Lucky Penny (20 page)
Paxton conceded the point with a nod. “A proper
wife
would never have put herself in a position to be on the receiving end of such a crack. What did you expect he’d think when you appeared in the middle of the night without your husband, wanting to hire a horse? He was out of line, but from the smell of him, he’s been drinking. Alcohol scrambles the brains. Plus, I’m sure the news of Daphne’s announcement tonight spread through town like a prairie fire.” Looking over the horse at her, Paxton treated her to a slow once-over, followed by a deliberately insolent grin. “Any woman in a dress that displays her assets so noticeably has to expect a certain amount of unwanted attention from the opposite sex.” He lifted one shoulder in another shrug. “If he’d taken it any further, I would have stepped in, but I’m not inclined to box a drunk man’s ears for only looking and angling for a sample.”
Blistering heat surged to Brianna’s cheeks. She was well aware that she’d matured physically since her dresses had
been made years ago. While in Ricker’s employ, she had let out the seams to accommodate her increasing bust, but that hadn’t helped much, and the side-seam inserts she’d added later while working for Abigail had only added puckers under the arms instead of solving the problem. She glanced at her cloak, which was wrapped around Daphne to protect her against the night air. One of their blankets would have served as well, but they’d already been stuffed in the pillowcases. Her shawl had been tucked into one of the totes at some point as well, and she’d been in too big a hurry to search for it.
Striding over to one of the packs now on the mule, Paxton lifted the flap and withdrew a denim flannel-lined jacket, which he tossed to her without a word of explanation. Grateful for the warmth and concealment that it offered, Brianna stuffed her arms into the sleeves, shrugged it on, and struggled with fingers gone numb from the chill to button the front. Once covered, she watched Paxton add her bags to the packs the mule carried and then check the load for balance.
Come or stay,
Paxton had said. Taking stock of the situation, Brianna decided to postpone the battle for another time. She was up against a man who outweighed her by at least eighty pounds, every inch of him appearing to be overlaid with a steely layer of muscle. He also wore Colt revolvers and a hunting knife and had a rifle in his riding boot, plus a document in his saddlebag that branded her and her child as his property. The way she saw it, her options were few—if, indeed, she had any at all.
For tonight, at least, she would acquiesce and go with him, ever watchful along the way for an opportunity to escape. She would
not
, under any circumstances, stay behind. She couldn’t be separated from Daphne.
After six long years of infrequent exposure to horses, Brianna’s fear of the gigantic beasts had never diminished. Ignoring Paxton, who still fussed with the packs, she considered the daunting prospect of having to ride one of the horrible creatures. She had limped and favored her bitten shoulder for days after her only attempt to get in the saddle, and she
didn’t relish the thought of trying it again. Especially in front of David Paxton. Heart in throat, she forced herself to walk to the already saddled bay gelding. The animal grunted and nudged her in a friendly way, dispelling some of her trepidation and leaving a damp smear across her jacket sleeve.
Recalling the form of riders she’d watched, she assured herself that she could do this. It appeared that the stirrups hung too low for her, so she quickly readjusted them. By the time Paxton strode up behind her, she’d inched up both of her foot wells to what she felt was an appropriate height.
“Daphne will ride with me,” he said. Then, piercing her with those sharp blue eyes, he asked, “You ever been on a horse? If not, speak up now. I don’t want you falling off and getting hurt.”
Brianna had suffered this man’s superiority for too many hours to admit the truth. “I know what I’m about.” She turned, grabbed the saddle horn, and bounced uselessly about on the ball of one foot while she tried, without success, to lift her other foot high enough to get it into the stirrup. She’d witnessed countless men in Glory Ridge mount with what had looked like effortless ease. How they managed it, she didn’t know. It was like trying to scale Pikes Peak. “I have lived in Colorado for
years
, sir.”
Paxton leaned around her to study the left stirrup. “Did you do that?” he asked.
“Did I do what?”
“Adjust the stirrups so high? I sure as hell didn’t.”
“They were too low for me.”
“Christ on crutches, with them that high, you could set a supper plate on your knee.”
“Can you
please
expend
some
effort to mind your tongue, sir?”
She heard him huff. He nudged her out of the way to readjust the stirrup straps. As he stepped around to the other side of the horse, he sent her a knifelike regard from under the shadowy brim of his hat. Even with the light of only one lantern, she saw his jaw muscle ripple and felt the
sting of criticism in his gaze. Everything about the man unnerved her. It was difficult for her to think straight.
“Okay, here’s how it goes. When you get on the damned horse, all I want you to do is to hold on to the horn and concentrate on keeping your seat. I don’t give a shit what happens. Just keep your seat and let the bay do the rest. Horses are herd animals. He’ll follow Blue Boy and Lucy. No worries.”
“Are you suggesting I don’t know how to ride this animal?”
His firm mouth quirked. In that moment, Brianna could no longer ignore the fact that he might be devastatingly handsome with a bit of cleaning up. In her mind’s eye, she pictured him in a tailored serge suit with a fashionable felt fedora hat perched properly on his head. And with a haircut, of course. That long hair made him look like a scoundrel of the first order.
“I’m not
suggesting
anything. After getting to know me, you’ll come to realize I never beat around the bush. I say what I think, and right now, I’m thinking you have absolutely no experience in the saddle.” He circled the bay, came to stand front side of the readjusted stirrup, and bent at the knees to interlace his hands to form a cup. “Step up.”
She stuck up her right foot. He released an audible breath. “Shit. With your
left
foot, Shamrock. You can’t mount that way. It’s physically impossible unless you go ass first onto the saddle and risk pitching over backward.”
Brianna had never felt so humiliated in her life. She
knew
to use her left foot. It was just that he rattled her so badly she was making silly mistakes. “You, sir, have the filthiest mouth I have ever had the misfortune to come across.”
“Because I said
shit
?”
Brianna winced. Had he no idea how crass a word that was? He’d also said
ass
. She stuck her left foot into the cradle of his joined hands. With a push of his shoulders and arms, he lifted her with alarming ease, then caught her elbow to steady her as she jerked at her clumped skirts, trying
to hide her knees. Sheer fright took precedence over modesty when she realized she was astride the horse. From where she perched on the saddle, it looked like at least a mile to the ground, and beneath her trembling body, she could feel the limitless strength of the gelding, which kept glancing nervously back at her.
“I can’t believe the word
shit
puts you in a snit,” he muttered. “Where I come from, we walk in it, we shovel it, and we use it to fertilize the garden. In fact, when I get up in the morning, I even
take
one. What fancy word do you use for it?”
She struggled to gather her wits. The very thought of traveling away from the safe environs of Glory Ridge with this uncouth, vile-tongued man unnerved her even more than being on the huge animal. “Excrement,” she blurted.
“What?”
“In polite society, it is called excrement, or
feces
. And when the morning urge strikes people, they refer to it as ‘a call of nature’ or ‘one’s morning duty.’” Brianna shuddered and gave her head a slight shake. “I cannot
fathom
that we are engaging in such scandalous discourse.”
“I take that to mean you don’t like this conversation. Well, that’s too damned bad. Where I come from, even ladies don’t cringe at the word
shit
.”
“Well, sir, such females are not truly ladies.”
“By your definition, not mine.”
Brianna jerked and almost fell off the horse as he led it three steps forward. Following his advice, she grabbed hold of the saddle horn to keep her seat.
He stopped, nudged back his hat, and sent her an incredulous look. “The only positive thing about this trip is that at least you don’t seem to be afraid of horses.”
“Is being afraid of them a bad thing?” she asked in a thin voice.
“Sure as hell is. Horses can sense fear, and it spooks the daylights out of them.”
Brianna’s grip on the horn tightened until her knuckles ached. “Truly? Horses can sense if you’re afraid of them? What . . . what do they do if they think you’re afraid?”
“Well, shit. You
are
afraid. You’re scared out of your wits to be up there, aren’t you?”
She cast a nervous glance at the ground, which didn’t look any closer than it had a few seconds ago. “It is a bit unsettling.”
“Just out of curiosity, do you lie about everything, Mrs. Paxton? I’ve heard tell of people who’d rather lie than tell the truth, but you take the prize. You say you can ride, but come to find out, you’ve never even been on a horse.”
“I am capable of doing many things I haven’t actually tried yet, sir. It is
not
lying to say I know how to do something when I’ve watched it done and feel that I’m able.”
He sighed and hooked a hand over the crown of the gelding’s neck to rub behind its ears. “Okay. Listen up. As you’re riding, think about something pleasant. That should help get rid of your willies.”
Brianna’s favorite thing was to dunk a piece of chocolate in hot tea and suck off the melted part. But she didn’t think it would calm her jumpy stomach to recall the taste of something she hadn’t enjoyed for over three months. “All right,” she agreed. “I’ll do that.”
He tucked the bay’s reins around her saddle horn, then went to collect his animals and Daphne. Brianna had seen men riding many times in Colorado and knew they steered a horse with the leads. She didn’t like the idea of being on an animal with no way to tell it which direction to go, so she collected the slender leather straps into the grip of one hand. The gelding threw his head back and she saw the whites of his eyes.
When Paxton noticed that she held the reins, his jaw muscle bunched. “You either have a hearing problem, Mrs. Paxton, or you’re deliberately ignoring half of what I tell you.” He gave her a long, hard look. “For once in your life, pay attention and do as you’re told. If you’re bent on holding the reins, you have to do it right.”
“How do I do it right?” she asked, her voice thin with alarm. The bay looked a little wild, and she feared he was about to take a chunk out of her foot.
“Well, if you don’t want him to rear, loosen your hold on
the reins. Trust me when I say you don’t want to be tossed. It’s a long way to the ground.” He watched her relax her clenched fingers. “A little more. You have to give him plenty of slack. Right now, you’re pulling back so hard, he doesn’t know if he should shit or go blind.”
A
Over his shoulder, David called, “There’s no need for you to be nervous about that horse. He shows no signs of being spooky. My guess is that he’s rock solid.”
“My
life
may depend upon your
guess
, sir. Could you be so chivalrous as to reassure me in more definitive terms?”
Did she
always
talk that way?
“As long as you keep your seat, you have nothing to worry about,” he said loudly because the wind snatched away his voice.
“And how does one keep one’s seat, sir?”
“Pretend you’re sitting in a rocking chair. Hold fast to the horn, relax with the motion, and press in tight with your knees.”
Watching over his shoulder, he saw her attempt to follow his advice, letting her shoulders slump slightly. She loosened one hand from the horn to stroke the gelding’s neck in an attempt to befriend the animal. When the town
was well behind them, David circled back to ride abreast of her. She threw him a worried glance.
“You said I needn’t worry about the reins, that my horse would just follow yours. How can he do that if you’re back here with me?”
“I just thought it might be a good time for a little riding instruction.”
“Oh, dear,” she muttered. Then, with a nod, she said, “All right. Do carry on, sir.”
“The name’s David.” He launched into an explanation of Western riding techniques and watched as she executed his instructions, stopping the horse, nudging it into a walk, and then reining left and right. “Good job. You’ll be a horsewoman in no time.”
“I doubt that,” she retorted, but David heard in her voice that she was pleased. “Being a horsewoman is not one of my aspirations.”
Even in the darkness, David noticed how rigidly she sat in the saddle now that he was next to her. He had a nasty suspicion that if he reached out toward her, she’d flinch away and fall off the horse. As if the bay sensed her fear, he snorted and swung his head around to sniff her foot. She jerked her toes back.
“He won’t bite you. You can trust him.”