Hannah Howell (29 page)
Authors: Stolen Ecstasy
“I am not incapable of taking care of myself, Charles.”
“Nope. But,” he pointed at her rounding stomach, “ain’t only going to be you to care for soon. Now, don’t argue,” he said when she opened her mouth to speak. “Me and Jed talked it all over and it’s decided. This place has all we need—beds, a roof, food on hand. Good a place as any to set down in. And if this fellow O’Malley decides he don’t want us squatting here, you’ll be glad to have us around. We’ll be able to help settle you someplace else.”
Resting her elbow on the table, she cupped her chin in her hand and smiled at them. “Oh, I’m glad to have you here now. It’s always much better to have friends near.” She smiled even more at their identical looks of embarrassment.
“Me and Jed’ll do some hunting before winter sets in firm. Thought we’d sell one of the horses and use the money to get more supplies.” He flushed faintly. “Thought we’d also see if there’s a midwife or a doctor about.” He glanced at her stomach. “We don’t know nothing ’bout babes or women having them. Thought you oughta know that.”
Standing up, she moved to start their supper. “I had rather guessed that. Don’t worry. There’s months left.”
“How many? You’ve gotten rounder in just the time it took to get here.”
“I have, haven’t I? Unfortunately, I can’t give you a definite answer. Three, four months. Probably three.”
“That’ll put us right in the middle of winter. That ain’t too good.”
“Don’t worry about it, Charles. I’m not.”
That was a lie and she knew it. A quick, covert glance at the men told her they knew it too, but were too nice to say so. When she had assisted Doctor Chelmsford while at school she had unfortunately seen what could go wrong, horribly wrong, in childbirth. There had also been no shortage of horror stories whispered by her classmates. She told herself to be sensible, not to think the worst, but it did little good at times.
It was after supper, as they sat comfortably before a small fire, that Charlie touched upon another subject she had tried, and failed, not to think about. She had sensed that he wanted to talk. His hesitation had warned her that she might not like his choice of topic.
“Now, I know you don’t like talking on Hunter and I’ve been real careful not to.”
She sighed, then braced herself to discuss what he wished with calm and maturity. “And I thank you for that. But?”
“I think we gotta come up with a way to have a word or two with him and most likely before you wanna tell him about the kid.”
“Why?”
“We still don’t know if he got your name cleared.”
“Or our pardons,” Jed added.
She stared at them for a moment, then shook her head, muttering, “I can’t believe I forgot all about that.”
“You had something else to weigh on your mind.”
“Perhaps, Charles, but you’re right. We need to know about that, need to know if we still have to watch out for the law.”
“Me and Jed could be the ones to do it. By wire maybe.”
“Perhaps you could wire Marshal Tuckman instead. Or Charity. Someone must have told her something. Because of this baby, I’d just as soon try to keep from letting Hunter know where I am.” She shrugged. “Heaven alone knows why he would try to find me, but he could even just come this way for another reason and decide to look in on me. I don’t know. I just wish to avoid any possibility of a confrontation, at least until I am good and ready to have one.”
“Yeh, Tuckman would know,” Jed agreed. “Ain’t no reason for him to tell Hunter he’d heard from us neither.”
“That’s settled then. We’ll slip into town in a few days and send a telegraph message to the sheriff,” Charles said.
“You’ll feel better for the knowing, Leanne.”
“I know I will, Jed. So will you. I would have recalled it before much longer, I’m sure.”
“Well, since we’re talking on going to town soon, it’s best we set to thinking on what supplies we’ll want.”
She was more than willing to follow Charlie’s suggestion. It would keep her mind from settling on Hunter. Brief though the mention of him was, it had stirred up all she sought to bury, all the hurt and memories.
As she lay in her bed later that night in the room O’Malley had made especially for her, she was not surprised when Hunter was all she could think about. Exhaustion from scrubbing the cabin clean had kept those thoughts at bay. She should have found more work to do, she thought sadly.
What hurt most was that she had trusted him, had begun to believe that he would stay with her. Instead, she had to face yet another rejection. Covering her rounded abdomen with her hands, she felt her child move. They could have been such a lovely family together. She swore that her child would not know the bitterness of rejection. If that meant that Tarrant Hunter Walsh never knew of the child he had created, then so be it.
Chapter Sixteen
H
UNTER URGED HIS HORSE DOWN THE
small rise, Sebastian and Owen silently following. He was torn between hoping Leanne was safe with her father and dreading the confrontation with her. It was his mother’s fault that Leanne had fled, yet Hunter knew he had to shoulder some of the blame. He had known what his mother was like, known she had not really accepted Leanne, yet he had left the poor girl to his mother’s mercy. Neither had he given Leanne the words or promises she needed to hold out against his mother’s insinuations, to believe that he really would return and marry her.
UNTER URGED HIS HORSE DOWN THE
small rise, Sebastian and Owen silently following. He was torn between hoping Leanne was safe with her father and dreading the confrontation with her. It was his mother’s fault that Leanne had fled, yet Hunter knew he had to shoulder some of the blame. He had known what his mother was like, known she had not really accepted Leanne, yet he had left the poor girl to his mother’s mercy. Neither had he given Leanne the words or promises she needed to hold out against his mother’s insinuations, to believe that he really would return and marry her.
It did not surprise him when three men appeared on the veranda, rifles held with deceptive carelessness. He and his companions had made no attempt to hide their presence. Any stranger was worthy of caution, and Hunter knew the way they had lingered on the hillside had added to that. As he reined in before them he idly noted that the rifles were Henrys. Hunter sat relaxed in his saddle, studying the oldest of the three men and trying not to let the man’s excellent taste in weaponry or his apparent readiness to use it sway his opinion. Grant Summers had deserted his child.
“I’m looking for your daughter.” He spoke coldly, remembering Grant’s treatment of Leanne.
“Who the hell are you?” the older man snapped, closely studying the three young men before him.
“Are you Grant Summers?”
“I am, and you better tell me quick who’s asking.”
“Tarrant Hunter Walsh.”
“And how’d you come to know Leanne?”
“That’s a long story, Mr. Summers.”
“I got time.”
“Is Leanne here?”
“No.” The brief yet sharp look of disappointment that passed over the younger man’s face worked to ease Grant’s suspicions. “My daughter hasn’t seen fit to confide her whereabouts for quite a while,” he said as he lowered his rifle. His sons following suit. “You meet her in that time?”
“I not only met her, I was with her for most of that time.” He was not surprised to see the rifles pointed at him again.
“You’re one of those damn outlaws that dragged her off.”
“Dragged her off? She was facing jail under false charges.”
Grant frowned, studied Hunter closely for a while, then lowered his rifle again. “I think we’d better talk. Joe,” he called to a man loitering at the far end of the veranda. “See to our visitors’ horses.”
“Since Leanne is not here, I don’t see any need to linger.”
“You just might be surprised. You also don’t have much choice. It ain’t a polite invite I’m handing out.”
Hunter cursed, but he dismounted, Sebastian and Owen slowly following suit. Joe led their horses away, and one of the younger men flanking Grant took their guns. It was clear they were not to be trusted until Grant had heard their story and decided on its worth. Grant Summers was acting like any other father, and Hunter found that puzzling.
He, Owen, and Sebastian had barely stepped inside, Grant and the other two right behind them, when Grant nudged the three of them towards a door to their left. “We’ll just set ourselves in here.”
Once everyone was seated, Grant facing them, one son behind the settee they were crowded onto and the other guarding the door. Hunter snapped, “I don’t have the time for this. It’s very important that I find Leanne.”
“I know how important it is, boy, but I’m still waiting to hear about you and my daughter.”
“You’re very concerned for someone who hasn’t had squat to do with her since dumping her on that whore’s doorstep.”
Holding up a hand to stop his sons’ angry move towards Hunter, Grant drawled, “I’d set aside those thoughts, seeing as they’re formed on only part of the facts. Now, I’ll give you a minute to pull in your horns and introduce my boys. Brandon and Matthew.” Sebastian and Owen introduced themselves, then Grant looked at Hunter again. “Now, about you and Leanne?”
Forcing himself to remain calm, Hunter related the basic story. He could tell by the slow narrowing of Grant Summers’ eyes—eyes exactly like Leanne’s—that the man knew exactly what was left out of the tale. It annoyed him to see that look of fatherly outrage on the man’s face. Grant Summers had not earned the right. He met the man’s glare with a look of silent challenge.
“You’re a cocksure young bastard,” Grant murmured. “You drag the poor girl . . .”
“I had no choice. If I’d left her with Martin she would’ve been raped and undoubtedly murdered before long. She certainly wouldn’t have gotten any help from that bitch who threw her out in the middle of the night. You could have chosen a little better before you handed her over to that woman.”
“Will you two sit down?” Grant snapped at his sons who were again moving toward Hunter.
“But, Pa,” protested Brandon even as he and Matthew did as they were told, “he’s got no right to talk to you like that.”
“He thinks he does.” He turned a piercing gaze on Hunter. “I’ll be asking why he feels that way soon enough. First I’m telling you a few facts, young man. We’ll get nowhere trying to work around that chip on your shoulder.”
“Perhaps when I finish what I need to do . . .” Hunter began to stand up.
“Sit down!” bellowed Grant and nodded with satisfaction when Hunter, after a brief glaring match with him, obeyed.
Grant Summers was a damned autocrat, Hunter thought. He was not sure which annoyed him more—that or the way the man’s sons smirked when he obeyed their father.
Suddenly he took a closer look at Grant’s two sons. One had dark eyes, the other blue—that soft lavender blue he so admired in Leanne’s eyes. The dark-eyed son, Brandon, had the same long, thick lashes Leanne did. Grant Summers had short ones. Matthew had neat arched brows like Leanne’s. Grant Summers had straight brows. Hunter began to think he was looking at Leanne’s brothers—yet, if that was so, it made Grant’s desertion of Leanne even more confusing. Why keep some children and not all?
“Now, you’ll listen. I know it’s important to find Leanne, but you won’t be going far this late in the day. You’ll just about get off my land when you’ll have to stop to make camp. You’re done in and so are your horses. So set here and listen. Then you can decide whether we ride together come the morning or separately.”
Crossing his arms over his chest, Hunter arched one brow. “It better be good.”
“Hard-nosed too, I see. Leanne’s mother and I were married for ten years, ten good years. Then everything started to go wrong. We were up Colorado way then, not too far from Charity.
“I saw you looking at my boys, so I reckon you won’t be all that surprised when I tell you they’re Leanne’s brothers. My Delia gave me three fine sons and little Leanne. Then the trouble started. Small losses, a hint of some financial trouble in my business. I probably could’ve fixed it, but then Delia fell ill. Nothing helped. The doctors gave up. She just wasted away slowly and painfully. I neglected everything to be with her, was there when she breathed her last.”
He fell silent for a moment as he remembered that sad period of his life. “I was a broken man. No other way to say it. I did what I had to do to keep a roof over our heads and food in our bellies, but I let myself sink into despair. That’s the only explanation I have for being such a fool.
“I was a prosperous man, but prosperity needs working at. I let it all slip and started taking on larger losses. By the time I came to my senses, my troubles were past fixing. I had more creditors than I could count. It was then that I understood Delia’s dying wish.”
“Which was?” Hunter pressed when Grant again grew silent.
“To make a long story short, she saw what was happening but couldn’t get me to listen. As she lay dying, she asked me to give our baby girl to Charity. She wanted Leanne to be in a stable home and knew I wouldn’t be able to provide one while I was running from creditors and ’trying to straighten out my life.”
Shaking his head, he laughed bitterly. “I finally had to give in. What choice did I have? Suddenly, I had no home, nothing. I faced years of rough, hard living. Now, I’d never met Charity myself—she was my wife’s cousin—so I posed as a family friend entrusted with the care of Leanne . . . said I was Grant Summers’ emissary. By that time I couldn’t even afford to show my face in the area, things had gotten so bad.
“Then began years of moving from place to place, hiding from creditors even as I sweated to pay each one off. Somehow I managed to keep scraping money together to send Charity to house Leanne, then even enough to send her to a good school. It slowed up my own recovery, however. Delia was right. It would’ve been a hell of a life for a tiny girl. It was nearly too much for my boys. Even when I started to see Charity’s faults, she was still better than anything I could offer.”
“Doesn’t look like you’re suffering now,” Hunter drawled.
“No, not now. But this is all new. I was working towards bringing my little girl home. I even hired a woman to help look after her. Binnie’s still here—waiting for my little girl to join us. I told Binnie so much about Leanne, the woman acts as if she’s always known the girl.”
“So why didn’t you go get her?”
“She didn’t even know about me. It takes time to sort out that sort of tangle. Then all this happened.”
He sighed and shook his head. “I’ll admit I seemed to go wrong each way I turned. I tried to give my baby girl a good home and a fine upbringing, but as the years slipped by and my circumstances improved, it got harder to straighten it all out.”
“Are you sure you were ever planning to tell her the truth?”
“Oh, I was, but it ain’t an easy truth to tell, is it? Then Charity—and there’s a misnamed woman if ever there was one—went and told her the whole story, twisting it badly—not that there’s any good way to tell it, but it could’ve been done softer.”
“But did you have to keep yourself hidden from her? Why so damn secretive?”
“I didn’t want my creditors or my enemies finding the girl. I didn’t want them trying to use her in any way. If they discovered I sent money to her, they could’ve taken that away. It was best if I just disappeared from her life. So I did, and I did my best to keep it that way.
“The sad thing is, it was coming to an end. Now it’s Leanne in trouble—and she’s in a lot of trouble, isn’t she? Charity wrote and told me some of it.”
“Yes, she is in a great deal of trouble.” Hunter told him all about Watkins, Martin, and their threats. “It’s Leanne and me he’s after, but he’ll kill anyone connected to either of us if he has half a chance. He killed my mother just before I left home.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, son.”
“Thank you,” Hunter murmured, and there was a moment’s silence while both men composed themselves. “Think we could move now, Mr. Summers?” Hunter said.
Grant took the “we” as the peace offering it was. No apology was offered, nor did he expect one. He knew what he had done appeared the basest of desertions, that only a thorough explanation could alter that. A quick glance at the other two with Hunter showed they understood that the earlier animosity was now set aside.
“Well now, I reckon I can muster up some baths. Your personal things will have been set in the hall. A bath and a good hot meal will see us in much better shape to set out in the morning.”
“It just might at that.” When Grant stood and strode to the door, Hunter quickly moved to follow, Owen and Sebastian right behind him.
“Binnie!” Grant bellowed as he stepped into the hall.
“What d’you want, old man?”
“Got me three young fellows here who could do with a bath.”
“Water’s just about ready. I set it to heating when you’d been settin’ in that room a while and there was no shooting.”
Hunter smiled faintly as he was introduced to Binnie. She was a tiny, sprightly lady with red hair, freckles, and big blue eyes, probably in her mid-thirties. Catching a certain warmth in the smile Grant gave the woman, one returned in Binnie’s fine eyes, he decided that Grant Summers would not be a free man for very long.
By the time they were washed and changed into fresh clothes, Hunter found Owen and Sebastian as eager for the meal they could smell as he was. Binnie served with the help of one of the ranch hands’ wives, then sat down at the table. She was clearly already considered family.
“So, you’re going to find that poor little girl?” Binnie asked as the potatoes were passed around, the meal officially begun.
“I told you we were, Binnie. We’re all headed out crack of dawn tomorrow.”
“I just wish I knew where to go,” Hunter said. “I feel sure she wouldn’t search out Charity, but that’s the only other person I can find. Charity might be able to tell me how to find this O’Malley fellow Leanne was always talking about.”
“Ain’t you told him anything?” Binnie gasped, staring at Grant.
“I’ve told him a lot. I had to clear the air about why Leanne wasn’t where she belonged, didn’t I? Things weren’t too friendly to start. Just giving him the bare bones of it talked me out. Figured we could discuss the rest over a fine meal.” He looked at Hunter, frowning slightly. “Just how did you find me? Charity didn’t know, and Leanne couldn’t have found out.”
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