Always You (13 page)

“Well, not exactly—”

“Sure you are.” Will nodded vehemently and whistled through his teeth. “Cal wouldn’t have brought you here if you weren’t his girl,” he stated with complete confidence. “He always said when he gets himself a girl he wants to marry, he’ll bring her home to meet all of us and see if she passes muster.”

“I don’t want to know if I do or not,” Melora said hastily, holding up a hand as Cassie seemed about to give her judgment. “Because I’m not—”

“Cal’s coming with the doctor!” Jesse announced suddenly from the doorway, and they all turned to stare.

At once they became aware of the hoofbeats drumming toward the farmhouse, and as Melora turned to the window, she saw Cal leading the way for a rickety wagon that plummeted over the uneven land.

“You—come with me,” Jesse told her roughly, grabbing her arm before Melora could even tell him how much better Louisa was feeling.

He dragged her out of the room and into the second bedroom, then stood there with his back to the door. “Don’t make a sound. Don’t let that doctor know you’re here, or I’ll—”

His voice trailed off. He obviously wasn’t sure what he would do to silence her. Melora almost pitied him.

But then she remembered her own little sister. Now that Louisa appeared to be out of danger, she had to think of Jinx.

“I won’t say a word,” she promised, but her fingers were crossed behind her back.

She and Jesse stared at each other as they heard Cal and the doctor come in, heard the children explaining about the bathtub and about how the fever seemed to have broken.

Suddenly Melora dashed toward the door, shouting, “Help! Doctor, help me. I’m being kept—”

Jesse dived at her, trying to cover her mouth with his hands. She bit him and screamed “Help” again. But the boy was game, as game as Cal, she soon found out, for he suddenly pushed her into a closet and slammed the door.

Her shouts were muffled.

“Who’s that?” Dr. Wright’s beetle brows drew together as he straightened up from his patient.

“Just my wife, Doctor.” Cal spoke calmly, ignoring the amazed stares of his younger siblings. “She’s upset because she wants permission to come in here and tend to Louisa herself. But I’m keeping her away. You see, we just found out she’s expecting a child, and she’s been feeling a bit under the weather. The last thing I need is for her to come down with this fever, so you go on and tend to Lou, and don’t pay my wife any heed.”

As Dr. Wright bent over his patient again, Cal sent Cassie and Will a warning glance that kept them silent in the face of his bald-faced lies. He staunchly ignored the faint sounds of Melora’s fury as he watched the doctor examine Lou.

In the other room Jesse would not budge from the door. Melora, seeing that her cries were being ignored and that she couldn’t push the door open, slumped down in the darkness and sat on the closet floor with gritted teeth, waiting.

At last Dr. Wright left. He pronounced that the child’s fever had indeed broken, that she should get plenty of rest and take in as much soup as she could to keep her strength up.

Only when his buggy had disappeared over a rise did Jesse let Melora out of her makeshift jail. Cal was there when she stepped out, her eyes blinking dazedly in the light.

“Go away,” she said dully. “I don’t want to talk to you. Either of you.”

“I had to do it,” Jesse muttered to Cal in explanation. “She was going to tell the doctor that you’ d—”

“I know.” Cal cut him off as Cassie and Will appeared in the doorway, all ears. “Hey, you two, don’t you have chores to do around here?”

“We want to know why your girl was yelling and why Jesse locked her up in the closet,” Will piped up. Cassie nodded agreement, her hands clenched on her brother’s shoulders. She looked worried.

“Go ahead, Cal. You too, Jesse.” Melora’s bitter gaze shifted from one to the other of them. “Why don’t you explain?”

“Reckon I will. When the time is right.” Cal went to Cassie and Will, hunkered down on one knee, and pulled them into the circle of his arms. They snuggled eagerly against him, lifting trusting faces.

“Do you remember that I told you I had to go away for a while because of what happened to Joe? That I was going to take steps making sure that the man responsible for killing him was punished? Well, I’m still working on that. And this lady is not my girl; she’s someone who’s going to help me.”

The youngsters nodded solemnly. Cassie chewed on her lower lip. “But I don’t understand. If she’s helping you, Cal, why would Jesse lock her in the closet?”

“Don’t ask so many questions,” Jesse exploded, raking a hand through his hair.

“It’s all right.” Cal threw him a level look. “I don’t blame Cassie for having questions. Or you either, Will. This is pretty confusing. But right now you just have to trust that me and Jesse and this lady—her name is Melora—are doing the best we can to catch and punish the man who killed Joe. And to clear Joe’s name—and mine. Your job is to look out for each other, lay low here on the farm like I told you, and take care of Louisa until she’s all better. Okay?”

“Okay.” Will pulled impatiently out of Cal’s embrace. “I’m hungry. When can we eat?”

“Oh, my gosh, supper,” Cassie gasped. She broke away from Cal and, with a frantic glance at Melora, raced off to the kitchen. At a nod from Cal, Jesse shepherded Will after her.

Alone with Melora in the little bedroom, Cal shut the door. He regarded Melora with his arms folded across his chest.

“If you wanted to escape, why didn’t you leave while I was in town? I’m sure you had opportunities.”

“No, I did not,” she lied.

“That so?”

“That’s so.” But she couldn’t help flushing under his relentless gaze. In the fading afternoon light his eyes were the color of a storm-tossed sea. “I was busy trying to help Louisa. I wouldn’t run out on a sick child, even if she is your sister. I couldn’t do that no matter what you may think of me.”

“You want to know what I think of you?” Cal stepped closer.

He looked tired—exhausted, really. His hat was pushed back on his head; his boots were covered in dust; there was grime streaked across his lean face.

“No,” Melora told him bluntly. “I’m not sure I do.”

Suddenly Cal sat down on the bed and closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, he stared at her without speaking. Then he cleared his throat.

“Look, Melora, maybe I don’t have any right to ask favors of you, but would you please not tell Cassie and Will—and Louisa when she wakes up again—the truth. About us. About you... and me.”

“Don’t you think your family would be interested in hearing all about how their wonderful big brother kidnapped me?”

For a moment anger flared dangerously in his eyes. Then it was replaced by that look of staunch, stubborn purposefulness that always made Melora uneasy. “They’ve been through enough already.” He swung off the bed and advanced on her, his mouth a hard line that slashed the tough planes of his face.

“None of them has had it easy, Melora. They’ve lost both their parents over the years, and recently their oldest brother and their home. This farm is only a temporary refuge until I’ve straightened everything else out—” He broke off suddenly, frowning at her. “Don’t ask me to explain it all to you because I’m damned if I will. But know this, Princess: It’s my job to protect them and help put the pieces of their lives back together, and I’m damned if I’m going to stand by and watch anything else shake up their already rickety little world. So if you won’t agree to keep quiet, I guess I’ll just have to hustle you out of here and take you up to that cabin I’ve got all ready for you. It’s a good twenty miles from here, and there’s not a soul nearby, except the eagles and some deer and moose, so you can’t get into any trouble—or cause any.”

Her lips quivered. He meant it. There was no mistaking the cold threat radiating from his powerful frame. “I won’t tell them.” She turned her back on him. “But not because you threatened me.”

“Then why?”

“Because I like your family. And they obviously think the sun rises and sets with you, and I don’t want to be the one to disillusion them.”

There was a silence. From the kitchen they could hear Cassie and Will rattling plates and cups and utensils. Outside, a rose and vermilion sunset gilded the cool blue sky.

“Fair enough, Melora.” Cal spoke at last, his voice deep and quiet. “I’m beholden to you for that. And for what you did for Louisa today. Cassie told me and Dr. Wright how you took care of her.”

She spun back toward him, shaking with anger. “You can thank me by explaining all this! By telling me why you think Wyatt is responsible for your brother’s death.”

“Leave it be, Melora.”

“I have a right to know. To help clear up the mistake.”

“There’s been no mistake! Damn it!” he exploded, and reaching her in two strides, he snatched her by the shoulders, but just as Melora gasped in fright, Jesse shoved the door open a crack and poked his head in.

“Supper’s on.”

“I’m not hungry.” Melora was rigid in Cal’s arms. She spoke between clenched teeth. “I’d like to rest.”

It was true. She was worn out from the strain of the past days and, in particular, from the crisis with Louisa. And she was weary of this whole ridiculous charade, of fighting and arguing with Cal, who had to be the most mule-headed man in the world.

She didn’t want to sit opposite him and pretend to be his friend. She didn’t want to make small talk or eat any of the meal she’d worked so hard to prepare. She didn’t want to try anymore to figure out this whole mess. She just wanted to see her own little sister again, to have Wyatt cradle her in his arms and tell her that it was all a horrible mistake and that he was going to put everything to rights. That he was going to take care of her and Jinx and the ranch and she wouldn’t have to worry about anything ever again.

When she glanced longingly at the neatly made-up bed beneath the window, Cal followed the direction of her gaze. He let go of her arms. “You’re sure?” His tone was curt. “You need to eat, you know.”

“I need to sleep. To forget everything, for a little while.” To her horror she sounded dangerously close to tears.

Cal must have heard it, but to her relief he allowed her to retain some semblance of dignity by merely shrugging. “Suit yourself. Go ahead and rest. Reckon we can save you some supper for when you wake up.”

He closed the door behind him without glancing back. Melora immediately threw herself down upon the blue and green checked quilt.

For a kidnapper that man was mighty considerate. And for a kidnapper he had an unusually sweet and devoted family.

It complicated everything.

He’s not only a kidnapper,
she reminded herself as her eyes closed and her head sank onto the pillow.
He’s an outlaw. He was in prison.

She dozed fitfully, but thoughts of Cal, of his family, of Jinx and Aggie and Wyatt swirled confusedly through her tired brain.

As she wandered through that misty gray fog somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, those same words repeated themselves in her brain.

He’s a kidnapper. An outlaw...

Her eyes flew open suddenly. She had it. She knew why Cal blamed Wyatt for his brother’s death, why he hated him so much. This had to be the answer.

If Cal was an outlaw, then perhaps his brother Joe had been one too. And perhaps Wyatt had caught them both or identified them as the culprits in some crime, and somehow or other Joe had been killed by some lawman because of Wyatt’s intervention, and now Cal wanted vengeance against him.

She bolted upright, trembling. She had to get out of here. For all she knew, Cal was already making some move against Wyatt, was already drawing him closer to ensnaring him in a trap.

She ran to the window, but it was too small for her to climb through. Frustrated, she stalked the room, forgetting her weariness, frantic only with the need to get away.

Dusk loomed, and she turned up the kerosene lamp on the bedside table, illuminating the plainly furnished little room enough so she could make out the small homemade bureau, the closet, the shelf of books along one wall. Sudden curiosity sent her to the shelf, and she began glancing through the books.

What kinds of books do outlaws read?

To her surprise, there was a leather edition of
Ivanhoe,
Mark Twain’s
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,
and
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,
a Bible, a much-worn volume of
The Last of the Mohicans,
and a volume of poetry. Just as she was turning away, some papers wedged between
Ivanhoe
and the Bible caught her eye. On impulse Melora reached for them.

They were folded over. As she opened them, a gasp rushed from her.

They were wanted posters.

Ice crystals formed around her heart as her gaze flew over each one in turn. Cal’s likeness filled one page, his lean, taut face staring out at her, his expression fierce and stoic. The second poster contained a drawing of someone who could only be his brother—his older brother—for the resemblance was unmistakable, though his brother wore a neat mustache.

Her gaze riveted back on Cal’s deftly sketched face. The likeness was good; it was damned good.

But it wasn’t that which made her stomach feel as if she’d just swallowed ground glass, and which made her sink down on the bed in shock, her hands trembling as she clutched the wanted posters in numb fingers.

It was the
names
.

Beneath Cal’s image the names jumped out at her.

WANTED!

WYATT HOLDEN

FOR MURDER AND CATTLE RUSTLING

$200 DOLLAR REWARD.

“Joe Holden” was the name boldly printed beneath the sketch of Cal’s brother.

“No!” Melora choked out the word through numb lips. “No, this can’t be... it doesn’t make any sense...”

“
Give those to me.
” Cal addressed her from the doorway, his tone as hard as the fists clenched at his sides.

In three steps he reached her and snatched the wanted posters away. Melora perched frozen on the bed, staring at him, too shocked and bewildered to form any one of the hundreds of questions reeling through her mind.

“You—you’re not Wyatt Holden!” she gasped at last, fixing him with the first sparking glints of a growing fury.

“I’m not?”

“You—you used his name, you rustled cattle and used his name, and you—you murdered someone—and—”

Cal’s bitter, twisted lips made her voice trail off. He folded the posters and set them back between the books on the shelf, then turned toward her, his posture deceptively casual, but she could see the tension across his broad shoulders, the hard set of his jaw.

“Sorry, Princess, but it’s just the opposite. He used
my
name. He’s
been
using my name.”

“You’re lying!”

He stalked toward her again until he was so close he could have reached out and touched her ashen cheeks. But he made no move to touch her as she sat on the bed. “If you want to marry Wyatt Holden so badly,” he told her evenly, “we’d best call a preacher up here to this farm and get it over with. Because if you go back to Rawhide, you won’t be marrying Wyatt Holden, you’ll be marrying a snake named Rafe Campbell.”

His words rang like broken bells in her ears. She struggled to comprehend them, to make sense of them.

But she was lost.

“Let me out of here.” Melora lashed out at last. She sprang up, facing him, desperation in her eyes. “I don’t believe you. You’re a liar. A liar and a murderer and a kidnapper. Your name is Cal, not Wyatt! Now let me pass. I won’t stay in this cabin another moment!”

But as she whipped toward the door, Cassie suddenly appeared on the threshold. Her eyes looked enormous, sad and scared in her pale face. She wore an ankle-length calico nightgown with a ruffled neck, and her hair, no longer bound up in pigtails, trailed loose past her thin, childish shoulders.

Melora skidded to a halt as she saw the girl. She bit her lip, wondering how much Cassie had overheard. Behind her Cal sucked in his breath.

Cassie peered from one to the other of them. Then her gaze returned to Melora. “You’re not going to help us, are you?”

“Cassie, I want to help, but—”

“Didn’t Cal tell you about Joe?”

“No, he didn’t. But I don’t—”

“The posse killed Joe,” Cassie said before Cal could stop her. “And he didn’t do anything wrong. And that crooked sheriff was going to hang Cal. And he didn’t do anything wrong either. It was that other man—”

“Cassie, I have to leave. I can’t listen to any more,” Melora gasped, darting past the girl.

She fled past Jesse, who was stacking dinner plates in the kitchen, while Will played marbles on the floor. She raced past the doorway to Louisa’s room, where in a flashing glimpse she saw the girl sleeping peacefully. Leaping over the marbles beside the rug, Melora flew straight out the door.

“What did I say?” Cassie turned to Cal with a forlorn expression. She began to cry. “I just wanted to talk her into helping us, so this can all be over and you can stay with us for good—”

“I know, Cassie. I know.” Cal patted her arm. “Stay right here now and look after Lou. I’m going to bring Melora back.”

“But she doesn’t want to help us,” the girl wailed, and her voice echoed in Cal’s ears as he bolted out the farmhouse door in pursuit of Melora Deane.

He caught her just beyond the barn and hauled her up against the trunk of a spruce. “This is a stupid idea, Melora. You can’t run away in the dark.”

“It’s not dark yet!”

He threw a glance at the purple-shadowed twilight sky. The last glimpse of the luminously glowing sun was slipping beneath the horizon. “It will be in a minute or two. Come on back to the house, and we’ll talk.”

“I don’t want to talk!” Melora kicked him in the shin. Cal swore but didn’t loosen his grip, keeping her pinned against the tree, while his eyes narrowed dangerously at the corners.

“The reason you’re so mad is that you know deep down that what I said is the truth. The truth has a way of biting people on the nose; it can’t be ignored. It’s
felt,
Melora; it makes itself felt. You know the truth, don’t you? Admit it.”

He stared down at her, studying her as her face mirrored one emotion after another. All around them the final glimmers of daylight fled before encroaching blackness.

The hills sang with insect sound, and unseen animals rustled through the brush. An owl hooted from the tree above them, and beyond Cal’s shoulder, on a distant peak, Melora saw a prong-horned antelope poised on the shadowy crest of a ridge. She swallowed hard as she forced herself to meet Cal’s stare, forced herself to look into his eyes.

And suddenly the truth tumbled from her own lips. “I don’t know what to believe,” she gasped, and then she sagged against him, and Cal’s arms encircled her as naturally as if he were comforting his own little sister.

Except that Melora Deane was not his sister. She was an exquisite young woman, one coming to grips with a terrible truth. And Cal felt something quite different from brotherly concern as he thought of how much this must be hurting her, of how Rafe Campbell could bring pain to so many, and most specifically to
her,
and from so far away.

“Melora, he’s a snake. A cold-blooded, manipulative murdering snake. You should be glad you found out before you married him—”

“Glad?” Melora jerked back, as white-lipped and shocked as if he’d punched her in the stomach. “I’ll never be glad of anything again. Either I’m a complete fool to be so taken in by him, or I’m an even bigger fool to be taken in by you.” She gave a half-crazed, desperate laugh. “And I don’t know which kind of fool I am! I don’t have the faintest notion what to believe!”

“I think you do.” Gently, but firmly, Cal hauled her up against him.

With her breasts pressed hard against his chest, and his hands gripping her arms, she could do nothing but stare into the intense fire of his gaze, do nothing but gasp at the heat that flowed through her, through both of them, that threatened to engulf and disintegrate her.

“Admit that you know the truth, Melora.”

“No. Your name isn’t Wyatt.” She managed to churn out the words in a breathless voice. “It’s Cal. Everyone calls you that. Zeke and Ray, your brother Jesse; so do Cassie and Will and Louisa!”

“My full name is Wyatt Calvin Holden. My family’s always called me Cal ever since I was a boy. Lately I’ve been using it all the time, thanks to Rafe Campbell dirtying the Holden name all across Arizona. I’ve had to go by Cal Johnson because of those wanted posters. If I’m caught before I clear my name, I’ll be hanged.”

“Hanged?” She swallowed hard, searching his face. “I suppose that makes sense—because you’re accused of murder.”

“Accused, tried, convicted. And I very nearly was hanged already, thanks to your fiancé. The night before they were going to hang me, Jesse sneaked into town and broke me out of jail. I took Zeke and Ray out with me; they hadn’t done anything but get in a fight and bust up a saloon, but the sheriff took a dislike to them and accused them of rustling. Good old Sheriff Harper.” His lips twisted harshly. “The crooked bastard was in cahoots with Campbell; the two of them worked together to frame me and Joe.”

“I don’t understand.” Dazed, with a raw, sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, she shook her head, trying to make sense of all that he was telling her.

“It’s a long story, Melora. And it’s getting cold out here. You’re shivering.”

It was true. With nightfall, cool crystal gusts leaped down the mountains and slapped icily against her skin. She hadn’t even noticed until he pointed it out.

“I ... I don’t mind.”

“I do.” He took her arm and started back toward the farmhouse, now a dark silhouette among tall trees. The cozy glow beaming from the windows seemed a beacon, as did the gray smoke pluming from the chimney. “Let’s get you before a fire and give you some supper, and then later, when everyone else has turned in for the night, I’ll tell you the sad saga of Rafe Campbell and the Holden family.”

Everyone stared at them as they entered the lamplit farmhouse. Jesse fixed her with a wary glare, Will smiled tentatively as he clutched a fistful of brightly colored marbles, and Cassie hurried from Louisa’s room, her lips trembling.

“It’s all my fault, Melora,” she said in a tiny voice, and hung her head. “I don’t blame you for wanting to leave after I upset you.”

“No, Cassie. It isn’t your fault at all. I’m the one who’s been worrying
you
.” Melora went to the girl and embraced her, squeezing her thin shoulders. “I do want to help you—all of you.” She sighed. “It’s just that—”

“Melora and I had a squabble before we got here—just like one of our own family squabbles,” Cal interjected from the doorway of the farmhouse. “But now everything’s all straightened out.”

“Did you hug and kiss?” Will asked.

“Uh, well...”

“You know the rule,” the boy insisted. “After every squabble we have to hug and kiss and make up.”

“He’s right.” Cassie nodded, her eyes sparkling suddenly, and even Jesse grinned, his intent green gaze flicking back and forth with amusement between Melora’s delicately pinkened cheeks and Cal’s red ones.

“Go ahead.” Will trotted to Cal and tugged him into the cozy parlor, where a fire burned pleasantly in the hearth and everything looked tidy and inviting. “Give her a hug and a kiss.”

“Can’t right now, have to go check on Lou,” Cal growled, and started for the bedroom door, but it was Jesse who jumped up and, grinning even wider, put a restraining hand on his arm.

“Lou’s fine. She woke up, had two cups of tea, and some bread we dipped in the soup broth, and she fell back asleep. Fever’s gone.”

“So go ahead.” Cassie gave Melora a gentle push. A giggle escaped from her lips. “Show us that you’ve worked out your squabble.”

This is ridiculous,
Melora thought, blushing like a schoolgirl about to stand up at a dance with a boy for the very first time.
Neither Cal nor I need to do this to satisfy these silly children.

But as her feet dragged across the floor, Cal came forward to meet her. A sweet pounding started inside her chest.

To her surprise he looked nearly as uncomfortable as she. Though he was trying to appear casual and kept his expression determinedly neutral, there was something sheepish in the way he held his arms out toward her that tugged at her heart.

But there was nothing sheepish about what happened next.

Cal seized her, swooped one arm around her waist, the other around her neck in a graceless but powerful hold, and planted a kiss on her lips that scorched through to the tips of her toes. The room spun in a dizzying circle that made her hold on to him for dear life.

It was a long kiss, a very long kiss.

At last, faintly, she heard the sound of hands clapping. Dimly she realized that he had let her go.

Slowly her dazed glance scanned each person in the room. They all were staring at her. And grinning from ear to ear.

Except Cal. He stood with his thumbs hooked in his gun belt, looking perfectly nonchalant and quite pleased with himself,

“Haven’t you ever been kissed before?” Cassie piped up, giggling.

“Yes... of course, many times.” Flustered, Melora tossed her head. This was getting to be more ridiculous by the moment. To salvage her pride, she began to speak quickly. “But I didn’t expect to be kissed quite so enthusiastically by Cal because I thought he was going to kiss me the way he kisses the members of his family to settle a ‘squabble,’ not like... like—”

“Not like you were his girl.” Jesse finished for her helpfully, and for the first time, as she met the youth’s gaze, he smiled at her with no trace of either suspicion or hostility.

“Cal’s never had a girl,” Will informed her importantly. “Till now.”

Melora regarded Cal from beneath the sweep of her lashes, a pert, inquisitive glance. It pleased her to see that at last he looked as flustered as she felt.

“And I don’t have one now either,” he pointed out quickly, striding to the fireplace and adding another log. “Melora is just a friend.”

“But she’s so pretty.” Disappointed, Will pushed his lower lip out in a pout. “If you don’t want her for your girl, she can be mine.”

Everyone laughed, including Melora, who threw her arms around the little boy. “I’d be proud to be your girl, Will.”

“You would?”

“Yes. Proud and honored.”

He beamed and tossed his older brother a triumphant look.

“Well, good for you, Will. Looks like you’ve got yourself a girl.” Cal clapped him amiably on the back. Then he glanced at the window, noting the deep, thick darkness that had settled down like a fine wool cloak over the hills. “But now it’s time for everyone to get to bed. Cassie, you’ll come and get me right away if Lou wakes up in the night and needs something?”

His sister nodded and ran obediently to him for a good-night kiss. Then Cal turned briskly toward Will and scooped the boy up and onto his shoulders. “You and me and Jesse are moving into the barn, pardner, so’s Melora can sleep in that second bedroom and have some privacy. Unless you want me to fix you up a bedroll in the corner, right here in the parlor.”

“No, Cal—I’m going with you. I want to sleep in the barn with you and Jesse and Brownie.”

Cal grinned up at the small boy atop his shoulders. “Sure thing, pardner. Hang on tight.” He headed out the door, waiting for Will to duck before he crossed the threshold. “Jesse, bring some blankets and pillows,” he said over his shoulder. “Night, ladies.”

Later, as Melora peeked into Lou’s sickroom and saw both Cassie and Louisa peacefully asleep in their beds, an odd, comfortable feeling washed over her. There was no denying it: This was a homey little house. Despite missing Jinx and Aggie she didn’t feel lonely here.

She’d been lonely when she was away at school, desperately lonely for her home and family, though she’d hidden it well and concentrated on her studies, because Pop had insisted she get a good education. But each night in Boston she’d had to fight against the ache of loneliness in her heart. Here she wasn’t lonely at all.