Passion Flower

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She stared at him thoughtfully. “I’ll be sure to carry a pair of scissors on me.”

He was trying not to grin. “My God, you’re stubborn.”

“Look who’s talking.”

“I’ve had lots of practice working cattle,” he replied. He picked up his coffee cup and drained it. “From now on, I’ll come to the table dressed. Even at six o’clock in the morning.”

She looked up, smiling. “You’re a nice man, Mr. Culhane,” she said. “I’m not a prude, honestly I’m not. It’s just that I’m not accustomed to sitting down to breakfast with men. Dressed or undressed.”

His dark eyes studied her. “Not liberated, Miss King?” he asked.

She sensed a deeper intent behind that question, but she took it at face value. “I was never unliberated. I’m just old-fashioned.”

“So am I, honey. You stick to your guns.” He reached for his hat and walked off, whistling.

She was never sure quite how to take what he said. As the days went by, he puzzled her more and more. She noticed him watching her occasionally, when he was in the house and not working with his cattle. But it wasn’t a leering kind of look. It was faintly curious and a little protective. She had the odd feeling that he didn’t think of her as a woman at all. Not that she found the thought surprising. Her mirror gave her inescapable proof that she had little to attract a man’s eyes these days. She was still frail and washed out.

Eddie was the elder of the ranchhands, and Jenny liked him on sight. He was a lot like the boss. He hardly ever smiled, he worked like two men, and he almost never sat down. But Jenny coaxed him into the kitchen with a cold glass of tea at the end of the week, when he brought her the eggs before she could go looking for them.

“Thank you, ma’am. I can sure use this.” He sighed, and drained almost the whole glass in a few swallows. “Boss had me fixing fences. Nothing I hate worse than fixing fences,” he added with a hard stare.

She tried not to grin. With his jutting chin and short graying whiskers and half-bald head, he did look fierce.

“I appreciate your bringing in the eggs for me,” she replied. “I got busy mending curtains and forgot about them.”

He shrugged. “It wasn’t much,” he murmured. He narrowed one eye as he studied her. “You ain’t the kind I’d expect the boss to hire.”

Her eyebrows arched and she did grin this time. “What would you expect?”

He cleared his throat. “Well, the boss being the way he is...an older lady with a mean temper.” He moved restlessly in the chair he was straddling. “Well, it takes a mean temper to deal with him. I know, I been doin’ it for nigh on twenty years.”

“Has he owned the Circle C for that long?” she asked.

“He ain’t old enough,” he reminded her. “I mean, I knowed him that long. He used to hang around here with his Uncle Ben when he was just a tadpole. His parents never had much use for him. His mama run off with some man when he was ten and his daddy drank hisself to death.”

It was like having the pins knocked out from under her. She could imagine Everett at ten, with no mother and an alcoholic father. Her eyes mirrored the horror she felt. “His brother must have been just a baby,” she burst out.

“He was. Old Ben and Miss Emma took him in. But Everett weren’t so lucky. He had to stay with his daddy.”

She studied him quietly, and filled the tea glass again. “Why doesn’t he like city women?”

“He got mixed up with some social-climbing lady from Houston,” he said curtly. “Anybody could have seen she wouldn’t fit in here, except Everett. He’d just inherited the place and had these big dreams of making a fortune in cattle. The fool woman listened to the dreams and came harking out here with him one summer.” He laughed bitterly. “Took her all of five minutes to give Everett back his ring and tell him what she thought of his plans. Everett got drunk that night, first time I ever knew him to take a drink of anything stronger than beer. And that was the last time he brought a woman here. Until you come along, at least.”

She sat back down, all too aware of the faded yellow shirt and casual jeans she was wearing. The shirt was Everett’s. She’d borrowed it while she washed her own in the ancient chugging washing machine. “Don’t look at me like a contender,” she laughed, tossing back her long dark-blond hair. “I’m just a hanger-on myself, not a chic city woman.”

“For a hanger-on,” he observed, indicating the scrubbed floors and clean, pressed curtains at the windows and the food cooking on the stove, “you do get through a power of work.”

“I like housework,” she told him. She sipped her own tea. “I used to fix up houses for a living, until it got too much for me. I got frail during the winter and I haven’t quite picked back up yet.”

“That accent of yours throws me,” he muttered. “Sounds like a lot of Southern mixed up with Yankee.”

She laughed again. “I’m from Georgia. Smart man, aren’t you?”

“Not so smart, lady, or I’d be rich, too,” he said with a rare grin. He got up. “Well, I better get back to work. The boss don’t hold with us lollygagging on his time, and Bib’s waiting for me to help him move cattle.”

“Thanks again for bringing my eggs,” she said.

He nodded. “No trouble.”

She watched him go, sipping her own tea. There were a lot of things about Everett Culhane that were beginning to make sense. She felt that she understood him a lot better now, right down to the black moods that made him walk around brooding sometimes in the evening.

It was just after dark when Everett came in, and Jenny put the cornbread in the oven to warm the minute she heard the old pickup coming up the driveway. She’d learned that Everett Culhane didn’t work banker’s hours. He went out at dawn and might not come home until bedtime. But he had yet to find himself without a meal. Jenny prided herself in keeping not only his office, but his home, in order.

He tugged off his hat as he came in the back door. He looked even more weary than usual, covered in dust, his eyes dark-shadowed, his face needing a shave.

She glanced up from the pot of chili she was just taking off the stove and smiled. “Hi, boss. How about some chili and Mexican cornbread?”

“I’m hungry enough to even eat one of those damned salads,” he said, glancing toward the stove. He was still wearing his chaps and the leather had a fine layer of dust over it. So did his arms and his dark face.

“If you’ll sit down, I’ll feed you.”

“I need a bath first, honey,” he remarked.

“You could rinse off your face and hands in the sink,” she suggested, gesturing toward it. “There’s a hand towel there, and some soap. You look like you might go to sleep in the shower.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “I can just see you pulling me out.”

She turned away. “I’d call Eddie or Bib.”

“And if you couldn’t find them?” he persisted, shedding the chaps on the floor.

“In that case,” she said dryly, “I reckon you’d drown, tall man.”

“Sassy lady,” he accused. He moved behind her and suddenly caught her by the waist with his lean, dark hands. He held her in front of him while he bent over her shoulder to smell the chili. She tried to breathe normally and failed. He was warm and strong at her back, and he smelled of the whole outdoors. She wanted to reach up and kiss that hard, masculine face, and her heart leaped at the uncharacteristic longing.

“What did you put in there?” he asked.

“One armadillo, two rattlers, a quart of beans, some tomatoes, and a hatful of jalapeño peppers.”

His hands contracted, making her jump. “A hatful of jalapeño peppers would take the rust off my truck.”

“Probably the tires, too,” she commented, trying to keep her voice steady. “But Bib told me you Texans like your chili hot.”

He turned her around to face him. He searched her eyes for a long, taut moment, and she felt her feet melting into the floor as she looked back. Something seemed to link them for that tiny space of time, joining them soul to soul for one explosive second. She heard him catch his breath and then she was free, all too soon.

“Would...would you like a glass of milk with this?” she asked after she’d served the chili into bowls and put it on the table, along with the sliced cornbread and some canned fruit.

“Didn’t you make coffee?” he asked, glancing up.

“Sure. I just thought...”

“I don’t need anything to put out the fire,” he told her with a wicked smile. “I’m not a tenderfoot from Jawja.”

She moved to the coffeepot and poured two cups. She set his in front of him and sat down. “For your information, suh,” she drawled, “we Georgians have been known to eat rattlesnakes while they were still wiggling. And an aunt of mine makes a barbecued sparerib dish that makes Texas chili taste like oatmeal by comparison.”

“Is that so? Let’s see.” He dipped into his chili, savored it, put the spoon down, and glared at her. “You call this hot?” he asked.