Tristera laughed. She had not expected to enjoy herself. A moment passed in silence.
“You make magic, El—Tristera?”
“No longer. Once I could make small magic. At times.”
“If I stayed, could you promise me my poor heart would not pound with love for the beautiful widow?”
Tristera saw beneath Steve Sheridan’s teasing and smiled gently. “No man stays free forever,” she said.
“You know anything about failure?”
Tristera nodded. She had failed her duty and her people, by losing her purity. This afternoon she had awakened to the realization that her people were kind and well intentioned, but they deluded themselves. They could not stand against the greater strength and numbers of the white soldiers. Even their Great Mystery had failed to protect Tuvi, or He no longer loved the Hopi. Since she could not believe that, she was faced with accepting the fact that even He had lost His powers to protect them.
Her mind had finally put words to what she had struggled with for days. Now she knew—the Indians were doomed. The old ways were doomed as well. Her tongue tingled as if it had tasted metal.
With the sage-scented darkness pressing around her, bitterness burned in her heart. She would reject the ways of her people. She would do as they had urged her to do at the school. She would live her life as a modern woman and never go back to her village. She would work and live in the white man’s world. She would sleep with men if she wanted to, risk anything that attracted her. She would no longer be limited by the simplistic traditions of a dying race or their powerless god. She would not be like Steve Sheridan, either, so ruled by his fear of Samantha Forrester that he rode away.
Steve sighed. “I don’t want to be a failure. I need to make something of myself. I can’t do that perched on the arm of a rich woman.”
Tristera closed her eyes and saw Steve Sheridan holding Nicholas in his arms, cradled like a baby. The señora stood at his side, her eyes shining with tears of love and gratitude. Tristera’s heart felt full and warm with her vision, but it seemed Sheridan was determined to leave. There was nothing more to be said. She stood up.
“Thank you again,” she said, and walked away.
Steve watched until she was out of sight, then lay back on his bedroll. The sound of Indian drums and chanting drifted up from the river. In his mind he saw Silver Fish and his family dancing the Ghost Dances to bring back their dead loved ones and their lost lands.
The chanting—“Aiyee, ha, aiyee!”—called out to something in Steve. He listened with dreamy contentment, halfway wishing himself down there among them, dancing mindlessly. Part of him would probably always respond in that way.
He had declined the offer of a bed in the house because he needed the healing touch of the Earth under his back. He was like the antelope Crows Walking had told him about who, when wounded, pressed the injured part to the Earth and waited.
Steve thought it odd he should think such a thing about himself. He wasn’t wounded. He had suffered a little when he broke off with Caroline, but it was over. He needn’t think of himself as wounded.
Steve wanted to go directly to sleep and usually did, but tonight, with the new moon high in the western sky and the sweet lilt of Samantha Forrester’s voice lifted in joyful song, her image eased into his mind and stayed. He could almost feel her softness, waiting for him, calling out to him.
In spite of the reality of her marriage and her motherhood, there was something innocent and vague about Samantha Forrester. Part of her knew about men, and part of her did not. Even when he had kissed her and she had responded with passion, she didn’t appear to comprehend fully what was happening between them.
The night grew relatively quiet. Samantha was probably in bed. The house was quiet now. An occasional mockingbird trilled a variety of melodies, sounding now like a lark, then like a thrush. The wind came up, making him glad he had taken his heavy blankets with him. Stars overhead twinkled. He closed his eyes, but it was no good. The Earth beneath his back did not soothe him. Something kept him from sleep, something besides the woman tugged at his spirit and would not let him rest. Steve tried to ignore it.
He’d had this feeling the first time he’d gone into a cave filled with bats. Then the feeling had urged him to get out of there. Now the impulse seemed to urge him to go north. Steve fought it. He sensed that whatever he found there would embroil him more deeply in Samantha Forrester’s business, and he didn’t want to get any more involved than he was. The pressure of her appeal and her beauty was more than he wanted already.
But the feeling grew stronger. Finally, it could not be denied. Steve threw off his blankets, loped to the barn, and tossed his saddle onto a startled, sleepy Calico. The horse took the quick cinching in stride and allowed himself to be led outside.
Steve rode north awhile, stopped and listened, then rode some more. He didn’t know what he was riding toward, but he knew he had no choice.
The wind was cold and sharp. He dismounted and put his ear to the Earth. Finally he heard the rumble of hoofbeats and the bleating sounds of sheep in distress. When he’d lived with the tribe, he’d been around sheep enough to recognize their fear and terror. A sound like gunfire caused him to straighten. It came again—not the sound of a night hunter—more erratic.
Calico reared and pawed the air. Steve pulled him down and mounted. In the starlight bathing the rolling hills, he saw the silhouettes of half a dozen men riding away from the stampeding herd. These had to be Samantha Forrester’s sheep, Silver Fox’s herd. And this had to be her land. Yet he couldn’t believe these were her hands. Without Bush, her crew had no direction. No doubt they were in their beds sleeping, waiting for a new boss to tell them what to do.
Steve unsheathed the Sharps, sighted on the ground in front of the foremost rider, and pulled the trigger.
A moment of panic followed his firing. Men yelled and fought their frightened horses. Someone fired an answering shot. It missed so completely, Steve decided they had no idea where he was. He sighted again, this time aiming to hit something. One man cried out. Steve fired again and again. The men turned their horses and fled.
The bleating sheep reached Steve and spilled around Calico, who stood his ground, trembling at the smell and feel of the milling bodies. Steve waited until most of them had passed, then urged Calico through a small herd straggling at the rear. His presence spooked them at first, then they calmed down.
A mile farther on, beside a bed of glowing coals, Steve found Ramon, lying face down. He lit a match, turned the boy over, and held a hand to his throat. A light pulse throbbed beneath his warm, damp skin. Steve lit another match and examined him more closely. A bullet had dug a groove across his scalp. Blood soaked the sand under his head.
Ramon opened his eyes. “Compadre…” he whispered.
“Did you get a look at the men who did this?”
“They wore bandannas.”
Steve found Ramon’s horse and tied him onto it. An hour later they reached the house. Samantha Forrester answered the door. In her nightgown and robe, she looked soft and sleepy, still closed in on herself.
“I’ll send a man for Seth Boswell again,” she said, pulling her robe around her.
“May not be necessary.” The wound looked less serious in the light. There was some blood loss, but the bullet had only nicked the skull. Ramon would have a headache and a bald spot, but he wouldn’t die. There was nothing much the doctor could do for him that she couldn’t do. They put him to bed in the room with Sender Thompson.
Samantha cleaned the wound, dabbed it with kerosene to prevent infection, and bandaged it. Ramon slipped into sleep; Samantha left Juana with him and took Steve into the kitchen.
“Who did this?”
“He didn’t see their faces, but I reckon you can thank Bush for this. He probably had the rustlers lined up before he talked you into buying the herd.”
She looked puzzled. “I thought maybe Silver Fish.”
Steve shook his
head. “These were not Indians.”
“How did you know about it?”
“I couldn’t sleep.” He did not question the power in him that had gotten him out of his warm blankets and made him ride through the cold night to an unknown camp.
“You seem determined to be our savior.”
“In spite of myself,” he said ruefully, rubbing his strong hand through his sleek black hair.
Samantha walked to the kitchen window. “I thought it would be easier than this,” she said softly.
Steve followed her. “Ranching?”
“Life.”
She looked so forlorn, so slender and soft and delicate, that Steve felt a rush of compassion and desire. He remained still. If he moved now…
“Steve…”
Like the echoes of a gong, her voice created a heavy pulse in his loins and temples.
Samantha saw the desire in his eyes. “Steve, I know you’re supposed to go to Waco, but I wish you’d reconsider.”
“You’ve got more problems than I can solve,” he said huskily, his voice as difficult to keep control of as the rest of him. “I’m just a house builder.”
“Then build me a house.”
“You think I can stay here and just build you a house, with nothing else ever coming of it?”
Amusement sparkled in the depths of her lovely blue eyes. “What are you afraid of, Steve?” She lifted her chin, as if daring him to lean down and taste those sweetly curved lips.
Steve chuckled. “So Tristera squealed on me.”
“Some things women just know.”
Steve pulled Samantha close to him. The teasing laughter in her eyes gave way to momentary panic, and he knew she felt it, too, this strong attraction between them.
“I’m not a marrying man,” he said, his voice gruffer than he would have liked. “I can stay here, build your house, make love to you, if I should be so lucky, and still ride away.”
“Can you?” she asked, her voice appealingly breathless.
“I think so,” he said. “I’ve done it before, and I need to do it again.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m a builder. I have to go where the houses are being built. I can’t stay in one spot.”
“I accept your conditions,” she said firmly, her gaze clear and earnest—and oddly disconcerting to him.
Steve hesitated. His partner was already at the Waco site overseeing the preliminary phase of cutting the limestone from the mountain. That would take a while. “What kind of house do you want?”
“I want the castle you told me about.”
“Wait here.” Steve released her and walked to the barn, where he reached into his satchel and pulled out the plans for the house in Waco.
In the kitchen, Samantha poured two cups of coffee and set them on the table. Steve smoothed and spread out his plans.
The line drawing showed a three-story stone castle framed by two wide gateposts. The structure’s focal point was a round turreted tower between two square, protruding porches supported by arched stone columns. French doors on the upper story opened onto the top of the porch, which served as a veranda off the master bedroom.
“Ohhhh! It’s perfect!” Samantha said, leaning closer.
Steve envisioned her standing on the porch or walking out the French doors onto the veranda. “It would look right at home on the side of your mountain.”
“I can see it there, too.”
“I’d have to do some testing. See what that mountain’s made of…”
“Could we build it with adobe?”
“Have to. Unless you wanted to import stone from somewhere else. That would be expensive.”
“I don’t care about the expense. What you told me in town, is that really what you charge?”
“Yes, ma’am. A thousand a month, plus expenses—and ten percent of the finished cost of the house.”
“So if it costs half a million dollars to build, you get a fifty-thousand-dollar bonus.”
Steve nodded. “It could run over that.”
“You’re hired. How long will it take?”
“Depends on how many men I hire.”
“How many would it take?”
“Depends on when you want to finish.”
“Soon!”
“Six, eight months, a couple hundred men.”
“What is that total?”
Steve barely paused. “One hundred twenty thousand for workmen, eight to ten thousand for me, plus building materials. Depends how fancy you want to go. My guess, three, four hundred thousand dollars.”
Samantha knew where the money would come from. She would sell her house in Manhattan. Jared had bought it with her money. She’d only kept it because she wasn’t sure she’d stay in Arizona. With this house, she would stay. Tomorrow she would send word to her attorney in New York, have him transfer a sum of money into her Phoenix account and sell the house to replace the funds. She had enough in her accounts in Picket Post and Phoenix to handle the start-up costs.
“You can’t afford this,” he said in one last attempt to stop her and save them both.
“My parents did one thing right. They left me almost a million English pounds, which my guardian invested for me. He is a shrewd businessman. My money doubled twice while I was growing up,” she said firmly. “Will you build it for me?”
With her cheeks glowing with excitement, she was incredibly appealing to him. “You realize we’re getting off the mark. You need a man to ramrod your cattle, not a builder.”
“I know, but with you here, advising me, I won’t pick another Grover Bush. Please say you’ll do it.”
Steve knew he needed to say no, but under the power of Samantha’s beautiful shining eyes, he nodded. “Suppose I build you a smaller house from adobe instead of a palace? It wouldn’t be so expensive or take so long to build, but it would have most of the features you want.”
“No. I’m attached to the Waco castle.”
Steve laughed. “All right. I’ll take a look at your mountain and see if I can find an appropriate site.”
Samantha extended her hand. “We have an agreement, Mr. Sheridan.”
Solemnly Steve shook her hand. “Yes, we do, Mrs. Forrester.”
Too excited now to sleep, Samantha pored over the plans for an hour, asking questions and finding out exactly what their agreement entitled her to. She had certain minimum requirements—a trunk room next to the laundry room in the basement, a dumbwaiter between the kitchen and dining room, and inside toilets on every floor.
Samantha gazed at the plans. “How big is this round room?”
“Fifteen foot across.”
“Oh! How wonderful!” The round tower room would be hers and Lance’s private hideaway. She smiled, envisioning Lance and herself snuggled together on the window seat. “Can you build a seven-foot-long window seat under each of these windows?”
“Sure.” Steve made quick notes. Samantha was like a child in a candy store, and that enchanted and excited him.
Finally, near dawn, Steve went back to his blankets. Samantha checked on Ramon and Sender, both sleeping quietly, and then went to her own room. She undressed and slipped under the covers. Shivering at the coldness of the sheets, she called up an image of Lance and herself swinging on the swing on the porch of the Kincaid house near Austin. She pressed against his warm side. Darling, I’m so happy. Steve has agreed to stay and build us a new house.
Steve? he asked, scowling down at her.
Mr. Sheridan. I’ve hated this house for so long. It’ll be our house. And when it’s finished—
Who the hell is Steve?
Samantha laughed. She loved it when Lance was possessive. Just a builder.
Smiling, Samantha fell asleep with Lance’s face warming her heart, his wonderful presence filling the room.
The next morning Steve spread the plans on the dining room table and worked steadily for hours. When he’d made as many of the changes as he could without the proper tools, he walked int
o the parlor where Samantha sat at her desk, writing.
“Finished?” she asked, looking up.
“Barely started. I’ll have one of my partners send a draftsman to make a clean set of plans to work from, but these will get us started. Thought you might take a look at what I’ve done and see if it suits you.”
Samantha leaned over the plans and studied them. “What’s this?”
“That’s the basement door.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing. It’s just a standard basement door.”
“It looks like it’s lying down.”
“It is. Basements are generally underground.”
“I don’t want it that way.”
Steve frowned. “How do you want it?”
“I want to walk out of the basement standing up.”
“If you build it above ground it’s not a basement.”
“Well, couldn’t we build it the usual way and then dig a trench around the basement to accommodate a standard doorway?”
“What about drainage when it rains?”
“You’re the builder. Isn’t there any way you can provide for drainage?”
Steve frowned. He didn’t mind making a few changes, but he didn’t like it when a client tried to change basics.
“What’s this?” she asked, turning back to the plans.
“Bedroom.”
“Where’s the bathroom?”
“Down the hall, here,” he said, leaning around her to point with his pencil. The silky dark skin of his forearm gleamed with the lightest mist of perspiration. He smelled wonderful—the perfect scent for a warm, living, breathing male. It made her dizzy.
“Only one?” It came out as a near croak.
“How many do you want?”
“I want one for every bedroom and one on every floor for guests.” Her face felt hot. His nearness, even though he wasn’t actually touching her, played havoc with her ability to concentrate.
Steve laughed. “You want that bawdy house I told you about, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“The plans don’t call for all that plumbing, but there’s no reason why we can’t do it. At this stage, you can have anything you want to pay for.”
Adobe Palace Page 17
