Once in Every Life
"Well," Tess drawled. "There's plenty of room. You can sleep on the other side of Katie."
Jack climbed, fully clothed, into bed beside Katie. "Leave the candle on till I go to sleep, okay?" Katie mumbled, her little eyelids already drooping. Tess smiled down at her. "Sure, honey." The three of them snuggled under the thick quilt. Katie curled up against her Mama and went to sleep.
When Katie was sleeping soundly, Tess pushed up onto one elbow and looked at Jack. "Tell me something so I know you better tomorrow than I did today."
Humor glinted in Jack's eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it. The humor in his gaze vanished, and a dark, formless pain filled his eyes. He glanced down at Katie's head. He brought a hand up, as if to stroke her hair, and Tess could see the tremble in his fingers.
Tess stared at his hand, hovering so close above his daughter's head?close, but not close enough?and she felt tears burn behind her eyes. When he began to draw his hand away, she grabbed it. Their eyes met, and in the troubled green depths she saw his indecision, his fear. "It's okay," she whispered. "Don't be afraid."
He licked his dry lips and slowly, so slowly, lowered his hand to Katie's head and began stroking her curly hair. "Katie .. ." His voice thickened, and Tess could see by the pain in his eyes that it was killing him to speak. "My Katydid. No one's ever dried her tears, or rocked her to sleep, or told her she was loved."
Tears burned Tess's eyes, streaked in hot, wavering lines down Tess's cheeks. "Oh, Jack ..."
He looked up suddenly, and over Katie's small, dark head, their gazes locked. The bleak desperation in his eyes
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tore ragged slices from her heart. "If you can change anything, Lissa, change that."
Tess's hand moved over the slim hump of Katie's body and found Jack's. Their fingers threaded into a warm knot.
"I can't do it alone, Jack."
He gazed at her for a long time, then slowly, quietly, he spoke. "Okay. We'll do it together."
Smiling, holding hands across the child, they fell asleep.
Chapter Nineteen
Someone banged hard on the back door. "Jack! Are you there?"
Jack came awake with a start.
"What ... huh? Whaas going on?" Lissa lifted her head and blinked hard, trying to focus.
Jack stared across Katie, who was still asleep, at his wife. She looked unbelievably sexy, with her hair all messed up and her cheeks flushed from sleep. Desire flashed through his body like a bolt of lightning. "There's someone at the door," he said in a husky voice. "I'll be right back."
Thankful now he hadn't undressed last night, Jack hurried through the cold, dark house and opened the back door.
Jim Hannah stood on the porch, dressed in his old work dungarees and straw hat. "I know you didn't expect us till day after tomorrow, Jack, but Clyde Johnson's wife took sick. They had to take her to Victoria to see some special doctor."
Jack squinted into the predawn darkness and saw three men standing out on the dirt road. "Who you got with you?"
"A couple of Indians and Jerry Sikes. We thought we'd do your herd today and tomorrow, then move over to mine."
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"Sikes doesn't mind working with me?" Jim looked uncomfortable. "Well, truth to tell, he's a
mite ... concerned. But I told him you were a friend of
mine."
Jack nodded. "Thanks, Jim. I'd been wondering how you and I were going to shear all these sheep alone."
Jim grinned, obviously relieved by Jack's easy acceptance of Sikes's anxiety. "It shouldn't take us more'n a couple days now."