Texas Blue (39 page)

Lewt blew the lamp out and undressed in the dark. Half of him wanted to run for the bed and the other half wanted to run for the door. This woman, his wife, was giving him a heart attack. His chest was pounding and his hands couldn’t seem to remember how to undo his trousers.

“Don’t be afraid,” she whispered. “I promise not to hurt you.”

Suddenly, he smiled and walked slowly to the other side of the bed. “I never saw anyone lose seven straight hands,” he whispered as he slid under the covers. “You even folded on the three aces I dealt you.”

“Did I?” She giggled as her hand brushed timidly across his chest.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you wanted to undress in front of me.”

“No, that wasn’t my plan, but you didn’t seem to mind.” She reached for his hand and pulled it to her.

“What was your plan?”

She laughed. “I just didn’t want to see those hairy legs, so the only choice was to go first.”

He laughed, finally relaxing. “I’d think as much as you love animals, you’d like my legs.”

“I’d just as soon never see them.” She tickled her fingers across his chest.

“Fair enough.” He pulled her close, loving the way she felt with no clothes between them. “I’ll watch you undress every night. I’ll even help, and then I’ll turn off the light and undress in the dark.”

He kissed her then for a long while as his hands moved over her body. When he pulled away from her mouth, he moved to her ear and whispered, “I love you, Emily McMurray Paterson. Live with me, sleep with me, all the days of our life.”

She cuddled against him, learning his body as he already knew hers. “And what will we tell our children and grandchildren when they ask how we met?”

He leaned down and kissed the tip of her breast, knowing it would take her breath away. “We’ll tell them that I won you in a poker game.”

She was laughing when he kissed her again, and they both knew it was time for the talking to stop and the loving to begin.

F
OUR DAYS LATER, MR. AND MRS. LEWTON PATERSON picked up horses Duncan had sent down from Whispering Mountain. They rode across the countryside alone. They camped under the stars wrapped in each other’s arms and talked for hours about nothing and everything.

Lewt found he knew nothing of loving, but he was always gentle. Each night she came to him willing and ready, and he learned more of her and how to please.

When they’d finished making love, she’d lie next to him and sigh as he moved his hands over her body for a long while, as if he couldn’t get enough of the feel of her. Then he’d hold her hand in his and she’d go to sleep on his chest.

“I love you,” she’d whisper just before she drifted off.

She’d feel his hand move over her one more time, then settle on her hip. “I love you too, darling,” he’d whisper. “Forever.”

A week later, when they finally reached the ranch, everyone around turned out to the party. The two cooks proved to be a wonder. They even made a wedding cake four layers high.

Lewt danced with his bride until they were both exhausted. While he poured her a punch he thought had been spiked, he said, “Everyone is smiling at us.”

“Maybe they’ve never seen me so happy,” she whispered.

“Maybe they don’t know I’m a gambler who stole your heart.”

“Oh, they all know you were a gambler. They also know you risked your life for me and you stood by Duncan when he was in trouble.” She kissed his cheek, and they heard several people laugh. “They don’t care what you were, Lewt, they only care about what you are.”

“And what am I?” he said, thinking that he had no job and no hint of one.

“Don’t you know, Lewt Paterson, you’re a good man.” She smiled. “You’re the man I love.”

He kissed her full on the mouth and didn’t care if folks laughed. “No, darling, I’m the luckiest man alive.”

They danced another dance and talked with people who’d grown up with Emily, but Lewt’s thoughts were on getting her back to the cabin where they were staying and watching her undress before he turned off the light.

When he looked into her beautiful blue eyes, he knew she was thinking the same thing.

He’d gambled with his life and won her heart.

 

 

THE APPLE ORCHARD ALWAYS FASCINATED REAGAN Truman in the winter months. Her uncle Jeremiah told her once that his father had started it back before the First World War. Now, a hundred years later, half of the apple jelly in town and most of the apple pies came from Truman apples. But it wasn’t the fruit, or the trees that drew Reagan. The shadows pulled her near like long fingers. In the summer all grew green and beautiful, but when the weather turned cold and the bare branches crossed over one another like a framed wonderland in blacks and grays she had to come close.

Some people might love the spring, some the summer or even the fall, but for Reagan her heart beat strongest in winter. She loved the raging storms and the silent snow. She loved her land as though she had been born to it.

The orchard bordered Lone Oak Road on one side and the Matheson Ranch on the other. Late Wednesday afternoon she walked and enjoyed her time alone. Somehow, Reagan felt she belonged here in this unfinished world with its beginnings and endings mixing together without forming a complete canopy. Her whole life seemed like that. Starts and stops forming like ribs around a body lean of meat.

Smiling, she remembered how her uncle always said she needed to grow roots. At sixteen she’d had nothing, been nothing but a runaway with no place to run to. Now, at twenty Reagan felt like her very blood pumped through this land . . . her land. She’d poured her sweat in it along with her love. She’d even risk her life fighting a prairie fire to save this farm. It was as much a part of her as she was of it. She felt like her adopted uncle did: She’d never sell, never.

After a deep breath, she turned, knowing it was time to get back to the house. Uncle Jeremiah was probably already in the kitchen. He liked to watch her cook, though he’d grown so thin she wasn’t sure he ever ate more than a few bites. His mind was still sharp, but his body was failing him. Reagan did all she could, taking over the running of the farm, and the maintenance of his established orchard and her new one. Hank Matheson, the rancher next door, often told her she was doing too much. But how much was too much to give an old man who’d taken her in as his own when no one else in the world wanted her?

She’d hired a couple who were both nurses and moved them in upstairs. Foster took care of Uncle Jeremiah, doing all the things her uncle wouldn’t allow her to help with and Cindi, Foster’s wife, monitored the old man’s medicines. To Reagan’s surprise, her uncle didn’t seem to mind having them around. After a few days, he even stopped telling Foster that being a nurse wasn’t a good job for a man.

As she walked toward the little golf cart–sized truck she used on the trails between the fruit trees, Reagan was mentally planning dinner when her cell phone rang.

She slid behind the wheel and flipped the phone open.

“Hi, Rea,��� came Noah’s familiar voice. “You asleep yet?”

She laughed. “It’s not even dark, Preacher, what time zone are you in and how much have you been drinking?”

“I’m in North Carolina, I think. I didn’t win any money the last ride.” She heard his long exhale of breath. “The rodeos aren’t much fun when you don’t make the eight seconds.”

She didn’t miss that he hadn’t answered the second question. More and more when Noah called from the road she had a feeling he wasn’t sober. Maybe he only got homesick when he drank. Maybe he needed the whiskey to give him enough courage to talk about going on. Somewhere along the way the boy she’d known in high school had lost his big dreams and, in so doing, had lost himself.

His easy laugh came over the phone. “What are you up to, Rea? No. Let me guess. Sitting in the yard with your uncle waiting for the sunset or maybe walking in that forest you call an orchard. One of these days you’ll fall over a tree root and we won’t find your bones until spring.”

“You know me pretty well,” she said, figuring he knew her better than anyone else alive. “You planning on making it home before spring?”

“Sorry, Rea, I don’t think so, but I’ll call. I promise. No matter where I am, I’ll call. There’s always a rodeo somewhere and, as long as I’ve got the gas and the fee, I’ll be riding.”

He was the first real friend she’d ever had. He’d been the first boy to kiss her, her first date, her first heartbreak. “Take care of yourself, Preacher.”

He laughed without much humor. “No one on the circuit calls me that anymore.”

They’d called him “Preacher” because when he rode in high school rodeos the announcers used to say he got religion when he climbed on a thousand pounds of mean muscle. Now, four years later, Reagan knew he’d lost his religion, along with the joy he had for the sport. Now he rode like it was an addiction. Only even when he won, she had a feeling the money never made it to the bank.

“Why don’t you come home, Noah?” she asked as she did almost every time he called.

“I’ll think about it,” he said, but his words didn’t ring true. “Got to go, it’s my time to drive. I’ll talk to you again soon. I promise. Good night, Rea.”

Reagan closed the phone. She hadn’t told him what was happening in Harmony or in her life. She had a feeling he didn’t care. Even if she’d said she needed him right now, he wouldn’t come and if he promised tonight, he’d only break his word come morning.

They’d been best friends in high school, talked every night on the phone, drove all over the panhandle so he could ride in every rodeo they heard about. Then his father thought he was good enough to turn pro and Noah gave up his plans for college. The first year, he barely made enough in prize money to stay on the road. The second year he told her it looked like he might break a hundred thousand, enough to start his herd on his small ranch. But halfway through, Noah got hurt again. This time when the doctors patched him up, they seemed to have left out his love for the sport.

Noah McAllen was on a merry-go-round—not with painted wooden ponies, but with huge angry bulls—and he couldn’t seem to find the way off the ride.

Reagan leaned her head on her arms atop the steering wheel and cried. She feared for Noah the ride wouldn’t stop until one night one bull killed him.

 

Noah flipped his phone closed as he walked around his pickup, now so dirty he couldn’t even tell what color it was. He slipped into the driver’s seat as his buddy slid across and began building his nest for the night.

“Just head west,” Don grumbled already sounding half asleep. “We’ll be lucky to make it to where we turn south by noon tomorrow. If you get sleepy, wake me.”

Noah knew the routine but he let Don ramble. They both knew they probably wouldn’t be friends if it wasn’t for the rodeo. Though they both rode bulls, they did it for different reasons. Noah saw it as a fast way to make money and he had long ago become addicted to the thrill of adrenaline that jolted through his body every time he climbed on. Don, on the other hand, rode for the thrill that surrounded the game. The wild unpredictability of the game, the giggles of the girls when bull riders entered the bar, the flash of camera lights when he won. He didn’t care for the sport, he liked the parade.

Noah let Don talk himself to sleep; for once he didn’t really want to talk about what they’d face tomorrow. He just wanted to drive and think of Reagan. He hadn’t seen her in months and then their last words had been yelled at each other. He’d waited two weeks before he called. He’d forgotten what they’d been arguing about and she didn’t mention it.

He drove through the night trying to remember exactly what she looked like. Her voice had sounded older somehow tonight. Part of him still saw her as that frightened new kid at a school where everyone else knew one another. She wasn’t his girlfriend then or now. Maybe she never would be. They’d grown apart, he told himself, like people do. He’d seen best friends in high school go away to different colleges and a year later struggle to keep a conversation going over coffee.

She was just a friend, he reminded himself. Only . . . Once in Oklahoma City after the rodeo, the girl he was with said he’d called her Rea when they made love.

Noah shook his head figuring that could mean one of two things: Either he’d have to try to get along with Reagan and marry her, or he’d have to learn to keep his mouth shut when the lights go out.

FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES
BESTSELLING AUTHOR

 

JODI THOMAS

 

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