Colorado Moonfire

by Charlotte Hubbard

  “You don’t know how good it feels to be standing here alive, talking to you again, although fancy speeches aren’t my strong suit,” he began in a steady voice. “You’ve heard by now that Frazier and Connor Foxe are dead, and I won’t elaborate except to say that I’ve spent the weeks since the Christmas Eve robbery at the Golden Rose trailing them, on the suspicion that they were behind it. Frankly, I wish they were still alive so they could answer to me for the things they’ve done.”

  The crowd buzzed like a hive of agitated bees, scowling at each other and at him, which he’d expected. Most of these folks never dreamed the elegant Englishman who promoted so many of Cripple’s civic projects was crooked, and he planned to keep their questions to a minimum for now. When he had their attention again, Barry continued.

  “During my travels I was ambushed, shot, nearly barbecued after being kidnapped, and meanwhile learned that the very purpose of the Rose robbery was to do me in. What you read in the papers about Lyla O’Riley was a smokescreen, friends—another of Frazier’s ploys to discredit me and the woman who saved my life.”

  Again his listeners murmured in astonishment, and he held his hand up, shaking his head at the reporters who were poised with questions.

  “My disappearance and her wedding today were part of our plan to prove Foxe guilty of extortion, robbery, and murder, and we’ve accumulated irrefutable evidence of these crimes. But the investigation has cost us both, and I promised myself that if I lived through it, the Foxe case would be my last. So I hereby announce my resignation as the city marshal of Cripple Creek. Thanks for your support and concern while I was your lawman.”

  Barry turned before the barrage of questions began, pleased that McClanahan and Adams stepped between him and the reporters, and then followed him inside. The door wasn’t shut before they were hounding him.

  “What the hell’s this about? What’ll you do now that—”

  “So what am I supposed to say? All the papers will want—”

  Thompson held up both hands, smiling with a sudden serenity. No more drunks to corral, no more late-night chases. He’d arrested his last recalcitrant crook, and it felt pretty damn wonderful.

  “Rex,” he said, his hand extended, “there’ll be another marshal in here come Monday, supplied by the Springs. You’ll be a top-notch deputy for him, too, and I wish you luck and that pay raise you deserve. Give Theresa and the kids my best.”

  The carrot-haired deputy blanched as he shook hands. “Where’ll you be?”

  “In and out, after I take a long-overdue vacation.”

  “But what’ll I tell—”

  “Give those reporters whatever you want, Adams. I’m sure you’ll be the most quoted man in Cripple Creek for the next week or so,” Thompson said with a chuckle. Then he turned to Matt, whose eyes were full of questions he wouldn’t be able to sidestep quite so easily. “Let’s go someplace private for a drink while we look at these papers Rafferty left me.”

  Matt followed him into the back room, but as they were putting on their coats, he stalled. “I know you want to get over to Lyla, and I really should fetch Emily, pal. She’s feeling puny—”

  “Not coming down with something, I hope?” Barry watched the emotions flicker across his best friend’s face as they donned their hats.

  “No, actually she’s pregnant, and—”

  “Son of a gun!” He grabbed the shorter man in a bearhug, lifting him from the floor in his excitement. “Congratulations, sure-shot! Didn’t take you long—or will this one be a little early?”

  “Will I be asking you the same question in a few months?” McClanahan teased back.

  Sobering, Barry set him down and headed for the door. “I can’t rightly say. Might depend on what these documents tell me.”

  Matt grabbed his arm. “You’re not going to walk out on her? Not because of papers she signed when she was forced to—not after all she’s been through with you?” he demanded.

  Thompson’s stomach tightened with anxiety. He looked McClanahan in the eye and said softly, “Do you know what it did to me, seeing my woman in that spectacular wedding gown, saying yes to another man? A lot’s happened in the past few hours, and until I get some explanations, I can’t answer your questions.”

  He stepped into the back alley, suddenly very tired from chasing across Colorado and frustrated because a jealous housekeeper had stolen the satisfaction of seeing Frazier Foxe humiliated and punished for his crimes.

  “We’ve been friends a long time, Barry,” McClanahan said from the doorway. “I thought your attraction to Lyla was another flash-in-the-pan at first, but now anybody can see you’ll have a hole in your heart big enough to fall through if you leave her.”

  Thompson let out a long sigh, keeping his back to the jailhouse.

  “Think about it before you let your pride and her inheritance come between you, pal. I hate to see Foxe ruin two more lives.”

  Chapter 32

  Lyla sat fidgeting in her suite, watching for Barry but seeing only the lengthening shadows falling across a fresh blanket of snow. Was she a fool to assume he could still love her?

  She fingered Mick’s pendant, like a mother fondling every plane of a rescued child’s face. No one could fault her for wishing to preserve her brother’s memory, but as the dusk settled into her unlighted room she wondered if she’d sacrificed too much for a simple silver shamrock. What was the loss of a necklace compared to losing the man she loved? Had she endured threats, degradation, and abuse at the gloved hands of Frazier Foxe, only to be left as completely alone as she’d been before he’d caught her in his insidious web of deceit?

  She should’ve refused those first three dresses and the maid’s job, should’ve let Marshal Thompson chase the Christmas Eve bandits ... should’ve run like hell when three different friends and Barry himself had warned her not to stay in church this afternoon. But she hadn’t.

  Oliver Hollingsworth entered to light a few lamps, graciously preserving her privacy by not speaking. A few moments later, though, he admitted the tall, burly lawman Lyla had been praying, yet afraid, to see.

  Thompson set his hat on the highboy, glancing about the lavishly-appointed suite. He was wearing fresh clothes and smelled of shaving soap and cologne. And whiskey. The set of his jaw suggested a marshal after the facts rather than a lover come calling, and Lyla braced herself for an unpleasant encounter. “I thought you weren’t coming.”

  Oi thot ye warnt comin’. Barry dismissed the notion that her musical brogue tickled him like an Irish ditty, concentrating on the business at hand. “I had to set things straight with Rex, and then I gave my resignation speech. It brought the house down.”

  Frowning, she shoved images of Barry making love to her in a dilapidated shack out of her mind. “You can’t tell me anyone applauded, or let you go without asking questions.”

  “I left Adams to handle the press. It’s his penance for a half-assed betrayal.”

  Lyla sensed some of the hurt in his voice was directed at her, yet he’d allowed the hapless deputy to remain employed, so there was hope: he could still rise above the shortfallings of those who hadn’t followed his instructions. “What’ll you do now?”

  He recalled discussing this before, when they were reunited at Foxe’s shack, bound by ropes yet set free by pledges of everlasting love…talk of marriage and children he might have to recant now. “Oh, there’s always the Flaxen Lassie and the Golden Rose. I see no need to chase after Rafferty, since he was decent enough to return those papers and the five hundred bucks. And after looking over Foxe’s will and that other agreement, I don’t guess I need to worry about your welfare, either.”

  Her mouth went coppery and she felt the blood in her veins slowing to a trickle.

  Thompson watched her periwinkle eyes mist over but he refused to fall for them, shrugging. “My attorney says the will stands regardless of the faked signature, because both you and Frazier signed it—and because no heir exists to contest it. I believe that
makes you the new owner of Colorado’s largest sheep ranch, and with Connor dead, you’ve got the flocks to support it. You’re a wealthy widow, Mrs. Foxe. You surely don’t need a has-been marshal cluttering up that fancy house, taking up your time.”

  He was serious. The eyes that had once sparkled like Irish hills after a rain now reminded her of scum on a stagnant pond. Who did he think he was, sounding so injured? Lyla sat taller in her chair, determined to set a few things straight before this man sucked them both down into the quicksand of his own self-pity.

  “Are you insinuating that I loved you only for your money, Marshal Thompson? That I was a poor Irish lass latching onto a swaggering American millionaire?” Lyla removed the aquamarine ring from her left hand and let it clatter onto the tabletop beside her. ‘‘Don’t let me detain you, sir.”

  Barry heard a purposeful pride that rivaled Allegra Keating’s, and when he saw no sign of Foxe’s wedding band he studied her closely. “No, the thought of you chasing after my money never occurred to me,” he admitted.

  “What is it, then? That I’m perhaps wealthier than you are, thanks to a twist of fate?” she demanded. “I have a ranch to run, a manager to hire—”

  “You’ll do fine,” he mumbled, stepping back when she sprang from her chair.

  “But I want you there! Even if you were late getting back to Cripple,” she challenged, crossing her arms beneath her breasts. “I assume some act of God held you up.”

  The sight of this tiny spitfire in red plaid, her breasts jutting out in her indignation as she tossed her honey hair over her shoulders, nearly felled him. But by God, she had no cause to point a finger!

  “It was an avalanche, as a matter of fact,” he replied, placing his fists on his hips, “and I was tied in knots the whole time I sat helpless on that damn train, hoping Foxe hadn’t already killed you for skipping out on him again. Imagine my shock when I returned to find you married to the bastard, after all he did to you. After I warned you to run before it was too late!”

  And after all she’d laughed and cried about with this giant of a man, their fate came down to a shouting match: Barry was leaning over her, his nose only inches above hers as he glowered at her, and she was glaring back, her neck tilted until she was nearly toppling over backward. For several moments they remained frozen in their defiance, searching each other’s souls while goading each other to break the deadlock.

  Lyla gave in first…or at least gave the appearance of it. Barry Thompson had his pride and he had a legitimate point, given the circumstances. A lifetime of loving him was a terrible thing to relinquish, all for two such minor details. She let out a quavery sigh and turned away, hoping the truth would speak for itself and his heart would hear it.

  “I wanted to run—God knows Grace and Matt and Oliver tried to whisk me away from that church, but I held out…for you.”

  From the corner of her eye she caught the twitch of his jaw. If there was ever a time to use every resource and feminine wile she possessed, it was now, when she had all at stake and everything to gain. She stepped away, and then faced him with her hands clasped, her eyes entreating him.

  “I knew you’d come, knew you’d be there for me, Barry,” she whispered. “You’re the strongest, kindest, dearest man I know, and I love you. My faith in you gave me the strength to face up to Frazier, and for once in my life I didn’t run when things got rough. I stuck it out to the end—waiting for you.”

  Thompson felt himself sinking, drowning in the periwinkle pools he’d never been able to resist. He’d been so incensed by a twist in timing—no more her fault than his own—that he’d overlooked the hell she had to have gone through while waiting for him to keep the promise that he’d return. His throat was so tight he couldn’t speak. He slowly opened his arms, hoping.

  Lyla savored her victory, but only for a moment. It was nothing compared to the warmth of Barry’s embrace, the strength of arms that lifted her from the floor to kiss lips that promised a love more enduring and fulfilling than any fairy-tale ending. She clung to him with her arms and legs, reveling in the glory that this man alone could show her.

  Still clutching her, as though the spritely enchantress in his arms would try to abandon him as she had the first time he saw this plaid dress, Barry lowered himself into the chair. He kissed her again, running his fingers through her silken hair, pressing into flesh that was firm and soft and excruciatingly tempting after all these weeks without her.

  “I love you, too, honey,” he murmured against her ear. “Guess we both had reason to panic, knowing what we stood to lose. But now that things are right between us again, a few details need to be settled.”

  “Like what?” Lyla sat up to gaze into his boyish, handsome face.

  “Well,” he sighed, “the fact that you could buy and sell me doesn’t really matter, but these big old feet don’t fit into Foxe’s shoes and I’m not sure I’d ever be comfortable in his house, either. And I can’t imagine you wanting to live there, after what he put you through.”

  She couldn’t recall ever suggesting they had to reside at the ranch, but since Barry was thinking about it—and had no house of his own—it seemed a more logical alternative than letting the mansion sit empty.

  “It’s a lovely place, actually, and I suppose the sheep remind me of home,” Lyla said softly. “‘Twas Frazier and Connor that ruined my stay, and now that they’re gone it seems a shame to let all those spacious rooms…along with the nursery and schoolroom…go to waste.”

  She picked up the aquamarine ring, watching it sparkle in the lamplight. “It’s the sentiment about a thing that determines your attitude—the meaning you invest in it, rather than its actual value,” she continued wistfully. “When Frazier forced me to wear this ring as a mockery of my lost love for you, the pain was only momentary. Knowing it was really your ring was a great comfort to me when I thought you were dead.”

  Thompson had a feeling she was artfully tugging his heartstrings. And since he hadn’t had a chance to meet with his architect, perhaps he could live under Frazier’s roof awhile, let her think she was having her way. A small concession, considering how empty his life would be without her.

  Seeing the warm flickering in his green eyes, Lyla cleared her throat coyly. “Well, then, if you’d be uncomfortable in Frazier’s house, could you consider living in mine? I know you own that acreage overlooking Cripple—”

  “I do,” he replied with a nod.

  “—and it’d be the perfect spot for a home to entertain in when we spend time in town,” she continued with her sweetest smile. “But I have an obligation to provide Hollingsworth with someplace to live, and your house isn’t ready yet. And after all he’s done for us, I want him to have the comfort of his own quarters, don’t you?”

  “I do,” Barry agreed with a nod.

  Lyla chuckled, loving the way he indulged her. His patient humor would make him a perfect father, and she could easily imagine the laughter and love-making they’d share while begetting a houseful of beautiful brown-haired babies. But a man like Thompson was used to overseeing more than siblings’ squabbles and arrangements for the next dinner party.

  “Now that you’ve turned in your badge, you’ll need something besides a Flaxen Lassie to occupy your time,” she teased. “You’ll have me and the children, of course, but I bet you and Buck would enjoy riding the range, seeing that the sheepherders are keeping our flocks profitable and that the grass isn’t overgrazed. I envision you as an authority our employees will respect, much more than they ever did Frazier and Connor. Don’t you?”

  “I do.”

  That settled it. Thompson was raising no objections, and his vowlike replies were begging the question…just as his large, warm hand had found its way under her skirt and was unhooking the top of her silk stocking. Perhaps he thought he could sidetrack her with his advances before any intentions were exchanged, but he was wrong! She’d waited far too long and suffered innumerable tribulations for the love of this man, and s
he would hear him declare himself!

  “Well, then,” she breathed, her pulse racing as his fingers found their way beneath her lacy drawers. “If you know of any reason why this man and this woman shouldn’t be united in Holy Matrimony, speak now or forever hold your peace.”

  Laughter started low in his chest, becoming hoarse as his desire for her rose with the color in her lovely cheeks. “I’m already holding my piece,” he quipped, “and by God, she’s not getting away from me ever again. I love you, Lyla. And forever won’t be long enough to show you how much.”

  He took the ring she was holding, the magnificent aquamarine encircled by diamonds that sparkled almost as brightly as the woman in his arms. He solemnly slid the gem onto her left hand, an act he’d dreamed of performing months ago, finally consummated.

  His promise rang sweetly in her ears as Lyla melted against him, knowing Barry would always have his way with her. And giving it to him sounded like the finest of pastimes, now, and for as long as they both should live.

  Acknowledgments

  With many thanks to Bronna Flanagan—

  boss, friend and Waldenbooks manager

  extraordinaire—who goes above and beyond

  the call to promote my books.

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2016 Charlotte Hubbard

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is purely coincidental.

  By payment of required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this book. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without the express written permission of copyright owner.