For a Sister's Love

by Paty Jager

  “Are you sure?” he asked, kicking the door closed.

  “Very,” she assured. Her body hummed and the thrill racing in her veins made her quiver. When Sam lowered her onto the bed, his touch was so gentle and caring, tears pricked her eyes.

  He kissed her lids. “Are you scared?”

  “No, I’m not scared.” Her palms absorbed the heat of his skin as her hands roamed his shoulders. “I’m so happy I can barely breathe. I’ve wanted this to happen for a very long time.”

  “Me, too.” He settled on the bed, kissing the side of her face. “If anything frightens you, just tell me and I’ll stop.”

  He ran a hand over her stomach. The skin beneath her shift leaped into life, begging for more.

  “No, Sam,” she whispered. “Please don’t stop. If I get scared, just kiss me until my fear dissolves.”

  Several times over the next few hours, he asked if she was afraid, hungry, cold, or tired. Her answer was always the same. No. She hadn’t imagined sharing her body would be so wonderful. She’d never need anything again, for as long as she lived, if he was at her side. In that hotel room in Boise, she discovered a binding love she’d treasure the rest of her life. Not even the telegram he’d carelessly tossed aside, the one now in her skirt pocket, could take that from her.

  Their wayward clothing was neatly folded outside their door the next morning, and before they joined the wagon train, Sam purchased a tent to stake a short distance away from the train each night. Loralei left Boise a different person. Not only was she loved, she was content—something she hadn’t experienced since the Indian attack.

  To Sam, the trail to Silver City flew by. Life was good, and having Loralei at his side day and night left a smile on his face as wide as the Mississippi. Even Mrs. Wilson’s disposition seemed sweeter.

  The train rolled into Silver City on an afternoon filled with sunshine and bright blue skies. To Sam, it was a good omen, one that said his new life was bound to be filled with happiness and love. As soon as the travelers separated, each going in the direction of their final destination with promises to see one another soon, he led Loralei to the Idaho Hotel.

  The streets buzzed with activity, and Sam wrapped an arm around Loralei’s shoulders as men gazed her way with appreciative eyes.

  “Need a room?” the hotel proprietor asked as they walked through the open doorway.

  “Yes,” Sam answered.

  “You’re lucky. The stage just left and since the next one hasn’t arrived yet, we got a couple rooms to let.”

  Sam went through the routine of checking in, which included the explanation Ruth would stay in the room with them. The man was amicable about the dog, didn’t even charge any extra for her.

  “Would you like to take a bath before we go searching?” Sam asked after opening the door to their room on the second floor.

  “Searching?” Loralei looked at him like he’d lost his mind.

  “Yes, for Maggie, your sister?”

  “Oh, my.” She let out a tiny giggle and wrapped her arms around his waist. “I forgot.”

  “You forgot?”

  “Yes. My mind has been on other things lately.”

  “What things?” He pulled her close, sighing at the temptation heating his loins.

  “You.” She looped her arms around his neck. “You have the most amazing way of making me forget everything except…” Her lips latched onto his.

  He had a hard time pulling out of the kiss. The bed was right behind her, but he couldn’t, well shouldn’t—even though it would be fun. Loralei embraced their deeper relationship as passionately as she did everything else. He kissed the tip of her nose and set her an arm’s length away. “You traveled halfway across the country to find your sister. Let’s go see if she picked up your letters.”

  The tiny pout on her mouth disappeared. “All right. But on one condition.”

  “What’s that?” It wouldn’t take more than a head nod for him to strip her naked and have his way with her sweet, welcoming body.

  She pulled a slip of paper from her pocket. “That you respond to this.”

  The crinkled telegram from Boise sat on her palm. “You kept that?”

  “Yes. Don’t you want to read it?”

  He turned around. “No.”

  She slipped her arms around his waist from behind. “Why not?”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s from your family.” When he didn’t answer, she continued, “If there’s one thing I know, it’s how hard not knowing is. Not knowing if someone you love is hurt, sick, or even dead.”

  He twisted and wrapped his arms around her. “We’ll find her.”

  “I’m not talking about Maggie. I’m talking about you. You have to respond. If it’s just to say you’re alive and well.”

  “Honey, my family isn’t like yours. They don’t want to know I’m alive. They want—”

  Her finger on his lip stopped his explanation. “I haven’t had a family in a very long time.” Tears glistened in her eyes. “But now I do. You and Ruth and Raindrop and King. And it’s a wonderful family. The best.” She kissed his neck. “You can just say you haven’t found Bancroft yet.”

  “I’m done looking for Bancroft.”

  “You are?”

  He took the hands that fell to her sides. “We can continue to look for him, to see if he has your necklace, but I won’t take him back to New Orleans.”

  “But your family…his grandmother.”

  “Can find someone else to search for him.” His hands inched up her arms, and then cupped her cheeks. “I don’t have anything to prove to my father. I never did. I just had to figure that out, and because of you, I did.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I blamed my father for ruling my life, when it reality, I was letting him rule my life. You showed me what a person can do when they set their mind to it.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you.” He kissed her forehead. “You set out alone, to travel across the nation on a ten year old promise and nothing more. That’s belief, Loralei. Belief in oneself that I’d never witnessed before. You made me look at so many aspects of my life.You made me want. I’d never wanted before I met you.”

  Her frown deepened.

  “I had everything. There was nothing for me to want. Or maybe I was taught not to want. Until I met you. Now, I know I want a life full of the love and happiness I’ve discovered.” He took the note from her clutched fingers. “I’ll respond to this, for you. I’ll tell them I’ve met and married—we are getting married here in Silver City—the most amazing woman on earth, and that we’re going on an extended honeymoon.”

  The past week had been dreamlike, sharing days and nights with Sam and loving him wholeheartedly. Even thoughts of Maggie had vanished. No, Loralei concluded, it hadn’t been just this past week. Ever since meeting Sam, thoughts of Maggie, the longing and the loss, had gradually lessened.

  His gaze was intense and full of love. A soft wave rolled over her. Her heart swelled three times its size. His love had made her whole, and she’d do anything to make his life just as full.

  Smiling, she rested a hand on his cheek. “Where are we going on this extended honeymoon?”

  His kiss made her swoon with want of lying down on the bed together and forgetting the rest of the world existed. When Sam did break their embrace, it was to lead her to the door. “We can go anywhere you want. Do anything you want.”

  Loralei glanced over her shoulder. Ruth opened an eye, but didn’t lift her head from the rug.

  “She’s tired,” Sam said. “Let her stay here.”

  “We’ll be back soon,” Loralei assured the dog, walking out the door. As she and Sam walked down the stairs, she asked, “Where are we going?”

  He took her elbow. “We could go to the west coast and catch a ship sailing around the cape or—”

  She giggled. “No, I mean right now.”

  “Oh, well, you said you mailed letters to Maggie
at general delivery in Silver City.”

  She nodded.

  “Then let’s go see if those letters have been picked up.”

  A multitude of emotions rippled through Loralei. She mulled them as they walked across the lobby and out into the street. Her life was so different now, even if Maggie was here, Sam was her family now. Meeting up with her sister would be wonderful, but life with him would be amazing. It already was.

  “If she hasn’t picked them up, we can go to Oregon and look for her there,” he said.

  Back at the hotel, he’d said she taught him how to want—funny thing, because he taught her how not to want. She looped her arm through his elbow, hugging his arm.

  He winked. “Or, we can stay here, and wait for her to arrive.”

  “How do you know she will?”

  “Because she’s your sister. If she’s anything like you, nothing will stop her from eventually arriving in Silver City.” He opened the door and nodded for her to enter.

  Five years of letters addressed to Miss Magdalena Holmes were in the bottom of a canvas bag behind a counter that held a U.S. Post sign in Water’s General Store. Disappointed, Sam wrapped his arm around Loralei. “We’ll find her, sweetheart. I promise.”

  She nodded, running her fingers over the letters.

  “Do you want to take them or leave them here?” he asked.

  Stuffing them back into the bag, Loralei handed it to the woman on the other side of the counter. “I’ll leave them.” She smiled up at him. “You’re right. She’ll eventually arrive.”

  He turned her about. “Come on. Every bride needs a new dress.”

  By the time they left the store and headed back to the hotel, Sam didn’t know which of them was more elated. He waited in the room with Ruth while Loralei used the bathing chamber downstairs. When she returned to the room, he took a moment to admire how lovely she looked in the ivory dress before he snatched his pinstriped suit and rushed down the stairs for his bath.

  The stage had arrived while they were shopping, and the lobby hummed with newcomers. A man briefly caught his attention as Sam—clean and dressed—hurried back up the stairs. Dull recognition hung in the back of his head, until he opened the door to their room. A more beautiful bride had never existed.

  Sam proudly escorted Loralei down the stairs and out the door. They strolled along the boardwalk, Ruth of course followed, to the long set of steps that led to the church nestled high on the hill at the edge of town. Another couple climbed the steps near the top. “The cleaning woman at the hotel said the Pastor is always at the church.”

  “And if he’s not?” Loralei held the hem of her dress high above the ground.

  “We’ll wait.”

  She laughed and Ruth barked.

  “You know, we could always buy a chunk of land here. You could plant your cucumber patch,” he said. “We could call it Loralei’s Pickle Ranch. Before long people will travel for miles just for a bottle of your famous pickles.”

  She giggled. “I’ve never heard of a pickle ranch. I think we should raise horses and call it McDonald’s Stallions. I bet the president himself will come to Idaho to buy one of your horses.”

  They shared a laugh, still climbing the unending row of steps. “We could always return to your land in Colorado.”

  “I don’t have any land in Colorado.”

  “Yes, you do. Baumgartner’s land, as well as his mining claim.”

  “That’s not mine.”

  “Yes, it is. You were the only family they had. You earned it, and while you were saying good-bye to Mert, I made it legally yours. It was a simple matter of processing the papers.”

  “You did?”

  The stairs were never ending. They still had several to climb before reaching the top. Stopping he grasped her elbow and turned her about, slipping both arms around her waist. “Yes. I did. And it truly doesn’t matter what we do, or where we live. As long as it’s together.”

  Loralei wrapped her arms around his waist. “I agree. As long as we’re together, nothing else matters. I love you Sam McDonald. And I always, always will.”

  “And I love you, Loralei.” Not caring that they stood in the middle of the steps, Sam kissed her long and hard, just like he would forever.

  Part Two: Maggie

  by Paty Jager

  Spring 1874

  Portland, OR

  One

  It couldn’t be?

  Maggie swallowed the lump of fear in her throat. She glanced at the hotel room door, placed the dust rag on the bureau, and reached a finger out to skim over the cool lavender stone in the locket on the bureau top. Lora Beth would never part with their mother’s locket. This had to be a different one.

  Her hand shook reaching for the silver trinket. The cold metal mimicked the dread in her heart. Had something happened to Lora Beth? Would she never see her sister again? She’d spent ten long years dreaming of their reunion. Trembling fingers worked to spring the latch.

  Frustrated, she chewed on her lower lip. “Danged thing. I don’t remember it being so contrary before.” It couldn’t be their mother’s locket, the one she gave Lora Beth after Indians ambushed their wagon train and killed their parents.

  The locket sprung free.

  Her blood froze.

  Eight-year-old Loralei Elizabeth and ten-year-old Magdalena Ruth Holmes stared back at her just as Maggie remembered she and her sister looking before their family set off with the wagon train.

  The snick of a key in the lock to the hotel room rang through the silence like a gunshot from the Silver Horn saloon on a Saturday night.

  Maggie faced the door. She didn’t care if she lost her job for snooping. If she hadn’t noticed the locket while cleaning his hotel room she could have wasted more years trying to find Lora Beth. She had to know why this man had something that should have been in her sister’s safekeeping.

  Maggie clutched the jewelry in her hand. The door swung open, and a man, nearly the height of the doorframe, strolled into the room. A self-satisfied smirk stretched across his handsome face. His light blue gaze landed on her, and he stopped, his grin tilting into a seductive smile.

  “Well, what have we here? Were you sent as a congratulatory gift?” His gaze swept the length of her, and he stopped three steps away, a frown arched his dark brown brows. “You don’t look like a sporting lady.”

  His slow drawl had a relaxing quality until he called her a sporting lady.

  “Because I’m not. I clean the rooms in this hotel, not allow men to use my body for their pleasure.” Not only a gambler but a womanizer as well. How had her sister come to know this man?

  She dangled the locket in front of her. “Where did you get this?”

  “That’s mine.” His quiet, smooth tone belied the hand whipping out to snatch the chain. But she was quicker, pulling the item behind her back.

  “I could have you fired for digging through my things.” His slow deliberate words were as irritating as the smirk on his handsome face.

  “It was sitting on top of your bureau, in plain sight. Where did you get it?” She wasn’t about to back down. She’d lost touch with her little sister years ago and wasn’t giving up on her one chance to find her.

  “I won it in a card game.”

  Maggie sucked in her breath. Was Lora Beth in such despair she had to sell the trinket to survive? Her fingers clutched the locket. No, she refused to think of losing her last family member.

  “Where and from whom?” She took a step closer to the man. He smelled of cigars, whiskey, and something clean and earthy.

  “Why do you want to know?” He walked away from her and slid his arms out of his jacket, revealing a deep blue vest. He loosened the cuffs of his fine linen shirt.

  She drew in a deep breath. This man had her family’s possession and he asked her questions? She’d been reprimanded more than once for speaking her thoughts, but right now she wanted to find her lost sister. Be damned with propriety.

  “I asked y
ou where you won this if that is what you did. Answer me.” She marched over to him and tipped her chin up to meet his gaze. It irked her to see the corners of his lips tip into a smile, and his eyes crinkle with mirth.

  “I could have you thrown in jail for stealing.” He chucked her under the chin. “I’ll not tell you a thing until you explain why you think that belongs to you.”

  His touch silenced any rebuke she could muster. No one, either male or female, had touched her so intimately in ten years. The casualness of his contact and the humor in his eyes stole her wits.

  He turned away, rolling up his sleeves, and walking toward the washbasin. Maggie shook her head. How could he just wash up while she stood in the room accusing him of having her mother’s locket? The nerve of him! He’d not dismiss her so easily.

  She grabbed his arm swinging him around. “The last time I saw this locket I handed it to my sister before we were taken in by different families. I haven’t been able to find her. Where did you win this?” She shook the necklace in front of his face. Panic squeezed her chest. She didn’t like having to rely on a stranger. It was as if the past ten years had faded away, and she stood in the middle of the wagon train parentless and bewildered all over again. Lora Beth’s tear-stained face staring back at her as the wagon rolled away. Worry and loneliness had been her shadow for so long she didn’t know if any light, even knowing Lora Beth’s whereabouts, could brighten her life.

  “Shh…“ He reached out to her, and she backed away. “Why do you think that is the locket you gave your sister?” He crossed his arms over his wide chest, his muscled forearms revealing defined ridges.

  Maggie held the locket next to her face. “This stone is the color of my eyes, my mother’s eyes, and my sister’s. It was a gift from my father to my mother.” Her fingers trembled again as she worked the latch loose.

  Opening the locket, she held it out with shaking hands. “This is my sister, Loralie Elizabeth, only I call her Lora Beth.” She took a deep breath and pointed to the other side. “This is me. These were taken before we set out with a wagon train for Silver City, Idaho.”