Free Patricia Potter by Lawless Page A

people mattered, and they were all safe.
    But face ravaged, eyes red, he would accept none of it. Brady said he would ride bareback to town and obtain a saddle, then find Jupiter. After that he would leave the ranch, the town, perhaps even the territory. He had caused enough trouble.
    “But we need you,” Willow had protested.
    Brady laughed bitterly. He remembered hearing a voice saying, You sure as hell don’t need any enemies. The words had pierced his half-conscious mind and had stuck there. They would never leave him.
    “Please, Brady,” Willow begged.
    His head aching, his throat burning, and his stomach cramping, Brady turned and looked at her. “You have enough problems without me, Willow.”
    “But—”
    “And now it seems you have someone to help you.” Brady remembered little about the morning, only arms lifting him and dropping him, and those few words. But Chad had filled in some of the blank spots. The boy was bursting with admiration for the heroic stranger who seemed always to appear in time of need. Brady wished like hell he could remember something of the man, but the earlier hours of the day were only painful blurs.
    He did ascertain from Chad that the man meant well. He was probably just a cowhand who had wandered onto the farm for water and then had checked back to see if everything was all right. There was a certain code in the West about helping women and children.
    Perhaps the man could help Willow against Lobo. Maybe it would be even better if she moved back to town, where Sullivan could watch over her. One thing Brady knew for sure: he himself wasn’t of any use, not to her, not to himself, not to anyone. It was time he moved along.
    So he shook his head gently at her next protest. “I’ll find Jupiter,” he said with finality, “and then I’m leaving.”
    “But where will you go?”
    He shrugged. “A drunk doesn’t care where he is.”
    There was so much self-accusation, so much self-hate in his eyes that Willow wanted to cry for him. But she didn’t. Pity wouldn’t help anything.
    “But I’ll find Jupiter for you first,” he promised.
    Willow nodded, her mind working. She would find a way of making him stay. He had been doing so well. He had even been happy in a small way. Sallie Sue adored him, and the twins often followed him around. Only Chad, who’d seen too much drinking in his own father, was wary.
    After Brady had left, Willow and Chad went out to the still-smoldering ruins of the barn. There was nothing salvageable, not even a stray piece of lumber. Her credit was already stretched to the limit at the store because of the seed, and if there wasn’t rain, she would lose that too.
    She thought very briefly about Alex’s offer for the ranch, and even Gar’s, but a sale to either would mean a bloodbath in the valley. She had to find another way.
    As Chad looked after the horses, she thought again about the man who had helped them, and the magnetic force that had flowed so vibrantly between them. He was not handsome in the traditional sense, and yet the face was strong and compelling. She wondered how a smile would look upon it. He seemed to have precious little experience with that. She had never seen eyes quite as protected as his, or a mouth quite as grim.
    Yet he had risked his life for them three times now, declining even thanks.
    Like Odysseus, he seemed to come from nowhere to confront obstacles and disappear as quickly. She wondered if he had a Penelope waiting for him. It was a shattering thought and one she didn’t wish to dwell upon. Not, she thought, that it made any difference. He certainly had shown little interest in her as a woman. And who would want all the trouble that came with her? A ready-made family, a run-down ranch in the middle of a feud, and one disaster after another.
    But she knew a need and want she’d never known before, a feeling of unfulfillment that was new, an aching that wouldn’t go away.
    The doctor arrived almost at dusk and was