“I’m getting a sense of that. I’m beginning to see what a place like this means to someone like you. And Jake. I just don’t know if I could take it for the rest of my life. I mean there are places to see, people to meet, new projects to design. I love to travel. I love the excitement.”
Opal smiled. “You know I remember telling my Henry the same thing.”
“You? I thought you were from a ranching family.”
“No, I married into it. I was a school teacher in Portland. I grew up there. I met Henry at a rodeo, and that’s how it started. I adapted. I loved Henry so much I would have followed him to the end of the Earth. And then some.”
“Didn’t you want to marry again?”
“No, it took me years to get over losing Henry, and then it was too late to have kids, and I never found that kind of love again.” She smiled impishly. “Not that I didn’t have offers. So you and Jake might have a future together.”
Opal finished her drink and went to bed. While Fiona finished her drink, she thought over their conversation. Maybe she did have a future here. Maybe she could be a settling down kind of woman like Opal.
Jake was up at first light which at that time of the year in Harney Valley was before four in the morning. He made coffee and took a mug to the office to start his computer work. He had a good idea who had worked for them, but he wanted to look at the list he had kept on who they employed and when. He set up a spreadsheet, a column for relatives and a column for outsiders.. He had a hunch that it was Walt and Ralph back to their old tricks. He hoped Hoover would find something on them. He had a feeling they might be in cahoots with one of the family. Walt and Ralph had gotten to Cody. They could have done the same with another of Opal’s relations.
He had had his own problems with the family. Some had the old prejudice against Native Americans. He was part Native and looked it. That brought it out in them. He guessed they didn’t think an old half breed could run a ranch.
The other complicating factor was that Opal had a reputation for taking in wayward cowhands and making something of them. He was one. There were probably at least half a dozen in the list that may have reverted back to their old ways. You could never tell what was going to turn a man one way or another.
He sighed, looked at his empty coffee mug, got up and went to the kitchen for a refill. The stuff was going to hit the fan, but Opal and he had agreed that the paperwork would all be finished on his buying the ranch before anyone knew. It was sneaky, but they couldn’t figure any other way.
The sun peeked over the eastern ridge as he poured another mug. The breeze coming in the open windows was cool, but he could tell by the dry feel to the air that it was going to be hot, hot, hot. And they needed rain, rain, rain. He turned at the sound of footsteps. Fiona stood in the doorway to the kitchen in her Beavers sweat suit. Did the woman ever not look good? It was probably his eyesight. He should have his eyes checked. Maybe he needed glasses.
“Good morning,” she said.
He smiled. “Isn’t this the middle of the night for you?”
“Yes, but I couldn’t sleep. I’ve been awake since two. I heard someone in the kitchen and thought maybe I could get a cup of coffee.”
He smiled, poured her a mug, and handed it over. He went about making a fresh pot. Her presence put a brighter shine on his day. He hoped he wasn’t too obvious. He couldn’t help he liked everything about her.
She sat at the kitchen table. He leaned against the counter while the pot of coffee brewed. He was afraid to get any closer. He wanted to touch her so bad.
“Opal and I had a good talk last night,” she said.
He felt his heart seize up. Fiona was going to leave. He watched as she played with her coffee cup, drawing slow circles on the old worn table top with it. He couldn’t stand the tension but he waited, fearing the worse.
“She’s going to give me a formal deed to the place on the knoll. I’m going to rebuild. “
Jake couldn’t help the big grin that spread across his face. He felt like a boiler about to explode he was so happy to hear that. Letting out a big sigh to take off some of the steam, he said, “I’m glad.”
Fiona smiled. “I’m glad you’re glad. I like it here. I don’t know if I’ll stay all year round, but at least I can have my little getaway place up there on the knoll overlooking your ranch.”
If that was all he could have, he was happy for now. “Please keep the thing about my ranch to yourself until we settle, and I have the title.”
“I will. Opal said that things will get touchy with the relatives when they find out.”
Jake shrugged. “Maybe. We can hope for the best. She’s trying to work out some kind of a trust. The difficulty is where she draws the line of who is included. It’s like trying to decide who gets the wedding invitation. There are probably forty or so relations, and the cash divided that many ways won’t be as much.”
“Why does Opal want to accommodate them?”
“I guess she loves them, bickering lot that they are, and it has to do with the way she wants her will drawn up. I’m not sure she’ll be able to anticipate everything. A few want the ranch. Her niece, Tillie, comes to mind. But most will be happy with the cash. It would all go to Henry’s relations. Nothing goes to her side because the ranch was Henry’s. His relations would have a fit if they had to share it with even more people.”
Fiona rose and poured another cup of coffee. She was so close, Jake could smell her sleepy self but he restrained himself from pulling her against him.
He said, “I better get back to the computer. Then I have to get to the impossible task of inventorying cows.”
“I could help.”
He smiled. “You sure could. I’d like that. Go get your buckaroo outfit on while I finish up with my paperwork. Are you ready to get back up on a horse?”
Fiona smiled. “I’ll give it a try.”
Jake couldn’t stop smiling as he bent over the computer. He hurried to finish the list and email it to Hoover, who was supposed to go up in a plane today to get a better lay of the land and see where the road went that the rustlers used. Hoover had been at his job for a long time, but he told Jake that nothing much changed. He had started out in the early days chasing cattle rustlers, and he was still at it.
Jake hustled out to the corral to find Sweet and have him saddle up Harriet. He caught Blitzen and saddled him. Both horses were standing ready at the corral gate when Fiona came out. She sure filled out clothes nicely.
Sweet went with them, and they rode back and forth across the 160 acre fenced pasture where they had moved the cows and calves, checking ear tags as they went. They needed an accurate count on which cows and calves were missing.
“Stay close to me,” Jake told her. “I’ll call out the ear tag numbers, and you check off the number on the list.”
“I think I can do that.” She took the clip board he handed over.
The job went faster with the three of them, and they were done in time to ride back to the house for lunch. Jake was impressed with Fiona’s calmness around the animals for a woman from the city. Maybe she could fit into life here. With him.
Nine
Opal replaced the phone on the receiver and stared out the window. It was the call from her doctor she had not wanted. The tests had come back. She had leukemia. That was why she had felt so tired and so exhausted these last few months. She had thought it was only from having to deal with Albert’s death and his estate. No, it was because weird little cells in her blood weren’t working right. The doctor wanted her to come to see him that afternoon. She was not to drive by herself.