by Sarah Hegger
She shook her head. “No, Cole. You were young and impetuous. We were your parents. It was our duty to teach you better, not send you into the wilds alone.”
“It made a man of me.” He squeezed her hands. “Look at me, Mother. I’m alive and well and, I like to think, a better man than the one who left here.”
“When Brett told me he’d sent you away, I nearly hit him.” Her eyes grew flint cold. “He had no right to do that.”
He didn’t want to talk about Brett. He chose not to get lost in the anger and bitterness of the past. Everything he’d done was to create a new way forward. “It doesn’t matter anymore. You’re here, and I’m here.”
“Oh, Cole.” Fresh tears tracked down her cheeks. “I’ve prayed for this every day since you left.”
Cole laid his head on her knee. “I missed you, Mother.”
“And I missed you.” She put a hand on his head.
At some point, Ellie must have left them alone. Cole stood and found a handkerchief for his mother and poured them both a stiff drink.
“Whisky?” Mother looked up at him with laughing eyes.
Ellie must have been telling stories. “But only the best whisky.”
“How on earth did that come about?” Mother sipped her whisky and sighed. “I think we could both do with this.”
“Like a lot of things out west, a little bit of an accident and a whole lot of exaggeration.” He needed to say it before they went further. “I’ve done things you wouldn’t be proud of. I’ve done things I’m not proud of, but I came here hoping for a new beginning.”
“You have it.” She quaffed her whisky and held the glass for a refill. “You can tell me as much as you like or as little. Although I do hope you’ll tell me where you met the delightful Ellie. I like her.” She swirled her drink in her glass. “I have no right to judge what you did to survive. Or even how you fit into your new world. I’m the woman who let her son be cast out and did nothing about it.”
“What could you have done?” Cole’s memory of his father hadn’t dimmed over the years. One look at Brett’s mulish, angry expression had brought his father back again. “His word was law in our house. He never brooked any argument or opposition.”
“You were my son.” She sighed. “And I should have fought for you.”
“It wouldn’t have helped.” He could acquit her of any guilt she felt. He’d never once blamed her for what had happened. His memories of his mother were of the one soft and beautiful thing in his childhood. However tough the old bastard had been, she’d been there with a gentle word and a loving touch. “He made up his mind about me, and nothing would have changed that.”
“Maybe not.” She shrugged. “But we will never know now, will we?”
“No.”
The silence of so many memories and regrets settled around them.
Mother cleared her throat. “Tell me about Ellie.”
“I think that’s her story to tell.”
Mother laughed and the sound took him back to happier times. “That’s what she said about you. She must be special to you.”
“Ellie is…” How to sum up the vibrancy and force packed into that small woman? “She’s the bravest, strongest woman I’ve met, and for a time, she was my only friend.”
He told her all about Ellie and her dreams of a dress shop. He even hinted at how she was running away from her brothers.
Nodding, Mother studied him. “What of Victoria?”
“I’m here to see if she will give me another chance.” The words didn’t fit comfortably, and he avoided making eye contact with his mother. “She’s all I ever wanted, and I owe it to myself to see if there’s hope for us.”
Cole arrived at her house the next morning to collect Victoria. She’d agreed to a stroll with him, and the late morning was warm and fine. He’d forgotten how close and damp the air was in New York. Beneath his stiff, formal suit, perspiration slid down his sides.
Here he had thought he missed his fine duds, and right now, he’d give his right jewel for some denim and a bandanna to keep the stench of the city out.
Victoria appeared in her doorway, elegant and subdued in her light purple dress. A bonnet heavily weighted by silk flowers covered her hair and drooped artfully over one eye.
“Cole.” She held her hand out to him, and he dutifully brushed the air over her knuckles. “It’s a fine morning.”
“Even finer for the company.” He offered her his arm.
She snapped open her parasol and tucked her free hand into his arm. “I have been reading one of those dime novels since I saw you yesterday. I must say, it all sounds terrifying.”
And parts of it had been. “Not really. Those silly lurid tales exaggerate.”
Their strides matched. She was the perfect height for him. During their betrothal, friends had often remarked how well they looked together as a couple. Here they were on a fine New York morning, being a couple again.
“Tell me what you’ve been up to.” He wanted to hear about her marriage to Bonnington, but only if it had been a disappointment.
“I was married,” she said and waved to an acquaintance across the street. “But you already knew that.”
“Were you happy?” Her infernal bonnet got in the way of him seeing her face and reading the truth of her answer. One of the benefits of making your money at a card table was being able to read the faces of the men around the table.
Victoria glanced at him. “I must say you have grown more direct.”
“Have I?” She was probably right. Out west, people didn’t have time for dancing around. When they wanted to know something, they asked.
She nodded. “Indeed you have.” Raising her head, she smiled at him. “I like it, and I shall answer in kind. Bonnington…loved me and was good to me.”
“And you?”
“I was very fond of him.” Victoria nodded a greeting to two smartly dressed women walking past them. “He was a good husband.”
Which was probably the most honest she would get. Thinking of how Ellie would have answered made him nearly laugh. However Ellie had felt, she would have told you. In fact, he couldn’t see her wearing black because it was expected. Then he did chuckle.
“What?” Victoria looked at him with a slight frown. “You are amused by my marriage?”
“Ah, no.” He backtracked. “I was thinking of someone…a friend of mine from out west.”
She accepted that with a nod. “Will you stay in contact with this friend?”
“Most definitely.” He steered the conversation into calmer waters. “Now, tell me all I’ve missed in twelve years.”
Victoria laughed, and it brought so many memories flooding back. He’d been captivated by her from the moment he had first seen her at the theatre with her parents. Immediately he had sought an introduction, which had delighted his mother and even drawn a reluctant nod of approval from his father.
They had made the perfect match. Both families were delighted, and Cole had played by the rules for the first time in his young life.
Victoria was chattering on about a couple they used to know. The wife had apparently been caught cheating on the husband. She’d been sent from the city, and rumor had it she was expecting a child. Rumor was also rampant as to who had fathered the child.
Cole couldn’t give a shit, but he smiled and let her carry on to another piece of gossip. Something about two women wearing the same dress.
Eager to win the beautiful Victoria, Cole had courted her without taking one misstep. He had rigidly suppressed his boyish eagerness and ardor, not wanting to take any chance she would turn him away. And she hadn’t. He’d asked her father, got the blessing and then asked her.
“Are you listening to me, Cole?” Victoria shot him a coy look from beneath her bonnet.
He smiled and nodded. “Of course I am. Pricilla Honeycutt is said to be finally stepping off the shelf.”
“Right.” Her eyes sparkled with delight. “You know she is my age and neve
r been married.”
Not if she’d gone out west, she wouldn’t be. Pricilla would already be sporting the name of one of her choice of desperate men. Wives were the rarest commodity in his world—his old world. “She should have come to Denver.”
“I beg your pardon?” Victoria stopped and stared at him. “Who should have come to Denver?”
“Pricilla Honeycutt.” He kind of wished he hadn’t opened his mouth now, but he would follow through now that he had. If this thing with Victoria was going somewhere, she needed to understand about the life he’d led for so many years. Like grit in a cattleman’s skin, it was forever a part of him. “You were saying she couldn’t find a husband.”
“I’m sure I never said it quite so indelicately.” Victoria raised her chin and stared away from him.
“Of course not.” He reined in his impatience. What the hell difference did it make how she had said it? The meaning was the same. “But the sort of women you marry are in short supply in Denver. Men would line up four deep for a chance at a wife like Pricilla.”
Victoria sniffed. “How vulgar.”
Cole didn’t think so at all. When good women were in short supply, you didn’t hang about and wait for one to drop in your lap, you made your intentions clear. “It’s a different world,” he said, picking his words carefully. “Men come there alone to make their fortunes. Those who survive get themselves a nice piece of land or start a good business. Then they start looking for someone to share that with, a family.”
“Hmm.” She gazed at him. “But you did not.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You made your fortune, and yet you did not find a woman to marry.”
No, he most definitely hadn’t, and Cole raised her hand to his mouth. This time he pressed his mouth to her gloved fingers. “That’s because I already had the woman I wanted to marry.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Ellie faced her morning without enthusiasm.
After a shared breakfast, Cole had left to go strolling with Victoria. Strolling? She didn’t get it. They could both walk, they’d done it before, what possible joy could two people get from walking around together?
Then she remembered how good it was when she and Cole sat together, neither of them doing much at all. Him having that with Victoria pinched.
She needed to get out of the hotel room. She was in New York. She should be out there looking around.
A knock at the door came as she was putting her bonnet on.
Mrs. Mansfield stood on the other side. “Good morning, I hope you don’t mind.”
“Not at all.” Ellie motioned her in. “But Cole isn’t here now.” Then she added because this was his mother, and Ellie wanted her to know that she knew all about Victoria. “He went to see Victoria.”
“Yes.” She smiled and motioned Ellie’s bonnet? “Were you on your way out?”
“I was.” Ellie felt a bit foolish to confess, “I wasn’t really going anywhere, just out of the hotel room.”
Mrs. Mansfield’s smile broadened, and it was Cole’s grin on a woman’s face. “Good, I can help on both counts. Get you out of the hotel and find somewhere for you to go.”
Ellie had grown up never going anywhere blindly with another person. “Where?”
“It’s a surprise.” Mrs. Mansfield motioned Ellie to precede her. “But I promise you’ll like it.” She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “Cole told me of your plans, and this will fit perfectly into those.”
“Plans? For the dress shop?” Ellie had to hurry to keep up with Mrs. Mansfield’s much longer legs.
They descended into the lobby as Mrs. Mansfield said, “Yes and yes. Come along now. I’m excited for you to see this.”
With her shorter legs, Ellie was coming along as fast as they would carry her.
She followed Mrs. Mansfield into a carriage waiting outside the hotel.
Settling herself across from Ellie, Mrs. Mansfield said, “Thank you for telling me about Cole yesterday.”
“It was my pleasure.” There was something easy about talking to Mrs. Mansfield. “He was very upset when he couldn’t see you.”
“Yes.” Mrs. Mansfield rolled her eyes. “My oldest son assumes too much at times.” She waved a dismissive hand. “His heart is in the right place, but he is prone to acting too much like his father.”
Ellie would love to ask what sort of man had kicked his child out of his home, but she dare not.
“We were not a love match,” Mrs. Mansfield looked at her. “Cole’s father was an arranged marriage, but he was handsome and wealthy, had the right connections to please my father, and I was halfway persuaded I might be in love with him.”
Women had precious few choices open to them, and most of the women she knew had made the best choices they could. “But you weren’t?”
Mrs. Mansfield shook her head. “I was not, but we got on well enough, and I took joy in my children.” A deep sadness spread over her lovely face. “There is nothing worse than losing a child, you know. I lost three between Brett and Cole.” She sighed, and it came from a bottomless grief that brought tears to Ellie’s eyes. “And then, I allowed my youngest to be taken from me.”
She took one of Mrs. Mansfield’s hands in hers. “Cole doesn’t see it like that.”
“Cole is too generous.” She shook her head and took a deep breath. “Forgive me. This”—she motioned between Ellie and her—“With Cole reappearing so suddenly has made me so happy, but also melancholy. It reminds me of all the years I’ve wasted.”
Cole must have felt the same when he looked at Victoria, all those wasted years and no way to get them back.
“Now.” Mrs. Mansfield straightened. “Enough of that. This is supposed to be a good surprise.”
“Mrs. Mansfield—”
“Dear Lord, call me Joy.” Mrs. Mansfield smiled at her. “And you are Ellie to me.”
“Thank you. Joy.”
The carriage rattled over some ruts before settling into a smoother rhythm. They didn’t seem to be getting very far fast, and Ellie decided she would walk in New York. She needed to find somewhere to live close enough to her business to do so.
Joy peered out the window. “Not long now. Why does Cole call you Sugar Ellie? That sounds like a name with a story behind it.”
“When did he call me that?” Ellie played for time. Joy had no idea how much of a story that was.
Joy turned back to her and cocked her head. “Yesterday, when he was telling me about your plans. He also mentioned how you’d been having some trouble with your brothers.”
Oh dear. Cole’s mother would not be happy to hear the truth. “Sugar Ellie is a part I played.”
“You’re an actress?” Joy frowned. “Cole never mentioned that. Why we have a number of good theatre—”
“No, ma’am. Joy. I’m not an actress.” If Cole had let slip and called her Sugar Ellie, he should have told the whole story and spared her the mortification of telling it now. Joy would look at her with that curl of disgust to her lip and that would be the end of their budding acquaintance. “It’s not a pretty story, Joy.”
“Hmm.” Joy studied her and then nodded. “Ellie, are you or where you a…um…prostitute?”
Ellie froze and blinked at Joy. All thoughts scattered, and she answered before she could stop her mouth. “No, but also yes.”
“Now you have to tell me.” Joy raised her eyebrow. She didn’t look like she might throw Ellie out of the carriage once she knew the truth.
“I’m not a prostitute in truth, but a lot of people think I am. Or at least they think Sugar Ellie is,” she said.
Joy frowned. “But you’re Sugar Ellie.”
“I am.” She took a deep breath. Thus far, only Cole knew her real story. “My ma died when I was too little to remember her, and my pa followed the first rumors of gold out to Colorado.”
“You must have been very young.” Joy looked at her with compassion and not judgment.
“I was, and m
y four brothers and I followed my pa out to Colorado.” She didn’t remember any other life but struggling through the thick, red Colorado clay and living in filthy tent camps. “But my pa died when I was young, and my older brother—Theo—he and Jake, that’s the second oldest, had this hooch distillery in the mountains near our tent, and after pa died, they started selling the hooch to feed the rest of us.”
Joy nodded. “You said four brothers.”
“Yes. Theo and Jake and then the twins, Paul and Patrick. I’m the only girl and the youngest.”
“They should have taken better care of you then.” Joy looked angry on her behalf. “Instead of letting you be…letting that happen to you.”
Ellie needed to stop her before she went down the totally wrong path. “They did. At least, Theo always did. The selling hooch grew into a hooch tent, and as the town grew, it became a saloon. Then Jake got the idea to start running girls.” Heat climbed her face. She shouldn’t talk like that in front of a real lady like Joy. “What I mean is—”
“Whores,” Joy said. “Jake wanted to make money from whores.”
“Yes.”
“Good God!” Joy reared back. “You were not one of their whores. Tell me they didn’t sell their own sister into prostitution.”
“No.” Ellie got in quickly before Joy went off half-cocked again. “Well, not then they didn’t because Theo was about.”
Joy stared at her. “You better tell me the rest quickly because we are almost there, and I cannot wait until our business is concluded to hear the rest of this.”
“Okay then.” Ellie locked her fingers together for courage. “When I was fifteen, and men started looking at me, Theo came up with an idea that would keep me safe, but also close to my brothers all the time. He set me up as the madam of the whores. I dressed the part, painted my face to look older, and nobody thought anything of it. They believed I was Sugar Ellie.”
“This is when Cole first met you?”
“Yes, as Sugar Ellie.” Ellie decided to skip the twenty-thousand-dollar story. “He came to the Four Kings, that’s the saloon, to say goodbye before coming back here. I found out that my brother Jake was planning to blow the whistle on who I was and sell my first night to the highest bidder.”