Chapter One
The size of the big ranch house and the property itself belied its condition. The paddock fences were unpainted and rotting, the barn was inches from falling apart and the paint on what had once been a showplace of a home was peeling and curling in the strong Colorado sun. It was definitely suffering from the lack of a strong leader. Granted, when the Mister was healthy, it wasn’t as if he was a part of the operation, really, but he certainly wasn’t hesitant to throw money at it.
But it had been a while, and the lack of attention definitely showed. There was an old saying that you could tell who was really in charge on a farm by which was better taken care of: if the barn looked nicer than the house, then the husband was in charge. If the house looked better than the barns, then the wife ruled the roost.
That didn’t work on the Circle C Ranch, because its owner had been overly concerned with appearances above all else. Both the barns and the big house had gleamed, and the place had swarmed with more hands than were really necessary.
Nowadays, though, there was barely enough money to pay a small handful of men, and everything was being done on a shoestring. There wasn’t a piece of equipment left that wasn’t jury-rigged to within an inch of its life, because there simply wasn’t enough money to replace it if it died.
Since the Mister took sick, the foreman, Cooky, had had to handle the ranch by himself while Miss Rose took care of her husband as best she could.
Which was where he’d come in.
He was doing as much as he could with what he was provided, which wasn’t much. There was too much land and too many cattle for too few hands. He wasn’t the type to shy away from a hard day’s work, and he’d known this place was a loss when he’d signed on, so he had no one to blame for the back breaking work but himself. But it was getting to the point of a diminishing return, and he really should be thinking of moving on. This place couldn’t last much longer, and he should be leaving now to beat the rush of hands that were going to find themselves out of work within the next six months.
But he couldn’t seem to make himself leave, which was highly unusual for him. He’d never had any problems moving on from anywhere before – even away from his blueblood family back East. He snorted. That was the easiest move he’d ever made. At twenty eight, he’d had more than enough of his mother’s meddling and his father’s lack of backbone in standing up to her, but the last straw had been the discovery that the respectable fiancé he’d let his parents choose for him was making absolutely no attempt to keep her liaisons with a stable boy in her parents’ employee under wraps.
He’d allowed himself to be guided into a mutually beneficial marriage agreement because he hadn’t much cared one way or the other about whether or not he got married, but it was of paramount importance to his mother and his family, as their financial fortunes were shrinking due to his father’s incompetence. Bella was pretty enough, he supposed, and he was trying to make an effort at being a better son than he had been in the past.
That was his first mistake, Quinn thought to himself.
He’d had heard the rumors about Bella, but kept his suspicions to himself as he investigated the matter, finally encountering the couple in the loft of her parents’ stable. He called her down immediately and broke off the engagement in no uncertain terms as she stood there shaking, hair askew and hay clinging to hastily arranged skirts.
That was his second mistake.
He should have dragged her – and the miscreant who hid like a coward in the loft – in to her mother’s front parlor and had witnesses to the incident. Instead, Bella created a vicious storm of gossip, telling her parents after he’d dismissed her and left, that he’d attacked her, and she’d feared for her virtue.
He’d snorted when he’d heard that. What virtue?
The fact that she’d been cheating on him hadn’t bothered him in the least, which should have been a clue to him that it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to marry her, but he was still trying to do the right thing, trying to be the son his mother wanted, which was a lost cause he’d refused to acknowledge at that point. But the rumors damaged the entire family’s reputation, giving him the excuse he needed to leave. Without him around as a constant reminder, the tongues would cease wagging.
His parents practically packed his bags for him, and, the moment he was out of sight of that stuffy mausoleum they called a home, he felt as free as he had when they’d sent him to his Uncle’s in Arizona in the summer, and he’d wondered why it had taken him so long to leave.
Since then, he’d been a riverboat gambler in Mississippi, a Texas Ranger in Arizona, and an itinerant ranch hand, depending on where he was and what he wanted to do. He’d amassed a bit of a fortune gambling, and that had pretty much supported his other endeavors, which was a good thing since Rangers weren’t given much beyond the opportunity to get shot. It was a job he’d loved, but he’d decided, after a series of bad injuries laid him up for quite a long time, that he wasn’t willing to die for the job any longer, so he hired on as a hand wherever they’d have him.
Luckily for him, Uncle Remy had had a huge ranch, much to his sister’s – Quinn’s mother – disgust, and he’d spent all of those long, wonderful summers on horseback, learning how to run a ranch, and he was no lay about. If any foreman was reluctant to hire him, he always offered to work the first week for free, and if they didn’t like how he worked, he’d leave immediately. Most had begged him to stay after only a day or two.
But this ranch needed more help than any twenty of him could supply. It seemed that everything he touched was either already broken or well on its way. Quinn looked up from trying to dust off his chaps and jeans with his dingy gray hat, despite the fact that he knew it was a losing cause, and saw her carrying that man by herself again, placing him more gently into the rocker than he deserved by far, from what he understood about how he’d treated her when he was well.
That woman needed to be spanked. There was just no way around it.
He'd told her not to do it, but she'd gone and done it again, right in front of him, as if he'd never said one word to her.
Quinn's jaw set hard as stone and his chin lowered as he started towards the veranda. Anyone who knew him would recognize that look and get the hell out of his way, and several men who valued their lives did just that, even after a relatively short acquaintance.
When he reached her, she was still fussing over the old man, bent at the waist and presenting him with a wonderful view of her fine – if too thin for his liking – figure. He could smell the sunshine on her clothes, as well as whatever soft perfume she used. It was almost enough to distract him from his intent . . . but not quite.
“I thought I told you not to do that by yourself?”
The voice was unmistakable. The new man Cooky had hired hadn’t been here long, but he’d certainly managed to make an impression on everyone in a short time with his autocratic ways. Rose straightened, noting the twinge of the ever present crick in her back that she despaired of ever getting rid of, but didn’t turn around. That man had to learn that she no longer had to answer to anyone, least of all him.
“Mr. Hamilton, I’ll thank you to remember that you are employed by me, not vice versa.”
He reached out and grabbed her upper arm in a grip that he might have intended to be merely firm, but was going to leave bruises, she could tell. Rose’s lips pursed. She was somewhat of an expert on bruises, unfortunately.
It was impossible to resist being turned around to face him; he was much too strong for that. He was also inappropriately close to her, so that she could feel heat of him even though several layers of clothing. She could see the deplorable condition of his Stetson, and the angles of his dirty, tanned face. His shirt didn’t look like it was in much better condition than his hat, and his jeans were stained with things she’d rather not think about.
Still, she had to admit that her nose wasn’t burning the way it did around most of the cowboys who worked for her, and she thought she might even be able to detect the slightest hint of bay rum, which was certainly a pleasant surprise.
That was more than she could say about the look on his face, though, and she had to stop herself from taking an automatic step back when she met those cold black eyes. There was no mercy in them. None at all.
Seconds later, she found herself in the living room, draped unceremoniously over his lap, and being spanked like a recalcitrant child.
It was exactly what he’d warned her he’d do when he’d confronted her yesterday.
Since Alan had deteriorated so badly, and had been stuck in their bedroom for so long during the winter, she had taken to carrying him down to sit him on the veranda. He had long since lost enough weight that she could lift him with relative ease. He really was just skin and bones, despite all the good food she and Lilah tried to get him to eat. Rose wasn’t even sure that he knew that he was in a different place, but she figured the sun and fresh air couldn’t hurt.
No one had offered their assistance – not that there was anyone, really. Lilah was pretty much the only other person in the house, and she was too old to offer much beyond advice, but she had agreed that it could only help the Mister. Rose figured that as long as she made sure that the blankets were trailing on the floor, so that she didn’t trip, and she took the narrow stairs slowly and carefully, they’d be fine.
And they had been. That was until the new hire decided to butt into a situation that had nothing to do with him.
Quinn had seen the mistress of the house bring her ailing husband out onto the porch only one other time, while he was on the way out to the range and couldn’t do anything about it. Yesterday, however, he was just crossing what passed for the lawn on the way to the bunkhouse and he’d seen her bump her way backwards through the door, barely able to keep him secure in her arms as she carefully made her way to a big wicker rocker that had been generously padded with pillows and an old quilt.
There was no doubt about it; that man was on his way out. But that didn’t mean he was light as a feather to lift, especially for a woman as small as Miss Rose. She was a tiny thing with in well-worn dresses, with her strawberry blonde hair always piled on her head. Quinn was surprised to find himself rising at the idea of taking all of the pins out of that beautiful mass.
But right then, what made him madder than a wet hen was the fact that there were at least five other men in the yard, and not a one of them had offered her any sort of help.
He didn’t even remember crossing the yard, and got there after the fact anyway, but did manage to help her straighten the man’s limp body into some semblance of an upright posture.
Startled by the deep brown hands that reached out before she could to adjust Alan into a more comfortable position, all she could think to say was, “Thank you.”
She continued to make small changes here and there, knowing that he needed to be in certain positions to avoid the bedsores that could become infected and take him so quickly. When she’d finally finished, and turned to go back inside, she was surprised to see that the new man was still standing there, his hands on his hips, looking like he wanted to break something.
“Can I help you, Mr. Hamilton?” she asked softly.
“Indeed you can, Ma’am.” His mother’s years of training him to be a gentleman sometimes came in handy, such as when he quickly doffed his hat in deference to the lady. “You can help me by letting me help you. I’d be glad to carry the Mister down here any time you like. You just let me know.”
Rose’s open mouth snapped shut from astonishment, and she truly didn’t know what to say to him. She was so used to doing things alone that her first thought was one of blessed relief. To have someone assume any of the burdens she faced daily would be wondrous. But then she thought more practically and realized that that could never happen. It would be entirely inappropriate of her to allow a hired man into her bedroom for any purpose, and she had enough to do with the concerns of impropriety that had followed her from Denver. She wasn’t going to give the old biddies of Brentwell anything more to gossip about on her account.
It had been so long since she’d smiled that she could barely remember how to. Nevertheless, she bestowed a small one on him, saying, “I thank you for your kind offer, Mr. Hamilton, but I’m truly not in need of any assistance.” How had she learned to lie so glibly? Had it been her time with Alan that had made her this way?
With that, he was dismissed, and she took a step towards the door that had her running directly into him. How had he moved so fast?
“I beg your pardon, Ma’am, but I feel I must insist.” A courtly sounding sentence with underlying steel.
Her eyebrows rose. Cooky had liked this man, and had hired him without consulting her. She had complete faith in her foreman, but this oaf’s behavior was beginning to make her reconsider. Rose’s eyebrow’s rose. “Mr. Hamilton - “
“Quinn, Miss Rose.”
Nodding quickly, she tried to brush past him, but he was no gentleman to yield the way to her. Instead, she brushed up against him in the most indelicate of manners, only because he refused to move. Rose stepped back automatically, lifting her skirts so that no part of her person was in contact with him. She was barely able to suppress the shudder that threatened to set her knees trembling and her teeth chattering.
But she wouldn’t. She couldn’t show weakness in front of the men, and most especially not this one. Cooky was really the only permanent man she had. Hired hands weren’t the most trustworthy of sorts, most of them only signing on for a season or so, sometimes just for roundup, and their backgrounds were always suspect. This one more so than most, if one believed everything one heard, and he certainly looked the part of the gunslinger everyone was cackling about him being.
His jaw couldn’t possibly have clenched any tighter without shattering. It was obvious what she thought of him; the help wasn’t nearly good enough to be in her presence. Funny, he was usually a pretty good judge of character, and he wouldn’t have thought she’d been so much of a bluenose, but he guessed one could never tell.
Regardless, he wasn’t going to have her – or any other woman on this ranch – doing what a man should rightly be doing. And if he needed to take her in hand to impress on her how serious he was about that, then so be it. He’d certainly done worse in his time than take a stubborn woman over his knee.
Setting his hat back just a little, he made sure to catch her eye before saying unwaveringly, “Miss Rose, I won’t have you doing this when you could trip or fall or drop the Mister on your way. Call me the next time you need him moved, or I’ll blister you bottom so that you’ll wish you had.”
He was halfway across the yard before Rose could calm down enough to even think of a response. Her open mouth was fit to collect flies. That was one of the strangest conversations she’d ever had in her life. None of the men but Cooky had spoken to her since Alan had been overcome, and even before then, Alan’d certainly never said anything that showed any care or concern for her. He just barked orders and screamed at the top of his lungs, red faced and fists balled to strike out with lethal accuracy at the least provocation.
It was strange to think that someone was watching out for her. It had been so long . . .
Regardless, someone needed to take that man down a peg or two. She didn’t know who or how or when, but she knew she needed to speak to Cooky about him right away. She wasn’t going to have an employee of the ranch acting like he owned it, and threatening her with – well, with physical harm if she didn’t comply with a rule of his own designed. It wasn’t supposed to work that way. She was his boss, not the other way around.
After a quick glance at Alan, she flung open the squeaky screen door and marched through the foyer and into the dining room, breaking out the silver to polish it so furiously it was a wonder she hadn’t whittled it down to a nub by the time she was finished.
She had to admit that it was actually a very nice offer, originally. It was a very gentlemanly thing to do, and one that no one else had seen fit to make since Alan had taken sick. She – with some help from Lilah – had seen to his every need since that terrible night, unflinchingly and uncomplainingly. But by the end of the conversation, he’d somehow decide that he could dictate to her what she could and couldn’t do, and that was where she drew the line.
No one was ever going to tell her what to do again. No one. Certainly not a stranger in her employ.
Just who did he think he was?
That next day, with both ends of her burning bright red, she screamed the same question at him, not that he bothered to answer, and not caring that the windows were open and both her castigations of him as well as her irate screams of pain were being carried outside to anyone who cared to cock an ear.
And it seemed there was quite an audience gathering.
Cooky, who had been in the barn and hadn’t heard any of the commotion, was just about to open his mouth to yell at the men, who were all standing in the front yard, gazing towards the house with prurient interest, when they all heard an ear piercing scream from the house. Unlike the rest of them, that set him to running, hell bent for leather, into the house.
It was Miss Rose herself, and she sounded like she was in trouble. No one tried to stop him, but no one came with him, either, as he bolted and took the porch steps three at a time, guided by her screams, until he found himself in the front parlor. The scene before him was just about as bizarre as it could get. Quinn, the newest man he’d been able to hire, was sitting on the faded settee, looking like the cat that swallowed the canary while Miss Rose did her best not to hop around clutching her severely scorched bottom. Cooky’d known the woman for more than five years, and he’d never heard her so much as raise her voice.
But now she looked fit to spit nails, directly at the man looking so self-satisfied on the divan.
Rose didn’t know how she was going to live through this moment. She’d never, ever been that embarrassed in her life. Everyone had heard what had just gone on. Everyone. And she knew that everyone in town would know about it within the next day or so, as if the town didn’t already have enough to gossip about in her case.
Barely keeping a hold of the slim thread of her control by consciously taking a deep, slow breath, Rose turned to Cooky and said in a deathly calm voice, “I want that man off my ranch. Now.” She didn’t wait for a response but walked slowly and deliberately into the foyer and up the stairs, leaving Cooky standing there scratching his head and wondering how he was going to keep the ranch afloat when the boss lady had just told him to fire his best man.
He swiped his hat off his head and rubbed the sweat off his forehead and onto his dirty sleeve. “Well,” he began, jamming the hat back where it belonged, “I reckon you’d better get to the bunkhouse and grab your gear.”
Quinn rose slowly. “Cooky, you and I both know that I do the work of four men around here, and I know almost as much about ranching as you do.” Quinn was careful to give the older man his due. He probably knew more than Cooky, but he wasn’t going to point that fact out to him while he was trying to keep his job here. “You can’t afford to lose me.”
Cooky was agog. Yes, they needed him. Quite desperately, in fact. But the big man had spanked the wife of the man who owned the ranch, who was, because of his incapacitation, the de facto boss of the operation, and yet expected to keep his job?
Quinn knew that the foreman agreed with him, whether or not he was willing to admit it, but all Cooky did was clench his jaw and stalk out into the yard. Quinn followed, snatching his disreputable beat up hat from where it lay on the settee and pausing at the bottom of the staircase to glance up once, quickly, then he, too, entered the yard.
Jenson, the loudest and laziest of the men, confronted him immediately. “What you go and do that for? The Missus done nothin’ to deserve a whuppin’, especially not from you.”
Quinn took one step towards the lout, and that was enough to make him take several steps back. But Jenson wasn’t the only man who felt like that. “Where were you these past months when I wasn’t here?” The accusatory tone in his voice was more of a promise than a threat. Scorn dripped from every word as he met every man’s eyes, shaming them into staring at their boots. “There’s not a man among you who noticed that that poor woman’s been carrying a man who, even wasted away as he is, is two thirds her size, up and down stairs like that? And not a one of you offered her a lick of help? Not even you, Cooky?” he raised his voice to include the man who was just inside the barn, trying to figure out what the hell he was going to manage roundup with so few men.
Quinn turned and stomped into the barn himself, his snort of disgust disbanding the would be mob. He stopped short next to Cooky, not deigning to look at the man. “I’m not leaving, and you can tell Miss Rose that yourself.”
Would you like to read more? The Rogue and the Rose is currently a "weekly" story on Bethany's Woodshed, updated each week until completed. Click HERE to Join and you'll be reading more within minutes.
