Suddenly, he realized how desperately he wanted her to stay, and how desperately he wanted her to be his real wife and partner ... in every way. He wanted that even more than he wanted to keep his project a secret from her.
Trey almost turned around and rode back to the ranch to tell her, but the new chemicals that he was on the way to pick up might be the very thing that would finally work. It would be much better to tell her once he had them and he could show her his successful experiment. Or they could do the experiment together.
Yes, he would tell her as soon as he got back.
Trey tapped his heels against his horse and it raced toward town.
* * *
The house was quiet when Chevonne awoke. She stayed in bed and admired the view from her window. But then the events of the previous evening returned to her.
She listened carefully but she heard no bubbling noises. There were no glass beakers smashing. And certainly no goats were dancing on the wooden floors.
What had Trey been up to last night? She didn’t believe for a second his explanation of a pet goat in the study. Why would he say that? Maybe he had someone in there? Who?
Thoughts of Phinneas Gulch passed through her mind, but she couldn’t for the life of her figure out why Trey would be hiding him in the study—unless they were having some secret meeting and he didn’t want her to see the thief.
Chevonne had a sudden urge to pound the life out of some bread dough.
She got up and quickly performed her toilette. When dressed and more than ready for some hard work in the kitchen, she went downstairs.
Standing at the foot of the stairs, she glanced toward the study door. It was, of course, closed. She resisted the urge to creep down and listen at the door, instead turning abruptly and heading for the kitchen, praying she wouldn’t find Trey there.
The sun slanted through the windows above the sink, painting the pine table in a wash of light which illuminated a note in the middle. Chevonne picked up the plain paper. In watery ink were the words, ‘Gone to town, be back later. Don’t hold breakfast.’
“I wonder what he would have to go to town for?” she asked out loud. “Goat feed?”
She had to admit she was glad Trey wasn’t home. He’d acted so strangely last night that she wasn’t sure what to say to him this morning.
Chevonne pushed everything from her mind and focused on the tasks at hand. First she went to every room in the house, except Trey’s locked study, and closed the windows and lowered the shades to keep the house cool.
In the kitchen, she decided to have just some coffee and bread to keep her hunger at bay while she worked. She’d make fresh bread, a rhubarb pie, maybe a pudding and another sauce. Perhaps she’d churn butter. All the activity would certainly keep her upsetting thoughts at bay.
At least she hoped it would.
She set out everything she needed, filling every counter and tabletop in the kitchen, then set to work in a flurry of intense activity.
Chevonne barely flinched when Luke arrived mid-morning with supplies from the ranch. She poured him a cup of coffee and handed him the last cinnamon-current rolls then continued with her work.
He watched her in silence while he munched away. When done with the rolls, he poured himself another cup of coffee and watched her some more with a smirk on his face.
Could he know there was trouble in the newlyweds’ home? Of course he could. She suspected that quiet Luke knew everything about everything on the ranch.
Chevonne ignored the old ranch hand and continued with her whirlwind of kitchen work. She made Mrs. Gillette and Mrs. Harland proud.
One memory from the evening before returned more often than any other through the activity. It was of the deliciously tingly feeling she’d felt when she’d thought Trey was going to kiss her. She’d wanted him to, more than anything. That thought nearly caused her to burn a few things.
The other thought that intruded often was of what was going on in the study and why was he hiding it from her? That thought gave her extra strength when punching the bread dough, which brought a chuckle from Luke. Or had she muttered something aloud about goats?
Was Luke still there? Yes, and he was still munching on something.
The thought that maybe Trey wasn’t everything she’d thought he was, was the most disturbing one. Were all his good bits all in her imagination?
Trey didn’t seem like the kind of husband that expected her to just keep house but the way he acted last night coupled with his comments after church had her wondering.
A mixing bowl nearly broke under her butter beating when she wondered why she was good enough to kiss but not good enough to show what he had in the study.
She had always considered herself to be practical, ruled by common sense, but in this case she was afraid she might have let her heart rule. She couldn’t afford to make that mistake. She’d be wise to steer clear of Trey Garner and his locked room and focus on her plan.
When Chevonne came to that decision, she paused in her work to catch her breath. She saw that Luke was gone, along with the last of the molasses cake. Right. She’d make an old-fashioned sponge cake with peach-cream filling and gelatin frosting. That would keep her mind from straying.
She set out everything she needed and set to work with renewed determination to keep all thoughts out of her head of Trey Garner... and his supposed goat.
* * *
Trey tied his horse’s leather reins over the hitching post and headed toward the apothecary. His mind was preoccupied with rehearsing for the hundredth time just exactly what he was going to say to Chevonne when he got back to the ranch... to explain the goat remark.
“Yoo-hoo, Trey!”
He stopped short and turned. Dang it! Sarah Perkins was sashaying down the walkway toward him. What was she doing out and about in town so early?
He dipped his head and touched his hat brim. “Mornin’.”
“Morning. I see you’re up early today.” She stopped very close to him.
He backed up a step. Her eye had a predatory gleam that he didn’t like.
Sarah asked with seeming innocence, “Are you here to pick up the mail for your wife?”
“Huh?” Trey’s eyes narrowed as they drifted toward the post office. What was she talking about? Chevonne hadn’t mentioned anything about any mail.
“Isn’t your wife expecting an important letter?”
“Maybe. I’m heading to the apothecary. Nice seeing you.” Trey turned to leave.
Sarah grabbed his arm. “Don’t tell me she didn’t tell you.”
Doubt niggled in Trey’s mind. Sarah clearly had some information and Trey had a feeling it was something important. He didn’t have patience for her silly games, though. He looked down at her and demanded to know, “Sarah, what in tarnation are you talking about?”
Sarah’s face relaxed into an expression of supreme satisfaction. “I ran into Chevonne in the post office the other day and it seemed like she was sending a letter,” she lowered her voice, “and didn’t want anyone to know.” Sarah’s eyes went wide, her mouth formed an ‘o’ and then her hand flew up to cover it. “I do hope I didn’t give away a secret.”
Trey snapped out reflexively, “My wife and I don’t have any secrets.” Well, not except the one he was keeping in his study.
“Oh, good.” Sarah turned away and took two steps then turned back. She said loudly, “Then you know she wrote to the U.S. Patent Office.”
Trey felt like he’d punched in the face by the annoying woman. Patent Office? Why would Chevonne be writing there? “What? Are you sure?” he stammered.
Sarah’s lips curled into an ugly smile. “Why, of course. She said it was right important, too. You can double check with Myron. He looked up the address for her.”
Trey turned his gaze on the post office. He strode off in that direction, his trip to the apothecary and irritating Sarah Perkins all but forgotten.
Why would Chevonne be writing to the Patent Office?
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He could think of only one reason—she was about to steal his ideas and patent them before he had a chance to do it himself.
Chapter 16
Chevonne lined the delicate lace up carefully along the edge of the silky fabric. She’d made an adjustment to the placement of the seams that she hoped would make the knickers fit better.
She threaded her needle and pierced the fabric, making small even stitches. Her grandmother had taught her to always take pride in her work and do her best even if she was just mocking up the design to see if it would fit properly.
If only she could find a way to secure the waist and the leg holes so that they were tighter but without using bulky ties or a knitted band.
Crash!
Chevonne leapt up from her chair. What was that? It sounded like the front door had been torn off its hinges. Heavy footsteps thudded up the stairs toward her room.
She opened her door tentatively to find Trey standing on her doorstep, his fist poised to knock. Her heart crashed when she looked at his face. It was twisted in anger. “What’s the matter?” she asked.
“Myron at the post office told me about your little plan to get someone from the Patent Office here,” Trey blurted out, his words dripping with rage. He looked over her head into the room.
Chevonne stepped back and tried to shut her door. Angry Trey was not a Trey she wanted to know. He put his foot in the way of the door, blocking her escape and setting her blood to boil.
So, it was as she’d suspected. Trey didn’t like the idea of his woman being independent. He wanted to keep her in the kitchen with no ideas of her own and dependent on him. Well, she wasn’t going to stand for that. “I see you don’t value an independent woman with a brain.”
“Independent?” Trey scoffed. “I hardly see how you can say that’s being independent.”
Chevonne glanced back at her grandmother’s designs on the bed. Did he think because her grandmother created the original designs that it meant they weren’t Chevonne’s too, that she was dependent on Gram despite sewing and testing them out and modifying them when they didn’t work?
Trey’s voice rose in anger, “If I’d known this was the kind of woman you were, I never would’ve let you into my house.” His fists clenched at his sides.
Was he going to hit her? Chevonne’s anger grew even greater at the thought of it. She shouted with equal anger, “What right do you have to be questioning my integrity when you’re the one telling fibs about goats in your room.” He winced at that blow, so she continued, “What are you really doing in there?”
Trey ran both his hands through his hair, pulling it hard. “You’re just pretending not to know to muddle my mind. You women--“
“I hardly think that you’re one to be questioning my motives.”
“Oh, really? Now that I know for sure what you were doing downstairs last night outside my study? Now that I know what you were doing outside the other night in your nightdress?”
“What do you think I was doing? That I was trying to spy on you? To meddle in your business? Oh, just like a man to think I should stay in the kitchen and not question anything he was doing.”
“Oh, just like a woman to turn this perfidy around on me.”
Chevonne fisted her hands on her hips and fired away, “Perfidy? For your information, I don’t need to be nosing around. I don’t need to know what you’re doing. I have my own life and my own projects going on.”
Trey snorted in contempt at her projects.
That snort angered Chevonne more than anything he’d said since storming up to her room. Scoffing at her project was like scoffing at Gram, and that was unacceptable. She sputtered out a weak retort, “At least I don’t have to make up stories about some mythical goat in my room.”
Trey rolled his eyes at the mention of the goat then shot back, “Well, then, with all your projects going on it sounds like you don’t need me. How about you continue your projects somewhere else.”
“Fine. I don’t want to spend a minute more in the presence of a self-centered man who thinks like you do!”
Trey shook his head and looked at her incredulously. “Fine. I’ll have Luke get the wagon. Pack your trunks.” He spun on his heel and raced down the stairs.
“Fine,” Chevonne shouted after him. “That’s just fine by me.”
“Fine,” Trey roared back. “Write when you settle so we can finalize a divorce.”
Wanting to get the last word in but not knowing what to say, Chevonne just slammed her door as hard as she could, rattling the windows and sending one of her window shades rolling up of its own accord.
* * *
Chevonne refused to cry. What was there to cry about, anyway? She couldn’t let anyone squelch her passion to bring Gram’s designs to life and she certainly couldn’t abide living with someone who would want to keep her trapped in the kitchen baking or tied to her sewing machine making quilts and curtains.
She packed up and dressed for travel without shedding a tear. Then she silently clutched her Gram’s bag to her chest and went downstairs and out the front door.
Luke had the wagon waiting. Chevonne stepped on Luke’s offered knee to get aboard, then she waited there, not daring to look toward the house or Trey’s study window, until poor old Luke had Dustin help bring her trunks down and load them on the wagon. Her last glance at the ranch house nearly brought a tear, but she squelched it with the memory of her anger at Trey.
As Luke drove the wagon away from the ranch, Chevonne realized that she had no idea where to go. Could Oklahoma City still be her home even with Trey here?
Her thoughts drifted to Dacey, one of her friends from Lawrence. Dacey was a young woman after her own heart, a woman with original thoughts and ideas. Dacey would never let a man tell her what she could do or not do with her talents.
Dacey had gone to North Carolina as a mail-order bride. Maybe Chevonne could write her to see if there was a place in North Carolina for a young woman with dreams of independence. She knew Dacey would approve of her project, and she was a good seamstress. Maybe Chevonne could enlist Dacey’s aid in bringing Gram’s designs to life. But until the letters could be exchanged, she needed somewhere to go.
Chevonne clutched her grandmother’s lace bag in her lap to give her comfort and to seek inspiration. Gram had always told her to never be caught out without an emergency stash of money. Chevonne had taken that advice to heart so she was not destitute.
Luke was being his usual silent self, but he seemed more brooding than usual. She couldn’t blame him. It was an uncomfortable situation. He worked for Trey. She didn’t want to make things difficult for the old man, and besides, she preferred the silence so she could think and decide what to do.
Chevonne reached into her bag and pulled out Gram’s change purse. The squelched tears threatened to fall as she traced the beaded butterfly on the front of the purse. Then she undid the clasp and looked inside to make sure her money was still there. It was, and it was enough to buy food and to pay for a good hotel room for several weeks.
Luke drove the wagon onto busy Main Street and slowed the horse down. Chevonne spotted a fancily dressed woman on a walkway, about to board a fancy buggy with a uniformed driver. It was Anna Overholser. The woman carried herself well and her outfit was impeccable. Celia had said that Anna was a big social influence in town. Gram had always said if you could get someone with social influence to wear your designs, business would flourish.
“You goin’ to the station?”
Chevonne started in surprise at Luke’s deep twang. She twisted in her seat to watch Anna a moment while she mulled over an idea. “No,” she said firmly. Did he sigh with relief? “I’d like you to take me to a hotel.”
“A lady alone can only stay at the Overholser’s Grand Avenue Hotel, but you’ll have to register with your married name.”
It was the longest sentence she’d ever heard Luke utter, and it was full of good sense. Most hotels forbid single women, afraid they would hur
t their reputation. But as a well-off married woman, even one separated from her husband... “The Grand Avenue Hotel it is, then.”
Luke nodded his approval.
Chevonne felt herself smile suddenly, the tears a distant memory. Things would look up. She had enough money to support herself for now and an idea on how she could make more. With some luck, she could be the independent woman she yearned to be and bring Gram’s dream to life at the same time and she didn’t need a pretend husband to do that.
Oklahoma City was where she wanted to be and she had no intention of letting the likes of Trey Garner run her out of town.
* * *
Trey felt like he’d been sucker punched in the gut by a friend. How could Chevonne have lived in his house and then betrayed him like that? And how had he not noticed? Had he been so taken with her green eyes and coppery hair and good humor and smarts and cinnamon-current rolls and soft skin and so much more that he was blind to the real Chevonne?
Well, all that would blind any man, wouldn’t it?
After their fight, he’d stormed out of the house shouting instructions to Luke to deliver his wife and her trunks to the station. Then he’d climbed back on his horse and returned to town, to a saloon where no one he knew ever went to drink.
An added benefit of the remote saloon was that the train station was on the other end of town, so his path would not cross with Chevonne’s. He didn’t want to be anywhere near her, and he planned to wait a good long time until he went home, to be sure that she was all packed up and gone when he got there.
Good riddance.
Trey sat at a table with just a glass of amber-colored whiskey and a head full of dark thoughts for company. How had he been so careless? He let Chevonne weave a spell around him. He should’ve known Chevonne was up to no good when she drew him away from Phinneas Gulch. They had to be in it together.
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