The Lady's Arrangement (Help Wanted)

by Colleen L. Donnelly

  I slid to Regina’s side as Mr. Gulliver came out of his chair. “My proposal comes before anyone’s. You ready?” I extended my elbow. I’d done that only one other time in my life. Ages ago with Becky. The same night she told me she wouldn’t be seeing me anymore. I held it steady and watched Regina’s face.

  Her small hand rose, her fingers inching around my elbow.

  “I might still be interested in some land.” I said it slow and easy, with only a quick glance to Mr. Gulliver as I watched Regina. Not the rush in which I nearly said it as the warmth of her hand took hold. “Like you talked about the other day. But first, I have more important business to take care of.” I lifted Regina out of her chair. “I mean, me and Mrs. Howard have important business to take care of.”

  “You might want to reconsider.” Mr. Gulliver planted his fingertips on his desk’s glassy top and leaned into his arms.

  “Don’t look back,” I whispered as I drew Regina away from her banker. “Stay with me.”

  I held onto her until we made it outside. I continued to hold and continued to walk, several steps of howdy-ing and helloing, until she let go.

  She squared herself, and faced me. “Do you mean it? Or do you want to shake hands out here in front of the bank and see if Mr. Gulliver will turn over the deeds?”

  “I meant every word. Mrs. Howard, it’s high time you became Mrs. Miller, before you become something worse, like stowed on a train heading off to where you clearly don’t want to go.” Or yoked to a one-handed ranch manager that collects fancy broken combs. “And someday you’re going to have to tell me about this other deed I keep hearing about. But not today.”

  I took her by the elbow and steered her down the walkway, the only aisle I’d ever known.

  Chapter 24

  On a train heading East or in front of a Justice of the Peace in Kansas. Not sure which is worse. ~Regina

  The world became tiny. I shut out Jess and Flynn. My parents. Ted. It was just me and this stranger and the lie I was about to tell. A huge lie. Far greater than the finagling I’d been doing with the bank.

  “And do you…” The Justice of the Peace’s voice droned on. If I didn’t hear that I’d love, honor, and obey, maybe it was okay if I said yes. I distracted myself with thoughts of New York, of restaurants there, of Boss and learning to ride, of the fights Jess and I had over the ranch. Of this. My plan. An arrangement, and nothing more, followed by a parting. I rehearsed my answer to the question and thought my most recent meal might end up at my feet.

  “I do.”

  The Justice of the Peace’s voice became a background drone. He was asking Ben now. I prayed Ben would lie, just as I had. Not pull anything sneaky when we were done, like deciding to stay, turn my ranch into something he enjoyed. The Justice of the Peace paused, peered at me over tiny spectacles. I glanced down. I wondered if I’d groaned. Or gasped.

  Ben’s boots were worn, miles dulling the leather, reddish hues tingeing them as if they’d been dyed. He was so much taller than I was, taller than Flynn. Flynn. We hadn’t been particularly romantic in our marriage. But he’d been my vow. The one Jess still kept. The one that gave me the right to go back home to New York without complication, without explanation, without a penny in my pocket, and without judgment.

  “I do.” Ben’s voice was strong. I glanced up to make sure he didn’t mean it.

  Ben didn’t try to kiss me when the ceremony ended. He merely squeezed my upper arm and led the Justice of the Peace aside to discuss payment, paperwork, whatever needed to be settled.

  Settled. More settled than I’d expected from this man after he tended my injured son out on the prairie. I gazed at the stark room as the two men sealed my ranch’s fate. The fate I wanted.

  “You ready?” Ben was at my side. The room began to swim, the walls to melt.

  “A swooning bride,” was the last thing I heard. After that, everything went black.

  Chapter 25

  For someone hard as nails on the inside, Mrs. Miller sure is soft on the outside. ~Rex

  I propped Regina against my shoulder, red hair, clothing she did justice to, and the scent of a woman mixed with fresh air so close and powerful I garbled the guttural command for Walter to take it even slower than usual. He understood, in spite of my bungling, and eased forward. Somehow Walter understood women better than I did. Regina’s head lolled back and forth, a sea of curls washing against my arm as the wagon lumbered toward home. Her home. Our home. I dropped her bag on the floorboard near our feet and caught combs and pins as they came loose, freeing more of her hair and its waves as she rolled against my arm and my shoulder…whatever she happened to touch.

  I pondered my father and stepmother, wondered about things I hadn’t noticed or cared about as a boy, as I balanced Regina against me. How did they behave as husband and wife? Even though Regina and I would never live the way they did, we had to put up a good pretense in front of folks. At least in front of the bank. Until we both got what we wanted.

  Her head rolled forward, as I thought back to those secret parts of family life that remained a mystery to me. It slid off my arm, and dropped to my lap.

  “Whoa!”

  Walter yanked to a stop, jerking Regina farther forward.

  “Not you, Walter, giddy-up.”

  Walter started again. I looped an arm around Regina, around her shoulders, and dragged her closer to my hips. I held her there, held and beheld a face crowned with a mane of red. Red. My favorite color. I ran a finger over her cheek. “Regina, are you with me?”

  Her skin was soft, so soft I traced a line the length of her jaw, her face smoother than anything I’d ever touched. Her hair spread over her features and across my legs—so much red, like the sky during an Oklahoma sunset. I hooked my finger around a long strand and pulled it aside. I wanted to touch more of it…all of it…draw it through my fingers the way I did Walter’s mane.

  “Doggone it all, anyway. This is why I never got married. It’s too confounding.” I laid the reins across the seat to my left and pinned them under my thigh. With both hands, I raised her up, held her close, and patted the palm of my hand against her cheek. “Regina, wake up.”

  Her eyes fluttered. Green hit me in the late afternoon light. Her lashes lined that green, beautiful strokes like a painting again, arching around what was now my second favorite color. I propped her close and cupped her face in a hand. Those lashes closed, then opened, until at last recognition set in…a stormy sunrise…eyes widening and lashes shooting up. She shrugged out of my arms and looked around at Walter, at the passing scenery, and finally, at me.

  “Did I fall asleep?”

  “No,” I dragged the reins from under my thigh. “You fainted.”

  “Fainted?” She stared at Walter’s rump. I watched our wedding come back to her, a new sort of dawning, a crimson blush where it rose. “Oh, my.”

  I flicked the reins. Walter hied it a bit more. She laid a hand on my forearm. “No, wait.”

  “Whoa,” I said again, this time to Walter. He stopped. The three of us sat, the wind in our faces, the grasses bowing our direction.

  “We’re married now?”

  “You going to faint again?”

  She shook her head.

  “Then, yes, we are.”

  Her back bowed against the seat as she stared forward.

  “So we did it. I told Jess this morning I’d do something.”

  I tucked the reins back under my leg. “Something?”

  “Yes, something.” More color returned to her face. “I wasn’t sure what it would be, after your handshake deal, but… Oh, never mind. He remembers now.”

  I glanced at the woman that was now my bride. The red hair that billowed around her face. “Remembers us talking about getting married?”

  “Yes, that. And since I didn’t know if you were actually going to give me a civilized ceremony…which you came close to not doing…I had other plans in mind.”

  “Like proposing to your banker.” I
liked the way her face could turn the same color as that hair.

  “Not that sort of proposal. I had to do something, though, since it seemed marriage was rather onerous to you.”

  I gazed at her, watched her curls toss in the wind. “Onerous?”

  “Distasteful. Something you really didn’t want to do.”

  I settled back on the bench seat alongside her and stared at Walter’s rump myself. “I thought you really didn’t want to marry. You needed a husband’s name to hold onto this ranch, and I needed…well, I was needing to start a new life. We both got what we wanted. Right?”

  Her head took a slow trip in a full circle, something I figured was supposed to be a nod. “Right. I guess we did both get what we wanted. I’m certainly glad you’re satisfied.”

  Satisfied? If this was what marriage was supposed to feel like, then I wasn’t. “Mrs. Howard—I mean, Mrs. Miller—you got what you wanted, and I’ll figure my way, but besides us, there’s Jess. And as far as he goes in all of this, my experience with trying to satisfy boys is that they like to be treated like men. They like to know the black and white of things so they can sort them out. He’s going to want to know what this something you’ve done is.” I watched her face, the green and the red, watched for the something that pertained to me.

  Her brows drew together and leveled into a frown. “By all means, we want all of you men satisfied and treated properly.”

  “Properly? Well, then, if Jess, and Ted, and everyone else is to be treated properly, where do I properly sleep?”

  I watched the red of her face, hoping to see her relax, the red of her lips, waiting to see her smile, and the red of her hair…most of all I was wanting to see her toss every bit of it back and laugh. Properly. Satisfied. I loved red. Just never seen so much of it in a woman before. Red like fire. Hot fire.

  I gripped her face between my hands, watched her green eyes as I brought it to mine. Those lips were burning, stinging me with words as I pressed them against my own. Pressed them until the words stopped, and she pressed back. Her mouth, her shoulders, everything she had to offer melding into me. I’d only kissed someone once. Becky. A slight peck on the cheek. But in this moment it was as if I’d had lessons all my life and I knew exactly what to do. So did Mrs. Howard.

  I mean Mrs. Miller.

  Chapter 26

  Nothing resurrects an old memory like a kiss from a handsome man. Nothing puts that memory to rest quicker, either. ~Regina

  His hands were rough, powerful against my face. Flynn’s had never been that way. Ben’s were big; they were strong, almost as strong as the kiss he gave me. I swam in a sea of leather, of hands made rugged by work, of soap I’d never smelled before. The black of his hair, the coarseness of the stubble he barely kept shaved, the potency of a man who’d run the land with cattle and never let it run him, engulfed me.

  The vigor I’d fought in this man was there, fueling the fervor of his kiss. I’d never known such power, such hunger, such fire. Time ignited right there in the wagon, exploding in a magnificent display. I immersed myself in the heat, relished its charge.

  I pressed deeper, neither of us finding the bottom. His lips, my lips, our lips…

  Then mine. Just mine as his softened. His relaxed, his mouth moved away.

  I leaned further forward, searched for his kiss. His hands, so firm around my face, relaxed as his lips had, slid from my cheeks, over my shoulders, and down my arms. My skin prickled in waves behind them. Fire followed his touch in full flame until both of his hands dropped into his lap. I opened my eyes. I glanced down and stared at his hands, grabbed them up, latched on, and cupped his monstrosities in my smaller ones, holding tight, never to let go.

  My lips burned. My skin crawled with excitement, my hands warm, my face hot. I wondered if Flynn saw. He hadn’t answered even once when I’d challenged him from on top his grave. Maybe he couldn’t hear or see what I was doing. Doing for the first time. I’d never been kissed this way before. Of course, neither had he. Poor Flynn!

  I stared at Ben, swimming in his dark eyes. Passion roiled through me, a tumult that never wanted to stop.

  “I’m sorry.” He slid his hands from mine.

  “What?”

  “That wasn’t part of your arrangement. I wasn’t supposed to do that.” He tipped his head back, stared toward heaven. “Unless things could be different…” He glanced down at me. I saw the question in his eyes that I wanted to hear his answer to, not mine. I waited, gave him the chance to say yes, things could be different. Waited and watched the question give way to an answer I didn’t want. “Never mind. They couldn’t.” He rubbed his hands along the tops of his thighs. “I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

  I was falling. I had no idea where from or where to, because I’d never been that high before. I looked below me, and there was no bottom, no place for a scream to stop, or for tears to hit when they fell. I gripped the seat and stared at Walter’s rump, tightened my throat against the fist that wanted to wrench out my heart. “You’re right.” I spoke over the pain, my voice sounding odd and wrong in the prairie wind. “It won’t happen again.”

  He made one of those infernal noises only Walter understood. A sound I’d be sure to use in the future. If I ever spoke to this man again.

  Chapter 27

  Morrissey, Morrissey, Morrissey. I’m a Ranger, I’m a Ranger, I’m a Ranger. ~Rex

  Kansas grass looked greener than it had before. The wind felt fresher. Brown dirt sounded solid, like a road meant to be traveled on.

  I shook my head. No, Kansas was all plains. Dull. Ruts didn’t make a true road.

  Her lips were soft, yet powerful. Warm, yet hot. Different from Becky’s cheek. Responsive. Alive.

  I stared at Walter’s rear end as it lolled from side to side. This was a business arrangement. She’d get her ranch, and I’d get whoever was behind the thieves stealing ranches. And eventually I’d get Morrissey. She’d stay, and I’d go. Back home to my father. Back home to rebuild Pop’s ranch. Back home to red—red dirt, not red hair. It was our understanding. We’d marry, then part.

  I wanted to glance to the side. At her. At red lips and red cheeks. I made another sound, a noise with my tongue that told Walter to step it up a bit.

  “What is that ridiculous noise you make at poor Walter? Does he really understand you? Wouldn’t real talking be better? Surely the poor animal would be happier if you spoke English.”

  “English? Like obdurate? Onerous? Some of those foreign words you toss around?”

  “How about obtuse?”

  I glanced to the side, at my arrangement, my wife, crossing her arms. The blaze in her eyes was obvious, even from the side. Red. Not a good kind of red. I looked at Walter. “Giddy-up.”

  She didn’t budge other than to snatch that bag of hers from the floor, swipe all of the combs and pins she could into its top, and press it tight against her chest. The chest she’d pressed tight against me moments ago. Red. Her eyes were red around the edges. I’d never seen so much red. Except in Luke’s eyes. And my father’s, Adler’s. And mine, when my stepmother died.

  She yanked her head to the right.

  “I said I’m sorry. I can’t take that kiss back, and neither can you.” I watched, hoping the tension in her shoulders would let down. Tension I’d caused. Walter should have stopped me. “Let’s pretend it never happened. Just carry on with this business arrangement like we’re supposed to.” Those tiny shoulders that had felt so good moments before looked sharp and painful. “I’m sorry.”

  “I heard you,” she shot. “Stop jabbering about it, so I can forget it happened. Be happy to forget it, too. Already would have, if you didn’t go on and on about what a big mistake you made and how sorry you are. I heard you. I don’t need to hear it again.” The bulk of her hair spilled down her back, the wind lifting and blowing it behind us. Red.

  I made another noise, and Walter stepped up his pace. A burst of air exploded to my right. Her arms crossed tighter over th
e bag. “Stop the wagon! Make one of your silly noises to tell Walter to stop!”

  “Whoa,” I said.

  “See? He understands English.”

  “We get on good several ways.” Maybe because he was a he, and had black hair instead of red. Maybe because I’d never been tempted to wrap my arms around him and…

  “I’m walking the rest of the way home.” She scooted to the right and swung her feet over the end of the seat.

  I grabbed her arm. “Wait. You’re not walking anywhere. I will.”

  She yanked her arm free and brushed where I’d held onto it. “Your hands are rough. You should be more careful where you put them.”

  I glanced down at my palms. At the one with red bumps where the barn splinters lay, looking even redder next to her white. She frowned from my hand to my face.

  “Splinters. Just what your backside’s going to look like if you keep sliding around on this seat.” I jumped to the ground and handed her the reins. “I’ll meet you at the house. You decide what you want to tell Jess. If you want to tell him nothing happened, and that we didn’t get married, that’s fine with me. I’ll go along with whatever you decide. And I’ll stay in the loft above Ted. But pick a story and stick to it. Men prefer facts, so what you say, every one of them will believe.”

  She took the reins. “Facts. What men like. Whether it works or not.”

  I saw myself in her eyes, and it wasn’t good. I made that noise she hated, and Walter started forward.

  Chapter 28

  I didn’t know men could be so heartless until I discovered my own. ~Regina

  I didn’t turn and look back. I hoped Ben got lost, even though that was unlikely for a cattle driver. I tried to make that noise he made so Walter would go faster, leave Ben farther behind. I clicked. I tried a low growl. Walter snorted and shook his head. I flicked the reins, and he stepped to, a smart little clip that would leave Ben in my dust.

  Men liked facts. Phooey! I was sure Jess would like to hear his father’s money had vanished. That we were penniless because of someone’s mismanagement. That we’d lost everything—the money we’d brought, four years of good education for Jess, and…