Patricia Potter (8 page)

That name wasn’t much better than his own or Sallie Sue.

“But everyone calls me Willow,” she added with a brilliant smile that could melt snow.

She waited for him to proclaim his identity, but there was only silence.

She appeared unfazed. She stepped closer to him and reached out to take his arm, frowning as she studied the small blisters. He felt something other than pain run down his spine.

She looked up at him and smiled slowly. “I’m not going to allow you to leave the house until I see to those burns.”

Lobo hesitated. He didn’t want to leave. He didn’t want to lose that smile. He wanted to prolong the cool touch of her fingers on his skin, the concern in her eyes for him.
For him.

He swallowed, knowing he should get the hell out of the house, out of Newton, out of the territory, probably out of the country.

“I’ll get some salve for those burns, and you can have one of Jake’s shirts.”

“Jake?”

Relieved that he had finally uttered a word, she smiled again. “He left the ranch to me. He died eighteen months ago.”

“He didn’t do you a favor, lady,” Lobo said. “This place is a disaster.”

She suddenly looked wistful and incredibly appealing. Burns or not, he had an enormous urge to take her in his arms. How would she react when she discovered who he was? A gunslinger. A man decent people crossed the street to avoid. Fool! he called himself.

“I know,” she admitted softly. “But we’ve made it this far.”

Lobo raised his eyebrows. Now was the time to make her see reason.

“Lady, two kids and a drunk would be dead if I hadn’t shown up.”

“But you did,” she said with indisputable reason.

Frustrated, he stared at her. There was such complete blind faith in that face, in those eyes. He’d never seen anything like it in all his years. He damned well hoped he never would again.

“Lady…”

“Willow.”

“Miss Taylor…”

“Willow.”

His hands clenched. “There are people who want you out of here.”

Her smile faltered slightly. “You’ve heard the stories too. I can’t believe Alex Newton really wishes me harm.”

He wanted to shake her. He wanted to prove it to her by telling her he’d been hired to do just that. But the words stuck in his throat. It would be like whipping a puppy, he thought. He couldn’t bear to see that light leave her eyes. Nor did he want to lose the smile for himself. Not yet. Not until he stored a little more of it in his memory.

Before he could say anything, she was guiding him into the kitchen.

“Estelle,” he heard her say in the gentlest voice, “can you get some water and soap for me. And the medicine box.”

The two younger boys came in. “Chad’s taking care of your horse, Mister,” one said.

“Don’t know if we’ll ever git ol’ Jupiter back,” the other said.

“He sure was a-running,” the first boy said. “I’m Jeremy. He’s Jimmy. We’re twins,” he said proudly. “We thought Chad was lyin’ when he told us ’bout you.”

“What’s your name, Mister?” the other twin asked.

“Don’t ask so many questions, boys,” Willow said.

“But you always tell us to ask questions. You say that’s how we learn things.”

“You also learn things by being quiet and listening,” she said. “Jeremy, go get a shirt from Jake’s trunk in the storeroom.” She turned back to Lobo as the thin woman with the odd eyes returned and timidly set a box on the large round table that dominated the kitchen.

“Won’t you take off those gloves and shirt and sit down?” Willow Taylor’s voice was soft.

He hesitated, knowing that of all the things he had done in his life, this was probably the most foolish. Yet the burns must be treated. He didn’t want to go to a doctor. He didn’t want to go into town. He surely didn’t want to go back to Newton’s place and explain, not that he minded what Newton thought. He just didn’t like asking for help from the man.

“Hell,” he murmured, and looked from his hands up to her face, and toward a mouth that was obviously trying not to smile. He tried to take off the gloves, but they stuck to his hands. His shirt pulled easily over his head, though, revealing an arm streaked with red.

“Hell,” Jimmy echoed, and received a reproving look from the women.

“Well…he said it,” he protested.

“Well, small boys don’t,” Estelle countered.

“Why?”

Lobo scowled at him, and the boy snapped his mouth shut.

“Do you think I can learn to do that?” Willow Taylor said, her mouth twitching even more than it had a moment before.

Then her gaze went to his chest, and he knew from her faltering smile that she had seen the scars. He winced. They were too ugly for her, and he felt naked under her gaze, all the way down to his equally scarred soul. He was about ready to go, burns and all, when a bowl of water and soap were placed next to him. He tried to pull off the gloves again, setting his jaw as the pain became agonizing.

Soft hands clasped his and drew them down into the water, her fingers gently separating the cloth from flesh, her eyes reflecting a hurt of their own as they saw the exposed raw flesh. She washed it carefully, tenderly, then covered it with cooling salve. When she was finished, her lips were trembling and her eyes were glazed with tears. With wonder he actually believed that she was feeling more pain than he.

“You shouldn’t ride,” she said. “Stay here a few days.”

“Do you have something to wrap them with?”

“Yes,” she replied reluctantly. “But they would be better open to air.”

“I’m leaving,” he said curtly. “With or without bandages.”

She nodded and bandaged the hands and arm. Every touch, she knew, had to be agonizingly painful, but his expression never changed. It was as stoic as a carving.

Jimmy returned with a shirt, and Lobo pulled it on awkwardly, not protesting when the woman started buttoning it. There was an intimacy about the last few moments, about sitting in her kitchen shirtless, about her fingering the buttons that made him uncomfortable. He had never felt things like this before, never felt the warmth that filled the kitchen, or the gentle humor, or the soft, caring touch.

He’d also never said thank-you before, and the words stuck in his throat. So he merely nodded his gratitude and, without any more words, strode out the door.

W
ILLOW WALKED OVER
to the window and watched him mount. From the way he used his hands, she would never have known he was injured.

The rider’s body moved so easily in the saddle, he and the horse seemed a part of each other. His shoulders proud, his back stiff, her stranger looked straight ahead, never turning back even though she wished him to with all her might.

Her hands still trembled from touching him. His shoulders had been wide, his chest strong and covered with crinkly blond hair. His body was perfect, except for what looked like knife scars, jagged and rough. She’d hurt when she’d seen them, just as she had hurt when she caused him pain by washing the burns.

There was so much strength in that body. And so much pain. The physical scars were easy to see, but he was expert at hiding the mental kind. She’d seen only a brief glimpse of them, but they were there in his anger, in his hesitancy to accept her help.

Willow had seen injured wild things before. She had nursed them back to health. She’d held and reassured frightened and lonely students at her father’s school. She knew trust and healing took time.

Chad had once shared the same suspicion this man apparently had of other people. She had slowly earned the boy’s trust.

She would also earn this man’s.

She’d known from the moment he’d first met her gaze that she could not push.

But he would be back.

She knew that too.

5

W
illow had more visitors that afternoon.

She and Chad were out looking at the smoldering ashes of the barn when three men rode up and dismounted.

Gar Morrow, a tall, stocky man, looked with question at the scene before him, his mouth tightening.

“Newton?” he asked curtly.

Willow shook her head. “An accident.”

“You sure?”

“Yes,” she said. She seldom saw Gar Morrow except when he needed to use her land to get his cattle to water or when they accidentally met in town. Once he had briefly appeared at a benefit picnic for the school. He had stayed only a moment and then left a substantial check.

Gar’s gaze went from the barn to Willow. He took off his hat, as did the two men next to him. All three wore guns. “I would like to talk to you. Alone.”

Willow stiffened. She didn’t like the feeling she was getting. But she agreed, and nodded for Chad to leave. When he was out of earshot, Gar hesitated, looking distinctly uncomfortable. “I didn’t want to frighten the boy,” he said.

“What is it, Gar?”

“I heard about the gunfighter Alex hired,” he said. “You gonna sell?”

Willow’s chin went up. “I said I wouldn’t.

Gar’s expression relaxed slightly. “I’ve heard of that man…Lobo. He won’t give a damn you’re a woman.”

Willow stilled a moment, then her hands busied themselves in the cloth of her dress. “Perhaps not,” she merely said.

“Dammit, Willow, listen to me.”

“I am listening.”

“I’ve hired someone myself. A man named Canton. I want him to protect you.”

“No,” she said. “I don’t want a hired gunman around here.”

“Willow…”

“I have Brady and Chad.”

Gar looked at the still-smoking ruins of the barn, and furrowed his brows. “A drunk…and a boy.”

“And I have right on my side.”

“Dammit, Willow, right won’t do a goddamn thing against someone like Lobo.”

“And this man of yours can!”

“Yes.”

“I will not have Jake’s ranch turned into a battleground,” Willow said stubbornly. “Jake didn’t want it either. That’s why he left it to me.”

“Jake was a damned old fool. He didn’t know how much Alex has changed.”

“Why?”

Gar stared at her with puzzlement. “Why what?”

“Why did he change so much? Why does he hate you? What happened that can’t be fixed? Perhaps if you talked…”

“Stay out of it, Miss Taylor.” He hadn’t called her Miss Taylor for months.

“I can’t. You two have put me in the middle.”

Gar Morrow lowered his head. There was defeat in the gesture, in the face that Willow thought must once have been very handsome. Now it was lined and tired-looking. Yet a determined light still shone in the eyes.

“There’s nothing more hopeless than a shattered friendship,” he said wearily. “And I’m sorry you and the children are involved. But reconsider about Canton.”

“No,” she said. “It would just make things worse.”

He stared at her. “According to his wire, Canton should be here late this afternoon. But I wanted to talk to you first. Will you at least meet him?”

She shook her head.

“I won’t have anything to do with a gunfighter. The boys already talk too much about guns and gunfights and violence. I won’t have them exposed to a man who kills for money. I won’t let them make a man like that into a hero.”

“Willow—”

“But I thank you, Gar, for your concern.” It was a dismissal, plain and simple.

Gar shook his head. “If you need any help…”

“I know,” she replied softly. She wanted to say more. She wanted to say she already had a knight errant, a man who helped not because of money, but because he was a good man. But the images of her stranger were too new and precious to share. And she didn’t know what to say about him. She still didn’t know who he was, or where he came from. But she knew he would be back.

Gar Morrow gave her a frustrated stare before turning and nodding to his two men. “Just remember…”

She nodded.

W
ILLOW WISHED SHE
had never told Sullivan she would go to the dance with him.

But she had, two days before, when he had driven her home. They sometimes went to social events together; it was a kind of protection for each of them.

She could quite legitimately decline when he arrived. She had the best of excuses after that morning’s catastrophe, yet she had promised, and Sullivan asked very little of her in return for all he did for them. And she suspected Sullivan had an ulterior motive for wanting to go: Marisa. And perhaps she had had one, too, when she agreed: the stranger.

Willow felt a sudden quickening of her blood, even though she doubted very much he would attend. He didn’t seem the type, yet…he had to belong someplace.

While she waited for Sullivan, she wandered out to scan the garden. She swallowed as she saw its condition, the baked earth, the scraggly, struggling plants that had once looked so healthy and green.