by Sharon Ryan
Bewildered, Willa looked back to the corral to see a very large man waving a brown hat. This man was trying to get the horse to shy and move away from the fence. Willa quickly realized that in his fury, the stallion could have easily charged through the corral rails. She then looked up to see a stern and angular face, and for a moment, Willa would have called that face ‘“handsome’.” His eyes were tinged by panic.
“What the hell!” he said. “You could have died out there!”
Willa caught her breath as she floundered a bit to find her footing. “Then it’s a good thing you showed up here uninvited,” she hotly retorted.
Shamus was dumbstruck. “What?” he finally sputtered.
“I said it is a good thing that you came out here uninvited.” Willa spoke slowly, as if she were speaking to a child.
Shamus pushed his long fingers through his hair and bent to retrieve his hat from the ground. He cast Willa an incredulous look as he straightened. Willa noticed the man’s chestnut hair. She had never seen a man with hair color that rich and deep; she was intrigued.
“I think the phrase ‘thank you’ should probably come to mind,” he replied caustically. “I saw you by the river the other day and wanted to introduce myself but had things I needed to attend to.”
Willa realized he was the stranger who had been watching her. She felt unnerved by his size and his directness. She could see he was strong. His shirt stretched tightly over his chest and shoulders. His upper arms looked thicker than the corral’s fence rails. His auburn hair, no doubt, touched the top of his shoulders, but he had it tied into a leather cord. She imagined he could be dangerous, and too late, she realized she had left her rifle in the house. Yet if he had a mind to visit mischief upon her, why save her?
“Okay. Thanks,” she mumbled. “Now, please leave.”
“You are serious?”
“Of course, I am! I didn’t invite you here, and you need to move on. I appreciate the favor, but don’t plan on my repaying it. Now get moving!”
Shamus leveled a disapproving stare. “Where I come from, there is an expectation of a little hospitality when someone goes out of his way.” He noticed her stiffen and quickly added, “Such as a cup of coffee.”
The tension eased out of Willa’s shoulders. “Yes. Of course. But you will move on afterward. My husband is returning soon, and he won’t take kindly to strangers on the place.”
Shamus smiled to himself. There was, of course, no husband. She would find out he knew that soon enough.
“Come on over,” Willa said offering a grudging invitation.
“Be right there,” Shamus said as he waked over to his horse. He pulled one of the jars of peaches from a saddlebag. “Two good deeds in one day.” He smiled as he showed her the golden fruit in thick syrup.
Willa was happily surprised but wasn’t going to let him know it. She turned on her heel and headed toward the sod house. “Wait outside,” she called over her shoulder.
Willa set the two kitchen chairs outside and brought out two cups of coffee, two bowls and two spoons. She also brought the rifle and set it next to the chair where she would sit.
“Oh, I am Shamus Harding. Is that gun necessary?” he asked as he eyed the rifle.
“Willa Freeman, and it might be,” was her retort.
They looked over the landscape to avoid making eye contact as they sipped the strong black coffee. Shamus looked away from the house and noticed the copse of trees to the west. He also observed the fresh burial mound nearby. Willa followed his eyes to see what he was observing. He saw her do this out of the corner of his eye while opening the peaches. He nonchalantly offered them to Willa who produced the bowls and a spoon. Shamus split up the jar contents and started eating the fruit. Willa took a small bite. Suddenly, she found herself licking the thick syrup from her spoon after realizing the fruit was gone.
“Hungry?” he asked.
“Uh,” she stammered as she realized she had forgotten about breakfast. “I guess,” she replied sheepishly.
Shamus smiled and then levelled his gaze at her. “I know there’s no husband,” he stated frankly.
Willa looked stricken and then defiantly raised her chin. “I get by,” she replied tersely.
“I see. Well, in that case, I have to say that you aren’t managing well enough. Anyone who gets so far out of their depth and is so foolhardy deserves to be smacked.”
Willa bristled. “Big words,” she said. “You don’t know the first thing about me or what I am capable of.”
“I know you are a danger to yourself and that someone needs to get your attention and turn you around.”
“And who do you propose is going to do that?” she growled as she reached for the Remington.
Shamus calmly lifted his bowl and slowly put the last bite of peach into his mouth. He eyed her over the top of the bowl and evenly said, “Me.”
Willa stood up, grabbed the gun, and grumbled, “I think it’s time for you to leave.”
Shamus stood up, calmly walked to his horse, mounted and thought to himself that indeed it would be he who taught her a lesson. She was clearly defiant and oblivious to the hazards she was creating for herself. Shamus concluded that her rebelliousness was nothing a stern spanking couldn’t change.
Chapter 2
Relaxing in the shade of a tall cottonwood, Shamus sat alone ruminating in the heat, thinking of the strange, uninhibited Willa Freeman—her light, long hair; her fierce, taut face; her determined, willful attitude.
“The disobedient should always submit to authority when they endanger themselves or others,” he said to himself. “The lass should be broken. Couldn’t even offer a fellow a decent cup of coffee! Foolish girl!”
Shamus sat back in the shade with the second jar of peaches. The pop of the lid opening pleased his ears and startled a small hawk that darted somewhere south. He let his large hand rest in the lukewarm juice—sticky, sweet-smelling. He pulled a peach out and, knowing how no one was looking, slowly licked the peach. The peach tickled his tongue, and he laughed. He loved the taste, the texture. He bit the peach and felt an explosion of flavor. The light orange-colored juice dripped to his lean stomach and got trapped in the chestnut hairs on his face and chest.
“She’s a strange girl,” he thought. “That gun needs to go. A lady with a gun? This isn’t Chicago! No, she needs a man in that house, and I’m fixin’ to do something about it.”
Shamus paused and closed the peaches. He stood briefly, removing his shirt completely. He touched his large biceps and smelled his musk. He smelled of sweat and dirt.
Suddenly, he felt the urge to swim. He could afford a cooling down as the thought of Willa Freeman’s free spirit made him feel hot and aroused. Thinking of Willa combined with the late-July heat made his heart beat louder, harder than it had ever beat before.
Shamus laid some beaver traps near the Poudre River. He could check them, put his catch in his brown sack and go for a brief swim.
“Maybe Miss Freeman would like a winter coat made from Colorado beaver?” he thought. “Colorado winters are brutal and cold.”
Clayton’s loss was the hardest thing for Willa to accept.
“Clay,” said Willa as she looked at the portrait taken of Clayton and her long before their journey west. They were children in the portrait. He was nine and she six. Her father paid good money for that tintype. He saved for years. She and Clay had to stand for over an hour as the strange photographer settled on the perfect composition and light.
They were no longer smiling when the flash lit up. Now, those two confused faces were trapped on the thin metal for an indefinite number of years. This tintype was all Willa had left of Clay. Well that and Clayton’s torn clothes.
Willa remembered crying to her mother as she and her brother posed, “Momma, I want to go play. I’m hot, Momma.”
“No, foolish child! Stay!” Mrs. Freeman had said, annoyed.
“Poor Clayton,” Willa said and kissed his image, that sad imi
tation of Clayton’s tragic face.
Her people, all of them were now all gone. The Freeman lineage died well before it established itself in Colorado. A few days after Mrs. Freeman one day collapsed on the kitchen floor, her husband died of a broken heart.
“It’s time we leave this place of sadness,” Clay had said after their parents were buried, before she and he ventured to Colorado. Clay—Mr. and Mrs. Freeman’s pride, their darling boy—Willa’s only protector.
Before they arrived in northern Colorado, Clay bought the stallion; it was practical to own a horse—transportation, something to sell should times get tough, something to breed.
“That stupid horse will be the death of you, boy,” she once told Clay.
“Sissy,” he had said, “You’ve got to be so heavy and morbid all the time. Without me, who would ever take care of you, huh? I will tame that stallion. Just you watch and see.”
Then a few months after their arrival, Clay died. Willa sat staring out the little kitchen window as she was kneading bread dough, and she saw the stallion running across the land. She saw Clay on top of the horse. He looked exhilarated. She smiled at him. He smiled at her, too. It all happened so fast—so very fast. The stallion flung Clay ten feet ahead of itself, and then—then—the great horse charged, and Clay was dead, trampled, mutilated, and now Willa sat weeping. She wept often.
How dare any damn man try to take his place! They are nothing next to Clay. I am Clays kin, and I can manage just fine by myself. Offer me protection and their ignorant devotion! She guffawed, disgusted.
She undressed and found a pair of Clay’s ripped trousers. She also found an old shirt of his. Clay’s clothes allowed more flexibility, and, working with animals, Willa needed flexibility.
Dressed in her brother’s clothes, Willa saw her ridiculous reflection in her bedroom window. She looked like a teenaged boy!
Willa felt a compulsion to go look at the stallion, to stare into its face and hold its gaze as she mastered it.
“So, tell me, Joe,” said Shamus, “tell me everything you know about Miss Freeman.”
Shamus went into town that morning to buy some scrap metal and grease to repair his traps. He liked Joe, the wiry blacksmith. Joe was born in Colorado and knew the complete history of the area, both the grandiose settlement of the land from people out east as well as the minute, ever-evolving gossip revolving around the townspeople.
“She’s as untamed as a cat in heat,” said Joe. “She’s pretty enough, but I hear that she likes to wear her brother’s old clothes. That’s just what I hear. She’s come into town seven times with that Goddamn rifle of hers to tell us she doesn’t want any of us men. That woman acts like we men all have the smallpox, like we aren’t good enough for her. Her loss. Crazy little lady, I tell you.”
“Maybe none of you are good enough; it takes a special kind of man to tame a wild woman,” Shamus said this without thinking, without wanting to offend. Nonetheless, Shamus knew he was right, that most of these men were townsfolk and could hardly begin to tame much more than chickens.
Joe turned red, and Shamus saw the ancient body go slightly limp, listless.
“Oh, Joe, I didn’t mean it like that,” said Shamus. “I just… I just…”
“Oh, so you think you could beat her into submission, do you? Man, I’ve seen Miss Freeman reject better men than you, a hell of a lot better men. Before you came into town, she fired three rounds at Johnny Sillet, crying, ‘Don’t you ever come onto my property and try to fix my fence again, you damned fool!’ She screamed at him. Funniest thing I’ve ever heard in my whole life. You meet Johnny yet? My niece sees him, and she just swoons—just like all the other women in town. I don’t see those girls swoonin’ for you, sir.”
“Joe, I didn’t mean no harm, just thinking out loud.”
“If you get Miss Freeman’s attentions,” said Joe, “I’d give you this here shop. It’s never gonna happen, Shamus. Why don’t you go for one of those Wilson girls? They’re pretty enough.”
Shamus felt his stomach turn at the thought of paying respects to either of Fred Wilson’s daughters—bland, boring, mousy girls. Suddenly, Shamus felt a compulsion to pay Miss Freeman a visit, to make her aware of her limitations, her place, to let her know that she needed him.
Willa walked into the corral, and the stallion raised its head and stared at her defiantly. She felt that it was scoffing at her, insulting her, questioning her, challenging her, this beast that took the last person she had ever loved.
“You bastard,” she screamed at the horse. “I loved him. You took him from me. My people are proud. Clay was proud. This was supposed to be the beginning of his life, not the end.”
The stallion stared back, unaware.
Without hesitation, Willa lifted her hand, tempted to smack the beast, to punish it. In fact, she wanted to kill it.
Blinking back tears, Willa stopped cold. No. No. She couldn’t kill it, but she would tame it. She would ride it. She would break it and maybe fulfill Clay’s intentions to make the homestead more solvent. Willa pushed her anger aside and prepared herself for what was likely to be a rough ride.
“Miss Freeman!” called a voice from outside—deep, strong, hard. “Miss Freeman, I would very much like to see you right now.”
“Who is it? Go away. I don’t need you menfolk in my business,” she said as she sat atop the horse. The horse’s movements became noticeably uneasy.
“Miss Freeman,” the voice said, getting closer, “I know you don’t like having me around, but you need some help. This is Shamus Harding, the trapper from down yonder. Now, I know we didn’t have such a great introduction yesterday, but you’re going to take my help, whether you like it or not, Miss Freeman. Understand?”
Suddenly the figure of the tall man stood before her. He rounded the corner of the lean-to only to find her perched atop the stallion’s back
“You’re crazy! Get off that damn horse! Now, I say! And how silly you look, Miss Freeman, in those tattered boy’s clothes.”
“Leave! Do you understand?”
“That horse will be your death, lass. Just like your brother.”
“How dare you—”
But Willa could not finish her sentence because the startled stallion bucked and threw her into the air, right into Shamus’ arms. She felt herself fall and be caught as if by magic, as if by fate.
Shamus put the startled Willa on the ground. Slowly, he walked to the walls of the lean-to and grabbed the horsewhip. As if by instinct, he smacked the horse’s hide, just enough to make the stallion go into a corner and stay put. Willa had never seen the horse obey like that before. In fact, Willa had never seen it submit to any man.
Then, Willa turned and ran toward the sod house.
Shamus wanted to chase Willa through the clearing between the corral and the sod house and smack her with the whip, with the same authority with which he had subdued the horse.
Red with anger, sweating from exertion, Shamus thought, “No, she deserves something that will redirect her bad behavior, something stern.”
Running after her, Shamus caught up and grabbed ahold of Willa’s waist.
“Don’t you dare touch me!” she said.
“This is for your own good,” he replied, still holding her. “No other man but I would dare teach you the lesson you’re about to get, Willa.”
She could hardly move. He was too strong.
“Willa, you can’t go gallivanting around like some crazed creature. You can’t tame that horse. You can’t even tame yourself. What are you looking for, anyway, huh? You want an empty life—alone?”
“You let me go, you hear? You let me go, or you’ll be sorry. As soon I get ahold of my Remington—”
Shamus picked Willa up and carried her over his shoulder. She tried to punch his back, but it was a futile effort on her part; Shamus felt nothing. Her hits couldn’t weaken his strength.
“Not so strong without that rifle, are you?” he said, and laughed. Willa looke
d ridiculous wriggling about without direction or hope.
Shamus walked through the door of the sod house. He sat on a kitchen chair and placed the squirming Willa over his knees. He pulled her trousers down, which now hung limply around her ankles. He was surprised that Willa wasn’t wearing underclothes under her brother’s pants.
“What do you think you are doing?” Willa screamed. “You have no right to touch me.”
“Miss Freeman,” Shamus replied, “this is for your own good, to remind you to be safe. I told you to stay away from that horse. He’s mean-spirited, lass, and you’re going to hurt yourself or get killed.”
“Someone has to do it, and I’m the only person here. I have no choice!” Willa snarled back.
“You do have a choice; I can help you if you’ll let me.”
“I’m all alone here. I have to do it.” Willa struggled to get loose as Shamus gave her rear a firm swat.
By now, Willa had given up the fight, exhausted by the effort. Deep down, though she would never admit it to herself, Willa knew she needed a firm hand, a devout protector.
With his right hand, Shamus again smacked Willa’s fleshy backside. Once. Twice. Three times. On the fourth smack, she whimpered a little because each swat was more intense than the last.
Shamus thought Willa’s ass now looked like one of the peaches from his jar—pink and vulnerable, ready to be taken and consumed. He leaned his face closer to her buttocks. He muttered a little sound of pleasure, and he all too briefly wanted to bite it. Like the peach, her ass was sure to be delicious.
“Are you learning anything, Willa?” Shamus asked, giving Willa’s blushing buttocks another stern swat.
“Yes, I’m sorry; I won’t be riding that horse again, Shamus! Please, no more!”
“Four more and we’ll be done.”
“I’ll never survive four more,” she moaned through her tears.
