Tomorrow's Dreams (5 page)

Until now
. Seth's belly tightened with anticipation as he watched her march down the walkway of the Vanderlyn Brewery and approach the waiting buggy. Perhaps she was going to be a worthy adversary after all. He hoped so. It would make his vengeance all the more sweet if she had a spirit worth crushing.

Without letting his gaze waver from the object of his speculation, he reached into his waistcoat pocket and pulled out his cigar case. Two years ago he'd been shown a portrait of Louisa, the only daughter of the all-powerful Willem Van Cortlandt, one painted in honor of her sixteenth birthday. She'd been breathtaking in her youth. Perfection itself.

She had also been cold-blooded enough to order her newborn bastard son murdered.

Tightening his lips into a bitter line, Seth snapped open the case and removed a thin cigar. What would he see if he were to move across the street and pull her face into the light of the buggy lamp? Had years of wickedness and corruption left their mark on her once angelic countenance? Had time stripped away her beguiling mask of innocence to reveal a visage as ugly as her sin-rotted soul? If fate were indeed just, she would be an abomination to the eye.

But as Seth knew all too well, there was no fairness in fate … or in life itself. And somehow he knew, though distance and the shadows of the approaching night obscured her features, that Louisa was still beautiful.

Muttering an oath beneath his breath, Seth savagely bit the end off the cigar and spit it into the dust at his feet. Just the sight of her dredged up all the hurt he'd suffered as an unwanted child, all the futile longings of his lonely youth, making him ache to shed the tears he'd repressed for so many years.

God! How he hated these conflicting emotions; how he hated her. Stifling a sob, Seth forced his mind from his pain to focus on searching his pockets for his matches. Like taunting children long ignored, his feelings ceased their torment and drifted away. And by the time he pulled out his match safe, only the trembling of his hands betrayed his surge of emotion at finally seeing the woman whose love he had once so desperately craved.

Clenching the cigar tensely between his teeth, he struck a match against the brick wall behind him. Immediately a tiny flame danced in the shadows. Willing his trembling hands to be still, he lit the cigar. Feeling more in control now, he leaned against the darkened shop window and resumed his scrutiny of Louisa.

She stood at the edge of the boardwalk, murmuring to the man holding the reins of her buggy horse. Beneath her Tyrolean-shaped hat, Seth could see a thick braid of fair hair coiled at her neck; hair that appeared to be a hue very like his own leonine mane. Briefly he wondered if that hair was still a dark honey blond streaked with ribbons of pale gold, like his own, or if it was now liberally sprinkled with gray.

As if sensing his stare, Louisa abruptly ceased her conversation and looked straight at him.

With a nonchalance he didn't feel, Seth took a deep draw from the cigar. Promptly he succumbed to a fit of choking. Try though he might, he had never really developed a taste for tobacco. In truth, the stuff made him violently ill—if he actually tried to smoke it, which he usually didn't. Yet, of late, he'd begun to indulge in the charade of smoking simply because he found the motions of the act oddly comforting. Especially in situations like this when he desperately needed something to distract him from his suffocating anger.

From atop the Vanderlyn Brewery building the clock chimed seven. Seth dropped the cigar to the boardwalk and ground it out beneath his boot. Louisa, who was now being helped into her buggy, seemed to have lost all interest in the stranger across the street.

“Beware, Louisa
Van Cortlandt
,” Seth hissed beneath his breath. “I won't be a stranger for long.”

The time had come to implement the final phase of his plan; the one that would sound the death knell on Vanderlyn Brewery and destroy everything Louisa held dear. And as her life fell into ruins, while she was mired in her own hopeless despair, she would be forced to face the avenging spawn of her own evil: Seth Tyler—her long-dead son.

“Here you are, gentlemen, the ace of hearts! Ace of hearts is the winning card! Here you see it—” With an extravagant flourish, the dealer turned up a card that was indeed the ace of hearts and flashed it before the passersby.

“Keep your eyes on the ace while I shuffle; watch it closely now.” After giving the cards one final shuffle, he laid them facedown on the table, then searched the crowd for an easy mark. He let his gaze skim past a small cluster of drunken bummers and two saloon girls before homing in on a stranger lounging against the wall a few feet away. Everything about him, from his diamond shirt studs to his heavy gold watch fob, reeked of Eastern money.

“Make a bet, sir?” The dealer smiled in his most ingratiating manner, beckoning like a wolf intent on luring a lamb away from its flock. Indeed, these Easterners who came west in search of adventure were like lambs—lambs for the fleecing.

The stranger pushed away from the wall and sauntered over. “Fifty dollars.” He tossed several gold coins onto the table.

“Pick your card, then!” the dealer urged.

Instead of pondering the cards, the stranger narrowed his eyes and studied the dealer. After a long moment, one corner of his mouth curved up.

Something about that smile made the dealer long to squirm like a schoolboy caught dipping a little girl's braids into the ink pot. Up close, the tall stranger looked less like a swell-headed Easterner and more like a marauding pirate—an effect that was heightened by his flowing mane of leonine hair and the wicked slant of his brows.

Uncomfortably aware that it was too late in the game to turn back now, he inquired hoarsely, “Your selection?”

Never once letting his gaze waver from the dealer's face, the stranger raised one hand and laid it over the middle card.

The dealer almost sagged with relief. The man hadn't detected his cheating after all. “Fifty dollars on the pasteboard in the center,” he announced, preparing to flip the card over.

With the speed of a striking rattler, the stranger grabbed his arm and pinned it to the table. “Fifty dollars … on the pasteboard up your sleeve,” he rasped, extracting a card from the dealer's false cuff and tossing it faceup on the table.

“What's goin' on here?” Floyd Temple, the bull-like owner of the Shakespeare Saloon elbowed his way through the gathering crowd. His jaw dropped at the sight of the stranger. “Mr. Tyler!”

“And a good evening to you, too, Floyd,” Seth drawled, tossing the saloon owner a lazy grin.

“This fella ain't givin' you trouble is he?”

“No trouble.” Seth glanced at the dealer. “I was just having a rather interesting conversation with Mr.—?”

The man sputtered.

“Mr—?” prompted Seth, this time more forcefully.

“Higginbottom, sir. Horace P. Higginbottom.”

“Horace P. Higginbottom. I'll make a note of that.” Seth gave the man a look that told him exactly what kind of note he was making.

Floyd stared at the dealer's flushed face for a second, then at Mr. Tyler's amused one. The whole situation smelled worse than a polecat in hundred-degree weather. He groaned inwardly. Something was going on here, and he had a hunch he wasn't going to be happy when he found out what it was. Especially if it ruined his chances to sell the Shakespeare to Mr. Tyler.

“Mr. Tyler—” he began.

“Seth.”

“Seth. If there's some sorta problem—”

“No problem.” Seth winked at the dealer, whose color deepened to an alarming shade of purple. “Horace, here, was just telling me how he had an itch to move to Cheyenne. Said something about leaving tonight. Right?”

Horace bobbed his head frantically.

Sensing that this was one of those situations best left alone, Floyd pasted on his most jovial smile and changed the subject. “Ever heard of Mademoiselle Lorelei Leroux?”

Seth let his gaze waver from the dealer to the beefy saloon owner. “Can't say as I have.”

“Then, you're in for a real treat. Got the voice of an angel, the face of a goddess, and her figger,” he let out a long whistle and sketched an exaggerated set of female curves in the air.

Raising one eyebrow in wonder, Seth copied the man's sketch in the air. “You don't say?”

Floyd winked in confirmation. Looping one arm around Seth's shoulders, he said, “Got a front-row seat set aside for you in the variety hall. Just wait till you get a peek at Lorelei's ankles, trim as an Arab filly's. A real Thoroughbred, that one.”

Seth grinned. “Did you check her teeth and withers as well?”

Floyd let out a raucous whoop. “Not me. The missus would whup me good if I so much as sniffed in that direction. Tell you what, though. I'll set up a private supper after the show, and you can check her points yourself.”

Seth's grin turned wicked at that. A little female companionship might be just the thing to get his mind off Louisa.

His smile faded as he shifted his gaze to the dealer, who was secreting gold from the game table. “Those are my winnings,” he pointed out, motioning to the coins in the man's hand.

Horace's eyes bulged in terror. “Just c-collecting 'em for you, Mr. Tyler.”

“Seth,” Seth amended, taking the gold from the man's outstretched hands. He paused to contemplate the money for a moment, then tossed several coins onto the table. “For your trip to Cheyenne.” Without sparing the dealer so much as a parting glance, he turned and rejoined the saloon owner.

Floyd, deliberately blind to the interplay between Horace and Seth, guided Seth toward the variety hall, pointing out the wonders of the Shakespeare Saloon with the smoothness of a patent medicine salesman as they went.

“As classy as any establishment in St. Louie” was how Floyd described the Shakespeare. Though Seth knew St. Louis well enough to disagree, he had to admit that by Denver's standards, the Shakespeare was very grand indeed.

Gaudy red and yellow paper covered the walls, their vivid tones rivaled only by the well-worn rugs placed at intervals on the hardwood floors. Over the men's heads hung three gilded wagon wheels that had been fitted with kerosene lamps to fashion makeshift chandeliers. There was a large potbellied stove in every corner, and along the frosted glass front window was a row of tall potted plants. Scattered throughout the room were tables offering chances to win on games ranging from faro to roulette.

Seth's stomach gave a painful lurch as he passed the gaily painted wheel of fortune. When he was seventeen, he'd lost his last coin to the game, a bit of stupidity that had resulted in him going hungry and sleeping in the bitterly cold streets.

“Betcha never seen a finer bar than this,” Floyd boasted, giving the well-polished surface a proud pat. “Thirty-two feet of gen-u-ine mahogany. Came all the way from Chicago.”

Swallowing hard, Seth forced his gaze away from the wheel of fortune to glance toward the bar. His gentlemanly reflection in the plate-glass mirror along the wall served as a powerful reminder he hadn't gone hungry or slept in the streets for over a decade now. Slowly the ache in his belly receded.

“And this here is Monty Dowd,” introduced Floyd. “The finest mixologist west of the Mississippi. Monty, meet Mr. Tyler.”

Monty, a lanky, sandy-haired man with a properly waxed mustache and a friendly smile, extended his hand. “Pleasure.”

Seth took the proffered hand and returned the man's smile as Monty proceeded to pump his arm with enthusiastic vigor.

“Well, then,” Monty said. “Now that we're on handshakin' terms, why don't you nominate your poison?”

“What would you suggest?”

“You look like a man with a healthy constitution. I'm guessin' some Red Dynamite would put a spin in your sombrero.”

“No way, no how,” Floyd bellowed, grabbing Seth's arm and pulling him from the bar. “Save your pizen for the bummers. Only the finest of the Shakespeare's libations for Mr. Tyler.”

As Floyd guided Seth through the door leading into the variety hall, Seth tossed the bartender a look promising that he would be back later to sample the infamous Red Dynamite.

“Make way! Make way!” bawled Floyd, shoving his way through the crush. The variety hall was packed tonight. “You sit here, Seth,” he said, snatching up and tossing aside a cowboy who had dared to sit at the front-center table. After plopping down in the opposite chair, he pulled out two fat cigars and handed one to his prospective buyer. “Finest bit of tobaccy in the world. Rolled between the bare, supple thighs of a Cuban virgin.”

Carefully hiding his distaste, Seth pulled out his silver cigar cutter and expertly notched the end. That formality completed, he jammed the nasty thing between his lips and leaned back in his chair, hoping that no one would notice that he hadn't lit it. Nothing choked him quicker than the initial puff it took to make the tobacco catch the flame.

But someone had noticed. No sooner was he settled than he heard a faint hiss and caught a whiff of sulfur mixed with cheap perfume. “Light your cigar, mister?” A moon-faced saloon girl with hair an improbable shade of blond leaned over his shoulder, holding out a lit match.

Stifling his urge to groan aloud, Seth gave the girl his most charming grin and, against his better judgment, accepted the light. Manfully he inhaled, praying that he wouldn't disgrace himself by collapsing in a hacking heap on the floor. Luck was with him and, aside from succumbing to one discreet cough, he managed to have the cigar lit with minimal embarrassment.

Tucking a coin in the girl's hand, Seth drawled. “What's your name, sweetheart?”

She rubbed her breasts against his shoulder. “Desdemona.”

“Desdemona?” He tossed Floyd a wry look.

Floyd shrugged. “All the girls are named after Shakespeare's ladies.” Counting them off on his fingers, he recited, “We got Juliet, Ophelia, Miranda, Titania, Portia, Jessica, Katharina, Cleopatra, Beatrice, Cordelia, Helena, and Hermia.” He looked puzzled and appeared to recount, his lips moving as he went over the names again. With a heavy sigh he added, “Oh, and Gladys.”