Rugged and Relentless (16 page)

J
ake wanted to throw all the other men in the room into a freight car and lock it. Didn’t really matter when the train left, so long as the men couldn’t get out and tempt him to knock their fool heads together. The lot looked ready to fight over who got to sit in the empty chair at the head of the women’s table.

Evelyn Thompson tilted her head, the soft contours of her profile a taunt to any man, forcing Jake to consider the idea he may be just as much a fool as any other sap in the building. If he wasn’t already sitting here, he wouldn’t have waited in line. Then she smiled at something one of the other men said.

Not the dimple
. Jake stopped just shy of cramming an entire biscuit into his mouth to stop a groan.
Protecting the daft woman will be next to impossible if she keeps smiling like that. I’ll need more bullets than an army regiment to keep the men away. Even worse once they figure out she’s the cook
.

Maybe he’d do better to just snag her and jump aboard the next train himself. Jake pushed aside a twinge of guilt over the thought of the other three but swiftly reasoned it away. The younger Miss Thompson had a fiancé to look after her, who happened to be Miss Lyman’s brother and Miss Higgins’s cousin. Let him worry
about the other three. From where Jake sat, it seemed like they’d hatched the entire crackpot idea and swept Miss Thompson along with them into the lunacy.

He shoveled another bite of shepherd’s pie into his mouth, creamy mashed potatoes blending with heartily seasoned beef in such a way as to make a man believe in miracles.
Yep
. Jake eyed the woman sitting across from him, sharing one of those miraculous dinners with her sister. She—and her cooking—was the only thing in this fool town worth saving.

Too bad he’d be up against fourteen—no, fifteen—lumberjacks the moment he tried to take her. Even Clump would fight him tooth and nail. Jake shot a glance at his traveling companion to find the man making calf eyes at the cook.
Especially Clump
.

Even worse, Miss Thompson didn’t look like a woman who wanted to be rescued. Which meant he might’ve been wrong in judging her a woman of good sense. Jake hated being wrong under any circumstance, but for some reason, this rankled more than most. Evelyn Thompson wore the face of an angel, whipped up meals to make a dying man smile, and ran a business of her own with spunk and grit. A woman like that wasn’t allowed to plant herself in the middle of the most harebrained scheme ever hatched.

He should haul her out of Hope Falls to prove it. But somewhere in this mess of men sat a murderer.
And I’m not leaving until I find him. Miss Thompson made her choice, and I’ve made mine. Twyler’s who I came for, and Twyler’s who I’ll leave with. Justice before—

“Move, mister.” Men crowded behind the row of women and glowered at him, interrupting his train of thought. And more to the point, his supper. “You’ve sat there long enough.”

“Excuse you?” Thunderclouds gathered in Miss Thompson’s gaze, while the other women merely seemed amused by the show.

“Don’t you worry ‘bout a thang, miss.” A voice near the back piped up. “We figgered out how to make it so’s we all get a chance
to get ta know ya better, without goin’ one by one.”

“I ain’t movin’.” Clump crossed his arms, uncrossed them to snag the last biscuit, and crossed them again. “I’m eatin’.”

“You chose your seats before we arrived.” Jake set down his fork. “You were served first. We’re going to finish our meal.”

“You four can finish at another table.” A demand.

“We could,” Jake agreed, “but we won’t.” He picked up his fork and started eating again, sending a smile to comfort the now-nervous women. Not that they deserved it. They should’ve known this sort of thing would happen when they paraded themselves in front of a dozen lonely men, with no rules.

“Then you won’t finish at all.” A man whose swift movements labeled him a high climber darted forward to grab the smallest man from the train by the collar. His fingertips barely brushed his target before he hit the floor. He sat there for a moment, stunned, before rising to his feet.

“That does it!” Miss Thompson slapped her palms on the table and stood, drawing all attention to herself. “There will be no brawling in my café. There will be no fighting over which men sit beside us, or we won’t take our meals with you at all. There will be order, or giblet stew and liverwurst will be the only items on the menu. Do I make myself understood, gentlemen?”

“Oooeee, she’s a spitfire, thatta-one is!” Someone with more admiration than brains whistled. “I like that in a woman.”

“Seems a mite bossy to me,” another muttered.

“I don’t care. See how her eyes flash? She’s right purty when she’s riled,” the first one said, defending his choice.

Magnificent describes her better
, Jake decided, watching a vibrant rose flush climb her cheeks, her eyes indeed flashing.

“We thought it would be a simple matter for everyone to share a meal then have each of you men stop over and say hello for a moment.” Miss Lyman stepped over the bench, the other women following suit until all four stood at the side of the room, in varying postures of disappointment, worry, and anger.

“She’s the one I like,” a nameless fool evaluated. “Women should look like that—girly and poufy and so forth.”

“Poufy!” Miss Lyman patted her sleeves—which, Jake suddenly noticed, were kind of poufy. Apparently she didn’t like the term much, though. “I’m not ‘poufy.’ This is fashionable!”

“I never liked the frilly, fussy sort, m’self,” another judged. “But that one in the corner’s got possibilities.”

“We assumed you could behave as gentlemen!” Miss Higgins scolded, wagging her finger at every single one of them like an irate schoolmarm. “You should all be ashamed of yourselves!”

“That one,” another scoffed, “seems kind of priggish.”

“Nah. A woman should be prim and proper.” The one who’d pointed to Miss Higgins shook his head and grinned. “In public.”

“Oh, I see what you mean.” Knowing chuckles spread through the room as every man caught the implication that a woman who was prissy in public might be a lot less controlled in private.

Thankfully, the women didn’t seem to understand the joke. They were plenty overset, each one blushing and angry.

Good
. Maybe they’d rethink the wisdom of their plan. But for now, the men weren’t showing proper respect, and it needed to be checked before things got further out of hand. Tonight would set the tone for the rest of this farce, and Jake couldn’t let the women be endangered—no matter they’d done it to themselves.

“That’s enough.” He stood between the women and the crowd almost before he’d decided to move. “These are ladies.” Jake emphasized the title and made eye contact with a few particulars whose comments had set up his back. “If you can’t treat them as such, I’ll be more than happy to escort you to the train.”

“Aye, and I’ll be doin’ the same, d’ye ken?” The giant redhead didn’t stand beside Jake. He stood a few paces away so they bracketed the women. His speech wasn’t as easy to understand as before—his thickened accent a sign of his ire, most likely—but not a single man could mistake his meaning.

“You don’t talk that way about ladies, and you don’t act that
way around them.” Clump plunked himself between the two of them so they formed a semi-solid barrier. “I won’t let you.”

“Ribald jokes offend delicate ears.” His top hat marked the Gent’s progress through the crowd as he took a place alongside Clump. “And aggressive postures disrupt peace. It will not do.”

Before any others could detach themselves from the fold, Jake decided to put the force of their conviction to use. “Each man who wants to stay, and work, and respect these fine women, sit back down. Anyone else goes to the train. Tonight.”

To a man, every single one took a seat. Some grumbled, some looked embarrassed—as though they’d only just remembered their manners—but most seemed amused and even relieved to have order established. Only Jake, Clump, the Gent, and the redhead they called Bear remained standing.

“Do you think …” Cora’s whisper drew Lacey’s attention away from the men standing and, from the sounds, sitting before them.

She couldn’t really tell about the ones who might be sitting down, because the four who stood in front of them did an excellent job of blocking her view.
Which isn’t what we hired them for
. Lacey let loose a disgruntled little huff.

“They’ve entirely forgotten we’re standing back here while they decide how to run our town?” Evie’s whisper carried just far enough for Lacey and—Lacey assumed by the way her cousin sidled over—Naomi to hear. “Yes, I do believe that.”

All four of them took a moment to look at the backs of the four men forming a human blockade between them and their beaus. Not a single one turned around or even looked over his shoulder. They just kept glowering at the others—or at least that’s what Lacey imagined they did. The backs of their heads didn’t really tell her all that much about their expressions, after all.

Funny how all four, different as they were, stood the same way as they took control of the unruly room. Boots planted a
little wider than shoulder width apart, jaws thrust forward, arms crossed over their chests in a sort of instinctive male posture that screamed of take-charge masculinity and authority.

Of course, only two of them really managed it with any aplomb. The men on the ends—the great big Irishman and the rangy Mr. Creed whose presence obviously made such an impact on Evie—exerted the power that made the others listen. The one in the top hat, for all his fine manners, couldn’t exert enough primal influence to keep a bunch of working men under control. Neither could the stockier Mr. Clump, for all his good intentions.

“They can’t forget us!” Lacey whispered back. “Please tell me why are we whispering when we don’t
want
to be forgotten?”

“Because those four are taking over our town, and we need to set everyone in his place,” Naomi hissed back, her explanation eliciting nods from the others. “We need a plan.”

“Mr. Draxley should come to our aid at a time like this.” Lacey craned her neck, searching for the businessman in what she already knew to be a futile attempt. Even if she spotted him, the squirrelly fellow wouldn’t take a stand for anything.

“We need to just walk up there and start listing rules.” Evie’s brows lowered in determination. “First rule: We invite who dines with us, and there is no changing that arrangement. I’ll go up and say it while you three each make up a rule of your own, and we’ll keep on going from there until we’re done.” With that, she headed toward the line of men still firmly planted in their way, bound to uproot them.

Lacey exchanged startled glances with the other two and scurried to keep up. In a moment, they’d slipped past the men to stand directly in front of them. If they turned around to face the four fellows, they could perform a rollicking Virginia reel. As it was, they stayed where they stood, with the women in front and the men right behind, waiting to follow.

But where are we leading them?
She slid a glance at Evie, who’d burst up there with more outrage than solid planning but
somehow managed to take her place last out of all of them.
And where is Evie leading us with this little maneuver?

Evie didn’t know where to go. If she went to the right of Mr. Creed, she’d most likely wind up shimmying against the wall. If she attempted to make her way to his left, she’d be squeezing past both him and Mr. Clump—which would be worse for two reasons. First, she’d brush against both men and give either a chance to halt her progress. Second, if Cora tried to go to Clump’s right, she’d block her sister. Which left her the wall.

This would be so much easier if I were a slender wisp of a woman, but the element of surprise works wonders
, Evie assured herself, striding behind Mr. Creed, darting right, and sliding past. Make that
almost
sliding past.

A fraction of a step, and he stopped her midslide, his shoulder lightly pinning her against the wall for the merest moment while he dipped his head and murmured something for only her to hear. “Stubborn woman.” As quickly as he said it, he’d shifted away to let her through, leaving only the memory of the words and the heat where his arm pressed against hers in his wake.