Chapter 37 #2
She took a deep breath, glaring at him and ready to go at it one more time. Then she paused. “No. You’re correct. We are done with that conversation.”
“Good, cuz you ain’t in New York no more.”
“I definitely am not.”
“But you’ll be able to return to the safety of that life soon enough. And then you can just forget about everything that happened here.”
She looked at him like he’d just told her she could fly to the moon. “The dangers in New York are different from what you face here, but the city is no safer than the frontier.”
“I can’t say nothing about that, but I’d wager you’re better protected there.”
“One can build a fortress to live in anywhere, Marlowe, but that is not the life I’m looking for. In fact, you should know, I’m not going back. I’m staying in Elkhorn.”
She blurted out the last words, and Caleb watched her full lips thin and the furrows deepen in her forehead. Her chin jutted slightly, and she looked ready to fight this out.
Caleb wasn’t the one to fight with, however. “Talked to your father about it?”
“Not yet.” Her features softened, and she looked for a moment like a lost child. “You’re his friend. You probably know him better than I do. Do you think he’ll object to me staying?”
Caleb knew nothing about father-daughter relationships, but this woman was looking pretty damn vulnerable right now. When it came right down to it, though, Doc was his friend. Who was Caleb to say anything about his daughter’s future? Hell, he and Sheila were closer in age than he’d like to admit.
Still, he knew he’d object if she were his daughter.
No matter what she thought, frontier life was hard and dangerous, especially for women.
That is, women who weren’t raised to it.
This past week was proof of it. She survived the perils she faced, but she’d also been lucky.
He’d face a hungry grizzly before he’d say that to her, though.
“I’m sure Doc only wants what’s best for you.”
“And who’s to know what’s best for me?” The fighter was back. “My father? My grandfather in New York? You?”
“Don’t come at me with your claws out. You asked a question. I answered.”
“Is that so? How old were you when you left your parents’ home?”
“We ain’t talking about me.” Her question took him by surprise. “But I see what you’re doing.”
“What am I doing?”
“You want someone so you can practice the argument you know you’re gonna have with your father.” He shook his head. “Sorry, Miss Burnett. I’m the wrong person for it.”
“I think you’re the right person for it.” She was not quitting.
“And why is that?”
“Because you’re a man. The only man out here that I can talk to about this before I speak to my father.”
“Go practice on Lucas.”
“What does he know about my father? Or me?” She made a face that said she was appalled he would even suggest such a thing.
“Well, it don’t set well with me, Doc being my fr—”
“He needs me.” She was going to have this conversation with him.
Period. “I lost my mother at the age of nine. Since then, my father has been alone. Don’t you agree that I should come and live with him now that I’m a grown woman?
He’s not married. He has no one to look after him, and I’m his only daughter. It’s my duty!”
The only way to avoid getting dragged into this was for Caleb to pick her up and throw her off this ledge. And she’d still be jawing at him all the way down.
He took a deep breath. “Miss Burnett, are you doing this for him or for you?”
“For both of us.”
He held her gaze. “For him, or for you?”
She paused before answering. When she did, her voice was no more than a whisper. “For me. I need to stay. I can’t go back to New York. The life I had there ended when I left.”
Caleb was surprised by her reply and—he hated to admit it—curious what had happened in New York. But that was none of his business, he told himself.
The admission sat between them, soft and honest and more dangerous than any argument she could have offered. She wasn’t playing at frontier adventure. She was searching for a place to begin again. Caleb knew more than a little about that.
“You tell Doc that, Sheila. He’ll want to know why, but you’ll see. It’ll all turn out fine.”
The smile on her face blossomed like a morning glory on a summer day. “You think so?”
Caleb knew he ought to keep his hands to himself, but his fingers seemed to have a will of their own. He reached out and brushed the smudge of dirt from her cheek. Her skin was soft beneath his thumb, soft enough to make a man forget himself entirely.
Her eyes opened wide, and suddenly his breath caught hard in his chest.
For one dangerous moment, the whole mountain seemed to fall silent.
No wind through the trees. No foxes crying in the distance.
No far-off howl of wolves. There was only the warmth of her skin beneath his hand and the startled, tender look in her eyes.
A look that made him wonder what might happen if he leaned the slightest bit closer.
“I do,” he said quietly, his voice rougher now than before. “Now get. You might want to have that conversation with your father sooner rather than later.”
Sheila jumped to her feet and disappeared into the darkness like a flash.
Caleb shook his head at the thoughts that had rushed into his mind. All he’d been doing was talking and admiring her smile and her skin and how damn pretty she was. And kissing her wasn’t the only thing he was thinking about.
“No,” he said out loud. A man would be a low-down dirty dog to mess around with his friend’s daughter. It just wasn’t done.
Not when she’d trusted him. Not when Doc trusted him. Not when every good thing in him ought to know better.
Damn it.
When he got back to town, the first thing he was gonna do was make a long-overdue visit to one of them girls at the Belle Saloon.
Except the thought sat wrong the moment it crossed his mind. Wrong in a way it never had before.
Hearing her coming back, Caleb turned to look at her.
He’d need to apologize. But before he could say a word, he froze.
It was Doc’s daughter, but she wasn’t alone.
The man behind her was young and big, and the smirk on his face was nothing if not nasty.
And the look in Sheila’s face told him exactly who the man was.
“Weren’t that touching? I damn near started bawling over here.”
Dodger was holding his pistol to Sheila’s temple and using her as shield.
“And I’m much obliged to you, Miss Burnett, for distracting Marlowe like you done.”
Caleb went cold inside. The kind of cold that cleared the mind and steadied the hand. Whatever happened next, Dodger had made the worst mistake of his life.