Two Brothers

by Linda Lael Miller

  While Aislinn hung back, there in the entryway of the McQuillan house, Dorrie and Cornelia greeted their “brother” very cordially, and neither seemed to suspect that they were entertaining an imposter. While the sisters were fussing in the dining room, Tristan paused beside Aislinn and spoke to her in a genial whisper.

  “What gave me away?”

  She smiled up at him. The deeper reasons were beyond her ability to explain. “The clothes. Shay probably hasn’t owned a suit since he left home.” Her amusement faded. “Where is he? He’s all right, isn’t he?”

  Tristan was quick to reassure her. “He’s busy looking after his prisoners. It seems they were a bit too much for the deputy he left in charge—the big one tried to hang the little one with one leg of his own pants. You’re not going to tell them who I am, are you?” He tilted his head to indicate the McQuillan women, who were chattering as they bustled between the dining room and kitchen, carrying in platters and bowls, rearranging the lush, velvety roses in their mother’s Cut-crystal vase, moving silver candlesticks from the table to the mantel and then back again.

  She linked her arm with his. “No,” she said, hiding her disappointment that she would not see Shay that evening after all, unless she sought him out, which might be awkward. “It should be interesting.”

  “Which one hates me?” He was frowning at the two women buzzing around the table.

  “The beautiful one, giving all the orders. Her name is Cornelia. Didn’t Shay give you any instructions at all?”

  “He said they’d probably serve something he hates.”

  “Pork roast,” Aislinn confided. They had gained the threshold of the dining room then, and she was extra careful to keep her voice low.

  Tristan’s blue eyes sparkled. “Do I like that?”

  She laughed, causing both Dorrie and Cornelia to turn and look in their direction. Dorrie’s expression was indulgent, even benevolent, while Cornelia’s smile was fixed and there was a pulse leaping spasmodically at the base of her throat. “It’s your favorite,” Aislinn answered, barely moving her mouth.

  He gave a comical sigh of relief. “Thank God it isn’t liver and onions,” he said.

  The meal was pleasant, and the food was plentiful. Aislinn had not enjoyed such a repast since before she left Maine, and even though she knew she was no more welcome in that house than the man the sisters called Shamus, in Cornelia’s mind anyway, she ate heartily. The beautiful china, the starched white tablecloth from Ireland, the shining silver and the candlelight, all of it made for a very festive effect. Afterward, there was rich coffee, imported from Arabia, a little pyramid of chocolates served on a plate painted with lilacs, and the conversation, if superficial and somewhat on the brittle side, was lively. Not quite like eating in the hotel kitchen, with Eugenie and the cook bantering back and forth over her head, but nice nonetheless.

  The evening would have been close to perfect if the man with the elegant table manners and sophisticated opinions had really been Shamus McQuillan the younger. It was a testament to how little both Cornelia and Dorrie knew about their brother that they didn’t seem to suspect anything. To Aislinn, who had not known Shay long at all, the contrasts were glaring.

  “Perhaps Miss Lethaby wouldn’t object to taking a brief stroll with me,” Tristan said, when the evening began to wear on. Aislinn looked from Cornelia to Dorrie, unable even to imagine Shay speaking so formally, and certain that one sister or the other would take notice of the deception at last.

  Neither of the women seemed even mildly suspicious. Cornelia had probably never paid a lot of attention to Shay, even while he was growing up in that house, preferring to pretend he didn’t exist, while Dorrie had lived by means of distraction, keeping the realities of her life at bay by daydreaming of her reunion with Leander.

  “Fine, fine,” Cornelia answered, with a dismissive wave in Aislinn’s direction. “Have a nice walk.” The unspoken addition was as plain in its meaning as if she’d breathed sound into it. Don’t come back, and if you lose her somewhere along the way, that will be fine, too.

  The stars were out, the saloon was spilling noise and yellow light into the street as always, and Shay’s office looked more like an armed camp than a small-town jailhouse. There were guards with rifles out front, and the back entrance was probably covered as well.

  Aislinn was alarmed. “Is he expecting trouble?” she asked. She held Tristan’s arm, and he squired her along the shadowy edge of the road with as much style as a gentleman escorting his lady through a park.

  Tristan gave a little shrug. “It comes with the territory,” he said. “He’s a lawman, after all. Are you worried about him?”

  She sighed. “Yes,” she admitted. She thought he smiled slightly at that reply, but she couldn’t be certain, since it was quite dark and she only caught a glimpse out of the corner of one eye. “Oh, yes.”

  He squeezed her arm reassuringly. “Shay’s more than a match for Kyle, the boy and all their henchmen put together, but don’t tell him I said so. I wouldn’t want him to think too highly of himself.” That time he did smile; she caught him outright.

  “What brought you to Prominence? Were you looking for Shay?”

  He seemed to be in no particular hurry to get back to the McQuillan house. Pausing across the street from the jail, he leaned one shoulder against a wall and struck a match to a cheroot. “I have business here,” he said. “I confess that I wanted to see my brother, too.”

  “It must be a strange thing, to look at someone and see yourself.”

  Tristan nodded. “It’s spooky, all right. But at the same time, it feels completely natural.” He was silent for a few moments, his head tilted slightly back so that he could scan the star-bright sky. “We don’t look alike to you, Shay and I, do we?”

  Aislinn pondered the question, then shook her head. “It’s a mystery to me, how I can tell one of you apart, because either of you might be the other’s reflection.”

  “Maybe it’s because you love Shay. You see him with your heart instead of your eyes.”

  She started to protest. She didn’t know Shay well enough to love him—they’d danced on the hotel veranda in sweet, sultry shadows, and he’d kissed her, and as crazy as it sounded, the night she’d spent in his custody in that jail cell would probably be a fond memory until the end of her days. But those were frivolous things; when she gave herself to a man, the decision would be a serious one.

  Tristan gazed toward the marshal’s office as he drew on the cheroot.

  “Shay cared for another woman,” Aislinn told him. “Her name was Grace, and she was killed in a stagecoach robbery, along with several other passengers.”

  It was then that Shay came out of the building on the other side of the street, and Aislinn realized that Tristan had been waiting for his brother. That the forthcoming meeting had been prearranged.

  “I know about Grace,” he said quietly, watching his brother approach. “Losing her nearly destroyed him—he’s been in some kind of trance since it happened, but he’s coming out of it now. He’s worth a little patience, Aislinn.”

  She was pleased by the prospect of an encounter with Shay, but when he stopped briefly to confer with a man passing by in a buggy, she looked up at Tristan and allowed him to see her worry. “Have you ever noticed how he polishes that badge of his? It’s a habit with him, the way some men straighten their cuff links or hook a finger in the front of their collars. He’ll never be happy in any other kind of work, but enforcing the law is dangerous, and I would die a thousand deaths every time he strapped on that god-awful gun and stepped out of the house.”

  “You want a man who doesn’t take risks, is that it?”

  Shay was very near now, almost within earshot. She bit her lower lip. Her father had been a practical, quiet man, never given to taking chances, and he’d perished in the prime of life, along with her mother. Maybe there was no such thing as safety, no way to protect the people you loved. “I suppose that sort of man might be
rather dull,” she admitted.

  Tristan laughed. “That’s true. He’d be around to help you raise your children, but you might find yourself wishing he’d take to the road now and again.”

  “Good night, brother,” Shay said pointedly.

  Tristan grinned, inclined his head to Aislinn, and walked away, whistling, toward the Yellow Garter.

  Aislinn had eyes only for Shay; when had looking at him gotten to be such a pleasure? He took her arm, and she didn’t pull away.

  “Why did you send Tristan to the house in your place?” she asked.

  “It was his idea,” Shay admitted. “And I had my hands full over at the jail. Did he fool you?” They were strolling slowly through the warm night, moving in the direction of the McQuillan house.

  “No,” Aislinn answered, without hesitation. “I recognized him right away. I don’t think Dorrie or Cornelia suspected anything, though.” Surely Shay’s sisters had known he was a twin, though, if they had been nearly grown when he was adopted into the McQuillan family. It seemed odd that they’d never told him.

  Too soon, they were at the gate in front of the house. Shadows gave them a degree of privacy, and Shay took a tender hold on Aislinn’s chin and raised her face to his. His kiss was a gentle one, and yet it speeded up her heartbeat and sent heat racing through her veins. She was trembling when he finally let her go.

  Amazingly enough, he looked as nervous as she felt. He took off his hat and thrust a hand through his hair. “When things settle down a little—well—I’d like for you and I to get to know each other better.”

  Aislinn was exulted and deeply touched by the shyness in his manner, in his voice. “I’d like that, too,” she managed to say.

  He leaned forward and brushed her forehead with his lips, ever so lightly, then reached around her to push open the gate. The air was redolent with the perfume of summer flowers. “You’d best go inside before I do something I shouldn’t,” he said. “Good night, Aislinn.”

  She hesitated briefly, then turned and started up the walk. When she reached the porch steps, she looked back, and saw that he was still watching her.

  Dorrie waited just inside the house, holding a kerosene lantern and beaming as brightly as the light. “The evening went very well, don’t you think? Cornie’s gone to bed with a sick headache, but I had a perfectly stupendous time.”

  Aislinn smiled and secured the door while Dorrie prattled on. “Shay was charming, wasn’t he? I’ve never known him to talk so much, about so many places and things.”

  “He had a great deal to say,” Aislinn agreed, hiding a smile. “Dorrie, do you think I could take a bath?”

  “Help yourself,” Dorrie said. “There’s still hot water in the reservoir beside the cookstove. I’ll get the copper tub from the mud room and put it in the kitchen for you.”

  “I can find everything I need on my own,” Aislinn said gently. She didn’t want to put her friend to any more trouble than necessary. After all, Dorrie had already provided her with work, however tenuous, and a home, however temporary.

  Dorrie took a candle in a brass holder from the entryway table, lit the wick from the flame of her lamp and handed the light to Aislinn. “I had a letter from Leander today,” she said. “Would you like to read it?”

  Aislinn didn’t know how to answer. Dorrie looked so eager to share the contents of Leander’s missive, and yet such things were private, like journals and keepsakes. “Is he coming back soon?” she asked, hedging. Something about the situation troubled her vaguely, though she couldn’t have explained.

  “Very soon,” Dorrie said, with a nod. “I’m absolutely certain of that.”

  Aislinn smiled and impulsively kissed the other woman on the cheek. “You’d better get your rest, then,” she whispered. She stood watching as Dorrie nodded again and hurried up the stairs, happy as a child looking forward to Christmas. But as Aislinn made her way back through the large house, toward the kitchen, her heart still soaring from Shay’s kiss, she felt fretful, too. Why was she suddenly afraid that Leander would never come back, and Dorrie would spend the rest of her days waiting for him?

  Chapter 8

  THE RIDERS FROM THE POWDER CREEK RANCH Stormed the town in the hazy dawn light of the following day, whooping like Apaches on the warpath and firing pistols and rifles and shotguns into the air. Although Shay had been half expecting them, the sights and sounds reverberated in his bones. Not a praying man, he offered a silent petition all the same, asking only that the citizens of Prominence, Aislinn Lethaby in particular, would stay in and stay down. That there would be gunplay he had no doubt.

  Indulging in a quick, cautious glimpse out the front window of the jailhouse, he saw the flash of Tristan’s silver card case, the prearranged signal, from the roof of the general store across the street. Lace curtains fluttered in the hotel windows, and he sensed motion in some of the other buildings, too, but except for the two guards out front, rifles cocked and ready, and the raiders from Powder Creek, now milling in front of the office, shooting holes in the sky, there was no one else in sight.

  Old man Kyle rode to the head of the twenty or so riders, looking more like a circuit preacher than a prosperous rancher in his round-brimmed hat and dark, somber suit. A Remington with a polished wooden stock rested crosswise in front of him, and his expression was typically grim.

  “Shamus McQuillan!” he snarled, never one to waste words. “Come on out here and maybe—just maybe—I won’t have to shoot either of these fine men watching the door.”

  Shay was already on his way outside; he’d never planned on holing up inside until the danger was past. He glanced back at Billy, who was grinning at him through the rusting bars of the cell.

  “Now don’t get restless, Billy-boy,” he said, “because your stay in our fine establishment is only beginning.”

  Billy’s response was a confident curse; O’Sullivan, being older and perhaps a little wiser, hung back, looking like a man who wanted whiskey for breakfast.

  Shay opened the door and stepped out onto the wooden sidewalk. He was armed, as always, but he hadn’t bothered to draw the .45. He knew he had only to summon it with a thought and it would be in his hand and firing on command.

  “Good morning, William,” he said. If he’d been wearing a hat, he might have tipped it. “What brings you here, so early in the day?”

  “You know damn well what brings me here, McQuillan. I want my boy back. He belongs at home, in the bosom of his family.”

  Shay sighed, polishing his badge with the cuff of his shirt. He was aware of the hired guards at his back, nervous and grim and probably as much a danger to him as the Powder Creek men, given their fidgety trigger fingers. It was Tristan he was counting on, lying on his belly over there on the roof of the store, with a pistol trained on the back of William Kyle’s head. “I reckon we have differing opinions, you and I, on where young Billy belongs. He stays here until the judge comes through Prominence and says otherwise.”

  Kyle’s foreman drew, and within the space of a heartbeat, he’d taken two bullets, one from behind and one from in front. Wearing an expression of indignant surprise, he fell forward from the saddle and landed on his face in the dirt, while the riders around him struggled to control their horses. Shay’s .45 was still in his hand as he scanned the group to see if anybody else wanted to step into the crossfire. Several men had drawn, but they hesitated to shoot, and at the signal from Kyle, they holstered their guns.

  “Pick him up,” the rancher said, speaking of the dead man being trampled under the hooves of his own panicked horse, now barely restrained by the hold of another man’s hand on the bridle. Someone at the edge of the group moved suddenly, and it was just enough of a diversion; Shay looked in that direction, and a rope looped over his upper body from the other side, pulled tight with such swift, muscle-severing force that he dropped the .45, his arms pinned to his sides at the elbows.

  One of the guards behind him stepped forward, probably to come to his aid, an
d was immediately gunned down. Before Shay could turn and see for sure, he was jerked off his feet and dragged between the prancing, sharp-hoofed legs of a score of horses, helpless to free himself or even gain his feet.

  He hoped to hell that Tristan was good in a crisis.

  The dirt was packed hard and studded with more sharp rocks than he could have imagined, and as the horse dragging him picked up speed, its rider pulling the rope taut again with a wrench that fairly caved in his rib cage, he felt like he was being stripped of his hide. His mouth was full of dust and fine gravel and a few other things even less palatable, his eyes were veiled with grit, and he’d gotten the wind knocked out of him when he struck the road. None of that was as bad as knowing he was probably going to die with nothing much to his credit but a good childhood and eighteen months of self-pity and hard drinking.

  He heard a shot, a hollow sound that might have come through a tunnel, followed half an instant later by another. Two shooters, since nobody could have gotten off a second round that fast.

  Mercifully, the horse that had been dragging him stopped, but that wasn’t necessarily a cause for encouragement, because Shay felt like some skinless creature, doused in kerosene and set ablaze. He rolled onto his back, blinking in an effort to clear his eyes, and looked up to see Aislinn kneeling beside him in the dirt, sawing at the rope with something that looked like a meat clever. Dorrie was at his other side, her face white as fancy foreign marble, except for two round blotches of color on her thin cheeks.

  “Are you hurt?” his sister asked.

  Now what kind of damned fool question was that? He’d just been roped and hauled half the length of Main Street behind a horse, and if he didn’t die of broken bones and crushed organs and having no hide left on him at all, the wounds to his pride were probably enough to kill him on their own. He shook off Dorrie’s concern and, when Aislinn had finally cut through the rope, struggled to his feet. His head swam, and he staggered a little.