The Marriage Agreement

by Carolyn Davidson

  Her head lifted and her nostrils flared as if she caught a whiff of some pleasing aroma. “Just smell the earth, Morgan. There’s nothing like it.”

  “You think not?” he asked, enjoying her pleasure. And then he doused her mood by drawing forth the gun he held. “I hate to be a killjoy, sweetheart, but here’s the gun I want you to carry.”

  Her face fell and the glow of delight left her eyes. “All the time?”

  “I’m afraid so. If anyone comes around and I’m out in the barn or beyond, where I can’t see or hear you, you’ll have to be prepared. Bear in mind that all you’ll need to do is fire a shot in the air and I’ll come running. No matter where I am, I’ll hear it.”

  She took the weapon from his hand and held it gingerly. “Just point it and pull the trigger?”

  He shook his head. “No, you’ll have to cock it first.” He reached from behind her and held the gun, her hands beneath his as he pulled back the hammer until it clicked. “That alone will no doubt make a man think again about facing you down, Lily. Just be sure you’re standing behind some sort of protection. If he’s armed, don’t risk yourself. Fire the gun in the air and then aim for your assailant next.”

  “I don’t know about this,” she said dubiously. “I’m not sure I could shoot to kill.”

  “You’d better be ready to do that very thing,” he said harshly. “Trust me, if it comes to you or the other fella, you’ll do it.”

  “Let me take my vegetables in the house and then I’ll practice with it,” she said.

  He followed her from the garden to the porch and then into the kitchen. She spilled out her bounty into a dishpan and added water from a bucket near the stove. “They don’t have a pump in the kitchen,” she said. “I used the one by the watering trough. I can’t believe Sarah doesn’t even have a sink or water in the house.”

  “I’ll do water duty from now on,” he told her. “Is there only one pail?”

  “No, there’s another, but I think they used it for milking.”

  “Carrying water in it won’t hurt anything,” Morgan said. “In fact, I’ll fill them both right now so you’ll have enough to last through the evening until I go out to take care of the cow.”

  “Sarah had just made butter,” Lily told him. “She washed out the churn and formed the round before she left.”

  “Is there any meat to cook?” Morgan asked.

  “Just a side of bacon hanging in the pantry. I’ll slice some off and make a skillet of eggs. Do you like lettuce and tomatoes mixed with bacon grease dressing?”

  “Never had it, but I’ll give it a shot,” he said, pleased at her willingness to adapt.

  “Well, that’s another thing, Morgan. Have you ever killed a chicken?” she asked, slanting a questioning look at him. “I’m not real good at the bloody stuff, but I can clean it and get it ready to cook for dinner tomorrow, if you’ve got the nerve to chop its head off.”

  “Can Sarah spare a laying hen?” he asked.

  “I saw a couple of young roosters out there, strutting around like they owned the place,” Lily said. “One rooster is all any flock needs.”

  “You seem to know all about this stuff,” Morgan said, settling in a chair at the table. “A regular farm girl at heart.”

  “I used to help in the kitchen. Probably got in the way more than I helped, now that I think about it, but Susanna put up with me. I learned how to do any number of things. I bake a dandy biscuit, Morgan.”

  “Seeing is believing,” he teased, enjoying her sparkle as she flitted around the simple kitchen. It felt almost as if—

  He shook his head. This was an interlude, fraught with danger. He’d be remiss if he forgot for a moment to keep up his guard. But the temptation to imagine, just for a few minutes, that Lily was cooking for him in their own kitchen, that the words they exchanged were as ordinary as any between husband and wife…

  She’d set the boundaries, though. He would take her home. That far he’d go, and gladly, but the rest of it might not be to Lily’s liking. Whatever faced her in Louisiana, he would be a part of it.

  He looked up at her, catching a pensive expression as she came to a halt, standing silently beside the table. “What is it?” he asked. “Did I hurt your feelings, sweetheart, doubting your ability to bake decent biscuits?” Something had spoiled her mood, and in all probability it was something he’d said.

  But she shook her head, and though it failed to touch her eyes, her smile was ready. “Of course not. I’m just thinking. Wondering how long we’ll be here, how long the supplies we brought will last.”

  “Yeah, well they won’t do us much good tied on the back of the buggy,” he said, rising as he thought of the foodstuffs they’d purchased in town. He went out the door and automatically scanned the horizon. The barn was the place to watch from, he decided. Open at both ends, it held numerous places a man could lie in ambush. Stalls lined the main aisle and there was no doubt a tack room. The loft held hay, he’d warrant, and probably straw. Old Sam had done well for his herd of horses.

  To the west, a line of trees caught his eye. When danger came, it might appear on that front, the trees providing good cover until an assailant was within a couple hundred yards of the house. Of course, he thought, untying the boxes of food, and lifting one into his arms, they might come right up to the porch, demanding that the occupants move out and leave the property to the government.

  Caine Harris said that the Blairs had not been face-to-face with their foes, had only received written notice that the property was to be vacated by the middle of the month. It was the twelfth today, if he remembered right. At most, they had two or three days leeway before they could expect visitors.

  The kitchen door stood open and Morgan carried his load inside, settling it on the table, then returned to the buggy. If he was any judge of it, Lily had bought enough food to last them the better part of a week. Along with what the garden produced, they should be well fed. He brought the second box to where Lily was putting up canned goods and sacks of basic food items.

  “I hope this stuff won’t spoil,” she said, frowning as she looked down at the piece of sausage she held. “Maybe I should make it for breakfast. I got a chunk of ham, and that’ll hang in the pantry.” She stepped back and considered her purchases. “I think we have enough, Morgan. I bought coffee and sugar, and Sarah had oatmeal and flour.”

  “Biscuits and gravy for breakfast?” he asked, aware of the plea in his words.

  She shot him a glance. “I thought you were doubting my ability to produce biscuits.”

  “Not for a minute,” he swore, holding his hand over his heart. And then he smiled, as her saucy smile appreciated his gesture. “You know what, Mrs. Morgan?”

  “No, what?” she asked, returning to the stove where bacon sizzled in the skillet.

  “I like you. I really like you, Lily.”

  She was silent, her head bent as if the sizzling bacon fascinated her. For a moment he had second thoughts about his declaration. Then she turned to him and he caught a glimpse of dampness on her cheek, one she brushed away with the back of her hand.

  “Do you?” she asked, and he thought the query held more meaning than the words implied. “You don’t mind getting tangled up with me and having me on your hands while you finish this assignment?”

  “Hell, yes, I mind,” he said sharply. “I’d like to have done this a different way. I wish I could have met you somewhere other than in a riverboat saloon, and that things were different in several ways. But all that aside, you’re…” He paused, unable to speak the words that hovered in his mind.

  “I’ve enjoyed every hour I’ve spent with you, Lily,” he said after a moment. “Even when I spent some long minutes wondering how far I could trust you, even when I found you’d not been honest with me.” His voice lowered as he spoke his intentions. “Even then, I had no intention of giving you up.”

  “Giving me up? I don’t think there’s a choice, is there?” She tilted her chin and he
saw the effort she made to remain indifferent to his words. “We’ve established the limits of our relationship already, if I remember rightly.”

  “We don’t have a relationship yet,” he reminded her softly, and knew that he would remedy that fact before very many hours had passed. Lily would not escape him so easily. He was a man jealous of what he claimed as his own.

  And Lily was his.

  The bed was decent, and that was the best that could be said for it, Lily decided. The sheets were fairly clean and she debated for a moment whether she would trust herself to lie where Sam Blair had placed his body the night before. Her natural inclination for cleanliness won out and the sheets were stripped from the mattress. The quilt was spread quickly over the striped ticking and she searched out another coverlet from a chest in one corner of the room.

  Kneeling before the wooden box, she handled its contents with gentle hands. It was no doubt a part of Sarah’s dowry, remnants of what she had brought to her marriage. A small flannel gown was folded in one corner, a hand-worked baby quilt beneath it. There’d been no sign of children about the place, and Lily could only imagine that Sarah’s life was barren in more ways than one.

  She felt nostalgia grip her, knew a rush of tears that she could not contain, and wiped them away with the edge of the apron she wore. The weight of the gun she carried was a reminder of their circumstances and she drew it from its hiding place and placed it beside her on the floor.

  “It just isn’t fair.” She’d cried the words aloud to her mother one day, years ago when it seemed that chaos reigned and their existence as a family had come to a halt.

  “No one ever said life was fair,” the small, elegant woman had said. “We just all do the best we can, and face the future one day at a time.”

  “Mama.” Lily uttered the single word beneath her breath as a flood of yearning almost overcame her. She’d sworn never to go back home, but now, with Morgan’s aid, it seemed she would once more see her family. And if they chose to welcome her, she would sort out her life and seek a modicum of peace of mind there on the plantation where she’d been raised.

  “Lily?” Morgan’s voice called her name from the doorway. “What are you up to, sweetheart? I could have helped you with the bed if you’d called me.”

  “I’ll wash those sheets tomorrow,” she said, blinking back the tears that flooded her eyes. “I thought we’d sleep on top of the quilt for tonight.”

  He was silent, save for the sound of his footsteps across the bare floor. And then he was behind her, bending to place his hand on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

  “Of course,” she asserted firmly. “Just looking for something to put on the bed. I think we’ll settle for this,” she said, lifting the coverlet from the depths of the trunk. She rose, holding it before her, refusing to meet his gaze. “Do you know, Sarah doesn’t even have a parlor. That miserable man scrimped by with as little output as he could manage, with only a bedroom and kitchen in this place.”

  Morgan laughed, a sound of derision. “I’m surprised he provided her with that much. From the outside, I figured it would be one room. His animals get treated better than his woman.” He stepped to the bed and picked up the quilt, inspecting the mattress. “This isn’t bad, Lily. I think we’ll get a decent night’s sleep, anyway.”

  He turned then, catching her unaware, and his eyes narrowed as he focused on hers. “You’ve been crying,” he said softly. “You never cry, Lily. What’s happened?”

  “Oh, I’ve been known to shed a few tears on occasion,” she told him. “This is one of them.” She waved a hand at the trunk, and then reached to lower the lid over the sparse collection of treasures Sarah possessed. “I found all the things Sarah holds dear in that box,” she told Morgan. “Including a baby’s gown and blanket, both of them used and then stored away.”

  “She doesn’t seem to have had an easy life, all the way around,” Morgan said. “I hope she’s enjoying her stay in the hotel, having someone else do the cooking for a few days.” His hands reached then for Lily and his arms drew her to him, holding her in a comforting embrace.

  She leaned against him, welcoming his warmth and the sheer strength of the man, finding the solace her aching heart sought. For a moment they stood in the center of the small room, the twilight gathering outside the window and the shadows creeping into the corners of the house. Lily straightened and leaned back to look up at him.

  “I’m fine now, really,” she said. “Just one of those woman things.”

  “I don’t know much about women, I suppose,” Morgan said ruefully. “At least not that part of womanhood.”

  Lily laughed softly. “I suspect you know your way around women quite well. You’ve certainly managed to make an impact on my life.”

  “Are you sorry?” he asked. “Would you do things differently if you could go back to that first day on the riverboat?”

  She considered the matter, and then shook her head. “Probably not. You were the only one I could trust, besides May. She’s a good person, you know. I’d like to meet up with her again some day.”

  “Not much chance of that,” Morgan surmised. “But I don’t think she’ll last long riding up and down the river. She’s got more value than that.”

  “Down on her luck, do you suppose?” Lily asked. And then murmured her suspicions aloud. “I think she was involved with Ham Scott.”

  “No doubt,” Morgan agreed. “You know she stood up to Ham for you.”

  “So did you.” And he had, she thought. He’d pulled her out of danger, perhaps not life-threatening, but certainly a perilous situation, one she was unable to cope with on her own. “I thought I’d chosen the lesser of two evils at first,” she admitted. “And then I realized you were a gentleman at heart.”

  “I’m not a gentleman tonight, Lily,” he warned her, and then set her away from himself, paying mind to the buttons that closed the bodice of her dress. “I’ve milked the cow and set the pail aside until morning. The chickens are penned up and the horses are settled out in the pasture. Even closed the barn doors,” he told her. “Now it’s time for us, for the two of us to think about the situation we’re in.”

  “I’ve thought of little else lately,” she admitted, lowering her head to watch as the last button was slipped from its mooring. Morgan’s hands were warm against her skin as he lowered the dress over her shoulders, allowing it to fall to the floor. She wore a shift beneath it, a petticoat tied at her waist, and stockings held up by plain garters just below her knees.

  It seemed she was about to lose every bit of her clothing, if Morgan had anything to say about it, for he showed no signs of stopping with the removal of her dress. His fingers worked at the ties of her petticoat, and then he watched as it joined the dress on the plank floor beneath their feet.

  “Sit down on the bed and I’ll take off your shoes and stockings,” he offered, a lazy smile appearing to curve his lips. He had a nice mouth, Lily decided, the bottom lip fuller than the top, his teeth even and white when he smiled. In fact, there wasn’t much about the man she could find fault with. He was dark and muscular, tall yet not overpowering with his size.

  She complied with his request, knowing he would not take her refusal as an answer, and so decided to go the route of least resistance. His long fingers worked at her shoes, and then slid up her legs to where the garters held her stockings in place.

  “These are too tight,” he said, easing the elastic down to her ankles and then sliding the circles from her feet, the stockings with them. She curled her toes at his touch and he laughed softly, looking up into her face. “Are you afraid of me, Lily?” And at the quick shake of her head, his smile widened. “I thought not,” he said, satisfaction alive in his words.

  She was in her shift, only a pair of drawers beneath it to protect her modesty and he was apparently not going to stop until he had stripped her of everything she wore. But as if to give her a bit of respite, he stood and unbuttoned his shirt, then tossed it aside wit
h an impatient gesture. His trousers were next, his fingers moving quickly to undo the front placket, shoving the denim fabric to the floor, his drawers joining them. His feet were bare.

  In fact, she noted with embarrassment, he was as naked as the day he was born, and seemed to have no problem with her seeing him that way.

  She lowered her gaze to her lap, finding that her fingers were clenched tightly, a detail Morgan seemed to pay special mind to. He squatted in front of her and she looked up, startled by the sight of his broad chest, muscled arms and the dark hair that formed a triangle, its color matching that which covered his head. He seemed pensive, she thought, his hand reaching out to enclose both of hers in his palm.

  “I think we can get rid of the rest of your clothes, Lily,” he said quietly. “It’s almost dark out, sweetheart. I’d like to have a candle or lamp lit, the better to see you, but I’ll defer to your modesty for tonight if you like.”

  She nodded, wiggling to loosen the shift from beneath her bottom, then pulling it over her head, leaving her bare, but for the drawers she wore.

  “Stand up,” he told her, rising before her and waiting until she should do as he asked. There didn’t seem to be much choice, she found, for his hand drew her to her feet. And then she felt his palms on either side of her waist, long fingers causing her drawers to fall around her ankles.

  “No other man will ever see you this way again in your life, Lily,” he vowed, his voice dark and filled with promise. “You belong to me now. I promised to take care of you and keep you safe.” His tone lightened a bit as he revised his words. “At least as safe as I can for the next little while. I’ll do my best.”

  “I can’t ask for more than that,” she whispered, hearing the tremor in her words and knowing he sensed her apprehension. “Please, Morgan,” she murmured, unwilling to look into his face, but needing to ask this one boon of him. “Please don’t hurt me.”

  “Now?” he asked, the single word slashing the air between them. “You think I’d cause you pain, Lily? Here on this bed?”