A Taste of Heaven
Page 20
The crew was still lively and joking when she and Tyler reached them.
“About time you two got back,” Joe teased. “We were near ready to come lookin' for you.”
Tyler ignored the remark and tied the lines around the break handle. Pulling his bedroll out of the wagon, he jumped down.
“Rory,” he called. “You climb up here and drive the wagon for Miss Libby. Possum, you and Hickory can see to the horses.” He strode over to a cottonwood where his pinto waited, saddled and nibbling on the new grass. After tying his bedding behind the cantle, he mounted the horse and wheeled it around. “I'll see you at the ranch.”
He spurred the pinto and took off at a gallop across the field.
“What the hell is wrong with him?” Joe demanded of no one in particular. Then he turned to study Libby, apparently searching for an answer to Tyler's abrupt mood change. She knew she looked as startled as everyone else who'd watched him ride away.
Staring openmouthed at Tyler's diminishing form, Rory walked around and got into the seat next to Libby. “What's ailin’ him?”
“Rory, I think I met your father in town. I didn't know that you were Tyler's brother-in-law.” She recalled a conversation they'd had their first night on the trail. He'd said his father knew where he was. Now she understood why.
Rory let his hands rest on his thighs. “Aw, dang,” he sighed, and offering nothing more, unwrapped the lines.
“Oh, Jesus,” Joe added. “That explains it all. Well, we'd better get movin'. We've lost most of the day as it is.” The contingent moved forward out to the open grassland.
Libby sat in baffled silence, watching the buffalo grass and sage roll by. The information she'd provided about Tyler and Rory's father explained the situation to everyone but her.
Chapter Twelve
The trip back to the Lodestar was shorter, and easier for Libby with Rory driving. But it seemed strained by Tyler's absence. During the day, as she and Rory bounced along in the chuck wagon, she tried to learn the reason for the malevolent animosity between Tyler and his father. Why on earth would he blame Tyler for letting his sister die? But Rory, in a departure from his usual outgoing friendliness, proved as unwilling to discuss the situation as his brother-in-law.
Rory considered her question, then shook his head. “Tyler can tell you if he's a mind to, but I doubt he will. No offense, Miss Libby, but it's been a sore spot with him for a long time, and we just don't talk about it. None of us.” Then to the mules, he yelled, “Heyup, you knobheads, keep movin'! Keep movin'!”
Libby spoke no more of the incident, not to Rory or anyone else, and simply withdrew to her original role as camp cook. At night, though, when she lay in her makeshift bed in the wagon, she missed knowing that if she were to peek out under the wagon canvas she'd see Tyler staring into the flames of the campfire, or watching the last minutes of a sunset.
The wound Wesley had left on her heart was beginning to fade into a scar, and she no longer missed Chicago.
But she missed Tyler Hollins.
Libby was relieved when they arrived at the ranch. Except for one night in the hotel in Miles City, she'd slept in the back of the chuck wagon and bathed from a bucket for almost a month. She hadn't been able to wash or iron her clothes. To top it off, she'd grown heartily sick of pork belly and beans.
And she wanted to see Tyler.
They rode in with the same fanfare and whooping as the day Charlie and Joe had driven the wild horses to the corral, and she and Rory laughed and made as much noise as any of them.
When she caught sight of Tyler's tall, slim form leaning against one of the porch uprights, her heart flip-flopped. The sun glinted off the rich auburn strands in his hair, and he stood with his arms folded over his chest. Right now, she was too glad to see him to tell herself that he was her boss, and that her shameful daydreams were improper.
After the first rush of greetings, Rory stopped the wagon in front of the house, and Tyler stepped forward to help her down. Although he still looked tired, she was reminded all over again what a handsome man he was, how blue his eyes were, how lush the curve of his mouth.
“Take the wagon on to the barn, Rory,” he said. Then he smiled at her and she saw a faint spark in his eyes before his familiar cool mask dropped into place. “Welcome back, Libby. The trip went well enough?”
She smiled, too. “Yes, but I'm glad to be back. It'll be good to sleep in a bed again and cook on a stove. I just wish we had a copper bathtub like that hotel in Miles City. And tonight, thank God, well have something besides pork.” Without thinking, she put her hand on his arm.
He took a step back. “Then you'll want to settle in.” He started to walk back into the house.
She was stunned by his coldness. “Tyler, wait. Is that all you—um, I mean are–are you all right?”
The faint frown she knew so well drew his brows together. “I'm fine, Libby. It's not your job to worry about me. Your job is to cook.” He left her standing on the porch, and the screen door slammed behind him. A moment later, she heard his office door close at the back of the house.
Her face was hot with embarrassment, and she looked around to see if anyone had witnessed his curt dismissal. Fortunately, the crew was busy with the horses over by the corral.
Oh, that man, she stewed. He was every bit as rude as on the morning she met him. She hoped she wouldn't be sorry they'd cashed in her train ticket.
*~*~*
One night a week later, Libby woke with a start. She didn't know what time it was, but the moon had crossed the sky to lay a slash of light across her bed from the window. It was a mild night and a soft breeze fluttered the lace curtains. A noise, she thought, something outside had awakened her.
She pushed back the covers and went to the open window. The full moon lighted the yard and surrounding buildings but she saw nothing. The horses in the corral were quiet, the bunkhouse was dark—
Thwuck!
Thwuck!
Thwuck!
She looked down then, and just beyond the edge of the porch roof she saw Tyler chopping wood. There was no mistaking his identity. He'd taken off his shirt and his sweating torso gleamed in the gray light—she remembered very well the contour of his shoulders and straight back. The ax blade flashed silver on its upward arc before it plunged down again to bite into a log.
Chopping wood! At this hour? She was certain it must be far past midnight.
Sighing, Libby crept back to her bed. She lay awake a long time after the noise stopped, cursing the cruel moment of fate that had allowed Tyler to meet Lattimer Egan on the sidewalk in Miles City. No matter how she tried not to, her mind kept returning to the other side of Tyler Hollins that she'd glimpsed so briefly—Tyler massaging her shoulders, kissing her in the wagon the night of the storm, searching for her at the railroad station. She'd liked that man very much.
She didn't know much about him, but she knew enough to realize one thing. Grieving for his wife was his prison. It kept him from sleeping, and it crowded everyone else out of his heart.
For that Libby was resentful. And very sorry, indeed.
*~*~*
Fresh from a sluicing on the back porch, Tyler slowly climbed the stairs in the darkness and made his way down the hall. An inexpressible weariness dragged at him. That was good—he hoped it meant he'd finally be able to sleep now. It was nearly two o'clock, and the sun would be up in only another three hours. When he reached Libby's closed door, he paused. He thought of her, with her long honey hair and gray eyes. He saw comfort and redemption in those eyes whenever he looked at them. He'd told himself often enough that the idea was just so much bushwa, but he couldn't banish it from his mind. After a long moment, he reached out and gripped the knob. It was cool and metallic beneath his touch.
He wished he had the right to open her door and go to her, to leave the burdens of his heart out here. But he had no right at all.
He released the doorknob and went to his own bed.
*~*~*
“Well, maybe I can't fix anything else around here, but I can sure fix you,” she muttered to the plants. She turned back her sleeves and put on her gloves, intent on reclaiming the beauty of these beds. She knew she was in for a lot of hard work. But it was a beautiful, cloudless day, and she welcomed a task to take out her frustration with Tyler, and to distract her from the vague gray mood that hung over the Lodestar.
Since their return Tyler had been withdrawn and irritable, reminding her of what he'd been like when she first came to the ranch. He disappeared for hours at a time while he rode the range alone. Thank God his horse knew the way back. A couple of nights she'd heard him stagger up the stairs and knew he was drunk. Her chief worry was that he'd tumble over the gallery railing before he got to his own room. She'd even heard the cowboys grumbling about how much they'd enjoyed the “new” Mr. Hollins, the one who laughed and joked and drank with them at the Briar Rose. Too bad it hadn't lasted.
Tyler stopped at the parlor window and watched as Libby dug at the flower beds in front of the porch. Or rather, what had once been the flower beds. The land had pretty much reclaimed them in the seven years since his father died. Tyler hadn't had the time to keep them up, and Jenna had not cared about them. His father had planted them for his mother, hoping to make her feel more at home at the Lodestar. Tyler didn't think they'd done the trick, not for his mother or for Jenna.
Now a beautiful little cook from a big metropolitan city, who in many ways was much braver than he was, apparently planned to give the wild roses new life. Armed with only a sharp-clawed weeder and a spade, she set to reversing years of neglect.
Kneeling on a pad of old newspapers, she yanked out a winter-bleached clump of grass and threw it into a bushel basket next to her. Long strands of hair had escaped the loose knot at the back of her head and trailed on her shoulders. A smudge of dirt marked her forehead, and she was dressed like a refugee, but once again, the image of an angel crossed his mind.
He walked out to the porch and considered her progress as he leaned on the railing. It seemed like a nearly hopeless enterprise to him—it was impossible to tell where the beds ended and the scruffy yard began. But she'd erected a substantial pile of grass and weeds.
“You don't have to do this, Libby,” he said.
“Oh, but it feels good to be out here with the sun and digging in the soil. I've never had the chance to do that before.” She paused and locked her eyes on him. “Are you going to tell me that this isn't part of my job here?”
“No, of course not,” he mumbled, and self-consciously slapped his gloves against his thigh. When he'd heard the wild commotion of the crew coming home from Miles City, he'd been so anxious to see her he'd had to stop himself from running out to meet the chuck wagon. He'd wanted to pull her down off the seat and kiss her soft, pink mouth until she was limp in his arms, and carry her up to his bed and make love to her. Then, as if he were a dog on a short rope, the memory of Jenna had pulled him back, and he remembered the one truth that Lat Egan had spoken: Tyler was responsible for her death. Because of that, any real happiness wasn't to be a part of his future. So he'd walked away from Libby with a curt dismissal. He looked down at her now, kneeling among the weeds. “But I can't spare anyone to help you with this, and it'll take weeks.”
Libby sank the weeder's claws into the two-foot square of dirt that was finally clear after an hour of work, and churned up rich, dark soil. “That's all right. I'm in no hurry, and I think it will probably be beautiful when it's finished.” She rose from her knees and flexed her back. Tyler felt his gaze drawn to her breasts and tiny waist. “Besides, if I work hard enough during the day, I might be able to sleep through the wood-chopping at night.” She gave him an even look.
Tyler felt the blood rise in his face. Damn it, he thought, no other woman had ever made him do that as often as she did. He didn't know what to say. To offer the excuse that he was catching up on chores seemed ridiculous. Telling the truth—that his thoughts wouldn't let him rest, that he'd wanted nothing more than to lie down with her and just hold her in his arms—wasn't an option.
Fortunately, he was saved from offering any explanation because Joe rode in at that moment. His expression was as dark as a thundercloud.
“How did it go?” Tyler asked.
Joe climbed down from his horse and threw the reins over the hitching rail. He tipped his hat and smiled at Libby, then trudged up the front steps. Tyler waved at the pair of chairs on the porch, and Joe sank into one.
“That old bastard and his vigilantes tried to blow my head off, Ty.” Astonishment colored his deep voice. He crossed his ankle over his knee.
“Vigilantes! When did Lat hire them?”
“I don't know, but that ain't all. He's got his boys sinkin' posts and stringin' bob wire. They said they'll shoot anyone who even comes near that damned fence.”
Tyler sighed and shook his head. Barbed wire—that was bad. A lot of the territory had already seen the end of open-range grazing, but it went against all of his cattleman's instincts. He tipped his chair back against the wall. “I wonder what's gotten into him now. Did you talk to him at all?”
Joe lifted his hat and resettled it. “Yeah, but hell, it wasn't what you'd call a friendly conversation. I only got as close as the road that leads to the ranch house. Lat came out wavin' a rifle, and said he'd put a bullet in my hide if I came any nearer.”
“Jesus—did you tell him about the fifty head we want to give him?”
“I told him. It just made him madder. His face turned nearly purple, he was so damned mad. Said he don't need our charity.”
Tyler let his chair fall forward with a bang. “Oh, goddamn it, I was just trying to help him out. Everyone lost so much this year, not just him.”
Joe lifted a hand. “I know, I know. But he fired over my head and told me to take our damned cattle and—” With a glance at Libby, he left the sentence unfinished. “Uh, well, you can probably guess the rest. I didn't need any more encouragement to leave, so I met the boys back down the road and we brought those steers home.”
Silence fell between them for a moment. Only the rasping sound of Libby's clawed weeder filled the void. From her secluded place next to the shrubbery, she listened to this exchange.
Then Joe said, “You might as well give it up, Tyler. You're wastin' your time trying to please that old man and ease your conscience.”
She couldn't see Tyler's face, but his words suddenly exploded with anger. “That wasn't why I did it, Joe. My conscience has nothing to do with this, and I don't need you to second-guess my decisions.”
Sounding just as furious, Joe said, “I ain't second-guessin' nothin'. But I ain't gonna take a bullet between the eyes from Lattimer Egan, either.” She heard his boots hit the porch flooring as he stood. “You'd best remember who your friends are, Tyler, and stop chewing at 'em like they've got nothin' better to do than take it.”
Joe thundered down the steps, spurs clinking madly, and snatching up his horse's reins, pulled him none too gently toward the corral.
With her brows raised and eyes wide, Libby stood and looked at Tyler. She read the chagrin in his face when he realized that she was still there, and a witness to the heated exchange. She threw her garden tool and gloves on top of the grass pile and climbed the steps. He still sat in the chair where Joe had left him. Crossing the porch, she sat next to him.
“Tyler—”
”Don't you start,” he muttered, exhibiting great interest in a sliver on the edge of the chair seat. His lean, handsome face was beginning to show the strain he was under.
Libby wasn't sure why she bothered. She knew she shouldn't care. In fact, she didn't want to exam
ine her feelings too closely, but the feelings were there, nonetheless, and she couldn't deny them.
She put her hand on the arm of his chair, and leaned toward him. “To keep grieving for someone until you make yourself sick, and sacrifice your own happiness, why, you're throwing your life away. I don't think Jenna would have wanted you to do that, no matter what her father says. You can't let his bitter heart become yours.”
His blue eyes met hers sharply. “Libby, you don't know what you're talking about here,” he warned.
She squeezed the chair arm until she felt the square edges dig into her fingers. This was so difficult for her to talk about, but it was the only example she could think of “Yes, I do. My mother left me at the foundling home when I was four years old. Years afterward, I-I found out that she died a week later in a doorway, alone. Tuberculosis, they said.” He said nothing but his frown knitted more tightly, and he put his hand beside hers on the chair arm. She took a deep breath to continue. “Everybody loses someone, Tyler. We live and we die, some of us sooner than others. You have to go on and make the most of your time on this earth. Otherwise, grief will eat you up.”
He studied her for a moment, then shook his head and stood up. "Like I said, Libby—you don't know what you're talking about." He went down the steps and headed toward the corral without a backward glance.
Libby watched him walk away, and tried to pretend that his words hadn't hurt. But they had. Moments later, she saw Tyler gallop out of the yard on the bay filly that he'd finally tamed. The two of them streaked across the field toward the hills, as if he thought he could outrun the demons that were chasing him.
*~*~*
That night Libby stood before the mirror over her washstand, brushing her hair and thinking. She was alone in the house again. She hadn't seen Tyler since he'd left that afternoon. When he'd asked her to come back to the Lodestar, she never once envisioned being lonely. She was now, though.