He chuckled. "Do I?" His knee touched hers. "You look like an angel to me."
She ducked her head, suddenly shy. "Now you are being dishonest. I'm not pretty, Shaw. I know what I am. I'm tall and—"
"Beautiful," he finished. "A prairie flower."
She covered her face with her hands. Abruptly, he was beside her, taking her in his arms and tilting her head to kiss her full on the lips. "I'm scared," she whispered. She was trembling from head to foot.
"Darlin', darlin'," he soothed. "You've never been afraid of anything in your life. Let alone me."
"What have we done?"
"Becca... it's just me. I've never hurt you... and I never will."
He kissed her again, and this time the sweet feel of his hands on her and the taste of his mouth on hers brought the excitement rushing back. The kiss deepened, and the room faded until there was only Shaw.
He swung her up in his strong arms. "I believe it's the custom to carry the bride to—"
The moment was broken by a soft knock on the door. "Ma'am," a small anxious voice called. "Mrs. MacCade."
"Go away," Shaw said.
"Ma'am, please. It's me—Mattie. I have to talk to you."
"Tomorrow," Shaw groaned.
"It's important! If you wait till morning, they'll catch you sure."
Shaw sat Rebecca on the edge of the bed. "Don't move," he ordered her. "I'll be right back." She drew in a shuddering breath and tried to regain her composure.
Shaw yanked open the door. "Now, what's so damned important, you need to interrupt a lady on her wedding night?"
A wild-eyed Mattie, no longer wearing her black dress and white apron, stepped inside. "Please, ma'am," the maid said. "There's three armed men at the sheriff's office offering a reward for a missing woman. They say they're kin. They know she's in town and not travelin' alone. And..." She paused long enough to take a breath. "They claim she's been took, against her will, and they're threatening to hang the blackguard who stole her!"
Chapter 17
"Poppa!" Rebecca paled. "We can't let him find us here."
"You're of age. He can't stop you from marrying." Shaw's features tightened as he took hold of her shoulders. "It's time we ended this farce. We'll face him down. We should have done it—"
"No!" Pulse hammering, hands icy cold, she pulled away from him. "I know it's hard to understand, but I can't hurt Poppa like this."
"You're being childish. I'm your husband. I—"
"No." Panic squeezed her chest as though she were caught in a vise. "Poppa will be furious. I can't take the chance that this could lead to violence."
"You afraid for him or me, Becca?"
"Both of you! I don't want either of you killing the other one!" she insisted. "Poppa will never accept a civil wedding as real. He'll force me to go home. I'll never find Eve, and I might never see you again."
Shaw's eyes hardened. "I'm not a man for runnin' from trouble."
"Please, do this for me," she pleaded. "I know Poppa. If Uncle Quinn's with him, they won't give us a chance to explain. Don't think of it as runnin', just advancing to a better position."
"All right. We'll do this your way, Becca."
Disapproval made his voice cold, but she couldn't relent. She wasn't ready to face her father yet. And she wasn't prepared to explain her decision to betray them by marrying a MacCade. No matter how much she loved Shaw, she still loved Poppa. Nervously, she looked at Mattie. "Can you help us?" she asked. "My father and brothers may shoot first and ask questions later."
The maid nodded. "Down the back steps, the ladies' stairs to the bath. Go past the tub room to the end of the hall. There's a barred door there. They use it to carry in firewood. But the bolt is on the inside. I'll fasten it after you go."
Rebecca picked up her valise. "Thank you." She glanced at Shaw. "Come with me. Hurry, before it's too late."
His features were grim, his muscles taut and rigid. "It's your decision. But I'm not afraid of them."
"I know you're not."
"Take the alley left," Mattie instructed. "There's a Chinese laundry a block down. Cut through the yard. From there you can see the docks."
Rebecca dug in her money bag and came up with a Liberty dollar. "Take this," she said, pushing the coin into the girl's hand. "For your wedding."
Mattie grinned. "As far as I know, you vanished like chimney smoke."
Rebecca found herself wishing they could.
* * *
Full nightfall found them not sharing a wedding bed but standing on the deck of the Maryland and watching the lights of Miles City fade in the distance. Shaw's arms were around her, but she knew that he'd not forgiven her for insisting that they flee discovery. "I'll never get my marriage lines now," she worried aloud.
"We could ask the captain to put us ashore." She didn't believe he was serious, but it was impossible to tell by his brusque tone.
"We could not." She nudged him with her elbow. "And he wouldn't anyway." The sound of the paddlewheels and the water rushing past the hull of the steamer were reassuring. Each mile was one more between Shaw and her father.
With proper luggage and a husband beside her, Rebecca had had no trouble acquiring passage to St. Louis. But the Maryland was small compared to the steamboats on the Mississippi. There were no private cabins to be had. The best the ship had to offer was a private ladies' salon where Rebecca could rest, jowl to jowl, with a dozen or so other women. Men were strictly forbidden to enter the quarters, and a sour-faced matron stood guard to enforce the rule. Despite her weariness, Rebecca much preferred sharing a space on the upper deck with Shaw.
A group of musicians strolled among the passengers strumming banjos and singing off-key renditions of "Old Dan Tucker" and "Blue Tail Fly" while a young black boy danced for pennies. Amidships, four gentlemen were engaged in a game of cards around a small table that the steward had set up for then-pleasure.
Below, between bleating livestock and stacks of cargo, roustabouts leaned against the rail, smoked corncob pipes, and devoured great quantities of cornbread, fatback, and beans. The smells of animals, tobacco, and oil drifted up, mingling with the odors of the roast beef and sweet potatoes being served in the main dining area.
"Have you thought of what you'll do if you can't find Eve?" Shaw asked.
"I will find her. I must." She didn't want to talk about her sister; she wanted to talk about them. She had to make Shaw understand that it was because she loved him so much that she was afraid for his life. And she was still, she admitted painfully to herself, afraid of what he would do if her father or brothers turned violent.
"Saint Louis is a big place. I hear they have stages large enough to carry forty or more people at one time. Bruce said they call it an omnibus. He was there last winter. Claims he paid five cents and got to ride all over town. Next, I suppose they'll be bringin' in the railroad."
She forced a laugh. "Forty people? Sounds like a river tale to me."
"No, I think he was telling the truth."
"Well, maybe. But I'd have to see it to believe it." Would the night ever come when she could stand this close to Shaw and not have her heart race or feel moths fluttering in the pit of her stomach? "I wouldn't mind riding on a rail car, although Uncle Quinn says trains are nosier than a riverboat." Rebecca yawned. "But I don't think I want to go on one. I read that they fly along the tracks at nearly twenty miles an hour, but they spit coal dust and sparks. There was a newspaper account of a car that burst into flames."
"And riverboats don't?" Shaw rested his hand lightly on the nape of her neck, and she shivered despite the warmth of the evening. "Your grandmother said that you have river water in your blood. Reckon that's so?"
"Maybe." Her mouth felt dry, and her palms damp. "I can't imagine living where I can't hear the water or see it first thing in the morning, sparkling like a thousand diamonds." She put her hand in his and squeezed it tightly. "Don't be angry with me, Shaw. I can't stand it if you're angry."
He
didn't answer for a long time, and then he said, "Seems to me we've been runnin' and hidin' from our families forever. Maybe it's time we quit."
"I feel so torn," she admitted, "so selfish." She struggled to find the right words. "I love you, Shaw, but I can't stop loving them either. I don't know if I can turn my back on them. I can't promise you we'll ever be able to be together."
"I don't want to talk about it," he said gruffly. "We've gone over it enough. If all I have is now, don't spoil it."
She dropped his hand, and a knot formed in her chest. "It's not just us," she continued. "It's Eve and her boy; it's Noah and Grandma. I have to worry about them, too. I hate having Eve so far away. She needs her family."
"Seems like your folks are the ones drove her off."
Rebecca felt his gaze on her. "If Poppa would relent, the others would come around."
"Some think the MacCades are hard, but we don't turn our backs on our own. If Eve got herself in trouble, it seems like that was when she needed you all the most. I've read the Good Book. Isn't that what it teaches?"
"Forgiveness. Love." She nodded. "Yes. But..."
He cut her short. "Do you have a place to find Eve, or do we just wander around Saint Louis looking?"
"She wrote to me. She lives in a boardinghouse on High Street, run by a Mrs. Thelma Brown. Eve said the house is green. It shouldn't be hard to find."
"If she's there, I'll find her for you, Becca. Count on it." He slipped his arm down to circle her waist and pulled her closer.
Tears clouded her eyes. "I know you will." Hope swelled inside her. Shaw was a good man, MacCade or not. She loved him, and she thought he loved her. Somehow, they would have to find a way to make this work.
Violins and a pianoforte replaced the banjos. Rebecca didn't recognize the music, but the sweet, poignant notes spilling over the black water made her happy and sad at the same time. She leaned her head against Shaw, inhaling his clean, male scent. And she found herself wishing that the sun wouldn't come up, that they could just stay as they were until the end of time.
"The stars look so close tonight," she said after a long silence had stretched comfortably between them. "It's almost as if we could reach up and pluck them out of the sky."
"In the mountains, they're even closer. One night, I saw wide, sweeping streaks of color," Shaw murmured. "Blue and green. It was cold, so cold I shot a grouse and it froze in midair. I climbed a tree to try and rope it, but it just hung there until spring thaw."
"Liar." Rebecca giggled softly. "Rainbows in the night heavens and frozen birds. You're as bad as the river pilots."
"It's true. At least about the northern lights. The Indians have all kinds of tales about them. Some say they bring good luck, other's bad."
"And what do you think?"
"I think we make our own luck."
I wish we could, she thought poignantly.
Fireflies winked, and the lantern closest to where they stood flickered and went out. "Tell me about California," she urged.
"It's a fine country, bigger and more varied than you can imagine. There are deserts and high country, and they say it never gets cold in the south."
She tried to imagine the Little Smoke River without winter—without hushed snowfalls on the ice, howling January winds, and April thaws. It was impossible. "Would you like to go back to California to live?"
"Not really," he answered. "I don't know as a Missouri man could ever feel at home there."
"Corbett says it's a place where a man can make his fortune. Lord knows enough of them are pouring west in search of the promised land."
"He's right. There are fortunes to be made. A lucky man can reach down and pick up gold nuggets the size of marbles. But more will find their graves than gold."
"Like your partner?"
Shaw nodded, and his voice took on a hollow timbre. "I saw a man knife his own brother over a whore's smile, and three Mexicans murdered for no reason at all." He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles. "California's a wild place. And desperate men end up there. I never was too scared of dyin', Becca, but I want to die for something. And when I take my last breath, I'd hate to have my clothes and boots stripped off by bandits and have them roll me over a canyon rim for buzzard bait."
The piano went silent, and the violinists began to play a waltz. Almost at once, Shaw's mood shifted, "Would you care to dance, Mrs. MacCade?"
The tenderness in his question made her heart leap. "I would like that very much."
He put a hand on her waist, clasped her hand firmly, and swept her into the spell of the beautiful music. One rendition followed another, and Rebecca stopped thinking about her father and Eve. For this one night, she would cast away her fears and regrets. She would let the riverboat, the music, and the warmth of Shaw's arms spin a dream of utter enchantment that she could cherish for the rest of her life.
* * *
Nothing that Shaw had said or that she'd read about Saint Louis in the newspapers had prepared Rebecca for the size of the city or the destruction last year's fire had caused. In May of '49, a fire on a steamer called the White Cloud had leaped from one boat to another in the harbor. Despite all efforts by the citizens, nearly two dozen steamboats had been lost. But the flames hadn't stop there. Wind had carried sparks to the buildings along the docks, and the resulting blaze had consumed four hundred buildings before the city's valiant fire companies could blast a firebreak with kegs of gunpowder.
As Rebecca descended the gangplank on Shaw's arm, she could see new construction rising all along the waterfront. Carpenters, masons, and laborers were hard at work on every block. The few blackened brick structures that had survived the fire stood in stark contrast to the new homes and businesses already replaced. But the scars of the catastrophe were still evident.
"Where do we start?" she asked Shaw. She had to raise her voice to be heard above the clatter of the steamer and the clamor of the dock.
There were people everywhere, talking, laughing, cussing, and shouting. Rebecca saw whole families of immigrants, including wailing babies and tottering ancients, crowding the wharf. Threading between them were steamboat captains, gamblers, French trappers, keelboaters, lines of roped-together slaves, and two stoic-faced Mandan Indians. Some travelers chattered in French, others in German, Swedish, or a dozen other tongues. Most were loaded down with bundles and luggage and looked more lost and confused than Rebecca felt.
"Hold tight to my hand," Shaw said as he signaled for a hackney.
Shaw exchanged a few words with the driver before climbing up into the carriage beside her. "I asked him to take us to a respectable hotel."
"I don't want to go to another hotel. I want to find Eve," she protested.
Shaw rapped on the roof, and the driver slapped the reins over his horse's back. "We will find your sister," Shaw assured her. "But how long has it been since you got a decent night's sleep? You'll do Eve no good if you get sick."
"I don't get sick. I'm as healthy as a horse."
He grimaced. "Even horses sleep."
The carriage jolted along past ships' chandlers, gunsmiths, wheelwrights, butchers' shops, churches, stores, eating houses, a newspaper office, and public buildings. Elegant carriages vied for space with freight wagons, dogcarts, stagecoaches, and a feather-plumed hearse pulled by four coal-black Morgan horses. The sidewalks were crowded with men and women, all seemingly in a hurry.
As they left the business district and entered a section of private homes, Rebecca stared with equal interest at stylishly garbed ladies followed by serving maids and at barefooted black boys. "Where did they all come from?" she murmured. "So many people. And such grand houses."
Shaw took her hand. "I'm thinking I'll be hard pressed to get you to leave Saint Louis. You may decide that city life is—"
"I will not. It's just exciting to see it!" She rubbed her eyes and leaned against the cab window. "Look at that mansion. A prince could live there."
He laughed. "More likely some fat m
erchant."
Soon, they turned onto a side street, and the driver reined in his horse in front of a rambling, two-story brick building with tall, shuttered windows. A small wooden plaque beside the door read Macintosh House. And a few minutes later, a middle-aged housekeeper in a starched white apron showed them into a lovely room with a balcony overlooking the formal garden.
A tall mahogany four-poster draped with filmy, white gauze dominated the bedchamber. There was a round marble-topped table with claw feet by the window, two straight-backed chairs, a Boston rocker, a smaller writing desk with slender legs, and a chaise longue with fat, velvet cushions. One corner of the room was blocked from view by a floral patterned, Chinese-style screen. Curious, Rebecca crossed the bare, wide-planked floor to peek behind the partition.
"That's the bath, ma'am," the housekeeper said, pushing back the linen screen to reveal a huge, copper, freestanding tub. "There's running water, too. Hot and cold. Only the best hotels in the city have running water. When you want to bathe, you pull that bell cord, and then Toby goes up to the roof, lights the furnace, and heats the reservoir. When it's hot enough, Toby opens the valve and releases the water." Her plain face shone with pride. "One bath a day included in your regular night's charge, nothin' extra for the towels or the French soap. One bath every day included per room, you understand, do you wish to take the trouble. But why a body'd think they'd get so dirty as to need more than one all-over scrubbin' a week is beyond me." She nodded as if expecting Rebecca to agree with her.
"Thank you. Mrs. Thompson and I will be quite comfortable here," Shaw said as he ushered the woman out the door.
Puzzled, Rebecca glanced at him. Shaw raised one dark eyebrow, a gesture that she took meant for her to keep silent.
"Breakfast is served between six and eight. I'm Mrs. Baker. If you need anything, ask for me. I'm always here. Dinner is at noon, and supper at six. Or shall I have Toby bring your evening meal up here on a tray?"
Shaw said something in reply, but Rebecca couldn't make it out. She slumped onto the chaise, suddenly so drained of energy that she didn't think she could remain on her feet another second. She closed her eyes, just for a second.
The Taming of Shaw MacCade Page 19
