by Marla Monroe
“That was Kelly. She did the best she could.”
“If it had been clean soil, not the dirt on the tine, I’d say you’d have been fine in a few more days, but this was just one of those things you couldn’t have figured out.” Scott continued helping the doc as he cleaned out the wound with something that looked just as red as blood.
“So, what are you doing to it?” Tyler asked.
“Cleaning it out with an antibacterial to remove the source. Then we’ll sew it back up and rebandage it. Can’t suture it really, we’ll be using a type of wound glue that fills in and holds the edges so that the wound heals from the inside out. You’ll be on couch duty for another three days then you should be safe to work if you keep it wrapped up.” Doc Jeff started filling the wound with something that looked like Elmer’s glue.
“How’s your pain level right now?” Scott asked.
“Not too bad. It feels like the pressure is gone,” Gabe said.
“I’m going to go ahead and give you an IV antibiotic but keep taking the pills until they’re all gone. We’ll set you up with another couple of batches to have on hand if something else happens.” Doc Jeff nodded to Scott, who pulled a pole over to the stretcher.
“Man, I hate this,” Gabe said.
“It won’t hurt but a second.” Scott chuckled. “Men can be such babies.”
“Fuck you, man.”
Scott and Jeff chuckled. Tyler had to hide his own smirk. Kelly just shook her head. She hated that he was going to have to have the IV but felt much better about his condition now.
“While you’re being treated, Kelly and I are going to go grab the things on her list. We’ll be back as soon as possible.” Tyler punched Gabe on the arm.
“He’ll be ready to go in about two hours. The IV will take a little over an hour then we’ll watch him for a reaction after that.” Scott looked up from what he was doing and nodded. “Just come on in when you get back. He’ll be in the first door to the right as you walk in the door.”
“Is that okay with you, Gabe? I can stay and keep you company,” she said.
“Nah, I’m fine. I’m just a baby, according to Scott. You go get what you need.”
Kelly smiled and let Tyler steer her toward the door. He helped her up into the buggy then climbed up on the other side.
“He’ll be fine. You did everything you could but we didn’t know what was going on. End of story. Now, where do we need to go first?”
Kelly drew in a deep breath and nodded. “Let’s go to see about chickens. You said they and the dairy cow could be delivered so let’s pick out what we want and get the lumber to build the chicken coop for them. Then we can go get groceries.”
* * * *
Tyler let Kelly pick out the chickens, but he made the choice on the milk cow. He wanted one that looked healthy and had a history of milk production. He chose a young cow that had a good disposition since Kelly would be the one milking her.
Kelly browsed around the store while Tyler picked out lumber for the chicken coop and had it loaded on the buggy.
“How’s your wife working out?” Doug, one of the clerks helping him load the wood, asked.
“Great. She’s a great cook and a hard worker. She already has the garden planted.”
“The women in town pretty much hate her guts, but then I guess you’ve figured that out by now,” Doug said.
“Yeah. They treat her like dirt and we don’t like it. She says she doesn’t know why. Do you?” Tyler asked.
“Seems that some of the guys were talking about how good she looked one night when they were playing cards and one of the wives overheard them. They were talking about how curvy she was and how they bet whoever ended up with her would love taking her to bed at night. It pretty much pissed off the women in town and they made her life miserable. I’m glad she’s got you guys now.”
“Thanks for telling me, Doug. We’ve been at a loss as to why they were doing it. Pure jealousy. That’s all there is to it.” Tyler nodded and closed the buggy’s back hatch once they’d finished loading the lumber and the nails he’d need.
He’d have to tell Gabe about it and they’d make sure to put a stop to the way they were treating her. It wasn’t her fault that she had the body of a goddess. The other women were just mean to pick on her like they had. They’d sabotaged their own selves by trying to keep her from getting her husbands. Instead of moving out from under the noses of their husbands, she’d been stuck there.
When they stopped by the grocery store, he noticed how the women stared at her. When she wandered over to look at the produce section, he waited by the cart.
“If she’s not working out, you can always change your mind.” A tall thin blonde fluttered her lashes at him.
“She’s our wife. We’re perfectly happy with her.”
“Everyone here thinks you got roped into taking her as your wife when she cornered you at your home. You don’t have to stay with her. There are five of us here from the latest ship. The gathering is next weekend. You’ll come, won’t you?” she asked.
“We don’t need to anymore. We have our wife.” Tyler pushed the cart closer to where Kelly picked over some stone berries, but the woman followed him as he moved his cart from one aisle to another.
“My name’s Darla. I’d love to talk to you about why you should choose me,” she said.
“I told you. We’re taken.” Tyler shoved the cart toward where Kelly stood with some posh in one hand while she watched them.
“Kelly, this is Darla. I was just telling her how happy we are now.” Tyler wanted to yell at the woman to let go of him. She had a firm grip on his arm and no amount of maneuvering had helped to dislodge her.
“Hi, Darla. Take your hands off of my husband.”
“Oh, sorry. I was just asking him if he was going to be at the gathering. He said he couldn’t wait for next weekend. I’d better go before the frozen vegetables I have melt.” Darla swished her ass as she walked away.
“Why do you plan to go to the gathering when you’re not looking for a wife?” Kelly asked, jerking her hands to her hips.
Tyler groaned. “I didn’t tell her that. I told her we were happily married. She kept hanging on to me.”
“Why did she snag you in the first place?” she asked.
“I’m not sure. It sounded like someone told her we were free. I told her we weren’t.”
“Those bitches are still messing with me. Why? I never did anything to them.”
Tyler sighed. “We need to talk about it when we get home. I think I know what has them holding a grudge against you. It’s not even your fault.”
“How? I’ve asked them point blank what they had against me, but all they ever say is that I cause trouble. I don’t cause trouble. I rarely talked to anyone.” Kelly wanted to scream at the injustice of it.
“Let’s finish with the shopping and get back to Gabe. I’m ready to go home before anyone else messes with us.” Tyler stayed right by her side the rest of the way through the store. They had the produce placed in cold packs and the canned and jarred goods packed in cubes. The cow and chickens would be delivered the next week. Tyler was sure he could have the coop up and ready by then. They didn’t need much for four chickens and a rooster. Once they had the majority of the crop harvested they’d put up a smaller fence around the coop to further protect them.
When they returned to the buggy to settle their cubes of groceries in the back, another woman stepped off the wooden walkway and approached them. Tyler groaned.
“Hi, I’m Angela. You’re Tyler, right?”
Kelly stuck her head out of the buggy door. “That’s right, and he belongs to me. My name is Kelly.”
“Hi, Kelly. I’ve heard about you. I bet if you hadn’t chased after them they would have waited on us to arrive.”
“They’re grown men and could have said no. I don’t appreciate you approaching them when they’ve already committed to me. Go poach on someone else’s men and leave mine alone.�
�
“From what I’ve heard, you’re the poacher.”
Tyler reached in and helped Kelly down out of the back, keeping one arm around her as much to protect the other woman as to assure Kelly that he wasn’t interested in Angela. This was getting out of hand.
“Look, Angela. Gabe and I are perfectly happy with our wife. Kelly is a wonderful woman, and I don’t know what you’ve been told, but we aren’t looking for anyone else. We won’t be at the gathering and have no intentions of changing wives.” Tyler prayed that would settle the question.
“You might want to check with Gabe. He seems pretty happy with Rhonda right now. It’s terrible that his wife would leave him while he’s so sick. Don’t you think?” With that, Angela walked away.
“With Rhonda?”
Chapter Seven
Kelly stormed into the doctor’s office and slammed back the door into the first room on the right. Fury burned through her gut like hot coals in a fire. Rhonda sat on the bed next to Gabe, her hand running over his hair. She jumped but didn’t move her tiny tail off the bed.
“Get out of here right now. This is my husband and you’re not wanted.” Heat burned in her face at the sight of the other woman rubbing on Gabe.
“You’re not much of a woman to go shopping while her husband is sick in the hospital,” the other woman told her.
“He was fine with me and Tyler going to get supplies. I didn’t go dress shopping, Rhonda. I don’t know what you’ve been told, but these two men are off limits. They’re taken.”
Tyler stepped in between them. “You need to leave, Rhonda. We aren’t on the market. The women in town have stirred crap up to make you think otherwise.”
“You should ask Gabe what he thinks. Right, darling?” she cooed.
Gabe’s face turned red that reached down into the collar of his shirt. Kelly had a sinking feeling he’d been flirting with the other woman. The bitch’s smirk said it all.
“Gabe?”
“We were just talking. That’s all. I was bored and she offered to keep me company.” His face told her she was right. He’d been flirting.
“Rhonda, either you walk out now, or you’ll need a stretcher to get around for a few days. I’m just this”—she held up two fingers almost touching each other—“close to beating your ass for flirting with my husband.”
The other woman’s smirk faded when Kelly took a step toward her. Tyler started to hold her back, but evidently, he thought twice about it when he looked at her face. He let go and held both hands up.
“I think you’d better leave, Rhonda. She’s not kidding,” Tyler said.
Rhonda didn’t say anything more until she’d reached the door. “If she cornered you into accepting her like everyone says, you can back out. She’s not worth living in misery with a fat bitch.”
Before Kelly could make a grab at the women, she’d slammed the door behind her. The pain of betrayal slid along her skin like a slithery snake. How could Gabe have done this to her? She thought he was happy. Yeah, he was pissed and in pain with his injury, but was that a reason to cheat on her?
“Kelly,” Gabe started to say, but she cut him off.
“Don’t Kelly me. What were you doing talking to her? She had her hands on you!”
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t do much other than sit there. I wasn’t messing with her. We just talked.”
“You could have called for Scott to put her out, man,” Tyler told him.
“I did call out for him, but she had the call button and short of manhandling her, I couldn’t get to it.” Gabe’s mouth thinned to a straight line. “Look, Kelly. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have talked to her, but I didn’t know what to do with her sitting on the bed next to me. I thought talking was better than letting her get touchy.”
“Yet she got touchy anyway. I haven’t done anything to deserve all of this. Why are they doing this?” Kelly’s eyes burned with the tears she refused to shed in front of the men. “I’ll wait in the buggy until you’re ready to go.”
Kelly walked out of the room but made sure not to slam the door. Her heart was tearing into little pieces. How could he have done this to her? She’d offered to stay while Tyler did the shopping, but he’d waved her off. Maybe she should have insisted. Kelly didn’t know the rules for things like that. What if she made a mistake and opened Gabe up for someone to pounce on him by not staying with him?
What did this mean for them now? He hadn’t actually cheated on her. He’d flirted, but it had been harmless, right? Did she immediately forgive him or did he need to feel guilty for a few days first? Kelly didn’t want anything between them. She wanted them to be honest and open with each other. It was the only way to have a happy marriage.
Kelly had listened to all of the lectures and read the books they’d given them. Pairing up with virtual strangers was a risky way to create a family, but they’d done it in the past back when mail order brides were popular in the West. It had worked then.
A good marriage was founded on trust and openness. She’d been honest with them from the beginning, telling them about her shortcomings and asking them to call her on them when she messed up.
Considering how little experience she had with the opposite sex and interpersonal relationships, Kelly was afraid to let it fester like a dirty wound. They needed to talk it out and put it to rest. Tyler seemed to have found out something about why the women hated her so. They’d talk it out on the way home.
* * * *
“What in the hell were you thinking, man?” Tyler glared at Gabe.
“Look,” Gabe began. “Nothing happened. I might have flirted a little bit, but I was trying to keep her from climbing in the fucking bed with me. The woman was like a dog with a bone. She kept saying that we’d been backed into a corner by Kelly and hadn’t had a chance to say no.”
“Did you tell her you hadn’t wanted to say no or did you lead her on into believing she was right?”
“I told her that we’d already been interested in Kelly before she showed up. She knew everything, Tyler. She knew that Kelly had come out to our home and asked us to be her husbands.”
“Kelly’s hurt, man. How are you going to fix this? She didn’t deserve what you just put her through. You could have at least told her you were sorry.”
“I’ll tell her on the way home.”
“I hope it’s not too late.”
“Fuck, Tyler. I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
“I know, but it has, so you’ve got to fix it.”
A knock on the door brought Scott in. “Ready to go home?”
“Yeah. I’ve got a mess to clean up,” Gabe said.
“You’re not going to be doing much of anything for two to three days, Gabe. You’ve got to stay off that leg for at least that long unless you want it opening back up again.” Scott took down the IV bag and then removed it from Gabe’s arm. “Watch for any signs of infection like we went over and return for a check up on it in two weeks.”
“I’m not going out on that glider thing. It’s humiliating.” Gabe crossed his arms, feeling like a petulant child.
“Use the glider, man. You need all the sympathy you can get from her right now,” Tyler told him.
“Um, am I missing something?” Scott asked.
Both of them said “no” at the same time.
“Just a little misunderstanding. Gabe will use the glider out to the buggy. Be sure and repeat that stuff about him not using his leg at all for three days.” Tyler helped Gabe sit up on the side of the bed.
“Two to three days,” Gabe pointed out. He wasn’t staying in bed either.
“Three days,” Tyler insisted. “You’ll need that time to suck up.”
“I didn’t do anything to warrant staying on the couch for three fucking days. We’ve got fields to tend to.”
Scott wisely remained quiet as he let Tyler help him onto the fucking glide chair. Gabe wanted to scream, he was so frustrated. He settled for gritting his teeth and glaring at Scott. It w
as the nurse’s fault for not hearing him and coming to help him get rid of Rhonda in the first place.
He did feel a little guilty though. He hadn’t demanded she leave. Just told her she needed to leave. He’d been bored and a little hurt that they’d left him there alone even though he’d told them to go on and get the shopping out of the way. It made sense so that he wasn’t waiting in the buggy while they did the shopping later. It would have put them getting home later.
Hell, he had some groveling to do. He prayed he hadn’t caused a permanent rift in their relationship. He was beginning to fall in love with Kelly. She’d only been there a few days and already he loved having her around. The house felt like a home now, and he enjoyed having someone to come home to.
“Smile, dammit. You’re scowling. That’s no way to suck up to our wife.” Tyler popped him on the back of the head.
“Ow!”
“Better think about how nice it’s going to be to have her all to yourself for three days. Once you tell her you’re sorry and make up with her, she’ll wait on you hand and foot.” Tyler opened the door to the office to let Scott steer the chair outside. “Don’t make up with her and you’ll have three days of hell to contend with.”
That was all the incentive Gabe needed. He would much rather have a happy, loving Kelly than a mad, vindictive wife for three days. He smiled.
Tyler and Scott helped him into the cramped back area and propped his leg up on some of the wood for the chicken coop. Kelly would have fit better in the back while he could have used the space in the front seat now that the back was so crowded but Gabe accepted it as part of his punishment.
Once they were on their way, Gabe broached the subject of his screw up.
“I’m sorry for not doing something more to get Rhonda out of the room, Kelly. It was stupid to let her stay in there like that.”
“You mean it was stupid to get caught flirting.” Kelly’s voice broke on the last word.
Hell, he hadn’t counted on her being so upset she’d cry. He couldn’t stand the idea of her crying over something he’d done.