One Heart to Win (35 page)

She was delighted to see it was the cookbooks she’d asked for, French, Italian, even New York favorites, thick volumes all three of them. But no letter was included with them. Tiffany
was certain the letter had been addressed to Jennifer Fleming at the Triple C Ranch. How ingenious of her mother. She wanted to make sure Tiffany contacted at least one of her brothers to get the cookbooks. She’d probably been hoping they would make her see how foolish she was being. But Tiffany wasn’t eager to read that first letter. Even on paper, Rose was quite capable of shouting. It was the next letter from her mother that she was anxiously awaiting because that was the one that would rescue her.

She was impatient to join her brothers for dinner and tried to rush Anna in preparing her, but then she laughed at herself. Had she gotten a little too used to how quickly this went without a maid dressing her and styling her hair? She took a deep breath and kept her mouth shut because the result would be worth it. Looking at her reflection in the mirror before she left the room, she was right. She looked like Tiffany again, the real Tiffany.

—

She was laughing with her brothers when Franklin walked in to join them. The boys continued to talk excitedly, telling her funny stories and more about what they’d done in the last years since she’d seen them. No one noticed that she’d stopped participating in the conversation. She knew then it had been a mistake to come down for dinner. She’d just been unable to resist her brothers’ company.

“What do you think, Tiff?” Roy asked her. “Tiff?”

He finally got her attention, though she’d missed the original question. “Pardon? What did you say?”

“How about going for a swim in the lake sometime this week?”

That god-awful lake! It was the very reason she was here,
contention over water rights. She was bitter enough to say, “You don’t think we’ll get shot at?”

That definitely put a damper on the merry atmosphere at the dinner table. All three boys looked contrite, when it wasn’t even their fault. It was Franklin’s fault though, and he didn’t look the least bit apologetic for his part in that feud. A little exasperated maybe over her remark. It was obvious now why Rose had married him. Blond, eyes as green as Tiffany’s, apparently quiet in demeanor as opposed to tempestuous the way Rose was, and still incredibly handsome, even in his early forties.

“Can you at least give us one evening to enjoy your company without dredging up the past?” Frank asked.

She wished she could, she really did, but not with
him
sitting at the table. She almost asked him to leave. Almost. But her brothers would no doubt leap to his defense and be upset with her, so she didn’t.

Instead, she reminded him, “It’s the only reason I’m here. The past. A feud that none of you have had sense enough to end. I’ve heard the Callahans’ side of it. I’d like to hear your side now.”

“We can discuss that if we must.” Frank even offered a slight smile. “Not exactly good for the digestion though. Can it wait until after we eat?”

Levity when his presence infuriated her? But a servant came in with a big bowl of salad that the girl started serving them as the first course. At least Frank had a decent cook, and many servants for that matter. Most of them appeared to be Indian or of Indian descent. After two servants who had looked more Indian than white had filled Tiffany’s tub today, her
own
tub, she’d asked Sam about them. He’d explained that twenty years
ago it hadn’t been uncommon for Indians to trade their women to the first trappers in the area. The women couldn’t go back to their tribes after that, and by the time the Indian wars began, they already had families of their own and weren’t involved in the fighting. But because many white men had died in those wars, the prejudice against the Indians intensified, even after the tribes were driven out of the territory. The offspring of those interracial unions had had trouble finding work after the wars. Frank, apparently, didn’t share that prejudice, but then he’d been trading with the tribes long before the animosity had started. Which was probably why the Warren Ranch had been spared during the hostilities.

Tiffany managed to hold her tongue for the meal. The main course arrived, a chicken casserole smothered in freshly churned cheese. It looked and smelled delicious and made her wonder what Hunter was eating tonight. She hoped it wasn’t Jakes’s cooking.

The boys continued talking and laughing. She smiled tepidly when they tried to include her. Frank watched her quietly. Every time she caught him at it, that pain in her chest got worse. It was a wonder she could get any food down, even the cherry cobbler that arrived for dessert. All it did was remind her that she hadn’t yet made dessert for the Callahans, or that cake she’d promised the hired hands after they’d cleaned the house.

But when the last fork was set down, she was done waiting. Her brothers realized that. Sam nodded them out of the room to give her some privacy with her father. She hadn’t counted on being alone with him and almost railed at him again, but there was no point. He’d had his chance this morning to mend their
breach, but all he’d spoken of was “thinking” about her. A fat lot of good his
thoughts
had done her growing up.

So she stayed focused on her goal and said, “I want your feud to end without a marriage because I can’t live here. I’ve led a genteel life. Not once, ever, was it marred by violence until I came here, where I’ve had guns pointed at me, seen men die in front of me, seen men fighting on the street. I’m going home just as soon as Mama agrees that she never should have sent me here. So before the Callahans come over tomorrow, I want to know why I had to get tangled up in this.”

“I’m sorry you had to witness—”

“Please,” she cut him off coldly. “Sam’s already mentioned it was probably just bad luck. Whether that’s so or not, the fact remains that a marriage isn’t going to end what’s gone on for three generations. It would stand no chance of succeeding if the only reason for it is to end this feud.”

“I didn’t think that would be the only reason,” Frank said. “I was positive that you would like Hunter. You don’t?”

She felt like groaning, she was so tired of hearing that question. “I do, but he’s spent his whole life hating Warrens. That will always get in the way. So explain it to me. Why did he have to grow up hating you?”

“I suppose the Callahans blamed us when they told you about it?”

“I know your feud didn’t start here, that it began with a practical joke on Elijah Callahan that went seriously wrong. And your mother, Mariah, shot him the day they were to marry.” Tiffany recounted the full story Mary Callahan had told her.

Her father nodded. “She shot him because he cheated on
her, plain and simple. That’s why she was so furious she married someone else so soon. My father, Richard, even suspected she still loved Elijah, but he still wanted her enough to marry her. However, he ended up hating the Callahans because of it. My God, she had a powerful hate.”

“And infected you all with it?”

He nodded. “I think some of it was self-directed though, because she knew she was incapable of forgiving the man she loved. She loved him with all her heart. That’s why she never let it go. . . .”

So her family wasn’t entirely to blame? Had Mary purposely left out the part about Elijah’s actually cheating on Mariah, or had Elijah been too ashamed to tell his family about his indiscretion? But that didn’t explain why the feud moved to Montana.

“Elijah tried to get away from her,” Tiffany said. “Moved his family across the whole continent. Why did she follow him here?”

“My mother was a strong, courageous, passionate woman who withstood a lot of heartache and loss in a short time. My father and two brothers died within five years, and she shouldered all the responsibility for our ranch while I was young. After so many deaths in our family, her obsession with Elijah intensified. She was furious when she learned he was moving away from Florida. I didn’t know it at the time, but she hired a man to follow him and find out where he settled. Then she started complaining about Florida and suggested we move West to Montana. I was barely eighteen. I didn’t suspect she was playing me, to get me to agree to pull up stakes and move up here, though it wasn’t actually a bad idea.”

“To follow them?”

“No, to leave Florida,” Frank said. “There were too many ranches fighting over too little land and far too much rustling. Those were her excuses, which were accurate, but easier than telling me the truth, which I would never have agreed with. I was as surprised as the Callahans were to find us settling on land so close to theirs.”

“You didn’t confront her about it?”

“Of course I did. All she said was she needed resolution. Peace. I should have known her definition of peace wasn’t the same as mine. Her peace meant killing him. She’d said it enough times over the years, that she should have killed him that fateful night before they were to marry.”

“When did they shoot each other?”

“It was almost a year after we got here. Zachary came over one morning, demanding to be told where his father was. I didn’t know until then that my mother was missing, too. It took us the whole day, but we finally found their trail. They were in an old trapper’s cabin. They were lying in each others arms. Their weapons, both of which had been fired, were still in hand or close to it. Theirs were the only fresh tracks up there. We don’t know exactly what happened. Maybe they hoped to find happiness together in the next life because they sure couldn’t find it together in this one. I can only hope they were able to forgive each other in the end.”

“So all you are fighting over now is the water?”

“Not exactly. The Callahans blamed my mother for everything, shooting Elijah instead of marrying him, following him here, killing him in the end. The water is just a side issue. I was only eighteen when we came here, Zach was a few years older. He and I couldn’t get near each other without accusations flying.
I was weaned on hate, Tiffany, we both were. It was hard to let that go even after our parents were gone.”

“Do you still hate them?”

“More than ever.”

“But why?”

“Because they drove your mother away.”

Chapter Forty-Five

T
IFFANY WAS SUDDENLY REELING.
Her father had just given
her
a reason to hate the Callahans. How could she talk their families into a truce with
that
now on the table?

But a few moments later, she frowned. The feud couldn’t be the reason her mother had left. That was something Rose could easily have admitted when Tiffany had asked her, but she hadn’t—unless she’d kept it from Tiffany because she was afraid her daughter would use the same excuse not to marry Hunter.

But before Tiffany took up the gauntlet, she demanded, “Did she actually tell you that?”

“No, she wouldn’t lay that guilt on me. She came up with so many other excuses instead. Each time I shot one down, she’d drop another on me. She said she hated it here, yet she’d never been happier than when she was designing this house. She said she missed her mother too much, yet we visited her every year and the old gal even came here once. She said her mother finally convinced her she’d made a mistake. She said she’d been told another child would kill her after having too
many too quickly. She used that one to move out of my bedroom, yet she couldn’t keep her hands off me. She even used
that
excuse after she was gone, for why she left. It was the only one I believed for a while. So many excuses—and anger, when I tried to talk her into coming back.”

Tiffany shook her head at him. “So you now blame the Callahans for something you’re not even sure they should be blamed for?”

“Nothing else makes sense. Fifteen years ago they nearly killed me. It was shortly after I took that bullet that Rose snuck off with you. I think she just realized she couldn’t bear to live through something like that again.”

“Or she was kind enough not to tell you she’d stopped loving you.”

“Don’t say that, Tiffany. Please don’t.”

She sucked in her breath. He looked as if she’d just devastated him. She should be pleased, not feel that knot swell in her throat again for hurting him. She leapt to her feet and headed for the door before he noticed the tears gathering in her eyes. She only paused for a moment.

Without looking at him again she said, “I don’t know why she left any more than you do. But I know why I want to leave. I’m going to suggest tomorrow that your truce with the Callahans become permanent immediately, that both families share the water from now on. Will you agree to it?”

“I won’t agree to share it without establishing a blood tie between our families that will secure access to the water for future generations. Your mother had the right idea. I want my sons and grandsons to be able to raise cattle on this land we love well into the future.”

Her cheeks already wet with tears of frustration, she ran
out of the dining room. She had to find somewhere private to let the pain out before she rejoined her brothers. She slipped into an empty room. She hoped it was empty. She shouldn’t have asked Franklin that question when she already knew the answer. Because like everyone else, he expected her to marry Hunter.
How
was that going to end anyone’s hatred? How could it not just make everything worse?