A Cowboy For Clementine

So she had mounted the brown horse and followed the horse’s tracks. When she’d found the hat, she’d felt a little better. She’d have something to give him. Two things. His horse and his hat. Surely, he would help her. Now she held out the hat even farther. His long arm reached up and he grimaced as his tanned fingers curled around the worn felt. He settled it on his head and looked significantly better.

Clem peered down and doubt flooded through her. If this was Dexter Scott, he was dusty and younger than she’d thought he’d be. Too young for retirement, too young to be as good as the grapevine said he was. Dark eyebrows arched up, framing hazel eyes that were as clear as a still lake at sunrise. Those eyes weren’t dusty at all. And Clementine found herself staring into them, as if she were staring into the lake, watching flecks of gold sparkle along the water’s edge.

Even though she had a feeling she was talking to him, she shifted in the saddle and said, “I’m looking for Dexter Scott.”

“How’d you get in here?” His voice was gravelly, as if he hadn’t spoken in a very long time. The horse she was riding skittered from side to side, and the cowboy stilled the horse by tugging the reins out of her hands. He did look menacing, his eyebrows coming together in a scowl, his mouth tight.

“Are you Dexter Scott?”

“How did you get in?” Each word was marked by a short staccato. He muffled a groan as he stood up.

“On the road.” Clem repeated. She hated that he had the reins. It made her feel as if she was being held. And she was, by his eyes, by his angry stance.

He didn’t say anything for a long time, his eyes flicking over her, running a lie detector test. Then he shook his head. “Gates are locked.”

Nerves made her laugh. “Not if you know how to get through or climb over.”

“You shut them?”

Clem bristled. Even she knew not to leave gates open. “Of course.”

“I could shoot you, you know. Didn’t you read the sign?”

“You could,” Clem agreed, but patted the shotgun on the saddle in front of her. “If you had your horse, which you don’t. It seems as if I do.”

It occurred to Clem she shouldn’t antagonize this man, so she fished out a tattered brochure from her back pocket and proceeded to read.

“This says you’re an elite cowboy. A cowboy’s cowboy,” she said for emphasis. She stared at him doubtfully. He appeared anything but elite. Knowing that he’d fallen off his horse didn’t give any credence to the brochure.

“Not anymore.” He rubbed the nose of the horse, and moved to stand right next to her leg. “Retired.”

God, he was tall. No wonder the stirrups hung so low. Clem refused to be put off by the definitive bleakness in his voice. She had more than six hundred feral cows roaming around on her father’s ranch. Laboring all through spring and most of the summer, Clem and a crew of six transient cowboys had tried to round them up. Tried was the operative word. Oh, everyone had theories as to why the cows were so hard to catch. Difficult breed. Large size. Formidable horn growth. She had hoped that when the feed in the hills had dried up in the summer heat, these cows would want to come down and graze on her green pastures, but those freaks of nature seemed to find their own feed higher up the mountain range. The more she tracked them, the more impossible the task became, not just because of the rocky terrain but also because each seemed to be larger and more fierce than any cow she’d ever encountered. She’d thought she was purchasing a Charolais-Hereford cross, a hardy, disease-resistant hybrid that could grow to a thousand pounds in a season. She was wrong.

In desperation, she’d had five separate outfits come to the ranch, spy a couple of the cattle, then turn away, saying that it wasn’t worth the money to break their necks in such inhospitable terrain. In each case, the final edicts had been that if she really wanted to solve her problem, the cows needed to be destroyed, especially the bigger ones with horn spreads of nearly six feet. That wasn’t an option to Clem.

Dead cows fetched no money at market, and if she could only get those suckers to market, they’d be rich.

“You should’ve chosen something a little tamer, smaller,” the leader of the first outfit had remarked as he’d climbed back into his beat-up truck.

“Maybe they’re Charolais, got the coloring,” a man in the second had said. “But can’t see no Hereford in them. Maybe longhorn.”

“Gotta have some Brahman. Look at how mean they is,” a third had offered with a shrug.

“Man, look at that horn spread. Think you could have a strain of Belgian Blues.” A member of the fourth had shaken his head in awe. “It’s gold if you don’t mind dying while mining it.”

When the last outfit went, Clem was still left with enormous, renegade cows trampling the land, hiding in the crevasses, growing healthier, heavier and more territorial with each passing day, as disease resistant as the man who’d sold them to her had assured her. Clem had kicked herself a thousand times for not asking about temperament. She’d only seen the potential dollar signs. A swelling sense of pride that maybe this was something that she could do hadn’t helped. Maybe her mother’s faith wasn’t misplaced—no matter what her father thought, no matter what she thought.

It seemed she’d waited a long time to hear her father praise her for something that she’d done. For years, she just had to walk into the room and her father would light up. Somewhere along the way as Daddy’s little girl, she’d learned that she didn’t have to do, anything, simply being was enough. It was a hard lesson to unlearn since she’d gone from the adoration of her father to the adoration of her husband. Claire Wells had tried to warn Clem, tried to get her to realize that she had to rely on herself, but Clem hadn’t listened. She’d gone ahead and married Nick rather than finish college.

Clem understood intellectually what her mother was saying, but she’d liked the fact that Nick loved her the way her father did. It felt right to Clem. Nick had done an exceptional job of taking her father’s place until he decided to leave her for his colleague. Devastation couldn’t begin to describe her feelings. Suddenly, at thirty-two, she faced difficulties that most people dealt with at eighteen. How to live alone, how to be alone.

But with her mother’s help, she realized that there were things she could do. She knew horses. While Nick had been having his affair, she’d been at the stable with Archie, a beautiful chestnut that Nick had given her for their sixth anniversary. She also knew how to rope and brand. But apparently, not how to choose a herd.

“So tell me who’d help me,” she had finally asked. “There’s got to be someone.”

The cowboys she’d found had exchanged glances. One shrugged and another kicked at the dust.

“There is someone,” Clem had said with hope.

“Yep.”

“But, ma’am, you just might want to shoot these, take your losses and get a real job.”

Clem could have laughed at the irony of it all. This was the only real job she was qualified for.

“I have a real job.” Clem had glared at them. “Tell me who can help me.”

A long silence followed while the cowboys eyed each other.

One finally asked the other, “Where’d we last see him?”

“El Paso.”

“He was scouting those crazy horses of his.”

“Ben Thorton still with him?”

“Nope. Heard they split up after…you know. Those Miller brothers, too.”

“Who?” Clem asked again. “Give me a name.”

“Can’t vouch for him.”

“Craziest son of a— Oops, sorry, ma’am.”

“Didn’t they single-handedly clear out the old Russell Saloon?”

“Did some jail time.”

The oldest man shook his head. “I’d feel bad if something happened to you, ma’am. Even if you could find him, he won’t help.”

“Why not?” Clem had asked, her voice curt.

“Retired.”

“Give me his name,” Clem had begged. If he was alive, he could help her. She wasn’t going to let an itty-bitty complication like retirement get in her way.

With a sigh, he said, “Scott. Dexter Scott. Trust me, ma’am, you’d be better off if you didn’t find him.”

Dexter Scott.

Clem had burned that name into her mind. She’d scoured old copies of Western Horseman, looking for something, anything about him, a mention in an article, a small ad. Ben Thorton and the Miller brothers, too. Tracking one of them could lead her to him. She went on the Internet to the different ranching Web sites. Posted on message boards, sought information during chats.

Finally, some kind soul sent her a brochure, an old tattered brochure. Clem had treated it like a map to buried treasure, carefully taping the folds intact. And when she discovered the phone number was out of service, she’d used a magnifying glass to read the faded address. The next evening, last night, in fact, she’d driven off in search of Dexter Scott, the legend.

He didn’t look much like a legend, not with that frown. Clem cleared her throat. “Um, have you ever considered coming out of retirement?”

“Nope.” The answer was matter-of-fact, given with a disinterested glance in her direction.

That answer was unacceptable.

Clem stared at the man who was stroking the nose of the horse. Whether he knew it or not, her fate was in his hands. And she wasn’t going to lose six hundred cattle worth at least a thousand dollars apiece. She could, however, give up forty percent of what they would bring in. It was an enormous amount of money. With her cut, she could pay off her debts and still make enough to buy the most sedate herd of Herefords she could find.

“I’m sorry, I can’t take no for an answer.” Her voice came out a little weaker than she’d planned. Where was the authority that her father talked with? She sounded like she was asking for permission.

The cowboy’s lips twisted into what she thought was a smile, but since the brim of his hat shaded his face, she couldn’t quite tell. “You’ll have to.”

He gave the horse a final pat on the nose, before saying, “Skooch.” The horse lurched underneath her as, in almost one motion, he pulled himself up behind her and then lifted her up and deposited her snugly between his lap and the horn of the well-used saddle. A warm forearm wrapped around her rib cage. As he took the reins from her hand. With just a touch of his heels, he turned the horse and urged it into a trot back in the direction of the ranch.

Clem was too astonished to protest.

Not that she could protest even if she wanted to. Her body was already cinched to his lean frame, his chest pressed flat against her spine, and while he had pulled back in the saddle to give her as much room as he could, it was a tight squeeze.

She held her breath as the horse danced underneath them, not at all certain he liked this newest burden. She felt the man behind her squeeze the ribs of the horse to establish control.

“Relax, you’ll be more comfortable.” His voice was polite. “Break fewer bones if we get tossed.”

“Okay.” But her breath just didn’t want to let go.

They rode in silence for a cautious few minutes. Clem knew he was testing the horse, seeing if it was willing to take them home. When the horse didn’t protest, she felt the cowboy settle down behind her.

“So explain again how you got in?” His voice rumbled from deep within his chest, and Clem could feel it reverberate against her back.

“I just went through the gates,” she said, trying not to sound as defensive as she felt.

“They’re locked.”

“They’re latched,” she corrected him. “Only the last one was locked.”

“And?”

“I climbed over. Left my truck there.”

“How’d you find the horse?”

“He found me on top of the gate.”

That seemed to be enough of an explanation because he was silent.

After another hundred yards, he demanded, “So what is it you want from me?”

“I want you to be as good as your brochure says you are.”

She didn’t know what she expected in response to her outburst, but a deep chuckle wasn’t it.

“Nobody’s as good as brochures says they are. They’re brochures.”

Clem’s stomach knotted up. “I need you to be.”

“I’m retired.”

There was something in his voice, some sort of odd quality that made her not want to believe him. His forearm tightened around her ribs and Clem swallowed her protest. He may think he was retired, but there was some ember in his hazel eyes not yet snuffed out. Clem didn’t know how to fan it, but she knew that she needed to. As she thought, she became very conscious of the rhythm of his body and the horse as they moved across the desert. Riding with him was hypnotic, reminiscent of when she’d ridden with her father.

On cold fall evenings, Jim Wells would zip them both up in his large sheepskin jacket, keeping her warm as they rode to the high ridge of their property to watch the sun set before dinner. She could feel the cold on her nose and ears, the comfort of her father’s heartbeat. Even when she got her own horse, they still rode to watch the sunset, but it wasn’t the same.

She could almost purr with the memory. She didn’t want to like the way this stranger’s arm felt around her waist, acknowledge how secure she felt with him. She’d done that once before. She frowned in displeasure at her own reaction. Apparently, even after the divorce, she hadn’t learned anything at all. She was still waiting for someone to keep her close.

CHAPTER TWO

CLEM JERKED AWAKE as they rode up to Dexter Scott’s ranch, then stiffened when she realized she’d relaxed against him. He obliged her new posture by loosening his arm, though she could still feel his hand on the top of her hip. A dingy, two-story Victorian came into sight, along with dead patches of grass and flower beds long overgrown with wild roses and native plants. Dexter Scott apparently cared more for the comfort of his horses than himself, because three well-placed, well-kept stables and a barn made the old Victorian look more faded.

Clem couldn’t help studying the layout of his training area. She smiled when she saw a corral of horses only a mother or Dexter Scott could love. How different than what she’d anticipated. She’d imagined a ranch rather like an elite racing stable with glossy-coated handsome horses prancing across acres of green lawn.

Glossy coats, yes. Handsome, no. Dexter Scott’s horses sported eyes set too close or ears too big or markings just plain wrong. Rather than giving these horses an endearing quality, the physical imperfections made them look as if they were genetic throw-backs of the worst possible mix. Clementine refused to be disappointed. Now that she’d found him, she was going to make sure Dexter Scott was the legend she needed him to be.

“Guess I must’ve dozed off. I was driving all night,” she apologized, mentally climbing a thicker branch of hope. First impressions were rarely the measure one should use to judge the character of a person or a situation, right? And she shouldn’t judge the horses, either.

A large hand slid under her thigh.

“Off you go,” Dexter said as he boosted her leg over the saddle horn. With his arm still around her waist, Clem was gently set down on the ground. From this perspective, Dexter Scott was enormous. He swung himself out of the saddle and led the horse to one of the stables. The horses in the corral tossed their heads in greeting. Clem stood for a moment, looking around, trying to get her bearings. Then, even though he didn’t invite her, she followed him.

Dexter Scott was sliding the door with one hand, and just as she’d suspected, it opened with a quiet swish perfectly balanced on its rails like a finely made dresser drawer. She followed him as he led the horse to an empty stall. Yes, a man who kept his stables so clean could be an elite cowboy.

“So,” Clem began. She climbed up on the lowest slat of the stall in order to see him better. “I need your help.”

“Grab that hard brush for me, will you?” he asked her as he untied the leather knots of the saddle. He tended to his horse with practiced, methodical movements. With an easy heft, he put the saddle on a stall rail before he folded the horse blanket. Then with complete absorption, he ran his hand up and down the horse’s back, up and down his legs, feeling for small stickers or other irritants.

A moment later Clem got the brush and handed it to him. With even circles, he began to curry the horse, getting rid of the dirt, gravel and bits of desert sand that had worked their way up under the saddle. After a protracted silence, Clem wondered if he’d actually heard her.

“I need your help,” Clem repeated, mesmerized by his movements. His right hand brushed, while his left hand followed behind, lightly. Every so often, he paused to dig through the coarse hair to investigate before continuing. The horse stretched with the care and Clem could see the muscles ripple on its withers. With each stroke, Clem felt even more certain that this was the man she wanted, the man she needed.

After he finished one side, he moved to the other and as if synchronized, Clem picked up a softer finishing brush and went to work. The horse whinnied softly. Dexter Scott just kept brushing and feeling, feeling and brushing. Clem wondered if he paid attention to his wife the same way he paid attention to the horse.

“It’s taken me a month to find you,” Clem remarked, trying another way into the conversation. “I’ve driven all night from Los Banos.”

His hat obscured everything but his mouth. “I know Los Banos.”

Clem took that as an opening. “My dad has a ranch southwest of the city, right up against the Diablo range.”

After another extended silence, Clem tried again. Maybe he was waiting for her to finish her thought.

“We have a few cows roaming up there I need to get down.”

“A few?”

If she could see his face, she’d probably watch one of those dark eyebrows arch up.

“Well, six hundred.”

He didn’t say anything.

Finally, he pushed back the brim of his hat and asked, “What kind?”

His eyes were moss-green now. Clem looked away and brushed her side more vigorously, trying to cover the flush that was working its way up her neck. She muttered, “Don’t really know.”

For the first time, he stopped what he was doing and evaluated her. “How can you not know?” Curiosity tinged his voice.

DEXTER SCOTT HAD TO ADMIT he was interested. By the way she rode and brushed, she knew her way around horses. She also knew her way around gates. Some of his gates were constructed more than a hundred years ago, though the one closest to the property was new. That one he locked.

He took advantage of the fact that she wouldn’t look at him. On closer examination, she didn’t resemble Joanna so much. Her hands, for instance. Joanna’s hands were like a basketball player’s and since she’d never wore gloves, they were as weathered as old leather. But this woman’s hands were smooth, soft, just showing signs of wear. Joanna would also have been able to tell the breed of a cow a hundred yards away. Who was she? Dexter realized he didn’t even know her name.

“Who are you, anyway?” he demanded, appalled that his voice sounded as if it erupted from his belly.

She stopped currying as the flush spread from her slender neck to her ears. “I’m sorry. I should have introduced myself earlier. Clem. Clementine Wells.”

Clementine.

“The song or the orange?”

She made a face, then shrugged slim shoulders and smiled a smile that revealed white, even teeth. “I think the song, but I know my mother is partial to tangerines.”

Dexter couldn’t think of anything to say, but he was grateful that her name wasn’t Joan or Jo or Jess.

Clementine. Clem.

They continued to brush.

“I’d be indebted if you’d just come to the ranch to look at my problem. See if there’s anything you could do. There’s a fortune waiting for anyone who can do this.”

Dexter didn’t need a fortune. He had more than enough money to exist.

“I’d offer you, er, forty percent of what you bring in.”

Dexter, against his will, wanted to laugh. She wasn’t a tough negotiator. In fact, she looked so hopeful Dexter thought that if he was a different kind of man, he’d take the forty percent and then some. But as it was, forty percent, fifty percent, a hundred percent meant nothing. He didn’t need the money. Rather than prolong her misery, he said, his voice as abrupt and definite as he could make it, “I told you, I’m retired.”

She blinked and Dexter noticed her eyes were the same color as the blue horse blanket he’d just removed. He didn’t want to see the hope there dull, but it was necessary. He didn’t work anymore and that was all there was to it.

There was another silence.

Finally, she said, still hopeful, “I have more than six hundred cattle out there, all weighing more than a thousand pounds. You’d have enough money to fix up your house.”

Dex flinched at her insinuation that he was struggling financially. He had plenty of money to fix up the house. The cans of paint that Joanna had bought for the exterior were still in the basement, dusty, untouched. He was glad the pick in his hand didn’t falter as he used quick, short movements to clean New Horse’s back right hoof.

“It’s a beautiful house.”

He ignored her, wondering why this woman didn’t seem put off.

“It’s a shame that it should be so run-down. I imagine it was quite a showpiece in its day.”

She stopped talking, but the barn wasn’t silent to Dexter. He could hear the blood rushing through his head, New Horse’s breathing, the woman’s movements as she put away the brushes. He worked his way through the other three hooves, concentrating on a grooming ritual that he’d completed a thousand times.

CLEM WATCHED THE MAN straighten from his chore.

“No.” The single word bit into the stillness.

“What?” Clem asked, pretending to play dumb. Maybe it had been wrong to make a remark about his house, but it was the truth. And she just couldn’t accept “no” for an answer.

“No,” he enunciated, and straightened. “Thanks, but no thanks. I’m retired. You have a safe drive back, ma’am.”

She watched him look around as if he’d suddenly realized he’d finished the grooming, then stride out of the stall, having to wait impatiently for Clem to exit before he could shut the door. He walked out of the barn, heading for the house.

Clem stood there, her mind whirling as she sought a solution. It wasn’t going to end this way. It wasn’t. There must be something that he wanted that she could give him. She hadn’t driven all night to be flicked away like a fly on the potato salad. His long stride had already taken him to the Victorian, where he climbed up the creaking steps, his arm extended to open the screen door.

“Hey!” she called in desperation. “Can I at least use your bathroom? It’s a heck of a drive back.”

She didn’t think he heard her, but he stopped with his hand on the screen. He moved it back and forth, back and forth. Finally, without turning, he gave a quick nod and then disappeared into the house, the door banging behind him.

Clem smiled. If she got in the house, she would at least have another shot at convincing him.

When she stepped into the house, two things struck her; the darkness and the aroma of frying sausage and pancakes. Her stomach rumbled. She was starving. She’d driven all night and the only thing she’d eaten that morning was a quick sandwich and a cup of coffee at a fast-food restaurant in Barstow. What she wouldn’t give for some of those pancakes and sausages.

“Hello?” she inquired, peering into the shadows, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dimness.

No answer.

She supposed Dexter Scott figured she’d find her own way to the bathroom and then her own way out. She walked down the hall, looking at pictures that were covered in more than a layer of dust. Cobwebs strung the frames together, and Clementine frowned. What a sad, gloomy house. If she didn’t know that he lived here, she would have thought it was abandoned. Any happiness that it had once known had long since leached out, leaving just a shell of a house. Maybe that was what was wrong with Dexter Scott—the fun, the adventure had leached out of him.