Amelia (27 page)

"Anytime," Quinn returned immediately.

Amelia sighed loudly, glaring at both of them. "Do you never think of anything except fighting?" she raged. Her fists clenched at her side. "Physical violence will solve nothing."

"Then why did you throw that damned carafe at me?" King asked conversationally.

She bit back more furious words. Her face colored with high temper as she glared at him.

"The wedding will be Sunday," he told her firmly, and then looked back at Quinn. "If you object, we can settle it right here."

Quinn wanted to hit him more than he wanted to eat. He bristled with bad temper and vengeance. "My father would be alive but for you…"

"I know that," King said quietly. "I'll have to bear the burden of it for the rest of my life."

"Quinn, he would have died anyway," Amelia said wearily. She looked at her brother with sad, wistful eyes. "He would have suffered more, and as the doctor said, he might actually have killed me."

"He almost did that because of what King told him!"

"I'm not defending what King did," she replied. "But you know that anything could have, and did, set Father off. He slapped me on the way home from Latigo after the hunting trip, because I protested a charge he made against me."

"You didn't tell me that," King said angrily.

"He had become more violent in the past few weeks." She unclenched her hands. "I mourn for the father I knew as a child." She stared at the lonely grave. "But I rejoice for the tortured man who died, because he was spared more pain."

"Which still doesn't solve the problem of Amelia," Quinn muttered.

"I told you," King returned, "that we're getting married on Sunday. That will certainly solve her problem. My parents dote on her."

"Well, you don't," Amelia said, her temper rising all over again. "If I made a list of the insults you've heaved at me since I came out here the first time, it would stretch all the way to El Paso!"

"I didn't want you being tempted to marry Alan," he said easily. "He's afraid of her now, by the way," he added with a smile at Quinn. "When she loses her temper, he runs for cover. It would never have worked. She'd have him henpecked by the end of the first week they were married."

Amelia knew that, but she didn't like hearing it in that smug drawl. "Perhaps I loved Alan, didn't you think about that before you started spinning your vicious web?"

He smiled lazily. "If you had, you'd never have let me touch you in the first place."

"You… you… !" She couldn't find one single adjective that was adequate to describe him.

"Calm down," he murmured. "You're not recovered enough for war, even verbal war." He bent and lifted her gently off the ground in his arms. "Come on back to Latigo with us," he told Quinn. "I expect you came straight here when you got to town. You could probably use a good meal. Do stop struggling, Amy, it's so undignified."

"Don't call me… Amy!" She gasped, pushing at him.

"Why not? It suits you." He turned and walked back to the buggy with her, enjoying the soft warmth of her in his arms.

She subsided, because she didn't want to be dropped on the hard ground, she told herself. But when he put her in the buggy and his dark, lean face came momentarily too close, she went breathless and boneless.

He looked straight into her eyes and sparks seemed to leap between them. The unexpected longing he felt prodded his temper. He moved away from her with undue haste, his face like stone.

She clenched her hands together. So now he couldn't bear to touch her. What had she expected? He was being forced by honor into a marriage he didn't want. He would make the most of it, but he certainly didn't love Amelia. He could offer her none of the feelings she had for him, which she would now have to keep carefully hidden. There must be some way out of this dreadful situation.

"I could go back East…"

"You'll go nowhere, except to the church on Sunday," he said, his voice deep and cutting.

He moved around to the other side of the carriage, lighting a cigar as he went.

Quinn had mounted and rode up beside Amelia, who was smoldering quietly in the buggy.

"I do not wish to marry him. You must save me," she told her brother firmly.

He pulled his hat low over his eyes, commented that he thought it was King who needed saving, and rode on ahead of them.

Amelia took one last look at her father's sad, lonely grave, and turned her attention toward Latigo.

 

The announcement of King's marriage to Amelia had predictable results at Latigo.

"I couldn't be happier," Enid said with tender enthusiasm as she hugged Amelia. "I saw it coming, you know," she added teasingly, while the others eavesdropped. "All those long, slow looks that passed between you, the nervousness and shyness. Imagine, my King, shy!"

"You exaggerate," King said lazily.

"I thought he hated me," Amelia said.

"That could hardly be the case, since he has asked you to become his wife," a blissfully ignorant Brant noted.

Amelia didn't look at King. She glanced toward her brother. "Did you catch Rodriguez?" she asked suddenly.

Quinn looked uncomfortable. "I trailed him down into Sonora," he said.

"And… ?"

Quinn took a sip of his coffee. "And nothing. I lost his trail," he lied.

"That's too bad," King said curtly. "I hope to live long enough to see that cutthroat swing at the end of a short rope!"

"The Mexicans love him," Quinn pointed out. "To them, he's a saint."

"No saint cuts people up and leaves them for the vultures," King said bluntly. "Which is what he did to my fiancée."

Amelia started. She hadn't known about any fiancée, or that the woman had been killed. She stared at King without breathing, waiting for him to elaborate. So that was why he was cold-bloodedly thinking of marrying Darcy, because his only love had been lost. And now he was cold-bloodedly going to marry Amelia, because he might have made her pregnant. It made her heart ache to realize just what a hollow marriage it would be.

"He waylaid a carriage which contained my fiancée and a… friend of hers," he said. "He robbed them, stripped them, and hacked them to pieces. Forgive me," he added when his mother went pale. "But it is the truth. No one who saw them would hesitate to hang Rodriguez on sight."

"Are they certain it
was
Rodriguez?" Quinn asked, surprised by this latest admission, because he knew King had been engaged but nothing more. He'd assumed the engagement had simply been broken.

"There was an eyewitness," King said. "A Mexican named Manolito Lopez."

Quinn's heart jumped. He almost burst out what he knew about Manolito, who had just been killed by Rodriguez for leaving a drugged Maria in a brothel. But he couldn't defend Rodriguez without admitting he'd seen him. Brant Culhane had friends among the Texas Rangers, and he, like most of the ranchers who'd had cattle stolen, also hated Rodriguez.

Amelia saw the torment on King's face and had to look away. There was little doubt that he still mourned the woman he'd lost. She sighed, glancing at her brother. Oddly, he looked worse than King. "Are you troubled?" Amelia asked.

He forced a smile. "It is Father," he said, and partially it was. He grieved for the man. "I shall miss him. As you said, Amelia, there were wonderful times when we were younger. He was a caring and kind father, then."

"Let us remember him as he was," she said softly.

King was staring down at his plate, quiet and brooding. Memories of Alice as he'd last seen her made him ill. He could almost picture it, but now it was Amelia he saw there, and his head jerked up. He looked at her with faint terror, as he began to realize how he would feel if it had been Amelia instead of Alice. It was only then that he came to the true depths of his situation; now, when he knew that life without Amelia would be no life at all.

He didn't want to face that unpalatable fact, so he pushed it to the back of his mind and concentrated on his almost cold coffee.

"Can you stay the night, Quinn?" Enid asked.

He shook his head. "I'm very grateful for the sandwiches and coffee," he said, indicating the full tray that he'd all but emptied while they sat drinking coffee and talking in the front room. "But I have to report back. Then, I'll have to make arrangements about Father's things."

Amelia's face fell as he discussed that business. It was a sad thing to realize that the precious bits and pieces of her father's whole life had to be liquidated.

"I thought his pocket watch should go to you, as I have his pistol," Quinn told Amelia. He handed it over to her, watching her eyes water as she took it, opened the back of the gold case, and saw her father's initials there.

"There is so little of him left," she said quietly. "A sad collection of bits and pieces that contain a man's entire life."

"You will always have the memories of him," Enid said comfortingly. "The good memories, Amelia."

She smiled at her hostess. "Yes, I will have those."

 

Later, after Quinn rode back to town, Amelia sat on the porch step and looked at the stars. Far away, she heard the sounds of cattle and horses making soft noises. In the distance, a wolf howled. The dark silhouette of trees on the horizon made her think of happier times.

"It's too cool for you out here," came a stiff voice from behind her. "Come inside."

She had her arms wrapped around herself against the chill, but his cold concern made them unfold. She glared at his shadowy figure. "I shall sit outside if I please," she said formally.

There was faint laughter. "And I thought you were biddable."

"What do you want?"

He moved into the light, a smoking cigar in his hand. "I might ask you the same question. Are you regretting the fact that you didn't let Quinn shoot me? He wanted to."

"Killing you would hardly solve any problems. And you are friends," she added.

"Perhaps not as much as before," he replied. "He will not forget. Nor will I."

"Time heals many wounds." She got slowly to her feet. The night air was chilly.

"Wait."

His voice stopped her. He pulled her around to face him with his free hand gently but firmly, holding her upper arm. His knuckles were against the soft swell of her breast under her arm, and she felt an unwanted thrill of pleasure. She tugged against his hand.

He let her go at once, and she stepped back. His face was in the shadows, but his deep voice sounded strained. "You may withdraw from me all you like. I intend to marry you."

"I'm doing it only because I have no choice. I should sooner marry one of your cowboys!"

"Take care," he warned curtly. "A woman in your position should be grateful for an offer of marriage."

"A man in your position should be ashamed of himself!"

"I am," he said soberly. "Ashamed and disgusted. But all the regret in the world will not undo what has happened. We have to look to the future."

"Yes. You must tell Miss Valverde that your fortune will soon be out of her reach!"

"You have a stinging tongue," he accused. "Miss Valverde is my business, not yours."

"She will be, if you think to carouse with her while you are my husband!"

He stared at her curiously. "No such thought would ever occur to me. A vow is a solemn matter."

"Then make sure that Miss Valverde knows that, please."

His bold eyes slid up and down her lazily. They narrowed. "Then make sure that Alan knows it, as well."

"Alan is afraid of me, remember?" she chided.

"He does well to feel that way," he retorted. "He needs a house sparrow, not a vicious little ruffled wren."

"How dare you!"

She drew back her hand, but he caught it, jerking her against him, where he held her until she stopped struggling and stood panting for breath. His hand was steely from long hours of ranch work, his hold impossible to break. He didn't hurt her, but he held her securely.

"I am not vicious," she said through her teeth.

"Not to the others," he agreed. "Only to me. You fight me at every turn, Amelia. Why?"

"Because you hate me," she said unsteadily. "You've always hated me. Everything you've said and done since I've been in Texas has been to make me understand how much you hate me. Even… even what happened at Latigo that day. You wanted nothing more than to shame me, so that Alan wouldn't want me. I was afraid of father, hopelessly alone… !"

He pulled her head against his chest and held her, smoothing her hair, whispering soothing things against her temple, her cheek, her nose, and then, her mouth.

The unexpected contact was so soft and brief that she didn't feel threatened by it. She relaxed, until his mouth began to part her lips in a prelude to the hard, insistent passion she remembered from before. His arms swallowed her up, and his mouth became demanding. She began to tremble as the need worked its way into her body and made it throb with the desire that only he could kindle. Her nails bit into his hard arms, and she heard him groan against her lips.

The harsh sound penetrated her whirling mind. His hands were on her hips now,
pulling her closer. He was aroused and not hiding it, and his mouth was frighteningly expert.

"No. No!" she began to fight and twisted harshly out of his arms to back against a post and hang there, her lips swollen and trembling, her body slumped with the weakness he'd invoked.

He looked wild. His eyes were glittering in that hard, dark face on which not one expression was discernable. Only his eyes were alive in it.

"You want me," he said roughly.

"Want," she choked, fighting tears. "That's all you know, all you understand. You hate me, but you want to make love to me just the same. It's… disgusting! It's degrading to make me feel like this and take advantage of it!"

His lips parted on a harsh breath. He glared at her. "What do you expect oar marriage to be, a union that allows hand-holding and nothing more?"

"That's exactly what I expect!" she raged. "I have no intention of sharing a room with you! Or do you think I could love my father's murderer?"

She hadn't meant to say that. She didn't think it. She'd been searching for a weapon, something to save her from him. But this weapon had cutting force. She saw his face go white, the light in his eyes go out. He ran a rough hand through his dark hair and took a hard breath.