A Promise in Defiance: Romance in the Rockies Book 3 (8 page)

Only virgins cry like
that.

Confident in her
assessment, Delilah subtly signaled Otis to stay back. Pasting on an expression
of concern, she approached the young lady. “Honey . . . honey,
is everything all right?”

The girl looked up, revealing
striking green eyes rimmed with misery, nose red from the sniffling, and shook
her head. “He’s dead. My–my fiancé is dead.”

Her sobs erupted again
and Delilah quickly dropped down beside the girl, taking her hand. “Oh, honey,
I’m so sorry. Tell me what happened.”

The girl shook her
head, fighting for control, and finally managed to gain her voice. “I answered
his letter. He said he had a profitable claim. He needed a wife and–and could
pay my fare. He–” She sort of hiccupped and sniffled noisily. “They said he was
shot. Only a few days ago.” She hugged herself and shook her head. “I just got
off the stage. I don’t have anything. Nothing. No place to stay. The marshal
said Jay’s claim has already been claimed by somebody else.” Panic crept into
the girl’s voice. “What am I going to do?”

As she buried her hands
in her head, Delilah tamped down her delight at meeting this little lost lamb. “Shhh,”
Delilah hugged the girl. “There, there. Don’t you have family, an ex-husband,
anyone?”

“No one,” the girl
sobbed. “I’ve never been married. I came here against my parents’ wishes. They
were furious with me—called me foolish and incorrigible.”

Two of Delilah’s
favorite words. “Well, now, you listen to me.” She lifted the girl’s chin to
assess her looks. About twenty, with mysterious catlike eyes, delicate
features. Pretty, but they’d need to do something about her flat, drab blond
hair. “Everything is going to be all right. I’ve got a tent you can use—uhm,
stay in . 
. .
and I’ll get you
some dinner.” She pulled the astonished girl to her feet. “We’ll just take this
one day at a time.”

“Why—why are you
helping me?”

“Why?” Delilah feigned
complete astonishment. “Because it’s the right thing to do. I can’t leave you
alone, here on the street. I couldn’t call myself human if I didn’t help you,
especially when I have the resources.”

The two women started
walking back toward Tent Town, and Otis drifted into the shadows of a doorway
as they passed by him. “What’s your name, dear?” Delilah asked, nearly choking
on the sugar in her voice.

“Mary Jean.”

“Ah, such a pretty
name.” Delilah pulled a hair, still wet with tears, from the girl’s cheek and
tucked it behind her hear. “Innocent and pure, just like you, I bet.”

Logan leaned on the bar
and scanned Rebecca’s article announcing the arrival of a pastor, while Emilio
loitered at the door of the dilapidated church. Almost amused, Logan read aloud
phrases that struck him as carefully
crafted
. “ . . . a
new era dawns in Defiance . . . the preacher brings with him
myriad experiences and insights . . . and he seems unafraid of
our town’s rough and rowdy ways.”

Translation: The
Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. A man of God who has enough sin in his background
to embarrass even the residents of Defiance has come to share the Good News.  

But Rebecca’s final
sentence, “All are welcome at the Crooked Creek Chapel,” swelled Logan’s heart
with . . . peace.

She had written a fine
article, all without using his name.

He suspected that
wouldn’t hold water for long. He rubbed his smooth chin, hoping the shave, haircut,
and bath might go a ways in making him less easily recognizable. He would
introduce himself simply as Preacher, and see where that got him.

“Emilio, thank you for
bringing me this. And to your questions, please tell Rebecca I think the
article is fine, and Mr. McIntyre that his crew can start whenever they’re
available.” He glanced up at the torn, mildewed canvas. “Let’s build a church.”

The young man
straightened and snugged down his worn, tan cowboy hat on his head. “He said he
could have men here this afternoon.”

Accepting help
graciously had been one of the hardest lessons Logan had had to learn about
being a pastor. Giving folks a way to serve the Lord was not the same thing as
accepting charity. Charles McIntyre had the means to renovate this building.
The sooner a church was up and running, the better. Besides, Delilah’s place
was going up at a breakneck pace. “This afternoon is fine.”

Emilio nodded and
slipped out the door to deliver the messages.

Logan folded the paper
and laid it on the bar. Searching for his enthusiasm, he surveyed his
ramshackle church. While he’d swept it clean of leaves and broken glass, and
turned up the few remaining chairs, he knew God hadn’t sent him here to play
house.

Other men would build
this church. His job was to fill it with people.

He dragged his hat off
the bar and headed out to round up a flock. He hadn’t yet stepped into the mud
of Bonanza Street when he noticed Delilah making her way toward him down a warped
boardwalk, a brawny, wide-chested Negro following close behind her.

Logan waited on the
bottom step, refrained from putting on his hat, and watched her. She sauntered
up in a red silk dress, as smooth as a housecat headed for its favorite spot in
the sun.

“Preacher.” She flipped
a fan open like a switchblade and waved it back and forth at her throat.

“Miss Delilah. What can
I do for you on this fine day the Lord has made?”

Her delicate features
tightened, golden brown eyes narrowed, seeming to glitter. “You shaved and cut
your hair.”

Logan scratched the
back of his neck, now bare. “Yes ma’am. Cleanliness is next to Godliness, I’ve
been told.”

Myriad emotions raced
across her face, but he couldn’t make heads or tails of them. Recognition,
possibly? He could read suspicion and disdain without doubt, especially as her
lip curled into a sneer.  

Such a dark expression
clouded an otherwise stunning beauty. She had a face men should sketch or
paint, not buy. Defined lips, high cheek bones, flawless olive skin touched
with a hint of peach, surrounded by wisps of honey-colored hair. Surprised by
his distraction, he cleared his throat. “Is there something in particular I can
do for ya?”

His question seemed to
interrupt her thoughts, but not her intense perusal of him. “Seen the paper?
There’s a nice article on you. A little light on the facts, I thought.” Her
eyes roamed over him, as if she was searching every scar, every shadow on his
face. “Looks to me like life’s been hard on you. I see a lot of miles.”

He shrugged one
shoulder. “Rough miles on a road that was leading me straight to hell. I’ve
found a better way to live, Delilah. Peace and joy like I never had.” He
softened his voice, offering sincere humility. “I wish you’d let me tell you
about it sometime.”

Her cheeks flushed a
deep red, but not with embarrassment. Anger. “You pious piece of—” Delilah bit
that off. She fought for self-control and Logan could see the victory didn’t
come easy. The battle left him perplexed.

“What I mean is,” she
raked a curl off her forehead and tucked it up, “don’t
you, especially
you, ever talk to
me
about the Gospel.”

Her antagonism toward
him and the Gospel mystified Logan. Not that it mattered. It wouldn’t stop him.
He dropped his hat on his head. “I can’t promise it won’t come up sometime,
Delilah.”

He stepped down into
the mud. As he passed by her, she whispered over her shoulder, “True, you’re
not much for keeping promises.”

Not much for keeping promises?
Delilah’s mysterious observation followed Logan down the rutted narrow path
that served as a road here in Tent Town, but he determined he wouldn’t look
back at her. She was playing some kind of game and until he knew the point, or
at least the rules, he wouldn’t deal himself in. Besides, she was a little too
easy to look at.

The hum of men’s
voices, grumbling horses, and the jingle of tack surrounded him as his boots
squished in the mud near the bath tents. Apparently, the proprietor had no
qualms about flooding the lower part of Tent Town with used water.

Inside the tent he
heard water slosh and splash, and a man cursed about the unsatisfactory
temperature. Logan stepped over a large puddle as he and another man coming
from the opposite direction made for the same dry spot. The man started at
first to hold the patch of earth, but then recognition dawned in his eyes. They
widened, and he took a step back. Rather than challenge Logan, he waded through
the ankle-deep puddle and carried on.

Logan hung his head.
Rounding up a congregation wasn’t going to be easy if these folks still thought
he was a kill-happy gunslinger.

The faint smell of
urine and fresh-cut lumber laced the air as he ambled forward. A hundred or so
yards up, hammers whacked and lumber thudded as men crawled like ants in and
out of the skeletal structure of an up-and-coming building, the second floor on
the rise. The bones of Delilah’s new saloon?

Across from the
construction site, men gathered at a bar. The remnants, he guessed, of a former
saloon. No walls, no chairs, just a plank floor. A long, polished, ridiculously
ornate mahogany bar drew in the customers like flies. Even at this early hour.

The bartender, a young
girl with pert features and drab blond hair piled messily atop her head, poured
beer from mammoth kegs resting on sawhorses behind the bar. Men, holding their
shots of liquor or mugs of beer, milled about on the empty floor. Trying to
ignore the smell of the demon rum, Logan wandered into the midst of the patrons
and glanced around.

“Might breezy on a cold
day, isn’t it?” he asked of no one in particular.

One man looked over,
looked again, and moved away. The bartender heard Logan’s question and lifted emerald
green eyes his way. With a hesitant jerk of her chin, she invited him over. “What
can I get for you?”

“You mean besides a
roof and four walls?”

“Whether I’ve got walls
or not shouldn’t bother you. Liquor and beer taste the same. What’ll you have?”

Logan licked his lips
pondering the young lady instead of his desire to order a round. She sounded
something less than enthusiastic, even rehearsed.

“Nothin’.” At the girl’s
scowl, he quickly added, “Thanks, though. I was just curious.”

“Well, if you must
know,” she pulled the towel off her shoulder and commenced to wiping down the
bar, “this hunk of wood is going in Delilah’s new place. We just opened for
business a little early.”

“I see.” Logan shoved
his hands in his pockets, both impressed and repulsed by Delilah’s
entrepreneurial spirit.

“Now, across the street
there, we’ve got a tent with a live show.” The girl’s voice quivered, as if she
was nervous. “The girls don’t keep a shred of clothing on. The midnight show is
especially rowdy, if you take my meaning.”

The girl’s discomfort
rolled off her like heat from a blacksmith’s fire. Working diligently on the
mahogany, she cleared her throat and added, “Delilah’s girls are the next
street over. See Smith. He’ll show you to the right one.” She paused. “He’s
taking bids for the virgin, as well.” She dove back into wiping the bar with a
frenzy.

Logan froze.
Virgin?
Slowly, he reached out and stilled the girl’s hand. He opened his mouth to ask
about that, but the shame in her countenance abruptly changed his course. “What
are you doing here?”

She wouldn’t look at
him. Or couldn’t. “I found myself in a tough situation, mister. Delilah gave me
a job. I just serve drinks and . . . and tell folks about her
attractions.”

“Attractions?” Logan
released her, dropped his hand on his hip. “I can see you don’t want to be a
part of this. I can help you.”

“I agreed to stay. I’m workin’
off some food and rent. “When she me his gaze, Logan saw the hint of anger in
her tight lips and strained jaw. “Besides, why would you help me?
Because it’s
the right thing to do
?”

“Because Christ loves
me, and He asked me to love my neighbor.”

Tears suddenly sprang
to her eyes. “Where were you a week ago?” Without another word, she moved to
the other end of the bar and started combining low whiskey bottles.

And just like that, the
door slammed shut. Logan knew he couldn’t push too hard, but how his heart
ached for this girl. She’d gotten herself into a deal with the devil. He only
knew Delilah by reputation, but she was one mean wench. A degenerate. She’d put
on some pretty debauched shows in her Abilene saloon, at least as best he could
recall. He’d never walked in the door sober.

And in a few weeks, she
would be—what—
auctioning off
a virgin . . . to the
highest bidder?

God help us 
. . .