Texas Lily (18 page)

She found Roy happily playing with a set of toy soldiers and her heart plunged to her feet. So Travis had already been in here. Perhaps God had sent him to punish her. Or save her. She wasn't exactly certain which it would be.

Nine years was a long time. Lily remembered it almost too clearly: her sisters' excitement over their betrothals, the peddler's wagon coming down the hill, and Travis Bolton, sitting bold as life on the wagon seat. He was the most handsome thing she had ever seen in her life, and the tallest. When he had climbed down from that wagon and smiled at her, she had felt dainty and feminine and just the right size. And he had never done anything to discourage that impression. Except get her pregnant and leave without marrying her.

He couldn't have been much more than nineteen himself at the time. That wasn't much of an excuse for what he had done, but it was all Lily could ever offer. She had never even told her father. When she had determinedly stalked Jim Brown two months later, her father had thought it was because she was upset that her sisters were getting married, and she didn't have a beau. She doubted if
he had
ever realized it was because she had to marry or bear a bastard. Until now.

Damn Travis Bolton to hell. He had nearly destroyed her life once. What did he think he was doing here now? Knocking her legs out from under her again? Well, this time it wasn't going to be so easy.

"Look at these great soldiers Mr. Bolton gave me! Will you ask him to stay a while? He has the funniest stories."

Lily tested her son's head for fever and, reassured, tried to ease the inevitable. "Mr. Bolton is a traveling man, Roy. I'm sure there are places he's supposed to be. I imagine Cade has some interesting stories to tell if you'll ask him."

"Cade told me about how he learned to ride once. Did you know he never had a horse 'til he caught a mustang?"

There were any number of things Lily didn't know about Cade. How did a boy who didn't know how to ride manage to catch a wild mustang? Probably wrestled the animal to the ground. Lily held her fingers to her head and felt another ache coming on.

She heard her father and Travis enter, their voices boldly jovial. The two of them made a good pair. Her father had always been better at selling than farming. Cade would be off checking on the men and making certain that the chores were getting done. She had to ask him to eat with the family. She might not be able to mention their "marriage" yet, but she certainly couldn't delegate him to the bunkhouse anymore.

She didn't have to worry about that. By the time Juanita had the evening meal prepared, Cade had washed and joined the others in the main cabin. Lily felt his speaking glance as she entered wearing the blue gingham she had worn the night of the dance. It was the newest dress she owned. The others seemed too girlish and frilly. The gentlemen politely rose to their feet when she entered. Cade followed their example.

He was furious. She could tell it. But what was she supposed to do? That was Roy's father sitting there. Lord in heaven above,
Roy's father
. Lily took her place at the table, and when the men had taken theirs, she bowed her head in prayer, then asked them to pass the salt. It was the only thing she could think of to say.

"Travis was heading for San Antonio when he stopped here. I recommended that he find another destination. You know the place better than I do, Lily. Where would be a good place for a man to sell his supplies?"

"His supplies? Your alcoholic cure-all, Travis?" Lily couldn't keep the hint of scorn from her voice. Nine years and he was still peddling garbage, just a finer class of it.

"Now, Lily, don't disparage my medical training. I don't suppose you remember Dr. Joseph from Natchez? I worked with him for several years before he died, and I spent years after that perfecting the formulas for five of his medicines. I was just telling your father about the book I've written detailing my discoveries."

"Do you have bottles of medicine to cure broken legs? Do you have something we should try on Roy to get him better and make him walk without limping? Did your great training teach you any of that?"

Travis looked slightly uncomfortable before his handsome mouth bent into a wheedling smile. "Now, Lily, there you go exerting your overactive imagination again. You've done all that medical science can do for the boy. A sip of my rheumatism medicine wouldn't hurt him any if the pain gets too bad, but young bodies heal themselves quite miraculously."

She had to give Travis credit for not wanting to quack a child. She couldn't tell yet whether he had figured out that Roy was his. She should quit antagonizing him. He hadn't done anything that a million other men hadn't done at some time or place. It was just her unfortunate luck that she got caught.

Lily sent Cade a quick glance. She could tell by the depth of his silence that he had already figured out who Travis was. Cade might not say much, but he never missed a thing. She hoped he understood her predicament. She wasn't certain of the law, but Travis could very possibly take Roy away from her if he chose. She couldn't imagine him wanting to, but she wouldn’t allow any opportunity for him to try.

"Who is Professor Mangolini?"

Lily looked up. She hadn't even been certain that Cade could read. Most men out here couldn't, except for the lawyers in their three-piece suits. To expect an Indian to read...

Travis sat back and sipped his water. "People are inclined to believe that foreign physicians know more than homegrown ones, and that professors know more than mere doctors. So I have become Professor Mangolini in order to reach a larger number of people."

"To make more sales," Lily corrected.

Travis scowled at her. "You make it sound as if what I'm doing is a crime. That isn't fair of you, Lily. Should I go back to peddling tin pots and pans that fall apart the instant they hit a flame?"

Ephraim looked up in recognition. "So that's where I remember you! You came by that spring the girls got themselves hitched. Tried to sell me an iron skillet that wouldn't hold water. But you had some half-decent bootleg in that wagon when you came back in the fall."

The undercurrent around the table was about to pull Lily in. She saw the glance that Travis gave her and knew what it meant. He had come back after all. Just a little too late.

"I was just trying to make a living. I'd had a good summer that year, if I remember. I came back thinking to court the prettiest girl I'd ever seen, only to learn she'd already been taken. Near broke my heart at the time. It's odd how the world turns so the same people are thrown together a thousand miles and too many years apart."

Odd wasn't the word for it. Cade would bet his bottom dollar that this scalawag had passed through Lily's hometown on his usual route and heard from Lily's sisters that she was a widow with a wealthy ranch now. He'd bet more than his bottom dollar. Surely Lily could see that.

Cade glanced her way, but she seemed totally entranced by the quack. She had a glazed look in her eye even when she was trying to cut the man to ribbons. The man had hurt her once, hurt her badly, but that wasn't always enough for a woman to turn away a handsome man.

Somehow they suffered through the remainder of that meal. Lily gave an expurgated version of her visit to the Indians, exclaiming over the kindness of their treatment and the intelligence of the boys who had saved Roy's life as if she'd actually had an opportunity to see any of that. It seemed to pacify her father, although he was still giving Cade pointed looks.

When Lily finally begged leave to retire, Cade couldn't take it any longer. He touched her arm, and she swung around as if he had burned her.

"I need to have a word with you before you go to bed. Shall we step outside?"

She turned on him with wide, terrified eyes, and Cade instantly dropped his hand.

"Not tonight, Cade, please. You know what needs to be done. I'll trust you to it."

Cade watched her walk away as a knife pain slit him from gullet to loins. She meant to deny him. She was going to pretend that nothing had happened. She would go to that damned bed alone.

He ought to be accustomed to betrayal and deceit. He'd seen enough of it in his lifetime. But he couldn't believe that after what they had shared, she could up and walk away. It surpassed the bounds of all credulity.

But she did so, and like the others, Cade stood and watched her go. Not wanting to hear what was said after she left, Cade made his excuses and went out the back door. He should take Serena and go back to his cabin and get drunk and forget the hell about her. It had been madness to think that he could marry a lady and make a place for himself. He had no illusions about what he had to offer: a gray gelding and some vague hopes. He couldn't even fool himself into thinking that he could offer the passion she had never known, because the passion that had created her child was right there in the house with her. Damn, but why in hell did the man have to show up now?

But seeing Serena and holding her chubby little body in his arms, renewed Cade's determination. He refused to give up. Not without a fight, at least. If he had to invent another rattlesnake in a box, he would find some way of showing Professor Travis Bolton Mangolini out of the territory.

Lily evinced no surprise as her window slid up later, after the house had grown quiet. She couldn’t sleep, and she didn't think Cade would be managing it very well either. There just wasn't any easy solution. How was she to explain that?

Sitting in her white nightgown, she pulled a quilt across her knees. She’d braided her hair before bed, she wasn’t entirely certain why.

"He's Roy's father, isn't he?" Cade asked first.

Lily made no attempt to deny the obvious. She nodded.

Cade leaned his shoulders against the wall and shoved his hands in his pockets as he watched her in the dim light from the window. "Where does Jim fit into this picture?"

Lily gave him an angry look. "He knew. Don't look at me like that. Jim wanted a wife. A married man gets three times as much land out here as an unmarried one. He'd lost his son. Roy was the son he wouldn't have had otherwise. We were both happy with the arrangement."

Cade scowled. "That's why you were so starved for passion that you'd even take a renegade like me. And now you've got your chance to get Roy's father back and you mean to set me aside."

Lily balled her fists into knots on top of the bedclothes. "Don't talk to me like that, Cade. You have no right. What we did was your choice. You never asked my opinion on the matter. And now Travis is here and could take Roy away if he wanted. I'll be damned if Roy goes anywhere without me."

"And I'll be damned if you go anywhere without me." Cade said it quietly, but the threat was still there as he pulled away from the wall.

Flinging back the covers, Lily leapt for the long-barreled Kentucky rifle Jim had always kept beside the bed. Grabbing it, she held it steady to her shoulder. "Not one foot closer, Cade. You had your way last night. It's my turn."

"You're my wife, Lily. Do you expect me to sleep out there," he nodded toward the window, "while you sleep in your lonely bed? Or do you entertain some expectations of sleeping with your friend Travis?"

"Get out, Cade. I don't have to listen to that. For once, you have to listen to me. When Travis is gone, we'll talk about what we've done, but not a moment sooner. I'm not ready to be a wife again, Cade. You should have asked me that the first time."

"You were ready enough to take what I had to offer." The barrel of the rifle was pressed against his chest and Cade grabbed it, twisting it out of her hands. "I'll not let him have you without a fight."

The words "and he'll lose" hung unsaid between them.

Lily took the rifle Cade shoved back into her hands and watched in silence as he climbed out of the window.

She wondered what it would have been like if she had welcomed him into her bed, accepted his right to act for her, allowed his strength to come between Travis and Roy. But she wasn't ready to find out. It was time that she did a few things for herself.

But her body felt hollow when she crawled between the sheets without him.

Chapter 15

"Juanita, these have got to be the best cookies I've ever tasted, and I've eaten at the tables of kings."

"Who don't serve cookies," Lily murmured at the red flannel shirt she was sewing.