WestwardWindsV2Arebooks

by Linda Bridey

“What are you saying?” Tessa said.

  “If he starts causing trouble in front of my children, I’ll ask him to leave. I’m not gonna be blamed for something you did or didn’t do,” Dean answered.

  “I won’t let that happen and I won’t let the children be upset, either. Besides which, my father is a wonderful man who has raised three daughters and would never purposely upset a child. You have nothing to worry about.”

  Dean nodded, apparently satisfied on that score. “Why didn’t you write home to tell them you were getting married? Are you ashamed of me because we’re not from high society? Is it because you felt that your parents wouldn’t approve of you marrying someone below your station?”

  “No! Of course not,” Tessa said.

  “Sure, Tessa,” Dean said sarcastically. “Why don’t I believe you? You said you were bored with your old life and wanted some adventure. Here’s what I think happened. You thought running away to the west would be romantic, so you wrote me and agreed to come here. As time went on, you began to see what it was really like here, that livin’ here is a lot of hard work. You started thinking that your parents would be really disgusted by the fact that you were marrying some poor rancher with two kids. I guess you’d say it was scandalous. Yeah, I think that’s the right word.”

  Tessa couldn’t help saying, “It is.”

  Dean nodded. “Ok. Then once you’d married me, you were trapped. You couldn’t go back home because you’d be disgraced. Unless your family came up with a good story, of course. Maybe you went to visit your sick aunt or something? Isn’t that how you people do that when someone gets into some kind of trouble? You just sweep it under the rug and make up something so that no one is the wiser?”

  Tessa hadn’t thought to ask her father what they’d told any of the friends or family in her circles about her disappearance. She looked at Dean with wide eyes and said nothing because she could neither confirm or deny his statements.

  Dean saw her confusion. “What excuse did your father give them?”

  “I have no idea. I’ve never asked him,” Tessa said.

  His laugh held no warmth. “So you didn’t even think it was worth your time to find out what lie they told to your blue blooded friends? You know, Tessa, your family has enough money and clout that if you wanted a divorce you could get one and no one would know. Do you want a divorce?”

  If Dean had stabbed her with a knife through the heart it wouldn’t have been nearly as painful as his last remarks. She didn’t want to show any signs of weakness in front of him, so she tossed her head and turned away from him so he couldn’t see the tears welling in her eyes.

  She fought to make her voice strong as she said, “No, Dean, I do not want a divorce. I would never do that to the children.”

  “But if it were just me?”

  “I’m not going to deal with fiction—”

  “—That’s rich coming from a writer,” Dean said. “I thought that’s what writers did? Make up stories? That’s it, isn’t it? You wanted something new to write about and having an adventure like this would definitely be something to write about,” Dean said.

  Tessa turned back to him as fury built inside. “Yes! At first!” she cried. “You don’t know what it’s like to be trapped in a life you deplore, Dean. You have no idea how miserable I was!”

  Dean didn’t smile as he said, “I think I know something about misery, Tessa.”

  Tessa had to concede that point. “Yes. You do. I know that my misery was greatly different than yours, but it was misery just the same. You don’t understand what it’s like for women, at least in the east. In many ways, women are considered property and although my parents are wonderful, they saw it as my duty to do what was expected of me for someone of my station, as you put it.”

  “Explain it to me more, Tessa,” Dean said.

  “Every day I was told how to feel, what to think, how to dress, where I could and could not go. What to eat, how much to eat, who my friends should or shouldn’t be. Can you imagine such a life? And the damn parties! Endless parades of men who had no substance, who were out for a dalliance, or to marry someone with whom to breed just to create an heir. No one wanted me for me, Dean. No one even knew the real me.”

  Dean replied. “Why didn’t you just tell them you didn’t want to do that anymore?”

  “You’re not listening again and neither did they! They didn’t listen when I did tell them over and over. They believed I was just being silly and thought I would see the error of my ways at some point. Just like you have believed about me of late. My feelings don’t seem to matter to people.

  “I love my family very, very much, but I know they were hoping that I would suddenly become the dutiful daughter and be what society said I should be,” she said. “I had to get out of there or go mad, Dean. I was in danger of suffocating and dying inside.”

  “So you thought up this crazy plan when you saw an ad in the paper for mail-order-brides? So I was just a way of escape?” Dean couldn’t believe how much that stung. “Me and my family were a means to an end?”

  Tessa saw her own fury matched as Dean’s protective nature regarding their children came to the fore. His eyes took on a fierce light. Tessa put a hand on his arm without thinking.

  “No! I swear! All right, maybe it sort of started out that way, but once we began writing back and forth, getting to know each other, I began to care about you and I wanted to come meet you because I felt you were a wonderful man. Not as an escape. I still had to sneak away because they would have never let me come here to meet you. And after we met, I knew I’d made the right decision, or at least I thought I had.”

  Dean sighed and closed his eyes for a moment as understanding dawned on him. “So that’s why you were so mad about the letters. I guess I didn’t look at it from your point of view, but I see it now. You left everything you knew behind—your family, friends, and your way of life—because of our letters to each other. You felt safe enough to do that because of the things you thought that I had said to you. And finding out that Marcus wrote them instead of me scared you, like the stuff in them wasn’t true and here you were married to some guy you didn’t really know.”

  “Yes! Yes!” Tessa could have wept with joy. He was finally listening to her. “It was as if everything I had come to know about you was false. What would I find out about you that contradicted the things in those letters? Were they just said to lure me here to be domestic help or were you really looking for someone to love you? And were you looking for someone to love again? I knew no one here, Dean, and yet I came because I felt that I’d come to know you. Those letters made me trust you and made me feel safe in coming here.”

  Dean nodded. “I get it, Tessa, but why not write home about us? Was it because I’m not rich or don’t come from some fancy bloodline?”

  Tessa saw how vulnerable he felt and wanted to reassure him. “I don’t care from what class you come. I’ve never cared about class, Dean, and I never thought of you as being inferior in any way. I had planned to send a letter once we were married because then there would be nothing anyone could do to prevent it. Dean, I wanted very badly to marry you and I wasn’t going to let anyone stop me from becoming your wife.”

  “That makes sense,” Dean said with a smile. “I’m glad in a way, for that reason, you didn’t send a letter beforehand, too. I wouldn’t have wanted anything to mess up us getting married. But you didn’t send a letter after we were married, either. That makes me feel like you were ashamed that you’d married someone like me. Someone who doesn’t have the kind of education you do or fancy clothes or knows which fork you’re supposed to use at an expensive restaurant.”

  A smile curved her mouth over his “fork” remark. “Dean, I don’t care about any of those things. What I was looking for in a man I found in you. Someone brave, honest, caring, and strong. A man who wouldn’t be afraid to make a commitment or honor that commitment.”

  “Yeah? What else?�
�� Dean said.

  “A man who knew how to be loyal, who would be a wonderful father, and who found it important to take care of his family. Someone smart.”

  Dean pursed his lips at that.

  “Dean Samuels, do not do that! Do not think less of yourself because you didn’t have the opportunity to go to school or because you were too busy making a living for your family to have the proper time to study! There is certainly no shame in that and you are much more educated about what’s really important in life than a fraction of the people I used to associate with back in Pittsburgh,” Tessa said.

  Dean was startled by her stern demeanor. It reminded him of the way she talked to Jack when he was misbehaving. “You really feel that way about me?”

  “Yes, I do!”

  Dean grinned. “I still don’t know how smart I am when it comes to women. Not very, I don’t think. Tessa, I really didn’t think it was a big deal about the letters. I would never lure you here under … no, don’t tell me … false pretenses. I need to tell you something else about those letters. Please don’t get mad again. We’re makin’ progress here. Aren’t we?”

  His unsure expression amused her but Tessa kept from smiling. “Yes, we are.”

  “Good. You see, Marcus was the one who put that ad in the paper. He knew that I had a lot on my hands with the ranch and the kids and all and he kept teasing me that I should put an ad in the paper for a mail-order bride and, finally, one day, I said go ahead. I was only joking, but he did it anyway, the jerk,” Dean told her.

  Tessa laughed. After coming to know Marcus and his mischievous ways, she could well imagine him doing it.

  “But, Tessa, once I read that letter, I wanted to know more about you. The main reason I asked Marcus to help me was because I was afraid if I sounded stupid, you’d stop writing and I wanted to keep hearing from you. I couldn’t admit it to anyone, including myself, at first.

  “You’ve never lost a spouse, Tessa. You’ve never lost the person you thought you were going to grow old with and raise a family with. After Sarah died, I was scared to death to love anyone again. I was afraid of losing someone again. I also felt that if I did get married again, I’d be cheating on Sarah somehow. Can you understand that, Tessa?”

  “Yes,” she said and hated herself for the first prick of jealousy she’d felt towards Sarah.

  “So I locked up all those kinds of feelings and I never intended on letting them out again. But every time I got a letter from you, a little bit of my grief went away. And then you said you wanted to come here and that really made me panic because it was becoming real. But something made me have Marcus send that last letter to you, the one tellin’ you to come out here.

  “Then you were here and you were so much more than I ever expected you to be. I thought you were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen and I kept thinkin’ that there was no way you would end up stayin’. But you did and, little by little, I started letting Sarah go and saw that it was ok for me to be happy again. To be happy with you.”

  “You finally got me through my grief over Sarah. She’ll always be a part of me and I’ll always love her, but I’m not in love with her anymore. I love you, Tessa, only you,” Dean said.

  His tender words melted away all of Tessa’s doubts and fears. “I love you, too, and I’m so happy to have my own place in your heart, Dean. It means more to me than I’ll ever be able to tell you. Thank you for telling me your feelings even though I know you’re not comfortable with talking about them.”

  Dean said, “We’re married now and we should be able to tell each other anything. I won’t promise to be perfect at it, but I promise to do my best. Does that sound fair?”

  Tessa took his hand and squeezed it. “Very fair. You know, for someone who says he’s not very smart, you certainly sound intelligent.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Samuels. I appreciate that,” Dean said with a smile.

  Tessa said, “You’re very welcome, Mr. Samuels.”

  Dean leaned closer and said, “So how do you feel about doin’ some of that other kind of talkin’?”

  “What other kind?” Tessa asked with mock innocence.

  Dean’s kiss slowly went from being tender to sensual and demanding. Tessa became warm all over and she responded to him eagerly. When it ended, Dean smiled down at her.

  “That kind.”

  “Oh. Yes. That kind. I think I could be persuaded,” Tessa said.

  “Then up the ladder you go,” Dean said as he pointed to the hayloft.

  Tessa’s eyes widened. “What? Up there?”

  “Uh huh. Unless you’re chicken,” Dean said with a grin.

  “I am no such thing,” Tessa said defiantly as she gathered the bottom of her nightgown and started climbing.

  Dean followed closely, enjoying the view as they went. When they reached the loft, he grabbed Tessa and pulled her down onto the loose hay with him. Tessa laughed as he nuzzled her neck and asked, “So are you serious about wanting more children?”

  “You know I am,” Tessa said. “Why do you ask?”

  He answered by embracing her and kissing her fiercely. “Talkin’ time is over. I’ll show you,” he said when he ended the kiss.

  Like the winds of fate that had brought her to Dawson, Tessa let herself be swept away by her love for Dean. She responded to the love and desire in his eyes and in his touch. Soon they were lost in one another as the moon shone down on the barn.

  Epilogue

  The next afternoon, Geoff and Tessa walked through the barn, trying to work out their differences since they hadn’t done so yet. She had been too preoccupied with the tense situation between her and Dean; Geoff knew this and had not pressed until now. However, he was due to return to Pittsburgh soon and wanted some answers from his daughter.

  “Papa, don’t you see? I’m not much different than you. As I said before, you struck out on your own, so why shouldn’t I have been allowed to?” Tessa asked.

  “It was different for me, Tessa. I didn’t want to get caught up in all of the fighting. Things were dangerous in Ireland. It wasn’t what I wanted for myself. I wanted to be my own man and make my own future,” he told her.

  Tessa arched a brow at Geoff. “Did you hear what you just said?”

  Geoff went back over it and saw her point. He gave her a considering look. “You tricked me,” he said.

  “No, you tricked yourself, Papa,” Tessa said with a mischievous smile. “I had nothing to do with it.”

  “I hate it when I’m outsmarted by a woman,” he teased.

  Tessa laughed.

  Geoff sobered. “But your life wasn’t in any danger.”

  “No, not any physical danger, but I was in danger of becoming resentful of the people I love because I couldn’t pursue my own dreams and wishes. If I had stayed in that life, I would have withered away inside. Would you want that for me?”

  “Of course not.”

  “And if I had told you what I wanted to do, would you have let me?”

  Geoff’s silence and uncomfortable expression told her the answer to her question.

  “Right. So you see that I had no choice and none of this is Dean’s fault. He had no idea I’d run away like that, so please don’t blame him,” Tessa said.

  “I understand where you’re coming from,” Geoff said. “And I don’t blame him. I could see that he had no knowledge of your subterfuge. I don’t necessarily agree with your methods, but I can now accept why you did it. I now know that we should have listened to you better. I’m sorry that I didn’t.”

  Tessa hugged her father. “Thank you for saying so, Papa. I appreciate it very much. I have a good life here. You don’t have to worry about me anymore. We’re not the richest people, but Dean is a hard worker and he loves me and the children. That means more to me than any amount of money.”

  “I know he’s a good man, Tessa, and the children are a delight. Jack is quite amusing,” Geoff said with a smile as he tho
ught about how Jack had started calling him “Grandpa” right away.

  “You don’t know the half of it, Papa. You never know what he’s going to say or do,” Tessa said. “And he’s so hard to stay cross with.”

  “Hmm. I know someone else like that,” Geoff said with a twinkle in his dark eyes.

  “Papa!” Tessa’s objected.

  Geoff said, “You know that it’s true, Tessa. You may be incorrigible and strong-willed, but you’re also beguiling and charming. It’s a very lethal combination.”

  Tessa smiled. “I will take that as a compliment.”

  Geoff embraced his daughter and laid his cheek atop her head. “As far as worrying about you goes, I’m your father and I will always worry about you. That’s what parents do. I’m sure you’re learning that already.”

  Tessa said, “Yes, I am. It astounds me that I fell in love with Sadie and Jack as well as their father, Papa. But we are going to have more children, so be prepared to be a Grandpa several times over.”

  “I look forward to it.” He tightened his hold on her and said, “I love you, Tessa.”

  “I love you, too, Papa.”

  Geoff released her and smiled at her as Jack came running into the barn. “Grandpa! C’mon, we’re goin’ fishin’ and Uncle Seth says you wanted to learn.”

  Laughing, Geoff said, “So I did. Lead the way, young Jack!”

  By the time two weeks had passed, Geoff was indeed convinced his daughter had made a good match and that he would be leaving her in good hands. He’d enjoyed meeting the rest of Dean’s family and had gotten to know them all a little better. Geoff found himself impressed by Marcus’ self-taught knowledge and Seth entertained him with stories of his exploits on cattle drives. In exchange, Geoff told them some of his own adventures in Ireland.

  Too soon, it came time for her father to head back, which made Tessa realize how much she missed her family. Geoff promised that he would try to bring the whole family to meet them the following spring.

  Dean and Tessa drove Geoff to Wolf Point to meet the stage coach. They waved him goodbye and Tessa couldn’t help crying. Dean held her and whispered comforting words to her. She finally dried her eyes and smiled.