by Kit Morgan
Lottie gave him a helpless look. “I’m nervous.”
“Nervous? About what, for pity’s sake?”
She swallowed hard. Was he serious? “Everything!”
He took her hand in his and gave it a pat. “There’s nothing to be nervous about… except maybe Mrs. Dunnigan. But the chances of crossing paths with her today are slim.”
“Mrs. Dunnigan?” The name didn’t ring a bell.
“Great-Aunt Irene? The one with the ladle?”
Lottie smiled. “Oh yes, now I remember. From what I remember you telling me, your town is full of … interesting people.”
“You have no idea,” he muttered archly and let go of her hand.
The train slowed and eventually stopped amidst clouds of steam and the screeching of brakes. Sam stood, stretched, then started to gather their things. Lottie was silent, her nerves suddenly raw. What was wrong with her? Why was she so nervous?
Because you’ve never had to answer to new people before, her conscience reminded her. Because this is all so unfamiliar! Maybe if you hadn’t been so wrapped up with chasing after Mr. Brown, you’d be better prepared …
Lottie shut her eyes against the voice and tried to extinguish it with a deep breath.
“They’re not a firing squad, darling.”
Lottie eyes opened. “Huh?”
Sam gave her a sympathetic look. “My family. You don’t have to act as if they’re going to shoot you when you meet them.”
Her shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry, Sam. I don’t know what’s come over me. I guess I feel … a little lost.”
He studied her a moment. “Understandable. Now, let’s go see who came to pick us up.”
She followed him off the train to the platform and waited with him hand in hand as he looked for a familiar face. It didn’t take him long to spot one. “Father!”
Lottie’s eyes roamed the crowd. A man was making his way toward them, and she could spot the resemblance immediately. Sam was the spitting image of his father, with the same dark blonde hair and hazel eyes, though his father’s eyes were full of surprise. “There you are,” his father said with a distinct English accent. He fixed his gaze on her. “Er … who’s your friend, Sam?”
Sam beamed with pride as Lottie stiffened. What did he mean, who’s your friend? Wasn’t it obvious? Sam pulled her around in front of him and put his hands on her shoulders. “Father, I’d like to introduce Lottie, my mail-order bride.”
His father stood stock still as his eyes grew round as saucers. “Your … what?”
Lottie felt Sam straighten. “My mail-order bride.” He gave her shoulders a squeeze. “Lottie, this is my father, Mr. Colin Cooke.”
His father opened his mouth to speak and instead coughed a few times. Good grief, the man didn’t know? She tried to turn around to ask Sam what was going on, but he held her fast.
“Now I know this may have come as a shock,” Sam said, “but I can explain …”
Was he talking to her or his father? Lottie wrenched herself free and spun on him. “You do that, Sam Cooke! Why didn’t you tell me your family didn’t know?”
“That’s what I’d like to find out!” his father croaked. “What were you thinking?”
“Stop it, both of you, let me finish!” Sam said, doing his best to keep his voice even.
Lottie stepped back and bumped into Mr. Cooke. “Oh!” She turned to him, her face red with a combination of anger and embarrassment. “I … I’m terribly sorry.”
Colin Cooke studied her. “No, it’s all right. Let’s all calm down.” He glared at his son. “It’s a bloody good thing your mother didn’t come.”
Sam looked almost guilty. Almost. “Perhaps you’re right, but you know why I had to do this.”
“No, I’m not sure I do …”
“I’m sure I don’t!” Lottie snapped.
Sam’s father glanced around the platform. “Where’s Ferris?”
“He’ll be along.”
“Who is Ferris?” she asked.
“His traveling companion,” his father answered.
Sam mumbled something indistinct.
“Traveling companion? Sam, what is going on?” It was one thing to suffer the stress of the whole Bob Brown incident and feel like a failure, but now this? His family knew nothing about her? How dare he! Her heart and mind reeled. Why didn’t he tell them? She could understand that there might be no women in Clear Creek of marriageable age, but there was no good reason for him not to tell his family he’d gotten himself a bride!
Sam sighed heavily. “I … wanted to get to know you first,” he told her. “And I wanted to see to the business of finding a wife by myself.” He looked at his father. “Without interference from the family.”
His father frowned, but eventually nodded. “I can understand that.”
Lottie was still confused. “But I still don’t. Why didn’t you let them know about me?”
“If I had, then the whole town would have turned out to greet us. There would have been some huge gathering at Mulligan’s or the hotel for a wedding supper and … I thought it would be too much too soon. I wanted to ease you into everything instead of being shoved into the town’s social den.”
“You mean the ladies’ sewing circle?” his father teased.
“Quite right I do. You know how some of those hens can be.”
Lottie had no idea what they meant by circles full of hens, but what Sam had said about the social scene did make some sense. She wasn’t good at dealing with too much too soon. She was still getting used to the idea that she was married.
She went back to Sam. “Thank you … for thinking of me.” She turned to his father. “He’s right, Mr. Cooke – it might have been too much. Sam may not have picked the best way to handle it, but he was only trying to protect me.”
Sam’s father studied them both. “I understand. Your mother, on the other hand, might have a few things to say.”
A man standing next to Sam cleared his throat. He was handsome and, Lottie thought, familiar-looking. “Sam did what he thought was best. And I have to agree with him.”
That seemed to settle it for Mr. Cooke. “Very well. I’ll help break the news to Mrs. Cooke and the rest of the family.” He took a step toward Lottie, bent at the waist as he took one of her hands in his and kissed it. “As your new father-in-law, may I be the first to tell you … welcome to the family.”
Fourteen
Meeting the rest of the Cooke family was going to be no small task, Sam informed her. She was glad they took the time to stop for something to eat before they headed out to the ranch.
Mulligan’s was a restaurant on Clear Creek’s main street with a saloon in the back. If she did have a wedding celebration there, she could see why it would be the perfect place. Apparently the whole town used it for gatherings as it could easily accommodate a lot of people. Anything bigger was held in the hotel’s dining parlor.
An old man with white hair and a handlebar mustache shuffled his way to their table. “Welcome back, Sammy me boy!” he said in an Irish accent.
“Hello, Patrick. It’s good to be back.”
The man stared at Lottie. “Brought a visitor, I see.”
Sam’s eyes darted around the table, and Lottie held her breath to see what he’d say. She was beginning to wonder about her new husband. His “traveling companion,” Ferris Kincaid, had traveled east with him and been on the same trains coming west. He’d kept his distance to give them some privacy.
But that mattered less than another salient fact: Ferris was apparently the “trustworthy man” Sam had asked to look into Bob Brown. Now she was dying to find out what the man knew. As soon as she got the chance, she’d ask Ferris if he’d followed Mr. Brown, had he seen him among the throngs of people when she’d chased the man from the hotel lobby into the street …
“Yes. This is Lottie,” Sam told the Irishman. “She’s my wife.”
Patrick Mulligan stood in shock a moment, then burst out laughin
g. “Glory be!” he said in a loud voice as he threw his hands in the air. “Sammy here’s gone and got himself a wife!”
Everyone in the restaurant stopped. Sam leaned toward her and whispered. “I’m sorry. Brace yourself.”
The room exploded with cheers.
Lottie almost jumped into Sam’s lap. A series of “congratulations!” and “attaboys!” followed. A few men got up, came to their table and slapped both she and Sam on the back. Her heart thudded in her chest. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like if the whole town did this. Sam, however clumsily, had made the right move.
The people returned to their meals, and not a minute later Sam and Lottie’s food came. Lottie ate in silence, overwhelmed by the last hour. She would gladly have retreated to a quiet hotel room for the night, but that wasn’t about to happen. As soon as the meal was over, they were on their way.
Mr. Cooke led them to a wagon parked across the street. Earlier, they’d walked from the train station to Mulligan’s, which gave her a chance to see some of the town. It was quaint and charming and the air was clear, nothing like crowded, smoky, industrialized Lawrence. There was no sign of a mill or factory anywhere – ranching and farming were the area’s mainstays. And the rolling prairie was a far cry from the Massachusetts landscape she was used to.
Sam and Lottie rode in the back of the wagon while Mr. Cooke drove alongside Ferris up front. No one spoke for a mile or so, and Lottie enjoyed the relative silence. Dusk was approaching and she could feel a familiar weariness creep into her bones, the same sort she’d get when she’d worked extra hours at the mill when one of the other girls was sick and unable to work. Most worked whether they were sick or not. Once, when one woman fainted from fever, Lottie picked up the slack while another saw the fellow employee home. That poor girl was so sick she never came back …
“There’s something I haven’t told you,” Sam said, startling her out of her reverie.
She looked at him as the wagon rolled along, her brow furrowed. “Something else, you mean?”
He gave her a sheepish smile. “First of all, I’m sorry about earlier. I did it with your best interest in mind … but I could’ve done it better.”
“I know,” she said, her voice flat. “After that … rambunctious welcome at Mulligan’s, I can understand why.”
“Jolly good. Secondly …”
“There’s more?”
His face twisted up into a grimace. “I’m afraid so.”
She turned to face him better. “What? This whole trip has been hard enough.”
“All of it?”
She knew what he meant and blushed. “No, not all. But … you know which parts.”
“Oh, you mean our dear Mr. Brown.”
She gazed across the prairie as the sun began to set. It was a beautiful sight. “Yes, him above all. What did Ferris find out about him?” she asked in a low voice.
“Lottie, calm yourself – I’ve barely had the chance to speak with him. Besides, I’ve had all I can stand of Bob Brown. Sometimes I feel like I married him, not you. Can’t we have a day without having any mention of him?”
“You know how I feel.”
“Yes, and you know how I feel about how you feel.”
She raised a single eyebrow at him, smiled and shook her head. “What’s your second thing?”
“Oh, yes, well … I was hoping for more time to get to know each other before arriving home, but that’s not going to happen – and the time we did have, dear Bob interrupted so much that …”
“Sam, that’s the second time you brought him up. Now who’s obsessed?” She was smiling when she said it, and enjoyed the pop-eyed look Sam gave her.
Finally he recovered enough to say, “Touché. But that’s not what I wanted to tell you. This is.” The wagon reached the top of a rise and came to a stop. He stood and helped Lottie up.
“Welcome to your new home, Lottie!” Sam’s father cried.
“Oh. My. Gracious.” They were the only words to leave her lips. After that, her mouth flopped open and she didn’t bother to try and close it. What she was looking at wasn’t a ranch but more like a tiny town. After a moment, she finally got her mouth to work. “Is … is that …”
“I’m afraid so,” Sam confirmed.
“It’s … huge!”
“Don’t I know it,” Sam said blandly. “I hope you’re not upset with me.”
“Upset?” she whispered. “I don’t understand. I thought … wait a minute. Which house is ours?”
“The main house, of course,” his father answered. “For the moment at least.” He gave the horses a slap of the reins, Sam and Lottie sat down again and the wagon began its descent into the Triple-C Ranch.
The main ranch house was an enormous two-story structure with a porch that wrapped around the front and one side. A large barn sat opposite with a wide barnyard in between. Another building sat behind the barn – a bunkhouse was her guess – with a small cabin on another rise. She could see not one, but several smokehouses and yet another house on the other side of the main ranch house – much smaller, of course, but two stories.
“Are there any more?” she rasped.
“More what?” Sam asked.
“Houses.”
“Oh yes. I’ll show them to you in time.”
Lottie gawked, as on the day he first graced her doorstep. “What … what didn’t you tell me, was it that … you’re …”
“Sam,” his father barked. “What did you do this time?”
“Nothing. I’ll handle this.”
Mr. Cooke brought the wagon to a stop in front of the main house. “Something. And you’d better handle it before your mother comes out here and meets your bride.”
Sam rubbed his face with one hand. “Yes.”
Mr. Cooke and Ferris climbed down from the wagon and went into the house, leaving Sam and Lottie alone.
“You’re … you’re …” Lottie stammered. What a day this was turning out to be!
“Exceedingly blessed – and let’s leave it at that. Now, let’s go meet …”
“Sam!” a woman cried and ran across the porch to the wagon. “You’re home!”
Sam took Lottie by the hand. “Hello, Mother.”
Lottie looked between the two. Mrs. Cooke was a beautiful woman and Lottie couldn’t imagine her having done a hard day’s work. Yet despite her obvious health and vitality, and the splendor of the house and grounds, she didn’t dress like a woman who was “exceedingly blessed,” as Sam had put it. She wore a simple blue calico dress and a white apron.
“Sam?” his mother said as she stared at Lottie.
Oh no, here we go again, she thought silently.
“Mother,” he said as he stood. “This is …”
“Your new bride,” the woman whispered as she looked Lottie up and down.
Lottie’s eyes flicked between the woman and the fancy white wicker furniture on the porch. The house and grounds were pristine. She suddenly felt very out of place. Would these people accept her? Or would they view her as nothing more than a lowly mill worker, not fit to sit in the same room with them? She’d obviously had no value in Mr. Brown’s eyes, or he never would have set fire to …
“I’m pleased to meet you. Help her down, Sam, and come in the house.”
Sam jumped out of the back of the wagon, then reached up to help Lottie down. She stared at his outstretched arms and felt a pang of betrayal. She waited until his mother went through the front hall and disappeared into a room. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because … because I was hoping you’d want this marriage to work because of me, not …” he waved a hand at their surroundings. “… all of this.”
Lottie glanced around again in an attempt to take it all in. “Why did you marry me?”
“What kind of question is that?”
“Look at what you have. I’m … I’m not from anything like this.”
Sam reached his arms up to her again. “Come here.”
&
nbsp; Overwhelmed didn’t come close to what she felt in that moment. She’d dealt with rich people before, and they were fickle. All she had to do was think of her former boss to know. The man had money, yet look at what he did …
“Lottie,” Sam said in a gentle voice.
She walked over to the edge of the wagon bed and let him help her down. Once she was on her feet he put his arms around her. “I don’t belong here,” she said without thinking.
“Of course you do. You’re my wife.”
She looked up at him. “That’s just it – I don’t understand. You could have anyone. Why me? Why not someone from … Boston society, or San Francisco or Seattle if there are no women here for you to marry?”
“Because all they would see is this ranch. Not me. My father and uncles had nothing before they wed. They were pig farmers, dirt-poor ones at that. They built this place from the ground up – with help, of course, but …”
She sniffed back a tear, then another. “But why didn’t you say anything?”
“If I had, would it have made a difference?”
“Yes!”
He stared at her a moment. “How so?”
“Don’t you see? We could have hired someone to follow Mr. Brown! A … a Pinkerton detective, a professional, just as you said …”
“Oh bugger, Mr. Brown again, is it?’
“Yes! Don’t you see, why didn’t you do something? Why didn’t you use your money to help me?”
Sam let her go. “Mr. Brown, Mr. Brown,” he muttered. “Will you forever be a thorn in my side?”
Lottie balled her hands into fists. “You know how important this is to me.”
“I know that what you’re doing could very well be chasing the wind. Lottie, don’t you see what this is doing to you?”
“If I could let go of it, don’t you think I would? Don’t you think I’ve tried? Time and time again – but the injustice, the wrongness of it … I can’t get past it! That’s me, that’s who I am! Send me away if you can’t deal with it – but if you’re not going to do that, and you’re not going to let me deal with it, then you deal with it, just as you said you would! And whining about it isn’t going to help anyone!”
Lottie heard heavy breathing and realized it was her own. She was more upset than she’d thought, for her to explode like that. But she wasn’t going to apologize for the way she was. And so far, he hadn’t helped her a whit, just complained. With all the resources he had, all he’d done was gripe and make her feel guilty for caring. Enough of that, she decided.