"You what?" Trish raised her voice to a high pitch. She looked him in the eye, but he couldn't even do that. He was too drunk. "What are you sayin'?"
"You heard me, gal. I just lost you in a poker game. That's what I'm saying. You can take this so-called marriage of ours and throw it away. I don't care. You don't belong to me no more, understand? So don't follow me. Don't come home. I don't want you no more…"
Trish's eyes widened in horror. "How could you do that?"
"Didn't have nothin' else to bid on." He started walking away, stumbling as he went.
"But…we're married?" she cried out, wondering if he was joking and if she should follow him anyway. "I'm a human being, not a anti…"
"Not anymore, we ain't."
"But it was a legal marriage. You can't just walk out on me, like that."
"Reckon I can. Don't fret. In three years, you can get a divorce on abandonment charges."
Three years. What was she supposed to do in the meantime?
Pure panic set in. Trish flopped back into the chair. He lost me in a poker game? Like I'm some sort of trash he doesn't care about.
Now what was she to do? Chester was still her husband.
Didn't he care? Although upon reflection, she gave him nothing to care about. He certainly didn't seem distraught.
The farther away he got, the more her heart pounded in fear of the unknown. He was leaving her here to rot!
Chapter Two
About to run away as far as she could, she stopped her in mid action.
"Ma'am, I'm sorry to tell you this, but I just won you in a poker game." The man leaned on the swinging door. A comfortable smile played with the corners of his sensual mouth. He rubbed his chiseled jaw thoughtfully. He was undoubtedly the best looking man she'd ever seen. Her heart fluttered momentarily. "I am not a side of beef to be traded for a fair hand at poker."
The man eyed her with renewed interest. He took his time looking from head to toe, veiling his reaction behind his thick set of dark lashes. "No ma'am, I don't think you are."
Gorgeous and tempting, Trish had met plenty like him, and knew she was in for trouble now.
Her mind raced with possibilities of her future and failures of her past.
She'd been too long trying to find a husband. Cowboys came and went, but Chester had looked like something solid to lean on, and she grabbed him before anyone else did. Little did she know that no one else wanted him.
Selfishly, she married him for his land and his home, and felt her reward might be children someday, if she could stomach going to bed with him. She honestly thought that marriage would mellow her toward Chester, somehow. It didn't. That could have been why he traded her in a poker game, now that she thought of it.
She gave the gambler a second glance.
She did what she always did when she got angry—she fought with words. Placing her hands on her hips and firming her lips, she frowned. "You cannot win another person in a poker game, sir!"
The gentleman looked down the road at the retreating Chester Smith then smiled sexily at her. "Perhaps, when you are dealing with a normal person. But your husband is not what I consider normal. I encouraged him to throw in a saddle or horse perhaps in your place, but he would not have it. I did win you, and I don't have the slightest idea what I'm going to do with you. First time I let a player play me."
Trish folded her lips and made a face. "You don't have to do anything. I'm married to that man."
"Not anymore," came a voice from inside. A tall man with spectacles glanced outside the doorway. "I reckon his running off like that and bettin' you in the pot, makes you a very abandoned woman. You can claim abandonment, but it won't be legal for three years. Now, since this man owns you, so to speak, your husband could get a divorce by adultery. Meanwhile, this man owns rights to you. Best thing you can do if you want free from Chester is talk him into a divorce. Otherwise, you are more like a bond servant to this man, than married to that one."
"I am not a commodity, sir. I'm a lady." She glared at the newcomer. "I won't barter myself."
When neither man replied, she grew angrier.
"And exactly who are you?" She twisted her head back and forth rather haughtily from one man to the other.
"I am a lawyer. I often witness this kind of dealings. Although it is certainly an underhanded deal for you, it is legal. I've seen men bet almost anything with a good hand, ranches, cattle, and women, sometimes everything a man has. And your Chester, he had a good bettin' hand, so you can't blame him for tryin'. Guess you better be discussing it with this gentleman, or I could draw up the papers for the divorce."
"And exactly who are you sir?" She turned on the roughly handsome gambler.
"The name is Gil Davis, ma'am." The gambler tipped his black Stetson hat to her with a somewhat crooked smile.
Her anger began to subside as she regarded the men. Deciding to try a different tack, she blinked. "Do you think we could sit down and talk this out, sir?"
"Well, right now, I'm in the middle of another hand. If you'd care to join us at the table until we are through, I'd be glad to discuss things afterward."
"Do I have a choice?" she muttered.
"No, ma'am, you don't. Unless you want to try to take care of yourself. Which I don't recommend. As if I let you go to be a vagrant with no support. I didn't agree with your husband throwing you into the pot like that. It is disgraceful. This gentleman, here, told him it was legal. Now you are my responsibility. But… right now, I'm willing to consider that support, after the game is over."
"I see!" She raised a brow. Why would he be so willing to support her? Her eyes narrowed. "Then I guess I'll join you at the table."
He smiled and opened the swinging doors for her, his smile unexpectedly attractive. Why her heart fluttered so, she couldn't imagine.
She squared her shoulders and held her head high. The way she entered the saloon had all heads turning.
Inside she was shaking, from the forthcoming unknown.
The gambler was lethal. She never trusted good-looking men. Her own father was good-looking… and she hated him for what he tried to do to her.
She breathed the familiar air of rot gut whiskey and smoke of spittoons not emptied and cleaned regularly.
Where had she gone wrong? Perhaps she should have submitted to Chester, but in all that was holy, she couldn't find it in herself to take him to her bed. She had thought of it on her wedding night. After all, he'd taken a bath for her, but still, she couldn't reconcile her instincts.
Every day since, he reeked at the end of the day and he was sloppy in his appearance. He rarely changed his clothes and rarely combed his hair. There wasn't much to love about Chester, though at first she had tried. She'd realized his shortcomings before she married him, but she thought she could change him. It didn't take long to dispel that idea.
Just from one glance, she knew the gambler changed regularly, he combed his thick head of hair every day, and shaved. He didn't stink, and that put him an inch above the others he gambled with. Aside from the lawyer, he was the cleanest man in the saloon.
The way he played his game told her he knew what he was doing. He dealt the cards like a professional, he kept his expression bland during the game and he seemed to gauge his opponents.
His eyes met hers for a moment, and his expression changed from serious to curious. Still, Trish didn't trust a tin-horned gambler either. She'd seen enough of them in her time.
However, her strong, protective husband had shown a weakness she hadn't expected too, in gambling and drinking and now her future was more uncertain than ever.
Once she married, she was no longer under the mail-order-bride contract as she had fulfilled that bargain. Since she had no visible means of support, she would return to being a saloon girl. That option no longer appealed to Trish. If she had been cold before, she had learned the art even more since being married to Chester.
With Nadine finally married and settled down, Trish felt she had to
reach higher than a saloon girl once more. All the other girls seemed relatively happy. Unlike her, they had all married for love. Jo Ella had settled down with the sheriff and was about to deliver a baby. She'd been at Nadine's wedding. But the others she wasn't sure about, only that they had met the contract. So she figured them all happily married.
Trish sat at the poker table, as smoke curled in the air. The smell of tobacco and whiskey always made Trish ill. How she had endured the saloons was beyond her, but returning to them held no prospects either.
She eyed the men at the table—some business men, another a cowboy, even a drifter had joined the game, and then her gambler—but it was her gambler she kept going back to. She studied him out of the corner of her eye as he upped the stakes of the game once more. He did know his business. She'd give him that. He held a poker face while he waited to see who would bid against him.
Most of these men showed no signs of stress. But a couple of them dripped with sweat, fumbling with their cards, or looking disinterested. Trish found it fascinating how men took it so seriously, and some walked away so empty without a word.
From the pile of money in front of him, Gil was good at his game.
She waited as Gil raked in the pot. There was no tension obviously these men knew he was a professional and accepted him before he sat down to play.
Perhaps she should rethink him.
The other men excused themselves from more torture. Most of them headed for the bar, to drown their sorrows she expected.
The gambler looked at her with a sexy smile. "You seem to bring me luck."
"You’re a professional. I hardly think it is me, sir."
"What's your name?"
"Trish… Smith, I guess." She shrugged. "That's the first time anyone's ever asked me, since I married Chester. It sounds strange, even now."
"Let's go find somewhere to talk." He put his black hat on his full head of black hair and took her arm.
"And where would that be?"
He grinned. "We'll go out back."
"Fine." Trish let him lead the way.
As he closed the back door to the saloon, he glanced around. Then he pulled an empty whiskey barrel around and offered it for her to sit on. The way he looked her over had her almost squirming. He didn't miss a thing.
"Thank you." Trish sighed.
"Now, Mrs. Smith…"
"Call me Trish, under the circumstances…" She adjusted her cotton dress over the barrel.
"Trish, then. You aren't exactly a free woman unless your husband files for divorce. In which case, he could obtain at his convenience. And would probably do so if he wanted to remarry right away, Gil said. "Naturally, since he abandoned you and I sort of won you in the pot, I should take care of you. And believe me, I'd marry you myself if it were legal. But that would make you a bigamist. So …"
"You'd marry a total stranger? Why? What's wrong with you?" Her eyes widened as he came closer.
"Not a thing, but being married to a woman who helps me protect my interest and keeps other women off my back would be useful. Besides, you aren't hard on the eyes, that's for sure." His glance went over her again.
"I suppose in some roundabout way, that was a compliment. Thank you…" She kept her chin up, but it quivered.
"So, do you think he might want a divorce?"
Trish sighed again, her shoulders slumping. "I have no idea. We didn't talk much. If he wanted a drink, he came and got it. If he wanted a woman… he got that too. As for a wife, I can't see it happening. I've already cleaned his house and that should last a while. He's got groceries for a couple of weeks. I don't see him needing much of anything, except maybe a drink or two."
"Am I to detect from that statement that you didn't have relations with your husband?"
How dare he ask such a private question? Trish's cheeks heated as she arrested her temper once more.
"By what right do you ask such a thing?" she demanded.
He smiled cagily. "I was just curious to see if you would tell me. I detect a touch of a southern bell in you. So much pride wrapped in such a lovely package."
"I am a lady, sir, and you will address me as one."
"You aren't in a bargaining position, are you? But I do consider you quite a lady. However, I can already see that having you around might be a good idea, so I'm taking you on."
"Exactly what do you mean? Taking me on?"
"I mean, you'll be the lady you claim to be, and you'll be with me at the tables."
"At the tables?" Trish frowned. "In a saloon?"
"Yes, you will be my good luck charm. Of course, we'll have to get you some clothes befitting your stature."
"And if I refuse?" she countered.
"Then I could leave you to the streets, to salvage what you can." He glanced around. "And in this town, there isn't much to salvage."
With a heavy heart, she realized she was fast becoming this man's property, to do with as he pleased. She had no horse, no clothes… no nothing. She was almost back where she started before she married—in a saloon. Was there no escaping it?
"You'd subject me to the stench of smoke and whiskey every day?"
"Maybe not every day. That would depend on you… and my luck."
The implication of that statement had her blinking hard and trying to figure a way out of this. "You would make a whore of me?" She became indignant. She slapped his face boldly, then grabbed her mouth before she overloaded it again.
He recovered easily.
"Never… Mrs. Smith. That choice would be yours, but unless your husband releases you, then for three years you will be mine, so to speak. I will support you until you are out from under this yoke. And people will talk, naturally. I'm afraid unless we do marry, you name won't stay spotless."
"But you can't marry me. I'm already married."
"That's true, but most the places I will be traveling to don't know that, so we could lie about it. Unless you have some aversion to lying?"
Her mouth formed the perfect "O."
"Well, not under the circumstances I don't."
"Good."
"And after those three years, I could go my own way?" She met his gaze.
He seemed to consider that a moment. "If that's what you want, yes."
"How can I go my own way, if I have no money?" she countered. "I'd by right back where I started from. Broke with no options."
He twisted his head. "Good question. You are quite intelligent too. I like that. All right, he left you in a not-so-nice situation. It isn't your fault. I will give you a small percentage of my gains. Say ten percent. You bring me good luck, and you will have a small dowry by the end of the three years."
"And if I don't bring you good luck?"
"Then we both lose."
"I'd want a bed or room of my own at all times," she insisted.
"Of course you do, but as I said, I'll have to tell everyone you're my wife, and it will look strange if you come out of another room every night. I'm afraid we will have to make compensations for that. Besides, I travel from town to town, and it might be different everywhere we go. Some nice and some not so nice. But I will honor your intention of not sleeping with me as long as you like. And in public, you will be my wife."
"You mean that?" She eyed him suspiciously.
"Yes, ma'am, I do." He smiled again. "A gambler has a reputation too, you know."
Trish wanted to cry, to run away from this man for he could trap her in ways her husband never did. But if she remembered their bargain and kept it in three years, she'd have some money. No matter what, she couldn't fall for him. He wasn't the settling down type, and he certainly wasn't husband material. He would always be the gambler, and she would be the lady who got away. That was fine with her.
This could work. Three years wasn't such a long time. She could only hope he would honor their bargain.
"In that case, Mr. Davis, you have a deal."
He took her hand in his and shook it firmly.
"Now tell me, what
would I have to do at the tables?"
He smiled again, looking at her thoroughly. "Be a lady at all times. Look beautiful. That won't be hard for you. And never leave with anyone but me."
"Of course… I wouldn't think of it."
"Do you drink?"
"Why, of course not, unless I'm taken ill."
"Then I shall do my best to see that doesn't happen."
"And other women, sir. Do you plan on having other women in your life? I mean, me being around all the time might get in your way of romancing the ladies."
"I'm usually a loner. Gambling and women don't mix. A good woman wouldn't be caught dead with me, and a bad one would only want my money. However, you are in a pickle and I am left responsible for you. So, do we have a deal?"
"As much as I know better, I suppose we do." She she nodded slowly. Trish knew she was taking on a huge risk, but she had little choice in the matter. It was up to her he kept his part of the bargain. But she never thought this would be her fate.
He nodded too and smiled down into her face. "Then let's go over to the hotel and get you a place to stay. Will you be going home to get your things?"
Trish fumbled with her handkerchief she'd pulled out of her dress pocket. "I don't have much there. I don't think I want to go back now… He's in a contrary mood, and I don't know what he might do."
"I understand." He took her elbow, and they walked toward the hotel. "Tomorrow we'll see about getting you some clothes." Gil folded her hand against his arm.
She allowed him the privilege without a word.
So far, her gambler man was treating her well. She couldn't really complain. She no longer had to scrub floors nor lay down for many men. Life could be worse, she supposed.
Chapter Three
A week passed, and Trish didn't see hide or hair of her so-called husband. She thought he might wander back in and play another round of poker, but perhaps he learned his lesson. He'd lost a dandy cook. He'd lost more than he could ever know, for in time, Trish had planned on having children, Chester or no Chester. Children would be the pay-off with any bad marriage, she wagered.
Winning the Lady (Book 4 of the Red River Valley Brides) Page 2