Once the men left, the women and children stood outside the barn and listened until they no longer heard the sound of hooves pounding. For a few minutes all was silent. Too silent.
Johanna’s voice rang like a lone bell. “Come along. Let’s go inside. We’ve nothing to do but make coffee and wait.”
Everyone seemed to agree. They gathered children and moved inside the house. Mary glanced around in panic, wishing she had a horse. Maybe she could catch up with the men. If she tried harder, she could make him understand.
But even the old nags had been untied from the wagons and ridden bareback by men in a hurry. Nothing remained in the corral except a dozen young colts shooed off into the corners.
Mary hurried to the fence. One of them had to be the Steeldust colt the strangers planned to take. But which one? She tried to remember what the colt had looked like the day Cooper showed him to her, but she’d been paying more attention to his hand touching hers than to the horse.
She couldn’t watch them all. It was so dark she wasn’t sure she could even see several of the animals. And even if she did keep her eye on the colt, how would she be able to stop men from taking it?
Glancing back at the house, she noticed Miles standing alone in the shadows beside the porch. She knew why he was there. He wouldn’t go in with the women. He couldn’t ride with the men.
Mary ran to her brother. As she pulled him toward the corral, she tried to remember all she’d heard. They had to somehow protect the colt. But the enemy had no face and she knew few details.
Miles listened to her ramblings, but she could see it in his face as clearly as if he’d said the words,
When words ?nally came all he said was, “Go in with the women, Mary.”
“I’m staying,” she said as he took a step toward the house.
He shifted, waiting for her to come to her senses. “You’re going back to the house,” Miles ordered, as he always did.
“No,” she answered just as strongly. “Not this time. It is my fault Cooper wasn’t warned about the trick. I should have told him.”
“But what if you run into the rustlers? What then, Mary? You said there were three. You don’t even have a weapon.”
Her brother knew her for the coward she was. Afraid of the dark. Afraid of the sound of spurs. Afraid of almost every man in the state. What did she think she could do against three men?
“Come back with me,” Miles asked again.
“No,” she answered. “I have to try.”
Even in the darkness she could see it in his eyes. He would no longer play the parent role in her life, she would never again be the child. “All right.” He moved toward her. “Then I’ll stay also.”
Mary knew they were still no match for three armed men, but she was glad Miles stayed.
“Evenin’,” came a low voice from the shadows. Spurs jingled as a man stepped into the faint light coming from the barn door. “So, we meet again.”
It had been almost a year, but Mary knew the stranger’s voice. She’d heard it last in the darkness of the store.
She couldn’t breathe as the man moved closer. The feel of his hands gripping her arms, his hot words shouted in her face, the smell of whiskey, all ?ooded her mind. He had been so polite, so nice that afternoon, but in the shadows, anger twisted his words.
“Adams will be back in a few minutes with his men,” Miles threatened as he stepped in front of Mary. “You had better be gone before he returns.”
The intruder pulled a long Bowie knife from his boot. “Don’t try to fool me, Yank. He won’t return for hours. He and every man for miles around will be chasing shadows tonight.”
“I’ll not let you take the colt.” Miles stood his ground.
The man laughed. “How do you plan to stop me? If you had a gun it would already be pointing in my direction and you’d be no match for me with a knife even if you had one.”
“Kill them and be done with it, Len.” A man on horseback rode out of the blackness. “We ain’t got all night.” His gruff voice rattled across the damp air.
Mary recognized him as one she’d heard earlier during the dance. The planner.
“Now, wait a minute, boss. You don’t know who we’re dealing with. This Yank won’t ?ght. It ain’t no fun killing a man who won’t ?ght back.” Len moved a step closer and pointed with his knife. “But the woman, she screams and ?ghts like crazy. I’ll have to slit her throat, before I let the Yank die a little at a time.”
“Do what you have to do,” the leader said calmly as if they were of no importance to him. “The kid backed out on us. I’ll need your help rounding up the colt. Get rid of the witnesses.”
Chapter Thirteen
COOPER YELLED ORDERS for his men to guard the herd and let the others worry about chasing rustlers as he turned the midnight mare toward home.
“But, boss?” a ranch hand yelled over the thunder of hooves. “Don’t you want in on the ride? They couldn’t outrun us.”
Cooper didn’t bother answering. Three times the men required to round up a half dozen rustlers were riding north at full speed. The county marshal took the lead, much more at home than he’d been on the dance ?oor. Cooper wasn’t needed in Echo Canyon. Something about the call to arms gnawed at him. Why would men try to steal a herd the night before a drive began when every ablebodied cowhand was camped out, waiting to get started, or at the dance a few miles away? And if they’d moved that many cattle, why hadn’t someone heard? Cooper might have been occupied, but Duly had maintained a residence on the porch all night. The old cook could smell rain before a cloud formed.
Cooper couldn’t remember the number of times he’d seen Duly start thinning the gravy before anyone else even heard riders arriving for supper.
Pushing his horse harder toward home, Cooper tried to make the pieces ?t.
Mary’s last words haunted him. She’d said his future was in danger. Even if the cattle he put into the drive were stolen, the ranch would stand the loss. Didn’t she understand that he was solid enough to survive?
He ?gured the cattle, even the Steeldust colt, could disappear and they’d still make it as long as she was by his side. He had to tell her that his need for her was more than an ache deep inside. He’d built the ranch for nothing if he didn’t have her to share it with. These past years he’d worked thinking he would be happy, when all he needed was to ?nd her.
She must know that she was his future. The last few minutes they’d been together before the shouting started had left no doubt how he felt. She was his future, the only future he wanted. Why would she think she was in danger? Mary would be safe with his sisters and the other women.
Cooper didn’t slow until he spotted the house. The pale moon offered him little help as he neared. He heard women’s voices braided with laughter. He breathed for the ?rst time since he’d turned the mare around.
Whatever frightened Mary had been only in her mind. He’d have to learn that about her if he planned to cherish her for the next ?fty or so years. She was gentle and kind and intelligent, but not brave. He would be brave enough for them both.
Cooper grinned as he stepped onto the porch. If he’d wanted brave, bossy, and absentminded he would have looked for a woman like one of his sisters. But he wanted Mary, who needed him to take care of her and protect her and love her.
As he walked into the house his gaze searched for her. From now on he’d ?nd her here when he got home, he thought. She’d be the one who had supper ready, who waited for him, who bore his children, who completed his life.
His house was, at present, full of every size and age of woman. They circled in small groups, busy visiting. Mary wasn’t among them.
Johanna walked by with a plate of rockhard cookies made by one of the Williams girls. “Forget something?” she
