Chapter 21
Ben lumbered in through the wide-open front door. Now that the heat of early summer was upon them, Cora made it a habit to leave every door and window in the house open during the day for maximum airflow and cooling.
“Dinner’s ready,” Cora called from the kitchen.
But he paused at the parlor entrance before heading down the hall. He’d never set foot in the room before. Had LeBeau?
The breeze ruffled the curtains. Thank goodness, the blistering wind had settled down to a whisper, or the forest-green sofa and high-back chair would be coated in dust. A bookshelf, a couple of oil lamps, and a rocking chair filled out the sparsely populated room.
The walnut side table stood empty with nothing more than a doily gracing its surface.
No book, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t been there.
He stepped into the room and perused the titles on the shelf, works by Jane Austin, James Fennimore Cooper, and a copy of The American Frugal Housewife.
He wagered the family Bible was in her room.
Had Cora taken the poetry book there, too, or hidden it away from his view?
He turned back into the wide-planked hall.
Cora stood in the kitchen doorway, arms crossed. Her hair hung over her shoulder in a loose braid, no trace of the comb he’d given her. “Can I help you with something?”
“Nothing in particular.” Hands in his pockets, he ambled to the kitchen past the barrels and the two cane rockers which lined the hall. “Just checking to make sure there weren’t any tumbleweeds blowing in.”
She snorted. “If you see any, let me know.”
“You can bet on it.” He tugged on his waistcoat and slipped between her and the doorjamb.
She glanced back at the parlor and then at him. Her look said she knew exactly what he was up to. If she wanted to bring the subject up, she was welcome to do so. For his part, he wasn’t going to say a word.
Charlie dried his hands at the washbasin and hopped into his chair, Jack at his heels. “Can you tell me more about the roundup over dinner? I was hoping you’d bring the cattle by here.”
“Maybe next time. I had to hurry them off to Mr. Goodnight.”
Charlie pointed to the floor, and Jack sat. “Were there any bulls in the herd? How did you get them to not fight?”
Ben poured himself a cup of coffee and took his seat. “Yep, there were a couple in the herd. Best way to keep them from fighting is to keep them out of each other’s territory.” He flicked a glare Cora’s way as she set a venison roast on the table.
Charlie shot out another string of questions.
Picking over the meal he’d looked forward to for two weeks, Ben answered the boy and responded to Cora’s inquiries about the cattle transaction with sparse words. Beneath the table, his knee jerked up and down faster than a horse trot. It was all he could do to not drum his fingers on the table.
Halfway through the meal, Cora’s eating picked up speed. Chomping her food, she finished before Charlie and sat there, hands clasped, lips pursed.
As Charlie scooped his last bite of pie into his mouth, Cora nodded to the skillet on the grill. “Why don’t you take Jack outside and feed him the scraps?”
“He’ll love that.” The boy jumped up. “Then maybe you can read to me and Ben.”
“Not tonight. I’m sure Ben’s tired.” She placed her palms on the table. “After you finish with Jack, I want you to take the horses into the stable. I’ll read you a quick Bible story before bed.”
Ben swallowed the rest of his coffee. If she wanted to talk, he was ready.
Jack, who’d been napping under the table, scurried to his feet and followed Charlie into the hall and out the back.
Cora fiddled with her napkin. “You might as well say it.”
“Say what?”
“Whatever is bothering you.”
“What makes you think something is bothering me?”
She held her hands wide. “A couple hours ago, you were all excited about your success, and now smoke is practically coming out of your ears.”
He blew out a breath. “You exaggerate, Miss Scott.”
“‘Miss Scott’?” She crossed her arms. “Charlie told you about the doctor coming to visit, didn’t he?”
He leaned forward and pushed his plate out of the way. “Yes. Was it supposed to be a secret?”
“Of course not. It’s none of your concern. The doctor merely—”
“Don’t you mean Arthur?”
She blew out a breath. “Charlie told you that as well?”
He shrugged.
She narrowed her eyes. “Well, I’m not the one receiving perfumed letters with the cursive scribbled so poorly that a body can hardly read who it’s addressed to.”
“You read it?”
She swatted a fly. “Only the envelope. To make sure of who it was addressed to. I could care less what it had inside.”
He cocked his eyebrows. “Is that why you sat around on the porch all afternoon drinking tea with the overly friendly neighborhood doctor?”
“My keeping company with Arthur has nothing to do with you.”
“For your information, I threw the letter behind my bunk.”
She jutted out her chin. “That sounds about like what you’d do with a letter from a woman pouring out her affection on you.”
He pushed up from the table. This woman!
Back turned to her, he flexed his hands at his sides, fighting the urge to clench them.
Fighting the urge to turn around, take her in his arms, and kiss her.
He had no right. “Send Charlie out with my breakfast in the morning.” He shoved his fingers through his hair.
“I’ll leave day after tomorrow for the widow’s in Palo Pinto. ”
He slammed the door behind him.
Cora clanked her silverware against her plate. Let him storm off in a fuss. She’d spoken the truth. Hadn’t she? As much as one could string together a clump of facts and yet not have them convey the real story. She clomped her arms down on the table and dropped her forehead to her wrists.
How had the conversation gotten so far off track?
What business of hers was it what he did with his letters or who wrote to him?
He wasn’t her beau. As a matter of fact, she should encourage his entanglement with the perfume princess.
Build another wall between Ben and herself.
Right. Any such suggestion would die on her tongue.
The best she could hope for was to keep her mouth shut, but tonight, she’d failed miserably even at that.
She pushed up from her chair and slung her napkin across the room. How in the world had Ben ended up proposing to some upper class flirt? Influence from his family? Maybe it was the laudanum, and now that he was free of its influence…
The looks he gave her sometimes jellified her knees and filled her stomach with butterflies. It couldn’t all be just her imagination. There had to be something to it, especially the way he’d fumed all evening over LeBeau’s visits.
She leaned over the dry sink by the window and slid back the curtain. Ben wasn’t in sight, but the chop of an ax boomed through the air. Surely, he wasn’t chopping wood. That was Charlie’s chore, and they already had a pile big enough to last two or three days.
She should find him and make amends. Tell him it’d be fine with her if he never spoke to Olivia again.
Tell him that Arthur wasn’t the man she wanted to come calling.
What if something happened while Ben was away?
Rounding up cattle across country he didn’t know?
And who could be certain when the Comanche or Kiowa might strike?
She shuddered. There were no guarantees.
Rubbing her hands up and down her arms, she slipped across the hall to her bedroom for a better view, the room which had once been her parents’. Kneeling on her bed, she peeked out.
In the half dark, Ben stood at the woodpile, swinging away at a log on the chopping block.
Smack. The blade came down with a vengeance.
Split in half, two sections toppled off the block.
He swiped his wrist across his brow and raked his fingers through his dark hair.
He’d unbuttoned his shirt at the neck, and his waistcoat lay atop the rain barrel.
A fine-looking man. And the most stubborn one she’d ever met.
What would it be like to have those strong, muscular arms wrapped around her?
Goodness. She shoved the curtains aside and yanked the shutters closed, blocking out sound and light and encasing the room in heat. What had gotten into her? Spring? Not to mention, she was twenty-four years old, on her way to becoming a spinster.
That’s why she’d allowed Arthur to come calling. To bolster her heart’s resistance to a man with invisible chains.