Black Hills Bride (10 page)

S
he could ride! She could really ride!

In the month since Erik had begun teaching her to ride on Victory, she’d learned to saddle and bridle the horse, taking care to tighten the cinch against Victory’s stubborn inclination to bloat when she saddled him.

She’d learned how to groom him, feed him a more substantial fare than sugar cubes and clean the mud from his hooves with a pick. She’d learned to mount and dismount without Erik’s assistance.

And she’d learned to ride.

Okay, so she wasn’t galloping through the fields yet. But Erik often complimented her on her natural seat and instinctive use of her body and knees in guiding the horse.

She could walk, trot and even canter, although she still felt like grasping the saddle horn when Victory got going at such a fast clip. She didn’t dare make that amateur mistake, not after the first time Erik chewed her out for it.

He wouldn’t let her take her free hand from her thigh, telling her if she was going to learn to ride, she’d learn to ride right. She was afraid of the consequences if she didn’t. He threatened to hold the hand there himself.

Just the thought made her skin tingle.

She needed to learn to
feel
the horse, move
with
the horse instead of fighting him. Not think about Erik.

There would be no need for a saddle horn when she learned to be one with the horse, he assured her. She wasn’t sure at this point if she’d get past the bumbling part, not as long as she had a handsome cowboy as a teacher.

She smiled softly, hearing his gentle instruction even now.

Grip with your knees. Lean backward going
downhill, forward going uphill. Relax. Relax. Relax.

With the horse, at least, she was starting to relax, starting to feel her dream broaching reality. Erik Wheeler was another matter entirely. The more time she spent with him, the harder it became to concentrate—at least on learning to ride. Yet, ironically, Erik was the means to the fulfillment of a lifelong dream.
Many
lifelong dreams, some only recently coming to light.

Or maybe it wasn’t quite as ironic as it first appeared.

She shook her thoughts from her mind. She had work to do, and here she was, daydreaming again.

She found it infinitely more pleasurable to think about her horse—and about the man who trained him—than to consider the overwhelming number of tasks left to do before the members of her church arrived in two weeks.

The buildings were complete, and the retreat itself looked wonderful. Riding and hiking trails were well established.

She’d been working to build respect with the stable hands. Tally had taken over as the unofficial leader of the hands. She had high hopes the other boys would follow his example and stop harassing her. She’d been working alongside them, deciding actions would speak louder than words to the young men.

Today she’d rounded the hands together to make a final tour of the fencing around her land. It needed to be done, but she didn’t necessarily have to be there. She wanted to be there.

Armed with a hammer and nails, she mounted Victory and took the lead as Tally and the others followed her to the outskirts of her land. The outside fence was made with split pine logs from her land.

It had only been a few weeks, but already, a little wear and tear was visible.

Mostly, it was just a pleasant ride. At least until they came to the gate leading to the Needleson property, which Dixie quickly assessed with her newly learned carpentry knowledge. The gate was twisted sideways off its hinges, looking very much as if it had been run over with a motor vehicle of some kind.

Sighing, Dixie dismounted and hobbled her horse, gesturing for the boys to do likewise. Planting her hands on her hips, she groaned. “Any of you boys know how to fix a mangled gate?”

Silence. She glanced around. The hands were staring back at her with dazed looks in their eyes.

“No carpenters in this bunch?” she asked, punctuating her sentence with a laugh.

Bushman, one of the younger hands, laughed low and deep. “We do horses, not hammers.”

“Yeah,” Hogan, the largest and eldest of the hands, piped in. “And this one looks like it definitely needs a hammer.”

Dixie mock-frowned. “I thought ranch hands mended fences.”

Tally made a face. “The unfun part of ranching.”

Dixie smothered a grin. “You fellows would rather be horsin’ around?”

The young men laughed in surprised unison.

“Plenty of time for that. First, we have a fence to mend.” She rummaged through her saddle pack for a hammer and nails.

Bushman followed her lead, hobbling his horse and walking to her side. “You’re going to help?” he asked, astonishment lining his voice.

“Yes. And why wouldn’t I?”

Hogan snickered, a sound that eternally ruffled Dixie’s feathers. She tensed her shoulders, then relaxed. “Is there a reason that is funny?”

“No, ma’am,” Tally interceded before Hogan could reply. “It’s just that you—well, you’re a city girl with enough money to buy a nice spread of land out of pocket. It seems…” His sentence drifted off for a moment as he struggled to choose the right word. “Weird. For you to get your hands dirty. I mean, why should you?”

She bristled. There was a little bit of resentment behind Tally’s tone, Dixie realized, but then again, it was understandable. She’d put any misapprehensions to rest.

Right here. Right now.

“Oh, I see. City princess with loads of cash who has never seen a day’s work in her life, never mind a lick of trouble, waltzes on this land and orders a passel of poor men around. Is that it?” She reined in her temper, but the backlash of her own resentment filled her voice nonetheless.

“Something like that,” Hogan muttered under his breath.

She wanted to box his ears—or at least plant her fists on her hips while she argued with him, but instead she offered a silent prayer for patience and divine assistance with her words and actions.

This was the opportunity she’d been waiting for. The chance to really get to know these boys—make friends. If she lost her temper, she’d lose what God had graciously given her.

She walked toward the gate and tried to move it. It didn’t budge. She put a shoulder to the wood and pushed, grunting with effort, to no avail.

Both her body and voice strained against the firm wood. “What’s this gate made of, anyway? Lead?”

“It’s not that,” Tally answered, pointing at the juncture of the gate and the fence. “It’s wedged into the post.”

“Great,” she muttered under her breath. She wiped a hand across her sweaty brow and continued. “Give me a hand, here.”

The three young men gathered around the gate and, under Dixie’s guidance, attempted to pull it up and out of the solid wood post.

“We need leverage,” Dixie inserted, narrowing her eyes and looking around, her mind tossing about for an answer.

“Over there. Get a couple of those logs.”

Tally lifted his eyebrows, then complied, Bushman taking the second log.

“Put the fat one on the ground. We’ll use the other across it as a lever to raise the gate. Then you brutes can pull it out.”

“Who is going to hold the lever?” Hogan asked, taking his place at the side of the broken gate.

“Me.”

The young men chuckled, though none of them outright laughed.

She smiled cattily, then sat down on the
up
side of the teeter-totter log. She had to bounce once or twice, but slowly the gate moved up until it was parallel to the ground.

“Good going,” Tally said, and the others nodded.

Dixie beamed with their grudging praise. “Still think I’m a no-good city girl?”

“No, ma’am,” Hogan answered, sounding just a little bit ashamed.

She probably had at least a dozen splinters on her backside, she thought, wincing. But it was worth it if she could get even one of these boys to see past the obvious, into the heart of things.

About her. And ultimately, about God. She couldn’t very well show them God’s love if they didn’t respect her.

“I grew up different from you fellows,” she continued, “But not necessarily better.”

Hogan humphed, and Tally pinned him with a warning glare.

Dixie just smiled. “Where do you think I got the money for this retreat?”

“Your papa,” Bushman answered promptly.

It was Dixie’s turn to snort. “Believe me, the last place my
papa
wants me to be is working in Christian ministry.”

Even Tally looked surprised.

“I had to work and pray my way here. I traveled for two years from church to church, asking for support. It didn’t come easy, partly because I’m a woman. I had to fight for my vision.”

She looked from face to face, meeting each man’s gaze. “I didn’t give up. Sometimes all I could do was keep my eyes on the Lord. But I didn’t quit.”

“But you’ve known God for a long time,” Bushman protested.

She shook her head. “I didn’t grow up in the faith. I didn’t even hear about God until I was seventeen. That’s part of the reason I wanted to build this retreat. I want the little ones to hear about Jesus.” She paused and waved a hand. “Pull just a hair to the left. I think we’ve almost got it.”

“I never heard about God ’til here. Um, I mean now,” Hogan admitted, his voice low and scratchy.

Dixie’s throat caught, and tears sprang to her eyes, though she held them at bay by pinching her bottom lip between her teeth.

“It took me three more years to finally understand Jesus could love me. Bad childhood, wretched teen years and all.”

“You did bad things?” Tally asked, sounding genuinely amazed.

Dixie nearly howled with laughter. “I must really look like Miss Goody Two-shoes to you fellows.”

A low laugh came from behind her, sending Dixie’s heart into her throat. She didn’t hear Erik laugh often. She hadn’t even known he was there, or she would have tried harder, she thought crossly.

She leaned back and tipped her head in order to see Erik. At the same time, the stable hands yanked on the gate, which gave suddenly without a sound, other than the muttered exclamations of the young men.

Dixie careened onto the ground with a bone-jarring bump, pounding the breath from her lungs as she landed flat on her back. She pinched her eyes closed, not wanting to see Erik’s expression.

“You okay?”

She cracked one eye open.

Erik rested one forearm on the saddle horn of his mount and leaned over her, his mouth twitching at one corner.

If he laughed, Dixie thought she might scream. That is, if she had any breath left in her lungs, which she sincerely doubted.

“Playing teeter-totter?” Erik asked, grinning fully.

“Very funny,” she groaned, surprised the young men didn’t laugh with Erik.

“It was her idea to hoist this thing with these beams,” Tally said, sounding defensive.

“Yeah,” Hogan agreed. “These hinges are shot. But now that we’ve got the gate down, we’ll have it fixed in a jiffy, boss.”

Dixie raised her head. Hogan was looking at her.

“What happened?” Erik asked in his usual clipped tone.

“Looks like a truck ran this through,” Bushman offered.

Erik scowled. “Needleson.”

Dixie shook her head. “You don’t know that.”

Erik nudged his horse with his heels and began moving away without comment.

Annoyed, Dixie scrambled up as fast as her aching limbs would allow and reached for Victory. “Can you boys finish up here?”

“Yes, ma’am,” they said in unison.

She nodded and mounted, turning Victory in the direction Erik had gone.

“You don’t know it was Needleson,” she called after him.

He turned his horse so abruptly she nearly ran Victory right up his nose.

“Needleson sold you a bum horse and you know it,” he snapped.

“Victory is
not
a bum horse,” she protested automatically, grinding her teeth against a further outburst. But despite her denial, doubt crept into her mind. Could John Needleson have sold her Victory as some sort of nasty prank? And who
had
run through the gate?

Needleson was the obvious culprit.

Her gazed locked with Erik’s. He pinched his lips together, then shook his head. “I’ll take care of it.”

“You most certainly will not.” Dixie maneuvered Victory until she was practically nose to nose with Erik. She could feel his warm breath on her face. Aqua eyes met and melded with the color of steel, and her heart felt just as cold.

“It could be John,” she conceded reluctantly. “But until we have proof, I don’t want to make trouble.”

“Seems to me Needleson’s the one making trouble.” Erik leaned toward her, closing the distance between them.

“But I won’t bother him,” he said huskily. “For now. Still, if I find out he’s trying to hurt you—”

He let the end of his sentence dangle in the air as he nudged his horse into a canter. In moments, he was out of Dixie’s sight. But not out of mind, she thought, still trying to catch her breath.

Definitely not out of mind.

Erik couldn’t ride fast enough or far enough. He hadn’t known what to say when Dixie ordered him not to see John Needleson. He wasn’t a
take-orders
kind of guy, especially where potential trouble was concerned.

And John Needleson was potential trouble. Erik recognized it just as surely as he’d recognized it in Ellis. And, as usual, he’d been stymied by Dixie’s enduring faith in God and humankind. Her strength of character amazed him, her goodness and kindness daunted him.

Would he ever find the words to tell her how he felt?

A
whole week later, Dixie was still mulling over her last encounter with Erik. She’d seen him two dozen times since, but he’d reverted to the silent, brooding cowboy she was used to.

The stable hands were beginning to trust her, if only a little. Now, if only she could convince Erik to follow their example. He was as aloof and silent as ever, and his actions—or lack of them, to be more precise—were driving her to the border of insanity.

She needed to talk about what was happening between them, if indeed anything was. She scolded herself for spending her valuable time and emotional resources thinking about the infuriating man.

She should be thinking about the people, her guests, who would soon descend on the retreat in droves. At least, she hoped they would. She’d booked a few church retreats beyond her own church’s
grand opening
celebration, but the future was uncertain at best.

She needed to concentrate, but thoughts of Erik kept intruding, like a bothersome fly that buzzed around her head. No matter how many times she swatted him away, he just kept coming back for more.

She blew out a breath and surveyed her list. She had yet to receive the shipment of beds and basins for the individual cabins, though the main lodge was now furnished with everything from dining tables to appropriately rustic-looking curtains for the windows, and the staff cabins were likewise ornamented.

She still needed a truckload of linens, not to mention the food needed to feed fifty people, not including her staff, for two weeks.

She’d been putting off going to town, unwilling to miss out on her daily riding lesson. But it had to be done sometime, and today was as good a day as any, she decided spontaneously.

Checking to make sure she had the appropriate lists with her, she climbed into the cab of her truck and started the engine. It wasn’t until she attempted to pull out that she realized something was wrong.

The truck wasn’t moving properly, with the horsepower the all-terrain vehicle usually exhibited. In fact, it was barely moving at all.

Baffled, Dixie cut the engine and exited the cab, wondering if anyone on the premises knew anything about fixing cars. She was the last person on earth who could tell what was wrong with her truck, or at least she thought so, until she surveyed the outside of her truck.

She might not be able to tell a muffler from a radiator, but it didn’t take a trained auto mechanic to see that her tires had been slashed.

All four of them.

That it was no accident was equally as evident, for the bowie knife used to perform the deed had been left in a conspicuous spot on the hood of the truck, holding down a folded piece of notebook paper like a paperweight.

If she hadn’t been so preoccupied with other matters, she would have noticed it earlier.

Anger flared. Who would do this to her?

The stable boys, for a laugh.

Ellis, to get back at her for firing him.

Erik, just so he could come to her rescue again.

John Needleson.

That thought just added fuel to the fire. A grown man wouldn’t play a nasty, immature trick like this, would he?

She snatched the gleaming, unsheathed bowie knife from the hood and opened the paper beneath.

“Go home. You don’t belong here.”

It wasn’t signed.

“O-o-o-o-h!” she yelled, venting her anger aloud as she stomped back and forth, surveying the truck’s damage. She screamed so loud, even James the cook popped his head out the kitchen window to see what the ruckus was about.

It didn’t take long for Erik to appear at her side. He always seemed to be around to see her fall apart during a crisis, she thought resentfully.

Why should today be any different?

Not that he could help in this situation, unless he knew how to magically patch tires.

Horses, he knew. Cars, she doubted. He didn’t look like the greasy, under-the-hood type.

She mentally calculated how much it would cost to get her truck towed on a flatbed into Custer, and cringed at the dollar amount.

A second job was beginning to look like a necessity. She’d considered the option since she’d arrived in South Dakota, but it still disturbed her to have her hand forced. It wasn’t going to be easy.

She’d have to commute into the small town to waitress or something. Every moment working in town would be a moment away from directing her retreat. And she wouldn’t have any more free time to ride Victory.

The thought didn’t do anything to elevate her mood, which was quickly deflating to the level of her truck tires.

In typical Erik fashion, he didn’t say a word, but crouched down by the truck, examining the tires. Anger sparkled in his eyes, simmering just below the surface, carefully controlled with the strength of his will.

For some reason, that annoyed her. What did he have to be angry about? It was her truck tires that were slashed. He could go right back to the stable and forget all about it.

But he wouldn’t. He’d step in and try to take over, like he always did.

And for another, why was he always so
in control?

Once, just once, she’d like to see him overcome with anger—or any emotion, for that matter. She’d like to see him lose his cool. Really blow it, as she did on a regular basis.

“This was no accident,” he said, his voice low and gravelly.

“No kidding,” she snapped back. “Here’s the knife that did the dirty deed.” She dropped it at his feet.

“You touched it.”

“Well, of course I touched it. There was a letter—” She stopped midsentence, realizing her error. Disturbing evidence at the scene of the crime.

Erik grunted in disgust. With her, most likely. “Where’s the letter?”

“Should I call the police?” she asked, answering a question with a question. When Erik didn’t answer, she sighed and handed him the letter.

“No.” It was almost a growl.

“No, what?”

He glanced up, his blue eyes so dark they were almost black under the rim of his Stetson. “You probably shouldn’t call the police.”

He was right. She had nothing to go on, and what little evidence she did have, she’d already tampered with, not that she thought a set of fingerprints would amount to much in a town as small as Custer.

The note was definitely a plus, but it wasn’t signed, and she suspected handwriting analysts were few and far between this far out.

“Well, in any case, I do have to call a tow truck. And then I’ve got to deal with whatever spiteful vandal slashed my tires.”

She shivered. “Do you think it’s one of my staff? One of the stable boys, maybe? Or was it Ellis?”

He frowned. “I’ll drive you to town. We can pick tires up there and I’ll put them on myself. You can get them aligned later.”

Pulling his hat off by the crown, he swiped his forearm against his temple. “Ellis wouldn’t be stupid enough to pull a stunt like this.”

Angry heat flared to her cheeks. Ellis was stupid enough to do a lot of other spiteful things, most of them right to her face.

Why not slash her tires?

“You don’t think so?” she retorted, her voice higher, louder and squeakier than she would have liked.

His stone-cold gaze settled on her. “No. I don’t. But I’ll check it out while we’re in town. If he did slash your tires, he’s in for it.”

Dixie shuddered. She didn’t like violence, and she felt the rage barely contained within Erik. Suddenly the idea of him blowing his top wasn’t as agreeable as it once had sounded.

And she still didn’t know why it mattered to him.

What difference did it make whether or not Ellis slashed her tires? It wasn’t all that long ago Erik himself wasn’t so keen on her being here, though she liked to think she’d changed his opinion on that subject over time.

If someone was trying to run her off the land, he should be rejoicing, not commiserating.

John Needleson.

Her eyes met Erik’s and his gaze confirmed her fear. He was thinking the same thing. And this time she wasn’t sure he’d keep his promise to keep his hands off.

He strode to his truck and opened the passenger door, gesturing for her to hurry. He didn’t have to speak for her to feel the tension in the air, tension between them, and tension aimed at the unknown vandal.

The drive to town in Erik’s truck was made in silence. Dixie was busy with her own thoughts, and Erik—well, he was being Erik. He didn’t speak until they pulled up in front of the auto shop in Custer.

“If you can’t get what you need here, we’ll drive up to Rapid City,” he said, leaning his forearms against the steering wheel. “I’ll pick you up in about an hour. We’ll know better, then.”

Her eyes widened. He was leaving her here? What did she know about tires? Besides, she knew he was going to ask after Ellis.

And that was none of his business.

She opened her mouth to protest, then snapped it shut again. Hadn’t she just been complaining that no one ever took her seriously, that Erik didn’t believe she could do anything by herself?

And here she was about to whine about her lack of knowledge where truck tires were concerned.

Go figure.

Scowling, she got out of the truck and slammed the door. Hard.

She’d figure this out on her own if she had to go to the public library and read a book about buying truck tires.

She could swear Erik was chuckling as he turned out of the parking lot. A loud protest welled in her, but she held back, knowing the object of her wrath was on his way to investigate Ellis and wouldn’t hear her even if she screamed down the road. Which she was mighty tempted to do, whether he could hear it or not.

She took several deep breaths and consciously unclenched her fists.

Let him laugh. She’d show him just what Dixie Sullivan could do if she put her mind to it.

She didn’t need a man in her life to order her around and protect her when she didn’t need protection.

Even Erik Wheeler.

Erik was loathe to leave her alone, even within the safety of town limits. Someone was being nasty. Very nasty. If he were a gambling man, he’d put his money on John Needleson.

But he’d promised Dixie to follow up with Ellis, and he intended to keep his word. If it didn’t take him long, he might be able to ask a few pertinent questions around town. Starting with Mary in the post office. If there was any new gossip running around, Mary would know it.

He clamped his jaw until his teeth hurt, and reluctantly turned his truck down the lane toward Ellis’s grandmother’s house. His gut told him he was wasting his time. And time was working against him. He wouldn’t let anyone harm Dixie, if that was the vandal’s intent.

That’s what Erik was determined to find out.