A Stone Creek Collection, Volume 2

by Linda Lael Miller

  Lydia stopped herself from prattling with a determined gulp. What was the matter with her? First, she hadn’t been able to utter a syllable, she’d been so thunderstruck, and now she was inclined to chatter senselessly.

  “Gideon,” he said, very solemnly, his eyes still watchful.

  “I beg your pardon?” It took all the force of will Lydia possessed not to squirm in her chair.

  “Call me Gideon, not Mr. Yarbro.” He leaned forward, easy in the imposing chair, easy in his skin. Rested his elbows on his thighs and looked deep inside Lydia, or so it seemed. His probing gaze made her feel uncomfortable, intrigued, and almost naked, all of a piece. “You sent the letter, Lydia,” he reminded her, “and I don’t believe it was an accident.”

  “She’s getting married tomorrow,” Helga proclaimed loudly from the parlor doorway, a herald in a plain dress, apron and mobcap. All she lacked, in Lydia’s fitfully distracted opinion, was a long brass horn with a banner hanging from it and velvet shoes with curled toes. “To a man she hates.”

  Lydia’s face throbbed with mortification. “Helga,” she said firmly, “I do not hate Jacob Fitch, and you are overstepping—again. Kindly return to the kitchen and attend to your own affairs.”

  Helga didn’t obey—she never did—and the aunts stayed, too, hovering behind the housekeeper, all aflutter.

  “All right,” Helga conceded, “perhaps you don’t actually hate Fitch, but you certainly aren’t in love with him, either!”

  Lydia’s humiliation was now complete.

  Gideon rose from his chair, crossed the room, and spoke so quietly to the women clustered in the doorway that Lydia couldn’t make out his words. Miraculously, the avid trio subsided, and Gideon closed the great doors in their faces.

  Lydia sat rigid, and squeezed her eyes shut.

  She didn’t hear Gideon approaching her, and when his hand came to rest on her shoulder, she started, gave a little gasp. It wasn’t so much surprise that had made her jump, she realized, horrified, but the strange, sultry charge Gideon’s touch sent coursing through her entire system.

  “Open your eyes, Lydia,” he said. “Look at me.”

  He was crouched beside her chair now, his green gaze searching her face, missing nothing, uncovering secrets she’d kept even from herself.

  Or so it seemed.

  “It’s really a misunderstanding,” she whispered, trying to smile.

  Gideon took her hand. Squeezed it gently. “Stop lying to me,” he said, his voice husky and very quiet. “Who is this Jacob Fitch yahoo, and why are you getting married to him if you don’t love the man?”

  Lydia swallowed, made herself look directly at Gideon. She forced out her answer. “I have my reasons.”

  “And those reasons are…?”

  Tears blurred Lydia’s vision; she tried to blink them away. “What does it matter, Gideon? I have no choice—that’s all the explanation I can give you.”

  He straightened, reluctantly let go of her hand, went to stand facing the marble fireplace, his back turned to her. Looked up at the life-size portrait of the Judge looming above the mantel, dominating the entire room, big as it was.

  At least, Lydia’s great-grandfather’s painted countenance had dominated the room, seeming so real that she’d swear she’d seen it breathing—until Gideon Yarbro’s arrival.

  “There are always choices, Lydia,” Gideon said gruffly. “Always.”

  He turned around, leaned back against the intricately chiseled face of the fireplace, folded his arms. His shoulders were broad, under his fresh white shirt, and his butternut-colored hair, though still slightly too long, had been cut recently…

  She gave herself a little shake. Why was she noticing these things?

  Lydia sat up a little straighter in her chair. Maybe there were “always choices,” as Gideon maintained, but in her case, all the alternatives were even worse than the prospect of becoming Mrs. Jacob Fitch.

  The aunts, fashionably impoverished now, would become charity cases. Their cherished belongings would be sold at auction, pawed through and carried away by strangers.

  And she herself, with no means of earning a living, might be reduced to serving drinks in one of Phoenix’s overabundance of saloons—or worse.

  No, she would marry Mr. Fitch.

  The following afternoon, at two o’clock, she’d be standing, swathed in silk and antique lace, almost where Gideon was standing now, with Jacob beside her and his termagant of a mother looking on from nearby, while a justice of the peace mumbled the words that would bind Lydia like ropes, for the rest of her life.

  “Lydia,” Gideon said firmly, sending her thoughts scattering like chickens suddenly overshadowed by the wingspan of a diving hawk. “Talk to me.”

  “I’ll lose this house if I don’t marry Mr. Fitch,” Lydia heard herself say. “The aunts—you saw them, they’re ancient—will be displaced—no, destitute. It doesn’t—it doesn’t bear thinking about.”

  Gideon tilted his head back, scanning the high ceiling, with its hand-carved moldings and thousands of tiny inlaid seashells imported from some faraway ocean.

  Lydia wished she could magically transport herself to that ocean. Jump in and sink beneath its waves and never be seen again.

  But, alas, there she remained, in that august parlor, in the middle of dry and dusty Phoenix, with no handy place to drown.

  “It’s a fine house,” Gideon allowed. “But it’s only a house. And your aunts would adapt to new surroundings. People do, you know—adapt, I mean.”

  Lydia stood up abruptly, found that her knees were still quite unreliable, and dropped back into her chair again. “You don’t understand,” she protested weakly.

  Gideon’s handsome face hardened a little. “I’m afraid I do,” he answered. “You’re willing to sell yourself, Lydia. And the price is a house. It’s a bad bargain—you’re worth so much more.”

  His statement stung its way through Lydia, a dose of harsh medicine.

  But then a strange, twittering little laugh escaped her, as she remembered just how hopeless her situation truly was.

  Would the embarrassment never end? Again, she found that she could not look at Gideon, could not expose herself to the expression she’d surely catch on his face if she did. “Just forget the letter, Gideon,” she said. “I’m sorry if I inconvenienced you, made you go out of your way, but, really, truly, I—”

  “I can’t,” Gideon broke in. “I can’t ‘just forget the letter,’ Lydia. Our agreement was that you’d send it if you were in trouble, and I know you are. In trouble, that is.” He paused. “And I just accused you of selling yourself. Did you miss that? Most women would have slapped my face, but you didn’t even get out of your chair.”

  Lydia didn’t trust herself to answer.

  Gideon strode across the room again, bent over her, his hands gripping the arms of her chair, effectively trapping her between his arms.

  “There’s nothing you can do to help,” Lydia nearly whispered. She simply couldn’t lie anymore. Nor could she meet his eyes, though the sunlight-and-shaving-cream scent of him filled her nose, and invaded all her other senses, too, and made her dizzy. “Please, Gideon—just go.”

  He didn’t move. His voice was a rumble, low and rough, like thunder on the distant horizon. “I’m not going anywhere—except maybe to find your bridegroom and tell him the wedding is off.”

  Lydia flinched, her gaze rising to collide with Gideon’s now. “You mustn’t do that!” she cried, aghast at the prospect. “Gideon, you mustn’t! This house, my aunts—”

  “Damn this house,” Gideon growled, backing up now, but just far enough to take hold of Lydia’s shoulders and pull her to her feet. “You are not marrying a man you don’t love!”

  At last, Lydia dredged up some pride. Lies hadn’t worked. Neither
had the truth. Bravado was all that was left to her. “You can’t stop me,” she said fiercely.

  She saw his eyes narrow, and his jawline harden.

  “Yes, I can,” he ground out.

  “How?” Lydia challenged.

  And that was when he did the unthinkable.

  He kissed her, and not gently, the way a friend might do. No, Gideon Yarbro kissed her hard, as a lover would, slamming his mouth down on hers—and instinctively, she parted her lips. Felt the kiss deepen in ways she’d only been able to imagine before that moment.

  That dreadful, wonderful, life-altering moment.

  Gideon drew back too soon, and Lydia stood there trembling, as shaken as if he’d taken her, actually made her his own, right there in the parlor, both of them standing up and fully clothed.

  “It won’t be like that when he kisses you,” Gideon said, after a very long time. Then he let go of her shoulders, he turned, and he walked away. He opened the parlor doors and strode through to the foyer, then banged out of the house.

  Lydia couldn’t move, not to follow, not to sit down, not even to collapse. She simply could not move.

  Damn Gideon Yarbro, she thought. Damn him to the depths of perdition. He’d ruined everything—by being right.

  Jacob Fitch would never kiss her the way Gideon had, never send thrills of terrible, spectacular need jolting through her like stray shards of lightning. No, never again would she feel what she had before, during and after Gideon’s mouth landed on hers. In some inexplicable way, it was as though he’d claimed her, conquered her so completely and so thoroughly that she could never belong to Jacob, or any other man, as long as she lived.

  Gideon had aroused a consuming desire within Lydia, simply by kissing her, and simultaneously satisfied that desire. But—and this was the cruelest part of all—that sweet, brief, soul-drenching satisfaction had shown her what a man’s attentions—one certain man’s attentions—could be like.

  He’d left her wanting more of what she could never have—and for that, she very nearly hated him.

  The aunts and Helga rushed into the room, like a talcum-scented wind, pressing in around Lydia, so close she nearly flailed her arms at them, the way she would at a flock of frenzied, pecking crows.

  “You look ghastly!” one of the aunts cried, sounding delighted.

  “Do sit down,” begged the other.

  “Glory be,” Helga exalted, throwing up her hands like someone who’d just found religion. “That man kissed you like a woman ought to be kissed!”

  Lydia recovered enough to sweep all three women up in one scathing glance. “Were you peeking through the keyhole?” she demanded. It was as if another, stronger self had surged to the fore, pushed aside the old, beleaguered Lydia, taken over.

  That self was a wanton hussy, mad enough to spit fire.

  And not about to sit down, whether she looked “ghastly” or not.

  “Helga was,” Mittie said righteously. “Millie and I would never do any such thing. It wouldn’t be genteel.”

  “To hell with ‘genteel,’” Helga said joyously. “He might as well have laid you down and had you good and proper as to kiss you like that!”

  Mittie and Millie gasped and put their hands to their mouths.

  Even the wanton hussy was a little shocked.

  “Helga!” Lydia erupted, her face on fire.

  “Such talk,” Mittie clucked, shaking her head.

  “Major Bentley Alexander Willmington the Third used to whisper naughty things in my ear,” Millie confessed, succumbing to a dreamy reverie, “while we were rocking on the porch swing of an evening. Papa would have had him horsewhipped if he’d known.”

  “Millicent!” Mittie scolded.

  Helga laughed out loud. “Glory be,” she repeated, turning to leave the room. “Glory be!”

  “You don’t understand,” Lydia said, for the second time that afternoon. The wanton hussy had suddenly vanished, leaving the fearful, reluctant bride in her place, virginal and wobbly lipped and tearful. “Gideon accused me of—he left here in a rage—” She began to cry. “He’s never coming back.”

  “You’re a damn fool if you think that,” Helga answered, from the doorway. “He’ll be back here, all right, and in plenty of time to put a stop to this wedding foolishness, too.”

  “You didn’t see—he was furious—”

  “I saw him,” Helga countered, more circumspectly now that the glory bes had subsided. “He nearly knocked me down, storming through this doorway like he did. No denying that he’s fighting mad, either. But he’ll be back just the same. You mark my words, Lydia Fairmont. He’ll be back.”

  The prospect made Lydia feel both hope and fear, as hopelessly tangled as the mess of embroidery floss in the bottom of her sewing basket.

  Mittie, now solicitous, patted her arm. “Has your headache returned, dear?” she asked. “You really do look dreadful. Perhaps you should lie down, and Helga will bring you your supper in bed—”

  “I will not serve Miss Lydia’s supper in bed!” Helga shouted, already halfway to the kitchen, from the sound of her voice. “She’s not an invalid—so just forget that nonsense, all of you!”

  Mittie, Millie and Lydia all looked at each other.

  “I think Helga has grown a mite obstinate,” Mittie confided, wide-eyed.

  “Papa would never have tolerated such insolence,” Millie observed, but her expression was fond as she gazed toward the space Helga had occupied in the parlor doorway.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Lydia snapped. “Have neither of you noticed, in all these years, that Helga not only manages the household, she manages us?”

  “Perhaps we should send her packing,” Mittie said, tears forming in her eyes at the very idea.

  “Show her the road,” Millie agreed, crying, too.

  “She’s not going anywhere,” Lydia told her aunts, softening at their obvious dismay. “You’re not, either, and neither am I.”

  Mittie sniffled. “We’re not?”

  “No,” Lydia assured her, slipping an arm around each of her aunts’ shoulders.

  No, echoed a voice deep within her heart, with sorrow and certainty. Because Gideon Yarbro or no Gideon Yarbro, tomorrow afternoon, at two o’clock sharp, you’re going to do your duty as a Fairmont and marry Jacob Fitch.

  Lydia lifted her eyes to the Judge’s portrait, glaring down at her from above the fireplace.

  Sure as sunrise, he was breathing.

  * * *

  THE FIRST THING GIDEON had to do was talk himself out of going back to the Golden Horseshoe Saloon and swilling whiskey—forget beer—until he stopped thinking about Lydia Fairmont.

  The second thing was track down Jacob Fitch.

  That was easier. He asked about Fitch on the street, and was directed to the First Territorial Bank, right on Main Street.

  Still full of that strange fury Lydia had stirred in him, Gideon strode into that bank as though he meant to hold it up at gunpoint, and the few customers inside actually fled as he approached the counter.

  The clerk, apparently alone in the place, looked as though he might drop right to the floor and cover his head with both hands.

  Gideon slapped his palms down on the counter top. “I want to see Jacob Fitch,” he said. “Now.”

  The clerk, a small man with a twitch under his right eye and a nose that wriggled like a rabbit’s, blinked behind his thick spectacles. “Well,” he said tremulously, “you can’t.”

  “Why not?” Gideon demanded, not to be put off.

  “Because he’s not here,” the clerk retorted, getting braver. “He’s at the tailor’s, being fitted for his wedding suit.”

  “And which tailor would Mr. Jacob Fitch be patronizing?” Gideon asked.

  “I don’t ha
ve to tell you that,” the clerk said.

  Gideon reached over the counter, got the little man by his shirt front, and pulled him clear off his no doubt tiny feet. He didn’t normally handle people, at least not ones that were smaller than he was, but he was in a state and nothing would do him but finding Jacob Fitch. “Which tailor?” he repeated. Then, realizing the man couldn’t answer because he was being choked, Gideon slackened his grip just enough to allow the fellow to suck in some wind.

  “Feinstein’s,” the clerk sputtered. “On Third Street.”

  Gideon allowed the man to slide back to his feet. “Thank you,” he said moderately, and left the bank.

  He found the tailoring establishment right where the clerk had said it would be. Mindful of the stir he’d caused in the bank—and regretting it a little—Gideon paused on the sidewalk out front to draw a deep, slow breath. He read and reread the golden script printed on the pristine display window—Arthur Feinstein, Purveyor of Fine Men’s Wear—even examined the three-piece suit gracing a faceless mannequin, as though he might be in the market for new duds.

  When he thought he could behave himself, Gideon pushed open the door and went into the shop.

  A little bell jingled overhead.

  The place seemed deserted, a development that threatened Gideon’s carefully cultivated equanimity.

  “Anybody home?” he called. You could take the boy out of Stone Creek, he reflected, but you couldn’t take Stone Creek out of the boy.

  A bald head appeared between two curtains at the back of the store. “I’ll be with you right away, sir,” the man said, speaking clearly despite the row of pins glimmering between his lips.

  Mr. Feinstein, no doubt. Purveyor of fine men’s wear.

  “I’m looking for Jacob Fitch,” Gideon said, raising his voice a little.

  Another head appeared beside Feinstein’s, also balding. The face beneath the pate was sin-ugly, and none too pleased at having the fitting interrupted.

  “I’m Fitch,” the second man said. “Who are you and what do you want?”