The dark-skinned man replied proudly, “And won’t ever need or want to look for another.”
“Where’s the petition, Sophie?” Standing before her, Dusty was lean and handsome in his rawboned way. Being in his preferred milieu of cattle, horses, and apparently, six-shooters, seemed to make him more attractive.
She commanded herself to focus on what he asked as opposed to how tall and tanned he was. “I left it in the wagon. I’ll have to go get it.”
“I’ll come with you.” Dusty withdrew the gun from his holster belt and presented it handle-first to her brother. “David, practice on the targets while I’m gone.”
“A Colt revolver.” David accepted the smaller, more expensive firearm and let the rifle clatter at his feet.
Sophie began to protest when Dusty stopped her. “Don’t worry. The men won’t let him get hurt.”
“It’s not the gun that I worry about hurting him.”
“They won’t, either. Mabrey and Emmers will see to that. They’ll teach him how to better hold a firearm.” He put a hand on her shoulder to steer her away.
CHAPTER 23
I T’S NOT ABOUT how well he can hold a firearm. That rifle was strictly for defense, Dusty. You’re encouraging my brother to be a gunslinger.” Sophie continued to worry about leaving David behind the ranch house with those rowdy men, especially the trigger-happy one with the surname Freeman. “I thought ranching involved tending livestock. I hadn’t the slightest inkling that you took time to practice sharpshooting painted targets and old bean cans.”
“You’d be surprised how many men want to steal cattle. Much easier and more profitable to take a calf than to run off with an armload of crops.” Dusty dropped his hand from Sophie’s shoulder once they were clear of the house.
“This is why my father doesn’t want him to be a rancher. It’s dangerous.”
“He’s turning seventeen. If your brother doesn’t want to be a farmer, there’s nothing your father can do to change his mind. You have to let a person be who they are.”
As they walked the range, Sophie noticed that several members of the cattle herd had returned from further afield.
They would go back once the cowhands and her brother resumed shooting. “Are you happy with who you are at this ranch?”
“I’ve always been the man I am, no matter where I worked.” He gave a passing glance to the Herefords. “But yeah, the work here’s good. The foreman and the other cowhands respect me.”
Sophie latched onto the word respect. “Dusty, I can’t say how sorry I am and how terrible I feel about what happened on the farm. It wasn’t right of my family to ban you from our house and supper table.”
She knew when the tic in his jaw resumed that he was careful in choosing his words. “Your mother and father did what they thought was best to protect you. No one can argue with that.”
“But they weren’t protecting me because I wasn’t in any danger. Not from you.” She walked around the horse and stopped by the side of the wagon. Dusty moved her way. The gold flecks in his eyes held her attention.
“Sophie, I can’t fault them. I cared for you. It wasn’t getting easier to hide it.”
Her heart quickened until she thought he could also hear it pound. “Do you still care about me?”
“Yes.” His voice became husky. He didn’t try to hide the inflection. “What they did doesn’t change that.”
A longing crept over her to go closer to him. Carried by the sensation, she stepped closer and allowed herself to utter words that she kept in secret. “It doesn’t change the way I feel, either.”
He encircled his arm about her waist, closing the gap between them. The heat of his embrace was warmer than the summer air. Rising on her toes, Sophie reached to put her arms around his neck. She closed her eyes as he kissed her long and slow.
For minutes, hours, she didn’t know or care, her consciousness drifted from her surroundings until all she could sense was the tactile heat of his skin, the strength of his arms, and the taste of his lips. When he pulled back, she was disappointed that it couldn’t go on forever.
“This is what your parents were afraid of.” He played with the hair that curled behind her ears. “Their sweet daughter being taken in by some careless cowboy.”
She felt the green ribbon which her mother had so meticulously tied begin to loosen. “You’re not careless. You’re very attentive.”
To her delight, he demonstrated skillfully with another kiss that started at her lips before descending into a warm trail that ended at the base of her throat. “I should stop before I’m tempted to give you more attention,” he murmured, pulling back.
Sophie heard noises in the background and remembered that they left her brother and Dusty’s fellow cowhands engaged in shooting practice. “I don’t think they’ll notice how long we’ve been gone.” What was she doing? Inviting him to continue?
His eyes closed down. “We should head back.” He gave her the ribbon that had fallen across her shoulder.
Sophie turned away from him while she attempted to refashion her coif. Without a mirror and comb, the best she could do was make a simple bow at the nape of her neck. She hoped the others behind the ranch house didn’t study the way she wore her hair when she first came onto the property.
“Is Chad still courtin’ you?”
Her elated mood came back to the cold, hard ground and turned into guilt. She had told Dusty that he wasn’t careless, but she had certainly let her own restraint fly the coop. The gold necklace Chad gave her burned a ring at the base of her neck, just below the place where Dusty had kissed. She wished her answer could be in the negative, that she and Chad were no longer considered a pair, but she was the only one privy to that truth. “I told him that I wanted to end it, but he wouldn’t listen. I’m going to tell him again that I no longer wish to be the subject of his attentions.”
Dusty groaned. “Sophie, you led me to think that he wasn’t pursuing you anymore. Why didn’t you say something before you let me kiss you?”
Sophie felt shame in not telling him sooner, but instead of apologizing, she grew defensive. “He courts me only with words. I don’t feel any affection from him.”
“He’s still courtin’ you.”
Sometimes Dusty’s simplicity could be one of his most engaging qualities. At that moment, Sophie considered it to be his most irksome. “You’re the one who said that the rules of courtship didn’t make anything final until a lady was spoken for. Chad hasn’t asked for my hand.”
“That’s not how I meant it. Don’t you see?” His drawl thickened as he took her hands in his rope-calloused ones. “I thought you fancied Chad a bit at first, and I was gonna do my best to make you look my way. Now you’re tellin’ me that you don’t care for him, yet you still let him court you. That’s gettin’ to be dishonest.” He weighed her with a serious face.
Sophie hated being accused, but not as much as she hated not being firm enough in response to Chad’s insistence at continuing to see her. Her mind spun in search of a reply to Dusty. “But I don’t play coy or coax him anymore. I don’t love him.”
“Then end the courtship. You can’t have it both ways where you’r
e visitin’ me in secret and steppin’ out in public with him.” He let her hands fall. “That may enliven you, but I’m not a pair of boots you can put on and kick off whenever you please.”
She winced at his strong words, knowing that he had a right to say how he felt. It all started as a game when she first told him about Chad paying her notice at the Founders Day Festival. She didn’t stop to think that Dusty could truly be hurt if she continued to goad him. “Chad went to Missouri for one of his family’s companies. He won’t be back until the first week in August. I’ll tell him again when I attend a party his father’s having.”
“Make sure you do.” He touched her temple and let his fingers glide down her cheek. “’Cause this is turning into a lie that I’ll have no part of.”
She nodded. There was nothing else to say on the matter until she had her conversation with Chad.
Dusty waited for her to get the petition from the back of the wagon. Gunfire was in full force as they walked toward the ranch house again.
“I wasn’t lying when I wanted you to kiss me, though,” she stated to lighten the mood.
He turned up a smile. “I’ve known for three years that you wanted to kiss me.”
“How so?”
“Please, Sophie, you’re not slick enough to fool me. Maybe you can pass one over on Chad Hooper, but not me.”
“I don’t know if I should be offended by that.”
“What, that you can’t fool me?”
“No, that you called me slick.”
He gave her hair a tug. “I beg your pardon, ma’am. I’ll be pleased to make up for it and call you something more winsome after you tell that mayor’s boy to stop comin’ around the farm.”
“You made yourself clear the first time, Dustin Sterling.”
They went around to the back of the ranch house after the gunfire settled.
Dusty knew Joe and the other cowhands were sitting on pins and needles, waiting to ask him about Sophie. After she and her brother left the ranch, taking five new signatures on the petition with them, he arose to saddle up his horse for an evening run.
Joe, Freeman, and Wilcox beat him to the stables. “Pretty little lady you got that showed up today.” Freeman grinned, showcasing the gold fillings in his teeth. “All dainty with eyes blue as cornflower. No wonder you ain’t told nobody about her.”
Dusty carried his saddle over to Gabe’s stall. They followed him. “I figured that French picture you have on the bunkhouse wall was enough woman to tide you over, Freeman.”
“She’s not flesh and blood.”
Being new to the ranch, Dusty debated over the proper time when he could talk to Wilcox and Freeman about being more respectful of women. “Nope, that she is not. You ought to tear it down and go find yourself a real woman in town to court properly. Leave Miss Charlton be, of course.”
Joe snickered as Freeman wandered away. “Is Miss Charlton the lady you intend to build that house for?”
Dusty made sure the saddle straps were snug around the horse’s withers. “No house built yet.”
Wilcox went ahead and said his piece. “You went and bought the land, though. You tell her while she was here?”
Dusty felt like he was toting a lead weight on his back. In the past month, he often pictured how he would tell Sophie about the twenty-five acres of land he purchased. All his, with room to buy more when he wanted. When he first saw her on the ranch today, he even imagined her riding out there with him to see where the house was going to be built. She’d sit behind him in the saddle, her small hands wrapped tight around his waist, the wind kicking at her long blonde hair.
He well-aimed to do just that after they shared that first kiss behind the wagon. After several kisses. Then she had to go and mention that Chad was still courting her. What a fool he was to ask in the first place. Sophie always kept the interest of town bachelors, whether she intended to or not.
“No, I didn’t say anything.” He placed a bit in Gabe’s mouth, wishing he could do the same for the three men that followed him around the stables. “Don’t y’all have things to do? Joe, I know your wife’s waiting for you to get on home, especially now you have a new baby boy. And Wilcox, you said you were fixin’ to go into town.”
“I’ll go in a few minutes to get my drink.” Wilcox leaned against the wall as though he had no plans of leaving so long as talk of women continued.
“Better head out before it gets too dark. You’ll have to stay in town overnight.”
“Oh, I plan to.” The cowhand gave a coarse grin, hinting at his less-than-honorable intentions. “You should join me. I got a girl meetin’ me. She might have a friend.”
“Go on now with that,” Joe admonished him. “You know Sterling doesn’t carouse.”
Wilcox laughed and shrugged. “Sorry, Emmers, I forget you two find your women in the church. See you in the mornin’.”
Dusty led his horse out of the stables after Wilcox departed. Joe was still shaking his head. “I’m gonna have to hide my daughter in the house once she comes of age. Somebody like Wilcox come near Violet or my wife, I might have to be escorted to the sheriff’s when all’s said and done.”
“You can always teach your wife and daughter how to shoot.”
“Say, what about your Miss Sophie? I hope she can stand the coarse-talkin’ workers out here.”
Dusty got in the saddle. “She’s tougher than she looks. She can put a man in his place if she’s a mind to. But Joe, Sophie’s not my woman. At least, not official.”
“But she’s gonna be. She kept lookin’ at you sweet-eyed.”
Should he tell Joe? The assistant foreman wouldn’t air his business out to the other cowhands, but it was still embarrassing to admit that he was waiting on her to quit some other man. He didn’t want to bring disgrace to her reputation, either. “She comes from a well-to-do family. They got certain expectations of the people she associates with.”
“Is that why you left her family’s employ? You got caught together?”
“Not the way you think.” Dusty hurried to explain further. “I did nothing that would taint her honor, but her folks did get wind that I fancied her. Look, Joe, that’s why I didn’t say anything before. I don’t need gossip circlin’ around me when I’m tryin’ to do my job.”
“What you say to me won’t reach another ear.”
“Thanks.” He pressed his heels into the horse’s flanks to make the stallion walk.
“Dusty,” Joe called.
“Yeah?”
“It sure takes a lot of gumption and bold steppin’ out to build a house for a woman that ain’t yours yet. I know you’re gonna live in it too, but still.”
All Dusty could do was agree. “Yeah, I reckon I’m crazy that way.”
“Men have done worse. I s’pose you got a bit of hope. She came out to see you. Maybe she is willing to let go of where she came from.”
“Maybe.” Dusty turned his horse into the setting sun. “That’s a decision she has to make for herself.”
“Guess so, but she better not take too long.”
“I’ll agree.” Dusty ma
de himself sound tough as old rawhide, but on the inside it ate at him that he couldn’t do anything to help Sophie along. He was unsure if she really wanted to take such brave measures. The choice to follow her mind instead of that of her parents, to end the courtship with Chad and accept his attentions, and ultimately to choose a rough ranching life instead of a refined town life—it was all in her hands.
Thursday morning Sophie put the petition in Mr. Shaw’s hands. “Will you please see that Mayor Hooper gets this?”
The mayor’s assistant took the envelope that held the three pages of signatures that she had collected over the summer. “He’s in his office as we speak, Miss Charlton. I will take it to him now. Can I get you a glass of water to drink while you’re here?”
“No, thank you.” Sophie declined in spite of the humid morning air that made her hair swell into a nest of undefined curls and her dress sleeves cling to her arms. “I should get back to the farm. Good day to you, Mr. Shaw.”
She left the house to return to her father awaiting her in the wagon. He offered his hand to assist her onto the bench. “Your mother will dance for joy, glad you and that petition have parted.”
Sophie studied her fingernails. Her mother wouldn’t be in a good mood for too long once she found out that her daughter and Chad Hooper would also be parting. “Thank you for letting me see it through to completion, Daddy. Mother would never have allowed me to.”
“Your mother just needed to see that you could devote yourself to a cause while still being a dutiful daughter.”
Dutiful. She touched her lips where they were still sensitive from kissing Dusty yesterday. Her father waved to one of his friends in the town square on the way back home. “Now, if only we can teach your brother to be obedient.”
A Windswept Promise Page 22
