Pete was a savvy old codger about females, after all. “You been worryin’ about what you saw them bastards in the arroyo doin’.”
She nodded, then let the yarn slip free from her fingertip and began wringing her hands. “I know, of course, that you’d never be cruel! I just mean—well, the tendencies to do those kinds of things—to a woman. Do you have those sorts of inclinations?”
“Honey, them ruffians is all a half-bubble off plumb. You know what I’m sayin’? They’re loco. With normal men who ain’t loco, there ain’t a whole lot of difference between how one fella goes about things and how another one does.”
She sneaked a glance at him. “Are you saying you would go about it the same way my mother described? Like the brethren, I mean?”
He chuckled. He couldn’t help himself. “Do they stand on their heads and drink water from a glass while they’re at it, or what?”
She rewarded him with a startled giggle, which she stifled by biting her lip. “Ma never made mention of it, so I rather think not.”
“Well, then, since I got the same equipment as any other man, churchy or not, I think I’m safe in sayin’ I do it pretty much like your people do it.”
She averted her gaze from his. “I have one other question.”
“Ask away. Like I said, there ain’t a whole lot I’m bashful about.”
“Frequency,” she said softly.
Race couldn’t believe he’d heard her right. “Beg pardon?”
“How often? Ma told me what I might expect from Henry, but I—”
“Who the hell’s Henry?” Race immediately wanted to kill the son of a bitch. Jealousy, white-hot and clawing, grabbed hold of him. “Henry?”
She fastened a startled gaze on him. “Henry Rusk. He’s the brother the Council of Brethren selected to be my future husband. That’s why Ma explained my wifely duties to me, because the council had chosen my life partner. She would have had no reason to prepare me, otherwise.”
“Do you got feelin’s for him?”
“I respect and like him.” As if she feared he would find that appalling, she rushed to add, “I’m sure I would have grown to love him in time, and he me. We were to become officially betrothed when I reached Santa Fe, where he and his family live now, and married sometime next summer, the precise date as yet undecided.”
Race pushed up to sit cross-legged. “So you and this here Henry ain’t betrothed yet?”
“No, and even if we were, Henry and the others are bound to think I’m dead. Another wife will be selected for him, and he’ll get on with his life. Happily, I’m sure.” She sighed. “It’s not as if ours would have been a love match.”
“So how often did your ma say you could expect good old Henry to—” He cleared his throat and gestured with his hand. “Well, you know. How often?”
She wrinkled her nose and her pretty mouth tightened. “Once a week.”
Race didn’t blame her for looking disgusted. “Jesus, how old is Henry, anyway?”
“Twenty-two.”
Race pictured a Nancy-boy fanatic with a protruding Adam’s apple who wore horn-rimmed spectacles. “Sweetheart, with me as your husband, you could pretty much forget that once-a-week business. I can do a helluva lot better than that.”
She fixed lustrous blue eyes on him. “Truly?”
For the first year, he’d have this girl for dessert after every meal, then love her senseless at night. She wouldn’t have a problem sleeping anymore, that was for damned sure. “Honey, pleasin’ you would be the most important thing in the world to me, I swear it. If you ever agreed to marry me, that is.”
She searched his gaze, then bent her head to fiddle with the buttons on the front of her nightgown, which ran from chin to waist. “Well, I’ve been doing a great deal of thinking since we retired.” She looked up and nibbled at her lip. “I, um…truly don’t believe I’m ever going to wish to return to my church family in Santa Fe. Since the arroyo—” She broke off and glanced around, as if she sought answers in the shadows beyond the glow of the firelight. “I just don’t have the same beliefs now, and I doubt I ever will again.”
Race doubted it too. Not because he believed she’d never regain her faith. Without it, he feared she’d never have the ballast she needed to withstand the windstorms life had a way of blowing at a person. For that reason, he counted it as damned important to somehow restore her belief in her God. How he would manage that, he had no idea, the only certainty being that when he did, he’d encourage her to believe differently than she had before. To stand on her own two feet. To fight to defend herself. To trust in her God to give her the strength to fight her own battles, instead of counting on Him to fight them for her.
“I see,” he said softly. “I reckon I can understand you not wantin’ to go back. As much as I’m sure they love ya, they’d expect you to take up where you left off, and that’d be damned hard after all you been through.”
She started to wring her hands again. “Yes, and that being the case, I am pretty much alone in the world now. You are my only close friend. There’s Pete. And Johnny and Mr. Grigsley, of course. And I’ve become fond of them. But not like I am of you.” She dragged in a deep breath, then exhaled with a lift of her shoulders. “Anyway, there’s no one in Denver for me, no one in Cutter Gulch. There’s only you.
“I, um, don’t suppose that’s a very good reason to marry a man. But on the other hand, I must say I am much fonder of you than I ever was of Henry, and I fully intended to marry him. I also feel convinced I would have come to love him in time. So why wouldn’t the same hold true with you?”
Race had a lump in his throat the size of a hen egg. “Rebecca, are you sayin’ you’ll be my wife?”
“Are you absolutely sure you want me?”
He couldn’t believe she was about to say yes. “Ah, honey. There’s nothin’ I want more in the whole damned world.”
“Even though you know I don’t have the same depth of feeling?”
Race felt positive he could make her love him, given a bit of time and half a chance. “Even though,” he said softly. “I just got one question. I know how come I want you. But what do you figure to get out of this marriage? I offered to let you stay with me for the next six months.”
She bent her head. “It’s not that I don’t trust your word or anything. But it occurs to me that if you were to become truly miserable, rather than have me shoot you, you might elect to make me go to Cutter Gulch.”
“So this is kind of like a guarantee to you that I won’t do that?”
“A guarantee that I can stay with you, yes.”
“Well, hang me for a fool, darlin’, but I said six months, and I’ll give you six months. I don’t break my word.”
“And then?” She lifted her shimmering gaze to his. “When the six months are up? You’ll want to be rid of me. You’ll take me someplace and leave me there.”
Race couldn’t imagine leaving her anywhere. “You’re liable to be feelin’ a hair different in six months, honey. That gives you some healin’ time. You’ll be stronger and not feelin’ so froggy. You sure you don’t wanna wait and see how you feel then? Marriage is forever.”
“You’re attempting to talk me out of it.” There was a note of accusation in her tone. “You’ve changed your mind.”
“Nope. Get that outta your head.”
“It’s true!” Her voice went shrill. “You were all ready to do it, and now you’re not.”
“Damn it, Rebecca, that ain’t it!” He raked his fingers through his hair. “I’m tryin’ to do the decent thing instead of the rotten one, which is a helluva lot more appealin’. I haven’t changed my mind. I just don’t wanna take you as my wife unless you’re sure.”
“I’m sure. This way I know you won’t leave me. Not next month, not in six. Come spring, I’ll still be all alone in the world except for you. What will change? Nothing!”
“Well, I sure as hell ain’t gonna beat you off with a stick. If you’re sure, you got y
ourself a deal.”
“Well, then?” she said, her voice vibrant with anxiety. “It’s decided?”
“It’s decided.”
She smiled slightly. “Have you any plans for when?”
“When will we get married, you mean?” Race flashed her a slow grin. “If you’re sure you wanna do it, darlin’, I ain’t a man to let the prettiest little trout I ever seen slip off my hook.”
“I’m absolutely positive I want to do it,” she assured him.
“Well, then, as far as I’m concerned, we can do it right now.”
“Now?”
She looked so startled that he chuckled. “Actually, I reckon we’ll probably marry twice. You’ll be wantin’ to say words in front of a preacher someday, I’m guessin’.”
“Someday? Most assuredly, Mr. Spencer, no ‘someday’ to it.”
“Fine with me. As soon as we can arrange it, all you gotta do is say the word, and I’ll be happy to marry you in front of a preacher.” To Race’s way of thinking, her kind of marriage wasn’t really necessary, and until he got the ruffians off their backs, there was no telling when it could even be done. He wasn’t about to wait that long. “Meanwhile, though—what with you bein’ a lady and all—I reckon you’d feel easier about sharin’ my bed if we had us a formal agreement. I’d be right proud to marry you in the way of my mother’s people, that bein’ the Apache way.”
“The Apache way?” She blinked. “Um…Mr. Spencer, is there truly such urgency? We’re only three days from your ranch. Correct? Why can’t we simply wait to share a bed until then?”
“Because you ain’t sleepin’, and until we get settled at the ranch, which could take a spell, it’ll be hard to get away to get married in town.”
“But if you’re in the wagon or the cabin with me, I’ll sleep.”
He bit back a smile. “Darlin’, lookin’ at you right now, I can’t say, in all honesty, that you seem real relaxed.”
She gave a shrill little laugh. “And you think my sharing your bed will relax me?”
“Uh-huh.” He ran his gaze over her tense body, thinking to himself that within an hour, he could have the girl feeling as if her bones had melted. “I guarant-ass-tee it.”
“Actually, Mr. Spencer, I think I would prefer to wait and have a conventional ceremony. I’ll be fine for however long it takes to arrange it.”
“You’ll get your preacher ceremony, Rebecca. I promise you that. But for now, we can’t go that route, and I ain’t inclined to let you go on like you are until we can. You ain’t fine, darlin’. You got circles under your eyes, you’re droppin’ weight, and you’re wound up like a watch spring. As your husband, I got a magic cure for all three problems.”
“The last time I partook of a magic cure, I couldn’t walk.”
She wouldn’t be able to walk this time, either. “Rebecca, among your church folks, ain’t it an upheld rule that the man makes the important decisions and a woman does like she’s told?”
“Yes,” she said faintly.
Most times, Race felt that way of thinking was damned near as stupid as turning the other cheek. But he had no qualms about using it to his advantage in this instance. If she was too skittish to gentle break, he would at least be able to hold her, which was bound to make her feel safer. That way, maybe she would get some rest.
“Well, then, I’ve decided to marry you the way an Apache man would in an urgent situation.”
“Wh-what does that entail?”
He touched the tip of her nose and winked at her. “Rebecca Ann Morgan, from this moment and until I’m dust in the wind, you’re my woman, my life, my heart. I have spoken it.”
“And that’s all there would be to it?” At his nod, she looked slightly appalled. “And what words would I say?”
“You don’t get to say nothin’.”
“Why? Surely both people must make a vow.”
“Nope. It ain’t necessary for the woman to make a vow. Just the man. And it’s more like statin’ his feelin’s, actually.”
“Oh.” She frowned. “What if the feeling isn’t reciprocated?”
“Isn’t what?”
“Returned. What if the girl isn’t so inclined? Doesn’t wish to marry him?”
“Well, a smart man usually tests the water first, I reckon. If he ain’t so smart and he takes a girl who don’t want him, she accepts it. Ain’t a whole lot else she can do once she gets took. An Apache man is kinda bent on keepin’ what’s his when it comes to his woman.”
“That seems rather barbaric.”
Race smiled. “It ain’t a whole lot different than the way your folks do things, from the sound of it, gettin’ your husband picked for you instead of pickin’ him yourself.”
She wrinkled her nose, much as she had moments before. “Would you mind waiting until tomorrow, at least?”
“I can’t see the point.” He rose to his knees and reached to smooth her hair, smiling at the way the curls immediately popped back up and wondering how she might look with it down. His gut knotted at the thought of her coming to him, as if in a dream, wearing nothing but waves of gold falling over her shoulders. “Sweetheart, don’t look so worried. I ain’t gonna bite. Not hard, anyhow. You trust me, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“You wantin’ to do somethin’ havin’ to do with your religion to make it seem more right to you?”
She shook her head. “No. I just don’t feel comfortable with that barbaric custom of being ‘took,’ is all. Just the thought gives me the shudders.”
Race leaned down to look her in the eye, his nose scant inches from hers. “I didn’t notice you shudderin’.”
“When?”
“When you got took. Honey, I done did it.”
“You done did what?” she asked, looking mildly alarmed.
“Took you.”
She glanced around as if she’d missed something. “I didn’t get ‘took.’”
“You sure as hell did. I said the words, clear as rain.”
She blinked. “I thought you were simply informing me of the way it was done.”
“It was more showin’ you, actually.” Race noticed her eyes going dark. He knew from experience that wasn’t a good sign. “Sweetheart, don’t get all het up. I ain’t gonna be all over you like dogs fightin’ over a bone.”
She fixed a frightened gaze on him. “Dogs fighting over a bone?”
“Bad choice of words. I got a talent for it.” He settled a hand over her nape, his fingertips feathering through silken curls. “You gotta know I ain’t gonna force you to do nothin’ you’re afraid to do, or that you feel real nervous about. Not straightaway, anyhow.”
“Of course.”
“Well, then? Think of the Apache thing as a handshake marriage. We’ll get married again when the time is right, all fancy and proper to your way of thinkin’. Until then, we’re married all fancy and proper to my way of thinkin’. What real difference does it make how we done it, as long as we’re married?”
She hugged her waist. “None I guess.” As her voice trailed away, the alarmed expression came back over her face. She pressed closer and whispered, “Does that mean this is our wedding night?”
Race wasn’t sure why she was whispering, but given the fact that he’d just married the girl, he figured this was just one of the hundreds of times he’d probably do things that didn’t make sense to him, simply to please her. Pitching his own voice to a whisper, he replied, “I reckon so. Why?”
“Oh, lands!” she cried, loud enough to scare snakes in six counties.
Chapter 16
It was obvious to Race the instant he touched his new bride that theirs had no chance of being the most satisfying wedding night on record. She knelt next to the pallet, gazing at the quilts. He touched his palm to the small of her back. Her trembling back. He wasn’t sure if she was shaking from fear or from cold.
“Sweetheart?” On his knees and slightly behind her, he leaned around to see her face. “You gonna ju
mp on in? You’re gettin’ chilled.”
Judging by her less than enthusiastic expression, he might have just asked her to leap in a rattlesnake pit. He tossed the quilts back, then grasped her arm to guide her forward. With halting movements, she took it from there, twisting to sit and scooting to the far side of the makeshift bed. Race removed his guns, folded the gun belt around the holsters, and placed them carefully on the floor at the head of the pallet.
Acutely aware of Rebecca’s gaze on him, he smiled slightly as he took off his shirt. She shot him one startled look, then immediately squeezed her eyes closed. He decided the old saying, “just keep your pants on,” might be damned good advice for him to heed, at least until she settled down some and became more comfortable around him. He tossed the shirt near his guns, then sat at the edge of the pallet to pull off his boots and remove his thick leather belt.
Finally ready to join her in bed, Race drew up his knees slightly to rest his arms and study her. There was something peculiar about the way she lay there, flat on her back, eyes squeezed closed, fine-boned hands folded beneath her breasts. Christ. She looked like a corpse laid out for burial.
“Rebecca, darlin’, are you scared?” he asked softly.
A disgruntled frown passed over her delicate features. She cracked open one eye. “Mr. Spencer, if you…if it’s your intention to consummate, I’d truly prefer to maintain a degree of separateness, which is difficult to do while conversing.” Her mouth softened a hair. “As for your question, never having done my wifely duty before, I’m quite tense, but I wouldn’t go so far as to say I feel afraid. My mother assured me it will be quick and involve only a tolerable amount of pain. I can’t imagine why she would have lied to me about it.”
Race reached up to stroke his chin, more to hide his grin than to check for stubble. He had a feeling he could go to bed tonight with a beard rough enough to sand wood and it wouldn’t matter one hell of a lot. “I wish I could put your mind at ease, honey, but the honest truth is, I don’t know no more about it than you probably do.”
She opened both eyes and one of the sweetest smiles he’d ever seen curved her mouth. “Oh, I’m so pleased,” she said softly. Then she wrinkled her nose and giggled. “I feared perhaps you had firsthand knowledge, and I was rather hesitant to come straight out and ask you.” She took a deep breath and sighed. “To be honest, Mr. Spencer, I sorely misjudged you. I had you pegged as a—well, please don’t be offended—but I rather suspected you were no stranger to fornication.”
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