Happily Ever After in the West

by Debra Cowan

  Through the screened door, she could see her husband and brother in the front room, clearly profiled in the glitter of the setting sun as Zeke helped Quentin into his wheelchair. Had her brother been assisting Quentin with his exercises when Zoe wasn’t around?

  She reached for the door as her husband settled himself in his chair and glanced at Zeke. “What did Mr. Gordon say to you?”

  “He said they still had a few bonds,” the teenager replied. “I can buy one if I want.”

  Bristling, Zoe paused.

  “You didn’t buy any, did you?” Quentin asked. “Not yet.”

  The relief she felt was so strong that it caused an ache in her chest.

  “That’s good.” Quentin moved a few feet closer to the young man. “Your sister wouldn’t have been happy.”

  “I don’t care.” Zeke’s voice vibrated with resentment. “You didn’t think it was a bad idea.”

  “I said I wasn’t sure if it was or not. I’ve asked Weaver some questions and I’m still not certain you should buy one of those bonds.”

  Thank goodness, Quentin was siding with her on this. He might not know what she did about Weaver’s scheme, but he wasn’t comfortable with the “opportunity.”

  Zoe was tempted to talk to him about this, but if she started asking questions, he would figure out lickety-split that her anxiety was somehow related to Weaver or the bond issue.

  “Remember what we talked about earlier?” Quentin asked her brother.

  “Yes.” The boy’s voice brightened. “Will you still let me do it?”

  “If Zoe agrees. You need to talk it over with her.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “I know, but she’s your sister.”

  “She was mean to you.” Zeke turned, enabling her to see his profile and the angry set of his jaw. “She was mean to both of us.”

  She should probably apologize to her brother, too, Zoe thought, even though she wasn’t changing her mind about letting him spend his money on those bonds. And exactly what was Quentin willing to let Zeke do?

  Her husband was quiet for a long moment. “Sometimes people come across as mean when they’re just worried or afraid. Zoe loves you very much and she feels responsible for you. She just doesn’t want you to make a mistake with your money.”

  Tears burned her throat.

  “It took you a long time to earn that,” Quentin continued. “You want to use it wisely.”

  His words had Zoe wincing. After the way she’d lit into him, he was defending her to her brother. The urge to tell him everything grew even stronger.

  “After supper,” Quentin said, “why don’t you talk to her?”

  “Talk to whom about what?” Zoe asked brightly as she stepped inside.

  She glanced at Quentin, but he wasn’t looking at her. He nodded encouragingly to Zeke.

  Her brother eyed her defiantly. “Quentin said I could invest in his bees.”

  “You’d buy into the business, Zeke,” the man corrected. “You’d be my partner and we would share the profits.”

  Zeke drew himself up, pride shining in his blue eyes. “Yeah, I’d be his partner.”

  Zoe’s gaze shot to her husband, her chest tightening. “Are you sure? Zeke only has the experience you’ve given him.”

  “He’s good with the bees, Zoe.”

  The younger man beamed. She swallowed past the lump in her throat.

  Quentin showed a faith in her brother no one else ever had. Did he realize he was giving Zeke a way to take care of himself if something happened to her or to Quentin?

  She melted inside. “It’s kind of you to offer,” she said hoarsely.

  “I’m getting a good deal. Zeke has a knack for beekeeping and harvesting the honey.”

  “So?” Zeke demanded impatiently of her. “Can I do it?”

  Zoe’s gaze locked with Quentin’s. Did the man know what this meant to her? It was plain he knew what it meant to her brother.

  “Yes,” she said softly. “You can do it.”

  Zeke whooped and rushed around the dining table to scoop her up in a big hug. She hugged him back, grabbing the back of Quentin’s chair for balance when her brother put her down quickly and rushed toward the hall.

  She laughed. “Where are you going?”

  “To get my money!”

  Quentin grinned. “You can do it later.”

  “I want to do it now!”

  As Zeke disappeared into his room, Zoe moved closer to Quentin. “You don’t have to let him invest in your apiary, although it’s very kind.”

  “He really is good with the bees.” Quentin moved away from her, causing a hollowness in her stomach.

  He was still angry. She didn’t blame him.

  “I’m not offering because I’m trying to smooth the waters between you two.”

  “I understand,” she murmured.

  “This is the first chance I’ve had to speak to you in a couple of days. You’ve been avoiding me,” he said coolly.

  She shifted nervously. “Not really.”

  He gave her a flat stare. “You’ve been scarce since the town meeting, which was probably good. It gave me a chance to cool down.”

  She grimaced. “Quentin.”

  “Are you regretting our marriage? Your agreement to stay?”

  “No.” She eased closer to him, relieved when he didn’t move away. “Not at all.”

  “What am I supposed to think? I know we have a problem.”

  “It’s not—”

  “Don’t bother denying it.”

  It’s not what you think! She wanted to cry out, but she couldn’t. However, she could try to make amends.

  “I’m sorry for the things I said the other night.” The words rushed out. “I didn’t mean them. I was worried about Zeke. You were right—I was being overprotective. It’s hard not to be when I’m all he’s had for most of his life.”

  For a long moment, Quentin said nothing. A muscle jumped as he clenched his jaw.

  Didn’t he believe her? “I really am sorry.”

  “I’d like to think so, but I wonder if you’re only apologizing so I’ll stop asking you what’s wrong.”

  Hurt stabbed at her. “I mean it, Quentin. I’ve wanted to apologize since I said it. You’ve only ever tried to help me and Zeke. It’s clear that you have my brother’s best interests at heart. And mine. I appreciate that. You don’t know how much.”

  “I’ve told you before. Gratitude isn’t what I want from you.”

  At first, she thought he meant he wanted her physically, but no, she realized as she stared into his somber eyes. He wanted her to confide in him.

  After the way she’d behaved, he could’ve told her things were over. Could’ve helped Zeke buy the bonds. But Quentin hadn’t done any of that.

  He’d been patient, steady, true. And she’d hurt him.

  She was sorry for that, but she was protecting him and Zeke. Wasn’t that the important thing?

  A little voice niggled at her. Hadn’t Quentin thought the same thing about her when he had pushed her out of his life seven years ago?

  He turned toward Zeke’s room though he looked at her. “I meant what I said about wanting our marriage to work. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “I know.” She held his gaze. She was completely sure of him. She still loved him, she admitted. In fact, she was more in love with him than she had been in the past. “I know you won’t leave.”

  “When you’re ready to talk, to tell me what’s going on, I’ll be here. But my patience is running out, Zoe. You should be aware of that, too.”

  She nodded, her chest aching as he moved toward Zeke’s room. Only now did she realize that she had been—was—building something with Quentin. They were building a future.

  And her silence could destroy it.

  She was sick to death of Weaver and his partner eyeing her and her brother and husband every time they left the house.

  She had to find something incriminating on the con m
an. Until she did, her marriage was in jeopardy.

  Over the next few days, Quentin recognized Zoe’s apology as an attempt to put things right.

  But they weren’t right and wouldn’t be as long as she kept secrets. However, she’d made an effort. He couldn’t expect everything from her all at once.

  It crossed his mind that she might be keeping him in the dark to get back at him for pushing her away years ago, but he’d immediately dismissed the thought. Zoe didn’t play games like that. Besides, whatever was bothering her put her on edge, made her jittery. It had nothing to do with retaliation.

  She’d said she didn’t regret their marriage or her decision to stay. That was good, but it was obvious that if Quentin wanted to know what was wrong with his wife, he was going to have to figure it out on his own.

  So, he watched her.

  Not spying exactly and not every minute, but he paid very close attention when she went to work at Josie’s or Haskell’s or the Fontaine. He took note of who she spoke to in town and how she seemed afterward, realizing that she was most agitated after her shifts at the hotel. But why?

  Three days after Zoe had apologized, Quentin left Annalise’s clinic via the back door as he always did. He wheeled his way up the side of the building then out of the shade into the afternoon sun.

  According to Annalise, he could do anything he wanted as long as he was careful. And what he wanted was his wife. How much longer until she was ready?

  Red dust swirling beneath his wheels, he headed to the newspaper office to talk to Hoot Eckert about returning to work. He approached Haskell’s General Store where Charlie stood on the porch under the wood awning, talking to Davis Lee and Matt Baldwin.

  Quentin greeted all of them, pleasantly surprised when Matt came down the steps to shake hands.

  “How do you like married life?” the rancher asked.

  “Pretty well. When are you going to make an honest woman of Annalise?”

  Matt and Annalise had reconciled just before Quentin and Zoe’s marriage.

  The big man grinned. “As soon as she says the word. Josie’s making her a dress.”

  Quentin was slowly healing the rift he’d created with more than half the town when he’d ambushed his former brother-in-law, Jake Ross, in a hail of bullets. His resentment over his sister’s death and his paralysis had consumed him.

  Matt had been the first to give Quentin a chance to make amends by trusting him with Annalise’s safety during one of the rancher’s several out-of-town attempts to catch a band of murdering rustlers. Quentin considered the big man a friend and he thought Matt felt the same. Friends were something Quentin didn’t take for granted anymore.

  After a brief exchange with Davis Lee and Charlie, Quentin continued to the newspaper office. From the corner of his eye, he caught a flash of copper and looked over at the Fontaine. His wife stepped off the hotel’s sandstone porch and started toward the livery a few yards away. She was likely on some errand for a hotel guest. She didn’t appear to have seen him.

  He started to call out when she halted in front of the hotel, but something stopped him. She looked back, her gaze going to the second-floor balcony. Or was it the third floor? Quentin wasn’t sure.

  Fear crossed her face, fear so stark that protectiveness surged through him. Then she hurried over to the livery.

  As he paused at the foot of the ramp in front of the newspaper office, Quentin’s gaze panned the long porch of the Fontaine and its two balconies. He saw no one. Of the people walking along Main Street, there were no familiar faces. Egan Weaver’s announced plan to drill a water well nearby had brought a slew of visitors to Whirlwind, but Quentin saw no one following Zoe or even paying much attention to her. Certainly not as much as he was.

  Even so, something had frightened his wife and Quentin wasn’t having it. What the hell was going on? Was his handicap the reason she wouldn’t tell him? Did she think he couldn’t protect her? Well, he could.

  He might have decided—reluctantly—to let her tell him the problem in her own time, but that didn’t mean he was going to sit idly by while she grew more distressed.

  It was well after six that evening when Quentin heard the tap of Zoe’s shoes on the porch. He went to the door of his small office and levered himself out of his wheelchair, bracing himself with his cane.

  She came inside, closing the screened door behind her. Looking tired, she hung her calico bonnet on the peg beside the door. Her gaze met his as she smoothed a few stray wisps of hair away from her face. “Hi,” she said softly.

  “Hi.” The dark circles under her eyes attested to the restless nights she’d been having lately, tossing and turning in their bed. Quentin hadn’t asked her about those, figuring they were related to the problem she wouldn’t share with him.

  Glancing at his wheelchair, she started toward him. “Let me help you.”

  “No.” He held up a hand. “Stay there for a minute. Please.”

  “Why?”

  Rather than tell her, he showed her. Shifting to his right foot, he took a halting step toward her.

  She drew in a sharp breath. He took another step. And another, using his cane for support and balance.

  “Oh, Quentin!” She pressed a hand to her chest, her eyes filling with tears.

  Last evening, before starting his exercises with Zoe, he had gotten out of the wheelchair under his own steam. The surprise and admiration on her face then had filled him with satisfaction. The pure joy and affection he saw in her eyes now was even better.

  Slowly, carefully, he made his way to her, finally stopping inches away. Close enough to catch a whiff of her clean soap scent, to see the fine grain of her silky skin.

  She smiled through her tears. “You did it!”

  The sense of accomplishment was greater than he’d expected. “I’ve been working every day.”

  “In addition to the time you exercised with me?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is so wonderful.” She wiped away the wetness on her cheeks and raised her arms then lowered them, looking uncertain. “I want to hug you.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.” Every cell in his body hummed with the need to feel her.

  She slid her arms around his waist and squeezed. “I’m so proud of you.”

  The smile on her face had his heart pounding. He flattened a palm to her lower back, urging her fully against him. For a long moment, he just held her.

  He buried his face in her neck, drawing in her scent, sliding his free hand into her low chignon to lock her to him, even though she showed no sign of pulling away.

  Every inch of her was plastered against every inch of him. He savored the press of her body against his, the tickle of her warm breath on his throat. The fact that she stood between his legs, right up against him.

  He’d thought he would never again be able to experience something so simple.

  Still feeling steady, he drew back and nudged her chin up. “It’s been a long time since I was able to hold you this way.”

  She nodded, her eyes soft on his face.

  Quentin felt as if he could do anything. Including make love to his wife. But was she ready? Was he?

  They had a couple of hours alone because Zeke was working this evening at the Whirlwind Hotel for Penn and Esther Wavers.

  Quentin lowered his head, his voice hoarse with need when he said, “Zoe?”

  “Yes,” she whispered quickly, lifting her face to his and letting him know she was aware of exactly what he was asking.

  His mouth settled on hers. Her hands framed his face and she kissed him as greedily as he kissed her. Quentin’s world narrowed to the woman in his arms. Her mouth hot on his, the satiny feel of her hair in his fingers. He couldn’t get enough of her.

  All the need, the driving want he had thought he would never feel again swept over him, throbbed deep and low. His legs felt like sand. He thought his knees might buckle.

  She tasted
sweet and hot. The soft noise she made had his hold tightening. Her nails raked his nape as her fingers delved into his hair. Wanting more of her, Quentin’s lips moved to her neck, the only part of her bared by her white shirtwaist. He wanted the garment off, wanted to feel her satiny naked flesh against his.

  She moved against him and the full-blown sensation that shot through him was so keen that it bordered on pain. Hard with need, he swelled against her hip. His breathing turned rough.

  “Quentin.” Her voice shook. “I can feel you.”

  He could feel it, too, and it felt damn good. He lifted his head to look at her. “I want you.”

  Her eyes darkened. “I want you, too, but are you ready?”

  “I’ve been ready for a long time,” he said huskily. “I want to make love to my wife.”

  She lifted a shaking hand to his face. “But what if it undoes the progress you’ve made?”

  “I talked to Annalise about it, and she said as long as we’re careful and stop if there’s any pain, things should be fine.”

  She flushed. Impatient to see if she turned that rosy-pink all over, he kissed her again, hard. “Tell me yes, sweetheart.”

  Her blue eyes searched his. He didn’t know what she was looking for, but he hoped she found it. She had to or he might explode.

  “Yes,” she said softly.

  Chapter Six

  Quentin was barely aware of getting to the bedroom. He felt no pain. All he could feel was Zoe.

  He settled on the bed, easing back against the big pine headboard that had belonged to his parents. Drawing her next to the bed, he said hoarsely, “Take your hair down.”

  She did and when it fell in a wild tumble of red silk, he reached out to touch the thick waves. One shiny curl wrapped around his finger. Her blue eyes darkened with desire as she watched him curiously.

  The scent of clean skin and a sweetness that was all Zoe drifted to him.

  Her pulse beat wildly in her throat. He wanted to put his mouth there. Everywhere. Her chest rose and fell beneath her high-necked white bodice.

  Keeping his gaze on hers, he undid the top button of her blouse then the second. Unbelievably, his hand shook. Maybe he shouldn’t be surprised. It had been a damn long time since he’d been with a woman. Plus, this was Zoe. His woman.