Adrienne deWolfe - [Wild Texas Nights 03] (10 page)

Lucinda never let her daughter forget she was to blame for Lucinda's miserable sheepherding life in Texas. The fact that Lucinda was able to conceive only two more stillborn daughters, never a son, confirmed in her mind that the marriage was cursed.

At least that was the excuse she had used when she'd run back home to Beacon Street on Bailey's tenth birthday. Patrick, believing in the sanctity of their wedding vows, had sailed north after his wife, but he came home bitter and disillusioned, divorce papers in his pocket. Lucinda, it seemed, had wasted little time planning her nuptials to an elderly railroad tycoon.

Bailey cleared her throat. The silence lengthened unbearably. Through the smoke of his pipe, Mac was staring at her with some chagrin, as if he had guessed her thoughts. He said nothing about them, though. As was his way, he gave her hand a gentle squeeze and went back to hammering the misshapen wagon wheel.

She sighed. It was at times like these when she wished she could love Mac passionately, not like the second father he'd always been to her. She knew she could do a hell of a lot worse than Iain McTavish as her mate, even if he was more than twenty years her senior.

"Mac, do you think I'm wrong to compete in the rodeo?"

He never missed a beat with his hammer. "Do ye want to compete, lass?"

"Yes."

"Then what difference does it make what I think?"

She squirmed on the inside. That wasn't exactly the answer she'd wanted to hear.

"But do you think I can beat Zack Rawlins? Really?"

She watched the corners of his eyes crinkle beside his jaw-long sideburns. "When you set your mind to something, lass, I've always seen ye rise above the odds. So I've no doubt ye'll come out a winner, as long as ye keep yer head... and yer heart."

She blushed at that. Iain McTavish knew all her secrets. Season after season, he'd listened to her prattling stream of confessions while she'd worked beside him pitching hay, harnessing horses, dipping sheep, and bottle-feeding lambs. Of course, he also knew her only interest in Zack Rawlins these days was business. She'd been sure to tell him that.

"Well," she said briskly, "I figure I can up the odds in my favor if I practice. You know, find some hogs for Pris to herd. Zack'll be in Fort Worth next week, lobbying the railroaders to build a feeder line in Bandera, so that won't leave him much time to get many pig roundups in before the contest." She grinned smugly at her advantage. "So with me winning pig herding, and the Eldridge-Cole team winning fence stringing—"

Mac raised his bushy eyebrows at her.

"I'm not leaping to conclusions," she said defensively, "I'm looking at the facts. Bandera cattlemen have experience
cutting
barbed wire. They hardly ever string it."

Mac's expression turned wry as he shook his head. Setting aside his hammer, he reached for a bucket of grease. She handed him a brush.

"And then there's Octavio Ramirez—you know, Billy Chilton's new foreman," she continued excitedly. "I heard he won a gold buckle last year busting broncs in Mexico City. That means we sheepherders might actually have a contender who can beat Nick."

Mac snorted. "Ye wouldna be dealing with gossips, gunnysackers,
or
rodeos if ye would have let me handle that upstart as I'd wanted to."

She flinched at his tone. She should have known better than to speak Nick's name. Now she was in for a McTavish lecture, the kind that had made even her daddy squirm.

"That lad needs a couple of good swift kicks in the pants," Mac growled, jabbing his pipe stem in the air for emphasis, "preferably from a man who knows how to wear his. There oughta be a law in this land against what he did to ye. Why, back in Scotland—"

"Now, Mac," she interrupted gently, "we've already been through this. First of all, Nick and I never... er, mated."
We have, however, seen each other as naked as jaybirds, which, I'm sorry to say, was my idea, not his.
"Secondly, my reputation couldn't be any more tarnished than it already is."
Thanks to my mother's legacy, and how I choose to live.
"Thirdly, I have a lot fewer snake oil salesmen beating down my door, professing their undying love for me, when all they really love is my land. I have Nick to thank for that."

"Maybe," Mac muttered. "But that bastard had no right saying the two of ye were to be wed."

"You're right," she said soothingly, still regretting how deeply the news had shocked and hurt Mac. "And I like to think I put an end to that rumor." A rumor that, ironically, Nick had spread because he thought he was doing the right thing. However, as she'd expected, no one had been more surprised or relieved than Nick when she'd dug him from his hole and set him free.

Mac's jaw hardened. Rising abruptly, he knocked the tobacco from his pipe bowl with sharp, fierce whacks against the wagon.

"The fact is, lass," he said, "I blame myself for what happened to ye. When you came to me all those months ago, wanting me to..." His face reddened. "Uh, that is to say, wanting to become a woman, I didn't handle ye the best way. I should have been more understanding, but I was just so surprised, ye see—"

"I know," she said quickly, her stomach clenching at the memory. Asking Mac to show her what she was missing, what all the cowboys joked about and what the sheep and cattle, hell, even the birds and the bees all seemed to know except her... well, that had been her most stupid idea ever.

No, she took that back. Her most stupid idea had been seeking out Nick in an insulted huff after Mac had turned her down. When push came to shove, she hadn't been able to mate with Nick, and she'd slinked out of the hayloft hating herself and her weakness, but most of all, hating the burden of her femaleness.

"Ye came to me because ye trusted me," Mac said, his ham-sized fist white around the pipe bowl, "and I let ye down. Now Nick Rotterdam's mouth will keep any decent man from asking for ye—"

"You asked for me," she reminded him lightly, hoping to relieve the mounting tension between them.

Instead, his gaze melded with hers, and the usual warmth there seemed to rise a couple of degrees.

"Aye, lass. And my offer still stands."

She drew in a sharp breath, not prepared to see, not
wanting
to see, what she imagined she saw kindling in the depths of his lonely eyes.

Oh, damn
, she thought, swallowing hard.
He really was serious.

Chapter 4

All of Bandera County must have turned out for the Independence Day Rodeo. The usual events—roping, riding, broncing, and racing—were of course among the attractions, but the main draw for this year's phenomenal crowd, as Bailey well knew, was the long-awaited competition between the sheepherders and cattle ranchers.

The grandstands were filled with cowboys, sheepmen, farmers, and townsfolk, each group assembled in its own loosely defined cheering section. A few early-morning arrivals had rigged canopies over their buckboards and jockeyed them into a ringside view; food and craft vendors had staked tents beneath the live oak trees beside the alarmingly low Medina River. Other than the occasional lady's parasol, however, little else offered relief from the sun.

The shadeless location, coupled with the blistering heat, made barrels of whiskey extremely popular throughout the long day. Sheep and cattle ranchers alike fell under the rotgut's allure, and more than one drunken fistfight erupted near the livestock pens behind the arena. Nick proved to be the vendors' biggest customer, and Hank had to heave his firstborn into the river to soak some sense into him, since Nick was dead set on breaking his fool neck in the bronc-busting contest. Luckily for him, Nat got up enough nerve to say he'd ride Widowmaker, keeping the Rotterdam ranch and the cowboy team from forfeiting.

Nick's disqualification from the games kept the whole arena buzzing, mostly with oddsmakers and bettors. Folks seemed to think the bronc competition was up for grabs, what with Octavio's win in Mexico City. Bailey couldn't have been more pleased to hear the speculations. As she'd predicted, the fence-stringing competition had gone to the sheepmen, and the shooting match had gone to the cattlemen. If Nat couldn't beat Octavio's time in the saddle, the sheepherders were practically assured of winning the day. All Bailey had to do was beat Zack at pig herding.

No big task, right?

Shifting from foot to foot, she stood nervously behind her rival at the rear of the arena, where he leaned against the high cedar fence connecting the competitors' circle to the horse barn. The sun was in the five o'clock position now, throwing his long, lean shadow into the ring. To see it reminded her of the gunfighter showdowns illustrated on so many penny-dreadful covers. He'd already competed in the countywide competitions, putting on a tremendous show. He hadn't been gored, trampled, or thrown by his longhorn, and she wondered a little hopefully if being named champion bulldogger for the third year in a row might have tuckered him out.

He didn't look tuckered out, though. He looked downright relaxed. Taking off his Stetson, he balanced it on his saddle, which he'd thrown over the fence's top rail. An occasional puff of wind ruffled the short-cropped waves of his chestnut hair; his pale green shirt cleaved damply to his broad back. When he raised his forearms to the fence, Bailey enjoyed watching his muscles ripple beneath the clingy cotton of his shirt.

She enjoyed even more trailing her gaze over the taut derriere above his brown and white cowhide chaps and the hard, corded thighs filling his denim blue jeans. He was a fine specimen of manhood, Zack Rawlins was.

She found herself wondering what he thought of her looks—strictly from a stockman's perspective, of course. When they'd been growing up, Nick had called her Little Butt, and Nat had called her Skinny. Apparently if she'd been a heifer, she wouldn't have made good breeding stock. She wouldn't have made much of a breeding ewe either, come to think of it.

She worried her bottom lip, wondering how much longer she could safely ogle Zack before one of two things happened: either he caught her, or Nat's ride began. Because Zack had a good view of the arena in a nice piece of shade, she was sorely tempted to go share it with him. But that meant she would have to talk with him, and she always had the damnedest time talking to Zack Rawlins.

She blew out her breath. Well, one thing was certain. She'd never been one to back down from a challenge.

Marching up to the fence, she climbed the bottom rail and gazed out at the arena. They stood shoulder to shoulder, and a minute or two passed. She noticed her heart was hammering ridiculously hard. Still, he didn't say anything. He didn't even glare at her. She wondered a tad irritably if she had to climb another rail just to get his attention. Hell, she wasn't that short, was she?

She ventured a glance his way. Only then did she realize he'd shaved his mustache sometime since the rodeo meeting. She caught her breath, unable to keep from gawking at the rugged, clean-shaven face that had haunted so many of her girlish dreams. Now more than ever, Zack Rawlins was her fantasy come to life, and he was standing right beside her.

She cleared her throat. She supposed she should say something to him. "You ready for the herding contest?"

He cast her a sideways glance. The touch of heat in his mahogany eyes sprinkled goose bumps all the way to her toes. She wasn't entirely opposed to the sensation, and she felt a fleeting disappointment when he let his gaze slide away.

"Yep," he answered. "You?"

"Yep."

More silence. Now what? She steeled herself against fidgeting. When she was younger, she used to get Mac's attention by jumping on his back. Usually, it had made him smile. Then she'd turned thirteen, and Mac had taken her aside and gently warned her against such tomfoolery with boys. He hadn't been specific, just dire.

That lecture had been the first of many he'd given her about her blossoming womanhood. Since his last lecture—and his last proposal—things had gotten steadily more uncomfortable between them, much to her secret upset. The thought of losing Mac and the closeness they'd always shared scared the living daylights out of her. It was just one more reason to find being a woman so annoying. If she'd been a man, none of this nonsense would have happened.

She sighed, and Zack arched an eyebrow at her.

"Change your mind?"

She raised her chin. "Not on your life."