Desert Angel (6 page)

“How many months are there?”

Trying to ignore the gnawing pain low in her stomach, she decided that conversation was better than silence. “The baby is September, but I was starting to suspect that October is on the way.” Her voice grew softer. “I wonder if they’ll name the new baby March, now that I’m gone.”

Jim didn’t know how to respond to her so he remained quiet. From what he had seen of the family, he thought that it would be a blessing to be free from them. They were white trash, pure and simple, and would never be anything else. But they were the girl’s family, and he guessed that she would have some kind of feelings for them.

March was in so much pain by the time they reached the house, that at first she didn’t see it. Concentrating on staying on the back of the horse when Jim dismounted, she kept her eyes lowered until he reached up for her.

Raising her gaze, she emitted a startled gasp. “You live here?” She had never seen anything as beautiful as the pristine white building with its many sparkling windows.

Jim looked at the house, and realized for the first time how much he hated it. It was Melanie’s house. It stood for all the things that she had given up to come West, and it was filled with the memories of her unhappiness. He much preferred the adobe house they had lived in before building this monstrosity.

“I live here.” He motioned up the porch. “Wait here while I go get the baby.”

“Baby?” March’s heart began to pound, as if she had run for miles.

“My son.” Jim looked at the girl and noticed the strange look on her face. “Why did you think I brought you here?”

March shook her head. She hadn’t given much thought as to what he wanted. She had been in too much pain, and was too worried about her younger brothers and sisters to consider what her own fate was to be.

“I need someone to take care of my son. He’s ten days old.”

“His ma?”

“She died.”

Jim watched as the girl reached for the handrail and climbed laboriously up the steps. The back of her dress was spotted with blood, and he cursed beneath his breath. She didn’t know how to decently attend to her own problems, and he was expecting her to know how to take care of his son.

“I think you’d better tend to your needs, while I get the baby.”

March turned her head back toward him. A fiery blush replaced the pallor of her cheeks, when she realized where his gaze rested and what must be there. Feeling a wetness roll down her legs, she knew it was getting worse.

“I need to lay down a bit,” she mumbled. Jim had a sudden urge to throw her on his horse and get her back to her family, before he lived to regret this day.

“You can sleep in — “ His words were harshly broken off, when he saw her eyes roll up in her head and her legs begin to collapse beneath her.

He grabbed her before she could fall and roll off of the steps.

“Damn, I think I just added another problem to the list.”

FOUR

March opened her eyes and found herself in a room unlike any she’d ever seen before. It was like the fairy-tale story Ma told them sometimes, when she was in a good mood. The prince always saved the princess from some evil, and took her to his castle that was filled with wonderful and exciting things.

Everywhere she looked there was something different to admire. The long windows had real glass, and were framed with bright yellow-and- white-checked gingham curtains. The highly polished floor was covered with a circular rag rug with every color of the rainbow in it.

Sitting up to better view the room, she saw that the walls were a pale yellow, while the furniture was painted white. Colorful pictures, some of things she couldn’t identify, decorated the walls.

Her eyes came to rest on the baby bed in the corner, and her heart skipped a beat. She rose, moving painfully to the bed, reverently touching the soft, fuzzy blankets.

Biting the inside of her cheek as tears blinded her, she thought of the baby who would never know such riches, who would never see a cloud or hear the sweet songs of the birds. The baby girl, her baby girl, who had been born too early and had never drawn a breath.

“You’re awake.”

Turning too quickly, March grabbed onto the baby bed for support, as blackness wavered in front of her eyes.

“Hold on, girl, or you’re going to pass out again.” Jim closed the space between them and grabbed her arm. He’d never realized that a woman could be so weak during her monthly time. But then he’d never realized what was involved in taking care of a house either, until he’d had to do it. He wasn’t about to have a monthly so that he could find out about it the hard way, too.

“I’m sorry,” March apologized. “I’ve never passed out before. I’ll be all right in a minute.”

Not sure what to say, Jim looked around the baby’s room. “This is my son’s room. You can share it with him. When you feel up to it, I’ll show you the kitchen and such, but for now maybe you should rest.”

“Where’s the baby?”

“When you passed out on me I carried you up here and decided to leave him be for a time. Whenever you’re ready, I’ll go get hin?.”

March wondered if she’d ever be ready to hold someone else’s child in her arms. Her heart ached for her own baby, and yet there was a relief that the child wouldn’t have to suffer as she had suffered. She’d had nothing to offer her daughter except a heart full of love, but love wouldn’t fill an empty stomach or warm a cold body And love wouldn’t protect her when someone called her white trash or whore.

“I’m ready,” she stated softly.

“Maybe you should … ah, clean up a little.” Her blond hair was hanging in snarls down her back, and she was still wearing the bloody dress. It embarrassed him that she would have let such a thing happen, or that he would have to draw her attention to it.

He nodded toward the pretty yellow and white pitcher and bowl sitting on the dresser. “There’s warm water in the pitcher. I’ll go get the boy, and you come on downstairs when you’re ready.”

March nodded, watching as he left the room. Unbuttoning her dress, she pulled it over her head, horrified at the large bloodstain on the skirt. A lady was never careless enough to let blood get on her skirts, even if it was three days after giving birth. She’d never be able to look him in the eyes again. Knowing that he must be thinking all kinds of terrible things about her, March moaned in despair.

A thick cotton drying towel and smaller washing cloth hung on the rail beside the sink. Dipping the washing cloth into the water, she scrubbed as much of herself as possible. It had been months since she’d had an all-over bath. It was too cold to wash in the river during the winter, and they didn’t have a bucket large enough to sit down in. As soon as it was warm, she decided, she’d find a creek and take a nice, long bath.

Putting on her only other dress, she carefully wrapped her stained clothes in a bundle and put them on the floor, taking great care that they didn’t touch the rug. She would have to wash them and hang them out to dry, since she had nothing else to wear.

As she came slowly down the stairs, Jim noticed that the clean dress was badly wrinkled, and if anything, smaller than the one before. Her legs were visible several inches above her ankles, but it was obvious that she’d made an attempt to wash her bare feet. He tried not to notice how shapely her legs were or how the dress clung lovingly to every curve. She was tiny, but well filled out, and he forcefully reminded himself that she was just a girl and here to take care of his son, not him.

Her gaze glued to the bundle in her employer’s arms, March forgot her earlier embarrassment. Her heart beat painfully hard as she reached out to pull the blanket away from the baby’s face.

“How old is he?” she whispered.

“Ten days.” Jim looked down at his sleeping son. “His mother didn’t survive his birth.” He saw no reason to tell this child about the horror Melanie had gone through.

Longing with every fiber of her being to take the baby into her arms, March clasped her hands behind her back. “What’s his name?”

Jim looked up at the girl and then back down at the baby. In all the confusion, the work and worry, he’d never given thought to giving him a name.

“He doesn’t have one,” he finally admitted. “What?” Her stunned expression made him feel sadly lacking. “Everybody’s got to have a name. What have you been calling him?”

“Mostly just boy.”

“You’ve got to give him a name, Mr. Travis.”

“Jim,” he corrected. They didn’t stand on formality at the ranch.

“Jim,” she seemed to roll the name around on her tongue. “That’s a good strong name for a man, but maybe you could call him Jamie ‘til he grows a little.”

“No,
my
name is Jim.”

“All the more reason to call him Jamie; it’ll avoid confusion.”

He noticed that her eyes were the deepest gray he’d ever seen, nearly violet, with thick dark lashes that shadowed her cheeks. Her hair was blond, streaked nearly white in places by the sun. He wanted her to be about fourteen, maybe fifteen, but looking at her now as she gazed down at the baby, he was afraid that she was considerably older than that. He suspected that she was fully grown, and that he was courting trouble by having her in his house.

“No,” he mumbled to himself, uncomfortable that he was noticing her as a woman rather than a child. He pushed the baby into her arms. “There’s bottles and tinned milk in the kitchen, clean towels in his room. I’m heading out, but I’ll try to be back tonight. If you need anything, give a holler, Hank and Woods stay around the bunkhouse most of the time. They’ll give you a hand.”

March didn’t see him grab his hat from the hall tree or hear the door slam behind him. The pain between her thighs and the exhaustion brought on by the simplest movement faded away. All that she was aware of was the warm bundle in her arms.

“Hello, Jamie. Do you like that name? Your pa couldn’t seem to decide if he wanted you named that or not.” She carefully unwrapped the sleeping baby, studying his long, slender fingers, counting his stubby little toes. His rosebud mouth puckered when she caressed the deep dimple in his chin, and she smiled when he yawned and stretched out in her arms.

“You’re a beauty, little boy,” she whispered as tears suddenly filled her eyes. She had lost her own baby, but had been given another child who desperately needed a mother. “I’ll be a good mama, sweetheart. You’ll never be hungry or cold, and I won’t let anyone ever hurt you.”

Holding onto the handrail for support, March slowly climbed the stairs, returning to the baby’s room. She needed to wash out her dress before the bloodstains set. She didn’t even know where the kitchen was, and her stomach rumbled with hunger. But she laid down on the bed, the baby snuggled safely between her and the wall. Her eyes slowly closed, and for the first time since she’d lost her own baby, March slept without dreams.

Jim returned home long after sunset and wasn’t surprised to find that the house was dark. He hadn’t expected March to wait up for him. Grabbing the lamp hanging beside the front door, he struck a match and adjusted the wick.

He was surprised that there wasn’t a fire in the kitchen fireplace, or a plate of food waiting for him. Alarm raced through him when he knelt at the fireplace and discovered that the ashes were cold.

With a pounding heart, he climbed the stairs and went directly to the baby’s room. He muffled a sigh of relief to find March asleep on the narrow bed, the baby cradled in her arms. He turned and left the room quietly before the light could disturb either of them, but the picture of his son snuggled against her breasts followed him bac\ to the kitchen.

Remembering her exhaustion and weakness, he allowed that she probably hadn’t felt up to doing anything other than caring for his son. In a day or two she’d be over the worst of it, and he looked forward to coming home to a hot meal. He hadn’t realized how bad his own cooking was until he’d been forced to eat it day after day. He’d gotten accustomed to Melanie’s cooking, and while not the best in the world, it had been far superior to his own.

Opening a can of beans, he leaned against the table and ate them straight from the can. Women definitely had a place in the world, he decided, the kitchen being the number one spot. Now that there was someone to take care of the baby, do the washing and cooking, and generally keep the house running in smooth order, Jim expected his life to go back to the way it was.

With a tired sigh, he put the can on the sink and picked up the lamp to light his way upstairs. For the first time in days, he could count on a night of undisturbed sleep.

Unbuckling the holster belt, he laid his Colt on the dresser beside the lamp. Putting first one foot and then the other in the bootjack, he pulled the boots off and then his socks, rubbing his itchy feet on the rug. Slipping the suspenders down his arms, he rotated his tired shoulders, trying to work some of the kinks out as he unbuttoned his shirt. Lord, but he was tired. The bed would feel like heaven, he thought, as he threw the shirt in the general direction of the corner where he knew a pile of dirty clothes waited.

Reaching for the buttons on his canvas trousers, he stopped when a noise interrupted the silence. It was a furtive whisper of sound, like someone walking quietly, so that they wouldn’t be heard.