His cold eyes warmed, and he gave her a sloppy smile. “Yes, soon.”
“Tomorrow?” she asked with forced gaiety.
Frowning, he motioned the waiter to the table. “Tomorrow’s not good. No, not tomorrow. I have to take a short trip tomorrow. Won’t be back again for nearly a week.”
Her heart bumped her rib cage. He was too drunk to realize that he’d tipped his hand. Maybe he was transporting Buck to Fort Riley. She would find out if she had to get up before dawn to watch him herself.
“When I get back from Fort Riley, we’ll get you packed up. Sada will be so happy to have you home again.”
A sick feeling coated her stomach, aiding her ever-present nausea. “Packed up?”
“You need medical care, Rachel. Being around these savages has made you crazy.”
She briefly closed her eyes and pressed her fingers against her mouth. She couldn’t go back with him. She wouldn’t! Her marriage might not be perfect, but it was a far better alternative than going back to North Dakota with her father-in-law and being forced to live under Sada’s ruling thumb.
Anxious to get away from him, she pretended to be interested in his slurred conversation while she toyed with her dessert. When the painful meal finally came to an end, she realized she wouldn’t have made such a clean escape, except that the captain had been too drunk to care.
After carefully hanging up her new gown, Rachel slipped into her nightclothes and waited for Jason. She was not going to slink away like an abused dog. She had to face him. Attempting to read, she found that she nearly jumped out of her skin every time she heard a noise. So, she paced. Finally, she recognized Jason’s footsteps.
He walked into the room and stopped. Her expression must have warned him something was wrong. “Rachel?”
She took a deep breath. “I have something to say to you, and I don’t want you to interrupt me until I’m done.”
He raised his eyebrows, but said nothing.
“I… I think you’d better sit down,” she said, motioning him to the chair by the stove.
He complied, settling back and resting his elbows on the arms of the chair.
She pulled in another breath. “I know what we have isn’t perfect. I know why you married me, and—”
“Just why did I marry you?” he interrupted.
“Shhh, I told you to be quiet until I was done.”
Raising his arms in defeat, he nodded.
“I know why you married me, and I’m grateful. But now that the threat is gone, I’m sure you’d like to get on with your life. I understand that, Jason, I really do.” No matter how many times she’d said the words to herself, they hadn’t hurt nearly as much as they did now, saying them to his face.
“You understand that.” He pursed his lips and looked very grim.
Her stomach dipped, but she forced herself to continue. She’d practiced this speech for hours. “Yes, but… but you see, I could be very helpful in your career. You… you really do need someone to work with, and although you probably think Nell is better equipped than I am, I mean… since you tell her everything anyway, I think you need me. Well, for one thing,” she continued, blathering away like an idiot, “I’m a White, and maybe I can bring in more patients for you.”
She stared at him, trying to gauge his reaction. She could read nothing from his expression. She began to weaken.
“Oh, who am I trying to fool? Jason, Captain Weber thinks that because… because I married you, I’ve gone stark raving mad. He thinks that seeing Jeremy murdered snapped my mind. He also thinks I’m going to willingly pack up my things and go back to North Dakota with him.” She smiled sadly and blinked back tears. “It’s his opinion that I need some help.”
Jason shifted in the chair and cleared his throat. “And you want to stay here, rather than be shut away in some asylum in the backwoods of North Dakota.”
Her stomach sank further. He didn’t sound very enthused about it. She hadn’t thought much about his reaction to all of this. “I’m not crazy, Jason. I lo—” She coughed, catching herself before she blurted out the words, even though she’d said them to him before.
“You—what?”
She gave him a nervous smile. “I… I loathe the idea of going back with him.”
He nodded. “You’d rather stay here.”
She rolled her eyes in frustration. “Jason, I eavesdropped on your conversation with your father. I deserve the pain I’ve been going through for listening, I know I do. I heard you tell your father why you married me.” She held her breath.
“You did? What did I say?”
Pushing out a lungful of air, she scolded, “You know perfectly well what you said.”
“No,” he argued. “I don’t remember at all. When was this?”
“The day… the day that Nell came and convinced me you needed help. Before that, I’d gone over to Ivy’s. When I came back, I went in through the other door and overheard your conversation with your father.”
He looked at her cautiously. “What did I say? Refresh my memory.”
She suddenly found the satin piping on her dressing gown very interesting. Moving her finger along the pink braid, she answered, “Well, it wasn’t so much what you said as your father’s response to your having told him you married me.”
“And that was what?”
She closed her eyes, not wanting to watch him as she recited, “ ‘Did you have to marry her? Hell, Jason, most people would have hired a bodyguard or a nursemaid. Wasn’t marrying her kind of extreme?’ Or something like that.”
Lowering his gaze, he ran his hand over his mouth. “Hmmm. Yes, it was something like that. But do you remember what I said to him?”
Her stomach caved in a little further. “Yes, you said, ‘I did what I had to do.’ ”
“That’s right. I did.”
She nodded, suddenly feeling very tired and sick to her stomach. “You married me to keep an eye on me and keep me safe from Bram Justice.”
“Partly, yes.”
She gave him a wan smile. “It was a little extreme, Jason. Your father was right. You could have hired a bodyguard.”
He gazed at her carefully. “Would you have preferred that?”
Pressing her hands against her stomach, she crossed to the bed and sat down. How was she going to put this? She didn’t want him feeling sorry for her. Pity was something she couldn’t handle—not from the man she loved so desperately.
“If… if it would have made you happier, then, yes. I wish you’d have hired a bodyguard. I don’t want to ruin your life, Jason. If…” She took a deep breath. “If you want out of this marriage, then… then I won’t fight you.”
He was quiet for a long time, then swung around to look at her. “Is that what you want?”
No.! No! No.! “If… if it’s what you want.”
“Did you happen to hear the rest of my conversation with my father?”
Giving him an embarrassed smile, she answered, “Oh, no. I hurried outside and came in through the office, hoping you wouldn’t know that I’d been listening.”
“So, you didn’t hear anything else?”
She shook her head, kicked off her slippers, and slid under the covers. She was so tired. She closed her eyes briefly, and when she opened them again, he was standing by the bed.
“Is something wrong?” His face was etched with concern.
She yawned. “No, I’m just tired.”
He grinned at her. “And pregnant.”
Her stomach dropped and her hands went down as if to protect it from the fall. “How… how did you know?”
He gave her an intense look. “I know everything about your body, Rachel.”
She rolled onto her side away from him. “I didn’t want you to think you had to stay married to me because of… of the baby.” She felt his weight on the bed as he sat down beside her.
“Can I stay married to you because I love you?” He stroked
her hair.
She rolled back and stared at him, her heart certainly in her eyes. “Don’t say it unless you really mean it, Jason.”
“After you’d apparently left, you didn’t hear me tell my father the reason I’d married you.”
“No,” she answered shakily. “I didn’t.”
“I told him I’d done what I had to do. I married you because I’d fallen in love with you.”
She went limp. “Oh, you have? You really have?”
“How could I not? You’ve proved ten ways to Sunday that you love me. In spite of your initial meekness, you found that inner bravery that is only bred into special people. You believed in me, even though you’d known the Webers longer. I don’t think that belief ever faltered, no matter how much Weber tried to convince you otherwise.” He shook his head and gazed at the floor. “I don’t deserve you.”
Her heart filled, spilling over with love. “Oh, don’t say that, my darling. Please, don’t ever say that.” She turned on her side and flipped back the covers. “Just tell me you love me again, and come to bed.”
“I love you, again and again and again.”
She held out her arms to him.
He threw off his clothes and joined her in bed, hauling her against him. “Thank God we’ve got that settled. Now, what’s this nonsense about Nell being my confidante?”
Rachel snuggled against him. “She said you told her everything.”
He snorted a laugh. “God knows what made her say that. I think maybe she’s a little jealous of you.”
“You don’t tell her everything?”
He kissed her forehead. “Never have, never will.” He ran his hand down over her stomach. “Have you been sick?”
A delightful shiver shook her. “A little queasy today.”
“How do you feel about being pregnant?” He settled her against him.
She yawned, smiling lazily against his shoulder. “I love it. How do you feel about it?”
He hugged her tight. “I think I’m a pretty damned good stud.”
She smiled sleepily at his boast and tried to stay awake. There was something else she was going to tell him, but she was just too tired and too much in love to think. Burrowing her nose against her husband’s neck, she drifted toward sleep. Tomorrow. She’d tell him tomorrow.
Epilogue
A fierce March wind howled through Pine Valley, rattling the windows in a frantic effort to reach inside. The year had been kind to some, not so kind to others.
Rachel Gaspard felt blessed. Sitting near the stove in their small apartment, she held her infant son, Lucas, named after her own baby brother, to her breast. The stinging pull of the milk as it drove to the surface of her nipple and into her son’s mouth thrilled her. She rocked gently back and forth, humming a sweet, poignant lullaby she’d learned from her mother years before.
Looking up, she felt her pulse thrum heavily as her husband stepped into the room, one arm behind his back. Her milk came forth with such a surge, the child sputtered and choked, coughing as the rich liquid dribbled from his mouth and over his chin.
“Such a greedy, demanding little beast you are,” Jason chided, once the child began to nurse again.
Rachel gazed up at Jason, loving him so much she thought she might fly into pieces. “Much like his father.”
Giving her a hot, private look, he pulled his arm from behind his back and presented her with a small bouquet of daisies.
Every week since the birth of their son, he’d presented her with either daisies or roses. She swore he was some kind of sorcerer, able to manufacture flowers out of thin air. “Oh, they’re beautiful. When are you going to tell me where you find them in the middle of winter?”
Turning briskly from her, he answered, “It’s my secret. The only one I’ll ever keep from you, I promise.” He put the flowers in water, returned to her and lifted his son into his arms. After burping the child, he nestled him into the beautiful hand-carved cradle that had been a gift from the happily retired Earl Tully, and his new bride, Ivy.
Rachel’s gaze swept Jason’s dark, arrogant profile as he put their son to bed. Even now, she thrilled at the sight of him. He turned, his eyes suddenly filled with concern.
“What is it?”
He crossed to her again and took her hands in his. “The new marshal got word today that August Weber has finally been stripped of his captaincy.”
She sighed, relieved. She often relived the morning she’d secretly discovered her father-in-law hauling Buck off to Fort Riley in chains. She was still grateful she’d been able to help convince the authorities that Buck was innocent. Bram Justice was serving a life sentence for his crimes. Karleen had gone into labor shortly after her father’s sentencing, and because she’d allowed Tess to deliver her child instead of Jason, the baby was born dead—the cord wrapped tightly around its neck. Karleen buried her baby next to its father and left Pine Valley to be near her own.
Gazing at her husband again, Rachel noted his pinched expression. “I thought that news would cheer you up more than this,” she said softly, rising to touch him.
He turned and pulled her into his arms. “I’m worried about Buck.”
Hugging him fiercely, she asked, “Still nothing?”
He shook his head. “He’s been gone for months. There’s been no word to me or his family. He hasn’t even contacted poor little Dusty.” He let out a ragged sigh. “That’s what concerns me the most.”
Rachel unbuttoned her husband’s shirt, kissed the old scars, then rested her cheek against his chest. “He told you not to worry about him, Jason.”
“I know, I know. But how can I help it? He’d just begun to come back from self-destruction, then he took off.”
“In his heart, he’s a renegade, darling. A rebel; a maverick. Don’t cry for him; he wouldn’t approve.”
“I think of Buck out there somewhere, cold, drunk, maybe even d—”
She pressed her fingers against his lips. “No. Don’t say it. If nothing else, Buck’s a survivor. In your heart you know that, too.”
He squeezed her hard. “I want so much for him. He’s closer to me than my own brother. I want him to have what we have. Is that so much to ask?”
Rachel stared out into the night, seeing beyond the trappings of man and nature. Somehow, in all that had happened between them, she and Buck had developed a unique, if tenuous, bond. Though she wasn’t gifted with any special powers, the peace in her heart told her he was out there somewhere, fighting to survive.
“No, my darling, it’s not so much to ask.” She turned her face toward her husband’s and they kissed. “If he can find even a fraction of the happiness we have, he’ll be blessed.”
More from Jane Bonander
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Heat of a Savage Moon--The Moon Trilogy--Book Two Page 34
