Page 7 of The Rancher Who Swore Off Love
“All right.” She buckled the satchel and gave it a pat. “All packed.”
“That’s my sister. Tougher’n rawhide, you are.”
***
“Platform seven.” Jonah steered her left, past a newsstand and a shoeshine boy calling out prices. “Right this way, ma’am.”
The platform stretched long and loud with hissing steam and the clang of luggage being loaded into cargo cars.
“That there’s your car.” Jonah nodded toward a passenger car near the middle. “Nine-fifteen to Chicago. You hop off there, switch over, then do the same in Denver. You still got that schedule Mason wrote out for you?”
Grace patted the pocket of her dress. “Right here.”
“And the letter?”
“In the bag.”
“And the—”
“Jonah.” She set the carpetbag down on the platform and turned to face him. “I’ve got everything. I promise.”
He stood there with his hands shoved deep in his pockets, rocking on his heels, looking for all the world like a man trying hard to hold the shape of himself together. The steam from the engine drifted between them and broke apart in the morning air.
“A couple of months. That’s all it’ll take. I’ll get my affairs in order and hop the next westbound train, they’ll sell me a ticket for. You won’t even have time to miss me proper.”
“Ialreadymiss you.”
His jaw worked. He pulled one hand from his pocket and rubbed the back of his neck.
“Now don’t you go doin’ that to me, Gracie. Not here, not in front of all these good people. I got a reputation to uphold.”
But his voice came out rough at the edges, and when he blinked, his lashes stuck together.
She stepped forward and wrapped both arms around his middle and pressed her face into his chest. He folded over her like he always did, tucking his chin on top of her head, and his arms tightened until her ribs creaked.
“You look after yourself out there, you hear?” He ruffled her hair. “You eat proper meals. And don’t let nobody push you around, not one solitary soul.”
She nodded against his shirt.
“And you write me. Every blessed week. I wanna know the whole of it. What the house looks like, what them mountains look like, whether this Foster fella’s got all his teeth or if he’s chewin’ with his gums.”
A wet laugh broke out of her. She pulled back and swiped at her eyes with both palms.
“All his teeth. That’s your top concern.”
The conductor’s whistle cut through the platform noise, sharp and final.
“All aboard! Chicago line; all aboard!”
Jonah picked up her carpetbag and handed it to her. Then the satchel, adjusting the strap on her shoulder with a fussiness that didn’t suit him, smoothing a wrinkle in the canvas that didn’t exist.
“Go on, now.” He stepped back. “Git, ‘fore I lose my nerve and haul you back home.”
She grabbed the railing of the passenger car and climbed the steps. At the top, she turned. Jonah stood exactly where she’d left him, hands back in his pockets, holding that crooked grin of his firmly in place even though the rest of his face told a different story entirely.
She raised one hand.
He raised his.
