Leslie LaFoy (46 page)

“And Havers?”

She hesitated before arching a brow and saying, “He's a bit difficult to tolerate. He thinks very highly of himself and the value of his service.”

“Did he ever get his list of demands written?”

“If he has, I haven't seen it.” The housekeeper looked between them and then moistened her lower lip before venturing, “Would you care for a household report, Miss Lindsay? Or would you prefer to wait until later?”

“Is there anything of special importance?” Lindsay asked, hoping there were no decisions to be made.

“I've enlisted the assistance of Lucy Rutherford with the household duties. The dust in the dining-room curtains—the ones Mr. Stennet pulled down for you—was such an embarrassment and I thought that you wouldn't mind employing her for a short while to help me with some very necessary deep-cleaning chores. She's quite competent and very willing to work.”

If that was the only matter needing her attention, Lindsay would count herself fortunate and grateful. “It's a good idea, Abigail. Perhaps you'd like to have her assistance permanently. I'm sure Lucy would appreciate the wages.”

Abigail beamed. “I knew you'd suggest it and Lucy's agreeable. Now, I'm truly off to see to your dinner. Might I suggest that you take a good long nap while it's being prepared? You look exhausted.”

“I am,” Lindsay admitted.

“And I'll see that she does,” Jack declared, gently sweeping her up into his arms. Lindsay twined her arms around his neck and laid her cheek on his shoulder. She was home now, she thought as he started up the stairs with her. Finally. Her eyes drifted closed and she surrendered to the warmth and comfort of the welcome.

J
ACKSON LAID HER IN HER BED
,carefully tucking a feather comforter around her, and then stood there, watching her sleep and marveling at the woman she was. Exhausted from traveling, she'd come home to bad news. Most women would have taken to their beds for a week to recuperate. But not Lindsay. Instead, she'd immediately stepped up to the matter of Abigail's involvement in the shell game. Thank God the woman's explanation had been both reasonable and clearing. If it had been an admission of betrayal, Lindsay would have collapsed on the spot. She was strong, but Jack wasn't sure how much more she could take.

Unfortunately, she wasn't going to have much of a respite. Tomorrow morning they were going to have to confront Otis Vanderhagen. If the attorney wanted to discuss what Patterson had left her in the will, then fine. But one way or the other, Vanderhagen was going to answer some
tough questions about the sham businesses and the stripping of the MacPhaull Company assets.

Jack sighed and raked his fingers through his hair. Lindsay's illusions had taken a hard blow on the steps of the O'Brien boardinghouse. But it was going to be nothing compared to the bludgeoning she was going to get in Otis Vanderhagen's office tomorrow. God, if there was any way he could spare her the pain, he would. All he could do, though, was hold her up as best he could and promise her that she wasn't going to be penniless when he left.
When he left …

Time was running down on him, he realized with a start. The auction was two days out, and when it was done, he'd have to head back to Texas so he could meet the deadlines for repaying Billy's loans on the ranch. And he wasn't ready to leave Lindsay. Just thinking about it made his chest ache and his throat tight. She needed a shoulder to lean on, someone who could see her through the rebuilding of her fortunes. It should be him, dammit. No one else in her world cared enough to ease her worries or make her smile.

But since he couldn't stay, maybe the thing to do was what Billy should have done all those years ago. Maybe Lindsay should pack her bags and come to Texas. He could get her there, he could help her adjust to the changes in her circumstances. And then there was the very real chance that she'd find herself a husband and be happy.

He needed to talk to her about it all. And before they headed off to Otis Vanderhagen's in the morning. Lindsay needed to know before she went into that beating that he was committed to doing whatever it took to see that she survived it. Tonight, he decided. He'd broach the subject at dinner after she'd rested some. And he'd lay it out carefully so that she wouldn't be able to turn down his offer. He wouldn't have to leave her behind went he went home. He'd take her with him and everything would be all right.

With a confident smile, he leaned down and brushed a kiss across her lips. Lindsay smiled sweetly in her sleep, and he left the room certain that he was on the correct course.

L
INDSAY SLID A GLANCE
across the table, wondering why Jack seemed so tense and preoccupied this evening. Had something of concern arrived in the mail while they were gone? She was about to ask him when he cleared his throat and said softly, “I'm sorry you weren't here for Richard's funeral.”

It wasn't what he wanted to say; she could sense it still coiling upon itself under the surface of things. But knowing Jack, she suspected that he was working his way toward it. All she had to do was be patient. “I'm sure Richard understood why I wasn't there.”

“Do you think that the dead are aware of what they leave behind?” he mused, studying his plate. “What the living are doing?”

“I don't know. Sometimes, as with Richard, I like to think that they do because it gives me solace.” She smiled ruefully as she added, “And sometimes, as with my mother, the greatest comfort comes from hoping that they don't. Why are you asking?”

He looked up and gave her a mischievous smile. “I was thinking about Billy and wondering whether he'd twist himself into a knot if I asked you to sleep with me in his bed.”

“Well, I suppose he couldn't be too upset if all we did was sleep.”

He laughed and shook his head. “I've spent five long days having my bones beaten to dust on the worst roads mankind has ever seen fit to lay down. And I've spent four even longer nights in roadhouses, sleeping in rooms full of snoring, drooling men, knowing you were on the other side of the wall and that I couldn't get to you. It isn't just sleeping with you that I have in mind.”

“Do you ever wonder if my father wanted—” Lindsay bit off the rest of the words, knowing the notion to be on the far side of foolish. When Jack cocked a brow in silent question, she laughingly replied, “Nevermind. It was a silly idea.”

“Do I ever wonder if he gave everything to me because he thought maybe there was a chance you and I might find something in each other?”

How had he known what she'd been thinking? It was both a little disconcerting and oddly, deeply comforting. “That's what I was thinking,” she admitted. “But for circumstances to allow us to be together, even briefly, is really quite unusual. Most women my age are married and have families. I don't see how my father could have known that I'm not. And he had to have expected Henry to be involved in the business, not me.”

Jack nodded, but the light in his eyes darkened and she knew that his thoughts had gone in another direction. “I met Billy when I was ten years old,” he said softly, meeting her gaze. “It was when we all went into Texas together with Stephen Austin. I've spent practically all my life thinking that he was the smartest, kindest, most honorable man I'd ever know. But I've discovered that he wasn't what I thought, Lindsay. If he had been all those things, he would have taken you with him when he left. He wouldn't have left you here to grow up alone.”

She knew how much it hurt to realize that the reality of people wasn't as bright and shiny as your illusions of them. Jack hadn't gloated over the tarnishing of hers; she couldn't do any less than comfort him in the loss of his own. “You've told me yourself that Texas is a dangerous place. Maybe my father thought that he was doing the best he could for me in leaving me behind.”

“He could have come back to see you. He could have written you a letter or two over the years. He could have asked you to come visit him.”

“But if he had done those things,” she pointed out, “then he would have had to deal with my mother again. Their relationship was horrible, Jack. I remember lying awake in my bed at night and thinking that I wouldn't be at all surprised to wake up in the morning to find that one of them had killed the other.” She gave Jack what she hoped passed for a brave and accepting smile. “It was undoubtedly a very intelligent decision on his part to stay away. He built a new life for himself and, from what you've said, it seems that he was happy with it. That's something that can't be said about his life here.”

“You're a lot like him, you know,” he said softly.

“Same eyes, same intelligence, same taste for risk and high-stakes games.”

Lindsay chuckled. “You've forgotten to mention the other character traits we had in common; the penchant for ignoring the opinions of others, the lack of concern for social convention, and the determination to do things our own way. I've heard all about them.” She took a sip of wine before adding, “Those are just the most obvious, of course. There are many, many other faults only slightly less grievous.”

“You're different from him, too.” Jack grinned and cocked a brow. “Billy was a good shot.”

Lindsay laughed outright and then protested, “I'm getting better.”

“Oh, yeah,” he agreed, chuckling. “If whoever comes at you is as big as a barn, you'll do just fine. I need to get you a shotgun.”

“I think we'd both be safer if I just stayed very close to you and let you shoot the gun.”

He sobered instantly, causing Lindsay's stomach to clench. “Speaking of staying close to me …” he said.

They were at whatever it was that was bothering him; she knew it. And it was something he clearly didn't want to talk about, but felt compelled to. Deciding it was best to get it out in the open and over with, she prompted, “What, Jack?”

He took a sip of his wine and exhaled long and hard before saying, “I have an idea and I want you to hear it all the way out and give it some serious thought before you make any decisions about it. All right?”

“All right,” she agreed warily, noting that his gaze was fastened on the tablecloth.
Not a good sign, Linds.

“I was thinking while we were in Boston. …”

A long silence stretched between them, and her heart began to race. “Yes, Jack?”

“Well…”

She couldn't take much more of his hesitation. “Jack,” she ventured, mustering all the patience she had left, “will you please just say whatever it is that you want to say? It doesn't have to be perfectly presented.”

He nodded once, crisply, and then all but blurted, “I
was thinking that maybe you should come to Texas with me.”

Lindsay vaguely heard herself gasp. Go to Texas with Jack? He was asking her to go with him? Her heart swelled, her pulse skittered, and if she'd been less stunned, she'd have vaulted from her chair and thrown herself into his arms.

“Now, don't say it's impossible, Lindsay,” he said hurriedly, his gaze finally coming up to meet hers. “Hear me out. There isn't going to be much property left once the auction's done. What's left when split three ways—which is only fair since there are three of you—means you're going to be strapped until you can make some decent investments and rebuild. I don't care what happens to Henry and Agatha. But I do care about what happens to you. You've earned a better life than the one you've been dealt.

“I wouldn't be able to save the ranch like Billy wanted me to if you hadn't been willing to meet me halfway. It seems only right to me that you should get something out of it. So I'm thinking that you could come to Texas with me. You could live in Billy's house and I'd see to it that you had whatever money you needed to live on. It would come out of the ranch accounts. There's plenty of money for us to do this.”

She
could live in Billy's house? Lindsay's throat tightened with a sickening realization. Jack wasn't asking her to go to Texas to be with him, to live with him. He was suggesting only that they travel together. God, what a fool she'd almost made of herself. He was looking at her so expectantly, so hopefully, and she knew she had to say something. She summoned a smile and quipped, “Going to Texas isn't at all necessary, Jack. If you're worried about me having enough money, you could just arrange to send me some every week when Tiny is sent his.”

“But that wouldn't solve the other problems,” he instantly, earnestly rejoined. “You'd still be here, having to face Henry's and Agatha's expectations day in and day out. And you'd be all alone, too. I know you, Lindsay. You'll bury yourself in rebuilding not only your own fortunes but Henry's and Agatha's, too. If you came to Texas with me,
you'd be far enough away that they couldn't ask you to take care of them anymore.”

And what would she have in exchange? A life alone in the house of the father she had never known. And Jack thought that was an improvement? “Henry and Agatha are my brother and sister,” she countered, wishing she could offer a better reason, but not being able to think past how stupidly giddy she'd been at thinking Jack was proposing a long-term relationship. She should have known better than to assume he'd ever suggest such a thing.

“And they're full-grown adults and it's time they took care of themselves.”

She shrugged and snatched up her wineglass, desperate to not only distract herself, but to conceal the acute embarrassment she felt. Lord, her cheeks had to be bright red. She could feel the heat fanning over them.

“There's more, Lindsay,” Jack went on, apparently— and thankfully—unaware of her discomposure. “See, I figure that the minute you cross over the border, the word's going to go out that there's a beautiful and intelligent woman available and—”

“Available?” she echoed, stunned anew.

He nodded, his smile bright. “Every eligible bachelor in the Republic of Texas will make a beeline for Billy's front door. I'll sort 'em out for you, but you'll have the final say on which one of 'em you want to marry.”

“Marry?” she squeaked out. He was planning to marry her off? He was asking her to go to Texas so he could marry her to someone else?

“Well, yes,” he admitted, blinking and looking as though he'd finally noticed that she was slightly less than ecstatic over the idea. “You've told me, I don't know how many times, that getting married and having a family of your own isn't something that's in the cards for you. But I know it's something that you'd really like and you're just saying all that to buck yourself up. Sweetheart, pasts don't matter in Texas. You could have any man you want. You can get married and have your family. You could be happy. That isn't going to happen if you stay here.”