by Kristin Holt
Maybe not guests. Businessmen. Investors. Perhaps competitors.
Last night, Mr. Gideon had been dressed in a costly suit of clothes, a heavy gold watch-fob dangling from his waistcoat. Today, he wore the rough, durable clothes of a laborer. “What business are you in, Mr. Gideon?”
“Call me Rocky.”
His formal name maintained boundaries.
“Please.” Instead of sitting behind the desk, he took a seat near her and turned it to provide an intimate proximity. “We’re soon to be family. No need for formality.”
She nodded, but had no intention of addressing him if doing so required use of his given name.
“Mining. I own the Peerless Mine, one of the two largest and most productive gold and silver mines in the area.”
“Oh.” Her modest, serviceable calico turned to rags in this opulent room. Compared to the lawyer’s office, this room’s furnishings must have cost double. This office building, from roof to carpets, draperies to paintings, furnishings to carved marble mantelpiece defined Mr. Gideon’s import, power, and wealth.
Whatever he wanted, he’d obtain.
This prominent, prosperous man wanted Temperance Cartwright. He belonged to Temperance, and she to him.
Felicity vowed, then and there, to rip out her undesirable attraction to this man by the roots. She controlled her passions. Her passions did not control her.
So with a deep breath and a conscious effort to relax into the comfortable chair, she met her host’s brown eyes, warm with compassion.
“I believe we’re safe from prying ears, Mr. Gideon. Do tell what great secret couldn’t be overheard by the good people of Mountain Home.”
“I’ll make you a deal, Miss Percival,” Rocky said to Felicity, ignoring the kvetching of his conscience. “You solemnly promise to address me as Rocky and I’ll answer every question you have about your father, his frame of mind, his decisions. Everything.”
Hints of her thoughts played over her marvelously expressive face. Doubt. Concern. Effort to determine what he wanted from her.
“First, my offer for a train ticket stands.” No sense mentioning the bill at Mrs. Ihnken’s. Correcting her room assignment would be his little gift. “When you determine it’s time to go, your fare is covered. I’ll leave money with the stationmaster.”
“Why?”
“Because your father or his attorney should have secured your return tickets.”
“They preferred I stay.” Evidently, she wondered why he wanted her to leave town.
“I’ll make this easy, Miss Felicity. Like I said, it’s your decision whether you stay or go. If you want to go, know I can easily afford it.”
She blinked, evidently uncomfortable.
“This isn’t about the money. It’s about honoring your choice in the matter. Like I said, I hope you decide to stay.”
Something odd and a little reminiscent of hope or pleasure flickered through her imperfect gray eyes. In the indirect light, they appeared more hazel than gray.
“You asked a loaded question,” he reminded her. “You want to know what I know about your father, what was on my mind last night in Stuart’s office. I’ll tell you because it’s best you know the whole truth. It’s also best for Temperance, and I want everything best for her. I want to do the right thing.”
Felicity watched him closely, as if weighing his words. She must have reached a favorable conclusion for she offered a small smile. “Very well, Rocky. You must call me Felicity.”
With pleasure.
“I recognize,” she said, “my appearance brought tremendous embarrassment to your fiancée.”
“I’m courting Temperance,” he clarified, not sure why it mattered, “but we’re not yet engaged to be married.”
She shifted in her chair, uncomfortable. “Please tell me what you know.”
“Felicity,” he called her by name because she’d given him leave to do so and her name on his tongue brought him mechaye—pleasure. “Your sister is not embarrassed, not by you. Angry that your shared father aired dirty laundry, yes, but she’s rutzer.” Young and without experience. “She’ll have a change of heart.”
“What language is it you toss in here and there? You use words I don’t understand.”
He hadn’t realized. “It’s Yiddish—Jewish.”
“I’m surprised Cartwright would allow his daughter to wed a Jew.”
He chuckled and noted her tension waned. “I arrived in Mountain Home when a teenager—just coming into my height, and without family. I needed work, a place to stay, someone who’d treat me right. Cedric Cartwright went out of his way to place me with Mikkel Herschstein who happens to be Jewish. Mick became like a father, or maybe an older brother. But Mick and Cedric decided I was born a Christian, best I knew, and I should remain a Christian.”
“Ah.” Her expression grew pensive.
Leaning forward in his chair, he rested elbows upon his knees and caught a hint of her scent. Clean woman beneath honest sweat, sunshine, and a fragrance all her own. Awareness tingled up his spine and traveled all the way to his fingertips.
Not the way he ought to notice his future sister-in-law.
“It seems,” she said, “Cartwright knew of my existence for some time, yet he made no attempt to contact me until after his death. I must have been an embarrassment.”
“He was not embarrassed by you, Felicity.”
She shook her head, adamant. Fine dark hairs had escaped the knot at the back of her head and floated free. “What other reason could there possibly be?”
She clearly doubted his ability to comprehend the minister’s state of mind.
“I wish I knew, precisely, why he didn’t contact you. All I can do is guess.” How could he help her understand? “Indulge me for a moment, will you?”
Several seconds of intense eye contact passed before she nodded.
“I recall little of my parents,” he confided. “My mother wept all the time and nothing I did comforted her.” He’d lived with it for most of his life and could speak of it without emotion. “She left one day and never looked back. She walked away from sons. I don’t recall how many. And left our father too. I have no idea why. Mother’s selfishness, and maybe my father’s, destroyed their marital happiness, ripped our family to shreds, and scattered their sons to the four winds.”
“I’m sorry.”
Why hadn’t he yet shared much of this with his future bride? He ought to.
“Once, I asked a man at the orphanage when my father would come for me.” The memory remained as vivid and painful as it had been in his youth. “I must have been four or five. The stern fellow’s expression was devoid of hope. He left me wondering what I’d done so wrong that my father abandoned me.”
Passion fired in her eyes, warming gray to near-blue. “You did nothing wrong. A child is not responsible for his parents’ happiness.”
He couldn’t help but chuckle. This woman, defending him?
He reached for her hand, savored the warmth and roughness of her fingers. “I’ll admit, it took years, well into adulthood, but I figured it out. The deficiency resided in my parents, not me.”
“You’re right.”
He smiled at her. A strange, moving sensation washed through him. Had he actually met someone much like himself? Two people cut from the same bolt of cloth. A matched set.
She understood.
He wanted nothing more than to remain like this, her hand in his. Whatever he told her, he knew she’d understand without judgment.
Feh!
How had he allowed a flicker of attraction for Temperance’s sister to flash from simple appreciation to…to this?
No. He could not, would not deviate from his chosen path.
He knew what he wanted. Temperance. Temperance would be his wife. His perfect helpmate. After all, he’d carefully selected her. He’d courted her with the precise purpose of falling so deeply in love that their marriage would last.
It had been too long since h
e’d spent an evening courting his intended. With the sudden loss of her father, the funeral, and the shocking news of her half-sister, he’d neglected his love. He wouldn’t repeat that mistake.
He needed stability.
He drew a deep breath and gathered his sanity. He would remain in control. “You,” he whispered, “are not responsible for the deficiencies of your parents.”
She squeezed his hand then slipped her fingers free. She must’ve realized she’d given too much away for her expression was blank, a slate wiped clean. “I never believed I was.”
Chapter Six
“Understand the importance of choosing with your intellect and not your heart. If your heart be not encumbered elsewhere, you will come to love the one you have chosen. No man ever loved a woman—no, not one—without first determining that she was indeed the right one for him to love.”
~ The Gentleman’s Guide to Courtship and Marriage
“Good.” He shifted on his chair. “I remember the day The Reverend Cartwright learned about you. I was present.”
Felicity flinched.
He wanted to recapture her hand, soothe her. Instead, he balled two fists. “It so happened I was at Murphy’s Mercantile, picking up my mail. Your father was distressed by the return address on a letter.”
Felicity watched him with intent, as if taking in every nuance of the story revealed in his expression and his posture. He forced his fists to unfurl.
“He opened the letter immediately, sat down heavily on the bench outside the store, and began reading. Tears streamed down his face as he read. He wept openly, shamelessly, as if his heart were breaking. I couldn’t ignore him, so I sat.”
Rocky remembered the tug of emotion as if that summer’s day had been last week. “He did the oddest thing. He handed me the letter. I hesitated, of course. A fellow doesn’t read another man’s private mail. But he nodded at me as he blew his nose, so I did as he asked and read it.”
“From my mother?”
“Yes.” Word for word, that brief letter had branded his memory.
“When did he learn about me?”
“Summer, two years ago. I’m not sure precisely. Late May, I think.”
She pressed a hand over her mouth. Her eyes widened, and for several seconds he thought she’d weep. What had happened to her or her mother to incite that revelatory letter?
He ached to reach for her, but knew that would be foolish. He wanted to ask questions but held back.
By degrees, she regained control. “I don’t understand.” Her voice sounded high and tight. “Why would the minister show you the letter and not Temperance?”
“He must have—” believed he protected her? Thought the timing wrong? Thought he had one more day, until death stole the opportunity? “We had an unusual bond. A close friendship.”
Pain flickered across her features. Regret charged in. Why hadn’t he censured his words? Of course Felicity would be hurt by his cavalier reference to unusual bonds and close friendships—she would have wanted those things with her father.
“I apologize, Felicity.” He took her hand, squeezed it in earnestness. “I spoke without thinking. Can you forgive me?”
Her gaze locked on their joined hands. Her bowed head hid her expressions, denied him clues to her thoughts. But she didn’t pull away, her work-toughened fingers warm against his palm.
“There is nothing to forgive.” Her voice sounded small. “Mother wrote because she’d taken ill. Cancer, the doctor said. She died in June, two years past.”
Rocky had Felicity’s hand halfway to his mouth before he caught himself. Not wise, but compassion overrode judgment. He pressed a kiss to her knuckles.
He knew the ache of loneliness. The darkness that encroached without family and home.
He tugged his chair closer and with his elbow on his knee, kept her hand clutched in his own. She needed him, needed his touch, he knew it and apparently so did she for she didn’t pull away.
“What did Mother write?”
“Her letter was brief. She informed the pastor that she’d borne him a daughter nine months after he’d departed St. Louis, she’d named you Felicity, and true to your name, you’d filled her life with joy.”
“I wondered how he knew my name.”
W.W. Stuart’s arrival in St. Louis must have come as a surprise—both dreadful and wonderful. He could imagine the mixed feelings he’d experience if he ever found his father.
She’d taken his hand in both of hers, holding on the way a little child clutches the hand of a parent. But then her thumb caressed his pinkie and he instantly revised that assumption. This was no platonic hand-holding.
“I don’t know whether to be more upset with Mother or Cartwright,” she murmured. “I was with my mother every day until the end. She could have told me.” She met his gaze then, her hands stilling. Tears pooled in her eyes but did not spill. “All she ever told me about my father was that she’d loved him and he’d loved her. Hopelessly in love, Mother said. But she refused to confess his name. No stories, no pictures, no details. If Mr. Stuart hadn’t found me at the boardinghouse, I’d never have known.”
“I’m sorry you found out this way.” He remembered her shock and panic upon learning Cartwright had married and borne children. “Cartwright should have prepared Temperance. And he should have contacted you himself.” No matter how much Rocky had admired and respected the man, he’d made a horrible mistake by leaving the revelation to W.W. Stuart and his will. Waning health, cough or no cough, some things had to be done.
“Any guesses why?”
“I expect he knew the news would hurt Mrs. Cartwright and Temperance, though his—” what word could he possibly use? “—love for your mother occurred prior to his marriage. Mrs. Cartwright hadn’t been well for quite some time, and not long after the letter arrived she took to her bed. She passed away last winter.”
She nodded. Her grip tightened on his hand.
“I suppose he thought he had time, after his wife passed. He probably clung to the idea of tomorrow.” He held her gaze, sensed their mutual understanding. Cartwright had been a fool to fritter away time he could have had with this remarkable woman, his daughter. “He procrastinated until it was too late.”
The following evening, Rocky made it a point to court Temperance. Seven days had elapsed since her father’s sudden death. So much had happened in that week: the shock of Pastor Cartwright’s passing, the visitation, burial, a half-sister’s arrival in town and reading of the will.
And, worst of all, Rocky’s inconvenient, highly improper attraction to Felicity.
Tonight would fix things.
Time in Temperance’s company, wholly focused on her, would correct his errors in judgment. He’d get back on track, remember all the reasons he’d chosen Temperance to become his wife and set about courting her with full intent of falling madly in love.
Yes, this evening’s courting would solidify his affection for his chosen bride and all would be well again.
He pushed the porch swing into motion, loving the sensation of sitting quietly with her, sharing conversation, sipping ice-cold lemonade, and in no hurry. Courting at home, per the minister’s advice, was truly ideal.
Without distraction of a theater production, company of friends, or time spent driving, they had nothing to worry about but each other.
An occasional pedestrian or wagon rumbled past in the heat of the setting sun. In full view of neighbors and townspeople, no one could fret about inappropriate behavior.
Inappropriate behavior…Rocky’s thoughts rebounded to Felicity. For the hundredth time.
He didn’t know whether to hope she’d departed on this afternoon’s train or pray she hadn’t. Now that she’d found the answers she’d sought, she might leave at any time.
True to his word, he’d left money in the stationmaster’s keeping. And paid a visit to stingy Mrs. Ihnken.
Widow Ihnken had firmed her lips, pouted, complained, accepted his gelt, and vowed t
o move Miss Percival from the attic to the large corner bedroom with two windows so she might enjoy the cross-breeze.
“If she shows her true colors and tempts my male boarders, I’ll put her out.”
“You’ll do no such thing.”
“I will. I don’t care if you’re a wealthy man, Mr. Gideon. I don’t care if our dearly departed minister was to be your father-in-law, I won’t tolerate sin under my roof.”
Interesting that the harpy blamed Felicity for the accident of her birth but withheld judging the man who, by his own admission, fathered her.
He should be pleased Mrs. Ihnken’s respect for the pastor hadn’t diminished, but the insult to Felicity was offensive.
“Rocky?” Temperance touched his arm, the cold of her lemonade glass transferred to her hand, seeping through his shirtsleeve. Blast the intolerable heat for making it difficult to fasten his attentions where they belonged.
“I’m sorry, my dear. Beg pardon. My mind wandered.”
“You seem troubled. Won’t you tell me what distracts you so?”
By tacit agreement, they’d not spoken of her half-sister. Why tarnish their cherished time together? “It’s nothing.”
She eyed him closely, assessing. “Won’t you share your thoughts?”
Wasn’t this intimacy, sharing private thoughts and ideas, what courtship was all about? He couldn’t admit he’d been plagued by constant reflection upon Felicity. He scrambled to find something—anything—factual, truthful, that would have otherwise weighed heavily upon him. “Production is waning. And today I lost three men in a cave-in.”
“Oh, Rocky. I hadn’t heard.”
“I didn’t want to worry you.”
“I know, and I’m grateful. Yet how can I comfort you if I’m unaware?”
He’d have to learn to share his concerns, especially once they married. Temperance had a gift for lightening his burden.
She brushed her fingertips over his cheek. Her touch felt remarkably good. “Thank you, sweetheart.”