Lily (Wildflowers Of Montana Book 5) (2 page)

I would not be like the randy, rough miners that we passed on the boardwalk, eager for a quick tumble. I would be the one to teach her about fucking. I would be the one to see the surprised look as her first pleasure overtook her. I would be the one to
give
that to her, but I would not be a bastard and steal that moment. We would share it and I would keep it safe, keep her safe.
Mine.
 

The way she pursed her lips at my words, that was for me alone. That slight curve of her auburn eyebrow was a haughty look just for me. Perhaps it had quelled lesser men. It only made me eager to see more. I’d brought about that response and I reveled in it. Fuck. This little miss had ruined me!

Why her? Why this little slip of a female with wild hair, an equally wild demeanor and a wall of no-nonsense bravado? She wanted to go about her way without a backwards glance, but that wasn’t going to happen. She’d almost died because of me and that meant she wasn’t unaffected.

I took her basket from her and carried it in my free hand and used my shoulder to forge a path for us past the rowdy men we encountered. While they looked their fill with eager eyes, that was all they were going to get from her. My possessiveness had me ready to punch their faces—hell, I wanted to punch many people today. They would not get near her.

My boots were loud on the wooden boardwalk as I steered her home, even though I had no idea where that was. I just wanted to keep walking, to forget about Benson and the colonel and his undercover plans. I wanted to forget I’d spend a week or two with Benson, rob a bank with him and then have the colonel capture him red-handed. I was a Pinkerton, a detective, and instead I wanted to use those skills to discover everything about Miss Lenox; it would be much more enjoyable than trailing Benson. It was as simple as feeling the warmth of her skin even through her green dress.

“I assume you wish to leave that piece of steak in the street for the dog?”

She glanced over her shoulder to look at her butcher order—the wrapped parcel that had been tossed from her basket when I’d grabbed her—being gobbled down by a dog, only leaving the twine and paper to tumble away in the breeze. Glancing down at her, I saw the corner of her lips turn up.

“I suppose it’s the nice thing to do, especially since I don’t eat meat myself,” she replied. She was no simpering wallflower and I had to smile at her witty response. Some women would have complained and worried about their dinner cut being trampled by a stage, then eaten by a roaming dog. Some women may have cried or even stomped their foot at the bad dog. She, on the other hand, saw the folly of it and just continued to let me guide her down the boardwalk with a smile forming on her plump, pink lips.

“You don’t eat meat?” I asked and watched as she shook her head, a curl at the nape of her neck moving from side to side as she did so. “You won’t eat
that
piece of meat,” I added with a touch of humor. “You will have your meal with me instead,” I told her. It wasn’t a question. Unless… Wait. She didn’t eat meat? Then who was the butcher’s cut for? “Is a husband waiting for you at home?”

A man would let his bride run wild in a city such as Butte needed to find his balls. Once he did, I was willing to shove them down his throat for keeping his woman unprotected.

I felt her stiffen beside me. “No. No one is waiting at home.”

I needed to be clear, for I did not pursue a claimed woman.

“No beau?”

She shook her head and her copper curls bounced.

“No father with a shotgun?”

I saw wry mirth, and a touch of bitterness. “I do not have a father, but if you’re referring to a male figure responsible for me, he is not at home currently. If he were, he would be wielding a scalpel. No bullets needed.”

A scalpel? Interesting, yet enlightening. Her… male figure responsible for her was a doctor and he left her to roam the oft wild streets of Butte. Relief filled me when I knew that no one stood in my way to make her mine.

I led her toward the nearest restaurant. “I’ll keep that in mind when I’m pressing my attentions upon you.”

CHAPTER TWO

LILY

A frisson of excitement went through me at his words. They were roughly voiced, tinged with a touch of dark carnality that no man had ever directed my way before. I knew men propositioned women all the time, swapping coin in exchange for sexual favors on the second floor of the saloon, or even in a dark alleyway. I’d seen the latter by random chance once and scurried off. I most certainly didn’t look like a lady of the night, my dress being the latest cut of fashion, yet simple and very modest. Even in the heat, the lace at the end of my sleeves covered even the barest hint of my wrists. The high collar seemed stifling and overly snug all of a sudden and with my free hand, I tucked two fingers into the cotton and gave a small tug.

I couldn’t believe the last few minutes. A horse had reared on the far side of the street, drawing my attention, the cowboy tying his lead to the hitching post settling him easily. It was then that I saw
him
come from the bathing house. I’d stopped in my tracks because of the wave of odd feelings that had washed over me. My heart had skipped a beat and my breath had caught in my throat. Oddly enough, my palms had begun to sweat and my nipples tightened beneath the tight confines of my corset.

I’d thought I was having an apoplexy. No. The change. God, I’d thought myself an idiot. A cardiac arrhythmia. No. The man was just the most handsome thing I’d ever seen. His hair was dark, wet and slicked back from his tanned face. His eyes were dark, almost black at this distance. His jaw was freshly shaven and I couldn’t miss the hard angles of it, or his full lips. He was taller than those who passed him on the boardwalk, his size and well-muscled physique indicating that he was perhaps a miner. A miner who worked very, very hard. His suit was crisp with a bespoke cut that spoke of money.

Perhaps he had felt that someone was watching him, for he’d turned his head slightly and his eyes met mine. And held. And held. That heartbeat problem had returned and I’d licked my lips as they’d been all at once so very dry.

His gaze had held mine, then slid down my body, raking over every inch of me. My skin had heated as if the sun shone down on me. His gaze had shifted to the side and his eyes flared wide with something akin to panic. He’d run down the boardwalk, then leaped over a water trough. Long legs ate up the distance from where he had been standing to… me. I had no idea what he was doing, but he wasn’t stopping before me. In fact, he wasn’t stopping at all. Surprised, I’d had no opportunity to put my hands up in front of me before he scooped me up in his arms.

I remembered the hard feel of his body pressed against mine, the heat of him, even his scent. Perhaps it was apoplexy, because he was leading me down the sidewalk, eager to press his attentions.
Attentions! Him? With me!
 

While I knew about these amorous conversations, had experienced a few firsthand with some slightly inebriated miners, none of their words had made me feel like this. None with a man who made my heart pound, my palms sweat, my body ache with need. I was at a loss on how to respond, which was a first. I’d always been able to offer a witty reply and fend for myself if my lack of interest caused the coal man to under-deliver on the winter order.

This man though, addled my brain, yet intrigued the basest feminine part of me. I had to respond. I couldn’t play coy, couldn’t play prim miss. I
needed
to know what he meant, for whatever he offered was something I wanted. Oh, yes, I wanted this man in a way I’d never found in another. Stiff men had presented themselves to me on occasion, often ending up across from me at our dining room table for a meal. In the past and when I still lived on the ranch, they’d suffered through Miss Esther and Miss Trudy’s subtle questioning and my sisters’—the three who were still unwed and remained home—less subtle interrogations. Only two had joined Dr. Bower and me for dinner. None, however, interested me, or made my nipples tighten. I licked my lips. “Pressing your attentions?”

He was a head taller than me, so he leaned down slightly so his words were for me alone. “Telling you that I find you more than attractive. Interesting. Unusual. Intriguing.”

My steps faltered at his admission. “Intriguing? Me?”

I was the least intriguing person I knew. I was… odd. Well, at least Mrs. Dimplemeyer had said so at church when she didn’t know I was seated in the pew directly behind her. My brother-in-law, Ethan James, had arranged for my apprenticeship in Butte with Dr. Bower, the copper mine’s head doctor. It was unusual for a woman to work with a doctor, but I’d been insistent and Ethan had been understanding. I
could
have worked with Ethan, but he and Daisy were newly wed and she didn’t need her sister about her house. Besides, I wanted out of town and Butte was only two days’ ride from home. It had been going well, until recently. Strangely, and fortunately, Dr. Bower had never considered me female, talking to me and teaching me how to treat patients as he would any man. That was until last month when he began to refuse my presence.

I’d felt shunned and neglected. To make matters worse, he’d hired an assistant, a small, miserable man named Dr. Meager, who looked something along the lines of a pond muskrat. I was relegated to household chores befitting a woman, which was boring me to tears. He already had a housekeeper, a stout woman named Mrs. Reading, who came to clean and cook twice a week. She acted as a very casual chaperone, although the doctor had no inclinations in my direction, nor I in his. While Dr. Bower had promised me the muskrat wasn’t the basis for his decision, he’d informed me that my status as a woman was too apparent to continue helping him at the mines.

Too apparent, I muttered to myself. Preposterous. I wasn’t lovely like the ladies from Belle’s, and they certainly knew how to use their
attributes
as a benefit. I wore modest dresses, my hair pulled back in a prim bun at my nape. My hair was curly and wild, so it took plenty of pins. It was also red. Very, very red. But, I wasn’t demure and quiet like the wallflowers at church. I shared my opinions and readily, too. With Mrs. Reading’s arthritic knees, I was helping her run his household more and more, plus the practical side of his work, the ladies’ auxiliary meetings. I couldn’t sit still if I tried and my mind sped ahead faster than my legs could carry me. I was, in one word, a bluestocking.

So was my sister, Hyacinth, but I wasn’t shy. I was a little too bold for my own good—per Miss Esther. I was well read, but unlike Hyacinth, was well experienced in the seamier side of men’s rough language. I could cook a pot roast thanks to Miss Esther’s tutelage. I could even butcher a cow—I spent one cold winter day when I was fifteen learning the finer points of using a knife on a side of beef from Big Ed, the Lenox ranch foreman. He’d always indulged us—me and my seven sisters—in all of our unusual interests.

That skill turned into a job at the butcher shop, cutting meat. Yes, it was ludicrous, but one day I was chatting with Mr. Brainerd about my unusual skills and, during a lull in business, offered to help him cut up some chickens for one of the hotel restaurants. He’d been remarkably impressed and offered me a job, on the sly.

So if this handsome man—a man whose name I didn’t even know—found me, a bluestocking butcher’s apprentice, intriguing, I had to think perhaps he was the one with the apoplexy.

He remained silent as we entered the restaurant and were led to a table. After pulling out my chair, then settling across from me, he stared at me. I felt like I was back in the middle of the street, caught up in his piercing gaze. His eyes were dark, but in the light cast from the room’s chandeliers, they had a whiskey coloring. His hair, while not overlong, fell over his forehead. I itched to reach up and brush the lock back, but I knew it would just fall right back in its wayward place.

His skin was tanned as if he’d been in the sun, the muscular bulk of his body indicative of an active life. He was no banker.

“If you are going to press your attentions on me, shouldn’t you at least know my name?”

His dark brow quirked and I noticed a small scar that bisected it, a thin white stripe. “I know that you are Miss Lenox, but that isn’t important.”

“Oh? And why is that?” Irritated at his sudden disinterest, I picked up my napkin, unfolded it and placed it on my lap.

“Because soon you’ll be Mrs. Matthews.”

My gaze had been on my folded hands, but at his words, I whipped my head up and stared at him. He was so cocky, so full of himself. He was staking his claim, so sure that I was his, that he wanted to—

“You want to
marry
me?” I realized my voice had risen, so I glanced about, but no one was paying us any attention. The restaurant was busy and we were not the boisterous ones. Several tables were filled with miners who had received their pay and were busy feasting on a large, well-deserved meal after a long week.

“Yes.”

The growled demand behind his simple admission caused goosebumps to rise on my arms. The men who’d come to dinner at the ranch or with Dr. Bower had never been this forward, this… dominant. I liked it. I liked it very much.

“Why?” I glanced about, then leaned forward. He put his forearms on the table and leaned toward me as well so that there was only a foot that separated us. I could see that his whiskers would come in dark and that he had a shaving nick at the corner of his jaw. “I’ve heard men press their attentions without marrying, you know.”

His eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched. I’d said something wrong.

“And you allow men to do that?” I heard the sharp censure in his tone. He was tightly coiled waiting for my answer, as if he would track down any man who’d treated me improperly and rip them limb from limb.

I stiffened my posture. “Certainly not.”

He relaxed then. “That is excellent to hear. I refuse to speak of such things with you until you are my wife. Then—” He paused and I licked my lips, eager to hear more. “Then, I promise I will tell you all the things I will do to you.” He leaned forward, so close that I could see the flecks of gold in his eyes, feel his warm breath fan my cheek. “My name is Jack. I want you to know because I’m putting my ring on your finger and getting you in bed beneath me. When my cock is buried deep inside you, that’s the name you’re going to scream.”