Flint Hills Bride
Authors: Cassandra Austin
10
TH
ANNIVERSARY
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Hills
Bride
Cassandra
Austin
For Megan,
our family’s most recent bride
consider apologizing.
He glanced Emily’s way and discovered her scowl had deepened. “What?” she demanded. “Why are you grinning?”
“You first,” he said, making an effort to be serious. “Why are you frowning?”
“You’re impossible,” she said. “I should hate you!”
“Why?” He truly was bewildered now. “Because I left you? Or because I kissed you?”
“Yes. Yes. And for other reasons. I should hate you. But I can’t!” She slammed her gloved hand down on the saddle horn, and it made the softest of thuds.
He laughed. He knew he shouldn’t. He should take her unhappiness seriously, no matter how little sense it made. “You’re angry because you can’t hate me? Of course you can’t hate me. We’ve been friends forever. That’s what friends do. They get angry, and then they forgive each other.”
“I don’t
want
to forgive you,” she muttered…
Also available from Harlequin Historicals and
CASSANDRA AUSTIN
Wait for the Sunrise
(#190)
Trusting Sarah
(#279)
Cally and the Sheriff
(#381)
Hero of the Flint Hills
(#397)
Kansas, 1881
“A
m I to understand I’m under arrest?” Emily’s gaze went from the deputy’s badge to the serious green eyes.
“Well, I’m not sure, ma’am. You say you’re Emily Prescott, but you don’t fit the description. I was expecting a tomboy in braids.”
“Very funny, Jake.”
His flash of a smile faded as she glared at him.
Noisy activity surrounded them on the train depot’s platform. Emily barely noticed. She wrapped her cloak more tightly around her and regarded Jake Rawlins with growing irritation. “My parents sent you, didn’t they? I can just hear them. ‘Take her to her brother’s ranch, and see that she stays there.’ ‘Telegraph immediately if she doesn’t get off the train.’ It amounts to house arrest, Jake!”
She brushed past him to find her trunk. He followed, of course. She hadn’t expected to get away from him, merely to be out from under his scrutiny
long enough to get her temper under control. None of this was Jake’s fault.
“I’m not your guard,” he said softly. “I’m just your ride to the ranch.”
“And that explains why they sent you, Deputy?” She found her trunk. A sudden wave of exhaustion made her turn and sit on it, clasping her gloved hands on her lap.
He moved to stand in front of her. “I volunteered, Emily. I’m headed the same way you are. Remember, my parents live on your brother’s ranch.”
She sighed, regretting her short temper as she always did. “I remember, Jake. But I visit the ranch regularly, and I’ve hardly seen you the last three years.”
A somber nod acknowledged the truth of the statement. “I’m trying to correct that,” he said. “I heard you were coming early for Christmas, and it seemed like a perfect excuse to take a vacation and spend time with…my family.”
Emily noticed the hesitation. Perhaps there was a rift between him and Martha or Perry that she had not been aware of. Perhaps he would be more understanding than she had expected. She cocked her head to one side as she looked up at him. “So that’s all they told you? That I would be coming in today?”
After a long moment, he slowly shook his head.
The anger swept over her again, and she came to her feet. She didn’t know if she wanted to scream or run. Before she could do either, he placed his hands on her shoulders. She was momentarily surprised by how gentle the touch was, then wondered why. Jake had never been anything but kind to her.
“We’ve known each other since we were babies, Emily. I thought we were friends. Have things changed so much?”
His soft voice dissolved her anger, leaving only defeat in its wake. “Everything’s changed, Jake. Look around you. When my parents were separated, I came here once or twice a year to be with my father. This was a little place called Cottonwood Station. Now it’s a town called Strong.”
He was eyeing her quizzically, and she had to laugh at herself. “Which has nothing to do with anything, I suppose, except that all the way here I kept wishing I was still the little girl you remember. I wanted to get off the train and find everything as it was, for life to be simple again.”
The deep worry that was always with her rose to the surface. She turned away to keep from revealing it to Jake. She had grown accustomed to hiding it with anger until she didn’t like herself anymore. “I’m ready to go now,” she said. “And, Jake—” she turned back to face him “—it’s good to see you again.”
Jake made Emily wait inside the depot near the stove while he loaded her trunk into the boot at the back of the buggy. He had ridden out to the ranch the day before to bring the buggy into town. Emily’s brother, Christian, had suggested he use the wagon since Emily might have more than one trunk, but Jake had declined. The buggy offered more protection from the cold wind than the wagon. He would make two trips if he had to, but Emily would be as comfortable as he could make her.
He hadn’t really been too busy to come home for
holidays the past three years. He had avoided the ranch when he knew Emily would be there. His hopeless attraction for her would fade, he had reasoned, if he didn’t have to look at her. The irony was it had almost worked. Then he had heard she was in trouble, and reason had gone out the window.
In three years she had only grown more beautiful. At eighteen, her face had lost a little of its plumpness making her dark brown eyes more striking. They sparkled when she teased, as they always had, and her expressive lips that smiled and pursed and pouted looked as kissable as they did in his fantasies.
He shook himself and hurried into the depot. Emily was chatting with another patron, and he let her finish as he collected the blanket he had hung over a chair near the stove. “Are you ready to go?” he asked when she turned toward him.
She moved to walk outside with him. “Do you need anything in town?” he asked, handing her up into the buggy. “Are you hungry?”
She shook her head. “Mama sent a lunch with me,” she said. “But thanks.”
It was foolish to cherish the smile she gave him, but he would readily admit to being a fool where Emily Prescott was concerned. At least her anger of a few minutes before seemed to be forgotten. He climbed up beside her and unfolded the warm blanket, tucking it across her lap.
“That was sweet of you, Jake,” she said. She sounded more amused than grateful.
“Easy enough to do,” he said, shaking the lines and starting the horse forward. Now he was feeling
foolish to the point of embarrassment. She had an annoying knack for doing that.
She laughed, and he risked a glance at her. The teasing grin took him back so quickly he could have sworn he was seventeen and she twelve.
“You better be careful or you’ll spoil me,” she said.
“Oh, no, not me. Somebody—everybody—else took care of that long ago.”
She laughed, wrapping herself around his upper arm. “Didn’t you help them at all, Jake?”
The face that turned up to him was so appealing he wanted to kiss it. Or at least throw off his glove and run his fingers down her soft, pale cheeks. He gripped the reins more tightly. “I guess I did my share,” he admitted softly.
The teasing light went out of her eyes, and she turned her face away. He was being too serious, and their relationship had never had much room for that. But he couldn’t pretend he wasn’t worried about her.
He took a deep breath, letting the bite of the cold air clear his head. His voice was even when he began. “Emily, your parents sent you here because of some young man.” She let go of his arm and moved away from him, and he was sorry. “Tell me your side.”
“My side! Did they write to you? Tell me what they said!”
Jake kept his voice quiet. “I talked to Christian. He said the fella’s unemployed, reckless, wild—”
“What!”
“And in jail for tearing up a neighbor’s yard.”
She kept her face turned away from him, hiding
even her profile behind the hood of her cloak. He waited patiently for her to speak.
“It was an accident,” she murmured. “It’s all a big misunderstanding.”
“He accidentally rode through their rose garden on horseback? He accidentally pulled up a fence? He—”
“Enough!”
Jake waited for her to decide what, if anything, she would tell him. It was a long ride to the ranch, and he had hoped she would confide in him. He couldn’t imagine why he had thought she would. What was he to her anyway? A childhood playmate? Something less than a brother? Certainly not what he wanted to be.
The team clopped along the road, creating a monotonous rhythm. A rabbit darted across their path and disappeared in the tall grass. The buggy creaked and rattled softly. Jake heard his back teeth grind together and made an effort to relax. After several minutes he gave up hope of hearing any more from Emily.
“I don’t believe it happened the way they say,” she said, startling him.
“What do you believe?”
He heard her take a deep breath. He didn’t dare look at her for fear she would read the pain on his face. He kept his eyes on the track and waited.
“Anson is a good man,” she began. “He isn’t reckless and wild. He just believes in having fun. Old people can’t understand that. He’s going to work in his father’s flour mill, but there isn’t any room for him yet.”
Jake cast her a skeptical glance, but she was turned away.
“The neighbor that accused him of tearing up his garden is a grouchy old man who doesn’t get along with anyone. Even Papa doesn’t like him.”
Jake resisted the urge to turn toward her, hoping she would continue, afraid she wouldn’t if she knew what he was feeling. He turned his gaze toward the sky. It was blue, he thought irrelevantly. Blue in December. It should be gray, damned gray.
When she had remained silent for several minutes he tried to prompt her into more details. “Your parents objected to Anson Berkeley before this incident.”
“They want to keep me a baby and would have objected to anyone. His parents have at least as much money as mine do. There’s no reason to treat him the way they do.”
Jake schooled his features and turned to watch her. He was rewarded a moment later when she glanced at him. He hoped she read the honest concern in his face; he read indecision in hers. “Emily,” he said softly, “I’m your friend. Tell me about him.”
She wrapped her arm around his and rested her head on his biceps, sighing deeply. “I know you’re my friend, Jake. In fact, you may be my only friend. Everyone else is ready to judge both Anson and me.”
“Not me,” he lied. “You’re both innocent till proven guilty.” He had to swallow hard before he could ask, “Are you in love with him?”
Her sigh sounded different this time. “Yes, I love him. And he loves me. We’ve promised to love each other forever.”
Jake didn’t want to think about the implications of that statement. His pulse quickened. From her touch? From anger?
Unmindful of his pain, she continued, “He’s so handsome, and exciting. I’ve never known anyone like him.”
Jake heard his back teeth crunch together again. He spoke to the team, urging them to increase their infuriating pace.
“He takes me places,” she went on, “that I’d never get to go if my parents had their way.”
“Places?” He hoped his voice didn’t sound as furious as he felt. Where the hell had this bastard taken his Emily?
“Clubs. Where there’s music and dancing and laughter.”
“And drinking? That’s illegal now. They voted in prohibition last year, Emily.”
She pulled away from him again. “You’re no different than the rest.”
“Well, maybe all of us are right!” He regretted it immediately.
They rode for miles without either of them saying a word. The sound of the plodding hooves and creaking buggy was broken only by the brief chirp of a robin too stupid to have flown south. Jake watched it fly off into the ridiculously blue sky.
Jake knew he should have just listened, but his own feelings kept getting in the way. He told himself that if Emily loved this man he couldn’t be all bad. Her happiness was what was important. His jealousy was jeopardizing their friendship, and they needed to stay friends if he was going to help her.
“I’m sorry,” he said finally. “You’re right I have no call to judge. If Anson Berkeley is the man you want, then I hope things work out for you.”
She murmured her thanks, but didn’t move back toward him. He wanted to wrap his arm around her and pull her against his side, but he knew she would resist.
After many minutes he cleared his throat. “Ma packed some lemonade if you’re thirsty.”
“I don’t want any.”
“Well, Ma’s not going to buy that She’s going to think I forgot to offer it to you.”
She turned and glared. “Tell her you ruined my appetite.”
At least she was looking at him. “I guess I can accept the blame there. But I did apologize.” He pulled the basket out from under the seat. “If you don’t want any, I’ll have to drink all the evidence. If it’s a choice between a bellyache and being in trouble with Ma, well…”
She hadn’t smiled, but she was having to work to hold it back. “You could just pour it on the ground.”
“You would let me do that? With lemonade? You
are
mad at me!”
She finally laughed, and he felt relief that was clearly more than the situation warranted. He handed her one of the small jars from its straw nest in the basket.
She took it and drank a little before screwing the lid back on and placing the jar between her feet. She didn’t seem quite as tense as she had earlier, and he hoped that meant she had forgiven him. Still, as he waited for her to talk to him again, he tried to think
of something to say, something neutral that would prove he was her friend. Finally he accepted the silence, though he didn’t enjoy it. The ride to the ranch seemed to take longer than it ever had before.
Emily wished she hadn’t told Jake anything. He was as closed minded as the rest. For a moment she had thought she detected some jealousy in his reactions. But surely she had imagined it. He was just being stupid and brotherly like Arlen had and Christian, no doubt, would.
Go where we say! See who we say! Do as we say! She was sick of it. Anson had come at just the right time to rescue her from the boring life they all had planned for her.
And she would be with Anson again. There was no question about that. One way or another, they would be together.
She let her mind drift back to the first time they had met, reliving the excitement of his eyes on her, the adventure of being included in his close little group, the wonder at being singled out as his favorite, then his love. She tried to push away the apprehension that prickled the back of her mind.
She was so lost in thought that when she felt the buggy turn off the road she looked up in surprise. The huge rock house with its many balconies filled her with sudden nostalgia. They rode up the hill and around the house to the second-level entrance. Before Jake had even pulled the buggy to a stop, Christian was there to greet her. He lifted her out, hugging her to his chest and spinning her around as he had done since she was a child.
He set her back on the ground but waited a moment to let her go, giving her his familiar dimpled smile. “Get inside where it’s warm, muffin,” he said, guiding her toward the door, with his arm around her shoulder. “Jake and I’ll get the trunk.”