Lisa Kleypas - Give Me Tonight

"To North Carolina?" Addie guessed. It was where her mother, Sarah, had grown up, married, and eventually died.

"That's right. Guess you've heard 'em mention it."

He snorted. "East. Pete would feel at home there, sure enough. He's not a cowman. I'd hoped we'd make something of him when he an' Caro came to live at Sunrise. But he couldn't rope a calf if it stood still for him."

"What about leaving the ranch to Cade?"

"Cade can do whatever he set his mind to, but his heart's not here. He already wants a taste of city life, and when he gets it, he won't want to leave it. Too much like your mama. And May will see to it that her son gets a college education and winds up in a fancy office with glasses settin' on his nose and a pile of books on his desk. I hate to say it, but Texas just ain't in him. So that leaves you. But you can't inherit Sunrise, honey. No matter how smart y'are, you're just a woman."

"And that's nothing I can change," she said wryly. "So I was plannin' to do like everyone else around here, have the ranch sold off when I go, and divide the money between the ones I leave behind. You'd be a rich woman if I did that. You'd have enough money to do whatever you wanted for the rest of your life. I had it all settled in my own mind. But then Ben came along. "

Addie looked at him sharply. "What does Ben have to do with it?"

Russell smiled. "He runs the ranch as good as me. No dust settlin' on that one. When he says he'll do something, it gets done, one way or another. I like that. Man you can depend on. So I figured I'd make him trustee. That just means I'll leave Sunrise to you in trust, and he'll manage everything."

"You can't be serious!" Addie exclaimed, bug-eyed.

She was as outraged as if she were Russell's real daughter. "You're putting him in charge of your ranch, your money, and your family? He can do whatever he wants with us? Everything we have will be at his disposal? My Lord, he isn't even related to us!"

"I'm puttin' a few clauses in this will," Russell said, as if that was supposed to soothe her. "For one thing, Sunrise can't be sold off without the family's approval."

"What if Ben turns out to be a bad trustee? Can we fire him?"

"No, that's one thing y' can't change. He's trustee till he's dead and buried. But don't fret-he'll be damn good at it. I'll rest easy, knowin' I left things in his hands.

The very same hands that are going to strangle you! Addie's mind raced. Ben had the perfect motive to kill Russell. After the will was signed, he would be in control of the entire ranch and a large fortune, just as soon as Russell Warner was dead.

"Daddy, I know you trust him," she said, her voice wavering. "I know you depend on him and care for him. But it would be a mistake to put him in that position after you've gone."

"Aw, honey," Russell said soothingly, "I know you're prob'ly a mite disappointed at gettin' Sunrise in trust instead of all that money. But this is the only way the ranch won't go to pieces. Ben's my only insurance against it. I don't want my ranch to die just 'cause I have to. It's as simple as that."

"Have you told Ben yet?"

"Not yet. "

"It might be good to wait awhile," Addie murmured, and as she heard no reply from Russell, she fell silent. She tried to concentrate on the scene around them rather than go into a helpless tirade. That wouldn't do her cause any good. Later, she promised herself. There would be a chance to reason with Russell later, when she could pull some good arguments together.

The land was swarming with men and cattle, and the air was thick with dust and the smell of animals and sweat. Thousands of cattle were being treated for blowflies and screwworms, insects which settled in open wounds and fed on oozing flesh. The suffering longhorns were daubed with a mixture of grease and carbolic acid, which killed off the large maggots and relieved the animals' excruciating pain.

But the longhorns didn't know that the men were trying to help, and they reacted violently. Vicious curses sailed up the sky as the men danced out of the way of animals that had turned on them. There were clouds of dust curling, rising and settling around the moving figures, powdering the men's clothes, and sticking to their skin. All around them the cattle churned like a river of red-brown water.

Russell and Addie stopped to watch, keeping well out of the way.

"Hard work," Addie said, almost to herself. "Baking in the sun. Getting hurt so easily. No machines to help, no time to rest. Makes no sense for anyone to want to do this kind, of work. "

"Wait till the worst-tempered animals have to be dehorned," Russell said, and grinned.

"Why do they do this? What makes a man choose to be a cowboy?"

"Don't know that a man ever asks himself that. He either does or he doesn't, that's all."

"There's no glamour in it. It's nothing at all like the novels and magazines describe it. And they certainly don't get a lot of money for what they do-"

"The hell they don't! I pay my boys forty dollars a month. That's nearly ten more than they could get anywhere else in the country for the same job. "

"I just don't understand what the attraction is for them."

Russell was not listening. "C'mon, honey. Ben's over there pullin' out a steer from a boghole."

She followed him reluctantly, riding further down the pasture to the site where two longhorns were stuck fast in a boghole, having tried to evade swarms of flies by wallowing in deep mud. One of the steers was making plaintive noises, while the other was silent and exhausted, making no protest as it was pulled out with ropes tied to the cowboys' saddle horns.

Addie's lips tightened with disdain as she looked at Ben, who had tied the ropes around the longhorn. His Levi's were black with mud all the way up to his knees and beyond. It looked like he'd been doing some wallowing right alongside the cattle. Sweat made streaks through the dirt on his face and the sides of his neck, and caused the ends of his black hair to curl damply against the back of his neck. That was where he belonged, in the dirt.

"Ben seems to have gotten the worst of it today," she commented with a trace of satisfaction.

"He's not afraid of work." Russell regarded his foreman fondly. "The men respect him for it. And they know he won't ask them to do somethin' he wouldn't do himself. Hardest thing in the world, Adeline, is to work for a man you know is lazier than you are, just like it's easy to work hard for someone you respect. "

It didn't fit conveniently into her picture of Ben Hunter. After all, he would murder Russell for his own personal gain. Money the easy way. That kind of man didn't take to hard work… wasn't that true? She wasn't pleased by the discovery that Ben might have a few good qualities to complicate her vision of him as an unscrupulous criminal. She wanted it all to be cutand-dried.

If only there were someone she could talk to about him, someone to help relieve her burden of silence! Everyone was so maddeningly pleased with Ben. They admired and respected him, not knowing what kind of man he really was.

As if he could feel her stare, Ben turned his head to look at her. She was amazed by the intense color of his eyes, emerald fringed with thick black lashes, set deeply in his dark face. For a second she couldn't move, trapped by his intent gaze. Despite the distance between them, it seemed as if he could read her mind, and she felt heat rising in her cheeks. She was relieved when he finally returned his attention to the steer struggling out of the boghole.

The animal stumbled forward on unsteady legs and collapsed at the edge, having lost the will to do anything but lie there and die. Swearing, the men went to the quivering longhorn and strained to lift it to its feet. After a long struggle the men succeeded in their task, and the longhorn staggered away to find a place to graze. Leaving the others to pull the second steer out, Ben walked over to Russell and Addie, wiping his hands on the back of his pants. Addie noticed the way his smile turned cool when he looked at her, and something inside her shifted uneasily.