Her Bodyguard

by Geralyn Dawson

  Mari picked up her pace, her worry escalating with each second that ticked by. Maybe this was the reason for her father’s apprehension. Maybe her sister was in danger of true ruination. You’re too young, Kat.

  “I knew she was cooking up trouble,” Mari said as they approached the theater doors. “I didn’t think it could be anything too serious. It’s not like me to be that wrong. I usually have a hint.”

  “Don’t borrow trouble,” Luke advised, opening the door. “She might have better sense, or he might be another man entirely.”

  At first glance the dimly lit theater appeared empty, but as they moved down the aisle, Mari spied a thin line of light shining beneath the heavy red velvet stage curtain trimmed with gold tassels. Her muscles tensed. They climbed the wooden steps at the right side of the stage. Luke held up his hand palm out, motioning her to halt as he peeked behind the curtain. Mari held her breath.

  He motioned for her to follow as he slipped behind the heavy veil.

  Please let me be in time. Mari ducked backstage, swiftly scanning the set, part of the current production of Taming of the Shrew. No one.

  Luke stood still, listening intently, then walked quietly stage left. A second later, Mari heard it, too—a rustle of petticoats and a soft, throaty moan.

  Her stomach sank and just for a moment, Mari bowed her head and closed her eyes. Oh, Kat.

  Then a sense of urgency overtook her, and she pushed her way past Luke and followed the sound around a castle wall made of wood. She stopped cold.

  A pair of flickering candlesticks sat atop a small square table and illuminated the couple on a red velvet chaise longue. Her younger sister reclined against the chair, her gown and underpinnings pushed off her shoulders and pooling at her waist. A man lay atop her, feasting upon her bare breasts.

  Once she caught her breath, Mari exclaimed, “Katrina McBride!”

  The couple on the bed scrambled. Rory rolled onto the floor and began fumbling with the buttons on his shirt. Kat yanked up her dress, shielding her breasts, and sat up. Her face blushed crimson. “Mari. What are you doing here?”

  “Me?” Mari braced her hands on her hips. “Me? What am I doing here? Isn’t the question what are you doing here?”

  “I think that answer is obvious.” Luke’s slow drawl had disappeared, replaced by a voice as hard and cold as the West Texas plains in February. “Hello, Rory.”

  The handsome young actor spit out an ugly curse. “Luke.”

  “You sorry son of a bitch,” Luke said, advancing. “Do you have a clue as to the devastation you left behind in Galveston? Do you know—”

  “Outside,” Rory said, cutting him off, shooting him a fierce, demanding look. “Let’s take it outside and allow the ladies a moment of privacy, shall we?”

  Privacy, ha. Mari wrinkled her nose. Rory Kelly was the one who wanted privacy. No telling what “devastation” he’d caused that he didn’t want publicly discussed. Not that Mari cared. “Luke, perhaps it would be best if you escorted him away from here before I lose my tenuous hold on my temper and shoot him right in the…”

  “Mari!” Kat protested while Luke grabbed the scoundrel by the back of the neck and yanked him to his feet. After the men disappeared out an exit door that led to the alley behind the theater, Mari drew a deep breath and tried to calm her nerves.

  “How dare you!” Kat said, her expression mutinous as she yanked her bodice up and her skirts down.

  “Excuse me?”

  “How dare you follow me and spy on me? Invade my privacy.”

  “Privacy?” Mari said, incredulous. “This is a public place, Katrina. Anyone could have walked in here. Anyone. Mrs. Peters. Reverend Erickson. Papa. Kat, think about it If Papa had found you here like this, you’d be standing in front of a preacher repeating wedding vows this very moment.”

  Katrina’s chin came up. “And what would be the problem with that?”

  “Kat!”

  “Well?” She scrambled to her feet, blinking her eyes rapidly as she fought back tears. “Why not? Maybe a shotgun wedding wouldn’t be my first choice, but I’m beginning to think it’ll be my only choice. There isn’t a man in Fort Worth who’ll risk romance with me. Not since you went and ruined my chances.”

  Mari blinked. “Since I what?”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  “No, I don’t. I haven’t done anything to—”

  “Alex talked,” Kat boldly stated. “He told everyone that the reason he called off the wedding was because you are a cold fish, and that a man couldn’t light a spark inside you with a smithy’s furnace.”

  Mari sucked in a breath. Hurt was a cold spear to her heart. “Alex said that?”

  “He told his friends on the baseball team and word got around. He blamed it on the McBride blood and the curse, so now everyone thinks I’m as frigid as you are.”

  Frigid? Frigid!

  “Why did you have to go and tell him about the curse, Mari? You don’t even believe in it.”

  Frigid. Anger churned like milk into butter. Why, that sorry sack of wet sand! Just because she refused to anticipate their wedding vows, Alex had no right to spread such vicious gossip about her. Gossip that her younger sister obviously believed.

  Of course, her sister believed anything.

  Bitterness stung Mari’s tongue as she said, “I didn’t tell Alexander about the curse, Kat. You did. You told him the night of the Harvest Ball last fall when you got into the men’s punch.”

  “I don’t remember that.”

  “Of course not. You were drunk as a hoedown fiddler!”

  “Nevertheless,” Kat continued, “I wouldn’t be in this predicament if not for you, so don’t stand there acting all high-and-mighty on me. You may not want a husband, Miss High-and-Mighty Businesswoman, but I do. I want to be married and have a home and children. I don’t dream about running my own chocolate shop like you or teaching children how to read and write and do sums like Emma. I’m a woman, and I enjoy the way a man can make me feel. I won’t feel guilty because I’m not a dried-up old prune.”

  Like you. The unspoken words hung suspended in the air between them and wounded like an arrow. Mari reacted to the pain. “No, you should feel guilty because you’re acting like a harlot. I’m ashamed of you, Kat.”

  This time, Kat was the one who gasped.

  “How far have you allowed this to go?” Mari pressed on. “Have you given that scoundrel your virginity?”

  Katrina burst into tears, and Mari’s stomach sank to her knees. “Rory is not a scoundrel!”

  Oh, no.

  “He’s a talented actor who will be famous someday. I love him and he loves me and we’re going to be married. Soon. You just wait and see, Mari McBride. I’m going to be so happy. I’ll have a wonderful husband and wonderful children and a wonderful home and a wonderful life and you can just eat your words like that precious chocolate you sell.”

  Beyond the roaring in her ears, Mari detected the sound of a door opening, and she glanced over to see Luke Garrett and Rory Kelly standing in the doorway. In the thrall of her tirade, Kat remained oblivious to the fact they were no longer alone.

  “You’re ashamed of me?” she continued. “Well, I’m ashamed of you. You are a self-righteous, bitter old spinster, and you and your cold lonely heart deserve a cold lonely bed. Alexander Simpson did himself a favor by leaving you at the altar!”

  The fact that her sister had said those ugly things was bad enough, but knowing the two men witnessed it made Mari’s humiliation complete. She wanted to slink away and cry. Instead, she lifted her chin, squared her shoulders and said, “That’s it, Kat. I’m done trying to protect you. If this is what you want…well…best of luck to you.”

  “Luck?” Kat snapped as Mari turned to walk away. “What do you mean by that? You’re talking about the curse, aren’t you?”

  Attempting to depart with dignity, Mari nodded toward the men, doing her best to ignore the sympathetic look in the outlaw’s
eyes as Kat called, “Well, let me tell you this, Mari McBride. Rory and I will beat the bad luck. Our love is strong and true, just like Roslin said it needed to be. You just watch and see, Mari. You watch and see.”

  Mari knew she should keep her mouth shut and make her exit, but humiliation and hurt loosened her tongue. At the stage curtain, she paused and glanced back over her shoulder. “No, Kat. Your love is nothing more than lust that will burn itself out in a flash. I’m the intuitive one, remember. That’s what I see of your precious love. Dead, cold ashes.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “YOU BASTARD,” LUKE MUTTERED to Rory when Mari McBride’s proud, sad eyes shifted away and she hurried for the exit. “You must get a big charge out of causing women pain.”

  “You’re the one making me do this,” Rory murmured back.

  “Damn straight. You have responsibilities, and by God, I’m going to see that you live up to them.”

  The moment Mari McBride disappeared from sight, Kat McBride burst into tears, ran toward Rory and threw herself into his arms. Rory held the young woman tight, offering comfort. He stared over at Luke, his expression wordlessly asking What else can I do?

  Luke’s fingers itched to form a fist and pop him in the face.

  Kat sobbed against Rory’s shirt. “She hates me. My sister hates me. She said she’s ashamed of me.”

  “Shh, now, love.”

  Luke glared at Rory.

  “This is awful. It’s the worst thing. I wonder if she’ll tell. I don’t want her to tell. Papa will…oh, Rory. I said terrible things to her. I didn’t mean it. Truly I didn’t. I love Mari. She’s my sister. But she doesn’t understand. I love you, too.”

  Luke no longer wanted to punch Rory in the face, he wanted to pull his gun and shoot him. That poor girl. She didn’t deserve Rory’s kind of grief. Still, a sharp, clean cut healed the fastest.

  “The train leaves in half an hour,” he said to Rory. “Get it done.”

  Rory nodded and, shifting his hands on Kat’s shoulders, tenderly pushed her away. She lifted an anguished face toward him. He sighed and thumbed a tear off her cheek. “You are so beautiful.”

  “I love my family, Rory, but I want to be with you.”

  “I want to be with you, too.”

  “For God’s sake, Rory,” Luke said.

  The actor scowled at Luke, then led Kat to a chair placed near the chaise. “Please have a seat,” he asked gently. “There’s a few things I need to say.”

  Luke checked his pocket watch. Impatient as he was to be off, he recognized that Rory needed to let the girl down as gently as possible. Luke would give him five minutes but no more.

  Ever one to appreciate setting of a scene, always ready to play to an audience, Rory shrugged into his jacket, then shot his cuffs. He clasped his hands behind his back and leveled a solemn star upon the obviously anxious young woman. “You are a wonderful woman, Kat. You’re bright, you’re beautiful, you’re entertaining. You make me…happy.” He paused, frowned thoughtfully, then repeated, “Happy.”

  Kat blinked watery eyes. “You make me happy, too, Rory.”

  He cleared his throat. “This last month has been, well, it’s been wonderful. I love knowing you’re in the audience when I perform. You make me better, Kat, in many ways.”

  Luke folded his arms and scowled. Rory had always had a silver tongue with women, so he probably knew what he was doing. However, Luke thought he should get on to the leaving part.

  “You make me a more honest man,” he said, beginning to pace back and forth across the dull oak floorboards of the stage’s back space.

  Oh, brother.

  Rory picked up a prop, a silver-knobbed cane, and tapped it against the floor as he walked. “You make me a more sensitive man.”

  Luke folded his arms and took a couple steps back so he could lean against the doorjamb. What a load of sheep dung.

  “You make me more a more generous man.” Rory twirled the cane in a slow, showy circle.

  Luke couldn’t smother his snort at that. The one thing Rory didn’t need was more generosity where the ladies were concerned.

  “My dear Kat, being with you makes me the man I’ve always wanted to be.” Glancing at Luke, he added, “It’s true.”

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  “Rory?” Kat asked. “What is this all about?”

  Rory tapped the cane against the floorboard, once, twice, three times. “I’m afraid I must…I need to…” He stopped, dropped his chin to his chest and closed his eyes. “It’s all so difficult.”

  “Two more minutes,” Luke warned.

  Kat shifted anxiously in her seat. “Rory, you’re making me nervous.”

  “I’m rather nervous myself,” he murmured. “The idea of returning…” His voice trailed off.

  “Returning?” Kat’s eyes rounded. “Returning where? You’re not leaving Fort Worth, are you? You’re not leaving me?”

  Rory hesitated, fixed on the uneasy young woman. Following a long moment of silence, he slowly began to speak. “My situation has grown complicated, love. I am pursued by forces difficult to resist.”

  Kat turned to Luke. “Him? Rory, are you tangled up with outlaws?”

  Rory’s mouth twisted. “Am I tangled up with outlaws?” he repeated, walking toward Luke, tapping the cane against the floor as he approached. “Now there’s a question. What does the infamous outlaw Luke Garrett want with the likes of me?”

  Noting the faint edge in Rory’s voice, Luke went on guard. He straightened, flexed his fingers, watched the other man closely, paying special attention to the cane, a potential weapon. Not that he honestly believed Rory would resort to violence. That wasn’t his way. He’d lie, sneak, cheat and steal, but unless he’d changed dramatically in recent months, he avoided physical confrontation like the plague.

  “The answer is simple, my lovely Kat.” Rory swung the cane slowly back and forth. “Luke Garrett wants to send me…”

  Just being cautious, Luke reached to grab the end of the cane. Before he had a grip on the stick, Rory let go and the cane dropped to the ground. Luke bent to pick it up.

  He never saw the whiskey bottle until it crashed against his head.

  “Rory!” Kat squealed.

  Magician’s sleight-of-hand, Luke thought as his world went fuzzy and he dropped to his knees. I should have remembered.

  As if through a mist, he saw the young woman shove to her feet, her elbow brushing one of the candlesticks as she rose and rushed toward him. The burning candle teetered, fell to the ground, then rolled beneath the chaise. Luke tried to warn her and Rory, but his mouth didn’t seem to want to work.

  Everything went black.

  MARI BLENDED sugar and cocoa and cream for a living. She’d developed her own personal recipes for her chocolates’ cream fillings, using her Aunt Claire’s special flavoring, Magic, in many of them. She considered candy-making part science, part art. Baking oatmeal cookies was pure comfort.

  After the scene with Kat, she’d fled the Texas Spring Palace for her shop. There she fired up her oven, pulled out the butter, sugar and flour, and went to work. Blending the thick, heavy cookie dough with her favorite wooden spoon was just the physical work she needed.

  “Frigid,” she grumbled. “The next time I see Alexander Simpson I’ll teach him a whole new definition of the Curse of Clan McBride. Spreading such nonsense to his friends. How dare he!”

  It hurt. It hurt to know that she was being talked about in such a personal manner. It hurt to know that the good reputation she’d worked so hard to establish was being tarnished by ugly accusations. It hurt that the man she’d loved and intended to spend her life with, raise a family with, would do such a thing. It hurt that her sister would believe him.

  “She’s supposed to be on my side. She’s supposed to stand up for me. That’s what family does. That’s what the McBrides do.”

  That’s what the McBrides used to do. Ever since Casey’s death, it seemed as if the family was fallin
g apart. Emma was difficult to reach. Even tonight, dressed in yellow and out in public and obviously making an effort, grief wrapped Emma like a shroud and insulated her, isolated her, from her loved ones.

  Mari missed her.

  “Kat’s another story,” Mari muttered, giving her wooden spoon a whack against the side of the bowl. At the moment, she’d like to see her youngest sister take an extended trip somewhere far away. She could go visit their cousins, the Rosses, in Scotland. She could stay through the winter, a bitter cold Highland winter. “Maybe that would cool her lust-fevered blood.”

  Thinking along those lines, Kat would probably recommend Mari head for the Sahara Desert.

  “I don’t need a desert sun to warm me up.” Hadn’t her blood run plenty hot this very night while dancing with Luke Garrett?

  Luke Garrett. She wondered how he and Rory Kelly had crossed paths in the past. Something to do with money, she’d bet. A robbery? One of those legendary high-stakes poker games they have down in San Antonio? Maybe Rory once worked for Luke. She couldn’t imagine it being the other way around.

  If not money, then a woman. It wasn’t difficult to imagine a woman deserting Rory for the likes of Luke. Maybe she shouldn’t have left Kat alone with the two men. She’d jump from the frying pan into the fire.

  Mari wondered what it’d be like to play with that kind of fire. She wondered if Luke Garrett would tell all his outlaw friends that she was a cold fish. She wondered if he and all his outlaw friends had already heard that about her. Could she be as infamous in her own way as Luke Garrett was in his?

  “How humiliating.”

  Eyeing the cookie dough in her bowl, Mari imagined hearing the tinkle of her door chimes. She’d glance up to see Alexander Simpson walk into her shop, a penitent look on his face. She’d pick up the bowl—no, just scoop up a big wad of dough—and send it flying. It’d splat against his face in gooey, gummy wads. He’d drop to his knees and beg her forgiveness. He’d tell her—