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She wasn’t here, either.
A fresh new trail of horse hooves and the deep rut of wagon wheels marked the dusty path. Daniel followed them, wandering from the barn and into golden fields where the fat, seed-heavy heads of wheat spread for miles in every direction.
There, about a quarter of an acre due south, rose a cloud of chalk dust, a brown smudge hovering above the fields of gold. Someone was harvesting the Ludgrin’s wheat. Someone had beat him here. He’d waited too long. Cursing, he walked faster. Who had beaten him to the draw? Who was harvesting Kol’s wheat and for what price?
He shouldn’t have waited an extra day, shouldn’t have waited at all. When he thought of Rayna Ludgrin, pale and fragile at the funeral, he was at a loss. He couldn’t trouble the grief-stricken woman, not at her husband’s gravesite. He wasn’t a heartless person.
Neither, he figured was she. Although she’d suffered a terrible tragedy, she had to be starting to realize what she was up against. She had crops ready to drop in the fields. There were financial consequences that came from that. It had to be overwhelming to face her husband’s death and the responsibility that went along with farming all alone, all at once.
It was only natural that a person in that circumstance would want help. She’d said yes to the first man to approach her. Why wouldn’t she? It only made sense. Daniel felt like a clodpate for waiting. He’d meant it as a show of respect, but apparently that hadn’t been necessary.
As did many women he’d come across—most, in fact—Rayna Ludgrin probably only cared that a man was providing for her. Doing the hard work for her.
Yep, he knew that about some women. His low opinion of the gender was one of the reasons he’d never married. It was hard to find a smart woman who was kind and industrious.
He removed his hat and wiped the sweat from his brow. What he ought to do was to accept defeat, turn around and get back to his wheat. Why his boots kept heading deeper into Ludgrin’s fields instead of back toward his own, he couldn’t rightly say. Maybe he wanted to see who had beaten him to the gun.
It wasn’t any of the Dayton grandsons, because he’d seen them hard at work on the Dayton land on his way over. Who did that leave? The rest of the surrounding ranchers all worked together, buying one harvester between them and working as a team to bring in all the crops. An effort that Daniel had been invited to join but had turned down. He’d learned his hard lesson long ago. It was better to be alone than to trust someone else. Best to stand on his own two feet.
The tall rows of dense endless wheat gave way before him. Instead of the bright paint of a newfangled harvester, he saw the tailgate of a wagon. A hand scythe lay propped against the rear axle. The cutting implement was so old the blade was rusted at the joints and the wooden handle was cracked.
Daniel followed the wide swath where fallen, plump-headed wheat stalks lay on their stubble. The clearing was sizable, the same breadth as the town square. And cut by hand, too.
Whoever was doing this had to be plumb crazy. Or desperate for a little extra cash. That was probably it. Mrs. Ludgrin had no notion of how farming was done, like many women he’d come across. So she’d been sweet-talked by someone in town who thought he’d cut what he could and pocket the profits for himself.
White anger seared through him at the injustice. Some men were swine, he already knew it, and whoever was taking advantage of the widow was going to get an earful. Kol Ludgrin had been a fine neighbor, and he would expect Daniel to keep an eye out for Rayna’s well fare—
He stalked around the wagon, expecting to find some no-account sitting in the shade, taking a swig from a flask, no doubt. Daniel’s hand was already at rest on the holstered Colt .45 at his hip, just in case he needed it. A man had to be prepared.
The glare of the high-noon sun flashed in his eyes. Blinded, he knuckled his Stetson low so the hat brim shaded him from the brilliant sun.
It was a woman, dressed in a pair of trousers and a man’s short-sleeved work shirt, upending a jug of water over her head. She was half turned to him; she couldn’t have heard his step over the water streaming down her gold locks.
The liquid dampened the cotton along the nape of her neck, touching her ivory skin. His heart stopped beating as that lucky rivulet of water trailed the curve of her shoulder and meandered down the outside swell of her breast. Her uplifted arm gave him a fine view of her dark nipple puckered against the thin white cotton.
Don’t look, Daniel. What are you doing? That beautiful sight was not meant for his eyes. Heat spit into his veins and he took a step back. Not all the heat that burned through him was lust.
Embarrassed, he pulled his Stetson lower and cleared his throat. “Excuse me, ma’am.”
The water jug slipped from her fingers and hit the ground with a thud.
“Mr. L-Lindsay.” Rayna glanced down at the shirt sticking to her like a second skin and stepped diplomatically behind the rails of the wagon bed. “I d-didn’t expect anyone to find me out here or I would have, uh, dressed more appropriately.”
“Don’t worry, ma’am.” His face blazed as hot as the sun, no doubt she knew what he’d seen. “I didn’t expect to find a woman doing this work.”
“The wheat will not harvest itself, will it?”
He stared at a rock in the earth. “You cut all this?”
“My older boy was helping me, but he went to town on an errand.” Even though the side rails of the wagon bed hid her and Mr. Lindsay averted his gaze, Rayna felt more naked than clothed as the sun warmed the damp fabric hugging her uncorseted figure.
Goodness, what he must think of her! “I have a wagon wheel in need of repair—I sent Kirk since I could cut wheat faster.”
“By hand?” The way he said it, with that left hook of his dark brow, made her feel foolish.
She’d worked since just before noon and had made hardly a dent in the acres of gold that rustled around her, undulating like a slow tide on a mile-wide lake. So much wheat, it was overwhelming. Her responsibilities weighed on her each time she looked up from her cutting.
How was she ever going to cut it all? Not by wasting her time talking with another man come to swindle her. “I would appreciate it if you’d be on your way. I have a lot of work to do until dark falls.”
“Why aren’t Kol’s friends helping you?”
“Because they are busy bringing in their own crops, I imagine.” She fought to keep the edge from her voice. Every muscle within her exhausted body shrieked with a sharp, ripping ache as she lumbered around the tail of the wagon and took the scythe in hand. The worn wooden handle scraped against her dozens of blisters, popped and weeping.
With her back to him, she didn’t need to worry about propriety. “Please, be on your way, Mr. Lindsay. I’m of no mind to give away the wheat my husband worked hard to sow.”
“Give away?”
“I’ll harvest it myself before I hand over this crop for free, so listen up and take your leave, like the others who came to my door this morning. I may be a woman, but I am far from stupid, and I’ll not be robbed blind. I have my boys to think about.”
“Do you mean other ranchers around here have wanted your wheat. For free?”
“Not only for free! Most insisted upon a generous fee for the privilege of harvesting it.” She sent the sharp curving blade through the tender stalks and they fell with a tumble of chaff.
What was in the hearts of some men that they came like vultures, looking for quick money? It made her angry, that’s what it did, and the heat of it flashed like a flame in the center of her stomach. It was a good thing! She wasn’t as aware of the pain in her raw hands and the gnawing ache in her spine as she swung the scythe.
More chaff tumbled like rain to the earth as the stalks fell, lost amid the stubble. Would she lose half the wheat before she could get it into the wagon?
Frustration burned behind her eyes, gathering like a thunderstorm, and the pressure built within her. “That’ll be all, Mr. Lindsay. Don’t you have a crop to bring in?”
“That I do.” His shadow fell across her. The worn leather toe of his boot blocked the next swing of her scythe. “I have come to bring in yours, too.”
“Thank you, but I am declining your offer.”
“There’s no reason.” He did not move but stood as solid as granite as she swung the blade around him.
His wide hand settled on the wood, stopping her. Daniel Lindsay was a big man, tall and broad. Standing as he did, towering over her, he was intimidating.
Would another seemingly kind neighbor bully her? Kol had been the first to help any number of their neighbors over the years and without a single expectation of payment or compensation, no matter the crisis.
Was this how his generosity was to be returned? “I’ll thank you to let go.”
“It’s not right, you laboring this way.”
When she expected hostility or scorn, Daniel Lindsay’s words were kind. “I have my harvester waiting alongside the road. May I have your permission to take down a section of fence so I can harvest this wheat? I’ll get you the best market price I can at the station.”
“You’d do that?” She knew her mouth was hanging open, but she couldn’t seem to close it. He’d come here to help her? When so many hadn’t? “I imagine you’ll want to be paid for your trouble, the way Mr. Dayton did.”
His dark eyes narrowed. “What did he offer you? A right to half the wheat?”
“Half? He said I could keep a quarter of the value he got at the mill.”
“That swindler. He’d cheat Kol Ludgrin’s widow?” Daniel Lindsay’s hard face turned to stone.
Rayna swallowed. She released the scythe and crossed her arms in front of her breasts. He wasn’t looking at her, but she felt vulnerable. Angry, he was, and an imposing man while doing it. “I would appreciate it if you would be on your way.”
“No.” He strode away, taking her scythe with him. There was a clunk as he tossed it in the back of the wagon bed. “Kol helped me bust sod that first spring I came here. I was as green as a Kentucky boy could be. He gave me his help and his advice while we worked. Some of that made a difference, and I managed to hang on. I’ll harvest your wheat free of charge, Mrs. Ludgrin, for what he did for me.”
“What else are you wanting?”
“Only that I have the first option to lease the land, if that’s what you decide to do. Or buy it, if you’re of a mind to sell out.”
“The first option? I don’t understand.” She felt the burdens upon her shoulders weigh more heavily.
“You can trust me.” It was kindness, nothing more, as Daniel Lindsay gathered the long reins from the tangle on the sun-baked earth and held them out to her. “Go home. I’ll manage from here.”
“Y-you don’t want money? Or the land? Mr. Dayton had asked for it outright.” Crop’s already rotting in the fields, he’d lied to her with the fervor of a traveling salesman. But this neighbor, Mr. Lindsay, had his own lookout. Why was he doing this?
“One good turn deserves another,” Daniel said as he laid the reins in her bleeding hands.
Chapter Two
T he powerful knock rattled the front door in its frame, echoing through the house and into the scorching kitchen. Startled by the disruption, Rayna set three pans of bread on the stovetop to cool, if such a thing were possible in the stifling heat.
No breeze stirred the lace curtains as she tossed the hot pad on the table and hurried through the rooms. Her youngest was upstairs taking a nap, for his sleep during the last few nights had been interrupted by nightmares and she did not want him startled awake.
She yanked open the door just in time to see old man Dayton with his beefy fist in the air, ready to knock a second time. The man clothed in trousers and sweat-stained muslin spit a stream of tobacco juice across the porch into the dirt at the roots of her favorite rosebush.
Not a benevolent man. He hadn’t come for a pleasant visit.
She might as well stand her ground from the start. “Your son was here earlier. I’ve found someone else to harvest the fields for me.”
“I saw that tenderfoot from Kentucky haul his old threshing machine down the road past my place.” Another stream shot across her porch. “He ain’t worth dirt when it comes to cutting wheat. He probably offered to do it cheap, and I’m sure money is a concern, so here’s what I’m gonna do for you.”
“And what a courteous way to convince me to let you harvest my wheat. For what? Only three-quarters of the profit? Or are you willing to drop down to only half?”
“Now, Rayna, you know the growing of a crop is the easy part. A little dirt, seed and enough sunlight make the wheat grow. But harvesting it, that’s backbreaking labor. I’ve got the newest harvester. It came by railroad last week, and it wasn’t cheap.”
“After all that Kol has done for you over the years. He died in your fields. And you would charge me?”
“Friendship is one thing, Rayna. Business is business. A woman can’t understand—”
“I understand all too well. I’ve made a business decision and I won’t be changing it. Good afternoon, Mr. Dayton.” Careful of her bandaged hands, she shut the door with force.
The flat of his hand on the wood and the jam of his boot in the threshold stopped her. “Be smart. You can’t be thinking you will actually keep your land?”
“I would never sell my home.”
“You’ll have to. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”
Her Kol had built this house with his bare hands, and she’d helped him by holding the floor joists in place, handing him nails and bandaging his scrapes and gashes as they went. She’d been young and in love and expecting her oldest son. How happy they’d been.
Her children had been born in this house.
“Please remove your foot. I’d like you to go.”
“Fine. You’ll learn soon enough. It’s a hard, brutal world without a man to provide for you. Who do you think is going to furrow those acres of wheat come spring? This isn’t about the harvest, it’s about the land. I’ll give you a fair price.”
“Before or after you practically steal the wheat from me and my sons?”
“Rayna.” As if pained, Dayton shook his head as he backed away. “This is a pity, it sure is, how a pretty woman like you won’t face the truth.”
“What truth?”
“There’s no shame in it. It ought to be hard to lose your man. But you have to accept it. You can sell now while you can get out with some cash in hand, or you can struggle until you go broke, or you and I can arrange a deal.”
“No deal.”
“Listen to me. The bank’s gonna take this place out from under you. I’m the only one around here with enough cash in hand to stop them. The only one who cares.”
The bank? A horrible flitter of fear bore into her midsection. Why would Dayton mention the bank? And why was he looking at her as if she were for sale right along with the land?
There was no mortgage on this property and she knew it. Her dear Kol would have told her if he’d done something like borrow against their hard-earned homestead. They’d had the best harvests three summers in a row, and there was no reason for Kol to have gone into debt.
Dayton was just trying to intimidate her into selling. Make her uncertain so she would practically give him some of the best wheat land in all of Bluebonnet County. That was all.
Fresh anger roared through her. Where was his charity, his neighborliness?
“Ma! I’m back from town.” Kirk’s awkward gait thudded on the porch as he lumbered to a stop behind Dayton. “Uh, excuse me for interrupting.”
He was such a good boy, practically a young man, always remembering his manners. He looked so like Kol with his white-blond hair and jewel-blue eyes, and with the promise of strength in his rangy limbs. Pride surged through her, another raw emotion displacing the sudden anger at Dayton.
First grief, anger and now pride. All in a few minutes’ time! What an untidy mess she had become. If Kol were here, he would gently wrap his powerful arms around her and draw her to his barrel chest and tickle her forehead with his beard until she laughed.
“Now, Rayna,” she could hear him say as if he were in the room right along with her. “Life is a muddle, we all know that, so take a deep breath and stop all your fussing. There’ll always be plenty enough time for worrying later, but not nearly enough time for loving. So, give me a kiss, my love.”
Kol, I need you.
Her heart cried out for him, as if her feelings could have enough power to summon him up from the next room or wherever he had gone off to.
That’s how it felt, as if her beloved husband were somewhere close, just out of sight. As if any moment he’d be walking through the kitchen door with dirt on his boots and sweat on his brow, calling out for her.
“Rayna?” Dayton seemed alarmed. “Are you all right? I can fetch the doctor.”
“I’m fine. Just—” Missing my husband. She lifted her chin, tamping down the grief far enough so she could finish her day’s work. She didn’t want her oldest son to be worried. “I’m just thinking. I’m not interested in your offer. Goodbye. Come in, son. Where’s the part?”
Kirk looked uncertain as Dayton filled the space in front of the door, refusing to leave.
Rayna motioned her son inside and closed the door, although the windows were thrown wide-open to catch some hint of a breeze. She could hear Dayton’s slow steps as he paced the porch.
