Foxfire Bride (39 page)

"That man sure does love his daddy," Peaches said when he heard about them picking up coins again. "The animals?"

"The horses were rearing and the mules kicking. They had an agitated night, but the bear didn't get to them."

"That's good," he murmured, closing his eyes.

"I'm going to set up your tent so you'll have some shade." She looked around. "This is a good place to rest a while. We've got water and good grass. We can see anybody coming out of the canyons. Won't be any surprises on that account. And we've got enough fresh bear to feed a village."

"Dying's not a dignified process, Missy." He wouldn't look at her.

"What's that mean?"

"I soiled myself."

Tears jumped into her eyes. The end was closer than she could stand to believe. "Hell, Peaches. You wiped my fanny a time or two, guess I can wipe yours. It's not like I haven't seen a man's butt before." She thought a minute. At least she could do it in privacy. "I'll set up the tent and find you some fresh pants. You just rest a bit, and I'll take care of things real soon."

"I love you, Missy," he said looking up at her.

"I know. I love you, too, old man."

And then she walked away fast, heading past the fire and back toward the canyon rocks. She was going to explode inside. Was going to splatter salt tears and heart's blood. When she reached the canyon walls, she beat her fists against the rock and kicked at it until blood ran down her wrists and she would have broken every toe but for a good pair of boots. When the rage was spent, she sank to the ground and covered her face with bloody hands, sobbing with grief.

The pink had turned to gold on the high peaks when she finally dropped her hands. And a pair of familiar boots stood beside her.

"How long have you been here?"

"A while," Tanner said.

A wet bandanna dropped into her lap and she covered her face and swollen eyes, breathing in the scent of cold river water. Sitting beside her, Tanner gently took the bandanna and wiped blood from her hands, careful with the wounds on her knuckles.

"I'm staying with you."

"You don't have to."

"I know where we are now. Only ten or twelve days out of Denver."

"That's if nothing happens to delay you."

"I'm staying."

Shaking hard, she flung herself into his arms and held on as if Tanner were the only thing that anchored her to the earth. "It isn't fair! Goddamn it!"

Then she remembered leaving Peaches in soiled clothing and struggled to rise. "I have to set up the tent."

"Jubal's doing it."

"And I need to find Peaches some clean"

"Already done." His arms closed around her and he guided her head to his shoulder. "Just rest a minute. Then we'll move Mr. Hernandez into his tent."

Fox melted into his strong body and held on until she stopped shaking. She wished she could stay there forever.

Jubal had positioned the tent so Peaches could see the river and the mountain peaks rising jagged against a clear blue sky. A light breeze drifted through the open tent, but it was still hot inside. The heat didn't bother Peaches, he kept the blanket wrapped around his body, but Fox felt a trickle of sweat leak from her temples and zigzag down her cheek. She brushed it away and continued reading aloud.

"Missy?"

Marking the sentence with a finger, she glanced up. "Are you thirsty?" The spare coffeepot was filled with cool water at her side.

"I'm putting my death wish on you."

She swore softly. "You have to take it back. I'm going to kill Jennings, Peaches, and that's that. The only thing you'll accomplish with that death wish is to make me feel guilty all the rest of my life." Which wouldn't be long, but still "I'll feel like I let you down."

"You will have. Can't mince words now."

She hit the ground with her sore fist. "Now this isn't fair, and you know it!"

"I'd be honored if you named the first boy Jamie."

"Jamie?" She stared. "Good God. It never occurred to me that you had a name other than Peaches."

"If it's a girl, I'd be real pleased if you named her Maria."

"That was your mother." She dropped the book and threw out her hands. "Why are you saying this? If there's one thing I can imagine even less than trying to picture myself as a wife, it's trying to imagine myself as a mother!"

"Never seen a challenge you couldn't get on top of." Gasping and panting, he leaned against the saddle and closed his eyes. "If you don't mind, I'd like to speak to Mr. Tanner now."

"Well, I do mind. But I'll fetch him."

Irritated, she stomped out of the tent and found Tanner checking the horse's hooves. "He wants to see you," she said, jerking a thumb over her shoulder.

"How are you holding up?" Tanner asked, settling on the ground beside Peaches and placing his hat alongside him.

"I've felt better." Peaches raised a hand to cover a series of babbling coughs. "Arms and legs swollen like sausages," he murmured, shaking his head. "Need to tell you Eugenia's story."

Eugenia? Tanner hid a smile. "I know most of it."

"Good." Closing his eyes, struggling to breathe, Peaches rested a minute. "Maybe she'll listen to you. Don't let her kill Jennings."

Tanner stiffened. "Jennings?" he said in a flat voice.

"Hobbs Jennings. Your employer. Figured if you knew that, you'd try hard to stop her. Know you admire the man."

Tanner's mind raced, rushing back over everything Fox had told him and her puzzling hatred of Hobbs Jennings. The pieces fell into place.

"Her mother was Delphinia Foxworth," he said, thinking it through.

Peaches nodded, his head barely moving. "Got to stop her."

Tanner stared out the tent opening. Fox and Jubal Brown sat beside the fire, drinking coffee, not talking. Her braid had come partially unraveled and red strands lifted in the breeze. Faint circles bruised her eyes.

"It can't be Hobbs Jennings," he said in a low rough voice. "Hobbs Jennings would never steal a nickel. He would never, not ever, throw away a child."

"He did. I was there, Mr. Tanner. Saw the bastard. Heard him introduce himself to Miz Wilson, the cousin of Fox's mother. Saw him leave a little girl on the porch and ride away in his fine carriage without a backward glance."

Tanner lowered his forehead into his hand. His mind rejected what he was hearing, but the pain in his gut told him it was true. During the long minutes that passed in silence, he suddenly understood lifelong puzzles.

"Fox can't kill Jennings," he said flatly. "If I can't change her mind, then I'll have to tell Jennings that she's coming after him."

"Hoped you'd say that." Peaches turned his head and wiped froth from his lips off on his sleeve. "Nasty business, this dying," he apologized. "Do whatever it takes to save her from hanging."

Shock paralyzed him. He sat beside Peaches long after the old man had slipped into a semiconscious fitful sleep, staring out of the tent at Fox. Eugenia Foxworth. He had known there was a child, a little girl, but he couldn't recall if he had ever been told her name.

The sun was past the midday mark when he finally emerged from Peaches's tent and walked toward her.

"Come with me," he ordered in a rough voice. "We have to talk."

Tanner led Fox to the canyon wall where he'd found her earlier, and halted beside the bloodstains on the rock.

"What is it?" she asked anxiously, trying to read his expression. "Is Peaches?"

Tanner's hands clasped her shoulders. "My full name is Matthew Tanner Jennings."

The announcement wasn't close to what she had expected and her mind skipped past it, waiting for whatever would follow. His hard expression told her to go back.

Fox ground her teeth in exasperation. Matthew Tanner Jennings. Slowly, comprehension widened her eyes and she jerked out from under his hands, shocked and unable to speak.

"My mother was Caroline Tanner. When I went to work for Jennings Mining and Mercantile, my father suggested I use Tanner as a last name and I agreed. I could do my job better and with more cooperation if I wasn't known as the boss's son. Moreover, the men would speak freely. I'd be able to identify problem areas before those problems became serious."

"Peaches told you about Hobbs Jennings," she said, working it out. For a second her mind refused to grasp the implication of what he was saying. Then she reeled backward, staring with wild eyes. "Oh my God. Hobbs Jennings is your father!"

"I don't have the answers, Fox. I don't understand how the man you know meshes with the man I know. But Hobbs Jennings is a good man."

"Shut up!" Her scream echoed down the canyon. Bending at the knees, she swallowed back a rush of vomit. His father. Oh God. "I need to think a minute."

The late-afternoon heat radiated off the rock, making her feel dizzy and sick inside. Tanner was Hobbs Jennings's son. It couldn't be true. Straightening abruptly, she studied his face, searching for Jennings in the shape of his brow, the craggy angle of his jaw. But too many years had passed. She didn't remember or didn't want to.

"There was a son," she whispered, rubbing her temples. "I never met him. He was back east somewhere." Now she knew he'd been in Boston because Tanner had told her. "He'd been living with an uncle, going to school?"

"If my father did this, Fox, it's tortured him."

"Good! I wish it had killed him!"

Tanner's lips thinned and he turned stony eyes toward the river. "There's a portrait he keeps on his desk and has for as long as I can remember. A little girl of about five or six. I've always assumed she was one of the girls from the orphanages he supports."

"It sure as hell isn't me, if that's what you're implying. Your father has no reason to want to remember me. My mother wasn't buried yet before he'd dumped me on Mrs. Wilson's doorstep and walked away. He stole my money and never gave me another fricking thought! That's what a good man Hobbs Jennings is!"

"I can't believe that." Turning, he faced the sun-washed rock stained with Fox's blood.

Fox felt like attacking the wall again. "I've picked up coins until my back was screaming in pain. I've killed men, I've been shot up myself." Her fingers flew to her torn earlobe. "I've been half baked by the sun, and half frozen in snow. And all to rescue the bastard who ruined my life! I don't believe this!"

"And I'm paying you to go to Denver and murder my father."

They squared off, facing each other with rock-hard eyes and tense bodies.

"Don't do it," Tanner said softly.

His revelation and the enormity of what he asked drained the fight out of her, leaving her limp and trembling. "And then what? We go off and live happily ever after?" She shook her head violently enough that her braid flipped over her shoulder. "One day I'd look up at you and hate you, Tanner. I'd think about him living in that big mansion enjoying a life he stole. Maybe I'd think about you and the fancy education that my inheritance paid for. I'd think about me and Peaches eating out of waste cans behind San Francisco restaurants while you were on a Grand Tour of Europe. Paid for with my mother's money that should have been mine."

Tanner's shoulders twitched and he swore for a full minute. "If my father did this, then every privilege I grew up with should have been yours. Is that what you want to hear? All right. If my father did this, then it's true."