“You couldn’t be more wrong,” he said, staring down at her. “I invented reasons to call on your father so I could see you. I wanted to dance with you, but I’m so poor at it I thought you would refuse me. Les, I can’t remember a time when I didn’t love you.”
She faced him, sudden tears glistening in her eyes. She had waited a lifetime to hear a man say those words to her. No, she had waited for Luther to say those words. Until Freddy opened her eyes, she’d considered her feelings for him so hopeless that she had pushed them far far away. Eventually, she had turned elsewhere and had almost made the worst mistake of her life.
Gazing at each other in amazed delight, they stood on the prairie, their hands lightly touching. “Oh, Luther. I’m so happy.” And then began the rush of lover’s questions.
“When did you first know…?”
“How could I not have guessed?”
“What if…?”
“I almost spoke that time you…”
And suddenly it was dark. Supper had come and gone, the drovers had drifted to their bedrolls. And still they had not said all there was to say. Les suspected they never would.
Blazing with surprise and happiness, feeling the rightness of him, of them, she clasped his hands and gazed into the love shining in his eyes. “Luther? Are you ever going to kiss me?” The brazenness of the question shocked her, then she let it go. She was not the same timid, unsure girl she had been before this journey. A woman had replaced that girl, a woman who knew what she wanted and was not afraid to reach for it.
Grinning, he pulled her close. He kissed her tenderly, gently, as if she were a fragile porcelain creature who might shatter if he applied too much pressure. When he eased back, anxiously scanning her face, Les sighed. She was going to have to lead him every step of the way. Rising on tiptoe, she wound her arms around his neck, pressed her body hard against his, and kissed him with all the fire and passion she had been saving for a lifetime. This time when their lips parted, he looked stunned. But only for a moment. His hands tightened on her waist then slid to her buttocks and he caught her up against him. When his lips crushed hers, his kiss was as passionate as she had dreamed, a kiss like none other she had ever received.
Breathless and feeling her heart beating hard against her chest, she blinked. “I think we’re getting the hang of this.”
Laughing, he folded her into his arms and pressed her against his heart. “Say you’ll marry me, Les, I beg you. I want this to be the shortest courtship on record. I’ve waited long enough.”
Easing back in his arms, she lifted her fingertips to his lips. “Luther, will you ever wonder if I accepted you because we lost the contest, and I had no way to support myself?”
“Is that why?”
“No. I want to marry you because I love you.”
He cupped her face between his hands. “Oh, my dearest. Then you will marry me, and make me the happiest man on earth?”
“Oh yes,” she said, laughing and throwing her arms around him. “Yes, yes, yes!”
Someday she would tell him about Ward. What their relationship had been, and all that had happened. But not now. Tonight was for love and the wonder of discovery.
An hour before dawn she stumbled toward her bedroll, and as she sat down to jerk off her boots, she suddenly remembered her shift on night watch. With a guilty start, she began to rise, then Freddy pushed up from her pillow and squinted at her.
“I took your shift,” she muttered sleepily. “Are you still a virgin?”
Shocked, Les stared at her. “Of course! You are so vulgar, Freddy.”
“Too bad,” Freddy said, dropping back on her pillow. “About the virgin part, I mean.”
Laughing softly, Les crawled into her blankets and smiled up at the fading stars. Freddy’s rude question kept returning to her mind, making her feel warm all over and remember Luther’s kisses. He was right. The wedding needed to be very soon. Perhaps in Abilene.
“Pa?” she whispered, looking up at the velvety sky. “Thank you. This cattle drive is the best gift you ever gave me.” She’d found something far better than an inheritance. She’d found herself. And her sisters. And Luther.
“You know,” Freddy said, striding up to the chuck-wagon table. She slid her noon plate into the wreck pan and watched Alex cut chunks of meat for their supper stew. “I used to think you were smart.”
“Is that right?” Alex asked drily. “So what happened to change your mind?”
“The stupid way you’re behaving. For a person who has to be right all the time, you’re wrong about a lot of things. Maybe it’s time you thought about that.”
Alex looked up from her worktable and frowned in surprise. This was a familiar argument with roots twisting into their childhood. She’d believed this hard journey had changed her relationship with her sisters and laid to rest old conflicts. “What are you talking about?”