Cherish

  Rebecca? Are you hurt, honey?

  Strong fingers lightly tracing her ribs, his touch soothing away the pain. On her back, around to her side, then to center front. Hard knuckles under her breasts, pushing up against their weight, grazing bare skin through loosened laces. It was okay. These were Race’s hands. So different from those others. Big, gentle, radiating warmth into her skin.

  Talk to me, darlin’. Sweetheart—so much blood. Can’t tell if you’re hurt. Can you talk to me?

  No. Couldn’t talk. She could hear, now…a little. Didn’t want to talk. So tired. Heavy all over. He felt so nice and warm. She’d just stay like this. Let his hands find the hurt places with light touches. She wanted to stay just like this, always, surrounded by vibrant muscle, protected, not afraid—with his hands soothing away the hurting.

  “Dad-blame it!” Cookie hollered, his voice so clear that Race could hear every inflection from where he sat in the bedroll wagon, cradling Rebecca in his arms. “Stop that, I said! You’re makin’ it worse instead of better! That stuff stings like a son’bi—like the very devil!”

  “Well, shit! It’s only a little salve,” Johnny Graves retorted. “The way you’re carrying on, a body would think I’m killing you!”

  “Johnny, I’m tellin’ you for the last time, watch your mouth!” Cookie sputtered with indignation. “We got us a lady present, in case you ain’t noticed! We can’t be usin’ obscurities!”

  “Obscurities?” Johnny chuckled. “You mean obscenities?”

  “I said what I meant!” Cookie gave one of his loud snorts. “Sometimes I flat can’t believe I’m rubbin’ elbows with such dumb son’bucks! I swow, I don’t know why I bother talkin’ about nothin’ to nobody around here.”

  “You like to hear yourself, that’s why. Your tongue’s tied in the middle and loose at both ends! Goddamn it, Cookie, sit still, why don’t you? I almost got it in your eye!”

  Shifting ever so slightly on the folded wool blanket he used for a seat, Race smiled to himself, though more with relief than amusement. If Cookie could yell that loud and raise so much sand, he wasn’t seriously injured. Mighty banged up, for sure, but he’d mend and probably be back to his old self before the salve was washed away.

  Race just thanked his lucky stars that Johnny was there to take care of the old codger. As it was, Race had his hands plenty full trying to soothe Rebecca. If he’d been the only man in camp, he wasn’t sure what he would have done.

  There was hope for Johnny Graves, after all, he guessed. And wasn’t that a wonder? Sometimes Race despaired of the kid ever growing up, and more times than not, he felt like throttling him. But just about the time Race ran completely out of patience, Johnny would do something unexpected to redeem himself, as he had today.

  Alarmed by Race’s behavior when he’d left the stampeding herd and headed back for camp, Johnny had guessed there might be trouble afoot. So, all on his own, the kid had notified Pete of his suspicion, then rounded up two other men to ride back to camp with him and see if Race needed help. And, boy, howdy, did Race ever. With four dead men, a dead dog, an unconscious cook, a hysterical girl, and the possibility of more trouble on his hands, he’d been in a hell of a mess. Thanks to Johnny’s quick thinking, he and two other men had shown up to relieve Race of the load.

  “Jesus H. Christ! Would you stop batting at my hands?” Johnny groused. “It’s your own damned fault I’m hurting you, old man. How can I be careful with you thumping me?”

  “You need thumpin’! Watch your mouth, I said!” Cookie snorted again. “Mark my words, if the boss hears you talkin’ filth around that girl, you’re gonna think thumped. He’ll make like you’re a puddle he’s stompin’ dry. Unlike you, he knows what’s gentleman-like and what ain’t. He also knows a lady when he sees one. She’s a fine bit of lace, that’n.”

  Race raised an eyebrow. Granted, he recognized a lady when he saw one, but nobody could claim he was real clear on what constituted gentlemanly behavior. He glanced down at the “fine bit of lace” in his arms. Somehow, the description fit, even though he knew for a fact she didn’t have a scrap of lace on her anywhere, not even on her drawers. Some gals just seemed lacy. All soft and frilly and fine, no matter what they wore. With her face pressed to the hollow of his shoulder, all he could see was golden curls and the dainty shell of her ear, which was ivory smooth and etched in pink, reminding him of strawberry juice trickled over cream.

  “You sure have had a change of mind,” Johnny pointed out to Cookie. “Way I remember it, you ran the other way last night. Told the boss she’d be nothing but trouble. A crazy fanatic, you said. Threatened to quit if you had to take care of her.”

  “Ouch! Dad-blame it, be careful. I need that nose hole to blow out of, you know! As for me quittin’, that was afore I see’d her! I’ll tell you somethin’ else, too, boyo. On top of bein’ a lady, that there girl’s got more pluck in her little toe than you got in your whole body.”

  “Now, Cookie, that’s not nice. You’re bruising my tender feelings.”

  “You ain’t got no feelin’s. If’n you did, you wouldn’t be rubbin’ my nose plumb off!” Snort, snort. “You know what that little gal done today? Jumped right into the thick of it, takin’ up for me, a fella she don’t even know. A little thing like her, bellyin’ up to four growed men. Ain’t that somethin’?”

  “Took up for you, did she?” Johnny laughed. “Why, Cookie, I never thought I’d see the day. I do believe you’re sweet on her.”

  Race smiled again, wondering how much of that nonsense Rebecca was hearing. Maybe she was just blocking it all out, an example he decided he should follow. Cookie and Johnny seemed to take pleasure from going on at each other like that, but no one else enjoyed it much.

  Turning a deaf ear to their bickering, Race rubbed his jaw back and forth over her braid, thinking for at least the dozenth time that he’d never felt the like. He’d gotten his hair from his ma, thick, straight, and Apache black, without a curlicue in the lot. Hers squiggled in all directions, silky little curls poking up from her braid and everywhere else. When he touched them, they coiled around his finger and tried to hold on.

  He pressed his mouth to the wisps, pleasuring himself with the ticklish sensation and the nice way she smelled, a mixture of scents, vanilla, feminine sweetness, and lingering traces of bath soap. As he breathed in, he sensed a difference come over her—a subtle tension in her slender body—that told him she was more aware of him and all he did than she was letting on. He recalled all the times he’d thumped poor old Blue for sniffing of ladies, and heat crept up his neck. He quickly drew away. Too quickly. The back of his head connected with a nail in the hickory bow behind him.

  “Ouch!” Loosing an arm from around her, he clamped his hand over the smarting spot. “Damn that Cookie and his infernal nails!”

  He felt Rebecca move, and from the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a startled blue gaze looking up at him. He stopped rubbing to glance down, but by then, she had hidden her face against his shoulder again. At least now he knew for sure that she knew what was going on around her. That was a relief.

  Since he’d brought her to the bedroll wagon, she’d shown no inclination to speak, and until this instant, he hadn’t been sure if she was registering anything. She’d just been huddling on his lap and clinging to him, her slender arms locked around his neck, her face buried against his shirt. It was as if she were about to plunge off a cliff and he was all that could keep her from falling.

  Wedged between the lard bucket and a tin full of cracklings, he sat with his back to the wagon wall, one leg folded under him, the other extended and propped on a meal sack. According to Cookie, the chuck wagon was full, so he was using this wagon to store their extra food supplies. It wasn’t exactly an ideal place to have brought Rebecca, but with a dead man in her wagon, his only other choice had been to clear out a spot in Cookie’s gear wagon, which looked as if a tornado had gone through it.

  He wasn’t sure how long he’d been sitt
ing there now. An hour, maybe? He only knew that being in the same position for so long was beginning to tell on him. The leg he sat on had fallen asleep, the other one was starting to cramp, and something sharp, probably another of Cookie’s nails, was jabbing him between the shoulder blades. In addition to that, now he had an extra hole in his head, compliments of the nail in the hickory bow.

  For fear of startling Rebecca, he hated to move much, not even to get more comfortable. Nevertheless, he was starting to wonder how much longer she might need him to hold her like this. Considering how terrified of him she’d been upon awakening that morning, she sure had taken a mighty fast shine to him.

  Not that he was complaining. Hell, it wasn’t every day a beautiful girl glued her sweet curves so tightly to a man’s body that he couldn’t pry her loose. There was also the inescapable fact that it was his fault she was in this shape. Damn. He felt bad about that. Shooting the man right in front of her had not been his intention, not to mention letting the bastard fall directly on top of her. If there had been a last thing she needed, that was it.

  Given all she’d been through yesterday at the arroyo, Race had decided before entering the wagon to rescue her that he should take the ruffian outside to finish him, if there was any way he possibly could. But things had gone wrong, and in the end, sparing her the ugliness of it just hadn’t been in the cards.

  Race closed his eyes and tightened his arms around her, wishing with all his heart that it had happened differently. If he lived to be a hundred, he’d never forget how she’d reacted to seeing the bastard’s blood all over her. Slapping at herself and trying to rub it off, like someone being attacked by red ants. Panting shrilly for breath. Scrambling to get away from it. Before he could get to her, she’d been hysterical.

  “Boss?” Corey Halloway called from just outside the wagon. “Yo, boss, you still in there?”

  “Of course he’s still in there!” Cookie groused. “Where you think he coulda went?”

  Rebecca jumped as if someone had poked her. Splaying a hand over her back, Race gave her a quick squeeze. “It’s okay, honey. That’s just Corey, one of my hired hands,” he whispered. “He ain’t gonna hurt you.”

  She made a sound at the back of her throat, a soft “Mmm,” that didn’t tell him much of anything, except that she’d heard him. Race angled his head forward to peer around the flour and cornmeal sacks. Corey Halloway stood at the rear of the wagon, peering into the dim enclosure, his white-blond hair gleaming in the sunlight, one hand balancing a five-gallon bucket that he’d propped on the gate.

  “Yo, Corey,” Race greeted him softly.

  “Brought the hot water you wanted.” Raising his free hand, Corey dangled a red neckerchief for Race’s inspection. “This do for a washing stick? I couldn’t find nothing else without looking in the gear wagon, and you know how Cookie is.”

  Race felt the girl’s body grow more tense and cupped a hand over her shoulder, lightly massaging with his fingertips to reassure her. “That’ll do fine, Corey. You mind bringin’ it in here to me?”

  “No, sir.” Corey lowered the bucket over the gate, then climbed inside himself, moving with the limber agility of youth. As he carried the bucket to where Race sat, his light blue eyes remained fixed on the girl in his boss’s arms. “How’s she doin’?”

  “A lot better,” Race replied confidently, even though he felt none too certain of it. In his experience, it was always best to be positive about things. Gloomy words made for a gray day. As Corey deposited the bucket next to his right leg, Race said, “I thank you kindly, Corey. I know you fellows have had your hands full out there.”

  “No problem. I’m glad to help.” Glancing over his shoulder and shaking his head at all of Cookie’s carrying-on outside, Corey chuckled, then turned back to hand the neckerchief down to Race. “We about have all the digging done. That’ll be the worst of it, I’m thinking.” He glanced at the girl again. “I, um, did that cleaning up you asked me to do, first thing. Used a brush and sprinkled down some lye. It bleached out of the wood pretty fair.”

  Race realized the youth was referring to the bloodstains on the floor of Rebecca’s wagon. “That’s good. And the other?” he asked, meaning the ruined quilts, but not wanting to be specific, for her sake. “You get ’em washed up, or what?”

  “Chucked them in the fire. They were past help.” The youth scratched behind his ear. “McNaught rode out to the herd and gave Pete your message. Pete sent three men back to pull the bobtail, like you ordered. Trevor and me and Johnny’ll be finished up here in camp pretty soon, so we’ll pull the second shift. By then, everyone else should be back.”

  Race didn’t try to disguise his relief at hearing that. Just in case those bastards came back, and he suspected they would, he didn’t want to get caught by surprise again. With three men riding guard at all times, it was unlikely anyone would be able to sneak up on the camp again or even get close enough to snipe with a rifle.

  “Pete circled back to camp a bit ago. Said for us to tell you he took your message to heart.” Apparently fearful of speaking too plainly and upsetting Rebecca, Corey glanced down at her. “They’re ready to handle whatever comes up, he said, and they’ve got the herd settled down, so you don’t need to fret. He was in a hurry to get back, I reckon, or he would have talked to you himself.”

  “Anybody get hurt in the stampede?”

  “A lot of cows. But all the men are hale and hearty,” Corey assured him.

  “Losses?”

  Corey shrugged. “I hate to bear bad tidings, boss. But I’d say the news isn’t good. Pete didn’t give an exact number, but he didn’t look too chirp.”

  Race’s heart sank. If they’d lost a substantial number of cattle, it would take him a year to recoup. Financially, he’d be sunk, and all his men along with him.

  “I’m real sorry, boss. The herd bolted so unexpected, like. We did our best.”

  “I know you did, Corey.”

  Race hauled in a deep breath and slowly expelled it, imagining Pete out there, not only having to guard his back against attack, but putting down injured steers and having no choice but to leave the meat lay. Little wonder the foreman hadn’t looked very happy. Unable to risk firing a gun, Pete would be forced to use his knife, slitting the steers’ throats to put them out of their misery. That was risky business, not to mention sickening enough to make a strong man want to puke up his boot heels.

  “Well, let’s not cry over milk we ain’t sure got spilt,” Race said, injecting optimism into his voice that he was far from feeling. “Maybe, all told, it ain’t as bad as it looks. You reckon?”

  “I sure hope.” Corey’s tone implied that he had his doubts.

  A sharp yearning cut through Race to be out there with his men, trying to save what he could of the life he’d worked so damned hard to build for himself. But then he ran his hand over the girl’s back, felt how delicately made she was, and started to feel ashamed. Even if she hadn’t been so upset, he would have needed to stay in camp to watch over her. There were more of those sons of bitches still out there, a fact he knew by his own count and tally, taken that night in the arroyo, and now verified by what he’d heard the blond ruffian say today. We got more men out there to make sure those cattle keep on runnin’.

  At any other time, Race would have been riding the grasslands until midnight or longer, trying to round up strays and minimize his losses as best he could. But he’d lose every cow and every last dollar to his name rather than leave this girl alone again and risk her being harmed. A man could always get more cattle. Or do without the headache of the loco beasts entirely and go back to what he did best, hiring out his gun.

  “Fate’ll win out in the end,” Race muttered, more for his own benefit than Corey’s. Old Blue was gone, and now it looked as if his ranch might go under, or damned close to it. Hell, next he might lose his shirt. “Things turn out the way they’re s’posed to, I reckon.” And maybe he wasn’t supposed to be a cattle rancher. Some men wer
e born to be no-accounts, and if they tried to change that, Fate slapped them down. “No point in pullin’ long faces over what can’t be fixed.”

  “No, sir. I reckon not.” Corey scuffed his boot heel on the wooden floor, then sighed. “Well, I’d best get back out there to spell McNaught. Digging for five is a trying job, and he’s been at it alone for nigh on to twenty minutes.” By way of farewell, he inclined his head toward the girl and said, “Ma’am.”

  If Rebecca heard him, she gave no sign of it.

  Race waited until the youth had exited the wagon, then he wet the cloth and wrung it out, intending to wash the blood off her. He decided to start with one of her hands, that being fairly safe territory. Maybe by the time he worked his way up to her face, neck, and chest, she would feel easier about the familiarities he was taking.

  “Rebecca, honey? Now don’t you be gettin’ alarmed or nothin’, but I need to get you cleaned up a mite.” He held up the neckerchief for her to see, then went on in the best whispery voice he could manage. “Corey brought some warm water, and it’ll feel real nice, okay?”

  He waited, but she simply stared at him with those deep blue eyes he found so fascinating. Taking that for assent, he gave her his best smile, then got to it. Still, it was no simple task, drawing her left arm from around his neck.

  “Let go, honey, so’s I can help you.”

  Instead of obeying, she pressed her face to his shoulder and clung to him almost desperately, as if all the demons of hell might be loosed on her if she wasn’t close against him. Fingers locked around her wrist, he had to force her arm down, and she resisted every inch of the way, trembling with the effort she expended.

  “Sugar, I’m not gonna hurt you, okay? But we got to get this done.” She was no match for him, of course, just as she’d been no match for the ruffian earlier. Bully for him, the uncontested winner, and wasn’t he just some pumpkins? He tucked her hand against his chest. The instant she felt his shirt, she latched on with her fist, holding so tight her knuckles went white.