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She folded her arms tightly in front of her. “There are many women who—”
“We’re not talking about other women. We’re talking about you.”
“I...” She huffed. “I don’t see marriage or motherhood in a negative light. I merely don’t see it as part of my future.”
“Because...”
“Because I doubt there’s a man alive who would have the courage to put up with the likes of me!”
The words blurted from her mouth without any thought. But before she could retrieve them, Gideon Gault laughed.
“You may be right,” he offered.
There was no sting to his voice, no negative inflection. If anything, she sensed that he found the male population lacking in courage rather than the other way around. In any event, he resumed walking, forcing her to trail along behind him.
“So, you’ll be heading to California after this?”
She quick-stepped to catch up to him, nodding. “I begin my tour in San Francisco. Granted, many of my engagements have already passed and will have to be rescheduled, but I’m eager to get underway.” Peering up at him in the darkness, she asked, “Have you been to California, Mr. Gault?”
He shook his head. “No. I’ve always wanted to go there, but so far, I’ve never had the chance.”
“I hear that it’s warm all year round and you can pluck lemons and oranges right from the trees.”
“Will your itinerary allow you such luxuries?”
He was teasing her now, so she responded in kind. “Oh, I’ll make time. I also want to stand on the shore so that I can write to my aunts and tell them that I’ve dipped my toes in the Atlantic and the Pacific.”
“Aunts?”
“Yes. My aunts have been my guardians for nearly a dozen years.”
“That must mean that you’ve lost your parents as well. I’m so sorry.”
Yes, her mother had died soon after she was born. But her father...
He might not be dead, but he was lost to her.
“There’s no need to be sorry. My aunts have been wonderful to me. They saw to it that I had the finest education and a loving home.” Even more importantly, they’d helped her leave her shameful past behind.
They were almost to the door of the Dovecote now and Lydia’s steps unconsciously slowed. For some reason, she felt reluctant to end their walk. Being able to talk to Gideon this way, openly, honestly, had shown her a different side to the man. One that was...companionable.
“Here you are,” Gideon announced needlessly.
“Yes. Thank you.”
“In the future, perhaps you would be so kind as to wait for your guards to escort you around town?”
There was no sting behind the words, only weariness.
“You do realize that there’s no need for you and your men to trail us as if we had designs upon the company’s silver, don’t you?”
“I don’t think the silver is Mr. Batchwell’s main concern.”
“What else could we take? By your account, we only have a few weeks left in the valley at most.”
“Ah, but you and your friends have already stolen the affections of most of the men in Aspen Valley, which is why no one wants you to leave. That fact probably worries Batchwell more than his silver. So as long as I’m told to keep my men watching over the females in the Dovecote, that’s what I’ll have to do.” He motioned to the door. “I’ll wait here until you’re inside, and I’ve heard the bolt hit home.”
Lydia moved in a daze, entering and locking the door. After all her pestering and prodding, Gideon had admitted, of his own free will, that the women had touched the lives of the men in Bachelor Bottoms. Judging by his tone, he didn’t seem to mind.
She hurried to the window, pushing aside the curtain in time to see Gideon pausing to look over his shoulder. He must have seen her, because he lifted a hand to the brim of his hat.
She waved in return, waiting until he’d disappeared into the darkness. Then, she tossed the bag of beans onto the table and meandered upstairs to her room.
Once inside, she lit the lamp and adjusted the wick. As she did so, she caught her reflection in the mirror. For some reason, her cheeks were pink and her eyes sparkled with an inner energy.
How very odd.
Up to this point, she’d thought of the Pinkerton as something of a nuisance. But tonight, she’d had a peek into the gentleman behind the uniform, and she’d been surprised by what she’d found. He really was an interesting man. Although she’d learned a little about his family, there were so many things she still wanted to know.
Her hands lifted to her hair and she began removing the hairpins one by one. Sitting on the edge of her bed, she glanced at Iona’s empty cot and wished she could talk to her friend and get her opinion on the change in...
Iona.
The other girls were still locked in the storehouse!
Lydia jumped to her feet and raced pell-mell down the staircase. Then, after peeking out the front window to make sure that there was no sign of Gideon Gault, she ran as fast as she could back to town.
* * *
Gideon didn’t bother going back to the Pinkerton office and the barracks on the upper floor. He’d only gone a short distance into town before the old familiar restlessness began to bubble up inside of him.
He had to get away.
He had to keep moving.
He had to feel the wind in his hair and the roll of a horse beneath him.
By the time he’d reached the livery and saddled his gelding, he was breathing heavily and his lungs felt as if bands of iron tightened around them. The past seemed to suck him back into that dark place where flashes of battle crowded into his brain, pushing everything aside. Try as he might to stay rooted in the present, the coppery taste of fear tainted his tongue. His ears seemed to ring with cannon fire, and the stench of gunpowder and blood lingered in his nostrils. Then, just as quickly, the sensations shifted into something worse. Far worse.
Death.
Disease.
Untold suffering.
Swinging onto the back of his mount, he spurred it into a gallop as soon as the animal had cleared the threshold. Then he was riding, riding, up toward the mine where the intermittent lanterns illuminated the road.
Once he’d passed the opening, he was forced into slowing his horse, even though he wanted to keep flying through the darkness so that he could chase away the ghosts of his past and the sensation of being trapped. He doubled back in the other direction, taking a rarely used road that was little more than a set of wagon ruts etched into the grass.
It wasn’t until he found himself at the top of the slopes and looking down into the canyon that he brought his mount to a stop. Dragging the cool, damp air into his lungs, he closed his eyes, trying to push away the memories that seemed determined to wash over him and transport him to another time. He felt another mount beneath him, quivering as Gideon led it toward the noise and violence of the battlefield. He remembered the way it had reared back, unseating him, beginning a cascade of ill-timed events that would see him captured, then transported south.
To Andersonville.
His body and spirit railed against the images that flashed behind his eyes like malicious lightning bugs.
So much death.
Such despair.
As if his very soul depended on it, Gideon took deep breaths in an attempt to re-anchor himself in the present.
He would not give in to the past.
Not tonight.
Gradually, the sensations of misery and filth began to fade beneath the heady scent of pine and wet grass.
And something more. A faint hint of...
Gardenias and lemons.
An image of Lydia sprang into his head, pushing away the remembered ugliness of war. In his mind’s eye, he saw her in a montage of poses: militantly regarding him with her hands on her hips, challenging him with an imperious stare and smiling up at him in the darkness.
That thought lingered, becoming more real as he remembered the way that the moonlight had slipped over the curve of her cheek and sparkled in her eyes. Crystal-blue eyes the color of the Aspen River first thing in the morning.
The woman was full of surprises, he’d give her that. Until today, most of their encounters had proven to be a battle of wits. She’d seemed to delight in slipping away from the Pinkerton guards, and Gideon found secret pleasure in hauling her back into line.
But tonight...she’d been more open. More...
Real.
A man would have his hands full with a woman like that. If he didn’t keep her in line...
No. That kind of thinking is exactly what Lydia would expect of him. He could already hear her railing at him that the fairer sex wasn’t meant to be controlled. They were meant to be...
Loved.
But Lydia had made it clear that she didn’t want to be loved. At least not by a man. She intended to live her life as a champion for women’s suffrage.
Which was too bad. Because a woman like that could be a formidable force. Exasperating, yes, but she would also be fiercely loyal and devoted. No doubt, she would love a man with the same passion as she fought for women’s equality.
Gideon shook his head to rid it of such thoughts. Why was he even thinking of such a thing? Lydia Tomlinson was law unto herself. In a matter of days, she would resume her journey to California, and Gideon’s life and routine could return to normal.
It was better that way.
Much better.
As he shifted in the saddle, his horse nickered slightly. And somehow, the noise sounded like the animal was laughing at him.
Gideon’s gaze scanned the darkness of the pass one last time, taking in the glint of moonlight on the river below. And something more. A spark of light?
He leaned forward in the saddle, ruing the fact that he didn’t have his field glasses with him. For long moments, he scoured the area below him until he was sure that the glow had been a figment of his imagination.
He’d decided to return to town when he saw it again. A tiny flicker down by the riverbanks.
A fire?
For nearly a quarter hour, he watched, and in that time, the light neither grew larger or smaller—which meant it was being tended. Occasionally, Gideon would lose sight of it altogether—as if someone or something blocked it from view. Then it would reappear.
The sight wasn’t completely unexpected. The miners weren’t the only ones to make Aspen Valley their home. There were trappers and hunters who lived or crossed through the area. Farther north, beyond the next mountain range, there were farmers and ranchers trying to eke out a living in the fertile lowlands. If the pass had opened enough for Aspen Valley to contact the outside world, it only stood to reason that the outer world could come to them. For all Gideon knew, it could be the Pinkerton offices or the railway company trying to make contact.
But something about the idea of a stranger only a few miles away, with the Bachelor Bottoms warehouses full of silver ore and the Dovecote bursting with single women, caused the hairs at his nape to prickle. All thought of sleep skittered away. He would return to his quarters, retrieve his field glasses and leave word with his men that he’d be gone until morning. It shouldn’t take much longer than that to investigate what he’d seen and make up his mind whether added security measures were needed.
Chapter Four (#u49701fd4-80b5-5732-b77f-a261b285b1eb)
Gideon hurried into the Meeting House with only seconds to spare—which meant that the only seats available were toward the front. He could feel the heavy weight of dozens of eyes settling upon him as he dragged his hat from his head and did his best to finger-comb his hair into place.
He probably looked a sorry sight. He hadn’t slept at all the night before, and his clothes were spattered with mud. His hand rasped against the stubble at his jaw and his stomach gnawed with hunger. After a fruitless morning where he’d been able to discover little more than the still-warm ashes of the fire he’d seen the night before, he’d needed the steadying influence of the morning Devotional to begin his day.
Leaning back in his pew, he allowed the prelude music to soak into his tired muscles. Around him, sunlight streamed through the windows of the Meeting House, forming bands of warmth that highlighted the crowded pews. Since the hours at the mine had been extended, there were only two shifts, rather than the usual three, which meant that more of the miners attended the early services. The benches were filled to capacity with men who’d finished their work. Their weary, dusty faces butted up against those miners who were clean and eager to get to their posts.
Gideon had always thought that the Devotionals were a symbolic leveler. Here, there were no rich men, no poor men, no handsome dandies or ugly mutts. They were simply children of their Heavenly Father seeking the influence of the Spirit.
His eyes skipped from row to row, stopping at the front pews on the opposite side of the room.
No, not just men. The women came as well. Since Ezra Batchwell had been sequestered in his house with his injury, the women had stretched the boundaries of their freedom—and he supposed that it was to their credit that they’d sought out the spiritual venue. This morning, they sat in two rows, wearing their best Sunday bonnets. Some of them glanced over their shoulders to smile shyly at the men behind them. But for the most part, they seemed lost in their own thoughts, enjoying the music being played by their leader, Miss Lydia Tomlinson.
Gideon would have been the first to admit that Lydia was a fine organ player. She managed to coax sounds out of the old pump instrument that he never would have believed possible. This morning, she was playing something lyrical, classical. Gideon had heard the melody before, although he wasn’t schooled enough to know its name. He only knew that the melody seemed to chase itself from high to low then back again, bringing to mind soaring birds. Or playful cherubs.
The moment the thought appeared, Gideon pushed it away. Honestly, the lack of sleep was making him quite fanciful—yet another sign that the time had come for the women to leave the valley.
But even as he told himself to keep his mind on his job, he couldn’t help watching Lydia as she bent over the keys. She seemed lost to the music, her fingers flying, her eyes slightly closed as she played from memory. She’d removed her bonnet before sitting down and the sun wove among the coils and curls, gilding her hair until it seemed to glow.
So beautiful.
Stop it!
He tore his gaze away, focusing resolutely on his hat, running the brim through his palms. But just when he’d begun to control his thoughts, the congregation rose for the first hymn, and without thought, his eyes strayed back to Lydia again.
He couldn’t account for the way he felt a sense of...peace when he looked her way, as well as a heady anticipation. He had no doubts that within moments of meeting up with her again, the verbal sparring would begin—and the thought gave him a jolt of energy that seemed entirely inappropriate.
Once again, he yanked his thoughts—and his gaze—away from Miss Tomlinson. With all his might, he concentrated on the benediction, then on the sermon being offered by Charles Wanlass.
Unfortunately, his friend chose today, of all days, to speak about love, commitment and faithfulness.
Gideon fought the urge to roll his eyes. The man had it bad. It was there in the way he gazed down at his wife, Willow, who sat on the front pew with her friends. Charles was completely and irrevocably in love with his bride and thoroughly besotted with the twins they’d adopted as their own. It was enough to make a body wonder what he was missing.
Almost.
