The Lover (2 page)

“No, Mrs. Copeland, I would not. That's a fault.”

She tried to keep her stern expression—he knew because he watched her beautiful lips—but try as she would not to, she smiled back at him. Susanna Copeland was beyond beautiful when she smiled.

And it didn't take her all day to make up her mind. That was another trait he liked in a woman.

“You're hired,” she said, and reached in through the bars to shake on it.

Her grip was strong for a hand so small that it fit in the palm of his. Her soft glove was made of good quality leather but it had holes in two places.

He would pay her right back for the bail.

 

Susanna had to slow her pace for a second time before they even made it past the broad window that said SALADO JAIL Eagle Jack Sixkiller was barely steady enough to keep his feet under him and now he'd come to a complete stop at the edge of the sidewalk—standing there looking up and down the street at the vehicles going past as if he intended to flag down a ride.

She set her jaw. He could forget that. Drunk or
not, he was all the man she had and he wasn't going to quit her, no matter what.

Absolutely, she was not going to lose the only home she'd ever owned because some footloose, liquor-loving joker couldn't settle down to work instead of play. Selling those cattle at a profit was the only way for her to keep her beloved Brushy Creek Ranch, and if she had to make a trail boss out of a worthless drunk to take them north, then she would do that very thing.

She went to him and nudged his elbow.

“You agreed to hire me an outfit,” she said, “and you can't do it lollygagging around out here. Come on. Drink some coffee and sober up.”

“Go on,” he said. “I'll meet you at the café.”

A chill hand of fear touched her spine.

“I'm not letting you out of my sight,” she said. “I didn't pay the last hard money I had in this world to get you out of jail for nothing.”

His dark brown eyes flicked to her and she glimpsed a trace of his quick grin.

“Don't you trust me?”

She should've thought about that grin before she laid down her money. He'd taken her lightly from the very first, right there in the jail.

“About as much as I trust a rattlesnake.”

That only made his grin widen.

“Always like to know where I stand,” he said.

He turned and started down the street, walking much faster than he had before.

Susanna stayed right beside him. They passed the barbershop and came to the saloon, where he stopped.

“Wait here,” he said. “I'll only be a minute.”

She stepped between him and the half doors, her heart beating like a hammer in her chest.

“You heard me back there in the jail,” she said. “You have to learn to do without liquor and you have to start now.”

“I don't intend to drink a drop.”

There was that little twitch of his lips again.

Her anger bubbled over. She set her fists on her hips.

“Why in the
world
do men have to be such dense creatures?” she cried. “Look at you. Anyone can see you have a problem with drink. You're a fine figure of a man, Mr. Sixkiller. Don't let your natural bent for whiskey ruin you.”

His grin vanished.

“In other words, you're calling me a drunken Indian. Isn't that right, Mrs. Copeland?”

Colder fear grabbed her by the heart. Would he take so much offense that he'd quit her for sure?

She gathered all her strength.

“Some of your people—”

“I was the only sober man in that jail cell,” he interrupted. “And obviously the only Indian. Yes, ma'am. I'm Cherokee and proud of it.”

He took off his hat and bent his head, turning so that she could see the spot where he held back his
long hair, which was tied with a leather thong. A huge pump knot swelled behind his ear.

Susanna gasped before she got hold of herself. Showing him sympathy wouldn't help either of them. It would defeat her purpose.

“That should've taught you a lesson, right there,” she said. “When liquor's in control of you, you can't control anything around you.”

He straightened up and replaced his hat, all the while giving her a hurt look.

“They hit me with a two-by-four,” he said. “There were two of them. They could've killed me.”

“That's exactly what I'm telling you. Drunks get into lots of fights and bad situations. You'd better stay sober.”

“I'm not so sure about that,” he said, the corners of his mouth twitching as if he wanted to grin. “I was stone-cold sober when I got into
this
bad situation.”

A cold hand clutched her stomach. He wasn't going to back out now. She would
not
let him.

“At the end of the trail you'll thank me,” she said. “You'll be amazed how much better you'll feel after weeks of good, hard work in the open air and a true victory over demon rum.”

He looked at her for a long minute with that piercing gleam of humor coming back into his dark brown eyes.

“It'll be very good for you to go up the trail at
the head of my outfit,” she said. “The responsibility will be good for you, too.”

Of course, she'd have to be the
real
head of the outfit. There was no telling when he'd try to find a saloon again. Or when he'd take some happening lightly and laugh about it when it should be taken seriously, instead.

“You're a hard girl, Susanna,” he said. “Any other woman would have sympathy and a natural urge to take care of a hurt man.”

She was not going to give in to him. If she were not so perfectly desperate to get her hands on any man, she'd tell him to forget it this very minute. She should've known better than to get a man out of a
jail
!

“So would I,” she said, “if that man hadn't helped himself get hurt.”

He reached for her arm, turned her around, and marched her right through the swinging doors of the saloon. He walked her toward the bar, which was sparsely populated in the middle of the afternoon.

The bartender stopped what he was doing to come to meet them.

“Jonas,” Eagle Jack said, “have you seen those Kentucky fakers since yesterday?”

“Not a glimpse,” the man replied. “Heard they left town after they won your mare.”

“They stole her,” Eagle Jack said. “Any word which way they went?”

“Nope.”

“Much obliged.”

He dragged Susanna back out to the street as unceremoniously as he'd taken her in there. Back on the sidewalk, she pulled loose from his grip.

“Don't touch me again,” she told him.

He was walking much faster than she'd thought possible.

“Don't stand in my way again,” he said.

“Look,” she said, “you're my trail boss, not
my
boss. Nobody drags me anywhere, much less into a saloon.”

“What difference does it make? You've already been in the jail today. That's no place for a lady, either.”

“Social dictates don't tell me where to go. Neither does any one person. Especially not a man.”

He threw her the briefest glance.

“
Never
,” she said.

“Hey,” he said, with a trace of that irritating grin of his, “get the burr out from under your saddle.
You're
the one who said you aren't leaving my side.”

“What I said was that I'm not letting you out of my sight.”

He shrugged.

“Same thing.”

“I could've kept my eye on you over the bar-room door.”

“Aw, come on,” he drawled. “You'd argue with a fence post, Susanna.”

“Mrs. Copeland to you.”

“I thought we were friends,” he said, with a teasing, sideways glance. “You can call me Eagle Jack.”

He absolutely did have the most aggravating way about him.

Then she remembered.

“As a matter of fact,” she said. “You do need to call me either Susanna or Mrs. Sixkiller.”

“
What
?”

He stared at her as he stepped down off the sidewalk and held out his hand to steady her as she did the same. His brown eyes showed such surprise that she wanted to laugh.

“On the trail we'll have to pretend to be married,” she said. “It's the only way the men will respect my presence. I said that at the jail before you took the job.”

He shrugged. “No problem. I'll get your cattle to Kansas.”

He looked down the side street they'd just turned into. “If by some miracle I have reason to reach for my gun,” he said, “get away from me.”

“Look,” she said, “you're working for me now. You can't be going off somewhere tracking horse thieves…”

His hard glance stopped her tongue.

“I'm not leaving Salado until I know for sure they've hightailed it.”

“Ever since we turned into this street, I've known you were coming to get your horse and start out on their trail,” she said. “I cannot allow it. My business is urgent and now, as my foreman, it's your business, too.”

That
made him get serious at last.

“Don't
worry
about it,” he said.

Now he, too, was irritated.

“I told you I'd get your cattle to Kansas, and I will.”

This time she heard him.

“Our agreement is less than an hour old and already you're going back on it,” she said, in her most formidable manner. “Don't even try that with me, Eagle Jack.”

“I'm not. I just
said
I'd do it.”

“And I will help you do it. I'm not letting my
cattle
out of my sight, either.”

He gave her a frustrated look.

“Take a deep breath, Mrs. Copeland. I'll trail your cattle to Kansas. You have my word.”

The way he spoke and the way he set his jaw then made her know that it would do no good and quite a bit of harm if she said another word about it. He could be quite formidable himself, could Eagle Jack Sixkiller.

Walking steadily, he strode up to the wide
opening of the livery stable where a boy was sweeping the hard dirt of the entrance.

“Howdy, Mr. Sixkiller,” he said.

“Nathan. You seen those Kentuckians with the gray running horse today?”

Nathan seized that excuse to lean on his broom.

“They lit out,” he said.

“They say where they're headed?”

“All I heard was that short one—you know that short, fat one?”

He wouldn't go on until Eagle Jack had nodded.

“Well,” Nathan said, basking in such close attention from not one, but two adults, “that 'un was sayin' that lots of outfits goin' up the trail are braggin' they got a whole remuda full o' fast horses.”

Eagle Jack thought about that.

“Any mention of one trail in particular?”

“No sir. Not that I know of.”

Eagle Jack nodded.

“Let me see your horses for sale,” he said. “I need to get on the road.”

Susanna walked around to the pen in the back with them and watched Eagle Jack Sixkiller pick a horse from the dozen or so that Nathan drove into a trot and then a lope along the fence. Her trail boss was as good as his word in that respect, at least.

He didn't give them more than a glance apiece at each gait until he made his choice.

“Get that tall bright sorrel ready,” he said, to the boy, “I'll be right back.”

Then he looked at Susanna.

“You have thirty minutes to take care of any un-finished business, get your horse, and be ready to leave town,” he said. “I'm going to the bank, the saddle shop, and back to the livery here. In that order.”

“Then so am I,” she said.

His jaw hardened and the skin tightened across his high cheekbones.

His brown eyes looked almost black as they bored into hers.

He wanted to tell her to get lost. She knew that as certainly as if he'd blurted it out.

She waited. This was where she'd find out if he really was a man of his word.

“At the bank I'll get money to pay you back for the bail,” he said.

“I won't take it,” she said. “You can't buy your way out of our deal.”

For some reason that brought the glint of humor back into his eyes, even if he did shake his head in despair.

“I wouldn't even think of trying,” he said.

E
agle Jack cudgeled his brain as they walked the two blocks to the bank. He had to think of something. He had to
think.

By damn, it was going to be harder to escape from Susanna Copeland than from the Salado Jail. He would have to take her cattle north, yes, because he had said he would and never would he let it be said that Eagle Jack Sixkiller went back on his word.

But that didn't mean he had to have this bossy woman as his constant shadow.

He decided to try his famous charm again. After all, he had never met a woman he couldn't melt right down into her shoes if he put his mind to it. He was known as a ladies' man all over Texas, wasn't he?

“Sorry if I'm walking too fast for you, Su
sanna,” he said, slowing his pace and flashing his smile at her. “If you want to go and get your horse, you can meet me—”

She interrupted.

“I'm not falling behind, am I?”

It was true. Her long legs had kept up with his every step since they'd left the livery.

“And my horse is tied near the saddle shop. I'll get him when we're done there.”

Her blue eyes met Eagle Jack's with an annoyed glance.

Unfortunately, his charm might not work
every
time. At least, not on her.

Which made her a very unusual woman, indeed.

And it made her a challenge. He was not going to let her ruin his perfect record, especially not when she was one of the most beautiful women he'd come across in all his adventures.

“You needn't be in such a hurry,” she said. “I bailed you out of that stinking jail to hire me a crew and I intend to see that you do it before we leave Salado.”

Quick anger seared his nerves. She was a challenge, all right. His headache flared, its pounding worst right between his eyes.

“I'll
get
you a crew,” he said, through clenched teeth, “in my own good time.”

“We'll need them tonight,” she said. “My cattle should be at Brushy Creek when we get there.”

He stopped in front of the saddle shop and stared at her.

“How many cattle?”

“I'm guessing close to nine hundred, but it'll depend on how many more the brushpoppers can catch. My guess was around seven hundred head already gathered when I left home this morning.”

More than he'd imagined, from the looks of her clothes. Way more. Throwing them in with his would make one of the biggest herds on the trail. He would need four more men, at least.

But it did explain one thing.

“Is that why your husband sent you to hire the crew?”

“My husband has long since gone on to his great reward,” she said, with a bitter irony in her tone, “whatever that might be.”

Well. A widow. So she wasn't married, after all.

But why did he care? She'd be just as much trouble romantically as she was in every other way.

And just as surprising, probably. He'd like that.

“Did you kill him?” he said.

She gave a little burst of laughter.

“No. But I'm glad to see I've got my bluff in on you.”

He grinned.

“I didn't really take you for a killer,” he said, “but you don't sound too sad about him being six feet under.”

“I'm not. He was a bully and a brutal man in many ways. I wish I'd thought twice before I married him.”

Eagle Jack's headache couldn't keep his curiosity down. He always wanted to know why a woman did what she did. Women were fascinating creatures because all of them were different from one another—except for the fact that they didn't think one bit like men.

“Why did you?”

For the first time, she hesitated.

“I was a foolish young girl,” she said. “Too young to know better.”

“Did he beat you?”

It was a personal question that would have offended many women but she seemed to recognize the spirit in which he'd asked it.

“At the very first, he would have,” she said, seeming to think it through as she spoke, “but even though I was very young, I wouldn't stand for it.”

“What did you do?”

“When he raised his hand to me, I told him if he hit me he'd better never go to sleep drunk again.”

“Why?”

“Because I would sew him up in the bedsheet and beat him senseless with the broom.”

Eagle Jack threw back his head and laughed, in spite of his pain.

“I'm surprised he'd put up with that.”

“We were on the move by then,” she said. “It was too much trouble for him to stop and find somebody else to be his servant.”

She glanced up at him sideways. A matter-of-fact glance.

“Everett was a lazy cuss,” she said. “He liked his food and drink and he liked his sleep.”

He shook his head, grinning in spite of his pain. She was spunky, he had to hand her that.

But he had to stop this line of thinking. He'd fallen into a whole more with her than a dalliance—he'd fallen into a whole lot of work in a short amount of time. He'd better get his mind on the task ahead.

“We've got a lot to get done today,” he said. “What kind of help do you have?”

“An older couple, May and Jimbo—they live in my cabin.”

“They can't—,” he said.

“—hold a herd,” she interrupted. “I know. I asked the men who gathered the cattle not to leave them until we get there.”

“Are you telling me that you've been running around all over town trying to hire men that you have to have
tonight?
”

“Pretty much. Tucker, the brushpopper who's running my roundup, promised to stay there with his men until I get home with some help.”

The look in her eyes was earnest.

“I'm paying them by the head and I know there's a couple of dozen more cow and calf pairs in the mesquite out there.”

Eagle Jack felt trapped and weary already.

“So we also have to
count
cattle tonight.”

Susanna looked exasperated.

“Or
today
, if we get there before dark,” she said, “which might happen if we don't stand around here jawing all afternoon.”

Three young men came out of the saddle shop, pushing both doors open, talking quietly among themselves about the saddle one of them carried.

“Excuse me,” Susanna said, as they started past. “Do any of you happen to need a job? Would you like to go up the trail?”

Shocked that a strange lady had spoken to them on the street, they stopped and turned. Too shy to meet Susanna's gaze, they looked at Eagle Jack.

“I—” he began. He didn't quite know what he was going to say and Susanna didn't let him find out.

“This is my husband,” she said, “Mr. Sixkiller. We're looking for drovers to go up the Chisholm Trail.”

It was all he could do not to grab her and shake some sense into her. It was all he could do not to turn on his heel and walk away. She had no business butting into the job she'd hired him to do.

But these did look like fairly steady men. And he did have to have some help. No way did he intend to ride around a herd all night long by himself. Not to mention who would hold the cattle while he rode all over the countryside tomorrow trying to hire the oldest son of every war widow hanging on by the skin of her teeth or some hired hand who didn't know he was too old and broken-down to stand up to life on the trail. He couldn't wait for his own men to come with his herd from home because he had to get after Molly as soon as he could.

So he did what he'd done a thousand times in his adventurous life and grabbed the situation to make the best of it. If these men turned out to be lazy or trouble, he could replace them when he got to Waco.

My husband
, she'd said, so fast he couldn't even form a sentence on his tongue. It made him grit his teeth.

It made his headache blossom into its original glory.

But, knowing what he knew of her from this short acquaintance, if he wanted to accomplish anything here, he'd better go along with the charade. But only for the moment. Later, when he could get her alone, he'd tell her in no uncertain terms that it wouldn't be necessary to pretend that they were married because she wouldn't be going up the trail at all.

“Right,” he said, “we're putting together an outfit. Are you men available?”

It took a couple of minutes for one of them to get his tongue working. It was the taller one with the saddle. None of them looked to be more than twenty years old, if that much.

“To tell you the truth,” the boy finally said. “We're on our way right now to see a man about a drive.”

Eagle Jack opened his mouth but he never had a chance to get a word out. She was way too quick for him.

“We'll pay more than that man will,” Susanna said. “Is he offering you the going rate?”

Eagle Jack wanted to slap his hand across her mouth and hold it there. He set his jaw. They had an understanding to reach and they were going to reach it very, very soon or he would be gone.

With this kind of aggravation, it didn't seem so important that no one could ever say that he broke his word. His reputation be damned if he had to put up with this for another minute, much less a thousand miles.

“How much more?” the young cowboy said.

Eagle Jack gave Susanna a look that, to his surprise, actually stilled her tongue. He spoke before she could recover.

“Two dollars a month more,” he said.

The cowboy looked at his companions.

Without a word passed among them, he turned back to Eagle Jack.

“Done,” he said. “Marvin Dwyer's my name.”

He held out his hand to shake. Eagle Jack shook with all of them and introduced himself as they spoke their names.

Shyly, they tipped their hats in Susanna's direction, but Eagle Jack couldn't bring himself to introduce her as his wife. They had that impression already. And it wouldn't be necessary, anyhow. By this time tomorrow she'd be settled on her own ranch again, and he and these boys would be pushing her cattle north.

“Where should we meet you at, Mr. Sixkiller? And when?” Marvin asked.

He shifted his saddle to his other hand and waited.

“At Brushy Creek Ranch,” Eagle Jack said, “as soon as you can.”

He smiled. He had actually beat Susanna to the punch for once.

Then his triumph vanished. He didn't know how to direct them to get there, not even whether the ranch was east or north or south or west of town.

Great. There was nothing like a trail boss who didn't know where he was going.

“I'll let Miss Susanna tell y'all what road to take,” he said. “I have some business to see to and
we all need to get out there right away.”

He turned on his heel and left her standing there with the crew she'd hired. Great jumping Jehoshaphat, he'd never known a woman to talk so much—or interrupt so much—and he'd known a lot of women. He couldn't wait to get her back to her ranch and get away from her for a while.

He couldn't wait to be alone. Some peace and quiet might do wonders for his head.

Yet he hadn't been in the shop long enough for anything but to greet the proprietor, scan the used saddles, and decide that his stolen one wasn't there when Susanna followed him in.

“Mr. Sixkiller,” she said, “the new hands asked me to tell you that they'll start for the ranch in an hour. Maybe less. I asked them to go ahead and take delivery of the herd if we aren't there yet.”

He froze.

Then he crossed the shop to her with a whole new fire in his belly. She was the most aggravating woman on God's green earth but that didn't mean she had to be the dumbest. If he was going to put up with this nonsense, he was going to accomplish something. Left alone, she didn't even have a pair of decent gloves and pretty soon she wouldn't have anything at all.

“When the
hell
will you ever learn to let me do what you hired me to do?” he said. He kept his
voice low so the saddlemaker wouldn't hear and that took all the strength he had. He wanted to yell at her at the top of his lungs. “How'll you like it if they drive that herd off onto somebody else's place and sell them? Or just start up the trail with your cattle all by themselves? Are they trail branded?”

She looked up at him, her eyes wide and full of startlement.

He was standing closer to her than he'd realized. Her scent was fresher and crisper than he'd realized. And her eyes were bluer.

But he couldn't think about that.

“Your busy little tongue is going to create a disaster if you don't learn to control it,” he said. “
Damn
it, Susanna. I can't do the job you hired me to do. I can't even get a word in edgewise.”

“You walked off and left us,” she said. “You weren't trying to talk right then.”

But he couldn't pursue the subject for listening to the echo of the last question he'd asked her. He had to know.

“Are your cattle trail branded, Susanna?”

“No,” she said, “they're not trail branded, but it's all right. Those boys didn't look—”

His headache and his weariness grew heavier. Great. He also had to brand the herd, besides holding and counting it.

“They may be rustlers by profession for all you know,” he said. “Have you ever seen a rustler?”

“We-ell, no, but…”

“Then you don't know what one looks like,” he said. “Now—right now—we have an agreement to make, and if you can't live up to it, I'm gone.”

Her eyes narrowed dangerously.

“If you're gone, I'm on your trail,” she said. “I invested my last money in you, Eagle Jack Sixkiller, and you gave me your word.”

“And you gave me yours,” he said. “You promised me and all those other poor old down-and-out boys in the jail that whoever you hired as trail boss would be free to use his own judgment.”