by T. S. Joyce
“How much of your skin was marred?”
The frank way in which this family conversed had me praying no one asked more questions of me.
“Down this part of my body,” she said, pointing to her side.
Luke draped his arm around the back of her chair and traced the injury on her neck absently with the tip of his finger. “She’s more beautiful with them,” he said in a somber tone. “I don’t mind the scars.”
“What happened?” Mr. Dawson asked. He was a quiet man, and everyone seemed to sit up a little straighter when he spoke. His bottomless dark eyes had the same catlike slant as Jeremiah’s, and he looked at Kristina like he could see into her soul.
“Men came two months back and tried to burn me.” Kristina was a very brave woman to hold his gaze like that.
Whatever look passed between them, he leaned across the table and squeezed her hand. “Are you the one to thank for saving my son from that scar on his neck?”
Luke flinched. How hadn’t I noticed the mangled flesh that encapsulated the entirety of the front and sides of his throat? I was yet a baby to the dark ways of the world, but I knew a hanging scar when I saw one. Only the worst and most dangerous men were sentenced to hanging. A tiny sliver of fear moved in my gut.
Luke’s brilliant gaze landed on his wife. “I thought she’d burned alive, but she came striding out of the night to shoot that rope from my neck not two seconds after the horse had been smacked out from under me.”
Mr. Dawson leaned back into his chair with a dark arched eyebrow. “She shot it? That’s a mighty big claim to shoot a hanging rope. It’s nearly impossible to do.”
Kristina leaned forward. “You want to see my weapon of choice?”
Jeremiah groaned beside me. “Say no, Da.”
Mr. Dawson’s dark eyes swam with humor and he flicked two fingers at her. “Show us.”
She bounced up and stuck her foot in the chair beside her before pulling the skirts up to her thigh and exposing a lot of skin and a red and black lace garter that holstered a tiny and intricately carved gun.
As I sat there with my mouth hanging open, Mr. Dawson’s laugh was almost as boomingly loud as Jeremiah’s had been and Margery stifled a smile behind her napkin.
“A Derringer and you’re good enough with it to shoot a hanging rope,” Mr. Dawson said. “Luke, I knew it would take a special kind of woman to turn your head.”
“I’m getting good at shooting the pistols, too. I’ve got big plans to teach Lorelei as soon as we get back home.”
Mr. Dawson became serious. “It’s a useful talent to have when you’re the wife of a Dawson.”
What did he mean by that? Would I be shooting people? Maybe they were outlaws. That would explain the hanging and even though Jeremiah assured me he wasn’t a criminal, how could I trust that the man I just met wasn’t a full blown liar? The man I thought I’d known everything about had lied about loving me. From what I was learning the hard way, all men did it to get what they wanted.
What had I got myself into?
Chapter Seven
Jeremiah
The more time I spent with Lorelei, the more I liked her. She was a quiet woman unless she had something important to say. She reminded me of Da, and I respected him more than any other person in the known world. She was well-bred and unsettled by the way our family behaved, but there wasn’t any point in trying to stifle their antics. She’d have to get used to them or not. The choice was up to her. She should be aware of the caliber of family she was marrying into, and though they were the best people I knew, they wouldn’t ever be a highly mannered lot.
Kristina and Ma were whipping up a desert in the kitchen, and my sensitive ears picked up Luke telling Da all about the Hell Hunter’s attack on our home in the drawing room, so I led Lorelei to the front porch. A pair of rocking chairs sat waiting in the cold evening air. Her jacket was too thin for my liking, so I draped mine over her skirts and took the chair beside her.
“What do you think?” I asked. “You still up for this ride?”
She hesitated. “It’s a lot to take in with the hanging and the whoring and the burning and today I saw more skin on your sister-in-law than I’ve ever seen of any woman.” Her almond shaped eyes met mine. “When are you planning on leaving?”
“Tomorrow morning. We have to get back to plant the crops and one of Kristina’s friends is heavy with child. She aims to be there for the birth and I wouldn’t ask her to stay any longer. It’s a long trip back. Do you need more time to think on it?”
She exhaled long and slow and settled into the warmth of my jacket. The wolf inside of me relaxed with her acceptance of the small gift. It was the first positive feeling I’d drawn from him in years and an unfamiliar fear of loss echoed through me at the thought of her turning me down. Lorelei was so beautiful, sitting here on my parent’s rocking chair with the moonlight kissing her cheeks. Dark tendrils of hair hung down in her face like the waves of a babbling creek. Her nose was small and elegant and her lips full on the bottom. Perfect for nibbling. I hadn’t seen her smile much, but when she’d graced me with the tiny ones, my heart had thundered in ways I hadn’t felt since Anna had been alive. She was much too skinny, but from the way her stomach had been rumbling earlier today, it was probably from the lack of funds to eat well.
Her scandal was bad, awful in fact, but she’d survived it and nobody in Colorado Springs would care overly much about the affairs of city society. She’d be safer there, with me. Hell, who was I kidding? I was bringing her to a wolf den without a warm place to sleep. I was a horrible man for doing this to her, but I couldn’t drag myself away from her living in that poor house. I’d find a way to keep her comfortable.
“I’ll have your answer by tomorrow morning then,” she said quietly.
To hide my disappointment, I looked away. Why couldn’t she just say yes so I wouldn’t have to worry over it all night? Sleep would be unattainable now with the risk of this marriage not working out.
The clomping of horse’s hooves sounded from far away. It must be a husband returning late from work or a show to be out this late hour. Or maybe it was someone returning from a drink at one of the nearby taverns. The gently rocking rhythm settled me, but as the carriage stopped in front of Da’s house, my spine stiffened again. Instincts were a very serious part of daily life, and a wise werewolf listened when they were blaring like the blast of a steam engine whistle.
A man stepped out of a black carriage with a gold letter D written in fine print over the door. The driver was dressed in black from boot to top hat and when the door opened, a blond haired man in silk suites stepped from it.
The smell of Lorelei’s fear was bitter and made me want to kill the man who’d caused her reaction. “Your husband?” I asked.
“Not anymore,” she said, standing. “What’re you doing here, Daniel?”
My jacket slipped from her legs, but I caught it before it brushed the cold wooden planks beneath us. She hid her quaking fists well but the tiny vibrations in the air had a sound. I reached out and held her hand in mine and it was warm against my skin. She looked up with wide eyes but didn’t push me away.
“You have no place here,” I said, sliding my gaze to him. “Be on your way.”
His icy eyes narrowed. You could tell a lot from a man’s eyes and his held nothing. No fear, no feeling. He was a dangerous creature with a wicked soul. I pulled Lorelei behind my back.
He pressed the toe of his polished shoe casually against the bottom step. “My spies told me you came here tonight and I found myself curious about what you were doing with people above your new station.”
Lorelei lifted her chin and squeezed my hand gently. “They aren’t above my station. They’re my new family. You moved on and so have I.”
I was family? Well if that wasn’t what turned my insides to fire in a bitter winter, I didn’t know what did. “Mr., she ain’t your wife no more so you keepin’ tabs on her stops right here. Tonight. If you come wit
hin ten feet of her, I’ll know—and then you’ll regret it,” I promised, swallowing a billowing growl that threatened to rip from me.
“Ah, the threats of a country man. I’m afraid you wouldn’t be able to touch me, though. I’m well known around these parts.”
“Great for you. Around my parts, we feed stronger men than you to the pigs. Take the hint, sir, and leave before I forget my manners.” I stepped forward and the idiot held his ground. Did he have no instincts whatsoever when he was pushing a wild animal too far? City slickers.
All conversation had stopped inside and if I was right, which I often was on occasions such as these, my brother and Da were just on the other side of that door waiting for any hint of trouble. And they’d tear him to pieces just the same as me.
“Are you sure you know what you’re getting into with this one?” the man asked. “There’s a reason I divorced her. It’s quite well known around here, but you being a foreigner to Boston, maybe you aren’t up on current events. Has she admitted why she’s been shamed?”
“Daniel, stop,” she breathed, and the smell of her fear became more potent on the chilly breeze.
“I know she’s divorced and it don’t bother me none. You’re a damned fool for throwing her away.”
“Lorelei’s in the position she’s in now because she is, mmm, how should I say? Lacking in bed? You’ll never get your cock sucked with this one.”
Red hot fury blasted through my veins and I closed my eyes against the push of the wolf. Every inch of skin on my person tingled with the want to burst into an animal and rip his throat out so he couldn’t ever utter her name from his vile lips again. I needed an out. I needed something, anything, to soothe the urge to kill or I’d reveal myself as a monster right here in the middle of the city.
Unable to think over the pounding in my ears, I pulled Lorelei to me. Grasping the back of her hair, I leaned down and pressed my lips to hers. She squeaked and stood rigid for a moment before her lips turned soft and inviting. When I pulled her hips flush against mine, a tiny accidental sound came from her throat that made me want to claim her right here on the porch. I’d give everything I owned to draw that little noise of pleasure from her again. I kissed her once more, softly, then turned my head to her gawking abuser and growled, “She’s been nothing but warm to me. It’s pretty obvious you weren’t doin’ it right.”
Lorelei was leaning on my arm heavily, her breathing ragged. “Get on inside,” I told her.
“Okay,” she said in an odd tone. Her boot prints were unsteady across the wooden floorboards and when the door clicked shut behind her, I leapt from the porch and wrapped my hands around his throat.
“It’s all become really clear to me now what’s happened,” I said as I pulled his choking form around the shadowed side of the house. “You’ve slandered her to get your divorce, am I right? And now you’ve moved on but you want to keep her impoverished. You get some sick kick out of that, don’t you?” Desperate fingers grappled at my hand and his face turned the shade of a saloon girl’s made up lips. His body thudded against the side of the house as I slammed him into it. “If you come near my wife again, I’ll kill you. I don’t care what kind of high falutin’ blood you’re convinced is runnin’ through your veins, trust me when I say a pedigreed man dies just the same as a pauper.” I released my grip and he dropped flailing to the ground. “Have a nice life,” I said, turning with a bow of my head. “I know I will.”
Lorelei sat in Da’s favorite chair with a glass of water in her shaking hand. “Is he gone?” she asked.
“You don’t have to worry about that man botherin’ you again. Are you okay?”
She nodded slowly. “What he said about me—”
“You don’t have to say nothin’ about that. I told you, I don’t care what happened. Did you mean what you said out there? We’re family. Does that mean you’re coming with us tomorrow?”
Her whiskey colored eyes were big and scared looking when she nodded. I didn’t care if she was saying yes to my proposal for the wrong reasons. None of that mattered as my innards loosened with hope for the first time in a long time.
“The hour’s late and I should return to my apartment,” she said as she set her glass on the table beside her.
“You sure you don’t want me to put you up in someplace nicer?”
“Like the tavern? No, I’ll spend my last night in Boson in my own room. I need to pack my things and gain some closure.”
None of me was okay with her staying in that rat hole. The tavern wasn’t the classiest place for a woman, but she’d be safe there with me. I couldn’t protect her in a place I hadn’t any access to. Pushing her wouldn’t get me what I wanted though. That she was scared was apparent, and my crowding her would only make her run. I had to be a patient hunter.
“I’ll take you back,” I offered.
Ma shooed me away to talk to her alone for a goodbye, but I stayed just on the other side of the wall so I could listen.
“I’ve heard the reasons your man divorced you,” Ma whispered. “If it’s true or not isn’t any of my business but I must warn you, Dawson men are a needy lot. You’ll have to get over your reservations if you’re going to keep Jeremiah happy.”
I rubbed my hands over my face until the skin was raw as Lorelei gulped on the other side of the wall. “I’ll try,” she whispered.
When they returned, a glare at Ma only received an unapologetic shrug. She hugged Lorelei and Kristina in turn and told them to take good care of us.
Ma, tiny human Ma, stood up to her full height and hugged me as hard as she could. “You write me the second Gable returns,” she said. Our other brother hadn’t returned from the War Between the States, and the lack of communication had been an unsettling situation for the entirety of our family.
“I will, Ma. I love you.”
“My boy,” she cooed happily as she kissed my cheek. “Be patient with your new mate. She’ll have a hard time finding her place out there.” No one knew that as well as Ma. She’d been a lady mated to a werewolf out in the wilderness and had struggled to adjust. And now the same challenge lay ahead for Lorelei.
Pa clapped Luke and I on the backs and in that silent way of his, passed a million words with a glance before he waved us off. Luke and Kristina walked hand in hand toward the tavern and I led Lorelei toward a waiting buggy up the street. Our journey to her part of town was much farther than my brother had to travel, and Luke was perfectly capable of redirecting any riffraff intent on bothering them on their walk back to the inn.
Across the wagon from Lorelei, I selfishly drank her in while she watched the passing houses and stores. She looked nothing like Anna. They were as different as night and day and I preferred it that way. It didn’t feel like a betrayal to Anna’s memory because I wasn’t replacing her. I was simply trying to fill the void she’d left behind the day she died.
Lorelei touched her lips absently. Was she thinking about when I’d kissed her? If I’d been in my right mind, I would’ve given her time. The warmth of her body up against mine was a satisfying memory though, and I was glad I’d had the rage and courage enough to touch her.
She was already mine and she didn’t even fully know it yet.
Chapter Eight
Lorelei
The range of emotion I’d felt since meeting Jeremiah Dawson swung high and wide, but the tingling in my stomach was so obviously disappointment when he didn’t kiss me goodbye. Wanton woman! What would mother say if she could take a peek into the scandalous thoughts that had raced through my mind when that man’s lips had crashed upon my own on the porch?
It was the God’s honest truth that I, Lorelei McGregor, had never been kissed by a man like that before. I waved as Jeremiah disappeared down the street in front of my apartment and stumbled abstractedly up the stairs to my room. The violence and raw power had terrified me in the moment it happened, but as he’d nipped at my lip, all thoughts had washed out of my head until only the most primal and base cons
ciousness existed there. There was no way an honorable man kissed like him, but I was having difficulty caring about such things as that. My, had I changed my tune over the last month of struggle. Murdering? Okay, so long as they deserved it. Holding hands and touching in the midst of the public eye. All right. Kissing a man like some shameless commoner in the street? So long as it’s Jeremiah who was doing the kissing.
I had to admit to an acute satisfaction at the sight of Daniel’s enraged face when Jeremiah had pulled away from me. What did I care what he told everyone in the morning? My reputation could get no worse, and I wouldn’t be around Boston to hear it anyway.
I kicked the door closed with my shoe only to have it fling back open. I pulled my bag out from under the small bed and folded my few belongings neatly inside of it.
“You going somewhere?” Analise said from behind me. We’d become friendlier over my time here.
“I’m following your advice.”
She gasped and flung herself onto my screeching bed. “You answered the advertisement? That’s so romaaantic,” she sang, clutching the lumpy pillow to her chest.
I didn’t know about romantic, but it did seem terribly exciting to leave the heartache behind and start fresh in a new place with new people. “I met him today. He surprised me and was waiting outside when I left for dinner tonight. I just met his family.”
“And?” she all but squealed.
“They are scandalous people with almost no manners on proper etiquette or conversation.” Analise frowned and I pursed my lips to contain the excitement. “And I liked them.”
“When are you leaving?”
“In the morning. He wants to leave early. If I pen a letter for the Countess, would you mind delivering it?”
Anilise lay on my bed staring at the ceiling with a dreamy look in her eyes. “Yes, of course.”
I’d tell Mother and Father of my decision when I was officially married and it couldn’t be undone. They’d try their best to convince me out of doing this, but moving away with Jeremiah was something I had to do. Every instinct I possessed said this was important. I sat at my small desk for what would be the last time and wrote my farewell to the only remaining friend I had from my old life.
