When he started to protest, she interrupted. “But surely we’ll see you there. Good day.”
She smiled again and quickly stepped back into the house. It took considerable restraint to keep from slamming the door, but she managed to close it quietly. She leaned back against it and tried to stifle the anger threatening to choke her.
“Court me, will he,” she murmured. “Not on your life, Mr. Mayor Ian Baxter.”
She waited until she heard the wagon pull away, then turned around and kicked the door.
Ash twisted the sheet in his hand and listened as the slimy bastard in the front parlor followed Sunny out the door. The kerthump, kerthud must be the wheelchair hitting a bump.
He heard them talking out on the porch but couldn’t make out their words. Then the front door closed, and he heard low mumbling.
He yanked the end of the rope from where he kept it tucked out of his way beneath the edge of the mattress and used the rope to pull himself up to a sitting position.
“Sunny?” he called.
He got no answer so he called again. Then he heard a loud whack. “Sunny?…Sunny!”
“What!”
Ash pursed his lips. The lady was definitely not pleased about something. Was it Baxter she was angry with, or was she upset because she now realized he was awake?
“You all right out there?” he asked.
He heard her stomp toward his room. He’d never heard her stomp before.
“Of course I’m all right,” she said coming to his door. “Why wouldn’t I be, in my own house?”
“Huh. With the kind of company you invite in, anything could happen.”
She got a funny, kind of sickly look on her face. “How long have you been awake?”
“I was awake when he came in the door,” he said bluntly.
“Oh.” First she paled, then she blushed. “Then you…heard—”
“Everything. What the hell’s going on, Sunny?”
She finally entered the room and stood at the corner of the bed. “Don’t worry about the things he said about you, Ash. Whatever happened between the two of you, you can’t really blame him for being bitter.”
Ash waved her words away. “I don’t give a damn what he thinks of me. What was all that talk about your father and a loan?”
She stiffened visibly. “I don’t think—”
“I’m not just being nosey, Sunny. It’s important.”
“I don’t see of what possible importance it could be to you.”
“Not me, dammit, you. I think there’s a lot more going on here than you could ever guess. Tell me about the loan.”
Sunny folded her arms across her ribs, obviously unaware of how the action emphasized her breasts. She leaned her knees against the bed’s footboard. Her lips remained stubbornly sealed.
“Please, Sunny. I might be able to help.”
“But I don’t need any help. My father owed money to the bank, and when I sell the cattle this spring I’ll pay off the loan. That’s all there is to it.”
Ash felt a dreaded sense of déjà vu. Gooseflesh raised the hair on the back of his neck. “Nothing’s ever that simple with Ian Baxter when he wants something.”
“All he wants is his money, and he’ll get it as soon as I sell the cattle.”
Ash shook his head, memories swamping him. “I’m not sure it’s money he wants at all.”
She flopped her hands up in the air and paced from the bed to the window and back. “What else could he possibly want?”
How much should he tell her? How much would she believe? Hell, he had to tell her something, so she’d be warned. He couldn’t leave her defenseless to fall into a trap of Baxter’s making. “It could be like he said. He could want you. Much as I hate to agree with him, he’s right about one thing—you are a beautiful woman.”
She lowered her gaze, and a blush tinted her cheeks. Her response to his words sent his pulse racing.
Damn. He hadn’t meant to say that. For all he knew, it was the thought of Baxter’s wanting her she was reacting to. “But even more than you, he wants this ranch,” he said harshly.
She raised her head and looked at him, doubt plain on her face. “What would he want with Cottonwood Ranch when he’s already got the Bar B?”
“I don’t know, dammit. I’ve never known.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Let me make a few guesses here,” he said, ignoring her question. “Things were going along fine at the ranch until some sort of disaster struck that killed the cattle ready for market. Maybe a stampede, maybe something else.”
Sunny felt a sudden chill race down her arms. “Poisoned water,” she whispered. “How did you know?”
“Even then,” Ash said, ignoring her question, “your father had enough money set aside to see him through. It would have been tight, maybe uncomfortable, but he could have made it. Right?”
Sunny swallowed hard and nodded. She felt suddenly cold. How did he know those things?
“But our generous, friendly banker,” Ash went on, “just couldn’t stand to see one of his neighbors struggle so hard when it wasn’t necessary. He talked your father into a sizeable loan your father could have done without.”
Any confidence she had left over from her earlier assumption that everything would be all right crumbled at her feet. “How did you know?”
“Then things got tight again and your father got behind on his payments. Baxter was the picture of kindness and patience. Until recently. Then, when he knew your father didn’t have the money, he demanded payment in full.”
Twin shivers raced down her arms. “The day you rode into town,” she admitted. “Ash, how do you know these things?”
“Tell me, have you heard if he’s demanding money from other ranchers in the area, or was it just your father?”
She had asked herself—had she asked Baxter?—that same question. “I-I don’t know.” She watched his knuckles whiten on the rope and felt herself start to shake.
“Find out,” he said harshly. “Find out now, Sunny.”
She leaned down and gripped the foot of the bed, a sick feeling churning in her stomach. “Ash, tell me how you knew those things. Please,” she begged.
“It’s simple,” he said. “The same things happened to my father. Except with us it wasn’t poisoned water, it was a stampede right after roundup. More than half the cattle went over the cliff and were killed. And I’m not convinced the water or the stampede either one was an accident.”
Ian Baxter whistled all the way home. When he wasn’t grinning, that is.
Why thank you, Mayor. How generous of you. How thoughtful and kind.
“Yes, it was, wasn’t it, my sweet Sunshine?”
Before the end of summer he’d have her eating out of the palm of his hand and Cottonwood Ranch would be his.
A thin cloud passed over the sun. Ian shivered.
He didn’t have ‘til the end of summer—only until May. Davis wouldn’t wait any longer.
Sunny couldn’t put to rest the disturbing questions Ash had raised about Mayor Baxter and her father’s loan. For two days she couldn’t even think about anything else. Was Baxter pressing her neighbors the way he had pressed her father, was pressing her?
It didn’t help her peace of mind any to have Ash keep urging her to talk to the other ranchers.
“You’ve got to do it, Sunny.”
She flexed his knee again. “Why?” The question was a deliberate ploy to put off making a decision. She knew why. She just didn’t want to go through with it.
But Ash answered her anyway. “If others are behind and he’s not threatening them with foreclosure, that at least gives you something to tell the sheriff. If Baxter hears about that, he might be forced to back off. Otherwise, he’ll do everything he can to get his hands on this ranch.”
“But why would he want this ranch?”
“I don’t know, dammit, and at this point it doesn’t really matter. Go talk to your neighbors, S
unny. Now.”
He was right. She knew he was right. “But what do I say to them? Oh, I hate this!” She lowered his leg to the bed and whirled away from him. “I can’t do it. What ever made me think I could run this ranch? No, I can’t do it.”
“Sure you can. You just—”
“You don’t understand, Ash. I’m scared.” She turned back to face him. “When it comes to caring for my family, keeping house, raising a garden, tending the chickens, I can do all those things. I want to do those things. I love them. But I don’t know how to run a ranch. Oh, I can keep the books and order supplies, but that’s about it. I can ride, but I can’t rope. I’ve never branded a calf or driven a herd to market in Kansas. That’s why I made Tom foreman, so I wouldn’t have to deal with all those other things I don’t understand. Why can’t Tom go see the neighbors?”
“Come here,” Ash said, holding out a hand to her.
She took it without hesitating—because it looked so strong and capable—and sat on the side of his bed.
“Listen to me.” He slipped his fingers through hers and gripped her hand. Warmth stole up her arm. “Tom is a good foreman. He understands cattle, he can handle the men, and he knows how to take orders. But he’s not a businessman, and that’s something a rancher has to be. You can’t expect him to make important decisions for you—decisions that can affect the rest of your life.”
“So what do I do?”
“You learn. You learn by doing what has to be done, like going to see your neighbors. You’ll probably make a mistake or two along the way—everyone does. But you’ll learn. Hell,” he said, “if Tom went instead of you, I can just hear him now. He’d ride up to the first ranch—probably wouldn’t even dismount—and say something like, ‘Bank houndin’ ya for money?’“
The almost perfect imitation of Tom’s nasally drawl surprised a laugh out of her.
“And your neighbor,” Ash went on, “will tell him it’s none of his business. But you, now. You’ll ride up wearing a dress and looking all tired and thirsty, like a wilted flower, from that long ride, and your neighbor will bust his tail to get you into the house where you can rest and his wife can offer you some lemonade. They’ll be all concerned with how you and your sisters are doing out here all alone, with an ex-convict to look after.”
She started to protest that, but he didn’t give her a chance.
“That’s when you tell them you just wanted to get away for a short visit with them, to forget about your worries. With all you’ve got to do, looking after the girls, running a ranch, seeing after an invalid,” he added with a cheeky grin, “having the bank threatening to foreclose is just more than you care to think about.”
“I’m supposed to tell them that?”
“Sure. Then you can assure them that the good mayor isn’t picking on you simply because you’re a bunch of orphans—he threatened your father first. And then you can tell them how your father was upset, how he felt like he was the only one around being pressured for money. About how alone he felt.”
“And they’re supposed to just blurt out that he wasn’t alone, that they, too, are being pressured?”
“Maybe, maybe not. But at least then word will get around. If others are behind on their loans and aren’t being pressured, somebody’s going to start questioning Baxter.”
“But won’t that make him simply start pressuring them, too?”
“Probably. But he can’t possibly foreclose on everybody who owes him money. He’d never be able to sell all those ranches, so he wouldn’t get his money back. The ranchers, and you, too, would be able to bargain with him for more time.”
“I see.” And she did. What he said made sense. It just all seemed so…unpleasant.
Her thoughts must have shown on her face, for he said, “You’ve got to do it, Sunny. For your own protection. For your sisters, too.”
For her sisters. He was right. If what he suggested would help guarantee they’d be able to keep their home, she’d do it.
And she did. She spent the better part of the next three days in her accursed sidesaddle visiting her neighbors.
At the first ranch she put it down to coincidence. At the second, a lucky guess. But by the time she’d paid her third and fourth visits she was hard-pressed to keep from laughing out loud. It was as if Ash had written the script for a play and distributed it to all the neighboring ranches.
It wasn’t always the rancher himself who ushered her swiftly into the cool house for lemonade; sometimes it was merely a ranch hand. But everyone’s actions were almost identical to what Ash had predicted.
After her fourth visit, Ash told her she’d done enough. Word of mouth would do the rest.
She was relieved. She’d rather stay home and do the things she was good at, things she was comfortable with. It was a pleasure to spend the next morning weeding the garden and looking for insect damage on the seedlings.
Chapter Ten
His back, shoulder and arm muscles screamed with pain as Ash raised and lowered himself one more time on the rope over his bed. Sunny was outside waiting for the girls to come in from school. He was taking advantage of her absence to get in a little exercise. Sweat ran down his temples, his chest, and between his shoulder blades. His palms burned.
And it felt damned good. He welcomed the pain and the sweat and the blisters. It beat the hell out of lying flat on his back in bed like a helpless infant.
He ignored the quivering in his arms and lifted himself one more time, breathing heavily with exertion.
“Whatcha doin’?”
Ash jerked his head up. Rachel, chewing on her braid, peered at him from around the doorway.
His concentration broke. His hands slipped down the rope, burning a fiery path across his palms. He bit the inside of his jaw to keep from crying out.
The child at the door turned to leave.
“It’s okay, Rachel, you can come in,” he said, trying to keep his voice even.
She paused and peeked at him again.
This was the first time she’d come to his room since the day Sunny made her apologize for hitting him with her slate. He didn’t know anything about little girls, but he wasn’t comfortable knowing she resented his presence. He put an index finger to his lips and winked at her.
Rachel giggled.
“I’m not supposed to do this,” he confessed in a loud whisper. “I’m supposed to rest.”
Her eyes widened. “In peace?”
“What?”
“In peace,” she repeated, stepping into the room. “Are you supposed to rest in peace, like my daddy?”
Ash felt a quaking sensation in the region of his heart. “No,” he said softly, “not like your daddy. Why don’t you come sit by me and we can talk about it?”
Good Lord! What in the world made him say that?
But it was too late to call back the words. Rachel hopped to his side and crawled up onto the bed. The sudden trust he saw in her big golden eyes unnerved him. But from somewhere, the words came.
“I wasn’t much older than you,” he said, “when my mother died. They told me she was resting in peace. Oh, I knew that meant she wasn’t ever coming home again, but I was like you, I was stubborn. I didn’t want her to be gone forever, so I refused to listen, to believe it was true.”
Rachel’s big eyes stared at him, unblinking. She leaned forward. “What did you do?”
He smiled sadly at the memory. “I did what you do. I argued with everybody who told me she was dead. I wouldn’t listen. I got mad and threw a fit. I kept insisting she was coming back, even though, deep down, I knew she never would.”
“You knew?”
“Yeah, I knew. Same as you know your daddy’s not coming back. But like you, I thought if I kept denying the truth, kept denying she was dead, that somehow she wouldn’t be dead anymore.”
Rachel hung her head and picked at her dress.
Ash thought he heard a noise in the hall, but ignored it and went on. “I thought if I admitted to m
yself—or anyone—that she wasn’t coming home again, she’d know it, and then she really wouldn’t come home. And it would be my fault.”
He heard a small sniff. When Rachel raised her head, tears glistened on her pale cheeks.
“It wasn’t my fault, though,” he said. “It wasn’t anybody’s fault. It just happened. Sometimes bad things happen and we can’t do anything about them.”
Rachel’s lower lip trembled and the tears gushed. “M-My daddy!” she wailed.
Ash felt his own eyes mist over. He held his arms out and the girl fell against his chest sobbing. He cradled her there as best he could, feeling an alien warmth seep into him.
Lord, help me. He felt himself being drawn deeper and deeper into the very heart of this family.
A flicker of movement caught his eye. He glanced up and saw Sunny standing at the door, her hand clamped over her mouth, tears running down her cheeks.
“My d-daddy’s not c-coming home again, is he?” Rachel cried, sobbing against his chest.
Ash held her tightly and smoothed his hand over her hair, his eyes still locked on Sunny. “No, honey, I’m afraid he’s not.”
Amazingly, by the time Sunny composed herself and came to kneel beside her sister, Rachel had managed to cry herself to sleep in Ash’s arms.
“Poor little thing,” he murmured.
“Oh, Ash,” Sunny said. She placed her hand on his where it rested on Rachel’s back. “I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you for what you just did. I’ve tried everything with her, but she just wouldn’t accept it.”
She lifted his hand to her cheek and Ash thought his heart might burst. She was soft. So soft. Her cheek was still damp with tears. Her eyes were red. He watched, mesmerized, as she turned her head and pressed her warm, tear-puffed lips to his palm. A hot shudder ripped through his chest.
She raised her eyes, those great golden eyes, to his and whispered, “Thank you. You’re a very special man, Ash McCord.”
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