to Ivan first?”

Danny laughed and dropped into his usual seat at the table. “Apparently you’ve forgotten what happened just before I left.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” Carla said without heat. “If I could still love you after losing half the ranch, I could love you despite falling in love with a mere child.” She knew she’d said the wrong thing before the last words were out of her mouth. “Forget I said that. Tell me what you’ve been doing.”

Danny’s smile struggled before making a full recovery. “Making money,” he said.

“How?”

“Finding herds that have been stolen and returning them to their owners.”

“I thought Riley’s men were supposed to do that for free.”

“Lots of herds are stolen from other places from owners we can’t identify. We bring them back and turn them over to people who find the real owners.”

“And you get money for this?” Ivan asked.

“Yes.”

“How much?” Carla asked.

“I didn’t get a lot because I’m still learning,” Danny said, “but I’ll get more when I can help more.”

“How will you do that?” Ivan asked.

Carla had been so elated about Danny’s return she didn’t want to interrupt him to ask Ivan why he was looking particularly solemn.

“When we go into Mexico, we don’t all go as one group,” Danny said. “We pair up and go in different directions. In a couple of days we meet at an appointed place. If we’ve found a stolen herd, we bring it back.”

“This has to be dangerous,” Carla said. “You’re trying to reclaim cows from rustlers and thieves who won’t hesitate to shoot you.”

“That’s why we get paid,” Danny said. “Texas has no official authority in Mexico. The government can’t go after these herds, but we can.”

“Who do you deliver the herds to?” Ivan asked.

“I don’t know. That’s Riley’s business. Have you seen Beth since I left?” Danny asked his sister.

“She comes by every day wanting to know if you’re back. Have you tried to see her?”

Danny looked downcast. “I went there first, but her father wouldn’t let me near the house. Will you invite her for supper?”

“Sorry, Danny, but I’m not going behind Kesney’s back. Besides, if he knows you’re home, he probably wouldn’t let her out of the house.”

“No point in staying then.”

“You could stay because I’m your sister, and you haven’t seen me in three days.”

“Beth’s father won’t let her marry a pauper, and I can’t make any money staying here.” Danny got up and gave his sister a hug. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be back in a few days.”

“I can’t help worrying when I know people are shooting at you.”

“We go in at night. It’s a lot easier than I thought. Why don’t you go with me?” he said to Ivan. “You can make more money than you can taking care of Carla’s cows.”

“He has to take care of my cows because
you
won’t,” Carla told her brother.

“I can make a month’s wages in a couple of days. By the time Beth is old enough for her father to let her marry me I’ll have enough money to buy my own ranch.”

Carla couldn’t imagine her impulsive brother settling down and waiting the two or three years before Kesney thought Beth was old enough to marry, but she wasn’t going to discourage him from thinking about the future rather than the next five minutes. She just wished he had found a less dangerous way to earn the money. “Do you need anything?” she asked. “Clothes, food, a new bedroll?”

“I’ve got everything I need. Now I’d better go.” He gave Carla a peck on the cheek. “Take care of her,” he said to Ivan. “She’s not as strong as she thinks.”

Carla stifled an impulse to take issue with that statement. She didn’t want them to part on an angry note again. “Come see me as soon as you get back,” she said. “I won’t sleep soundly until you do.”

“If you’re going to lie awake, spend the time thinking about Ivan instead of me.” He winked at Ivan. “I can’t marry you.”

Carla felt heat rush up the back of her neck. “Don’t talk nonsense.”

Danny laughed and disappeared through the door. Carla turned to Ivan, but he seemed to be deep in thought. “What’s wrong? Do you think Danny is in some danger he didn’t tell us about?”

“I do not know.”

“Then what are you frowning about?”

“Have you ever heard of a rancher paying to have his herd returned from Mexico?”

“No.”

“Neither have I.”

***

“Is that all the evidence you have to set before me?” the judge asked.

“What more do you need?” Carla asked.

Her chance to place her case before the judge had finally arrived. Because Overlin was so small, the only available place for the judge to hold court was in the largest of the town’s saloons. One advantage was that it allowed the judge to eat his meals while he held court. A disadvantage to the owner was that for the few hours a day that the judge spent listening to cases, everyone wanting beer or whiskey had to go to another saloon. To compensate, everyone bringing a case had to pay a small fee to the saloon owner. Carla had no objection to paying the fee when there was a chance she could get her ranch back. The judge, however, didn’t appear anxious to do that.

“What I need is real
evidence
,” the judge said. “Not opinion, not hearsay, and especially not supposition about what might have happened.”

“There’s no supposition involved,” Carla insisted. “Danny is only seventeen. He’s not old enough to sign legal documents without adult approval. There is also no supposition that Mr. diViere got Danny drunk. You’ve heard several men testify to that.”

Lukey and two others in the saloon nodded in agreement.

“What I haven’t heard is testimony that Mr. diViere restrained your brother and poured the whiskey down his throat.”

“Of course he didn’t,” Carla said, irritably. “No one would have stood for that.”

“Then how can you say Mr. diViere got your brother drunk?”

“Everybody knows Danny doesn’t drink because it goes straight to his head. Mr. diViere used that to question his manhood. In Texas, if a man can’t drink, he’s not considered a man. Danny already gets teased for looking so young. Mr. diViere played on all of Danny’s insecurities to induce him to drink.”

“That’s not very sportsmanlike,” the judge agreed, “but it’s not against the law. What makes you think Mr. diViere would do such a thing? Do you know him?”