Buck struck a match and put it to the end of his cigar. He sucked in the flame, drew the smoke into his mouth and then slowly released it, expelling the smoke up to the stars. “We had a lot of reservations. But we always have room in the house for Gabe and a couple of guests. But if everything panned out, with all those guests here, somebody like you, dropping by like you did, might’ve ended up bunking in the barn with the livestock.”
He rested his cigar on the charger plate Birdie used to serve the shot glasses. He began to pour the whiskey and pass the glasses around one by one. After everyone was served, he leaned back, took a long, thoughtful draw on his cigar and pulled it out of his mouth to study it for a second or two. “Funny thing about those reservations,” he said to the glowing end of his cigar. “The Calveras made their reservation a year ago. Here, all at once, we received an avalanche of cancellations. Now we’ve no reservations for the summer at all.”
His eyes boring a hole in Cornell’s head, Buck stated, “That’s never happened before. Seems kind of odd, don’t you think? Make’s a fella suspicious something or someone got to our guests. Somehow, somebody, some low-life skunk, convinced them they shouldn’t come to the hot spring this year. But who’d want to do a thing like that, is what we have to ask ourselves. Why? Why would anyone want to do a thing like that?”
Buck missed Cornell’s mumbled response. He was distracted when Birdie, standing in the kitchen doorway, waggled her fingers above her curly head to catch Doreen’s attention.
Buck was familiar with the signal. The ladies were planning to slip off to enjoy the hot spring. He kept his mouth shut and let Van take charge of the discussion while he enjoyed watching the ladies try to make good their escape without disrupting the conversation.
Doreen rose, leaned down, and planted a kiss on Rafe’s cheek. Buck heard her murmured excuse. “I think I’ll go soothe away the cares of the day in the hot spring.”
“Edditha, Adella,” Doreen said to the young woman across from her then to her mother, “I hope you both will join us. I believe the girls are done with the supper dishes. They’re waiting for us to join them.”
Adella rose to her feet. “Gentlemen, you’ll have to excuse me. I, for one, have been waiting to partake of the hot spring ever since I read your brochure, Buck, and I intend to take advantage of your lovely pool every chance I can get.”
Buck grinned at her and nodded. “Nice to know someone read my brochure. Van thought them a waste of money.”
“Not at all,” she said, her hand sliding from his arm to his back and then to his shoulder as she walked around his chair. “So far you’ve lived up to all my expectations. The scenery—breathtaking, the food—sublime, the accommodations—charming, and the host and hostesses make one feel right at home just as your brochure promised.”
Van barely waited for the ladies to disappear into the kitchen before he took up where Buck left off. “We had thirty-two reservations. They all canceled,” he said, directing his statement at Cornell. “They all canceled within a few days of one another. Just lousy coincidence you think, like seven head of cattle dying all at once for no reason at all. Sure, a run of bad luck, and then, a miracle, you and your Pa come along with this deal to take rock out of the canyon and wave a wad of cash in front of our faces. You come along, giving us hope we might be able to stay afloat for a while longer, until the next run of bad luck, that is. Seems almost providential how your pa’s deal saved us from going under. And today you accidentally blast the wrong side of the canyon—one more coincidence, one more accident? I think we have to wonder what the hell is going on around here. How do you and your Pa figure into all of this happenstance—the cancellations, the cattle dying, everything, you blasting accidentally right where you were specifically instructed not to blast?”
Cornell set his empty shot glass on the table and tapped the ashes from his cigar over the railing of the porch into the dust. “I don’t see what the cancellations of your guests or a few head of cattle have to do with our contract for the rock in the canyon. The railroad needs rock. Pa means to supply rock. The orders I got gave specific instructions where to set those charges. I followed orders to the letter. It’s what I do.”
Van jumped on his statement, asking, “And your pa gave you those instructions?”
“Yeah, he gave me the instructions,” Cornell said, his lips curling up into a snarl.
“So, that proves it,” Van said, his voice rising as he lunged forward in his chair.
Gabe turned a little sideways to speak to Cornell. He made eye contact with him. “You say you got your instructions from your pa? Did you see the contract where Dad outlined where the markers were going to be set? Did your pa actually outline the instructions for you, I mean personally?”
Cornell pulled in a deep breath, held it, and then released it. “Well, no, I didn’t see the contract. I leave that end of things to Pa. And no, he didn’t read them out loud to me, if that’s what you’re asking. I got the instructions like I always do. Pa lines out the jobs and sends them over to me by one of the boys the night before the job. That’s how Pa and I work. Usually, his assistant writes them up, Pa dictates. He just hired a new man, come to think about it. I haven’t met him. I don’t even know his name.”
The ladies emerged from the kitchen doorway, Adella and Doreen arm in arm and Edditha between Jo and Birdie. They were giggling about something. Buck figured men didn’t need to know what, but it sure was a pretty sight, the ladies all rosy cheeked and merry. It gave his sore heart a lift. He really needed this distraction, a way out of his grief, if only for a little while.
As the flock of females stepped off the porch, they all heard Birdie assure Edditha, “You don’t need a bathing costume. Jo and I usually jump in buck-naked, but with guests, we keep on our drawers and chemises. It’s just us ladies, no men allowed in the pool or even in the shelter. We’ll have all the privacy we need for as long as we want.”
Cornell busted out laughing and choked on his cigar smoke.
Over her shoulder, Birdie yelled back, “Mind your own beeswax, Corney Norquist. If we catch you peeking, we’ll toss your sorry butt in the rushes with the frogs and mosquitoes. And you know we can.”
Buck grinned. Gabe turned red as a poppy. Even in the dark, the boy practically glowed. When he groaned and put his head in his hands, Buck speculated as to the cause. It could be the vision of all those beauties down there in the water swimming around in their underwear had him discombobulated, or it could be Birdie’s candid recommendation or her advice to Cornell. Could be all of it. Everything Birdie did and said, even what she didn’t say, Buck suspected, had the boy all mixed up. Not a bad thing. Nope, it was about time.
Covertly, he’d watched them during the meal. They’d sat there quietly, trying to ignore each other, while anyone could see the sparks zapping between their bodies when either one of them twitched or spoke or sighed. He didn’t know if they’d ever manage to turn those sparks of passion into deep, abiding love.
Gabe hated upheaval and turbulence, and Birdie-Alice caused turbulence wherever she went. She thrived on it. If ever they did decide to take each other on, Buck had no doubt it would be a fiery match, but a good one.
He admitted he’d felt a spark or two himself tonight, and he wasn’t real comfortable with the feeling. The problem was the sensation didn’t instantly disgust him. On the contrary, he found it quite pleasant. Who could resist Adella’s infectious smile? Her optimistic and cheerful demeanor captivated and intrigued him.
Immediately, he saw in his mind’s eye an image of Adella, her plump, white bosoms bobbing in the water and her pink nipples erect. It set a flame to burning within his breast, bringing to life the heart he’d allowed to grow cold, dark, and lonely. Thoughts of another woman besides Petra had him feeling defensive.
His grief upon losing Petra banished all desire from his body, or so he’d thought. Adella awakened something, the dormant stirrings of passion. He hadn’t realized how much he missed
having a happy woman around. The sound of a woman’s giggle, the spark of interest when he spoke, the warm touch of a feminine hand lightly resting on his shoulder—he’d missed that.
And she was a widow, too. He’d made note of it right off the bat. Shamefully, she really did intrigue him. The thought of taking another wife skittered across his mind, and he promptly pronounced himself a treasonous bastard. He told himself such thoughts were disloyal to Petra’s memory. Then the guilt set in because he didn’t want to stop flirting with the lovely, lively Adella.
She’d set his blood to pumping the second she’d introduced herself. Recognition and memories hit him like a landslide. The Adella of twenty-seven years ago, the one in his memory, remained a scared fifteen-year-old kid trying to get her brother out of the middle of the street all by herself after the thugs beat the crap out of him. Buck helped her get her brother up to their little barrack above the apothecary shop. And he’d given her some cash to buy food. At the time, he’d been nosing around, trying to get information he could use to help protect Petra against Gabe’s father, Beau, and his brother Kurt Laski.
Adella Ridenhour, the scared little girl, had given him a useful clue that night. To have her pop back into his life after all these years, a woman grown, gave Buck a sense of serendipity. Surely her arrival at this point in time had a purpose, a reason.
Chapter Eleven
Gabe heard a groan. He realized he’d unintentionally made a noise, and a blush heated his cheeks.
Birdie, my God, she’d always been a caution. She hadn’t changed one bit. Outspoken, frank to a fault, full of piss and vinegar is how Petra once described her.
A memory leaped into his mind’s eye. Birdie-Alice and Jo at thirteen, stark naked, budding bosoms bobbing and bare butts glistening wet in the summer sun. Just as clearly as if it were yesterday, he could see them dragging poor Tommy Dixon, kicking and screaming, up the path to the far side of the bathing pool. The boy made the mistake of getting caught spying on the girls while they bathed. From the barnyard, Gabe and Van had heard the boy’s cries for help, but it was too late. They arrived in time to watch the girls toss the boy into the rushes.
Word got around, and from that day on neither Jo nor Birdie had any problems with peepers. All the boys gave the ladies their privacy. But Gabe had gotten an eyeful, and he’d never forgotten the sight of Birdie’s pink little bottom or her ripening, perfectly pink-tipped nipples.
All the while he and Van worked to extricate poor slime-covered Tom from the rushes, both of them were laughing so hard Gabe feared he might pass out. To this day, whenever he and Van needed a good chuckle, all either one of them had to say was poor Tommy and the memory would have them both in stitches.
Funny, but for once the memory didn’t make him want to laugh. It made him randy, and hence he had groaned with shame.
Damn it anyway.
He couldn’t get Curly-Birdie out of his mind, the way she looked, full-bosomed, eyes shining with the devil’s own mischief.
No, Gabe didn’t doubt for a minute Birdie could route any male stupid enough to think he could spy on her or the ladies in the hot spring. Birdie and Jo could take care of themselves, and any of the guests who accompanied them. After all, they’d been in charge of entertaining female guests long before Petra passed away. Jo could swim like a fish, fast and sleek in the water, and Birdie, what she lacked in style she made up for in courage and strength.
But the reminder the girls usually swam in the raw—that, he had trouble with. The thought of Edditha naked or in the water in her underclothes made him wince with something akin to embarrassment.
Edditha didn’t like going anywhere without her gloves on. To expect her to strip down in front of strangers and jump into water, no, not the Edditha he knew. Then again, her mother would be there, which might help. Mrs. Millican gave the impression of a woman up for anything.
He also worried about when and how Edditha would find out about Doreen having once been one of Buck’s whores here at the hot spring. He wondered if Mrs. Millican realized the hot spring had once been a brothel? If so, had she told her daughter about its colorful past, about Buck’s colorful past, and about his mother’s involvement with a pair of no-goods by the name of Laski?
What did the woman know? She remembered Buck and Raphael, but did she know two years after the infamous trial finding Gabe’s father guilty of multiple murders, Rafe’s wife had run off with their children to Oregon City with the lawyer from his father’s trial? Did Mrs. Millican know Gabe’s father had swung from the end of a rope for his sins? And if she knew all of it or even some of it, why had she allowed him to court her daughter?
Life at the hot spring might give the appearance of a wholesome enterprise, but hidden away in its past lay a treasure trove of nasty nuggets Gabe would as soon keep locked away.
He feared Birdie-Alice, Curly-Birdie, posed the biggest threat. She knew all the sordid details of the Buxton family history, as well as her own family history and how it all intertwined. Gabe knew she loved to recount, as well as embellish, the story to anyone who showed the least little bit of interest.
He didn’t trust this new and supposedly mature Curly-Birdie. There was something smoky about her behavior. She was holding back. She’d have to bust loose sooner or later and then look out.
The troubling fact of the matter he realized immediately. It should’ve been Edditha’s body dripping wet giving him enticing fantasies, not Birdie’s. He couldn’t quite bring into focus Edditha’s body. She might look sleek as a cat, maybe a slender, graceful cat. At least he supposed that’s what her body would look like; he’d never really seen her body except for a glimpse of throat, wrist, or ear lobe.
The female body he fantasized about most of the time glistened with droplets of water, from her curly blonde head down to her pink toes. In between, he saw a set of curvaceous hips, perfectly formed with a dainty little belly button right in the middle of her creamy white, soft, and slightly rounded tummy. Her twin breasts, round and firm as plump ripe peaches, tipped with petal-pink erect nipples, tantalized him. He dreamt of a thatch of golden curly hair at the apex of her strong thighs that begged exploration, always holding the promise of a warm, sweet, and juicy center.
God help him. The guilt.
He blamed Birdie for his out of control passions. She’d done something to herself to make him long to touch, to taste every inch of her. She was up to something, playing some kind of game, but why and who was her victim?
Edditha? It had to be Edditha. By attacking Edditha, Birdie could get back at him. But she hadn’t attacked Edditha. She’d actually gone out of her way to be nice to her. Too nice, suggesting a picnic. It had to be a trap. And proposing Edditha might like to ride smelled of a set-up.
Maybe Birdie wanted to get back at him for kissing her and then running off to Portland. Well, he’d gotten engaged, but he didn’t need to have her permission or approval. There were no promises given when he’d bestowed a kiss on her at her sixteenth birthday party. That night he’d put the blame on the moon.
All at once, he began to doubt his sanity. He wondered now if he hadn’t left the hot spring to go make a life for himself, not only to get away from memories of his mother but also to get away from his feelings for Birdie. He couldn’t love Birdie…Curly-Birdie, his almost-sister. He couldn’t lust after a little sister; that would make him some kind of sick bastard.
“I might have to ride over to Halfway and pay a visit to the Thurmans, see how they’re doin’,” Buck said, bringing Gabe’s attention back to the present.
“I’ll ride along,” Rafe said. “Haven’t seen Dave for a while. It’d be good to pay him a call. Besides, I’m not interested in huckleberry picking or picnics.”
Buck accepted the offer with a grin and a nod. “Good, we’ll let Van, Gabe, and Cornell escort the ladies tomorrow.”
From the porch, Gabe saw the ladies come up the lane, returning from their swim. He waited for Birdie and Jo to enter the house f
rom the back and for a light to come on in Edditha’s cabin.
Buck, Rafe, Van, and Cornell rose from their places at the table, eager to have their turn for a late-night swim. Gabe hung back, intending to wish his fiancée goodnight.
He knocked on her cabin door and when she opened it, her hair unbound and wearing a dressing-gown of blue jersey, he felt a jolt of desire and instinctively reached for her hand to draw her into an embrace.
Just as instinctively, Edditha stopped his impulsive attempt with her hand going to his chest to hold him at bay. He’d started courting Edditha seven long months ago. In all that time, he’d never really embraced the woman. Oh, he’d had his hands on her waist during a waltz, and she’d allowed an awkward joining of arms during their brief encounters of lips upon cheek, or briefer still, lips touching lips upon greeting or saying goodbye. Tonight, he felt compelled to take Edditha in his arms and kiss the hell out of her. Tonight the devil challenged him to set her on fire. He wanted to inspire her to seek his embrace, his kiss, ignite passion.
“Let me hold you, Edditha,” he heard himself beg. His hands enfolded her cool fingers between his own. “You’re lovely in the moonlight with your hair down. You should wear it down more often.”
“You shouldn’t see me like this, all undone. It isn’t at all proper.” She moved to the side of the door and tugged her hands free to pull her robe closer about her.
Gabe tipped her face up. “We’re going to be married, Edditha…man and wife. I’ll see you with your hair down and in your dressing gown every night.”
Unable to look him in the eyes, she fluttered her eyelashes and said with a little shake of her head, “Not every night…surely not every night, Gabriel.”
“Well, we’ll sleep in the same bed,” he declared, suddenly ill at ease with the direction this conversation had taken. Once again, he tried to take her in his arms to kiss her and taste her lips, but she evaded his intent with a shake of her head.
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