Intimate Secrets

by B. J Daniels

  Josie stopped in the center of the circular pen to rub the flat of her hand over the horse’s forehead, her movements slow, graceful, gentle. The stallion snorted and jerked his head, ears up and back as Josie slid off the halter.

  Sensing its freedom, the stallion took off, running around in a circle, obviously nervous and tense.

  Josie pulled a coil of light rope from beneath her jeans jacket and let the bulk of it drop to the dirt floor. The horse eyed her, looking as wary as Clay felt. Josie held the stallion’s gaze as, from the center of the pen, she began to pitch the line at the horse’s flank, sending him cantering around her.

  What the hell did she think she was doing? A horse like that could be unpredictable. Dangerous. At any moment, the stallion could turn on her and kill her before she could get out.

  “Fool woman,” he cursed.

  He spun around at the sound of a soft chuckle behind him to find an elderly woman with a cane standing in the doorway. She didn’t seem surprised to see him as she let the door close behind her.

  “Are you familiar with this type of horse training?” she asked, her voice stronger than he’d expected. She was tall, rawboned and weathered, with sharp eyes and a determined air about her. A horsewoman. She used the cane to maneuver herself over to the window and the bench in front of it. She wore a walking cast on her left ankle and seemed to belong here. He took her for the ranch owner.

  “I’ve heard about it,” he said.

  She chuckled again as she took a seat on the bench. “Please join me.”

  He wondered if she had any idea who he was. Or what he was doing here. She didn’t seem to care as he sat next to her. Her attention was on what was happening in the ring below them.

  Anxiously, he watched Josie pitch the line at the stallion as he cantered around the fifty-foot circle. The horse watched Josie as closely as she appeared to be watching him.

  Suddenly she flicked the line in front of him. The stallion swung around and ran in the opposite direction, keeping close to the wall, his eye still on her.

  “Watch his inside ear,” the elderly woman said as she leaned forward on her cane.

  To his surprise, while the stallion’s outside ear continued to monitor his surroundings, the inside ear locked on Josie.

  “Watch his head,” the woman ordered.

  The stallion dipped his head, turning it slightly toward Josie, and settled into a steady trot.

  “He’ll start licking and chewing and running his tongue outside his mouth,” the older woman predicted.

  Sure enough.

  “It’s a show of respect,” the woman said, looking over at him. “And a willingness to cooperate.”

  Clay sat up, leaning toward the window as Josie dropped the line, then angled both her body and her gaze away from the horse. The stallion slowed, then stopped to look at her.

  Clay held his breath. Josie seemed so small inside the pen with the powerful horse. Too small.

  Then she did something Clay couldn’t believe. She turned her back on the stallion.

  “Fool woman,” he breathed, his heart pounding as he feared what the horse would do. “She’s going to get herself killed.”

  “Then you don’t know Josie O’Malley,” the woman said as she put a hand on his arm to keep him from rising.

  The stallion approached Josie from behind, but she didn’t turn. Just inches away, the horse reached out with his large head. Clay held his breath, his heart pounding.

  The stallion touched his nose to Josie’s shoulder. She turned slowly, and he watched as the horse let her rub the spot between his eyes.

  Amazing. Josie had this high-strung, unbroken horse eating out of her hand. He stared in disbelief as she turned and walked away and the stallion followed her like a pet dog.

  He wouldn’t have believed it, especially after seeing the stallion in the corral last night. The horse had had that wild look—the same look Clay had glimpsed in Josie’s eyes a time or two.

  But now as he watched her, a thought hit him right between the eyes like a brick. The way she handled that stallion… If Josie had been able to tame that wild stallion, then maybe she’d somehow been able to smooth-talk Diablo into letting her ride him.

  “Well?” the elderly woman asked, jerking him back from the thought.

  “She must have worked with the horse before,” Clay said, unwilling to accept what he’d just seen.

  “Are you always so skeptical and suspicious?” the woman beside him asked, those keen eyes on him.

  “I just know that horses are like women. Unpredictable. Often dangerous. And it’s usually a mistake to turn your back on them.”

  She laughed and held out her hand. “Ruth Slocum. Owner of the Buffalo Jump Ranch. And you are…”

  “Clay Jackson,” he said, not at all surprised by the strength he found in her handshake.

  She slanted her head, still openly studying him. “I understand you’re here investigating a crime?”

  “Unofficially. I followed a suspected jewel thief to your stables last night.” He didn’t mention his suspicions about Josie. Not yet.

  “I heard someone got into the tack room, but a jewel thief? What would a jewel thief want in my stables?”

  “That’s the question, isn’t it?” he said, glancing down into the pen at Josie.

  Ruth Slocum followed his gaze but said nothing.

  Chapter Five

  “He’s certainly a handsome devil,” Ruth said as she sat down to the table on Josie’s porch.

  “Don’t say that too loudly,” Josie warned as she slid Ivy into her high chair. “It’s a bad idea to feed that man’s ego, and knowing him, he isn’t far away.”

  Her boss smiled. “What about feeding his stomach? I heard it growling while we were watching you gentle that new stallion this morning.”

  Josie looked up in surprise, almost dropping the bowl of macaroni salad she’d whipped up for their lunch. “Jackson watched?”

  “You seem surprised,” Ruth said.

  She’d known he’d hang around, but she never dreamed he’d have any interest in her work. “He and I never agreed on horse training. Or much of anything else for that matter.” She handed the bowl to Mildred, who was already seated but hadn’t said much.

  “I think he’s here to make trouble for Josie and Ivy,” Mildred blurted.

  Ruth raised a brow at her friend. “Oh, you do, do you?” She chuckled. “What do you think, Josie?”

  She felt the woman’s sharp eyes on her as she sat down. “I think he’s on a wild-goose chase. But I hope he finds what he’s looking for soon and leaves.”

  Ruth nodded and glanced toward the pines behind the cabin. “Don’t you think you should invite him to lunch?”

  “With us?” Mildred asked, apparently shocked that her old friend would want to share the table with him.

  “Better to have him where we can see him, don’t you think?” Ruth said.

  Josie hesitated. She could tell that Ruth was taken with Clay, although other than his looks, she couldn’t image why. But not asking him to lunch would look as if she had reason to avoid the man. Which was true. Or that she had something to hide. Ditto.

  She pushed back her chair and went to the edge of the porch. “Jackson!” she hollered. “You might as well come join us for lunch.”

  Silence.

  “Try, please,” Ruth whispered.

  She mugged a face at her boss but obliged. “Please?”

  He came down out of the pines and at least had the good grace to look sheepish.

  She couldn’t help laughing as she shook her head at him and went to get another place setting.

  “Thank you for the kind invitation,” he said, tipping his hat to the ladies at the table and giving Josie his best smile when she returned with a plate and silverware. Ivy giggled and turned shy as he pulled up an extra chair and sat down next to her high chair on the opposite side of Josie.

  They talked about the weather, horses and kids during the meal
. Mostly Clay charmed Ruth, even softened up Mildred, and did his best to put Josie at ease.

  But unlike the other women, Josie knew the threat he posed. She secretly hoped that Clay was wrong. That the man in the stables last night hadn’t been Raymond Degas. And that no matter who it had been, it had nothing to do with the stolen jewels. Or Texas.

  But, like him, she couldn’t pretend it wasn’t an amazing coincidence that Raymond—or at least the man Clay believed was Raymond Degas—had led Clay to her.

  The one woman at the table whom Clay charmed without any effort was Ivy. She definitely had taken to him, just as Mildred had said after their encounter in the grocery store.

  And Clay, to her amazement, seemed to have a real way with the toddler. Who would have known? Josie had never seen him show any interest in children before. Or was it just Ivy?

  The thought worried her. She told herself that her daughter just had that kind of effect on people. She was as much a charmer as Clay. It surprised her, though, that Clay Jackson would be susceptible to that charm. Maybe he did have a heart after all. Scary thought.

  After they’d finished, Ruth offered to clear the table with Mildred’s help. When they’d both disappeared inside the cabin, he asked, “Where’d you learn to break horses like that?”

  She looked up from removing Ivy’s bib and felt the heat of his gaze. “I don’t actually break them. I try to gentle them, to gain their trust and confidence so they let me train them.”

  He smiled. “I’m familiar with the approach. I suppose it works sometimes, if you get lucky.”

  She felt a surge of anger. “You just can’t admit that I might know what I’m doing when it comes to horses, can you?”

  He met her gaze and held it, his smile fading, his eyes growing dark and serious. “You were great with that horse this morning,” he said, as if the words came hard. “Where did you learn that?”

  She busied herself with Ivy again. “I’ve always loved horses, you know that. I used to watch my father and brothers.”

  She knew he wasn’t buying it. “The O’Malley men don’t gentle horses.”

  How true. “I also learned a lot watching your trainers, and I’ve read about the different techniques. The rest Ruth taught me.”

  “Really,” he said, surprise in his voice. “So you learned some of it in Texas?”

  She nodded, wanting to change the subject. “I really need to get back to work.”

  He got up from the table, studying her openly.

  She knew he was wondering if she’d ever worked with his horses. He no doubt couldn’t stand the thought that she’d ridden one of them.

  She carried Ivy into the cabin. Clay jumped up to open the door and followed her inside, obviously not done with his interrogation.

  “Ruth said you’d never worked with that horse before today,” he said.

  “You don’t think Ruth would lie to you, do you?”

  “It’s not that I doubted you—”

  Right. She played patty-cake with Ivy, changed her and got her ready for her nap, although Mildred insisted she’d be happy to do it. Josie wanted the time with Ivy. She kissed her daughter and laid her down in the crib.

  “Singa,” Ivy cried.

  Josie glanced at Clay, who had followed her into Ivy’s room. She felt self-conscious, but she wasn’t going to let him disrupt the life she’d made for them any more than she could help.

  She sang Ivy’s favorite song, one Josie’s father used to sing to her when she was a child. Suddenly she felt close to tears, her homesickness for Texas, the ranch, but especially her father and brothers, acute.

  “You have a beautiful voice,” Clay said as she turned away to hide her tears and tuck her daughter in.

  When she turned back, he was gone, the screen door downstairs banging behind him. Ruth came in to give Ivy a kiss and took Josie’s arm as they walked out of the room.

  Ruth Slocum had given her more than a job. She’d recognized her love of horses and her desperate need to do something with her life for her unborn baby.

  Ruth had advertised for a stable hand, and Josie had driven out to the ranch with little hope that anyone was going to hire her in her obviously pregnant state.

  While Ruth showed her around the stables, Josie hadn’t been able to keep her hands off of the horses. It had been weeks by then since she’d been around horses. She’d missed the smell, the sound, the sight, but especially the feel of them. Under her palms. Under her saddle.

  Later Ruth would tell her that it was her love for horses that made her offer Josie the job, which included a place to live on the ranch. Within days, Ruth pulled her out of the stables and into the training pen.

  In the pen, Ruth had taught Josie more about horses than she dreamed possible and made her realize how much more she needed to learn. Horse training took a lifetime, Ruth had told her, but Josie knew now that it was what she wanted to do with her life, along with raising Ivy. Horses and her daughter were her life. She had no regrets about that. Only a deep sense of gratitude to Ruth.

  She’d met Mildred through Ruth. The two older women had been friends since grade school. Both had been godsends to Josie. Along with giving her a job and a place to live, Ruth had dug out her son’s crib from the attic, and Mildred had collected clothing from her many nieces’ and nephews’ children for Ivy.

  Josie often wondered how she’d have ever made it without both women. She just hoped that one day she’d be able to repay their kindnesses.

  “Mind if I offer a little advice?” Ruth asked now.

  Josie shook her head.

  “Men are like horses,” she said. “What works with horses, also works with men.”

  Josie blinked at her. “You aren’t suggesting that I try to…gentle Clay Jackson to a saddle?”

  The older woman laughed. “Hell, yes. If you can communicate with a horse by reading his body language and sending similar signals back, why not do the same with a man?”

  “I don’t have to read Clay’s body language, I can read his lips loud and clear,” she said, feeling tears close to the surface. “He always thinks the worst of me.”

  Ruth tilted her head to study her. “What kind of signals are you sending him?”

  “You don’t understand. There was a man in my past—”

  Ruth laughed, her weathered face crinkling with humor. “Honey, it’s pretty obvious there was at least one man in your past.”

  Josie had to smile in spite of herself. “There’s a lot you don’t know about Clay and me.”

  “And there’s a lot I do,” Ruth said, squeezing her hand. “Would you give up on a horse after a few failed attempts? You have to school a horse, slowly and gently. Men are no different, honey.”

  Josie smiled at the idea of schooling Clay Jackson.

  “You have a gift when it comes to horses, Josie.”

  “Yeah, well, believe me, I don’t have the same gift when it comes to men.”

  Ruth laughed and released her hand. “Give it a chance. I think you’ll be surprised.”

  As Ruth left, Mildred settled into the couch with her knitting. She made afghans for her church as part of a blankets-for-the-homeless project and swore that knitting kept her out of trouble. Josie thought she might take it up.

  As she pushed open the screen door, she wasn’t surprised to find Clay leaning against one of the posts, looking toward the stables. In the distance, Ruth drove off in the golf cart she used to get around the ranch.

  “Thanks for lunch. It was delicious,” Clay said, never forgetting his breeding or his southern manners. Old-school Texans and cowboys prided themselves on their manners.

  “It was Ruth’s idea.”

  “I’ll have to thank Ruth the next time I see her.”

  She groaned, hoping he wouldn’t be around long enough. “Don’t you have something better to do than follow me around, Jackson?” she snapped irritably as he fell in beside her for the walk down to the stables.

  “Nope. You are my work,
Josie. And believe me, it isn’t easy. As a matter of fact, I’ve been thinking—”

  “I’ll just bet you have,” she said, giving him a sweet-as-penuche smile.

  “You really should smile more often,” he said. “You’re really quite attractive when you’re not frowning.”

  She glared over at him.

  “Sorry, just trying to help,” he said with a shrug.

  “I’ll have you know that I’ve been doing fine on my own. I don’t need your help. Or your advice.” She started to walk away from him.

  He grabbed her arm and pulled her around to face him. “What makes you so damned ornery?”

  “I’ve been bossed around my whole life,” she snapped, jerking her arm free. “By my father. By my three older brothers.” Her gaze narrowed. “And by you. Everyone knows what’s best for me. Even you treated me like I was one of your horses that needed to be corralled.”

  “I treat my horses very well.”

  “Oh!” she said, stomping away from him.

  He shook his head as he stared at her rigid spine, the proud incline of her head. A woman with a lot of grit. Then he laughed softly and went after her. “A man can’t act protective around you.”

  “It’s more than that, Jackson, and you know it.”

  Damn her. She knew him too well. Although there was a lot she didn’t understand about him.

  But she was right about one thing. He wasn’t here to protect her. Nor did he have any business trying to tame her in Texas. “I was out of line.”

  That took some of the wind out of her sails. She’d obviously expected him to make excuses. She slowed, studying him as if she suspected he wasn’t being entirely honest.

  He couldn’t remember a time he’d been more honest.

  “I didn’t want to see you hurt. Odell Burton was nothing but trouble and you were—”

  “Wild as an unbroke stallion? Isn’t that what you once told me?”