Maverick Heart

by Joan Johnston

  “It can. You’re both a great deal alike,” she said. “Stubborn, headstrong. But fair.”

  He took the kiss without asking, needing it, needing hope. She gave him the comfort he sought. Her hand slid into the hair at his nape.

  He raised himself enough to look into her eyes and spoke quietly to avoid waking Rand. “Do you remember how it was between us the first time, Verity?” he whispered. “Do you remember the day we made our son?”

  How could she ever forget? Verity thought. She stared into his gray eyes, remembering.

  It was summertime, and oh, so unbearably hot. Dark, dangerous thunderclouds had threatened. She had slipped away to the pond at the edge of her father’s estate, taken off her shoes and stockings, and stuck her toes into the icy water. Even then, a trickle of perspiration had wiggled its way down her back beneath her sky blue merino gown.

  Miles had appeared on horseback looking like a centaur, he was so finely made and so much a part of the animal. He had flashed a confident grin—he had been so charming in those days—and asked, “May I join you?”

  He hadn’t waited for her answer. He had already known what it would be. They were young and foolish and in love.

  Verity closed her eyes to force the memories away. “Don’t make me remember, Miles.”

  “It was a sweet time, wasn’t it? Sometimes I hardly believe it myself. I was Rand’s age.” He turned his head so he could see his son. “We were such babies. If you had a chance to change the past, would you have denied me, Verity?”

  “That isn’t a fair question.”

  “I suppose not. But I’m asking it anyway.”

  She met his gaze steadily. “No, Miles. I wouldn’t change a thing. I loved you so very much. I’ve never been as happy before or since. I wouldn’t give up that joy.”

  “I wish I had known about Rand. I would have done things differently.”

  “Would you have come back?”

  “It’s easy now to say I would have. But I’m not sure.”

  “Why not?”

  “You could have fallen in love with Talbot. I wouldn’t have been able to bear seeing that. It was easier not to know. I stayed away, I never asked, so I wouldn’t have to know.”

  “Why didn’t you ever marry?”

  “I never loved another woman.” He didn’t explain that since she had taken his heart, he’d had nothing left to give another woman. That would have sounded too self-serving—or too pitifully sad. Unfortunately, it was the truth.

  Her lips pressed the pulse beneath his ear. “It was probably better you didn’t return,” she whispered. “I was never very good at resisting temptation.”

  “Could I have tempted you?”

  “There were nights when the memories of the two of us together haunted me.”

  She remembered the cool grass beneath her buttocks. Being naked beneath the brooding sky. She remembered the feel of his silky hair against her throat, and the wetness, the hotness of his mouth on her breasts.

  She remembered the sharp pain of losing her virginity, the way Miles’s hard body had filled her, stretched her, thrust within her. She remembered the feel of his sweat-slick shoulders beneath her fingertips, the wet curls at his nape. The musky smell of sex.

  And the rain, first in sprinkles, then pelting harder and harder against their naked bodies. Washing away the blood and the guilt and leaving them fresh and clean and new. She even remembered the laughter as they donned their soggy clothing in a redeeming ray of sunlight, kissing and touching each step of the way.

  The afternoon of her deflowering remained such a vivid recollection, it might have happened yesterday.

  “Yes, Miles,” she whispered, raising herself enough to touch her lips to his. “You could have tempted me.”

  He buried his face in the niche between her neck and shoulder. “We were fools.”

  “It’s never foolish to love. Perhaps we were guilty of poor judgment. I don’t know.” She sighed and soothed herself and him by caressing him, running her fingers through his hair and clasping him close. “It would be nice to have a crystal ball, to be able to see into the future. Perhaps if we knew what was coming, life would be too terrifying to live. I’ve learned to face each day, one at a time, and survive it the best way I can.”

  “Thank you for my son, Verity.”

  She felt her throat clog. “You’re welcome, Miles.”

  He raised his head and looked into her eyes. “Where do we go from here?”

  “That’s up to you, Miles.”

  “Shall we start all over? Shall I woo you and win you again?”

  He already had her heart. He always had. Didn’t he realize that? “Why now, Miles?”

  “I think that would be obvious.”

  “Rand.” She bit back the disappointment she felt. She should have known. He wasn’t really interested in winning her love. He wanted his son’s favor. And he wasn’t above using her to get it.

  “I want my son to get to know me, Verity. I want to be his father. Or at least try. That will be easier if you and I are friends.”

  “We were never friends, Miles. Only lovers.”

  “Are you refusing my offer?” he asked.

  “To be your friend? Or to be your lover?”

  Miles’s eyes narrowed, and a muscle in his jaw worked. “Why are you making this so difficult?”

  “I have the most to lose in this arrangement.”

  “Meaning Rand? You’ve had him for twenty-one years, Verity. Don’t you think it’s time I had a chance to be involved in his life? We could be a family if you’d cooperate.”

  “Rand is a grown man, not a child. He’s ready to start a family of his own. It’s too late for what you want.”

  “No, it’s not,” he said stubbornly. “Rand could still use some fatherly advice. This is a different land, with different customs. I could be a help to him.”

  “You don’t need me in order to do that for him.” She wanted Miles to come up with a different reason to pursue a relationship with her, something more personal. And he was resisting.

  “What do you want from me, Verity?”

  “Nothing you seem willing to give,” she said bleakly.

  “So we leave it like this? You on one side of the fence, and me on the other?”

  She could tell he was angry from the tension in his body. His voice gave away his frustration.

  “I’m willing to live here with you as amicably as possible. You’re welcome to establish a relationship—of whatever kind—with Rand. But leave me out of it.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, rising from the bed.

  She edged over onto her side, turning her back on him, feeling the hopelessness of the situation. Only it wasn’t quite hopeless. He had gotten past the revelation that he had a son, and he was still talking to her. Maybe she should have cooperated more with him. Maybe she should have given him what he wanted.

  She felt him lay a quilt over her shoulder. “Go to sleep, Verity,” he said. “You have another challenging day to survive tomorrow.”

  “Miles—”

  He cut her off as he shut the bedroom door behind him.

  14

  Verity’s burns healed quickly. Within ten days, new skin had begun to replace what had been burned by the fire. By the end of two weeks, she was able to sleep comfortably in any position. The day came shortly thereafter when she woke up and realized she felt well enough to get up and get dressed. But she had absolutely nothing to wear.

  “I’ve been thinking about that problem,” Miles said. “And I’ve come up with a solution. I’ll be right back.” The twinkle in his eyes should have given her some warning.

  She discovered what he found so amusing when he returned to the room and presented her with long Johns, a gray wool shirt, a pair of denim jeans, a belt, socks and cowboy boots, all cheerfully donated by his cowhands.

  “You expect me to wear men’s trousers?” Verity asked.

  “You’ll be riding astride from now on,” he
said. “Until I have time to take you to Cheyenne to shop for a new wardrobe, this will have to do. I’ve already given Freddy a similar outfit.”

  Over the weeks Verity and Rand had been recuperating, Miles had cajoled Freddy into calling him by his first name. She had insisted he call her Freddy in return. Because Freddy felt awkward calling Verity “Mrs. Broderick,” and “Lady Talbot” was no longer correct, and “Lady Linden” was absurd under the circumstances, Verity had asked if Freddy didn’t think she could just call Verity by her name, too.

  Freddy agreed, and that put everyone on a first-name basis. Or almost everyone. Rand refused to call Miles anything but “sir.” His continuing formality pointed up the awkwardness of strangers forced to live together in a too-small space.

  Freddy appeared in the doorway wearing jeans, a plaid shirt, and her leather half-boots. She held out an imaginary skirt and mimed a curtsy. “Good morning, Verity.” Her impish grin was broad enough to make her eyes crinkle at the sides. “These trousers are really quite comfortable. I don’t know why I didn’t try something like this sooner.”

  “What would your parents say?” Verity asked, dismayed at how precisely the jeans outlined the young woman’s figure.

  “They’d be appalled,” Freddy said. “Which I admit contributes to my affection for the fashion.” Freddy did a complete turn to show off her rear end in the form-fitting pants.

  “You look marvelous to me,” Rand said from his side of the bed. His grin was just short of leering.

  “They’re positively indecent,” Verity muttered.

  “And wonderfully comfortable and eminently practical,” Freddy said. “Which is probably why men have always worn them,” she said, crossing the room and settling herself on the mattress beside Rand.

  Rand winced as he propped himself up on his elbows, but it was evidence of how much healing had occurred in his wounded shoulder that he could manage the feat at all. “My only reservation is the reaction you’ll get from the cowhands.”

  “My men won’t say or do anything to embarrass either woman,” Miles said. “A lady’s treated with respect out here.”

  Verity arched a brow. “Even if she isn’t dressed like a lady?”

  “Even if she’s buck naked or branded. No man would lay a hand on a respectable woman in the West unless he wanted every other man within a hundred miles to come after him with a rope.”

  “That makes me feel much better,” Verity said wryly.

  “Will you wear the trousers, or not?”

  “I don’t seem to have much choice,” Verity conceded.

  It didn’t take a day for Verity to concur with Freddy’s assessment of trousers. They were comfortable and practical. They also attracted a lot of male attention.

  Freddy was naturally flirtatious and used to being fawned over by the young bucks of the ton, and she quickly became a favorite of the cowboys. But Verity wondered how far the rugged ranch hands could be teased before one of them crossed the line. She kept a constant eye on Freddy, fearing the worst. But it never materialized.

  While he was recuperating, Rand stayed in the bedroom with his mother. Miles retreated to the bunkhouse at night. Freddy slept near the fireplace on a Missouri featherbed—which of course involved no feathers at all, but was merely a mattress filled with straw ticking over a wooden frame that Sully had knocked together for her.

  It was late September before Rand’s shoulder was well enough for him to take up residence in the bunkhouse, at which time Miles was able to resume sleeping in his own bed. The day Rand moved out of the bedroom and Miles moved back in, the two men circled around each other like two dogs around the same bone.

  Rand didn’t trust Miles with his mother.

  Miles wasn’t about to give Verity up, even to please his son.

  They had spoken little to each other over the past month and their relationship had turned as cool as the late September weather. Two sets of hackles rose as Miles dropped his shaving kit onto the four-poster bed while Rand gathered up his beaver brush and razor from the dry sink and put it in a bag to take with him to the bunkhouse.

  “Stop it, both of you,” Verity said. She put herself between them, turning first to Rand. “Miles is my husband. This is where he belongs.” And then to Miles, “He’s my son, Miles. He only wants to protect me.”

  “From me?” Miles snarled.

  “From you,” Rand retorted.

  Verity saw the anger and pain in Miles’s eyes at this show of mistrust from his son. It was a far cry from the friendship Miles had hoped for. Maybe Miles ought to bite the bullet and confess to Rand that he was his father, Verity thought. She didn’t know why he was procrastinating. Rand was no less distant or hostile toward Miles now than he had been a month ago.

  “Look, Rand—” Miles began.

  Rand picked up the small bundle of belongings he planned to take with him to the bunkhouse and headed for the bedroom door. “I don’t care to listen to anything you have to say, sir.”

  Miles snagged him by the arm as he passed by. “You’re going to get some advice, anyway. If you’re smart, you’ll heed it.”

  The two men, both with the same dark hair, both tall and lean, stood glaring at each other with equally stormy gray eyes. Tension bristled between them.

  Verity held her breath as Miles spoke.

  “Keep your eyes open and your mouth shut in the bunkhouse. Let everybody else do the talking. You just listen.”

  “Is that all, sir?”

  Miles nodded curtly.

  Rand jerked himself free and left the room without another word.

  Miles huffed out an angry breath. “Damn that boy of yours, Verity! He’s as stubborn—”

  “As you are?” she finished for him.

  “I was never that bad, was I?”

  “Worse,” she said with a smile. She crossed to him, slipped her arm through his, and raised herself on tiptoe to kiss his lips. “Give him time, Miles. He’s had to adjust to so much in the past year. Please, give him some time.”

  Miles stared bleakly out the bedroom window. He watched Rand kick viciously at a stone as he stalked toward the bunkhouse. He wished he could spare his son the pranks he knew would be played on him as part of his initiation by the cowboys whose ranks he was joining in the bunkhouse. But if Rand was going to become one of the men—and perhaps, eventually, their boss—he would have to prove himself to them. There was nothing Miles could do to ease his way.

  Besides, if his son couldn’t handle the hard cowboy life, it was better to find out now. Miles would be sorry to see Rand fail, but the West was no place for a man without courage—or the sense of humor that helped make it possible to endure a life of such constant adversity. It took grit, guts, and gumption to handle the kind of deadly “jokes” cowboys played on one another. But for men who often had to rely on each other in life-and-death situations, it was important to test the limits—to find the razor’s edge—of a new man. His son was about to endure that trial by fire.

  Rand simmered with anger. He resented having to listen to Miles Broderick spout advice. He had conceded that the move to the bunkhouse was the most practical solution to a crowded situation. Truthfully, he had been looking forward to living in the midst of real live cowboys, who were objects of great mystery and compelling interest to him.

  But he didn’t need anyone to tell him how to comport himself with strangers. He had been sent away to boarding school at an age when he was among the smallest of the boys there. He had learned early how to survive as an outsider in alien surroundings.

  When Rand stepped through the bunkhouse door, he found the reality of cowboy living fell somewhat short of the myth. The smell of the place was enough to gag him. Licorice, of all things, from scented chewing tobacco that had missed the brass spittoon in the corner and landed on the floor. Coal oil and smoke from the tin lamps. Tobacco. Manure that had clung to boots and then dried and dropped off onto the floor. The rank smell of unwashed bodies.

  “Guess y
ou got tired of ridin’ the bed wagon,” Frog said in welcome. “Pick any bunk ain’t got a blanket on it.”

  Since there was only one stacked bunkbed without a blanket on it, the advice was obviously given tongue-in-cheek. It was Rand’s first, relatively harmless, experience with the Western sense of humor. He ended up on a top bunk above a man called Chip, at the opposite end of the room from the stove. He imagined it got cold this far from the fire in winter.

  He saw something tacked to the wall at the head of his bed and looked closer in an attempt to figure out what it was. It looked amazingly like a human ear.

  “What is that?” he asked Chip.

  “Last man had your bed didn’t listen when he was spoke to. We put his ear up there to help him out.”

  Rand’s eyes got huge as he looked at the shriveled human ear. If that was really what it was.

  He glanced suspiciously, surreptitiously, at the six other cowboys in the bunkhouse, all of whom must have heard what Chip had told him, but each of whom had busied himself with something so it appeared he was paying no attention. Rand’s eyes stopped on a man who had no ears. He swallowed hard. Then the cowboy turned and Rand saw the awful scars that explained what had caused his abnormality.

  Maybe the tacked-up ear was real and maybe it wasn’t. But he decided he ought to take Miles’s warning about keeping his mouth shut and listening a little more seriously.

  Rand noticed, once he started looking, that each of the cowboys seemed to have some sort of flaw that set him apart. He rubbed the four stripes on his stomach. Since his episode with the bear, he fit right in. He decided to make up his bunk and get some sleep and began unrolling the mattress over the wooden bunk frame.

  “You got any pants rats, be sure to kill ’em fore you throw ’em on the floor,” Frog said.

  “What?”

  “Ten-cent fine every time you throw a grayback on the floor without pinchin’ it dead first,” Sully explained.

  Pants rats? Graybacks? Rand had no idea what they were talking about, but he didn’t want to show his ignorance. He watched Frog scratch, reach inside his long red underwear and retrieve a bug, pinch it, and drop it over the edge of the bed. Good God! Lice!