“I would never condemn you,” Allison told her sister fervently.
“Then, Allison, how can you say a word about Addie? Things happen. They're married now. You can't deny he's happy, and she seems nice so far.” Becky's gentle voice left no room for either anger or mistaking her meaning.
“Allison?” Addie's soft voice cut through the sound of wind whispering through the grass to reach unwelcoming ears. “I didn't marry Jesse to hurt you, and I have nothing against you. I'm glad he had wonderful friends growing up, especially you and Kristina. You two taught him how to listen to women. Most men don't know how to do that. I knew about you both. He told me so many stories. I was looking forward to seeing this town, to meeting his friends. This seemed like a place for a person to start over, with no one judging them.” Her face twisted into lines of uncertainty once again. I wonder what that means. “A place to fit in and make a life. I wanted that. I had hoped his friends could be my friends. If you won't accept me, well, there's nothing I can do about it, but I hold no anger toward you.”
Allison bit her lip. “Why do you have to be nice?” she demanded.
“Why do you have to choose her for a target?” Lydia shot back. “Why not be angry with the people who actually hurt you? Start with your evil mother-in-law. Leave Addie alone if you can't be her friend.”
Allison sighed and fell silent, contemplating. “I'm not apologizing until I have a better handle on how I feel about anything. It's probably best to give me a wide berth until after the delivery. I'm not in a good state right now.”
“You're not,” Kristina agreed. “I do feel sorry you're so uncomfortable, but it has been affecting your mood.”
“I can't control it,” Allison said. “I feel so horrible. My feet hurt. My back hurts. When I try to sleep, my hips hurt and my legs twitch. I'm never doing this again.”
Becky rose and went to her sister, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “I'm sorry, honey.”
Allison gave her sister a tight pseudo-smile and stretched out on her side on the blanket. Within moments she drifted off into a restless and uncomfortable sleep.
“See, it was never you,” Lydia told Addie quietly. “She has a witch of a mother-in-law and she's hurting. You just got in the way. It's not fair, but try not to take it to heart. Allison isn't usually unfair. I bet once her little one comes, she'll be nicer to you.”
“Yikes,” Addie replied. “I'm not sure I want to go through what she is.”
“Unfortunately, we don't have a choice,” Becky said, laying her hand on her own tummy. “It's too late now. At least we're prepared.”
“That's for certain. Um, do I even have a mother-in-law?”
“No, honey,” Kristina said. “Jesse's dad was killed in a farm accident when he was fifteen. His mama sort of wasted away a year later. He more or less lived with my family after that. They were good folks though. They would have liked you.”
“Oh.” Addie fell silent. They all did. The wind whispered through the shoulder-high grass, making it dance like ladies in fancy dresses. They waltzed and swayed, clad in gold and green, adorned with dusty blue and vibrant red blossoms, while huge, gaudy sunflowers watched the sky with single, sightless eyes.
A melancholy feeling reminded Lydia of when she was younger, of looking out of Boston harbor into the vast, gray Atlantic. Though her childhood had been happy, the sight of the undulating waves always drew her, tugging unrealized sorrows from the depths of her soul and tossing them on the sun-bright water.
Stretching out on the blanket, Lydia regarded the sky. Fat, puffy clouds floated overhead. Her mind shaped them into dragons, pirate ships and for some reason, a goat. She smiled as sleep crept up and claimed her.
“Do you think Lydia knows how to cook fish?” Dylan asked, lifting the fat trout he'd just snared so his friends could see it.
“Lydia can cook anything,” Wes replied. “You're a lucky man.”
“What?” Jesse interjected. “Allison can cook. She force fed us cookies all along. They weren't bad.”
“Allison is fine,” Wes replied. “We eat well enough. It's Sam who wasn't.” Then he stopped, eying his little daughter.
“Daddy made us dinner until Mama Allie came to stay,” Melissa announced. “He makes good soup.”
Wes gave the other men a look that dared them to comment. Jesse guffawed, but Dylan, who had been present to witness the young banker's nightmare of a first marriage, kept silent. Bad cooking was one of Wesley's smaller problems.
Gathering up their trout, the men returned to the blanket. It appeared Sunday afternoon had attacked the women with an unplanned nap. Allison lay on her side, twitching in her sleep. Becky snored softly under the tree near her sister. Kristina and Addie chatted quietly while Lydia sprawled on her back, eyes closed.
Dylan took a moment to study his intended's face. So pretty. So soft and yet so strong. I'm glad she's accepted me. He knelt, setting the fish in the grass beside the blanket, and kissed her cheek. Lydia opened warm brown eyes and looked up at him, first with confusion, then with a soul-deep joy that touched him to the core. “The afternoon is waning, honey,” he told her quietly. “Shall we go?”
He extended a hand. She grasped it, but wrinkled her nose. “Something smells like a trout.”
“That would be… a trout,” he replied, triumphantly retrieving his catch and dangling it far too close to her face.
She recoiled from the slimy scales. “Dylan!”
“If I clean this…” he wiggled it provocatively, so it nearly touched her skin, “do you think we could have it for dinner?”
“If you clean it, I'll cook it with potatoes and green beans. But it you hit me with it, you'll be left in the street alone with your fish.”
“And no one to cook it? What a shame. All right, all right.” He withdrew the trout and hoisted Lydia to her feet. All around them, the lazy afternoon party showed signs of breaking up. Despite their tension, Wesley gently helped Allison to her feet, and then took her arm. Melissa grabbed her hand and they headed for their home, closest to the picnic spot, on the far south side of town. A little further on, the Heitschmidt family home waited to welcome James and his bride in established comfort. The church towered over the center of town, and in the shade of its steeple the tiny, single-story parsonage would shelter Cody and Kristina. Though the space would never work for a family, for the couple, it sufficed, especially after the installation of an attic bedroom as well as an indoor privy and interior walls separating the parlor, kitchen and dining room.
“Where are you staying?” Lydia asked Jesse and Addie.
“The boarding house,” Jesse replied. “Getting enough money together to buy a house is going to take a while, but it's okay for now.”
“I hope something becomes available quickly,” Addie added. “I don't want to deliver the baby there. I'd like to be somewhere ours.”
“I'm trying, honey,” Jesse said, and Lydia could see the frustration on his face as the younger couple moved on. At last only Lydia and Dylan remained lingering in the lovely late-summer day, as the prairie grass blew and the sluggish river sloshed against the banks. Dylan picked up the basket and Lydia accepted the fish. Their free hands linked together almost without thought. Holding each other just felt natural.
The couple made their way through the length of Main Street towards Lydia's home and café. “I'm glad we went, aren't you?” Lydia asked.
“Oh, definitely,” Dylan replied. “But Allison and Wes aren't doing well, are they?”
Lydia released a slow breath. “No. It's hard to say who's in worse shape. I didn't know Wesley Fulton when he was a kid. I've heard he was outgoing and fun, but as long as I've been here he seemed so… fragile.”
“That's true,” Dylan replied. “I thought it might have to do with that first wife of his. She was a piece of work.”
“Hush,” Lydia admonished. “The poor thing wasn't right in the head. She couldn't help it.”
“She couldn't help being sim
ple,” Dylan conceded, “and that might have made her kind of angry and hard to get along with, but she could help lifting her skirt for everyone. I know she knew better than that.”
Lydia frowned. “That's vulgar, Sheriff.” They had arrived at the café and she turned the key in the lock.
“It true though. Wes isn't a bad guy, but being with that…” she glowered and he continued, “that woman wasn't good for him. And now Allison's turned every bit as grumpy as Samantha was. I do hope it's temporary or the whole Fulton household might just implode.”
They stepped over the threshold and Lydia led Dylan back into her kitchen. Removing a sharp knife from a wooden block on the oak countertop, she handed it to him. Then she retrieved the basket and began unpacking the dirty dishes, which she piled up in the white sink below a small window that overlooked her garden. She worked the pump and water sluiced over the chicken plate and the pie pan before she began rummaging in the cabinets and bringing out a copper pot. She filled it with water and poked the ashes in the firebox of the stove, feeding it a bit more fuel. Then she turned and began peeling potatoes.
Dylan took a seat at a small table stashed in the corner between the door and the icebox. A newspaper – a month old by the look of it – sat on the surface.
“Should I use this to wrap the head and guts?” he asked.
“Yes indeed,” Lydia replied. “I was going to use it for pumpkin, but there will be more before then. The slops bucket is…”
“I see it. Over by the back door.” He retrieved the pail and set it beside the table before setting to work fileting the fish.
“You know,” Lydia said, continuing the conversation, “If I had to have Mrs. Fulton as a mother-in-law, I might turn grumpy too. Do you have any family, Dylan?”
“Nope,” he replied. A strip of trout skin plopped onto the paper. Lydia set the potatoes to boil and turned her attention to a bowl of green beans in the icebox. She quickly began snapping off the stringy ends. “Or well… I do, but I don't talk to them.”
“Why not?” she asked. That sounds important.
“Dad died when he was only thirty,” the sheriff replied, setting aside one beautiful white filet and flipping the creature over to extract the other. “He ran the general store. We don't know what happened. One morning he just slumped over at the breakfast table and that was it. I was ten. Mama remarried pretty fast, to a rich man who didn't want some other man's kid underfoot. By the time I turned sixteen, I had moved to the logging camp. Mama had more kids by then, and I guess she thought it was okay to forget about her firstborn.” The bitterness in his voice brought tears to Lydia's eyes.
“Oh, honey, that's sad. I'm sorry.” She dropped the beans back into their bowl and took the five steps to where Dylan sat, resting her hand on his shoulder. He leaned his cheek against her skin.
“That was a long time ago, Lydia. I don't think about it much anymore.”
What a lie. She kissed the top of his head and returned to her beans. She set a second pot of water beside the first, and began her next preparation. Soon she had a cast iron skillet heating to melt a pat of butter as she mixed up cornmeal and seasonings. Just in time, because Dylan arrived a moment later with two portions of trout. The moist surface of the fish grabbed the coating the moment she dropped it onto the plate.
Dylan looked over her shoulder. “I'm feasting like a king today.” Then he returned to the table to gather up the unwanted portions of the fish and put the whole mess outside.
Lydia sighed. Every cat in town will be paying a visit tonight, I'm sure. The sound of the sink told her Dylan was washing his hands. I didn't even have to tell him. He's at least half civilized already.
She dropped the filets into the butter.
Dylan approached from behind and rested his chin on her shoulder. His hands closed on her waist. “Why, Miss Lydia. Can it be you're not wearing a corset?” He sounded shocked.
She rolled her eyes. “As hot as this kitchen gets, I'd faint if I tried, if not fall down stone dead. I need to breathe more than I need a wasp waist.”
“Good,” he replied. “You have lovely proportions.” He slipped his arms around her middle, turning the clutch into a hug. The close proximity to her man set Lydia's heart pounding again. His thumb made a strumming movement in the vicinity of her belly button. Heat shot straight to her core. Leaving the food to its own devices for a moment, she turned.
“This is dangerous,” he warned her.
“I know,” she replied, wrinkling her nose and smiling. Her eyes crinkled in the corners. “You shouldn't even be in here.”
“Don't you worry about scandal?”
Lydia snorted. “There's always some scandal. Once we're boringly respectable again, people will move on to the next one. I have more important things to worry about. Like not letting the trout burn.” She tugged his head down. “Kiss me.”
He did, lavishing her lips with wanton, tender caresses. His moustache ticked her face, enticing a giggle from her.
“Tend the food, woman,” he ordered in a false growl.
“Yes, sir,” she replied in a parody of submissiveness. Turning, she managed to turn the fish just moments before the golden crust turned black. “Dylan, can you please get me two plates from the cabinet beside the ice box?”
“Of course,” he replied, releasing her with obvious reluctance.
“And I don't know if you're a temperance proponent, but I have a nice bottle of red wine, if you'd like.”
“I normally drink whisky,” he replied, “but today is worth celebrating. I'll join you in a glass.”
She smiled. “Oh, are we celebrating?” she asked in a show of false innocence. “And just what would the occasion be? I'd like to know.” She retrieved two long-stemmed glasses from the shelves above the plates and set them on the table. “These belonged to my parents, by the way. I've kept them all these years, which wasn't easy on the train from Boston, let me tell you.”
“Yes, we're celebrating,” he replied with a growl. “Don't you think our betrothal is worth a drink at least?”
Lydia retrieved a loosely corked bottle and opened it. The rich aroma of fermented grapes wafted into the room. She poured a generous portion into each of the glasses and admired its purple hue. I'm getting better at making this. “I certainly think drinking a toast to an engagement is worthwhile,” she said, not meeting Dylan's eyes. “But I don't recall having received a proposal. We talked about marriage, but no asking ever happened.”
Dylan's hands closed around Lydia's, plucking the bottle from her grip and setting it on the table. Then, still clutching her fingers in his, he sank to one knee. “Lydia, honey, will you marry me?”
Lydia bit her lip and nodded, her words choked behind a flood of tears that threatened to spill. She sucked in a shaky breath. Her joke had gone wrong – or maybe right – as his formal proposal warmed her from the heart outward. She tugged on his hands, urging him to rise. He followed her lead and she threw her arms around his chest and rested her head on his shoulder, just below his chin. He enfolded her.
Long moments passed as they clung to each other. This feels so good. So right. My man. My love. Suddenly she couldn't wait to be his wife. The warmth of his body sank into her soul and told her something she hadn't known before. There will be powerful closeness, when we become man and wife. The joining of bodies symbolizes the merging of lives. His hand slid away from her back, cupping her cheek and laying his lips on hers in a kiss that simmered with tender heat. She opened to a tentative touch of his tongue, deepening the embrace. Shocking, how something everyone says is naughty feels perfectly right. She closed her eyes, drinking in the potent blend of love and passion, and then sucked in a sharp breath. In sliding away from her face, his hand brushed downward, seemingly looking to wrap around her waist, but touching her breast. With only two thin layers of fabric between them, the touch could almost have been on her bare flesh. His hand froze.
She pulled back from the kiss and met his eyes, took i
n the startled, eager expression that had nothing to do with seduction or triumph. “May I?” he asked.
Lydia didn't know how to respond. She blinked, but the rest of her remained frozen like a block of ice in the blistering heat of the kitchen. Passion rose to volcanic as Dylan's accidental touch turned deliberate. He lifted the heavy globe, gently squeezing. The touch stimulated her nipple, setting off a sizzle of arousal like ball lightning in her lower belly. The little bud rose proudly in his hand. He stroked it with his thumb.
Frightened by the intensity in Dylan's eyes, Lydia drew him down for another kiss, shutting out the sight but making no move to push his hand away from her body.
Then the smell of butter growing almost too brown shook her loose from the embrace and sent her scurrying out of her beloved's arms to retrieve their dinner. She quickly plated the fish, added a spoonful of potatoes with butter and salt, along with a sprinkle of fresh herbs, and the beans. “Nothing like prosaic reality to spoil a tender moment,” she said as she carried the food to the small table.
“That's for certain,” Dylan agreed. He joined her, sitting facing her so they could stare into each other's eyes. Like a pair of besotted fools, Lydia thought. Of course, he looks just as hooked as I feel, so that's not a bad thing.
Holding hands across the table, they ate in silence. Words seemed to have fled in the face of such intense emotion, but it didn't matter. The meaning flowed between them, free and easy as water along a river bed. Obstacles did not interrupt, nor could the power be contained. I love you, she thought. The light of that love reflected in his eyes.
Chapter 7
“Any idea,” Jesse asked, leaning down to examine the threatening letters from the train robbery, which were once again spread across the sheriff's desk in the jail building, “why they decided to celebrate Founder's Day in September? There are a number of dates they could choose, but not one of them is in that month.”
Dylan reversed a letter with a newspaper clipping and frowned as the move provided no insight. If only I could concentrate. “Since when has Ilse Jackson let a little thing like a fact get in the way of her plans? Though I have to admit, mid-September is a fine time to have an outdoor event. It won't be so hot then, but the winter will still be a long way off.”
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