Apache Summer

by Heather Graham

  Smoke was spewing from the chimney; Dolly or Jane must be cooking something inside. Life had gone on while she had been with the Apache. And the people who loved her had held on.

  Jamie was behind her. She turned and shouted to him. “It’s still standing!”

  “Yes,” he began.

  She didn’t let him say more. She nudged the mare hard again with’ her heels and thundered toward the ranch. She passed the paddocks and the beautiful mares with their foals and she felt joy cascade throughout her. Von Heusen hadn’t beaten them—not yet.

  She reined in the mare as she came to the house. Dust flew as the little horse pawed the ground. Tess leaped down and went racing for the front door.

  “Dolly, Jane, Hank!” She stood in the entryway, looking at the large desk, at the stairway leading to the second floor, at the furniture in the parlor, at the dining table. She was home.

  “They’re here! Someone is here!” a voice shouted. It was an unfamiliar voice. Tess stared in astonishment as a tall, slim blond woman came hurrying down the stairway. She was followed by a handsome little boy of about five, then a second blond woman with a serene and beautiful face.

  “Miss. Tess!”

  Tess swung around as Jane hurried from the kitchen, throwing her arms around her.

  “I knew you’d come back, I just knew that you would!”

  “Well.” The first woman had reached the entryway.

  “I knew that Jamie wouldn’t come back without you, of course,” she said.

  “Where is he?”

  Tess stared with astonishment at the two women and the little boy.

  Then the door burst open behind her. Jamie had arrived, but he wasn’t alone.

  With him were two men, both as tall as he, with the handsome but rugged features of ranchers, of men who eked their existence from the land and the elements. They were talking, the three of them were talking, the darkest of them saying something about yon Hensen.

  Then Dolly emerged’ from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron.

  “Those twins!” she proclaimed.

  “The little darlings are going to eat us out of cookies and cakes, they are!

  Oh!

  Oh, Tess! Jamie, Lieutenant Slater, why you’re home! You’re home!” There were tears in her eyes, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  “I knew Tess wouldn’t come home without her lieutenant. I knew you wouldn’t!” Dolly flung her arms around Jamie, and then Dolly and Jane were fighting to hug Tess, and she was trying to hug them back.

  But she still couldn’t help staring at the strangers who were suddenly filling her house. Twins? What twins?

  The two blond women were kissing and hugging Jamie. Jamie was laughing in return and thanking both for coming.

  Tess wasn’t sure if she would lose her temper or her mind first.

  “Excuse me!” she said, but there was too much noise. “Excuse me!” she shouted. The room went still. She looked around, and then said frankly, “Excuse me, but—who are you?”

  “Jamie!” the taller woman wailed.

  “You didn’t tell her?” Tess smiled sweetly.

  “No. No, he didn’t tell me.”

  Jamie stepped forward.

  “These are my brothers, Cole and Malachi. And their wives, Kristin and Shannon. And that’s my nephew, Gabe. And I take it that Shannon and Malachi’s twins are in the kitchen” — “The little darlings!” Dolly said rapturously. “We’ve come because Jamie sent us a wire about von Heusen,” Cole Slater told her.

  Tess gasped. She stared at them all. So this was having a family.

  They were so close. They knew one another so well.

  They were happy and content, she could see it on their faces; they were serene with their world.

  She shook her head.

  “Thank you, but” — She swung around on Jamie.

  “Jamie, you can’t—they could get killed here!”

  “Well, ma’am, I’m not planning on getting killed,” Malachi told her, tipping back his hat.

  “I’m not planning on it at all. You see, we came to kill them if need be.”

  “You don’t know von Heusen.” “Oh,” Kristin said cheerfully, “we have known men a great deal like him.” She smiled, stepping forward.

  “We’re family, Tess. And that’s what it’s all about.” She flashed Jamie a quick grin.

  “My brother-in-law was always there when I needed him,” she said.

  “Oh!” Shannon said suddenly.

  “Smell that! Oh, no, Jamie and Miss. Stuart have come home at last, and it seems we’ve let dinner burn!”

  She swung around, then looked back.

  “Well, isn’t anyone hungry?”

  And Tess realized she was starved.

  She glanced at Jamie. She was still amazed, still in shock. But Kristin Slater set a hand upon her arm.

  “Come on! I promise you, things will start to look more reasonable after a good dinner and a full night’s sleep!”

  Jamie shrugged.

  Tess felt herself gently pulled along. Dinner. The perfect end to the. perfect day?

  Chapter Thirteen

  They had just reached the table when Jon Red Feather came in with Hank. Tess let out a startled, joyful cry and raced to Jori, giving him a fierce hug.

  “You did come back! You made it out, and you came back!”

  “Of course,” he told her.

  “Someone had to be here to welcome the Slaters. I mean, this is practically a tribe. Have you realized that yet?”

  “A tribe!” Kristin said indignantly.

  “Sit down, Jon, and watch your tongue, if you will. Jamie, by the way, you should marry this girl before you find out that you’ve got competition on your hands.”

  Jon laughed, and Tess flushed. She wasn’t sure about Jamie’s reaction.

  Kristin Slater started calmly doling out food into the numerous plates on the table. It was a good thing it was a big house.

  Uncle Joe, you would have loved to have seen this! she thought.

  “If everyone would come sit down,” Malachi said, pouting wine into the glasses around the table, “I think that Jon has something to tell Tess and Jamie.”

  “Yes, I do, as a matter of fact.” Jon walked to the table and picked up a glass of wine. He smiled at Tess and Jamie. “Cheers,” he said, raising his glass to his lips.

  “Will you all please sit!” Cole said emphatically.

  Tess sat at her own dining table—as she had been so politely orderedl Jamie sat beside her, and they stared at Jon, who looked at them.

  “I have discovered why von Heusen is so particularly eager to seize hold of your land, Miss. Stuart.”

  Tess gasped, and she and Jamie stood.

  “Why?” Tess demanded.

  Jon smiled, swirling his wine.

  “The railroad.” “Oh, my God!” Jamie said, sinking into his chair.

  Tess stared at him. He obviously understood completely what was going on, but she didn’t have the least idea.

  “What?”

  “Miss. Stuart,” Cole Slater told her, drawing out a chair and sitting back in it, “the railroad is coming through here.

  That means that this property is going to go sky-high in value. If you wanted to sell some land straight, it would be worth a small fortune.”

  “But there’s more,” Jon Red Feather told her softly.

  “If 9ou do sell just the necessary land, the rest of your property will still go sky-rocketing in value—you’ll be able to send your produce right out from your own doorstep. Tess, you’re sitting on the best land this side of the Mississippi. And that’s why von Heusen has been so desperate to get rid of you. With this property in his hands, he could really control a good percentage of western Texas.”

  Tess smiled slowly, looking at Jamie.

  “But—but he can’t touch any of it now. He must know that! Half of it is in your name, and even if we hadn’t returned” — “Ownership would have come to Cole
and me and our families,” Malachi supplied for her.

  “Well, he must know that.”

  “He does know that,” Jon said. Gabe was sitting beside him, and he tousled the lad’s brown hair to be rewarded with a fascinated smile. Jon smiled in turn, then gave Tess his attention again.

  “I let it be known that Jamie had found you and that he’d be bringing you home. I also went to see Edward Clancy and had him print up the arrival of Cole and Malachi—and I stressed the ability of the Slater brothers with their small arms.”

  “A couple of von Heusen’s men rode out here the other day. But we uninvited them quickly,” ICRISTIN said, heaping mashed potatoes on a plate to pass to Jori. “Cole or Malachi scared them away?” Tess asked.

  “Oh, no, Shannon did,” Kfistin said.

  “She’s an ace.”

  “I’m a decent shot,” Shannon said demurely.

  “She can hit a fly’s eye at a hundred yards,” Malachi said drily.

  They all laughed, but’ Cole sobered quickly and spoke to Jamie in low, even tones.

  “The point is, this von Heusen knows that scare tactics aren’t going to work with Miss. Stuart anymore. No one can quite fathom what he’ll pull next.”

  “Well, he’ll have more to worry about after tomorrow,” Tess said firmly.

  “I’m going to go to the paper and I’m going to give Clancy another front-page story. It’s going to be all about David and Jeremiah and Mr. yon Heusen’s orders to see that I never returned.”

  “There might be a few problems with that,” Jon advised her.

  “Why?”

  ” Tess asked.

  “Because Clancy and your printer gave in at last. Someone shot a few windows yesterday, and by last night, Clancy had thrown in the towel. He wanted you to know that he was sorry.”

  Tess inhaled and exhaled.

  “I can do it myself,” she said. “You won’t have to do it yourself,” Kristin corrected her, sitting at last with her own plate.

  “Dolly and Jane can keep the children here, and Shannon and I will come in and help you with the press. If you give us directions, we can surely follow them. The three of us will go into town first thing in the morning” — “NOV’ Jamie said emphatically.

  “I have to,” Tess began, turning, ready to give battle. “Jamie, I’ve told you” — “The three of you aren’t going anywhere alone,” he intempted harshly.

  “It isn’t safe. Dammr to hell, Tess! Don’t you understand yet?”

  “I understand that the newspaper has always been my maj or weapon.”

  “But right now it isn’t enough. Okay, we’ll go. You’ll do your damned article, but we’ll go together. Tess, what do I have to say to get through to you? When yon Heusen attacks again, it’s going to be all-out war.”

  She wanted to retort. She was furious. He was right, of course, but she still wanted to yell at him.

  Fighting desperately to hold her tongue, she looked at Jon.

  “How did you find all this out?”

  He shrugged.

  “I was still in buckskins when I came back, and I didn’t change before I made a visit into town. Von Heusen had one of his guns follow me. I knew it, so I doubled back and got hold of him. As it happened, Cole and Malachi had been riding in to meet me.” “And,” Malachi said, grinning, “Jon just happened to be dressed for the occasion.”

  Tess was still confused. Kristin sighed and explained. “Cole and Malachi convinced von Heusen’s hired goon that Jon was scarcely more than a raw savage and that he actually delighted in human flesh. Between the three of them they barely had to touch the fellow before he was spilling everything he had ever known in his life.”

  Tess smiled and glanced at Jamie.

  He was not smiling. She looked away quickly, pushing a piece of roast around on her plate. They were a lot alike, the Slater brothers. Cole was the darkest, with golden eyes—his little boy had those eyes, even though he had his mother’s soft blond hair. Malachi was a golden blond with blue eyes, and Jamie was sandy-haired with his smoke gray and silver eyes. But the planes of their faces were similar, strong and hard and weathered. She realized suddenly that she would trust any of the brothers with anything she had.

  And she didn’t really mean to keep fighting Jamie. It just kept coming out that way.

  He stood up suddenly, his chair scraping back.

  “That was a fine meal, Kristin, Shannon—Dolly?”

  “We all contributed,” Kristin told him.

  “Well, thank you, but I think I need a little air. You got a good cheroot on you anywhere, Cole?”

  “Sure,” said his brother, rising as well. He stopped by his wife’s chair and kissed her tenderly at the base of the neck before following Jamie out.

  “Seems like we’re splitting up here,” Malachi said. “Well, don’t stay on my account!” Shannon told him.

  He laughed, shrugged at Jon, and the two of them left. Hank followed them and the women were left—Jane, who had barely said a word, Dolly, who was unbelievably quiet, and Shannon and Kristin and Tess.

  “All this to make a meal, and then it’s just wolfed down, and then everyone runs” — “Ma,” Gabe suddenly interrupted from the end of the table.

  “I cleaned my plate. Can I go join Pa?”

  Kristin threw up her hands, and Tess felt some of the tension leave her as she laughed.

  “Go!” Kristin told her son.

  He smiled, excused hun self politely to Tess and ran out of the house.

  “We might as well pick up,” Shannon said. “Might as well.”

  Things went quickly with five of them to do the clearing, the scraping, the washing and the drying. Shannon asked Tess what it had been like with the Apache, and by the time she finished with her story about Jon and Jamie appearing at just the fight time, they had finished the dishes. Jane and Dolly kissed Tess again and went to bed. Shannon and Kristin and Tess made tea and then sat around the kitchen table, staring at one another.

  “And then this Nalte let you go—just because Jamie asked for you? He let you go to Jamie?” Kfistin said.

  Tess felt herself flush, wondering how to avoid saying the very thing the Indian chief had so clearly understood.

  “He, uh, he …”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Kristin, they’ve been sleeping together and this Nalte man knew it!” Shannon exclaimed.

  “Shannon!” gris ting protested.

  “Well, all right, I’m terribly sorry, but Ktistin and I both married Slater men. I know. They’re so easy to want to shoot, but at the same time …” Her voice trailed away and she was really beautiful as she grinned.

  “Well, they are easy to sleep with. Seductive.”

  Tess knew she had to be a thousand shades of crimson. Kristin sighed.

  “He’s very much in love with you. I’m sure We’ll see a wedding any day.”

  “I’m not terribly sure about that.”

  “He called us here. To protect your interests. He must love you.”

  “I’ve turned over half the property to him. It’s his own property he’s protecting.” “Urn. Did he bargain for anything else?” Kristin asked her.

  She didn’t know why she was being so honest except that somehow she felt she had known the two women all her life.

  Maybe it was because they had all become involved with Slater men.

  “Maybe they just don’t marry easily,” Shannon suggested.

  “But you’re both married,” Tess began.

  “Cole had to marry me,” gris ting said.

  “Oh, the baby?”

  “No!” gris ting ‘laughed.

  “There was a horrible, horrible man after me.

  The war was going on and the only way he could count on some protection from some old acquaintances was to be able to say that I was his wife. He fell in love with me slowly; it took him a long time.” She smiled sweetly at Shannon.

  “And Malachi had to marry Shannon.”

  “Well, he didn’t h
ave to,” Shannon protdsted. “The twins?” Tess asked.

  “No, a shotgun,” Shannon explained ruefully. They both laughed, and Shannon took a deep breath and tried to explain that Kristin was her sister, and that Kfistin had been in trouble.

  She and Malachi had gone after her, and a kindly old couple had derided the two of them had to be married. “But they’d been in’ love for years. They wouldn’t admit it, of course, because they were too busy gouging one another’s eyes out.”

  “Oh, it never was that bad!” Shannon protested. “No, it was worse!” Kristin said. She stood up.

  “I think that we need a drop of brandy to go with this, too. Girls?” Shannon and Tess both agreed. Then Tess yawned and complained that her buckskins were filthy and that she felt as if half of Texas was covering her.

  The sisters quickly had the hip tub out and filled, and Shannon was racing upstairs for French bath oil, and before she knew it Kristin was presenting her with a lilac nightgown that matched her eyes. “I can’t take these things!” Tess protested.

  “But you can. It’s all in the family,” Shannon told her. Tess shook her head.

  “I heard Jamie once. He said that no one would ever make him get married.” Kristin shrugged.

  “They can’t force him—but he just might choose to do so on his own.”

  ‘ “Do you want him?” Shannon asked her.

  Tess f~it her heart beat hard and she closed her eyes. Yes! Yes, she wanted Jamie desperately. She had wanted him his eyes had first fallen upon her, since he had killed since he had told her in a soft voice that she was Since that day by the stream before the nightmare had begun and he had touched her and said, “I think I’m falling in love with you …”

  But that had been before they had nearly been destroyea, before he had lost his beloved cavalry mount to retrieve her.

  She was trouble. He had told her that again and again. He had walked out at dinner because he had been so furious with her that he hadn’t been able to stay at the table. “Do you?”

  Shannon persisted.

  “Yes,” Tess admitted softly.

  “I want him. For keeps.”

  “Then forget the arguments. Even forget the fact that you’ll probably never get along. I have,” Shannon said cheerily.