Secondhand Bride
Page 8
“Down at the Arizona Hotel, last time I looked,” she answered. “Jeb McKettrick and I are—separated.”
“I see,” Doc said, taking a few moments to consider. Then he smiled and shook his head at some amusing thought. “So you’re the wife he kept bragging about. Most of us didn’t believe you existed—Jeb’s been known to play fast and loose with the truth on occasion.”
Chloe spread her hands. “Here I am,” she said, somewhat ruefully. “In the flesh.”
Doc mused a while. “He’s likely to carry you off to that ranch sooner or later,” he went on presently. “Probably sooner, if he’s anything like Rafe and Kade, and obviously, he is.”
Chloe straightened her spine, vertebra by vertebra. “I don’t think there’s any danger of that,” she said. “We’ve got some serious differences.”
“I won’t ask what those differences are, but I daresay the two of you must have agreed on something, if you tied the knot in the first place. Just the same, if you can promise me a full year of service, I’ll hire you right now.”
Chloe tried to speak, failed, and tried again. “Thank you,” she managed.
Doc took out his pocket watch, flipped open the case, and frowned at what he saw there. “Thirty dollars a month, the cottage, and meals. You agree to that, Mrs. McKettrick?”
“Yes,” Chloe said, praying she would not come to regret the decision. “My answer is yes.”
14
Holt had known, the moment he looked at Lizzie, lying there sleeping, with her dark hair spilling over Becky’s linen pillowcase, that she was his. He saw himself in her and, more importantly, he saw Olivia. It had been all he could do not to awaken the child and demand to know where her mother was, but compassion had stayed his hand. She was a fragile little thing, and even though he had yet to learn the details, he knew she’d been through hell.
There would be time enough to question her later, when she’d awakened, and the two of them had been properly introduced.
Now, he stood on the back stoop of the Arizona Hotel, his hands gripping the rail, white-knuckled, his stomach churning, his mind spinning. He stiffened when he heard the door creak open behind him, knew before a word was spoken that if he turned, he’d see Angus standing there.
“You all right?” the old man asked.
Holt gave a bitter laugh. “Nope,” he said, without turning around.
Angus stepped up beside him, moved to lay a hand on his shoulder, then evidently thought better of the idea and let it fall back to his side. This was a relief to Holt; he didn’t think he could have borne to be touched—at present, his nerves were all on the outside of his skin. “I take it you didn’t know about this child,” Angus said.
Holt shook his head. “I had no idea,” he admitted. He spared his father a brief, sidelong glance. “If I had, I sure as hell wouldn’t have left Texas without a backward look.” It was a gibe, and Angus grimaced as it struck its mark.
“That’s what you think I did, I reckon,” Angus said, with a sigh.
“That’s what I know you did, old man,” Holt replied.
“I thought you were better off with your mother’s folks. What would I have done with a babe in arms? Hell, you couldn’t even talk, let alone ride.”
Holt thrust out a hard breath. “I watched the road for you,” he said, without intending to reveal that much.
“I wish I’d gone back,” Angus allowed. “But I had a ranch, and a new wife, and sons. There was no money back then, and no time. I had my back to the wall for years.”
“I didn’t care about money,” Holt replied, consciously releasing his grasp on the porch rail, lest he snap it in two. “I wanted a father. Not an uncle who wished I’d never landed on his doorstep.”
“Dill was hard on you, I reckon.” To his credit, Angus sounded sincerely regretful. Trouble was, it was too little, too late. “I guess he and the missus never had any children of their own.”
“I was curse enough,” Holt answered.
“I’m sorry,” Angus said.
“Your remorse doesn’t amount to a pitcher of warm spit, old man, and there’s no sense talking about it now anyway. Too much water under the bridge.”
Angus shifted beside him, turned to lean against the rail with his arms folded. “I might believe that, except for one thing. You had an outfit of your own, down in Texas. Becky told me all about it, said the two of you were acquainted back in Kansas City. You could be any of a hundred places, but the fact is, you’re right here in the Arizona Territory. That tells me there are things you want settled.”
“I wanted a look at you,” he said. “You and those boys you cared enough about to raise up under your own roof.”
“You’re mighty jealous of your brothers, aren’t you?”
Holt tensed. “No,” he said. “I’d just as soon forget all of you.”
“Well, I reckon that’s going to be difficult. Important thing is, what are you going to do now? You’ve got that little daughter in there, and she’s most likely alone in the world, but for you. She wouldn’t be here if she had other folks willing to take her in.”
“I don’t know what I mean to do about Lizzie,” Holt confessed. “Maybe I’ll put her in boarding school.”
Angus turned his head and spat, a clear indication of his thoughts in that regard. “Well, hell, don’t do her any favors. If you aren’t willing to give that little girl a proper home, Concepcion and I would be happy to take her in.”
“She’s none of your concern.”
“By God, she’s my granddaughter, flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone. That makes her my concern. I won’t see her handed over to strangers.”
Holt’s breath scraped at his throat, and his blood ran as hot and poisonous as venom. “If you think you’re going to raise my daughter, you’re full of sheep dip.”
That statement seemed to please the old man, though it surely wasn’t meant to. He gave a raspy laugh. “That’s more like it,” he said.
“I’m glad you approve,” Holt scoffed.
“You go ahead and hate me all you want, boy,” Angus went on. “I can take it, and I’ve gotten pretty well accustomed to it over the last year. But you mark my words: If you try to send that child off to some school, to be fetched up by strangers, I’ll go there and bring her straight home to the Triple M.” He paused. “I made one mistake with you. I don’t intend to make another with her.”
Holt turned to look into his father’s face. “Why is she so important to you?”
Angus thrust himself away from the rail and let his arms fall to his sides. “Because she’s yours,” he said. And with that, he went back inside, leaving Holt to his own thoughts.
After five minutes or so, Holt left the back porch, getting only as far as the hotel kitchen before he ran smack into Jeb.
“What happened out there? On the trail, I mean?” Holt demanded. He knew Jeb and Sam had found the girl in a broken-down stagecoach, knew her name was Lizzie, but that was a mile shy of enough.
Jeb, sipping coffee from a mug, met his gaze squarely. “Somebody robbed the stage, shot the driver and Lizzie’s aunt like squirrels. Lizzie said the woman’s name was Geneva.” He shook his head. “It was bad, Holt. Real bad. The kid will be a while getting over it, if she ever does.”
Holt felt sick, because of the memories etched in Lizzie’s mind, and because Geneva hadn’t deserved to die like that. He was relieved, too, because it hadn’t been Olivia found beside that stage. “Did Lizzie mention Olivia, her mama?”
He saw pity in Jeb’s eyes and braced himself for what he knew was coming. “Not by name,” Jeb said, with a shake of his head. His voice was hoarse. “She did say her mother had died in San Antonio, of a fever. Her aunt was bringing her here, as far as I can figure, to meet up with you.”
Holt reeled inwardly. Olivia, dead. He couldn’t imagine it; she’d been vibrant with life the last time he’d seen her, full of radiance and passion and spirit. Why hadn’t she written him, at some point during the
decade that had passed since their final parting, and told him they had a child?
The answer was pride, he supposed. She’d wanted to get married, he’d said he wasn’t ready, and lit out with the Rangers. When he got back to Austin, six months later, she’d long since packed up and vanished. He’d visited her friends and Geneva, too, but they’d been tight-lipped, and said if she had anything to say to him, she’d find a way to do it on her own. He’d looked for her in every town he passed through, for years, before finally giving up.
He’d never dreamed, never imagined even once, in all his many speculations, that they might have conceived a baby. He’d simply decided that she’d married someone else, mourned his foolishness, and gone on with her life.
Jeb laid a hand on Holt’s shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he said.
Holt shook off the past. It was gone, and he had to think about the present and his daughter’s future. “Thanks,” he said, with some difficulty. “For looking after Lizzie, I mean.”
Jeb shrugged, withdrew his hand. “I wasn’t about to leave her out there,” he answered. He smiled slightly. “She’s a tough little kid. When we found her, she was holding a .45. Said she’d shoot us if we made a wrong move, and I believe she meant it, too.”
Holt chuckled. “Damn,” he marveled. “You’d think she was related to Angus McKettrick.”
“Or you,” Jeb said.
Holt nodded. “Or me,” he agreed.
15
Jeb was just about to go looking for Chloe when she drew up in front of the hotel in a buckboard, with Old Billy, from the livery stable, at the reins. He stepped out onto the sidewalk, prepared to argue if she’d taken it into her head to leave town, though he supposed he should have been hoping for just that. Her going would certainly simplify matters, and complicate them at the same time.
He took off his hat to shove a hand through his hair, replaced it as he approached the wagon. When he reached up to help Chloe down, she hesitated for an instant, then took his hand.
“Where are you going?” he asked bluntly.
She took a few seconds to deliberate, probably working out how much she ought to say. “Dr. Boylen offered me a teaching position,” she said. “There’s a cottage included, and I’m here to get my things.”
Jeb didn’t know whether to object or be pleased. If she was telling the truth, and their marriage wasn’t a fraud, he didn’t want his wife working for a living. And though a part of him wished she’d never come to Indian Rock in the first place, the thought of her going elsewhere was no damn good, either.
Once, he reflected ruefully, he’d known exactly what he thought about everything. Since he’d met Chloe, life had become one big conundrum.
“Does Doc know you got fired from the last one?” he asked, then could have kicked himself for stirring up a hornets’ nest.
Her face tightened, and she realigned her shoulders, as if bracing herself against him. “Yes,” she said shortly. “So if you have any ideas about spoiling this job like you did the last one, you’re too late.”
Jeb rubbed the back of his neck with one hand, purely frustrated. “Chloe, I didn’t mean to do that. It was just plain bad luck that the head of the school board happened to be in that poker game at the Broken Stirrup.”
Old Billy waited, shifting from one foot to the other on the sidewalk in front of the hotel. “I ain’t got all day,” the smith complained. “Where do I find them bags?”
Chloe picked up her skirts and made to slip past Jeb and join Old Billy, but Jeb took hold of her arm.
“You’re going to live in the cottage behind the schoolhouse, all by yourself?”
She answered in a brisk whisper. “Of course I’m going to live by myself.”
She tugged, but Jeb didn’t let her go. “Chloe, for all that there are good people here, this is still a wild town. All sorts of cowboys and drifters come through. You ought to stay on at the hotel if you won’t live at the ranch.”
She blinked. “Live at the ranch?” she echoed. “Why would I do that? It’s miles from town and, besides, according to you, we’re not married.”
“You’d be safer there,” Jeb insisted. “You’d have a room of your own. As for this job—”
“As for this job,” she interrupted, “I’ve already accepted it. You needn’t take any responsibility for me at all. I can take care of myself.”
How did they always get into these snarls? He’d begun this conversation with the best of intentions, and right away it had gone down the wrong trail. “Chloe—”
She pulled free and swept past him. “I’ll show you where to find my things,” she said to Old Billy. Jeb might have vanished like smoke in a hard wind for all the notice she paid him after that.
Determined not to be put off so easily, he followed the pair through the lobby and up the stairs and helped Billy lug the trunks, valises, boxes, and reticules down to the waiting buckboard. Chloe supervised, taking care never to let her gaze connect with his, and made the final descent with them, a hatbox in each hand.
At the schoolhouse, they unloaded the whole shooting match again and carried it around back to the cottage. When everything was inside, Chloe thanked Old Billy and paid him a dollar. He hastened away, but Jeb lingered.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Chloe said. He wondered if she was as painfully conscious of the brass bed as he was. The thing seemed to dominate the room. “It isn’t proper, and I don’t need you wrecking my reputation all over again.”
Jeb knew she was right—at least where propriety was concerned—but he couldn’t bring himself to say so, or to leave, as he should have. “A lot of folks know we went through with a wedding ceremony, even if it was a sham. That’ll cause just as much talk. They’ll wonder why we’re not living together.” He paused, hat in hand. “I’m not your enemy, Chloe.”
“You’re not my friend, either,” Chloe pointed out, busying herself with one of the trunks. “As for what people will think, I’m surprised you care. It’s not as if you’ve ever acted like a husband.”
He went to her, turned her to face him, catching sight of the contents of the trunks as he did so. Books. Piles of them. He looked into her eyes. “I could remedy that easily enough,” he said. And then, before she could protest, he kissed her.
At first, she set her palms against his chest and tried to push him away, just as she’d done the night before, when he’d kissed her in the street, but then he felt a softening in her. She slid her arms around his neck and kissed him back in earnest.
“Chloe,” he said, when they both came up for air.
She drew back, out of his embrace, smoothed her hair, then her skirts. “Oh, no, you don’t, Jeb McKettrick. You are not going to get me into that bed. And you are not going to cost me this job, either. I want you to leave, right now.”
“If we’re married,” he reasoned, knowing he’d already lost this battle, “what’s the harm?”
“You know damn well what the ‘harm’ is,” she bristled. “You don’t trust me any farther than you can throw me, and you’re not willing to acknowledge me as your legal wife.”
He grinned weakly. “I think I could throw you quite a ways,” he said. “You don’t weigh very much.”
She didn’t smile. In fact, she turned her back on him and started grabbing up books, setting them on the shelves with a lot of thrusting and thumping. “Go away, Jeb,” she said, and he thought he heard tears in her voice. “I mean it. I want you to leave. Immediately.”
He hesitated. “All right,” he finally agreed. “I’ll go. But I’ll be back, Chloe. You can’t hide out in this cottage forever.”
“Go,” she said, and that time he was sure she was crying.
He wanted to take her into his arms again, but he didn’t dare. “I’ll be at the Triple M,” he said, pausing in the open doorway. “If you want me, send word.”
“Don’t watch the road for a messenger,” she said.
He sighed and went out, leaving a part of himself behind.
He turned his attention to the schoolhouse and smiled to himself. At least he knew where to find Chloe when he decided to pay his respects. In the meantime, he’d lie low. She wasn’t the only one who’d landed a job that day; he’d just met the foreman from the Circle C, a man named Henry Farness, and he’d signed on to ride fence lines and punch cattle.
It would be a change from bounty hunting and playing cards for a living, but he was a good rider, and a hand with a gun, and he knew how to bide his time. He also knew that the ranch belonged to Holt Cavanagh and recalled the name from his conversation with the little girl, alongside the stagecoach the night before. If Cavanagh was her daddy, like she’d said, and she ended up living out there on his ranch, he might run into her. To his way of thinking, that merely added spice to the game, and, anyway, she probably wouldn’t recognize him even if they met face-to-face.
He watched as McKettrick conferred with an old man and a very pregnant Mexican woman outside the Arizona Hotel, and wondered how many folks he’d have to kill before this thing was over.
Maybe he ought to go over to the schoolhouse, right now, and confront Chloe. Tell her the jig was up, and take her away. He had plenty of money, thanks to last night’s enterprise, and they could start over somewhere new, live high on the hog. She was used to that, having been raised in a Sacramento mansion, and he’d enjoy buying her pretty presents and the like. He’d show her she’d been right to marry him in the first place.
He felt his face harden. Chloe was a wildcat, and she’d surely make a fuss, at least at first, when she found out he’d followed her to Indian Rock. Might even tell somebody that he was a gunslinger, and that wouldn’t do. Folks in small towns tended to mistrust strangers, and he didn’t want anyone wondering if he’d been the one to hold up that stagecoach and gun down the woman and the driver.