Grace be a Lady (Love & War in Johnson County Book 1) (13 page)

Feeling
quite full of himself, Bull marched down the sidewalk. He tipped his hat
politely at the women, nodded knowingly at the men. He was Bull Hendrick, and
he was the King of Chicago. Men feared him, on both sides of the law. Women
loved him. His bank accounts runneth over. He had the world by its tail.
Almost.

He
had no reason to check on Grace, but the woman had never quite let go of a
spark of resistance, and that troubled Bull.

His
step slowed. If she came back, it wouldn’t be good for business. He would
appear foolish, weak. If he couldn’t control one stubborn female, how could he
run the South Side?

So
he would keep a check on her.

He
brushed a little lint from his hounds tooth sleeve and entered the Western
Union office. From behind the counter, an old man, as gray as a corpse, removed
his thick reading glasses. “Help you, sir?”

“I
need to send a telegram.”

Moving
like rigor mortis had already set in, the old man reached for a pad and pencil.
“Yes, sir.”

Deciding
not to let the slow service or concern over Grace spoil his mood, Bull nodded.
“To the sheriff in Misery, WY. STOP. Status of . . .” He jingled
the coins in his pocket. He could dole out less if he could shorten this
telegram. “No. Correction. To the sheriff Misery, WY. Family inquiring into
status of
G
.
Hendrick. Reply promptly.” As the man finished
writing, Bull fished the payment out of his pocket. “Signed, B. Hendrick.”

With
renewed vigor, Grace threw herself into the work at the ranch. Hate could do
that—energize the tired, focus the lost. Bull would not have the last laugh. He
would not keep her son from her.

“Pull
it tighter.”

A
pinch in her finger
brought her back to the business
at hand
and Raney’s steely gaze. The two were running fence on a barren
stretch of pasture, and the barbed wire had hooked Grace . . . again.
She refocused and leaned back, trying to hold the wire taut.

Shaking
her head, Raney finished driving the horseshoe nail into the post then tossed
her hammer to the ground. “Let’s eat,” she grumbled, heading toward the wagon.
Grace sensed the woman was displeased. Handling barbed wire with skill was
beyond her. Way beyond her. Grace peeled off her left glove and sighed at the
red puncture wounds speckling her palm and fingers. She eyed the fence line.
Compared to the strands Thad and his hands had run a few days ago, Grace’s
attempt to help Raney was loose and drooping.

She
would get better. She had to.

Raney
tossed her a sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. “Here, let’s get some meat on
those bones.” The woman muttered under her breath, “At least I’m gonna die
tryin’.”

Unwrapping
the sandwich, Grace took a seat in the grass and pondered the last few weeks.
Add the barbed wire to her string of—well, not failures, exactly—but Grace hadn’t
done any chores smoothly yet. Raney did everything as if she was born to ranch.
Grace, on the other hand, was clumsy and uncertain, like a new foal. Her string
of embarrassments paraded through her head.

She
had attempted to move the hogs the other day when a boar swung around and ran
her up on the fence. Raney, passing by, shoved an unlit cigarette between her
lips, opened the gate, whistled, and the animal jogged into the adjacent pen
like a house pet.

Grace
had mixed up feeding instructions and nearly foundered a horse. She’d built a
fire in Raney’s kitchen stove but forgot to open the flue. She’d tripped over
Dog the other day, crushing a basket of eggs in the dirt. Most noteworthy of
all, she’d set a hot branding iron down on Raney’s saddle bag and burned a hole
clean through it.

The
failures made her head ache and she rubbed her temple. If Raney fired her,
Grace could only see one option for employment. The thought stole her appetite
and she re-wrapped the sandwich. “I think I’ll save this for when I’m a little
hungrier.”

On
the way back to the ranch, Raney diverted from the road onto a skinny path.
After only a few yards, Grace saw the reason: two white headstones, surrounded
by a wrought iron fence, peeked above the waving autumn grass.

“I
rarely drive by without stopping,” Raney said, pulling up the brake. “I used to
get out and sit for hours. Now I just stop by for a minute. I guess that’s
good. Life moves on.”

Grace
hated to ask whose graves they were, and figured if Raney wanted to, she would
tell her. She surmised one belonged to Jake. But the other?

“Jake . . .
and my son, Cole. One day, I’ll be there beside ’em.”

Grace
flinched. Raney had lost her husband
and
a son. She couldn’t imagine
losing Hardy. The pain would be utterly insurmountable. And, yet, here sat
Raney, carrying on. Grace’s respect for her boss increased exponentially.

“Cole’s
wife Amanda couldn’t take the loss. She headed home to Alabama the day after
the stampede. Wasn’t even here for the funeral.”

Stampede?
Surely not.
“Did your son work
for . . .”

“Earl?”
Raney kept her attention on the graves. “Nah. We’d combined our herds that day
to get them over into the basin.” A gray strand of hair blew loose from her bun
and danced along her cheek. “It wasn’t Thad’s fault. Things happen. It’s called
ranching.”

Grace
studied the woman’s profile. A sharp nose and high cheekbones revealed the
ghost of a young girl, once pretty, mostly likely full of hope. Now, Raney wore
pain and forgiveness in every wrinkle. Hard-fought lines. “I’m sorry.”

The
woman shrugged and released the brake. “I’ve still got my daughter Katie. Sort
of.”

Katie?
That Katie?

“She
moved away to write for a newspaper. Wants to see the world. She’ll go pretty
far afield, I expect, but one day she’ll come home to Wyoming.”

An
inexplicable sense of dismay drove Grace’s spirits even lower. “I’m sure she
will,” she whispered without any enthusiasm.

Thanks
to Thad, Grace had developed at least one skill useful on a ranch. She could
drive nails.

Confident
she could handle this new project, she climbed a ladder and emerged on the line
shack’s roof. The view stopped her in her tracks. Rolling plains, the rich
amber of honey, dipped and rose toward the towering, snow-capped Big Horn
Mountains. Blond cottonwoods lined the creek, revealing its meandering path
through the valley. A mile away, Raney’s white farmhouse and red buildings
glowed against the shimmering sea of tawny grass. Sunshine peeked
intermittently through rolling gray clouds, but didn’t deliver any warmth.

Grace
liked Wyoming. Lonely, quiet, filled with wild animals and vast, empty
distances, as opposite of Chicago as the South Pole . . . yet
she felt peace here. A place she could call home.

The
November breeze tossed occasional snowflakes about as it carried along the
contented mooing of the herd, reminding her of the job she’d come to do. Cedar
shingles covered the swaybacked roof before her, but several were missing in
the center near the crumbling, river rock chimney. Two more trips up the ladder,
and she had her supply of nails and shingles at the ready. The roof, though,
was fairly steep, and several times one or the other of her supplies tried to
slide off. Frustrated, she laid shingles atop the chimney, hooked the nail
bucket over her arm, dropped to her knees, and slid a plank into place. Pulling
the hammer from her belt, she went to work.

More
than once, shingles shifted out from under her, adding several more to the
number to be replaced. Undaunted, she worked hard, and at a steady pace.
Finally, down to the last repair, she crept toward the chimney like she was
walking on eggs, and grabbed a shingle. She stepped over a few feet and
squatted to nail it in place.

The
cedar beneath her right foot let go with a screech. Grace’s weight shifted, and
her feet slipped out from under her, throwing her face down onto the roof. She
rocketed feet-first toward the edge, clawing and scrambling like a madman for
something stationary. More shingles ripped lose beneath her fingers, and Grace
went over the ledge in a shower of cedar.

The
fall wasn’t all that far, and she tried to right herself before hitting the
ground, but her left foot landed on a rock and slipped sideways. White-hot pain
seared deep into her ankle and shot up her leg. She howled and collapsed hard
on her rear end. Tears sprang to her eyes. Moaning, she commenced to rubbing
the burning ankle furiously, trying to snuff out the breath-taking pain. She
writhed in torment, swinging her head back and forth, and panting like a dog.

“Holy
cow, you’re lucky you didn’t break your neck.”

Pounding
hoof beats barely cut through the black shroud of pain that surrounded her like
a fog. She recognized Thad’s voice, but couldn’t let go of the agony consuming
her. Oh, God, when would it stop?

“Here,”
Thad moved her hands, “let me make sure it ain’t broke.”

Grace
had the urge to punch him for butting in, but it was fleeting. At his touch,
the pain started slowly ebbing to something that didn’t make her want to throw
up. Thinking a bit more clearly, she watched Thad’s hands with fascination as
he carefully worked the boot off her foot, then the sock, and ran warm fingers
lightly over the ankle.

“Hmmm.
Hard to tell yet. You sure got little bones. Did you hear anything snap?”

He
cupped his hands around her ankle and heel. She was amazed how good his touch
felt, like a balm to her injury, and she found herself wishing he’d keep
holding her that way.

“No,
it just felt like a wrenching.”

He
pulled away. “All right, let’s see if you can put any weight on it.” He hauled
her to her feet. Grace made the effort, but any weight at all sent pain
exploding from the ankle in all directions. She gasped and folded, but Thad
caught her before she collapsed to the ground. “Guess that answers that. Let’s
get you back to Raney’s.” He retrieved his horse and positioned him next to
Grace. Taking a breath, he lifted her into the saddle, sideways. “Shoot, you
don’t weigh anything, boy.”

He
rolled her sock gently back up on her foot, handed her the boot, then stepped
into the stirrup and settled in behind her. The warmth coming off his chest
made butterflies flutter in her stomach. A little unnerved by her reaction, she
pulled away, but realized quickly that was no way to ride.

“What
about the wagon?”

“I’ll
come back for it. Here,” he pulled her to him, “lean on me and rest your foot
over Bo’s neck.”

Settled,
Thad kicked his horse into an easy lope. Grace closed her eyes and pretended
for a moment the man holding her was all hers; his strong arms, his warm body,
his hips moving rhythmically with the horse. She could so easily drift and
dream about his lips brushing her neck . . .

“You
even smell like her.”

Reality
fell on Grace like a brick, and she moved away from him, just enough so she
wasn’t touching him. What had she heard in his voice? Longing?

“Greg,
I’ll give you a hundred dollars if you get your sister to the dance.”

“That
all she’s worth?” Grace tried to sound offended, but didn’t think she quite
accomplished it.”

“Name
your price,” Thad responded instantly. “Then double it. And, in truth, it still
wouldn’t be enough.”

In
spite of her throbbing ankle, a smile deviled the corners of Grace’s mouth.