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Since he'd admitted to employment shortcomings, she was willing to let the subject go—until he added, "But at least I've worn my clothes in my jobs."
Pinning him with a glare, she choked, "What did you just say?"
"Think you heard me, Isabel." With that, he went to his feet. She shot up next to him.
"You have no call to be saying such a thing to me."
"Wasn't me who worked at the Blossom." His eyes locked with hers. If she could have calmed her jagged pulse for a moment and looked at him rationally, she would have seen the jealousy in his gaze. "And we know what kind of place that is."
"I suspect all of Limonero knows exactly what kind of place the Blossom is. And don't you try and tell me you've never been there. Jacaranda told me all about you."
John adjusted his Stetson—that habit of his; there was never anything wrong with the angle. He just rearranged the brim when he got mad and always set the crown exactly the way it had been before he messed with it. "She did? What in the deuce did she have to say?"
Isabel wasn't about to tell him that Jacaranda said she should have been paying him instead of the other way around. Jacaranda had claimed John was the best—
"Somebody's coming," John hissed between his teeth.
Snapping her chin up, Isabel searched the dull horizon. A dust cloud rose in a thin plume: one rider.
"Get on your horse."
Isabel protested. "But we haven't picked all the berries. Why let somebody else have the rest?"
He brought his face close to hers, his nose and forehead inches from her own. The smoldering fire of his blue eyes grounded her to the spot. She could smell the sweetness of cinnamon and cocoa on his breath. "It's not the berries on the bushes I'm worried about. It's the ones we already picked. Some people would do anything to win this contest, even if it means thievery at gunpoint. I don't know about you, but I don't feel like getting killed today."
They loaded the horses with their gear, and rather than ride out, John told Isabel to take the reins and follow his lead. Where they'd stopped for breakfast had been flanked by an outcropping of sandstone directly behind them. He knew of a narrow canyon inside that had been carved out by water some hundreds of years ago. The stream that meandered through it now was low, but crystal clear. He had a good mind to go swimming as soon as whoever the rider was had either passed this way and left, or got his fill of
berries.
Guiding his horse around the twists and turns of the soft rock incline, John reached the top and tied off the reins, motioning Isabel to do likewise. Once their animals were secured, he crouched low and went to the ground. Crawling up to the edge of the cliff, he peered down at the scene below just as Isabel scooted next to him.
The flashy gray roan tipped him off as to who the rider was reining in and dismounting.
"It's Newt," John stated dully.
"Who?"
He flashed her a sideways stare. "Guess you didn't go by names."
Nudging toward him, she said, "I don't like what you're hinting at."
"I'm not hinting at anything." John kept his gaze fixed on Newt, who was in a hurry to pluck berries and throw them in a burlap sack. "Newt told me all about it."
"All about what?"
"You and him at the Blossom."
"There wasn't anything between me and him at the Blossom."
"Not what he told me."
The censure in her voice had slapped him as sure as if she'd used her hand. "Well there wasn't and he's a damn liar!" With that, she cuffed him for real and they both went sliding backward down the ledge.
He put a hand over her mouth to muffle her scream and she latched on to him with both hands on his shoulders. John lost his hat, swore, and yelled at Isabel to shut up. She kept on with her cries. He cupped his fingers tighter over her mouth; she bit him. He swore once more.
Looking about for a strong foothold to stop their decsent, he wedged his boot into a flannel bush. They came to a sliding halt. Pebbles showered their heads and dust clogged the air.
John didn't remove his hand from her mouth and arm, fearful he'd reach for her throat if he did. She'd come after him as if she was some kind of crazy woman. To think, he'd watered her stupid lemon trees to help her out.
