Hill Country Cattleman. Laurie Kingery

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      What he wouldn’t give to be the one to make her blush like that on a regular basis. Dream on, cowboy.

      * * *

      Violet couldn’t remember when she’d enjoyed an evening more. Caroline Wallace Collier was a natural hostess, and soon even Edward was smiling and praising her cooking. And when Caroline, who’d been the town schoolteacher until she’d married Jack Collier, discovered Violet was an avid reader, she’d begun talking about books a mile a minute, asking Violet what she’d read, offering to loan volumes from her library and asking if Violet had brought any reading with her.

      “Only one, I’m afraid, Wilkie Collins’s new novel, The Moonstone, and I read it on the voyage,” Violet said, remembering how Edward had bustled her aboard the ship with but a few days to pack. There hadn’t been time to order new books from her favorite store in London. “You’re welcome to borrow it, of course.”

      “How wonderful! I’ve read his other novel, The Woman in White. In return I will loan you part one of a marvelous book, Little Women, by an American author, Louisa May Alcott, also published this year. I like her writing, even if she is a Yankee,” she added with a laugh.

      “You’re very kind,” Violet murmured, charmed by the other woman’s enthusiasm.

      “Not at all,” Caroline said. “It’s too rare that I have a chance to get my hands on a new book—or a new friend.”

      “Mama’s always reading,” piped up one of the Colliers’ pretty blue-eyed, black-haired twin girls. Violet wasn’t sure if it was Abigail or Amelia.

      The other girl chimed in. “Yeah, and if we’re very good, Mama reads to us at bedtime.”

      “You know, in England you two ladies would be called ‘bluestockings,’” Edward commented wryly. “I’m sure Violet won’t mind if I tell you she’s an aspiring novelist, as well.”

      Caroline’s eyes widened. “Is that right, Violet? How fascinating! What do you write about?”

      “The American West, actually.”

      “You don’t say! Tell me about your story,” Caroline invited.

      “I—I haven’t got very far as yet, because I felt I didn’t know enough about the area,” Violet had to admit. “Other than that there will be a romance in it. I plan to gather details while I’m here—scenery, clothing, that sort of thing. Your Mr. Masterson was kind enough to tell me the names of some of the wildflowers yesterday, and that the bird we saw was a roadrunner,” she said, trying to sound casual as she mentioned his name.

      She missed the quick look Edward darted at Nick.

      “Oh, yes, our Raleigh knows the country,” Caroline said. “Most of these fellows could live off the land if they needed to, so they know their surroundings. Well, be sure and let me know if I can answer any questions....”

      Where is Raleigh? would have been her first question, if she dared. The addition of the handsome Texan at the table was the only thing that would have made the evening more complete. Violet hadn’t realized how much she had been counting on seeing him until she didn’t catch even a glimpse of the rugged cowboy at Colliers’ Roost. When they arrived in the buckboard, it had been another cowhand who’d emerged from the barn to see to their horse.

      Where could he be keeping himself?

      * * *

      “See? I told you you’d enjoy meeting the Colliers,” Milly remarked as they waved goodbye to their hosts and the wagon carried them away from the house.

      “Yes, Caroline was very kind,” Violet agreed, clutching the volume of Little Women that their hostess had lent her as the wagon lurched over a dip in the road. “And her husband is so handsome—just what one pictures when one thinks of a Western rancher.”

      “Yes...how those two fell in love is quite a story,” Milly responded with a smile. “Caroline was engaged to marry his brother Pete, you see, but he died during the influenza epidemic a couple years ago. Then, after Caroline became the schoolmarm, Jack turned up with his twin girls, not knowing his brother had passed away. Jack was a widower, and had been planning on driving his cattle to Montana, and wanted his brother and Caroline to keep the girls till he could send for them. He ended up wintering here. He and Caroline fell in love and he forgot all about Montana.”

      “That is romantic,” Violet agreed with a sigh. “Why, I thought they’d been married a long time and that Caroline was the twins’ mother.” What would that be like, she wondered, to raise children to whom one hadn’t given birth? Gerald had a son off at Eton whom she had never met, so it was unlikely she would ever become as close as Caroline Collier was to the twins.

      She would begin that letter to Gerald before retiring, she decided. In addition to the things she’d thought about writing to him while she lay awake last night, she’d tell him about Simpson Creek, her brother’s ranch, the pinto mare and about the people she’d met since her arrival—though not Raleigh Masterson, she thought again. Gerald wouldn’t think to mention some neighboring land agent who’d done him a couple of trifling services, would he?

      * * *

      Violet would have been interested to know that Raleigh had watched both her arrival and her departure from the safety of the bunkhouse.

      “She’s a purty thing, right enough, that sister of Nick Brookfield and his fancy lord of a brother,” Cookie noted now, next to him.

      Raleigh hoped the old chuckwagon cook hadn’t seen him jump. He’d been so intent on watching the Brookfields’ buckboard roll away with Violet in it that he hadn’t heard Cookie come up behind him.

      Cookie’s comment didn’t carry far enough to reach the ears of the other cowboys, who had settled down to a game of poker as soon as the visitors’ horses had been hitched back up to their wagon. “Guess ya learned yore lesson about women down in Blanco, after ya almost got yerself hung for a murder ya didn’t commit, didn’t ya?”

      “Yeah, don’t worry, Cookie. A fellow can’t get in trouble just looking,” Raleigh responded, but he let the calico curtain fall back into place, denying himself a last glimpse of the English beauty. He shuddered, remembering how being in the wrong place at the wrong time had nearly cost him his life when a girl lured him into the saloon she worked in after it had closed for the night. He’d found the saloon owner dead and been accused of his murder. He’d almost been the guest of honor at a lynching before the real guilty party was discovered.

      “Yeah, that’s what Adam said when he first spied that there apple in the Garden of Eden, ain’t it?” Cookie retorted. “Where ya goin’ now?”

      “I’m going off on nighthawk duty early, since you’re in a naggin’ mood,” Raleigh replied. “You tell Wes to be sure and relieve me midway through the night, hear?” he added, jerking his head toward the stocky cowboy who currently held what looked to be the winning hand.

      They hadn’t stopped riding herd at night after they’d returned from Abilene, even though what they guarded were just the remaining heifers and young bulls that had been too young to go on the drive, plus the horses. There hadn’t been any episodes of rustling for quite a while, and no Comanche raids since earlier in the spring, but it didn’t do to grow careless.

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