Wicked Wyoming Nights (4 page)

His coarse bushy hair was brushed back from a high forehead, and thick eyebrows nearly joined over the bridge of a strong nose. She wished his jaw were not so set—it gave him an inflexible appearance—but the face was more to her liking than any she could remember. He might not be all that handsome, but the more she thought about him the less she found she would alter.

“Have you gone to sleep in there?” her uncle shouted through the window, causing her to start violently. “When is dinner going to be ready?”

It won’t be long, Uncle,” she promised, realizing she had spent twenty minutes staring vacantly into space.

She busied herself with her preparations, but Cord’s image wouldn’t go away. She couldn’t help contrasting the erect, well-muscled body that sat so easily in the saddle, strong hands holding the reins and powerful legs wrapped about the barrel of his horse, with her thin and slightly bent uncle. She wondered if she would ever see him again. He looked so big and frightening it was a wonder she hadn’t fainted when he took her hand. Just the thought of it made her light-headed.

You don’t know the first thing about that man, or any other, she told herself severely. You ran from those two boys like they were murderers, yet you didn’t even back away from Stedman, and he looked fierce enough to murder a dozen people. Still, Stedman saved our wagon, she thought, shaking her head.

Her uncle’s angry face appeared in the doorway. “I’m going to take a willow switch to you if you don’t get moving. I’ve never known you to act like this. Are you ailing?”

“I am a little tired,” she murmured, moving quickly to set the food on the table.

“Then get yourself to bed after you clean up. There’s too much work to be done for you to take sick.”

Chapter 3

The Matador ranch house was unusually large for Wyoming. It had been built by the previous owner at the insistence of his demanding wife and ambitious daughter, but Cord was now its sole occupant and the few rooms he used were streamlined for business. He believed a cowman who lived in the saddle needed few possessions, and he didn’t burden himself with anything he considered unnecessary.

The front porch sheltered two wooden benches too uncomfortable to encourage long stays, while the entrance hall served as a business center for the ranch and contained nothing more than Cord’s rolltop desk and a small iron stove for warmth. The kitchen and dining room were the province of Ginny Church, his foreman’s wife, and were run with an efficiency that rivaled Cord’s. But with the exception of a single bedroom furnished with a narrow bed and a trunk, the rest of the house stood empty, stripped bare of its luxurious furnishings.

“This bill looks mighty large,” Sturgis said for the fourth time as he paced up and down the porch.

“What do you think he’ll say about it?” asked Royce, becoming increasingly nervous.

“It’s what he’s gonna
do
that has me worried,” replied his friend, and a thoughtful silence fell between them.

“He
did
tell us to get rid of squatters.”

“Well, it’s plain as a pimple on your backside he didn’t like the way we did it.”

“But what did we do wrong?”

“He’ll tell us soon enough.” The sound of a leisurely tread approaching the door caused them to freeze, but it was Franklin Church who stepped out into the twilight.

“Come inside,” he beckoned, laughing softly when he saw the boys standing like stone sentinels. “The boss is expecting you. In fact, he’s downright impatient to see you.” The color drained from their faces, and try as he would, Royce found he could not swallow.

A single oil lamp cast Cord’s rugged features into unsympathetic relief as he sat at his desk adding a column of figures. In the dancing shadows the lines of firmness showed hard and unbending, and the boys’ courage faltered despite their determination to take their punishment like the men they hoped to become. Cord finished his figures and, apparently satisfied, entered the results in a ledger. Then he blotted the page, put the ledger away in a drawer, and turned to face his quaking hirelings.

“Where’s the bill?” In the boys’ keyed-up state, the paper seemed to grow longer and the total more enormous as Cord painstakingly checked each item. “It’s a right sizeable figure,” he remarked, looking up. “You can’t make a practice of this, or you’ll be in debt for the rest of your lives.”

“No, sir,” Sturgis acknowledged, crestfallen.

“But you did tell us to keep everybody off the creek,” Royce reminded his boss, and received a paralyzing elbow in the ribs from his friend.

“I don’t remember telling you to rope women or burn their books.”

“We were only trying to scare them,” Royce explained, rubbing his side and glaring angrily at Sturgis.

“Is that why you were wearing Miss Smallwood’s clothes?” Royce flushed crimson at the memory. “Never mistreat a woman in my name again. Now, do you have the money to pay this?” The boys hung their heads knowing they didn’t have five dollars between them. “I didn’t think so. I’ll withhold your wages until it’s paid.”

“That’ll take months!” Royce exclaimed, unable to restrain himself.

“Almost until Christmas from the looks of this.”

“We won’t get any money at all?”

“I can lend you something along, but it’ll just take you longer to pay it off.” The depressing vision of Saturday nights in the bunkhouse with no cigarettes or whiskey took all the spirit out of Sturgis.

“It won’t seem like living without no pleasures.”

“Maybe next time you’ll be more careful” cautioned Cord, folding the bill and putting it in a drawer. “One day someone’s going to use a rifle on you, and that can’t be fixed by withholding wages. Now get along. Franklin’s waiting for you in the bunkhouse.” The boys shuffled toward the door, shoulders drooping and their youthful optimism utterly crushed. Cord watched with an unchanging expression until the door was just about to close behind them, then he called out, “Come back a minute.” As they retraced their steps, they wondered what further calamity could befall them.

“I can’t allow you to take all the blame,” Cord told them. “You were protecting my property, and it’s my fault if you didn’t understand my orders.”

“We should have known better, sir.”

“You’re young yet,” Cord continued, “but you’ve got promise and I don’t want to discourage you.” He took out the bill. “I don’t think I should have to pay all this,” he said, grimacing at the total. “Let’s say you’ll get your wages, but not your bonus. Does that seem fair?”

“Yes, sir!” the two replied in chorus, reviving miraculously.

“Be off then and don’t keep Franklin waiting.” The boys stumbled over themselves in their haste to leave. They were afraid if Cord had to look at their ugly, stupid, guilty, vastly relieved faces a moment longer he would change his mind.

“He never objected when Franklin turned that squatter’s wagon over and ran off his stock,” remembered Royce when they were well out of earshot.

“Nor any other time,” allowed Sturgis, “but I’m not asking any questions.”

“You’re lucky,” Franklin said when they reached the bunkhouse. “No other owner would have paid that bill.”

“Or cared what happened to a squatter as long as they were gotten rid of,” added a veteran hand.

“Mr. Stedman’s not like the other ranchers” Franklin informed them with a slightly scornful manner.

“Just the same, I don’t think he would have replaced a single cup if it hadn’t been for that girl. He’s got some mighty gentlemanly notions about females.”

“What did she look like?” asked Franklin.

“Royce thinks she looked like an angel,” Sturgis laughed.

“Married?”

“No. The man was her uncle.”

“That must account for it then, but I don’t understand it. Mr. Stedman never gives the time of day to those women in town.” No one was prepared to debate the point. Something had to account for Cord’s puzzling leniency toward the Smallwoods.

Ira rolled a cigarette and lighted it with a quick flick of the match head on his rough pants. “I was lucky to get the chance to buy into a place like the Sweetwater”

“I suppose,” Eliza answered mechanically, but the thought of serving liquor to dozens of strange men petrified her. Fatherly Ed Baylis made her edgy, while the bold men who had shamelessly eyed her that morning made her want to hide under the counter. A sharp knock at the door caused her to glance inquiringly at her uncle.

“Don’t just stand there” he grumbled. “Open the door.”

“But who would be wanting to see us at this time of night?” Eliza asked anxiously. “We just got here.”

“If you’d open the door, we could both find out,” he said sarcastically. Eliza was even more unsettled by the man standing in the doorway.

“Is this Ira Smallwood’s place?” he asked in a reedy, clipped voice. “I’m Croley Blaine.” Hard, calculating eyes swiftly examined Eliza from top to bottom in an appraisal so cold and unnerving she could only point to her uncle.

“Come in,” Ira invited, glad of a break from the monotony of his niece’s company. “Don’t mind her. She’s just skittish around strangers.” A man of medium height, Croley still retained much of the trim, muscled physique of his youth, but Eliza disliked him instantly and her flesh quivered under the impact of his flinty, inquisitive gaze. She felt immodestly clothed despite a collar that reached to her chin.

“Go along to bed,” Ira ordered impatiently. “Mr. Blaine and I want to talk business and I don’t want you dragging tomorrow.”

Eliza almost ran to her small room, hiding behind a rickety door that muffled the sound of the men’s voices while providing a feeling of safety. She knew it was unfair to dislike Mr. Blaine before she even knew him, but she couldn’t help it. She undressed quickly in the shadow-streaked light of the moon and climbed into the cold bed. She tried not to think about the saloon, but it appeared to be settling over her head like a malignant destiny, while her ambition to become a schoolteacher was moving farther and farther away.

That girl’s got to be part of the bargain, or the deal’s off” Croley said to Ira.

“She will be.”

“She doesn’t look like the type. If she’s that jumpy over one stranger, how will she keep her head when some drunk makes a grab for her?”

“She hasn’t been around people much. Shell get used to it.”

“I don’t know. I’m not giving you half my place for nothing,” stated Croley, unconvinced.

You’re not
giving
me anything. I paid you good money.”

“Not as much as it’s worth.”

“It’s not worth half of that unless you start getting more people inside your doors, and my Eliza is the only way you’ll do it.”

“In the right getup she could draw bees from a honey pot,” Croley agreed thoughtfully. “Take her over to Lavinia’s tomorrow. She’s got a house full of gals she dresses fit to get a man’s blood riled up. Your niece won’t do a thing for business in a dress that covers up everything from her chin to her toes. She’s not sweet on anybody, is she?”

“We just got here. She hasn’t set eyes on more than a dozen people.”

“Well, people have set eyes on
her
. They’re already asking after the black-haired beauty who went riding out of town with an old weasel.”

Ira liked being called a weasel about as much as anybody else, and he glowered fiercely. “Don’t go telling everybody where I live. I don’t want the place swarming with a bunch of thieving cowboys.” The fury blazing in Ira’s eyes captured the interest of his new partner.

“For a man fixing to make his living in a saloon, you don’t seem too fond of our best customers.”

“Actually I don’t mind cowboys too much, but I won’t have anything to do with those high and mighty ranchers.”

Croley’s eyes grew bright with interest. “You had a run-in with one of them?”

“I have cause from years back to want them all dead.”

“Who’d you cross up this way?”

“You ought to be asking who crossed
me
,” Ira erupted. “I was minding my own business too, which is more than can be said for the swaggering hellion who owns the Matador.”

“So you’ve run up against Cord Stedman, have you?” Croley asked, his eyes narrowing.

“If he’s the big bruiser with bushy hair and eyebrows and a cocksure way that makes you ache to fill his ass with lead, then that’s the one,” Ira ranted.

Croley’s expression was unreadable, but a trace of a smile showed fleetingly at the corner of his mouth. “He’s pretty well thought of in these parts. Even the small ranchers usually find a good word for him.”

“Then they haven’t tried to homestead Bear Creek,” snarled Ira.

Croley’s grin was unmistakable now. “So you made that mistake, did you?”

“It’s not private property.”

“It might as well be. There’s only a couple of pieces along the creek from here to North Fork not already in Stedman’s name.”

“He’ll learn his mistake before long.”

“What are you planning to do about it?”

“I don’t know,” Ira acknowledged lamely. “I haven’t had time to think about it yet.”

“You’ll be wasting your time if you keep trying to claim that land. Stedman won’t let you live on it, not even if they let you record it at the land office, and the sheriff won’t help you.”