Just North of Bliss (30 page)

“Damn you!” Win drew back his fist to sock
him again.

Again Belle grimaced and shut her eyes so
she wouldn’t see the blow land. The crunching noise told her all
she needed to know about that. When she opened her eyes a second
later, she saw that her assailant was bleeding copiously from the
nose and mouth. Although she didn’t care for the man—he’d
frightened her terribly—she didn’t think she wanted to witness his
death at Win’s hands. Leaping at Win’s back, she grabbed hold of
his arm. It felt like steel under her fingers, even though the
thickness of shirt and jacket. “Don’t do it, Win!”

“He tried to assault you,” Win growled
through his teeth. The blow he’d just landed would have flattened
the other man had Win released his throat. He hadn’t, and the
wrongdoer now hung limply in Win’s grasp. “Anyone who tries to hurt
you is going to pay for it.”

“I think you’ve made him pay enough.” She
held on tight, hoping he wouldn’t hit the man again. She feared he
might already be dead.

“Nothing’s bad enough for him.”

“Please, Win!” Belle begged. “You’ll only
get into trouble.”

“I don’t care.”

A wild glance around in hope of finding help
told Belle that people had been attracted by the commotion and were
gathering ‘round. Like a flock of buzzards or a swarm of locusts.
Oh, my land. “
I
care, confound you! You’re creating a
scene!”

Win dropped the man, who fell to the ground
like a sack of flour, and spun around to gape down at Belle.
“
I’m
creating a scene? Damnation, Belle! That man was going
to carry you off! Do you have any idea what he might have done to
you?”

“Yes.” She ground the word out through her
teeth. A huge gasp arose from the spectators and she pressed a hand
over her eyes. To her rattled senses, the mob sounded like
honeybees on a rampage. “Please, let’s get out of here,” she
pleaded.

“Dash it, Belle, I just saved you from
assault!”

“Will you please stop shouting? The whole
world doesn’t need to know that!” This was so embarrassing. The
whole world also knew that
assault
meant
rape
, and
Belle could already picture telegrams winging their way from
Georgia to Chicago, all scolding her. And all paid for by her.

“I’ll stop shouting, damn it, but the least
you could do is thank me!”

“Thank you,” she said desperately.

“Here, here,” came a gruff voice. Belle saw
to her dismay that a huge man was headed their way, his spiffy
uniform declaring him a member of the Columbian Guard, the special
police force hired specifically for the Exposition. “What’s going
on here?”

“Oh, this is just perfect,” she muttered
under her breath. More telegrams popped into her imagination, this
time from all of her aunts and uncles as well as her
parents—perhaps even the mayor of Blissborough—and again paid for
by her.

“Damn it, Belle, you have to report this
incident. That man—” He kicked his fallen foe in case Belle didn’t
know to whom he referred. “—tried to—”

“I
know
what he tried to do, curse
you!”

Oh, Lord, now she was swearing in public.
This had gone far enough. Deciding to take matters into her own
hands, she marched up to the Columbian Guardsman, endeavoring to
ignore all the whispers and snickers issuing from the gathering
throng. Pointing to the villain on the ground in typical Northern
fashion, she said, “That man tried to bother me. Mr. Asher saved
me.” There. That said everything that needed to be said.

“Good gravy!”

While Belle might have used more elegant
phrasing, she was pleased that the Guardsman at least appreciated
the severity of the situation.

He went on, “We don’t tolerate that sort of
thing at the Columbian Exposition, young lady. I’ll take care of
this right now.”

“Thank you.”

Win had walked up to them. He snarled, “You
thanked
him
without being asked.”

She shot him a frown. “Oh, be quiet for a
minute, can’t you? I want to get this taken care of and get out of
here. Look at all those people.” She wished she’d worn a veiled
hat. She hated being on display, especially for this reason. It was
so—so—unladylike. Ungenteel. Un-Southern.

Win took her arm, and Belle decided not to
try to wrench it away from him, sensing she couldn’t and that the
attempt would only result in more embarrassment. The two of them
followed the Columbian Guardsman to the man on the ground. He was
beginning to stir and moaned piteously once or twice. While Belle
was glad for this evidence that the villain hadn’t been slain by
Win, her heart remained unstirred. She had no sympathy for
mashers.

It occurred to her that she’d at least
learned something from this experience. She could now tell the
difference between a masher and a man driven by an artistic vision.
She couldn’t imagine what good this lesson was going to do her.

“Come with me, you,” the Guard said. A big
man, he seemed to have no trouble lifting the man from the
ground.

Belle wrinkled her nose. The man was a mess.
His nose had bled all over his shirt, coat, and cravat, and his
mouth had started swelling as had his eyes, which Belle assumed
would be black upon the morrow. Good. She hoped he’d learned a
valuable lesson from this night’s work, the fiend.

Holding the scoundrel in a tight grip, the
Guard turned to Belle and Win. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am
about this, madam. If you’ll come with me, we can file a report and
you can press charges.”

The man hanging from the Guardsman’s hamlike
fist groaned.

Still Belle felt not the least dribble of
sympathy for him. She also didn’t want to press charges. Sure as
anything, if she pressed charges, the incident would be reported in
a newspaper somewhere, her parents would find out about it, and the
telegrams would cluster around her like hail. “Um, I don’t believe
I shall press charges, Officer.”

“Why not, for God’s sake?” Win shouted.

She frowned back and hissed, “I don’t want
the publicity.”

“You sure, miss? He deserves to be punished
for worrying you.”

He did more than worry her, although Belle
really didn’t want to get into that at the moment, especially with
a crowd of fascinated people eager to gobble up the salacious
details. “I believe Mr. Asher punished him enough, Officer. Thank
you. Is there any way you can just—just—remove him from the
premises? So that he can’t—ah—bother any other young women?”

“Certainly, if that’s what you want,
madam.”

“Dash it, Belle, you should press charges!
His kind won’t stop with just one woman, you know.”

“And how would you know that, Mr. Win
Asher?” Her glacial gaze flickered from Win to the villain and back
again. “Do you regularly associate with people like this
creature?”

“Of course, I don’t! You know me better than
that. But I have friends in the newspaper business, and they know
all kinds of stuff like that.”

“Hmmm.”

“It’s your choice ma’am,” said the
guardsman.

The masher had begun to get his feet under
him. “I’m sorry, ma’am,” he whimpered.

At least that was Belle’s interpretation of
his words, which were mushy because his mouth was damaged. Belle
wondered if Win had knocked out any of his teeth. She hoped so. She
said, “Fah,” and turned away from him to address Win. “Of course, I
don’t want him bothering anyone else, but I also don’t want to make
more of a scene than you’ve already done.”

Win gaped at her.
“I!
You think
I
created this
scene?” He turned abruptly, snatched his hat from his head, and
slapped it against his thigh as he stomped back and forth. “I can’t
believe this. You get attacked by a disgusting criminal, I rescue
you, and you blame me for creating a scene.” He threw his head back
and glared at the heavens. “It figures. I should have known better
than to expect gratitude from you.”

Deciding it would be best to ignore Win for
the moment, Belle turned to the Guard. “Please just take him away,
if you will. I appreciate your help in this matter.”

“Ha!” came Win’s bitter voice behind her.
She opted to ignore him some more.

“That’s what we’re here for, ma’am,” the
Guardsman said. “Although we’ve had very few incidents of this
nature.” When he turned around to drag Win’s trophy off, he noticed
the crowd of curious onlookers. Adopting a stern expression, he
said, “Move along now, folks. There’s no need for this sort of
thing.”

What sort of thing? Assaulting women or
gaping at the scene of an attempted crime? Belle didn’t ask.
Rather, she ignored the crowd as she’d ignored Win, and walked over
to Win, who was still glowering at the evening sky and slapping his
hat against his thigh. “Win?”

He didn’t look at her. “What?”

Oh, dear, he sounded extremely crabby. Belle
sighed and took his arm. “I’m sorry if I offended you.”

“Ha.”

Belle persevered. “I truly do appreciate you
for coming to my rescue.”

“Ha.”

“You’re a genuine hero, Win.” She wondered
how many women actually had cause to say such a silly-sounding
thing and mean it. “And I’m truly grateful.”

At last he stopped staring at the sky and
gazed down at her. “You didn’t act much like it.”

She held on to her temper, knowing that his
feelings had been ruffled, although, being a man, he’d never admit
it. “I’m sorry. I was trying to prevent you from killing him. You’d
have gotten into trouble if you’d done that, and I’m sure your
conscience would have bothered you.”

“Ha.”

In an effort to get away from the scene of
her recent humiliation, Belle tugged gently at Win’s arm and
finally succeeded in budging him. “It must be horrid to know you’ve
killed a person. You have to admit it, Win.”

“No, I don’t.”

She guessed she wasn’t going to win this
round and decided to change the subject. “Did you have an
opportunity to talk with your agent today?”

A large huff preceded his next comment.
“That’s all you care about, isn’t it? Money.”

Belle sighed heavily. Perhaps she should
have pressed charges, even at the risk of courting telegrams. That
might have gone some way toward ironing out Win’s wrinkled ego.
Maybe he would have felt more heroic and vindicated if she’d
praised him lavishly instead of trying to stop him from killing
that man, but she’d been worried that he’d get hurt. She’d never
say so, understanding that his masculine pride would be even more
severely wounded if she did so. He’d probably take her concern as
an indication that she didn’t believe he was strong enough to
vanquish his foe. Men. They were entirely too sensitive.

Anyhow, it had been she who’d almost been
kidnaped, after all. Why should
he
be in a
huff?

Fiddlesticks. Belle gave up trying to fathom
the masculine mind. She snapped, “No, that’s not all I care about.
I care about my family.”
I care about you
. Laws-a-mercy, she
could never say that.

“Your family,” Win muttered bitterly.

“Yes. And I care about my job with the
Richmonds.”

“Right.”

It had been a trying day for Belle. First
she’d received two telegrams from her parents that had all but
massacred her sensibilities. Then she’d been kissed senseless by
Win. Then she’d been accosted by a vile masher and almost seen the
awful man dispatched by Win. It was all too much for her, and her
reserve broke. “Curse you, Win Asher, you’re the one who offered me
a partnership!
You’re
the one who brought up money!
You’re
the one who lied to me in the first place!”

“I didn’t lie! Exactly.”

“Fiddlesticks!”

Win slapped his hat onto his head and
stuffed his hands into his pockets. “Oh, very well. I guess I
misled you slightly.”

“Slightly,” Belle repeated, giving the word
the emphasis she believed it deserved.

Win sucked in a huge gulp of air.
“Hmmm.”

A whole lot of good
hmmm
did. “The
only reason I came to the Exposition this evening was because you
told me you’d get some estimates on how much money I can expect to
earn if we join together in a business partnership. This whole
thing came about because you wanted to photograph the children and
me. You accosted me. I didn’t come to you and ask you to make my
life miserable. Don’t you dare insinuate that I’m being
mercenary!”

“I didn’t accost you.”

She gave him back one of his “ha’s.”

They were approaching his booth, and Win
took the key from his pocket. He looked like a sulky child under
the electric lights. He also looked like the most appealing man
Belle had ever met. This was all most distressing. Belle figured
that, one way or another, she was doomed.

That being the case, and with visions of
accusatory telegrams dancing minuets and polkas with greenbacks in
her head, Belle steeled her nerves and hardened her heart. Win was
right about her parents. They had no right to use the money she
earned to thrash her with. They were being disingenuous and
insensitive at best and downright wrong at worst. Therefore, since
she had an opportunity to earn a lot of money—perhaps; she had yet
to see the numbers—she might as well leap on it. A woman’s looks
didn’t last indefinitely. If Win wanted to photograph her, and if
she could make a lot of money as a model, so be it. And her family
could just go jump in a lake. The good Lord knew, there were plenty
of lakes around Blissborough where they could accomplish the
feat.

When Win opened the door and she marched
into his booth, Belle felt as if she’d become somebody else. She no
longer felt like Rowena Belle Monroe, the charming, sweet, shy
little girl from Georgia. Rather, she felt as if she’d somehow
turned into a woman of the world. Hardened. She felt hardened.