Midnight Star (15 page)

“Complete and utter surrender,” he sighed. “Will you marry me?”

“Do you know,” she said thoughtfully, studying his face, “I think it just might be a good idea.”

“A quite good idea,” he said. It occurred to him on their ride home that neither of them had mentioned love. He frowned at Lucas’ back. Surely Chauncey must love him, to have gone to such lengths. Why hadn’t she said anything? My sophisticated lady is shy, he thought. All in good time. As to his own feelings, he dismissed the notion of love. He wanted her; she pleased him. Love would come in due course.

“All right, Del,” Dan Brewer said, thumping down his frothy mug of beer, “you’ve dragged me out of the bank, twisted my arm to come into the El Dorado, and forced me to drink this damned beer. Will you now tell me what’s going on?”

“
Forced?
You have foam on your upper lip, Dan.”

Dan swiped the back of his hand across his mouth. His eyes suddenly narrowed. “It’s nothing to do with Miss Jameson, is it? She is doing just fine now?”

“Oh yes, she is all pert and sassy-mouthed again, and I’m going to marry her.”

“
You’re what?
”

“I trust that you aren’t going to be heartbroken, along with a dozen other men?”

“Good God! Congratulations, Del!” He shook his head, bemused. “I’ll be damned. But not surprised, no, not really.” He leaned forward in
his chair and cocked an eyebrow at his friend. “Having her in your house did it, huh?”

“I’m certain,” Delaney said softly, only a hint of menace in his voice, “that you aren’t picturing any . . . improper scenes?”

“No,” Dan said, “I’m not. At least, if I was, I’m not now!”

“I knew I could count on you, Dan.”

Delaney sat back in his chair, briefly scanning the group of men in the most flamboyant gambling saloon in San Francisco. It was late afternoon, and the regulars were already hunched over circular tables, their cards fanned out in front of them. A tinny piano was blaring in the background, blending in with jovial male voices at the huge mahogany bar and sounds of poker chips flicked onto the tables. There were only a couple of garishly dressed women present at this time of day. Their efforts were saved for the night.

“Do you know something?” Del said finally, almost as if speaking to himself. Not waiting for a response, he continued, “I have come to believe in the past two hours—that is the length now of our engagement—that it was somehow inevitable. Sounds rather idiotic, doesn’t it?”

“Does this mean when I decide to marry I’m going to begin waxing philosophical?” Dan asked, grinning. He watched Delaney swallow a generous portion of his beer. “Inevitable? Well, Miss Jameson did come in asking for you the same day she arrived in San Francisco.”

“Do you think my fame as the brilliant lover lured her over from England?”

“I’d like to be a mouse in your pocket if you asked her that!”

“Oh, I probably will. No blushes from her, I’m sure. She’d probably tell me she heard I needed instructions.” But that wasn’t true; he knew it now. She was incredibly naive, her working knowledge of her own sexual responses to him, a man, nonexistent.

“What about Penelope Stevenson and Tony Dawson?”

“The two flies in the ointment? Well, set your mind at ease about Penelope. I told her yesterday when I took her riding that I was going to marry Chauncey.”

“Chauncey?”

“Elizabeth’s nickname. I find it rather . . . endearing.”

“Quite confident about the lady’s feelings, weren’t you?”

“Perhaps. But it didn’t really matter. I would no more marry Penelope Stevenson than sign over my ownership of the bank to you!”

“How did Penelope react to your announcement?”

“Let me put it this way. I never knew that an eighteen-year-old girl, supposedly raised in the most proper way imaginable, could spout such colorful language. After she finished raking Chauncey up and down, she lit into me. Her parting shot was to tell me to go to hell. I spoke then to Bunker. He surprised me. No bluster at all. Merely sighed and wished me well. Told me in a wistful voice that I was a lucky man.”

“It’s not as if you were engaged to the chit, for heaven’s sake, Del.”

“True, but Penelope has a high opinion of herself and her charms. I had heard that she was spreading the word that it was she who was holding me off. Amazing, absolutely amazing.”

“You know, Del,” Dan said thoughtfully, “you really don’t know Miss Jameson very well. She’s been here under a month.”

“Yes,” Delaney said slowly, gazing into his beer mug, “that’s quite true.” He gave Dan a rakish grin. “I will now have years to get to know her. She is a puzzle that I will delight in solving, but slowly, very slowly.”

James Cora, owner of the El Dorado, strolled over to their table, his habitual cigar dangling in the corner of his mouth. A tall man, he was floridly handsome, his wide, white-toothed smile always slightly suspect, at least in Delaney’s jaundiced view. “Del, Dan, how are you boys doing?”

“Making money, but I doubt at your rate, Jim,” Delaney said, shaking the older man’s hand. “I don’t need to ask you how your business is faring.”

“Nope,” James Cora said, turning his head to proudly survey his opulent kingdom. “How ’bout I buy you boys another beer? On the house?”

“Sure,” Dan said. “But I don’t intend to stay around and lose all my money playing poker with you.”

“I’ll live, son, I’ll live, which is more than I can say about that fool Jack Darcy. Stupid ass.”

“I heard he accused Baron Jones of cheating,” Dan said.

“Not a smart move,” Del said, shaking his head, remembering his own duel with Baron more than two years before. “The man’s an excellent shot and something of a sadist to boot. Is it true he
moved in on Darcy’s mistress before the man was even buried?”

“Yep,” James Cora said. “Nice piece,” he added, dismissing quite coldly the entire incident. “You boys keep out of trouble.” He nodded to them and strode over to greet Sam Brannan.

“That man is going to come to a bad end,” Dan said, shaking his head.

“You’re doubtless right, particularly with Bella and her rages. I heard she threw a vaseful of wilted flowers with slimy stems right at his head just last week.”

“Let us trust that a wife is less violent than a mistress! Incidentally, Del, what about Marie?”

Delaney gave him a twisted smile, remembering Chauncey’s innocent questions regarding men and their need for mistresses. It occurred to him that she had said not one word about his giving up his mistress. She hadn’t even seemed overly impressed that he’d willingly offered to give her up.

“I’ll speak to her soon, Dan. I doubt she’ll have any difficulty at all finding a generous new protector.”

They spoke of business for a while; then Delaney pulled out his vest watch. “I’m having dinner with my future wife. Keep my news under your hat for the time being, though I doubt Bunker Stevenson will show such restraint, particularly if he has informed his wife.”

“Have you set a date yet?”

Delaney shook his head. “No. Chauncey was exhausted from our carriage ride to the ocean. I left her sleeping soundly. I’ll talk to her about it this evening.”

* * *

Delaney carried his future wife downstairs to the dining room for supper. When he eased her into a chair, he whispered in a wicked voice, “Tell me you’ve got that funny feeling in your stomach again.”

She smiled up at him, clearly puzzled. “I
am
hungry,” she said.

He couldn’t wait to show her the source of her hunger, and the thought of caressing and fondling her made his body tense with desire. He wanted to whisper to her that she would learn all about funny sensations on their wedding night. But he said nothing. She was so bloody innocent about sex, and he drew the line at embarrassing her in that way, at least until they were married.

When he was seated and Lin had served their dinner, Delaney raised his wineglass to her. “To us, Chauncey.”

She hesitated almost imperceptibly, then raised her own glass. “Yes, to us.”

“While you were having pleasant dreams this afternoon, I was with Dan. He sends his congratulations.”

“That is kind of him. Umm. Lin makes the most delicious pork. And all these crunchy fresh vegetables.”

“She uses a Chinese ingredient called soy sauce. And ginger. Did I mention that you look utterly delicious yourself this evening?”

“Yes”—she grinned at him—“you did. And you, sir, do not exactly look like a chimney sweep yourself. Very dazzling, I should say, in that black frock coat. It makes your eyes look like dark honey. You do have very expressive eyes,
you know, Delaney, but I imagine that many women have told you that before.”

“Certainly,” he said blandly. He felt inordinately pleased to hear it from her, the woman who would be his wife.

“Conceited man,” she teased him.

“At least now I have justification for it. The most beautiful woman in San Francisco is going to marry me.”

For an instant she felt choked with misery. And something else. Guilt. Stop it, Chauncey! You must do it, you have to! He deserves it!

“I do not wish to be simply a . . . decoration, Del,” she said, her falsely light voice not fooling him for an instant. “A wife who exists only through her husband.”

“Have I asked that of you?”

“No. But I know what Englishmen are like. I realized after I broke my engagement to Sir Guy that he thought me a brainless, silly female, good only to run his household in the ever-present shadow of his dear mother.”

“I am not English, my dear, and there are no shadows in this house.”

She fiddled with her fork a moment, making designs in the small pile of vegetables left on her plate. “I . . . I do not want to lose control of my money.” She raised her eyes to his face and saw that he was regarding her intently, his eyes puzzled. “What I mean to say is that after I came into my inheritance, I spent two months with a man of business in London learning how to . . . well, how to handle money. He told me that in America, just as in England, when a woman marries, she loses control of her money. She becomes
an appendage, completely dependent upon her husband. I don’t want that.”

“Your money is yours, Chauncey,” he said with quiet deliberation. “I want nothing to do with it. Did you think I would demand that you turn your funds over to me? A dowry of sorts?”

“I don’t know,” she said, looking at him straightly. “I am not much used to men and their ways.”

“I think you are somewhat used to men, but the variety you’ve known were not particularly sterling specimens. Your uncle, Sir Guy the prig, and Owen the toad. Perhaps, if you wish, I can point you to some wise investments.” He shrugged, and her eyes were drawn, despite herself, to his shoulders, firm and muscular. She swallowed convulsively and reached blindly for her wineglass.

“I told you, Chauncey,” he continued after a moment, not understanding her sudden abstraction, “that I would never harm you. Nor will I ever try to make you into something you are not. All I will ever ask of you”—his lips twisted into a crooked smile—“is that you will be happy as my wife.”

“Yes,” she said firmly, “that is what I want too.”
But I will harm you! I must!

“Tell me, my dear, does reality taste as sweet as the dream?”

“I . . . I don’t know what you mean.”

“Reality, dear one, is me as your husband. The chase was the dream.”

“Perhaps,” she said a bit unsteadily, “you should ask me that after you are my husband.”

“I will, you can count on it. There was something else I wished to say to you, Chauncey. You are English. Until five months ago, England was
all you knew. I want to assure you that if you wish to spend some time in England, we will go together. Wives adhering to their husbands is all fine and good, but I would never demand that you forget all that you were before you came to me.”

Her hand tightened about the stem of her wineglass. She spoke aloud her confusion without considering. “Why are you so . . . nice? So considerate and reasonable?”

He cocked a mobile brow at her. “Did you expect me to be otherwise?”

Yes, damn you!

She smiled brightly, a false smile. “No, of course not, you simply took me off-guard. There is really nothing left for me in England. But you, Del, you have those illustrious relations, do you not?”

“Yes.”

“Were you not thick as . . . thieves with them when you were last in England? When? Fifty-one?”

“Yes, in 1851. The duke and duchess certainly introduced me to a lot of people, as I told you. I believe the duchess’s not-so-hidden motive was to find me a nice English wife. She will doubtless be utterly delight to hear that she has succeeded, all without lifting a finger.”

Oh God, will she recognize the name Jameson? If she doesn’t, will she want to know who the devil I am? Will Delaney ask questions I cannot answer?

“It takes dreadfully long to send and receive letters from England, doesn’t it? Good heavens, your precious duke and duchess won’t know of your marriage for at least three months.”

“True. I wrote to both to them and to my
brother this afternoon after I returned home from my visit with Dan. My brother has long urged me to take the fatal step.”

“I don’t think I like the sound of this fatal-step business!”

“Man talk, Chauncey, nothing more. Men tend to boast aloud of their freedom all the while wishing desperately for permanency: a wife and home and family.”

Permanency. Will I be gone in six months?

“A family,” she repeated suddenly, her eyes going blank.

Delaney’s wineglass paused at his lips. “It is normally something that follows quite naturally from marriage, you know, my love. Do you not want children?”