The Last Renegade (17 page)

“I cannot lie about it,” Jones said.

“No, I don’t suppose you can. You have to do your job.” He finished his coffee and returned the cup to its saucer. “I don’t pretend to know Eli and Clay well. In fact, I’m not claiming that I know them better than anyone I’ve shared a couple of drinks with, but I think if you offered something of value to the Burdicks, showed them how the geological survey could be to their advantage, they might not kill you where you sit.”

Jones pushed his lower lip forward and exhaled through his mouth. The hairs of his mustache stirred. “I should probably apply to Washington for some guidance in this matter,” he said at last.

“If you think that’s best,” Raine said. “Mr. Collins will telegraph your message.”

“I’m wondering if I shouldn’t write. This is not a situation that can be adequately explained in a telegram.” He indicated his ankle. “And I have some time. There is only so much I can do while I am recuperating.”

“Probably wise,” said Kellen. He nodded in turn to Raine and Jones and pushed back his chair. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to return to my room before I head out. Good meeting you, John Paul.” He stood. “Good day, Mrs. Berry.”

Jones waited until Kellen left the dining room before he spoke. “He is somewhat abrupt in his manner, isn’t he?”

“Forgive me, Mr. Jones, but I make it a practice not to discuss one guest with another.”

“I understand. I should not have looked to you for
confirmation. I could see very well that he is. He spoke little of himself, which I suppose is an excellent quality in a newspaper writer. More listening. Less talking. The seeds of a story are sown in the listening, I imagine.”

“Is that what he is?” she asked. “A newspaper writer?”

Jones chuckled. “See? That’s how little he says. Yes, I managed to get that much from him. He’s doing a story on cattlemen. It’s occurred to me that he would be an excellent addition to my survey group.”

“You want to hire him?”

“I think he might be just the man to approach the Burdicks.”

After the odd exchange at breakfast, Raine thought she might see more of Mr. John Paul Jones. Instead, he asked for an exception to the Pennyroyal’s policy of not serving meals in the rooms and requested that luncheon and dinner be brought to him. Although Raine might have encouraged another guest to make the effort to come to the dining room, she did not ask it of this particular guest. Instead, she sent Emily with a tray and decided that would be his punishment. She could not make herself believe the sprain he sustained was worthy of confinement.

Kellen did not return until after lunch had been served. The dining room was empty, the dishes cleaned and put away, and Mrs. Sterling was taking a few minutes with her feet up while she contemplated what she would prepare for dinner. Raine was in her office when he arrived, so she wasn’t witness to what transpired, but she had it all from Sue, and then Emily, and they reported that Mrs. Sterling fell all over herself making Mr. Coltrane a special meal of sausages and baked apples. She also gave him both heels from a loaf of freshly baked bread when he asked prettily for them.

Raine did not know what was more difficult to believe, that Mrs. Sterling would give away both heels or that Kellen Coltrane was capable of asking prettily for anything.

According to Sue, and verified by Emily, Kellen retired to his room after that. No one saw him again until dinner.

At eight o’clock, when the Burdicks had not shown themselves at the saloon, Raine was satisfied they were not coming. She handed management of the saloon over to Walt and told Charlie Patterson in passing to keep an eye on him and Sue.

Raine paused at the entrance to the second floor on her way to the third. She did not linger long. All the rooms were filled now, and she did not want to be seen coming and going from Kellen’s, at least not without an armful of towels. She wondered what he was doing and where he had been.

Raine entered her apartments and removed her shawl. It was an afterthought that made her lock the door. She tossed the key in an empty vase on the entry table and laid her shawl over the chair at her desk. She lit one lamp in the office and another in the sitting room as she passed through. The final lamp she lit was at her bedside, and this one she carried into the bathing room while she turned on the taps.

She returned to her bedroom and began undressing, loosening the front lacings of the bodice first, then removing the brooch from her jabot and setting it aside. After she eased out of the bodice and hung it in the wardrobe, she took off the jabot, checked it for stains, and finding none, folded it and placed it in a drawer. The red dotted sateen skirt was next. She untied the ribbons at the back, fussed with the panniers and straw bustle, and finally was able to step out of all of it. The white muslin underskirt came next. She sat on the edge of the bed while she removed her red kid slippers and carefully rolled her white stockings over each knee and calf until they were balanced like small puffs of pastry on the tips of her toes. She kicked each one into the air and caught it before she tucked them both inside her shoes.

The front-laced bodice required that she wear a corset with laces at the back. She had managed to get it on that morning with a minimum of trouble, but she discovered now that the
laces were hopelessly knotted. She tried to shimmy out of the corset, and for all the reasons that steel stays worked so well, the undergarment remained precisely where it was. Her attempt to twist it was unsuccessful. She began to wriggle again.

“Would you like help?” Kellen asked.

Raine spun around so fast she lost her balance and fell back on the bed, barely catching herself before she sprawled across the top of it. “Mother of God.” The hand that she pressed to her heart had nothing at all to do with preserving her modesty. She tried to put Kellen in his place with a sharp stare while her breathing settled.

“I suppose you think I meant to do that,” he said.

“Try to scare me to death? Why would I think that? You already assured me you don’t work for the Burdicks.”

Kellen leaned a shoulder against the jamb in the open doorway. He folded his arms against his chest. She was recovering her sass, which was a good sign, and she wasn’t reaching for anything to throw at him, which was a better one.

“So,” he asked after a moment. “Would you like help?”

“How did you get in? I know I locked the door.”

“I was already in,” he said.

“But where? I didn’t—”

“You didn’t go in all the rooms. I was sitting in the bedroom with the pink roses on the wall. I thought it was yours.”

“Ellen’s,” she said.

“I realize that now.”

“You should have told me right away that you were here. Better yet, you shouldn’t have come here without an invitation.”

“I’m sure you’re right about all of that.”

“That’s not an apology.”

“No, it’s not.”

Raine set her jaw but not so hard that it would become a source of amusement to him.

“When I heard the water running,” he said, “I was going to let myself out, but I couldn’t find the key.”

“I doubt you would have found it much of a challenge to turn the lock without one.”

“Perhaps not, but I did not need another challenge.”

“Another?”

“I was eluding Mr. Jones when I came up here. I caught sight of him standing outside my door and made a hasty retreat up the stairs.”

If it was a lie, Raine thought, it was a good one. She decided she would believe it. “The key is in the vase by the door.”

“I didn’t look there.”

“Evidently.” When Kellen did not move, she raised an eyebrow.

Kellen lifted his forefinger and pointed to the bathing room door. His cocked eyebrow mirrored Raine’s.

“The tub!” Raine leaped forward and charged for the bathing room. Kellen followed but at a slower pace. He was still in time to see her rush the tub and seize the spindle of each faucet in her hands. She turned them hard.

Raine sat on the rim, catching her breath. The corset did not help. “Thank you,” she said. “I forgot about it.”

“It was the least I could do.”

“The very least,” she said dryly.

Kellen made himself comfortable in this new doorway, setting his shoulder against the frame.

Raine waved him out. Her gesture had no effect. “You can’t stay there.”

“I can,” he said. “I doubt that I will, but I don’t doubt that I can.”

Shaking her head, Raine stood. She retrieved two towels from the cupboard beside the sink, aware all the while that his eyes were following her. “If you truly want to be useful,” she said, “you could stoke the fire in the stove. Add coals if you think it needs more.”

“All right.”

He moved out of the doorway and bent to open the grate. Raine immediately ran to the door and pulled it shut.

“I knew you were going to do that.” He grinned when he heard her laugh. She had a husky laugh made more intriguing by its edge of wicked amusement. “What about your corset?”

“I will manage.”

His grin deepened when she responded with a certain amount of prickly in her voice. When they were young, his sister Kitty would have answered in just that fashion, and then tattled to their mother that he was teasing her again. “You stay confident,” he called through the door. “I will remain hopeful.”

He heard her swear softly, and he didn’t stray far. Two minutes did not pass before she opened the door and presented her back to him.

Kellen did not say a word. He applied himself to the Gordian knot she had made of her laces.

Raine tried not to show her impatience, but she could feel his fingers at the small of her back and it was frankly unsettling. “You’re taking an extraordinarily long time.”

“I assume you don’t want me to use scissors.”

“No.”

“Or my teeth.”

Raine craned her neck to try to see over her shoulder. “No!”

He stopped what he was doing to gently push her head back. “Then you will have to be patient.”

She faced forward and pressed her lips together.

“Almost…” He managed to snag one of the laces with a fingernail and loosen it enough to pull. “There. Just a moment.” He quickly finished separating the laces.

Raine heaved a sigh, not only because he was finally finished but because she could finally breathe. Her thin muslin shift still clung to her skin. She held the corset in front of her as she turned to thank Kellen. “I need to get my robe. I left it in here.”

He stepped out of the way and watched her pass. If she had turned then and caught him staring, he would have acknowledged guilt but no remorse. His hands had spent enough time at the small of her back to come by an itch to be there again.

Raine retrieved her robe and went back to the bathing room. Kellen let her go unmolested. In truth, she did not know how she felt about that. She didn’t think she would have turned him away, but neither was she sure she would have welcomed him. She found her confusion disturbing, a state of being that made her head feel thick and her stomach knot as tightly as her laces.

Raine poured lavender-scented salts into her bathwater before she sank deeply into the tub. Hot water lapped the rim. She rearranged her hair so that it was loosely secured closer to the crown of her head. That allowed her to lean back comfortably and rest her head against the tub. Sighing softly, she closed her eyes.

When the door opened a few minutes later, Raine did not stir.

Kellen stayed in the doorway. Ribbons of fragrant steam rose above the tub and curled the copper halo of hair around Raine’s face. Her splendidly realized features were composed, even serene, and shone golden in the lamplight. She looked otherworldly, the stuff of fairy stories and legend. She might have been the Lady of the Lake holding her magical secrets as closely as she held the sword Excalibur, or one of the sirens who trapped Ulysses with her beauty and her song. Kellen caught the drift of his thoughts and reined them in, but not before he had to clear the wry chuckle that lodged itself deep in his throat.

Raine opened one eye and looked askance at him. “Will you not even allow me the luxury of pretending you aren’t there?”

“I am profoundly sorry.”

He did not sound contrite in the least, but Raine let it pass. She closed her eye and slipped a fraction lower into the water. “You will keep your distance, won’t you?”

“Reluctantly.”

That had the ring of truth, she thought. “Why are you still here? I told you where the key is.”

“I am confounded by the problem of what to do with the key after I unlock the door. If I leave it behind, then I’m leaving you alone, in your bath, I might add, with no way to immediately lock the door after me. If I lock the door after I exit, not only am I in possession of your key, but you have no simple way to get out. You see my quandary.”

“What I see is that you are riding on the longhorns of a pretty big dilemma.”

Kellen’s brow furrowed. “I am doing what?”

“Something Rabbit said. At least I think it was Rabbit. It might have been Finn.”

It was all the explanation Kellen required. “I see.”

“They did not endear themselves to Mr. Jones,” Raine said. “He made that clear.”

“Several times,” said Kellen. “What were you doing out while I believed you were safely tucked in for the night? You understand, don’t you, that I can’t provide protection when you’re eluding it.”

“I understand, but the Burdicks were with you. I didn’t expect a confrontation.”

“Perhaps not, and that’s a serious miscalculation.” His tone was devoid of humor. “You know, or you should know, that the direct threat is not the Burdicks. It is the men the Burdicks hire. Stay close, Raine. I mean it.”

She felt vaguely threatened and thought it was his intention to make her feel that way. “There are other people you have to consider,” she said. “I explained that to you. I cannot be your sole concern.”

“Nine of the twelve men who sat on the jury were in your saloon last evening. Did you know that?”

Her frown gave her away. She hadn’t known. “Nine? You’re sure?”

He ticked them off. “Sample. Rogers. Allen. McCormick. Faber. Pennway. Reston. Jack Clifton and Howard Wheeler went to their own corner as soon as the Burdicks arrived. Considering that John Hood is dead and that Hank Thompson is missing, the only person unaccounted for was Matthew Sharp.”