Chapter Sixteen
Excerpt from Ch. 15
John smiled wide and nodded. "I won't mind at all. I..." His sentence was cut short when he saw the youngest Davies daughter riding her horse towards his home. "If you two will excuse me, I need to see what Rose wants." He then walked out of the dining room and exited the house. The moment the door was shut Jarrod laid into Steve.
~oOo~
Jarrod, who had been working alongside Steve most of the morning, took out the bandana he'd been carrying around in his back pocket and wiped his forehead while stretching his back; his shirt hung over the side of the wagon they'd driven to the area they were working in. Since Heath had joined the Barkley family, it had been a while since Jarrod had had to help out on the ranch. Not that he was complaining, he wasn't. He didn't mind helping Steve mend some of the Davies fences, especially since it meant working with Nick as well. His long lost brother could be seen further up the fence line working.
"He's impressed with you already." Steve, who was just securing some of the barbwire, glanced towards Jarrod. "I heard him tell Mrs. Davies last night he'd never met a lawyer who wasn't afraid of getting his lily white hands dirty with good old hard work."
Jarrod smiled and then shrugged his shoulders before beginning to work again. "Work's work, whether it's on my family's ranch or here." He quit speaking and fell silent. He and Steve had been on the Davies ranch for four days, most of the time spent working from the crack of dawn until the sun set. Now John and Steve were talking about going into town, something Jarrod wasn't about to fight. With the more relaxed environment, maybe he could get his brother to talk more about his past, something Jarrod wanted desperately to hear.
From where he was working, John could see Jarrod and Steve. While it felt good to have Steve around again, John was still very unsettled when it came to Jarrod's presence. Oh, not that he minded the extra help, and he did have to give his hat off to the stranger. Jarrod had to be the hardest working lawyer John had ever met. Still, John didn't like not knowing why he'd felt what he had when he first shook hands with Mr. Barkley. It hadn't helped his nerves any as a feeling that he'd met the man before began growing steadily since Jarrod had begun working alongside Steve and himself.
"Someone's missing," twenty-two year old Steve sat on the lower cot in the jail cell while John lay on the top one. The two had just been arrested, along with two other saloon patrons, for fighting in the saloon and busting up the establishment. "I mean, it feels like there should be someone else here, someone to give us some lecture or something." Before John could say anything, Steve had reached up and slapped the side of his leg. "And don't tell me I'm talking about the Davies or my father."
John leaned the shovel he'd been using to dig holes with against one of the posts which had already been set. 'Why do I feel as if I should know you' John thought, as he again glanced in the direction Jarrod was working. Then, like Jarrod, John began thinking of his and Steve's plans. At first, John had wanted to find an excuse to leave Jarrod at the ranch. Only, the more he'd thought on it, the guiltier he'd felt for even thinking such a thing. Besides, John wanted to learn more about Jarrod; maybe, find a reason for the familiarity he felt around him. Shaking himself from his thoughts, John went back to work. Fences didn't mend themselves.
~oOo~
Mrs. Davies was standing in her living room and looking out the window when she saw John and his friends heading towards the house. Since it was
past noon, she wasn't surprised to see them. She had their lunch fixed and waiting for them. Though, as she watched the three men she found her mind replaying the past for her, back to the time the Indian chief had brought John to them.
"We have taken care of him since we found him six summers ago." The Indian chief spoke while keeping a firm hand on the shoulder one very angry eleven-year-old boy. "But he and my nephews, the fights between them...it is not good. He is white, he needs a white family. Will you take him?"
Mr. Davies looked at his wife. She was good with their children, but would she really want to take someone else's child in, one that apparently had been separated from his family for one reason or another. Only after she'd
she nodded did Mr. Davies turn back to his friend.
Mrs. Davies took a deep breath as she watched John laughing and talking with Steve and Jarrod. Where had the years gone? She and her husband had done their best with this particular son; they'd dealt with his tempers, his nightmares; ones he would never talk about, and she'd seen him through the dark days after they'd lost Eliza and the baby. Mrs. Davies had not seen John laugh and talk this much since her daughter-in-law and grandchild passed away. It would have thrilled her if it wasn't for the fact that she too had been keeping an eye on Jarrod, trying to figure out what it was about him that bothered her. It's not like she got a bad feeling from him; she didn't. He seemed to be a good, honest, hardworking gentleman. He was more than polite too. Still, she had been uneasy ever since she'd see him standing next to John. She forced herself to stop trying to figure it out when John, Jarrod and Steve headed for the front steps. She turned from the window and disappeared into the kitchen, doing her best to keep the uneasy feeling away ...a feeling that told her more changes were coming.