Linda Castle (17 page)

“Miss O’Bannion, would you do me the very great honor of consenting to be my wife?” He flipped open the box. Sunlight glittered off the stones. “To have and to hold, in sickness and in health…?”

Her eyes snapped from his face to the ring and back again. “Oh, Brooks.” She sat up and leaned over the box, staring at the ring. “Oh, oh, Brooks. I am going to cry.”

“Now are tears a yes or a no?”

She looked up at him with eyes awash. Her bottom lip trembled. “Oh, Brooks…”

“Marisa, I love you. Will you marry me?” His eyes rolled up toward the treetops and his voice was teasing. “I mean, after all, I have this ring and I have developed an appetite for kisses that taste like sugar cookies. And after the way you have shamelessly seduced me, my reputation will be in tatters. It would be a crime for me to have gone through all this for nothing, that great proposal wasted. Besides, the ring might not fit another girl…”

She hit him on the shoulder with the palm of her hand. It was like striking stone. “Oh, you!”

It made his heart contract with love to have her teasing him.

“God knows why you want me, but…I love you, Brooks, that is a fact. If you are sure, then I’m willing.”

“I’m sure.”

“Then I’m willin’.”

He crushed her to his chest. A hot, tight lump was in his throat and he had to swallow several times before he could breathe. For a moment he thought that he might actually break down and cry himself, so great was his joy.

“I’ll do my best to make you a good wife.”

“Just be yourself, honey, that is all I want. Just you and your love.”

“That you will have for the rest of my life, Brooks. I swear it.”

They allowed their mounts to walk aimlessly, picking a random path through the foliage. The afternoon sped by while they looked at each other with passion and love in their eyes.

Finally, Marisa pulled up on the reins and the gray reluctantly came to a halt.

“When would you like to be married?” she asked abruptly. Her mood had changed, shifted like mercury in the blink of an eye while Brooks had not been watching.

He smiled. “Tomorrow—today—now. This very minute would not be too soon for me.”

Even white teeth flashed against the dusky smoothness of her skin. “What will your family say? Will they think you have picked a silly girl from the Territory?”

He reached across the short distance between them and laid his gloved hand upon her arm. “They might think of you as exasperating, stubborn, willful, and let’s not forget reckless, but never silly.”

She tilted her head and slanted him a look of mock irritation. “Do you think we were wrong not to have waited—I mean, for our wedding night?”

Brooks suppressed the urge to grin. He had never known a more passionate woman. He thought it was probably due to her upbringing in the Territory. She had none of the prudish attitudes of other women he had known. Marisa was a sensual, sexual woman, at ease with her body. But she had given him a gift beyond imagining because she had wanted to come to the marriage bed with
her virtue intact. She had told him that last night after their first searing encounter.

“I don’t know if I could’ve waited. I might’ve died from the discomfort, and then you would’ve been a widow.”

She struggled to keep from giggling at his contrived expression of pain and agony. “I couldn’t be a widow unless we got married first, you ninny!”

“Oh, right.” He looked at her and felt a tug on his heart. “It makes me proud and happy that I was your first.” His expression turned more serious. “But what is more important, Marisa, I will be your only lover. You are stuck with me, forever.” He rolled his eyes heavenward. “Do you hear that, Lord?”

“You are awful. God may strike you dead right here and now.”

“Probably, but I will die a happy man.” They ducked under a low-hanging branch and emerged into a small meadow gilded with light. “I don’t suppose you really would sneak away with me today, find an obliging judge and do the deed?”

“Uh, I think we did the deed last night.” She winked.

“Don’t tempt me, you vixen,” he exclaimed. “We could find a minister and get the vows done.”

“Your mother and father would be heartbroken.”

Brooks frowned and sighed. “I suppose we do have to allow my family to help. Do we let our wedding become one of those horrible New York events? Mother has taken quite a shine to you. I hope you can endure her through the trials of preparing for a wedding. Thank God Clair is pregnant. At least that will spare us a small amount of the customary nonsense.”

Marisa attempted to look sympathetic, but a smile tickled
her lips. “It would mean a lot to your mother, I am sure. And I would like for Ellen to be my maid of honor.”

The gelding lowered his head and clipped off a mouthful of grass. A squirrel peered at the animal from its perch on a low-hanging bough, chattering in irritation as the horse came too close to its territory.

“So be it. I will be the dutiful son and very impatient prospective groom. We will set a proper date in order to allow my mother to plan and fuss. And Cousin Ellen will be consulted and cosseted as you desire.” Brooks swiveled slightly in the saddle and propped his leg on the horse’s withers. The animal continued to graze around the bit in his mouth. “What shall it be, my love? A winter wedding? Or perhaps full summer when the roses are in bloom? Maybe Leland will forgive you by then. We could have the wedding in his rose arbor, after the repairs on his trellis have been taken care of, of course.”

“I didn’t mean to break his trellis.”

He shrugged. “Oh, I am quite sure climbing on the rickety old thing was a complete accident…” He waggled his brows. “I mean, it was right there, more convenient than the front door and all…”

“Stop it,” she ordered. She tried to ignore him and imagine a wedding in both settings. “The snow would be lovely, but it would make it difficult for guests.”

“You are most sensible. What a wise wife I am getting. Then summer it is! The sooner the better.”

She speared him with a frosty glance. “There are two more seasons in the year, Brooks.”

His brows shot up toward his hairline. “Surely you are not proposing that we wait another whole
year?
Marisa, don’t tell me you are thinking of
next
spring?” He slapped a hand over his chest in mock pain.

She laughed and shook her head. The action sent her
carefully arranged curls bouncing. “No. I am as anxious as you are, silly. How about this fall? We could be married in the autumn when the leaves are turning. I imagine the reds and golds in this park would be beautiful.” She glanced overhead at the canopy of new spring growth.

“Fall…over four months from now.” Brooks tapped his index finger upon his mustache. “All right, I accept. We shall be married in mid-October, and then, my lovely, I intend to ravish you on a regular basis throughout the cold winter months—so be warned.”

“I think you have been ravishing me fairly regularly as it stands now.” She leaned over the gray’s neck to meet him halfway for a passionate kiss.

Abruptly she pulled away. She lifted the reins along with the riding crop she had insisted on carrying, intent on being outfitted properly. With a flick of her wrist she tapped the wild-eyed mare on the rump. The horse exploded in a ripple of sleek muscle.

“Race you back to the lake!” she shouted, over her shoulder.

He laughed and kicked his horse, bringing the startled animal’s head up. “If I win, I get five kisses!” Brooks was filled with admiration and a love so deep it was nearly frightening. She was everything he had ever dreamed of, and never expected to find.

And she had finally accepted his proposal. There was a ring firmly on her finger to prove it to one and all.

“Come on, boy, we have a race to win.” Brooks leaned low and whispered encouragement into his mount’s ear.

Marisa glanced over her shoulder. Brooks was finally gaining on the mare. She made a great show of trying to urge more speed from the animal, while she secretly pulled back on the reins.

She wanted to be caught. She wanted to have to pay
off the wager of five kisses. And she hoped that she and Brooks would lie in each other’s arms once again tonight.

With each thud of the mare’s hooves another burst of happiness warmed her chest.

She was engaged; she was in love. Life was just about perfect.

“Ha! I won,” Brooks declared as he thundered passed her. He eased his horse to a stop and swung out of the saddle.

“Yes, you won.” Marisa waited until he lifted his arms to assist her from the sidesaddle just so she would have the pleasure of feeling his wide rough hands on her body.

“After we walk the horses to cool them down, I expect my reward.” Brooks leaned near and whispered into her ear. “And I have something for you.”

“Another present?” Marisa raised her brows quizzically. “Hmm, I wonder if it is earbobs.” She looked up at him and grinned mischievously. Now it was her turn to tease him.

“I see my dear cousin has been telling tales out of school.” Brooks frowned.

“Actually, I heard this particular story from Cyril. He told me that one Christmas you practically saved the New York City economy by buying identical earbobs for all your, um, lady friends.” Marisa’s fine leather boots crunched over the early spring grass while she matched Brooks’s long stride.

He sighed and shook his head. “I guess the folly of my youth is going to plague me forever. I bet good ol’ Cyril loved revealing my sordid past to you.” Then Brooks glanced down at her and tried to look melancholy. “Wait until I get him in the ring again.”

“Now, Brooks.”

“There is one thing you may be sure of. You are the only woman with my engagement ring on her finger.”

“As long as I am the last,” she said, remembering Violet’s confession.

He stopped walking and tipped her chin up with his gloved index finger. “You aren’t really bothered by these stories, or the past, are you, Marisa? Have no doubt, I have never loved anyone before you. What I felt for Violet was not love.”

“It doesn’t matter what you did before, just what happens for the rest of our lives.” She smiled and stood on her tiptoes to place a kiss on his chin.

He looped his free arm around her waist and kept her possessively close to his lean hip while they walked. A shiver of delight worked its way up her spine.

“Cold? We can go back if you are cold.”

“No, I’m fine.” She absently tapped the riding crop against her skirt panel while she walked. “Brooks, I love the gifts and the parties, but I don’t want you to spoil me.”

“Too late.”

“I mean it. I don’t want to forget how to take care of myself. I want to be…independent.”

He stopped and stared down at her in mock horror. “Lord save me, have I just proposed to a Bloomer?”

“Don’t tease.” She bit her bottom lip and tried to think of a way she could make him understand. “This is important to me. Since I have been here in New York I have seen women who, well, women who seem to have given up every little bit of themselves. All they do is stay home and make sure the servants keep the place tidy. They become so—so…” She searched her mind for the right word.

“Dependant?” he offered.

“Yes. I don’t want to be like that. I love being a lady, but I can still take care of myself.”

“I have seen you rope, shoot and cuss the hide off a mule skinner.” He grinned when she blushed. “I am not likely to forget where you came from.”

“Good, as long as you understand. I am not going to ever be one of those women who say ‘yes, dear’ and ‘no, dear.’ At least not all the time.”

“I love you, Marisa. I love you because you are capable and independent. I don’t want you to change. I adore you just the way you are right now.”

“So would it bother you terribly if we didn’t live here? I mean, after the wedding? I’d like to go
home.
”

“I am glad to hear you say that.” He clasped her hand and they walked side by side until they reached the edge of Harlem Lake. The horses were breathing normally and had begun to grab a mouthful of grass whenever the couple slowed enough for them to manage.

“Shall we sit?” Brooks pulled out a kerchief and wiped off a boulder that was nestled beneath an ash tree.

Marisa sat down and carefully arranged her skirt. Then she folded her hands in her lap and looked up at Brooks.

“You are a treasure, Miss O’Bannion.” He tied the reins loosely to a slender bush. Then he returned to the boulder and knelt beside her on the damp turf.

“After all the ribbing I have taken over those damn Christmas earbobs, I shouldn’t even give you these.” Brooks reached into his coat pocket and withdrew another tiny, velvet-covered box. He opened it and took out a pair of emerald-and-diamond earbobs. Sunlight caught the faceted stones in the center and sent a rainbow prism of light across her plum riding skirt.

She giggled. “They
are
earbobs!” She felt tears welling
up behind her eyes as she laughed. “And they match the necklace you gave me.”

“I intended to buy them for you the minute I saw how that necklace looked around your pretty throat. Now my ring is on your finger, and my heart is in your hands. You are as good as branded, Marisa. And I have learned to think like your father and brothers. I don’t take kindly to having what is mine rustled.”

She threw her arms his neck and hugged him tightly. The feeling of his mustache scraping her cheek made her stomach clench and roll. Excitement telegraphed through every muscle in her body when she glanced at her hand where the sapphire and diamonds winked. A part of her still felt ill-suited to be the fiancée of this remarkable gentleman, but she was ready to take a leap of faith.

“Are you are as anxious to marry as I am?” he coaxed.

Marisa leaned into his embrace once again. “Yes, I am.”

“Then I believe it is time I collected my bet.” His voice was husky and low with passion.

“Five kisses?”

“Um-hmm.”

She was only too happy to pay off the debt.

L
ying on his back in the grass, Brooks watched the golden disk of the sun dip toward the west. “I suppose we should start back before the liveryman reports his horse stolen and we find ourselves residents of the penitentiary on Blackwell’s Island.” He stood up and stretched extravagantly. “Let’s not wait until fall, Missy. Let’s find a preacher and get married now—today.” The prospect of waiting until fall to make her his wife suddenly seemed a terrible burden.

“Why?” She touched the side of his face with her bare fingers. “Are you afraid you will change your mind?”

“Not me, but maybe you. You have most of the eligible men in New York fawning over you.” He tried to smile, but there was a strange sensation of foreboding he could not shake. “Sometimes I wish we had stayed in the Territory. Maybe if we were out West you would elope with me immediately instead of making me wait.”

Missy smiled and rolled her eyes. “Those other men are all peacocks, Brooks. You know I don’t take any of their folderol seriously.”

“Not even Cyril?”

“Especially not Cyril. He smiles so widely that I am
always put in mind of a fox who has found the door to the henhouse open. Besides, Ellen is crazy about him.”

Brooks guffawed loudly and sat up straight. The gray mare raised her head and snorted at the sound of his laughter. “Ellen? You are joking.”

“Nope. She has a real tender spot for him and I think he returns the feeling.”

“Than all that nonsense with you…him…he was just—”

“Getting your goat, as the saying goes,” Marisa said with a smile.

Marisa’s rented horse rolled her eyes while the inside of her nostrils flared bright rose. She pulled hard on the lines, which were tied to a nearby bush.

“I don’t like the way that filly is acting.” A strange sensation crept up the back of Brooks’s scalp while he watched the animal paw the earth. “She’s got a wild look in her eyes that I just don’t trust. Marisa, take my horse. I’ll ride her back to the stable.”

“Sidesaddle?” She giggled. “That would be a sight, now wouldn’t it? She is just spirited. It feels good to have a well-bred horse beneath me.”

“I’m serious, Marisa. Ride my gelding back.” A sense of urgency gripped him as he brushed the grass from his trousers.

Marisa placed her hands on her hips, elbows akimbo. “Brooks James, I am capable of making my own decisions, and riding this horse. I haven’t had your ring on my finger for more than two hours and you are already trying to make me…subservient.” The word rolled off her tongue with some difficulty.

“I am doing no such thing.” He shook his head in annoyance. “I don’t want to see anything happen to you,
that’s all.” In a quieter voice he added, “I couldn’t stand it, honey.”

“Nothing is going to happen to me.” She kissed the tip of his chin. “Now give me a leg up so we can get started back.” Brooks reluctantly obliged, while he tried to shake off the feeling of doom.

Marisa tugged on her glove, but it would not fit over the stones of her engagement ring. With an exasperated sigh she stuck the glove between the front buttons on her jacket. The fingers poked out and flopped when she gathered the reins in her hand.

“Be careful. If she starts to give you any trouble, stop and we’ll walk the horses.” Brooks couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling that had settled upon him. His knuckles were white on the reins while Marisa adjusted her seat and arranged the panel of her habit over the side pommel. He brought his docile gelding close to the mare, hoping she would calm, but her ears moved back and forth and she tossed her head with each high step. The bit jingled at every turn, making Brooks all the more aware of how jumpy he had become.

Marisa turned and smiled at him. “I wish you wouldn’t fret. There is nothing wrong with this mare, she just needs a good run.” Her smile grew mischievous. “And so do I.”

“Marisa, no. I’m asking you not to do it, for me.”

“You are worried, aren’t you?” She was genuinely surprised by the level of his concern.

“Yes, I am.”

She reached across the space between them and touched his arm. “I am not a hothouse lily, but if it means that much to you I will keep her to a walk. Happy?”

“Very.” Relief flooded through him like a warm current
in an icy lake. “I promise I won’t make a habit of asking you to comply with my wishes.”

“That’s good, because I don’t plan on making a habit of letting you have your own way.” She giggled and tossed her head. “It’s not good for a man to have his own way too often, even Clell says so.”

“Clell?”

“Yep.”

“That old codger does nothing
but
have his own way, so how would he know?” Brooks shook his head and laughed.

“It’s good to see you are relaxing,” Marisa said with a wink.

All the way back she kept her word and made sure the mare was well in hand. The trip back took twice as long but was worth it. When they rounded the last bend in the bridal path, Brooks was not surprised to see the livery owner pacing in front of his barn with an anxious look on his face.

“Sorry we took a little longer than I planned,” Brooks yelled. “The mare was a little shy.”

A frisky ground squirrel darted from the area where the liveryman stored his grain. The animal stopped and sat back on its haunches as if surveying the land, then with a flick of its bushy tail darted straight toward the gray mare’s legs. The ball of fur was bobbing like a cork on water as it deftly threaded through the maze of flashing hooves.

“Easy, girl.” The hat on Marisa’s head skewed slightly to the right The feather dipped low in front of her eyes, obscuring her vision.

“Careful, Marisa,” Brooks advised. He saw her draw in the reins and he relaxed a bit. But just when he was
sure it was going to be all right, the dappled gray exploded upward like a rocket on the Fourth of July.

The scene before him unfolded in an exaggerated manner. It was as if time had been altered, each event taking place so slowly that Brooks could see every detail as it happened.

He saw the look of surprise sweep across Marisa’s lovely face.

Guilt flooded over him.

He saw her hat come free and flutter to the ground like a bird with a broken wing.

Brooks mentally asked himself why he had not jerked the sidesaddle off and switched them.

He saw the mare’s hooves hammer the hat into bits of ripped fabric and crushed feathers.

Marisa was too petite, too frail to handle a thousand pounds of startled fury. Why hadn’t he done more to protect her?

And then, while his belly grew cold and heavy as a stone, he saw her thigh come away from the pommel. That was the moment when Brooks silently started trying to bargain with God. He promised a thousand things in the seconds it took for Marisa to fall to the earth in a flurry of ebony curls and plum velvet.

Brooks leaped from the gelding and rushed toward her.

I would give my own life for hers, Lord.

She lay on the hard-packed ground, all the color drained from her face.

Please, God, oh please, don’t let her be hurt.

Before the bellow of impotent fear had left his throat, the mare shied once again. Just before Brooks reached her side, iron-shod hooves struck Marisa’s body. Then the mare took off in a blur of gray, the stirrup slapping her side as she went.

Please don’t let her be dead.

He touched the hollow of her throat with two fingers.

There is a pulse. Thank you, God.

She was alive, unconscious but alive. Her body bent at the waist in an unnatural position. He touched her cheeks, willing her to waken.

He looked at her small body, twisted and still, and willed himself to know what to do.

But he didn’t.

“Where is the nearest hospital?” Brooks barked at the chalk-faced stableman.

“I—I don’t think there is one close by. She isn’t—dead?” The nervous man kept staring at Marisa’s lifeless form with eyes wilder than the half-broken horse’s.

“No. She won’t die—she can’t!” Brooks looked at her pale face and nearly cried out in rage and fear. “Think, man, think. Where? A physician’s office, anything?” Brooks fought to control the panic rising inside him.

“The New York Hospital is on 68th Street and York Avenue.”

Brooks glanced at Marisa and his belly twisted. “Hurry man, take the gelding.”

“I’ll hurry.”

“I love this woman more than my life. Go, and ride like Satan himself is at your heels.”

It seemed like an eternity had passed before the clang of a bell announced the arrival of the hospital wagon.

Brooks had gone from periods of praying to moments of dark despair when he questioned God, life and everything around him. But through it all he had remained crouched at Marisa’s side as if his very presence could hold off the Grim Reaper.

He stood up when the wagon stopped beside him. Two men garbed in white jackets and trousers jumped out of
the back, running with a canvas-and-wooden stretcher between them.

Brooks had covered Marisa’s body with his coat and she had not moved since the fall. He dared not allow himself to think that she might not live.

She had to survive. She was his life.

He willed her to hang on, prayed she would regain consciousness, while the men prepared to place her body on the stretcher. Suddenly a wave of fear rolled over him.

“You’ll handle her carefully, won’t you?”

One man looked up and nodded; the other kept his eyes on Marisa.

“Because if you don’t, I swear to God I will kill you.”

That comment brought the other man’s eyes up. He looked at Brooks, then nodded.

They slid her body onto the stretcher, and with practiced efficiency raised her between them.

“I’m riding with you.” Brooks jogged beside the stretcher, watching Marisa for any signs of returning consciousness, any sign of pain. He had checked her head, but found no wound. That frightened him even more. Her injuries were internal.

Fear of what he could not see and what he could not fix threatened to overwhelm him. But he fought it off, thinking only of Marisa and what was best for her.

“There is no. room in the back for all of us,” one of the attendants said when they reached the wagon.

“Then one of you is walking, because I am damn well going with her,” Brooks snarled. No more was said, but when the stretcher was loaded in the back of the wagon, one man, a swarthy fellow with a thick mustache, stepped aside and nodded toward the narrow bench that was fastened on one wall.

“God be with you, sir,” he mumbled when Brooks impulsively grabbed his hand.

Brooks’s eyes returned again and again to the black numbers on the round clock face as he paced the hospital corridor. His stride was in perfect cadence with the swinging arc of the old pendulum. He focused on a curved scratch on the old wall, looking for anything that might occupy his thoughts for a few minutes.

But it did not work. He thought only of Marisa and how long she had been suffering.

Twelve hours had ticked by since she’d been thrown. Eleven hours since she had arrived at The New York Hospital. Nine hours since Dr. Malone had responded to Brooks’s plea. Six hours since Brooks had sent a frantic telegram to Marisa’s family in the New Mexico Territory.

All that time had been marked by the silent clock on the wall.

Dr. Malone appeared at the end of the dimly lit corridor. Brooks rushed to meet him. “Is there any change?”

Doc Malone removed his glasses and dragged his palm down his lined face. “None. Come over here, Brooks, I want to talk with you.”

Brooks followed the aging physician to a scarred wooden bench along one wall. “Spare me no detail.”

Doc smiled wanly. “I never lied to Bellami and I will not lie to you.” He sighed and tilted his graying head back against the wall. He closed his eyes while he spoke. “The young lady has shown no sign of waking. I’ve seen cases like this before. There is a chance she will open her eyes and be little worse for wear.” He lifted his head, replaced his glasses and blinked several times. “Another possibility is that when she wakes she will be changed.”

“How so?”

“We know so little about the workings of the mind. There have been incidents of people waking and being, well, just different. Sometimes they have lost blocks of memory. Sometimes their personalities have been transformed or, in the worse possible cases, they have lost their entire past and identity.”

“I see.” Brooks sighed.
Dear Lord, let Missy remain Missy.

“No, I don’t think you do, Brooks, but it does not matter. There is also another potentiality you must prepare for. She might not ever regain consciousness.”

Might not ever regain consciousness?
Brooks swallowed his fear. “Which of those options do you think will take place?”

“I just don’t know, Brooks. I’ve examined her…There do not seem to be any broken bones, but…”

“But what?”

“If she does wake up, her ordeal, and yours, may just be beginning.” A cloud that might have been pity seemed to flit through his aging eyes.

“I want to know, Doc, whatever it is.”

“All right. I have an area of deep concern. As I said, there are no obvious broken bones, but there is a massive amount of swelling around two contusions.”

“Is that bad?”

“In this instance it is.” Doc drew in a deep breath. His bony shoulders appeared to sag under an invisible weight. “The injuries are to her spine. If she wakes up and she is herself, with no change to her personality, she may still be facing the hardest situation in her life. She could be facing the prospect of partial or even complete paralysis.”

Paralysis.
“She might not walk again?” Brooks wanted to wake up and find this was all a hideous nightmare.

“It is a possibility.”

Brooks inhaled the pungent, sterile smell of the hospital and focused on the problems at hand. Marisa needed care, and that was all that mattered at the moment. “Who is the best in this field of medicine?” He heard his own voice, oddly clear and composed.

Doc frowned. The skin between his brows wrinkled deeper. “Dr. Stanley Jakobs is good.”