“Yes.”

  Desire darkened his eyes. “I don’t want to make a dishonest woman out of you.”

  Even as he said that, his left hand gripped my ass firmly over the heavy skirts. His right found its way under the fringe shirt. Dishonest woman? I’d be that, for Cal Sampson.

  “Stop tryin’ to talk yourself out of it,” I whispered.

  “Then tell me you want it.”

  “I want it.”

  He had my skirts ruching up and up my leg. Trying to reach the honeypot between my legs.

  “Say my name.”

  “I want it, Cal.”

  Our voices were at the lowest of whispers. His fingers circled around the soft meeting of my thighs. When they delved into me, I lost a gasp against his lips.

  “You’re too damn pretty,” he growled.

  He worked me until I had to bury my face in his shirt; until I trembled against him. When I couldn’t take it anymore, when I was too weak to stand, he lowered his mouth to my ear.

  “Tomorrow I’m gonna look around for somewhere quiet. And then we’re gonna finish what we started.”

  He pulled his hands from me. Let my skirts fall. Looking into my eyes, he put his two fingers in his mouth and tasted the juices now running down my thighs.

  “We can do it now,” I said.

  “Don’t tempt me,” he muttered.

  “I want to tempt you,” I said.

  He turned me around. The skirt went up over my waist.

  “Ada, you’ve got the best ass in Oklahoma,” he muttered.

  “Mmm- oh!”

  “That’s right,” he said. “Stay still. Hold still now.”

  I didn’t know much about men and what went on under their pants. But I knew enough to knew Cal was above the average size. He plunged only the tip into me, stroking out the creamy wetness from within.

  “I don’t know if I can take all that,” I said.

  “Of course you can. You will.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m gonna put the rest in,” he murmured.

  “But Cal. Oh- oh.”

  “Hold still,” he said again. “Good girl.”

  I buried a cry in my fist. As if rewarding me, he stroked the nap of hair at my neck and kissed it. Then he began to move.

  We could have been caught any minute by the other men. That lit me up even more. And I discovered Cal himself had a little wild side. He started doing things to make me whimper. Like reaching his hand around and thumbing that little button at the top of my venus. I gripped his wrist.

  “You want me to stop?” he said wickedly.

  “I don’t know,” I gasped.

  “If we were back at that camp,” he growled in my ear, “I got a few things I could do to you.”

  “Like what?”

  I wanted him to move faster. He wouldn’t, though. He liked to torture me.

  “I’d tie your arms to one of them bedpoles. Just your arms. And I’d lay down on top of you. Grease up those tits of yours and work you until you came all over my thighs...”

  Hidden from view by his enormous horse, Cal could do whatever he wanted to me. We moved like that for long minutes. He whispered love words in my ear, sex words, that made me feel like he would push me down and claim me right there on the grass, right next to the horse. But before either of us could see our deed to its wet and sticky conclusion, he pulled away. When his cock slid out of me I felt a wild emptiness. I still burned for him.

  “Why’d you stop?” I whispered.

  “Tomorrow,” he promised. “When we can go somewhere quiet.”

  “You think they heard us?”

  “I don’t care about that. But I don’t want them to get ideas about you.”

  “Ideas like what?”

  “You’re mine,” he said. “If I start layin’ with you in full view of ‘em they might think otherwise. They might think you’re community property.”

  “I ain’t nobody’s property.”

  “You’re mine,” said Cal again. His green eyes burned. He held me to his chest strongly. “What we do is between you and me.”

  My knees went weak. Our next kiss went on for long minutes. The sudden snore of Miranda broke us apart. I pushed off from Cal and went round back to my blanket.

  Saint’s eyes followed me all the way there. He alone was awake. I went cold under his blue stare.

  But he said nothing.

  Don’t be scared of him. Long as Cal’s here, he’ll leave you alone.

  I just hoped that was true.

  After Cal finished with the horse he came over. I watched him through the tail of my eye. He shook out his glossy gold hair and combed it through with his fingers.

  Against the bronze glow of the fire his silhouette made a deep black shadow. Only the planes of his high cheekbones glowed, and those green eyes like two gems.

  He tended to his hair and stared deep into the fire. Then he got up and went over to me.

  “You awake?” he murmured.

  “Yeah.”

  Cal lay down on the earth. Somehow I’d got used to the scarce bedding, and sleeping out in the open under the stars. Millions of stars! More than I’d ever seen.

  He didn’t reach out for me, like I expected. He only steepled his hand on his chest and propped his head up on his saddle. Of course; we were in the company of his men. He’d never show them I was anything more than his guest. I wondered if Saint was still awake.

  “So you want to go to California?” he murmured. “And what’s out there for you in California?”

  “Plenty,” I replied. “I can get work somewhere. As a cook, maybe, or a seamstress. Maybe save up enough, get my own farm.”

  “You want a farm, city girl?”

  “I ain’t a city girl any more than you,” I retorted. “I know my roots. I come from country folk.”

  “So say we drop you off in Independence.”

  “I’d rather you take me all the way to Baxter Springs.”

  “It’s still a good piece away from California.”

  “I know that, girl. But say we drop you off in Baxter. I reckon the best thing for you to do is get married right away.”

  I blinked. “Married?”

  “Sure. You get hitched up with a good man who’s gonna take care of you. He can take you to California. I know some folks out there that can look around-”

  “Cal,” I said.

  “Hm?”

  “I don’t plan on marryin’ the first man I stub my toe on.”

  “I didn’t-”

  “And anyway,” I said primly. “I can take care of myself.”

  I realized then that Cal Sampson operated outside of the world of emotions and impulse. He made all his decisions based on what was practical. What could be reasoned out. Except when it came to me.

  “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “What did you mean it like?”

  We had started whispering, cautious of the sleeping men next to us. I sensed the conversation had got out of hand.

  Cal shifted. “It’s not good for a woman like you to be alone in that wild country.”

  “I’ve been alone before.”

  “California’s different from Boston.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  But I regretted being so snappy. I laid a hand on his arm. “I appreciate your concern.”

  “I ain’t tryin’ to push my nose in your affairs,” he said stiffly.

  “I know.”

  He seemed about to say something else. But I wanted the conversation to end. Whatever we had shared an hour ago seemed long gone. Now I felt awkward.

  Cal cleared his throat. “I just want you to be, uh, happy.”

  “That’s sweet of you,” I said.

  He turned suddenly, and said, “I enjoy you, Ada. Don’t know how it happened. Since the moment I saw you, I thought, she’s a mighty pretty woman. And then I got to know you better, and I think, between you and me, there’s somethin’ now like respect. I never meant to bed you.”

  “I appreciate-”

  “That’s why you ought to be taken care of. I’d see you married off and safe before I let you down in Kansas.”

  “Now hold on a minute, Cal. I don’t plan to get married at all.”

  “Never?”

  “No.”

  I’d marry you, I thought. For a brief moment I looked away, imagining a future with Cal. Tall, upright, strong Cal Sampson, with a big, generous heart. You didn’t find a man like that just anywhere. Men like that were grown on good soil, with all the right circumstance to turn them away from the general vices that tempted lesser folks and made them mean. He’d cared for me first out of duty, and then out of love. Could I call it love?

  But I came to my senses. I’d had too much sun. I couldn’t marry Cal any more than I could put on furs and call myself First Lady.

  “You got to get married, Ada.”

  “I will. Just now now.”

  “Well.” He took a deep breath. “Maybe we better stop this foolin’ around right here. Before it gets outta hand.”

  Had the passion of a few minutes before just disappeared, like it had never happened? Could Cal just shut off his emotions like that? I stared at him in disbelief.

  “It’s already out of hand, Cal.”

  “I mean it.”

  I looked at him from the tail of my eye. He seemed to be resolving himself to something.

  “Don’t,” I said. “Whatever it is you want to say- just don’t.”

  I rolled up in the Buffalo blanket and turned my back to him.

  “Ada,” he said.

  I stayed silent. “God damn it,” he muttered. I heard him pull his hat low over his eyes and settle down against the saddle. But it would be a long time before I fell asleep.

  I had to learn to control myself. Just because I’d got all cuddly with the man once or twice didn’t mean we would be getting married. Didn’t mean it should continue.

  5

  “Wake up, you Texan bastards!” roared Miranda. “Who went into my kitchen?”

  “What the blue fuck,” swore Butch Allison. He went straight for his own pistol, and that might have been the end of Miranda, if not for Cal. He grabbed Butch’s wrist before he could squeeze the trigger.

  Butch howled. The cattle moaned in the distance, disturbed by the shouting. Guts and Stu and Jim Bowers went immediately to quiet them.

  “Someone went into my kitchen,” Miranda shouted. “Someone opened my box. I find all the bacon gone. All the salt beef gone.”

  “No one went into your kitchens, Miranda,” said Cal. “And you fire that gun off again you’re gonna give us a stampede.”

  Miranda brought Cal into the chuck wagon. Indeed the lid of the box had been left wide open. Most of his meat was gone, along with a sackful of beans, thirteen potatoes, and worst of all, the rest of our coffee. The loss of meat you could blame on anything- a coyote, for example. But what would a Coyote want with beans and coffee?

  “I won’t have it, Cal,” spat Miranda. “I won’t have this insolence.”

  “Insolence?”

  “It was that Indian. That Joseph.”

  “Alright, see here now, Miranda-”

  “The coffee’s gone?” said Tim loudly.

  Butch hadn’t dropped his temper. “Firin’ off his gun like a fuckin’ animal. Fuckin’ Mexican scum-”

  “Eh? Eh? What’s that you say?” said Miranda, pushing past Cal. He went for his gun again. “You say I’m an animal? I can tell you about animals, you hijo de la gran perra-”

  Butch swelled like a bullfrog. “What you sayin’ about my mother?”

  “Listen!” shouted Cal. He stepped between the two, his hands up. “Everybody shut the fuck up. Miranda, who was the last person to go for that wagon?”

  “Me,” he said. “I locked the box myself.”

  “Alright. Ada, Saint, y’all were sleepin’ closest to the wagon. Did you hear anythin’?”

  “I sleep like the dead,” I said. “So no.”

  “I didn’t take shit,” said Saint. “I hate Miranda’s food.”

  Cal glared at him. “Alright.”

  “Nobody would eat a whole three pound of bacon and four pound of beans by himself,” I said. “Must have been more than one person.”

  “No more coffee,” moaned Tim. He put his head in his hands.

  “Indians,” spat Butch. “Had to be.”

  “It wasn’t Indians,” I said tiredly.

  “How you so sure, nigra bitch? How do we know it wasn’t you?”

  “Watch your mouth, Allison, ” Cal said. His voice cut over everyone’s complaints. It came up so sharply even Miranda fell silent.

  “Why should I?” said Butch, after a moment.

  Sensing the conflict was getting away from his beans, Miranda interjected, “We would have heard Indians.”

  “Because I said so,” Cal said, stepping up to Butch. “I’m right sick of your attitude.”

  “Me? You’re sick of me?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “Well, we’re all right sick of you!” He hissed. “You forgot who your brothers are. For some little African piece of tail, who don’t know she should shut up when white folks is talkin’.”

  “Aw, Butch,” said Tim. “Ada ain’t so bad.”

  “I wasn’t talkin’ to you, Tim,” said the grizzled cowboy. “I was talkin’ to this high-steppin’ shit here who thinks he’s too good for the rest of us. You ain’t all that big, Cal.”

  “So try me, Butch.”

  “Now hang on a minute, Cal,” said Saint, stepping smoothly in between the two. “Maybe this ain’t the time.”

  “You stay defendin’ him!” snapped Butch. “And you said the same thing I did! You said was lettin’ that woman get in the way of the drive. Lettin’ her ride his ass into the sunset and puttin’ us in danger-”

  Saint’s blue eyes flared. “Why you little-”

  “What men you are,” snarled Cal. “Gossipin’ behind my back like schoolgirls in pigtails. Is it true, Saint? You said that?”

  “I may have said- you were compromisin’ our drive, yes.”

  “And I agreed with them,” voiced Tucker. He hadn’t raised himself up yet, on account of his bad leg. He patted his bald spot nervously. But no one paid him mind.

  I forced myself into the fray. “If anyone’s got a problem with me they can take it up with me here.”

  “No respect!” raged Butch. “I never heard a woman talk that way. You ought to be taught a lesson.”

  “And I suppose you want to be the one to teach it to me.”

  “Don’t you move a muscle, Butch Allison,” said Cal. “That’s an order.”

  “I’ll cut your tongue out, bitch!”

  “I got a right to stand here and defend my name same as you!” I shouted.

  He moved too quick for me to catch. One moment I’d been walking over to Cal. The next, the ground came rushing up to catch me. A whine went whistling through my left ear and came out of my right. I saw in streaks of light. Butch Allison had punched me.

  What happened next moved in a blur before my eyes. Cal grabbed a fistful of Butch’s hair and slammed him to the ground. Loyal to the end, Tim went over to help him.

  “I’ll kill you!” roared Butch. His cries muffled under the elbow Cal rammed into his jaw. He scrabbled for his bowie knife. Tim dropped a kick on his wrist to make him reconsider. Saint tried to drag Cal’s hands away from Butch’s throat and got elbowed in the eyeball. Tim, mistaking Saint’s movement as an attack, left off Butch and went to take him on.

  The sound of slapping flesh filled the awful silence.

  Miranda reappeared with a bucket of icy river water. He hoisted it over the men. Spluttering, they pulled back.

  Cal’s left eye was starting to swell. A deep scratch dug into the side of his face. I chanced a look at Butch. One of his teeth had shattered. It embedded right there in his lip, like the white center of a puffy red flower. Cal shook out his hands. The skin on both knuckles had split.