Page 86 of Texas Glory
She rubbed the back of his hand, remembering the many times she’d done so as a child, wondering now when he had acquired the hand of a man. Even relaxed the veins bulged, the muscles appeared strong.
“Are you happy, Dee?”
Sighing, she closed her hand around his. “Yes, I am. Dallas is … fair.”
He jerked his head back. “Fair?”
“I don’t know if I can explain it. He never expects more of his men—of anyone—than he’s willing to give. He’s up before dawn, working, and he labors into the night. He talks to me, but more he listens. I don’t know if I’ve ever had anyone truly listen to what I had to say.”
“Do you love him?”
She shrugged and spoke as wistfully as her brother had only moments before. “Maybe.”
She glanced up at the pounding hooves of an approaching rider. Dallas drew his horse to a halt beside Cameron’s.
Cameron leapt off the steps. “I need to go,” he said, bussing a quick kiss across Dee’s cheek. “Can’t you stay for supper?” she asked.
“No, I—”
“Your sister wants you to stay,” Dallas said, his voice echoing over the veranda.
Cameron nodded quickly. “Then I’ll stay.”
“Doesn’t anyone in your family eat?” Dallas asked as he watched Cameron and Austin ride away from the ranch, heading for the saloon in town. The hostility between the two that he’d first noticed when they’d sat for dinner had abated during the meal. “Your damn prairie dog eats more than he does.”
“He was just a little uncomfortable—”
Dallas turned toward her and raised a dark brow.
She dropped into the rocking chair and folded her hands in her lap. “You terrify him.”
Dallas hitched a hip onto the railing. He needed a porch swing with a bench that wasn’t too wide so he could sit next to Dee and enjoy the evening breeze as night moved in. As soon as the cabinet maker set up shop, Dallas would order one, specially made with his new brand carved into the back.
“Reckon you understand that feeling.”
She smiled. “I also know what it isnotto fear you.”
He couldn’t argue with that. If she still feared him, maybe she wouldn’t have been so quick to kick him out of her bed.
He liked the sight of her sitting on his veranda. It felt right, like the breeze that turned his windmill. The gentle wind that blew her little chimes.
Reaching up, he touched the various lengths of barbed wire that Dee had strung together and hung from the eaves of the veranda, the eaves of the various balconies. They clinked in the wind. She had touched his life with an abundance of small gestures.
“Walk with me,” he said.
She rose and followed him down the steps. In companionable silence, they strolled toward the setting sun.
He thought about taking her hand, but after last night, he wasn’t exactly sure where he stood, and it would gouge his pride if she didn’t welcome his touch.
He had spent thirty-five years sleeping alone, and suddenly he desperately wanted something that he couldn’t even put a name to: the filling of an emptiness that he’d discovered within himself last night only after it had overflowed with contentment as he’d lain in her bed, holding her within his arms, listening to her soft breathing.
He almost found himself hoping that he hadn’t given her a son.
“I’m not carrying your son.”
Dallas snapped his head up and looked across the table at his wife, her gaze locked on her cold eggs. Austin had left only a few moments before, leaving a heavy silence in his wake, a reticence shattered by her words.
“Are you sure?”
