Bound for Eden

by Tess LeSue

  “I think you’re being awful unfair,” Seline told him hotly. “You only come to town once a year. Why should I give up my few nights a year just because Dolly’s got some cousin who is willing to give it away for free? You did promise you’d come back for a visit with me today.”

  Luke sighed. “I s’pose I did,” he admitted. “And I was going to, but then you got unreasonable about Victoria.”

  “Victoria?” Seline’s face darkened again.

  “The runt’s sister. And there you go again, looking like some kind of thundercloud.”

  Seline sashayed closer and rested her palm against his chest; she tilted her head and looked up at him through her lashes. “I’m sorry. You know I’m a passionate girl.” Her hand trailed down his chest, to his stomach, and lower. “Ain’t that why you like me?” She fitted her body to his and rose on tiptoe to kiss him, her tongue assaulting his mouth instantly.

  * * *

  • • •

  ALEX COULDN’T BELIEVE it. Within half an hour of leaving her bed he was all over another woman. She grabbed a hay bale and tried to hurl it into the stall where the oxen were still snorting and slurping at the trough. The bale bounced off the rail and thudded into Luke, knocking him and his whore sideways.

  “Watch what you’re doing,” Seline snarled.

  “Sorry,” Alex muttered, in a voice that implied she wasn’t sorry at all.

  “Where in the blazes have you been?” Luke said. “I’ve got better things to do than look after your animals.”

  I bet, Alex thought sourly, remembering the intense blackness of his gaze and the heat of his kisses. “Dolly tried to make me take a bath,” she mumbled, inventing quickly.

  “Don’t look like she succeeded.”

  “I don’t like baths,” Alex said sullenly, even as she thought longingly of the hot water and the musky rose soap she’d enjoyed. What a waste. Now look at her, filthy again, and looking for all the world like a flat-chested, prepubescent boy.

  “I’m amazed Dolly let you touch her, looking like that.”

  Alex blinked.

  “Don’t look all innocent at me,” Luke accused. “She went and confessed everything. In my book you’re far too young. Mark my words, you’ve time enough to waste your gold chasing after women.”

  “Hypocrite,” Seline giggled. “Don’t listen to him, you can come and waste your gold with me any day.”

  Alex gave her a black look.

  “Here’s your change.” Luke tossed her the bag of gold. It was considerably lighter, and the few pieces left made a disconsolate clicking sound as she caught it. She glanced over at Blackie Junior, happily munching on his oats. What had she been thinking? What did she need with a horse?

  It was all his fault; she wouldn’t have even been at the auction if it hadn’t been for him. He was nothing but trouble. Alex glared at him.

  Luke didn’t notice. He was too distracted by Seline’s wandering hands. “I’ll go for half-price,” she was whispering in his ear, “and I’ll make it all up to you.”

  Alex scowled. The man didn’t care which woman he was with. She had to resist the urge to give him a kick.

  “Make sure they’re fed,” Luke told Alex absently as he let Seline lead him from the stable.

  * * *

  • • •

  ALEX HAD TO bite her tongue at dinner that night when Victoria was singing his praises. They were holed up in their room, eating picnic-style on the bed, hiding from the Gradys.

  “Don’t you think it’s the sign of a true gentleman to look after us this way?” Victoria twittered.

  “We’re paying him,” Alex grumbled.

  “Speaking of money,” her sister said, pausing and pursing her lips, “Luke told me what you did.”

  Alex’s head snapped up and her cheeks flared scarlet. For an instant she could feel the brush of his fingers against her bare skin and that strange, insistent pulse deep inside . . .

  “The horse?” Victoria prompted.

  Of course. Blackie Junior. Alex pressed her cool palms to her cheeks, silently berating herself. Luke had no idea he’d kissed her today. In his mind, he’d kissed Dolly’s cousin.

  “You know we need that money,” Victoria said primly, “but Luke said not to scold you. He said that you did it out of the goodness of your heart. That you knew he didn’t have the money here in Missouri to pay for the horse. He told me about how when we get to Oregon he’s going to buy the horse off us.”

  “He did, did he?” Alex said darkly. Why that mercenary . . .

  “We’re not selling Blackie Junior are we, Alex?” Adam asked in alarm, looking up from the mashed potato he’d been shoveling into his mouth.

  “Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Victoria reprimanded him. “Where are your manners?”

  Alex gave Adam’s arm a squeeze and shook her head ever so slightly, and he returned to his potatoes happy. She’d be damned if she’d give that man the satisfaction.

  “Luke’s arranged a meeting of everyone in our party tomorrow at Mrs. Tilly’s Tearooms,” Victoria chattered happily. “So we can see who we’re traveling with, and so he can give us some final instructions.”

  “When exactly did he tell you this?”

  “When he brought Adam back. He showed me the oxen—they really are ugly, aren’t they? I think I should have preferred mules. But I suppose Luke knows best.”

  Alex wondered when he’d become “Luke” instead of “Mr. Slater.” He was a fast worker, that was for sure. She bit her lip as she regarded Victoria’s dreamy expression. She sure would hate for her sister to get hurt.

  She was mighty tempted to tell him so, the next day at the tearooms, when he greeted Victoria with an enormous smile. Victoria practically turned to liquid. Flirting with whores was one thing, but leading on an innocent like her sister . . .

  “Now we’re all here, I’m going to make a few announcements, and run through the equipment and supplies you should have, and then we’ll just take the time to get to know one another,” Luke declared after they had settled themselves in Mrs. Tilly’s side room.

  Mrs. Tilly was a widow in her fifties. She had rosy cheeks and sparkling blue eyes, and was clearly smitten with Luke.

  “He always holds his meetings here,” she had confided in Alex and Victoria when she led them through to the room. “Such a lovely man.”

  “Isn’t he?” Victoria agreed with a sigh.

  Alex had to restrain herself from snorting. Lovely man, my foot, she thought sullenly; he just knows how to wind every female of the species around his little finger. Just look at him now, up there at the front of the room, comfortable with every eye upon him, oozing charm, making sure to make eye contact with each and every one of them. She was gratified when he blinked, startled, as he met her evil stare. Not everyone is taken in by you, she snarled silently.

  She was so busy with her evil thoughts that she didn’t hear a word he said. She supposed it didn’t matter, as Luke himself had helped to outfit them, but she found she couldn’t join in any of the conversation afterward. Then again, no one really expected her to—they all thought she was just a child. She even found herself ushered over to the table set up in the corner for the children. All of them were between the ages of five and ten, except for fifteen-year-old Jane O’Brien, and they amused themselves by torturing one another and throwing food.

  Alex didn’t like the way Jane was looking at her. “How old are you?” the girl asked. She was one of three sisters and had big brown eyes and a spattering of freckles across her nose.

  Alex cleared her throat; she was still uncomfortable with lying. She was almost twenty, but she forced herself to say, “Sixteen.”

  “You don’t look sixteen.”

  “I’m taller than you.”

  Jane gave her a shy look through her eyelashes and Alex’s heart sank. She knew t
hat look. It was the look Victoria kept giving Luke. Fortunately, Mrs. Tilly chose that moment to deliver plates of sandwiches and pastries to their table. “I know you children aren’t too fond of tea, so I’ve made a nice batch of lemonade. With extra sugar.” She gave them a wink.

  “Do you think I could have some tea, please?” Alex asked politely.

  “Me too,” Jane said quickly. “After all, we’re really not children anymore.”

  “Of course not,” Mrs. Tilly agreed, beaming at them and clucking like a mother hen. “I’ll bring over a pot.”

  “Where are you from?” Jane asked, and Alex looked longingly at the other table, where the adults were getting to know one another. Victoria was sitting between Adam and a bookish-looking man, but she was desperately trying to catch Luke’s eye.

  Luke was too busy talking to a bunch of the men to notice.

  “That’s my father,” Jane said, following Alex’s gaze, and Alex realized she meant the bookish man next to her sister.

  “I’m with Victoria and Adam. Next to him.”

  “You’re family? You don’t look like them.”

  Alex wondered how on earth she could tell, what with all the muck Alex had smothered on herself. “I’m adopted,” she explained shortly.

  After another few minutes at the children’s table, fending off cucumber-sandwich missiles and Jane’s attentions, Alex just wanted to leave. But she could tell by the stubborn look on Victoria’s face that she was planning to stay to the bitter end, in the hopes of catching a moment alone with Luke.

  “You’re in a foul mood today,” a voice drawled from above, and she looked up into those horribly familiar black eyes.

  One of the boys chose that precise moment to hurl a strawberry tart at her; it landed with a wet squelch against her cheek and the table erupted into giggles. “I can’t imagine why,” Alex told him dryly, wiping strawberry jam from her face.

  “I suppose now that you’re . . . all grown up . . . you think you don’t belong with the children.” His eyes were twinkling and she knew by “all grown up” he was referring to the experience he assumed she’d had with Dolly.

  “Oh, Mr. Slater,” Jane exclaimed in her defense, “there’s an awfully big difference between ten and sixteen.”

  “Sixteen?” His eyes narrowed dubiously as he considered Alex.

  She set her jaw stubbornly and stared right back at him. “Nearly seventeen.”

  “That’s practically a man,” Jane said earnestly.

  “Jane and Alex sitting in a tree,” her younger sisters, Susan and Ellen, chorused in singsong voices. Jane picked up splattered strawberry tart and threw it at them.

  Luke laughed at the long-suffering expression on Alex’s face. “I came over to get you, runt. I want you to show the Watts brothers the way to our friend’s place.” He lowered his voice significantly and Alex realized he meant Dolly’s cathouse.

  “I wouldn’t mind a walk . . .” Jane hinted.

  Both Luke and Alex looked at her, horrified.

  “Ah . . . I’ve got to feed our animals right after,” Alex lied.

  Jane’s face fell. “But you’ll be at the dance tomorrow night?”

  “I guess so.” Victoria had spent the last two days trying to convince Alex it was safe to go. They think that you abandoned us and are heading east, her sister had said as she happily sewed her new dress. What’s the bet they’re on a steamboat this minute, heading back to St. Louis. Alex wasn’t convinced. But they were about to leave civilization for a good long while and she didn’t have the heart to disappoint her sister. She could only hope that when Gideon found no trace of a blond woman spending his gold here in Independence he would follow the rumor east.

  Jane gave Alex a shy smile as she rose from the table. “Maybe we could have a dance?”

  “I don’t dance.”

  Luke laughed and clapped her on the shoulder. “He’s just being modest, Miss O’Brien. Alex is a great dancer—he’d love to dance with you.”

  Alex took care to tread on his foot as she passed him, and resolved to tell Seline that he wanted to see her tonight. And then she might tell Flora, Margaret and Gracie the same thing. They’d just see how he liked dealing with the four of them.

  “Your sister ain’t spoken for?” Henry Watts asked Alex curiously as she led them to Dolly’s. Alex gave him a sour look. She didn’t appreciate him asking after her sister when he was off to visit a whore. “She sure is pretty,” he said.

  “Sure is,” his brother Joseph echoed. “And not in an obvious way. She looks like a real decent girl.”

  “She is,” Alex said shortly.

  She didn’t go into Dolly’s when they got there. She watched them mount the front steps and then turned and dragged her feet back to the hotel. Victoria and Adam weren’t back yet. She lay on the bed and stared at the water stains on the ceiling. She felt tangled up and out of sorts, and for once it had nothing to do with the Gradys, or with finding enough food, or with getting them out to Oregon. All she could think about were the swirling currents of a wicked black gaze . . .

  She turned her head and saw Victoria’s new yellow dress hanging from the door. It was simple but very pretty, the cheery color of sunshine and buttercups. It would suit Victoria’s coloring tremendously. Alex pictured her at the dance, a graceful sunbeam, pretty and feminine, twirling around the floor . . . led by strong muscular arms. Her chestnut hair would be pulled up into a loose cascade of curls—or maybe she’d even wear it down, the way Alex no longer could—and she would stare blissfully up into those tender, teasing, seductive eyes.

  Alex’s insides twisted with jealousy. If only she could dance with him. She closed her eyes. She could imagine the way his hands would feel on her body . . . Only she didn’t need to imagine, she thought with a sigh. She knew how it felt.

  It felt like heaven.

  12

  EVERYBODY IN INDEPENDENCE turned out for the Saturday night dances. Almost weekly there was a new batch of wagoners about to head out, feeling merry and ready to kick up their heels.

  The town square was hung with paper lanterns and lined with stalls selling ale, lemonade, sandwiches, corn on the cob and cakes. Children ran squealing through the dusky lavender twilight as the band tuned up on the courthouse steps.

  Victoria looked prettier than she ever had in her life. Her chestnut hair hung straight and glossy to her waist, adorned with a blue satin ribbon. The yellow dress fit her like a glove and made the most of her slender figure, and the color made her skin glow. Alex was green with envy. Not that anyone could tell—the green tinge to her skin was well camouflaged by the dirt.

  The members of their party had claimed a trestle table under the large sycamore, and Alex watched them greet Victoria warmly. The single men snatched their hats off their heads and practically tripped over one another in an effort to offer Alex’s sister a drink, a seat, a sweet or their hand for the first dance.

  No one even noticed scruffy old Alex.

  At least no one except Jane O’Brien. “Oh, you came,” she exclaimed, blushing prettily. “I wasn’t sure you would. You look . . . nice.”

  Alex looked down at herself and wondered if the girl was blind. Then she noticed the way Jane was plucking at her own blue dress and realized that she was expected to return the compliment. “You look nice too,” she said glumly.

  “Would you like to take a walk and get some lemonade?”

  “Jane.” Ned O’Brien was striding toward them, giving Alex a hard look.

  Jane started guiltily. “Oh, Daddy. Alex and I were just going for a walk.”

  Ned shook his head. “I’d like to talk with young Mr. Alexander, if you don’t mind.”

  “Oh, Daddy,” she sighed, but she obeyed. Alex noticed she kept shooting wistful glances back over her shoulder as she went.

  “Now,” Ned said, looking deep into Al
ex’s eyes, “I don’t want you to get any ideas regarding my daughter.”

  Alex flushed, feeling inexplicably like a criminal.

  “She’s very young and she’s led a sheltered life. She doesn’t know how forward she can seem.”

  “No, sir,” Alex mumbled.

  Ned cleared his throat. “I saw you at,” he lowered his voice, “Dolly’s the other day.”

  Alex wished the ground would open and swallow her up.

  “And I can’t say that I approve,” the easterner continued, “but I’m not your father. What I will say is that we have a long trip ahead of us, and I expect you to treat my daughters the way you would treat your own sister.”

  Alex felt as though the dirt had soaked through her skin. She’d never be able to clean it off. Not only did people look at her and see a scruffy boy, they saw a scruffy reprobate, the kind of person no decent parent would let their daughter associate with. How ashamed Ma and Pa Sparrow would be of her, let alone her own parents. All of them must be turning in their graves. Alex slunk to the table, feeling like the lowest of the low.

  “Why, Miss Victoria,” a smooth voice said, sliding through Alexandra’s funk, “aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”

  Alex couldn’t believe the change in him. She’d never seen Luke Slater dressed up before. The man looked wonderful in rumpled traveling clothes, incredible in his everyday wear, magnificent wearing nothing at all, but there just weren’t words to describe him when he was dressed up in his best suit.

  The cut of the jacket made his shoulders seem wider and his body longer and leaner, and the brilliant white of his shirt made his skin look very dark. He’d had a haircut, Alex noticed, and a close shave. Somehow, he looked even more masculine now that the high cheekbones and strong jaw were smooth.

  Alex was having trouble breathing. And so too, she realized, was Victoria.