Tyler, page 13
Chapter Nine
Nell worried all night about Margie and Tyler and what she was going to do. Her own insecurities haunted her.
She went downstairs, her thoughts murky and still without concrete answers. She half expected Tyler to be there again, waiting for her, but he wasn’t.
Bella bustled in with breakfast and sat down beside Nell. “Too early for the new arrivals to be up and hungry, so you and I can have ours in peace,” she said, pouring two cups of coffee. “Tyler’s having his in the bunkhouse.”
“That’s nothing unusual, is it?” Nell sighed. “He always seems to be eating down there lately.”
“I don’t think he’s felt very welcome here in recent days,” Bella told her bluntly. “Pity, because he sure is a nice fella and you could do worse.”
“It isn’t me he wants,” Nell said curtly, glaring at the older woman as she helped herself to a fresh biscuit and buttered it. “It’s Margie.”
Bella sipped her coffee. “Did he tell you that?”
“No. But he didn’t deny it, either.”
The older woman spooned scrambled eggs onto her plate and reached for bacon. “Nell, I steered you wrong when Tyler came here. I should have encouraged you to dress up and act like a young lady. I should have realized what kind of man he was. But I didn’t, and I’ve helped complicate things. I’m sorry.”
“You didn’t do anything,” Nell said. She glowered at her eggs. “I’m not the kind of woman a man like Tyler needs. I’m just a country tomboy. I don’t even know how to dance.”
“Stop running yourself down,” Bella said gruffly. “Listen, child, just because Darren McAnders couldn’t see past Margie to you is no reason for you to bury yourself in baggy britches forever. You’re young and pretty, and if you tried, you could be everything Tyler needs. Don’t forget, he isn’t a rich man anymore. He doesn’t need a social butterfly, he needs a woman who can help him build a new legacy for his children.”
“Margie can work,” Nell said halfheartedly.
“Oh, sure, like she does when she’s here?” Bella scoffed. “Fat chance. Tyler would be out of his mind after the first week and you know it. She’d never cook supper—she’d be too busy trying on dresses in town or gossiping on the telephone.”
“She’s pretty and flamboyant.”
“A sensible man doesn’t want a wall decoration, he wants a flesh-and-blood woman.”
“I guess I’m flesh and blood,” Nell agreed.
“And a hard worker, a good little cook, and a companion who listens more than she talks. You’re a jewel,” Bella concluded. “You should think positively. At least you’ve made a start. You’re wearing clothes that really fit, and you’ve put away that horrible slouchy hat and let your hair down. You look like a different Nell.”
“I decided that you and Margie were right about what happened with Darren,” she conceded. “I overreacted because I didn’t know what a man was like when he was hungry for a woman. Well, not then, at least.”
Bella’s eyes widened. “And now you do?” she asked with a slow, wicked smile.
Nell felt the flush working its way up her neck. She reached blindly for her coffee and turned it over onto the tablecloth and herself.
“Oh, my, what little fumble fingers.” Bella chuckled.
“I meant to do that,” Nell protested as she got to her feet, brushing at a tiny spot on her blue-checked Western shirt and her new jeans. She glared at Bella. “I just hate coffee. And I don’t fumble!” she added.
Then she turned around and tripped over the chair and fell flat on her face.
Bella doubled over laughing while Nell, bruised and furious, disentangled herself from the chair. She was turning the air blue when she saw a pair of boots come into view past her nose.
“She don’t fumble,” Bella explained to the boots, and walked off into the kitchen.
Nell scrambled to her feet, assisted by a familiar lean strong hand.
“Having trouble?” Tyler asked pleasantly.
She did fumble then, nervous with him and still uncertain of her ground. She looked up into his dark face, wondering at the secret pleasure it gave her just to stare at him.
“I was looking for a contact lens,” Nell said, flustered.
“You don’t wear contact lenses,” he pointed out.
She cleared her throat. “That doesn’t mean that I can’t look for one if I want to.”
He smiled slowly. “Whatever turns you on,” he said dryly.
She brushed back her unruly hair. “What can I do for you?” she asked abruptly.
“You can come on the camp out trail ride with me this afternoon,” he said. “Chappy’s tied up with those new mares, so I told him we’d take the greenhorns out today.”
She colored. “You and not Darren?”
He pursed his lips. “That’s right. Is that a problem?” he added quietly.
She was still feeling her way, but telling the truth might be a good start, she decided. “No, it’s not a problem,” she said. “Darren has been a good friend. But I’d rather be with you.”
He smiled slowly because her face flamed when she said it, and her shyness made her even more delectable to him. She was a pretty woman when she didn’t dress like a baggy orphan.
“I’d rather be with you, too, sunshine,” he said softly.
Her heart soared. Heaven must be this sweet, she thought dazedly. She smiled at him, her dark eyes like brown velvet.
Bella came through the door and broke the spell. Nell excused herself as the housekeeper giggled wickedly, and went out into the hall to get her hat. She did her usual chores, feeling as if she were walking on air, and the day was all too long until it was time to pack the bedrolls and the cooking utensils and the food that Bella had provided and head out for an overnight camp out. The Double R Ranch was one of the few left that did it for real, complete with bedrolls and rough accommodations and no luxuries. Only a few hardy souls were willing to rough it the way the old-time cowboys had.
There were six people in the party, three couples. Four of that number were good riders already, and they weren’t afraid of snakes or coyotes or rolling into the camp fire in their sleep. It was a beautiful day, with the ragged mountains ringing around the flat grassy plain, and Nell felt on top of the world as she rode along at the head of the group with Tyler at her side. She kept looking back to make sure she wasn’t losing any of their small parade.
“They’re doing fine,” Tyler told her as he lit a cigarette with steady hands. “Don’t worry so much.”
“Two of them have never even seen a real horse before,” she reminded him.
“The Callaways?” He grinned, referring to a newly married, middle-aged couple who were, to put it politely, well fed. “No, but you’ve taught them how to stay on, at least, and they’re getting the hang of it. Just relax.”
She tried, but being a mother hen had become a habit, and she had a bad feeling about doing this camp out without Chappy and the chuck wagon that usually came along with a bigger crowd.
And sure enough, things did begin to go wrong suddenly. They rode for an hour and then turned back toward the ranch house and stopped about a mile out to make camp just before dark.
Mrs. Callaway, a pleasant cheerful little blond lady, came down off her horse too suddenly and caught her blouse on the pommel. There she hung, two inches above the desert floor, while the horse shook his head and pranced restlessly.
Tyler leaped forward to lift Mrs. Callaway while Nell soothed the horse and extricated the blouse.
“Are you all right, Mrs. Callaway?” Nell asked anxiously when the red-faced little woman had stopped shaking in her concerned husband’s arms.
“Oh, I’m fine,” she said with a grin. “What a story to tell the folks back home!”
Nell relaxed, but Mrs. Callaway’s experience was only the beginning. Her husband went to help Tyler and the other men gather brush to make a fire and unearthed a long, fat, very unsocial rattlesnake.
He let out a war whoop, which startled Mrs. Donnegan, who backed into a cactus and let out a war whoop of her own. By the time the rattlesnake was disposed of by Tyler, and Mrs. Donnegan had her cactus spines removed by Nell, everybody was ready to eat. Tyler had a roaring fire going and had passed out wieners and buns and marshmallows and sticks for the guests while he brewed up a pot of black coffee.
“I really hate coffee,” Mrs. Harris remarked. She was the only sour note in the bunch, a city woman who’d come to the desert only because her husband had coaxed her into it. She hated the desert, the cactus, the heat, the isolation—she hated everything, in fact. “I’d rather have a soft drink.”
“No problem,” her husband said. “We’ll ride down to the ranch and get one.”
“On that horse?” Mrs. Harris wailed, her black eyes going even blacker. “I hurt in places I didn’t even know I had!”
“Then you can drink coffee, can’t you, sweetheart?” her husband continued.
She pouted, but she shut up. The Callaways sat close together, sharing condiments for the hot dogs while they munched on potato chips and carried on a casual conversation with the other guests on a variety of newsy subjects.
Nell enjoyed the quiet wonder of night on the desert as she never had, especially when Tyler started telling their guests about the surrounding territory and something of its history. She hadn’t realized how much he knew about southeastern Arizona, and some of it she hadn’t even known herself.
He talked about places like Cochise Stronghold, where the famous Apache chief was buried. There was a marker there, he added, telling that Indian Agent Tom Jeffords, a friend of Cochise, was the only white man privileged to know the exact spot of the chief’s burial. The Apaches had run their horses over the ground and dragged it with brush behind them to conceal forever the place where Cochise rested.
There was also the famous Copper Queen Hotel in Bisbee, a landmark from old copper mining days in the Lavender Pit, where guests drank French champagne and were entertained by famous singers.
Farther south was Douglas, where Agua Prieta lay just over the border in Mexico. Pancho Villa had raided the border town, and a hotel in Douglas bore the marks of his horse on its marble staircase, which could still be seen today.
“You know a lot about this part of the state, Mr. Jacobs,” Mr. Callaway remarked. “Do you come from around here?”
“No. I’m from south Texas.” He smiled. “Near Victoria. My people founded a little place called Jacobsville, where I was raised.”
“I love Texas,” Mrs. Callaway said, sighing. “I guess you have cactus and mesquite and sagebrush….”
“Actually, it’s more like magnolias, live oaks and dogwood trees,” Tyler mused. “West Texas has those plants you’re thinking about.”
She blushed. “Sorry.”
He laughed out loud. “Don’t feel bad, a lot of people don’t realize just how many different geographic sections there are in Texas. We’ve got everything from beach to desert to mountain country and plains. Texas had the option of becoming five separate states if it wanted to. But nobody ever did.”
“I can see why,” Mrs. Callaway said. “I’ve heard that you can drive from sunup to sunset and never leave Texas.”
“That’s very nearly true,” he agreed.
“I suppose you’ll go back there one day?” the small woman asked.
Tyler looked at Nell, his eyes narrow, thoughtful as they caressed hers until she caught her breath. “Maybe. Maybe not,” he added softly, and smiled at Nell.
She felt lighter than air all over again, invincible. She laughed delightedly. “Anybody want more marshmallows?”
They roasted marshmallows until nobody could stuff another one into his mouth, and then they laid out the bedrolls and settled down for the night, while the orange flames of the camp fire drifted lazily back and forth in the faint wind. It was cold on the desert at night. The guests had been told that and were prepared.
Nell moved her sleeping bag close to Tyler’s, to his secret delight, and with a shy glance at him as he rested with his saddle for a pillow, she settled down beside him.
“Comfortable?” he asked, his voice deep and soft in the firelit darkness as he turned on his side to watch her.
“Yes.” She gave in to the need to look at him, to memorize the lines and curves of his face, his body. She felt a kind of possessiveness toward him that she didn’t really understand. “Do you miss Texas, Tyler?” she asked hesitantly.
“I got pretty homesick at first,” he conceded. “But there’s something about this desert that gets into your blood. It’s full of history, but the cities are forward-looking, as well, and there are plenty of conservationists around who care about the land and water resources. Yes, I miss Texas. But I could live here, Nell,” he said, smiling at her.
She wanted so badly to ask him if it was just because he liked the land, but she couldn’t get the words to form properly. She blurted out, “With Margie?”
His eyebrows lifted. “Did I say with Margie?”
“No, but…”
He reached out a lean hand and touched her fingers where they lay cold and trembling on her stomach. His covered them, warmed them and made her tingle from head to toe. “I told you, Nell, you’re going to have to figure it out for yourself. I won’t tell you how I feel about Margie, or how I feel about you, for that matter.”
“Why?” she asked more plaintively than she knew.
“Because I want you to understand a little more about trust than you do, honey,” he replied. “There’s a part of you that draws back and shies away from me. Until you get it worked out, I’m not going to influence you one way or the other.”
She sighed. “I guess maybe I’ll work it out, then.”
“Want to come closer?” he coaxed with a warm smile. “You’re pretty safe, considering how we’re surrounded by curious eyes.”
She yielded to the temptation to be close. Inching her way, she moved her sleeping bag right up against his and turned on her side to rest beside him, with her head pillowed on one of his hard arms.
“That’s better,” he said softly. He eased forward a fraction of an inch and brushed her warm lips gently with his, savoring their faint trembling, their helpless response. “You might keep something in mind,” he whispered.
“Oh? What?” she breathed against his lips, and her eyes opened straight into his.
“You aren’t wearing makeup or a fancy dress,” he whispered quietly. “And I’m not drawing back because you don’t appeal to me the way you are.”
Her fingers touched his face, loving its strength. “I’m not pretty,” she said.
“You are to me,” he said. “That’s all that matters in the long run, if you’d open your eyes and see what’s right under your nose.”
“I see you,” she said, her voice achingly tender as she adored him with her eyes.
“That’s what I mean,” he replied. He drew her closer. The saddle protected their faces from prying eyes, and he bent slowly to press his mouth hard against hers. “I want you, Nell,” he said into her parted lips as he bit at them.
She wanted him, too. Her body was already on fire, and all he was doing was kissing her. She nibbled helplessly at his teasing mouth, and her hand smoothed into his thick hair, trying to draw him down.
“No,” he breathed. “You can’t have my mouth that way, not tonight. I can’t lose my head with you, honey. There are too many witnesses.”
“What if we were alone?” she moaned under her breath. She slid her arms around his neck to press her breasts against his hard chest.
“Nell…damn it.” He shuddered. He lifted his tormented eyes to the camp fire. It was dying down and he needed to get up and put some fresh wood on it. The other campers were in their sleeping bags and turned toward the fire in a semicircle, which he and Nell were behind. No one could see them. He realized that now, and his powerful body trembled with the need to ease Nell onto her back and slide his leg between both of hers and show her how much he wanted her. He could feel her skin against his, the silken warmth of her breasts hard tipped under his broad chest, the cries that he could tease out of her throat while he seduced her body slowly and tenderly and penetrated its virginal purity….
He groaned. His fingers on her arms hurt, but she didn’t mind. Something powerful and mysterious was working in him, and she was too hungry to be afraid of it. This was Tyler, and she loved him with all her heart. She wanted memories, all that she could get, to press to her mind in the years that would follow.
“What is it?” she asked.
He looked down at her. In the dim light he could see her soft eyes, he could feel her quickened breathing. His hand moved with quiet possession over her blouse and smoothed around her breast until he found the hard tip. He watched her bite her lip and jerk toward him, trying not to cry out lest someone heard her.
“This is not sane,” he whispered as the arm under her nape contracted with desire. “Of all the stupid places to make love….”
“Touch me,” she whispered brokenly.
His breath was audible as the words shattered his control and made him vulnerable. “Oh, Nell, you can’t imagine what I’m thinking.” He laughed huskily as his hand slid to the buttons of her blouse and began to lazily unfasten them. “You can’t imagine what I want to do to you.”
“Yes, I can,” she whispered back, “because you told me, remember?” Her eyes met his searchingly. “You told me every single detail.”
His powerful body trembled as he reached the last button. “Yes. And I dreamed it that night. Dreamed that I took you under me and felt your body like a field of flowers absorbing me so tenderly.” He was whispering, but the tone of his voice drugged her. His fingers slid under the fabric and stopped with delighted surprise when he found nothing except soft warm skin.
