Free Rose by Leigh Greenwood

Rose’s willingness to stand up for herself.
    He remembered her profile as she moved to put away the dishes. He felt a familiar warmth begin to stir in his groin. Odd she should set him off so easily. He had met hundreds of women before and during the war, some of them very beautiful,some of them ready to do just about anything for the son of tall, handsome, infamous William Henry Randolph, and he’d been able to ignore them all.
    But he couldn’t ignore Rose.
    He remembered the endless trip from Austin, the hours he spent trying to concentrate on the ranch, the numberless times his eyes had sought her out, the struggle to keep the heat flaring inside him out of his voice, his actions, his every thought.
    It was like that now. Everything faded until he could see nothing but Rose, think of nothing but Rose, want nothing but Rose. It was like she had bewitched him, made him do things he didn’t want to do.
    It would be so easy to reach out and touch her.
    And so stupid!
    “Does George know you’re out here?”
    “I told him.”
    “What did he say?”
    “I didn’t ask.”
    Monty chuckled. “You don’t mind getting into the middle of any kind of fight, do you?”
    “I don’t like fights,” Rose answered, surprised he would say such a thing.
    Monty laughed again. “You throw a whole dinner on the floor because you don’t like our manners. Then you bring me dinner after George and Jeff have exiled me, and you say you don’t like fights.”
    “George didn’t exile you.”
    “Yes he did—he and that sanctimonious prig.”
    “You must try to be patient with Jeff.”
    Monty made a rude noise.
    “Losing an arm must be a terribly difficult thing to accept. As for George, he was only trying to see that you treated me properly. He didn’t enjoy sending you from the table.”
    “I can’t believe that.”
    “You should. He’s the one who told me where to find you.”
    “Why would he? He doesn’t care whether I go to bed hungry or not.”
    “You’re wrong. He also told me I’d better bring your dinner in a bucket or the dogs would get it before I got halfway here.”
    Rose was exhausted, but she couldn’t sleep. She had twisted and turned in her bed until the sheets were in a knot and the thin blanket had fallen to the floor. She listened for any sound, but silence had settled over the house more than an hour ago. She doubted she would have heard the men even if they’d been talking loud. The house didn’t look like much, but it had been very well built.
    She had locked the kitchen door below. She wasn’t sure whether she was keeping the men out or herself in, but she needed the security of knowing she was safe from rustlers.
    Monty was sleeping out. It seemed one of the boys always spent the night somewhere in the brush. It was a little like standing watch. That made her feel better, but it also worried her. She had never feared attack, not even during the war. Now nothing but Monty stood between them and the dreaded Cortina. And Hen, who shot people when they tried to take their cows.
    And George. Rose didn’t imagine that George liked shooting people, but she couldn’t see him allowing anybody to harm his family or take his property. And for the time being she was part of his family. Knowing that made her feel safer than she had felt since her father left for the war.
    George felt strongly about his family—as far as Rose could discover, it was the only thing he did feel strongly about—but she didn’t see them showing a similar interest in him. They didn’t realize they had a corridor straight to his heart, that everything they did, everything they wanted, everything that hurt them affected George, sometimes more than it affected them. Jeff and Monty would soon forget their fight. They would have other fights. They wouldn’t remember any of them for very long.
    But George would. He would agonize over ways to bind the family together while they mindlessly went on tearing it apart. It made her so