“Yes. I thought it was lovely.”
“I’m sure she thought it was. She made it. Julia has a kiln behind her house. She makes pottery, and I sell some pieces in my store and ship some to Mr. Johnson’s old friend in Fort Worth.”
“She didn’t say a word,” Amelia said, laughing.
“It was very kind of you to give it to her just the same,” he said quietly.
“She’s a lovely woman. I plan to visit her again before I leave. I’m certain I shall be here for several weeks at least.” She let out a sigh. “I did mean to ask you if you requested a reply from my brother so that I at least know he received the telegram.”
“I did. Because there’s no office in Small Fork, it will come in the mail. We get mail on Tuesdays and Fridays when the train runs.”
“Oh, bother. I could have an answer sitting there and not know it.”
“Is it so bad here then?”
“Yes,” she said grumpily, then laughed. “I know you must think I’m extremely ungrateful, but I do wish I could simply blink my eyes and be home.”
Just then, they heard Agatha calling for Boone.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to talk to Agatha and try to get her to convince Dulce to come back. Once I get the money my brother is sending, I’m certain I’ll be able to pay her quite handsomely. I do feel awful about forcing you from your home.”
Twenty minutes later, Amelia was feeling nothing but pure frustration.
“She won’t come back,” Agatha said. “She told me so herself. Not for all the tea in China.”
“But why?”
Amelia had asked before, but Agatha had pressed her mouth closed.
“She doesn’t like me,” Amelia guessed.
Agatha sighed. “It’s not you, honey. Dulce don’t like nobody telling her what to do. You’re used to people listening to you, and Dulce is used to not listening to a soul.”
Amelia looked helplessly at Boone, who shrugged, his only contribution to the conversation. “I hate to force Boone from his own home, but he won’t let me stay at the hotel.”
“That’s no place for you,” Agatha said, nearly repeating what Boone had told her.
“I don’t mind staying at the hotel. George owes me for the time I sewed him up, so I’m not even paying.”
“You can hardly call the place a hotel. I’ll have you stay with me before you go there,” Agatha said.
Boone stared at the older woman, completely surprised by her unexpected generosity. Agatha had a tiny house; it wasn’t a house that could easily accommodate a guest. Where would she put Amelia—on the kitchen table?
“You’re making the hotel seem rather intriguing, you two,” Amelia said.
“It’s got rats,” Agatha blurted out. “I didn’t want to say anything and spread rumors about the place. I wouldn’t want George to know I’ve been talking bad. But, that’s it. Rats.”
Amelia wrinkled her nose. “Rats? Out here?”
“Big ones. I saw a real big one there just yesterday,” Agatha said, and then it dawned on Boone exactly what she was saying.
Carson was back in town.
Chapter 8
“What are you doing back here?” Boone said after finding his younger brother knocking back a whiskey.
“Drinkin’,” Carson said with a careless grin. By the looks of him, it wasn’t his first whiskey of the day, and it was barely noon. Carson’s eyes were more than bloodshot. He had the look of a man who’d given up entirely, with hair a greasy mass hanging far below his shoulders, and a scraggly beard that should have been scraped off his face weeks ago. Give him a haircut and he would have looked exactly like their old man not long before he’d puked blood all over the town’s main street and died. It made the bile in Boone’s stomach churn to see him looking so much like their father.
“You look like hell,” Boone said, gazing at his brother. He was twenty-four years old but looked far older.
In answer, Carson reached into his pants pocket, digging deep, and took out a wad of cash, throwing it to Boone carelessly. “Thanks for the loan.”
Boone gave Carson a hard stare before looking down at the bundle of money in his hand. “What did you do, rob a bank?”
“Haven’t sunk that low yet, big brother.” He was still grinning so Boone shook his head, exasperated with himself for not smashing Carson’s face and with Carson for using his considerable charm on him. No wonder women fell at his feet; he had a way of turning people’s rage into bewildered acceptance in a few seconds, even when he looked not much better than something you scraped off your boot. “Turns out, Fort Worth’s full of people who like to gamble and lose.”
Boone pulled back a beat-up wooden chair and sat next to his brother, laying his hands flat on the table. “She’s still here, you know.”
“That’s why I’m here and not across the street. She waiting for me to come back?”
“She’s waiting for her brother to send her money so she can leave as fast as possible. Apparently her maid helped herself to Miss Wellesley’s cash.” Boone held up the money. “This might help her on her way.”
Carson emptied the bottle into his glass and took another long pull, frowning as the last drop splashed into his glass. “I’m real sorry for what I done to that girl. You probably won’t believe me.”
“I know you’re sorry she showed up here. I know you’re sorry you’re stuck here waiting for her to leave.”
Carson stared into his drink. “Yeah. That’s about right.”
“She didn’t deserve what you did to her. I’m pretty sure she loved you, and thought you loved her.”
“Stupid girl.”
Boone would have smashed his fist into Carson’s face if he hadn’t detected an underlying sadness to that seemingly cruel answer. He wished Carson didn’t get to him, but he always had. Even when they were kids, all Carson had to do was look at him with his angel-blue eyes and Boone would do anything to protect him from their monster of a father.
“Make me understand, Carson,” Boone said, even though he suspected he knew why Carson did what he did. Carson was afraid he was like his father, that if he had a wife and kids, he’d beat them down until they either left or died.
“Can’t.”
“You sure as hell should try.”
Carson shrugged, then stared at his brother with those bloodshot eyes. He took another drink and placed the glass down hard. “Leave me the hell alone. I don’t have to listen to your shit. I wanted to fuck her and she wouldn’t let me,” he said, finally sounding as drunk as he no doubt was. “The end. And then she’s stupid enough to follow me halfway across the world without me askin’ her to, making me some kinda villain when all I was doin’ was trying to get a fancy piece of tail.”
“You’re disgusting.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you could get it up.” And then he grinned, almost begging Boone to hit him. God above knew Boone wanted to, could feel his fists curling and tightening, could feel the rage making the veins in his temples throb.
Boone shoved away from the table before he murdered his little brother.
“Run away, Boone. Goddamned coward.”
Boone stopped, closed his eyes, then continued walking out the door, the sound of his brother laughing drunkenly behind him.
Amelia took up a place in the mercantile where she could keep an eye on the hotel and watch the entrance. She knew what Agatha had been hinting at, that Carson was back and holed up in the hotel. Against her will, she allowed herself to imagine Carson, looking fine and clean, following behind Boone when he returned. He’d beg her forgiveness, promise never to leave her again, promise to make their lives happy. Even though she knew with absolute certainty that Carson was not the man she’d thought he was, she still allowed herself to dream, to escape for a time the pain of him discarding her.
It was what she did. A curse. She dreamed up things in her head that somehow turned into hope, and which nearly always ended with her feeling ridiculous. How ma
ny times had she done this to herself, set her dreams so high, so beautiful, that they could never come true?
She told herself Carson was a cad, a man who’d used her for a bit of distraction in England. And yet, when Boone emerged from the hotel alone, her eyes pricked with tears as if she’d really believed Carson would follow behind, hat in hand, ready to beg forgiveness.
Sometimes she just hated herself.
Before Boone came through the door, she watched him cross the street, his strides long and sure, his face set and angry. Apparently the confrontation had not gone well. She hurried to the back of the counter, pretending as if she was just waiting for a customer. The place was deserted most of the time, and other than that first day when nearly the entire town showed up to get a glimpse of her, they’d only had a handful of customers each day.
“How’s Carson?” Amelia asked when Boone returned.
He looked at her as if mildly surprised she’d figured out Carson was back, then took a deep breath. “Drunk.” He was angry.
“He thought I’d be gone, no doubt,” she said, using great effort to act as if she didn’t care whether Carson hoped she was gone or not.
“No doubt.” He began straightening shelves that didn’t need straightening, then seemed to make himself stop. “If you want to go home on the next train, I have the money to send you.”
As tempting as the offer was, and Lord knew it was tempting, Amelia knew she couldn’t ask Boone to part with so much money. It was clear to her that the mercantile wasn’t making money, and he certainly wasn’t getting rich from his practice.
“No, I couldn’t. But I thank you for the offer. No doubt my brother has received the telegram and is already sending the funds I need. He has an extremely efficient staff. They’ll know where he is even if I do not.”
“You don’t mind being stuck here?”
Amelia smiled. “Oh, I do mind. Very much. But I will use this opportunity to teach myself a lesson in impulsive behavior.”
“So, staying here is a punishment.”
“Yes, in a manner of speaking. If I ever consider acting so impulsively again, I shall only remember my time here and be dissuaded from that action.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “I think that was insulting to all Texans.”
“I didn’t mean it to be,” she said lightly. “It’s Texas I don’t care for, not Texans.”
“It’s the same.”
“Oh posh,” she said, waving a hand at him. “It isn’t the same. You, for example, are a very nice man who has been only kind to me. Well, mostly kind when you’re not insulting my intelligence.” She grinned at him when he scowled. Teasing Boone was nearly as much fun as teasing her brother.
“You have to admit, coming to Texas for Carson isn’t a sign of high intelligence.”
Amelia would have been insulted if it weren’t for the glint of humor she thought she detected in his eyes—and the painful fact that what he said was probably true. It wasn’t readily apparent that he was teasing her, but she was getting better at reading him.
“And it’s also probably not a sign of intelligence that I didn’t accept your offer for funds so that I could remove myself from your onerous presence as soon as physically possible.”
Goodness, he almost grinned. “Onerous, hmm?”
“Extremely.”
Amelia smiled at him. She couldn’t help herself, for it was clear he was trying quite hard not to smile himself.
Just then the bell tinkled on the door, and a man walked in looking harried. Amelia studied him curiously, because other than Boone, he was the only man she’d seen in town who was dressed like a gentleman.
“Afternoon, Jason.”
The man nodded. He was young and handsome, with slicked-back hair, a neat mustache, and sideburns that bracketed his strong jaw. He wore a blue jacket with a deep burgundy vest beneath, decorated with the fanciest buttons Amelia had seen since leaving England. In fact, the suit looked decidedly English.
When he spotted Amelia behind the counter, he came to an abrupt stop. “Ma’am,” he said, giving her the smallest of bows. Even that little gesture of respect made her homesick.
“Have you met Lady Amelia? She’s visiting from England.”
“No, but my wife…” He stopped speaking abruptly, as if he’d gotten something stuck in his throat. “Paula mentioned her.” He finished, looking miserable.
“How can I help you?” Boone asked, as if also aware that the man standing in front of them was suffering from some unknown ailment.
“It’s my wife,” he said, and Amelia thought the young man just might cry. “She’s left me. Or rather, she’s left Small Fork. I need to bring her back.”
“Sorry to hear your troubles,” Boone said cautiously.
“She hates it here,” Jason said, and Boone darted a look at Amelia.
“It’s a difficult place to live for women,” he said, his tone neutral and calm.
“She’s gone back to Fort Worth to her parents and wrote me…” He dug a letter out of his trouser pocket. “She’s not coming back. She says so right here. But I can’t leave. I’m the branch president here. My employers put great faith in me, and I cannot abandon my position.” He turned to Amelia. “You’re a woman; would you live here?”
“Not except under extreme duress,” she said frankly, and received a dark scowl for her honesty from Boone. “I’m only being honest. Why, there’s no school, no church even. Where would she shop? Or luncheon? There’s no theater, or even a town square to sit in. There are no trees, for goodness sakes.”
“We’ve got trees,” Boone said, interrupting her.
“I suppose I meant trees that offered shade from this incessant heat,” she said, and smiled just to irritate him. Then she turned to Mr. Brentwood. “Perhaps most difficult for your wife is that there are no young women she can relate to.”
“There’s Dulce,” Boone said, and she assumed that was his idea of a jest.
“I meant nice women with whom she could take afternoon tea,” she said, giving Boone a dark look because it appeared he was not taking Mr. Brentwood’s plight seriously. “Frankly, I’m surprised there’s even a bank,” Amelia said.
“It’s because of the ranchers. They petitioned for one after getting robbed a few times bringing their money to Hanover.” The man truly did look as if he was going to cry.
“What about the ranchers’ wives and their daughters? Surely not every man in this town is a bachelor.”
“They stay out on their ranches for the most part,” Jason said, shaking his head. “It’s a long trip into town, and they don’t come but when they need supplies.”
“You need to have something in this town that would be remotely attractive to a woman. A shop. A real restaurant. An opera house.” She wasn’t certain, but it almost sounded as if Boone snorted.
“Well, none of that’s going to happen in the next day or so, and I want my wife back,” Jason said, his frustration showing. “I came here to tell you that I’m shutting down the bank for a week so I can retrieve my wife and children. If you have any business to conduct, I’d appreciate if you could conduct it before the next train comes in.”
“As a matter of fact, I’ll be making a deposit tomorrow,” Boone said. “I won’t make the mistake of keeping my money here until Carson leaves.”
Jason darted a look at Amelia, and she felt her face heat with embarrassment. She wondered if everyone in town knew of her humiliation.
After Jason left, Boone closed up the store, pulling down a shade.
“I think I would die of boredom in a month if I had to live here,” Amelia said, completely unaware she was being extremely critical of the town where the man in front of her had lived all his life.
“Most people are too busy to get bored. Not too many pampered ladies ’round these parts,” he said, suddenly sounding nearly as Texan as Carson did, drawing out his words.
Amelia lifted her chin. “I daresay I don’t know what I could possibly t
o do pass the time.”
“Cooking. Laundry. Gardening. Cleaning. Women around here find it a blessing just to be able to have enough time to watch the sunset.”
“What a completely dreadful life they must lead,” she said. Even though she did, indeed, think it sounded dreadful, she’d said it aloud simply because she detected a large amount of censor from Boone. “Thank goodness I can return to my life of complete idleness.”
His lips curved. “You’re not there yet, miss. So I’d appreciate if it you could cook me up some supper.”
Amelia smiled slyly. The biggest punishment she could think of would be to make supper for Boone. “Only if you promise to eat it.” She lifted one delicate brow.
He let out a sigh. “I’ll cook. But you watch.”
Amelia clapped her hands and smiled. “I’m not really hungry yet. What are you making?”
“Chili. And it won’t be ready for another two hours.”
She furrowed her brow.
“You’ll like it. Real Texas food, though I’m not the best ’round here at making it.”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“That’s because you’ve never been in Texas. It’s the only place you can find it, to my knowledge.”
She wrinkled her nose. “It doesn’t have rattlesnakes in it, does it?”
Boone chuckled and walked back toward the kitchen. “No. Beef, onions, and enough spice to grow hair on your chest.”
At her alarmed look, Boone laughed again. Goodness, she wished she was better at making him laugh. He looked completely lovely at that moment.
“I’ll go easy on the spice. We can have rattlesnake tomorrow.”
He didn’t appear to be joking. “People don’t really eat snake, do they?”
“Of course. But you have to make sure you cook it enough to get the poison out.”
Amelia laughed uncertainly. “You’re telling tales,” she said, feeling foolish for believing him.
He grinned. “People do eat rattlers. If you like chicken, you’ll like rattler.”
Amelia wrinkled her nose and shook her head. “I don’t think it could possibly taste anything like chicken. But I suppose I could try it. I seem to be quite adventurous lately.”
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