Tall, Dark, and Texan (8 page)

At sunset she walked out on the porch. The last light of day disappeared along the mountain ridge. Jessie looked in the direction of the bridge and to her surprise saw what looked like an Indian encampment.

“Martha!” she screamed. “Martha, come quick.”

Several moments passed before Martha, dressed for bed, stepped out of the house. “This better be important. I like my head hitting the pillow as the world turns dark.”

“It is. We’re being invaded.”

Martha squinted out in the direction Jessie pointed. “You’re right. I’ll get the guns, and we’ll shoot them all.”

“But I can’t fire a gun.” Jessie panicked. “And I’m not sure I could shoot anyone, even if I knew how to pull the trigger.”

Martha laughed. “Well, I guess we’ll just have to let Teagen’s grandfather stay then.”

“Teagen’s grandfather?”

The sound of a horse riding in made both women turn. Teagen circled the barn and headed toward them. When he was ten feet away, he reined his horse in but didn’t climb down. He seemed to stare at the two of them a minute, then raised his hat. “Martha, shouldn’t you be in bed?”

“I should,” she answered. “But the yelling woke me.”

“Emily again.”

The housekeeper shook her head. “Jessie. She seems to believe we’re in danger of an attack.”

“We are,” Teagen admitted. “I heard a band of raiders planned to storm the bridge, so I asked Grandfather if there was any chance he’d send a hunting party to camp out for a few days.”

Martha laughed. “I know your grandfather has a strict rule about interfering with McMurray business, but the raiders couldn’t know that. Any outlaws would be fools to try to cross that bridge now, so I guess I can sleep easy. Which is past due.” She turned to the door.

“I’m sorry,” Jessie said as Martha passed. “I didn’t know they were McMurray relatives.”

Martha glanced back from the threshold. “It’s all right, dear.”

Teagen nudged his horse closer. “Martha, I was wondering.” His words sounded stiff. “Would you leave your door open? If the girls cry or come down, they’ll have to pass your room. I’d like to take Jessie over to the campsite so she’ll know there’s nothing to fear.”

Martha smiled. “Are you asking me for a favor, Teagen McMurray?”

“I guess, I am.”

“Well then, I’ll do it. Only because you asked nice and didn’t yell at me.” She disappeared into the house.

Jessie laughed. “I think there has been enough yelling for one day.” She walked to the edge of the porch where she could almost touch Teagen’s horse. “I’m sorry about the mess at breakfast. You must be starving.”

“No, I ate at my grandfather’s summer camp when I rode up to talk to him. The old man is funny. If I ask him for support or advice, he acts like he doesn’t understand, but if I tell him my problem, he finds a way to help.”

“He sounds like a wise man.”

“He is.” Teagen offered his hand. “If you’ll come along with me for a short ride, I’ll show you the camp set up down by the bridge.”

“I don’t know how to ride. It might be dangerous. It’s late. The girls—”

Teagen laughed. “When you’re out of reasons to say no, we can start.” He maneuvered the horse a few inches closer. “You won’t be riding alone. You’ll be sitting here in front of me. It’s no more dangerous than rocking in a rocking chair. Martha will look after the girls if they wake, and the best time to see an Apache village is at night when the fires make the place glow.”

Jessie had never done anything adventurous in her life. When she’d been thirteen and Eli hired her, within months she was running the bookstore. There were always things that needed doing, or the weather was bad, or one of the girls was sick. Except for Sunday afternoon walks, she’d never had a single adventure. And now, Teagen offered her one that she could fold away and cherish forever.

She stepped closer and touched his shoulder. He carefully circled her waist and lifted her up in front of him. The horse shifted. Jessie let out a little cry of fear, and Teagen laughed.

“I’ve got you,” he whispered against her ear. “I’m not going to let you fall.”

His arm pulled her against the warmth of his chest, and they began to move. “It’ll take longer to walk the horse, but I don’t mind. Just relax and enjoy the night.”

Jessie wasn’t sure relaxing was possible, but she did plan to enjoy tonight.

They talked about the ranch and what had happened during the day. Teagen told her about Roak’s visit and didn’t ask questions when she seemed to know all about the boy. Jessie reminded herself that the letters from him that she’d treasured had been addressed to Eli. She made a point to mention that Eli sometimes shared a few lines of Teagen’s letters.

She wished she could call them her letters. She wished she could tell him they had been her own private treasure. A hundred nights, when loneliness kept her awake, she’d tiptoed to her desk in the corner of the bookstore and lit one lamp so she could read his words, his thoughts, his dreams.

As they moved closer to the campfire lights, Jessie noticed they both lowered their voices. In a funny way even out here in the open, she felt very much alone with Teagen.

“Is it all right to ask how you felt today?” He broke the silence.

“I feel fine. And you’ll be happy to know that I ate like a pig all day.”

His arm squeezed slightly. “I can tell you’re getting fatter.”

“Martha made apple pancakes, applesauce, and apple pie today. Tomorrow she promised more cinnamon apples.” She shifted slightly so she could face him. “The big excitement of the afternoon was one of the hens had chicks hatch out. The girls loved it. By the time the birds were all out of their shells, Rose had tried to name every one. It took me an hour to convince her she couldn’t bring them in the house.”

Their faces were so close she could feel his breath on her cheek. Suddenly she became very much aware that their bodies touched from shoulder to leg. She knew she should turn away. This wasn’t proper to be so close to a man she barely knew. But it felt so right. He felt so warm.

The memory of what life had been like with Eli invaded her thoughts. They’d been married over a year before he came to her bed in the attic. He hadn’t said a word. He pulled her covers away, lifted her nightgown to her waist, and lowered his body on top of her. Jessie closed her eyes and shivered with the cold until it was over. When he left, he hadn’t pulled her gown back or returned the covers, but Jessie didn’t care. She lay shaking until the cold numbed her body and she no longer felt the pain. Eli never spoke of what had happened. He set a pattern of climbing the stairs once or twice a month. In all those years, through winters and summers, Jessie never felt anything but cold when he touched her.

“There’s the night guard.” Teagen turned loose of her for a moment while he waved.

A man with very few clothes on stood and waved back. Teagen reined the horse so they circled the camp. Firelight made the place seem enchanted. The tepees glowed in the night, and tiny embers drifted into the sky as if dancing toward the stars.

“How many are here?”

“A dozen men and a few women. Most of these braves are young and unmarried. Once married, their wives travel with them until too many children keep them back at the main camp.

“This is more a holiday for them than work. My grandfather knows I’ll cut a couple of head of cattle out of my herd for them to take home.”

“How long will they stay?”

“A week maybe. By then the men I’ve hired should be here. We’ll just wake up one morning, and they’ll be gone, tents and all.”

They circled the camp twice. One couple sat talking by a fire, another man seemed to be checking the line of horses, but most of the men must have retired for the night.

“Martha says you’re half-Apache,” she whispered.

“Yeah, but I don’t feel it like Travis and Tobin do. Maybe because before I was twelve I stepped into my father’s role. I even grew into his clothes. The Apache are my mother’s people. Both my brothers spent time at the camps, but I never had the time. There was always too much to do here.”

No sadness or regret lingered in his words. Teagen had simply done what he had to do, but she couldn’t help but wonder: if he’d been allowed to be a boy for a few summers longer, would he be a different man? Eli had always been treated like a child by his parents, and he’d crumbled into a bottle. Teagen had grown up too fast, and somehow he’d hardened to stone.

She laid her hand over Teagen’s arm. If only to her, he didn’t seem as unyielding as the world thought him to be. She knew the Teagen of the letters, the one who worried and bragged and loved this land. “Thank you for bringing me out here. It’s like I stepped into the pages of a book for a little while tonight.”

“You’re welcome.” He turned his horse toward the house, now only a spot of light in the distance. “You must be ready to get back. It’s getting late.”

“No,” she said without thinking.

She couldn’t see his face beneath the shadow of his hat, but she knew he was studying her. Finally, he said, “There’s a place behind the house where you can see almost the whole ranch. Would you like to see that?”

“Yes, please.”

As they rode toward Lookout Point, Jessie wondered why Martha thought Teagen was so impossible to get along with. To her, he’d been kinder than anyone ever had.

She rested her back against his chest, thinking that if he ever found out she’d written the letter and signed Eli’s name, she’d probably see the hard side of Teagen. The lies she’d told him seemed to be piling up. She couldn’t stay here forever and wait for relatives who weren’t going to show up. When she’d stepped off the stage, she’d told herself she had to find a place to rest and think. Now she had to find the courage to face her lie.

A few more days, she almost whispered aloud. Let me stay in this place for just a little longer, then I’ll be stronger.

TEAGEN DIDN’T SAY A WORD AS HE GUIDED THE ROAN up the rocky slope to where a ledge provided the perfect viewing point. Jessie seemed relaxed in his arms, moving with him as the horse shifted with the climb.

He knew he shouldn’t be thinking about her as a woman. She was the widow of his only friend. She was pregnant. Hell, he thought, in a few weeks she’ll be headed out of here and on her way to California with her own people. He’d never see her again. By the time she finished mourning Eli, she’d be so far away he’d be lucky if mail reached her.

Teagen might not know her well, but he’d bet his horse she wasn’t the kind of woman who’d consider a friendly roll in the hay before she left. And, he decided, neither was he. Early in his twenties he’d danced a few rounds with the kind of women who cuddle up easy and then didn’t remember a fellow’s name come morning. He discovered that no matter how interested he might have been after a few drinks at night, he couldn’t wait to get away the next morning.

“Cold?” he asked more gruffly than he’d meant to.

“No.” She patted his arm. “I’m fine.” Leaning her head against his shoulder, she added, “The stars look so bright here.”

It never occurred to Teagen that the stars wouldn’t appear to be the same anywhere. The only town of any size he’d ever been in was Austin. With four thousand people running around, he didn’t remember having time to look at the sky. Funny thing, he’d been born here, born beneath this sky, and in a way he thought of it as his.

“My father used to bring me up here at night.” The horse slowed as they reached the edge of the shelf twice again as high as the ranch house. “We’d come up here, and he’d tell me about his dream for this place. About how we’d raise the finest horses ever and how his sons and grandsons and great-grandsons would leave their mark on this piece of Texas.”

Teagen could never remember talking so much, but once he started, he couldn’t seem to stop. “The night before he left, he brought all three of us up here. Tobin was only six. He fell asleep and almost tumbled out of his saddle. We all knew our father was leaving the next day, and he’d be gone until the fight for Texas was over. But he didn’t talk about leaving us. He talked about how much he loved this place.”

Teagen felt her fingers brushing across the muscle on his forearm as if she were brushing away pain. “Did he tell you he loved you?”

“He didn’t have to.”

Jessie nodded. “I know what you mean. I was thirteen when my folks died too. When the fever got bad, my mother kept saying she loved me, but my father’s last words were that he was sorry. He only lived a few hours longer than my mother.”

“What do you think he was sorry for?” Teagen couldn’t help but ask.

“For leaving me, I guess. We never had much, and when they got sick, all we had disappeared. I’d been selling the furniture to buy medicine for weeks. We leased a place, and the only reason we stayed was because the landlord didn’t want to come into the apartment with them down with fever.”

“What happened when they died?” Teagen told himself he didn’t want to know, but he had to ask.

“I sold everything we had left to pay for their burial. Then I lived there awhile alone. The neighbors would invite me in to eat, but most of them had more kids than they could raise already. The landlord finally came around and told me I had to clean the place up and then he’d take me to the orphanage. I didn’t want to go, so I ran away. For a while I slept in the park, but when winter came I knew I’d freeze, so I started hiding in the bookstore about closing time. Eli was usually so busy it was easy to slip in at night and out before he opened. The place was a mess with boxes of books everywhere. Then, one morning he caught me.”

Teagen waited. He wouldn’t ask what happened, but he didn’t plan on moving until she told more.

Jessie looked up at him, her huge eyes filling with moonlight. “I thought he’d turn me over to the police, but he offered me a job. Meals, if I cooked them, and a cot in the attic if I worked in the store. The arrangement was good. It gave me a safe place to stay, and it provided him with the freedom to leave. Eli loved two things in his life: books and whiskey. As long as the store was open and running, he had both.”