He walked straight to the bed and let his burden drop in a heap. He glanced around the room with fiery blue eyes, and his chiseled face darkened when he saw Lily.
“This is the man,” Mrs. Cartwright announced. “I’m sure this won’t take long, Miss, and then we’ll be out of your hair.”
Just then, the pinched-faced maid entered carrying more bolts of cloth. She scowled at Lily, and after she deposited her load on the bed with the rest, she propped her hands on her hips to watch.
The tailor approached Lily with cautious, wary steps. His eyes flashed, and his piercing gaze drilled to her very soul. She never met any tailor like him before, and she quailed under that direct, unflinching gaze.
He surveyed her traveling costume. She never got a chance to change her clothes since she first arrived at this estate. “I suppose you’re used to getting measured for clothes,” he remarked.
“Yes,” she replied. “Always.”
He nodded and pulled out a tape measure. “All right. Turn around.”
She turned away and found herself gazing out the window again. She slipped into her trance planning her escape. Merrill really did intend to marry her against her will. If he arranged for this man to make her a wedding dress, he must be seriously serious about that.
Nothing else remained but to run for it. She buzzed through her loose plan while she stood with her arms extended at her sides. The tailor measured around her waist. He measured her arm length and her skirt length and all the other little measurements.
Lily floated a million miles away. She would wait until night fell. She would wait until midnight to ensure the cook and all the other servants were asleep. She would tiptoe down to the kitchen, steal a knife and some food, and make a break for the woods.
She would probably spend several days hiding there before she made her way to town, but she didn’t care. Anything was better than this foul marriage.
“Turn around,” the tailor ordered.
Lily turned away from her beloved window. That window gave her the only scrap of hope that she would ever get out of here.
She came to a stop facing into the room. The tailor knelt in front of her. He worked away with his tape measure and jotted her measurements in his notebook. The sour maid stood a few paces away with her hands still on her hips.
The maid watched a few more minutes before she threw up her hands. She smacked her lips and marched out of the room. She gave the door an extra hard slam, just for good measure.
Lily puffed out her cheeks and let her shoulders slump in despondent anguish. Her chin sank onto her chest, and she found herself gazing down into the tailor’s face. He knelt in front of her and lifted his smooth, angular features to return her stare. His blue eyes blazed out of his head.
“I’m Sam Dolan, Miss,” he murmured. “I’m a friend of Doctor Kearney’s. He sent me to smuggle you out of this house.”
Lily’s breath caught in her throat. Had she heard right? She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. Could it really be?
He rose to his feet. He towered a full head taller than Lily. Only now, when he stood upright before her, did she realize that his thick, muscled shoulders and broad chest dwarfed her by a mile. His eyes burned into her very soul.
“Listen to me very carefully,” he whispered. “We don’t have much time, and we have to do this just right. Merrill’s people are watching my every move—and yours. You have to do exactly what I tell you. Understand?”
She nodded, too stunned to say a word. He was going to get her out of here! It was all really true.
“Catherine told us all about it,” he went on. “I have a wagon downstairs loaded with bolts of fabric and other goods. I have a box hidden underneath it all to hide you while I drive away. Doctor Kearney is waiting for you outside of town. We just have to make sure we don’t get caught. Are you sure you’re ready to go through with this?”
His eyes mesmerized her as never before. She couldn’t take her eyes off his face. In that instant, she trusted him with her life. She could barely fathom how a mere tailor could command such a magnetic presence.
She never doubted him. Whatever he said he would do, he could do. He would smuggle her out of Merrill’s house and take her to Doctor Kearney. Nothing else mattered.
“I’m ready, Sam,” she replied. “I’m ready when you are.”
“All right. Here’s what we’re gonna to do.” He turned back to the bed and started stacking the bolts in piles. “I’m gonna to go down to the wagon maybe four or five more times. I’m gonna to bring up as much fabric and cloth and goods as I possibly can. This is gonna take a while, so you have to stay calm. Do you hear me? You have to go along with this like nothing’s out of place. Got it?”
She nodded. “I got it.”
“I’m gonna drag this out as long as I can. I’m gonna go through a very detailed process of measuring you and checking a lot of different fabrics on you for color and sheen and a lot of other made-up stuff. Understand? When that’s finished, I’ll take just as long at taking it all back down to the wagon. That’s when I’ll take you down, too. Got it?”
She nodded again. “I understand.”
“You have to play your part,” he insisted. “If anybody listens at the keyhole, they have to hear us planning your dress. We have to make this as long and as boring as we possibly can so all the servants lose interest and stop paying attention to what we’re doing.”
Lily’s heart screamed with riotous laughter. Of course! What a brilliant plan! It couldn’t fail to work, so long as they both remained calm and held up their parts. She burst into a glorious smile. “You don’t have to worry about me, Sam. I’ll do everything I can to make this work.”
He cracked a wicked grin. “Good girl. Stay here, and I’ll be right back with the first load.”
He left the room. Lily struggled to suppress her excitement. To steady her nerves, she paced back to the window. The same intoxicating aroma of freedom cooled her brow, but now a new world of possibility spread out before her. Just a few more minutes, and she would be free!
Sam returned with an armload of bolts. He selected one and unrolled a long length of glistening satin fabric. He draped it over Lily’s shoulder and held it up to her cheek. He pursed his lips and frowned. “Too pink. Maybe this one.”
He unwrapped another sample, but when he wrapped it around her shoulders, he discarded that, too. “Too shiny. We need something more subdued, more elegant. I’ll be right back.”
Lily did her best not to burst out laughing at the pretense. Sam played his role to the letter. He concerned himself with selecting exactly the right cloth for her wedding dress. He spent over an hour trooping downstairs to his wagon and returning with dozens of samples.
Halfway through the process, the maid came in to watch. Sam made an elaborate show of placing two or three fabric samples side by side near Lily’s face and comparing them. He mixed them and matched them and scratched notes in his book. The minutes dragged one after another until the maid left.
Mrs. Cartwright came back to watch for a while, too, and she, too, left in boredom. Lily started to lose interest in the game, too, until Sam wrapped up his notebook with a piece of string and shoved it in his pocket. “I think that’s it. My work here is done. I’ll see you in three days for the first fitting. Have a pleasant afternoon, Miss.”
Lily stared up at him. Was he leaving her alone after all? Then she remembered he was only acting. He gathered up his bolts on his arm and trucked them downstairs. She stood rooted to the spot. What should she do now? Should she get her handbag or leave it behind?
He made five trips to take his things back to his wagon. He came back and picked up a bolt of shimmering taffeta. He unwound several lengths and approached Lily with a sly grin. “Ready?”
She could only nod in reckless anticipation. Whatever he had planned, she couldn’t think to do anything but go along with it. He wound the scratchy cloth around her again and again. He wrapped up every inch of her in
it, including her head. He didn’t even leave her a hole to breathe through.
She stood still with her arms and legs bound to her sides. She couldn’t move a step. The next thing she knew, he picked her up in his arms. He laid her across his elbow like a bolt of fabric. The taffeta held her out stiff so she couldn’t bend.
Thumping beats pounded down her body while he piled more bolts on top of her. The heavy weights crushed her ribs. She gritted her teeth against the pain, but she made no sound. This was the moment to which their whole charade led. If she gave herself away now, she would never get free.
He whispered low under his breath. “Here we go.”
She sensed herself gliding through space. She bounced when he trotted down the stairs, and she heard him laughing and joking with the cook when he passed the kitchen. Raucous laughter and jeers answered him.
The next instant, cool air hit her through her straightjacket. She crashed onto a treacherous hard surface. Sam weaseled two fingers into the taffeta around her nose and mouth. He jiggled the restraints loose to give her a tiny opening through which to breathe.
“Stay here,” he murmured. “I’m going back for the last two loads. Don’t make a sound.”
She gasped for air, but the next thing she knew, pitch black descended all around her when he shut the lid of his hiding box.
How long she lay there in the dark silence, she couldn’t guess. Every torturous minute, every ragged breath she drew cost her every ounce of strength she had.
After what seemed like eons, a drumming noise pounded on her box. Then silence. Three times she lay on tenterhooks waiting for Sam to come back. He dropped his bolts and bundles into the wagon and left her alone.
Finally, when she thought she couldn’t tolerate another second of this eternal waiting, the wagon lurched and started moving. It rattled and rumbled over rocky ground. She recognized that constant jiggling motion, but she never rode in a hard wooden box without padding before.
The boards bruised and battered her, but she bit her lip and kept silent. Her life depended on this, and she would never jeopardize that over a little discomfort. The wagon tottered away, down the long drive away from Merrill Fox’s house.
6
Lily never experienced the pain and confusion of that awful journey to freedom. She prided herself on her sturdy resilience, but that trip took every morsel of resolve she could muster.
By the time the wagon stopped, her hip, legs, and shoulder screamed in pain from constant jarring against the rough boards.
Muffled sounds drifted to her from far away, but she couldn’t make them out. Banging and clattering followed. At long last, light poured into her eyes, and the box lid pried back.
Now she heard a flurry of voices coming from all directions. “Jeez, Sam, you brought us a bolt of cloth. Good job.”
“Put a sock in it, man,” Sam replied. “Help me get her out so we can unwind her.”
Laughing and jokes fired from all sides, but Lily couldn’t see anything inside her cocoon. A woman’s voice joined the tumult. “Did you have to truss her up like a Christmas turkey? I can’t see a scrap of her.”
“That’s the whole idea,” Sam grumbled. “I couldn’t exactly walk her out and sit her on the wagon seat.”
Hands worked all over Lily’s body to unwrap her. Inch by inch, the taffeta fell away. It drooped off Lily’s head, and she caught her first sight of Sam Dolan standing in front of her. He burst into a mischievous grin. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”
Before she could say a word, a woman rushed into her face. “Welcome, welcome! We’ve all heard so much about you. I’m Betsy Wilcox, and this is Cici Kirk. Don’t pay any attention to those reprobates over there.”
“Hey!” shouted another man standing nearby. “I’m only your husband.”
Everybody burst out laughing. Lily looked around her, stunned. Two rough men flanked Sam. They both carried shotguns and wore pistol holsters on both hips. A blacksmith’s forge stood not far away, and Sam’s wagon parked next to the corral.
Sam took her hand. “It’s all right. You’re safe now. Don’t let them bother you. This is Jed Wilcox, and this is his place.”
Jed doffed his hat. “An honor, Ma’am.”
“This is Kelvin Kirk.” Sam indicated the other man. “He looks ugly, but he’s harmless to women and children and anybody on the right side of the law.”
“You got that right,” Kelvin snapped back.
“They’re all good people,” Sam told her. “They’re just excited to see you. That’s all.”
Lily tried to say something and failed.
Betsy took her other hand. “Come inside. Catherine told us all about your situation, and we’ve been waiting for Sam to bring you back. You come inside. We’ve got it all worked out, and I hope you’ll be comfortable here. Did you leave all your luggage back at Merrill’s? We can send someone from the Hotel to pick it up.”
“Have you eaten anything recently?” Cici asked. “When Catherine told us what was going on, we wondered if Merrill was keeping you on bread and water.”
“He’s a nasty one, that Merrill Fox,” Betsy chimed in. “We all know about him. When did you get off the coach? How did you wind up at Merrill’s place? It doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“Let her get a word in, Betsy,” Cici chided. “Come on, Lily. We’ll get you some tea and cake in the parlor. You don’t have to worry about a thing now. Did you know Betsy and I were both mail order brides? You didn’t know, did you? All the men in this town are gonna be getting hitched before you can shine your shoes. Do you take milk in your tea? My word, look at you! You don’t even have a shawl to put on. Give her one of yours, Betsy.”
Betsy towed Lily toward the forge. Sam, Jed, and Kelvin all talked at once over the nonstop babble of both women. Lily’s head spun trying to put all the puzzle pieces together. One minute, she was Merrill’s prisoner and would-be bride. Now she was here among these strangers. She knew Sam best of the bunch, and she only met him a little over an hour before.
Betsy guided her through the forge, past the anvil blackened with soot and gnarled tools and broken farm implements to a door leading into the kitchen. Lily stopped dead in her tracks when she saw rifles, pistols, and shotguns piled on the table.
“This way to the parlor,” Betsy chirped. “Never mind about those. The men just want to be ready in case Merrill tries anything.”
“Tries…anything?” Lily stammered.
“You know!” Cici exclaimed. “Tries to get you back after we stole you from his house. He doesn’t take kindly to anybody doing anything against his wishes. He’s that kind of man, if you know what I mean.”
Lily’s reserve started to thaw. “Yeah. I know what you mean. I saw what kind of man he is.”
“Then you know all about it,” Cici replied. “We’ve all had our fair share of Merrill Fox, I can tell you. There’s not a man or a woman in this town that hasn’t tasted the worst he can dish out. It’s too bad you had to find out the minute you first set foot in this town.”
“It goes that way for a lot of people,” Betsy added. “It happened to me, and it happened to Cici, too, so you’re in good company.”
Lily passed her hand across her forehead. “Thank you for taking me in. You don’t know how grateful I am to get out of his house. He tried to force me to marry him.”
“That’s just like him,” Betsy remarked. “He thinks he can take what he wants by force. He has the money and the power to do what he wants most of the time.”
“Isn’t there anybody in this town that will stand up to him?” Lily asked. “What about….you know, the law?”
Betsy and Cici exchanged glances. “Well, the Sheriff works for him. The only people in this town that stand up to him are right here at the forge right now, us and our men and Sam and….”
While they talked, Betsy led the way through the kitchen down the hall, and into a cheery, immaculate parlor decorated with beautiful furniture and wool carpet.
Pictures of a family perched on the mantle shelf and crystal sparkled in a glass cupboard against the wall.
The instant Lily entered the room, she spotted a tall man in a black frock coat standing at the window. He turned to face the sound of voices at the same moment Betsy finished her sentence. “….and Doctor Noah Kearney.”
Lily froze in her tracks. She would have recognized him anywhere from the daguerreotype he sent her in his letter. Tall and square and reserved, his dark eyes scrutinized everything in the minutest detail. His curved black mustache hid his mouth, and his black suit made him look taller and more imposing than ever.
He didn’t rush at her and deluge her with a thousand questions like these effervescent women, but the charge of tension crackled across the room between him and Lily. His black eyes shot straight to her guts, and she quivered all over with excitement.
She never let herself believe before this moment that she could meet a man she wanted to marry, especially a stranger with whom she only exchanged a few letters. She always reserved a possibility in the back of her mind that if she didn’t like him, she would go home with no harm done.
She never believed she could feel such an unstoppable attraction for anybody. She certainly never expected to meet someone who produced such an instant effect on her body and soul.
She could marry this man. She could dedicate her life to him, and she’d never even spoken to him. Were moments like this even possible?
She lost all awareness of everything around her. Betsy and Cici kept talking. Lily even heard the men talking in the background, but she paid no attention to the words. Time stood still. Nothing existed in the world but her and Noah Kearney.
He materialized in front of her. His face occupied her whole view. Somewhere out of the distant reaches of time, his hand touched hers. It electrified her in a way Betsy’s touch never could.
The Doctor's Bride (Brides 0f Brimstone Book 3) Page 4