Mail-Order Man

by Martha Hix

  “So, you were scared your strong back would ride out.”

  Was there a defense against a grain of the truth?

  The pitch of his voice lower than before, he ground out, “You were too much of a mouse to admit a lot of things. While you were stringing me along, you let me think you’d never been touched by a man. You never said you mourn a lover.”

  She started to defend her reputation. Why not let Braxton know she was damaged goods? When men married maidens, they expected the maidenly. Surely Braxton would wish to be his wife’s first man. It was highly probable this kept him from claiming Claudine, the fact that she’d had husbands, and not just one or two. Which unearthed yet another dilemma. What if he wouldn’t settle for either of them?

  “James was my lover,” Skylla admitted with false calm.

  “May he rot in hell.”

  His insult wrought sadness and defiance. Yet the level of his attack caused another emotion in her. She wondered if Braxton felt true affection. How could he? I want him to.

  “Skylla, I demand to know why you placed a misleading advertisement. I came to Texas with the impression I was going to marry you. You, not some relative of yours.” He punched the air with a finger. “Petry said nothing—not one goddamn thing!—about a man for your stepmother. He sent me to you.”

  “There’s no need for blasphemy. I won’t have it.”

  “Don’t preach behavior.” Braxton advanced, threatening her thin grip on composure. “Not after your lie of omission.”

  Her muscles jerked, and she felt the strength ebbing from her legs as he asked, “What in hell makes you think some man would come all this way to marry a woman who doesn’t even hold the deed to the ranch?”

  Dead quiet.

  It shouldn’t have hurt, the mercenary twist to his words. It did.

  “Don’t stand there like a church mouse,” Braxton shouted. “Answer me.”

  No one would ever mistake Claudine for a church mouse, which hit at Skylla’s confidence even more. “You frighten me,” she whispered. “Anger is so unlike you.”

  “How little you know.” His chest rose and fell as he blew out a deep breath of aggravation and distaste. He cut the distance between them, stopping close enough to loom over her. The devilish light that so often showed the very life in Braxton was now but a shadow. “What do you think I’ll do? Beat you?” He paused. “Or do you fear I’ll take you in anger?”

  “I’m not quite certain,” she managed to utter. “I don’t think it’ll be pleasant.”

  They stood staring at each other, both in a blur of doubt about the course of their lives. Braxton began to steer it his way. “That’s where you’re wrong. When I take you—and I will take you—it won’t be in anger. When you and I are beneath the covers”—he nudged his head toward the big brass bed—“it’ll be because we’re both hot for each other. And because it’s right. I want you. I want you for my wife. Marry me, Skylla.”

  Marry him. Make love with him. How luscious those concepts. She could get over the hurt of losing James. In Braxton’s arms, where she would know the joys of passion’s culmination. If only the situation weren’t complicated.

  “I can’t marry you.” She couldn’t meet his eyes. “If you marry a St. Clair, it must be Claudine.”

  “Not in my lifetime.” He emitted a mirthless laugh. “It’s you. Or no one.”

  “But she’s so lovely.”

  His gaze canvassed the thin material of Skylla’s nightgown, surveying the woman within. Her prominent ribs and the twisted leg not apparent in the dim light, he replied, “Not as lovely as you.”

  “All her husbands fought a throng of suitors to win her hand, and they adored her to their dying breaths.”

  “I’d slay a thousand dragons for you.”

  All Skylla could do was turn away. “Why must you make this so difficult?”

  “Difficult for you? How do you think I feel?” Braxton took hold of her shoulders, turning her to face him again. “You have cast me off like so much refuse.”

  “Marry Claudine. We’ll make it appealing.”

  “We? What is this ‘we’? You own this ranch, you don’t have to ask anyone’s permission for anything.” He squeezed her shoulders, shaking her. “Don’t let her run your life. Tell her the deal’s off. Or that she can have the next fellow. Better yet, I’ll tell her.”

  “If I marry you, then her husband won’t have any incentive to make something of this place. Claudine must marry first. While I still have the power to give over a one-fourth lifetime estate in the ranch.”

  Braxton shook his head in confusion. “Come again?”

  “Mister Petry advised that I must protect the ranch.” On sure ground, Skylla found it easier to debate. “Once I’m married, my husband will have legal hold on it. I must protect Claudine, and her husband, by deeding an interest in the property while it is mine and mine alone.”

  Braxton’s face blanched beneath his tan. “You didn’t.”

  “Already I’ve given Claudine her part.” Yet the document wouldn’t be legal until the papers were filed, which made it all the more important for Claudine to marry first.

  “So, you’ve given her a chunk of the Nickel Dime.”

  “It’s not the same as out-and-out ownership. A lifetime estate allows the recipient to live on the property for as long as he or she lives, and it can’t be sold without the recipient’s permission. As her husband, you’ll have the right to stay here for the rest of your life, and benefit from its future success. That should make up for my uncle’s debt.”

  “Clever. Very clever.” Braxton took a backward step, then retraced it. Thrusting his fingers through her hair, he curled his hand into a fist. She gave an involuntary yelp. His teeth clenched. “If you’ve known all along I’m to become your stepfather, why did you let me kiss you?”

  Stepfather? Her stepfather! My God, why didn’t I think about that?

  His free arm snaked behind her waist and urged her to the hard angles of his body. She gasped at the feel of him, the scent of him, the way he felt when she ventured to flatten her palms on the heated steel of his chest. The room became heated, very hot. Never had she experienced the desire to move even closer to the source of that heat, not until now.

  “Shall we share another father-daughter kiss?”

  His hard exacting lips captured hers, molding and softening against her mouth; his callused hands cupped her face. His tongue pushing its way past her teeth, he backed her against the bureau. Her arms slid around his waist, moving up the rock-hard planes of his back as her fingers coiled into the curls that brushed his neck. With a groan of desire he pressed even closer, his hands moving to caress her shoulders, her arms, her hips. The feel of his growing arousal sent a heightened surge of excitement through her limbs to settle in her womanly reaches.

  He grabbled the ribbons to her nightgown, closing his palm over her breast before he began a kindling exploration of her puckering nipple. The moans of passion that echoed through her bedroom were her own, the scent and feel of desire wafting within her. When Braxton’s lips replaced his fingers, he reached to the back of her thighs, lifting her from the floor to bring her closer to his seeking mouth.

  “Tell me you like this,” he demanded.

  It was impossible not to whisper, “Yes, oh yes.”

  “Does that mean yes, you’ll marry me?”

  “N-no.”

  He lowered her to the floor, adjusted her nightgown. Finished, he clasped both her hands in one of his, and said, “Mark my words, I refuse to let another man take the reins of this ranch, because if I did, that would mean he’d have you. I won’t stand for that. I will have you for my own. For my wife. And then I am going to make love to you until you forget everything but me. Even your dead lover.”

  That he had smoothed the mercenary slant of his anger caused her to smile. The ranch was but incidental to him.

  Suddenly, Claudine pounded her fist against the bedroom door, “You in there! It’s gotten
too quiet. Daisy, are you all right? Come out, Sergeant Hale! Right this instant.”

  “Go away,” he shouted after turning his face toward the doorway. “Go away and stay away!”

  “I will not. Be warned, Brax Hale. If you don’t open this door this instant, I will—”

  “Go to hell, Mrs. St. Clair.”

  Braxton bent his knees, wrapping both arms behind Skylla’s knees and lifting her toward the ceiling. As a lumberjack might give a gigantic log a vertical heave, he threw her over his shoulder. Her arms swung over her head, her hair flying free. She giggled. Giggled!

  The moment Claudine burst through the door, Braxton feinted to the side and ducked out of the bedroom. Rushing through the house, onto the porch, and into the inky darkness of midnight, he carried Skylla away.

  “Where are you taking me?” she managed to ask, her words pumped from her lungs by the motions of his strides.

  “To the creek. To take up where we left off.”

  “Don’t you hurt her! Stop right there, bad man!”

  Kathy Ann.

  Lifting her head slightly, and blowing a lock of hair from her eyes, Skylla saw her sister running toward them, Geoff, Claudine, and Charlie Main a good distance to her rear. Kathy Ann had something in her lifted right hand.

  “Oh, my God!” Skylla wailed. “No!”

  Her scream caused Braxton to slow his pace, to turn.

  Suddenly a shot rang out, the air cracking with the explosion. Skylla felt his body tense; she heard his intake of breath. For a moment he teetered, then slowly lowered her to the ground. He slid sideways. Falling face up at her feet.

  Her hot tears of worry and anger spilled as Braxton groaned and rolled into a ball of pain. Instinctively, she scrambled to protect his toppled body with her own, else Kathy Ann might take another shot.

  Geoff and Claudine, both shouting, ran forward.

  “Did I get him?” Kathy Ann shouted.

  “Yes, damn you!” Skylla’s voice was a cry, a scream, a lament. Bending over Braxton, she crooned, “It’ll be all right, it’ll be all right,” as he made the motions of bravery.

  “I’m okay, I’m okay,” he moaned and tried to stand.

  Kathy Ann stepped closer, then blew on the pistol’s barrel. “He won’t be bothering you anymore, Sissy.”

  Furious, Skylla glared at her sister and let loose with a variation of a threat Papa had employed with her. “Pray to God Braxton’s all right, or I’ll give you to the Indians!”

  One more time, Skylla had let her temper get the better of her.

  Ten

  “He’s ruint.”

  Miss Skylla cried out at Charlie Main’s pithy statement about her man, while her stepmother dragged the brunette away.

  “What happened?” Geoff asked over and over, getting no answer as he and the cowhand lugged Bubba to the first-floor bedroom. The men got Bubba settled on the quilt.

  “He’s gettin’ blood all over hisself.” The ranch hand grabbed a folded white garment from the bedside table—probably Miss Skylla’s nightdress—and slapped it into Geoff’s hand. “Do somethin’, boy. Else, he’ll die. I need a drink.”

  The cowboy beat a hasty retreat.

  Frozen, Geoff stared at the material, then gaped at his brother’s ashen face. He’d seen countless men die for Jeff Davis, and one of them had been his blood kin, same as Bubba, but this was the first time Geoffrey Hale yearned to cry out to The Maker above—and beg for a man’s recovery.

  “Stop the blood, Geoffie—do it,” Bubba ordered, his voice weakening. “Am I ruined?”

  It took force of will not to gasp when Geoff gaped at the crease in his brother’s groin. He sat down on the bed’s edge to press a cloth against the crimson flow. “You’re not ruined, but she like to got you,” he joked for the sake of sanity. “An inch to the left and you’d be singing soprano in the church choir.”

  Bubba’s face twisted into the guise of a smile. “Then you think my career as a Romeo isn’t over?”

  “Heck, Bubba, in no time you’ll be flaunting your scar to Miss”—he swallowed—“to the painted ladies in San Francisco.”

  “Yeah. That’s right. Dance-hall girls.”

  Miss Skylla charged through the door right then.

  “Braxton.” The crippled girl went around Geoff to kneel beside Bubba, burying her head on his arm. “Oh, Braxton, what have we done to you?”

  He put his hand on her head. “You’ve done me wrong. Make it right, Skylla. Say you’re ready to be mine.”

  She lifted her head, and the look they exchanged was one of two people in agony. In agony from the mess of their lives. Anyone could see that it took a great effort for her not to throw the outside world to the winds and give in to her heart. Why didn’t she just do it? Why didn’t she give her man the comfort he begged for?

  Something died in those pained green eyes. “Go away, Skylla.” His voice brooked no argument. “Go away and let Geoff tend me.”

  Like a wounded doe, she retreated, closing the door softly. Why hadn’t she consoled Bubba?

  His eyes on his adored brother, Geoff pressed harder on the wound. “Help me,” he said, his vocal cords stretched tight. “Tell me what to do.”

  “You’ve seen me work on bullet wounds. You’ve got to take a few stitches to stop the blood. We’ll worry about the bullet if I get septic. Get a needle and thread from Piglet.”

  “I ought to shoot her.”

  “Don’t. She’s just a stupid kid. Besides, who gives a damn about her? She’s not the problem here.”

  “Seems to me she is the problem.”

  “Not hardly. This is a helluva fix we’re in.”

  Bubba’s voice hadn’t been this hopeless, this dejected, since word had arrived all the girls were dead. They had both cried, grieving for Diana and Susan and Larkin’s pretty bride. The baby was newborn when the war started. Lilly had been a cute little baby. Bella said she’d just started being a rambunctious toddler when the malnutrition set in. The Hales were a doomed lot.

  One time, in a weaker moment, Bubba had talked about the day Massa John sailed out of their lives—Geoff couldn’t remember the day that hexed the Hales. John Hale, a physician trained to save lives, damned his family to hell. His curse was coming to fruition.

  Geoff looked at the last of the white Hales. “Don’t you dare die on me, Bubba.”

  “I’m too damned bad to die. The devil is giving me a taste of hell on earth, I reckon.” Wiggling, he shoved a pillow behind his back. “Of all my schemes, trying to collect on Titus’s debt is the most wild-eyed of the lot.”

  “Don’t talk. I’ve got to stitch you up.”

  Ignoring the advice, Bubba said, “Geoffie, they’ve made fools of us. As soon as I get back in my boots, you and I are hightailing it west. Forget the nosegay of baby’s breath.”

  “What are you talking about, ‘made fools of us’?”

  “That redheaded twit did more than pick your brain. She’s manipulated Skylla into giving her an interest in the ranch. She’s worked it so I can’t sell the place. Ever.”

  “She can’t do that.”

  “Wrong. That pansy Virgil Petry had an ace in the hole. I’m pegged to marry Claudine.”

  It was all Geoff could do not to laugh. That didn’t fit. She wasn’t the crippled girl possessing the calm temperament and loving nature necessary to deal with a flawed fellow like Bubba.

  Geoff had been pushing for California and all it held, but lately he’d had second thoughts. Miss Skylla would be good for Bubba. Very good. And she needed a man to cluck over. That Claudine would never be good for anyone but Claudine.

  Warm blood began to seep over Geoff’s hand. “I’ve got to cut these britches off you.”

  “Yeah, do it. See if there’s water in that pitcher over yonder, and don’t forget to wash the wound. Fetch the medical supplies from the cookhouse, too.”

  The wound washed and a fresh cloth over it, Geoff rushed out of the room, nearly knocking Miss Skylla to th
e floor when he hurried past the staircase in the parlor, where she’d been holding onto the railing for dear life. He righted her.

  “What can I do to help him?” she asked, worried.

  “Give him time. Keep your distance.”

  She nodded, wilting to sit on one of the steps.

  From the corner of his eye, Geoff saw that redheaded piece of work relaxing in a horned chair, swilling her favorite one-hundred-proof beverage. Like nothing much had happened. “You didn’t keep Kathy Ann out of trouble,” she charged.

  “Neither did you. Ma’am.”

  Geoff carried on toward the cookhouse. Bubba didn’t need the bother of that black-widow spider.

  All his life, Geoff had worshiped Brax Hale. As a youngster, he’d been the older boy’s shadow, hanging on to his every word. Bubba had seemed as tall as a tree, as solid as its roots. Without being told by a spiteful little neighbor girl, Geoff had guessed they were brothers. Already, Geoff had made a promise to himself. He would follow Bubba wherever he went. Nevertheless, Bubba had left without him, once. When he came here to Texas to search for “Massa John.”

  By the time the war came around, Geoff had been on the brink of manhood. Thirteen. There had been no stopping Geoffrey Hale when the white Hale men had left Vicksburg with Titus St. Clair, bound for the battlefields. Geoff caught up with them.

  He witnessed his brother’s valiancy in the theaters of war. He hurt for him when the major let him down. The day General Lee surrendered to General Grant, the same general who’d laid waste to Vicksburg, Geoff stood at Bubba’s side as he gave over his sword and rifle. Through it all, he’d been a partner in many schemes and tricks.

  Now—by a flea-bitten hound of Jeff Davis’s!—he would get Bubba well.

  Geoff hurried into the cookhouse. Kathy Ann was there already, shoving something into her pocket. No telling what.

  “Where’s your needle and thread?” he asked.