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Her shoulder lifted in an expressive shrug of indifference. “I’d much rather be your partner, but we’ll talk about that another time.”
“There won’t be another time, and I’m not interested in any proposition of yours—business or otherwise. I suggest you leave before I throw you out.” There was no softening of his hard, embittered features.
“I’ll leave.” She smiled coolly. “There’s just one more thing before I go.”
“Then say it and be done with it,” he snapped, showing the first rush of impatience.
“I believe you know a man named Judd Boston.”
“What about him?” His dark eyes were guarded.
“It seems he has a friend in the land office who had told him about three claims that have not had the necessary improvements made to fulfill the requirements of the land act. All rights and title will be denied the present claimant, and Mr. Boston will be quietly taking them over.”
“Very interesting, but hardly surprising. That’s the way Boston works,” Benteen replied.
She moved slowly toward him, gliding in rustling satin skirts. “Ah, but those three claims are yours, Benteen.” The uncertainty of disbelief flickered across his face. “So you see, I can be very helpful to you—in many ways.” Elaine smiled knowingly and laid her hand lightly against his cheek, stroking her fingers across it in a brief caress. “I’ll be in touch in a few days, and we’ll talk about that proposition.”
After she walked by him to the door, Benteen remained motionless. The touch of her hand had brought a pain that splintered through him like shattering glass. For a split second he was a little boy again, wanting the warmth of a mother’s hand and desperately wishing the beautiful woman in the picture would come back to him. That was before he realized his dream mother didn’t exist.
Slowly he turned and walked to the front door, where she waited to be escorted to her carriage. Benteen didn’t look at her. He tried to expel her existence from his mind. Although he knew her to be in her late forties, she didn’t look it. She was too elegant and sophisticated to ever be considered matronly.
Ma
ny times in his youth he had planned what he would say to her if she ever came back. Some of it he had done—calling her names and denying her, ordering her out of his life. Yet, the sensation of her touch lingered on his cheek. He ached from it. But no one could see it. His hard features had been too well schooled in concealing the privacy of his emotions.
The southern exposure of the house had them walking into the sun. The sky was a huge chunk of blue, crowning the range in all directions. Benteen surveyed it with a slow, sweeping gaze, aware of the land’s raw malevolence that could give and take by turns. The warning from his mother of Judd Boston’s plans came whirling into his thoughts. He had been too confident, too sure of himself.
When they reached the carriage, Lorna was just coming out of the cabin with Webb at her side. Bull Giles followed her, carrying little Arthur in the hook of one arm. Despite the skinned knees and the traces of tears on his cheek, the toddler seemed quite happy on his lofty perch.
“You’re a brave boy,” Bull Giles was saying, neither he nor Lorna noticing the pair standing by the carriage.
“Just clumsy,” Lorna laughed.
“Give him a chance to grow into his feet,” Bull insisted. But when he smiled at Lorna, his glance encountered Benteen.
Beside him, his mother remarked, “Mr. Giles appears to be very much at home here. Is he a close friend of yours?”
“No.” Benteen pulled all expression from his voice as he watched Bull set Arthur on the ground. The natural smile had left Lorna’s lips, replaced by a more self-conscious one. “He’s my wife’s friend, not mine.”
All is not well, Elaine thought to herself as Lorna came forward. She studied her son’s wife with a little more interest. Lorna was an attractive, well-developed young woman. The hard work this country demanded from a female had kept her figure intact, despite the birth of two children. In the right clothes, she could be stunning. There was intelligence in her eyes, yet she had retained a certain vulnerability. Elaine saw that Lorna still possessed a child’s desire to trust, which made her easy to be deceived.
“I’m glad your child’s injury wasn’t serious,” Elaine remarked when Lorna reached her, with little Arthur trotting to keep up.
“It was very minor,” Lorna responded.
“It’s been an enjoyable afternoon. I shouldn’t have liked it to end on an unpleasant note,” Elaine said.
“Are you leaving now?” Lorna inquired with mixed surprise and disappointment.
Elaine slid a brief glance at Benteen. “I must,” she replied. When she moved to the carriage door, Bull Giles was there to help her inside.
Lorna came to the side of the carriage and took the boys by the hand to keep them away from the wheels. “I’m glad you called. And thank you for the gifts.”
“You’re most welcome.” Elaine’s glance slid past her to Benteen, standing silently. “We’ll meet again,” she said, then brought her gaze back to Lorna. “I’m confident of that.”
As the carriage pulled away from the cabin, Lorna watched it for a few minutes, then turned to Benteen. “Why didn’t you tell her good-bye?”
He seemed to drag his gaze from the sight of the carriage rolling onto the limitless plains. “I already had,” he stated, and swung away from her and the boys.
