Rancher Wants a Wife (11 page)

All this time tonight, while they’d made love, not once had her burn injury come between them. Not once had she felt neglected or pitied. But his vocalizing that it would hamper her work as a detective made her feel inadequate. She would never again have a perfect face. Was she supposed to run from it? Hide from it? Was she supposed to beg him for the opportunity to work in a profession in which she had talent and skills?

Then when would her begging ever end?

With that outburst, she grabbed her flannel gown from his fingers, slammed the door on her way out and headed to the guest room.

Chapter Twelve

F
or Cassandra to storm out of the bedroom was unthinkable to Jack. How could a night filled with such pleasure and intimacy turn into such a battle?

He ate breakfast before she rose, then left to check on Finley’s sick cattle, and was relieved to see they were on the mend. He returned within two hours, entering his stables to give instructions on which of his men would stay to overlook the ranch, while the rest of them went to Dunleigh’s funeral. Two of the younger men who didn’t know the Englishman well volunteered.

When Jack returned to the house, Cassandra had eaten, cleared the dishes and was ready to leave. She wore a black jacket and long black skirt, both threadbare along the buttons and trim, as though she’d worn them many times before. She probably had at all the funerals she’d attended in Chicago.

The two of them remained cool and cordial to each other.

“Is there anything I can get you before we leave?” he asked.

“I’m fine. I feel for poor Mrs. Dunleigh this morning, and what she must be going through.”

“She’s not alone today.” Jack’s stance softened. “Yet she will likely feel more alone than she’s ever been.”

He went upstairs and changed into a black suit. When his dark cowboy boots thudded on the treads of the stairs, Cassandra slipped out of the parlor and joined him at the front door.

They stepped outside into a blanket of sunshine. Jack followed her shapely form toward the swaying oaks, and the buggies that’d been spiffed up and polished for the procession. Jack had a hard time forgetting the sensual night they’d spent together. It had started out slow and steamy and irresistible. She’d given him provocative looks that could melt an iceman from ten paces. The hours of pleasure had been followed by hours of stone-cold silence.

Why couldn’t she see that he was only looking out for her best interests? No man he knew would be pleased if his wife worked alongside lawmen and lawyers.

And for her to accuse him of hiring an investigator in order to guard his ranch and income from her was an insult.

He tried not to think about it as she climbed onto the front seat of the buggy—before he had an opportunity to help her. The foreman, Crawford, and the cook from the bunkhouse, Malcolm Pheebs, rode in the back. A stream of buggies—six of them—and eight more riders on horseback followed behind them, everyone dressed in their Sunday finest.

Mrs. Dunleigh was surrounded by her family when they got to the riverside ceremony. Her grandchildren, Julia and Ronald, were much quieter than usual, standing back from the newly dug gravesite and Finley’s pine casket, and squinting up at Reverend Darcy when he said a few words to the family beforehand.

“Good morning, Mrs. Dunleigh.” Cassandra embraced her.

The ceremony took place as the river rolled by, wide and blue and as deep as the sorrow felt by the more than one hundred people gathered. Yule had made a lot of friends in the twenty years since coming to Napa Valley, including Sheriff Leggett.

The tall lawman with the overly prominent jaw tipped his hat to Jack. His badge glinted in the morning sun. He used to be a railroad police officer, a difficult job, considering the outlaws that preyed upon the railways. Sundial was lucky to have him as a sheriff. He was tough, seasoned and fair.

With some hesitation, Jack introduced the lawman to his wife. There was no telling what she might say about possible detective work.

“How d’you do, ma’am?”

“Fine to meet you, sir,” she said, and with a pointed glance at Jack, left it at that.

He and Cassandra stood beside Mrs. Dunleigh on one side, her family on the other. Jack tried not to notice that Elise had arrived—without Thornley—and was quietly keeping to herself near the rear. Jack couldn’t be aggravated with her today; it would be disrespectful to the family of the deceased. So, when he was asked by the minister to say a few words on Dunleigh’s behalf, Jack stepped forward in his black Stetson and black suit, and didn’t meet Elise’s gaze when she focused on him.

“Yule was a good man,” he told the listening crowd, hat in hand. “Honest to the core. No one ever criticized him as a friend. I reckon that’s about the highest compliment you can pay a man.”

Dunleigh was buried beneath a big oak tree.

Jack was concerned that the funeral might bring back too many painful memories for Cassandra, but was relieved when she seemed to be handling it with no outward emotion. Yet there was a chasm between them, and he felt it now as she seemed to retreat inside herself.

All he could think of when he looked down at her blond hair pinned up beneath her black bonnet, and the dull, starched jacket, was that she was too young to be wearing black.

The ceremony drew to a close. Jack and Cassandra said their goodbyes to Mrs. Dunleigh and her family and headed toward their buggy. He placed his palm protectively against her shoulder blade and she turned her head, almost twitching at the contact. They were so aware of each other physically, and he didn’t wish to make the wrong move. He dropped his hand.

Jack spotted Elise weaving her way toward them. His gut instantly tensed. Surely she wasn’t going to approach. Not here. Not now.

“Jack,” she called, to his disappointment.

Cassandra stiffened beside him. Her swirling black skirts came to an abrupt halt. He noticed her eyeing the buggy, as though she wasn’t sure whether to stay or retreat.

Too late. Elise was beside them. She glanced at Cassandra with a tense nod, seemingly polite, then back at him. The woman was dressed in a high-fashioned black outfit as crisp and new as if it had only just arrived from one of those fancy New York dress catalogs.

It bothered him that she felt the need to get all dolled up for a funeral.

She
bothered him.

“Elise,” he said, edging past her with Cassandra. “Pardon us, we do have a full day ahead.”

Elise raised her voice from behind him. “I simply wondered if you’d heard the bad news about Woodrow’s horses.”

“Woodrow?” The man was Jack’s neighbor. Elise’s neighbor, too. Woodrow owned a horse ranch adjacent to Jack’s and Finley’s properties, along the back. “What’s wrong with his horses?”

“There’s about five or six of them. Came down with the same sort of illness as Finley’s cattle.”

“When? And why didn’t I hear about it?” Jack was usually one of the first to be notified.

“Well, I just heard myself, by accident, as I was leaving for the funeral. They’re right behind our vineyard, and I gather one of his hands told one of our hands, and that’s how I heard. They would’ve known you were heading here, so I imagine you’ll be notified shortly.”

Jack scowled. Not so much because Elise was bringing the news, but because more animals were coming down ill. What did they all have in common? It was too soon to jump to any conclusions about the illness and cause, since he hadn’t seen the horses yet. “Much obliged,” he said to her. “I’ll head out that way.”

Elise stepped back in a meek manner, and nodded politely to both him and Cassandra. But judging from her subtle smile, the slight release of tension in her pinched cheeks and the color rushing to her lips, he had an uneasy feeling he might be seeing Elise at Woodrow’s ranch, too.

* * *

Jack was right. The woman was there.

He took barely an hour to return to his ranch and drop off Cassandra. There was a ranch hand from Woodrow’s waiting for him, to explain that his services were requested.

“I’ll be right there,” Jack told the rider.

The messenger galloped away on his horse.

“Will you be long?” Cassandra asked twenty minutes later, when she’d changed into an apricot-colored dress that matched her hair, and Jack had changed into his denim pants and work shirt. She slipped an apron over her neck. “I’m preparing lunch.”

“It’s better if I have a look at those horses as quick as I can. The sooner they’re diagnosed, the sooner I can start treatment if needed. I can’t say for sure how long I’ll be. An hour or two at most. You go on ahead without me.”

“As you wish.”

He hurried to Woodrow’s ranch, and Elise was already there in her working blouse and skirt, standing on the hill at the water trough, examining a chestnut mare. Her medical bag was beside her.

Jack muttered beneath his breath, wondering why she had to be here.

Woodrow, a retired politician sporting a large belly and long mustache, was talking to her. “I’d like to thank you for coming so quick, Miss Beacon.”

Oh, so she wasn’t barging in; she’d been summoned, too.

Elise rubbed the horse’s nose. The animal seemed a bit jittery. “Not at all, Mr. Woodrow. We’re concerned this may reach our animals, too.”

“Woodrow!” Jack called hello and received a friendly handshake in return.

“Jack. I’m not sure what to do.”

“What’s wrong, exactly?”

“Six of my horses came down with some sort of stomach ailment.”

“Scours?”

“Two or three times in the past few hours,” Elise explained. “Along with vomiting.”

“Any blood from either end?” asked Jack.

“No.” Woodrow planted his hands on his hips.

“Well, that’s good.” Jack moved into the shade alongside the mare and took a look at her. “Easy now, girl. This won’t hurt.” He pulled out his stethoscope and listened to her heartbeat. “It’s fast,” he told Woodrow.

“And this one’s got a temperature,” said Elise. “Two degrees higher than it should be.”

“That’s not too bad,” said Jack. “Considering the heat of the day.” He held the mare by her bridle and looked at her face. “Dull eyes.” Jack turned to Woodrow. “Any idea why she’s behaving like she is?” He preferred to ask that question directly from the owner, who often had clues about his animals that could help Jack build an illness history.

“Something they ate in the pasture last night, I believe. Miss Beacon and I were talkin’ about where the horses grazed, and I was just pointin’ out the southwestern slopes.”

“Next to Finley’s,” said Jack, scanning the grassy area. “Maybe it’s a patch of the same toxic weeds running through both your properties.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” said Elise. “I was just about to have a look.”

“No need to trouble yourself,” Jack told her.

Alarmed, she looked up from the animal.

“I’m here,” he said in a friendly tone. “I can look after it. Woodrow, would you mind showing me where? I’d also like to have a look at the other horses that have come down with it.”

“Surely, Jack. Follow me.” Woodrow led the way, then glanced back at Elise. “You’re welcome to join us, Miss Beacon. I’m just hopin’ it’s not too much bother.”

She smiled and followed the men. “No bother, sir. I’m glad to help.”

“You always were smart as a whip. Could ride better’n any female I’ve ever seen.”

They continued talking. Jack shook his head, determined not to be too judgmental of Elise when Woodrow seemed so grateful for her opinion. She did know an awful lot about animals, thought Jack. But she didn’t know an awful lot about him, otherwise she would’ve picked up on the fact that he wished she’d go home.

* * *

They didn’t find any poisonous weeds, which was puzzling to Jack. Unless the horses ate it all, in which case there’d be little evidence to find on the hill.

Elise didn’t make a nuisance of herself. On the contrary, thought Jack, she was a help, keeping the ranch hands talking and out of his way when he examined the horses in the stable. She seemed to know when he needed equipment from his medical bag, and when he needed a hand calming one of the sicker animals when he wanted to use his stethoscope.

All in all, it took him under two hours to finish.

“Give them some of this tonic tonight. Two capfuls mixed into half a pail of water. Don’t exercise them too much, but give them some air tonight. If they get any worse, send for me immediately. Otherwise I’ll be back in the morning.”

“Sure am glad you’re my neighbor,” said Woodrow. “Mighty kind of you. And you, too, Miss Beacon.”

She smiled brightly and followed Jack outside into the sunshine.

His horse, River, was tethered to the hitching rings at the far end of the corral. Elise followed him in that direction to her red buggy.

“If you need help with any of this, Jack, you can count on me.”

“Good to know.” He didn’t plan on needing her for anything.

“I mean it. It’s not like we have to keep avoiding each other.”

“You’re liked by an awful lot of ranchers in the area, Elise.”

She beamed at that remark. It was true.

When he looked at her standing there, so proud that she’d been able to help, he wondered if maybe he was being too harsh on her. She seemed to honestly want to put the past behind them, and maybe he shouldn’t hold a grudge.

In a gesture of goodwill, he stuck out his hand. “If need be, I’ll call on you.”

She slipped her fingers into his and radiated that same provocative warmth he remembered falling for just before Christmas. Not that he was in any way tempted now.

He slung his medical bag to the saddle, climbed up onto his horse, nodded goodbye and tore off for home. Cassandra was likely waiting for him.

He barreled over the hills, dust rising behind him, the wind billowing his shirt and the sun blazing onto his shoulders. He loved a good run. He unwound from the day’s events. Dunleigh’s death had taken a bigger toll than he’d realized. The man had been a close friend, and Jack hadn’t truly comprehended that fact until it was too late and the friend was gone.

He came around a cluster of trees, feeling much freer than he had on Woodrow’s ranch with Elise so damn close, then spotted a man on a horse on a far hill. But he was there all right, and he was watching Jack.

Jack slowed his mare to a trot. “Easy, River. Almost home.”

He kept one eye on the man as an uneasy tension rolled through his body. Who was he?

As Jack got closer, he realized the man wanted him to recognize him, or else he would’ve galloped away.

He wore a tan Stetson and denim pants. But what gave him away was his horse. A dapple-gray mare.

Thornley.

What did he want? To intimidate Jack?