Her Colorado Man

Henrietta raised both hands and ran them over his dark wavy hair, loosening another curl in the process, and then trailed her fingers over his forehead and nose. “Isn’t he a handsome one, Mariah?” she asked.

Mariah’s neck warmed and the heat spread to her cheeks. Wes Burrows was definitely a ruggedly handsome man. The last thing she wanted to do was tell him she thought so, but she had to answer her mother. “He’s a handsome one, Mama.”

Chapter Four

Laughter erupted around them.

Henrietta took Wesley’s hand and placed it on her arm. “Come, get a plate and eat. It’s my father’s birthday and we’re celebrating with our traditional dishes. Do you like schweinswurst?”

“I don’t know that I’ve ever had it, ma’am. But the food sure smells good.”

Mariah stood rooted in place as conversation swelled to normal. Her brothers blended back into the gathering, and her mother led Wesley toward the food tables.

Roth poured a mug full from the barrel and handed it to Wesley, who accepted the beer with a nod of thanks.

John James followed with the puppy at his heels and fed the animal bites of sausage without anyone scolding him.

Mariah’s newly married sister, Annika, took Mariah’s hand and led her toward the dining hall. “This is an exciting day.”

Mariah nodded.

“John James looks so happy.”

Now Wes was seated at the long table and Henrietta directed Mariah’s youngest sister Sylvia to fill his mug already. A heaping plate of food befitting a logger sat before him, and in between answering questions from others at the table, he seemed to be enjoying it.

Annika urged Mariah toward the empty chair beside him, and reluctantly, she took it.

“Where did you leave your plate?” Annika asked.

Mariah couldn’t remember, so Sylvia brought her new servings and a fresh mug of beer.

Wesley glanced from the mug placed before Mariah to all the others around the table. The Spanglers drank beer with their meal as though it was water. Even the children had brimming mugs. He’d never seen beer served outside a saloon.

The food was pure heaven on his tongue, rich sauces and savory spices. This was a meal cooked by women who knew their craft and employed it seriously. His meals over a typical season consisted of salmon and small game roasted over an open fire. An occasional stay in a town sometimes garnered him a few vegetables and maybe a dried fruit pie that cost an arm and a leg.

“What is this?” he asked, of a particularly tasty serving on his plate and Mariah politely explained the potato dumpling.

She pushed around the food on her plate with her fork. It was plain she was uncomfortable with his presence, and he didn’t really blame her. John James waited until a chair became available across from them and climbed up.

“Would you like some more to eat?” Mariah asked her son.

The boy shook his head and his gaze fixed on Wes.

The way the child looked at him made Wes sit a little straighter, eat his food a little more slowly. Clearly, the boy was completely enamored with having a father of his own.

A tiny arrow of guilt tried to stab his conscience, but Wes used his determination as a defense. He was giving John James the father he had longed for. He knew firsthand what it was like to see other kids with parents and have none. Of course, John James had his mother, a woman with fire in her eyes when she looked at him, though she avoided that most of the time.

She was spittin’ mad.

Wes finished his meal and polished off another mug of beer. It was fine brew indeed, with a dark full flavor like nothing he’d enjoyed before. “I believe this is the best beer I’ve ever had.”

Mariah nodded in her suspicious way, her wide blue gaze not lifting all the way to his. “Spangler Brewery makes the finest lager in the country.”

“The children drink it, too,” he remarked.

Something more flashed in her gaze when she directed it to him that time. Had he made her feel defensive? He hadn’t meant to. “Some outside our culture find it an outrageous custom,” she replied. “But we don’t know anything different.”

She had lustrous fair hair fastened in a loose knot atop her head, and skin as pale and smooth as the Chinese women who worked the laundries in the gold camps. Each time she looked at him, a rosy-pink hue tinted her complexion.

She was angry. Angry and wary, and he couldn’t blame her. He wasn’t even positive why he needed to make this trip and insert himself as John James’s father, but he’d been pulled.

And after seeing the expression on the boy’s face, after meeting him, he wasn’t sorry. Not a damned bit sorry.

“Can I see Yuri?” the boy asked.

“Sure.” Wes glanced aside at the boy’s mother. “As long as your mama approves, we’ll go outdoors later.”

“How many dogs did you have?”

“Eight fine sled dogs,” he replied. “Plus the occasional pups.”

“Where did they sleep?”

“They camped under the stars with me,” he replied. “Most usually I set up my tent and we all shared it. Keeps the snow from drifting over us during the night.”

“You sleep right out in the snow with no house or nothing?”

“No houses out in the Yukon wilderness between towns and tent camps,” he replied.

Two more children sidled in beside John James to listen. A girl and a smaller boy. “What did you eat?”

“These is my cousins, Emma and Paul,” John James told him. “This here’s my papa.” The pride in his voice tugged at Wes’s heart. “He delivers mail in Alaska.” He turned back to Wes. “What did you eat?”

“Pleased to meet you,” Wes said to the wide-eyed children, then replied to John James’s question. “Sometimes I cut a hole in the ice and caught salmon for our suppers. Ate a lot of dried fish and dried meat during the day. In fair weather I found duck eggs and snared rabbits.”

“Wasn’t you scared of coyotes and mountain lions?” John James asked.

“No mountain lions, but I was always on the lookout for wolves and bears.”

“Did you ever shoot a bear?” Paul asked.

“Yup. One time I had a good shot on an elk. Was looking down the barrel of my rifle when I heard branches snapping behind me. The elk bounded off.” He gestured with a rapid swing of his arm. “I turned around to see a silver-tipped grizzly heading straight for me. That bear must’ve been twice as tall as me. At least he looked it from where I stood.”

“What did you do?” one of the boys asked.

A few more children had joined them and now the adults had turned their attention to his story. One of Mariah’s male cousins leaned against a doorway. Others stood nearby listening as attentively as the youngsters.

“I quick ran behind a tree and kind of circled it to buy some time. The bear followed and swiped at me. I didn’t know how well I’d do shooting at it up close like that, but I fired. First shot didn’t faze him.”