Tall, Dark, and Texan (7 page)

Teagen realized how much alike he and this kid were. After a moment of silence, he asked, “I got some coffee still on the stove. Want some?”

Roak’s head jerked up as if he smelled a trap, but after a short hesitation, he said, “I might if you got any of them cookies your housekeeper makes. I can still remember them from when you tied me up in the barn and all your womenfolk tried to feed me to death.”

Laughing, he showed Roak the way to the kitchen. “We had other things on our minds at the time, as I remember. We figured you’d stay put in the barn.”

“I seen a play in Houston, in a fancy bar, that had less acts in it than your barn did while I was your
guest
.”

Teagen poured the boy the last of the coffee and set the jar of cookies on the table. “Nothing’s changed around here. I’ve still got my hands full of women and thieves.”

Roak ate the first cookie whole, then mumbled around it as he chewed. “You’re not kidding, McMurray. Everyone in town knows your brothers are both gone. What kind of fool lets them both leave at the same time and then invites a widow and three kids to stay with him?”

Teagen had little defense; in fact, he agreed with Roak. He was a fool. “Tobin and his family left first for Washington, D.C., then Travis got called into Austin for a trial. He lives there more than he lives here these days.” He didn’t add that a few old Rangers were riding in from Austin to help him out. Once they were here, he’d no longer be alone. No sense filling the kid in on anything he didn’t know. “Don’t tell me you’re here to offer to help guard the place?”

Roak laughed and dug out another cookie. “Of course not. That’d ruin my reputation as a gunfighter. I just thought I’d tell you what I know about this gang of cutthroats. When they come it will be at dusk, and they’re planning to ride right over the bridge. They figure alone, you can’t stop them. Maybe you’ll get one or two, but then they’ll take you down and have a free pass to take all the horses they can find. You’re too far from town and too mean to have any neighbors who could hear shooting and come to help. So, the way they look at it, they’ve got one man between them and a fortune in fine horse-flesh.”

Teagen had never heard of such a bold plan. “Where’d you hear about this?”

“From one of the men who’s scared ’cause he knows he’ll be riding in front when they storm the bridge. He got drunk one night in a bar not even the cowhands will hang out in. The more he drank, the more he talked.” Roak looked up. “By the way, you owe me for the whiskey I had to buy to get all the details.”

“Take it out in cookies, boy.”

Roak’s words came fast and deadly. “I’m not a boy.”

Teagen raised his hands. “All right. Fair enough. I have no plan to fight with the
man
who brings me a warning.” He watched Roak closely. “By the way, why did you really come out here to warn me?”

Roak grinned. “I thought Sage might be home by now. I hear she’s due back any day.”

Teagen fought down a laugh. The kid was sweet on his sister and had no idea that he was out of his league. Sage was not only three years older and far more educated, she’d want nothing to do with a man who wore a gun. “Even if she was here, Roak, she wouldn’t want to see you.”

Teagen’s words didn’t seem to bother Roak. “I know.” He shrugged. “I just like knowing she’s home and safe.” He winked and offered a wicked smile. “When I get a little older, she’s going to be crazy about me; you wait and see.”

“I doubt it. She’s sworn off men. The Ranger she fell hard for a few years ago in Austin is dead, and she claims she’ll never love any man again. Swears she’ll be an old maid and live with me.”

Roak nodded as if he’d heard this promise before. “Which is why I have to warn you. I can’t have you losing the ranch while she’s gone.”

Teagen returned the coffeepot to the stove and added, “All right, kid, I’ll take—”

He turned back to the table to find Roak gone. He’d left as silently as he’d come without even stirring the air.

Teagen swore when he realized the thief had also taken the jar of cookies.

JESSIE WOKE LATE AND KNEW THE GIRLS HAD ALREADY tiptoed down the back stairs. Even Bethie had learned to crawl her way down one step at a time. Jessie dressed as fast as she could and ran to make sure they were all right and not getting into trouble.

She couldn’t help brushing her hand along the wood. If houses had souls, this one must have a strong one. In the two days she’d been here it seemed to have cradled her, making her feel welcome and protected. Even if today were the day she had to leave, Jessie would never forget the warmth of this place.

When she stepped into the kitchen, she let out a long-held breath. All three of her daughters sat at the table. Emily and Rose wore Martha’s aprons tied around their necks. Bethie’s borrowed apron had been tied to the chair as well. They all smiled at their mother with bright syrup grins that tickled her heart. The three looked nothing alike, but they were all hers.

“Morning, Mom.” Rose lifted her fork and smiled. “We’re having pancakes with raisin smiles for breakfast.”

“Great.” Jessie came closer, almost dreading the first smell of breakfast. “What else?”

“Cinnamon apples.” Martha turned from the stove. “Teagen McMurray has decided we have far too many apples in the storage shed. He told me he wanted apples at every meal from now on.”

Jessie smiled.

Martha continued to fret. “That man would drive a sane woman to drink. He’s had the same breakfast for years. Biscuits, sausage or bacon, eggs, and gravy. Now all of a sudden, this morning he comes in and says he doesn’t want bacon or sausage. He says he doesn’t even want to smell it cooking. I swear if he wasn’t already over thirty, I’d mail order him a bride to watch over him and take some time off. But, with my luck, I’d never find a woman to marry a man who has spent twenty years stewing in ornery.”

Jessie tried to defend him. “Apples don’t sound all that strange. Maybe he just wants a change.”

“Oh, that is not all.” Martha waved her wooden spoon. “He seems to have eaten the cookies, jar and all. When I asked him about it, he didn’t even deny it.”

Jessie laughed as she poured a cup of coffee. Now
that
she couldn’t believe. “Well, the girls will help you make more. They are great cookie makers.”

“I can’t, Mom.” Rose shook her dark braids. “I’ve got to start naming the pigs today. My work around here is never done. I’ve finished with the cats and the goats, but today I have to start on the pigs, and they keep moving around, so it won’t be easy. You can’t just give a pig any old name. I have to find just the right ones.”

“Help!” Bethie cried and kicked her legs, turning the table into a drum.

Jessie glanced over at her youngest, who’d poured so much syrup on her pancakes her fingers were stuck together with huge pieces of pancake clinging to both hands.

“Mommy,” she cried. “Help.”

Both Jessie and Martha dropped what they were doing and ran to her aid.

“Morning.” Teagen stepped through the back door just as Bethie managed to pull her hands apart and sent the pancake flying.

Teagen growled and looked around the room.

All three of her daughters froze and watched as he slowly reached up, pulled the pancake piece off the side of his face, and ate it.

Emily started to cry.

Teagen frowned at her and took a step toward her.

Emily broke into huge gulps of half screams, half sobs.

“Stop it!” Jessie yelled at Teagen. “Stop it right this instant.”

Teagen glowered in confusion when he figured out she was yelling at him. “Stop what? I’m not the one screaming my head off. That honor goes to your oldest.”

Jessie stepped in front of him and lowered her voice. “Stop looking at her with that look.”

Teagen appeared to be chewing on words to keep them from coming out. Finally, he managed, “This is the only look I have, lady. I may think for some reason it’s raining pancakes in this kitchen, but you’re the one who’s crazy.”

Jessie didn’t back down an inch. “Stop frowning at Emily. It frightens her.”

To everyone’s surprise, Teagen turned around and stormed back through the door. “Martha,” he yelled. “I’m taking my breakfast on the porch.”

“This ain’t no boardinghouse!” the housekeeper hollered back. “If you can’t stop scaring that child, you can go without breakfast.”

Jessie stood at the door and watched him swing into the saddle and disappear in a cloud of dust.

For no reason at all, she began to cry. Tears ran silently down her face. She’d managed to drive Teagen out of his own home. He’d already been up for three hours doing chores, and now he’d go until noon without any breakfast.

She heard the kitchen return to normal behind her. Bethie was eating, probably getting more on the floor than in her mouth. Rose asked Martha how she got all the pancakes the same size, and Emily had stopped screaming.

All was normal, except Teagen was gone. Resting against the doorframe, she watched until the last of the dust he’d kicked up vanished. She saw herself as a mighty warrior when defending her daughters, but this time, this one time, she may have rushed to the battle call too fast.

Wiping her tears aside, Jessie turned to Emily. “Finish your breakfast, Em, and we’ll start your lessons.”

“All right, Mom.” The child showed no sign of having ever been upset.

“And, tomorrow, when you see Mr. McMurray, if you feel you are about to cry or scream, I’d like you to leave the room.”

The seven-year-old teared up. “But Mom. He—”

“He did nothing but walk into his own house, Em. He’s been kind to us, and you’ve paid him for that kindness by screaming and crying.”

Jessie could almost hear her oldest daughter’s mind working. For the first time she realized Emily had controlled her with tantrums for as long as she could remember. When she’d been tiny, Jessie had often given in to Emily’s demands because Eli hated any noise in the bookstore. Somehow she’d believed if her child were perfect and silent, Eli would love her. By the time Rose came along, Jessie knew it would never happen.

Moving around the table, Jessie hugged her firstborn. “I’ll be here ready to fight if someone tries to bother you, but you can’t just pick a person and scream every time you see him.”

“He’ll hit you like Father did,” Emily whispered.

“No, he won’t,” Jessie answered, remembering how Emily had once been in the kitchen during a fight she’d had with Eli. He’d been determined to leave. She’d been just as determined that he’d stay. The argument had ended when he knocked her out of the way. Jessie had only been bruised when she’d fallen, but Emily had cried all night long.

“Oh, Em, we’re going to find a place where we’ll be safe. You don’t have to cry or scream anymore. You don’t have to be afraid.”

Martha set Jessie’s plate down beside Emily’s. “Your mom is right about the McMurrays. They’re a tough bunch, but in all my years here, I ain’t never seen one of them hurt a woman. In fact, from what I’ve seen, I think they see little girls as some kind of rare treasures that seldom come along. You should see the way Tobin and Travis almost carry their wives around on pillows.”

Emily looked up at the housekeeper. “You have never seen Mister get mad and hit his sister?”

“Nope, and believe you me, Sage did some crazy things growing up. I love her dearly, but there were times I thought she could use a spanking. None of the boys would hear of it.” Martha took the empty seat at the table. “When she was growing up around this place, if the truth be told, she was as wild as them. They’d ride in at full gallop and pass her off from one to the other. When I made them stop, she cried so hard she made herself sick.”

Jessie ate her stack of pancakes as Martha continued. “When that girl weren’t no bigger than Rose, she could outrun the wind on horseback, and she’d be laughing all the way.”

“I want to do that,” Emily said, propping her elbows on the table. “I want to ride a horse.”

“Me too,” Rose said with a hint less determination.

“Well, you’ll have to ask Teagen to teach you. I don’t know how to ride, and I’m guessing your mother doesn’t either.”

“Would he if we asked?” Emily, her shyness forgotten, looked directly at Martha.

“Maybe, maybe not. If you made him cookies and didn’t scream when he walked into the room, I’d say you’d have a good chance.”

The two girls looked at each other and nodded once as if making a pact.

Jessie downed the last of her milk and wondered if Teagen had any idea of what waited for him when he got home.

While the girls helped clear the table, Martha whispered close to Jessie’s ear, “You feeling the need to visit the weeds this morning?”

“No.” Jessie studied the older woman. “How’d you know about that?”

“There ain’t much that happens between dawn and dusk that I don’t know about. I’ll put some salt crackers on my grocery list. I’ve heard they help for women who have upset stomach in the morning.”

Jessie was trying to decide whether to tell Martha the truth or lie, when the housekeeper got up and went to help the girls wash the dishes. Apparently, Martha hadn’t needed her to explain.

Teagen didn’t come in for lunch. Martha told Jessie that it wasn’t unusual for the men to eat jerky and hard biscuits when riding in wasn’t convenient, but Jessie still had the feeling he might be avoiding her family.

When he didn’t return for supper, she got worried. The girls had played hard all day and were ready for bed, but she found herself wandering from room to room, waiting for Teagen’s return.

The McMurray house seemed huge with its wide dining room and a great room with one group of chairs turned toward the fire for warmth in winter and another group facing the windows. There were no frills or pictures on the walls. What looked like an Irish tartan and a strand of Indian beads hung above the fireplace. It was a home built like the man who owned it: solid and strong enough to weather anything.