Judith E French (14 page)

He tried reason. “Because I’m the boss on Kilronan. And I’m the head of this family.”

“Oh.” Caity smiled as though he’d given her a compliment instead of a talking-to.

Clearing his throat, he pushed back from the table and fixed Caitlin with a stern look. “That’s the way it has to be.”

She smiled at him again, a smile that would melt ice. “There’s an old saying in County Clare. Do you remember? The husband is the head of the house, but the wife is the heart.”

He stood up. This wasn’t going the way he’d thought it would. She seemed to be agreeing with him, but she really wasn’t.

Shane switched barrels and tried praise. “What you said to Big Earl was smart. You kept him from startin’ a fight. You were right, and I was wrong.”

“Yes,” she said. “I was, wasn’t I?”

Gabe made a sound that might have been a chuckle.

Shane’s patience ran out. “It could as easily have turned out the other way, Caity. There might have been shootin’, and you would have been in the middle of it.”

“Justice was beside you, Shane. He’s ten years old. Why is it all right for a child to stand in the middle of a fight and not a grown woman?”

“Justice is a man. At least, he will be a man.” Shane could barely contain his temper. He shot the boy a look and was rewarded by a fleeting grin.

“Berry a man, too!” Derry chimed in.

“You are not,” Caitlin corrected. “You are a young lady. And one who’s up past her bedtime.”

Swiftly Caitlin rose and lifted Derry out of her seat. “If you will excuse us, I—”

“I’m not done,” Shane said sharply.

“No, I suppose you’re not, but do feel free to finish your supper.”

Shane followed her from the room. “You know I wasn’t talkin’ about the food.”

“Oh, you weren’t?”

“I’ll carry her upstairs for you,” he said. “We’ll put her to bed together, and then we can finish our
talk.”

Caity surrendered the child.

Derry threw her arms around his neck and planted a damp kiss on his cheek. “I wove you,” she proclaimed.

Upstairs, he waited as Caity washed the child’s hands and face and put her into nightclothes.

“Story! Story!” Derry urged.

“We always have a story,” Caity answered. “A story and prayers.”

“Not Mama. ’Kenna. ’Kenna read a story.”

“Your … your aunt will read to you,” Shane said.

“It’s all right. I’ve given up,” Caity put in. “She can call me Mama if she wants to.”

“ ’Kenna read!” Derry insisted.

“McKenna can’t read the d—” He caught himself. “I can’t read, child. Never learned how. She’ll give you your story.” Shamed, he retreated into the hall.

When the routine was complete and Derry was tucked into bed, Shane led Caitlin downstairs and out onto the front porch. He was very much aware of the scent of
heather in her hair and the graceful way she moved, but he wasn’t about to let her win this contest. She needed to know how things had to be on Kilronan.

Not that he wanted to argue with her. He’d have much rather pulled her into his arms and held her against him, just to feel a woman’s softness again. But if he didn’t have his say, he knew he’d regret it.

“You were wrong to disobey me and go out to meet the Thompsons,” he said. “But I was wrong to bring it up at supper in front of Gabe and Mary.”

Caity leaned against the railing and looked up at the night sky. “There must be a million stars up there. They seem so close … so bright. Is it possible that they’re the same stars we watched at home?”

“This is home for me,” he reminded her. “But I didn’t bring you out here to talk about the stars.”

She turned to face him, sending a wave of heather fragrance wafting over him. Desire flared in his loins.

“Maybe you should have.”

She was close … so close. He knew that if he reached for her, she wouldn’t pull away. But he also knew his own weaknesses, and he was determined not to let her rule him because of it.

“What you did today was dangerous,” he said.

“But it turned out all right.” Her voice softened. “How’s your head? Your ribs?”

“I’ll live.”

“I hope so.”

Her voice was a breath of Ireland. Listening to it made him want to smile. Lord in heaven! How many nights had he gone to sleep with a hollow feeling in his chest from missing her?

Now she was finally here. She was in reach, and he didn’t know if he could keep her beside him … or if he even wanted to.

For the space of a heartbeat, he wished he could turn the clock back. When he’d taken her for his wife, he’d felt like the richest man in the world. And for a few short hours, they’d been together as man and woman.

But that was in Ireland, where he was nothing—worse than nothing. Not fit to take Caity’s hand to help her into a carriage, let alone think of marrying her.

If he shoved time back, he’d be that clumsy boy with the thin-soled shoes and the thick accent again. He’d be at the beck and call of any man with a coin in his pocket, and he’d be a husband without a hope of owning an acre of land or of making a decent living for his wife and family.

Here, in Missouri, he’d proved himself. He had Kilronan, and he knew he was the equal of a man like Earl Thompson or any other.

“I don’t give you orders because I want to control you, Caity,” he said. “It’s my duty to keep you safe.”

“You would have fought Thompson today, wouldn’t you?”

“If I had to,” he admitted. “You don’t go up against a man like Big Earl halfway. But I couldn’t let him take what was mine.”

“Wouldn’t it have been better to pay him the fee for his stallion?”

“And admit I was a cheat when I wasn’t?”

“What will you do with the filly now? You can’t keep her star dyed with lampblack forever.”

That had been worrying him, too. “I’ll think of something.”

“Maybe it would be better to try to find a way to make peace with your neighbor than to keep up an old feud.”

“His feud, not mine.”

She sighed. “Earl Thompson seems a hard man, but I don’t think he’s the type to commit murder.”

“He’s not sneaky. He’d shoot me if he thought he had to, but not in the back.”

“Then maybe if the two of you worked together, you could find the—”

“Damn it, Caity. Stop tryin’ to change things you know nothin’ about. Can’t you just accept me and Kilronan the way we are? Accept Justice and Mary?”

“Why should she?” Justice demanded.

Shane turned to see the boy standing in the shadows. He’s good, Shane thought, as good as Gabe. He’d never heard a sound.

“You’ve no business here listening to private conversations,” he said to Justice. “And I told you before, you’re to show respect to your new mother.”

“She’s not my mother!”

“No,” Caitlin agreed. “Not your mother, but someone who wants to be your friend.”

“Why should you?”

“Justice,” Shane admonished. “I think you’ve said enough.”

“Be my friend?” the boy taunted. “Be nice to the dirty little Indian half-breed? The whore’s son?”

“Damn it, Justice!” Shane said. “Shut your—”

“Don’t say such things about your mother, child,” Caitlin cried. “You don’t mean—”

The boy swore a foul oath. “Don’t mean it? Course I mean it. Ask anybody. They’ll tell you. My mother was nothin’ but a cheap, whiskey-drinkin’ whore.”

“Is it true, Shane?” Caitlin whispered huskily. “Was she …”

“McKenna’s whore?” Justice mocked her. “Sure she was. The most expensive gal at Fat Rose’s. And if
she weren’t dead, he’d still be with her. Not you! Not ever you.”

“Caity,” Shane said, reaching for her.

But she dodged past him and ran back into the house, and the sound of her weeping cut him deeper than the dull ache of his broken ribs.

In the days that followed Justice’s angry revelation, Caitlin maintained an uneasy truce with Shane. Her pride was shattered, and she was in no mood to listen to any more of her husband’s explanations or excuses.

Shane had broken his marriage vows to become deeply involved with a common bawd who sold her favors to the highest bidder. He’d accused Caitlin of being unfaithful and giving birth to an illegitimate child, while he’d been the one who’d cheated and lied.

Now he expected her to overlook what he had done with Justice’s mother and go on as if nothing had happened. And as much as Caitlin wanted to save her marriage, she didn’t know if that was possible.

She loved the man he used to be. But maybe love wasn’t enough—maybe she should take Derry and leave Kilronan.

Mary and Justice would be happier if she went away. If Shane was steely polite, the Indian woman and Shane’s adopted son were anything but. Battles raged on every front. Mary had her own way of running the house, and she was not prepared to share her responsibilities or to change her habits.

And Caitlin was just as determined not to back down. So long as she was mistress at Kilronan, she’d manage
the household her way. That meant spotless floors, scrubbed walls, and clean children at meals and bedtime.

Caitlin rose at first light every morning and kept busy until the last of the dishes were done, the kitchen floor swept, and dough set to rise for the next morning’s bread.

Since Mary was so deeply entrenched in the kitchen, Caitlin made the front parlor her first project. She found a hammer and painstakingly pried out the nails that held the connecting door between the kitchen and parlor shut.

“Why would anyone build a doorway and then board it up?” she demanded of Shane over supper.

He shrugged.

“Too many door,” Mary grumbled. “One, two, three. Three door in kitchen, too many. Not need waste wood to heat empty room.”

“Well, we don’t need to heat the room now, do we?” Caitlin replied with a forced smile.

“Winter come,” Mary said. “Winter always come. Waste wood, heat, ’nother room. Eat in kitchen. All time, eat in kitchen.” She spread her worn hands expressively. “Good room. Good food. Good heat.”

“It’s not winter now, and we will be taking supper in the parlor room as soon as I finish it,” Caitlin said firmly. “It will be our dining room.”

The following day she inspected the house from top to bottom. Upstairs, in the attic under the eaves, she found a cache of old furniture covered with dusty trade blankets: a dismantled four-poster bed, seven straight-backed chairs, an Irish hunt board, and an old-fashioned dining table crafted of solid walnut.

The front parlor was smaller than the kitchen, but the room boasted a lovely stone hearth, deep window seats, and whitewashed plaster walls. Sunshine streamed through the glass windowpanes onto the pine floor, giving the
chamber a warm glow. A second doorway led to the entrance hall.

While Shane ignored her and busied himself with the unending task of caring for his animals and crops, Caitlin attacked the parlor. She coated the walls with fresh whitewash, scrubbed and polished the floorboards, and shined the windows. Then she dragged the dismantled table piece by piece, and the hunt board down two flights of stairs and into the room. These, too, she carefully cleaned and waxed.

The room took longer than Caitlin had thought it would, nearly a week of hard work. But when she pushed the last chair under the table and hung a portrait of her great-grandmother over the hunt board, she was satisfied. Her back ached and she had blisters on both hands, but she didn’t care.

“All done?” Derry asked.

“Not yet,” she murmured. “Almost, but soon.”

A midday thunderstorm had kept both children in the house, and Caitlin had heard them giggling in the kitchen and running up and down the stairs. Then Caitlin heard Justice say something about going to the barn.

“Stay inside, Derry,” Caitlin warned.

The kitchen door slammed shut.

“Justice gone,” Derry said dejectedly.

“He’s a big boy,” Caitlin soothed. “He has chores to do.”

“Berry do chores.”

“Yes, when you’re bigger.”

Derry trailed after Caitlin as she hurried upstairs to her bedroom. The rain was coming down in sheets, hitting the windows in waves.

Caitlin thought of Shane and Gabriel mending fences, and wondered if they’d taken shelter somewhere.

“Justice catched a f’nake,” Derry said as Caitlin picked her up and set her on a chair.

“A real snake or a make-believe snake?” Caitlin asked absently. One leg of Derry’s pantalettes was hiked up above her knee, the other drooped over her shoe. Her face was smeared with honey, and her hands were black and sooty.

“No. Don’t touch your dress. I’ll wash you as soon as I find something.”

Derry shook her head so hard that her pigtails whirled in the air. “A blue f’nake.”

“Blue? All right.” Caitlin smiled. “Sit still. I’ll be done in a minute.” She was certain that she’d packed four linen swags in the bottom of her big trunk. Once the delicate drapes had adorned her mother’s bedchamber; now they would do nicely for the dining room.

At home in County Clare, she’d taken the beautiful furniture, family portraits, and silver for granted. They hadn’t been rich, no matter what Shane said, but her parents had lived graciously. Her father had loved books; her mother, music and painting. Maureen had learned to play the piano, and Caitlin the small harp. Caitlin could remember dinner parties and dances and poetry readings that went on until late at night.

Here in the Missouri wilderness there was only endless sky and grass, ancient forests, and rushing streams. Caitlin appreciated the breathtaking beauty of this new land around her, but she also longed for the intellectual richness of her old life.

“It’s a good thing I brought my favorite books with me,” she said to Derry. “I’ve seen nothing in this house but a single tattered Bible.”

“Like f ’nakes. You like f ’nakes, Mama?”

“Not especially.” Caitlin opened the big trunk and dug
to the bottom without finding the linen swags. “Now, where can they be? I was certain I saw them last week.”

“Justice like green f’nakes.”

“Umm-hm,” Caitlin agreed. “Maybe in the other …” Nibbling at her lower lip, she flipped up the lid on the smaller wooden case. “I think I saw—”

Something slithered over Caitlin’s hand. She screamed and leaped back.