Part 37 (1/2)

”You said I could do anything I wanted. You were the one who encouraged me to try to be on my own. You can't hold back now. That would make you worse than Guy.”

They started back up the trail looking for a camp site. ”How do you figure that?”

”Guy doesn't really believe a woman can take care of herself. He might agree to any number of things to placate me, but he would never encourage me. You did.”

”Encouraging you doesn't mean I think you're ready to tackle rustlers.”

”I didn't say I wanted to tackle them. Maybe I just want to be certain you won't get hurt.”

”Is that important?”

”Of course it is. I don't want any of my employees to get hurt.”

”I'm not your employee.”

Daisy refused to fall for that. ”I may not be paying you, but you're working for me.”

”So you don't care anymore about my safety than that of Bob Green's hands.”

Now he was getting personal, digging for information. She didn't mean to give in that easily. ”Why should I? Do you care especially for my safety?”

”I'm here.”

It wasn't much of an admission, but she figured it might be the best she was going to get out of him. ”Why are you here?”

Tyler didn't answer. Daisy wondered why it was so hard for him to put his feelings into words. It was hard to imagine what could have happened to make him so insular. She'd been dominated and confined, her self-esteem destroyed, but it had only made her more anxious to find someone to love, to share her life. It seemed to have worked just the other way around with him. One more reason why they weren't good for each other.

”Because I can't be anywhere else.”

He fell silent. She guessed she would have to be satisfied with that.

”I liked you better the way you were back in camp.”

That got him. He turned in the saddle to face her. ”How's that?”

”You talked and smiled and acted like an ordinary human being. People enjoyed being around you. But I've watched you change with every mile we've traveled today. It's like you've been wearing a mask and it has been falling off bit by bit until there's nothing left but the Tyler who was back in the cabin.”

”You don't like him?”

She was feeling stronger, more in control. She figured she could answer him honestly. ”Not especially. He doesn't give and he doesn't share. When he talks, it's in cryptic utterances that choke off conversation rather than start it, freeze emotion rather than warm it.”

She watched his back grow rigid. She wondered if his face was any more expressive.

”There is a different man inside you. The one who took care of me, cared how I felt, empathized with my suffering. I fell in love with that man, but I lost him somewhere.”

There, she had said it. It had taken all her courage, but at least she had gotten the words out. And it had to come out between them. Otherwise, their parting would always be incomplete.

”What if he came back?”

”He would never stay. The other you wouldn't let him.”

Tyler stopped his gelding in a grove of pine and spruce that grew along a wash snow melt had turned into a noisy stream. ”This looks like a good camp site.” He rode into the thicket until the trail was no longer visible.

”Suppose he did come back to stay.”

”I could never marry a man like that,” Daisy said. ”He's not a complete person. He's a fragment, just like the sociable fragment you pulled out back at camp. I suppose you've got other fragments I haven't seen.” She dismounted. ”Here, give me the reins. I'll take care of the horses while you fix supper.”

As Tyler watched Daisy curry the horses and picket them near some gra.s.s, he decided that was what was wrong with this whole relations.h.i.+p. It was backwards. She was taking care of the horses, and he was cooking. She was the boss, he the employee. She had control of her feelings, and he didn't. From the moment he had left Willie Mozel at his claim, he'd been operating in uncharted territory.

Why couldn't he concede he didn't know what he was doing? It was about time he admitted his feelings of inadequacy weren't limited to his family. It was tied up with his perception of himself. He had lost control because he was trying to do something he had fought against this whole life.

He was trying to reach out to Daisy, but he was scared to death. When she said she loved him, something inside him leapt for joy. Some barrier came down, one he'd propped up for years, one he thought was impregnable. Yet Daisy with her freckles and curls had cracked it wide open with just three little words.

It didn't seem to matter that she wouldn't marry somebody like him. She loved him. For now that was more than he could handle.

He seemed to have lost his sense of pride, but that didn't mean as much as he expected. He'd held on to his pride all his life, and it hadn't made things any better. He had a feeling if he could just figure out how to open up to Daisy, pride wouldn't be so important.

She said she loved him but wouldn't marry him. Love wasn't enough, and he knew it.

”Tell me what you've got in mind,” Daisy said when she came to the fire. ”Mmmm, that smells delicious. You've got to teach me how to cook like that before you leave. You've spoiled me for my own cooking.”

Tyler was a little startled that she took his leaving for granted. He had never intended to stay more than a few weeks, but he had a.s.sumed he'd be dropping by periodically to see how she was doing. Apparently Daisy expected him to disappear for good.

”I thought I'd ride back to their camp sometime after midnight. Maybe I can drive off the cows without waking them up. You can be waiting here. If they follow, I can hold them off while you drive the cattle back to your land.”

”Wouldn't that be dangerous alone?”

”I'm not very good with a gun, but I can hold an army at bay with a rifle.”

”You think they'll fight?”

”I don't know. They may figure it's easier to go back and rustle more. I can't figure out how you come to have so many unbranded cattle.”

”My father wouldn't hire enough hands. He didn't trust anybody but Rio. He was convinced he was close to finding that mine. Maybe he thought they would try to steal it from him.” Daisy poured herself a cup of coffee. She took a sip. It burned her tongue. ”He wanted to find gold so he could go back and show his family he had become rich on his own. He never understood that mother and I didn't care. How long do you think it'll take us to finish branding?”

They talked of general things while they ate, but Tyler's thoughts still revolved around the fact Daisy loved him but expected nothing of him. The more he thought about it, the more determined he was to make her change her mind.

He loved her and wanted to marry her. Fool that he was, he couldn't see that's why he'd been following her around.

Tyler's hand paused with the fork half way to his mouth. He had fallen in love with a woman who didn't like his kind of man and wouldn't marry him on a bet. He put the food in his mouth and chewed slowly. What a h.e.l.l of a mess. Somebody once told him gold was never any trouble until you found it. They should also have told him being in love was no trouble until it happened to you.

But that wasn't his most immediate problem. Daisy was only a few feet away. He didn't know how he was going to get through the night without making love to her.

Chapter Twenty-four.