Daisies In The Wind (16 page)

Rebeccah felt as low and dirty as a common
lightskirt. He must certainly think her no better than one. Her
cheeks burned with shame. “It’s obvious just what kind of a woman
you think I am. Easy pickings. One so disreputable and so desperate
for a man’s affections that I don’t give a damn if he’s
married!”

A stunned look entered his eyes.

Rebeccah lost all control of her temper and
slapped him. “How dare you look so surprised. You think I have
no
scruples, that I’m the commonest, loosest, most
despicable kind of female—”

“Hold on a minute and listen to me—”

“A minute? No,” she flashed, her face ablaze
with mortification and fury. “I’ve wasted too many minutes on you.
You and your son, Sheriff Bodine, had best be on your way
immediately. I’m certain Billy’s mother is waiting for word of him!
Poor woman,” she added, her voice trembling with scorn and fury. “I
feel only pity for her!”

“That’s enough!”

Wolf gripped her wrist so tightly, she cried
out. “For your information, Miss Rawlings—” he began, but Billy’s
voice, sounding very small and sad, interrupted him from the
doorway.

“My ma is dead.”

Wolf released her and spun to face the
boy.

Rebeccah gasped, and rubbed instinctively at
her tender wrist. For a moment she was speechless. Billy’s young
eyes were filled with sorrow. He looked very small, very thin, and
very alone. And Wolf had suddenly become a wall of solid
granite—hard, cold, and impenetrable.

“Oh, Billy, I’m sorry,” she whispered,
knowing even as she said them that the words were woefully
inadequate. “I didn’t know. Billy, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“It’s all right.” He was trying hard to sound
matter-of-fact. But he bit his lip and looked down at the floor.
Rebeccah felt as if a rusty knife were twisting inside of her.

What have I done? What have I
said?

She wanted to beg Wolf to forgive her
stupidity, to look into his eyes and let him see how dreadful she
felt, but before she could say or do anything else, he had a hand
on Billy’s shoulder and was leading him out of the kitchen.

“Billy, let’s go.”

She wanted to call after them, to explain, to
make everything better, but the words choked in her throat.

Then they were outside, riding off together
into the inky, vile night, disappearing almost immediately into the
streaming darkness.

His wife was dead.
Dead
.

And she had accused him of such terrible
things.

Rebeccah stood in the open doorway, staring
off in the direction they had gone, letting the chill rain slash
against her hot cheeks and her trembling, burning body, still on
fire from Wolf’s touch.

Oh, God. He truly hates me now. I’ve hurt
him and hurt his son.

She closed her eyes and struggled against the
bitter tears. But they came anyway. They mingled with the rain
pelting her face, ran down her cheeks, and watered the ache deep in
her soul.

Four days later on a cool, cloudy September
afternoon, Rebeccah perched in a wing chair in the modest Brady
parlor and faced questions from Mayor Ernest Duke, Culley
Pritchard, Caitlin Bodine, Emily Brady, and Myrtle Lee Anderson,
who comprised the school-board committee of Powder Creek.

The formal invitation for the interview had
come from Mayor Duke himself, who had explained that Caitlin Bodine
had recommended her for the schoolteacher’s position at a town
meeting and the citizens had approved the suggestion that she be
interviewed. That in itself had astounded Rebeccah —how had Caitlin
managed to convince them?

The interview lasted more than an hour, and
during the course of it she realized that she was being judged not
only on how knowledgeably and eloquently she answered their
questions relating to her education and training but also on how
she conducted herself, how she spoke, moved, whether or not she
smacked her lips over her lemonade or ate strawberry pie with her
fingers.

She didn’t. She wasn’t entirely sure she
wanted the teacher’s position, but she knew she needed it. So she
was careful to smile politely when she answered the questions, to
sip her lemonade delicately, to nibble at her pie with exactly the
right degree of well-bred enjoyment. The way she had been taught at
Miss Elizabeth Wright’s Academy for Young Ladies. The way Analee
Caruthers would have eaten her strawberry pie.

And it worked. Whether it was the demure
chignon into which she’d pinioned her heavy hair or the quiet gray
serge gown left over from her teaching days, serviceable and plain,
with only a wisp of white lace at the throat, she impressed them
enough and overcame their trepidations enough so that they glanced
at each other, reached an agreement through some silent signal, and
offered her the position.

“The salary is small, but you will be
compensated in other ways as well,” Ernest Duke informed her with
his usual pomposity. “If you take sick, Doc Wilson will treat you
at no charge. The town will furnish you with a buckboard and team.
Koppel’s General Store will provide you with all the eggs, canned
milk, and vegetable seed you need at no cost, and the blacksmith
will shoe your horses and fix your wagon wheels with nothing asked
in return.”

“And twice a week,” Culley Pritchard told
her, “I’ll send one of my ranch hands around to help out with
chores and wood chopping and repairs—whatever you need. We look
after our own, young lady.”

Our own. Rebeccah found herself smiling
tentatively at him. Besides Caitlin and the Bradys, both of whom
had treated her with great kindness since the night of the storm,
Culley Pritchard seemed the most friendly member of the board, the
one regarding her with real interest and, well, almost approval. He
was a broad, powerfully built man who spoke bluntly and with a
shrewd, brisk intelligence. And she sensed that unlike Myrtle Lee
Anderson and Mayor Duke, he didn’t hold her father’s misdeeds
against her.

“Well,” Myrtle Lee said with a sniff, leaning
forward in her straight-backed chair to peer crossly at Rebeccah.
“Speak up, Miss Rawlings. We don’t have all day. Do you accept the
position or not?”

“I accept.” Rebeccah kept her tone as calm as
Culley Pritchard’s had been. “When would you like me to start?”

Emily Brady and Caitlin Bodine burst into
wide smiles.

“Next Monday will be just fine,” Caitlin
assured her, and glanced around the sunlit parlor for confirmation.
“We’ll have time to get the schoolhouse in order by then and pass
the word around that Powder Creek has itself a brand-new
teacher.”

Rebeccah, who considered herself far above
sentimentality or excessive emotion, suddenly found herself feeling
almost overwhelmed as she realized the responsibility and the trust
being placed in her. This was very different from being offered the
teaching position at Miss Wright’s Academy. Because she was a
graduate of the academy, the school had been almost duty-bound to
hire her, for she was one of their own, and not to do so would have
suggested a lack of confidence in the training they had provided
her. But this school-board, needy as they were for a teacher, was
overcoming strong prejudice against her to give her the job. It
demonstrated great faith, she realized, and she couldn’t help but
be moved.

She rose and glanced around the room, gaining
confidence from Emily Brady’s reassuring nod and Caitlin’s smile.
“I appreciate the board’s confidence in me, and I will try to do my
best for the children,” she said crisply, and forced herself to
meet the gaze of each member of the school-board, even Myrtle Lee
Anderson’s doubtful frown and Mayor Duke’s worried pucker.

“Of course you will,” Emily Brady said warmly
and came forward to grasp Rebeccah’s hand. “I know Joey will be
very happy. He might not even balk each morning about going to
school. Matter of fact I know he won’t.”

“My younger boy won’t either,” Culley
Pritchard added, looming before her, rugged in his rancher’s shirt,
vest, and trousers, his spurs jingling as he walked. “But if he
ever gives you any trouble, Miss Rawlings—any trouble at all—you be
sure to let me know about it right off.”

They were kind, Rebeccah thought wonderingly
a short time later as she drove herself home in her rented wagon.
Genuinely kind. At least the Bradys were, and Culley Pritchard, and
Caitlin. After what Bear had done in this town, it was a miracle
that anyone would even speak to her, much less give her a job and
make her feel welcome.

Maybe Caitlin was too kind, she thought,
guiding the horses along the rutted trail with a frown creasing her
brow. Confident of the interview’s outcome, Caitlin had earlier
invited her to have supper with the Bodines afterward, in
celebration of Rebeccah’s new position, and not knowing what excuse
to give, Rebeccah had accepted. But now that the hurdle of the
interview was over and she had the job, she was uncertain if
Caitlin’s kindness was a blessing or a curse. Because of it, in a
few short hours Rebeccah would have to face Wolf Bodine again.

She hadn’t seen him once since that awful
night of the storm, when she’d said such terrible things to him and
behaved so ... ridiculously. That was the only word for it,
Rebeccah admitted in shame.
Ridiculous
.

He’d sent his deputy, a laconic man named Ace
Johnson, out to the ranch to deliver her reward money for shooting
Scoop Parmalee. The man had handed over the money without any
message, not even one businesslike word, from Wolf Bodine.

Why, oh why, had she let him kiss her? And
why had she let it go on for as long as she had?

No man had ever kissed her like that. She
hadn’t even had time to panic, to feel the familiar cold sweat or
the nausea, for Wolf Bodine had taken her completely by surprise,
and by the time she realized what was happening, she’d been swept
away by inexplicable feelings she’d been powerless to fight.

It had been wonderful. Even more wonderful
than her dreams, her fruitless imaginings all those years—because
it had been real. Wolf Bodine the man was even more dangerously
compelling and irresistible than Wolf Bodine the memory. His
knowing touches, his urgent kisses, the rugged, sensuous whole of
him, was far more powerful than dream images of such things.

Yet Rebeccah felt dismayed with her own
weakness in succumbing to them.

True, Wolf was not married, as she had first
thought. His wife was dead—but what difference did that make? He
would never care about her. He would never take her seriously or
regard her as anything other than an amusing diversion. After all,
what more could there be with Bear Rawlings’ daughter?

The late-afternoon wind blew autumn leaves
across the trail and cooled her burning skin. The memories of that
night stung. Considering the contempt in which he held her, a
contempt he’d made all too clear from the moment he discovered who
she was, Wolf’s advances were insulting, painful. She couldn’t bear
to think about them, and yet she could think about little else.

What was worse, she’d hurt Billy when he’d
overheard her comment about his mother. Now he probably despised
her as well.

For a fleeting moment as she guided the
horses over the rise toward the trail that led to her own yard, she
wondered about the woman who had been Wolf’s wife. No doubt he
still loved her and mourned her. He would probably never get over
her and only assuaged his physical needs with loose women and
whores who meant nothing to him, while still holding onto his love
for ... what’s her name.

Don’t think about him
, she
instructed herself when she reached home and began unhitching the
wagon.
Think about Caitlin and Billy. Reach out to them, let
them be your friends (if Billy still will). Forget about Wolf
Bodine.

Yet as she sponged herself clean in the icy
river, sudsed and rinsed her hair, and then later in the bedroom
brushed it until it shone, and slipped on a fresh gown—a, sprightly
cherry-and-white calico with tight sleeves—she studied herself in
her hand mirror and wondered if Wolf Bodine thought her the tiniest
bit attractive—or if he had only kissed her because she was an
outlaw’s daughter and therefore an easy woman, someone unworthy of
his respect.

She examined her features in the mirror, each
one of them, then made a face. Her mouth was too large, her nose
too ordinary. And her hair never seemed to stay contained, no
matter how many pins she thrust into it.

The bruise on her cheek had faded, but she
brushed on a dusting of rice powder to conceal it further. And a
tiny, daring fluff of rouge. If she was to be considered a loose
woman, she may as well play the part!

I don’t care what he thinks
,
Rebeccah decided rebelliously as she picked up her good ivory lace
shawl. It was time to hitch up the wagon again and start for the
Double B.

But she turned and hurried back into the
bedroom to dab on the fancy French perfume Bear had sent all the
way from San Francisco for her last birthday.
There
, she
thought.
That’s for me, because I like to smell pretty, not for
him. Not one little bit for him.

She arranged the shawl around her shoulders
and hurried for the door. Worried that she was late, she opened it
quickly and started to rush outside.

A man loomed on the threshold, one powerful
arm raised.

Rebeccah screamed. She shrank back so
abruptly, she nearly stumbled, but he caught her arm just in
time.

“What are you screaming about, you clumsy
woman? You scared the wits out of me,” Wolf Bodine growled at
her.

“You! I scared
you
?”Rebeccah’s heart
was racing triple its usual speed. She yanked her arm free of his
grasp. “What are you doing here?”