The Rustler's Bride (12 page)

They would all suffer. But it was becoming clear to Declan that he might suffer the deepest wounds of all. Because his pain would be sharpened by shame and guilt. And yet, his conscience, his sense of honor, his sense of duty to those who had gone before him prevented him from abandoning the revenge which had taken a decade of his life to bring to fruition.

****

Victoria surveyed the sliced carrots and juicy tomatoes heaped on the kitchen counter and wondered if arranging a dinner party was a mistake. As they no longer employed a maid, she had to rely on her own skills, with help from Mrs. Flynn.

“And then the there was a blood curling scream, and the lanterns went out, even though there was not a breath of wind, and Genevieve crept past the crypt the darkness—her candle had already guttered out, you see—and a cold hand settled at the nape of her neck…”

Victoria only listened with half an ear. How could a person who looked so matronly be so enthralled by stories full of blood and gore?

“Do you think the roast might be getting overdone?” she asked.

Mrs. Flynn stopped relaying the plot of her latest penny dreadful. She leaned over with a swing of black skirts and the wobble of heavy hips, opened the hatch to the big cast iron oven and poked a fork in the side of beef. “It needs a bit longer.” She glanced up over her shoulder. “You go and have your bath. I’ll manage the rest.”

Victoria untied her apron, hung it on a peg on the wall and hurried through the house, her nerves thrumming. She’d been married a month now, and tension had become a permanent state of affairs in the household. What was wrong with her father and husband? Sometimes, they seemed to get along fine. Declan would laugh at her father’s flashes of humor. Her father would praise Declan on his hard work and the way had gained the respect of the ranch hands.

And then one of them would say something sharp, something cold, and the lingering hostility and suspicion between them would flare up again. The dinner party was her attempt to repair the rift once and for all. It would introduce her husband to her friends, and it would demonstrate to her father the hostess skills the expensive education in Boston had drummed into her.

In the hall, Victoria saw her father emerge from his office. She slowed her steps, concern niggling in her mind. Her father had changed in the past few weeks. His face had become gaunt, and an air of defeat clung to him. Never even in the difficult years when the draught had depleted the herd, or cattle prices had fallen, had she seen him appear quite so downcast.

“Father, is something wrong?”

“Hmm?” He glanced over, as if he’d failed to notice her standing there.

“The guests will be here in an hour,” she told him. “Will you be ready?”

“Or course.” He squared his shoulders. “My hospitality remains intact.”

Baffled by the comment, Victoria went out to the stable yard. She found Declan playing the throwing game with Stan and Hank. Stan was throwing, a toothless grin brightening his shrunken features. The small square of wood landed in the padded cage, now covered in mud and dust. Stan whooped, threw again, and hurried out to collect the half a dozen blocks he had thrown.

“What does it spell?” he asked, with the eagerness of a child as he crouched down and let the alphabet squares tumble to the ground by his feet.

Declan squatted beside him and turned the blocks over to study the letters.

“The boss is learning me read,” Stan informed Victoria, beaming up at her over his shoulder. He turned back to the blocks, pointed with a grimy forefinger. “That’s an S. Can you make my name?”

“No.” With a quick shuffle, using both hands, Declan selected three squares and lined them up in the dust. “What’s above you in the sky?”

Stan looked up overheard, then down again. “The first letter is S. And then...” His mouth moved in silent concentration, sunken lips puckered.

“What letter is like a bucket without a lid?” Declan asked.

“A bucket without a lid?” Stan’s face furrowed, and then lit up as if he had just won a barrel of whisky in a raffle. “That’s a U. And the last one is an N. It’s the goddamn sun in the sky, ain’t it?”

Without speaking, Declan pointed at Victoria.

Stan’s grin eased, but only a little, and his faded brown eyes didn’t lose their shine. “Sorry for me language, Miss Ria. Forgot you was standing there.”

She smiled at him. “That’s all right, Stan. Looks like you’re well on your way to picking up a newspaper and reading all about what’s going on in the world.”

Stan let out a cackling laughter. He was still shaking with it when Victoria turned to Declan. “The guests will be here in an hour. Do you plan to have a bath and shave?” She never dared to give him orders, or use the gentle bullying tactics that worked so well with her father.

“I’ll take a bath.” He rubbed a hand over his jaw. “Shave, too.”

“Good,” she replied, and turned to go. It tied her up in knots, the way her life seemed to be divided between the hours of the night, when Declan couldn’t get enough of her, and the hours of the day, when a barrier remained between them—a small, invisible barrier, but a barrier nonetheless, one that she was never able to forget existed.

It was a wall of uncertainty, of unspoken words, of declarations never made, of feelings never acknowledged. Never once had Declan told her that he loved her. And because he kept his silence, she suppressed her own longing to talk about her feelings.

His voice rang out behind her. “Stay and watch. It’s my turn to throw.”

A frisson ran over her at the serious undertone in his casual words. Slowly, Victoria spun on her heels and faced the group of men again. Stan was studying the letters on an alphabet block. Hank, who had remained silent as usual, was cranking the well pump to soak his purple kerchief. Declan was facing her, standing at ease, once hip cocked, the black Stetson pulled low over his brow. Beneath the brim, she could feel his blue eyes on her.

It hit her again, the way it had when she saw him for the first time. Masculine appeal, the kind that could send a young girl into a dizzying swoon, or turn a sensible woman into a wanton for a night. It was not the kind of aggressive masculinity she recognized in some men, but an easy male confidence that tempted instead of demanded, all the more devastating because if forced her to acknowledge the power of her own desire.

“What are you waiting for?” she asked on an indrawn breath, her heart suddenly thudding in her chest. Would it always be like this? Would a mere look from him always make her ache with yearning?

Without a word, Declan turned around. He removed his hat, balanced it upside down in his left palm, bent to reach down to the corset cage and took his time picking up blocks, studying the letters, discarding one, selecting another, storing a half dozen of the small wooden squares in the crown of his hat. Satisfied with his choice, he settled to stand behind the line someone had scraped into the ground and began throwing.

One. Two. Three. All met their aim. The fourth missed. He inspected the two remaining blocks in his hat, selected one and tossed it through the air. It landed with a clatter in the cage with the others. No one spoke as he walked up to the corral gate to retrieve the squares. Even Stan had fallen silent, aware that some hidden current was whirling beneath the surface of what they could see.

Declan returned, fell down on one knee, the hat in his hand, four squares in it. His fair hair shone in the sun. He arranged the blocks into a row on the ground, stood straight again and shoved the hat back on his head. In the distance, the herd of cattle waiting to be driven to market broke into a restless mewling and the beating of hooves.

“I’d better go and have that bath,” Declan said and walked off.

Victoria craned closer.

L-O-V-E.

Stan pushed beside her. “What does it spell?”

“I don’t know.” Her booted foot shot forward and kicked the blocks into disarray. “He must have made a mistake. I don’t know what it was supposed to mean.”

Her hands curled into fists as she ran back into the house. Why did he keep doing this to her? Pushing and pulling. Tempting and rejecting. Everyone, including her father, took it for granted that Declan would to stay with her after his year was up. And yet, every time she tried to look ahead, every time she mentioned some practical arrangement that involved planning for the future, he refused to be drawn into the conversation.

At school, she had read romantic novels some girls smuggled in and passed around. In those, this sort of thing happened, but there was always a happy ending, and the couple resolved the differences that kept them apart. In real life, she realized, there was no such guarantee of a happy future. The torment of waiting and hoping might be all she ever got.

Chapter Eight

The ladies were dressed in formal gowns with bustles and the gentlemen wore suits with long jackets. Oh, the joy of it! To see her friends gathered at her table. To be at home at Red Rock again for good. Victoria blinked back tears, but they gathered anyway, and she lifted a hand to wipe the corners of her eyes.

Her father frowned. “Ria, is something wrong?”

“No, no.” She sent a watery smile all around the table and fanned a hand in front of her flushed face. “It’s just that I’m so happy to be back. I hated being away at school.”

“Were the other girls horrid to you?” Jade Ritter asked.

“No. Most were nice. Some were interested in the West. One girl asked me to teach her to shoot. But I was
sooo
homesick,” Victoria replied, and then she spent a few minutes telling her guests anecdotes about boarding school life, some of which drew a flurry of  laughs and others disbelieving protests.

Her father sat on her left. On his other side were Carl and Jade Ritter. Jade’s father owned a fruit farm. She was a halfbreed who had until recently hidden her Apache blood, and was still a little touchy about the possibility of social exclusion. A few months ago, she had married Carl Ritter, a former bounty hunter, and they were expecting their first child.

Annelise Krauss on Victoria’s right was a young widow with a small son. Her husband had been much older, in his fifties. When he died six months ago, Annelise had inherited his ranch and was trying to run the property alone. Victoria had hoped that her father might take an interest in the young widow, who was a delicate beauty with pale gold hair and cautious gray-green eyes. Watching them now, she realized her hopes were in vain, for she could detect no spark of attraction between them.

Beyond Annelise sat Rebecca Eastman and Charles Foster. They were engaged to be married. Rebecca’s father owned the bank in Mariposa, and the Foster family ran the mercantile. As Victoria let her eyes linger on the pair, it struck her that they too lacked a spark of attraction. Charles was slender, sandy haired, with even, unremarkable features. Rebecca was tall, with reddish brown hair, bleached by the sun into a mix of cinnamon and honey. She possessed a forceful, driven nature. It seemed clear to Victoria that in their marriage Rebecca would lead and Charles would follow.

Annelise Krauss leaned forward and spoke in the timid way most men seemed to find enchanting. “Mr. Sinclair, may I ask why you have gathered a herd to be driven to market?” She hesitated. “I mean, it is a little late in the season, is it not?”

Andrew Sinclair touched a napkin to his mouth. “Those heads of cattle are sold to the Indian Agency,” he replied, appearing reluctant to discuss the matter. “It’s winter supplies for the White Mountains Apache Reservation. I guess you’ve all heard the rumors that sometimes unscrupulous Indian Agents switch beef destined to the reservations for inferior quality. I’ve delayed delivery to minimize the chances of that happening.”

Victoria saw it then, a flash of admiration and respect in her husband’s eyes as he watched Andrew Sinclair. Then Declan’s features grew grim again, as if he had dug into some hidden store of hostility, and the moment was gone.

“Thank you,” Jade Ritter said in a low voice. “What is left of my mother’s tribe is up at the reservation. I appreciate what you’ve done.”

A hushed silence fell over the table. They all knew how hard the Apache were fighting for survival, and how quickly their numbers were dwindling, from massacres and famine and the new diseases the white man had brought with him.

“Declan is going to drive the cattle up to the reservation,” her father said, smoothing over the awkward moment.

Bless him,
Victoria thought. Her father really was trying. He had invited Declan to take host’s place at the end of the table. And now, in front of their guests, he had recognized Declan’s contribution to the running of the ranch. Why couldn’t Declan accept the overtures of friendship but instead chose to cling to some hidden resentment?

“I’m just helping,” Declan replied. “Hank’s riding ramrod.” His mouth tightened, and he directed a challenging glare across the table at Victoria’s father. “You’ve done your share of cattle drives, haven’t you, Sinclair? All the way through Kansas?”

“That was before the war, in the eighteen-fifties, on the old route to St. Louis.” Her father sent a warm smile in her direction. “That’s when I met my wife, Victoria’s mother.”

The hostility that radiated from Declan hung in the air like a poisonous cloud. People were starting to notice, Victoria realized, as she saw Rebecca Eastman and Charles Foster exchange a puzzled glance.

She rushed to ease the tension. “You haven’t heard the story of how my parents, met, have you, Declan?” With a forced cheerfulness, she rambled on. “I mean, you know she died when I was small, but before then, it was such a romantic—”

Her father laid a restraining hand on her arm. “Ria, this is not the time and place for family reminiscing.”

She lowered her gaze to her plate, her cheeks aflame. “Of course not. I’m sorry.” On her plate, the spicy smell of the roast beef she’d been too nervous to eat sent a wave of nausea rising up in her throat.

“Charles is going on a cattle drive next year,” Rebecca put in.

“But he’s a merchant, and your father is a banker,” Annelise said.

In plain sight on the table, Rebecca curled her fingers around her fiancés hand. “We are going to buy a ranch when we get married. My father has promised the bank will lend us the money. I’ve always wanted to live on a ranch. Before my friend Laura died, I spent most of my spare time on her father’s ranch. That’s when I discovered I wanted to be a rancher.”

The party grew quiet as they paused to think of Laura Carmichael. They had all gone to the tiny, one-room school in Mariposa together. She’d been a quiet, shy girl, and at sixteen she had died, together with her mother, when train robbers blew up a railroad bridge and the carriage they were in fell into the ravine.

“Where will you plant the rose bush?” Annelise asked.

Victoria managed a smile. “In the front, by the porch steps.” Before she went to Boston, she had admired the white roses Annelise grew in her garden, and now she had received one as a gift. Jade and Carl had also brought her a gift, a basket of shiny, red apples. Rebecca and Charles had given her a book on livestock breeding.

“My mother had a rose garden.” Declan’s tone was harsh. “Do you recall ever seeing one on your way through Kansas, Sinclair?”

Her father twirled his wineglass, his lean fingers curled around the stem. “Can’t say that I do.”

“That’s too bad,” Declan replied.

By now, everyone had caught on to her husband’s morose mood. Victoria saw Rebecca Eastman glance at Declan, a little awkward. “Mr. Beaulieu, I saw you last week talking to my father’s clerk, Howard Peterson. You were standing on the boardwalk outside the mercantile, and you seemed friendly with him.”

Declan nodded. “We are acquainted.”

“I thought I ought to warn you.” Rebecca hesitated. “This is in confidence, of course. My father suspects he might be…unreliable. He talks too freely about the bank’s business, and he boasts about his success in investing on the stock exchange in New York, even though it is clear that he possesses no wealth of his own.”

Declan’s face lost all expression. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

As the evening wore on, a sense of despair settled over Victoria. She had hoped that introducing Declan to her small circle of friends would create harmony. Instead, it had raised the discord between her father and Declan to a new, public level. Grudgingly, she had to admit that her father was not to blame but the fault lay with her husband.

****

Declan tossed and turned on the narrow brass bed, unable to sleep. Outside, the autumn heat had given way to another storm. Thunder rumbled in the air, and jagged forks of lighting rent the sky apart, bathing the room in bright glow before the darkness took hold again, even more solid than before.

So, he’d been noticed, talking to Howard Peterson in town. The banker’s daughter was quite right—the clerk was selling client secrets, and Declan had been buying those of Andrew Sinclair. It didn’t matter if people found out about it, for he had already discovered everything he needed to know.

A loan repayment was due in three days and Sinclair’s account was empty.

Rolling onto his back, Declan threw an arm over his eyes to block out another flare of lightning. The strain of waiting for his revenge to unfold had become almost unbearable. Most evenings, he dined with Victoria and her father. Occasionally, he claimed fatigue and slept in the small room behind the kitchen, but on other nights he marched into her bedroom, as bold as a soldier on parade, as if wanting to gloat about it to her father.

And perhaps he did.

The roar outside grew continuous, and yet the flashes of lightning had ceased. Icy shivers rippled down Declan’s spine as he recognized the sound for what it was—the restless mewling of a herd of cattle on the verge of stampeding. He’d last heard the sound more than twenty years ago. He’d been a boy then, but he’d never forgotten the deep, bellowing noise that had heralded his mother’s death.

He got up and yanked on his pants, shirt and coat, and slammed a hat on his head. In the big foyer, he found Victoria holding up a storm lantern. Andrew Sinclair stood beside her, dressed in a long duster, dripping wet, a sign that he had already been outside.

“No,” he was saying as he took the lamp from Victoria. “You stay indoors, girl. And that’s an order.”

“Father—”

Sinclair cut her off with an impatient gesture. Hearing Declan approach, he whirled around, the long duster flapping about his ankles. Spurs rattled on his boots and droplets of water flew from the brim of his hat.

“She’s your wife now, Beaulieu,” Sinclair said. “You tell her to stay inside.”

Terror pierced Declan at the thought of another tragedy. He strode up to Victoria, curled his hands around her upper arms and stared down into her fear-filled eyes. “If you leave this house, I’m going to pull every hair from her head. I’m going to thrash your ass until it’s black and blue. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” she muttered, eyes downcast.

“Good.” He ducked down for a brief, hard kiss. For one second, uncertainty tore at him. He shouldn’t tackle a herd of stampeding cattle without telling her that he loved her. He took a deep breath. “I—”

“What are you waiting for?” Sinclair bellowed, holding up the lamp. His boots thudded in an urgent cadence as he headed for the door. “If you’re coming, follow me.”

Declan released Victoria and hurried after his father-in-law. As he stepped out of the door, the wind whipped around him, almost knocking his hat from his head. He lifted a hand to force the black Stetson deeper over his head, and then he ran after Sinclair, following the flickering light of the lamp toward the stable through the rain that came down like a solid sheet of water.

“Be careful.” The brittle, frightened voice reached out to him.

He glanced back, saw Victoria standing on the porch. She was framed by the open doorway, the light behind her rendering her into a ghostly silhouette. For an instant, he was hurtled back in time, to the day at the hanging oak, and he recalled his words.

I want the face of a pretty woman to be the last thing I see before I die
.

She’d given him so much in the weeks that followed. Her love. Her faith in him. She’d given him her passion. She’d sided with him against her father, shared her friends with him. It occurred to Declan that despite the internal battle between love and revenge, he’d never been as happy as he had been since he married her.

And he had given her nothing in return.

Not even the words, unless you counted L-O-V-E spelled in alphabet blocks.

With a sinking heart Declan realized it would be best for Victoria if he died.

****

The herd was small, only three hundred head, and it hadn’t stampeded, yet. The animals were in restless motion, the steers pushing against each other, bellowing in fear. Sinclair rode his black stallion, Declan his blue roan gelding. Hank and Stan followed close behind, and Lenny and Clyde were already out by the herd with a small remuda of cutting horses.

“Don’t risk your good horse,” Sinclair yelled at Declan through the deluge, pointing at the temporary corral where the cutting horses were huddled in a tight group, water sluicing down their flanks.