by Merry Farmer
Well, she couldn’t exactly say he showed up out of the blue. But if she would have bet on it, she would have put all her money on him cursing her name, planting himself in Everland, and never wanting to see her again. Of course, that meant that as likely as not, he was there to punish her for walking out. All of those beautiful words he’d just spoken might be not so much out of genuine feeling, but because he was angry and attempting to make her look like a cold-hearted witch in front of her friends.
As soon as she heard the door shut behind her, she spun back around. He’d followed her. She launched right into a furious, “What do you think you’re doing?”
He blew out a breath and spread his arms wide. “I don’t even know.”
Bonnie blinked. That wasn’t the answer she’d been expecting. It made her restless. She shifted her weight between her legs, chewing her lip. “Well…you didn’t have to go humiliating me in front of my friends like that.”
Rupert’s eyes blazed wide. “Humiliating you?”
There was the answer to whether he’d meant those beautiful words. He had. And she’d just accused him of using them to hurt her. It was just one mistake after another with the two of them.
She continued to fidget, no idea how she would salvage the situation. “I kept our marriage a secret on purpose. Now they’re all going to think I’ve been lying to them for years, playing them for fools.”
“Why didn’t you tell them the truth?” He glared at her, but Bonnie couldn’t tell if the emotion rippling off of him was anger or pain.
“What was I supposed to tell them? That I had a husband who I’d left?”
“Yes,” Rupert answered through clenched teeth.
“And how do you suppose that would have played out with the good people of this town? Most of them barely accepted me when I first opened my Place. A whorehouse doesn’t exactly elevate the neighborhood.”
“Then why did you open one in the first place?”
His indignation set her over the edge, and she threw up her hands, genuinely irritated. “We’ve been through this before. Hell, Rupert, half the people in this town understand what you don’t seem to be able to grasp. My girls only entertain who and when they want to. The rest of the time, they work to better themselves so that they can escape into calmer lives. And even if they didn’t, they have done more to keep the unruly young ranch hands and cowpokes of this area from tearing the place down than Trey Knighton could if he had an army of deputies. They—”
“What’s going on here?”
The all-too familiar voice of Rex was like ice pouring down Bonnie’s back. She snapped her mouth closed so hard that she bit her tongue. Every muscle in her body jerked tight with tension. Worst of all, Rupert stared at her as though he deserved some kind of an explanation.
He probably did.
It was all Bonnie could do to breathe in and put on as much of a smile as she could manage. She turned slowly toward Rex.
“Rex. I was just about to come looking for you.” Her voice sounded unnaturally high and guilty as sin.
Rex glowered at her. He must have come to town on business of some sort. He wore one of his finer suits—one Bonnie had picked out for him and had shipped in from San Francisco—and had a clean Stetson on slicked-back hair. His gold watch fob glittered in the afternoon sunlight, but that was the only thing about him that glowed.
“Who is this?” He narrowed his eyes at Rupert.
Panic flared up in Bonnie’s gut. “Rex, this is—”
“Rupert Cole.” Rupert stepped past her, holding out a hand to Rex. “From King Cole Construction in Everland.”
“Everland?” Rex took Rupert’s hand, but barely shook it before pulling back as if Rupert were diseased. He sneered as he swept Rupert with a glance, evidently finding him wanting. Then he turned to Bonnie, suspicion painting dark lines on his face. “Didn’t you just get back from some nonsense errand in Everland?”
“I—”
“She was there to see me,” Rupert cut in.
Bonnie’s panic grew so pitched that the edges of her vision went black. If she could have stomped on Rupert’s foot, she would have, if only to get him to shut up. She wasn’t ready for Rex to figure everything out and turn her life upside down just that moment.
“Bonnie!” Rex barked. “What is the meaning of—”
“She came to Everland to ask me about building a house on your ranch,” Rupert interrupted.
Bonnie’s eyes shot wide. She stared at Rupert. He sent her a sideways glance that made him look like he had something sour in his mouth.
“Since you two are planning to get married and all,” he continued, almost growling.
He hated her. He had to hate her. After the way she was making him lie for her?
But no, she hadn’t made him do anything. He was spinning tall tales on her behalf that would do him no good, but would keep her head attached to the rest of her body for a little while longer. Best of all, Rex didn’t question a word of it. He dismissed Rupert out of hand and turned to Bonnie.
“Speaking of that very thing, I’m through with waiting, do you hear me?”
“I hear you, Rex,” she sighed. “It’s hard not to when you start bellowing like a stuck bear.”
“And I’m through with your sass!” he added, even louder.
Bonnie flinched, half because of the threat inherent in his words and half because Rupert was standing right there to see it. Nothing about this situation was going to turn out well.
“You’ve delayed long enough,” he went on. “I’m tired of waiting for our marriage to be finalized, and I’m extra tired of waiting for you to get started on producing that heir of mine.”
“There’s no need to go getting yourself all worked up about it,” she replied, rubbing her forehead where a headache was coming on.
“Good. So you’ll have no objections to having the wedding on Tuesday.”
Bonnie dropped her hand and stared at him. Rupert made a sound that didn’t quite form into words. “Why Tuesday?” Bonnie asked.
Rex rolled his shoulders and looked momentarily embarrassed. “I’ve got too much to think about with this baseball game until Sunday. Monday I’ll likely be sleeping off my victory celebration. So Tuesday it is.”
Tuesday was less than a week away.
Then again, with George filing the divorce decree the day before, there was no reason to delay.
“Fine, Rex,” she sighed. “Tuesday will work splendidly for me.”
Rex took a half step back in surprise. “Really?” Before she could answer, he cleared his throat and put his fierce demeanor back on. “Good. I’ll tell my girls. They can help you decorate and fuss over menus, or whatever it is women do to prepare for a wedding.”
Without another word, he stomped off to be about whatever business he had.
“I love you too,” Bonnie muttered, full of sarcasm. Well, she’d asked for it.
As much as she wanted to go her own way, retreat to the sanctuary of her Place, and remind herself of all the reasons she was doing something so heartbreakingly stupid, she still had Rupert to deal with.
“Thank you,” she told him, not quite able to meet his eyes.
“For what? For chickening out at the last second and making up some fool story?” He grunted at himself and spat in the dirt. “I need a bath.”
Just like Rex, he marched past her, arms crossed. She supposed she’d asked for that too. Any hope she had for her tragic love story having a miraculously happy ending was pretty much in its grave. Heart heavy, she turned to slog her way across the street to her Place.
“Bonnie!” Rupert stopped her before she was halfway across the street. His disgusted look had changed to one of determination. “Don’t think this is the end of things between us. And don’t you begin to think for a second that I’m actually going to let you marry that horse’s ass.”
Chapter 9
For the second night in a row, Rupert barely slept a wink. This time, instead of tossin
g and turning over memories of his amazing night with Bonnie and worries about how she would react when he came after her, he was just plain furious. Rex Bonneville was a first-rate ass and a shameless bully. How could Bonnie even contemplate marrying the man for money?
He was so tempted to use Bonneville as his excuse to throw her over forever, to find that damned divorce decree and sign it in disgust, that he almost jumped out of bed to pack his things and leave in the middle of the night. The only thing that stopped him was the knowledge that if he hadn’t let his temper get the better of him four years ago when he’d found out Bonnie was a madam in Haskell, none of this would have ever happened. For all those years, the two of them just kept running away from each other when things got bad. Well, he was tired of running.
That and the fact that every fiber of his being and every molecule of his heart longed for Bonnie, as if she’d branded her name on his soul.
By the time the first rays of dawn broke through the curtains of his hotel room, Rupert had decided the only reasonable thing to do was to convince Bonnie that marrying Bonneville would be the biggest mistake of her life, and to win her back.
He rose and dressed in a groggy blur, then headed downstairs to the lobby and the hotel restaurant. As much as he wanted to charge into battle, he had no idea what that battle was or where it would take place. In fact, as he sipped a cup of strong coffee and picked at a plate of bacon and eggs, he felt utterly clueless. How did you stop your wife from going off and marrying a wealthy rancher so that she could keep her whorehouse open?
Rupert grunted and shook his head over the problem just as the hotel’s regal, white-haired manager, Mr. Gunn, approached his table.
“I wanted to take the liberty of delivering your bill for breakfast myself,” Mr. Gunn began in a manner so straightforward that Rupert nearly swallowed his coffee wrong.
“Is something wrong?” he asked, taking the bill from Mr. Gunn’s hand and looking at it.
“Not per se.” Mr. Gunn helped himself to the seat across the table. He folded his hands on the pristine, white tablecloth as if conducting a business meeting. “Word has gotten back to me that you are, in fact, married to Bonnie Horner?”
Dread pooled in Rupert’s stomach, making him wish he hadn’t eaten those eggs. “I don’t think Bonnie wants folks around here to know,” he mumbled.
“No, I imagine not.” Gunn nodded. “And I have taken steps to make sure that the truth remains a secret.”
Rupert’s brow flew up. “You have the power to guarantee that?”
“Yes.”
Something about the dead-pan certainty in Gunn’s eyes sent a shiver down Rupert’s spine. As kindly and charming as this Gunn appeared on the outside, Rupert didn’t want to mess with him.
“What do you want from me, then?” he asked, looking for some sort of writing implement to sign the bill for breakfast. Nothing was on the table, so he patted his pockets out of habit. To his surprise, there was a pencil in his pocket, though he didn’t remember putting it there. It must have been the one the barmy old lady had given him at the train station. Lucky for him, he hadn’t thrown it away. He used it to sign his name to the bill.
“I want you to take care with how you treat our Bonnie,” Gunn went on. “She’s an essential part of this town, very well-respected amongst its citizens, and she provides an important service.”
He couldn’t help it. Rupert arched his brow in a borderline lewd manner.
“Not like that,” Gunn corrected him, a sharp edge in his voice.
Rupert immediately dropped his expression to contrition. “Well, what am I supposed to think? What would anyone think? Two of those girls who work for her exposed themselves to me yesterday like it was some joke. What do you think an average man would assume about them, about the house where they work, and about the owner of that house?” He shoved the bill across the table to Gunn.
“I understand what things appear to be,” Gunn conceded, picking up the bill. “But if you know Bonnie at all, if you’ve had any sort of discussion with her about what she’s really—”
He stopped abruptly as he scanned the bill. A strange sort of confusion furrowed his brow. He blinked, but his stare remained fixed on the bill.
At last, he said, “You have a very nice signature.”
Rupert’s lips curled in a wry grin. “It’s a plain old signature.”
“Still…” Gunn continued to stare at it for a few seconds before clearing his throat and tucking the bill into his jacket pocket. He pressed his fingertips to his brow as if remembering where he was and what he was talking about. “Ah,” he said at last. “My point is, you seem like a fine sort of man and an asset to any community…” He paused, brow sinking to a slight frown, as if that wasn’t quite what he’d meant to say, then went on. “As Bonnie’s husband, you have a right to insist on certain things, but I urge you to be absolutely certain you understand the entire story before you do anything that might interfere with the important work she’s engaged in.”
Rupert narrowed his eyes. “I’m not going to let her marry that sack of horse caca, Bonneville.”
Gunn stood, wearing a mysterious and almost triumphant grin. “If I implied that it was my wish for you not to hurt Bonnie by allowing her to continue with that farce of a union with Rex Bonneville, then I apologize. In fact, I meant quite the opposite. But you need to have a care how you go about salvaging that situation. It will do no good for her to lose financial support for her work. Ask for help if you need to. There are plenty around here who will give it.”
Rupert wished he could have found a smart way to reply to Gunn’s statement, but he was left completely speechless. He nodded, Gunn returned the gesture and then walked off, back to work. Rupert spent the next couple of minutes finishing off his coffee, wondering what had just happened and what he could possibly do about it.
He hadn’t come up with a solution by the time he left the restaurant and headed outside. The town was relatively quiet first thing in the morning. Folks were going about their business with purpose. No one was in the mood to do more than send him a friendly smile as he stood on the hotel’s porch, staring across the street at Bonnie’s Place. Her Place looked as sleepy as the rest of town.
He headed down the porch steps, but as his feet hit the dirt of the road, he reconsidered his fleeting idea to confront Bonnie directly. Instead, he turned right and marched along the street that ran perpendicular to Main Street. There were more shops and businesses along that road than there had been last time. The open field where the road curved to the left that he’d vaguely noted four years ago had been transformed into a well-maintained baseball field. There were even a few men out practicing before whatever other work they did.
Rupert continued to walk around, noting several new houses as the road continued to curve, and a gigantic school that looked far too big for the number of children that must inhabit Haskell. Some of those children were already on their way to school. Rupert smiled and nodded at a few of them. He even got smiles back from a parcel of redheaded children who chattered away with each other and their friends as if they’d all kissed the Blarney Stone.
Beyond the school was the church. One glimpse of it, and Rupert stopped in his tracks. A dozen memories clicked into place from his last, miserable visit to Haskell. Rev. George Pickering. Bonnie knew him, had known him before. Rupert had had the uncomfortable feeling that Pickering was in love with Bonnie last time. That or he was just overprotective of his congregation. He’d given Rupert a tongue-lashing that he would never forget. Rupert remembered thinking after the fact that he couldn’t blame the man, and if he couldn’t be with Bonnie, at least she had someone on her side who would look out for her.
That decided him. Hands thrust in his pockets, gut wriggling in anticipation, he marched on to the church.
“Hello?” he called out once he’d entered the sanctuary. Churches had always seemed a bit spooky to him on any day other than Sunday or when there wasn’t a service. Haske
ll’s church was a bit of a wonder, though. It was outfitted with the most magnificent stained-glass windows that filled the sanctuary with multicolored light. It was hard to hold on to gloom or foreboding with all those colors swirling around him. “Hello? Rev. Pickering?”
A thump sounded from another room, and moments later, a door at the side of the chancel opened.
“Good morning.” Rev. George Pickering stuck his head out of what must have been an office. He wore a pastorly smile…which promptly faded as soon as he saw Rupert. “Oh. Hello.” A moment later, Pickering shook himself, his expression dropping to a confused frown. “What are you doing here?”
Rupert debated what he should say, but only for a second. Blurting out the truth had carried him this far. Why stop now? “I’m here to stop Bonnie from marrying Rex Bonneville.”
Pickering’s eyes popped wide at the declaration. “Well.” He walked slowly toward Rupert, rubbing a hand over his mouth and jaw as he did, eyes still wide with surprise. “I can’t say I expected to hear that.”
“Expected or not, it’s what I’m here to do.” Rupert took his hands out of his pockets, but he didn’t offer to shake with Pickering. He didn’t nod to the man or smile at him. In fact, part of him wanted to throttle the good reverend for having the gall to fall in love with his wife. If he had fallen in love with her.
Pickering stopped a few feet away from Rupert, studying him with a critical eye. “Why now?” He shrugged. “Why show up in Haskell when she’s so close to meeting Bonneville at the altar?”
Rupert crossed his arms. “Did you know that she came over to Everland the other day to see me?”
Pickering’s expression faded to a blankness, but it wasn’t enough to hide that he knew that much and more. “That’s why you came here? Because she came to see you?”
“More things happened in Everland than just a how-dee-doo and a tea party.” His competitive streak wanted to brag about the night he and Bonnie had spent together, to rub in the fact that Pickering had no chance with her.
