Texas Blue (17 page)

“I’ve never been friends with a woman, but I’d like to try. Picking one who already knows she can beat me up anytime she likes seems like a good choice to start with.”

She didn’t say anything for a while, and he guessed she was planning on reminding him about the robber he’d called his friend just before he’d tossed the knife into his hand.

She stood suddenly and began shaking out the blanket.

Before he could think of what to say, she sat back down and settled the blanket over them both. “I guess we could try. What does this being real friends entail?”

He studied her in the pale lights coming from the house. “Well, first we try hard to be honest with each other. No pretending.” When she didn’t move, he added. “No subjects are out of bounds, but if you, or I, don’t want to answer, we don’t have to. As friends we’ll respect each other’s boundaries.”

“Fair enough.”

He decided that if this was going to work, he needed to risk losing the hand right now; otherwise, he wouldn’t be following his own rules. “Why’d you have us ride double back in the trees?”

She didn’t answer. He pushed so they would swing gently and waited. Strange, he thought, how the most interesting woman at the ranch wasn’t one of Duncan’s cousins. He admired Em, but he wasn’t sure he liked her. Right now, so the week wasn’t a total waste of his time, he hoped to go back to Austin with a little better understanding of women, and this one next to him seemed as good a subject to study as any.

“We didn’t need to,” she finally said, drawing her knees up to her chest. “Your horse would have followed mine.”

“I figured that out,” he offered.

“I guess I just wanted to be close to you. I don’t ever plan to marry, but sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be close to a man, to see what he smells like and feels like. Most of the men here on the ranch are related to me or old enough to be my father, and I stopped going to the few socials in town years ago. I’m twenty-six years old and I’ve never been kissed.”

“That’s impossible,” he said.

She shook her head. “When I was in my teens I’d cry if my mother tried to make me go to a church picnic or a dance. After I turned twenty, I think my family just assumed I’d never marry. Besides, I’m not likely to meet anyone out here, and I hate leaving Whispering Mountain.”

Lewt frowned. He had no desire to kiss Em. Not that she was ugly, she was just plain. The kind of plain that makes a woman invisible to a man. Some women, just watching them move stirred a man. Others had pretty faces or big eyes that a fellow never tired of looking at. Some were top heavy or nicely rounded on the bottom. Em was none of those, but somebody had to give the girl her first kiss and he seemed to be the only one around willing to risk death to do so.

“Would you promise not to shoot me if I kissed you, Em?”

“I wasn’t asking,” she snapped.

“I know, but I’m offering anyway. And before you yell at me and say no, I’d like to promise that I wouldn’t give or expect more than a kiss.”

“No strings?”

“No strings. I’ll just kiss you and then you’ll know what it’s like.”

She was silent so long he considered the possibility that she’d fallen asleep, and then she straightened and said simply, “All right, what do I do?”

He stretched his arm over the back of the swing. “Move closer and look up at me.”

She did, but he wouldn’t have been surprised if she had her hand on her Colt beneath the blanket.

“Now take your hat off.”

He thought he heard her swear, but she pulled the hat off and tossed it on the table where the blanket had been. He put his arm gently around her. “Relax, Em. This isn’t going to hurt, you know, and when it’s over you can say you’ve been kissed.”

He leaned over and brushed his lips lightly over hers. When she didn’t move, he asked, “You all right?”

She nodded. “That wasn’t so bad.”

“I’m not finished.” He smiled an inch away from her. “Now take a deep breath and let your mouth open slightly.”

This time when he touched her lips, they felt soft, ready to be kissed. He tugged her gently toward him as he let her get used to the feel of his lips on hers. When he circled his other hand at her waist, he felt her stiffen again and whispered against her mouth, “It’s all right. Relax, Em. It’s me, remember.”

He half expected her to bolt from the swing, but she didn’t. She let him taste her lips. “Feel the warmth of it moving through your body. There’s something magic in a kiss.”

She made a little sound of pleasure, and his hand at her waist moved to her back. “Now, put your arms around my neck and open your mouth, Em.”

He held her close as she jerked when the kiss deepened and his mouth fit over hers. There would be no more talking, he thought; from now on he’d have to show her.

He kissed her as tenderly as he guessed a woman would want her first kiss to be. Her cheeks were warm when he finally released her mouth and kissed his way across her face to whisper in her ear, “That was great, Em. Now breathe and we’ll finish this kiss.”

He could hear her rapid breathing, but he wanted to feel it. He tugged her closer until the rise of each breath made her breasts brush against his chest. He hadn’t been prepared for how good she would taste. He wanted more, but he waited until she calmed in his arms.

“Open your mouth again,” he whispered, “and this time kiss me back.”

His mouth lowered over hers as his tongue plunged inside. Then, she was kissing him back. Awkward at first, but hungry, and Lewt felt like his mind was exploding. A hunger built inside him. Roughly, he pulled her onto his lap and held her so tight he feared she couldn’t breathe. When she’d decided to kiss him back, he’d lost all control of this little favor he thought he was doing for her.

Finally, when they both had to come up for air, he broke the kiss but held her tightly to him. There was nothing plain about the way she kissed.

She slipped off his lap, pulled the blanket over them both, and leaned her head on his shoulder. “Thanks,” she whispered. “That was nice.” As her breathing returned to normal, he realized she was asleep with her hand laced in his.

Lewt rocked for a while, wondering what had just happened. He’d been kissed a thousand times. When he’d been about fifteen and had no money, the ladies in one of the bars would play a game with him. They’d all walk past him and kiss him and laugh as they teased him. Their kisses had been bold, hungry, sometimes savage.

But Em hadn’t been teasing him, and she didn’t pull away when the kiss got interesting. She didn’t want him any more than the ladies of the night did, but what they’d just done hadn’t been a game.

He lifted her up and carried her to the couch. The blankets Emily had used were still scattered around. Lewt covered Em, then knelt down and kissed her on the cheek. “See you in the morning,” he whispered as he brushed a stray strand of white-gold hair away from her soft cheek. He knew that the woman he’d meet at dawn would be nothing like the woman he’d just held in his arms, but maybe, if he was lucky, he’d see this Em one more time before he had to leave.

 

D
UNCAN WOKE SLOWLY ONE PAIN AT A TIME. HIS mouth was so dry he thought he must have eaten the sandy dust around him in his sleep. His entire leg throbbed as if it were slow-roasting on a fire, yet the rest of his body was so cold he couldn’t stop shaking. And, on top of everything, something was jabbing into his back over and over, harder with each blow.

“You dead, mister?” Each word was punctuated by another stab.

Duncan figured if the outlaws had been the ones poking, they would have just fired a round to make sure he was dead and not asked. “No,” he tried to say as he rolled over and grabbed the stick. “But I’ll make you wish you were.”

He jerked the branch toward him so fast the pile of rags on the other end squealed and let go.

Duncan’s leg was worthless. He pulled himself out from under the rock with his arms. “Who are you?” he demanded, as if he had some right to know.

The figure before him reminded him more of a character in a nightmare than a real person. She couldn’t have been five feet tall. With the scraps of clothes layered all around her and her sombrero, she looked like some kind of huge, colorful mushroom. He wouldn’t have been sure she was female except for the squeal, and half her face was draped in black as though she considered herself in half-mourning.

The creature grabbed back her stick and hurried a few steps away. “I’m Toledo, named for the town in Spain where I was born, and you, mister, are a dead man talking to me.”

Duncan tried to sit up but couldn’t. “You’re not telling me anything I don’t know, old woman.” He stared at the pile of rags, knowing that if the wound on his leg didn’t kill him in the next few hours, one of the outlaws would. If an old woman could find him, surely a lookout would. As soon as it was full light, he’d be an easy target. If he tried to move toward the border, he’d leave a wide trail of blood for anyone to follow.

“Folks don’t like rangers on this side of the border, and they have good reason. You Texas devils come down here and cause nothing but trouble. You’d better vanish or they’ll be using you for target practice in an hour.”

Duncan tried to focus. “I don’t much like being here,” he said, as he spotted her cart sparkling in the first rays of dawn. The old woman was a tinker; her wares of pots and pans and brooms hung from her cart much like her clothes hung from her body. “Any chance you could help me get to the river?”

“There are guards watching the river,” she answered. “I saw them last night when I passed. They had a wild-eyed horse staked out to catch you, but he got away.”

“She broke free. I knew she would.”

“Sí.”
Toledo snorted. “And she unsaddled herself also. A very wise horse you have, Ranger.”

Duncan guessed his horse was halfway back to the ranch by now. He knew his only hope of staying alive now was to bargain with the woman. “I could pay you if you helped me.”

She laughed. “I could just sit here and wait until you die and then take all your money. I’m too old to go helping half-dead men who sleep where they do not belong.”

He swore. She was right, and from the way he felt, she wouldn’t have to wait long to collect his coins. He thought of pulling his gun and demanding her help, but she didn’t look like a woman who’d fall for that. Right now she could swing that stick and knock him out before he could clear leather with his Colt.

“Name your price for helping me,” he said, knowing he’d have little chance surviving the day, and if he did, he’d be too weak to make it to the river, much less swim across.

“I want your word that you’ll help me make a little money to tide me over the winter, but I’ ll not ask anything of you until you can walk.”

“You’re not asking me to do something illegal?”

She shook her head.

“How do you know I won’t walk out and forget your problem?” The lawyer part of him wanted to make both sides clear, even though he realized it might cost him his life. He doubted that he had enough life left to be of much help to her. The sun seemed to be fading even though he could still feel its warmth on his face. If he passed out now, in the open, he had a feeling he’d wake up dead.

The woman rattled on as if he were paying attention. “Because if I help you, I’ll be risking my life, and when you’re well, even if I ask you to do the same, you’re honor bound. I haven’t figured out what, but I bet I can make use of you.”

She stared at him and shifted her weight. Her skirts moved just enough for him to see the rifle at her side. “If you get away without making me a little money, I’ll find you and kill you along with every relative you have. Don’t doubt Toledo. I’ve done such a thing before and I’m more than capable of doing it again.”

Duncan didn’t see any choice in the matter. Either way he was probably counting his time left by hours. “All right. You have my word. If you can get me out of this mess, I’ll help you, but if we don’t do something fast the only way you’ll be helping me is to bury me.”

She poked him again with her stick. “Wake up,” she ordered. “Wake up.”

He rolled over, trying to ignore the pain in his leg. She helped him to his feet, and then with the stick as a crutch and the little woman holding him up on one side, they made it to the cart. While he held on to the little wagon, she pulled everything from the floor, shoved him in, and began dumping her goods on top of him.

As she worked, he looked up just as the wind caught the scarf covering one side of her face and lifted it long enough for him to see what she hid. Twisted scars rippled from her eye to her neck, reminding him of a dried-up riverbed still echoing the water’s flow. The left side of her face was deformed, but not unbearable to look at. He found it surprising one so old could still be so vain.