This Calder Sky (15 page)

Only it wasn't paper. It was money. She sat back on her heels in stunned disbelief. She had never seen so much money in all her life. She fingered the bills, all crisp and green. They didn't look like counterfeits; the money looked real. Maggie started to count it with trembling, eager fingers. Too dazed by her find, she didn't hear the footsteps on the porch. She wasn't aware of anything until she heard the screen door slam. Then she looked up to see her father and brother had entered the house.

“Look what I found!” Maggie lifted her hand to show them the money, laughing and excited. “There's hundreds here and more!”

“What are you doing with that?” The angry demand from her father was followed with action as he strode quickly over to take it from her hands.

“It was in the beer stein. When it fell—” Maggie stopped when she realized that neither of them was surprised. Culley looked uncomfortable—worried, almost. The sparkling excitement of discovery faded from her green eyes. A sharp-edged tension claimed her, running tautly through her nerve ends. “Where did you get this money, Pa?”

“It's none of your affair.” He avoided her gaze and shoved the roll of money into his pocket.

Maggie pushed to her feet, an unknown fear gnawing at the pit of her stomach. “Yes, it is. I want to know how you got that much money.”

Her father glanced at Culley, a secretive gleam dancing in his dark eyes. “We've been doing a little moonlighting,” he said, sounding deliberately mysterious. A smile didn't quite make it onto her brother's face, but Maggie could tell they were sharing a private joke. It increased her suspicions.

“Are you trying to tell me you earned that much money working for someone else?” She didn't believe them. “Who? When? You've been here all the time.”

“It's night work,” Culley said and grinned at his father.

“Night work? Doing what?” Her uneasiness grew as she looked from one to the other.

“Now just what do you think we've been doing, little girl?” her father challenged with a cocky look.

A cold, sinking feeling chilled her. The one thought her mind had been avoiding became the only one left. The clues were all there—night work, a large sum of money, and the widely known fact that someone had been stealing Calder cattle. That was all anyone had talked about for the last two weeks. And her father had smirked with satisfaction each time the subject was discussed in front of him.

“Have you … had anything to do with the cattle that have been stolen?” Maggie had to force the question out, her voice flat and hard in its accusation.

A smugness came over her father's face. “You're looking at the brains behind it.”

“You fools! You crazy fools!” Maggie stormed. “Do you think you're going to get away with it?”

“We haven't been caught the last three times—and we aren't ever going to be caught!” Her father stretched his short body to attain every inch of his height and pushed out his chest.

“Three?” Maggie frowned. “But I only heard about—”

“Yeah.” There was a malicious grin on his face. “Calder hasn't discovered the last one yet. That's the problem with owning so much. It takes a while to find out if something is missing.”

“We're just like two pesky mosquitoes,” Culley inserted, “buzzing around and stinging him where he
ain't expecting it, taking little bites here and little bites there—until pretty soon he's all ate up.” He laughed and her father joined in with him.

Maggie stared at them, chilled to the bone and frightened, although she didn't let it show. “What happens when he gets mad, Pa? What happens when you sting him so much that he comes after you?”

“How's he going to know which mosquito to swat at?” he retorted. “He'll go stomping around, swiping at everyone, but he'll never be able to prove nothing.”

Maggie shook her head slowly, not believing that. “You've just been lucky.”

“Lucky, hell! We've been smart! Tucker and me have worked this thing out to where it's foolproof!” he bragged. “Not even the guy we're selling the beef to knows who we are. We can't be traced. Even the semi changes drivers so the guy making the delivery doesn't know any names on the other end.”

“Why are you doing this, Pa?” she demanded. “Because of Chase? Because of—”

“Calder's had everything his way in this part of the country for too long. It's got to the point where he thinks him and his can do anything without being touched—without being made to pay for it. He's squeezed us little guys out, taking the best land and water, controlling the market so we don't get decent prices for our beef, and lording it over us like he was some damned king!” Angus towered in his role as champion of the oppressed, David rising up to smite Goliath. “We're going to get even with Calder for everybody! And we've only started!”

“You have to stop!” Maggie insisted, and she vibrated with an anger that came from an inner fear. “Quit while you're ahead, Pa. You've got all that money. It's more than we've ever had. It's enough. You've showed Calder—now quit while you can.”

“We aren't quitting. We're going to keep taking from
the rich and giving to the poor until there isn't anything left to take. We're going to break Calder.”

“No. If you don't stop stealing cattle, I'll go to Calder and tell him what you're doing,” she threatened.

“No, you won't.” He shook his head, unalarmed by her threat. “You won't send your father and brother to prison. Right now Chase Calder has you blinded, but the day will come when you'll see what the Calders are really like. They think they are so big and powerful that they can do anything they want and get away with it. But they won't—not as long as there's an O'Rourke around.” He studied her, then gave a decisive nod. “You'll keep quiet about what you know.”

Her father was right. It had been an empty threat. She wouldn't tell old man Calder or Chase that her father and brother had joined up with Bob Tucker to rustle Triple C cattle. She couldn't turn in her own family.

“You'd better get some lunch on the table,” Angus advised now that he had silenced her argument for good. “We've had a full morning's work and we have to meet Tucker in town to start working out the details of which spot we're going to hit next.”

In a numbed state, Maggie prepared the noon meal and put it on the table for them. She had no appetite as she picked at the food on her plate. While she listened to the confident voices of her father and brother, there was no question in her mind that her loyalty was to them, but how could she meet Chase again, knowing what she did? If she saw him and didn't mention anything, then wasn't she a party to the rustling? But if she stopped meeting him, wouldn't he become suspicious and wonder why? She was caught in the middle with no way to turn.

The theft of the cattle had meant a lot of extra work at the Triple C, so it had been a week since she'd seen
him for more than a couple of minutes, just long enough for Chase to explain why he couldn't stay. Maybe he wouldn't be able to make it tomorrow afternoon, either, Maggie hoped. Then perhaps she'd have time to decide the best way to handle the situation.

But he was there waiting for her when she arrived the next day. His horse was grazing in the wildflower-strewn meadow in the section they called the Broken Bluff. Chase walked forward to meet her, the white flash of his smile showing against the layered tan of his features. Maggie stopped her horse before she reached him and slipped out of the saddle without giving him a chance to help her down. She let the reins trail the ground and patted her horse's neck, not looking at Chase when he walked up to her, postponing the moment when she had to meet his eyes.

“I thought you might be too busy to come today.” She gave him an immediate opening to say he had to leave.

“We're busy, all right, but not
that
busy.” A hand was hidden behind his back. He brought it around to offer her a bouquet of wildflowers. “These are for you, Maggie.”

Her throat grew tight when she looked at the collection of riotous color held in that large, masculine hand. She reached for them hesitantly, encircling their stems with her fingers and lifting them to her face to inhale their wild fragrance.

“No one's ever given me flowers before.” She glanced into the dark intensity of his eyes and ached inside.

There was a faint curve to his mouth. “If any of the boys saw me picking those flowers, they would never let me hear the end of it.”

She could well imagine how much he would get ribbed if he had been seen doing something so blatantly
romantic. It was difficult for her to imagine this virile and husky man picking flowers. Such sentimentality didn't seem to fit the image of rough, raw manhood.

“Do you like them?” he prompted.

“Yes.” Maggie nodded, unable to lift her gaze from the bouquet, her fingertips lightly tracing the satiny petals.

The point of his finger raised her chin. “Then how about thanking me for them?” he suggested.

Her gaze went no higher than his mouth, its strong, firm line coming toward her. She was shaken by a fervent need to know the forgetfulness of his embrace, the heady wildness his kiss could bring. She didn't wait for his lips to complete their descent to claim hers. Instead, she flung herself into his arms, the bouquet slipping from her hands as they wound around the thick column of his neck. Her mouth moved hungrily and desperately over his.

She was seeking and demanding, driving against him with her lips and her body. There was heat. There was fire. There was the wild tingling in her loins. But she didn't find the needed assuagement for that niggling feeling of duplicity. The steel band of his arms and the fierce pressure of his roaming hands tried to absorb her into his body, but the physical impossibility of such a feat soon made itself known. Slowly, crying inside, she turned her face away from him and pushed at his shoulders.

“The flowers. I dropped the flowers.” She used them as an excuse to end an embrace that fulfilled every physical and emotional need except one.

Chase was reluctant to let her go because he sensed that he had somehow failed her. He mouthed the sensitive spot on the curve of her neck, knowing how the caress always aroused her and feeling the subsequent shivers of stimulation, but she continued to resist him. Confused by her conflicting signals, he loosened
his hold and she quickly moved out of his arms, bending to pick up the scattered flowers. When she straightened, her back was to him. His hands moved to rub the soft points of her shoulders.

“I've missed being with you, Maggie.” His voice was husky with meaning. “I've missed
you
.”

“I know.” Her head was bent, her expression hidden from him. “I missed you, too.” But the tone of her voice sounded deliberately light. In the next second, she was walking away from his hands. “Thank you for the flowers. They're lovely.”

A frown plowed a furrow between his brows as he watched her walk to an outcropping of rock and sink to the ground to rest against it. He followed her after a few seconds, his keen gaze studying her smooth, expressionless features. He stopped near her feet, towering above her.

“What's bothering you, Maggie?”

“Nothing,” she insisted, then looked up at him with a certain thoughtfulness. “You want to make love to me, don't you?”

This candor wasn't what he had expected, not that she wasn't usually direct in her statements. He could scarcely deny her question, but he guessed it wasn't sex that she wanted from him.

“Yes, I want to make love to you.” He lowered himself to the ground beside her. “But not if it isn't what you want me to do.” With his back against the same rock, he hooked an arm behind her waist and started to pull her toward him. “Come here.”

“No, I don't think I want—”

“I know you don't.” Chase guessed what she was going to say. “And I'm not going to try to persuade you to change your mind and let me love you. All I want to do is hold you. Okay?”

She searched his face for an instant, then let him turn
her sideways to lie across his chest. Chase took off her hat so her head could rest against his shoulder and smoothed the tangle of long, black curls. A hand was doubled near her mouth while the other rested lightly on his chest. He could feel the tension in her body and held her loosely, one hand resting on her hipbone and the other cupping her rib cage below the swell of her breast.

He made no attempt at conversation, simply holding her in his arms. The sun was warm and a light breeze rustled the grass. Gradually, he felt her relax against him like a slowly uncoiling spring. A quiet contentment seemed to claim both of them. Chase had no idea how long he held her like that; five minutes or twenty. His muscles were starting to cramp; soon they would be numb if he didn't move. He shifted slightly, tucking his chin into his chest to look at her. Her eyes were closed, long curling lashes lying together.

“Are you sleeping?” he murmured.

“Uh—” It was a negative sound. “Thinking.”

“About what?” A strand of black hair laid across her cheek and Chase gently pushed it back with the others.

She smiled, almost sadly. “I don't think you would understand.”

“Try me.”

“I was thinking”—her eyes opened slowly as she shifted in his hold so that she was lying with both shoulders against his chest and facing the open sky—“that I won't always be cooking and cleaning and mending worn-out clothes for my father and brother. When I finish school, I'm leaving the ranch. I'll get a job somewhere and have a place of my own … and new clothes. People won't look at me and click their tongues, saying the poor girl doesn't have a decent thing to wear.” She mimicked the words with bitter
pride. “I'm going to work and make something of myself. And my hands won't have callouses. They'll be smooth, like a lady's.” She paused to look at her hands. “I suppose that sounds silly to you.”