by Nancy Pirri
“Thanks, Callahan.”
“Thank you, Cane, for giving our family the time we need to adjust.”
Cane left the library, detouring to the kitchen to refill his coffee. Sinking into the creaky rocking chair on the porch, he quickly scanned the property ads. He circled those that interested him, tucked the newspaper between spokes of the porch railing, and thought about Annie.
Second sight. Even after reading a book about the reality of this phenomenon, I can’t get myself to believe it.
He leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes. Strange, unexpected things happened in life all the time. Whether he believed in her abilities or not, it didn’t matter to him. But then, if she did have this particular gift of seeing things in the future, it might come in handy sometime.
Chapter Three
With the loan of a horse from Callahan, Cane spent the day looking at two ranches. The properties, separated by other ranches, were too small in acreage for raising cows and horses.
Then he rode the ten miles back to Bozeman to check out what folks in town had to offer by way of horseflesh. After looking at several for sale, he decided the horse he’d ridden in was better than any he’d seen and decided to make Callahan an offer. He returned to the Moonstruck Ranch, arriving just as Mark and Annie drove their wagon into the drive.
Mark jumped down and ran into the house. Raising his arms to assist Annie, Cane lowered them when she just stood there, one hand braced on the back of the seat.
“You too independent to accept a man’s help?”
Damn. I didn’t mean to sound so self-defensive. Seven years in prison will do that to man.
She stared at him a long moment before she let go of the seat and leaned forward, reaching for his shoulders. His hands spanned her waist, and he eased her down to the ground. She was too independent for her own good. Surely she had to see that herself.
She smiled and shrugged her shoulders. “Perhaps.”
“If I were your pa, I sure wouldn’t allow you to drive that wagon all by yourself the way you do. It’s not safe for you or Mark.”
“I’ve been driving myself all my life. Nothing has ever happened to me.”
“There’s always a first time. It’s not just your safety I’m thinking of, but Mark’s. I want someone to drive you.”
She laughed mirthlessly. “Who, for instance?”
Cane scowled. “Your pa’s got plenty of ranch hands. He could spare one of them the short trips to and from town.”
“All right. Since you’ve no employment or ranch to run, Mr. Smith, you may drive us.”
He nodded. “Now you’re being sensible.”
She gaped at him.
He smiled. She’d expected him to refuse.
Pivoting on her heel, she huffed into the house.
Cane looked after her with a smile. While he’d been out looking at properties, every time he pictured Mark in his life, he pictured Annie, too, as if the two were a packaged deal. Home, family and work all appealed to him. If he married Annie, the boy would have parents and a loving grandfather, too. Marrying Annie would be the right thing to do for Mark.
That wasn’t the only reason, of course. He could take care of her, protect her. In time, they would grow to love each other. He had better hurry, too, if the neighboring rancher had his sights on Annie. First, he’d talk to her father and get his blessing and... But what if Callahan didn’t give it? What man in his right mind would want his daughter to marry a man who’d done time?
Damn, I was innocent! Maybe I’m the only person in the world to believe it, but I’m as good as the next decent man. Somehow, I have to lay to rest any doubts Callahan and his lovely daughter have about me. How can I prove myself?
Inside the house, he found Annie cooking again.
“Cook still sick?” he asked.
“Mrs. Williams is still ill, and now her mother, as well. She quit permanently to care for her.” She eyed him up and down when he rolled up his sleeves and washed his hands. She still stared at him when he glanced back at her. Cane felt something then—a pleasant awareness of her beside him as she cooked up slabs of ham. Potatoes and a pot of greens boiled on the stove. Biscuits turned golden brown in the oven.
He found her grinning as he dried his hands on his thighs. Looking down at his wrinkled, stained shirt, self-consciousness set in.
“What’s so funny?” he said.
“You’ve two missing buttons. Do you know where they are?”
He shook his head. “Long gone, I suspect. These are the clothes they gave me when I left prison. Hand-me-downs. And call me Cane.”
She nodded. “I’ve extras, Cane. After supper, give me your shirt and I’ll sew them on.”
“Just hand over needle and thread, ma’am, and I can do it.”
One silken brow lifted. “Annie, please. You can?” At his nod, she added, “I don’t mind.”
He smiled. “Sounds good. My mother used to do it.”
“Where is your mother?”
“She met a Canadian who’d come down to work as a cowboy back home in Texas. When he’d made the money he needed to buy his own spread, he set himself to buy a place back home. He and my mom married, then she left with him.”
“And your father?”
“Never knew him.”
“Oh, sorry.”
Tom Callahan arrived home with two of his hands, their neighbor, Jed Porter, and the circuit judge, Simon Hopkins. Callahan was lucky his daughter had cooked enough food since Cane knew, by the surprised look on her face, she hadn’t been expecting company.
Cane sat down next to the judge, then shook his hand, knowing they’d already had this conversation when Cane got into Bozeman. “I can’t thank you enough for all of your help, Judge Hopkins.”
“If there was ever a man who didn’t belong in prison, it was you,” said Hopkins. “I’ve always been a fair judge of people, and I had a gut feeling you were innocent. Sorry that it took so long to prove it though.”
“What’s all this about?” Porter asked his eyes narrowed on Cane.
Hopkins explained Cane’s predicament, including being sent to jail for a crime he didn’t commit. Afterwards, Jed sent unsettling looks at Cane. Cane stared the man down, silently daring him to make some snide comment. He knew of men like Porter—privileged, tough, unfair and unkind to humanity in general.
During dinner, Cane decided Porter was showing too much interest in Annie. If the cowboy said one wrong word to her, he’d toss him out on his ear.
She wasn’t a flirtatious woman, but she was a beauty with long, wheat colored hair bundled up at the back of her neck and pretty blue eyes. She was petite—he’d noticed when he’d helped her up and down out of the wagon—and her laughter was contagious. He found himself grinning whenever she laughed.
“So, what brings you here, Jed?” Annie asked.
He gave her a devilish grin that made Cane see red. “Just bought a few horses from your pa and he invited me to stay. Glad I did.”
Mark finished eating and fidgeted in his chair. Cane took pity on him. “How about some checkers, Mark?”
“You bet!” Mark’s face lit up brighter than a full moon on a clear, starry night.
“Excuse us?” Cane said. At Annie’s nod, he looked at Mark. “Come on, son.”
Cane tried concentrating on the game but found his attention drifting toward Annie’s laughter in the kitchen. With the library door open, he heard nearly every word of conversation. Then he heard Porter murmur, “Come set out on the porch with me, sweet Annie.”
Once again, he heard her girlish laughter and grimaced.
“You got a stomachache, Mr. Smith?”
Cane met Mark’s inquisitive expression. “No. Why?”
“Your eyes are all squinty, and you got a frown on your face. You look like you got a stomachache.”
“I don’t. I’m just thinking about something that doesn’t agree with me.”
Like Annie sitting out on the porch with Port
er. Sounds too much like courtin’ to me. I should be the one on the porch with her.
Tonight, after the company left, he decided he’d speak with Callahan. If he got a blessing, he’d propose to Miss Annie—hopefully by tomorrow. What would her answer be?
Cane looked across the table at his son. Maybe she’d accept his proposal before any other man’s because he was Mark’s father.
* * * *
“Jed, I said no for the second time.” Annie scowled up into the frustrated face of her neighbor and would-be suitor.
“Why won’t you marry me, Annie? What did I ever do wrong?”
“Nothing.” She sighed. “Nothing at all. Simply put, I appreciate our friendship, but marriage? No, it wouldn’t be right. I’ve no romantic inclinations toward you, Jed. Now don’t ask me again.”
They sat in chairs on the front porch, having a discussion Annie did not want to have.
Her stomach somersaulted in dread when, as the sun set, she caught Jed’s face in profile. Everything about him was familiar to her, but something else stirred inside her. She’d seen that profile in anger before, his set jaw. At the same time he looked at her again, she realized it.
The premonition! Jed is the man in my vision. No! It can’t be. He’d never harm me or Mark. He’s always been a perfect gentleman. He’s helped us in so many ways over the years.
She rose from her chair. “Good night, Jed.” She left him on the porch and entered the house.
Detouring into the library, she found both Cane and Mark bent over the checkerboard concentrating. She sat down on the divan. From a wicker basket beside her, she picked up a wool sock.
“Mind if I join you two?” she asked.
* * * *
Cane looked up. “Not at all.” He glanced at Mark. “Hang on a minute, pardner.” Rising to his feet he slowly unbuttoned his shirt, his eyes focused on Annie.
Interesting. She looked shocked, which made him hesitate, but only for a second. Her eyes were half closed and focused on his chest. He saw her sniff, her nostrils flaring a bit, as if catching his scent. It took him a second to remember what that look meant—it had been so long. Arousal—gut wrenching, body drenching, hot between the legs arousal—was the look on her face.
“What are you doing, Cane?” she whispered, dropping the sock to the floor.
Mark looked at Cane. “Looks like he’s getting ready to turn in, don’t it? Cane, you promised to finish the game,” he protested.
“I will, while your sister sews the missing buttons on my shirt.”
Cane shrugged out of the slightly tight shirt and held it out to her. She snatched it from him and dug around in the sewing basket on the floor. He sank into his seat to finish the game with Mark, conscious of her eyes on his bare back. Damn! It felt good to know she was attracted to him.
He made his move on the checkerboard, then looked at Annie again, watched her swiftly thread a needle with blue thread that was a fair match to his shirt. She picked up a white button from a small basket and sewed it on, chattering, “Father went to bed early with a headache. He gets them occasionally...”
She picked up the second button and quickly sewed that on the shirt, too. She bit the thread between her teeth and tossed Cane his shirt. “There. All done.”
“Sis? Somethin’ wrong?” Mark asked.
Her head shot up. “What do you mean?” Her gaze left Mark and moved to Cane who had donned his shirt, still sitting in his chair, his back to her.
“Uh, maybe you need to have your eyes looked at by Doc. You sewed ’em crooked, Annie.”
Cane swiveled around to face her, a slow smile forming on his lips.
Annie glanced down at her work and sighed.
“That’s okay,” Cane said. “As long as there are buttons sewed on, I don’t care if they don’t line up so well with the buttonholes.”
He watched her face turn an interesting shade of pink before she bent to pick up the sock she’d dropped earlier. He swiveled around to continue the game. Then he thought about Jed Porter. Casually, he said, “Something happen out on the porch?”
“Why do you think anything happened?”
“You seemed fidgety when you first came in from the porch. I heard it in your voice. And you were talking real fast.”
“Jed Porter proposed to me.”
Cane froze. Hell, did she accept? Am I too damned late to ask her myself?
Cane released his breath. “I passed by his ranch today. It’s quite a place. He appears to be doing real well for himself.”
“Jed never dirties his hands with ranch work. His hired hands do it. He inherited the ranch from his father, who did all of the initial back-breaking work.”
He looked over his shoulder at her. “So did you accept his proposal?”
“Of course not!” She scowled at him. “We grew up together. It would be like marrying kin.”
One up for me.
“Uh, Cane, it’s your turn,” Mark said.
He shook his head and continued playing checkers with his son. After a while, Mark’s head dropped to his chin. Then he started awake and rubbed his eyes.
“Time for bed, Mark,” Annie said. She dropped the sock into the basket beside her and rose to her feet. “I’ll help you get ready.”
“I will, too,” Cane said.
Mark gave Cane a curious, sleepy look. “You gonna tuck me in?”
“If you want me to, I will.”
“Annie always reads to me first.”
Cane nodded. “I can do that.”
Mark gave Annie a kiss good night. Cane saw sadness—and resignation in her eyes. It’d begun. She seemed to accept that it was time for him to be Mark’s father—to become a Smith and not a Callahan.
Mark took Cane’s hand and they went upstairs. Cane could hardly breathe, so sweet and innocent was his son’s gesture. The boy trusted him. Cane’s eyes smarted.
He read from Tom Sawyer, until Mark fell asleep. Then Cane made his way down the stairs and back to the library, intent on asking her to be his wife, now, instead of waiting to talk to her father. Now, before he lost his courage.
He found her sitting on a window ledge seat, staring out into the night. He went to her, and she rose from the seat as though expecting a confrontation. Then she astonished him when she threw herself into his arms.
Holding her against him, he heard her sobs. She cried against his shirtfront until it was wet and clammy. Eventually, she said, “I can’t let him go, Cane. I just can’t.”
Cane took her shoulders and stepped back from her.
Now or never.
With a trembling finger, he traced a tear down the porcelain slope of one cheek. “Maybe you won’t have to, Annie.”
* * * *
She raised her brows in amazement. Had he changed his mind about claiming Mark? Searching the gentle expression in his eyes she stepped back from him, her legs feeling numb, and she sank to the seat. “I don’t understand,” she whispered.
“I meant what I said. You won’t have to give up Mark...if you marry me.”
Hope and joy soared through Annie. My heavens, she felt giddy at the thought of marrying Cane. Astonished at the idea of his asking for her hand in marriage, she paused, then frowned. But had he asked her?
No, he hadn’t proposed, not really. Not in the way she believed a man should propose to a woman. She bit her lip, deep in thought, then straightened her shoulders, deciding it was a proposal, albeit not a traditional one, but still a proposal. “Why are you asking me to be your wife?”
“You want Mark in your life, don’t you?”
“Of course I do. More than anything, b marriage is a drastic step. We’re all but strangers, Cane.”
He bent down and pressed firm lips against hers. They lulled her, made her want him more than she’d ever wanted a man before. She sighed against his lips, then turned her head, breaking the kiss.
“We’ll grow to know each other, love each other.” Taking her hands, he pulled her to her feet and sl
id his hands around her waist.
Though she found she enjoyed his masculine size and warmth, Annie pressed her hands against his chest to make contact with his gaze.
“You’re right. Over time, we’ll learn to care for each other. But at first I’d need time to...” She couldn’t meet his eyes, embarrassed yet thrilled at the thought of sharing the same bed with him.
“You can have all the time you need to get used to me. Hopefully, it won’t take you too long to decide you like me enough to make ours a true marriage. Say yes, Annie,” he encouraged her. “Then we can get your father’s blessing.”
“Wait. I need to tell you about me, something important.”
“You mean the visions? Your father already did.”
Astonished, she widened her eyes. My God, he’d asked her to marry him, even knowing about her unusual gift. “Well...well...how do you feel about that? About me?”
“Nothing to be ashamed of.”
“A gift, yes, if you can call it that. It took me years to get used to it. I’ve had a recent premonition, one that’s alarming to say the least, and it’s occurred three times. This has never happened to me so often before—the same vision.”
He pressed down on her shoulders until she sank to the window seat once more. Sitting beside her, he again took her hands in his. “Tell me what you saw.”
She sobbed and tears filled her eyes. “A man trying to take Mark from me.”
“When did you have this vision?”
She sniffled. “Moments before you walked up to my wagon at the schoolhouse.”
“What you saw was me claiming Mark.”
Annie shook her head. “No. It wasn’t you. It was another man. I believe it was Jed. He tore Mark from my arms. I can still hear Mark’s screams.”
“Then what happened?”
“The premonition stopped. I’ve no idea what happened after that.”
Cane stroked her cheek, helping her trembling abate slightly. “Don’t worry. I’m here to protect both of you. No one will dare take Mark from us.”
She smiled at him and nodded.
“I’m asking again, Annie. Will you marry me?”
Tears filled her eyes even as she whispered, “Yes.”
