Austin tipped his hat off his brow. “Yes, ma’am?”
“My father sends someone into town every week for supplies. Wouldn’t it save you considerable time if you brought a wagon so you wouldn’t have to go into town every day for supplies?”
Austin’s face turned beet red as he tugged his hat down. “I ain’t goin’ into town for supplies. Dallas sends Pete in to get the supplies.”
“Then why do you go every day?”
He cleared his throat. “I just like to.”
“Dallas doesn’t mind?”
“Long as I get my work done, he don’t mind at all.”
She contemplated his answer. Her days were long, her nights even longer. She wondered if she could find something in town to help her pass the time.
Tightening her hold on the reins, Cordelia stared as Leighton came into view. Half a dozen wooden buildings checkered the wide dusty street. On the outskirts of town, it looked as though people had haphazardly thrown up tents.
Workers were hammering on the frame of a building. The scent of sawdust filled the air. She had never seen anything like it.
The day Dallas had announced that he was setting aside the land for a town, she had seen nothing but open prairie. She hadn’t returned since.
She had known the town had acquired a dressmaker and a general store. She hadn’t known about the saloon or the bank or the jail.
“What are they building?” she asked Austin as he led their horses down the center of town.
“A livery and a blacksmith shop.”
“It really is going to be a town,” she said in awe. “Boyd had said it would never happen. That Dallas was a fool.”
“Boyd’s the fool,” Austin said. “I’ve never seen Dallas fail at anything.”
Austin brought their horses to a stop in front of a false-fronted building that proclaimed OLIVER’S GENERAL STORE. He dismounted, tethered both horses, then reached up and helped Cordelia dismount.
A whole town to walk through. Well, not quite a whole town, but it would be someday, and her husband was responsible. An empire builder.
Perhaps he was more. A builder of dreams.
How did one even go about knowing where to begin?
Austin opened the door that led into the general store. As soon as he entered the building, he swept his hat from his head and an easy smile played at the corners of his mouth.
Becky Oliver stood on a ladder, placing canned goods on a shelf. She glanced over her shoulder, her blue eyes growing warm.
Cordelia thought she might have discovered Austin’s interest in coming to town every day.
“What can I do you for?” asked a balding man standing behind the counter.
Cordelia remembered being introduced to Perry Oliver at her wedding.
Becky rolled her eyes and climbed down from the ladder. “Oh, Pa, you got the words all mixed up again.”
He winked at Cordelia. “Young’uns. They ain’t never happy with what their parents do.” He looked at Austin. “Well, young man, what brings you into town today?”
“Dee needs something so I just brought her into town.”
Cordelia fought to keep the surprise off her face. She didn’t need anything, but Austin gave her an imploring look that begged her to play along. How could she resist the plea in those blue eyes?
“What do you need then, Mrs. Leigh?” Mr. Oliver asked.
Mrs. Leigh? She thought she’d never get used to that name. “I. uh … books … I need some books.”
Mr. Oliver’s eyes widened. “You already read those books your husband came in and purchased last week?”
Cordelia glanced at Austin. He simply shrugged. She had no idea what books her husband had bought. No doubt more on husbandry. “No, he didn’t share them with me,” she finally confessed.
Mr Oliver rubbed his palm over his shining bald pate. “That’s odd. He said they were for you. Said you liked to read.” He squinted his pale blue eyes and puckered his lips. “Let’s see. I had A Tale of Two Cities and Silas Marner. He bought them both.”
Words failed her. If Dallas had purchased the books for her, wouldn’t he have told her? If he hadn’t purchased them for her, why had he told Mr. Oliver that he had?
“They were all I had in stock,” Mr. Oliver continued. “He told me when I got more books in, I was to set them aside until he’d had a chance to look at them.”
The bell above the door tinkled as a young boy walked hesitantly into the store. His black hair was in dire need of a cut and his face a good scrubbing. His bare feet shuffled over the wooden floor as he neared the counter and dug his hand into the pocket of his coveralls. One strap trailed down his backside since he had no button on the front of the coveralls to hold it in place. It looked as though the button on the other side wasn’t going to stay with him much longer.
Perry Oliver leaned over the counter. “Well, Mr. Rawley Cooper. What can I do you for today?”
The boy slapped some coins on the counter. “My pa’s needin’ some cig’rette makin’s.”
“I’ve got some right back here,” Mr. Oliver said as he disappeared behind the counter.
The boy gazed at the jars of colorful candy that lined the counter. Cordelia didn’t think he could be much older than eight. His black eyes shot back to Mr. Oliver when the man set a pouch of tobacco and some papers on the counter.
“Obliged,” the boy said as he slipped the supplies into his pocket and turned to leave.
“Hold on there a minute, Rawley. You gave me too much,” Mr. Oliver said as he placed a pudgy finger on a copper penny and slid it across the counter.
Rawley looked doubtful as his gaze darted between Mr. Oliver and the penny. Hesitantly, he placed his grubby hand over the penny.
“I’m selling licorice for a penny today,” Mr. Oliver said. “Don’t reckon your pa would miss a penny.”
Rawley shook his head, grabbed the penny, and hurried out the door.
“You should have told him it was free,” Austin said.
Mr. Oliver shook his head. “Tried that. The boy has too much pride to take something for nothing. Beats anything I’ve ever seen. Considering who his pa is, I don’t know how he managed to latch on to any pride.”
“Who is his father?” Cordelia asked.
“One of the workers putting up the buildings, although calling him a worker is giving him the benefit of the doubt. Mostly he just draws his pay and gets drunk.”
“Where is Rawley’s mother?” Cordelia asked.
“Dead, I reckon.”
Austin pulled two sarsaparilla sticks out of a jar. “Put these on my account,” he said as he headed toward the door.
“He won’t take them,” Mr. Oliver called after him.
Austin flashed a disarming grin. “I can be quite charmin’ when I want to be.”
As the door closed behind him, Cordelia backed away from the counter, feeling self-conscious without Austin by her side. “I’m going to look around.”
Mr. Oliver nodded. “You let us know if you need anything.”
Cordelia walked to the far side of the store, not certain what she should do if she did find something she wanted to purchase. She felt vulnerable and lost, like a child who had let go of her mother’s hand in a crowd of people.
She was twenty-six years old, and she had no idea how to purchase a ribbon for her hair. Her father and her brothers had gotten into the habit of bringing everything to her while she had tended to her mother. The habit had remained long after her mother had passed away.
Where once she had felt pampered, she now felt afraid.
She had allowed herself to become dependent on the kindness of her family, and they had pulled that kindness out from under her. She turned toward the soft footfalls.
Becky smiled at her. “Did you find something that you wanted?”
Cordelia wrung her hands together. She supposed she should begin turning Dallas’s house into a home. “I was looking for some rugs.”
“W
e have some over here,” Becky said.
Cordelia skirted barrels and boxes as she followed Becky to the other side of the store. Becky patted a stack of rugs.
“This is all we have. Just look through them and let me know if you want one.”
Careful not to disturb the pile, Cordelia removed one rug at a time and examined it. She wanted something with brown woven through it, Dallas’s favorite color.
“I sure was surprised when I heard Dallas was going to marry you,” Becky said.
Cordelia glanced up from the selections and smiled. “I guess you didn’t know my brothers had a sister.”
“Oh, I’d heard the rumors,” Becky said. “I was just surprised Dallas would marry you after Boyd shot Austin.”
Cordelia’s heart rammed against her ribs, and she could feel the blood draining from her face.
Becky’s eyes widened. “Oh, my goodness. Didn’t you know?”
Cordelia lowered her gaze to the floor. Why wouldn’t it crack open and swallow her whole?
“I’m sure Dallas has forgiven him, otherwise he wouldn’t have married you.”
The door swung open, and Austin sauntered into the store, a sarsaparilla stick jutting from his mouth. “Well, I did it. Got the boy to take one of the sticks.”
He strolled over to Cordelia, confidence in his step. “What you got there, Dee?”
“R-rugs. I thought … I thought I’d purchase one for the house.”
“That’d be fine,” Austin said, talking around the sarsaparilla stick. “Which one?”
Cordelia quickly searched through the stack and pulled out a brown rug. “This one.”
Becky took it from her. “I’ll wrap it for you and put it on Dallas’s account. You can pick it up on your way out of town.”
“Can we go home now?” she asked Austin.
“Thought you wanted to see the rest of the town?”
“Oh, yes, I forgot.” She couldn’t bring herself to look at Austin, knowing her brother had shot him.
Austin took her arm. “Come on, Dee, you’re looking pale. Let’s get some air.”
She allowed him to lead her outside. Then she broke away from him, crossed the small boardwalk, and wrapped her trembling hands around the railing.
Austin studied the woman clinging to the railing as though she were afraid she’d drown in the dust without it. He took the sarsaparilla stick out of his mouth. “What happened, Dee?”
She looked at him, with hurt and anger mixed in her eyes. His stomach dropped clear to the ground, and he fought the urge to reach out and touch her, to wipe the hurt and anger away. “What did I do?” he said, his voice low.
“Boyd shot you.”
He furrowed his brow. “Yeah?”
“You said it was cattle rustlers.”
“Dallas said it was cattle rustlers.”
“Why?”
Austin shrugged. “Maybe he didn’t think you’d believe him, or maybe he was trying to spare you some hurt. Sitting in that shade, eating our meal, it just didn’t feel right to me to say Boyd had shot me. I reckon Dallas felt the same way.”
“But Boyd did shoot you.”
“Becky tell you that?”
She nodded.
“Dang, that girl has a big mouth.”
“Why did he shoot you?”
“Don’t think he meant to. He was just shooting, and I got in the way.”
Tears welled in her eyes. “I don’t have any friends, Austin. I need a friend right now. Be my friend.”
“Sure. Whatever you want.”
“Friends never lie to each other,” she said.
With his thumb, Austin pushed his hat off his brow, wishing he’d been a little slower in agreeing to be her friend. “What do you want to know?”
“Do you know what happened the night that Dallas broke Boyd’s arm?”
“Yep. That’s the night I got shot.”
“Was Boyd guarding his cattle? Did you, Dallas, and Houston attack him?”
Austin jerked off his hat and looked at the sky, wondering where wisdom came from.
“I want the truth,” she said. “Am I married to a man who sneaked up on my brother in the dead of night and broke his arm?”
He lowered his gaze to hers. Within her brown eyes, he saw a sparkle of hope, and he wondered which would hurt her the least—the truth or a lie.
“The truth,” she whispered as though understanding his hesitancy.
“No, you’re not married to a man who’d sneak up on anyone. It’s not Dallas’s way. It never has been. He meets every problem head-on. Your brothers were gettin’ into the habit of cutting through Dallas’s fence and killing off his cattle. That night, we were waiting for them. When the pain ripped through my shoulder, everything went black, but Houston told me that Dallas had dragged Boyd through the river. I reckon his arm must have hit a rock or something and got busted, but I do know Dallas didn’t do it on purpose.”
“Dallas frightens me, Austin.”
Austin couldn’t stop himself from stepping closer and wrapping his arms around her. “I know. I see it in your eyes every time you look at him. He sees it, too, and it makes him mad, which scares you more and makes him furious. It’s a circle you can’t seem to get out of.”
“The things Boyd told me … I don’t know what to believe anymore.”
Austin leaned back and cupped her chin. “Well, you might try by not looking at him through Boyd’s eyes, but look at him through your own. Pretend you just met him and had never heard anything about him.”
“I think he’d still frighten me.”
Austin laughed. “He scares the hell out of me. Out of Houston, too.” He grew somber. “But he’d never hurt you, Dee. I know that.”
“But he won’t set me free.”
“If he did, what would you do? Was living with your family better than what you have now?”
“I need something more, Austin. I don’t know what, but I know I need something more than what Dallas or my family has the power to give me.”
He drew her close, pressing his cheek against the top of her head. “Then I hope you find it, Dee. I truly do.”
CHAPTER
NINE
Dallas stepped out of the bank and wished to God that he hadn’t desperately searched for an excuse to come into town. He’d hoped to casually cross his wife’s path, perhaps walk through the town with her.
He hadn’t expected to see her on the boardwalk wrapped tightly within his brother’s arms.
Austin looked up and his blue eyes widened. “Dallas!” Like a snake wrapped around a low-lying tree branch, Austin slowly uncoiled himself from around Cordelia. “Didn’t know you had plans to come to town.”
“Obviously.” Dallas balled his hands into fists and clenched his jaws, his gaze darting between his brother and his wife. The terror had returned to her eyes, and he imagined right now she had good reason to fear him.
With a loose-jointed walk, Austin approached him. “Dee found out that Boyd shot me. She was a little angry at us for not telling her outright, for saying it was cattle rustlers. I was just trying to cool her temper.”
Dallas glared at his brother. “You don’t hug me when I’m angry.” Austin barked out his laughter. “I will if you want
me to because I can sure tell that you’re fit to be tied right now.” Stretching out his arms and tilting his head, he flashed an infectious grin that Dallas was certain he would use to charm the ladies if there were any ladies around. “Want a hug?”
Dallas stepped back. “Hell, no.” Dallas shifted his attention at Dee. She was studying him as though he were a stranger, which he realized he was. What did she really know about him? What did he know about her?
“How did she find out?” he asked.
Austin jerked his head toward the general store. “Becky.” He rubbed his hands on his thighs. “Listen, Dee’s never visited Leighton. Would you show her the town while I talk with Becky for a while?” Austin swiveled his head around. “You don
’t mind going with Dallas, do you, Dee?”
Dallas watched his wife grow pale before she finally nodded. “That would be fine.”
“Thanks. I’ll catch up with you.”
Austin disappeared into the general store. Dallas wished he had been the one to whom Dee had turned, the one who had held her when she’d learned the truth.
“You’ve never been to town?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Not this town. Not after the day you set the land aside. My brothers never had time to bring me.”
“Well …” He stepped off the boardwalk, suddenly self-conscious with all that remained undone. “It’s nowhere near finished.” He pointed straight ahead. “The general store.” He moved his hand to the left. “The bank.”
“What were you doing at the bank?” she asked as she walked to his side.
“I wanted to talk with Mr. Henderson about a loan for another building.” “What sort of building?”
He cleared his throat. “A man—cabinetmaker—wrote to me. He wants to move here, but he hasn’t the means to finance his own business. I think he would be a good investment.”
“Do you have the means to finance him?”
“With the assistance of the bank, I’ll help him get his start. Eventually, he’ll own his business outright, but the more people I can get to Leighton, the more we’ll grow.”
“How do you determine which businesses would be a good investment?”
He studied her, not expecting the questions she was asking, but pleased that she knew enough to ask them. He crooked his elbow and watched as she swallowed before placing her hand on his arm. Together they walked slowly along the street.
“I try and figure out what people need,” he explained to her. He pointed toward the clothing store. “Houston was always going to Fort Worth to purchase clothing for Amelia. He’d visit Miss St. Claire’s dress shop. The idea of a new town intrigued her, so she moved her business here, hoping the town would prosper and more women would come. Until then, she sews clothing for men and women.”
“There aren’t many women from what I’ve seen.”
“A half dozen if that many. I haven’t figured out how to attract them to Leighton. I’ve been thinking of running an advertisement for brides, similar to the one Amelia placed for a husband. Only I’d want a whole passel of women to come, and I’d need to have husbands waiting for them. I’ve got to give some thought to the best way to handle that. I don’t particularly relish the thought of being a marriage broker.”
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