The Fur Trader's Daughter: Rendezvous (Destiny's Daughters Book 3)

by Colleen French

  "Why do you wear it so short?" He fingered a silken curl. It was softer than he'd imagined. He yearned to press it to his lips.

  Gabrielle pushed his hand away with her elbow. "I dunno. Just always have."

  "Even when you were a little girl?"

  "Well no. I used to wear it in long braids. Jack's mother could weave my hair so tight it made my head hurt." She smiled at the memory.

  "So why did you cut it?"

  Gabrielle dipped the razor in the water again. "Lift your chin," she ordered. The steel razor glided expertly down his neck. "Actually it was a prank. One of the sisters at school accused me of being more like a boy than a girl, so I cut it all off. I was nearly bald."

  "And you didn't mind?"

  "Oh, I minded. I cried for days afterward. But I'd never have let that old witch know!" She was making the finishing touches now, lingering when it really wasn't necessary. For some strange reason, she didn't want to pull away. Gabrielle ran her hand over Alex's smooth cheek, blotting at a patch of soap with the towel. "How's that?"

  Alex brushed the back of his good hand against his cheek. "Better than I could have done myself." His hand touched hers for a moment, and then she pulled away. Gathering her implements, she got to her feet and began to put everything away. "Now it's time to find something to eat around here."

  "What are you making?"

  "I shot a rabbit. It's hanging outside. How about fried rabbit and biscuits?"

  Alex raised his arms in mock horror. "No! No! Please, ma'am, not the biscuits!"

  Gabrielle spun around. "How dare you insult my cooking. I don't see you getting yourself up to make anything!" She knew he was barely fit to cross the room, nevertheless cook a meal, but it made her mad. What right did he have to say anything? He didn't have a cent in his pocket nor a place to go. He ought to be damned grateful!

  Alex smiled, but his voice became more serious. "You're right. I know I've invaded your privacy, and I'm sorry. I'll make it up to you." He didn't know how or when, but he'd repay her for her kindness. "Now how about letting me try a hand at biscuit making."

  "You?" Gabrielle raised an eyebrow skeptically. "Where'd you learn to make biscuits?"

  "For your information, ma'am, I am multi-talented. I can speak French, bale cotton, write newspaper reports, shovel horse manure, harpoon a whale and make the best damned beaten biscuits this side of Richmond, Virginia!" He sat up and swung his feet over the bed. His face grew instantly pale, and he paused to let the waves of pain subside. His chest ached from the broken ribs with each breath, but the dizziness passed.

  Gabrielle eyed him suspiciously. "Let me guess, you went to the finest schools to learn how to hold that shovel just right." To her own surprise, she was at his side now, helping him across the room. His good arm was around her neck, her arm around his waist. She shivered involuntarily, and her stomach gave a flipflop. His arm felt good around her, sure and strong.

  Alex could feel a tightening in his groin as Gabrielle slipped her arm around his waist. He turned his head ever so slightly until his chin brushed the soft cap of curls that covered her head. It was difficult for him to understand how this short-haired girl in men's breeches could attract him so. Gabrielle was nothing like his wife. Whisper-thin Amber had been tall with long locks of silver-blond hair to her waist. Amber had been soft-spoken, a sweet blushing bride as delicate as the china tea cups she sipped from. But Gabrielle—she was a wharf rat, part boy, part wild creature, part woman.

  Gabrielle eased Alex into the chair at the wooden table, wishing it had been farther away. Confused by her feelings, she turned her back to him and lifted a wooden crate to the floor.

  Alex couldn't help chuckling as he watched her move the other crate filled with flour. His Amber had barely had the strength to lift her own tea pot, but this girl—he had a notion she'd be stiff competition in an arm wrestling match!

  "What are you laughing about now?" Gabrielle demanded, dropping her hands to her hips.

  Alex just shook his head. "Nothing, just ignore me. I'm prone to these fits. Now, if you'd be so kind as to fetch me the necessary ingredients, I'll do my best to make you some real biscuits."

  "What do you need?" She was already digging out a tin mixing bowl and a wooden spoon.

  "Flour, sugar, leavening, a little salt, lard and milk."

  "Milk?" Gabrielle spun around to stare incredulously.

  Alex's face was blank for a moment, and then the realization of his foolish words washed over him. "No, I don't guess you would have milk."

  "Not one cow more here than you had on that whaling ship of yours." Gabrielle shook her head, turning back to look for the salt. "Not very prepared for this territory, were you, Alex?"

  "I thought I knew what it would be like. I thought I could make it."

  "Then you'd be one tenderfoot in a hundred that did."

  Alex stared at her back, her words biting into his flesh. Anger rippled down his spine as he looked away. Damn her! She made him out to be such a buffoon. Who was she to judge him, to sum up his entire life on the basis of one mistake?

  One mistake? He shook his head. This one stupid mistake might cost him his little girl. The gold he'd been certain he'd find this winter was going to be the means to support Alexis. If he didn't find a way to make a great deal of money in the next two or three years, it would be a lost cause. By then, his daughter would have lived too long with her aunt to separate them.

  Gabrielle turned from the stove to see Alex's eyes growing misty. His gaze dropped to the floor as she neared. She was intrigued. What was this man thinking of that would bring tears to his eyes? Until this moment it had never occurred to her that a man could cry. "Here you go." Her voice was as smooth as honey again. "I'll fetch the rabbit and be back in a minute."

  Alex gave a nod of dismissal, leaning over the table to dump flour in the bowl with his good hand. Gabrielle paused, wanting to say something else. But she didn't know what to say. Should she tell him it's all right to stay? Should she tell him that suddenly she was glad he'd be here all winter? Could she admit that she was just a tiny bit afraid to stay there alone through the heavy snows? She caught her parka off the peg on the wall and slipped out the door before her foolish words got the best of her.

  Outside, darkness had settled upon the tiny cabin nestled on the bank of the great Tanana River. Gabrielle took a deep breath, welcoming the sharp sting of icy air as it filled her lungs. The snow crunched beneath her feet as she walked to a leaning pine to cut down the rabbit she'd left strung in the trees. One of her young dogs gave a long eery howl, and she turned to stare into the darkness.

  The other dogs were up on their haunches now, peering upstream. Gabrielle swore beneath her breath as she moved toward the cabin straining to see into the icy blackness. Where was her sense, coming outside without her rifle this time of year? There was too much movement, too many men trying to settle before the first heavy snows. There were too many vagabonds who would think nothing of killing to have a warm cabin and plenty of food.

  Her dog Tristan growled deep in his throat and moved to stand beside Gabrielle as she eased the cabin door open and felt for her rifle against the wall.

  "What's wrong, Gabrielle?" came Alex's voice from within, but she ignored him. Relief flooded her as her fingertips met with the ash stock of her father's rifle. Keeping her attention focused on the darkness upstream, she cradled the Winchester. It was loaded, she was sure of that. She'd been loading it for her father since she was five, firing it since she was seven.

  A great horned owl wailed mournfully in the distance as Gabrielle raised the rifle to her shoulder. "Show yourself," she ordered, her voice echoing in the tree tops.

  No answer came from the darkness, but Gabrielle knew there was someone there. She could feel his presence in the emptiness of the new-fallen snow. Just behind her, she heard the cabin door swing open.

  "Gabrielle," Alex called quietly.

  She waved to him to be silent, nodding into the dista
nce. The light from the cabin had spilled into the snow, creating an aura of golden light. The trees hung low, laden with sparkling frost, casting long-fingered shadows against the rough-hewn log walls.

  Alex swallowed hard, leaning against the inside of the door. In his hand he held Gabrielle's Colt 45, his finger poised on the trigger. Streaks of sharp, stabbing pain shot up his legs, and he swallowed hard to force down the nausea. He hated himself for getting into a position like this. Because of his own stupidity, he had almost lost his own life, and now he was too weak to protect the woman who'd saved him.

  Gabrielle heard movement to the left, just outside the circle of light, and she swung around, aiming the rifle carefully. "Hold it right there, mister," she called in her gruffest voice. Alex was beside her now. Somehow he'd managed to get down the step.

  A lone figure took one step into the light, his hands raised high in the air.

  "You son-of-a-bitch!" Gabrielle shouted, lowering her rifle. "What's wrong with you, Peg? You almost lost your other leg!"

  "You know this character?" Alex's voice was weaker than it had been a moment ago.

  Gabrielle broke into a grin, dropping the butt of the rifle to the ground to hold it by the barrel. "Know him? Why that man there is Peg-Leg Laurence. He's the one I was telling you about. My father sawed his leg off when he got frostbite and it turned green on him." She leaped off the step and ran toward Peg.

  He put out his arms to greet Gabrielle, wrapping her in the folds of a bear-skin cloak. "Gabe, you sweet thing! How about a kiss for your ole Uncle Peg?"

  Gabrielle kissed the old man's grey-whiskered cheek. "What's wrong with you, sneaking up on me like that? Have you lost what little sense you had left in that head of yours?" They walked toward the cabin, linked arm in arm. Peg limped, dragging one foot behind him, but kept up with Gabrielle's long-legged gait.

  Spotting Alex on the steps, she held out a hand with a flourish. "Peg, I want you to meet Mr. Jefferson Alexander the fourth of Richmond. Alex, this is Peg."

  Alex took one dizzy step forward, meaning to offer his hand, but was overcome by a heady blackness. He saw a whirl of snow and heard Gabrielle call his name . . . and then there was nothing.

  Chapter Six

  "Alex?" Gabrielle called softly. "Can you hear me, Alex?"

  Alex sighed. Yes, he could hear her, but he couldn't answer. Her voice came to him as if he were under water, muffled and from a distance. He could feel himself rising slowly to the surface, but as he rose, the pain of his injured limbs began to seep into his being. For a moment he was caught between wanting to climb toward Gabrielle's hushed voice and wanting to stay below where he was warm and void of pain.

  "Alex, answer me!" Gabrielle's voice came sharper this time. She eased a cold, wet cloth over his forehead, jolting him back to reality. "Can you hear me?"

  "I can hear you," Alex mumbled, catching her hand. "I'm all right."

  "Don't look much all right to me," she chided. "If you hadn't fallen into us, you'd have been headfirst in that snowdrift." She thought she should brush his hand aside, but she didn't. As she spoke she could feel the heat of his hand radiating through her arm. A delicious tingle ran down her spine.

  Alex heard a male chuckle and lifted his heavy eyelids to see Gabrielle and the old man watching him intently. Alex let his eyes drift shut again. He couldn't believe he had fainted! To his knowledge, in the history of the Alexander family, no male had ever fainted.

  "What were you doing out of the chair?" Gabrielle removed the cloth from his head, and Alex let his hand fall. She dipped it into the icy basin and eased it onto his head again. "You could have hurt yourself."

  "I was trying to help," Alex answered beneath his breath.

  "What?" She smoothed his pillow, tugging a woolen blanket over his chest.

  Alex cleared his throat. "Do I have to spell it out for you in front of him?" He lowered his voice. "I was coming to your rescue."

  Gabrielle covered her mouth with her palm to stifle a giggle. "I really didn't need any help." She thought it funny, but at the same time she felt a strange tightening in her chest. Was he so concerned for her welfare that he would risk injury to come to her side?

  Alex frowned. "That's pretty obvious isn't it?" Damn it! he thought to himself. How was it that this girl could continually make him out to look like such a jackass?

  "Well, I thank you just the same," she told him quietly, smoothing the blanket she'd covered him with. It was a subtle gesture that did not go unnoticed by either man in the room.

  Another chuckle came from Peg near the fireplace. "I didn't mean to bust in on you two. I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

  Gabrielle lifted her hand aimlessly to smooth her chestnut hair, laughing nervously. "Just like you to come around at supper time, Peg." She got up from the edge of the bed and crossed the room to the stove.

  The bearded man shrugged off a fur-lined coat and sat down to pull off his boots. "Come to think of it, I am famished."

  Gabrielle rolled her eyes for Alex's benefit. "Peg can't talk like the rest of us. He's got to be fancy about it." She dropped the coffee pot on the stove with a bang. "He was a professor at Princeton before he came north during the war."

  "Were you?" Alex rolled onto his side. "I had a friend who attended Princeton. Fine school. Why did you leave it for this?"

  Peg gave a snort. He had removed both boots and was now pulling on a pair of red, knitted socks he'd fished out of his coat pocket. "Just t'weren't the life for me. Couldn't stand to see my country pulled apart like that. The way I looked at it, no matter who won, North or South, we were all going to lose."

  Alex gave a nod of understanding. "I've never heard it put so well, sir. And from a Northerner, no less. Glad to meet you."

  Gabrielle turned from the stove to stare at the two men. They were actually going to get along! Why that mattered to her, she really didn't know. "So," she asked, "how about fried rabbit and some of Mr. Alexander's beaten biscuits?"

  "Good God, Gabe, for a moment there I thought you were going to offer me some of your own!" Peg laughed, banging his pipe on the table.

  Alex's laughter mingled with Peg's, and Gabrielle ducked outside to retrieve the rabbit, giving the door a good slam behind her.

  An hour later the threesome had settled at the wooden table for the meal. Alex sat on one chair with his feet propped on pillows on another. Gabrielle sat across from him and Peg on the end. They laughed as they ate, swapping stories and complaining about the age of the rabbit Gabrielle had brought home for dinner.

  "Toughest damned hare I ever had, but these biscuits, they melt in my mouth!" Peg dropped a bone on his plate and reached for another round biscuit.

  Gabrielle made a face but reached for another as well. "So who invited you anyway?" she asked, smothering the bread with salmonberry preserves. "I'll remember this next time you come begging."

  Alex leaned back in the wooden chair, licking his fingers. "Come on now, admit it, Gabrielle. Are these the best beaten biscuits you've ever had or what?" He settled his gaze upon her. "Milk or no?"

  "I don't know that I can say. Never had beaten biscuits before." Her mouth turned up in a grin. She was so pleased to have some company to keep her mind off her father . . . to keep her mind off the man who had murdered him. . . . Somehow this stranger Alex took some of the ache from her heart.

  "Well, all and all, it was a superb meal, Gabe." Peg was up now, carrying away plates. "I don't know about you two, but I'm ready to turn in."

  Alex got slowly to his feet, surprised to find Gabrielle at his side. She looped her arm easily around his waist and started for the bed. "I could get used to this," Alex dared.

  Gabrielle looked up at him, her dark eyes searching his. "Hush," she murmured. "Or it's out in the snow with you."

  Long after Peg and Gabrielle were asleep on the floor of the cabin, Alex lay awake. His mind churned over the events of the past few days. His life was going so poorly, and yet here in the middle of the
mess he'd created, appeared Gabrielle. His logic told him to leave her alone, to get through the winter as best he could and get on with his life. But when he closed his eyes, he could see her oval face smiling down on him. He could smell the fresh, clean scent that clung to her hair.

  Gabrielle LeBeau was a paradox of femininity. One moment she was tromping about the wilderness dressed in men's breeches and toting a loaded gun, the next she was here in her own cabin, moving like a dancer, her hips swaying sensually beneath the heavy wool pants to some imaginary tune.

  Alex needed no woman in his life right now, yet he needed Gabrielle more than he had ever needed anyone. There was something about her that made him see hope when there was no hope. She made him laugh like no one ever had before.

  Alex groaned, rolling onto his side in Gabrielle's bed. Opening his eyes, he saw her slim form in the darkness. She was asleep in front of the fireplace, and though he could not see her face, he could imagine how beautiful she must be with her head resting on a rolled-up sweater, her lips parted slightly as she breathed. He smiled in the darkness. He had never seen anyone look so peaceful. Once she was asleep, she never moved until morning, unlike himself who tossed and turned his night away. Rolling back over, Alex closed his eyes, letting thoughts of a dark-haired beauty lull him to sleep.

  Alex woke in the morning to silence. Bright light filled the small cabin, and he blinked, adjusting to the golden rays. Gabrielle and Peg were gone, where he didn't know. Moving slowly, he got to his feet and stumbled across the room to where the wash basin and razor strap hung on the wall. While they were out, he thought he would clean himself up and try shaving on his own.

  It was only when he began his morning ritual that he realized what a help Gabrielle was. Just getting out the door to get a basin of snow and take it to the stove took all of the strength he could muster. As he sat on the side of the bed trying to catch his breath, he shook his head beginning to fully realize the extent of his injuries. Even if he had been able to find shelter, if it had not been for Gabrielle, he would never have lived. It was her doctoring and the crushed herb poultices that had saved his legs from gangrene. Though she said he would be many months healing, she assured him he was out of danger. He had only to give his legs time and he would be as good as new.