by Jillian Hart
The look on Daniel’s face— Rayna scooped her little boy, grown so big and heavy, into her arms. Held him as he kicked and punched at the air.
Sobs racked him from head to toe and she sank into the closest chair, the one Daniel had vacated. It was his hands guiding her down, his movements at the stove saving their breakfast from crisping.
He set a cup of coffee beside her, filled two plates and left the room.
Hans’s cries had changed to sobs. Her poor baby boy. She held him tight, humming the melodies she’d sung him to sleep with long ago, waiting for him to quiet.
Kirk came to grab his muffler from the wall pegs by the back door. He looked exhausted, too.
“Daniel’s going to let me ride his gelding to school, if that’s all right, since he’s not going.” Misery settled on Kirk’s face. He laid a hand on Hans’s back.
Rayna understood, for it was the same misery she felt. “I have your lunch ready on the counter.”
Kirk nodded, ruffled his little brother’s fine hair with affection and left, only to return to grab his lunch. Then he was gone, the door slamming shut.
Rayna couldn’t get warm. Daniel came in to stoke the fire. Hans stiffened, tension coiling in his muscles, and he buried his face against her throat and held on with all his might.
“Is there anything I can do?” Daniel knelt. What a steady, good man he was. His touch to her arm was welcome.
She didn’t know what he was thinking. She couldn’t guess what he would do next. Would she ever? But his goodness surprised her as he brushed the palm of his big hand against Hans’s head.
The tenderness etched into his face was genuine.
Of all the men who could have made this same offer to her, there couldn’t have been a better one. Not just to work the ranch and to step into a man’s duties around this place.
But who better to know a child’s worth than one who’d never been valued.
She could see that, too, in his dark eyes, shadowed with a strange longing. The man who’d kept himself separate from others, a true loner, so much so that his neighbors hardly knew him by name, had dreams, too.
“Do you need me to stay?” he asked, his gaze searching hers, and she swore she could feel the impact deep within her.
“No, he’s calming. I just need to hold him.”
Daniel rose, greater for his kindness as he rubbed something from her cheek. A teardrop marked the pad of his thumb. “Let me know if you ever need someone to hold you.”
She didn’t ask and the seconds beat between them before he turned. His boots thudded on the floor and the hinges squeaked. Then he was gone for town with a click of the door, taking a part of her broken heart.
There it was again. The itch at the back of his neck that had Daniel’s senses on alert and had been troubling him on and off. When he looked up to wipe the sweat from his eyes, he saw why.
Clay Dayton’s fine team—Rayna’s former driving horses—were tied up in the far corner of the yard, near to the office door.
That lowlife. Hatred for the man churned in his guts and if it weren’t for the job he had to keep, he would hunt Dayton down and make it clear. Rayna was his. The land was his. The old man needed to stay far away or he’d be sorry.
In Daniel’s view, a man did what he had to in order to protect his family. Last time, he’d dragged the man out of the barn and thrown him on his horse. He’d had to hold himself back from doing more.
He wouldn’t next time. One thing he intended to do was to keep his wife safe. He went back to work, but the back of his neck kept feeling itchy. It was as if Dayton was keeping an eye on him from inside the building. The windows made it impossible to see in, but Daniel kept vigilant.
He didn’t know much about Clay Dayton. Only that he had a wife and a large, extended family. And that it was rumored he owned more land than anyone else in the county. How he got that land, by hook or by crook, was up to debate. Either way, Daniel figured that Dayton was none too happy losing out on getting his hands on the Ludgrin property. And on the Ludgrin widow.
Yeah, he pretty much despised the man. He knew the exact moment when the office door opened and Dayton strolled into sight. He wore a fine black suit as if it was Sunday, acting so fine when he’d have violated Rayna if he hadn’t come along.
Daniel sunk his shovel deep into the coal pile and from the top of the rail car sized up his enemy. Dayton glowered at him across the distance and there was no mistaking the look of hatred in the man’s eyes. And something else. A glitter of warning that had Daniel wishing he could take care of Dayton here and now.
Later. Daniel vowed to choose the place and the time. He glared right back at the man who climbed into the fine buggy as if there were no better man in the county.
All Daniel could think about was his lovely wife, her precious children and how he would give his life to keep them safe.
Rayna turned the gelding off Main Street, slipping a little because she just couldn’t get used to the blasted sidesaddle. She steadied herself, nearly dropping the bundle of mending she’d done for Betsy, when she saw him. Clay Dayton watching her from the benches near the bank building.
She set her chin and met his glare before he disappeared from her sight. But not from her mind. She’d worried about meeting up with him on the road alone. Daniel, if he knew she’d come to town by herself, would not be pleased. But this was business—she had promised Betsy she’d bring the clothes by before she left on her afternoon deliveries.
So she was stunned when Mariah opened Betsy’s kitchen door. Her eyes were shining. “Surprise!”
“What are you doing here?” Rayna stepped through the threshold to see Betsy and their new neighbor Katelyn Hennessey at the kitchen table, slicing up some very delicious-looking desserts. “I smell apple pie!”
“Guilty!” Katelyn admitted with the pie cutter gripped firmly. “Congratulations on your marriage, Rayna. There’s nothing as nice as being a new bride. A doting husband, everything is so exciting and, oh, just lovely.”
“It sounds as if Katelyn has found the secret to a good marriage.” Betsy winked as she passed silverware around the table. “The trick is to never let the honeymoon be over.”
“Life gets in the way,” Mariah argued, glancing over to check on her little boy toddling around the kitchen, hand outstretched after their gray house cat, who kept one step ahead of that grasping hand. “But an enterprising wife can find a way to make time for what’s important.”
“And that is important.” Katelyn blushed again. “Especially to a marriage made for convenience’s sake. It’s a…well…a way of bonding.”
“Well said!” Mariah didn’t seem the least bit bashful about the subject of marital relations as she shut the door and led the way to the table. “My marriage was for convenience, so Nick and I were friends first, before we became lovers. I imagine that’s what Rayna is struggling to do. Just to get to know this man she married. He’s a stranger to all of us.”
“He certainly keeps to himself,” Katelyn agreed as she began filling dessert plates with the rich cinnamony apple treat. “Dillon knows him, though, and speaks of him highly. He says it’s a fine man you married, Rayna.”
“He certainly is that.” His patience, his hard work, his care. She could still picture him kneeling before her as she’d held Hans and offering to hold her if she needed it. If she needed comfort from her pain.
“Daniel is a good husband, but we are still getting to know one another.”
“Still?” Betsy looked crestfallen.
“Give her and Daniel time to come to know one another first.” Mariah pretended to scold. “So, you and Daniel are getting to know one another, right?”
“We have a companionable arrangement.”
“What does that mean?” Katelyn looked confused as she put the pie cutter in the wash basin.
“It means—” Betsy waved her fork in midair “—that they are not quite consummated. Right, Rayna?”
“I’m not go
ing to dignify that with an answer.”
“See? She’s blushing. It’s true. I bet by this time next week, she’ll be humming a different tune.”
Rayna took a bite of pie, hoping to distract Betsy. “Katelyn, this is excellent. I would love your rule.”
“I’ll be happy to write it down.” Katelyn’s eyes twinkled. “I bet your Daniel looks at you like you were a piece of this pie and he was the hungriest man in the world.”
“I give up!” Rayna tossed down her fork and covered her face with her hands. These women were apparently having a lot of fun at her expense. “I’m not in love with Daniel. This is a practical arrangement.”
“You know what’s practical?” Mariah rose to top off the coffee cups. “Sharing body heat to keep warm through the night. It’s a good idea. You should invite him to your room.”
“And if any snuggling is involved, then that’s just another way to keep from getting frostbite,” Katelyn said, stirring sugar into her cup as if she hadn’t said anything outrageous. “True love deepens with time. It certainly did for me. I’m just very hopeful that Rayna and Daniel will have a happy marriage.”
“We’ve all been married.” Betsy turned serious and reached for Rayna’s hand. “We know how important that is.”
Mariah had slipped into the pantry and quietly returned with a ribbon wrapped around the folded square of a wooden frame. A quilt frame.
“We knew you needed a new one.” Betsy’s grip squeezed, conveying all the love and friendship of a lifetime. “This way you can work on your new quilt at home, instead of having to borrow Mariah’s.”
“Oh.” It was too expensive. It was too lavish. It was…just right.
“This is from all of us, to wish you a happy marriage,” Mariah explained as she set the gift into the seat of an empty chair. “In time, I hope you will find great love with your Daniel.”
In time? She doubted she could love again if she had her entire life to recover from her loss. She thought of the past nights, coming home from the boardinghouse in the freezing cold. How Daniel was there waiting for her at three o’clock sharp in town. How tired and cold he must be, but he never seemed to mind. Not when he would drop her off at the door and head off to the barn to put up the team.
Not when he made up his bed on the sofa, shivering with cold, to crawl beneath the pile of blankets alone.
Marital relations. She couldn’t deny she longed to have said yes this morning. To lean against his chest and to let his comfort sift over her like powdered snow.
He was her husband. She wore his ring. But what if her heart remained lost? As frozen as the Montana prairie in midwinter?
Daniel saw her coming through the stubborn snowfall, the lunch hamper hung over her good arm. It heartened him to see her bundled well against the cold. He had to keep his attention on the plow. Every time he glanced up to check her progress across the acres of upturned earth, crowned with snow, the plow went off course and he had a crooked row to show for it.
There she was, wearing a hooded woolen cloak that draped around her face and gold curls and made her so dang beautiful it made his chest hurt just to look at her.
He halted the horses, lathered and panting. “How’s your little fella?”
“Finally asleep.” She looked tortured as she bit her bottom lip, as if thinking. Or debating what to share with him. She must have come to a decision because she kept on talking. “Maybe it was too much for him to have returned to school yesterday, but he wanted to go. He seemed to be doing better, and there was no reason not to send him.”
“You did right. It’ll take a long time. A papa is a lot to lose for a little boy.”
“It was everything.”
For her, too. He could see it. He didn’t know much about what bonded a man and a woman together, but spending time with her, he had some notion.
“I can’t leave the team standing for long.” He snapped the reins and the Clydesdales dug in, pulling the heavy plow like a spear through the thick, rich earth. “Walk with me.”
“Okay.” She stepped over the raised furrows of raw earth. “Can you stop long enough to eat lunch?”
“I’ll eat and work. I used to always wait until after I was done working, but I’ve learned my lesson. You’re a damn fine cook. I’m not about to let whatever you got in that hamper sit. My mouth is watering and I don’t even know what’s in there.”
“You’re making it impossible for me not to like you.”
“You were determined not to like me? Or do you mean you just didn’t like me first off?”
“When I first met you? I thought you were out to try to steal our crop. But you proved me wrong. You keep doing that.” She didn’t look at him.
She didn’t have to. He felt the change. She was walking a little closer to him. Not much, but she was more at ease. Didn’t look at him as if he were a stranger. His pulse kicked up in rhythm from her nearness. “How else did I prove you wrong?”
“You could have gotten angry with Hans’s behavior this morning. I’ve talked to him about it, but—” She shook her head helplessly. “You weren’t angry.”
“I have a lot in common with Hans.” And it hurt to think about. “I didn’t know my parents, so I guess my loss was a different one. But being a little boy hurting… I know something about that.”
Gratitude made her eyes so bright and beautiful he swore he could see her soul. That tenderness unspooling in his chest went right on loosening.
The horses reached the end of the row and he turned them, standing full weight on the plow to keep the tooth in the ground. The decomposing wheat stalks caught and tangled, adding to the fact that the earth was trying to freeze on him.
“I sure appreciate this early snow. I always like my after harvest plowing to be challenging.” He felt the metal groove twisting and he halted the horses. But it was too late, the old plow decided to pitch. “Great. That’s just what I needed.”
He wrestled the dang thing upright, sweating and trying not to cuss in the presence of his wife, and managed to get the contraption upright. Then he realized she’d been watching every move he made, and the corners of her mouth were twitching.
“Are you doing all right?” She was obviously trying not to laugh.
That made him feel more confident. “I was doing just fine until you came out to distract me with your promises of lunch.”
“How many acres have you done this morning?”
“Ten. I’ve only got one hundred and fifty more.”
“Lucky you. Here, you’ll need this.” She reached into the hamper and unwrapped the top half of a thick sandwich.
He took a bite. Hell, it was so good, it made his tongue ache. Moist seasoned meat, chewy bread, and some kind of white creamy stuff that he really liked. He’d never tasted it before, until he’d had one of her sandwiches. He figured there was a whole lot he had yet to taste when it came to Rayna. She’d only been feeding him for a short spell—
Wait up. Maybe he was liking a passel more than just her cooking. The woman walking beside him was his wife. And he wouldn’t always be bunking down in a bedroll on the parlor floor.
The bed he’d put up in her room was for the two of them. When she was ready. Ready to just sleep beside him. Not that lying beside her and not touching her was going to be a restful experience. But she’d married him because she’d had no better choice. It didn’t take a genius to figure out she would need time.
But that didn’t stop him from wanting her. He was dog-tired because he’d lain awake more hours than he wanted to admit last night, thinking of her in his bed. When he’d brushed his lips against her cheek, it had been the sweetest thing. He’d never known anything like that before. The tenderness pooled like warm light in the center of his chest brightened, filling him up. And at the same time a hunger for her thudded in that light inside him. He wanted to haul her against him and taste her satin skin. Kiss the graceful curve of her neck, feel her arch against him. He wanted to unbutton that pretty dress
of hers—
Whoa there, Lindsay. He wanted what came after the wedding, but he’d never courted Rayna, never had the chance for her to come to know him. To know how safe she’d be with him. How treasured. So he had no right to a marriage bed. Not until he honored the natural progression of things.
He sunk his teeth deep into the sandwich, tugged back on the reins draped over his shoulders. The horses slowed a bit, which was making it easier to keep the plow in the ground one-handed.
“I didn’t know food could taste so good,” he told her when he was done eating. “What else do you got in that hamper?”
Soft pink blushed across her delicate cheekbones. She must have liked his compliment because she handed him another sandwich. Since he was hungry enough to eat worn-out shoe leather, he swore he’d found paradise on earth biting into a second sandwich thicker than the first.
Or maybe the paradise was having her at his side. He’d never realized how lonesome his life had been until this moment. It wasn’t as if they were doing anything grand. He was simply doing his work. But she made everything different. The rustle of her petticoats, the faint scent of spring and the feel of her, it was as if they were linked. When she came near, his soul came on like a lantern on a dark winter’s night, chasing away every shadow.
He shoved the last bite into his mouth, chewing as he handed her back the waxed paper. Efficient, she handed him a large cup and a spoon. Last night’s stew, warmed and steaming. He could only stare, disbelieving. But the bowl didn’t disappear, and the hot tangy gravy and juicy meat chunks had his mouth watering and his stomach growling.
It was just the thing he needed, for he was half frozen through. Rayna had taken care to warm the meal and it was only cooling in the bitter wind. He yanked back on the reins, stopping the horses, and took the bowl. It felt good on his hands. Even better in his belly.
He ate fast to the last drop. The good, flavorful stew thawed him from the inside out. Amazing what a difference it made. He felt ready to take on every acre that had been left fallow for too long—and that made plowing tough.
