by Lisa Plumley
“This is cozy,” Amelia said, smiling. “Thank you.”
The warmth inside made her skin tingle, and her stomach rumbled at the savory smells of roast meat and bread. On the huge cast-iron stove beside Mason, coffee perked, adding its rich aroma to the air, too.
“Manuel told me James is at Fort Lowell,” Mason said.
“He left yesterday,” Juana said, nodding her head. She showed Amelia to a bow-backed chair at the table, then went to the stove. “But he should be returning late tonight.”
Spying Mason still at the stovetop pot, she picked up a wooden spoon lying nearby and whacked his hand with it. “Wash before grubbing around in my pots,” she scolded.
Amelia laughed. He paused, another bite of beef halfway to his mouth, and gave Juana a wolfish grin. Then he ate the meat.
“Your chalupas are good as ever, Doña,” he said. “But I think you’ve turned ornerier. Time was, you’d never turn a starving man from your table.”
“Starving man?” Amelia asked, arching her eyebrow. Leveling him a what-about-my-cornbread-and-beans look, she crossed her legs and clasped her hands at her knee. She waited for his answer, her top leg kicking back and forth.
“Ornerier?” asked Juana, hands on her hips.
Mason glanced from one woman to the next, then grimaced.
“You want sweet talking, ask Manuel,” he finally said, eyeing a stack of flat, pale pancakes on the table near Amelia’s elbow.
“You just make these?” he asked, heading for the plate—and away from the long reach of Juana’s wooden spoon.
She sighed, but without rancor. Amelia recognized the sound. It was the same one she used on her brothers back home, filled with affection, tolerance—and a good measure of resignation.
“The tortillas are fresh and so are you, Mason Kincaid,” Juana said, turning her back to him while she stirred the contents of the pot. “You can leave my brother out of this.”
On his way to the tortillas—Amelia could see now how Mason’s had learned to speak Spanish, with so much of it being used in the Territory—he paused beside her chair. His hand dropped to the nape of her neck, his fingers absently kneading the taut muscles there as he listened to Juana talk about happenings at the stage station.
Amelia felt like sighing. Between Mason’s soothing touch, the warmth of the room, and the relief of being in friendly surroundings at last, she thought she might finally be able to relax.
Juana, her hands wrapped protectively in her apron, carried the steaming pot of meat from the stove. Her gaze flicked to Mason’s hand on Amelia’s neck, then away. Pursing her lips thoughtfully, she set the pot in the middle of the table. With a studied casualness Amelia could detect, even embodied in Spanish words as it was, Juana asked Mason a question.
His hand stilled. Slid away. “No.”
Juana shrugged. “It looks like it,” she said.
Scowling, Mason pulled out a chair across the table from Amelia and sat in it. She felt his withdrawal from her as plainly as if he’d slapped her first, then turned away. As it was, it didn’t help that they faced each other across the table. That only meant she had a better, if unwelcome, view of his granite-jawed face.
Squaring her shoulders, Juana smiled at Amelia. “Please help yourself,” she told her, nodding toward the meat and tortillas on the table. “I have other work to attend to—” her gaze slanted toward Mason, dark with a meaning Amelia couldn’t decipher, then back again “—but I’ll return once you’ve eaten.”
“Thank you,” Amelia said, “for everything. Thank you very much.”
Juana nodded gravely. “Bienvenido. You’re welcome,” she replied, and then she was gone.
Chapter Sixteen
While they were finishing dinner, James Fergus arrived. Juana’s wiry, redheaded husband burst into the room with two mongrel hounds yapping at his heels and Manuel at his side, calling out a greeting to Mason in a thick Scottish brogue.
“Mason Kincaid, ye old rascal,” he exclaimed, slapping Mason on the shoulder. “How do ye fare, with a price on your head and all?”
His keen, blue-eyed gaze fell on Amelia. “Fair well, with a lassie like this by your side,” he went on before Mason could reply. His smile charmed a blush to Amelia’s cheeks as he bent to grasp her hand. “She’s a beauty, just like your Ellen was.”
Ellen? Mason’s wife, Amelia realized. The woman whose death had sent him on the run. Her hand remained in James’, but her gaze went straight to Mason.
He stared at the tabletop, appearing lost in thought. If not for the tapping of his fingertip against his coffee cup, she might have believed he wasn’t even listening to their conversation. With Mason, even such a small gesture as that rubbing, rhythmic fingertip was telling. Was he remembering the woman he’d loved? Who he loved still?
“God rest her soul,” James added, his sympathetic gaze flicking briefly toward his friend before settling again on Amelia. Had he guessed already how she felt about Mason?
She longed to ask him what he knew about Mason’s life before, about his wife and her passing. But how could she, with Mason only a few feet away, and obviously unwilling to talk about it?
James squeezed her hand. His fingers were chill with having just come in from outside, and he carried a breath of that cold night air with him on his plain workman’s clothes. But his touch was caring, and his manner made Amelia feel as at home as Juana’s invitation to dinner had.
For her hosts’ sake, Amelia put her thoughts of Mason’s past aside until later.
“Thank you,” she said, bowing her head slightly. “Mason, if all your friends are like Juana and Mr. Fergus, I’ll remember my time as a lady outlaw fondly.”
“Och, call me James, lassie,” he commanded, releasing her hand. “And what’s this I hear about remembering? Are ye leaving us so soon, then?”
He winked at Mason, and the mood in the room lightened with his gesture. “Losing your way with the ladies, are ye? I never thought I’d see the day.”
“He still has a way with your woman,” Manuel put in from his place near the stove. He handed a cup of steaming coffee to James, then poured one for himself. “If he’d held my sister any tighter, he’d have broken her ribs.”
He ambled toward the table, then paused beside Mason’s chair. Both hounds sat at Mason’s knee, their massive tawny bodies alert as they watched eagerly for a bite of fallen meat.
“What happened to your hair, amigo?” Manuel asked, squinting at Mason’s hatless head. “Did that crazy barbero in Tucson cut your hair while he was drunk again?”
He clucked his tongue, shaking his head with pity.
Calmly, Mason finished chewing his last bite of tortilla, then he picked up his coffee cup. “Amelia cut it,” he said.
“Oh, lassie.” James gave her a mournful look.
Amelia felt like sinking straight into her chair. Mason’s hair did look awful, she realized upon closer inspection. She hadn’t noticed before, since he’d kept his hat on until they’d begun eating. After that she’d been too engrossed in Juana’s wonderful, spicy food to notice.
“He didn’t let me finish,” she explained. At the memory of the reason why the haircut had ended so abruptly, the memory of the intimacies they’d shared atop that desert rock, she felt a renewed flush climb her cheeks. “He just stuck his hat on and drove us straight here instead.”
Manuel nodded. “I can see why,” he told Mason. “Maybe Juana can fix it for you before you go.”
He frowned doubtfully toward the jagged spikes of hair sticking up on the left side of Mason’s head. “Or maybe just shave you bald and start over.”
“Then the pretty ladies would leave you alone, to be sure,” put in James.
They all laughed, Mason included. Here, he was like a different man—more lighthearted, more at ease. More like the man he must have been, before he’d been set on the run as an outlaw. Amelia wished she could have known him then, known the man everyone at Picacho Peak seemed to remember. The m
an they treated him as, still.
If she’d had any doubts about his innocence, seeing his friends’ faith in him would have laid them to rest. There’d been no guardedness in Manuel’s laughing greeting earlier, no hesitancy in Juana’s embrace. They all believed in him. Perhaps Amelia could trust in Mason, too, no matter how he pushed her away at times.
Mason’s gaze touched her, and she saw that he was still smiling. “It’s not Amy’s fault,” he said in her defense. “I was in a hurry to get here for some of Juana’s good cooking.”
“And you should have been,” said Juana, entering the room with an armload of soiled stoneware plates. She stacked them on a cupboard beside the washtub, then wiped her hands on her apron, turning to scrutinize Mason.
“You need to get some meat on those sorry skinny bones,” she said, twisting her mouth. “Couldn’t heft a frying pan to feed yourself, eh? No wonder you left home.”
Skinny? Mason? Amelia looked at him, wondering how Juana could think a man so strong needed fattening up. For an instant, she saw what Juana saw—a man with a face a shade too gaunt for his big build, eyes too shadowed—and then the impression faded. He was just Mason again. Her Mason.
His eyes darkened. “You know why I left,” he said quietly.
His gaze captured each person’s at the table in turn, save Amelia’s. Each one looked downward.
“I am sorry,” Juana whispered, adding something more in softly spoken Spanish. She patted his shoulder, then went to stand behind her husband.
“The rider who came brought us wanted posters, too, lad,” James said, capturing Juana’s hand and clasping it loosely near his shoulder. “I burned the blasted lot of them.”
Mason’s lips tightened. He stared into his coffee cup, his finger again stroking the plain stoneware mug. Was he worried about the wanted posters? Surely he’d known they’d be issued.
“Have you had news of Ben?” Juana asked. “We—”
Mason’s head snapped up. “Luego.”
His terse command silenced Juana before she could say more. Clearly he didn’t want to talk about Ben, whoever that was. Across from him, Amelia cursed the all-but useless Latin she’d learned at the ladies’ seminary. An education in Spanish suddenly seemed much more useful.
“Ben?” she asked, raising her eyebrows hopefully toward Mason.
Utter, conspicuous, silence descended upon the table.
Mason’s fingers clenched tighter on his coffee cup. Unsmiling, he shoved his chair backward and stood. With mounting dismay, Amelia watched him set his coffee cup atop the stack of unwashed plates. He remained there, gripping the cupboard’s edge, his back to them.
Juana delicately cleared her throat. “James, didn’t you have something to discuss with Mason?” she asked.
Her husband’s head jerked like a man caught napping and startled awake. He nodded.
“Amelia, you would perhaps help me clean up? We haven’t many travelers in the front room, but the ones we have are messy,” Juana said, nodding toward the stack of plates she’d carried in. “It has been a long time since I have had a lady’s company.”
How had the mood in the room changed so quickly? Amelia, confused and troubled, tore her gaze from Mason’s back long enough to mumble that she’d help wash up. Scooping up her plate and Mason’s, she stacked them and stood.
Something was wrong. Something to do with Ben, she guessed. Hesitating beside the table, Amelia saw a shudder pass through Mason. His knuckles showed white on the dark wooden cupboard’s edge.
“Mason?” She started toward him, her free hand outstretched, drawn by the need to comfort him. His rigid shoulders, his bowed head, made her heart twist. He looked so vulnerable.
So alone.
Juana stopped her before Amelia reached him. Wrapping her arms around Amelia’s shoulders, she guided her to the washtub.
“Sometimes there is nothing we can do,” she murmured, her dark eyes compassionate and knowing. “Sometimes we must let them struggle alone.”
Tears and frustration crowded Amelia’s throat. Her gaze flew to Mason as though called to him.
“I can’t!” she whispered. Behind Juana, Mason straightened and followed the other men out the back door. “I—”
“You must,” said Juana, reaching for the serviceable black pump handle set near the washtub. “He will turn to you when he’s able. Not before.”
Amelia swiped the back of her hand across her burning eyelids. “What if he’s never ready?” she asked, her voice cracking shamefully on the words. “What then?”
“Then he will remain alone, pequeña.”
Juana worked the pump handle slowly, filling the washtub with water. It splashed inside the silvery zinc tub, spotting them both with droplets. When it was filled, she turned to Amelia again, her manner businesslike.
“Will you help me carry this to the stove?”
Dumbly, Amelia nodded and took up the narrow handle nearest her. Holding her breath, she managed to get the tub to the stove and heft it on top.
“Mason is your friend,” Amelia said once the job was accomplished. “Don’t you care that he’s hurting?”
“Sí,” Juana snapped, cracking a match across the stovetop with far more force than necessary. “Of course I care. He is my friend. But more than that, he is a man. He will not accept my help.”
Her forehead creased with worry, she leaned in front of Amelia and lifted the glass chimney of the lantern that hung there. She handed it to Amelia, turned up the wick, and lit the lamp. Satisfied, she took back the chimney and replaced it.
“I have to do something,” Amelia said. “Mason says I can’t help him, but I owe him so much. And I…I….”
Juana smiled gently and squeezed Amelia’s arm. “You love him.”
“Does it show?” she asked miserably. The thought that everyone at the table tonight had likely known her feelings—and witnessed Mason’s indifference—filled her with mortification. Juana had known her mere hours before guessing.
“A woman knows,” said Juana. Pursing her lips, she gazed up at the brass studs that fastened the white muslin at the ceiling. Then, she smiled. “I am always closest to my James at night, when we’re alone. At night he can hear my heart. He listens.”
Her expression turned wistful. “Perhaps you can help Mason then.”
“He’s grouchy at night,” Amelia protested. “I don’t think he gets any sleep.”
“Ahhh,” murmured Juana, one slender fingertip poised at her lips. “I know just the remedy for that,” she said. She leaned closer. “Tonight when he cannot sleep, you must kiss him, well and often.”
“That’s all?” Amelia asked, feeling skeptical. After her experiences this afternoon during Mason’s haircut, she had her doubts he’d be receptive to such a tactic. It might even make him madder.
“The rest will take care of itself,” Juana assured her, stirring soap into the washtub water. “If you want to reach a man, kissing is the best way to make him start listening.”
Encouraged, Amelia nodded. Anything was worth a try at this point, she figured. She didn’t have much time to lose—he’d told her they’d reach Tucson tomorrow evening. After that, he’d try to send her away. He’d all-but promised it.
She’d have to act tonight.
Mason waited as long as he could before coming inside. By the time he did the stage station was dark, lit only by the lamp Juana had told him she’d leave in the room he was to sleep in. He saw its glow through the partly opened doorway and staggered toward it.
By now, Amy would be asleep in whatever room Juana had bedded her down in. Only one more night, Mason thought as he neared the door, reaching to drag his suspenders from one shoulder, then the other. Only one more night and he could leave Amy in Tucson, his conscience clear, and get on with what needed to be done. Get on with finding his son.
Bleary-eyed, he shouldered the bedroom door open and went inside, nudging it closed again behind him with his foot. His suspenders flopped around hi
s thighs as he crossed the room, pulling off his shirt.
“Mason?”
He froze. Stared toward the bed, his shirt still bunched in his hands.
Amy.
He threw his shirt onto a chair, too weary to hurl it with any force. “I told Juana I’d sleep outside before sharing a room with you,” he said bluntly.
Holding the thick patchwork quilt against her chest, Amy blinked at him sleepily. Her bare shoulders gleamed pale above the quilt, betraying how little she had on beneath it. The low lamplight shone on her hair, turning it golden, and Mason’s fingers itched to smooth it from her face.
“I know. You’re supposed to be sleeping on a pallet out there,” she said, nodding toward the station’s back room. “Juana told me.”
Juana. He’d been duped, Mason realized. A noose tightening around his neck couldn’t have made it plainer. I’ll leave a lamp burning for you, she’d told him. Come in whenever you’re ready.
He snatched his shirt from the chair.
“Wait! Where are you going?”
“Anywhere but here.”
Lack of sleep made his head spin as Mason turned toward the door. Damned matchmaking Juana. His fingers touched the latch.
“Mason, who’s Ben? Who’s Ellen?”
He stopped, leaned his forehead against the cool smoothness of the fitted-plank door.
“Was she your wife?”
Mason traced a whorl embedded in the wood door, trying not to hear the plaintive note in her voice. It called to mind their places in the kitchen earlier…he with his hand unthinkingly, protectively, on Amy. She, accepting his care without question.
And then Juana’s soft-spoken Spanish question had made him remember.
Have you found another Eastern woman?
No, he’d said. No. Thinking that Amelia and Ellen were not the same. Eastern ladies both, but different inside. Was it true? Or did he only want it to be true?
Hell.
“I asked Juana,” Amy said behind him, “but she wouldn’t tell me.”
“Good.”
Mason wrenched open the door, felt the rush of cool air as it swept inward. An instant later, the bedsprings creaked. Before he could step outside, Amy was there.
