McKettrick's Choice (19 page)

T
HE CROW OF A ROOSTER
pulled Lorelei from the dark maze of her dreams, and she awakened with a gasp of relief. Slumber fell away from her mind in layers, like a series of loose garments, and she sat up, blinking. In the nightmare world, she'd been taken captive by a band of Comanches and tied to a stake to be burned, while ghostly monks danced around and around, laughing as the flames kindled at her feet.

She sat up, pressed both hands to her face, waiting while the images receded, tidelike.

Outside the window, chickadees twittered.

Voices rose through the floorboards, from the kitchen below, along with the aroma of strong coffee.

Lorelei threw back the covers and scrambled off the bed, hastily donning yesterday's clothes, which she'd shaken out the night before. As the first light of dawn crept into the room, she made out Melina's shape in the next bed, but there was no sign of Tillie or the baby.

She did what she could with her hair and rooted through her valise for tooth-powder, a brush and her bar of yellow soap. She would use the outhouse, a facility only marginally better than the chamber pot under
the bed, then perform her ablutions at the pump in the backyard. After a night of horrendous dreams, her head felt clouded, and she needed fresh air and cold well water to dispel the last of the shadows.

Holt was in the kitchen, seated at the table, with a steaming cup of hot coffee in front of him. He wore clean clothes, and there was a scrubbed look about him, too. His hair was still damp, and Lorelei felt an entirely unseemly urge to run her fingers through it.

She shifted her attention firmly to Tillie, who was stirring something at the stove. Pearl played at a safe distance, seated on a blanket on the floor.

“Good morning, Tillie,” she said, as merrily as she could, after escaping a horrible death at the hands of Comanches who had seemed all too real. She pretended Holt wasn't in the room. “Where's Heddy?”

“She's out gathering eggs,” Tillie answered. “I hope she hurries up, because this cornmeal mush is almost ready.”

Lorelei headed for the back door. Had her hand on the knob, ready to turn it, when Holt spoke.

“Did you sleep well, Miss Fellows?” he asked, lending a wry note to the words. He knew she wanted to get by without speaking to him, she thought, and he enjoyed thwarting her.

“Yes,” she said, without turning around. Drat it, the doorknob might as well have been greased; she couldn't seem to get a grip. “Did you?”

“Well enough,” he allowed.

She hadn't heard him come in the night before. Not that she'd been listening. “Good,” she answered, and wrenched on the door again.

His chair made a scraping sound as he pushed it back, and then he was behind her, reaching over her arm,
turning the knob with her hand still on it. He chuckled when she bolted through the opening.

It was embarrassing to walk down the path to the privy when she knew he was standing on the threshold, watching her, but she had no choice. She set her soap, toothbrush and powder on a block of wood near the outhouse door and dashed inside.

When she came out, Holt was still there, in the kitchen doorway, one shoulder braced against the frame while he sipped his coffee. She was careful not to look directly at him, but when she'd finished washing her hands and face and scrubbing her teeth at the pump, he hadn't moved.

“No privies on the trail,” he said, when she got to the bottom step.

Did he think that would send her scuttling back to San Antonio?

“Thank you, Mr. McKettrick,” she replied, “for pointing out a perfectly obvious fact.”

He chuckled again, stepped aside to let her through.

“What are you planning to do today?” he asked, as if they were on the best of terms and he had every right to know her comings and goings.

Lorelei helped herself to a mug and filled it from the coffeepot on the back of the stove. “I thought I'd visit some of the shops,” she said.

“In need of a flowered bonnet? Dancing shoes, maybe?”

Tillie slopped a scoop of cornmeal mush into a bowl and handed it to her. Lorelei nearly dropped it.

“My purchases are none of your business,” she told him, sitting down at the table with her breakfast. If she hadn't been half-starved, she'd have walked right out of that kitchen without a moment's hesitation.

“I reckon that would be true, if you weren't horning
in on my cattle drive,” Holt said. “Since you are, I feel called upon to remind you that the trail is no place for a lot of fripperies and geegaws from the mercantile.”

“I had deduced that on my own,” she said, drawing each word taut, and without looking up from her mush. It was delicious, swimming in fresh cream and generously laced with brown sugar. Before she was halfway through that serving, she wanted seconds, but she was damned if she would indulge the desire with Holt McKettrick watching every bite go into her mouth.

“Here's them eggs,” Heddy thundered happily, from the doorway, nearly startling Lorelei out of her skin.

“Everybody better eat up. You look peaky, the whole lot of you.”

Mercifully, Heddy's arrival shifted Holt's attention away from Lorelei. She wondered at the bereft feeling that gave her, right along with the relief of a worm let off a hook.

“You're the best cook in Texas, Heddy,” Holt said. The feckless charmer.

“And you're the biggest liar,” Heddy responded fondly.

“That mush won't be enough to hold you. Sit tight, and I'll fry up some ham to go with these eggs.”

Lorelei's greedy stomach rumbled, even as she filled it.

“No biscuits?” Holt teased.

Lorelei felt her ears heat up.

“If you want biscuits, I'll make you up a batch,” Heddy offered, bustling cheerfully around the kitchen.

“Did Tillie tell you she's stayin' on here? Her and little Pearl.”

“I think it's a good idea,” Holt said, with a nod in his voice. “Melina and Miss Fellows ought to do the same, it seems to me.”

Lorelei stood, carried her spoon and empty bowl briskly to the sink. If Holt decided to leave her behind, there wouldn't be much she could do about it, so she didn't say what she was thinking, though she had to bite her lower lip to keep the words back. She did meet his gaze, however, and she might have been glaring a little.

He started to say something, but John and the Captain came in from the barn just then, causing a stir. Through the open doorway, Lorelei saw Sorrowful lie down dejectedly at the foot of the steps.

When Heddy brought the aforementioned ham out of the pantry and set it on the table next to the stove, Lorelei snatched a scrap of fat from the side and took it out to the dog.

He ate it gratefully, and trotted after her when she made for the barn. She needed something to do while she waited for the shops to open, something that would keep her out of Holt's path, and giving Seesaw a good brushing was all she could think of on short notice.

She'd been at the task for perhaps twenty minutes when Mr. McKettrick showed up in the barn, where his gelding was stabled. Rafe came with him, gnawing on a huge ham and egg sandwich as he walked.

She tried to ignore them both, but Rafe was in a friendly mood, as usual, and he further softened her heart by giving Sorrowful a generous piece of ham.

“Morning, Miss Lorelei,” Rafe said.

Holt banged into his horse's stall without a word and reached for the saddle blanket draped over the top rail.

“Good morning, Rafe,” Lorelei said warmly, putting her brush aside and wiping her dusty hands down the legs of her trousers. She intended to change into the only dress she'd dared to bring along, given Holt's mandate
about the weight of the belongings she could carry—a practical calico—and pin up her hair before walking to the main part of town. She wasn't out to impress Rafe McKettrick
or
his brother, but she wished she'd taken a little more care with her appearance just the same.

Rafe gave Sorrowful a piece of bread crust. “Holt says you're going to the store,” he said, using his free hand to dig in one pants pocket. “I wonder if you'd mind choosing something for my wife and little girl. I don't believe I'm going to get the time.” He gave his brother a grudging look at this, and handed Lorelei a five-dollar gold piece. “Emmeline likes combs for her hair, and Georgia would probably favor a nice doll.” He frowned, perhaps remembering the burial of Tillie's china baby. “Better make it small, and all cloth.”

“I'd be happy to,” Lorelei said truthfully, and accepted his money.

“Get your horse saddled, Rafe,” Holt commanded gruffly. “We've got things to do.”

Rafe smiled and shook his head. “He's a contrary cuss, isn't he?” he asked, in a tone meant to carry across to the other stall.

“You won't get an argument from me,” Lorelei said sweetly.

“Not unless you say something sensible,” Holt threw in, leading his horse out of the barn into the heavy sunlight of another hot Texas day.

“I hope you don't think we're all like him,” Rafe said, with a grin. “Us McKettricks, I mean.”

“Rafe!” Holt yelled, from outside.

Rafe rolled his eyes, but he headed for Chief's stall and saddled him up.

Lorelei waited until they'd ridden out of Heddy's dooryard before she left Seesaw to nibble contently on his
hay and stepped outside his stall. Rafe's gold piece felt heavy in the pocket of her trousers; she wondered what the other McKettricks were like. Surely not as stubborn and stiff-necked as Holt.

Leaving the barn, she nearly collided with the Captain.

He smiled as he gripped her shoulders to steady her. “There's another poker game tonight,” he said. “Right after supper. You care to give me a chance to win back some of that money I lost at the mission?”

The reminder of the mission sent a chill trembling down Lorelei's spine—she didn't know which had been more unnerving, the Comanche visitors or the invisible monks—but she soon shook off the feeling. Best not to think about Comanches, with so much time on the trail still ahead, though she rather enjoyed puzzling over the padres.

She laughed. “I might be willing to put some of my winnings at risk,” she said. “Provided Heddy allows gambling in her establishment.”

“Heddy,” the Captain said pleasantly, “allows most everything, I suspect.”

Lorelei was distracted as Heddy came out of the kitchen door and set a pan of scraps on the step for Sorrowful. The dog shot across the yard like a streak of wildfire. “When I first met her,” Lorelei mused, “I thought she must be the meanest woman on earth.”

“Can't always count on a first impression,” the Captain replied, and now his voice was quiet.

Lorelei met the older man's eyes. “That's the second time I've felt as if there was a lot more behind what you say than just the words themselves. Is it my imagination, or are you trying to tell me something?”

The old Ranger sighed. “I reckon it would be better if I
waited for you to figure it out on your own,” he said, with some reluctance. “Now, I'd better get my horse saddled and ride. Holt gave me a list of errands as long as the barrel of a Colt .45.” With that, he walked on into the barn and left Lorelei standing there, wondering again.

Tillie, the baby and Heddy were in the kitchen when she went inside, but there was no sign of Melina. On the trail, she'd always risen with the rest of the party, and Lorelei was worried.

“That girl needs to rest,” Heddy said. Apparently, she'd read Lorelei's thoughts in her face. “It's a trial to a body, keeping up with a bunch of wranglers traveling through Indian country.”

Again, Lorelei felt a whisper of dread, and it had nothing to do with Melina's failure to come downstairs for breakfast. “I'd better take her something to eat,” she said.

“I've already done that,” Heddy told her. “Tillie-girl, knead that bread dough like you mean it. It won't rise any higher'n a flapjack if you don't.”

Tillie was a fine cook, but she didn't take offense at Heddy's instruction. In fact, she seemed to like it. “Yes, ma'am,” she said.

Upstairs, Lorelei opened the bedroom door quietly, in case Melina was sleeping, and was relieved to find her friend sitting in a rocking chair by the window, fully dressed. Her dark hair gleamed, freshly brushed, and she'd pinned it into a loose knot at the back of her neck.

She smiled at Lorelei's expression. “Don't fret about me,” she said. “I'm just being a lazybones while I can.”

Lorelei found her calico dress rolled up inside her valise, and shook it out. “Tillie and the baby are going
to stay here,” she said easily, “at least until we get back from Mexico. Maybe you should, too.”

“And leave you the only woman with all those men?” Melina asked, with a dismissive wave of one hand. “I couldn't do that.”

Lorelei studied her. “When is your baby due?”

“In a month, maybe two,” Melina replied, rocking placidly. She looked toward the window and sighed. “I do like being in a real house, with curtains on the windows and quilts on the beds. If I lived in a place like this, I don't believe I'd ever step outside the front door.”

Lorelei forgot her dress and sat down on the edge of one of the beds, both of which had been neatly made. She couldn't help thinking of her father's fine home in San Antonio, and all the luxuries she'd taken for granted. She didn't regret leaving, but she wished she'd been more grateful, if not to the judge, then to a kindly fate for favoring her with things other women only dreamed about.

“You'll have a place someday, Melina,” she said softly. Her throat tightened, and her eyes burned, but she took her emotions firmly in hand. “You and Gabe and the baby.” The moment she'd spoken, Lorelei could have swallowed her tongue. Gabe was going to hang in less than a month, and Melina and the child would be alone in the world. It was a bleak thought.