Twice Blessed (28 page)

Noah had none. When he had taken Belinda and left Chicago, he knew what the cost of the precipitous action could be. He had been willing to risk it … then. Belinda had meant no more to him then than the sole legacy his brother had left. Even more importantly—then—Noah had been determined that no Gilson would ever possess a splinter of the Sawyer family's business. In the years since, the company had become secondary, for he had come to love the little girl who considered him her father. And she was his daughter now, too.

Gilson would not have her.

Throwing open the door of the telegraph office, Noah saw no one was inside. He looked back at the sheriff, who leaned against one wall of the train station. As Lewis drew out a bag of chewing tobacco and stuffed some into one cheek, Noah knew Emma had been right when she told him the sheriff took his job seriously.

Seriously enough to hang Noah? That was a question he was not in a hurry to get an answer for. What he was in a hurry for was to send this telegram.

“Kenny!” he shouted.

The back door opened, and the telegraph operator peered out, one hand holding his unbuttoned trousers closed. Frowning, Kenny asked, “What is it? I heard you in the outhouse.”

“I need to send a telegraph. It's an emergency.”

Kenny buttoned up his trousers as he came into the office. “An emergency? What sort of an emergency?”

“You'll hear.” Waiting for the young man to take his seat behind the low wall, Noah clasped his hands behind him as he paced the two steps in either direction across the small room. “Ready?” he asked, pausing.

“Go ahead, Noah,” Kenny said, his finger just above the key that would send the message.

“This is to go to Chicago.”

“To Montgomery Ward & Company, right?”

He shook his head. “That's Emma's business. This is my business today. Send the message to Ronald Sawyer, Lincoln Park, Chicago, Illinois.” He took a deep breath, then said, “Gilson found us. Been arrested.”

“Arrested?” Kenny gasped, even as he continued to send the message.

Noah did not pause. “Send lawyer. Need to keep Belinda out of Gilson's hands.” He smiled as he added, “Got married yesterday. Sign it with my name.”

“What in the blazes is going on?” the telegraph operator asked as he sent the end of the message. “Who got arrested?”

“Me.”

“You? You're joshing me.”

“I'm afraid not.” Noah continued to smile as he hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Just ask Sheriff Parker.”

Kenny's eyes grew wide, but before he could ask another question, the telegraph began clicking. He grabbed a piece of paper and began to write furiously.

Noah walked out of the telegraph office. When he saw that the sheriff was asleep, tobacco juice dripping along his chin, he considered leaving the man there to rest. That might give the wrong impression, and he needed every good impression he could get right now.

Shaking the sheriff awake, he said, “I'm heading back to Emma's house, Lewis. Why don't you go and get some sleep?”

Lewis stumbled to his feet. Spitting out the tobacco, he mumbled, “Can't. Not until I get someone to watch over you.”

“Alice Underhill is right across the street. She can watch to make sure I keep my promise to stay around Haven until this gets all straightened out.”

“Alice?” His eyes grew as round as Kenny's had. “She's a woman!”

“So I've noticed.” Noah chuckled, but put his arm under the sheriff's to help guide the man up the street. “I'll send Sean to her house to get her, and you can sleep on the sofa in Emma's parlor.”

“I need to do my duty.” The sheriff's exhausted voice was slurred and his steps so unsteady that anyone watching them would think Noah was helping a drunken Lewis Parker up the street.

Noah did not slow as he passed the store. Emma would send for him if she needed him. Tonight, he would hold her and let himself lose all his anxiety in the depths of her sweet passion once more. If not for her love … he sighed. He did not want to think of that. Her love was the one thing that Gilson could not poison, and Noah would make sure his enemy never would.

“It's all a horrible mistake.” Emma was sure she had repeated those words a thousand times by the time she got ready to close the store that Saturday afternoon.

As soon as people had seen that Delancy's General Store was open for business, they had poured through the door like a freshet. Somehow, with a speed astonishing even for gossip in Haven, the story of Noah being arrested on his wedding night reached every ear in town. Now the day was over, and she could close the store and go home and learn if Noah had heard back from his surviving brother in Chicago.

She sneezed as she swept the back corner of the store. This had become Sean's job, but she had told him to take the day to play with Belinda in the yard behind the house. He had given her a baffled frown when she asked him not to go out on the green today. For as long as she could, she wanted to protect the children from the horror hovering over them like a malignant shadow.

Sweeping the dust and dirt—much more than usual, because of the many people who had come in and out today—toward the front door, Emma paused when a man walked across the porch and through the door. He was dressed with an elegance that was completely out of place in Haven. She froze and stared when she realized she had seen such a fancy outfit before—twice before. Noah had worn such clothes to the Smiths' wedding and to their own yesterday.

This man's suit was dark brown, almost the very shade of his hair and the thick mustache that seemed to explode from beneath his nose to cover both his upper and lower lips. When he walked toward her, she saw he also held in his gloved hand a cane with a carved ivory handle and what appeared to be a gold tip. Every inch of him announced he was very rich and wanted everyone to know that.

She said nothing as he glanced around the store, the hint of a condescending smile curving along the outer edges of his mustache. Usually she would have bristled like a frightened woodchuck if someone had looked down their overly long nose at her store, but some sense—the same sort of survival instinct that had guided her to Haven—warned her to wait and see what this dandy wanted.

“I would like to speak with Mr. Delancy,” the man said without the courtesy of a “good afternoon.”

She would be more polite. “Good afternoon, sir. There is no
Mister
Delancy. I run the store.”

“Is it Miss or Mrs. Delancy?”

She did not hesitate as she answered, “Folks around here just call me Emma.”

“How very informal of you! I guess that's one of the interesting parts of life in the country.”

“I guess so.” She kept her broom between them. She did not like the way this man eyed her up and down as if she were just another piece of the merchandise for sale.

A nagging suspicion in the back of her mind grew louder. The fancy clothes, the even fancier carriage she could see parked in front of the store with a driver waiting patiently, the man's arrogant expectation that she would welcome his salacious stare … she prayed she was wrong.

“How may I help you, sir?” she asked when he continued to ogle her. “I trust it won't take long. I don't want to seem inhospitable, but I'm ready to close the store.”

“I will not keep you long …
Emma
.” His smile was warm, but his eyes remained calculating. “I have a single—and hopefully simple—request.”

Now she really wanted to stiffen with fury at his tone, which suggested anything more complicated than the most elementary task might be beyond her country bumpkin comprehension. She could not keep her irritation from chilling her voice as she asked, “What request?”

“Can you give me directions to Noah Sawyer's farm?”

She did not react, for she had expected this very question. “Of course, mister …”

“Gilson. Laird Gilson.” He bowed slightly toward her as if they stood in a ballroom instead of her store.

Even though she had already guessed this
must
be the man who wanted to ruin Belinda's life as Miles had ruined hers, she could not halt the icy river of disgust racing down her back. She wanted to take her broom and bat him over the head with it while she demanded how he could try to destroy a little girl's happiness simply to get a share of a successful furniture factory.

As he straightened, he said, “A man who used to live in Haven suggested I should stop here to get directions.”

“A man who used to live in Haven?”

“Mr. Baker.”

She had not anticipated
this
. When she bought the store, she had endured Mr. Baker's odd ways and his whining about being penniless. Then he had left Haven. Somehow, he must have met Laird Gilson and revealed that Noah and Belinda were here. But how? She could not understand how this had happened.

“Emma?” asked Gilson. “I'd like those directions now.”

She clasped the broom tightly as she said in the most pleasant tone she could manage, “Ah, Mr. Gilson, giving you those directions is very simple. Noah Sawyer's farm is outside Haven. Take the road past the school and keep going until you get to a ruined bridge. Then turn away from the river and follow the creek until you come to another bridge. Cross that and drive back down to the road that would have connected across the ruined bridge. His farm is not far from there.”

“That sounds like a roundabout trip.”

“It's the quickest way since the bridge was washed away earlier this spring.” She must continue to be honest with him, because he had to trust her directions. If he asked anyone else in Haven, they would direct him to her house.

He tipped his hat to her again. “Thank you, Emma.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Gilson.”

Instead of leaving, he stepped forward and plucked one of her hands off the broom. He bent over it and pressed his mouth to it. She yanked it away, putting it behind her to wipe the moisture on her skirt.

“I've heard how shy country misses are,” he said with a smile.

“We simply know to mind our manners.”

He laughed, but the sound was as cold as the shiver that ran its frigid finger down her back again. “Clever as well as pretty, I see. Would you join me at the Haven Hotel for dinner this evening, Emma?”

“The hotel has no public dining room.”

“I know.”

It was so tempting to think of slapping his face to wipe that superior smile off it. Instead she said coolly, “I believe you have mistaken my store for another sort of business establishment, Mr. Gilson.” She walked past him and put her hand on the door. “Good afternoon.”

He tugged on the top of one glove, cleared his throat, and nodded toward her as he left her store. Her hope that she had persuaded him to treat her properly vanished when he turned and said, “I trust we shall speak again, Emma, soon. Very soon.”

She did not answer. Closing the door, she quickly locked it. Her name was called, and she whirled with a gasp.

Noah put his hands out to steady her. “Calm down, sweetheart.”

“
He
was just here.” She pulled him back away from the door. “Don't let him see you.”

“Gilson?”

“Yes! How did you know?”

His smile was even icier than Gilson's. “I saw the carriage come into town. I came through the barn and the storage room and got here just in time to hear you tell him to get out and to see his lecherous looks at you. Are you all right?”

“As long as I don't have to talk to him alone again. He makes me feel as if a whole mound of ants are creeping across my skin.”

“Gilson does seem to have that effect on many women who aren't interested in his money.” He took her hand. “Let's get back to the house. Poor Lewis is going to think I have tried to give him the slip.”

“Lewis?”

“He's still napping on your sofa.” He chuckled. “He refused to let Alice Underhill be my guard because she's a woman, so he watched over me until he fell sound asleep about four hours ago.” He glanced out the window. “What did Gilson want?”

“Directions to your farm. He's on his way out to there now. That gives us some time to find out how and why Mr. Baker contacted him.”

“Baker?” He looked toward the stairwell door.

“That's what he said.” She released his hand and threw open the door to the dim stairwell. Gathering up her skirts, she climbed the stairs that twisted up to another door at the top.

She opened it. Her nose wrinkled as she smelled something that had gone bad. She would have to find it and get rid of it before the odor seeped down into the store. She opened both windows at the front of the main room.

Papers crunched under feet as she went to peer into the other room, a bedroom which reeked even more than the main room. Holding her breath, she sprinted across the room and pushed up the window. Fresh air burst in, and she went back out into the front room.

“What a mess!” Noah said. He kicked yellowed newspapers aside.

“I had no idea he lived like this.”

“A single spark, and this could have burned your store to the ground.”

She nodded. “I will get it cleaned up … after.”

“A good idea.”

“If—” She gave a soft cry as the breeze slammed the door shut.

Noah chuckled as he brushed her lips with his. “Don't be so jumpy, sweetheart. You need every bit of your wits about you now Gilson has arrived.” He reached to open the stairwell door. “What's this?”

Emma stepped over the scattered papers as he ripped down one that had been nailed to the door. When he swore under his breath, then more loudly, she took the page he held out to her. She choked as she read the faded page that had the words
Wanted
in huge letters across the top. Beneath those letters were a description that fit Noah perfectly and described Belinda as she must have been when she was a baby. A reward of a thousand dollars was offered for information leading to the arrest of Noah and the return of Belinda to her uncle.