Fletcher's Woman (11 page)

•   •   •

Rachel lay perfectly still beneath the sheets and blankets of a real bed, Molly Brady's good cooking resting lightly in her stomach. A soft rain pattered on the solid roof overhead, and she was warm in her borrowed nightgown.

She did not permit herself to think of the staggering course that day had taken; she could not bear to remember it all now. But she did allow her mind to slide back over the evening.

They had eaten dinner, not in Dr. Fletcher's expansive, many-windowed dining room, but in the large, bright kitchen, around a circular oaken table.

There had been so much food, all of it hot and fresh, and to Rachel's great surprise, she had been ravenously hungry.

Molly Brady, her huge, slow-witted son, Billy; Dr. Fletcher, and herself. Reviewing the scene in her mind, Rachel knew she would relish the quiet, ordinary celebration of it always.

Molly was a spritely, direct woman with a ready laugh, and Rachel liked her, even though she wondered whether or not her relationship with Griffin Fletcher went beyond cleaning and cooking and doing wash.

Rachel sighed and drew the heavy flannel sheets up under her chin. She wondered which of the bedrooms contained Fawn Nighthorse, the Indian woman she'd met that morning—a lifetime ago—in Tent Town.

A great fuss had been made over Fawn throughout the evening; Molly carried trays up to her room, and Dr. Fletcher visited her frequently, his face grim.

Rachel didn't know whether Fawn was ill, or whether she'd been hurt somehow. She hadn't dared to ask.

Now, alone in a small, quiet bedroom, she felt a twinge of envy, followed by a deep, shattering sense of loneliness.

And Dr. Fletcher—Griffin—was out. She could feel his absence throbbing in the substantial house, as though the structure was straining to hold its breath until his return.

Then, in the distance, a door closed. The house let out its breath, drew another, and was normal again. Rachel closed her eyes and slept.

•   •   •

Griffin awakened reluctantly with the dawn. Another day. God, sometimes he wished that time would stop just long enough to allow him to gather his thoughts.

He threw back a tangled blanket and moved, naked, across the cool smoothness of his bedroom floor. At the washstand, he poured tepid water from a pitcher into a basin and washed. That done, he shaved, dressed in his customary black trousers and a fresh white shirt, and brushed his hair.

Though he had a number of other matters to think about, his mind kept straying back to Rachel, who was sleeping in the room directly across from his. A sudden, devastating need sprang up inside him, consuming him, thrusting aside all his good intentions.

He was free now, he reminded himself. There was no good reason why he shouldn't be attracted to her.

Fitful and unaccountably anxious, he moved to the windows, looked out on the clear, freshly washed day forming itself of sunshine and blue sky and fading mists. He drew a deep, ragged breath and searched his mind for specific fears but found only one—loving again.

Griffin braced himself inwardly, turned from the window, and left his bedroom.

In the hallway, he paused, everything within him drawn to Rachel's closed door. After several seconds, he summoned enough discipline to walk away, to open the door of the room where Fawn rested and look in.

She was gone, and the room was as neat and unchanged as if she'd never been there at all.

Griffin was both exasperated and amused, but he wasn't surprised. Even as a small child, Fawn had had trouble staying in one place for more than two hours at a time.

He descended the stairs, strode through the quiet house to the kitchen.

There, four different lamps aided the struggling dawn, and Molly stood before the enormous cookstove, stirring something in a cast-iron kettle.

Her smile was wary, and a tendril of steam-dampened, coppery hair fell over her forehead. She brushed it aside with the back of one hand. “What about the McKinnon girl?” she demanded without preamble.

Griffin bowed slightly and laughed. “And good morning to you, too, Molly Brady.”

Molly shook her head good-naturedly and ladled hot oatmeal into a crockery bowl as Griffin helped himself to coffee.

“She's a pretty thing, isn't she?” Molly pressed. “Saints above, I can just imagine what those lilac-colored eyes do to a man's insides.”

Griffin sat down at the round oaken table and spooned coarse brown sugar over the cereal Molly set before him. “She's only a child,” he snapped, speaking as much to himself as to Molly.

Her laugh was pleasantly derisive. “Some child, that one.”

“She's only seventeen,” Griffin said, taking an unusual interest in the cream pitcher.

“Aye,” Molly agreed cheerfully. “And at her age, I was a year married and mother to my William.”

Griffin ignored the remark and ate in silence.

Molly wouldn't have it. “The poor thing—she looked so lost and confused last night! I'll be bound you didn't trouble yourself to explain matters to her, Griffin Fletcher.”

Griffin sat back to finish his coffee. “Her father can explain. I'm going to find him today.”

Molly raised one shapely auburn eyebrow. “Aye? And it's a day's ride up that mountain and back. What if you're needed here?”

Griffin shrugged with an indifference he didn't feel. He shouldn't go, he knew that—especially not when he could probably persuade Field to go instead. But he needed the ride, the distance, the time.

“I'll be back as soon as I can. Until I am, you keep Rachel in or near this house. Jonas is flat on his back and hurting in some crucial places, but that doesn't mean he won't try anything.”

Swiftly, before he could refuse, Molly refilled his cup with coffee. “Griffin,” she ventured, with gentle caution. “I know that you and Becky McKinnon were close friends. I know you promised her that you would see Rachel safely out of Jonas's reach. But what if Rachel is attracted to him? Whatever else he is, Jonas is good-looking and rich. Those qualities make a powerful combination when a girl has been poor all her life.”

Griffin shoved his cup away, staining the crisp white tablecloth in the process, and rose to take his suit coat and round-brimmed hat from the peg beside the back door. “Jonas would destroy her,” he said.

Squaring her shoulders Molly, extended the ever-present
black bag. “Maybe he does love her,” she said doubtfully, her green eyes haunted and faraway.

“Love?” The word was bitter on Griffin's tongue. He wrenched open the door and was comforted by the resulting rush of cool air. “Jonas wouldn't know love if it did a jig on his breastbone.”

Molly's strong, Irish chin lifted. “And you're a fine one to be throwing stones, Griffin Fletcher. The word practically makes you scream and run.”

Griffin went out, slamming the door behind him in eloquent response.

•   •   •

When Rachel awakened, she was bemused to find that she felt nothing. Not grief for her mother, not anger at Griffin, not loneliness. There was, it seemed, a void inside her.

The lovely house was cool and quiet as she made her way through it, to the kitchen.

Molly Brady was there, with her quick smile and her cautious, questioning eyes. “Here, then, sit down and have a bite,” she commanded, in her melodic brogue.

Rachel smiled wanly as she accepted the offered oatmeal, with muttered thanks, and sat down to eat. As she moved, the cheap wool of her dress scratched at her bare thighs and irritated her breasts, but she didn't care. Nothing mattered, nothing at all.

Molly centered a wide-brimmed straw hat atop her head. “Rachel?”

Rachel looked up, managing a soft, distracted smile. “Yes?”

“Welcome.”

Tears clustered in Rachel's throat, which was odd, she decided, since she had no feelings.

Molly must have seen something in her face, for she approached swiftly, took off her hat, and sat down in the chair nearest Rachel's. “I'm thinking you're a girl in need of someone to talk to, Rachel McKinnon.”

“It's very strange,” Rachel confided, pushing her half-finished breakfast away. “So much has happened to me, and yet I don't feel anything.”

“You will,” Molly promised, one of her small, reddened hands coming to rest on Rachel's wrist.

Rachel swallowed, averting her eyes. “What kind of man is Dr. Fletcher?” she asked.

The housekeeper sighed. “He's a good man—a strong, responsible man.”

“But he's arrogant and aloof, too!” Suddenly Rachel's lost emotions were streaming back, and she wasn't so sure she welcomed them. “My goodness, Molly, I was minding my own business. I went to Mr. Wilkes's house because he invited me to take a bath—”

Gentle amusement sparkled in the green, green eyes, but there was something disquieting there, too. “Yes?”

“It was all very innocent—I'd gotten muddy, you see, and there was no place
else
to bathe! In any case, Griffin—Dr. Fletcher—came storming in there and dragged me out, and he's been giving me orders and insulting me ever since!”

Molly sat back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. “Tact has never been one of Griffin's outstanding gifts. He is a very direct man.”

“What right does he have to tell me where I can stay and where I can't, to bring me here?”

“None, I suppose. But the doctor and your mother were good friends, Rachel. And he promised her that he would protect you.”

“From what?” Rachel demanded, her voice sharp with frustration.

“From Mr. Jonas Wilkes,” replied Molly evenly. There was a darkness in her shamrock eyes, a shadowy remembering.

Rachel heard again her mother's words. “
There's a man, a terrible man.”
Had she referred to Mr. Wilkes then, rather than Dr. Fletcher? It was all too confusing. “Why would Mr. Wilkes want to hurt me?”

Molly looked distinctly uneasy, and she lowered her voice. “We don't know that he does, Rachel. From what I gather, he fancies you—and that's a dangerous thing.”

Rachel sighed. Had everyone gone mad? What would a man of Jonas's wealth and power want with a sawyer's daughter? “Dr. Fletcher hates him—and I think Mama did, too.”

Molly nodded. “Aye. It's my guess that Becky thought Jonas would get even with her for some differences they had by striking at you. As for Griffin, he has good reasons for what he feels, though I wish he'd forget them.”

“What differences did Mama and Mr. Wilkes have?”

A patch of sunlight glimmered, square, on the table between them, and Molly's features were hidden by the brightness of it. “Jonas Wilkes is one of the most powerful, influential men in
Washington Territory, Rachel. And he was never able to control your mother, as he does so many other people. She simply didn't fear him—not until you came along, that is.”

Rachel was silent for a time, her mind busy absorbing this peculiar information, but finally, she spoke again. “Is that why he hates Dr. Fletcher—because he can't control him?”

“I'm sure that's a measure of the problem,” agreed Molly, as the sunlight dimmed and her features were visible again. “But there's far more between those two, and it began long before Jonas inherited the mountain.”

Something in Molly's manner made Rachel frame her words carefully. “It has something to do with the pain inside Dr. Fletcher, doesn't it?”

Molly was suddenly fretful, rising from her chair, straightening her spotless apron, tying a yellow kerchief over her bright hair. The straw hat lay, forgotten, on a sideboard. “I've said too much as it is, and there's gardening to do. You're to rest quietly, but we've hundreds of books in the doctor's study, if you've a mind to read.”

Rachel welcomed the prospect of losing herself in a novel or a volume of epic poetry—if, indeed, the forbidding Dr. Griffin Fletcher possessed any such flighty books.

Thoughts and feelings were swirling inside her as she made her way back through the house, toward the closed room she suspected was Griffin's study. Molly clearly knew so much more than she was willing to tell, and Rachel was frustrated by her silence.

Rachel paused in the study doorway, enchanted. Molly Brady had not exaggerated; there were, indeed, hundreds—perhaps thousands—of books here. They were packed tight on shelf after shelf, stacked precariously on chairs and tables, piled high on the massive desk occupying the center of the room.

And yet, conversely, the place had an air of austere neatness. The brass andirons in the fireplace gleamed, the two barrel-backed,
black leather chairs facing the hearth smelled of saddle soap, and the surgical instruments, neatly aligned in a glass-fronted cupboard, sparkled.

Never one to hesitate for long, Rachel entered the room, approached a book-lined wall, and ran delighted fingers across rich, colorful leather bindings. Many of the titles were stamped in gold, and the works themselves ranged from one end of the literary scope to the other.

There were medical books, of course—thick, dry treatises on the working of the human anatomy—but there were classics, too, and texts on botany, astronomy, philosophy, and government. Interspersed among these tomes, as if for spice, were irreverent comedies and daring adventures. These, without exception, were inscribed, “Louisa G. Fletcher” in flourishing, ornate handwriting.

Rachel turned over the name in her mind, wondering. She would have to live with her curiosity, for she had no intention of asking Griffin who Louisa was, and Molly probably wouldn't tell if she did.

Resigned, she settled into one of the intimidating chairs facing the hearth and opened a saucy French novel. The morning passed in sweet, restful indolence; for a few hours, at least, Rachel McKinnon was able to set aside the grim realities of her life. During that glorious respite, her scratchy, ugly dress became a gown of silk, her poverty became opulent wealth, and her loneliness was swept aside by the adoration of dapper gentlemen wearing clothes so fine that she could only vaguely picture them.