A Texan's Honor (24 page)

“Get down,” Bret said to Zeke and Hawk. They'd remained in the saddle during the conversation.

“The lady hasn't asked us yet,” Hawk said.

“I'm sorry,” Emily said, mortified she'd been so nonplused she'd completely forgotten her manners. “Please, get down and come in.”

“Let me take them to the bunkhouse first,” Bret said. “They need to meet Lonnie.” He looked at Jinx and grinned. “You'll have your hands full with him.”

“I ain't no trouble,” Jinx insisted.

“You wouldn't have been if you'd stayed in Fort Worth until I got back,” Bret said.

“I was telling the lady here—”

“Save it,” Bret said. “You can tell me later.”

“You're not going to forget about me, are you?” Jinx asked, glancing nervously in Emily's direction.

“I couldn't if I wanted to,” Bret said. “Now behave yourself and do exactly what Miss Abercrombie tells you.”

Emily watched Bret and his brothers lead their
horses toward the corrals and the bunkhouse. It was hard to imagine three such different people growing up in the same family, but it was obvious that a strong bond connected them even if they did seem a little stiff with each other. She had a feeling Zeke and Hawk hadn't shown up by accident; Bret must have written to them. But Lonnie disliked Bret so much, he wasn't likely to want two of his brothers working for him. She also had the feeling Zeke and Hawk wouldn't work for anybody but Bret. If Lonnie figured that out, things could get difficult.

But right now she had to decide what to do with Jinx. “Come on in the house,” she said. “I want you to meet Bertie.”

“Who's he?” Jinx asked.

“
She
is the cook. And you have to be good to her or your life won't be worth a sack of oats.”

“She's going to hate me,” Jinx mumbled. “All women hate me.”

“I don't.”

“You're a girl,” Jinx said.

That made her smile. “I'd forgotten that.”

“How can you forget you're a girl?”

“Someday I'll tell you. For now, wipe your feet, push your hair out of your eyes, and be on your best behavior. Don't think you can impress Bertie with your poor-little-orphan-boy act. The only person I've ever seen get around her is Bret, and I still haven't figured out how he did it.”

“That guy would have run us off if he could have figured how to do it,” Zeke said to Bret. “Why does he dislike you so much?”

“Lonnie wants to marry Emily and run the ranch. That makes me a threat.”

“How about the rest of the cowhands?” Hawk asked.

“They know one of them is helping the rustlers, and that hasn't gone down well. The crew is loyal to the brand. I think Lonnie is the culprit, but Emily and her father insist they won't believe me until I produce proof. The evidence points to him, but he's so crazy about Emily, I can't see why he would do something like that.”

“I don't understand why the rustlers are branding calves rather than running them off,” Zeke said.

“Neither do I,” Bret said, “but I think that's the clue to the whole thing.”

“Any theories?”

“Maybe.”

They were leaning on the fence of the big corral. Each man had a booted foot resting on the bottom rail as they watched Hawk and Zeke's horses roll in the dust. Rather than trust their lives to unknown ranch ponies, they had brought their own mounts, a big Appaloosa and a heavily muscled steeldust gelding.

“I think Lonnie is doing it because he wants to make Emily believe she's in danger of losing the ranch,” Bret explained. “If she's scared enough and believes he can save it for her, he thinks she'll marry him. That's why I think the calves are being branded rather than rustled.”

“That sounds crazy,” Zeke said, “but it covers all the points except one. What will happen when it comes time to sell the cows and they're wearing the wrong brand?”

“By then he may have thought of a way to sell them without her knowing. If he has to confess, maybe he hopes she'll love him enough to stick with him.”

“I can just hear what Isabelle or Drew would say if somebody tried to pull a trick like that on them,” Hawk said.

All three men laughed.

Bret had forgotten how good it felt to laugh. He'd also forgotten how good it made him feel to have two of his brothers at his side. He'd had a difficult time adjusting to being part of the Maxwell clan, and even longer to get over his prejudices against Hawk and Zeke. At first he didn't like Hawk because he was a “savage.” He didn't like Zeke because Bret's father had been hanged for attempting to free slaves. But years of working together—and occasionally fighting—had taught him that Hawk and Zeke had far more to forgive and forget than he did. When they managed to do it, it became a point of pride for Bret to do the same.

“How is Isabelle?” Bret asked.

“The same as ever,” Zeke said. “She'd like to see you.”

Bret knew she would, and that made him feel guilty. He knew she felt all of the orphans were as much her children as her daughter, Eden.

“I'd like to see her, too, but there are some things I have to do first.”

All three were silent for a few minutes.

“How do you want us to set about finding these rustlers?” Zeke asked. “If it's one of the cowhands, he's not going to do anything while we're here.”

“I've been thinking about having Sam say he doesn't want you to work for him,” Bret said. “That way you could disappear, I could make myself scarce for a few days, and the informer would think the coast was clear to start again.”

“Do you think Sam would agree to that?”

“He'll agree to anything he thinks will make things safe for his daughter.”

“And how do we find out if Sam has confidence in us?” Zeke asked.

“We'll talk to him tonight. Maybe you should hang
out with the rest of the crew. Make yourselves unpopular without going too far. That will give Lonnie a reason to tell Sam not to hire you.”

“We can do that easy enough,” Zeke said, looking at Hawk. “Just get him started acting like an Indian.”

“You mean you expect me to put up with something like that in my kitchen?” Bertie said to Emily as she looked at Jinx as if he were some kind of rodent that had invaded her domain. “He's not even clean.”

“I can wash up,” Jinx said.

“He won't be here for long,” Emily said. “Bret plans to take him to his parents' ranch when he goes back to Fort Worth.”

“What would a respectable woman want with a creature like that?” Bertie demanded.

Emily had been afraid Bertie wouldn't be happy. She stood over her stove like she was protecting it from attack and glared at Jinx. “If you want him so much, you take him,” Bertie said. “He ought to fit right into the stables.”

“He's too young to work with the men.” Emily was so stunned by Bertie's reaction, she was tempted to say something very sharp until she noticed that neither Bertie nor Jinx was looking at her. They were glaring at each other.

“You're a mean old woman,” Jinx said.

“You're a dirty varmint,” Bertie replied.

“I wouldn't tote your wood if you was to beg me.”

“You'd keep the wood box filled or I'd take the skin off your backside.”

“You'd never catch me.”

Emily watched in amazement as they traded insults. It took a few minutes before she realized they weren't getting ready to kill each other. Instead, in a
manner that was totally foreign to her, they were setting up the parameters of their relationship.

“You're too skinny to be worth anything,” Bertie said.

“I don't have to be bigger than a market steer to tote wood.”

Bertie wasn't fat, but she was big-boned and taller than every man on the ranch except Bret. Apparently, size didn't impress Jinx.

“It'd be a waste of food to feed a scoundrel like you,” Bertie said.

“How do I know anything you cook is decent enough to eat?”

“You won't see nobody pushing away anything I cook.”

“I'll leave you two to settle things between you,” Emily said.

She had no idea how such an exchange could be the start of a working relationship, but it was obvious Bertie was beginning to unbend toward Jinx. She had stopped waving her big knife, and Jinx no longer stood with the table between them. The volume of their shouting had diminished to a growl; their gazes were no longer locked in mortal combat. Emily figured if she left them to it, they would manage to work something out. She was still shaking her head when Bret entered the house.

“Are your brothers settled in the bunkhouse?” she asked.

“Not yet. I've been thinking about the best way to find the rustlers, and I think I need to change my plans.”

“How?”

He explained his reason for her father saying he didn't want Zeke and Hawk to work for him.

“Do you think the rustlers will believe it?”

“I don't know, but we have to catch them in the act.”

When they went to his office to speak to him about it, Sam understood almost immediately. “All you want out of me is an acting job?”

“You can act as querulous and ill-tempered as you want,” Bret said.

“Do I get to meet your brothers?”

“Have Lonnie bring them. It'll be better if I'm not in the room. That way I won't have to pretend to defend them.”

Later that evening, an angry Zeke and Hawk stormed out of Sam's office, followed by a confused Lonnie.

“Sam doesn't want them to work for him,” Lonnie said to Bret. “He's not having a black man or an Indian on his crew.”

“They're my brothers,” Bret said. “I can vouch for them.”

“Sam said they were to leave first thing in the morning. He said if any cows were missing after they left, he'd hunt them down.”

Bret wished he could have been in the room. Apparently, Sam had put on quite an act.

“I've got to go,” Lonnie said. “Sam said I wasn't to let them out of my sight.”

Bret waited until Lonnie had left the house before going into Sam's office. “It looks like you should have been an actor.” Bret's feeling of satisfaction at the way his plan was going turned to concern when he saw Sam. The old man looked faded and lethargic.

“I guess all that blustering was too much for him,” Emily said, looking worried. “As soon as Lonnie left, he seemed to collapse.”

“I'm just tired,” Sam said.

He was leaning against a bank of pillows, his full head of dark brown hair in stark contrast to the white pillowcases. The lack of gray in his hair accentuated his pallor. Even his lips had lost their color.

“Let me help you lie down,” Bret said.

It took only a few minutes for Bret and Emily to make him comfortable, but Bret could tell that Sam's condition was getting worse each day. He wouldn't last much longer. Even after he relaxed, he still struggled to get his breath.

“They look like good men, those brothers of yours,” Sam said.

“They are. I was lucky they were free to come.”

“I can't imagine the three of you growing up together. Must have had some interesting times.”

“A few,” Bret said. “But our parents taught us to believe our differences were less important than the things we had in common.”

“You make sure those boys have everything they need before they leave tomorrow. I told Lonnie to give them enough supplies to get off my land without having to stop, so you won't have any trouble with him.”

Sam's eyes had closed before he finished his last sentence. Bret waited while Emily adjusted the bedspread, and then they left the room together. “I wouldn't have asked him to do this if I'd known it would take so much out of him.”

“I tried to get him to let me do it, but he said as long as he owned the ranch, he'd be the one to make the decisions.” Emily looked so worried, Bret put his arm around her shoulder to comfort her. She leaned against him. “It makes him feel better to have some part in running the ranch. Being confined to bed is hard on him.”

“It's hard on you, too.”

A wan smile was all Emily could muster. “Having you here has made it easier.”

“How?” He would have expected her to feel he was in the way.

“I wouldn't have known what to do about the rustlers. And you worked out a compromise about Galveston I think both of us can live with.”

Bret dropped a kiss on her forehead, wished he'd kissed her lips instead.

“Of course, I may not forgive you for setting Jinx on me.” She told him about the unaccountable exchange between Bertie and Jinx. “When she let Jinx help her bring the food to the table, I knew she'd taken a liking to him. It's your doing, of course.”

“How do you figure that?”

“She adores you. You could have brought a monster in here, and she'd have taken him in.”

“I never figured Jinx would follow me across half of Texas,” Bret said, laughing.

“He believes in you. It seems a lot of people do.”

That stopped him in his tracks. Nobody had ever said that to him.

She pulled him down so she could give him a light kiss on his mouth. “I really don't know what I'd have done without you.”

Bret would have liked nothing better than to continue doing what Emily had started. Her kiss was stretching the limits of his control to the danger point. He really wanted to make love to her. It had taken him a while to admit it, but he knew that was exactly what he wanted to do. And he knew it was the one thing he absolutely could not do.

“I'd love to stay here and listen to how wonderful I am,” he said, trying to achieve a lightness he didn't feel, “but I have to confer with my brothers.”

“I'm sorry I won't get a chance to get to know them.”

Bret wasn't. He'd already seen the question in their eyes about his relationship with Emily. He didn't have an answer for himself. What could he possibly say to them?