The Men of Pride County: The Pretender

by West, Rosalyn

  Garnet nodded. How well she understood that sentiment. Losing a loved one, losing one’s history and identity—those were much worse. Allowing a bruised heart to encourage a fit of retribution, could that be any better?

  “My dear, are you all right?” Hannah coaxed, with a concern that only deepened her despair. “You seem so low of spirits this morning.”

  “This isn’t how I expected it to be, is all,” she admitted with complete honesty. “I fit like a square peg in a rounded hole.”

  “It’s not apparent to anyone but you.” When she saw that claim had failed to lessen the younger woman’s woeful look, she added, “What can I do to help?”

  Her sincerity overwhelmed Garnet to the point of weeping. But she held on to that last scrap of dignity to confess, “I don’t believe anyone can perform the miracle of transforming a Cumberland country girl into bluegrass belle. I’ve put on the outside affectations, but I’ve no knowledge of what’s required. Monty wants me to give a grand party.” Her laugh was fragile with inadequacy. “I’ve never entertained more than one person at a time and fear I’ll shame him and this house most disgracefully.”

  Hannah’s arm banded her easily. “Is that all that has you bothered? I can help with that, if you’d like me to. I’ve prepared a daughter for society, and there’s no great mystery there. It’s all a bluff, you see, learning to hide your true feelings behind a smile and a show of manners.”

  “Really?” Garnet’s tone quivered with hope. “You’d help me?”

  “Of course, my dear. Sinclair Manor is known for its hospitality, and you will do it proud.”

  Measuring out lengths of bird’s-eye for diapers, toting strong-smelling onion starts to the back of one-horse carts, and dipping green coffee beans a pound at a time out of the Brazilian jute bags wasn’t the future Deacon had envisioned for himself.

  It wasn’t so much the embarrassment of his lowered situation. Not one of his customers treated him with a fraction less respect than he’d known as the master of his estate because he refused to act any less the man. No citizen of Pride was going to see him humbled in word or spirit. He had too much breeding for that. And he had too much intensified training to be selling plows to cut the land rather than directing where those cuts should be made upon acres of his own.

  He was a Sinclair, carrying the expectations of all those long dead and buried Sinclairs, men who’d forged their own way and controlled their own destinies. Not men who sold turpentine to combat rheumatism. It was the disappointment of all those generations that weighed heavily upon him. Behind it, he could hear his father’s firm dictates: “You were made for better things than this, Deacon. Don’t disgrace me.”

  What had he done all his life but try to escape that claim?

  And now some sly-eyed stranger on Tyler Fairfax’s say-so was making it impossible.

  He thanked the dressmaker, Myrna Bishop, for the small sackful of sewing notions she’d purchased and nodded that he’d relay her best wishes to his mother and sister. As he put her coin in the till, he studied the scant pieces of change wryly. At this rate, his commission on sales would earn him a handful of Sinclair dirt every six months.

  “A sad state of affairs, eh, Mr. Sinclair?”

  He sighed as Herschel added two pennies. “There must be a way to increase our profits.”

  “There’s the space overhead dat sits empty. If you could find someone to let the upstairs—”

  “Excuse me.” Myrna Bishop returned to the counter. Deacon hoped it wasn’t to get her money back. “Did I hear you say you had space for rent?”

  “The whole second floor. Do you know anyone who might be interested, Mrs. Bishop?” He refused to give his optimism a free hand until he had rent money in it.

  “My niece from Mobile is coming to stay with me. She lost her husband and is planning to start a millinery business. She’d talked of moving on to Louisville, but there’s no reason she couldn’t set up right here, with family close by.”

  “When she arrives, have her come talk to me. I’m sure we can make some mutually beneficial arrangement.”

  Myrna gave Deacon an appreciative once-over, seeing him in a new light, then smiled. “Perhaps you could, at that.”

  It didn’t take Roscoe Skinner long to make his authority clear in Pride. By afternoon, he was in the store with several of the Manor’s new sharecroppers, working out appalling terms of interest for liens against their crops to come. Once they’d determined the profit to be made off the square plots of land and figured a weighty amount to be taken off the top, the paltry remains were divided down into monthly allotments of credit redeemable at the mercantile for all the necessities of their meager lives.

  New to these dealings, Deacon stood back and watched Herschel hammer out a tough but fair arrangement on behalf of the store. It was Skinner who tightened the financial noose almost to strangling those who would work the land. They cast woebegone looks up at Deacon, as if pleading with him to intercede. They must have known he was powerless, but those looks haunted him just the same. Had it been his land, he would never have drained them beyond the point of living comfortably to the mere grimness of existing. That was no way for a man to stand with pride in front of his family.

  Skinner, with his broad, blameless smile and his ruthless manipulating of unfortunate circumstance, was the perfect negotiator. He’d leave the tenants frustrated with their lot, pinning their dissatisfaction erroneously upon the store or the Priors. Unless the Priors had set the terms of his dealings.

  Which was another thing altogether.

  Garnet herself arrived close to closing, just as Skinner wrung the final juice of independence from the last sharecropper of the day. He greeted her with an ingratiating bow and the presentation of his ledger.

  “Feast your eyes on them figures, Mrs. Prior, and tell me I ain’t done a good day’s work.”

  While she was tallying up his mathematics, he was admiring another sort of figure: the one sweetly encased in turquoise satin.

  Deacon busied himself counting up the day’s receipts, his jaw locked, his fierce glare cast downward. Where had Fairfax found this particular polecat? Or had they just naturally scented one another out under the same dark porch?

  “My,” Garnet murmured. “This speaks of an impressive profit. The farmers were agreeable to the terms?”

  “Oh, yes, ma’am.”

  Agree or starve. Deacon started counting over again, trying to concentrate on what he was doing instead of what Skinner was doing with his roving gaze.

  “And this is legal?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Set up by our government, ma’am, to get the farmers back on their feet.”

  Knock the feet out from under them, was more like it.

  “I’m ready to close up, Mrs. Prior,” Deacon announced, slamming the cash drawer to punctuate his claim.

  “If you’d wait just a moment, Mr. Sinclair, I’d like a word with you. Have Mr. Rosen file these documents, Mr. Skinner. And yes,” she added almost reluctantly, “you’ve done a good day’s work.”

  “Thank you, ma’am. Kind of you to say so.” With a bobbing bow, he was quick to rejoin Herschel in the back room to finalize the terms in the store’s bookkeeping records.

  When they were alone, Garnet demanded, “You have been glowering like a lion ever since I arrived. Is there a problem, Mr. Sinclair?”

  “You know the problem. We’ve already discussed it, remember?”

  “Refresh my memory.”

  “Fairfax is behind that man’s employment. Whom do you think he’s loyal to?”

  “Doesn’t loyalty go to the highest bidder, to your best experience? Skinner looks to make a tidy fortune off his dealings.”

  “His thievery, you mean.”

  “What he’s doing isn’t legal?” Concern puckered her brow.

  “Legal but immoral.”

  Relieved, she countered, “An odd judgment for you to be making, sir.”

  “He doesn’t care about those
poor people scratching a living out of the dirt. The terms he’s forced them to take will swallow them whole.”

  “And that bothers you, does it?” Her black eyes snapped in angry challenge. “Since when does the welfare of some farmer concern the mighty Deacon Sinclair? Why do you care what they suffer, as long as you receive your cut of the proceeds? Your concern is as false as your warnings, sir. Keep them to yourself in the future. Good day.”

  As she stormed out, Deacon ground his teeth on a particularly odd truth.

  He did care.

  He did care what happened to the people of Pride. A new revelation for someone raised to contain his interests to within his own property lines.

  “How goes it, Mr. Skinner? Are they treating you well out at the Manor?”

  Roscoe joined Tyler Fairfax on the porch of his family’s home. For all their wealth, the property was in a shabby state of disrepair. Rather like Tyler himself. He was draped in one of the dusty iron chairs, as rumpled as an old bedsheet and reeking of his family’s product. A large tumbler dangled from one hand with a single swallow remaining. Despite his negligent appearance, the sharpness of his gaze contrasted with his obvious drunkenness.

  Roscoe eased himself down on the top step and allowed a pleased smile to spread. “Took me in like family and opened their ledgers wide.”

  Tyler laughed and sucked up the last of his bourbon. “Told you, didn’t I? You keep your eyes and your ears open and you let me know what our dear friends at the Manor are up to. It’s important that they trust you.”

  “I don’t see a problem with the old man, but Sinclair—he’s another matter.”

  For an instant, Tyler’s amiable expression changed, twisting into something dangerous. “Sinclair has always been another matter. Don’t you underestimate him. The man is as deadly as a rattler, and he’ll strike if you force him into a coil.”

  “I ain’t afraid of him.”

  “Then you’re a fool.”

  Roscoe let his own mask slip for a moment. His black eyes glittered with lethal purpose. “Don’t call me that, or you’ll find out that Sinclair ain’t the only dangerous man around here.”

  Their stares locked for a long minute, then Tyler turned back to his empty glass with a chuckle. “Maybe you are his match. That’s why I sent for you. You had no problem playing both sides for your own benefit during the war and we both reaped handsome rewards due to your lack of … conscience. There’s money to be made here, Roscoe. And it might as well be ours.”

  Skinner smiled and the oily sheen disappeared from his gaze. “I couldn’t agree with you more.”

  “Get the old goat to lean on you for advice, then I’ll tell you what to whisper in his ear.”

  “What you got in mind, Fairfax?”

  Tyler grinned. “Don’t trouble yourself with my plans, Roscoe. You do what I tell you and you’ll be a rich man.”

  Roscoe shrugged and gained his feet. He wasn’t all that interested in Tyler’s goals, anyway.

  He’d pretend to work for Fairfax just as he pretended to work for Prior. He’d collect double pay, which he didn’t mind doing, and he’d play both sides with equal indifference. It wasn’t the money that mattered, nor did he care about the small-town politics in Pride. He had his own agenda concerning Deacon Sinclair. And to that end, he would act out the expected roles. After all, that was what he and Deacon had been taught to do during the war. And it was time Sinclair learned that he was just a little bit better at it.

  “I’ll keep you posted, Fairfax.”

  “You do that, Roscoe. You do that.”

  Tyler leaned back and watched the man climb aboard his blooded stallion and rein it away. Roscoe Skinner wasn’t the type you trusted with your secrets or your intentions, but Tyler knew he’d get his money’s worth. Skinner would finish what he’d started, but it was wise to remember that he always had more than one iron glowing in the fire. Having been burned once by impulsive behavior, Tyler had no desire to feel the flame again. He was studying the disfiguring scars on his hands for a long brooding moment, then yelled, “Tilly, fetch me another bottle.”

  The movement at the door brought his head around in a leisurely loll, but it wasn’t his family’s maid Matilda. His insides seized up, the liquor roiling in an uneasy tide.

  “Daddy, you shouldn’t be up.”

  Knowing his son’s concern was as false as his smile, Cole Fairfax ignored both to wheeze, “What scheme you got cookin’, boy?”

  “Nothin’, Daddy.”

  Cole’s cane struck the doorjamb. At the sound, Tyler leapt from his indolent slouch in the chair to a defensive stance.

  “Don’t lie to me, boy. I can always tell when you’re lying, you little cur. Now what mischief are you makin’?”

  “Just playin’ at politics, Daddy. Seein’ to our best interests, as always.”

  Cole made a disgusted sound. “You gotta have some kind of character and seriousness to politic, boy, and you got neither. You’d best tend our business here and leave the rest to them that are suited ‘fore you go doing something stupid that’ll cost us money.”

  “I’m not risking anything of ours, Daddy.”

  “Everything with you is a bad risk, whelp. You quit your playin’ and get down to some hard facts. I’m dying, boy.”

  Tyler’s expression never altered from its fixed glaze of caution. But in the flicker of his eyes was the question “When?”

  Cole leaned against his cane, struggling for air and with his loathing for the one he depended upon. “This will all be yours, boy, and you’d better start takin’ that serious or I’ll leave it all to charity and you’ll have to learn how to make a livin’ off your own misbegotten talents.”

  “I’m takin’ care of things just fine, Daddy. You can trust me—”

  “Trust you?” That bellow cost him long minutes of painful coughing. Finally, he concluded with a raspy chuckle. “I’d sooner put a serpent to my breast. I got my eye on you, boy, and you won’t betray me like your faithless mother did, you hear?”

  Tyler waited for the sound of his father’s halting steps to carry the wasted figure back into his parlor lair, for the scent of sickness and the shivery sense of fear to abate before he took a deep, cleansing breath.

  “You old bastard, you got no idea what I’m capable of. But you’ll find out,” he promised. “And won’t you be surprised. You’ll all be surprised.”

  Chapter 15

  Within the week, replies to the Priors’ evening party began streaming in. Staring at the stack of affirmatives, Garnet felt panic press upon her. This would be her proving ground, and these people her judges. They were attending not out of friendship or respect, but because of curiosity.

  They all wanted to see who had ousted Pride’s premier family. And all hoped to watch fireworks as they appeared under the same roof.

  She would be scrutinized, categorized, and picked apart. Would any of them be fooled by the bluff she was learning to play under Hannah’s tutelage? Or would they all see exactly what she was—a backwoods girl who was buying her way into their circles with money she hadn’t earned?

  Now she understood Deacon a little better. This was the playacting he had been called to do in the service of the South. Only he was a smooth professional, and she an amateur.

  Beneath her determination to succeed was the remembered truth that Deacon had surrendered up his first love because his family and peers found her unacceptable. If she wanted to be a part of his life, either directly or on the periphery, she would have to win over not just the tenderhearted Hannah, but his suspicious sister and the town’s elite. Once that task was accomplished, her only hurdle was Deacon himself.

  Monty was right: she did love him. He continually impressed her with glimmers of humanity that seemed to surprise him as much as those around him. He was maturing from isolated aristocrat to a caring member of a community. And as uncomfortable as he was with the progression, he wore it well. A decent man lurked beneath his surface indifferenc
e. That was the man she’d fallen in love with and she was beginning to suspect that he was more that man than the coldly motivated spy who chose duty over emotional involvement.

  Clutching at all she’d learned to steady her quaking knees and welcoming smile, Garnet stood in the parlor at nine o’clock to receive her guests, and for the next hour, bowed and smiled and struggled to remember the faces and names of the endless parade of Pride citizens come to shine in their dressy best. In a show of support that puzzled and invited whispering, Hannah Sinclair was often at her side, her hand lightly on Garnet’s elbow in a show of silent approval—almost as if she were bringing the young woman out into Pride society under her wing.

  And the most puzzled of all was her son.

  Deacon stood apart from the guests out of habit, and from that separate stand was able to observe the happenings dispassionately. He tried not to think about the last elaborate affair under the Manor’s roof. His mother and father had been the ones to receive the guests. His father, in a full dress uniform that had yet to see the wear of battle, was a handsome sentinel at his mother’s side.

  Patrice had been a vivacious girl with the county’s blades hovering around her. That night, she’d announced her engagement to Jonah Glendower, Reeve Garrett’s half-brother. It was his father’s triumphant moment: his daughter set to wed in what he considered a prime match between the area’s most powerful families. He’d been proud and content. After the guests had gone he drew Deacon aside to pour modest glasses of bourbon and toast the future of the Sinclair name. Then he’d taken Deacon’s vow that his son would carry on in the family tradition if he didn’t return from the supposedly brief confrontation with the North. Deacon gave his oath with the same solemness with which his father had surrendered his life.

  Thank God his father had never seen him break it.

  “A lot’s changed since then.”

  The sound of his sister’s voice and the gentle touch of her hand on his arm startled Deacon from his ruminations.

  “Everything’s changed,” he amended, before looking down at her. Heavy with Reeve’s child, she was no longer that flighty girl who’d bedeviled him when they were children. He liked the sensible woman his sister had become, and begrudgingly he admired her husband for his ability to protect her and make her happy.