Fire on the Plains (Western Fire) (23 page)

A
s if they’d just been given a battle command, every southern man present immediately rose to his feet.

Ben, knowing
that he would insult his wife if he refused to join in, reluctantly followed suit. As he stood at attention, he was acutely aware of the fact that he was the only man at the table not attired in a uniform tunic, his plain white shirt unadorned except for the cream-colored suspenders that held up his trousers.

“Beautiful of face, graceful of figure, and lovely of temperament, I give you Mrs. Lydia Strong, the fairest lady in all of Texas.”

A rousing chorus of ‘Here! Here!’ accompanied Beaumont’s flowery toast. Finishing off the last of his wine, Ben grimaced, unaccustomed to drinking red wine with his supper. As far as he was concerned, only nandy-pandies drank wine. Real men drank whiskey.

Resuming his seat, Ben cast a sideways glance at Lydia
, irked to observe that her cheeks were brightly flushed. And while she appeared flustered, he sensed that she was also flattered by Beaumont’s effusive show of attention.

Goddamn the man, anyway.

Why the hell did Beaumont have to fawn over
his
wife? Why not Starkweather’s spouse? Or Doctor Wylie’s?
Why Lydia?

Seemingly unaware that he’d given offense, Beaumont
jutted his chin in Ben’s direction, an unctuous smile plastered on his lips. “Captain Strong, in light of the fact that you are such a patriotic American, I’m certain that you’ll appreciate tomorrow’s festivities.”

“Festivities?”
Just what in the blue blazes was the man talking about now?

Beaumont’s smile broadened, giving Ben the distinct impression that he was being toyed with. “As we do every year, we intend to celebrate the Fourth of July in true southern fashion.”

“And what gives you Rebs the right to pay homage to the birth of the United States?” Ben demanded to know.

His host
made an expansive hand gesture, the gold signet ring that he wore on his pinky finger glinting in the candlelight. “It is a time-honored tradition in the Southland. Do not forget that our grandfathers also fought for American Independence.”

Turning
her upper body in his direction, Lydia placed a placating hand on Ben’s forearm. “The Colonel is absolutely right, Ben. Despite the late unpleasantness, they, too, are Americans. We are
all
Americans.”

‘
The late unpleasantness?’
Now, there was one helluva euphemism.

Beaumont lifted his
wine goblet. “Well said, Mrs. Strong. Well said, indeed.” After taking a sip from the glass, the colonel turned to the other members of the supper party. Looking as though he’d been struck by a sudden, inspired thought, Beaumont said, “Gentlemen, do you know that we happen to have a bona fide war hero in our midst?”

The remark garnered the attention of everyone at the table, Ben included.

“Goodness, after four years of fighting, I don’t believe that there’s a man among you who isn’t downright heroic,” Harriet Starkweather tittered, a mass of blond ringlets bobbing on her shoulders.

Beaumont smiled indulgently. “
You pay us a high honor, Mrs. Starkweather. However in the Union army, medals were awarded to those brave soldiers who displayed exemplary valor on the field of battle. Isn’t that so, Captain Strong?”

Caught off guard, Ben kept silent.

“Sir, there’s no need for false modesty. Your wife was kind enough to show me your Congressional Medal of Honor.”

“B-Ben, darling, I can explain everything,” Lydia nervously whispered.

“Save it for after supper,” Ben muttered. To the best of his recollection, he’d not mentioned the military medal to his wife. Or anyone else in his family, for that matter.

“What
exactly did you have to do to win a medal?” Lieutenant Starkweather inquired with a congenial smile.

Angered
by the unforeseen turn in the conversation, Ben donned his best poker face. “Nothing to speak of. The government gave out lots of those medals during the war.”

“Oh, come now, Captain Strong. You know perfectly well that’s not true,” Beaumont
admonished, his veneer of courtly civility beginning to wear thin. “As fellow warriors, we are anxious to laud a conquering hero. Perhaps you single-handedly captured one of our Confederate cannon. Or maybe you rescued—”

“I said
it doesn’t warrant discussion,” Ben rasped.

“Well, then, perhaps your lovely wife would do us the honor of
—”

“If you really want to know, I led the charge that took out a whole regiment of enemy infantry,” Ben
said over top of Beaumont, not about to let the double-dealer draw Lydia into the hand. “In fact, we mopped up you southern boys pretty good that day. As I recall, more than two hundred of you took to your graves by the time us Union men got through with you.”

Several of the ladies gasped, Lydia among them. Not that Ben cared. He’d had all
of the insincere civility that he could take. If it was a fight Beaumont wanted, then he was more than ready to step outside and be done with it. But no way in hell would he play a cowardly game of innuendo and flowery double-talk.

Beaumont gave a tug to each of his braided cuffs, a disdainful look on his face. “And to think that your government saw fit to honor such brutality.”

“Believe me, they were tickled pink,” Ben gamely replied. “In fact, Abe Lincoln couldn’t wait to shake my hand and pin a medal on my chest.”

Ignoring the shocked expressions of the ladies and the embittered scowls of their spouses, Ben rose from the table. Not bothering to inquire if Lydia was ready to depart, he wrapped a hand around her elbow and urged her to her feet. Taken by surprise, she fumbled with her napkin, dabbing at her mouth before placing it beside her plate.

“Er, thank you for the delicious supper, Colonel Beaumont,” she stammered, clearly embarrassed. “You have proven yourself a most cordial gentleman.”

Unlike your husband, huh, Lydia?

Without so much as a by-your-leave, Ben made his way to the open tent flap, his wife in tow.

Once outside, he headed straight for their wagon,
only releasing his grip on Lydia’s arm when they had returned to their Conestoga. Ben then braced himself for the inevitable tongue-lashing sure to come his way.

He didn’t have long to wait.

“Your behavior this evening was deplorable!”

Shrugging, he leaned his hip against the side of the wagon box. “Is that so? Well, how is it that Beaumont even knew about my medal?”

Lydia’s gaze dropped to the ground, her fingers plucking at a dress pleat. “I was looking for your shaving kit and . . . and I discovered the medal in your saddlebag.”

“All right. That explains how
you
know about it. But what I want to know is how your Colonel Beaumont found out.”

From Lydia’s annoyed expression, he could see that she didn’t like being raked over the coals.

“He happened upon me when I was searching for your shaving kit. And he is not
my
Colonel Beaumont.”

“Well, it’s not for lack of trying,” Ben grumbled. “And from now on, I’d appreciate it if you kept your nose out of my private affairs. That medal doesn’t concern you. And it sure as hell doesn’t concern Beaumont.”

“I am your wife,” Lydia retorted, refusing to let the matter drop. “Which means that it does concern me. Why, any other man would be proud to have such an honor bestowed upon him.”

At hearing that, Ben snorted. “Honor, my ass. As far as I’m concerned, it’s nothing more than a piece of scrap metal.”

“If that is true, then why do you keep the medal with your personal effects?”

“To remind me of what I did to earn it,” he
muttered, unwilling to explain further. “And after six weeks of marriage to you, I’m thinking they ought to give me another one.”

The
instant the words left his mouth, Ben wanted to kick himself. Particularly when he caught sight of the wounded expression on Lydia’s face. She’d done nothing wrong, yet here he stood castigating the hell out of her. Truth be told, he’d spent the last four days punishing her for the fact that he didn’t like traveling with a gang of dyed-in-the-wool rebels. Even though those same rebels had saved their lives.

Sweet Jesus. What’s
wrong with me, anyway?

“Look, Lydia . . . I’m sorry, all right.”

“I, too, am to blame. You didn’t wish to attend the supper party. Yet I insisted that—”

“I’m sorry about
everything
,” Ben clarified. “Beaumont’s shindig, the way I spoke to you just now, my sour disposition these last four days. I know that I’ve been a bear to live with . . . and I apologize.”

Lydia’s
lips curved in a tremulous smile; one that conveyed that all was forgiven.

Damn, but he
’d missed seeing that smile, his groin tightening at the sight of it. He and Lydia hadn’t been intimate since the Comanche attack, the sexual frustration only heightening his contentious mood.

What he needed, and needed bad
ly, was to make love to his wife.

“Come here,”
Ben husked, extending his uninjured arm in Lydia’s direction.

Still smiling, Lydia
placed her hand in his.

As Ben gently pulled his wife close to him, he took
a moment to breathe in the heady mix of lemon verbena, lilac water, and warm woman. He then leaned toward her, angling his head to one side.

Taking it slow and easy, he kissed
Lydia with lazy familiarity, his tongue grazing across her lush lips before stealing its way into her mouth.

The
mere taste of her, the wet, inviting warmth of her, sent the blood pumping to Ben’s manhood.

Wrapping
his good arm around Lydia’s waist, he brought her flush against him. Then, with a satisfied groan, he suckled her lower lip, his hand straying past her waist, palming a soft buttock as he pulled her against his erection.

Suddenly, and for no apparent reason, Lydia pushed against his chest, struggling to free herself from his one-armed embrace.
Because he was just starting to feel good, his cock straining against the fabric of his trousers, Ben refused to release her.

“Ben
!
Please
! Your behavior is highly improper. Anyone could walk past and see us,” Lydia hissed as she furtively glanced over her shoulder.

“There’s nobody around,”
Ben assured her, nuzzling his lips against her neck. “Besides, what’s improper about a man kissing his own wife, huh?”

When he tried to recapture her lips,
Lydia clamped her mouth shut, twisting her head from side to side. Annoyed as hell, Ben let his arm drop from her waist.

“I just can’t figure you out anymore,” he groused. “One minute you’re returning my kisses, and the next you’re running cold, fighting to get away from me.”

“That’s because one minute you’re kissing me, and the next you’re groping at me like some—” Lydia broke off suddenly. Then, with a haughty look plastered onto her face, she said, “I am your wife, sir. Not a receptacle for your animal lusts.”

Ben’s eyes narrowed, his earlier anger returning with a vengeance. “Is that what you think I am, an animal?”

“I didn’t mean it that way, and you know it.”

“Al
l I know is that I want my wife; but I can’t have her because she’s all mooney-eyed over some puffed-up, pomaded
gentleman
.” Ben spat out the word ‘gentleman’ like it was snake venom.

“How dare you make such a patently untrue accusation!”

“Oh, I dare, all right. And do you want to know why?” He took a step toward Lydia, his chest grazing her bosom, enabling Ben to feel her hardened nipples. “Because I’d have to be blind not to see the way that Beaumont fawned all over you tonight. And the whole time he did, you sat pretty, batting your eyelashes and cooing like some well-fed pigeon come home to roost.”

With an indignant
huff, Lydia stepped away from him. “I will not listen to—”

“We’re cutting loose from this
wagon train the day after tomorrow,” Ben tersely interjected. “Until then, I don’t want to see you within spitting distance of Beaumont.”

Having said his peace, if
it could be called that, Ben turned and headed for the stream that ran along the outskirts of their camp, in dire need of a cold dunk. As he made his way across the camp, someone started to blow a harmonica, the familiar strains of
Dixie
reverberating across the camp.

Gritting h
is teeth, Ben kept on walking.

“
I would like to speak to you about last night.”

Turning a deaf ear on Lydia’s request, Ben splashed a handful of cold water onto his face. His movements unhurried, he reached for the towel
that was slung over his bare shoulder, using it to pat his face dry.

“There’s nothing to say,” he
informed his wife, still in a surly mood.

Having slept
on the ground beneath their wagon, when he could have been curled beside his wife on a soft mattress, had put Ben in a decidedly foul humor. Not to mention that his left arm hurt like hell, his right shoulder ached with rheumatism, and the wound on his chest felt like someone had scoured it with prickly pears.

“
Our attendance at Colonel Beaumont’s supper party is not the reason why I spurned your advances last evening,” Lydia primly asserted, her voice lowered so as not to wake Dixie who was still asleep inside the wagon.

“Yeah? Well, I find that hard to believe.”

“Not only were your accusations in regard to Colonel Beaumont insulting, but they were wholly without merit. I’ll have you know that Colonel Beaumont is a southern gentleman, and the epitome of gracious hospitality.”

“‘A southern gentleman?’
” Ben parroted, irritated as all get-out. “Maybe if you weren’t so besotted with the man, you’d be able to see Beaumont for what he really is. And in case you’re interested, that would be a perfumed, strutting popinjay!”

Drawing herself to her full height,
Lydia bestowed Ben with a glacial stare. “I will not even dignify that with a response.”

“Fine,” he grumbled, trying to ignore the fact that Lydia’s copper-colored tresses begged to be touched, the
early morning light washing her hair in a rosy glow.

Grabbing the washbowl
that he’d been using, Ben flung the contents to the ground, dousing a nearby tree trunk. Then, reaching for the shirt that he’d hung on a low-lying limb, he slowly eased it over his head, the motion causing his bandaged left arm to throb with pain.

“Here, let me help,” Lydia offered, reaching under his shirt to help guide his injured arm into the armhole.

At the mere touch of his wife’s hand, Ben was suddenly encumbered with another kind of pain altogether. Milking the brief moment of contact for all it was worth, he allowed Lydia to button his shirt for him. As he watched her tapered fingers nimbly slip each button into its mooring, Ben wished that there wasn’t a bevy of harsh words hovering between them. Particularly since, standing only inches apart from another, Ben was acutely aware of Lydia’s dramatic coloring, her skin like newly fallen snow, her lips as succulent as ripe berries on the bush. And hidden beneath the modest calico dress, he knew that there was a womanly, full-breasted body, the likes of which made his blood run hot.

When the last button was fastened,
a skittish air suddenly came over his wife.

“If you have something to say, just spit it out,”
Ben prompted.

“You were entirely wrong about . . . about last night’s episode
,” Lydia said haltingly. “After we left the supper party, I, too, felt a passionate urge when we kissed one another.”

“Well, you had a
damned funny way of showing it,” he muttered.

“If you must know, I was—
” Lydia broke off abruptly. Turning her head from side-to-side, she peered around the encampment. Then, evidently satisfied that no one could overhear her, she said, “I was self-consciously aware of our surroundings last night.”

“And still are from the looks of things.”

Given her peevish expression, Ben surmised that his wife was not amused.

“In case you haven’t noticed, we are ensconced amidst a veritable multitude.”

About to inform Lydia that it was because of her that they were ‘ensconced’ with several dozen rebel families, Ben thought better of it. Instead, he said, “Just what do think all these married folk do come nightfall? Do you think they’re in their tents playing patty-cake with each other?”

“Really, sir!”

“Well, I’ll tell you what they’re doing,” he continued, ignoring Lydia’s testy reprimand. “They’re in their tents screwing each other’s—”

“Mama, is it time to get up yet?”

In tandem, the two of them spun toward the Conestoga, both of them surprised to see Dixie’s head poked between the canvas flaps above the tailgate.

“It’s still rather early,” Lydia replied
with a pinched smile.

Dixie
rubbed her eyes with her balled fists. “I know. But I don’t want to miss the big party.”

Not so much as glancing in his direction, Lydia stepped toward her daughter, lifting her skirts several inches as she climbed into the wagon. Watching
his wife disappear into her canvas-covered domain did little to slake Ben’s anger.

Or his lust.

Is it so wrong to want to bed my own wife?

In the
two weeks prior to the Comanche attack, he’d had the pleasure of Lydia’s company during the daylight hours, and he’d shared her bed every night. Now, she barely spoke to him. If she’d
really
felt a ‘passionate urge’ after they left the supper party, she wouldn’t have spurned his kisses.

Feeling o
rnery, and in desperate need of some coffee, Ben jammed his hand-me-down gray slouch hat onto his head, hoping to rustle a cup of coffee from an easy-going Reb. Spying two gray-suited soldiers milling in the distance, he headed in that direction.

As
Ben got closer, he could see that the pair wasn’t milling about. Instead, they were on sentry duty, their rifles at the ready as they slowly paced back-and-forth in front of six identical supply wagons.

Interested
to know what Beaumont was toting in those wagons that would warrant armed sentries, Ben veered behind a tree where he could watch unobserved.

A
few moments later, one of the soldiers stopped in his tracks and propped his rifle against his leg. Reaching into his pocket, he removed a briar-root pipe and a pouch of tobacco. Then, rummaging in his vest pockets, he tried to locate a match, without much success. When the other guard came to his assistance, Ben seized his chance. Quickly approaching the last wagon, he pulled aside the canvas flaps, grasped the iron hoop, and hauled himself over the tailgate.

As his eyes adjusted to the dim lighting,
Ben could see that the interior of the wagon was filled with neatly stacked grain sacks. Curious as to their contents, he removed a whittling knife from his pocket and sliced a small hole in one of them, dismayed to uncover nothing more incriminating than cotton seed.

Feeling like a jackass,
Ben was about to make a hasty exit when he suddenly detected a metallic gleam behind the sack of cotton seed. Suspicions aroused, he lifted the heavy burlap sack out of the way, ignoring the bolt of pain that shot through his injured arm. A few seconds later, in stunned disbelief, he let loose with a volley of silent expletives, bowled over by the sight of a Gatling gun.

Well, this sure as hell
isn’t Louisiana cotton seed.

Ben’s
fury spiked even higher when he next uncovered a stack of wooden boxes packed with seven-shot Spencer rifles.

If all six wagons were loaded with contraband arms, and Ben had no reason to think
that they weren’t, then Beaumont had enough fire power at his disposal to start another war. And in light of the fact that the Gatling gun was Union manufactured, as were the Spencer rifles, he further suspected that Beaumont had stolen the weaponry from a Federal armory.

Since
new guns were no different than hard currency, Ben wondered if Beaumont was planning to sell the armaments in order to raise enough cash to buy land in Mexico. Granted, it’d buy a helluva lot of land, the Gatling gun alone going for nearly a thousand dollars on the open market. Given that the imperial soldiers under Emperor Maximilian and the rebel guerillas under Benito Juarista were currently engaged in a bloody revolution, Beaumont would have no problem finding a Mexican buyer for his contraband arms.

To further muddy the waters,
because Texas was a former Confederate state, there wasn’t a nearby Union military outpost where Ben could go to report his findings. Even if he could get to a town with a telegraph operator, by the time a cavalry regiment could be mobilized and deployed, Beaumont would have already crossed the Rio Grande with his arms stash.

Knowing that his hands were tied,
Ben restacked the grain sacks. When he was finished, he cautiously pulled aside the canvas wagon cover and waited. When the guard closest to him pivoted on his booted heel, marching away from the wagon, he made his move.

Noiselessly vaulting over the side of the tailgate, Ben quickly headed for his own wagon.

If he disliked Percy Beaumont before the discovery, he sure as hell loathed him now.

“Do you mean to say that you won’t be attending the Fourth of July festivities?”

Ben paused in mid-motion, a whittling knife in one hand and a cottonwood stick in the other. Standing in front of his camp chair, a basketful of fresh baked biscuits balanced on her arm, Lydia waited for his reply.

“I hadn’t planned on it,”
Ben said nonchalantly as he resumed his whittling.

“
But it would be rude
not
to attend.”

“To the best of my recollection, that’s what you said about attending Beaumont’s
supper party, and look where that got me.”

Dixie, dressed in her best Sunday go-to-meeting dress,
plopped down at his feet. “But, Captain Ben, you have to come to the big party,” she insisted, her eyes sparkling with irrepressible excitement.

Ben couldn’t help but smile. “And why’s that, Corporal Dixie?”

“Because there’s going to be cake and pie and fried fritters. And Doctor Wylie’s wife even made lemonade.”

Not wanting to dampen the child’s high spirits, Ben
cocked one eyebrow as he gave the matter due consideration. “What kind of pie will they be serving?”

“Peach
and
apple,” Dixie exclaimed, barely able to contain herself.

“And Harriet Starkweather has baked a cherry cobber,” Lydia added,
wisely knowing that the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach.

Tossing aside the whittled piece of cottonwood, Ben pocketed his knife, unable to fight two women at
once. Besides, if he didn’t attend, he figured Beaumont would be all over his wife like a flea on a dog.

“All right, Corporal Dixie
. You talked me into it,” Ben said as he rose to his feet, resigned to the fact that the imp had him wrapped around her little finger.

His stepdaughter lunged to her feet, a gleeful smile on her face. “Yippee!” she hollered, the exuberant exclamation earning her a chastising glance from her mother. “I knew
that we could talk you into it.”

Having been hoodwinked,
Ben brushed the wood chips off the front of his gray trousers. “Well, then, let’s get to it.”

“Ben, I would like for you to carry that crock of baked beans,” Lydia
instructed, pointing to a large clay pot conspicuously set on the camp table. “And Dixie, I would like you to carry those two jars of pickled cucumbers. I shall take the biscuits.”

As he and Dixie
diligently obeyed the issued commands, Ben winked at his stepdaughter. “Maybe we should make her a general, what do you think?”

The question sent Dixie int
o a gale of childish laughter.

“I heard that,” Lydia chimed in,
the rebuke softened with a teasing smile.

Baked beans in hand, Ben joined his wife. While not particularly
enthused to be attending Beaumont’s holiday bash, considering it an affront for renegade Confederates to be celebrating the birth of America, at least now he and his wife were speaking civilly to one another. As far as he was concerned, they’d exchanged enough heated words for one day.