Secrets (4 page)

“Then you're a fool,” Edward said just as flatly.

A moment passed. Slade smiled. It was a sad smile, but a smile nonetheless. Edward smiled, too, his expression almost identical except that his was dimpled. The waitress came with a glass. Slade was about to pour his brother a drink, but Edward stopped him. He took a handkerchief from his breast pocket and cleaned the glass, holding the cloth up afterward to show Slade that the linen was now gray. Slade shrugged, refilling both of their drinks. “A little dust never hurt anybody.”

Edward sighed and drank. “So what happened? The whole town's buzzing. You found her.”

“I found her.” Slade's mouth tightened. “She doesn't remember who she is. She doesn't remember anything.” An image of her looking at him with near-worshipful
eyes assailed him. Angrily he shrugged it off. But it was an image that had been haunting him ever since he had left her at the hotel.

Edward blinked. Then he said, “Well, maybe that's for the best.”

Slade looked at him, understanding him. “Did she love James?” If so, it was better that she didn't remember, that she was spared, at least temporarily, some of the grief.

“How in hell would I know? You're the one he wrote those letters to. I got sick of hearing how goddamn beautiful and perfect she was and told him to shut up years ago.” He winced, then eyed his brother. “Is she God's gift to man?”

“Yeah.”

“I don't recall you and James having the same taste in women.”

“She's beautiful,” Slade said brusquely. He didn't bother telling his brother that she was more than beautiful. She was sexy. Very sexy. It wasn't even that knockout body of hers, which he had inspected too closely and too carefully. It was her face. There was something about that face that would make a man crazy and make him think of sex. He shut off his thoughts with a vengeance. She was obviously a lady, but his body didn't seem capable of respecting that.

“So maybe it's not such a bad idea after all. Maybe you and Rick can work things out and…”

“No!” Slade slammed his fist down hard and the glasses jumped and fell to the floor, breaking. Edward caught the bottle before it tipped over. Slade couldn't believe himself. Lusting after Elizabeth, his brother's fiancée.

“That sure was smart,” Edward said.

“This town hasn't changed,” Slade said. “Nothing changes around here, does it? She needs to be examined and I found Doc upstairs with a two-bit whore, passed out cold.”

“You see Rick? We got to town hours ago. Rick's been going crazy waiting for you to get back. He'll really bust
loose when he hears she lost her mind. That sure puts a kink or two in his plans.”

“She lost her memory,” Slade corrected. “And I saw him just after I brought her to the hotel. I told him she didn't know who she was. He was very surprised. Last I know, he was going over there.”

Edward looked at him. “Something's bothering you. What?”

Slade shifted. “Nothing.” He wasn't a liar and he never had been. “It's been a bitch of a day.”

But Edward was a clever man. He couldn't possibly be so in tune with Slade's thoughts, but when he spoke, it was as if he was reading his brother's mind. “You know, you've never met Elizabeth. Neither have I, for that matter. Rick's the only one who has, and I guess he's with her now. What if the lady is someone else?”

“Elizabeth was scheduled to arrive on that train,” Slade pointed out. “She was on her way to Miramar to marry James. The wedding was supposed to be in two weeks. These plans were made a long time ago. If for some reason she didn't board, if there had been an emergency, she would have wired us. Only one passenger—one woman—was missing.” Slade shrugged indifferently. “Besides, she looks exactly the way James described her.” Small and stunning, he added silently. And yes, perfect.

Yet his indifference was all show and he knew it. No matter how hard he tried to tell himself that he didn't care, he did. He was a traitor to himself and to his brother and the fact shocked him. Because he was hoping that she wasn't James's fiancée. It was ridiculous, it defied logic, and, more importantly, he had no right to hope like that at all.

Even if she didn't belong to James—and those odds were a million to one—she was obviously a lady, and ladies did not look twice at a man like him. He would rein in his traitorous mind if it killed him.

“What is it?” Edward asked again.

“Nothing,” Slade ground out. He might be able to turn off his thoughts whenever they dared to intrude,
but it was much harder not to be angry. The anger coiled thick and hot inside him. Rick had better not say one damn word about his latest scheme. Slade would erupt if he did.

“Maybe we should go over to the hotel and find Rick.”

Slade didn't move. Sweat beaded his brow. “No.” He knew she was Elizabeth. Which was why he did not move. Right now, Rick was undoubtedly there, with her. Removing the last doubt would be crushing when he was far too cynical and wise to be crushed.

“I see,” Edward said. He folded his arms and watched Slade drain the glass. “You've made up your mind, haven't you? You're not going to stay. You're Rick's heir now, but you're not going to stay. You're going to go back up north.”

“That's right.”

Edward was mad. He lunged to his feet and placed his palms down hard on the table, causing the bottle to roll off and spill all over the floor. Neither brother noticed. “Why the hell don't you stay?” Edward demanded. “You're going back there to work like a frigging majordomo for Charles Mann, when you should be here!”

Slade kicked back his chair. For a moment he was an inch from taking his fist and blacking out one of his brother's eyes. But he controlled himself. “Because I like working for Charles,” he said. “Because I don't like working for Rick. And because I don't like being blackmailed.”

“You're a goddamn fool!” Edward shouted. “Be honest. You're doing this to get back at him, right? You think you're getting back at Rick. You know what? You're doing this for all the years he loved James more than you!”

Slade was white. “Wrong,” he said. “
Wrong
. I'm doing what I want to do for me!”

“You're choosing
them
over
us!
” Edward shouted. “They're not your family—we are!”

“That has nothing to do with it!”

“You belong here! Now more than ever. James is dead. Rick needs you! We need you!”

“No.” Slade shook his head, enraged. His face was flushed with fury. “Rick needs an heiress, not me. And I am not going to marry her in order to inherit Miramar. I am not going to marry the woman James loved—not for you, not for Rick, not even for Miramar.”

E
dward left abruptly after their shouting match. Slade made no move to follow. He drank the awful gut-wrenching whiskey, trying not to think about what Edward had said and trying not to think about the woman he'd left at the hotel. He watched as shadows finally appeared on the hard-packed dirt outside, watched as they gradually lengthened. Dusk settled over Templeton with finality.

It wasn't true. It was ridiculous. He wasn't trying to get back at Rick for favoring James. He had loved James, too. Everyone who had known James had loved him; James had possessed a rare kind of magic, the magic of charisma and kindness, a magic very few men had. Edward had some of that magic, too. He, Slade, was the only brother who had not been touched by that special magic wand.

James had been Slade's hero even though he was only a year older. They had both grown up with the housekeeper and cook, Josephine, acting as their mother, even after Rick had married Victoria;
her
only interest was her own son, Edward. James's mother Catherine had died in childbirth, and Slade's mother had run away when he was only a few months old and too young to know what had happened. He had thought the Negress
Josephine his real mother until James had explained to him the facts of life when he was three years old.

James and Slade had been as inseparable as twins, with Edward, three years younger, tagging along behind them. The brothers were perceived as being as different from each other as night and day, James always sunny-tempered and quick to laugh, Slade hot-tempered and grim. Yet contrary to popular belief, James had had a mischievous streak in him too, although he wasn't the determined rebel that Slade was. But it was James who had the common sense to deter Slade from some of his wilder ideas, just as it was James who was always standing up for Slade when he was caught for a misdeed, hoping to distract the adults or take the blame himself. No one ever believed James, because everyone knew Slade too well.

But Slade could accept that now. It had been harder when he was a boy. As a boy he had thought it grossly unfair to be the one instantly blamed for every misdeed, even if he
had
been the one responsible for most of the pranks, some kind, some mean, that he and his brothers pulled. Unquestionably he had been the leader of the hell-raising pair, which had become a trio once Edward was a bit older.

Today, as an adult, he could look back at that boy and smile sadly, for it was so obvious why he had been an unrepentant mischief-maker. He had desperately wanted attention. The only way he had known how to get it was to cause trouble. And trouble begat trouble. He had been punished countless times, but confinement or an occasional slap were not enough to redeem him.

Yet he hadn't been the one to get fifteen-year-old Janey Doyle pregnant. That still rankled. It still hurt. Even when Edward had come forward to claim responsibility for the deed, no one had believed him, because Edward was only twelve. Of course, no one had thought James would ever ravish their innocent neighbor, but everyone had believed he, Slade, who had in fact still been a virgin, to be the culprit.

There had been no minor slap for that incident. Slade had ceased protesting his innocence way before the punishment began. Edward would not stop proclaiming his guilt and had finally been locked in his room. Rick had whipped Slade. But Slade had refused to cry. Rick had been so angry Slade had truly been afraid, too afraid then to understand what his father had been saying. Rick had been berating him for being exactly like his mother. In retrospect it was ironic, because he was actually as different from his mother as a son could be.

Now he was wise enough and detached enough to know that the whipping had been the trigger for his running away, not the cause. The issue of Janey Doyle's pregnancy had merely been the last and final straw in a never-ending and bitter battle he'd waged for his father's attention. The whipping had been a crushing defeat, not of his body, but of his soul. Rick had not tried to stop him from leaving. Rick had let him go.

James had tried to prevent him from leaving, though. Slade could still hear James's urgent voice and Edward's soft sobbing.

“You can't go. He didn't mean it.”

“He meant it. I've got six marks on my back. He meant it.” Slade's voice choked.

“Let me get Jojo,” James said worriedly. Jojo was their pet name for the woman who had mothered them both. “She's in the kitchen, crying a flood over you.”

Slade thought he might cry soon, too. At least she cared—she'd always cared. But tonight that just wasn't enough. He scowled at Edward, standing behind James, now hiccupping. The stable was dark and he was a small noisy shadow. “Tell him to quit it.”

“Stop it,” James commanded, but his voice wasn't harsh and his hand clasped Edward's shoulder. “It's not your fault. You told the truth.”

“Slade's leaving because of me,” Edward cried. “I should have been whipped, not him!”

“That's right,” James said. “Just forget it. Slade, don't go. I'll be right back with Jojo. She can put salve on your back.” His tone was desperate.

“No. She'll only cry harder.” He turned, moving stiffly, his back hurting. He led the small roan out of the stable. Rick would probably be mad at him for taking the cow pony.

James grabbed him, whirling him around. “You can't go! You can't do this! You can't!”

“Yes, I can,” Slade managed, trying to ignore Edward, who was crying again.

“I'm going to get Dad,” James shouted.

“Don't you dare!” Slade retorted. Yet half of him wanted James to do just that.

From the shadows, Rick spoke, stunning them all. “He's like his mother. She wanted to leave and nothing could stop her. If he wants to go so badly, let him go.”

Those words were all he needed. Slade jumped on the roan. James tried to grab his foot but Slade kicked him, hard, when it was his father he would have liked to hit. And it was Edward who begged, “Please don't go. I'm sorry. Please don't go.” Those were the words he wanted to hear from the man who had sired him, not from his brother.

He had ignored his brothers' pleas. And later that night, alone by a small campfire not far from San Francisco, with only the wind and the fog for company, he had cried like a baby. It was the last time he had cried, too, until the day of his brother's funeral.

It was a little more than a month since he had been alerted by Edward—not Rick—and had come home. He had made the short train journey in shock. To this day he could barely remember boarding in San Francisco or the journey south. Charles had been there, he thought, trying to comfort him. But he wasn't sure. His mind had been consumed with denial. James could not be dead, drowned, for God's sake, in a flash flood. Other men might die, but not James, never James.

Miramar was in mourning when Slade returned after Edward's summons. Rick had been closeted in the solitude of his study for days; it was weeks before he functioned, and then with an ashen pallor and the automatic movements and speech of a sleepwalker. He
barely acknowledged Slade's return, and Slade hadn't been home in two years. Yet Slade could not feel bitter toward Rick. He even imagined comforting him. But Rick held everyone at arm's length, unable to share his grief, and later, he came up with his damned idea to see Slade and Elizabeth wed. Slade instantly realized that he had been a fool to feel any compassion at all for his father.

Edward managed to hide his grief with great self-discipline. Still, his smiles and witticisms were gone. Slade knew that beneath his smooth surface he was as anguished as anyone; there were no secrets between the brothers. Even Victoria, Edward's mother, was somber. Slade was certain it was an act. And when she saw Slade she forgot her grief—if she really was grieving—and her eyes blazed with fury. She wasn't happy that he had come home. Then again, Slade hadn't expected her to be.

The funeral had finally been held four weeks ago, shortly after Slade's return. Until the funeral, the shock had been numbing. Until the funeral, James's death didn't seem real. Didn't seem possible. The eulogy was Slade's undoing; unlike most eulogies, which were bullshit, this one was not. Father Joseph was not exaggerating when he praised James for his extraordinary kindness and endless generosity, for his compassion and his morality. It was also true that James had been selflessly devoted to his family, to his father and brothers, to his stepmother, to Josephine, to Miramar. Such sincerity, devotion, and commitment were astounding in one so young. All life was God-given, but a young man like James was a very special and holy gift.

Father Joseph ran the mission at San Miguel and he had known James since he was born. He delivered the eulogy with teary eyes and a choked-up voice. He was only halfway through it when Slade lost all control. He wept. Restraint was impossible. Edward proved to be stronger and more disciplined, or perhaps he had already shed his tears, for he put his arm around Slade, offering him what support and sympathy he could.
Slade could not stop crying until the funeral was over and everyone had gone, the coffin buried deeply in Miramar's rich red earth.

The whiskey wasn't doing its job. Tonight the grief was as painful and raw as it had been that day at the funeral. Father Joseph had said it would lessen in time. Common sense said the priest was right, but at the moment common sense was no consolation. He had never missed James more. It was even more heartrending to face the fact that he was never going to see his brother again—to finally comprehend the utter finality of death.

Eventually the big bubble in his chest began to deflate. He had weathered this latest crisis. He looked around at the dark cantina with its less-than-respectable patrons, so caught up in his grief and memories that he was briefly surprised to find himself there. Edward was right in more ways than one. In San Francisco he wouldn't be caught dead in such a place, but when he came home he didn't think twice about joining this kind of crowd. Even at the age of twenty-five, he still came home determined to rebel. The thought, laced with whiskey, made him slightly uneasy.

He wondered what had happened over at the hotel. Did he really have a doubt? It was obvious that she was Elizabeth Sinclair, not some other woman. When her memory came back, would she grieve, too? Had she loved James? The marriage had been arranged and they had only met a few times because she'd been away at school in London, until last summer. Her father had died and she had come home for the funeral, staying the summer. James had courted her. He had gone to San Luis Obispo as often as possible to see her. Slade knew; James had written all about her. James had sure as hell loved her. Slade's gut grew tight when he imagined their courtship, which had ended in the fall when Elizabeth had returned to London for her last year of school.

He thought about what Rick expected of him and it was almost funny. He was the oldest now. Rick wanted
him to inherit Miramar. Rick expected him to inherit Miramar. It was tradition, real old-fashioned Californio tradition. But there was a catch. He had to marry the heiress, Elizabeth Sinclair, to do so. Because Miramar was cash-poor, real cash-poor, as it had always been, and she was bringing all the cash they'd ever need to the union.

He did not like recalling her wide, trusting, grateful eyes. Especially not now. He didn't want her looking at him like that, not ever. He wasn't going to marry her. Slade would never agree. He wasn't staying, he wasn't inheriting Miramar, and he wasn't marrying Elizabeth Sinclair. Rick, who had never asked him to stay the few times he'd come home to visit, would have to do a lot more than ask him to stay now. He'd have to beg. As if he would. And as if it would matter.

It wasn't that he didn't love Miramar. He did. He always had. He always would. But Miramar had belonged to James, just as Elizabeth Sinclair had belonged to James. And he loved James, his death didn't change that. He wasn't going to betray James, not even in death.

Tomorrow he would return to San Francisco, where he had worked for Charles Mann for almost ten years. San Francisco was his home now. Rick might not have James, but he had Miramar, and Edward could take over when Rick got too feeble—which wouldn't be for another twenty years, Slade imagined.

But the irony was that Slade knew he could turn Miramar around and pull it out of the hole it was in. They'd been cash-poor since he'd been born, because times were changing. Slade was no longer a green boy. He'd traveled enough, worked enough, and seen enough to know that it was time to get rid of the old in favor of the new. He saw it up north. The old ranchos were not making ends meet. Modern industry, technology, and agriculture had come to California with a vengeance. The great self-sufficient ranchos like Miramar were obsolete, empires which
belonged to the past, dinosaurs which could not survive in the future. They were no longer viable. The future belonged to other enterprises such as mining, lumber, farming. Already there were vast agricultural enterprises in California that were making big profits in oranges and lemons, wheat and barley. Miramar had an abundance of land, and plenty of it was fertile. The few orchards they had yielded the sweetest fruit in the county, the best wine. They had forests aplenty, too, and with careful management Slade knew that a portion of them could be harvested, cultivated, and regrown, not raped and destroyed. It was time to make changes, to take Miramar into the twentieth century, and it was the ultimate irony because Slade knew he could do it, but he wasn't going to.

Instead of turning Miramar around, tomorrow he was going to ride out of town right back to the big city where he now belonged.

 

When Slade returned to the hotel it was after dark. He was sober. He'd gone to the cafe, which had been closing up. Mrs. Burke had seen who it was at her door and had immediately invited him in and fixed him up. She had served him a thick rare steak, which he'd washed down with lots of strong coffee. He'd even managed to eat half of a piece of her apple pie. She seemed to take pleasure in hovering over him, although he couldn't understand why, because as a boy he'd pulled a few good pranks on her, too. She was his own age. He finally decided she was so friendly because she felt sorry for his loss.