High Country Bride (27 page)

“You look very nice,” a voice said from behind her. She stiffened, because she knew that voice, and because it wasn’t Rafe’s.

She turned, very slowly, to face Holt. He was still using a crutch, of course, but with some help from Kade and Rafe, he’d gotten himself spruced up for the celebration, and he looked handsome in his suit, one pant leg altered to cover his splints without binding, a string tie at his throat.

“Thank you,” she said politly but without warmth.

“I hope you’ll save me a dance,” he replied. His face was in shadow, the study being lit by just one lamp, and she couldn’t make out his expression. He spoke quietly, and his tone revealed nothing.

She simply nodded, for there was no graceful way she could refuse, and it would not have been kind to point out that dancing would be awkward, if not impossible, for him.

He offered her his arm, and she took it, and so it was that Mrs. Rafe McKettrick was escorted to her husband, already at the bonfire, talking with neighboring ranchers, by the very man with whom she had compromised herself.

She was barely able to meet Rafe’s eyes when they reached him.

He grinned at her. “You are something to behold, Emmeline,” he said, taking her hand, nodding coolly to Holt, who stood a little distance away now, looking on in silence. She could feel him watching her and Rafe, and she wondered when, or if, he would betray her. To lose Rafe, and her place in this community, would be devastating, and to look at the other McKettricks, or Concepcion, and see censure in their eyes would be nearly as bad.

She curtseyed slightly.“Thank you, Rafe,” she said very softly.

The music had begun, and Rafe led his bride toward the dance floor, into the spill of colored light from the Chinese lanterns, and they swept around and around in each other’s arms, with the dance floor all to themselves. The guests clapped and cheered when the waltz ended, and Rafe gave his wife a brief, tender kiss.

She wanted to take his hand then, as he had taken hers, to lead him away, somewhere quiet, and tell him everything, reveal every secret, regardless of the consequences. He would probably scorn her, once he knew that she’d spent the night with a man, his own brother no less, in return for a stack of coins, but there was also a chance, remote though it was, that he might understand, and find it within himself to overlook her mistake. After all, for all their strife, they had found much happiness together, she and Rafe. They had plans, and a beautiful house nearly finished. When they made love, they knew a wild, strange, soaring joy, far too intense to be ordinary. Perhaps he would not be so quick to throw all of that away.

Alas, she could not bring herself to speak of the matter on that night of nights, with all the music, the laughter, and the dancing to serve as a backdrop for what she had to say. She decided to wait until they could be truly alone, which probably wouldn’t be for several days yet. In the meantime, she would enjoy the gathering to the utmost, knowing that it might well mark the high point of her life, with everything going downhill after that.

She danced. Oh, how she danced.

With Rafe first, of course, but then with Angus, and then Kade, and then, calling upon all her inner resources, with Holt, who moved with surprising grace, if not speed or agility, holding her loosely in one arm and keeping time with the music. She thought she saw bewilderment in his eyes, once or twice, but she dared not look too closely, nor would she risk asking.

For all intents and purposes, this man was her mortal enemy. If indeed he intended to blackmail her in some way, well, he’d soon find his plans thwarted. Neither he nor anyone else would ever be able to hold the past over her head again, once she’d told Rafe the whole truth.

After Holt, Emmelindanced with Rafe again, and that calmed her nerves. Her smile, shaky while she was in Holt’s arms, came naturally in Rafe’s.

He took her aside for a glass of sweet punch, and she enjoyed a few minutes of badly needed rest.

“Are you enjoying the party, Emmeline?” he asked, as they sat together on a bale of hay covered with a horse blanket. He sounded as though her answer truly mattered to him.

She was flushed, and little breathless, and the stars overhead were so bright, she was sure she could reach up and snatch one for a keepsake and tuck it into her evening bag.“Yes,” she said.“What about you?”

Out on the dance floor, the Milldown sisters, newcomers to the community, were dancing happily with one man after another. They might have been considered plain, wherever they came from, but in and around Indian Rock, Arizona Territory, they were sought-after beauties. Rafe watched them for a moment, a smile lifting one corner of his mouth, then turned to look at Emmeline.

“I reckon that right now, in this moment, I’m about as happy as a man has a right to be, this side of the great beyond,” he said, with sweet solemnity.

Emmeline’s heart did a little flip, and tears burned behind her eyes. “Oh, Rafe,” she said. She almost told him everything then, despite her earlier decision to wait, because she wanted to tear down the last barrier between them, for better or for worse, once and for all, so that she never had to be afraid again.

He straightened her lace shawl, draped loosely over her shoulders, and leaned over to kiss her just beneath one ear. She shivered, closed her eyes tightly, and he chuckled at her response.

“I do like it when you say ‘Oh, Rafe,’” he teased in a gruff whisper. “Do you suppose anyone would notice if we sneaked into the house, you and I? I’d like to take off your clothes, Mrs. McKettrick, one garment at a time, until all you’re wearing are those earbobs of yours. And I’d like to—”

She was falling under his spell, and that simply would not do. No lady left her own party to make love with a man, even if that man
was
her husband. “Rafe McKettrick,” she scolded, her cheeks hot, her backbone stiff, and all her senses rioting for more of the very thing she was refusing with such spirit.“Stop that, this instant!”

He laughed. “All right,” he said, “but when I get you alone—”

She scooted over a little way on the hay bale, in order to put some space between them, and when she saw Becky and the marshal coming toward her and Rafe, she was so relieved that she bolted right to her feet and almost stumbled over the hem of her dress, hurrying to meet them.

It wasn’t until she got closer that she noticed the strain in the marshal’s face, and the alarming pallor in Becky’s. She was leaning on John a little, a very un-Becky-like stance.

“Is Doc Boylen around anywhere?” the marshal asked, holding Becky with a firm gentleness. She looked as though she might swoon.

Rafe, bless his heart, was close behind Emmeline, and he immediately took charge.“You take Mrs. Fairmont on up to the spare room, John,” he said. “Emmeline, you go along, too, and see that she’s comfortable. I’ll find the doc.”

John lifted Becky easily into his , against her muttered protests, and the concerned crowd parted, whispering, as the three of them made their way into the house.

Angus claimed the last waltz of the evening with Concepcion, who, like the other women present, fat and skinny, plain and beautiful, wives and spinsters, had barely gotten a chance to take a breath, for dancing with cowboys and prospectors, farmers and ranchers. Only the little nun had sat idle, but he’d seen her toes tapping under the hem of the church getup she wore.

Concepcion was breathless, and flushed, and very beautiful. So beautiful that it fairly made Angus’s old heart turn right over in his chest. He tightened his embrace a little, missing more than one step as the dance progressed, and stared down at her as if he’d never seen her before.

She smiled up at him.“What is it, Angus?” she asked.

“Have you always been beautiful?” he countered, frowning.

She laughed. “You old fool,” she said, “you’ve had too much dancing and too much whiskey. I have
never
been beautiful.”

The words sounded garbled to Angus, as if he’d stuck his head in the horse trough and come up with water in his ears. Good Lord, how could he have failed to notice Concepcion’s grace and humor and, yes, her beauty? He was stupefied by the scope of his oversight.

Concepcion tilted her head to one side. Her lush dark hair, wound into an elegant chignon at her nape, glittered in the starlight and the flickering crimson glow of the bonfire. Her eyes caught the reflections of the colored Chinese lanterns and held them in their dark depths, like fragments of a gaudy rainbow.

“Angus?” she prompted, sounding a little worried now. “Are you all right?”

He felt like five kinds of an idiot. “Of course I’m all right,” he grumbled. Maybe it was the moonlight getting to him. Folks said it could drive a sane man mad, if the circumstances were right.

She lowered her eyes, then raised them again, meeting his gaze.“It is a fine party,” she said.“You can be proud of yourself, Angus, and of your sons, and your lovely daughter-in-law.”

“Of course I’m proud of them,” he said, barking out the words without meaning to, feeling like some young whippersnapper, still wet behind the ears, he was so nervous. “I don’t see much point in being proud of myself, though—all I did was pay for this shindig. It was you, you and Emmeline and that little Pelton gal, who did most of the real work.”

She looked pleased.“So you noticed,” she said.

“Yes,” he said, still dancing, and feeling as if he’d grown a third foot.

Concepcion arched one perfect eyebrow. “And did you notice my dress?” she asked, with a mischievous note in her voice.

She could have been wearing a burlap feed sack, for all Angus knew. When he looked at Concepcion, he realized that, whether on this magical evening or on an ordinary day, he didn’t see her clothes, or even her body, for that matter. He saw her fine, strong spirit, her endless competence, her generosity and readiness to laugh even when crying would have made more sense. He saw the woman who came to his bed some nights, and held him, asking nothing more than to be held

“Yes,” he lied.“Of course I noticed your dress.”

She placed her hand under his chin, quick as a jackrabbit, so he couldn’t look down.“What color is it, then?” she challenged.

He couldn’t even guess, and she laughed when she saw the dilemma reflected in his face. “Just as I thought,” she said, but she sounded triumphant, not angry.

He all but fell into her eyes, headfirst, rolling end over end like a cowboy flung from a bronco’s back. It seemed as if he’d never land. “I believe I love you,” he said, amazed by the revelation, since he hadn’t known it himself until a minute or so back.

She smiled up at him. “Has that just occurred to you, Angus McKettrick? I’ve known it for a long time.”

Angus managed to break his metaphorical fall, and glowered down at her, stopping in his tracks, right out there in the middle of the dance floor, with his friends, neighbors, and favorite enemies whirling all around them in a colorful blur.“You have?” he asked.

“Of course,” she said, sounding smug.

“Well, I guess we’d better get ourselves hitched, then.”

She smiled again.“In time,”she said.“There is no hurry.”

He frowned harder. He couldn’t follow her reasoning; he was seventy-five, and might turn up his toes any day now. If that wasn’t reason to make haste, he didn’t know what was. “Do you love me, Concepcion?” he heard himself ask, and his face flamed, because he hadn’t put a question like that to a woman since he’d proposed to Georgia, better than thirty years back.

“Yes,” she said.“I do.”

“Then why not tell the world?”

“This time belongs to the young people, Angus. To Rafe and Emmeline, to Holt and Kade and to Jeb, wherever he is.” She paused to cross herself at the mention of his youngest son, and he loved her even more for that.

“You and me, we can go to the mission and get married, if that’s what you truly want, but let’s keep it to ourselves for a while, if we do.”

“How can we do that?” Angus boomed, and was shushed for his trouble. “How can we do that?” he asked again, more quietly. “We’ve got a houseful, in case you haven’t noticed, and I’ll be damned if I’ll take myself a wife and then sleep apart from her.”

Concepcion’s eyes flashed, not with anger but with the quiet passion of a woman secure in her charms.“I did not suggest sleeping apart,” she said, softly but with no lack of meaning. “There are things happening around us, Angus, in
la familia
. Very important things, written in the stars long, long ago. We might upset the balance, and ruin everything, if we are not careful.”

Angus didn’t understand, and he didn’t pretend to, but he was willing to concede the point, whatever it was, because it seemed so important to Concepcion. “There must be a preacher somewhere in this bunch,” he said. Now that he saw a way out, he realized how tired he was of being alone. He’d been a widower for so long; now, as far as he was concerned, it was time to let this bronc out of the chute and watch it buck.

She raised her eyebrows. “s that your proposal, Mr. McKettrick? Because if it was, well, it’s God’s own wonder that you ever managed to land one wife, let alone two.”

He led her off the dance floor, through the crowd, into the moonlit darkness, well away from the bonfire and the other guests. Then, knowing he might not be able to get up again without help, Angus McKettrick got down on one knee and took both Concepcion’s hands in one of his.