Hannah frowned at him. "But you think I’d lose.”
He shrugged. "I can’t be certain of that. But assault against females isn’t uncommon, and I’ve heard that very few women are successful bringing charges.”
She must have looked skeptical, because he shook his head impatiently and added, "I haven’t been here long enough to witness it myself, but the men in the saloon talk, Hannah. Apparently there was a case last summer, a French woman named Sophie Rouillard. She worked for a miner as his housekeeper, and she said he owed her money. When she went after him for it, he punched her in the stomach hard, and two weeks later she died. There were witnesses, a coroner’s report of serious injury, a trial, but the official consensus of the all-male jury was that she died of a visitation of God brought on by strong drink.”
Hannah was incensed. "That’s disgusting. I can't believe the other women in town didn’t protest.”
He smiled at her naivete. “There are fifteen hundred men in this town, Hannah, and perhaps a hundred women. Married women are considered the property of their husbands, and the single women are mostly prostitutes, reliant on males for their living. Exactly what would you have them do to protest?"
She thought of marches and bra-burning and petitions to the government, and then realized that women were still years away from even having the right to vote. Frustration and a sense of discrimination brought a scowl to her face.
"It’s not fair," she insisted.
"You keep saying that, and I agree, it’s not fair," he said, "but it's the way things are. I’ve heard of other, similar cases to Rouillard’s, and in every one, the law unfortunately seems to favor the male." His gaze slid to her torn shirt, and his eyes and mouth hardened. "Slater won’t bother you again."
"I don’t ever want to see him again," she whispered, shuddering at the memory of Slater pinning her to the ground, of his cruel hands as they grasped her breast.
"You won’t have to. But you’re going to have to change your mode of dress, because unless you do, there will be others who’ll mistake your intentions, Hannah." His tone was soft and gentle, but there was steel beneath the words. “And I may not be there to rescue you next time. I know it irks you to have me make comments on your clothing, but I don't intend to fight gun battles to defend your honor."
Hannah swallowed the defiant retort that came to her lips, that she had no intention of making him do anything of the kind. The truth was, he had almost ended up in a gun battle defending her, and she remembered how he’d looked as he held the gun to Slater’s head. He’d seemed a stranger all of a sudden, hard and cold, capable of anything.
He carried a pistol inside the leather vest he wore. These were very different times from her own.
"Would you have ... you wouldn’t have just shot Slater tonight, would you, Logan?" Her voice was shaky.
He smiled at her, a lazy smile calculated to reassure, and shook his head. "Slater’s not worth hanging for.”
"I should think not. And just to put your mind at rest, I bought a couple of sets of what you’d consider suitable clothes today. I’m going to start wearing them tomorrow, for work."
"I’m sure you’ll find the sacrifice worthwhile." There was more than a touch of sarcasm in his tone, and she grinned at him, and then glanced around the room, relaxed enough now to be cu- rious.
"So this is where you’re sleeping while we’re using your room?" The shed was primitive, and she felt guilty. She realized for the first time what a sacrifice he’d made in providing them with accommodation, generously exchanging his comfortable bedroom for this.
"Angus and I sleep here. He’s been sleeping out here since he came to live with me. I offered him a room inside, but he wants to be out here. He likes to whittle and carve little animals, and we’re making a cradle for his sister's baby."
“Angus reminds me of a boy I know back ... back home. A patient at the hospital named Stephen.” She remembered the child-man who’d had such a crush on her, and whose sweetness touched her heart.
He gave her a look. "So you put people like Angus in hospitals where you come from?”
Hannah shook her head. "No, we don’t. Generally we try to help them in any way we can, just as you're doing with Angus. Stephen didn’t get the help he needed, though. He tried to commit suicide. That’s why he’s in the hospital. In the time I live in, a lot of young people commit suicide.”
Logan's eyes darkened and when he spoke, the terrible bitterness in his voice shocked and surprised her. "Young people take their own lives in this world, too, Hannah." He tossed back the last of the whiskey in his cup and got to his feet so abruptly, he knocked over the chair. Without bothering to right it, he went over to the cot and snatched something from a low stool beside it.
When he came back, he thrust it at Hannah. It was the likeness of a lovely young woman, her dark hair a mass of curls, her huge eyes innocent and trusting.
“My sister Nellie." The harshness in his voice made Hannah wince. "She died two years ago. She’d just turned twenty.” He rescued the overturned chair and sat down again, the same way he'd been sitting before, straddling the seat, arms resting on the chair back.
Hannah waited, and when he didn't continue, she said in a hesitant voice, suspecting the answer before she asked. "What did she die of, Logan?”
There was a long silence. Just when Hannah had decided he wasn’t going to answer, he spoke. His voice was uninflected and totally devoid of emotion.
“Nellie was expecting a child, and she wasn’t wed. She was slow, like Angus. My father is a clergyman with very strict rules. Nellie was scared. My father found out about the baby and he gave her hell. She drowned herself."
"Oh, Logan." Shocked and horrified, Hannah looked at the picture again and then at him. "She’s so very beautiful, so young. Logan, I’m terribly sorry.”
His strong face was like a mask, but the agony in his eyes tore at her heart. It made her long to comfort him, but she didn't know how. The only thing she could do was encourage him to talk. "Were there just the two of you?"
He shook his head. “I have two brothers. I'm the eldest. I was already fourteen when Nellie was born." Again he fell silent, his eyes looking past Hannah at something she couldn’t see. She quickly added the years. So Logan was now thirty-four, six years her senior. He seemed older, somehow.
He said in the same quiet voice, “Nellie was a late child, and my mother didn’t survive her birth." His lips tilted in a fond, sad smile. "Neighbors helped, but my brothers and I took over most of Nellie’s care. We did our clumsy best at diapering and feeding her until at last an aunt arrived from England to take over. But Nellie would have none of Aunt Tillie for the longest time. She would only let us boys feed and dress her.”
“It must have been difficult for your father, raising four children on his own."
He made a sound that should have been a laugh but wasn’t. "My father knows less than nothing about raising children.” There was disdain in his tone. “All he knows how to do is pray and preach and condemn. Joy and laughter are foreign to him.”
She watched the powerful emotions come and go on his face.
“You must have loved Nellie very much.”
His tormented eyes met Hannah's for a moment, and then he looked away again. “I did, but I wasn’t there to watch out for her. I ran away when she was only three."
"But you went home again?"
“Only twice. My father and I quarreled. He has always considered me tainted by the devil. My brothers were a little more tractable. They followed his dictates as long as they could. We grew apart."
"Where are they now?”
"They both left home early. David joined the army. Andrew homesteaded in Idaho.” He gave her a crooked smile. “I haven’t seen them in years. We have little but blood in common any longer, my brothers and I.” The haunted expression in his eyes intensified. “When they left home, Nellie was alone with my father. I thought of her often. I intended to go back and make certain she
was all right, but of course there was the war."
Hannah frowned. "Which war?"
He gave her a puzzled look. “The War Between the States, of course."
Hannah stared at him as it slowly dawned on her that he was talking about the United States Civil War. Once again she’d forgotten for these few moments where and when she was.
“Logan, you actually fought in the Civil War?" Her voice was filled with awe. He raised his eyebrows, and this time his smile was genuinely amused. "I didn’t fight, no. Soldiering is not usually a profitable occupation, Hannah. I’m not a knight in shining armor.”
She thought of the way he’d come to her rescue with Slater, and she wanted to disagree.
“But you were there? Close to the fighting?"
A shadow came and went on his lean features. “I was there, yes. I bought and sold equipment, guns, supplies.” An ironic smile came and went. “To both armies, actually. There were opportunities, and men like me made the most of them. I had no strong feelings for either North or South. In California many of us felt that way, that it wasn’t our cause. It’s a sickening business, war. No one wins except the politicians and the profiteers. I hope never to have to witness anything like it again."
A deep sadness overcame her. She could have told him how many times war would happen in the next hundred years, but she didn’t.
"When did it end, the Civil War?"
“Just three years ago, in 1865. I stayed on in Washington for two years afterwards. It was there that a letter finally reached me about Nellie." His voice hardened. “I should have gone back when the war ended, made certain she was all right. But I delayed, and in the meantime a man came along and seduced her. It wouldn’t have taken much. She was a loving child.”
Hannah could have wept for him. “You can’t blame yourself, Logan. What happened wasn’t your fault.”
His face grew dark and taut and his eyes glittered. The look he gave her was a warning.
"She was my sister. What happened to her shouldn’t have been allowed to happen.” The suppressed rage in his voice sent a shiver down her back.
"What became of the man?" He looked away, and now his voice was off-hand and cool.
"He disappeared. No one knew where."
Hannah wasn’t sure she believed him, but she sensed he didn't want to pursue that subject. She looked again at the picture of Nellie, and she reached across and impulsively touched the back of Logan’s hand.
“She was lucky to have a brother like you. I always wished I had a brother. Or a sister. I’d have loved to have had a sister." Her forefinger caressed the picture, touching the soft line of cheek and jaw, the special innocence in the girl’s eyes.
He turned the hand she was touching over, so that their palms met. The contact sent a rippling shock through Hannah, and she jerked her hand away.
He didn’t resist or react. He hardly seemed to notice.
"You were an only child, Hannah?” It was her turn to nod. There was an intimacy here in this rough shed, with the lamplight flickering over them, that inspired confidences, and the powerful attraction she felt for Logan made it seem natural to confide in him.
"I didn't get on well with my father, either," she confessed. "Oh, I adored him when I was really little, but after I grew up and saw what he was doing to my mother, I hated him.” Her voice shook. Talking about Michael always upset her.
“What sort of man was he?”
She pretended to misunderstand. "A very big man. That's where I got my height from.”
"And what exactly did he do to Daisy?" His entire attention was focused on her now, and too late, Hannah realized that telling him about her father would also reveal a great deal about herself, perhaps more than she wanted him to know right now.
Hannah shrugged, trying for nonchalance. "Oh, he made promises he never kept. He drank too much. And he lost all her money."
"He was a gambler, Hannah?” The question was casual, but they both understood its import.
She met his curious gaze defiantly. “Yes, he was. Not with cards. But he took chances on the stock market, on useless investments and idiotic schemes. His gambling was out of control. Daisy had an inheritance that would have made life easy for her now that she’s older, but he lost it all."
Logan nodded thoughtfully. "Some men shouldn’t gamble."
"No one should," she burst out angrily. “It’s a disease, just like alcoholism. It ruins lives. It all but ruined ours."
"Only because your father allowed the gambling to rule him.” His voice was gentle. “Poker, all games of chance, they're only games, Hannah, best played by men who have nothing to lose but their gold. No wives, no children."
“Men like you?" She was asking a question, one she’d wondered about.
He recognized it, and his smile was lazy. “Like me, yes."
"But haven’t you ever thought of getting married, Logan?" She twisted the ring on her engagement finger and for the first time in hours, thought of Brad. She should feel guilty, having this intimate discussion with another man, but for some reason she didn’t.
He shrugged, still smiling. “Everyone thinks of marriage at one time or another. I’ve just never found good enough reason for it.” His gaze went to the ring she was twisting, and he jerked his chin at it. “What is it about him that makes you want to marry?”
“About Brad? Oh, I—well, I love him, of course."
She did, of course she did. She tried to visualize Brad, to make the question easier to answer, but the exact contours of her fiance’s face eluded her. "He's very reasonable. And reliable. And trustworthy." Heavens, it sounded as if she were describing a family pet. She wracked her brain. "He wants a family, and I do, too. We value the same things in life, security, enough money to live comfortably. We have the same objectives.”
What the heck were they? It was difficult to think, with Logan staring at her like that.
He got to his feet in one smooth, lithe motion, and before she could guess what he intended, he reached out and took her hand, pulling her up and drawing her towards him. One hard arm came around her waist, cradling her under the flannel shirt, holding her disturbingly close to his body.
She raised a hand to his chest, meaning to push away, but instead she flattened her palm against his warmth. His big body seemed to radiate heat, and it mesmerized her. All of a sudden she felt hot too.
He studied her leisurely, his blue eyes almost black in the lamplight. There was challenge in their depths, a trace of humor and more than a trace of challenge in his voice. “There's only one reason to marry, Hannah. I believe it has everything to do with this."
He bent his head and brought his mouth to hers.
Yesterday’s Gold: Chapter Fifteen
His kiss was both savage and sexual.
He tasted of whiskey, and he used his tongue skillfully, urging her response.
When she gave it, helpless to deny him, he took full advantage, exploring, probing, demanding, angling his mouth to fit hers ever more closely. His mustache was soft and sensual against her skin. Every pore seemed to tighten on her body, every nerve ending become alive and needy. Locked against him, she could plainly feel his arousal, hard against her belly.
He kept one arm around her waist, but with his free hand he caressed her, cupping her bottom, drawing her against him and releasing her, mimicking the relentless rhythm of his tongue.
She ought to pull away, but she couldn’t do it. Her breasts ached and exquisite sensation flooded through her, a coil of urgent need that wound tight in her belly, so powerful it left no space for reason. Hunger was suddenly overwhelming. She wanted him in a way she'd never wanted before. She’d never dreamed she could want in this way, with a ferocious need that threatened to consume her.
"... been gone for hours, I’m worried about her." The sound of her mother's worried voice from outside the building slowly penetrated Hannah’s awareness, and she stiffened and pulled away from Logan, but he held her steady in his arms, soothing h
er with a gentle hand on her back.
"Hannah? Hannah, where are you?"
It sounded as if Daisy was right outside the door. Klaus was barking frantically, and Elvira said something to him in a peevish tone.
"Logan, let me go. Please, I have to go.” Her voice surprised her. It was a gasp, husky with desire.
Reluctantly, he allowed her to slip from his arms. His eyes were heavy-lidded, and he was breathing as hard as she was. He smoothed a rough finger across her swollen lips.
"Damn your chaperones,” he muttered. "We were only just beginning.”
Hannah pulled his shirt closer around herself and reached up to smooth her hair.
He watched her silently, his eyes a caress.
“Hannah?” Daisy’s voice held a note of hysteria, and Hannah finally moved to the door and opened it.
“It’s okay, Mom. I’m right here. I'm fine." She was relieved to discover that it was very dark outside. At least the other women wouldn’t be able to see the telltale flush she knew was in her cheeks. It felt as if her lips were swollen.
"Oh, thank goodness you’re here, Hannah. I thought you’d gone for a walk, and I got so worried when it got dark and you hadn’t come home."
“I was just about to come in the house." Hannah quickly closed the toolshed door behind her.
"What on earth were you doing in there?" Elvira stalked over and opened the door again and stuck her head in the toolshed. “And why are you wearing Logan’s shirt? Oh, hello, Logan, I didn’t realize you were in here, too. So this is where you're sleeping these days, is it?"
"Evening, Elvira."
Hannah heard the amusement in his voice. She didn’t find Elvira at all amusing. She hurried up the back steps and through the kitchen. The woman was a busybody, and as soon as she had the chance, she’d undoubtedly make some remark or other about Hannah being engaged to Brad and in the toolshed with Logan. Well, Hannah decided, she just wouldn't provide the opportunity.
She bolted straight up the stairs to the bedroom, longing more than ever for even a few moments of privacy as she lit the lamp. Her emotions were in a turmoil, and she needed time alone to sort them out, but the other women were already coming up. She could hear them on the stairs. She hung the lamp on its hook and frantically pulled off Logan’s shirt and then her torn blouse, thrusting it in her carryall.
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