Waiting for Morning (The Brides Of Last Chance Ranch Series) (6 page)

Miss Walker hadn’t seemed to notice the wheelchair rising up and down like a barometer in changing weather. “I feel it fair to warn you that only one previous candidate lasted for more than a week. Most barely made it through the first couple of days.”

Molly refused to be discouraged. She knew nothing about cattle, but life on a ranch couldn’t be any harder than living in a mining town.

Miss Walker’s gaze settled on Molly’s velvet slippers, now covered in dust. “Do you have anything remotely similar to ranch attire?”

Molly glanced down at her gown. It was the most fashionable one she owned, but next to the ranch owner’s practical garb it looked downright dowdy. “I’m afraid most of my clothes were lost in the fire.”

“I’ll see what I can rustle up. Meanwhile, your room is waiting. I’ll have my housekeeper prepare a room for your brother.” She glanced at Stretch. “See that the horse and wagon are returned to the livery stable.” With that Miss Walker strode toward the ranch house, her jingling spurs sounding like a death knell.

Molly waited for the two ranch hands to lift Donny into his wheelchair. The man named Stretch pushed the wheelchair through the courtyard and he and Feedbag hauled it onto the shaded verandah and into the house. A young Mexican woman greeted them, eyeing Molly up and down.

“My name is Molly.” She pronounced each word precisely. She guessed the housekeeper was somewhere in her teens.

“Rosita,” the woman replied, pointing to herself.

Relieved that the woman seemed to understand English, a dozen questions leaped to mind, but they could wait till later. She turned to the two men.

“Thank you.”

“Glad to help,” Stretch said. He and Feedbag left and Molly took in her surroundings. The entry hall opened to a large spacious room.

Compared to their tent home, the house was quite grand with its red tile floor, stone fireplace, and floor-to-ceiling bookcases. A stuffed steer head hung over the mantel and Indian rugs adorned the adobe walls.

Donny gazed longingly at the overstuffed bookshelves.

“This way,” Rosita said. She started down a small hallway and then waited for Molly to follow with the wheelchair. Though the doorway was wider than average, the chair caught on the jamb, leaving a dent in the wood. Molly wiggled the chair back and forth until she was able to push it through.

Donny’s room was in the same wing as the kitchen. It was a small room, obviously meant to be used by a cook or housekeeper. A single window faced the front of the house, shaded by the roof overhang. There were no stairs to worry about and for that Molly was grateful.

After settling Donny in his room and giving him his medicine, Molly followed the Mexican housekeeper upstairs to the second floor. The woman led the way to the end of the hall. Molly’s room was considerably larger than Donny’s and opened onto a lovely balcony that stretched the length of the house.

The cheerful room was furnished with a single bed, chest of drawers, washstand, and desk. Molly ran her hand across the bed, absorbing the smooth softness of the quilt. She couldn’t imagine sleeping in such luxury.

Molly’s spirits rose for the first time since the fire. Suddenly aware that the housekeeper stood staring at her, Molly smiled.

“Have you worked here long?”

Rosita gave a curt nod. “Long enough.” Her formal manner and stiff voice seemed designed to discourage unnecessary conversation. She pointed to the garments on the bed. “Miss Walker sent clothes. I’ll fetch hot bath.”

A
hot
bath? That was a luxury Molly hadn’t counted on. Back home she managed to heat water for a bath with hot rocks, but if she was in a hurry, she settled for the cold stream that ran outside their tent.

Even more amazing were the indoor privies, one near Donny’s room and the other just down the hall from hers. She imagined this was how kings lived, not ranchers.

“A bath would be most—”

The housekeeper left the room, slamming the door shut with a bang and leaving Molly’s sentence half-finished.

Molly shrugged. No matter. She glanced around, unable to believe her good luck. She touched the walls, the floor, the door leading to the balcony. She never thought to live in a house with plaster walls, wooden floors, and glass doors and windows. Strangest of all was having a room to herself. A blanket strung across the tent from a rope was the only privacy she’d ever known. She wasn’t sure she liked being so far away from Donny, though. What if he needed her in the middle of the night? Or his asthma grew worse?

Pushing her worries away, she opened her valise and lifted out a scarlet frock.

Even as a child she insisted upon wearing bright clothes and refused to wear the sedate hues her mother favored. Her father flinched whenever he saw her coming, raising his hands in front of his face as if to ward off a bright light.

“You look like a peacock,” he’d say fondly. Or “Put a star on top and you’d pass as a Christmas tree.” But he always sided with her whenever her mother complained, calling her his little sunshine.

“When a man spends his days in a mine, he welcomes a bit of color,” he’d say.

“I can understand a bit of color,” her mother would reply, “but does she have to wear all the colors at once?”

What neither parent had known, had no way of knowing, was that her flashy clothes, and later her makeup and hearty voice, had all been cultivated to protect her brother. No one stared at him with
pitying eyes when she was around. No one stared at him at all. People were too busy staring at her.

It had been hard at first. By nature she was reserved—shy. But she’d soon found out that if you pretended to be someone else long enough, you eventually forgot who you were. It was for the best, really. As Donny’s protector and caretaker, she didn’t have time to be anything else.

Chapter 6

C
actus Patch buzzed with news of Miss Walker’s newest “heiress,” and that infuriated Bessie Adams. She’d practically knocked herself out these past few weeks
planning her nephew’s wedding and not a single person she’d
encountered in town mentioned it—not one. Not even the customers gathered in Mr. Green’s mercantile early that Wednesday morning.

Incensed, Bessie strolled down an aisle checking out the produce, basket on her arm. Now that the nice new doctor was boarding with her and Sam, the list of needed groceries had almost doubled, but her mind was on her nephew’s upcoming nuptials.

The wedding of Luke Adams to Kate Tenney would be the event of the decade. The town had never known anything like it. Every lamppost, every wooden sign, every door on Main Street had been decorated with large white ribbon bows. Bessie spent hours writing invitations, planning the food, overseeing the bride’s dress, and explaining to her thickheaded nephew and groom-to-be why all this fuss was necessary.

It wasn’t every day that a man got married. Seeing Luke properly
wed fulfilled the promise made on her sister’s deathbed to care for her two orphaned boys.

Bessie picked up a head of lettuce and gave it an expert squeeze. Mr. Green called over to her.

“What do you say, Bessie? Wanna bet?” He shook a cardboard box of money. “How long do you think Miz Walker’s latest
heiress
will last this time?”

“I’ll give her forty-eight hours,” Harvey Trotter said. A farmer by trade, he wore overalls and a large straw hat the same color as his sun-streaked hair. Puffing on his stogie, he plopped a coin on the counter and Mr. Green wrote down the amount.

Bessie grimaced in disapproval. Trotter had a wife and six children and could ill afford such folly.

Saloon owner Randy Sprocket made a face. Thumbs hooked around his suspenders, he shook his head. “Nah. She’s got a brother in a wheelchair. She ain’t gonna last a day.”

“Did you say wheelchair?” Hargrove was the owner of the local ice plant and Bessie never saw him when he wasn’t dressed for winter. Today he wore a heavy flannel shirt. In this heat!

“Saw him with my own two eyes,” Sprocket said. “She paid the Miller twins money to lift him and his wheelchair into a wagon at the livery.”

“In that case, I change my mind,” the ice man said. “I’m only giving her till noon.”

Mr. Green noted the change on his tally and called over to Bessie. “Come on, Bess. Winner takes all. What do you bet?”

Bessie sniffed and placed a firm head of lettuce in her basket, which brought a nod of approval from farmer Trotter. “I’m not a gambler.” The nerve of him suggesting such a thing to a fine Christian woman like herself.

“Anyone who’s married is a gambler,” Hargrove said. “Since you’re the town matchmaker, that not only makes you a gambler but a dealer as well.”

This brought a frown to Bessie’s face and a round of laughter from the others. Bessie’s temper snapped and she squeezed a tomato until it practically turned to ketchup. In all her sixty-something years she had not so much as touched a deck of cards.

“The whole idea of advertising for an heiress is ridiculous,” she scoffed, shaking her head. “Even Mr. Vanderbilt with all his money didn’t have such an abundance of heirs.” Before his death Cornelius Vanderbilt was considered the richest man in America.

She’d lost count of how many women had traveled to Cactus Patch in answer to Miss Walker’s advertisement. The way some of them carried on, you’d think they’d been offered husbands instead of cattle.

One by one those women had left—all except Kate Tenney, but that was only because Bessie made Luke chase the girl all the way to Boston. Had she not put her foot down and talked some sense into him, her nephew would have let a perfectly good woman slip away.

“It’s a crying shame that none of you have anything better to do with yourselves than throw away your money,” she said, reaching for a box of her favorite chocolate bonbons. The problem with the men in this town was that they drank and gambled too much.

“Ah, come on, Bessie. What could it hurt?” Green urged.

Bessie was tempted, God forgive her. “What if you’re all wrong and no one wins?”

“Then we’ll donate the money to the church.”

Bessie hesitated. No one had been right in the past about how long a girl would last at the ranch. Why, even she was convinced Kate wouldn’t survive twenty-four hours and the poor girl lasted
a full four months. But if this current “heiress” had a brother in a wheelchair . . . hmm. The church could use the money and . . . She caught herself in the nick of time.

“Gambling is wrong, no matter what,” she said with a toss of her head. At least someone in this town knew how to resist temptation.

Trotter chomped down on his stogie and hooked his thumbs around his overall straps. “Are you telling us that you have no opinion?” He looked incredulous.

“She has an opinion on everything else,” Green said.

All four men stared at her and Bessie cleared her throat. “Of course I have an opinion. I think the woman will surprise us all and last . . . two months.” Any woman traveling all this way with a brother in a wheelchair had to have some starch in her.

This brought a round of laughter from the others.

“I tell you what,” Hargrove said with a magnanimous air. “I’ll put in for Bessie.” He tossed a shiny coin on the counter. “Put her down for two months.”

Not to be outdone, the others slapped coins onto the counter on Bessie’s behalf.

Smiling to herself, Bessie continued her shopping. Even if by some miracle she won what was now a healthy pot of dough, no one could accuse
her
of gambling.