Summer Breeze (7 page)

that is—can you pull your aim wide to the left? Maybe then you won't shoot Buddy. His penchant for licking aside, he's a lovable dog, and he's never harmed a living soul. I'd hate to see him get hurt. "

"I said you can't sleep there!" she cried.

"Why? You snore or something?"

"No, I don't
snore!"
The shrill pitch of her voice gave measure of her mounting frustration.

"Then I reckon I can sleep here well enough. "

Light from the kitchen illuminated the side of her face. Joseph saw her mouth working, but no sound came out. Finally, she gave up on talking and disappeared. Shortly thereafter, he heard a commotion. It sounded to him as if she were tearing something apart.

Angling his upper body to see the doorway, he gazed curiously after her. He wasn't left to wonder what she was doing for long. She soon reappeared at the hole, a half dozen nails clenched between her teeth and a hammer in her hand. He watched as she set to work, nailing the slats of an apple crate over the opening. The sections of wood were barely long enough to span the distance and so flimsy as to provide little protection, but she furiously pounded them into place.

Unfortunately, she lacked a sufficient number of slats to completely fill the hole, the result a sloppy crisscross with triangular gaps large enough to accommodate a man's fist. To curtain off her sanctum, she draped two bath towels over the lot, tacking them at top and bottom.

Joseph frowned in the ensuing dimness. A man could crawl through that two-foot hole, but not without making a good deal of noise in the process. With a

loaded shotgun handy, she was as safe in there as a babe in its cradle.

Only a dim glow of light penetrated the linen towels. The illumination cast diamond patterns over the room. Settling back on his pallet, Joseph studied the shapes, acutely aware of every sound she made on the other side of the wall. Soft rustles, breathless utterances. "Consternation" seemed to be her favorite byword, "drat" running a close second. She clearly wasn't pleased to have houseguests.

Joseph grabbed his saddlebags, thinking to fetch himself and Buddy some supper. His hand met with emptiness when he reached in the pocket.
Damn.
After a day of wrangling, he always replenished his trail supplies, but somehow or other he'd forgotten to do it last time. Thinking back, he recalled the reason: a heifer in the throes of a breech birth. He'd been out in the field with her until late and had been so exhausted when he reached the house that he'd fallen straight into bed.

Well, hell
Excuses wouldn't fill his stomach. More important, they wouldn't fill Buddy's. Joseph was accustomed to going hungry on occasion, but his dog wasn't. Sighing, he rolled onto his side and rubbed the animal's upturned belly. "Sorry, partner. I'll feed you twice in the morning to make up for it. I know you worked damned hard today. You should have stayed home with Esa.

He would have fed you, at least. "

Buddy's warm tongue rasped over the whiskers sprouting on Joseph's jaw.
Damn dog.
If there was anything he hated, it was a licker. He pushed at the

shepherd's nose. "Stop it, " he whispered. "You think I don't know where that tongue of yours has been?"

Buddy whined and nailed Joseph directly on the lips. He almost sputtered as Rachel Hollister had.

Instead, he settled for rubbing away the wetness with his shirtsleeve and then changed the position of his upraised arm to guard his face. After a moment, the dog thrust his nose in Joseph's armpit, huffed, and went to sleep,

Joseph's thoughts drifted and circled until his eyelids grew heavy. Buddy snuggled closer, and their combined body heat made the bed cozy warm.

Rachel had turned her mother's rocker to face the archway. She sat poker straight on the chair, the shotgun balanced on her knees. A blanket draped around her shoulders, she stared fixedly at the towels she'd tacked over the crate slats. One question circled endlessly in her mind.
What in
heaven's name am I going to do?

She had no answers. She knew only that her world had been turned upside down. Nothing was as it should be—as she so desperately needed it to be. First and most alarming, her home was no longer safe, The hole in the barricade made her feel horribly vulnerable. When she thought about that man possibly crawling through, her skin shriveled, she broke out in a cold sweat, and she found it difficult to breathe.

He was there, just on the other side of the wall, a threat to her safety—and her sanity. She wanted him gone. Out, out,
out!

But then what? She had no boards to repair the bar-

ricade, and she couldn't go into town to buy more. Darby always went to town and purchased what she needed. Without him, she was helpless, absolutely helpless. What on earth would she do if he died and never came back?

The question was one she couldn't answer, and it also filled her with guilt. What if Joseph Paxton was telling the truth, and Darby had been shot? She loved that old foreman like a father. What kind of person was she to be worrying about boards when he might be dying?

Tears stung her eyes. She began rocking in the chair to maintain her self-control.
Squeak, squeak,
squeak.
The whine of the chair came faster and faster until she realized she was pushing with her feet almost frenetically and forced herself to stop.
Darby. He
was much older than she was, and at the back of her mind, she had always known that she would outlive him. She'd just never allowed herself to contemplate the possibility that he might die any time soon. Darby was the closest thing to family that she had left. Oh, how she would miss seeing his craggy face through the peephole that he had installed in her door. And how empty her days would be if he never again tapped on the wood safe for his meals.

The wetness in her eyes spilled over onto her cheeks, creating cold, ticklish trails that made her want to scratch. Only she couldn't pry her hands from the gun. Why hadn't she shot Joseph Paxton when she had the chance? He'd known she couldn't do it, blast him. Even through the shadows, she'd seen the twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

This was all
his
doing. She never would have fired the shotgun if he hadn't made a loud sound and startled her. And just who did he think he was, tearing the boards off one of her windows and breaking the glass? She would never feel safe until the window was repaired and boarded up again.

Anger roiled within her. But before she could get a firm hold on it, worry for Darby assailed her again. If the old man truly was hurt, the least Joseph Paxton could do was apprise her of his condition. Had anyone fetched the doctor? How bad was the wound? And who was caring for the poor old fellow?

Rachel wanted to jerk the towels away from the opening and demand that Joseph Paxton give her answers. But was that even his real name? He'd come here with another man. For all she knew, they could be outlaws. The one she'd seen definitely had the look of a scapegrace. Men who wore sidearms were a dime a dozen in No Name, but there was nothing ordinary about the way he wore his, a pearl-handled Colt. 45, strapped low on his thigh. Rachel had read enough novels to know that a gunslinger wore his weapon that way to minimize the distance of reach, thereby maxi-mizing his speed at the draw.

She stared at the towels, which offered her little privacy and even less protection.
Darby.
She had to find out how he fared. Only how? When she contemplated tearing the towels away to confront Joseph Paxton again, she started to shake.

He wasn't really a large man, she assured herself. But he had a large presence, every inch of his lean body roped with muscle, his broad shoulders and well-padded chest tapering to a slim waist and narrow hips. His eyes were particularly arresting, an ordinary blue yet razor sharp, giving the impression that he missed nothing. In the lamplight, they had shimmered like quicksilver.

A frown pleated Rachel's brow as she tried to recall the rest of his face. Exposure to the elements had burnished his skin; she remembered that much. But she couldn't for the life of her envision his features. He'd worn a sand-colored Stetson with a wide brim that dipped down in front.

Perhaps that was why. She could remember his hair, which was as blond as her own, only as straight as a bullet on a windless day. Shoulder length, if she recollected right, and tucked behind his ears.

The rapid creak of the rocker told Rachel that she was pushing too fast again. She brought the chair to a stop and then nearly jumped out of her skin at the sound of a low growl. The towels over the hole moved, and the next instant, a liver-colored nose lifted a bottom corner of the linen.

The dog.
She watched the animal's nostrils flare to pick up her scent. Shortly thereafter, another inch of white blaze on the canine's nose became visible.

"No!" Rachel cried softly. "Stop that. "

But the reddish-gold dog kept pushing until the bottom of one towel popped free and a slat snapped. His head poked through. Rachel leaped up from the rocker. Leaving the gun on the sofa within easy reach, she advanced on the archway.

"Bad,
bad
dog, " she whispered. "I don't want you in here. Away with you. Go on. "

Rachel could have sworn that the silly animal grinned. And then he let loose with more growls, working his jaws so the sounds changed pitch, almost as if he were talking. When she reached to push him back, he whined and licked her hands.

Rachel's heart sank. He was such a sweet, friendly fellow, and he truly didn't mean her any harm.

He only wanted to say hello. She had always adored dogs. One of the great loves of her life had been Denver, a huge, yellow mongrel with soulful brown eyes. Many had been the time that Rachel wished the killer might have at least spared the dog's life.
Denver, her special friend.
The silly mutt had rarely left her side. In the end, his unfailing loyalty had been the death of him.

The thought always made Rachel sad. Unlike the other members of her family, Denver could have run and saved himself. Instead, he'd stayed to protect her and earned himself a slug between the eyes.

As though her hands had a will of their own, Rachel found herself fondling Buddy's silky ears.

Dogs were wonderfully uncomplicated creatures. No subterfuge or pretense. What you saw was what you got. She liked the way his ears stood up, with only the rounded tips flopping forward.

He only straightened them when she spoke or made a sound.

He was a handsome fellow, she decided. A snow-white blaze ran the length of his muzzle, and the lighter russet spots above his amber eyes lent his face a pensive look. He was a sheepdog, she concluded, a breed that had proven useful in herding cattle and become popular with the ranchers hereabouts. Rachel had heard it said that most sheepdogs were uncommonly intelligent. Looking into Buddy's alert, questioning eyes, she had little trouble believing it.

"You're a pushy sort, aren't you?" she whispered, wishing that she could let him into the kitchen.

As it. was, he was about to destroy her makeshift repairs. He shoved with a shoulder and snapped another slat.
"Stop!"
she whispered. "You can't come in. Can't you tell when someone doesn't like you?"

"He's hungry. "

Startled by Joseph Paxton's deep voice, Rachel jumped back from the opening.

"Whatever you fixed for supper smells mighty good, " he went on. "I thought I had jerky in my saddlebags, but I was mistaken, and he's not used to missing a meal. I've spoiled him, I reckon. "

Rachel retreated another step. The dog seemed to interpret that as an invitation. Before she could react, he jumped through the hole, breaking the remaining slats and jerking one towel completely loose. The next instant, she was being accosted by the friendly canine. Fortunately, he was an agile fellow and light on his feet. When he planted his paws on her chest, she barely felt his weight. He growled at her again, a
yaw-yaw-yaw
that sounded absurdly conversational.

It was impossible for Rachel to look into the animal's expressive eyes without wanting to smile.

"So you're hungry, are you? All I have is stew and cornbread, and I don't think that's good for dogs. "

Buddy dropped to his belly, put his paws together as if he were praying, and then lifted his head to bark. The message was clear. Stew was very good for dogs, the more the better. Rachel was lost. Maybe it was the

prayer position that did her in—or maybe it was the sweet, imploring expression on Buddy's face.

She had never been able to turn away a hungry critter. As a girl, she'd loved to feed the wild animals and birds that visited the ranch. One year, her pa had built her half a dozen birdhouses for Christmas so she'd be able to watch the sparrows build their nests and hatch their babies the following spring. Oh, how Rachel missed the birdsong. With her windows boarded up, inside and out, she couldn't hear it anymore.

Just in case Joseph Paxton decided to climb through the hole after his dog, she retrieved the shotgun before advancing on the stove. With the weapon leaning against the wall within close reach, she set to work to feed Buddy. Thoughts of Darby once again assailed her as she filled a serving bowl with stew and added some crumbled cornbread. This was to have been the foreman's supper. Would he ever again tap on the wood safe and enjoy a meal that she had cooked for him?

She cast a considering glance at the damaged barricade as she set the bowl on the floor. Buddy didn't hesitate. With a happy growl, he began gobbling the food as if he hadn't been fed in a week.

Rachel straightened, gathered the blanket closer around her shoulders, took a breath for courage, and said, "I shall strike a bargain with you, Mr. Paxton. In exchange for information about my foreman, I'll feed you supper. "

Surprised by the unexpected offer, Joseph sat bolt upright on his pallet. Surely he hadn't heard her right.

"I'm sorry. What did you say?"

"I said that I'm prepared to make a deal with you. Food for information about Darby. "

Joseph ran a hand over his midriff. "I'm hungry enough to eat the south end of a northbound jackass, Miss Hollister, but I've already told you everything I can. "