She didn’t know that Maria was behind her until the woman placed a reassuring arm around her slender waist. “Ben fought his love for me like a man possessed, Lauren. They are both tough, strong men. Tenderness doesn’t come easy to Jared. Or even kindness. Be patient with him.”
Lauren couldn’t speak for fear of weeping. She turned to Maria and hugged her quickly before seeking the privacy of her room. Jared’s room.
* * *
Gloria helped Lauren braid her hair in the style now familiar to her. She wore the same suit she had worn on the morning she and Jared left Coronado for Keypoint. The ensemble that had seemed scandalously indecent at the time now felt quite comfortable. She had become accustomed to many changes in her life.
Maria was in the kitchen making good her promise to prepare their lunch. Jared strolled in and without a word handed Lauren a dark blue bandana. She looked at it and then at him with puzzlement.
“It’s clean,” he said testily. “I borrowed it from one of your many admirers and washed it myself. You may need it today.”
She took the scarf and folded it into a triangle. Placing it around her neck, she tried to tie it as the vaqueros wore theirs, but her fingers were unaccountably clumsy.
“Here,” Jared said in exasperation, batting her hands away. He stepped closer to her and wound the ends of the bandana into a perfect knot. Deft as he was at this, it seemed to take an inordinate amount of time to get it right. He moved closer still, and his fingers found it necessary to brush against the warm, smooth skin of her throat as he adjusted the scarf.
“Thank you,” she said when he finally stepped away. He only shrugged in response.
After a hurried breakfast, she and Jared departed. Lauren waved goodbye to Gloria and Maria, who stood framed
in the doorway. Flame had now become known as “Mrs. Lockett’s mount,” and a rapport had developed between Lauren and the mare. Jared was mildly surprised when he spurred Charger into a gallop and Lauren followed suit, keeping pace with him effortlessly. Well, she’s learned something, he thought grudgingly. She had lost her eastern pallor, too, and her complexion had taken on a healthy, rosy glow.
He wouldn’t admit to anyone, even to himself, that he had missed her while he had been away. He wouldn’t define the sense of longing that had plagued him from the time he left. Scattered over Lockett land were sheep ranchers and nesters whom he visited, and their daughters always welcomed a pat on the bottom or a stolen kiss. They had all been disappointed this time. Jared spent his time in serious conversation with the menfolk. He hadn’t consciously avoided the women. He just wasn’t interested, and therefore didn’t give them a thought.
At night, rolled up in his blankets, he tossed and turned in an effort to rid himself of disturbing mental images. Lauren in her dressing gown, her hair spilling over her shoulders. Lauren sleeping in his bed at the ranch, moonlight caressing her cheeks. Lauren in deep concentration over a book, her eyeglasses resting on her nose. Lauren. Lauren. Lauren.
He cursed himself for being a fool as his imagination drifted and he pictured himself lifting a stray lock of hair from her shoulder and kissing it. He was caressing her cheek resting against his pillow. He was sliding the spectacles off her nose in order to kiss her soft mouth.
Sleep eluded him night after night. He sat before his dying campfire smoking cheroots and cursing his intense physical discomfort and the conniving wench who had manipulated his father and was now trying to do the same thing to him. Well, he’d be damned before he’d let her get to him!
But as he’d approached Keypoint last night, his heartbeat had accelerated as he spurred Charger into a mad gallop. Jared swore that his eagerness to get home had nothing to do with the woman he had left there. Now, as he watched her from under the protection of his hat brim, he wasn’t so sure.
They rode in silence for half an hour. Jared slowed Charger to a trot and led the way to the riverbank where cypress roots snaked along the ground, knotted and ropelike. On the other side of the river, a rock formation formed a wall, a backdrop, looming up fifty feet. About midway up, jutting out of the rock wall, was the strangest structure Lauren had ever seen.
It was barely more than a wooden shingle façade a few feet deep. A black metal flue extended a few inches out of the roof, emitting a thin wisp of smoke. The only door, in the center of the structure, was made of rough planks. A square window was on either side of it. Over these had been nailed cowhides, which stirred slightly in the breeze. Various antlers of deer and cattle adorned the exterior walls. The small shelf of rock on which the house was perched was barely wide enough for a man to stand on, but it was littered with all types of utensils; pails and washtubs, bridles and harnesses, rope, plows in sad disrepair, a stack of nondescript pelts, metal objects that Lauren couldn’t identify from this distance.
“What is that?” she asked Jared in awe as he reined in and began to dismount.
“Just stay where you are. We’ll only be here a minute. Crazy Jack doesn’t like company.”
“Wh—”
“Just sit still, Lauren,” he said crisply.
She watched him as he untied a bundle from behind his saddle and casually walked to the riverbank. He knelt down and scooped several handfuls of the clear water into his mouth. Then he placed the package on a flat-surfaced rock and returned to Charger, mounting with studied nonchalance.
Lauren stifled her curiosity as they rode away from the strange scene in silence. She glanced nervously back over her shoulder to steal a final look at the bizarre sight.
They had covered about a mile before Jared once again led the horses near the Rio Caballo, this time nudging them down to the bank to drink. He handed Lauren a canteen and crossed his leg across his saddle, lighting a cigar.
“What was that house, Jared? Does someone live there?” She couldn’t contain her curiosity any longer.
“Yes, someone lives there.” His manner was irritatingly casual. “His name is Jack Turner, though everyone has nicknamed him Crazy Jack. He built a façade over a dry cave for his house. He’s a hermit and not at all crazy.”
“A hermit!?” she exclaimed. “How long has he lived there? Where did he come from? Is he dangerous?”
With annoying slowness, Jared retrieved his canteen, recapped it, and took a long pull on his cheroot before he replied. “Jack and his brother Bill came to Texas in the late fifties from God knows where and settled in a small deserted cabin. They either didn’t have the initiative or the capital to ranch or farm, but they grew staple crops. They did odd jobs when they needed money, otherwise they were pretty reclusive. The German settlers around here were so industrious that they shunned anyone who didn’t share their proclivity for work.” He shifted in his saddle and drew again on the cigar.
“In 1872, the Comanche went on a rampage and raided the smaller farms. Jack and Bill were both captured, their cabin burned. They were held captive for six months or so, but then Jack was rescued. If they had been the only hostages, no one would have bothered, but some women and children had been taken at the same time. So a rescue party had been formed. Brother Bill had been killed by the Indians. Tortured and killed. Jack was… injured… and when he came back to civilization he was scorned by all his ‘Christian’ neighbors.”