Morrow Creek Runaway

by Lisa Plumley

  I’ll master this eventually. I will.

  Rosamond remembered that stubborn catchphrase of hers and realized that as much as it had helped bolster her at times, it had also held her back. Because sometimes, her motto was just a way to keep claiming she was trying…even when she was standing still. Sometimes it was just a way to feel better about things, even as she locked herself away behind self-made brambles and barriers…and then wondered why she felt so lonely all the time.

  She couldn’t wait to devise the perfect approach. That was simply more stalling. She had to go see Miles now. Now.

  Determinedly, Rosamond headed for her parlor door.

  At the same moment, Dylan Coyle came through it. Hat in hand, he nodded. “Afternoon, ma’am. Do you have a minute?”

  Brought up short, Rosamond frowned. “Not really. I’m—”

  “Good. Because we need to talk.” Behaving as though she hadn’t just brushed off his request, Dylan carried on speaking. “The thing is, ma’am, I’m quitting. I’m leaving Morrow Creek.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.” Rosamond inhaled, dredging up a smile for him. “You’re a good man. You were very helpful.”

  A mysterious smile quirked his mouth. “Not as helpful as I might have been, but I gave it full effort. Just like always.”

  “Yes, I imagine you did.” With a businesslike air, Rosamond nodded. She didn’t want to lose Dylan, but she couldn’t very well keep him employed. Not anymore. She held out her hand. “Thank you kindly for looking out for me. I appreciate it.”

  Sobering, Dylan grasped her hand. “It was my pleasure.” His grip was callused. Steady. The significance of their handshake was not lost on him, she saw. “Good luck to you, ma’am.”

  Dylan put on his hat. He ambled out, boots ringing.

  Good. Rosamond inhaled. Now she could go see Miles.

  She made it all the way to the doorway again before Seth appeared. He unwittingly blocked her exit with his huge body.

  “Mrs. Dancy?” He tipped his hat. “I’m awfully sorry to bother you like this. It’s just that—”

  “I don’t have time to talk, Seth. I have to leave.”

  Her security man didn’t appear to understand. He didn’t so much as budge. “I have to quit working for you, Mrs. Dancy. It’s been a real pleasure and all. I can promise you that.”

  Oh dear. Two of her security men were leaving?

  It was a good thing Rosamond had decided to rejoin the world again. Starting with Miles. Starting with going to Miles. Because there wouldn’t be anyone around to guard her haven.

  “But the fact is, I have another job on offer, and I’d sorely like to take it. Jack Murphy’s faro dealer is leaving Morrow Creek, and I aim to grab his spot at the table.”

  “You’re going to gamble professionally?”

  “I already done it like an amateur.” Good-naturedly, Seth grinned. “But I learned a few things. I think I’m ready.”

  “Well, I can’t stop you. Nor would I try to, if this is what you truly want.” Rosamond offered a handshake, feeling perplexed by the suddenness of his decision. “Good luck.”

  Solemnly, they shook hands. “Good luck to you,” he said.

  After a bit more chitchat, Seth meandered out, leaving Rosamond scrabbling to collect her things, fetch a parasol, head for the door…

  As she stepped outside her front door, Judah rushed over.

  At his worried expression, Rosamond lost the last thread of her patience. Didn’t they know what was at stake here?

  For all she knew, Miles was leaving town.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake, Judah. Are you quitting, too?”

  Her security man gave her a funny look. “No, ma’am. I’m not leaving till you make me go.” His spoony-eyed glance reminded her that might not be a bad idea. “I came to tell you that Mrs. Larkin has a visitor—and he’s an awfully insistent one, too.”

  *

  Miles had never been accused of a crime. Not even a minor one. He’d never stood on trial or been forced to defend his good name.

  That day, in the inner sanctum of the Morrow Creek Mutual Society, Miles felt he had to do all those things. Expertly.

  “Exactly how do you intend to make a living, Mr. Callaway?” Katie Scott intoned. Surrounded by the other ladies, she consulted a sheet of paper in front of her. She frowned up at him. “I understand you’re a stableman by trade. Is that right?”

  “You know darn well it’s right. I gave you and Tommy riding lessons down at Cooper’s stable last week.” Miles swept all the assembled women with an impatient look. He’d been here for several minutes, being interrogated. “Now, you’re all just wasting my time. Am I admitted to this marriage bureau or not?”

  “Mutual society,” Libby Jorgensen corrected, adjusting her spectacles. “And we’ll make our decision in our own time.”

  “We have to decide if you’re man enough,” Maureen O’Malley told him. Her lingering gaze suggested she was making her decision based on the fit of his shirt. Or his britches. Or both. “This decision can’t be rushed. Turn around, please.”

  Miles protested. “What for? I’m hardworking, honest and capable of reading a book. I have a good job, and I haven’t touched a drop of liquor for more than three weeks. What else—”

  “Just turn around, please,” suggested Miss Scott.

  Maybe it was better to cooperate. Then he could get to see Rosamond more quickly. Obligingly, Miles turned. He stood.

  A collective sigh fluttered through the room.

  Miles heard it. “I’d like to know what my backside has to do with my capacity for membership in this society. Because—”

  “It has nothing to do with that.” There was tart humor in Bonita Yates’s tone. “We all just want to look. Ladies?”

  “We approve,” they chorused to Miles’s vexation.

  Fed up, he turned around. “Now I’m going to see Rose.”

  They looked alarmed. Chairs scraped across the floor. Women came hurrying toward him, muttering amongst themselves.

  Miles couldn’t listen to their nattering. He had important things to do. He had to find Rosamond. He had to tell her—

  “You haven’t found out about the baby yet.” Lucinda Larkin’s voice rang above all the others. “Aren’t you curious?”

  Caught, Miles paused. He glanced at Mrs. Larkin, taking in her defiant demeanor—and the baby in her arms. Tobe stood nearby her, doing his utmost to sport a poker face that would hide whatever secrets his mother—and Rosamond—wanted under wraps.

  “I love Rosamond,” Miles told them all, giving up his quest to learn the baby’s origins for good. “I’ll love her baby, too, if it comes to that. Now, if you’ll all excuse me, I’m leaving.”

  He charged for the door—at least as ably as his battered body would allow him to. It felt more like a limp. It felt…

  It felt as if half a dozen fallen angels were holding him by the arms, carrying him forward, bringing him to Rosamond.

  The ladies of the mutual society were fully on his side. They bustled Miles in their midst all the way down the hallway.

  There, he spied Rosamond with her back to him, speaking with a man at the front door. No, there were two men there, Miles saw. One was indisputably in charge, from his aristocratic face to his expensive suit and fancy shoes. The other was in service, gray and dignified, with an armful of wrapped gifts.

  Simon Blackhouse, Miles surmised, remembering what Seth had told him about expecting someone rich, powerful and willing to break every rule to find out what Lucinda Larkin had been up to.

  Behind him, Mrs. Larkin came to a halt. Her gaze flew to Blackhouse’s face, then dropped tellingly to the baby in her arms.

  In a heartbeat, Miles recognized the truth.

  The child had been Lucinda’s all along. Likely, Rosamond had helped her hide the baby from him. Because, undoubtedly, Lucinda had guessed someone might be keeping watch over her—someone in Simon Blackhouse’s employ. She’d simply—mistakenly—
surmised that Miles was the man to be wary of…when it had been Seth interrogating Tobe, reporting in to Blackhouse, all along.

  He had to admire Rosamond’s loyalty to the women of her household. He knew she would have done whatever her friends asked her to, with no limitations or questions asked, purely for the sake of protecting them. Even clobbering a man like him.

  He didn’t have long to contemplate his onetime sore head or those startling realizations, though. The ladies of the mutual society bowled Miles forward, pushing him into the parlor like a pack of determined and lace-bedecked sheepdogs.

  Miles stumbled inside, inadvertently poked and prodded in all his most injured places. If not for the saving glimpse he’d had of Rosamond, he might have resented that rough treatment.

  As it was, it was all he could do not to run to her.

  “Stay here,” Miss Yates ordered. Then she shut the door.

  Inwardly, Miles gave a sardonic laugh. If Bonita Yates and her cohorts thought they were keeping Miles from reaching Rosamond now, they’d better think again. Because he was damn well going to get to her. He was going to get to her now.

  As he reached the door, a clink sounded.

  He tried the knob. Damnation. He was locked in the parlor.

  It looked as if Rosamond wasn’t the only one who could surprise a man in Morrow Creek. She’d cultivated a whole houseful of meddlesome women who could do the same damn thing.

  *

  “…so I insist on seeing Lucinda Larkin.”

  Rosamond heard the patrician man in front of her repeat his earlier demand, but only with half an ear. The man who’d arrived—the man whose accompanying valet, Adams, had announced as “Simon Blackhouse, ma’am,”—was tall, handsome and insistent. He had an overall aura of power, a sheen of personal wealth and a pile of gifts. Those were all lovely and intriguing things.

  But Rosamond had just glimpsed Miles being bustled past her. She only had eyes for him. He was there. He was there!

  “Don’t make me sic Adams on you,” Blackhouse was saying, looking beleaguered and intent and very unused to being refused anything he wanted. “He’s a war veteran. He’s fearsome.”

  Rosamond examined the refined man holding all the gifts in his arms. He gave her a polite smile. She smiled back at him.

  “Yes, I’m sure that would be terrifying, Mr. Blackhouse,” Rosamond told her visitor impatiently. “But the fact remains that we don’t allow unexpected visitors here. So I’m afraid—”

  “I’ll see him.” From behind her, Lucinda stepped forward. With Tobe trailing her and her baby in her arms, she stared at Blackhouse. “If you can confront your past, Rosamond, so can I.”

  Rosamond didn’t understand. “Judah is right there. He can help,” she insisted. “If you want Mr. Blackhouse to leave—”

  “You’ve done enough.” Gently, Lucinda transferred her baby to Libby’s arms. “You have a visitor of your own to see to.”

  Miles. Rosamond remembered him and lost a bit of her zeal for making sure that Lucinda and her baby—for it was Lucinda’s baby, hers and someone Rosamond didn’t know—were seen to. Because ultimately, this was Lucinda’s decision to make.

  “I never thought I’d see you again,” Blackhouse was saying, his unfathomable gaze fixed on Lucinda. “You look…well.”

  Rosamond felt Judah tapping her arm. She looked his way.

  “You have a gentleman caller,” her security man told her with apt gravity. “He’s waiting for you in the parlor.”

  Rosamond picked up her skirts and all but ran to see him.

  *

  When the parlor door finally burst open, Miles had the window raised. He had one poor, abused, nearly uncooperative leg flung over the windowsill. He had both nicked-up hands grasping the ledge. He had a single desperate heart ready for escape.

  “Miles!” Rosamond’s eyes widened when she saw him. She rushed to the window, her hands aflutter. “What are you doing?”

  “Getting out to see you.” Miles withdrew. With effort. He couldn’t help grimacing as his insides twisted. “By whatever means possible.” With both feet grounded, he brushed off his hands. “Good news. Your ladies say I’m in the mutual society.”

  Rosamond’s smile beamed up at him. “They do?”

  “Yep.” He aimed a disgruntled glance toward the hallway, knowing they were all probably still congregated there in an interfering, overly curious mass of femininity. “They’ve got a funny way of showing it, though. They were a lot more demanding than you were, too.” Miles remembered their final mandate that he turn around and flaunt his backside for them. “In some areas, at least.”

  That last request had not been one of the more demanding areas, though. Rosamond had been quite fond of his posterior. For whatever reason, she’d declared his personhood “remarkable.”

  Just then, Rosamond seemed less than pleased, though. She’d come close enough to catch sight of his bruised face and awkward stance. More than likely, both of those things betrayed his injuries. At least they probably did if Coyle had tattled about those things already. Judging by Rosamond’s shocked expression, Dylan hadn’t. At least the man had left Miles with some dignity.

  If he’d waited, he could have spared himself Rosamond’s concerned, pitying look altogether. But he’d refused to wait.

  “But what happened to you?” Gently, Rosamond put her hands to the sides of his face. She turned his head this way and that, examining his lumps and bumps. “Who did this to you?”

  “Would you believe…Coyle?”

  Miles was still peeved at the man for forcing him to realize what a chowderheaded mistake he’d made with Rose.

  “Dylan? No. Absolutely not.”

  “Seth? Judah?” Miles grinned, nearly overcome with joy at being so close to Rosamond again. “Agatha Jorgensen? Tobe?”

  “No, no. No.” She considered Tobe. “Maybe…”

  “It’s not important,” Miles told her, drinking in the sight of her. “What matters is that I’m here. You’re here.”

  For an instant, they only stared at each other.

  Then, “I’m so sorry, Miles!” Rosamond burst out, brave and sure. “I never should have behaved so poorly with you. Drugging you, searching you, having Dylan knock you unconscious—”

  At her mention of Coyle, Miles narrowed his eyes.

  “—making you leave me! I don’t know what I was thinking. Only that I was scared and alone and desperate to be safe, and I knew that if anybody could threaten me, it was you—”

  “I would never hurt you, Rose. Never.”

  “—because you were the only one who could really see me. The only one who could understand me and know me and tempt me to leave my hiding place at all. Because I didn’t want to go—”

  “I only wanted to help you, I swear.”

  “—but I needed to go, and you saw that.” Tenderly, she took his hands. “You did help me, Miles. You helped me in a way that no one else ever could have. I’m so grateful for that. For you.”

  Humbled by her gratitude, Miles squeezed her hands.

  Then he realized…this wasn’t a declaration of love. This was an apology. Maybe Rosamond didn’t love him. Maybe he’d dragged himself all the way across Morrow Creek for nothing.

  He’d be damned if he’d allow all that effort to go to waste.

  “Mrs. Dancy,” he said soberly, “I didn’t come here for an apology. As kind and eloquent as yours was, I—”

  “I thought I told you to call me Rosamond.” She frowned, looking delectably put out. “Please call me Rosamond.”

  “But this is a formal occasion,” Miles protested, wanting to do this correctly. “I have to address you properly.” He grinned at her. “My mutual society membership is at stake.”

  “Yes.” Evidently reminded of that, Rosamond gazed at him with shining eyes. “You know why my friends voted you in, don’t you?”

  “Because I’m the finest man in all the West?”

  Her besotted expression agreed. He
r headshake did not.

  “Because, officially, only mutual society members are allowed to call on the proprietress of the mutual society in her parlor.”

  “Oh.” Miles pretended to be perplexed. “I wasn’t aware of that rule. Are you—” He broke off, pointing at her. “You’re the enterprising, fascinating, utterly lovable woman who runs this place? You? Because if you are, I have a few complaints.”

  “You do?” Rosamond arched her brow. “Such as?”

  “Such as the objectifying treatment of male members.”

  “I see. I’ll make a note of that.”

  “And such as the very long distance this place is located away from Owen Cooper’s livery stable.”

  “That’s Cooper’s fault, not mine. Anything else?”

  Her pert, expectant face nearly made Miles swoon on the spot. It wasn’t a manly thought, but there it was. He needed her. He didn’t care if it made him helpless with longing.

  “Yes, there is. I came in here to make a damn proposal,” Miles said, “and your busybody ladies locked me in.”

  “I reckon they wanted to make sure you wouldn’t escape,” Rosamond told him gaily. “A good man is hard to find.”

  “Even harder to keep from crawling out the window.”

  “And what’s more—” Abruptly, Rosamond broke off. Her gaze swiveled to his, bright and hopeful. “Did you just say—”

  “Proposal? Yes, Mrs. Dancy, I did.”

  “Miles, honestly. Please call me—”

  But he couldn’t let her finish. Not now. “Because that’s what this is. A proposal. So you’d better get yourself ready.”

  “I am ready.” She crushed his hands in hers, demonstrating her eagerness with an iron grip. “Do it! I’m ready.”

  Miles wasn’t sure. “Are you certain? Because if you would rather be proposed to elsewhere—say, a forest glade or a riverbank or a town square…anyplace at all—I can oblige you.”

  “No! Here is fine. Here is excellent.” Rosamond gazed up at him, trustingly and—he dared to think—lovingly. “Do it. Go ahead. I’m ready!”