Prairie Moon

by Maggie Osborne

  Reaching blindly, she felt for Cameron’s hand and released a breath when his fingers twined through hers.

  He had admitted that he was powerfully drawn to her, and heaven knew that she went weak inside when he looked at her. Whatever he had to tell her, whatever lay ahead, they could work it out.

  Chapter 16

  The ride across Missouri to the depot at St. Louis seemed endless. Cameron didn’t have much to say and neither did Della. He assumed her thoughts had turned toward seeing her daughter. Maybe she pondered what she could say to Mr. and Mrs. Ward, or perhaps she wondered if it was possible to see Claire without having to speak to the Wards.

  His thoughts turned backward, stuck near the docks in St. Joseph. In all the years that he’d carried her photograph and dreamed and pretended, he’d never dared imagine that Della would seize the initiative and invite him to court her.

  If the past had been different, and he wished to God that it were, he would have seized the opportunity to live his fantasy. Instead, knowing that Della favored him and would welcome his attentions was like a bayonet in the gut.

  It shouldn’t have gone this far. Because he was weak and wanted her, he’d let things get out of hand. Folding his arms across his chest, he stared toward the front of the train and mentally flogged himself. He’d behaved badly in Santa Fe when he’d lost control and kissed her in the hotel corridor. He succumbed to weakness every time he fed his spirit with her smiles or shining eyes or the electric touch of her fingertips on his sleeve.

  Because he was a lonely man stockpiling memories, he’d let her assume that he kept his distance because she’d been the wife of a friend. Since he’d done nothing to correct that impression, he’d hurt her there on the docks in St. Joe.

  Tomorrow the train would roll into the station at St. Louis. The next morning, they would head south toward Atlanta on one of the new fast trains that didn’t make many stops.

  “Cameron?”

  He looked down into her upturned face.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Why would you ask?”

  “I don’t think I’ve heard you sigh before.”

  He’d sighed? That surprised him as much as it seemed to surprise Della. “You must be mistaken.”

  She arched an eyebrow then turned her face to the neat farms slipping past the train windows. Cameron tugged at his collar and wondered why the boy who tended the stove still had the job. Inside the car it felt like an August afternoon, not conducive to rehearsing the most important and the most devastating speech of his life.

  Once he’d been articulate and nimble with words, a natural-born attorney according to his father, the judge. Then came the war. Long before he’d encountered Clarence Ward, the words had begun to dry up in his throat. After Clarence Ward and after he went west, there wasn’t much that seemed worth saying. A man got out of the habit of conversation.

  I’ve deceived you. I was not your husband’s friend. I’m the Yankee who killed Clarence, then went through his pockets and stole his personal effects.

  Once, he’d believed there wasn’t a jury that he could not persuade to his way of thinking. Arrogant, yes. But ten years ago words had come easily and convincingly.

  Everything you think you know about me is a lie. I didn’t know Clarence Ward, didn’t serve beside him, was not his friend.

  There was no easy way to say it. No way to soften the death of a loved one, even ten years later. And no hope for forgiveness for having killed her husband and having caused the loss of her daughter and home. How could she forgive him when he’d never been able to forgive himself?

  When the conductor came down the aisle announcing that the dining car was open, Cameron shook his head and pulled out his watch. The day had passed with little conversation between himself and Della. Both were wandering in an unforgiven past.

  The train yard at St. Louis swarmed with tracks, sidecars, and men clad in sooty uniforms from half a dozen lines. The depot was large, ornate, crowded, and confusing. Della clung to Cameron’s arm, struggling to keep their porter in sight as people flowed past them, rushing toward boarding platforms or hurrying toward the street. She didn’t recall ever seeing so many people in one place.

  Most were well dressed in fashions that made Della realize how provincial she and Cameron appeared. The thought made her smile. The traveling suit that had been the height of fashion in Two Creeks, Texas, was hopelessly dated in St. Louis, and her winter hat was simply deplorable. She decided that Cameron fared better than she since styles for men changed slowly, but his boots and the width of his lapels set him outside the present mode.

  The absence of side arms impressed her, both at the depot and an hour later at the hotel. She’d observed a few hard-eyed men exchange glances of recognition with Cameron, but it wasn’t personal. It was more the recognition of kindred types and a knowledge of weapons concealed in a boot or beneath a jacket. Della hadn’t seen anyone wearing a gun belt.

  “Can you relax here?” she asked curiously when Cameron crossed the lobby to where he had left her beside one of the large hotel ferns. “Or are you still worried that someone will pull a gun and shout a challenge?”

  He gave her a smile that didn’t warm his eyes. “I don’t worry.” Placing a hand in the center of her back, he led Della toward a carpeted staircase where a bellman waited with their trunks. “We’re on the third floor.”

  Of course he didn’t worry. Living or dying made no never-mind to James Cameron. Della lifted her skirts. “I’m glad you could get rooms. There are so many people everywhere, I wondered if the hotel would be full.”

  They had decided on accommodations near the train depot, taking the carriage driver’s recommendation to stop at The River Manse. When the bellman opened Della’s door and she stepped into a high-ceilinged, commodious room with a pleasant view of streets and tree-tops, she silently thanked the driver.

  “I’ll see to the gentleman, ma’am, then return and light your fire.” The bellman gestured to logs laid in a tile-faced hearth.

  “Thank you.” A fire would be welcome against the damp chill in the air.

  But it seemed silly for him to return when Della could have lit the fire herself. However, that wasn’t how things were done. It seemed the farther east they traveled, the more helpless women were expected to be. While she awaited the bellman’s return, she discovered a water closet and then bounced on the bed with a sigh of pleasure. The train berths were short, narrow, and hard, and Della had decided she’d rather sleep on the ground than in a sleeping car. At this point, a real bed felt like a luxury.

  The last door she explored revealed the back of another door. At first she didn’t grasp what she was seeing. Then the second door swung open and her eyes widened on Cameron. For a long moment they regarded each other in silence, then Cameron turned abruptly to the bellman.

  “The desk clerk said these were the last available rooms. I want you to return to the lobby and find out if that is correct. We would prefer accommodations that do not connect. Inform the desk clerk that price is not a concern.”

  “Yes, sir.” The bellman’s gaze strayed to Della before he hurried out Cameron’s hallway door.

  “The clerk didn’t mention that the rooms connected. If we can’t be moved, naturally I’ll respect your—”

  “I know,” Della said hastily, feeling her cheeks color. “It isn’t a difficulty. Really.” She stepped backward. “I’ll just keep my door closed and you keep your door closed.”

  She shut the door, leaned against it and drew a deep breath. Well. It didn’t matter that their rooms connected. If anything could be construed as improper, it would be camping together. Sleeping with their bedrolls only a few feet apart. This arrangement offered more privacy and propriety.

  A knock sounded on the other side of her connecting door. “Della?” Cameron frowned as she opened the door. “The bellman says these are definitely the last available rooms. We could try another hotel.”

  Until she thoug
ht about checking out of this hotel, finding a carriage for hire, searching out another hotel, checking in again . . . Della hadn’t realized how tired she was.

  “That seems silly, doesn’t it? Cameron, we’re mature adults. This isn’t a problem.” Glancing over her shoulder, she looked toward the hallway door. “That must be the bellman coming to light the fire.” She closed the door on Cameron before she opened the hallway door to admit the bellman, then she pressed her fingertips to her forehead and smiled. For a mature adult who didn’t care about connecting rooms, she’d been quick to close her door rather than have the bellman see her talking to Cameron again.

  When the bellman departed, leaving her with a cheery fire, she squared her shoulders and rapped on Cameron’s door. He opened his side at once.

  “What are our plans now?” Della asked. She spoke in a bright voice as if it were the most natural thing in the world to have a room that connected privately with his. And she had to concede the arrangement was convenient.

  Cameron consulted his pocket watch. “Our train leaves early, at seven o’clock tomorrow morning.”

  “Then we’d be wise to make it an early night.” Behind him, she saw flames in a fireplace that matched the one in her room. “I’m not very hungry. A light supper that we don’t have to dress for would be welcome.”

  “I was thinking the same.” He returned his watch to his waistcoat pocket. “Let’s say in an hour and a half? Will that give you time to rest and freshen up a bit?”

  “That’s perfect.”

  “Good.” He made no move to step back but stood in his doorway, looking down at her with that hard-eyed expression that made her stomach feel strange and tight.

  “Well, then.” Della wet her lips. She didn’t feel right about shutting her door in his face. “Until later.” She eased her door toward shut, wishing he would do the same. When there was only an inch of space left, she peeked and discovered he had closed his side. Good. Really, there was no need to open the doors again. Except . . .

  She opened her door and rapped on his. Immediately it opened, startling her. He’d removed his jacket and stood before her in his shirt and waistcoat. “I just . . . I thought I’d take a little nap. Would you knock on this door in an hour? I’d appreciate it. I don’t want to oversleep.”

  Cameron cleared his throat. “I’d be happy to.”

  “Thank you.” She gave him a bright, false smile and closed the door before she could think about who closed whose door first.

  Standing before the bureau mirror, she removed her hat and glanced at the connecting door in the glass. Should she lock her side? But that would imply a lack of trust. But if her trust was well placed, then he would never discover that she had locked her side. But if she truly trusted him to act as a gentleman, then there was no need to even consider locking the door.

  “Sometimes you are a very silly woman,” she murmured as she stripped off her traveling clothes and climbed into bed with a deep sigh of comfort and pleasure.

  If James Cameron could not be trusted, then no man on earth could be trusted. Della’s eyes popped open, and she sat up in bed to stare at the connecting door.

  Cameron would never walk through that door.

  He was a man of honor and integrity. Nothing could induce him to walk through the connecting door with impropriety on his mind. Secretly disappointed, Della fell asleep thinking about lost opportunities.

  It was the damnedest thing. There might as well have been nothing in the room except the connecting door.

  Cameron tried taking care of some correspondence, but every few minutes he paused with the pen in his hand, raised his head and looked at the door, half expecting, hoping, that Della would knock again. Next, he plumped the pillows and laid on top of the bed and tried to read. But he’d read a few paragraphs, glance up at the door, wait, then read the same paragraphs again before he looked up again. Eventually he made a disgusted sound and tossed the book aside.

  It was a mystery why the connecting door had assumed such importance and why it seemed such a source of temptation.

  There weren’t many things that Della could be doing behind that door that he hadn’t seen her do at dozens of campsites. He knew she went to sleep with her face planted in the pillow, then turned on her side as she drifted into deeper sleep. He’d heard the soft, gentle sound of her sleeping breath, almost a ladylike snore.

  He knew the erotic sight of her lifted arms, brushing out her hair at the end of the day. The sight of long, nimble fingers plaiting a braid.

  He’d watched her wash her face and throat, had tried not to stare at laundered unmentionables hanging on low brush to dry.

  He had seen her kick off her boots at the end of the day and wiggle her toes with a sigh of pleasure.

  He knew the lines of her body in every stance and posture.

  After a long moment of scowling at the connecting door, he thrust his arms into his jacket and pushed his hat on his head. He’d wait in the bar downstairs until it was time to wake her. And he would try like hell not to think about what a long night it was going to be, lying here in the dark staring at the connecting door and thinking about miracles.

  Swearing under his breath, he went out the hallway door.

  Cameron’s knock woke her. But when she opened the door on her side, his door was already closed again. That was fine. It was probably best not to be seen flushed with sleep and awkwardly positioned so he wouldn’t see her shimmy and drawers.

  After yawning and stretching, Della went through her trunk and laid out what she would wear to supper, a winter suit in gray wool trimmed with blue-and-gray paisley. In Two Creeks, she would have worn this suit to a potluck supper in the church basement if she’d been of a mind to attend such a function, which she seldom was.

  She’d eaten out more often in the weeks with Cameron than she had in the ten years preceding his arrival.

  “My life has changed completely since you came riding up my driveway,” she said once they were seated in a modest restaurant a block from the River Manse. “Sometimes I pinch myself to make sure I’m awake and not dreaming all this.”

  Cameron smiled and buttered a roll. “It’s interesting that you’d say that. Earlier today I was remembering you washing out your stockings in a muddy water hole no larger than a dishpan. There were some times out there on the plains when I imagine you wished you were dreaming.”

  “Once or twice,” she conceded. “But not often. Back on the farm, I used to wake and just lie there in bed trying to think of a reason to get up.” She straightened her silverware. “That’s why I kept animals. So I’d have to get out of bed and feed them.”

  Since Cameron had come into her life, she’d been eager to jump up and discover what the new day would bring. It was like she was a different person. Because of him.

  She raised her head and looked at a stubborn chin she well knew. And a mouth she dreamed about. Gazed into eyes that could turn as cold as a winter lake, or move across her cheek and throat as gently as a caress.

  “This journey is almost over, isn’t it?” she whispered.

  “It has been a privilege to be your escort.”

  Sudden, unexplainable tears stung her eyes, and she lowered her head, not speaking again until they had eaten and the waiter placed coffee and pie before them.

  “After I’ve seen Claire, and maybe I’ve spoken to her . . . when it’s time to leave her again . . .”

  “Then you’ll return to Santa Fe.” He pushed the pie and coffee away. “I’ll hire someone to take you back to Two Creeks if that’s what you want.”

  “I don’t have a choice. Where else would I go?” She cleared her throat. “You won’t take me back to the farm?”

  “No.”

  “I know,” she said with a faint smile. “You don’t explain yourself. But I wish you would.” She couldn’t imagine making a campsite with anyone but Cameron. They had a routine, they worked well together. They knew when to talk and when to enjoy the silence. Knew when to
offer each other company or solitude. She didn’t want to make the long ride with a stranger.

  “Cameron?” She swallowed the tears that had receded only as far as her tight throat. “When this is over—will I ever see you again?”

  He turned his head and looked out the window at the conveyances passing in the street, and Della knew the answer was no. There were things she didn’t understand, she thought, frustrated.

  She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. “I think I’ve had a headache since we left Santa Fe.”

  And dreams. There was the hearse dream, and anxiety dreams where something terrible was about to befall her if she didn’t run or swim or fly faster. Dreams set on the Wards’ plantation, dreams where she wandered on a battlefield or among rows and rows of gravestones, nightmares about the pumpkins and baby blossoms.

  “You said that I’ll return to Santa Fe. What about you? What are your plans?”

  A veil dropped over his gaze and she knew this was another question he would evade, but she didn’t understand why.

  “We’ll talk about it when the time comes,” he said when she refused to say another word until he answered. When she still didn’t speak, he frowned. “If something happens that prevents me from accompanying you back to Santa Fe, surely you know that I’ll arrange an escort to see you safely home.”

  “What could happen that would prevent you from accompanying me?” She leveled a steady gaze on his growing discomfort.

  “All in good time,” he said finally.

  “This is a good time.”

  “No, Della.”

  The finality in his voice underscored the cold, hard expression that she’d seen him wear when they encountered strangers. Most people stared and then backed away.

  Since she didn’t view Cameron as icy, hard, or unapproachable, she tended to forget that was how the rest of the world saw him and that was how he wanted it. This magnificent male animal treated her with care and gentleness, but he could be quick and deadly.