Adams, Eve - The Banished Bride [Brides of Bachelor Bay 5] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (2 page)

“How dreadfully unfair! She’s nothing like me. I’d just as soon see her on the next boat out of Port Steele.”

“She’s family.”

“She’s horrid!”

“Amelia,” Lizzie warned in a low voice.

“But she makes me crazy, Lizzie, and I know she does you, too. When she’s around, not a single gaze swings my way. She’s old and shouldn’t be flirting like that. It’s pitiful. I, at least, have reason for the men’s attention.”

Lizzie sighed long and hard, and rubbed her temples with the tips of her fingers as she closed her eyes. “It isn’t always about you.”

“Of course it is.” As soon as she said it, she’d wished she hadn’t. Lizzie opened her eyes and glared, and Amelia swallowed down the rest of her words.

“I’m at my wit’s end with you, sister. You have got to start taking your obligations seriously.”

Amelia thrust out her chin. She answered to no one, contract or not. “And what if I choose not to honor my contract? What then?”

Lizzie’s jaw dropped as her eyes flashed a brilliant green. “Amelia Prescott, tell me you are not serious.”

Amelia spun on her stool to look Lizzie in the eye. “And what if I am? What if I wish not to marry at all?”

“You’d rather a life of loneliness?”

“As opposed to a life of servitude?”

“Is that what you think of my life? Do you think I am a servant to my husbands?”

It was no secret the relationship Lizzie had with both Logan and Gage Gallagher. Lizzie attempted to be discreet about it, but Amelia saw the way Gage looked at Lizzie, his eyes glazing over with love and lust, just as Logan’s did. And Lizzie, bless her wicked heart, returned both of her husbands’ looks with equal hunger.

And then there were the nights Amelia lay in her bed, the darkness filled with passionate moans and Lizzie crying out both of the men’s names.

She wanted that. So many of her dreams were filled with images of both Andrew and Noah in her bed, devoting all of their efforts on her pleasure. She knew Olivia had that with Jack and Aaron, as did Lizzie with Logan and Gage. Even her best friend, Patience Steele, had that with her husband, the town mayor, Adam Steele, and his brother, Raven.

Would she be allowed such happiness? Had she done anything on this earth that warranted her being granted such bliss? Just the thought had her core heating up, her nipples hard, and the tender flesh between her legs throbbing as blistering liquid coated her curls.

“Of course not.” If only she could find the kind of love Lizzie shared with both Logan and Gage. Lord knew she’d been searching long enough. She saw the way Lizzie’s two husbands looked at her. Logan and Gage Gallagher were absolutely and hopelessly in love with Elizabeth Gallagher. Amelia knew about how her sisters had both found husbands—as in plural. She wanted that as well and couldn’t imagine settling for just one.

If she settled at all.

But the entire town expected her to marry Andrew Gallagher, and truth be told, there were times he excited her, but they were few and far between. He did have the power to charm her right into a blush and at times she couldn’t resist his boyish charm, but she didn’t want a boy.

She wanted a man.

Amelia craved excitement. She wanted to know what it felt like to experience love that burned so hot it set her on fire. With safe, settled Andrew, she’d never get that.

With a huff, Amelia turned to the mirror and pinched at her cheeks.

“Pinch them again and you’ll draw blood.” Lizzie rose and stood behind her youngest sister, resting her hand on Amelia’s shoulder once she stopped behind her. “Talk to me. Is this about Andrew? You know as well as I do he was simply upset after what he’d heard. He didn’t mean it when he released you. When he returns from San Francisco, sit down with him and talk about it. I know he still wishes to marry you.”

She highly doubted that, not after the news he’d heard. Still, she couldn’t stand not knowing the reasons behind his release. She couldn’t stand not having his undivided attention.

Shaking her head, she said, “Andrew doesn’t know what he wants, but it obviously isn’t me.”

“Don’t fret. He’ll come around.”

“I don’t know if I still want him. In all honesty, I don’t know if I ever wanted that Gallagher.” Only that she didn’t want anyone else to have him.

Amelia didn’t know how her oldest sister, the one who’d practically raised her, would react. Lizzie had a hand in Andrew’s courtship with Amelia. If she knew how Amelia felt about Andrew’s brother, Lizzie would never forgive her.

Just as Amelia knew it would, Lizzie’s green gaze flashed. “Surely you aren’t entertaining the idea of courting another when you have a perfectly wonderful man willing to marry you.”

“Willing, indeed. The man released me, Lizzie. Me! Men don’t release me,
I
release
them
.”

Lizzie shook her head as she studied Amelia, disapproval clear in her expression. “You’ve grown out of control, little sister. I fear our move from Boston has had ill effects on you.”

Amelia dropped her gaze to her lap as the heat of her embarrassment scorched her cheeks. She couldn’t talk to Lizzie about this. She couldn’t talk to Olivia either. With a deep sigh, she let the subject drop.

If only Lizzie knew
how
Andrew had released Amelia, at what he’d heard to force his decision, surely her mood would change toward that Gallagher.

If not toward her.

Who knew Andrew would be so upset when Amelia allowed John Jacobs to escort her from Hattie’s to the mercantile? Or when Charles Phillips saw her home after a late night of dancing? Or after cute little Bobbie McGee gave her a peck on the cheek?

Andrew simply overreacted at, well, everything.

Which allowed her mind to yet again drift to the
other
Gallagher, the one who’d been preoccupying her thoughts for weeks. Noah Gallagher had everything she’d ever wanted and more. He was charismatic, had looks to match his wonderful charm, and made her head fill with the most impure thoughts whenever he looked at her with those sparkling brown eyes.

And yet she couldn’t stop obsessing about Andrew and why he’d released her. She didn’t gossip like Lucy or have her nose stuck in a book like Olivia, yet both women had found husbands while Amelia had been released by one of the most eligible bachelors in all of Port Steele.

The world had surely gone mad.

“Oh, what am I to do?” she cried to Lizzie in her best attempt at playing the most dramatic of all her characters. She even held the back of her hand to her forehead for good measure.

“Amelia, that may work on the men you have following you around, but it will not work on me. You’ve been out of control for months and I’m not the only one to notice. You need to settle on a suitor.”

“But I’m not sure I want Andrew,” she cried.

“Then choose another!” Lizzie snapped and slapped her palm down on Amelia’s vanity, causing all of the bottles of cosmetics to rattle as if shivering in fear. With a deep breath, she added, “If you don’t choose a suitor, I won’t be able to protect you.”

“I don’t need protection,” she snapped and twisted her curls to make them tighter. “Liv took care of Uncle. He won’t be back.”

Lizzie thinned her lips and said nothing.

Shock plunged through Amelia’s body, and she stilled as she studied the solemn expression on her sister’s face. The realization hit Amelia so hard she sucked in a breath. “You think he’ll return, don’t you?”

Lizzie plastered a smile on her face and released a breath, and Amelia knew the subject was once again closed. “A contract is a contract.”

Her entire being went still. Lizzie had always protected her. Why would this be any different? “Are you saying you wouldn’t stop Logan from putting me on a ship back to Boston to face Uncle Robert all by my lonesome?”

Lizzie pleaded with her. “Amelia, you only have until the new brides arrive, which will be any day now. You have got to choose a husband or repay the Gallaghers. That was the agreement. We don’t have that kind of money and you know that.”

“I never agreed to that,” she stated haughtily, squaring her shoulders and biting her lips to give them color.

“You did when you signed that contract.”

Amelia already knew the answer before Lizzie said it, and she had a retort ready. “You’re married to two of them. Why don’t you simply negotiate my release?” In a muttered tone, she added, “Releases seems to run in the Gallagher family.”

Lizzie stood and stormed to the door. She jerked it open and then turned back to Amelia. “Mark my words, dear sister. If you do not change your ways, you will end up alone and no different than Aunt Mildred. Think about that as you parade around at that dance tonight instead of staying home and waiting for Andrew where you belong.”

She slammed the door behind her and left Amelia at a loss for words for the first time in her life.

Chapter 2

Lizzie’s Journal, Saturday, August 12
^th
, 1865

Port Steele, Washington Territory

I must do something to make Amelia realize the severity of her situation. God forgive me as I know she won’t once she finds out the arrangement I’ve made for her. Logan is in support of my decision, but I still feel doubt. Is banishing my own flesh and blood really the right answer? What if Uncle Robert returns and Amelia isn’t under my watchful eye? What then? If anything should happen to her I will never forgive myself. I just pray that she’ll do the right thing for once and not continue to put me in the difficult situation of making the choice for her.

* * * *

Noah Gallagher combed the front of his hair with his fingers and clenched his teeth to hold in a curse. Why in the hell did his mother have to give him wavy hair? He kept his brown kinks as short as he could without shaving his head altogether, which he hadn’t ruled out.

Giving up, he leaned against the wall with his shoulder, crossing his arms in front of him as he eyed the door. As with the majority of the men here tonight, he came to catch a smile from the most beautiful of all the brides and, God willing, even share a dance with her.

Amelia Prescott.

“Why, Mr. Gallagher, you look positively sinful tonight.”

Noah Gallagher turned to see Mrs. Hathaway batting her brown eyes up at him. A voluptuous, beautiful woman, Martha Hathaway only came to the dances at Hattie Red’s to shop for a lover when her husband was out of town. She never left alone.

“Good evening, Martha.” He flashed a grin and kept one eye on the door as he addressed her. Amelia would be walking in at any moment, and he wanted to be the first one to approach her.

“Are you here alone this evening?”

“That I am.” He hoped that wouldn’t be for long.

“As am I,” she purred and gave him a flirty smile.

A year ago he wouldn’t have hesitated to escort the delicious Mrs. Hathaway to her house as he’d done many times before. He glanced over her shoulder toward the door as another couple entered her the dance hall and bit back his disappointment.

And now?

Ever since he’d spotted the youngest Prescott step her dainty foot off that ship full of brides, he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her. Other women didn’t hold his attention the way she did—including the lovely Martha Hathaway.

“I have no doubt you won’t be alone for long.”

She tilted her head and looked up at him beneath her lashes. “I certainly hope not.”