Bridget

by Linda Lael Miller

  He made a brew of hot water, molasses, and whiskey and brought it to her. It had a lot more kick than tea, and it might dull the pain a little.

  She sniffed the concoction and scrunched up her face.

  “Drink it,” Trace commanded. He wanted to reach out, brush a tendril of pale gold hair back from her forehead, but that would be pushing his luck. She was skittish as a filly about to be ridden for the first time, and the mere suggestion that she might need anyone’s help—his in particular—was bound to scare her half to death.

  She took a cautious sip, coughed, tried to push the mug back into his hand.

  “Drink,” he repeated.

  “Where are Noah and Skye?” She was stalling.

  He took the cup, held it gently to her mouth. Reluctantly, she sipped and swallowed. “They’re right here, darlin’. Sitting at the table, playing cards.” Poker, to be exact. He’d taught them himself—well, he’d taught Skye, anyhow; Noah still had a way to go—while Bridget was asleep, but it was probably better not to go into too much detail just then. He grinned at her, made her drink more and then more of the whiskey mixture, but slowly.

  “Trace?” She’d taken half the drink, and she was already getting heavy-eyed.

  “Um?” He set the cup aside, tucked the covers under her chin.

  “Thanks.”

  He leaned down and kissed her lightly on the forehead, the same way he might have kissed Skye. The result was a tangle of emotions and sensations that fairly took his breath away, though he was pretty sure he’d managed to hide his reactions. “Anytime,” he replied. “But I’ll thank you not to go grabbing up any more rattlers.”

  Her eyes shone, though she could barely keep them open. “You’ll be—you’ll be close by?”

  He wanted to kiss her again, but he didn’t dare because he knew it wouldn’t be the same kind of kiss as before. So he nodded instead. “I brought my bedroll in and laid it out over there by the stove. Go to sleep, Bridget. You need to sleep.”

  A smile wobbled on her mouth, vanished. “I hate to sleep,” she said.

  He knew it was true. She was a vital person, energetic, fully alive. Even her stillness was vibrant, and she begrudged every idle moment. “Look at it this way,” he teased. “The sooner you go to sleep, the sooner it will be morning.”

  She managed a small, strangled laugh, and he knew he’d turned a corner, that somehow his whole life had pivoted on that tiny sound. “That’s what I tell Noah,” she said.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Well, then,” he said, “it must be true.”

  She smiled again and closed her eyes, none too soon. The tenderness he felt toward her was overwhelming, bound to show in his face, and he didn’t want her to see it, lest she retreat again.

  * * *

  When Bridget awakened the next morning, a burning ache throbbed in her arm, but she would have celebrated if she’d had the strength. She was alive, thanks to Trace. On the crate next to the bed, a fruit jar spilled over with colorful wildflowers, reds and violets, yellows and whites, and the new book was there, too, promising so much.

  The tarp had been drawn back from the roof, halfway at least, and Trace, shirtless and sweating, grinned down at her from the rafters. “Hullo, Sleeping Beauty,” he said.

  She swallowed hard. Trace had been twelve or so the last time she’d seen him without a shirt; she’d come upon him and Mitch down at the swimming hole. This was disturbingly different. “What are you doing up there?”

  Even from that distance, the mischief was clearly visible in his eyes. “Now, what kind of question is that?” he countered. “I’m fixing to put on that roof I promised you.”

  She felt self-conscious, lying there in bed, gazing up at Trace and his naked chest. “Put on a shirt,” she said, sitting up. “You’ll get sunburned.”

  Again, that lethal grin. “Watch out,” he warned. “You keep talking like that, I might get the idea that you care.”

  She blushed. “Stop looking at me. How on earth am I supposed to get up with you staring at me like that?”

  He laughed. The sun shone around him like an aura. “You’re not,” he said. “Supposed to get up, I mean.”

  Bridget sighed. “In the meantime, you plan on nailing up beams and shingles right over my head?”

  He pretended to consider the matter seriously. “I guess we’ll have to put you outside, by the creek.” Again, that light in his eyes. That grin. “Skye and I have rigged up a place.”

  The mere thought of getting outside raised Bridget’s flagging spirits. She smiled. “Really?”

  “Really,” he replied, and dropped into the cabin, agile as some sort of jungle creature. “If you’re ready, I’ll take you out there right now.”

  Bridget couldn’t help staring at him, and she was mortified by her own wantonness. What kind of woman was she, looking at a man’s bare chest? A man, no less, who was not her husband.

  Not Mitch.

  He seemed to read her thoughts, and a sad smile rested on his mouth and settled in around his eyes. He lifted her out of bed, quilts and all, and somehow managed to hand her the book he’d bought for her in town a few days before. The breeze and sunlight were like the touch of a healing hand, and Bridget gasped in delighted surprise when she saw the hammock. He’d tied an old blanket securely between two small but sturdy birch trees, a stone’s throw from the creek’s edge. Skye and Noah were further down the bank, each holding an improvised fishing pole, and both of them beamed when they saw Bridget.

  It was heaven, lying there in that hammock, shaded by the dancing shadows of leaves, lulled by the sound of flowing water. Bridget read, dozed, and read again. Noah and Skye continued to fish, and Trace worked on the roof, driving in wooden pegs with Granddaddy’s hammer.

  “Look, Mama!” Bridget had nodded off, but the sound of her son’s voice and the feel of something cold and slick against the back of her hand brought her awake. “I caught a fish!” he crowed.

  Sure enough, Noah had a fine, gleaming trout on the hook. She laughed and leaned over to kiss his cheek soundly. “Why, it’s nearly as big as the whale that swallowed poor Jonah,” she observed.

  Noah nodded. “Nobody helped me, neither. I did it all by myself.”

  Bridget ruffled his shining hair, thought of Mitch. Some of the sparkle faded from Noah’s catch, from the sun-spattered creek, from the comforting sound of Trace’s roof building. “Your papa would be so proud,” she said softly.

  Noah’s small brow knitted into a frown. “I want Trace to be my papa,” he said.

  The remark didn’t surprise Bridget, but it did sting. “Sweetheart,” she said, fighting a silly, weak impulse to break down and cry. “Oh, sweetheart. Things don’t work that way. Your papa was a man named Mitch McQuarry, and even though he’s gone, he’ll always be your father.”

  Noah let the fish fall to his side, and there was something so disconsolate in the motion that Bridget yearned to gather him in and hold him close. She restrained herself, though; Noah might be a small boy, but he wasn’t a baby. To patronize him would serve no purpose but to undermine his dignity. “Where is he? My papa, I mean?”

  “We’ve talked about that before, Noah,” Bridget reminded him. She had to look away, dash at her cheek with the back of one hand. “He’s in heaven.”

  “Is he coming back?”

  She met her son’s gaze. “No, darling. People like to stay in heaven when they get there. It’s a wonderful place.”

  “Could we go there? You and me and Skye and Trace? Could we go and find my papa?”

  Bridget swallowed, glanced at the creek, and made herself look at Noah again. Her eyes were still dazzled; she could not make out his features. “All of us will go there, someday,” she told him carefully. “But not anytime soon.” And not together.

  Noah digested that. “Oh,” he said. Then, quicksilver, he held his gleaming trout high above his head again and whooped, “Look, Trace, I caught a fish, all by my own self!”

  Chapter
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br />   5

  Marshal Sam Flynn showed up the next day, stood with his head back and his thumbs hooked into his gunbelt, squinting as he admired the new roof on the McQuarry cabin. “Yes, sir,” he called to Trace, who was straddling the ridgepole. “That’s a fine job of work. Jake Vigil sees that, he’ll be after you to turn a hand to that sawmill he’s trying to get built.”

  Bridget had mentioned a sawmill, but Trace had seen no sign of one during his brief visit to Primrose Creek the day he’d bought the groceries. “He got a planer?” Trace called back. He had plenty of rough timber. What he needed was lumber, cut to measured lengths and planed smooth, if he was going to get Bridget’s place in any kind of shape; besides the roof, she needed bedrooms added on, and a barn. A real corral.

  “Steam-operated,” Sam answered, sounding as proud as if the machine were his own. “Has one coming, anyhow. I reckon it’s someplace between here and San Francisco. Jake’s got a good bit of lumber laid by, though. Had it planed over in Virginia City. He might be willing to make a trade for some labor.”

  Trace reached for his shirt, discarded earlier when the sun was high, stuck the handle of the hammer through his belt, and made for the edge of the roof. From there, it was an easy jump to the ground. “I’m obliged, Sam,” he said, and thrust out a hand.

  The marshal shook it. His horse, an overfed sorrel with ears like a mule’s, snuffled behind him.

  Trace grinned. “This a social call, or did my wasted youth finally catch up to me?”

  Sam chortled. “If you got a wasted youth, it’s bound to turn up on your doorstep one of these days.” He swept off his sweat-stained hat and thrust the splayed fingers of his left hand through thinning hair. “Fact is, though, I came out here to bring a letter for Mizz McQuarry. Come all the way from England, and from the looks of the envelope, it’s been one hell of a trip.”

  Trace frowned as he accepted the thin scrap of translucent vellum. Bridget had been recovering from the snakebite for a full week, and although he knew she’d enjoyed being waited on and fussed over for the first few days, she did not have the temperament to be an invalid. In fact, she was as cantankerous as a mother bear missing a cub. Trace cherished a slight hope that the letter might cheer her, but at the same time, he knew it must have come from one or both of her estranged cousins, whom she viewed as virtual deserters.

  He slapped the letter thoughtfully against his palm. “Water your horse, Sam, and sit a spell.” He indicated the upended rain barrel he’d taken off the broken-down Conestoga while scrounging for tools. By then, the wagon had somehow gotten itself overturned on a steep hillside, and it wasn’t good for much of anything now besides firewood. Bridget was probably asleep, and he knew she’d kill him if he invited the marshal inside while she was in repose. He’d been treading carefully around her, in order to preserve the delicate peace, and neither one of them had ventured to mention his proposal of marriage. “I’ll let Bridget know you’re here.”

  “I can see that for myself,” Bridget said clearly, and he turned to see her standing in the cabin doorway. She’d put on her yellow calico dress and caught her long, long hair back at the nape, and she looked thin and pale and incredibly young. “Come inside, Mr. Flynn. I’ll make some coffee.”

  Sam doffed his hat and smiled, but Trace could see that the other man had taken note of Bridget’s malaise. “I’m obliged, ma’am,” he said, “but I can’t stay. I just came to bring this here letter. Got some rowdies in town, and I don’t want to leave them to it for too long.”

  She managed a smile, but she was holding the door frame with one hand, as though unsteady, and the blue shadows under her eyes made Trace want to go off in search of a doctor. He’d just decided that he’d drag one back from Virginia City if he had to when she answered. “I can’t imagine who’d be writing to me,” she said.

  “Come all the way from England,” the marshal said, for the second time. “I hope it brings you good news, ma’am.”

  Bridget’s smile had already faded. “England?” she said, and started toward them. She stopped uncertainly in the middle of the dooryard. Sam, busy hauling himself up into the saddle, didn’t see the expression on her face, but Trace did, and he almost wished he didn’t have to give her the letter.

  He went toward her, placed the envelope in her hand, and supported her by slipping an arm loosely around her waist.

  She studied the elegant, faded handwriting, the stamp, the words McQuarry Farm and Virginia crossed out, replaced with Primrose Creek, Nevada. “It’s—it’s from Christy,” she said. He couldn’t tell much from the tone of her voice, but her lingering weakness gave him worry enough to last a lifetime. “She—she must have thought we were all still at the farm—”

  “Come inside, Bridget,” Trace said firmly, after sparing a wave for the departing marshal. “You’ll be wanting some privacy, and you need to sit down.”

  She allowed him to steer her back into the cabin and seat her at the table, and that, too, was troublesome proof of her frailty. Skye and Noah were somewhere nearby, fishing for trout, and the house was quiet. She’d shown a fondness for tea since her encounter with the snake, and Trace went about brewing a batch, using a plain cooking pot to boil the water while she sat there, staring at the letter as if she thought it might sprout wings and fly out the window.

  “Our parting was not a pleasant one, you know,” she said, so softly that he almost didn’t hear her.

  “I know,” he replied quietly. “I was there, remember? People change. Situations change.”

  Bridget was silent for a long time, and when she spoke, it was as if she hadn’t heard a word he said. Didn’t recall that he’d helped haul the two of them apart. “We had a dreadful row, Christy and I, that last day. Things were said—”

  He would have crossed the room and laid a hand to her shoulder, if he hadn’t guessed that she didn’t want to be touched. “Maybe it’s time to forget old differences. Family is family, after all.”

  She was watching him; he felt her gaze, in that uncanny way, even before he turned and met her eyes. “Uncle Eli went with the Confederate side. Christy said our daddy, Skye’s and mine, was a traitor for taking up the Union cause. Said he was a disgrace to the whole state of Virginia and ought to be hanged.”

  Trace sighed. “Bridge,” he said. The water wasn’t quite hot, but he dumped a couple of spoonfuls of loose tea in, anyhow. “She was a kid. You were a kid. The country had just snapped in two like a dry twig. A lot of folks said a lot of things they didn’t mean.”

  She bit her lower lip, reached for the letter, lying travel-worn on the table before her, drew back her hand again. “I told her I hated her, Trace,” she said. She closed her eyes tightly for a moment, and when she opened them again, her gaze was fixed on something far away. “I spat on her skirt.”

  “If I recall it correctly,” he said, “you went at her with your claws out. She gave as good as she got, and I suppose the two of you would have killed each other if your granddaddy and I hadn’t dragged you apart.”

  She blushed. Set her jaw. “I vowed I’d never forgive her,” she said.

  He leaned down, peered doubtfully into the can of hot water and floating tea leaves, and stirred the concoction once with a wooden spoon. “Some promises,” he answered distractedly, “really ought to be broken.” He knew immediately that he’d made a mistake, but it was too late.

  “Yes,” she said. “Like the one you made to Mitch, for instance.”

  “That,” he replied after a beat, “was different.”

  She thumped her fingers lightly on top of the letter; that was still as close as she’d gotten to opening the thing. One eyebrow was raised, and there was a triumphant tilt to one corner of her mouth. “I’m not so sure of that,” she said thoughtfully, but she didn’t pursue the subject any further.

  He was grateful for her restraint; as it was, he felt like a trout wriggling on a hook about half the time. Not that he’d have left, no matter how good a case she made. She h
ad to marry somebody sooner or later, and it might just as well be him.

  He sloshed some of the tea into a mug and set it before her. “I’ll be on the roof,” he said, and headed outside.

  She looked into the mug, furrowed her brow, and then smiled to herself. “Make sure you wear your shirt,” she said. “You’ll be peeling like an onion if you don’t be careful.”

  He sighed, winked somewhat dispiritedly, and left the cabin.

  Bridget waited until Trace was overhead again, hammering away at the shingles he’d fashioned from thick pieces of tree bark. Although she wasn’t quite ready to tell him so outright, she was glad he was around. If he hadn’t been there when she was bitten by that rattler, she would surely be dead, and Skye and Noah would have been left alone.

  Skye was strong, in her own way, and resourceful; she would have found a way to provide for herself and her nephew, but Bridget shuddered at the predicament the girl would have been in—a woman’s options were narrow, after all, especially in a place like Primrose Creek. She could enter into an immediate and probably loveless marriage or trade her favors for food and shelter; the line between those two situations was thin indeed. Thanks to Trace, though, Skye could grow to full womanhood and choose a husband for herself when the time came.

  You’re stalling, Bridget scolded herself. Then, with her hands trembling a little, she picked up the envelope, turned it over, and broke the once-fancy wax seal covering the edge of the flap.

  The single page inside bore an embossed crest in the upper left-hand corner, and beneath that was a date—approximately six months before—and Fieldcrest, the name of Christy and Megan’s stepfather’s estate.

  Bridget sniffed once and gave the sheet of fine paper a nearly imperceptible snap before reading on.

  Dear Bridget,

  I direct this letter to you because I know you must be managing everything and everyone around you, like always. My regards to Skye.