Adella's Enemy (3 page)

“Different,” he said, nodding, “is an appropriate word for today. How do you feel?”

She blinked. “Feel?”

“You struck the earth fairly hard when you fell.”

Heat scorched her cheeks. “Oh yes. That. I am quite recovered.”

“Out here, a man can usually count on a bit of rain to wash away his work. That way he doesn’t come to town looking grim enough to startle ladies off train platforms. I’d say it’s been a different, and difficult, day for both of us.”

“You work too hard.” She bit the inside of her cheek, regretting the sentiment behind her words more than the words themselves. She should only want to reduce his workload in order to delay the Katy from reaching the border, not to offer him comfort.

He shrugged. “There’s no shame in an honest day’s work.”

“For dishonest overlords?”

A slight tightening of his brow informed her she’d struck a chord.

“Someone’s told you a story or two about Ireland,” he replied. “Does your informer have a name?”

“They cheat to get even richer, you know.”

He allowed a heavy silence to stretch between them as if he meant to challenge her avoidance of his question. But instead he said, “They?”

“The railroad owners.”

“There’s good and bad in every person.”

“Even in the English?”

He laughed again. The same rumbling sound that kept turning her body and mind to mush.

“I’ve recently been reminded to keep an open mind, even about the English.” A sudden commotion on the other side of the saloon, two men exchanging blows over some unknown grievance, removed his smile.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he said gruffly. “It’s not safe.”

“It’s as good a place as any.” In her line of work, dangers were everywhere. Here they included a saboteur who’d almost killed her. The man had been so reckless he hadn’t seemed to care if his actions hurt others.
Adella would rather die than cause someone’s death. The anguish she’d experienced when she’d first learned Declan had died, the relentless grief every day that followed— She couldn’t put other families through what she’d felt, what she was still feeling. She couldn’t live knowing she’d caused that amount of pain. Not even to get revenge on someone she despised as much as Parsons.

“Besides,” she continued, pushing aside her morbid thoughts, “if I hadn’t ventured inside this saloon, I wouldn’t have been reminded of an interest in long-forgotten games.”

“Why venture at all? Why come to New Chicago?” Cormac’s gaze pierced her.

His sudden interest in her motives made her throat constrict. She forced herself not to swallow. He was waiting for a reaction—and an answer. Of course! She hadn’t told him her cover story. “My newspaper sent me to photograph the railroad.”

Silent and as impenetrable as a stone, he continued staring at her.

“You don’t believe a woman can do the job?” She sharpened her tone, aiming to sound offended.

One of his dark brows arched. “I haven’t seen you with a camera.”

Her tension eased, letting her breathe normally again. The conversation was headed in a direction she could work with. “I’ve had little time to unpack, what with falling off platforms and wanting to make up for causing your men more work.”

“Your day hasn’t been all hardships, has it? You mentioned enjoying chess. So, the least I can do is offer you another game.”

“With you?”
The prospect of spending more time with him sent a spark of anticipation up her spine.

“Aye, and if I win, you give your word you won’t return to this saloon.”

Disappointment doused her like a cloudburst. He only wanted to be rid of her. She opened her mouth to refuse, but his gang beat her to it with a chorus of no’s.

“She’s in a saloon…”
Cormac stared each of his men in the eye until they quieted, “…with a brothel above it.”

Their gazes fell like dominoes.

“Aw, Mac, she ain’t in any danger.”

“We’ve been
guardin’ her like hawks.”

“You know she shouldn’t be here,”
Cormac said. “Remember who we are and who we work with.”

The rebuke that they didn’t know her—or what she was capable of—hovered on
Adella’s lips. She swallowed the foolish words. They once again failed to serve her purpose. She couldn’t let anyone know her strengths, good or bad.

“Del, is that you?”

Her heart slammed against her ribcage. Only two men had called her by that name. One was dead. She scrambled upright and sent her chair toppling. It struck the floor with the crack of a bullwhip.

Fergal
Kilroy pushed his way through the McGrady Gang. The handsome lad from her youth—the one who’d teased her unmercifully while defending her as fiercely as her brother—had grown into a man of striking good looks. But a world-weariness that did not match his years clung to him, shadowing his once warm brown eyes and boyish face.

The reason for his pain—and for the pain she wanted to inflict upon Parsons—burst through the walls she’d erected around her past. She took a step back, gasping to draw breath, struggling to control her grief, and failing.
Miserably.

Fergal reached for her. “Del, wait.”

Cormac inserted himself once more between her and another man. “Why is she scared of you?” His voice was low, his words slow and precise. And all the more deadly for it.

Here was the work-disrupting brawl she’d hoped to instigate. Unfortunately, she no longer wanted it. Not between these two men.

“I’m not frightened,” she blurted out. “I’m—” Stunned. Undone. Destroyed. None of that could happen. She straightened her shoulders. “I’m just surprised.”

Fergal peered around
Cormac, his gaze riveted on her, pleading. “I tried to find you after— Dec made me promise that I would. Del, I—”

“Those names are dead.”

He flinched. “Adella, I never meant for Declan to—”

She raised her hands. “I don’t want to talk about him. I blame myself more than you.”

“You shouldn’t.” His gaze dipped, travelling over her dress, and his eyes widened. “My word, but you’ve grown into a fine lady.”

“How do you know each other?” The question was casual, but
Cormac’s back was rigid, his hands once again fisted by his sides.

“We grew up together in Georgia.” Fergal’s gaze swept the men surrounding them. The beginnings of a familiar teasing grin twitched his lips. “She’s a
mick like us. Her people—”

“Fergal!”
Adella winced. She hadn’t meant to say his name so sharply. But the Fergal she’d known, once he started talking, was difficult to stop. “No one’s interested in a poor southern horse trainer and his family.”

“Not poor but miserly. Your father cared about horses at the cost of everything else. Stingy and stubborn, he was.
A right sour ol’ codger. I’m not just saying that ’cause he was born in Coventry. The best part of you is Irish. Your mother…” He released a low whistle. “Now she was a corker.”

Complications.
They were part of her job. But why this job? And why Fergal? She pressed her lips tight to stifle a groan. Fergal was one of the reasons her mother had told so many tales of Ireland. She’d shared them to enlighten Adella about charming young Irishmen, even those born in America and living just over the fence—on the greener side with the rich plantation owner’s family.

Fergal’s eyes took on a faraway look. It made him appear young again. Like the boy who’d disobeyed his father and ran wild through the fields and forests alongside her and
Declan.

“Like sunshine on a dreary day, your mother was,” he murmured. “She raised grand children.” A shadow from the past suddenly darkened his eyes. He closed them convulsively.

The McGrady Gang were too busy grinning at her to notice.

“Mac was certain Miss Willows was English to the bone,” one of them said.

“He even told her so,” added another.

Cormac’s
attention remained on Fergal. “I made a fool of myself based on a name I recognized…in the wrong way.”

Fergal opened his eyes, his expression unreadable. “And then?”

“Miss Willows put me in my place. Then—” Cormac’s voice turned gruff, “—after the saboteur nearly killed her, Stevens arrived and put us all in our places.”

Fergal inhaled sharply, his gaze snapping to
Adella. “That was you at the train station this afternoon?” He lifted his gaze heavenward. “Sweet Mary and Joseph, I didn’t know. I should’ve met the new recruits like usual, instead of…”

Cormac
shook his head. “Wasn’t your choice. You said you had to talk with some farmers upset with the railroad. I’m surprised Stevens hasn’t told me about them yet.”

A clammy unease stole up her spine. “How do you know each other?” she asked, like a parrot repeating
Cormac’s earlier question.

“I oversaw a cut crew on the transcontinental.” Fergal’s gaze skimmed the
McGrady Gang standing around him. “That’s where I met this lot. We parted ways after that railroad held a fancy ceremony where the owners finally lifted a hammer and drove the last spike. I drifted south and eventually found the Katy and a promotion to supply master. I report to Stevens now.”

Adella
pressed her fingertips to her throbbing temples. If Fergal had been employed by a business in town—the hotel, a mercantile, even this saloon—she might’ve been able to confide in him, just a little. But he worked for the Katy. By targeting Parsons via his railroad, Adella threatened Fergal’s livelihood. She was Fergal’s enemy. The same held true for the McGrady Gang and Cormac.

She clutched the table for support and her gaze fell to the chessboard. Every day presented a new game, and she must play all of them alone.

“You look pale.” Cormac stood beside her with her chair in his hand. “You’d best sit down.”

She forced herself to push away from the table and
Cormac. He reached for her arm, then stopped and stared at her in silence.

“As a walking boss,” one of the
McGrady Gang said, once more jumping in to fill an awkward silence, “Fergal was lousy at walking but first-rate at bossing. His leg helped him find his calling as the Katy’s supply wrangler.”

She spun to face Fergal. Without
Cormac standing between them, she now saw him fully.

He drew himself
up, forcing his weight off a cane he’d been leaning upon. The movement made him grimace. “The sawbones said I’d die. So he didn’t bother removing the bullet in the bone.” He went very still. “I should have died in Camp Douglas too.”

Adella
forced herself to remain still as well. Fergal wouldn’t welcome her pity. That didn’t stop her from silently grieving for the pain he’d suffered. Not just to his leg. Her brother and Fergal had been best friends. Fergal was the reason Declan had joined the army, the reason Declan was dead. Well, one of the reasons.

If she hadn’t told Declan that at fifteen he was too young to join the fighting… If she hadn’t told him he was a fool for enlisting just because his best friend was of age and could… If she hadn’t told him he’d regret his decision one day, and she wouldn’t be there to help him… He might not have given up and stopped writing to her at the very end. He might have sent her a letter during those final months of the war. She might have saved him.

Now, she’d make Parsons pay for the loss Fergal bore as heavily as she. But she couldn’t do it through men such as Fergal and the McGrady Gang. She understood that now. Retrieving her valise from under the table, she moved out of the men’s sheltering circle. They had a way of doing that, rallying around her, cocooning her.

When she stood alone, she turned to address them. She was careful not to look at Fergal.
Or Cormac. “The hour grows late. I must wish you goodnight.” With her head held high, she marched toward the door. Outside, a chill breeze gusted in her face. She plowed into it and the darkness, following the walkway toward her hotel.

“Blasted Irish,” she muttered, wrapping her free arm around her waist to ward off the cold. Except her back felt warmer than her front, as if something or someone blocked the wind.

She spun round. For once her foolish feet cooperated and found solid purchase on the boards. A pair of hefty hands took ownership of her elbows, jostling her valise out of her hand. It fell with a thud. She thrust her hand into the hidden pocket she’d sewn in her skirt.

Her breath stalled in her throat, then lodged there when her other hand slammed against rough tweed. She locked her elbow, holding the rock-solid wall of muscles behind the cloth at bay.
Cormac’s height and breadth filled her vision, his stomach muscles jumping beneath her palm. She clenched his waistcoat, then splayed her fingers and shoved hard with the flat of her palm. He sucked in his breath, but didn’t budge.

“What were you thinking?” she demanded. “I could’ve shot you.”

He stared down at her hand. Not the one groping him just above the trousers riding low on his hips, but the other one—the one she’d used to extract the double-barreled derringer from her skirt. A derringer she now held between them.