Angel's Embrace

by Charlotte Hubbard

  She gawked at him. “Sorry, sir. I coulda swore you was—”

  “Maisie, have you finished your sweeping?” an imperious voice demanded from behind them. “If the places aren’t set for dinner in five minutes, you’ll be departing without your pay. This is your third warning, girl.”

  The maid hurried away, but stole another glance at him over her shoulder. And when the tall, reedy man who’d reprimanded Maisie took his place behind the desk, Billy felt another set of eyes studying him closely.

  “How may I help you gentlemen?” he inquired.

  “I’m sure you recall that my wife and I checked in earlier,” Carlton replied. “We’ll be needing another room near ours, please, for Mr. Bristol.”

  “I—oh, yes, of course, Mr. Harte!” The man couldn’t smile widely enough as he flipped through the hotel’s register. “Might I suggest that Mr. Bristol would be more comfortable in the suite at the end of your hall? Compliments of the management, of course.”

  Billy blinked. “Why do I deserve special treatment?”

  “Why?” The man behind the desk laughed so hard he banged the edge of the counter. “Mr. Bristol, your modesty! Why, you’ve systematically rid us of so many Northern sympathizers! Their choke hold on our economy has nearly ruined—”

  “Like I was tellin’ Maisie,” he interrupted quietly, “I’m not Wesley Bristol. I’m his brother Billy, come in from Abilene. I’d like to pay for just a plain ole room, thank you. How much’ll that be for tonight?”

  He took a roll of greenbacks from his back pocket, once again stunned that people mistook him for his notorious twin. Surely he looked cleaner and more reputable than Wes. And surely Wesley had made as many enemies as admirers while he’d eliminated those local families. Might be a lot of lawmen gunning for him when word got around that “Wesley” had come out of hiding.

  The man took his money, a flush riding his cheeks. “Thank you, Mr. Bristol,” he said stiffly. “I’ll put you next to the Hartes, in room twenty-two. Enjoy your stay.”

  Now there was a challenge. With a sigh, Billy looked at the man beside him. Harte’s crow’s feet and the dark circles beneath his eyes made him look older than he had only a few days ago.

  “Let me know when Mama gets in,” he murmured, heading for the staircase with his saddlebag. “I’ve got some things to think about.”

  Once inside his room, Billy considered his encounters at the desk. The single bunk and nightstand were over by the window, where the afternoon light was fading behind the buildings on this side of the street. He let his saddlebag drop, poured cool water into the washbowl to rinse his face, and then caught his reflection in the small gilt-framed mirror.

  Did he really look like Wes? Or were folks just expecting to see his infamous twin? As Billy blotted his face with the towel, he recalled his brother’s scraggly beard, dirty hair, and the air of malevolence that hung around him like a storm cloud.

  Lord, help me not to be like him! he prayed. Thank you for Your protection today—for gettin’ Eve and me out of the line of fire, and for keepin’ Mama safe when Wes came out of the house . . . picked up that pie knife—

  What would he have done if Wes had lifted a hand against Mama?

  I’d have killed him, came the quick reply. I’d have had no choice!

  Had he sunk so low that he’d take his brother’s life without a second thought? The idea twitched within him, like the tail of a nervous cat. Yet he’d hidden himself in the house to be sure Mama wasn’t shot. It was God’s doing entirely that Carlton Harte and his men had already surrounded the place.

  Because they see Wes for the dangerous, hunted animal he’s become. And they intend to bring him in. Or bring him down.

  That, too, made him flinch. Billy longed to stretch out on the bed after this long, complicated day, yet he lingered by the window. The light soothed him. He wished he could detain the twilight until he knew Mama, Eve and Olivia were accounted for, because although the street below bustled with activity and economic progress, Richmond no longer felt like his hometown.

  He felt silly about it, but Billy wondered if any of them would be safe in their beds tonight. While he trusted the Lord implicitly, he had serious doubts about his twin. And he wasn’t prepared to feel these low-down, snake-in-the-belly suspicions about his own brother.

  Out in the hall, purposeful female footsteps passed by his door, pausing a little way beyond it. Billy had no desire to listen in on Mama’s conversation with her husband, but the walls of the hotel were pretty thin.

  “Virgilia!” Carlton’s footsteps approached the door in the next room. “Did you convince Mrs. Massena to see Eve?”

  “Well, I had to do a lot of talking!” Mama responded briskly. “Time has not been kind to Florence, nor to her attitude. It was all I could do to keep my hands to myself when she started in on Wesley and his—his—”

  Billy closed his eyes. His mother’s voice sounded angry. He could envision her removing that proud purple hat before yanking at each finger of her gloves in her frustration.

  “Carlton, can you—believe that boy—wouldn’t even—look me in the eye?” she said with each tug. “He smelled—to high heaven—and yet absolutely refused to sit by me and—and—”

  Billy walked out his door and knocked quietly on the next one before twisting the knob. His mother gasped at his intrusion, but from over her head Harte gave him a grateful smile.

  “Billy! Of all the—”

  “Mama, I’m sorry for what Wesley said and did—”

  “But how did you—”

  He crushed his mother in a hug, absorbing the first of her sobs. She felt so fragile—so much more vulnerable than the mother who’d disciplined her boys with a strong hand and a willow switch. As he held her close, Billy realized he’d let the cat out of the bag: Mama didn’t know he’d been watching from the house. She’d give him an earful about that.

  “Mama,” he whispered, “I couldn’t let you face Wes alone. Not after he shot at Eve and me.”

  “But he’s your brother! He’d never—”

  “Everything’s changed,” he murmured, closing his eyes against that harsh reality. “When I saw how dirty he looked. How he’d lost the use of his right arm and walked with a limp—”

  “He needs our help, Billy!”

  Mama’s outburst rang in the small room as she glared up at him, and at Carlton, who stood at her other side. “You two hard-hearted schemers see him as an outlaw and a—”

  “Hired gun,” Billy murmured sadly.

  “—but I’m his mother! He needs me more than ever!”

  “Virgilia.” Carlton’s weathered hand followed the curve of her back. “Honey, I know how you poured all your hopes and dreams into seeing your boy again, but he’s grown up cold. Cruel. And I won’t let him hurt you.”

  His mother’s red-rimmed eyes were running over now. Billy suspected she’d been crying during her ride from Eve’s house and had composed herself to come into the hotel, but her bravado didn’t fool him. Her slender body trembled uncontrollably.

  “You won’t tell me how to—”

  “He’s right, Mama. Just like Eve was,” Billy countered quietly. “Much as I hate to say it, I can’t deny all the horrible things my brother’s done to folks in these parts—folks who were behind on their payments, just like we were after Daddy got shot. Folks whose only fault was their poverty, or the loss of the family breadwinner. Which Wesley also had a hand in.”

  “That is the most—the most—”

  Her efforts to defend Wesley got drowned out then: She realized her boy was bad to the core, and that she’d arrived too late to mend his ways. Billy held her, rocking her as though she were a child, letting her cry out her anguish and fear. Carlton kept a hand on her back, trying his best to soothe her, too.

  When she stopped crying, Mama focused her watery green eyes on him. “You surely believe, from your years of living with the Malloys,” she whispered, “that we must do more than pray for those who wo
uld do us wrong, Billy. I’m no Bible-thumper, but I believe we were led here because Wesley needs us in his darkest hour.”

  Billy sighed. “Mama, he’s been taking the men away from their ranches—arranging ‘accidents’—so he could scare their families off the land. Just like Leland Massena did to us.”

  “But you took right up with his pretty daughter, didn’t you?” his mother challenged. Her eyes shone like green daggers. “You loved that baby, knowing her mother would take to you because—”

  “Partly because Wes left her destitute, and partly—”

  “She’s back with her mother now. Thanks to me!” Mama crowed.

  “—because God was wakin’ me up to the mistake I’d be makin’ if I married Emma,” he finished in a tight voice. This wasn’t the easiest conversation to have with his mother, because she’d likely change tactics as it suited her. Use his own words to win her argument.

  “And who’s to say God’s not leading me here? I firmly believe, after seeing the state Wesley’s fallen into, that it’s my responsibility to take him in.” She turned to Carlton then, her green eyes burning with purpose.

  “And I believe we should live here in Richmond,” she stated in a steadier voice. “Could be we’re intended to buy that boarded-up hotel across the square from—”

  “Absolutely not.”

  Harte didn’t stand much taller than Mama, but he took her by the shoulders so she looked square at him. His face was taut. He had a way of sparring with his wife until he won, although he remained calm and kept his voice low so no one else would be in on their business.

  “First of all, I was in the house same as Billy was—to protect you!” he said firmly. “I’m convinced Wes Bristol is even more dangerous now that he’s wounded and forced to lay low. He’d get word if you moved back, and he’d be on you like a duck on a bug, honey.”

  Mama planted her hands on her hips. “Carlton Harte, you’re using your position with the Pinkertons to—”

  “It would be stupid to jeopardize my cover by living here,” the detective confirmed, “but I assure you, my love, that your welfare—and the welfare of Olivia and Billy and Eve—are my highest priorities.”

  Billy held his breath. He could feel the heat and frustration rolling off his mother’s small body: She didn’t like being challenged or told what to do. But he agreed with Harte. Wesley and his cohorts would get mighty suspicious if Mama moved here. She’d be an easy mark, trying to nurture her boy back to respectability again.

  And respectability wasn’t high on Wes’s list of priorities. By all appearances, his twin just wanted to be left alone to regain his strength, so he could go back to “cleaning up” for whomever bought his bullets.

  His mother, meanwhile, was pointing a finger at her husband. “If I’ve told you once, Carlton, I’ve told you a hundred times, you’ll not be making my decisions! Or telling what I can or cannot—”

  “Fine.” Harte’s eyebrows rose but his voice did not, and Billy could see how he talked his way around hardened criminals. “There’s a place for sale in Excelsior Springs, a few miles down the road from here. We can move to Missouri if you insist, Virgilia. But it won’t be to Richmond, where so many folks know you.”

  “Mr. Pinkerton arranged this, didn’t he? Because he needs your help with the lawlessness in these parts.”

  Harte had the good sense to shrug and slip his hands into his pockets. “Isn’t that convenient? You can move closer to your son—”

  “And you will vow not to lay a hand on him!”

  Carlton shifted, but he didn’t drop his gaze. “If he threatens you, sweetheart—if he retaliates against any member of our family—I’ll have no choice but to defend you.”

  Billy’s pulse thrummed in his ears. Though he’d never doubted his father’s love for his mother, Daddy had never dared cross Mama this way. He’d agreed with her to her face, and then quietly worked around her.

  But then, Daddy had never dealt with a son like Wesley. Owen Bristol hadn’t seen or felt the emotional arrows Wes shot, or the way he’d used Mama for target practice.

  He sighed, sensing Harte needed some time alone with Mama.

  “I’m goin’ to fetch Eve and Olivia,” he said quietly, “and I’m takin’ ’em back to Abilene tomorrow. So they’ll be safe while I figure out what to do next.

  “I’m sorry things worked out this way, Mama,” he added with a rueful smile. “I had my dreams of comin’ home, too. Buyin’ our ranch back from the bank and raisin’ horses there again. But it’s not worth losin’ more lives to have my way about it.”

  Before his mother could protest or call him a coward, Billy left the room. As he stepped out of the hotel into the twilight, he prayed his brother wasn’t poised to pounce on him between here and the Massena place.

  Chapter Sixteen

  As Billy slipped past rooms where the children still slept, and then down the stairs toward the aromas of bacon and biscuits, the deep peace of early morning settled over him. He paused at the foot of the stairs, entered the front parlor to marvel for the hundredth time at how, when the sunrise beamed at the beveled picture window, a rainbow colored the wall.

  The rainbow—God’s promise that he would never again destroy the earth with a flood.

  And yet even as he gazed at this symbol, where comfortable chairs and Mercy’s new piano and a dozen other homey, familiar things proclaimed this the Malloys’ favorite room, Billy’s gut rumbled. And it had nothing to do with hunger for Asa’s breakfast.

  He entered the kitchen, inhaling deeply, grateful to be sharing this morning meal with the two men he loved most in this world. The men who’d given him a home and a faith to grow up in so long ago.

  The old Negro flashed him a grin as he forked sizzling strips of bacon onto a platter. “Mornin’, Mister Billy! These old eyes is mighty glad to see ya. My prayers has been answered, havin’ you here safe and sound again.”

  “Mine, too,” Billy breathed, taking a plate of steaming, golden biscuits to the table. He sat across from Mike Malloy, nodding his greeting. “For a few minutes there, I wasn’t sure I’d make it back. At least not in one piece.”

  Malloy’s brows arched over hazel eyes that reminded Billy of an old hound dog’s: devoted and always happy to see him, yet wise to the ways of the world. The owner of the Triple M had his share of concerns, managing so much crop land, and raising Morgan horses and four children: Billy noticed a few silvery hairs catching the light from the window. Michael was a year or two beyond thirty, prosperous despite the hardships of this homesteading Kansas life. Yet he never seemed to doubt. His faith never wavered.

  As he drizzled sorghum over his split biscuits, Malloy revealed the worry he’d kept from the younger children last night, when Billy had arrived with Eve and Olivia.

  “So you met up with your brother? And you saw your old home place?” he asked quietly. It was his way to lead with questions and allow his kids to answer—even though Michael instinctively knew when they weren’t telling the whole story.

  Billy sensed he might as well spill out his heartache and distress, because if Michael didn’t coax it out of him with those wise eyes and that patient, mustachioed smile, Asa would peck at him like a sly old rooster, going after every last kernel.

  “Yessir, I rode down that long tree-lined lane, bracin’ myself for the deterioration Eve had warned me about,” he mused aloud. “But nobody coulda prepared me for meetin’ up with Wesley again. Or havin’ him shoot at me from our bedroom window.”

  “Lord a-mercy, he shot atcha?” Asa grasped his arm, looking him over for wounds. “Now what woulda possessed him to—”

  “He’s earned that bad reputation Eve came here cryin’ about,” Billy said with a sigh. “And he got the home place as payment for some dirty work he did for that banker who turned us out after Daddy died. The way Wesley saw it, I was trespassin’. Showed no inclination to talk with me, let alone come away from his outlaw life.”

  Michael’s fork was pois
ed over his plate and his expression made Billy’s heart ache. “I’m so sorry, son,” he murmured. “I suspected things got nasty, the way you didn’t want to elaborate last night with the girls all over you, but I never dreamed your own brother would fire at you.”

  “And you wasn’t carryin’ no gun, were ya?” Asa cut into his biscuit, shaking his white-sprigged head. “Musta been the Good Lord hisself got you outta harm’s way, Mister Billy. That was entirely uncalled for!”

  “Yeah, well Wes seems to have a different view of right and wrong these days.” He bit into a thick slice of bacon, savoring its salty goodness. “As you say, I felt a force—like a strong wind or the beating of angels’ wings—pushin’ Eve and me ahead of those bullets.”

  “Eve was there, too? And he still fired?” Michael rasped.

  “Yessir. And those same angels who got us outta there were watchin’ over Mama, too,” Billy replied. “I no more’n got out to the main road when here she comes, drivin’ a wagon, hellbent on seein’ her boy. Takin’ him a pie, no less, to win him over to her side. Or just to lure him out, so she could lay eyes on him again, after all these years of not knowin’ if he was even alive.”

  The two men shifted in their chairs as they shared an uncomfortable glance. “Is she all right, son? I mean, other than getting her heart broken?”

  Billy smiled ruefully. “Well, she performed her own kind of miracle, findin’ a pie from a shop where our old cook, Beulah Mae, bakes now—’cause Wesley did take her bait. But he wouldn’t stay by the wagon long enough to eat a piece and talk to her. Just snatched it up and told her to get outta there, or he’d come gunnin’ for the rest of us. Meanin’ Eve and Olivia. And me.”

  Billy thought for a moment, and then realized he’d better share his darker suspicions now, while it was just the three of them.

  “I want you to be real careful for a while. Watch the trees by the river, and check inside the stables before you tend the horses. My brother’s got a bum leg and his shootin’ hand’s danglin’ useless, but he’s a mean one. And he knows I’ve been livin’ in Abilene, after seein’ that article years ago in the Kansas City paper. He doesn’t think it’s fair that I have a home and a family and a good job these days.”