McCrory's Lady (19 page)

      
“Oh, dear, ladies, I hope you don't mind Miss Phibbs. She's a newspaper person,” Lucille Guessler said with a censorious tone.

      
Ed extended one big bony hand to Maggie for a fervent shake, then to Eden as their hostess made introductions. “Please, just call me Ed. My full name is Esmeralda Doucette Phibbs.” She rolled her eyes in a self-deprecating expression. “Now I ask you, do I look like an Esmeralda—or an Ed?” Her voice creaked high, then low with a peculiar rhythm.

      
Eden suppressed a chuckle. Maggie's instincts were to like the homely, unpretentious woman with the highly unlikely name and the calliope voice; but she was wary of any newspaper reporter who wanted to dig into her past—or what had happened to Eden. Then again, if she could get Ed Phibbs to do a favorable write-up, it might help Eden quell the storm of gossip flurrying about her.

      
“Ed it is then, if you'll call me Maggie.” She was rewarded by Ed's gummy smile.

      
“I'd like to do an interview with you, Maggie. You've just landed the most eligible bachelor in Arizona Territory. After his eluding the likes of the Widow Whittaker for over a year, that's news!”

      
Maggie laughed out loud. “I suppose we could work something out. We won't be leaving town until tomorrow afternoon when Colin arrives to escort us back to Crown Verde. How does ten a.m. at our hotel sound?”

      
Eden looked worried, but Maggie gave her arm a gentle squeeze of reassurance. At present, they needed every ally they could get. She prayed her judgment about Ed Phibbs was sound.

      
By the time they left
 
the Guesslers' later that afternoon, Maggie knew that Eden's nerves were frayed from smiling and pretending that everything was normal with gossip flying around her thick as snowflakes in a blizzard. Mariah and a number of her friends made a frosty, early departure, leaving Lucille's soiree in shambles as the remaining women broke into small nervous cliques, whispering and casting furtive glances at Eden and Maggie.

      
Maggie made their farewells and thanked the harried older woman, who had by this time almost reduced her linen handkerchief back to flax by wringing it so hard. Their carriage was brought around and they headed back toward the hotel.

      
“I told you it wouldn't work. I'm a pariah and I'll spoil your chances in Prescott society if I come to town with you and Father anymore,” Eden said quietly.

      
“That's absurd,” Maggie remonstrated sharply. “That Whittaker witch simply used you as a means to attack me. There will always be those who gossip. The good thing about their kind is that some new scandal comes along every few weeks, and they haven't the mental capacity to remember the last one after the next one occurs. It will blow over.” At Eden's look of disbelief, Maggie tried to think of something to divert the girl from what had certainly been a depressing afternoon.

      
As they neared the livery stable, Maggie had an idea. “Why don't we return the rig here and walk back to the hotel? It's only a few blocks, and I seem to recall a hat shop along the way.”

      
“I suppose that would be nice,” Eden replied without any great enthusiasm.

      
They meandered along Alarcon Street, browsing in the shop windows and watching the flow of people in the bustling capital. Teamsters cursed at mules plodding along, pulling their heavy wagons laden with everything from cook stoves to calico, while an Overland Stagecoach whizzed by in a flurry of dust. Men in rough range clothing rubbed elbows with nattily dressed legislators and various political functionaries. Here and there, pairs of well-dressed ladies strolled with parasols, while a few more humble sodbusters' wives dragged shaggy-haired, barefoot children behind them as they went about their monthly shopping trip in the big city.

      
Men tipped their hats and the farm women smiled shyly, but several of the well-groomed older women ignored them and whispered as they passed by on the opposite side of the street. A mixed reception at best. Then, as Maggie was pointing out a frilly parasol that would look lovely with one of Eden's day gowns, a reflection in the shop's polished glass window caused Eden to stiffen and freeze.

      
Maggie overheard the caustic clipped tone of the silver-haired woman and knew who she must be.

      
“She has some nerve showing her face in Prescott after the shameful way she's treated you.”

      
“Mamá, please,” a low male voice pleaded.

      
Maggie turned to get a look at the fabled Stanleys. The woman was the wicked queen straight out of Sleeping Beauty; and oddly enough, the young man with the earnest and embarrassed look on his face was pretty enough to be a fairy-tale prince with curly brown hair and dark eyes. But there was something missing. Backbone. Character.

      
Maggie surveyed mother and son with the cool, disdainful look she had spent years cultivating, raking them with glacial blue eyes. She willed Eden to turn and stare them down as well, and was rewarded when the younger woman met her former fiancé’s gaze with her chin uptilted. Edward crimsoned and firmly took his mother by the arm, attempting at once to tip his hat perfunctorily to Eden and Maggie while at the same time dragging Sophie away from an ugly confrontation.

      
Having made her point, the matriarch clutched her gray silk skirts and swished them when she turned away, as if from some offal that would contaminate her. After they disappeared down the street, Maggie could see Eden's resolve crumple, and the tears she had held at bay all afternoon finally welled up in her eyes.

      
She blinked them back as she said forlornly, “I was a fool to think Lazlo was exciting and Edward was dull. How could I have been so blind, Maggie?”

      
Maggie took her arm and they began to walk slowly toward the hotel. “It seems to me if Edward had been really all that wonderful and worthy of your love, your head wouldn't have been turned by Lazlo—or any other man. Marrying Stanley would've been a horrible mistake.”

      
They heard the commotion before they even turned the corner, the sounds of a dog screaming in pain, then the loud, grating curses of a drunken male voice.

      
A huge, burly miner with a wild yellow beard and bushy eyebrows glared murderously at Wolf Blake. Dressed in rough denims and a plaid flannel shirt, the man was half a head taller than his opponent, with shoulders broader than the handle of the pickax tied to his overloaded mule. The large reddish cur that cowered between them was whimpering piteously. Blood ran from one side of its mouth.

      
“Damn yew, yew red-skinned son of a bitch! It's my critter 'n I'll treat ‘em any which way I want. Filthy Apach eat dawgs—ya fixin ta steal ‘em fer yore cook pot, huh, breed?”

      
“I'm fixing to keep you from beating the poor animal to death, and I don't give a damn if he's your dog or the territorial governor's,” Wolf replied in a low voice gone deadly with anger. His black eyes shot sparks of killing rage.

      
“He wants that fool miner to draw his gun,” Eden said, amazed that the cool, deliberate Wolf Blake would intervene to save a dog.

      
“Maybe he identifies with the mongrel—it's an outcast without a pedigree just like he is,” Maggie replied, eyeing the miner. “The only problem for Wolf is that the miner isn't carrying a gun.” Before she could think of a way to defuse the confrontation, Eden rushed into the street and knelt between the men, cradling the injured animal's head on her lap and stroking it gently.

      
“There, there, it's all right.” She daubed at the bloody mouth. Several teeth were loosened, and a nasty gash, no doubt caused by the miner's heavy boot, split the side of his muzzle clear down to the gum line.

      
“You takin' up with this here breed, Miz McCrory?” the miner asked, leering nastily at her.

      
“Leave the lady out of this. Just take your mule and head out before there's trouble.” Wolf edged himself carefully between Eden and the irate giant.

      
“Aw, there's already trouble, yew murderin' Apach bastard.” The miner took a powerful swing at Blake but only grazed his cheek as the faster, slimmer man dodged the clumsy blow.

      
By this time Maggie had helped Eden drag the injured dog away from the fight as a crowd gathered and the usual bets were exchanged.

      
“I’ll put twenty on Willis.”

      
“Done. I think the breed kin take him.”

      
Blake landed several hard, fast jabs to the bigger man's face. The crowd warmed to the fight, most cheering for the miner, a few for the dog's rescuer, even if he was part Apache. For such a lithe, slim man, the half-breed was a wickedly effective street fighter who used speed and cool nerve to offset brute strength.

      
The contest was going in his favor until the miner staggered back against his pack mule and seized the long-handled pickax from his pack. At once Blake stopped closing and backed off a step as the bearded giant grinned evilly, revealing a mouthful of straight yellowed teeth.

      
“Now I got ya.” He swung the ax, and its gleaming point missed Blake by a scant inch.

      
Eden seized Maggie's arm in a viselike grip. “My God, we can't let him kill Wolf! Shoot him, Wolf!”

      
Maggie wished desperately that she had not decided to leave the .32 caliber Colt she usually carried back at the hotel. As the two men fought, her eyes darted to Eden.
I think she cares for Blake even if she doesn't know it yet.

      
Wolf knew that if a man with Apache blood killed a white man over a mutt in Arizona Territory, he was as good as hanged for murder—even if the dead man was swinging a pickax as if he'd just struck the mother lode. He let the bruiser take another swipe at him, then dodged in beneath the deadly arc of steel and tackled the miner to the ground.

      
After landing hard on top of the bigger man, Wolf seized the miners brawny wrist and wrested the pickax from his hand. He thrust the sturdy oak handle firmly down on his foe's windpipe and pressed hard, throwing his whole body weight atop the larger man to hold him as he choked and thrashed.

      
It was over in moments. The miner's face mottled pinkish red, then turned to a deep plum shade before he slipped into unconsciousness.

      
Wolf sent the ax sliding across the dusty street and stood up. He turned toward the two women as he picked up his hat, which had fallen into the street during the fight. “I always seem to be brawling around you, Miss Eden.” There was regret in his voice but no apology.

      
She met those fathomless black eyes and somehow could not look away until the dog emitted another low whimper. “It was very kind of you to stop him from abusing this poor fellow any further,” she said, resting one small soft hand on the shaggy fur soothingly. “He's badly hurt. Do you think we could carry him to the veterinarian's office? It's only a couple of blocks away.”

      
“I reckon I can manage him,” Wolf said, kneeling beside Eden. How small and fragile she was, as silvery and delicate as a moonbeam. He reached out to pick up the dog, and Eden gasped and took his dark hand in her pale one.

      
“You're hurt, too.” His hands were finely made with long, tapering fingers.
They could be the hands of a gentleman if not for his Indian coloring.
When she touched him, a frisson of heat leaped between them, shocking her with its raw sexual potency. “Just look at your knuckles,” she whispered breathlessly. Then their eyes met again.

      
“Always happens when you jab at a fellow twice your size,” Wolf said, trying to break the spell of her nearness. He wanted to feel the silk of her skin so badly he ached.

      
Maggie's voice interrupted them, wry with amusement. “Let Wolf carry the dog, Eden. You show him the way to that vet's. He's new to Prescott, just like me. If you two can manage, I think I'll retire to my room and let Lucille Guessler's petit fours digest for a bit. Wolf, you will see Eden safely back to the hotel, I trust?”

      
“I'll try to stay out of any more fights,” he replied as the two of them exchanged a look of understanding.

      
Flushing a delicate pink, Eden released Wolf's hand and stood up, dusting off her skirts, which were quite filthy from kneeling in the street. The crowd had trickled away by now and the two of them were left alone. “The vet's place is down the street and around the next corner. I hope Doc Watkins isn't off with some foaling mare.”

      
“Not at Crown Verde,” Wolf replied, carrying the dog as carefully as he could. “Colin sent me to escort you and Mrs. McCrory home in the morning.”

      
“And you just happened to stop to rescue this poor critter,” Eden said, a shy smile dimpling her cheeks. “I wouldn't have thought you the kind of man to be so soft-hearted.”

      
“Why?” he asked quietly. “Because I'm an Apache?”

      
“Maybe because you're just so prickly and mean-tempered,” she replied tartly, stung at his sudden inexplicable mood shift.
What did you expect of a gunman?
Then, she saw the gentle way he carried the heavy animal, careful of his injured leg. “But perhaps you're only mean to people...and kind to animals.”

      
“Animals return kindness for kindness. In my experience, Miss Eden, people usually don't,” he replied in a voice that hinted of long-buried pain.