That jealous, righteous part of Cass whispered the loudest in his ear. It told him he had a duty to protect Sera, just like he'd promised. It told him she would be hurt by Jesse's lies. And Cass wouldn't stand for that. He liked Sera. He liked the way she smelled. The way she laughed. The way she flashed those saucy dimples and fluttered her lashes over those columbine-blue eyes.
Cass especially liked the way Sera treated people—no account people—as if they mattered. She had a big heart. A heart big enough to love children who had no mothers. That made her special. Cass remembered what it was like to be an orphan. To be nobody. To live in terror of becoming target- practice for some smart-mouthed planter's son with a low-riding holster.
Even so, would he have dumped his best friend of 11 years for the privilege of deflowering Seraphina Jones?
Hell, no!
Sera didn't know what hurt more, to watch Jesse prowl through the festival goers, tipping his hat to each of the cooing young belles who batted their eyelashes at him, or to watch him go out of his way to avoid an encounter with her every time their paths were in danger of crossing.
Last Wednesday morning, at the orphanage, she'd been so angry about how he'd spurned her, and so confused by Cass's burning persistence to woo her, that she'd been unable to face Jesse without moral support. She'd kept Michael or Lydia too close for Jesse to strike up any meaningful kind of conversation.
But there had been one opportunity in the kitchen. He'd been carrying sacks of potatoes in from the wagon. When their eyes had met, her heart had started speeding like a locomotive. Butterflies had launched in her stomach. She'd scarcely been able to breathe.
She was so in love with him, so desperate to share a fleeting moment with him, that in the blink of an eye, she'd been willing to forget her pain and swallow her pride.
"It's good to see you, Miss Sera," he'd greeted in his rumbly, Texas baritone. "I was worried about you. Doc and Miss Eden were, too."
Her throat constricted. She wanted to believe that he'd tacked on that latter part—how her kinfolk had worried—to hide the forbidden love affair that they'd kindled, not to emphasize the dying embers of their romance.
She was all too aware that Lydia and Michael were chatting companionably about 10 feet away, and that Mamie was also within earshot, stocking the pantry.
So Sera strived for a light tone. A touch of humor.
"Riding out the storm was certainly an adventure," she told Jesse. "But I was never in any real danger—except, perhaps, of becoming a mother before my time. To about 40 orphans," she amended lamely as Jesse's brow darkened. "And maybe to Billy. Keeping that young man in a bed was the greatest challenge of all. Billy is not a model patient."
Jesse's burning eyes narrowed to emerald spikes. Sera realized she'd put her foot in her mouth. She hadn't meant to imply anything sexual. She hadn't even intended to be coquettish or taunting. But Jesse had clearly misread her meaning.
She raised her chin a notch.
You don't have any right to disapprove of my moral behavior. Not after you seduced me and tossed me aside like a worn out shoe!
But if Jesse wanted to challenge her, he didn't. Good manners—or perhaps Michael's presence—kept Jesse from demanding an explanation, much less showing any further sign of caring. With a curt nod, he touched his hat brim and turned on his heel to fetch another sack of potatoes.
Now her elusive Panther Man was pausing in his prowl to consult with his deputy, Johnny Dufflemeir. Both men were armed with revolvers. In addition, Johnny had chosen to carry a scattergun during his rounds, while Jesse had chosen to patrol with his rifle. The sight of armed peacekeepers only served to elevate the underlying tension that the crowd was feeling as they participated in the recreations of the day. A few belligerent yokels had even argued that they had the right to keep their sidearms to protect their sweethearts.
Five hours earlier, Billy had been one of them.
Jesse had looked Billy square in the eye during the opening oration, delivered by Mayor Frothingale, before the Town Hall.
"I don't want trouble, Cass," Jesse had bit out.
Cass? Sera had been stunned. Billy was the Cass who could clear Jesse's name?
Everyone had been calling him Billy or Mr. Somebody for so long, that Sera had never given much thought to learning his full name.
Billy curled his lip. "You should've thought of that six weeks ago."
"I have to treat you like everybody else," Jesse growled.
"You mean like the two-legged cockroaches, who aren't as high-and-mighty as you, 'cause they don't have a shiny new tin star?"
Jesse's jaw twitched. Luke stepped up behind his shoulder, his fists tensing over his Winchester.
"Hand over your .45," Jesse snapped.
Billy's smile had been anything but pleasant as he'd unbuckled his gunbelt. "Sure, Lynx. I already got what I came here for, anyway."
Sera had felt sick after that confrontation. Jesse was Lynx? Billy's best friend? The "Injun" with whom Billy had been planning to hunt big game in Tennessee?
Merciful heaven. I kissed Jesse's best friend?!
Now, five hours later, Sera's gut was still roiling at the idea. She told herself that she had nothing to be ashamed of. One week ago, Jesse had minced no words while she'd stood before him with tears streaming down her cheeks. He'd insisted that there could be no future between them. As for kissing Billy on Tuesday evening, he'd believed that she was in love with Kit McCoy at the time. He would have had no reason to be jealous of Jesse.
Nevertheless, Sera couldn't escape a nagging sense of foreboding. Something had happened between Monday afternoon, when Billy had reminisced so fondly about Lynx, and this morning, when Billy had spoken to Jesse with such bitterness and contempt.
Sera couldn't help but worry that that "something" was her.
"Now Miss Sera, don't you fret," Billy drawled, patting the gloved hand that she'd linked through his arm. "I tasted that chocolate-peanut-butter pie of yours, remember? And it turned out just dandy."
Sera pasted on a smile for Billy's gallant cajoling. Early that morning in the kitchen, while she'd been in a crust-rolling frenzy, she'd turned her back for five seconds to test the heat of the oven. Billy had taken that opportunity to sneak up to her mixing bowl and pour half of his flask into her batter—much to the amusement of Collie, who'd mumbled, "I told you so!" around his spoonful of oatmeal.
Honestly. Those two scalawags have been underfoot ever since I stepped off of yesterday's stage!
Sera squinted at the ball of fire in the western sky. Since the sun was sinking behind the flag pole on the Town Hall's copula, she judged the time to be after five o'clock. In less than an hour, Jeremiah's Jubilant Jug Band would clamber onto the roof of the Town Hall and rosin up their bows to saw the first notes of the hoedown.
She cast a furtive glance at Billy's right leg. He was limping.
"Billy, the dessert judging can take a while. And the committee is still waiting on Sheriff Truitt and Aunt Claudia to arrive. Maybe we should sit—"
"I'm just fine, Miss Sera. Don't you worry about me."
Sera bit her tongue on her worry. She'd heard this pat response at least four other times. The only way that she'd been able to get Billy to rest his leg was after she'd insisted that she needed to sit on a bench or take some shade.
That man's pride is going to be the death of him!
A ripple of applause started in the grandstand. Within moments, the entire crowd was on its feet, clapping and cheering as barrel-sized Ben Truitt strolled into the churchyard, accompanied by Michael and Eden.
The ruddy-faced lawman grew even redder at Blue Thunder's show of affection for him. He doffed his hat to the crowd. He shook Michael's hand and kissed Eden's knuckles. Then, as Sera's kinfolk took their places in the grandstand, Luke relieved Ben of his rifle, so he could judge the desserts.
"Uh-oh. Here comes trouble," Sera said half-seriously.
Now Claudia Ann Collier was making her grand
entrance with Collie on her arm. She flashed her sparsely-toothed grin and blew kisses at the grandstand. She thumbed her nose at Postmaster Aubrey Cadawaller when he asked her to "move along," so he could read the rules to all the judges.
Everyone who wasn't competing settled back to enjoy the entertainment to come. Claudia didn't disappoint. As Collie escorted her from entry to entry, she sniffed her fork. She made hideous faces. She held her nose before she opened her mouth. Whenever she started hacking and making loud pitooey noises, Collie would solemnly hand her a cup of cider and thump her between the shoulder blades.
Honestly. Auntie should be spanked.
Cheats like Puddin' Puddocks and Mary Blackburn were scowling on the first row of the elm-shaded grandstand. Betsy and Bonnie Frothingale, Praline Puddocks, Widow Hammond and a host of other blue-ribbon hopefuls didn't look much happier. These maligned bakers sat wringing their hands and biting their lips each time Claudia approached an "anonymous" dessert and provided comic relief for the men.
Billy was laughing. "Is that woman always like that?"
"If you think Aunt Claudia's bad now," Sera said dryly, "you should see her at the Independence Day Jamboree, when she takes over the kissing booth. With her shotgun."
"That might be worth the price of admission."
Sera's belly clenched. Billy's voice had turned husky. He'd allowed his sapphire eyes to linger on her lips. She wanted to kick herself for providing him with such a perfect opening for flirtation.
Back in the orphanage, she'd been flattered to think that Billy was attracted to her. Now she couldn't help but wonder if his solicitous attentions were attempts to goad Jesse—who now stood grimly beside Luke. Judging by Jesse's glare, he wanted to flatten Billy.
Swallowing nervously, Sera dragged her gaze away from Jesse. She forced her attention back to the fluttering, yellow linens that draped the picnic tables. Lydia Witherspoon and Aubrey Cadawaller were huddling to compare notes over the baked goods that they'd finished judging. Claudia (that stinker) pulled what looked like an oatmeal cookie out of her hip pocket and stumped to join them. A general rumble of dismay circled the blue-ribbon hopefuls as they imagined that Claudia had found the dessert that she preferred.
As it turned out, the "cookie" had a hinged lid. Claudia deftly snorted snuff from the back of her hand before elbowing Aubrey aside and commenting loudly enough for the spectators to hear:
"Lawdy. Are you out of your mind? That one tasted worse than my great granddaddy's boot leather after a six day march!"
Collie, who'd been dismissed from his escort duties, joined Sera and Billy, who were standing apart from the grandstand in the welcome shade of a cottonwood tree.
Collie grunted.
Billy nodded.
That was the extent of their conversation.
Suddenly, an exuberant Becky Cassidy came skipping out of the junior tent, bearing a blue ribbon and a basket that smelled like oatmeal cookies.
The child looked particularly fetching in her froth of jade and lemon calico, the combined shades of which served to highlight the green flecks in her hazel eyes. Her sausage-style ringlets had been tied back with a matching bow, and her black Mary Jane shoes had been buffed until they gleamed beneath her pristinely white stockings.
Becky looked like a young lady who was on her way to a fandango—or a rendezvous with her favorite beau. Completely ignoring her mother, who called to her from the front row of the grandstand, Becky made a beeline for Collie.
"Good luck with the judges, Miss Sera!" the child exclaimed breathlessly, bobbing a curtsey to Billy and Collie. But her eyes were all for Collie.
"I saved you some cookies," she told him shyly. "They won first place."
Collie turned as red as the fireball in the western sky. "Not now," he growled, darting an embarrassed glance at Billy.
Billy was smirking at Collie's discomfort. With a gallant sweep of his arm, he doffed his hat. Billy had won the Stetson back, fair and square, after challenging Collie to a game of mumblety peg last night.
"Well now. Ain't that thoughtful," Billy drawled, lavishing his most delicious smile on Becky. "First-place cookies, too! Do I smell cinnamon?"
She nodded, stretching her freckles into a giddy grin. Even at 10-years-old, Becky wasn't immune to Billy's dazzling good looks.
"Nutmeg, too?" he asked.
"Yessir," she said shyly. "Plus cranberries and currants. They're my secret recipe."
Collie's eyes turned flinty. "You ain't getting none of my cookies," he growled at Billy.
Billy winked at Becky. "I wish I had a best girl who baked me cookies."
"Miss Sera bakes cookies," Becky said loyally. "Only..."
Her eyes strayed to Jesse. For some reason, he was flying past the bakeoff table like a rifle shot. Every inch of his body was radiating tension. The chinking of his spurs echoed with dire intent as his long legs ate up the 200 feet that stretched between him and Billy.
But Billy ignored Blue Thunder's marshal and the pair of lawmen who trailed uncertainly after him.
"Only what?" Billy asked gamely of Becky.
Her tawny eyebrows knitted. She raised her troubled gaze to Sera. "I thought Miss Sera had a different beau."
Sera squirmed inside. She was doing her level best to ignore Jesse, too, and not just because every eye in the yard was currently trained on his charge across the lawn toward her and her quartet's private tête-à-tête.
All day long, she'd been weathering the speculative stares and waspish questions that Billy, as her new escort, had attracted. Not that Henry's notable absence from her side was anyone's business.
Still, she wouldn't have been able to live with herself if she hadn't done the right thing by Henry. So last night, after she'd completed the final leg of her journey home by stage coach, she'd convinced Billy and Collie to give her a private moment with the preacher in the rectory. She'd felt horrible telling him that she couldn't allow him to court her any more. And why.
However, a mildly surprised (and somewhat sheepish) Henry had confessed that he did indeed have feelings for Allison—feelings that he hadn't let himself act upon, because he'd always believed that a "preacher's daughter" was better suited to be a "preacher's wife."
Why are men so stubborn about being stupid?
"Fiddle-dee-dee," Sera addressed Becky a bit more tartly that she'd intended. "A lady has the right to walk with any gentleman she chooses, Miss Becky Cassidy!"
Billy's forearm went rigid under her fingertips.
At first, Sera assumed that Jesse's menacing approach was the reason. But when she peered up into Billy's face, she saw that it had frozen. He was crushing the crown of his Stetson. He was staring hard at Becky.
Allison, meanwhile, had bolted off her grandstand seat. She looked even more alarmed than Jesse. "Becky! Come away from that man."
"But mama—"
Billy was quivering now. Sera was surprised when she heard his teeth grind. His eyes had grown cold and dark. They were drilling into Allison, who was hurrying toward her child as if the hounds of hell were nipping at her heels. Something violent, primal and raw flickered across Billy's features.
Something like hatred.
Even Sera was inclined to recoil from him, then.
But the dreaded kaleidoscope of light started spinning in her mind. Despite the protective layers of her gloves and Billy's sleeve, the unwelcome vision hit her full force. Thirsty pine trees and weathered, limestone walls emerged from the prismatic colors. Beneath a pitiless sun, she saw a white-haired, blue-eyed boy weeping at the base of a ravine. His gawky, under-nourished body was covered with dust—and so was his shotgun stock, which was badly dented.
Sera guessed that the boy—who could be none other than Billy—had been trying to use his Whitney to dig a grave into the merciless ground. Her heart ached for him. He was so young. So alone.
"I'll kill him!" Billy vowed in her vision. "I'll make them both pay for murdering you, Bobby!"
Desperate
ly, Sera tried to clear her head of the spinning colors of earth, blood, and sky. Bobby had been murdered? Dear Lord!
But Bobby who?
And then she remembered that Bobby was a nickname for Robert. And that Allison had once asked Jesse about the whereabouts of her husband's cousin, William.
William "Billy"
"Cass" Cassidy?
Sera caught her breath. Billy and Bobby Cassidy!
Tears sprang to her eyes. Sympathy flooded through her, drowning her fear. She found the courage to allow more of the vision of Billy in the canyon, kneeling at his dead cousin's side.
Billy wouldn't leave Bobby for the coyotes. Somehow, that bony, gawky manchild found the strength to wrestle Bobby's corpse onto a horse. Beneath a blistering sun, with buzzards circling overhead, Billy rode all the way back to a ramshackle hut. The one-room eyesore had so many holes and broken windows, that Sera thought the shack had surely been abandoned.
Imagine her alarm when Billy went inside that firetrap! To her growing dismay, she realized that he made his home there.
She glimpsed a torn daguerreotype of a strapping, Confederate Corporal, a sickly woman, and a tow-haired toddler. That scrap of a family image had been nailed above a rumpled mattress with wisps of straw jutting from its sides. Sera spied empty cans of beans. Mounds of ants. Rat droppings. And a dog-eared prayer book with the words, "Robert Cassidy, Sr.," etched in silver letters on its cover.
No wonder Billy had taken such a shine to Collie! Billy had lost his family at a young age, too. Sera guessed that he'd been living with the orphaned Bobby, who'd been looking after his younger cousin. Now Bobby was dead. And adolescent Billy no longer had someone to keep him on the straight and narrow.
Firmly, deliberately, Sera shut down her vision, just as Hiawassee had been instructing her in her dreams. Sera didn't want to know what Billy had done after he'd tossed aside the ax that he'd used to chop Bobby's shallow grave. She didn't want to see his destination as he rode away from that grave with a six-shooter strapped to his hip. Billy's past choices were between him and his Maker.
Seduced by an Angel (Velvet Lies, Book 3) Page 24