Your young man, she’d said. Bess looked into her mother’s eyes. Their sternness had gentled to a soft blue-gray. Bess couldn’t hide a smile. “You like him?”
“He’s not altogether without charm. Very concerned about Miss Shelton, and very brave as well.”
Coming from her mother, it was incredibly high praise. “My heart felt like it jumped into my throat when I saw him bleeding that way. I’m so angry with this Hollas fellow I could gouge his eyes myself. Do you suppose it’s un-Christian to hope he hangs?”
“Certainly not. The whole town feels that way, after Mrs. Tanner’s death. And abducting a bride from her own wedding —why, every man in town and half the women would line up to do the honors. I shouldn’t be surprised if some of the rougher class threw a hanging party before he ever made it to the jail. If they can catch him, that is.”
“They have to,” Bess insisted.
“I shouldn’t think, with his scars, the beast would have any chance of escaping justice.”
“John is going to take Amelia home, but Hannah . . .”
“The poor woman needs time to heal, and of course she must have privacy. It would be unthinkable to put her back in a hotel. A lady simply cannot be seen in her condition. She’ll stay here until she’s well, and her betrothed may come to call as often as he likes. Provided he keeps his visits to respectable hours.”
Bess kissed her mother’s cheek. “Thank you. Thank you for everything.”
Mrs. Brannon smiled. Bess knew she loved the role of magnanimous matron. But she wasn’t finished being generous. “And before your young man leaves, I’d like him to speak with your father.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Jacob Handley roundly cursed the telegram. So that’s what Malcolm had been up to. The stupid bastard had completely lost his mind, and now it would be up to him to spare his friend the consequences.
He had to admit he’d missed Malcolm these last months. They’d often share a few drinks and talk of women, horses, and the law. Jacob’s position as county sheriff he owed mostly to Shelton’s influence, so he never spared sharing the most interesting details.
The two of them went way back, to boyhood. Together, they’d explored the hills, shot copperheads, even discovered their first whore. When he thought of Big Belinda, his lips curved in a smile, and he stroked a thick mustache the ladies still found handsome enough.
He and Malcolm shared the same opinion of women. Marry one, to keep your home and breed your children. But don’t let that make you disappoint the others. He and Shelton might be respected civic leaders, even deacons in their church, but that needn’t curtail a bit of harmless fun.
Usually harmless, Jacob admitted to himself as he thought of Hannah. She had never understood the rules. Unlike his poor, deluded Belle, she’d confronted Malcolm’s excursions with a wall of solid ice. Who could blame the man for tiring of that treatment?
Of course Malcolm had been ruthless in the way he’d handled Hannah. But a man couldn’t very well be expected to hand over his business to a woman after all the years and sweat he had invested.
After the divorce, Jacob felt sorry for the lonely woman. He chuckled to himself. The fact that she was the most beautiful thing in Shelton’s Creek hadn’t hurt either. But the ungrateful slut had slapped him —and then she disappeared.
At first, Jacob listened to the local gossips. Maybe Malcolm had killed her. He sure as hell had temper enough for it. Jacob might have let some evidence slip past him, for the sake of friendship, but no proof appeared in his investigation. Nothing but the blood and broken glass.
Finally, he concluded Hannah must have set up the whole thing. Malcolm’s indignation, even in private, was too real. And when Jacob thought of it, he couldn’t piece together even the thinnest motivation for the man to kill his former wife. She lived in poverty, disgraced beyond redemption, without a single friend to stand beside her, while Malcolm suffered the attentions of townswomen eager to console him after the divorce. Hell, he’d even snagged a rich one for a second wife.
No, he hadn’t killed her, but his business had turned sour. And then the righteous fury had built up and up, until he barely could contain it.
So he’d gone after her, thought Jacob. And from the looks of this telegram, he’d found her. He shook his head and grimaced.
“By God,” he told his glass of whiskey, “I hope this time you finished it.”
o0o
In front of Daniel, his horse’s breath steamed in the frigid, winter air. For the last three weeks, he’d spent many hours in the saddle, riding from his uncle’s farm to visit Hannah. Each time he saw her, the bruises on her face continued their metamorphosis. Though she still looked battered, she moved more easily.
When she chose to move at all. She spent long hours in a chair inside that room, doing needlework with Bess while gazing out the window. Watching, always watching, terrified, she told him, that Malcolm would come back.
Another snowfall had kept him away for several days, but the last time he’d seen her, Daniel tried to discuss a new date for their marriage.
“I’ll think about it when he’s caught.” Hannah refused to say more on the subject.
Daniel hated the fear he saw in her face, as well as the fear in his own heart. Would she ever move beyond this? Would either of them heal?
The letter in his pocket wouldn’t help. Though he hated to let her read it, he knew he’d have to. The sheriff had to know if his men were seeking the wrong suspect.
Mrs. Brannon welcomed him warmly, and Bess inquired about his brother.
“I haven’t seen him since last time I came. I imagine he’s trying to keep warm and keep Amelia out of mischief.”
Bess took him to the doorway of the parlor. “I promised mother I’d help her with the weekly menus,” she said as she retreated toward a gold-painted corridor.
Daniel waved, then turned his attention to the parlor, where he was shocked to find Hannah absorbed in a game of chess with Mr. Brannon. Daniel stood in the doorway, too intrigued to interrupt.
As if in defiance of her fading bruises, Hannah peered intently at the board. Her opponent adjusted his waistcoat around a thickening middle and tapped his pipe against the table. Almost nervously, or as if he were trying to distract her. Daniel didn’t know the game, but even he could see she had captured most of Mr. Brannon’s pieces.
An almost feline smile curved Hannah’s lips as she picked up a piece carved like a small castle. “I believe that would be checkma—”
Mr. Brannon leapt to his feet. “Oh, dear. You have a guest, Miss Shelton. I’m afraid our game is at an end.”
“But —”
“—Entertaining guests is a woman’s province, and besides, I’m beginning to regret teaching you this game.” He extended a welcoming hand to Daniel. “And I thank you, sir, for the timely interruption.”
“You mean rescue,” Hannah said.
Daniel laughed, as much with relief at Hannah’s smile as anything. It was the first time he’d seen her smile since the abduction.
He hated to be the one to wipe it from her face.
“I believe I’ll leave you two for the sanctuary of my study,” Mr. Brannon told them. “It’s the last refuge for a man bested by females.”
“He’s really very pleasant,” Hannah told Daniel as they sat on the divan. “He and Bess convinced Mrs. Brannon to allow me out of bed. Rest is one thing, but I can’t just lie there reading and doing needlepoint, waiting to be ‘presentable.’ It gives me too much time to think and stare out that damned window.”
“You sound like Hannah.” Daniel grinned at her. “It’s good to have you back.”
She leaned toward him, then hesitated, as if some painful memory had risen up between them.
“It’s all right,” he reminded her, repeating the litany she never seemed to tire of hearing. “You’re safe, and it’s all right now.”
She settled into his embrace, her soft exhalation like a breath of spring upo
n his neck.
“I love you so much,” she said.
He stroked her hair and accidentally knocked a pin askew. He moved as if to fix it, but instead loosed all her tresses.
“Do you have any idea how long it took to do that with this hand?” Hannah displayed her left, still discolored with bruises which had faded to green-gold.
“It looks prettier this way.” After a last, lingering caress, he fished the letter from his pocket. “I have some bad news here.”
She sat up straighter, a wary expression on her face. “Tell me. I’m a grown woman, not a child, and despite what some may think, there is a difference.”
Daniel nodded. Though he agreed with her, that didn’t make this any easier to say. “Sheriff Skinner received this letter from some fella back in your hometown. Calls himself the Sells County sheriff. He says he saw Malcolm on and around the day —the day he took you. Says he can produce a deposition from Shelton’s wife as well.”
Beneath the mask of bruising, her face grew icy pale. But he wasn’t yet finished, though he wished to God he could stop now.
“He suggests . . .”
“He suggests what, Daniel? Tell me now.”
“He thinks you’re on a campaign to destroy Mr. Shelton. Either that or you’re hysterical. Maybe confused about what you saw.”
“Confused? As if I wouldn’t know a man I married?”
“Skinner wondered, with the head wounds, if maybe —”
“Sheriff Skinner was swayed by that pack of lies?” She stared at him, her eyes round with sudden wonder. “And you? You think it’s possible that I’m —that I’m mistaken?”
For just a moment, he supposed he had, but he’d be damned if he’d admit it. Besides, Malcolm as attacker made much more sense than some so-called stranger, this mysterious Captain Hollas.
“You’re not wrong,” he said. “I met Malcolm back before the fire. I couldn’t see his face this time, but I remember how he wanted you. He tried then to —to do just what he did. But the witnesses . . .”
She took the letter and examined it, then laughed without a trace of humor. “Jacob Handley. Malcolm’s old friend, Jake! They’re a pair. A couple of adulterous whoremongers.”
“I’ll try to convince Sheriff Skinner —”
“Why? Malcolm has more connections than Jesus Christ in Shelton Creek. He’s going to get away with this. He’s going to get away with murder!”
“There has to be something we can do.”
“Not we. You have a daughter, Daniel, and a farm that needs you.”
A jolt of fear leapt through him. “You haven’t changed your mind about our marriage?”
“If there’s one thing on this earth I’m sure of, it’s your love for me. When I think of what you did, how you’ve stood by me, I feel . . . so fortunate. Another man would have walked away, or at the very least made me feel he was only offering to honor our marriage agreement out of a sense of duty.”
He held his peace, dreading what he sensed was coming next.
Hannah shook her head. “I should marry you this minute. But when I think of it, when I think of all that we could have together, I start shaking, worrying, looking out those windows. Thinking he can steal it all away, any time he wants. There’s nothing I can have that he can’t take.”
“I won’t let him. Hannah, I’ll protect you from now on.” God knows, he would have to find a way. Every time he slept, he had nightmares about pulling her out of that icy creek with her face so bruised he barely recognized it. He woke up screaming sometimes at images of Malcolm pummeling and —worse yet —raping her. He’d rather die than let her go through that again.
Hannah stood, walked over to the chess set, and picked up a crowned player. “The queen,” she explained. “The most powerful piece on the board. Yet if she sits in what she thinks is safety, she’ll be taken. Just as I was.”
She slid the piece across the board and picked up one of the few remaining black pieces. “Only by attacking can she win the game.”
“Hannah? You’re talking about some rich man’s parlor amusement like it’s your life.”
“It is. Don’t you understand? I tried to hide. I sat and waited for him come for me, to take everything that mattered. And now they’re going to let him get away with it. Even if he never comes within five hundred miles again, I’ll spend the rest of my life cringing at every footfall, jumping at each shadow. Pitiful.”
She leaned over and swept the pieces to the floor, a gesture so unlike her, he leapt to his feet. A piece rolled across the parquet and came to rest against his boot.
“I won’t be pitiful. When I think about a wedding, I think of pain and death and —and that man inside me! I think of Malcolm offering a quick and easy death, as if he really wanted to spare me the grief and shame. I don’t want to end up wishing I’d accepted his offer. I don’t want to settle for whatever crumbs he left me of my life.”
Bess stood in the doorway, hands halfway to her mouth. Mr. Brannon came up behind her and discreetly ushered her away.
“Let them be,” he whispered and slid shut the paneled door.
Daniel stood, and, feeling helpless, ran his fingers through his hair. “I should have been there sooner. Maybe I could have —”
She moved into his arms and interrupted with a kiss. Soft and warm, it bound them, then was over far too quickly. “No,” she said. “Don’t ever think it was your fault. I know you want to care for me. John once told me you’re good with wounded things, and he was right. But some things need tending. Others have to pull back and heal all on their own. It’s time for me to do that. I can’t marry you until I’m whole.”
“Hannah, right now we need each other more than ever.”
She stepped away from him. “You’re wrong. Right now we need to be apart. Otherwise, there won’t be any later.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“Daniel! Dan Aldman!”
Daniel turned in his saddle to face Petey. Right now he wasn’t in the mood for socializing, but he hadn’t seen his old friend in weeks. He dismounted and shook Petey’s hand.
The shanty boy grinned at him, his front teeth chipped from an old saloon brawl. “Come on inside the Blue Spruce. I’ll pay you back one of those drinks I owe ya. Looks like you could use one anyway.”
Daniel shrugged. Why not? He sorely needed to forget his problems for at least a little while. After tying his horse to a hitching post, he went inside with Petey. The saloon was already populated by the usual assortment of rough-looking men. In one corner, a pair of garishly dressed women laughed too loudly at a grinning logger’s tale.
“I’m flush today. Won me a pocket full o’ rocks at draw poker last night.” The logger scratched his beard, which from the ratty look might be full of crawlies, and shouted out an order for two whiskeys.
“Make mine beer,” Daniel amended. “Draw poker, huh? I’da guessed croquet for a fella with your distinguished manners.”
Petey guffawed and clapped him on the back. “Woulda done that, too, but the fields was all snowed over. You still doctorin’ that mangy dog I brung you?”
“Sure am. He’s healing pretty well.” If Hannah wouldn’t accept his efforts, at least the mongrel wagged a tail. Petey had found him singed and starving, lost among the woods, one last survivor of October’s holocaust. “I call him Sam.”
The logger nodded his approval.
Their drinks arrived on a bar stained with earlier overflows.
“I heard that Malcolm fella come back for your woman. They say he beat her half to death. They ever catch the son of a whore, he’ll never live to trial. A bunch of us, we’re gonna see to that ourselves.”
Another logger, Pug Barton, seated himself beside them without invitation. The huge man was nearly as tall as Daniel, but far heavier. His nose had been flattened years ago, supposedly by another shanty boy’s caulked boot. He was ugly as sin, with about half the personality.
“I hear he had at her.” His voice was loud, a challe
nge. He threw back a whiskey in two gulps, then licked the moisture from his lips.
“Private conversation, Pug,” said Petey. “Do ya mind?”
He acted like he hadn’t heard. “Women. They’re always hollerin’ about a man’s too rough. Hell, Daniel, you were in the army. You had one of them housewife kits to mend your drawers. Ever try to thread the needle while it’s wigglin’? Can’t be done.”
Daniel put down his beer. “Didn’t know you were such a seamstress. Hard to figure, with that outfit of yours.”
Pug leaned closer, sharing the odors of old sweat and rotting teeth. “Ain’t no such thing as rape, is what I’m sayin’. Any man believes it is bein’ played a fool.”
Most times, Daniel realized, he could have tossed off a quick remark to shut up Pug. But today wasn’t most times. He felt a flush of anger heat his face. Before he made a conscious decision to strike, his fists were flying.
Pug, for all his size, moved as quickly as if he’d planned this all along. Savage glee lit his tiny eyes as he hit Daniel in the jaw. Recovering from the glancing blow, Daniel caught sight of a gleam reflecting the poor lamplight. A blade’s gleam, he realized. His opponent held a knife. But Pug had thrown back one drink too many. His first slash went wild. Daniel grasped his wrist and slung him head-first into the bar.
He thought he heard wood crack. In one quick motion, Daniel scooped up the dropped pig-sticker and slid it to the bartender for safe keeping. With a groan of misery, Pug started crawling off. Petey lifted his backside with a boot as he made for the door.
Daniel took his seat once more. “I can’t abide any man that doesn’t talk right about women,” he remarked.
Petey lifted his drink in a toast. “Here’s to fancy manners, then. Good thing my Mama taught me right.”
“Pardon me.”
Daniel turned as his brother stepped inside and nearly tripped on the departing Pug. John joined him in the bar and offered him a handkerchief.
“Your mouth is bleeding.”
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