Broken Vows (6 page)

      
Wells ran his fingers through his dark hair, which was liberally streaked with gray. “As you know, Henry, the year of mourning for my dear departed Heloise is past. I must have another wife, someone suitable as a hostess for the business and political entertaining I must do. Do you think Rebekah Sinclair would serve?”

      
Snead could feel the dampness of perspiration against his shirt. Damned wool suit was too heavy for Nevada's hellishly hot summers, but a man of property had to look the part. It was expected of him now. “Yes, I do. She's studious and bright. I could see her learning her way around the politicians' wives in Carson City, even those in Washington, given time.”
If she'll have you.

      
“Good. I concur. And I count upon your good offices as a member of the Sinclair family to support my suit.” Without waiting for Snead's reply, Wells picked up a sheaf of papers from his desk and shoved them toward the younger man. “These are instructions for the managers at the Silver Star and Glory Gulch mines. Production is down and we need to—er, boost market interest before selling our stock.”

      
A sharkish grin raised the tips of Snead's mustache. “Looks as if there's going to be another big bonanza by next week. I'll get right on it.” He picked up his new bowler hat from the chair and rose to leave, but Wells' parting words stopped him short.

      
“Do remember me to your sister-in-law when you and Mrs. Snead dine with the reverend and his family tonight. I'd be most interested in your impressions of how Rebekah is receiving my suit.”

* * * *

      
Rebekah Sinclair sat staring out the kitchen window, not seeing the pale pink mountains on the distant horizon or the riotous gold sunflowers growing against the picket fence out back. Mechanically, she snapped beans for dinner, going through the motion like a sleepwalker as her thoughts tumbled through her brain.

      
Why couldn't Amos Wells have set his sights on Celia Hunt? Celia would swoon in bliss to have the rich, powerful man for a suitor. But he had fixed his attentions instead on the Reverend Sinclair's second daughter.
Why me?
She was no great beauty—her figure was far too slender, possessing none of the hourglass flair so in vogue. Her hair, unlike Leah's pale silvery blond, was a brassy dark yellow that had always seemed tawdry to Rebekah. Lord knew, she was no pious, proper clergyman's daughter, although she had tried to be on her best behavior at dinner last Sunday.

      
What an ordeal it had been, smiling, trying her best to be shy and modest so as not to embarrass her father in front of his treasured parishioner, yet at the same time trying not to encourage Amos in his courtship. He had made no overt gestures to her that in any way betrayed his prior conversation with Ephraim. But he was a shrewd silver baron, used to keeping his own council, hardly the sort to come with nosegays and candy boxes in hand.
If only he were not so aloof and pompous…so old
. When Celia heard about his intentions, Rebekah knew her friend would be hurt and jealous.

      
Why did nothing ever seem to work out the way anyone wanted? Dorcas wanted a rich son-in-law, and her father wanted her settled down with a suitable man. Celia wanted Amos, but Amos wanted her. What did Rebekah Beatrice Sinclair want? A pair of laughing blue eyes with a lock of inky hair curling over a high forehead flashed into her mind.
Rory
.

      
Don't even think about him
, she scolded herself angrily, pulling the end of a bean so hard the whole thing came apart in her hands.

      
“Mind what you're about, young lady,” Dorcas admonished. “It will be a fortunate thing that you'll have servants to cook and clean for you as Mrs. Wells. You're a poor enough help around here.”

      
“I'm not affianced to Mr. Wells yet, Mama,” Rebekah replied crossly, pushing a wisp of burnished gold hair from her cheek. The heat was growing worse, and the hour neared noon. A kettle boiled away on the stove, and the big granite coffeepot sat ever ready with steam rising from the spout.

      
“Mind your manners and you soon will be.”

      
“But I don't love Amos Wells. He's...he's more than twice my age. Leah got to choose her own husband, and I shall do the same.” There, she had said it, even though she knew she would pay for it.

      
Dorcas's ruddy face grew even redder in the hot kitchen as she yanked the bowl of green beans from Rebekah's hands. “Old indeed. Mr. Wells is in his prime. A fine figure of a man. You should be honored that a man of his importance has even taken note of you. Your sister was always a dutiful girl who chose a man her family approved. Now, you, who have never felt a shred of family responsibility, have the best catch of the valley interested in you; and this is how you respond! If only Leah were single, she would make Mr. Wells a perfect wife.” Dorcas sighed in martyrdom and tossed the beans in a pot along with a chunk of salt pork.

      
Knowing how taken Leah was with Henry, Rebekah had a strong suspicion that even her saintly sister for once would have balked at their mother's wishes. She said nothing, however, just began to set the table with their chipped but serviceable everyday dishes.

      
A loud banging on the front door, followed by a low, urgent conversation between her father and another man, drew both women to leave the kitchen and investigate. Reverend Sinclair was talking to Emett Watkins from the Pelonis Peak Mine.

      
The minister's face was grave as he said to his wife, “There's been an accident at the mine—an explosion. A dozen of the miners are trapped below, and nearly twenty more have been brought up.”

      
“Pelonis—isn't that the fellow who hires all sorts of foreign riffraff? Irish and Cornish—even those yellow heathen?” Dorcas asked, her face tight with distaste.

      
“Most of the injured men are Chinese, yes, but they're not all heathen. You know I've baptized several families down in Alder Gulch. It's my duty to see if I can help, Dorcas.”

      
His wife gestured in frustration, knowing he would risk life and limb for those worthless foreigners and she could do nothing to stop him. The tribulations of being a minister's wife were a heavy burden at times.

      
“I'll go with you, Papa. I could help with the injured,” Rebekah volunteered.

      
“You most certainly will not, young lady. No daughter of mine will set foot among those rough men.”

      
“Your mother is right, Rebekah. A mining camp is no fit place for a young innocent such as you,” Ephraim said firmly. “Please fetch me my Bible.” He turned to Dorcas and took her hand. “I would appreciate it if you would have the ladies from the guild gather medicines and blankets.”

      
Rebekah was left behind to tend to the dinner, which would have to be warmed over when her busy parents returned. Dorcas gave her explicit instructions about storing the food, along with a list of other chores to occupy her daughter's idle hands, then bustled off for a nice long visit with her friends. The guild ladies would gossip as they did their Christian duty. Once Rebekah had cleaned up the kitchen, she felt restless and frustrated. Her life seemed so meaningless at times such as this. Only married ladies had the freedom to go out in society and perform useful tasks, not that she relished the prospect of rolling bandages while Lucinda Maybury carried on about the latest scandal in the congregation.

      
“I want to be free. Maybe I just want to get away from Wellsville. For certain, I don't want to be married—at least not to Amos Wells or any of the other eligible men I've met.” But she did want to wear silk dresses and travel in elegant sleeping cars on the Central Pacific, drink champagne and dance all night in big eastern cities—all the exciting things she had only read about in books. “I must stop being so selfish. Just think of all the poor people involved in that mining cave-in. In fact, imagine how poor their lot in life is compared to yours—and you're pining away for frivolous pleasures like Celia talks about.”

      
Rebekah stared out the kitchen window at the vegetable garden. Heat rose in shimmering waves from the dry alkali soil across the road, but here in her backyard the earth was dark and moist. The parsonage sat beside a deep well that yielded water enough to allow the luxury of gardening—if one considered canning peas and carrots and pickling cabbage and beets a luxury.

      
Sighing, Rebekah prepared to tackle the weeding. Then, a thought danced into her head. Another, frivolous one. Mama would not return until supper, and her father would probably be later yet. Who would know if she broke just a few tiny rules, nothing more than foolish social conventions really? She laid aside the ugly sunbonnet and heavy gloves, rolled up the sleeves of her old muslin dress, and unfastened the top buttons. There, much cooler and more comfortable. Who would be there to see her anyway?

* * * *

      
Rory had spent the week in back-breaking labor—indeed, potentially bone-breaking labor. Luckily, his were all still intact, thanks to his ability to communicate with horses. He had broken a dozen wild mustangs to accept bit and bridle and trained six others to bear his weight and respond to the rein and knee signals. As soon as the wild herd was ready for sale, Beau Jenson had promised to take him out to his track to meet the trainers who worked with his thoroughbreds.

      
Rory knew he would prove himself even more valuable to his employer handling fine racers. In any case, Jenson had been so impressed with his new man's breaking methods that he had given the enterprising young Irishman the afternoon off, saying it was too hot to work horses. Ostensibly, he was going fishing, a pole slung over his shoulder as he walked his bay down the street, but he planned a small detour past the parsonage of Wellsville's First Presbyterian Church. He had made it a regular part of his nightly trip to the river outside town where he bathed off the smell of horses and dust.

      
The first thing he had done after unpacking his saddlebags in the small room above the stable was to make some casual inquiries about the Reverend Sinclair and his flock. If any of the men in the Dry Gulch Saloon thought it odd that an Irish Catholic was curious about the local Presbyterians, no one mentioned it. They remembered all too well how wickedly he wielded his fists.

* * * *

      
The water buckets were heavy. Rebekah had overfilled them, but laden with her burden it was better to eliminate at least one trip the length of the large yard. She had to soak the hard earth around the cabbages and beets before she could pull weeds, a slow, laborious process involving filling the heavy tin sprinkling can with water from the buckets and plying it across the long, even rows of vegetables. Most of the big plot was neatly wet down and cleaned of weeds.

      
Rebekah could feel the itch of mud beneath her fingernails and knew her face and arms were smeared with it. No matter, she would soon be finished. A long soak in the big iron tub in the washroom sounded heavenly. She could hardly wait and picked up her pace, letting the water slosh carelessly over the side of the pail. Unfortunately, the garden sat on a slight incline and she was heading downhill with her burden.

      
The spilled water rolled ahead of her in an ever widening rivulet on her well-beaten path between the rows. Heedlessly, she persevered until one of the pesky pumpkin vines, which twisted in and out between all the other vegetables, caught her ankle and she lurched forward, struggling to regain her balance and kick free of the vine.

      
One bucket dropped to the ground with a loud clank, followed by a splash. Her left heel slid in the mud. Before Rebekah realized what had happened, both feet flew up in the air and she landed on her backside in a puddle of muddy water. She let out a loud squawk of surprised indignation, then a very unladylike swear word which Dorcas would have caned her soundly for using.

      
“If I'd known you liked to play in the mud so much, I'd have invited you to ride up around Pyramid Lake to where the sulfur pots bubble up out of the ground,” a familiar mocking voice taunted.

      
Rory Madigan leaned against the side of the shed with one booted ankle crossed negligently over the other and his arms across that magnificent expanse of lean, muscled chest she had so admired the day of the boxing match. But Rebekah Sinclair was in no mood to admire anything at the moment. She raised one mud-covered brown hand and shoved angrily at the wad of hair that had come loose from its moorings and hung in her eyes.

      
Succeeding only in snarling it worse than before, she yanked the pins from it and shook it back out of her face. “I hope I've amused you sufficiently, Mr. Madigan.”

      
Her green eyes glared up at him, and the bright afternoon sun highlighted the gold flecks swimming in them. Rory fought the urge to kiss away the mud smear across her nose. Instead, he reached out chivalrously and offered her his hand. “I thought we'd dispensed with surnames, Rebekah. I'm never amused by a lady in distress.”

      
She looked up at the devilish smile on his handsome face and gave in to one of the impulsive urges that had made her the bane of Dorcas Sinclair's existence since she was a toddler. She took his hand, then yanked him from his casual stance at the edge of her self-created mud wallow. He tumbled to his knees, then rolled into the trough between rows of cabbages and pumpkins.

      
“So, it's a dirty fight yer wantin', eh colleen?” he said, his brogue thickening as he chuckled while pulling her closer to him until he lay on top of her. He could feel her breasts through the wet, muddy fabric of her dress, pressing intimately against his chest. Although tall and slender, Rebekah Sinclair was very soft and very female—preacher's daughter or not. He grinned impudently down at her sputtering face, then gave in to impulse as well, for Rory Madigan had never even tried to curb his baser instincts, especially when they came to lithesome females. He placed his hands on each side of her head and slowly lowered his mouth to hers.