The Genuine Lady (Heroines on Horseback) Read Online Free Page B

no laughing matter.
    And a woman like that, too pretty by half: what was she doing out here alone, anyway? Jared shifted uncomfortably in the saddle and resisted a nearly painful urge to look over his shoulder. Too pretty by half, hah, she was stunning. Those eyes… a queer light blue, with a dark ring around them, like the sky in the spring. All he wanted was one more look… but no, he wouldn’t. Jared resolved to be strong. A woman, especially one with a temper like a snake’s, was the last thing he needed in his life.

CHAPTER THREE

    The Professor’s breakfast was a greasy delight of sausages and fresh eggs, to be washed down with a black bitter brew he swore was coffee. Jared, who ate it whenever he was in Bradshaw overnight, was fairly certain it had a lot to do with his constant bad temper. But a bachelor kitchen was a sorry thing, and a cabin on the prairie a lonely one. Jared spent some of his nights in town to get away from the quiet, laying down his head in a room at Miss Rose’s. Miss Rose set a real pretty table, but her girls were always giggling and giggling got on his nerves, so he dragged the weakly protesting Matt down to the saloon most mornings to break his fast and work on his hangover.  
    Matt, as usual, recovered much more quickly from a night ill-spent than Jared did. Jared supposed this was because Matt was a cheerful drunk, and he was just a gloomy one. There was nothing really to be cheerful about, in Jared’s estimation. He’d gotten tired of cattle drives, and wanted a ranch, so he’d filed a claim out here in hopes of putting cattle on that good green grass. It wasn’t a place he’d ever planned upon settling, but it had made a lot of sense at the time, and now here he was. It was good enough land. He had the cattle. He’d plant some wheat where he could irrigate. He’d asked Michael Wassbaum, the town’s attorney, if that crazy neighbor-lady he’d met last week could actually sue him for diverting the creek, and Wassbaum had said she couldn’t, and that was about the sum total of his life right now.  
    But Matt, who had no claim and no land and no worries, Matt was prattling on now about some party. A party! Like they were schoolgirls, or Galveston debutantes out in their billowing white dresses, pretending they were royalty. Jared just hated royalty. And parties. And debutantes. And Galveston. He wished Matt would quit talking about going back. It wasn’t going to happen.
    “I hear there’s going to be a genuine lady at this party of Patty’s,” Matt announced with some delight. “Patty Mayfield said so just now, over to the store. She said it’s going to be some…” he paused to remember the word. “Some swar-ray . Fancy, like Back East, with nice clothes and a punch bowl. On account of the genuine lady she met. In the store. Buyin’ pickles, she said.” He thought. “Even genuine ladies like pickles,” he said wonderingly.  
    “We got ladies enough,” Jared said absently. He was absorbed in a month-old newspaper some cowboy had left lying around, and barely paying attention to Matt, who was no better than a fool most days anyhow. “Seems every week another one gets off the train looking for a husband. Don’t know why everyone wants to get excited about this one.”
    “Not some schoolmarm,” Matt scoffed. “A Lady . An English lady, the kind you got to bow and kiss her hand. Patty Mayfield said she talks like she has something wedged in her throat. Said she talks real fancy.”
    Jared looked up from his newspaper, suspicion rising in his thoughts. “She say where this lady lives?”
    “Just she has a claim in the district. Don’t know why she’s out here. Don’t know much about her at all, except she’s a widow. That’s why Patty Mayfield is throwing her a party. So everyone can talk to her.”
    A widow! Well, that would explain why she was alone at the claim… although not why she would have thought it would be a good idea to actually be on a