With that she passed on through the stable doors. Chase angrily put his gun away. Jeb’s scratchy chuckling only made him angrier. In fact, he couldn’t remember when a female had ever made him so mad, and he wasn’t going to put up with it.
He went after Jessie, catching up with her halfway between the stable and the house. Too late she heard him coming up behind her, and before she could react, he had jerked her to a stop, getting to her gun before she could and throwing it across the yard.
“We’ll talk,” Chase said brusquely.
“The hell we will!” Jessie shouted each word just a little louder than the last. Before she had finished, she was swinging a fist at him.
Chase caught her wrist and jerked it up behind her back, then went for the other one and did the same, leaving her feet kicking at him. “You were only half-right back there,” he told her sharply. “It’s not that I wouldn’t dare shoot you, kid. It’s that I wouldn’t want to. But I’m not opposed to giving you a richly deserved spanking if you don’t settle down.”
Jessie stopped all resistance instantly and relaxed against him. Chase held her like that, waiting for her to calm down a bit. As he waited, he became acutely aware of her body. Confusion set in. How old had Rachel said her daughter was? Eighteen! She was full grown, even if she didn’t act it and her clothes hid the fact. Soft, full breasts were pressed against his chest. No wonder he was beginning to respond to the closeness.
Chase swore softly and set Jessie away from him, holding her wrists in front of her. He looked her over, seeing the alluring curves he had missed before, the way her pants fit like a second skin, the way her shirt strained against her breasts.
“Are you ready to behave now?”
Jessie’s head was lowered, and she seemed subdued. “You’re hurting me,” she said.
He relaxed his hold. The second he did she jerked loose and started running for the house. When he caught up with her, she had reached the porch steps. This time he was fed up. Jessie screamed when he sat down on the steps and pulled her across his lap. She squirmed with all her might, trying to face him, yet he kept pushing her down. She kept screaming.
Rachel heard the yelling, and when she rushed to the porch and saw, she was shocked. “Stop it, Chase!”
With his hands full of a hissing, spitting wildcat, Chase couldn’t turn to look at her. He said angrily, “She deserves it, Rachel!”
“That’s not the way to handle Jessica, Chase.” She came around to face him. “Now let her up.”
Chase stared hard at her, and slowly some rationality returned. “You’re right. It’s not my place to discipline your kid, no matter how much she needs it.”
He let Jessie go, and the moment her feet were planted firmly in front of him, she hauled off and socked him on the nose. He was so surprised that she was able to run past him and into the house before he could react. He growled and got up to go after her.
Rachel caught his arm. “Let her go, Chase.”
“Did you see what that little bitch did to me?” he shouted furiously.
“Yes, and it was no more than you deserved,” Rachel told him sharply. Then she said in a calmer tone, “She’s a young woman, Chase. You can’t manhandle her like you did.”
“Young woman, hell! She’s a spoiled brat.” He felt his nose, and his hand came away smeared with blood. “Is it broken?”
“Let me see.” Rachel felt around the edges and along the ridge and shook her head. “I don’t think so, but you’re bleeding pretty badly. Come inside, and I’ll take care of it.”
Chase stepped through the door, but he did so warily, as if he expected Jessie to be waiting to clobber him again. Rachel saw him looking around and said, “The door to her room is open, so she has probably taken off out the back.”
“If you mean Jessie,” Billy Ewing volunteered, coming up the hall, “she just left on Blackstar.”
“She’s probably going off to sulk,” Chase said.
“Jessie?” Billy scoffed. “Nah, she’s got work to do. She said so, when I asked where she was going. What happened to you?”
“Never mind!”
“Boy!” Billy cried as he turned around and went back down the hall the way he had come. “You never get a straight answer out of grownups.”
Rachel smiled after her son. He was so different from her first child. Having the love of two parents made such a difference. Billy was so good-natured, not at all like Jessica. It was all such a shame.
“You can’t get straight answers out of willful little chits, either,” Chase grumbled.
“What?”
“Did your daughter happen to tell you where she went? When did she get back?”
“Five days ago,” Rachel replied. “And no, she wouldn’t tell me where she’d been. I tried to talk to her, but she accused me of only pretending to be worried, of putting on an act. She said it was none of my business and I’d had no right sending you after her. I really think she was most angry about that, that you went after her.”
“I’m beginning to think your Jessica is perpetually angry. You want to know why she took off that night? It’s because I was here.”
“Did she tell you that?”
“She didn’t have to,” Chase replied. “She happens to be the kid I told you about, the one who sent me off in the wrong direction that day, lying to me. That’s why she left, I’m sure. She didn’t have the guts to face me after she saw I’d made it here after all.”
“But, Chase, you said that girl was with a man, that they were—”
“I know what I said. But that was Jessica, one and the same.” And then he added spitefully, whether he believed it or not, “I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s where she was that whole week, with a man somewhere.”
“You’re going too far, Chase Summers,” Rachel said defensively.
“Okay, but what are you going to do about her? You are her guardian, Rachel. Her father left her in your care. Are you just going to let her run wild?”
“What am I supposed to do when she won’t talk to me? She doesn’t believe I care about her. How do I reach her when she hates me?”
“I’ll tell you what I would do.”
“I’ve seen what you would do,” she said sternly. “And that’s not the answer. There has to be some other way.”
“You ought to just find her a husband and get her off your hands. Let someone else worry about her.”
Rachel didn’t answer, but she looked at him thoughtfully. An idea began to take shape in her mind, an idea Jessica wouldn’t have liked at all.
Chapter 6
“HAVE you seen my sister?” Billy asked Chase as he joined him on the porch.
“Not since yesterday,” Chase grunted. “At least this time your mother didn’t ask me to go after her when she didn’t come home last night.”
“But she did come home,” Billy said. “It was late, but I heard her come in and go to her room. I missed her this morning. I was hoping she would let me ride with her today.”
Chase smiled at Billy’s enthusiasm. “I take it you like it better here than the city?”
“Well, sure! Who wouldn’t?”
“I kind of like city life myself.”
“But you’ve been out West a long time, at least that’s what Mother said. This is all new to me.”
“And what about your schooling? As I remember, that was one of the golden rules in the Ewing household—thou shalt be educated, or suffer the consequences. Or has that changed now that Jonathan Ewing—” Chase stopped, cursing himself for his stupid blunder. Why had he said that?
“That’s all right.” Billy rescued him. “Father’s been dead three years now. It doesn’t hurt to talk about it anymore. But as for schooling, I wish you hadn’t reminded me. Mother was saying she’ll probably send me back to Chicago soon, since the nearest schoolroom is a day’s ride from here.”