Deborah Camp
Authors: To Seduce andDefend
TO SEDUCE
AND DEFEND
Deborah Camp
Copyright © Deborah Camp, 2013
All Rights Reserved
“A lot of what a man knows, a woman knows better.”
Cowboy saying
Much thanks to my dear friends Joyce and Ann Marie. I’m also grateful to Barbara Lowenstein for digging up the old girl and breathing life into her again.
He wasn’t at all what she expected. In fact, she did a double-take when he walked into the law office where she sat waiting for him. His burnished blond hair was slightly windblown, falling across his lined forehead. Tall and broad-shouldered, he wore a dark blue shirt under a black leather vest, black trousers, a belt with a big, silver buckle, and shiny black cowboy boots. His footfalls sounded like the boom of cannon fire upon the wood floor.
“Mr. Polk?” she asked.
“Hmm?” He barely glanced up from the folder of papers he held. Then quickly, his blue eyes focused on her. He gave a nod, holding her gaze for just a moment before offering a polite smile. “Oh, no. I’m Zachary Warner, Adam Polk’s law partner. It’s Mrs. Jennie Hastings, right?”
She yanked her gaze away from his attractive smile and nodded. “Jennie Caldwell Hastings. I hope you don’t mind, but no one was here, so we came on inside to wait. Where is Mr. Polk?”
“He isn’t feeling well and asked me to meet with you and to extend his apology.” His gaze slid to the chair next to her where her son sat, swinging his legs from side to side. “And who is this?”
“Oliver, my son.” She rested a hand on Oliver’s knee to stop him from squirming. “Say hello to Mr. Warner.”
“Hello.” Oliver looked surprised when the man held out his hand to be shaken. With timidity, Oliver complied, his brown eyes widening when his fingers were swallowed by the lawyer’s.
“Nice to make your acquaintance, Oliver,” Zach said. “And you, too, Mrs. Hastings. I must admit that I haven’t had time to read through your case entirely. Give me just a minute here to see what Adam has found out … hmmm.” He moved away and the scent of leather and pine drifted from him. He sat in the oak chair behind the desk. “I see. Hmm.”
The starch of worry seeped into Jennie’s spine, forcing her to sit ramrod straight in the chair. She didn’t like the concern etched on Zachary Warner’s face or the frown that was tugging at the corners of his generous mouth. Tired from her train travel from St. Louis to Guthrie, she had tossed and turned last night in the hotel where she and Oliver had lodged. She had been anxious for this meeting with the lawyer, wanting to settle this claim quickly and move to their new home.
“That’s odd.”
“What’s odd?” She strained to read the papers he perused, then realized she should show him what he undoubtedly needed to see. She pulled an envelope from her skirt pocket. “My husband purchased 160 acres of land two miles outside of Guthrie. Mr. Homer McCoy sold it to him. It includes a house or cabin, I’m told.” Leaning forward, she handed the deed to Zach. “I found this in Charles’s papers a few weeks after he …” She looked sideways at Oliver and lowered her voice. “After he passed.” The now familiar sadness tightened her throat with the mention of burying her husband.
“He never told you that he bought land here in Oklahoma Territory, I take it.”
“That’s right. I don’t know why he didn’t tell me about it. We wanted our own place and the Land Run seemed to be a wonderful opportunity. Charles came here first to find land and he planned to send for me and Oliver within a couple of weeks. But weeks grew into months … and he came back home and said the land here wasn’t a good bargain, after all.”
“You were willing to settle outside of town? Didn’t you think life on a ranch would be – well, challenging for you and a young child?”
“It was my idea,” she said, remembering the excitement she’d felt when Charles agreed to the plan. “I’m sure Oliver and I will be able to make a nice home here. We’re ready for some adventure, aren’t we, Oliver?”
“I want to ride a horse!” Oliver piped up. “And an elephant!”
Zach sat back in the chair and chuckled. His blue eyes sparkled with good humor. “I can’t help you with the elephant, little man, but I’d let you ride my horse.”
“Do you have a horse?” Oliver asked, slipping to the edge of the seat as he gripped the chair arms.
“I do. In fact, I used to have five of them, but I’m down to two now.”
“Five! I’m five. Isn’t that right, Mama?”
“That’s right.” Jennie patted his knee. Oliver was a perfect combination of her and Charles. He had his father’s brown eyes and chestnut hair and her dimples and heart-shaped face.
Zach Warner gave Oliver a wink, then stood and crossed the room to a shelf. “Say there, partner. I have something here I bet you would like to look through. It has lots of pictures of horses in it.” He withdrew a book and motioned for Oliver. “Want to look at it? Come on out here and you can sit on this window seat and look to your heart’s content. It will be more comfortable here for you.” He glanced once at Jennie to receive her smiling consent before ushering Oliver to the window seat in the outer office.
Once Oliver was settled with the book, Zach returned to the chair behind the desk. He looked through the legal papers for another minute and that frown returned to his handsome features. “There seems to be a discrepancy here, Mrs. Hastings.”
“What do you mean?”
“How long ago did Mr. Hastings live in Guthrie?”
“He arrived here the third of August in 1889 and stayed until July.”
“He returned to St. Louis in July of last year?”
“That’s right. The last week in July. We lived with his parents in St. Louis. He came down with influenza during the winter and never recovered from it. He passed the fourth day of February.”
“My condolences to you, ma’am,” Zach said with a nod. A warm spring breeze sailed in through the partly opened window behind him and ruffled his hair, picking out a few reddish strands among the gold.
“Thank you.” She glanced down at her folded hands, focusing on the thin, gold band that now marked her as a widow. She took a deep breath to ease the tightening in her chest. “I wrote to Mr. Polk when I found that deed. He was recommended by an attorney my father-in-law knows. He didn’t say anything about there being any legal problems.” She squared her shoulders, suddenly feeling that she might be in for a fight.
“That might not be the only problems you have if you expect to live in the country. Farm life is not an easy life.”
“I admit that I have no real knowledge of living off the land, but I am able-bodied and I can learn. I’m sure I will miss some things about St. Louis, but I have been reading about the Territory and there seems to be so much opportunity here.”
“Yes, ma’am, that’s true enough.” He looked at her from beneath his lashes. “Are you thinking of farming or ranching?”
“A bit of both,” she said, sensing he was testing her. “I will grow as much food as I can, but I want to purchase cattle. Mr. Polk said it was good grazing land.” She released a swift sigh when he scowled at the papers in front of him again. “What
is
the problem?”
“When your husband returned to St. Louis, he never breathed a word about the land he purchased or … or anything else he did while he was here?”
“As I told you, it came as a complete surprise to me,” Jennie said, speaking more slowly as irritation built within her. “I’m still trying to sort it out for myself. It wasn’t like Charles to withhold things from me.” She knew the rugged looking attorney wasn’t the source of her aggravation. What rankled her was the line of questioning. It struck a nerve because Charles had kept her in the dark about the land, and for the life of her, she couldn’t understand why. He had never been secretive.
Charles had told her that he had
not
purchased land, but had spent most of their money hiring lawyers and land surveyors, paying for his room and board, and being robbed by two men when he had been deep in the Territory looking at some land for sale.
“He told me about the robbery, of course, but nothing about actually purchasing a home here,” she said, almost to herself. “I don’t know why he kept it from me. I thought perhaps the land wasn’t that good and he was hoping to sell it and I wouldn’t know that he had made a bad investment.”
Zach nodded. “That’s a good story. You mentioned a robber?”
“Yes.” She stared at him, surprised he didn’t know the details. And what did he mean by
a good story?
Did he think she was trying to make excuses for her husband’s behavior? “My husband was robbed of more than a hundred dollars. He reported it to the authorities, but nothing came of it. Charles said the law here is primitive.”
“The law here is more than adequate, Mrs. Hastings. I don’t have any report of a robbery in the file.” He closed the folder slowly and rested his hands on top of it. “I suspect your husband spent that money on the land, don’t you? Your husband seemed happy to be home? There was no trouble in your marriage?”
Jennie tipped up her chin in affront. Not only was he calling Charles a liar, but now he was poking his nose in her bedroom! “I beg your pardon?” She glanced toward her son to make sure he wasn’t listening. He seemed absorbed in the book. “I have come here to claim the land my husband purchased, not to discuss my personal life with an utter stranger.”
He had the good manners to look away from her to study his clasped hands resting on the file. She was glad she had shamed him, but then thought better of it when he lifted his gaze to hers again. In the depths of his sky blue eyes, Jennie did not see embarrassment or even chagrin. She saw pity. A lump began to form in her throat and her heart beat double-time. Something was wrong. Terribly wrong.
“Mrs. Hastings, forgive me, but I have some disappointing news to deliver.”
What? What?
Her mind screamed the word, but she pressed her lips tightly together to keep the sound of her anxiety trapped inside.
“While your husband was here, he did purchase land, but the land is not yours.”
A shaky laugh escaped through her tensed lips. “Of course the land is mine. Are you saying that there is some medieval law here that prohibits women from owning land?”
“No, ma’am, nothing like that.” He sighed heavily. “On December 2, 1890 Charles Hastings divorced you here in Guthrie.”
The statement hung in the air like stale cigar smoke, slowly spreading until Jennie thought she might choke. At first, the words meant nothing, but then they burned a hole through her heart.
“That …” She had to stop and swallow hard because her voice had emerged as a raspy whisper. “That can’t be true.”
“I have the court documents here.” He tapped the folder. He wore a hammered silver ring on the middle finger of his right hand. A small nugget of turquoise rested in the center of it and seemed to wink at her. “There is also a marriage license in here, Mrs. Hastings. Your husband re-married while he was here, too.”
Crazy thoughts jumped around in her head like water drops in a hot skillet. “Re … remarried? You mean he divorced me and then remarried me? But how could he do that without me?”
“No, ma’am. He didn’t marry you again. He married another woman.”
“No!” The word exploded like a stick of dynamite and reverberated in the high-ceilinged room. She shook her head and looked toward Oliver. His eyes were wide with alarm. Jennie forced a smile and waved to him. “It’s okay. Go back to your book, Ollie.” She took a deep, cleansing breath, but it did not steady her heart or rein in her racing pulse.
“I know this is a shock —.”
“
It is an outrage
,” Jennie corrected him in a hissing whisper. “And I don’t believe it. Maybe … maybe he withheld some information from me about this land deal, but he would not marry someone else! Charles would not be so cruel. He loved me and his son! He would
never
do that to us.”
He pulled several sheets of paper from the file and handed them across the desk to her.
Jennie took them with trepidation. She felt ill, as if by taking them into her trembling hands, she accepted a dark fate. The first document was a divorce decree with Charles’ signature clearly written in one corner. Her name was scrawled by an unknown writer upon a line for “defendant.” On another line the words could have been charred into the pages, they blazed so accusingly at her: “Defendant (spouse) refused to join plaintiff in Guthrie and has, thus, abandoned him and the marriage.”
“But this is a lie!” she said under her breath, painfully aware of her son sitting in the next room. The words began to blur as tears stung her eyes. “An outright lie! I
wanted
to come here. I wrote to him over and over, begging him to let me come. Oliver and I expected to join him in only a few weeks. But he kept telling me it wasn’t the right time and that he would send for me soon.” She looked up from the paper. “I never abandoned the marriage and I can’t believe that he did, either! It’s all in the letters and telegrams he wrote to me. In them he tells me he loves us and can’t wait for us to begin a life here together. I have the letters …” Her voice trailed off as the words died in her throat.
He said nothing and his gaze never wavered from her face. His silence was oddly comforting and she realized it was because she didn’t feel that he was judging her. He listened intently, not jumping to conclusions or opinions, and she began to admire that about him.
Jennie examined the next page and it appeared to be a court document concerning the divorce. The last sheet of paper was heavier and obviously more important. She stared at it, her eyes refusing to focus for several seconds. A marriage certificate. Charles Hastings wed Luna Lee on June 18, 1890. Jennie stared at the date. June, and a month later he was back home with her in St. Louis. Of all the crazy and insane … nothing about this made any sense!
“Who is this woman? This Luna Lee? Do you know her?” Jennie asked, then told herself to calm down because her tone had been as sharp as a whip.
He nodded.
“Does she live in Guthrie or … or on the land Charles purchased?”
“She lives in town. I believe a relative of hers is living on the ranch for now.”
“Does she know about me and Oliver?”
“I’m not sure.”
“I should talk to her. I’m sure that she will understand that Charles didn’t mean for this to happen. I know that he would want the land to be passed on to Oliver and me. His divorce from me probably isn’t legal.”
He lifted one hand, his palm facing her. “I know you’re upset and you have every right to be, but the divorce
is
legal.”