Luke

by Leigh Greenwood

  The doctor entered almost immediately, followed by Luke.

  All the doctors Valeria knew had been portly, florid, jovial gentleman obviously well-supplied with the necessities of life. This man looked as though he'd been diagnosed as incurable and left for dead. He was so thin his clothes hung on him in folds. His face and hands appeared to be nothing but skin and bones, the flesh having wasted away. Only his eyes, rich brown orbs that scanned her face with abundant nervous energy, showed signs of the inner life that activated this skeleton.

  "Looks to me like Luke's gotten mighty careless," the doctor said as he came toward Valeria. "Can't remember that he ever brought a female to me before." He looked at her wound. "Mighty careless indeed. What kind of man would let a pretty woman like you get shot? I'm Reed Felkner. I'll have you fixed up in a trice. Let me know if I hurt you."

  Finally a man who didn't look upon pain as a sign of weakness.

  "This doesn't look too bad," he said. "Was the man a bad shot, or did Luke manage to bring up the cavalry just in time?"

  Valeria was having a difficult time understanding what he meant. Nobody talked like this in Belgravia. "He shot the man who was trying to kill me," she said, hoping she'd interpreted his words correctly.

  "Good. We won't tell anybody about this close scrape. Wouldn't want to ruin his reputation."

  Valeria couldn't understand everybody's obsession with Luke's reputation. It seemed nothing else mattered. "No, of course not," she said.

  The doctor dusted her wound with a white powder. "You're healing well," he said. "All you need is some rest. Leave that to Mrs. Brightman. She'll take very good care of you."

  "We have to leave tomorrow," Luke said.

  "It would be better for her to rest a day or two," the doctor said, "but there's no reason she can't travel if you take care to keep the wound clean."

  "I'll give you a reason she can't travel," Mrs. Bright man said, a look of determination on her kindly face.

  "Her backside looks like you scraped the skin right off." "You a horsewoman?" the doctor asked Valeria. "Yes," she replied.

  "But you haven't been riding much lately?" "Not for several months."

  He turned to Luke.

  "I'm being paid to protect her," Luke said, "not to worry about her bottom."

  "I know you don't remember much about being a human being, Luke Attmore, but you do remember a person's bottom is attached to the rest of them, don't you?" Mrs. Brightman said.

  "I remember."

  "Well, it don't look like it." She threw back the sheet. "See for yourself, Reed."

  "Turn over, young woman," Dr. Felkner said, as though it was of no consequence that he intended to inspect Valeria's bare bottom in the presence of two other people.

  "You're going to have to turn over," the doctor said when Valeria didn't move. "I can't guess at the condition of your bottom."

  Valeria decided no one in America had any sensitivity. No doctor in Belgravia would have made such a request without profuse apologies and forcing everyone else to leave the room. Her gaze settled on Luke.

  "I'm not leaving," he said, understanding immediately what she meant. "I can't decide what to do unless I know what I'm up against."

  "You could leave me here and tell Rudolf where to find me," she said.

  "I promised to take you to that ranch, and-"

  "You never break a promise," Valeria finished for him. "It's clear my humiliation means less to you than your promise."

  "Would it humiliate you to have me see your bottom?" "Yes, you dense man. It would humiliate any woman." Luke turned to Mrs. Brightman.

  "I wouldn't let you see my bottom even if you were to hold a gun on me," she said.

  Luke turned to the doctor.

  "Even husbands leave the room at times like this." Luke's expression made it clear he didn't like this advice. "You'll tell me exactly what it looks like?" he asked the doctor.

  "Exactly."

  Wearing an even deeper scowl, he left the room. Valeria felt the tension flow from her muscles. She hadn't realized she was so edgy.

  "I've never seen him so worried about anybody," the doctor said, his eyes sparkling with interest. "Don't tell me you've managed to snag his interest. I can't tell you how many women have tried."

  "He's not interested in me," Valeria said, "only in his promise to deliver me safe and sound."

  "Luke is fond of his reputation, but-"

  "Look at her bottom, Reed," Mrs. Brightman said. "Luke'll be back any minute now. He's not one to wait long."

  Valeria turned over and buried her face in the pillow. She accepted the necessity of letting the doctor see her abrasions, but she couldn't look him in the face. The heat flamed in her face when he pulled her petticoats aside.

  He whistled sharply. "What did you put in that saddle-cactus? Your bottom looks like a piece of raw meat. You can't possibly ride for at least two days."

  Though Valeria greeted with relief the doctor's announcement that she didn't have to climb back into the saddle immediately, she didn't appreciate being compared to raw meat. She remembered what the butchered deer looked like.

  "I'll give Mrs. Brightman a stronger salve," the doctor said. "I want you to let her rub it in tonight and again tomorrow morning. I'll come by tomorrow afternoon." He pulled Valeria's petticoats back in place.

  "Tell Luke to come in," he said to Mrs. Brightman. "If he cares for this young woman, he'll hire a wagon to take her the rest of the way."

  Chapter Nineteen

  "I don't know how she stayed in the saddle without screaming," Dr. Felkner said to Luke.

  "I told her to let me know when she wanted to stop."

  "Just sitting in the saddle must have been pure agony."

  Mrs. Brightman had insisted Luke and the doctor stay for coffee. They sat in her small, neat parlor while Valeria rested. Mrs. Brightman had wallpapered the room with white paper covered with pink and red flowers and vivid green foliage. She had made the cotton slip covers on her furniture of similarly bright, cool material to combat the perpetual heat. She had decorated the very feminine room with small pillows, lace-framed pictures, and crocheted doilies. She poured coffee from a creamcolored pot and served it in white porcelain cups adorned with a floral design.

  "Valeria never said anything," Luke said.

  "She doesn't want you to think badly of her," Mrs. Brightman said. "She thinks you hate her."

  Luke didn't understand how Valeria could think that.

  He'd gone to more trouble for her than for any female. Ever. "I don't hate her."

  "How do you feel about her?" Mrs. Brightman asked. That was one question Luke didn't mean to answer. "This is just another job. I-"

  "Don't you dare say a word about your reputation," Mrs. Brightman said. "She thinks that's more important to you than she is."

  Why shouldn't it be? If he lost his reputation, he'd be the nonentity his parents thought him. "You can't balance people's lives against a reputation," he said.

  The words had hardly left his mouth when he knew that wasn't the way he would have answered a few days ago. It was what Isabelle would have said. What had made her words come out of his mouth? That hadn't happened in years. He started to speak again, to change his statement, but couldn't. He wasn't sure how he felt, and that surprised him just as much.

  "I'm glad to hear you say that," Mrs. Brightman said. "Valeria's right sweet on you. Maybe it's time you thought about settling down and getting married."

  Luke hated the arch look that came with Alice Brightman's words. Why did every woman think a man couldn't be happy, that his life couldn't be complete, until he married and saddled himself with a passel of kids? But the absolute dumbest thing she could have thought was that he and Valeria could develop such a relationship.

  "My job is to take her to the man who's supposed to be her husband" Luke said. "They signed some contract." "Contract?" Mrs. Brightman asked, not understanding. "She's a princess from a tiny European country," Luke said. "Th
ey sign contracts instead of falling in love." "Does she want to marry this man?"

  "She says she doesn't."

  "If she's signed a contract, she won't have any choice."

  "I tore it up."

  Both Mrs. Brightman and the doctor's looks demanded explanation.

  "She's rich," Luke began. "Her money goes to her uncle if she dies before she's married and to Rudolf afterward. I tore up the contracts so she won't be forced to marry Rudolf, but that doesn't protect her from her uncle, who's already tried to kill her. I don't know who coordinated the attacks, and I don't know when they'll strike again. That's why we can't go by wagon and can't use the trails."

  "Do you think you can get her safely to the ranch?"

  "I can if she's able to ride."

  "She'll be able to ride in a couple of days," the doctor said, "but you'll have to take it easy at first."

  "You said she doesn't want to marry this Rudolf." Mrs. Brightman said.

  Luke had known for some time he didn't want Valeria to marry Rudolf. He kept telling himself he'd torn the contacts up for no reason except her safety, but he'd told Zeke to notify Rudolf about the destroyed contracts as soon as he reached the ranch. He'd reminded him three times. He'd accepted his attraction to Valeria. He'd even stopped pretending it was just physical. But he'd kept himself under control by repeating over and over that Valeria didn't like him.

  No one could love him. If his parents couldn't do it, how could anyone else? But as stupid as it was-and he told himself constantly that it was very stupid-he couldn't get the idea out of his head that somehow Valeria could. "My job ends the moment she sets foot on that ranch."

  "But you can't leave her there if she doesn't want to marry him."

  "What do you suggest I do?"

  "Take her somewhere like Phoenix and help her find a job."

  "She's a princess. She can't take care of herself."

  "Then you'll have to take care of her until she learns."

  That was something else he refused to think about. His responsibility ceased as soon as they arrived at her ranch. If she decided not to marry Rudolf, she could work it out herself.

  "She's rich. She can hire someone to take care of her."

  But he knew he was just trying to avoid what he had to do, what he wanted to do. She had no experience, no knowledge of the world. She wouldn't know where to start to find a job, how to protect herself from chiselers and fortune hunters.

  But there was no point in thinking about any of this. She would probably marry Rudolf. She'd spent her whole life doing what she was told. Faced with momentous change, she'd cling to the familiar.

  But if she didn't marry Rudolf ...

  "I don't know what she'll do," Luke said. "But if she doesn't marry Rudolf, I'm the last person she'll ask for advice."

  "Why?" Mrs. Brightman asked.

  "Because she thinks I represent everything that's bad about this country." He puts his coffee cup down and rose. "Now I have to see to the horses and find myself a room."

  "You're not staying here?" the doctor asked.

  "I don't have any extra rooms," Mrs. Brightman said.

  "I had to give Valeria my own bedroom."

  "I appreciate your making room for her," Luke said. Mrs. Brightman smiled. "I couldn't think of turning her away. How many women can say they've had a real princess sleep in their bed?"

  "None, I would expect," said the doctor. "That ought to make your boardinghouse the most popular in town."

  And that, in a nutshell, was what was wrong with the notion of his caring for Valeria. She would always be a princess, and he would always be a gunman.

  He needed to get out of Alice Brightman's fancy boardinghouse. He needed the heat, the stench of sweat and manure, the noise and odors of a saloon to remind him of his reality. It was becoming all too easy to imagine something quite different.

  "Have you always run a boardinghouse?" Valeria asked Mrs. Brightman.

  They were in the kitchen, Mrs. Brightman and her daughters fixing dinner for twelve men, Valeria doing her best to stay out of the way. She'd started by standing in the middle of the room. But after Mrs. Brightman politely walked around her-her twin daughters weren't so circumspect about letting her know she was in the wayValeria took her coffee and found a place against the wall. She reminded herself she was no longer a princess surrounded by people whose sole aim was to minister to her comfort.

  "Only since my husband died," Mrs. Brightman replied.

  "Was he a gunman?" Valeria asked.

  Mrs. Brightman laughed. "Nothing so exciting. He managed one of the mines. He got killed during a robbery. Be careful with that dough, Sue. You know the men like their biscuits fluffy."

  Valeria didn't know the age of Mrs. Brightman's daughters, but she guessed they couldn't be more than eleven or twelve. She found it incredible that anyone so young could actually make biscuits.

  "Weren't you afraid?" Valeria asked. "Afraid of what?" Mrs. Brightman replied. "Of everything, I guess."

  Mrs. Brightman tasted the beef stew, decided it needed more of something, and added a dash from one of the many bottles of herbs and spices that filled one shelf. "I wasn't afraid of anything except being married to the wrong man," she said. "Besides, after my Horace, I wasn't sure I wanted to be married again."

  "Was he that mean to you?"

  Mrs. Brightman stopped stirring her stew and turned to Valeria. "He was that good. Built me this big house when he had to haul the wood from a hundred miles away. He paid to have all my mother's furniture brought west after she died. I know he was disappointed I couldn't give him a son, but he always acted like no man could have wanted more than his two daughters."

  Valeria knew about the need for a son. Her father had stopped speaking to her mother after she failed to produce a son. Only an occasion of state brought them together the day they were killed.

  "But how did you know what to do?" Valeria asked.

  "What's there to know?" Mrs. Brightman asked. "All a man wants is a soft bed with clean sheets and a good dinner. As long as you can supply that, you'll have boarders lining up at your door. Come to think of it, that's a pretty good formula for keeping a husband, too."

  Valeria wondered what it would take to keep Luke happy. He appeared to be satisfied with food cooked over a campfire and a bedroll spread on the ground. What else would such a man want?

  A woman.

  Valeria felt herself blush. She never used to think about the physical side of marriage, but being around Luke had changed that. Just being near him, just looking at him, caused her to have hot and cold flashes, to feel unfamiliar stirrings deep in her belly. She was uncomfortably aware of his body, his arms, his legs, his rear. This was no polite or casual awareness. It was hot, intense, and kept her watching him long after she knew she should turn away.

  She knew men placed great importance on their physical relationships with women, but no one ever explained why it was so important for men and not for women. Valeria wondered if it might not be the same with some females. If so, the way she reacted around Luke made her wonder if she might not be one of those females.

  "Do you ever feel afraid, being here by yourself?" Valeria asked.

  She had never been alone. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to be responsible for running a boardinghouse, preparing the meals, and taking care of two daughters.

  "Goodness, no," Mrs. Brightman replied. "If any boarder gets unruly, I tell him to leave."

  "Suppose he doesn't want to leave?"

  "The business end of my shotgun would take care of that."

  "Mama shot a bear last winter," one of the daughters said.

  "And a prospector last summer," the other added.

  "He was trying to get one of my girls around the corner," Mrs. Brightman said, "and I couldn't have that."

  Valeria felt a bubble of happiness forming inside her. Listening to Mrs. Brightman and her daughters made her want to laugh. She couldn't explain it, but just being in th
e same room with them made her feel better.

  "Are you looking for a husband?" she asked Mrs. Brightman.

  "No."

  "Would you marry again if somebody asked you?"

  Satisfied her stew was up to her standards, Mrs. Brightman tasted a pot of beans. "Maybe," she said. She added some pepper and covered the pot again. "He'd have to be pretty persuasive though. I'm used to doing things my way. I'm not sure I like the idea of changing to please some man. He'd have to go a long way toward making it worth my while."

  "How would he do that?"

  Mrs. Brightman looked straight at Valeria. "You don't know?"

  "Luke will tell you princesses are useless, that we live off the efforts of others. I guess that's true. I know how to dress, how to behave at parties, how to talk to men, but I don't know much beyond that." Valeria remembered the way she felt when she was around Luke. "Do you mean the physical relationship between a man and a woman?"

  Mrs. Brightman smiled. "You know more than you give yourself credit for."

  "My aunt said women aren't supposed to like that."

  "Maybe you aunt didn't, but I know a lot of women who like it very much." She turned back to her pots. "Sometimes it's all that makes it worth putting up with a man."

  A thousand questions flooded Valeria's mind, but she didn't even know how to ask them. "I wouldn't know about that," she said.

  "Well, I can't talk about it now, not with long ears listening," Mrs. Brightman said, nodding in the direction of her daughters.

  "We know all about boys, Mama," one of the girls said.

  "You'd better not know too much."

  "We don't have time to get into trouble if we wanted to," the other twin complained. "There's always beds to make, sheets to wash-"

  "Dinners to fix and clean up after," finished her sister.

  "Do you want to have a boardinghouse when you grow up?" Valeria asked.

  "No!" the twins answered in unison.

  "I want to sing and dance on a stage in front of a lot of people," one said.