Darby: Bride of Oregon (American Mail-Order Bride 33) (7 page)

Jacobs came to the room before the sun was up. “How
is he?”

Darby was glad to have good news. Finally. “His
fever broke. His leg looks much better. It’s a good thing we opened it up
again. All that running around was too much, I think. Now he needs to stay put
for as long as we can hold him down.”

The driver grinned. “My turn.” He offered a hand
and pulled her to her feet. “You sleep. I’ll sit on him.”

She indulged in one lingering look, pretended to
fuss, then dragged herself away.

“It wasn’t as if she had feelings for the man.
They hadn’t known each other long enough for that. But she did feel something—like
when she’d saved a calf one summer when its mother had died. She spent so much
time feeding it and worrying about it, she called it her pet even after it was
full grown. Rand Beauregard was just that. An animal she’d had a hand in
saving. He wasn’t quite out of the woods yet, but his chances had improved a
hundred fold since the night before. So she felt...responsible was all.

Before she could crawl into bed, however, she had
to call the staff together and have a nice talk about the Phantom. She had to
explain why the monster of Portland, Oregon had to recuperate in their very
house, and why they had to keep that fact to themselves.

And if they couldn’t?

Well, she would just have to persuade them…

~ ~ ~

A woman was singing. Somewhere in the mist rolling
across the river… She had to be in a boat. And she was moving closer.

Rand opened his eyes and the singing from his
dreams grew sick and dissonant. But it wasn’t a dream, and it wasn’t a woman
signing. It was Hardy Jacobs snoring two feet from him. The man had fallen half
off his chair and his head was pressed against the edge of the table. How he
could sleep in that position was a miracle.

Rand put up with it for another minute, however,
so he could swallow the disappointment that his wife hadn’t been the one to
watch over him in the night.

Granted, they were still strangers, but he’d
expected…some concern. After all, if he’d died, she might have ended up in the
poor house if it were well known that their marriage had never been
consummated.

“Rand Beauregard is alive. Alert the papers!” The
big man grinned and unfolded himself from his awkward position, then stood.

“You’ll do no such thing.” Rand’s voice was raspy.
His throat dry. He remembered whisky. “Why did you give me whisky?” he asked. “You
know I hate it.”

Jacobs shook his head. “I’d never be guilty of
that blasphemy. Must have been your lady wife. When the sun come up, I shooed
her off to bed.”

So she
had
cared. With all she had learned
about him, she still stood by him.

Excellent.

He tried to sit up, but he didn’t have the
strength.

“Here, now. Sit back. I’m supposed to sit on you
if you try to get out of that bed.”

Rand shook his head. “I need to have a talk with
the staff—”

“No need. Lady Beauregard already explained it
all.” He chuckled. “Then she threatened to wipe their posterity from the face
of the earth if word ever got out. One of us squeals, she says, we’ll all pay.”
He laughed out loud for a minute, then shook his head. “You stay put. I’ll get
you a pot to piss in, then I’ll see if you’re allowed breakfast. The doc should
be by in a while.”

“She got a doctor to come?”

Jacobs’ eyes flashed. “I reckon your wife could
get near anyone to do anything.”

The casual comment scared the life out of him for
only a second or two. There was no need for him to be afraid. She might need to
order the staff around, but not him. And no matter what she said or how she
argued, he wouldn’t stop his Phantom work and that was final. If it meant she
would never wear his ring, then she would never wear his ring.

But he really hoped she would wear his ring.

~ ~ ~

“What do you mean, stop? Of course I don’t want
you to stop.”

The conversation over the breakfast table, which
also happened to be his bed, wasn’t going at all like Rand had expected. As the
man, it was his duty to lay down the law. But it seemed like his wife had
already made up her mind before they could even discuss things.

Instead of insisting she come around to his way of
thinking, it sounded like she was already there waiting for him.

He scowled. “So there’s no problem?”

She shrugged and smiled, damn her. “No. No
problem.”

Right then, Jenny came in and said she needed
Darby’s attention. And the pair left him alone.

“Well, I’ll have you know,” he mumbled, “that
there
is
a problem, Mrs. Beauregard.” And the problem was, he was
hurting and itching for a fight. And she was being far too agreeable when he’d
been getting ready for a good, loud argument.

She came back into the room and her smile turned
instantly to a frown. “What the devil is the matter with ye—” She choked, then
went off on a coughing fit. He wanted to do something to help, but he couldn’t
get to her.

She waved a hand to signal she was going to be all
right. The coughing slowed to a stop and she took a seat on the edge of the
chair by the door. “Forgive me,” she said, suddenly cold and aloof again, like
she’d been the day before, on the stairs. Gone was the woman who had cared for
him through the night. “What were we discussing? Oh, yes. I noticed a scowl on
your face when I entered before. I wondered what that matter might be.”

“My leg hurts.” He bit his lower lip to keep it
from protruding and making it look like he was pouting, even though that was
exactly what he was doing.

“And you’d like to take it out on someone?”

He raised his brows high. “As a matter of fact, I
would.”

She stood, as prim and proper as you please. He
thought she would storm out—Jez would have stormed out. But instead, his
strange, unpredictable wife came to stand at the foot of the bed, and widened
her stance, kind of like a boxer preparing to fight. Only she didn’t raise her
mitts.

“All right,” she said. “Go on, then.”

“Go on, what?”

“Take it out on me. Let me have it. Don’t
underestimate me, Lord Beauregard. I am made of sterner stuff than you might
think.”

“Let you have it?” Ridiculous.

She shook her head in obvious disappointment. “Don’t
dare throw the first punch, do you? Because I’m a lady?”

He chuckled. “You’re suggesting I strike you?”

She put her chin in the air. “I wouldn’t advise
it, my lord. But I have no doubt that one day I will drive you to it.” She
lowered her brow again. “But I see I’ll have to start this fight.”

He laughed again. “I don’t want to fight—”

“How dare you leave me alone on our wedding night?”

The blow took him by surprise and knocked the wind
from his lungs as if she’d actually struck him. “I apologize—”

“Come now, my lord. I thought you wanted to fight,
not apologize.” It was like a taunting tap on the chin. She might as well have
been bouncing on her toes, circling him in the ring.

He didn’t want to hurt her, of course, but the
idea of sparring cheered him up. So he dealt a jab himself. “
You
were
relieved when I left you alone.”

“Believe you me, sir, that relief did not last
long.”

Again, he wanted to apologize. But a sharp pang in
his leg had him cursing.

She laughed like a school yard bully. And he
imagined her going toe to toe with Harrigan. But he would never allow that to
happen. Which reminded him…

“How dare you go nosing around in the most
dangerous parts of the city? When I sent word that I would return when I could,
you should have stayed here, not gone looking for me.”

“A wife’s duty, sir, is to care for her husband.”

“No. A wife’s duty, madam, is to obey her husband.
So from now on, I suggest you keep to the role I hired you to play.”

He’d struck a blow there. In her eyes there was a
flash of pain, or maybe anger. And for a heartbeat or two, he worried. But that
chin went back into the air and she laughed. With her hands on her hips, head
thrown back, she laughed at him.

“It’s not a role,” she said when she finally wound
down again. “It’s a partnership. And I own half.”

It was his turn to bark with laughter. “A
partnership?” He narrowed his eyes and pointed to her hand. “There is no
partnership, Lady Beauregard, until you put on the ring.”

She had no quick retort for him then. Her chest
heaved slightly and her face was flushed, but he suspected it was more from
their argument than from his reference to her wifely duties. But he noticed
something else too.

His own chest heaved as if they’d truly been
dancing together in the ring. And the throb in his leg had eased. He gingerly
rested back against his pile of pillows, careful not to move, not to wake the
pain again.

Darby’s brow was pinched with worry as she hurried
around the bed to lay her cool fingers on his brow, and a dozen misty dreams
teased just beyond his reach…

“Forgive me,” she said quietly.

“Don’t be silly,” he said. “You gave me just what
I needed, and the pain eased.”

“You swear it?”

“I swear it. I guess all I needed was a good
fight. Thank you.”

She blessed him with a beautiful smile. “Anytime.”
Her smile fell when she realized she was sitting beside him on the bed, and she
flushed even darker than before. She jumped to her feet. “Rest now. The doctor
will come soon.”

Before she could get away, he caught her hand and
pulled her close again, then kissed the back of her fingers. “You are a puzzle,
Lady Beauregard. And I look forward to discovering all your pieces.”

Hovering so close, face to face, he watched a
parade of emotions flit across her features. But there was one emotion that
both intrigued him and worried him—the woman was honestly afraid of something,
and he didn’t think it had anything to do with his grandmother’s ring.

Yes. She was a puzzle. And he could hardly wait to
get started.

Her husband would kill her. She knew it.

Darby actually crawled inside the wardrobe to
search the floor of it with her bare hands. But she found nothing more than a
little dust, and not much of that. Jenny and the other maids were very
thorough. And they seemed genuinely interested in pleasing her, so if one of
them would have happened upon the blasted ring, they surely would have brought
it to her at once. Or left it on her vanity table.

She took the opportunity to say a few choice words
in Gaelic. After all, she hadn’t lost her temper for days, and if she didn’t
let a bit of steam out her ears, she’d pop for certain.

Again, she checked the wee table. Nothing but the
usual hair combs, pins, and her brush and hand mirror set, all placed just
where she’d left them. Nothing extra.

She checked her pockets again, and every pocket in
the closet.

Her memory insisted that the last time she’d
touched the ring, she’d placed it back into the little box and returned the it
to the top drawer of the bureau. But the box was empty!

After a quick knock on the door, it opened. Her
heart jumped into her throat.

“Letter for you, mum.” Jenny hurried to her with
the envelope.

Darby thanked her and bit her tongue while the
maid left. There was no use rousing the house and risking the chance of word
getting to Rand—that she’d lost the one truly precious thing he’d given her.

When she could think clearly again, she would do
another search. Until then…

She hurried to her writing desk and perched on the
chair. The return address on the back of the envelope read North Dakota. She
knew only one person who could be writing her from there.

Violet!

Just what she needed to calm her racing mind—a
note from a friend who knew her for who she truly was, a Scottish lass with
good intentions.

She could nearly hear Violet’s voice as if her
friend were standing at her shoulder, reading the letter aloud. She’d arrived
safely in North Dakota—the letter was dated nearly two weeks before. And she
planned to send the letter to Haver House and hoped it would be forwarded if
necessary. But the letter changed after the pleasantries. She no longer sounded
like Violet at all. And though she claimed everything was to her satisfaction,
and that she had no complaints, she failed to say she was happy. In fact, the
letter hinted at many things but never said them.

Something was wrong. But what could Darby do? It
would be ridiculous to assume her friend was in some sort of danger, but
something was amiss. She only wished Violet would trust her with the truth.

Perhaps, if she knew that everything was not so
rosy in her own new marriage, the girl could at least feel as though she wasn’t
the only one to be worried.

Darby pulled out a page of stationary and began to
write. And, like Violet’s letter, after the pleasantries, she explained that
her marriage was not yet consummated, and indeed, may never be if she failed to
find the wee ring! She ended the letter with an exhortation that secrets were
incredibly dangerous, and that Violet should avoid them at all costs.

By the time she finished the letter, Darby was
breathing fast, as if she’d just hurried up the stairs. But she also felt
relieved to be able to share her worries with someone she knew cared for her.
Perhaps, if she did find the ring, and everything worked out well enough
between Rand and her, one day she would be able to share her burdens with him
instead of a friend from halfway across the country.

She carefully addressed the letter and asked Jenny
to post it for her. But long after the letter left her hands, her own words
repeated in her mind.

Avoid secrets at all costs…

And yet, she couldn’t bring herself to tell Rand
her latest secret, that his grandmother’s ring might be lost forever.

~ ~ ~

For two weeks, the entire staff enjoyed the game
of pretending that the man and woman of the house were out of town. Only a
small staff stayed on hand, which made it seem as if they really were alone on
a honeymoon, at least, according the Jenny.

Darby was able to put the ring out of her mind for
the better part of the day. But every once in a while, she would remember,
panic, then say a hasty prayer that the blasted thing would come out of hiding.
Then she would work on the speech she was preparing for when her husband
insisted she put it on so they could get on with it.

To his credit, however, she never caught him
glancing at her empty finger. And she was too busy being grateful to worry about
what that meant.

There was no more fighting between them. They
agreed it might be better for them both if she simply read to him when he
needed a distraction from the pain. When it grew unbearable at times, he sent
her from the room. And later on, she would return with a bite of something
tasty and they would act like nothing had happened.

The doctor came twice a week to check his
progress, and one evening, when he insisted the leg was improving by leaps and
bounds, she finally had to vent her frustration, though careful not to lose her
practiced English accent.

“Please, Doctor. How can you possibly claim such a
thing?” She gave Rand an apologetic look, then pressed on. “He is not
improving. In fact, his pain seems to worsen every day.”

Rand laughed. “I beg your pardon?”

She ignored him and set a hand on the doctor’s
arm, urging him to listen. “When he’s in great pain, he asks to be left alone.
Two or three times a day now. And it lasts longer and long—”

The truth hit her in the chest like a physical
blow. He wasn’t sending her away because he was in pain. He was simply sending
her away from him.

The doctor seemed to realize the same thing and
patted her arm. But she recoiled, embarrassed. She found it difficult to
swallow and could only whisper. “Won’t you excuse me?” Holding her head high
was impossible, but she managed to walk a straight line, at least until she was
out the door. In the hallway, however, she hurried to her own room and shut
herself in, not daring to take a breath until the door was locked behind her.

Then she fell to pieces.

She tried to contain the sound with her hands, and
then with a pillow. But she suspected the whole house would soon know how
heartbroken she was, since she couldn’t see any end in sight.

And no matter how she tried to be reasonable, the
voice in her head kept on insisting that Rand Beauregard didn’t really need
her, or want her, after all.

“You’ve ruined my surprise.” Rand’s voice came from
the door that adjoined their rooms. A door that, until that moment, had never
been opened.

She turned her face away, though he probably
couldn’t help knowing why she’d flung herself across the bed. “I think I should
be alone for a while,” she said, throwing his usual phrase back at him.

“Are you sure?”

She could hear a hint of laughter in his voice and
turned to glare at him.

He stood, grinning in the doorway, with one
shoulder resting against the casing. His thumbs hung on his belt, and he looked
like an unshaven cowboy waiting at the bar for his shot of whisky.

The doctor laughed gleefully behind him and poked
his head around Rand’s shoulder. “I’ll be going now. I’ll leave you two kids
alone to work things out.” Then he laughed again and went away.

Through angry, tear-filled eyes, she finally
understood why the old fool had been laughing. And why her husband stood
grinning like an idiot.

“You’re standing!” She pushed up off the bed, her
shame forgotten. “No cane or anything?”

Rand lifted his bad leg out in front of him and
wiggled it around. “No cane or anything.”

She was happy enough to jump for joy—if only her
heart wasn’t weighing her down. “That’s wonderful,” she managed, then turned to
look out of the window.

“Darby?”

She couldn’t face him. She couldn’t! “Yes?”

“I’m in the mood for a fight.”

“You’re just saying that.”

He laughed. “Darby Beauregard. I’ve been sending
you away so I could practice walking. I wasn’t in pain. I wanted to surprise
you.” She heard him stepping across the floor but stood her ground. “I wanted
to be able to walk up to you, like this.” Still she didn’t turn. “And look into
your eyes.” She turned then and lifted her chin. Surely he meant to kiss her.

“And help you slip the ring on your finger.”

New tears washed down her face at the mention of
the missing ring. She could barely see his features for the water in her eyes.
But when her vision cleared, she clearly caught the sparkle of the precious
little ring in his grasp.

“Forgive me,” he whispered. “I saw the box sitting
on your bureau and the idea came to me. I hope you hadn’t noticed it was
missing.”

“No,” she lied.

She pulled her handkerchief from where she’d
tucked it into the sleeve at her wrist. She wiped her cheeks and covered her
mouth while she watched him slide the ring onto her finger. Before she’d lost
it, she’d carried it for days, studying it, trying it on. She’d known every
curve and angle. But at that moment it became a new thing altogether. It felt
like—a puzzle piece she hadn’t realized was meant to be a part of her.

And now she was complete and made more so when he
bent his head toward her and gently pressed his lips to hers. She’d felt so
close to him the past few days, but it all meant so little when compared to
sharing the same space, with their bodies so close together. It was like they’d
stepped into a tiny room, filled it up, and never wanted to leave.

When Rand finally straightened, she felt alone and
awkward. So she tried to make conversation to hide her nerves.

“You said I’d ruined your surprise,” she said. “Just
when had you planned to surprise me?”

“Tomorrow. For your birthday.”

He remembered!

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, though she wasn’t.

“Don’t be. I’m very glad I won’t have to wait
another day.”

She nodded. “You mean, keep your secret another
day?”

One side of his mouth rose in a slight smile. “No.”
He looked at her finger again, and when she followed his gaze, she finally
understood.

“Oh.” She could think of nothing else to say.

“Yes. Oh.”

Her hands suddenly felt damp, so she slid them
over her handkerchief, first the left, then the right. The feel of the delicate
lace felt good against her skin and she repeated the motion over and over
again.

She looked up to see him still watching her. Still
amused.

“I… I should go speak to Cookie about supper,” she
said, but Rand put a hand on her shoulder to stop her.

“No. I’ll go. I need more practice on the stairs.”

She worried he thought her a coward, and she
couldn’t have that. So she suggested they have supper brought to his room.

“I’ll arrange it then, Lady Beauregard.”

She shook her head. “Mrs. Beauregard.”

His smile deepened. “Soon…”