Chapter Sixteen
Belle
Belle held a cloth soaked in cold water to Beau’s swollen eye.
She’d wedged herself between his thighs as he sat on the examining table so she could assess him.
He had his hands on her hips, which was a little distracting, but the doctor in her overruled how good it felt, and also, how fantastic he smelled.
Like sandalwood, which was new. She’d gotten used to smelling her shampoo on him.
She lifted the cloth. The eye socket was fine, and no harm had been done to the oculus. His cheek had absorbed most of the blow. She checked his knuckles. No damage, so he hadn’t put up a fight.
She had a good idea of how things had played out. “Tell me again how you ran into a door in the dark,” she said.
“I was minding my own business, on my way to see you, when pow.”
“Minding your own business seems out of character.”
He grinned at her. “I know, right? A black eye is going to make me look tough, though. Perfect for a box herder.”
He sounded so proud she wanted to punch him herself. “May I ask why the door took exception to you?”
“That’s between me and the door.”
Belle passed the damp cloth to him. “Hold this on your eye.” She exhaled a soft sigh. “Why do you keep annoying him?”
Beau shrugged. “Genetics, I think. My mom can get on people’s nerves, too.”
Belle rarely asked people personal questions, mostly because she didn’t want them asking personal questions of her. But Beau knew the worst about her family, so now she was free to be curious about his. “You have a mother, two sisters, and an ex-wife. No brothers? What about your father?”
“No brothers, and my dad died when I was a baby. Some sort of forklift accident at work. We lived on the insurance, which wasn’t a whole lot. Mom never talked too much about it. She’s more about looking forward.”
“She made sure you had music lessons, though.”
“Yeah. For the most part, my mom’s pretty great. So are my sisters. Money has made them all a little crazy, but they’ll settle down.”
She loved the way he smiled when he talked about them, even if she might be a teensy bit jealous that her family didn’t spark the same reaction in her. “You’re lucky.”
“You’d think.” Beau one-arm hugged her around her waist. “Turns out Burning Scrub has been a nice little break.”
It had been a nice little break for her, too, but it was almost over, and there was no point in dwelling on it because she didn’t like feeling sad. Or anxious. She was more of a people pleaser, and it was a hard habit to break.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” she said, “and maybe making script changes isn’t such a good idea after all.”
“Don’t chicken out on me now,” Beau said.
“It’s just that…”
She tried to sort out her feelings so she could explain.
She’d liked Benny and Mavis before, but that was when they’d been her employers—people she’d get to know for a few years until she moved on, the same as everyone else she’d ever known in her life.
Now that she knew they were also her family, didn’t she owe them loyalty and a certain amount of respect? How did that work?
Shanda, however, was where the real conflict came in. Belle didn’t like her at all, but she was her mother.
“Just nothing,” Beau said.
He set the cloth down and pressed her cheeks with his palms, studying her face. Close up, his swollen eye looked really painful. It was shiny and red, and in a day or so, would become a spectacular purple. She’d have to give him something for it so he could sleep.
“It’s not about revenge, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said.
“It’s about standing up for yourself. Playing the part you choose for yourself changes nothing important about the sheik’s adventure.
If anything, it’s going to add some excitement.
Dave can still kidnap you. The sheik can still ride to your rescue.
As long as he has a good client experience, no one can complain. You can do this.”
That was easy for him to say. He thrived on risk. Not even a black eye could dissuade him.
“How’s my song coming along?” she asked, since they were being supportive.
“Don’t worry. You’ll get your song.” He kissed her and jumped off the table, then took her hand in his. “Want to try out your new role on me? How much is the going rate in the nineteenth century, anyway? I think I might have a buck on me somewhere.”
*
Belle
Beau left as soon as the warm glow of the rising sun touched the tops of the trees outside Belle’s bedroom window. She stayed in bed for a few hours longer, but she couldn’t sleep. She was too busy trying to work up her nerve.
You can do this.
She dressed in the green corset and the cream-colored bloomers and sat on the front steps in what she hoped was a come-hither pose.
The undergarments covered a lot more than shorts and a tank top, so by twenty-first-century standards, there was nothing shocking about them, even if the corset alterations Pearl made did prop up her breasts higher than expected.
The message her outfit sent was what was important.
She hiked up one leg of her bloomers and settled in to wait for word of her new role to spread.
She didn’t have to wait long. Everyone was anxious to set eyes on the new sheriff, so they’d found reasons to be in town for the morning.
The Johnsons were the first to stroll by. An older couple in their mid-fifties, their two adult sons had moved away from Burning Scrub and joined the navy so they could see the world. The Johnsons remained convinced they’d return once they got tired of exploring.
“Good morning, Belle,” Jonah Johnson said politely without looking directly at her. “Beautiful day.”
“Stunning,” Belle said, smiling brightly.
The couple continued on their way, but they looked very confused. Noelle Johnson kept looking over her shoulder.
Several more people walked by. Two rode through on horseback.
Another fifteen minutes passed before Belle’s costume achieved the desired results.
Her mother strode down the street toward Belle in her pretty red dress and a fashionable red-feathered hat.
She looked very elegant. And irritated, Belle noted.
Beau trailed behind her, no doubt contemplating whose side he should take if a catfight broke out.
The swelling around his eye hadn’t come down, and the medial commissure had turned almost black.
“What are you doing?” Shanda said, pleasantly enough, although there was a hard edge to the set of her mouth and her word choice spoke volumes. If she was trying to project parental concern, she’d missed the mark.
Rage, hot and unexpected, swelled inside Belle.
She grew light-headed from the sudden shift in blood pressure.
Light-headed and bold. She didn’t want this woman to ever think—not for one single second—that she had any sort of right to tell the daughter she’d abandoned at birth what she could or could not do.
“I’m enjoying the sun.” She stretched her arms over her head and prayed nothing fell out of the corset, which hadn’t been made for containment. “Winter starts early in the mountains.”
Beau’s attention latched on to her breasts. A smile flashed across his face and was gone, but not before Belle had seen it. It added to her burst of courage.
Several more passersby slowed.
“I’m familiar with the climate,” Shanda said. “Maybe it’s best for you to move somewhere warmer, since this one disagrees with you.” She placed a hand on Beau’s arm.
If she thought that gesture would annoy Belle, she was mistaken. One of the best things about him was that he was loyal.
Benny wobbled into view. He wore a brown sack suit and carried a cane. He puffed from the energy expended doing his version of running, but his heart was healthy so the exercise would do him some good.
“Doctor Belle,” he wheezed. “Don’t you have a clinic to run?”
“I’ve had to give up practicing medicine.
” She smiled brightly. “We need money to pay our bills, not the bread and eggs my patients pay me. My husband doesn’t bring in enough from his work in the mines.
The bank has threatened to foreclose on our house, so I’ve had to open a second and more lucrative business. ”
“I’ll talk to the bank manager. We’ll work something out,” Benny said tightly. “Get inside and get some decent clothes on.”
“I’m as decently clothed as she is,” Belle said, indicating her mother, whose dress barely covered her knees. Its bodice exposed more flesh than Belle’s corset, too—although granted, its construction wasn’t as flimsy.
Benny brandished his cane. “You’re a respectable woman. She’s not.”
A decent-sized crowd had gathered by now.
Belle knew most of them from church, but other than that, she had no more than a passing acquaintance with them, even after the better part of a year.
Burning Scrub had about as much use for a doctor as it did a tax collector.
Four more years of her medical degree, going to waste. One more source of frustrated anger.
Pearl and Grady had arrived while Benny was speaking. Pearl wore her best Sunday bonnet above an expression of horror. They were followed by two men on horseback. One was Adam. The other, the new sheriff.
He’d chosen the name Wyatt Earp for himself, although he and the original had very little in common.
The new sheriff was a slender man in his early forties, around average height, with warm-toned skin, brown eyes, and black hair.
He appeared calm and relaxed, as if this were an everyday occurrence for him, and he sat his horse as if born in a saddle.
Adam liked him, Belle could already tell.
He hung back and allowed him to take the lead.
Sheriff Earp didn’t dismount but held his horse steady and leaned on the saddle horn as if about to engage in pleasant conversation. He’d want the advantage of higher ground while exerting authority. Smart.
“What seems to be the problem?” he asked.
His accent was British, no doubt thanks to his education at Eton, and he scanned the crowd as he spoke, missing nothing.
“No problem, Sheriff,” Benny said. “The doctor locked herself out of her house. But the door’s open now, and she was about to go inside.”
Belle didn’t move.
Sheriff Earp’s gaze skimmed over her, then Shanda, before settling on Beau and his glaring black eye. “What happened to you?”
Beau touched his cheekbone with his thumb. “Rowdy customer. Hazard of my profession.”
“Why don’t you tell me what’s going on here,” the sheriff said to him, which clearly annoyed Benny, because as mayor, he’d positioned himself to be in charge.
Now that the attention was off Belle, however, she could relax. Beau thrived on it, and she was happy to let him take over.
“We have two businesswomen discussing how they’re going to handle competing operations,” Beau said.
Shanda took exception to that. “There’s no competition.
” The look she shot Belle was that of a duchess dismissing a peasant.
“I cast this harlot out of my saloon because she was too forward with the clients. I run a discreet business that caters to the elite. Now she thinks she can set up a house on her own.”
That raised the sheriff’s eyebrows an inch. “How can a harlot be too forward?”
“Fortunately,” Benny interrupted, obviously hoping to salvage what remained of the original script. “The young lady has medical training and serves as our doctor, because the town isn’t big enough for two henhouses.”
The spotlight was on Belle again. She wasn’t entirely comfortable with it.
She’d asked for this, however, and it was too late to quit.
She said the first thing that popped into her head. “I like working in henhouses. Women have urges, too.”
Beau coughed into his fist.
“Which businesswoman do you work for?” Sheriff Earp asked him, proving he’d studied his script and correctly interpreted what part Beau played in it.
Beau touched Shanda’s arm. “This lovely lady right here writes my paycheck.” Then, because he’d learned nothing about the dangers of provoking Adam from last night, he winked at the sheriff and added, “The other lovely lady’s a hobby.”
Adam’s face gave nothing away. Belle worried Benny might have a stroke.
The sheriff’s lips twitched. “Prostitution is legal in the Territories,” he said to Shanda. “There’s nothing to stop another woman from starting her own business.”
Shanda had her gracious smile down to a fine art. She must not have gotten to the part in the script that stated she and the sheriff weren’t on good terms. Either that, or she chose to ignore it. The sheriff was an attractive man, after all.
Belle had a thought. He was an obscenely wealthy one, too, and the timing of Shanda’s arrival couldn’t be better. Why settle for fifty thousand dollars when there was a whole lot more to be had?
“You’re right, Sheriff,” Shanda said. “Competition is good for a healthy economy. A little competition between two sisters is perfectly normal, as well.”
“Sisters, hmm?” Sheriff Earp took a closer look, noting the similarities in their appearances.
Belle hadn’t gotten used to those similarities yet.
“That’s what Mother insists she and I tell people,” she said, channeling Beau’s ability to go for weak spots.
“She claims it’s better for business if men don’t know she’s old.
” She adjusted the corset, which was digging into her armpits. “Her business, maybe. Not mine.”
Adam finally stepped in to move the script’s timeline along.
“Now that Sheriff Earp has the harlot situation sorted out, Beau, why don’t you escort Miss Shanda to her establishment?
” He gave Belle the hard stare he normally reserved for Beau and the stray deer that wandered into town and ate everyone’s flowers.
“You. Take your new business venture inside.”
If the sheriff found anything off about the start to his adventure, he didn’t let on. He tipped his hat to Shanda, and Belle, then the spellbound onlookers. “Have a nice day, ladies and gentlemen.”