Lone Heart Pass (6 page)

CHAPTER SEVEN

Charley
February 27

T
HE
MORNING
WAS
COOL
,
but Charley could feel spring coming as he saddled his horse, Dooley, and prepared to ride out. The calves he'd bought yesterday at the auction would arrive after lunch and he wanted to cross the pasture on horseback a few times just to make sure there were no surprises. A leftover round of wire or a nest of snakes could kill a calf. He had the feeling Jubilee couldn't take much of a loss.

One bite from a rattler on a horse or cow's neck could cut off the windpipe and suffocate the animal. There would be nothing a cowboy could do to help.

He also wanted to check the quality of the water. Sharon's parents had taken Lillie to the farm and ranch show in Amarillo, and on this rare Saturday without her, he planned to put in an extra five or six hours of work. He knew his daughter would have fun with her grandparents, and he needed every daylight hour he had to get this place ready for spring. He was making progress, but not fast enough. On Monday he'd hire men to help him work the cattle but today he was working on his own.

Grinning, he remembered Jubilee mentioning twice yesterday that she was glad it was Friday. She wouldn't be helping him today. City people might take off Saturdays and Sundays, but most farm and ranch folks kept working.
Livestock don't know it's the weekend.

He'd spent more time explaining things to her this week than working. He should have added in the bargain that he would get paid double for every day she helped. Yesterday, when he'd gone in for breakfast, he noticed she'd turned what had been a living room/bedroom for Levy into an office. Calendars, maps and goals for each month were taped to the walls.

The woman was as much a puzzle to him as she'd been the first day when she'd stormed out in her raincoat and socks. Bossy one minute and completely confused the next. She was her own private merry-go-round of emotions.

What made it worse was that he felt the need to help her, watch over her. She seemed adrift, without any friends or family. As far as he knew, not one person had called to check on her. Now and then he had to fight the need to just hold her and tell her it was going to be all right. She didn't have to fight so hard or always put on such a brave face.

Only Charley wasn't sure he believed that himself. He knew what it was like to have few friends and no family that cared. Sometimes being brave was the only choice because the other alternative was too dark to think about.

Jubilee did look good in her jeans and boots, though. He'd give the crazy lady that. And she always took the time to stop and talk to Lillie, even if she barely spoke five-year-old.

He'd found them sitting in the middle of Jubilee's dirt garden one afternoon. They were laughing about all the strange vegetables they could grow if plants mixed.

“If an apple married a carrot,” Lillie had said, “I'd call it a carropple.”

Jubilee made several suggestions for new plants and that night she brought over a tower of vegetables for Lillie to eat with her supper.

Her being kind to Lillie mattered to Charley.

The second day, when Lillie mentioned to Jubilee that her daddy was sleeping on the couch because there was no bed in his room, Jubilee insisted they go shopping in the upstairs rooms of her house. Four bedrooms were completely furnished and looked as though no one had slept in any of them for over fifty years. Plus, extra furniture lined the walls of the attic.

When the three of them moved furniture out of the old place, Charley looked around. The big old house wasn't in bad shape even if it did seem haunted with a hundred years of memories.

The fifth bedroom, the one over the kitchen, was obviously Jubilee's. She must have decorated it when she'd lived with Levy as a child. It looked as if she hadn't changed a thing.

When they started lugging the bed frame into his place, Charley complained all the way, but that night he stretched out in a full bed and slept like a rock. When he tried to thank Jubilee the next morning, she brushed it off as nothing, saying she'd had fun with Lillie.

As he led Dooley out, saddled and ready on Saturday morning, Charley noticed Jubilee walking in the dirt she called her sleeping garden. This time she had the book in her hands he'd given her. The woman was always planning. More than a dozen times over the week her quick mind had surprised him and, though he wouldn't admit it even to himself, he found that sexy as hell.

He waved and thought of reminding her to put on sunscreen, but he reconsidered. He hadn't minded two nights ago when she'd knocked on his door and asked him to cover her back with aloe vera lotion. She'd worn a sleeveless blouse with tiny straps that morning and blistered both her front and back all the way down to the top of her bra line.

For a moment he'd just stood there staring at her bare shoulders.

“Well?” she said. “Would you mind helping me?” She'd obviously taken off her blouse and bra and wrapped herself in a towel.

He couldn't stop staring. The towel was low enough to show off not only the sunburn, but the white line below where no sun had touched. With each intake of breath a tiny bit of creamy breast seemed to push up from beneath the towel.

“I'll help. Sure.” He tried to sound simply polite.

She handed him the lotion and turned, lifting her hair off her red shoulders.

He poured the lotion in his palm and slowly spread the cream over her skin. Back and forth from just below her hair, down her neck, over her shoulders and down to where the towel blocked his progress down her back.

If he didn't know better he'd think his soft caress was absorbing the heat from her skin, for he felt as though his entire body was growing hot.

When she turned and his hand moved over the tops of her breasts where the skin was burned the worst, she let out a whispered cry.

Charley wasn't sure if he'd hurt her or if she was simply reacting to the feel of his touch.

Lillie pushed her way between them. Taking the lotion away from him, she claimed his rough touch made Jubilee jump.

The five-year-old had taken over the doctoring, even insisting Jubilee stay for ice cream as part of her treatment.

Charley tried to apologize, but when he looked at her talking to Lillie, smiling at her, letting Lillie be the doctor, he couldn't seem to form words.

The feel of her warm skin lingered on his hands but he'd done his best to ignore it the next day. No women in his life, he reminded himself. If he ever did need a woman, he'd pick someone like Lexie, who'd know from the start that there would be no strings, no commitment, no future. He'd been fighting to get his footing since his dad kicked him off the ranch and made sure his college days were over. He'd worked and saved and done his best to raise Lillie. Nothing would stop him. No woman would ever get to him again.

Not even one with skin like silk and breasts that promised to be irresistible.

Don't get involved
, he reminded himself—so often that it started echoing in his mind.

If he'd had any doubt that Jubilee wanted it the same way, all he had to remember was yesterday morning. When he'd asked how the sunburn was, she'd said “fine” as if drawing a line of what should not be talked about. The rest of breakfast had been formal, all business. He'd eaten his burned eggs and almost-raw bacon without another word about her body.

Of course, he couldn't help it if now and then his body went rogue with memories of its own. The way she'd felt. How he could feel her breath brushing against his throat as he leaned closer. The soft cry that could have been pleasure or pain.

Yesterday morning, all that seemed to have vanished with the dawn. Maybe he'd just imagined how good it felt so close. Maybe he was simply starved for a woman and had seen a request only for help as an invitation.

He had looked across the table. All business.

“Fine,” Charley had finally echoed under his breath when she got up to get her notepad. He wanted it that way, too. The last thing he needed to do was get involved with her on anything but a business relationship. She'd told him while they were eating lunch a few days ago that she'd lost both her job and her lover, whom she didn't really love anyway.

She was the definition of mixed-up. He hadn't asked any questions, but now he wished he had.

“Someone's coming,” she called to him as she closed her book and walked across her sleeping garden toward him.

He noticed the cloud of dust flying behind a little compact car. “Looks like the sheriff's daughter's VW Bug. Don't know anyone in town who drives a yellow one except Lauren.”

Jubilee raised an eyebrow. “You know everyone's cars in town?”

“No, but I know Lauren's. She's had that one since she left for college. She and my little brother are friends, or at least they were the last time I talked to Reid. He's a year older than her but my dad said once that they dated some.” Charley clamped his lips together. Too much information, he decided. Jubilee wouldn't care. Why did he always feel as though he needed to explain everything about not only the ranch, but also the town, to her?

It occurred to him that maybe he talked so much because he wanted to learn more about her. Or maybe he simply liked that low voice of hers that was starting to whisper through his dreams. Who knows, maybe if she knew the place and the people better, she'd stay.

As the car turned into the dirt drive, Jubilee commented, “I didn't know you had family in the area.”

“You didn't ask and the answer is no, I no longer have family in the area. None that claim me anyway.” He could hear the bitterness in his words, but he didn't plan on explaining. Let everyone for a hundred miles around believe whatever they wanted. He was the bad seed in the Collins clan. He'd gotten one girl pregnant and she'd left him with a kid. He'd slept with his stepmother. He'd never amount to anything. He was blacker than the blackest sheep.

Charley clenched his jaw to keep the swear words from spilling out. He'd prove them all wrong even if it took him a lifetime.

Before Jubilee could ask more questions, Lauren jumped out of the VW and hugged Charley. “It's good to see you,” she said. She was laughing, though for some reason she looked a bit nervous. “I've missed your being around campus, Charley. You're my favorite Collins, you know.”

He guessed Lauren was trying to tell him she wasn't one of the ones who judged him. He didn't know her well, but she'd always been kind. He'd been sad when he found out she'd dated Reid. She deserved better.

“It's good to see you, too.” That was it, he thought. The limit to their conversation since they'd been toddlers.

The last time he'd seen Lauren was the day he packed to leave college. She'd been much more of a kid then, it seemed. Tall, slender, her hair blowing across her face wiping away tears. She hadn't asked questions then, she'd simply looked sorry for him.

“I wish you could stay,” she'd said even though they seldom saw each other on campus. “It isn't fair. You only need to finish one semester.”

Charley hadn't explained. He figured she'd heard the stories. “Don't worry about it. No big deal.” He'd lied. “I'll come back when I have time.”

Now he needed to think of something to talk about before she started asking questions. She'd had over a year to think of a few. The last thing he wanted to do was talk about ancient history.

With his arm still resting on Lauren's shoulder, he turned her toward his boss. “This is Jubilee Hamilton, old Levy's great-granddaughter. I'm helping her get the place up and running again.”

To his surprise, Jubilee was very professional. Shaking hands. Saying she'd seen the sheriff's car drive by a few days ago and looked forward to meeting him.

Charley didn't miss the gentleness, a true friendliness, in Jubilee's welcome. She'd been like that with Lillie, too. Maybe he was the only one alive who brought out her anger? Or maybe it was men in general—after all, every boyfriend had left her, she'd admitted. Which he found hard to believe, remembering the feel of her skin.

Charley tried to get his mind back in the present.

“What brings you out here, Lauren?” he said as he noticed the bone-thin kid Thatcher Jones trying to get out of her tiny car. He reminded Charley of a long-legged spider. “Did you bring the boy out to pick up his truck? I saw it parked down the road in the bar ditch.”

“Something like that.” Lauren glanced back as if she'd forgotten Thatcher was there. “He's riding shotgun on my mission.”

Charley waved at the kid and Thatcher waved back. He'd seen the boy around. They'd never talked, but they were on waving terms.

“I'm looking for my father.” Lauren straightened as if finally getting to the reason she'd driven out. “Hikers found a body in the canyon a couple of nights ago. My dad said he'd be north of Lone Heart Pass this morning looking for clues. I've got information he asked for and thought the pass might be the quickest way to get it to him.”

Charley got the picture. Lauren needed his help, but she didn't want to give more away than necessary. “You could go down into the canyon behind the museum, but I'd pack water if I were you. It could be a long walk. Or I could saddle up another horse and take you through the pass. I'm stabling several extras here and I figure the owners would be happy if I got them out for a little exercise. Once we ride down the hiker trail, we'll probably be within sight of the sheriff if he's still in the canyon.”

“Would you?” Lauren smiled, but like always, she seemed a bit shy. “I'd appreciate it if you'd go with me, Charley.” She gave him that you're-almost-like-my-big-brother look she used to shoot him when she visited the ranch. Reid, who was more her age, and his friend Tim O'Grady usually ignored her at parties and roundups. Charley would always end up saddling her horse, or talking to her for a few minutes.