Noelle. Diana Palmer
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family kept a carriage and a horse at the local livery for use on special occasions. Andrew was forced to ask Jared’s permission to use it, now that Jared was in residence. It rankled.
Jared agreed, because he had no engagement of his own that evening. “Are you taking Miss Brown?” Jared asked pointedly.
Andrew was glad, given that angry stare, that he could deny it. “No. She refused, and I have to admit that I’m a bit relieved,” he added. “She has no social sense, you know, and she dresses like a serving woman. Her one saving grace is that delightful body. She’s very well formed, don’t you agree?” He smiled.
Jared’s eyes narrowed. “I haven’t paid that much attention to her body. I’ll remind you that she’s a guest in our home,” he said sternly. “I expect you to treat her with courtesy and respect.”
Andrew was surprised by Jared’s protective attitude, but he tried not to show it. “Why of course. But Jared, you must have noticed that she’s hardly the sort of woman a man wants to be seen with in public.” He laughed. “She’s very uncultured. She can’t even hold a fork properly.”
Jared’s unspeaking stance rattled him. In the end, he rushed out with hardly a goodbye.
Jared watched him go with mixed emotions. It had been a long time since any woman’s honor had mattered to him. He thought back to his one tragic love affair with cold cynicism. Hadn’t he learned how treacherous women were by now? But the thought of seeing Noelle ridiculed was bad enough—without worrying if Andrew would seduce her and throw her aside. It made him angry.
It certainly seemed as if Andrew had seduction in mind. His remarks about Noelle had been frankly personal. And it was all too obvious that Noelle found the younger man fascinating. She was inexperienced and smitten, a combination that would work very well in Andrew’s favor. Well, if Noelle was endangered by Andrew because she was uncultured, it was time to think about correcting that flaw. There was one appropriate way, but it was going to be up to Jared to implement it. He cursed himself for having to interfere, but as he’d said, the girl was under his protection.
Andrew had complicated his life enough in the past. Now here he was, putting more obstacles in Jared’s path. He’d expected his homecoming to Fort Worth to be uncomplicated. He should have known better. Nothing in his life had ever been uncomplicated, least of all where women were concerned.
The night of the dance arrived and Andrew left before the rest of the family sat down to the supper table. He wanted to avoid Jared, whose black looks were making him uncomfortable. But when Andrew was ushered into the house to escort Miss Beale out to the carriage, he got a look as black as Jared’s.
Beale was a self-made man who’d risen to prominence because of a knack for investing his meager savings into profitable ventures. He’d invested in a million-to-one shot that a prospector would find oil in East Texas. His small stake had made him rich when the prospector hit one of the deepest wells at Spindletop. He had money to burn.
But Terrance Beale, who was a widower, considered his elegant blond, blue-eyed only daughter his greatest asset; he didn’t want her head turned by fortune hunters. He numbered Andrew among them. He didn’t like Andrew and made no secret of it. He made Andrew nervous.
Beale, a lean and dark-faced man, glared at Andrew without speaking.
“I’ll have her home by a reasonable hour, I assure you, sir,” Andrew said politely.
“You’d better,” Beale, a man of few words, replied. He had eyes that were steely and cold.
Andrew thought absently that he’d hate to make a real enemy of the man.
“Now, Papa,” Jennifer Beale chided gently as she joined them, beautiful in her lacy black dress and scarf. “Andrew will take excellent care of me. Don’t worry so.”
The older man seemed to relax. He smiled and beamed at his daughter, then bent to kiss her soft cheek. “Have a good time.”
“Yes, I will. I’ll see you later, Papa.”
She took Andrew’s arm and squeezed it comfortingly. “I’ve so looked forward to tonight, Andrew,” she added, smiling up at him. “It’s going to be great fun!”
“Certainly it is,” he agreed. She made him feel lordly. Her eyes were as soft as Noelle’s, looking up at him from a face that would have graced an art gallery.
Terrance Beale watched them go, his eyes narrowed. He couldn’t keep the girl in a glass bottle, but he hated seeing her throw herself away on that tame city boy. She deserved better.
He stuck his hands in his pockets and wandered out to the barn. He had a sick foal and he was worried about it.
Brian Clark, a middle-aged black man with a twisted hand, smiled at him as he approached. Clark had appeared out of the dark one November morning carrying a saddle over one dusty shoulder. He’d asked for a job, and Beale, sizing him up in one long glance, had given it without question. He’d never asked where Clark came from, or why he was on foot. In spite of his handicap, Clark was good with horses and he could gentle the meanest of them. Beale had put him to work taming the remuda to a saddle, and he’d never regretted his snap decision. Clark was kind to Jennifer, too, going out of his way to make sure that her horses were the best kept in the stable.
“How is he?” Beale asked.
The other man ran a lean hand over his short curly hair. There were threads of gray in it, but that scarred face wasn’t as old as the eyes in it were. He glanced at Beale without the subservient attitude that some of his race wore like a garment. Clark was surprisingly well educated, and he had the bearing of a man who’d wielded authority. He was an odd man altogether, but Beale had always respected him.
“The foal is worse,” Clark replied. “He needs more than my poor efforts for a cure. I think you should call the veterinarian.”
Beale nodded. “I’ll have Ben Tatum come out first thing tomorrow. Will that be soon enough?”
Clark nodded. “I’ll sit up with him tonight.”
Beale bent and touched the soft coat of the foal, noting its labored breathing. “You know a lot about horses, Clark.”
“Yes, sir, I do,” Clark replied, with a faint smile.
Beale straightened, eyeing the other man. “Wouldn’t care to tell me how, would you?” he asked, with a gleam in his eyes.
Clark chuckled. “You know I wouldn’t, Mr. Beale.”
“Guess I do, after six years,” came the dry reply. “Keep an eye on him. If he gets worse, come get me.”
“I’ll do that, Mr. Beale.”
Beale nodded. He smiled to himself as he left the barn. He was the only man he’d ever heard Clark address as “sir” or “mister.” Despite the insults he sometimes got from temporary cowboys who hired on for roundup, Clark had an innate dignity that kept him out of brawls. He kept his temper when Beale lost his own. Once Beale had knocked a mean cowboy down for cursing the black man, who’d taken a quirt away from him. Clark had chided Beale for his lack of control, and then laughed at the other man’s outraged expression. They got along well, despite the disparity in their backgrounds. It occurred to Beale that if his foreman ever quit, he’d probably give the job to Clark. The man had the makings of a first-rate boss. Nobody questioned his orders about the remuda. Not even the white cowboys. Well…most of them, anyway. There were a few who didn’t like Clark, especially one bullying middle-aged wrangler named Garmon. He was from Mississippi and he hated blacks. He made remarks that Beale would have decked him for, but Clark simply ignored them. Maybe that was the best way to handle it. Beale tended to be too hot-tempered. He’d led a wild life on the border in his youth, before a pretty young Eastern girl had captured his heart and made him human. He smiled, remembering Allison, Jennifer’s mother.
He whistled softly through his teeth