The Invitation (41 page)

I
should have left you there,” Cole was saying. They were in bed together, or rather in a berth on a train together, headed toward Latham. He had been lecturing her for three days now. Dorie wondered if it was a record. But he had stopped complaining about her long enough to make love to her at every possible opportunity since they'd escaped Winotka Ford and his men. Only once had Dorie offered the opinion that she had helped. According to Cole, this was not so. If she'd done what he'd told her, he would have rescued them even sooner.

Dorie just said, “Yes, dear,” and snuggled up to him for more kisses.

After he had taken a gun and some money from the gamblers in the saloon, he had run outside, found the men who wanted to kill Ford, and brought them back to the saloon with him. Cole had figured they could all fight it out amongst themselves.

Of course he told Dorie that the big part of the problem was her performing that lewd, indecent dance of hers.
While taking off her clothes!

He never so much as gave Dorie a chance to defend herself, but after a while she realized how very jealous he was, and she didn't want to defend herself. Many times in her life she had inspired anger in men but never jealousy, and she found she rather liked it. She also realized that Cole was worried because he thought maybe she
liked
undulating and taking her clothes off in front of all those men. She wanted to defend herself, tell him that she had done it for him, that she
hated
the way the men looked at her, but he never gave her a chance. And later, when she did have a chance, she thought perhaps a little mystery was better than knowing everything.

The first time she'd gotten him to stop telling her what an awful thing she'd done by showing him how she would have finished her performance in the saloon. By then he had bought her a dress that was half again too big for her and that covered every inch of her, as well as a hat as big around as a barrel so even her face was hidden from the view of others. Without ceasing his tirade on how she'd disobeyed him and put herself in jeopardy, he checked them into a hotel as man and wife. Once inside, Dorie began to peel off her clothes, layer by layer. Cole sat down on a chair and didn't say a word after the first three buttons of her dress came unfastened.

So now they were on their way to Latham, snuggled together in the train berth.

“Dorie, did you enjoy performing for those men?” he asked.

She didn't answer, but kissed him instead. She never planned to tell him the truth.

“All right,” he said, but she could see that her silence annoyed him. “Don't tell me. Instead, tell me about this town of yours. Is it anything like that place of Ford's?”

Dorie didn't like his patronizing tone, which implied that Latham ran itself, which was not the case. “It's not easy managing an entire town,” she said. “I already told you that Mr. Wexler won't pay his rent.”

“Why not?” he asked, yawning.

“Because all the women in town love him. No, no, don't look at me like that. Mr. Wexler is an ugly little man, but he manufactures a tonic that all the women in town love. Personally, I don't like it. It makes me very sleepy, but the men give it to their wives because they say it makes the women say yes, which I have learned is something that a man loves to hear a woman say. Anyway, Mr. Wexler won't pay his rent, and whenever I try to evict him, the entire town wants to tie me to a stake and set me on fire. I really don't know what to do. And why are you laughing?”

Still laughing, Cole began to nuzzle her neck. “You know, I used to think that good people were different from bad people, but I've learned that they just put different labels on their bottles.” He kissed her a few times. “Apollodoria, my love, when I first met you I thought you needed no one. I thought you were sufficient unto yourself. But with every passing minute, I find there's a great need for me in your life.”

“Ha!” she said. “I saved you in that dirty little town. If it hadn't been for me…”

“Mmmm?”

She didn't say another word.