Read Cactus Flower (Gone-to-Texas Trilogy) for Free Online Page B

very lonely. Don't be stupid, girl, she thought. Richard Lee is all the family you have left and he's here. Together we'll make a home in this wild new land.
     
    * * * *
     
           On the solitary ride to Bluebonnet, Charlee considered how Richard Lee would react to her unexpected appearance. She could bathe and don her gingham dress, so he couldn't yell at her. Or she could keep the trail filth and breeches. It would be armor against his inevitable proclamations that a girl couldn't survive on a ranch. However, she saw no place to bathe in security along the way, and even if she had, her only dress was dusty and wrinkled. She decided it was better to remain a grimy male urchin rather than become an ill-groomed white-trash female.
           Charlee recalled her brother's letters describing the ranch, the outbuildings, and the three clear creeks that ran through the lush rolling hills of Bluebonnet. The ranch was named for the brilliant wildflowers that covered the countryside each spring. She remembered the descriptions of his place, the foreman's cabin, tucked beneath a stand of live oaks. The small house sported a high chimney and cool dog-run porch between its two rooms. Of course, the Slades' big ranch house was lots fancier, two stories high and built of imported hardwood with all the lumber milled into clean whitewashed boards. The boss, Mr. Slade, lived there.
           Curiously, Charlee tried to imagine what he would look like. In all of her brother's letters describing the lay of the land, the buildings, and the idiosyncrasies of the cowboys, he had mentioned little of Jim Slade except that he was a war hero of sorts, quiet and hard working. Richard Lee had never described the man who had come into such a splendid inheritance, nor mentioned that he was half Mexican.
           She recalled a man she'd seen in San Antonio, lounging in the doorway of a fandango hall. He'd been short and stocky with a rounded, smiling face and dancing black eyes. Yes, Slade was probably a genial, plump, dark-haired fellow wearing a serape and sandals. She hoped he would not mind his foreman taking in an orphaned kid sister, then assured herself that there was no possible reason he should object. After all, she was a hard worker, a fair country cook, and a superb shot. She could take care of herself and hold her own with the best or worst Texas had to offer.
           When she crested the hill and saw the panorama of Bluebonnet before her, Charlee gasped. It was grand, much grander than Richard Lee's letters had been able to convey. The big house was a brilliant white frame building shaded by rustling cottonwoods and gracious live oak trees. A wide veranda stretched across the front of the first and second stories. Large neatly constructed corrals held horses and cattle. The bunkhouse stood nearby, a long, low building beneath more dense shade trees. There was a wash house, a blacksmith shed, and several other structures.
           “Lordy, I been in towns with nary so many buildings,” she breathed to herself. Then she saw the small house, behind the big bunk house, half hidden by the trees. It was just as her brother described—his place! She quickly kneed her tired old nag and eagerly trotted toward her new home.
           It was late afternoon and only a few people were around the corral. Most of the hands would not ride in until dark. Knowing she was filthy, Charlee decided she would rather face her brother alone and not risk embarrassing him in front of his friends. She rode slowly and inconspicuously through a tall stand of grass, avoiding the open road to the complex of buildings and circling to the rear of the foreman's cabin. She slid from the back of the old gray and stealthily crept up to the porch between the cabin rooms. A door stood ajar and Charlee peeked inside. Before her eyes could adjust to the dim light, a fierce, rumbling growl and a sharp tearing sound interrupted her inspection.