Short Straw Bride (Harlequin Historical)

by Dallas Schulze

  Thank heavens her Anabel wasn’t a little dab of a thing, Eleanor had once heard Aunt Dorinda say, with a pointed glance in her niece’s direction. At barely five feet tall and with a figure that was neither elegant nor slender, Eleanor couldn’t even attribute the remark to Dorinda Williams’s acid tongue. She was a little dab of a thing, and there was just no getting around it.

  His little chicken, her father had called her. Always fussing over him like a mother hen with only one chick, he’d tease. Every night he’d come to her room wherever they were staying and she’d solemnly inspect his person. Always, there’d been some small flaw for her childish fingers to adjust—a tie not quite properly tied, a lock of hair slightly out of place, a loose button to be quickly stitched onto the crisp white linen of his shirt.

  The memory made Eleanor smile. It was only after he was gone that it had occurred to her that those little flaws had been deliberate. Nathan Williams had understood his daughter’s need to be needed. If they’d had a settled home, she could have fussed with the cooking and cleaning. But he was a gambler and they rarely stayed in one place more than a few weeks at a time. Since he couldn’t give her a house to fuss over, he’d given her himself.

  Eleanor’s mother had died when Eleanor was six, and for the next eight years she’d traveled with her father. Nathan Williams had been a gambler by profession. He’d started out gambling on the Mississippi riverboats before the war. When he married Emmeline St. Jacques, he’d purchased a store in St. Louis and settled down to try his hand at being a tradesman. Eleanor had vague memories of a high-ceilinged room, with sawdust on the floor and goods piled high on every side.

  But after Emmeline’s death Nathan hadn’t been able to stay in one place, and he’d gone back to his old profession. He’d brought his young daughter west and they’d traveled from town to town, staying in each only a short while, until he judged it time to take his skill with the cards and move on. It hadn’t been a conventional upbringing and Eleanor knew there were those who’d say that he’d had no business dragging a child all over the country the way he had. But she’d never minded the travel as long as she could stay with her father.

  It had been six years since he was killed by a stray bullet in a barroom quarrel between two cowpunchers, and she still missed him. Eleanor’s eyes grew wistful, remembering her father’s quiet smile and the gentle warmth of his laugh. There was rarely any laughter in her Uncle Zebediah’s house. When she’d first come here, newly orphaned and almost paralyzed with grief, one of the first things she’d noticed was how seldom her aunt and uncle smiled.

  At first she’d thought it was because they were sorry about her father’s death, but it hadn’t taken long for her to realize that Zebediah had sternly disapproved of his older brother’s profession. Gambling was an activity steeped in sin and, as far as they were concerned, Nathan’s death in a common barroom brawl was confirmation that God punished all sinners, even if it did occasionally take Him a little longer than Zeb would have liked.

  Eleanor might have been offended on her father’s behalf if she hadn’t already begun to realize that there wasn’t much that Zeb and Dorinda Williams didn’t disapprove of. Where her father had always made it a point to find pleasure, even in small things, his younger brother and his wife seemed to try to do just the opposite. They could find fault with anyone and anything, no matter how small. Over the past six years Eleanor could almost count the number of times she’d seen a real smile from either of them, and she couldn’t ever remember hearing them laugh.

  Anabel smiled and laughed, but her smiles were well practiced in front of her mirror and her laughter was generally at someone else’s expense. Her parents doted on her, and they’d spoiled her terribly. Anabel had only to express an interest in something for them to leap to get it for her, whether it was a new pink ribbon for her golden curls or watercolor lessons to show off her refined sensitivity to the finer things in life.

  It was no wonder she was so bone-deep selfish.

  Anabel had been only ten when Eleanor came to stay, but she’d already been well versed in getting her own way. At the suggestion that she might share her big, sunny bedroom with her cousin, Anabel’s pretty pink complexion had flushed an ugly shade of red and she’d begun screaming. Eleanor could still remember her cousin standing in the middle of the parlor, her hands clenched into fists at her sides, her body rigid with anger as shriek after shriek issued from her perfect Cupid’s-bow mouth.

  Eleanor, dazed by the abrupt changes in her life, had waited in vain to see one of Anabel’s parents slap her to stop her hysteria. Dorinda’s pale blue eyes had filled with tears and she’d quickly promised her daughter that “Mommy’s precious” wouldn’t have to share her room with her cousin. After all, Dorinda had told her husband, without regard for Eleanor’s presence, there was no telling what kind of manners they could expect from a child raised in saloons. Best not to risk Anabel’s delicate sensibilities by subjecting her to bad influences.

  Eleanor could have told them that she’d never been in a saloon in her life and that she certainly had better manners than her young cousin, but it hadn’t seemed worth the effort. She’d been grateful for the privacy afforded by the boxy little room at the rear of the house—the maid’s room, Anabel had pointed out with a smug smile the first time they were alone together—and the more she got to know her cousin, the stronger her gratitude had become.

  When she’d first come here her aunt had explained that she undoubtedly had a great deal to learn about proper living. Raised as she had been, she’d no doubt picked up many improper notions, and such notions wouldn’t be tolerated in the Williams household. Six years later, Eleanor still didn’t know what ‘improper notions’ she might have had, but she did know that if this was “proper living,” she was not impressed. Zebediah and Dorinda Williams might be proper but they were also smallminded, parsimonious people who took no pleasure in life.

  She sighed again and rested her chin on the hands she’d propped on the windowsill. She could leave, of course, but she had no money and no way to earn a living. Though her father had done his best to shield her from the more sordid realities of life, she’d seen enough to know just how difficult the world could be for a woman on her own.

  She might be able to wangle a job as a schoolteacher in some remote area. There was always a crying need for such. Or she could marry Andrew Webb and become a mother to his four small children. She could do worse. Andrew was pleasant enough and, as owner of the general store, considered a good catch, particularly for a young woman of no real beauty or expectations, as her aunt Dorinda had pointed out when Mr. Webb began making his interest in her niece obvious. It isn’t as if Eleanor can simply have her pick of beaux, after all. Not like dear Anabel. This last had been said with a fond look at her daughter, who’d managed to blush and look modest, no mean feat for a girl who spent nearly every waking moment in front of a mirror.

  Aunt Dorinda was right, of course. She could do worse than to encourage Mr. Webb. It was just that…The thought trailed off as a cloud drifted across the face of the moon. A light breeze blew through the open window, its chill cutting through the light cotton of her nightgown. Shivering, Eleanor rose from the trunk where she’d been sitting and lowered the window.

  It was just that she was a silly, romantic fool, she told herself as she climbed into her narrow bed and pulled the covers up around her shoulders. She was still clinging to the childish idea of a handsome knight who’d ride into her life and fall instantly under the spell of her negligible charms.

  It was past time to put away such foolish notions, she told herself briskly. She was twenty now, no longer a girl. Unless she wanted to prove that little cat Anabel right and end up an old maid, it was time to stop looking for a handsome knight and start thinking of marrying a good man with whom to build a solid, dependable foundation for the future.

  An image of Andrew Webb’s thin face and watery blue eyes rose in her mind’s eye and she felt her determination
falter. She wasn’t clear on just what intimacies being married entailed, but whatever they were, it was difficult to imagine sharing them with Mr. Webb. Still, his first wife had clearly had no difficulty doing so, as witness the four children she’d given him before falling victim to consumption.

  Eleanor set her chin with determination. Tomorrow was Sunday and she was sure to see Mr. Webb at church, since he attended the services as regularly as the Williams family. When she saw him, she’d do her best to discreetly indicate that his attentions were not unwelcome. If she was not mistaken in the strength of his feelings, she could find herself Mrs. Andrew Webb before the summer was out.

  She used the edge of the sheet to dry a tear from her cheek. It was the sensible, mature thing to do. If it wasn’t the love match of her childish dreams, it would certainly be better than spending the rest of her life as Aunt Dorinda’s unpaid housekeeper.

  Closing her eyes, Eleanor forced back tears that threatened to spill over. Despite the turmoil of her thoughts, she was soon asleep. Through her dreams drifted images of a dark-haired man with a dazzling smile who swept her up onto the back of his horse and carried her off to a castle that sat incongruously in the middle of the prairie.

  Chapter Two

  The last time anyone could remember the McLain brothers setting foot inside a church was three years past when their mother had been laid to rest beside her husband. So their arrival on this fine spring morning created a buzz of talk as people wondered what had caused their sudden attack of piety.

  The speculation was already well advanced by the time Eleanor’s family arrived. Zeb Williams had a firm, if unspoken, belief that God rewarded not merely godliness but punctuality. But this morning Anabel had been unable to find a particular hair ribbon and their departure had been delayed while the house was searched for the missing item. Though the pink ribbon was found in Anabel’s reticule, exactly where she’d apparently put it, the blame for their lateness had somehow fallen on Eleanor and she’d been treated to a telling silence on the carriage ride.

  She was actually grateful for the opportunity to review the decision she’d made the night before. Though she tried desperately to find some flaw in the plan, none presented itself. No matter how she looked at it, marrying Andrew Webb seemed the best option available to her. He was a respectable man, a kind man, even. She’d be a very foolish girl indeed to turn him away.

  So, when Mr. Webb greeted the Williams family today, she’d put on her very best smile for him and try to look as if the prospect of wedding a man with cold, damp hands and four small children filled her with something other than dread.

  But the whispered buzz that hummed through the small church pushed all thoughts of Andrew Webb momentarily aside. Of course, even without the whispers running through the pews, Eleanor would have noticed the McLains. They sat in the front pew, next to the aisle. Broad shoulders beneath neat black coats, dark hair worn just a little too long for complete respectability—even from the back, they drew a woman’s eyes.

  Though she’d attended church there every Sunday for six years, it seemed to Eleanor as if the building was suddenly much smaller than it had been, as if the McLains’ presence filled up the available space in some way that mere mortal men had no business doing.

  It was doubtful that anyone paid much attention to the Reverend Sean Mulligan’s sermon that day. Eleanor certainly couldn’t have repeated a word of it. When the sermon ended, the murmured amens were perfunctory, everyone’s mind occupied with things of more immediate interest than the hereafter.

  It was the normal practice for people to linger in front of the church, exchanging greetings with each other, complimenting the minister on his sermon. On this particular Sunday there was only one topic of conversation among the womenfolk—what had brought the McLains to church after all this time. And though the men pretended to be above such common speculation, it didn’t stop their eyes from sliding to where the McLains stood talking with Reverend Mulligan.

  Cora Danvers suggested that they’d come to repent their sins in the eyes of the Lord. But no one who looked at either McLain—and everyone was looking at them—could give much credence to that theory. Neither of them looked as if they felt the need for repentance. There was too much confidence in the way they moved, too much arrogance in the way they carried themselves.

  Perhaps they were lonely, Millie Peters said. After all, they were orphans, alone and without family. Her soft blue eyes teared up at the thought, her plump face crumpling in sympathy, and Eleanor had no doubt that Millie would try to take the McLains under her wing. But they didn’t look as though they needed Millie’s wing, nor anyone else’s, for that matter.

  She’d never actually seen either Luke or Daniel McLain but, like most people in Black Dog, she knew who they were. They owned the largest ranch in the area, a ranch their father had begun and that they’d continued to build after his death. Their patronage kept half the businesses in town in the black. She knew Mr. Webb’s store depended in large part on orders from the Bar-M-Bar.

  But she wasn’t thinking about Andrew Webb as she watched the brothers talk to Reverend Mulligan. Though there was a strong resemblance between them, it was the taller of the two who drew her eyes. He looked dangerous, she thought, studying his profile. A strong chin, an almost hawkish nose, his hair brushing the collar of his conservatively cut black coat—there was something just a little untamed about him. And the gun that rested so snugly on his hip completed the image. Not that he was the only man wearing a gun—this was still a wild land in many ways, after all, and most men went armed. It wasn’t the presence of the gun but the ease with which he wore it that was just a little shocking.

  As if sensing her gaze, he turned his head abruptly and their eyes met across the packed dirt of the churchyard. He was too far away for her to see the color of his eyes but she felt the impact of that look all the way to her toes. She knew she should look away, that it wasn’t ladylike to stare, but she couldn’t drag her gaze from his.

  “Stop staring like a cheap tart. Try to at least pretend you’re a lady,” Dorinda Williams hissed in her ear. Eleanor gasped as her aunt’s fingers found the tender flesh on the back of her arm in a vicious pinch. She lowered her lashes to conceal quick tears of pain. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Anabel smile with pleasure and had to restrain a most unladylike urge to slap her smug pink-and-white face.

  “What I’ve got in mind is a gentle girl, one who won’t be too demanding,” Luke said. “I’ve got enough on my hands with the ranch work. I don’t want a wife who expects me to dance attendance on her.”

  Sean Mulligan had known Luke and Daniel since the family had first moved to Black Dog after the war. He’d been a friend of their father’s, and he’d often thought that Robert McLain would have been proud of the way his sons had kept the ranch going after his death, fulfilling his dream. He was fond of both boys—men, he corrected himself, looking up at the two of them. He’d been pleased to see them in his church this morning, but his pleasure had rapidly changed to dismay as he’d listened to Luke coolly outline his plan to find a wife.

  “I don’t want to waste a lot of time,” Luke was saying now. “Spring’s a busy time, what with calving and all.”

  “Finding a wife isn’t like buying a horse, Luke,” Sean protested.

  “Buying a horse would be a damn sight easier,” Daniel put in, grinning at his older brother. “Just check the bloodlines, look at the teeth, take it for a ride and you know what you’re getting. Too bad you can’t do the same with a woman.”

  “Well, you can’t,” Sean snapped. He dabbed at the beads of sweat on his forehead. The mild spring sunshine suddenly felt uncomfortably warm.

  “It can’t be that hard, Sean,” Luke said, looking impatient. “People get married all the time.”

  “Yes, but they generally spend some time getting to know one another. They court. A man doesn’t just pick out a bride like…like…”

  “Like picking out a horse?”
Daniel supplied helpfully.

  “Exactly.”

  “I don’t have time for courting, and we can get to know each other after the wedding. As long as she doesn’t have a temper like a wolverine or a face like a mud fence, we’ll do fine. I need a wife, not a best friend.”

  “But…” Sean sputtered and dabbed the handkerchief frantically over his forehead. How could he explain the impossibility of what Luke wanted?

  “There must be some unmarried females in town,” Luke said, his eyes skimming the crowd, unconcerned with the interest he was receiving in return.

  “Yes,” Sean admitted cautiously.

  “What about the redhead in the blue dress?” Luke asked, narrowing his eyes on the statuesque girl.

  “Dorcus O’Hara,” Sean supplied, following Luke’s gaze. Sensing their gaze on her, the girl lifted her chin. “I don’t think she’s what you have in mind, Luke. Dorcus is a bit, er, high strung,” he said delicately.

  “Temper like a hungry grizzly?” Daniel asked shrewdly.

  “Well, er, yes,” Sean admitted, sighing.

  “What about the little one with the brown hair? The one wearing the blue dress and the ugly hat?”

  “Eleanor Williams.” Sean’s pale blue eyes widened in surprise.

  “She taken?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Ain’t much to her,” Daniel commented. “What about the yellow-haired one next to her?”

  “That’s her cousin, Anabel.”

  “Too narrow between the eyes,” Luke said critically. “Reminds me of that mule we had in Virginia, the one that’d try to bite anything came within reach.”

  Sean choked on swallowed laughter, trying to imagine Anabel Williams’s reaction to hearing herself compared to a bad-tempered mule.