David dug a deeper hole in the dirt, wishing he were better with words. “No offense intended, ma’am, but I’ve searched high and low for another man named David Paxton in or around Denver. I’ve visited the saloons, the post offices, the assayers, and all the stores, searching the books for a transaction under his name. I’ve also interviewed countless people, hoping to find just one person who might remember him. Plain and simple, another David Paxton in that area simply doesn’t exist.”
She looked as if she might faint. Her mouth compressed into a thin line. She weaved on her feet. David gripped her shoulder to steady her. She jerked and cringed from his touch.
“That isn’t possible,” she told him. “I’m married to the man. I had a child with him. No more than a month ago, I received a letter from him, postmarked in Denver! He’s there, mining for gold, I’m telling you. Just because you didn’t locate him doesn’t mean he doesn’t exist. Why would I lie about such a thing?”
David had no idea why she might lie; he knew for a fact only that she had. About a month ago, he’d spoken to the Denver postmaster at length. The man had a mind like a steel trap, took a personal interest in all his customers, and never forgot a name. If another David Paxton had posted a letter at his window at any time over the last few years, the postmaster would remember him.
As if Brianna sensed that he didn’t believe her, she rocked forward onto her toes and extended her neck. “He mines in Denver, I tell you. In the gold fields! All of his letters have been postmarked there!”
David didn’t want this discussion to get ugly, but Daphne’s sweet face kept swimming in his mind. Her resemblance to his mother was uncanny, and that birthmark on her neck was undeniable proof that his blood flowed in her veins.
Trying to choose his words carefully, he replied, “The placer mining in the Denver gold fields petered out years
ago. Only a fool would sift through that dirt now, trying to find enough color to amount to anything.”
“Are you calling my husband a fool, sir?”
Well, no, he wasn’t, at least not exactly. David was saying, as politely as he could, that her alleged husband didn’t exist. He looked deep into the alleyway, searching the shadows, wishing he could find answers there. “I’m saying no other David Paxton resides in the Denver area.”
“Then maybe he mines somewhere else! Maybe he moved on!” she cried. “Maybe he only goes into Denver for the amenities, a hot bath, a good meal, and a night at a hotel. He enjoys a game of cards now and again, and also an occasional drink. A man can’t live his entire life working without taking a break now and then.”
It appeared to David that she was doing pretty much that, toiling long hours with precious little rest. “The mining towns in the mountains west of Denver are well established with their own hotels, saloons, bathhouses, and postal services,” he informed her. “Why would a man travel clear to Denver when all the things you just mentioned are readily available in the town where he works? I’ll also add that I checked out those distant mining communities. Leadville, Central City. I even went as far as Summitville. There’s no record of another David Paxton ever having been in any of those places. Quite simply, the man doesn’t exist. Do you think I’d be here otherwise? That I’ve got a strange hankering to take on a ready-made family? I have a nice life in No Name—a job as the town marshal and a prosperous cattle ranch.”
“Then go back to them!” she cried. “I didn’t invite you here.”
“Yes,” he corrected, “you did. In dozens of letters written over the last six years, you not only invited me here, but you begged me to come.”
She sank against the clapboard wall behind her. “Please, just go. Don’t do this.”
“I don’t have any choice,” he replied.
“Why?”
she demanded, her voice rising to a shrill pitch. “Are you out of your mind? I guess I know who the father of my child is, sir, and you are not he!”
“Then why did you send me those letters?”
“I didn’t!” She practically screamed the words, then pulled in a gasping breath in an obvious fight for self-control.
David was fast moving beyond diplomacy. “I’ve seen Daphne. That child is the spitting image of my mother. She even has the Paxton birthmark on her neck. Don’t stand there and deny she’s mine. I know better.”
She laughed—a brittle, frantic little bleep of sound followed by a gulp that bobbed her pebble-size larynx. “You’re delusional. That spot on my daughter’s neck is
not
a birthmark.” She paused and her gaze shifted nervously. “Hot grease splattered from a skillet while I was cooking when she was just a baby. The burn left a scar.”
David had interrogated too many people to be easily deceived. The hand she used to grasp her shawl had gone white at the knuckles. Instead of looking him directly in the eye, she kept her gaze fixed on the building behind him. He didn’t believe a word she was saying. Maybe he’d guessed right about there being a new man in her life and marital plans in the making. The unexpected appearance of her child’s father would sure as hell be a fly in her ointment.
“Bullshit,” he shot back.
She jerked at the word, which told him she was unaccustomed to rough language. Well, he was no longer in any frame of mind to mince words.
“I know a Paxton when I see one,” he added. “She’s my kid, God damn it! And now you expect me to just walk away? Think again. You look like you haven’t had a decent meal in weeks. Your clothing is threadbare. My daughter would be wearing rags if I hadn’t sent money. Yet you stand there denying me the right to care for her—and for you?”
“I’ve done the best I can by her! You have no right to criticize me or how I’ve provided for my child. You’re stepping beyond your bounds.”
“I meant no criticism. Under the circumstances, I think you’ve done a swell job. But with my help you can do better.”
“I don’t
want
your help.”
“Not even if it makes things better for Daphne?” he
thrust at her, and saw her flinch. He pressed his advantage. He had a feeling he wouldn’t get many of them. “Whether you want my help or not, Paxton men don’t sire children and then walk away. We’re honor bound to do right by the child
and
the mother. Get that straight in your head. Now that I’m here, I’ll by God not leave without my daughter.”
She looked at him as if he were a five-headed coiled rattler. “Are you
threatening
me?”
“Read into it what you like. I didn’t stutter my words.”
Even in the dim light, tears sparkled like diamonds in her eyes. “You have to listen to me,” she said jaggedly. “You’re wrong, I’m telling you. My husband, David, was once a rancher here in Colorado.”
“Where at in Colorado?” he broke in.
She fixed him with a blank look. “It’s—um—a tiny place. I’m sure you’ve never heard of it.”
“Try me.”
She flicked the tip of her tongue over her full lower lip. “Taffeta Falls,” she blurted.
David almost chuckled.
Taffeta Falls?
She was a dressmaker, so he supposed it followed that she’d draw from her ready store of knowledge when she lied. “You’re right. I’ve never heard of it.” Undoubtedly because such a place didn’t exist. He gestured with his hand. “Please, do go on.”
She drew up her shoulders, breathed deeply through her nose, and visibly collected her composure. “Where was I?”
“Your husband was once a rancher here in Colorado near a tiny town called Taffeta Falls.”
“Oh, yes, of course.” She drew in another breath before continuing. “I met David in Boston when he journeyed there to visit his relatives. After we married, I returned to Colorado with him. Shortly thereafter, he heard of the gold being found in Denver, and he set out to find his fortune. Not long after he left, I realized I was with child, and I was soon unable to do the work required to keep the ranch. The bank foreclosed. David didn’t respond to my letters or return to collect me. At that point, I was homeless, so I went back to Boston, prevailing upon David’s family to help me.”
“You don’t have any relatives of your own?” David interjected.
“No, I was left on the doorstep of an orphanage when I was an infant.”
David filed away that bit of information for later.
“After Daphne was born, I found that I missed the wide-open spaces of Colorado and responded to an advertisement in the Boston paper, applying for a job as a housekeeper and tutor in a widower’s home outside of Glory Ridge. I worked for him until three months ago, when he took a second wife.”
David almost rolled his eyes. She had her story down pat; he’d give her that. It was like listening to a kid’s recitation of the Gettysburg Address, a fine bit of memory work, but delivered too perfectly and without a hitch of emotion.
“Why, after you realized you had a bun in your oven, didn’t you stay in Denver until you were able to locate me?” he shot back.
“Locate
you
? Did you hear
nothing
I just said?”
“I heard you, but I have to go with the evidence of my own eyes. That little girl is a Paxton.”
“She is not a Paxton!” she flung at him. “I mean, she is—but she’s not yours! Look at me,” she cried. “Really,
really
look at me. Have you
any
recollection of ever having met me before?”
David had already considered how insulted she might be if he confessed the truth, so he decided to say something flattering rather than answer her question. “How could any man with blood in his veins forget a beautiful woman like you?”
She gaped at him. He felt like a cockroach that had just appeared on her supper plate. “You, sir, are completely out of your mind. We’ve never met. You are
not
my child’s father. Perhaps, in your countless conquests, you have lost the ability to remember each and every woman with whom you’ve consorted, but I have perfect recall of the
one
man I’ve been with, Daphne’s father. I’ll add that it is patently obvious, at least to me, that I would never keep company with a man of your stratum.”
His
stratum
? David’s folks had it in them to spew some fancy words, but he’d never heard that one. All the same, he knew an insult when he heard one. Okay, this was going to get ugly whether he wanted it to or not. He hauled in a bracing breath and searched his memory for any highfalutin words he knew. His brain went as blank as a freshly scrubbed chalkboard. “What the hell’s wrong with my stratum?” As he asked, David wished he knew the exact meaning of the word because he’d shove it right back down her throat. “I come from good people,
upstanding
people, damn it. And you obviously don’t know who you’re dealing with. You will
not
keep me away from my daughter or deprive me of my right to fulfill my obligations to her. Are we clear on that? My offer still stands to take care of
both
of you, but you’d best recognize, here and now, that you’re not dealing with some pampered Boston dandy who runs at the first sign of trouble. I’m going to be there for my little girl, and nobody will stop me. If you think different, come with an army to back you up, and while you’re at it, tell the bastards to pack a lunch.”
“This is, without question, the most
ludicrous
exchange I’ve ever had the misfortune to participate in. She is not your child! What possible reason would I have to lie to you about it?”
“I don’t know,” David admitted. “But you’ve sure got a reason. And yeah, I may be ludicrous, but you’re fixin’ to discover the cut of my cloth, lady. I’ve decided this disagreement isn’t going to be settled in any damned alley. We need to take the issue before someone of authority.” David had to bite down hard on his back teeth to keep from following that with a string of curses to turn the air blue. She was fast becoming one of the most infuriating women he’d ever met. That snooty Eastern accent of hers could get under his skin quicker than an Oklahoma chigger. “So far as I can see, talking any further is pointless.”
She visibly groped for calm and relaxed her shoulders. “Perhaps we should both take a step back, Mr. Paxton. We
are
both adults, correct? Surely we can discuss this matter and reach a conclusion satisfactory to both of us without involving anyone else.”
David sure as hell considered himself to be an adult, but at the moment his
stratum
seemed to be something of a problem. Nevertheless, he forced himself to shove away the anger—and, okay, his offended feelings. She clearly didn’t feel comfortable about a hearing before the authorities, and if the two of them could settle this without anyone else making the calls, he was all for it.
“Okay,” he agreed. “Start discussing.”
She turned up her palms in a gesture of helpless bewilderment. “I defer to you, sir. Discuss away.”
“All right, I’ll start with how I think it happened.”
“How you think
what
happened?”
“What happened between us, in what I guess you’d call the
biblical
sense.”
Two bright spots of color appeared on her cheeks. “We have
never
been together in any sense, Mr. Paxton, biblical or otherwise.”
“There you go again, not letting me talk. Maybe my first instinct was right, and we need some referees.”
“Arbitrators, you mean.”
David clenched his teeth. She apparently noticed because she flapped her wrist, muttered something under her breath, and said, “I’m sorry. Please, do continue.”
“Thank you.” He laced that with an edge of sarcasm. “Here’s how I think it came about.” David jerked off his hat, raked his fingers through his hair, and slapped the damned thing back on his head. “I think you and me met—”
“I,” she interrupted. “That is the proper form of the first-person pronoun in that sentence.”
David arched an eyebrow. She had more brass than a rich man’s door knocker. “Excuse me?”
“I’m sorry.” She flapped her hand again. He’d never seen anyone so loose at the wrist, making him wonder if she had gelatin for bones. “Your improper use of pronouns isn’t really important. It’s just that ‘me’ is only used as an object in a sentence. For instance, you’d never say, ‘Tell
I
what you mean by that.’ It makes no sense at all.”