Palomino

14

They met at five minutes before ten in the south clearing, their horses fresh, the sky blue, their eyes bright with desire. It was a little crazy, this brand-new passion, she couldn't explain it but deep in her gut, she knew that she had to be with him, and she was ready to make a commitment to him for the rest of her life. She tried to explain it to him later that morning, as they lay in the big comfortable brass bed in the pale blue bedroom, their bodies tired, their hearts light, and his arm encircling her as she nestled at his side.

“I don't know, Tate, it's as if… as if I've always been waiting for you. As if suddenly I know what I was born for…”

“You mean screwing?” He grinned at her and rumpled the exquisite hair.

“Don't call it that.” She looked hurt.

“I'm sorry.” He kissed her softly and touched her face. “Making love. That's what it is, you know, no matter what I call it.”

“I know it is.” She moved closer to him with a happy smile and closed her eyes. “It must be wrong to be this happy. It's certainly indecent.” Her eyelids fluttered and he kissed the tip of her nose.

“Is it? Why?” He looked just as happy as she as he lay there. “Why don't we have a right to feel like this?”

“I'm not sure. But I hope we do and for a very long time.” Their thoughts went in unison to Bill and Caroline, who had lain in the same bed before them and were still together after such a long time.

“It's crazy, Tate, it's all so new between us and it just doesn't feel like it, does it?”

“No, but if you don't stop talking about it, I'm going to start treating you like you've been around for the last twenty years.”

“And then what?”

“I'll ignore you.”

“Just try it.” She ran a slender finger up the inside of his thigh and stopped interestingly where his legs joined.

“And just what is that all about, Miss Samantha?”

“Hang around and I'll show you.” She teased in a sultry voice and he put a hand between her thighs. They were the oddest combination of teasing and serious, and through the entire morning there was always the feeling that they had been there before and been part of each other's lives for a very long time. It was almost impossible to realize that the relationship was a brand-new one, and Tate seemed to feel as comfortable as she did as they wandered naked through the tiny house.

“Did you see the photo albums, babe?” he called out to her as she made sandwiches in the cheerful little kitchen from the provisions he'd brought. He sat on the couch, with a blanket over his naked shoulders, his feet extended toward the bright fire. The fireplace hadn't been cleaned since the last person had used it, so they felt certain that no one would discover that they'd been there from whatever ashes they eventually left in the grate.

“Yeah, they're great, aren't they?” There were photographs of Bill and Caroline, and other people on the ranch, dating all the way back to the early fifties, and the two new lovers chuckled fondly as they glanced through the pages, watching people cavort years ago in front of outdated cars, in funny bathing suits and odd hats. There were a few pictures of rodeos, and there were even some photographs of the ranch before some of the newer buildings had been built. “Gee, it used to be a lot smaller.”

He smiled in answer. “One day it should be a lot bigger than this. This could be the finest ranch in the state, maybe one of the best in the country, but Bill King is getting old, he isn't as anxious to see it grow. Leastways not anymore.”

“What about you? Is that what you want, Tate? To run this ranch someday?” He nodded slowly, being honest with her. He had a great deal of ambition, all of it centered around this ranch.

“Yeah. I'd like to make it something very special one day, if Miss Caro will let me. I'm not sure she will, while old Bill is around.”

Samantha spoke softly, almost reverently. “I hope he always will be, Tate, for her sake.”

He nodded slowly. “So do I. But one day, one day… there are some things I'd like to change on this ranch.” Closing the album carefully, he began to tell her. An hour later he glanced at the electric clock in the kitchen and stopped. “Listen to me, Sam, I could go on like this for hours.” He smiled sheepishly but it was obvious that she had enjoyed it.

“I like hearing about it.” And then after a minute, “Why don't you start your own ranch?”

But he laughed and shook his head. “With what, little Palomino? Good wishes and old beer cans? Do you have any idea what it would cost to start a decent ranch? A fortune. Not on my pay, babe. No, all I want is to be one hell of a foreman, not an assistant foreman, but the real thing. The man in power. Hell, most of the ranchers don't know their ass from a hole in the ground. The foreman is the one who keeps the place running.”

“You do that here.” She eyed him proudly and he gently touched her hair and then cupped a hand under her chin.

“I try, little Palomino. I try when I'm not playing hookie with you. You could make me almost sorry I'm working. All I wanted to do yesterday was come here with you, and make love to you and sit by the fire and feel good.”

Samantha stared into the fire with dreams in her eyes. “So did I.” And then after a moment she turned her eyes back to him. “What are we going to do, Tate?”

“About what?” He was teasing her. He knew what she meant.

“Don't be cute. You know what I mean.” And then she giggled. “The other night I had this vision of you and Bill King tiptoeing into the house and bumping into each other in the dark.” They both laughed at the image and he pulled her close, with a pensive look in his eyes. He had already mulled over the possibilities, and all of them were complicated, none of them was ideal.

“I don't know, Sam, it would be a lot easier if it were summer. We could come here every night after work and ride back in the moonlight under the stars. But it's dark as hell now when we finish, and I'd be afraid one of the horses might stumble and get hurt.”

“We could carry lanterns.”

“Sure.” He grinned at her. “Or hire a helicopter, why not?”

“Oh, shut up. Well… what are we going to do? Do you want to try sneaking into Aunt Caro's?”

He shook his head slowly. “No. They'd hear us, just like you told me you hear him coming in every night. And my place is so damn wide open. All it would take would be for one of the men to see you, just once, and it would be all over for us.”

“Would it?” Samantha looked strained as she said it. “Would it really be so awful if they knew?” He nodded slowly. “Why?”

“It's not right, Sam. You are who you are and I am who I am. You don't want them talking and neither do I.” But the truth was that she didn't give a damn. She thought she loved him, and she didn't give two pins what anyone said. What could they do to hurt them? But she saw in his face that it was a sacred rule. Ranchers didn't fall in love with ranch hands.

Samantha looked at Tate squarely. “I'm not going to play the same game they've played, Tate, not forever. If we stay together, I want people to know it. I want to be able to be proud of what we have, not afraid of who might find out.”

“We'll cross that bridge later.” But she had the feeling that he wasn't prepared to move an inch in her direction, and suddenly she bridled and the light in her eyes was as stubborn as his.

“Why? Why not start dealing with it right now? Okay, I understand that we don't have to advertise to everybody right this minute that we're having an affair. But hell, Tate, I'm not going to sneak around forever.”

“No.” He said it very quietly. “Eventually you're going back to New York.” The words hit her like a wave of cold water, and when she spoke again, there was ice and pain in her voice.

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because that's where you belong, just like I belong here.”

“Is that right? How do you know that? How do you know that I'm not like Caroline, that I haven't decided I don't want that kind of life anymore, not that my life is like hers was?”

“You know how I know?” He looked at her with the full wisdom of his forty-plus years. “Because when Caroline came here, she was a widow, she wanted to give up the life she had shared with her husband, because he was gone. And she was forty years old, Sam, that's not the same as thirty or thirty-one. You're young, you still have a lot of living to do, a lot of your crazy commercials to put together, a lot of deals to make, a lot of buses to catch, phone calls to make, planes to miss, parties to go to…”

“And I couldn't do some of that here?” She looked hurt and he eyed her gently, with wisdom and tenderness and love.

“No, little one, you couldn't. This isn't the place for that. You came here to heal, Sam, and that's what you're doing, and maybe I'm just part of that. I love you. I never laid eyes on you before three weeks ago, and I haven't really given a damn about a woman in years, but I know I love you. I knew it the first day we met. And I hope you love me. But what happened to Bill and Caro is a miracle, Sam, they don't belong together, and they never will. She's educated, he isn't. She's led one hell of a fancy life, and his idea of class is a solid-gold toothpick and a fifty-cent cigar. She owns the ranch and he ain't got a hill of beans. But she loves him, and he loves her, and this was all she wanted. For my own reasons I think she was a little crazy, but she'd had another life, and maybe after that this was enough for her. You're different, Sam, you're so much younger, and you've got a right to so much more than I could give you here.” It was totally crazy, they had known each other for less than a month, and only been lovers for two days, and yet they were talking about the future as though it really mattered, as though there were even a question of their staying together for the rest of time. Samantha eyed him with amazement and then looked at him with a small smile.

“You're crazy, Tate Jordan. But I love you.” And then she took his face in her hands and kissed him, hard, on the lips and then sat back and crossed her arms. “And if I want to stay here, if this is the life I want, whether I'm thirty or ninety or eighteen, then that's my decision. I am not Caroline Lord, and you are not Bill King, and you can save your damn self-sacrificing speeches, mister, because when the time comes, I'm going to do exactly what I want to do. If I don't want to go back to New York, you can't make me, and if it's you I want for the rest of my life, then I'll follow you to the ends of the earth and bug you to death until you announce it to every last goddamn ranch hand, and Caroline and Bill. You're not going to get rid of me as easily as you'd like to. You got that?” She was grinning at him, but she saw that there was still a broad streak of resistance in his eyes. It didn't matter though, he didn't know her, and the truth of it was that with only one recent exception, what Sam Taylor wanted, she got. “Got that, mister?”

“Yeah, I got it.” But without saying more, this time it was Tate who kissed her and silenced her almost completely as he threw off the warm blanket and cast it over both of them. Only moments later they were once more blended together, their legs and their arms and their bodies one shimmering tangle as their lips held and the fire crackled nearby. And when it was over, he pulled his lips from hers breathlessly and carried her back to the little blue bedroom where they began again. It was after six o'clock when they noticed that it was nighttime. They had slept and made love and slept and made love all afternoon, and now regretfully Tate swatted her bottom, and then went into the bathroom to run a hot tub. They took a bath together, his endless limbs wrapped around her, as she giggled and told him stories of her early summers on the ranch.

“You know, we still haven't solved our problem.”

“I didn't know we had one.” He lay his head back on the edge of the tub and closed his eyes in the hot bath.

“I mean about where and how to meet.”

He fell silent for a long moment as he thought it over and then shook his head. “Damn, I wish I knew. What do you think, Sam?”

“I don't know. My room at Aunt Caro's? I could let you in the window.” She laughed nervously. It really had overtones of being fifteen years old and very “fast.” “Your place?”

He nodded slowly. “I guess so. But I don't like it.” And then suddenly he brightened. “I've got it. Hennessey's been bitching for two months about his house. Says the cabin's too small for him, it sits in the wind, and it's too far from the chow hall. He's been driving us all nuts.”

“So?”

“I'll trade him. His place is on the edge of the camp, almost behind Caro's. At least if you go there, no one should see you. It's a hell of a lot better than where I am right now.”

“You don't think they'll suspect?”

“Why should they?” He grinned at her in the steam from the bathtub. “I don't plan to pinch your ass every day at breakfast or kiss you on the mouth before we ride.”

“Why not, don't you love me?”

He said nothing, but only leaned forward, kissed her tenderly, and then fondled her breasts. “Matter of fact, little Palomino, I do.”

She raised herself on her knees in the old bathtub and then knelt facing him with everything she felt in her eyes. “So do I, Tate Jordan. So do I.”

They rode back that night after seven, and Sam was intensely grateful that she knew Caroline had gone to dinner at another ranch. Otherwise Caroline would have been frantic. But the day had slipped past them, with their chatter and their laughter and their loving, and now as Sam came back to the main ranch house she felt a sudden loss at not being with him. It was as though someone had severed her right arm. It was an odd feeling to have about a man she had known for so little time, but isolated as they were from the rest of the world, there was something special and intense about their feelings, and she found herself longing for him again as she sat alone in the empty house. Caroline had left her a note that expressed concern at her long absence but not panic, and she had also left a warm dinner on the stove, which Sam only picked at before going to bed at eight thirty and lying there in the dark, thinking of Tate.

When Caroline came home that night with Bill King beside her, they tiptoed stealthily into the darkened house, and Bill went immediately to her room. Sam's presence in the house had made things a little awkward, and Caroline had to remind him every night not to close the front door so hard, but he didn't hear. Now Caroline walked softly down the hall to Sam's room, opened the door, peered into the moonlit darkness, and saw the beautiful young woman asleep in her bed. She stood watching her for a moment, feeling that her own youth had come back to haunt her, and then silently she walked into the room. She thought that she knew what was happening, yet as she had known it for herself, it was something that couldn't be changed or stopped. One had to live one's life. She stood there for a long time, gazing down at Samantha, her hair fanned out on her pillow, her face so unlined and so happy, and with tears in her eyes, Caroline reached out and touched the sleeping girl's hand. It did nothing to wake Sam as she lay there, and on still-silent feet Caroline left the room again.

When she returned to her own room, Bill was waiting in his pajamas and taking a last puff on his cigar. “Where were you? Still hungry after all that dinner?”

“No.” Caroline shook her head, oddly quiet. “I wanted to make sure that Sam was all right.”

“Is she?”

“Yes. She's sleeping.” They had thought so when they saw the darkened house.

“She's a nice girl. That guy she was married to must've been a damn fool to run off with that other woman.” He hadn't been impressed with what he'd seen of Liz on TV.

Caroline nodded silent agreement and then wondered how many of them were damn fools. She to have let Bill force silence on her for two decades, keeping their love for each other a secret; Bill for living like a criminal, as he tiptoed in and out of her house for more than twenty years; Samantha for falling for a man and a way of life that were both as foreign to her and possibly as dangerous as jumping off the top of the Empire State Building; and Tate Jordan for falling in love with a girl he couldn't have. Because Caroline knew exactly what was happening. She sensed it in her bones, in her gut, in her soul. She had seen it in Sam's eyes before Sam even knew it, sensed it on Christmas when she saw Tate look at Sam while she was busy doing something else. Caroline saw it all, and yet she had to pretend that she saw nothing, knew nothing and no one, and suddenly she didn't want that anymore.

“Bill.” She looked at him strangely, took his cigar away, and set it down in the ashtray. “I want to get married.”

“Sure, Caro.” He grinned and fondled her left breast.

“Don't.” She brushed him away. “I mean it.” And something suddenly told him that she did.

“You're senile! Why would we get married now?”

“Because at our age you shouldn't be sneaking in and out of our house in the middle of the night, it's bad for my nerves and your arthritis.”

“You're crazy.” He lay back against the headboard with a look of shock.

“Maybe. But I'll tell you something. By now I don't think we'll surprise anyone. And what's more, I don't think anyone would care. No one would remember what or where I come from, so all your old arguments are nonsense. All they know after all this time is that I'm Caroline Lord and you're Bill King of the Lord Ranch. Period.”

“Not period.” He looked suddenly ferocious. “They know you're the rancher and I'm the foreman.”

“Who gives a damn?”

“I do. And you should. And the men do. There's a difference, Caro. You know that after all these years. And I'll be damned”-he almost roared it at her-“if I'll make you a laughingstock. Running off and marrying the foreman-the hell I will.”

“Fine.” She glared at him. “Then I'll fire you, and you can come back as my husband.”

“Woman, you're crazy.” He wouldn't even discuss it. “Now turn the light out. I'm tired.”

“So am I…” She looked at him unhappily. “Of hiding, that's what I'm tired of after all these years. I want to be married, dammit, Bill.”

“Then marry another rancher.”

“Go to hell.” She glared at him and he turned off the light, and the conversation was ended. It was the same conversation they had had a hundred times over the last twenty years, and there was no winning. As far as he knew, she was the rancher, and he was the foreman. And as she lay on her side of the bed, her eyes filled with tears, her back to him, she fervently prayed that Samantha would not fall hopelessly in love with Tate Jordan, because she knew that it would end no differently than this. There was a code that these men followed, a code that made sense to no one but them, but they lived by it, and Caroline knew that they always would.