Palomino (4 page)

She grunted disapproval and then chuckled softly through her tears. Is that what they call it? Yeah ' She pulled away from him, sighed, and wiped the tears from her cheeks. Maybe I do need a vacation. And then, valiantly swinging her hair back over her shoulders, she attempted to glare at her friend. But not for the reasons you think. You bastards have just worn me out.

You're damn right we have. And we have every intention of doing so again when you return. So enjoy yourself while you're out there. Horse freak. A hand on both their shoulders suddenly made them both turn.

Haven't you left yet, Samantha? It was Harvey, pipe clenched in his teeth and a bright light in his eyes. I thought you had a plane to catch.

She does. Charlie grinned at her.

Then put her on it, for chrissake. Get her out of here. We have work to do. He smiled gruffly, waved the pipe, and disappeared down another hallway as Charlie looked at her again and saw the sheepish smile.

You don't really have to put me on the plane, you know.

Don't I? She shook her head in answer, but she wasn't paying attention to the art director, she was looking at her office as though for the last time. Charlie caught her expression and he grabbed her coat and bags. Come on, before you get maudlin on me. Let's catch that plane.

Yes, sir.

He crossed the threshold and waited, and with two hesitant steps she followed him. With a deep breath and one last glance behind her she softly closed the door.

The plane ride across the country was uneventful. The country drifted below her like bits and pieces of a patchwork quilt. The rough brown nubby textures of winter fields drifted into snowy white velvets, and as they reached the West Coast there were signs of deep satiny greens and rich shiny blues, as lakes and forests and fields ran beneath them. At last, with a fiery sunset to welcome them, the plane touched down in L.A.

Samantha stretched her long legs out in front of her, and then her arms as she looked out the window once again. She had dozed most of the way across the country, and now she looked out and wondered why she had come. What point was there in running all the way to California? What would she possibly find there? She knew as she stood up, tossing her long blond mane behind her, that she had been wrong to come all this way. She wasn't nineteen years old anymore. It didn't make any sense to come and hang out on a ranch and play cowgirl. She was a woman with responsibilities and a life to lead, all of which centered around New York. But what did she have there really? Nothing nothing at all.

With a sigh she watched the rest of the passengers begin to deplane, and she buttoned her coat, picked up her tote bag, and fell in line. She had worn a dark brown suede coat with a sheepskin lining, jeans, and her chocolate leather boots from Celine. The tote bag she had brought was in the same color and tied around the handle was a red silk scarf, which she took off and knotted loosely around her neck. Even with the worried frown between her eyebrows, and the casual clothes she had worn on the trip, she was still a strikingly beautiful woman, and heads turned as men noticed her making her way slowly out of the giant plane. None of them had seen her during the five-hour trip because she had only left her seat once and that to wash her face and hands before the late lunch that was served. But the rest of the time she had just sat there, numb, tired, dozing, trying to reason out once again why she had let them do this, why she had allowed herself to be talked into coming west.

Enjoy your stay. Thank you for flying' The phalanx of stewardesses spoke the familiar words like a chorus of Rockettes, and Samantha smiled at them in return.

A moment later Samantha was standing in the Los Angeles airport, looking around with a sense of disorientation, wondering where to go, who would find her, not sure suddenly if they would even meet her at all. Caroline had said that the foreman, Bill King, would probably meet her, and if he wasn't available, one of the other ranch hands would be there. Just look for them, you can't miss 'em, not in that airport. And then the old woman had laughed softly, and so had Sam. In an airport filled with Vuitton and Gucci and gold lame sandals and mink and chinchilla and little bikini tops and shirts left open to the navel, it would be easy to spot a ranch hand, in Stetson and cowboy boots and jeans. More than the costume, it would be easy to spot the way they moved and walked, the deep tan of their skin, their wholesome aura as they moved uneasily in the showily decked-out, decadent crowd. Sam already knew from her other visits to the ranch that there would be nothing decadent about the ranch hands. They were tough, kind, hardworking people who loved what they did and had an almost mystical tie to the land that they worked on, the people they worked with, and the livestock they tended with such care. They were a breed Samantha had always respected, but certainly a very different breed than she was accustomed to in New York. For a moment, as she stood there, watching the typical airport chaos, she suddenly realized that once she got to the ranch she would be glad she had come. Maybe this was what she needed after all.

As she looked around for the sign that said BAGGAGE CLAIM, she felt a hand on her arm. She turned, looking startled, and then she saw him, the tall, broad-shouldered, leathery old cowboy that she remembered instantly from ten years before. He stood towering over her, his blue eyes like bits of summer sky, his face marked like a landscape, his smile as wide as she remembered it; a feeling of great warmth exuded from him as he touched his hat and then enfolded her into a great big bear hug. It was Bill King, the man who had been the foreman on the Lord Ranch since Caroline had bought it some thirty years before. He was a man in his early sixties, a man of slight education, but with vast knowledge, great wisdom, and even greater warmth. She had been drawn to him the first time she'd seen him, and she and Barbara had looked up to him like a wise uncle, and he had championed their every cause. He had come with Caroline to Barbara's funeral and had stood discreetly behind the family with a floodtide of tears coursing down his face. But there were no tears now, there were only smiles for Samantha as the huge hand on her shoulder squeezed her still harder and he gave a small shout of glee.

Damn, I'm happy to see you, Sam! How long has it been? Five, six years?

More like eight or nine. She grinned up at him, equally happy to see him and suddenly delighted that she had come. Maybe Charlie hadn't been so wrong after all. The tall, weathered man looked down at her with a look that told her she had come home.

Ready? He crooked an arm and with a nod and a smile she took it, and they went in search of her baggage, which was already spinning lazily on the turntable when they got downstairs. This it? He looked at her questioningly, holding the large black leather suitcase with the red and green Gucci stripe. He held the heavy case easily in one hand, her tote slung over his shoulder.

That's it, Bill.

He frowned at her briefly. Then you can't be meaning to stay long. I remember the last time you came out here with your husband. You must have had seven bags between the two of you.

She chuckled at the memory. John had brought enough clothes with him for a month at Saint-Moritz. Most of that was my husband's. We had just been to Palm Springs.

He nodded, saying nothing, and then led the way to the garage. He was a man of few words but rich emotions. She had seen that often during her early visits to the ranch. Five minutes later they had reached the large red pickup, stowed her suitcase in the back, and were driving slowly out of the parking lot of the Los Angeles International Airport, and Sam suddenly felt as though she were about to be set free. After the confinement of her life in New York, her job, her marriage, and now the confusion of bodies pressing around her on the plane and then in the airport terminal after the trip, finally she was about to go out to open places, to be alone, to think, to see mountains and trees and cattle, and to rediscover a life she had almost forgotten. As she thought of it, a long, slow smile lit up her face.

You look good, Sam. He cast an eye at her as they left the airport, and he shifted into fourth gear as they reached the freeway beyond.

But she only smiled and shook her head at him. Not as good as all that. It's been a long time. Her voice softened on the words, remembering the last time she had seen him and Caroline Lord. It had been a strange trip, an awkward mingling of past and present. The ranch hadn't been much fun for John. And as they drove along the highway, Sam's mind filled with memories of the last trip. It seemed a thousand years later when she felt the old foreman's hand on her arm, and when she looked around, she realized that the countryside around them had altered radically. There was no evidence of the plastic ugliness of the L.A. suburbs, in fact there were no houses in sight at all, only acres and acres of rolling farmland, the far reaches of large ranches, and uninhabited government preserves. It was beautiful country all around her, and Sam rolled down the window and sniffed the air. God, it even smells different, doesn't it?

Sure does. He smiled the familiar warm smile and drove on for a while without speaking. Caroline sure is looking forward to seeing you, Sam. It's been kind of lonely for her ever since Barb died. You know, she talks about you a heck of a lot. I always wondered if you'd come back. I didn't really think so after the last time. They had left the ranch early, and John had made no secret of the fact that he'd been bored stiff.

I would have come back, sooner or later. I was always hoping to stop here when I went to L. A. on business, but I never had enough time.

And now? You quit your job, Sam? He had only a vague idea that she had something to do with commercials, but he had no clear picture of what, and he didn't really care. Caroline had told him that it was a good job, it made her happy, and that was all that counted. He knew what her husband did, of course. Everyone in the country knew John Taylor, by face as well as by name. Bill King had never liked him, but he sure as hell knew who he was.

No, Bill, I didn't quit. I'm on leave.

Sick leave? He looked worried as they drove through the hills.

Sam hesitated for only a moment. Not really. Kind of a rest cure, I guess. For a minute she was going to leave it at that and then she decided to tell him. John and I split up. He raised a questioning eyebrow But said nothing, and she went on. Quite a while ago actually. At least it seems like it. It's been three or four months. A hundred and two days, to be exact. She had counted every one of them. And I guess they just thought I needed the break at the office. It sounded lousy to her as she said it, and suddenly she felt panic rise in her as it had that morning when she spoke to Harvey. Were they really firing her and just didn't want to tell her yet? Did they think she couldn't take the pressure? Did they think she'd already cracked up? But when she looked at Bill King, she saw that he was nodding, as though it all made perfect sense to him.

Sounds right to me, babe. His voice was reassuring. It's damn hard to keep on going when you hurt. He stopped for a moment and then went on. I found that out years ago when my wife died. I thought I could still handle my job on the ranch I was working on then. But after a week my boss said, Bill, my boy, I'm givin' you a month's money, you go on home to your folks and come back when the money's gone.' You know, Sam, I was mad as fire when he did it, thought he was telling me that I couldn't handle the job, but he was right. I went to my sister's outside Phoenix, stayed for about six weeks, and when I came back, I was myself again. You can't expect a man nor a woman to keep going all the time. Sometimes you have to give him room for grief.

He didn't tell her that he had taken three months off twenty-five years later, time off from the Lord ranch, when his son was killed during the early days of Vietnam. For three months he had been so stricken that he had barely been able to talk. It was Caroline who had nursed him out of it, who had listened, who had cared, who had finally come to find him in a bar in Tucson and dragged him home. He had a job to do on the ranch, she had told him, and enough was enough. She barked at him like a drill sergeant and heaped work on him until he thought he would die. She had shouted, yelled, argued, bullied, until finally one day they had almost come to blows out in the south pasture. They had gotten off their horses, and she had swung at him, and he had knocked her right on her ass, and then suddenly she had been laughing at him, and she laughed until the tears ran from her eyes in streams, and he laughed just as hard and knelt beside her to help her up, and it was then that he had kissed her for the first time.

It had been eighteen years ago that August, and he had never loved another woman as he loved her. She was the only woman he had actually ached for, longed for, lusted after, laughed with, worked with, dreamed with, and respected more than he respected any man. But she was a very special kind of woman. Caroline Lord was no ordinary woman. She was a superwoman. She was brilliant and amusing, attractive, kind, compassionate, intelligent. And he had never been able to understand what she wanted with a ranch hand. But she had known her mind from the beginning and never regretted the decision. For almost twenty years now she had secretly been his woman. And she would have made the affair public long before, had he let her. But he felt that her position as mistress of the Lord Ranch was sacred, and although here and there it was suspected, no one had ever known for certain that they were lovers, the only thing anyone knew for certain was that they were friends. Even Samantha had never been sure that there was more between them, though she and Barbara had suspected and often giggled, but they had never really known.

How's Caroline, Bill? She looked over at him with a warm smile and saw a special glow come to his eyes.

Tough as ever. She's tougher than anyone on that ranch. And older. She was three years older than he. She had been one of the most glamorous and elegant women in Hollywood in her twenties, married to one of the most important directors of her day. The parties they had given were still among the early legends, and the home they had built in the hills above Hollywood was still on some of the tours. It had changed hands often but was still a remarkable edifice, a monument to a bygone era rarely equaled in later years. But at thirty-two Caroline Lord had been widowed, and after that, for her, life in Hollywood had never been the same again. She had stayed on for two more years, but they had been painful and lonely, and then suddenly without explanation she had disappeared. She had spent a year in Europe, and then another six months in New York. It took her another year after that to decide what she really wanted, but as she drove for hours, alone in heir white Lincoln Continental, she suddenly knew where it was she longed to be. Out in the country, in nature, away from the champagne and the parties and the pretense. None of it had had any meaning for her after her husband was gone. All of that was over for her now. She was ready for something very different, a whole new life, a new adventure, and that spring, after looking at every available piece of property in a two-hundred-mile radius of Los Angeles, she bought the ranch.