Comanche Heart (50 page)

“I’ll buy her a coat, and dresses, too. Just you watch. I’ll buy you all dresses.”

Mary Beth’s eyes filled with tears again. She stared at him a moment, then lowered her gaze. “Even if you tried, Pa’d take your money and spend it on mining gear. All he cares about is finding color. He didn’t care if Ma hurt herself and the baby by workin’ so hard. And he don’t care about us. Sarah won’t never have a coat, nor dresses, neither. The only thing Pa’ll ever give her is a shovel with her name on it. Same for me and Rebecca.”

Jacob had thought the same himself, but hearing it said out loud frightened him, especially now, after promising he’d watch after his sisters. He hadn’t been big enough to do Ma’s share of the work, but surely he would be by the time Mary Beth’s turn rolled around. She was going to be a small fry, just like Ma. Working in the digs would kill her.

Jacob eyed the grave and remembered the desperate, pleading look in his mother’s eyes last night just before she died. With her only remaining strength, she had clutched his hands and whispered, “Take care of them for me, Jacob. Promise me you will. Don’t let your father . . .”

Her voice had trailed off, and her beautiful dark eyes had fluttered closed, the remainder of her request left unspoken. Jacob had held tight to her hands, hardly able to speak around the sobs that had torn up his throat.

Even as the words passed his lips, Jacob had known he was lying. His mother was dead. His father had killed her and her unborn child chasing a fool’s dream. Nothing would ever be all right again.

And don’t miss Catherine Anderson’s
star Bright
next in the Harrigan family series,
available now.
An excerpt follows. . . .

RAINIE HALL DANNING PAUSED AFTER EXITING the ship elevator onto the third deck. Her whole body trembled with nerves, and she wanted nothing more than to collapse against the wall for a moment to gather her composure. But she didn’t dare, not with cameras hidden everywhere.
Just start walking. Act normal. Every move you make may be recorded.
Upstairs inside the posh ladies’ lounge, where electronic surveillance was forbidden, she had altered her appearance. Now she wore a stretchy black sheath, an Elvira wig, brown contacts, black cat’s-eye glasses, and so much makeup that her face felt stiff.
Tasteless but effective.
No one who saw her later on film would recognize her as the wealthy and elegant Lorraina Danning, who’d gone to dinner wearing a sequined evening gown and a forty-thousand-dollar diamond necklace.

Yearning to run, Rainie walked slowly along the corridor, shoulders straight, chin held high. No ducking her head to hide her face. Her friend Janet had assured her only minutes ago that this disguise was good enough to withstand close scrutiny later.
Oh, God, oh, God.
Was it possible that she and her friend were actually going to pull this off? Rainie stifled a hysterical urge to laugh. Now dressed as Lorraina Danning, Janet was somewhere on an upper deck, moving toward a camera-free area, where she could duck into a closet, change clothes, and emerge as herself.

Rainie’s heart slammed with every footfall, and cold sweat filmed her body. The ceiling of the hallway, which seemed endlessly long, felt low and oppressive. With every breath she took, she prayed she wouldn’t hear the elevator doors slide open behind her. Her husband, Peter, seemed to have a sixth sense where she was concerned, enabling him to guess what her next move was going to be, sometimes even before she knew herself. If he caught her—oh, God, oh, God, she couldn’t let herself think about that. She needed to stay calm, keep a clear head. Just one little mistake could ruin everything.

The numbered plaques beside the cabin doorways swam in Rainie’s vision. Where was 3056? Her back tingled, and an awful, burning sensation had taken up residence right between her shoulder blades. She glanced back, half expecting to see her husband—tall, elegant, sophisticated Peter, whose kindly demeanor and gentle smile fooled everyone. The hallway behind her was empty. She was still safe, and she would stay that way if she could just find the damn room.

It seemed as if she covered the length of a football field before she reached the right cabin. She fumbled with clammy fingers for the plastic key card that she’d slipped inside the bodice of her dress.
Hurry, hurry.
Glancing up and down the corridor to make sure Peter hadn’t suddenly appeared, she shoved the card into the slot.
Nothing
. She realized the card was upside down and inserted it again. At last the little green light came on. Frantic to vanish, she almost fell into the room. After closing the door, she collapsed against an interior wall, trembling so violently that her knees threatened to buckle.

The housekeeping staff had flipped on the lights and left clever towel sculptures on the turned-down bed. The room was cramped compared to the royal suite on deck ten, where she’d dressed for dinner earlier. There was barely walking room between the queen-size bed and the ocean-view window. Opposite the sitting area, which consisted of only a short couch and coffee table, the wall was lined with storage cabinetry, a built-in vanity, and a closet. But to Rainie, the accommodations looked wonderful—a small hidey-hole where she would be safe from her husband.

When she recovered enough to move, she hooked the
Do Not Disturb
sign over the outside door lever. Then she began stripping off the dress as she approached the suitcase on the couch. Though a claustrophobic breathlessness made her lungs hitch, she needed to shower and cover her body with sunless tanning lotion before she went out on the balcony to gulp fresh air. Having dark skin was part of her disguise, and the colorant might take a few hours to work. From this moment forward, Lorraina Ann Danning had ceased to exist, and Anna Pritchard had taken her place.

Rainie’s friend Janet, who worked aboard the ship, had kept her promise. The suitcase contained everything Rainie would need to make good her escape—black leather and denim clothing, a silver-studded belt, chunky boots, lots of gothic-style jewelry, oversized sunglasses, fake tattoos, makeup, the tanning lotion, and all the necessary fraudulent identification. Rainie fingered a roll of cash tucked into a storage pocket, stared with burning eyes at a Visa card imprinted with her alias, and sent up a silent prayer of thanksgiving that she’d been blessed with such wonderful friends.
All set and ready to go.
Now she had only to keep her head down for the next seven days until the ship returned to Seattle.

Rainie stepped into the small bathroom to shower. By the time she’d finished washing off the expensive French perfume that Peter insisted she wear, her skin smarted, yet it seemed to her the scent still lingered.
His mark.
Needing to get it off, she scrubbed with soap again, and then again. Finally she came to accept that her compulsive urge to scour until her skin felt raw stemmed more from emotional reasons than her sense of smell. She wanted—no,
needed
—to get everything she associated with Peter Danning out of her life.

After toweling dry, Rainie smoothed the tanning lotion over her body and then scrubbed her hands clean before tugging the Elvira wig back on. Before slipping into a white terry guest robe she’d found in the closet, she inserted the brown contacts and outlined her mouth with purplish black lipstick. Only then did she feel it was safe to step out onto the balcony to cleanse her lungs with the moist sea air. As she gripped the railing and fixed her gaze on the sinking globe of orange on the western horizon, the night breeze whipped the synthetic strands of pitch-black hair across her face.

Peter would be looking for her by now, going first to the ladies’ room and then possibly to their suite. When he failed to find her, how long would he wait before raising an alarm?
My wife is missing.
Her earlier urge to laugh had now been replaced by fear. What if a search of all the cabins was executed? If anyone could make the ship’s captain and crew hop to, it was the rich and influential Peter Danning. By morning, law enforcement teams would descend on the vessel to unravel the mystery of Lorraina Danning’s disappearance.

Rainie forced herself to think positively. If they came to her quarters, they would find only an awkward, sunbaked young woman with brown eyes, an Elvira hairdo, and weird-looking clothes. No one would suspect anything.

In only moments, darkness would descend. To Rainie, who’d so frequently gone to the theater with her husband over the last two years, the sunset seemed symbolic. The curtain was falling. The nightmare her life had become was over, and the next act was about to begin.

Bright with promise, tomorrow beckoned. Rainie had once endured a horrible beating for dropping one of Peter’s precious crystal goblets, so it had seemed almost prophetic to her when she’d found a rural town called Crystal Falls on an Oregon map. It appealed to her sense of irony.
When the crystal falls, Lorraina may die.
So that was her destination, Crystal Falls. She had no idea what difficulties she might face when she got there. She only knew that anything would be better than what she’d just left behind.