Texas Homecoming (7 page)

Knowing Pilar thought he was ruggedly handsome caused the stirring in his groin to intensify. He carried the last of the dirty plates to the sink. “I doubt you’ll find anyone who’ll agree with you.”

“A woman makes her own judgment about a man. It doesn’t matter if no one else agrees with her.”

He wondered if men could be so independent, but it didn’t matter in this case. Everyone agreed Pilar was beautiful.

“There’s more to being handsome than a pretty face.” Pilar kept her gaze on her work. “There’s character. A man can have a truly handsome face and be cruel and self-indulgent. A plain man’s face can be transformed by honesty, generosity of spirit, and courage.”

Was she saying he was honest and generous of spirit when all the time he was pretending to like her so he could hang her brother?

Decency required him to leave immediately, but he couldn’t. Laveau was a traitor responsible for the deaths of twenty-four innocent men. Cade had made a vow on the sword of a dead comrade that he wouldn’t rest until the traitor had been brought to justice. His duty to his fallen
companions was greater than his desire to appear decent and honorable in Pilar’s eyes.

She would hate him in the end, but he had known that from the first.

It hadn’t mattered then. Why should it begin to matter now? And why wouldn’t the stirring in his groin die down?

“You don’t have to stay,” Pilar said. “I’m almost done.”

He looked at the pots still on the stove, bowls on the table with food to be put away, cups and plates that had to be dried, forks and knives still in the hot, soapy water. “You’re much too pretty to be telling such bald-faced lies. I’ll wash while you put away the food. I don’t know where anything goes.”

She looked at him as if he’d gone mad.

“Haven’t you ever seen a man wash dishes?”

“No.”

He hadn’t realized until he saw the expression of disbelief on her face how much the war had changed him. Maybe other men would return home and fall back into old habits, but he couldn’t.

“Every man in my troop cooked or washed dishes at one time or another. Washed his own clothes, too.” Pilar hadn’t taken her eyes off him, but her hands kept washing forks and knives. “Move over. It’s my turn.”

He lifted her hands out of the water and dried them. It should have been a simple task, but Pilar stared down at her hands, then gazed up at him with a look that caused his insides to knot. It wasn’t the surprise that got him. It was the look that said he was a minor god and she could hardly believe she had been so fortunate as to have him turn his attention on her, if only for a few minutes.

He was a fool. No woman thought that of a man, even when she was madly in love with him.

But the feeling wouldn’t go away. Nor did it diminish as he dried her hands, one finger at a time.

“I could just as easily have dried them on my apron,” Pilar said. “They’ll be back in the water soon.”

She held her hands in front of her, fingers spread, looking at them as though they had changed somehow. He’d never really looked at a person’s hands before, never realized they could be attractive, even beautiful.

“You shouldn’t have to wash dishes.”

She started, as though coming out of a trance. “They won’t wash themselves. Neither will the pots.”

“We should get someone to do the washing for you.”

“I’m not fragile, Cade. Thousands of women all over Texas wash dishes every day. Besides, you have no money to pay anyone.”

Cade wondered why the lack of money had never bothered him before. His grandfather was much more interested in acquiring land than in doing anything with it. He was a fighter, not a rancher. Cade had known for some time it would be up to him to make something of the ranch.

“I’ll have money as soon as I sell the herd.”

“If you don’t start washing, I’ll be through before you get your hands wet.”

She had kept working while she talked. He had followed her as she moved about the kitchen, emptying pots and bowls. He turned to the sink and plunged his hands into the water. His finger encountered the sharp point of a fork. He stifled a sharp intake of breath, told himself to be more careful.

“You’ve promised to share your profit with your friends. And there’re a lot of things that need doing around the ranch. Then there’s your intention to buy blooded bulls to upgrade the herd.”

“I don’t have to do all of that at once.”

“Probably not, but you don’t have to do anything for me. When Laveau comes back, he’ll clear out the squatters and I’ll go home.”

Cade forced himself to focus on his work. He didn’t know why he should be so worried about the amount of work Pilar did. She hadn’t complained or asked for help. He’d planned to wiggle his way into her confidence by any means possible, but this was a genuine concern, one that indicated a potentially fatal weakness in his plan. He’d better get himself under control before he messed everything up.

“A few more men may show up,” he said. “I don’t know how many.”

“That’s your business, not mine.”

“What I’m getting at is it may be too much work for one person. Let me know if that happens. I know you didn’t expect to have this many settle on you.”

“I didn’t expect to be thrown out of my own home by thieving vagrants, but I survived. I expect I’ll survive you and your friends.”

It must have been devastating to have to beg to be taken in by a man she considered her worst enemy. Her grandmother had drummed it into her head that she was too far above the Wheelers to even speak to them. Having to cook and clean for them must have come close to destroying her. Now he was implying that she couldn’t do the work. One more instance to support Owen’s claim that Cade didn’t know anything about women.

“I don’t want you to feel we’re taking advantage of you. After all, you are helping to support us. In all fairness, you and your grandmother deserve part of the profits from the sale of the herd.”

“You’d do that?” She finally stopped working and stared at him in disbelief.

“I’ll talk to my grandfather.”

Her mood changed abruptly, and she went back to work. “He won’t agree.”

“My grandfather isn’t above taking advantage of anyone when he can, but he’s got just as much pride as you. He hates feeling unable to take care of himself. The world has changed, and he doesn’t know how to change with it. He strikes out at you because you offer him money he doesn’t have. He strikes out at me because I have youth and strength he doesn’t have, new ideas he can’t understand.”

“You’ve changed, Cade Wheeler. You aren’t the same man who left here four years ago, bragging he was going to beat the Yankees singlehanded.”

“I hope you think it’s for the better.” What the hell was he doing asking her a question like that?

Well, actually it was exactly the kind of thing that would convince a woman that her opinion of him mattered.

Only what Pilar thought of him
did
matter.

Her girlish smile caught him by surprise. “Girls are silly creatures. We tend to admire the most unsuitable boys. We dream about them, make up all sorts of stories about being carried away by a handsome young man.”

“Did you ever dream about me?”

She turned back to her work but not before smiling once again. “Many times. I thought you were romantic.” She looked at him again, her expression serious now. “But girls grow up. They might sigh and regret the passing of their dreams—might even weep over them—but they put aside their youthful daredevils to look for someone they can depend on, someone who will care for them and keep them
safe. I think you’ve turned into such a man. Some young woman is going to be very fortunate.”

Cade didn’t know why he said what he said next. He could only assume that Pilar’s words had knocked every bit of sense out of his head.

“We’ll need to take baths tomorrow. You’ll have to heat lots of water.”

Chapter Seven

Nothing had gone as Pilar expected. She had been prepared to fix a large breakfast. Instead, the men nibbled all day and washed what they ate down with endless cups of black coffee.

“You can’t ride a bucking horse with a full stomach,” Cade told her. “You’ll throw up on yourself before you hit the ground.”

She couldn’t understand why the endless cups of coffee didn’t bother them.

“We sweat it out as fast as we drink it,” Cade said. “There’s nothing like the hot Texas sun to make you thirsty.”

Pilar had expected to have no part in what the men were doing. But finding herself outside, she became spellbound by the drama in the corrals. At home she’d rarely been allowed beyond the hacienda courtyard. Every time she expressed curiosity about the work done on the ranch, her grandmother told her that work involving men, horses, and
cows was coarse, unsuitable for a young woman to know anything about. Her job was to look beautiful, marry well, and provide her husband with children.

Pilar had seen a lot in the two years she ran the rancho, but none of it had prepared her for this exhausting, brutal, dangerous work.

“You can’t call yourself a real cowboy until you’ve been thrown at least a dozen times,” Cade had said earlier that morning after being unceremoniously dumped by a pinto mare. “It keeps you limber.”

“Or breaks all your bones,” Pilar replied. But the most unpleasant part of the day had been gelding the colts and young stallions.

“I don’t mind telling you, I’m glad Rafe volunteered for this job,” Cade said.

She spent most of her time during the afternoon heating water in a huge copper bathtub. The tub had been ordered by Laveau but had remained in the stables in a wagon. Pilar and her grandmother had hidden their clothes and jewelry in it. When they made their escape, it was easier to harness a horse to the wagon and bring the tub filled with everything they could carry away. It had remained behind the Wheeler bunkhouse ever since. Holt pounced on it the minute he saw it. “At home we didn’t have a tub like this,” he said. “We took a cloth bath. In the summer we went in the lake.” He gazed at the tub with a smile of anticipation. “Sinking in water up my neck will be a wonderful pleasure.”

For most Texans, taking a bath on a regular basis wasn’t of primary importance. Water had to be carried inside by hand and heated with scarce fuel. As for bathing outside, no sensible man dived into a river in south Texas without
first checking for poisonous snakes—and the water level. Most rivers went dry in the summer.

Women
never
bathed in public.

Owen and Jessie had volunteered to gather firewood. Earl spent the day at the corral, criticizing everything Cade and his friends did.

“You going to work the kinks out of that buckskin?” he asked Cade when it came down to the last horse. It was late in the afternoon, and all the men were tired. Holt was looking longingly at the bath. Tendrils of steam had begun to rise from the surface of the water. “You can’t keep expecting your friends to do all the work for you. You could learn a few things from that Rafe fella, though. I don’t much like outsiders, but he knows how to handle a horse.”

Pilar didn’t see that Rafe was any better than Cade. They were both tall and slim waisted with powerful shoulders. They both walked like they’d been born in boots and rode a horse like they didn’t know any other way to get from place to place. Rafe had been thrown one time more than Cade, even though they’d ridden the same number of horses.

She had been counting.

“Well, you’d better get on that horse if you’re going to,” Earl said. “I’m getting hungry for my supper. Ain’t it about time you start bustling about in the kitchen?” he asked Pilar.

“It’ll be ready as soon as the men finish their baths.”

“Baths!” Earl said with disgust, as though being clean was something to be ashamed of. “I can’t see why you want to go taking a bath. You’ll just get dirty all over again tomorrow.”

“Then we’ll have to take another bath,” Cade said.

“There’s not enough wood between here and Mexico for
that many baths. What do you think that girl will use to cook your supper?”

“You won’t starve, old man. Now I’d better climb on that buckskin. I don’t want him to feel left out.”

“You’re the one’s going to be left out when he pitches you tail first over the corral fence.”

Cade had called his grandfather
old man
most of the day. She figured it was a sign of affection. He had been careful to make sure Earl didn’t get on any of the bad horses, but he’d also tried to make sure he didn’t feel left out. He asked his advice on which horses they ought to keep, which they might consider selling. He even asked whether Earl thought he should breed any of the Virginia mares to a young sorrel stallion he decided not to geld.

“You won’t get nothing you can use,” Earl had said. “Those mares are too long-legged and skinny-rumped. Look at the hindquarters on that buckskin. He’s got enough power to throw you from here to San Antonio, then chase down a half dozen ornery steers.”

Cade had pointed out advantages to be gained from the mares’ height and streamlined conformation. As testimony to his grandson’s persuasiveness, Earl had agreed it might be an interesting experiment.

Cade had discarded his Confederate uniform for some old clothes, but his body had filled out during the last four years. Watching him move about in pants that fit him like a second skin kept Pilar in a state of constant turmoil. She couldn’t tell whether the heat in her face came from the fire or the internal flame ignited by the sight of Cade’s muscled thighs gripping the sides of a horse, his hand brushing dirt from his bottom after he landed in the dust. He had a habit of sliding his hands into his back pockets when he stopped to talk with one of the men. Pilar wondered
what it would be like to put
her
hands on his bottom.

Even when she wasn’t looking at him, she could visualize his hands pressed tightly against the curve of his buttocks. Until today, no thought even remotely similar to that had ever disturbed the serenity of her mind. Now tremors shook her body, an unfamiliar heat coiled and uncoiled in her belly. Maybe this was why her grandmother said a lady should keep herself separate from men on all but formal occasions.

For most of her life, Pilar had chafed against her grandmother’s tight restrictions, but she’d never rebelled. Then Laveau had gone off to war, leaving no one to run the ranch. Her grandmother had insisted they hire an overseer, but they didn’t even have the money to pay their servants. Despite her grandmother’s objections and continual predictions of failure, Pilar assumed management of their ranch.

The last four years had gradually turned her into a different woman. She knew she could never return to being the biddable girl she used to be. She also knew she could never be the silent, obedient wife her Mexican fiancé expected. She felt confident of her ability to make decisions, to act on them.

But this newfound sense of physical awareness, this unforeseen and unmanageable fascination with Cade—especially his body—was something she was neither confident about nor able to control. She’d never felt anything like this before.

Except when Cade kidnapped you.

She refused to take that comparison seriously. She had been a virtual child then, frightened, thrilled, fascinated by the whole experience. It had been the single most exciting event of her life.

But she was a woman now. How could she explain her reaction today?

“I’ll hold him while you mount up.”

Pilar came out of her self-absorption to see Rafe holding the bridle of the buckskin and Cade preparing to climb into the saddle.

“Better stand back,” Earl said to Rafe. “I give Cade five seconds before that buckskin tosses him.”

Despite having been hobbled, the horse had fought the lasso over his head, the bridle, blanket, and saddle. He should have been exhausted by now, but Pilar could tell from the wildness in his eyes that he had neither exhausted his energy nor given up the fight. He watched Cade’s approach with fearful expectancy, sidling away when Cade reached for the saddle horn. Rafe held the horse’s head tight against the hitching post. A single powerful leap, and Cade was in the saddle. Rafe let go of the bridle and jumped back.

Pilar had watched the men break horses all day, watched the horses expend every available ounce of energy to get rid of the men on their backs. But watching Cade ride the buckskin was like seeing it all for the first time.

The horse came alive with incredible energy, jumped straight into the air, came down on stiff legs, spun to the right, reversed to the left, spun to the right again, bucking furiously as it turned rapidly.

With a swiftness she didn’t think possible, the buckskin broke into a run, stopped dead in its tracks, thrust its head between its legs, and threw its hindquarters into the air.

Cade left the saddle, sailed over the horse’s head, and landed in the cut-up dirt. Rafe ran to grab the buckskin’s bridle. When Cade didn’t move immediately, Pilar waited, breath suspended.

“Damn, that’s one fine horse,” Cade said, still lying on the ground. “I’m claiming him.”

“You’ll have a damned hard time doing that with your face in the dirt,” his grandfather said.

Cade pushed himself into a sitting position. “Just trying to make him think he hurt me.”

“You fooled me,” Broc said. “I thought he knocked the wind out of you.”

Feeling as though he’d knocked the wind out of her at the same time, Pilar finally relaxed enough to take a full breath. Cade got to his feet and brushed the sand from his shirt and pants.

“How can he be thrown like that and not get hurt?” she asked Broc. It was a foolish question. She’d seen it happen all day. She’d been shocked and surprised at first. Now she felt worried and fearful.

What had changed?

Maybe she’d begun to realize some part of the real danger a man faced when he pitted his strength against an animal’s. She understood how to manage a ranch, what it took to keep one going, but she knew very little about the actual work it took to support the luxurious life she and her grandmother enjoyed.

She’d begun to doubt that Laveau could ever do this work even if he tried, that his return wouldn’t restore the life she had known.

“The secret is to relax, just let your body fall naturally,” Broc said.

Pilar couldn’t imagine how anybody could
fall naturally,
but it was obvious that Cade was unhurt. He didn’t even limp.

“I’m ready to go again,” he said.

The buckskin eyed him fearfully and attempted to back
away, but Rafe twisted his ear and the horse stood still long enough for Cade to mount.

The moment Cade’s boots were in the stirrups, he shouted, “Stand back!”

Rafe ducked toward the rail, and the buckskin turned his mind to bucking.

Pilar couldn’t begin to remember the names of all the jumps, twists, turns, stops, starts, and feints Earl called out as the buckskin did his level best to get rid of Cade, but Cade stayed on. He actually seemed to be enjoying himself. He smiled, even laughed as he dared the buckskin to try something more dangerous, bragging that the animal was his from this moment.

The buckskin finally came to a halt, its trembling legs spread wide, white lather flecking its neck and shoulders, its breath coming in huge gulps, its sides heaving. But unlike the other horses, the buckskin didn’t hang his head in submission when Cade dismounted. He stared back at Cade, momentarily defeated but still defiant.

“That horse will go after you the minute you turn your back,” his grandfather said.

“He’s the best of the bunch,” Cade said as he unbuckled the cinch and pulled off the saddle and bridle. “One of these days he’s going to save my life.”

“Right now he wants to take it,” Holt said.

“He won’t try now,” Rafe said, speaking for one of the few times that day. “He’s rethinking the situation, trying to figure out what to do next time.”

Cade laughed. “You boys trying to spook me?”

“Naw, just keeping you on your toes,” Broc said. “Seeing as how you were the last man to get thrown into the dirt, I suppose you ought to be the first one to get a bath.”

Holt tried to argue his own case, but after Earl refused
to have anything to do with submerging his body in hot water, it was unanimously decided that Cade should go first.

Pilar stopped breathing the moment Cade released the second button and a small patch of chest hair came into view. His nimble fingers didn’t stop until all the buttons were undone. He pulled his shirttail out of his pants and took off the shirt.

Pilar felt her heart lurch into her throat. Her limbs felt as shaky as those of the buckskin, her breath just as labored. She had never seen a man’s body. The sight mesmerized her.

“You going to strip naked in front of this girl?” his grandfather asked.

Cade turned to Pilar, his eyes sparkling with mischief. “If that’s what she wants.”

Cade was laughing at her. Pilar refused to let him see just how strongly he’d affected her. She managed to pull herself together. “It’s time I started supper. Put your dirty clothes in the wash pot, but wait until
after
I get inside.”

“Doesn’t sound like you’ve made a very good impression on the lady,” Owen crowed. “Maybe she’d like it better if I undressed first.”

“I don’t want to see anybody undress,” Pilar said, able to speak more decisively now that she had herself in hand. “I’m not one of your camp followers.”

“So you’ve heard about them, have you?” Owen said, his eyes alight with devilment. “None of them were as lovely as you.”

Pilar headed to the house, spurred on by laughter and whispered comments. She didn’t know what all their comments meant—her grandmother said love was vulgar, sex a necessary evil, and that a woman should remain ignorant
of what happened between her and her husband until the wedding night—but she knew enough to blush. She jerked open the door. But rather than find the solitude she needed to regain her equilibrium, she nearly ran into her grandmother.