The Beholding, page 2
“There’s no use wasting it.” When Luke took the cup, her eyes revealed all the confusion and grief she must be feeling.
“It’s kind of you to keep Tommie from hearing this,” she whispered.
You might not be so friendly if you knew what I have to say, he warned silently.
Tess offered a high-backed chair. “Were you there when my husband died?”
Luke sank into the chair and took a sip from the imported china. Unconsciously he scraped an arm across his nose and mouth to clear away the foul taste of the words he was about to utter. “I shot him.”
She stopped in mid-pour, then after only the briefest pause, filled her own cup to the brim.
“You?” Tess was amazed at the calmness in her voice. Alternating emotions raged within her in harsh discordance. She hated Luke Reeves more than she had ever hated anyone. He had taken Tommie’s father away forever, and the boy loved Clifton so. Yet in that same taking, this stranger released her from the hell that had become her life. What manner of woman was she that she couldn’t despise Luke Reeves for bringing Tommie such pain?
Tess took another look at Luke, this time setting his features to memory. Six foot. Black hair. Indigo eyes. Scars on his right cheek and brow. Broad shoulders and a leanness of physique that could have wrestled Clifton’s bulkier frame easily to the ground. Why had the man needed to kill her husband?
Tess’s gaze focused on the ivory-handled Colt resting in his left-handed holster. The pistol looked well-used, with grips yellowed from age. Was this man so accustomed to killing that he thought of no other alternative?
“I’m a bounty hunter of sorts, Mrs. Harper,” he began. “I make my living tracking down wanted men and do some troubleshooting now and then for a financial concern.” Luke inwardly berated himself for the word choice. “Your husband got into the line of fire when I attempted to capture three scoundrels who were selling rifles to a bunch of Comanche. Unfortunately, one got away.”
He noted her surprise and knew, if nothing else, she lacked guilt in the rifle scheme. “I warned your husband repeatedly to stay out of the way. Wasn’t sure it was my bullet that got him, but the one I pulled out of him was the same caliber as mine. Near as I can tell, I killed him.”
What Luke saw in the emerald depths of her eyes nearly made him drop his cup. He had faced the steel-eyed glint of some of the fastest gunfighters in the territory and never blinked an eye. He had stared down the boldest look of pity ever offered a man with scars, but not once had he looked into genuine forgiveness. An unearned forgiveness. This woman knew how to stir a man to his core. Maybe she was guilty, at that.
Tess set the pot down and released the handle.
Here it comes, Luke thought, waiting for her to slap him. His jaw tightened in anticipation of the blow. Instead, Widow Harper gently pressed her palm against his scarred cheek, as if she understood his sincere regret at killing her husband.
“I know it was difficult for you to bring me the news, Mr. Reeves.” Tess let her hand slide slowly back to her side. “Thank you for bringing him back to us.”
She owed this man nothing, yet she couldn’t allow him to leave her home without letting him know she understood. Tess wanted to strike him, hurt him for leaving Tommie fatherless. But that part of her that had once been unjusty accused of misdeeds reached out and offered comfort to this stranger. Offered a promise that if she faced up to her own past as Luke Reeves faced her now, she might one day forgive herself.
“Do you have any idea why your husband was at Pencil Bluff?”
Tess shook her head. What could she say? I suspected Clifton of dealing with Hoot Hill. Wondered if Jim Daggert might be involved as well. Surely her husband’s best friend didn’t know of Clifton’s involvement or he would have already told her of the mishap.
If only she had stood up to Clifton when she confronted him with her suspicions months ago. When he told her to mind her own house and leave a man’s business alone, she’d known her husband had shady dealings. Just as she never said no to her parents at Hot Springs, neither did she tell Clifton he was wrong. All she had ever done was live by someone else’s demands, never her own choices. The day for her to trust herself had finally arrived. Tess knew it was the only way she and Tommie could remain together. Circumstances would never again frighten her into doing something against her principles. “My son and I would like to be alone now,” she insisted, irritated that her voice trembled.
Luke recognized purpose in the widow and suspected she was gathering strength to meet the many hardships pressed upon a fatherless family. How well he knew the anger that nourished a mind and body after devastating blows to the emotions. It fueled the conscience when hard choices needed to be made and principles got in the way of common sense. When hurt seeped in so deep a man wept tears from his wounded heart.
Though she stood inches away now, Luke felt the imprint of her hand upon his cheek. Tess’s simple touch chipped away at the fortress of indifference built around Luke’s heart. The report must be wrong. His gut instinct told him there was more to the Hot Springs story than he had been told. An error had been made somewhere along the line. He meant to make quick work of Tess Harper’s involvement in the mining and Hot Springs scams, then planned to journey on to Colorado and follow up on the lead he obtained concerning her husband’s dealings. But sudden caring found a voice within Luke.
“Ma’am, I know it’s policy for the widow to leave the post as soon as the funeral’s over. I’d like to escort you and your son to wherever you mean to settle. I figure your husband deserves half the reward money I collect for bringing in Hoot Hill. I’ll see you get it before you leave.”
Offering her half seemed little enough reparation. Luke’s thoughts surprised him. He didn’t know whether or not she was guilty, and what he just offered went against the grain of his suspicious nature and profession. Soft inside. That seemed to be the only way to describe his feelings. Almost too human for a man who lived his life by the gun. Was this new bent toward neighborliness a result of her having a boy to care for, or did something else urge this recklessness?
Unable to endure any more, Tess wanted to scream as she hurried to the door and flung it open. “That’s unnecessary, Mr. Reeves. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have much to do.”
Knowing he’d been dismissed, Luke strode past her and trudged out into the mud. Too late he realized he had sank up to his bare ankles. “Do you want me to take his body to the undertaker?” Luke motioned to the horses. “Two’s no more trouble than one.”
Tension began to pulse at Tess’s temples, and all she could think of was her need for Luke to disappear. “Please, just go.”
She had no idea how much money her husband had saved, if any. Affording the undertaker’s fee might not be a possibility. In a friendlier tone, she stepped out into the rain and moved toward the horses. “I’d best see to him.”
“You’ll need help getting him inside.”
Resentment curled in her stomach, not so much aimed at Luke’s offer but at the way life threatened to challenge her resolve to prove herself capable even now. As she stepped closer to the horses, it seemed Heaven mourned with Tess. She was glad for the heavy drizzle. Grief surged through her, and a flood of relief streamed down her face. A part of her still loved Clifton and could mourn him, not for the man he was but for the husband and father he might have been to her and Tommie.
The bounty hunter looked at her and, despite the distinct odor of death, she nodded slowly, folding her arms protectively around her waist. When he pulled back the blanket, her hands shot to her mouth to stop the bile rising from the pit of her stomach. Tess averted her head from the horrifying sight which no amount of preparation could have made easier. “What am I going to tell Tommie?” she whispered behind her palm. “Dear God, you didn’t think of Tommie.”
Tess took a deep breath to steady herself, then stepped forward. She stumbled on the heavy dampness of her skirt hem. Luke’s hands shot out and caught her at the shoulders to prevent the fall. The momentum propelled her against his hard warm body. Tess felt Luke’s strength in the iron sinew of arms wrapped around her, pushing against the underside of her breasts. Anger compelled her to jerk away from the hands that had wielded the gun that had killed her husband. But the spell of human compassion filling Luke’s dark blue gaze forced her to halt as heat kindled in her cheeks, the peaks of her breasts, then banked low within her abdomen.
A longing engulfed her, hitting like a blast of cold air. Shaken by the powerful emotion, it took all of Tess’s effort to ignore his touch and the shameless possibility that she felt an attraction toward her husband’s killer. “I shouldn’t have been so clumsy,” Tess muttered. “I really must get him inside.”
“Here, let me.” Luke exhaled a long, tense breath. What would she think if he hauled her up against him, grabbed a fistful of that sunshiny hair and kissed her? Would she be so forgiving if he invaded her mouth with his tongue and pressed his chest against her breasts, searing them with the heat that now coursed through his loins? Where was her anger?
Beware, pretty lady, he silently warned. Be like the others. Hate me. Despise me. Pity me, but never offer anything I can turn against you. It’s my job. To find your weakness. I’ll hurt you before I’m hurt.
Hefting the corpse on his shoulder, Luke found the exertion a welcome release to the tension spiraling through his body. The effort to keep his balance while sloshing through the mud blessedly drew his thoughts to less dangerous avenues. “Where do you want him?”
“On the kitchen table.”
Luke followed her into the house, scraping his feet to keep from tracking up her floor. He swallowed back a curse as splinters jabbed his left sole.
“Papa?” Tommie ran toward the door, and his small face took on a look of confusion. The question turned into a shriek as his confusion whitened into fear. “Papa’s sick! Wake up, Papa! Wake up!”
“Please, lay him there and go, Mr. Reeves.” Tess enfolded Tommie in her arms and tried to quell the growing hysteria she felt soaring in her son and herself. “Shhh … son. It’s all right. Everything will be all right.”
While gently placing the body on the eating table, Luke made certain Clifton was situated so his wife wouldn’t have to move him further. As he straightened, Luke ran a hand through his disheveled hair and the black strands fell down in his face. He had dropped his hat somewhere. Widow Harper bent and picked up the slouch hat, now caked with mud to its crown, then thrust it into his stomach. Her eyes insisted he leave even as Tommie clutched at her skirt, wailing.
Luke moved toward the door but something urged him to stay. The feeling made him uneasy. Steeling himself against the unaccustomed surge of emotion, Luke sought ease in setting the trap he had planned all along. “Remember my offer, Mrs. Harper. I’ll take you wherever you need to go. Back to your folks, maybe?” He awaited her reaction.
“Get out of my house. Now!” Tess demanded. Anger at an unfair past and the cruelty of the present filled her with a surge of strength. Letting go of Tommie, she shoved Luke backward, past the threshold, into the night. “Stay out of our lives, and don’t involve me in yours!”
Though conviction gave her courage, she doubted that a planked wooden door would do very much to hold such a man back if Luke Reeves truly wanted to make a nuisance of himself.
Damned woman! Who would have thought a female like that could get under his skin? Luke cut out the remaining splinter from his bare feet and tossed it away. His gray dun wrestled some livery feed into its mouth, then nuzzled Luke’s neck.
Luke stood, scratched behind Talon’s ears and stowed the knife in his pack. He’d have to wait until tomorrow before he returned it to the hidden sheath in his boot where it belonged. Taking a cheroot from his pocket, he lit it and inhaled the tension-relieving tobacco.
The rain stopped, urging him out of the livery’s confines and into the night. Stars rose over the Arkansas hills, bright and shining, and newly washed. Locating the North Star and its position in the heavens, he gauged the hour of the night. A couple of hours before dawn. The business at the undertaker had taken longer than expected. Guess he should be getting some rest. The widow would be up and making preparations soon. Just because he hadn’t slept in close to three days didn’t mean she would wait on him. He intended to escort her where she went, despite her anger. Probably for that reason alone. Though a rash offer, the idea seemed a perfect way to pursue his investigation.
Green eyes haunted him. Eyes clouded with grief and fear had also looked up at him with challenge and purpose. He hoped the fear was of him and not of the law he represented. She needed to fear the emotions she evoked within him. He wanted her. Burned for her like for no other woman who had lain beneath him in passion.
Flicking the cheroot into a puddle, he imagined stamping out the flame as he wanted to rub out the memory of her breasts pressing hotly against his chest. Luke sauntered back to the stall and unbuckled the wide leather gun belt strapped low on his hip. Placing it alongside the saddle he used as a pillow, he stretched his body onto a bedroll next to the dun.
Served him right having to forgo a softer bed for the night, letting himself get pushed out of the Harper home without his boots. Pride kept him from purchasing a room, not wanting to walk in anywhere barefooted. Fortunately, the gravedigger wasn’t the curious sort. Then again, Luke supposed a bootless man wasn’t such an uncommon sight to an undertaker.
Linking his hands behind his head, Luke didn’t see the livery’s planked roofing any longer. Instead, green eyes seemed to be staring at him, trusting … asking something of him he didn’t know how to give. Dammit, could he destroy the innocence he had seen for the sake of fulfilling a contract with the Denver Stock Exchange?
Determined to forget Tess Harper, Luke crossed his arms across his chest and closed his eyes. Instead of the numbing void of sleep, he envisioned a blond-haired beauty with forgiving green eyes and a small boy with equally trusting features. Luke cursed and sat, resting his arms on bent knees.
Talon snorted.
“When I find out what the hell’s going on, fella,” Luke grumbled, “I’ll let you know, too. Then maybe we’ll both get some sleep.”
Chapter Two
The sweet scent of mountain honeysuckle drifted on the breeze that fluttered the black veil covering Tess’s tear-streaked face. She kissed one petal of the white rose and gently placed it on the muddy earth now resting over Clifton’s wooden coffin. Urging her son to do the same, she winced as he pricked his finger on a thorn while trying to place the offering near her own. The sight of her child’s blood sent a shudder through Tess. Even death seemed to mar Tommie’s love for his father.
A handful of Clifton’s friends, Jim Daggert among them, remained at the top of the hill crowned with crooked wooden crosses and rough-hewn tombstones. The respect Tess sensed was given to her husband rather than herself. Let them harbor their false impressions; she no longer cared. She had lain awake all night wondering what else she could have done to be a better wife. Her only conclusion: it was not her fault.
When Tommie’s small fingers reached up to thread her own, she gave a reassuring squeeze. “Are you ready to leave now, darling?” She stared at the quadrangle of buildings which had been his only home. How would he handle the move and giving up his friendship with the other camp children?
His small hand squeezed hers in return.
“I yove you, Mommie.”
“And I love you, too, Tommie.” Despite all the wrongs of her marriage, one great blessing Clifton Harper had given her was this wonderful little boy.
“Wait, please, Mrs. Harper.”
Tess stopped her downhill trek, taking a deep breath and steeling herself against the interview with the general’s wife. Mrs. Henry J. Hunt waddled to a halt, one gloved hand splaying across her throat as she huffed and puffed with exertion. How had she ever managed to walk up the brush-covered hill to the gravesite?
“Will you be ill?” Tess asked, trying to sound sincere in her concern. The woman could either help or hinder her plans.
“It’s the altitude, Mrs. Harper, the uncommon altitude.” Tugging at the shirtwaist riding up the swell of her nonexistent waist, the rotund woman flicked open her parasol to shield out the hot Arkansas sun rising over the hills. Silver brows arched over rheumy gray eyes. “Where do you intend to go?”
The question was where, not if, as Tess knew it would be. Hearing it struck a bitter finality to any hopes of staying on at the fort. As Luke Reeves had reminded her, Army regulations required a widow to leave upon completion of the burial. Regulations or no, Tess would never have been invited to remain. Too often she had spoken her opinion, one seldom corresponding with Mrs. Hunt’s. The general’s spouse allowed no mutiny among the company wives.
Tess took a certain pleasure in wiping the smug look from Mrs. Hunt’s face. “My husband has holdings in Colorado … a place called Harper Hall.”
Remembering the document she’d tucked away in the pocket of her skirt that morning, Tess wondered again about the warning written on the pouch she’d found among her husband’s belongings. Do not open until after my death. The message scrawled in Clifton’s handwriting had caught her attention while she searched through the carpetbags to look for his pocket watch. It had not been on his body. And, try as she might, Tess couldn’t believe that a man who was honorable enough to face a widow whose husband he had killed would be the sort of man who stole from a corpse.
Unable to find the timepiece, she discovered the bag and record that listed the name of an estate Clifton owned in Georgetown, Colorado. It was odd, since he’d never mentioned such a possession.
Her gaze shifted to Jim Daggert’s tall form among the gathering, and she wondered if he knew anything about the Colorado holdings. He seemed to know so much about what went on with Clifton.
“Then you’ll be leaving promptly, I assume.” Both of the matron’s chins lifted, her voice offering false cordiality.
