Texas Pride: Night Riders (3 page)

But he didn’t want to dwell on the past. It was the present that needed his attention. He didn’t know if he’d done the right thing in letting Carla Reece believe he was simpleminded, but it was easier to get the advantage of people when they underestimated you. He was aware that women were attracted to him. Cade’s wife had encouraged him to become interested in one woman after another. He never had because he had known he was going back to Poland someday. Only then would he look for a wife.

Still, he wouldn’t mind spending time with Miss Reece. She was spirited and prickly, but that didn’t bother him. He was the only one who could calm Cade’s Spanish grandmother-in-law. Compared to her, Carla Reece was a lamb.

Not that she looked like a lamb. She looked more like an angel, albeit a thoroughly angry one. The lawyer told him Carla wasn’t married and warned him not to get any ideas. The local citizens might have to tolerate his presence, but they wouldn’t tolerate his attentions to Miss Reece. It was with a clear conscience that Ivan had assured him he had no intention of competing with any of the local gentlemen for Miss Reece’s favors. Living on the ranch, seeing her every day, maybe even working with her, didn’t constitute competing for her favor. It
did
look like an intriguing way to pass the next year.

At the sound of approaching footsteps, he looked up to see a young man emerging from the deepening gloom. “Who are you?”

“That’s what I’ve come to ask you,” the young man said as he drew near.

“I am Ivan Nikolai. I have a contract with Laveau diViere to manage his part of this ranch.”

The boy dropped his head. “I’m Danny Reece, the fool who let diViere cheat him out of his half of the ranch.”

Ivan sympathized with the boy and his sister, but he’d suffered at Laveau’s hands as well. This was his chance to get something back.

“Why are you here instead of Mr. diViere?” Danny asked.

Ivan repeated what he’d told Danny’s sister.

“That sounds fishy to me,” the boy said.

“Fishy? What is this
fishy
? This place is like a desert. One does not speak of fish in a desert.”

Danny’s scowl disappeared, and a charming smile took its place. “Where are you from?”

“Poland.”

“That would account for it.
Fishy
means something doesn’t smell right, that something’s wrong. How did you end up in Texas?”

Ivan knew he would have to tell his story sooner or later. He decided it was probably better to begin with someone who appeared to be sympathetic.

“My family lost its ancestral lands, so I came to America to make my fortune. I met Laveau when we fought together in the war. I became his friend because he could speak to me in French, but he was not
my
friend. He stole my money and betrayed our troop to the enemy. Most of my friends died in their sleep. At the end of the war, Cade Wheeler, my commanding officer, offered me a job on his ranch. I was there until I came here.”

“Does Carla know that?” Danny asked when Ivan had finished.

“She was not interested in my history, only in my departure. She was very angry at me.”

“Not half as angry as she is at me,” Danny said. “But I deserve it. I don’t know why I let diViere talk me into drinking or gambling so much. I’ve never done anything like that.”

“Laveau has a way of convincing people to do what he wants.”

“I can’t blame him,” Danny said. “I was cocky. Just because I can beat everybody in town at poker, I thought I could beat
anybody
.” He paused, appeared to be thinking of something. He shook his head, as though ridding himself of a bad memory. “What are you doing out here?”

“I have to live somewhere. Your sister said the house and all the buildings were on her half of the ranch. Here I have water, grass for my horse, shade from the sun, and level ground for sleeping. It is good.”

“It’s not good,” Danny said. “Besides, we never divided the ranch. Everything is as much mine as it is hers.”

“I thought that might be the way it was, but I decided it was best not to argue. Your sister is very fierce. I am afraid of her.”

Danny laughed. “I don’t think you’re afraid of anybody.” He gave Ivan a questioning glance. “She said you acted simpleminded, smiling like you didn’t have good sense. You’re not, are you?”

Now it was Ivan’s turn to laugh. “No, but it is hard for a woman to do anything bad to a person of simple mind. I did not want your sister to dislike me. It will be hard to work with her if she is angry at me.”

Danny had been standing of the far side of the remains of Ivan’s fire. He dropped down and settled on the ground. He put his arms around his legs and drew his knees up under his chin. “There’s no hope of Carla working with you. I’m her only brother, but she’s so mad at me she can’t stand to have me in the house. Did diViere really say he’d give you his part of the ranch after a year?”

“Yes.”

“What will you do with it?”

“Sell it so I can return to Poland.”

Danny sighed. “That’s what Carla said.”

“Why do you sound so sad?”

“Dividing the ranch would be hard no matter how we did it, but now it will be worse. Carla will want to keep the best parts, and you’ll want the same parts so you can sell it for more money. Carla is determined to buy it back. We don’t have that much money, but Kesney Hardin does. He wants our ranch, and he wants to marry Carla.”

“Who is this Kesney Hardin, and why does he want your ranch and your sister?”

Danny sighed again. “He came here after the war with lots of money and plans to buy up the whole county and marry the prettiest girl. He already owns the biggest ranch in the county. Now he considers himself practically engaged to Carla.”

Ivan had no explanation for his instant animosity toward Kesney Hardin except that maybe he likened him to the Russians who had carved up Poland with the cooperation of Austria and Prussia. “Maybe this Kesney Hardin will give your sister the money to buy back your share of the ranch.”

“That won’t help me. I’ll still be nothing more than a cowhand on what used to be my ranch.”

Ivan would have been in the same position if he had stayed in Poland.

“You probably think I deserve what happened to me,” Danny said.

“No one deserves bad luck.”

“Carla says it was stupidity.”

“We all make mistakes.”

“Is that why you’re here and not in Poland?”

“No. My ancestors made those mistakes.”

“I have nobody to blame. I don’t even know who my ancestors were.”

“I can trace my family back more than five hundred years.”

“Why would you want to do that? Those people have been dead so long their graves have disappeared.”

“In Poland we do not lose the graves of kings and princes.”

“Wow! After five hundred years, there must be a lot of them. Where do you put ’em?”

Ivan couldn’t say why he laughed, but he liked Danny. The boy was just as disinherited as Ivan was when he left Poland. “The past is very important in my country. We take care of the graves of our ancestors. My family occupied the same castle for almost five hundred years.” Ivan looked over his shoulder at the ranch house which could be seen in the distance. “We build with stone.”

“You won’t find any stone around here.” Danny appeared to lose interest in the conversation. For a moment he looked like he wanted to go, but then he asked abruptly, “What do you plan to do now that you’re here? I gotta tell you. Carla’s going to put a spoke in your wheel every chance she gets.”

Ivan didn’t know what spokes and wheels had to do with the situation, but he figured Danny meant his sister was not going to be helpful. “You know the ranch better than I do. What do you think I should do?”

Danny grinned. “Leave before Carla poisons your coffee.” He sobered quickly. “She thinks you left. She’s going to be mad as a wet hen when she finds out you’re still here.”

Ivan couldn’t understand why Danny would compare his sister to a wet chicken, but he’d learned to expect anything from Texans. “I think I should ride over the whole ranch. Then I will know what to do.”

“Carla will be fit to be tied, but I’ll ride with you.”

Ivan thought he understood most American expressions, but Danny seemed to be speaking a different language. Not even Nate Dolan was so hard to understand, and he was from Arkansas. “Your sister does not like me. I will go alone.”

“It won’t be a problem if you get lost and end up on Kesney Hardin’s range, but Wilbur Joiner or Frank Bass might shoot you.”

“Why do they want to shoot me?”

“They don’t like strangers on their land.”

“Soon I will not be a stranger. Then they will not want to shoot me.”

“Well, until you aren’t a stranger, I’ll ride with you.”

“Why will you do that? Your sister will be angry.”

Danny shrugged. “It’s not your fault my sister hates you. Besides, you’re a lot nicer than Mr. diViere.”

“If you did not like him, why did you play poker with him?”

“It wasn’t until I knew he was a cheater that I didn’t like him.”

“But you could not prove he cheated?”

Danny hung his head. “Nobody could.”

“That is like Laveau. He earns your trust then betrays you.”

“If you don’t like him, why are you here?”

“It is a chance to earn money to return to Poland, but I do not trust him. Laveau never does anything good for anybody but himself.”

“He certainly didn’t do anything good for me.” Danny got to his feet. “I’d better go. Carla will have breakfast ready at six o’clock. Don’t be late.”

“I will eat here.”

“You can eat at the house with us.”

“Not until your sister invites me.”

“She’ll never do that.”

“Then I will never eat at the house.”

“Suit yourself, but Carla is a great cook.”

“I am too. During the war I had to eat what I cooked, so I learned.”

“Well, good night. See you in the morning.”

Ivan watched the boy walk away. He had accepted his misfortune while his sister hadn’t. But he wasn’t going to be driven away until he sold his share of the ranch. That meant he had to find a way to get along with Carla Reece for a whole year.

***

Carla always saddled her own horse, but today she was so angry and upset she was clumsy.

“Here. Let me,” Danny said. “At this rate, you’ll have your horse so worked up he’s liable to throw you.”

“I haven’t been thrown since I was twelve.”

“You haven’t been this angry since you were ten and Forey Allen cut off your pigtail. And don’t think you can do the same thing to Ivan you did to Forey. Ivan’s twice your size.”

“I don’t plan to speak to the man.”

“I don’t see how you can avoid it since he owns half of the ranch. And don’t start yelling at me again. Nothing either of us can do now will change anything.”

“That’s exactly the kind of attitude I can’t stand. How can you just do nothing?”

“Because right now I can’t think of anything that will change what happened.”

“The judge—”

“That’s a long shot, and you know it. I’m sure diViere cheated, but unless we can prove it—and we can’t—the judge will have no reason to throw out the bet.” He finished tightening the cinch and stood back. “You ought to talk to Ivan. He seems like a nice man.”

“I don’t care if he’s a saint. I’m not giving him half of our ranch. Give me a leg up.”

Rather than let his sister step into his cupped hands, Danny picked her up and settled her in the saddle. She arranged her skirt round her then turned to her brother. “Keep an eye on him while I’m gone.”

“What do you expect him to do?”

“I don’t know. Just watch him.”

She turned, and pressing her heels into her horse’s side, rode off at a canter. She couldn’t understand how Danny could like Ivan. It didn’t matter what kind of person he was. He was trying to take half of their ranch. That was all that mattered.

It infuriated her that Ivan had set up camp along the trail to the house. She would have to pass him every time she went to town. It made him look like a vagabond, one she’d forced out into the cold. Only it was summer and not even the water in the well was cold. Still, it was the principle of the thing. What would people say? Nobody liked Danny being cheated out of his part of the ranch. Surely they wouldn’t care that she’d forced this interloper to camp out by the creek. He wasn’t a Texan. He wasn’t
one
of
them
.

Her conscience niggled at her. Ivan wasn’t the one who’d won the ranch by cheating. He was just taking advantage of a chance to earn money to return to his own country. She’d have been sympathetic if it wasn’t her ranch he intended to sell. In any case, she had a year to figure out how to get it back. And she would. That’s why she was going to town.

As she came around a bend in the trail, she saw where Ivan set up his camp. She wasn’t sure it could really be called a camp, except that he was staying there. Or he had been. His bulging saddlebags were on his saddled horse, and he was in the process of tying his bedroll behind his saddle.

He was getting ready to leave.

Her initial relief was countered by worry that the next person diViere sent would be even worse. Or diViere might decide to sell his portion of the ranch to the first person who would buy it. Though she initially thought to pass Ivan without speaking, she changed her mind. “I hope you weren’t too uncomfortable last night,” she said when she brought her horse to a stop next to Ivan’s.

“Not at all. I had a nice talk with your brother, and it was cool enough to sleep.”

His smile was so dazzling she started feeling guilty for being so inhospitable. “I should apologize for the way I treated you, but I am still so angry at Mr. diViere I can’t think straight.”

“I understand. He has done worse to me and my friends.”

She wanted to ask what could be more terrible than being cheated out of half of her ranch, but she didn’t want to encourage him to linger. “I’m going into town, so I probably won’t see you again. I hope you find a way to get the money you need to return to Poland.”

Ivan looked puzzled. “Why will you not see me again? Do you not return to the ranch?”