He couldn’t look at Amanda without seeing the knowledge in her eyes, the tears she’d spent for him, the quiet concern.
The truth.
He’d tried to see it her way, that he really hadn’t had any other choice. He’d tried to think past the old humiliation the town had unknowingly inflicted. But he had more than twenty years’ worth of experience to overcome. He had a guilt the size of those mountains out there to face. And he was just too tired of facing it anymore. He wanted to live his life the way it was, work his horses, ride his land, visit with the people who knew him and didn’t expect anything from him that he couldn’t give.
He was teaching one of the fillies about saddles. They’d progressed past the saddle blanket. Today, Jake would cinch up one of the lighter saddles and let the animal get used to it. By the looks of her laid-back ears, it would take a little sweet-talk.
Jake could afford sweet-talk for a horse. A horse didn’t expect things from him he couldn’t give. A horse worked you hard, demanded your attention and your best efforts. This yearling was a bay filly named Lazy Susan, a sharp, fiery little thing who would probably be perfect for speed events when she got a little more sense and a little less sass in her. It was Jake’s job to take care of both without taking the spirit right out of her. It was what he liked to do best.
Today, though, his mind wasn’t on her. As he eased the saddle down onto her back, his mind was on green eyes. His memory was plaguing him with promises and demands. With offers so seductive that a man couldn’t be expected to ignore them just for work. Offers that had nothing to do with that lithe body that had danced with his the night before. That had everything to do with the delicious appetite of the mind inside. The experience, the knowledge.
Jake wanted what Amanda had. He wanted her intelligence, her hungry curiosity, her insight and humor. He wanted to see the world through her eyes and hold her hand while he was doing it.
He wanted desperately to read her words.
He’d stood all alone in his room this afternoon, the copy ofSimple Giftsin his hands, Amanda’s glossy picture looking back out at him from the back jacket. Amanda in her other persona, her professional self, where she wore classic, tailored clothes and where her hair looked like a corona around a bright sun. He’d stroked the pages as if they were the rarest of silks, running his blunt fingers over the print, the letters blurring before his eyes, the meaning forever locked away from him.
This was as much a part of her as her laughter, as the way she cocked those fists on her hips when she was determined about something. This was a window into that deep, sweet soul of hers, and he wasn’t allowed to see in. It threatened to break him when nothing else in thirty years had.
“Call out the press. Jake Kendall spends time with a horse.” Jake didn’t bother to look around from where he was stroking the filly and bribing her with a little grain as she skittered beneath the unfamiliar weight.
“Hello, Lee. Have a nice time up at the cabin?”
“I had a great time. Did you know that Great-Great-Grandma Barkins was a pow-wow woman?”
Jake remained eye to eye with his charge. “Is that right?”
“It’s a fact. Back in Kentucky before they came out to the territory.”
“I know you’re dying to tell me what a pow-wow woman is.”
“You’d probably already know yourself,” his sister taunted,“if you’d ever thought to go through all that stuff locked away in the attic.”
“I wasn’t the only one who grew up in that house.”
She laughed behind him, and the sound was delighted and light. Teasing, taunting. Usual stuff. Amanda hadn’t given him away.
He was going to have to live the rest of his life waiting for it.
“When was the last time you let me in the attic?” Lee demanded playfully.
Jake couldn’t help a smile. “The day I caught you and Tommy Helpern playing doctor.”
“Tommy Helpern’s in premed now,” she teased. “I imagine we could really work up a good game if we tried.”
“Not if you want him to make it to med school,” Jake retorted easily, hiding the fear, just as he’d always done. Showing one thing, being another.
“Do you know what a pow-wow woman is?”
“The person with the concession for Indian war dances?”
“Very funny, Jake. This is your own family we’re talking about. Your history. Don’t you care?”
“Of course I care, honey. But unless pow-wow women knew how to exorcise psychotic palominos, it doesn’t make much difference.”
“You still haven’t given Sidewinder back?”
“I’ll be able to ride him again in a week or so.”
