by Rosalyn West
“That’s about it.”
“You’re crazy.”
Dodge jerked him up by the shirtfront. The movement was fierce and demonstrative, startling Reeve with a sudden hugeness of presence from the smaller man, the same powerful authority that allowed the unpretentious lieutenant to command an army into hell without question. “What I know is that this may be my only chance to raise a child as my own, and damn it, you’re not taking that away from me. You owe me this, Reeve.”
Reeve blinked in sudden understanding as Dodge let him go, acting apologetic but no less obstinate.
“I need something to hold me here,” Dodge went on in a low, almost angry tone. “I can’t go home. They’d treat me like—” He broke off to rethink his words, then continued in earnest. “I want a family to tie me here in Pride. I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to—that I’ll ever have children of my own, and now I’ve got this chance to help out a friend of yours, a woman who can give me the family I need, and the reason to drag myself up in the morning. Don’t you dare tell me I can’t make this work. I will. For that baby, if for nothing else. Damn it, if that isn’t reason enough—”
Reeve put a hand on his shoulder. “It’s reason enough.”
Dodge expelled his breath noisily, and his hostility with it. He clasped his hand over Reeve’s for a brief instant, then Reeve walked back to the sideboard, where he spoke without turning.
“Have you thought about the other two people involved in this grand gesture?”
“You and Patrice?”
“No. You and Starla. I don’t want to see either of you get hurt in this.”
His friend’s sincerity warmed him to his soul. Dodge smiled with grim determination. “It’s worth the risk to me. It’s a business arrangement, Reeve. I make them all the time and nobody’s better at it than I am. Nobody gets cheated. We’ll be fine … as long as we can keep from killing each other.”
“All right. I guess if any one can make Starla behave, you can.”
Not exactly confidence-inspiring words to a groom-to-be.
Exactly twenty-four hours later, Hamilton Dodge brought the same judge who’d married Patrice and Reeve to the door of the Glade. He didn’t draw a deep breath until he saw Starla there waiting, still of the same mind. He’d worried that perhaps—
Then he saw her standing by the stairs in a demure gown of ivory silk, her glossy black hair swept back beneath a crown of lace and pearls, and his emotions staggered. It wouldn’t have taken much for him to convince himself that he was in love with this glorious creature who’d consented to be his wife.
But of course, he wasn’t. He was merely stunned, as any man with eyes would be, by her exotic beauty. On closer examination, he could see how pale she was, how her vivaciousness was tempered to the vaguest of smiles when she saw him. Regrets? Or just wishing there were some other way than having to say vows with a perfect stranger? His mood sobered. This was no love match, so it wasn’t smart to consider it as anything but business.
They said their vows in the sunny front parlor, Patrice weeping freely on one side, Reeve grim as a sentinel on the other. Beside him Starla spoke the necessary words without inflection, then lifted her hand so he could slide on the ring his mother had given him to see him safely through four years of war. Let it see him through this marriage with equal indemnity.
As Reeve had predicted, the solemnity of the event didn’t strike home until the judge intoned the words pronouncing them man and wife.
Man and wife.
His to have and hold.
An attack of nervous exhilaration took hold of him, rattling him with consequence and conviction. He’d just taken a woman for his wife and had given himself as husband. And that was about as far from a business merger as anything he could imagine.
Panic chilled through his belly. Anticipation slicked his palms. Slowly he turned to his wife of less than a minute as the judge invited him to kiss his bride.
His mouth went desert dry as he bent for his first taste of her kiss. At the last possible moment, she jerked her head to one side, just far enough for his mouth to find her cheek instead of settling upon her lips. It was more than a denial of intimacy on grounds of embarrassed modesty. When he put his other palm to her opposite cheek, he heard her sharp intake of breath and felt her go stiff as stone against him.
He finished the gesture quickly, grazing the soft curve as if it had been the intended target all along, then leaning back to accept Reeve and Patrice’s congratulations.
But his smile was forced as he had to wonder if his bride’s distaste was directed at him or if it was the manifestation of some deeper loathing.
Had he just made the biggest mistake of his life?
Chapter 6
“I need to tell my brother.”
They’d just started along the quiet streets on the outskirts of Pride when Starla made that announcement. Though her voice was carefully modulated, Dodge caught a ragged edge of worry.
“All right. We’ll tell him together.”
Starla twisted on the buggy seat, her eyes going round and dark. “No!” Seeing she’d startled him with her vehemence, she managed a smile and placed a placating hand on his sleeve. “It would be better coming from just me. If I could drop you off and take the buggy….”
His dark gaze flickered to the hand on his arm, then up to her smiling face. She could see his suspicion and quickly dropped the coquettishness in favor of candor.
“He’s not going to like it and if you want to remain my husband for more than these past few hours, you’ll stay out of arm’s reach of Tyler for a while.”
Dodge quirked a smile. “Guess I wouldn’t be his ideal brother-in-law at that.”
He reined up the buggy in front of a small two-story frame house. The fenced-in front yard and side garden were slightly overrun with weeds, but the clapboards and trim were in good repair. She glanced from its tightly closed curtains to the man beside her.
“Who lives here?”
“We do.”
He was watching her face, waiting for a sign of her disapproval or acceptance. She simply nodded, eager to get to the task ahead of her.
“I’ll be back soon. Do you need help getting down?”
It was a reasonable question, but his reaction held no logic at all. Like a badger protecting its den, he went into a full aggressive bristle.
“I don’t need help.”
To prove it, he snatched up the crutches from between them, planted them on the ground, and swung down from the high seat. After a precarious moment, he found his balance and said with more than just a little arrogance, “I told you, I can take care of myself.”
More incensed by his harsh tone than impressed by his independence, Starla took up the reins. “So you did. I won’t forget again.” And with a snap, she left him standing in her dust.
Fair Play.
Starla grimaced at the misnomer. Cole Fairfax had never been honest in any of his dealings that she was aware of. He’d risen from seedy moon-shiner, dumping cane sugar into corn mash, to become one of the finest distillers of bourbon in Kentucky, and he hadn’t done so by making many friends. He was ruthless in business and even more so in his personal life. She and Tyler had grown up in lenient luxury, but that freedom hadn’t come without cost. For the last four years, her brother had been paying it for her. Now was the time for her to get out from under the debt altogether.
She knew it wasn’t going to be easy stepping through that front door again. But her anxious imaginings didn’t contain the gut-level terror that came over the threshold with her. Or the smack of fermenting vapors and lingering death that nearly sent her reeling back in nausea.
“Miss Starla?”
The whisper of disbelief from Matilda, her mother’s onetime maid, was followed by a cushiony embrace and a flood of memories linking her to the only adult affection she could clearly remember.
“It’s me, Tilly.” Surprisingly, tears burned her eyes. Matilda had raised her an
d her brother as best she could while managing the running of their unconventional household. The black woman had reared them with love, not discipline, but Starla couldn’t fault her, thinking it was the former more than the latter that two wild children had needed.
“Whatchu’ doing here, child? Whatchu’ come back for?” The scolding tone held affection, but more strongly it held fear, a reminder of where she was.
“I need to talk to Tyler.” She kept her voice low as her gaze slid anxiously to the closed study doors. Beyond them was her father’s bastion. She’d always thought of those doors as the gates to purgatory. “Is he home, Tilly?”
“You wait right here, child. I’ll go get him for you. You wait right here.”
She stood in the large foyer, her arms wrapped tight about her as if she could shield away all the awful ghosts still haunting the home of her birth. They rose up all around her, their wailing laments demanding she acknowledge what she’d tried to push away for so long. She closed her eyes, refusing to be drawn back by either memory or circumstance.
“Star? Darlin’, what the hell are you doin’ here?”
She looked up to see her brother on the stairs, and her heart broke at the evidence of his dissipation. It wasn’t even six o’clock and he was already knee-wobbling drunk. His clothing reeked of whiskey and wear, and the only thing more unkempt was his appearance. The females who’d once flocked around her to ooh and ah over her brother’s sharp Creole beauty and lethal grace, begging her for an introduction, would have turned away in distaste now. There was nothing attractive about negligent abuse of self and surroundings. Tyler was guilty of both.
“Tyler, I need to talk to you.”
He cast a red-rimmed glance at the study doors, then came haltingly down the stairs. His smile unfurled loosely.
“I knew you couldn’t stay mad at me.”
He’d almost reached the bottom when his knees buckled and he met the steps with a hard jolt. Instead of trying to lift himself up again, he sprawled back easily, leaning on his elbows as if it had been his intention to recline there all along. Starla bunched her skirts and lowered herself beside him.
“You shouldn’t ought to be here, darlin’, but it’s good to see you.” His rheumy gaze roamed her face with a needy fondness, making her task all the harder.
“Tyler, there’s something I have to tell you.”
He lay back against the slant of the steps, closing his eyes, going bonelessly liquid in body the way only a drunken man can. “What’s on your mind, Star? Not here to reform me, are you?”
She hesitated. “Maybe this isn’t the best time—”
His unfocused eyes blinked open. “No time like the present, as Daddy’s so fond of saying.” A bitter curl warped his lips.
“I’m married, Tyler.”
The words hit him like a dash of spring water. The shock had him gasping.
“What? When?”
“About an hour ago.”
Tyler struggled to catch his breath. “Married? To whom?”
“Lieutenant Dodge.”
He shook his head, trying to make sense of her words. “The banker? That Yankee?” His brows lowered then he grinned. “Don’t go funning with me, darlin’. You did no such thing.” Then he stared at the ring on the hand she extended. Slowly the mirthful expression drained from his face, leaving a blankness that shone dully in the eyes he lifted to meet hers. “You tell me you didn’t. You tell me, now.”
“Reeve and Patrice were our witnesses.”
Tyler drew a strangled breath and pushed off the stairs, stumbling, nearly falling down those remaining, to pace the floor in tight, uncoordinated circles.
“You married a Yank. A banker. A stranger! What the hell are you thinkin’, girl?” He staggered to a stop, staring at her narrowly. “What did he do? Did he do somethin’—?”
“No. It was my choice.”
His features crumpled into a twist of incredulous surprise.
“Why? How could you do such a thing?” Then his gaze flashed like the sudden baring of a stiletto blade he carried. “You’ll be a widow again before nightfall.”
She surged up to grasp his forearms, only to have him jump back with a vehement flailing of his arms. She pitched her petition low and passionately.
“Tyler, listen to me. Listen! Don’t you see? It’s the only way I could stay here in Pride and still be free of this house … of him.” She nodded toward the double doors. “I’m a married woman. He can never make me come back.”
Tyler laughed, a hoarse, horrible sound totally without humor. “You crazy? You think he’ll care if you got yourself some Yankee husband? The only way you’ll be safe is if you put half a country between you and here.”
She stood her ground stubbornly. “I won’t run again. I’ve done nothing wrong. And I’m tired of being punished. This is my home. My friends are here.”
“Friends? How many a those friends you think you’re gonna keep when they find out who you picked to marry?”
She set her jaw and glared at him.
“You just made yourself as big an outsider as he is.”
“He’s a good man.” She repeated Patrice’s claim staunchly. Then her confidence ebbed as she added the familiar conclusion. “And he was the only one who asked.”
“Everything’s changed now, Star. Everything.” The snag in his voice clued her to his biggest concern.
She spoke gently, firmly. “Not between us.”
Tyler laughed, his bitterness laced with anguish. “Really? Do you think your Yankee banker husband is gonna invite me to sit down at your dinner table anytime soon? He tell you how he got that bullet in his back?”
“I thought during the war.” A terrible insight pierced through her as she whispered, “You shot him?”
Tyler waved impatiently. “No, but I was there and that makes me as responsible as him that did.”
“Starla?”
The faltering cry coming from within the closed study set both brother and sister back in startled alarm. Tyler grabbed Starla’s arm, shoving her toward the outer door.
“You get clear of here,” he told her tersely. “Get out, now, and don’t you be coming back.”
“Tyler—”
“You stay close to that Yank husband and maybe he can protect you.”
“Starla!”
Tyler yanked open the front door and pushed her out onto the porch, where the air was fresh with the taste of freedom. “Go on, now. Get.”
Impulsively she threw her arms around his neck, hugging hard until he relented long enough to return the embrace. She felt his quick kiss against her hair before he stepped back and closed the door firmly between them.
Tyler leaned back against it for a timeless minute, his eyes closed tight until a clattering from within the study drew his attention. With a fierce expression chiseling his features, he crossed the foyer and opened the double doors.
Cole Fairfax was half out of the chair where he spent his days and nights. He’d knocked over the table next to it to make the racket that had brought Tyler in. He glared up at his son as he struggled to sit back beneath the heavy bundle of quilts. Tyler made no move to assist him.
“Where is she?”
A room away, Tyler regarded him dispassionately. “She’s gone. She’s outta your reach now.”
“I know she’s here in town—”
“She’s got herself a husband.”
“You lie!”
“No. It’s the truth. You leave her alone, old man. You leave her alone, or I’ll be outta here myself. Then what would you do, with no one here to run your precious business?”
Fairfax squinted at his heir, a snide smile on his face. “You wouldn’t give it up. You like the easy life as much as you like the free liquor.”
“Try me, old man. You let Starla alone, and I’ll stay here and see to things like I been doing. But you go bothering her, and I’ll see this old mausoleum crumbles down on your head, whether you’re ready to meet your maker o
r not.”
From his vantage point on the porch, Dodge watched his new bride angle the buggy up next to the house. He looked for signs of upset in the way she handled the reins, in the way she climbed down and crossed the untended lawn, but outwardly she was as cool as the late-day breeze was warm. Because he considered her dealings with her family personal business, he couldn’t ask how things had gone with her brother. So he made himself smile as she stepped up onto the whitewashed boards. He levered up on his crutches and pushed open the front door. “Home sweet home. After you, Mrs. Dodge.”
She looked startled at the title, then was stoic once more as she swept inside the modest house. She paused to take in the dust-covered furniture in the parlor.
“Have you lived here long?”
“Since I signed the papers this morning. I couldn’t very well expect you to live on a cot in the back room of the bank. The folks who owned this place got called back East a month ago and left it to the bank. It’s not what you’re used to, but it was all I could come up with on such short notice.”
Her quiet “It’s fine” gave away no clue to her true thoughts.
It was then, as they stood there in the entry hall surrounded by dust sheets and awkwardness, that he realized his mistake. Some welcome this was. He should have had someone come over to open the place up, to shake out the air of emptiness. He should have had flowers waiting. What a dismal greeting—someone else’s abandoned home with a stranger for a husband. He should have been thinking of her comfort, but his mind still worked in a bachelor mode, with considerations only for himself and what little he needed to get by. That would have to change.
If she was disappointed, she didn’t show it.
“You can do anything you like with the place,” Dodge told her, hoping to win a little enthusiasm. “Buy whatever you want so it suits you.” Then, because maybe she didn’t know it, he added, “I have money. I can afford it.”
“So can I, Lieutenant.”
She moved into the parlor and began stripping off the sheets. The dust cloaked her in a fine aura against the lamplight. His wife. Their house. His palms grew damp against the smooth wood supporting his weight.
