The scent of him – warm leather, minty soap, and wild grass – filled her head and she wanted to press her cheek to his back, but dared not. Clinging to him, she gloried in the movement of his muscles and the rubbing of his body against hers. He was lean and hard and all man, making everything womanly in her tingle.
His big horse ate up the ground, and before she knew it, they were on open pasture and she caught sight of a herd collected under a stand of trees. One lifted her head and let loose a long, anguished “mooooo” as Butter thundered closer. Banner felt Callum tug on the reins, pulling the horse to a dead-stop that almost unseated her.
He reached behind him, grabbed her forearm, and helped her slide off the horse. “Damn it all, she’s lying down. She was still standing when I left her.”
Banner brushed down her skirt and massaged the small of her back as she took in the situation. The calving heifer was, indeed, down and leaking out of her backside. She bellowed again in obvious discomfort. Callum sprang into action, fashioning a hackamore out of his rope and fitting it around the heifer’s head and nose. He glanced back at Banner.
“You pull on her while I get behind her to give her a shove. We need to get her upright.”
Eyeing the heifer with trepidation, Banner grabbed the rope and planted her boots while Callum went behind the distressed animal. He placed her hands against the cow’s rump and nodded at Banner. “I’m ready.”
Callum grunted as shoved with all his might. His face reddened and he gritted his teeth. Banner locked her knees and pulled and yanked on the rope. Callum shouted at the heifer and she finally stood, her hind legs first and then her front ones. Banner stepped back, winded, and her arms trembled from the exertion. She watched as Callum went to his horse and removed a long, dark coat from his saddle bag. He held it out to her.
“Slip your arms in this.”
“Why?”
“To keep your clothes clean. No, no,” he said, shaking his head when she started to turn around. “Put it on so that the coat protects the front of you.”
“Oh.” She nodded, realizing his intention. The last time she’d helped Hollis pull a calf she’d been soaked in blood and other smelly fluids that had taken two washings in vinegar and baking soda to remove from her skirt and blouse. “Good thinking.” She thrust her arms into the sleeves and Callum hoisted it up onto her. His coat swallowed her and fell past her feet. It was made of canvas and wasn’t lined. She reckoned he wore it when it was raining. Rope hung from the cuffs instead of buttons and he tightened them around her wrists, finishing them off with knots.
He grabbed the halter rope she’d dropped and planted his boots. “I couldn’t get my big paw very far up in her, but I think the calf is either sideways or coming butt first. Needs to be positioned right.”
“Okay.” She approached the business end of the heifer, dreading what she was about to do. Placing one hand against the animal’s rump, she held her breath and pushed her free hand inside. Muscles contracted around her fingers and wrist and she waited for them to release before she shoved in further. Closing her eyes so that she could try to “see” what she was feeling, she located a hoof and a head.
“The baby is sideways,” she said as she sought the other front hoof. The cow’s muscles contracted again, squeezing her arm like a vise. “Owww.”
“What’s wrong?”
“She’s having contractions.” Waiting her out, Banner steadied her own breathing, telling herself not to hold her breath, no matter how bad it smelled. After a few more seconds, the inner vise released her and she delved around the slime and poked at the slick calf until she found the other small hoof. Bracing herself, she began to maneuver the calf’s hooves and head into the birth canal. She could feel Callum’s steady gaze as she shifted her feet, tightened her grip, and tugged the calf another inch or two in the tight space. “Got it in the chute.”
“Good girl. Start pulling.”
“Not yet. I have to get its front legs straightened out.” Squeezing her eyes shut, she envisioned the calf as she worked one leg straight and then the other to bracket its face. “Ready now.” She backed up and her arm slipped out, the coat sleeve covered in slime and blood and leaking down the front of the coat. Her hand came free with a soft popping sound.
The heifer moaned and started to lie down again, but Callum was having none of it. “Oh, no, you don’t!” He jerked on the rope. “Grab the hooves and see if you can’t get the calf started.”
Banner nodded and shoved both hands inside the cow. It was a tight fit, but she was able to grasp the two hooves, which she tugged on. Her shoulder muscles burned and her back ached, but she kept up the steady momentum, feeling the calf move ever so slightly. “Help me, little mama,” Banner whispered. “Push!”
Suddenly, the cow bellowed as a contraction seized her, and Banner felt the calf slide forward. Two white hooves poked out. “Yes!” Banner got a better grip on them, dug in the heels of her boots, and leaned back with all her body weight. She watched with barely contained excitement as legs began to emerge and then a nose. “Come on, come on!”
“Step aside and let me at her,” Callum said, resting a hand on her shoulder and easing her away so that he could wrap his big hands around the calf’s front legs.
Banner blinked, her breath whooshing in and out from her struggles, and then stopping altogether when her gaze fell on the wide expanse of shoulders and back exposed to her. Having removed his shirt, Callum was naked from the waist up, and Banner couldn’t take her eyes off him. Muscles rippled under taut skin. As he tugged on the stubborn calf that was stuck in the birth canal, rivulets of sweat raced each other on either side of his spine and the muscles and sinew in his powerful forearms bunched and quivered.
Everything feminine within Banner quivered, too. She swallowed hard and felt herself go soft and creamy. How was it fair for a man to be that enticing and that virile, while a woman was expected to remember she was a lady and ladies weren’t supposed to be filled with lust?
“Come on, baby!” he growled, and Banner tried to focus on the cow and calf again.
With a squishy, sucking sound, the newborn’s head and shoulders cleared and it slipped all the way out, falling limply to the ground.
“Is it alive?” Banner asked, moving to stand beside Callum. He squatted down and wiped birthing fluid off the calf’s face.
“Take a big breath of life, little fella,” Callum crooned, his voice dipping to a soft, soothing rasp. He glanced up and sent Banner a quick wink that made her knees go weak. The calf’s head bobbed and its long legs flailed as it tried to stand. The mother ran her wide tongue across its backside, urging it up. “Clean him up, mama, and let him have some milk.” Callum straightened and strode to his horse. He removed the canteen from the saddle horn and poured some of the water over his face and hands. His stomach looked like a washboard and Banner had trouble not staring at those proud muscles. He motioned for her to come closer.
She looked down at the smears of fluid and fecal matter dotting the coat and winced. “I’m filthy and I stink.”
Callum lifted one dark brow. “That’s okay. It’s all part of ranching.” He unknotted the rope at the cuffs, his gaze returning again and again to her face as if he were reading something there. He pinched the shoulders of the coat and slid it off and down her arms, slowly and carefully so as not to transfer any more of the muck onto her clothes. He rolled the coat up and stuffed it into his saddle bag. “I’ll wash it off when I get back to the house.”
“Leave it with me and I’ll clean it for you.”
He shook his head. “Hold out your hands.”
She did and he poured water over them as she rubbed them to get as much of the stinky stuff off them as possible. The smell still clung to her, though, but she knew she could get rid of it with a bar of Mary’s good-smelling soap. The woman not only made great tooth paste, she also made lye soap with crushed lavender and rose petals in it.
Trying not to stare, she couldn’t m
anage to keep her gaze from flicking to Callum’s exposed torso. A light furring of black hair stretched across his chest and arrowed down to disappear under his wide, leather belt. Simply put, he looked magnificent and she knew the sight of him would fuel her dreams for weeks . . . no, months to come.
He hung the canteen on the saddle horn and swung around, catching her heated gaze on him. That dark, winged eyebrow arched again, following by a twitch at the corner of his wide mouth.
“You’re pretty handy to have around,” he said, his voice deeper, darker.
A fluttery laugh escaped her as desire corkscrewed in her belly. “Glad I could help.” She gasped when he suddenly captured her hands and turned them palm up to his gaze.
“Small hands, but capable and strong . . . like the rest of you,” he murmured, his gaze lifting to settle, unsettlingly, on her lips. “Anybody courting you, Banner Payne? Other than Altus Decker?”
“No.” She smiled at him, wishing he would smile back at her.
“Hmmm. Hard to believe.” He ran his thumbs across the inside of her wrists where her pulse galloped. “What’s wrong with the men around here? A girl as pretty as you should have bachelors circling her.”
“You’re available and you’re not interested.” She swallowed hard, appalled at her own brash statement.
His forest green gaze latched onto hers and his long fingers circled her wrists. “Who says I’m not?”
“Just not interested enough,” she tacked on, and watched, fascinated, as his mouth straightened into a line of determination and his fingers tightened on her wrists. She held her breath, knowing he was going to jerk her to him and crush his mouth to hers.
He must have heard the approaching horse at the same moment she did because he released her. Stumbling away from him, she swung her attention to the rider bearing down on them.
Hollis reined his horse and rested his hand on his thigh as he bent over a little toward Banner. “What are you doing out here?” He eyed Callum, who was slipping back into his shirt and buttoning it.
“I pulled a calf,” Banner said, glancing over her shoulder at the wobbly newborn that was suckling on his mother. “Callum’s hands were too big to get in there and do the job.”
Hollis gave her the once-over. “You’re awful clean to have pulled a calf.”
“I have Callum to thank for that. It’s something I’ll have to remember next time. He had me put his coat on . . . backwards . . . to protect my clothing.”
“Oh.” Hollis glanced at Callum. “Hop up, little sister. You can ride back with me.”
If she could have opted to ride back with Callum instead, she would have, but that would have spawned questions she didn’t want to answer. With a sigh, she placed her hand in her brother’s and let him haul her up behind him. Wrapping her arms around Hollis, she caught Callum’s teasing smirk and smirked right back at him.
###
She had a devil of a time getting her emotions in check and setting her mind to preparing breakfast for a bunch of hungry cowpokes. Her thoughts kept sneaking back to the vision of Callum bare-chested and lusty-eyed. What would have happened if Hollis hadn’t ridden up when he did? Callum would have kissed, that’s what!
She barely had enough time to get the table set and the platters of food on it before the men lumbered in, smelling like cowhide and sweat. As usual, they mumbled, “Morning, ma’am,” to her as they took their places at the table and dug into the hash browns, scrambled eggs, ham, fried fatback, red-eye gravy, and biscuits.
Two new hands took the places of Johnson and Baines. Shane Potter and Franklin Ames told her that they were former Confederate soldiers who had come to Texas to find ranch work. Shane was the same height and same age as Banner. He said that he’d left his pregnant wife back in Joplin with her mama and older sisters. Franklin, forty years old and a widower, told her that his wife had been shot and killed on the streets of Atlanta by Yankee soldiers. He’d lost two children to dysentery, too. Banner’s heart had gone out to him.
She poured fresh, cold milk and strong, hot coffee into tin cups, flying around the table to be sure they all had what they needed – and feeling Callum watching her. She didn’t dare look at him because she knew she’d blush and someone at the table would notice.
“How many head you think will calf this winter?” Shane asked around a mouthful of biscuit and gravy.
“Too many. At least fifty,” Callum answered.
“How come so many?”
“The Paynes didn’t pull their bulls off the heifers.” Callum glanced from Hollis to Banner.
Banner had been pouring milk into Shane’s cup, but paused, stung by the hint of censure in Callum’s tone. “We were supposed to keep separate the bulls from the heifers? You’re not doing it. I see bulls out there all the time when I—”
“I’ll take the bulls off them come spring,” Callum explained. “That way, the ones kept here instead of going to market won’t calf in the winter when it’s harder on them and predators are more desperate for a meal.”
“Oh.” She shrugged and looked at Hollis, wondering if he knew about this and why he hadn’t told her. “That makes sense.”
“We barely had enough men to keep the herd together,” Hollis said, staring at his plate. “Couldn’t worry about breeding calendars.”
Banner’s heart softened. “We did the best we could. In fact, I think we did a mighty fine job, considering we were being preyed on by two thieves.”
“Has anyone seen Johnson or Baines since they were run off?” Callum asked, glancing around the table at the men, who all shook their heads. “That’s good. I hope they’re in the next county by now.”
“Y’all going to that meeting Friday evening in town?” Shane asked. “I am. Ought to be right interesting.”
Sly looks were exchanged across the table. Banner paused on her way out of the dining room, aware of tension quivering in the air.
“Sounds like a waste of time to me,” Callum said. “Bunch of hotheads letting off steam.”
“Yeah, tempers are firing, for sure, but who can blame them?” Shane said, his sandy eyebrows moving up and down in agitation. “All those darkies swarming in here and the dirty Yanks buying everything that ain’t nailed down and the Injuns making claims on parcels of land. It’s getting out of hand, if you ask me. And where’s the law in all of this? The Texas Rangers and county sheriffs are as scarce as chicken teeth out here.”
“That’s right,” Seth said, stabbing at another biscuit with his fork. “Need to rid this county of all them squatters.”
“Even the Indians?” Callum’s tone was quiet, but carried weight. “You think we should make war with them, Pa?”
Seth’s scowl deepened “Nah. They don’t bother nobody, really.”
“It’s the darkies and Yanks that are fouling up the place for everyone,” Flint said.
Shane bobbed his head, enthusiastically. “Right you are, sir. That’s why I’m going to that meeting. We need a plan to stop the freed slaves and the uppity Yankees from taking over what we have left.”
“They’ve taken enough, for sure,” Franklin agreed, his sonorous voice breaking through the chatter. “I’ll go with you to that meeting, Shane.”
Banner shook her head and went into the kitchen to refill the coffee pot and milk pitcher. Men. Would they ever get a bellyful of war and blood and suffering? Why would they want to go to a meeting and stir up more trouble? There was plenty floating around and infecting people. Couldn’t they find ways to live with each other instead of talking about ways to make things worse?
As she filled the pitchers, she recalled hearing Hollis talking about a town meeting that none other than Eller Hawkins was spearheading. Hollis had said it was to discuss the future of Texas and ranching, but it didn’t sound like that now. Sounded like the topics were more about hatred and being sore losers.
She wasn’t surprised that Eller Hawkins was one of the pot stirrers. He loved attention and strutted about feeling as if it
was his right to have money without breaking a sweat for it. Her father had called him “the little emperor” and it fit. Eller wouldn’t take kindly to freed slaves, Indians, and Yankees obtaining land or earning money when he didn’t have any or very much of either.
At least, he didn’t show up at the Latimer house for meals. He went to his home to partake of them with his wife. He’d shown up once at the breakfast table a few days ago, saying that Lilah was under the weather that day. Banner had avoided eye contact with him and could barely muster a half-smile when he commented on how pretty she looked and that she was a good cook.
No matter what came out of his mouth, Banner sensed that vindictiveness toward her simmered just beneath his friendly façade. He’d never forgiven her for spurning him and she didn’t trust him. He was like a finger curled around a trigger. All it would take was one twitch.
Chapter 6
Town was bustling, but that wasn’t unusual on any given Friday evening. What bothered Callum was the sense of unrest hovering over the town. It felt like trouble and he wanted none of it. Still, he made his way to the Masonic Hall at the end of the main street where a meeting was being held to discuss “the state of current events and ranching reports.”
Inside the hall, the low buzz of the audience bombarded him as he shouldered through the clutches and knots of men and made his way toward the front of the hall. A few rows back from the staging area, he spotted a place on one of the long benches. He edged past those already seated and eased his big body down onto the hard seat.
“Good to see you here, Cal,” the portly man on his right said, sticking out his hand and giving Callum’s a firm shake. “How’s your father doing?”
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