by Vanessa Vale
Jed stepped right up to me, his face inches from mine. I could see the dark flecks in his blue eyes. “You’re telling me you both fucked our sister when you’re not actually married?”
Jed’s fist connected with my face and the world went dark before I could even come up with a response.
CHAPTER TEN
Piper
“You cheated,” the man snarled, spit flying onto the table in front of him.
I wanted to roll my eyes, but knew the man wouldn’t appreciate it. He was already angry that he’d lost his hard-earned money to a woman, so I didn’t need to make it worse. Why did men have to be such jackasses?
Every single one of them were like that. My brothers were bossy and overbearing. Lane and Spur had been two-timing liars. These drunk gamblers were terrible losers and they were all women haters.
Well, not if one was naked and beneath them. That was a guaranteed way for a man to smile and hand over his coin. But then, I’d have to give myself in return. I’d done that once, for free, and it got me nothing but heartache.
“I didn’t cheat,” I countered, eyeing the man across the table as I scooped my winnings in front of me. He’d had three shots of rotgut whiskey since I sat at the table and it was his drunk mind that was making him lose. “Ask the others.” I tilted my head toward the other two men at the table. “They lost their money too and they’re not complaining.”
“That’s because they want to get beneath your skirts and know it’s easiest to do so if you’re not a cranky bitch.”
I did smile then and noticed the two men flush hotly. While I doubted they were true gentlemen, they weren’t going to drag me into a corner and have their way with me either.
“Those are very wise words. I guess you’re not getting lucky with any of the ladies tonight.”
The man stood, his chair tipping over.
“I won’t stand for this from a woman.”
I stood as well, pulled my gun from my reticule. There were some coins in the pouch already, but would be quite heavy when I added what was on the table.
“And I won’t stand for you accusing me of things. I won fair and square.” Before things got even worse, I dropped the earnings into my bag. All alone now, I needed them. “Get the hell out of here before I shoot you.”
The man on my right pushed his chair back and stood, hands up. “She will, too.” He was four feet back when he spoke. “The other night, she shot the tip of Sam Crockett’s left ear off.”
“Yes, he bled like a stuck pig, too,” I added.
I’d spent the past week visiting the saloons in Slate Springs. There were three of them so I rotated between them. Since I no longer had a means of income—Spur’s house was fine to live in, but there was no money to put food on the table—cards was how I earned my keep.
Walker and Luke had put up a fight about my moving out of their house, but I wasn’t going to stay with them indefinitely. With Spur and Lane dead, I needed to decide what I was going to do. Since everyone in town assumed I was married to Spur, and since Patricia was the only person who could argue otherwise and she was very dead, I played along. It seemed I was taking advantage of two dead people, but what was a woman to do?
Unfortunately, I was becoming quite infamous among the miners and I would soon lose much of my chances to gamble. Only the cockiest of men wanted to lose to a woman, a woman who was known for her abilities. My income would soon dry up, so until then I’d get as much as I could.
Walker and Luke had warned me that being under their protection kept me from harm, but it also kept me from potential husbands. I was a widow, supposedly, and now very marriageable. To the men, I was attractive, young and everything they would want in a bride. Come winter, I was told one of the only requirements was consciousness and perhaps being under the age of fifty.
I’d had three marriage proposals and a near miss with being caught in a compromising position, but my gun had kept the most ardent and desperate of men away. But winter was coming quickly here in the mountains and a man wanted a woman to warm their bed. I doubted I could make it past the first snowfall without being wed. I would have to leave Slate Springs if I wanted to avoid that. Soon. I’d do it soon, but I just couldn’t pass through Jasper yet.
While they’d treated me falsely and I’d been so angry with them, that didn’t mean I wanted Lane or Spur dead.
“I don’t care if she shot him and mounted him on the wall, I want my damn money.”
He came around the table with a pace much faster than the usual drunk. I didn’t hesitate and shot him.
He cried out in surprise as much as in pain, his hand going up to his left ear.
“In case you were wondering if I had a bad aim and hit that man’s ear by mistake.”
I backed up a step, then one more, keeping my gun pointed at the man who now had blood seeping between his fingers. I wasn’t taking my eyes off of him.
He was swearing hotly, but I’d heard it all before.
I took another step and ran into a hard body. I startled and then tried to turn about when hands dropped to my shoulders.
“This seems to be a common occurrence for you, shooting men in saloons.”
I whipped around at the familiar voice. “Lane,” I breathed.
Clearly, he wasn’t dead. In fact, he didn’t even look injured. Except for the black eye. His hair was a touch longer than I remembered and he had pale whiskers on his cheeks. Other than that, he looked… good.
“Oh, my God. I thought… I thought…” I jumped into his arms and hugged him, reveling in the hard feel of him, his heat, his scent. Everything. He wasn’t dead!
“Do you shoot men in every saloon?” Spur asked, coming to stand right beside Lane, pushing my wrist so that the gun didn’t aim at him, then taking it from me.
“Spur!” I let go of Lane and grabbed him next. Then I remembered myself and stepped back. “Wait. Wait. I’m so angry with you two. What are you even doing here? Where’s Lil?”
I knew everyone in the saloon was looking at us.
“That woman yours?” the guy with the shot ear shouted. “She took my money!”
“She took your money, and your pride, too,” Spur said, looking at the man over my shoulder. “Be lucky she only took off part of your ear instead of your balls.” He aimed my gun at the man. “Now I have the gun and I’m not as steady as a shot, which means I might not hit your ear. It’s time you left my wife alone.”
The whispering and chatter started then. Wife? I thought Doc died.
“We’re not in Pueblo. Do I have to wait this time?” Lane asked Spur.
“Hell, no.”
Before I could even wonder what they were talking about, Lane leaned down and I was tossed over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Before I even started to pound on his back he’d turned and was heading out the door. The men whistled and shouted at my departure. Humiliated, I could do nothing but be thankful I’d already put my winnings into my reticule that slapped against Lane’s bottom as he moved, coins jingling.
Lane didn’t stop when he got outside, but kept walking down the block. I pounded at his back and yelled at him, but I gave up because when he shifted me on his shoulder, my wind was knocked from me and pounding on his back was like pounding marble.
Finally, finally, he stopped and put me down, keeping hold of my upper arms to steady me for a moment, then I stepped back.
“Like I said, what are you doing here?” I looked from one to the other, both whole and clearly healthy. They looked as handsome and rakish as ever and I hated them for it. I wanted to hate them, but my traitorous body remembered what we’d done together and wanted more.
“Claiming our wife,” Lane said, his gaze serious.
There wasn’t a better time to tell them the truth because for once, I could use it like a weapon. “I was going to tell you that day the Tates came, but I changed my mind. Now I think it was a good thing.” I took a deep breath, let it out. “I’m not really your wife.”
&
nbsp; Spur moved to stand directly beside Lane. “We know.”
My mouth fell open. “What… what do you mean you know?”
“They mean they know you’re not married to them.”
I whipped around, my skirt tangling about my legs to find out who spoke.
“Oh, shit,” I muttered. “Knox. Jed. What the hell are you doing here?”
My brothers looked angry. Knox had his arms folded over his chest, Jed had his hands on his hips.
“To find you,” Jed said.
“You always did like to swear,” Knox added.
“I learned from the best,” I replied, a tad bitterly.
“Nice shot, by the way,” Jed added, tilting his head to indicate inside the saloon. While I hadn’t seen him, he must have witnessed what had happened.
“Again, I learned from the best.”
I had no idea what to say after that and the silence was awkward.
“It seems there’s some things that need to be cleared up,” Spur said. I turned and positioned myself so I could look at all four men at once.
“Everything’s clear now,” I replied. “You have your mistress and I’m not your wife. I think it makes it simple, really. Go to Lil. Have fun. I’ll go my own way.”
“You’ve been with two men, Piper.” Jed narrowed his eyes at Lane and Spur, but didn’t get closer. He looked ready to beat them up. Had that been how Lane got his black eye? “That means you marry them.”
I felt my eyes widen. “What? They don’t want me! They want some whore named Lil. Lane didn’t even make it one day before he went to her. I… I can’t be in a marriage like that. Fortunately, I don’t have to be.”
“Oh, yes, you do,” Knox countered, pointing at me.
“You don’t care if my men wander?” I shook my head, looked down at the ground. I took a moment to blink back tears. It seemed I didn’t really know my brothers as much as I thought. “Unbelievable. I thought… I thought you wanted more for me.”
“I do.” Knox looked to Jed. Sighed. “We do. But you’re so stubborn. Fuck, Piper,” Knox said, dragging out my name. “You will listen to Spur and Lane or I will take you over my knee.”
“No, you won’t,” Lane barked. “That’s our job.”
“You—”
“I told you, precious, no more saloons. No more gambling and yet I find you… again, shooting people.”
I walked up to him and poked him in the chest. “You two were dead and left me destitute, without a way to support myself. This is how I make money!” I lifted my wrist and let the coins in my reticule jingle as a reminder.
His brows drew together. “Left you destitute?”
“You said being married to two men would keep me safe, that I’d never have to worry again. Well, I worried.”
“Rolon Jennings should have approached you. He’s the town banker. If something really happened to me, then you have all my money. The mine, too. If he didn’t come to you, I’ll—”
I thought back to the long string of men who’d stopped me to chat. Or propose.
“I… I think he did. I must admit, I had many men approach me this past week. Three marriage proposals alone and after that, I began to turn them away before I listened to what they had to say.”
Lane ran his hand over the back of his neck. “Three marriage proposals?”
“You were dead!” I shouted. “There was a bet going on how long I could hold out.”
“All right,” Spur interrupted, placing a hand on Lane’s arm. “Yes, we learned of our supposed deaths. Luke and Walker were just as stunned as you. We’re not dead, so let’s move on.”
“Move on? Move on?”
“Piper!” Jed yelled. “Close your mouth and listen to Lane.”
“No way. He’s… he’s—” I couldn’t think of a word to describe him.
“Then you’ll listen to me,” Spur said.
Lane shook his head. “No. I made this mess. I’ll fix it.” He looked to my brothers. “But I’m not doing it with the two of you looming. Back the fuck up.”
“Watch your tongue around my sister,” Jed warned.
“Really? Your sister swears more than a drunk miner. Her language is not my top concern. Her complete lack of regard for her safety is. Now back the fuck up.”
Jed held his hands up in front of him at Lane’s growl and they both took a step back, then another. “We’re not going far until the vows are said.”
Lane muttered something along the lines of jackass and fucking asshole under his breath.
“I don’t want to hear it,” I said when he turned to me.
“You will listen, Piper Drews or I will take you over my knee right here, right now.” While the threat was real, his tone was not as severe as when he spoke to my brothers.
I pinched my lips together and crossed my arms over my chest.
“Lil is the woman who took Spur and me in when our mothers died. She was a whore, just like they were. She lives in Jasper because she’s sick. Cancer. I moved there from Denver so she could be near me. She wanted to live at the Frightful Fawn because her longtime friend, Rachel, is the madam.”
My arms dropped to my sides. “Lil is…”
“Like a mother to both of us,” Spur added. “She’s sick and Lane has been visiting her. He sent for me in Chicago and I moved back so I could help treat her.”
“But cancer?” I asked.
Lane nodded. “She’s dying. When the Tates were at the house, I had gone to the mine, but stopped to see Lil and tell her about you. That’s what you overheard.”
“I don’t care about her history. If you care for her so much, I’m sure she’s wonderful.” I paused, bit my lip. “But… why didn’t you tell me?”
Lane’s body stiffened, as if the words coming were hard for him. “Because I didn’t want you to know about my past. I’m the son of a whore. Not only a whore, but a vicious bitch. She… she was not a good mother.”
That was the reason he’d kept the woman Lil a secret from everyone, even his closest friends? I could sense there was more to his mother just being a vicious bitch because Lane seemed jaded to the worst vagaries of life to be unaffected. But this, this cut him deep, so horribly deep, and he wasn’t going to say. Perhaps not now in front of Jed and Knox, perhaps not ever. And that was more telling than the whole truth. But he’d told me things, things that put everything in perspective. Yet still…
“The Tates all think you have a mistress.”
“They do,” Lane admitted. “Because I went to visit her at the brothel and they assumed I was going for… well, for companionship.”
I snorted at that. Companionship.
“I didn’t set them straight, because like you, I didn’t want them to know the truth.” He reached out to stroke his knuckles over my cheek. I didn’t want to give in to the simple, tender gesture, but I couldn’t resist. “As I told Spur, I’d share the truth about Lil, but I won’t share about my life before her. My childhood. I’m sorry for making you upset, for making you think the worst. I was protecting myself when I should have been protecting you.”
Lane’s pale eyes met mine. Held. I saw the truth there, the sincerity, the disappointment in himself and whatever misery he suffered when he was small.
“Now it’s our turn to talk about you, precious.”
I liked hearing the endearment when it wasn’t dripping in sarcasm or said when I wanted to shoot him. It made me feel… wanted.
My brothers stormed over then, looking at Lane and Spur as if to tell them they weren’t backing off again. “We want to hear this, too. Patricia Strong.”
The gentler moment Lane’s apology provided disappeared as if it never happened. I whirled on my brothers—I was getting quite tired of fending off two sets of men—and gave them my meanest look. “If I were a man, you’d be slapping me on my back for my ingenuity and cleverness and hiding from you as long as I did.”
“If you were a man, we wouldn’t be married to you,” Lane countered. “Talk.”
Yes, so much for gentle.
I pursed my lips and faced my brothers. This wasn’t about Lane and Spur, although they were the ones who’d been slighted by my deception. I loved seeing Jed and Knox, for I’d missed them, and the rest of my brothers, too. But it was time to stand up to them.
“You—the five of you—are stifling. You want me to marry, have a family, but then don’t let any man near me. You shot at Albert Dinker.”
“He was a little shit,” Knox said with a huff.
“Shooting people seems to be a family trait,” Lane murmured, but we ignored him.
“It wasn’t for you to decide,” I said to Jed and Knox. “You know me well enough. I am able to judge a man’s character.” I sighed. “I’d had enough. I took the money I saved up and purchased a ticket on the stage headed west. Also on the stage was a woman named Patricia Strong.” I glanced over my shoulder. “Your mail order bride. She was excited to meet you. To be your wife.”
“What did you do, punch her in the nose to take her place?” Jed asked, poking fun. “Shoot her in the ear?”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “No. She died. She fell asleep on the stage and just didn’t wake up.”
“Died?” Knox repeated, his red eyebrows disappearing under the hair on his forehead.
“Died?” Lane echoed.
I looked down at the worn wood of the boardwalk. “I don’t know how or why, but she was just gone.”
“An aneurysm, perhaps,” Spur commented. Yes, the doctor would probably know. “A bad heart.”
“The stage driver was just as stunned as I, but he didn’t have a dead body falling on him when he hit a large rut,” I added, reminding them I wasn’t the only one to witness her demise.
“He took her to the next stop to be buried and I convinced the man to take me on to Pueblo.”
“Convinced how?” Spur asked warily, as if he wasn’t sure he really wanted to know the answer.
I just shrugged, not wanting to tell them my gun was involved. Again. Turning to face Lane and Spur, I continued. “I’m sorry your wife died. She was very nice. Very pretty. Completely unlike me so I think you would have been happy with her.”
