“No, it isn’t like that—”
He cut off the rest of her words with his mouth. Samantha tried to resist, but the heat and excitement of his kiss devastated her. She felt herself collapsing, even as his arms closed around her, pressing her weakened body against his angry one. His kiss was hard and demanding. She felt it the length of her body, as if all her most sensitive places had fused into one contact point that responded to his lips and tongue, invading even her soul.
He released her abruptly, leaving her gasping for breath and sanity. “So, what did you two do in Phoenix?”
“Noth—nothing.”
“Did he make love to you?”
“That is none of your business,” she said weakly.
“He did then,” he said grimly. The anguish in his eyes caused her heart to constrict.
“No, he didn’t.”
“You don’t have to lie to me.”
“Thank you, Mr. Sheridan. I appreciate that concession.”
Defiance and anger sparkled in her lovely eyes. Steve could not believe that Lando would pass up an opportunity to get her into bed, but she looked so indignant, perhaps it was possible.
“His tough luck then.” He released her abruptly and stalked past her toward Nicholas’s room, leaving her still gasping for breath and wishing she could throttle him.
Samantha expected Steve to go on up to the work site, but he took one look at Nicholas, saw how sick he was, and stayed to help take care of him. The boy seemed to draw strength from his presence. That night, Steve sent Samantha, Juana, and Tristera to bed, insisting they needed the rest.
Samantha laid down to rest her eyes and opened them to bright sunlight streaming in her window. Amazed that she’d slept the whole night through, and remembering suddenly the note she’d gotten, she ran down the hall and slipped noiselessly into Nicholas’s room.
She didn’t know what she had expected, probably anything except the sight that greeted her: Steve asleep in the rocking chair, her son cradled in his arms. Nicholas’s face was pressed to Steve’s breast, his thin arm crooked around Steve’s sturdy neck.
Emotion swept through her. Tears tingled in her throat, aching to be cried. Tristera tiptoed into the room and stopped beside her.
“Perhaps we should take a picture of this for the one who wrote the note.”
“What?” Steve croaked, blinking groggily.
“We were just admiring your motherly ways,” Samantha said softly.
“Nicholas was having trouble breathing,” he rasped. “So we sat up.”
Gratitude was so heavy in Samantha it felt like tears. She turned away, so he wouldn’t see them.
“Hey, look at this,” Steve whispered, lifting Nicholas’s pajamas. His stomach was covered with tiny red points. “That’s what I was waiting for,” he said, smiling at Tristera, avoiding Samantha.
By midmorning the measles began to appear all over Nicholas’s body, from his scalp to the bottoms of his feet. By noon, he was covered with tiny red points. As if that signaled the worst was over, even his breathing came more easily.
“This is great,” Nicholas said, marveling at the density and redness. “Can I keep them?”
“I doubt you’ll want them once they start to itch,” Steve said, grinning.
“Tristera,” Samantha said, “Would you ask Juana to find the calomel lotion.”
Samantha turned to Steve, smiling. “Thank you for all your help.”
“Welcome,” he said gruffly.
“Are you still angry at me?”
Steve shrugged. “I decided maybe you were telling the truth.”
“Oh, and why?”
“Because,” Steve said, grinning, “if he’d made love to you, he wouldn’t have let you come back. He’d keep you there with him. Probably forever.”
The way he said it sounded like an admission of what he would have done. And the look in his eyes was revealing and stunning at the same time. She felt humbled by so much honesty.
“Thank you.”
“Welcome,” he said, his voice gruff. “Well, I guess I have to check on this house I’m supposed to be building. I think I’ve still got a job.”
At the house site, Steve found Ian Macready at the west end of the new basement, yelling at a man who had just spilled a load of adobe bricks off a gangplank laid over a small ditch.
“Air ye blind or drunk, laddie?” Macready bellowed.
“He was daydreaming about his ladylove,” another hod carrier yelled.
Steve answered Ian’s questions, ate the evening meal with him, then shaved, washed, and changed. Ian followed him to the barn, just finished that morning. Steve saddled and mounted Calico.
“I’ll be back in a day or so. In the meantime, I know you’ll make it come out right.”
“Ho, laddie, that we will.”
Steve reached the old house at sunset. Juana packed two saddlebags full of food for Ramon. Steve turned Calico out to pasture, saddled a fresh horse for himself and a mare for Tristera, and led them out of the barn. Samantha Forrester blocked his path.
“You’re taking Tristera?”
“Ramon might need a nurse.”
“I generally decide which of my employees does what.”
“I guess I was thinking of her as a friend of Ramon’s, not an employee of yours. I suppose I could take Juana,” he said, grinning at the thought of Juana’s bulk bobbing around on a horse.
“There are others on this ranch besides Tristera and Juana.”
Steve frowned. “Like who?”
Samantha’s lovely eyes reflected deep hurt. “I could nurse Ramon,” she said, her voice husky.
“I thought of that, but I knew you wouldn’t leave Nicholas here sick,” he said.
“He’s over the worst of it.” She realized she had momentarily forgotten about Nicholas, but remembering didn’t stop her from feeling rejected. “Fine,” she said, turning away, “take anyone you want.”
Steve expelled a heavy breath and shook his head. It was his curse to rub her the wrong way. He’d be lucky to stick here long enough to build another outhouse.
With Nicholas recovering, life began to return to normal. Samantha looked up from figuring a payroll to see a train inching across the desert. A spiral of black smoke lifted into the still air behind it.
The train arrived minutes later carrying the lumber Steve had ordered. The engineer gave her a letter with a Los Angeles postmark from her sister-in-law, Jennie, which was chatty and full of family gossip.
The train’s crew unloaded stacks of yellow, gleaming oak, which smelled resiny and wonderful. She was pleased. She had been waiting for the lumber. Digging a basement might be necessary, but it didn’t look much like progress. She wanted to see walls go up.
That afternoon Marshal Daley rode out with a small posse looking for Ramon. Samantha told them she hadn’t seen Ramon since the night in town, but they searched the house and barn and all the outbuildings anyway.
That evening Steve and Tristera rode up to the barn and dismounted. Samantha waited on the porch swing.
Steve walked from the barn and sat down on the porch swing beside her. He stretched his legs out and sighed, and Samantha realized how tired he must be. He’d been riding since Sunday night. Ramon wasn’t even Steve’s problem.
“How was he?”
“I think he was still there, but he didn’t show himself. We left supplies and blankets.”
“He may be dead.”
“Dead men don’t walk away.”
“Why would he hide?”
“He could have been off looking for food. I fired a couple of shots to bring him back and that might have scared him. I think he’ll find the things we left. When did this come?” he asked, pointing to the lumber stacked beside the barn.
“This afternoon. There must be a reason why you didn’t find him.”
“It’s a big valley. One man could easily conceal himself. I’m not as worried as I was. I’ll go back in a week and see if he took
the food. In the meantime, try not to worry. His not being there is a good sign. We could have found a body.”
A week later Ed Stokes, one of the cowhands, approached Tristera awkwardly, shyly, as if the act of stopping her were as serious as proposing marriage.
“Miss Tristera, ma’am?”
“Sí?”
“That Silver Fish, he’s lookin’ to tawk to y’all.”
“Did he say why?”
Stokes recovered somewhat. “Danged if I know.”
Curious, Tristera caught one of the horses in the corral, slipped onto its bare back, and rode to the Indian camp. The women looked at her with curious eyes. She nodded to them and rode to where Silver Fish worked with a hide. He was one of the handsomest warriors she had ever seen. His fine black eyes watched her closely. His body was tall and straight, his limbs clean and well developed.
“You wish to speak with me?”
Silver Fish put down his skinning knife. “In town we met with Indians who say you look like the Hopi Indian woman who killed the five old men.”
Fear ached dully around her heart, like an old wound. “Do they look for her to kill her?”
Silver Fish shrugged. The soldiers wanted to kill her, and it was probably the same with the Indian police.
Tristera was not surprised that her own people would send out scouts to kill her. People harbored misconceptions about the Hopi, thinking them peaceful, placid, and accepting, when in fact Hopi warriors were as fierce as any.
She was filled with shame and despair. Part of her hoped they did kill her. Then at least she would not have to suffer these horrible pangs of guilt about Tuvi’s death.
“They are right. I am the one they all look for,” she said defiantly.
“The rainmaker?”
“Sí.”
“Perhaps for us you could make small rain.”
“I cannot.”
“Too bad,” he said. “My first wife, she has planted the seeds, but seeds need rain to grow.”
Tristera shook her head. “I cannot make rain.”
“The Hopi would like to know where you are,” Silver Fish said, watching her closely.
She had to be careful. Whatever she said, Silver Fish would carry these words to others, who would carry them to her people at Third Mesa. “I suppose you will tell them.”
“No. Unless you wish me to.”
“I do not wish it.”
Silver Fish nodded. Relieved, Tristera mounted and rode back to the barn.
General Ashland waited impatiently. At last, footsteps sounded in the outer office. Captain Rathwick stopped in the doorway. “You wanted to see me, sir?”
“Sit down, Captain.”
Rathwick crossed the office and sat down facing his commander. Ashland reached back, picked up a box, and dumped its contents on his desk. “Do you know what this is, Captain?”
“Looks like dirty white buckskin.”
“It’s a buckskin dress and a feather bonnet.” Ashland raised his eyebrows. “You were supposed to bring this to me with the woman still in it.”
Rathwick frowned. “Where was it found?”
“About six miles from Picket Post, beside the railroad tracks.”
“Maybe that’s why we didn’t find her.”
General Ashland slammed his fist down on the desk beside the dirty buckskin. “I don’t want excuses. I want you to find her, dammit!”
“There are thousands of Indians in the Arizona Territory, sir. I don’t even know what she looks like. It would make more sense for Lawson to look for her. At least he saw her.”
“Lawson is insubordinate. Unless you want to be labeled the same, bring me this woman!” Ashland repeated grimly.
“Yes, sir.” Rathwick stood up. He wadded up the dirty buckskin and carried it out of the room. At least he could take some measurements and figure out how big she really was. Rumors placed her size at close to six feet.
Back in his room, he spread the buckskins on his bed and went to find a tape measure. A few minutes later he was back. He found a pencil and paper, smoothed the garment out on his bed, and stretched the tape measure from neckline to hem.
Twenty minutes later he sat staring at the paper. According to his measurements, the woman was small. An image of Tristera Rodriguez flashed before his eyes.
“No,” he said aloud. It couldn’t be. Mrs. Forrester had vouched for her. But somewhere in Arizona Territory there was a woman he needed to find. And she wasn’t six feet tall as the boy had said. She was closer to five feet tall. And she wasn’t Hopi. This was a Plains Indian getup. No Hopi would have been wearing this.
A week dragged by. Then another. On Tuesday evening, after two weeks without a sight of Steve’s sturdy form, Samantha stepped out of the bathtub in the kitchen and took the towel Juana held out to her. The room smelled of warm water and peppermint castile soap.
Samantha dried herself and spread peppermint-scented lotion on her skin from throat to toes. In the lamplight, her skin was soft and lovely. This should have made her feel good, but she realized time was passing, her beauty was fading, and even though men showed occasional interest in her, she was still alone, with no one to share herself or her life.
“The señora will go to the new house tomorrow?”
“No. No, I don’t have to go every single week,” she said irritably. “We’ll can peaches tomorrow. The early peaches are ready. The trees are heavy with them.”
“Sorry,” Juana mumbled.
In her bed, Samantha tossed half the night. She kept seeing Steve’s face when he told her that Lance wouldn’t have let her leave if he’d made love to her.
She was suffering from badly mixed emotions. On the one hand she realized that by sending him back into the arms of his wife, she’d probably ruined any chance of having Lance.
And she hadn’t heard a word from Lance. He must be in San Francisco by now. They’d probably made up. It would be just like him to forget to write and let her know.
On top of that she’d infuriated Steve, again. She closed her eyes, saw Steve’s face and the momentary anguish in his eyes when he’d thought she had slept with Lance, and smiled into the darkness. She hated to think of herself as a mean woman, but she liked knowing how that had affected him.
There was the nicest curve in his neck, chin, and jaw, especially when he was frustrated and angry. Anger seemed to enhance the manly fierceness he exuded.
Then, unbidden, her mind recalled how his lips had felt, claiming hers. A warm, sweet, achy little itch started deep in her belly, and once started, it tormented her most of the night.
The next morning she washed in her basin, dressed carefully, choosing one of her most attractive riding habits.
“I thought you wanted to can peaches today,” Juana said when she walked into the kitchen dressed for riding.
“I changed my mind. I don’t feel like it.” That admission made her feel weepy. No tears came, but Juana saw it in her eyes and turned away.
“Go see new house. That will make you feel less bad.”
“I don’t know,” Samantha said, flushing that she would lie to sweet, loyal Juana. “Maybe I should. I’m feeling restless. A ride might help. Will you sit Nicholas down with his lessons? Tell him to read the novel and work on his book report.”
“Sí, señora. Read nobbel, work on book report.”
Chapter Fourteen
Near the work site Samantha stopped behind the last bush big enough to shelter her from view of the noisy workmen.
Shamefully aware of her shaking hands and pounding heart, she was glad for this moment of privacy before she faced Steve Sheridan. His piercing eyes would just have to glance at her to know she’d lain awake most of the night, rehearsing what to say to him.
The lusty cries of male voices mingled with the crack of hammers on nails. Every hammer crack was echoed back by the mountain, setting up a wild cacophony. Steve’s deep bronze voice rang out above the others, sending a thrill down her spine and making her even mor
e reluctant to ride out and let him see her. With trembling hand, she patted Brickelbush’s damp neck.
As she watched, Steve stepped out of the barn and walked with springy step toward the basement walls, rising raggedly out of the Earth, ten courses high in one area, twenty or more in others. Steve stepped through the basement doorway and disappeared inside. Samantha urged her horse forward.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw a movement on the hill overlooking the house site. The movement was significant enough to make her look again—this time more carefully. Facing the house, with his profile to her, a man with a bandanna from nose to chin rested his hands on what looked like the T-shaped handle of a butter churn.
Samantha realized from the mask and the furtive way the man squatted over the handle that he probably did not work for Steve. Then she realized the butter churn might be a plunger.
In the basement, Steve stopped at the door. Eddy Nabosky was bent over—looking at something his broom had uncovered in a pile of sawdust and wooden blocks. “What’d you find?”
“I don’t know,” he said, trying to lift it. Steve stepped closer, saw the sticks of dynamite tied together with two leather strings, a wire leading away from it.
“Dynamite!” a voice yelled from outside.
“Dynamite!” Samantha yelled again, leaning over her horse’s neck, urging him toward the masked man, now bending forward to lean on the plunger. It was probably too late to do anything for Steve or the men working below, but it was not too late to ride down their attacker.
The man pushed down the plunger and ran. Samantha kicked her horse’s sides, her mind not fully accepting dynamite and all it would mean.
Steve looked over the shoulder-high brick wall and saw Samantha Forrester spurring her mount up the hill, a masked man running ahead of her. Steve reached for an ax someone had left standing beside the door.
“Get out!” he yelled at Eddy, and lifted the ax over his head, bringing it down into the new subflooring with a solid thwack. Ian wouldn’t be pleased about that.
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