Spirit of Love

by Duncan, Alice

  Ash still hadn’t offered a retort, and when she looked up wondering why he was so quiet, he was watching her leg avidly. She lifted her chin and went searching for the other garter, trying like the devil to ignore his heated gaze.

  He cleared his throat. “Listen, I’m sorry if I didn’t sound very romantic when I proposed, Georgina. It’s only that I’ve been married before, so it’s not like—well, you know.”

  She sat again and squinted at him through eyelids gone narrow with rage and hurt. “No, I’m sorry. I don’t know. I, for one, have never been married. However, I do recollect you telling me you’d been married before, and that it had been a ghastly mistake. And now you’re telling me that you’re willing to commit another ghastly mistake because you perceive that you have no alternative, although you really don’t want to.” She yanked on her stocking and tied the other garter.

  “No! Confound it, that’s not what I meant!”

  Shaking with fury and on the verge of tears, Georgina rose from the chair and glanced around for her shoes. She didn’t want to cry in front of this man and give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he had hurt her. “Isn’t it?”

  “No, it’s not. I don’t understand what your problem is, anyway. I asked you to marry me. Isn’t that what you females want? You torture a man until he gives in to his lust, and then you’ve got him hooked. Well, you’ve hooked me. Isn’t that enough for you?”

  She walked right up to Ash and looked him straight in the eye—well, almost straight in the eye. She had to crane her neck back a ways since he was so much taller than she was. “I want you to understand something, Ash. I don’t want there to be any mistake about it. Are you listening to me?”

  “I don’t see how I can avoid it,” he muttered grumpily.

  “Good. Then here it is. I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man on earth. I wouldn’t marry you if you held a gun to my head. I wouldn’t marry you if—”

  All at once, Georgina thought about her derringer. She glanced at the night table and didn’t see it. Immediately she knew Ash had done something underhanded with it. She glared back up, at him. “Where’s my gun, you fiend?”

  “Fiend? Now I’m a fiend?”

  Georgina wasn’t sure, because she hadn’t known him long, but she suspected he couldn’t look more exasperated than he did just then. His attitude only fueled her anger. In a way, she was grateful, because she no longer felt the least little bit like crying. “Yes. You’re a fiend. Now where’s my gun?”

  He huffed hard. “It’s in the drawer. I’ll get it.”

  She turned abruptly and headed for the night table. “Stay right there and finish dressing. I’ll get my own gun.”

  “Confound it, I don’t trust you with it.”

  She ran the last several steps to the night table in case he tried to beat her to it. “Well, now, isn’t that just too bad, because I got here first.”

  She turned and pointed the derringer at him for long enough to relish the look of worry on his face. Then she stuck it into her skirt pocket. “Don’t worry. I won’t shoot you. Not that you don’t deserve it.”

  “Why? Because I made love to you or because I asked you to marry me?”

  She sat on the bed and thought about his question for a few moments before she answered. Fortunately, she masked her thought processes by making a show out of tugging on her shoes. When she was finished with the right shoe, she looked over at him “What we did today bore no resemblance whatever to making love, Ash.”

  At least it didn’t on his part. Georgina didn’t want to think about it from her perspective for fear she’d start to cry and never be able to stop. “And if that was a question you asked me about the marriage part, I missed it entirely. It sounded like a statement or a command to me.”

  He rubbed a hand over his face. He was plainly as frustrated as all get-out. “Confound it, I’m sorry if I didn’t ask you properly!” He walked over and stood in front of her. “Will you please marry me? There. Is that better? Shall I get down on one knee? Is that what you want?”

  She wished she hadn’t put on her left shoe. She’d like to batter him with it. Instead, she smiled sweetly up at him. “No, Ash. That’s not better at all. It’s worse. And no, it’s not what I want.” She jumped up from the bed, saw her hat in a corner, and dashed over to fetch it. As she tied the ribbons, she said, “Now, if you please, take me back to town. My horse and buggy are still there, and I want to go home.”

  “I’m not going to let you drive home alone. Not now. You’re too upset to drive properly.”

  That might well be true, but Georgina would never admit it. “Drive me to town this minute, Ashley Barrett.”

  “No. What do you take me for, anyway? I’m not going to let you drive home alone.”

  “I’d rather not answer the part about what I take you for. And I’m perfectly capable of driving myself home alone.”

  “No. I’m taking you home.”

  She gaped at him. “Of all the high-handed men I’ve ever known in my life, you take the cake, do you know that? What, pray, is going to happen to my grandmother’s buggy and horse if you take me home?”

  “Go ahead. Call me all the names you want. I’m still taking you home. Then I’ll go back to town and get Maybelle’s buggy. Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to it.” He shot her a furious scowl. “Or you, either.”

  Something had already happened to Georgina today. She’d made love to a man for the first time, fallen head over heels in love with the wretched fellow, and had her heart broken. But she’d die before she told him any of that.

  “Fine,” she said, her voice as hard as marbles. “Take me home.”

  “Fine,” he said, his voice as hard as hers. “I will.”

  Neither one of them spoke a single syllable on the ride from Ash’s place to the Murphy farm.

  When he aimed the horse down the twin rows of pecans, he said in a voice that sounded like it hurt coming out, “You get on inside the house. I’ll go back to town and fetch Maybelle’s buggy.”

  Georgina didn’t even argue with him. She merely nodded. She couldn’t recall ever feeling as unhappy and hopeless as she felt just then.

  Her defiant attitude lasted until she’d stormed to the house, stomped up the steps, wrenched the door open, and slammed it behind her. Then, when she saw Vernice and Maybelle’s questioning glances from where they sat in the parlor, her composure collapsed like a burst balloon.

  She ran to her grandmother, flung herself onto her knees, and burst into tears. Oscar, who had been preening himself on the back of Maybelle’s chair, gave a yowl and leaped to the floor.

  Maybelle and Vernice exchanged a concerned glance, then Maybelle began stroking Georgina’s head softly. “It’s all right, girl. You go ahead and tell Granny Murphy all about it. Then we can decide how best to kill Ash Barrett.”

  Georgina wouldn’t have thought it possible before it happened, but, with her face still buried in the folds of her grandmother’s skirt, she laughed.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ash couldn’t believe it that Georgina’s stony attitude hadn’t softened one iota in the time it had taken them to travel from his home all the way back to the Murphy place. He’d sort of expected that she’d come to her senses before then, but no such luck. She wasn’t inclined to give up a good anger once it took hold, he reckoned. In that regard, she was not unlike her grandmother, dammit.

  He’d never seen anything like it. When he drew the buggy up to the porch, she didn’t even wait until he could help her out, but bounded down on her own. Then she flounced away from him as if she’d never even been kissed, much less bedded, and he could only scratch his head and watch her go, his heart behaving in a manner he’d never experienced before.

  His heart used to be a fairly reliable organ. Not today. Today it ached. It throbbed. It hurt like a son of a bitch. When Ash remembered the ecstasy he and Georgina had shared in his bedroom—before the prospect of marriage had driven all the happi
ness from his body—his undependable heart soared, like a hawk. Then it took to aching again. Dammit, his heart never used to give him any trouble. Well, except for Phoebe, but that was a long time ago, and he was older and wiser now.

  Pressing a hand to his wounded heart, he wondered if he had a touch of indigestion.

  He drove back to his house in a wicked temper. There he collected Shiloh, returned to town, tied his horse to the back of the Murphy buggy, drove the buggy to the Murphy place, and sat there, stewing and wondering what he should do next.

  Should he knock on the door and demand that Georgina marry him? Or should he quietly put the buggy in the barn, unharness the horse, brush him down, give him some grain, and leave?

  After a few gloomy moments, Ash decided to do the latter. If anyone inside the place wanted to talk to him—or holler at or shoot him—he’d be in the barn, and they could have at him with his blessing.

  No one did. The place might have been deserted, except that there was smoke coming from the kitchen chimney. They were cooking. They were good cooks, the Murphy-Witherspoon crew. He sighed despondently and wished he hadn’t remembered that aspect of domestic bliss. He faced the prospect of eating cold corn pone and fried bacon. The reality of his anticipated supper only deepened his already foul mood.

  Georgina hated his guts. He’d suspected as much for quite a while, but there could be no doubt about it now. He’d ruined any possibility of a truce between them.

  He’d blundered badly. Like a total fool, he’d, bedded her and then not gushed out a pile of slop regarding love and devotion and all that related hogwash, the way he’d done with Phoebe. He shuddered, remembering what a jackass he’d made of himself with his wife. Phoebe’d taken every ounce of love he had given her, trampled all over it, and then thrown it back in his face, along with her sincere loathing.

  Ash had never been so wrong about a person as he’d been with Phoebe. He wasn’t about to make the same mistake a second time. His pride wouldn’t let him.

  Of course, Georgina wasn’t Phoebe. He had to keep reminding himself of that. Hell, the first time Ash kissed Phoebe, she’d laughed coyly, as if she’d just won a prize, and he knew at that moment that she expected him to marry her.

  Not Georgina. In spite of himself, Ash grinned. Damned if she hadn’t gone to bed with him—and enjoyed herself, if he was any judge—and then refused his inelegant proposal of marriage. Ha! The woman had grit; he’d give her that.

  His grin soured. What he’d done was, he’d probably driven her right into the arms of one of her other suitors. One of those jackass bankers. What a horrible thought.

  Ash allowed himself to contemplate what he’d feel like it he were to see Georgina married to another man. His insides curdled as if they’d been pickled in vinegar.

  Georgina wailed, “I won’t marry him! I won’t!”

  “You just drink this tea and tell me all about it, honey. Don’t let what anyone else thinks make you do anything. Especially not something so important that it will affect the rest of your life. I did that and I not only hurt myself, but a whole lot of other people as well. I’ll stand by you, no matter what you decide.”

  “We both will,” Vernice said, her kindly voice as gentle and soothing as a summer breeze.

  Georgina sniffled and wiped her eyes on her grandmother’s apron. Since her knees had begun to ache, she pushed herself away from Maybelle and sat on the floor next to her chair. “Oh, Grandmother Murphy, I was so stupid.”

  “It’s never stupid to love someone, sweetie,” Maybelle said in the most affectionate tone Georgina had ever heard issue from her wrinkled lips.

  Oscar hissed at her, which made her feel as if the world might not be totally askew. When she lifted her head and saw Vernice, smiling tenderly at her and pouring out another cup of tea for herself, Georgina started crying again.

  “Oh, Aunt Vernice and Grandmother Murphy, you’ve been so wonderful to me. And this is how I’ve repaid your kindness! I’m so sorry!” Georgina buried her head in her hands.

  “Fiddlesticks!” Vernice’s voice was firm, which surprised Georgina. She was used to flutterings and palpitations from Vernice, not firmness. “You haven’t done a single thing to us, Georgina. If you’ve hurt anyone, it’s yourself, not us, but it’s not your fault. You’re upset, and that’s too bad, but it’s truly not your fault.”

  “Aye, child, dry your eyes. There’s nothin’ in this life worth crying those bitter tears over. “

  “As if you’d know anything about it,” Maybelle said to her dead lover’s ghost. “Get out of here. This is girl talk.”

  “Pisht, Maybelle. I’m fond of the girl.”

  “I don’t care if you are, Devlin! You’re a man and a rogue, and you have no business here!” Maybelle heaved a darning egg at him, and he vanished.

  Vernice shook her head. “It’s so disconcerting to have that man hovering about. You never know when he’ll pop up.”

  “If he turns up again today in this room, I’ll swat him like a fly.” Maybelle returned her attention to Georgina.

  “If you’d just tell the man what he wants to hear, Mother—”

  “Never!”

  Vernice, perceiving the steel in her mother’s answer, sighed and sipped her tea.

  “Pay Dev no mind, Georgina. He’s a man and an idiot and can’t possibly understand anything. So, tell your old grandmother what happened today that has you in such a fuss.”

  “Oh, Grandmother!” Georgina broke down in tears again, but this crying jag didn’t last very long. After blowing her nose and sniffling and wiping her eyes, she told Maybelle and Vernice exactly what had transpired at Ash Barrett’s house, leaving out the more salacious—and delicious—details. She expected Vernice to be shocked, but her aunt remained placidly darning stockings—she’d retrieved the darning egg—and only nodded sympathetically. During her confession, Georgina appreciated her territorial relatives more than she could ever express.

  When she came at last to the end of her recitation, she realized she was still sitting on the floor, leaning against her grandmother’s chair, and had started petting Oscar, who didn’t even scratch her for it. In fact, he was purring. She’d never heard the beast purr until this minute.

  She sniffled again. “So I refused him. He didn’t want to make the offer, you know.”

  Maybelle sighed. “I’m sure you’re right. That first wife of his was a piece of work.”

  Vernice tutted. “I fear Mother is correct, Georgina. I’m not surprised that Mr. Barrett doesn’t look upon marriage with favor. Phoebe was far from an ideal spouse for the poor man.” She sounded sad about it.

  “The poor man, my foot. He was an ass to marry her.” After a good, derisive snort, Maybelle said, “He’s a damned fool, though, to compare our Georgina here with that worthless Phoebe of his.”

  “Yes, that’s so,” Vernice agreed. “But you know what they say: once burned, twice shy.”

  “Fiddlesticks. The man’s an ass.”

  Georgina couldn’t have said it better herself.

  “You did the right thing, girl,” Maybelle went on. “He needs to know that women are often better off without husbands. Marriage isn’t the only worthwhile life for a female to pursue. Men! They’re such fools.”

  “I believe Mother is right about that, too, dear. It’s far better to remain a spinster than to marry the wrong man. I’ve seen such tragic things happen to women whose husbands aren’t good providers or who are unfaithful and mean. Or drink to excess.” She shook her head and looked somber.

  “That’s the truth,” Maybelle said firmly. “And you must know, too, that a woman gives up damned near everything when she marries, so it’s best not to marry at all unless you’re absolutely sure about the man”

  Vernice nodded her agreement. “I chose not to marry a man even though I cared for him, and I was right to reject him. He turned out to be a terrible drunkard.”

  “My goodness.” Georgina had never heard this tale about her au
nt’s former life.

  “Listen to her, Georgina. I remember it. Howard Phipps. He was a handsome devil, but he turned out to be a wastrel, and Vernice saw right through him when no one else did.”

  It was the first time Georgina had heard Maybelle say anything nice about her daughter. Georgina looked at the two of them, saw them smiling at each other, and realized how deeply the bond of love between them ran. She was touched.

  She was also feeling better to a degree, although something else had begun to plague her. She cleared her throat. Oscar hissed at her. She stuck her tongue out at him and continued petting him. She could have sworn he grinned at her. “There’s one thing, though . . .” She wasn’t sure how to phrase her concern.

  Maybelle took the matter out of her hands. “Don’t worry about it, Georgina. If there’s a baby, it will be perfectly welcome in this house.”

  “Oh!” cried Vernice, and clasped her hands to her bosom, darning egg and all, her face alight with happiness. “Wouldn’t that be perfect? A precious little baby!”

  Georgina blinked at her relatives, dumbfounded. “Er, you mean, you wouldn’t mind if I had a . . .” She couldn’t make herself say the word aloud. Bastard sounded so crude.

  “Nonsense! Nothing would make us happier. Would it, Vernice?”

  Vernice didn’t really have to answer her mother’s question, because her face told the story. She’d be ecstatic if Georgina were to have a baby, in or out of wedlock. Georgina felt her spirits rise slightly higher. Maybe her life wasn’t over yet after all.

  “And you never know,” Vernice went on. “He may come around. I’m sure he loves you, dear. I’ve seen the symptoms before.”