Page 33 of The Enchanted Land

Morgan remembered how she had felt today, awakening beside the water in Seth’s arms. For an instant she had felt warm and safe. But she realized now that all he had cared about was seeing her without her clothes. As she drifted off to sleep, she wondered what Seth had thought when he saw her nude. “Probably thought I looked like a boy compared to Cynthia Ferguson,” she murmured, before she fell asleep.

In sleep, his arms enfolded her and held her close to him. Morgan was getting used to having his body near hers, to feeling his breath close to her ear.

Joaquín was the first to notice Seth’s and Morgan’s new attitude toward one another. He had seen several changes in them already. At one time they had looked at one another with an expression akin to love. Now they never seemed to look at one another at all, though Joaquín had noticed Seth staring wistfully at Morgan a few times.

From the moment Joaquín saw Morgan on the stairs of the hotel in Kansas City, he had known she was beautiful. He had been surprised that it was not treated as a fact, and generally accepted by everyone. It amazed him that all men couldn’t see her beauty just because of ill-fitting clothes, and that rather sad look about her. There were times when that expression left her face, and she held her head up, and her shoulders didn’t drop. Ah! Then she really was beautiful.

Colter, thought Joaquín, you’ve had everything all your life, but you won’t have it all much longer. No, Nuevo Mexico will soon belong to us again. His lips curled. He lifted his coffee cup to Seth in a simulated toast.

After crossing the Arkansas, the group had taken on a tension that hadn’t been there before. Seth or Frank constantly rode ahead to check for signs of Indians. Each night the campfires were smaller, and there was little conversation. At the snap of a twig, someone jumped toward the sound with a rifle or gun.

They were over halfway there now, and Morgan longed for the jolting days to stop.

“Morgan, I’m glad to see you holding up so well under the strain,” Frank told her one night.

She managed a smile. “My father seemed to think New Mexico was worth all this.” Her hand swept toward the blackness outside the little camp.

“Oh, yes, Seth mentioned your father. What was his name? Maybe I knew him.”

“Charles Wakefield. He had a ranch somewhere around Albuquerque, I believe.”

Joaquín listened carefully. Seth was on watch, and Jake was on the other side of the wagons.

“Charley Wakefield!” Frank nearly shouted, and then quieted his voice. “I knew your father—no wonder I liked you from the moment I saw you. Your father was a hell of a man. It really made me sad to hear he’d left us. Seems like a lot of the good ones die young.” He looked at Morgan with a puzzled expression. “I always wondered why Charley never married.”

Morgan had never heard her father mentioned in favorable terms before, and she wanted to hear more. She stared at the fire. “Tell me what he was like.”

“He was a good man and a hard worker. I didn’t know him until he’d been around for some time, but I heard he built up his ranch from practically nothing. It’d take a man a week to ride the borders of his land.” Frank smiled. “I worked as a hand for him some years ago. Charley wasn’t like most of those rich boys; he joined right in and worked alongside us. He could rope a steer with the best of ’em.” Frank stared at the fire in silence. Then he added, “Sure never heard him mention a wife or little girl, though.”

“My mother took me back to Kentucky when I was very young.” Morgan’s response was stiff. It was difficult to feel kinship with a man who had made her marry and leave her home against her will.

Frank sensed Morgan’s hostility and wondered about it. “You sure missed a lot by not living out here. This country’s got more excitement in one day than the East has in a year.”

A bit later on that night, she slipped to the side of camp to sit on a rock and stare at the stars. Joaquín’s voice startled her.

“There are no stars in the East like there are out here, are there?”

“No, I guess not. But it seems a high price to pay for stars.”

Joaquín smiled, his teeth white in the moonlight.

“I was raised out here. To me the East is too unchanging. There is no surprise, no adventure.”

“You have a ranch, too, like Seth’s?”

Joaquín chuckled, and there was a tone of contempt in his voice. “I have a ranch, yes, but not like the Colter one. The Montoya ranch is several times larger than his, and it has been in my family for generations.”

“Do you live there alone?”

“No,” Joaquín answered, “I live with my sister, Lena.” When one of his riders had told him about Lena and Colter, he had wanted to kill her. All she had done was laugh at him. He had vowed then to avenge himself on Colter one day.

“Tell me, Morgan, do you hate our West so much?” His voice had a slyness that Morgan missed.

“Yes!” was her vehement answer. “I hate this dust and the constant danger and … and…” Her eyes involuntarily went to the west where she knew Seth was on watch.

“And your husband?” Joaquín’s voice was very low.

“Yes.” Her voice was resigned, and Joaquín realized that she was close to tears.

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