Texas Tiger TH3 (43 page)

Mulloney's face turned a mottled purple as he obviously restrained himself by clenching his fingers around his desktop. "I paid good money to see you brought up to show some respect to authority. I have a good mind to demand my money back."

"If you can get blood out of a turnip, I suppose you can get money out of a dead woman. But I suspect Nanny taught me a great deal more about respect than you ever learned in a lifetime. I have a great deal of respect for people who scratch and save and try to make a living while a bloodsucker like you steals them blind. Forgive me if I don't recognize you as the kind of figure of authority I'm supposed to respect."

The man behind the desk grew dangerously quiet as he pushed his chair away. The city street below went unnoticed as he crossed his arms in a gesture unconsciously similar to his son's.

"You'll learn to respect me before I get finished with you. Even as we speak, I have lawyers preparing the papers to take over Hanover Industries and that hideous monstrosity of a house that your wife calls home. You'll both be on the streets before evening. You thought you were clever in stealing Georgina Hanover away from me, but you'll soon learn what it's like to keep a woman like that in the streets. She'll make your life hell until I take pity on her suffering and offer to pay for a divorce so she can mend her childish errors. You'll never get your hands on Hanover Industries while I'm alive."

Daniel sighed and shook his head. "You just don't get it, do you? I suppose I should have known, but it's difficult to believe one's own father isn't human. I don't suppose you want to tell me why you found me so repulsive that you banished me from your kingdom?"

Dark eyes gleamed from behind the grim mask of the older man's features. "Because as far as I'm concerned, you're no son of mine. You might bear my name, but not an ounce of my blood. Are you beginning to get the picture?"

Daniel shrugged nonchalantly, but the stiffness of his posture indicated some of his inner turmoil. "Since I don't know my mother, I can't very well defend her. I'll take your word for it." He swung his boots to the floor and stood up, prepared to depart.

"You don't leave here until I tell you to leave!" Artemis shouted, rising from behind the desk.

Daniel kept walking.

"I'll make a deal with you!" When Daniel still didn't halt, he added, "It concerns your wife, so you damned well better listen."

Daniel sent a questioning look over his shoulder.

"I want you out of this town. I don't want you bothering my wife. She's ill and I won't have it." Artemis clenched his fists against the desk. When Daniel still made no reply, he continued, "I'm prepared to put the mortgage to Hanover's house in your wife's name so she effectively will own the property. All you have to do is get out of town and not come back."

"And Hanover Industries?" Daniel asked carefully.

"That's mine. I'll do with it what I wish. If your wife's bleeding heart can't bear to see the place shut down, then she can damned well divorce you and marry my son the way it was intended. Then the decision will be up to Peter."

"I'm certain that makes perfect sense somewhere in your cold heart. I fail to admire the logic of it, but I'll give it some consideration. But if intuition serves me, you might not find Peter as cooperative as you seem to think. I'll get back to you."

With an assurance bordering on the insolent, Daniel walked out.

After he was gone, a tall man wearing oddly western clothes for a city of this sort stepped out from behind a concealed door in the wall. He scratched thoughtfully at his two-day old beard.

"You heard that?" Mulloney demanded.

The stranger nodded. He hadn't bothered removing his badly stained Stetson earlier. He took it off now and examined a bullet hole through it.

"Then you understand why I want him out of town. You said you were looking for him yourself. Here's your opportunity."

The man adjusted the hat over his eyes and hooked his thumbs in his belt. "He ain't 'zactly what I expected. These writer fellers are usually shrimps that squeak when you look at 'em. This one ain't like that a'tall."

Mulloney gave him a look of disgust. "I thought you were a gunfighter. You can't be afraid of a callow youth."

The man shrugged and rocked back on his heels. "Ain't afraid of no man, not even you. What I'm sayin' is that I like the man's guts. He stood up for himself. I was plannin' on scarin' a mouse. Now I ain't so sure if I shouldn't get to know him better."

Mulloney scowled. "Get out of here, Martin. You're a broken-down has-been. I don't know why I bothered with you in the first place."

" 'Cause I was lookin' to kill the boy and you thought I'd save you the trouble." Pleased with himself, the cowboy spun around on his tall heels and let himself out.

Chapter 34

Daniel sat on the front step of Georgina's enormous home and watched his wife playing with the two youngest Harrison children. Janice had found a boarding house to take them in and they would be leaving tomorrow, despite Georgina's vehement protests. This huge old house would seem empty without them.

As it would be empty and lifeless without Georgina. Daniel watched as she flung a ball to Betsy and laughed as the little girl caught it. Georgina was meant to be wealthy. She had a generous heart that would break if she couldn't help others. She was meant for having children, too, even though she wasn't entirely aware of it yet. Daniel watched indulgently as she dodged Douglas's throw and laughingly drew him into a race across the lawn. The boy hadn't looked so young since he'd known him.

He wasn't a poor man. He could buy Georgina a modest house and support children, but the cost would eat into his capital quickly. He would have to make money to keep her comfortably for the rest of their lives, but he couldn't do that here. Artemis would see to that. Daniel was realistic enough to know that he could cause his father untold grief, but he could never stop him entirely. On his own, he would have stayed to fight. A wife and children were another matter entirely. They would have to leave Cutlerville if he wanted to provide for a family.

But this was Georgie's home. Her life was here. Daniel knew the power of family, and he didn't want to deny her that, even if her father was cut of the same cloth as his father. He didn't want to destroy the sheltered world that had created a gem like his Miss Merry. He was accustomed to living without family, to traveling without a home, but Georgina wasn't. He couldn't do that to her.

If this had been a love match, had Georgina married him because she loved him in defiance of all else, Daniel might have considered other options. For the love of a woman like Georgina, he would have climbed mountains and swum seas, anything she might ask of him. And he would have expected her to do the same for him. As it was, he couldn't even ask her to leave home for him.

It was a dilemma he didn't like. He could stay and try to destroy his family for her sake. He could take her with him and force her to leave her family behind. Or he could give her her freedom and walk away.

Selfishly, he preferred the first two alternatives to the last. Georgina was the best thing that had ever happened to him, and he didn't want to give her up. Remembering how she had looked in the bathtub last night, her wide blue eyes stunned and delighted as he had taken her in the most erotic experience of his life, Daniel groaned and forced his thoughts to the practical. He couldn't be practical while dreaming of the full globes of her breasts glistening wetly in the lamplight. He would never think further than their bed at that rate.

They were good together in bed, there was no doubt of that. But how long would that last if he took Georgina away to a place totally alien to her? From his experience, women made love with their brains as much as their bodies. If they were unhappy, they weren't satisfied physically or emotionally. He would destroy what little they had together when he destroyed her happiness.

So he would have to do the unselfish thing and make Georgina happy. He was damned tired of playing the hero, but he couldn't do anything else. As much as he despised giving in to the man, he would have to take his father up on his offer, for Georgina's sake. All he had to do was scribble his name on the document in his coat pocket and disappear. It shouldn't take any effort at all.

But it did. As he left the porch to find a pen, Daniel heard his wife's laughter drifting from the front lawn. He had imagined living the rest of his life hearing that laughter. He had daydreamed of how she would look when she grew round with his child. He had wanted to take her south with him to meet his friends and the rest of his adopted family. He had invested a lifetime of wishing for love in his desire for Georgina Meredith Hanover. He would rather keep those dreams intact as dreams rather than see them destroyed by the reality of a loveless marriage.

Trailing slowly up the stairs, Daniel imagined he could still smell the fragrance of lilies of the valley wafting from the room they had shared last night. The bare room they had shared in the warehouse had been his. This frilly concoction in her father's house was hers. He wondered what kind of room they would have created together had they been allowed.

He wasn't destined to find out. Sitting at Georgina's desk, he penned his name to the agreement, went over the newly written mortgage to make certain of its legality, then placed the latter in Georgina's desk and the former in an envelope to be delivered to his father. With that done, he stared at the empty blotter and Georgina's stationery for a minute longer. Writing was his business. Surely he could come up with something that would make her understand.

As he wrote, Daniel tried to tell himself that he didn't have to do this tonight. He could stay and spend another night in Georgina's arms, memorizing all those things he would miss when he was gone. If he took enough memories with him, they might last a lifetime.

But he would feel like a traitor if he stayed, now that he had signed the papers. It was better to make the break swift and clean. Georgina was much stronger than anyone imagined. She would see to the workers at the factory and the department store. She would lead them to victory over his father's machinations. He could count on her to finish what he had started. There was no reason to linger over sentimental maundering.

Leaving the letter under her pillow, Daniel packed his few belongings and slipped down the back stairs and out through the kitchen.

At twilight Georgina sent the children off to bed and went in search of Daniel. She had been aware of him the whole time he had watched her from the porch. She had known when he had gone inside. She had hoped he would join them, but Daniel had never learned to play as a child and probably didn't know how. She would have to teach him someday.

She figured she would find him occupying the study, either writing or reading, but the light was cold as if he had never been there. In hopes that he had decided to bathe after his miserable day dismantling the press, she slipped into her bedroom and partially disrobed. Two could play at this game.

But he wasn't there. Sighing, she filled the tub and finished undressing. Maybe he would find her.

He didn't appear by the time she had finished. Wrapping herself in a cotton robe, Georgina found a book and settled in her bedroom chair to wait. Daniel was quite capable of anything. She couldn't possibly pin him down and didn't want to try. She loved him too much the way he was.

Something had been bothering him all evening, she knew. Perhaps it was those photographs mysteriously appearing in the kiosk. She hadn't been down to see them herself, but she'd heard about them from the Harrisons. Daniel hadn't mentioned them, but he hadn't asked questions either, so he knew about them. Maybe he had gone to find out who had put them there.

Secretly, she hoped it had been Peter. Peter had her camera, after all, and he had access to all those houses. Daniel needed to get to know his family, and Peter ought to be the easiest. She really thought they had been making overtures of a sort the other night, but nothing had come of them. Maybe she could devise some way of bringing the brothers together.

The day at the factory had left her bone weary, and her head began to nod over the book. Glancing up as the mantel clock struck eleven, Georgina frowned and set the book aside. Where could he have gone at this hour?

Putting on her slippers, she went downstairs to see if any of the servants knew anything, but they had long since retired, as had the Harrisons, she discovered, as she noted their darkened room. There was no one up and stirring but herself.