Daisies In The Wind (18 page)

“You still don’t.”

Caitlin opened her mouth to say more, but at
that moment Billy darted into the kitchen. “I’m starving, Gramma.
When can we eat? We’re not waiting for Pa, are we?”

“No, we won’t wait for Wolf. He’ll come back
when he’s good and ready. Wash your hands at the pump and then take
your seat.”

Rebeccah forced herself to smile at Billy and
Caitlin as they took their places at the table, but she was all too
aware of the empty chair at the head of the table. Damn Wolf
Bodine. He had spoiled the dinner for everyone, acting like a
spoiled child, running away.

He must truly hate me
, she thought
yet again.
He can’t bear even the briefest time spent in my
company. No doubt after hearing me play the piano he completely
lost his appetite.

She bowed her head as Caitlin said grace and
then obediently helped herself to a portion of the tender,
succulent beef. But her heart was heavy, and she boiled with rage
as she thought about the insulting, childish, and oafishly rude
manner in which Wolf Bodine had been treating her.

* * *

Wolf went straight to the Silk Drawers
Brothel, plunked himself down at a small table in the darkest
corner, and ordered whiskey. He drank it down in one gulp and
ordered another. Molly Duke, wandering toward the stairs from
behind the bar, spotted him at once. She sauntered over, her ample
breasts swelling above the daringly low-cut décolletage of her
black-and-violet-striped gown. A statuesque woman, she enjoyed
styling her bright russet hair in a high pompadour held in place by
rhinestone or imitation-ruby combs. She favored black silk
stockings and a cheap perfume some peddler had once sold her called
“Red-Hot Kisses,” and she had a long, sultry face that was comely
even without the layers of paint she artfully applied.

“Want some company?” she inquired with a
faint smile.

Wolf shook his head. “More whiskey,” he
called to Lil, who nodded and hurried off to the bar.

Molly hesitated. She’d known Wolf Bodine
since he’d first come to Powder Creek. In her opinion he was the
best thing that had ever happened to the town. She’d drunk whiskey
with him, slept with him, broken her heart over him, and ultimately
become friends with him. She’d tried to make him fall in love with
her, but it hadn’t worked, and now she was wise enough and
practical enough to settle for mutual friendship with the only man
who’d ever treated her like a lady despite the fact that she’d
always made her living as a whore.

For the past few years she’d owned the Silk
Drawers, and now she was retired from her former profession—she
didn’t have to sleep with any other man unless she wanted him, but
to most of the people in the town, once a whore, always a whore.
Molly accepted that. But Wolf Bodine was different. He had never
looked down on her, never been rude to her, never hurt her or
shouted at her. He was a gentleman. She respected him more than any
other man she’d ever known.

And she knew when something was wrong with
him. Wolf never drank this much unless something was bothering him.
“What’s the trouble?” Molly asked bluntly, pulling up a chair and
sliding her long, supple body into it, despite the glare of
resentment he shot her way.

“I’m not in a talking mood, Molly.”

“I can see that. You’re in a drinking mood. I
just thought you might need a friend.”

“Not tonight.”

“You sure?”

“Sure as hell.”

“Okay, Wolf.” Defeated by the cold, hard way
he stared down into the amber liquid in his glass, then downed it
like a man dying of thirst in the desert, without even sparing her
a glance, Molly rose and strolled away. She knew enough about men
to recognize when they needed time alone. For Wolf this was one of
those times.

Maybe he was thinking about his wife. About
Clarissa. She shrugged to herself as she headed to the backroom to
begin counting up the day’s receipts. She’d probably never know for
sure. Though Wolf was her friend, and on occasion spoke frankly to
her after one of their passionate sessions in the big
velvet-canopied bed upstairs, he didn’t confide much about his
personal life. Once in a while he talked about his son, and when he
did, she could see how proud he was of Billy, of the hopes he had
for him. And occasionally he talked to her about his work, or
sometimes even about his childhood escapades with his brother. But
never about Clarissa, or any other woman. Not Nel Westerly, nor
Lorelie Simpson, both of whom had done all in their power to win
the tall, handsome sheriff’s heart.

But he probably doesn’t talk a mite to them
either, Molly reflected with a small degree of spite as she sank
into the chair behind her desk. Wolf Bodine was a man of action,
not of words.

Outside her small floral-carpeted office,
Wolf stared at his third glass of whiskey and pushed it away.
Getting drunk wouldn’t help what ailed him. Hell, he wasn’t even
sure what it was that did ail him. But he’d learned long ago that
liquor only made things worse.

Why did Bear Rawlings have to win
property in this town, my town? And why did his daughter, with all
her money and fancy jewels and whatever other ill-gotten riches
Bear gave her, have to move out here and turn my life upside
down?

Caitlin liked her. Billy liked her. Hell,
before long, the whole damn town would probably like her. But I
won’t, he told himself coldly, studying the scars and scratches in
the knobby table before him. She’s stubborn, ill-tempered, and
damned secretive—and she had twice now brought up the subject of
Clarissa. Of course she did it out of ignorance, but she was
plainly nosy, and that was irritating in a woman.

So why do you keep thinking about
her—remembering how soft she felt in your arms, remembering the
soulful way she kissed you, as if she could never get enough?

Wolf sat up straighter in his chair and
scowled at nothing in particular. It had just hit him that it
really wasn’t Rebeccah Rawlings he was mad at—it was himself.

He never should have kissed her in the first
place. He should have walked out of that cabin with his son and
just steered clear of her. Unlike the other women he knew, she
grabbed hold of a man’s attention and didn’t let go. Her face,
framed by that cloud of midnight hair, kept popping into his mind.
Her beautiful eyes seemed to beseech him, even when she was yelling
at him. Damn! His fingers itched for that third glass of whiskey,
but he forced them to grip the edge of the table instead.

He had to go back. However he felt about
Rebeccah, he’d been downright rude to Caitlin, he had probably
spoiled the dinner she’d worked so hard to make festive and
special, and he’d set a poor example for his son.

Fine, I’ll go home and sit there in the
same room with her and then drive her home when everyone’s had
enough of each other, but I won’t give her a chance to get under my
skin again. No matter what she says, how pretty she looks, how
sweet she smells. I’ve survived the War Between the States, army
food, gunfights, ambushes, rattlers, and encounters with
desperadoes from here to the Rio Grande. I can sure survive
Rebeccah Rawlings.

* * *

Two men met on the shallow banks of Deer Run
Creek, not far from the Missouri River. In the darkness of the
starlit night they dismounted, left their horses to graze, and
stood together among the pussy willows and cottonwoods. The taller
man, heavier and wearing a wide-brimmed black Stetson, spoke
first.

“What did you find out?”

“He’s dead.” The slimmer man with the
clean-shaved face spoke matter-of-factly and smoked a hand-rolled
cigarette. “Seems the local sheriff shot him.”

“Naw! You’re loco! Fess is too damn good for
that! No small-town sheriff could plug him.”

“This hombre’s no ordinary sheriff.”

Something in the slimmer man’s tone made the
other snap his mouth shut. For a moment there was only the hiss and
gurgle of the creek, the screech of an owl diving in for the kill,
the anguished final cry of his prey dying somewhere in the
brush.

Then the big man let out a stream of oaths,
followed by a question. “Who is he?”

“Wolf Bodine.”

“Damn! Son of a bitch!”

In the starry darkness the clean-shaved man
studied the glowing tip of his cigarette. “He won’t be a
problem.”

“He’d better not be. Wolf Bodine. Of all the
rotten luck. What about the girl?”

“What about her?” The slimmer man, whose eyes
gleamed brightly in the dimness, rewarded his companion with
something very like a sneer.

“What’d she do, go running to Bodine for
protection?”

“I don’t think so. She may not have said
anything about the mine yet to anyone. At least I haven’t heard
anything, and I’ve been listening closely.”

“I’d like to get my hands around her stubborn
little neck for jest five minutes,” the big man growled.

“Leave her to me.”

“You seen her yet?”

“You ask too many questions, my friend. Let
me handle this my own way. I want that deed as much as you do.”

“Then get to work,” the large man snapped.
“Remember, she’s Bear’s daughter, so she’s tough. She’s got all his
orneriness, as I remember.”

The other man laughed. “I like them
ornery.”

His companion studied him a moment. “Is it
true, that story they tell about you?” he asked slowly, almost in
awe. “You strangled a woman down in New Mexico over a bottle of
tequila? And then set her house on fire?”

“What difference does it make?” the man
replied softly, throwing his cigarette into the swirling waters of
the creek. His eyes glistened from beneath his hat as he glanced
toward his horse.

“None, none at all. I was jest
wonderin’.”

“Start wondering how you’re going to spend
the money from that silver mine, my friend. We’ll meet back here in
one week, same time.”

“I’ll be here.” The large man sprang into his
saddle with remarkable ease for someone of his height and breadth.
He turned the horse toward Helena and called over his shoulder;
“You watch out for that girl. She ‘pears to have the devil’s own
luck!”

“So do I,” the other murmured, smiling to
himself as he gently stroked his horse’s muzzle. “So do I.”

He was back.

Rebeccah nearly choked on her raspberry
cobbler as she heard the hoofbeats outside, and then Billy, racing
to the window, cried out, “It’s Pa!”

She didn’t glance at him when he strode
through the kitchen door, nor when he leaned down to give Caitlin a
quick peck on the cheek, nor when he hung his hat on a hook and
then slid his long, rugged frame into his chair.

“I’m starved,” he declared, as innocently
robust as any man who’s just come in from a day’s hard labor. “Any
grub left over for me?”

“Plenty—not that you deserve it,” Caitlin
zipped back at him, but though she tried to maintain her starched
demeanor, it wilted at his grin and disappeared completely when he
reached out to nonchalantly pinch her lined cheek.

“Ma, will it help if I apologize?”

“Only if you apologize to Rebeccah.”

He turned to Rebeccah, the grin still locked
in place, but stiffer now and obviously forced. His eyes had lost
the playful glint he’d had when he’d addressed his mother. “Miss
Rawlings, I beg your pardon.”

Like hell he did. “There’s no need, Sheriff
Bodine,” she murmured dutifully, and stabbed viciously at the
hapless raspberries oozing from beneath a wedge of golden
crust.

Sensing his eyes boring into her, she peered
up and met his glance with a steely gaze of her own. A gaze, Wolf
thought, that could freeze a man to death in the height of
summer.

“Glad to hear it,” he returned shortly, and
reached out across the table to tousle Billy’s hair.

“Where’d you go, Pa? Why’d you have to leave
right at suppertime?”

“I told you, I went to town. It couldn’t be
avoided. But I’m back now, so pass me some of that beef, son, and a
handful of those biscuits. With all that riding, I’ve worked up
quite an appetite.”

“I’ve lost mine,” Rebeccah announced coolly,
and pushed her plate away. It was all she could do not to hurl the
cobbler at Wolf Bodine’s smug face as he proceeded to stuff himself
with huge amounts of food, packing it all away with relish and
precision, as if everything was jim-dandy in his world.
He’s
the most infuriating, arrogant, insufferable man I’ve ever
met
, Rebeccah thought for perhaps the hundredth time since
she’d re-encountered Wolf Bodine. As she helped Caitlin clear the
table a short while later, she made up her mind that the less she
had to see him after tonight, the better.

“You going to the dance?” Caitlin asked as
she washed the chipped plate with a soapy dishrag and Rebeccah
dried the spoons.

“Dance?”

“Oh, heavens, didn’t anyone mention it? It’s
to be held at the schoolhouse, matter of fact. Two weeks from this
Saturday. Everyone will be there. You’ve got to come, Rebeccah.
It’ll be a good chance for you to meet folks.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Wolf is going.”

Rebeccah rubbed furiously with a towel at the
dripping plate Caitlin thrust into her hand. She said nothing.

“He’s taking Miss Westerly.”

Who was Miss Westerly? For some odd reason a
knot like cat’s twine balled up tight in her stomach.

“You haven’t met her yet, have you?” Caitlin
went on. “A right nice and pretty young lady, but a little too sure
of herself for my taste. Of course some folks thought sure Wolf
would ask Lorelie Simpson—she’s only twenty-four and already a
widow, poor thing—her husband got killed on a cattle drive two
years ago. But Wolf asked the Westerly girl instead. Do you have a
dress to wear?”

“I won’t be needing one. I’m not going.”

“Oh, but ...”