after the flood. He thought maybe I ought to offer to bring you out to the ranch for a while, until things are cleaned up better here. The branding is keeping us all pretty busy, but there's more than enough room at the house."
Evie wanted to ask if Tyler were there and what he had to say about that, but she merely smiled and returned the indignant cat to its feet. "That's kind of you, Mr. Harding, and you can thank your brother for me, too, but someone needs to look after the children. I'm not much inclined to sitting around while everyone else is working."
"I can see that." He hesitated there in the doorway, seeing the amount of work yet to be done in just this one room. He ventured to say the back rooms were worse. His glance returned to the schoolteacher's smiling face, the wickedly dark eyes and tempting lips, and he knew Jace didn't need him at the branding as much as this woman needed him here. He began rolling up his sleeves. "Let me haul that table back where it belongs for you. It's too big for a woman to handle."
The overturned table thrown against the back wall by the flood was quickly restored to its proper position in front of the fireplace. Under Carmen's direction, Kyle was soon righting furniture in the other rooms and hauling soaked mattresses out to air. Evie watched him with laughter and continued directing the boys to search out unwanted animal life with brooms. Much of the mud on the floors went out the door with their efforts.
Ben wandered over in curiosity later that day and found himself chopping empty crates and broken boards for firewood. The wood dried quickly over a smoldering tinder fire. Before he could escape, he was coerced into nailing a bed back together while smells of Carmen's cooking began to lace the air.
The sheriff stopped by as they were preparing to put dinner on the table, and Evie deliberately sent the two young boys out of the house with a covered tray for Daniel.
When they were gone, she offered Sheriff Powell a cup of coffee. Maria was too young to understand the sheriff's arrival, but Carmen wasn't. She had the fourteen-year-old sit down in one of the kitchen chairs that still had four legs.
"What have you found, Mr. Powell?" Exhausted, Evie was in no humor for male equivocations. The truth might be painful, but it was better than knowing nothing and suspecting everything. She knew that from experience.
The sheriff glanced at Carmen, anxiously following his every word. An infant version of her sat in her lap, watching him solemnly, and his gaze returned to the schoolteacher. For an instant, he saw a similarity in their dark-lashed, exotically shaped eyes, but he shook his head and the image went away. Mrs. Peyton had the peach-and-cream complexion of a Southern lady. The children had the olive complexions of Mexicans. There could be no resemblance.
"We found the remains of a horse we think belongs to the livery. Tom thinks it's the one Mrs. Rodriguez took out that night. It doesn't look good. There were Indians camping in that area right before the flood. We're looking for them now, but we think they were reservation Indians and had no place being there. They won't be easy to find."
Carmen shivered and a tear glittered in her eye, but when Maria patted her face with chubby hands, she straightened and began feeding the child small pieces of the tortilla growing cold on the table. Evie's heart nearly broke at the sight.
"Thank you, Sheriff. Carmen has an address for her uncle. We'll send a telegram in the morning. I'm going to take the children back to the hotel tonight, but I think once the house is returned to order, I'll have to move in with them. I'd appreciate it if you'd let me know of anyone who can help me move my trunks. I can't pay much..."
Kyle intruded. "I'll make certain there's someone here to help. What about your brother, ma'am? I understand he's laid up."
Evie glanced around the small house uncertainly. It had three rooms instead of the two they were living in at the hotel, but it wasn't her house. She made a helpless gesture. "We'll have to see. I need to talk to Daniel and the doctor. He's still in a lot of pain, and I don't want to hurt him by moving him too soon."
One by one