Free Dorothy Garlock - [Wabash River] by Yesteryear Page B

long moment their eyes locked—blazing violet burning into dark blue fire. A thought came to John that immediately doused his anger and caused him to smile. He remembered his father saying that John Spotted Elk had said that a woman needed taming like a horse. Keep a strong hand on the bridle, pet them a little, and they would not mind the halter. But let them get the bit in their teeth, and they would make a man miserable and themselves too.
    His smile seemed to make Addie all the more angry. Silence swirled around them as their eyes did battle.
    “I’m sorry if I riled you, Mrs. Hyde. It isn’t often that I offer my services to a lady. If they’re not wanted . . .” He turned to walk away.
    “Wait!”
    John turned back. Color had drained from Addie’s cheeks. Her eyes were wide with distress, but she looked steadily at him. Oh, God, but she was pretty. He realized that suddenly he was feeling things he had never felt before, had never dreamed of feeling. His heartbeat surged as a fierce wave of longing, an enormous desire, washed over him.
    “You want to say something more?” he said gruffly, because he felt that reality was slipping away.
    “I’m sorry—” The words came in a tormented whisper from her tight throat. “It’s just that I’ve not had time to sort things out.”
    “I’m thinking you don’t have much time.”
    “I . . . know.”
    “I’ll speak to the magistrate. I can tell him better than you can what kind of man Renshaw is.”
    “Thank you.”

CHAPTER
    *  6  *
    J ohn rode away from the farm cursing himself for a fool for allowing the warm feeling of joy to come over him when he held Addie Hyde’s hand as they said goodbye. She had awakened something in him that had not even been stirred before—something that left him restless and excited. John had been intimate with a few women. He had never felt the urge to go back to any of them.
    He remembered the clear, honest way Addie had looked at him when she thanked him, the graceful movements of her body when she had moved back from the horse and taken her son’s hand. There was quality to Addie Hyde; she was like a sleek handsome Thoroughbred.
    Hell, he thought. He couldn’t afford to be interested in a woman a thousand miles from home. Her roots were here on that farm where she had lived all her life. Why couldn’t he have met such a woman in Santa Fe?
    He kicked his horse into a canter. He would forget her once he was on his way home. He would do what he could to help her keep the orphans, then he would ride on.
    My obligation will be over.
    At the livery, John unsaddled his horse and put him in a stall.
    “Give him a little grain,” he said to the old man sitting outside the door with his feet on a stump. He flipped a coin, which the old man failed to catch but bent to pick up out of the dirt.
    A rider came from the corral side of the livery.
    “You leavin’?” the old man asked.
    “Nope.” The rider’s eyes were on John. “You John Tallman?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Thought so. Met ya once over at Fort Gibson in the Nations.”
    John studied the man. He wore a brown and white cowhide vest even though the day was hot. His hat was wide-brimmed and turned up in front. He was big, thick-chested, and had legs like tree trunks. He was so tall that his stirrups hung below his horse’s belly.
    “Don’t recall,” John said.
    “Been five or six year.” The man leaned over to spit on the other side of the horse. “Didn’t have all this face hair then. Name’s Jerr Simmons. Ya might of knowed me as Buffer Simmons.”
    “Hunter?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Well, good day to you.” John stepped around the horse and headed for the main part of town.
    “Strange feller,” the liveryman said. “Ain’t much of a talker.”
    “But a hell of a fighter.”
    “What’s he doin’ here?”
    “Damned if I
know,
but I got me a idee.”
    The big man put his heels to the horse and rode away leaving the curious liveryman disappointed that he