by Carol Arens
He wouldn’t let the fact that his ranch was bordered by the two feuding families—the Folsoms to the west and the Broadhowers to the south—bother him. He’d grown up with trouble most of his life.
“Lordy, will you look at that?” Aunt Tillie exclaimed, pointing toward Town Square.
Town Square was not a square but a circle with a clear bubbling spring at its center. It looked to be a gathering place, since it had benches and flowerpots all about. Pleasant-looking stores surrounded the square. He’d make sure to bring Grannie Rose and Aunt Tillie back here for some shopping and visiting with friendly folks. That’s not something they had done in the past, being shut away at the Broken Brand most of their lives.
“There’s a shop that says The Sweet Treat,” Grannie Rose exclaimed, nearly trembling with excitement. “It’s been an age since I had a sweet treat that I didn’t make for myself and a dozen others.”
“Past time you did, then, Grannie,” Colt answered. A sweet treat sounded just the thing before he settled the women into the hotel for the evening. They could set off for the ranch in the morning, fresh and rested.
Had it only been him traveling, he’d have been settled at the ranch weeks ago, but the old women had required a gentler pace.
Three doors down from the sweet shop he drew the buggy horses up sharp when a rolling ruckus broke out in front of them.
Two men lunged at each other, poking with balled-up fists and kicking at each other’s tender spot. Neither of the fools knew how to fight. They were just as likely to drown in the spring as to do the other in.
“Hand me my cane, Colt,” Aunt Tillie ordered after the men careened into a flowerpot and sent the orange mums flying.
“Let them be. It’s none of our concern... Besides the fools will give it up before anyone’s taken hard damage.”
One man got the better of his enemy and pinned him to the ground. The fellow on top balled his fist, aimed for the grounded man’s nose. Too bad for him that the combatant on the bottom turned his head. The balled fist slammed into dirt as hard as a rock.
A holler of pain shot about Friendship Spring’s spring.
“Ain’t no yellow-bellied, low-moraled Folsom going to wed Holly Jane,” one of them shouted.
“Any Broadhower puts a ring on her finger’s going to feel my bullet in his back!”
Colt grunted in disgust. With talk of a gun, things had taken a dangerous turn. Any rattlehead could kill from a distance.
Now, with the mention of Miss Holly Jane, things had suddenly become his business.
The only reason William Munroe had sold him the ranch was to keep his granddaughter from falling prey to the feud between the families. Had he left the land to the spinster, she would have become a pawn in the Folsoms’ and the Broadhowers’ lust for her property.
Through that prime ground flowed the river that fed water to the Folsom spread on the west and the Broadhower spread on the south.
Whoever controlled the water controlled their enemy.
Apparently, old William Munroe had been rightly worried about his granddaughter.
This was as good a time as any to set matters right. Colt drew his long, double-bladed knife from the sheath slung across his back. He let the weight of the Arkansas Toothpick balance across his palm, while he chose his target.
Since Broadhower stood up, he was it.
Colt watched the man’s boot twitch. If he didn’t get out of the way, Folsom would be caught between the boot and the back of a bench. It looked like Broadhower meant to crush a rib or two.
Colt threw the knife. The hiss of cold, sharp steel cut the air, barely disturbing the fair afternoon.
Broadhower gasped when he found his pant leg suddenly pinned to the bench.
Colt jumped from the buggy and strode slowly toward Broadhower, who glanced ogle-eyed at him, then the knife.
Colt plucked the blade from the bench, yanking it from his pant leg.
He glared at Broadhower, then at Folsom. “From now on, Saphead...and you, Featherbrain, Miss Munroe is off-limits.”
“Says who?” Folsom and Broadhower spoke together.
“Says the new owner of the Munroe place.”
In the face of a shocked expression and a furious one, Colt climbed back into the buggy and settled between the ladies.
“You boys have a nice day.” He flashed them a smug grin that was sure to make them steam.
“Why, will you look at that?” Grannie craned her neck to look behind as he led the team toward the bakery. “There’s mashed cake spread all over town square.”
* * *
Colt watched Grannie Rose’s grin crinkle while she sighed over each and every sweet treat in the display case. The three-week trip from the Broken Brand to Friendship Springs had been worth it for this moment alone.
Grannie’s mind wasn’t as clear as it had once been. Now and then she saw things that weren’t there. Still and all, she was his grandmother, and he meant to see that she enjoyed every year that she had left.
“I’ll take one of everything, except those chocolate hearts,” Grannie announced, and clapped her hands. “I’ll take two of those.”
“You’ll take two sweets and one chocolate heart,” Aunt Tillie said in the tone that she used on contrary toddlers.
Looked like his spoiling of Grannie might have to be done on the sly.
“Oh, Tillie, you need to loosen your corset strings on occasion.” Grannie nudged her sister in the ribs.
At that moment the curtain to the back room rustled and a young woman stepped through. For half a second he was stunned by her resemblance to a heavenly angel.
“Good afternoon,” she said, gazing at him with eyes as rich a brown as the fancy chocolates piled on the plate between them. “How can I help you?”
With a sugar sweet kiss was the first thought to pop into his mind, but clearly, this was not the kind of woman that a man casually canoodled.
“I’ll have one of everything,” Grannie Rose declared. “Except for the hearts, I’ll have three of those...and so will my sister.”
“Make yourself sick then, but don’t think I’ll be up all night caring for you,” Aunt Tillie huffed.
The woman smiled at Grannie, then Aunt Tillie. Hell if she didn’t look as sweet as the pastries covering the counter.
“May I make a suggestion?” she asked.
“Anything that will keep my sister from the sin of gluttony.”
“I’ll take your suggestion, dearie,” Grannie said. “As long as it comes with four hearts of chocolate.”
“As a matter of fact, it comes with a plateful of them to share among you. I guarantee no one will become sick from it.”
Colt tried not to stare at her, but the woman was damned pretty. He’d seen a pink rose once that was a match to the blush in her cheeks.
“As long as it’s not the whole contents of the display case, we’ll take it,” Aunt Tillie said.
“Just have a seat at the table over there by the window. Won’t take but a minute to prepare.”
Fresh is what best described her...fresh and luminous. He’d never seen a luminous woman before, but just to prove his thought, when she walked through a beam of afternoon sunshine streaking through a window on her way to the back room, her blond hair turned gold, like the light was inside it.
He didn’t realize that he had been staring calf-eyed at the curtain until Aunt Tillie asked if he was ailing.
He shook his head. “Just a mite wearied from the trip.”
“She’s a very pretty young lady.” Grannie studied him with a look. She arched a fine gray brow. “In fact, Colt Wesson, I believe she is the one for you.”
Aunt Tillie rolled her eyes and shrugged.
“Grannie, she’s not my kind of woman at all. I’
m partial to the earthy kind.”
Once again Aunt Tillie rolled her eyes. This time she sighed out loud.
That’s right, earthy with a whiff of sin about them.
Hell, he wasn’t her kind of man. She would require a gentleman.
It threw him off a bit when, a few moments later, the angel emerged from the back room and a surge of desire rocked him to his dusty boots.
She glided toward them with a tray balanced on her palm set with daintily painted teacups and a plate of chocolates. The scent of cinnamon, mint and cloves rose from the delicate china.
“There’s a dash of everything in the tea, and it won’t do a bit of harm to ladylike figures,” she said, placing the teacups on the lace tablecloth then setting the plate of chocolates in the middle.
Grannie Rose caught her hand before she walked away. “You are a lovely girl. Not married, I hope.”
“No, ma’am.” Colt didn’t miss the shadow that passed over her soft brown eyes.
Grannie winked at him.
He was in for it now. Once Grannie Rose had a notion about something it was difficult to dissuade her from it.
Next trip to The Sweet Treat, he’d wait outside. He’d take a peek or two through the window, but what man wouldn’t?
“There’s a pig nibbling on my boot toe,” Grannie Rose announced.
“Really, Rose,” Aunt Tillie whispered. “Don’t insult the proprietor by saying such a ridiculous thing.”
“But there is a pig, a small one, but a pig, nonetheless, and it’s nipping my footwear.”
Colt glanced at the lovely shop owner to see if the lady meant to kick them out over Grannie’s words. Her cheeks were flushed...turning redder by the second.
“Apologize, Rose!” Aunt Tillie had turned nearly as red as the angel, who swished her yellow skirt rounding the pastry counter.
“Look for yourself, then.” Grannie lifted the table lace.
“Lulu!” The angel dashed forward.
By damn, it was a pig! A pig with a pink ribbon tied through a slot in its ear. It was hard to know what surprised him more, the presence of the pig or that he had failed to notice it under the table. But Grannie was right. It was a very little pig.
The angel rushed for the pig; the pig dashed from under the table snagging the lace tablecloth around its foot.
Tea and chocolate went sailing, while fragile cups hit the floor and shattered. He caught a blue one and saved it.
He and the old ladies jumped up and backed away from the table a heartbeat before the pig ran into the leg and knocked it over with a smash and clatter.
Aunt Tillie laughed out loud. The animal squealed while the angel dashed here and there in pursuit of it.
The pig collided with Colt’s shin then skidded across the floor in a mess of hot tea and melting chocolate. He lunged for it with one hand because he gripped the surviving teacup in the other. The smooth round belly of the creature passed through his grip like it had been buttered. It spun in a circle on short legs then made a dash between Colt’s feet.
“Lulu!” the angel screeched.
She ran forward, stepped in a square of slick chocolate then slipped, sliding belly first...between his legs.
By now Aunt Tillie was laughing so hard that she began to wheeze.
By a bit of good luck, the pig tangled itself in Grannie’s skirt. Colt grabbed it by the scruff while the angel slowly rose to her feet.
She wouldn’t know it, glowering at the animal like she was, but her belly was streaked in chocolate. Even better, chocolate rings circled each of her breasts, revealing that they were plump...womanly.
“Here’s your bacon.” He stuffed the squealing, wriggling creature under her arm then handed her the blue teacup.
“Blast it, Lulu,” she muttered, then looked up with a furious blush staining her cheeks. “I beg your pardon, sir...ladies. Please do come another day for tea and chocolate...on the house naturally.”
She spun about then disappeared behind the curtain, the piglet’s tail twitching with the scolding it was getting.
“I do have to say, Colt,” Aunt Tillie managed to say while attempting to bring her laughter under control, “the girl is a bit earthy.”
“I knew she was the one for you the moment I saw her, Colty.”
“Hell,” he grumbled, and his aunt didn’t even bother to frown.
Chapter Two
“I should have let the butcher keep you,” Holly Jane grumbled at the pig, who grunted at a weed growing near the back door of The Sweet Treat. “You’d have made a fine sandwich.”
She locked the door then glanced about. So far, not a single suitor was visible on the path through the woods that led home.
That, at least, was a blessing. With the sun dipping behind the treetops, she didn’t need another delay. She would be late getting back to the ranch as it was.
What with broken china scattered about and chocolate-tea goop to be scrubbed from the floor, it was well past the time that she liked to be home.
“You, Miss Pigling, will help me feed the chickens since they’ll be cackling up a storm by time we get to the barn.”
Holly Jane walked the path toward home taking deep breaths of autumn-scented air. Late-afternoon sunshine shot through tree branches and cast long shadows behind her and Lulu. Leaves twisted in the breeze, looking like molten gold and then red sparks.
She loved her life here. When she had discovered, at the reading of his will, that Granddaddy had sold her inheritance, she had cried for a week. Between missing the man who had been everything to her and wondering how she would get by without the ranch she had planted her roots in, she thought she might never quit weeping.
Overhead, a crow cawed, flapping its wings toward the west and the coming sunset.
Given a choice, Holly Jane would be snuggled in a cozy chair beside the fireplace when darkness came. Since she didn’t have the choice, she would make another one. She would enjoy the beauty of the evening as it faded from light to dusk then full dark.
Coming out of the woods just now, she watched the sun slip behind the trees growing on the western edge of the ranch. The great orange glow peeked between a line of cedar and cottonwood, with elm and maple tossed in.
It would be dark by the time she reached the house, but a fat full moon rose behind her to light the way. Stars began to blink and twinkle. A raccoon rustled out of the brush and waddled up to Lulu.
“Good evening, Mayberry.”
Lulu oinked and the pair of them toddled behind Holly Jane toward the ranch house...the home she couldn’t even think of leaving.
Blame it, she wouldn’t leave. She had vowed that, to herself if to no one else.
Grandfather, in his wisdom...or confusion...hadn’t sold the entire ranch to the stranger. He had left her a perfect circle of land a hundred yards in diameter and only a short distance from the house.
Smack in the middle of the circle of land was her carousel, the gift Granddaddy had given her when she was five years old.
Why hadn’t he left her the house, as well? What could it have hurt to do that? These questions had plagued her like hounds on a scent.
Her grandfather had meant well, the lawyer had explained that day when her tears wouldn’t stop. Granddaddy’s intention had been to keep her from falling prey to the Folsoms and the Broadhowers, who would do anything to get the Munroe land.
“The new owner has agreed to watch over you, Holly Jane,” the lawyer had explained. “Your granddaddy only wanted to keep you safe.”
Holly Jane stepped onto the bridge that crossed the narrow river that Granddaddy had named Neighborly Creek. She sighed so deep that it must have alarmed Mayberry. The racoon stood on her back legs with her paws scratching the air.
“Can’t think of what got in
to Granddaddy. I don’t need a stranger looking after me. Haven’t I been watching after him and me since Grandma passed?”
Lulu oinked then trotted over the bridge. Holly Jane hurried after her. The chickens were probably pecking each other by now.
Two hours later, Holly Jane sat down on an overstuffed chair beside the fireplace with a cup of hot cocoa warming her palms.
The house looked like it had been shaken about in a jug then the contents dropped like gambling dice to lie where they landed.
Until Granddaddy’s passing, she had kept these rooms swept and in order. She’d put flowers in vases on the dining room table. She’d let fresh air waft in through open widows, carrying the scent of summer blossoms through the house.
But summer was gone and so was Granddaddy. And the stranger was on his way. As much as it hurt to turn the house she loved into a tumbleweed, she did not want the new owner to see it at its best. If she could prevent him from falling in love with the place, it would be easier for him to sell it back to her.
After a while, she couldn’t bear the unkempt look of the rooms so she went outside.
Her carousel glowed dully in the moonlight. She hugged her robe around her white nightgown, went down the steps and walked over newly deeded Travers land to her own inherited circle.
She stepped upon the carousel platform. It creaked, showing its age. She ran her hand over the peeling red paint of a horse’s rump.
There had been a day when the carousel still worked—before the steam engine that powered it quit—that she would ride for hours on end. Even the children from town would come to the ranch on Sunday afternoons. As hard as it was to believe, for those hours, the Folsom children and the Broadhower children forgot the feud between their parents and played peacefully together.
Holly Jane climbed onto the back of her favorite wooden horse. She glanced at the sky. An owl beat silently against the dark, its pale wings bright against the canopy of stars. It screeched and a mouse exploring the platform dashed between the boards to safety.
