Midnight Lover (37 page)

And so Caroline did not tell Jesse that night, either.

Morning dawned grey but the rain had slowed to a steady mist and Jesse decided to ride out to the mine with Sam Markham and see how much flooding they'd had. Caroline watched him dress in the dim light and a deep sense of foreboding suddenly came over her.

"I wish you wouldn't go to the mine today, Jesse," she said, her voice husky with sleep. "I still hear thunder beyond the foothills. You know those supports are shaky enough as it is."

"You worry too much, darlin'," he said, stroking her cheek. "We're just goin' to assess the damage. Won't be in there more'n an hour."

"I just don't feel right about it. You're the one who told me how dangerous the thunder can be."

"If Sam and I don't see what has to be shored up, it ain't never going to be safe in there, storm or no."

"Be careful. I—" She stopped abruptly, face flaming, and kissed his palm.

But he knew. She saw it in the look in his midnight blue eyes and that look carried her through the morning. The rain may have upset the schedule at the mine but work on renovating the Crazy Arrow continued. Everywhere Caroline looked she saw progress and she moved through her chores with a feeling of optimism in her heart. If only Thomas would see the light and return home where he belonged, everything would be perfect. Toward that end, she sent Abby to The Last Stop again that lunchtime with another offering and was pleased when the girl returned a little while later with a message from Thomas.

"Looked like the inside of a goat's mouth, he did, miss, all bristly and red-eyed."

"I shouldn't wonder," said Caroline, shaking her head. "I heard he drank a prodigious volume of whiskey before he passed out."

"He wants to speak with you."

"No apologies are necessary."

"He wouldn't be takin' no for an answer, miss. I think you owe him that much."

Of course that was true and Caroline sent Abby back to The Last Stop with a note asking Thomas to rent a trap and meet her on the ridge just beyond town. The one thing she didn't need was to bump into Jesse. She loved Thomas as a friend and would stand by him, no matter what he decided to do. This anxiety was simply Caroline's guilty conscience speaking—if only she had told Jesse that her friend from Boston was in town...

#

Thunder rattled through the mine and Jesse placed his hand against one of the rotting supports to gauge the severity of the vibrations.

"Sweet Jesus," Sam muttered next to him, ducking his head to avoid being hit by some falling rock. "Damn place is spooked."

"Damn place needs some work done," Jesse shot back.

"Well, I got me more brains than to stand here and wait for it to collapse on my head, boss. I'm goin' back to open the saloon."

Jesse cocked his head and listened to the sound of another clap of thunder. "Storm should be passin' soon."

Sam, however, was having none of it and he turned and disappeared through the tunnel to the main entrance on the east side of the hill where they'd tethered their horses.

Jesse lingered awhile, listening to the ominous creaks and shudders overhead and the steady drip of rain pooling at his feet. Sam was right, he thought as a rock slid to the ground somewhere deeper in the mine. This wasn't any place to be during a storm.

The rain had broken the back of the heat wave and, despite the grey sky and the steady drizzle, Jesse couldn't resist giving Diablo his head and they galloped over the hills until he pulled up on the reins near a small spring just beyond town. He'd brought Caroline there a few days ago and he smiled as he remembered the pleasure he'd found with her as they lay on a blanket and watched the sky.

While Diablo was drinking his fill of the cool clear water Jesse climbed up on a boulder and gazed down at the panorama below. Deer tracks were visible and a pair of cottontail rabbits grazed nearby and standing there beneath a Joshua Tree was his wife in the arms of another man.

#

Caroline couldn't find Jesse anywhere. The moment she got back into town she flew to the King of Hearts. Abby's beau, Sam Markham, looked at her kind of strangely but she believed him when he said his boss hadn't come back from the mine.

Today Thomas had proved himself a true friend, putting aside his own distress in order to let Caroline know that last night he had slipped and told Jade about the secret marriage. "I don't know what I can say to apologize," he'd said to her as they stood near the Joshua Tree, "but if it's any consolation, she didn't seem terribly interested." But as the night wore on, Thomas told Caroline, one theme became prominent in Jade's conversation: the old Reardon mine. "I can't put my finger on it, Caro, but she seems to have strong feelings about keeping that mine closed."

She had to tell Jesse about Thomas immediately; and she had to tell Jesse about Thomas's suspicions, as well.

Caroline checked the dry goods store, the barber shop, and Aunt Sally's and she was almost desperate enough to barge right into the Golden Dragon but she decided she would stop back at the Crazy Arrow in case Jesse had come by.

Abby pounced on Caroline the moment she came through the door. "Mr. Jesse's here, miss, and if you don't mind me sayin' so, he seems mad as a hornet. Stormed up to the second floor, he did, with a bottle of whiskey in each hand."

Caroline thanked Abby and flew upstairs where she found him in their room, stretched out on the feather bed.

"Just in time, darlin'," he drawled. "I'm 'bout to start the second bottle. Why don't you pull up a chair and join me?"

Heart thudding painfully, she closed the door then sat down on the window seat. She drew back when he offered her a swig from the bottle. "You know I do not drink whiskey, Jesse."

He chuckled and took a long pull himself, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Thought I knew a lot of things about you, darlin'. Appears I been real mistaken."

Her breath caught in her throat. "You know, don't you?" she whispered.

"Don't know much of anything, Car-o-line. Why don't you tell me what's on your mind?"

His expression had closed in upon itself; his midnight eyes were hooded and wary. She lifted her chin and plunged in: "Thomas is a friend of mine from Boston. His mother took me in when Aaron set out for the west. The Addisons are a fine, upstanding family and I owe them a tremendous debt of gratitude for the generosity they extended to me."

"A real purty story, darlin'. Maybe you should just write it up and sell it to the papers."

"You don't understand, Jesse. My father abandoned me...he left me with the Addisons and they were kind enough to open their home to me."

He took another swig of whiskey. "Suppose you're tellin' me this city gent don't mean more'n a hill of beans to you."

"Thomas means a great deal to me. He is a good and true friend who is trying to help us."

He muttered an oath as ugly as it was violent. "I saw how your good friend was tryin' to help you, darlin'. Did you open your mouth for him the way you do for me and wrap your legs—"

With a cry she moved to slap him but he was swift as a snake. He grabbed her wrist and the next instant her arm was twisted behind her back and she was sprawled under him on the feather bed with whiskey staining her skirt and fear filling her brain.

"You got no right to be so uppity, Car-o-line, not after what I saw today."

"What on earth could you have seen?" she cried, panic rising in her chest. "Have you sunk so low you cannot recognize human kindness when you see it? I have done nothing to be ashamed of."

His breath was hot against her cheek and she winced as his knee pushed between her thighs. "Depends what you call nothin'."

"We were talking, Jesse, that is all. We were—" She stopped as the image of Thomas opening his arms to her sprang to mind. "Oh, Jesse, that embrace was one of friendship, nothing more. Thomas was wishing me—he was wishing us well."

"Did he do this for you?" He cupped her face roughly between his hands and plundered her mouth with savage thrusts of his tongue. He reeked of anger and violence and she struggled against him in vain. He brought one hand down to her breasts and his hand slipped inside the bodice of her gown, fingers hot and demanding against her flesh. "Did you let him do this, darlin'?" His fingers sought the secret spot between her thighs. "Did you let him—"

She screamed and he covered her mouth with his own, absorbing the sound of her outrage. Twisting her head, she broke the mockery of a kiss. "Live in the gutter if you want to, Jesse, but understand that I shall not live there with you!" She placed her hands against his chest and somehow pushed him away. "I am sorry I told Thomas about our marriage."

"I bet you are, darlin'. Let's just hope he keeps that embarrassin' fact to himself."

She scooted to the edge of the bed and rose awkwardly, skirts tangled about her legs. "How I wish he had, but that problem belongs to you. I shall be most interested to discover how you explain our arrangement to your friend at the Golden Dragon."

"I ain't going to waste my energy tellin' nobody, gal, because once the mine is open, this marriage is as good as over."

"As you wish," said Caroline. "The end cannot come soon enough for me."

With that she glided from the room before her husband could see her cry.

#

Jesse listened to Caroline's footsteps retreat down the hall, the urge to go after her burning hot inside his chest.

"...that embrace was one of friendship..." Her words echoed inside his head. Those beautiful blue eyes of hers had brimmed with tears but his heart was turned against her.

He'd seen his wife in the arms of another man, a man who understood things Jesse never could. It didn't matter how much money he made or how much he spent making sure everybody knew he had it—he'd never have what that Boston boy had been born with.

The right to love a woman like Caroline.

Trapped. For the first time in his life, Jesse was well and truly trapped by circumstances beyond his power and the feeling didn't set well with him.

Not well at all.

He downed the rest of the whiskey, staring at the silver brush on the dresser top. Just last night he'd lain in bed, watching her draw the brush through her long golden hair while she readied herself to join him.

"Son of a bitch!"

He picked up that silver brush and sent it crashing through the window in a spray of broken glass and broken dreams.

Then, with apologies to no one, he left to saddle Diablo and get the hell out of town before he killed somebody.

#

Jesse didn't return to the Crazy Arrow. Caroline waited in the parlor, ostensibly to work on her mending, but in truth she was waiting for the sound of his spurs jingling as he came through the front door.

Abby and the girls were terribly solicitous; not once did anyone mention the broken window in her bedroom or the silver hairbrush Abby had found in the rosebushes. They tiptoed through the house, offering her tea and apple muffins but wisely they kept their sympathy to themselves.

From the parlor she watched men traipse in and out of the Golden Dragon across the street and was dismayed to see Thomas, resplendent in his best navy suit, disappear behind that red lacquer door. Thomas was a grown man and entitled to do as he wanted, but she could not help wishing he would choose a better way to spend both his time and his money. Although she watched until well after midnight, she did not see him leave.

Thomas's defection was further proof of the faithless nature of man and she turned from the window in disgust.

The hall clock tolled three hours after midnight and still Jesse did not return. How could she have been such a witless, naive fool as to think their marriage could ever be anything but a cut-and-dried business deal? Just because two people were able to make the midnight stars explode was no reason to believe they could build a life together.

And just because a man whispered pretty words in the darkness was no reason for a woman to think he loved her.

A dizzying wave of fatigue washed over her. Sleep, Caroline thought, rising and heading toward the staircase. Perhaps after a few hours rest she would find a way to deal with the tangle her life had become. Jesse couldn't stay away forever. Marriage had bound their destinies together and—

"There she is, men! Get her!"

The front door to the Crazy Arrow was knocked clean off its hinges as a phalanx of men, drunk and angry, stormed into the foyer.

"How dare you!" Caroline pulled her silk wrapper more tightly about her body. "This is an establishment for women only!"

"Shut up, Mrs. Reardon!" yelled Three Toe Taylor. "Where's your husband?"

"He's not with you?" she countered.

"Don't get smart, little lady," Big Red Morgan warned. "We ain't in the mood for wise talk."