Heiress (19 page)

"He's magnificent," she said, a slightly nervous edge to her voice as she turned her attention back to El Kedar.

"My father thought so." Abbie wasn't sure why she'd said that, except in some way, she knew she wanted to challenge Rachel and assert her claim to him—to River Bend, to everything that she had once thought of as solely hers.

"At his age, I expected him to be heavier. . . thicker-necked, maybe, and stoutly muscled. But he looks lean and fit.”

"We've always had trouble putting weight on him, especially during the breeding season. He was born and raised in Egypt. They don't believe in putting flesh on them. He was a three-year-old when he finally arrived here at River Bend—practically skin and bones after the long sea voyage and the quarantine. He'd never seen a blade of grass, let alone walked on it or ate it. And he'd never had room to run free." In a paddock separated from El Kedar's, a bay stallion similarly marked trotted boldly up to the fence and whistled a challenge to his older rival. "That's Nahr Ibn Kedar, his son."

"He doesn't have El Kedar's presence, does he?"

Abbie was briefly surprised by Rachel's observation. She hadn't suspected that she was so knowledgeable about Arabians. "No. El Kedar has never reproduced himself." Abbie paused, fighting a tension and an anger she couldn't quite understand. "Exactly why have you come here?"

Again she noticed Rachel's hesitation, that trace of uncertainty and nervousness in her expression. "I've only seen pictures of El Kedar. I've wanted to see him in person ever since Dean gave me his daughter, Nahr Simoon, out of Nahr Riih."

Abbie stiffened, remembering the filly, one of the best of El Kedar's daughters—the filly her father had supposedly sold. But that was yet another lie he'd told. She couldn't admit that, certainly not to Rachel.

"You called him by his first name?" she said instead.

"Yes. It was my mother's idea. She thought it would create fewer questions than if I called him Father or Daddy." Just for an instant, a wryness, faintly sardonic, crept into her voice and expression. But it was gone when Rachel turned from the fence and swept the stable area with a glance. "I was hoping I might tour the facilities here."

"Why?" Abbie wondered. To appraise its worth?

"I. . . I just wanted to see it. I've heard so much about it."

"I'm sure you'll understand that a tour isn't possible." Pushed by some territorial compulsion, Abbie wanted only to get her away from there, off of River Bend, now. Rachel had no right here, none at all. "River Bend isn't open to the public. And it won't be again until the estate is settled."

"Surely it wouldn't hurt anything if I just. . . looked around," Rachel suggested tentatively.

Over my dead body, Abbie thought, trembling with the rage she felt inside, not really knowing where it came from—and not really caring. "I can't allow that." She managed to keep the pitch of her voice calmly even and firm, but it wasn't easy.

"I see." Rachel held herself stiffly, looking a little hurt. "In that case, I guess there isn't much point in my staying here any longer."

"I guess not."

"Thank you for at least letting me see El Kedar."

"You're welcome."

As Rachel walked back to her car, Abbie felt the tears burning in her eyes. She was afraid, and it was the first time in her life she could remember feeling fear. So much had happened. She'd lost her father. She'd lost her illusions of the past. She couldn't stand the thought of losing even one small part of River Bend.

Surely Rachel hadn't really believed she would blithely show her around. Did Rachel really think she was so stupid that she hadn't guessed she intended to claim part—maybe even all—of it? Abbie wondered as she watched Rachel slide behind the wheel of her car and close the door. Well, she was wrong if she did.

Abbie started to turn and walk back to the stables. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a movement along the fence and glanced over, expecting to see Ben. But the tall, dark-haired man in a wheat-tan sports jacket and crisp new jeans bore no resemblance to the elderly Pole.

She breathed in sharply, fighting to bring her emotions under control, as she stared at MacCrea Wilder. She wondered how long he'd been standing there. How much had he heard? She saw his glance follow Rachel's car as it pulled out of the yard. When they'd met at the cemetery Rachel had been involved that time, too, Abbie remembered.

"Mr. Wilder. I didn't hear you walk up." She studied his angular face, noting the aggressive jut of his chin and jaw. Despite the smooth darkness of his eyes, his was a hard face, she realized.

"I guessed that." Unhurriedly, he moved toward her. When he reached the approximate place where Rachel had stood, he stopped. "Did I understand right? She's your half-sister?"

Abbie didn't have to wonder anymore about how much he'd overheard. "Do you know anything about horses, Mr. Wilder?"

His mouth quirked in a little smile, lifting one corner of his mustache. "I know which is the back end."

"In the Arabian horse business, the term half-sister is restricted to fillies foaled by the same mare. Rachel Farr and I share the same sire."

Idly MacCrea studied her, catching the glitter of moisture in her blue eyes. He frowned briefly, realizing that he'd unwittingly touched a sore spot. She had looked so calm and poised to him before, completely in control, that he hadn't noticed the fine tension emanating from her. He could see it now in the firm set of her lips and the almost rigid lines of her jaw.

"Sorry. I guess I put my foot in it, didn't I?"

"All the way up to your boot tops," she retorted curtly.

"But I couldn't know that, could I?" he reminded her, squarely meeting her gaze and holding it until hers fell away.

"I don't suppose you could," she admitted grudgingly, leaving him with the impression that she would have preferred to battle it out with him and let him be the scapegoat for her anger. But a fight with Dean Lawson's daughter was the last thing he wanted. "Is there something I can do for you, Mr. Wilder? I presume you didn't come out here just to eavesdrop on a private conversation."

"I stopped by to see your mother."

"You'll find her at the house."

"I figured that. But I wasn't sure she was receiving visitors yet, so I stopped by the stables to check. That's when I saw you."

Abbie believed him. She didn't want to, but she did. "I was just on my way to the house to change for dinner. If you'd like, you can walk along with me."

"Thank you, I will."

Chapter 11

"Momma." Abbie entered the foyer, conscious of MacCrea Wilder following her—just as she had been conscious of him during the walk to the house. She'd forgotten what it was like to be physically aware of a man, to be alive to the close swing of his arm next to hers, the inches it would take before they accidentally brushed. When had the sensitivity been buried? During her years of marriage to Christopher? Had she taken a man's nearness so for granted that she'd become indifferent to it? Maybe familiarity did dull the senses, she decided. Practically every man she'd dated, both before her marriage and the few afterward, she'd known for years. Maybe that's why it was different with MacCrea. She didn't know anything about him, not his background, or his tastes—or even the way he kissed. Abbie smiled at herself, amused that she even had such thoughts, considering all the things she had on her mind. Yet she almost welcomed the diversion he offered.

"Someone's here to see you, Momma." She led the way into the living room.

As she turned, she caught the sweeping glance he gave the room before he focused his attention on her mother. Despite his seeming casualness, Abbie suspected that he had noted every detail. She doubted that those ever-watchful dark eyes missed much.

But she wondered how he'd seen it, as she looked around the room, taking in the wainscot's striped pattern of alternating chestnut and walnut boards that matched the parquet floor, the walls painted a cool shade of blue above the wainscot, the elaborately carved walnut molding around the fireplace, the neo-Victorian tufted velvet sofa and swan chairs, and the lace curtains at the tall windows. She wondered whether he liked it, then almost laughed. What did it matter whether he liked it? This was her home, not his.

"I haven't had the pleasure of meeting you before, Mrs. Lawson. I'm MacCrea Wilder," he said, shaking hands with her mother.

"Mr. Wilder. I'm happy to meet you." But she threw a questioning look at Abbie.

"After meeting you in person, I can honestly say that the photograph your husband kept on his office desk doesn't do you justice."

"You're obviously a Texan," Babs laughed, beaming at the compliment. "Only a Texan can tell tall tales like that and get away with it."

"It's no tale. I promise you," MacCrea chuckled, the sound coming from low in his throat. Abbie was warmed by it.

"Now I know it is," Babs declared, and waved a hand at the sofa and chairs. "Make yourself comfortable, Mr. Wilder. Jackson?" As she turned to summon their houseman, the ubiquitous Jackson appeared in the archway, carrying a tray of iced drinks. "Oh, there you are. And you brought extra glasses of iced tea."

"Yes, ma'am. I heard the gentleman and Miss Lawson come in," he replied, walking in and pausing to offer each of them a glass from the tray. "Will there be anything else, ma'am?"

"I don't think so, Jackson. Thank you." As the black houseman withdrew, they each found a place to sit, Abbie on the blue-flowered velvet sofa with her mother and MacCrea in a pale-blue swan chair, but she noticed he waited until they were seated before he sat down himself.

Abbie also noticed that the swan chair didn't suit him at all, with its gleaming walnut arms carved in the shape of swans with necks bowed and wings curved back to form the chair's sides. With his broad shoulders and lean hips, he was much too masculine to look natural in such an ornate chair. Abbie remembered that her robust grandfather had referred to the twin chairs as the "bird seats" and claimed he always felt ridiculous sitting in them, but he sat in them anyway. Like MacCrea, he didn't let them bother him or make him uncomfortable.

"You knew Dean?" Babs prompted.

"Not well. My relationship with him was mainly business."

Crossing his legs MacCrea hooked his hat on the bend of his knee. "He was helping me with a project of mine."

"Are you involved with Arabian horses, too?" Babs guessed, influenced by the boots, the hat, and the jeans, even though they were fairly standard dress in Texas.

"Mr. Wilder's in the oil business," Abbie inserted. "He's one of those wildcatters." In her opinion, he fit the mold of the independent oil men—a bit of a gambler with shrewd instincts.

“Not exactly," MacCrea denied smoothly, meeting her glance. "I'm a drilling contractor by trade, although on occasion I have taken a small piece of action in a well."

"Then what was your business with my father?" Abbie had assumed her father had been putting together a limited partnership to raise the capital for some new well, a fairly common practice of his.

"Truthfully, I was hoping he had talked to you about it, Mrs. Lawson," he said, shifting his gaze to her and watching her expression closely.

"Dean knew better than to discuss business with me," Babs declared. "What I know about it wouldn't fill a beanpot."

Abbie caught the look of disappointment that flickered briefly in his eyes, then it was deftly smoothed away, leaving only the grim set of his jaw to indicate that her reply wasn't the one he had wanted to hear.

"What kind of project was Daddy helping you with?" Abbie leaned forward, her curiosity thoroughly aroused.

He hesitated, as if trying to decide how much to tell her. . . or how much she'd understand. "With the help of a computer friend of mine, I've come up with a system that can test the downhole performance of drilling fluids. Without getting too technical, it will allow an operator to better determine what kind of drilling fluids he might need."

"You mean mud." Abbie smiled.

His mouth crooked in response. "Yes. The Lawson name is somewhat legendary in the mud industry. I grew up hearing the old-timers telling stories about your grandfather."

"R.D. was a character," Babs recalled fondly, her expression taking on a reminiscent glow. "He never did anything small. With him everything had to be big—and I mean Texas-big. This house was so alive when he was here. He just filled it up. Not that he was noisy, although his voice could boom when he wanted it to. He said it came from all those years he spent in the oil fields, trying to talk above the racket going on. But when he was home, you just felt like you could relax 'cause everything was going to be all right. He'd see to that." She paused to sigh. "I always thought it was a shame Dean sold the company R.D. worked so hard to build and took such pride in. Was your family in the oil business, too, Mr. Wilder?"

"My daddy was a drilling contractor. He was born in the Permian Basin area west of Abilene on the family ranch. That's where he caught the oil fever." MacCrea didn't bother to add that the ranch had been lost in a foreclosure sale during the depression, making his father's venture into the oil fields to find work a necessity.

No did he consider it advisable to talk about his own childhood. By Lawson standards, it would probably be regarded as rough. His mother had died when he was barely three years old. He had traveled with his father after that, living in whatever drilling site the rig was sitting on, playing in the mud pits, and eating with the crews. Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Wyoming, Louisiana—he'd gone to school all over the country and started working in the fields when he was twelve. When he'd turned eighteen, his father had made him a full partner and changed the signs on the trucks to Wilder & Son Drilling Contractors. They were going to make it big together. John Thomas Wilder had been more than his father; he'd been his partner and buddy, too.

"Your father: is he. . ." Abbie hesitated over the question.

"He's dead. Killed in a freak drilling accident several years ago." Thirteen years ago, to be exact, he remembered, conscious of the hard flatness in his voice and the effort it took to suppress that memory and keep it locked in the past with his feelings. He took a sip of the cold tea, then lifted the glass in the widow's direction. "This is good tea, Mrs. Lawson. Some people make it too sweet for my taste."