Texas Bride: A Bitter Creek Novel

by Joan Johnston

  “I came here with the best intentions,” Wentworth spluttered.

  “You came here to cheat me out of my inheritance,” Miranda said in a cold voice. “You came here to take advantage of me. Papa would have been ashamed of you, Uncle Stephen. He loved you, he supported you, and—”

  “I hated him!” Wentworth said, venom in his voice. The mask he’d worn fell away and exposed the greedy swindler.

  At Wentworth’s admission, Miranda put up a hand as though to ward off a blow. Jake took a step forward to intercede, in case Miranda’s uncle actually threatened her with physical violence.

  “Why?” she asked in a tormented voice. “What did Papa ever do to you?”

  “He never trusted me. He never gave me any authority. He always kept me under his thumb,” Wentworth ranted. “He promoted other men ahead of me. Me! His own brother!”

  It was clear why Miranda’s father hadn’t trusted his brother. Stephen Wentworth had turned out to be untrustworthy.

  “You won’t have to worry about being under my thumb,” Miranda said. “I will hire someone else to manage my money, so it will no longer be a burden to you. And I will be taking whatever legal steps are necessary to protect the financial interests of Hannah and Hetty and Josie and Nick and Harry,” she finished breathlessly.

  There spoke a wealthy banker’s daughter, Jake thought.

  “Good-bye, Uncle Stephen,” she said. “I won’t see you to the door. I’m sure you can find your own way out.”

  He glanced out the window at the vast Texas prairie and said, “I’m not sure I can make it back to San Antonio before dark. What if I lose my way?”

  “Then you’ll spend the night alone in the dark,” Miranda said. “Be sure to watch out for snakes. And bears and panthers and wolves,” she added with relish.

  Honestly, Jake hadn’t seen a wolf in quite a while, except his mother’s pets. And most of the bears and panthers were found in more heavily wooded areas farther east or west. But he applauded Miranda’s efforts to upset her uncle.

  Wentworth focused his gaze on Miranda and said, “I wasn’t going to tell you, but you’ll find out anyway. You may have trouble locating your sisters.”

  “What are you talking about?” Miranda said. “You told me they’d given you my direction.”

  He smirked. “Miss Birch got the information about where you’d gone from one of Josie’s confederates. Your sisters are no longer at the orphanage. Miss Birch contacted me the day they disappeared. That was almost a month ago.”

  “Disappeared?” Miranda said in a faint voice.

  “Gone without a trace,” Wentworth said with malicious satisfaction.

  Tears filled Miranda’s eyes and she covered her mouth to stifle the wail of despair Jake could hear growing behind her hands.

  “You must have some idea where they’ve gone,” Jake said.

  “Some idea, yes,” Wentworth said.

  “Where are they?”

  “Apparently, they joined a wagon train heading west.”

  Miranda turned and grabbed Jake’s arm. “Oh, no! Oh, no!”

  “I’m glad you’re unhappy, Miranda,” Wentworth said. “Because I certainly am.”

  “Get out,” Jake said. “Out! Before I throw you out.”

  Wentworth bowed and turned to leave. He couldn’t resist one last parting shot. “If the girls are gone, and if anything should happen to you and your brothers, I believe I am next in line to inherit.”

  Jake caught Stephen Wentworth by the scruff of his neck and the back of his trousers and pitched him out the door.

  Miranda cried most of the way back to Three Oaks. By the time she got into bed in one of Priscilla’s cotton nightgowns, she was dry-eyed, but her heart was heavy. The incident with the three cowboys that she had found so soul shattering had faded to insignificance in light of the knowledge that her three sisters were missing.

  She pulled a brush through her curls, wondering what she could have done to avoid what had happened. “I never should have left Chicago,” she murmured.

  Jake was undressing for bed—in their bedroom, no less—but she hardly noticed him, her mind was in such turmoil.

  “I think Nick and Harry would have suffered from that choice,” he said.

  He was right about that, Miranda conceded.

  “And without the perspective you had here, you might have signed those papers when your uncle brought them to you and lost your fortune.”

  “Instead, I’m rich,” she said in wonder. “We can rebuild the burned wing of the house. We can paint. We can buy more cattle.”

  “We aren’t going to use your money to improve Three Oaks.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s your money.”

  “It’s our money,” she said. “But it doesn’t mean anything to me if I can’t find my sisters. Where do you suppose they are?”

  “If they left with a wagon train, they’re certainly headed west. The question is, how did they get someone to take them along? The trip west is expensive. Any wagon master worth his salt requires each wagon to be outfitted properly with oxen or mules and enough supplies to last till the end of the journey.”

  “So how did they manage to join a wagon train?” Miranda wondered.

  “Maybe they didn’t,” Jake said. “Maybe Josie told her friend that was what they were doing to put Miss Birch off their trail. Maybe they’re on their way here right now.”

  “Oh, do you think so?” Miranda said, feeling her heart lighten for the first time since she’d heard her sisters had fled the orphanage. Then she remembered how difficult it had been for her and the boys to make that journey—how often she’d been offered the chance to sell herself to buy food—and shivered with foreboding.

  “They also might have stowed away on someone’s wagon,” Jake said.

  But they couldn’t remain hidden forever. They would have to reveal themselves at some point. She knew from her experience in Texas that it wasn’t so easy to hide on the wide-open prairie. It wasn’t a matter of whether they’d be discovered but when. “What will happen when they’re discovered?”

  “It’ll depend on how far the wagon train has traveled. If they’re close enough to some settlement, they may just leave them there.”

  “Strand them in the middle of nowhere?”

  Jake’s lip quirked. “It wouldn’t be the middle of nowhere. There would be some town close by.”

  “How would I know which one? How could I find them?”

  “We can hire a detective, if it comes to that. But your sisters have been resourceful so far. I suspect they’ll send a letter to you when they can.”

  Miranda had thought of another way her sisters might buy passage on the wagon train. One of them might try to do as she had done. One of them might marry a man if he agreed to bring her sisters along on the trip.

  “I want to hire a detective right away,” she said.

  “You’d be better off waiting for word of their direction,” Jake said.

  “What if a letter never arrives? I have to find them, Jake. I have to! This is all my fault. I should have stayed in Chicago.”

  “You’ve talked yourself in a circle, Miranda, right back to where you started.”

  Miranda bit the inside of her cheek. Life was so unpredictable. Now that she possessed the money to bring her sisters to Texas, she didn’t know where to send it. Of course, they would need somewhere to live when they got here, so the sooner she and Jake got started repairing Three Oaks, the better. “Jake, you have to let me use some of my money to rebuild the burned wing of the house.”

  “No.”

  She looked up to argue further and caught sight of bare male flesh. She dropped the hairbrush to her lap, staring wide-eyed as Jake dropped his long john shirt on the floor, then stepped out of the bottoms, leaving him naked.

  “I can think of something better to do with our mouths than argue,” he said, leaning over to kiss her softly on the mouth.

  He sat down besid
e her on the bed, took the hairbrush from her limp hand, and, to her amazement, began brushing her hair. “I’ve wanted to do this ever since the first time you let these golden curls out of that awful bun you were wearing the day we got married.”

  Miranda glanced over her shoulder and asked, “Why didn’t you?”

  “I was keeping my distance. I didn’t want to be tempted to make love to you.”

  Did that mean he was now willing to be tempted? And was he going to make love to her? Miranda shivered as the brush moved through her hair and his large hand followed after it. “That feels good.”

  He brushed her hair aside with his hand and bent to kiss her nape.

  Miranda shivered with excitement. “What are you doing, Jake?”

  “Making love to my wife.”

  “I thought you didn’t want to do that.”

  “That was when I was worried about getting you pregnant.”

  “Oh, I see. I’m already pregnant,” she said, pointing out the obvious.

  “And I want you.”

  They weren’t the three words she yearned to hear spoken again, but they were nice, nevertheless. And, Lord help her, she wanted him. She felt an ache that began in her belly and traveled up to her breasts all the way to her throat, as the blood hummed through her veins.

  “I thought you would be stubborn and deny us this pleasure,” she said as she leaned her head back so he could kiss her throat more easily.

  He stopped kissing her to speak. “That was my thought at first,” he admitted. He continued caressing her, his hands sliding up her ribs until he took the weight of her breasts in them, teasing the nipples into peaks. “But after what happened today,” he said, “I changed my mind. If there’s a chance I’m going to lose you—for any reason—I want to have this to remember.”

  She turned in his arms, her body fully aroused, aching and wanting, and rose onto her knees, which put her breasts level with his mouth. Jake stripped the cotton nightgown down past her shoulders and teased her nipples with his teeth.

  She thrust her hands into his hair, keeping him where he was, and tried to continue their conversation. “I’m determined to make Three Oaks the beautiful home it once was,” she said, panting as he brought her a kind of bliss she hadn’t imagined. “And to bring the rest of my family here to live.”

  “We can discuss it later,” he said, pulling her down onto his lap so he could reach her mouth.

  Miranda suddenly wasn’t interested in talking anymore.

  It was a long time later before she had the breath to speak at all. She felt too languorous to argue, and she knew that bringing up the subject of money would start another argument. But she was determined to have her way.

  Jake slid his arms around her and pulled her close, his nose in her hair. She felt safe and secure in his embrace, two things that had been lacking in her life for the past three years.

  And she felt loved.

  He’d already said the words. She had not. But she thought she loved him. She really thought she did.

  “I want you again,” he murmured in her ear.

  She could feel him growing hard against her belly. She hadn’t imagined he could want her again so soon. He reached down between her thighs with his hand, and she ducked her head at the grin on his face when he said, “I see you want me again, too.”

  The second loving was slower, and as Jake moved within her, Miranda’s body began to quake. She felt herself losing control and didn’t know what to do.

  “Don’t be afraid, Miranda,” he rasped. “Come with me.”

  Her body spasmed with such force, it wrenched a raw, primitive sound from her throat.

  Jake’s body was arched backward as he spilled his seed with a savage cry of satisfaction.

  He came to rest atop her so they were still joined, both their bodies heaving. She held him close, welcoming the solid weight of him. When they could both breathe easily again, he separated them and lay by her side, pulling her close.

  “We should turn out the lamp,” she murmured sleepily.

  “Give me a minute and maybe we can do this again.”

  She raised her head to look into his face and saw his teasing smile. She swatted his chest and laughed. “I almost believed you.”

  “Almost?” he said, chuckling. “I was serious.” But he leaned across her and turned out the lamp.

  It should have been dark, but a soft blush of light remained outside the window.

  Jake sat up, a frown wrinkling his brow. “What is that?”

  Miranda bolted upright, staring hard at the orange-yellow glow. She felt her blood run cold. Her heart hammered in her chest and her body began to tremble.

  She looked at Jake, her eyes wide with fear, and croaked, “That’s fire.”

  Miranda had never seen Jake move so fast.

  He already had his Levi’s on and was pulling his boots over bare feet as he said, “It’s the barn! Wake up the boys. They can help carry buckets of water. Get Slim out of bed. He can man the pump in the yard. I’ll go get the stock out of there.”

  “Jake!” she cried. “Be careful!”

  He was gone before she could say anything more. Miranda hurried to dress and ran to wake the boys. She did it quietly. With any luck, they could put out the fire in the barn without waking the baby and scaring her to death.

  Nick scrambled out of bed and said, “Fire? Where?”

  “Shh,” Miranda warned. “We don’t want to wake Anna Mae.” When she had the two boys in the hall and the bedroom door closed behind them, she said, “It’s the barn.”

  “My horse!” Nick said, his eyes wide with fear.

  “Jake’s getting him out.” Miranda remembered every detail of the fire that had burned down their house in Chicago. The ferocious heat, the wind that fanned the scorching flames and sent burning ashes into the air, and the horrible, choking black smoke. And afterward, the soot that covered every pore, as the roaring fire—a dangerous, living thing—destroyed everything she loved.

  Nick had been seven. She wondered how much of that awful night he remembered. His trembling body and his terrified face told her the answer. He remembered everything, too.

  She laid a hand on Nick’s shoulder and said, “It’s only the barn. Jake will rescue the animals. Go wake up Slim,” she said. “Take Harry with you. I’ll meet you outside.”

  Miranda had pulled on trousers and a shirt and shoes almost as quickly as Jake, so she was a step ahead of the boys and Slim as she headed outside to help Jake. She didn’t realize he wasn’t alone until she’d almost reached the barn. She could see Jake outlined in the firelight.

  Three men on horseback surrounded him.

  Miranda knew without seeing their faces who the three cowboys were. Just then, one of them turned his horse, and, in the light of the fire, she saw the bloody furrows she’d scratched in his cheek that morning.

  “Let the barn burn,” Call said.

  “At least let me save the stock,” Jake said in what Miranda thought was an amazingly calm voice.

  “Let them burn, too,” Call said.

  “Why not let him get the stock out?” one of the other cowboys said.

  “That bitch made us outlaws,” Call said viciously. “Wearing clothes that showed her legs like no proper woman would. Tempting decent men. Better her man should know her for what she is. Won’t any spread in Texas hire a man who’s touched a woman against her will. We’re outcasts no matter what we do from now on. The blame for all of this falls on her!”

  Miranda felt sick. She backed away into the house to stop the others from coming outside. She ran into Slim and the two boys in the kitchen, where Nick had already pumped a pail full of water, which was sitting by the sink.

  “The fire was set by the three men who attacked me this morning,” she told them. “They’ve got Jake surrounded. They’re forcing him to let the barn burn.” She didn’t mention the fact that the stock might burn as well. She was afraid Nick would run outside to try to save his horse.


  “Nick, go get the rifles,” Slim said, rolling himself toward the kitchen door.

  “Sure, Slim,” Nick said.

  Miranda called after him, “Who are you planning to shoot?”

  “Give you three guesses,” Slim said.

  “You can’t kill them all, Slim.”

  “I can. And I will.”

  “Here’s yours, Slim,” Nick said, handing one of two Winchester rifles he’d retrieved to Slim and keeping the other for himself.

  “How did you know where to find those guns?” she asked Nick.

  Before he could answer, Harry piped up, “Slim’s been teaching us how to shoot.”

  Miranda’s brows nearly reached her hairline. “Both of you?”

  “Both of them,” Slim said. “Now, boy,” he said to Nick, “remember what I taught you.”

  Miranda gripped the barrel of Nick’s rifle and said to Slim, “My little brother isn’t going out there with a gun in his hands. Those men are liable to shoot first and realize he’s only a boy of ten when he’s dead.”

  To her surprise, it wasn’t Slim who argued the matter. It was Nick.

  “I know what I’m doing, Miranda. I’m a good shot. Those cowboys might not settle for burning the barn. They might decide to shoot Jake and come after you again. After they’ve burned the barn and killed Jake and attacked you, they’re not going to leave any witnesses.”

  Miranda hadn’t let herself imagine that sort of savagery. Clearly, Nick had. “I still think you’re too young to be threatening grown men with a gun.”

  Too late, Miranda realized she’d said exactly the wrong thing.

  Nick’s shoulders squared and he tightened his grip on the Winchester, jerking the barrel from her grip. “This rifle will even things up.”

  “The boy’s right,” Slim said. “We’re wastin’ time talkin’. Open the door and let’s get this over with.”

  Miranda wished she’d never suggested Jake build that ramp. If Slim was trapped on the porch by his wheelchair, Miranda was sure he wouldn’t have sent Nick out there alone. She grabbed Harry’s wrist when it looked like he planned to follow the other two males out the door. “You stay here with me.”