Page 91 of Texas Splendor
“There, just rub your hands in front of the stove.”
“I’ll be all right,” she assured him.
He smiled and leaned low. “I’ll warm you up all over when we get home. How’s that for a promise?”
She returned his smile. “I’ll make you keep it.”
He touched his finger to her nose before turning to Cameron. “You still carry violin strings?”
Cameron’s face split into a wide grin. “You playing again?”
Austin shrugged. “A little. Now and then. When the music comes over me.”
Loree listened with half an ear as their conversation continued. She had once known a man named McQueen, but Cameron didn’t favor him in the least, not in looks or temperament. Maybe they were cousins or distant relatives or had nothing more in common than the same name.
She rubbed her hands together and almost imagined she saw the blood—bright red, glistening in the moonlight. “Austin, could I please have my gloves back?”
“Sure.”
He handed the thick gloves back to her, and she slipped her hands inside. She always felt safer when her hands were covered.
“Did you want to get that rattle you were telling me about?” he asked.
She nodded and forced herself to stand on trembling legs. She glanced at Cameron. He gave her a warm smile that calmed her fears.
No one as nice as he was could be related to the devil who had murdered her family.
“Oh, come on, Loree. Please!”
Loree pursed her lips, crossed her arms over her stomach, and fought hard to resist the plea in those mesmerizing blue eyes. He’d replaced the string he’d broken two days before, and no longer had an excuse not to practice. “No. Not until you’ve mastered this.”
Austin slumped back in the chair like a petulant child and started to randomly pluck the strings on his violin. “It’s such a boring song. Just the same sounds over and over and over. No wonder Rawley hated his piano lessons.”
“You can’t play the complicated songs until you’ve learned the easy ones.”
He sprung forward. “Take pity on me, and just let me try. If you’re right … I’ll go back to ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’ … unless I kill the lamb first.”
Loree couldn’t stop her laughter from bubbling up. How could she expect a man who played from his heart to be content with other people’s music? For the first time, she was catching true glimpses of the young man he had been before he went to prison.
When he awoke at dawn, he still carried his coffee out to the porch and sat on the top step, but instead of staring into the distance, he’d tuck his violin beneath his chin, and Loree would hear the sunrise as well as see it.
She knew the sound of twilight and midnight … and her husband’s easy laughter. The ranch chores that had once exhausted him no longer phased him. He came home, anxious for her kiss and her arms around his neck. Through his gift, he would give her an accounting of his day until she could hear the bawling of the cattle he’d branded or the snap of the barbed wire he’d mended. He might not be a man who could explain things with words, but with his music, he had the ability to create worlds.
Against her better judgment, she unfolded a more complicated piece of music and slapped it down in front of him. “There. Play that.”
Eagerly, he scooted up and studied the sheet of music. Then he took a deep breath, lifted his violin, and without shifting his gaze from the notes, he began to play—the most beautiful melody she’d ever heard.
She sat in awe, watching his fingers coax the notes from the strings, following the path of the bow as he stroked it—slow and long—over and over. It was little wonder that the man was skilled at stroking her.
She lifted her gaze to his only to find his eyes closed, his expression serene. He stilled the bow, opened his eyes, and met her gaze.
“You were right,” he said quietly. With a sigh, he tossed the sheet of music aside and turned his attention back to the tune he’d been playing earlier.
“I was wrong,” she said as she pulled the sheet away from him. “What were you playing?”
“Did you like it?”
“I thought it was beautiful.”
