He took a seat at the table. “Mind if I sit awhile?”
“Nope,” she told him as she grabbed the large wooden bowl that held the peas and joined him at the table.
“You know, the sheriff’s visit did make me realize something, though.”
“And that is?”
“I don’t know the first thing about what I’m doing.”
Jessi looked up. “I wondered when you’d get around to that, but I didn’t think you’d admit it aloud.”
“Me being so exaggerated and all,” he came back sarcastically.
He sounded offended, but she ignored the tone. “Exactly.”
“So you don’t have any faith in my abilities, either?”
“I don’t know anything about your abilities.” She paused. “Well, I know a bit about some of your abilities.”
He smiled at that.
“But in reality I’ve known you less than a week. I don’t have a true measure of what you’re capable of. I do know Darcy, however, and he’s been stampeding through folks’ lives since before either of us were born. He’s crafty, mean, and arrogant, and smart enough not to do his own killing.”
She held his eyes. “I’m not saying you can’t do what you came here to do. You obviously love a challenge.”
He smiled at that too.
“But this challenge could cost you your life. Darcy’s not going to surrender simply because you walk up and ask him to.”
Jessi paused to observe him for a moment. Had she stepped on his manly pride with her words? “You’re not one of those men who can’t handle taking a woman’s advice, are you?”
“I’m still deciding.”
Gasping with mock offense, she threw a few peas at him.
He ducked, chuckling, “Hey, I was being honest. Now, tell me about the sheriff.”
The light in Jessi eyes faded. “He and my father were best friends at one time. Grew up together. When Hatcher’s wife Betsy became ill, the doctor visits and the medicines she needed cost more than he could afford. He sold his ranch to Darcy’s bank because he needed the funds and then ran for sheriff with Darcy’s blessings.”
“When was this?”
“About five years ago. At first, Hatcher thought he was going to be a true sheriff. He’d fought on the side of the Union during the war, so he knew about honor, but Darcy stripped him of that. There were rumors that Hatcher had to do what he was told or Darcy wouldn’t pay for Betsy’s treatments.”
“What happened to his wife?”
“She died. The doctors said some kind of cancer.”
“Did Hatcher love his wife?”
“As much as my father loved this land. He hasn’t been the same since Betsy died. I thought he’d help avenge my father’s murder, but he didn’t.”
Jessi finished shelling the peas silently, then poured flour onto the tabletop and began combining the ingredients for the bread.
“How’d Darcy’s family get to be in charge here?”
“Through his father.”
“Explain.”
“My grandfather, Thomas, and Reed Darcy’s father, Vale, were given this land in ’36 as a reward for their bravery during the Texas war for independence. They were both freedmen. My grandfather started this ranch after getting his title, and Vale started a town he named for himself.”
“Humble man.”
“Very,” Jessi cracked. “Over time, more and more freedmen moved here and they brought their families and their businesses, and soon Vale was a real town. Vale Darcy died in ’56. That’s when Reed took over the reins.”
Griffin had heard about men of the race participating in the various Texas wars for independence, but had never been personally acquainted with one. He’d have to remember to ask her about her grandfather’s role sometime. “Besides burning out his neighbors and declaring war on women and children, what’s he like as a man?”
“You’ve met him. Pompous and arrogant. He’s the richest person around, and he makes sure everyone knows it. Gives fancy parties; has all of his house furnishings shipped from back east.”
Jessi began to knead the dough with relish. Just thinking about Darcy made her blood rise, and she took it out on the bread.
Griff watched her pounding the dough and smiled to himself. She was all fire. “I think that dough would yell surrender if it could.”
She stopped. “I guess I am being a bit brutal.” When she resumed, she worked the bread at a more normal pace.
Griff watched her silently for a while, noting the strength in her dark hands and how expertly she handled the task. “Can’t remember the last time I saw a woman making bread.”
“I’ve been making bread since my mother died.”
“How old were you?”
“Thirteen summers.”
After placing the bread in a big bowl to rise, Jessi covered it with a cloth, then rinsed her hands at the sink. Dipping herself a cup of water from the water jug by the sink, she told Blake, “It’s probably much cooler out on the back porch. How about we talk there?”
“An invitation?” he teased.
Jessi did her best to hide the smile in her eyes. “It’s an invitation to talk, nothing more.”
“Pity,” he replied without embarrassment.
Jessi decided that resisting him was going to be an all-day job. “You flirt as easily as you breathe, I think.”
“And I think that deep down inside you’re enjoying it.”
Jessi had to confess she was enjoying this highly-charged back-and-forth banter. It made her feel alive and, dare she say, sensual. Having him here awakened a part of herself she never knew existed. The path of life she’d been following since the death of her mother left little time to explore tenderness, frivolity, or feelings other than those fraught with pain and anger. Now life had put this man in her path and she didn’t know what she was supposed to do with him or about him. “So are you going to come out to the porch or not?”
He stood slowly and gestured. “After you.”
It was much cooler at the back of the house, just as she had hoped. She took a seat on the old rocker and he sat on the porch step.
“Where’d you grow up?” she asked, once they were comfortable and the silence of the Texas afternoon resettled around them.
“Nebraska. Mother died when I was ten. Drifted awhile until a preacher man named Royce Blake hauled me out of a whorehouse in Abilene and took me home.”
“A whorehouse? What were you doing there?”
“Worked there, ran errands for the girls and gamblers. Swept floors.”
“How old were you?”
“Twelve, thirteen.”
“Surely you weren’t on your own all that time after your mother’s passing?”
“Yep.” Griff didn’t want to think about those times.
“You had no other family?”
“None that I knew of.”
Jessi realized Blake carried his own heartaches. Royce Blake must have been a very special man to take in a thirteen-year-old orphan. “Did Mr. Blake have other children?”
“One, a son named Jackson. He’s a few years older than I am.”
“Did you two get along?”
Griff grinned. “Yeah, we did, although we were nothing alike.”
“Where is he now?”
“Here in Texas, last I heard. Probably in the Brazos Valley. He was a sheriff down there after Lincoln’s war, but when some rebs murdered Royce, Jackson had to leave or be lynched.”
“How long has it been since you’ve seen him?”
“Too long,” he replied wistfully. “Going on six or seven years now.”
Jessi could sense Blake’s love for his brother in his tone. “What’s he think about your way of life?”
A half smile curved his red gold mustache. “Hates it, of course. It’s hard having a former lawman in the family when you’re robbing trains, but he’s always walked the straight and narrow, even when we were young. I was the wild one. In and out of scrapes the
whole time.”
Jessi bet he’d been a handful to raise.
“Now it’s my turn to ask the questions,” he said, looking up at her and marveling again at her dark beauty.
“I suppose that’s only fair,” she responded. “But no questions about Bob.”
Griffin could see the firmness in her eyes. He nodded.
She looked away for a moment, her thoughts seemingly elsewhere, then she turned back. He could see pain in her eyes unveil itself briefly, then disappear. Someone had hurt her very badly, he sensed. “Joth said you were a teacher back east. I wanted to know where.”
“At the Miss Paris LaMarr School for Young Women of Color, in upstate New York. I taught literature and the sciences,” she replied, her voice brightening for a few moments. Then, as she began to relate more, the darkness returned. “When my sister died in childbirth, I came back to Texas to help my father raise Joth.”
In reality, Jessi had raised Joth alone. Her father’d loved Joth, probably more than anyone else in the world, but he’d loved the land more. It left him little time for anything else.
“Did you enjoy teaching?”
“Very much. The young women were bright and eager to learn, and Paris was wealthy enough to equip the school with all the materials and supplies we needed. She and I became fast friends in the three years I was there. I miss her dearly.”
“She’s the one responsible for all that gear in Joth’s room?”
“Yep. She’s as rich as Cleopatra and because she has no children of her own, Joth is her beneficiary. He’s still waiting to use those ice skates, even though he grew out of them a few years ago.”
“Is the school still open?”
“As far as I know, yes, it is.”
Jessi wondered how Paris was faring. They’d written back and forth regularly over the past ten years, but in the last nine months Jessi hadn’t had time to answer any of her friend’s letters—she’d been too busy surviving. “Enough about me. How’re you going to put Darcy in prison?”
“No idea. Now, if he were a train I wanted to rob, I’d do things like check out the arrival schedule and find out how many people are in the depot at night, what type of express car the train was running, how much gold it was carrying, and how secure it was.”
“Darcy isn’t a train,” Jessi pointed out.
“No, he’s not, but I’ll still have study him if we’re going to derail him.”
“Train similes, Mr. Blake?”
He shrugged. “Hey, my boss is a very smart lady, I’m just trying to keep up.”
She shook her head at his wit; she did enjoy his company. “So how would your friend Marshal Wildhorse start an investigation?”
“Probably by asking folks a bunch of questions.”
“Sounds like a good place to start. I wonder if Hatcher’s going to tell Darcy the truth about why you’re here?”
Griff shrugged. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
As the silence lengthened, Griff searched his mind for something, anything, to talk about. He didn’t want her to leave and go back into the house. “How’d your family come to be in Texas?”
“We Claytons are descendants of an African craftsman named Santo. He escaped from Louisiana and into Texas back in ’03.”
“’03? That was a long time ago.”
“Yes it was. After the French gave the United States Louisiana, Santo and many other Africans escaped across the Sabine River into Texas because the Spanish promised they’d be free here. Back then, the Spanish didn’t care if we owned land or who we married or if we held office. In fact, my great-grandmother Lydia was African-Mexican. The story goes that Santo purchased her out of a Galveston brothel and that she was very fiery and beautiful.”
Jessi looked at his lazy silent smile and asked, “What?”
“Nothing, just thinking that you could have been describing yourself when you said she was fiery and beautiful, but go on, I didn’t mean to interrupt your train of thought.”
Jessi groaned in reaction to the bad pun. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. You are definitely fiery and beautiful.”
Jessi shook her head. “I meant, are you sure I can go on with the story?”
“I’d much rather talk about your fire and beauty, but if you want to go ahead, the floor’s yours.”
“You’re flirting again.”
“Yes, ma’am, I definitely am.”
“You planning on wearing me down?”
“Nope, just plan to play until you say yes.”
“And if I don’t?”
“It’ll be my loss,” he replied without shame.
Jessi searched his eyes and saw that they were serious and unshuttered. What was he really about here? Jessi knew he was flirting, but was uncertain still about the intent behind the words. “What do you want me to say yes to?”
“Whatever you’re at ease with. If all you want to do is flirt, I’ll go with that. I just like being in your company, Jessi Clayton. One day I hope I get to show you just how fiery and beautiful I think you are.”
Griffin wanted nothing more than to kiss those lush, full lips, then magically draw her back into the dream he’d had last night and make slow, sweet love to her. He wondered if her late husband had loved her fully. He knew a gentleman wasn’t supposed to ponder such things, but Griff never claimed to be a gentleman.
Jessi forgot all about the story she’d been telling, she was too busy fighting off the effects of Griffin Blake’s last words. No man had ever spoken so frankly or so boldly to her before, and because she lacked the experience, she’d no idea how she was supposed to react. “I believe I should go and check on my bread.”
“What about the rest of the story?”
“I don’t think you’re really interested.”
“Sure I am.”
“Then will you behave, so I can finish?”
“Can’t promise you that, but I’ll do my best.”
Jessi could feel his light slipping into the dark corners of her soul.
Continuing the story, she told him of her grandfather’s role in the Texas Revolution. “The Battle of San Jacinto was the battle that finally won Texans their freedom. It was fought on April 21, 1836, and my grandfather was amongst the men there that day. Hendrick Arnold was another freedman at that battle, and he too was rewarded with land for his bravery.”
Griff had never heard of Arnold, nor of a Black man Jessi called Dick the Drummer.
“No one knew Dick’s last name,” Jessi explained, “but he was a freeman and already old and gray by the time the war came. The old-timers say he was as valuable as the fighting men because his drumming kept Santa Anna’s forces confused and off their stride. After the revolution he and his drum helped the U.S. Army at Monterrey and Buena Vista during the Mexican War. Are you sure you’re interested in all this?”
“Sure am.” Griff loved the sound of her smoky voice.
Jessi went on to talk about other Black heroes of the Texas Revolution, particularly those who’d fought at the Alamo, the most revered war site in the state’s history. “Even though all of the White male combatants were killed, some of the Blacks, like Joe Travis, who was a slave of Col. William B. Travis, were spared by General Santa Anna after the Alamo fell. Joe Travis was one of the first people to report the capture of the Alamo to the Texas provisional government.”
Griff found her accounts fascinating. Listening to her he learned that a slave named John, who was owned by Francis De Sauque, fought to his death alongside Crockett, Bowie, and Travis at the Alamo, and to this day lay buried with them in an unmarked common grave. He heard about Jim Bowie’s slave Sam, and how he, like the De Sauque slave John, was also captured and released after the battle. Griff had no idea there were women at the Alamo, but according to Jessi, Bowie also had with him a Black female cook named Betty.
Griff said, “But with all the turmoil between the races in Texas, I can’t believe they let your grandfather keep his land.”
“He almost didn’t. After the revolution, one of the first items undertaken by the new Texas government was to banish all free Blacks from the Republic of Texas who did not have Congressional permission to stay. Those allowed to stay could not vote or own land, but because of the pressure applied by some of the more powerful White veterans, Black men like my grandfather and others were made exceptions.”
“What about that Hendrick Arnold fellow? Did they give him permission to stay?”
“Supposedly, Mr. Arnold neither asked for nor received permission to stay. He simply resided on the 1,920 acres given to him in reward for his bravery and lived out his years there. He died in a cholera epidemic in ’49.”
Jessi looked down at Griff and asked, “So, is that enough history for today, Mr. Blake?”
Griff smiled. “I think so, but one last question.”
“Okay.”
“When are you going to stop calling me Mr. Blake? Being so formal doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, especially after last night.”
His soft words stroked her like a caress from his hands.
“It’s a very easy name to say,” he told her pleasantly. “Repeat after me: ‘Griffin.’”
Her eyes lit with humor. “Griffin.”
“Again.”
“Griffin.”
“See, that wasn’t very painful at all, was it?”
She shook her head no.
“Do you think you can call me that all the time?”
Jessi hesitated. “Yes. I suppose I can.”
“Good.”
“I’m going in and check on the bread. Any more questions?”
Griff had plenty, like When will you let me make love to you? Instead he replied, “Nope.”
She stood, only to have hear him say, “I’ll never force you to do anything you don’t want to do.”
Jessi knew what he meant, and even though she’d known him less than a week, she believed him without question. “I know.”
He touched his battered hat politely, then watched the tempting sway of hips as she went back inside.