Janet Dailey Calder 05 Calder Pr

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another. What the hell did you do, anyway?"
"Hey, she had a knife. I had to take it away from her."
"You must have done more than that." Rollie gave him an accusing look.
Lath shrugged. "So I copped a few feels. Let me tell you, little brother,
that's one piece of tail I wouldn't mind havin' some of."
"Well, you can forget about that unless you want to die real slow," Rollie
grumbled in ill temper. "And you can sure as hell forget about your brag to Ma
about doing something with the kid. If anything happens over there,
Echohawk'll come straight here."
"Not if we handle it right, he won't. Besides," Lath grinned, "he warned me to
stay away from his wife. He didn't say anything about the kid."
"If you think he won't put two and two together and come up with us, you're
wrong," Rollie told him.
Lath was unconvinced. "Not if we lay low for a while and play it cool. He may
think about us, but not seriously, and not for long."
Time passed much more swiftly than Cat thought it would. Her first days at the
Circle Six were spent unpacking everything and arranging it to suit her. It
was a process made longer by the time she took out to spend with Quint.
Although he had always been content to entertain himself from the time he was
small, Cat was concerned that he might have trouble adjusting to his new
environment, a concern that proved to be groundless. If anything, he seemed
happier. Which should have been a relief, but it bothered Cat that he was so
quick to embrace this new life, so eager to explore every inch of it and so
ready to make Logan a part of it.
"Graciously civilized" was the best way to describe her relationship with
Logan after two weeks. There had been times when she was relaxed in his
company, but on those occasions, someone else was invariably present, either
Quint, her uncle, or some other member of her family. On the whole, Cat made
it a point not to be alone with Logan. Which wasn't difficult, considering
that he was away the biggest part of the day. In the evenings, after she
tucked Quint into bed, she usually went to her room and read for a while or
occupied herself with some household task.
The role as woman of the house was a new experience for her. At The Homestead,
the responsibility had always belonged to someone else-her mother when she was
alive, then Ty's first wife, Tara, and now Jessy. But here, she was in charge.
With the additional work came an amazing sense of freedom. Suddenly Cat could
do things the way she wanted them done, not someone else. Sometimes it was
something as simple as folding the towels lengthwise first, then in half, or
as major as rearranging everything in the kitchen cupboards. Without being
aware of it, Cat subtly put her personal stamp throughout the house.
With Quint's help, she planted a flower border along the length of the front
porch. Nearly every day, they would saddle up their horses and go for a ride.
At first, it was a chance to spend time with Quint and familiarize herself
with this rough, broken country that was so different from the wide, rolling
grasslands of the Triple C. But as Quint's fascination with the wild landscape
and his desire to explore it grew, so did hers. Out of habit, Cat would check
on the condition of the range, the cattle, or the fences and pass the
information on to Logan that evening.
And there was the young Appaloosa colt. Every time she turned around, Cat
found Quint down at the corral trying to coax the flighty youngster to come to
him. Out of concern for Quint, she began gentling the colt, teaching it to
lead and getting it used to being handled, in short, making it safer for Quint
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to be around. Since she had always enjoyed working with young horses, the task
was a pleasure of its own.
"What do you think of Raindancc, Mom?" Quint climbed onto the kitchen counter
and balanced on his knees to lift the plates out of the cupboard.
"Raindance?" Cat lifted the lid on the sauce pot. Steam, scented with basil
and oregano, rose in an aromatic cloud as she stirred the simmering tomato and
meatball mixture.
"Yeah, for the colt. We can't keep calling him Easy Boy Easy." Balancing the
plates, he climbed back onto the chair and jumped to the floor.
"Raindance sounds good. Where did you come up with that?"
"Well ... I wanted an Indian name for him 'cause he's an Indian horse. And it
looks like he's got raindrops on his rump."
Quint walked around the table, setting a plate in front of each chair. "It's
okay to say rump, isn't it?"
"Yes." Cat retrieved a head of lettuce from the refrigerator and took it to
the sink to wash.
"The sheriff said butt isn't a nice word." Quint went to the silverware
drawer.
"The sheriff's right. There are definitely better words."
The crunch of tires on gravel and the low rumble of a car engine filtered into
the house. Quint snapped his head toward Cat and listened with eyes wide and
mouth open, a look of excitement dawning.
"That's the sheriff!" He gave the drawer a shove and stampeded toward the
door, all coltish energy. "I gotta go tell him we fed the horses."
A quicksilver tension raced through Cat, all her senses going on high alert as
she rinsed the lettuce one last time and turned off the faucet. Leaving it to
drain in the colander, she went to the cupboard and took down a salad bowl.
A mix of footsteps, one set slow and even and the other quick and light, [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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