Rugged and Relentless (23 page)

If I had even one good leg, I’d kick myself
. Braden groaned.
No matter how long I live, I’ll never understand women
.

“I won’t allow you to stay because I don’t want you here. They’re connected, but if one won’t oust you, the other will.”
So help me, heaven. Because, to be honest, Lord, I think I’ll need all the help I can get if I’m going to convince Cora to leave me behind and move on. It’s even harder than I thought
.

“No, it won’t.” She cheerfully—
cheerfully
—dug a spoon from her apron pocket and handed it to him. “Because you do want me. You just don’t want to admit it because you’re too stubborn.”

That hit close enough to make Braden bend the spoon handle.
Not quite, but what can I say? “Actually, Cora, I don’t want you here because I want you here too much?”
He snorted. Loudly.

“For pity’s sake, if you want a hankie, just ask for one.” She pulled one from another pocket and pushed it toward his other hand. Then the daft woman picked up what looked to be corn bread, split it in half, and began slathering it with butter.

When Cora drizzled honey on top, he reached for it. “Hey!” His jaw dropped when she smacked his hand.

“Fix your own.” She nodded to the three other pieces sitting on the tray before sinking her teeth into hers. “You don’t want me here, you should pretend I’m not. In fact”—she gave the tray a considering glance—“you shouldn’t eat that at all. Evie made it and I carried it in, so it should be part of your protest. If you don’t want us, you don’t want our food.”

“Lunch can stay.” Braden held the sides of the tray in a death
grip, silently daring her to try to wrestle it from his hands. “You can’t. And this is
my
tray.”

“Very well.” Cora set down her piece of corn bread, stood up, and dusted her hands in a show of supreme unconcern that didn’t fool him enough to relax his grip one bit. “Keep your tray, Braden Lyman.” In a flash, she grabbed the soup bowl and plate of corn bread and flounced toward the door. “Enjoy it!”

     FIFTEEN     

I
changed my mind.” Lacey saw Cora come stomping out, sloshing stew from one hand and trailing corn pone from the other, and made an instant decision. “Telling Braden isn’t something I should do alone. Truly, it isn’t.”
Especially when he hasn’t been softened up by a good meal first, like we planned
.

“We’re running out of time, Lace.” Naomi waved her hands to encompass the entire town. “Look at this place—men everywhere! The doctor may be prudent enough not to say anything to Braden for now, not wanting to overset him until we explain, but he’s bound to notice all this activity and begin asking questions.”

“I know. Twenty men do make an awful racket.” Lacey felt surrounded by noise and eyes. Men in the house moving boxes, men in the diner knocking doors into walls, men outside the diner building on rooms, and men in what used to be a saloon, of all things, carting in crates of books for the library. “We’re dreadfully outnumbered, though it pains me to say such a thing.”

“Five men to every woman,” Evie mused. “That’s what Mr. Creed mentioned to me as part of the reason we’ve so many responses. With the three arrivals today, and if you count Mr. Draxley and Braden, that’s twenty men to the four of us.”

“Don’t count Draxley and Braden,” Cora directed. “Draxley isn’t courting anyone, and Braden’s already taken. So am I.” Her eyes widened. “That leaves eighteen men to three of you.”

“Six men to each woman.” A giggle crept from Naomi before she stifled it and gave a penitent shrug. “I’m sorry, girls. I just never thought an old spinster like me would see such odds!”

“You’re twenty-seven, Naomi.” Lacey dropped into the familiar scold with ease. “Hardly ancient. Besides, you know you look far younger than your years. Don’t ever call yourself a spinster.”

“None of us will be spinsters, and any man would be blessed to have either of you. Now, Cora”—Evie changed the subject—“may I ask why you brought back Braden’s lunch? With no tray?”

“He spouted some hogwash about not allowing me to remain, then got testy when I pointed out at least he wasn’t pretending he didn’t
want
me here.” Cora rolled her eyes. “So I told him if he didn’t want us, he didn’t want our food. Braden said I couldn’t take his tray and held on to it like a drowning man.”

“So you took the dishes.” Lacey began to giggle at the image of Braden clutching a suddenly-empty tray as Cora left.

“Of course she did.” Evie patted her sister’s shoulder, the show of closeness sending a pang of regret through Lacey.

Braden was a good brother, usually, but still a brother.
Worse, my only sibling acts like an utter heel from the moment we arrive in Hope Falls. Braden may be a man, but that’s no excuse for his boorish behavior
.

Lacey remembered comments about poufy sleeves and Mr. Williams’s bluntness over how he only cared to court Evie.
Well, it’s a very poor excuse at least
.

Besides, Braden hadn’t always been such a cad. Back in Charleston, they’d gotten on quite well in most circumstances. He’d treated Cora as a priceless treasure, an amusing and charming way of showing his affection. It would have driven Lacey mad to be treated as a delicate china shepherdess. Indeed, many suitors made that mistake back home, forcing her to refuse them. A
pretty face didn’t erase a healthy curiosity after all.

But it did tend to put a woman in danger, her brother often pointed out—the very reason he’d insisted she, Cora, and the others wait until he’d established Hope Falls more fully. Braden wanted the town to be not only prosperous but far more civilized before they arrived to take their rightful places.

Which was why he’d been so put out when they showed up. Now, more than ever, Hope Falls lacked any sort of order or civilization.
And he doesn’t even know the half of it
.

“He’s not going to handle this well,” Lacey warned in what just might be the greatest understatement of the century.

“He doesn’t get a choice.” Cora’s lips compressed into a thin, determined line. “Braden can’t give orders all his life.”

“We’ll all go in.” Naomi clasped Lacey’s hand in hers. “Together.”

Alone, Braden stared at the empty tray he grasped. It still held a small pot of honey, a butter crock, and the spoon he’d set down to stake his claim on the tray. So really it wasn’t empty. It just didn’t have anything worth keeping anymore.

Useless
. His hands were clenched so tight his knuckles went pale.
Like a man who can’t walk or provide for his own bride
. He had more in common with that almost-empty tray than Braden ever would have believed possible.

“We both need Cora back to make us complete again
,” a treacherous voice whispered.

“No!” He shouted the denial as his tray slammed into the wall, shattered crockery sticking to globs of honey as everything else clattered to the floor.
I don’t need her
.

“What on earth is going on?” Lacey plowed through the door, drawing up short as she caught sight of the mess to her left. Cora, Naomi, and Evie raced in right behind her, until all four clustered around his bed wearing expressions of shock and anger.

“I take it back. It’s not that I just don’t want any of you here.”
He directed his gaze at Cora, refusing to wince when her eyes widened in hope. Braden wouldn’t change course now, not when gentler means failed. “I don’t want your food either!”

“Oh, you … you … insufferable …” She started spluttering at him, searching for words vile enough to describe him. “Lout!”

“I’m much worse than that, sweetheart.” He tucked his hands behind his head and forced a sneer. “Want me to sully your ears with a few more colorful descriptions, or will you
leave?”

“You should slap him, Cora.” His own cousin turned on him.

“If you don’t, I’d be happy to.” Evie’s hand twitched, and Braden hoped she’d go ahead and do it. Maybe it would ease some of the guilt he felt and help hasten this entire process.

“We can’t hit him. He’s injured.” As they so frequently did, Cora’s eyes showed two different emotions. The left, brilliant blue, blazed with the heat of anger. The right, a more faceted hazel, swam with sorrow, hurt, and resignation just before she reached out and yanked the pillow from under him.

Braden’s shoulders and neck jerked back without the familiar support, only the cushion of his hands keeping his head from smacking against the mattress. It didn’t matter. The move jostled his still-healing shoulder and jarred him clear down to his legs, sending shooting pains upward. He sucked in a breath and held it until the room blurred—and so did the intensity.

This is why they can’t stay. A pillow. A single blasted pillow moves, and I’m down for the count
.

As the pain cleared, so did his thoughts. No more worrying about their feelings or even considering them. As far as Braden was concerned, Cora, Lacey, Naomi, and Evie no longer owned emotions. They owned only themselves—and he’d pay whatever price it took to pack them up and ship them home to safety.

“I think that might’ve been worse than slapping him.” Evie’s quiet comment reached him now. “Did you know he dislocated his shoulder, too, Cora? We can’t jar him like that.”

“He deserved it.” Again, his fiancée’s eyes showed separate
emotions—conviction she’d been right warred with horror at the unexpected severity of her punishment. “But I didn’t mean it.”

You should mean it!
he wanted to yell at her for daring to look overwrought at giving him
less
than he deserved for treating her so terribly. She didn’t know it was for her own good.
I’m not worth your tears
.

“One of us means what he says. Get out. All of you. Wire me a telegram when you’re back in Charleston, and don’t return.”

“I mean everything I say.” Cora glowered at him afresh.

That’s my girl
. He bit back his smile.
But not anymore
.

“I didn’t mean to cause you so much pain when I moved your pillow. All I wanted was to give your brain enough of a thunk to knock some sense back into it!” She railed at him; the entire time she tenderly tucked his pillow back beneath his head.

“Try that little maneuver on your own selves,” he barked. “Let me know when the four of you combined manage to scrape together enough common sense to match what I already possess. You don’t belong here, this is no place for women, and you need to pack up what I’m sure is too much stuff and head home!”

The jibe about packing too much hit pay dirt, Braden could tell. Evie bit her lower lip, Lace inspected her nails, Naomi cleared her throat, and Cora harrumphed in the sort of way she did when she couldn’t deny something but really wanted to. He’d give them this much—they rallied in a blink.

“We belong here as much as you do, Braden!” His sister made an expansive gesture he took meant Hope Falls. “Each of us owns a part of this town, same as you, and that makes this our home.”

“And our livelihood.” Evie raised a brow. “Lacey’s mercantile, my café, and Naomi’s mending shop all represent substantial investments we can’t afford to see lost or sold for the ridiculously low current market value, Braden.”