Savage storm

by Conn, Phoebe

  Michael was stunned by that hostile exchange, because of what it revealed rather than the angry tone of the participants. "It's Royal, isn't it? He's the one you want. You said your feeings about getting married had changed during the trip out here. He's the reason why, isn't he?"

  Since he seemed more astonished than provoked with her, Gabrielle saw no reason to deny the truth he had just discovered. "Yes, but I hope you will keep that secret to yourself since it would hurt all three of us badly if you were to reveal it."

  Michael's dark eyes narrowed slightly, his confusion plain in his glance. "Of course I'll keep it to myself. It's easy to see why any woman would be impressed with Jason Royal, but surely you must know he's definitely not the marrying kind. You'll just be wasting your time if you wait for a proposal from him."

  "Yes, I know that," Gabrielle admitted sadly. "It is my right to do so, however. But I'll not waste your time, Michael. If Erica doesn't appeal to you, find one of the others who does and soon!" She reached up to kiss his cheek sweetly, then left

  him standing beside his buggy as she ran up the steps of the impressive home and hurried inside. She found the bedroom she shared empty now that the bachelors could invite her friends to go elsewhere. She removed her bonnet, washed her hands and face, and then brushed her hair before she went downstairs to Clayton^s study. She had to wait only a minute or two befoVe Jason came into the room and slammed the door soundly, but she'd had long enough to decide what she wanted to say.

  "Must you be so dramatic? You have my attention; you needn't slam the door so loudly to get it." She lifted her hand to her forehead, not looking forward to another confrontation with Jason. Her head ached already just thinking what he'd say. "I find it difficult to believe it upset you so greatly to find I'd gone to Michael's farm rather than to church, especially if you'd planned to allow us to go where we pleased this very afternoon."

  Jason walked around the desk and sat down in Clayton's chair. He leaned back to make himself comfortable, attempting to project a more relaxed mood now that he was finally alone with Gabrielle. Rather than reacting to her sarcastic comment, he began his own line of questioning. ''Did Michael propose to you? He certainly had plenty of time to do it. I swear I could have walked here faster than he brought you home in his buggy."

  "Whether or not he proposed and the speed with which he wishes to travel are none of your business, Jason." Gabrielle sat up straight then, preparing for the long and bitter scene she knew would be forthcoming.

  "How he wishes to travel may not be one of my legitimate concerns, I'll grant you that, but whether or not he proposed to you certainly is. I brought you to Oregon to be a bride. Yesterday you told me you weren't going to marry any of the bachelors, but this morning you went out to Michael's farm. Even you must admit that seems a bit contradictory, or have

  you decided you do want to get married after all?"

  "No," Gabrielle responded in a vain attempt to control her temper. "Michael has made no secret of his interest in me, and I thought he deserved to be told I'd decided not to marry before I moved out of this house. I didn't want him to come here especially to see me and find me gone."

  "Hell, you could have told him that on the front porch. You didn't have to ride all the way out to his farm to do it," Jason scoffed rudely.

  Gabrielle looked away, seeing no point in arguing over what she'd done. "If I have satisfied your curiosity, may I please be excused?"

  "No. Not until I have satisfied yours," Jason answered calmly. "I've decided to tell you the truth about Joshua Taylor since you've taken such a personal interest in him."

  "You mean he's come here? You've finally met him?" Gabrielle leaned forward, very curious indeed.

  "Not exactly." Jason took a deep breath, attempting to compose his thoughts in some rational order before he continued. "I'm uncertain where to begin. Perhaps you remember the night we had dinner in Kansas City? I gave you my hotel room when there was none available for you."

  "How could I possibly forget your generosity? What has it to do with Mr. Taylor though?" Gabrielle wanted him to stick to the point of his story.

  "Quite a bit actually. I offered to find some way for you to come to Oregon, but you misunderstood my motives and said you'd come as one of the brides or not at all."

  Gabrielle blushed deeply, recalling that scene all too well. She had sense enough not to point out her appraisal of his motives had been shockingly accurate however. She wasn't in the least bit ashamed of what had happened between them, but she regretted that it had meant so little to him. "Is there some point to your rambling narrative, Jason? If so, I fail to see what it has to do with Mr. Taylor."

  Jason's gray eyes grew dark as he continued to explain, his glance as frightening as his words. "I wanted you to come with us very badly. Since we needed one more bachelor to accommodate one more bride I simply created one. I won quite a bit of money playing poker that night, and when I returned to the hotel I wrote the letter that supposedly came from Joshua Taylor. I included the fee plus a bit more than the other men had paid. The night clerk was sound asleep at his desk so it was a simple matter to slip the letter into Clayton's mailbox where he found it the next morning. He never doubted it was from a real man and neither did you."

  Gabrielle didn't know whether to laugh or cry, she found Jason's tale so preposterous. She considered it for a moment then asked, "What did you expect to happen when we arrived here and there was no Mr. Taylor waiting to claim a bride? You must have had something clever planned in order to avoid having to reveal what you'd done. Since it's probably equally amusing, I'd like to hear it."

  "No," Jason responded confidently. "I simply wanted you to meet all the men so you'd have a choice; then I planned for you to marry me."

  Gabrielle's thick fringe of long lashes swept her brows as she leaped from her chair. 'That is a damn lie and you know it!"

  Jason rose slowly to his feet, towering above her. It was a lie of course, but the fact he'd considered marriage between them an impossibility until that very day was due to his own stupidity rather than to a lack of desire to make her his wife. He'd certainly never admit that to her. "I wanted you the minute you knocked upon our door, Gabrielle, and don't tell me now that fact wasn't obvious. I wouldn't have left Kansas City without you, but inventing Joshua Taylor seenned to be a far better method to win your confidence than tying you up and tossing you atop one of the brides' carriages like part of the luggage."

  "You bastard," Gabrielle hissed menacingly. "You got

  exactly what you wanted, how dare you tell me now that you had marriage in mind all those months you demanded I meet you in secret? You could have proposed to me at any time, and there were several places along the Oregon Trail where we could have heen married. What's happened to you, Jason? Is your conscience finally troubling you? Have you begun to feel guilty because you continually used my affection for you without offering anything in return?''

  Jason had little choice but to stand there and take whatever abuse she cared to hurl. The deep red of her hair seemed tinged with the flames of her anger, the blue of her eyes was so deep they appeared purple. He thought her the most desirable woman ever born. "I'd say I gave as much as I took," he replied, exhibiting far more pride than he actually felt. "You gave me little reason to believe you'd accept my proposal, Gabrielle. How can you fault me for not making one?"

  "Oh!" Gabrielle shrieked in frustration. "You're lying! You know you are, but what I don't understand is why you'd bother." She turned away then, pacing upand down in front of him with the frantic stride of a wild beast on too short a leash. She looked ready to explode as she continued. "What you are describing is a deceit of monstrous proportion. To have lied to me from the moment we met merely to gratify your own insatiable lusts is so despicable it makes what Lewis Bradley did to his Indian mistress seem like a minor insult! How can you possibly think I'd believe you have always wanted me for your wife? That is simply ludicrous after the way you have behaved!"
>
  Clayton knocked softly at the door before peering inside. "Is everything all right in here?"

  "No!" Gabrielle shouted loudly, and the man was so startled by that response he offered no more than a brief apology for interrupting their conversation and closed the door at once.

  "Perhaps you should keep your voice down, my dearest." Jason offered his advice with a sly grin. "Clayton is discreet,

  but I doubt many of the others in this house are.''

  *'0f course, discretion has always meant more to you than my feehngs, hasn't it? There's not a woman alive who deserves to have a snake Hke you for a husband, not one!"

  "Does that mean you are refusing my proposal?" Jason asked nonchalantly, seeming to care little what her decision might be.

  "What proposal?" Gabrielle cried indignantly. "I have not ever heard anything which sounded remotely like a proposal from you!"

  Jason kept reminding himself that despite her astonishing beauty Gabrielle was no more than eighteen years old and could not be expected to react any differently to his confession than she had. "If you would be polite enough to be seated once again, I might be able to summon the courage to make an acceptable proposal. I hope you will forgive my inexperience with this subject, however, and not be too critical of my words since you know my feelings are sincere."

  "That would be a miracle!" Gabrielle replied in a renewed burst of hostility, but she returned to her chair and sat down upon the edge, eager to hear whatever it was he wished to say.

  Jason walked around to the front of the desk and sat down upon it, his pose a surprisingly informal one for so serious a discussion. "As I see it, I am responsible for your being here in Oregon. I brought you here to be my wife, and you've told me yourself you have no interest in marrying any of the other men you've met since your arrival here. I'll admit we have had more than our share of disagreements, but I think once we are married we can solve our problems far more easily. Since we are definitely compatible when it comes to the physical side of marriage, I am willing to overlook your uncontrollable temper. It would be only fair for you to overlook any faults I might have as well. You didn't want to rush into marriage with a man you didn't know well, and I doubt you'll ever come to know any other man as well as you already know me. We've been

  through several extremely trying situations together, probably the worst life has to offer, and I think we make a very good team. Call me all the vile names you want and distrust my motives if you must, but I still desire you for my wife. If youMl agree, there's plenty of time for us to get married this afternoon. It's up to you, Gabrielle; do you want to marry me or not?"

  Gabrielle licked her lips slowly, unable to make any coherent reply for the moment. She had not even thought it possible for a man to make such an unemotional proposal, but clearly Jason was attempting to win her with logic, not with love. She looked down at her hands, twisting them nervously in her lap while she tried to think how best to respond. Their marriage would be sure to cause the most tantalizing of gossip, as would the fact their first child was very likely to arrive in less than nine months time. She did not want to wait until she was positive about the baby, not because of the trap Iris had laughed about but because she would feel as though she, not Jason, had been caught against her will.

  Jason found Gabrielle a fascinating sight at any time, but now the conflicts which had made her decide to withdraw from the group of brides were so close to the surface he could readily see them in her troubled expression. He wanted her to say yes, but didn't know what else to do to convince her to marry him if she truly did not want to. He opened his mouth to insist she make up her mind quickly, then thought better of it and was still. He would just sit there until nightfall if it took her that long to make up her mind. She is well worth the wail, he reminded himself. Still, it was difficult to sit calmly when he wanted so badly to reach out and shake her until she'd say yes to whatever question he asked.

  Finally Gabrielle looked up at him. "I wish that I could say the same thing to you that I said to Scream of Lightning, but I don't feel in the least bit honored since you've waited so dreadfully long to propose. You led me to believe marriage was

  not something you'd consider unless you had no choice, and that was terribly cruel. I can't help but think you were lying then or you are lying now, and neither of those possibilities pleases me. You may think I know you, but you're wrong for I can't predict what you'll do in the next five minutes, let alone imagine what sort of husband you'd prove to be."

  "A simple yes or no will do, Gabrielle," Jason reminded her softly, not certain what her decision would be but impatient to hear it nonetheless.

  ''A marriage proposal is not a simple question, Jason. I can't give you a reply so easily." Gabrielle was overcome with sorrow, for she loved him dearly but his feelings for her were clearly of the most primitive kind. Would it be wrong of her to marry him and hope that one day his feelings for her would deepen as hers had for him? Would that be wrong, or merely incredibly foolish? She sat back in her chair and considered the other alternative. If she did not marry him but went on loving him, the resulting agony would be every bit as painful as losing Beau had been. She'd experienced far too much of the grief of lost love and not nearly enough of the bliss of its shared beauty. This time, the choice was hers rather than fate's and suddenly she knew exactly what she wanted to do. She rose gracefully to her feet, crossed the short distance between them, and placed her hands upon Jason's shoulders. She kissed his lips lightly and then smiled.

  "Yes. I do want to marry you, this very afternoon if you cannot abide a longer engagement."

  Jason made no further attempt to understand the curious thought patterns of the rare beauty in his arms. He drew her close and, winding his fingers in her long, flowing hair, kissed her again and again until he was certain by the depth of her response that she would not change her mind before he could get her to the church. He drew away then, laughing as he got to his feet and took her hand.

  '*I will allow you five minutes to gather the things you'll need tonight. We'll take whomever we can find to the church

  with us to serve as witnesses and then we'll spend the night at the hotel. Til take you home with me in the morning." He swept her along beside him through the door and sent her up the stairs with a playful swat. "Don't keep me waiting, Miss MacLaren!" he called after her, and then, nearly bursting with happiness, he went to find Clayton to ask him to be his best

  man.

  ^/uz/t/e^ m/JJ

  Erica sat up quickly, turning away to hide her tears as Gahrielle came running into their room. She was ashamed to he caught weeping again after having sounded so confident that morning. Her courage had now deserted her completely, and she was feeling so wretchedly alone she didn't think she*d ever get over her heartbreak at losing Lewis. Attempting to smile bravely as though she'd only been resting, she hoped Gahrielle would be too polite to ask why she'd been crying.

  "I didn't know anyone was home." Gahrielle greeted her friend brightly, too considerate to remark upon the signs of tears still visible upon her flushed cheeks. ^* was up here just a short while ago."

  ''I was probably out in the garden then. After church everyone sort of disappeared," Erica explained dejectedly. "I'm the only one here."

  "I am so glad that you are, for I would not have wanted to get married without your being there." Gahrielle took Erica's hands firmly in hers to lift her from the bed. "I'm getting married this afternoon. Aren't you excited for me?"

  "What?" Erica exclaimed in an enthusiastic screech, so astonished she instantly forgot her own sorrow. "You and Michael have already decided to get married? When you are such a cautious type it never occurred to me you might be the

  first of us to take a husband/*

  Gabrielle could not help but laugh at Erica's confusion. ''Michael is a delightful man. However, he's not the one Fm going to marry so I would greatly appreciate it if you would give him some of your time and lift his spirits as he's sure to be v
ery disappointed in me. Would you please do that? Perhaps you've not noticed that he's taller than Lewis Bradley and several years younger too." With that teasing remark, Gabrielle left her to begin gathering the things she'd need. "Jason only gave me five minutes so I'll have to talk as I pack."

  '7ason?" Erica gasped in disbelief. *'You don't mean Jason Royal, do you?"

  "Of course, he's the only Jason I know," Gabrielle responded with another lilting laugh, too excited now to worry about what anyone thought of her choice of husband.

  "But I saw you with Michael Jenkins only this morning!" Erica pointed out logically.

  "Yes, you did. As I said he'll not be pleased I'm marrying Jason, but I'm certain you can distract him from his grief quite easily. You were so positive you wanted Lewis before we even arrived in Oregon City that I don't think you've really given any of the other men a fair chance to impress you. Michael can be very charming, truly he can. From what I saw of his farm I'd say he's very ambitious too."

  Erica did not know which question to ask first, she was so confused. But as she thought back over the months they'd spent together she grew increasingly curious. "You and Jason aren't even friends. I thought you regarded him as being lower than a serpent!"

  "A snake." Gabrielle corrected her friend, an impish smile on her face; then she went back to folding her nightgown. "I've called him a snake on more than one occasion and a lot worse to his face, but since he's to become my husband I hope you won't repeat that insult to anyone, most especially not to him."

  "You needn't worry. So few people are speaking to me now, nobody would care to listen." Erica flopped back down on the

  bed, feeling very sorry for herself.

  Cabrielle had no patience with her friend's self-pity. "If you have decided you want Lewis no matter how he's lived, then just say so. rm sure Clayton can have him back here tonight. If, on the other hand, you truly are finished with the man, then you'll have to make more of an effort to meet someone new. You can't just mope around here and let all the other girls have their first choice of the men without any competition!" She tugged on Erica's hands to lift her from the bed and, with an emphatic push, propelled her to the mirror. "Just look at yourself for a minute, none of the others is as pretty as you. Now come to the church with us and tonight go downstairs and be sociable. I don't care how much it hurts. You owe these men a chance to impress you, and none will have the courage to come up here to your bedroom to do it!"