to ride out today and check on a few of the line shacks,” he said. “To see if they need repairs.”
Emily was gazing at him so intently now, such bright curiosity shining in her eyes, that he found himself uttering words he’d never intended.
“You could come along if you want. With me, I mean. See some of the ranch.”
Then, before he could take the invitation back, Emily’s whole face fairly glowed. “Oh, I’d love that,” she said. “I’ll hurry and get dressed.”
Emily surveyed as much of herself as possible in the little mirror that hung between Señora Fuentes’s wooden crucifix and a candle sconce. She’d laced her corset as loosely as she could before putting on her lightest gabardine dress. She looked healthy and plump, she decided, rather than three, nearly four months pregnant. And she was looking forward to her excursion around The Crippled B.
“Best bring some extra belongings,” John had told her, and when she’d raised an eyebrow, he had added, “This is Texas. We may not make it back tonight.”
She had simply nodded in agreement, and now she wondered why the prospect of overnighting in the wilds with a near stranger—half Indian, at that—didn’t bother her in the least. Quite the contrary as a matter of fact. She was looking forward to seeing as much as possible of Price’s ranch and, somewhere deep inside her, in some curious little corner, she was looking forward to being with John Bandera, listening to his deep, Spanish-accented voice, stingy though he was with it, and looking into his dark amber eyes.
“Why, Emily Russell, you shameless hussy!”
She grinned at her own reflection in the mirror, thinking that being out West had already stripped her of more than a few constraints of polite society. There was the loose corset, of course, but that was a necessity in her condition. But she had also brushed out her hair and pulled it back with a blue ribbon, something she never would have done back home. Nor would she have found herself so drawn to a man who was little more than a stranger. Or attracted to anyone, for that matter.
The incident with Alvin Gibbons had had nothing to do with physical attraction, but everything to do with her broken heart and devastated hopes. There hadn’t been a second she’d spent with Alvin that she hadn’t wished that he were Price. On the night that they made love, she almost managed to convince herself that he truly was Price.
Funny, she thought. All of a sudden she didn’t feel so brokenhearted anymore or quite so hopeless. No doubt that was because she was here, at The Crippled B, surrounded by Price’s land and his possessions. Now, if only Price himself were here, everything would be perfect. Or almost.
She smiled softly, remembering the feel of his pen in her hand a while earlier. That little piece of steel and all the poetry that had flowed from it had changed her life, she thought. She could only pray now that it was for better rather than worse.
Then she sighed, picked up the carpetbag she’d packed, and went to meet John Bandera for their excursion.
John had already stacked an assortment of lumber and tools in the wagon bed. Then, just as he was lifting a keg of nails, he caught sight of Emily coming from the back of the house. He nearly dropped twenty pounds of iron right on his toes.
She looked so pretty and prim in her tan getup with all its pleats and swags and bows. Like a little birthday cake swirled with pale chocolate icing. Like the best of birthday gifts. He had to firm his lips against the smile that was itching across them.
“You can’t wear that hat,” he said almost gruffly as she approached, narrowing his eyes on the straw and velvet concoction atop her head. “You’ll burn to a crisp. This is—”
“Texas! Yes, I know.” She laughed as she brought a beige silk parasol from behind her skirt, then snapped it open and lifted it above her head. “There. Will that do, John?”
He grinned in spite of himself, thinking he’d never seen anything quite so charming or half as silly. “Fine with me, if you want to hold that umbrella for ten or twelve hours.”
“It might even shade us both,” she said.
John had no intention of sitting that close. Where the hell had his head been when he’d conjured up this trip, then suggested she come along? Hell, if he’d used his head six years earlier instead of his heart, if he’d never sent that first fateful letter, he wouldn’t be in this situation now, would he?
While Emily waited in the dainty shade of her parasol, he finished loading the wagon. He tossed his saddle in and then brought his favorite mare from the corral, slipped the bridle over her head, and secured the reins to the tailgate.
“That’s it,” he said. “Let’s go.”
She stood on the opposite side of the wagon, smiling pleasantly, twirling her parasol, making no effort to move. He found himself staring at her stupidly while it slowly dawned on him that it had been a while since he’d been with a person hindered by her own clothes, one who required assistance getting into, out of, up on, down from, and around.
Madre de Dios. That meant he was going to have to assist her, to act as if he wasn’t terrified to clasp his hands about her waist, to feel the size and the warmth of her through her dress when he lifted her up. And then he was going to have to let her go, to pretend that touching her meant nothing to him at all when it meant everything, when it was all that he’d longed to do and dreamed about for years.
For a second John was tempted to unload the wagon and drag all the lumber and tools back into the barn, to tell Emily the weather looked bad or the horse looked lame or the axle looked cracked or any excuse he could conjure up to stay here, not to have to put his hands on her.
Caught in his quandary, John didn’t immediately notice that Emily had already taken matters—as well as her skirt—into her own hands. She had collapsed the little umbrella in order to grasp the back of the wagon seat to haul herself up, but in another second it was going to be confounded Emily who collapsed if he didn’t help.
John sprinted around the rear of the wagon and got his hands up just as she was coming down, then he stood there—half dazed and wholly mute—with his arms full of his Emmy, her twenty yards of skirts and petticoats, and her damn blasted parasol.
The little shriek she’d uttered when first falling turned into a bright peal of laughter now and her blue eyes sparkled up into his, reminding him of high mountain lakes and wide summer skies and how much he’d loved the sense of humor that always came through in her letters, making him laugh out loud when he read them. He wanted to laugh now in concert with Emily, but he didn’t. He didn’t dare.
Instead, he let out a scorching curse in Spanish before he growled, “You need to be more careful. You almost broke your blasted neck.”
She blinked at his harsh tone and her laughter stopped immediately. The light in her eyes darkened. The lovely sparkle disappeared.
He shifted her abruptly in his arms, then lofted her brusquely onto the seat. “Hang on, will you? It’s a long drop to the ground.”
Emily nodded, thinking suddenly that the drop was longer and more treacherous than John could know for someone in her delicate condition, a fact that she’d breezily ignored when she’d attempted to climb into the wagon without his aid.
Ever since her arrival in Texas, she’d felt young and adventurous. That wasn’t good. At twenty-six, she wasn’t all that young. At more than three months gone with child, she shouldn’t feel the least inclined to adventure. In any condition, she shouldn’t be so excited about the prospect of an excursion with a man she barely knew.
What would people in Russell County think of her outrageous behavior? What would Price think when he learned that she had gone off so cavalierly with his partner? Surely he wouldn’t approve.
But no sooner had that idea struck her, than she realized just how ludicrous it was to worry about Price’s or anybody’s approval or disapproval. Her reputation was already ruined. She was already a fallen woman. All things