Heath introduced Willow to Bitty, though they’d met before in town. Heath then lectured his children about making Willow feel welcome and behaving themselves while he was away working. “I also expect you to help her with the household chores,” Heath said as he drew his short speech to a close.
Bitty spoke up then, directing her statement to Willow. “I’m in charge of fetching the eggs from the coop because I’m the best at doing that.”
Willow raised her eyebrows with mock skepticism. “Are you? What makes you the best?”
“It’s because I know how to scoop out the eggs before getting pecked by the grumpy hens. I sometimes sing a little ditty to them and they like that too.”
Willow acted surprised at the child’s cleverness. “What a good idea. I’m mighty grateful you’ll be doin’ that, Bitty. I don’t want to get pecked.”
Bitty’s face broke into a grin. “Yeah, and I know how to steer clear of the mean rooster too. But Pa says we’ll eat him soon anyway.”
“Well, until we do, I thank you kindly for saving me from him.”
“You’re welcome,” Bitty said magnanimously.
Heath cast an appreciative smile at Willow. “I think this is going to work out just fine,” he said, sounding like he meant it.
Willow almost believed him.
Chapter Four
Heath spent the following day mending the fence along the eastern border of his property. His ranch hands were on the other side of the range, driving the cows west to freshly grown grazing land, so he was alone with his thoughts the entire day. Willow McAllister kept coming to his mind.
When they had sat around the sitting room for the family meeting, he’d noticed for the first time how exceptionally beautiful she was. He reckoned he hadn’t noticed it before because she seemed to do everything in her power to hide it. Her dark hair, pulled tightly away from her face in a single braid, was thick and shining. She had the sort of proud, handsome features he’d seen in the Apache—high cheekbones and expressive, dark eyes. Her lips were full and, despite the lack of paint, appeared as red as an overripe strawberry.
However, draped around her compact, voluptuous figure were drab clothes that belonged on a working cowboy, not a beautiful young woman. How she held herself was sloppy as well. She would do well to learn how to sit like a lady, with shoulders back and a poised expression, as opposed to hunched over casting furtive glances like an anxious filly.
He had the urge to insist she conduct herself like the young woman she was, but he knew without testing it that his efforts would be met with hostility. Willow was not used to taking orders, least of all from a man, and she’d likely try to scratch out his eyes if he suggested even a single modification in her dress or manners.
Besides, it was outside the scope of his responsibility. He had agreed with the marshal to teach her to behave in the sense of not stealing, doing an honest day’s work, and staying out of trouble with the law. Dressing like a man and acting coarsely weren’t sins in and of themselves, so he knew he had no right to impose a change in that regard.
At the end of his workday, as the sun dipped into the horizon, Heath rode his horse back from the range at a relaxed jog, all the while wondering how Willow had fared on her first day. Before he’d left, she’d asked him what she should do. He’d suggested cleaning and cooking supper. “Get Jack and Bitty to help you. They know their way around,” he’d said.
Heath slowed his horse to a walk and loosened the reins. The path had turned rocky and was at a slight decline, so he wanted his horse to pick her own pace.
He thought about the previous day. If Willow hadn’t made such a good impression on him during the family meeting, he likely would have popped in and checked on her and the children at least once instead of working so far away from the house all day. Willow’s interaction with his children had set his mind at ease. Jack had told him how nicely she’d thanked him for giving up his room, and when Bitty proudly proclaimed that she was the best at gathering eggs from the chickens, Willow had responded with validation and enthusiasm.
No matter Willow’s flaws, she’d revealed to him aspects of her personality that all of her rebellion and penchant for mischief couldn’t mask—compassion and human kindness, along with an ability to relate to someone different from herself. He’d known women with fine manners purchased at the best finishing schools who didn’t have that ability. It was something that couldn’t be bought and he didn’t know exactly where it came from, but it was something he didn’t take for granted when he encountered it.
A familiar bolt of sorrow hit Heath then, as the memory of his beautiful Rose glided into his mind as easy as cream over a biscuit. His late wife had been blessed with that quality of relating to all kinds of people.
He hadn’t realized his luck when he’d first married Rose. She was predictably sweet and innocent as one would expect of a debutante from high society. But he noticed in the months following their wedding that, along with her genteel nature, was a streak of irreverence so carefully hidden, he was one of the few to be privileged to witness it. Her jokes were littered with coarse language, and she deftly clipped the horns of anyone who disrespected her. At the same time, she did not consider herself better than anyone, and in fact went out of her way to befriend those less fortunate, such as Willow’s mother. Rose had been able to appreciate people as they were, not how they appeared.
Heath arrived home, feeling depressed and nostalgic for the days when he would come home to his beautiful, surprising wife. It was unfair that she had been taken from the world before she could bless it to her full potential. And it saddened him daily that his children would not reap the benefits of growing up to learn from both her good manners and her good mind. He unsaddled and brushed his mare slowly, then walked into the cabin, bone-tired and hungry.
Upon broaching the entrance, he came to a sudden stop and looked around. Smoke from the kitchen clouded the sitting room and caused his eyes to water. Bitty was running from one end of the room to the other wearing nothing but her underclothes, shouting that the prairie was on fire. Jack was standing atop the sofa pointing a stick at the fireplace and imitating the sounds of a rifle. For some reason he could not fathom, the curtains from the two windows in the sitting room had been pulled down, wadded up, and stacked in the corner. Willow was nowhere to be seen, though he guessed she was in the kitchen attending to whatever was smoking.
“Jack! Bitty!” he called out sharply, alerting them to his presence.
Both children halted and peered at him with matching guilty expressions. He’d never before seen them running in the house or standing on the furniture.
He tossed his Stetson on the chair next to the door and stomped his boots before he realized he wasn’t standing on the mat. It wasn’t in its proper place, so he’d just shaken the dirt from his boots directly onto the floor. It did nothing to help his mood.
“Come here,” he barked at his children, who obeyed about as quickly as sap slides down a tree in February. When they finally stood in front of him with gazes focused on the dirty floor, he said, “Why are you behaving like wild mustangs instead of helping Miss Willow like I asked you to?”
“She said she didn’t need our help,” Jack responded. “She said we should play.”
“Fine. But since when have you been allowed to play like this, running around the house and jumping on the furniture?”
No response.
“Well?” he prompted.
“Never?” Jack guessed.
“Precisely. Now get to your rooms and calm down. And for goodness sake, put some clothes on, Bitty.”
“Alright, Pa,” she answered cheerfully, and proceeded to run to her room.
“Walk, Bitty!” Heath said, while Jack walked away with measured steps.
He shook his head and went in search of the next person in need of a scolding, and found her as he suspected in the kitchen. She sat slumped on a stool, her well-formed limbs hanging loosely around her. Strands of wav
y dark hair had come free from her braid, and a sheen of perspiration wet her flushed cheeks.
One look at her face caused his annoyance to fade, replaced with alarm. She looked utterly defeated, and his first instinct was to wrap his arms around her. Instead, he said, “Willow? You alright?”
She looked at him with red-rimmed, watery eyes, from crying or from the smoke in the air, he wasn’t sure, and said, “I’m sorry, Mr. Wolfe, I burned supper and didn’t get hardly any cleaning done. I noticed the curtains needed hemming, so I started that and soon realized it would take days. So I stopped trying to sew and got to work cleaning the floors, but I only got so far as shaking out the mats because it was nearing suppertime and I hadn’t even started anything. I put the chicken over high heat and it didn’t cook. It went straight from raw to burnt. I’m sorry, I’m just awful at this. I tried. I promise I really did try. I’ll leave tomorrow and find a different job.”
Heath leaned a shoulder against the frame of the door, studied her, and thought about what was best to say. It wouldn’t do any good to tell her she had done just fine on her first day, when she was smart enough to know she hadn’t. He also knew she would think him patronizing if he tried to encourage her. She’d made it clear she was too proud to accept even a small gesture of help or kindness from him, such as when he’d tried to help her down from the buggy.
So Heath took the only approach he thought would make sense to her. Gruffly, he said, “You promised me a month, young lady, and that’s how long I expect you to try and work here.”
She stared at him blandly and chewed on something large that made one of her cheeks puff out like a chipmunk’s. “Wouldn’t you want that I should I go?”
“No, I want that you should to learn to cook and make yourself useful.”
Chew. “What makes you think I ever can?” Chew. “I’ve loused up everything to shit on my very first day.” Chew.
Tobacco. A nasty habit for a man, in his opinion, and even more disgusting for a woman. He strode over, took a rag from the table, and held it in front of her. “Spit it out.”
She scowled. “That would be a waste of good tobaccer.”
“Consider it your punishment for giving up so easy. Come on now.”
Her scowl deepened, but she obediently spit it out. Heath wadded up the rag and tossed it aside. She avoided his eyes.
He had guessed it would be difficult for her to take on housework, but he hadn’t guessed how completely out of her element she’d be. It didn’t seem prudent to allow her even one more day on her own trying what she didn’t know how to do.
After a short time ruminating, an idea came to him. He knew the marshal’s daughter, Sadie, had taken over the household duties ever since her ma had died, and he wondered if she would mind coming out to the ranch to teach Willow the basics. “Know what?” he said, “I’m going to see about having someone come teach you how to cook.”
“Who?” Willow asked, in the same defeated tone.
When Heath told her his idea, she sighed. “You know how old Sadie is? She’s twelve. Nearly half my age. It’s embarrassing, needing help from someone that young.”
Heath rubbed the stubble along the side of his jaw, noting to himself that he needed to shave when he got a free minute. “I think you’d best set aside your pride about getting some help. It’s clear you need it. And hey, I’m sure you can teach Sadie a thing or two she doesn’t know.”
A naughty glint came into her eyes. “I can teach her how to pick pockets. I’m sure the marshal would love that.”
Heath was glad to see some of her spirit coming back—he didn’t at all like to see her looking so defeated—but he felt obliged to set her straight. “You do anything tricky like try to corrupt the marshal’s daughter, I’ll be forced to punish you.”
She sighed. “Cooking is punishment enough. It’s intolerable and boring.”
Amused by her frankness, he let out a short chuckle. “Work tends to be that way a lot of the time, I’m afraid.”
“I can’t believe you still want me to stay here after I ruined everything,” she said spreading her hands palms up in a sign of confusion.
“I don’t give up easy, and neither should you. Now, how ‘bout we scramble some eggs and butter up some of the leftover bread? I don’t have a hankerin’ to keep jawing with you when my stomach’s rumbling, and I’d wager those two rascals of mine are hungry too.”
She nodded her agreement and walked to the cellar to fetch the goods. “Bitty got the eggs today, just like she said she would, and Jack chopped more wood for the stove. You have fine children, Heath. I like them a lot.”
It pleased him more than he thought it would that she liked his children. “Thank you, Willow, but they weren’t acting so fine when I walked in. Bitty was hollering and running about, and Jack was standing on the sofa.”
Willow shrugged. “So? They were just playing. No harm in that, is there? What’s the worst that could happen with them running inside?”
Her question gave him pause. Before he could answer, she said, “See?” with a look of victory. “You people in polite society make up rules and restrictions for no good reason. Fold your hands. Cross your ankles. Eat with a spoon. Sit up straight. Don’t run in the house. Blah blah blah.” She waved her hand dismissively before turning her back to him to slice the bread.
Heath didn’t bother arguing, mostly because he couldn’t think of a single rebuttal. Instead, he smiled. The girl was a handful, no doubt about that, but so far he liked her—quite a lot more than he thought he would. It had been a long time since a woman had amused and surprised him. And looking at her pert little backside made him want to give her a sound swat for mouthing off to him. Instead, with effort, he turned and walked out the door to fetch the children.
Chapter Five
Willow woke from a restful slumber in her new bed. She hadn’t slept so well in a long time, and she thanked her lucky stars that Heath still wanted to give her a chance. She’d expected him at the very least to be angry with her for leaving the house a mess and ruining supper, but he hadn’t even acted annoyed. Instead, he’d been hell-bent on helping her. His kindness had surprised her, as had his humor when she’d spoken frankly. It made her want to do the very best she could at her new job, and she hoped Sadie Shaw could teach her something worth learning.
While the four of them ate breakfast, Heath told Willow and the children that, but for a quick trip to town to inquire about whether Sadie could help Willow learn to cook, he would stay home that day and allow his hands to work without him on the range.
Willow silently observed Heath with his children throughout the day. He read to them from thick books with big words, helped Jack whittle a wooden bull, and twisted the rope around with Jack so that Bitty could jump-rope—outside, of course.
Despite her desire to continue working on the ranch, a growing sense of melancholy came over her. She felt bereft. She didn’t care that she wasn’t included in the Wolfe family’s activities. But she began to realize in watching them that she had been deprived of something throughout her life.
Willow kept herself busy cleaning. She swept the hardwood floors and was pleased with how much dirt she managed to pick up. She found a fresh rag and got to work scrubbing the surfaces in the kitchen with a bit of lemon and vinegar. She cleaned the windows, too, and put the curtains back up, deciding it was best to save the mending until she’d gotten into a better routine with the day-to-day chores.
When Heath returned from town, he made a jovial announcement. “Good news, Trouble.”
Willow hid a smile. The nickname he’d bestowed on her was said with an affectionate tone, and it didn’t bother her at all. Rather, it gave her a sort of happy feeling.
“Sadie Shaw has agreed to give you cooking lessons,” Heath said. “She’ll call on you tomorrow.”
“Alright, that’s fine. Thank you,” Willow responded. She knew she should be glad that someone was coming to help her, but it made her feel inept. “I cleaned a
lot today,” she reported, in an effort to regain some of her pride by sounding useful. She proceeded to give a run-through of all her chores, while Heath listened with a patient expression on his face.
“Good job, Trouble,” he said, when she was finished listing her activities. He strode to his armchair next to the fire and settled into it with a newspaper in his hand.
The small praise and term of endearment caused pleasure to wash over her. It unnerved her. Since when had anyone’s opinion of her become important? Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the front door bursting open and the children tumbling in.
Jack was laughing, but Bitty had a pout on her face. She stood by the door and crossed her arms. “Pa, Jack says he’s allowed to pet Ace but I’m not. That’s not true, is it?”
Heath glanced up from his paper. “It’s true, Bitty.”
“See! I told you,” Jack said. He laughed again.
Willow had learned the previous day that Ace was a stallion—tame in comparison to many stallions—but a stallion nonetheless, and Heath’s reasoning for not allowing Bitty near him were related to safety. Heath was already teaching Jack how to work with horses, but Bitty had yet to even ride without assistance.
Heath frowned at Jack. “It disappoints me, son, that you would laugh at your sister’s hurt feelings. It’s unkind.”
The boy sobered. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “She was goin’ on and on about how you would let her pet Ace, and I knew you wouldn’t. I like being right is all.”
Willow could see Heath wasn’t impressed, evidenced by the scowl lines across his forehead. “How about you go enjoy being right in your room.” It wasn’t a question.
As Jack trudged down the hall, Bitty continued to pout. “Pa, can I go see Ace tomorrow and feed him some carrots? I won’t pet him.”
This time Heath didn’t look up from his paper. “No.”
“But, Pa, why will you let Jack around Ace and not me?” Her words were spoken in a whine, with increasing volume.
Bringing Trouble Home (Lost and Found in Thorndale Book 1) Page 3
