Mail Order Cowboy (Harlequin American Romance) (6 page)

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Authors: Pamela BAUER

BOOK: Mail Order Cowboy (Harlequin American Romance)
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After what seemed to be an eternity to Wood, she finally appeared in the door. Just like Jeremy, her steps were tentative as she crossed the room. As she drew near, he once again caught the scent of orange blossoms. Dressed in trousers and a man’s shirt, she was every bit as pretty this morning as he remembered her to be.
“So my angel returns,” he drawled, wondering why she felt the need to dress like a man instead of a woman. “You’re not a dream after all.”
“I’m not your angel.” She didn’t come close to the bed, but kept her distance.
“You don’t need to be afraid of me, ma’am,” Wood called out when she eyed him suspiciously.
“I’m not.”
“Good. Then maybe you’ll undo these fancy knots you tied and let me go find Hannah. I need to talk to her.”
She stood silently assessing him, as if he were a bolt of fabric in the dry goods store that she couldn’t quite make up her mind about.
“At least take pity on the fact that I haven’t relieved myself since sometime yesterday. If I don’t get off this bed soon I’m going to embarrass myself. You wouldn’t want to see a grown man wet himself, would you?” Wood’s grin did little to persuade her.
Apparently his physical needs were of little concern to her. She didn’t move toward him. Instead she folded her arms across her chest and said, “I guess we weren’t introduced last night, were we, Mr. Dumler? I’m the Hannah you’re looking for. Now what is it you want to say to me?”
“You’re
Hannah?”
“Yes. You look disappointed.”
He was about to tell her the reason why—that the Hannah he had expected to find was his sister. But then realized that it probably wouldn’t be wise to give these people any clue to his real identity. The three of them had mistaken him for a Mr. Dumler, and he was content to let them think that’s who he was. By now his name would be plastered all over “Wanted” posters in the area. Once these women went to town, they’d know that he had nearly been hung for murder.
“I’m not disappointed,” Wood assured her. “Perhaps a little surprised, that’s all.” He could see that she didn’t believe him.
“I’m sorry if I’m not what you expected, but I didn’t answer your ad,” she said in a defensive tone. “Gabby did and she’s the one who’s responsible for any assumptions you’ve made.”
Ad?
What was the woman talking about? And what assumptions was he supposed to have made? If she wasn’t aware of his true identity, then why was she looking at him as if he were a fly in her apple pie?
“And haven’t you made some assumptions about me, Hannah?” he asked.
To his surprise, she looked him straight in the eye and said, “Look, I’m going to be honest with you, Mr. Dumler.”
“Wood,” he automatically corrected.
“Wood, I didn’t invite you here. My aunt did.”
“Do you want me to leave?”
He thought a hint of red colored her cheeks, but he couldn’t be sure. “Not until you’re well enough to make it back to wherever it is you came from.”
Wood knew that she didn’t want him to stay a minute longer than was necessary. It was there in her eyes. He chuckled to himself. What she didn’t realize was that he shared her sentiment. He wanted to leave. As beautiful as she was and no matter how tempting it would be to enlist this Hannah’s help in locating his sister, he’d be foolish to spend one minute longer than was necessary at the Davis farm.
“I understand perfectly,” he told her.
“Good. So how are you feeling this morning?” she asked politely, as if she hadn’t just told him he wasn’t welcome in her home.
“I feel pretty damn good for a man who’s been tied to this bed all night.” He didn’t mean for the words to sound so sarcastic, but he had never been a woman’s prisoner before and he found the experience rather unsettling. But then everything about the Davis family unnerved him. They dressed oddly, they talked funny and they couldn’t quite decide whether to treat him as a friend or enemy. Right now Hannah Davis was looking at him like the latter.
“I had to restrain you last night,” she said coolly. “So you wouldn’t hurt yourself.”
“And why would you think I would do that?”
“You were behaving rather strangely, wandering around the yard talking incoherently. Gabby and Jeremy said you’ve been behaving oddly ever since they found you stretched out in the cornfield. We weren’t sure what you might do,” she told him. She rubbed her hands across her folded arms. “If it had been up to me, I would have sent for the sheriff, but you’re here at Gabby’s invitation, and she assures me you’re sane.”
“You think I’m crazy?”
She took another step backward. “I don’t know you, Mr. Dumler.”
Her eyes met his, and Wood saw fear in them. He wanted to say something that would persuade her he wasn’t going to hurt anyone, especially not her. “I am not crazy,” he told her, although he wasn’t quite convinced of it himself. “And I am not dangerous. I won’t cause any trouble for you or your family.”
She held his gaze for several seconds before looking away nervously. “Gabby assures me she’s checked your references thoroughly. She seems to think you’re trustworthy.”
“But you don’t, do you, Hannah?”
“I’m not seventy-five, Mr. Dumler....”
“Wood,” again he corrected her.
“And I’m not in the habit of letting complete strangers into my house.”
“If you’ll untie my hands, this stranger will leave your house. I don’t make a habit of staying where I’m not wanted.”
He could see she was still a bit apprehensive about untying him, but finally she moved closer to the bed. Tentatively, her fingers reached for the frayed ends of cloth, carefully avoiding any contact with his flesh. As she struggled with a knot that didn’t want to be undone, Wood saw straight white teeth tug on her lower lip. The longer she worked at the knot, the more he studied her face.
She knew he was staring at her. She’d sneak a quick peek at him, then quickly return her attention to the knot, a delicate pink spreading across her cheeks. For someone with such a sharp tongue, she had a very kissable mouth. Soft. Full. Wood had to look away for he could feel his body reacting to her nearness.
Not that it helped. Even with his eyes on the ceiling he was very much aware of her presence. The scent of orange blossoms wouldn’t let him forget that she was close enough to touch.
“There.” She breathed a sigh of relief as the knot finally came undone. “Can you get the rest?”
“I don’t think even a sane man could untie one of your knots with only one hand,” Wood answered.
“I get the job done,” she said proudly. She had to stretch to reach his other hand, the action pulling her shirt free of her trousers so that Wood caught a glimpse of bare flesh. Automatically his body responded and he tried to focus on . something—anything to take his mind off of her.
It was then that Wood noticed the leather band on her wrist. In the middle was a small gray square with numbers.
“Is that some sort of time piece?” he asked.
“It’s a digital watch,” she replied flatly, then straightened and gave him a look that said in no uncertain terms was she going to help him with his ankles.
Digital watch?
Something was definitely odd with these folks. In all of the time he had been in Minnesota he had never heard anyone use such foreign words or dress so unconventionally. He needed to get away from the Davis farm. He freed his feet, then flexed his muscles, before pulling on his boots.
“Are you all right?” Hannah asked when he dropped his head in his hands.
He nodded. “My head’s sore.” Confused would have been a better word, but he didn’t want to give Hannah Davis any fuel for the fire. “Jeremy said your privy’s near the house?”
“Our what?”
“Privy.” He remembered that Jeremy had told him they called it something else in this part of the country. “The bathroom.”
“You’ll have to come up to the house,” she told him, her face revealing just how distasteful that thought was.
Wood was getting tired of her displeasure. “This might surprise you, but I don’t want to be here, either. Just show me where the privy is, give me my hat and I’ll be gone.”
“I don’t know where your hat is.”
“I reckon I can get along without it,” he said unhappily. “I don’t suppose anyone found my horse?”
Her brow wrinkled. “You brought a horse? I thought Gabby said you came on the bus?”
What was the bus? Wood could only guess that it must be some kind of wagon. “I had a horse, but I’m not sure what happened to it.”
Again, wariness had her stepping backward. She motioned for him to follow her outside. As Wood stepped into the bright sun, he squinted. When his eyes finally adjusted to the light, he stopped in his tracks. Across from the bunkhouse were four round metal buildings.
“What are those?”
“Grain bins,” she replied in a tone that said he had to be the dumbest man on earth if he needed to ask that question.
“They’re metal.”
“Yeah. So?”
As she led him past the bins his footsteps slowed at the sight of the oddest looking contraption he had ever seen. It was red with two small wheels at one end and two large wheels at the other.
When he stopped to stare, she said, “What’s the matter? You act as if you’ve never seen an old tractor before?”
A tractor? Grain bins? Bus? Wood did a complete circle, looking in every direction, trying to find something familiar in the landscape. There was nothing. It was as if he had fallen off his horse and landed in a foreign country.
“This is Minnesota, isn’t it?” he asked.
“Yes.”
From the look on her face Wood knew he needed to be careful or she would call the sheriff. “I thought so,” he said as calmly as he could, Although he was feeling anything but calm.
He wished he knew what the hell was going on. Maybe he was crazy. Where was his sister, Hannah? And how was he ever going to find her when he didn’t even know where he was or how he got here?
Nothing made sense. A digital watch that flashed numbers, a canteen that was bright red, clothes unlike any he had ever seen before. It was as if he had awoke in another era.
The thought caused his heart to pound. Yesterday Gabby had said “back in 1940.” Could it be that he was in the twentieth century? He shook his head. No, he
was
crazy if he thought that.
“Alfred! Are you well enough to be up and around?” Gabby had come out of the house and stood in front of him, critically assessing his condition.
“He’s fine,” Hannah answered for him, which Wood thought was rather odd. But then everything on the Davis farm seemed odd.
Gabby shuffled over to Wood’s side. “I’m the one who should be taking care of you.”
“He needs to use the bathroom. Gabby,” Hannah pointed out, hinting that the old lady should move out of their way so they could get up the steps of the house.
“Of course he does,” Gabby crooned. “Hannah, you go in and start breakfast. I’ll see that Wood is taken care of.” She insinuated herself in between Wood and Hannah, wrapping her bony fingers around Wood’s arm.
Hannah didn’t object. In fact, Wood thought she looked relieved to be able to turn him over to her aunt. She climbed the stairs and disappeared into the house without another word.
As soon as she was gone, Wood asked Gabby, “Can you tell me what date it is, ma’am?”
“Why sure. It’s September the eleventh.”
So he had lost a few days. The question was, had he lost years, too. “I don’t mean any disrespect, ma’am, but may I ask what year you were born?”
“Why, 1923,” she answered cheerfully.
Wood felt as if all the air was being sucked out of his lungs. 1923! He hadn’t misheard her when she’d said her cousin’s wedding was in 1940. Hannah had said Gabby was 75. It couldn’t be...Or could it?
He had thought that when he’d awakened in the Davis’s cornfield he had lost a couple of hours of his life. Now he knew that simply wasn’t true. Instead of a hundred and twenty minutes passing, he had skipped a hundred and twenty years...or a hundred and twenty-two to be exact.
It was 1998.
Chapter Four
“Y
ou didn’t tell Hannah why you’re here, did you?” Gabby asked anxiously.
Stunned from his discovery, Wood didn’t answer. He couldn’t. He was still trying to comprehend how he could have passed through a hundred and twenty-two years and not be dead. It had to be a dream, yet this old woman clutching his arm was as solid as the ground beneath his feet.
“Did you tell Hannah why you’re here?” she repeated.
“No, ma’ am.”
She exhaled in relief. “Good. You see, Hannah doesn’t know I placed the ad. She thinks you put one in because you were looking for work.”
It only took a few moments for Wood to realize that Gabby was still under the false assumption that he was someone named Alfred Dumler. She had no idea that he was an 1876 man who by some strange phenomenon was now in the twentieth century.
He thought about telling her the truth, yet how could he? How could he explain something he himself didn’t understand? Hannah Davis already suspected he was crazy. He had little doubt she would call the sheriff and have him dragged off to an insane asylum if he uttered one word about traveling through time. Not that he would blame her. Hell, it had happened to
him
and he still wondered if maybe he wasn’t crazy.
“Are you sure you’re feeling all right? You’re looking a little pale,” Gabby remarked, giving him a thorough appraisal.
Pale? He felt as if he’d been thrown from a horse. Disoriented. Sore. Lost. No, he was definitely not feeling all right. “I reckon I’m feeling as well as can be expected, ma’am.”
“You need some food in your stomach. We’ll go inside and get you something to eat, but first I need to know that you’re not going to tell Hannah why you’re really here.” She thrust her arm through his and pulled him close. “Will you do me this favor?”
Wood’s voice was tentative. “You don’t want me to tell Hannah that you were the one who was looking for a man, and not the other way around?”
She nodded vigorously. “Right. You see, I did it as a surprise for her. I figured once you got here and she got to know you she would...” she smiled shyly, “well, things would happen and you know.”
Wood assumed she meant Hannah would approve of him as a hired hand. Obviously, Gabby had arranged for hired help without Hannah’s knowledge. He could be that man for now—providing the real Alfred Dumler didn’t turn up.
“You’re not mad at me for pretending to be Hannah, are you?”
“No.” Why should he be? Since he wasn’t Alfred Dumler, it truly didn’t matter to him what the old lady had done, although he didn’t think she had a malicious bone in her frail body. She had been nothing but kind to him.
“Then you still want to go through with it?” she asked hopefully.
What he wanted was to go back to his old life. To his sister. To his job at the bank in Missouri. To the life he knew. He didn’t want to be in 1998 where everything was as strange as a two-headed calf.
Yet he couldn’t tell Gabby that. At least not yet. Until he could figure out how he could get back to 1876, he really had no choice but to let her assume he was this Alfred person. With nowhere to go, no place to stay and not a single friend, he was at the mercy of the Davis women.
“I appreciate your hospitality, ma’am, but Hannah doesn’t want me to stay,” Wood warned her.
Gabby flapped her hand in midair. “It’s only because she’s stubborn and thinks we can get along without a man around here. That’s why I was the one who wrote the ad. I knew she’d never do it. You do understand, don’t you, Wood?”
He nodded. “I’ll do what I can to help you.”
“Good. Now you need to get inside. We’ll discuss our plan later.” She winked at him then led him up the porch steps. “The bathroom’s on the second floor, so you’re going to have to do some stairs. Do you think you’re strong enough?”
“It shouldn’t be a problem, ma’am.” Wood moved in front of her so he could open the screen door.
“It’s really sweet of you to call me ma’am, but it’s not necessary. Why don’t you call me Gabby?”
“All right. Gabby it is.”
She smiled gratefully at him as she sashayed by. “Here’s the kitchen,” she announced.
Wood took one step inside the house and stopped suddenly. If he had any doubts that it wasn’t 1998, they were gone now. The room was not like any he had seen. Nearly everything was white—the cupboards, the walls, the ceiling—even the floor. The only splashes of color were the blue curtains on the windows.
“As you can see, everything’s been updated,” Gabby told him.
“What’s updated?” he asked, wondering what the date had to do with anything.
“The microwave is new.” She pointed to a square white box with a black front. “And so is the dishwasher:”
Wood had no idea what a microwave was nor did he see any dishwasher. The only other person in the kitchen was Hannah, who stood in front of a large white metal box that appeared to be a stove. When she turned a knob, blue flames glowed in a circular pattern. She pulled a cast iron fry pan from the wall and set it on a grate in the fire.
When she noticed Wood staring at her, she asked, “Is something wrong?”
“I’ve never seen a stove like that,” he remarked, although it wasn’t the stove that had his attention, but Hannah’s backside. Tight-fitting trousers clung to her derriere revealing curves women normally kept hidden beneath their skirts. If all the women in 1998 dressed so provocatively, he wondered how the men kept their concentration on the task at hand.
Hannah gave him a look that told him she knew exactly what he had been staring at and that she didn’t appreciate it. She moved to a large metal closet with two doors, one above the other. “I suppose you haven’t seen a refrigerator like this, either.” With a yank of her fingers, the lower door opened.
Wood moved closer and peered over her shoulder. “You have light in that thing?”
“It’s not
that
old,” she snapped.
Wood watched her reach for a bowl of eggs, rearranging several jars in the process.
All he could see was the back of her head, her blond curls wiggling like broken springs as she foraged for food. He was having trouble deciding what was more fascinating—the modern refrigerator or Hannah.
She was unlike any woman he had ever known—and not just because she wore trousers. There was something in the way she carried herself that announced to the world she was not going to sit back and wait for anything to happen. Determination sparkled in those blue eyes, eyes that refused to be intimidated by his scrutiny.
As she closed the refrigerator door she asked, “Is there something you want?”
Wood realized there was. He wanted to get to know Hannah Davis. Of course that wouldn’t be wise since he was not planning on staying a minute longer in 1998 than it took him to figure out how to get back to 1876.
“He probably wants something to drink,” Gabby interjected, tying an apron around her waist. “Go ahead and help yourself, Wood. Take one of those small cans of orange juice off the top shelf.”
Wood opened the refrigerator door and stuck his hand inside. “It’s really cold in here, even with the light.”
“Hannah’s grandfather believed some of the older appliances were built better than the newer ones,” Gabby told him. “He was probably right. It doesn’t have all the fancy features the new ones have, but it is dependable.”
Curiosity had Wood pulling open a drawer at the bottom of the refrigerator. Inside was a head of cabbage and some carrots. “Where’s the ice?”
Hannah shot him another wary glance. “You want ice in your juice?”
Gabby shushed her niece and said, “It’s on top.”
He nodded, closed the lower door, then opened the upper one. Not only was there no light inside the top compartment, there was very little ice. Packages occupied most of the space, some square, some round. Corn, beans...in boxes? And what were Hot Pockets? He could feel two sets of eyes on him as he gawked at the contents and quietly closed the door.
“You can have ice if you want, Wood,” Gabby insisted. “Pull out a cube tray.”
A cube tray? “No, I don’t need any ice, ma’am,” he said, slowly closing the door.
As he turned he noticed a calendar hanging on the wall. Without thinking, he walked over to it and lifted the pages. Every one of them had 1998 on the top right-hand corner.
“It really is 1998, isn’t it,” he mused aloud.
“Time flies, doesn’t it?”
He turned at the sound of Gabby’s voice and noticed that both women were staring at him.
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered, wondering what she would say if he told them a hundred and twenty-two years had flown without his knowledge.
Gabby gave Hannah a gentle nudge. “Why don’t you show Wood where he can wash up, and I’ll make the pancakes and eggs.”
“I will, but first—If you’ll excuse us, Wood. I need to talk to my aunt for a minute.” She pulled the older woman by the arm out the door.
“What’s the matter?” Gabby asked when they were in the halfway.
“What’s the matter?” Hannah repeated in an urgent whisper. “Something’s not right with that man. Did you see the look on his face when he was staring at the calendar? I know you don’t want to believe it, but I think he could very well be a patient at a mental hospital.”
“He’s not!” Gabby denied in a scratchy whisper.
“He’s odd, Gabby. He told me he had a horse but he doesn’t know what happened to it.”
“So he has a bit of amnesia.”
“It’s more than that. I can’t let him stay here. He’s going to have to go,” Hannah declared authoritatively.
“But you haven’t given him a fair chance. Maybe if you’d get to know him, you’d like him,” she said with a naivete that had Hannah rolling her eyes. “We can’t just turn him out. He’s not well,” Gabby fretted, concern lining her already wrinkled brow. “He should at least stay for one more day. You know, to make sure he’s recovered.”
“It’s going to take a lot longer than one day to cure what’s ailing him—like men in white coats and heavy narcotics,” Hannah drawled sarcastically. “You saw the fuss he made over the refrigerator. Didn’t you think it was odd the way he stared at the food in the freezer?”
“He’s probably never seen such an old refrigerator,” Gabby rationalized. “It is rather odd looking.”
“He’s the one who’s odd...the way he’s been looking at everything in the kitchen with that dumb look on his face.”
“Don’t you think it’s a handsome face?” Gabby asked.
“No!” Hannah denied quickly, although it really wasn’t quite true. He did have a certain look about him that some women might find attractive—
if
he were clean and
if
he wasn’t crazy. And his eyes...something about them made her extremely aware of the fact that she was a woman and he a man.
“You’re getting awfully worked up over this,” Gabby observed calmly as Hannah continued to pace.
She was worked up and with good cause. She had a strange man sitting in her kitchen expecting to be hired on as a farm hand—a man unlike any she had ever met before. Never had any man both frightened and intrigued her at the same time.
“I don’t want him working here, Gabby. You’re going to have to tell him he has to leave. If you can’t do it, I will,” she warned.
Her aunt placed a bony hand on her arm. “Can’t we give him a couple of days? Barry could show him around the farm, and you could get to know him better.”
“I don’t want to get to know him any better,” Hannah snapped.
Gabby frowned. “Oh. That’s not good...that’s not good at all.” She raised a fist to lips that quivered.
When she looked as if she might start to cry, Hannah placed her hands on her aunt’s frail arms. “Can you honestly tell me that the man sitting in our kitchen is the kind of man you thought would come for the job?”
“He’s not, but...” she trailed off uneasily.
“That’s my point. You didn’t know from the ad that he would be like...like
that
. We’ve seen him, he’s not what we want, so he has to go,” Hannah stated simply, although it was obvious she hadn’t convinced her aunt.
“It doesn’t seem fair that he gave up his previous job and spent money to come here only to have us send him away without giving him a chance. He has such good references.”
Hannah sighed and rolled her eyes. Hadn’t her aunt heard a word she had said?
“I don’t think you should judge him by his appearance,” Gabby advised her. “If your grandfather were alive, he’d give the man a chance to prove himself. You know he would. He was as fair a man as there ever was.”
“Maybe when it came to men.”
“Yes, but he wouldn’t have shut his door on anyone who needed a helping hand.”
Hannah peered over Gabby’s shoulder into the kitchen. She saw Wood sitting at the table looking like a confused puppy dog, wearing a shirt that looked like it had come out of someone’s trash. The image tugged on her heart strings. Would it hurt to let him stay another night?

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