Redtail
3 Picking Up Pieces
WE USE A DONKEY to train a bull. Sounds silly, but a bull needs to figure out that he’s not the alpha male. While the bull is young, under about eight hundred pounds, we just use a big old halter on him and attach it to Benji’s halter with a lead rope. The bull learns to go wherever Benji goes. Of course, if he figures out he’s bigger and stronger than Benji, then there’s a problem. That’s where the ring comes in. We watch that stuff pretty close. You don’t want a bull thinking all he has to do is throw his weight around and he can do whatever he wants to. The danged thing is going to weigh more than a ton and the most common accidental death among cattlemen is being crushed by a bull. Not gored—crushed.
So, once he gets above about 750 pounds—like at three months—we put a ring in his nose. From then on, Benji’s halter is attached to the ring. No bull fights against the ring more than once. When Benji digs his heels in, the bull can’t move away. If Benji wants to graze someplace different, the bull has to follow. Not to mention the fact that if a bull gets feisty, Benji has no qualms about lining up on him and belting him with both back hooves. Our bulls get pretty gentle.
We had a little problem once when a young bull lunged away from Benji and his halter snapped. I don’t know how long we’d had that halter, but the leather got weak along one side and when 600 pounds lunged against it, it snapped. Dad gave me the job of mending the halter.
“Sometimes you have to mend things, Cole,” Dad said. “You need to know how, even if we go out and buy a new halter.” So, he taught me. We had to splice new leather onto the old and glue it, then use an awl to punch holes so I could force a needle and thick thread through the holes. It looked pretty damned good when I was finished, though it was bulky as hell with all the new leather.
Dad didn’t put the halter back on the bull, though. He had a ring in his nose by that time. Instead he said he wanted us to test the mend. We’ve got all kinds of scales and weights around the barn, so Dad looped the halter around a beam in the barn then attached a lead rope to it. He tied the other end of the rope to a 500-pound weight balanced on a board. I’d learned about fulcrums in school, so he had me holding the other end of the board about six feet the other side of a stall half-wall. When everything was set he warned me to keep my chin back and let go of my end of the fulcrum.
I did. The board flipped up in the air and the weight tipped off the end. It fell about three feet and came to the end of the lead rope. It was almost like watching a bungee jumper get to the end of the rope and then bounce up. The weight stopped, sprang back a bit, and then fell to the floor. I looked up and my newly repaired halter was snapped again.
“Son,” Dad said, “sometimes when something breaks there’s just no way to patch it so that it’s as strong as it used to be. You either have to treat it more gently or replace it.”
Patches
Geneive and I got back together. In fact, we got back together with some pretty loud yowling that very night. Now that she knew my dick was regularly if not frequently in someone else’s pussy, she didn’t balk so much at me wearing a condom. I still sensed a kind of yearning in her, though, as if she wanted to share something more with me than our admittedly hot sexual relationship. I assumed it was because she was still fixated on having a baby, but I just wasn’t ready for that kind of commitment.
Spring break didn’t match up for me and Mary Beth. I told her I’d come down to be with her, but she said not to bother because she had exams and a huge paper due. She was up to Laramie over her spring break the week before mine and we managed to squeeze in some good loving. But that meant that I had a whole week that I could devote to Geneive. I wondered if she could get away or if her parents would frown on the two of us going off together for a few days. Well, it turned out they did.
But Geneive and I did get one break that was what I wanted most. Her parents ran the restaurant, so they left the house at eight to prepare for the lunch crowd. Geneive didn’t have to be there until she helped serve dinner at four. I visited Ginny from nine till three and we made love in her bed. I’d learned a few tricks on the advice of Mary Beth about covering my truck seats with a one of those fleece blankets you can get at Walmart for like five bucks. During the winter, we’d needed one over the top of us, too, but we kept the truck pretty warm and fogged over with our body heat.
Being in bed with Geneive changed things. In the truck, there was always a kind of desperation to get to the end because we were going to freeze if we didn’t heat things up. She had a small bed, but it was bigger than the seat of the Ford. The house was warm and we didn’t need to rush things. For the first time, I stood up in front of Geneive and undressed her, slowly, paying attention to every detail I uncovered. The little mole on her left shoulder blade. Hell! I’d hardly ever seen her bare back unless we were trying to hump doggy-style in the confines of the truck. There really just wasn’t room for that! I loved the way her shoulders sloped, the curve of her spine, the flare of her butt. I paid the same kind of attention to her back that I had paid to her front a few months ago, just before we broke up. I hoped that wasn’t a sign.
She shivered as I kissed the back of her arms as she stood facing a mirror with me behind her. I could glance over her shoulders and see her standing there facing me while I kissed all along her shoulders and the back of her neck. I found the same kind of sensitive indents on her back as I’d found on her front. Just below her shoulder blades. The small of her back. The crease of her butt and the ledge at the bottom. The back of her knees. I moved to take her to the longed-for bed, but Geneive was fascinated with our image in the full-length mirror on her closet door.
“Wait,” she whispered. She pulled her vanity chair in front of the mirror and pushed me down in it. “Watch us,” she said turning back to face the mirror. I had a pretty good view just by tilting my head to the side a little as Ginny reached between her legs and found my cowboy. She backed her little bubble butt up against my stomach and started to sink down, guiding me into her from behind. I leaned back a little to give her more room to maneuver.
That sight—watching my condom-covered cock disappearing into my little lover’s body—was almost more than I could take. I reached around and fondled her, not dwelling on any one spot squeezing her tits, but letting my hands stroke the whole length of her torso from her neck down onto her thighs. Her fair skin gained a pink tint as she rose toward her climax, rising and falling on my cock as we watched in the mirror. She put her hands in the air, stretching as far as she could so I could slide my hands down her arms and her smooth pits, following the curve of her body to her hips where I helped lift and drop her. When she came, she pushed herself down as far on me as she could, gasping when I touched bottom in her vagina. That was all it took for me to start filling that condom.
We made love again, this time stretching out on the bed and just luxuriating in the feel of softness under us as we shifted positions, trying things we’d never managed in the truck. After lunch, she led me back to her bedroom and we collided in another love-making session, this time finally managing the doggy-style that had been thwarted in the truck.
We went five days like that. She even suggested trying anal as she always loved it when I tickled her rosebud with my finger. That proved to be the only unsuccessful thing we tried. Things just wouldn’t fit together without both of us having pain. Well, that was okay with me. Between Ginny’s pussy and her mouth, my cowboy was getting everything he could ever desire, and between him and my tongue, Ginny seemed pretty pleased as well.
The weekends were always different for Geneive’s work schedule. She spent all day Saturday and Sunday at the restaurant, and I’d been rushing through my chores during the week so I had quite a bit of catch-up to do over the weekend at the ranch. Dad told me to expect to spend Saturday on the roof of the equipment shed as we’d taken some damage during the heavy snows this year and didn’t want water damage to the equipment. So, Friday night Ginny and I had a tearful but loving good-bye.
“I’ll see you Monday in school and maybe we can slip away for an hour after before I go to work,” she said. “I’ve had so much fun loving you this week, Cole. I could really be gone on you.”
“Don’t think I don’t love you, Ginny. I do. I can’t turn my back on Mar… her. She means the world to me.”
“Someday I hope to know what it is you feel for her and have you feel it for me, too,” she said.
“I hope that day will come.”
“I can’t wait for us to go back. I mean, to the way it was before,” she whispered as I was leaving.
Well, we weren’t going to be making love every day in her bed come summer. Before school was out, Dad told me that we’d lost a cowboy for the drive this spring and since I was nearly 17 he figured it was time I took a turn riding the range this summer. Truth was, I kind of liked that idea. Last summer I’d spent three weeks on the range while each of the other hands got their week off. I liked it. Unfortunately, it meant that I wouldn’t be seeing Ginny until my week break over my birthday in July. I was trying to figure out how that would work out with Mary Beth being home and me wanting to spend time with her, too. Well, I’d just have to figure out how to handle that in July. As soon as school was out at the first week of June, I was in the saddle and headed for the upper range.
From there on, it was just more watching and seeing that our herd didn’t get mixed up with anyone’s besides the Alexanders’ when we were on the open range. Mostly, we had enough private range, but cattle have a mind of their own. Ginny once asked me why people thought cows were so dumb. I laughed and told her it’s because most folks never get to know them before they cook ’em.
It was while I was in my tent at night that I started having dreams. These were different than when I’d traveled back in time. Then I’d known I was actually in the body of Kyle Wardlaw and I could see and hear and feel with his body. I recognized what happened when I slept as dreams. Sure, I had my share of dreams about Mary Beth and about Geneive. But I started dreaming about Laramie and Caitlin, too. In my dreams, they were just as real as Mary Beth and Ginny. I guess that I should have expected the wet spot in my sleeping bag the first time I dreamt about Laramie. I’d dream her right there in my sleeping bag with me—not in her time, but in mine. She never changed, always such a lean hard body beneath or on top of mine.
Dreams of Caitlin were exhausting. She was aggressive and demanding of my loving. Caitlin was willing to try everything and pushed past the pain of anal sex to give me the ride of my life. And it was me screwing her, not Kyle. I woke up as tired as when I’d gone to sleep.
Of course, dreams of Mary Beth and Geneive were as much fun and there were nights when my dreams had leapt from one to the other taking me from bed to bed to bed. Those were the really exhausting nights. Who knew dreaming could be so tiring.
I got to thinking, though. I loved Mary Beth; there was no question about that. What we shared was something special. She could just imagine my kiss once every day when she stood in that spot at college where I kissed her. I wondered if Laramie ever went to that place where we made love and imagined me kissing her. We were somewhere in these mountains, but the terrain and landscape had changed in the past hundred plus years. There’d been some logging and a lot of cattle roaming these hills since Laramie and me. Still, if I could find a place where I could remember just one of her kisses, maybe that would mean something.
I was off chasing down a steer we’d seen go over the ridge about dawn. Something had spooked the herd during the night and all three of us were riding to get them back in one valley. Buttercup and I took off up the ridge and then set about tracking down where the stupid steer had gone. I hoped I got to it before a cougar did. The dogs were guarding the herd while the three riders hunted strays. I rode a crisscross pattern down the western slope. This section had been logged once, but it was an environmentally conscious group that got the contract from the BLM and they’d taken only every third tree that was over ten inches in diameter. There were a lot of stumps and a couple of logging roads that had been cut through. I heard the stupid bovine before I saw it. His rump was in the air and he had one foreleg curled under him and the other stuck out like he was kneeling before this giant Douglas. I looped a rope around his neck and tied it off to my saddle horn. Dismounting I approached the beast whispering soft comforting words. Steers aren’t violent, but if they get spooked and throw twelve hundred pounds against you, you’re in bad shape.
This dumbass had come through next to the tree and let his foot slide down a marmot hole. He was trying to lift it the way his leg would normally bend, but that just brought pressure up against the root it was under. I didn’t really have anything I could cut the root with and wouldn’t want to swing an axe that close to the animal anyway. I debated myself and decided to get the camp shovel out of my saddle roll. Carefully and slowly, I dug out under his leg until he could sweep the leg out from under the root. He jumped up and bolted, but that was why I had the rope tied to my saddle horn. Buttercup dug in and the steer came to a screeching halt. I laughed at him as the two of them planted their feet and stared at each other. I grabbed my canteen and took a long swig of water, then went back and filled in the hole. Let the damned marmot dig a new one.
When the hole was full, I leaned back against the tree and took another long drink of water. The canteen was still at my lips when I heard the hawk’s lonesome scream.
Traveling: My Baby
I still had the canteen to my lips when I felt the rolling gait of my horse beneath me. I was following the directions that Cal gave me, stocking up in Casper and then moving cross-country into the mountains. I was back in Kyle’s body and let him do the driving as I settled into the back of his mind to watch and learn. It was late June, but still pretty cold out here.
I couldn’t figure out why I didn’t totally freak out when I got ripped out of my body and planted into Kyle. In spite of the fact that I was in a different place and time, being in Kyle was sort of comfortable—like I belonged there. My thought processes changed, too. When I was in Kyle, that was my reality. My ‘real’ life was more like a dream. I knew I was there, but it was remote. What I felt in this time was what was real. Not that I felt the same things that Kyle did, though. As far as I could tell, he had no emotional attachment to Laramie, but was really fond of Caitlin. I liked Caitlin and could see why Kyle was falling for her, but the moment I looked into Laramie’s eyes, I felt an attachment that I knew I’d never break. I fell in love twice that birthday afternoon. Once in each timeline. Somehow, that seemed okay.
I learned something else, though. Kyle could sleep and even if his body was a little uncomfortable, he rested and his mind blanked out the discomfort. I was conscious all the time and his body’s discomfort was as exhausting as my dreaming was, but not as pleasant. I wondered about the whole sleep deprivation thing and started doing different meditation exercises I’d heard of while Kyle slept. It was all pretty much self-taught, so I don’t have any idea if I was doing them right. Most of what I knew had to do with relaxing the body, but, hell, Kyle’s body was asleep and as relaxed as it was going to get. I had to focus on relaxing my mind and that was all I had. Still, after two weeks, I got pretty good at just drifting off when Kyle slept.
Two weeks was when the action started. I had to admit that Kyle was good at what he did. In spite of the fact that he liked to dress nice when he was in town, once he hit the mountains, he dressed more like what I’d last seen Laramie in. He wore buckskins and moccasins rather than jeans and boots. When he crept up to the fugitives’ camp, he was silent, even carrying the packs. And like me, Kyle was strong. While I had a few inches in height on him, he had a few pounds on me, and they were all muscle.
As soon as the gunfire started, Kyle slipped into the camp, used a small mallet to smash the lock, and quickly emptied most of the contents of the fugitives’ strongbox into his bags. Kyle was a little disappointed that most of what was in the box was paper money—fifty dollar United States Notes with a picture of Franklin on the left and Lady Liberty on the right—but it made it lighter to carry. There was a good sack of gold and silver coins though and Kyle tossed a couple of them back in the box, leaving about six bundles of the paper money there as well.
When he had transferred the money and was slipping back into the woods, the gunfire suddenly ceased. He hurried back through the woods a good mile before picking his way up a steep trail to the cliff-top again. He loaded the packs of money onto his already packed mule and headed east into the Big Horn Mountains looking every bit like a grizzled prospector before winding his way back south. We actually missed Casper and came back toward Laramie from the east through the mountains.
Instead of returning directly to Laramie, Kyle followed a track west that led him to a bluff north of Laramie. I wished I had a topo map and compass so I could mark the location. Kyle didn’t bother to open any of the other boxes in the cavern he entered. He pulled out a bundle of fifty dollar notes and a big handful of Morgan Silvers and loaded the rest into a box already almost full in the cave. Then he wearily headed the last fifty miles into Laramie.
I had to agree with Kyle’s assessment of what was needed. He climbed off the horse in front of Bertha’s Wild Ride and a boy ran out to take the horse and mule to the stable and Kyle’s limited luggage to his room. Kyle kept his saddlebags. In the restaurant, he had a big steak and an even bigger potato with three tankards of sour beer. He and I were both thinking more of the bath that would be waiting in his room than we were about the possibility of a hot redhead or big woman joining us in bed. After dinner, Kyle saw the bartender and settled his bill and rent with two Franklins. He got a handful of tokens in return and headed through the back door.
No bouncing redhead threw herself into Kyle’s arms when we walked through the door. Otherwise the atmosphere seemed unchanged from the last time we’d been here. A young Hispanic woman approached Kyle shyly. She was a little round, but it was pleasant curves and not a lot of bulging fat. I estimated that like most of the whores she might be fifteen or sixteen.
“Senor Kyle, I have your bath ready. Will I be good for you?”
“Who are you?”
“Sorry, Senor. I am Maria.”
“Where’s Caitlin?”
Something was wrong. Maria hung her head and refused to look at me.
“I am so sorry, Senor Kyle. Caitlin is no longer… sir, Caitlin is dead.”
That about did it for both Kyle and me. He sank down on a chair and took a deep breath. Maria knelt on the floor at his feet and kept whispering, “I sorry,” over and over again. I looked up and another woman stood in front of me that Kyle recognized as the Madam—Liza.
“Kyle, Caitlin died after an abortion last week. When you came last time, she was going to tell you about it, but she got distracted. She didn’t know if the baby was yours or someone else’s so it is no cause for you to fret. She had Ellen and two others help, but she started bleeding and the next day she died.”
“Where’s Ellen?”
“She started refusing to eat after Caitlin died. She’d turn her head suddenly and mutter, ‘Stop watching me. I didn’t do it.’ It was like she was being haunted. Two days later she left. I don’t know where she went. But Maria will service all your needs, or if you want someone else, just say so.”
“No,” I whispered. “Come on, Maria. I need that bath before it gets cold.”
It was the first time I really couldn’t separate my thoughts from Kyle’s. We were both so stunned and tears were leaking out of our eyes. We rose and followed Maria up the stairs to Kyle’s room. Maria undressed quickly and then helped remove my clothes. I sank into the tub seeking the relief of hot water. As soon as I was settled, Maria climbed in on top of me and began washing me. Somehow, even with this lovely girl doing her best to make sure I was washed absolutely everyplace, my cowboy never woke up. When I was out of the tub and dry, I climbed numbly into the bed naked and Maria cuddled up next to me. I gently took her hand off my cock and just wrapped my arms around her.
Kyle and I both cried ourselves to sleep.
Well, Kyle slept. I just kept crying, though the tears no longer seeped from Kyle’s eyes. This was ridiculous. I’d been in this time, in Kyle’s head, for nearly a month. By the time I got back in my own body, if I ever did, I’d be too exhausted to ride herd. The first time I was here, it was for a few hours and only seconds had passed when I got back. The next time was longer—a couple days. All I knew was that I was freezing to death on a tractor when I woke up. How long would I have been leaning against a tree with Buttercup holding the rope on the steer if I ever got back again? What if I never got back? Did my body continue to function in my own timeline? I hadn’t had a lot of lovers in my life. Well, just two back in my own time. I’d been with Kyle with three, but I’d picked up bits and pieces of memories with several others. I wasn’t sure even Kyle would recognize all the whores he’d fucked. But this was the first time somebody I actually felt I knew and had a connection to and had made love to had died.
I made up my mind and before daylight broke, I had Kyle up and dressed. Maria still slept in the bed as I strapped on my guns. I went straight to the stable and kicked the stable-boy awake. I got my buckskin saddled and grabbed some hardtack and jerky from the kitchen. I was off with the rising sun to my back.
I’d picked up enough from Kyle’s memories to simply shove him to the back and tell him to shut up as I headed up into the hills near Centennial Ridge. I knew this territory pretty well in the 21st century. The fact that it was still completely wild in this time period caused constant distractions. I didn’t know exactly where she lived, but I knew it was up this way.
It was late in the day when I finally saw a wisp of smoke across a low ridge. I rode up to the top and looked down on what could only be referred to as a hut. It looked almost like it had been a tepee, but had been walled into a permanent dwelling with the addition of a lot of branches and mud instead of a skin covering. The smoke came from a hole in the roof. I rode down the hillside, weaving in and out of the trees. There was no identifiable trail here.
“Hallo!” I called as I emerged from the woods into the small clearing.
A silver-haired woman emerged from the tent with an old rifle resting comfortably in her hands. I lifted my arms to the side to show I meant no harm and nudged the horse forward with my knees. This certainly wasn’t the woman I was looking for, but maybe she knew where I’d find her.
“State your business, stranger,” the woman commanded. Her voice was aged but held a cultured accent. She hadn’t always lived in the wilderness.
“I’m looking for Laramie.”
“That town is a day’s ride behind you. You’ll find it if you get moving now.”
“Not the town. A girl. A young woman named Laramie. I’m looking for her.”
“Kyle?” a voice said from behind the woman. The skins over the door moved and the girl of my dreams pushed past. She started running toward me and I swung down off my horse heedless of where the other woman’s gun was pointed. In a dozen steps, Laramie was in my arms. I buried my face in her hair and crushed her to me. If I was going to stay in this time, I was going to stay with the woman I loved, Kyle be damned.
I leaned down and kissed Laramie softly. She took my hand and led me back toward the hut.
“This is him?” the woman at the door asked.
“Mama, this is Kyle. I told you he would come back to me.”
“Ma’am,” I said tipping my hat to her.
“Have you?”
“What, ma’am?”
“Have you come back to her or are you riding your fancy buckskin off again.”
“I’m…” What could I say? I had no idea when I’d be jerked out of this body again and Kyle the asshole would be back. I certainly didn’t want him here with Laramie and her mother. “I don’t know, ma’am. I wish I could just stay here, but I don’t know.” She nodded her head.
“Come into the cabin, Kyle,” Laramie said. She was dressed just the same as when I’d first seen her a year ago in buckskin shirt and breeches. Her mother also wore buckskin, but had fashioned it into a dress. Both outfits were decorated with bead-work.
Once inside, Laramie continued to pull me to the side where a bed of furs was piled. Nestled asleep on the furs was a little baby.
“This is Kaylene,” Laramie whispered.
“Kaylene?” I asked, stupidly. “Laramie, is this… our daughter?” She nodded with her head against my chest. “I will never forgive him.”
“Don’t be angry, Kyle,” Laramie said. “We will never ask you for anything. We didn’t even put your name in the Bible. But you’ve come back. I knew you would come back.”
“What are your intentions, young man,” said the older woman.
“Mrs.… uh… ma’am, I don’t know what to tell you. I won’t make promises I can’t keep. I love Laramie. I’ll tell you that.”
The woman gave me a hard look, her eyes slightly squinted. I wasn’t sure if it was the squint of a gunslinger like I’d seen in movies or if she was having trouble seeing. Maybe she was squinting so she could see inside my soul. And what would she find? The asshole cowering in the back of my mind or the future time traveler? She just nodded and looked away.
I sat with Laramie and her mother who had yet to give me a name. There wasn’t really much in the way of furniture. There were a couple of log stools and a split log that acted as a table. Their beds, both in the same large room, were simply furs piled on pine needles. Still, it had a homey feeling. There was even a piece of sandstone at one edge that had been polished flat and painted with fiery colors. The artwork was not primitive. I sat on one of the log stools and Laramie’s mother sat on the other. Laramie settled on the floor leaning against me and nursed the baby—my daughter—as we ate a simple stew of venison and root vegetables. I fed Laramie from my bowl as she cared for our daughter.
“Ma’am,” I said to the older woman, “what would be the respectful name that I should call you by?”
“Theresa Ranae.”
“Miss Theresa, the repast you have set is very tasty. Thank you.”
“Theresa Ranae,” she repeated. “I am not Miss or Mrs. anything. I am Laramie Wyoming’s mother.”
“Yes ma’am. Theresa. You do not sound or look Native American. I mean like an Indian.”
“I married a Cheyenne brave. My family before is all gone.” I nodded. I’d heard stories like that. Family attacked and killed and white girl taken by the Indians. Well, I wouldn’t make any judgments.
“Laramie Wyoming is a lovely name but how did you come by it?”
“I met someone named Laramie when I was a girl. I thought it was a beautiful name. Then we came to live in Laramie. White Horse and I were forced to move to a reservation in Montana. I named our daughter after the place my heart yearned for. Two summers ago, we returned. The soldiers did not object to a white woman and her half-breed daughter ‘returning to civilization’ as they said.”
“White Horse was your… mate?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve heard many stories about white girls stolen by an Indian chief. Their daughter is always considered a princess.” There were tons of stories of that sort that I’d heard of. I always thought there must be a lot of Indian chiefs for so many families to have half-breed princesses in their family tree. There was even one in my family legends. I’d have to look it up sometime. Theresa looked at me sharply and laughed.
“White Horse stole my heart. I gave him my body willingly. Much as my daughter went with you. He was a good man and provided for us, but he was not the chief,” she said letting the implication that I was not a good man rest on me.
There was no refrigeration, of course. The meat had a smoky taste so I assumed they had arranged at least a temporary smokehouse. Theresa added water to the kettle of left-over stew and put it back on the coals to heat. A never-ending pot of stew if they added fresh vegetables or meat to it tomorrow.
“Mama, Kaylene is asleep. I am going to walk with Kyle.”
Theresa sighed and nodded her head. I certainly wasn’t what she hoped for in a son-in-law.
Laramie and I walked out under the moonlit sky. It was early August, but this high in the mountains the night was clear and pleasant. I boldly reached out and took her hand. She leaned against me as we walked away from the hut. When it was out of sight, Laramie pulled me down to sit beneath a Mountain Douglas. As soon as we sat, Laramie pressed herself against me and offered her lips to my questing mouth. We kissed for a long time. I can’t tell time when I’m kissing, but the moon had risen and it was near full dark when I first became aware of my surroundings. Both of our shirts were off and Laramie was lying atop me as I caressed her back and her milky breasts.
This woman was the mother of my daughter! I hadn’t even been here for her during her pregnancy. All I had was the memory a single afternoon where we taught each other how to enjoy our bodies beneath a hot Fourth of July sun and dreams that had haunted me ever since. But I had her now. I didn’t really care if I had to keep Kyle subdued in the back of my mind forever. I was going to stay with Laramie.
“I love you, Laramie,” I whispered. “I’ve never loved any woman like I love you.” Well, Mary Beth was close, but she’d made it clear we’d never be a couple. Laramie and I were a couple. We were as good as husband and wife—and daughter.
“Love me,” she said as she began to grind down on my cock. We slipped our trousers off—my boots were long gone—and lay side by side as we pleasured each other. We made love long into the night.
This wasn’t the howling passionate lovemaking that I’d experienced with Caitlin and Ellen or even, for that matter, with Geneive. Every physical act was an extension of how we loved each other. When I entered her wet folds, we were truly one person. When I emptied myself into her womb, I emptied my soul into her heart.
“I love you, Laramie. Remember that no matter how far I have to travel or how long before I see you again, I love you and I would give my soul to be with you.”
“Who are you, really?” she asked.
“You know that. These are Kyle’s hands. Kyle’s heart. Kyle’s lips.”
“No. It is Kyle’s hands and Kyle’s lips, but here…” she laid her hand on my heart, “this is not Kyle’s heart.”
“I don’t know how to answer you, my love. You may be right. It is not Kyle’s heart that loves you. But I do. Across time and ages, I love you.”
“What will we do then, my love?”
“I will be back as often as I can and stay as long as I can, but if Kyle returns to take his own heart back, you dare not let him be here with you.” Laramie cuddled against me but in a bit insisted we return to the hut. Kaylene would need to be fed.
For the rest of the night, I held Laramie and our daughter in my arms as we slept on the furs together. I was at peace, and something told me that Kyle was peaceful, too.
Over the next couple of days, I helped with the house and preparations for the winter. I wanted them to file land claims and to do that, they would need to winterize. Laramie carried Kaylene in a kind of sling as we worked to make the hut secure. I swung an axe until there were blisters on my hands, right through Kyle’s gloves. I wanted to be sure they would have adequate wood for winter.
I shot another deer and butchered the meat while Theresa treated the hide. I was shown how they smoked the meat and kept it drying so it would not rot. There were a number of edible roots in the area and I helped dig and gather. I dug a root cellar and built an earthen wall around it and a thatched roof over it. The opening between the hut and the root cellar was small and Laramie could barely fit through the door, but they stored food like squirrels.
And each night Laramie took my hand and led me into the forest away from the house to make love. I loved her and felt contentment as we held each other in our arms. But one morning I could feel a foreboding in my heart. I needed to get Kyle away from here. I took Laramie to my saddle bags and sat with her.
“Here.” I pulled the bundle of Franklins from the bag and put them into her hands. I thought better and removed ten of the bills to put in Kyle’s pants. No sense leaving him without money so he’d feel compelled to come back here to reclaim it. Five hundred dollars would keep him in beer and whores for months. “It’s all I have right now. Take this and go to Laramie to file a land claim. Buy as much adjacent land as you can.” A sudden flash came into my mind of money hidden in Kyle’s saddlebags. I don’t know if he actually thought it to me or if it was an involuntary thought as I handed Laramie the Franklins. I grabbed the saddlebags and emptied them. I could feel the coins. I didn’t waste time. I grabbed my knife and slit open the bottom of each bag. Sewn into the bag was a second skin that contained twenty-five double-eagles in each bag. Fifty twenty-dollar gold pieces. This wasn’t California. In Laramie, Wyoming this was serious cash. I was giving her close to five thousand dollars and that could buy Laramie over a thousand acres. I gave it all to my beloved.
“Buy as much land as you can darling. Raise our daughter to love the land and love her papa, even though I won’t be here. Wyoming became a State in the Union this summer. It’s a state where there’s women’s equality. They can’t stop you from filing a claim or buying land.”
“I would rather have you than all this gold or what it could buy,” she said.
“As would I, my love. But here is my pledge to you.” I took my knife and carved in the bark of the tree the initials LK overlapping. “Laramie and Kyle. As long as a tree stands in the forest, I will be yours.”
About halfway back to town the next day, I started relinquishing my hold on Kyle’s body and letting his consciousness seep through. He was mad, but I held a firm grip before giving him full control.
If you ever harm a hair of her or her mother or her child, I will take you to the grave and bury you in your misery. Never tell anyone. Do you understand? Kyle mutely nodded his head as I gave him back his body.
I heard it before I saw the shadow this time. It was far away but close enough to draw me out of Kyle’s body and plant me back on Centennial Ridge with a bleating steer and a pissed horse.
Verified
I leaned against the tree as I got my bearings back. Buttercup kept dancing back and forth keeping the steer on a taut rope. I felt the bark under my hands. There was a groove where I was touching. Somebody, maybe a pioneer had blazed the tree. It’s illegal these days. I looked and rubbed at the bark until I could clearly see the mark. I sat square down on my rump just staring. It was an old scar and the tree had grown out stretching the mark, but it was clear to me. LK.
That was the first I knew it wasn’t all just a dream.
The rest of the summer, whenever I wasn’t on an active shift, I’d ride over to that ridge and sit under the Mountain Douglas Fir. It hadn’t all been a dream. I’d been here and carved our initials in that tree over a hundred years ago. I’d made love with Laramie here throughout the night. And I’d sworn that I’d love her as long as there was a tree in the forest.
It wasn’t a dream.
I’d been on the range for over a month now. I knew my turn for a week’s break was coming up soon. It seemed like no time at all had passed when I found myself back on my horse again, but I had close to five weeks of extra memories. It was too bad I missed all the festivities when Wyoming’s statehood was announced but that really wasn’t important. I was heartsick for my one true love, Laramie Wyoming Ranae. I assumed that was her last name. Her mother’s name was Theresa Ranae. I wondered if my daughter Kaylene would take Kyle’s surname.
I was lonelier up on the ridge that summer than if I’d been shipped off to war. The last week of July I came down from the mountain for a week’s break. Dad handed me the keys to the truck and told me to remember I was due back on the mountain Monday a week.
I called Geneive first thing and got another shock. Her mom answered the phone and told me that Geneive wasn’t available to talk right now and I shouldn’t really call back this summer.
What the fuck? The last time she’d broken up with me by phone, but at least she’d talked to me. Now she’s having her mother break up with me? Shit! I called Mary Beth. I mean, I intended to call Mary Beth anyway, but I owed it to my girlfriend—ex-girlfriend—to call her first. Mary Beth said she’d be ready in half an hour. I used the time to get a hot shower.
You’d think that after a month and a half in the mountains, all I’d want is a soft bed, but after a very long, very hot shower and a shave, I tossed my gear in the back of the pickup truck and headed for the mountains. Half a mile from my house I stopped the truck and Mary Beth tossed her pack in the back and climbed into the cab. We were off down the road again before the dust settled.
She slid to the center seat and fastened her seatbelt before leaning into me. I wrapped an arm around her and she looked up at me.
“Where to, honey?”
“I know this place up in the Big Horn,” I said.
We had a great week in that tent next to the Big Horn River and I spun her a tale about how bank robbers from Salt Lake City had come northeast and died here in a shoot-out with the posse. All the posse ever found of the loot, though, was five stacks of fifties and a few gold coins.
“What happened to all the rest?” she asked.
“Nobody ever found it. It’s one of the mysteries of the mountains. Maybe we should look for it.”
“You are such a bullshitter, Cole,” she said, climbing on top of me again.
I guess I wasn’t responsive enough, though I’m sure this was the fourth or fifth time we’d had sex that afternoon.
“You’re still upset about Geneive, aren’t you,” she asked.
“Hmm? Geneive? Yeah. Maybe a little. It’s nothing.”
“Did you meet someone new? When? How could you have time? You’ve been up in the mountains for six weeks. Is there a mountain girl up there?”
“God, Mary Beth. You’re sick. It’s just a daydream. There’s no one in our reality that I’ve fallen for.”
“Then fall for me again, lover. You know that I never missed a day—even when there was two feet of snow—going to that courtyard and thinking about your kiss. I love you, Cole.”
“Mary Beth, you are the best thing in my life. I love you.”
Yes. I’d pretty much resolved the major things about time travel. I didn’t know how I was doing it, but I could recognize when it was going to happen. It was still making me crazy. I couldn’t do it at will. If I could have, I’d have gone to be with Laramie and never come back.
Except there was Mary Beth. I realized I was just as anchored in this time as I was in the past. When I looked into Mary Beth’s eyes, I knew I loved her just as much as I did Laramie.
It’s hard to believe I’d had enough time with Laramie to really know that I loved her. I’d seen her a grand total of twice for maybe five days all told. But from that first time when she came to me in spite of what a jerk Kyle was, it was like she recognized me and I recognized her. And it wasn’t just the physical similarities between Laramie and Mary Beth. I could tell the difference. Different eye color. Different hair style even though very similar color. Laramie’s complexion was a little ruddier. She was half Indian after all. And she was inordinately lean. Even with milk in her tits for our baby, she was smaller in the chest than Mary Beth, but she wasn’t anemic. She was just all muscle and very little fat. She lived outdoors before the invention of fast food.
And that other little bit. Our baby. Shit! In 1890, I was a daddy. And I wasn’t there to be with my little girl and help her grow up and protect her and provide for her. If anyone had offered me the choice, I’d have bundled Mary Beth up in my arms and left everything else I knew in the present to go be with Laramie.
No one gave me that choice.
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