The Traveling Kind (8 page)

“At least now you look like you’ve been kissed.” His mouth quirked in a mocking line.

His hand fell away as he stepped back, setting her free. Charley hesitated uncertainly, then walked to the staircase. She paused at the opening to look back, but Shad was already disappearing into the kitchen. She slowly climbed the stairs to her bedroom.

The weekend came and went with Charley trying to pretend that nothing earth-shattering had happened and attempting to pickup the threads of her previously friendly relationship with Shad. He appeared to accept her Friday night answer as final but there continued to be an awareness of her in his eyes although he didn’t make any overt moves. But Charley was discovering that the daily exposure to him was only increasing the attraction.

Gary had mastered the use of his crutches. He could do anything and go anywhere on them. No longer housebound, he began doing some of the light chores such as feeding the horses, thus freeing Charley and Shad of that responsibility.

With the dawn of Thursday morning, Charley wakened to discover a steady rain was falling. There would be no ranch work done except the daily chores that Shad took care of. Charley used most of the morning cleaning the house. The kitchen was the last room on her list. Gary was sitting at the table with his leg propped on a chair when she entered.

“Did you hear that?” he asked.

“Hear what?” She half frowned as she glanced at him, her mind busy trying to decide what to fix for lunch. Then, above the steady rainfall, she heard the sputtering cough of an engine before it caught and roared to life. Charley didn’t understand the significance of that sound until Gary explained.

“Shad has been working on that old truck this morning. It sounds as if he’s got it running.” He shook his head in wry amazement. “I didn’t think he could do it. He’s really something, isn’t he?”

“Yes.” It wasn’t a subject she could comfortably discuss. He was becoming much too special in her life. She walked to the refrigerator. “How about cold roast beef sandwiches for lunch?”

“What you’re trying to tell me is that we’re going to have leftovers for lunch,” Gary said dryly.

“I want to clean the refrigerator this afternoon,” she defended her position.

“Bring on the leftovers,” he declared with a motioning wave of his hand.

Charley began carrying the plastic food containers from the refrigerator to the table, an assortment of condiments and dressings, and a loaf of bread from the bread drawer. As she got out the plates and silverware the hum of the truck engine seemed nearer. She even thought she heard the tires splashing in the puddles of water. A horn blared right outside the kitchen door, causing her to jump. It sent out its summons a second time and Charley set the plates and silverware on the table and hurried to the back door.

Gary was a fraction slower, reaching the door after she had opened it. The truck was stopped just outside, the motor idling as steadily as a purring cat. Shad had rolled the window down on the driver’s side and had an arm hooked over the frame. A hand was resting on the steering wheel. His lean, rugged features were broken with a wide smile, his blue eyes dancing with a thousand lights.

“It sounds great!” Gary told him.

“Thanks!” But his attention was focused on Charley, disarming with its slightly laughing persuasion. “Let’s go for a ride, Charley!”

“I just put lunch on the table.” She lifted her shoulders in an expression of genuine regret, ensnared by his celebrative mood.

“So?” he grinned. “Let Gary eat it.” His gaze sliced to her brother. “Promise you won’t break your neck if we leave you alone for a couple hours.”

“I promise.” Gary mockingly crossed his heart in a childhood vow.

“Come on, Charley,” Shad coaxed.

She glanced sideways at her brother, who smiled and gave an approving nod. “Go on.”

She needed no second urging as she dashed out from beneath the shelter of the overhang and into the raindrops. Shad had leaned across the seat and opened the passenger door for her so she could climb right in.

“Are you sure this thing doesn’t leak?” She was slightly out of breath as she slid onto the seat and closed the door.

“Does a Rolls-Royce leak?” He gave her a look of mock reproval that she should have so little faith in the old truck. “Of course not.”

As he shifted the truck into forward gear a huge drop of water plopped onto the dashboard and they broke into laughter simultaneously. Charley reached out to wipe it away with the sleeve of her plaid blouse.

“A little water never hurt anyone,” Charley assured him.

“That’s what I thought.” He sent a saluting wave to Gary standing in the back doorway and started the truck rolling forward. The windshield wipers swished back and forth, leaving spotty patches of water where the blades failed to touch the glass.

“You need new windshield wipers,” she pointed out.

“But only when it rains,” he countered with a wickedly teasing look.

“What do you think it’s doing now?” she laughed.

“That’s only liquid sunshine,” he insisted.

As he turned the truck around in the yard and headed it down the lane, she felt the smooth acceleration of power. “It really runs well, better than before it quit working.”

“All it needed was some loving attention and a few well-chosen words.” A dark eyebrow arched with speaking amusement and Charley recalled a few times when she’d heard him cussing out a resisting engine part.

She laughed and lifted a hand to fluff the rain-dampened hair around her face. The quick dash from the house to the truck had left her only slightly wet. She would dry quickly.

“Now you have your own transportation,” she declared. “When you finally leave, you won’t have to hitchhike. You can drive away in your own truck.” Almost as soon as the words were out, she regretted them. Just knowing the day would come brought a twinge of pain in her midsection. She wished she hadn’t referred to it.

“That’s right.” Even the lightness of his voice sounded forced.

Leaning back in the seat, she let her head rest on the curved top and turned her gaze out the window. The mountains were shrouded in dark clouds, a gray mist hanging over the valley floor. The tap-tapping of the rain on the metal roof of the truck was a soothing sound.

“I love to ride in the rain,” Charley said.

“So do I,” Shad agreed and slowed the truck as they reached the intersection with the highway. There was no traffic in sight and he pulled onto the road.

“Where did you learn so much about fixing engines?” She was curious about how he had become so knowledgeable about so many things.

“I picked it up here and there, just like everything else. An old Mexican showed me how to braid and make cinch straps as soft as velvet when I worked on a ranch in Arizona. And an old-timer in Wyoming showed me a few tricks with a rope. You can learn a lot of things if you keep your eyes and ears open.” His sideways glance held humor “
And
—as long as you’re not ashamed to admit that you’re ignorant about something;”

Yet it seemed to her that he was letting all his knowledge and abilities go to waste. She didn’t understand why he had remained a drifter, never using his intelligence to make something better out of his life.

“Haven’t you ever wanted to be something else than what you are?” she frowned. She face his profile, her cheek resting on the back of the seat.

“Something other than a cowboy?” He named his profession, then silently shook his head. “Granted the hours are long. Sometimes it seems that you get up so early in the morning that you’re eating breakfast in the middle of the night. And the work is hard, sometimes dirty and smelly. The pay is cheap. A guy could earn a lot more working in a factory in the city. But it’s a proud way to live.”

There was an underlying emphasis on the last sentence, a sense of deep satisfaction and— pride. Charley was moved by the force of his abiding love for his profession and was sorry she had implied it wasn’t a worthy one.

“Was you father a cowboy, too?” Giving way to her curiosity, she unconsciously began to delve into his background.

“I really don’t know.” He spared her a glance, his expression vaguely thoughtful as he met her confused and questioning look after such a strange answer. He smiled absently and let his attention return to the highway. “I was abandoned as a child when I was somewhere around two years old. I don’t remember anything about my natural parents. There weren’t any papers left with me. I have no idea when or where I was born or what my real name is.”

“I see,” Charley murmured as a picture began to form in her mind. “This was in Colorado?” She remembered he had told her that was where he had been raised.

“Yes.” The rain had become spotty and Shad switched off the windshield wipers.

“Didn’t they try to find your parents?” It seemed incomprehensible to her that someone could abandon their child. She wondered what kind of people could do that, and guessed the same thought had probably occurred to Shad. Such an experience had to leave a scar.

“They tried,” he said with an expressive shrug, a certain impassivity about his features. “A service-station owner found me sleeping in one of the rest rooms when he opened up for business one morning. There wasn’t any clue to go on. The station had been closed so no one saw who left me. There was always the chance my parents would come back to claim me so I wasn’t considered adoptable. I was shuffled from one foster home to another.”

“So you never really knew what it was like to have a family,” Charley realized. Traveling, always moving on, had been a part of his lifestyle from a very early age. There hadn’t been a stable home in his life.

“Not in the beginning,” he admitted, and sent her a smiling look that held no self-pity. “None of my foster parents ever mistreated me. They were all good to me but I was still an outsider. It wasn’t until I was older that I discovered most children had parents and a family. When I found out differently, I was realistic enough not to cry about something I couldn’t change. In some ways I was lucky because I was exposed to a variety of environments and lifestyles, learned a lot about people, and life in general.”

“But it had to have an effect on you,” Charley insisted.

“I learned to be self-reliant and independent. “I struck out on my own when I was seventeen,” he explained. “I got a job herding sheep up in the high country of Colorado with a Basque shepherd as my partner. From there I went to work for a quarter-horse breeder, cleaning stables. Cattle were a sideline with him. That’s where I started riding fence and working branding crews. I .moved south after that—Arizona, New Mexico, Texas. I’ve seen a lot of country.” His gaze made a sweep of the rugged land outside the truck windows. “But I guess I was mountain-bred. Look at that.”

With absent obedience, she glanced out the window and felt the breath being drawn from her lungs. It had stopped raining, leaving behind a world that had been washed clean. The air was vibrantly clear and fresh, its clean scent rushing into the cab through the now opened windows. The leaves of the trees had seemed to turn emerald green, while the pines took on the darker shade of green. The sun had broken through the clouds, a patch of blue showing in the sky. Against the backdrop of the wild mountains, a rainbow arched its multicolored promise.

“Everything is always so beautiful after a rain,” Charley murmured with a trace of awe.

“Yes.” But he was looking straight at her when he said it. The disturbing darkness of his blue eyes disrupted the steady beat of her heart.

She turned quickly to face the front again and fought the rush of wild longing that swept through her. The cab of the truck suddenly seemed very cramped. She was conscious of his long, muscled thighs on the seat near hers and the sinewed strength of his arms beneath the sleeves of his shirt. It became difficult to think clearly in such close quarters and Charley tried to concentrate on the passing scenery.

“Where are we going?” she asked as she tried to recognize her surroundings.

“That’s a surprise,” Shad replied, deliberately mysterious.

“Tell me where you’re taking me,” she insisted. The game he was playing brought a reluctant smile to dimple the corners of her mouth.

“Somewhere out of this world,” he said with a mocking grin and refused to tell her more than that.

Her curiosity was fully aroused as she sat back and watched the .passing scenery. Her mind raced in an attempt to guess their ultimate destination. She made a lot of guesses and discarded them all, no nearer to unraveling the mystery than before. And Shad wouldn’t help her.

Chapter Five

THE HIGHWAY SWUNG along the foothills of the mountain range with the Snake River Plains spreading out flat on the other side. Charley was still in the dark about their destination until she saw the harsh, forbidding landscape ahead of them. Barren of plant life, it was a tortuous collection of volcanic rock and solidified lava.

“The Craters of the Moon, that’s where we’re going,” she guessed accurately this time.

Shad chuckled and reminded her, “I told you it was someplace ‘out of this world.’ “

“That was a rotten clue and you know it.” She poked her fist at his shoulder in a playful reprimand and laughed.