“You be careful of her,” Seth murmured as he sat down to Daniel’s right. “I hear tell she’s been known to cheat.”
“She don’t cheat,” said Henry. “Fact is, she’s just a mighty fine card player even if she is a wh—”
“No need to say it,” Daniel said as he rose to his feet, pulling out the chair to his left and bowing. He’d been taught to be courteous to women lifetimes ago and had never seen a reason to be otherwise—no matter what a woman’s occupation or station in life might be. First Seth and then Henry rose, eyes wide with evident surprise at themselves. Seth doffed his hat. Henry, who was hatless, inclined his head.
Miss Susan looked pleased. She bobbed her head, sat down and murmured, “How do you do?”
“What’s the story of Miss Dunbro?” Daniel asked, dealing the cards.
“She shouldn’t have come bustin’ in here,” said Miss Susan, picking up her hand and glancing at it. “Her being a decent woman and all, she should not of done that.”
“True,” said Henry, studying his cards. “This ain’t no place for the likes of her. But we all know that Miss Eliza Dunbro does whatever she wants.”
“She’s a strange one. She had me kill every single one of her roosters a while back,” said Seth. “Didn’t want to keep even one of them.”
“I’ll take two cards,” said Miss Susan. “She got rid of the roosters on account of the fact that she hates waking up early in the morning. Says there ain’t no reason she can’t do her chores in the evening if she feels like it. She’s a night owl,” she lowered her eyes demurely, “like myself.”
“There’s some chores I like to do at night.” Henry grinned lasciviously at Miss Susan. “Gimme three.”
“Is that fact?” She sounded bored.
Daniel smiled.
That’ll make it a whole lot easier for me to have a lengthy visit with Miss Eliza Dunbro.
“One please,” Seth said. “She’s in one bad mood. Somebody done rustled her cattle—the nine head she had left since the last time she got rustled. She had twenty-four head to start with. She says she’s gonna plug whoever done it soon as she finds out who it is.”
“Dealer takes two,” Daniel murmured
“She’s trying to sell her place,” said Miss Susan. “She don’t want to live around here no more.”
“Shame,” Henry said. “She’s a right pretty woman, though she won’t have nothing to do with the likes of us.”
“She ain’t got no use for men, and that’s a fact.” Miss Susan nodded her head approvingly. “I bet two bits.”
“She don’t bother nobody,” added Seth, “so long’s nobody vexes her. But if she’s been vexed, then look out.” He nodded. “I’m in.”
Henry leaned forward as best he could over his bulk and lowered his voice. “The sheriff,” he said to Daniel, “he kept botherin’ her and tryin’ to kiss her and putting his hands where he shouldn’t until she up and shot him in the foot.”
“She actually shot him?” Daniel exclaimed. He burst into laughter and the others joined in. When he stopped, he said, “I’ll raise you another two bits.” The others one by one nodded their assent.
“He’s been twice as mean since then,” said Seth, looking around as though he feared the sheriff had appeared. “He couldn’t arrest her or nothin’ because he was too embarrassed. Afraid too.”
“Thinks she might shoot him dead if he tried.” Henry chuckled. “And I do believe she might. Truth be told, I’m a little scared of her myself.”
Seth said, “I done some target practice with her and I seen her shoot a green tomato clear off a post at one hundred paces. Ain’t no man ’round here, ’cepting the sheriff, willing to get her riled up.”
Miss Susan sniffed. “That’s on account of he’s too greedy to spend his money where he ought, like a decent man so he don’t get so randy.”
Daniel could not help but smile at that remark, but at the same time he was thinking,
A woman who can shoot—and is willing to do so?
I certainly shall get to know more of the fierce Miss Eliza Dunbro.
He leaned his chair back onto two legs. The woman grew more intriguing with each thing he learned about her. He’d never even imagined a lone woman scaring a roomful of men, to say nothing of shooting the sheriff! She was definitely unlike any woman he’d ever known in this century—or the last for that matter. He smiled thinking about the curvy shape filling the faded gown most attractively, the ferocious frown changing into a wry half-smile.
When he thought about the curl of black hair lying against the white skin of her throat, the warmth started again, spreading from his groin to his belly. His horn nudged his new trousers. He decided it was time to take a rest from traveling. The hotel room was very suitable. He’d already put a good lock on the door, and the heavy velvet curtains would keep out the daylight while he slept. Yes, he’d stay here a while, see what might develop with the intriguing Miss Eliza Dunbro.
He smiled. There was a woman in town who’d offered to cook for him. He’d invite Miss Dunbro out for a late picnic so they could get acquainted. He intended to get to know her most intimately.
“How do I find her and that land she wants to sell?” he said, bringing the front legs of his chair to the floor with a clunk and putting his cards on the table. The others followed suit. Miss Susan had won.
Nothing here but less than an eighth of a cup of flour and the tiniest bit of shortening. Eliza dejectedly surveyed the contents of her pantry—or rather the lack of contents. Best to save those until there was truly nothing else. Until then, the green beans would have to do. They had grown very well. She had plenty of them, but a diet of nothing but vegetables did wear on a body after a while, even when, now and again, a tomato ripened and she could add that to dinner. Or better yet, if she found some eggs. Half of the chickens had disappeared along with the cattle, but the darn critters hardly laid for her anyway. She hadn’t seen an egg for a week now. She sighed. She was no rancher. She dearly wished she hadn’t inherited this godforsaken place or been fool enough to think she could make something of it. It was embarrassing to remember that she’d imagined bountiful vegetable crops, trees laden with fruit and pretty chickens that produced lots of eggs while cattle lowed contentedly in green fields. She hadn’t known that there were no green fields or fruit trees in this part of the country. Or that the cattle would have to be slaughtered.
“Next time one of the cowboys comes by, I’m gonna get him to kill me a couple of those birds,” she said to herself. “Everyone around here would laugh their heads off if they knew I can’t bear to chop off their heads myself. And they’d laugh even harder if they found out that I cry when I think about the dreadful fate of my cattle.
“And now someone around here has my poor creatures. And he cleaned out the root cellar.” The thief or thieves had taken all the smoked pork and the bag of dried corn she stored there. Four jars of pickled green beans were all that was left. She sat down at the bare kitchen table and rested her head in her hands.
Not one of the local men would say who did it, but she was pretty sure they knew. Ugh. The men of Haley. Uncouth and unwashed, every one of them. Not a single one appealed to her in any way. That handsome stranger, however, was polite and clean and very intriguing. She sat back in her chair. She’d thought about him all the way home and hadn’t given a thought to food until she’d walked into the pantry.
He talked a little funny—but that was probably the way they spoke in England. His pale-gray, almost transparent eyes set in a white-as-a-clean-sheet face were strange but she liked them a lot. His pretty blond hair was kinda wasted on a man. She absent-mindedly ran her free hand through her own black locks. And those broad shoulders! She wondered for a minute what he might look like without the jacket. Oh heck, what was he like without his shirt and string tie?
She got damp imagining him taking her in his strong arms and holding her tightly, crushing her against himself. He’d feel so good, his body hard against her softer one. He’d look down at her with those pale-gray eyes filled with desire for her. She ran her hands over her breasts and her belly.
She sighed. Although thinking about that fancy cowboy—or whatever he was—might make her damp, it wasn’t enough to totally distract her from the fact that right now what she wanted more than anything, including the stranger, was something to eat that wasn’t green beans, fresh or pickled. Unless she got up her nerve and killed one of the chickens, it was nothing but green beans for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
She sighed and walked outside into the bright moonlight and studied the For Sale sign she’d put up out front. It leaned at a precarious angle but that didn’t really matter because anyone in Haley or the surrounding countryside who had enough money to buy her place wouldn’t be dumb enough to do so.
She turned around and studied the house. It needed paint—probably had needed paint for the last twenty years. The weathered boards curled here and there, the hitching post lay rotting on the ground and the tiny porch sagged alarmingly. The roof on the side of the house, where the leak was, looked as if it was about to cave in. Lucky it almost never rained in these parts.
Eliza sighed. She hated living here. She’d worked hard to try to make something of this little ranch but nothing ever went right and now she was flat broke, hungry and sick and tired of the dust that was everywhere.
The twenty-four head of cattle had been her last chance. She’d even arranged with two cowboys to herd them to the railhead in a few days.
If I could just get my hands on some money to pay my way, I’d go back to Kansas City with the next stagecoach.
Eliza turned her head at the sound of a horse and buggy trotting her way. Could the sheriff have decided to come courting after dark? That man never seemed to understand that she was one hundred percent not interested. She would shoot him somewhere even more painful than his foot if he ever tried to touch her again, even if she had to go to jail.
The buggy that came into view in the dim moonlight was not a familiar one. It pulled u, and the easy-on-the-eyes stranger in the brand-new clothes leaped down.
“Good evening, madam.” He tipped his hat and bowed slightly, his straight blond hair falling forward. He stood and pushed the hair back, his strange gray eyes meeting her own.
“Hello,” she said. In spite of being so very white, he was most definitely more handsome than any man had a right to be.
“My name’s Daniel Hastings, Miss Dunbro. I heard you were putting your house and land up for sale.”
She nodded and pointed to the sign. “Can’t keep the place with all the rustlin’ and stealin’. No way I can make a living that way.” Stupid thing to say, when what she wanted was to sell it. At least she hadn’t let loose about how the roof leaked and the dust crept inside, or how desperately she wanted to escape and go back to the city where she belonged.
“That is a real shame. Perhaps I can cheer you up somewhat. I wondered if you might join me for a little moonlight picnic.”
Moonlight picnic with a man she didn’t know—a stranger in Haley? Hah! She’d done some real stupid things in her day, but she wasn’t that stupid. Even if he was the handsomest man she’d ever seen in her entire life. Even if she were hungry. Very, very hungry. Painfully so, actually.
He pointed to a basket with a snow-white cloth covering it sitting on the seat of the buggy. Eliza recognized it as a basket that belonged to Mrs. Timmons over at the hotel. She must have lent it to him. Mrs. Timmons sure had a way with fried chicken.
Eliza had had some of that fried chicken one time at the church potluck dinner. She herself had brought a huge bowl of green beans to the event and had eaten an embarrassingly large amount of the food that other people had brought. It had been no contest—Mrs. Timmons’ chicken was the best food there. Sadly other people had thought so too, and it had been eaten up before she got a third helping.
If her mouth watered any more than it already was, she’d be drooling. And she most definitely did not want to do anything that undignified in front of this man.
She studied Mr. Hastings as he stood there quietly looking at her. His sensuous mouth, clean-shaven chin with a slight cleft and broad shoulders made her long to get close, really close. She yearned to run her fingers through that blond hair, over those tantalizing lips. She put her hands behind her back so she wouldn’t be tempted to touch what she shouldn’t, and looked him over. He was all male in that immaculate white shirt, black jacket and string tie, new trousers and fancy boots. She imagined him smiling at her as he pulled off the tie and then the jacket. He’d stroke her hair as she undid the buttons of his shirt, revealing the pale skin.
She mentally shook herself. She needed to make a decision, not get herself all hot and bothered. A man that clean and neat couldn’t be dangerous, could he? She was a pretty good judge of character, wasn’t she? For example, she would never go on a moonlight picnic alone with the sheriff and she knew him right well. A midnight picnic with Mrs. Timmons’ fried chicken wasn’t the sheriff’s style anyway. Oh how she wanted to spend some time with Daniel Hastings. And oh, how she wanted some food.
“You got chicken in there?” She pointed to the basket. Of course she wouldn’t go along for a nighttime picnic in the middle of nowhere with a perfect stranger, no matter how clean and neat and charming. Not even if there really were several birds in that basket. He was, after all, a man who had whopped Billy Joe and thus was clearly dangerous, even if he did make her heart turn somersaults, to say nothing of the fact she needed desperately to touch him and be touched by him. Surely she didn’t need a proper dinner that bad, surely she wouldn’t risk her life—and her virtue such as it was—just to have some fried chicken. Of course not. She wasn’t that desperate.