Lord Rogue

by Patricia Rice

  “I expected you to say that, but it’s too late to change your mind. I choose to believe your words of the other night, not the rationalizations of today.”

  “Travis, I am not rationalizing.” Alicia tried to jerk her arm away, but he held it too firmly and she did not want to make a scene. “I just want to be left alone.”

  Travis bent a skeptical gaze to her. “Shall we step down this alleyway and repeat the experiment? You didn’t seem to find my attentions unbearable the other night.”

  Alicia clenched her teeth and lifted her chin. “That was an exception. Everyone has moments of weakness.”

  As they turned the corner from Main Street onto the empty side street leading to the boardinghouse, Travis halted beneath the overhanging branches of a willow. “I am happy to know that, Blue Eyes. You will excuse me if such a moment of weakness overtakes me now.”

  Before she could guess his meaning, Travis covered her lips, electrifying them with the heat of his kiss. His hand rested on her shoulder, applying no pressure, but she could not escape. The hunger she felt in the caress of his mouth totally disarmed her.

  As if he had never molested her on a public street, Travis pulled her hand back through his arm again and proceeded toward the low gate marking the boardinghouse entrance.

  “There is a church social Saturday night. I will be by at seven to take you. Will you still be at Mrs. Clayton’s or will you have removed to your father’s house?”

  Still breathless and feeling decidedly weak in the knees, Alicia could only shake her head in reply. She didn’t know where she would be. She didn’t know where she wanted to be. And she certainly didn’t know what she was going to do with this man who did not take no for an answer.

  Travis cast her a curious glance. “It would be easier if you remain with Mrs. Clayton, but I am willing to appear on your father’s doorstep should the need arise.”

  She could just imagine her father’s reaction. Travis could be as charming and polite as any gentleman, but the element of danger in his character could not be disguised. The self-assured manner in which he handled every situation gave her a false sense of security. He would protect her against all else, but who would protect her against him? No, her father was no fool. It would be best to keep the two apart.

  “I am staying here for the time being,” Alicia replied, opening the gate. “You may appear anywhere you wish.”

  “I fully intend to.” With a deep bow Travis strolled away, whistling happily.

  What would she do now?

  There seemed to be little choice. She did her best to justify her madness. Teddy had seemed as harmless as the bland young men of her father’s acquaintance, but he had violently attacked her. Travis gave every appearance of being dangerous, but he had treated her with patient kindness. She would never understand men, but she chose to go with the one she knew.

  Alicia’s appearance at the church social on the arm of the foreign-looking newcomer caused a ripple of murmurs. Travis seemed to be on friendly terms with many of the men, and he easily charmed the women. In his company the conversation never lagged, and Alicia relaxed and laughed more than she had in months.

  Travis took her home in a wagon she had not known he possessed. This time when he kissed her beneath the overhanging protection of the trees in Bessie’s yard, Alicia did not protest. She had anticipated the moment and was more than ready for it. Still, the power he exerted over her caught her by surprise.

  The bulk of their overcoats prevented further contact than the pressure of mouth and hands, but Travis even made that sensation a sensual experience. Alicia tasted his lips in feather-light caresses across her mouth, and she longed for them to cling as they had before. When he finally deepened the kiss, she gave in willingly. Even when he persuaded her to part her lips, and his tongue invaded to take possession, she wasn’t afraid. She couldn’t seem to get enough, even though this intimate mingling of their breaths and the lingering caress of his tongue left her breathless and warm all over.

  As his kiss traveled upward, brushing her cheek, her eyes, and covering her hair, Alicia trembled against Travis’s hard chest, not understanding what he had done to her. Was doing to her. His arms were strong and protective as they held her in place.

  It seemed wisest if she put an end to this. Words were her only defense.

  “I don’t even know who you are, Travis,” she protested, still taking advantage of the security his arms offered.

  “Does it matter? Can’t I be what you see now?” Travis cupped the back of her head in his hand, pressing it against his shoulder.

  “Even that changes from day to day. How can I know what you are when you are never the same? Why do you play the part of drunken Indian one place and gentleman the next?”

  “Can you not guess, Alicia? I did not think I made my intentions a secret. The river life is a lonely one, and I am tired of it. I want to settle down, have a home, a wife to welcome me with open arms at day’s end, and someday, perhaps, little ones to buy ponies for. Is there something wrong in my asking for what every man wants? And doing what is necessary to get it?”

  Alicia tried to push him away, but his arms remained around her, his dark gaze searching her face.

  “You do not want me, then,” she answered sadly. “Why not Babette? Why not all the other women who look at you with smiles in their eyes, as I cannot?”

  A grin lifted a corner of his mouth. “Babette is much too young and foolish. I want a lady, Alicia Stanford, and I have found one. The land out here is wild and uncultured, but that is no reason that I must succumb to its forces. I will have a lady for wife, one who will raise my children properly.”

  Alicia grew angry with his arrogance. “You once told me you loved an Indian girl, but her family would not have you. Was she a lady? Was she not part of this wilderness?”

  Travis dropped his arms and stared down at her. “My mother’s people are called the grandfathers of all the Algonquin tribes. We are a proud race, and the woman I chose was of the family of one of our sachems. Under your standards she may not have been considered a lady, but under those of my mother’s, she was royalty. Our children would have been raised to be leaders. Do not scorn that of which you have no understanding.”

  “I am sorry, Travis.” Alicia turned away, gazing toward the welcoming light in Bessie’s front window. “I did not mean to scorn. I simply do not understand. I had better go in now.”

  Travis caught her arm. “There is nothing to understand, Alicia. I have told you before, our pasts are behind us. Only the future counts. Together I think we can make something of our lives. I am willing to try if you are.”

  And he was most certainly trying. Alicia offered a small smile. “I think we may both be hardened cases, but I’ll not keep you from trying. Miss Lalende will benefit at least.”

  Travis laughed and released her. “At least, I do not have to pretend with you. Sooner or later the fact that I am half Indian will come out and doors will close in my face, but not yours, not for that reason. Yours will remain barred because I am a man. At least that puts me on an equal footing with my competition.”

  Alicia came to expect the noise of Travis’s saw and hammer when she emerged from her classroom at the end of each day. She developed the sad habit of stopping to admire the platform rising from the shavings of wood and sawdust. Travis invariably had several children scrambling around the room, “helping” him, but whatever he was doing he would put aside as soon as she entered. He would dust himself off, send the children back to Miss Lalende, don his coat and hat, and escort Alicia back to the boardinghouse.

  Where Bessie plied him with coffee and pie, and Becky hung on his every word. Travis accepted the attentions as if they were his due, and Alicia listened in open-mouthed astonishment as he and Bessie discussed the best way of persuading her to let down her hair a little. Alicia smacked away Becky’s hand as she loosed one of her pins and tried to show what a curl around Alicia’s face would look like, and she threw Tra
vis an incensed look.

  “I did not tell you how to wear your hair or your clothes when you looked like a savage. Just because you fancy yourself a gentleman now does not give you cause to criticize my fashion ability or lack of it.”

  Mrs. Clayton appeared startled at this declaration, but Travis grinned and winked. “Alicia is afraid some Indian will come along and try to scalp her if she looks too fetching.”

  Becky’s whoops of laughter left Bessie even more confused. Alicia would have liked to kick Travis, but not only was that not ladylike, but he wore boots and wouldn’t feel a thing. She doubted if he would feel a thing should she bring the sugar bowl down upon his head. He grew much too sure of himself.

  Still, when she came out of the classroom the next day to the sounds of silence, she felt a dismaying disappointment. She had no right to expect Travis to hang around waiting for her. He must have business to attend to. He was as free as she to do as he pleased.

  Alicia halted in the door of the dance room to see if anything else had been done on the stage since yesterday. To her shock she discovered Travis sitting on the platform with his back against the wall, a small girl in his lap, and two hanging on his shoulders as he carved away at a piece of wood.

  That children hung around Travis did not surprise Alicia so much as recognition of which child graced the place of honor in his lap. The tiny six-year-old had been sent to Miss Lalende in desperation by doting grandparents who hoped the presence of other children would chase away some of the girl’s fears and overwhelming shyness. Since her parents had died in an Indian raid on their home a year ago, the girl had scarcely said two words together.

  The quartet noticed Alicia, and she flushed at the appraising gaze in Travis’s eyes as he noted the two new curls peeking out of her bonnet in front of her ears. But her curiosity was too great to be diverted. She entered to examine the piece that Travis carved.

  He handed the wooden rabbit to the child in his lap, who regarded it with awe. Alicia noted the other two children had similar talismans and surmised the youngest had demanded the same. What she wasn’t prepared for was the shy child turning a frank and trusting gaze to her and asking a complete question.

  “Lonetree says there are good and bad Indians, but he’s lying, isn’t he?” Wide blue eyes stared up at her for affirmation.

  Startled, Alicia met Travis’s eyes, only to be met with that unfathomable dark gaze with which he looked upon the world. She turned back to the child cuddled against his broad, linen-covered shirt.

  “No, Penny, he is not lying. There are good and bad Indians just as there are good and bad little girls. Why don’t you run along and show that lovely baby rabbit to Miss Lalende?”

  Penny solemnly digested this new piece of information. “My cousin is a bad girl. She pinches me and makes me fall down.” She turned back to Lonetree. “Do Indians have little girls?”

  Laughter leapt to his dark eyes as Travis placed the precocious child on her feet. “They most certainly do. And they love bunny rabbits just as much as you. Now, do what Miss Alicia tells you.”

  The children scampered away as Travis rose to his full height. The laughter had not quite left his eyes as he waited for Alicia to approach.

  “And what is your opinion, Blue Eyes? Am I a good or bad Indian?”

  She glanced to the broad, callused hands that could produce such delicate works of perfection and cradle a terrified child, then back to the sharp planes of his high cheekbones. She had once found those harsh features frightening but no longer. In an odd way he was quite handsome; striking was the word that came first to mind.

  “I suspect that when you are bad, you are horrid,” she paraphrased the nursery rhyme. “Mostly, you are just a man. But for Penny’s sake, thank you.”

  Travis wiped off his hands and reached for his coat. “I suppose most people can be horrid at some time or another. Will you go with me Saturday night anyway?”

  The moment had come and she took a deep breath before replying. “No. My father is entertaining and would like me to be there. I have agreed.”

  Travis shrugged on his coat. “Fine. I will see you there.”

  Chapter 15

  On the night of the party, Alicia glanced up every time her father’s large paneled oak doors opened, but the caller was always an expected guest. As the room filled with men in somber frock coats and women dazzling in diamonds and silks, she tried to breathe easier. Her relationship with her father was a precarious one at the moment, and she had no desire to explain Travis to him.

  She listened as one of her father’s cronies detailed the growing tension in Indiana and Ohio territories, where the British still manned forts and outposts. They blamed British instigation for the rash of Indian war parties and could see no alternative but another war.

  The argument wasn’t a new one, only now, with Travis on her mind, the words held new meaning. The various tribes confused her, but Travis had said he was a Delaware. Delawares were among the tribes flocking to British forts for protection against the encroaching Americans. True, they had been the first tribe to sign a peace treaty with the new American government, but that treaty had been hacked to death as swarms of settlers spilled over the mountains into the territories. The Delawares had been driven back until desperation made them turn on their former allies. Now many aided the British.

  What made her think of Travis in connection with these incidents? He was half white. He had a father with whom he had lived, who had taught him the rudiments of being a gentleman. For all she knew, his father might be living in Philadelphia as a butcher or a tailor or a candlestick maker. What made her think of Travis and the British in the same breath? And why did it worry her?

  Could Travis be half British? Could he be a spy? Other than traveling up and down the troubled rivers unmolested, what would he gain from such a life?

  Her thoughts had become so entangled she did not hear the front doors open one last time. Not until her father appeared in the doorway to introduce the latest arrival did she look up. The shock of seeing that bronzed visage among this glittering company stopped her breath.

  Travis seemed to have no awareness of Alicia as Chester introduced him to Letitia and then to various other acquaintances near the doorway.

  Avoiding Travis had been her only means of avoiding her own disturbing responses to his presence, and now she had learned her father’s home was no haven.

  With relief she saw the dining room doors open. There would not be time for Travis to find her. She took her place near the head of the table with her father. Travis found a seat midway down the table.

  Remembering those times when he had sat picking meat out of his bowl with his fingers, Alicia sent a surreptitious glance in his direction. Aside from his weathered face, his appearance was little different from the other men. He used his napkin and finger bowl properly, and showed a careless acquaintance with the array of cutlery. A crude keelboatman or savage would not possess such knowledge. He was more civilized than he’d allowed her to see. She ought to be angry, but she expelled a sigh of relief. She had not wanted him to be any less than perfect in front of her father.

  She flushed at this insight and returned her attention to her table companions.

  Even Letitia seemed to smile approvingly at the newcomer. Alicia sensed her father’s curiosity as the meal continued. She had an uneasy feeling Travis had wrangled this invitation by dubious means, and her father would soon put an end to it.

  If he did not, if Chester continued to sponsor Travis in St. Louis society, Travis was well along the road to respectability. Alicia knew this was his intent, but she doubted his motives. Ostensibly, he acted the part of gentleman to pursue her. But she had been used before by men who simply wanted what she had. The Stanford home was the gathering place for not only the influential in society but in government as well. If there ever came a war, news would arrive here faster than anywhere else in the territory.

  She had no reason to think such thoughts. Travis
had never given any indication that he was other than he seemed, except what he seemed was an impossible combination of savage and gentleman.

  When the ladies retired to the parlor after dinner, Alicia contemplated pleading a headache and going to the room she used here. But curiosity kept her at Letitia’s side. Her father’s fiancée was an accomplished society matron, a descendant of an aristocratic French family. She assured that all her guests were comfortable before cornering Alicia.

  “This Captain Travis your father brought in tonight, he is known to you?”

  Alicia always felt awkwardly tall in Letitia’s petite presence, and she took a chair before replying. “I traveled here with him.”

  Letitia clapped her hands and perched on the edge of a needlepoint chair. “Then you know all about him. Who is he? Where does he come from? What does he do?”

  Lifting her coffee cup, Alicia smiled wryly. “You will have to ask Mr. Travis that. Let me know when you conjure an answer from him.”

  Letitia grimaced with dissatisfaction. “But he is such a gentleman, and he speaks so highly of you. Surely you must know something? He looks almost Spanish, but his speech . . . Every so often, there is this British ring to it.”

  Perhaps that was the connection that had been bothering her. Alicia had met men from England and was familiar with the accent. Travis’s American slang and occasional backwoods drawl had little relation to the pompous tones of the men she had met, but every so often—Letitia was right. Occasionally a British word or a clipped accent escaped.

  “He only tells me that the past is over, and the future is what we make of it. He has never treated me with anything less than respect, and I have known him to be kind and generous. He has a talent for carving wood into any shape, and he has offered to contribute a stage to the school. I suspect he is like most men in matters that are not mentioned before ladies, but . . .” Alicia shrugged her shoulders, knowing her father’s worldly fiancée would understand.