Midnight Lover

by Barbara Bretton

  "They all know you," she remarked in awe after the tenth sugar-sweet hello had been acknowledged.

  "Real well," he said with a wicked grin, "if you get my meanin'."

  Oh, she certainly got his meaning. Cradled against his muscular chest, Caroline found it impossible to dwell upon her bullet wound. A thousand other sensations were awakening inside her body and that sense of disorientation swooped over her once more as she caught the odd scent of candlewax and spice.

  He carried her up two flights of stairs as if she weighed no more than an English saddle then entered a room at the end of the hallway and kicked the door closed behind them.

  Everywhere Caroline looked she saw red: velvet drapes of deepest ruby; flocked wallpaper with a delicate gold fleur de lis pattern on a garnet background; and—dear God in heaven!—a massive four-poster bed that bore Jesse Reardon's monogram on every scarlet sheet and pillow slip.

  The opulence of the room astonished her. She'd imagined Reardon living in a boarding house somewhere, sleeping on scratchy homespun sheets that cried out for a scrubbing with strong lye soap. Instead, here he was living like a king with Lord-only-knew how many willing subjects at his disposal.

  He placed her down and she sank into the luxuriously soft mattress. The hem of her skirt had risen up above her ankles and, even through her lisle stockings, she could feel the satin's coolness against her heated skin. His scent was all around her, that tang of leather and spice and male power, and a trembling began deep inside her, a trembling she'd never known before.

  His long, muscular thighs pressed against the mattress at the head of the bed and her cheeks flamed from his nearness. She could not continue gazing at his flank—or the interesting geography of the button-front fly of his trousers—and she forced herself to meet his eyes.

  He grinned at her and she held her breath as he bent down toward where she lay.

  "Let's see what we got here," he said, his long fingers quickly undoing the first two buttons of her bodice.

  She cried out as the fabric clung to the burning wound and his hand stroked her cheek and throat in the motion she'd seen a groom use to gentle a skittish pony.

  "Gotta do it." His voice was a low murmur, dark as the midnight blue of his eyes. "Leave it this way and we're asking for trouble."

  He moved to the third button where the fabric grew rounded over the initial swell of her breasts and she felt as if someone had ignited fireworks inside her brain.

  "No," she whispered, breaking away from his gaze. "Let me."

  His hands slowly dropped and although he did not touch her, his heat seemed to insinuate its way into her chest and belly.

  "Turn away." Her fingers hesitating at the button loop. She sensed rather than saw the amused glint in his eyes.

  "Sooner or later I'm going to see it all, Car-o-line."

  "Turn away, Mr. Reardon, please." Dear God, if she didn't have a moment's respite from the fiery heat of his gaze, surely she would go up in flames.

  Finally he acquiesced. "I'll get a basin of water and some alcohol," he said, moving toward the door. "Get yourself ready."

  The moment the door closed behind him Caroline quickly began unfastening the buttons. He had already eased the fabric off the wound so it was an easy matter to slip the dress off to her waist and drape one of the red satin sheets around her torso, baring nothing save her injured shoulder.

  And just in time. Caroline had no sooner arranged her makeshift wrapper when Jesse Reardon marched through the open doorway, carrying a basin and towels and a bottle of whiskey.

  She had to give him credit for he betrayed no emotion whatsoever as he squatted down next to the bed and began gently probing the wound with his callused fingertips. His expression was studiedly bland and distant as he moved the sheet lower, exposing the rise of her breasts and she wondered if he noticed the blush coloring her throat and cheeks.

  "Just like I thought. Surface scratch. No bullet fragments. Ain't nothin' to worry about."

  "You're certain?"

  "Hellfire, I seen a lot worse than this." That wicked glint reappeared in his eyes. "Hardly worth the whiskey to clean it out."

  Caroline tossed her head. "Do not worry, Mr. Reardon. I shall reimburse you the cost."

  He pulled the stopper from the whiskey bottle with his even white teeth then put it down next to her on the bed. "Wouldn't go spendin' money I didn't have, Car-o-line. You're going to need it to get you back to Boston."

  "I'm not going back to Boston. I'm—Oh!" She yelped as the alcohol made contact with her injured shoulder. "Dear God in heaven, have you set fire to me?"

  He put the stopper back in the whiskey bottle and rose to his feet. "That'll do it. Ain't nothing ugly going to live through Jade's one hundred fifty proof snake poison."

  She sat up straight. "Snake poison?!"

  "You know: rotgut. Lightning flash. Tonsil varnish." His grin was amused and altogether too patronizing for Caroline's taste as she continued to stare at him. "Whiskey, darlin'. Don't you know nothing?"

  "Are you finished, Mr. Reardon?" she asked, her voice scrupulously polite.

  He sat down on the edge of the bed. "Not rightly sure, Car-o-line. Are we?"

  Her pulse points leaped into painful, throbbing life as his thigh brushed against the curve of her hip. "What I mean is, may I get dressed?"

  "Seems like a waste of time."

  "Mr. Reardon, you have shown me a kindness. Please do not tarnish that kindness with an untoward comment."

  "I reckon I don't know what in hell you're talkin' about, darlin'. All I'm saying is you need to be bandaged up."

  Her face flamed with embarrassment. "I thought you meant..."

  That lightning grin of his was back. "I know exactly what you thought, Car-o-line."

  "I'm sorry. I was unfair."

  "The hell you were." He ripped off a strip of towel and folded it into a bandage. "Just wait until I finish patchin' you up and we'll see what happens." His gaze travelled lazily across her torso. "Almost makes me sorry you're takin' that stage out this afternoon."

  She pulled the sheet tighter about her torso and scooted toward the middle of the feather bed. "Nothing is going to happen, Mr. Reardon, and although this is the most inopportune of moments, I feel I must inform you I have no intention of taking that stagecoach this afternoon."

  "No point to stayin' in town, darlin'. You'll be out of money before the month is over."

  "That would appear to be my problem, Mr. Reardon, not yours."

  "'Fraid I got to disagree with you on that one. Becomes my problem when you go beggin' around at the banks, lookin' to turn my saloon into a hotel."

  Caroline took a deep breath and struggled to appear composed which, considering her dishabille, was quite a task. "The Crazy Arrow is my saloon, Mr. Reardon, to do with as I wish."

  "Ain't nobody in town going to agree with that. I won it fair and square off your pa in a game of chance."

  "But I have the deed."

  He laughed out loud. "Paper don't mean a hell of a lot around here, Car-o-line. I thought you'd kind of figured that out for your own self."

  "I imagine the circuit judge would have something to say about that code of ethics, Mr. Reardon."

  Reardon grinned. "Bet he would, too, but it don't matter. You'll be gone before he comes 'round again."

  From the street outside they heard the steady clip-clop of horses' hooves heading out of town. "Son of a bitch," muttered Reardon, leaning out the window.

  "The stagecoach?" Caroline ventured, a surge of pure elation racing through her body.

  "Damn right," said Reardon, turning back toward her. "Looks like we're stuck with you another week."

  "It does look that way, doesn't it?"

  He leaned over the bed, imprisoning her against the brass headboard. "You ain't goin' to win this fight, Car-o-line," he said, his voice low. "I'm not a man who takes kindly to losing."

  She gathered both her dignity and her red silk sheet around her and me
t his gaze head on. "There's always a first time, Mr. Reardon."

  He trailed his finger across her lips, her throat, then—dear God!—that rough-tipped finger grazed the curve of her breasts.

  "Remember that, Car-o-line," he whispered. "Sooner or later, there's always a first time."

  * * *

  Jade watched from the doorway, her insides twisting with a violent emotion she understood all too well.

  His voice reached her as if through one of those San Francisco fogs she'd grown up with. The words he spoke to the woman were unimportant; indeed, Jade couldn't make them out over the roaring of her blood pounding wildly inside her head.

  But she knew.

  Her body trembled with the knowledge that this woman with her long golden hair and skin pink as English porcelain was the one.

  "We're two of a kind, Jade," he'd always said, right from the very beginning. "No ties, no lookin' back, no regrets."

  She leaned against the doorjamb as a wave of nausea broke over her. She was tied to him; she had been from the very first moment he'd found her on the streets of San Francisco, bleeding and broken-hearted.

  "We ain't the kind to fall in love," he'd said, but Jade knew better.

  His hand lingered near the woman's breast and Jade held her breath, sick with longing. She'd loved him from the very first and she'd be damned if she would lose him now, not to that golden haired woman.

  Not to anyone at all.

  Chapter 8

  Jesse saw Caroline back to the Crazy Arrow but she refused to allow him inside. The shot of whiskey he'd given her had, indeed, dulled the pain of his ministrations but it had also dulled her senses and the last thing she needed was to have Reardon follow her into the Crazy Arrow. He waited, clearly expecting an invitation, but, instead she stiffly thanked him for cleaning and bandaging her injured shoulder then stood on the porch, guarding the front door until he shrugged his shoulders and, laughing quietly, sauntered back to the Golden Dragon.

  Abby and the girls were waiting for her in the saloon and Caroline found it required tremendous effort to walk a straight line into the room.

  "Is it time for a celebration then?" asked Abby, rushing to her side. "The stage came and went with us sitting here, wonderin' where you were."

  Caroline let her shawl drop off her shoulders, revealing her torn and bloody bodice. "I was shot."

  A collective gasp rose from the seven women.

  "Shot! How on earth—?" Jenny Wilder plucked at Caroline's sleeve and Caroline let out a sharp yelp as the material strained over her bandaged shoulder.

  "I do not know how—or why, for that matter." She took a deep breath, trying to bring order to her fuzzy thoughts. "I was about to enter Howell Bank when it happened."

  "I knew we should have moved on to Virginia City!" exclaimed Betty McGuigan. "At least there you can patronize a bank without being accosted."

  Abby, who had been muttering Irish oaths under her breath, sprang into action. "Up the stairs," she commanded, her capable hands at the small of Caroline's back. "I'll see to that wound before it turns bad on you."

  "It has been taken care of already."

  "There is a doctor in town, miss?" Abby's brows arched in disbelief.

  "I wouldn't know, Abby, for Mr. Reardon bandaged my wound." The shock on their faces would have been quite comical were it not for Caroline's intense embarrassment. Forcing a smile, she gestured toward her shoulder. "He did quite a competent job, you must admit."

  "He took you into the King of Hearts?" Abby sounded properly scandalized.

  "No, he didn't."

  "Saints be praised! At least he's gentleman enough to protect your good name."

  Caroline's face flamed. "I probably no longer have a good name, for he took me to the Golden Dragon."

  "What was it like?" Margaret McGuigan fairly trembled with curiosity. "Is it true they have mirrors on the ceiling?"

  "Margaret!" her sister Betty exclaimed. "How can you ask such an indelicate question?"

  "Oh, nonsense," said Margaret. "Every one of us has been wondering the same thing since we got off the stage last week."

  "Mind your tongue!" scolded Abby. "Miss Caroline is a lady and ladies wouldn't be thinkin' of such scandalous things as mirrors on the ceiling."

  "I didn't see any mirrors on the ceiling," Caroline said, lowering her voice conspiratorially, "but the bed sheets are made of shiny red satin so slippery I almost slid off the mattress!"

  "Oh, dear!" Margaret McGuigan seemed horrified. "I had no idea...I mean..." The girl's voice trailed off uneasily.

  "What on earth is wrong with everyone?" Caroline protested. "He was simply doing me a good Christian turn—"

  Abby sniffed the air suspiciously. "And I suppose good Christians be plyin' unsuspecting spinsters with liquor?"

  "For medic-medicinal purposes," Caroline managed with difficulty. "Bandaging it was quite a painful process."

  Abby crossed herself, eyes raised toward the heavens in supplication, while the other girls stared at Caroline as if she had sprouted horns and a tail.

  "Don't look at me like that! Under the circumstances, I had no choice in the matter."

  "Well, of course you didn't," Jenny Wilder said, patting Caroline's hand. "Taking care of that terrible wound was the most important thing of all."

  "Most certainly," said Betty McGuigan as the other girls nodded in agreement.

  Everyone, that was, except Abby, whose face was stern as Massachusetts granite. "It seems to me a well-bred lady would see to it she was cared for in her own home."

  "Would you rather I bled to death, Abby? My life was draining away with each second!"

  The maid narrowed her eyes as she looked at Caroline's shoulder. "If you don't mind me sayin' so, miss, that wouldn't be lookin' like a mortal wound."

  "How dare you make light of my injury! Why, it might have turned septic and then what would have happened?" Caroline protested.

  "I'm thinkin' a well-bred lady would take that risk so she could reach the privacy of her own quarters, miss."

  "And I'm thinking a well-bred lady would discharge a maid who dared be so impertinent." Caroline drew herself up to her full height and inclined her head toward the other girls. "If you'll excuse me, ladies, I am going to my room to rest." She could not resist casting a sharp look at Abby as she glided toward the door. "The loss of blood has made me quite lightheaded."

  Abby harrumphed. "Perhaps it would be the whiskey that be makin' you lightheaded."

  Caroline stopped at the bottom of the staircase and faced the outspoken young maid. "Did you say something, Abby?" she inquired sweetly. "You must speak up and make yourself heard."

  "I said, 'sleep well, Miss,'" retorted Abby with a smile as phony as a Confederate bill.

  Tripping over the first step, Caroline gathered her shawl and the remnants of her dignity around her and climbed the stairs to her room.

  * * *

  Caroline didn't know if it was the whiskey or a week's worth of restless nights, but she quickly sank into a dreamless sleep and did not awaken until well after dark. Abby had left a pot of tea and a cold supper on her nightstand but Caroline found herself too tired to eat.

  She pulled the sheet up under her chin and tried to go back to sleep but, despite the fact her shoulder no longer hurt, that beautiful dark oblivion eluded her once again. The pain had disappeared, but the primitive sensations Jesse Reardon's touch had unleashed seemed to have taken possession of her body and mind.

  What on earth was the matter with her? For twenty-three years she had laughed at the foolish women who pined for a kiss or a look from a man; she'd been secure in the knowledge that she could never fall victim to temptations of the flesh as her father had been wont to do.

  How quickly it had all changed. From the moment she had first seen Jesse Reardon, she'd been filled with emotions so tempestuous, so dangerous, so terrifying, that for one wild moment she'd had the urge to toss everything aside and flee to the safety of her old life
in Boston.

  She had already sustained a gunshot wound and lived to tell the tale. A stubborn glow of exhilaration filled her soul as she realized that Thomas Addison would probably have run after that stagecoach this afternoon, pleading to be allowed on board, pride be damned!

  Silver Spur wasn't Boston; that much was clear. How difficult it had been to try to explain this new world in the letter she wrote to Thomas Addison that first day in town. Even then she'd understood that the old rules of behavior didn't hold here. In Nevada men talked with their Winchesters and Colts. Was it any wonder a stray bullet had found its mark in her? It was an accident and accidents happened all the time in a town as wild and free as this one.

  Just look at the string of odd episodes that had occurred this past week: The shooting; the neatly sawed-off step in the cellar of the Crazy Arrow; the rock that had sailed through the front window moments after she'd passed by.

  An odd prickle of dread crept up her spine, causing the hairs at the nape of her neck to stand on end. Maybe that hadn't been a stray bullet after all. Maybe someone knew exactly what he was doing when he aimed and fired his gun.

  "Ridiculous!" she said aloud in her dark and lonely bedroom. Her imagination was surely running riot. Who on earth could possibly want her dead? She'd been in town just one week; certainly that was not sufficient time to make a deadly enemy.

  And then Jesse Reardon's image came into her mind. Jesse Reardon with the magic hands and silver-tongued promises that made her face burn even as she lay in her maidenly bed in the saloon she had wrested away from him.

  Only Jesse Reardon stood to profit if she died.

  And dying of pleasure didn't count.

  * * *

  In Boston that afternoon, Thomas Addison watched as his employer, Neville Pearson Lord, leaned back in his chair and laced his aristocratic fingers in front of his aristocratic face.

  "Have you nothing to say for yourself, Thomas?" Lord asked in a voice rich with the sound of the right side of the Charles River. "No explanation for this unfortunate behavior?"