Page 6 of The Gunslinger’s Bride (Montana Mavericks: Historicals #1)

“A bby, are you all right?”

She nodded silently, but her cheeks blazed with the heat of humiliation. She had never shared what had happened with anyone. She’d been too ashamed and embarrassed. For nearly eight years she’d held her silence about what had been a painful and life-changing turn of events.

Brock’s return had resurrected old hurts, all those chaotic feelings of confusion and apprehension. His insistence on seeing Jonathon endangered the secure life she’d grown comfortable with. She would go crazy if she couldn’t release the tension by at last telling someone.

Opening her eyes, she turned, seated herself upon a chair and patted the one beside her. She couldn’t carry this burden alone any longer. “I foolishly fancied myself enamored with him when I was young,” she confessed matter-of-factly, knowing her confidence was well-placed in Laine.

“You had feelings for Mr. Brock?” Her friend sat beside her, their skirts touching.

Abby nodded, incredibly relieved to make the confession at last. “But he barely gave me a second glance. I always knew when he was at a gathering because I watched for him and observed his every move. I knew the way he walked and the way he smiled and how he held a partner on the dance floor. When he looked my way I could barely breathe.” She shook her head at her childishness.

“So you see, it was a one-sided admiration. Until one summer all those years ago.” She paused to think about that particular year, and could still remember the scent of the pines in the high country, the vivid splashes of paintbrush streaking the mountainsides and the unique paleness of pink sunsets.

That summer had defined all that was beautiful—and what had happened had characterized all that was ugly.

“He was miserable at home. His brother Caleb was married to an insufferable woman. Brock had no father or mother by this time, and his brothers fought all the time. He used to ride into town with the ranch hands and shoot up the saloons, then sleep off the liquor in jail.”

Laine gave her a puzzled look. “And you were sweet on this young man?”

“I knew him before all that,” Abby replied with a dismissive shrug.

“I remembered him from when his mother was alive and our families were friends. Obviously I had an image of him that wasn’t the real person.

I thought he was misunderstood. Humph.” Again she shook her head at her youthful foolishness.

“I was the one who misunderstood. I thought he possessed redeemable qualities.”

Laine took Abby’s hand. “What happened the day your brother died?”

Abby studied their fingers. “It was night. And he was murdered.”

“How?”

“Brock had asked me to meet him in the foothills by the river. It was our secret place. I took a horse like I always did.” She turned a pleading gaze on Laine. “I was so in love with him. I thought he felt the same. I thought…”

“What?”

“Well, I thought our—relationship was quite romantic and forbidden and exciting. He was the most handsome young man—those sad blue eyes and that wavy hair—and he had this…this appeal. I can’t explain it.”

“I think I understand.” Laine’s sympathetic eyes said as much, too. “But what about Guy? He did not like you with Mr. Brock?”

“Afterward he found the note Brock had written, asking me to meet him. He knew I’d been taking a horse and disappearing for hours at a time.”

“And he was angry.”

“He was very angry. He set out to avenge a wrong he thought had been done to me. I rode after him. I got to town in time to see Brock pull his gun and shoot Guy.”

“He seems like such a nice man. You said your brother had gone after him. Did Guy shoot at Mr. Brock?”

Those words seemed traitorous to Abby. She stared at Laine. “A nice man? He killed my brother!”

“Did he not have cause to draw his gun? If he was a cold-blooded murderer, he would be in jail right now, would he not?”

“If there was any justice!” Abby replied, tears forming in spite of her anger.

“I am sorry, my friend.”

Abby shook her head and blinked away the moisture. “I blamed myself for not getting there in time, for losing my head and making such an awful mistake.”

“You weren’t to blame for your brother’s death.”

“I wanted Brock so much that I didn’t think of the consequences.”

“And he wanted you?”

In all these years Abby had never allowed herself to think of Brock—to remember the feelings and the passion and the wonder—because their time together had so swiftly turned ugly. But she had to face it now. “He is Jonathon’s father.”

The confession had been so easy to say. Part of the tension inside her abated and she took an easy breath, not realizing she’d been holding herself rigid and barely breathing.

Laine’s eyes widened in surprise. “Jonathon’s father! Who knows of this? Your husband knew of this?”

The rest came easily now that that had been revealed.

“We never spoke of it, but he knew. No one has ever spoken of it until now. Until Brock came and asked me. That was the first time I’d ever heard the words aloud.

Saying them to him—to you—have been the first times I’ve heard the truth other than in my head. ”

“It must feel good to have the truth out in the open.”

Abby gave her head a quick shake. “I’m glad I’ve told you, but it’s not good that he knows. It frightens me what he’ll do.”

“What do you want him to do?”

“I want him to go away and leave us alone.”

“You still have feelings for him,” Laine stated.

Abby’s stomach clenched at the accusing words. “I have no feeling beyond contempt for a cold-blooded killer!”

“You have made excuses for his behavior. His parents were gone, he was miserable with his fighting brothers. You think he is handsome.”

“I do not.”

“You do. You describe his hair and his eyes and his— what did you call it? Appeal.”

“That was a long time ago! He’s not the man I thought he was.”

“Same hair. Same eyes.” Laine pressed her small hands against her breast. “Same attraction. And you have a son together. Jonathon is a tie that binds.”

Abby clenched her fists in her lap. “I am not attracted to that man.” At her friend’s skeptical look, she protested more emphatically, “I’m not! And as far as I’m concerned he is not the kind of father Jonathon needs. His influence can be nothing but harmful.”

“A boy needs a father.”

“Perhaps, but not a father who is a murderer. Whose side are you on?”

“If sides are drawn, I will stand on yours, of course.”

Having a sympathetic confidante was new to Abby, and she was grateful for Laine’s caring and loyalty. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Abby swallowed her indignation and gave her outspoken friend a half smile.

Laine’s old-fashioned father believed she should be silent, bowing to the decisions and wishes of the males in her family.

Because she respected her father, Laine did her best to oblige them and be an obedient daughter, but her Americanized thinking had her in hot water more often than not.

She had been born and raised in a Western mining camp, not in her father’s native land of China, and she loved to share her opinions.

Laine returned the smile.

Abby leaned toward her and the two embraced.

“I am glad you told me,” Laine said.

“Me, too. I’m sorry I didn’t know how to say it before. I didn’t want you to think badly of me.”

“I could not think badly of you.”

“Others would.”

“Others should not matter, but I know they do. You know you have my confidence.”

“I know.”

“Now come. Sell me some lamp oil.”

That afternoon, when Jonathon and Zeke arrived at the hardware store after school, Abby hung their coats and poured them mugs of milk she’d warmed. She’d thought of little else but Brock’s visit and his warnings all day.

As Jonathon sipped his milk beside the stove and bit into a raisin cookie, she studied his dear, familiar face with its delicate nose and spray of freckles. The freckles and nose were hers; every other feature he’d inherited from his father.

His hair, as fine as a baby’s, had turned thick and wavy. If it were longer, it would curl over his collar like Brock’s did.

Jonathon had never known any other home but this one, any other life but that of playing between barrels and kegs and wheelbarrows.

They lived overhead, their quarters taking up only half of the huge expanse.

The hardware store was three levels. The lower level was partially underground and filled with bins of coal and stacks of lumber.

The middle level was the retail area, and the upper floor was divided into living sections.

One side had always been rented to Asa and Daisy Spencer, which made Abby feel safer than if she were completely alone.

Jed had made his home above the store for as long as Abby could remember.

Coming from a ranch, she had felt it confining at first, but she’d learned to appreciate the convenience of working and sleeping in the same building, without braving the harsh Montana elements in the winter. And Jonathon knew nothing else.

“Me and Theke wanna play marbleth, Ma,” he said, raising those irresistible blue eyes. “We got jarth and jarth of ’em and no dirt.”

“No dirt is a problem,” she said, and her mind tossed around possibilities.

The ground was frozen too hard to loosen enough dirt to bring inside, but come this summer she could make them a ring in a frame somehow.

For now… “How about something that would slow the marbles down, like dirt does, something like…fabric? Canvas maybe. We could cut a circle and nail it to the floor.”

“Think it would work?”

“We can try.” She found shears and set to cutting a length of tarpaulin.

When John Whitefeather came for Zeke, the boy didn’t want to leave.

“Look, Uncle John! We’re playin’ marbles.” Zeke showed him excitedly.

“Your ma has a fine roast and a cinnamon cake ready,” he replied. “And your pa needs some help stacking wood.”