The Wedding Kiss

by Hannah Alexander

  As if this whole day had not been awkward enough—with Cynthia Lindstrom’s little innuendoes and Raylene Harper’s attempts to attract the groom with her laughter and manipulative wiles during the formal reception at the Crescent Hotel—someone had decided a chivaree would be fun.

  But maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. It wasn’t as if they would have an audience when Keara made herself comfortable in Britte’s bed after the commotion died and she and Elam were left alone, able to carry on as before.

  She couldn’t ignore the quiet question deep inside that asked whether or not they would ever be able to do that—carry on as before. That kiss, hadn’t he felt it, as well? Or was she behaving like a silly adolescent? After all, what did she know about the romantic side of marriage? Men were said to respond much differently than women when it came to affairs of…amour.

  Penelope and David were taking the children for the night, and so Britte, Rolfe, and Cash had ridden off with them in their wagon. Now, as Elam urged the horses toward home in the buggy he’d prepared for the special occasion, Keara was dismayed by the lack of comfortable banter that she and Elam had always enjoyed—about the children, the ranch, the horses, especially frisky young Freda Mae. Many times this past winter they had shared memories of Gloria…

  But tonight was different, as if speaking about normal things would break the spell. Tomorrow she would awake in Britte’s room and begin her new life with little fanfare, but today was her fairytale day, and she didn’t want it to end with talk of horses and breeding and what needed planting next week. And she felt awkward bringing up Gloria’s name on the night of marrying that wonderful woman’s husband.

  Elam, though seldom taciturn, also seemed introspective as they rode to the ranch. Keara couldn’t help wondering about the regrets that must be plowing through his mind.

  She glanced over at him to find him watching her. “I guess thanking you again would be silly,” she murmured. “For all this. For—for rescuing me.”

  “You’ve thanked me at least three times a day for the past week.” His voice was gentle, almost tender.

  “But now the deed is done. You followed it through. You can’t know how relieved I am.”

  “Surely you knew I would not go back on my word.”

  “Of course I did, but unless you’ve been in my place you could never understand how indebted I feel.”

  For a moment, he didn’t speak, just watched her. And then a smile passed his lips—brief, with a shake of his head. “Nearly every day since Gloria first got sick, you’ve been seeing to her family. I’m the one who should be thanking you. I believe she’s in heaven now, watching us and approving.”

  Keara swallowed, then before she could stop herself, she blurted, “You think she saw the kiss and everything?”

  Elam remained silent while warmth crept across Keara’s face.

  “I don’t think she’d have turned her head to avoid it,” he said, his tone thoughtful. “It’s normal to kiss in a marriage.” He held her gaze for a long moment. “Many things are normal in marriage, between husband and wife. You told me yourself that Gloria wanted me to remarry.”

  “I reckon I never thought about Gloria up there in heaven watching us all the time.”

  “The Bible says there’s no marriage in heaven, and that remarriage here on earth after a death is true and right.”

  “Still, it kind of makes me rethink a lot of things. Do people feel jealousy in heaven? Do they feel betrayal?”

  He didn’t reply for a moment, and as the sky darkened into night, she couldn’t read his thoughts in his expression the way she’d learned to do these past months.

  “We aren’t betraying anyone,” he said at last, his voice almost a whisper.

  “Then why do I feel like we are?”

  “Because you loved her too.” He shook his head, looked at Keara. “I didn’t expect you to come down that aisle the way you did, looking like a princess.”

  Her breathing stopped just for a second as she allowed those words to echo in her heart. A princess? He thought she looked like a princess? All thoughts of Gloria vanished, and the kiss—the feel of his lips, the strength in the arms that had held her, the passion of his gaze when he straightened from that kiss…that wonderful, beautiful kiss that seemed to come from heaven—filled her thoughts.

  She knew she could not let them linger there.

  “I’ve never had a stylist’s art worked on me before,” Keara said dryly. “Penelope and Jael are talented.”

  “They aren’t the only ones with talent.” He cleared his throat, looked toward her. “You have a way with Britte and Rolfe and Cash.”

  She realized he was distracting her from the subject of Gloria, as if he also felt like a betrayer. But why would he feel that way unless he, too, had experienced more than easy companionship between them during their kiss?

  “We both know they need constancy, and I can give them that,” she said.

  “And you, Keara?” His voice was quiet, solemn, and she heard a concern in it that disturbed her. “What do you need? When you were a little girl, did you ever dream that you’d spend your whole life taking care of other people, raising another woman’s children?”

  She lingered for just a moment on the deep rumble of his voice, the…intimacy of it that warmed her in ways she’d never felt warmed. “Why not? If that’s my calling in life, then that’s where I’ll feel my finest satisfaction.”

  “Just because caring for others is all you’ve been allowed to do these past years doesn’t mean it’s all you could do.”

  “Maybe God’s placed me right where He wants me.”

  She was still pondering his words and her own reply when the deep neigh of a horse reached them from ahead.

  “Did you leave Freda Mae out in the corral?” Keara searched for a sign of the animal but could see little in the deepening gloom.

  “No, and Buster and Moondance are in the barn as well.”

  “That didn’t sound like any of them,” she said. “Do you think the chivaree crowd has beaten us to the house?”

  Elam urged the muscular stock horse forward with a flick of the reins. “I don’t know. That call was unfamiliar to me, and it wasn’t coming from the corral.”

  This perked Keara’s attention. Elam knew the voice of each horse in the territory. If he didn’t recognize the call, it was a strange horse not from these parts…and perhaps a strange rider?

  By the time they reached the house, they sighted a dark shadow that blended with the overhang of the porch. Another whinny. They scrambled from the buggy to find a large and beautiful black mare, fully saddled, standing with head lowered, nuzzling at a still form on the steps. A human form.

  A soft, feminine groan reached them as the horse continued to nudge.

  Elam and Keara rushed forward. The lingering light from the last glimmer of sunset showed the glow of long, dark hair and a woman lying as if she’d fallen there.

  Keara saw the outline of the woman’s face and went cold to the bone. She heard Elam’s quick intake of breath. It couldn’t be. Her eyes were playing tricks. She saw the broken and bleeding body of Gloria Jensen.

  Elam felt the world stop revolving. The only sound he heard was the pounding of his heart and the quickening of his breaths. His mind flashed to his last vision of Gloria, ravaged by smallpox, pleading with him to stay away from her, not to look at her, to care for the children.

  She could not be lying on the steps of her own home, with her face clear and white.

  He fell to his knees beside the fallen form. Not Gloria. Of course it wasn’t. He’d buried her, had watched the earth slowly cover her grave, had visited and watched the grass grow and the leaves fall and the snow drift over the gravestone. And yet the hair, the face in the gloom…even the soft moan of pain, were so familiar.

  He touched the woman’s face, and she groaned again, tried to sit up, cried out, and fell back against the steps. The sense of unreality scattered into the gloom. He recognized her. />
  “Elam?” Keara’s voice held a note of shock.

  “It isn’t Gloria.”

  “But who—”

  “Susanna. This is Gloria’s sister.”

  Elam couldn’t move. For a moment, he couldn’t think. Not Gloria…but so like her…

  “Elam Jensen, get moving!” Keara snapped, shocking him from his idiocy.

  He reached for the woman who was not Gloria, and when his hand touched her left shoulder, she cried out. He felt something sticky and realized that the scent lingering in the air was the coppery smell of blood.

  “Elam?” The woman’s voice was weak. “I’m here? I made it?” She looked up at him as Keara reached for a lantern on the porch and lit it.

  “Yes, it’s me. You’ve made it.” As the woman’s face glowed in the lantern light, he pushed away thoughts of Gloria. “Susanna, what’s happened? What are you doing here?”

  “I’m in trouble.” Her eyes slid shut. “Hide me,” she whispered. “Hide Duchess. No one must see her. Help me. A man tried to kill me. He’ll finish the job if he can.”

  Keara set the lantern on the porch and inspected the bloody wound in Susanna’s shoulder.

  “Let’s get her inside,” Elam said.

  “She needs a doctor now, Elam. She needs more help than I can give her. The buggy—”

  “No quack from Eureka Springs,” Susanna said, her voice weak but determined. “I didn’t come to Arkansas for those so-called healing waters.”

  “But you’re hurt,” Keara said.

  “Hide me.” Susanna went limp.

  “But Elam,” Keara said, her voice trembling, “she needs medical care quickly. Look at the blood.”

  He examined the injury. “First, we do as she says.” He lifted his sister-in-law into his arms. “We’ll put her in Britte’s room for now. No one will be going in there tonight. We can keep her concealed.”

  “What? Look at her! She must be out of her mind if she thinks—”

  He turned to Keara. “What if she isn’t? Don’t forget the telegram I received last month.”

  Keara caught her breath. “Nathaniel. But the telegram said it was an accidental shooting.”

  “I know what it said, but—”

  “You think Susanna’s husband was murdered?”

  “I don’t know, but what if he was? We can’t take chances with her.”

  “She’s still got to have a doctor.”

  “You’re as close as we’re getting tonight.” He kept his voice firm, though Keara’s fear was obvious, and he shared it mightily. Still…he knew this was the right thing to do. He’d learned in his marriage to Gloria that if she feared something, it was to be feared. He suspected the rest of her family was the same way.

  “But we can’t just shove her away in a back room when she’s—”

  “You heard her, Keara.” He kept his voice gentle, feeling badly that, for the time being, his new bride would be responsible for treating Susanna’s injuries. On her wedding night. “Would you please get the door?”

  Despite her protests, Keara did as he asked, and the scent of cedar wafted out to greet them. “This is crazy, Elam.”

  “Not if she’s in danger.” And it had been hovering for a while, if Elam’s guess was right. Too many past events made him wonder… .

  “Her life’s also in danger if we don’t get her to a doctor.”

  “Keara.”

  She stopped, eyes widening at what he knew was an unusual sharpness to his tone.

  “Listen to me,” he said more gently. “You can treat her. I’ve seen you work miracles on people and horses. It’s time for another one, because if we take a buggy into town, or if one of us rides back for the doctor in Eureka Springs, everyone in the county will know about it by morning because of the guests on their way out here now. We can’t take that chance.”

  Keara held the lantern high as she ascended the stairs ahead of him. “You put too much faith in me, Elam. I’m not a doctor. Susanna’s the doctor, and she doesn’t look to be in any shape to tell me what to do or how to do it.”

  “You get her back amongst the living and she’ll be glad to tell you all about it,” he said dryly. From Gloria’s own lips, he knew that her sister always did have a mind of her own and was never afraid to speak it. Much like Gloria herself.

  As soon as he’d laid Susanna’s slender body on Britte’s bed, he grabbed the lantern in the room and lit it. They needed lots of light in here. “Get out those poultices and herbs of yours. My bottle of whiskey is in the top cupboard in the kitchen. I’m going to put the mare in the barn. Susanna’s sure to have brought her doctor’s bag with her so I’ll bring you whatever medical supplies I can find.”

  “But I don’t know how to use them.”

  “You’ll have to use what you can, and just do what you do best.”

  “The others will be coming any minute.”

  “Then we’ll have to hurry.”

  “We can’t keep this quiet for long.”

  Keara was right. He thought for a moment while adjusting the flame in the lantern. “You’re going to have to suddenly take ill,” he said. “The way you’ve been breathing in that torture device my sisters rigged up, that shouldn’t be too hard. We’ll have to call the chivaree short tonight.”

  With a quick release of her breath, Keara sagged for a second against the dresser. “Lord, give us wisdom,” she murmured.

  Each time Elam glanced at Susanna, he had more questions. In the flickering lantern light, Susanna’s face half in shadow, the room seemed surreal to him, her body in motion instead of quiet repose. If only she would awaken with answers, show them how to help her.

  “If she came here, and if she told us to keep her secret,” he said, “there’s a reason for it.”

  Keara pushed away from the dresser. She leaned over Susanna and studied the bloody shoulder. “That’s a fresh wound.”

  “Exactly.”

  “It must have happened nearby.”

  “Which emphasizes her need for secrecy.” Elam stepped to the bureau they had moved into Britte’s room for Keara’s use. He pulled out the top drawer and gestured to the dried leaves, roots, and herbs she’d brought from her home yesterday. “You stopped the bleeding in Freda Mae’s flank and kept it from infection.”

  “Susanna’s not a horse.”

  “She’s flesh and blood. Remember what we were talking about on the way here? You have a healing touch. Use it.”

  He spared another lingering glance toward the woman who looked so much like her older sister. Longing and loss streamed through him in a fresh current, and he turned away quickly.

  The children must not see her or their loss would be freshened in them, as well. He would ask David and Penelope if they would keep the children for another day or two, at least until he decided what to do about Susanna.

  The smell of coal oil blended with the cedar as he rushed back down the stairway and out the front door. Droplets of blood stained the steps, but not too many. God willing, Susanna hadn’t bled too much, but Keara would be the judge of that.

  Much as Elam felt the need to stay close and help Keara, he was controlled by the sense of urgency he’d heard in Susanna’s voice.

  As he grasped the mare’s bridle and turned to lead her to the barn, he couldn’t help pondering what might have happened. The biggest conflict in these parts had been the extension of the railroad into Harrison, Arkansas, straight from Seligman, Missouri. Eureka Springs was no longer the end of the line, and therefore would no longer be such a center of commerce.

  The population was already dropping as folks followed the money trail, and fortunes were being lost—not all, because tourists and the ill still came here for the waters—but trouble still brewed in Eureka Springs. He’d seen bouts of violence as a result of the losses. Some of the new breed of tourists—only a handful, but too many, in his opinion—were troublemakers.

  But what would events in Arkansas have to do with a couple of married doctors all
the way back east in Pennsylvania?

  Elam needed to talk with Susanna as soon as she roused.

  Duchess was a huge, eye-catching animal with a spirited step, despite the dried sweat and mud on her coat. Her mane and tail had been clipped exceedingly short. He wished he could read the thoughts behind those large, dark eyes.

  He was guiding her into the roomiest stall in the barn when he heard the rattle of a wagon and the calls of hopeful partiers. He sighed and patted the horse’s neck then pulled off the huge saddle and reached for a curry comb. This night promised to extend into forever.

  Five

  Keara tried to ignore the voices outside the window, the laughter and catcalls, as she poured a small amount of whiskey into the wound on Susanna’s shoulder. Only a low moan escaped Susanna’s lips, but it was encouraging. At least she wasn’t so far gone that she could feel nothing. The whiskey would burn like fire, but like fire, it would help cleanse the torn flesh.

  To Keara’s regret, the bullet—if indeed this was a bullet wound, and it sure did look like one—had obviously not gone through the backside of the shoulder. This meant that sooner or later Keara would have to remove it. Susanna moaned again. It could be done later.

  Eyes the blue of a summer sky opened and studied Keara. They narrowed. “Who are you?”

  “I’m…a friend. Don’t worry, Elam’s out hiding your horse in the barn.”

  The gaze went to the window. “I hear voices.”

  “Friends and family. There’s been a wedding, and…” Keara raised her arm and noted she’d stained the lacy sleeve of her mother’s beautiful wedding dress with Susanna’s blood.

  Susanna’s gaze sharpened, and she lifted her head. “You’re the bride?”

  “That’s not important right now. Did you bring medical supplies with you? Are you hurt anywhere besides your shoulder? It doesn’t appear you’ve lost a whole lot of blood. You were shot?”