“Then why not resign now?”
Meade grimaced and explained the trade he had made with the army—a course in surgical procedures for two additional years’ service.
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“And what will you do when that time’s up?” she asked.
“Become a gentleman rancher,” he announced grandly, and Rayna had to laugh. “What’s so funny?”
“I’m trying to imagine you pulling a bog or culling calves,” she said, chuckling at the image. “I don’t expect you know a branding iron from a salt lick, do you, Major?”
Meade couldn’t believe how good it felt to see Rayna genuinely amused. “I most certainly do. And as for pulling bogs, I said I wanted to be a gentleman rancher, remember? I’ll leave the pulling and culling to the experts.”
“While you sip fine wine on the veranda?”
“Exactly.”
“You’ll be bankrupt within a year,” she predicted.
“Not possible. What I don’t know about ranching might fill an encyclo-pedia, but my brother-in-law, Case Longstreet, is a genius—in more ways than one,” he added cryptically, thinking of the prediction Case had made several months ago. He had been absolutely right about Crook’s impending return. Astonishing.
“So you’re going into business with your brother-in-law?” Rayna asked.
“I already am. When Case married by sister, Libby, eight years ago, we jointly purchased a large plot of ranchland. Between the two of us—my capital and his know-how—the ranch has done very well. It’s not as grand as Rancho Verde, but then, few places in the Southwest are.”
Rayna’s smile thanked him for the compliment. “What’s your ranch called?
Where is it located?”
“It’s called Eagle Creek, and it’s located just west of the White Mountain and San Carlos Indian reservations.”
“Really?” she asked, impressed. “I’m amazed that anyone would deliberately choose a location adjacent to a reservation.”
Meade finished off the last of his wine. “Actually, the choice of location was Case’s.” He hesitated a moment, then became a little angry with himself for being embarrassed to admit the truth. “You see, my brother-in-law is a full-blooded White Mountain Apache. He was orphaned when he was twelve or so, and he was raised by a frontiersman named Jedidiah Longstreet. Case always maintained his ties to his people, though. He’s considered something of a legend among them, in fact.”
Rayna’s smile widened. “It seems we have something in common.”
Meade could have gone on to tell her that he was very reluctantly related to an Apache, but it would have required more explanations than he wanted to delve into at the moment. “Apparently so,” was all he replied.
She asked him other questions, general ones about the time he’d spent in the army and why he’d chosen the military over a practice as a private physi-101
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cian. She’d inquired about his sister and the remainder of his family. Though Meade’s answers were somewhat superficial, what emerged was a portrait of an idealistic young man whose outlook on life had changed drastically, courtesy of the harsh realities of being an army surgeon. He had become a cynic who felt he had grown old before his time. His only real joy in life, it seemed, was his sister Libby and her small family.
“Why have you never married?” Rayna asked, hoping he wouldn’t take offense at the personal nature of the question.
“Marriage is not an institution that appeals to me,” he replied, then turned the tables. “And what of you? Why aren’t you making some poor man’s life a merry hell?”
She bit back a smile. “My opinion is much the same as yours, Major. It’s not an institution that appeals to me, and I’ve yet to encounter a man I respected enough to make me change my mind.”
“You mean you’ve yet to encounter someone stout enough to handle you.”
“I don’t want to be handled, sir. If I ever marry, it will be to someone who treats me as a partner and an equal. Frankly, I don’t see that happening. I’ve worked alongside my father running Rancho Verde for as long as I can remember, and that is all I want from the remainder of my life. Thus far, the only men who have expressed a serious interest in me have been those who were anxious to become Raymond Templeton’s heir.”
“I find that hard to believe,” Meade said, studying the graceful slant of her brow and the sculpted set of her jaw. “No young man could look at a woman as beautiful as you and see only land and cattle.”
The compliment momentarily robbed Rayna of the power of speech. “Th-thank you,” she stuttered after a moment.
Meade cursed himself for having given voice to his thoughts. “No thanks are necessary. I was merely stating the obvious. I just meant that if you’ve failed to attract the right sort of suitor, it’s because of your personality, not your looks.”
That was a subject that had become something of a joke between them, and he was obviously trying to lighten the mood because she’d taken his compliment too seriously. Had Rayna not been so emotionally vulnerable, the comment might have rolled off of her as so many of his others had, but in this instance she felt as though he’d slapped her.
“Excuse me, Major, but it’s time I left for the train station,” she said, slipping her chair back from the table.
“Rayna, wait, I’m sorry,” he said, realizing that he’d hurt her. “I meant what I said as a joke.”
“I know,” she replied. “It just didn’t come out that way.”
“I apologize.”
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“No apology is necessary.” She rose, and Meade stood up as well. “Thank you for supper, Major. And for all the other kindnesses you’ve shown me.” She offered him her hand, but Meade refused to take it.
“I had planned to see you to the train station.”
“You don’t have to trouble yourself. You’ve done too much already.”
“It’s no trouble,” Meade insisted. He couldn’t possibly let her go like this.
Seeing that it was pointless to argue, Rayna waited while he settled the bill. In the lobby he hired a porter and sent the man on up to Rayna’s suite to collect her bags while he ordered a carriage.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to make one more turn through my room to make certain I haven’t forgotten anything,” she told him.
“Of course.” Meade stayed at her side as she went upstairs. They encountered the porter as he was coming out of the room, arms laden, and Meade instructed him to deliver Rayna’s things to the carriage out front.
He waited near the door as Rayna walked through her quarters, and he noted that when she came out of the bedchamber she was carrying a book.
“Did you strike gold?”
She held up the volume. “Elizabeth Barrett Browning. I left it by my bedside.”
“Browning?” Meade craned his neck to see the book. “You’re a romantic after all, Rayna.”
He was trying to be friendly and polite, but she was in no mood to be teased. “It’s Skylar’s favorite,” she said defensively.
“But not yours?”
“Now, what would a woman with my prickly personality and prospects want with a book of romantic poetry?”
Meade sighed heavily and looked down at the floor. It was a moment before he looked up again. “I apologized for that, Rayna. I thought we had progressed beyond the point of contention on this issue, and I certainly didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“I’m not hurt.”
“Yes, you are, and understandably so. I was callous.” He took a step toward her. “Now, tell me you forgive me so that we can say good-bye at the train station like the good friends we have become.”