The Bridal Veil (3 page)

“
I know that I’m not Alyssa,
Mr. Becker,” she murmured. “But I believe I would suit. I’m not
expecting romance, merely companionship and a chance to
help.”

Luke said nothing and the silence
stretched out before them like a long, dark tunnel.

Emily thought about the disheveled
girl and considered her grim-faced father, and wished she could
shut her eyes and wake up to find herself back in her rooms in
Chicago. She wished she could turn back time to the days before all
the bad things had happened, before Alyssa’s accident and the
demise of Miss Wheaton’s school, back to a time when Emily had been
just a teacher, innocent and ignorant.

She felt like the worst fool God ever
allowed on the face of the earth. Coming here had been a horrible
mistake—she must have been out of her mind when she’d made the
decision. She had suffered many humiliations in her life, large and
small, but none like this. How she yearned to be back in her
classroom, in charge, in control. Not at the mercy of her own
feckless judgement, and subjected to a girl who should be taken in
hand for her abominably smart mouth and unacceptable
behavior.

But with Alyssa’s death and the
closing of Miss Wheaton’s, Emily had felt so lost in the world, the
idea of staying in Chicago became intolerable. She had no classroom
to return to, nothing to take charge of. She was adrift and without
employment. Her impatient landlady had threatened to evict her for
back rent that Emily had no means to pay. And so she had come to
Oregon in her sister’s place.

Once again, though, Emily had fallen
short of lovely Alyssa’s charm and beauty. It had happened so many
times over the years—now that her sister was dead, Emily felt
vilely disloyal even thinking about it. Except it was true. She’d
loved Alyssa with all her heart, but Alyssa had been everything
that Emily was not: small, dark-haired, popular.

“
I’m sorry I wasted your
time, Mr. Becker,” Emily said, shaking off the painful memories. “I
will return to Illinois. If you’ll just escort me to the ticket
office so that we can buy my passage to The Dalles, then I’ll get a
train back home—”

Luke put an elbow on the table and
leaned forward. “Do you have the money to make the
trip?”

His blunt question brought Emily up
short. Not only was it unseemly to discuss finances, it forced her
to reveal her reduced circumstances. Her small savings had gone to
giving Alyssa a proper burial. And none of the sentimental things
in her trunk had any monetary value. Even her landlady had said as
much when Emily had offered them in exchange for the back rent.
“Well, n-no, I don’t.”

His smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Neither do I. Farmers don’t earn a lot of cash, Miss Cannon. If I
see more than a hundred dollars a year, I’m lucky. I spent the
little I could spare on the train ticket you used to get
here.”

The pit of Emily’s stomach seemed to
drop to her knees. She’d long ago become a careful person, weighing
her actions and the possible outcomes from every angle. But when
she’d finally decided to come to Oregon, she’d closed her eyes and
jumped, refusing to give any thought to what might happen if Luke
Becker didn’t want her. If she’d been more cautious, she was afraid
she wouldn’t come at all. She’d had to get away from Chicago and
the bad memories that teemed in her mind like a milling crowd. But
it had been pure foolishness and now she stared into the face of
the consequences, both for herself and Luke. Of course, he didn’t
want her. He was too handsome, too vitally attractive to be
satisfied with a plain-featured woman who was almost tall enough to
look him straight in the eyes. She felt her cheeks grow as hot as
stove lids. What was she going to do now?

“
I’m sorry,” she began
again. “I had no idea— What if Alyssa had come and things didn’t
work out?”

He shrugged and took a sip of his cold
coffee. “I never thought they wouldn’t. I had a lot of
hope.”

It seemed they were both guilty of the
same idealistic notion.

Just then, Rose ran into the
restaurant, holding a large handful of striped candy sticks. Fast
on her heels was Franny Eakins, her face vermillion and her
caterpillar brows knitted in a furious frown. Her shopkeeper’s
apron flapped around her skirts like a sail and every eye in the
place shifted from Luke and Emily to the distracting
commotion.

“
Rose Becker, you give me
back that candy right now! One thing I won’t put up with is
stealing.”

Luke jumped up. “What the hell is
going on?”

Franny, a small woman, stood on tiptoe
to put her face in his. “I’ll tell you what’s going on. Your girl
here stole all those candy sticks when she thought I wasn’t
looking.”

Rose ducked behind Luke, but Franny
made a passing grab at her arm to pry the candy out of her grubby
hand. “Unmannered little thief!” she barked.

“
Rose, is that true?” Luke
demanded. “Did you take those peppermint sticks? I gave you three
pennies.”

“
I was gonna pay for them!”
Rose said, but she held more than three cents’ worth in her fist.
Somewhere since the time he’d last seen her, she’d lost her new
straw hat and streaked her dress with mud. At least he hoped it was
mud. These days, he never knew what she might get into.

“
I’ve had enough of your
daughter’s shenanigans, Luke. A week ago she took a new pencil from
my place, and the Tuesday before that, she was caught soaping the
windows at the drugstore. You’d better take better control of this
girl pretty soon or she’s going to be in more trouble than you’ll
know how to fix.” Glaring at Rose as she peeked around her father’s
coat, Franny added, “You are not welcome in my store, Rose Becker.
You’re just like your father was, a wicked, black-hearted brat and
a thief, too!”

Luke could take the insult to his
character—it sure wasn’t the first time someone had made an
unflattering comment about him. He’d heard them all of his life.
And for all her complaining, Franny Eakins had always been
attracted to what she called bad boys, even though she talked them
down in public. But he wasn’t about to stand here and let this
busybody attack his child, regardless of Rose’s guilt. Especially
since he suspected that Franny was grinding her axe over him. “Just
a minute now, Fran, I—”

Emily stood, her height calling
attention to itself. With her shoulders back and her chin lifted,
she had a regal bearing. “Forgive my intrusion, madam, but your
accusation is very harsh, and making it in such a public place is
highly improper. I might add that name-calling is no way to teach a
child right from wrong. It makes the name-caller look worse
than—”

Franny gave her a withering glare. “I
don’t know who you are, Miss High-and-Mighty, but it’s not my job
to teach her anything. This is none of your business, anyway.” She
cast her hard look on Luke. “I’ll add the price of the candy to
your account.” Turning, she flounced out, her heels pounding across
the plank flooring.

Luke glanced around the
room, at the rubbernecking lunchroom patrons, at the tall, pale
woman who’d come west to deliver bad news and then to marry him,
and at his incorrigible, defiant daughter. This was swiftly
becoming one of the worst days of his life. It wasn’t
the
worst, not by a long
shot. The worst day still lay in his heart like a rock. But this
one was right up there near the top of the list. He threw a half
dollar on the table, far more than he owed for the check. “Let’s
get out of here.”

They filed out to the sidewalk into
the gray drizzle and he turned to Rose. “Stealing, for God’s sake?
You’ve got some explaining to do when we get home.”

Rose said nothing, but rolled out a
long-suffering sigh and flipped her wilting curls behind her
shoulders.

Then there was the matter of Emily
Cannon, who’d followed Luke outside. He felt as if he now had more
problems than Job. “Look, Miss Cannon, I appreciate that you stuck
up for Rose, but I’m sorry you came all this way. I just don’t
think . . . ” She met his gaze and the welter
of emotions he saw in her eyes made the rest of his sentence fizzle
away.

“
I felt I had to try. For
Alyssa, and for your young Rose, too.”

For Rose.

That made him forget what he’d been
planning to say. He barely heard her over the rumble and clatter of
a passing farm wagon. But he heard enough.

At last he uttered, “Yes, ma’am. I
think I understand.”

Rose butted in, and he swore
he heard Cora talking. “Well, you can’t marry
her
.”

These days when Rose spoke, Luke more
often heard Cora’s voice and vitriol, and none of Belinda’s
sweetness. His mother-in-law was spoiling Rose rotten, indulging
her, and little by little, undermining his own authority. On top of
that, her bitterness was boiling over onto his daughter, and that
was part of the problem, wasn’t it? Rose was turning into a sullen
imp. Yeah, he’d sown his share of wild oats in his younger years,
but he’d never been like his girl. No eleven-year-old child should
be so miserable or cantankerous.

He glanced at Emily Cannon. Etiquette
teacher. It seemed like a useless occupation to him, what little of
it he could imagine. A girl didn’t need to fill her head with
foolishness like how to hold a teacup or a fan. She needed to learn
practical things, to cook and sew and keep house. To be a good
daughter. To be a good wife.

Most importantly, to be a good
person.

What was she learning now? To lie and
steal? To be disrespectful and irresponsible, a whining
complainer?

Luke didn’t want to marry Emily
Cannon. But he sure as hell couldn’t sit back and let Cora win the
tug-of-war that she was waging over Rose. Even though he’d been
deceived and didn’t owe Emily a damned thing, when he saw the pain
and uncertainty in her eyes, he couldn’t find it in his heart to
turn her away. And she’d risen to his daughter’s defense, when Rose
had been nothing but rude to her. That took a woman with integrity
and steel.

Maybe, just maybe, Miss Emily Cannon,
etiquette teacher, could help him turn his daughter around and
teach her to be a decent young woman. He hadn’t gotten what he
wanted, but he might have gotten what he needed. If she could save
Rose from Cora’s influence, he’d do whatever it took, even if it
meant marrying a woman he would never love.

“
Rose, go wait in the
wagon.”

“
Aw, Daddy—”

He fixed her with an
unwavering stare. “You’re already in a peck of trouble. Don’t make
it worse.
Wait
in
the wagon.”

The girl dawdled off to their wagon
where it was parked down the street.

When she was out of earshot, Luke
turned to Emily. “Look, Miss Cannon, I can’t pretend that I’m real
happy about the way this has turned out. I can’t afford to send you
back to Chicago. And I can’t promise you anything besides a decent
place to live and the respect any man would give a wife.” He shoved
his hand through his hair. “I guess what I mean, that is, well, I
won’t be any good at moonlight and roses—”

Emily tipped her head slightly. “You
mean love and affection.”

He sighed, half relieved,
half self-conscious to even hear the word
love
voiced. Luke had never felt
comfortable talking about personal things like that. Except with
Belinda. “Yeah. I can’t give you that. But you can see that Rose
needs some refinement—well, a lot of refinement, I guess. I can’t
do it by myself. I don’t know
how
to do it. If you’ll help me with her, I’ll give
you everything else a woman should expect from her husband—my name,
a home, and respect. So if you still want to get married, my offer
stands.”

Emily gazed out at the river for a
moment, as if weighing her whole life on the point of that moment.
She had kind of a nice profile, Luke thought. To his surprise, he
felt a twinge of worry that she might not accept the
proposal.

But she nodded and said, “I accept
your offer, Mr. Becker.”

CHAPTER TWO

Mrs. Luke
Becker.

Emily sat next to her new husband on
the hard seat of his farm wagon, trying to keep her back straight
and maintain her balance on a conveyance that bounced her around as
though she were a bead dropped from a broken strand.

Luke sat forward, silent, his elbows
on his knees, and kept the broad-chested horse team moving along a
rutted, muddy road toward his farm. The lines laid easy in his big,
work-roughened hands. As soon as they were away from town, he’d
unknotted his tie and opened his shirt collar, muttering a comment
about “the damned noose” choking him. Now and then, Emily caught a
glimpse of his throat and chest when his shirt gapped away from his
body.

On either side of the path, newly
green grass and Queen Anne’s lace, heavy with raindrops, mingled
with emerging clover. Sometimes they passed a length of fence,
where a few black-and-white cows hung their heads between the
weathered rails to watch them go by.

Along the way, an occasional farmhouse
dotted the high, green landscape. One was set close to the road,
with fresh-plowed fields behind and to the sides. Another nestled
back against the edge of tall, dark stands of fir trees, its drive
long and straight. As they drove, they climbed, and the river gorge
spread out in the vista below. Despite the low, gray sky, Emily
thought it was an impressive sight, a bright spot during a day
filled with inauspicious events.