Emma's Blaze (Fires of Cricket Bend Book 2) (21 page)

Emma left. Her heart, her soul, every part of her felt lighter. She’d return to the hotel room, and sleep next to Bill, and in the morning she’d wake him up in a delicious way and, if his proposal still stood, she’d accept it. She’d become Mrs. McKenzie, and they’d go home. Maybe they could marry there, in New Orleans, and return to the McKenzie drive to surprise all the boys. They’d finish the drive as a honeymoon of sorts, and then return to Laredo and the ranch. She’d be a ranch wife. Apart from hard work, she had no idea what that would entail, but she wanted to learn. She wanted to meet Maureen McKenzie and see the woman who had raised such wonderful sons. She wanted to be there when Jess and Clara Belmont were wed. She wanted to fall asleep each night in Bill’s arms, worn out from work.

She wanted to go home, and to finally know what a home would be like.

Hank was giving her a divorce. By the following afternoon, she’d be a free woman.

***

Bill

Someday, Emma would have to realize that he would always notice her slipping away in the dark. Although that assumed there would be more somedays. At the moment Bill could barely see through surviving the rest of the night.

He’d followed her to the Magnolia Crow, having heard her go out the door of their hotel room. He’d looked out the window just in time to see her headed that way. He pursued, and only had to threaten the bartender a bit to get him to blurt out where the redheaded woman seeking Hank Porter had gone.

To Hank’s room.

Damn. Bill didn’t want to think he’d been taken for a fool again.

Bill rounded the corner and looked through the partly-open door in time to see Emma and Hank locked in an embrace. Hank held tight to her bare arms, and Emma’s hands rested on Hank’s chest. She wore only her fancy new underthings. The two of them made a beautiful pair. Bill’s world stopped cold, then sped up until he felt dizzy. He backed away from the door and reached out to steady himself against the wall.

He’d been conned. He’d kept her safe on a journey across tough country in exchange for a few kisses and warm nights, and he’d been deceived and placated all the while. He’d come to forgive her, and it had been another act she’d pulled to get her where she’d wanted to be all along.

For all his terrible traits, Andrew had been right. A damned fool, that’s what Bill was, and even worse than he’d imagined himself to be originally. Worse, because as he saw Hank’s lips on Emma’s, he felt a pain in his heart every bit as bad as the pain he’d once felt for Greta.

Women were devils, and men were fools.

Part of him wanted to charge into the room and beat Hank Porter to a pulp. If there ever was a time to bloody his knuckles, it was then. Pounding the charming scoundrel into the floorboards sounded like a fine idea.

But there’d be no point. The game had already been played. And the sight of his destroying Hank would only scare Emma. Mad at her or not, he still couldn’t do that.

“Fool me twice…” he whispered. Slowly, he returned to the hotel room and lay down in the darkness. A man could only take so much before his heart gave out.

He felt as though he could die.

In the morning, Bill decided he would go to the livery and get Orion and begin the long ride back to the drive. He’d continue up to Abilene and finish the drive and head home with his pa and Appie and the boys. He’d go back to working himself to the bone on the ranch, and sitting in his chair at night alone.

Alone.

For a while, he’d thought he was done being alone.

Maybe there was another woman in the world who could lighten his heart the way Greta, and then Emma, had. He wouldn’t bet on it. He stared at the ceiling and wished he was staring at the stars shining above. Emma returned after a while. She sneaked quietly back into the room. She dropped her jacket, revealing her underthings in the dark of the room. Bill pretended to sleep. She curled up against him, draping an arm over his side. Her touch was gentle and sweet, but all it made him feel was cheated.

This would be the last night he would ever touch her.

CHAPTER

THIRTY-ONE

Emma

The cool sheets of the bed enclosed Emma as first light came through the open window. Already she could hear New Orleans at work, and the early June warmth breezed across her sin.

Bill. I love you. Will you still have me as your wife?

If your offer still stands, Mr. McKenzie, I’d be delighted to be your wife.

Saints alive, Bill. Of course I’ll marry you.

She ran over the different ways to say what she was dying to say. What way would be the prettiest, the most memorable, the most true? She would roll over and curl into him. Then she’d rise and bring her lips to his, waking him softly, and she’d say yes.

Perhaps they’d have beignets for breakfast. Powdered sugar and sweet wishes. It would be a beautiful way to start a beautiful life.

She rolled over, ready to begin.

He wasn’t there.

Emma sat up with a start. The blankets were flat where there should have been another person. Looking around the room, she saw that Bill’s clothes were gone from where they’d been draped over a chair last night. His bedroll had been left abandoned on the dresser when he’d taken to sleeping in the four-poster bed with her. It was also gone.

Where in the world would he have gone?

If he’d simply stepped out to, say, find something to bring back for breakfast, why would he have taken his bedroll?

He hadn’t just gone after breakfast. Emma felt her stomach turn in realization.

He’d run out. She’d made him run out.

Her first thought was to march herself back to the Magnolia Crow, to Hank, to demand her money and for him to secure her divorce immediately. She’d figure out what to do and where to go. Where would she go?

Laredo—no, not Laredo.

Cricket Bend—good heavens, no, not there.

Without Bill, no place would ever feel like home. Every moment she delayed, he was getting farther away from her, and closer back to the drive, where he belonged.

It was where she belonged too. And it was slipping away with each tick of the clock.

There was a knock on the door. She jumped from the bed, threw on a dressing gown, and answered it. The hotel manager stood there.

“Mrs. Forest,” he greeted. “Sorry to have disturbed you—”

“You didn’t,” she said.

He held out an envelope to her. “A man dropped this off for you.”

Emma plucked it quickly from his hand. “Thank you, sir.”

“Ma’am.”

Hastily, Emma closed the door and tore open the thick envelope.

A legal-looking document was folded around a stack of bills. With a gasp, Emma realized she was holding both her money and her divorce papers.

“Bless your scoundrel heart, Hank Porter,” she exclaimed.

Everything she had sought was in her hand. Now that she had it, she could go anywhere. If only she could find Bill.

She dove for the wardrobe. There wasn’t much of a choice of what to wear—she only had two sets of clothes hanging inside.

The brown and white flowered dress, designed for a woman accustomed to finery who didn’t trifle with things like work, caught her eye first. It was so close to the blue dress she’d worn when she’d set out from Fort Worth all those weeks ago to find Hank.

Next to the dress hung her trail clothes.

Emma grabbed them. As she stepped into the pants, pulled on the blue shirt and the worn boots, she stared at the pretty dress. The woman who it was meant for lived an entirely different life than the one she was going to have, by God. Still, she rolled it up and tucked it in the bag she carried under her arm as she left the hotel room in a hurry. Letting such a lovely garment go seemed a waste.

In a rush, she made her way to the livery. What if he’d taken Maggie? She’d come to trust the mare nearly as much as Bill, and couldn’t imagine riding any other horse.

But she’d still go after Bill, Maggie or not. She’d figure it out—buy another horse, get a train ticket, if a train even went from New Orleans to Abilene. By train, she could beat the drive. That’d be a start. How surprised would they be if she was waiting when the boys and Josiah and Appie and the two thousand cows rolled into Abilene.

At most, Bill could be three or four hours ahead of her. Someone would know the best route for a man on horseback. Surely she could catch him.

When she arrived at the livery and made her way through the horses and saw the familiar horse, Emma nearly burst into tears. Bill had left Maggie for her. Orion was nowhere to be seen, but Maggie was still there. His anger at her didn’t go deep enough to leave her stranded.

She found her gear and saddled up, tucking the dress into her saddlebag. She rode out of the stables and on to the street, leaving town the way she and Bill had come. He couldn’t be so far ahead that he’d have gotten past the route through the wetlands.

“Go,” she whispered to Maggie as she reached an open stretch of trail. Leaning down, she patted the mare’s neck. “Go like the wind, pretty girl.”

CHAPTER

THIRTY-TWO

Bill

It would serve Emma right to wake up without him there. He’d woken all those times to find she’d sneaked off for some reason or another, and now it was his turn to take off in the darkness.

When he’d seen Maggie, he’d nearly stopped and turned back.

“Fool me twice,” he’d repeated to himself when he made the decision to keep moving.

Emma and Maggie were a team. No doubt neither one of them would find another partner that they worked so well with. He couldn’t bring himself to leave Emma with nothing in a city she didn’t know, regardless of his anger at his own stupidity.

So he’d left Maggie, pointed Orion toward the trail, and for the past four hours he’d been happy to let the horse do the work. He had enough to think about as he fought off a mean sadness which threatened to overwhelm him and leave him a puddle on the side of the road. The sadness was the kind that made a man do stupid things—drink too much, take to bed with a woman who meant nothing, run off and hide from those who loved him.

How could he return to the drive without her?

He certainly couldn’t go back with her—not after he’d seen her kissing her husband.

God damn cursed Hank Porter.

All his life, he’d wanted to feel the way he’d felt by Emma’s side. Like a fool, he’d gotten caught up in a web of lies and hadn’t noticed that the woman he’d kissed and lain with was the spider wrapping him tighter, in order to take what she needed from him. Folks like Emma, Hank Porter, and Andrew were spiders. Let them crawl around in their webs of deceit together.

Bill had been riding Orion in the direction of the drive for two hours. At least there he knew what he was doing, and what was expected of him.

He’d loved Greta, and he’d let her go.

He’d loved Emma, and clung to her for too long, and she’d lied. Countless times.

He reckoned love wasn’t worth the trouble. Looking around at the land that stretched out all around him, he thought maybe the earth was a good enough reason for living. A man needed a reason to get out of bed each morning. Maybe his was the earth.

When he glanced over his shoulder, he saw a rider.

It wasn’t of consequence. He was hardly the only man riding to get somewhere.

He went on riding and thinking.

When he looked back a few minutes later, he saw that the rider came fast, bent forward on their horse.

“Damn,” Bill muttered to himself. As if the events of the past days hadn’t been hard enough, now he faced the possibility of having to face off with a stranger.

And to think, this was supposed to have been a quiet spring. Just a regular drive, no different or any more unusual than any other.

Then he’d found a woman in the trees, and everything had started spinning.

He looked back at the rider again. They were moving fast, and getting closer.

“Damn,” he repeated, stopping Orion and turning the horse to face the rider. Just in case of trouble, he moved his gun to his lap. It was just as likely the rider aimed for him was lost or something, and the gun wouldn’t be needed.

As the rider came closer, the figure flipped back the hat and released a shock of red hair he would have known from a hundred miles away. It was Emma, and she was running Maggie toward him as fast as they could go. His stomach and heart leapt. How much pain could a man take in the name of love? At the hands of Emma Porter, the Sparrow, he had already suffered enough for two lifetimes.

“Bill!” she called with a desperation he could hear even over the distance between them and the pounding of horse hooves. When she came closer, she slowed Maggie and jumped off to the dirt. He saw the trail clothes under her jacket, and that her saddlebags were full. She’d come after him.

“You came after me?”

“Yes, Bill—”

He held up a hand. “Before you say another word—”

“Bill—”

“No. Before you say anything else, I have to know something. Did you mark me for a fool the second I found you in those woods? Was every single word you’ve ever said to me crafted to make me believe you loved me? Because I have had enough of secrets and lies for twenty men.”

From where he sat, still on Orion, he looked down at Emma. Knowing he could turn the horse and run from her at any minute helped with the hurt seeing her again caused him.

“This is not how I planned—”

“Damn your plans. I had plans too. We’ve messed up each other’s plans. That’s been established.”

“Marry me.”

In disbelief, he paused. “What?”

“Marry me, Bill.”

“You’re already married, remember? Or did Hank turn you down when you went to him last night?”

The lovely green eyes grew big. “That’s not what—”

Bill exploded. “I saw you. With your dress on the floor, kissing that son of a bitch.”

Emma didn’t back down. “And if you’d bothered to listen another second, you’d have seen the two of us squabbling as we always did.”

“I don’t know if you’re fooling with me.”

“I started out trying to fool you. I thought I could flirt with you, and it’d be a fun way to spend the days on the trail. You’re sweet, and you’re better-looking than just about any other man I’ve ever known, and it seemed like a good way to pass the time.”

“I’m flattered,” he said.

“Before I knew it, I was fooling myself. I am hard-trodden in love with you, Bill McKenzie. You and your hard life on the trail, and Appie and Ollie and Maggie and your rowdy brothers, and that terrible coffee you drink and your endlessly doing the right thing. I love you. I can’t help myself.”

The words pulled at his heart. He wanted to believe them. Standing in her trail clothes, every trace of finery stripped away, she looked like the woman he’d fallen in love with. The hopeful way she stared at him made him think she’d run away from the world with him if he asked.

She’d come after him—and in her trail clothes.

“Marry me, Bill,” Emma repeated. “I can barely cook. I don’t guarantee I’ll make you a good ranch wife.” Never had he seen her so worried. Any façade or bluster was long gone. Before him stood a woman determined to make her case as if she were pleading for her life. “I might just drive you crazy.”

“You already have,” he replied. “You drive me crazy just standing there. You have since the day I met you.”

Her worried expression cracked, and a small piece of a smile emerged.

“What about your husband?”

“He saw the error of his ways.”

“What did that cost you?”

“Nothing I cared about. I don’t mean an awful lot to Hank. Last night I realized that, other than my being angry at him for leaving me, he doesn’t mean anything to me anymore.” Emma took two steps forward, until she was close enough that she could have touched his leg. Her sun-kissed skin, her bright hair, her beautiful face—Bill took in all of the wonderful pieces that made up the woman standing before him, and the ice in his heart melted. “I don’t want a life with corsets and finery. I’ve done that, and it bored me near to death. I want this life, and I want it with you.”

He got off Orion. “I told you there may not be any more drives.”

“So, I’ll become a farmer’s wife. I don’t mind.”

“Who’s the lucky farmer?”

She hit him in the arm. It wasn’t a mean hit, and he caught her hand to hold it in his. Her skin had become a little rough over the weeks spent on the drive. The bit of roughness on the elegant, soft woman before him spoke volumes. Whatever her sins, she’d dove into hard work and had flourished.

She spoke more quietly. “I am sorry that I withheld the truth from you. I should have trusted you from the first minute I met you. You deserved that. I don’t know what I thought I would get out of coming after Hank, but…I wound up getting you. You’re a hundred times better than money. If we part right now, I do believe I will die.”

“What happened to your money?”

Emma patted her pocket. “My portion is right here. Along with a paper that makes me a free woman.”

“Emma—”

“I told him about Callie’s son. If he took my meaning, he’ll send the rest of the money to her.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“I won’t be surprised. But he’s different than he was. I think he’ll do the right thing. And that is the last time I ever want to talk about him for the rest of my life.”

“Hallelujah,” Bill answered. “And amen.”

“Now, being as I am a free and divorced woman, there’s something I have to ask you.” Emma took a small step back and dropped down to one knee on the dirt road. “Bill McKenzie, are you crazy enough to still want to marry me?”

The sight of her before him on bended knee made him laugh out loud. Bold, impossible Emma. Of course she was going to do things her way.

Was he crazy enough to say yes? The ways a man’s world could change completely over just a few months seemed endless. Things would be changing at the ranch when he got back home. He knew now that the drives were done forever, so the operation would need to adjust. Life at the ranch without Andrew would change the McKenzie family again. Neither adjustment would be easy, but they’d get through.

Getting through anything would be better with Emma by his side. He imagined her in his house, in his rocking chair and in his bed. She’d fill up the space in his life that had been empty too long. Yes, she’d probably make him furious and cause troubles, but she’d also be there with her open arms and her sweet kisses.

She wanted to marry him.

Hell yes he was crazy enough to say yes.

“I reckon I’m the craziest man in the territory. I still want to marry you. And I reckon I will marry you. Especially since you asked me so nice.”

When he saw her watery eyes, and heard the small sob that came from her, he pulled her up to her feet. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulled her tight against his chest. Her hair smelled of the fancy soap from the hotel. The red strands filled his view as he buried his face in her hair. Neither of them were perfect, but together they could make a life worth celebrating. With his Emma by his side, he could face anything to come with hope in his heart.

The sky was the brightest blue he’d ever seen. A flock of birds soared past.

With the woman he loved in his arms, Bill felt alive.

“Can we go home?” Emma asked.

“Of course,” Bill answered.

The End