by Jane Toombs
He saw no women in either room.
"Why, Mr. Reid, it's so nice of you to visit us. I'm gratified. And surprised."
He turned as Monique approached him, hand extended. Taking her hand in both of his, he smiled appreciatively. Her jet-black hair was coiled in a chignon on top of her head, her cameo-white face was devoid of make-up, except for a touch of scarlet on her lips, and a low scoop neckline revealed smooth shoulders. The black silk of the gown matched her hair, molded her high breasts and highlighted her narrow waist before flaring out in a modified hoop-skirt that swept the floor.
"You look even lovelier than I remembered,” he said.
Monique met his eyes for a moment, then looked away, unsettled all over again by Mr. Reid, wary of the dark thread of attraction that made itself felt in a rising excitement. She didn't want to be attracted to any man, ever again. Especially in this dark way.
"You're early,” she said. “Let me find out if our young ladies are dressed for callers."
"Don't bother. I'm not there to call on them."
"Why are you here, Mr. Reid?” she asked, afraid she already knew the answer.
"I came for you,” he said.
"Oh, but you'll particularly like Gabrielle,” she said hurriedly, wondering if she'd chosen the French girl at random or because, of all of them, Gabrielle looked the most like herself.
"Thank you, but no. They don't interest me. You do. I've heard the sum of five hundred dollars mentioned."
Monique shook her head, conscious of the rapid beating of her heart. What was there about this man that drew her? Most unwillingly, too.
"Why do you shake your head?” he asked.
"I'm not available for five hundred dollars."
"Ah?"
She took a deep breath. Actually she wasn't available, period. She ran the place, but didn't intend to offer any other service. Why then, did she find herself saying, “For you, Mr. Reid, it's one thousand."
He frowned, the frown replaced by a slow half-smile. “You value yourself highly."
Now he'll turn and leave, she told herself, knowing somewhere deep inside that he would not. That Van Allen Reid was not about to be thwarted.
"Done.” He hit the open palm of his hand with his fist.
Monique swallowed, hesitated, then started to turn toward the stairs, expecting him to follow. His words stopped her.
"No, not here. And not just yet. Put on a wrap and come with me."
She blinked at him. “I can't possibly leave. I'm needed here."
He waved the objection aside. “Of course you can leave. You will leave. One of your girls can take your place for the evening."
Being with him in her territory was daunting enough. Being with him in his was worse. Still, what was she afraid of? “I'll fetch a wrap,” she told him.
A few minutes later he escorted her down the steps and into the waiting carriage, saying to the driver, “The mill."
The black gelding trotted up C Street, turning left at the foot of the mountain. After the carriage dipped into a ravine and climbed a hill, the buildings of the stamp mill loomed out of the darkness in front of them. A rhythmic pounding shook the ground.
Reid helped her from the carriage, then, a hand light on her arm, steered her toward the first of the mill buildings. A watchman with a lantern approached, a scowl on his face until he recognized Reid. “Good evening, sir,” he said, all but scraping and bowing.
Reid ignored him, walked on to the door and escorted Monique inside. She stopped short, hands over her ears to shut out the deafening noise as she stared at the great machines called stampers as they pistoned up and down, rising and falling a hundred times a minute as they crushed the wet ore, thrusting up and down, up and down in a never-ending rhythm.
Van Allen Reid eased one of her hands away from her ear to say, “This all belongs to me.” Then he led her outside, but not to return to the carriage as she'd expected. Instead, he escorted her to another building. Inside, she recognized the hoisting engines and the cables of an elevator at the top of a mineshaft.
"There's another entrance to the mine from my office building in town,” he said.
Why was he showing her all this? To impress her? Most likely. Similar to Don Fernando and his horsemanship.
The engineer on the platform looked up from a giant cylinder. “Mr. Reid,” he said, “we didn't expect you tonight."
"You should expect me at any time of the day or night,” Reid told him.
The engineer nodded, his Adam's apple working up and down. “Yes, sir."
Like the watchman, he's afraid of his boss, Monique realized.
"We're going down,” Reid told him.
The man's eyes widened. “The young lady, too?"
"Of course. I said ‘we.'” Reid's voice was even, with a chill undertone.
"Yes, sir. You did, sir. I'll have the cage up by the time you're ready.” He glanced at the cylinder. “She's at the three hundred foot level now."
Saying, “Over here,” Reid led Monique to a small room opening off the entrance to the shaft. “You'll find a change of clothes on those pegs.” He left the room before she had a chance to protest.
She glanced at the formless smocks hanging on pegs, then at one of small wall mirrors, smoothed her hands over the silk of her gown and shrugged. If Reid wanted her in a drab gown, it was his choice. Removing gown and petticoats, she left on her undergarments and slipped one of the smocks over her head. Seeing a row of heavy shoes lined up beneath the pegs, she took off her slippers and pushed her feet into the smallest of the stout shoes. Lastly she chose a shapeless felt hat from among the many hanging there and donned it, feeling almost as though she was masquerading as Martin all over again.
She found Reid waiting outside the changing room, wearing a long-sleeved cotton shirt, rough breeches and a battered hat. Again she was struck by the blackness of his hair, so like her own, and the whiteness of his skin, also like hers.
A short, beetle-browed man met them on the platform. “This is Mr. Bemis, my shift foreman,” Reid told her.
Bemis bowed and waved her into the waiting cage. The two men followed, the foreman raised his hand, and they dropped noiselessly into a womb of darkness lit only by the lantern in Bemis’ hand. Great timbers seemed to rush up out of the darkness at them, speed past and disappear over their heads.
The cage slowed, jounced up and down several times and stopped. Reid took her arm and they stepped onto the wooden floor at the eight-hundred-foot level. The station, a large, well-lighted room, was like an underground store packed with tools and row after row of barrels containing candles, fuses, powder and ice water.
Reid took the lantern from Bemis and led Monique into the darkness of a tunnel. She was surprised by the heat in the mine, the heat of an August noon on the surface. Thinking of the great mass of earth above her, she hugged herself, not frightened exactly, but uneasy. Somewhat like the way Van Allen Reid made her feel.
Miners passed them, the men naked from the waist up, their bare skin gleaming palely in the gloom. At the tunnel face, men labored with picks and shovels, torsos and faces glistening with sweat. Some broke away the wall of ore, while others loaded the dirt and rock into small carts.
"This all belongs to me,” Reid told her once more.
She had to admit it was impressive. Whether it made her like or dislike him, though, was debatable.
When they were on the surface, once more dressed in their street clothes, he ordered the carriage to take them south, away from the city. Stopping at the foot of an isolated height, he helped Monique over the rocks to a promontory above Virginia City. She found the night breeze chill after the mine.
"Someday,” he said, indicating the valley below them with its lights, the roaring mills, the gambling halls, “someday all this will belong to me."
Did he really think so? And would it? Monique hoped not. Still, she knew by now he wasn't easily thwarted.
Back in Virginia City, they turned, not ont
o C Street as Monique had expected, but into the valley. Skirting the edge of Chinatown, they drove several miles to a house standing alone in the desert, a large house, its turrets and towers dark against the night sky.
Inside, they sat across from one another at a table lit by a single red candle. An aged Chinaman served them champagne before he bowed his way from the room.
Monique could not resist saying, “This house, I presume, also belongs to you, Mr. Reid."
"Yes, naturally. May I suggest a less formal address between us? I prefer Van Allen to Van, but either will do."
She nodded. “I believe you know I'm Monique."
He raised his glass in a toast. “To Van Allen and Monique,” he said.
Taking a sip of champagne, she watched him warily, wondering where he was heading.
"You can be a part of all this,” he told her. Her confusion must have been evident, because he added, “We can be allies. Partners."
Monique smiled, letting him refill her glass. “For a moment I thought you were proposing marriage."
He blinked, setting down his glass and touching his lips with a napkin. “Marriage isn't for me. I have too much to do to be hindered by a wife. Women tend to want trips to Europe and European castles transported to the Nevada desert. Squandering money instead of making money work for you."
"I don't plan to marry, either, so I would have had to refuse you. I do tend to agree with you, though about men, not women. What men don't gamble away, they spend on drink and women."
He looked at her closely, as though wondering if she could be mocking him, which she was not. At least not at this moment.
Finally he said, “The first time I saw you, I decided you were the kind of woman who'd understand me. More?” He nodded to the champagne, and she smiled an assent.
When at last the bottle sat empty on the table, Van Allen stood and bowed. “Come with me,” he said.
With a tremor, whether from anticipation or unease, and feeling slightly lightheaded from the wine, she followed him along a dim corridor into a darkened room, hearing him close the door behind them. Pulse racing, she waited.
His hand touched her cheek, slid downward until his fingers found the fastenings of her gown. Slowly, deliberately, he undressed her, gown, camisole, petticoats and drawers. She didn't wear corsets, no matter what the fashion. He knelt at her feet, slipped off her shoes, then rolled her stockings down her legs and over her feet.
The room was so dark she couldn't see him when he moved away from her, but she heard the rustle of clothing. So she waited, naked, for what he planned next, unwanted squiggles of excitement coursing through her. The events of the evening had been unexpected so far. What else would he do to surprise her?
His arms came around her and he held her urgently to him. She barely had time to notice his arousal before he swept her into the air and carried her to a bed she couldn't see in the darkness. After laying her on her back, he knelt on the floor, his hands trailing over her body from her breasts to her stomach, on to her hips and along her legs. Though he said nothing, she could hear his rapid breathing.
Her own breath quickened as his mouth closed over her nipple, his tongue circling it. Despite herself, a trembling began in her legs, a trembling that grew and grew.
His mouth and hands left her. She felt his weight on the mattress, felt the heat of his body next to her, but he didn't touch her. Unable to wait, she leaned to him until her lips touched his. He pulled her to him, deepening the kiss while his fingers, feather light, slid along her thigh, circled her womanhood, then caressed her at its center. She moaned, parting her legs for him to enter her, arching to him as he thrust into her, hard and fast, bringing her to the edge and over, making her cry out with release.
When she opened her eyes, he was lying beside her with his arm thrown over her breast. Her head pounded and, for a moment, she imagined it was the distant mills. The pounding was, of course, the blood drumming in her ears. She sighed, sated, only to have the disturbing thought that Van Allen Reid had aroused as much passion in her as Jeremy could. And yet she didn't love this man next to her. Far from it.
"Your girls,” Van Allen said.
"My girls?” she repeated, confused.
"They see many men in a week's time. There's a great deal your girls could find out that would be helpful to me. Naturally I'd pay for the information, pay generously."
Why, you son-of-a-bitch, Monique thought. But what else had she expected from him? Certainly not a romantic interlude. Or had she? Then it struck her funny and she began to laugh.
"What's so amusing?"
"I'm laughing at myself."
"What do you say to my proposal?” he asked. “Can we help one another?"
"Go to hell,” she told him.
She felt him shrug. “I'm in no hurry,” he said. “You'll come around."
He began to caress her and, despite herself, she began to respond to the touch of his hand, his lips. But when he knelt astride her, she shoved him away. He gripped her as he lost his balance and they both rolled to the edge of the bed and tumbled to the carpeted floor. There he entered her and once again she had no control over her desire. Arching to him, she held him close.
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CHAPTER 17
On a Saturday evening in late summer, Monique was reading when she heard Jess’ signal—three quick taps on her bedroom door. Rising, she opened the door.
"You best come downstairs, Miss Monique,” Jess said. “There's a slant-eyed gal saying she got to see you. Won't take no for an answer."
Before Monique could respond, a diminutive girl slipped around Jess and threw her arms about Monique.
"Chai!” Monique cried.
Jess’ huge hands gripped the girl and lifted her into the air, away from Monique.
"It's all right, Jess,” Monique said. “Chai's a friend of mine. She saved my life in the fire last year."
Jess set Chai on her feet, and Monique took the Chinese girl in her arms. Jess’ head jerked up at the sound of shouts and jeers from below.
"I leave the boys for two minutes,” he muttered, “and all hell breaks loose.” He lumbered from the room.
Releasing Chai, Monique closed the door.
"You my friend, like you say?” Chai asked
"Of course I am. I'll be beholden to you as long as I live.” Noting tears on Chai's cheeks, she frowned. “What's wrong? What happened?"
"Chai run away. Run away before they catch Chai.” She slipped her loose-fitting gray dress from one shoulder and turned so Monique could see her upper back.
Monique gasped at the sight of crisscrossed red lash marks. “Good God! Who did it?"
"Master catch Chai. Whip her. Chai run away to you.” She looked at Monique, fear in her eyes. “You help?"
"Certainly I will. We're both women, just as you said to me when you saved me from the fire. Women should help women."
"They come after Chai, send men, maybe kill her. I need go San Francisco. Friends there, maybe safe there."
"No one will harm you while you're with me,” Monique said. “If they try, they'll have Jess to deal with."
"You no understand. I belong Chinee man."
Monique recalled having heard that many Chinese girls, purchased in their homeland, were shipped to California as virtual slaves.
"We'll see about sending you to San Francisco,” she said. “Perhaps it would be a good idea. But first I'll have Ah Sing put something on your back, some herbs or one of her other remedies. I didn't believe in them until I found out how well they worked."
Taking Chai's hand, she led the girl from her room and along the corridor.
"Miss Monique!"
Looking over her shoulder she saw Jess at the top of the stairs.
"What is it?” she asked.
"You best come down. The boys got deviltry in mind, no two ways about it."
"You know the rules, Jess, and the men do, too."
"I ain't quite sure they be br
eaking the rules. That's why you best come. Besides, I needs someone what understands English."
She frowned at him. “You understand English as well as I do."
"I always reckoned I did,” Jess said, “but this gent don't talk it like nobody I ever heard. Probably ‘cause he come from England, that's what the boys say. I can't make out more'n maybe one word outta ten of his."
A man's loud voice came from below, followed by raucous laughter.
"I'll be right there,” Monique told Jess.
Turning, she found Ah Sing eyeing Chai with hostility from the open doorway of her room, as though she suspected the other Chinese girl was a rival.
"This is Chai,” Monique told her. “She's my friend and needs help. She'll stay here with us.” Ah Sing still looked disturbed, so Monique added, “Until she's able to travel to San Francisco."
At that, Ah Sing smiled and spoke a few singsong words to Chai, who answered in the same language, smiling back. Both young women then slipped into Ah Sing's room.
Monique joined Jess at the top of the stairs. The lamps hadn't been lit yet and the house was pleasantly cool in the half-light of early evening. “You say there's an English gentleman downstairs?” she asked.
"More'n him. There be him and his friends what ain't. If'n I had friends like that, I sure wouldn't lack for enemies."
"What are they doing to this poor Englishman?"
"Best you come down and see for yourself, Miss Monique. They ain't hurting mean to him, just funning mean so far. That ain't saying they couldn't turn nasty."
With Jess beside her, Monique descended the steps. At the bottom she paused and stared into the parlor, where some ten guffawing miners stood clustered in the center of the room around a chair.
"The English gent be in that chair,” Jess told her.
As she watched, a burly young man she recognized as Hal Stuart held a wineglass to the Englishman's mouth and, despite the other's protests, forced him to drink.
"Hal,” Monique said. She spoke quietly, but her voice carried into the room.