Diamond Spur

Kate laughed delightedly. “What would I do without you?”

“Starve, most likely, if you weren’t such a good little cook yourself. And I’ll pat myself on the back for teaching you how, too, because your sweet mama is the best seamstress and the worst cook I ever knew.”

Kate started to argue, and then closed her mouth. “I thought hamburgers were supposed to be black and crunchy,” she said under her breath.

Gene and Cherry were whispering when Kate walked into the elaborate dining room. Jason was sitting quietly at the head of the table, impressive in pale slacks and a tailored gray shirt open at the throat. He was tapping his silver fork against the tablecloth, lost in thought, brooding if that scowl was anything to go by.

He looked up suddenly, as if he sensed Kate, and the scowl was still there. But something new kindled in his eyes, something born of their tempestuous interlude the day before. He was aware of her now, and she was just beginning to realize it. Her heart raced as his dark, very Spanish-looking eyes went over her like hands tracing every curve and line of her slender body.

“Did somebody die?” he asked politely. “I haven’t seen you dressed like that since the last time you went to church with us.”

Kate curtsied to cover her nervousness. “Do you like it? I made it myself.”

“It’s beautiful,” Cherry sighed, propping her head on her hands to stare dreamily at the long full skirt and blouson top with its sky blue colors and detailed embroidery. “Gosh, Kate, you ought to open a boutique.”

Kate could have hugged her. Cherry was petite and blonde and blue-eyed, always smiling, always enthusiastic. She encouraged Gene to be himself, to do what pleased him instead of what pleased big brother. But she did it in such an open, sweet way that Jason had become less antagonistic toward her. She was just eighteen now, and to Kate she seemed very young, despite the fact that there was less than three years between them.

“I’ll second that,” Gene chuckled. He was thinner than Jason, a little shorter. He had lighter hair and dark eyes, but his features were more even and attractive than his older brother’s. Jason had the business sense and the steel will, but Gene was the male beauty of the family and had always seemed to have girls hanging all over him.

Kate wondered sometimes if that wasn’t why she preferred Jason—he wasn’t a ladies’ man by anybody’s measure, although she was sure that he wasn’t naive. He’d had her trembling with need in no time at all. Not that he needed vast experience to accomplish that, when Kate thought the sun rose and set on him.

“Jason would loan you the money to go into business for yourself, wouldn’t you, Jay?” Gene asked him with the careless certainty of youth.

“Careers are the ruin of good women everywhere,” he commented dryly, leaning back in his chair with his hands behind his head. The posture outlined the powerful muscles of his chest and stomach, and it made Kate tingle to touch him. That must have showed, because his slow smile was knowing and faintly predatory. “A woman’s place is three steps behind her man.”

Kate stared at him, and even though it sounded like teasing, it took some of the joy out of her surprise. His mother’s betrayal had warped his attitude toward marriage, and his one-time fiancée’s defection to Hollywood had compounded the prejudice.

“Not this woman,” Kate told him as she sat down beside him at the table. “I think a woman’s place is at a man’s side.”

“Here we go again,” Gene muttered to Cherry, who giggled.

“Women shouldn’t have careers,” Jason repeated, his dark eyes level and somber. “Not unless they never plan to settle down.”

“I plan to settle down one day,” she said unexpectedly. “And have a home of my own, and children. And a career. I’m going to be a designer.”

“Without any help from me,” he returned blandly. “I’ll be damned if I’ll start you on the road to women’s liberation.”

Her eyes flashed. It wasn’t the first time she and Jason had argued about the traditional place of a man and a woman in society, but it was the first time it had mattered.

“I’m on the way already,” she shot back, “and without any need to go to you for help, thank God. I’ve just agreed to sign a contract with Clayborn to design a new line of leisure wear.”

“Congratulations! Kate, that’s grand!” Cherry gushed.

“I knew you could do it,” Gene chuckled.

“What’s this? A career designing clothes?” Sheila asked from the doorway, all eyes. “Great! Design something for heavyset women, the moderately priced stuff I can afford makes me look like a tub of lard.”

“Don’t say it,” Cherry gritted as Gene started to say something. “Not until after we get our peach cobbler, for heaven’s sake!”

Gene looked as if he might burst. Sheila glared at him out of gimlet eyes, the bowl of cobbler held protectively against her waist, her head cocked threateningly.

“I’ll throw it out,” she promised the young man.

Gene sighed. “I love peach cobbler.” He grinned. “Sheila, you ravishing beauty, you, how about a taste of that exquisite dessert you concoct with such style and sensuality?” He wiggled his eyebrows.

Sheila curtsied, almost falling over. “Why, thank you, kind sir, would you like to eat it or wear it?”

“I’ll eat it, thanks, and I swear,” he stood, hand over his heart, “I’ll never make another sarcastic remark about your size.”

Sheila nodded curtly. “See that you don’t. Here.”

She set the deliciously browned dessert on the table and laid a serving spoon beside it. “Kate goes first, since we’re celebrating.”

“Well, I won’t argue with that.” Gene grinned. “She’s earned it. When did you find out?”

“This morning,” she replied, digging with the serving spoon through the sugar-sprinkled crust to the sweet smell of sugary peach and dumpling beneath. She filled her dish, aware of Jason’s dark glare on her averted features. It was difficult to keep her hands from trembling as she began to sample the dish.

“It’s wonderful,” she told Sheila, who beamed and went back into the kitchen.

Gene got up and did an impression of the ample-hipped housekeeper waddling away, only to turn and find the object of his demonstration scowling at him from the doorway.

He cleared his throat and sat down quickly. “I lost a button, I was looking for it.”

Sheila glared at him. “Ha, ha. You just hold your breath until I cook you that vanilla pound cake you keep begging for.”

“I’ll repent!” He ran into the kitchen after her and the door closed behind them.

“Disgusting, watching him grovel.” Cherry grinned. She grabbed the cobbler. “Maybe if I hurry, I can finish his part and mine before he gets back.”

“Evil girl,” Kate accused. She glanced at Jason, who hadn’t said a single word through all the wordplay. He didn’t seem to hear what was going on around him. In fact, he didn’t. He was still hearing Kate rave about her career. He’d never realized how ambitious she was. It bothered him because he didn’t like to think of losing her to the big city and high fashion. And that was vaguely surprising. He’d been fighting the memory of her soft mouth for a whole day without success, and that hadn’t helped his temper.

“Don’t you want any cobbler?” Kate asked him.

“I’ve lost my appetite.” He lit a cigarette, daring anyone to object, and leaned forward to stare at Kate while she tried to eat her cobbler. “What will it mean, this job?”

“More money to start with. And I’ll get to do a lot of traveling once the designs are finished and we have samples made up,” she told him. “I’ll go to New York for market week this October and talk to the buyers and salesmen, and if my designs sell well, I’ll get to do another collection. All with my own name on it. I may even get to go to Europe to look at styles before I start on my next designs.”

Jason stared at her quietly. That wouldn’t suit Kate. She was meant for a kitchen and a house of her own, for children. Not this house, of course, not his children. He didn’t want any kind of permanent relationship even with Kate. He frowned. She’d meet all kinds of men in a job like that, predatory men. He didn’t like to think about some suave stranger seducing her.

“You’re too damned green for a sophisticated job like that,” he said aloud, shocking her.

She gaped at him, her fork poised in mid-air. So did Cherry. “What?!” Kate asked, torn between exasperation and laughter.

He crossed his long legs and took a heavy draw from his cigarette. In the overhead light, his dark straight hair seemed to have black highlights. “You’ll get in trouble back East, with no one to look out for you.”

“Well, you’ll probably bleed to death while I’m gone,” she shot back, “since nobody else can convince you that blood poisoning is dangerous.”

“I’ve been looking out for myself just fine.”

“Oh, of course,” she agreed. “Ripping your arm open, trying to shoot people...how’s the bull, by the way?”

His jaw tautened. “The bull is alive, through no fault of mine. I had to sell six cows to Tanner because his bull bred them. Luckily, I had plenty of replacement heifers this time.”

“How do you know his bull bred them?” Cherry asked innocently.

Jason looked suddenly hunted, his whole expression set and uncomfortable.

“Go ahead,” Kate dared him. “Tell her.” She knew about the new system of dyes that were used to show a stockman when a cow had been bred, but Cherry had never taken much interest in the cattle. Like Gene, she was more fascinated by art.

Jason took a sharp breath and stood up. “You tell her,” he said to Kate, his tone deep and cutting. “I’ve got better things to do.”

“You might congratulate me on my new job,” Kate said quietly.

He searched her green eyes curiously, his eyes narrowing on her oval face in its frame of dark, softly loosened hair. “I can’t do that. I think you’re making one hell of a big mistake.”

“You didn’t think so when I wanted to take the course in fashion design!” she argued.

“That was just something to help you sew better at the plant, or so I thought. I didn’t realize that San Frio was going to get too small to hold you.”

She stuck her chin up in the air and stared at him, refusing to be told how to live her life. “You’re just jealous because you can’t sew a dress, Jason,” she replied, resorting to teasing to keep from blowing up at him again.

“Oh, hell.” He turned on his heel and walked away without another word or a backward glance.

Kate smothered a grin, sharing a wink with Cherry, who was about to burst with mischief. Jason would come to his senses and then they’d talk about it. For now, he had to get used to the idea, and Kate knew very well how to skirt his moods. She’d had almost three years of practice.

“I never used to believe Gene when he talked about how well you managed to get along with Jason,” Cherry grinned. “But I’m beginning to see the light. My gosh, he takes a lot from you, doesn’t he?”

“From time to time,” Kate agreed with a sigh. “I wish he could understand that women aren’t property anymore. He doesn’t like them very much, you know.”

“It’s hard to miss,” Cherry murmured dryly. “All the same, I guess he’ll marry a woman someday, as long as she’s socially acceptable and doesn’t mind giving him an heir.”

Cherry couldn’t have known how much that supposition hurt Kate, even though she’d already faced it.

“I guess he will,” Kate replied, going quiet. She finished her cobbler and poured herself a cup of coffee from the carafe. She took it black, hardly tasting it as she lifted it to her mouth.

Cherry smiled. “I thought he was going to pass out when you dared him to tell me about those bred cattle.” The younger girl frowned. “How do you tell that a cow’s been bred?”

Kate told her absently, and Cherry just shook her head. “I can’t imagine a man being a rancher who’s too old-fashioned to talk about breeding in mixed company,” Cherry remarked.

Kate bit back a defensive comment. She couldn’t help it that she felt defensive about Jason. Despite her proud defense, she liked a few of his old-fashioned attitudes. In the modern world, where rough language and frank discussions were a matter of course, it was sometimes refreshing to be treated like a lady. Not that Jason cared much who was around when he lost his temper, she mused, but he’d never let Kate near his cows and heifers at breeding time or expose her to cattle that were being put down because of illness. Apparently he thought women were too delicate for that kind of thing.

She’d asked him once why he didn’t want her around the breeding stock, just in passing. He’d said something that had puzzled her at the time—that he didn’t want her to get the wrong idea about it because the cows would sound as if they were in pain and he didn’t want her to be frightened of a natural process. Now that she was older, and had been exposed to at least one racy motion picture, she began to understand what he’d meant. Passion was violent, if what she’d seen was any indication, and on the screen at least, women looked and sounded as if they were being killed. Kate had wondered a time or two if she’d ever sound like that, but she’d never felt passion with the few hometown boys who’d taken her out. She’d only felt that kind of fiery heat with Jason, the day before, and it was still new and a little unnerving.

“Jay just rattled the windows in the front room slamming out the door,” Gene remarked as he rejoined them with another saucer of cobbler. He grinned knowingly at Cherry as she guiltily gulped down the last bite of his after having finished her own.

“It was my fault, I guess,” Kate confessed. “I got a little overheated about his opinion of a woman’s place. Honest to goodness, I think sometimes that he doesn’t know what century this is.”

“You know why, though,” Gene said gently. “You of all people know why.”

Kate sighed. “Yes. But I was so excited about my break,” she smiled. “I wanted to share it.”

“He’ll storm around the barn for a while and then he’ll be all right,” Gene assured her. “Just drink your coffee, Kate, and remember that even the nastiest storm rains out eventually.”

“After it gets through rumbling,” she agreed, and sipped her coffee.

She stayed a few minutes longer, telling them about the new chores she had at the plant and what she was going to work around in her designs. Then, depressed by Jason’s sustained absence, she told them good-bye, waved to Sheila, and went out the front door to go home.

It was a glorious spring night. The sky was clear and the breeze was warm, and the stars looked close enough to touch. There was a whisper of jasmine in the air from the thick bushes at the front steps and at the corner of the house, lilac was just blooming. Kate sighed, smelling it, her eyes on the long horizon. Somewhere cattle were lowing softly, and she thought about the trail drives of the last century, when cowboys would sing to the cattle to calm them.

“Leaving already?”

She stiffened at the unexpected sound of Jason’s voice from the porch. She turned to find him sitting in the porch swing, barely silhouetted in the light from the nearby window. The orange tip of a smoking cigarette waved in his hand as he pushed the swing into motion. Its soft creaking sound was oddly comforting, but Jason’s presence made Kate feel nervous.

She lifted her chin. “Are we still speaking?”

“If you’re through reading me sermons on the modern woman, we are,” he said shortly.

“I might as well be, for all the good it’s done me,” she sighed, and smiled at him, because it was hard to fight with Jason. She understood him all too well, most of the time.

He got out of the swing lazily and strode toward her. Seconds later, he towered over her. The soft light coming out of the window lay on the floor in abstract patterns at her feet.

“I hate fighting with you,” she remarked to break the silence.

“Then don’t do it,” he said lazily, and managed to smile.

But as he smiled, he stared. He hadn’t really come face to face with her career until tonight, and now that he had, he was concerned. He knew that she couldn’t stay a girl forever. But he’d opened up with Kate in ways he couldn’t with even his own brother. He could talk to her. Somehow in the past few years he’d come to think of her as his own, and now she wanted to go away and leave him.

His eyes narrowed as they searched her face and then down her slender, exquisite body. Just lately his affection for her had become physical. He’d told himself that he hadn’t noticed her blossoming figure, but he had. Ever since that sweet interlude by the Bronco when he’d come within a hair of kissing the breath out of her, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. And that wouldn’t do. He couldn’t give her a physical hold on him. He didn’t want commitment with anybody just yet, much less with a girl like Kate who was years younger than he was, and a world apart from him in experience and maturity. She wouldn’t fit into his world. Even if she could, he didn’t want to let her.

But letting go was hard. “Do you even realize what a change it will be, if you get what you think you want?” he said after a minute. “You’ll be thrown into a world you’ve never experienced,” he said.

“It isn’t so different from mine,” she defended.

He lifted his chin, staring down his straight nose at her. “You’re a poor little girl from rural Texas, Kathryn,” he said shortly. “You don’t even know how to speak the language.”

“And I guess you do?” she challenged.

He looked at her half angrily. “Of course I do,” he said shortly. “I’m worth a small fortune. I’ve been moving in monied circles for years.”

Her face went blood red. She’d never considered the differences between herself and Jason as much in her life as she had in the past two days. She knew he was a rich man and she was a poor woman, but she’d never really noticed it before.

“You like to go barefooted and groom horses,” he said on a slow breath. “The people you’ll be associating with in New York will be city sophisticates. You won’t understand the discussions they have, or know the people they talk about, or be knowledgeable about the customs they’ll take for granted. You’ve got a Texas drawl that will stand out, and an innocence that some city man will do his best to relieve you of. If you aren’t careful, you’ll end up a broken flower, used up.”

She glared up at him. “What a glowing character reference,” she said, almost choking on her own pride. “I’m poor white trash, is that how you think of me after all these years?”

Her voice broke and she turned away furiously. But he was one step behind her. Without bothering to worry about consequences, he reached for her hungrily, locking her in his arms. He held fast, her tearstained cheek against his broad chest.

“I don’t want you hurt,” he said curtly. His mouth brushed her forehead, his lean hand smoothed her hair away from her face. “You’d be on your own in the city, with nobody to protect you, and you’re so damned innocent, honey.”

“And who’s to blame for that?” she demanded, hitting at his broad chest.

He took a slow breath. “All right, if you want to put it that way, I guess some of the blame is mine,” he admitted. He nuzzled her dark hair with his cheek. “I’ve tried to help Mary keep you out of trouble, and maybe I’ve gone overboard. It’s just that it’s hard to let go,” he admitted finally, breathing in the scent of her.

She’d hoped for something more. And that was foolish because she knew better than most people how much Jason avoided involvement. He had almost a fear of it, and knowing his past, she couldn’t really blame him. He couldn’t trust anybody that far, not even Kate.

“You’ll have to let go one day,” she reminded him.

“I guess so.” He spoke absently into her soft hair. “But you’re the closest thing to a friend I’ve got,” he added, the words slow and gentle. “I’ll miss having you around.”

“I won’t be going away forever,” she laughed, because he sounded so fatalistic. “Just for an occasional week.”

“That’s what you think now,” he said quietly. “That isn’t how it will be. Business tends to overshadow everything else, after a while. I’ve given everything in me to the Diamond Spur in recent years. It’s become my life. Be careful that designing doesn’t obsess you the same way.”

“It won’t,” she said. She drew back enough that she could smile up into his concerned face. “And if you’d relax a little now and again, maybe you wouldn’t have those gray hairs.”

“I can’t relax,” he returned. “The cattle industry has been in a slump for the past few years. Until market prices edge up, the Spur is hanging by a thread.”

“You could delegate once in a while.”

“Maybe I could, if Gene would hold up his end of the work,” he returned. He studied her quietly. “You never seemed so ambitious, Kate. You used to talk endlessly about getting married.”

“Well, I’ve changed my mind now,” she said, holding back the fact that she’d changed her mind because she knew she’d never change his about marriage.

He sighed, watching her. With her hair loose around her shoulders and that silky blouse she was wearing, she looked seductive. When she moved her breasts danced with erotic subtlety, and he was sure that she wasn’t wearing anything to support them. That made it even worse, thinking about what her full young breasts looked like under their sensuous covering. He even felt vaguely guilty to be considering Kate in that light, when she’d been off limits for years.

“It’s strange to argue like this with you,” she said finally, smiling faintly. “We’ve been friends for a long time now. We get along better than any two people I know. And yet in the past two days, all we’ve done is disagree. It’s...it’s uncomfortable.”

“This is the first time you’ve really gone against me,” he replied.

“I’ve never wanted anything this badly before,” she replied. And it was true, she’d never fought him. How odd to suddenly wake up and find that she’d allowed herself to be dominated by him for years. Her eyes searched his dark face. “You won’t change my mind, Jason. I’m going to do what pleases me, even if it doesn’t please you.”

His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t speak. It was frankly arousing to argue with her. His body made a sudden and emphatic statement about what it wanted, and he moved restlessly, trying to convince it that she wasn’t fair game.

“I’ll drive you home,” he said abruptly.

“I have the car,” she reminded him reluctantly. His nearness was already working on her, and she wanted the delight of being alone with him, even if it was just for a few minutes on the way home. Remembering the way he’d looked at her and touched her the day before still made her burn with untried longings.

“That’s just as well,” he said after a minute. He lifted the cigarette again to his chiseled lips. “I’m in a strange mood tonight.”

“I don’t understand.”

His chin lifted and he scowled at her. “Don’t you? Are you going to pretend that nothing happened yesterday?” he challenged, driven by mingled desire and frustration to lash out at her.

She remembered, but she didn’t want to. Jason aroused her, excited her, and she was uncertain of his motives. He’d always been possessive of her, but lately he was taking it to new heights. She felt that if she let him, he’d smother her.

“Nothing did happen, really,” she faltered.

He moved closer, his whole posture threatening. She could smell his cologne and the scent of leather that clung to his soft Western shirt. Her breath stifled in her throat.

“And nothing’s different between us?” he persisted.

She could hardly breathe at all. His fingers were on her hair, lightly touching it. “No,” she whispered.

“Then it shouldn’t bother you if I have women.”

She bit her lower lip until her teeth almost broke the skin. The image of that was unbearable. “No,” she agreed. “It shouldn’t.”

He flicked the cigarette off the porch while the silence closed in around them. He tilted her chin up and searched her eyes in the dim light from the windows.