Winning the Widow's Heart Read online

  Perhaps a bit of snow had melted from the roof. “Why do you need my help? I’m fetching the eggs.”

  “Already done.”

  He jerked his head. A wire basket full of eggs rested in the snow near the corner of the house.

  She ground her teeth together. She didn’t like how he was taking over all the chores. He was disturbing her schedule once again.

  “Stop fussing over your routine.” He grinned. “Follow me.”

  The accusation stung. “I do not fuss. I have a certain way I like things done. A certain order to my chores that maximizes efficiency.”

  “You’re definitely fussing now. Why don’t you help me finish the snowman?”

  Crossing her arms over her chest, she tapped her foot on the packed snow. “A what?”

  “Haven’t you ever built a snowman?”

  Elizabeth gaped at the fool man. No one built snowmen, did they? While she pondered the question, Jack disappeared around the corner.

  With a weary sigh, Elizabeth trudged in his wake. Since the eggs had been gathered, she did have a few extra minutes this morning. Perhaps if she indulged him for a moment, he’d leave her alone to finish her chores.

  Perhaps she’d simply watch his antics. She hadn’t managed more than a few hours of sleep at a stretch in months. For weeks she’d existed in a blurry fugue. This morning, in an exhausted haze, she’d stumbled right into the doorjamb. Frolicking around in the snow was not on her to-do list.

  As she rounded the corner, another snowball hit her on the opposite shoulder. “What are you doing?” she sputtered.

  “It’s a snowball fight. You’re supposed to hit me back.”

  “I will not.” She knew full well how these games went. He’d use the opportunity to show off his superior strength and skill, humiliating her in the process. “Have you been drinking your medicinal whiskey?”

  He shrugged. “I’m having fun.”

  Since when did he have fun? He was always frowning and serious. “Are you ill?”

  He stared at her as if she were the one acting like a fool.

  “Some of us have chores.” Elizabeth glared at him, one hand shielding her eyes from sunlight sparking off the shimmering, white snow. “Enjoy your fun. I’m going back in the house.”

  She pivoted on her heel. A soft explosion shattered over the back of her head. Chilly blobs trickled down her neck. “You—why—you.”

  Fuming, she bent to gather a handful of snow. If he wanted a fight, she’d give him one. She packed the frozen material together, cocked back her arm and let the ball fly. White exploded over his face.

  “You have good aim,” he said with an ice-covered grin.

  “And you called me a lunatic?” Gracious, the man didn’t even have the good sense to be annoyed. The time for fun and games was over. “I don’t have the energy for this. You and I need to have a conversation, Mr. Elder.”

  His jubilant expression fell. “So it’s like that, is it?”

  “Yes.” She didn’t care that her words had wiped the joy from his face. She didn’t care at all. She didn’t even know what he was insinuating with his cryptic declaration and hangdog expression. “It’s like what?”

  “Never mind.” He brushed the snow from his hands. “Let’s have this talk.”

  She stole a furtive glance at the window. No doubt Jo was watching them with rapt attention. “Not in the house. I don’t want Jo to overhear.”

  He quirked an eyebrow. “The bunkhouse, then?”

  Warmth crept into her cheeks. His temporary quarters were closest to where they stood, but she shied away from his offer. “It’s not proper. How about the barn?”

  She waved in the opposite direction.

  “What’s more proper about the barn?”

  A lump of snow had caught between her boot and her stocking. The ice was starting to melt, sending a stinging cold trail down her ankle. She shifted her feet. “There’s more activity in the barn.”

  “I guess I see your point.” He wiped the snow from his face with a bandanna he’d unfurled from his pocket. “But the pig isn’t going to be much of a chaperone.”

  “Fine.” She gritted her teeth. “We shall conduct our conversation in the bunkhouse.” Straightening her collar, she assumed her most disapproving frown. “But only because I left my rosetta iron in the cupboard last summer.”

  “Your English is showing, Miss Prim and Proper,” he teased.

  “Well.” The nerve of the man! One minute he was pelting her with the snowballs, and the next minute he was mocking her heritage. “The English are very fine people. I take that as a compliment.”

  He winked at her. “As intended.”

  “Oh,” Elizabeth huffed. She really didn’t have time for this foolishness. Tossing him off her property was going to be so much easier since he had reverted to this annoying behavior.

  She marched to the bunkhouse and yanked open the door with too much force, then leaped out of the way as the heavy wood ricocheted, nearly taking off the end of her nose in the process.

  Good heavens, this wouldn’t do at all. She was accustomed to being in control. He had her huffing and grinding her teeth like a fishwife. Pausing for a long beat, she took a deep, fortifying breath. While her pulse slowed, she studied his temporary quarters, struck by how clean and tidy the space appeared.

  The bunkhouse had replaced the original sod homestead years before Elizabeth and Will had arrived. The long narrow room had five empty cots lined up along either side of the center corridor. A sturdy pine box capped the end of each bed for the worker’s storage. The previous owner had been a wealthy adventurer from back East with grand schemes for improving the land. His dreams had fizzled beneath the relentless prairie winds and his wife’s discontent.

  She rarely used the space except for cooking occasionally in the summer months to keep the heat out of the main house. An enormous cast-iron stove used for heat as well as cooking dominated the center of the room. Unbidden, images of the orphanage came rushing back. A familiar wash of loneliness clouded her vision. She recalled staring at the ceiling, night after night, praying for the loneliness to end.

  She wanted to run to Rachel and cradle her baby, never letting go. What a tragic choice her mother had had to make, surrendering the care of her only child. Elizabeth curled her hands into fists. That would never happen to her. She’d fight a grizzly with her bare hands to keep her baby.

  A gentle hand touched her sleeve. “Are you all right?”

  “Of course.”

  She shook off the gloomy feeling along with the last of the melting snowflakes. Lingering in the past was a dull and lonely business.

  Clearing her throat, Elizabeth squared her shoulders. “You’re going to have to leave. It isn’t proper for you to be here. The McCoys know you’re back. They’re a nice family, but I don’t want word of a single…of a man…of you reaching Cimarron Springs.”

  Jack leaned one shoulder against a sturdy support pillar and crossed his arms. “Mrs. McCoy didn’t strike me as the kind of woman to gossip.”

  “Be that as it may, gossip has a way of spreading like wildfire during a draught.”

  Chilled from her trip outside, she sidled down the narrow center aisle toward the cast-iron stove. She stole a discreet glance at Jack’s belongings. He’d taken the bunk nearest the warming fire. His saddle bags and other paraphernalia were neatly laid out on a small side table. Each item had been carefully arranged—razor, mirror, pencil and paper. How different from what Will had carried, and yet how similar. They were both drifters, men who preferred to live their lives unencumbered.

  Nothing encumbered a man more than a wife and child.

  She’d already made one mistake concerning a man. She couldn’t afford another. She woul
dn’t let the Ranger’s laughing hazel eyes lure her into a false sense of security.

  “Listen, Mrs. Cole,” he spoke. “I’d like to leave. I have work to do. But I can’t abandon you to care for Jo and Rachel all alone. It just isn’t right.”

  “We managed quite well on our own.”

  “Yeah. That’s why I found you half frozen in a blizzard.” He raked his hand through his hair. “You’re a greenhorn with no idea what you’re up against. You haven’t an inkling what you’re risking.”

  He crossed the length of the room, crowding her until they stood inches apart.

  A shiver of panic snaked down her spine. She refused to back away, even when she had to tip back her head to meet the raw fury glittering in his steady gaze. “What happens to us is none of your concern.”

  “You don’t have enough wood cut to make it through the rest of the month, let alone the rest of winter. What are you going to do then?”

  His accusation straightened her spine. She was all the more determined to prove him wrong. “I’ll manage. I always do.”

  “Yes, but it’s not just you anymore, is it?” His freshly shaven face flushed with anger. “You have your daughter to think of now.”

  She felt heat creep up her cheeks. “Are you insinuating something?”

  “No, I’m telling you. Move to town. Be near people. Then I’ll leave. If you don’t care enough to save yourself, at least have the decency to think of your child. She doesn’t have a choice. You do.”

  He could question her skills all he wanted, but he’d better steer clear of her mothering. “How dare you question my devotion. I can protect my daughter. I can protect my home. This is where I belong.”

  “Prove your devotion. Sell the buildings. Move to town.”

  She swallowed around the lump in her throat. If only things were that easy. She didn’t want Rachel to live under the townspeople’s scorn, and she didn’t know where else to go. Right then, the homestead was the safest place for them.

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “’Course it is.”

  “This is none of your business.”

  Anger swelled in her chest. He was a threat. A threat to her home, a threat to her reputation, and a threat to her peace of mind. “What does a drifter know?”

  Hurt flicked in eyes, passing so quickly she might have imagined the emotion if not for the agitated tic in his cheek. “I’m not a drifter, I’m a lawman. I have a purpose.”

  Suddenly, she wanted to hurt him as much as he’d hurt her. “Really. Then where is your home? What is your purpose now—besides threatening me?”

  “Threatening you? I saved your hide. Twice.” His boots scraped the floor as he pivoted away. “And this isn’t about me. This is about you living on a homestead without even a rifle.”

  “I have the shotgun and Will’s revolver, remember?”

  “You’ve fired the shotgun twice. And you’ve never fired the revolver. How are you going to react in an emergency? That’s not your only handicap, and you know it. You’ve limped through half the winter, but once spring comes, you’ll never be able to keep up. How are you going to climb on the roof and clear the chimney? How are you going to cut hay, chop wood and still care for Rachel? You can’t handle all the work on your own.”

  Elizabeth narrowed her eyes. She was well and truly tired of being told what she could and couldn’t do. She’d done a fine job of caring for the homestead while Will was away, but he’d never once complimented her abilities. Instead, he’d search until he found something out of place, a frivolous chore she’d failed to accomplish, then he’d pounced. She didn’t need a man to criticize her efforts. Jack wasn’t so perfect, either.

  “It’s not safe,” he continued. “You don’t have any idea what I’ve seen. You have no understanding of the dangers facing a woman.” He stabbed his hand through his hair again, appearing to reconsider his tact. “And it’s not practical. If you want me to leave, you’ll have to prove you’re capable.”

  He splayed his hands, pained frustration glittering in his eyes. “Don’t you miss the company of other people?”

  “That’s none of your business,” she spoke, her voice pinched. “I don’t have to prove anything to you.”

  She’d never confess her insecurities, but his words eroded all her rationalizations. Her head ached at the thought of the insurmountable tasks awaiting her in the spring. She needed more time to think, to plan.

  Rubbing her temples, she blew out a long breath. Those problems were months away. She’d figure something out, she always did. “Why do you care? You’ll be gone. Back to Texas.”

  “I’m saving somebody else from the trouble of cleaning up your mess.”

  “I’ve never been a burden to anyone.”

  She’d love nothing more than to report him to the law for trespassing, but involving the sheriff risked drawing attention to herself.

  “Say something,” he demanded. “Defend yourself. Tell me how you’re going to cut enough wood to keep the house warm for the next three months. Tell me what you’re going to do if there’s an Indian uprising.”

  “God will take care of us. ‘Consider the ravens. For they neither sow nor reap. Which neither have storehouse nor barn. And God feeds them. How much better are we than the fowls?’”

  “You’re a naive fool who never should have left New York. This isn’t a page from a penny tale, this is the real thing. Do you want to know what it’s like out here? Really like? I once saw a man hanged for shooting his whole family. You want to know why he murdered them?”

  His implacable expression unnerved her. “You’re just trying to frighten me with these petty parlor tricks.”

  “He shot them because he couldn’t stand to watch his family starve. Is that what you want? Do you want to watch Rachel starve? To see your own flesh and blood waste away in misery before your eyes?”

  Elizabeth pressed her hands to her ears. “Be quiet. You don’t think people starve to death in the city? They die in the gutter while people step over their bodies like so much garbage. No place is safe. You don’t frighten me.”

  How dare he intimidate her. This was a home. Land. A roof over her head and the prairie stretching out to the horizon. If she lost this house, she had nothing. Here on the homestead she had shelter, a sustainable source of food and the possibility of a legacy for her daughter. She had a future.

  He paced the narrow aisle. “I’m not going to quit until I talk some sense into you. If you keep on the way you’re going, you’ll end up a pile of stones on the prairie. Is that what you want for Rachel? No one will even remember your names.”

  She froze, numbed by the thought of the anonymous piles of stones littering the prairie. “This is pointless.”

  Drained by the frustrating conversation, not to mention more exhausted than she’d ever been in her whole life, Elizabeth spun on her heel for her dramatic exit.

  Instead, she stubbed her toe. “Ouch.”

  With tears of frustration pricking behind her eyes, she rubbed her foot. “What else can go wrong today?”

  Jack lifted the heavy metal box she’d collided with onto the bunk. “Since you’re not going to take my advice, it looks like I’ll be staying a few more days. At least until Jo is up and about.”

  Her annoyance suddenly felt like relief. That was absurd. Of course she was mad. She was furious.

  “Where on earth did the box come from?” she asked to cover her confusion.

  Certainly he hadn’t dragged the heavy object around on the back of his horse.

  He wrestled the box into position. “I found this in the bottom of one of the lockers. You might as well take it back to the main house.”

  Startled by the abrupt change in conversation, she touched the lid. “I don’t rec
ognize this.”

  “It’s yours now. I found it on your property.”

  The metal shape was vaguely familiar. Had the box belonged to Will? She had a hazy recollection of a furtive trip to the bunkhouse last spring.

  Jack stared at her expectantly. Her hands grew cold. Dare she open the box in the Ranger’s presence? Certainly Will hadn’t left behind anything of value. He’d cleared the house of valuables before he left.

  She pinched off her mittens. If she didn’t reveal the contents, Jack would only be more suspicious. She couldn’t afford him asking any more questions, or worse yet, reporting back to the sheriff.

  As she vacillated, Jack’s expression stilled and grew serious. She sensed the return of the Texas Ranger in the speculative gleam of his eyes.

  Her resolve crystallized. There was no reason to assume the box held anything worth worrying about. If Will had left anything valuable, he’d have left it in his trunk in the house.

  She licked her lips, tentatively stretching out one hand. Flipping open the lid, she sucked in a breath. Jack loomed behind her. She glanced over the contents. Several crumpled bills, four gold watches, a money clip and a revolver nestled in the box. She poked around with one finger, brushing the bills aside to reveal two thin gold rings.

  Inordinately relieved to find the box filled with harmless objects, Elizabeth sighed. “This must have belonged to the previous owners.”

  “These items don’t belong to you?”

  She shook her head. “I told you. They must belong to the previous owner. A man from Pennsylvania lived here for years. His wife never could adjust to the prairie, so they moved back East. They must have left these things behind.”

  “Why didn’t someone discover the box sooner?”

  “Will kept a few hired hands when we first moved, but they took off.”

  Much to her relief, they hadn’t returned. She’d never been partial to the company Will kept, and she definitely didn’t like being alone with them when Will traveled.

  Jack frowned. “How many watches does one man own? It doesn’t seem right.”