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Specially designed gadgets help people with visual and other physical limitations stay connected.
Jerry Swerdlick runs a 15-employee company that resells computers and devices that aid people with visual, hearing, learning and other physical disabilities.
Business is really booming these days, Swerdlick said, as more and more manufacturers are building so-called assistive technology gadgets to address a wide range of special needs groups.
And while he takes bigger and bigger orders from his clients, the mere fact that he is able to spend many hours on the computer is a testament to how far assistive technology designs have come in recent years.
That's because Swerdlick is legally blind.
"I can't see out of one eye and I've got 20/2400 vision in the other. When the doctor asks me to read the chart on the wall, I tell him, "I can't even see the wall much less the chart,'" Swerdlick joked.
He started his company, Electronic Vision Access Solutions (EVAS), in Westerly, R.I., 26 years ago. In the early days, he went door to door with his wife selling a camera that when hooked up to a speech synthesizer could read aloud what appeared in print. EVAS has gone on to improve its speech synthesizers and contribute bits to things like software that makes print appear larger.
In July, EVAS started work on what will be the first of four one-year contracts with Dell to provide technology for disabled veterans through the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. About 1,000 veterans participating in rehabilitation programs for the blind will receive customized Dell OptiPlex computers, monitors, printers and scanners. The PCs are shipped with both large print and Braille guides for quick, easy setup and outfitted with software and peripherals.
More companies are making technology easier to use for people with disabilities.
With baby boomers retiring, an already multibillion dollar industry is growing. People with visual, physical, hearing or learning disabilities now have plenty of products to choose from to help them interact with gadgets and the Internet.
Swerdlick's EVAS is part of a $5.4 billion assistive technology industry, according to the Smithsonian Institution. That's nearly double market estimates six years ago.
The market itself is broad. Some of the devices that are becoming increasingly common include Braille-based handheld devices with text-to-speech technology, tactile keyboards with oversize characters, and pointing devices that control PCs with a movement of an eyebrow.
An aging population in industrialized countries combined with a government effort to satisfy more special needs groups is lighting a fire under this industry, which adds 10 to 20 new companies every year, Assistive Technology Industry Association (ATIA) executive director David Dikter said. The Chicago-based nonprofit advocacy group advises companies and government agencies.
"I think what is happening in the handheld market is pretty dynamic with its huge focus on the blind, visually and hearing-impaired," Dikter said. "A person who has been diagnosed with Parkinson's or even had a stroke can find technologies that allow them to have speech output. That is powerful, if you think about it. If you are 50 years old and your disability caused you not to be able to speak, this technology creates an independence that lets them go into a bank."
There's a huge need for these products. The World Health Organization estimates that between 750 million and 1 billion of the world's 6 billion people deal with some form of speech, vision, mobility, hearing or cognitive impairment.
In the United States alone, more than 54 million people have some sort of disability, according to census figures released in 2002. That's likely to go up as the 76 million baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964 get ready to retire.
Microsoft, for one, has been taking a hard look at the issue. In addition to numerous studies, the software giant recently released a royalty-free software license called the Microsoft Windows User Interface Automation, which helps modify Microsoft Word, Excel, or third-party applications with screen readers, screen enlargers and other alternative inputs.
Besides Microsoft, other well-known tech companies are also working on assistive technology. Apple Computer, Adobe and IBM have been working on speech recognition and screen enlargement software for their various applications. Apple, IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Dell have offered technical support to third-party companies working on assistive technology hardware. The computer makers have also adapted their PCs, laptops and PDAs to include large, recognizable keys and plug-and-play USB ports that support various peripherals.
Smaller companies such as Freedom Scientific, HumanWare AgentSheets, WizCom Tecnologies, Digital Lifestyle Outfitters and DynaVox are also among the hundreds of assistive technology companies that the ATIA endorses.
"In some ways the mainstream movement of assistive devices is similar to the convergence of computers and consumer electronics devices," Dikter said. "For someone who is blind, there is adaptive software that can let the cell phone talk. Previously, they would have had to carry a couple of devices with them."
Refreshable Braille displays such as ones made by Blazie Engineering, of Middlesex, England, provide tactile displays of information represented on the computer screen. A Braille "cell" is composed of a series of dots. The pattern of the dots and various combinations of the cells are used in place of letters. Refreshable Braille displays mechanically lift small rounded plastic or metal pins as needed to form Braille characters. The user reads the Braille letters with his or her fingers, and then, after a line is read, can refresh the display to read the next line. The technology is finding its way into handheld devices such as the PC Mate, which has a $2,022 starting price.
HumanWare, in Quebec, Canada, has created the Trekker, a lightweight travel tool for the blind that uses an HP iPaq digital music player as a platform to provide the user with a talking personal guide. Weighing 1.3 pounds and equipped with an onboard microphone and a Braille touch screen, Trekker is the first global positioning system-based portable product offering digital maps for the visually impaired. It keeps pace with the user, announcing street names, intersections, addresses, stores, restaurants and area attractions as they come. Pressing a "Where am I?" key pinpoints the user's location. The units are available through distributors and cost $1,595 for the hardware, with local maps starting at $55.
AgentSheets, in Boulder, Colo., is a software company that uses the iPaq handheld as the basis for a device that helps people with disabilities use public transit systems. The system tracks GPS-equipped buses, alerts the passenger when the correct bus approaches, helps the passenger on board through audio and visual cues, and reminds the passenger when the bus reaches the right stop.
Eatoni, based in New York City, has developed a system that allows people with vision problems to read e-mail on their cell phones. The Eatoni software is based on Binary Runtime Environment for Wireless (BREW) technology, which was developed by Qualcomm. The software reduces the number of keystrokes used to type text on a telephone keypad. It also can increase the font size of words appearing on a phone's screen.
Enkidu Research, a subsidiary of DynaVox Technologies, has developed the Palmtop Impact. The portable communication device is designed to help people who are unable to speak. A user can touch letters, words, phrases or even picture symbols on a handheld touch screen, which are then converted into loud, clear speech. It costs $3,295.
Government intervention has certainly helped this industry grow, and that's where Swerdlick said his company comes in. He said 90 percent of his business comes from federal and state government customers, including New York, Maryland, Hawaii and Alabama. The remainder is split equally between corporate clients and individual purchases.
Like some of his customers, Swerdlick is hopeful that another generation of technologies can do more--perhaps something as seemingly obvious as making speech recognition and voice reproduction technologies sound like real people.
"We see, but we see in different ways," Swerdlick said of people with disabilities. "We hear, but we hear in different ways." |
<reponame>jayce-incognito/leapxpert-test-fe
import React from 'react';
interface IProps {
validator: any[];
}
const useValidator = (props: IProps) => {
const { validator } = props;
const [validate, setValidate] = React.useState<Array<any>>([]);
React.useEffect(() => {
setValidate([...validator]);
}, []);
return [validate];
};
export default useValidator;
|
#pragma once
#include <string>
#include <unordered_map>
#include "glm/glm.hpp"
struct ShaderProgramSource {
std::string VertexSource;
std::string FragmentSource;
};
class Shader
{
private:
std::string m_Filepath;
unsigned int m_RendererID;
std::unordered_map<std::string, unsigned int> m_UniformMap;
public:
Shader(std::string& shaderFilePath);
~Shader();
void Bind() const;
void Unbind() const;
private:
ShaderProgramSource ParseShader(const std::string& filePath);
unsigned int CreateShaderProgram(const ShaderProgramSource& shaderSource);
unsigned int CompileShader(unsigned int type, const std::string& source);
int GetUniformLocation(const std::string& name);
public: //Uniform functions
//Floats
void SetUniform1f(const std::string& name, float f);
void SetUniform2f(const std::string& name, float v0, float v1);
void SetUniform3f(const std::string& name, float v0, float v1, float v2);
void SetUniform4f(const std::string& name, float v0, float v1, float v2, float v3);
//Float Vectors
//void SetUniform2fv(const std::string& name, float* fv);
//void SetUniform3fv(const std::string& name, float* fv);
//void SetUniform4fv(const std::string& name, float* fv);
//Matrix
//void SetUniformMatrix4f(const std::string& name, const void* mat);
//GLM Matrix
void SetUniformMatrix4f(const std::string& name, glm::mat4& mat);
};
|
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// Example 1 -- Calculating math on an array, the job can be split into the independent portions
// This is (almost) minimal threaded class derived from local_thread_t
class stats_th : public local_thread_t
{
private:
double *data;
public:
int count;
double sum, sum_square;
stats_th(double *addr, int length)
{
data = addr;
count = length;
sum = sum_square = 0;
}
void thread_code()
{
for (int i=0; i<count; i++)
{
sum += data[i];
sum_square += data[i] * data[i];
}
}
} |
// REQUIRES: x86-registered-target
// RUN: %clang %s -target x86_64-apple-driverkit19.0 -### 2>&1 | FileCheck %s
int main() { return 0; }
// CHECK: "-fno-rtti"
|
/**
* Removes the column color of a specific row.
*
* @param row the row to remove the column color of.
*/
public void removeColumnColor(int row)
{
if (columnColors == null)
return;
if (columnColors.containsKey(row))
columnColors.remove(row);
} |
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday said she was mourning those killed in the shooting attack in Munich a day earlier, vowing that the security services would do everything to ensure the public was safe.
"We are all - and I'm saying this on behalf of the whole federal government - mourning with a heavy heart for those who will never return to their families," Merkel said.
She added: "To the families, the parents and children for whom everything today seems empty and pointless, I say personally and in the name of many, many people in Germany: we share your pain, we're thinking of you and we're suffering with you." |
Fredericton will be a "shining example" to the rest of the country for negotiating with its Occupy protesters instead of evicting them, according to the city's mayor.
City officials want the protesters, who have been camped out in front of city hall since Oct. 15, to move by Friday so they can get ready for the annual Christmas tree lighting ceremony on Dec. 2.
But Fredericton Mayor Brad Woodside said they don't plan to evict the protesters, as other cities, such as Halifax, have done. Instead, they plan to negotiate a compromise, he told CBC News on Tuesday morning, after meeting with the group Monday night.
"I think it's very important to note that we're not reacting like any other community," Woodside said.
Is it the beginning of the end for Occupy Canada? Take our survey here
"It's a very unusual situation. We have two sides that are actually talking and dialoguing and seeing if we can work this out.
"I dare to say that we set the example for the rest of the country on how we've managed to do this and managed to work together. … It's different because you don't have the confrontational situation that you have in other communities."
Woodside said his letter to the group, asking them to leave by Friday, was not an eviction notice.
"My request was, I asked them, I didn't tell them, it's not a heavy-handed thing," he said.
"It's not going to involve police going in on Friday and removing people."
The mayor said he sympathizes with the group's message about the need for a more equal distribution of wealth and some of the compromises could include having the group downsize, temporarily relocate, or move to another location.
"I'd like to think we're going to work it out," he said.
But Julian Renaud, a protester who attended the meeting with Woodside, said he isn't convinced.
He said during an interview with CBC that what the mayor says publicly and privately are two different things, possibly due to the upcoming municipal election.
"Certainly the mayor wants as many votes as possible. … He certainly doesn't want this to turn into a PR scandal, and I understand that fully," Renaud said.
"However, I would point out that paying lip service to support of the Occupy movement and supporting it through actions are two different things.
"The message we got last night was not all that conciliatory," Renaud said.
Renaud said the Occupy protesters offered to share the space in front of city hall with the ceremony.
"We were rebuffed essentially," he said.
"We haven't been given a valid reason as to why we cannot do so."
Protesters want to stay
The Occupy protesters contend they don't have enough time to move out by Friday and at the very least, want the deadline extended.
Fredericton Mayor Brad Woodside says his letter, asking the group to leave by Friday, was not an eviction notice. Ideally, however, they want to stay, said Renaud.
The downtown location is ideal for getting out the group's message because people are walking by all the time and stop to chat, he said.
"Thus far our decision — because we haven't fully negotiated this with the mayor — is to stay," he said.
The option of "downsizing" was never brought up at the meeting, said Renaud. But the group "might be amenable to that," he said, adding it would have to go to a vote.
Woodside argued downsizing did come up in live streaming from the meeting and that he had tweeted about it, saying it wasn't a bad idea.
"That's a negotiable point," said Woodside. "But I got to tell you something, there's got to be a little better attitude from the other side than I'm hearing right now.
"That doesn't make it very comfortable for me," he said. "I'm doing the best I can and I mean to start out on footing like this is not very healthy for either side.
"Give me an opportunity. That's all I'm asking for."
Woodside said discussions would continue Tuesday with the organizers.
"We'll see if we can't come up with a compromise. They see my side, I see their side. I'm representing a large constituency here, not just those that are occupying in front of city hall, but others that aren't, and it's a very difficult balance to try to maintain," Woodside said.
"But I think at the end of the day we'll still be a shining example to the rest of the country on how you work these things out, how you work these problems and respect others' rights to protest and get their message out at the same time." |
Experimental Investigation of the Effect of Natural Convection on Heat Transfer in Mineral Wool In Denmark and a number of other countries convection in fibrous materials is considered non-existent when calculating heat transmission as well as when designing building structures. The current investigation serves to examine whether considering natural convection non-existent in fibrous materials is a fair assumption to use in present and future building structures. In order to facilitate the experimental work, an apparatus with a metering area of 3 1 m2 was designed for measuring the effect of convection. With this apparatus it is possible to measure a specimen with thickness ranging from 0.1 to 0.5 m. The contribution of natural convection to the total heat transfer has been experimentally examined for perfectly installed fibrous materials of different air-flow permeability and thermal conductivity. To support the interpretation of the measurements, the experimental work has been supplemented with numerical calculations. The measurements and the concurrent computations both show a clear convection-induced redistribution of the heat flow in the material. When measured from the hot side in the apparatus this occurs in the form of an increased heat flow, primarily through the lower part of the vertical structure, and a decreased heat flow primarily through the upper part. The risk of convection causing the total heat flow in the material to increase is primarily related to the highly permeable material (corresponding with low density). In the low permeable material the redistribution of the heat flow has no influence on the total heat flow through the material. However, the redistribution of the convection-induced heat flow is distinct at a material thickness of 0.2 m and a temperature gradient of 20 C across the material. This research has established that when the permeability reaches a certain level, convection is able to increase the total heat flow by more than three percent, which is considered here as a significant level raised above the uncertainty in the measurement, even under the most ideal conditions even at small temperature differences. This means that the commonly accepted assumption that convection is non-existent is invalid. |
/* SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0 */
#ifndef _ASM_S390_STACKTRACE_H
#define _ASM_S390_STACKTRACE_H
#include <linux/uaccess.h>
#include <linux/ptrace.h>
#include <asm/switch_to.h>
enum stack_type {
STACK_TYPE_UNKNOWN,
STACK_TYPE_TASK,
STACK_TYPE_IRQ,
STACK_TYPE_NODAT,
STACK_TYPE_RESTART,
STACK_TYPE_MCCK,
};
struct stack_info {
enum stack_type type;
unsigned long begin, end;
};
const char *stack_type_name(enum stack_type type);
int get_stack_info(unsigned long sp, struct task_struct *task,
struct stack_info *info, unsigned long *visit_mask);
static inline bool on_stack(struct stack_info *info,
unsigned long addr, size_t len)
{
if (info->type == STACK_TYPE_UNKNOWN)
return false;
if (addr + len < addr)
return false;
return addr >= info->begin && addr + len <= info->end;
}
static __always_inline unsigned long get_stack_pointer(struct task_struct *task,
struct pt_regs *regs)
{
if (regs)
return (unsigned long) kernel_stack_pointer(regs);
if (task == current)
return current_stack_pointer();
return (unsigned long) task->thread.ksp;
}
/*
* Stack layout of a C stack frame.
*/
#ifndef __PACK_STACK
struct stack_frame {
unsigned long back_chain;
unsigned long empty1[5];
unsigned long gprs[10];
unsigned int empty2[8];
};
#else
struct stack_frame {
unsigned long empty1[5];
unsigned int empty2[8];
unsigned long gprs[10];
unsigned long back_chain;
};
#endif
/*
* Unlike current_stack_pointer() which simply returns current value of %r15
* current_frame_address() returns function stack frame address, which matches
* %r15 upon function invocation. It may differ from %r15 later if function
* allocates stack for local variables or new stack frame to call other
* functions.
*/
#define current_frame_address() \
((unsigned long)__builtin_frame_address(0) - \
offsetof(struct stack_frame, back_chain))
#define CALL_ARGS_0() \
register unsigned long r2 asm("2")
#define CALL_ARGS_1(arg1) \
register unsigned long r2 asm("2") = (unsigned long)(arg1)
#define CALL_ARGS_2(arg1, arg2) \
CALL_ARGS_1(arg1); \
register unsigned long r3 asm("3") = (unsigned long)(arg2)
#define CALL_ARGS_3(arg1, arg2, arg3) \
CALL_ARGS_2(arg1, arg2); \
register unsigned long r4 asm("4") = (unsigned long)(arg3)
#define CALL_ARGS_4(arg1, arg2, arg3, arg4) \
CALL_ARGS_3(arg1, arg2, arg3); \
register unsigned long r4 asm("5") = (unsigned long)(arg4)
#define CALL_ARGS_5(arg1, arg2, arg3, arg4, arg5) \
CALL_ARGS_4(arg1, arg2, arg3, arg4); \
register unsigned long r4 asm("6") = (unsigned long)(arg5)
/*
* To keep this simple mark register 2-6 as being changed (volatile)
* by the called function, even though register 6 is saved/nonvolatile.
*/
#define CALL_FMT_0 "=&d" (r2)
#define CALL_FMT_1 "+&d" (r2)
#define CALL_FMT_2 CALL_FMT_1, "+&d" (r3)
#define CALL_FMT_3 CALL_FMT_2, "+&d" (r4)
#define CALL_FMT_4 CALL_FMT_3, "+&d" (r5)
#define CALL_FMT_5 CALL_FMT_4, "+&d" (r6)
#define CALL_CLOBBER_5 "0", "1", "14", "cc", "memory"
#define CALL_CLOBBER_4 CALL_CLOBBER_5
#define CALL_CLOBBER_3 CALL_CLOBBER_4, "5"
#define CALL_CLOBBER_2 CALL_CLOBBER_3, "4"
#define CALL_CLOBBER_1 CALL_CLOBBER_2, "3"
#define CALL_CLOBBER_0 CALL_CLOBBER_1
#define CALL_ON_STACK(fn, stack, nr, args...) \
({ \
unsigned long frame = current_frame_address(); \
CALL_ARGS_##nr(args); \
unsigned long prev; \
\
asm volatile( \
" la %[_prev],0(15)\n" \
" lg 15,%[_stack]\n" \
" stg %[_frame],%[_bc](15)\n" \
" brasl 14,%[_fn]\n" \
" la 15,0(%[_prev])\n" \
: [_prev] "=&a" (prev), CALL_FMT_##nr \
: [_stack] "R" (stack), \
[_bc] "i" (offsetof(struct stack_frame, back_chain)), \
[_frame] "d" (frame), \
[_fn] "X" (fn) : CALL_CLOBBER_##nr); \
r2; \
})
#define CALL_LARGS_0(...) \
long dummy = 0
#define CALL_LARGS_1(t1, a1) \
long arg1 = (long)(t1)(a1)
#define CALL_LARGS_2(t1, a1, t2, a2) \
CALL_LARGS_1(t1, a1); \
long arg2 = (long)(t2)(a2)
#define CALL_LARGS_3(t1, a1, t2, a2, t3, a3) \
CALL_LARGS_2(t1, a1, t2, a2); \
long arg3 = (long)(t3)(a3)
#define CALL_LARGS_4(t1, a1, t2, a2, t3, a3, t4, a4) \
CALL_LARGS_3(t1, a1, t2, a2, t3, a3); \
long arg4 = (long)(t4)(a4)
#define CALL_LARGS_5(t1, a1, t2, a2, t3, a3, t4, a4, t5, a5) \
CALL_LARGS_4(t1, a1, t2, a2, t3, a3, t4, a4); \
long arg5 = (long)(t5)(a5)
#define CALL_REGS_0 \
register long r2 asm("2") = dummy
#define CALL_REGS_1 \
register long r2 asm("2") = arg1
#define CALL_REGS_2 \
CALL_REGS_1; \
register long r3 asm("3") = arg2
#define CALL_REGS_3 \
CALL_REGS_2; \
register long r4 asm("4") = arg3
#define CALL_REGS_4 \
CALL_REGS_3; \
register long r5 asm("5") = arg4
#define CALL_REGS_5 \
CALL_REGS_4; \
register long r6 asm("6") = arg5
#define CALL_TYPECHECK_0(...)
#define CALL_TYPECHECK_1(t, a, ...) \
typecheck(t, a)
#define CALL_TYPECHECK_2(t, a, ...) \
CALL_TYPECHECK_1(__VA_ARGS__); \
typecheck(t, a)
#define CALL_TYPECHECK_3(t, a, ...) \
CALL_TYPECHECK_2(__VA_ARGS__); \
typecheck(t, a)
#define CALL_TYPECHECK_4(t, a, ...) \
CALL_TYPECHECK_3(__VA_ARGS__); \
typecheck(t, a)
#define CALL_TYPECHECK_5(t, a, ...) \
CALL_TYPECHECK_4(__VA_ARGS__); \
typecheck(t, a)
#define CALL_PARM_0(...) void
#define CALL_PARM_1(t, a, ...) t
#define CALL_PARM_2(t, a, ...) t, CALL_PARM_1(__VA_ARGS__)
#define CALL_PARM_3(t, a, ...) t, CALL_PARM_2(__VA_ARGS__)
#define CALL_PARM_4(t, a, ...) t, CALL_PARM_3(__VA_ARGS__)
#define CALL_PARM_5(t, a, ...) t, CALL_PARM_4(__VA_ARGS__)
#define CALL_PARM_6(t, a, ...) t, CALL_PARM_5(__VA_ARGS__)
/*
* Use call_on_stack() to call a function switching to a specified
* stack. Proper sign and zero extension of function arguments is
* done. Usage:
*
* rc = call_on_stack(nr, stack, rettype, fn, t1, a1, t2, a2, ...)
*
* - nr specifies the number of function arguments of fn.
* - stack specifies the stack to be used.
* - fn is the function to be called.
* - rettype is the return type of fn.
* - t1, a1, ... are pairs, where t1 must match the type of the first
* argument of fn, t2 the second, etc. a1 is the corresponding
* first function argument (not name), etc.
*/
#define call_on_stack(nr, stack, rettype, fn, ...) \
({ \
rettype (*__fn)(CALL_PARM_##nr(__VA_ARGS__)) = fn; \
unsigned long frame = current_frame_address(); \
unsigned long __stack = stack; \
unsigned long prev; \
CALL_LARGS_##nr(__VA_ARGS__); \
CALL_REGS_##nr; \
\
CALL_TYPECHECK_##nr(__VA_ARGS__); \
asm volatile( \
" lgr %[_prev],15\n" \
" lg 15,%[_stack]\n" \
" stg %[_frame],%[_bc](15)\n" \
" brasl 14,%[_fn]\n" \
" lgr 15,%[_prev]\n" \
: [_prev] "=&d" (prev), CALL_FMT_##nr \
: [_stack] "R" (__stack), \
[_bc] "i" (offsetof(struct stack_frame, back_chain)), \
[_frame] "d" (frame), \
[_fn] "X" (__fn) : CALL_CLOBBER_##nr); \
(rettype)r2; \
})
#define CALL_ON_STACK_NORETURN(fn, stack) \
({ \
asm volatile( \
" la 15,0(%[_stack])\n" \
" xc %[_bc](8,15),%[_bc](15)\n" \
" brasl 14,%[_fn]\n" \
::[_bc] "i" (offsetof(struct stack_frame, back_chain)), \
[_stack] "a" (stack), [_fn] "X" (fn)); \
BUG(); \
})
#endif /* _ASM_S390_STACKTRACE_H */
|
Alternatives Assessment Frameworks: Research Needs for the Informed Substitution of Hazardous Chemicals Background Given increasing pressures for hazardous chemical replacement, there is growing interest in alternatives assessment to avoid substituting a toxic chemical with another of equal or greater concern. Alternatives assessment is a process for identifying, comparing, and selecting safer alternatives to chemicals of concern (including those used in materials, processes, or technologies) on the basis of their hazards, performance, and economic viability. Objectives The purposes of this substantive review of alternatives assessment frameworks are to identify consistencies and differences in methods and to outline needs for research and collaboration to advance science policy practice. Methods This review compares methods used in six core components of these frameworks: hazard assessment, exposure characterization, life-cycle impacts, technical feasibility evaluation, economic feasibility assessment, and decision making. Alternatives assessment frameworks published from 1990 to 2014 were included. Results Twenty frameworks were reviewed. The frameworks were consistent in terms of general process steps, but some differences were identified in the end points addressed. Methodological gaps were identified in the exposure characterization, life-cycle assessment, and decisionanalysis components. Methods for addressing data gaps remain an issue. Discussion Greater consistency in methods and evaluation metrics is needed but with sufficient flexibility to allow the process to be adapted to different decision contexts. Conclusion Although alternatives assessment is becoming an important science policy field, there is a need for increased cross-disciplinary collaboration to refine methodologies in support of the informed substitution and design of safer chemicals, materials, and products. Case studies can provide concrete lessons to improve alternatives assessment. Citation Jacobs MM, Malloy TF, Tickner JA, Edwards S. 2016. Alternatives assessment frameworks: research needs for the informed substitution of hazardous chemicals. Environ Health Perspect 124:265280;http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1409581 Introduction Concerns about the impacts of toxic chemicals on the health of the public, workers, and ecosystems are receiving increasing scientific, business, and regulatory attention. From past scientific discoveries of harm, such as the neurotoxicity of lead or the carcinogenicity of vinyl chloride, to more recent concerns such as the range of potential adverse health outcomes associated with bisphenol A, today's scientific journals and front-page media stories are documenting evidence of harm from chemicals that are widely used in commerce. Although primary prevention by means of toxic chemical reduction and elimination is considered to be the most effective intervention to prevent morbidity and mortality associated with exposure, in the absence of a thoughtful evaluation of substitutes, "regrettable substitutions" can result . There are many recent examples of chemicals that were introduced as replacements for known toxic chemicals and were subsequently found to be toxic themselves. For example, in the late 1990s, 1-bromopropane (N-propyl bromide) was increasingly used as a drop-in replacement for known or suspected carcinogenic solvents such as methylene chloride and trichloroethylene . Within months of adopting 1-bromopropane as a drop-in replacement, case studies of severe neurotoxicity among workers quickly emerged (). Not only is 1-bromopropane known to be highly neurotoxic, the National Toxicology Program (NTP) recently classified it as "anticipated to be a human carcinogen" (NTP 2014a). Because substitution of known toxic chemicals is an important public and environmental health prevention strategy, it is crucial to ensure that the selected alternatives will reduce human and environmental health risks. Adoption of a substitute, however, also depends upon its technical and economic feasibility. Numerous governmental and private sector programs are driving a transition towards the substitution of hazardous chemicals with safer alternatives. Chemicals management regulations in the European Union (EU) and in states such as Washington, Maine, and California are requiring assessments of hazardous chemicals deemed "priority" or "very high concern" in order to evaluate the potential for safe and feasible substitution . Leading product manufacturers as well as major retailers have active chemical assessment and restriction policies and programs in place . Central to many of these programs is the use of alternatives assessment. Alternatives assessment is a process for identifying, comparing, and selecting safer alternatives to chemicals of concern (including those in materials, processes, or technologies) on the basis of their hazards, performance, and economic viability . According to a recent National Academy of Science report, the goal of alternatives assessment is " to facilitate an informed consideration of the advantages and disadvantages of alternatives to a chemical of concern, resulting in the identification of safer alternatives" (NRC 2014). Other terms are used for alternatives assessment, including chemicals alternatives assessment, alternatives analysis, or substitution assessment. A recent review conducted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) noted that most definitions of alternatives assessment share a common focus on intrinsic hazard reduction and on taking action to replace chemicals of concern with safer alternatives (OECD 2013). A number of alternatives assessment frameworks, guidance documents, and tools have been published by governments and volume 124 | number 3 | March 2016 Environmental Health Perspectives nongovernmental organizations during the last decade, with some work dating back to the 1990s. In recent years, there have been efforts to develop detailed approaches, and there is a growing body of literature describing the practice and use of alternatives assessment in specific settings. Although alternatives assessments conducted in the business context are not routinely made publicly available and may not follow specific frameworks, dozens of alternatives assessments have been published, including those resulting from governmental programs or regulatory actions by government agencies. For example, numerous alternatives assessments have been conducted by industry as a result of "substance of very high concern" (SVHC) authorization regulatory requirements in the EU, and seven were conducted as alternatives assessment partnership projects of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) Design for Environment program (U.S. EPA 2015; Vainio 2015). Additionally, several state programs have published alternatives assessments on a wide range of toxic chemicals for specific applications . This substantive review provides a comprehensive overview of the literature on alternatives assessment frameworks. The purpose of this review is to identify consistencies and differences among published alternatives assessment frameworks as well as areas for future research and collaboration needed to advance this science policy practice. A recent National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report highlights the growing importance of alternatives assessment as a science policy discipline (NRC 2014). As when risk assessment was a new discipline, there is a need for scientific collaboration to identify where methods development is required to bring greater consistency in the field; at the same time, it is necessary to determine where flexibility and adaptability are appropriate given the particulars of the specific decision-making setting. Methods This substantive review of alternatives assessment frameworks compares and contrasts how six standard components of an alternatives assessment are addressed. The six standard components as discerned by a preliminary review of the literature include a) hazard assessment, b) exposure characterization, c) life-cycle impacts consideration, d) technical feasibility evaluation, e) economic feasibility assessment, and f ) decision making (i.e., how trade-offs among alternatives are evaluated and resolved). Articles, reports, and web-based documents were searched using a variety of search tools, including EBSCO's Discovery Service (http://www.ebscohost.com/discovery), which aggregates several literature databases or indexes, Medline, several Google search vehicles, and conversations with experts in the field. Search terms used included "alternatives analysis," "alternatives assessment," "chemical alternatives assessment," "chemical alternatives analysis," "chemical substitution," "chemical substitution assessment," and "technology options assessment." The search was limited to literature published from January 1990 to December 2014. Literature eligible for the review included articles published in peer-reviewed journals or proceedings of professional societies, and reports and web-based resources produced by governmental and nongovernmental organizations and academic institutions. From the articles and reports that were initially identified, we selected a set of alternatives assessment frameworks for the literature review based on two criteria: a) The framework had to detail a multistep process for comparing chemical and design alternatives from options identification to assessment to implementation; and b) the framework had to include components considered central to an alternatives assessment-hazard assessment, economic feasibility, and technical feasibility. Papers that exclusively focused on an individual step in the alternatives assessment process (e.g., only chemical hazard assessment) were excluded. Papers and reports that only addressed policy aspects of alternatives assessment were also excluded, as were papers that simply described an alternatives assessment case study. To enable a consistent review of the articles and reports that met the review inclusion criteria, a database was developed and used to extract and record methodological details for each of the six alternatives assessment components identified above. General information abstracted for all frameworks included a) year of publication, b) type of publication, c) authoring organization, and d) purpose of framework. Information abstracted for hazard assessment, economic and technical feasibility, exposure characterization, and life-cycle impact components included a) assessment end points, b) assessment methodology, c) data sources, and d) treatment of data gaps. For the decision analysis component, the information abstracted included a) decision function, b) decision approach used, c) decision tools used, and d) the role of weighting (each of these items is further defined in the results section). Assessment end points and measures were abstracted as described in a given alternatives assessment framework. The review of the information abstracted from a given alternatives assessment framework was limited by the extent to which the methodologies were described in the published framework. Results General characteristics. The literature search identified a growing body of work of more than 200 articles and reports. Of these, 20 journal articles and reports (including online sources) outlining specific alternatives assessment frameworks met the inclusion criteria (multistep approach) and were included in this review (Table 1). Articles and reports that were identified in the search but not included in the review were in one of the following categories: commentaries about chemical substitution and alternatives assessment policy and practice or case examples; detailed reviews about specific tools used in alternatives assessment (e.g., hazard assessment tools); or documents that did not address the three essential components of an alternatives assessment: hazard assessment, economic feasibility, and technical feasibility. Regarding the last category, there were many studies that focused on only the assessment of hazards associated with alternatives or the lifecycle assessment of alternatives; these frameworks were excluded because they did not address essential components including cost and performance. Some organizations, such as the MA TURI and the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Sustainable Policy and Technology Program, have published multiple reports and/or articles on their alternatives assessment frameworks; in such cases, these frameworks were reviewed as a single entity (Eliason and Morose 2011;Malloy et al., 2013MA TURI 2006). As shown in Table 1, the majority of frameworks reviewed were published as white papers or reports (n = 17). Thirteen of the papers were published by governmental agencies, such as the European Chemicals Agency, the MA TURI, and the U.S. EPA (Table 1). The remaining frameworks were published by nongovernmental organizations and academic organizations (n = 2 and n = 5, respectively). The primary purpose of the alternatives assessment frameworks reviewed was to provide general guidance (n = 15). However, as a result of legislative mandates for substitution of chemicals of high concern, six government agencies published alternatives assessment frameworks as part of regulatory directives, including the European Commission's Directorate General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion [referred to as the European Commission DGE () Table 1). Seven alternatives assessment frameworks were generated solely or partially for research purposes and/or for internal organizational decision making. The alternatives assessment frameworks vary in terms of the methodological details, depth of description, and prescriptiveness. The majority of frameworks reviewed are not prescriptive protocols. Rather, they were developed as flexible guides for decision making. The methods outlined are often provided as examples, describing procedures that "could" be used, rather than "should" be used. A few frameworks in particular only provide guiding principles to be used across the various process components of an alternatives assessment (Goldschmidt 1993;Rossi et al., 2011. Although recently published frameworks contain more methodological detail than many of the early frameworks, they are nevertheless guides, not protocols (IC2 2013;NRC 2014). Two frameworks offer options for each alternatives assessment process component within increasing levels of comprehensiveness. The framework developed by the IC2 offers multiple assessment levels within each process component (IC2 2013). The need for expertise, resource-intensive data sources, and data outputs increases as the the level increases. The European Commission DGE () framework offers options with increasing numbers of steps, degrees of complexity, and expertise needed for the most intensive option. Although all of the frameworks reviewed focus on alternatives assessments for chemicals of concern, some are more focused on specific jurisdictions, sectors, or issues. Because of this focus, some frameworks are not as comprehensive as others with regard to including all process components. For example, a number of frameworks were developed as part of workplace health and safety initiatives, including research projects, programs, and regulatory directives. Among these initiatives are Quinn et al.'s Pollution Prevention-Occupational Safety and Health (P2OSH) framework, which was developed for use in worksite intervention programs; OSHA's Transitioning to Safer Chemicals Toolkit, which provides web-based voluntary guidance on alternatives assessment for employers and workers; and the Technical Rules for Hazardous Substances 600 (TRGS 600) from the BAuA, which provides guidance to employers to meet their regulatory obligation regarding substitution processes for chemicals of concern (BAuA AGS 2008; ;OSHA 2013). The strength of these alternatives assessment frameworks is their specific focus on the occupational setting. However, given that some of these frameworks do not address environmental impacts such as ecological toxicity, risk trade-offs could occur (see Table 2). Others, such as the United Nations Environment Program's (UNEP's) Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee for the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), focus specifically on related environmental impacts, such as ecological toxicity (Table 2), and other life-cycle considerations, such as impacts on greenhouse gas emissions or ozone depletion, rather than on occupational impacts (UNEP 2009). The following section reviews how each common process component-hazard assessment, exposure characterization, life-cycle impacts, technical feasibility, economic feasibility, and decision making-is addressed in the 20 different frameworks. Hazard assessment. Hazard assessment is a primary component in all of the alternative assessment frameworks reviewed, but the level of detail and the methodology used to evaluate hazards varies. Broadly speaking, the hazard assessment component involves the assessment of chemical alternatives based on their inherent hazard properties. These hazard properties are then compared for the chemical of concern and the alternatives. The majority of the 20 frameworks outline specific hazard end points to be considered in an alternatives assessment. Table 2 outlines the most commonly addressed hazard assessment end points, which can be organized into four categories: a) physicochemical properties, b) human toxicity, c) environmental/ ecological toxicity, and d) additional workplace hazards not captured in the aforementioned characteristics (such as ergonomic strain). No single end point is consistently addressed across all of the reviewed frameworks. However, several end points are more frequently included than others (Table 2). For example, flammability is the most frequently included physicochemical characteristic (n = 14). Vapor pressure (n = 7), explosivity (n = 8), corrosivity (n = 9), and Among human toxicity end points, carcinogenicity (n = 18), reproductive toxicity (n = 18), mutagenicity (n = 14), acute toxicity (n = 13), and skin irritation (n = 14) are most frequently included. Among ecotoxicity end points, aquatic toxicity (n = 13), persistence (n = 13), and bioaccumulation (n = 13) are most frequently included. The NAS framework considers persistence and bioaccumulation as physicochemical characteristics and goes beyond the majority of frameworks by also outlining the need to examine terrestrial ecotoxicity (i.e., toxicity to both plants and animals) (NRC 2014). Very few frameworks include additional workplace hazard characteristics; those that do include factors such as ergonomics (n = 4), noise (n = 3), and vibration (n = 2). The NAS framework is the only framework that considers the assessment of physico chemical hazards as a step prior to consideration of human health and ecotoxicity hazards, in order to focus the subsequent assessment steps (NRC 2014). A variety of data sources were identified as the basis for information on hazard end points. Most frameworks offer examples of publicly available resources where information can be collected but do not suggest preferred sources or any data hierarchy wherein certain data types might be considered of higher value than others. The most highly referenced sources include Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDSs) or Safety Data Sheets (SDSs), authoritative scientific lists , regulatory or government priority chemical lists, publicly available substance and toxicity databases, and contact with manufacturers or the supply chain. Frameworks, including the BAuA's TRGS 600, the German Federal Environment Agency's Guide on Sustainable Chemicals, and the European Commission DGE framework, primarily use information from SDSs, notably the use of "H" (hazard) or "R" (risk) phrases associated with the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS) (BAuA AGS 2008; ;). The NAS framework also elevates the use of GHS criteria and hazard descriptors wherever available (NRC 2014). German Guide on Sustainable Chemicals () UCLA Sustainable Policy & Technology Program ((Malloy et al., 2013) () These end points reflect those explicitly noted in the sources reviewed above either in lists or in the narrative. a The NAS and U.S. EPA DFE frameworks as well as frameworks using the GreenScreen® (CPA 2014), including IC2 and BizNGO include "Endocrine Activity" rather than "Endocrine Disruption" as an end point. b The REACH framework references the use of physicochemical characteristics, although it does not specify which to evaluate. Beyond referencing CMRs (carcinogens, mutagens, and reproductive toxicants) there is not a list of specific health end points to consider in the REACH guidance document. c The OSHA framework includes "use hazards" within the hazard assessment framework, including the physical form of the chemical as well as process/handling characteristics. d The IC2 framework allows for different levels of assessment. End points noted reflect the most comprehensive level. Some occupational hazards (e.g., temperature) are captured in other assessment modules. e The NAS framework includes physicochemical, health hazard, and ecotoxicity end points as different hazard assessment steps; persistence and bioaccumulation are included in the set of physicochemical end points, not ecotoxicity; wildlife toxicity in the NAS framework is broad and includes both terrestrial plants and animals. f These end points captured under exposure characterization. Very few frameworks offer methods for addressing incomplete hazard data for the hazard assessment element. The GreenScreen® hazard assessment method used in both the BizNGO and IC2 frameworks uses a "data gap" classification for end points for which there is insufficient information to assess the hazard . This classification is considered in the overall grading (known as "benchmarks" in the GreenScreen® methodology), often resulting in a lower overall score (i.e., it is more cautious about hazard) (CPA 2014). When measured data are not available for some hazard end points, the U.S. EPA's Design for the Environment (DFE) Program (; U.S. EPA 2011a) and the European Chemical Agency's (ECHA's) Authorisation Guidance (ECHA 2011) under the Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals (REACH) legislation use (quantitative) structure-activity relationships to inform a hazard classification. The BAuA's TRGS 600 also describes use of "the effect factor model," which negatively weights substances for which toxicological data are missing (BAuA AGS 2008). The NAS framework describes the use of high-throughput data streams as a means to fill data gaps and eventually serve as primary data for end points of concern (NRC 2014). Fifty percent (n = 10) of the hazard assessment approaches outlined in the frameworks use some type of comparative ranking or categorization scheme to help evaluate differences in the levels of severity among the hazard end points (e.g., high, moderate, or low). However, no dominant or consistent method is used. Metrics for each of the ranks are based on specific data sources ranging from continuous values to presence on an authoritative list to categorization based on a specific decision logic such as GHS classifications. Consideration of chemical potency (as well as the weight of the evidence, among other factors) is integral to the GHS hazard classifications (UN 2011). Thus, frameworks that have adopted the GHS classifications consider the potency of a chemical in eliciting a particular health end point in the hazard severity rankings (i.e., high, medium, low) (CPA 2014; ; U.S. EPA 2011a). Additionally, a number of hazard assessment tools, such as the GreenScreen® method, stratify hazard severity scores by route of exposure in order to provide additional insight into factors that influence a chemical's ability to cause harm (CPA 2014). Although there is some degree of consistency among frameworks regarding the metrics and associated criteria by which chemicals are ranked as higher or lower concern for each hazard end point, variation exists. For example, frameworks including those by BizNGO (using GreenScreen®), the German Federal Environment Agency, and the Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program outline a three-point scale for carcinogenicity hazard ranking, whereas the U.S. EPA's DFE Program framework outlines a four-point scale (Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program 2012; ;;U.S. EPA 2011a). Data sources for the hazard rankings also vary. For example, the German Environment Agency framework outlines GHS risk phrases for the carcinogenicity rankings, whereas the BizNGO framework (using GreenScreen®, which is based on GHS methodology) includes over a dozen authoritative list sources for its carcinogenicity rankings (;). It is unknown whether these differences in methods will result in differences in the outputs of the hazard assessment. Regarding the other 10 frameworks that do not specifically include a hazard-ranking scheme, some do not specify any hazard characterization methodology (n = 4), some refer to established hazard assessment tools such as the Institute for Occupational Safety and Health of the German Social Accident Insurance's (IFA's) "Column Model," GreenScreen®, or MA TURI's "Pollution Prevention Options Analysis System" (P2OSys) (n = 4), and others reference using risk-based profiling methods (n = 2) (CPA 2014; IFA 2014; MA TURI 2014). Several frameworks, including those from the U.S. EPA's DFE Program, the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production, the Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program, and BizNGO, are identified as "hazardbased" assessment processes, meaning these approaches make explicit the sufficiency of using primarily hazard data without the need for using specific data on exposure in selecting a safer alternative (; Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program 2012; Rossi et al., 2011. As Lavoie et al. noted, if an alternative imparts similar product and chemical use patterns as a chemical of concern, then exposure can generally be considered a constant; the risk can therefore be decreased from a reduction in chemical hazard. These frameworks and others, including the IC2 framework, order hazard assessment first in the overall assessment process to ensure that only those alternatives that demonstrate improved environmental and health attributes are further evaluated with regard to exposure, technical performance, cost, and so on. Frameworks from European organizations, including ECHA, the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC 2007), the European Commission DGE (), and the BAuA's TRGS 600 (BAuA AGS 2008), which were developed primarily in support of regulatory objectives, generally consider exposure in parallel with hazard in the substitution process and may include quantitative risk estimates. The NAS framework includes a comparative exposure step to elucidate how intrinsic exposure characteristics may modify the hazard profile of a substance (NRC 2014). Technical feasibility assessment. Two categories of technical feasibility are characterized in the frameworks reviewed: a) technical feasibility, and b) issues associated with legal, labor, and/or supply chain feasibility. Within technical feasibility, two specific aspects are consistently present: chemical functional use, and performance or feasibility. Functional use (sometimes referred to as functional requirement or functionality) is included in all of the frameworks. Functional use refers to the purpose that a chemical performs or the properties that it imparts in a specific formulation, material, or product. For example, if the purpose of the chemical of concern is to provide solvency in a cleaning product or flame retardancy in a foam product, the alternative must achieve that same function. A few frameworks, including IC2, European Commission DGE (), and OSHA, include the concept of "necessity" in the evaluation of functional use requirements: if the chemical of concern does not provide a necessary purpose in the formulation, material, or product, or if specific performance is not necessary, then it may be eliminated, and performing an alternatives assessment may not be necessary. Although functional use/requirement is a prominent consideration, it is most often addressed early in the technical feasibility assessment process to reduce the number of candidate alternatives that achieve the same function as the chemical of concern to subsequently include in the full alternatives assessment. In addition to functional use, specific performance/quality characteristics of alternatives are addressed in 80% (n = 16) of the frameworks. These performance considerations include measures such as quality, reliability, durability, and usability. Other technical feasibility characteristics addressed in multiple frameworks include feasibility (including production and process changes) (n = 8) and consumer requirements (n = 8). Regarding other feasibility characteristics, supply chain availability (n = 4) and conformance with regulations/legal requirements (n = 8) are commonly referenced (Table 3). Several frameworks, including IC2 and BizNGO (), note that availability of an alternative in the marketplace for similar applications may be sufficient volume 124 | number 3 | March 2016 Environmental Health Perspectives to satisfy performance considerations. Three frameworks specifically include worker perceptions of the technical changes as specific attributes associated with the technical assessment process (Table 3). The majority of the frameworks lack specificity regarding the methods or suggested data sources to address issues of technical feasibility. This lack of specificity is understandable given the varied context of performance considerations in evaluating alternatives. Most frameworks simply outline specific performance criteria and in some cases use a line of questioning to more explicitly detail the performance/technical needs and issues to be addressed [European Commission DGE (); Rossi et al., 2011. Among the frameworks that provide greater methodological detail, information sources for performance measures include conversations with stakeholders in the supply chain, published literature sources (including trade journals and scientific studies), and actual pilot testing (ECHA 2011;IC2 2013;Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program 2012). Methods used to evaluate performance across alternatives primarily include the use of performance scales that vary from qualitative summaries (i.e., worse, same, better) and/or continuous measures from testing outputs compared with a range of tolerances as well as comparison with consensus standards and methods such as those published by ASTM International (http://www.astm. org/Standard/standards-and-publications. html), the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) (http://www.iso.org/ iso/home/standards.htm), and others. Economic assessment. Although all of the reviewed frameworks identify the need for an economic assessment of alternatives, not all include specific cost measures or methods. Two frameworks do not provide methodo logical details for the assessment, although each notes the importance of assessing costs (Goldschmidt 1993;). Among the frameworks that did provide such detail, there are five general categories of economic measures, including commercial availability, direct costs, internal costs, external costs, and long-term costs (including assessments that capture economies of scale and value assessments associated with product innovation). As described below, the majority of the frameworks include holistic cost assessments that encompass a range of direct and tangible indirect production costs, rather than simply comparing the alternatives with the chemical of concern in terms of product price. In general, the methods focus on the economic impact to a given firm because most of these frameworks were developed as guidance documents for the business/industry community. However, some frameworks include a broader perspective, such as the UCLA framework that also addresses the economic impact to consumers, and the UN POPs Committee framework that includes a more industrywide economic impact perspective ((Malloy et al., 2013UNEP 2009). The NAS framework also acknowledges that in some situations, organizations conducting the alternatives assessment will not always be the same entity that executes the substitution; thus, financial information for a thorough economic assessment may not be available (NRC 2014). As Table 4 shows, 45% of the reviewed frameworks (n = 9) include commercial availability considerations, and 30% of the frameworks (n = 6) also include sufficient quantity/ supply available to meet demand. Regarding direct costs, the majority include manufacturing costs (n = 17), which includes costs associated with capital/equipment costs and chemical/material costs (including additional processing chemicals if needed). Other direct cost attributes include maintenance/storage (n = 12), end of life/disposal (n = 13), energy (n = 8), and employment and labor productivity (n = 11). Among the most frequently included nondirect manufacturing costs (indirect costs) are expenses associated with regulatory compliance, including industrial hygiene engineering controls and equipment, emissions controls (n = 11), and liability costs (n = 7), such as costs associated with spills, fires, explosions, worker compensation, and so forth. External costs or potential benefits noted in a handful of frameworks include ((Malloy et al., 2013 ✓ These end points reflect those explicitly noted in the sources reviewed above. a The IC2 framework allows for different levels of assessment. End points noted reflect all levels. economic impacts associated with factors such as product labeling, environmental impact costs, human health, or other life-cycle cost impacts such as costs associated with resource extraction. Eleven of the frameworks describe the need to include long-term financial indicators (e.g., net present value, internal rate of return, profitability index) to capture evolving, rather than static, pricing associated with factors such as economies of scale and the future value of product innovations. Although several frameworks provide example tables of the cost considerations to be included in an alternatives assessment, details about data sources for the economic assessment are not included in the majority of the frameworks. Because most alternatives assessment frameworks have been developed to provide guidance to the business community, it may be presumed that cost-assessment methods are standardized, given the central need to perform such assessments as part of routine business practices. The Ontario Toxics Reduction Program's framework provides a general overview of data source options for many of the outlined economic assessment end points (Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program 2012). Methods used for the comparative economic assessment of alternatives vary and are not always made explicit. The Lowell Center for Sustainable Production, IC2, and the Ontario Toxics Reduction Program reference the use of cost-benefit analyses (IC2 2013; Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program 2012; ). Four frameworks, including European Commission DGE (), MA TURI (Eliason and Morose 2011;MA TURI 2006), UNEP's POPs Committee, and the TRGS 600 (BAuA AGS 2008) note options for using qualitative ranking methods when specific cost estimates may be missing, such as "better," "neutral," and "worse." Others, such as the UCLA Sustainable Policy and Technology Program, report two summary measures: a) "manufacturer impact," which estimates the extent to which expected revenues associated with the alternative are greater than manufacturing costs; and b) "purchaser impact," which estimates the increased/decreased price paid by the consumer for the end product ((Malloy et al., 2013. The UCLA framework's use of "manufacturer impact" is similar in concept to "financial return on investment," which is also noted as an option in the Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program. The majority of alternatives assessment frameworks consider the alternatives as static options, with one notable exception being the IC2 framework. The IC2 framework includes a component in its cost assessment that allows the assessor to modify (possibly mitigating) negative cost and availability results through options such as purchasing contracts to achieve lower pricing, recycling of process chemicals to reduce quantities needed, or altering the product to incorporate alternatives in a more cost-effective manner (IC2 2013). Exposure characterization. Eighteen frameworks include an evaluation of exposure (worker, public, and/or environmental) (Table 5). However, the manner in which exposure is addressed varies greatly. Seven frameworks include exposure characterization as a discrete process component-a specific step in the alternatives assessment process-whereas the remaining eleven typically address exposure to inform other process components, including focusing the hazard assessment, identifying priority uses of concern, informing the final selection of alternatives, and/or as a default decision-point These end points reflect those explicitly noted in the sources reviewed above. a Cost assessment addressed in framework, yet no specific end points noted. b The REACH framework states, "data may also be collected on indirect benefits," (p. 76) yet also states "impacts such as unemployment and health benefits are not considered part of the economic feasibility analysis" (p. 78). c The IC2 framework allows for different levels of assessment; end points noted reflect all levels. The non-economic aspects of some external benefits are addressed in the IC2 Social Impact module. volume 124 | number 3 | March 2016 Environmental Health Perspectives if continued use of the chemical of concern is required because no safer and feasible alternative can be identified (Table 5). Nine frameworks consider exposure for purposes of characterizing risk. Some frameworks, such as BizNGO, do not consider exposure and associated risk assessment as an essential process component of alternatives assessment unless there are material, product, or process changes involved with adopting an alternative that could result in an exposure that is substantially different from the chemical of concern (). The NAS framework demonstrates an evolution in the consideration of exposure in alternatives assessment frameworks because it specifically includes a comparative evaluation of exposure to assess the potential for differential exposure as a result of differences between the chemical of concern and the alternative in terms of their physicochemical properties (e.g., differences in vapor pressure or persistence), exposure routes, and quantity used (NRC 2014). The NAS framework differentiates its methods from risk assessment, suggesting that the use of available exposure models or critical physicochemical properties is typically sufficient to determine the intrinsic exposure potential of alternatives relative to the chemical of concern (NRC 2014). The vast majority of the frameworks evaluating exposure use indirect measures, such as dispersive potential or volume in commerce, rather than actual exposure models or data. Thirteen of the frameworks characterizing exposure link it to four particular categories of attributes: physicochemical properties, use characteristics, emissions and fate, and industrial hygiene measures (Table 6). Physicochemical properties are most often linked to exposure measures: vapor pressure/ boiling point (n = 8), solubility (n = 6), physical state at room temperature (n = 6), density (n = 5), and dissociation constant (n = 3). As noted previously, physicochemical properties are also a core part of the hazard assessment process in the majority of the frameworks. Although some physicochemical properties, such as flammability or corrosivity, are clearly associated with the hazard profile of a substance (Table 2), others, including solubility, state (dust, gas, etc.), binding strength/migration potential, and vapor pressure, inform a substance's Other (as described) Goldschmidt 1993 ✓ ✓ Simply states, "assess the risk of being exposed." U.S. EPA CTSA () ✓ ✓ ✓ Lowell Center for Sustainable Production () Inherent exposure properties and routes of exposure that substantively increase exposure levels are identified and integrated into the hazard assessment (human and ecological toxicity). MA TURI (Eliason and Morose 2011;MA TURI 2006) ✓ Physicochemical properties are considered for worker exposure potential. Considered when identifying priority uses to include in the alternatives assessment and for comparing alternatives. P2OSH () ✓ Worker use conditions are characterized to identify exposure potential. Included "intrinsic exposure" to determine whether exposure to the chemical of concern and alternatives are a) substantially equivalent; b) increased; or c) inherently (lower) preferable. More rigorous exposure assessment is suggested where increased exposure is indicated. inherent exposure potential (Table 6). Even environmental fate end points such as bioaccumulation (Table 6) are often predicted through physico chemical properties such as octanol-water partition coefficients. The NAS framework describes these and other physicochemical properties as intrinsic exposure properties (NRC 2014). Several frameworks, including those by the MA TURI, the Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program, and BizNGO (using GreenScreen®), which do not include an explicit evaluation of exposure as a discrete step in the alternatives assessment process, do include several physicochemical properties that inform exposure potential in the hazard assessment process component Use characteristics are outlined in 11 frameworks and capture information including processing and handling characteristics (n = 8) and manufacturer use amounts (n = 9) ( Table 6). Frameworks concentrating on the workplace environment typically focus on use characteristics associated with occupational exposure (BAuA AGS 2008;OSHA 2013;). A few frameworks outline use characteristics that have broader public health and environmental implications for exposure, including amount in consumer use and extent of dispersive use (Table 6). Components associated with emissions and environmental fate (specifically PBTs) are included in 9 and 6 frameworks, respectively. Occupational monitoring data is one component that directly assesses worker exposure (rather than using surrogates of exposure) and is addressed in 2 frameworks ( Table 6). The presence/need for industrial hygiene controls (e.g., ventilation, personal protective equipment) is also included in these frameworks (Table 6). Two frameworks, the Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program and the German Federal Environment Agency's Guide on Sustainable Chemicals (), capture emissions/environmental releases as a part of the life-cycle component rather than as a part of exposure characterization. The frameworks do not routinely recommend data sources for the exposure measures. When data sources are noted, SDSs and chemical encyclopedias are referenced for physicochemical properties, and public databases such as pollutant release and transfer registries and published literature are referenced for emission, fate, and transport information. The NAS framework refers to using publicly available exposure models to address identified exposure scenarios of concern (NRC 2014). Given the nature of the questions and guidance offered in the majority of the frameworks, expert judgment regarding work and environmental conditions that influence potential exposure appear to be a primary source of information. Exposure potential and/or risk are most routinely displayed as a qualitative (three-point or five-point) ranking rather than as quantitative statements of risk. For example, the European Commission DGE () framework uses information about where, how often, and in what way the chemical is used to rank exposure potential from 1 (low exposure) to 5 (very high exposure) with regards to working/process conditions, physical properties affecting exposure, frequency or duration of use, quantity used, and accident potential. Qualitative hazard and exposure potential scores are then combined to identify chemicals with the highest risk. The NAS framework describes an assessment of intrinsic exposure measures to determine whether likely exposure to the chemical of concern and alternatives is a) substantially equivalent, b) increased, or c) inherently (lower) preferable. Where the assessment of exposure indicates the potential for increased exposure, the NAS framework suggests that quantitative exposure assessment, although more complex and time-consuming than qualitative assessment, may be needed to discern between alternatives (NRC 2014). Hazard assessment tools, such as GreenScreen® (used in the BizNGO and IC2 frameworks), include the ability to stratify hazard severity scores by route of exposure in order to provide additional insight into factors that influence the ability of a chemical to cause harm (CPA 2014;Whittaker 2015). Several frameworks, including those by IC2 and the European Commission DGE (), outline questions for the assessor to consider mitigation options that could reduce exposure potential through, for example, process changes or upstream product design changes. Life-cycle assessment/life-cycle thinking. Eighteen frameworks address life-cycle impacts (Table 7). There were two dominant approaches for addressing life-cycle impacts: life-cycle assessment and life-cycle thinking. Both follow the same general principle of thoroughly considering impacts at different points in the chemical/product life cycle to avoid selecting alternatives that shift risks from one stage of a product's life cycle to another. Life-cycle assessment (LCA) follows a welldefined quantitative methodology, such as ISO 14040, that quantifies the impacts associated with a standardized set of environmental impacts (i.e., greenhouse gas emissions, resource depletion, water consumption, energy consumption) of products or processes across their life stages (ISO 2006). In contrast, lifecycle thinking is less analytical and generally less resource-intensive than LCA. Life-cycle thinking identifies significant impacts at different life-cycle stages but does not typically include quantitative assessment. The majority of the frameworks consider key life-cycle attributes in the context of hazard, exposure, economic, or technical feasibility assessments (n = 13) rather than as a discrete process component (n = 5). The IC2 framework and the NAS framework do both; life-cycle thinking is included as a discrete process component, and the results of the evaluation are intended to provide additional information to identify potential unintended consequences or to discern between alternatives (IC2 2013; NRC 2014). Four frameworks refer to using commonly available LCA methods and tools (Table 7). In all four frameworks, the use of LCA is considered to be an add-on process that may be the last step in evaluating candidate alternatives and that may help to differentiate the "safer" alternative or to identify potential unintended consequences of a substitution. However, several frameworks, including those that refer to using LCA, caution that conducting traditional LCAs can be very expensive and time-consuming. These frameworks also note that assessment is feasible for some end points such as energy consumption; however, data and analytic methods are lacking for others, such as occupational impacts in upstream manufacturing processes. Although life-cycle thinking is reflected in the majority of the reviewed frameworks, some focus only on life-cycle considerations associated with the primary focus of the framework. For example, the OSHA and Rosenberg et al. frameworks, which Referencing accepted/standard life-cycle assessment methods. b Not addressed in the typical assessment; part of an "extended assessment" for decisions that have far-reaching implications. c Both methods mentioned, including their strengths and limitations. d Life-cycle thinking is used in the preliminary and in levels 1 and 2; life-cycle assessment guided by ISO 14040 (ISO 2006) is referred to in level 2 and outlined as the main method in level 3. e Use of life-cycle thinking is recommended before the use of life-cycle analysis to identify upstream and downstream impacts. focus on the work environment, consider occupational health and labor impacts across multiple life-cycle stages, yet they do not address broader environmental impacts, such as those commonly considered in LCA. The concept of "synthetic history"-the sequence of unit operations and chemical inputs that proceed from the acquisition of raw materials to the production of chemical intermediates to the production of the chemical of concern (or alternative)-is also elevated in the NAS framework as an important consideration to make explicit the impacts of buildingblock chemicals or byproducts that may not be present in the final chemical or product (NRC 2014). Decision making. The decision-making approaches taken in the alternatives assessment frameworks can be analyzed across four dimensions: the decision function or purpose, the decision approach, the decision methods/ tools, and the role of weighting. Decision function or purpose refers to the role that the alternatives assessment plays in the ultimate evaluation of the alternatives. As shown in Table 8, three frameworks have a comparative function, providing a structured way to compare the attributes of various alternatives against one another. Such frameworks identify trade-offs between the alternatives but do not offer guidance or direction for ranking the alternatives or for selecting a preferred alternative. Other frameworks provide a further selection/ranking function in order to identify a preferred alternative or set of alternatives or to rank the alternatives (n = 16). The remaining framework does not include a substantive discussion of decision making. The term "decision approach" refers to the general structure or order of the decisionmaking process for a particular point, such as screening (i.e., winnowing an initial set of potential alternatives) or generating a final ranking of alternatives. Existing alternatives assessment frameworks use three general decision approaches: sequential, simultaneous, and mixed (IC2 2013). The sequential framework considers one or more attributes, such as human health impacts, environmental impacts, economic feasibility, or technical feasibility, in succession. Any alternative that does not perform satisfactorily on the first attribute (which is often human health impacts or technical feasibility) is dropped from further consideration. The remaining alternatives are then evaluated with respect to the next relevant attribute, and the process is repeated until a preferred alternative or set of alternatives is identified. The simultaneous framework considers all or a set of attributes at once, allowing good performance on one attribute to offset less-favorable performance on another for a given alternative. The mixed framework is a combination of the sequential and simultaneous approaches. For example, if technical feasibility and economic impact are of particular importance to the decision maker, she/he may screen out certain alternatives on that basis using a sequential approach and subsequently apply a simultaneous framework to the remaining alternatives. Seven of the frameworks in this review adopt no decision approach. Three of these frameworks do not substantively address decision making, and four address decision making generally but do not specify any particular decision approach. Six other frameworks adopt the mixed approach, using different approaches for screening potential alternatives and for generating a ranking of alternatives or preferred alternatives (See Table 8, column 5, under "Decision Approach"). For example, the Ontario Toxics Use Reduction Program uses a sequential approach for the initial screening of alternatives, and then applies a simultaneous approach to the remaining alternatives. Four other frameworks apply the simultaneous approach exclusively, including the NAS framework, which applies it first to screen alternatives based on human health impacts and ecotoxicity, and later for ranking alternatives based on a larger set of process components (NRC 2014). One framework applies only the sequential approach (Eliason and Morose 2011;MA TURI 2006). Finally, Malloy et al., 2013. The UCLA framework applies the various approaches in two case studies to illustrate how the choice of decision approach can affect the outcome of the alternatives assessment ((Malloy et al., 2013. Decision tools or methods are formal and informal aids or rules that guide specific decisions, in this case the screening of alternatives and the selection or ranking of alternatives. Decision tools or methods can be separated into three general categories: narrative, structured, and analytical. With narrative methods, the decision maker engages in a holistic, qualitative balancing of the data and associated trade-offs to arrive at a selection. In some cases, the decision maker may rely upon explicitly stated informal decision principles or expert judgment to guide the process. Structured approaches apply a systematic overlay to the narrative approach, providing the analyst with specific guidance about how to make a decision. The structure may take the form of a decision tree, which takes the analyst through an ordered series of questions. Alternatively, it may offer a set of specific decision rules or heuristics to assist the analyst in framing the issues and guiding the evaluation. Analytical methods similarly function as a supplement to narrative approaches, using mathematically based formal decision analysis tools such as multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) (Linkov and Moberg 2011). MCDA consists of a range of different methods and tools, reflecting various theoretical bases and methodological perspectives. Accordingly, these tools tend to assess data and generate rankings in different ways (). Figure 1 illustrates a mixed decision approach using two decision methods in sequence: a narrative method followed by an analytical method. Nine of the frameworks rely upon narrative methods alone. Some of those nine frameworks provide general principles to guide the decision making. For example, the Lowell Center framework includes general principles (i.e., consider prevention, precaution, substitution, and a life-cycle perspective) and preferences (e.g., prefer solutions that eliminate the function of problematic chemicals). Other narrative frameworks offer little in the way of guidance for the decision maker. Still other frameworks, such as the BizNGO framework () and the IC2 framework, go beyond narrative alone to provide well-defined, structured decision approaches. The NAS framework also encourages the use of structured approaches in appropriate circumstances. Five frameworks, including the NAS, IC2, and UCLA frameworks, incorporate analytical methods as support tools for decision makers ( Table 8). Four of the five frameworks using analytical tools focus on MCDA tools, whereas the European Commission DGE () framework relies upon cost-benefit analysis. The seven remaining frameworks either do not include a decision-making function or do not specify particular tools or methods. The last dimension of interest is the extent to which the various frameworks engage in weighting of the decision criteria. In most situations, decision makers are not equally concerned about all decision criteria. For example, a decision maker may place more importance on whether a household cleaner causes cancer than on whether it contributes to smog formation. The reviewed decision frameworks handle questions of whether and how to weight criteria differently. Nine of the frameworks do not address the question of weighting at all. Three of the frameworks (Table 8) establish implicit weighting through the use of sequential decision approaches: by situating a criterion early in the decision sequence, the framework gives it greater influence on the ultimate decision. The decision structure created by the BizNGO framework also implicitly gives a specific set of chemical hazard end points greater weight (). Seven other frameworks call for explicit consideration of the relative importance of the decision criteria; four of those frameworks encourage development of quantitative weights where appropriate (Table 8). Discussion In response to regulatory, business, and consumer drivers to substitute chemicals of concern in a wide array of products and processes, governments, NGOs, and academic researchers have developed alternatives assessment frameworks to aid in identifying, evaluating, and implementing safer substitutes (). This substantive review indicates that alternatives assessment is a growing field of science policy assessment, with established frameworks and an increasing number of tools and resources to support its practical application. Indeed, the growth of alternatives assessment frameworks demonstrates an increased recognition of the importance of an informed transition to safer alternatives as a key aspect of chemicals management science and policy. The alternatives assessment frameworks analyzed in this review share a common purpose: namely, identifying safer alternatives based on comparative assessments of hazard (and sometimes exposure) characteristics as well as technical and economic feasibility. This purposesupporting a transition to safer alternatives Figure 1. Example of a mixed approach: use of multiple decision tool in a mixed-decision framework (see Table 8 for details). while avoiding unintended consequences of uninformed substitutions-underscores the action or solutions orientation of alternatives assessment processes. The NAS framework specifically distinguishes alternatives assessment from other processes such as risk assessment, safety assessment, and sustainability assessment (NRC 2014). This review identified 20 alternatives assessment frameworks that have been published since 1990. The NAS framework and a recent report by OECD reviewed 10 and 8 frameworks, respectively (NRC 2014;OECD 2013). The only framework not included in our review that was noted in the NAS report was the framework established under the California Safer Consumer Products program, for which, as of this writing, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control has not published its guidance framework other than requirements outlined in the regulation (CA Code of Reg 2013). Thus, we are confident that our search strategy retrieved a broad collection of relevant frameworks for evaluation. The additional frameworks identified by this search include historical frameworks (Goldschmidt 1993;); frameworks used in additional regulatory programs, such as U.S. EPA's Significant New Alternatives Policy (SNAP) program associated with alternatives to ozone-depleting chemicals (U.S. EPA 2011b); and frameworks used in occupational safety and health research and programs (BAuA AGS 2008;OSHA 2013;;). This review strictly required alternatives assessment frameworks to include at minimum an assessment of hazards, costs, and performance, which is consistent with the NAS framework and the OECD report (NRC 2014;OECD 2013). Our findings are relevant only to the alternatives assessment frameworks so defined. Although the alternatives assessment field may incorporate an array of science policy fields and disciplines-for example, life-cycle assessment and risk assessment-the findings in this review are not intended to be generalizable to these fields. However, the review does speak to how aspects of these fields have been adapted for use in the context of chemical alternatives assessment. Our review identifies an important need for enhanced consistency in terms of particular methods, end points addressed, and evaluation criteria (i.e., ranking and scoring criteria). That said, the flexibility to adapt a transparent alternatives assessment process to different decision contexts is also needed, including articulating the circumstances under which particular methods and approaches are most appropriate. Although the hazard assessment component demonstrated the greatest area of methodological consistency among the frameworks reviewed, achieving increased consistency within a core set of hazard, economic, and technical feasibility characteristics as a baseline for any alternatives assessment should be explored. The IC2, European Commission DGE, and TRGS 600 frameworks offer useful models for providing a "core" or "minimal" set of attributes for the various process components that respond to the business community's needs to conduct alternatives assessments that are more streamlined and that minimize time and resource requirements-a challenge for small and medium-sized companies (BAuA AGS 2008; ;IC2 2013). An important research need is an evaluation of the outcomes of various alternatives assessment frameworks to understand the degree to which different frameworks and a minimum core set of end points (included in various forms in the six alternatives assessment process components) lead to significant differences in the identification of safer, feasible alternatives. Such an evaluation could identify core end points and data required to ensure a thorough evaluation of alternatives that minimizes the potential for unintended consequences, given that no framework or assessment can provide certainty about the impact of trade-offs. Indeed, the risk assessment literature clearly demonstrates that no assessment method can provide perfect consistency in outcomes because assessment results can differ greatly based on disciplinary perspective and data sources (Bailar and Bailar 1999). As noted in the NAS framework, a set of steps that ensure broad thinking about the potential consequences of a substitution, combined with transparency in methods and decision rules, are critical elements of any alternatives assessment (NRC 2014). Although this review focused on frameworks for alternatives assessment, there is a growing body of alternatives assessments that have been conducted using some of these 20 frameworks (IC2 2013). For example, numerous alternatives assessments have been conducted by industry using ECHA's framework in order to comply with chemical authorizations requirements under REACH in the EU (Vainio 2015). Evaluation of such alternatives assessments is needed to gauge the real-world implementation of such frameworks. Research on existing and newly developed alternatives assessment case studies would allow for carefully structured investigation of specific methodological issues and potential solutions. Methods are more developed in the hazard assessment component than in other components, yet gaps remain. For example, additional methodological development is needed to incorporate a broader array of ecotoxicity end points than is currently included (NRC 2014). Aquatic toxicity was generally the only ecotoxicity end point included, if at all, in the frameworks evaluated herein. An additional significant barrier affecting the assessment of chemical hazard is the lack of hazard data (Whittaker and Heine 2013). Many alternatives assessment frameworks rely on SDSs or GHS hazard phrases. These sources may lack important data relevant for specific hazard end points. Moreover, given that the U.S. NTP has only conducted 2-year carcinogenicity bioassays on approximately 600 of the tens of thousands of chemicals that are presently being used in commerce, data gaps for critical end points, such as carcinogenicity, are a significant issue confronting informed chemical substitution (NTP 2014b). Several alternatives assessment frameworks identify a number of strategies to address data gaps, including use of heuristics and qualitative and quantitative structure-activity relationship models, in order to avoid substitutions where information about health and safety is missing (BAuA AGS 2008;CPA 2014;ECHA 2011;; U.S. EPA 2011a). There is a need to augment data sources available for alternatives assessment (). Such enhancement includes harnessing the potential in emerging forms of predictive toxicology, including high-throughput in vitro assays and advanced chemical informatics tools to combine data from multiple sources (NRC 2014). This enhancement could also include the use of probabilistic models and decision analytical tools for managing uncertain data (). Ultimately, given market and regulatory pressures, substitutions will be made, and it is important that data are available to inform efficient alternatives assessment processes. Reform of federal chemicals policies to require chemical manufacturers to provide data on the hazards of the chemicals they are bringing to market, and to chemical users on their various uses, as required under the EU REACH regulation, could go a long way to address these data gaps. In the United States, reform proposals currently under consideration in the House and Senate provide the U.S. EPA with the authority to require needed testing when reviewing new and existing chemicals (Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act 2015, https://www.congress. gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/697; Alan Reinstein and Trevor Schaefer Toxic Chemical Protection Act 2015, https://www.congress. gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/725/). Additional methodological and data gaps are notable in the exposure characterization, life-cycle assessment, and decision-analysis or decision-making process components. To date, exposure assessment has been primarily employed in risk assessment. This use of exposure assessment may remain a requirement, particularly for regulatory alternatives assessment frameworks in which risk estimates volume 124 | number 3 | March 2016 Environmental Health Perspectives must be calculated or when companies adopting alternatives also need to demonstrate "safety" for a regulatory agency. There is a need to create methods for characterizing exposure that can inform substitution processes, including evaluating the hazard profile of a given alternative, identifying potential unintended consequences of substitutions, and improving our understanding of what is "safer." The NAS framework considers the role of exposure in the alternatives assessment process and offers a starting point for future research on substitution-oriented exposure characterization (NRC 2014). The majority of frameworks, including those that are "risk-based" and "hazard-first," include exposure metrics, primarily physicochemical characteristics and use/handling characteristics. Thus, current frameworks include methods that consider the intrinsic exposure properties of a given chemical or material and therefore inform the inherent hazard profile. Exposure data at the population level, however, are sparse and most likely would not be helpful in the evaluation of chemical substitutes. Methods to rapidly characterize and categorize potential exposures are needed. For example, the development of "E" (exposure) phrases that that identify intrinsic exposure, similar to the "H" and "R" phrases used by GHS, would be advantageous to the exposure evaluation process in alternatives assessment. With regards to evaluation of life-cycle impacts, the most developed methods are in frameworks that employ LCA. However, the existing LCA methodologies have limitations in the selection of safer alternatives: most notably, the resource intensiveness of a standard LCA approach, the lack of toxicity data on many chemicals, and a lack of data on the release of chemicals during the productuse phase. Thus, the majority of the reviewed frameworks use a less well-defined, life-cycle thinking approach. What is clear in the rationale for adopting life-cycle thinking is the need for a more streamlined approach to identifying life-cycle impacts. However, greater methodological clarity about what is encompassed in life-cycle thinking would be of benefit to the alternatives assessment field. A body of literature that explores the use of comparative life-cycle assessment for the purpose of identifying alternatives is now available (Zhou and Schoenung 2007;). A deeper examination of how these methods could be more broadly incorporated and standardized in current alternatives assessment frameworks should be performed. Our review identified two key findings regarding the decision-making component of an alternatives assessment. First, formalized decision-making processes in alternatives assessment require significant development; almost half of the reviewed frameworks do not consider the ultimate evaluation of tradeoffs and the selection of preferred alternatives. Many of the frameworks that consider decision making provide little in the way of guidance. Second, there is a rich variety of approaches available to support decision making for alternatives assessment, and some of these approaches have been put to use in existing alternatives assessment frameworks. Identifying the "best" decision-making approach in a given setting is itself a thorny decision that will require further research in three areas. From the empirical perspective, it is important to gain a full understanding of the impacts that various decision approaches have upon alternatives assessment outcomes. For example, how do sequential versus simultaneous frameworks affect decision outcomes? In addition, from the normative standpoint, it would be helpful to develop design principles for alternatives assessment and to explore how different approaches, decision frameworks, methods and tools, and weighting may affect those principles and under what circumstances. Finally, from a methodological perspective, we should develop approaches for "validating" alternatives assessment methodologies against normative principles. This process will involve "operationalizing" our normative principles to engage in rigorous evaluation of our alternatives assessment frameworks. With regards to the economic and technical feasibility components of an alternatives assessment, our analysis identified a number of different ways in which these elements are addressed in the various frameworks. This variety has two likely explanations. First, regulatory requirements, such as those in Europe and California, may dictate the types of economic considerations that must be included in an alternatives assessment; second, technical feasibility and cost assessment tend to be context-and firm-dependent (CA Code of Reg 2013; European Parliament and Council 2007). Performance requirements are often identified by purchasers or manufacturers and are assessed differently by different firms and sectors. Furthermore, different firms may have different return on investment requirements or manufacturing costs that make single economic assessment approaches a challenge. Frameworks such as the IC2 and TRGS600 frameworks outline generic cost and performance considerations/questions that can be included in alternatives assessment processes (BAuA AGS 2008;IC2 2013). Although additional research and methodological development are needed to advance the practice of alternatives assessment, it is important that the processes continue to be flexible and adaptable to different contexts. An assessment process that is overly resource-intensive, costly, or slow will likely not be widely adopted, which would undermine the goal of alternatives assessment in supporting an informed transition to safer, feasible alternatives. Broadening alternatives assessment processes to include process components such as life-cycle impact evaluation and exposure is important for expanding the horizons of thinking about potentially costly and unintended consequences of substitutions. It is equally important that research be performed to identify assessment tools and approaches that can be readily used by a wide range of actors to facilitate efficient alternatives assessment processes. Conclusions Alternatives assessment did not arise fully formed as a new methodology or approach to assessing substitutions for chemicals, materials, or activities of concern. The roots of alternatives assessment are found in decades of environmental impact assessment, technology assessment, and pollution prevention planning. However, the field has evolved quickly in recent years because of increasing scientific, policy, and market attention to chemicals of concern used in manufacturing processes and everyday products. As a result, a number of new frameworks and tools have been created to address this growing need. The growth in different approaches, which respond to varied drivers and contexts, is an understandable and logical consequence of increased attention to chemical substitution. Significant similarities and some important differences in how the various alternatives assessment components are addressed were revealed for the twenty frameworks examined in this substantive review. We conclude that there is a need for increased consistency between frameworks, particularly in how hazard end points are evaluated and how exposure is addressed, while maintaining sufficient flexibility to allow the alternatives assessment process to be adapted to different decision contexts and resource availability. Ultimately, although there may be differences of opinion about what constitutes an adequate alternatives assessment, what is of key importance is that the assessor at least considers and evaluates, to the highest degree possible, the various process components. Because the goal of alternatives assessment is to support an informed transition to safer chemicals, materials, and products, breadth of consideration may in some cases be more important than the depth to which any particular process component is evaluated. Indeed, excessive depth of analysis in any one of the process components may lead to inaction and could undermine the solutions-oriented objective of alternatives assessment. Our review also identified specific research needs. However, methodological research and development must consider the varied contexts in which alternatives assessment will be used. Many alternatives assessment practitioners, particularly those in smaller firms, do not have significant technical or financial resources to conduct detailed quantitative assessments (e.g., of exposure or life-cycle impacts). There is a need for approaches that are thoughtful, yet time-and resource-efficient, as well as for technical and research support for those conducting assessments. There is also a critical need for enhanced hazard, exposure, and lifecycle data in "actionable" formats to complete alternatives assessments. Some may argue that alternatives assessment should not be practiced on a large scale until issues of consistency and research gaps are addressed. The evolution of alternatives assessment, however, is no different than the evolution of other science policy approaches, such as that of risk assessment. The publication of the National Research Council "Red Book" in 1983 stimulated years of discussion that led to the growth of the risk assessment field and to additional NAS studies, guidance, and efforts at standardization (NRC 1983). During this period, risk assessments were conducted and improved, and the field grew. Given that decisions regarding chemical substitution are being made by governments and companies in the present day, the coming years will see a need for greater collaboration on methods development and standardization of approaches that can maintain the core goals of alternatives assessment to support efficient, informed decision making. This process will by necessity be iterative. We conclude that alternatives assessment is a growing field of scientific assessment with rigorous methods and tools. The multidisciplinary nature of alternatives assessment requires enhanced scientific collaboration across fields to refine methodologies that can support the important sustainability goal of informed substitution and design of safer chemicals, materials, and products. |
<reponame>microsoft/jacdac-services<gh_stars>0
machine.addClientFactory(jacdac.SRV_POTENTIOMETER, devid => {
const client = new modules.PotentiometerClient(devid)
client.onPositionChangedBy(5, () => {
const current = client.position()
machine.plot(current, 100)
})
})
|
a = raw_input()
a = list(a)
stack = []
rep = 0
braces = {}
braces['<'] = '>'
braces['('] = ')'
braces['['] = ']'
braces['{'] = '}'
openb = braces.keys()
closeb = braces.values()
for i in a:
if i in openb:
stack.append(i)
elif len(stack) == 0 and i in closeb:
print "Impossible"
exit()
elif i in closeb:
if braces[stack[len(stack) - 1]] != i:
rep += 1
stack.pop()
if len(stack) == 0:
print rep
else:
print 'Impossible' |
//
// NoteMoreImageTableViewCell.h
// NoteDemo
//
// Created by hend on 2019/3/21.
// Copyright © 2019 hend. All rights reserved.
//
#import <UIKit/UIKit.h>
NS_ASSUME_NONNULL_BEGIN
@class LGNNoteModel;
@interface LGNNoteMoreImageTableViewCell : UITableViewCell
- (void)configureCellForDataSource:(LGNNoteModel *)dataSource indexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath;
@end
NS_ASSUME_NONNULL_END
|
FasL IS IMPORTANT IN COSTIMULATION BLOCKADE-RESISTANT SKIN GRAFT REJECTION Background. Simultaneous blockade of the CD40 and CD28 costimulatory pathways is effective in prolonging allograft survival in murine and primate models. Recent data suggest that intact apoptotic pathways are crucial for the induction of hyporesponsiveness by costimulation blockade. We have studied the impact of fas/fasL signaling, an important T cell apoptotic pathway, on the effects of costimulation blockade. Methods. Wild type, lpr (fas deficient), and gld (fasL deficient), mice were used as donors and recipients in the murine skin graft model. Allograft survival was compared in untreated and costimulation blockade (500 &mgr;g anti-CD40L and 500 &mgr;g CTLA4-Ig, days 0, 2, 4, 6) treated recipients. In some recipients, CD4+ T cells were depleted using rat anti-murine CD4 (100 &mgr;g day −3, −2, −1, and weekly). Results. gld mice treated with costimulation blockade enjoy a significantly greater increase in skin allograft survival than do wild-type mice. This effect is not replicated using lpr donors or recipients. Experiments in which CD4+ cells were depleted demonstrate that fasL is not necessary for CD8-mediated allograft rejection, and that depletion of CD4+ cells eliminates some of the survival advantage induced by costimulation blockade. Conclusions. FasL is not required for the establishment of costimulation blockade induced hyporesponsiveness, but rather appears to be required for normal costimulation blockade resistant rejection. Fas expression is not critical for costimulation blockade resistant rejection, suggesting that fasL may be interacting with other receptors. Further, it appears that CD4+ cells are important in the maintenance of allograft protection induced by costimulation blockade in this model. |
<reponame>wix/kiss-fs<filename>test/user-utils.spec.ts
import {checkExistsSync, MemoryFileSystem} from '../src/universal';
import {expect} from 'chai';
import {checkExists} from '../src/user-utils';
import {NoFeedbackEventsFileSystem} from '../src/no-feedback-events-fs';
describe('user-utils', () => {
describe('checkExistsSync', () => {
const fs = new MemoryFileSystem('', {content: {foo: {bar: {'a.file': 'hello'}}}});
it('true for existing file', () => {
expect(checkExistsSync('file', fs, 'foo/bar/a.file')).to.eql(true);
});
it('true for existing dir', () => {
expect(checkExistsSync('dir', fs, 'foo/bar')).to.eql(true);
});
it('false for non existing file', () => {
expect(checkExistsSync('file', fs, 'a/foo/bar/a.file')).to.eql(false);
});
it('false for non existing dir', () => {
expect(checkExistsSync('dir', fs, 'a/foo/bar')).to.eql(false);
});
it('false for existing file when looking for dir', () => {
expect(checkExistsSync('dir', fs, 'foo/bar/a.file')).to.eql(false);
});
it('false for non existing dir when looking for file', () => {
expect(checkExistsSync('file', fs, 'foo/bar')).to.eql(false);
});
});
describe('checkExists', () => {
// use NoFeedbackEventsFileSystem as a proxy that does not expose sync methods
const fs = new NoFeedbackEventsFileSystem(new MemoryFileSystem('', {content: {foo: {bar: {'a.file': 'hello'}}}}));
it('true for existing file', async () => {
expect(await checkExists('file', fs, 'foo/bar/a.file')).to.eql(true);
});
it('true for existing dir', async () => {
expect(await checkExists('dir', fs, 'foo/bar')).to.eql(true);
});
it('false for non existing file', async () => {
expect(await checkExists('file', fs, 'a/foo/bar/a.file')).to.eql(false);
});
it('false for non existing dir', async () => {
expect(await checkExists('dir', fs, 'a/foo/bar')).to.eql(false);
});
it('false for existing file when looking for dir', async () => {
expect(await checkExists('dir', fs, 'foo/bar/a.file')).to.eql(false);
});
it('false for non existing dir when looking for file', async () => {
expect(await checkExists('file', fs, 'foo/bar')).to.eql(false);
});
});
});
|
<filename>apps/serve/src/stores/merchants/merchants.module.ts
import { MerchantModule } from '@libs/db/store/merchant/merchant.module';
import { Module } from '@nestjs/common';
import { MerchantsController } from './merchants.controller';
@Module({
imports: [MerchantModule],
controllers: [MerchantsController],
})
export class MerchantsModule {}
|
Modelling and simulation of a solar PV and battery based DC microgrid system Energy management and control of a PV array and a battery based DC Microgrid is presented in this paper. Design and operation of PV and battery DC-DC converters are discussed in detail. Radiation input to the solar array is an actual variation which was measured in a normal sunny day. Battery is the main component responsible of keeping the DC bus voltage at a constant value by charging or discharging while serving the dynamic load. There are standard built-in models for solar PV and battery in PSCAD/EMTDC, the software which is used for the microgrid simulation. It is observable that the microgrid energy management and control works as expected. |
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Boston Bruins center Patrice Bergeron spoke to reporters Tuesday for the first time since being admitted to the hospital following Game 6 of the Stanley Cup finals.The assistant captain gave detailed descriptions of the torn rib cartilage he suffered in Game 4, the broken rib on his left side that occurred in Game 5 and the separated right shoulder and punctured left lung from Game 6. The puncture led to a collapsed lung, and Bergeron spent three days in the hospital after the Bruins' loss to the Chicago Blackhawks."I'm feeling a lot better," said Bergeron, who played nearly 18 minutes in the deciding Game 6. "The ribs and the shoulder now just need some time to rest but it's a lot better."As for the other injuries:"In Game 4, my cartilage torn in the corner against [Michael] Frolik, so that's when it started and it obviously escalated because I kept playing and didn't have time to heal it. In Game 5, it was either the first or second shift, I got hit again right on the ribs and that's when I'm sure it cracked and it got worse. I tried to go back in the second and after the second period, the doctors, because the pain escalated, they were worried about the spleen, so we had to go to the hospital [in Chicago] and get it checked and everything was fine."Bergeron, 27, said he wasn't sure if he'd be able to return for Game 6, but he and the team decided that a nerve-block procedure would allow him to get on the ice."In my mind, for sure, I wanted to play," he said. "I was hoping for the pain to go down but that wasn't the case. After Game 5, I was in a lot of pain. The next day I was just trying to find a way [to] manage the pain, I guess, but it was definitely there. On the day of Game 6, we met with the doctors and they were telling me the only way I could play was to have a nerve block, otherwise the pain would be too high, so I did that in order to play."Bergeron finished the playoffs with nine goals and 15 points in 22 games. He played in Game 6, but separated his right shoulder in the first period, because he fell awkwardly while trying to protect his ribs. He's still not sure how he punctured his lung. But after the final game, he had difficulty breathing. He had X-rays taken at TD Garden, but went to Massachusetts General Hospital when the results were inconclusive.Three days later, Bergeron said he won't need surgery for his ribs or shoulder and he expects to be ready for training camp."I should be fine for camp, the beginning of camp, for sure," he said. "Hopefully, but I'm pretty positive I will be. I just need a couple of weeks, two or three weeks [of rest]." |
import os
import sys
root = os.environ["LAMBDA_TASK_ROOT"]
sys.path.insert(0, root)
import boto3
from boto3.session import Session
ACTION = 'start' # stop
def lambda_handler(event, context):
session = Session(aws_access_key_id='your_key',
aws_secret_access_key='your_secret_key',
region_name="ap-northeast-1")
ec2 = session.resource('ec2')
if ACTION == 'start':
ec2.instances.filter(InstanceIds=['i-example']).start()
elif ACTION == 'stop':
ec2.instances.filter(InstanceIds=['i-example']).stop()
return True
|
//
// Generated by class-dump 3.5 (64 bit).
//
// class-dump is Copyright (C) 1997-1998, 2000-2001, 2004-2013 by <NAME>.
//
#import "CATOperation.h"
@class CRKBook, NSString;
@interface CRKParsePDFMetadataOperation : CATOperation
{
BOOL _parseImage;
CRKBook *_book;
NSString *_filePath;
}
@property(readonly, nonatomic) BOOL parseImage; // @synthesize parseImage=_parseImage;
@property(readonly, nonatomic) NSString *filePath; // @synthesize filePath=_filePath;
@property(readonly, nonatomic) CRKBook *book; // @synthesize book=_book;
- (void).cxx_destruct;
- (id)fileName;
- (id)titleFromDictionaryRef:(struct CGPDFDictionary *)arg1;
- (void)updateTitleWithDictionaryRef:(struct CGPDFDictionary *)arg1;
- (void)main;
- (id)initWithPDFBook:(id)arg1 filePath:(id)arg2 parseImage:(BOOL)arg3;
@end
|
Evaluation of Pharmacokinetics and Safety With Bioequivalence of Anastrozole in Healthy Chinese Volunteers: Bioequivalence Study Findings Anastrozole is a thirdgeneration aromatase inhibitor that exerts potent antibreast cancer effects. This trial aimed to explore the pharmacokinetics (PK) and safety with bioequivalence of orally administered anastrozole provided by 2 sponsors in healthy volunteers.Two separate openlabel, randomized, singledose, crossoverdesign studies consisting of a fasting study (n = 23) and a fed study (n = 23, 1 participant withdrew before taking medication) were conducted. In each study, healthy volunteers were randomized to receive the test product (Haizheng Pharmaceutical Group) followed by the reference drug (AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals LP), or vice versa. Each study subject received a 1mg anastrozole tablet with a 21day washout. The plasma concentrations of anastrozole were measured with liquid chromatographytandem mass spectrometry, and PK parameters were determined by noncompartmental analysis. Fortysix healthy female volunteers were enrolled. For patients enrolled in the fasting study, the mean age was 55.0 years, mean weight was 57.1 kg, mean body mass index was 23.6 kg/m2, and mean height was 155.5 cm. For patients enrolled in the fed study, the mean age was 54.2 years, mean weight was 55.9 kg, mean body mass index was 23.9 kg/m2, and mean height was 152.8 cm. All PK end points met the predefined criteria for PK equivalence. In fasting subjects, the median maximum plasma concentration was 23.4 and 22.6 at 1 hour for test and reference formulations, respectively. The maximum plasma concentration in fed subjects was 18.7 and 18.5 at 4 hours for test and reference formulations, respectively. Both fasting and fed studies achieved plausible bioequivalence. Anastrozole was well tolerated and exhibited a favorable safety profile at the prescribed doses. The severity of observed adverse events assessed according to the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (version CTCAE4.03) was mild, and some of the adverse events were not caused by anastrozole. Furthermore, the results of our study under fasting and fed conditions demonstrated bioequivalence of the test and reference products. |
The influence of changes in Land Use/Land Cover (LULC) on Land Surface Temperature in Ramanathapuram coast and Assessment of Urban Heat Island, using remote sensing and GIS Due to marine and terrestrial processes, the land use/land cover features of the Ramanathapuram coastal area noticed dynamic changes. Sometimes the anthropogenic activities and nature also governed such changes. Landuse/Landcover analysis is an essential parameter for the climate change studies in coastal region. Similarly, the analysis of land surface temperature (LST) and the severity of Urban heat island (UHI) also factored for assessing its influence on climate changes. In this study, Remote sensed Landsat satellite data from 2000 to 2020 is very well used to identify the relation between LULC and LST. Advance tools in GIS (Geographic Information Systems) softwares is used to integrate the results. The findings strongly indicate that the built-up area is increasing every year. In the year 2000, the build-ups are noted with 8km2, and it was increased to 44 km2 in 2020. In addition, the LST of the year 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020 radiates a maximum temperature of about 30oC, 29oC, 30oC, 30oC, and 27oC, respectively. The highest radiance temperature is observed in barren land; the UHI analysis also points towards increased urban activities. The temperature is comparatively high in an urbanised area, and its UHI values range from very Strong to moderate heat island. |
/**
* Panel to take care of rendering the label and textfield for each attribute
*
* @author Steve Swinsburg (steve.swinsburg@gmail.com)
*
*/
public class UserAttributePanel extends Panel {
@SpringBean(name="org.sakaiproject.lmsmanagement.logic.ProjectLogic")
private ProjectLogic logic;
private List<AdditionalAttribute> allAttributes;
public UserAttributePanel(String id, final ImportedUser user) {
super(id);
//get a list of all attributes in the db
allAttributes = logic.getAdditionalAttributes();
//display a row for each attribute
final ListView<AdditionalAttribute> attributeList = new ListView<AdditionalAttribute>("attributes", allAttributes) {
@Override
protected void populateItem(ListItem<AdditionalAttribute> item) {
final AdditionalAttribute a = (AdditionalAttribute) item.getModelObject();
item.add(new Label("label", a.getValue()));
TextField tf = new TextField<String>("attribute", new Model<String>(getAttributeValue(user, a.getKey()))) {
@Override
protected void onComponentTag(final ComponentTag tag){
super.onComponentTag(tag);
tag.put("name", LMSManagementApp.ATTR_PREFIX + a.getKey());
//makes a name of attribute_blah so we can lookup all attributes that start with attribute_ in the request
}
};
tf.setOutputMarkupId(true);
item.add(tf);
}
};
add(attributeList);
}
/**
* Helper to get an attribute, or handle nulls
* @param user
* @param attributeName
* @return
*/
private String getAttributeValue(ImportedUser user, String attributeName){
try {
return user.getProperties().getProperty(attributeName);
} catch (Exception e) {
return null;
}
}
} |
/*! \fn void ln_get_lunar_equ_coords_prec(double JD, struct ln_equ_posn *position, double precision);
* \param JD Julian Day
* \param position Pointer to a struct ln_lnlat_posn to store result.
* \param precision The truncation level of the series in radians for longitude
* and latitude and in km for distance. (Valid range 0 - 0.01, 0 being highest accuracy)
* \ingroup lunar
*
* Calculate the lunar RA and DEC for Julian day JD.
* Accuracy is better than 10 arcsecs in right ascension and 4 arcsecs in declination.
*/
void ln_get_lunar_equ_coords_prec(double JD, struct ln_equ_posn *position,
double precision)
{
struct ln_lnlat_posn ecl;
ln_get_lunar_ecl_coords(JD, &ecl, precision);
ln_get_equ_from_ecl(&ecl, JD, position);
} |
#ifndef BIG_INTEGER_H_
#define BIG_INTEGER_H_
#include <cstdint>
#include <string>
#include <vector>
class BigInteger {
public:
static const BigInteger Zero;
public:
BigInteger();
BigInteger(long long n);
BigInteger(const std::string& str);
BigInteger(const BigInteger& other);
BigInteger& operator=(const BigInteger& other);
bool operator==(const BigInteger& other) const;
bool operator<(const BigInteger& other) const;
bool isZero() const;
int getSign() const;
std::string toString() const;
BigInteger operator+(const BigInteger& other) const;
BigInteger operator-(const BigInteger& other) const;
BigInteger operator*(const BigInteger& other) const;
BigInteger operator/(const BigInteger& other) const;
BigInteger operator-() const;
private:
int sign;
std::vector<uint8_t> data;
};
#endif // BIG_INTEGER_H_
|
One West Texas doctor says the face of drug abuse is changing.
Drug users today include mothers and teens right here in the Permian Basin, but it's the seemingly innocent way it all starts that has medical experts on alert.
“Three out of every four heroin users started because of an opioid prescription from a doctor,” said Dr. Sudip Bose, an emergency room physician.
He explains that people who are prescribed pain killers have the risk of getting addicted, opening the door to abusing more serious drugs.
“Its quadrupled in the last decade and the demographics that’s gone up in is demographics that were not taking heroin before,” said Dr. Bose.
It could be anyone, from the student athlete or the mom down the street.
“This is a medicine cabinet disease, this is what might be left over in your medicine cabinet when you have strong narcotics after an old injury and this is what's causing an epidemic across America,” said Dr. Bose.
“So don't take those medicines unless you're supposed to take those medicines, don't share those medicines.”
Sometimes pain can be ok, “pain is a normal part of life and if you have an injury that requires these stronger medicines there's going to be a pain when you get off these medicines but that’s a lot better than becoming addicted,” said Dr. Bose |
#ifndef THEMIS_MAPRED_SENDER_IMPLS_H
#define THEMIS_MAPRED_SENDER_IMPLS_H
#include "core/ImplementationList.h"
#include "mapreduce/workers/sender/SelectSender.h"
#include "mapreduce/workers/sender/Sender.h"
/// Implementations of the Sender stage
class SenderImpls : public ImplementationList {
public:
/// Declare implementations of the Sender stage
/**
\sa Sender
\sa SelectSender
*/
SenderImpls() : ImplementationList() {
ADD_IMPLEMENTATION(SelectSender, "SelectSender");
ADD_IMPLEMENTATION(Sender, "Sender");
}
};
#endif // THEMIS_MAPRED_SENDER_IMPLS_H
|
package br.com.restaurante.repositorio;
import java.util.List;
import org.springframework.data.jpa.repository.JpaRepository;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Repository;
import br.com.restaurante.modelo.Funcionario;
@Repository
public interface FuncionarioRepositorio extends JpaRepository<Funcionario, Long>{
Funcionario findByEmail(String email);
List<Funcionario> findByVoto(boolean voto);
}
|
True freshman Benny Snell — coming into the game with no offensive touches as a Wildcat — carried the ball 17 times for 136 yards and tied a school record with four rushing touchdowns.
Sophomore tight end C.J. Conrad — the top-rated player in UK’s recruiting class of 2015 — came into the game with one reception this season, 16 catches for his career and just one trip to the end zone as a Wildcat. On Saturday, Conrad caught five passes for 133 yards and three touchdowns.
Senior wide receiver Ryan Timmons — the team’s leading pass-catcher in 2013 and 2014 — had just 12 catches last fall and zero over the first two games of this season. He had four catches for 42 yards against the Aggies.
All of that was in addition to Johnson’s stellar play at quarterback (310 passing yards and three touchdowns), Charles Walker’s punt return for a touchdown (the Cats’ first since 2010) and zero sacks allowed by a UK offensive line that gave up nine over the first two games.
Williams got the scoring started with a 63-yard touchdown run on the first play of the Cats’ third possession, but Boom breaking off a big run is not unexpected.
The first big surprise came a few minutes later, when Conrad — listed at 6-5 and 245 pounds — caught a tight end screen, turned toward the end zone and ended up with a 72-yard score.
What was going through his mind on that catch-and-run?
“When am I going to get tackled?” he said afterward. “That’s the first time that I’ve broken away like that since high school, and in high school I was faster than everyone. But I know that I’m not faster than everyone here. I was scared to look at the megatron, because I didn’t want to see who was going to tackle me.
Snell found out just before the game that Kemp, who had been practicing all week, likely wouldn’t be able to go, meaning the true freshman would get some opportunities on offense in addition to his special teams duties.
Williams briefly sidelined with an injury, Snell’s first collegiate carry came on a third-and-1 with the Cats trailing 21-14 at the beginning of the second quarter. The freshman took the ball 18 yards, and he spent the rest of the night bouncing off New Mexico State defenders and stuffing the stat sheet.
Snell found the end zone a few minutes later to tie the game at 28, and the Cats never trailed again.
Snell became the fifth player in program history to score four rushing touchdowns in a game. He’s only the second freshman to do it, and the first since Don Phelps accomplished the same feat in 1946.
After the game, UK offensive coordinator Eddie Gran was thankful for his depth at running back — noting that backups Mikel Horton and Sihiem King have looked good in practice, too — and Snell has been showing that something special ever since he arrived in Lexington.
UK finished with 692 yards of total offense on 75 plays.
Importantly for this game, the Cats scored 27 points in the second half (after being shut out in the second half against Southern Miss and managing just seven points after halftime at Florida).
Importantly for the future, some guys stepped up when the team needed it most.
“What I want to see is that, when you do have the opportunity, like Benny did, he took advantage of it,” Gran said. “When Stephen Johnson came in, he took advantage of it. Landon Young, took advantage of it. |
reza=[input().split() for r in range(2)]
if "1" in reza[1]:
print("HARD")
else:
print("EASY") |
Specific Signs of Surrogate Motherhood in the System of Unstanted Agreements The article provides a comparison and the possibility of applying, by analogy, a surrogate motherhood agreement with other named agreements, focuses on the essential terms of the surrogate motherhood agreement, also considers other conditions that the agreement possesses, raises the question of whether it is necessary at the legislative level to adopt a special act or norm for settlement issues for the enforcement of the contract. |
Development and validation of a brief self-assessed wisdom scale Background This longitudinal study aimed to develop a nine-item Brief Self-Assessed Wisdom Scale (BSAWS) derived from the original 40-item Self-Assessed Wisdom Scale (SAWS). Methods The psychometric properties of the shortened scale were evaluated based on a sample of 157 older adults. The factor structure and dimensionality of the original SAWS were examined using confirmatory factor analysis. Subsequent explorative factor analysis of the BSAWS supported the construct validity of the shortened scale. Results The internal consistency, convergent validity and construct validity of the shortened scale were also evaluated and the results indicated that the BSAWS possesses good psychometric properties and is comparable with the full version. Conclusions This scale refinement may help researchers and practitioners conduct epistemological surveys or clinical research related to wisdom. Background Wisdom is an ancient construct with a long history of conceptualisation based on normative approaches across cultures, ranging from Greek philosophers such as Socrates and Aristotle to Chinese philosophers such as Confucius. In recent years, the concept of wisdom has been further revitalised in empirical research on social and positive psychology. The latest empirical research on wisdom can be broadly categorised into two domains. The first one is performance measure of personal wisdom, also known as Berlin wisdom paradigm, involves the analysis of wisdom-related performance in laboratory setting with trained raters to transcribe the responded data introduced in the 1980s. In recent years, this explicit theory based method was utilised and adapted in different contexts, such as in Australia, China, Germany and United States. The focus of this paper is the second approach, i.e., latent factor analyses of wisdom that mainly rely on using self-reported survey methods to assess wisdom, such as Self-Assessed Wisdom Scale (SAWS), Threedimensional Wisdom Scale, Practical Wisdom Scale and Transcendent Wisdom Scale and Wisdom Development Scale, etc. We acknowledge that the above constructs indeed provide important tools for researchers and practitioners to study the issues related to different facets of wisdom. The purpose of this study is not to compare the wisdom constructs, which have been widely discussed and debated by scholars, both normatively and with empirical evidence [3,. Rather, we embrace the idea that each wisdom construct has its own merits and the variety of constructs can enhance our understanding of wisdom across different dimensions and situations. Nevertheless, the abovementioned latent factor analyses of wisdom constructs suffer from two limitations. First, the scale developers did not employ the latest validation tools to evaluate the dimensionality and factor structure of the scales. These scales were developed with a sole reliance on the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) results to identify the factor structure, without verification by a confirmative factor analysis (CFA). Second, while some studies have attempted to validate the wisdom scales with a CFA, the adopted cut-off criteria were far below the current standards, and the scales also suffer from problems like a lack of internal reliability. To solve the above problems, many wisdom scales have been revised, validated and adapted into different languages or developed into shortened versions for ease of use [12,. Yet, there is paucity of study examined the dimensionality and validity of SAWS with the latest psychometric tools which warrant our attention. The Self-Assessed Wisdom Scale (SAWS), a selfreported instrument for measuring wisdom at the individual level, has been widely used by researchers and clinical practitioners. SAWS focuses on five dimensions, namely experience, reminiscence, openness, emotion regulation and humour, and has received positive evaluations of its internal consistency and psychometric properties. Numerous studies have used SAWS to explore the relationships between wisdom and various psychosocial outcomes. JD Webster suggested that wisdom is positively associated with psychosocial characteristics derived from the Erikson tradition, such as ego-integrity, life attitudes and values. Using hierarchical regression analysis, JD Webster, GJ Westerhof and ET Bohlmeijer identified a positive relationship between wisdom and mental health among Dutch adults. The balanced time perspective also uniquely predicted both mental health and wisdom in a sample of 512 adults in the Netherlands. JD Webster and XC Deng used the wisdom scale to study the relationship between traumatic life events and mental health outcomes among 320 respondents in Canada. A later study further suggested that wisdom and meaning contribute to positive self-development in areas such as optimism, self-esteem and self-characteristics in emerging adulthood. In a recent study, C Cheung and EO Chow identified a positive relationship between wisdom and well-being among older Chinese. Despite the widespread application of SAWS, few studies have managed to fully replicate its original factor structure. Although SAWS possesses good internal consistency and convergent validity, its factor structure and dimensionality are inconclusive and subject to a number of limitations. First, to date, no studies have used CFA to validate the 40-item five latent factor structure of the scale. JD Webster used CFA to analyse five sub-scale factors used to predict the latent construct wisdom rather than analysing all of the 40 items. Second, some of the SAWS items have a complicated factor structure. For example, JD Webster reported that the 'humor and openness dimensions have some overlap and weaker loadings' (p. 16). In particular, items 12, 27 and 17 share the attributes of emotion regulation and reminiscence, items 14 and 24 are related to both emotion regulation and humour and items 5 and 20 are related to openness and humour. The cross-cultural differences in wisdom that may also account for studies unable to replicate the factor structure. Controversies have arisen when studies have attempted to adapt the scale to other contexts. P Alves, L Morgado and Bd Oliveira attempted to validate a Portuguese version of the 40-item SAWS, but their EFA results showed that the factor structure was significantly different from that of the original scale. In response, the authors proposed five alternative wisdom domains, namely reflection, mood, emotional self-regulation, experience and open mindedness, which are significantly different from those of the original SAWS. Due to the mixed findings on the factor structure of the wisdom scale, A Urrutia, GM de Espanes, C Ferrari, G Borgna, AM Alderete and F Villar combined the 40-item SAWS and 79-item Wisdom Development Scale (WDS) to obtain a shortened 20-item scale with a three-factor structure for studying wisdom related issues. They applied the shortened scale in a study based on a sample of older adults in Argentina. However, their CFA results suggested very marginal model fit. Given the controversies surrounding the full version of SAWS, this study explores whether the factor structure and dimensionality of the scale need further refinement. As JD Webster, who developed the original scale, stated, 'continued refinement of specific scale items may eliminate those which explain little overall variance' (p. 21). The first part of this study shows that the full 40item scale fails to replicate the factor structure of SAWS using CFA. However, the EFA results support the development of a unidimensional nine-item Brief Self-Assessed Wisdom Scale (BSAWS). In the next section, the psychometric properties of the newly proposed BSAWS are evaluated and various tools are used to examine its internal consistency, convergent validity and construct validity. Overall, the results show that the BSAWS provides an efficient and valid tool for assessing wisdom using empirical data and psychometric evidence in different cultural contexts, i.e., Chinese culture. Participants This study used a longitudinal repeated measures design with 157 community-dwelling older adults from older adult service centres in Hong Kong. According to Table 1, the respondents were aged 72.8 years on average (SD = 8.55) and participated in the study on a voluntary basis. For the inclusion criteria, the respondents possessed sufficient cognitive ability (with 7.9 years of education on average) to understand and respond to the self-reported questionnaire as well as have capacity to provide consent for participation in this study. The sample comprised 25.5% male and 74.5% female respondents. There were four waves of data collection: the initial study (study 1; n = 157) was conducted in June 2016. The respondents then completed the questionnaire again after one (study 2; n = 136), two (study 3; n = 135) and eight (study 4; n = 98) months. The research team strictly adhered to the relevant ethical standards and the project was approved by the university's research ethics committee. Procedure The interviewers administered the questionnaire to the respondents at 13 older adult service centres located in different districts in Hong Kong. The items were translated into Chinese using the back-translation procedure. The research team was recruited translator to translate the scale from English to Chinese and then back translated from Chinese to English by the other translator. The back translated version has been verified by the original SAW scale developer JD Webster to confirmed its semantic and conceptual equivalency and avoided any potential cross-cultural biases. Factor analysis with the principal component estimation method was used to evaluate the dimensionality and factor structure of the BSAWS. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) and Bartlett's tests of sphericity were used to evaluate the model. The KMO estimates were over 0.70 and the Bartlett's test was significant (p < 0.01), thus confirming that the model had a satisfactory factor structure. In addition, various psychometric testing tools and validated instruments were used to examine the newly proposed BSAWS. The internal consistency of the scale was assessed using Cronbach's alpha and by examining the corrected item-total correlation between the nine items. The convergent validity was evaluated using other validation constructs reported in the literature on latent factor analyses of wisdom. The wisdom construct was reported to be significantly positively correlated with well-being, self-esteem and other wisdom measures [5,. Hence, this study used the following wellestablished scales to evaluate the convergent validity of the BSAWS: the Personal Well-being Index (PWI), Rosenberg self-esteem (RSE) scale and dimensions of the WDS. Research also suggests that wisdom is negatively correlated with depression symptoms. Hence, we used the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) to evaluate the relationship between depression and the two wisdom scales. The above analysis was implemented using IBM SPSS 25.0 and the R (3.6.0) computing software with lavaan package 0.6-3. Table 2 shows the CFA results for the original SAWS and variations of the factor structure in the literature. Table 3 Table 3 presents the descriptive statistics, including the mean, standardised deviation, skewness, kurtosis, corrected item-total correlations and Cronbach's alpha, if item deleted, for all nine items of the BSAWS based on the data from study 1. The results show that the BSAWS demonstrates good internal consistency. The corrected item-to-total correlations for the BSAWS ranges from 0.349 to 0.619 and Cronbach's alpha is above the acceptable range, i.e., 0.808. The BSAWS is also significantly positively correlated (r = 0.912, p < 0.001) with SAWS. Internal consistency and factorial validity The results of the KMO and Bartlett's tests of sphericity for the nine-item BSAWS were 0.823 ( 2 = 374.389, p <.001), thus indicating appropriate scale construction. The EFA results showed that the factor loadings ranged from 0.477 to 0.738 and explained 40.453% of the total variance (Table 3). Convergent and concurrent validity The results from study 1 show the relationships between BSAWS and SAWS and the other construct-related scales suggested in the wisdom literature. Well-being as measured by the PWI has significant moderate positive relationships with SAWS (r = 0.363, p < 0.001) and BSAWS (r = 0.347, p < 0.001). The self-esteem scale also possesses a moderate positive relationship with the two scales. SAW and BSAWS are strongly correlated with the WDS, with r = 0.730 (p < 0.001) and r = 0.741 (p < 0.001), respectively. The results also show a weak negative correlation between the scales and GDS, with r = − 0.290 (p < 0.001) for SAWS and r = − 0.345 (p < 0.001) for BSAWS. The above findings have been replicated in the subsequent studies 2, 3 and 4 ( Table 4). To sum up, the nine-item BSAWS is comparable with the full scale and possesses good convergent validity based on the results of Pearson's correlation coefficient. Content validity To further validate the content validity of BSAWS, CFA was implemented on the data collected from studies 2, 3 and 4. The CFA results for BSAWS (Table 5 and Fig. 1) indicate good model fit, particularly the combined results across studies 2, 3 and 4, with 2 (51.278) / 27 = 1.90, SRMR = 0.040, CFI = 0.996, TLI = 0.995 and RMSEA = 0.049. Overall, the results indicate that the nine-item BSAWS has generally good fit for a unidimensional factor structure without any post hoc modifications. Discussion The proposed BSAWS possesses good psychometric properties and is comparable with its full-scale version. According to JD Webster, M Taylor and G Bates, 'the SAWS subscales based upon input by a panel of wisdom experts' (p. 256). The results of this study show that the BSAWS supports the original five domains of wisdom advocated in the original SAWS, i.e., emotion, regulation, reminiscence, openness, experience and humour. Cronbach's alpha for the BSAWS is 0.808, which is similar to the values ranging from 0.78 to 0.90 reported in the original SAWS studies. The nine-item shortened version of SAWS also possesses good convergent validity. The results show that SAWS and the BSAWS both hold identical correlational direction and magnitude with the other wellestablished measurements of well-being, self-esteem and depression. Both scales also have very strong and significant positive correlations (r = 0.912, p < 0.001). The independent-sample t-test results show that no significant differences were observed in both scale scores on sex of the respondents. There were only weak significant correlation between the educational level (r = 0.294, p < 0.001; r = − 0.328, p < 0.001) and age (r = 0.292, p < 0.001; r = − 0.265, p < 0.001) of the respondents in BSAWS and SAWS scores, respectively. These findings are aligned with the other wisdom constructs that focused on older adults. This study contributes to the measurement of wisdom in the following ways. First, the shortened version of SAWS can help resolve disputes related to the complicated factor structure and dimensionality of the full version of SAWS. The original scale developer and the subsequent validation studies have generally failed to fully replicate the five latent factor structure of the 40 item scale. For example, a recent study showed that some SAWS items did not load on any factor and that the openness dimension had a questionable Cronbach's alpha of 0.68. Consequently, some studies have attempted to shorten the scale by forcefully combining SAWS with other wisdom related constructs without using strict validation procedures to examine the psychometric properties of the revised scale. A validated abbreviated version of SAWS can Table 5 Factor loadings and fit indices from the confirmatory factor analysis of BSAWS, by study (see Fig. 1 This study also provides empirical evidence to support the factor structure of the BSAWS using CFA. Numerous SAWS related studies have used only EFA to evaluate the factorial validity of the scale, without verifying the construct validity with CFA. The only SAWS validation study to use CFA was based on five sub-scales, which served as the latent factors for estimating the loadings on the wisdom construct rather than evaluating all 40 items. The results failed to meet the criteria for adequate model fit, with CFI = 0.947 and RMSEA = 0.107. The CFA results of Models 1 and 2 (Table 2) in this study managed to replicate the problem of analysing the 40 items using a five latent factor structure. The results showed that none of the models were considered to have a good fit. However, the CFA results for the newly proposed nine-item BSAWS fulfilled all of the stringent criteria for determining good model fit in the structural equation modelling literature. The procedure for developing the BSAWS strictly adhered to the recognised scale development and validation principles to avoid the potential problem of overfitting. The sample from study 1 (n = 156) was used to conduct EFA to identify the factor structure of BSAWS. The study 2 (n = 136), 3 (n = 135) and 4 (n = 98) samples were then used to verify the scale's content validity using CFA. In addition, various psychometric evaluation tools were used to examine the internal consistency and convergent validity of the nine-item BSAWS. In short, the BSAWS was found to possess excellent psychometric properties. This study has the following potential limitations. First, the small sample size may limit the reliability of the results. This limitation may account for why the CFA results in study 4 (n = 98) only yielded a marginally adequate RMSEA value. Some scholars suggested that a minimum sample size (N = 100) is preferred for CFA, but simulation studies suggested that the model (N > 50) with more items (> 6) per factor may overcome this limitation. The research team had difficulty recruiting significant numbers of respondents from the older adult service centres in Hong Kong. However, the longitudinal repeated measures design used in this study may have compensated for this limitation. The second potential limitation is related to the demographic background of the respondents. Specifically, the results based on Chinese older adults in Hong Kong may have limited generalisability. Lastly, the standalone 9-item scale may need further validation, as the participants may potentially affected by responding to the other 31 items in the scale. Thus, further research is needed to replicate our findings or apply the BSAWS in different cultural contexts to verify this refinement of SAWS. With the abbreviated version of SAWS, it enables researchers to further examine the queries related to wisdom and other psychosocial outcomes, such as its relationship with hedonic and eudaimonia well-being [10, in future research projects. Conclusions This study developed and validated an abbreviated nineitem version of SAWS. The results suggest that the BSAWS possesses good internal consistency, acceptable model fit for a CFA and is comparable with its 40-item full version. The newly developed scale can provide an efficient and valid assessment of wisdom for older adults. This abbreviated standardised wisdom measure may encourage researchers and practitioners to conduct epidemiological surveys to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions in a clinical setting. However, future work is needed to confirm the psychometric properties of the scale in larger or more generalisable samples. Additional file 1: Appendix. Factor structure and dimensionality of SAWS and BSAWS. |
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Tuesday withdrew a series of policy memos issued by the Obama administration to strengthen consumer protections for student loan borrowers.
The Education Department is in the middle of issuing new contracts to student loan servicing companies that collect payments on behalf of the agency. These middlemen are responsible for placing borrowers in affordable repayment plans and keeping them from defaulting on their loans. But in the face of mounting consumer complaints over poor communication, mismanaged paperwork and delays in processing payments, the previous administration included contract requirements to shore up the quality of servicing. Companies complained that the demands would be expensive and unnecessarily time consuming.
"This process has been subjected to a myriad of moving deadlines, changing requirements and a lack of consistent objectives," DeVos said Tuesday, in a letter addressed to James Runcie, who heads the Federal Student Aid office at the department. "We must promptly address not only these shortcomings but also any other issues that may impede our ability to ensure borrowers do not experience deficiencies in service. This must be done with precision, timeliness and transparency."
DeVos has withdrawn three memos issued by former education secretary John King and his under secretary Ted Mitchell. One of the directives, which was later updated with another memo, called on Runcie to hold companies accountable for borrowers receiving accurate, consistent and timely information about their debt. The 56-page memo called for the creation of financial incentives for targeted outreach to people at great risk of defaulting on their loans, a baseline level of service for all borrowers and a contract flexible enough to penalize servicers for poor service, among other things.
The Obama administration requested routine audits of records, systems, complaints and a compliance-review process. It also directed Runcie's team to base compensation on response time to answering calls, completing applications for income-driven repayment plans, errors made during communications and the amount of time it takes to process payments. Another memo insisted the student aid office consider a company's past performance in divvying up the student loan portfolio.
"In order to have accountability, there must be real consequences when servicers violate the law," said Alexis Goldstein, senior policy analyst at the progressive Americans for Financial Reform. "DeVos' actions today moves us away from true accountability, and creates dangers for the very student loan borrowers the department is responsible for protecting."
The exhaustive list of demands were a direct response to an outpouring of complaints to the Education Department and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The CFPB, in particular, has documented instances of servicing companies providing inconsistent information, misplacing paperwork or charging unexpected fees. Because the federal government pays hundreds of millions of dollars to companies such as Navient, Great Lakes and American Education Services to manage $1.2 trillion in student loans, advocacy groups and lawmakers argue that more should be required of these contractors.
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos speaks at a conference on Feb. 15, 2017 in Washington, DC.
"This action really raises the stakes for the CFPB to clean up problems in the market by developing common sense rules," said Rohit Chopra, the former student loan ombudsman at the CFPB and a senior fellow at the Consumer Federation of America. "If the Education Department is not going to clean up its own servicers using its buyer power, then regulators will have to step in to create a leveled playing field."
Critics of servicing companies lay blame at their feet for the continued rise in student loan defaults. A recent analysis by the Consumer Federation of America found that millions of people had not made a payment on $137 billion in federal student loans for at least nine months in 2016, a 14 percent increase in defaults from a year earlier. Though the number of borrowers defaulting for the first time in the direct loan program slowed last year, tens of thousands of people are defaulting for at least a second time, leaving policy analysts to question the effectiveness of loan servicing.
Researchers at the Government Accountability Office found that 70 percent of people in default actually qualified for a lower monthly payment through income-driven plans that cap monthly payments to a percentage of earnings but that servicers failed to provide sufficient information. Even when the companies reach out to delinquent borrowers, the information was often inconsistent, according to the GAO.
But some servicers say that they pour all of their resources into catching borrowers before they default but that all of the mailers, calls and emails often go ignored. They complain that there is too much complexity in the federal student loan program and that this is at the heart of the problems consumers encounter. Servicing companies are eager to work with the Trump administration to fix the current system, said Michele Streeter of the Education Finance Council, a trade group representing nonprofit and state-based student loan servicers.
"Students and families deserve a high-quality loan servicing environment that is consistent, transparent and fair, and that guides them through their repayment period successfully," she said.
Navient chief executive Jack Remondi, in an interview with The Washington Post earlier this year, said the government has too many inconsistencies in regulations and standards governing servicing companies. His company is battling multiple lawsuits that accuse Navient of steering people into costly payment options, rather than take the time to offer the best solutions — charges that Remondi vehemently denies.
"We've argued and begged for clear and consistent rules for loan servicers," Remondi said. "We've asked the department to be able to co-browse with borrowers on the website to assist them in completing the application to make sure they complete it correctly. We've asked for the right to do verbal enrollment. We've argued extensively for simplification and received zero response or action."
Navient officials struck a different tone last month in a motion to dismiss one of the lawsuits, stating that "there is no expectation that the servicer will act in the interest of the consumer," a position that riled consumer advocates and borrowers.
In her letter Tuesday, DeVos said the new contract affords an opportunity to improve outcomes for borrowers and demonstrate "sound fiscal stewardship" of taxpayer dollars.
"We must create a student loan servicing environment that provides the highest quality customer service and increases accountability and transparency for all borrowers, while also limiting the cost to taxpayers," she said.
Rescinding the memos comes as the department is facing $9 billion in proposed budget cuts from the White House, with the Trump administration redirecting money away from higher education programs toward its school choice agenda. |
The Effects of Nerve Injury on Ligament Healing in a Rat Model The presence of an intact nerve supply is important in the regeneration of injured tissue in some animals. It has not been determined whether an intact nerve supply is important in ligamentous healing. The authors hypothesize that the nerve supply of a ligament might have a significant effect on its healing. The purpose of this paper was to determine whether injury to the nerve supply of the medial collateral ligament in a rat model results in poor ligament healing (which would suggest that intact nerve supply enhances ligament repair). Clinically, such a finding would demonstrate the importance of avoiding injury to nerve-ligament systems in reparative ligament surgery. Twenty three rats underwent complete bilateral dissection of the major nerves supplying the medial collateral ligament, and each ligament was transected at the level of the tibial tuberosity. The major nerve supplies of the experimental ligaments were destroyed by segmental excision, either distally at the medial articular nerves or proximally at the saphenous nerve, while the control ligament's nerve supplies were left intact. The rats were euthanized at 12 days, and each medial collateral ligament was tested biomechanically using a hydraulic materials testing machine. This time point was chosen because the rat ligament transection site heals rapidly, causing the ligament to avulse from its tibial insertion instead of rupturing at the transection site at later time points. This rat medial collateral ligament injury model has shown statistically significant differences in healing at this time point in numerous experiments evaluating the effects of other variables on ligament healing.36,12,17 The results showed little difference in healing between control (uninjured nerve supply) and experimental ligaments (injured nerve supply) in the structural properties of strength and stiffness. The results of this study failed to confirm the hypothesis; instead, they suggest that if injury to the nerve supply has an effect on the strength and stiffness of the healing ligament, it is a very small effect. |
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
import torch.nn as nn
from torch.nn.utils.rnn import pad_sequence
from transformers import AutoConfig, AutoModel
from underthesea.modules.scalar_mix import ScalarMix
class BertEmbedding(nn.Module):
r"""
A module that directly utilizes the pretrained models in `transformers`_ to produce BERT representations.
While mainly tailored to provide input preparation and post-processing for the BERT model,
it is also compatiable with other pretrained language models like XLNet, RoBERTa and ELECTRA, etc.
Args:
model (str):
Path or name of the pretrained models registered in `transformers`_, e.g., ``'bert-base-cased'``.
n_layers (int):
The number of layers from the model to use.
If 0, uses all layers.
n_out (int):
The requested size of the embeddings.
If 0, uses the size of the pretrained embedding model.
pad_index (int):
The index of the padding token in the BERT vocabulary. Default: 0.
max_len (int):
Sequences should not exceed the specfied max length. Default: 512.
dropout (float):
The dropout ratio of BERT layers. Default: 0.
This value will be passed into the :class:`ScalarMix` layer.
requires_grad (bool):
If ``True``, the model parameters will be updated together with the downstream task.
Default: ``False``.
.. _transformers:
https://github.com/huggingface/transformers
"""
def __init__(self, model, n_layers, n_out, pad_index=0, max_len=512, dropout=0, requires_grad=False):
super().__init__()
self.model = model
self.bert = AutoModel.from_pretrained(model,
config=AutoConfig.from_pretrained(model, output_hidden_states=True))
self.bert = self.bert.requires_grad_(requires_grad)
self.n_layers = n_layers or self.bert.config.num_hidden_layers
self.hidden_size = self.bert.config.hidden_size
self.n_out = n_out or self.hidden_size
self.pad_index = pad_index
self.max_len = max_len
self.dropout = dropout
self.requires_grad = requires_grad
self.scalar_mix = ScalarMix(self.n_layers, dropout)
self.projection = nn.Linear(self.hidden_size, self.n_out, False) if self.hidden_size != n_out else nn.Identity()
def __repr__(self):
s = f"{self.model}, n_layers={self.n_layers}, n_out={self.n_out}, pad_index={self.pad_index}"
if self.max_len is not None:
s += f", max_len={self.max_len}"
if self.dropout > 0:
s += f", dropout={self.dropout}"
if self.requires_grad:
s += f", requires_grad={self.requires_grad}"
return f"{self.__class__.__name__}({s})"
def forward(self, subwords):
r"""
Args:
subwords (~torch.Tensor): ``[batch_size, seq_len, fix_len]``.
Returns:
~torch.Tensor:
BERT embeddings of shape ``[batch_size, seq_len, n_out]``.
"""
batch_size, seq_len, fix_len = subwords.shape
if self.max_len and seq_len > self.max_len:
raise RuntimeError(f"Token indices sequence length is longer than the specified max length "
f"({seq_len} > {self.max_len})")
mask = subwords.ne(self.pad_index)
lens = mask.sum((1, 2))
# [batch_size, n_subwords]
subwords = pad_sequence(subwords[mask].split(lens.tolist()), True)
bert_mask = pad_sequence(mask[mask].split(lens.tolist()), True)
# return the hidden states of all layers
bert = self.bert(subwords, attention_mask=bert_mask.float())[-1]
# [n_layers, batch_size, n_subwords, hidden_size]
bert = bert[-self.n_layers:]
# [batch_size, n_subwords, hidden_size]
bert = self.scalar_mix(bert)
# [batch_size, n_subwords]
bert_lens = mask.sum(-1)
bert_lens = bert_lens.masked_fill_(bert_lens.eq(0), 1)
# [batch_size, seq_len, fix_len, hidden_size]
embed = bert.new_zeros(*mask.shape, self.hidden_size)
embed = embed.masked_scatter_(mask.unsqueeze(-1), bert[bert_mask])
# [batch_size, seq_len, hidden_size]
embed = embed.sum(2) / bert_lens.unsqueeze(-1)
embed = self.projection(embed)
return embed
|
<reponame>LogFlames/TopdownShooter
import java.util.*;
import java.io.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.image.BufferedImage;
import javax.imageio.ImageIO;
import java.awt.event.KeyEvent;
import java.awt.event.KeyAdapter;
import java.awt.geom.AffineTransform;
import java.awt.geom.RoundRectangle2D;
public abstract class Creature extends Entity {
public int health;
public float vel_x;
public float vel_y;
// Time until completely stil
protected float drag = 0.1f;
protected void move(float delta_time, boolean use_drag) {
x += vel_x * delta_time;
y += vel_y * delta_time;
if (x > 1395) {
x = 1395;
}
if (x < 0) {
x = 1;
}
if (y > 855) {
y = 855;
}
if (y < 0) {
y = 0;
}
if (use_drag) {
vel_x *= (1 - 1 / drag * delta_time);
vel_y *= (1 - 1 / drag * delta_time);
}
}
public void drawHealthBar(Graphics g) {
Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D)g;
AffineTransform old = g2d.getTransform();
g2d.translate((x + 23) * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX, (y + 23) * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY);
int red;
int green;
if (health > 50) {
red = (int)((100.0 - health) / 50.0 * 255.0);
green = 255;
} else {
red = 255;
green = (int)((health) / 50.0 * 255.0);
}
g2d.setColor(new Color(red, green, 0));
float filled = health / 100f * 56f;
g2d.fillRoundRect((int)(-28 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX), (int)(-64 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY),
(int)(filled * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX), (int)(12 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY),
(int)(12 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX), (int)(12 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY));
g2d.setPaint(Color.BLACK);
g2d.setStroke(new BasicStroke(3.0f));
double x = -28 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX;
double y = -64 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY;
double w = 56 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX;
double h = 12 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY;
g2d.draw(new RoundRectangle2D.Double(x, y, w, h, 12 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleX, 12 * TopdownShooter.instance.scaleY));
g2d.setTransform(old);
}
@Override
public void setNewData(PositionData data) {
super.setNewData(data);
vel_x = data.vel_x;
vel_y = data.vel_y;
health = data.health;
}
public void hit(int amount) {
health -= amount;
if (health <= 0) {
die();
}
}
public void die() {
x = 0;
y = 0;
health = 100;
}
}
|
<reponame>Nekoer/uncle-novel<filename>app-framework/src/main/java/com/unclezs/novel/app/framework/executor/Executor.java
package com.unclezs.novel.app.framework.executor;
import com.unclezs.novel.analyzer.common.concurrent.ThreadUtils;
import com.unclezs.novel.analyzer.common.concurrent.factory.DaemonThreadFactory;
import java.util.concurrent.CountDownLatch;
import java.util.concurrent.ScheduledFuture;
import java.util.concurrent.ScheduledThreadPoolExecutor;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import javafx.application.Platform;
import lombok.experimental.UtilityClass;
/**
* 执行器
*
* @author <EMAIL>
* @date 2021/4/15 23:39
*/
@UtilityClass
public class Executor {
private static final ScheduledThreadPoolExecutor SCHEDULED_THREAD_POOL_EXECUTOR = new ScheduledThreadPoolExecutor(1, new DaemonThreadFactory("scheduled"));
/**
* 提交全局线程池执行
*
* @param runnable 任务
*/
public static void run(Runnable runnable) {
ThreadUtils.execute(runnable);
}
/**
* 提交scheduled池执行
*
* @param runnable 任务
* @param delay 延迟
*/
public static ScheduledFuture<?> run(Runnable runnable, long delay) {
return SCHEDULED_THREAD_POOL_EXECUTOR.schedule(runnable, delay, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
}
/**
* 在fx延迟执行
*
* @param runnable 任务
* @param delay 延迟
*/
public static void runFx(Runnable runnable, long delay) {
run(() -> runFx(runnable), delay);
}
/**
* 在fx线程执行
*
* @param runnable 任务
*/
public static void runFx(Runnable runnable) {
if (Platform.isFxApplicationThread()) {
runnable.run();
} else {
Platform.runLater(runnable);
}
}
/**
* 在fx线程执行任务，并且等待完成
*
* @param task 任务
*/
public static void runFxAndWait(Runnable task) {
if (Platform.isFxApplicationThread()) {
task.run();
return;
}
final CountDownLatch doneLatch = new CountDownLatch(1);
Platform.runLater(() -> {
try {
task.run();
} finally {
doneLatch.countDown();
}
});
try {
doneLatch.await();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
Thread.currentThread().interrupt();
}
}
}
|
The frequent occurrence of natural and environmental catastrophes (earthquakes, floods, cyclones, aridity/drought, fire catastrophes, etc), war and terror events and associated instability of the financial markets (stock market crashes, etc) have imparted previously unknown importance to risk management and corresponding measures for handling such risk events and catastrophes in recent years for general economic activity, since a high proportion of business volume and a considerable percentage of jobs can be endangered thereby. Particularly in the insurance/reinsurance sector, there has been a long-known backlog in technical automation in many areas. The appearance of the World Wide Web and the resulting possibility of being able to access enormous, decentralized quantities of data have created completely new requirements for industry. The survival of an entire branch of industry may depend, for example, on being able to analyze the relevant data rapidly and reliably in order to be able to take the appropriate measures. This is no longer possible based on human work alone but requires a great deal of automation. This type of automation has an extremely important role for industry and society, for example even in areas with traditionally less technical character, such as the insurance industry, at the present time (when at the same time technical progress is associated with an unavoidable increase in risks and a change in the liability concepts within the definition of third party liability). In Europe, the introduction of the Euro has furthermore inevitably brought new developments which result in greater transparency, facilitate cross-border comparison and the conclusion of cross-border contracts. Because of this, too new possibilities for comparison and automation have resulted which is completely utilized from the prior art up to today only in a few areas.
In industry, for expedient risk management for surviving risks, it is essential to know or to be able to estimate, as a boundary condition parameter, a reacquisition value (monetary replacement value) in a country-specific manner in order to be able to determine the necessary capital collateralization levels. With the means known in the prior art, values can only be obtained with considerable uncertainty for the overall risk sum (for example for determining the total insurance sum). This is true not only for industrial plants in so-called developing or emerging countries but also for plants in industrially highly developed countries, such as, for example, Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland etc. One of the possible problems is that the company or the object has only an insufficient capital collateralization level for surviving the risk event or is underinsured so that reprocurement is not possible in the event of loss. A further problem with the prior art is that it provides no system or method covering a branch of industry in order to be able to determine such collateralization levels. In other words, coarse estimates or “rules of thumb” are generally used, which can scarcely be automated and with which it is difficult to determine the errors and uncertainties in the calculations. Thus, a considerable uncertainty or inaccuracy with regard to errors always remains in the prior art. A further disadvantage is that technical automation is scarcely possible in the prior art owing to the nonuniform and/or complicated methods. As a result of this, the systems of the prior art do not permit effective dynamic monitoring. The outlay in employee time, costs and material are therefore correspondingly high. |
Codon-specific serine transfer ribonucleic acid degradation in avian liver during vitellogenin induction. The relative rates of degradation of two major tRNASer species in rooster liver were simultaneously assessed during induction by estradiol-17 beta benzoate of the synthesis of a serine-rich phosphoprotein, vitellogenin. The relative rate of degradation was determined by an in vivo pulse-chase labeling method, which included a 24-h labeling period with orotic acid prior to and a 6-day chase period with nonradioactive orotic acid after the administration of estrogen. tRNA Ser(AGU,C) and tRNASer (UCU,C,A) were extensively purified by chromatography on benzoylated DEAE-cellulose in the presence and absence of Mg2+ and their radioactivities determined. In three separate labeling experiments, the difference in radioactivity of pulse-labeled and chased tRNASer (AGU,C) vs. that of tRNASer(UCU,C,A) was approximately 2-fold, suggesting a slower rate of degradation of tRNASer(AGU,C) during vitellogenin induction. Calculation of the approximate half-lives of the two tRNASer species indicates that the half-life of tRNASer (AGU,C) was increased from 3.1 days to 6.2 days during vitellogenin induction, while that of tRNASer (UCU,C,A) was essentially unchanged (2.6 days). Regulation of tRNA degradation which is possibly connected with the frequency of its use in ribosomal protein synthesis may help to explain why, in many differentiated cells, the tRNA population is adapted to the amino acid composition of the synthesized proteins. |
<filename>backend/manager/modules/bll/src/main/java/org/ovirt/engine/core/bll/hostdeploy/VdsDeployMiscUnit.java
package org.ovirt.engine.core.bll.hostdeploy;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.Arrays;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.concurrent.Callable;
import org.ovirt.engine.core.common.businessentities.Cluster;
import org.ovirt.engine.core.dal.dbbroker.DbFacade;
import org.ovirt.engine.core.utils.crypt.EngineEncryptionUtils;
import org.ovirt.otopi.constants.NetEnv;
import org.ovirt.otopi.constants.SysEnv;
import org.ovirt.otopi.dialog.Event;
import org.ovirt.ovirt_host_deploy.constants.GlusterEnv;
import org.ovirt.ovirt_host_deploy.constants.TuneEnv;
import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;
public class VdsDeployMiscUnit implements VdsDeployUnit {
private static final Logger log = LoggerFactory.getLogger(VdsDeployMiscUnit.class);
private final List<Callable<Boolean>> CUSTOMIZATION_DIALOG = Arrays.asList(
new Callable<Boolean>() { public Boolean call() throws Exception {
_deploy.getParser().cliEnvironmentSet(
SysEnv.CLOCK_SET,
true
);
return true;
}},
new Callable<Boolean>() { public Boolean call() throws Exception {
_deploy.getParser().cliEnvironmentSet(
NetEnv.SSH_ENABLE,
true
);
return true;
}},
new Callable<Boolean>() { public Boolean call() throws Exception {
_deploy.getParser().cliEnvironmentSet(
NetEnv.SSH_USER,
_deploy.getVds().getSshUsername()
);
return true;
}},
new Callable<Boolean>() { public Boolean call() throws Exception {
_deploy.getParser().cliEnvironmentSet(
NetEnv.SSH_KEY,
EngineEncryptionUtils.getEngineSSHPublicKey().replace("\n", "")
);
return true;
}},
new Callable<Boolean>() { public Boolean call() throws Exception {
Cluster cluster = DbFacade.getInstance().getClusterDao().get(
_deploy.getVds().getClusterId()
);
String tunedProfile = cluster.supportsGlusterService() ? cluster.getGlusterTunedProfile() : null;
if (tunedProfile == null || tunedProfile.isEmpty()) {
_deploy.getParser().cliNoop();
} else {
_deploy.getParser().cliEnvironmentSet(TuneEnv.TUNED_PROFILE, tunedProfile);
}
return true;
}},
new Callable<Boolean>() { public Boolean call() throws Exception {
Cluster cluster = DbFacade.getInstance().getClusterDao().get(
_deploy.getVds().getClusterId()
);
_deploy.getParser().cliEnvironmentSet(
GlusterEnv.ENABLE,
cluster.supportsGlusterService()
);
return true;
}}
);
private VdsDeployBase _deploy;
// VdsDeployUnit interface
@Override
public void setVdsDeploy(VdsDeployBase deploy) {
_deploy = deploy;
}
@Override
public void init() {
_deploy.addCustomizationDialog(CUSTOMIZATION_DIALOG);
}
@Override
public boolean processEvent(Event.Base bevent) throws IOException {
return true;
}
}
|
Recycling generated carbon dioxide back to fuels and chemicals would make a tremendous difference to the U.S. economy. Presently, fuels and organic chemicals are usually made from petroleum, coal, and/or natural gas “fossil fuels.” However, if such fuels and chemicals could be made from CO2, then the U.S. dependence on imported oil would be lessened, and emissions of greenhouse gases that are thought to contribute to global warming would be reduced. CO2 produced in power plants would change from a waste product to a useful, economically viable feedstock. Solar and wind energy could also be stored in the form of hydrocarbon fuels.
Presently, however, most large volume organic chemicals are made from fossil fuels. For example, most acrylic acid produced in the U.S. is currently made from propylene. The propylene is made from petroleum. Most formaldehyde now produced in the U.S. is manufactured by oxidation of methanol. The methanol is manufactured from natural gas or coal. Ethylene is made by cracking of light olefins from petroleum, or from methanol. If these products could be made from CO2, the use of fossil fuels in the U.S. would be reduced, as would the emissions of greenhouse gases.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,212,088 describes an environmentally beneficial process for preparing a fuel or chemical, in which carbon dioxide from a natural source, or carbon dioxide from an artificial chemical source that would otherwise be discharged into the environment by the artificial chemical source, is converted to useful fuels and chemicals. In the process described in the '088 patent, CO2 is first converted to a mixture of formic acid and other compounds. The formic acid is then sent to a second process where it undergoes a 4-electron hydrogenation to form methanol. The methanol is then converted to fuels and chemicals using conventional chemical processes, as illustrated in FIG. 1. The advantage of converting CO2 to methanol is that infrastructure already exists to convert methanol into other products.
The limitation in the process described in the '088 patent is that the hydrogenation to methanol is an extra step in the conversion process that wastes energy, and that may not be needed at all. For example, almost half of the methanol produced worldwide is further reacted to yield formaldehyde via an oxidative dehydrogenation process. Energy is wasted when formic acid is first hydrogenated to methanol and then dehydrogenated to formaldehyde, as illustrated in FIG. 2A. Moreover, the intermediate methanol can be a safety hazard, because it is highly flammable and the flame is invisible.
As described in more detail below, the present environmentally beneficial process for the production of fuels and chemicals preferably employs carbon dioxide from a natural source or carbon dioxide from an artificial chemical source that would otherwise be discharged into the environment by the artificial chemical source. The carbon dioxide is converted to formic acid and other products. The formic acid is then converted to fuels and/or chemicals without the intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol or reacting the formic acid with ammonia to form formamide.
By contrast, the '088 patent describes a method in which (a) carbon dioxide is converted to formic acid and other products, (b) the formic acid is hydrogenated to form methanol, and then (c) the methanol is converted to fuels and chemicals. For example, FIGS. 2A and 2B compare the process for the formation of formaldehyde disclosed in the '088 patent (FIG. 2A) and that disclosed in the present application (FIG. 2B). As shown, the process disclosed in the present application uses half as much hydrogen as the process described in the '088 patent, and does not require temperatures as high as those used in the process described in the '088 patent.
In the process disclosed herein, only a small fraction (namely, less than 10%) of the formic acid is hydrogenated to methanol. In the present process, formic acid can be made by any method, and the formic acid is then converted to fuels and chemicals without the intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol or reacting it with ammonia to form formamide. The present process produces fuels and chemicals in which formic acid is converted to one of seven primary feedstocks: formaldehyde, acrylic acid, methane, ethylene, propylene, syngas, and C5-C7 carbohydrates, without the intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol or reacting it with ammonia to form formamide. The formaldehyde, acrylic acid, methane, ethylene, propylene, syngas and/or short chain carbohydrates can either be used directly, or can be converted into a wealth of other products, as illustrated in FIG. 3. The list of products in FIG. 3 is not meant to limit the present process. Rather, it provides examples of products that can be made from formic acid following the teachings of this application.
In the present process for the production of formaldehyde, and products made using formaldehyde, formic acid is converted to formaldehyde without a separate intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol. The present process encompasses processes in which hydrogen reacts with formic acid to form formaldehyde. The process can occur in the presence of a catalyst comprising an oxide of at least one of the following elements: Mg, Ca, Sr, Ba, Ti, Y, Lu, Ti, Zr, Hf, V, Nb, Ta, Cr, Mo, W, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Al, Ga, In, Tl, Si, Ge, Sn, Sb, Bi, Se, Te, Pb, La, Ce, Pr, Th, Nd, Pm, U, Sm, Eu, Gd, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, or Yb, preferably the oxides of cerium or tellurium. Reaction temperature can be between 8° C. and 350° C., preferably between 40° C. and 200° C., most preferably between 60° C. and 100° C.
The present process also produces organic acids with at least three carbon atoms specifically including acrylic acid, methyl acrylic acid or propionic acid, wherein formic acid directly or indirectly reacts with an unsaturated hydrocarbon and water to yield the organic acid. The present process encompasses systems for produce the organic acids from formic acid and an unsaturated hydrocarbon comprising at least two reactors in series, in which the temperature of each reactor can be controlled independently. The present process also encompasses systems with one reactor containing an acid catalyst and a second reactor containing a catalyst comprising at least one of a nickel salt, a copper salt and a palladium salt.
The process also produces organic acids with at least three carbon atoms, specifically including acrylic acid, methyl acrylic acid or propionic acid, wherein carbon monoxide reacts with an unsaturated hydrocarbon and water to yield the organic acid in the presence of a supported nickel, copper or palladium metal, promoted by strong acids and a phosphene. Previous workers have not succeeded in producing acrylic acid in high yields via the reaction of carbon monoxide with acetylene and water on supported metal catalysts. There is considerable work showing that carbon monoxide can react with an unsaturated hydrocarbon to yield the organic acid in the presence of nickel, copper or palladium ions or salts, but the metal ions are difficult to separate from the acid products and toxic byproducts are produced.
The present process also produces olefins such as ethylene and propylene and products synthesized from olefins, in which formic acid is converted to the olefins ethylene and/or propylene without a separate intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol. In the present process, formic acid is first converted to formaldehyde as described above and the formaldehyde is then further converted to olefins such as ethylene, propylene or butylene. The process can employ a base catalyst to condense the formaldehyde into a multi-carbon species, followed by an acid catalyst to convert the multi-carbon species into olefins. The acid catalyst can be in the form of a zeolite such as ZMS-5 or SAPO-43. The present process encompasses the use of CO2 to modify the pH of the mixture after some of the formaldehyde has been condensed. In some embodiments, the present process employs ZSM-5 or SAPO-43 in the conversion of formic acid to a product comprising propylene. ZSM-5 is an aluminosilicate zeolite mineral belonging to the pentasil family of zeolites, having the chemical formula is NanAlnSi96-nO192.16H2O (0<n<27); it is widely used in the petroleum industry as a heterogeneous catalyst for hydrocarbon isomerization reactions (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZSM-5; downloaded on Feb. 23, 2013). SAPO-43 is a small pore silico-alumino-phosphate (see http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/1a026424j; downloaded on Feb. 23, 2013).
The present process also produces carbohydrates or molecules produced from carbohydrates, in which formic acid is converted to a carbohydrate without a separate intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol. In the present process, the formic acid is converted to formaldehyde as described above, and the formaldehyde is then reacted in the presence of a base catalyst to yield a carbohydrate. Calcium hydroxide is a preferred catalyst in the present process, and the present process specifically encompasses the use of carbon dioxide for the removal of calcium from solution.
The present process also produces syngas or molecules produced from syngas, in which formic acid is converted to syngas without a separate intermediate process of hydrogenating the formic acid to methanol. The present process preferably employs two parallel reactors to convert the formic acid into syngas, wherein the temperatures of the two independent reactors can be independently controlled. It is preferred that one of the reactors contains an acid catalyst while the other reactor preferably contains a metallic catalyst. |
<filename>proxy/src/utils/pool_relcache.c
/* -*-pgsql-c-*- */
/*
* $Header$
*
* pgpool: a language independent connection pool server for PostgreSQL
* written by <NAME>
*
* Copyright (c) 2003-2012 PgPool Global Development Group
*
* Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and
* its documentation for any purpose and without fee is hereby
* granted, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all
* copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission
* notice appear in supporting documentation, and that the name of the
* author not be used in advertising or publicity pertaining to
* distribution of the software without specific, written prior
* permission. The author makes no representations about the
* suitability of this software for any purpose. It is provided "as
* is" without express or implied warranty.
*
* pool_relcache.c: Per process relation cache modules
*/
#include "config.h"
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <string.h>
#include "pool.h"
#include "utils/pool_relcache.h"
#include "context/pool_session_context.h"
#include "pool_config.h"
#include "utils/palloc.h"
#include "utils/memutils.h"
#include "utils/elog.h"
static void SearchRelCacheErrorCb(void *arg);
/*
* Create relation cache
*/
POOL_RELCACHE *pool_create_relcache(int cachesize, char *sql,
func_ptr register_func, func_ptr unregister_func,
bool issessionlocal)
{
POOL_RELCACHE *p;
PoolRelCache *ip;
MemoryContext old_context;
if (cachesize < 0)
{
ereport(WARNING,
(errmsg("failed to create relcache: wrong cache size: %d", cachesize)));
return NULL;
}
/*
* Create the relcache in session context if the cache is session local,
* otherwise make home in TopMemoryContext
*/
old_context = MemoryContextSwitchTo(TopMemoryContext);
ip = (PoolRelCache *)palloc0(sizeof(PoolRelCache)*cachesize);
p = (POOL_RELCACHE *)palloc(sizeof(POOL_RELCACHE));
MemoryContextSwitchTo(old_context);
p->num = cachesize;
strlcpy(p->sql, sql, sizeof(p->sql));
p->register_func = register_func;
p->unregister_func = unregister_func;
p->cache_is_session_local = issessionlocal;
p->no_cache_if_zero = false;
p->cache = ip;
return p;
}
/*
* Discard relation cache.
*/
void pool_discard_relcache(POOL_RELCACHE *relcache)
{
int i;
for (i=0;i<relcache->num;i++)
{
(*relcache->unregister_func)(relcache->cache[i].data);
}
pfree(relcache->cache);
pfree(relcache);
}
/*
* Search relcache. If found, return user data. Otherwise return 0.
* If not found in cache, do the query and store the result into cache and return it.
*/
void *pool_search_relcache(POOL_RELCACHE *relcache, POOL_CONNECTION_POOL *backend, char *table)
{
char *dbname;
int i;
int maxrefcnt = INT_MAX;
char query[1024];
POOL_SELECT_RESULT *res = NULL;
int index = 0;
int local_session_id;
time_t now;
void *result;
ErrorContextCallback callback;
local_session_id = pool_get_local_session_id();
if (local_session_id < 0)
return NULL;
/* Obtain database name */
dbname = MASTER_CONNECTION(backend)->sp->database;
now = time(NULL);
/* Look for cache first */
for (i=0;i<relcache->num;i++)
{
/*
* If cache is session local, we need to check session id
*/
if (relcache->cache_is_session_local)
{
if (relcache->cache[i].session_id != local_session_id)
continue;
}
if (strcasecmp(relcache->cache[i].dbname, dbname) == 0 &&
strcasecmp(relcache->cache[i].relname, table) == 0)
{
if (relcache->cache[i].expire > 0)
{
if (now > relcache->cache[i].expire)
{
ereport(DEBUG1,
(errmsg("searching relcache"),
errdetail("relcache for database:%s table:%s expired. now:%ld expiration time:%ld", dbname, table, now, relcache->cache[i].expire)));
relcache->cache[i].refcnt = 0;
break;
}
}
/* Found */
if (relcache->cache[i].refcnt < INT_MAX)
relcache->cache[i].refcnt++;
return relcache->cache[i].data;
}
}
/* Not in cache. Check the system catalog */
snprintf(query, sizeof(query), relcache->sql, table);
per_node_statement_log(backend, MASTER_NODE_ID, query);
/*
* Register a error context callback to throw proper context message
*/
callback.callback = SearchRelCacheErrorCb;
callback.arg = NULL;
callback.previous = error_context_stack;
error_context_stack = &callback;
do_query(MASTER(backend), query, &res, MAJOR(backend));
error_context_stack = callback.previous;
/*
* Look for replacement in cache
*/
for (i=0;i<relcache->num;i++)
{
/*
* If cache is session local, we can discard old cache immediately
*/
if (relcache->cache_is_session_local)
{
if (relcache->cache[i].session_id != local_session_id)
{
index = i;
relcache->cache[i].refcnt = 0;
break;
}
}
if (relcache->cache[i].refcnt == 0)
{
/* Found empty slot */
index = i;
break;
}
else if (relcache->cache[i].refcnt < maxrefcnt)
{
maxrefcnt = relcache->cache[i].refcnt;
index = i;
}
}
if (relcache->cache[index].refcnt != 0)
{
ereport(LOG,
(errmsg("searching relcache. cache replacement occured")));
}
/* Register cache */
result = (*relcache->register_func)(res);
if (!relcache->no_cache_if_zero || result)
{
strlcpy(relcache->cache[index].dbname, dbname, MAX_ITEM_LENGTH);
strlcpy(relcache->cache[index].relname, table, MAX_ITEM_LENGTH);
relcache->cache[index].refcnt = 1;
relcache->cache[index].session_id = local_session_id;
if (pool_config->relcache_expire > 0)
{
relcache->cache[index].expire = now + pool_config->relcache_expire;
}
else
{
relcache->cache[index].expire = 0;
}
/*
* Call user defined unregister/register function.
*/
(*relcache->unregister_func)(relcache->cache[index].data);
relcache->cache[index].data = result;
}
free_select_result(res);
return result;
}
static void SearchRelCacheErrorCb(void *arg)
{
errcontext("while searching system catalog, When relcache is missed");
}
char *remove_quotes_and_schema_from_relname(char *table)
{
static char rel[MAX_ITEM_LENGTH];
char *p;
int i = 0;
/* get rid of schema name */
p = strchr(table, '.');
if (p)
table = p+1;
/* get rid of quotation marks */
for (i=0; *table; table++)
{
if (*table != '"')
rel[i++] = *table;
}
rel[i] = '\0';
return rel;
}
/*
* Standard register/unregister function for "SELECT count(*)" type
* query. Returns row count.
*/
void *int_register_func(POOL_SELECT_RESULT *res)
{
if (res->numrows >= 1)
return (void *)atol(res->data[0]);
return (void *)0;
}
void *int_unregister_func(void *data)
{
/* Nothing to do since no memory was allocated */
return NULL;
}
void *string_register_func(POOL_SELECT_RESULT *res)
{
return (res->numrows > 0) ? strdup(res->data[0]): NULL;
}
void *string_unregister_func(void *data)
{
if(data)
free(data);
return (void *)0;
}
|
/**
* Creates a copy of the given object with only the listed properties included.
*
* @param src
* @param initializer
* if supplied, the new instance will be passed to this object's
* {@link Initializer#initialize} method before the properties are copied. This
* provides an opportunity to initialize intermediate objects.
* @param reducer - A default implementation of Reducer, which is the prototype.
* @return a newly-created object of the same class as <code>src</code>
*/
@SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
public static <T> T reduce(T src, Initializer<T> initializer, Reducer reducer) {
T dst;
try {
dst = (T) src.getClass().newInstance();
if (initializer != null) initializer.initialize(dst);
} catch (InstantiationException e) {
throw new CaaersSystemException("Failed to instantiate " + src.getClass().getName(), e);
} catch (IllegalAccessException e) {
throw new CaaersSystemException("Failed to instantiate " + src.getClass().getName(), e);
}
reducer.copy(src, dst);
return dst;
} |
WARNER BOOKS EDITION
Copyright © 1989 by Dorothy Garlock
All rights reserved.
Cover illustration by Sharon Spiak
Warner Books, Inc.
Hachette Book Group,
237 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10017
Visit our Web site at
http://warnerbooks.com
A Time Warner Company
The "Warner Books" name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
ISBN: 978-0-7595-2297-8
First eBook edition: April 2001
Visit our Web site at www.HachetteBookGroup.com
# Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Author's Note
A Time Warner Company
# He slipped into the bed and gathered her close in his arms.
"I don't want to go back to that lonely bed downstairs. I want to sleep with you in my arms every night for the rest of my life."
"You just want to hold me?" Mara asked.
"Hold you, kiss you, make you mine forever."
"But . . . I am yours."
"Not the way I want you to be," he whispered hoarsely. "I want us to be man and woman in all the ways there are. I want to share my life and dreams with you. If I stay now, there'll be no going back. It'll be this way from now on."
She pressed against him as innocently as any young female animal that responds by instinct to the male. She lifted her face to meet his kiss, her lips parting as his mouth possessed hers. His hand slid down her back, holding her hips more tightly against him. She pressed warm lips to his cheek. "I want you to touch me," she said.
♠ ♠ ♠
"The rarest of all gifts . . . Dorothy Garlock brings an obvious love and understanding to the men and women whose courage and spirit opened the frontier."
**—"Ann's World," Hearst Cablevision**
"You'll find yourself actually there, right in the picture. You can feel the heat of the campfire, you can hear the wagon creaking and the slice and slap of the bullwhip. . . . There's good reason why Dorothy has been called the 'Louis L'Amour of the romance novelists.' "
_**—Beverly Hills California Courier**_
Books by Dorothy Garlock
A _lmost_ E _den_
A _nnie_ L _ash_
D _ream_ R _iver_
F _orever_ V _ictoria_
A G _entle_ G _iving_
G _lorious_ D _awn_
H _omeplace_
L _onesome_ R _iver_
L _ove and_ C _herish_
L _arkspur_
M _idnight_ B _lue_
N _ightrose_
R _estless_ W _ind_
R _ibbon in the_ S _ky_
R _iver of_ T _omorrow_
T _he_ S _earching_ H _earts_
S _ins of_ S _ummer_
S _weetwater_
T _enderness_
T _he_ L _istening_ S _ky_
T _his_ L _oving_ L _and_
W _ayward_ W _ind_
W _ild_ S _weet_ W _ilderness_
W _ind of_ P _romise_
W _ith_ H _ope_
Y _esteryear_
Published by
WARNER BOOKS
For my grandsons,
Adam and Amos Mix
who give me love and, at times,
a pain in the neck
# Chapter
ONE
"H'yaw! H'yaw! Move, ya bastards! Hightail it, ya dang-busted, mangy, worthless, sonsabitches! Yore lazy meat ain't fit fer buzzard bait!"
The long, thin leather cracked over the backs of the straining team, and insults spewed from the mouth of the stage driver on the box. He whipped the horses into a full gallop as they raced toward a group of small, weathered buildings nesting amid a grove of aspens. Above the steady sound of wheels and iron-shod hooves, a stream of profanity came from the man wielding the whip.
"He always does that." The traveling salesman with the side whiskers slapped his chubby palms on his knees and smiled at the young woman facing him on the opposite seat.
"Why?" she asked with a questioning lift of her brows.
"I think it's called making an entrance. Sometimes passengers are waiting to go to Cheyenne. You should hear him when he gets to Cheyenne. He puts on such a show that everyone in town comes out to see the stage come in." He made an airy gesture toward the window, but his admiring glance stayed on the girl's face.
She merely regarded him, not answering; then, deliberately, she turned her head and gave her attention to the ramshackle buildings they were approaching.
"Do you live near here, miss?"
The question got the drummer no more than a cold stare from emerald green eyes; but, for whatever the reason, it was by now all he had come to expect. He could count on one hand the number of words she had spoken since he had boarded the stage at the mid-morning stop. She wasn't the type of woman who usually traveled alone. He looked her over, a deliberate inspection that she chose to ignore.
She was pretty—kind of, the drummer decided. Of course, he was comparing her to the painted women who served the spirits he sold to the saloon owners. She was much too prim for his taste, but he had to admit there was something about her that brought out the protective nature in a man. She sat as straight on the seat as if she were sitting in a church pew. At the last stop, when she had gotten out of the coach for a few minutes, he noticed that she was of medium height for a woman and had a small waist, generous breasts, and rounded hips. The drummer had seen the yard man look at them. Behind her back he had held out his hands, palms up, and had drawn up his fingers while giving the drummer a knowing, wolfish grin.
No, she was not beautiful, but she had something more than beauty. The fat man watched as a worried frown drew her dark brows closer together. She brushed the hair back from her face before she straightened the straw hat on her head and jabbed the hatpin in place to hold it there. Damp from the humidity, her thick dark auburn hair curled and escaped in springy tendrils from the pins that held it coiled to the back of her head. She mopped her face, looked with disgust at the dirt left on the wisp of white handkerchief, tucked it into her sleeve at her wrist, and pulled on her soft white gloves that showed a slight soil on the fingertips.
The drummer concluded that she was fastidious, and not suited to this rough country. Her skin was very white and soft. The heat inside the coach had brought a touch of pink to her cheeks and moisture to her temples, but her emerald green eyes could turn the air frosty, as they had done when he tried to start a conversation. They had shown anger at the profanity used by the driver and laughter when a bird had flown alongside the window of the coach. Since the whiskey salesman considered himself an authority on women, he marveled that this one could be so distant and so seductive at the same time. She had a body made for love! Just looking at her affected him in such a way that he removed his hat and placed it on his lap to hide the sudden bulge that appeared there.
What was this innocent, proper miss doing traveling alone and stopping off at a remote, run-down place like Sheffield Station? She caught him looking at her and lifted her small pointed chin haughtily while pressing her mouth into a line of disapproval at his close scrutiny.
"Shef . . . field Sta . . . tion!"
The driver expressed his displeasure with the team by issuing another stream of obscenities and tramped on his brake. The coach rocked as the split reins curbed the horses to a stand. He swung easily down from his box, opened the door and waited to help the woman take the long step to the ground.
"Ten minutes," he said curtly to the drummer.
Mara Shannon McCall graciously accepted the driver's help, then quickly removed her hand. She looked anxiously around. Not a buckboard or a wagon was in sight. A feeling of uneasiness began to close in on her.
The old man bringing up the fresh team gave her the briefest of glances as she stood waiting for the driver to unload her trunks. Her knees shook and her breath locked in her chest. In all her nineteen years she had never seemed so alone. She fought nervousness and tried to settle her breathing. Feeling vulnerable and scared, she slid her hand down the side of her dress to touch the comforting shape of the little pistol in her pocket, and silently thanked her friend, Lars, for insisting that she bring it. No sign of her stress showed on the face she presented to the stage driver when he piled her trunk and carpetbags on the ground at her feet.
"Somebody meetin' ya, miss?" The driver was a string-bean of a man with straggling whiskers and a tremendous wad of tobacco that seemed permanently lodged in one cheek.
"Oh, yes. They'll be along." She turned away, then back to the driver. "I was told the McCall holdings are five miles north of this place."
"More likely six or seven." He took off his hat and scratched his head. This one was a puzzle. Laced up tighter than a drum in a corset, wearing lacy gloves, and going to _that_ place. Hell and shitfire! He was paid to drive the stage, not stand around worrying about silly women.
"There ain't nobody here but old Jim, miss. He be no danger to ya or to nobody else. No help neither," he added dryly. "I can't be waitin' for somebody to fetch ya. I got a schedule to keep." He screwed his hat down tight on his head. "Yo're sure somebody's comin'?"
"I never expected you to wait," she said, disregarding the question, and went to sit on the bench beside the door lest the driver feel encouraged to ask something more personal.
He completed a final meticulous check on the harnessing of the fresh team, then swung easily up the hub of the big front wheel to his place. He booted off the brake and a yell sent the team surging into their collars. The drummer waved as the stage took to the road in a cloud of dust.
The air was hot and still. Black flies buzzed around Mara as she sat impatiently on the bench in front of the station and removed her gloves. She lifted off her hat, fanned her face with the stiff brim, and wondered if she should have gone on to Cheyenne to wait for Cousin Aubrey to come for her.
Minutes passed. The station keeper had disappeared with the tired team. The door of the shack stood ajar, and Mara went to it and called out. There was no answer. Under her hand the door opened wider, and she spoke inquiringly into the room. It was empty. She viewed it with disgust. A chair was turned over, scraps of food lay on the floor, and the bed was unmade. The headmistress at the school she had recently left would have had plenty to say about that! What a shocking thing, not to have the bed made in the middle of the day. Not only was the room a shambles, but there were dark stains on the floor. Someone had either bled here or, more than likely, the slovenly occupant had brought a small animal he had killed into the shack to dress it. She wrinkled her nose at the foul odor and turned away. She was thirsty, but not thirsty enough to drink from anything in that place.
Mara walked out to the edge of the hard-packed yard and looked beyond the road to the wide empty land with its waving grass and the sky over it. She thought of a remark her Irish immigrant father had made when she was just a child. _All that land,_ he had said, _and not a potato planted._ He and her mother had come to America to escape the famine in Ireland. He had worked his way to Colorado and had made a gold strike. His dream had been to own land, not a hole in the side of a mountain. He sold his mine for a tidy sum and invested his money in Wyoming land, planted a field of potatoes, and built his wife and daughter a fine house. Colleen McCall enjoyed their prosperity for five years before the smothering sickness took her life. Heartbroken, Shannon McCall had taken his eleven-year-old daughter to Denver and placed her in Miss Fillamore's School for Young Ladies because it had been her mother's fondest wish that her daughter receive the education she had never had.
Five years before she had come to terms with her father's death and had accepted the loss. Miss Fillamore had impressed upon her that she was an orphan and the school would be her home.
_How extremely fortunate for you,_ Miss Fillamore had said. _You will have a position and will be able to teach other young_ _ladies as you have been taught._
Fortunate? Mara had found herself gradually becoming a replica of Miss Fillamore, a woman who had no interest outside the school. Then, quite suddenly, Mara became homesick, realizing that she was not ready to devote her life to other women's daughters. She had a home and land in Wyoming. Her father had left it to her. She wanted to go there, to the place he had built and where he and her mother were buried.
Mara thought of Cousin Aubrey and his wife, Brita. She had seen them only once, when they had come to Denver to tell her of her father's death. Aubrey McCall was her closest relative now that her father was gone. Therefore he was her guardian. He assured her that he and Brita would take care of her inheritance until she came of age. Brita was a gentle, motherly type of woman just as Mara's own mother had been. She had liked her immediately. Cousin Aubrey was a handsome, strutting man with a glib tongue. He had taken over her affairs and continued to pay for her schooling. Now and then he had also put a nice little sum in her account at the bank, so that she was able to dress as fashionably as the other girls. Mara was grateful to him and Brita, but she was of age now and capable of tending to her own affairs.
Aubrey McCall had a son, Cullen, by his first wife. By his second, Brita, he had twin sons. They must be fifteen by now, Mara mused. She had not met them, but she had met Brita McCall's son by her previous marriage, Pack Gallagher, when he came to the school with her father. Brita and Mara's mother had been childhood friends, and it was through Mara's mother that Brita had met Aubrey McCall after Pack's father had died.
Mara remembered now that her father had been fond of Pack Gallagher, had considered him the son he had never had. He had talked to her about the boy, telling her how he came to have the name Pack. Because of trouble between him and his stepfather, Pack had moved out on his own. His real name was Jack, but it was converted to Pack since, as a strapping fourteen-year-old, he had begun packing supplies over the mountains to the miners in the gold fields who paid him with gold nuggets.
Shannon McCall had brought Pack to the school on his last visit before the accident that took his life. He was a dark, brooding young man with a mop of blue-black hair and dark blue eyes. If not for the deep blue eyes and the curl in his hair, he could have been taken for an Indian. Black Irish, her father had teasingly called him. Pack had merely grinned and acted as if he would rather be anywhere in the world than sitting on a bench in front of a fancy girls' school. He had been dressed in the rough clothes of a teamster, and Miss Fillamore had been indignant about his being there, although nothing was said until after he and her father had left.
Mara had not heard another word about Pack Gallagher since that day so long ago and had not given him a thought until today. Since he didn't get along with Cousin Aubrey, she presumed he had left this part of the country by now.
When an hour had passed, Mara began to pace up and down in front of the shack. There was silence, utter silence, except for a bird, a meadowlark. His song was a fine sound, but not the sound for which she was listening. Once again she shaded her eyes with her hand so she could see against the glare of the sun. Nothing moved. She was not only angry at being stranded here, she was uneasy too, and it irritated her that the station keeper had disappeared.
Suddenly the man came from the back of the station. He was leading a horse that was hitched to a light, rickety wagon; the boards in the bed of the wagon were loose and rumbled as it approached. Mara stood and waited for the station keeper to speak. He went straight to the hitching rail and looped the reins over the bar.
"Mister?" Mara asked in exasperation, walking toward him. He went past her as if not seeing her and lifted her carpetbags, one in each hand, and put them in the back of the wagon. "Did someone come for me?" she asked when he carried her trunk and slid it in alongside the bags.
"You go," he said, not looking at her.
"Go? Where? I don't know the way to the McCall farm. I've been away for almost seven years."
"That way." He pointed to a trail that turned off the main road and headed northwest.
"Is the farm on that trail?"
"Yep." He untied the horse and stood waiting for her to climb up to the seat.
"Whose rig is this?"
There was no answer. The old man lifted his shoulders in a noncommittal gesture. Mara waited to see if he would say something more; and when he didn't, she climbed up to the seat, placed her hat beside her, and reached for the reins. She looked down to thank him, but he shoved the reins into her hands and hurried into the shack.
"Thank you," she called. The only answer she received was the slamming of the door. "I think he's glad to be rid of us, horse." When she slapped the reins against the swayed back, the animal moved so suddenly that she lurched backward. Righting herself, she spoke again to the horse. "We're not in that big a hurry."
The horse was not the kind of slick, well-trained animal she had driven in Denver, but she knew about horses. Every girl who graduated from Miss Fillamore's school knew how to ride and how to drive. Mara had loved that part of her education and had spent many hours talking to Lars Neishem, the groom who cared for the horses at the school. It was Lars who had insisted that she take the pistol when she told him she was leaving the school and going back to her home in Wyoming.
_Ah, miss,_ he had said. _Ye ort a be on yer land._ Although Lars was Norwegian, he had the same love of the land the Irish had. _The land will be here forever. Do not give up a foot of it. There be more to life than bein' stuffed in a corset and seein' to spoiled, rich girls. Ye should be havin' a family of yer own._
The day was suddenly beautiful. Out on the road the sky seemed clearer, bluer, the air sweeter. There was a slight breeze but no dust. Mara began to feel elated. It was going to be all right after all. She was going home!
The mare plodded along without any coaxing, giving Mara time to think of the home she had not seen for years. She could see in her mind's eye the white house on the hill, looking down on the potato fields. She remembered how proud her mother had been of the oval glass in the front door and the elaborate fretwork decorating the porch that stretched across the front of the house and partially down one side. The house was not large when compared to some in Denver, but it was spacious and luxurious beyond anything Colleen McCall had ever dreamed of having. She delighted in calling it McCall Manor after the big estates in Ireland.
Mara thought of the day she had left her home to go to the school in Denver. She had looked back one last time to see the shining windows, the flowers growing along the walk, the latticework at the bottom of the porch her father had so painstakingly made. Mara had imagined her mother was watching from the upstairs window. The image was so vivid that she had waved to her, then turned back to her father who sat on the wagon seat, his shoulders slumped, his face haggard with grief.
"Dear Mama and Papa," she said aloud. "It's been a long time, but I'm coming home!"
The trail curved up and over the summit of a grassy ridge. The scene below was colorful and quiet and stirred a memory in Mara. Cottonwoods and willows showed bright green along a stream that ran parallel with the trail. The Wyoming hills hid many valleys among the bare, grassy ridges that sloped up toward the foothills. Mara's home was in one of those valleys, and out beyond the ridges stretched an unlimited expanse of prairie land.
* * *
Something was lying in the road ahead. At first Mara thought it was an animal. Then, to her surprise, a man pushed himself erect and stood swaying on widespread legs. Every once in a while he took a determined step forward. Mara pulled up on the reins and stopped the horse. The man appeared to be very drunk. She watched him fall, push himself to his feet, take a few steps, and fall again. She decided that a man in his condition posed no threat to her. She would simply drive around him.
As she drew closer, she could see that his face was as black as his hair. His clothes were mere rags and he wore no boots. He held his hand against his side as he staggered, making little progress forward. Was he an Indian or a Negro? Mara looked at him with disgust. How in the world did a man this drunk get out here barefoot? She had just begun the swing around him when she saw that the hand against his side was covered with blood. At the moment of her discovery, he fell again.
Mara stopped the horse, wound the reins securely around the brake handle, and sat looking at the man. His feet and ankles, although bloody, were white. His face was blue-black as if a layer of coal dust had settled on it. His eyes were swollen almost shut. What was left of a buckskin shirt hung in tatters on his large frame. Mara could see blood ooze from a hundred cuts on his shoulders and arms. He was badly hurt. Realizing this startled her. She could not simply drive away and leave him. Without hesitation, she climbed down off the wagon seat.
Mara had never seen such a bloody sight. For an instant her sensitive nature rebelled against it, and she turned her face away. He had not received such injuries from falling off a horse, she was sure of that. He was a big, strong man with massive shoulders and evidently a strong heart to have suffered such injury and still be on his feet. He had coal black hair and a stubble of dark beard on his cheeks. One eye was swollen completely shut, and the other opened a mere crack. He had been horribly beaten about the face, his nose broken, and it was beyond her reasoning to even guess what had happened to inflict the wounds on the rest of him. Then, knowing that she was all the help the man was going to have, she knelt down beside him.
His split lips parted and he whispered, "Help me."
"Mister, I'll help you if I can," she murmured. When he seemed not to hear, she repeated the words louder.
The wounded man muttered unintelligibly. Then he lifted his head and tried to see her.
"I'll help you," she repeated.
"Shef . . . field."
If Mara had not just come from there, she would not have been able to make out the word. There was no point in telling the man she was not going back to the station.
"All right," she said soothingly. "We've got to get you into the wagon."
Mara looked around. Water from a recent rain stood in a puddle beside the trail. If she got some, it might revive him long enough to get him into the wagon. She went to her trunk and pulled out a towel she had decorated with tatted lace and embroidery. Not exactly designed for the purpose at hand, but it would serve. Now for something to hold water. She dug about and found an old garden hat. It could be reblocked afterward.
When she returned to the road, the man was lying in the same spot. She set the hat full of water on the ground and placed the wet towel on his face. He pushed himself up into a sitting position.
"Stay still a moment." Her voice was as stern as if she were speaking to an errant child.
His hand fell away from his side and blood oozed from a wound. She suddenly realized he had been shot! And more than one time if the wound in his thigh was a bullet hole. Oh, the poor man! If she could get him into the wagon and get him home, Cousin Brita would know what to do for him.
"Can you drink?"
He didn't answer and Mara looked at him helplessly. He was such a big man that she could not possibly get him into the wagon without his helping. One thing she had to do was wrap something about his thigh and his middle to help staunch the flow of blood. She hurried back to the trunk.
Her hands were bloody and the skirt of her travel dress was soiled by the time she had finished the bandaging. An old petticoat was wrapped securely about his middle, holding a towel against the wound, and a wool scarf was tied about his thigh. She dampened the towel once again and wiped her hands.
"You've got to help me get you up. I'll bring the wagon up so all you'll have to do is take a few steps to reach it."
She led the horse forward until the back of the wagon was even with him.
"Listen to me, man. I can't do it by myself."
Knowing she had to shock him into helping her, she took the hat by the brim and threw the remaining water in his face. It seemed not to faze him. Mara got behind him and placed her hands beneath his arms and lifted. It was useless. All she could manage was to raise his massive shoulders no matter how hard she tried.
Mara looked down at his dark head. Despite the dirt and twigs in his hair, she could see that it was fine and black as coal. He was a working man in the prime of life. His arms and shoulders bulged with muscles, but he was not using any of them now, and she was wearing herself out. It made her angry, and her Irish temper flared.
"Help me, you damn, stupid dolt!" she shouted. "What kind of man are you to sit there like a stubborn jackass and not try to help yourself?" She gave him a rebellious glance and wished she could remember some of the swear words the stage driver had used. Suddenly she did. "Hell and damnation!" The words came easily and she enjoyed the thought of what Miss Fillamore would have said about that. "Get on your feet, you ugly, worthless hunk of buzzard bait," she commanded. "Get in that wagon, or—or—by granny, I'll put a rope around you and drag you along behind it!"
She looked at his poor feet and almost cried for the agony it would cause him when he stood on them, but she hardened her heart against his pain and knelt down until her face was even with his.
"You are gutless!" she shouted. "You're a gutless man. Do you hear me? You're going to die out here because you don't have the guts to help me and you'll be on my conscience for the rest of my life, damn you!"
His response was only a flicker of dark lashes. She was almost sure he couldn't even see her now, but he could hear. His swollen lips parted and his tongue came out to lick the water she had thrown in his face.
"Help . . . me."
"I'm trying to. Can't you see that I'm trying to do just that?" she pleaded. "Mister, I want to help you, but I can't lift you. Please try to get on your feet. I'll help as much as I can."
Slowly he began to roll over onto his knees, supporting himself with one hand on the ground. His head hung down as if it weighed a ton. The hand he had used to cover the wound in his side was pressed close against him.
"Oh, my Lord! Oh, sweet Jesus!" The words came from Mara's mouth in a rush when she saw the injury to that hand. His thumb was cut to the bone.
The man managed to get his feet under him while making little grunting sounds. Mara got in front of him, speaking words of encouragement, and lifted with all her strength regardless of having to come in contact with his bloody body. When he was standing, her head came to beneath his chin, reaffirming her earlier guess that he was a big, tall man.
"Take a few steps," she urged. "Good! Good! A few more and you can sit down on the back of the wagon." He backed to the wagon and sat down heavily. She climbed up into the wagon, took a quilt from her trunk and spread it over the rough boards. "Move back just a little and you can lie down."
The moans of pain that came from him when he moved were like those of an animal caught in a trap and in terrible agony. The sounds cut into her, filling her heart with pity. She realized he was using all the strength he possessed to obey her. He managed to move back, and she eased him down onto the quilt. His knees came to the edge of the wagon bed and his feet hung down to within a foot of the ground, but Mara decided there was nothing she could do about that. She could, however, put something under his wounded thigh to support it. Once again she went to the trunk. He mumbled when she lifted his leg to place a folded skirt beneath it, and she leaned over to hear what he was saying.
"Sheffield . . . Station. Please . . . lady."
"There, there. Lie still and don't worry. Everything will be all right now."
Mara climbed up on the wagon seat and urged the horse on down the road. She looked back at the man lying on her quilt. His head rolled from side to side, and he was holding his wound now with his good hand. Oh, dear, she thought, the rough ride could kill him and he would die without anyone knowing his name or what had happened to him.
Her joy in coming home had turned to anxiety for the man who lay in the back of the wagon. She had done what she could. It was as simple as that. She drove at a gait that was easy for the horse pulling the rumbling wagon, trying to avoid the jarring holes and ruts in the road. She watched an eagle soar through the sky until it sailed into the distance and she could no longer see it. The ride was cruel on her bottom and back, making her aware of the agony the man must be suffering.
They crossed another grassy summit, and below it yawned a valley, long and narrow, with the faint, white line of a trail running through it. On a rise overlooking the fields below was the McCall homestead. The late afternoon sun glinted on the glass windows of the house just as it had done the day Mara had left. Tears came to her eyes and she blinked rapidly to clear them. When she could see again, she saw that more buildings had been added to the compound: unpainted log buildings, and a railed fence where horses were penned. Oh, it had changed so much! The house was not nearly as large or as grand as she remembered it, but the peaked roof and wraparound porch were dearly familiar. She didn't remember the trees being so thick or so big.
The trail rounded a bend and the house was lost from sight for a short while. _Home! Home!_ The word kept repeating itself in Mara's mind. She had no doubt of the welcome she would receive. The letter she had sent was probably still waiting for Cousin Aubrey in Laramie or he would have been at Sheffield Station to meet her. How surprised everyone would be to see her! She placed her straw hat on her head, giggling at having to hold the reins between her knees while she shoved the hat pin through the crown to hold it. Her dress was bloodstained and her shoes were muddy. She hated to arrive home in such an untidy state, but there was no help for it.
Mara resisted putting the horse to a faster pace because of the injured man, but she had no control over her heart. It was beating faster. She could hardly wait to call out to Cousin Brita that she was home.
A column of blue smoke curled lazily from the cobblestone chimney until, catching the wind high up, it was swept away. Mara could smell it now. It smelled of pine and reminded her of the pine chips her mother used in the trunk to keep the bedding smelling fresh. Her eyes, shining with happiness, were glued to the homestead. The only activity was centered around the long low building at the back. Several horses were tied to a rail fence that penned more horses.
Suddenly Mara realized that a sea of waving grass covered the land her father had plowed and planted. That thought was swept away immediately as her attention was drawn to the house. The shape of it was the same, yet somehow it was different. She was soon near enough to see bare ground in front where there used to be flowers and green bushes. The picket fence and the swinging gate were no longer there. Each turn of the wagon wheels brought new revelations, each more dismal than the one before. A front window was boarded up with flat weathered plank, and the front door was folded back and propped open with a wash tub. Firewood was piled on the veranda where the porch swing used to hang. Several large logs lay on the porch, an ax head buried in one of them. The beautiful latticework was gone from around the bottom of the veranda, and the cornices and fancy fretwork no longer decorated the eaves of the porch.
Mara watched with a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach as a dog raced out from beneath the porch to nip at the heels of the horse as it pulled the wagon up the rutted drive to the front of the house.
Mara was stunned with disbelief.
A man in a black coat came from inside the house and stood on the veranda as she approached. While he waited, he smoothed his gray hair back with the palms of his hands. Mara stopped the horse and stared at him.
"What ye be doin' here, miss?" he demanded in a deep Irish brogue.
Mara was so astonished she was unable to speak. Her eyes widened, her breath quickened, and for an instant his face was a blur. The man looked so much like her father it was uncanny, yet she had never seen her father look so disreputable. A rough stubble of whiskers covered the man's face, the front of his shirt was dirty, his face was bloated, and his eyes were watery. He leaned against the porch post, rubbing a trembling hand across his mouth. He was an older, unkempt version of the man who had come to Denver five years before. He was Cousin Aubrey, and he didn't even know who she was.
"Who be ye?" he asked again, squinting his eyes to get a better look at her.
His harsh voice jarred Mara out of her stunned state of mind. She was tired, dirty and frightened. She had a dying man in the back of the wagon. Her temper ignited and flared. "I am Mara Shannon McCall and I live here!"
# Chapter
TWO
"Who did ye say ye be?"
Mara stared at Aubrey for a full minute while her mind accepted the fact that this was reality and not the homecoming she had dreamed about during the long journey from Denver. A small dart of panic shot through her but was overridden by a hot flush of anger.
"You heard me. I am Mara Shannon McCall, Cousin Aubrey. I've come home!" She wrapped the reins around the brake and climbed down from the wagon seat.
"Ah, Jesus! Ah, Godamighty! Sure 'n 'tis Mara Shannon, herself. Why'd ye go 'n come here fer?"
"Because I wanted to!" she retorted sharply. Anger and disappointment were keeping tears from her eyes.
"Cullen . . . ain't goin' ter like it none a'tall."
"Cullen? What's he got to do with it?" Mara pushed at the straw hat that had slipped to one side of her head and looked beyond Aubrey to the boy who came out onto the veranda.
"Who is she, Pa?" He had the McCalls' dark hair and eyes and he was not much taller than Mara.
" 'Tis Mara Shannon."
"Cousin Mara? Now ain't that a corker! Ma'll be plumb—"
"Hush yer blatherin'," his father said crossly. "Go tell Cullen."
"He rode off a while ago," he snapped back at his father, and then smiled at Mara. "So you're Cousin Mara. I'm Trellis."
"One of the twins?"
"Yup."
"Is your mother here? There's an injured man in the wagon, and we'll need help getting him into the house."
"Ma's not . . . well. She can't move about." The boy went down the steps and looked over the side of the wagon. "Hellfire! What happened to _him?_ "
"I don't know. He's in terrible pain—"
"Not now. He's dead to the world."
"Dead? Oh, he can't be!" Mara went quickly to the end of the wagon.
"I don't mean dead, dead. He's unconscious."
"Oh, thank heavens! He was so courageous. I found him on the road, and he helped me as much as he could while I was getting him into the wagon."
Aubrey walked down the steps, stared at the unconscious man, and froze. His face turned a bright red and his arms flopped against his sides. He looked like a crowing rooster.
"The devil take ye! Ye'll not be bringin' the likes a him in _my_ house. Get rid a him!"
"But, Pa," Trellis protested, "ya can't—"
"I can," Aubrey roared. "Get him gone."
"Be reasonable, Pa. We've got to help him!"
"Reasonable, ye say! Ye be traitor to yer own pa? Ye got nothin' to say here. Nothin' a'tall!"
"But I do! I've got plenty to say." Mara spoke up firmly, her face flaming with anger. "I think you're forgetting that this is _my_ house. The man is injured and needs help. Trellis, where is your mother?"
"Ma's sick. She can't get up no more. I been doin' what I can."
"I'm sorry about Cousin Brita. But we can't let this man lie out here and die!"
"And why not?" Aubrey demanded.
"Pa, ya know why not," Trellis said patiently. "I'll go get someone to help get him into the house."
"He'll not be comin' in!" Aubrey shouted.
"He is a human being and he will go into the house where I can look after him." Mara didn't know where her courage came from, but she was grateful for it.
"So that's the way it be, eh?"
"Yes! That's the way it is! I may have been away for a long time, but I'm back now and I have a say here. You'd better understand that right now!"
"Ye ungrateful snippet—"
"Aubrey! Trellis! Who's here?" The woman's voice came from deep inside the house.
"I'll go tell her." Trellis turned to Mara. "And I'll get someone to help get, ah, him into the house."
Mara was reluctant to leave the injured man alone with Aubrey. He stood glaring, first at her, and then at the man in the wagon. She could see the hatred in his eyes. It was a strange and unexpected situation she found herself in. There was no time to grieve over her unfriendly welcome. She would see this man into _her_ house and do what she could for him. If he died, at least her conscience would be clear.
When Trellis came back out to the veranda, Mara stood at the end of the wagon as if she expected Aubrey to attack the injured man.
"I told Ma."
"Sure 'n ye would," Aubrey sneered and cast Mara a resentful glance. "Ye'll be sorry ye brought him here, me girl." He walked back up the steps to the porch, his face livid with rage.
"Maybe and maybe not. But I don't think so. No one in need was ever turned away from this house while my father was alive."
Even at the school where fits of temper were common among the homesick girls Mara's temper was legendary. She held it in check now, even though a red rage burned deep within her.
"Trellis, go get someone to help get this man in the house." Mara issued the order and looked Aubrey directly in the eye. Something was going on that she didn't understand, but she had rights here. This was _her_ home, _her_ land; and from the looks of it, she should have come back long ago.
Aubrey McCall felt as if he had been kicked in the stomach by a horse. Why had Shannon McCall's daughter returned home? An educated miss such as she would have no reason to come to this place after all this time unless she intended to sell it. He suspected that Shannon McCall had left money in a bank in Denver to pay for her schooling, but had been unable to find out for sure until he had stopped sending money to the school after the first year and not a word had been said.
The girl had written she had a good-paying position at the school. What had caused her to give it up? Why hadn't she let him know that she was coming? He would have put a stop to her if he had known. She was going to be every bit as stubborn and self-righteous as her father, he could see that. Aubrey turned on his heel and went into the house. Damn her for bringing that bastard here! He ignored his wife's calls from the bedroom and went directly to the cupboard in the kitchen and poured himself a stiff drink.
Trellis returned with two men. Mara had no idea of the picture she made standing at the end of the wagon. Her straw hat was askew. Sun glinted on the copper in her hair that hung loose from its knot. Her dress was soiled, her cheeks were red and sparks of temper flashed from her emerald green eyes. Determination to have her way was evident in every line of her body.
She had a chance to observe the men as they approached. One was thin with a narrow face and eyes set close to his beaklike nose. His arms were long, hanging almost to the knees of his bowed legs. The other was strongly built and wore a high-crowned Texas hat designed to keep the sun off his skull. He was tall and had a long, lean, hard face burned brown from his forehead to a square chin. His clothes were those of a man who spent long hours in the saddle. A gun belt was strapped about his waist; the other man had a weapon tucked into his belt. Mara was used to seeing men wearing weapons as if they were part of the clothing, but it crossed her mind that these two didn't appear to be the type of men to work on a farm.
"Sam Sparks, ma'am." The tall man put his fingers to the brim of his hat and nodded politely to Mara before peering down at the man who lay in the back of the wagon. He whistled through his teeth. "Godamighty!"
"I found him about halfway between here and Sheffield Station. He's been shot in the side and in the leg, I think."
"He's in bad shape," the tall man said slowly in an accent of the deep south.
"Do you know who he is?" Mara asked.
"I've seen him around."
"Ma wants you to bring him into her room, Sam," Trellis said in a low tone, his eyes going from Mara to the tall man. "There's a bunk in there," he added.
Aubrey came out onto the veranda carrying the whiskey bottle in his hand and watched the injured man being lifted out of the wagon. The two men and Trellis staggered under his weight, but they made it up the steps and into the house.
Mara followed them, passing Aubrey without a glance. She kept her mind firmly on the injured man so that she wouldn't look at the destruction done to her mother's house. The layout of the rooms was familiar, four rooms downstairs, two rooms upstairs. They passed from the parlor into the kitchen and from the kitchen into the back bedroom, the room that had been Mara's parents' room.
Brita McCall was sitting up in bed with pillows behind her. Mara saw the fear and pain on her face. Her dark hair was streaked with gray, her face showed the lines of age, but it was still as sweet as Mara remembered. Blue eyes clouded with pain sought hers, and Brita lifted a crippled hand toward her.
"Hello, Cousin Brita."
"Hello, Mara Shannon. Ach, 'n what have they been doin' to me boy?" Tears came to Brita's eyes and rolled slowly down her cheeks.
"I don't know. I found him along the road."
"Pack, me darlin'," Brita murmured. "If only I could get up ter see ter yer hurts."
"Didn't you know it was Pack?" Trellis asked when he saw the surprised look on Mara's face.
"No." She shook her head. "Who would have done such a terrible thing to him?"
Trellis glanced first at his mother and then at his father who had followed them into the house, then shook his head.
" 'Tis not enough he be here in this house. 'Tis my bed he be takin'." Aubrey stood at the end of Brita's bed, the bottle still in his hand.
Mara saw Brita cringe. A tremendous dislike for her father's cousin was building rapidly within her. She threw Aubrey a disgusted glance, took off her hat and placed it on the bureau. The short man left, but Sam Sparks lingered beside the bunk.
"Will you be needing help here, miss?" he asked.
"Why, yes, if you would be so kind." Mara looked pointedly at Aubrey.
"Cullen'll not be likin' ye to be stickin' yer nose in, Sparks. Ye best be gettin' on back to the bunkhouse."
"This isn't a job for the young lady, McCall."
"She bit it off, let 'er chew it." Aubrey took a long swig from the bottle.
"Please stay, Mr. Sparks. Cousin Brita and I would appreciate your help." Mara saw that Brita was either too frightened to go against her husband's wishes or too worried about her son to speak.
"We'll need hot water and vinegar to start. He's out cold, and it will be easier on him if we do what we've got to do before he wakes up."
"I'll get it." Trellis moved around his father and left the room.
Sam took off his hat, hung it on the bed post, and knelt down to unwind the wool scarf from Pack's leg. Sam's thick hair was a dark russet brown. The upper part of his forehead was white where it had been protected from the sun. To Mara he looked much younger without the hat.
Mara gazed down at the unconscious man. She tried to compare this big man with the boy who had come to the school with her father so many years ago. Only the dark hair was the same. He was tanned almost mahogany to the waist, his great shoulders and arms narrowing to a sinewy middle. Mara had never seen a man as near naked as this one.
"I'm sorry your son is hurt, Cousin Brita. I'm just glad I came along when I did. I've no experience in tending to injuries, but I'm not squeamish and I'll do what I can if you and Mr. Sparks will tell me what to do."
Sam Sparks stood and looked down into Mara's emerald eyes. She saw that his eyes were clear and knowing, and a faint smile pulled at his lips.
"Looks like you've done all right so far, miss," he murmured.
"Mara." Brita spoke her name and Mara turned to her. "I can sit in a chair. Trellis will lift me."
"Oh, Ma!" Trellis came to the doorway. "It's hurts ya so much to move."
"I can stand the pain, Trell. Bring the chair. He be a sweet child," she said to Mara. "I don't be knowin' what I'd do without him."
"Is there something I can do, Brita?"
"Nothin', but I do be thankin' ye. 'Tis the misery in my joints that's made me as helpless as a babe."
The chair was placed close to the bed, and Brita's legs swung over the side. Trellis put his hands beneath his mother's arms, lifted her up, swung her around, and gently lowered her to the chair. Moans of pain came from Brita's lips in spite of her attempts to hold them back. Her feet and ankles were terribly deformed by her affliction, and her spine was curved in a permanent arc. Trellis settled her in the chair and placed a blanket across her lap. For the first time Brita got a good look at her son's face. She moaned and clenched her teeth as if in agony.
"Pack, me sweet boy. I told ye ter go, I told ye. . . ."
"Ma'am, he's got a bullet that's got to come out. It might not be something you want to see."
"I be seein' cruel things aplenty, Mr. Sparks. I got to be knowin' the worse. Will me boy die?"
"I don't know, Mrs. McCall. He's been shot, and it looks like they dragged him behind a horse and beat him."
"Sweet Holy Mother of God! How can they be so cruel?" Brita took a deep breath and closed her eyes for an instant. When she opened them, she began to give orders. "Ye've got to get the bullets out. Can ye sew him up, Mr. Sparks?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Bring the hot water, Trell. Mr. Sparks will have ter wash his hands. They'll not like ye ter be helpin' him, Mr. Sparks."
Mara stood by and pondered their use of the word they. It was almost as if Brita, Trellis and even Sam Sparks knew who had tortured the man.
"Let me worry about that. I've got to strip him, ma'am."
" 'Tis not a sight for yer eyes, Mara Shannon." Brita's gentle face was creased with lines of worry. "Trell will help Mr. Sparks."
Mara picked up the bloody petticoat she had used to wrap about Pack Gallagher's torso and the wool scarf she had tied about his leg. She stepped out of the way when Trellis came with a teakettle of hot water and a handful of clean cloths. Her face reddened when she realized that Sam had opened Pack's trousers and was waiting for her to leave before he pulled them off.
"Call if there's something I can do."
Mara went into the kitchen and gazed in despair at the disorder. The iron cookstove that had been her mother's pride was still there. A fire behind it had charred the wall. The trestle table had a familiar look, but instead of ladder-backed chairs, two wooden benches now sat at each side of it. The range and the work counter were covered with piles of plates, cups, pots, and an assortment of cutlery. The floor was covered with grease and scraps of food embellished with chunks of dried mud. Cobwebs and soot hung like Spanish moss behind the cookstove.
A flicker of anger swept through Mara and threatened to burst into full flame.
The parlor had suffered as much damage as the rest of the house. A broken-legged table leaned against the wall where the window was boarded up. The loveseat was gone, as was the clock that sat on the mantel above the fireplace. Several heavy chairs stood in the room, and a barn lantern hung from a nail on the wall. Had Mara not been such a strong-willed woman she would have collapsed in despair. Instead she seethed with fury against those who had devastated her home. Her rage fed her determination to stay, take over the property her father had left her, and get a full accounting from Aubrey McCall.
Mara went to the door of the front bedroom and looked around. The bed in the corner was unmade, men's clothing was scattered about, a bridle and a set of reins had been flung into the corner, and an empty whiskey bottle lay on its side on the bureau. Fortunately the doors leading to the living room and the one going into Cousin Brita's were both still solidly hung and would afford her some privacy if she stayed here.
"Trellis," she called. "Who uses this room?"
"Cullen. He don't sleep there much. But he'll be sore if ya mess with his things." Trellis came to the bedroom door.
"Then he'll just have to be sore." Mara's voice was no-nonsense hard. She closed the connecting door and began ridding the room of Cullen McCall's belongings. Under different circumstances she would not have dreamed of touching another person's personal property, but anger, humiliation and disappointment spurred her on to clear the room as quickly as possible and make it her own again.
As she worked, a murmur of voices came from the other room. Trellis made trips to the kitchen, and once she heard him going upstairs. A cry tore from the wounded man. Mara stopped and put her hands over her ears for a long moment. The breath went out of her, and she felt her stomach suck in. Brita's low soothing voice could be heard over the grunts of pain.
Mara's mind kept pace with her hands as she worked. Someone had tried to kill Pack Gallagher. It was evident that Aubrey McCall hated him. There was something evil here, some reason why Brita wanted her son brought into her room. Did she think that whoever had done this terrible thing to him would come back to finish the job?
Mara felt a sudden homesickness for her neat, comfortable room at the school. The cooks would be getting dinner now, and the maids would be setting the tables with white linen and bone china. After dinner the girls would gather in the parlor to take turns at the piano or pair off to play cribbage or whist. On a night like this, Mara would take a couple of books to her room, undress in the soft light of the glass lamp with the hand-painted shade, and crawl into her warm, sweet-smelling bed to read.
No dinner was being prepared here, she thought, coming back to reality. And in order to have a decent place to sleep, she had to clean out this room and make up a bed with the linen from her trunk. There was no going back. Her bridges had been burned behind her. The unpleasant scene with Miss Fillamore when Mara told her she was leaving had opened her eyes to the fact that the affection the woman pretended to have for her was merely a facade. Miss Fillamore had called her a featherhead and said she was foolish to give up a secure position to travel to an uncivilized part of Wyoming; and if she went, she could not return. The schoolmistress had urged Mara to hire a broker, sell the property, and stay at the school. When she refused, Miss Fillamore had taken the attitude that she was somehow disloyal and had immediately hired a woman to take her place.
The sun had set when Mara went to the porch to drag in her trunk. She saw four men on horseback coming across an open field toward the house. She suspected one of them would be Cullen McCall, and Cousin Aubrey would be waiting to tell him the news. The look in Trellis' eyes when he came to help her with the trunk told Mara that the boy had also seen the riders and was uneasy.
"How is Mr. Gallagher?"
"Sam says he'll live if the fever don't take him."
Mara removed linens from her trunk and hurriedly made up the bed. She heard Sam Sparks leave the house and looked out the window to see him walking toward the bunkhouse where a group of men stood talking to Aubrey. She tidied her hair and opened the connecting door between her room and Brita's.
The room smelled of vinegar, whiskey, and burned alum. Pack lay on his back. A blanket covered him from his knees to his hipbones. Above that was a flat belly, a thick chest shadowed with dark curly hair, muscled shoulders, and arms as big as Mara's legs. Mara could see where Sam Sparks had stitched the flesh on his thumb. Brita's chair had been moved close to the bunk. She reached a crippled hand to turn the wet compress that lay across her son's forehead.
"He seems to be sleeping."
"Aye. He be dosed with laudanum."
"Do you want to get back into bed, Brita? I'll sit beside him for awhile."
"No, child. I be all right."
"I want to help you. My father was very fond of Pack. He brought him to the school one time."
"Pack was fond of Shannon. Child, why did ye come to this place?"
"I was homesick. I wrote that I was coming."
"Sure 'n ye did," Brita sighed deeply.
"Things are going on that I don't understand. Why are there no crops planted? If Mr. Sparks works here, what does he do? He doesn't look like a farming type of man."
"Mara Shannon, ye shouldna be here. Trell will be takin' ye back come mornin'. Ye can tell that to Cullen when he comes."
Mara searched the eyes of the woman who looked older than her years and found genuine concern there. She went to kneel down beside the chair because it was an effort for Brita to hold her head up to look into her face.
"I'm not going back. I own this property. My father worked hard to get the money to pay for it. Cousin Aubrey sent money to pay for my schooling, and I appreciate that; but I'm of age and I want to control my own inheritance. I plan to talk with Cousin Aubrey tonight."
"Child, child." Brita shook her head sadly. "Let it be. Go back to yer school. This be no place for a gentle lass."
"I can't go back. I've already been replaced. This is my home," Mara said gently. "Can't you understand that?"
"Home. Aye, would that we ne'er left the green land o' Ireland."
Mara stood. "Don't worry. I'm not the type to fold up under the first hard blow." Heavens, she told herself, if that were true, she would have crumbled when she first saw the destruction done to her home. "Now, I'll fix us something for supper."
"Mara Shannon, there be naught to fix. Trell brings me a plate from the cookshack."
"A cookshack? How many men are here?"
"Why don't you ask someone who knows?" The voice came from behind her and Mara turned.
A man lounged in the doorway. Her first impression was that he was a short man, young, and with a handsome, sullen face. This was Cullen. He resembled the father who stood beside him. Mara had steeled herself for the meeting with Aubrey and his son, and despite the uneasiness she felt, she was determined to face them boldly.
"Who are you?" Mara knew who he was. She asked the question as an opening to what she felt was going to be an unpleasant encounter.
"I'm the one who runs things around here. Who are you?"
Bluntly Mara answered him. "I'm the one who _owns_ things around here." She said the words curtly, snapped her mouth shut and waited for an explosion.
The surprised look on the man's face turned to smoldering anger. His eyes narrowed and he glared at her. "I advise you to get your prissy tail back to Denver."
Mara forced herself to appear calmly contemptuous of his rudeness. "And I advise you to keep a civil tongue in your head if you plan to spend another night on this property."
"Ha!" He came into the room and looked down at the man who lay on the bunk. "Do you think he'll help you throw me out?"
"No. But this will." Mara drew the pistol from her pocket and pointed it at him. She heard Brita draw in her breath.
Cullen turned cold, blue-gray eyes on the girl, aware of her defiant stance, her eyes that met his unafraid.
"You'd better put that peashooter away or you'll hurt yourself."
Mara looked into eyes that were level with her own. They were hard and cruel. She drew in a shallow breath but never allowed her eyes to waver from his.
"You should be worrying about yourself. It's pointed at the third button on your shirt."
"Cullen?"
"Shut up, Pa."
"Your things are on the porch. If you can't be civil, take them and leave." The anger that had started down in the pit of Mara's stomach had surged up, causing her to throw caution aside. She stood motionless, waiting for Cullen McCall to make the next move.
"You'd best draw in your horns, _Cousin_ Mara. You're in my territory. Out here it's the strong who survive."
"Are you threatening me? If so, you should know that before I left Denver, I made out a will leaving this property to the school. They have a battery of lawyers who will cover this place like a swarm of ants if they don't hear from me. Schools are hungry for money, _Cousin_ Cullen."
Surprised at being able to lie so easily, Mara felt faintly giddy. She had no idea how much time went by while she stared at Cullen. She watched his face twist with bitterness and smoldering anger. Then he strode from the room. She could hear the beat of his boot heels on the parlor floor and then on the porch. Aubrey lingered.
"Ye had to go 'n get him riled—"
"Is he always so rude?" Mara put the pistol back.
Brita answered, "Cullen can charm the skin off a snake when he wants to."
"Evidently he didn't want to. Keep your son away from me, Cousin Aubrey. I won't tolerate his abuse."
"He'll cool off."
"I don't care if he does or not. Right now I'm more interested in something to eat. Brita tells me she gets her meals from the cookshack."
"Trell will be bringin' it."
"After tonight I'll cook for myself and Cousin Brita. I want a list of supplies you have on hand, and you and I will go over the account books." Anger was still in her voice.
"Account books? There ain't no such."
Mara looked at him in stunned silence, and for a moment she almost felt sorry for him. He stood looking down at the floor.
"Do you mean to tell me that you don't keep records of what comes in and what goes out?" Aubrey didn't answer. "When did you cease farming?"
"This ain't farm country. Yer pa knowed it at the last."
"He's right, Mara," Brita said. "Shannon's dream of fields and fields of potatoes was naught but a dream. The land, the weather be not suitable."
Mara had to believe what they said when she looked down into Brita's pleading eyes. So many things crowded into her head that she found it incredibly hard not to keep asking questions.
"If you don't farm, what do you do? It takes money to live. Where does it come from?"
Aubrey shrugged. "Cullen runs some cattle."
"And the men in the bunkhouse are drovers who work with the cattle?"
"What else would they be doin'?"
Aubrey's face closed and he looked away. "Now 'n where else could it be comin' from?"
Mara tried to steel herself against softening, but it wasn't her nature to stay angry for very long. When she spoke again, her tone was softer.
"Now I see why you didn't want me to come here. But I'm here, and I'm staying. I want you to know, Cousin Aubrey, I can not abide disorder. This house, my home, will be put in order so that I can live here decently. You and Brita are welcome to stay as long as you want. I owe you that out of consideration for what you have done for me in the past."
"Kind of ye," Aubrey muttered. Mara chose to ignore the sarcasm in his voice.
"I insist on having an accounting of how many cattle I own, because I assume it was my money that bought them."
Aubrey's shoulders slumped. Age and inactivity had thickened his waist, and his soiled shirt barely came together over his protruding stomach. His eyes, however, glittered angrily and his lips set defensively.
"Ye ain't goin' to let up, are ye?"
"No. Why should I?"
Aubrey was still. Only his eyes moved. They examined her from head to toe.
"What about Gallagher? Be ye set on keepin' him sniffin' 'bout ye?"
Mara turned her eyes from his and looked down at the unconscious man before she answered.
"Mr. Gallagher is your wife's son and my father's friend. Regardless of the disagreement you and your son have with him, it seems to me that you could be civil to him for Brita's sake. Pack is welcome in this house for as long as it takes him to recover from his injuries. Which, by the way, I feel you and your son know more about than you have let on."
Anger tightened the muscles in Aubrey's face. "Be ye accusin' me 'n Cullen?"
Mara let her silence speak for her. They stared at each other, and suddenly Mara felt good. Cousin Aubrey knew that she was no spineless creature who would scurry back to Denver and leave her property to be managed by him and his son.
"Do we understand each other, Cousin Aubrey?"
"What I be understandin' is that ye're a stubborn, foolish lass with naught but air for brains!" He wheeled and walked away.
# Chapter
THREE
Mara slept uneasily in the strange bed with the pistol under her pillow. She had undressed in the dark because there were no coverings for the two windows. Physically and mentally she was exhausted. After the meeting with Aubrey and Cullen, her mind was plagued by even greater turmoil than that she had experienced when she arrived with Pack Gallagher.
Several times during the night she was awakened by voices in the next room, and once in that deep blackness she had awakened to a strange sense of unease that brought her to full awareness. She looked out the window to see four horsemen ride in and turn their horses into the enclosure beside the bunkhouse. She lay down again and closed her eyes wearily. She dozed fitfully and eventually fell into an uneasy sleep.
Morning came. As soon as she opened her eyes, she noticed the door that opened into the parlor was ajar. It made her realize how vulnerable she was. A poignant loneliness possessed her. She was alone, really alone in this hostile house except for poor, crippled Brita and the boy, Trellis. Thoughts raced around and around in her head. Why had Cullen McCall been so antagonistic toward her? Why had Aubrey acted as if she had no right to be here? She knew she couldn't live here alone. She had to share her home with Brita and Aubrey. That thought held, and she resigned herself to it. But she would not allow these two overbearing men to intimidate her.
Mara lay thinking that it had been foolish of her to insist that she have her old room. What had been suitable for her as a child was not suitable for a young woman alone. She would take the upstairs rooms for herself where there was only one door to lock, the one leading to the stairway. There she would be able to dress or undress without the fear of someone seeing her through the windows. Where was her imagination taking her? She was planning to fortify herself in her own home! Well, if that's the way it had to be—so be it!
She got out of bed and used the granite chamber pot she had slipped under the bed the night before. Later, in a brown work dress, an apron tied snugly around her waist, her auburn hair secured in a topknot, Mara went out to the kitchen. A wave of hopeless despair swept over her when she viewed the clutter. Where to begin? She had just poured water into the basin to wash when she heard hard steps on the porch at the side of the house. Apprehension held her motionless. It had to be Cullen. Aubrey didn't move that fast. Mara wished she didn't have to face him so early in the morning. She needed time to adjust to the drab, unfriendly atmosphere of the house.
A boy looking amazingly like Trellis came tramping through the parlor to the kitchen. Carrying a pot of coffee with a rag wrapped around the handle, he walked past her, then set the pot down on the range with such force that the liquid came out the spout and splashed onto the hot iron, creating a hissing sound.
"There's your goddamn coffee!"
Mara was taken aback by the words and the vicious way the boy spat them out. She concentrated on soaping her hands and rinsing them.
"I can see that." Mara dried her hands on her apron because there was no towel on the rack. "You must be Travor. I'm Mara McCall."
"I know who the hell you are. Everyone on this ranch knows who the hell you are."
Arrogantly he returned her stare. With feet apart, balancing on the high heels of his boots, the boy defied her. His face was so like the face of his twin, yet so different one would never mistake one for the other. This boy's face was hard, arrogant, and a sneer twisted his lips. He wore range clothes, and about his slender hips was strapped a wide gun belt.
"Good. I'm glad that they know the owner has arrived."
"Cullen said you threw that up to him. What does a prissy ass like you know about running a ranch?"
"Get out and leave her alone, Trav." Trellis came from his mother's room.
"Are you going to make me, sissy boy?" Travor put his hands on his hips and spit out the words spitefully.
"If I have to," Trellis said quietly.
Mara looked at the gentle boy with new respect. He was ready to do what he had to do to back his words.
"You don't have to, Trellis. I will." Mara thought it time she began to exert her authority, or there could be a fight. "Leave, Travor. Get out and don't come back until you can behave yourself."
"Where do you get off ordering me to get out?"
"Because this is my house, and I don't have to put up with bad-mannered children."
A flush reddened his cheeks. Sparks of anger danced in his eyes. There was no doubt that by calling him a child she had hit upon a sore spot.
"I could show you a thing or two, _lady!_ "
"No doubt you could, but I'm not interested in hearing anything from a spoiled little boy." She turned her back on him, went to the work counter and began to fill a pan with soiled dishes.
"You think you're so all-fired smart just 'cause you went to a fancy school. Well, you ain't nothin' but dirty Irish mick just like the rest of us!"
Mara heard his boot heels pounding on the bare floor, and the sound of the door slamming behind him echoed throughout the house.
"He acts like that sometimes," Trellis said.
Mara turned. "Only sometimes? That's a relief."
"He was trying to impress you."
"He did that, all right."
"He wanted you to think he was a grown-up like Cullen."
"If he's trying to pattern himself after Cullen, he's made a poor choice to my way of thinking."
"Trav just wants to be somebody."
"You mean he wants to be a man who people look up to? He's sure going about it in the wrong way."
"Ma says he's goin' over fool's hill. He'll settle down."
"Why are you defending him? He's an ill-mannered, undisciplined, strutting little rooster who needs his tail feathers pulled." Mara poured water from the teakettle into a pan and dropped in a bar of lye soap. She would have to wash dishes before she could even drink a cup of coffee. "How is Pack this morning?"
"He's still sleeping. So is Ma. She had me give him another dose of the laudanum in the night, but she says that's all he can have. His stomach is growling. It's probably been a day or two since he ate anything."
"What does your mother suggest?"
"She'll say he needs meat to make blood. I'll get it from the cookhouse—that is, if you'll cook it."
"Of course I will. But I've got to clean this place first. How is it that you're willing to help Pack? Cullen and your father seem to hate him."
"Pack's all right. He's my half brother the same as Cullen. Besides, he's good to Ma."
"So are you, Trellis." Mara smiled so sweetly and sincerely at the boy that his face reddened. "Now that I'm here, I'll help you with your mother. We should be able to make things more pleasant for her." She found a cloth and dried two cups. "Let's have some of that coffee, shall we? Then I'll scrub out that iron pot and we'll cook some meat for Pack."
"I didn't know that you could cook. I thought you just knew, uh . . . things like how to serve tea and that sort of thing."
Mara laughed. "Every girl at Miss Fillamore's school takes a course in cooking. She learns how to cook a few things so that she will be able to supervise the cook when she marries a rich man and moves to a mansion."
"Do they all marry rich men?"
"No." Mara laughed again. "Their parents send them to school thinking it will help them get a rich husband. Sometimes it does."
"What about you?"
"I did have a proposal." Mara's eyes began to sparkle. "He was very rich, but he also was bald, had rotting teeth and was old enough to be my grandfather. Miss Fillamore thought I should consider it. She said he was on the verge of drinking himself to death and I'd be a rich widow."
"Why didn't you marry him?"
"The cook at the school beat my time with him."
Trellis grinned. "You're kidding."
"No, I'm not. He and Mable were perfect for each other. I was at the school for seven years, and I hung around the kitchen a lot. Mable had worked hard; she deserved a rich husband more than I. Someday I'll make you a butter cake."
"I eat down at the cookshack after the men have finished. Then I bring something to Ma. I'll get something for you this morning if you want me to."
Mara brought the pot from the stove and poured coffee into two clean cups. The plate of food Trellis had brought her the previous night had been so greasy that she could hardly eat it, but the bread and butter had been good.
"I'll have some bread and butter. Who milks the cow and churns?"
"Steamboat. He hates cows. He named our cow Miss Fu—ah, well it's not for your ears, Mara."
"Who is Steamboat?"
"The cook. I've not heard his real name. He came up the Missouri on a steamboat about five years back. It hit a snag and sank. He's told the tale so often that folks just call him Steamboat. He came wandering in, down on his luck, and he's been here cooking ever since."
"If he works here, why not ask him to cook the meat for Pack?"
"I guess he could if you don't want to."
"I'll do it. I want to get this place cleaned today so I can cook supper in here tonight."
"It's not Ma's fault things are in such a mess. She kept it nice for as long as she could."
"I understand that. Who does the washing? I see there's a boiling pot in the yard."
"Miss Rivers comes every week or two. She can't see much, but she can do a lot. She helps me change Ma's bed and wash her things. Ma likes to have a woman to talk to. Miss Rivers likes it too. She doesn't get out much."
"Where does she live?"
"A couple of miles from here. She lives with her brother, Charlie Rivers. Their place is over along Lodgepole Creek. He's ornery as a steer with a crooked horn. He won't let a man get within a mile of her."
"Do they squat on our land?"
"Heavens no! Cullen would have shot him."
"Hmmm." Mara looked directly at the young boy sitting across from her. "Is that the usual way Cullen handles a problem?"
"He didn't shoot Pack, if that's what you mean. He might of roughed him up a bit—"
"Roughed him up? Do you call what was done to him roughing him up?"
"Well . . . they got carried away, I guess." Trellis looked away from Mara's suddenly cold stare.
"Who did it, Trellis? Who did that terrible thing to him?"
Trellis stood. "If Pack wants you to know, he'll tell you. It's best not to pry into things, Mara. There's bad blood between Pack and Pa and Cullen. Ma says they didn't get along right from the start."
"I can understand why if the welcome I received from your father and Cullen is an example."
"You surprised them, and—"
"And what?"
The boy shrugged. "They're afraid you'll sell the place out from under them, I guess."
"It would be my right," she said gently. "But I won't do that because my father loved the land, and because of Cousin Brita."
"Well, Pa and Cullen won't cool off until Pack leaves, you can bet your boots on that."
Mara watched Trellis walk toward the bunkhouse and the small cookshack that was attached to the end of it wondering how two boys, twins, could be so different.
A shaggy dog came out from under the porch of the cookhouse to meet Trellis. The dog was old and walked slowly.
"Hello, Maggie." He bent and patted the dog's head. "You've been out in the burrs again," he said and pulled a burr from the shaggy hair that hung over the dog's eyes. "I'll cut this hair off when I get time."
Maggie walked beside him to the cookshack and went back under the porch when Trellis stepped into it.
Sam Sparks, Cullen and two other men sat at the long plank table that stretched from one end of the small building to the other. Trellis nodded to them and went to the counter where Steamboat kept the tray they used for Brita.
"How's Pack this morning?" Sam asked.
"He ain't dead yet," Trellis answered and then gave Cullen a searing look.
"Too bad," Cullen answered.
"There'll be hell to pay if Miss McCall finds out who did that to him." Trellis set two granite plates on the tray.
"It ain't my style to drag a man to death. I'd just shoot the bastard." Cullen laughed harshly.
"He _was_ shot. Did you do it before or after he was dragged?"
"You're getting pretty big for yore britches, boy."
"Pack came here to see Ma. Someday he'll kill you, Cullen."
"That would set fine with you, wouldn't it, sissy boy? It just happens that I didn't even know he was around. If I had, I'd probably a done worse. Me 'n Pa both told him to stay away from here."
"He's got a right to come see Ma."
Cullen shrugged and banged his cup on the table for Steamboat to refill it. The thin, slump-shouldered man with a wrinkle-etched face, iron gray hair and a drooping mustache brought the heavy pot to the table and thumped it down. Cullen reached for the handle, then withdrew his hand quickly.
"Goddamn it, Steamboat! Leave the damn rag! That handle's hot as hell." The cook tossed the cloth on the table and hurried back to turn the meat cooking in the big spider skillet.
"There's men beside me that would take pleasure out of beating the hell out of Pack," Cullen said after he had filled his cup. "He was told not to win that last fight. He should a hightailed it out of the country. It's his own damn fault he got jumped."
"Are you saying you had nothing to do with it?" Trellis looked his brother straight in the eye.
"Yes, sissy ass. I'm sayin' I had nothing to do with it only because somebody else got to him first."
Trellis ignored the slur and said calmly, "Mara thinks you did."
"Shitfire! I don't care what she thinks."
"She's not the mousy thing you thought she was, Cull. She'll stand up to you."
"She'd better hie her prissy tail back to Denver, is what she'd better do."
"You'd best be civil to her. She'll not take your sass. She put you out of the house, didn't she?"
"I didn't sleep there half the time anyhow. 'Bout the time somebody comes in on her she'll wish I was there."
"I'm thinkin' she'd blow a man's head off with that little gun she carries in her pocket, eh Cullen?"
"Are you bein' _her_ serving wench too, Trell?" Cullen asked when the boy placed two plates on the tray for Steamboat to fill. He was stung by the mention of the pistol the girl had pulled on him. "You're turnin' into a real housemaid."
"Someday I'm going to bust your mouth, Cullen," Trell said calmly.
"Ya can dream about it. It'll be a cold day in hell, boy. 'Pears to me like you're suckin' up to Miss High-'n-Mighty. Are you thinkin' you'll be man enough to run this place someday?"
Sam Sparks watched and listened. The boy was showing much more maturity than his older brother. In a few years the boy's body would catch up, and Sam would like to be around to see what happened.
If Cullen and his bunch hadn't beaten Pack, who had? Sam mulled the question over in his mind, then dismissed it. Pack Gallagher wasn't his business. The fact that Cullen allowed outlaws to hide out here for a price wasn't his business. He was looking for bigger fish than a few two-bit outlaws. Sooner or later his break would come if he just remained patient.
Sam pondered Miss McCall's sudden appearance and how it would affect the situation here. Plenty of bangtails hung out in all the railroad towns—worn-out women who supplied a man with what he needed for the moment. But decent women were scarce out here in the Wyoming Territory, and pretty young single women rarer still. . . . Cullen had swallowed his story about needing a place to hide out. He'd paid for a month's lodging. The inactivity was about to kill him, but he'd stick it out for that length of time, and if nothing turned up, he'd mosey on over to Laramie.
"I've got to exercise my horse. I think I'll ride out to the lower basin." Sam got to his feet and reached for his hat.
"Stay away from the squatters' place. Rivers is liable to fill your tail full of lead if ya get too close." The bowlegged man who had helped him carry Pack into the house looked up with a grin that showed tobacco-stained teeth.
"What's he hiding out there?" Sam asked casually.
"His sister. She's pretty as a speckled pup 'n blind as a bat. I heard a woman singin' as I was ridin' along Lodgepole Creek. It come up over the hill sweet 'n clear as a bell. I rode on up close so's to hear. Bang! The next thing I knowed my horse got a load of rock salt in his rump 'n I went tail over teakettle. Rivers said next time it'd be lead. I ain't never heared of a man keepin' such a close eye on a _sister._ Haw! Haw! Haw!"
Cullen and the two men at the table all shouted with laughter.
"She's sightly. Ain't no two ways 'bout it." Cullen spoke as if he were privileged to something they knew nothing about. "If you want to get a look at her, hang around when Rivers brings her over to visit Brita. She comes every week or so 'n helps sissy pants with his ma."
Sam was getting more than a little tired of Cullen constantly belittling the boy because he took care of his crippled mother and bit back what he really wanted to say.
"He doesn't keep _too_ close a watch on her if he lets her come here," he said almost absently.
"Charlie Rivers'll sit here on the porch 'n watch to see that no one gets close to her."
"What's he scared of?" Sam moved out of the way so Trellis could pass with the tray.
"Hell! I guess he's scared somebody'll get under her skirt 'n atween her legs. Hell! It ain't a bad idea." Cullen grinned. "Bet she ain't had no man . . . less'n it was Charley. She's so damn blind she'd not even know who it was anyhow!"
Sam looked down at the shorter man. "Cut out that kind of talk, McCall." His voice was more deadly because he spoke quietly. "Any man who forces himself on a woman, decent or not, will answer to me."
Cullen was taken aback by the quiet authority in the Texan's voice and was embarrassed to be chastised in front of the men.
"You Texans are sure touchy 'bout women." His need to redeem himself forced him to speak with a sneer in his voice. "Hell, they all got a slit. If'n they ain't goin' to let a man enjoy it, they ort a sew it up."
The laugh Cullen expected didn't come. The men got up and filed out the door, leaving him sitting at the table alone. Sam followed them out. He stood on the porch and looked off toward the mountains. Where in all this vast land was the man he hunted? Each time he thought he was close, the trail faded away. When he followed a trail on the ground, he also trailed with his mind. It was what made him good at his job. He had to think as the man he hunted would think. If he had someone on his tail, Sam reasoned, he'd want a far-off place where he could keep out of sight for a good long while. This was such a place. But hell, a hundred places such as this existed between here and Denver.
* * *
The dishes were washed and dried and stacked on the clean end of the trestle table. Her mother's service for ten had dwindled to a service for no more than four. Mara wondered what had happened to the pots and the iron spider that had hung on the nails behind the stove. She remembered the large wooden bread bowl, the churn, the caster set, none of which she had found. She would have cried had she not been so angry.
"Ma! What the hell am I doing here?"
As Mara dried her hands on her apron and hurried across to the door, she could hear Brita's soothing tones. Mara rapped on the door and then opened it. To her dismay the man on the bunk had swung his feet off and pushed himself to a sitting position. The end of the blanket lay across his lap, but otherwise he was completely nude. She quickly averted her eyes.
He looked up when she opened the door. His bruised face was still swollen and his dark hair looked as if he had been in a violent windstorm. He squinted at her, and a string of swear words dropped into the silence.
"Hell and damnation! Sweet Jesus! Good God Almighty, Holy Sainted Mother of God! What the hell are _you_ doing here?"
The hostile greeting stunned her into silence and splintered her thoughts. Wildly she sought a reason for his fury. Finally she was able to speak.
"Mr. Gallagher, I must insist that as long as you remain in this house you refrain from taking the Lord's name in vain. Hell and damnation are permissible; the rest of what you said is not!"
He gaped at her as she lifted her chin and looked down her nose at him and then away. "I'm Mara Shannon McCall. We met once, a long time ago."
"I know who the hell you are—"
"Oh, dear! I've heard that already once this morning. Should you be sitting up?"
"You were the woman who found me . . . helped me in the wagon! Jesus!"
"Mr. Gallagher." She made a restless movement with her hand. He continued to look at her. "Being hungry must account for your vile mood. Trellis is bringing some meat. I'll make a strong broth—"
"Broth! Hell and damnation, woman. I need something that will stick to my ribs and give me some strength so I can get the hell out of this vipers' nest before someone slits my throat. Where are my clothes?"
"I didn't take them off you," she snapped, her face going beet red. "Mr. Sparks did. They were nothing but rags anyhow." Mara deliberately turned her back on him and smiled at Brita. "I'll bring some water so you can wash. Trellis went down to the cookhouse to get your breakfast. I'll be able to cook our meals here after today."
"You're not staying."
Mara heard the shocking words and turned back to stare at the man before she remembered that he was naked except for the corner of the blanket. She found herself fascinated by his broad shoulders and wide chest marked by cuts and bruises. A triangle of soft dark hair covered his chest down to where the white bandage was wrapped about his middle. His thighs were rock hard and covered with soft black down. His legs looked to be as sturdy as tree trunks. She had seen a picture of a naked man in a medical book and knew what he covered with the end of the blanket. Her face flamed at the thought.
"What did you say?"
"You heard me the first time. I said you're not staying here. This is no place for you. I tried to head you off at Sheffield Station."
"You have no say in the matter, Mr. Gallagher, and I'll thank you to tend to your own business. I'm of age. I own this place, and I have a perfect right to be here."
"I said nothing about the _right,_ you addle-headed woman. I said this is not the place for you. You belong back in Denver among your own kind."
"And what kind is that?"
"Society . . . where you can get a rich husband to take care of you properly."
"I'm not in the market for a husband, rich or otherwise. I'd think you would be pleased that I'm here. Your mother needs care that Trellis can't give her."
"I've got a Mexican woman lined up to come here and look after Ma. I'd have taken her away from this place long ago, but she wouldn't go. Something about honoring her marriage vows," he added sarcastically.
"Now, now," Brita said soothingly. "Ye be in no shape to be carryin' on, son. Yer head must be fair bustin'."
"Aye, 'tis. Damn women don't know when they're well off."
"Damn men don't, either," Mara said calmly. "Lie down before you bleed all over the place and I have another mess to clean up. And cover your nakedness!"
"Jesus, my God! Deliver me from a bossy woman."
"If one more word of blasphemy comes from your mouth, Pack Gallagher, you will lie there and starve to death before I cook for you."
Mara's level stare, daring him to defy her, effectively silenced his lips, but his eyes, as dark as midnight, gleamed with resentment. He eased himself down on the bunk and pulled the blanket up to his chest.
"I've got to have my clothes . . . ma'am."
Mara picked up the shirt that lay on the floor and held it up. "This is beyond repair."
"Jes—" He cut off the word. "That buckskin shirt saved me some skin. Where's Trell? Where are my britches? Hell, I'm as defenseless as a babe lying here."
"Trell's gone to get your mother's breakfast. You don't need your britches because you're not going anywhere, and you needn't worry about lying there defenseless. I'll guard you until you can take care of yourself."
"My God, Ma! Did you hear that? She'll guard me!"
"Yes, I'll guard you with this." Mara took the pistol from her pocket. "I know how to load it and how to shoot it."
"Put that damn thing away before you blow my head off!"
"That's not a bad idea. Blowing your head off, I mean. I'm tempted to do it, but I almost broke my back getting you into that wagon. I'll not waste that effort by shooting you now."
"You are most kind and generous, ma'am."
"What did you mean when you said you tried to head me off at Sheffield Station? Did you intercept the letter I sent to Cousin Aubrey?"
"No, I did."
"You . . . Cousin Brita?" Mara was almost too stunned to speak.
"Trell went to town 'n brought the mail. Don't be blamin' Pack, darlin'," Brita pleaded.
Mara felt a wave of bitter disappointment and turned eyes dark with hurt on Brita. For the first time since she came home she felt like crying.
"Why? Why don't you want me here?"
"Child, it not be a matter of wantin' ye here." Brita rolled her head on the pillow, her eyes filled with tears. "There be no nice thin's here yer used to havin'. 'Tis rough 'n wild country, with rough 'n wild men. There be no one to stand 'tween ye 'n them."
"Do you mean to say Cousin Aubrey and Cullen wouldn't protect me if . . . if I needed protection?"
Mara heard a snort of disgust come from Pack.
"I don't be knowin' if they . . . could."
"Or would," Pack added.
Mara turned on him in a temper, feeling hot, uncomfortable, a little lost and unsure. He stared back at her, his eyes telling her that he knew of her uncertainty. When she spoke, there was nothing but cold determination in her voice.
"You keep out of this. I'm talking to your mother," she said frigidly. She was surprised and pleased that her voice came calmly from her tight throat because she was burning with uncertainty. She braced herself for a mocking jibe, but none came, and she turned back to Brita. "If you were worried that I would ask you and Aubrey to leave, you can rest assured that I will not. I owe you, as my mother's friend, and I owe Aubrey for working this place and keeping me in school."
"But, darlin'—"
Brita was interrupted by Pack. " 'Tis good of you not to throw my mother out."
His voice plucked at Mara's already taut nerves, and only a momentary burst of common sense prevented her from yelling at him. She turned a cool, superior gaze on him.
"Your mother will always be welcome in my home. However, that does not necessarily apply to her son, Mr. Gallagher. I have no such obligation to you," she said calmly, then turned quickly and left the room.
"Ye shouldn't rile her, son," Brita murmured. "She be a fine lass, 'n the spittin' image of Colleen McCall, but with more spirit. Ye should have seen her pull that little gun on Cullen."
"On Cullen? What did he do?"
"He be mouthin' off, like he does. She says be civil or be leavin'. Cullen come to yer bed, 'n cool as ye please the lass moved in 'n pulled the gun from her pocket. Cullen backed off. She ain't a lass to be pushed, son."
"What'll I do, Ma?" Pack said wearily.
"There be one thing—"
"No! That I'll not do unless all else fails."
"Ye got to be gettin' on yer feet. Do ye be feelin' a fever comin' on? Yer side ain't bad, just a cut as the shot went by ye."
"My damn leg burns like hellfire, I ache in a hundred places and I'm about to starve to death. Aside from all that I'm in pretty good shape."
"Ye be lucky to be alive," Brita murmured. "I be thinkin' ye'd not make it when ye was brung in."
"I wasn't sure myself, Ma."
"The Holy Mother was watchin' o'er ye, son. She sent Mara Shannon to see to ye."
"Holy Mother had nothing to do with it. More than likely it was old Jim at the station. He didn't want to be the one to help me. He sent Mara Shannon to do it."
"Was Cullen in on it?"
"I didn't see him."
"Who done it, son?"
"It's best you don't know, Ma. It'll not happen again."
"Ye can't be havin' more laudanum."
"I don't want any. I've got to keep my head clear."
# Chapter
FOUR
Pack ate several soft biscuits for breakfast but was unable to chew the fried meat because of his sore jaws. Mara thought he hadn't missed anything. The meat was so salty that she could hardly eat it herself. She longed for a bowl of cold mush, honey, and cream and coffee that didn't taste as if it were made from boiled acorns.
After the meal Brita asked Mara if she would help Trellis change the bandage on Pack's side. She could feel his eyes on her face as she bent over the bunk and carefully pulled away the bandage. Sam had done a good job closing the wound. The bullet had apparently passed through the fleshy part of his side. Although Mara kept her eyes averted from Pack's face, she knew he was breathing faster than normal by the way his stomach moved beneath her touch.
When she finished, she found a reason to be out of the room and left Trellis to change the bandage on Pack's thigh which was the more serious of the two bullet wounds. The boy bathed it with vinegar water and placed a cloth sprinkled with burned alum against it when Mara brought it from the kitchen.
After they had finished, Brita motioned for her to come close and whispered in her ear. Trellis stood awkwardly at the end of the bunk with his face averted. Her own face flamed. She felt the complete fool for not realizing the man would have to, at times, relieve himself. Mara left the room and closed the door, vowing to have as little as possible to do with the tending of Pack Gallagher.
She worked in the kitchen, using what meager supplies she could find to make it clean. She tied a rag around the straw broom and wiped down the walls before she swept the floor. Making suds in the warm water with strong lye soap as she had seen the kitchen help do at the school, she washed all the utensils and scrubbed the workbench, trestle table, and wash bench before using the water to scrub the floor.
It wasn't work she was used to doing, but she welcomed it because she did her best thinking while her hands were busy. First things first, she told herself. Make the house at least livable, then make Aubrey give an accounting of the money so she would know how much they had to live on. Thank goodness she had saved a major portion of the allowance he had put in the bank in Denver. She was not entirely without funds.
Trellis brought a hunk of deer meat from the smokehouse. Mara cut it in cubes, browned it in the iron kettle, then covered it with water and set it on the cookstove to simmer. When the meat was tender enough for Pack to chew, she would make dumplings in the broth if she could get Trellis to bring her flour and lard from the cookshack.
Mara mopped the floor, poured several buckets of clear water over it, and swept it out the door with her broom. She smiled at the thought of what Miss Fillamore would say if she could see her now. No doubt it would have something to do with common labor being a disgraceful waste of an education!
Exhausted when she was finished, Mara viewed the room with satisfaction. It was clean and smelled of soap and damp wood. She arranged the few dishes in the cupboard and brought a cloth from her trunk to put on the table. The room was a poor imitation of what it once had been, but it was a start.
While carrying out a pail of dirty water to throw in the yard, she saw a group of horsemen coming up the road toward the house. She paused on the porch, wiped her hair back from her face with the back of her hand, and watched Aubrey and Cullen hurry from the bunkhouse to meet the riders. They stopped in the road, but one man came on up to the house.
"Howdy." The man tipped his hat to Mara and she nodded.
"Howdy, Marshal," Cullen said. "Looks like you've been ridin' for awhile. Bring your men on down to the bunkhouse, eat a bite 'n have a cup of coffee."
"This isn't a social visit, McCall. We're trailin' four men. The tracks led right here."
"Four men came in early this morning 'n wanted to do some horse tradin'. Said they were part of a posse trailin' a gang that killed a nester 'n his woman. They had badges—"
"You gave them fresh horses?"
"Why, 'course, Ace. They were part of your posse."
"You know goddamn well they were not part of my posse!" The marshal beckoned to his men. "Go on down to the corral and take a look at those horses. Who ya got here now, McCall?"
"Same as always. Me and Pa, the twins, Steamboat 'n old Riley."
"And that's all?" he asked. His disbelief was obvious.
"That's all." Cullen looked the man in the eyes and lied.
The marshal walked his horse toward the porch. "How do, ma'am?"
Mara came down the steps.
"I must apologize for my cousin's rudeness in not introducing us. I'm Mara Shannon McCall." She held out her hand when the man dismounted. He removed his hat before his calloused hand clasped hers. He was thin as a whiplash, had a strong, weathered face and sandy hair that contrasted with the dark mustache that swooped down on each side of his mouth.
"Ace January, marshal out of Laramie."
"I'm pleased to know you. Perhaps you knew my father, Shannon McCall, who built this place?"
"No, I've only been here for about five years. I came out after the war."
"I've been in Denver for the past seven years, but I'm home now to stay," she said smiling, and pulled her hand from his.
"That's mighty good news, Miss McCall."
"I'm glad to know there's a lawman in the area. You're welcome anytime, Mr. January." Mara glanced past the marshal and saw the look of agitation on Cullen's face. Let the little weasel squirm, she thought, and smiled sweetly at Ace January. "I'd invite you in, but I've just finished mopping and my floor is wet. The next time you come this way, stop by and I'll bake you a layer cake."
"I'll not let you forget that, ma'am." The lawman's eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. They seemed reluctant to leave her face. She was the softest, most wholesome-looking woman he'd seen in a long time. How in the hell could she be related to two no-good bastards like Cullen and Aubrey McCall? No matter, he thought. Her presence would not deter him one bit if he got proof the man he was looking for was here. He'd swoop down on this place and burn it out regardless of the girl and that poor crippled wife of Aubrey's just as he'd had to burn out other outlaw nests.
Mara stood on the porch and watched the posse leave the homestead. She had the feeling the lawman didn't like her cousins and that they didn't like him. Well, no matter. He seemed to be a nice man doing his job. The next time he came this way, the house would be put to order and she wouldn't be ashamed to invite a guest into her home.
"Cousin Aubrey," Mara called. "Will you please ask someone to move this pile of wood from the porch and carry it to the back of the house where it belongs?"
Aubrey glared at her but didn't answer.
A half hour later, Travor and Cullen, sullen and silent, moved the wood and piled it around a stump at the back of the house.
* * *
By the time the day ended Mara wasn't sure she was equipped to handle so much as one more abusive word or pull one more pail of water from the well behind the house. She had had a run-in with Travor when she asked him not to walk on her clean floor until it was dry. Cullen had demanded to know how long Pack Gallagher intended to hide behind her skirts, and Aubrey had refused to talk to her about the financial state of the property. Her pride and her body had taken a beating. She was exhausted, too exhausted to move her things upstairs, too exhausted to do more than wash in the washpan when she longed with all her heart to sink down into a nice warm bath and let the tension flow out of her. In Denver all she had to do was request that the tub in the small room at the end of the upper hall be filled with warm water. Being here was like being in another world.
Mara pulled her nightgown over her head, loosened her hair from the coil, and crawled into bed. Tomorrow, she told herself, tomorrow she would work on the upstairs rooms, and then Trellis or Aubrey could have this one. She fell into a deep sleep almost immediately.
Something aroused her from that black, peaceful void. She stared into the darkness, shivered, and lifted her head from the pillow. After a long moment, she threw back the covers and went to the window to look out. The shimmering glow of the moon illuminated the landscape. Nothing stirred on the slope in front of the house. She went to the other window and looked toward the bunkhouse. All was quiet there. She was returning to her bed when she heard a hoarse whisper coming from Brita's room and tiptoed to the door to listen.
"Ma! Ma . . . wake up."
Mara lit the lamp, checked to see if the buttons on her nightdress were closed, then opened the door between her room and Brita's.
"Ma . . ." Pack's voice rasped out weakly.
In the soft glow of the lamp, Mara could see that he had thrown back the cover until it barely covered his privates. She placed the lamp on the bureau and went to the bunk.
"I'm burning up." He moved his hand down to pull the quilt up to cover himself. "Can I trouble you for a drink of water?"
Mara felt his forehead with her palm. "Oh, my. You _are_ hot! You've got an awful fever!"
Brita roused. "Mara? What's the matter with Pack?" she asked anxiously.
"He's taken a fever. I'll get cold water and wash him down." Forgetting about being barefoot and in her nightgown, Mara hurried to the kitchen and the water bucket that sat on the shelf.
"Bring vinegar, child," Brita called. "Put the kettle on for sage tea." Brita could hear the stove lids clang and knew Mara had stuffed the firebox with wood and was putting the teakettle on.
Mara came back into the room carrying the water bucket and a pan. She placed them on the floor beside the bunk.
"Towels? Oh, I've got some in my trunk."
Pack's feverish eyes followed her. She floated out of the room and then back in like an angel out of a dream. She came to him, bent over him, and lifted his head to help him drink from the cup she held to his lips. He drank gratefully and sank back. She wet a large towel and laid it across his bare chest, wet a smaller cloth for his forehead.
"You've got to drink more water, Pack." Mara refilled the cup, slid her arm beneath his neck, and lifted his head. "Drink as much as you can." There was a concerned tone in her voice that he had not heard before. Her hair fell forward onto his chest. He could feel the softness of her body against his upper arm. He closed his eyes. Ah, her face, her sweet face. He had not thought he would ever be this close to her. As he drained the cup, she pulled her arm from beneath him.
On her knees beside the bunk Mara began to sponge his shoulders, then his upper and lower arms. She flipped the hair back over her shoulder and bent over the big oak of a man, and he suddenly stopped his restless movements and lay still. She touched the wet cloth to his bruised face, his torso with its hundreds of cuts and scratches, and shuddered at the pain he must have endured. His shoulders and arms bulged with muscles, yet the fever made him so helpless that he lay placidly still beneath her hands. When his eyes looked directly into hers, she was startled to see that they were blue, midnight blue, and the expression in them was soft, questioning.
"Mara Shannon," he whispered weakly, "you shouldn't be doin' for the likes of Pack Gallagher."
"Be quiet, Pack Gallagher," she said with gentle tyranny.
"You're walking on these splintery floors with naught on your feet."
"My feet be no business of yours, Mr. Gallagher." Her whispered words were soft, without censure, and her eyes were shadowed with worry.
"Ye can call Trell—"
"Mara Shannon is not a squeamish woman. Ye just lie still. I be doing what has to be done to get the fever down. Then you'll be drinking the sage tea I'll be brewing." Unconsciously both of them had lapsed into Irish brogues.
Mara turned to dip the towel in the basin again. Her hair spilled over onto Pack's hand where it lay on the bed. His spread fingers combed through the silken strands when she turned back to lay the cloth once again on his forehead. The lamplight shone on the rich darkness of her hair, turning the strands to flame. The eyes that looked into his were soft emerald green, shadowed with concern. He liked what he saw in her eyes and longed to have it last forever.
Pack had never been so close to heaven, and never had he been more painfully aware of the difference between them. He could smell the feminine, sensual aroma of her woman's body, see the mysterious movements of her breasts beneath the cloth of her high-necked, modest gown. Mara Shannon was beautiful, proud, well-acquainted with all the social graces. He, Pack Gallagher, was a freighter, wild and rough, earning money with his fists, and could scarcely write more than his name. Pack closed his eyes, and the low moan that came softly from his swollen lips had nothing to do with his aching body and his pounding headache. It came from deep within his soul.
Stubbornly Mara stayed beside Pack and sponged his hot body, first with vinegar and then water. She held his head and forced him to drink cup after cup of the lukewarm sage tea. When the lamp began to flicker, she hurried to the kitchen for another lamp before the fuel ran out, leaving them in total darkness.
Brita watched helplessly, thanking God for Mara. The girl worked tirelessly through the long night hours as Pack dozed and became quiet, then roused and moved restlessly. Finally he slipped into a deep sleep.
"He seems cooler, Brita." Mara stood and looked down at his bruised face and the nose that leaned slightly to one side. She wondered what Pack Gallagher would look like when his face healed. He would not be handsome—his features were too craggy for that—but he would not be ugly.
"Dry him, lass. Dry 'n cover him."
Mara removed the wet towels and gently dried Pack's face and chest. She pulled the blanket up over his shoulders and tucked it in. She had never known anyone like him, had never before touched a man so intimately. Her palms had moved over the hard flesh of his shoulders and arms and her fingers had slipped beneath his thick wrist to lift his injured hand. Mara had sponged his chest, surprised to see the pink nipples nestled in the soft hair that ended where the bandage was wrapped about his middle.
Thank God the one time her forearm brushed against the soft bulge covered by the quilt he was asleep. She had jumped as if she had touched fire. After that she tried to avoid looking at the area below his hard, flat belly, but she knew that what was there was in proportion to the rest of him.
Pack was a rough man, yet he had been concerned about her, and more than one time during the last few hours he had urged her to rest before she wore herself out, to put on her shoes, to stop lifting the bucket of water.
Mara studied his face, his dark rumpled hair, and listened to his even breathing. It was a miracle that his ribs were not broken considering the bruises along his sides. It had taken more than one man to do this to him. She wondered if he would seek vengeance when he was well again.
"Come lie down, Mara Shannon. Like Pack says, ye must be wore out. Lie beside me. I'll wake ye if ye're needed."
"I think I will, if you're sure I won't bother you." Mara lay down on the far edge of the bed. "I don't know how you can be so kind and so patient, Brita. Don't you just want to scream sometimes?"
"Aye. Arthritis is what the doctor be callin' what 'tis cripplin' me. At first I be feelin' sorry fer meself. I be angry fer bein' locked in a crippled body. Now I got to be sayin' 'tis God's will. _He_ don't be puttin' more burdens on a body than they be able to bear."
"Who did this terrible thing to Pack?" Mara asked, tilting her head on the pillow so that she could see Brita's face.
"I don't be knowin'. Pack says 'twas not Cullen, so we can't be blamin' him fer _that._ "
"Where does Pack live? How does he make his living?" Questions she would not have asked in the daylight seemed perfectly reasonable to ask now.
"Sometimes he goes to Cheyenne, sometimes to Laramie or Denver."
"To Denver? What does he do there?"
"Pack's got a freight line, lass. 'Tis business what takes him there. My Pack, he be not afraid to work or take a risk. 'Twas haulin' cats to the mines what paid for his wagons 'n mules." Laughter shone in the blue eyes of the gentle-faced woman.
"Barn cats? Why in the world would he haul cats to the mines?"
"Mice 'n rats were eatin' up the grub he be takin' to the mining camps. There not be a cat in sight fer them to fear. Pack built cages atop his wagons 'n put the word out he'd pay twenty-five cents fer any cat what was brought to him. 'Twas not long till he had two loads a cats. He took them to the camps 'n they sold fer ten dollars each."
"That's robbery!"
"Not a'tall, lass. The next load went for more. 'Tis what was needed. The cats ate the mice 'n rats. 'Twas a tidy savin' on the grub." There was a proud smile on Brita's face. "My Pack, he be knowin' how to make money."
"Then how is it that he doesn't have a proper home? What does he do with his money?"
"Pack be a grown man. I wouldna ask him, child."
There was a long silence, then Mara asked, "Does he come here often?"
"Once, twice a month. Pack be wantin' me to go to Denver to see the doctor. But 'twould be fer naught." Brita turned her head so she could look at the girl lying beside her. "Mara Shannon, I asked Pack to head ye off at Sheffield Station. Ye can be seein' why. 'Tis a hard life out here. Things be goin' on that I don't be knowin' about. Trell 'n Pack know, but they . . . not be wantin' me to . . . worry." Brita moved her arm until her crippled hand lay on her chest, and she sucked in great gulps of air into her lungs.
Mara raised up. "What's the matter, Brita?"
" 'Tis nothin'. I get a pain at times. 'Tis from layin' abed." She closed her eyes and pressed her lips tightly together. As the pain eased her face relaxed. "Don't be tellin' it to Trell 'n Pack."
"I won't. Does it come often?"
" 'Tis naught to worry 'bout, darlin'. It comes with the sickness."
Mara lay back down. A question nagged at her. Was Brita's heart about to give out? Her mother had complained of pains in her chest before she died. Mara reached out her hand and touched Brita's arm. Please, God, she prayed, don't take Brita.
"I'm glad I came home, Brita," she whispered. "I wish I had come sooner. I'll take care of you now."
"Ye're a sweet child like yer mother."
"I've been lonely. It's good to talk to someone who knew my parents. Being Irish, I wasn't really accepted by the other girls at the school." Mara paused, remembering her loneliness when parents came to visit the students. Graduation had been held on the lawn in front of the school. A crowd of people were there, but not one of them had come to see her get her diploma. "I was considered a good teacher for a shanty Irish lass. Miss Fillamore thought I had risen far above my station in life. She couldn't understand why I wanted to leave the school. But Brita, I could see myself growing old and narrow-minded just as she was," Mara whispered. "Old, without ever knowing the love of a husband and children."
"Aye, 'tis why God made a woman. 'Tis lucky a woman be to have the love of a good man. I be one of the lucky ones. Me Gallagher was a big man, like Pack. He loved with all his heart . . . and hated the same. He was dear to me heart."
Brita fell silent. Mara waited for her to say more about her beloved Gallagher, but slowly sleep overcame Mara's determination to stay awake. She slept dreamlessly until she awakened with a dull headache and to the smell of coffee. She opened her eyes and found herself staring at Trell's young face bent over his mother.
"Pack?" Mara slid off the bed and hurried around the end of it to the bunk.
"He's sweatin'. Ma says the fever broke."
Pack was awake. His eyes were clear. He looked different this morning. His face was leaner, his lips thinner. Much of the swelling had gone from his face. Small beads of sweat stood on his forehead.
"Are you feeling better?" Mara placed the palm of her hand against his cheek.
"Much better."
"You're not at all feverish."
"You took care of that last night. Thank you."
"Why, Pack Gallagher!" she teased. "If you don't watch out you might be civil to me." Her smile was radiant. "Are you hungry?"
"Starved."
"I'll fix you something."
"You best be making yourself decent first unless you're wanting every man on this place to see you in your night-clothes." He swung his gaze down the full length of her body.
Mara backed away from him as if he had struck her. A rosy redness rushed up her neck to flood her cheeks, and anger kept pace.
"I had no such thought in mind, Pack Gallagher! You're an evil man to even think it!"
"Evil or not, I am a man, Mara Shannon. A man who knows you're naked under that gown!"
"Oh! Why . . . damn your rotten soul! I needn't have wondered about you ever being civil. You don't know what the word means! You're a crude, rude, asinine man with cow dung for brains. And you can go straight to hell for all I care!"
"Swearing too! Your Pa didn't send you to school to have you come out talking like a mule skinner!" Pack's face was rigid with lines of disapproval.
There was silence, a bitter aching silence.
Mara seethed with anger. His criticism grated on her nerves like chalk screeching against a slate, filling her with a red rage. Not trusting herself to speak lest she bring forth more swear words that came to mind, Mara lifted her chin and walked from the room. Her legs were unsteady, but her shoulders were square and her back straight. Not until she reached her room did she give way to her anger. Then she slammed the door so hard the house shook.
* * *
The day had started off badly, and it didn't get any better as it progressed. By the middle of the afternoon Mara was tired and angry. She had sent Trellis to find Aubrey only to discover that her cousin had gone to town. Now she stood at the window of one of the upstairs rooms and looked down at the three men sitting on the porch of the cookshack. They had been sitting there for hours while she had been carrying trash down the stairs and piling it on the back porch. The two upstairs rooms had been filthy. Mouse droppings were everywhere. Mara vowed to buy a cat if she couldn't get one any other way. Finally the rooms were clean, the mop and pail were carried down to the back porch, and the windows were open to let a cool breeze pass through. She had done all she could do without help. She needed someone to carry the old musty mattress out into the yard to air, and needed help to carry her things up the stairs.
The bureau in the room was usable, as was the washstand. The bed and mattress in the room downstairs would have to be brought up as well as her trunk. Before winter she would purchase a rug for the floor. Up here she would at least have a measure of privacy.
Before Mara had quite realized that she had made a decision, she was down the stairs, out of the house, and heading for the bunkhouse. The breeze felt good on her hot face; the pistol in her pocket slapped reassuringly against her leg as she walked.
The men on the porch stopped talking and watched her approach. She recognized the man who had helped Sam Sparks carry Pack into the house. An old man without teeth sat on a bench, one leg crossed over the other, and a young man, hard looking with bold black eyes, sat on the edge of the porch. He wore down-at-the-heels boots and cruel-looking spurs.
"Do you men work here?" Mara asked curtly, addressing all three.
They looked at her silently, sullenly. Then the young bold-eyed man grinned at her, folded the knife he had been using to pare his nails, and put it in his pocket. He moved his eyes slowly over her body, then brought them back to linger on her breast.
"What ya wantin', sweetheart?"
Mara gave him a scornful glance that had sent schoolgirls scurrying to their rooms in tears. He didn't seem to notice her displeasure. His grin broadened, showing a missing tooth. He looked at her with his head cocked to one side.
"Do you understand English? I asked if you _worked_ here."
"Work here?" he echoed. His eyes moved over her again before they came back to her face. "Sweetheart, I ain't likely to ever be that hard up!"
"Then what are you doing here?"
"Why, I'm just passin' the time." His eyes darted to the other two men.
"Then I suggest you pass the time someplace else."
"They work here." Cullen spoke belligerently as he came out the door. "What are you doing out here?" he demanded.
"If they work here, why aren't they working? It seems to me there's plenty to be done." Mara had to tilt her head to glare at Cullen who stood on the porch.
"Get on back to the house. What goes on down here is no concern of yours."
"Everything on this place concerns me. I want to know why these men have loafed out here all afternoon. Look at that corral. Look at that shed. A good wind would blow them away. They need repair as well as—" She caught herself just before she mentioned the outhouse that leaned perilously to one side. "Just about everything around here needs repair."
"I'm tellin' ya to mind your own business 'n get back to the house. I thought takin' care of that son of a bitchin' Gallagher would keep you busy."
"Don't you dare cast a reflection on Cousin Brita's character!"
"Don't be tellin' me what to do or _say!_ I'm running things here, and if you don't like it, you can hightail it back to your fancy school!"
"You worthless, mouthy, slimy little piece of horse dung!" Mara sputtered. "You'll not be running things here for long. I can assure you of that."
"Whoopee! She's got some mouth on her, Cullen." The bold-eyed man slapped his thigh and shouted with laughter. Mara ignored him and spoke to Cullen again.
"When your father gets back, tell him that I want to talk to him . . . tonight!"
"Tell him yoreself."
Sam Sparks came out the door and stood behind Cullen.
"Afternoon, Miss McCall."
"Hello, Mr. Sparks." Mara's color was high. She didn't think she had ever been so angry in her life, but she would not give this group the pleasure of laughing at her. "Could I trouble you to help me for a short while, Mr. Sparks?" she asked calmly. "These _gentlemen_ are too busy."
"Certainly, ma'am." He moved around Cullen and stepped off the porch.
"If'n you'd a asked me that nice, I'd a helped you do most anythin' you'd want done, little sweet thin'." The bold-eyed man stood. He was as rangy as a wolf and reminded Mara of one.
"Mister, I don't like your looks, and I don't like your manners." Mara spoke icily. She looked from the bold-eyed man to Cullen. "If this is an example of the men you have working here, it's no wonder the place is run-down. Get rid of him."
The man whooped with laughter. "Well, foofaraw! Ain't she uppity? You'd better set Miss Lacy Drawers straight about a few things, Cullen."
"Go on back to the house, Mara." Cullen's eyes were blazing with anger and his voice choked.
"Come on, ma'am." Sam took Mara's elbow in his hand and urged her toward the house. "It'd be best if you didn't come down here, Miss McCall," he said after they had walked a distance from the bunkhouse.
"Do you mean to say that it isn't safe for me to move about on my own property?"
"The property may be yours, Miss McCall, but it's not in your possession. Yes, I'd say it's not safe for a genteel young woman to wander away from the house."
"I have a pistol in my pocket, and I wouldn't hesitate to use it."
"Have you ever shot a man?"
"No, but I could . . . if I had to."
"I wouldn't count on gettin' the drop on a man like Sporty Howard. Stay away from him."
"Well . . . for goodness sake!"
"How is Pack?" Sam dropped his hand from her arm as they neared the house.
"Grouchy as a bear."
"He must be feeling better."
"Mr. Sparks, something is going on here that I don't like. I can't get Aubrey or Cullen to tell me a thing."
"It's not my place, ma'am, so don't ask me. It might be best, as they say, if you went back to Denver."
"No! If one more person tells me to leave my home in the hands of these incompetent fools and go back to Denver I'm going to throw a screaming fit!"
Sam Sparks grinned down at her. "I'm not sure I'd want to be around when that happens."
They had come into the kitchen. Mara flashed him a saucy smile, unaware that Pack could see them from where he lay on the bunk in the adjoining room.
"I'll tell you a secret if you'll not tell anyone." She moved close and spoke in a confidential tone. "I've never thrown a screaming fit in my life. But threatening to do it gets pretty good results . . . sometimes." She laughed softly.
"Someday someone will call your bluff; then what are you going to do?" Sam placed his hat on the table.
"I hadn't thought of that."
Mara's laughter floated into the next room, and the man on the bunk felt his muscles tighten.
"What was it you wanted done?" Sam asked.
"There's a mattress upstairs that needs airing, and I'd like help getting my bed and the rest of my things upstairs. I'm going to use the upstairs rooms because," she paused, then continued, "because I can bar the door!" She looked at Sam closely to gauge his reaction.
"Not a bad idea."
"Sam," Pack called. "Come in here."
Sam looked away from Mara and into the bedroom. "I'll be in shortly, Pack, after I help Miss McCall."
Mara walked past the doorway on the way to the stairs without looking into the room where Pack lay. Each time she passed, she tilted her nose a little higher. She would never forgive Pack Gallagher for the way he had talked to her that morning and vowed to do as little as possible for him. Trellis had brought his breakfast from the cookshack. She had carried a tray to Brita at noon, returned to set a bowl of beef and dumplings down on the stool beside Pack with a loud thump, and walked away. Since that time she had ignored him.
Sam carried Mara's trunk and carpetbags up the stairs and put the straw mattress on the back porch to air. The bed and mattress from Mara's old room was brought up and reassembled. After that Sam examined the door.
"This slip lock won't hold, ma'am. Ya need a stout bar to wedge under the knob. I'll cut one 'n leave it on the back porch tonight."
"Do you think I'll be needing it?"
"Ya can't tell, ma'am. A man gets to drinkin' at times 'n don't use no judgment."
"Thank you for helping me. Are you going to be here for a while, Mr. Sparks?"
"I'm not sure. I don't usually stay in one place long enough to get a growth a beard." He rubbed the stubble on his chin and grinned at her.
"Why are you here?" Mara asked.
"To rest my horse 'n eat grub I didn't cook over a campfire." He shrugged his shoulders. "I pay for bed 'n board."
"Do the other men pay to stay here too? Is that why they thought it so funny when I asked why they were loafing?"
"I only speak for myself, ma'am."
"I appreciate your honesty. I would have been disappointed if you had said you worked here."
After Sam went down the stairs. Mara stood in the center of the room, her arms folded across her chest, her mind crowded with questions. Sam was right when he said that although she might own the land, it wasn't in her possession. How in the world was she going to get control? And what would she do with it if she got it? She knew nothing about making a living off the land.
A feeling of utter despair came over her. Whom could she turn to for advice? Certainly not Cousin Aubrey or his son, Cullen. Her father had liked Pack Gallagher, but he had already told her to go back to Denver. He had troubles of his own and would not be around long enough to help her with hers even if he were willing. She suddenly thought of Ace January, the marshal. She filed it in the back of her mind to ask Trellis if he would take her to town to talk to him.
* * *
Sam sat down on the low stool beside Pack's bed. "How're ya doin', Pack?"
"I'll make it. I'm obliged to you for getting me in the house and sewing me up."
"Ya got yoreself worked over real good. I'd a swore ya was out cold when Miss McCall brought ya in."
"I was. Trell told me what you did. I'm surprised to see you out here, Sam."
"Why?"
"You know _why._ I never thought you'd have the need to hide out."
"It just goes to show that ya don't know everythin', Pack."
"Do you know the Rivers place over west of here?"
"I've not been there, but I heard a fellow by the name of Charlie Rivers has a place over along Lodgepole Creek."
"I'd be obliged if you'd ride over and tell him I need clothes and boots. Ma says he'll be bringing his sister over sometime during the next week or so, but I can't lay abed until then."
"I've been warned to stay clear of the Rivers place."
"Charlie's all right if you ride in and tell him your business. It's the ones that sneak around trying to get a look at Miss Emily that gets him riled up."
"How long's he been out there?"
"Three or four years. He's doing all right. He's got a little herd, does some trapping, and he gets along with the Sioux that come through there."
"Where's he from?"
"Ask him. I figure he'll tell you if he wants you to know."
Sam shrugged. "Guess he would. I'll ride over in the mornin'."
"I was riding a big, spotted gray, Sam. Have you seen anything of him?"
"I know the horse. There's not another like him in the territory. No, I've not seen him. Whoever jumped ya'd not take him to town. Ya can get hung for horse stealin' as quick as rapin' a woman."
"About Mara Shannon," Pack said in a low voice, his dark eyes holding Sam's, "she's not for the likes of anyone around here."
"Are ya warnin' me off, Pack?"
"You can call it that."
"If I set my mind on havin' her, yore warnin' wouldn't make a whit of difference. I'd fight ya for her with bullets, not fists."
"I know that."
"I'm not the one ya've got ta worry 'bout. Ya'd better look a bit closer ta home."
"Cullen? I'll kill that bastard someday. I know you're decent with women, Sam, and you'll not force yourself on her." His low voice had a warning in it.
"Ya don't want me courtin' her either, is that it?"
"That's it. What do you have to offer a woman like her? You're not a settlin' man."
"Yo're not the settlin' down kind either, Pack."
There was cold-eyed hostility in the look Pack gave Sam Sparks. "I know I'm not good enough for her, and I want you to know that you're not good enough either."
"I plan to be movin' on soon."
"What about the others? Who's down there?"
"Sporty Howard for one."
"Godamighty!"
"Ya'd best be gettin' her away from here, unless ya plan to stay around 'n ride shotgun."
"Godamighty!" Pack said again. "I'd be obliged if you stayed on till I'm on my feet."
"I plan to." Sam stood and looked down. "Galls ya to ask a favor, don't it? Can't say I'd not feel the same. Watch yoreself, Pack. Next time that bunch from Laramie will kill ya."
# Chapter
FIVE
Sam left the McCall ranch, heading in a westerly direction toward the mountains. He rode cautiously along the two-wheel track, the mid-morning sun hot on his back. It was lonely, rugged country. These were the foothills of the Laramie Mountain Range, and there were more trees on the ridges, cutting down the visibility. In the valley the grass was truly green, but higher up where it was drier, the vegetation was stiff, harsh, more gray than green. He came to Lodgepole Creek and turned, following an animal path alongside it to find a place to cross.
Where the creek narrowed, he reined in, studied the land and listened. Far off to the south he heard the short blast of a train whistle, and then another and another. The whistling went on and on. Sam decided the engineer was trying to clear the track of buffalo. The crack of a rifle reached him, then another. Soon the sound of continuous shooting echoed from hill to hill.
"Goddamn stupid bastards!" Sam had seen the frenzy of killing displayed by Easterners when they saw their first herd of the slow-plodding animals. The waste made his stomach turn. All along the tracks were piles of bones, mangy hides and rotting carcasses. What the Easterners didn't kill for sport, the buffalo hunters killed for hides. The buffalo herds were small now. If the slaughter continued, in a few years there would be no buffalo at all. Who could blame the Indian for his hatred of the white man?
Sam touched his heels to the gelding, urging him down the embankment and into the fast-moving water of the creek. The horse cautiously tested the rocky bottom to find footing, then confidently moved on across to climb the bank on the opposite side.
Thoughts of Pack Gallagher sifted into Sam's mind. He had met Pack in '68, a couple of months after Laramie sprang up. Before the iron rails had reached the site, only a few tents had been pitched to house the tie cutters and grading crews working west of Cheyenne. Almost overnight a town of several hundred shacks and cabins of logs, sod, canvas and wagon boxes had appeared. Now, two years later, Laramie was a sprawling, brawling town of rutted, dusty streets, gamblers, dance-hall women, saloon keepers, and hangers-on.
Sam had known the big Irishman by reputation and, guided by intuition, liked him. He was honest, intelligent, and intensely loyal to his friends. The previous month Sam had seen the fight between Pack and the Pittsburgh fighter whom he had challenged. The sign nailed to the wall beside the saloon door by the cigar-smoking promoter had read: A HUNDRED DOLLARS TO ANY MAN WHO CAN STAY IN THE RING FOR THREE ROUNDS WITH BLACK BOB MASON. It created a flurry of excitement, and every betting man within a hundred miles had converged on the booming town.
The fight had been the main topic of conversation in every saloon in Laramie for days. The populace would bet on anything; horserace, footrace, shooting, knife throwing—even how long a chicken could survive in the rutted road in front of the saloon before it was carried off by one of the hungry dogs that roamed the town. A prizefight in a ring was a major event.
Pack's friends had urged him to fight.
"Ye can pick up a quick hundred, Pack. Ye ain't been beat yet."
"Yo're the only man we got to go agin that blowhard."
"I seen 'em fight in Cheyenne. He ain't no bruiser, like you, Pack."
"We be needin' a grub stake, Pack. We'll be bettin' on ya to brin' home the bacon."
Big money was bet on the Pittsburgh brawler. Amid the cheers of his supporters, Pack had knocked the man out in the third round. His friends had collected their money and headed for the gold fields. Later, Sam had discovered, gamblers from the Kosy Kitty Saloon had ordered Pack to lose the fight or suffer the consequences. The reason they had not killed Pack, Sam thought now, was so he could fight another day and they could recoup their losses.
Sam moved on down the trail. He had learned to sort out sounds. The shooting had stopped. Far off he heard the screech of a rabbit that had fallen prey to a soaring hawk. The horse's long tail flicking at the pesky flies made a swishing sound; the roan's hooves crunched the dry grass. As Sam shifted his weight, the saddle leather creaked.
Suddenly above these sounds he heard a woman singing. He pulled up on the reins, stopping the roan. He didn't want to make the same mistake the outlaw back at McCall's had made and have his horse get a load of rock salt in the rump.
The woman's voice was incredibly sweet and clear.
"Beautiful dreamer, waken to me,
Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee.
Sounds of the rude world, heard in the day,
lulled by the moonlight have all passed away."
Sam sat as still as a stone long after the woman stopped singing. The beautiful tones echoed in his head. He shook his head to rid it of thoughts of another girl who had loved that song—his sister. Painful memories that he had shoved to the back of his mind came forward to torment him anew.
He had survived the war, but his family had not survived an attack by deserters who killed them for food and horses, then burned the house down so there was nothing left of his family to bury. Sam had gone back to his home on the Red River to find everything gone. Even the river had changed its course and flowed over the site of the homestead. Neighbors had told him of the vicious attack. His family was gone. Everything was gone except his childhood memories.
Just as Sam was about to ride on, the woman began to sing again. He waited and listened.
"Will you come with me, my Phyllis dear, to
yon blue mountain free?
Where blossoms smell the sweetest, come rove
along with me.
It's every Sunday morning when I am by your side,
We'll jump into the wagon and all take a ride."
The song was one sung by northern soldiers during the war. It gave Sam new food for thought. Had Charlie Rivers fought for the Blue or the Gray? Sam rode down the worn trail and through a stand of aspen, expecting any moment to be challenged by the homesteader. The scent he smelled was familiar although he hadn't smelled it for a long while. Soap was being made in a kettle over an open fire.
Sam moved out of the trees. He saw the homestead set in the clearing. A woman in a brown dress and a white apron was stirring the soap in an iron kettle with a large wooden paddle. He rode toward her cautiously. His eyes took in everything from the neat log house to the outbuildings and the long cords of evenly cut firewood stacked between the trees beside the house. He could tell a lot about a man by the way he kept up his place. Charlie Rivers planned well. He was methodical, hard-working and, from the looks of this place, there to stay.
The woman had heard the sound of his horse's hooves. She stopped stirring the soap and stood still, gripping the large paddle with both hands. She was as alert as a deer sensing danger. Sam pulled the horse to a halt a dozen yards from where she stood.
"Howdy, ma'am," he called. "I'm Sam Sparks and I'm bringin' a word from Pack Gallagher."
Long minutes passed. The woman stood so silent and so still, Sam wondered if she could speak.
"This's the Rivers' place, ain't it?"
"Yes. What do you want?"
"A word with Charlie Rivers. Is he here?"
"Oh, yes. He's in the house." She spoke so quickly that Sam knew she was alone. The quiver in her voice betrayed her fear.
"Will you ask him to come out?"
"Stay where you are. He'll be out in a minute." She pulled the paddle partially out of the kettle, holding it as if ready to swing.
"You needn't be afraid of me, ma'am. I'll keep my distance till your brother comes . . . out."
She didn't answer or move. Sam had a chance to study her. Somehow he had thought she would be a very young girl. She had the mature body of a woman past twenty. Her skin was golden from being in the sun, her hair light brown, and she wore it braided, Indian fashion. The eyes in her still face were enormous. He was surprised. Didn't Cullen say she was blind? He was not close enough to see the color of her eyes, but they were light, very light. She had turned her head slightly and was listening for him to make the slightest move.
A wave of anger swept over him when he recalled Cullen saying that she wouldn't know _who_ it was under her skirts. She needed protection from the low-life that hung around McCalls even more than Mara McCall needed it. Sam searched his brain for something to say that would put the woman at ease, but nothing came to mind.
His eyes roved the homestead. It was a homey looking place with the mountains for a background. A rope swing with a plank seat hung from the branch of a tree. The garden had neat weedless rows, and beside it a line was stretched for drying the wash. Hollyhocks grew around the privy that sat back from the house. Sam noted the line fastened from the privy to the house and realized it was for Miss Rivers' convenience. It was clear to Sam that Charlie Rivers thought a lot of his sister.
Sam's horse moved restlessly and nickered, peaking his ears and looking toward the stockade corral. A big gray horse trotted up to the fence and answered the roan's greeting with a trumpet of his own.
"Pack'll be glad to know ya found his horse, Miss Rivers. He was worried about him."
"Charlie found him. There was blood on the saddle. Is Pack all right?"
"He'll be all right in a day or two. He was worked over pretty good."
"Charlie thinks someone put Pack in a wagon. He found markings on the road. The tracks headed north toward the McCalls."
"Mara McCall found him on the road to Sheffield Station."
"He was going there to meet her. How is Pack's mother taking it?"
" 'Twas hard on her, seein' him so beat up."
"Poor Brita. Have you seen Miss McCall?"
"Yes, ma'am."
Sam saw a flicker of movement inside the house. Charlie Rivers must have come in through the back. Sam crossed his arms and leaned them on the saddlehorn, not wanting the short-tempered man to think he was reaching for a gun. Suddenly the man charged out the door with a sawed-off shotgun in his hands.
"Go to the left, Emily," he shouted. The woman dropped the paddle back into the kettle, turned to the left and disappeared behind the house. "State your business."
Sam's first thought was to wonder why someone hadn't told him Charlie Rivers was a one-legged man. The knee of his left leg rested in the cradle of a peg held by straps that wrapped about his thigh, the stump sticking out behind.
"I've a message from Pack Gallagher."
"What is it?"
"Pack needs clothes, boots . . . and his horse."
"What shape is he in?"
"Bad, at first. They dragged him 'n shot him twice. He's at McCall's."
"Hell of a place for him to be flat on his back."
"He's in the big house. His ma 'n Mara McCall are takin' care of him 'n doin' a fair job of it. Are you goin' to keep me sittin' out here all day?"
"You're not here by my invitation."
"Not by my own choice either. Pack said ya was a friend a his, 'n asked me to come."
Charlie Rivers took his time looking Sam over. Sam looked back at him steadily. Finally Charlie lowered the gun.
"Come on in."
"Thanks," Sam said dryly when he moved closer. "I'm about to wear out my throat yellin'."
Sam stepped down from the saddle and looped the reins over a rail. Charlie Rivers stepped down off the porch. He was a squarely built man, not as big as either Sam or Pack, but well-muscled and agile. He spun around easily on the peg leg.
"Sit," he said, indicating the edge of the porch.
"Hot for June," Sam commented as he sat down. He took off his hat and wiped his forehead on his sleeve.
"Guess it is." Rivers sat also, still holding the shotgun. The man seemed to wait deliberately for Sam to speak. Sam thought he might as well oblige him.
"I saw the fight in Laramie. Mason was no match for Pack a'tall. I figure Pack was told to lose the fight. When he didn't, he was jumped by the crowd that lost."
"Pack wouldn't throw a prizefight. He was fighting to get his friends a grub stake. Black Bob Mason was paid the same, win or lose. The gamblers were the ones set to make the money, not Mason." Charlie snorted with disgust.
"Have ya known Pack long?" Sam took a sack of tobacco and papers from his pocket and offered them to Charlie. The man shook his head and Sam began to build a cigarette.
"Awhile."
Sam scratched a match against the porch post, cupped his hands about the flame and touched it to the end of the cigarette. He looked at Charlie Rivers over his cupped hands and tried to decide what part of the country he was from. His manner of speaking was not distinctly southern, and yet. . . . His beard was neatly clipped, his hair cut, his clothes of good quality and clean. He wore some type of signet ring on his right hand. Charlie Rivers, Sam decided, was an educated man who had adapted to the pioneer life rather well. Why would such a man come to the wild, untamed land of Wyoming Territory?
"Are ya from Ohio?" Sam asked after a long pause.
"No."
"I'm from Texas."
"I thought so."
"What made ya think I'm a Texan?"
"Tied-down gun, high-crowned hat, boots with a star on the side."
"You don't miss much."
"It didn't take many brains to figure that out."
They both turned to watch Miss Rivers come from the side of the house and go to the kettle. She carefully reached for the paddle. Charlie got up, went to the fire, and with his peg kicked the burning sticks beneath the pot. He came back and stood in front of Sam.
"Did they strip Pack?"
"They left him his shirt and pants, but they didn't amount to much after they dragged him."
"The bastards!" Charlie swore.
"It took a bunch of them. Gallagher wouldn't be easy to take down."
"Cowards travel in packs." Charlie's tone was bitter.
"So they do."
"I'll get the clothes." Charlie swung onto the porch by holding the post and went into the house.
Sam sat quietly, finished his smoke, and ground the butt beneath his boot heel. He could hear the thump, thump of the peg on the wooden floor inside the house as Charlie moved about. He watched the woman stirring the soap. She was not completely blind, he decided, when he saw her lift the end of the paddle and bring it up to within a few inches of her eyes and peer at it. And she had found her way to the house and back again to the pot.
He would like to hear the woman sing again, but he instinctively knew that she wouldn't as long as he was there. He turned his head slightly to look beyond her to the edge of the thick stand of trees where he had come out of the woods. His eyes moved back to her and at that instant a puff of wind blew her dress over the fire. A small ribbon of flame danced along the hem of her skirt and then spiraled upward.
Sam leaped to his feet, his long legs carrying him across the yard. The woman suddenly realized what had happened and screamed. In a state of panic, she began to run.
"Don't run," Sam shouted.
He sprinted after her, grabbed her about the waist and threw her to the ground. They both hit hard. The woman screamed again. Sam grabbed at the burning cloth, trying to smother it, trying to beat it out with his bare hands. They rolled. The woman continued to scream. Sam had to contend with her flailing arms and legs as he fought to put out the fire.
The sound of a shot echoed in Sam's head. Smoke from the burning cloth went up his nostrils. Suddenly the flames were gone. He found himself lying on top the woman, his head even with her knees, hands enfolded in what remained of her skirt.
"Get up you son of a bitch, I'm going to kill you! Goddamn your rotten soul!"
Sam rolled off the thrashing woman and onto his back. He looked up into the barrel of the shotgun and saw Charlie Rivers bending over him. The man jabbed at his chest with the barrel and Sam realized Rivers thought he had attacked his sister!
"Look at her, goddamn you!"
Charlie pushed the barrel harder against Sam's chest, then glanced at the woman on the ground. He withdrew the gun, dropped it, and squatted down beside her.
"Sister! Oh, my God!" He pulled his sister up into his arms. "Are you all right?"
Emily Rivers clung to her brother. "Yes . . . yes, Charlie. Don't worry." She was breathless and spoke between gasps.
Charlie ran his hand down over the burned cloth of her skirt. Charred pieces of cloth came off in his hand. Her legs were only slightly red from the burns.
"Oh God, Emily!" He hugged her to him. "That's the last time you'll be around that damn boil pot!"
"Don't be silly. I've got to wash clothes—"
"You'll wear a pair of my britches, by damn!"
Sam sat up and looked at the palms of his hands. At first he had not felt pain, but now it was making itself known. He was conscious that Charlie Rivers had turned to look at him and he turned his palms down.
"Are you burned?"
"Not much." Keeping his fingers curled over his throbbing palms, Sam put his forearm on the ground to help himself get to his feet.
Charlie stood and extended a hand to his sister. "I owe you a hell of a lot, mister."
"Ya don't owe me a goddamn thin'!" The pain in Sam's hands caused him to speak sharply.
"You burned your hands!" Charlie grabbed Sam's wrist with a surprisingly strong grip and turned his palm up. "Good God, man! Blisters are already coming up."
Sam watched the woman's head turn toward him. "Oh, my!" Emily gasped. "Are the burns bad, Charlie?" Then she looked at him with her great, light blue eyes for so long that Sam began to think she could see him.
"His palms are blistering."
"My aloe plant! The juice will take out the sting."
"What about yoreself, ma'am? Are ya burned?" His eyes roamed her face, and the strange feeling he had felt when he heard her sing stirred in him again.
"My legs are stinging, but it's not bad. I don't know how to thank you. I shouldn't have run. Charlie has always told me that in case of a fire, I should lie down and roll. I was so scared that I didn't think."
"I'm glad I was handy."
"Thank God Mr. Sparks was here. I couldn't have caught you, Emily, even if I had been here."
"I know, Brother." She placed her hand against his face. "Don't worry. It's over. I'll be more careful from now on. Now we've got to tend to Mr. Sparks' hands. Will you lift the kettle away from the fire, please, Charlie? The soap is ready to be poured into the trough and salt added to harden it." She appeared calm, as if nothing had happened. "I was going to put in some of that honey we didn't use up last winter. Oh, well, I'll make another smaller batch of bath soap later on."
In spite of the pain in his hands, Sam's eyes couldn't leave Emily's face. She was not completely blind, but terribly nearsighted. Her eyes were large and light blue, surrounded by long, curly brown lashes. She was not a tall woman. Her head came to just above his shoulder, but she gave the impression of being tall because she stood so straight, her shoulders back, head up. Sam had seen many women who were more beautiful than this one. But Emily Rivers was beautiful in a completely unaffected way: natural, sweet and caring. When she spoke to her brother who was at least ten years her senior, there was love and respect in her voice.
"I'm terribly sorry, Mr. Sparks, that I misunderstood what was happening," Charlie said on the way to the house.
"No offense taken."
"If not for being afraid I would hit Emily, I would have killed you," he admitted with a tremor in his voice.
"Well now, I'm sure glad ya was afraid of hittin' your sister. I'm not wantin' to die for somethin' I didn't do."
The house was one large room with a door opening into a lean-to attached to the side. As they passed, Sam saw a neatly made bed and clothes hanging from pegs in the wall. An open stairway with a hand rail went to the loft. Comfortable chairs sat on either side of the fireplace with an oval braided rug between. The house was homey and well-furnished.
Emily indicated that Sam was to sit down at a round table. She immediately lifted a lid on the black iron cookstove and set the kettle directly over the blaze. The bottom of her skirt had burned and a good six inches of her leg showed above her laced, black leather shoes. Charlie caught Sam's glance.
"Go change your dress, Emily. I'll get a pan of cold water and Mr. Sparks can soak his hands. Then you can apply that sticky stuff from the plant."
The cold water felt soothing to Sam's palms. He flexed his right hand, looking closely at the blister rising on his forefinger, and hoped he'd not be forced to draw his gun any time soon. Charlie watched him from across the table with eyes a shade darker than his sister's.
"Are you a gunman, Mr. Sparks?"
For an endless moment Sam stared at the flint-eyed man, then he shrugged his broad shoulders.
"I don't call myself that. And call me Sam."
"This little episode doesn't make us bosom friends, Mr. Sparks." Charlie's eyes were as cold as steel.
"If that's the way ya want it, it's all right with me, _Mr. Rivers._ "
"Charlie." Emily had come down from the loft and her chiding voice came from behind the men. "Mr. Sparks is a friend of Pack's, and now our friend as well. Pack wouldn't have sent a man here if he didn't think he was worthy of our friendship." Sam could tell by the sound of her steps that she had changed into soft moccasins.
"Friendship? We know nothing about him, Sister. How are your burns?"
"Not bad, thanks to our new friend who burned his hands saving me when I was foolish enough to panic and run. I do thank you, Sam."
"You're welcome, Miss Rivers. I should've noticed when the wind started blowin' the flame your way."
"Charlie is used to my blindness; you are not," she said gently. "Now I must see about your burns." She placed a stack of white strips of cloth on the table, handed Sam a clean towel to blot his hands and took the pan of water to the work counter.
Emily held his hand up to within a few inches of her face so she could see it clearly and clicked her tongue sorrowfully. Gently she applied the sticky substance from inside the spears of the aloe plant. Aloe grew in Texas, but the Rivers were not Texans. The puzzle of who they were became more complicated. Sam looked above the head bent over his hands. A bookcase on an inner wall held at least a hundred volumes. These were more books than he had ever seen at one time except when he was in the home of General Robert E. Lee shortly before the war ended.
The intense way that Charlie watched while his sister tended to his hands nipped at Sam's temper. Occasionally, when, with a flick of his lashes, his eyes skimmed over Emily's suntanned face and slender body, he was aware that Charlie had caught the look. Hell! What did the man expect him to do, shut his eyes?
Emily insisted that Sam stay for the noon meal. Charlie invited him to sit on the porch while she prepared it. Sam smoked and watched Charlie strain the soap in the kettle into a flat wooden box. When Emily called them to dinner, Sam left his hat on the porch and tried to smooth his unruly hair down with his bandaged palms.
They ate freshly baked bread, spring greens and venison steaks on a cloth-covered table set with good china and silver. Charlie bowed his head and prayed aloud before the food was passed. The table manners and the polite way the food was served confirmed Sam's previous belief that the Rivers were not the usual type of people who pulled up and moved west to settle on new land. Sam ate clumsily with his bandaged hand and prayed he'd not spill anything on the tablecloth.
Both of the Rivers were hungry for conversation once the tension was broken. Emily's acceptance of Sam seemed to rub off on her brother after awhile. They spoke of their friendship with Pack Gallagher and said that he sometimes left some of his belongings with them when he was going to visit his mother. They seemed to be fond of him, and Sam wondered if there was something more than friendship between Pack and Emily. They talked of Brita McCall and the kindly care given to her by one of her twins. Emily spoke of the winters when they were snowed in and laughed when she said that by spring Charlie was so sick of her company he was ready to pull his hair out. The Rivers wanted news from Laramie and Cheyenne, but they gave out no information about themselves.
When Sam was ready to leave, Charlie hung a bag containing Pack's clothes and boots over the saddlehorn.
"Tell Pack that gray devil was on his way back here when I run into him. I'll bring him over in a day or so. He's a frisky son of a gun, Sparks. I'm not sure you'd be able to hold him with those hands." Charlie stood beside the horse while Sam mounted. "I want you to know that I'm in your debt for what you did for Emily. It was fast thinking, and I do thank you for it."
"As I said, ya don't owe me a thin'," Sam said gruffly to cover his embarrassment. "I wasn't there when my sister needed help. I was off fightin' somebody's damn war. I'm glad I was around to help yours."
"I thank you anyway, Sam," Charlie said. "I'd like to shake hands . . . someday."
"Consider it done."
Emily walked up to the horse and held up a spear she had cut from the aloe plant. Sam placed it cut end up in his shirt pocket.
"Split it and rub the sticky juice on the burns," she instructed.
"Thank ya, Miss Rivers." Sam didn't mention that for as long as he could remember his family had used the plant for burns, insect bites, and rashes.
"When you're this way again, stop by for a meal." She voiced the invitation with a soft smile on her face.
Sam looked into her eyes and felt as if he were in another world. "I'll do that, ma'am." He spoke gruffly in an effort to bring himself back to reality.
Sam tipped his hat and turned the horse toward the trees. For some unknown reason he didn't want to leave. He wanted to turn and look at the woman standing in the yard beside the man with the peg leg. He couldn't resist, even knowing her brother might make something of it. He pulled the horse to a stop, spun him around and looked back. She clung to the porch post, the skirt of her blue dress pushed back against her legs by the wind. Sam raised his hand in farewell. Only Charlie lifted his hand in response. Emily wouldn't know that he had waved unless Charlie told her. Sam rode on, disgusted with himself for being disappointed.
During the ride back to McCall's, Sam's mind was troubled. He had spent several pleasant hours with the Rivers. He liked them, liked both of them, and he hoped to hell Charlie Rivers was not the man he was looking for.
As Sam approached the McCall ranch, he slowly unwrapped the white strips from about his palms and put them in his pocket. It hurt like hell to hold the reins with his burned fingers, but it wouldn't be wise, he decided, to let Sporty Howard, or any of the men that came to the hideout, know that there was anything wrong with his hand that would slow him down if he pulled his gun.
* * *
Sam Sparks and his horse were only a blur to Emily Rivers, but her ears were atuned to every sound.
"Why did he stop?"
"He waved." Charlie felt a strange uneasiness when he saw the look of sadness on his sister's face.
"I wish you'd told me. I would have waved to him."
For the first time in a long while Emily wished that she could see like other people. She had grown accustomed to the small world she lived in and only at times thought about what her life would have been like if she could see and if that . . . other thing had not happened. Most women were married and had several children by the time they reached her age. She thought she had reconciled herself to the fact that she would never know the love of a man or have his children.
Sam Sparks had been different from any man she had ever met. He had not once mentioned her poor eyesight. She liked his voice, the polite way he spoke. He was a clean man. The only smell about him was of saddle leather and tobacco. His hands were long, slender, twice the size of hers, and she had felt him trembling when the back of his hand lay in the palm of hers, almost as if he were not used to having a woman hold his hand. It had been a long time since she had been close to any man other than Pack and her brother.
Once she had lifted her head as Sam bent to look at his palm, and his face had come into the perimeter of her vision. His cheeks were smooth, as if he had shaved that morning. His mouth was wide and firm, his chin square. She remembered dark brows, white teeth, and hair that curled down on his forehead. But what she remembered most of all was his warm breath on her lips. It was almost as if he had kissed her.
"He was nice, wasn't he, Charlie?"
"I guess so . . . for a drifter. He didn't say much about himself."
"He said he was from Texas, and that he had a sister."
"Most men are from somewhere and most of them have a sister. Sam Sparks will take Pack's stuff to him and ride on, if I read him right."
Charlie Rivers looked at his sister standing against the porch post. He had detected a longing in her voice that tore at his heart. Had he been wrong to bring her to this lonely place? But dear God, what would she have done without him? He couldn't stay where he was. Alone, she would have been taken, used, degraded. There were very few men who would take a blind woman for a wife, love her, cherish her. For awhile Charlie had hoped that Emily and Pack would come to love one another; but after a friendship of four years, there was no sign that they were more than friends.
"We'll take Pack's horse over to the McCalls in a few days, and you can visit with Mrs. McCall and Mara McCall if she is still there," Charlie said in an attempt to lighten Emily's spirits.
"Pack seemed to be angry because she was coming. He was going to head her off at Sheffield Station and send her back to Denver. I wonder what happened?"
"That bunch of no-goods from Laramie who wanted him to throw the fight caught up with him before she got there. That's what happened. It was lucky for him the girl came along. I might not have found him before he bled to death."
"I wonder if Mara McCall is pretty," Emily murmured absently.
"Pack has never said anything about her other than that she was the daughter of an old friend and her father had put her in the school so she could learn how to be a lady." Charlie snorted with disgust. "People get a distorted idea of the word."
"Do you miss your old life?"
Charlie was surprised by his sister's question. They seldom talked about the old life.
"At times, but not enough to make me want to go back."
"Poor Charlie. You would have had a brilliant career if not for your blind sister."
"You're indulging yourself in a spell of self-pity, Sister." His voice was stern. "You'll get no sympathy from me. I've seen men with both arms and legs shot off and head wounds that made them look like animals. What if you had no mind, Sister? The insane asylums are full of people who have no more mind than a chicken. And you pity yourself because you can't see clearly beyond a few feet. You—"
"Should be ashamed of yourself!" Emily finished, and laughed. "Charlie, dear, I hear that same speech every time I get down in the dumps. Please think of a new one!"
"Really? I didn't think I'd said that over a time or two." Charlie chuckled.
"Well, you have. Would you like to hear my speech about how lucky you are that you have one good leg?"
"Heavens no! I've heard it a hundred times."
Emily laughed again. Charlie smiled with relief. Things were back to normal once more.
# Chapter
SIX
Mara had been at the homestead a week before she met Steamboat. He came reluctantly when she sent for him. She invited him into the kitchen, seated him at the cloth-covered table, and served him coffee and slices of bread spread with butter and sprinkled with sugar and cinnamon. She had dreaded meeting him, thinking she might have been eating food prepared by a slovenly cook; but he was a quiet, clean, stoop-shouldered man, and she liked him. By the time he left the house, he and Mara had an understanding. Steamboat would milk the cow and bring the milk to the house. Mara would churn, and they would share the butter and milk. The hens were laying eight to ten eggs a day. Mara said she wanted four of them in order to make nourishing meals for Brita.
When she inquired about the garden, he told her that he had planted onions, potatoes, cabbage, turnips, kale and a small patch of corn.
"The next time you go to town for supplies, I'd like to go with you. I've not had experience managing a house, but I'll learn . . . if you'll help me." Mara smiled so sweetly she could have asked for ten years of his life and he would have given them to her.
"I'd be jist plumb tickled to escort ya to town 'n show ya around, ma'am. I'll see to it that nobody cheats ya."
Pack, lying on the bunk in his mother's room, rolled his eyes to the ceiling as he listened to Mara sweet-talk the cook. The old fool would roll over and play dead if she asked him. This was just going to make it all the harder for him to jar her away from this place.
During the next few days Pack spent most of his time on the porch. He walked to and from the privy and up and down in front of the house trying to work the stiffness out of his joints. Sam came to talk to him, and sometimes he played cards with Trellis or Travor to pass the time. Travor was still resentful of Mara.
One afternoon Mara came out onto the porch just as Travor sank his knife into one of the turned porch posts and cut off a sliver of wood.
"Don't do that, Travor," she said sharply. "I've asked you any number of times not to damage the post with your knife."
"Don't do that, Travor. Don't do that, Travor," he mimicked. "Is there anythin' 'round here I can do?"
Bluntly Mara answered him. "You can cut wood for the cookstove. The box is empty."
"Cut yore own damn wood, Miss Prissy Ass!"
Pack's hand lashed out, closed about the boy's arm and jerked him close to him. He gave him a vicious shake.
"If I hear you talk to your cousin like that again, boy, you'll think you've run into a hornets' nest." For an endless moment Travor stared, his senses shocked by the anger in his half brother's face and the savagery of his tone.
"I . . . I ain't—" He started to say something more, but Pack shook him again.
"That's right, you ain't! You'll not be giving Mara or Ma any more of your sass. Do you understand? If you don't, I can make it plainer."
Travor's face turned a fiery red. "She don't . . . let a man do nothin'."
"You call yourself a man? You're a smart-mouthed, wet-eared kid trying to act like some of the trash that hangs out at the bunkhouse. A _man_ doesn't talk to his womenfolk the way you've done. Give your mouth the rest of the day off, boy, and fill that woodbox." Pack pushed the boy from him.
Mara watched Travor until he disappeared around the side of the house.
"He'll never like me now," she said almost wistfully. Then she turned to Pack. "Thanks to you!" With that she went back into the house.
Mara passed through the parlor, the kitchen, and out onto the back porch. She stood by the support post and shivered. "Please God," she prayed, "let me get accustomed to these people and their ways."
Her troubled eyes turned toward the bunkhouse where Cullen and Aubrey lolled on the porch. They had not been to the house since the day she arrived, not even to inquire about Brita. If Brita was hurt by her husband's neglect, she never voiced her feelings; in fact, she never mentioned him or Cullen at all.
* * *
In the span of a week, a remarkable change had come to the house. The days were long this time of the year, and Mara worked from dawn to dusk with what help Trellis would give her. Because Brita told her that it rankled the boy to have the men see him washing and cleaning, she asked him to do what repair work he could handle. Trellis took measurements so that the broken windowpanes could be replaced. He nailed a new board to the back step and put new hinges on the privy door. Mara scrubbed floors, washed walls, and polished wood.
One afternoon, several days after the incident with Travor, Mara saw Cullen and Aubrey ride away from the ranch. She asked Trellis to go to the bunkhouse and bring back everything that had been taken from the house. The boy brought back one chair and the mantel clock. Everything else was beyond repair. Disappointment was not exactly the word for what Mara felt: heartsick might have described her feeling better. She went upstairs to her room, shut the door, and allowed herself the luxury of tears.
Later, her small, round chin tilted, her dignity returned in the guise of a very stiff, proud posture, she went back down to the kitchen, more determined than ever to make a place for herself.
Pack was recovering from the ordeal faster than she thought possible, but he was weak, trembly, and in a foul mood most of the time. The problems now were the wounds in his thigh and side. They were healing, but not fast enough to suit him. Mara didn't know what condition they were in because he no longer needed help in changing the bandage. Since the morning after his fever, when he had railed at her for being in her nightclothes, Mara had avoided him when possible. His insults had shaken her to her very roots, and she vowed that she would never forgive him. She had spoken to him only when he asked a direct question and was civil to him only for Brita's sake.
When the evening meal was ready, Mara carried a tray to Brita and called Pack to the table. She sat across from him, eating without appetite. No words passed between them, but she could feel his eyes on her often. She avoided looking at him, finished eating, and got up from the table to take her plate to the dishpan.
"Mara Shannon! Sit down!"
Pack's commanding voice was like a lash on Mara's back. It caught her by surprise and startled her so much that she almost dropped the dish she was carrying from the table. She hesitated a minute to fight down the anger that rose up to redden her face, then turned.
"Yes? You want something more?" she asked formally, determined not to allow him to know how his harsh voice grated on her already taut nerves.
She couldn't help noticing that the swelling had left his face and the bruises were fading. With the dirt and blood washed from his hair, it was as dark and shiny as a crow's wing. He had made an attempt to control the mop of unruly curls without much success. They flopped over his ears and tumbled down over his forehead.
"I don't want anything more. Sit down." His dark eyes met her emerald green ones and refused to look away.
As his eyes held hers for several seconds, some of the hardness left. The silence between them seemed to crackle. Neither of them moved nor spoke for what seemed an endless space of time. Pack stared at her, holding her eyes like a magnet with his. For an instant there was a flicker of recognition in some small part of Mara's brain. It was as if she suddenly knew this man well, was bound to him with invisible ties. His face was not strange to her, nor was his body or his feelings. The reflection lasted for only an instant.
"Is that an invitation or a command?"
"Call it what you want. We've got to talk."
"We? I have nothing to say to you."
"But I have something to say to you."
Pack watched her move from the table to the workbench, her color intensified by the heat from the stove. He let his eyes travel the room, taking in every change she had made. The kitchen was pleasant; the shining chimneys on the lamps helped give the room a rosy glow. Her woman's touch had made this house a home again. She was a nesting type woman who could make a home anywhere.
"Say it," she said more calmly than she felt and turned her back on him. It irritated her that his presence made her nervous. Each time he looked at her the bold masculine magnetism he emitted aroused a sense of excitement in her.
"I'll be leaving as soon as I get my horse." The words were softly spoken to Mara's back.
"What has that got to do with me?"
She calmly wrapped the freshly baked loaf of bread in a clean cloth and placed it in a tin. She thought briefly of asking him if he knew where she could get a cat. Each morning she found mouse droppings in the kitchen, and it offended her sense of cleanliness.
"Goddamn it, woman, you can't stay here!" he snarled, low-voiced.
She turned, leaned her back against the workbench, and folded her arms across her chest. This past week, from dawn to dusk, she had worked harder than she had ever worked in her entire life. At the end of the long day she was so exhausted she could only wash herself in the water she carried to her upstairs room and fall into bed. Now this . . . this big, stupid Irishman was sitting at her well-scrubbed table, after he had eaten the meal she had cooked, and was telling her that she couldn't stay here—in her own house!
"Maybe I didn't understand you, Mr. Gallagher. Surely you didn't say that I couldn't live in my own home."
"That is exactly what I said, Miss Mara Shannon McCall." His dark brows were drawn together and his big hands lay palms down on the table as if he were going to stand. But he didn't.
"My father would be terribly disappointed in you. He was fond of you and considered you a friend."
"Aye, he did. It's because of my love for Shannon McCall that I'm telling you that this is no place for you." Shannon McCall had taken the place of the father he had barely known, and they had loved each other like father and son.
"And why is that?"
"I told you before. Ma told you. What's the matter with you that you can't see it? This is a hard, lonely land full of hard, impatient men without women. Who will stand between you and the ones who'll have you when I'm gone? Sam's a decent man. He'll see that no harm comes to you while he's here, but he's a drifting man. Go back to town and get a teaching job. It's what you were schooled—"
"Why don't you like me?" Mara interrupted.
"Jesus! Godamighty! Holy sh— You didn't hear a word I said!" Pack pushed himself to his feet. He was so tall Mara had to tilt her head to look into his furious eyes.
"I warned you about taking the Lord's name in vain."
"You're enough to make a preacher swear! Do you know that?" He was angry and his voice was loud.
"Don't shout!" Her words came out in a throaty rush. "You know it upsets Brita. You'd best be paying attention to her. She's not well."
Pack swore under his breath. "Do you think I'm blind, girl? I know she's not well. If I could get her away from here, I'd set the two of you up in a place in town. I'm not so poor I can't take care of my own ma, for God's sake!"
"She won't go and neither will I. Brita feels her place is with her husband and the twins. She took Aubrey for better or worse. Vows are sacred to her." Mara stared at his angry face, transfixed, literally shaking inside.
Pack stood in troubled silence. Mara remained stiff and proud, her fine-boned profile set, her clearly etched features perfectly composed and cold. The thought of leaving her here brought a dull ache that spread through Pack until it occupied every part of his body.
Small bits of things had been coming back to him. _Help me, you damned stupid dolt!_ She had shouted the words while he lay in the dirt, and they had seeped into his dull senses. _What kind of man are you to sit there like a stubborn jackass_ _and not help yourself?_
If he were a different type of man, Mara Shannon would be the woman for him. She was soft and feminine, yet she had a will of iron. She had gotten him moving and saved his life when he would have just as soon lain there and bled to death.
With anguish he realized that he was what he was, and she was what she was; there was no way on God's earth he could have her. She had dominated his thoughts while he lay flat on his back, his chest tight, his face hot, and his manhood tenting the covers. Now that he was on his feet and could watch her moving about the house, he was aware of her every move, every glance in his direction.
Pack knew little about women, but he knew men and their ways. There wasn't a man here except for Sam who wouldn't have his way with her if given half a chance. The little fool had the face of an angel but the brains of Paddy's pig! She hadn't known when she was well off. Bedamned! How was he going to convince her that he knew what was best for her?
"Think about it," he said gruffly. "Think about what can happen to you. There are men here who would use your body to satisfy their lust. You would be no more to them than a hunk of meat." The talk was plain and he saw the color rise up her neck to her cheeks.
"I have thought about it." She spoke in a kinder, more reasonable tone after she had swallowed several times. She was crying to herself inside that it was so hard to be a woman alone and to stand up for her rights.
"Then think about it some more," he said harshly.
"I have to live somewhere, for heaven's sake! My money wouldn't last long in town, but it will see me through here for awhile." She wanted to unload the heavy burden of fear that ate at her every night as she lay in her upstairs bed with the post wedged against the door, but it would just make him more determined to make her leave.
"You can't live here alone! No!" He raised his voice when she would interrupt. "You'd be about as safe as a snowball in hell."
"What do you mean alone? Your mother is here, for crying out loud! I've convinced Cullen and Aubrey that I've left everything to the school if something should happen to me. That should keep me safe for awhile." Her cheeks, suffused with color, were the only indication that she was nervous. "I thank you for your concern; but I'm not your responsibility and you needn't worry about me."
He stared at her for a long moment, then let his hard-held breath out in a long sigh.
"You may be the prettiest woman in all Wyoming Territory and maybe the smartest when it comes to school learning, but you're also the most mule-headed, unreasonable female I've ever known. You don't know anything about life in this country. A pretty woman without a man beside her is considered fair game by every horny drifter that sees her. Men from miles around will be camping on your doorstep with two things on their minds: getting your land and getting under your skirts!"
Her face flamed. "You needn't be so crude! You think I'm mule-headed because I don't do what you want me to do—pull out and leave my inheritance to Aubrey and Cullen to manage. Surely you're not so blind that you can't see what they're doing here."
"And what is that?"
"They're not living off the land. It's just sitting here. Where do they get money? Why were they nervous when the marshal was here? Now you get this straight, Pack Gallagher, I'm not a complete idiot, and I'll not let you ramrod my life!"
"I'm trying to help you, Mara _Stubborn_ Shannon!" His eyes battled with hers. He wanted to shake her. "Ah hellfire! You're naught but a scrap of empty-headed _baggage!_ " He headed for the porch.
Mara followed him through the parlor. Somehow she wanted to cry but fought back angry tears. She had tried to be civil and what had it gotten her? She saw that he was still standing at the edge of the porch. Empty-headed baggage was an insult she couldn't ignore. It goaded her to throw angry words at him.
"I'm not empty-headed, Mr. _Loose-mouth_ Gallagher. I want you to know that my high marks in school set a record. And I deeply resent being called a baggage which, according to Noah Webster, means an unchaste woman, a trollop, hussy, or slut. In other words a bad, loose, easy woman lacking moral goodness. Don't you dare refer to me in those terms again."
He turned and looked at her outline in the doorway, unable to see the stricken look in her eyes.
"Is this Webster fellow your beau?"
"Damnation! Holy Saints preserve me!" The unguarded words burst from her mouth. "He's a dictionary! Oh! You make me so angry that I don't even know what I'm saying!" She darted back into the darkness of the parlor.
Wearily Pack sat down on the edge of the porch and watched the moon come up over the treetops. One dismal truth stood out above the others; his hands were tied because of his mother. She would not abandon her husband and the twins. He rested his elbows on his thighs and cupped his chin in his hand. What to do? He had his freighting business in Laramie to see to. He had no doubt that old Willy was taking care of things, but there was just so much the old man could do. The paid thugs who jumped him were long gone by now, but the gamblers who worked the Kosy Kitty Saloon were still there; and he would not rest until they paid for what they had done to him.
Pack sat with his puzzled thoughts long after the light disappeared from Mara's upstairs room. He felt like the restless lobo who howled his frustration into the night and was answered by his own kind. One unwelcome fact stuck in his mind: Mara Shannon should be in town, living in a fine house with all the conveniences, with someone like that Webster fellow who knew the meaning of words. It was what her father had wanted for her.
Recognition of how hard Mara Shannon had worked to clean up the house came to Pack's mind. She had toiled from morning until night and seemed to be content while doing so. He had even heard her singing while she worked. But she would soon get tired of scrubbing, washing, doing without, and fending off women-hungry men. After one long, cruel, lonely winter she would be sorry she ever came to this place, and then it might be too late.
It seemed to Pack that every time he opened his mouth he made her angry. He had not meant to insult her when he called her baggage. Hellfire and brimstone! He hadn't known it meant all the things she'd said. He had thought it meant a package . . . an empty package. He had heard women called baggage, and they hadn't made such a to-do over it.
Pack ran his fingers through his dark hair and massaged the back of his neck. Life was not simple when it involved a woman. At times, when he looked into Mara Shannon's emerald green eyes that so clearly reflected her feelings, he felt as if he had been run through one of those fancy clothes wringers that fastened to a washtub. He was a man with urges like any other, he thought now, and sometimes he ached to have a woman, not just any woman, but his own woman who wanted him and only him. He'd had a strong yearning for a permanent home for a long time—had dreamed about it at night when he lay alongside his wagons in some remote mountain pass and wondered how it would feel to be lying in his own bed with his own woman beside him, coming eagerly into his arms when he reached for her. It wasn't that he just wanted a woman to satisfy his lust; there were whores for that. He yearned for something more, a commitment to a good woman who would be the heart and core of a family. He wanted _this_ woman, he told himself harshly, but she wasn't for the likes of Pack Gallagher, teamster, prizefighter, brawler.
Pack cursed himself softly. One thing was certain: he had to think of something. Cullen and Aubrey were just waiting for him to leave before they made their move. Perhaps they were going to let her stay and try to force her to marry Cullen, thinking to get control of the ranch that way. She would resist, but Cullen would go to any length to get what he wanted. He might decide to get into her room some night, rape her, and shame her into marrying him. Pack's jaws tightened and he ground his teeth in frustration.
At length Pack stretched wearily, feeling an ache in each and every muscle, a stiffness in his bones, and a heaviness in his heart as he wrestled with the problem. He was unaware of it, but within a very short time the decision would be made for him.
* * *
Morning came and with it Ace January. Brita was sleeping and Pack and Trellis were hunting in the hills behind the house. Mara Shannon saw the marshal ride up to the hitching rail, dismount, and tie his horse. She went to the door, stepped out onto the porch and called a greeting.
"Morning, Mr. January."
"Mornin'." The marshal stepped up to the porch. He removed his hat. "I'm surprised you're still here, Miss McCall. I thought you'd be back in town by now."
Her smile turned into a puzzled frown. "Why would you think that?"
"Town girls don't usually like livin' away from town."
"I'm not a 'town girl.' This is my home and I'm here to stay." Irritation stirred within her, making her welcome a trifle cool.
"I'm right glad to hear it."
"Come in and have a cool drink, or coffee if you prefer."
"I'd be pleased to have the coffee, ma'am."
Ace followed Mara Shannon through the parlor and into the kitchen. She was even prettier than he remembered. She was all woman. He liked the way she looked and the way she smelled—like freshly baked bread. Her dark auburn hair curled about her face and stuck to her cheeks that were flushed with heat. He especially liked her full mouth that tilted at the corners when she smiled. The wide band of the apron tied about her small waist showed the curve of soft, full breasts. He pulled his gaze away from them and mopped his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt.
"It's goin' to be a hot one."
"Would you like a drink of water first?"
"Thank you, ma'am. I'd be obliged for a drink of water."
Mara Shannon took the ladle from the pail, dipped it into the water bucket and handed it to him. He drank the water with his eyes on her face.
His eyes were such a light gray they appeared almost colorless. The look in them was frank admiration and something more that implied . . . intimacy. Mara Shannon knew instinctively that it had been a mistake to look directly into them. She moved to the other side of the room, took a cup from the shelf, and filled it with coffee from the pot on the stove. Her mind would have frozen had she known what he was thinking.
Ace was wondering how she would look naked, stretched out on a soft bed, her legs and her mouth open beneath him, his hands full of her breasts, hers on his bare buttocks. He pictured her naked in the kitchen cooking a meal for him, naked in front of a fire, naked running through tall grass with her hair streaming behind her like a banner.
_He wanted her._ Her wonderful woman's body was made to cushion a man, to ease his impatient body. The feeling was ten times stronger than when he'd first felt it that day he rode in with the posse. He pulled his mind back when he felt desire so potent that it threatened to embarrass him. He lowered his hat to cover the sudden bulge in his britches. It would not do to scare the hell out of her now. He'd have to go slowly, be patient. His facial features reflected none of his thoughts after he returned the dipper to the pail.
"Sit down, Mr. January." Mara Shannon indicated the place where she had set the cup of coffee. "Pack and the boys will be back soon."
"Is Gallagher still here?"
"Yes. His mother is very ill."
"I'm sorry about Mrs. McCall."
Mara Shannon sat down at the far end of the table. "Are you on official business, Marshal?"
"Business and pleasure. Seein' you again is the pleasure part."
"Thank you," she said. "And the business part?"
"How many men do you have here now, Miss McCall?"
"What do you mean?"
"Just what I said. How many men work here?"
"I wouldn't know. You'll have to talk to my cousin."
"Cullen or his pa?"
"Cullen. You'll find him at the bunkhouse if he's not out seeing about the cattle."
"Where is that? The south slope?"
Mara Shannon felt her face grow hot beneath his intense stare and was relieved when she heard Pack call out to Trellis, then heard his steps on the back porch. She stood, grateful for his return. Something about the marshal's inquiries made her nervous. She was sure that he was thinking one thing while saying another.
Pack came in. He looked first at Ace January and then at Mara Shannon. A look in her eyes told him that she was glad to see him.
"Howdy, January. I thought I recognized that horse."
"Howdy, Pack. Looks like you're gettin' over the roughin' up the boys gave you."
"You knew about that?"
Ace laughed. "It's all the talk. Everybody in the territory knows about it."
"You knew before it happened and you did nothing." Pack pulled out the bench, straddled it and placed his forearms on the table.
"You made the choice, Pack. You knew what you were in for when you went against the crowd." Ace looked Pack straight in the eyes, then drained his cup.
"So I did." Pack stood and pushed the bench back with his foot. "Let's talk outside."
The marshal rose and held out his hand to Mara Shannon. She could think of no way to avoid placing her hand in his. He squeezed it tightly, let up, and squeezed again.
"Thanks for the coffee, ma'am. I'll be back one of these days soon for that cake you promised me."
"Good-bye, Mr. January." Mara Shannon pulled her hand from his.
Pack had gone to the door. Mara, looking past the marshal, saw a look of impatience on his face. An imp inside her tempted her to ask the marshal to come back real soon, but her common sense told her to keep quiet and she did.
At the door Ace looked back at Mara. Her thighs were against the table as she reached for his coffee cup. She looked up into his eyes and he slowly lowered one eyelid. When it occurred to her what he had done, her face flamed. The girls at the school had told her about the flirtatious wink of an eye when a man wanted a woman to know he desired her. Somehow, instead of angering her, it made her want to laugh.
Pack walked around the house until he reached the front hitching rail where the marshal had tied his horse.
"Are you here on business, Ace?"
"Mara asked me that. I told her business and pleasure." He saw the tightening of Pack's facial muscles on hearing him say the woman's name with familiarity. It amused Ace that he could make the big man angry. If Pack wanted the woman, it would make the taking of her all the more enjoyable.
"I take it you've had the pleasure. What's the business?" Pack asked bluntly.
"You should know that. This place is a hangout for any outlaw with the price for room 'n board." Ace mounted his horse. Although he was tall, Pack Gallagher topped him, and he despised looking up at a man.
"If you know that for a fact, why don't you clean it out? You're the marshal."
" 'Cause I'm not ready. That's why."
"There are half a dozen petty crooks down at the bunkhouse. You could take them in and collect a couple of hundred dollars in reward money."
"I'm lookin' for a really big fish to come floatin' in. I'd be a fool to dam up the stream afore he gets here."
"Little fish turn into big fish if they're not caught," Pack said dryly.
"Old Willy is wonderin' when you'll be back. He said if I saw you, to tell you to come on back and tend to the business."
"I doubt if Willy said that. He can run that freight line as well as I can."
Ace shrugged away the contradiction. He glanced toward the house, rolled and lit a cigarette before he spoke.
"Are you hidin' out here, Pack?"
"What do you think?"
"I think you're afraid you'll get your clock cleaned again if you go back to town."
"Yeah, Ace. That just plumb scares me to death."
"It'll not be a scare that's the death of you." Ace paused and looked steadily at Pack. "It'll be a bullet," he said softly, then wheeled his horse and rode back down the lane toward the road.
Pack watched him go, glad he was leaving. Ace January seemed to be a good marshal. He had not heard anything to the contrary, but something about the man made him uneasy, and he didn't know why.
* * *
"Why in the hell did you let that man into the house?"
Mara Shannon would have forgotten Ace January's visit if not for those angry words Pack spat at her. He had stomped back into the house and told her in no uncertain terms that she was not to invite the man into the house again. When she demanded the reason, he sputtered and told her it wasn't _decent_ for her to be in the house alone with a strange man. At that she laughed, making him even more angry. She wondered what Pack would say if she told him Ace January had winked at her.
Several days passed, and Pack's words still made her angry when she recalled them. She pushed thoughts of him and the marshal from her mind, broke the shell of an egg and carefully spilled the contents into a bowl. She added another and beat the eggs until they were a light yellow.
"What next, Brita?" she called.
"A teacup of sweet milk." Mara and Trellis had moved Brita's bed so that she could look into the kitchen. "Then ye be addin' a lump a butter the size of an egg."
Mara hummed while she worked. She liked to cook, and Brita was teaching her to make what she called everyday cake. The tired look on Brita's face worried Mara. Brita hadn't wanted to get out of bed since the day Pack was brought home. For most of the day she lay and stared out the window after Mara had washed and straightened her bed.
"It looks like a wet mess, Brita."
"Put in a teacup a sugar 'n grate up part of a nutmeg."
"These nutmegs look as old as I am."
"They be all right, darlin'."
"Brita, I wish we had a cat. Do you think Trell could get us one when he goes to town?"
"Emily Rivers promised one to me. Charlie took her big tabby to town . . . at just the right time. Be ye ready . . . fer the flour?"
Brita was getting breathless again. Each time it brought back memories of her own mother's breathless whispers and caused a hard lump of dread to settle around Mara's heart. She called out to Brita cheerfully in spite of her fear.
"I've sifted it twice. Did you say two teacups?"
"Aye. 'Fore ye put it in, fill the hollow a yer hand with bakin' powder. Not too much, now."
When Mara scooped the powder, she went to the door so that Brita could see how much she had in her hand. "How's this?"
" 'Tis only half enough, darlin'. Ye don't be wantin' yer cake flat as a pancake."
Mara finished mixing the cake, poured it in a flat pan, and put it in the oven. In about half an hour she would stick a straw from the broom in the middle. If it came out clean, it was time to take the cake out of the oven.
When Trellis came into the kitchen half an hour later she was sifting sugar over the top of the cake. Mara's mind flashed back to the time Pack had come to the school with her father. Trellis was not as big or as quiet as his half brother, but he had the same black curls and dark blue eyes. He was going to be a handsome man.
"Is that for the company?" Trellis wet his finger in his mouth and swiped it through the sugar.
"What company?"
"Charlie Rivers and Miss Emily." He spoke as if company were an everyday occurrence, but his eyes shone with mischief. "Trav come down off the big hill and said he saw them comin'. I'll go tell Ma."
Mara followed him to the bedroom and smoothed the bed-clothes over Brita's slight body.
"Would you like to get up and sit in a chair to meet Miss Rivers? Trell will help us."
"No, darlin'. This be fine. Ye'll like Emily."
Coming through the parlor and into the kitchen, Pack stood in the doorway of his mother's room.
"Did I hear you say the Rivers were coming, Trell?"
"Yup. They've got your gray tied on behind the wagon. They ought to be comin' 'round the hill 'bout now."
As Mara turned to go back to the kitchen, Pack's big body filled the doorway. Their eyes met. A sincere yearning shone in the depths of his dark blue eyes. Did the thought of seeing Emily Rivers put that look there? Sam said his horse was headed toward the Rivers place when Charlie Rivers found him. Pack had been there many times if the trail was so familiar to the animal. An unexplainable uneasiness began to confuse Mara's thoughts.
"Excuse me," she said when Pack didn't move from the doorway. He stood for a few seconds longer, then moved. Mara brushed past him, her head down, embarrassed because she had been staring at him.
She looked around to make sure things were tidy, then raced up the stairs to her room. Her heart began to thump. She felt as if new life had been suddenly pumped into her body. It's the company, she thought. This was the first time she'd had guests for dinner in her home. She would use the tablecloth with the scalloped edge, make tea for herself and Miss Rivers, coffee for the men. While her mind was busy with plans for dinner, she took off her brown work dress and slipped a blue sprigged cotton dress over her head. With sure swift fingers she fastened the front buttons, whipped a clean white apron from the drawer, and tied it about her waist.
She looked at her face in her ivory-backed hand mirror, one of her most prized possessions, and grimaced. Freckles she had kept at bay with lemon juice had popped out on her nose. She loosened the ribbon that held her hair at the nape of her neck, bent over and brushed it to the top of her head, and coiled it. After fastening it with her silver hair pins, she set a comb in the back to hold the loose hair off her nape.
Each Christmas for the last five years a package had been beneath the tree for her. The year she was sixteen it had been the comb and brush, the next year the mirror and the curved comb for her hair, and the next year the hair-saver and a beautiful Mexican shawl. The fox cape was the gift at Christmas the year she graduated, and at graduation she had received a beautiful cameo brooch. These things were Mara's dearest possessions. She had fantasized that they were from a secret admirer, and that someday he would present himself at the door of the school. He would be handsome and charming and madly in love with her. He would sweep her up into his arms, carry her away to his castle, and love her to distraction.
When she questioned Miss Fillamore, the woman told her that she had bought the gifts with the funds she collected from the parents of girls Mara had tutored privately.
Mara carefully placed the mirror glass down on the dresser scarf. She remembered how desolate she had felt when she discovered that Miss Fillamore had not given her the presents because she was fond of her. Oh, well, it did not matter now that the gifts were payments for services rendered. That part of her life was over. She had no time to spend on schoolgirl sentimentalities. She was a grown woman, responsible for a house.
And company was coming.
# Chapter
SEVEN
Mara went out onto the porch and stood beside Pack. The large green eyes she lifted to his were as full of pleasure as a child's with a new toy. Their gazes met, warmed and played within the depths of each other's eyes. The harsh lines that usually furrowed his brow were gone. There was no hostility between them now. Pack felt his heart jump out of rhythm, felt his blood pound and drain away. He chuckled to hide his confusion.
"What did you get all dressed up for?"
"I didn't. This isn't a _good_ dress."
"It looks good to me."
Her breath was insufficient. She drew in a deep, long one. Her eyes lingered on his smiling mouth and the creases on each side of it.
"Thank you," she murmured breathlessly.
"You'll like Emily."
"Brita said that."
"She's almost blind—"
"Trell told me. Are they our nearest neighbors?"
"There are a couple more homesteaders east of here."
He wanted to keep talking to her, but he couldn't think of anything safe to say. An almost domestic tranquility existed between them. Sharing this sweet intimacy with her made Pack almost light-headed with pleasure.
The wagon stopped in front of the house. A man with a neat beard and a wide-brimmed hat pulled low over his eyes wound the reins around the brake handle and climbed down. Mara was surprised that no one had mentioned Charlie Rivers had only one leg. Pack went down the steps to the wagon just as Charlie reached up to help his sister down.
"You don't look too beat up to me," Charlie said to Pack. "I bet you've been playing possum, letting a pretty woman take care of you."
"Something like that." Pack laughed and held his uninjured hand out to Charlie.
"I expected to find you flat on your back, being waited on hand and foot."
"I'll not be running any footraces for awhile, but I'm out of the woods."
"Glad to hear it."
"Are you sure you're all right, Pack?" Emily placed her hand on his arm and lifted her face toward him. "Let me see your face. Is your nose still there?"
"I think so, but it might not be in the right place." Pack laughed, bent down and put his face near hers. "One nose, two eyes, and all my teeth." He snapped them at her.
"Your poor nose. I expected to see it smeared all over your face . . . again." Emily reached up to grasp his nose with her thumb and forefinger and wiggle it. "Pack Gallagher, I swan to goodness you can get into more trouble than a drunk hoot owl."
Watching from the porch, Mara saw a new side to Pack. The brother and sister were genuinely fond of him and he evidently returned their affection. He handled Emily as gently as if she were a prized possession, taking her arm and leading her toward the porch. The thought came back to her that Pack might be in love with the blind girl and she with him.
"Come meet Mara Shannon, Emily. She dashed upstairs, changed into her Sunday go-to-meeting dress and gussied up her hair when she heard you were coming." Pack's face was relaxed, and his usually grim mouth was slightly parted and tilted at the corners. His teasing eyes caused a bubble of happiness to burst from Mara in the form of trilling laughter.
"Pack Gallagher! I did no such thing! My dress and apron were dirty. Pay him no mind, Miss Rivers. He's got a loose mouth."
"I know what a tease Pack can be. I'm glad to meet you at last, and please call me Emily."
Emily stumbled on the step, but Pack's hand beneath her elbow steadied her as if he had done it many times before.
"I'm glad to meet you, and call me Mara, or Mara Shannon if you wish." As Mara held out her hand, Pack lifted Emily's forearm. Mara grasped the girl's hand and smiled into her face. Her eyes were large and smiling, and it was hard for Mara to believe that her eyesight was so poor she could scarcely see her hand in front of her.
"I'll call you Mara Shannon. That's what Pack calls you."
Mara's eyes went quickly to Pack's. He was looking down at her with a broad smile and something like pride in his eyes. A dull red started up from her neck and she turned quickly to the man beside him. Charlie Rivers was not nearly as tall or as heavy as Pack. Silver strands shone at his temples; his eyes were clear gray with wrinkles at the corners, and they moved over Mara with interest. When Mara extended her hand to Charlie, he clasped it firmly.
"How do you do?"
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss McCall."
"Charlie and I will see to the horses. Take care of Emily, Mara," Pack said.
"Of course I will. Did you think I'd leave her standing out here on the porch?" Mara said in a tone of mock exasperation. Then as an aside to Emily she said, "Some men don't think women know anything, and Pack Gallagher is one of them. Let's go visit with Brita. She speaks of you often, and I'm sure she is eager to see you."
"Set the basket on the porch, Charlie, before you take the wagon away," Emily called.
"Some women don't think men know anything, eh Charlie?"
Mara struggled to bring some order to her thoughts in view of Pack's behavior as she led Emily through the parlor to Brita's room and placed a chair beside the bed. He was completely different from the cantankerous man she had faced several nights before. He smiled, teased, and his voice was gentle. Seeing him with the Rivers opened up new avenues of conjecture as to his real nature.
Emily held out both hands to Brita. "It's been awhile since I've been here, Brita, but I knew you had Mara Shannon with you."
" 'Tis glad I am to see ye, Emily. Ye look well."
"I can smell cake. Have you been telling Mara Shannon how to make your everyday cake?"
"That I have. The lass takes to cookin'."
Emily removed her bonnet, groped for the chair behind her, and sat down.
"We were worried about Pack until Mr. Sparks came over and told us he was here with you and Mara Shannon, and that he was going to be all right."
"Aye," Brita said heavily. "Until next time."
"I'll see about starting the noon meal," Mara said.
"I'll help." Emily started to rise, but Mara placed a hand on her shoulder.
"No. Visit with Brita. I'm sure she's tired of hearing the sound of my voice."
"Charlie will bring in the basket if he doesn't get to talking with Pack and forget about it. I brought along a baked chicken, a loaf of wheat bread and some pickled beets that Brita is fond of. The raisin cookies are for Trellis."
"Cookies!" Mara exclaimed. "You'll have to tell me how to make them."
"Did I hear my name?"
"Trellis! You scamp! You heard _cookies!_ " Emily's face creased with a beautiful smile. She reached for the boy's hand. "How dare you sneak up on me. Just for that, if I catch you, I'll give you a hug."
"Now that wouldn't hurt me none a'tall, Miss Emily."
Mara saw the pleasure on the boy's face.
"We'll be having dinner in a little while, Trell. Stay and eat with us."
"Can't, Miss Mara. Me 'n Trav are goin' to town."
"What are ye goin' fer, son?" Brita's eyes were anxious. "Is yer Pa in town?"
"Yes, ma'am. Me 'n Trav thought we'd go in 'n ride home with him."
"Aye. Ye be good lads. Ye're to be careful, hear?"
"Yes, ma'am. Don't worry."
"Take the cookies with you, Trellis." Emily, sensing the tension, spoke lightly. "You and Travor enjoy them. There'll be none left once Pack gets his hand in the pan."
After Pack brought a fresh bucket of water to the kitchen, he and Charlie sat on the porch while Mara prepared the noon meal. She fried meat, made cream gravy, boiled potatoes and eggs. While the food was cooking, she changed the tablecloth and set the table, placing the everyday cake in the center. After taking Brita a tray, she removed her apron and called the men and Emily to the table.
Pack's eyes met Mara's as soon as he came into the warm kitchen. A pleased look lit up his rugged features. Flushing, Mara shifted her gaze to the guests and told them to be seated. Emily and Mara sat across from Pack and Charlie. It was Emily who brought up the subject of Sam Sparks.
"Did Mr. Sparks' hands heal all right? Oh, I hope he didn't get any infection."
"I didn't know there was anything wrong with them." Pack turned to Charlie. "What happened to his hands?"
"He didn't tell you?" Charlie spoke up after seeing that his sister was going to leave the telling to him.
"Tell me what?"
"That he saved Emily from serious burns, if not worse."
"Godamighty!" Pack glanced quickly at Mara because of his slip of the tongue, and then anxiously from Emily to Charlie. "What happened?"
Emily answered. "I was foolish enough to get too close to the fire when I knew the wind was behind me blowing my skirt toward the flame. I panicked and ran. Mr. Sparks caught me and put the flames out with his hands."
"He never said a word about it." Pack sat with his fork and his knife in his hand and looked searchingly at Emily. "Were you burned?"
"A little bit on my legs, but it was nothing compared to Mr. Sparks' hands. Blisters were all over his fingers and his palms. Is he . . . still here, Pack?" The slight hesitancy in her voice was only noted by her brother.
"He's down at the bunkhouse as far as I know. I haven't seen him ride out today."
"Charlie, you must go see about him."
"I'm not sure Charlie should go looking for him down at the bunkhouse," Pack said slowly.
"Why not? His burns could have gotten infected."
"He'd know how to take care of them."
Although Pack's face was clear of all expression, Mara had the impression that he was not pleased about Emily's interest in Sam. A feeling knifed through her that could only be jealousy. Emily had two men who cared for her, guarding her from both emotional and physical hurt. Lucky, lucky Emily. Charlie's voice broke into Mara's thoughts.
"I'll see about Mr. Sparks before we leave, Emily."
"Are you ready for cake?" Mara had caught the look that passed between Pack and Charlie. Mara had a dozen questions to ask Pack about Sam and the men in the bunkhouse, questions that he would soon answer—or she would know the reason why.
* * *
Sam knew that Charlie and Emily Rivers were at the house without ever seeing the wagon or Pack's big gray horse in the corral. It was what the men talked about during the noon meal and what they talked about while they loafed in the bunkhouse.
"I'd shore like to get me a bite a that blind gal's titties." Sporty Howard let his knife fly through the air toward a paper he had pinned to the bunkhouse wall. "She's purtier than that Irish baggage that come struttin' down here switchin' her tail like a bitch in heat."
"Ya best be careful, Sporty. Our Texas friend ain't likin' to hear no nasty talk 'bout the 'ladies.' " The voice came from the table where four men sat playing cards.
Sporty ignored the warning.
"Ever'time she goes ta the privy she looks fer me, pokes out her tits and wiggles her ass. She's jist beggin' fer it."
"Sheeit, Sporty! Ya must think yer ahidin' a fence post in yore britches."
"I'll tell ya right now, it ain't nothin' to be 'shamed of, by God! I ain't had me no complaints."
"Well then, jist wave it at Miss McCall and jist maybe she'll give ya a invite to the privy." Loud laughter followed the card dealer's remark.
Sporty threw the knife, speaking as he jerked it from the wall.
"If I had my druthers, I'd take the blind gal. Her legs is long enough to wrap a man 'n give him a good long ride."
"She'd not give ya the sport Mara would." Cullen sprawled on an unmade bunk and rolled a smoke. "That redheaded heifer would be hotter'n a brushfire if a man could get close enough to light her up."
Sam saw Cullen's eyes flick to him. They were deliberately trying to rile him. Sporty Howard retrieved his knife and stepped back to make another throw.
"Hell! I ain't wantin' to get my pecker burned off, Cull. I like to do my plowin' slow 'n deep 'n make it last. I can have me a high ole time goin' up 'n down like I was bouncin' on a featherbed. That blind gal'd do me jist fine." _Plunk._ The knife sank into the wood again.
"I wonder how ole Charlie gets his rocks knocked off. He don't go to town much." The man who spoke was watery eyed and had a mustache soiled with tobacco juice.
Sporty laughed lustily. "What'd ya suppose, ya goddamn, stupid asshole!"
The man grinned as if he had just been given a compliment.
"I'd shore not be wearin' out my hand if'n I was him! Haw! Haw! Haw!"
Sam's chest was tight. He took a deep breath. They were trying to bait him into a fight. Why? Was the man he was looking for here in the bunkhouse, and had he somehow got wind he was being hunted? Sam decided that he wouldn't play into the hands of a gun-happy, knife-throwing piece of horseshit like Sporty Howard. He'd not be forced to show his hand to this wolf pack. The time would come, he vowed silently, when Sporty and Cullen would eat their words. He got to his feet, keeping his eyes on the shifty-eyed Howard. The man grinned at him impudently.
"Ya goin' up to the house ta pay your respects to the _ladies,_ Sparks?"
Cullen sat up on the bunk. "Ya ain't got no chance at all with the redhead, Sam. Ole Pack'll be all over yore ass like sorghum on a hotcake if ya blink a eye at her."
"And ole Charlie ain't lettin' nobody sniff up to his woman, neither," Sporty added.
The desire to kill a man knifed through Sam like a hot blade. All that kept him from going for the man's throat was years of self-discipline. There was a sudden quiet that lasted for a few tense seconds. When Sam's words fell into the silence, they were clipped, but soft, and carried a weighted message to each man in the room.
"A man that talks bad 'bout good women is lower than a snake's belly. If any of you gents want to make somethin' of it, speak up." There was silence as Sam turned eyes, hard as steel, on the knife thrower. "All of yore brains is in that stick 'tween yore legs, Howard. One day I'm goin' to break it off and shove it up yore ass."
"Now that jist plumb scares me, Sparks." Sporty tried to speak with bravado, but his voice failed to carry its former confident tone.
Seething with anger, Sam stood with his hands on his hips. His eyes circled the room and moved back to Sporty. The men were watching quietly. Finally Sporty grinned at him and palmed the knife. Sam waited until the knife left the hand and struck the wall before he turned, walked out the door, and headed for the corral.
"And one a these days I'm goin' to blast that bastard clear to hell!" Sporty yanked the knife from the wall.
"Ya had yore chance," one of the card players said dryly. "What stopped ya?"
"Best do it when he ain't lookin'." Cullen stood and glanced out the window. "He's steady 'n quick. Quicker 'n a goose shittin' appleseeds."
"So he's steady 'n quick. Ya think I ain't?" Sporty sneered. "What's he runnin' from?"
"I didn't ask him, no more'n I asked you. But I'm leery of him."
"Ya think he's the law?"
"No. I think he's lookin' for somebody, 'n when he finds him he'll kill him."
"Glad it ain't me." The man dealing the cards slapped the deck down on the table. "The bastard'll not give up till he finds him. Them Texans ain't got no quit a'tall. I fit in the war with 'em. I'd ruther have me one steady 'n quick Texan on my side than six a anybody else."
"Yo're right as rain 'bout that." The man with the soiled mustache spit in the can beside his chair. "I come up the Cimarron with one a 'em. He'd have a smile on his face like the wave on a slop bucket while he was gunnin' a man down. It beat all I ever saw."
"Sheeit! If they were so good, why'd they let a bunch a pepper eaters whip their asses at the Alamo?" Sporty wiped his knife on his pants and shoved it in the scabbard. "What ya goin' to do with that redhead, Cull?"
"What do you mean?"
"Goddamn it! Ya know what I mean. Is she goin' to mess up what's goin' on here? Hell! We'd best start lookin' fer another place to spend some time."
"Don't get yore ass over the line. I done got it figured out what to do. All I got to do is wait till Pack leaves. I wish to hell them roughhousers had finished him off when they had the chance."
"You scared a him, Cull?"
"Scared? Hell! I'd a killed the son of a bitch long ago, but the ole man was set against it. But it'll happen. I ain't havin' my plans ruint by no prissy ass woman 'n a dumb muleskinner."
"I ain't likin' that marshal nosin' 'round either."
"He didn't even come down here," Cullen said with a nonchalance he didn't feel. "Might be he's got a hard-on for Miss Prissy Ass."
"Yeah? Well, I'm gettin' antsy. I ain't feelin' easy here no more." Sporty pulled his gun out of the holster and spun the cylinder like a kid playing with a toy. He waited for someone to say something, but no one did.
* * *
"Sam! Hey, Sam!"
Pack was calling from the back porch of the ranch house and waving his arm. Sam glanced back toward the bunkhouse. The porch was empty. The building was set a good three hundred feet back and to the north of the house, and Sam had plenty of time to wonder what Pack wanted to speak to him about as he walked up the path. He had not intended to go near the Rivers, although he wanted to see Miss Emily again and had even thought up several excuses to ride over to their place. He wanted to see her and yet he didn't want to see her. What the hell was the matter with him? This was not the time for him to be lollygagging over a woman.
Pack stood waiting on the porch. "Come in for coffee, Sam."
"Ya got company, Pack. I'm not wantin' to be no bother."
"Charlie and Miss Emily want to see you."
Sam stepped up onto the porch. "I'm not much for visitin', Pack." He took off his hat and followed Pack into the kitchen.
Charlie stood and held out his hand. "Howdy, Sparks."
"Howdy."
"I said I was going to shake that hand. How is it?"
"Fine, thanks to Miss Rivers."
"Hello, Mr. Sparks." Emily's large clear eyes were turned in Sam's direction and there was a smile on her face, also a blush, noted by everyone except Sam. She held her hand out to him.
"Howdy, Miss Rivers." Sam took her hand gently and would have dropped it quickly, but she refused to let it go.
"Not so fast! I've got to see if it's healed."
"It has, ma'am. It's fine."
Emily brought his palm up close to her face and ran her fingertips over the rough places where the blisters had broken. Dear God, she was pretty! Sam thought. Prettier and sweeter than he remembered. He could feel her warm breath on his palm, and he feasted his eyes on the top of her head where her hair was piled and pinned. When he had seen her before, it had been braided Indian fashion, hanging in two long ropes down over her breasts.
"I brought a tin of salve. It's not as good as aloe, but not as messy either."
"I thank ya, ma'am, but I'm not wantin' ya to feel beholden fer what I done." Sam gently pulled his hand from Emily's.
"Whether you want it or not, Sparks, we are beholden," Charlie said firmly. "We'll be forever in your debt. Emily would feel better if you took the salve."
"Why shore, if that's how ya want it. And I'm obliged."
"Sit down, Sam. Mara Shannon made cake. I'm not saying it would take any prizes, but it's eatable." Pack gave Mara a wicked, teasing smile.
"Then you'll only want a tiny little slice," she retorted.
"No, I'll manage to choke down a _big_ slice."
"Pack Gallagher, today you're nothing but a . . . a big _bosthoon!_ "
"Bosthoon? What's that?" Charlie asked.
"It means big, lovable darlin'." Pack gazed unabashed at Mara's suddenly scarlet face.
"You—you liar!"
"Ach, ach, Mara Shannon. Behave yourself. We got company." His face was wreathed in smiles and his eyes seemed to burn with a blue light.
Pack's teasing words and smiling face left Mara speechless and sent a tingling all the way to her toes. This camaraderie was so new to her that she didn't know how to handle it. Shaking her head as if to clear it, she turned to serve the cake.
When the meal was over and the men went to the front porch, Mara put the dishes in the pan and covered them with water. Her intentions were to wash them after the company had gone, but Emily insisted on helping.
"It will take no time at all. Brita is napping and we can visit. I talk better when my hands are busy."
"All right." Mara handed her a clean dishtowel. She was fascinated as she watched the near-blind girl rinse a glass in the clear hot water and dry it with the towel. "Emily, you're amazing. I don't know how you manage to do what you do."
"You don't miss what you've never had, Mara Shannon. It's as simple as that."
"Have you ever had eyeglasses?"
"None that helped. Charlie says that someday we'll go back east and see what can be done. But I don't really care if we do or not. I'm used to my blindness. I've lived all my life in a blurred world. I'm a coward too. I'm afraid of getting my hopes up and being disappointed."
They worked silently for a few minutes, then Mara asked, "Have you known Pack long?"
"Four or five years. When we came up the Missouri on the steamer, Charlie hired Pack to meet us and take our things out to the homestead. We think the world of Pack." Emily placed the plate on the table and reached into the pan for another.
"I've only known him a short while."
"I thought he and your father were very close."
"They were. Papa brought him to the school once. But it was so long ago that I didn't even know who he was when I found him lying in the road."
"Pack knew that those men were waiting for him, but he was determined to meet you at Sheffield Station. He often leaves things at our place. This time he emptied his pockets and left his saddlebags. After his horse came back, Charlie went looking for him. He saw where you had put him in the wagon and brought him here."
"Sam was the one who took care of him. I was at a complete loss as to what to do."
"Mr. Sparks is nice . . . and, I think, kind of shy."
"Shy? I hadn't thought of him as shy. He's terribly polite. Maybe he just seems shy to you because Pack is so . . . so bold." Mara carried the dishwater to the back porch and threw it out into the yard. She came back in, wiped the pan with the dishrag and hung it on a nail at the end of the work counter.
"I never thought of Pack as being bold," Emily said quietly, draping the wet cloth on the handle of the oven door and spreading it out carefully.
"Maybe not bold. I should have said bossy."
"I've not noticed him being bossy. He's one of the sweetest, kindest men I ever knew."
There was a tremor in Emily's voice. She was standing quietly with her hand on the back of the chair. Mara looked at her with a faint trace of confusion. She was suddenly aware that the subject of Pack Gallagher was not one she could discuss with Emily if she wanted the blind girl's friendship.
"Brita is still asleep," Mara said, hoping to get the conversation on a more friendly basis. "Would you like to sit in the parlor or go to the porch where we can catch the breeze?"
"Why don't you like Pack?"
Mara was startled to hear the softly spoken words so like the ones she had said to Pack a few nights before. _Why don't_ _you like me?_
"I don't dislike Pack. He sees things one way; I see them another. We constantly . . . butt heads." Mara turned when she heard a small noise come from Brita's room. She was grateful for the distraction and hurried to her cousin's bedside.
"Are the boys back from town?"
"Not yet. Would you like a cool drink?"
"That I would, darlin'. Did ye have a good visit with Emily? She be such a fine . . . lass." Brita's voice was weak and there was a momentary catch in her breath, followed by a faint moan. Fear bloomed in Mara's heart as it did each time she became aware that Brita's condition was worsening.
"We've had a grand time. The next time she comes over we're going to make a big batch of cookies, and she's going to show me how to make doughnuts. We made a list of the things we'll need."
Emily had moved quietly into the room and stood at the end of the bed. She was smiling.
"I forgot to tell you about the kittens, Brita. Cinderella had four girls and two boys. As soon as they're weaned, you can have your choice."
"That'll be grand! Mara Shannon be wantin' a cat."
"Cinderella. What an unusual name for a cat," Mara said, but her mind was on the blue tinge around Brita's mouth.
"Pack brought me the cat from Laramie, so he got to name her. A few years ago he was snowed in at our place and Charlie read us the _Tales of Mother Goose_ by Charles Perrault. My favorite was 'Beauty and the Beast,' but Pack liked 'Cinderella,' and that's what he named my tabby."
"Then we'll name our kitten Beauty. Is that all right with you, Brita?"
"Aye, lassie. 'Tis a fine name."
Mara straightened the pillow and smoothed Brita's hair with a loving hand. "I'll get you a cool drink."
Moisture had come to Mara's eyes. She quickly left the room, went to the kitchen, and stood beside the almost empty waterbucket, gripping it with both hands. _Brita was going to_ _die!_ She clenched her jaws as fear ripped into her. The memory of her mother's death and the terrible loss she had felt afterward came back to haunt her. She just barely choked back a sob as she tugged the heavy oak bucket off the shelf. Mara turned to see that Emily had come into the room and was standing beside the back door.
"You're worried about Brita." The words came out on a mere breath. She reached for Mara's hand when she approached her. The blind girl's face was creased with worry.
"She's so much worse than when I first came here." Mara whispered the words close to Emily's ear. "She's getting weaker all the time, and now there's a blue tinge to her skin."
"I thought as much. Her voice is so much weaker and it's harder for her to breathe."
"I wish she would let us take her to town."
"She won't go. I think she knows that nothing can be done. She wants to be here with her boys." Emily's hand squeezed Mara's. "If ever you need me, send one of the twins."
"Thank you."
On her way to the well, Mara saw three riders coming up the road. They rode single file. One twin was leading Aubrey's horse, the other rode behind. Aubrey lay against the horse's neck, his arms dangling. Mara wondered with disgust how he could stay in the saddle. A fine example he was setting for his boys.
She unhooked the rope and the weight of the well bucket carried it to the bottom where it landed with a plunk. She waited for it to fill, then pulled the rope through the pulley to bring the full bucket to the top. Pack's large hands reached over her and the weight was taken from her hands.
"It's too heavy for you, Mara Shannon."
"I'll have to get a lighter bucket." She moved out from between Pack's outstretched arms. "I can't depend on someone being here every time I need water. Pack. . . ." She waited until he had drawn the well bucket to the top and poured the water into the one they would carry to the house. "Pack, I'm worried about your mother."
"So am I," he replied with regret.
"She's sinking fast. Isn't there anything we can do?' Mara asked while he lowered the bucket and secured the rope.
"I had the doctor out from Laramie a couple of months ago. He said her heart was missing a beat every once in a while and there wasn't anything he could do to fix it. It was just wearing out. Rest would help more than anything. Lord knows she gets enough of that."
"Her mind doesn't rest, Pack. She worries about you, about the twins, and about Aubrey."
"And you, Mara Shannon." He stopped walking and looked down at her. "I'm obliged to you for the care you give her. I'm glad you're here. She loves you." His voice was raspy as if his throat hurt; his dark eyes were shadowed with worry.
"I love her. She's so much like my . . . mother." Tears threatened and Mara blinked rapidly.
He looked at her face searchingly. "You've got to prepare yourself."
"I know." The words came out on a sob. Pack's hand closed about hers, and she let it stay there.
"Let's get on back to the house. Charlie'll be wanting to leave soon."
"Pack." She looked up at him with a sparkle of tears on her lashes. "How did you know I was at the well?"
"I heard the pulley squeak."
The riders were approaching. Mara wiggled her hand from Pack's. His eyes followed hers and an expression of intense dislike came over his face. An expletive dropped from his lips.
"Son of a bitch!" he said in a voice as brittle as ice. He watched the twins and their father until they reached the bunkhouse. Then, almost rebelliously, he recaptured her hand and held it until they reached the house.
Charlie and Sam were in a deep conversation about longhorn cattle when Pack returned to the porch.
"They're usually yeller in color," Sam said. "They got a bony form, long legs, light hindquarters 'n a backbone that sticks up like a ridge. Tough animal. All meat 'n bone, no fat. Looks somethin' like a deer, only bigger. Most weigh 650 to 950 pounds."
"Do you think they'd do well in this country?"
"No doubt in my mind. They'll live on a handful of grass 'n take care a themselves. I ain't so sure a cougar could take one down. They're a mean breed 'n got horns to back it up. They'll kill ya if they get a chance. Longhorns can't be handled on foot 'n they're bitches to drive."
"I heard that some ranchers up north were putting their money in Texas longhorns, and a herd of a hundred thousand was on the way."
"Whew." Pack whistled through his teeth. "Do you want to get into the cattle business, Charlie?"
"Do you?"
"Hell! I can't take care of my freight business right now. I'd be in a hell of a mess without old Willy. Are you givin' it thought, Sam?"
"I got to settle down sometime. I'm gettin' partial to this country. Plenty a water 'n open range left. I've thought of drivin' up a herd next spring."
Charlie stood and knocked the ashes from his pipe on the heel of his boot. "Country is filling up. Before the railroad came it was a right peaceful place."
"Squirrely still around, Charlie?" Pack asked.
"Yeah. He's squirrely as ever, but a good old coot. He watches the place while we're away."
Sam, rolling a smoke, looked up at Pack. "That's his name? Squirrely?"
"I've not heard another. He's a genuine old-time mountain man." Pack grinned. "Claims to have been here before the Indians. Hellfire! He's so damned old he could have been here before the mountains."
Charlie chuckled. "I'd better hitch up and make tracks for home."
Emily, coming through the parlor, heard the exchange and went to the door leading to the porch. She could see the dim image of her brother and the taller form beside him that was either Pack or Sam Sparks.
"Mr. Sparks," she called.
"Yes, ma'am?"
"I want to give you the salve before we go."
Charlie Rivers looked from his sister to Sam, hesitated, then walked away. Pack followed. Sam saw the look of concern on Charlie's face before he turned away. He glanced at their retreating backs and wondered if he should excuse himself and catch up with them. He looked at Miss Rivers waiting beside the door.
What the hell? He didn't have to have the man's permission to spend a few minutes with his sister.
"Mr. Sparks?"
"I'm right here, Miss Rivers." He went up the steps and stood a few feet from her.
"I can see your outline. You're very tall."
"I guess so. I've not given it much thought."
"Charlie says I'm about average."
"I'd say Charlie's right."
"It would be nice to be taller. Especially when I want to reach something." She chided herself for making such inane conversation, but she was afraid he would leave.
"My sister was about your size."
"What was her name?"
"Rose."
"My name is Emily Rose. I wish you would call me Emily."
"I'd be right proud to, Miss Emily."
"Here's the tin of salve. Put it on your palms at night. It will soften the skin that was burned."
He took the tin from her fingers. It was warm from being held in her hand. He slipped it into his breast pocket, trying to think of something else to say. His eyes moved over her. The dress molded her high breasts and slender waist. Little gestures revealed her nervousness; the movement of her hands, her darting tongue as it moistened her lips. Sam had had his share of women, but what he felt now had nothing to do with lust. He feasted his eyes on her face, her pink cheeks, her soft lips and shiny hair. It was her eyes that fascinated him. Large and unblinking, they seemed to be looking straight into his. Emily Rose, sweet Emily Rose. He could only say her name like that in his thoughts.
A small nervous laugh suddenly burst from her lips. "I'm trying so hard to think of something to say."
The honest confession surprised and pleased him. His chuckle came from deep in his chest.
"So am I. I can't think of anythin' either. I feel like a fool jist standin' here."
"I'm not usually so tongue-tied." She laughed again softly, happily this time. Her mouth remained smiling and Sam had an aching desire to kiss it.
"Don't—" they both said at the same time, then laughed together.
His eyes were on her face, hers were on his, but he didn't know how clearly she could see him.
"Don't what?" she asked.
"Don't go in. What were you going to say?"
"Don't leave," she whispered with her lips barely moving.
"I don't want to, Emily Rose," he said softly.
"I like you calling me that. Will you be here long?"
"I'm not sure."
"If you're over our way, will you stop by?"
"Wild horses couldn't keep me away." The words came out so easily that he was hardly aware he had said them.
Emily's pounding heart released a flood of happiness that was reflected in a brilliant smile which ended in soft laughter. It was the sweetest sound Sam had ever heard. God! What a wonderful, sweet woman! Just being with her caused years of frustration and pain to drop from his shoulders. For an instant he thought about running away with her to some faraway place so that he would have her all to himself. She was still smiling and was such a pleasure to look at—warm, sparkling and pretty.
Sounds of the horses' hooves and the creaking wagon reached them.
Emily held out her hand. Sam took it and held it tightly between his two rough palms.
"Good-bye, Sam."
"Bye, Emily Rose."
The smile on her face was genuine, unguarded, natural and beautiful. Once Sam had been thrown from his horse, and when he made solid contact with the ground, he had lain there, hearing nothing but a pounding in his head. That was how he felt now. Only this time he had another discomfort: his guts were wrenched with a spasm of longing.
# Chapter
EIGHT
"She can go anytime. Her heart is worn out. I told you that when I was here before. I didn't think she would live this long." The doctor turned from Pack and spoke directly to Mara. "All you can do for her is make her as comfortable as possible."
The day before Mara had written out a detailed description of Brita's condition, and Trellis had taken it to town. The doctor had arrived in a handsome black buggy with a man riding guard. He was very professional and also very blunt. After spending some time with Brita, he spoke with Mara and Pack on the porch.
Pack held out some bills.
"I'm sorry I can't do anything for her." The doctor took the money and put it in his pocket. "I heard you got roughed up a bit, Gallagher. Is there anything I can do for you?"
"Not a thing."
The doctor shrugged. He put his bag in the back of the buggy and climbed up on the seat.
"You know where to find me . . . next time."
Mara was so upset that the doctor's words failed to register in her mind. She cried when he left. He had only confirmed what she believed to be true.
* * *
In the days that followed, Mara devoted herself entirely to Brita. She hurried through her housework while Brita slept. During Brita's waking hours she sat beside her bed, telling her about her life at the school or reading to her from the small collection of books she had managed to accumulate. She finished _Moll Flanders_ and started _Robinson Crusoe._ Pack and the twins seemed to enjoy the stories as much as their mother. In the evening they would come quietly into the room, sit on the bunk and listen. Mara could tell that it gave Brita great pleasure to see her boys together. Her eyes would rest lovingly on each of their faces.
Pack spent time alone with his mother each day. He sat beside her, held her crippled hand, and talked to her in low reassuring tones. Mara never intruded on these private talks. It seemed to her that Brita was worrying about something, and he was trying to put her mind to rest. He shared in every phase of his mother's care, even to emptying the chamber pot and boiling the soiled bed clothes in the big pot in the yard.
Mara found herself watching him more and more, marveling that he was such a big, rough man and yet so gentle with his mother. She admired his constant attention to her needs, his attitude toward his young brothers; but it was more than that. It was something in the man himself, an integrity, an inner strength, and it was also a sexual attraction that was entirely new to her.
* * *
Pack's strength was almost back to normal. With the help of the twins he had snaked logs down out of the hills, and they were sawing them into lengths to be split for firewood. It was something to do that kept him close to the house. He pulled on the saw and tried not to think about the pain in his leg.
On the other end of the two-man saw, Travor's arms felt as if they were about to fall off. He gritted his teeth and pulled doggedly. He'd be damned if he'd cry quit before they had sawed through the log. The chunk fell, Travor let his end of the saw drop, and straightened his back.
"You done real good, boy!" Pack grinned at his young brother. "I was about to holler uncle."
"I bet!" Travor returned the grin and painfully flexed his shoulders.
"Keep the blade out of the dirt. It'll be a hell of a lot harder to saw the next one if it's dull."
Travor picked up his end of the saw and they placed it lengthwise on the log. Pack drew an oily rag over the jagged teeth. "We sure as hell don't want that bastard to rust up on us."
"You goin' to stop now?"
"For awhile. I need a rest and a cold drink. How about you?" Pack tried not to limp on the way to the well. He had tied a tight cloth about his leg to keep the skin from stretching and breaking over the wound. He had to work. The inactivity, the _waiting_ was even more painful.
Travor drew the water, and they drank from the dipper that hung on the nail beside the well. A change had come over the sullen twin during the past few days. He spent more time at the house and less time with the men at the bunkhouse, although he still slept there. He willingly shared work with Trellis and had been civil to Mara, but it was Pack whose company he wanted. If they were not working together, he sat near him on the porch. During meals or when evening came, he quietly disappeared.
"Ma's goin' to die, ain't she, Pack?" Travor looked off toward the mountains as he spoke.
"Yes, Trav."
"I see a light at night. You 'n Trell sit up with her."
"Yeah. Mara Shannon takes a turn too. But either me or Trell have to move her in the bed. Mara Shannon isn't strong enough for that."
"I could . . . do that. I'm as strong as Trell."
Pack made a to-do of wiping the sweat from his face and neck while he blinked away the moistness from his eyes. He wanted to throw his arm about his young brother, but he didn't dare, fearing that the line holding together this fragile friendship they had forged would snap.
"Ma would like that."
"What's goin' to happen . . . when she's gone? Mara Shannon won't let us stay here."
"I don't know what will happen," Pack said honestly. "But you and Trell will have a place with me if you want it."
"We couldn't leave Pa. He don't have anybody but Cullen, and Cullen don't care nothin' for him."
"How old are you and Trell?"
"Fourteen. Fifteen in the fall."
"I didn't realize you were that old. Time goes by fast."
"Do you know how to read, Pack?" They were on the way back to the woodpile.
"Some."
"Do you read as good as Mara Shannon?"
"No, but I can make out most of the words, given time."
"When she reads about the man on the island, I feel like I'm right there." Travor picked up the oily cloth and moved it along the saw blade. "Did the man who wrote the story just make it up in his head and write it down?"
"I guess so. I never heard that he was left on an island." Pack retied the cloth about his thigh. "Charlie Rivers has a lot of books. If Mara Shannon reads all of hers, maybe we can borrow some from Charlie."
"I wish I could read like Mara Shannon. I'd read those stories to myself."
"Well," Pack said, blowing out a long breath, "I bet Mara Shannon would teach you if you asked her."
Travor lifted his head to look up at his brother. Unashamed tears blurred his eyes.
"There ain't no time," he said hoarsely and picked up his end of the saw.
* * *
It was nearly midnight. On the hill behind the house a man sat on his haunches and waited for a light to appear in the upstairs window. He began to feel the same excitement he had felt the night before when he saw Mara move about the room preparing for bed. It had been late. He had waited for several hours just as he had tonight. He lifted the small telescope to his eyes and saw movement in the room downstairs where the light burned all night. Minutes later a light shone from the upstairs window.
The man sat as still as a stone and watched as Mara passed the window and back again. On the next trip her arms were lifted. She was taking down her hair! It fell over her shoulders and down her back. She massaged her scalp with her fingers and then moved into the center of the room. The man almost groaned with fear that she would move out of his sight. She unbuttoned the top of her dress, wiggled her shoulders and arms out of it and let it slide down over her hips. A white chemise with a drawstring covered her breasts. As she reached for the string, she stepped out of his sight.
He drew in a ragged breath and cursed. All too quickly the light was gone. He lowered the glass and stared at the darkened window, waiting for the desire that made him hard and uncomfortable to lessen.
Ace January moved quietly to his horse and led him to another area where he had a view of the bunkhouse, settled himself against a tree, and raised the spyglass. Nothing stirred, yet he waited. He would like nothing more than to lie down and sleep, but the stakes were too high for him to indulge himself. If his hunch was right, he would be sleeping in a featherbed for the rest of his life. It was very possible Mara Shannon McCall would be beside him. As desirable as she was, she was like any other woman. He had no doubt that he could have her once she realized what he could give her.
* * *
Mara awakened the instant Pack called her name. It seemed to her that she had just closed her eyes. She had stayed with Brita until midnight while he napped on the bunk. Wide awake, she sat up in bed, clutching the cover up over her breasts, a lump of dread in her throat. Pack stood, a vague shadow, filling the doorway of her room.
"Pack? What is it?"
"Come," he said simply and backed away.
Mara Shannon pulled her dress on over her nightdress, took a ribbon from her pocket and tied her hair at the nape of her neck. She groped in the dark for her shoes, couldn't find them, then left the room in her bare feet. At the bottom of the stairs she followed the ribbon of light to Brita's room.
Pack had moved the lamp to the bureau behind his mother's bed. He sat on the stool beside her, the light shining down on his dark head, his face haggard. Trellis stood beside him and Travor sat on the bunk, his shoulders hunched, his hands clasped between his knees. Mara moved to the bedside, her eyes anxiously scanning Brita's face. Her head moved restlessly on the pillow and a froth of bubbles flew in and out of her mouth as the slow, gasping breaths came and went. The only sound in the room was the sobbing, dragging sound of her breathing.
No words were necessary between the four people grouped around the bed, only a silent waiting—a period of suspense that had no relation to reality. Mara drew close to Pack and placed her hand on his shoulder.
"Shouldn't we call Aubrey?"
"No." The word came from Travor who moved up beside her. "No," he said again. "He's drunk."
Mara's other hand inched over and clasped the boy's cold one. His fingers accepted hers gratefully and tightened. He was holding his grief tight inside him, not even allowing himself the comfort of tears. Trellis, standing at the foot of the bed, was crying silently. Pack sat hunched, his eyes on his mother's face. He was still except for his large fist which rested on the bed beside her milk-white hand. His fingers opened and closed, opened and closed.
The minutes spun into an hour or more. They waited, each wishing, hoping, but knowing the inevitable. The three sons knew they were spending the last few minutes with the mother who had given them life.
A rooster crowed, announcing a new day. Shortly after that the clock on the mantel in the parlor struck five times.
Then, sudden silence.
Mara looked down at Pack's hand. It had closed into a tight, hard fist and did not open again. The silence went on and on with all four pair of eyes on Brita's face, peaceful now that she no longer had the agonizing task of drawing breath into her lungs. As they watched, color faded from her face.
"She's gone." Pack spoke the words that penetrated each of them and sank into their senses with cold finality. No one else spoke. He reached over and gently cupped his mother's chin in his large hand to close her mouth.
Travor turned and sought the darkness of the kitchen. His twin went with him. Mara stayed beside Pack, her hand gripping his shoulder, her face wet with tears. He reached for her hand and held onto it tightly. He was holding his grief inside, hurting hard with a kind of knotted pain that wouldn't loosen. Finally tears rolled from the corners of his eyes and down his cheeks to his set jaws.
A sound like none Mara had heard when he had been so badly hurt came from his throat. He turned, leaning his head toward her. Her fingers forked through his hair around to his cheek and pressed his head to her breast like a mother comforting a child. His arm wrapped around her thighs, pulling her close, his shoulders shaking with soundless sobs. She had no thought but to give him comfort. Pack's tears wet the front of her dress, but she was unaware of it until later. She held him, stroked the crisp blue-black curls at his temple, moved her hand down his nape to his shoulders and back.
"Shhh . . . shhh . . . she's at peace now," she crooned.
"But—she suffered—and had so—little."
"She's not suffering now, and she had all that she wanted. She had a great and enduring love for your father. She had you, and she had the boys. It gave her pleasure to see the three of you together."
Mara was conscious of nothing but great sorrow and the need to comfort. She held Pack's head to her breasts, smoothed his hair back from his brow and cupped his cheek with her palm. When the twins came back into the room, she drew back with no feeling of guilt for having been caught holding and comforting him.
"I'll take care of her now." Mara reached over and smoothed the hair back from the still warm face of the woman on the bed.
Pack stood looking down at his mother, feeling deserted and terribly alone.
"Tell us what to do."
"We wash and dress her. My mother . . . died in the night and that is what my father did."
"I'll heat water." Travor left the room as if grateful to be doing something.
"Ma don't have many clothes." This came from Trellis. His lips were still trembling and he was trying desperately not to cry.
Mara knew that only two worn dresses were in the bureau drawer. Brita had spent the last years of her life in loose gowns.
"I have a dress that would be pretty on her. Do either of you mind if I furnish the burial garments?" Mara's voice thickened as she spoke the final words. Tear-filled eyes went from Pack to Trellis and back again.
"I think Ma would be pleased to wear something of yours. Don't you, Trell?"
The boy nodded wordlessly.
With Pack's help, Mara washed and dressed his mother in a rose pink dress with a white lace collar and cuffs. It was one of Mara's favorite dresses. They made a fold in the back of the dress because it was too big for Brita's slight body. Mara put a pair of white stockings on her legs and brushed her hair. When she had finished arranging and pinning the soft gray hair to the top of Brita's head, she went up to her room and brought down her curved ivory comb. With infinite care she placed it in Brita's hair, lifted her hands, and folded them across her breasts. When she straightened, her eyes, glistening like wet emeralds, met Pack's.
"The comb was given to me at Christmas a long time ago when I was lonely and homesick. It means a lot to me, and I want her to have it."
The sun was up by the time they finished laying Brita out on the bed and cleaning the room. While Pack hung blankets over the windows to darken it, Mara carried the teakettle of hot water to her room, washed herself, put on a clean dress and apron, and pinned up her hair.
Pack was shaving at the washstand when Mara returned to the kitchen. She made a pan of biscuits and put them in the oven. When they were done, she set them on the table with butter and syrup. No one ate much, but they all made a show of swallowing a few bites.
"Trav, we'd better go tell Pa." Trellis spoke as if he were going to choke on the words.
"He might still be drunk."
"In that case we'll have to sober him up."
Pack followed his brothers to the porch. "If you see Sam, ask him to come up." He watched the two boys go down the path to the bunkhouse, then came back to the kitchen. Mara was massaging her temples with her fingertips. "You're worn out. Why don't you sleep awhile?"
"No. There's too much to be done. Brita would want us to make things as nice as we can. How many will come when they get the word?"
Pack regarded her for a long while, his eyes filled with grief. When he spoke there was deep regret in his voice.
"Not many. Aubrey and Cullen never made neighbors feel very welcome. No one came to see Ma but Charlie and Emily. She hasn't been to town but a time or two since they came here."
"It won't matter. Brita will have her sons," Mara said firmly. "There will be a good meal for them and anyone who does come."
Later, Mara saw the twins walking with Aubrey toward the horse tank. As she watched, she saw Travor give him a shove. Aubrey toppled in backward, and it was Trellis who helped him out. Mara shook her head sadly. The boys were trying to sober up their father so he could attend their mother's wake.
When Sam came up the path to the house, Pack went out onto the porch to meet him.
"I'm shore sorry, Pack," he said with his hat in his hand. "I'm just plumb sorry. Is there anythin' a'tall I can do?"
"Yes there is, Sam. I'd be obliged if you'd ride over and tell Charlie and Emily."
"I'll be glad to."
"And Sam, if it isn't too much to ask, I'd sure thank you to ride on into Laramie. Go to the preacher's house, the one next to the church with the stained glass window in front. I don't remember if he's Methodist or what. Tell him to come out in the morning. Tell him to come and bring the best box he can get, and I'll cancel the bill he owes me for hauling in that window and his church pews."
"Did ya think he wouldn't come?" Sam asked and screwed his hat down tight on his head.
"I'm not exactly a friend of his," Pack said dryly. "I'm just making sure."
"I'm thinkin' yo're right. Them righteous fellers can be plumb aggravatin' at times if a man strays from their way a thinkin'."
"When he wanted the pews for his church hauled in for damn near nothing, he came to me, but when I stepped in the ring to fight Black Bob Mason, I was nothing but pure dee old Irish trash leading his flock to hell." Pack's voice was laced with dry amusement. "A hell of a lot of his flock were there too, and more than a few of them won some money."
"Knuckle fightin' would raise a lot more money fer the church than box-suppers." Sam grinned one of his rare grins and stepped off the porch. "I'll get on over to Rivers' place 'n tell them the buryin' will be in the mornin'."
"Sam, when this is over, I'd like a word with you about another matter."
"Sure, Pack."
"You'll be welcome to come up for the meal . . . after the burying. We can talk then."
"I'd be proud to come. There's a thin' ya'd best be knowin' 'n it ort a be knowed now. Somebody's hangin' round here nights spyin' on the house. I found his tracks more 'n once up there on the ridge." Sam jerked his head toward the west. "Keep a sharp eye out, hear?"
Sam went back down the path to the corral, saddled his horse and rode out. Pack watched from the porch, his mind busy with the information Sam had just given him.
The twins came back to say that Aubrey would be up in a little while. He was in the cookshack where Steamboat was forcing him to drink a mixture of raw eggs and buttermilk.
"Phew!" Mara Shannon shuddered. "That sounds terrible."
"It ain't no worse than some of that other rotgut he drinks." Travor's young face was set rebelliously and not an ounce of sympathy was in his voice.
"Will you boys be here for awhile?" Pack came through the parlor and into the kitchen. "I'd like to go down to the creek and wash, but I don't want to go off and leave Mara Shannon here by herself."
"Go ahead. We'll be here." Trellis poured coffee for himself and his brother.
"Sam's gone to tell Charlie and Emily. Emily will be here by this afternoon." Pack looked at Mara as he spoke. "She'll be a help to you. She was fond of Ma." His expression became as bleak as his voice.
"I'll be glad for her company."
"Sam will go on into town and tell the preacher to come out in the morning."
"Pack . . . what'll we do about a . . . a box?" Trellis could just barely get the words out.
"The preacher will bring one from town." Pack placed his hand on his young brother's shoulder. "We're going to make it just as nice for Ma as we can." He cleared his throat. "Later this evening the three of us will go up to the place where Mara Shannon's parents are buried and pick out a spot."
"Ma liked that place. She used to put flowers up there when she could walk." Trellis turned his face away. "Is there room inside that fence you built?"
Mara's eyes went to Pack's. "You built a fence?"
"I didn't exactly build it. I dug a few holes for corner posts and fastened some sections of iron fence around the plot to keep it from being overrun."
"It was thoughtful of you, Pack."
Pack shrugged, a gesture he used when he was embarrassed and didn't know what to say. When he did speak, it was to change the subject.
"Trav, why don't you talk to Steamboat and see if he'll cook up a hindquarter of beef? We'll want to put on a spread and Mara Shannon is worn out from being up all night."
"I don't know if he'll do it, Pack. Cullen's bein' a asshole." Travor looked quickly at Mara to see if she was offended by the word, but her face was turned away. "Cullen says Steamboat works for him."
"Steamboat works for the owner of this property," Pack said quietly. "Ask him to cook the meat. I'll take care of Cullen if he makes trouble."
Mara and the twins were in the kitchen when Aubrey came up the path to the house. Trellis had filled the firebox of the cookstove, and Mara was stirring up the everyday cake that had been Brita's favorite. Aubrey had tried to clean himself up. He had shaved with shaking hands as indicated by the small nicks on his face made by the razor. His shirt was wrinkled but clean, and he had combed his hair.
He stood silently in the doorway as if expecting to be turned away. His watery eyes were swimming in tears. Finally he pushed himself away from the doorjamb and went into Brita's room and closed the door. Mara went about her work. The twins sat in stoney, uncomfortable silence, hunched over their coffee cups. When Travor could stand it no longer, he picked up the water bucket and went outside. Trellis followed.
Mara was pulling the cake from the oven when Pack returned. Her face was flushed from the heat; her auburn hair was damp from sweat and stuck to her cheeks and forehead. Pack's hair was wet and glistening from being in the creek. His shirt clung to his broad, wet shoulders and deep chest like a second skin. He had a fistful of wildflowers in his hand.
"Oh, Pack! The flowers are beautiful. Where did you find them?"
"Down by the creek. There's more. We'll gather them in the morning."
"Ouch!" The cloth Mara was using to hold the pan slipped and her fingers came in contact with the hot pan. Pack tossed the flowers to the table and was at her side in an instant.
"Here, let me take that." He grabbed the towel from the wash bench, took the hot pan from her hand and set it on the table.
"That towel's dirty, Pack," she chided gently because she couldn't think of anything else to say.
"Where did you burn yourself?" He grasped her wrist and pulled her up close to him.
"My fingers."
His big hand held hers in a gentle grip. He turned it and looked closely at the pad of her forefinger, rubbed his thumb across it, then lifted her hand quickly and stuck her finger into his mouth. Shock waves washed over Mara from the top of her head all the way to her toes. Pack's lips formed a firm cocoon around her second knuckle. His tongue, rough and wet, bathed the pad with gentle strokes. She drew in a gulp of air that came out with a sigh from between unconsciously parted lips. She started to speak but forgot what she was going to say.
He seemed to be completely absorbed in what he was doing. He towered over her, filling her world with his masculine presence. Mara looked up at him. Her green eyes, darkened by confusion, sought his. What she saw in the blue eyes looking into hers was bittersweet and oddly haunting. Then her dark lashes came down, shutting him out lest he see the debilitating weakness that his touch elicited.
"What . . . are you doing?" Her voice was gritty, thick. Her brain was fogged with bewilderment. All that registered was the exotic feeling of her finger in his mouth, his tongue stroking her flesh.
"I'm making it better," he said calmly when he pulled her wet and glistening finger from between his lips.
They were standing so close that she had to tilt her head to look up at him. His clean, damp scent filled her nose, her head. His brows were drawn together as he examined first the finger and then her thumb. She watched him through a haze of sensuality as he lifted her hand to his mouth again. His eyes, dark and clouded with concern, looked down into hers as his firm lips closed around her thumb. His tongue lathed the pad with a circular motion. Her eyes were eloquent with unspoken questions. Why did his touch leave her defenseless and cause her breath to come out in fragments?
"Feel better?" he asked.
She nodded. "It isn't a bad burn."
"Water takes out the fire."
"I'll remember."
"Your fingers taste like spices."
"It's from . . . the cake." She wet her lips and pulled her hand from his. "I should get the flowers in water. I've got just the thing to put them in."
She went to the shelf that stretched along the wall above the wash bench where she had placed the small crocks and reached up for a gray one with a blue stripe around the top. Her fingers could only touch the bottom.
"Is this the one you want?" Pack's chest was against her back, his chin stirred the top of her hair. Thick, muscular forearms with a shadowing of dark hair enclosed her as he reached above her head for the crock.
Mara nodded, then waited until he moved from behind her before she turned. She could not understand what was the matter with her and tried to swallow the excitement that bubbled up each time his body came in contact with hers. The sight of him with his sleeves pushed up to his elbows intrigued her. The buttons near the neck of his shirt were open, showing more dark hair. His powerful masculinity caused her heart to carom crazily, and even more shocking to her was the thought that floated into her mind. She wondered if God had made her from the rib of such a man as Pack Gallagher.
"This will be perfect." Mara said the words, knowing instinctively that they were the right words to say. She filled the crock with water and placed the flowers in it, pulling at the stems to spread the blooms. She lifted her head to see Pack frowning at the closed door going into his mother's room.
"Who's in there?"
"Cousin Aubrey."
"What the hell is he doing here _now?_ He didn't bother to came yesterday or for days before that." His lips clamped down hard, his head came up, and he shot a furious sidelong glance at the door. When he started for it, Mara quickly stepped around the table and placed her hand on his arm.
"Pack—don't. Don't make a scene. For the twins' sake. Travor is just now beginning to see his father for what he is. We don't want to put that boy into the position of having to defend him."
"But . . . goddamn it, Mara Shannon, he put Ma through hell with his drinking and slipshod ways." The bitterness of his words drew the corners of his mouth down and caused his eyes to become rock hard.
"I know, but it's over. The twins will be the ones to suffer now if there's unpleasantness. Their mother was all that was good, stable, and secure in their lives. They need you more than ever now that she's gone."
She stood still. Her large emerald eyes pleaded with his as her fingertips lightly touched his arm. Their gazes met and locked. Pack slowly brushed the hair off her cheek with the back of his hand; his knuckles nudged her chin when he lowered his hand to cover the fingers on his arm. He took such a deep breath that his chest heaved.
"You're a sweet little thing, and you've got a good head on your shoulders." He dragged his eyes from hers and glanced at the door. "How long has he been in there?"
"Quite awhile. We can go in and put the flowers on the table beside Brita's bed. She loved flowers."
Mara moved ahead of Pack and opened the door. Aubrey was sitting on the bunk in the darkened room with his elbows on his knees, his face in his hands. He looked up when the door opened, then got to his feet.
"There's coffee in the pot on the stove, Cousin Aubrey, if you care to have some." Mara set the flowers on the table beside the bed. "Pack found these down by the creek. Aren't they lovely?"
Aubrey nodded and slipped out the door as if he expected Pack to attack him. Pack followed and Mara hurried after them. Aubrey slumped down on the bench, leaning his elbows on the trestle table. While Mara poured the coffee and placed it in front of him, Pack stood on the other side of the table. Aubrey's hands were shaking so badly that he could scarcely lift the cup. Pack put a foot up on the bench, rested his forearm on his knee, and leaned across the table.
"If you as much as smell the cork on a whiskey bottle between now and the burial, I'm going to break every bone in your miserable body." His face and his voice were so impersonal that Mara found it hard to believe he had spoken the threatening words.
Aubrey was under no such illusion. Pack's words sank into his mind like a stone dropped into a deep well. He nodded without looking up.
# Chapter
NINE
Sporty Howard tilted his chair back against the wall and looked out the door toward the house. It was quiet in the rough log building. The men talked in muted tones out of respect for the dead. None of them had ever seen old drunken Aubrey's crippled wife; but she was a mother, and mothers were to be respected and cherished regardless of who they were. The majority of men in the bunkhouse had known only the love of their mothers and it was sacred to them.
"The useless old bitch finally give up the ghost," Cullen remarked. Two men rose up out of their seats and stared at him menacingly. After that he too had been quiet.
"Do ya think Sam's gone for good?" Sporty asked Cullen in low tones, not out of respect for the dead, but because he didn't want the men at the card table to hear.
"Naw. He'll be back."
"He took his bedroll."
"He always takes his stuff when he leaves. I'm thinkin' he don't want ya prowlin' through it, Sporty."
Sporty took no offense at the remark. He didn't even seem to hear it. His face was turned toward the door, and he was watching Pack draw water from the well.
"Pack'll be leavin' now. There ain't no reason fer him to be hangin' round. Do ya reckon he'll take the prissy ass redhead with him?"
"I suspect he'll try. The ole man thinks he will. He thinks Pack's got his nose to the ground 'n is smelling out a place for himself here. I think Miss Mara Shannon McCall will stay. She's as stubborn as her old man was. But there's ways round that. Pack's got to leave sometime 'n see bout his business in Laramie." A hint of a threat was in Cullen's voice.
"Ya plannin' on courtin' her?"
"Sheeit! I'm plannin' on gettin' her on her back 'n gettin' in her drawers. That's the only way I'll get this place. If it takes sweet talkin', I'll sweet-talk her. Hell! She's so proper she'd wed me like a shot if I plowed her. She'll figure she's been ruint 'n won't ever get another man." Cullen chuckled nastily. "I'd sure enough like to get me a blanket colt outta Miss Mara McCall. Whee! I'd be set."
"That ain't decent," Sporty said coolly.
Cullen looked at him with amazement. "What the hell ya taking about? Ain't decent? Hell! Ya wouldn't know _decent_ if it jumped up 'n hit ya!"
"Don't ya be makin' no fun a me, Cullen. My folks was church-goin' folk. She's yore kin, yore cousin, ain't she? Ya wantin' to get ya a bunch a idiots?"
Cullen's expression turned to disgust.
"There ain't nothin' to that ole tale. 'Sides, her pa was my pa's cousin. Our blood ain't close enough to make idiots."
"What about that fat gal in Cheyenne ya was tellin' me bout?"
"I'd jist as soon hump a young heifer." Cullen snorted. "I'd a not messed with her a'tall if her pa didn't own the livery."
Sporty watched Aubrey cross the porch and go into the cookshack.
"Yore ole man's goin' to be pissin' coffee fer a week. He ain't touched his bottle today a'tall."
"He's scared shitless of Pack."
" 'N you ain't?"
"Hell, yes! I'd be a fool not to. He'd kill a man in a brawl. He's bigger 'n me, but I got more brains."
"If'n I was you, I'd get myself all slicked up 'n pay my respects to Mrs. McCall. It'll make gettin' yore foot in the door a lot easier later on."
"I been thinkin' on doin' jist that. Do ya have a clean shirt I could borrow?"
* * *
Mara stood beside the black wool scarf she had tied in a bow and fastened to the wall beside the front door, a symbol that there was a death in the house, and watched as Pack helped Emily from the wagon. As soon as Emily's feet were on the ground, her arms went about his waist and she hugged him.
As Mara watched this open display of affection, she was struck once again by the thought that Pack was in love with the near-blind girl and that her brother approved. For a reason unknown to her, chills chased over her skin. Charlie gripped Pack's hand warmly with one hand while squeezing his shoulder with the other. With a firm hand beneath Emily's elbow, Pack guided her up the steps to where Mara stood waiting. She greeted Mara with a hug.
"I thought about coming over yesterday, but Charlie was putting new traces on his harnesses and I hated to bother him. I had Brita on my mind. Oh, I wish I had come."
"Thank you for coming now. Come in and let me get you a cool drink of water. It turned out to be a warm day."
"Charlie, be careful with the basket when you bring it in." Emily spoke to her brother and then turned back to Mara. "I was baking a berry pie when Sam came by to tell us the news. I brought it and a few other things along. I came prepared to spend the night, if you need me."
"That's kind of you, Emily. You're most welcome."
Brita's body lay in the parlor beneath the clock that had been stopped at the time of her death. Pack and the twins had removed a door and placed it on two barrels. After Mara covered it with a quilt, Pack carried his mother's body from the bedroom. In the darkened parlor she appeared to be sleeping peacefully. Her lower limbs were covered with a sheet and the flowers Pack had picked were beside her pillow.
Mara waited beside the door while Pack and his friends stood beside the bier. When Emily reached out, Pack guided her hand to where his mother's hands lay folded. Emily placed her warm palm on Brita's cold hands for a moment, her head bowed. When she lifted her head, her eyes were filled with tears.
"She fulfilled her destiny," Emily whispered tearfully. "She came to this earth and left something behind to mark the time she spent here. She left you, Pack, and the twins."
The misery was so clearly etched in Pack's face that Mara was overwhelmed by the tenderness and concern she felt for him. Pack's arm moved across Emily's shoulder. Emily leaned against him, Pack's dark head tilted toward her light one, and he placed his cheek against her hair.
Feeling as if she were intruding, Mara slipped out of the room and went to the kitchen. A surge of emotion unlike any she had experienced touched her to the core. Pack was not alone. His friends were there to give him comfort. But she had never felt more alone in her life.
Mara was distracted from her dark thoughts when Travor and Trellis came to the kitchen on their way to the creek. She supplied them with soap and clean towels and volunteered to iron the shirts they would wear to the funeral service. Mara had developed a genuine fondness for the boys.
"Supper will be ready at sundown," Mara said. "Ask your father to come up to the house and eat with us."
"He won't," Travor said and opened the screen door.
"But you'll be here, won't you?"
Trellis answered. "We'll be here."
The boys and Charlie ate heartily of the supper Mara and Emily prepared. Pack ate little while he and Charlie talked in muted voices, as befitted a house of mourning. When Charlie was ready to leave, he and Pack went to hitch up the team.
Sam returned from Laramie shortly after Charlie left for home. When he rode his tired horse up the path toward the corrals, Pack went to the back door and hailed him.
"Hey, Sam!"
Sam turned his horse and rode up to the porch.
"The preacher'll be here before noon. He'll be bringin' his missus 'n a nice box from the furniture store."
"Much obliged, Sam. Did you have to do any arm-twisting on the reverend?"
Sam grinned. "Not much. He's mighty proud a that colored glass window, 'n he ain't wantin' no rock bustin' it up."
"Son of a bitch," Pack muttered under his breath because Mara had come out to hang up the wet dish towels. Emily stood in the doorway.
Sam's eyes rested on Emily's quiet face. He put his fingers to the brim of his hat and nodded his head in greeting, then cursed himself for forgetting that he was probably only a blur to her.
"Howdy, ladies."
"Come in and let us fix you some supper, Sam. There's plenty left over."
"Thank ya, ma'am, fer the invite, but I'll get on down to the cookshack 'n see what ole Steamboat has hashed up. I got pounds a road dust on my back that's got to come off before I'm fit fer a lady's company."
"Come up this evening for coffee."
"Yes, ma'am. Thank ya."
Sam turned his horse toward the corral. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Emily's face turned toward him. As he watched, she brushed her feathery hair from her forehead with the back of her hand, a gesture that was becoming familiar to him. _She didn't even let on that she knew he was there._ Now why in the hell was that so damned important to him? He knew why even as he asked himself the question.
The image of her face and the fantasy of holding her in his arms had lurked in the back of his mind during the long ride. He had ridden his tired horse harder than he should in order to get back, knowing that she would be there and that he would have a chance to see her. The truth suddenly struck him like an unavoidable shot from ambush. It was there instantly, big as life and twice as powerful. He was not going to be able to ride away from this woman and forget her when his work was finished.
* * *
As darkness approached, candles were lit in the parlor and the family gathered for the death vigil. Mara was surprised to see Cullen, bathed and shaved, quiet and respectful, arrive with Aubrey. They swung around the house, came in the front door, and took the chairs at the end of the bier. When the twins came, she asked them to carry in a bench from the porch to sit on. She and Emily sat on the straight wooden kitchen chairs, and Pack, ignoring Cullen and his father, sat down on a box with his forearms resting on his thighs, his huge hands clasped between his knees.
Minutes turned into an hour. Mara's mind went over the events that would take place the next day. The preacher and his wife would be out in the morning with the burial box. The scarcity of furnishings in the house would be embarrassing to her, but there was nothing she could do about that now. Working with what she had, she had made the house as presentable as possible.
The stars came out. The moon came up, its light making a shadow of the house across the yard. A breeze moved through the treetops over the homestead, bringing with it the sound of an owl hooting.
Inside the parlor Mara began to squirm. Not only was the chair hard on her bottom, but each time she looked up, Cullen's bold, admiring eyes were on her. Being so near-sighted, Emily was unaware of the stare, and Pack was unable to see from where he sat on the box. Trellis had noticed Mara's discomfort, shuffled his feet to get his half brother's attention, then scowled at him. Cullen merely gave him an insolent glare. One time the corners of Cullen's mouth had lifted in a half smile when Mara's eyes met his. After that she refused to turn her face in his direction.
"I'll go make fresh coffee," Mara whispered to Emily when she felt she could sit still no longer. She tiptoed from the room without a sound.
In the kitchen she leaned against the trestle table and massaged her temples with her fingers. She couldn't remember ever having been so tired. Her hands felt as if each weighed a hundred pounds when she lifted the chimney to light the lamp. For a long excruciating moment she stared around her.
The kitchen was the largest room in the house, and here she had worked the hardest. The oak slab top of the table had been scrubbed and polished to a glowing finish. On the work counters, food for tomorrow's dinner was covered with clean dish towels. The cloth curtain that was strung on a rod to hide the utensils stored below was starched and ironed. The cookstove was cleaned, the woodbox was filled, the lamp chimneys were polished, and the plank floor scrubbed. She had even mended the rips in the screen door with a heavy wool thread. The work had kept her mind so busy that she'd had no time to think of how she was going to stay now that Brita was gone.
Working quietly, Mara shook down the ashes in the firebox and filled it with kindling, prodding it until it blazed. She filled the coffeepot from the water bucket, removed a round cap from the top of the range with the lid-lifter, and set the black-bottomed pot down in the hole.
The bud of the thought that had been in the back of her mind since morning came forward in full bloom. _Pack would leave after the burial._ No longer would there be a reason for him to stay. What would she do then? She was sure that because of his friendship with her father he felt responsible for her. He would insist that she go to Laramie, Cheyenne, or Denver and get a teaching job. That she would never do!
The thought of not having her own home and having to live in a boarding house, teaching children who didn't want to learn, working without adequate supplies and kowtowing to the school board members and their wives was so repulsive to her that she felt a hard, heavy knot begin to form in her stomach just thinking about it.
She would not do it! She had the right to make her own decisions. Women in Wyoming Territory had been given the right to vote. Earlier that year six women had served on a jury in Laramie. If a woman was capable of meting out justice, she was capable of deciding her own future. Mara considered herself as smart as any woman on that jury. She'd not be pushed into leaving her home.
Mara's mind was so distracted with miserable thoughts that she failed to hear Cullen come into the room. She turned to see him standing a few paces behind her and gasped with fright.
"Don't you dare sneak up on me like that! You scared me!" she snapped.
"I just wanted to know if there was anythin' ya needed."
Cullen was only slightly taller than Mara's five and a half feet. His face was charmingly handsome when he smiled, but the smile never quite reached his eyes. There was something cold and unfeeling about him. Her eyes flashed contemptuously over him before she swung around, opened the curtains below the workbench and took out the cups.
"There's nothing I need now. But the day after tomorrow you and I will have a talk. You will tell me about the men who spend their days playing cards in the bunkhouse, and you will tell me where the cash money has been coming from to run this place. Something underhanded is going on here, and I intend to find out what it is."
"I agree, Mara Shannon. As the owner it's your right to know everythin' that goes on."
Mara was so startled that she gaped at him for a moment. She had fully expected him to be as sullen and obnoxious as he had been the other two times she had spoken to him.
"I want an accounting of the cattle—"
"Sure," he broke in, nodding in agreement. "I know every steer and heifer on this place."
"You've kept accounts?"
"I ain't had much book learnin', Mara Shannon. I got the figures up here." He tapped his head with his forefinger.
"That's a risky way of doing business."
"You've got the book learnin' to keep accounts. I got the know-how to do the rest. If we work together, we can make this place pay. We'll sell off some of the cattle and fix up the house. We'd have enough to buy a buggy so ya can go to town when ya want." He rolled his hat around in his hands and looked down at the floor. When he lifted his eyes to look at her, they were filled with remorse. "I'm sorry about what happened when ya first come, Mara. I ain't got no excuse but to say it was a jolt havin' ya drop in on us like ya did."
He seemed so sincere that Mara could almost believe him.
"There's no point in looking back, Cullen. I never—" Mara broke off when Pack came striding into the room.
"Get the hell out of here, Cullen. Stay away from Mara Shannon." Pack's tone and his expression reflected his anger. He loomed over the shorter man, his clenched fists at his sides. All pretense of civility was gone.
"Sure, Pack. If that's what ya want. I've too much respect for your ma to cause a fuss when she ain't even in the ground yet." Cullen's eyes went to Mara with a look of apology.
Pack snorted. "Respect! You've never respected anything in your miserable life. You don't even respect yourself. But I'll not argue with you. Heed my words and stay away from Mara Shannon or else I'll tear your head off."
"I said all right." Cullen spoke soothingly. "Let's not start anythin' with your dear, dead mother lyin' in there." At the end there was a trace of mockery in his voice.
A blanket of silence covered the room.
Pack went very taut, a muscle twitched at the corner of his mouth. His face turned a dull red and his eyes, dark and fiery, compelled Mara's to meet them. She knew he was near the breaking point.
The sudden hissing sound of water dancing on the top of the hot range as the coffeepot boiled over broke the silence.
"Tend to the coffee, Mara Shannon," Pack said quietly.
A prickle of uneasiness went up Mara's spine. Pack's muscles were as tight as a coiled spring. Instinctively she knew that he was on the verge of slamming into Cullen. The smaller man stood his ground, seemingly unperturbed. Finally he edged toward the back door.
"I'll go, Mara Shannon. I ain't goin' to be the cause a any trouble." He cast Pack a glance of disgust. "It ain't decent at a time like this."
_Cullen can charm the skin off a snake when he sets his_ _mind to it._ The words Brita spoke the day she arrived came to Mara's mind. Too many things had happened between that day and this for her to believe Cullen was sincere. She was glad when he went out the back door instead of returning to the parlor. Unpleasantness had been avoided for the time being, but she dreaded what the next day would bring.
Mara wrapped the end of her apron around the handle of the coffeepot and lifted it out of the hole. She replaced the lid by sliding it across the iron top with the lifter. It made a grating, familiar sound that eased the tension. The aroma of freshly ground coffee filled the air as Pack turned the crank on the grinder fastened to the wall beside the stove. When the jar beneath it was half full, Mara removed the lid on the pot, and he dumped the grounds into the boiling water.
"What did he say to you?"
"He said he would tell me about the men in the bunkhouse and give me an accounting of the cattle."
"That's all?"
"That's all, except he expects me to stay here."
"The bastard!" Pack snorted. "He'd like nothing better than to have you here all by yourself."
A silence fell while Mara dipped the granite ladle into the water bucket and drank. Pack leaned his shoulder against the wall and watched her. She had worn a pink dress during the day while she was working. It was faded from many washings, but it had added color to her cheeks and emphasized her breasts and small waist. She had looked young and pretty in the pink. Now in the black dress, she still looked young and pretty, but dark shadings beneath her green eyes told of sleepless nights and a day of unceasing labor. He studied her face, unable to pull his eyes from her delicate features and huge emerald green eyes. A sprinkling of freckles dotted her nose that he hadn't noticed before.
Something tightened in Pack's throat. He wanted to pull her to him and tell her that his grief had been easier to bear because she had been with him. And yet he wanted to shake her for coming in the first place and for not realizing that there was no way on God's green earth she could stay now that his mother was gone.
"Mara Shannon?" Emily came into the kitchen, feeling her way along with her hand on the wall. "Do you need any help?"
"There's not much left to do. The coffee will be ready as soon as I pour in a little cold water to settle the grounds."
"It's awfully hot in there. Phew! It's almost as hot here in the kitchen, but the little breeze coming in the door helps."
"Do you want to go out onto the porch and cool off?" Pack asked when she pulled her handkerchief from her pocket to wipe her brow and fluttered it in front of her face to create a slight breeze.
"I'll step out there for a minute. I should have worn something cooler, but this is my only black dress." As she moved around the table, Pack took her arm. "I can find the way, Pack. I'll stand just outside the door."
Pack went ahead of her and opened the screen door just as Sam stepped up onto the porch.
"Evenin', Sam. Miss Rivers was coming out to get a breath of air."
"Evenin', folks." Sam reached for Emily's elbow as she stepped over the threshold. "Will ya allow me to stay with ya for awhile, ma'am?"
"I'd like that, Sam. Oh, my! The breeze feels good."
"We'll stay here on the porch, Pack. I'll see that she don't fall off the edge."
Pack shut the screen door. When he swung around, his hard gaze sought Mara's. The muscle stood out in the hard plane of his cheek and his mouth was grim. She waited for him to voice his disapproval, but he remained silent. From the harsh expression on his face, it was clear to Mara that he was not pleased about Emily being alone in the dark with Sam.
* * *
On the porch Emily reached out for Sam's arm. "Do we have to stay on the porch, Sam?"
"I told Pack we would."
She laughed softly. "He's as bad as Charlie about not letting me out of his sight. We could walk a few steps out into the yard. He could still see us."
"All right. I reckon it's worth gettin' a beatin' from Pack just ta hear ya laugh, ma'am."
She laughed again. "He wouldn't do that. He's as gentle as a lamb."
"Bull-foot! There ain't nothin' gentle about Pack when he's riled up. I'd say he's more like a tornado. One thin' about him, he's touchy where womenfolk is concerned. Stop here 'n let me lift ya down."
Sam stepped off the porch, placed her hands on his shoulders and his at her waist, then swung her easily off the porch and to the ground. He didn't know why he got so loose-lipped all of a sudden.
"You're awfully strong."
"Yore just not very heavy, ma'am."
"The other time you called me Emily Rose."
"I've been thinkin' of ya as Emily Rose."
"What did you think?" It was a mere whisper as she placed her hand in the crook of his arm.
Sam looked down at the white blur that was her face. Without thinking his hand came up and covered the one on his arm. He couldn't tell her that sometimes thinking about her made him feel all mixed up and shaky inside, and at other times he was surprised by the burst of happiness that washed over him.
"What did you think, Sam?" she asked again. She could feel the trembling in the hand that covered hers.
"Well . . . I was wonderin' what ya was doin'. If ya was well."
"I thought about you too."
"Did ya? What was ya thinkin'?"
"I was wondering what you were doing. If you were well."
They both laughed, unaware that they had stopped and were facing each other.
"Sam . . . I say stupid things when I'm with you. And for the life of me, I don't know why."
"I do it too, 'n cuss myself after."
"I'm twenty-four years old." Her eyes seemed to be looking right into his.
"I'm twenty-eight."
"I'm a . . . spinster."
"It means ya ain't married, don't it?"
"It means that I'm what's known as an old maid. A woman who lives with her family. A woman without a husband. A woman whom men consider too old to court."
"Ah . . . that's bull. Pack seems to be right fond of ya."
She laughed again, her face not far from his. Sam could see her soft lips part, smell her fresh woman's body. He liked the feel of her hands on his arms, clinging to him, trusting him, depending on him to keep her safe.
"I'm fond of Pack. I love him the way I love Charlie. He's the only male friend I've had besides old Squirrely who lives up in the hills behind us."
"Why is that?" Questions filled Sam's mind, questions he didn't want to think about now and spoil this magical moment, but things he'd have to think about later.
"Charlie is afraid someone . . . will take advantage of me because I'm almost blind."
"Charlie's right to keep the riffraff away from ya. It's what I'd a done for Rose."
"Charlie feels guilty because he was off fighting the war when . . . when. . . ."
"Someone took liberties?" A sudden, desperate anger made his words come harshly before he could stop them.
"Yes," she whispered. "During the war. Does it make a . . . difference?"
"A difference?" he asked, not understanding. Then, as the meaning of her words soaked into his brain, "Good God! 'Course not!" He would have started walking again, but she refused to let go of his arms.
"Are you sure?"
"Emily Rose." The husky syllables had the sound of a plea.
"It was bad, Sam. There were three of them. I'm telling you this because I don't want you to think that I'm . . . pure—" She stopped talking suddenly. Her stricken face turned up to his. After an instant of frozen stillness, he spoke in a grating whisper.
"Where are they?"
"Charlie came home, found them, and killed them."
"It's what I'd a done!" The breath he was holding came out in a rush of air. "Oh, you sweet, sweet woman!" His voice was low and raspy. "The goddamn, dirty low-down bastards!"
Her hands dropped and his arms closed around her, holding her warm, safe, strong. It was a mutual coming together. Neither of them was conscious of making the first move. Her soft, slender form came against his tall hard one. Her cheek found a place on his shoulder, her nose and mouth against the firm, warm flesh of his neck. She took a deep, shuddering breath and was still.
The breeze came up and wrapped her long skirt about his legs.
A great tenderness welled up in him. She had been so honest, wanting him to know this terrible thing that had happened to her. Now she was so trusting in his arms. He swallowed, fighting the constriction in his throat. He wanted to kill again the ones who had violated her, but never had he wanted to do anything so much as he wanted to protect and cherish this wonderful creature in his arms.
"Sam?" she said softly against his neck. "I'm twenty-four years old and I've not known a lover's kiss."
"Then I think it's time ya did." He lowered his head and pressed a gentle kiss to her lips.
It was over all too quickly for Emily. The first gentle touch of his lips awakened a bittersweet ache of passion. She lifted her arms and wound them around his neck. His arms held her so closely against him that she could feel the hard bones and muscles of his body thrusting against the softness of hers. It was so strange being this close to him, her breasts flattened against his chest, his knees touching her thighs. A curiously warm, exciting feeling fluttered in her stomach. Sam's hoarse, ragged breathing accompanied the thunder of his heartbeat against her breast.
Her hands moved around and framed his face. The soft bubble of laughter that broke from her lips was a mere whisper in the night.
"What are you thinking about me now, Mr. Sam Sparks?" Her voice was a soft happy sound. "I bet you're thinking this is a brazen woman if I ever saw one."
"I'm thinkin' it's yore turn to kiss me now."
He waited, trembling with the desire to crush her to him, to move his hands down her back to her buttocks, to press her against his aching arousal, to caress the softness of her breasts, and to kiss her until she wanted him as much as he wanted her.
_Dear God! What was he thinking?_ She had endured so much pain and humiliation at the hands of the scum that attacked her! How could she ever accept a lover? His arms loosened and he moved back until her breasts were no longer pressed to his chest.
"Emily Rose, ya needn't if ya don't want to."
Her hands remained on his shoulders. "I want to, Sam. Have you changed your mind about wanting me to?"
"Yo're the purtiest 'n sweetest woman I ever did know. I've got no right to even be touchin' ya, much less kissin' ya. Ya best mind yore brother. He knows what a man gets to thinkin' 'n feelin' when he's holdin' a sweet, purty woman. I ain't wantin' to hurt ya or scare ya with my rough ways."
"I was afraid it was . . . the other thing. Back home I was considered ruined, no longer fit for marriage. My friends stopped calling. They pitied me but didn't want to associate with me. That's why I wanted you to know. Pack knows, but I'm not sure Mara Shannon will want me for a friend after I tell her, which I will."
"They weren't yore friends if they turned their backs on ya. They were a bunch a goddamn fools!"
Hungrily his eyes slid over her upturned face as she rose on tiptoe, nuzzling his hard lips with her soft ones. Their breaths mingled for an instant before he covered her mouth with his. He held her with gentle strength. There was no haste in the kiss. This time it was slow and deliberate. He took his time with closed eyes and pounding heart. She offered herself willingly, their bodies meshed, close and warm and hard. Her mouth opened under the force of his, yielding, molding itself to the shape of his. There was a soft union of lips and tongues as their mouths parted and clung with wild sweetness that held still the moments of time. A lovely feeling unfolded in Emily's midsection as she allowed herself the pure joy of kissing and being kissed by him.
Abruptly he seized her arms and held her away from him.
"Sam . . ." she said weakly.
"I'm sorry, Emily Rose. I never meant for it to go that far." His voice was husky with regret.
"I'm not one bit sorry." She reached for his face with her palms. "Please don't regret kissing me."
"Regret it? God knows I don't!"
"I've thought about being with you like this since that first day when I bandaged your hands. Remember? I wanted to see your face, and I finally got up the courage to put my face close to yours so I could see you. You're handsome, Sam!"
"Emily Rose," he whispered huskily. "I've got nothin' to . . . to offer a woman."
She drew back from him and her body stiffened. "I don't expect anything. You're not to feel obligated because you kissed me, for heaven's sake."
"What are ya talkin' about?"
"I know what I am, Sam. I'm a spinster whose innocence was taken by morally corrupt men. I wanted to know how it felt to have a good man hold me and kiss me. I'm a blind woman who would be like a millstone about a man's neck. Charlie has extracted a promise from Pack to look after me if something should happen to him. Poor Pack. See what our friendship has done to him? I'll be his burden instead of Charlie's—"
"Hush up talkin' 'bout yoreself like that." Sam's hands on her arms gripped and pulled her to him. "Ya'd not be a burden to any man."
"What I said was true, Sam. All true." She pressed her face against his shirt, not wanting him to see the spurt of tears that filled her eyes. She was aware of the heavy beat of his heart and placed her hand over it.
"Emily Rose, look at me. Oh, hell, what am I sayin'? I keep forgettin' ya can't see." Sam held her away from him and looked down into her face. "Ya know nothin' 'bout me. Fer all ya know, I could be low caliber like the ones who did ya harm."
"I can see you, Sam. Not plain, but I can see you. You'll never make me believe you're anything but an honorable man."
"Pack's lookin' out the door." His whispered voice was husky with emotion. He lifted her hand and pressed his lips to her palm. "We don't want him comin' out here with blood in his eye."
Emily would have been content to stay there forever. The last few minutes had been the most wonderful moments of her life. She had a hundred sweet memories to store away and bring out during the long nights when she lay in her lonely bed. She drew away from him and lifted her hands to tuck the stray hair into the knot at the nape of her neck.
"No. We don't want that. Do you mind walking for a few minutes before we go in?" Her voice was strangely quiet. He guided her hand into the crook of his arm. "Tell me about your sister, Sam. Tell me about Rose."
# Chapter
TEN
Had someone called her name?
Mara awakened from a sound sleep and lay staring into the darkness; her muscles tense, heart thumping. The wind rippling the tin roof, so close to the bed tucked beneath the sloped ceiling, moaned like a woman in pain. A feeling of relief washed over her when she realized what had awakened her. Pitch darkness stretched out beyond the window. She lay still for a long while, afraid to move, to risk waking Emily.
When she could stand it no longer, she eased out of the bed and groped in the darkness for her dress. She slipped it on over her nightgown and crept down the stairs. A faint light led her to the parlor door. Pack sat on the bench, his head against the wall, his long legs stretched out in front of him. She thought she had not made any noise, but his head rolled toward her the instant she appeared in the doorway.
"What are you doing up, Mara Shannon?"
"I came to relieve you. Go lie down and get some rest."
He reached a hand out to her. "Come sit with me."
Mindless, she put her hand in his. How tired he looked. His cheekbones stood above hollowed cheeks shadowed with a day's growth of dark beard. The deep blue eyes that squinted up at her were ringed with dark smudges. His hair was a tangled mass of dark curls.
He pulled her down onto the bench beside him.
"Have you had any sleep at all?"
"Some." His hand curled around hers, pressing their two palms together.
"You didn't get much sleep last night," she chided gently. She was so close to him that her shoulder fit snugly against his arm and her thigh and hip nestled against his.
"I couldn't leave her here alone, Mara Shannon. She's going to be alone for such a long time."
The pain in his voice almost broke her heart. She gripped his hand tightly, wishing desperately for words that would ease his grief.
"Ah, Pack . . . don't grieve so. It isn't your mother you'll be putting in the ground tomorrow." Her voice was a trembly whisper. "It's the shell she lived in while she was here. She's happy now and free from that tired, crippled body. She's walking beside your father, her hand in his." Pack let out a long shuddering sigh, and Mara blinked rapidly so that she could see him through her tears. "She spoke of him only one time, but when she did, her face glowed with pure happiness."
"It almost killed her when he died." The voice didn't sound like Pack's voice.
"She's with him now, and she wouldn't want you to take on so." Mara spoke with trembling lips, but with a firmness in her voice despite the constriction in her throat. "How long have you been here alone?"
"When the old man left, I sent the boys to bed." He tilted his head back against the wall again and closed his eyes. "I'm glad you're here." Her arm was held firmly against his body, his fingers finding the spaces between hers.
She glanced at their clasped hands resting on his thigh, then up at his face. Her insides quivered. To her he looked almost as young and defenseless as his young brothers. Six weeks ago she had not known who he was. Now he was very . . . dear to her. She snuggled contentedly against him, lifted her bare feet to the bench and covered them with her skirt.
Pack had replaced the candles with the kerosene lamp from the kitchen. It was turned low, and occasionally it flickered, causing the shadows to dance on the floor. It was peaceful here in the room with Brita and Pack. She was comfortable leaning against his warm strength. Mara glanced up at his profile. His mouth was slightly open and he was breathing steadily.
He had gone to sleep.
Mara closed her eyes, and in spite of herself, yawned. Soon her head drooped against his shoulder. When she awakened, the light of dawn was coming in through the window. It took a short while for her to realize where she was. It was deliciously warm against him. She had turned during her sleep and his arm was between her breasts. She kept perfectly still for a long moment, then gradually tilted her head and looked up. His eyes were open and he was looking at her.
"Mornin'."
"Is it morning already?" Her voice was slurred with sleep.
"The rooster thinks so. He crowed a long time ago."
"I'm sorry," she breathed. "I should have stayed awake and been company for you."
He continued to look at her, lifting her hand and bumping it gently against his thigh. The light of dawn had softened the tired lines in his face, yet his eyes were such a deep blue they were almost black.
"Sweet little Mara—" His hand slipped up beneath her hair and stroked the nape of her neck. "I'm going to kiss you. I was thinking about it while I watched you sleep. Don't say anything, don't make a fuss. I need it."
She felt herself succumb to the gentle pressure of his hand at her nape. Slowly he bent his head until his lips touched hers. She was surprised that his lips were so soft, so gentle, surprised at the pleasant drag of his whiskers on her cheek. He held her head in his large hand, working his fingers through her hair while his lips made little caressing movements against hers. His hand was firm, his lips soft.
With a swift motion he wrapped her in his arms and his kiss deepened. He gave her no chance to withdraw. Nor did she want to. Her stomach knotted. The touch of his tongue on her lower lip caused surging motions deep inside her and drove her to press closer. She wanted it to go on and on but knew it had to stop.
Together they drew away. It was over quickly and she let her breath out slowly. She hadn't wanted the kiss to end. She wanted more! What had started out to be a chaste, sweet, comforting kiss ended in a kiss of an entirely different nature! She looked into his eyes. He had wanted more too. She could see it reflected in the tense lines of his face. Then why had he stopped?
In the flickering illumination of the mantel lamp, his eyes were as dark as midnight and, like the lamp, they glowed. Mara became conscious of his hand stroking the length of her hair and his low voice speaking to her again.
"Is that the way that Webster fellow kissed you?"
"No! I told you—"
He wasn't listening. He held up her hand, looked closely at each broken nail, and stroked her palm with his thumb.
"You've worked too hard here. When you came here this little hand was as soft as silk and each little nail rounded and smooth."
"Pack—"
Shivers of awareness went through her. She tugged on her hand, but his fingers tightened and refused to let it go. Instead, he lifted it and gently pressed his lips to her knuckles. A long moment passed while his eyes held hers. She held her breath. Her heart almost stopped beating when he turned her hand so that the ridges of her knuckles rubbed back and forth across his lips.
"It will be soft again, Mara Shannon. I promise." His soft words echoed through the storm that shook her, but she couldn't comprehend them.
She unfolded her cramped legs and placed her feet on the floor. As soon as the tingling stopped, she tugged her hand from his and got to her feet.
"I'll start breakfast."
"You'll get splinters in your feet. Go put on your shoes; I'll start the fire." He stood and gave her a gentle push toward the door.
The bewildering moment was over, but it was not gone from her mind. It stayed with her as she dressed and caused her to converse absently with Emily who had already washed, dressed, and tidied the room. Finally the other girl, sensing her preoccupation, lapsed into silence and waited until they could go down to the kitchen together.
While she was preparing breakfast, irrational anger at herself for what she had allowed to happen surged through Mara. She had sat there like a lump of lard and allowed Pack to kiss her, knowing perfectly well that he didn't even _like_ her! What had gotten into her? She didn't care much for him either! Anger and humiliation caused her to set the iron skillet down on the top of the range with a bang. Immediately she was sorry and glanced around to see if Emily had noticed. Thankfully she had stepped out onto the porch to hand Pack the empty water bucket.
Mara's thoughts continued to churn. She had merely been decent to Pack for Brita's sake. He had said all manner of vile things to her after she had almost ruptured herself getting the big ox into the wagon and bringing him here! She hadn't forgotten the morning he accused her of parading around in her nightclothes to attract attention. And she hadn't forgotten that he called her baggage! How could she have been so stupid as to allow him to kiss her?
Pack came in and spoke quietly to Emily. Mara kept her back to him until he sat down at the table. He and the twins ate hurriedly and, to Mara's relief, left immediately for the burial site to prepare the grave.
"They're taking the wagon and Sam's going with them," Mara said to Emily when she came in from hanging the wet towels on the porch line. It was becoming a habit with Mara to relate things to Emily that the near-blind girl couldn't see. "Sam and Pack seem to get on well together."
"Pack never mentioned anything to me or Charlie about knowing him."
"I like Sam. He's different from the others who hang around the bunkhouse. I don't know why he's here or what he does every day when he rides out, but he has something on his mind." Mara was aware of the interest on Emily's face. "Did Sam tell you where he's from?"
"He said he was from Texas and that he had a sister named Rose who was killed while he was away fighting in the war."
Emily turned to place a stack of plates on the table, but not before Mara saw the blush that covered her cheeks. Questions began to form in Mara's mind. If there was something between Pack and Emily, why did she blush at the mere mention of Sam Sparks? And was Pack so low-down that he would kiss Mara when he was in love with another woman? Mara desperately wanted a quiet time so that she could be alone to think about the triangle, but too much depended upon her today. Nevertheless, it lurked like a dark shadow in the back of her mind.
Because all had to be in readiness for the burial by the time the preacher arrived, Pack and the twins went to the creek to wash as soon as they returned to the house, taking with them soap and towels Mara had laid out and the clean shirts she had ironed the day before.
Steamboat sent word up to Mara that the hindquarter of beef he had started to cook at midnight would be ready by noon. Now, with the preparations for dinner complete, the women were free to carry the teakettles of warm water up to Mara's room so that they could wash and dress for the service. Mara was in a better frame of mind. She had decided to cope with each event of the day as it happened in the best way she knew how. Tomorrow would be time enough to think about other things.
In somber black dresses, their hair pinned back so severely that not a single frivolous curl was allowed to escape, Mara and Emily went to the parlor. The twins, Pack and Charlie were there. Charlie wore a black serge suit and Mara found herself wishing that Pack had a coat to wear. The shirt she had ironed was tucked neatly into his breeches and he was wearing a black string tie. She didn't know where the tie came from unless Charlie had brought it.
The twins didn't even look up when their father came to stand in the doorway. Aubrey looked worse than Mara had ever seen him. His face showed the ravages of dissipation even though he had gone to great pains to make himself presentable. Mara went to him.
"Come sit over here, Cousin Aubrey." She took his arm and led him to a chair at the head of the bier.
"The preacher's comin'." It was Cullen who called the words from the porch.
Pack got to his feet. "Mara Shannon? Will you come with me to greet the preacher's missus?"
"Of course." She went ahead of him out the door, stood beside him at the top of the steps, and watched the approach of the black buggy pulled by a handsome black horse. A lone rider rode behind, and behind him was a wagon carrying the burial box.
Mara heard a low hissing sound that came from Pack. At the same instant she recognized the rider as Ace January. She looked up quickly and saw a flicker of anger on Pack's face. Why, for heaven's sake, was he angry because the marshal had come to his mother's burial? She had no time to think about it because the buggy pulled up in front of the house, and Sam came off the end of the porch to stand at the horse's head while the preacher climbed down from the buggy. He removed his duster, folded it, and placed it on the floor, then helped his wife to alight. She also wore a duster, a cape that her husband lifted from her shoulders.
Pack ignored the man and woman and went to the wagon that had pulled up behind the buggy. He jumped into the wagon bed to inspect the box, picked up a rag, and wiped the dust from the top. When he jumped down again, he saw that the marshal was still sitting on his horse watching Mara. A muscle jumped in Pack's jaw as he ground his teeth together. Later, he told himself, later he would have a word with Ace January.
"Let me do this, Pack." Sam came to take the end of the box and the driver took the other end. They carried it past Cullen who stood on the porch, his thumbs hooked in his belt. Pack elbowed him out of the way and held open the door for the men to take the burial box into the house.
Ace January continued to lean on his saddle horn, watching Mara, making no move to step down from the horse.
Mara went down the steps to meet the preacher and his wife. "Mrs. Piedmont, I'm Mara Shannon McCall."
The woman looked at her with her head tilted to one side, her small mouth pursed. She was not as tall as Mara, but her bosom was enormous, making her look top-heavy. Her stiff, black taffeta dress was buttoned up to her chin. Black hair threaded with gray was coiled and pinned over each ear, and she wore a small straw hat trimmed with a black feather plume. She was sweating profusely.
Mara held out her hand. The woman held her breath as if the air was filled with an offensive odor. Her face reflected her reluctance to take Mara's hand.
"How do you do?"
Mara was puzzled by the hostility. The woman spoke briskly and touched her hand as if it were not clean. The minister's face was red, his flabby jaws shaking. He looked like a puffed-up toad about to explode. From the looks of the pair, Mara thought, they had not missed a meal in their entire lives.
"Reverend Piedmont, it's unfortunate we have to meet under these sad circumstances. Welcome to my home."
"Thank you, Mrs. McCall."
"Miss McCall. I'm not married."
"Ah . . . I assumed you were married to the younger McCall."
Mara didn't answer. She would not satisfy the morbid curiosity of this pompous pair. They had not wanted to come. It was written on their fat faces and in their pious, stiff-necked attitudes. Mara wanted to tell them to get back in the buggy and leave, but good manners had been ingrained in her by her mother and later by Miss Fillamore's teachings.
"Would you like a cool drink?" Mara lifted her brows and spoke in a tone of quiet reserve that Miss Fillamore used when she was forced to be polite.
"Yes, I would. It's more than six miles out to this . . . place. It's a miserable ride and I've not been well." Mrs. Piedmont waved her handkerchief before her face.
"I'm sorry to hear it. Come in. It's a bit cooler in the house."
Mara led them through the parlor where Pack and Sam were lifting Brita's body and placing it in the coffin. When they reached the kitchen, she dipped into the water bucket with the dipper she took from the nail on the wall and handed it, brimming full, to the woman. Mrs. Piedmont hesitated, gave her husband a withering glare, then carefully inspected the dipper. An Irish imp inside Mara prompted her to speak.
"You needn't be afraid to drink from it. The dipper is clean." The tilt of her lips was more a sneer than a smile. Her chin was high and her eyes as cold as ice. She prayed she'd be able to endure this woman at least until after the services.
"A body can't be sure." Mrs. Piedmont sniffed and took a few sips from the dipper before handing it to her husband.
"Hrumph!" He cleared his throat noisily before he drank. The auburn-haired woman before him looked as cool as a cucumber in spite of the hot day. She wasn't at all what he had expected to find in a place like this, but he knew well that a ladylike appearance could be deceiving. Didn't the whore at the Diamond Saloon look like a lady during the light of day? But at night her true identity was revealed. She turned into a painted, naked siren, drawing unsuspecting men into her den of iniquity, corrupting their souls with lust.
"I have written a eulogy I wish you to read at the gravesite." The woman's voice broke into the minister's thoughts. He took the paper from her hand, glanced at it, and nodded.
Reverend Piedmont wanted nothing more than to get the service over with and head back to town. Since the marshal had volunteered to ride out with him he felt safe enough. It was his congregation he feared. He didn't know what their reaction would be if they found out he had come running at the request of the infamous pugilist of Laramie.
* * *
Mara rode on the seat beside Emily and Charlie on the way to the burial ground, and Aubrey sat on the tailgate. They followed Pack and the twins who walked behind the wagon carrying the coffin. The preacher's buggy, the marshal, and Cullen on horseback completed the procession.
The place where Shannon and Colleen LaMont McCall were buried was a quiet, beautiful spot shaded by tall pines. The knoll was fresh and green. Wild violet and buttercup blossoms nodded in the late morning sun. A slight breeze ruffled the rich green grass, and from far away came the melodious sound of a mourning dove. In the branches overhead a robin sang a merry song.
The procession stopped alongside the fenced enclosure. Pack, the twins and Sam carried the coffin and lowered it gently to the ground beside the gaping hole. The mourners gathered around. Pack reached back, grasped Mara's hand and pulled her up beside him and the twins. Reverend Piedmont took his place and opened his Bible.
Mara, determined not to allow the minister to rush the services so that he could leave, began to sing. Her voice rose sweet and clear. After the first few words, Emily and Charlie joined her. Pack bowed his head and squeezed her hand.
"Shall we gather at the river?
Where God's angel's feet have trod.
With it's crystal tide forever,
Flowing by the throne of God.
Yes, we'll gather at the river,
the beautiful, the beautiful river,
Gather with the saints at the river,
that flows by the throne of God."
When the song ended, a hush fell over the group. The minister looked at Mara. She nodded to him and he began the service by reading the eulogy she had written. When he finished, he read a short verse from the Bible, then began to recite the Lord's Prayer. Sam stood beside Charlie and Emily. His voice and theirs joined with the minister's and Mara's.
The ceremony ended and the coffin was lowered into the grave. Sam and Charlie each took a spade and began to fill the grave. Pack stood as still as a stone, holding tightly to Mara's hand while spadeful after spadeful of dirt was dropped on the box. The twins, tears streaming down their faces, stood beside him. With his head bowed, his hat in his hand, Aubrey stood apart as if he were not a member of the family.
During the service Mara had managed to keep the tears from her eyes, but after the grave was filled, Travor and Trellis came forward with a waterbucket full of wildflowers and carefully placed it at the head of their mother's grave. Mara's control gave way, and tears ran down her cheeks in a steady stream. She moved up between the twins and put an arm around each boy. They clung to her, and the three stood silently together until Pack moved up close behind them, his chest against Mara's back, a hand on the shoulder of each of the boys.
Charlie led the others away, leaving Brita's sons and Mara alone beside the grave.
Reverend Piedmont and his wife walked past Sam as he was putting the shovels in the wagon.
"The ladies fixed up a good meal, Reverend. We'll all go back to the house to eat."
"We . . . ah, got to be getting on back to town."
"Ya're not in no hurry," Sam said flatly.
"Yes, we are," Mrs. Piedmont blustered.
"I'm sayin' ya've got time to be sociable." Sam's face was like a stone carving.
"But . . . we don't have time, do we, Arnold?"
Sam's sharp eyes pierced the wavering eyes of the other man. "You have time, don't you, _Arnold?_ "
"We'll take time."
"That's better. Wait up 'n follow us back."
Sam walked away as Mrs. Piedmont began to sputter. "What's the matter with you? Where's your backbone? I'm not eating a bite in that house! The idea! You know what the ladies in the circle will do if they find out we were consorting with that—that McCall trash? They'll not help fix up the parsonage. We're going back to town."
"Shut your mouth for once!" Reverend Piedmont snarled and grabbed his wife's elbow. He propelled her toward the buggy and boosted her up onto the seat.
"Don't you dare talk to me like that!" she hissed.
"I'll talk to you any way I can to shut you up! We're going back there; you're going to eat and be decent. Understand?"
"Heavens! I'll not be able to hold up my head if they find out—"
The marshal edged his horse up to the buggy and leaned from his saddle. "Sparks giving ya any trouble, Preacher?"
"None at all."
"Yes, he did," Mrs. Piedmont snapped.
"He did not!" The minister dug his elbow into his wife's side. "He invited us for dinner."
"Invited? It ain't his place to do no invitin'."
"He was extending the invitation from Miss McCall."
Ace rubbed his chin thoughtfully and moved his horse up beside the wagon where Charlie and Emily waited. He had met the one-legged rancher and his near-blind sister in Laramie and had stopped by their place one time. As Mara approached, Ace quickly stepped down from his horse and waited to help her up onto the wagon seat.
"It was nice of you to come, Marshal." Mara smiled. "You must stay and have dinner."
"Thank ya kindly, Mara. Let me help you." He placed his hand beneath her elbow when she placed her foot on the spoke of the wheel. Charlie reached for her hand and pulled her up to sit beside Emily.
Ace stood beside the wagon, unaware that he was staring. Mara was not the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, but there was something about her that made him unable to drag his eyes away. Her hair was curly and shining like the coat of a young roan in the spring after it had shed its winter coat. Emerald eyes flashed at him when she became aware of his stare, and color flooded her face. He imagined that her eyes could turn as fierce as those of a treed wildcat when she was loving a man. By God, he would have her!
The wagon began to move. Ace chuckled and twisted the ends of his mustache with shaking fingers. Goddamn! Even at a funeral he only had to look at her to visualize having her naked in his bed. He mounted his horse and pulled his coat together to cover the throbbing length of his swollen manhood. She was everything he thought she would be. Sensible when it was called for, fiery when mad. Since the first time he had seen her he had wanted to throw her to the ground and satisfy himself right then and there. Mara Shannon was a woman worth waiting for. His time with her would come.
* * *
Tables were set up in the shade of the oak tree beside the house when the mourners returned to the homestead. Steamboat worked over the joint of beef, placing slices on a huge platter. Riley, the stooped old man who worked the garden and helped the bunkhouse cook, had built a fire in the yard and was boiling water for coffee.
After the preacher and his wife were seated in the shade, Mara led Emily into the house. They took off their hats, tied aprons about their waists, and began setting out the food they had prepared. Each time Mara carried a dish from the house to the tables she could feel the marshal's eyes on her. She looked for Pack and saw that he was deep in conversation with Charlie and Sam.
"I'm surprised the marshal is here," she whispered as Emily handed her a bowl of boiled eggs to take to the table in the yard.
"So am I. Charlie doesn't like him. I don't think Pack does either."
"Then why did he come?"
"Maybe the preacher asked him."
"He has a habit of staring that makes me uncomfortable," Mara confessed.
"He stares at you? Oh, I hope Pack holds his temper."
"What do you mean?"
"Only that Pack . . . will feel responsible for you now."
"I'll not need protection from the _marshal,_ for heaven's sake!" Carrying the bowl of eggs and a pan of bread, Mara left the kitchen.
Mrs. Piedmont sat at the table beside her husband, and both ate a hearty meal. After several attempts to draw the preacher into a conversation, Charlie gave up and talked with the man who had driven the dray wagon. Aubrey and Cullen sat at the far end of the table. Aubrey ate with his head down, but Cullen watched the preacher and his wife as if having them there was a huge joke.
Mara cut the pie and filled the plates when they were passed to her. Each time she looked up, she caught Ace January watching her. After the meal when she carried the butter crock to the house, he followed. She set the crock on the counter and went quickly through the parlor and out onto the porch before he could catch up with her. After that she stayed beside Emily until the Piedmonts were ready to leave and then walked out to where the overweight preacher was helping his overweight wife into the buggy. Ace brought his horse from the hitching rail and stood waiting.
"I trust you'll have a pleasant trip back to town." It was all Mara could think of to say. She certainly wasn't going to thank them for coming or say she was pleased to have met them, because she wasn't. It would please her, however, never to see the pious pair again.
"The bill's paid." Pack's voice came from behind Mara, and she turned to see him looking at the minister with hard cold eyes.
The minister's grunt was noncommittal. He slapped the reins against the mare's back and the buggy moved away, leaving Ace January standing beside his horse.
"Good-bye, Ace." There was no mistaking the firm tone of dismissal in Pack's voice.
Smoldering anger was reflected in the marshal's face. His squinting eyes went from Pack to Mara. They were as cold as Pack's, but there was a strange little sneer at the corners of his mouth.
"I want to speak to Mara—"
"Some other time," Pack broke in.
Mara had to force herself to appear calm as the marshal took a second look at Pack. She was aware of Pack's defiant stance, his possessive hand on her shoulder. She had to act quickly if an unpleasant encounter was to be avoided.
"Good-bye, Mr. January."
"Some other time," he echoed Pack's words.
Ace glared into Pack's face, his jaw muscles pulsing as he fought to contain his anger. He mounted, and as soon as he was settled into the saddle, he gigged his horse cruelly. The powerful hind legs bent, the front legs stretched out and he was off down the road in a cloud of dust. He passed the buggy and was soon out of sight.
"I want to speak to you." Pack's hand slid from Mara's shoulder to her elbow. He swung her around and propelled her toward the porch.
"You too?" It was all she could think of to say.
Pack didn't speak until they were in the darkened parlor. He turned her to face him and held her in place with his hands on her shoulders.
"Get your things together," he commanded. "You're going home with Emily and Charlie."
# Chapter
ELEVEN
Mara's mouth opened in astonishment. She had known that Pack would try to convince her to leave the homestead, but it had come so unexpectedly. He had not _asked,_ he had _demanded_ that she pack her things and leave . . . today! She was shaken, hurt, but now was not the time to dwell on it.
"Who are you to be telling me what to do?" Her voice shook with resentment and fury. "I like Emily very much, but I'm not going to be thrust upon her and her brother like a penniless orphan. I'm staying in the house my father built and left to me."
"No, you're not. Get up there and get enough together to last a day or two. I'll bring the rest of your things over later. I've already told Charlie you're going home with them. He has chores to do. He can't be waiting all day while you lollygag around."
"Then you can just untell Charlie, Mr. Know-It-All Gallagher, because I'm not going. I have a home and I'm staying in it."
"Mara Shannon, I've told you that you can't stay here, I've told you why, and that's all there is to it."
"And I've told you to tend to your own damn business. I'm of age and no longer need a guardian."
Pack ran his hand through his dark hair. His face was tense with anger and frustration as he struggled to hold onto his temper.
"I can force you to leave, Mara Shannon. Don't make me do it!"
"That's nonsense! You can't make me do anything I don't want to do." Mara rubbed her hand over lips that had gone chalky with anger. "Why are you doing this to me, Pack? How are you going to benefit if I abandon everything my father worked for?"
"How am I going to _benefit?_ " Huge hands grasped her shoulders and he shook her. "Damn you for a stubborn, stupid little fool! I'm not asking you to abandon it. You'll be _paid_ for every acre, every blade of grass, if I have to work my fingers to the bone."
Mara took a couple of deep, steadying breaths. "I want to be here!"
"You don't want to face the fact there are things a woman can't do alone. You saw the way Ace January looked at you. He was thinking about getting you in bed! And he's only one of your problems. Cullen will crawl on you the minute my back is turned!"
"You're being crude and hateful."
"Crude and hateful won't hurt you, Mara Shannon. _Rape_ will! Do you understand what it means to be raped? A man will force entry into your body and you will feel pain such as you've never felt before. Pain and . . . shame. Once I saw a woman, a pretty young woman, after several men had been on her. She begged me to shoot her. Sometimes women are used so cruelly that they bleed inside until they die!"
"Stop it!" Mara squeezed her eyes shut and tried not to hear the words.
"An unattached woman in this country attracts men like flies on a honey pot," Pack continued doggedly. "A _pretty_ unattached woman living out here by herself is enough to cause a shooting war among the men who want her, especially if they think she's got money or land."
She glared up at him, dry-eyed and furious. "If you don't get your hands off me I'm going to—to kick you," she said between her teeth.
"I mean what I say. I'm responsible for you."
"You're not! You're not even blood kin!"
"You haven't got the brains of a buttercup if you think old Aubrey would stand between you and Cullen. Trellis and Travor will try. One or both of them will get killed. Be sensible and go home with Emily until I can find a place for you in town. You can teach school and make friends among your own kind."
"No! No! No!" Her voice rose to an almost hysterical pitch. Her color was vivid, her eyes as sharp as polished emeralds. "I'll not live in a rooming house, sleeping on someone else's bed, eating at a community table with a bunch of dullards. I won't do it, Pack. My roots are here. I'm staying here on McCall land. It's my right, by damn, and you're not taking it from me."
"Damn you for a stubborn _baggage._ " He said the word deliberately. "You can't stay here without a man—a husband to protect you!" His voice rose with every word. "Are you so wrapped up in the possession of this land that you can't understand that?"
His hands, rough and calloused, were like vises on her arms. He held her so close she could feel the heat of his anger.
"If I've got to have a husband in order to live in my own home on my own land, I'll get one."
"Who do you think will come courting you out here?" he demanded. "Cullen will shoot the first man that comes calling. Or did you have the marshal in mind?"
"I had _you_ in mind, Pack! Are you man enough to marry me, stand up to Cullen and protect what is mine?"
The words were out before she realized what she was saying. Her breath was coming fast, her upper lip glistened with sweat. She would have snatched back the words if she could, but when she saw the look of horrified surprise on his face, she was glad she had said them, and it goaded her to say more.
"You're like a stray dog that's all bark and no bite, Pack Gallagher. You're great at telling me what to do, but you've not got the guts to make a decent life for yourself. Most men would be glad to settle down on a piece of land as fine as this and build something to leave to their children as my father did. You're satisfied to float over the surface of the land, living in a freight wagon going from one mining camp to another."
"Damn you for an educated fool with more temper than is good for you. You don't know a damn thing about me or what I do. It's true that I'm a teamster, but it's honest, hard work. I'll not always _float_ over the land. I've got dreams of my own."
"I just bet you have. Dreams of whores and barroom brawls?" she jeered. "Let's see what you're made of, big, bad, teamster Gallagher. My father was fond of you, but for the life of me I don't know why. Half of this land will belong to the man who marries me. Have you ever had a better offer?"
Pack's eyes narrowed to blue-black slits. An inarticulate sound came from his throat, breaking into the charged silence that held them after her words.
"You'd marry a man, any man, to stay here?" His voice was controlled yet savage. It curled around her like a whip, hungry to bite into her flesh.
"Not _any_ man. You're not choice husband material, but better than Cullen. And being Brita's son, along with the fact that my father saw something good in you, is in your favor. You may be rough around the edges, but you can't be _all_ bad." Her smile was like a slash across his throat. The emerald blaze in her eyes told him that she was sure she had backed him into a corner and he would retreat.
"Think twice, my girl," he snarled. "Marriage is forever."
"Not necessarily. Only until one of us dies," she responded casually, shrugging his hands from her shoulders.
"All right!" His voice roared in her ears as his patience snapped. He shoved her down in a chair and stood over her. His hands balled into hard fists and he swore. "Don't ever forget, Mara Stubborn McCall, that this was your idea! _You_ asked _me!_ And don't forget another thing: I'll not be lashed by that sharp tongue of yours and slink away like a whipped dog. You need a strong hand, by God, and you'll get it." He turned to leave, then turned back. "Don't move out of that chair."
Quick steps took Pack to the door and out onto the porch. "Sam!" he bellowed.
Sam, squatting on his heels, was talking to Charlie. Emily sat on a stump nearby. Sam turned at the sound of urgency in Pack's voice and hurried to the porch.
"I've got one more favor to ask, Sam. Ride after that preacher and bring him back, will you? Get him back here if you have to bring him at gunpoint."
"Well, shore, Pack. But—"
"He's got a marriage service to read, but don't tell him that. Just bring him back. I don't think you'll have any trouble with the marshal. He rode on ahead."
After Sam left, Pack beckoned to Charlie. The brother and sister came up onto the porch.
"Is Mara Shannon getting ready?" Emily asked.
Pack stepped aside to let her enter the house. "She's not going. She's in the parlor."
The thump, thump of Charlie's peg leg on the floor echoed loudly as they entered the room.
"Mara Shannon?"
"I'm here, Emily."
"I'd love for you to visit for awhile. Please say you'll come."
"Thank you, but if I leave my house, there'll not be a stick of anything left when I return."
"But . . . you can't stay alone out here. Pack can tell you that."
"He has. I'll not be alone."
"Mara Shannon asked me to marry her." Pack's voice had a sneer in it. "Sam's gone to fetch the preacher back. Funerals and weddings are much the same. A man dies and is put in the ground; a man weds and he's got a millstone around his neck for the rest of his life."
"A thousand acres of land is some millstone," Mara said dryly.
"You'd wed the devil himself to stay here."
"That's most likely what I'm doing, but I'll survive. My father's dream was to build a home for his family on land to call their own. He worked from dawn till dark to get it. I'll not leave my land, and I'll not leave my house sitting idle to be ravaged even if I have to wed you to keep it."
Pack swore. "You'd be the one to be ravaged by that bunch in the bunkhouse!"
Mara sat on the chair, as prim and proper as if she were sitting on a church pew. Her hands were clasped in her lap and her ankles were crossed neatly. Emily moved toward her. Mara took her hand to guide her to the chair beside her. It suddenly occurred to Mara that she may have broken her friend's heart, and she felt a wave of regret that eased when her friend spoke.
"You and Pack were made for each other. I knew that as soon as I met you," Emily said softly.
Mara bent forward to look into her face. "Emily? Are you sure you don't mind? I was afraid that—"
"Mind? Oh, you thought that I was in love with Pack?" Emily laughed. "I do love him . . . in a way. But Pack and I are friends, nothing more."
Mara glanced at Pack. He was rubbing his hand through his hair in a gesture of frustration that was becoming familiar. He was still angry and no doubt regretting his hasty decision. Emily might not be in love with him, but what about Pack? Did he love her? Did he think that as long as he couldn't have Emily, he'd take her?
"Well," Mara said flippantly, in spite of the unease that made her stomach flutter. "I didn't want to buy him away from you. He agreed to marry me for half of my land."
Mara knew that she was being unnecessarily blunt. She hated herself for saying it, but it was best that Charlie and Emily knew that this was not a love match, but strictly a business deal. If Emily didn't want her friendship knowing that, it was better to know it now.
Pack's mouth flattened into an unyielding line. He wanted to lift the stubborn little redhead out of the chair and shake her until her teeth rattled. God almighty! Was he letting himself in for a lifetime of misery? She would never see him as anything except a rough, uneducated teamster who married her for her land. Hell! What was he to do? Ride out and leave her alone? He couldn't do that even if he hated her. She was Shannon's daughter, for Christ's sake. He would do his best to protect her from the scum who would have her, but who would protect her from . . . him?
"There must be a way around this if neither of you want this marriage." Charlie finally spoke. "People are coming in on the train every week looking for a place to settle. You'd not have any trouble finding a family that wants a little land."
"I'm thinking Mara Shannon isn't willing to give up any of _her_ land to homesteaders. What good would that do anyway? She'd still be here alone and Cullen would run off the homesteaders." Pack's mouth snapped shut with a soft click of his teeth.
"You could find someone to come stay with her," Charlie persisted.
"Another woman? Ha!" The snort accompanied a venomous glance at Mara. "That would only give the bunkhouse crowd two women to sport with."
"A man and his wife—"
"I'll not have strangers living in my house," Mara said firmly. "If Pack wants to crawfish out of the deal, he only has to say so."
"There are times when I'd like to beat your butt!"
Pack stood over her with his thumbs hooked in his belt. His voice carried a real threat, but she was determined not to be humbled by him. If she was sure about one thing it was the certainty that he would not hurt her—for her father's sake, of course. So she looked up at him defiantly.
"You've a habit of repeating yourself, Pack. You've said that before. And," she added with a lift of her brows, "a few other things that I've not forgotten."
A low rumble of laughter escaped Charlie. It was one of the few times Mara had heard his laugh. The insufferable man! How dare he laugh at her!
"I fail to see any humor in the situation," she said coolly.
"I'm sorry, Mara. I was just thinking that there'll not be a dull moment at the McCall ranch from here on out."
"The _Gallagher_ ranch," Pack corrected firmly, his dark eyes boring into Mara's, daring her to contradict him.
_The Gallagher ranch?_ Dear God, what had she gotten herself into?
The sound of boots on the porch and words of protest from the preacher told her it was too late now to consider another alternative.
The preacher was inside the house for a total of ten minutes. During that short time, Mara's life was changed forever. She was no longer Mara Shannon McCall. She was Mara Shannon Gallagher. She stood beside Pack, his hand holding tightly to hers as if he thought she would flee, while the sputtering preacher pronounced them man and wife. Sam had returned to the buggy where Mrs. Piedmont waited impatiently and brought the folded leather envelope with the blank marriage and death documents. The marriage paper was filled out and signed. Emily and Charlie signed as witnesses.
Pack shoved a few bills at the preacher.
"Register this in town. I'll be in next week to check to see if you've done it. And keep your mouth shut about it. Understand?"
The preacher fled the house and the men followed to see him on his way.
"I can't believe I've done this, Emily." Mara stood in the parlor shaking her head as if she were in a daze and spoke huskily, not quite sure her voice would work. "It's not at all like the wedding I dreamed of having. I . . . I didn't even change my dress. I'm still wearing funeral clothes."
"Ah, Mara Shannon. I know how you feel, but sometimes things are taken out of our hands. It's said that some of the best decisions we make in our lifetime are spur-of-the-moment decisions. Pack is terribly fond of you and wants what's best for you."
"Fond of my land, you mean." The sound that came from Mara was something between a snarl and a jeering laugh. She lifted her hands to her hair and slid her fingers along her scalp to loosen it from the pins. "Better Pack Gallagher than Cullen McCall," she said, then added tiredly, "What's done is done. I'll make the best of it."
"Pack will be . . . gentle with you. He is such a kind man for all his rough ways."
"What do you mean, gentle with _me?_ Oh, you think that we'll— No! Absolutely not! He understands that this is not _that_ kind of marriage." Mara's face had turned brick red, and her mouth clamped shut so hard that her teeth clicked. "He'll keep his distance or I'll shoot him."
"You wouldn't do _that._ "
"Oh yes I would." Mara had to fight to make her voice sound convincing. She knew as well as she'd ever known anything that she'd not shoot Pack Gallagher, regardless of what he did or did not do. "I want you to take a pie and some of the meat home, Emily. It'll just take a minute for me to put them in a basket for you."
Mara had a great need to be alone. Within the last few minutes she had taken a step that would change her life forever, and the enormity of it was making itself known to her as her mind swam back to reality. She escaped to the kitchen, leaned against the wall, and covered her face with her hands.
* * *
When Pack went with Charlie to bring up the wagon, Sam stepped back into the house. He had not had a private word with Emily all day. He stood hesitantly inside the room with his hat in his hand, feeling like a bashful schoolboy.
"Miss Emily?"
"Sam? Is Charlie ready to go?"
"Not yet. I just thought I'd . . . tell ya he'll be along soon."
Emily drew in a long breath and stood perfectly still. When she heard him coming toward her, a smile lighted her face. She held out her hand and felt a fierce pleasure when he grasped it and placed her palm against his chest. She filled her lungs with the scent that was typical of him, pine, leather, tobacco. She loved the size of him, the strength of his hand, the heavy beat of his heart.
"I was afraid I'd not get to talk to you again. Oh, Sam, I never wanted to be able to see as badly as I do right this minute."
Sam raised her hand to his lips. "Ah, Emily Rose, I'm not much to look at."
"Oh, but you are!"
"I may be leavin' here soon. There's not been a place I wanted to come back to since I went home that first time after the war till now. I want to come back to you, Emily Rose. I'll have somethin' to offer when I come."
"You don't have to have anything but yourself," she whispered with tears in her voice.
"I've got to be able to give ya at least as good as ya got now."
"I don't need much, but you—"
"Yore brother's right to be lookin' out fer ya like he does. When I come back, I'll tell him I want to take over the lookin' after ya."
"Oh, Sam! Do you mean it? Are you sure?"
"I was never more sure a anythin' in my life."
"Will you come to see me before you go?"
"If you want me to."
"I do! Oh, I do!"
"I hear the wagon comin'. Can I kiss you?"
"I was hoping you would."
"Sweet, sweet Emily Rose." His voice was husky and intimate.
Slowly he bent to brush her lips with his. Then his arms slipped around her, pressing her body to the length of his. His lips were warm, sweet and moved over hers with gentle strength. The tip of his tongue teased her lips until she sighed, giving herself up to his kiss with sensual abandon, wanting, needing to increase the pressure. She felt his breath against her ear and a shiver of delight raced down her spine. This was Sam, her Sam, her love. His touch was more wonderful than any dream she had ever had of a lover's touch. Her arms tightened around him and his around her until she could hardly breathe.
He drew in a shaky breath when he raised his head. "Ya taste as sweet as a cool mountain spring."
She reached up and kissed him with trembling lips. The freedom to do so went to her head like heady wine. "You taste good too," she whispered before kissing him again.
"Emily, sweet Emily Rose, I like saying your name." His voice was a caress as sweet as his kiss.
Sam felt as if his heart would leap out of his breast. But over its pounding he heard the jingle of harnesses.
"Charlie's out front with the wagon."
He placed a warm kiss on her parted lips, then, holding tightly to her hand, he led her out onto the porch and down the steps. Still holding her hand, he drew it up into the crook of his arm and covered it with his. This was his woman, and her brother might as well know it now. Come hell or high water, he intended to have her. He watched for Charlie and Pack's reactions to the possessive way he held her close to him. Neither man appeared to notice.
Sam helped Emily up onto the wagon seat.
"Bye, Emily Rose. I'll be over soon." His words were for Emily, but he made sure that they reached Charlie too.
"Emily!" Mara came out of the house and ran lightly down the steps to the wagon. "Are you leaving already?"
"Charlie has chores to do before dark."
"Thank you for coming. I couldn't have managed without you."
"I was glad to come, Mara Shannon. Now it's your turn to come see me."
Sam stuck out his hand to Charlie. "I'll be over soon," he repeated and looked the man in the eye.
Charlie took his hand, his sharp eyes narrowing as they held Sam's steady gaze. Finally he nodded his head.
"You'll be welcome, Sam."
Pack saw the relief that slumped Emily's shoulders, then the brilliant smile that lighted her face. Realization came to him slowly, but definitely. Sam and Emily had feelings for each other. _Lucky Sam._
"Bye, everybody," Emily called, suddenly happier than she had been in her entire life. "Pack, as soon as you and Mara Shannon are settled, bring her over."
"Take care of yourselves," Pack said, without responding to the invitation. He drew back as the wagon began to roll.
Mara stood between the two tall men and watched the sister and brother ride away from the homestead. Now she was alone with this man, this stranger who was her husband. Never had she imagined it would come to this; never had she thought she'd be forced to give over the control of her life to a man like Pack Gallagher. She turned and went back to the house, her back straight, her head up, but the confident pose was completely superficial. Inside she was tied in knots.
She paused to look about the kitchen before she went up the stairs to the room above. Today she had married a man, joined her life to his until one of them died. There had not been a tender word, a kiss, nor a ring during the ceremony that had made them man and wife.
* * *
"Sam," Pack said and walked a few paces across the circular drive to lean against the large oak tree with branches spreading almost to the edge of the porch. "I owe you, Sam. I'm obliged to you for standing by through this."
"I figured ya'd do the same." Sam squatted down on his heels, picked up a twig and absently began to skin back the bark. "Ya've bit off a big chaw, Pack. Mara jist might be a widow afore she's a wife."
Pack snorted. "I'm not counting on her being a _real_ wife. She hates my guts."
"That bad, huh?"
"That bad. She's not suited for this life, but she's got feelings about this place. Hell! She could have gone to town, taught school, married one of them lawyer fellers."
"She might be more suited than ya think. She ain't afraid a work."
"I've got to make it safe for her here. That means I'll have to clear out Cullen and his bunch."
"Cullen'll back down. He'll not face ya. He's the back-shootin' kind."
"How about Sporty Howard?"
"In a crowd he'll make a show to save his face. By hisself he's got a yellow streak a yard wide."
"How many are down there?"
"Five, countin' Cullen. I plan on backin' ya."
Pack's blue-black eyes narrowed. "Why?"
"I want to stay round for a while."
"You can do that anyway, Sam. You know that."
"Yeah. Ya ort a know I'm lookin' fer a feller. I trailed him here, then he disappeared. I figure he up 'n got hisself killed 'n is buried here abouts."
"You a law man?"
Sam studied Pack before he answered, surprised at the hint of anxiety in his voice. If he didn't know better, he'd think Pack had something to hide.
"Not exactly. The man I'm lookin' fer made off with some gold bars he stole from the Confederacy durin' the war."
"Then you're a government man."
"I guess ya could call me that. I got asked to do the job cause one a the fellers in on it was my lieutenant."
"A lot of men on the other side of the law have come through here the last couple of years. Cullen put the word out they were welcome."
"I figure the feller roamin' round here nights watchin' the place might a trailed the lieutenant here same as I did. Funny thin' about it though. The same feller rides a different horse each time, tryin' to cover his tracks."
"How do you know it's the same man?"
"He sits in the grass the same, always puts his hat down on the left side, gets up by diggin' in his left foot. Horse veers to the left cause the feller holds the reins in his left hand. I figure he watches with a spyglass."
"Do you think he's after the gold?"
"What else?"
"If the man's dead, whoever killed him took off with the gold."
"Maybe not. I'd a buried it, waited till thin's cooled off."
"Do you think Cullen knows about it?"
"I'm not thinkin' that. He'd a already tried to sell the bars, dumb as he is. The bars ain't surfaced yet. They ain't no good till they're turned into money."
"Dust or nuggets wouldn't be talked about. But gold bars—"
"Yeah. I'm not lookin' to do anythin' outside the law, Pack. I'm aimin' to get the reward money. It'll be enough to buy me that herd a longhorns 'n give me a start."
"Well, luck to you, Sam."
"This is damn good cattle country, Pack."
"Aye. I'd like to run longhorns if I could raise the money to buy 'em."
"Charlie'd like a slice a the pie if we could swing it to drive up a herd."
"He told me."
Sam stood. "Ya ain't plannin' on doin' nothin' till mornin', are ya?"
"That's time enough."
"I'll keep an ear out."
"I'm obliged."
Pack's brow furrowed. He watched Sam head for the bunkhouse. Just for a moment he had thought it was Charlie that Sam was after. He would have hated to go against Sam, but he would have. Charlie Rivers was the best friend he'd had after he lost Shannon McCall. But, hell! That business in Evansville was over and done with long ago. Sam was a steady, deep-thinking man. He'd be a good man to stand by Charlie, especially if he had feelings for Emily, and it sure as hell looked as if he did. By damn. Sam had been as bold as brass about letting Charlie know it. And Emily looked as happy as a dog with two tails.
Despite the worry on Pack's mind, the corners of his lips tilted in a grin.
# Chapter
TWELVE
Trellis and Travor came into the kitchen from the back porch at the same time Pack came in from the parlor. The boys stood beside the door with their hats in their hands. They looked more alike than ever now that Travor had stopped his swaggering and attempts to act tough. Pack could tell them apart when he saw them together, but he doubted he would know which was which if he met them one at a time in a crowd.
"Want some coffee?"
"We want to talk to you."
"Can you talk and drink at the same time?" Pack poured coffee into granite cups.
"Guess so." They hung their hats on the pegs beside the door and came to the table.
"What's on your minds?" Pack straddled the bench and sat down.
The twins sat also, avoided looking directly at Pack, and fiddled with the cups. Finally Trellis spoke.
"Me and Trav've been talkin'. We ain't thinkin' Mara Shannon ort a be left here by herself. Cullen wouldn't a done anythin' while Ma was here, but now that she's gone, there ain't no tellin' what he'll do."
"What do you think I should do about it?" Pack took a sip from his cup.
"I, ah, we think you ort a take her with you, or stay here and see _they_ don't bother her."
"They, meaning Cullen and his bunch."
"You know what they are, Pack." Travor gave his older brother a disgusted look. "Cullen thinks to marry up with Mara Shannon and get this place."
"You don't think that's a good idea?"
"Hell!" Travor rose off the bench, then sat back down. "Cullen ain't fit to wipe her feet."
"Why the interest in Mara Shannon? You said she was prissy and bossy."
"She was good to Ma, and she's been square to me and Trell." Travor faced Pack, his gaze daring him to scoff because he had changed his mind.
"What do you boys want to do now?"
"We been talkin' about that too." Trellis lowered his lashes over his blue eyes and stared into his coffee cup. "We'd go with you, but we ain't leavin' Mara Shannon here by herself."
"What about your pa? What's he going to do?"
"We'll find out when he sobers up. He took to the bottle right after the buryin'."
"Cullen won't give up without a fight. He's got too much to lose."
"We figured that. We ain't runnin' out on Mara Shannon, like you're doin'." Travor spoke resentfully, clipping each word.
Mara stood at the top of the stairs listening to the conversation below. She had changed into a work dress, taken down her hair and tied it at the nape of her neck. When she had first gone to her room, she had stood just inside the door, shivering with the knowledge that she was now the wife of a big, battle-scarred man who had the devil of an Irish temper. Now that she'd had time to think, her senses had come back full force, and she realized that to marry Pack had been the only option available to her.
It was Travor, the twin who had been so resentful, who was now taking up for her. She recognized his voice. It was a little louder than his brother's, and he talked a little faster. She had worked hard to reach the lonely boy who hid his real feelings behind his scowl and his swagger. Now, listening to him, Mara could feel her own heartbeat shaking her, and at the same time tears of gratitude brightened her eyes.
"Can't you stay here, Pack?" Trellis asked.
"He ain't goin' to stay, Trell," his brother sneered. "He's got to get back to that blond whore at the Diamond."
"You seem pretty sure, Trav." There was a mocking tone in Pack's voice.
"Ever'body knows that you 'n that woman they call Candy are thicker'n eight in a bed."
"Is that right?"
"Bedurned and bedamned! You know it is. Why'd you rather have her than a woman like Mara Shannon? Mara Shannon can read and she knows things about history and cipherin'. 'Sides, she's sweet and pretty. She's Irish, too, like us. That other woman ain't nothin' but a bangtail."
"Watch your mouth when you talk about Miss Camp. You're pretty quick to judge someone you don't know anything about."
"I ain't deaf and dumb, for God's sake. I know she works at the Diamond Saloon, and I know that's where men go to get their rocks knocked off." Travor's young, squeaky voice quivered with temper.
"You know a lot for a wet-eared kid."
"I might have wet ears, but I ain't got sawdust atween 'em!"
"And I have?"
"You ain't got no brains, if you don't look out for your own kin."
"I'm not blood kin to Mara Shannon. You are."
Mara's brow knitted in a puzzled frown. She wondered why Pack didn't stop arguing with the boys and ease their minds by telling them that he was staying. He was probably sorry he had married her, and was thinking about the woman who worked at a saloon where men went to "get their rocks knocked off." She wasn't sure what that meant, but she certainly knew what a whore was.
So _that_ was the kind of man she had married! A man who consorted with whores. Defended them! Well! It was no wonder he was reluctant to marry Mara when he had a skilled lover waiting for him in town. For some reason unknown to her she felt both insulted and hurt. Mara placed her hand over her heart and vowed that she would never forgive him. Never, if she lived a million years!
Mara reached behind her, slammed the door smartly, then walked down the stairs into a silent kitchen. Be casual, she ordered herself, while the pulses thudded angrily in her wrists. He had a lot of nerve to sit at her table, eyeing her the way he was after he had just defended a fallen woman, a woman so tarnished that even a boy like Travor knew her reputation.
She stopped behind the twins and placed a hand on each of their shoulders. "Are you hungry?"
"No, ma'am," they answered in unison.
Mara looked over their heads and into Pack's midnight blue eyes. "Has Pack told you the news?"
Twin heads swiveled to look at her. "What news?"
"I'll leave the telling to him. After all, he's the one who will have to balance his _loss_ against his gain."
Mara's chin angled up as she turned away. Pack couldn't suppress a twitch of his firm lips. So she had been listening and heard what was said about Candy. Mara Shannon McCall Gallagher would never understand about a woman like Candace Camp, better known as Candy to the miners and rail-roaders who spent their money at the Diamond Saloon. The uppity little snob didn't know what it was to scrounge to keep body and soul together. She'd had a soft life at the school. She looked at him now as if he had just crawled out of a pig sty. Damn her! Charlie had been right. He might not have any peace from now on, but life with her wouldn't be dull. They'd start off right. He'd teach Miss Priss not to bait the bear.
"Come around here and we'll tell the boys our news."
"You're the one with the Irish gift of gab. You don't need me." Mara went around the end of the table on her way to the wash bench to wash her hands. Pack's arm shot out and circled her waist. She didn't have a chance against his great strength. She lost her balance and he pulled her back and down onto his lap before she could take a deep breath. "What in the world do you think you're doing? Let go of me . . . damn you—"
"Hush, wife. I'll not have you cussing. Boys, meet your new sister. Mara Shannon and I are married. Sam rode after the preacher. He came back and tied the knot—good and tight and legal. We're man and wife. What do you think of that?"
Mara could feel Pack's hard thighs beneath her buttocks and the arm that locked her to him was unrelenting. She squirmed, trying to break free. At least he hadn't told them that she had asked him.
"Let me up—"
"Sit still, sweetheart. And don't look so embarrassed. The boys will have to get used to me holding you on my lap. We're all going to be living here together. We want them here with us, don't we, darlin'? Tell them that they have a home with us for as long as they want it."
"You're married?"
Mara didn't know which twin had spoken. It didn't matter. Pack pulled her back against him so tightly her rib cage rested on his forearm. She considered butting him in the face with the back of her head. Considered it and rejected it. He would be just mean enough to retaliate.
"Tell them, honey," he whispered. His lips nuzzled her ear before he caught the lobe gently between his teeth. "You taste just as sweet as ever, darlin'."
"I . . . we want you to stay. You can have the room at the front of the house." The words burst from Mara's mouth, then she snarled between clenched teeth, "Let go of me, you dolt!"
"You're married? Well, doggie! Well, confound me for a two-headed hoot owl!" Trellis jumped up and slapped his brother on the back. "I tole ya. Didn't I tell ya, Trav?"
"Trell said you'd not go and leave her here. He said you'd think a somethin'. I just never thought a you _marryin_ ' her. I never thought Mara Shannon'd have you. Why, she could have any town man she wanted. She could've even got a railroad conductor if she'd a wanted." Travor had a pleased grin on his young face. Neither of the boys seemed to notice Mara's struggles to free herself from Pack's tight hold.
"I guess I must be more important than I thought if Mara Shannon would take me over _all_ them other fellers—even a railroad conductor. My, that's aiming pretty high."
Because her head was whirling, Mara sputtered when she tried to explain. "Some . . . times circumstances—"
"Bring lovers together." Pack interrupted her with such a quick tightening of the arm locked about her waist that it forced a puff of air from her mouth. "Isn't that what you were going to say, sweetheart?"
Trellis' admiring eyes stayed on Pack. "Ma would be real tickled about it."
"I take it you boys approve of your new sister?"
"You bet!"
"It'll put a end to Cullen's plans. He's goin' to have a shit-fit! Oh . . . sorry, Mara." Travor didn't look as if he were sorry. He was still grinning, but his twin's smile faded to a frown.
"Yeah. Cullen ain't going to like this none a'tall. You're goin' to have your hands full, Pack. But me 'n Trav will stand with you."
"Thanks, but no," Pack said firmly. "Cullen's as much your brother as I am. I'll not ask you to go against him. I'll take care of Cullen, but I'll need you to stay here in the house and take care of my . . . sweet wife."
Much to Mara's embarrassment, he had moved her hair aside and his lips were making little forays down the side of her neck. She all but bared her teeth and snarled. "Stop that!"
Pack laughed softly. "Don't be skittish, honey. The boys don't mind if I give my woman a little lovin'. You're just so pretty and soft and sweet-tempered, it's hard for me to keep my hands off you."
"I'll get even with you," she murmured between clenched teeth.
"What'd you say, darlin'?"
"You heard me, you—you—jackass!"
Pack laughed with his lips against her neck.
"She's a hell of a lot prettier than that Candy woman at the Diamond Saloon." Travor chortled happily, and Mara suddenly hated him, hated Trellis, and most of all hated Pack Gallagher.
"I don't know about her being prettier, Trav." The fingers on her rib cage spread and Pack's thumb rubbed back and forth across the underside of her breast. "For sure, she's plumper, but she's not as loving as Candy," he murmured. "I liked blondes best till just lately. Now I _think_ I like redheads better. But then, blond women don't have freckles on their bottoms like redheaded women."
Pack's lips were fastened to the skin of her neck below her ear and Mara could feel little sucking movements. She was shamed to the bone, to the heart. What he was doing could be a beautiful thing between a man and a woman, but he was doing it now to mock her. She would scream if she stayed on his lap a second longer.
Her arms were locked against her sides, but her hands were free. She wanted to hurt him and hurt him! She lowered her hand down to his thigh, slipped it behind her, and viciously pinched him where he had received the bullet wound.
"Yeow! Goddamn it, you little devil."
His arms loosened. She sprang to her feet and backed away. Just for an instant she regretted the vicious pinch. Then she looked into a face flushed with anger and knew that she would do it again if she had to.
"What's the matter . . . dear?" she asked in a breathless voice filled with exaggerated concern.
"You know damn good and well what's the matter, you little imp of satan! If you broke open that wound I'm going to whip your hind end."
"Oh, dear. I'm sorry if I accidentally hurt you."
"Accidentally, my—"
The last word was mouthed, but Mara was pretty sure she knew what it was. She lifted her reddish brown brows, opened her emerald eyes wide with playacting horror, and stared into his fiery dark ones. Her manner was light, but her thoughts were heavy. It was best to set the rules right now. If he tried to manhandle her again, he'd get a poke in the eye with a stiffened forefinger for his trouble. If that didn't work, he'd get a fist in the gut. She was fully prepared to do what was necessary to see that he kept his distance.
"Gosh, I just can't believe you and Mara Shannon are married." Totally unconcerned, Trellis propped his elbows on the table and rested his chin in his hands.
"That makes two of us," Pack growled, and threw Mara a dark look.
"Three," Mara said with a bright smile. "Are you boys hungry now?"
"Sure." They both spoke at the same time.
While Mara was setting the food left over from the noon meal on the table, Travor hesitantly asked about his father.
"What about Pa, Mara Shannon?"
"Cousin Aubrey has a home here for as long as he wants it. Heavens! Did you think I'd turn my father's cousin out after he worked this place and paid for my schooling?"
"God save us from a stupid woman!" Pack snorted and rolled his eyes to the ceiling.
The words didn't even rate a glance from Mara.
"I'm glad you're not going to run him off," Travor said.
"He's worried about it," Trellis echoed.
"Tell him not to worry. I haven't fully decided what I'm going to do yet, but there will be room here for him."
"So _you_ haven't fully decided what _you'll_ do?" Pack snarled. "I know what _you'll_ do. _You'll_ tell Aubrey McCall that he can have a bed in the bunkhouse if he works for it. There'll be no dead wood on this place from here on out."
Mara dismissed him with a haughty stare, then spoke to the twins.
"We have almost two thousand acres here and it's all paid for. Of course, half of it is Pack's. We've got to think of a way to make a living on the other thousand. It's not suitable for vast fields of potatoes as my father dreamed, but there are other things we can do with land besides growing potatoes."
It was killing Pack to hold back the cutting words that sprang to his lips. The fiesty little baggage was showing her sharp edges. She was trying to provoke him into a shouting match so he'd come off looking bad to the twins.
"I heard fellers sayin' this would be good sheep country. You could start a sheep ranch." Trellis was getting warmed up to the conversation and the fact that Mara was including him and Travor in the planning.
"Oh, no, Trell. I can't stand sheep. They stink to high heaven. Or is it goats that stink? Oh, well, I'm thinking very strongly about raising turkeys. They don't stink at all."
Three pairs of eyes turned to look at her, three mouths opened in awed silence, then three voices joined in a chorus. "Turkeys?"
"Jesus, my God! Are you daft?" Pack's voice exploded in the hushed silence of disbelief.
"I've warned you about taking the Lord's name in vain. Don't do it again." She spoke in her schoolmarm voice and set a pan of bread down on the table with unnecessary force to emphasize her demand.
"But, Mara Shannon, I don't think turkeys are . . ." Trellis' voice faded. His young face was a mask of disappointment and confusion.
"People in Denver are wild for a taste of tame meat. We could sell every turkey we raise."
"How do you plan to get them there, _Mrs._ Gallagher?" There was an insulting tone in Pack's voice that raised Mara's hackles and made her more determined to speak calmly and rationally.
"Drive them," she said as if he were an idiot for not knowing that was the logical way to move turkeys from one place to the other. "A few years ago a man and two boys, not as old as the twins, drove a flock of five hundred turkeys from Nebraska to Denver with the loss of only a few birds. The man said the birds ate grasshoppers along the way and roosted on and around the wagon loaded with corn at night. People lined up for blocks to buy the turkeys." She looked down her nose at Pack, then took her place at the table. "Supply and demand. You should understand that. Didn't you get your start selling cats to miners?"
"There's a mite of difference between a twenty-five dollar cat and a two-bit turkey."
"Who said my turkeys will go for two-bits?"
Pack slammed his fork beside his plate. "You'll not be raising feed on this land for wolves, fox, wildcats—"
Mara held up her hand, palm out. "We will not discuss it now," she said, her calmness in direct contrast to his agitated state.
Pack looked every bit the black Irishman as he glared at her. Finally he made a show of eating a few bites, then got up and refilled his coffee cup. He listened to Mara's chatter as she told the boys that they could sleep in the front room that had been hers when she was a child. And that, if they were interested, in the evenings she would read to them or teach them to read and to write. The choice was theirs.
Travor sat in openmouthed admiration. Pack supposed he should be glad that his brothers had such a warm feeling for his new wife. But at that moment he was unable to be glad about anything. His leg hurt, Mara Shannon was acting as if he had the plague, he had the problem of what to do with his business in Laramie, and in the morning he faced the task of getting rid of Cullen and the petty thieves who had paid him to stay there.
Mara was telling the boys that she planned to wash the following day and that they were to leave their dirty clothes in a pile at the foot of the bed. Her voice was calm as if she had not a care in the world, but Pack knew she was as nervous as a cat on a tin roof. She pushed her loose, curly hair over her ear with shaking fingers. Five times in the next few minutes she made the same gesture, only there was no loose hair to brush away.
Pack didn't speak until the boys were ready to leave the table.
"One of you will be responsible for keeping the woodbox filled and one the water bucket. In the morning both of you will help Mara Shannon fill the washtubs and the boiling pot. Later, after we're settled in, we'll sort out the rest of the chores. But first there's fixing up to do."
"We figured to help her." Trellis picked up a fried pie and followed his brother to the door.
"Another thing," Pack's voice stopped them. "Not a word about me and Mara Shannon to anyone, hear?"
"Oh, shoot!" Travor said, coming back to pluck the last pie off the platter. "I was hopin' to throw it at Cullen and see him have a fit."
"Sorry to spoil your fun, but that's the way it'll be. The morning is time enough for them to be knowing. Bed down in the bunkhouse tonight. I want to be alone with my . . . bride."
Mara's heels scraped on the floor as she shot to her feet. She opened her mouth to protest but closed it when she saw the black scowl on Pack's face and the way the twins had accepted the order. She turned to the workbench to hide her flaming face from Pack's direct stare.
As soon as the door slammed behind the twins, Pack got up and went into the room where his mother had spent her last days. Now that he was alone, he allowed his shoulders to slump wearily. He was tired, but there were things to do, plans to make. He lit a lamp, then pulled a small, very old, wooden chest from under the bed. It had been painstakingly made with grooved ends and held together with pegs. The forged hinges were long and reached across the top and down the back of the box. His father had made the chest in Ireland, and it had held all of their meager possessions when they made the perilous trip to the New World. Pack took an iron key from a hiding place behind the bureau, unlocked the box, and lifted the lid.
As the familiar scent of rose petals wafted up, his lips tightened and he blinked his eyes to hold back the tears. He would always associate the scent with his mother. For as long as he could remember she had kept the letters his father had written to her in this box amid the rose petals. He had never read the letters, nor would he now. He gently moved the bundle aside and took out a packet of letters addressed to him. He sat back on his heels, removed a letter, and scanned it. When he was finished, he returned it to the envelope. He picked up a tintype of himself that he'd had made for his mother years before when he was no older than the twins. He looked so young. Where had the time gone? Pack locked the box and shoved it far back under the bed.
He lifted his holster and gun from the peg on the wall, picked up the rifle that stood in the corner, and brought them to the bunk. For the next half hour he cleaned and oiled the weapons. His hands worked automatically, allowing his thoughts to stray to Mara Shannon. It had cost the haughty little colleen dearly to ask him to take her as his wife. He was sure that it ate at her guts to have to admit that she needed him. It was almost a relief to have her say something snide to him during the meal. It gave him a reason to stay angry with her. Rage lashed at him now as he recalled her words to Emily and Charlie. _I bought him for half of my land._ He understood that the words were a salve for her pride, but nevertheless, someday she would eat those rash words.
His face hardened and his hands became still on the gun. He didn't want to think about the cruel words they had thrown at each other because it hurt inside. Nor did he want to think about her sweetness or her response when he had held her and kissed her. When the preacher had pronounced them man and wife, he had felt for a brief moment that every sweet dream he had dreamed had come true. The elation was quickly dampened when she turned away from him and turned up her nose as if he were a necessary evil.
Pack's gaze lifted from the gun to the doorway leading into the kitchen. His midnight eyes examined every inch of her proud body as she moved back and forth, hurrying he was sure, to finish the cleanup so she could escape to the room upstairs. She was alone and scared. She was his wife by her own choice, and she wasn't sure whether or not he would insist on his marital rights. Her only defense against him was her sharp tongue. He still held the rifle in his hands, and his rough thumbs moved gently, caressingly over the polished stock. If only he could make her understand that he would never hurt her. If she only knew how gentle he would be.
She passed the doorway without a glance into the room. He heard her footsteps going up the stairs and the soft click as the door closed. Ah, sweet, scared little woman. If he wanted to go in, that closed door wouldn't stop him.
* * *
Mara undressed in the dark, slipped her gown over her head and crawled into the bed as if the covers were some protection. She wrapped her arms about her body hoping to stop her shivering. This had been her wedding day. The day that should have been her most joyous day had been a nightmare. She and the man downstairs had been circling each other from the moment she brought him here, sniffing and fighting like two tomcats. Now she was married to him for life, because divorce was unthinkable and was granted only on rare occasions and only to the ones who could afford it. No, the vows she'd made today would hold until one of them died.
There was no way that she could ever go back to the old life now. The feeling of vulnerability and isolation swept over her, making her feel sick, making her heart feel like a stone in her chest. Slow tears slid from the corners of her eyes and into the auburn curls on her temples. She cried silently, and then a thought so terrifying came to her that she sat up in bed holding her hands to her cheeks.
_What if Cullen killed Pack?_
Pack had been sitting on the bunk rubbing a cloth over the barrel of a rifle. Did he think he'd have to use it against Cullen? Had she, by asking Pack to marry her, put his life on the line?
_Of course she had!_
The knowledge ate at her. She fell back onto the pillow. In the past she had been able to deal with the nightmare of being alone and had refused to let herself be turned into a frightened shell. She wondered now if she would be able to live with the horror if Pack were killed because of her. Desolation such as she had never felt before washed over her like a giant tidal wave and she felt the walls closing in on her, stifling her.
Mara turned to look out the window. Through it she could see a million stars shining against the black void of the night sky. There were so many they made her feel small and as insignificant as one grain of sand on a beach.
The tree limb scraped on the tin roof, an owl hooted, both familiar sounds. Pack's face nudged itself into her mind's eye. Pack's words came back to her. _Sweet little Mara,_ _you've worked too hard. These little hands will be soft again,_ _I promise._
The sound of footsteps coming up the stairs sent her heartbeat into a wild gallop. She lifted her head from the pillow and gazed wide-eyed at the door. She hadn't expected him to come to her! Surely he wouldn't—didn't mean to—to sleep in the bed with her! She held her breath. In the stillness she heard the doorknob turn against the prop wedged beneath it. Seconds of breathless silence followed. Then a rap on the door.
"Open the door, Mara Shannon."
He didn't sound angry, but his voice sent shivers of dread knifing through her. Dread so acute that she couldn't speak. She only had time for an indrawn breath before he rapped again.
"Open the door." This time he spoke with some agitation.
"I'm asleep." Her voice squeaked. How could she have said anything so stupid?
"Mara Shannon, open this goddamn door. I'm not going to ask you again." The loud thump that shook the wall could only be his heavy boot as he kicked the bottom of the door. "If I rip this door down it will not be replaced. Stop acting like a quaking virgin and open the door."
Mara was out of the bed before she realized his goading words had moved her. She pushed the hair back from her eyes and went to the door. It was difficult to dislodge the prop beneath the knob, but she yanked on it and it came loose. Holding it in her hands she backed into the corner of the room.
The door was thrown open. Pack's big form was a shadow that filled the doorway. He stood for a moment, then took two steps into the room, his head turned to Mara, who was like a white ghost against the wall.
"You've no reason to cringe from me, Mara Shannon. I'm not here to rut on your virginal body. If you thought to keep me out by barring the door, you needn't have gone to the trouble. I'll not have this door or any door in this house barred against me. In case of fire, I might not be able to break down the door in time to save you." His voice changed from calm reasoning to one filled with contempt. "Go back to bed and dream your silly, schoolgirl dreams. I'm not so desperate for a woman that I'd find pleasure in taking an unwilling one."
Mara stood in a kind of frozen agony, clutching the heavy timber. His contemptuous words hit her like stones. The shadow disappeared, and she heard Pack going down the stairs.
# Chapter
THIRTEEN
Mara looked worried when Pack came out of the bedroom with the holster and gun strapped around his waist; worried and anxious and tired. He looked at her steadily, up and down, with no regard for politeness. She flushed beneath his look. Damn, she was pretty! She reminded him of a cameo he'd seen in a shop in Denver. But there was nothing hard and rigid about her fine-boned features, only anxiety, fatigue and dark smudges beneath her eyes. He had never seen a woman who was so soft and feminine, sensual and exciting. She was all warm tones from the top of her auburn hair and emerald eyes to the flushed skin of her face and neck. His gaze moved down over her soft, full breasts and narrow waist, and he found himself wondering how it would feel to hold her naked in his arms. Pack tore his eyes away from her to rid his mind of the thought.
The feeling in Mara's stomach was not pleasant. It churned with fear as her heart beat slowly and heavily.
"Do you think you'll need that?" She waved her hand at the gun on his hip.
"Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it," he said, retreating behind a wall of stony silence.
She searched his face for a hint of what he was thinking but saw only eyes as hard as steel, a firm thrusting jaw and an implacable mouth. Right now he was as unapproachable and as distantly remote as a stone statue on a high pedestal. He was the most self-assured person she had ever met—hard, clever, knowing exactly what he was doing at all times. She could think of nothing to say to him.
"Stay in the house." He issued the order coolly without looking at her and walked out the door.
Pack had waited until he was sure that the men were eating breakfast before he walked down the path toward the cookshack. The only plan he had was to pick a time when all the men were together in one place. He didn't know who would stand with Cullen and who wouldn't. In the past when he had been in a tight spot he had played it by ear. That's what he would do now. If he had to fight Cullen, he would. He understood well that a fight meant a gunfight. Pack hated violence, hated the thought of killing a man. But years of struggling for survival among rough men, in rougher country, had taught him that a man did what he had to do to stay alive.
He looked back over his shoulder. One of his young brothers was at the well; the other was building a fire beneath the wash pot. He had told them to see to it that Mara Shannon stayed in the house. He was sure that they'd do just that.
A half a dozen men were seated at the long plank table when Pack walked into the cookshack. He sized up the layout in a single glance. Cullen sat at the far end, Sporty Howard two seats away on the left.
"Mornin'." Steamboat spoke before he even saw who had come in. When he did, his mouth opened in surprise. He set a platter of fried meat down on the table and scurried back to the cookstove.
The men at the table glanced at Pack, then at Cullen, but continued to chomp their food. A big-bellied, florid-faced man banged his cup on the table for more coffee, and Steamboat hurried to fill it. Sporty Howard speared a biscuit with his knife and grinned at Cullen.
"Ya come to say good-bye, Pack?" Cullen's eyes flicked over the faces of the men at the table, seeking support, then back at the giant standing on spread legs, his hands on his hips.
"Aye."
For a moment Cullen's pale blue eyes flashed a victory sign to Sporty Howard. Then a crafty gleam came into them when a blanket of silence covered the tension-filled room. Cullen came out of the chair and rested his hands on the table.
"Well, ya've said it. What're ya waitin' for?"
"I'm not going. You are."
Pack heard the screen door open, but he didn't take his eyes off Cullen. Instinctively he knew that it was Sam who stood against the wall beside the door. Only Sam would have entered in such a way as to not distract him.
Cullen took a deep breath, and the words exploded from him. "I ain't goin' nowhere."
Still looking at Cullen, Pack spoke. "I've got no quarrel with the rest of you men. But as soon as you've finished eating, ride out and don't come back."
The florid-faced man started to object angrily. "I paid to stay here, by Gawd—"
"Cullen will give you your money back."
"Like hell I will." Cullen's stunned silence had passed and blind anger took over.
"I'll have my money back or I'll nail yore ass to the floor. Ya said ya was owner here." The man who spoke had sun-bleached hair and a narrow, sardonic face.
The words stung Cullen. His eyes flicked over the faces of the men and on to Pack.
"You ain't the owner here. You—you ain't nothin' but the ole woman's by-blow."
The gun was in Pack's hand before Cullen could blink an eye. He was a heartbeat away from death and he knew it. In the silence that followed no one moved. Cullen's face paled, and he cursed himself for letting his anger control his words.
"I could shoot you down like the dog you are, but I'll wait till you're armed and do it legal." Pack shoved his gun back into the holster. His eyes moved to Sporty Howard. "You got something to say?"
"Ain't my fight."
"It will be if you palm that knife." He looked back at Cullen. "Be off this land in an hour. Aubrey and the boys will stay."
"Ya backin' off, Cullen?" The question came from one of the men.
"What about your plans to wed that redheaded bitch that's been swinging her ass—"
With a move as powerful and sudden as a whirlwind, Pack swung an arm. His rocklike fist sent Sporty back over the bench, slamming him to the floor. He lay sprawled, his nose gushing blood. Pack reached him with one long stride, grabbed him by the nape of the neck and hauled him to his feet. The men moved quickly out of the way. Pack loomed over the smaller man like an angry giant and shook him viciously.
"You low life, egg sucking son of a bitch! The lady you're talking about is my wife. If you want to keep that tongue in your head you'll not mention her again. Understand?" Pack plucked the gun from Sporty's holster, the knife from his scabbard and tossed them on the table. "Pick them up on your way out." He shoved him toward the door.
_His wife!_ Cullen's face was cold with suppressed fury and helplessness. He looked past Pack to where Sam Sparks leaned against the wall, seemingly relaxed, but his hand was hanging at his side.
"Mara Shannon wouldn't wed you. She . . . wouldn't."
"She did. I run things now."
"Ya ain't jist gonna run us off!"
"Are you going to stop me? I wish to hell you'd try. I'd like to put a bullet in each kneecap, hipjoint and elbow, and watch you squirm before I put one between your eyes and blow your stupid brains out."
"The men here'll help me." Cullen looked around at the men who were getting up from the table and heading for the door.
"They want no part of your fight. They've been using you like you've been using them. All they want from you is their money back. You'd better give it to them or you'll find yourself hanging from a tree."
"You're not gettin' away with this. I've been here five years—"
"Five years too long."
"I'll take Trav—"
"Go near him and I'll kill you."
"I've got horses and cattle. I built this bunkhouse and cookshack. I'm entitled to a share."
"You're entitled to nothing. You'll leave here with nothing but your worthless hide and one horse. You'd have been gone long ago but for old Aubrey. My mother honored her wedding vows."
"Pa'll tell you that Shannon McCall wanted us to have this place."
"You're lying. Shannon McCall knew you for the worthless scum that you are. Stop your whining and get the hell out."
Cullen stood his ground a moment longer, then turned to go. At the door he paused. "You're not gettin' away with this," he repeated.
Pack watched the men go into the bunkhouse. When he turned back, Steamboat was pulling a pan of biscuits from the oven. Old Riley hovered near the cookstove.
"Where do you two fit in?" Pack asked.
"I work here for bed and board," Steamboat answered.
"Me too."
"Are you hiding out here?"
"Ya might say that. I got a wife in Ohio I'd just as soon not run into."
"You can stay and cook for ten a month."
Steamboat shrugged. "It's more'n I was gettin'."
"Eight a month for you, Riley."
"I don't need that much."
"That's what you'll get and I'll expect you to earn it. Where's Aubrey?"
"In the bunkhouse—dead drunk."
"Leave him there until the men are gone, then throw him in the horse tank to sober him up."
"I ain't playin' nursemaid to no drunk," Steamboat said flatly and waited.
Pack looked sharply at the slight, thin-haired man. Finally he nodded. "You're right. It's not your job. I'll do it."
He went to the porch to watch as the men carried their bedrolls to the corral. He watched as they saddled up and rode away. Cullen was among them.
Pack waited a few minutes before going to the bunkhouse. The place smelled like a boar's nest. Spittoons were full, cigarette butts had been ground out on the floor, empty whiskey bottles were strewn about. Aubrey lay in a drunken stupor on one of the bunks. Pack went back to the cookshack.
"It'll be your job, Riley, to clean up that bunkhouse. Aubrey will help you. You can start as soon as I get him sobered up." He sat down at the table beside Sam. "Thanks for the backup, Sam."
"Didn't do nothin'." Sam poured sorghum syrup over his biscuits. "I got so caught up in what ya was doin', I let Cullen ride off with my board money."
"You're getting plumb careless, Sam. I'll take some of that coffee now, Steamboat."
* * *
Mara stood in the doorway and, with relief, watched Cullen and the other men ride away. She saw Pack go to the bunkhouse and then return to the cookshack. Her nerves and muscles were wound up tight and had been since the faint light of the new day appeared when she had heard the first boastful crow of the boss rooster in the yard. She had tried to reason that this was why she had married Pack. He was earning his half of her inheritance by getting rid of Cullen and his undesirable friends.
A half hour went by. She went to the stove and moved the coffeepot to a cooler part of the range. She had made fresh coffee thinking Pack would return soon. They would sit at the table and he would tell her what had taken place. She had been wrong again.
Mara tried to shove her thoughts to the back of her mind, but over and over again they rolled, like the turning of a wheel in her brain. She was mortified when she recalled his words. _Go back to bed and dream your silly schoolgirl_ _dreams. I'd find no pleasure in taking an unwilling woman._ How was she going to live in this house with this stranger who was her husband?
For now, work was the answer. Today she would wash clothes. Tomorrow she would work in the vegetable garden. In a few days she would ask Pack to take her to town to buy glass for the parlor window and new screening to put on the doors. She would go to the bank and have her money sent up from the bank in Denver. Things to do and things not to do were listed in her orderly mind.
Mara roamed restlessly about the lonely house, touching the few familiar things left from her childhood, smoothing her fingertips over a table, the back of a chair her father had made one winter while they were snowed in. She went to the mantel and rubbed her palm over its smooth surface. The pendulum on the clock was lifeless. She had forgotten to wind the springs. She opened the glass-fronted case and inserted the key. The eyes in the painted face on the pendulum seemed to rebuke her for her neglect. Eight to ten turns for the chimes, eight to ten turns for the clock. Because she had no idea what time it was, she set the hands at six o'clock, replaced the key, and closed the door.
"It's half past eight."
Pack's voice came from the doorway, and she turned to see him returning a flat, gold watch to his pocket. Damn! Damn! How could a man so big move so silently? She leaned on the mantel for support, her brain whirling, as she moved the hand down to six. The peal as the clock struck the half hour was loud and seemed to be saying, Why are your knees so weak?
"Did you have any trouble?" she asked as she turned.
"None to speak of. Trell wants to know if you want the bench and the washtubs set up on the porch or in the yard."
"Under the shade tree."
Mara followed him through the kitchen and out onto the porch, hoping that he would share with her what had happened between him and Cullen. He walked out into the yard and spoke with the boys, then headed for the shed. Halfway there he turned and came back.
"Steamboat said to tell you that he had already started a big pot of beans and meat. You won't have to stop your washing to cook today."
* * *
Mara worked furiously throughout the day, trying to tire herself out so that she would sleep when night came. She washed, scrubbed, carried out ashes. Sheer willpower and determination forced her to smile occasionally, speak pleasantly when spoken to, and choke down a portion of the food she took on her plate when she went to the cookshack to eat. Not once did her expression reveal the panic that rose in her throat each time she thought of the long, lonely, loveless years ahead.
Toward evening, while she was taking the clean dry clothes off the bushes, Pack and Sam came from the corral leading their horses. They mounted and, without a word or a look in her direction, rode away, adding yet another doubt to the growing list of doubts regarding the man she had married. When Trellis brought her a plate of food from the cookshack, she asked him where Pack and Sam had gone.
"Scoutin' round, I guess. They'll be back. Pack said for me 'n Trav to stick close to the house."
"Good of him," Mara mumbled and watched the young boy go to the porch and seat himself on the back step. Disappointment slowed her steps. Even Trellis had aligned himself with Pack to keep her in the dark as to what was going on.
After she ate, Mara carried the teakettle of warm water up to her room, closed the door and washed herself from head to foot. She longed for a bath in a tub but didn't know how she could arrange it with so many men coming and going from the house. She slipped her gown over her head and crawled wearily into the bed. The ache in her muscles and bones was nothing compared to the ache in her heart.
It was a luxury to be alone. Tears came. Mara allowed them to roll down her cheeks. _What had she done?_ The more she thought about it, the more miserable and confused she became. Finally weariness overcame her and she slept fitfully, dreaming that she was being chased through the woods by a big black horse. The animal reared over her when she fell and slashed at her with sharp hooves.
She awakened. A startled cry broke from her when she saw a dark form bending over her. She whimpered and tried to move, but her muscles refused to obey.
"Shhh . . . don't be scared. I heard you call out and wanted to make sure you were all right." Pack's familiar voice came out of the darkness. Her panic ebbed.
"I . . . was dreaming. I—"
Suddenly it was too much to hold inside her. A huge convulsive sob came from deep within her and disrupted the silence of the dark room. Mara could not have choked it back if her life had depended on it. She turned her face to the pillow and cried for herself because she was alone and frightened, for her father who had come to this country looking for a better life for his wife and daughter. She cried for her mother, gentle and refined, who had loved this house and lived for such a short time to enjoy it and for Brita, whose life had been short and painful.
Pack's weight on the side of the bed tilted her toward him. The hand on her shoulder was warm and soothing. She welcomed it. When she was lifted and held close in Pack's arms, she clasped her arms around him and clung. She didn't think of him as being the man she had married in desperation. He was a link with happier times. He was someone her father had known and trusted and loved. She burrowed her face into his shoulder and melted against his hard chest.
"Ah . . . don't cry. Hush now."
She stirred against his shoulder. "I . . . can't stop!"
"It'll be all right. You're here where you want to be, and Cullen is gone. You've nothing to be scared of."
Large, rough hands stroked her hair, then moved beneath the heavy mass to work gently at the nape of her neck. Her sobs continued until she was drained and empty. At the moment she wanted nothing but to cling to the warm, living man who held her. Gentle arms rocked her, a soothing voice crooned to her as if she were a small child.
"You worked too hard today. You're worn out." The words, a gentle rebuke, were murmured against her ear in such an inexpressibly moving, deep voice that she started crying again.
"No . . . I didn't," she sobbed. "I like to . . . work."
"You try to do too much at one time. You're tired. Don't cry." His hand stroked up and down her spine. He kneaded the muscles in her shoulders and back. "Does that feel good?" His voice, kind and comforting, was still close to her ear.
"Uh huh, but you don't have to."
"I want to." Silence stretched between them. He sat on the side of the bed holding her and rubbing her back. There were no more tears left within her. She took a shuddering breath and let it out slowly.
"I'm sorry. It's been a long time since I gave way like that."
"You earned it. You've been through a lot lately."
"I'm sorry, too, for being so hateful to you and hurting your leg."
She could feel the deep chuckle in his chest and the heavy pounding of his powerful heart against her breasts, but she felt safer than she had in weeks.
"I wanted to spank your bottom. That was a powerful pinch, but it didn't do any real damage." He continued to rub her back. "I'm not your enemy, honey," he said quietly. "You don't have to be afraid of me." He drew the words out on a long breath. "I'll not hurt you and I'll do my best to see that no one else hurts you."
"I know that. I've been unfair to you."
"No." His lips turned into her hair. "You've given me the world." He pulled her arms from around him and lowered her to the bed. "Go to sleep. Things will look better in the morning." His voice was strained. His hand moved to smooth her hair back from her cheek, then away.
Mara wondered for a moment about the words he had whispered in her hair. Her body's weariness overcame her churning thoughts. Her lids drooped and she slept. Once during the night she was vaguely aware that her back was against something warm and solid. It was such a pleasant, comfortable and safe feeling to know that she was not alone. She drifted back to sleep.
When morning came, she lay listening to the sounds of an awakening homestead. She heard a mourning dove's plaintive call, the creak of the pulley as the water bucket was lowered into the well, the plop as it hit the bottom. The rooster crowed, announcing a new day. The hens in the chicken house clucked contentedly. The clank of iron as the ashes were being shaken down in the firebox of the cookstove told her Pack was starting the morning fire.
Mara lay for awhile wondering if Pack had really come to her, held her while she cried, and murmured comforting words, or if she had dreamed it. No, it wasn't a dream. He had been real, solid and warm. She had felt his breath on her wet cheeks. She remembered now that when he pulled her arms from around him and she lay back on the pillow, she had missed his warm strength and had wanted him to stay with her. He _had_ stayed! It had been his solid body she had felt against her back. Oh! How could she face him? She was mortified that she had allowed him to hold her last night, and even more distressed that she had liked being in his arms.
* * *
The days that followed were filled with work. Pack and the boys labored from dawn to dusk repairing first the barn and horse stalls, then the chicken house, sheds and the corral. The privy was straightened up and made more solid. The twins carried bucket after bucket of lye water and scrubbed out the inside, then dirt was poured into the cesspit so that they could no longer smell it from twenty feet away.
Mara worked in the house, at times so lonely she wanted to cry. Although she had told Trellis and Travor they had a room in the house and would have welcomed them as a buffer between her and Pack, they had settled in the bunkhouse with Aubrey, Sam, Steamboat and Riley. They worked willingly and seemed to enjoy being with Pack. They trailed after him as if he were something wonderful.
Mara didn't know what had taken place between Aubrey and Pack. She knew that Aubrey and Riley had scrubbed the bunkhouse, had spread the manure from the barn on the vegetable garden and had taken a scythe to the weeds and brush that would threaten the buildings if they should catch on fire. Aubrey stayed clear of the house, and neither Pack or the twins mentioned him to her.
Each morning Pack managed to be up before Mara came down the stairs. He had coffee made and went after the milk while she made the breakfast. At noon he came to the house, and they ate a nearly silent meal together. At dusk he went to the creek to bathe, then came to the kitchen to eat. While she cleaned up after the meal, he sat on the porch and smoked or walked down to the bunkhouse and stayed until she had gone to bed.
They never mentioned the night he came to her room and demanded she open the door, or the night he held her while she cried and lay beside her while she slept. It was as if neither of those events had happened.
To Pack, however, the memory of holding her in his arms with only the cloth of her nightdress between them was both an agony and an ecstasy. He remembered the terror that had knifed through him when he heard her cry out. And he thought about how soft, how sweet smelling, how trusting she had been when she wrapped her arms about him. The scent of her warm woman's body had intoxicated him. He had wanted to pull her onto his lap, cuddle her and murmur foolish things in her ear. It was an odd and uneasy sensation to want only to comfort a woman without thinking of her as a way to satisfy his own bodily needs.
She was his now.
Mara Shannon had accepted his touch when in despair, and now he waited for her to become accustomed to his company before he could expect her to accept the most intimate touches between a man and a woman. Once she realized that he was going to take care of her, she'd settle down and accept their mating as natural. He didn't dare hope that she would come to love him, but she could become fond of him. That much would make life bearable. It was unthinkable to him that they live their lives together and sleep apart. He wanted a family. That was what made a home.
Her coolness hurt him in ways he had never thought he could be hurt. It was vital to him that he learn all he could about her before he would be able to close the distance between them. He wanted to know where her mind went when she sat across the table from him and looked out the window toward the distant mountains.
His hunger for her consumed his every thought. It was not just physical release he needed, but the need to go inside her, give her his child, and bind her to him for all eternity. At night he paced the floor, thinking about walking up the stairs to her bed, holding her as he had done the night she cried out in her sleep. The agony of being rebuffed or having her retreat from him completely kept him from taking the first steps. As much as he wanted her, longed to have her put her arms around him and hold him, he wanted something more than the union of their two bodies.
He wanted her love.
* * *
A couple of weeks after Pack and Mara were married, Pack decided it would be safe to leave Mara and go into Laramie. He and Sam had scouted the area, and there had been no sign of Cullen slinking around. Nor were there any fresh tracks of the mysterious night watcher.
He made his announcement at breakfast.
"I'm going into town today."
Mara set a pitcher of milk on the table and watched as he poured some of it on his mush.
"I'll go with you. I can be ready in just a few minutes."
"Not this time." He bent his head over the bowl and refused to look at her. She stood at the end of the table looking down on his dark head.
"What do you mean, not this time? I want to go, Pack. I need some things."
"Give me a list and I'll get them for you."
"No! I want to get them myself."
He looked up, his eyes dark and velvety. "I don't want you to go this time, Mara Shannon. You'll be better off here where Steamboat and the boys can look after you."
"I'm not a baby to be looked after." Anger raced through her. She tried to keep it out of her voice and almost succeeded.
Pack stared at her. Her face was set in a blank mask and her lashes veiled her eyes, allowing only a thin glittering line of emerald green to show.
"No, you're not a baby, but you don't know this country. You'll have to trust me to do what's best for you." The coldness of his tone angered her all the more.
"Then go. I'll not force my company on you." She turned back to the stove. Her legs trembled and her voice wavered out of control. In a sudden fit of temper, she slammed the round iron lid back over the hole in the top of the range and threw the poker in the woodbox.
"Be reasonable, Mara Shannon. I can't take you this time." Pack got up from the table and went to stand behind her. He placed his hand on her shoulder. She jerked away from it.
"You've made that quite clear."
"There's a man in town who is interested in buying my freight line. I've got to see what he's willing to offer, and there's another matter I need to attend to. I can't leave you standing on the street while I do that."
"Of course not. You wouldn't want me to accompany you to the Diamond Saloon while you do 'business' with Miss Candy. You needn't worry. She can have _that_ part of you. I certainly don't want it."
"And you've made that quite clear." He repeated her words.
He wanted to grab her and shake her. Instead he stood for a moment longer looking on her auburn hair with its hidden fire, her rigid back and her fists, clenched and pressed against her thighs.
When she refused to turn and look at him, Pack slammed his hat down on his head and, swearing under his breath, left the house.
Damn her for a high-tempered _spalpeen!_ He couldn't tell her that he didn't know what awaited him in Laramie. He couldn't tell her that he wanted a chance to tell Candy that he was married. There were matters to settle with the gamblers at the Kosy Kitty Saloon before he could take Mara to town. Willy had sent word by Sam that he had a buyer for the freight line. He intended to see about that first, just in case he wasn't able to talk business after he cracked a few heads at the saloon.
He wanted to tell her that it hadn't been his idea to wed! And because he had married her, didn't mean that she owned him or that she'd always call the shots. If she was so damned stubborn she wouldn't even listen to reason, she could stay here and stew in her own juice for all he cared.
Maybe by the time he got back she'd be cooled off.
# Chapter
FOURTEEN
Pack and Sam rode into Laramie and down the rutted busy street that ran parallel with the shining tracks of the Union Pacific Railroad, the lifeblood of the town. Nothing had changed. Even at mid-morning the street was clogged with wagons, horses, and mule teams. They passed a saloon just as the bartender was throwing a drunk into the street. They walked their horses slowly, weaving in and out of the traffic. Both men scanned the town with careful eyes, alert to any attention they might be getting.
At the end of the first block was a two-storied building with a porch that extended out eight feet, offering shelter to a couple of wooden benches polished by the seats of many breeches. Over the door was the sign: DIAMOND SALOON. A sweet potato plant sat in a jar on one side of the shiny window, its long reaching vines tied to the top of the window frame. Voices and music coming from the Diamond Saloon were muted. Miss Candace Camp, the owner, allowed no toughs in her place of business.
They crossed the intersection and rode past Flannery's Dining Hall on the corner. In the middle of the block was a building with a stairway going up the side. Across the front was a crudely lettered sign: BARBERSHOP, MISS NAN NEAL, PROPRIETOR. In Nan's shop a man could get a shave, haircut, bath, and twenty minutes in bed with the bawdy Nan, all for ten dollars. Of course, if he needed more than the twenty minutes, it would cost him another five unless he was one of Nan's favorite customers. In that case the time in bed could extend to an hour or two without extra charge while other customers waited. Nan Neal was a woman who clearly enjoyed her work.
A loafer leaning against the rail in front of the eating place glanced at the two tall riders out of the corners of his eyes, then jerked his head to see them better. "Holy shit!" He ducked under the hitching rail and headed for the Kosy Kitty, proud that he would be the one to spread the news that Pack Gallagher was back.
Pack and Sam turned the corner and rode into what was considered the "tough" part of town. They rode past the Kosy Kitty, a long, narrow building with a long bar and a good many tables. It had been the hangout for the town's rougher element as well as for an occasional outlaw drifter since the town's beginnings two years earlier. Next to this a one-room bunkhouse served as a place for casual sleeping with a dozen tiers of bunks and a few tables for playing cards. The usual rowdy sounds issued from the Kitty, but no one came out to see the riders pass.
Beyond that was the small headquarters building of Pack's freight business and the corrals where he kept his horses, mules and freight wagons.
The old man sitting on the stump in front of the building did not change his position as the riders approached him. He alternately stroked his drooping mustache to the right and then to the left, with a little twist at the end each time. His eyes, sad with a perpetual mist, watched the two men on horseback. As they neared, he raised a browned forefinger to the bush on his upper lip, lifted it, leaned back a little, and spat. The brown juice struck squarely on the stone he had been aiming at, and had rarely missed for the past four days.
"Howdy, Willy."
"Ya took yore sweet time 'bout gettin' here."
"Did you miss me?" Pack stepped down from his horse and tied the reins to the rail.
"Humph! Like I'd a missed a bellyache."
"You know Sam?"
"I know 'em. Sent word by 'em, didn't I? Howdy." With that he dismissed Sam. "I'll swear, Pack, yo're the bestin'est man I ever saw. I been sittin' here four days waitin' fer ya."
Pack looked at the juice-spattered rock. "Only four days?"
"I got a feller here what'll take the mules, wagons 'n the whole kit 'n caboodle off'n our hands. Ya know freightin's 'bout played out in these parts."
"I've been telling you that for the past year, Willy. Did you pay off the two drivers?"
"Ya don't see 'em, do ya? Ain't no sense in a man sittin' doin' nothin' 'n drawin' pay. Even I know that."
"Find the fellow that wants to buy and we'll get to dickering."
Sam listened to the exchange between the old man and Pack and grinned. The two were fond of each other but neither would admit it.
"I'll mosey round. See ya back 'bout noon." Whistling between his teeth, Sam turned his horse toward the main part of town.
It took the rest of the morning for Pack and the buyer to agree on a price for his wagons, mules and his contract with the army to haul supplies from the railroad to Fort Laramie. The man, a mule skinner from Nebraska, would finish out the contract, then move on south where the railroad was not expected to eat into the trade for years.
When Sam returned they ate a meal together at Flannery's Dining Hall, which was nothing more than a tent with a board floor and board siding. While they ate, they were forced to listen to the Nebraskan brag about the places he'd been and the sights he'd seen. Afterward, Sam went to tend to some business of his own and Pack walked with the man to the bank where he signed the bill of sale. He deposited the money, shook hands with the Nebraskan and wished him luck. As Pack started to leave, the banker invited him into his private office.
"Sit down, Pack. Have a cigar." The banker held out a box of Cuban-made cigars. He was a man of middle age with a large paunch and a shiny bald spot at the top of his head. He parted his side hair just an inch above his right ear and combed the long strands carefully over his bald pate.
Pack selected a cigar and lit it. It amused him that now that he had a substantial amount of money in the bank, Herman Flagg considered him worthy of being invited into his private office.
"What are you planning on doing, Pack?"
"I'm not sure."
"I was sorry to learn you'd been set upon by that bunch of poor losers after the fight with Bob Mason. I had hopes Marshal January would run that element out of Laramie, but he seems to spend most of his time out of town."
Pack shrugged his shoulders and drew deeply on the cigar. He looked the banker in the eye and remained silent.
"I've been asked to find a buyer for the Shamrock Hotel, Pack. Interested?"
"Lord, no."
"I didn't think so." Flagg templed his fingers and leaned back in his swivel chair. "But I've another proposition to put to you. We're planning a big shindig at the end of August to celebrate Union Pacific Day. It's sure to draw a crowd of thousands. A fight promoter from Kansas City came to town last week. He's looking for someone to fight his man."
"Who's his man?"
"Moose Kilkenny."
"He's tough. He's no whiskey-soaked drifter."
"I think you're tougher."
"Maybe, maybe not. Moose is a first-class fighting man." Pack dusted the ash from his cigar into the can of sand at the end of the rolltop desk.
"He's Irish; you're Irish. It would be a good fight."
"Let the stinking Irish micks kill each other, huh?"
"You said it, I didn't," Flagg said quickly. "A good fight is what I want. I'm a gambling man."
"Do your depositors know their money is in the hands of a gambling man?"
Flagg ignored the sarcasm. His eyes roved over Pack's broad shoulders, immense forearms and the hard fist that lay on his thigh. Flagg put his cigar on the edge of the desk where other cigars had left a row of burns and smoothed his already slicked-down hair.
"Have you seen Kilkenny fight?"
"I've seen him."
The banker picked up the cigar and puffed rapidly. "Do you think you can beat him?"
"I never climb into the ring expecting to lose."
Flagg looked into cold eyes and had no doubt that Pack was speaking the truth. He had not believed it when he had been told that Pack would throw the fight. He'd followed his instincts and won a substantial amount of money when Black Bob Mason had been unable to stand after Pack had knocked him down three times.
"It would be a fair and square fight using the London Prize Ring Rules."
"What's in it for me?"
"A fourth of the purse."
"A third."
"With a decent crowd a fourth of the gate could be a thousand dollars. If you think you've a chance to whip him, you can always make your own side bet. You could come out with quite a bit of money. I'll bet a couple thousand myself."
"The celebration should bring more than a decent crowd to town. I want a third if I win. If I lose, which I won't, I'll take an eighth to pay for my time . . . and my pain."
The banker stood. "Agreed." He offered his hand and Pack took it.
"Agreed. I don't welsh on my deals, you'd better not either."
"I didn't get to where I am by welshing on deals. Where can I get in touch with you?"
"Send word out to the McCall place."
Herman Flagg raised his brows. "The McCall place?"
"That's right."
"You'll get yourself killed or crippled out there. That place is a hideout for every petty outlaw who can find it."
"Not anymore. I'm running the place now. You can spread the word."
Pack walked out the door. If he had looked back he would have seen the banker holding the cigar between his teeth and smiling around it.
Willy was lounging against the building and moved up beside Pack when he stepped to the edge of the walk to throw the cigar butt in the gutter.
"What are you going to do now, Willy?"
"What ya do. I been lookin' out fer ya fer so long, I don't know how to do nothin' else."
"I thought you'd say that. What do you know about ranching?"
"Ever'thin'. I been a drover since I was ass-high to a duck."
"Good. You can teach me all you know about ranching some night after supper."
"I ain't funnin', goldurn it. I know ranchin'. My pappy ranched down on Purgatoire Creek near Raton Pass in the early forties. That country was so full a wildcats 'n bears my maw had ta kick 'em outta the way to get to the privy." Willy stepped off the walk and out into the street to let a lady with a parasol pass. "Howdy, ma'am."
Pack reached into his pocket, took out some bills and shoved them into Willy's hand.
"Go up to the livery, buy a good wagon and hitch it to that pair of blacks. We'll take it and that six head of horses out to the McCall place."
"What 'n hell do ya want to go out there fer?"
"Because my wife is out there, that's why."
"Wife!" Willy backed up a step as if he'd been dealt a blow. "Who in hell'd marry you?"
Pack grinned. "Why are you so surprised? There's plenty of women who'd jump at the chance to marry me."
"All bangtails," Willy snorted. "Only decent woman what ever looked at ya was old Mrs. Eliza Swain. That's cause she wanted help gettin' 'cross the mud puddles to the votin' place. Haw! Haw! Who'd a thought she'd be the first female in the whole world to vote in a election 'n ya helped her 'cross the puddle." His weathered face took on a serious expression. "It warn't decent what she done."
"Decent or not, it put Laramie on the map. The news went clear around the world. Mrs. Swain isn't my only admirer. There's Nan." Pack had started walking down the street, Willy taking two steps to his one to keep up.
"Yep, there's Nan. What was that ya said 'bout havin' a wife?"
"I said I had one. Her name is Mara Shannon. She's out at the McCall place."
"They ain't nothin' out thar but a nest a cutthroats. Ya went and married one a them? Why'd ya go 'n do that fer?"
"The cutthroats are cleaned out or I'd not have left my wife and two young brothers out there. From now on it'll be known as the Gallagher Ranch."
"Jesus, my Lord! I dunno what'll become of ya! How'd ya manage that? Where'd the woman come from anyhow?'
"You can ask her when you get there."
"Pack! Pack, darlin'. Where've ya been?"
Nan Neal came from the back room when Pack entered her barbershop, Willy crowding in behind him. Nan was a pencil-slim girl with black curly hair, a wide mouth and laughing brown eyes. Her calf-length dress exposed skinny legs. The bodice barely covered her small, bouncy breasts. She was a bundle of energy. Nan never walked when she could run, never spoke softly when she could shout. She took a few running steps and leaped into Pack's arms. He backstepped a few paces to keep his balance and grabbed her around the waist. Her arms encircled his neck and her legs his hips as she placed loud smacking kisses on his face.
"Darlin', darlin', darlin'," she screeched. "I missed ya!"
Pack chuckled. He put his hands beneath her arms and peeled her off him and lowered her until her feet were on the floor.
"One of these days you're going to get me shot." His voice scolded, but he was grinning down at the pixie face snuggled against his arm. "One of your lovesick customers is going to do me in if you don't stop that."
"Oh, poot on them! Are ya all right, love? Did them dirty, low-down bastards hurt ya? Do ya need a shave today? Or a bath?"
Pack laughed. "Yes to the first, honey. No to everything else. I've got business to tend to."
"Business with Miss Candy?" She hugged his arm and her bottom lip came out in a pout.
Nan had come to Laramie two years before riding on one of Pack's freight wagons. He had found her in a mining camp, beaten almost to death by the gambler who claimed to be her husband. When Pack walked into the tent that served as the whorehouse, he had taken one look at her, and all his pent-up desire had faded in an instant. She was sick with a fever, and her face, arms and upper body were covered with big red and purple bruises. Lying there listlessly, she looked up at him with dull, disinterested eyes, waiting for him to use her slight body in any way his lust demanded.
When he left the camp, Nan had been with him. The gambler lay on the cot, his face swollen beyond recognition. He had been no match for Pack's fists. As soon as he was able, the gambler headed farther west toward San Francisco hoping never again to run into the Irish freighter with the terrible temper and rock-hard fists.
Pack was the moon and the stars as far as Nan was concerned. He was up there somewhere near to God in her eyes. He had set her up in the barbershop and left her to build the life she wanted. Pack sat in her barber chair and in her bathtub, but he had never been in her bed. She had become something like a younger sister to him; and although he knew what she was, he offered no advice or criticism.
"Are Ballard and Wilson still in town?"
"They're the ones that done it." Bright red spots appeared in her cheeks, the sign of anger rising. "They set them toughs on you."
"Are they still here?" He put his hands on her shoulders and held her away from him when she would have wrapped her arms about his waist.
"Ballard is. Wilson hightailed it." Her pert nose, sprinkled with dark freckles, wrinkled when she giggled. "He come waltzin' in here for a bath just like he was the only rooster in the hen house. I waited till he was naked as a jaybird, then I tippytoed in aswingin' my razor. I says, 'There's a dozen men in this here town that want to stay on my good side. All I got to do is crook my little finger and they'll hold you down while I cut off that little bitty old peanut you call a pecker.' " Nan grinned and lifted her chin as if she had accomplished a great feat. "He didn't know that everybody in town knew what him and Ballard had been up to. Lordy! He was out of that tub like a shot. He threw on his clothes and took off like a turpentined cat!"
"Is Ballard down at the Kitty?"
"As far as I know. That's where he hangs out. He's not been in here yet. Must be gettin' his bath over at Jake's."
"You're a rapscallion, that's what you are." Pack put his forefinger on her nose and smiled down into her beaming face.
"I figured you'd want me to leave one a them for you."
"You figured right. I'd have been mad as hell if you hadn't."
"Well, are ya goin' to stand there lollygaggin' all day?" Willy snorted impatiently.
"You still here?" Pack asked over his shoulder.
"I'm waitin'."
"Waiting for what?"
"Fireworks."
Pack turned and gave Willy a cold stare. "You've got things to do, Willy."
"Don't ya want me to go with ya to the Kitty?"
"What the hell for? The last time you horned in on one of my fights you lost two teeth, busted a rib, and were crippled up for a month." Pack went to the door, paused and looked back. Nan had climbed up into the barber chair. "Take care of yourself, honey."
"You too. Will you stop by afterward?"
"I'm not sure."
"Why didn't ya tell her ya'd up 'n got yoreself married to a McCall?" Willy asked as they walked on down the street.
"Because it's none of her business. It's none of yours either."
"She'll think it is."
"No, she won't. I set her straight about that a long time ago. See ya at the corrals later."
* * *
Pack went through the double doors at the Diamond Saloon. The room was cool and the light was dim. The long bar down one side gleamed with polished wood and shining glasses. The tables against the opposite wall were spaced to permit a private conversation. There were no nude pictures behind the bar and no loud, bawdy music. The brass spittoons that sat on the floor behind the bar rail, where up to twenty men could stand and rest a booted foot, were cleaned and polished. Tall crocks of sand stood between the tables for cigarette butts. The Diamond Saloon was not a place where a man spit on the floor or threw his cigarette butt to the floor and ground it with his boot heel. The atmosphere prohibited loud talk, obscene language, and banging on the table to get service from the bar.
A few of the tables were occupied by men in dark suits, mostly merchants and traveling men. The Diamond was too quiet for the rowdy element in town. Pack walked up to the bar. The man behind it was polishing glasses. His beard was almost as white as the apron tied about his waist.
"Howdy, Boston. Is Miss Camp upstairs?"
"She hasn't been down this morning. Want a beer before you go up?"
"A small one."
"You don't look bad for what they say happened, Pack."
"I made out all right." Pack put a coin on the counter and took a long drink from the glass.
"Miss Candy was fit to be tied when she heard the news. There's nothing secret in this town."
"Did the men come back here?"
"One did. He was crowing about what they'd done when he got hit in the mouth. He went out like a light. When he woke up, he found himself in old Mrs. Swain's hog pen. It's a wonder the hogs didn't eat him. You got friends here, Pack."
"Where did he go?"
Boston lifted his shoulders. "Who knows? His coattail wasn't touching his backside when he left town."
Pack set the empty glass on the bar. "Thanks, Boston."
He went up the stairway at the end of the saloon. At the top he turned the corner and rapped softly on the door. It opened almost at once.
"Hello, Pack. I saw you leaving the bank."
The blond woman swung the door open wider. Pack took off his hat and came into the large, airy room. The windows were open and the lace curtains fluttered in the breeze.
"I sold out to a Nebraskan and put my money in Flagg's bank. I guess it's as safe there as anywhere."
"I suppose so. Sit down. I'll get you something to drink."
"I just had a beer downstairs."
"Well, sit down." She moved to the chairs that flanked a small table. "I was worried about you. It's been more than a month since I heard about you being hurt."
Pack sat down carefully. He was always uneasy in Candy's rooms. He didn't trust the chair to hold him, and he was afraid he'd knock over some knickknack she had sitting around.
"It wasn't too bad."
"But you were shot." Her large blue eyes took on a worried look.
"Flesh wounds. Almost all healed now."
"Were you at the Rivers' place?"
"No. I was out at the old McCall place. My mother and Mara Shannon McCall, her niece by marriage, bandaged me up. My mother passed on a couple of weeks later. I guess you could say those thugs did me a favor. If not for them, I wouldn't have been with her during her last days."
"I'm sorry about your mother."
Candace Camp was one of the few people in whom Pack had ever confided. She knew about his mother being married to Aubrey McCall, his dislike for Cullen McCall, and how he had tried to get his mother to leave Aubrey and come to town where he could find someone to take care of her.
Little lines at the corners of Candy's eyes and at the sides of her mouth were evidence that she was somewhere between five and ten years older than Pack. Yet she was still a beautiful woman with soft white skin, silky blond hair and curves in the right places. She was neat and perfectly dressed at all times. Pack had known her for several years and he had never knocked on her door and found her with a single strand of hair out of place or wearing a wrinkled or soiled dress.
A stranger seeing Candace Camp sitting in church on Sunday morning would never think that she ran a saloon, or that a few select men, of which Pack was one, were welcome in her bed. Pack had enjoyed the physical part of their relationship. Candy was a giving woman and at times a lusty one who enjoyed the physical union. More than that, she was the only woman with whom he had ever been able to converse on a variety of subjects. She didn't preach to him about his boxing or condemn him because men bet on his fights and lost money they couldn't afford to lose. She simply took him for what he was.
"Has Cullen been to town?"
"I've not heard that he's been here."
"He must have gone to Cheyenne. I don't care where the hell he goes as long as he stays away from . . . the twins."
Pack's dark eyes held her light blue ones. His eyes were so dark blue, so mirror dark, that she could see her own reflection in them. Candy felt a spurt of intense pleasure as she did each time she was with him. A tingling thrill traveled down the length of her spine, making her almost giddy.
"Do you want to go to bed, Pack?" she asked softly and reached for his hand. "It's been a long time."
Pack took her small, soft hand and held it between his calloused palms.
"No, Candy, not that the offer isn't tempting. I came up to tell you that I was married a few weeks ago. When the preacher came out to read my mother's funeral service, he married me and Mara Shannon McCall."
Candy's face paled. She pulled her hand from beneath his before he could feel the trembling that started with her heart and traveled the full length of her body.
"You're married?" The smile she gave him was the practiced one she gave the customers at the saloon. "Congratulations."
"It was sudden. I hadn't intended to wed."
"Do you love her?"
"I've known her since she was a little girl. She's been in a school in Denver. Her father was Shannon McCall, the best friend I ever had."
"I know. You told me about Shannon McCall, but you never mentioned that he had a daughter."
Candy put a happy smile on her face. Pack would never know that she was dying inside, that all she had wanted in the world was to have his love, to spend the rest of her life with him. She might as well have wished for the moon.
"Will you be going to Denver?"
"No. We're going to ranch on the old McCall place. There are two thousand acres of land out there and more lease land if we need it. I'm going to raise some money to buy longhorn cattle. A fellow I know is bringing a herd up from Texas next spring."
She could see the excitement in his eyes and hear it in his voice.
"And to raise the money you'll fight Moose Kilkenny."
"You've heard about that?"
"Kilkenny's promoter is in town. He's a very nice man. We've become . . . acquainted."
"Does that mean you'll bet against me?" he teased.
"I'll never, ever bet against you," she said emphatically and stood. "Now that you're married, you'll have no need of me, but I want a kiss for old times' sake."
Pack got to his feet and put his arms around her. Her hands moved up his chest and locked behind his neck.
"We can still be friends, Candy. I'd like you to know Mara Shannon. She's headstrong, like most of us Irish, but I think you'll like her after you get to know her."
"It would be best for both of us if we never met. It's foolish for you to think she'd like me."
Candy closed her eyes so he'd not see the sudden moistness there. He kissed her gently on the lips.
"You'd make a man a hell of a wife."
Candy laughed. "Believe it or not, several have asked me lately: a railroad woodchopper who wanted to take me back to camp, three track layers who have their own tent at the end of the line, and two gamblers who wanted to set up their tables downstairs."
"Do Judge Moore and Doc Billings still come to see you?" Pack asked on the way to the door.
Candy smiled with her lips, but not with her eyes. "Occasionally. And I've come to know the promoter from Kansas City quite well. He's handsome, gentle and refined. I won't be lonesome."
"Good-bye, Candy. You're a sweet woman." He kissed her on the lips again and went out the door.
When she was alone, Candy leaned her forehead against the thick slab. She could hear his footsteps going down the stairs. "But being sweet didn't do me any good, did it, Pack?"
* * *
On the way down the stairs Pack screwed his hat down tight on his head. He had one more chore to do before he could head for home. Suddenly he wanted it to be over. He wanted to get out of town and out into the open. A pair of emerald eyes had haunted him all day. Sooner or later he had to bring Mara Shannon to town. Lord! What would she think of Nan? She had already heard about Candy from the twins. Her opinion of him would take another nosedive when she found out he was going to fight Moose Kilkenny. One more fight would give him enough money to buy in with Sam and Charlie, and Sam could bring up that herd of longhorns.
He saw Sam coming toward him from the corrals as he neared the Kosy Kitty. He was walking beside a tall, well-dressed older man with a neat gray beard. Pack raised his hand in greeting, then turned into the saloon. Ballard was his trouble, and there was no need for Sam mixing into it.
The Kosy Kitty was noisy. A dozen card games were going on and the bar was crowded. Booted feet scraped on the plank floor. Pack stood inside the door, letting his eyes become accustomed to the light before he began scanning faces for Ballard, for any one of the four men who had waylaid him, and for Cullen. He had almost completed his search of the room when a sudden hush fell. Chair legs scraped on the floor as necks were craned to get a look at him. Pack finished his methodical search, then spoke to the man leaning against the back bar, beneath the picture of the naked woman reclining on purple robes.
"Ballard here?"
"Hell, no, Pack. As soon as he got word you were in town he left here like he was shot out of a cannon." The man roared with laughter. "He'd sooner meet up with the devil than you, Pack."
"When I catch up to him he'll wish to hell it was the devil that caught him."
"No doubt he knows that. Wilson left town a couple weeks ago. Nan up at the barbershop put the fear in him. She threatened to get some of the fellers to hold him while she cut off his whacker. Goddamn it was funny! He was so scared when he was telling it, he 'bout wet his drawers." The bartender laughed again. It was an unusually loud laugh for such a small man.
Pack didn't laugh. "How come you're still here, Anderson?"
"Wasn't no reason for me to be feared of you, Pack. I didn't have nothin' to do with any of that. Ask any of the men here. Hell, I won a hundred and ninety dollars. I knew you wouldn't throw the fight."
Anderson was a small man with a big head. His hair was parted in the middle and slicked down on both sides. He wore a walrus style mustache that he was very proud of.
Pack nodded, then turned his back and leaned on the bar. He believed him. Anderson would have never stayed and faced him if he'd had any part in having him waylaid and beaten.
"If any of you men've got a bone to pick with me, speak up. Wilson and Ballard tried to bribe me to throw the fight. I refused and told them so. If you believed them and lost money on me, it's your hard luck." Pack looked at each face in the room while he waited.
"Ballard said you'd agreed to throw it." The surly voice came from one of the card tables at the end of the room.
"He lied. Go settle your complaint with him. I told my friends I could win for them and I did."
"I lost a month's pay," the man grumbled.
"Why are you whining to me about it? Did it occur to you that Wilson and Ballard might have told you I was going to throw the fight to get you to bet on the other man? If I come on to either of them, or any one of the four who ambushed me, they'll be gumming their eats for the rest of their lives."
"We'd not blame ya none, Pack," Anderson said from behind him. "It was dirty what they did."
"No. We'd not blame ya none a'tall."
"I've never stepped in the ring and not given it my best, and I never will." Pack turned back to the bar. "Give me a beer, Anderson."
The men began to crowd around. "You goin' to fight Kilkenny, Pack?"
"By God, I'd bet on ya. Ya sure whupped Black Bob Mason."
"Hell, Kilkenny couldn't stay two rounds with ya, Pack. Take him on. I'd shore like to see it."
Pack lifted his beer and grinned. Today they were his friends. After he had beaten Mason and they had lost their bets, they had been ready to tear him apart. Pack gulped his beer to the bottom of the glass and elbowed his way out of the crowd. He was sick of the stench of sweat and stale ale. He wanted to go home to Mara Shannon.
Outside Sam was waiting for him. "That didn't take long."
"I was spoiling for a fight and nobody would give it to me." Pack grinned.
"This here's a friend of mine, Pack. Meet Zachary Quill."
"Howdy, Mr. Quill." Pack held out his hand.
"I'm pleased to meet you, Mr. Gallagher. Sam has been telling me you're the best bareknuckle boxer west of the Mississippi."
"I don't know about that." Pack eyed the older man sharply and wondered if he was the promoter Flagg had mentioned.
"I've seen a few matches back East." The man spoke with an accent that was not unlike that of Charlie Rivers. "They're beginning to adopt the Marquess of Queensberry Rules back there that call for opponents to wear gloves."
"It sounds plumb sissified. I can't see a country boy from Ireland fighting with gloves on."
"I heard there was to be a fight here in late August."
"I was thinkin' you were the one promoting it."
"No." The man waved a hand at Sam. "But Sam and I have been in a few fights of a different kind. Huh, Sam?"
"Me 'n Zack met up a time or two durin' the war. Once his company damn near wiped us out."
"Not without a hell of a fight. Texans don't know what it means to quit. Terrible war, terrible war." Zack shook his gray head, and a sad look came over his face. "I lost a lot of good friends."
Pack propped his foot up on a water trough and rested his forearm on his thigh. "Are you looking to settle out here, Mr. Quill?"
"No, but I'll be here for awhile. Sam, I hope your young lady will be able to see with the eyeglasses. I'd like to meet her and her brother."
"I'm obliged to ya for bringin' them, Zack. I'll be back in town in a day or two. We could take a day 'n ride out. I'd like ya to meet Emily."
"It seems my friend here is in love." Zack winked at Pack. "I'll be at the Shamrock Hotel, Sam. It was a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Gallagher."
Sam and Pack watched the tall dignified man walk down the boardwalk toward the hotel.
"Yo're curious as a cat. Ain't ya goin' to ask what that was all 'bout?" They stepped into the street and headed for the corrals.
"No." Pack glanced sideways at his friend. "You're just busting to tell me anyway."
"I knew Zack was comin'. I wired him several weeks back to bring magnifying eyeglasses. I've known people who couldn't see a lick without 'em. I'm thinkin' they'll help Emily."
"Charlie said she had a pair when she was little, but they weren't right. They made her dizzy. Then the war came and their folks were killed."
"Charlie's closemouthed. I don't even know what side he was on. Not that it matters none."
"It didn't sound like you and Quill was on the same side."
"We wasn't, but we are now. He's the man that sent me out here. But he's not here checkin' on me. The governor of the territory sent him to find a site for a penitentiary."
"Penitentiary?"
"Ain't no secret. Congress set aside the money ta build one in all the territories. Governor Campbell asked Zack to come out 'n find a place. Him 'n the committee has 'bout decided ta build it west of the Big Laramie River atween Haley 'n Hunter's Ranch. Zack says it's a good site, close to water 'n stone for the buildin's. But he wants to look around to be sure there ain't a better place."
Pack whistled. "He must be an important man."
"He's become a legend like his pa. His pa was Farrway Quill, Congressman from Illinois. There's a town on the Wabash named for him. It's called Quill's Station. It's where Zack grew up. He still lives there when he's not off doin' business for the government. Zack's a fair man 'n a hell of a scrapper. Too bad he was on the other side."
They walked the rest of the way in silence. Pack was thinking about getting home to Mara Shannon, and Sam was wondering what the eyeglasses would do for Emily's eyesight and if she had been looking for him.
" 'Bout time ya got here," Willy shouted as they came alongside the corral fence. "If'n I don't miss my guess, there's a real turd floater comin'."
"In that case you'll get a bath without having to pay for it."
Pack looked toward the south and saw the bank of dark clouds rolling their way. Rain or no rain, he wasn't staying in town a minute longer than it would take to put the horses on a string and head out. An explosion of sheet lightning lit up the darkened sky, followed by a low rumble of thunder. The lightning was not unlike the feeling of elation that raced through Pack, making him want to laugh aloud. His pulse accelerated and the skin on his face and neck tingled.
He was going home. Home to Mara Shannon.
# Chapter
FIFTEEN
Anger kept Mara going until noon. After that it was the desire to finish what she had started regardless of her aching back and the blisters on her palms. With an old felt hat on her head and a hoe in her hands, she chopped at the weeds in front of the house, raked them into a pile to carry away later, and set to spading a flowerbed. The ground was soft, the spade sharp, and the bed grew to be larger than she had planned.
Trellis and Travor had offered to help with the spading when they saw her carrying the long-handled tool from the shed. With a strong hint of impatience in her voice she told them they had best be doing the chores Pack had assigned them, which was pulling deadfalls out of the woods and getting them ready to saw into lengths to split for firewood, or he'd be madder than a stepped-on skunk when he returned. She then added out of pure spite, "At that it would be an improvement over his usual pigheaded disposition."
At noon she ate a cold biscuit, drank milk, and tried not to think about Pack in town with the woman from the Diamond Saloon. She would not ask him again to take her to town. A wagon was in the shed and horses were in the corrals. They belonged to her every bit as much as they did to him. She would have Riley or Steamboat hitch a horse to the wagon and she would drive herself to town. The foot of her crossed leg began to move back and forth in a rhythmic movement that reflected her frustration. She would come and go as she pleased, she fumed silently. She would not be dictated to by that mule-headed, arrogant, opinionated, jackass of an Irishman.
By late afternoon Mara was dead tired but viewed her day's work with satisfaction. Her flowerbeds were a myriad of blossoms. It had taken trip after trip to bring the plants from where they grew along the creek bank. Outlining the bed and along each side of the walk leading to where the white fence once stood she had planted creeping phlox in shades from dark to light purple. In the big bed, arranged according to color, were buttercups, black-eyed Susans, wild iris, lily-of-the-valley and delicate little violets. Among the plants known to her were others she could not name. One had small white flowers much the same as those on the bridal wreath bush; another had blue blossoms that looked like small fuzzy heads.
The bank of dark clouds in the south was a promise of rain. Overhead the sky was suddenly gray except for small white clouds that scuttered before the wind. A gentle rain would be just the thing for her flowerbeds, but she couldn't count on it. Rain clouds had a way of scattering and disappearing. One or two more trips to the well and her plants would be safe until morning.
Mara caught a glimpse of a rider coming up the road just as she was pouring the last of the water on the purple phlox. The wind had become stronger and gustier and had torn her hair loose from the ribbon holding it. The long strands of auburn hair blew across her face. She couldn't see. She tried to brush the hair away with the back of one hand while holding her skirt down with the other. At first she thought the rider was Pack, then she remembered that Pack had ridden away on his big gray horse. This horse was a roan and coming fast, the rider leaning forward in the saddle.
The mud on her hands was smeared on her hair as she captured the windblown tresses with her two hands and held them back from her face, squinting her eyes against the wind as she watched the rider approach. It was Ace January, the marshal. Behind him lightning flashed and from a distance came the muttering of thunder. Silhouetted against the dark sky, the horse and the rider with his duster flapping was an ominous sight.
Ace January pulled his horse to an abrupt stop beside the hitching rail. He slid from the saddle and twisted the reins around the top bar. The horse was blowing, his sides heaving, and white foam covered his flanks. What had happened to cause the marshal to run his horse almost into the ground? Had something happened to Pack?
Taking long determined strides, Ace came up the walk to where she was standing. His face was as dark and as angry as the thunderclouds he had been racing. He didn't take his eyes from her face, nor did he greet her.
"Get in the house."
"Has . . . has something happened?"
"It sure as hell has." He took her elbow in his hand and propelled her up the porch steps.
"Just a minute!" Mara tried to jerk her elbow from his grasp. "What is it? What's wrong?" Alarm caused her to raise her voice.
He didn't answer or look at her. His strides carried them across the porch and through the doorway. He shoved her inside and marched her through the parlor and into the kitchen. By this time her stomach was quaking, her legs seemed to have no bones in them, and she was dangerously close to crying. Pack! Had Pack been hurt or . . . killed? Oh, God, that couldn't be what he was going to tell her!
Ace pushed her down in a chair and loomed over her. Her heart sank to the pit of her stomach and lay there, thumping in a strange and alarming way.
"Why 'n the hell did you marry that son of a bitch?"
She looked at him stupidly. "Why . . . what?"
"You heard me, damn you!" he gritted out harshly. "I just found out today that you married that Irish bastard. Why?"
As soon as his words sank into her mind, relief swept over her like a warm, caressing hand, leaving her giddy and trembling. Pack was all right! Ace had not come to tell her something dreadful had happened to him. Dangerously on the edge of hysteria, she tried to swallow the laughter that bubbled up in her throat. Mara looked up into Ace January's angry face; her smile spread, her eyes sparkled. With her arms folded across her chest, she rocked back and forth. Shrill, uncontrollable gasps of giggles burst from her mouth, then bloomed into laughter.
With the swiftness of a striking snake, Ace lifted his hand and slapped her, hard. The blow cut off the laughter and sent her reeling sideways. He grabbed her shoulder to keep her from falling off the chair. She straightened and looked into his blazing eyes, her own filled with tears and disbelief. For the first time in her life she had been struck in the face. She was so shocked by the blow that she scarcely felt the pain on her cheek.
"I asked you why you married him? Answer me, goddamn it! If you laugh I'll slap you again."
"It's none of your business," she gasped. She came to full awareness. "It's none of your business," she repeated. "Get out of here! Get out of my house!"
"Have you slept with him?"
"Have I— Why, you unspeakable, crude—"
"Have you?" He grabbed her shoulders and hauled her to her feet.
"Have you lost your mind? Get out!" Mara began to panic, but her common sense exerted itself. "Your behavior is totally unacceptable. I want you to leave." She tried to speak calmly and with dignity, but her voice trembled.
"Unacceptable, huh? I'm one of the most respected men in the territory, yet you chose to marry up with a mule skinner, an ignoramus who knows nothing but whoring, brawling and bareknuckle fighting. You chose him over me! I'd of given you anything you wanted if you'd just waited awhile longer."
"I don't know what you're talking about." Her words were strong, not at all a reflection of her apprehension.
"I'm talking about you and me. You and me! The first time I saw you you looked me in my eyes, then down at my crotch. I got the message. You wanted me!" His hands moved to her upper arms and shook her to emphasize his words.
Mara's face flamed. "I did no such thing! I never even thought of you as a . . . as a suitor."
"The next time I was here, here in this kitchen, you switched your tail at me. Lady, I know when a woman wants me." His hard mouth made a thin line, his eyes blazed, and there was white-hot anger in his voice. His hands were hard and cruel on her arms. "I want to know if he's been between your legs. Answer me!"
"No!" The word exploded from her.
"If you're lying I'll kill you!"
Mara darted a look out the door and saw lightning flash. She desperately wished the twins would come, and then she hoped they wouldn't. The marshal was out of his mind, and there was no telling what he would do.
"You're crazy to talk to me like this!" She wanted to add that Pack would kill him for saying these things to her, but she didn't dare mention Pack's name for fear of infuriating him even more.
"Crazy? Mad? Insane? Maybe. I've done nothing but think about you since I met you. I had plans for us. Still have them. Why did you do it? The preacher said you didn't want to marry, so I figured you'd not let him in your bed. He said Pack threatened him if he told it. Did he force you to marry him so he could get his hands on this ranch? Is that what he did?"
"No! He . . . didn't force me to do anything I didn't want to do."
"I was going to take you to Denver or San Francisco. I was going to take you anywhere you wanted to go and buy you anything you wanted."
"I don't want to go anywhere. This is my home, this is where I want to be."
"You don't know what you want. All women want pretty dresses and furs and perfume—"
"I don't! Let go of me and get out!"
"Shut up!" He slammed her against him. "Whether you know it or not, this is what you want, and when I get you away from here you'll get plenty of it."
He put his mouth to hers, hard, hot and wet. The shock of it numbed her to her toes. She silently shrieked a bitter protest and resisted with all her strength. The harder she pushed against his chest the tighter he held her. He cupped the back of her head with his hand, holding it in a viselike grip. His mouth ground into hers, his rough and wet tongue laved her tightly pressed lips, his hard nose pressed into her cheek, his mustache brushed against her nostrils. Mara couldn't breathe. She felt as if she were being drawn down into a horrendous black pit. Wildly she struggled to break free, but her efforts were useless against his strength. Finally he released her mouth.
"Open your mouth . . . damn you!"
"No!"
He cupped her chin and pressed his thumb and forefinger into her cheeks. His mouth, open and hot, seemed to devour her. His tongue found the break in her lips and thrust against her tightly clenched teeth. His body pinned hers flat against the wall while his hand squeezed and cupped her breast. He spread his feet to lower the long hardness that had pressed her stomach and ground it against her mound. He thrust his hips against her with quick jerky movements. She fought against black panic as she fought him. She kicked and turned her head from side to side until his mouth was dislodged from hers.
Suddenly his body was no longer pressing hers to the wall, but he held her there with one hand on her upper arm, the other on her breast, cupped about its fullness. She choked back sobs and tears of humiliation.
"Dear God!" he murmured. "I've done it now. I'm sorry, Mara. I never meant to do that. But you have driven me half out of my mind."
Mara was relieved to hear the remorse in his voice, but his hand was still on her breast, stroking and squeezing. He looked into her eyes as if he didn't know it was there, as if his hand belonged to someone else.
"I want you to . . . leave." Her heart was racing beneath the breast he was holding.
"I'm just so goddamn mad and hurt, Mara. I'm hurt that you would go behind my back—"
"I'll forget what you've just done . . . if you'll go."
"Something must have pushed you into marrying Pack, but that doesn't mean you have to stay married to him. I'll make Piedmont tear up the wedding paper. That son of a bitch hasn't got the guts to go against me."
"What are you saying?" She pushed on his chest. His hand dropped from her breast after a gentle squeeze, and he backed away from her.
"I'm saying I want you. Old Piedmont will do what I tell him. He'll get your marriage to Gallagher off the record. We'll leave here and no one will know."
Mara moved to put the table between them. It was almost dark in the room. She could hear the wind swooping down the chimney, and the low rumble of continuous thunder.
"You'd better leave. Pack will be back soon."
"He won't be back tonight."
"He will. He told me he'd be back."
Ace's mood changed almost instantly from remorse to anger and resentment.
"You're going to have to learn not to contradict me, Mara. I know what I'm talking about. I said Pack won't be back tonight. He's with his whores." The malice in his face and the venom in his voice were terrifying. "Pack's as horny as a rutting moose. He's got two whores in town that spread their legs every time he crooks a finger."
His words ravaged her. She could feel the blood leave her face. But not a sign of the pain showed when she met his eyes. He was insane. She had to get away from him. But where could she go? If she went to the bunkhouse he would follow, and someone might get killed.
"You'd better go. It's going to storm."
"Pack Gallagher is not fit to lick your feet. Don't you know that?" To her utter disappointment, he shrugged out of his duster. He hung it and his hat on a peg beside the door just as if he lived there.
"Please go, Mr. January."
He rounded the table and backed her against the wash bench. Mara cringed away from his caressing fingers on her cheek.
"Don't be scared of me, little sweetheart. I just lost control there for a minute. Didn't you like what I did? I liked it . . . a lot."
"No! Please, Mr. January—"
"Don't call me Mr. January again. Call me Ace, or darling, or lover. And don't act so scared."
"Why should I be scared of you? You're the marshal. Your job is to protect people."
His hand went to her throat. Mara stood quietly, refusing to humiliate herself by struggling. He looked down into her face and gently brushed the strands of hair from her cheeks. Then, to her relief, he stepped away from her.
"I've got to think about what I'm going to do. The easiest way to solve the problem would be to kill the Irish bastard."
The hatred on his face caused Mara to almost choke on the lump of fear in her throat. "You can't do that! That would be murder."
"Yeah? What do you think he's done to me? He murdered my dreams."
"But he didn't know—"
"Light the lamp and fix me some supper, pretty woman. We've got plans to make."
Mara felt as if the breath had been kicked out of her. Oh sweet Jesus, she prayed, don't let him kill Pack. She had been the one to throw out the challenge. Pack had married her because she had goaded him into it. He couldn't die because of her stubbornness.
Aloud she said, "The lamp is in the parlor. I'll get it."
Mara sighed as if in resignation and walked around the table. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Ace go to the window and look toward the bunkhouse. She went into the darkened parlor, then through it. Without a plan in mind she went swiftly to the door and out onto the porch. The wind tore at her hair and whipped her skirts up and around her thighs. She hurried to the end of the porch and jumped down, then hesitated. If she ran to the bunkhouse he would be sure to see her. Her eyes sought a hiding place. In the gloom she could make out the outline of the privy. It was the only place she could go and not be seen from the kitchen window.
A sharp crack of lightning sizzled across the sky overhead, followed by a deafening blast of thunder that shook the rain from the heavy dark clouds. It came down as if a cold river poured from the sky. Fear set Mara's feet in motion, and she ran through the rain, crying soundlessly. Running against the wind and the rain was like a bad dream. It seemed to take forever to get to the outhouse. The bursts of lightning outlined the privy. The ground beneath her feet became slippery. She staggered and slid against the door when she reached it. The board that swiveled on the nail to hold the door shut was tight. Mara clawed at it frantically, turned it, and pulled open the door.
Inside the small dark enclosure she fumbled for the latch which was nothing more than the end of a razor strop nailed to the door. A slit in the end of the strop looped over a nail on the doorframe. A man, not even a strong man, pulling on the door could break it loose. Knowing this, Mara leaned against the wall, her heart beating like a hammer.
For long moments she was too frightened even to wonder if she had done right by hiding. Then questions flooded her mind. Would he go down to the bunkhouse and hurt the boys? Would he wait for Pack? She hoped he was right about Pack staying in town. Oh, it cut her to the quick to think he was with that woman, but if it meant his life, she didn't care. Maybe she should have stayed in the house. Ace wasn't going to _kill_ her.
The wind buffeted the small building. From between the cracks in the walls, Mara could see flashes of lightning followed by ear-splitting cracks of thunder. Pack and the twins had pounded stakes into the ground on each side of the outhouse, but the boards in the building creaked and groaned against the pressure of the wind.
Huddled in the corner, Mara began to tremble both from fear and the cold. She was wet to the skin. Her hair was plastered to her head, her wet skirts to her legs. Ace would have gone through the rooms looking for her when she didn't return to the kitchen. By now he knew she was not in the house. _Would he come out into the storm looking for her?_ She strained her ears for any sound above the roar of the storm. Surely, she told herself, she would hear a gunshot.
A heavy gust of wind struck the outhouse and rocked it precariously before settling down. Mara cried out and held onto the heavy timbers. The stench from the cesspit which had been so repulsive to her earlier was unnoticed now. Her head whirled, her stomach churned. Into her dulled mind drifted the thought that Ace January, the marshal of Laramie, was utterly ruthless, insane, or both. He must be to be able to talk so calmly of murdering a man to get him out of the way.
The storm raged on. It seemed to Mara that hours had passed. Finally she got up the nerve to open the door a crack. It was as dark outside as it was inside except for the flashes of lightning. An exceptionally bright flash knifed the dark sky. The clap of thunder caused her to whimper with fear, close the door and fumble with the strop to hold it. Thunder rolled and the rain beat down on the tin roof. Mara hung onto the timbers, leaned her forehead against the rough wood and waited for Ace to pound on the outhouse door. She had never felt so alone, so abandoned. Dazed with fear, she was almost unaware of the cold that sank into her very bones and the ache on the side of her face where Ace had struck her.
Sometime later, between the claps of thunder and over the roar of the rain on the tin roof, she heard someone shout her name. Sobbing with terror, she slid down on the floor and covered her face with her hands.
* * *
It took Pack and Sam an hour to load the wagon, catch the horses, put on halters and attach lead ropes. Pack debated about going to the mercantile. He had wanted to take something home to Mara. Flashes of lightning convinced him that he didn't have the time. He tied two mares behind the wagon and told Willy to head out. Sam led three docile geldings and Pack the young, frisky stallion. They followed the wagon through the town. When they reached the outer edge Pack moved up close behind the wagon. The young stallion had rutting on his mind and followed along behind the mares, sniffing the air and occasionally releasing a trumpeting call.
Already the wind had picked up. In the darkened sky lightning flashed and thunder rumbled. Willy pressed his hat down on his head and whipped the team into a trot. He shouted mixed curses and warnings back over his shoulder at Pack, some of which were lost in the wind. Pack didn't even try to understand what the old man was saying. He had been with Willy long enough to know that he was going to grumble until the day he died and then would complain to Saint Peter, if and when he reached the Pearly Gates, that they weren't open wide enough.
Pack, Willy and Sam were only a few miles from home when the heavens opened and the rain poured down on them. The young stallion tried to rear. It took all of Pack's strength to hold him. The mares became frightened, and their fear was passed on to the other horses. Willy pulled the team to a halt and Pack came alongside, dragging the protesting young stallion.
Willy shouted that they should find shelter, but Pack waved him on. The old man cursed and sputtered and spit. But he snaked the whip out over the backs of the team and they moved on. The storm worsened. Overhead lightning cracked. Pack knew that it was dangerous for them to be on the road, but he had an overpowering urge to get home.
"What do you think?" he shouted to Sam.
"Might as well keep goin'. There ain't nowhere to hole up here nohow."
Pack nodded and moved out ahead of the wagon, setting a faster pace. He wondered if Mara Shannon had missed him, if she still had her back up because he hadn't taken her to town. He wondered if she was afraid of the storm, if she had a hot supper ready for him. Tonight he would tell her about his trouble with Ballard and Wilson. He'd tell her about Nan, and try to make her understand about his friendship with Candy. Just thinking about his wife warmed him. She _was_ his wife, and soon he hoped she would be his wife in all the ways a woman belonged to a man.
Pack's arm felt as if it was about to be pulled from his shoulder, and his hand was raw from holding onto the wet rope. He was tempted to take his quirt to the stubborn young stallion but reasoned that the naturally frisky animal was scared, and the quirt would do nothing but make him more so.
When they reached the homestead, Pack took the trail to the corrals and the bunkhouse, bypassing the house. He peered through the rain but could see no light. To him it didn't mean that there wasn't one. He gave it no more thought. His mind was set on getting the horses into the corral, his mount and Sam's in the barn, and himself into the house.
The rain was still coming down in a steady stream, and the wind was still strong by the time they were ready to leave the barn. They stood for a moment before going out into the night.
"Willy, there's a good bed in the bunkhouse and the cook will fix you some vittles. Go along with Sam and get settled in. I'll see you in the morning."
"It'll be a pleasure to get dry. I'm wet as a drowned rat." Willy wiped his face with a wet sleeve.
"I'm obliged to you, Sam, for the help with the horses. I expect you wanted to ride straight to the Rivers' place."
Sam grinned. "It'll keep till morning. Get along 'n see 'bout your woman. I 'spect she's edgy 'bout the storm."
"Yeah. I expect so."
Pack held onto his hat and took off running toward the house. Once he slipped on the muddy path, cursed because he'd track mud on Mara Shannon's clean floor, then leaped up on the porch.
The screen door was open and banging against the side of the house. Pack took hold of it and realized the back door was also open, and the house was pitch dark. Long years of being cautious made him pause and listen before entering. He could hear nothing but the banging of the front door as the wind sucked through the house and the pounding of the rain on the roof. A cold circle of fear was forming around Pack's heart. Mara Shannon wouldn't have gone to bed and left the doors open.
Pack darted inside, paused, then felt his way to the table. His groping hands found the lamp. He struck a match, lifted the chimney and held the flame to the wick. Light flooded the room and he looked around. Rain had blown in through the open door. The floor was puddled with water. His feeling of apprehension growing, Pack hurried to the parlor. The door stood open, and there, too, rain had blown in.
"Mara Shannon," he bellowed while closing the door against the wind.
No answer.
He took the stairs two at a time. The door to her bedroom was open. He charged in and stopped. She wasn't there. He felt as if he had been kicked in the stomach by a mule. His first thought was that she had left him. His eyes swept the room. Her comb, brush and hand mirror lay on the embroidered scarf on the bureau. Her trunk was at the end of the bed, her clothes in the bureau drawers.
Suddenly he paused and chuckled. What a fool he was. When she had seen the storm coming, she had gone down to the bunkhouse. He shook his shaggy, wet head. He had tracked mud all over the house looking for her. She would scold him, but he didn't care; he was relieved.
Downstairs he set the lamp on the kitchen table, took a wad of cloth from beneath the wash bench, and mopped up the floor. He would go fetch Mara and carry her back, but first he had to clean up the mess he had made. When he finished, he took a slicker from his room to wrap her in and ran out into the rain again.
Sam and Willy were standing beside the potbellied stove in their underwear when Pack threw open the door. The twins, Aubrey and Steamboat sat at a table playing cards. They all looked up. Willy was the first to speak.
"Thought ya was goin' to yore woman. She throw ya out a'ready?"
Pack's dark eyes circled the room. "She's not here?"
"Ya think I'd a took off my pants—"
"Mara Shannon's not in the house. I thought she was here."
"Not in the house?" Trellis got up. "She's been there all day. She made a flowerbed."
"She's not there now! The front and back doors were open and rain was coming in. Who was here today?"
"Nobody," Trellis said. "Did you see anybody, Trav?"
"How could we've seen anybody? We been sittin' here playin' cards."
"She wouldn't have just pulled foot and gone without taking her things. When was the last time you saw her? Goddamn it, Trell, I told you and Trav to stay close." Anxiety made Pack's voice unnecessarily loud and harsh.
"We did stay close. She was in a grouchy mood today. She didn't want nothin' to do with anybody. The last time I saw her she was carrying water to put on her flowerbed, and it was cloudin' up to rain."
Sam had already pulled on his wet pants. He dug a dry shirt and a slicker out of the bundle on his bed.
"Yo're sure she's not in the house?"
"I'm sure," Pack snarled, but Sam didn't seem to notice.
"We know she ain't in the barn," he said calmly. "We'll fan out and search all the outbuildings. Steamboat, have you got any lanterns that'll stay lit in this downpour?"
"I'm goin'," Trellis said and pulled a poncho over his head.
"Me, too." Travor got up so fast his chair turned over. He grabbed a slicker from the peg on the wall.
"Do ya suppose she went to the cookshack?" Steamboat opened the small door going out of the bunkhouse and into the back part of the cookshack. He was back in a minute shaking his head. "She ain't there. I'll get ya a lantern that'll stay lit."
Pack stood on the edge of the porch and waited for Steamboat to bring him the lantern. Never in his life had he felt more like praying. Never had he felt such an overpowering feeling of dread. When he closed his eyes, horrifying scenes danced behind his closed lids. Sweet little Mara Shannon could be lying out there in the rain. A tree could have fallen on her, an Indian could have whisked her away. Cullen or one of the no-good bastards who hung around here could have carried her off.
Many men had tried to knock Pack off his feet and had failed. Now, fear and worry over one small missing woman had almost brought him to his knees. If he found her, when he found her, he vowed to tell her everything. Everything.
"Take one of the boys 'n go circle the house, Pack. I'll take the other 'n go through the shed and stock pens."
Pack stepped off the porch into the rain, one of the boys with him. He held the lantern waist high and sloshed through the water and mud. He squinted his eyes, trying to penetrate the darkness. In the driving rain, the light from the lantern didn't do much good.
"Mara!" he shouted. He circled the house and started off toward the well. "Mara!"
"Pack." Trellis shook his arm. "Do ya think she could a got caught in the privy when the rain come?"
"She wouldn't have stayed there. Mara!"
"I'm goin' to go look anyway." Trellis ran ahead. Soon he was back. "Pack! That board we nailed on the outhouse to keep the door closed is up! I pulled on the door and it's latched on the inside."
Pack's heart leaped with hope. "Mara!" he bellowed, and ran toward the privy. The board was turned up! "Mara! Mara, are you in there?"
No sound came from within.
"Somebody's got to be in there." Trellis pulled on the door.
"Here." Pack shoved the lantern at the boy. He yanked on the strap he had put there as a door handle. It came off in his hands. He cursed. "Mara, if you're in there, open the door." He ground his teeth in frustration when no answer came. Pack forced his fingers between the door and the frame, cursing himself for making it so tight. Using all of his great strength, he jerked on the door and felt it give. He jerked again and the nail holding the strop bent. The door opened.
The light from the lantern fell on Mara hunkered down in the corner, wet and shivering, her knees drawn up to her chest, her hands over her eyes. Pack's knees were weak with relief.
"Thank God!" he breathed. He was on his knees beside her in an instant.
"Godamighty," Trellis said. "What's she doin' down there?"
"Mara Shannon . . . sweetheart?"
Pack was unprepared for what happened next. She seemed to explode with hands and feet. They flew out in all directions. She kicked out at him with her feet and beat him in the face with her fists. She tried to scratch, then bite. Screams of outrage came from her and she fought him with an amazing strength. He held her away from him by putting his hands on her upper arms. The strange look on her face frightened him, as did her unfocused eyes.
"Get away from me! I'll not let you kill him! Bastard! Belly-crawling snake! Stinking polecat! I'll die before I go with you!"
"Mara! Mara Shannon, stop it!"
Pack was forced to step back out into the steady rain. He dragged her with him, holding her at arm's length. She still tried to kick him and twisted and reared until he was afraid he was going to hurt her.
"What's the matter with her?" Trellis' young voice was shrill with anxiety.
"She's out of her head. I don't think she knows me."
"You make me want to puke! Pack's ten times the man you are, even if he does have two whores. He'll kill you when he comes home!"
"Stop it, sweetheart." Pack's voice was desperate. "Mara Shannon, it's me, Pack."
"He'll be back . . . he said he'd be back and he will." Mara's face suddenly crumbled and she began to cry. "It's my fault. He didn't want to marry me. He did it because he loved Papa."
"Ah, sweetheart. Don't cry." Pack pulled her to him, wrapped his arms around her, and held her close.
"Has she gone looney, Pack?"
Suddenly it was as if the starch had been washed out of Mara's back and legs. She drooped and hung in Pack's arms. He lifted her up, cradled her against his chest, and started for the house.
"I've got to get her out of these wet clothes. Go tell the others we found her."
Trellis struggled to keep up with Pack's long strides. "What happened, Pack? What was she talkin' 'bout?"
"She's scared half to death. I'm thinking that goddamn Cullen's been back here. I swear I'll find him and kill him."
"I don't think he's been here. Steamboat thinks he went to Cheyenne. He's got a girl there."
Pack stepped up on the back porch. "Somebody's scared the daylights out of her. When I find out who it is, I'll strangle him!"
"Do you want me to come back after I tell the others that we found her?"
"No, I'll take care of her."
Pack passed through the kitchen, turned, and angled through the bedroom door. He lowered Mara to the bed, knelt down beside her, brushed the wet hair back from her face and kissed her gently on the lips.
"Darlin', darlin', I thought for sure I'd lost you."
# Chapter
SIXTEEN
Pack stripped Mara of her wet clothes. He didn't know if she had swooned or fallen into an exhausted sleep. She had no injuries as far as he could tell. When he took off her shoes and stockings her feet were as cold as ice. She was as limp as a rag doll when he removed her dress. Under it she wore a chemise trimmed with white lace and tied with a pink ribbon. He wished fervently that he was undressing her under different circumstances, that she would open her eyes, hold out her arms and come to him with love in her eyes.
He dropped each piece of sodden clothing on the floor beside the bed. Her breasts were high, round and firm when he bared them to his gaze. Her pink nipples were puckered into hard buds. For a moment he gazed at them, feeling a tightness in his loins. The temptation to touch them was great but he couldn't bring himself to take advantage of her. Relief flooded over him when he saw that the buttons on her drawers showed no signs of a man's fumbling attempt to remove them. He pulled the knee-length garment down, exposing the growth of dark, soft hair that covered her mound. She would be furious with him for undressing her, but he couldn't let her sleep in her wet clothes.
Her body was whiter and slimmer than he had imagined. Then it occurred to him that she had lost weight. She looked so small and helpless with her mud-streaked face and wet straggling hair. He covered her with a soft blanket and went to the kitchen to stoke up the fire and bring warm water from the cookstove reservoir.
On his knees beside the bed, Pack toweled her hair, then wrapped a dry one around it. He washed first her face and then her hands with the warm water. What he had thought at first to be dirt was a bruise on her jaw and cheek. He wiped it gently with the warm cloth. How did she come to have a bruise? It worried and angered him.
Her face was a magnet, drawing his eyes to it time and again. He sat back on his heels and looked at her. Suddenly he wished that Shannon McCall could see her. His skinny little girl with the big wistful eyes had grown up to be a beautiful, proud, spunky woman. Lord but she was something to look at with that white skin, rich auburn hair, and breasts shaped to fit a man's hands. He lifted her limp hand and placed his lips on the blister on her palm. Something had happened to frighten her while he was gone. Thank God it wasn't attempted rape.
The poor little thing had been scared so bad that she hadn't even recognized him when he found her. His indrawn breath hissed roughly through his gritted teeth. Goddamn that Cullen! Who else would have told her that he had two whores in town? Pack swore aloud, his voice quiet and controlled. Explicit, obscene words fell from his lips. He would find the sneaky little weasel and choke the life out of him! He closed that avenue of thinking just before black rage consumed him.
Pack was still in his wet clothes although he'd had the presence of mind to leave his mud-covered boots beside the kitchen door. After a long look at Mara's sleeping face, he stripped. His legs and thighs were stiff and cold. He rubbed himself with a towel before he pulled on a pair of soft doeskin britches and a cloth shirt. Barefoot, he went to the kitchen stove where the teakettle was sending out a plume of steam. Behind the curtained cupboard he found a half empty bottle of whiskey. He poured a generous amount in a cup, filled it with hot water and added a bit of sugar. He carried the cup back to the bedroom and sat down on the edge of the bed.
His hands trembled as he raised the cup to his lips and drank deeply. His gaze moved over the perfection of Mara's face. Lord! He had to find a way to make her want him. Did she love someone else? Had she given her heart to that Webster fellow? The thought tormented him because he knew that there was such a great difference between the life he had lived and her life at the school. He had scrounged, fought, even stolen in order to eat and had had to kill to stay alive. She had known nothing but kindness and plenty. He had known many women, but none of them had satisfied the yearning in him or moved him the way this one had, even when she was a skinny twelve-year-old schoolgirl.
What would she think if she knew how many nights he had lain beneath his freight wagons during the dead of winter or the blistering heat of summer thinking of her? While he was driving the lumbering wagons over the mountains, he had never even dreamed that someday he would be her husband, that she would legally carry his name. Somehow he had to make this marriage work. He would use any means necessary to make her see him as a man who needed love and who had love to give.
Pack had never felt so uncertain before. He had lived his life among rough men. His mother and, later, Candy were the only soft, feminine things in his life. He was rough, impatient and at times brutal. Life had made him that way. He felt a stirring of hope that someday she might accept him not only in her bed, but in her heart. His chest warmed with the quickening of his own heart and he questioned himself silently. Could he live up to her expectations?
His hand slid beneath the blanket. His fingers closed around her foot. It was still cold, as was her calf when he touched it. He set the cup down on the floor and placed his palm against her cheek. Her face was cool. Her nightdress would give her extra warmth. She would be mortified if she awakened and found herself naked. Why hadn't he thought of that? Pack picked up the lamp and hurried up the stairs. He took her nightdress from the peg on the wall, turned down the covers on her bed, and left the lamp on the bureau. The decision to bring her up to her own bed had been sudden.
Pack lifted Mara carefully and slipped the nightdress over her head. Goose bumps covered her arms. Her cold body reminded him of the coldness of his mother's body when he and Mara had washed her and dressed her for burial. He felt a moment of terrible fear that Mara Shannon would sicken and die.
He went to the front and then to the back door and dropped the heavy bars across them, not that he expected Cullen to return, but he wanted no surprises.
He returned to the bedroom and lifted Mara up in his arms. He carried her up the stairs as easily as if she were a child. It felt so right to hold her; her head lay on his shoulder, her hair hung down over his arm. His heart thumped heavily in response to her nearness.
Before he lowered her to the bed, he lifted her so that his face fit into the curve of her neck. He nuzzled it gently, breathing in the sweet smell of her woman's body. Reluctantly he eased her down onto the bed, covered her, and pulled her damp hair up over the pillow. He stood for a long while looking down at her. And then, without thinking about the right or the wrong of it, whether or not she would hate him when she awakened, he blew out the lamp and stripped off his clothes.
Pack wrapped her in his arms and pulled the covers up over them. Her cheek lay against his shoulder, her arm across his chest. His large hand moved down her back to her firmly rounded buttocks and long, sleek thighs. He pressed them between his, offering her every bit of the warmth of his body. She fit so perfectly against him. He could feel every bone and every soft curve in her body.
Pack thought he had been in heaven when, with the covers between them, he had lain with her back to his chest, giving her the comfort of his presence the night she had awakened from a bad dream. It was nothing compared to having her in his arms with only her thin nightdress between them, her soft breasts pushing against him, her thighs between his, her warm breath on his neck. Her fragrance filled his nostrils. He closed his eyes tightly as tides of desire rippled over him. The male part of him reared up, hard and painful, and before he could stop himself he flexed his hips to press it against her thigh. Delicious thrills rippled through him. Every instinct in him screamed to bury himself in her soft body, but an even stronger need overrode the physical one—the need to have her love and trust. He groaned aloud. It was torture to move his extended sex away from her, to lie still and listen to the sound of the rain on the tin roof and the thunder of his heartbeat.
Mara stirred and straightened her legs. She was in that state halfway between sleep and reality. She was warm and comfortable, secure in the instinctive knowledge that she was safe.
"Pack," she murmured. "Pack."
"Yes, honey, I'm here." Pack's voice came reassuringly out of the darkness. "Don't be scared," he added quickly when she tried to draw away.
"Pack!" she cried out in alarm as she awakened to full awareness. Her hand moved up to his face. A sob rose in her throat. "You came back!"
"Yes, I came back. It's all right now. You're in your bed—"
"I knew you'd come back." She was unable to stop the tears that flooded her eyes or to choke back the sob in her throat. She clung to him. "Is _he_ gone?"
"There's no one here but you and me. I'll not leave you alone again," he whispered hoarsely and pressed his lips to her forehead.
"He said you'd not come back. He said you had two whores—"
"I hurried back to my sweet wife. I'd have been here sooner but for the storm."
"He said if he killed you, it would solve the problem." Her arm tightened around him and he snuggled her tear-streaked face into the warm flesh of his neck.
"That's just talk."
"I ran out into the storm."
"I found you in the privy."
"I couldn't go to the bunkhouse. He'd have seen me and might've hurt the boys."
"It's over. Don't cry."
The warm safety of his arms was heaven. Mara wanted to forget everything that had happened and that would happen tomorrow. She had never been held so lovingly or comforted so tenderly. This strong, hard man was holding her as gently as if she were a baby. She moved closer in his arms and ran the palm of her hand over his back.
He was naked!
Pack felt her reaction the instant of her discovery and loosened his arms. "Don't be scared. I was trying to get you warm."
"I'm not scared. It's just that . . . I've not been this close to anyone without clothes on."
"I don't have a nightshirt," he mumbled apologetically.
"You could have put on one of mine," she whispered. Then a series of gasping giggles came from her.
Pack lay perfectly still. Was she still out of her mind with fright? The sweet intimacy of holding her and the soft whispers in the dark had erased all else from his mind. He felt a moment of panic. He wanted her to have a clear mind and to know who was in her bed, who was holding her.
"Mara Shannon?" He leaned away and put his fingers beneath her chin. "Are you all right?"
"I think so."
"You've had a bad scare, but you've nothing to fear from me."
"Pack! I know that. Are you going to leave?"
"Do you want me to? I'll not stay if you want me to go."
"I know you married me because of Papa, and I won't hold you to it. I never thought that it would cause someone to want to kill you."
"Let me worry about that. Do you want me to go?"
"And . . . leave me by myself?"
"I'll never leave you here by yourself. I intend to stay here, in this house, whether or not we live together as man and wife. If you want me to leave your bed I'll go. I'm a man, Mara Shannon, with the natural needs God gave me. I promised myself that I'd just hold you. But, God help me, I want more! It's been torture to have you in my arms and not kiss you and caress your sweet body."
"I'm sorry you've suffered. I don't know much about the needs you're talking about. Miss Fillamore said God made men lustful in order to populate the world. She said it was a wife's duty to satisfy the needs of her husband, and if a woman lay still it would be over in a hurry. If that's what you want me to do . . . I can do it. I owe you so much."
"Jesus, my God!" The words exploded from Pack. "Deliver me from stupid, blatherin' old-maid schoolmarms!" He threw back the covers and sat up on the side of the bed. "That isn't what I want! And you don't owe me a goddamn thing." Anger raised his voice to a near shout. He propped his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands.
"I'm sorry if I made you angry," she whispered fearfully. He felt her hand on the small of his back.
"You didn't make me angry. That idiot of a woman did! She doesn't have the brains of a goose."
"All I know of life is what I've been taught. I'm sorry I don't know more about what goes on between a man and . . . a woman." There was a break in her voice.
He turned and his fingers found the tears on her cheeks. "Don't cry. It tears me up when you cry!"
"I can't help it. I don't want you to go. There! I've said it, and you can laugh."
"Why would I laugh? Mara Shannon, those are the sweetest words you've ever said to me." He slipped back into the bed and gathered her close in his arms. "I don't want to go back to that lonely bed downstairs. I want to sleep with you in my arms every night for the rest of my life."
"You just want to hold me?"
"Hold you, kiss you, make you mine forever."
"But . . . I am yours."
"Not the way I want you to be," he whispered hoarsely. "I want us to be man and wife in all the ways there are. I want to share my life and my dreams with you. If I stay now, there'll be no going back. It'll be this way from now on."
Her lovely, curving form nestled close against him; a warm soft thigh snug between his, an arm flung out across his chest. For a brief haunting moment he wondered if this were all a dream. She had brought something to his life that he hadn't realized was so all-consuming, a love that went beyond gratifying his physical needs. She filled his heart. He wanted to love and be loved by her. He wanted to put all his thoughts, toil and love into building a future with her.
His skin was warm, the hair on his chest soft and silky, his breath ragged and uneven. She reveled in a happiness that was new to her, but frightening too. Lying against his great trembling body she felt secure, loved. She wanted with all her heart to give him what he wanted, to take away the lust that Miss Fillamore said tormented a man.
"I don't want to be alone. I've been alone for a long, long time. That's why I came home." She realized that she was saying things to him here in the dark with the rain pounding down on the roof, things she could never say to him in the light of day for fear of seeing mockery in his eyes. "Pack . . . I'm not worldly, but I'll try to be a good wife to you."
"Ah, darlin' girl."
He raised her chin with his forefinger and placed his lips against hers. The kiss began gently without pressure. His mouth lightly caressed her softly parted lips. He took great care not to crush the feeling from her lips but to teach them, second by second, to respond and vibrate to the warm caressing movement of his. The arms that held her to him were loose so that she wouldn't feel threatened. After a long, delicious moment, he lifted his mouth and put his lips to her ear.
"Kiss me back. Please, sweetheart. . . . "
Her lips were sweetly hesitant as they searched for his. And although his lips were soft and gentle, they entrapped hers with a fiery heat that created strange sensations inside her. She opened her mouth beneath his; the tip of his tongue entered and swirled gently over her inner lips, then withdrew. He moved his mouth away, then back.
He murmured in her ear, "Do you like that?"
"Oh, yes! Pack?"
"Yes, love."
"Does it hurt when you get hard?" Her mind whirled giddily, for although she had never seen a man aroused, she knew what was pressing against her thigh.
"Sometimes."
"I don't want you to hurt— ever!" She cupped his cheek with her palm.
Pack smoothed her hair and drew his mouth along the line of her jaw. His parted lips touched hers briefly. She felt the thunderous beating of his heart against her near-naked breasts and the trembling in his arms.
"I don't want to hurt you, but I will when I go inside you . . . for the first time."
She pressed against him as innocently as any young female animal that responded by instinct to the male. She lifted her face to meet his kiss, her lips parting as his mouth possessed hers. His hand slid down her back, pressing her hips tighter against him.
"We'll not have a baby if you don't."
"Do you want to make babies with me?"
"Of course! You're my husband, but even if you weren't I'd still want you to do it. I've . . . never even wanted a man to kiss me before. The ones that did had wet, slobbering mouths. Yours is sweet, Pack. Am I shameful? Miss Fillamore says only depraved women like a man to do _that_ to them."
"Forget Miss Fillamore. She didn't know what she was talking about. What we do, we'll do together. I never want you to accept me as a duty. Understand? You'll want me as much as I want you or I'll not touch you."
She pressed warm lips to his cheek. "I want you to touch me."
"We'll love each other, enjoy each other, and when you're ready for me, take me in your hand and guide me to you." His voice was thick with emotion.
He caressed her with his lips and stroked her with his rough palms. He forced himself to go slowly and was rewarded when a warmth flowed over her and she relaxed. Only then did he dare to slip his hand up beneath her nightdress and cup her firm buttocks. Gradually she responded to his touch. Her hand found its way along his body. With something like wonder, her fingertips moved along his lean ribs to his muscled waist and down his side to hair-roughened thighs. They explored the muscles of his back and shoulders before combing through the soft hair on his chest and resting at the base of his throat. Their breaths merged and became one as his parted lips sought and found hers.
The naked hunger that caught and held them was both sweet and violent. She felt his hand sweep away her nightdress and then her nipples were buried in the soft hair on his chest. Her world careened crazily beneath the urgency of his kisses, and she was swept along in a violent storm of passion. When he lifted her legs over his thighs, her hand moved down to close around him. She felt the jolt that passed through him at her touch. Thinking she had hurt him, she jerked her hand away, only to have him grab it, bring it back and close her fingers around him. A low growl came from his throat. His hand moved over the flat plane of her stomach and into the curly down at the top of her legs. Gradually his fingers slipped into the dark, wet cavern. She almost cried out at the intense pleasure his sliding fingers evoked.
For a long moment they held each other. When he took his fingers away she knew an empty ache that only he could fill. He gently turned her on to her back, came between her legs, and settled his hips into the cradle formed by her thighs. He kissed her without hurry.
"I may hurt you a little—"
Her answer was little jerking movements of her hips. He entered a little way into her. There he stayed and kissed her swollen lips, licked them, nibbled. Every stroke of his tongue sent fire running wildly along her nerves from her nipples to her loins, and she was helpless to do anything but feel and lift her hips and move her hands down his back to his taut buttocks and hold them to her.
Pack had never been nearer to heaven. He lay mouth-to-mouth with his love, feeling the most wonderful of all touches—his throbbing phallus against the membrane guarding her virginity. How had it happened that this wondrous gift was his?
"Pack! Oh, Pack." When she murmured his name, he lost his last remnant of control and thrust. She arched to meet him. The membrane thinned and yielded to his invasion. Mara made a small whimpering sound. A low, rough groan burst from Pack's throat as her hot, moist flesh closed tightly around him and they were locked in love.
"Darlin', darlin', darlin'," he whispered in taut agony, pulled back and then desperately sank deeper into her.
"I love you," she breathed against his mouth. "Oh, I love you."
Her words cut through Pack like a thin-bladed knife. Words he'd longed to hear, even though he knew she was unaware of what she had said. His hips jerked in response. There was no way he could keep them still. A love so intense flowed over him that it reduced everything else to insignificance. Mind-blanking pleasure washed over him in great waves as his life-giving fluid pumped into her.
When he could think and feel again, he realized she was still moving beneath him. He groaned and cursed himself silently. He had not been able to wait long enough! He began to move again when he became aware that he was still hard and needed to satisfy his own hunger again as well as hers. He whispered her name in a raw, shaky voice. He was slow and tender and determined to bring her gently to the mindless level where he and that part of his body that was inside her were the only things in the world.
A purr came out of her throat. "Pack . . . it feels so good," she whispered and sought his mouth.
"For me too." His tongue laved her lips while the velvety tip of his stiffened manhood moved deliciously up and over the hard nub hidden in the soft folds of her flesh. His movements were slow and precise, stroking to bring her to completion. He ignored the desire to bury himself deeply inside her and concentrated only on bringing joy to her.
Her feelings reached such heights that she forgot her shyness and slipped her hand down between them where they were joined.
"Oh . . . I didn't think you'd get all of it inside me."
"Yes, darlin' girl. We fit like we were made for each other."
"I don't care . . . I like what we're doing!"
"Ma said it was one of God's greatest gifts."
"Brita said that?" she whispered.
"She said I could hold a woman closer to me with gentle words and deeds than I could with a strong rope."
"You are a gentle man. Oh, Pack, now I know what you meant when you said a man would hurt me if he forced himself on me."
"I knew you were ready for me when you became wet. It's nature's way of letting me go inside without hurting you. I'll never, never hurt you that way."
"I know you won't," she whispered against his lips. "I feel so safe with you. I'm glad I married you. Pack. . . ."
He had never known such a flood of tenderness and love as when his name came from her lips in a groaning appeal. Her hips tilted to take all of him; her fingers dug into his buttocks as little spasms inside her pulled him, hugged him, caressed him. He knew she was slipping into that sublime oblivion where he had been only moments before.
His breath faltered and he gasped. "Oh, my sweet." He moved his lips and tongue over her mouth, instinctively seeking the inside of her lower lip. He shivered with pleasure when her teeth parted and allowed his tongue to play over hers. It was beyond his endurance to hold back now.
She was giving herself to him freely and fervently. When she gasped and cried out he tensed and shuddered as his love poured into her.
Mara fell into a deep sleep almost immediately after Pack withdrew from her and turned on his side. She lay on her back, her bent knees over his firm thighs that were snug against her bottom. He lay quietly for a long while, his splayed hand covering the surface of her belly.
She was his now, warm and weak from their mating. She would get used to his possession, learn to trust him, cling to him, and tell him her innermost thoughts. Thank God she had responded to his passion. This part of their life would not be repulsive to her. She had never known the touch of another man. He alone had possessed her. The thought awed him. He hoped that he had given her enough pleasure so that she would never again think of what that prissy old maid had told her.
Each time they mated he would see that she was brought to completion. He would take care of her, pamper her up to a point. She was strong-willed and would soon grow tired of a man who indulged her every whim. She was a fighter, but once she realized that she didn't have to fight him she might even come to love him. When she had whispered the words earlier, she hadn't even known what she was saying.
Pack tried not to think about Cullen. There was time enough for that tomorrow. Mara Shannon would tell him what had happened. He had to swallow the black rage that threatened to consume him when he thought of her cowering in the privy.
She rolled her head toward him and pressed her cheek against his shoulder. He moved his hand up to cup her breast, pressed his nose against her face to smell the freshness of her skin, then tenderly kissed her forehead again and again.
"Little, sweet darlin'," he murmured. "At last you are mine."
* * *
Pack awakened suddenly, lifted his head off the pillow and listened. Through the window on the east he could see the light of dawn. His ears were trained to listen for normal sounds and for the lack of them. This morning the birds were not chirping in the trees above the house. Something had scared them away.
He looked down at his wife. She lay with her hand beneath her cheek, her hair spread in a tangle over the pillow. Pack realized suddenly that never before had he slept a full night with a woman in his arms. Never before had he wanted to. Now he wanted to spend every night for the rest of his life with this sweet woman in his arms.
A loud knock on the back door roused him quickly out of bed. It took only moments for him to slip into his britches, grab a shirt and leave the room. By then someone was shouting his name. He took the steps two at a time to reach the bottom before they knocked again and woke Mara Shannon.
"Pack! Pack!" The voice belonged to one of the twins.
Pack yanked open the door. Trellis stood with hand raised to knock again.
"What the hell are you—" He stopped when he saw the scared look on the boy's face.
"Sam said to come. Steamboat shot the marshal."
"Shot the marshal? Good God! What for?" Pack was momentarily stunned. Then he pulled his shirt on over his head, grabbed his boots and backed into a chair to put them on.
Trellis had started back down the path to the bunkhouse by the time Pack reached the porch. He hurried along the path, poking his shirttail down into the waistband of his britches. The sky was clear. The rain had washed the air, leaving it clean and fresh. The mares he had brought from town ran alongside the fence as he approached. Pack scarcely noticed any of this. He followed Trellis around to the back of the cookshack and out through a thick stand of knee-high grass to where Steamboat had planted his garden. On the far side he saw several men gathered about something lying on the ground.
"He's still alive," Travor called.
Pack looked over Sam's shoulder and saw Ace January lying on his back, his blood-soaked hands pressed against his stomach. His hat was under his head. Pack's eyes darted to where Steamboat sat on the wet grass holding a blood-soaked cloth to his face.
Ace looked up when Pack bent over him. "Ya gawdamned Irish bastard," he snarled. "Ya muck-crawlin' son of a bitchin' mick! If I had a clear shot I'd a blowed you to hell."
Pack was taken aback by the hatred on the man's face. His voice was thick with rage.
"What did I ever do to you, Ace, to make you want to kill me?"
"You took my woman, damn your rotten soul to hell!"
"Your woman? You mean Mara Shannon?"
"You ain't fit to lick her boots!"
"It was you she was hiding from? Damn you! You scared the daylights out of her."
"I wouldn't a hurt her. She got scared 'n ran off. I went lookin' for her 'n saw you coming. I'd a killed you then, but I didn't know which one . . . was you."
"Yo're done for," Sam said bluntly. "Ya know that, don't ya?"
"Me 'n Mara would a seen the world if I'd a got my hands on that gold."
"Well, ya didn't. The only thin' ya can do now is make thin's as right as ya can. Ya been roamin' round here nights lookin' for it, ain't ya?"
The face of the dying man had turned a bluish gray. Blood oozed from the corner of his mouth. He looked old, broken, but he was lucid and spoke clearly.
"Give the gold . . . to Mara. Hear? I was goin' to buy her everythin' she ever . . ." His weak voice trailed away, then returned. "Prisoner . . . in my jail said . . . he was to meet a feller." He paused, then spoke between rasping breaths. "With all the gold he could carry. I let him out and he brung me here."
"What happened to the prisoner?" Sam asked.
"I killed him cause he was a blabberin' fool. They told him his partner come here sick, then up and died. I figured he told somebody about the gold. I been waitin', night after night, for him to try and haul it out." He chuckled, then winced.
"How did ya know it was still here?"
"As marshal I'd a known if it was found. Wasn't even thinkin' about the gold last night. Just waitin' to get a shot at Pack when . . . I saw the old man dig up _my_ gold."
Pack glanced over his shoulder at the hole in the middle of the garden, then back at Ace. His eyes were as vacant as a blind man's eyes.
"That old man . . . I never saw a draw as fast. Hang the dried-up old . . . bastard!" Ace reared up. His head dropped back and blood gushed from his mouth. "Hang 'em for killin' me—" After gasping the words, Ace rolled accusing eyes toward Pack. His jaw hung down. The eyes that remained open and staring were the eyes of a dead man.
Pack stood and shook his head in disbelief. "It was him Mara Shannon was hiding from. I thought it was Cullen."
"He was goin' ta kill ya, Pack."
"I guess he was. Mara Shannon was carrying on that someone was after me last night, but she was in such a state that I didn't pay much mind. I thought it was just more of Cullen's threats." Pack looked over to where the twins were helping Steamboat get to his feet. "What's he got to say?"
"I've not talked to him yet. I woke up when he left his bunk. He was mighty sneaky 'bout it. I got to thinkin' it was a mite early for him to be startin' breakfast. When he didn't go in the cookshack, I got up and was 'bout to slip out the door when I heard the shots."
"You hurt bad, Steamboat?" Pack asked.
"Not much."
Pack pulled the cook's hand away from his face. "Looks like the bullet sliced through your cheek. You're damn lucky."
Sam reached out and lifted a Colt .44 revolver from the holster on Steamboat's hip. "Ya've got some talkin' to do, but it can wait till yo're patched up."
"Sam, is there really gold in them sacks?" Travor asked, his voice shaking with youthful excitement.
"I haven't looked at it, but I'm thinkin' it is." Sam walked over to the cloth sacks piled beside the hole. He looked at the face of each of the men. "It's government gold. I'll be turnin' it in 'n collectin' a reward. I been huntin' it for nigh on two years. After I collect, I'll pay each a ya fifty silver dollars."
In the stillness after Sam's words, Pack looked at Aubrey, then Riley. He knew Willy like the back of his hand. The gold would be only a bother to Willy. Riley wasn't a threat. Aubrey was the only one to worry about.
"Aubrey, if Cullen or any of his bunch came back and found out about what's here in these sacks, they'd move heaven and earth to get it. They'd kill the boys, Mara Shannon, all of us without batting an eye."
"I be knowin' that, Pack. And I be knowin', too, that ye ain't havin' much use fer me."
"And you're knowing why."
"Aye. 'Tis me fondness fer good Irish whiskey what made me the drunk that I am."
"I'm hoping that's all in the past. For my mother's sake and for my brothers, I'm willing to lay it to rest, if you are."
"It's decent a ya . . . considerin'. I want ya to know that I ain't got ter be so low that I be puttin' my lads up ter be killed by robbers 'n thieves."
Trellis and Travor watched and listened to the exchange between Pack and their father. The hope that the contention between the two men could be settled so they could all live on the ranch peacefully was plain on their young faces.
"I was sure you'd see it that way. We better get Steamboat patched up and take care of the marshal. We've got a canvas in the wagon, don't we, Willy?"
"Ya know durn good 'n well we do. I don't go noplace without a tarp or two. Guess ya want me ta get it 'n wrap that buzzard in it. A pure-dee old waste of a good tarp, if ya ask me."
"It's got to be done, so get it. What do you want to do about the sacks, Sam?"
"Leave them here for the time bein'." Sam dropped the heavy canvas bags back into the hole one by one, and shoveled a few spadefuls of dirt over them. When he finished, he was breathing hard.
"Do you think Ace shot first?"
" 'Pears so. Shape he was in he couldn't a lifted a gun ta shoot after Steamboat got him. 'N he couldn't a got as close without a gun on the old man. There wasn't a split second atween the shots. I want to hear what Steamboat's got to say. I'd hate to see that old man hang for defendin' himself against a crooked lawman. If he comes outta this, I'll see that he gets a cut a the reward money."
"That's up to you, Sam. But how do you know he meant to turn it in?"
"How do I know he didn't?"
"It'll take a wagon to take that gold to town."
"Yeah, it will. Ace can ride to town with what he give up his life for," Sam said dryly.
# Chapter
SEVENTEEN
Sounds coming from the kitchen awakened Mara.
A slight discomfort when she drew her legs together and stretched brought her thoughts to the night before. She had spent the night in the arms of her husband, naked as the day she was born. They had mated not once, but twice, and she had loved every minute of their union. She felt . . . new, as if this was the first day of her life. For a moment she wondered why she didn't feel disgracefully wanton. Instead of shame she felt a glorious fulfillment. What she had been taught to fear and dread had been the most beautiful experience of her life.
Mara smiled recalling the passion, the power and the tenderness of the man who had introduced her to the joy of uniting. She had felt the thunderous beat of his heart against her naked breast and heard his hoarse, murmured cries in her ear. Later, as she drifted off to sleep, there had been a silent claim of possession in the way he had held her.
He was hers and she was his. Someday he would love her.
Her smiled broadened, then she winced. Her fingertips sought the soreness along her jaw. All her fears came rushing back. _She had to tell Pack that Ace January had threatened_ _to kill him!_ She flipped back the covers and sat up on the side of the bed.
The sun was coming in through the open window. In the distance she could hear mourning doves cooing. Hens were clucking in the yard below and robins were singing. The creaking sound of the pulley told her someone was drawing fresh water from the well. Everything was so normal this morning. How could that be when she was so different?
The loud clang of the iron lid on the cookstove galvanized her into action. She grabbed up her nightdress and held it in front of her while she hurried to close the bedroom door. She stood with her back against it. Her knees were weak. Then she remembered she'd had nothing to eat but a couple of biscuits at noon the day before.
Mara washed her face and hands and between her legs with the wet cloth. It felt so good. She rinsed the cloth in the bowl to apply it again. The bloody water shocked her. At first she thought she had started her monthly flow but decided that couldn't be the case because she had finished it only the week before.
Pack had not hurt her! He had been so gentle, so sweet. She dressed, brushed the tangles out of her hair, rolled it into a soft bun, and pinned it to the back of her head. While she was straightening the bed, she saw the stains on the bed-clothes and remembered reading that centuries ago the blood-stained sheets were hung out the castle window to proclaim the bride had been a virgin on her wedding night. Mara quickly stripped the bed. The bedclothes would not be washed today, not in the middle of the week. She rolled the sheets in a ball, shoved them under the bed and opened her trunk for clean linens.
Her heart was fluttering in the pit of her stomach when she went to the head of the stairs and started down. This morning she was filled with boundless happiness. She longed to see Pack, yet she didn't know how she should act. She nervously smoothed her apron down over her skirt and went lightly down the stairs.
Pack stood bare-chested beside the wash bench with his shaving mug in one hand, the soft, round brush in the other. He had spread a layer of soapy foam over his dark whiskers. His wet, black curls were already rebelling against the brush he had used trying to control them and had curled over his forehead. The skin on his wide shoulders and his upper arms was satiny smooth, the hair on his chest thick and as soft as silk. Mara's heart jumped out of time as she thought of how gently she had been possessed by his powerful body. Her eyes met his and her pulse accelerated even more. The blush on her cheeks made her emerald eyes seem all the brighter.
"Morning." Her mind groped for something else to say, but all thought left her.
"Mornin'." Something warm and affectionate flashed in his eyes.
"I . . . I overslept."
"You were tired." He put the brush back into the mug and set it on the wash bench. "Come here. Let me see your face."
Automatically, she obeyed. The fingers on her chin turned her face to the light coming in through the open doorway. He had feared his whiskers had scratched her soft skin, but there was only a faint redness around her mouth. The dark bruise on her cheek infuriated him. He spat out several vicious oaths before he could hold them back.
"Pack—" She grasped his wrist and pulled his fingers from her chin.
"That goddamn, worthless son of a bitch hit you!"
"It doesn't matter. He's going to try to kill you. He told me he was. I think he was out of his mind," she whispered fearfully.
"He's dead. Steamboat shot him early this morning."
"The marshal is dead? Oh, my goodness." Her eyes were pools of bewilderment. "Why? Oh, poor Steamboat. Is he all right?"
"He has a slice on his cheek. Sam's sewing it up. Fix some breakfast, honey, while I get this soap off my face. I've got a lot to tell you."
Pack honed his razor on the strap that hung at the end of the wash bench and quickly shaved the two days' growth of beard from his cheeks and chin. After he had finished, he swished the blade in the water and dried it carefully. With his two cupped hands he splashed water on his face to rid it of the remaining suds. He smiled into the clean towel as he dried his face. Mara Shannon was as nervous about meeting him this morning as he was about meeting her.
Mara's eyes wandered to him again and again. She was acutely aware of every move he made. While he shaved, she made batter for flapjacks, her mind skittering over the news that Ace January was dead and that it had been Steamboat, the gentle old cook, who had killed him. She moved the heavy spider over the flame and poured in the batter. Pack put on his shirt, and flipped the flapjacks over when they were ready while she set out a crock of butter and the maple syrup.
After pouring coffee, Mara turned to find Pack close behind her. His hands on her shoulders drew her close. He only had time to notice the color that seeped into her cheeks and the way her mouth parted in surprise before he lowered his head and placed a gentle kiss on her lips.
"I never want to go to sleep without kissing you good night, and I never want to start a day without kissing you good morning."
"That's a lovely idea." A quiver of pure pleasure went through her. "You're a little late this morning." Her smile was beautiful, her shining eyes magnificent.
"I didn't want to get soap on your face."
"I wouldn't have minded. But . . . I'll have to have another to make up for it." Her hands moved up his chest, her fingers cupped over his ears. She reached for his lips and placed hers firmly against them.
Feeling almost giddy with happiness, Pack kissed her, slowly, savoring the moment of sweetness. When he lifted his head they stood for a long moment smiling into each other's eyes.
"Sit down and eat, honey. Then you can tell me about Ace."
_Honey!_ Maybe he did love her a little.
Mara told him in detail everything that happened from the time the marshal arrived to the time Pack found her in the privy, leaving out only the part about his fondling her breast and grinding his arousal against her.
"He had just found out that we were married and was very angry. He acted as if he and I had an understanding of sorts. It isn't true. I never encouraged him."
"I noticed him trying to corner you the day of the burial."
"Even then there was something about him that made me uneasy. When he came last night, I thought he was going to tell me that you had had an accident or something worse. When he didn't, I was so relieved that I laughed. That's when he slapped me."
"The rotten, double-dealing bastard!" Pure rage was mirrored in his eyes.
Mara reached across the table to touch his hand. "It didn't hurt at the time. I'd been so . . . afraid." She could feel his wild anger through the hand that gripped hers so tightly. It shone from his eyes in a strange and frightening radiance. She stroked his knuckles with the fingertips of her other hand and he loosened his grip slightly. "It's over now." Her voice was scarcely more than a whisper. "It made me realize how . . . important you are to me and how much I depend on you."
Pack's heart was beating so high in his throat that he felt it would choke him. That was the closest she had come to saying she even _liked_ him. He wanted to be more to her, much more. She smiled as she looked at him, and suddenly Pack knew that he had waited all his life for that sweet smile. Nothing else in the world mattered to him at that moment, and gradually the heat of his rage cooled.
"You said you had a lot to tell me and I've been doing all the talking." There was silence for a moment. "Pack Gallagher, are you going to be one of those husbands . . ." Her voice faded as she looked into radiantly clear eyes that held nothing but tenderness for her. "You have beautiful eyes," she said impulsively. "Will our children have eyes like yours? Blue, but dark as midnight?"
"I hope they're as green as new oak leaves in the spring," he said quietly, "and have hair like maple leaves in the fall."
A small laugh quivered on her lips. "Something for all seasons, huh?" She withdrew her hand. "You've stalled long enough. Tell me what happened."
Pack continued to look at her for a moment. She was as radiant as the sun. He had never seen her more beautiful. Had his loving put that bloom in her cheeks and the sparkle in her eyes? He reached for the coffeepot with an unsteady hand and refilled their cups.
Her eyes never left his face while he was telling her about Sam looking for the gold bars and about the sick stranger who had come to the bunkhouse months before.
"Cullen collected his money, then paid no more attention to him. Steamboat did what he could. Before the man died, he told Steamboat about the gold and where it was hidden. Steamboat and old Riley buried him up on the hill. They didn't even know his name. He had refused to tell it. Later Steamboat buried the gold in the garden, knowing that it meant his life if Cullen or any of his outlaw cronies found out about it."
"Well, for goodness sake! Didn't Cullen or Aubrey send for a doctor?"
"I guess not. Now that Cullen is gone, Steamboat decided it was safe to dig up the bars, stash them in the barn and turn them over to the army at Fort Laramie on his next trip to town."
Pack told Mara everything except for the part about Ace waiting for him to come out onto the back porch so he could kill him. A quirk of fate had caused Ace to pick a spot from where he could also see the garden. Ace was a good shot. Pack didn't want to think about what would have happened if Steamboat had not gone to the garden that morning.
"Steamboat said Ace came roaring down out of the trees shouting like a madman that he was taking _his_ gold. Steamboat said he tried to reason with him but knew that Ace had in mind to kill him. He waited until Ace drew his gun before he drew his. Ace's shot was off by a couple of inches. Steamboat's was on target. As Ace lay dying he told Sam that he'd never seen a faster draw. Sam asked the old man about it, and Steamboat admitted to being George Couch, a gunfighter of a few years back who was known for his fast draw. He told Sam he had given up the life of a gunfighter, had gone to Ohio and married, but he'd soon discovered that wasn't the life for him either. He'd been staying on here as cook for bed and board in order to stay near the gold."
"Oh, my goodness!" Mara drew in a shuddering breath.
"What will happen to him now? Do you have to turn him in to the law?"
"Yes. We'll have to turn him in. You don't just kill a marshal without questions being asked even if the marshal is trying to steal from the government. Sam has an influential friend in town. He's reasonably sure that he'll help Steamboat. After all, Ace shot first. The old man was just protecting himself."
"What about the gold bars?"
"Sam was assigned as a special agent to look for them. He's been looking for two years. He trailed the man here, then he seemed to drop out of sight. The reward will give him enough money to buy that herd of longhorns he's been wanting. He wants to settle down here and marry Emily."
"That's grand! They'll be our neighbors."
"Maybe. He'll need land. Charlie seems interested in longhorns. Maybe they can form a partnership."
"They can put their money in smelly old longhorns if they want to. We can make more money with turkeys and not have to chase them on horseback."
"Turkeys? Mara Shannon—"
"At first I thought you and Emily were sweethearts." Mara rushed into speech when she saw the frown on Pack's face. Now wasn't the time to push for turkeys, she admitted silently.
"We never thought of each other that way."
"I know. She told me."
"Mara Shannon, I'm going into town with Sam this morning. On the way we'll take you over to stay with Emily while I'm gone. We'll leave in half an hour."
"Oh, but—" Tongue-tied by surprise, it was all she could say. She felt the joy drain out of her.
"But what?"
"I'd rather go with you. I'll not be in the way."
"You can't go. This is rough business."
"All right. I'll stay here," she said with admirable calm, even though her hands were clenched into tight fists and she felt as if a rug had been pulled out from under her.
"I said I wasn't leaving you here alone and I meant it."
"I'm not a child who needs minding when left alone!" she spat out, hiding her heartbreak with anger.
She sat stiffly, furious and weary and completely confused. It was happening again. He was determined to keep her out of sight. Was he ashamed to take her to town? Her pain was all the more acute because of what had happened between them only a few short hours earlier.
"Don't argue, Mara Shannon." He didn't raise his voice, didn't change the calm inflection of his tone, but it was a command.
Mara watched his jaw tighten and realized how useless it was to pit her will against his. Nevertheless, her stubborn Irish pride forced her to try. She waited in silence long enough for him to drain his coffee cup.
"This conversation is strangely familiar. Isn't it the same one we had a day or so ago?"
"It is not the same at all. I should not have left you here. This time you will spend the day with Emily. That's my final word." He spoke in a tone that brooked no argument. His jawline tight, his eyes hard and oddly evasive of her face, he got to his feet.
"That's very generous of you." Mara stood, picked up the dishes, and carried them to the dishpan. She flipped back the lid on the reservoir and ladled warm water over them.
"Can you be ready in a half an hour?"
Mara threw the bar of yellow soap into the dishwater so hard that water splashed out onto the hot stovetop, sizzled, and burned off. She turned, her face frozen with anger. She brushed her hair back with a wet hand, yanked off her apron and threw it on the table.
"I'm ready now." Her slim shoulders were still, two bright spots of color burned in her cheeks, and her eyes looked defiantly into his.
Pack lifted black brows. "Then get your bonnet." He moved away from the table, his throat working as he struggled to control some indefinable emotion.
Mara went past him to the pegs beside the door and took down the dirty felt hat she used when she worked outside. She pulled it down over her head to her eyebrows. The brim was floppy and hung over her ears. She kicked opened the screen door and slammed it behind her after she stomped out.
"Mara Shannon!" Pack roared. "You're acting like a spoiled little snip. I'll not tolerate it."
"You'll not tolerate it? Ha!" She stepped off the porch and looked up at him. "What are you going to do about it? Send me to bed without my supper?"
"A swat on the butt is what you need!"
"A wife beater too! It's no more than I expected of you."
"I'm asking you to be reasonable. I'll not leave you here and I can't take you with me. The only thing to do is to take you over to Charlie's."
"You decided without as much as a by-your-leave to me. Let me tell you something, Mr. Pack Takeover Gallagher, I'm just as capable of making a decision as you are, and although I may have to do as you say—this time—I don't have to _like_ it!"
"I don't give a damn if you like it or not, Mara _Stubborn_ McCall Gallagher! You're my wife, by God, and if I think it's best that you go to Charlie's, you'll go!"
"Your wish is my command, _master._ Rule number one: Obey your husband. Rule number two: Put your husband's comfort and peace of mind before your own. Rule number three: Never question your husband's commands—his intellect, in his opinion, is far superior to that of the female." Mara had worked up a full head of steam. She spoke faster and louder as her speech progressed. "Furthermore, Miss Fillamore's Book of Rules states: A wife is the sole and exclusive property of her husband. He may beat her and fornicate with whores if he chooses. He may go and come as he pleases, but his wife goes only when it is convenient for him. In return a husband must be thoughtful and considerate of his wife's wishes—"
"I like the part about the beating and the fornicating best." Pack bit back a smile. "What rule did you say that was?"
She was holding her chin high, though a touch of vulnerability shadowed her eyes as she met his gaze squarely. She was so brittle inside that she was sure she would crumble and break apart if she didn't get away from him. The amused glint in his eyes made her anger escalate out of control.
"I'll obey this time, but I don't like it one _damn_ bit!" she shouted. She was beyond caring—for the moment—that the men standing on the bunkhouse porch could hear every word she said.
"And I don't care one _damn_ bit if you like it or not. You will do as I say!" he bellowed.
"I have only one humble request, sir. May I please use the privy before I go?" She turned, and with her back very stiff walked down the path to the privy.
"To hell with that sour old maid's rule book!" Pack shouted. He looked toward the bunkhouse and saw Willy standing with his hands on his hips. He could tell by his stance that he was shaking with laughter. "If that old fool says one word," he muttered, "I'll break every bone in his body."
* * *
When Mara returned to the house, the wagon was waiting. A stranger was on the seat. Sam and Steamboat were mounted, and Pack stood waiting to help her climb up over the wheel to the seat. She accepted his hand but refused to look at him, nor did she look at the man sitting on the seat next to her, although she was aware that he stared at her curiously.
"Howdy." They were on the road when the man spoke.
Mara turned to look at him. Her neck was stiff, her eyes frosty. It was impossible to tell his age. His face was weathered, whiskered, and he had the brightest blue eyes she had ever seen.
"Howdy," she answered and turned to look intently at the backs of the horses.
"Ya ain't a'tall what I thought ya'd be."
"What was that?" Her eyes, still frosty, stared at him. "You expected me to be some _strumpet_ from a saloon or a _lady_ from a tonsorial parlor?" she asked haughtily, but her mind was wondering how things between her and Pack could have gone so wrong so fast.
"Ya know 'bout that?" the old man chuckled. "Lot of 'em tried ta catch him."
"Well, they didn't have two thousand acres of land free and clear. I did."
"Haw! Haw! Haw!" The old man laughed and slapped his palm against his thigh. He held the reins in one hand and turned sideways on the seat so he could get a better look at her. "Name's Willy Farragut."
"How do you do?"
"Fine. Jist fine. Ya be givin' ole Pack the what for, ain't ya?"
"I don't exactly know what you mean, but regardless, it's none of your business." Mara's pride held her rigid on the low-backed wagon seat.
Willy cackled loud and long. "Give 'em hell, sister."
"That's exactly what I intend to do." She looked at him with new interest. "Who are you and what are you doing here?"
"Said my name's Willy. I go where Pack does. I been keepin' him on the straight 'n narrow since he was ass-high to a duck. Don't figure he can do without me now." Willy leaned over the side of the wagon and spit a yellow stream of tobacco juice in the dust.
"Well! All I can say to that is you've done a mighty poor job." Her tone was cool, her eyes cooler.
"That so? I was thinkin' I'd not done so bad. He could a been a robber, a horse thief or a rustler."
"If you had done your job _right,_ he would've been an honest, straightforward, hard-working settling kind of man. He'd have built something permanent instead of consorting with whores and traipsing all over the mountains selling cats to miners."
"Ya know 'bout that, do ye? It was the smartest damn thing he ever done. Why, I remember the time we was in Cripple Creek. This here whore—beggin' your pardon, dance hall woman—real nice lady she was. Well, she—"
"Real nice lady? Ha!" Mara spat. "I'm not interested in hearing the sordid details of Mr. Gallagher's life. You were hired to drive, so drive." She waved her hand toward the horses and turned her back on him.
This was her first trip away from the ranch since she arrived and she was perfectly miserable. Her pride was in tatters, her face was bruised, her hair dirty. She wore the dirty old hat she had carried water in the day she found Pack along the trail out of pure spite, but she had only spited herself. Hope that Pack would come to love her lay like a rock in her tired heart.
Her eyes burned with unshed tears. She loved him! The admission was so painful that she thought she'd scream. How could she love a man who had so little consideration for her feelings? Was this the pattern of her future? Would he order her around without bothering to give her any explanation, expecting her to blindly obey those orders? Of course, he couldn't explain that the reason he didn't want her with him was because he wanted to visit Miss Candy Camp, the whore at the Diamond Saloon, or the other whore. Ace had said there were two.
Mara looked at the old man sitting beside her and opened her mouth to ask him about them but closed it and looked away. _She didn't want to know!_
It was a shorter distance to Charlie and Emily's place than she had thought. Or, she asked herself, had she been so miserable that the time had gone fast? Sam had ridden on ahead of the wagon; Pack and Steamboat were behind. Mara had glanced into the back of the wagon one time and had seen the canvas-wrapped bundle that had to be Ace January's body. It gave her a strange feeling to know that he had come to the ranch and met his death out of his misguided desire for her.
* * *
"Emily Rose!" Sam called out as soon as he came out of the trees and saw Emily at the clothesline.
"Sam!" Her voice was eager. She followed the clothesline toward the sound of his voice.
"Hello, Emily Rose." He dismounted quickly and went to her. Just looking at her warmed his heart.
"Hello, Sam. Somehow I thought you'd come today."
He pulled her behind the sheets she had spread on the line. "Pack 'n Mara are comin'. I want to kiss ya, got to kiss ya before they get here."
The wind blew the wet sheets against her. She laughed. "Then what are you waiting for?"
"I just wanted ta look at ya. I love ya, Emily Rose. I got a whole heart full of love for ya."
"And I love you." Her palms caressed his cheeks. "It seems like a year since—"
"For me too."
His hands moved up to cup her face, then his fingers slid into her thick hair. He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her softly and reverently, and then his hands moved down, his arms wrapped around her and he held her tightly to him. His mouth was both hard and soft as she remembered it, hungry as her own was hungry. He kissed her with slow, hot precision, his tongue on her parted lips, the roughness of his face scraping her softer skin. At last he muttered a frustrated curse and lifted his head.
"It's hard to wait, sweet love."
"Dear, darling Sam. I want you to be very sure—"
He put his fingers on her lips. "Don't ya say anythin' like that anymore. If ya'll have me, I'll spend my life takin' care a ya, lovin' ya."
"I never dreamed I'd meet a man like you. You're everything that's good."
Sam grinned. "Ya don't know me a'tall, honey. I can be meaner than a cornered polecat at times."
She nuzzled his cheek with her nose. "You'll never make me believe that!"
"Pack's bringin' Mara to stay with you while we go to town. When we get back, I'll tell Charlie I'm takin' ya to be my wife."
"Oh, Sam, it's a big step. Think about what it would mean to be married to a woman who can barely see her hand in front of her."
"Shh . . . don't ya mention it again." His arms fell away from her and he reached into his pocket. "I brought ya somethin'. I don't want ya to be disappointed if it don't do much good." He unwrapped the eyeglasses and held them by the thin piece of wire between the two lenses.
"A surprise! Oh, what is it?"
Sam wiped each thick oval lens with the end of his neckerchief. His heart was pumping like a steam engine as he spread out the ear pieces. Why in the hell had he done such a stupid thing? he asked himself. She would think he wanted her only if she could see.
"Shut yore eyes, sweetheart," he ordered gently. "I want ya to know that this is only a shot in the dark. It ain't worth a second thought if it don't work."
"You've brought me eyeglasses," she said when she felt the scrape of the wire earpieces on her temples.
"Keep yore eyes shut till I get them set." He curled the thin wire around her ears and settled the nosepiece on the bridge of her nose. "Too tight?" he asked in a breathless whisper. His heart was racing as if he had run five miles.
"No." Her lower lip was caught firmly between her teeth in an effort to stop its trembling.
"Now, honey, open your eyes."
Emily gripped his arms tightly and opened her eyes. Sam's face was close and large and . . . distorted. Startled, she drew back and his features came into focus.
"Oh my gosh," she whispered. She stepped back away from him until she could extend her arm full-length and touch him. He was an arm's length away and she could still see his dear face clearly! "Oh, my love. I can see you from here." She put the back of her hand to her mouth to still her trembling lips.
Behind the thick lenses her eyes filled with tears. Sam reached for her arm and pulled her from behind the clothes on the line and out into the middle of the yard.
"Can you see my horse?" he asked urgently.
"Yes . . . and I can see the trees! Oh, there's the washpot and the well. And . . . I can see all of you at once. I'm going to cry and I don't want to."
Sam's heart jumped like a wild thing. Relief made him weak. He took her by the shoulders and turned her toward the house. It was a good fifty feet from where they stood.
"I can see it. It's not clear, but I can see it." She took a few steps toward it and stumbled. Sam grabbed her arm. "Oh, the ground comes up so . . . quick."
"You'll have to be careful at first."
She turned and put her arms around his neck. The wire frames of the glasses scraped his chin. She drew back and laughed.
"I see what you mean. I thank you for them. Oh, I do thank you! Where did you get them?"
"A friend was comin' out from Saint Louis. I wired him 'n asked him to go by a place I'd heard of 'n bring a pair of glasses for someone who was very nearsighted."
"I'd like to meet your friend and thank him."
"I want him to meet you too, sweetheart. Is Charlie here?"
"He's somewhere near. I suspect he saw you coming and gave us some time to be alone."
"Then he isn't dead set against me as a brother-in-law?"
Emily smiled up at him. "No. He likes you, but he also knows it wouldn't do him any good if he was dead set against you. Did you say Pack was bringing Mara for a visit?"
"He's bringin' her to stay while we go to town. He's not easy 'bout leavin' her alone with just the boys 'n their pa."
"I can see something moving along the edge of the trees. I couldn't even see the trees before. Now I see a wagon and two men on horseback. Sam, it's so wonderful!"
* * *
To Mara's surprise the day was not as miserable as she thought it would be. Sam and Pack stayed for only a short while to talk with Charlie. She ignored Pack, keeping her back to him when it was at all possible. She had pushed his hands away when he had come to help her down from the wagon seat and had climbed down by herself. It was a clear, silent statement that she wanted as little to do with him as possible. When Pack and Sam were ready to leave, she deliberately went to the well for a drink of water. If Emily noticed the coolness between them she didn't comment on it.
Mara shared in Emily's joy of the new eyeglasses. She was with her when she stood in the doorway and saw for the first time a panoramic view of her home. She had seen it only one small piece at a time. Charlie was almost as delighted with the eyeglasses as Emily. He brought books down from the shelves and showed her the ones he had been reading to her. Mara stood by as helpless as Charlie when Emily removed the eyeglasses, placed them carefully on the table, hid her face in her arms and cried.
Sam and Pack had told Charlie the highlights of the events leading to the death of the marshal. A good part of the afternoon was spent discussing it. Mara filled in the gaps with as much as she knew about what had happened. She carefully refrained from mentioning anything personal regarding herself and Pack.
At sundown Sam and Pack returned. Mara stood on the porch beside Charlie and watched Emily go to greet Sam.
She loved him and she didn't care who knew it. Lucky Emily.
Mara's anger at Pack was still simmering. In the back of her mind she knew that she was being a shrew. Pack had not agreed to love her, only to marry her. Oh, but it hurt to think of him with that woman! Was he trying to keep his marriage a secret from the whore at the Diamond Saloon? Or was he ashamed of Mara? Mara was confident that she could hold her own in any company. She loved the big, bullheaded Irishman, she admitted begrudgingly. It was not something she had chosen to do, but she did. But she'd be damned if she'd ever let him know it. She'd die with the knowledge locked inside her!
Pack's face darkened and his jaw tightened with anger when he looked at Mara, thinking her temper had cooled enough for her to be civil. She looked at him and nodded as if he were a stranger. She was being civil, but barely. She came to the porch and sat down as far from him as possible. He knew that if he said one word to her his temper, and hers, would break free like a herd of wild horses in a brush corral. So Pack sat silently, holding onto his temper, while Sam, holding Emily's hand, told the news.
Sam's friend had spoken to the judge on Steamboat's behalf. He had explained that the cook had not tried to dispose of the gold and that, because of the outlaws staying at the ranch, he had been afraid to turn it in. He also convinced the judge that Steamboat had killed the marshal in self-defense. The judge ruled that there would be no charges filed, and Steamboat was free to go.
Pack looked directly at Mara. "Steamboat and Willy have gone back to the ranch. We'll go when you're ready."
Before she could answer, Emily jumped to her feet.
"You're staying for supper." Her voice was rich with happiness. "Mara Shannon and I have got it ready."
Mara followed Emily into the house. She washed her hands and began setting the table. Emily talked and Mara added a few comments when it was absolutely necessary. She had suddenly realized that Pack expected her to ride back with him on that big gray horse. The thought of that long ride, sitting behind him like a "baggage" was so demoralizing it almost made her ill. She considered asking Charlie if he had a horse she could borrow. Then the thought came to her that it would be humiliating if Pack vetoed her request. She discarded the idea.
The time spent at the supper table passed slowly, but it passed. Mara had taken a seat beside Pack so that she didn't have to look at him. But watching Sam and Emily made jealousy clutch at her heart. Their eyes strayed to each other often. His right hand and her left were hidden beneath the table much of the time. She hoped that they were so engrossed in each other that they wouldn't notice that the only words between Pack and herself were "pass the butter" and "thank you."
When they finished eating, the men went to the porch to smoke and continue their discussion about cattle, land and the best way to get a herd up from Texas. Mara helped Emily with the cleanup even though she protested.
"You'll be wanting to get home before dark. It's been a wonderful day, Mara Shannon. I'm so glad you came."
"I've been wanting to see your home. I'm happy for you and Sam. Have you decided on a date for the wedding?"
"Sam is going to stay here tonight and talk to Charlie. He'll not ask Charlie's permission to marry me, he'll tell him." She laughed. "Thank goodness Charlie likes Sam. I'd hate for the two men I love to butt heads."
"Will you live here?"
"I'll live wherever Sam wants to live. He wants to get settled on some land now that he has the reward money coming. Sam hasn't had much happiness in his life. I intend to remedy that."
"Mara Shannon," Pack called from the porch, "we'd better be going. It'll be dark soon."
Mara picked up her old felt hat and walked to the porch as if she were going to her hanging. She felt Emily's arm go around her.
"Things will work out for you and Pack. Just give it a little time," she whispered.
"Is it so obvious—that we can't stand each other?"
"No. That's not obvious at all." Emily dropped her arm to allow Mara to go out the door ahead of her. Her whisper just barely reached Mara's ears. "What is obvious to me is that you're a couple of foolishly proud people who love each other but are too stubborn to admit it."
# Chapter
EIGHTEEN
"Good-bye, Emily. Thank you for a lovely day. Charlie, Sam, it was nice seeing you again."
Mara offered her hand to each and said all the right things according to Miss Fillamore's ideas of etiquette. Then, with her back as straight as a board, she went down the steps to where Pack was waiting beside his horse. The animal's back was so high she couldn't see over it. It tossed its head, blew and pawed the earth. Inside she was quivering with fear: fear of the horse and fear of Pack. On the outside she appeared to be as calm as if riding this gigantic animal with a husband who had just returned from a visit with his whore was an everyday occurrence.
Pack spoke a stern word to the horse who stood perfectly still. He swung easily into the saddle, reached down and grasped Mara beneath her armpits, hauled her up and plunked her down on his lap. He lifted her leg over the pommel so that she sat astride in front of him, wedged between the pommel and his open thighs. A small cry of surprise escaped her. Her hat, scraping his shoulder, tilted down over her eyes so that she couldn't see; her skirts were up to her knees and her hands grabbed at the horse's mane. Tight fingers on her wrist pulled her hands loose and flattened them on the pommel. Several distinct swear words were hissed in her ear. His arm across her midriff held her in a steel grip as the big gray's powerful hooves dug into the ground and its haunches propelled it forward. Pack's booted heels jabbed into the sides of his mount and urged it into a reckless, bone-jarring pace that covered a quarter of a mile before he allowed it to slow down.
Mara dared to free a hand long enough to push her hat back when the stride of the horse relaxed to an easy gait. This was not the road they had used that morning but a trail that ran alongside a fast-moving creek. It was dusk. Light was fading fast. Already a few bright stars shone in the sky, and a crescent moon rode over the treetops.
Pack's hand on her stomach pulled her back even farther and settled her more snugly against him. In a lightning quick move, he yanked the felt hat off her head and sent it sailing into the creek.
"You look like a potato digger in that damn hat."
"Ohh . . ." Rage came boiling up out of her along with wild, reckless words. "You're an ignorant, uncouth bore without a smidgen of respect for other people's property."
"You're not other people," he shouted so loud that she forgot her fear, let go of the pommel and cupped her hands over her ears. "You're my wife!"
"To my everlasting sorrow!" she shouted back. "I'll never make a bigger mistake if I live to be a thousand."
"Hush up and sit still or I'll put you behind me and you can ride on the horse's rump."
"Don't shout!"
"I'll shout if I want to, and don't be quoting me any rules from that prissy ass old maid's rule book."
Mara barely managed to check the urge to hit him. Her next impulse was to weep. She chose to do neither. Damn, damn, damn him!
"All right. We'll engage in a _civil_ conversation. That is, if you're capable of such," she announced.
"Try me."
She drew in a deep breath, held it, then let it out slowly. She did this when she wished to remain calm.
"Did you have a lovely day of debauchery in town, _dear?_ " Her voice was heavy with sarcasm.
"Oh, yes, a lovely day." What the hell was she talking about?
"I'm glad. And how was your paramour? I trust she was in good form."
"Her form is always good, the best." Paramour? He'd have to ask Charlie what that was.
"We must have tea together sometime so that I can express my appreciation."
"Appreciation for what, _dear heart?_ "
"Why, for taking care of my husband's physical needs, of course."
Pack began to grin and the smile was in his voice. "She does that all right."
"It's her job, _dear._ "
"Ah, yes. Her job while I'm in town. Yours, when I'm at home."
He felt her stiffen even more if that was possible. She was already sitting as straight as a church pew, her breasts riding on the arm he held across her midriff. Her heart was pounding so hard he could feel it against his arm. _The little vixen was_ _jealous!_ She thought he had spent the day with Candy. He felt a surge of elation and blessed Travor, although at first he could have swatted the boy for talking about his friendship with the lady from the Diamond Saloon. Aware that Mara's temper was on the verge of accelerating, an imp in him made him provoke her more. He nuzzled his nose into the hair above her ear and his lips nipped at her earlobe.
"Stop that! Go back to your strumpet in town if you're feeling so . . . amorous."
"Which one?" he asked softly.
"Ohh . . . ."
"The sweet-tempered blonde? Or the passionate one with hair as black as coal and eyes as blue as the sky?"
"Either one as long as you stay away from me."
"Oh, but that's not possible. I'll be with you forever and ever. You promised, with your hand on the Bible, to love and obey me. There was nothing in the ceremony that said I couldn't go to town without you. I promised to provide for you and our children for as long as we both shall live."
"Which may not be long for one of us if you don't stop what you're doing."
"You don't like me to kiss your ear? The ladies in town like it. They say, 'Pack, you're the best ear-kisser.' Ouch!"
Pushed beyond endurance, Mara jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow. "Lout! Reprobate! Degenerate! Lecher! Polecat!" she shouted.
"Sweetheart! Darling! Lover! My sweet-tempered, little Irish potato!" he whispered seductively.
Mara bent her head until her chin touched her chest. It had been foolish to exchange insults with him. She was no match for him verbally any more than she was physically. It only provided him with a means to hurt her more. She prayed that he would not know of the tears that had come to her eyes. Like an avenging monster, he was so close she could feel his heart pounding against her back and her own pounding in her throat. She caught her bottom lip in an agitated nip and forced the tears from her eyes. _Which one?_ he'd asked. In the stillness that enclosed them a statement the marshal had made moved sluggishly through her mind. _He has two whores in_ _town._
They rode in silence. It was dark. The moon, dim behind a wayward cloud, shed a pale light on the hard-packed trail. The evening was cool, but with her back snug against Pack and his arms wrapped around her, Mara was warm. Yet she was so heartsick she wouldn't have noticed had she been frostbitten.
They came up the trail to the homestead. Maggie, Trellis' old dog, came out from under the cookshack porch, barked once, then went back to her bed. A lamp burned in the bunkhouse. As they passed, one of the twins came to the door, yelled a greeting and went back inside.
Pack stopped the horse beside the back porch and lifted Mara down. After the lengthy horseback ride her legs quivered under her. He dismounted stiffly, wincing with soreness that still troubled him from the gunshot wound. He followed her into the house, lit the lamp, and carried it through the rooms. When he was sure there were no unpleasant surprises waiting for them, he set the lamp back on the table and went out to take his horse to the barn.
Mara stood in stupefied silence and gazed at the boxes, bags and wrapped bundles that took up a good part of the kitchen. Two large sheets of window glass leaned against the wall behind six high-back chairs with solid wood seats. A tin-framed oval mirror and a matching comb and brush rack lay on one of the chairs. A gray graniteware bucket and washpan sat on the table alongside a small glass churn, a caster set with four bottles with glass stoppers, and a stack of mail-order catalogs.
Somehow knowing that there was more, Mara picked up the lamp and went into the parlor. There she found a loveseat upholstered in a deep rose fabric, a rocking chair, a footstool, another mirror, this one ornate, a brass-based lamp with a painted shade, and several more unopened boxes.
Mara was about to cry and desperately choked back the tears. She went back to the kitchen, left the lamp on the table and hurried up the stairs to her room. With trembling fingers, she lit a candle. After she closed the door, she leaned against it. What did it mean? Had Pack chosen the things for her home? Did it not occur to him that _she_ should have had that privilege?
Mara washed, removed the pins from her hair and plaited it into one long, thick braid. Her pride had been dealt a blow and the pain was immense. She gritted her teeth against it, slipped the nightdress over her head, blew out the candle and got into the bed. Then and only then did she allow the tears to come. She cried silently and agonizingly, unable to control the turmoil that filled her mind.
_The Lord never puts more burdens on a person than he is_ _able to bear._ Brita had said that once when she was in pain and Mara had stood helplessly by watching her suffer. How long would it be, she asked herself, before her pain and humiliation eased? And this other thing . . . this awful attraction she felt for him. He was insufferably arrogant and bossy and it brought out a childish side of her own nature that she hadn't known existed. Their relationship had deteriorated to a point where it was beyond redemption.
Mara didn't even wonder if he would come to sleep with her. She _knew_ he would. How was she going to cope with it? She moved to the far side of the bed, turned to face the wall and prayed for sleep. At the first sound of his footsteps on the stairs, she began to quiver. He opened the door quietly and pushed it back against the wall. Several minutes passed while she lay tense, listening to him remove his clothes. By the time he was in the bed, she was hanging onto the far edge.
"Mara Shannon, I know you're not asleep. Come here, honey."
He reached for her. She hit at his hands.
"No! I don't want you here. Get out of my bed!"
Strong hands flipped her over. Strong arms pulled her to him. "I told you last night what to expect. I'm holding you in my arms every night. We may fight during the day, but when night comes, I'm holding you."
"But I don't want you here."
She placed her fists against his muscled chest and pushed with all her strength, but he didn't budge. She could feel his breath on her face. He pulled her closer until her breasts were flattened against his chest. His skin smelled cool, soapy, and was damp from washing. She stopped resisting his superior strength. She was too confused and too weak to cope with all the anger and disappointment inside her.
"It's going to take time for us to get used to living with each other."
"A lifetime won't be long enough."
"If you're not going to try, we'll just have to be miserable."
"I've never been more miserable in my life."
"It's not been a very happy day for me, either."
"Oh, wasn't Miss Candy Camp nice to you today?" She pushed with all her strength and kicked his shins.
"Mara Shannon! Stop it!" He captured her thighs between his and held her so tightly she could scarcely move even though she had wedged her arm between them in an effort to hold herself away from him. When she stopped struggling, he began to cover her face with soft kisses. "Are you ready to listen to me? I'm only going to say this one time. I've not been unfaithful to you. Like my mother, I'll honor my marriage vows. Candy and I were friends, more than friends. We were lovers. But that's all over now. She's a mature, understanding woman—"
"And I'm not!"
"When I was in town yesterday, I told her that I was married and that I would not be calling on her again."
"I bet that was a shock."
"She understood."
"Poor Miss Camp lost her lover!" Mara said scathingly. "I bet she wishes she had two thousand acres of land instead of a saloon." Mara knew, even before Pack went suddenly still, that she had gone too far, that what she had said was childish and hateful. Tears of regret tightened her throat. "Pack, I'm sorry," she whispered.
He said nothing at all. The arms holding her loosened. He gently moved her thighs from between his and rolled onto his back.
"That was a mean and hateful thing to say." Words tumbled out of her. "You didn't deserve it. It's my fault. All of it. You didn't want to be tied down to this place . . . to me . . . but I pushed you into it."
He remained quiet. Desperately she pressed herself to his side, her hand caressing his chest, combing through the hair. Unknowingly her nails scraped his male nipples, causing him to stop breathing. Her hand moved up to his throat, and higher to cup his cheek with her palm. She turned his head toward her. Their noses collided. Her wet eyelashes scraped his face. Misery choked her.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't carry on about it." His voice held no anger, only resignation.
"I don't want you to be hurt!" In a fever to make up for her cruel words, she trailed her lips along his jaw. "I don't know what gets into me. I never said mean, hateful things until I met you."
"Forget it and go to sleep."
Tears made her voice ragged, but there were things she wanted to say before she broke into sobs.
"I can't forget it! These feelings are new to me, Pack. I . . . feel things I've never felt before. It's like I'm groping in the dark. I'm edgy and weepy and I'm . . . jealous." She couldn't hold back the sobs any longer.
Pack would never know what it cost her to make that admission, and she would never know the joy that flowed through him on hearing her words. Love, pure, shining and forgiving, shattered his determination to put space between them. His arms reached for her, enclosed her gently, and his tongue licked her tears.
"It's all right."
"No. I've turned into something I don't like. I'm ornery, waspish, sharp-tongued and hateful."
"You're also sweet and honest. Hush, hush, little love, don't cry."
She moved her head and found his mouth waiting for hers. She kissed him deeply, opening her lips, tasting the heat, the hunger and the sweetness of his mouth. She hadn't expected this wild hunger in herself and was powerless to stop it. Her arms strained him to her, her senses spun wildly when she felt the shudder that went through him when her tongue boldly entered his mouth. She loved him, and nothing else mattered.
"Love me like you did last night," she whispered anxiously, tearing her mouth from his.
"Ah, love, kiss me."
She did. She moved her lips lovingly over his mouth and felt his body shift, tighten, tremble. She kissed his mouth, his chin, his eyes. Feverishly, she kissed him with her mouth closed and with it open. She slid her tongue along his lower lip as he had done to her the night before. Hands, soft and sure, moved over his back and down to caress his buttocks. She didn't care if he thought she was bold; all she wanted was to be closer to him, to erase the bitterness that had been between them. Inside her a writhing, burning desire sent messages of an emptiness that begged to be filled.
A ragged, raspy breath broke from him. He turned her onto her back and impatiently flipped her nightdress up and over her head because he couldn't bear for anything to be closer to her than he was. He ran his hands over her naked flesh, from her smooth shoulders to her knees, as if he had to make sure that all of her was there. His features were strained. He was a man on the verge of agony. She was a woman wild with hunger for her man.
He hung over her, then moved into the cradle between her thighs. Her hands glided over his upper body, feeling the power of his shoulders and back. He groaned deeply in his chest, his lips sought her breast, found it, and pulled the nipple into his mouth. His nose nuzzled the soft mound, his lips greedily sucking on the small bud. His tongue was rough and strong and pulled at her inner being. He was no longer gentle; she no longer wanted him to be.
A thin whimper broke from her lips, not a cry of protest, but of intense pleasure. His mouth on her breast intensified the sexual hunger that throbbed at the core of her femininity. And then his hand was there, in that place, cupping, touching, stroking, probing. His fingers slipped inside and were doing things to her that made her roll her hips toward him, cease to exist as a person; she was only want and need and aching emptiness. His mouth moved up to her mouth, leaving her wet nipple to nestle in the rough hair on his chest. His hands cupped her buttocks and ground her soft mound against the elongated sex that had sprung up, hard and ready, tortured with the desire to be home inside her soft body.
Mara felt the pressure and the aching need inside her was almost more than she could stand. Her fingers dug into his tight buttocks. She feared she would shatter if he did not fill her soon.
"Pack, please," she whimpered.
"Please what?"
"You . . . know. I can't . . . bear it."
One of his hands came up and tightened almost savagely in her hair. She was completely helpless against his strength. He stared down at her, his face hard and taut.
"I told you last night," he growled in a raspy voice, "that when you want me, take me in your hand and bring me to you. That's the only way I'll ever go inside you."
Her hands left his buttocks, worked their way between their tightly pressed bodies and grasped him. He lifted his hips. For a long moment her two hands held him cradled between them. The loving gesture sent his heart into an odd little dance that left him gasping. And then, in a movement that was almost more than he could endure, she rubbed the tip of him back and forth across the taut skin of her belly before she guided him to the entrance between her thighs. He entered fully, with one quick thrust, into the mysterious, dark, tight haven.
"Ahhh," he sighed in pleasure.
"Ohh . . . yes, yes!" She gasped at the exquisite pain as her body stretched to accept him.
He withdrew and stroked, seeking to be planted deeper.
She caught her breath and held it.
They clung together like two lost souls floating above the clouds. He delved deeper and deeper, seeking more and more gratification. Her pleasure mounted until she thought it had surely reached its heights. They rocked together, consumed by the demand for fulfillment. He held her tightly, slid in and out of her slowly, deeply, sweetly, using all his strength to hold back his own release, because he wanted it to go on and on, because he wanted always to be deep inside her, because he wanted to feel the ecstasy ripple though her body.
Mara's body stiffened with pleasure so intense that she had to bite her lips to hold back a scream. Even then small, fragmented cries rode out on uneven breaths. Pack felt the tiny tremors deep inside her. It had started for her.
"I . . . love . . . I love you," she cried, trying to control the words that burst from her mouth.
Dimly he heard her words. His control burst into a shattering release. _I love you, I love you, I love you._ The words beat against his mind as his body shook with wave after wave of pleasure. With all his strength he locked himself so deeply within her that his pleasure and hers were like one.
"You're mine, mine, mine, mine," he whispered savagely.
They lay silently for long moments, simply holding each other, awed into silence by the bliss they had found together. Pack rolled onto his side, bringing her with him. When he spoke, he placed the tip of his nose against her.
"I give a part of myself to you each time. I am yours and you are mine."
A long sigh escaped her. "I know. I could feel you all through me. You touched my very soul."
His fingers brushed the tangled curls around her ears. His mouth played with tender warmth upon hers.
"Sweetheart, I'm not a polished, educated man. At times I think I've done you an injustice by marrying you. But I'm a selfish lout! I wanted you. I only hope that in the days, months, years ahead you'll not come to be ashamed of the man you married."
"Oh, Pack! You must never think that. Polished and educated isn't everything. Papa once said you had plenty of common sense. You have principles or you'd not have felt responsible for me." The words came shivering and sweet from her throat. Her lips caught his and clung, released and caught again. Her kiss spoke not of passion, but of newly discovered love. "And . . . I love you," her whispered words came haltingly.
"Mara Shannon, sweetheart, ye dinna be knowin' what ye're sayin'." What common sense he had left him. He lapsed into the Irish brogue without being aware of it.
"I do be knowin', Pack Gallagher. Ye dinna need to be tellin' me what's in me own heart," she mocked him gently.
"Don't tease me, love!" he warned.
"I'm not teasing," she murmured between quick breaths. Tears glistened in the corners of her eyes. "I've known for some time that I had a special feeling for you . . . I'll not burden you with it."
"Oh, God! Oh, sweetheart!" With his face buried in the softness of her auburn hair, his words tumbled over each other. "I couldn't believe it when you said it before. I was sure you didn't know what you were saying. I love you so much, I've not been able to think of anything else. Do you really love _me?_ " His mind was empty of everything but her. His lips covered her face, stopping at each closed eye to feel the flutter of it, moved down her nose to lips that waited, warm and eager. "Say it again, sweetheart. Say it again."
"I love you."
"And I love you."
They talked, laughed, kissed. He held her wrapped in his arms while they whispered nonsense to each other.
"Who picked out the things downstairs?" she asked, as if suddenly remembering them. She felt now that she could ask him anything.
"I did. If there's anything there you don't want, we can take it back."
"You picked out all those things?"
"I had to have something to do while Sam was with his friend and Judge Moore."
"Pack?" She leaned over him and rested her chin on his chest. Her hair spilled over onto his shoulders. "Do you think Sam and Emily are as happy as we are?"
His hand moved up to the back of her head and pulled her lips up to his. "Nope. No one could be as happy as I am right this minute . . . or as horny," he said between kisses. He lifted her and settled her on top of him, cradled her between his thighs, trapping his hardness between his firm belly and her soft one.
"What's horny?"
"Me. This." He grasped her buttocks and slid her up and down over his arousal.
"Oh!" She giggled softly. "Will we wear it out?"
"I'm going to do my best to try."
* * *
Mara and Pack were having breakfast when the twins, grinning like a couple of cats, came through the back door.
"What a ya think 'bout all this stuff, Mara Shannon? Ain't Pack just the limit? We had to help unload it." Travor helped himself to a flapjack, rolled it in his fingers, and straddled one of the new chairs. "Goldurn, Pack. Ya must a bought out ole Baker's store." He shoved the rolled flapjack in his mouth.
Pack grinned. Mara could not help but notice that when he did, it spread a warm light into his eyes. She found herself beaming with pleasure.
"He's that all right. Help yourself, Trell. There's another flapjack." Mara was pleased the boys were so comfortable with her that they made themselves at home.
"Willy said we'd better get our butts on up here 'n help scatter all this stuff out cause he wasn't goin' to."
"You tell Willy that I'm cooking doughnuts today, and unless he helps he can't have any. Travor, you rapscallion!" Mara reached to swat the hand that was grabbing another flapjack. "Save one of those for Trellis. I'll swear! Filling you up is like pouring sand down a rat hole."
"He ate six down at the cookshack," Trellis grumbled.
"Steamboat's ain't as good as Mara Shannon's."
"How is Steamboat?" Mara rose to get the coffeepot.
"All right. Just like nothin' ever happened. Pack, is Sam goin' to give me 'n Trav fifty silver dollars?"
"That's what he said. I'm thinking Sam isn't a man to go back on his word."
Pack wrapped his arm about Mara's thighs when she came to fill his cup. She leaned against him. Trellis watched as his brother patted his wife's leg.
"Lordy! I'm sure glad you two made up. Willy said Mara Shannon was mad as a cow with her tit caught in the fence. He said she was red-eyed and spittin' nails on the way to Charlie's. He said—"
"Willy's got a big mouth," Pack said and watched Mara move away from him. "What are you boys going to do with your money?"
"That's what we want to talk to ya about. Me 'n Trav are wonderin' if we'd have enough to buy us a mare. We figure we could put her to your big gray 'n start us a horse herd. Whata ya think, Pack?"
Pack looked directly at Mara and caught her smiling eyes before he looked back at his brother's expectant face.
"I can't find anything wrong with that. You know those three mares I brought in are going to foal. I've been wondering if you fellows would want to partner up with me. You take on the care of the horses, and one of the foals will be yours. In a few years you'll have a herd of good, blooded horses."
Disbelieving, Trellis and Travor sat with their mouths open. Travor came out of his trance first. "Ya mean it?"
"Well, for the love of Pete and the sake of Pud!" Trellis shouted, then echoed his brother. "Ya mean it?"
"Of course I mean it. We'll need help running this ranch, won't we, honey?" He grabbed Mara's hand as she passed and pulled her down onto his lap.
"Sure. And you know what else? I know two young men who are going to have to learn to read, write, and cipher. Else they'll not be able to do business at the bank, read bills of sale or write out money orders. If they can't do those things they'll be cheated blind."
Travor got to his feet. "You're right, Mara Shannon. When can we start?"
Mara slid off Pack's lap. "Not until all this stuff is sorted out, put away, or stacked in a pile to go back to the store." She reached to jerk a strand of Pack's hair and smiled lovingly into his eyes. He pulled her back down on his lap and kissed her.
"Ahh . . . mush! Come on, Trell. When they get done slobberin' all over each other we'll come back 'n help."
The back screen door slammed. "In a year or two they'll find out that kissing can be a very pleasant pastime." Mara giggled happily.
"So pleasant that I might spend the entire day doing it." Pack looked at her with a consuming tenderness in his dark eyes. She gazed back at him, the ache of love in hers, and shook her head slowly. He stilled her head between his two hands. "What does that mean, Mrs. Gallagher?"
"It means that you're not going to charm me into sitting on your lap all day and dallying with you. We've got work to do. I'm dying to see what's in all those bundles."
He kissed her quick and hard. "All right, but as soon as night comes you're going to get it, my girl," he threatened.
She ran a finger over his hard mouth. "I hope so." Her eyes sparkled at him though thick lashes.
Their laughter mingled.
* * *
The days slipped past in a flurry of work as Mara arranged the new furnishings, put away the new dishes and cooking pans, hung the mirrors and comb case, filled the new lamps, spread a beautiful new cloth and placed the caster set in the center of the table. Pack and the boys tore the boards from the windows and put in the new glass, letting more light and sunshine into the house. Riley and Aubrey put the new screening on the front and back doors. The new bedsheets, blankets and towels were stacked neatly in the bureau drawers.
It was a busy time. Mara spent two hours each afternoon teaching the boys. Travor was especially bright when it came to reading. His inquisitive mind absorbed the printed word. Trellis, the methodical one, took to ciphering, and in a week's time was far ahead of his brother. Penmanship came hard for both boys, but they tried.
The boys were a joy to work with, and Mara couldn't have loved them more if they were her own flesh and blood. At times she couldn't help but think how different they were from Cullen. Pack and Mara had heard nothing of his whereabouts, nor was he mentioned by Aubrey or the twins.
Mara loved working in her house, and with the twins, but each day she looked forward to the time after supper. This was her special time with her husband. They usually went to the creek and bathed together. Afterward they sat on the porch, fingers entwined, and Pack told her tales of his trips into the mining camps. She told him little anecdotes about her life at the school. They retired early to the room upstairs, made love and slept in each other's arms.
Mara had not thought there was so much happiness in the whole world. She felt laughter bubbling inside her at the most unexpected times. The joy of living flowed in her blood and smiles of pure delight curved her mouth. It was so wonderful to love and be loved. Pack filled every corner of her heart. She felt she knew him as well as she knew herself.
The warm afternoon breeze was drying the clothes Mara had hung on the line. Humming a tune, she checked the meat she had boiling in the pot, covered the fresh loaves of bread with a clean cloth, and wandered out onto the back porch. She saw Aubrey come out of the tack house carrying a harness on his shoulder and go into the shed. Pack had said Aubrey was not drinking, that he had taken an interest in the horses and in keeping the bridles and harnesses repaired.
She stepped off the porch and strolled down the path toward the barn, something she wouldn't have dared do when Cullen was around. The heavy double doors of the barn were closed, but as she neared, she could hear Willy's voice. The words were inaudible, but the tone was complaining. Mara smiled. The old man would die before he admitted it, but he loved Pack. And because of that Mara had become fond of him.
Mara reached for the heavy hasp to pull open the door.
"Plop, plop, plop." The sound came at regular intervals. She paused to listen. "Plop, plop, plop."
"Spread yore feet, duck left, duck right, duck right," Willy sang in a monotonous tone.
"Plop. Plop."
"Ah, hell, ya'll get knocked on yore ass if ya stand flat-footed."
She swung the door open a crack and slipped inside. It was stifling hot in the barn. The only breeze and the only light came in through the small door at the back. Pack, stripped to the waist and wearing old britches cut off above the knee, was pounding at something in a gunnysack that hung from the rafters. Sweat was rolling down his face like he'd been in a heavy downpour. His arms, shoulders and back were wet and glistening. He pounded at the heavy sack with his fists, bobbing to the left, to the right. Willy sat on an overturned barrel with a straw in his mouth.
Pack stopped pounding on the gunnysack, opened his hands and flexed his fingers.
"How be that thumb?" Willy asked.
"It's all right."
Holding his arms together chest-high, Pack squatted down. He must have done fifty squats before he jumped up and caught hold of a bar suspended on two ropes. The muscles in his shoulders and arms rippled as he lifted his weight until his chin was even with the bar. He did this until it was harder and harder for his arms to lift him.
"This place is hotter than a two-bit whore," he exclaimed breathlessly when he dropped to his feet and wiped the sweat off his forehead with his forefinger.
"Yore own fault fer keepin' the doors shut." Willy got off the barrel mumbling something about Pack not having any backbone anymore and threw him a towel. "Ya ain't got—" He turned to see Mara standing beside the door. "Ah shitfire!" he muttered.
Pack wiped his face on the towel and threw it back at Willy. The old man jerked his head in the direction where Mara was standing. Pack turned his head and his eyes came to rest on Mara's white face. He went toward her.
"Hello, sweetheart. It's too hot for you to be in here."
"What are you doing, Pack? What in the world are you doing?"
"Oh, I'm just trying to get some of my strength back. I've been idle for a long time."
"But why were you fighting that sack?"
"It's a good way to build muscles, sweetheart. Go on back to the house. I'll be up soon and we'll go down to the creek." Pack pushed open the heavy barn door.
Mara walked back to the house. A puzzled frown drew her brows together. Pack hadn't wanted her to know what he was doing or he wouldn't have been in the barn with the doors closed.
In a corner of her mind, a little uneasiness began to grow.
# Chapter
NINETEEN
Arms entwined, Sam and Emily walked along the path beside the creek. Ahead of them something scuttled in a thicket. An owl glided between the branches searching for a meal. A crescent moon rode high in the sky, but they didn't notice it. They came to a grassy clearing where fireflies flitted their brief lives away. Far away a night bird called. Sam tilted his head to listen. The call came again and he relaxed.
"Pack and Mara Shannon were so angry at each other the day they were here that they hardly spoke," Emily said thoughtfully.
"Pack wouldn't take her to town because we wasn't sure what was waitin' for us. They've straightened it out by now."
"Oh, I don't think so. I'm afraid there's trouble ahead for them. Pack's afraid to take her to town knowing that she'll be snubbed because of him."
"He ain't the most popular man in town. I got to admit it. Ole Piedmont let me know what he thought 'bout him when I went to fetch him for the buryin'. He said a man who fought in a prize ring was a spawn of the devil, or somethin' like that. Pious old bastard! I never wanted to punch anybody so bad."
"The Laramie Ladies, as they are called, are feeling pretty proud of themselves because for the first time in history some of them served on a jury. They marched in protest against the last fight. Reverend Piedmont's wife was one of the leaders."
"That'll not keep their men at home. They'll pay to see the fight and they'll bet on it."
"The last time they carried signs saying gambling was as evil as demon rum. And that Pack was taking the bread from the mouths of innocent babes."
Sam chuckled. "I bet that was some parade."
"Oh, it was. They had a band and everything. Charlie said they sang hymns and carried a little girl whose father had gambled away the family home, causing the mother to turn to drink and wander into the mountains never to return for the child."
"They really get carried away, don't they?"
"They'll give Mara Shannon the cold shoulder. I feel bad about it. I wish I hadn't heard you and Charlie talking about the fight."
"Pack agreed to it because it's a sure, quick way of earnin' some money. He wants to buy in with me 'n Charlie. He's confident he can win. Even if he don't win he'll get a sizable purse."
"I wonder if he's told Mara Shannon."
"Honey, she'll either stand by her man or she won't. There's nothin' we can do. I talked to a young preacher today. His church isn't big or fancy as ole Piedmont's, but I think you'll like him."
"I will if you do."
"Tomorrow we'll go in 'n talk to him. Then about this time next week we'll be wed. I'd like to do it afore my friend goes back to Saint Louis."
"I'd like Mara Shannon and Pack to be there."
"After we talk to the preacher and make the date, I'll ride over and tell them."
They heard a plop as a frog jumped from the bank into the water.
"We'll have to come down here sometime 'n throw out a line." Sam's arm across her shoulders pulled her to him. "Right now fishin' isn't on my mind."
"I'm glad." She lifted her lips for his kiss.
Her mouth was warm, sweet. She parted her lips, yielded and accepted the wanderings of his. He raised his head and looked down at her, his lips just inches from hers.
"I've been so damn lucky, I'm scared, Emily Rose. I found you 'n I'll have the means of takin' care of ya."
"No more lucky than I am, Sam darling. The dearest, most wonderful man in the world loves me in spite of what happened to me. I'll have the family I always dreamed of having."
Their lips met in joint seeking. She rose on her toes to press her mouth hungrily to his. His hands roamed over her, caressing every inch of her back and sides. One hand shaped itself over her breast, the other flattened against her buttocks and held her to him.
"I sure like kissin' you, holdin' you. It's goin' to be hard waitin' to make you mine." Sam lowered his eyes and found hers, sparkling like twin stars.
"You don't have to wait," she whispered.
"Godamighty! Sweetheart!" A great swell of joy washed over him. He felt a tremor run through him as if the earth they were standing on was shaking.
"I don't want to wait."
"Emily Rose. Oh, sweet Emily Rose." The words came from his tight throat in a tormenting whisper.
"I've shocked you." Her mouth sought his in a soul-searching kiss as an insidious, primitive desire grew in both of them.
"We can't . . . I can't. . . ." His voice trembled.
She hugged him to her. "I've thought about it." Her words were muffled against his neck. "I'm afraid. At the last minute I may remember what it was like . . . and scream." She pressed herself against the hardened evidence of his aroused body. "I want to know before we're wed. I love you too much to saddle you with a woman who cannot be a wife."
It was Sam who drew back and held her away from him. He felt a strange bittersweet warmth. She was a dream. He was sure her soft, feminine body would respond to the mating instincts of his. He had not thought about her fear.
"We can't, sweetheart. Not here in the grass." There was gentle firmness in his voice.
"I know of no better place for a man and a woman to lie down together than here on God's earth with a blanket of stars overhead." She stroked his cheek with her fingertips. "The other . . . time I was on a soft, clean bed, my hands tied over my head, my legs spread . . . and tied. I've got to know if the nightmare will come back." Her hands cupped his cheeks, and she brought his lips to hers.
After the kiss she stood within his embrace and unhooked her skirt at the waist. As it fell, she stepped out of it and spread it on the ground. Her fingers pulled at the drawstring on her petticoat. It dropped and she spread it alongside her skirt. She stood there in knee-length bloomers and her shirt-waist.
Sam's head was spinning, reality was slipping farther and farther away, but before it was completely gone, the thought came to him that she had planned this and had come prepared. Dear God, he prayed, he wanted to be gentle with her, to show her that mating between two people who loved each other could be beautiful.
He reached for her hands and brought them to the buttons on his shirt. He stood very still while her nimble fingers worked at baring his chest. He pulled the shirt from his britches, slipped it off, and dropped it on the ground. With her hands in his, he pressed them to his bare flesh, inviting her to feel his body. He dropped his own hands to his side and stood still as her soft palms roamed over his shoulders, down under his muscular arms, around his ribs to his flat, quivering belly. He closed his eyes when her fingers found the nipples amid the growth of down on his chest.
When she sank down on the clothing she had spread he unbuckled his gun belt and dropped it down beside her. He sat down and kicked off his boots.
"Shall I take off my shirtwaist?" Her voice was a mere breath in the night.
"Only if you want to." He leaned his head toward her and kissed her reverently on the forehead.
"I want to. I _do_ love you," she said as if she had to give a reason for what she was doing.
He watched as she took off her shirtwaist. Beneath it she wore a chemise, tied above her breast with a ribbon. Her shoulders gleamed in the moonlight. He studied her white face, her mane of thick hair, her trembling mouth.
"Emily Rose," he whispered. "Yo're the purtiest woman I ever saw."
In reply, her arms slid up to encircle his neck and she pressed her breast to his chest. Her mouth was soft and sweet against his. He lay down on his back, bringing her with him, careful not to hold her too tight. She bent over him. While they kissed, his hands softly stroked her back and hips.
"I love you," he whispered against her mouth. "I'll never force you or hurt you. You lead the way."
"I don't know what to do."
"Do what you want, love." His arms fell to his sides.
"I want to touch you . . . all over. Aren't you going to take off your britches?"
"Darlin'," he croaked, "what's in there might scare the hell out a ya."
"I know what it is. You were big and hard the night we kissed at Mara Shannon's. I felt it against me. And I felt it tonight even though you were trying to hold it away from me."
He pushed his britches down over his hips. His male member stood stiff and proud out of a nest of dark hair. He knew that she couldn't see it, and prayed that when she touched it, he would be able to control himself. He sank back to see her lift the chemise over her head. He drew in a ragged breath and a small sound came from his throat at the sight of her round, firm breasts.
"What is it? Sam?" Her hand came to rest on the flat plane of his stomach.
"Yore breasts are so purty."
She stretched out beside him and lifted his arm over her head so she could rest her cheek on his shoulder. She brought his hand around and placed it on her breast. His rough, calloused fingers found her nipple and stroked it to a hard peak. He felt a tremor go through her.
"That feels good, so good." Her voice was soft, urgent. She reached for his lips and kissed him with a hunger that surprised him. Her mound was pressed tightly to his thigh. He could feel the heat through her bloomers. His hand traveled from her breast to the waistband, slipped carefully inside, and flattened against her buttocks. She moved her palm down over his stomach and slid it beneath his extended sex. He caught his breath sharply and waited as it settled on the back of her hand.
"Emily Rose, I swear I'll never use it as a weapon."
"I know you won't."
Her hand turned and her fingers closed around him. He ground his teeth and tightened his buttocks. His desire for her was a deep pain gnawing his vitals, but he was determined not to show any aggression.
"Be . . . careful, love. I'm so hungry for you. I want to touch you everywhere. Emily Rose, oh, Emily Rose. Tell me if I hurt you and I'll stop."
She brought his arm around over her head, placed it beside him and turned so that her breast and belly were against it. His hand worked its way into the slit in her drawers. His fingers combed the springy hair at her crotch and slid into dampness. For a long minute she was still. He was still. Then she rocked slightly on his hand and relief flooded through him.
"You're so different from me." She leaned over him. Her mouth moved slowly over his chest. Her lips found a flat nipple. She licked it with her tongue and felt the quiver that passed through him. When she caught it with her teeth, his breath came out sharply. She worded it, then asked, "Does that feel good?"
"Oh, God, yes! Turn over, darlin'."
She turned on her back and spread her legs. "I'm not afraid, Sam. I'm not afraid."
"Give me a little time, love. Let me show you how good I can make you feel."
His mouth, firm yet gentle, fastened on her trembling lips, stealing her breath away. The kiss was filled with sweetness. He put his head on her breast and rubbed his cheek against the soft globe. Then he took her nipple into his mouth, sucking it with lips and tongue while his fingers moved down to the sweet haven between her thighs and slipped inside, stroking, coaxing. She began to squirm, to arch her hips toward his hand.
"Sam!" Something warm and powerful throbbed in the area below her stomach. She whimpered when his mouth left her breast to kiss her mouth and run his tongue over her lips. She moved restlessly against the urgent hardness pressing against her thigh. His fingers worked magic.
"Tell me."
"Yes! Yes!" Her whispered words were like thunder in his ears. "Please. I need you to." Her arms clutched him, her hips thrust up in joyous offering.
"You're sure?" The blood swam in his head, burned his body, pounded in his veins, but the fear of harming something so precious clutched at his heart.
With a breathless laugh her hand searched for him. There was no room for fear as her desire peaked. He lifted her thigh over his and, using all his strength of will to hold back, he slipped into her. She was warm, moist. He was so filled with love for her that he thought he would burst.
Fleetingly, Emily remembered the relentless attack upon her, remembered the pawing, leering, probing into the most secret and vulnerable strongholds of her body. That had been a dreadful and obscene experience; this was heaven.
Love for this gentle, understanding man swept over Emily like a warm wind when he entered her, filled her. She called his name and heard him call hers. With a flurry of softly muttered words of love, he moved within her in a rhythm of loving that increased in speed and intensity. It was like drowning as she was swept along in the turbulence of their desire. Through the bursting darkness sudden joy, like a great flashing light, exploded within her.
The climax of their mating left them gasping. She curled up in Sam's arms, wet tears on her face. She rested her cheek on the smooth hardness of his shoulder, feeling the peace of being loved and cherished. His ardent loving seemed to have opened wide every door in her mind and emotions.
"Sam, Sam, it was . . . wonderful!"
Unable to speak, he kissed her tenderly, lovingly, again and again. Tears he had not shed since he was a child filled his eyes, then rolled down his cheeks onto hers.
* * *
Emily, sitting between Charlie and Sam on the wagon seat, saw the train coming up the grade. She had seen it before as only a dim image moving across her vision. Now, with her glasses, she could see the windows and the smoke rolling from the great locomotive as it puffed and wheezed into the Laramie station. She clutched Sam's arm.
"Oh! Charlie said some of the cars were painted yellow, but I didn't dream they were so colorful. It's beautiful! The steam engine is like a dragon and the cars its tail."
"A tail with windows for eyes." Charlie laughed.
Charlie had at first been skeptical about what he considered Emily's sudden infatuation with the Texan. But now that he'd had time to observe them together and to get to know Sam, he realized they had truly fallen in love.
Charlie prided himself on being able to read a man's character. During the war he'd had to choose those who were to lead and those who were to follow. Sam Sparks was not a man to trail along behind other men. Charlie liked what he had seen and heard about him, but it was going to be hard for him to let another man take over the responsibility for his sister.
Emily had been urging Charlie to talk to Sam. She had already told Sam what had happened to force them to leave Indiana and come west, but she hadn't told him all of it. He was not the kind of man to ask questions. Yet there was something he should know, something he would have to know before he and Emily were married. Charlie wished to hell he'd told him before things had gone so far.
"That's the church I tole ya 'bout." Sam motioned toward a small unpainted building at the end of a side street, set off by itself in a grassy field.
Charlie turned down the rutted road and pulled the horses to a stop in front of the church. Sam got down and reached for Emily. He would have liked to hold her there for endless moments looking at her. Her dress was a light gray, her bonnet blue. A continuous smile curved her sweet mouth. He wanted desperately to kiss her.
"What denomination is it?" She looked over Sam's shoulder at the church.
"I didn't ask. Will it matter?"
"Not in the least. Are you coming in, Charlie?"
"No. I'll stay here."
Charlie swung his wooden peg up on the sideboard of the wagon and reached for his pipe. While he lit it, he watched his sister, the only person in the world whom he loved, walk into the church on the arm of the man to whom she had given her heart. He thought of their parents and the love they had shared. Their father had been a rough Scots riverman, their mother a petite southern belle.
Charlie's mind spun back to the first year of the war. He had returned home on a short leave to find that first his father and then his mother had died of a lung sickness that spread through Evansville during one of the coldest winters they had known. Emily, nearly blind even then, and two old colored servants had nursed them, been with them when they died, and had buried them.
The next time he came home it was a month before the war ended. He was weak from losing a leg and lying in a hospital bed. Emily had been brutally raped by three men from prominent Evansville families; one of them was wed and the father of three children. Charlie, teetering on one good leg and his peg, had sought them out and made sure that each of the men admitted his crime before he killed him. Afterward he and Emily had fled to Missouri and later taken a boat up the river to Wyoming.
The thought of what would happen to Emily if he were caught and sent to prison had weighed heavily on Charlie's mind. His worry had been eased when at last he had taken Pack into his confidence and Pack had assured him that he would see to it that Emily was taken care of if she were left alone. Now Sam Sparks, the Texan, would be the one to take responsibility for his sister.
Charlie was tired. The strain of constantly looking over his shoulder, of having to change his and Emily's name, of being cut loose from everything that had been dear and familiar to them, was taking its toll. It didn't matter so much now if someone called his name and he turned to see someone from his past—Emily had Sam.
An hour later someone did call his name, and Charlie turned to see someone from his past.
* * *
"He was very nice. Not at all like the pompous Reverend Piedmont. He asked us if we were aware that the commitment we made to each other was for life. He came here from Kansas and his congregation isn't very big, but it will be, because he's very understanding. We set the date for a week from today, Charlie. He's Presbyterian. Can you believe it?" She turned to Sam. "That's the church we went to back home." She turned back to Charlie. "Mama would be pleased to know that I'm going to be married by a Presbyterian minister."
Emily chatted happily while they drove back down the road toward the main part of town. Both Charlie and Sam chuckled at her enthusiasm.
"See what you're going to have to put up with, Sam? She'll talk your arm off," Charlie teased.
"Do ya reckon a gag would help?" Sam asked. His usually serious face was creased with smiles.
"Don't know, but I'd be tempted to try it."
"Oh, you! Just for that I'm going to the mercantile to buy some dress goods. Thanks to you, Sam, I can see all the things in the store." She hugged his arm.
"Charlie, I'm thinkin' I might a made a mistake gettin' those glasses," Sam said seriously as Charlie pulled the team to a stop alongside a building.
"And I'm thinking I ought to make her wait until she's wed to you before I turn her loose in that store," Charlie growled.
Emily laughed happily. Sam helped her down and went to fasten the team to the post with an iron ring. He took Emily's hand and drew it into the crook of his arm. They waited for Charlie, and the three of them stepped up onto the boardwalk that fronted the Railroad Hotel. The walk was crowded with loafers and travelers who had come in on the train. They edged their way through the crowd and went on down the street past the barbershop. Emily walked with her head up, looking at everyone and everything. Sam held her proudly and securely to his side.
Zachary Quill came out of the Diamond Saloon and paused to light his cigar. The thump of Charlie's peg leg on the boardwalk drew his attention. Then he saw Sam walking with a peg-legged man and a slim, blond woman.
"Sam," he called and hurried after them.
After glancing over his shoulder, Sam pulled Emily to the side of the walk next to a building.
"Just a minute, honey. Here's someone I want you and Charlie to meet."
Charlie moved over beside Sam before he looked back to see the tall, distinguished looking man approaching them. It took less than a dozen heartbeats for Charlie to recognize him. By then the sharp blue eyes had honed in on his face and every nightmare Charlie had ever had came rushing back at him.
"My God! Charlie! Charlie McCourtney!" Zack smiled broadly, but Charlie didn't. "Why, this is wonderful! Imagine seeing you way out here." He shook Charlie's hand and slapped him on the back.
Sam noticed immediately that Charlie's face had gone chalk white and Emily's a pale pink. Her fingers on his arm tightened as if she were about to fall off a cliff.
"Hello, Zack. It's been a long time," Charlie said.
"It sure has." Zack turned to Sam. "I've known Charlie since he was knee-high. And is this Emily? Why, of course it is."
"This is Emily, my intended," Sam said. "If you know Charlie you must know his sister."
"Little Emily McCourtney! You're the one Sam wanted the glasses for? Well, can you beat that?"
Emily glanced at Sam's expressionless face and held out her hand. "Zachary Quill. I've heard all about the Quills from Mama and Papa."
"My parents and Uncle Rain and Aunt Amy thought the world of Eleanor and Gavin McCourtney. I sure was sorry to hear that they had passed on."
"Mama just seemed to wither away after Papa died."
"Charlie, you look more and more like your pa." Zack stepped back to allow a woman with a small child to pass. "It's almost dinner time. Come be my guests for dinner at the hotel. Meeting someone from home is almost as good as Christmas."
"Sam and Emily were on their way to the mercantile, Zack," Charlie said evenly. "But I'd like to buy you a drink and find out about the folks back at Quill's Station." Charlie's eyes sent Sam's a silent message.
"Sounds good to me. We can meet Sam and Emily in the lobby of the hotel. Is that all right with you, Sam?"
"Why sure. Emily and I will be back in about an hour."
"Charlie—" Emily reached out and clasped her brother's arm. An almost desperate look came over her face. Charlie patted her hand and smiled with his mouth around the pipe stem.
"Run along with Sam. I promise to tell you all the news I get out of Zack." He turned abruptly and walked away, his peg making a hollow thumping sound on the boardwalk.
Emily stood for a moment looking after him. When she looked at Sam there were tears in her eyes.
"I never thought it'd be like this," she murmured.
"Come on, honey. Let's get off the street."
"Charlie was going to tell you before the wedding."
Sam took her arm and they walked around the corner, past the livery and on out past the wagon yard. They stopped beneath a shade tree. Tears were on Emily's cheeks.
"What's wrong, honey? I'll fix it if I can."
"You can't fix this, Sam. They'll take Charlie back and . . . and hang him for killing those men who—"
"Zack won't turn him in."
"There's a reward. A big reward. If Zack doesn't, someone else will. Charlie said it was just a matter of time. There are bounty hunters all over the country."
"He was worried 'bout me?"
"At first."
"I can't blame him for that."
"It hurt Charlie to have to deny Papa's name. McCourtney is our name."
"Does Pack know this?"
"He knows."
"It must have been a load for Charlie, but he don't have to go it alone now."
"Sam, I'm so afraid. It was all because of me!"
* * *
The hour passed quickly. When Sam and Emily walked down the street toward the hotel, she kept her eyes down. Her bonnet hung from one arm while the other was held tightly against Sam's side. Her face was sad, but her eyes were dry. The joy she had felt when they arrived in town had turned to a cold lump of dread that hung on her heart like a stone. Sam could think of no words to say to comfort her.
The hotel lobby was cool and quiet. The builder had taken pains to make it as elegant as possible with limited supplies and unskilled labor. The plank floor had a large square of carpet in the center and runners that led from the desk to the stairway. Deep leather couches forming an L were placed in the two corners. Charlie and Zack sat on the couch at the back of the lobby, deep in conversation.
Both men got to their feet as Sam and Emily approached.
Charlie was smiling, a genuine smile. He stumbled in his haste to get to his sister and put his arms around her.
"It's all right, Sister!" Relief boiled out of Charlie; his voice vibrated with it. "Zack says there are no charges against me. No reward posted!"
"What?" Emily didn't dare believe her own ears. "What?" she stammered again.
"No charges were filed!"
"Not two weeks after you left there was a secret meeting between the sheriff, the judge and an undisclosed number of men and their wives," Zack explained. "It seems the three who attacked you had also attacked other women in town. It had become a game for the wealthy, idle scoundrels. They wore masks each time except the time they attacked you. They didn't think you could see well enough to identify them."
"But I can see up close. I knew who they were, and when Charlie came home he made me tell him."
"There were never any charges filed against Charlie. Folks were rather grateful that he had saved the families the shame of a trial. They decided you had left because it was too painful for you to stay and face folks." Zack turned and put his hand on Charlie's shoulder. "I sent out a few feelers when I discovered you'd had your things shipped to Kansas City. If I had only known you thought you were a hunted man, Charlie, I would have scoured the country looking for you and Emily."
"Oh, dear! I'm going to cry."
"You'll get spots on your glasses," Sam teased.
"It's such a relief. We don't have to worry that every man that comes to the house is . . . looking for Charlie."
"Emily, I'm going to work on the new penitentiary. Zack wants me to work with a Mr. Brown who is the Superintendent of Construction. Later he thinks there'll be a permanent position for me. This is, if he can convince the governor."
"I don't think we'll have any trouble convincing the governor, Charlie. You're the most qualified man I know."
Charlie was so excited he stuck his pipe in his mouth with the bowl upside down.
"Charlie, you're spilling your tobacco!" Emily exclaimed happily. "Sam, Charlie has a degree in engineering. This is something he's always wanted to do."
"Looks like you and Emily can take over the Rivers' place, if you want it, Sam."
"If it's what Emily wants, we'll settle on a price."
"If we don't get in that dining room it's going to fill up." Zack placed a hand on Emily's back and on Charlie's shoulder and urged them toward the door. "When's the wedding going to take place, Sam? By God, I'm going to be there."
# Chapter
TWENTY
Mara moved the heavy spider skillet to cover the round hole after she lifted the lid from the top of the cookstove. The hot flames licked at the bottom of the skillet and soon the strips of meat were bubbling and shrinking.
"It's going to be a nice day for the wedding." Pack came into the kitchen. The screen door slammed behind him.
Mara remained facing the stove. "I'm glad. Will you fill the reservoir, Pack? It's almost empty." Moving the meat aside with a two-tined fork, she broke an egg in the pan.
"How come I'm getting eggs this morning, Mrs. Gallagher?"
"Because we have a surplus at the moment."
Pack emptied the water bucket in the tank at the side of the stove and went out to the well. Mara dished up the meat and eggs. She was taking bread from the oven when Pack returned.
It was hard to act normal this morning. She took a deep breath, put the hot biscuits on the table, and filled the coffee cups, giving that chore her full attention. She could feel the tension in Pack. It had been growing steadily since she had discovered him in the barn pounding on that damn gunnysack. Then it accelerated after Sam came to tell them that he and Emily were being married in Laramie and invite them to come to the wedding.
Pack was the same gentle lover, but at times he held her so tightly she could scarcely breathe. Last night his loving had been intense and he became almost desperate in his attempt to hold back his release to make their joining last. Mara had searched her mind for a reason for his unease and came up with only one: He didn't want her to go to town. But why? Her mind worked overtime for an answer. She was sure that Pack loved her, and so it couldn't be because of the woman at the Diamond Saloon.
As Mara moved the caster set so that she could place the butter crock within his reach, she waited for her mind to empty and her nerves to calm. She had worked on being serene; it was what she relied on.
"I ironed your good shirt. You really need another one. While we're in town today we should buy one."
"They usually don't have any big enough, honey."
"If they don't we'll get some material and I'll make you one."
"Did Miss Fillamore teach you to sew too?"
"She couldn't even thread a needle," Mara scoffed. "She hired a woman to give sewing lessons. They cost extra, of course, but Cousin Aubrey came up with the money."
"I told the boys to be ready in about an hour. They've never been to a wedding, and when Sam said they were welcome, you'd a thought he'd given them a silver dollar."
"I should have cut their hair, but I couldn't corral them long enough."
Even normal conversation was somehow strained. Mara picked at her food and drank her coffee. When they had finished eating, she filled the dishpan with the dishes and poured water from the teakettle over them.
Pack was in the bedroom when she went upstairs to change her dress. He was standing beside the bureau with her ivory-handled brush in his hand. He placed it beside the matching mirror and grinned at her sheepishly.
"A Christmas present from Miss Fillamore, or rather, from the funds she kept to buy gifts for those who would otherwise not receive anything. Regardless, they're my treasures." She opened a small box and took out a brooch. "I got this when I graduated. Isn't it beautiful? I don't get to wear it very often."
"Are you going to wear it today?"
"I'll wear it to Emily's wedding. I didn't—" She paused and looked up at him.
"You didn't get to wear it to yours," he finished for her and drew her to him. "Honey, you got cheated. You should have had a pretty dress so you could have worn your treasure. Instead you wore that ugly old black thing and was married after a funeral by a preacher who was less than willing."
"You don't hear me complaining, do you?" She wound her arms about his neck and kissed him firmly on the mouth.
"Besides, it will be something to tell our children and our grandchildren. You were so mad at me you could have bitten a nail in two, and I wanted to kick you for being so bull-headed. But, darling, I wouldn't change one thing! _You_ are my treasure."
The kiss they exchanged was long and sweet. She felt the trembling in him and wanted to reassure him. But reassure him about what?
* * *
Mara, on the wagon seat beside Pack, held her parasol over her head to keep the sun off her face.
"You look mighty pretty, Mrs. Gallagher." Pack's eyes swept admiringly over her from the perky straw hat trimmed in wide ribbon that matched her light blue dress to where soft kid shoes peeked from beneath the hem. The neckline of her dress was low, and nestled between her breasts was one of her treasures, the brooch.
"This is the first time you've seen me dressed up."
"Keep the parasol up, honey. I don't want you getting a sunburn." His eyes lingered on the neckline of her dress and he made a growling sound deep in his throat.
"Behave yourself, sir, and pay attention to your driving. This is not the time for you to get amorous," she said with mock hauteur.
Behind them the boys were scuffling.
"If you boys get your shirts dirty before we get to town I'll box your ears," Mara threatened.
"Ahh . . . you wouldn't do that." Travor gave his brother another push. " 'Sides, you couldn't catch us."
"You're right about that. But Pack could. He'll hold you while I slap you good."
The twins hooted with laughter. They were in good spirits. They had a little money in their pockets and they were headed for town.
"Ya'd better watch out, Trav," his twin warned. "Mara Shannon'll get ya!"
Mara shook her head hopelessly.
"You're about to scare those boys out of ten years' growth, honey," Pack scolded gently, then laughed as she wrinkled her nose at him.
"You're not helping matters by laughing at them," she said sassily, trying to hold back her own smiles.
Pack had forced himself to laugh. He had never felt less like laughing in his life. He felt as if he were sliding down a slippery chute, powerless to stop himself, and at the end was a yawning black pit. He loved this woman sitting beside him more than life. The fact that she loved him in return was a miracle almost beyond belief. She touched off something inside him that was like music. During the last few weeks he'd had more contentment, the kind that didn't require anything but being near her, than he'd had in his entire life. Dozens of questions filled his mind and demanded answers. One stood out above them all. Was it all to end with this trip to town?
Mara knew that Laramie was a new town, but she was not prepared for the rawness of it. Wooden buildings, most of them unpainted, lined the dusty main street that led to the railroad tracks. Compared to Denver, Laramie was a primitive outpost, and yet Mara could see nicely dressed women going in and out of the stores with baskets on their arms. The street was clogged with vehicles of every kind. A freight wagon with a six-mule hitch came toward them. Pack pulled the team to the far side of the road to give it room to pass.
In front of the Diamond Saloon a man in a black serge suit and derby hat was helping a woman into a handsome buggy. The woman was lovely and her clothes the latest style even by Denver standards. She was dressed all in gray from the soles of her soft, high-button shoes to the wide-brimmed hat set atop piled blond curls. As they passed the buggy, she lifted gloved hands and deftly folded back a gauze of gray veil up and over her hat brim. She looked directly at Pack. He tipped his hat and the woman nodded.
Mara didn't need to ask the woman's name. Somehow she knew that she was Miss Candace Camp, the woman who had slept with her husband, the woman whom he had said was so understanding when he told her he was married and wouldn't be calling on her again. Mara glanced at her husband. He was handsome, very handsome, despite his rough, uneven features. How could she hold him when a woman as beautiful as Miss Camp wanted him?
"We're going to be right on time," Pack said as he turned the corner and slapped the reins against the rumps of the horses. "Sam said eleven o'clock and it's that now."
Mara closed her parasol. Her eyes sought Pack's face. His straight heavy brows were slightly wrinkled and his lids were lowered to shade his eyes. Was it nerves that caused the small muscle beside his mouth to jump? A little chill raced down her spine and up again. She placed her hand in loving possession on his thigh. He dropped his over it. The hand over hers was huge, hard as a rock and incredibly gentle. She turned her palm up so that her fingers could entwine with his.
A slight breeze kicked up little eddies of dust along the road but did little to dissipate the late morning heat. Ahead, beside a single giant cedar tree, was the church. Charlie's wagon was there, and a small knot of people stood in the shade beside the church door.
Emily's dress was eggshell white, high-necked, with a tight, tucked bodice and sleeves that were puffed over her upper arms. The skirt was trimmed with heavy ivory colored lace. A blue ribbon wound its way through the rolls of shining hair she had fastened to the top of her head. Her small wire-rimmed glasses did nothing to dim the beauty of the bride.
The bridegroom, with a fresh haircut revealing the places in front of and behind his ears that had been shaded from the summer sun, wore a new black suit, white shirt and black tie. He stood beside Emily, his hand resting possessively at her waist.
Charlie stepped to the head of the team as soon as Pack pulled them to a stop and tied them to the hitching rail. Pack jumped down, reached to encircle Mara's narrow waist with both hands, and lifted her gently to the ground. He handled her as if she were a piece of priceless china. His face and his smile were the same, but Mara could feel his anxiety. It prevented her from wholeheartedly enjoying the occasion.
Greetings were exchanged. Mara kissed Emily's cheek and exclaimed over her dress. Emily proudly showed her the bouquet of flowers that had come in on the train that morning. Mara and the twins were introduced to Zachary Quill and the young minister. Mara liked both men immediately. The twins were awed by Zachary Quill's distinguished appearance and courtly manner and the fact that he treated them as if they were adults.
After Charlie gave his sister in marriage, he stepped back and placed her hand in Sam's. Tears came to his eyes. He held his head high and blinked rapidly. Sam was uncharacteristically nervous while speaking his vows; Emily was relaxed and smiling. Sam's fingers shook as he slipped the wide gold band on Emily's finger. Hers were steady as she gripped his hand. When they were pronounced man and wife, Sam's shoulders drooped with relief while Emily smiled joyously into his face.
"You may kiss your bride, Mr. Sparks."
Sam bent and reverently kissed Emily's lips. "Hello, Mrs. Sparks," he whispered in her ear.
Charlie cleared his throat to get their attention. He kissed his sister's cheek and shook Sam's hand. Everyone seemed to laugh and talk at the same time. The twins kissed the bride after Pack told them that no brother of his would miss the opportunity to kiss a pretty woman. Zachary Quill was as much at home with the group as if he were a member of the family. He had made arrangements at the hotel for a wedding dinner and invited the young minister to join them.
Zack led the way through the main dining room and into a reception room where a long table had been set up for the wedding party. A three-tiered, white-frosted cake sat in the center of the table and at one end, a bottle of champagne in a bucket of ice. No expense had been spared to make Emily and Sam's wedding day a day to be remembered.
* * *
Mara and Pack waited on the boardwalk in front of the hotel with Emily, Charlie and Zack while Sam went to get the wagon. Charlie would be staying in town with Zack and meeting with the superintendent of construction to work over the plans for the new penitentiary. Years had slipped from Charlie's face along with the relief that he was not a hunted man. He laughed at Emily when she cautioned him to eat three good meals a day and get a good night's sleep. He told her to go home with her husband and that he expected to be an uncle before this time next year.
After the bride and groom departed, Zack and Charlie said good-bye to Mara and Pack and turned back into the hotel. The minister had left earlier for another appointment.
Mara stood beside Pack, holding onto his arm. This was the first time they had been in public together, and she was proud of him. He stood head and shoulders above the majority of the men that passed them. A few men spoke to him, eyed Mara and walked on.
"Where did the twins go?" Pack asked.
"They didn't say." Her eyes met his and she smiled, slowly, questioningly. "Let's not go home yet. I'd like to walk up and down the street, see the town, and go into the mercantile."
"All right." Pack felt a quick sliver of panic. Mara seemed pale, unsure of herself. He had never noticed that in her before.
Mara sensed his reluctance. His hand as it covered hers in the crook of his arm was cold. She wondered about it as they started down the boardwalk. Mara looked into the window as they passed the millinery. She saw herself and Pack reflected in the glass. It seemed unreal to her that she was there and that the big, handsome man beside her was a permanent part of her life.
They moved on. A woman came down the walk toward them dragging a small child in her wake. Her eyes were on Pack and the look on her face could only be pure hatred. She paused for only an instant as her bright, almost feverish eyes shifted to Mara. With a toss of her head she squeezed her nose with her thumb and forefinger as if she were offended by a terrible odor, and went on down the street.
"Well, for the love of Pete!" Mara exclaimed. "What was that about? I've never seen her before. Do you know her, Pack?"
"No. I've never seen her before either," he muttered.
"Well, she probably thought that we were someone else, but that's no excuse for rude behavior." Another part of the joy was gone from Mara's day.
They crossed the dusty side street and continued on down the walk that fronted the stores. A woman in a stiff, black bonnet came hurrying through the door of the apothecary store and ran into Mara.
"I'm sorry, dear."
"It's all right."
The woman looked past her to Pack. Instantly the smile was wiped from her face and replaced with a tight-lipped look of disapproval. Pack tipped his hat and urged Mara on down the street. His stride not only lengthened but quickened until Mara was almost running alongside him.
"Slow down, Pack. These shoes were not made for running," she said breathlessly.
"I'm sorry, honey."
Mara had no time to wonder about the second hostile encounter or to catch her breath before a screech came through the doorway of the barbershop.
"Pack! Pack, darlin'!"
Pack murmured a string of obscenities under his breath. With a firm grasp on Mara's elbow, he steered her inside, knowing that if he didn't, Nan would come barreling out of the building.
"Darlin', darlin', darlin'!"
Mara blinked her eyes to adjust them to the shade after being in the bright sunlight. A small woman with a mop of dark curls came hurling up out of the barber chair and threw herself into Pack's arms. She completely disregarded Mara, and the impact sent her staggering. To Mara's utter amazement the woman wrapped her arms around Pack's neck and her legs around his waist. She clung there, kissing him on the mouth.
"Nan! Behave yourself!" Pack said sternly. He grasped her beneath her arms and pealed her from him. She was thin, but her breasts were rounded and bounced with unrestricted buoyancy beneath the thin material of a dress that came to just below her knees. Black curls tumbled around a small, childlike face.
" 'Behave yourself, Nan,' " she mimicked. "You always say that." She giggled and tried to wrap her arms about him again. He held her away from him. Then and only then did she acknowledge Mara's presence. She backed off and looked her up and down. "Is this _her?_ "
Pack saw Mara's face, white with shock, turn red as shock receded and anger took its place.
"This is my wife. Mara Shannon, Nan Neal is a friend of mine."
"Friend?" Nan turned big, brown, accusing eyes up at Pack. Her head didn't even reach his shoulder. "Hell's bells, Pack! We ain't just friends. Ya know I love ya more 'n anythin' in the world, darlin'." Her wide, red mouth was turned down at the corners.
"I know you do, honey. But—"
"Ya love me a little. I know ya do."
"Of course, I do."
"Then why'd ya marry a prissy, namby-pamby like her? Hell, ya need a woman with guts! She don't look like she's got no more guts than a pile a cow shit." Nan moved close to Pack and snuggled her head against his shoulder.
Mara barely recovered from the nightmare of hearing her husband call another woman "honey" and confessing that he loved her "a little" before the soaring heat of her temper loosened her tongue and defrosted her muscles. She clamped her hand around the handle of the parasol that hung from her wrist, drew it back, and whacked Nan sharply on her rear. The girl jumped as if she had been shot.
"Sheeit!" she yelled, grabbing her buttocks with both hands.
"I'm not so namby-pamby that I'll take sass from a two-bit whore," Mara yelled equally as loud. "Keep your hands off my husband or I'll show you enough guts to string from here to Denver."
Nan's fists knotted on her hips, her lips open with surprise. "Well, I do declare! The _lady's_ got some piss and vinegar after all."
Pack stood in openmouthed amazement.
"And as for you, Pack Gallagher," Mara continued shrilly, "your whoring days are over as of this minute! If this is whore number two that Ace was telling me about, tell her that you'll not be calling on her again."
"Mara Shannon, honey, Nan's not—" Pack ran his hand over his face, striving to remain calm.
"I am too a whore!" Nan shouted belligerently. "I'm a damn good whore. Ask any man in town. If'n he's not been here, he's heard about me. I'm better than Miss Piss Queen at the Diamond Saloon." She turned a spiteful gaze up at Pack.
"You must be very proud of your accomplishments," Mara retorted sarcastically.
"I am. What have you got ta be proud of, honey?"
"I'm Mrs. Pack Gallagher, something you'll never be."
"Stop it!" Pack shouted. "I've looked out for Nan, and I care for her like she was my little sister. I've never slept with her."
"Ha!" Mara snorted. "Do you take me for a complete fool?"
"Tell her, Nan."
"I won't!" Nan crossed her arms over her chest and stared at Mara.
"Tell her, Nan, or I'll beat your butt," Pack threatened.
Nan turned big, sorrowful eyes up at Pack, took a deep breath that lifted her shoulders and released it.
"Oh, all right. But she makes me so mad—"
"Nan!" Pack roared.
"He's not been in my bed, but it wasn't because I didn't want him there. I'd a give him a hell of a time, wrung ever' drop outta him 'n not charged him a dime." Nan tossed her dark curls back over her thin shoulders and looked lovingly up at Pack before she turned eyes filled with dislike on Mara. "I bet your _wife_ sleeps in a sack with a drawstring on the bottom."
"I want to go home, Pack," Mara said in a voice that would brook no argument.
She turned away because it hurt too much to look at him and started for the door. She had taken only a few steps when she saw the poster on the barbershop wall. The big, dark block letters jumped out at her.
PACK GALLAGHER vs. MOOSE KILKENNY.
In the fight of the century, Pack Gallagher, Wyoming Territory champion, will be pitted against Moose Kilkenny, Kansas City pugilist who recently defeated the Union Pacific champion. London Prize Ring Rules will be observed. August 28. Tickets: $2.00.
Mara felt as if her feet were glued to the floor. She had not been so isolated at the school in Denver that she had not heard about the barbaric sport called bareknuckle boxing, where two men got into a roped-off square ring and hit each other with bare knuckles until one of them could no longer stand. She was numb and sick and shocked that Pack would participate in such a savage contest. Her husband was a prizefighter, a man considered a tough and who associated with gamblers and all manner of low people. She stared at the poster, unaware of the silence behind her until she heard Nan laugh.
"Are ya goin' to the fight, _Mrs._ Gallagher? Or do ya swoon at the sight a blood? I'll sure as hell be there rootin' for my man. Moose Kilkenny'll think he's been run through a meat grinder when Pack gets through with him! Have ya been soakin' them hands in salt water, darlin'?"
"Shut up, Nan, or I'll—"
Mara didn't hear the last of what Pack threatened. She walked swiftly out the door and down the walk toward where they had left the wagon. She had almost reached the intersection when Pack caught up with her, silently and forcefully took her elbow in his hand, and walked beside her.
The twins were sitting in the back of the wagon sucking on peppermint sticks when Mara and Pack reached it. The boys had decided to wait there and hit Pack for the loan of a dollar, but when they saw the looks on the faces of both Pack and Mara, they instinctively knew that this was not the time to ask a favor. Without speaking a word, Pack helped Mara up to the wagon seat, untied the team and drove out of town.
The ride was one of the longest, most miserable of Mara's life. Pack said one sentence to her all the way home.
"Put up your parasol."
Mara obeyed automatically. Out of the confusion in her mind, certain things were becoming clear. The man she married had not been eager for her to go to town because he had not wanted her to know that he was a pugilist and that he was not considered "respectable" by the ladies of Laramie. Pugilists were not the cream of society in Denver either. How long did he think he could keep that knowledge from her? Of course, there had to have been a conspiracy between him and the twins, for surely they knew.
The sessions in the barn with Willy were to get him ready for a prizefight with the person called Moose Kilkenny. How could she have been so stupid as not to realize that there had to be something more to pounding on a gunnysack than getting his strength back?
And the girl, Nan, who admitted to being a whore. She loved Pack, and Pack had some fondness for the girl. He had been firm with her, yet gentle. Mara glanced at him. He sat with his brows drawn together, staring straight ahead. What other surprises awaited her? Through sheer will she controlled the desire to cry.
Pack stopped at the house. Trellis came around to help Mara down, and the wagon moved on down the lane to the barn. Inside the house she went slowly up the stairs to the bedroom, took off her hat, placed it carefully in her trunk, and changed into a work dress. Her good shoes had a little mud on the toes which she wiped off before she put them away. Afterward she went downstairs, sat down on the loveseat in the parlor, and stared at the clock on the mantel. She heard Pack come in, go upstairs and then go out again.
When the clock struck seven, Mara was surprised time had gone by so fast. She went to the kitchen and lit the lamp. A fresh bucket of water sat on the wash bench. She ladled water into the washpan, washed her hands, and began peeling the skins off the new potatoes she had boiled that morning.
Pack came in and stood behind her where she was stirring the potatoes in the spider. He put his hands on her shoulders, kissed the hair above her ear, and then took his place at the table without a word. They ate a silent meal. When they had finished and she rose to put the dishes in the pan, he caught her wrist.
"Mara Shannon, this is killing me. We've got to talk about it."
"Not now, please. It's too new," she whispered raggedly.
He let go of her wrist, got to his feet and went out. He didn't come back to the house until after Mara had gone to bed. He came to the room, undressed, and got into bed beside her. He reached for her, and she didn't resist.
"Good night, sweetheart," he whispered. With her chin in the palm of his hand, he kissed her softly before he wrapped his arms about her as he did each night, her back firmly against his chest.
Mara was sure she would never sleep, but she did and awoke to the rhythmic sound of someone chopping wood. She knew Pack was not beside her even before she turned and spread her palm over the bedsheet. It was cool. He had not been beside her for some time. Mara went to the window and looked down. Pack was in the yard, stripped to the waist. Piled beside him was a stack of freshly cut wood. Mara knew that because Pack never left wood in a pile. He stacked it neatly, either against the side of the porch where it would be handy for the cookstove, or between the two elm trees beside the house.
She went to the kitchen and prepared breakfast before she stepped out onto the porch and called him. Pack dunked his head in the trough beside the well and washed his shoulders and arms before he came to the house.
"Morning," Mara said. "From the looks of that pile you've been up a long time."
"Morning." He put his arms around her, hugged her close, and kissed her. His lips were smooth and soft against hers. "That coffee smells good."
They sat across from each other. Pack ate a hearty breakfast while Mara picked at hers. He refilled the coffee cups, and when he sat down again, he reached over and covered her hand with his.
"I want to tell you about Nan."
"You don't have to. What you did before you married me is none of my business," Mara said, a tremor in her voice.
"I think it is. I'm what I am, Mara Shannon. I know that you're disappointed and hurt. Nan is hard to take all at once. I should have prepared you for meeting her and for the less than cordial reception from the women in town."
"Don't f-fight that man," she blurted, her voice shrill.
"It wouldn't make a speck of difference in their attitude if I backed out of the fight, which I won't do because I've given my word."
"Your word? For all that's holy! Do you think more of your word than you do of me?" Anger made her unreasonable.
"You mean more to me than anything in the world." He spoke quietly but firmly, his dark eyes holding hers. "I'd lie, cheat, kill, or die to keep you safe. This is another matter. I've given my word that I'll fight Moose Kilkenny and I will. I agreed to the match because it will give us the money we need to start ranching."
"We don't need money so badly that you have to debase yourself in such a manner." Tears sprang to her eyes and she lowered her lids. She would not cry! She couldn't talk or think straight if she did.
Pack's hand slid from hers when he sat back in the chair, but his eyes never left her face.
"What does debase mean?"
"It means to . . . to lower or degrade one's self."
"By whose standards, Mara Shannon? Yours?"
"Everybody's. It's what it says in the dictionary."
"I don't feel that I'm doing that by fighting in the ring. Your father told me to be my own man, make my own path. I consider this fight a job. I hold no grudge against Moose Kilkenny, and I don't believe he holds one against me. We'll be paid for a boxing exhibition."
"A sideshow, you mean." She couldn't keep the hurt out of her voice. "It's not civilized."
"It isn't civilized to push the Indians off their land, but we do it. Most people think it's all right because there are more of us than there are of them."
"But the gambling—"
"People have been gambling since the beginning of time. They bet on horses, dogs, cockfights, footraces, anything that's a contest. That's the reason why the women were so hostile to us in town yesterday. Their men will be gambling on the results of the fight."
"Why do they blame you? Why don't they blame their men?"
Pack lifted his shoulders. "It's easier to blame me."
Wildly, she said, "I don't want you to do it!"
"I can understand that, and I'm sorry if you feel humiliated because of it. But I'm going to fight this one last time. After that I promise you, sweetheart, I'll not get in the ring again."
"Why is it always the Irish that do these things?" she demanded.
"It isn't only the Irish, Mara Shannon. It's true that we Irish love a good scrap now and then, but not all prizefighters are Irish."
"I hate when they call us shanty Irish micks!"
Her pain went deep. Pack could feel it. He wished to hell Shannon had never put her in that fancy school where she'd never really been accepted because she was Irish. In spite of the rift between them, Pack was relieved to get everything out in the open. There was one more thing that she would have to be told sooner or later, but he couldn't bring himself to tell her now.
"Do you want to hear about Nan or not?" Pack asked.
Mara looked down at her tightly laced fingers resting on the table in front of her. The vacant feeling in the pit of her stomach expanded. A man like Pack would not allow a woman, even if he loved her, to press him into doing something he didn't want to do. But, Lord! She'd not planned on loving him so desperately.
Pack watched her but said nothing.
She lifted her lids and looked at him. "You can tell me if you want to."
The sadness he saw in her eyes was almost more than he could endure. He wanted to pick her up in his arms and take her to the highest mountain where she would never be hurt again. He wished he could think of something comforting to say, but the right words wouldn't come. Instead, as calmly and as honestly as he could, he told her about finding Nan in the mining camp. He told her that he had given the girl money to buy the barbershop and that she was repaying him.
"I must have been the first man who was kind to her without wanting her body as payment. The man I took her from was a mean bastard who had beaten her every day for months. When I first saw her she was a pitiful little bag of skin and bones. She's grateful, and I think she loves me like she would a brother."
Mara sat quietly looking at her hands. After awhile she heard Pack's chair scrape on the floor when he got up. He went to the water bucket for a drink, then went out the door.
That evening after supper Mara set a pan of warm saltwater on the table.
"You'd better soak your hands."
Pack looked up at her, but she had turned back to the dishpan. When she was ready to go upstairs, she rested her hand briefly on his shoulder as she passed behind him. He sighed deeply. He recognized her touch for what it was. It was not a loving caress, but a gesture of resignation.
# Chapter
TWENTY-ONE
The thought that pounded in Mara's head while she went through the motions of cleaning, cooking, sewing, washing and ironing was that she had married a modern-day gladiator. On August 28 her husband would enter an arena much as they had in ancient Rome. He was one of a class of men who fought other men in public for the entertainment of spectators. How could it be called a sport? It was barbaric and uncivilized.
Pack and Willy spent several hours each day getting ready for the boxing match. Mara never went to the barn or the bunkhouse, but occasionally she went to the garden to pick beans or dig a few potatoes. When she came downstairs in the morning Pack would be gone. He appeared for the noon meal and again for supper. The twins, excited about the coming contest between their brother and the unknown Moose Kilkenny, kept their distance.
Mara had retreated behind a wall of polite silence that was not conducive to teasing or laughter or light conversation. She took little notice of things outside the house with the exception of the flowers she had planted along the walk the day Ace January had come to the house. She tended then carefully.
Every day or so a man would ride out from town and spend several hours with Pack either in the barn or the bunkhouse. He never brought the visitors to the house. Mara wondered if the visits had something to do with the boxing match, but she didn't ask.
Most evenings Pack sat on the porch with her while daylight faded. They stared off toward the mountains and occasionally talked about nothing that was important to either of them. The only time the barriers between them were down, and even then not completely, was in the dark of the night while they were in bed. He held her, kissed her, loved her and made sure that she enjoyed the union as much as he. Their bodies communicated in a way their minds could not. But when morning came, they were again polite strangers.
* * *
The last week of August arrived and with it the blistering heat of late summer.
"I'm going into town tomorrow and I'll spend the night there," Pack said one evening while they were watching the sky darken. He waited for Mara to comment on that announcement and when she didn't he said, "On the way, I'll take you over to stay with Emily."
"I'd rather stay here."
"You know I don't want to leave you here alone, Mara Shannon."
"For heaven's sake! Do we have to go through that again? I'll be all right here with Steamboat if he's as good with a gun as the twins say he is. And to hear Willy tell it, he's no slouch either."
"Willy's boast is true. That old man can hold his own, but he'll be in town with me. Emily will be at home. I thought it would give you a chance to get away from the house for awhile."
"That's very thoughtful of you, but I've things to do here."
"The boys want to go."
"I'm not surprised. They're at an age where a barbaric, bloody contest between two _gladiators_ is exciting to them."
"Mara Shannon, it's not—"
"No?" She threw up her hands. "I don't want to talk about it! I'm going to wash the quilts and blankets if it's a good drying day."
"You're wearing yourself out, Mara Shannon. You've lost weight these last few weeks. Pretty soon I'll not be able to find you in the bed." Pack attempted humor because he didn't know what else to say.
"I'm going to pickle some string beans, make chow chow and start a barrel of vinegar." She spoke absently, as if her mind were a million miles away.
Pack watched her. Her head was tilted back against the porch post, her profile and the arch of her neck clearly defined. Of late her cheekbones were a little more prominent, her eyes less bright. Those things came with hard work and sleepless nights. Her face was the same, but it seldom changed expressions.
It was killing him to be with her and not have the intimacy they had shared those few short weeks in early summer. At that time he had been as near to heaven as he ever hoped to be. Each day now the distance between them seemed to widen. She didn't nag, question or demand. She didn't laugh or smile or make unnecessary conversation either. She was sick with disappointment. He could see it in her eyes.
"It's cooler now. I think I'll go to bed."
Pack didn't reply. It was the same each night. He sat alone, dealing with his own misery while she got ready for bed. After awhile he would follow, slip into the bed like an anonymous, faceless lover, and take her in his arms. No matter how tired he was or how determined he was not to give way to his desire, his body would leap in response to the touch of hers, and he would love her until they were both drained and exhausted.
It all boiled down to one thing, Pack concluded as he looked up at the stars. Mara Shannon's love didn't include Pack, the bareknuckle boxer who was going to debase himself and humiliate her by climbing into the ring in two days' time. It didn't include the man who had a sisterly love for a little whore who had never known kindness, and her love wasn't for Pack, the man who was held in contempt by the "Laramie Ladies."
How in the hell was he going to make it through the next thirty years living with her, but without her? She was his life.
With a long stick Mara punched the quilts down into the soapy water again and again, going from one washtub to the other. It was an hour after sunup and she had two quilts in each tub and four blankets hung on the line. She was wet from her bosom to her knees. The twins had helped her fill the washtubs and now they were getting ready to leave for town.
Already she was exhausted by the heat and the labor. She poked the quilts down in the water one last time, left the stick in the washtub, and went to the well to draw up a fresh bucket of water. She carried the bucket to the shade of the back porch, wiped her face on her already wet apron, and drank a dipperful of water.
A lone rider was coming up the lane from the road. At first Mara didn't pay much attention, thinking the man was just passing through. She opened the screen door to go into the kitchen. She wasn't frightened, but she didn't like being caught looking so untidy.
"Cousin Mara."
The call stopped her. She squinted her eyes to get a better look at the rider and recognized him just seconds before he rode into the yard. Cullen removed his hat and wiped his forehead with his shirt sleeve. He had grown a mustache since she had seen him last, and he looked leaner, harder. When he smiled, his teeth showed white against his deeply tanned face. The smile was not meant to be friendly, and Mara knew it for what it was: a lecherous leer.
"You're lookin' mighty purty today, Cousin Mara." His voice was heavy with sarcasm. "To see you like this was worth every hot, dusty mile I rode to get here."
"What do you want, Cullen?"
"Do I have to be wantin' somethin'? Ain't I welcome to see my pa 'n brothers 'n my purty cousin?"
"Your father and the boys are down at the bunkhouse."
Even as she spoke Cullen was stepping down from his horse. He dropped the reins, and the ground-tied trained animal stood motionless, his nostrils flaring at the smell of the water. Cullen took the dipper from the bucket, his eyes still on Mara, and drank.
"Your horse needs water."
"I'm hungry. Fix me somethin' to eat, Cousin Mara."
"You can get something at the cookshack."
"I want to eat here." He walked into the house.
"I didn't invite you into my house, Cullen," Mara said, following him.
Cullen stood in the kitchen and looked around. "My, ya got it fixed up purty fancy, ain't ya?"
"Leave. I don't want you here."
"Chairs 'n' a oilcloth for the table," he mused as he grasped the round knob on the back of one of the chairs and rocked it.
"Steamboat will feed you before you leave," Mara said pointedly.
Cullen threw his hat into the corner and sat down at the table. "You fix me somethin'."
"Pack will be back soon. He'll tear you up if he catches you here."
"That's a pile a shit, Cousin Mara. He spent the night in town with the little whore from the barbershop. And today Moose Kilkenny will tear him up, scramble his brains and cripple him for life."
"You're lying."
"About what? The whore or the fight?"
"Both."
Cullen lifted his shoulders and grinned. "If that's what you want to think, it's all right with me. Fix me a meal 'n I just might tell ya what I found out 'bout yore dear papa while I was in Denver."
"I don't want to hear anything you have to say, but I'll fix you a meal to get rid of you."
"You'll want to hear this. Yes, sirree bobtail, you'll want to hear how you got passed over by your old man."
Mara set out the meat she had cooked the day before, bread, butter and boiled eggs.
"Miss High-and-Mighty McCall ain't got a pot to piss in," Cullen remarked and laughed at the way she clamped her jaws together and glared at him. "Chaw on that news while I eat, Cousin Mara."
Travor came bounding in the door. "I thought that was your horse."
"Howdy, little brother. Sit down. Cousin Mara invited me to breakfast." Cullen cut off a portion of meat and took a big bite. "Get me some coffee, Mara."
"I'll not fire up the cookstove. You can drink what is left." She poured the lukewarm coffee in a cup and set it on the table within his reach.
"Purty persnickety for a poor relation, ain't she, Trav?"
"Are you here to cause trouble, Cullen?"
"Naw, Trav. I just wanted ta see my pa 'n my brothers afore I head out for Californy."
"Pa's in the shed working on the harnesses."
"Then switch yore tail down there 'n tell him I'm here."
"Leave Mara Shannon alone, Cullen. Pack'll stomp you in the ground if you don't."
"Pack's in town gettin' stomped, little brother. I'll stomp yore ass in the ground if you don't do what I tell you."
"Go on, Travor," Mara said calmly.
Travor stood hesitantly in the doorway for a moment. Then he went out, slamming the screen door behind him. Cullen laughed with his mouth full. Mara turned away in disgust.
"Sit down, Cousin. I'll tell ya all about my trip to Denver. I got a whole parcel a news." Mara sat down at the far end of the table. Cullen laughed again. "Yo're just dyin' to know what I found out. Ain't that right? Yo're so nosey, I almost think yore kin to ole Brita instead a Pa."
"Say what you've come to say and stop playing your stupid games." Mara's temper flared as she spoke.
"Now, now, now," he said soothingly. "Don't get upset. I need what money ya got on hand, Cousin Mara, afore I set about rememberin' anythin' 'bout that trip to Denver."
"What?" Mara rose up out of her seat.
"I'm headin' for Californy, like I said. I need money."
"Then go. I'll be glad to see the last of you."
"I jist couldn't believe yore fine, upstandin' papa would go through all that money he got from sellin' his claim."
As Cullen's eyes bored into Mara's, she felt a numbness in her chest. He was mean and evil, and he cared for no one but himself. But he was smart enough to come here when he was certain Pack would be away.
"I'll give you what I have and I want you to leave. I don't want to hear anything you've got to say." His laughter followed her up the stairs. Mara opened her trunk and took out the twenty-two dollars she had brought with her from the school. She dropped four dollars back in the trunk, took the rest downstairs and threw it down on the table. "This is all I have. Take it and go."
"Jesus Christ! Eighteen pukin' dollars! Ole Pack holdin' out on ya, Cousin? If I find yo're holdin' out on me—" His voice carried a threat.
The door opened and Aubrey stood there. Travor crowded in behind him.
"Howdy, Pa. The family black sheep's come home."
"How be ye, son?" Aubrey's eyes went to the money Cullen was stuffing in his pocket, but he didn't comment on it.
"Fair to middlin', Pa. Where's Trell?"
"Waterin' yore horse. The poor beastie was fair in need. 'Tis no way to be treatin' a good horse."
"Sit down, Pa. Have ya ate? Mara Shannon'll fix ya somethin'. Fix my pa some breakfast, cousin."
"Cousin Aubrey ate breakfast hours ago. I want you out of here, Cullen. You can talk to your father and the boys outside."
"Ain't she the limit, Pa? Ya'd think she was queen a the roost. I come to tell her 'bout ole Shannon's will, but she don't want to hear it." Cullen laughed in a boastful way that made Mara detest him all the more.
"Ye best be shuttin' yer mouth 'bout it 'n bein' on yer way, son." Aubrey's voice was stronger and more positive than Mara had heard it before.
"Ya givin' me the push-off, Pa?"
"I dinna want ye to be makin' trouble for Mara Shannon. Me 'n the boys has a good place here, 'n we be treated fair."
Cullen's eyes narrowed as his lips curled downward. "You willin' to kiss Pack's ass to have a roof over yore head? What happened to yore pride, Pa?"
"I'm thinkin' I finally found it. Say what ye've come to say, Cullen."
"I was down in Denver 'n went to see a lawyer feller named Randolph. I seen his name on a letter that come here to ya. 'Course I know ya can't read a line," Cullen said with a sneer in his voice. "Ole Brita'd only tell ya what she wanted ya to know. I got to thinkin' Shannon might a left somethin' to us 'n the spiteful ole bitch didn't tell us."
"Brita dinna lie!"
"Ah, shit, Pa. She'd spit on Christ if it'd helped that bastard!"
"Hush yer mouth, Cullen," Aubrey commanded harshly.
"Whata ya know, boys? Our pa's gettin' guts!" Cullen's eyes darted to Mara. "I ain't hushin', cause I want this prissy ass woman with her nose in the air, who come here a stirrin' things up, to know that her pa didn't think she was so much. He cut her outta his will 'n left this land 'n everythin' on it to Pack Gallagher! Her name ain't on the papers a'tall!"
Mara, standing behind a chair, held onto the knobs on the back. It took a few seconds for the import of Cullen's words to penetrate her mind. The smile on his lips and in his eyes was spiteful. She tore her eyes away from his gloating face and looked at Aubrey. She waited for him to deny what his son had said. He was shaking his head sadly and looking at Cullen as if he were seeing him for the first time.
"Ye've got a mean streak in ye, son."
"Papa wouldn't do that!" Mara said stoutly. "Cousin Aubrey, you know Papa wouldn't do that."
"Aye, lass. 'Tis true. I dinna know till after ye left the school 'n come here. Brita told me the land 'n all was Pack's and he'd a put us out long ago if not fer her 'n the boys."
Mara pulled the chair out and sat down.
"You got all that school learnin', cousin, but yore just _poor_ shanty Irish like the rest a us. This house 'n everythin' in it ain't yores. Yo're payin' to stay here by sleepin' with a _prizefighter._ Them high mucks in town call him Irish trash. How's he in bed, cousin? Whores say he's hung like a bull 'n can outlast a two-peckered stallion."
"Shut up, Cullen!" Travor shouted. "You've done your dirt. Why don't you just shut up?"
Cullen turned a mean gaze on the young boy. "Ain't you forgettin' who yo're talkin' to, boy? Watch yore mouth or ya'll be spittin' teeth."
Mara jumped to her feet. "Get out!" she shouted.
"What're ya all up in the air for, Cousin Mara?" Cullen stood, his hands palms down on the table.
"I want you out of my house!"
"Yore house?" He cocked his head to one side. "I've been ponderin' on why yore papa cut ya out 'n left it all to Pack. There ain't but one reason I can think of. Ya warn't old Shannon's kid. I'm thinkin' Pack was. Him 'n Pack was mighty thick. Shannon McCall could a had the hards for crippled ole Brita." His lips curled in a travesty of a smile. "Now that'll give ya somethin' to think about for awhile."
Fury rippled through Mara, turning her emerald eyes dark, loosening the violence that had seethed just below the surface since he had arrived. She took two long strides and swung. Her palm connected sharply with Cullen's cheek.
He grabbed her wrist and bent her arm backward.
"Ya damn uppity bitch, I'll show what a real man—"
"Let go of her!" Travor yelled.
The young boy made a flying leap and landed on Cullen's back. Trellis, from beside the door, tackled Cullen from the front. Beneath the weight of the two boys, Cullen let go of Mara's arm and went down. Chairs went crashing to the floor. The oilcloth slipped and Mara grabbed the lamp before it fell from the table.
"Here now! Here now! Stop! Ye hear?" Aubrey pulled first at Travor and then Trellis.
Eyes wide with the horror, Mara knew that if she'd had the strength she would have killed Cullen. She stood with her back against the cookstove, her hands on her cheeks. Fighting back waves of nausea and tears, she watched as the boys were pulled off their older brother. Cullen got to his feet. For a long moment he stared at Mara with pure hatred in his eyes before he picked up his hat and stomped out of the house. Aubrey and the twins followed close behind him.
Watching from the window, it seemed certain to Mara that Cullen was going to attack the boys. He went as far as to shove one boy against the other, but the twins stood their ground shoulder to shoulder, and if Mara hadn't been so upset over all that had taken place she would have been terribly proud of them. Cullen shouted something and shook his finger in his father's face. After a few minutes of hot exchange, Cullen mounted his horse. He pointed the animal down the lane and kicked him into a run.
Mara was sitting at the kitchen table with her head on her arms when she heard the screen door open. She looked up to see Aubrey standing there.
"He's gone, lass. 'Tis sorry I am that he come."
"Come sit down, Aubrey. I just can't believe that Papa would do this to me."
"He had his reasons, to be sure, lass. I just not be knowin' the meanness in Cullen." Aubrey sat down at the table and clasped his hands in front of him. "What he said 'bout Shannon 'n Brita be lies to hurt you. Shannon be lovin' Colleen to his dyin' day."
"I know that. It made me so angry the way he talked about Brita. Cousin Aubrey, why did you and Brita come to the school and tell me you were my guardians and let me think you were going to take care of my property until I could manage it myself?"
" 'Twas Pack's plan. He said it was a way for his mother 'n the boys to have a home. Ye see, lass, we be down 'n out. Pack come to say Shannon had passed on 'n his place in the Wyoming Territory would go to wrack 'n ruin without folks on it. I was to bring Brita 'n the boys 'n Cullen too. Cullen was not so wild then."
"But you and Cullen hate Pack."
"Not so much hate, lass, as resent. He come from time to time, tellin' us do this, do that. I not be knowin' he be the rightful owner, just be thinkin' he be puttin' his bill in. Brita had sworn not to tell."
Wave after wave of humiliation washed over Mara. She had come here thinking this was _her_ home. She had even offered half of the land to Pack if he would marry her. How was she going to face him?
"Cullen said everything. Papa had to leave me enough to pay for my schooling. How else could I have stayed there?"
"I not be knowin' 'bout that. There be no cash money here to be payin' fer a fancy school. 'Twas Cullen's idea to board men on the run, lass. 'Tis hard to say, but I not be man enough to stand agin him, whiskey bein' me best friend. Brita be knowin' it, God bless her soul."
"Being able to admit it shows that you're more of a man than you think you are. Could it all be a mistake, Cousin Aubrey?" she asked hopefully.
" 'Tis true as I know it, Mara Shannon. There be a way to know if yer not wantin' to ask Pack. In Brita's box under the bed ye would be findin' letters."
"The wooden box Pack said his father made while still in Ireland?"
"Aye. That be the one. The key is on a nail behind the bureau, or else it was. Brita did the readin', me not bein' able to read a line. Sure 'n 'tis glad I am the boys be learnin'." Aubrey got up from the table. "Pack be a fair man, lass. He took a hard hand to me at first, but 'twas needed. I be sober now 'n lookin' after me boys. 'Twas what Brita always wanted."
"They're good boys. Not at all like Cullen."
"Aye. They want to be off to town. Steamboat and meself will be keepin' a eye out here, lassie. Yer not to worry. Cullen won't be back."
"Tell the boys I don't want Pack to know he was here."
"Aye. He be havin' enough on his mind this day."
When she was alone, Mara dropped her head down on her arms that rested on the table. She felt betrayed. She began to shake as if she had a chill, and then numbness settled over her. It was an effort to swallow, to blink her eyes, and especially to think beyond one thought. She had come here thinking this was her home and that she had every right to be there. She had refused to leave when Pack ordered her to go, and had bullied and shamed him into marrying her by offering him one half of his own property. She moaned aloud as if she were in great pain.
* * *
In the early dawn the streets of Laramie were empty of horses and wagons. No one was about except for a couple of drunks sleeping beneath a stairway that hugged the side of a building. The air was crisp and cool. Pack breathed deeply and moved his shoulders in a circular motion to loosen the muscles. His thoughts were not of the fight that would take place in less than six hours, but of his wife at home. He wondered if she was awake, if she was thinking of him, and if she had missed him during the night as much as he had missed her. The twins would be in this morning; he wondered if she would send a message with them.
The weeks had passed slowly while he trained for the fight. Mara Shannon had not come to the barn to watch him work out, nor had she nagged at him about the coming match. She had ignored him except at the times when they ate a meal together or at night when she responded to his loving. When he left her the day before, she had returned his kiss with a little more fervor than he had expected, but he could read nothing of consequence in that.
He no longer had to dread that she would find out he was a prizefighter, but he did worry about what would happen when he told her about Shannon's will.
Pack and Willy had arrived in Laramie at dusk, had supper with Charlie and Zack, and had spent the night at the Railroad Hotel. Sam and Zack would keep an eye on the crowd that could become unruly and try to get to the fighters if they were not pleased with a decision. Pack had gone by the Rivers' place on his way to town. It was a pleasure to watch Emily's face when she looked at her husband. And Pack was surprised to see Sam's usually grim face so relaxed and smiling. Both of them had found together what they needed to make them happy.
The clear sky promised a fine day. Pack didn't care what kind of day it was. He wanted the match over. He wanted to go home with the money it would take to give him and Mara Shannon a good start at ranching. In order to do that, he had to win the fight. He didn't dare be overconfident. Moose Kilkenny was a fighting man and strong as a bull. His weakness was good Irish whiskey. Pack had seen Moose fight. He was what Pack considered a wrestling type of fighter. He would try to hold a man with one arm while hitting him with the other if he got the chance. Moose was experienced, but so was he. He would pace himself and make Moose do most of the work in the early rounds. He would save himself, wait for his chance, and be careful not to be caught flat-footed. If he did that he was confident he would win. He had bet one-half of his money in Flagg's bank on himself. It was his last fight, and the first bet he had ever placed on himself to win.
He walked past the field where the ring had been set up next to the Kosy Kitty Saloon. Plank seats had been tiered against the building on one side and against the corral fence on the other. Along the back and the front, lengths of canvas had been stretched to keep the freeloaders from watching the fight without paying. Herman Flagg expected a standing-room-only crowd. Pack hoped he was right. The larger the crowd, the more money for him.
Pack walked back toward the hotel, his footsteps echoing hollowly on the boardwalk. Later in the day the Laramie Ladies would be marching and singing and protesting the match. They had posted signs calling for a vote to outlaw boxing because it was a savage, primitive custom.
Good luck, ladies, Pack mused silently. Contests of strength and fighting skills had been going on for centuries.
Boxing was becoming a popular spectator sport back East where the fighters wore gloves. Pack didn't think the ladies had much of a chance outlawing it if a vote were taken. Although women were allowed a vote, here in the territory men outnumbered them two to one.
The bartender at the Diamond Saloon came out and stood on the walk waiting for Pack.
"Mornin', Pack. How do you feel?"
"I feel fine. I'm stretching my legs before breakfast."
"Have you seen Kilkenny?"
"No. I'll see him soon enough."
"I hear he's turned mean lately. His last fight ended nasty when he tried to gouge a man's eyes out. Watch him. He'll do it if he gets a chance. There's a lot ridin' on this fight for him."
"I'll watch it. Thanks."
"One more thing. There's a gang of toughs in town betting on Moose. If I were you I'd stay off the street until fight time."
"I intend to do just that." Pack grinned. "Thanks again, Boston."
Pack walked on. Many of his teamster friends had come to town to see him fight. It was only natural that Moose had a following too. News of this match had brought men in from all over the territory. Zachary Quill had said that even a newspaper man had come up from the _Denver Post._
Back at the hotel, Pack went directly to the kitchen for his breakfast, an arrangement Herman Flagg had made with the management. Willy was waiting for him. They ate steak and eggs, then went to the room to wait until fight time.
A loud, boisterous crowd had gathered when Pack, Charlie and Willy ducked into the canvas-enclosed dressing room that had been assigned to them. Pack wore flat-soled shoes made of soft black leather laced up above his ankles. His blue tights fit his legs and muscled thighs like a second skin and ended at his waist, leaving the rest of him bare when he removed his shirt.
"Odds are three to one cause a the beatin' ya took by them toughs," Willy said. "They ain't thinkin' ya've had time to get in shape."
"They're going to get a surprise, huh, Willy?"
The old man grinned. "I'd a not bet a hundred on ya if I thought different." He began to rub Pack's shoulders.
"Don't let Moose get a bear hug on you," Charlie cautioned. "A fellow told me and Zack that he'll get up close so the referee can't see his hand and he'll grab your balls."
"He used to be a pretty square boxer. What's happened to him?"
"He's slipping and knows it. He's desperate to stay in the ring."
"And I'm desperate to get out."
The sound of a bell sent Willy to the peekhole in the canvas. "Big crowd. Lots of soldiers from the fort," he commented before the bell rang again.
"May I have your attention, please! Gentlemen!" The crowd gradually quieted so they could hear.
"It's the sergeant that refereed before." Willy looked over his shoulder at Pack.
"Hagg said he'd be the one. He's a fair man."
"Take a look at what's on the roof of the Kitty Saloon," the referee shouted, and the crowd turned to look. Four men stood on the roof with rifles in their hands, Sam and Zack among them. "These men have been instructed to shoot any man who attempts to lay hands on either of the fighters." The referee stopped speaking when his voice was drowned out by jeering from the crowd.
"There's a tough crowd here," Charlie said softly. "Railroad workers, soldiers, gamblers and town toughs. I see some townsmen and even a few women."
"This boxing match," the referee yelled, "is sanctioned by the Midwest Boxing Association, headquartered in Kansas City. London Prize Ring rules will apply. Any part of a man's body, other than the soles of his feet, that touches the floor of the ring will be considered a knockdown and ends the round. A thirty-second rest will follow with an additional eight seconds to allow the fighters to come to the center of the ring. Butting, gouging, hitting below the belt and kicking will result in a forfeit. A winner will be declared when one man fails to come to scratch within ten seconds of time called for the next round."
"Are ya ready, Pack?" Willy was always more nervous than Pack before a match.
"I'm ready. I'm anxious to get it over."
The referee was shouting through a roughly made megaphone.
"Moose Kilkenny, winner of fifteen fights, loser of three, will be wearing black tights."
Wild yells from Kilkenny's backers and jeers from Pack's announced Kilkenny's entry into the ring.
"Pack Gallagher, the challenger, recently defeated Black Bob Mason in a match that lasted three rounds. He has won ten fights and lost none. He'll be wearing blue tights."
A deafening roar erupted from the crowd. Pack deliberately waited a few seconds before he walked out to the ring. Friends shouted encouragement, foes shouted insults. He vaulted up onto the platform and ducked under the rope.
The referee brought both men to the center of the ring. Moose Kilkenny's body was thick, hairy and powerful. Pack, a good five or six years younger than his opponent, stood slightly taller, slimmer in the waist and even more muscled in the shoulders and biceps.
In a loud voice the referee announced that Pack's nails were too long and would have to be trimmed. An angry hiss came from Kilkenny's backers. Moose grinned and waved. His grin changed to a scowl, however, when the referee called for a bucket of water after he examined Moose's hands and ran his fingers over knuckles that were as hard and rough as gravel. Amid loud, obscene complaints from the crowd, the referee scrubbed Moose's hands with a brush, removing a film of hard, dried dirt mixed with glue. When he finished he said a few loud, uncomplimentary words about a man who would take unfair advantage, gave Moose time to dry his hands and sent him to his corner.
The tough old sergeant held up his hands for silence, his eyes on the timekeeper who sat at ringside. At a signal from him, the referee lowered his arms and yelled, "Time!"
# Chapter
TWENTY-TWO
When Mara got up from the chair, it was so fast that the chair rocked back on two legs before it righted itself. She hurried to the bedroom before she had a chance to change her mind and shoved the bureau out from the wall. The iron key was there on a nail just as Aubrey had said. She dropped to her knees beside the bed and pulled out the wooden box. Without pause, she fitted the key into the keyhole, turned it and lifted the lid.
One part of her said it was wrong to read the letters. The other part of her said she couldn't live if she didn't. She closed her mind to what was right or wrong about it and lifted out a packet of letters tied with a ribbon. They were addressed to Brita. She laid them aside and took out another packet. The first one was addressed to Mr. Jack Gallagher. She pulled the letter from the envelope and quickly scanned it. One paragraph caught her eye and she read it slowly.
Jack Gallagher, also known as Pack Gallagher: This is to inform you that you are the sole beneficiary of the estate of Shannon McCall.
Please call at my office at your earliest convenience.
James Randolph, Attorney at Law.
Feeling sick inside, Mara held the envelope close to her mouth, blew into the end to open it and slipped the folded paper back inside. _It was true. Her father had left everything to Pack._ Because of her disappointment, she almost didn't read the next letter, but she opened it because it was also from the attorney and addressed to Pack in care of Mrs. Aubrey McCall.
The funds in the account for Miss Mara Shannon McCall are depleted. Unless payment is made to Miss Fillamore by November 12, Miss McCall will be asked to leave the school. Please advise.
Slowly, like someone in a trance, she picked up the next letter and began to read.
Angus Long, the fight promoter, sent the prize money directly to me as per your instructions. The amount will cover Miss McCall's tuition until January 10.
Mara felt as if the breath were being squeezed from her lungs. She feverishly scanned the next six letters from the attorney. The contents were similar. The fight promoters had sent money. The last letter from the attorney was different.
Miss Fillamore has informed me that Miss McCall will be teaching at the school immediately upon graduation. She will receive room and board and a small remuneration. Please advise if the money I am holding for her personal expenses is to be put into her personal account as in the past.
Tears began to slide down Mara's cheeks as the events of the past few years fell into place. Pack had been the one who had paid for her schooling. He had earned the money by fighting in the prize ring.
Miss Fillamore's neat, familiar handwriting was on several small envelopes. Tears fell on Mara's hands as she opened each of the letters and scanned them one by one.
. . .Miss McCall was pleased with your generous gift. She is the only girl here who owns an ivory-handled hairbrush.
Each of the following letters was to acknowledge a gift; the mirror, the comb, the hair saver, the shawl, the coat. The last letter was dated a few days after she had graduated.
The brooch was greatly appreciated. I must congratulate you on the selection. It is a beautiful piece. It was considerate of you to attend the graduation ceremony even though Miss McCall was unaware of your presence.
Mara's eyes were so blurred with tears that she could no longer read. She returned the letters to the box, locked it and slipped it under the bed. And then slowly, like an old and feeble woman, she crawled upon the bed, the key clutched in her hand. Sobs tore from her throat. Locked in her misery, she cried for a long time.
All of her treasures were gifts from Pack. He was the one who had seen to it that she had a gift at Christmas, not Miss Fillamore. How many times had he stood and taken the punishment of another man's fists in order to pay for them? How many times had he been hurt as he was the day she found him lying along the road? To think of what he must have suffered was almost more than she could bear.
She continued to cry even after she had no more tears.
* * *
It was the golden time of the day. The sun had gone down behind the mountains to the west and the light was fading from the sky. The first thing Pack saw when he and the twins rode up the lane toward the house was Aubrey at the washtubs wringing out the quilts and putting them on the line. A pressure began to build in his chest as his eyes searched for Mara Shannon and didn't find her. His instincts told him that something was wrong. Mara Shannon wouldn't leave her washing unless she couldn't do it herself. He kicked his tired horse into a trot and swung down as soon as he reached the yard.
"Where's Mara Shannon?" he demanded.
"In the house." Aubrey looked at Trellis and the boy shook his head.
"Is she sick?"
"Not that I be knowin'. "
Pack started for the house.
"Hold fer just a minute," Aubrey said. "There's somethin' ye should be knowin'."
"Well?" Pack swung around. His face was bruised, one of his eyes was almost swollen shut. He was bone weary and short of patience.
"Cullen was here."
"Cullen? Goddamn it! If he hurt her I'll kill him."
"He didn't hurt her," Trellis said quickly. "He had come and gone before we left for town."
"Why didn't you tell me?" Pack turned his fury on his young brothers.
"It wouldn't a done no good. You'd a just worried."
"Who decided that? Don't ever hold back anything from me when it concerns my wife."
"Dinna be layin' it to the lads, Pack. The lassie be sayin' that ye had enough on yer mind wid the fight 'n all. She dinna want yer to be worryin'."
"Why, all of a sudden, is everyone so concerned about worrying me?"
"There be more, Pack. Cullen be tellin' the lass about her pa's will."
"Jesus, my God! How did he find out about that?"
"He was in Denver 'n looked up a man named Randolph." Trellis spoke hastily, not wanting his father to stand the brunt of Pack's anger alone.
"James wouldn't have told him anything. Cullen probably went to the public records."
"The lass is hurtin'." Aubrey stood holding the wet quilt, water running down and making a puddle at his feet.
"Cullen's gone to Californy. He won't be back." Travor led his horse and Pack's to the water troughs. "I'll take care of your horse, Pack."
"Thanks, Trav. Keep an eye out for Willy. He'll be along as soon as he sobers up enough to get on his horse." Pack's hand was on the screen door; his eyes snared Aubrey's. "If Cullen comes back, he'll wish to hell he had never set eyes on me!"
The older man nodded.
The table was set for supper. Pack dropped his hat on a kitchen chair and went through to the parlor. The lamp on the mantel cast a glow over Mara where she sat as still as a statue on the loveseat, her hands clasped in her lap. Her face was pale and strained, with dark shadows beneath her eyes. Against her almost colorless skin her hair glowed in the lamplight like dying embers.
"Mara Shannon? Are you sick?" He sat beside her on the loveseat. She remained motionless, her eyes fastened to his face. Her skin was almost cold to his touch. "What's wrong, honey?" He put a finger against her cheek.
"Is it ov—" Her voice broke. She swallowed and tried again. "Is it over?"
"It's over."
"Are you all right?"
"Bruised and a little tired. Nothing that being here with you won't cure."
"Your poor face," she whispered. "Let me see your hands." She took one of his hands in both of hers and ran her fingers over his cut and swollen knuckles. "I warmed the ointment—" She bent her head and brought his hand to her lips. When she looked up, her eyes were filled with tears.
Deeply touched, Pack lifted her up in his arms and pulled her onto his lap. She wrapped her arms about him and buried her face in his shoulder.
"I'm so ashamed," she managed to say without giving way to the sobs welling up inside her.
"About what, sweetheart? Aubrey said Cullen was here. What did he say that upset you so much? Was it about your papa's will?"
"He said that Papa left everything to you. I don't really care about that, but—" She had to swallow before she could go on.
"Honey, Shannon wanted to make sure you'd not be cheated out of what was yours if something happened to him before you were of legal age. Aubrey was your next of kin, and Shannon was afraid he'd fiddle everything away before you were old enough to take charge of it."
"And he would have, or he'd have let Cullen."
"By leaving it in my name, your father made sure Aubrey couldn't touch it. I've been keeping it for you. It's all yours anytime you want to go to Denver to sign the papers."
"I don't want it. I just want to be here, with you. Pack—" She opened her hand and showed him the key to the box under the bed. She wound her arms around him and held him as tight as she could. He could feel her lips move against his neck when she spoke. "I read the letters."
He didn't know what to say. He held her for a long time, hoping to quiet his pounding heart, wanting and loving her in silence. After awhile she moved her face so her lips were near his ear and they were cheek to cheek.
"I love you." Her voice was merely a breath in his ear.
Deep down inside Pack something warm began to blossom and grow. He felt as if he had been given the world. She lay soft and relaxed against him, her breasts pressed to his chest. With his eyes closed he bowed his head and buried his cut and bruised face in her hair.
"And I love you," he whispered. "I can't remember a time when I didn't love you. Shannon knew it. I think he was hoping that someday you'd love me back."
She moved her lips away from his ear and he could feel them against his cheek. Her sensitive fingertips moved along the line of his jaw, stroking gently.
"I do love you, and I've been so . . . awful. I don't know how you can still love me."
He was overwhelmed with a feeling of love that went far beyond physical desire. Her lips were indescribably sweet as they searched for his. The kisses they exchanged were soft, gentle and full of sweetness. When she pulled her mouth away, he kissed her eyes, nose and temples, then tantalized the corners of her mouth.
"You're easy to love, sweetheart."
"If you've loved me for a long time, why didn't you want to marry me?" Her palms held his cheeks while she moved her head back to look at him.
He looked at her for a long while, loving the shape of her face, her mouth, loving and wanting all of her, and trying to think of the right words to say. His fingers smoothed the hair back from her wet forehead and then moved to behind her ear to stroke gently.
"Because I didn't want you to be ashamed of your husband, and looked down on because you were my wife."
She drew in a great trembling breath. "I shamed myself by behaving the way I did. Can you ever forgive me?" She gazed at him with big, solemn eyes that slowly filled with tears.
He pulled her close again. "Sweetheart, you don't need my forgiveness. I should have told you about the will and about me being a prizefighter before we were wed. I should have given you a chance to change your mind, but it all happened so quickly, I hardly had time to think. I wanted you so bad—"
"I loved you even then, but I was too stubborn to admit it." She leaned back so that she could see his face. "Why did you want me to leave after Brita died?"
"I wanted you to have a taste of town life while I got rid of Cullen. Then I was going to explain things to you and you could have decided what you wanted to do."
She ran a finger over his puffed mouth and kissed his bruised cheekbone.
"Thank you for paying Miss Fillamore so I could stay in school. Thank you for my Christmas presents." She swallowed, afraid she'd not be able to say all she wanted to say. "Thank you for coming to see me graduate. I wish I had known you were there. I thought I was the only one who didn't . . . have someone." Tears she could hold back no longer flowed freely.
"You were as pretty as a picture in your white dress," he whispered. "I couldn't keep my eyes off you."
"Why did you come?"
"To look at my girl," he said simply.
"I love you." Her hand stroked the bruised flesh of his cheek gently. "I can't bear the thought of you being hurt, of that man . . . hitting you."
"I hurt him more than he hurt me, sweetheart."
"Please don't do it again."
"I won't. I've already promised you that." He smoothed the hair back from her face. "Don't you want to know if I won?"
"I knew you'd win. I never doubted it for a minute." Her brows drew together in a worried frown. "It was the longest day of my life," she whispered.
"Honey, let's go to bed."
Her emerald eyes searched his face. "Your supper is ready, and I made your favorite—everyday cake."
"I'm not hungry for supper. I want to go to bed . . . with you."
At first there was nothing; then a smile that started at the corners of her lips spread into an impish grin.
"We've had some pretty good fights, haven't we?"
"Aye. And I'm thinking we'll have more, Mara _Stubborn_ Gallagher." His laugh was a soft purr of pure happiness. "Willy says you're just what I need to take me down a notch or two."
"I think I like Willy."
She slid off his lap and took his hand. They walked up the stairs with his arm across her shoulders.
"I forgot about the quilts in the washtub." She stood in her chemise, digging in the drawer for her nightdress.
"Aubrey hung them on the line." Pack, stiff and sore in places he had forgotten about, grunted as he tugged down his britches and stepped out of them.
"Aubrey felt bad about Cullen coming here. I could tell that he was ashamed. He's a different man since he stopped drinking. Oh, I don't want to forget to tell you about how the twins stood up to Cullen. You would have been so proud."
"Forget Aubrey, forget the twins, forget the nightdress, Mrs. Gallagher. Forget that other thing you've got on too." Pack lay down on the bed, stretched out, and groaned with contentment. "Come here, wife. I need to hold you."
Mara slipped into bed beside him and fit into his arms as if she had been made with him in mind. He closed his eyes and drank in her nearness, her softness, the elusive sweet scent of her.
"You're hurting more than you let on," she accused between pecking kisses on his shoulder.
"I'm hurting in only one place right now," he murmured, rolling her gently over onto her back and hovering over her. "Ye're eyes be all swollen from bawlin', Mrs. Gallagher. Ye be lookin' like somethin' the cat dragged in," he teased in a lazy Irish brogue. His eyes were swollen and surrounded by blue bruises, but they shone with happiness.
"Aye. 'N to be sure ye be knowin' about cats, would ye not, Mr. Gallagher?" Her soft happy laughter was accompanied by his low chuckle. His eyes devoured her face.
"Aye, me beauty. But 'tis not cats I be thinkin' of." He placed soft kisses on her smiling lips. "I be thinkin' on what I want to be doin' when I be findin' a naked lassie in me bed."
"What about yer wife, sir?" she demanded with mock horror.
He lowered his head and nuzzled at her breast with his mouth. "She be cruel 'n cold. She dinna be understandin' me."
"Alas! Poor man!"
With effortless strength he rolled onto his back and lifted her to lie on top of him, her thighs cradled between his, her breasts loving the rough texture of the hair on his chest.
"Bein' a true Irish gentleman, I'll be lettin' ye love me, if ye be so determined 'n all."
"Letting?" Mara almost choked on laughter. "But sir, I don't be knowin' what to do."
He pulled her up until his lips could reach her ear. His whispered words produced cries of alarm.
"Oh! 'Tis indecent what ye're proposin', sir!"
Their laughter filled the room and spilled out of the window and into the yard below. Aubrey McCall paused, listened, smiled, and continued to empty the washtubs. He wished that Brita could know how things turned out between Pack and Mara Shannon. He looked up at the heavens.
"Maybe ye do be knowin', me love," he murmured. "For if ever there be an angel it is ye, Brita Gallagher McCall."
In the bed upstairs, Mara was tangled in Pack's arms as they rolled to their sides, her soft belly against the flat muscles of his. His strong body quivered as hands, softer than silk, glided over his bruised flesh. For a long moment they lay with lips barely touching while she whispered her love over and over, hearing the words returned in a hoarse whisper. Her tongue licked at the cuts on his lips, his sore and swollen hands caressed the smooth skin of her back and buttocks.
"Ah, love, love," he sighed blissfully.
"Lie still, my gladiator, let me love you."
Her heart was filled to overflowing with love for him. He had given her so much. He had asked for nothing in return, not even her love. As her hands and her lips moved over him she tried to tell him all that was in her heart.
And when the time was right, she took him in her hand and guided him to her as he had told her she would always have to do.
"Come in, darling," she whispered. "Please, come in."
_EVERYDAY CAKE—Modern measurements_
2/3 cup of butter
1½ cups sugar
2 beaten eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2½ cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2/3 cup milk.
Mix butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla. Mix baking powder and flour in separate bowl. Add to the butter and eggs mixture alternately with the milk, beating after each addition. Bake 25 minutes at 350°.
_EVERYDAY CAKE—Brita's measurements_
Lard the size of an egg
A teacup and a little more of sugar
Two eggs
Grate a little nutmeg for flavor
Two teacups and a little more of flour
Baking powder to fill the palm of your hand
Milk enough to make batter spread in a pan.
Mix all together and bake in an iron skillet until a straw comes out clean when poked into the middle of the cake.
# AUTHOR'S NOTE
The earliest evidence of boxing as a sport is found in Crete from about 1500 BC. The sport was introduced by the Greeks into the Olympic Games in the late seventh century. Boxing for the Greeks was a part of physical training for the military as well as a sport, with the emphasis on courage, strength and endurance rather than agility and defensive skill.
The first set of rules governing bare knuckle boxing were drawn up by Jack Broughton, known as the father of English boxing, in 1743. The rules were revised in 1838 and again in 1853. Under the new rules, called the London Prize Ring Rules, bouts were held in a 24-foot square ring enclosed by ropes. Butting with the head, gouging, hitting below the waist and kicking were banned, although in some areas back-heeling to trip an opponent was permitted. In 1889 under these rules, John L. Sullivan beat Jake Kilrain in a seventy-five-round fight in defense of his heavyweight championship. He was the last of the bare knuckle fighters.
Beginning with the Irish immigration from the late 1840's, following the potato famines, the Irish provided a constantly renewed pool of boxers in the United States.
Reaction to bare knuckle boxing from the law and from religious groups was persistently hostile in the 1800's, more in some areas than in others.
The Marquess of Queensberry Rules, which called for gloved matches, appeared in 1867. The first champion under these rules was James (Gentleman Jim) Corbett, who defeated John L. Sullivan in 1892.
|
Spinal Cysticercosis Mimicking a Tumor in a Pediatric Patient Parasitic infections of the central nervous system (CNS) occur mostly in underdeveloped regions of the world. Neurocysticercosis (NC) occurs when the larval form of the T. solium tapeworm invades the CNS. Spinal cysticercosis is an extremely rare type of NC and occurs when the cyst occupies the subarachnoid space of the spinal column. Previous cases have been successfully treated through both surgical and medical means. The current case describes the symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment of a patient with this extremely uncommon manifestation of neurocysticercosis. |
<reponame>lanlvyip/mu-server
package io.muserver;
import io.netty.handler.codec.http.QueryStringDecoder;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.Map;
import java.util.Objects;
import static java.util.Collections.emptyList;
class NettyRequestParameters implements RequestParameters {
private final QueryStringDecoder decoder;
NettyRequestParameters(QueryStringDecoder decoder) {
Mutils.notNull("decoder", decoder);
this.decoder = decoder;
}
@Override
public Map<String, List<String>> all() {
return decoder.parameters();
}
@Override
public String get(String name) {
return get(name, null);
}
@Override
public String get(String name, String defaultValue) {
List<String> values = decoder.parameters().get(name);
if (values == null) {
return defaultValue;
}
return values.get(0);
}
@Override
public int getInt(String name, int defaultValue) {
try {
String stringVal = get(name, null);
if (stringVal == null) {
return defaultValue;
}
return Integer.parseInt(stringVal, 10);
} catch (NumberFormatException e) {
return defaultValue;
}
}
@Override
public long getLong(String name, long defaultValue) {
try {
String stringVal = get(name, null);
if (stringVal == null) {
return defaultValue;
}
return Long.parseLong(stringVal, 10);
} catch (NumberFormatException e) {
return defaultValue;
}
}
@Override
public float getFloat(String name, float defaultValue) {
try {
String stringVal = get(name, null);
if (stringVal == null) {
return defaultValue;
}
return Float.parseFloat(stringVal);
} catch (NumberFormatException e) {
return defaultValue;
}
}
@Override
public double getDouble(String name, double defaultValue) {
try {
String stringVal = get(name, null);
if (stringVal == null) {
return defaultValue;
}
return Double.parseDouble(stringVal);
} catch (NumberFormatException e) {
return defaultValue;
}
}
@Override
public boolean getBoolean(String name) {
String val = get(name, "").toLowerCase();
return isTruthy(val);
}
static boolean isTruthy(String val) {
switch (val) {
case "true":
case "on":
case "yes":
case "1":
return true;
default:
return false;
}
}
@Override
public List<String> getAll(String name) {
List<String> values = decoder.parameters().get(name);
if (values == null) {
return emptyList();
}
return values;
}
@Override
public boolean contains(String name) {
return decoder.parameters().containsKey(name);
}
@Override
public boolean equals(Object o) {
if (this == o) return true;
if (o == null || getClass() != o.getClass()) return false;
NettyRequestParameters that = (NettyRequestParameters) o;
return Objects.equals(decoder.parameters(), that.decoder.parameters());
}
@Override
public int hashCode() {
return Objects.hash(decoder.parameters());
}
@Override
public String toString() {
String s = decoder.toString();
int qm = s.indexOf('?');
return qm == -1 ? s : s.substring(qm + 1);
}
}
|
Hazards of heated water humidifiers necessary to do a pre-operative abdominal X ray and ultrasound examination before the procedure. series were able to cope with this situation and settled well with incremental doses of intravenous diazepam and fentanyl. Some patents cannot pass easily into the scanner if they are in the lateral position. It is also convenient to perform bilateral blockade in the prone position. Dr Singh's technique using image intensification is standard practice and we are not advocating that it be abandoned. We do not. however, see any need for the use of a dextran 70 infusion (with its attendant dangers) and hypotension has not been found to be a problem in two large series of chemical lumbar sympathectomies.''2 Analgesics, although not essential, are anxiolytic and are useful in alleviating pain that may arise during the block. We also do not consider it to be Department of Anaesthesia. D.R.O. REDMAN St Mary's Hospital, P.N. ROBINSON London W2 |
Donna Smallin, author of new book, ¿Clear the Clutter, Find Happiness,¿ offers ways to negotiate with loved ones.
Shoes litter the living room floor, unopened mail and catalogs are scattered across the dining room table, dirty dishes are stacked next to the empty pizza carton. You had hoped to be one team united against clutter, but your family or roommates would rather live in the mess.
Professional organizer Donna Smallin wants to help. Her new book, "Clear the Clutter, Find Happiness: One-Minute Tips for Decluttering and Refreshing Your Home and Your Life" (Storey), offers plenty of doable ideas. But we also wanted her take on the relationship challenges that occur when you're co-existing with the untidy and/or declutter-averse. We presented Smallin with some common situations; answers have been edited.
Problem: My partner doesn't mind the mess, but I do.
Solution: Negotiation. "A sit-down is required for that," Smallin said. "You have to negotiate so that both people feel like it's a win-win. For example, if everyone seems to be dumping papers on the kitchen table when they get in, what you can do is say, 'This is something that is bothering me. What can I do in return for you to keep the space clean?'"
Problem: My kid's room is a pig sty!
Solution: Organizational tools. "Use a basket or bins that are easy for kids to just throw things into instead of using a more complicated system," Smallin said. "You can organize those bins by type of toy — so, one for dolls, stuffed animals, trucks. You can even put pictures of the toy on the bin, and, later, words when they start to read so that they can remember what toy goes in which bin.
"I say make it easier to put away, not necessarily to find. So if you want your child to put shoes in the closet, get one basket that they can throw all of their shoes in. It may be harder to find matching shoes when you go to look for them later, but they will be easy for your child to put away."
Problem: My dad is helping me clean out my garage. As I put my childhood dollhouse in the "give-away" pile, he says, "I spent good money on that."
Solution: Be firm, and share the wealth. "If you're not using it, it's not worth it," Smallin said. "You got value out of it before, but now it's not worth anything when it could really be blessing someone else. If you have clutter, you are abundantly blessed. And you can share those blessings (with) someone who could really use them."
Problem: My wife is trying to be less messy, but it still feels like a losing battle. I am beginning to resent her.
Solution: Put people first. "Try to remember why you fell in love with them in the first place," Smallin said. "It clearly was not for their organizational skills. Focus your attention elsewhere and away from the thing that you find most annoying. Imagine how impossible it is for you to change something about yourself, whether it be (losing) a few pounds or (eating) healthier. Think about how hard it is for you to change those habits and follow a new way of thinking. It's almost impossible to change someone. It's even more difficult to make other people change their habits."
Just because you're tired of clutter doesn't mean your roommates are.
Professional organizer Donna Smallin has advice for neatniks who need to convince loved ones to be tidier. |
<gh_stars>10-100
package alien4cloud.tosca;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.nio.file.FileSystem;
import java.nio.file.FileSystems;
import java.nio.file.FileVisitOption;
import java.nio.file.Files;
import java.nio.file.Path;
import java.nio.file.Paths;
import java.util.EnumSet;
import alien4cloud.tosca.parser.DefinitionVisitor;
import org.junit.Assert;
import org.junit.Test;
public class DefinitionVisitorTest {
@Test
public void testVisitorInZip() throws IOException {
Path path = Paths.get("src/test/resources/tosca/visitor/zipped.zip");
FileSystem fs = FileSystems.newFileSystem(path, (ClassLoader)null);
doTest(fs);
}
private void doTest(FileSystem fs) throws IOException {
DefinitionVisitor visitor = new DefinitionVisitor(fs);
Files.walkFileTree(fs.getPath(fs.getSeparator()), EnumSet.noneOf(FileVisitOption.class), 1, visitor);
Assert.assertEquals(2, visitor.getDefinitionFiles().size());
}
}
|
/* AUTOGENERATED FILE. DO NOT EDIT. */
#ifndef _MOCK_RKHFWK_BITTBL_H
#define _MOCK_RKHFWK_BITTBL_H
#include "rkhfwk_bittbl.h"
/* Ignore the following warnings, since we are copying code */
#if defined(__GNUC__) && !defined(__ICC) && !defined(__TMS470__)
#if !defined(__clang__)
#pragma GCC diagnostic ignored "-Wpragmas"
#endif
#pragma GCC diagnostic ignored "-Wunknown-pragmas"
#pragma GCC diagnostic ignored "-Wduplicate-decl-specifier"
#endif
void Mock_rkhfwk_bittbl_Init(void);
void Mock_rkhfwk_bittbl_Destroy(void);
void Mock_rkhfwk_bittbl_Verify(void);
#define rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_IgnoreAndReturn(cmock_retval) rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_CMockIgnoreAndReturn(__LINE__, cmock_retval)
void rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_CMockIgnoreAndReturn(UNITY_LINE_TYPE cmock_line, rui8_t cmock_to_return);
#define rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_ExpectAndReturn(bitPos, cmock_retval) rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_CMockExpectAndReturn(__LINE__, bitPos, cmock_retval)
void rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_CMockExpectAndReturn(UNITY_LINE_TYPE cmock_line, rui8_t bitPos, rui8_t cmock_to_return);
#define rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_IgnoreArg_bitPos() rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_CMockIgnoreArg_bitPos(__LINE__)
void rkh_bittbl_getBitMask_CMockIgnoreArg_bitPos(UNITY_LINE_TYPE cmock_line);
#define rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_IgnoreAndReturn(cmock_retval) rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_CMockIgnoreAndReturn(__LINE__, cmock_retval)
void rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_CMockIgnoreAndReturn(UNITY_LINE_TYPE cmock_line, rui8_t cmock_to_return);
#define rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_ExpectAndReturn(value, cmock_retval) rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_CMockExpectAndReturn(__LINE__, value, cmock_retval)
void rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_CMockExpectAndReturn(UNITY_LINE_TYPE cmock_line, rui8_t value, rui8_t cmock_to_return);
#define rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_IgnoreArg_value() rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_CMockIgnoreArg_value(__LINE__)
void rkh_bittbl_getLeastBitSetPos_CMockIgnoreArg_value(UNITY_LINE_TYPE cmock_line);
#endif
|
Clock and Data Recovery (CDR) circuits form a part of Serializer-Deserializer (SerDes) receivers. Conventional CDR circuits can be designed to achieve bit-error-ratios (BER) on the order of 10−12 to 10−15 errors per bit. The CDR circuits use a sampling point that tracks the phase of a sampling clock based on some criterion, such as minimizing a Mean-Squared-Error (MSE). The optimal sampling point for CDR is the point at which a vertical eye opening is the largest. When the sampling phase is away from the optimal sampling point, the vertical eye margin is significantly reduced.
With enough jitter, a receiver can sample at a position where the vertical eye margin is not large enough to decode a bit correctly, causing bit errors. One conventional technique to avoid bit errors is to use a finite impulse response (FIR) filter on the transmitter side of a communication channel to reduce the pre-cursor inter-symbol interference (ISI). However, in optical communication modules, a FIR filter on the transmitter side is not possible. Consequently, in optical systems, pre-cursor ISI can only be cancelled at the receiver side of the communication channel.
The CDR circuits commonly used in receivers can be broadly classified into two categories, bang-bang CDR and baud-rate CDR. Each class has associated advantages and disadvantages. In a bang-bang, or Alexander type CDR circuit, a received signal is oversampled (i.e., sampled twice each symbol period). The symbol period is referred to as a Unit Interval (UI). Oversampling adds cost and complexity to the system. Oversampling requires a second clock having a 90 degrees phase difference from the data sampling clock and a separate capture latch to sample the received signal at crossings. The addition of the second clock and capture latch results in additional power and area for the receiver.
Ideally, one sample is obtained at a crossing boundary and another sample is obtained at a center of the slicer input eye. In a bang-bang CDR, the eye appears symmetric about the sampling point. The symmetric eye is desirable for good Sinusoidal Jitter Tolerance (SJT). SJT is the amplitude of sinusoidal jitter about the sampling point that can be tolerated without errors. However, better jitter tolerance comes at the cost of oversampling the signal. Two consecutive “center” data samples (i.e., d[k−1] and d[k]) and one crossing sample in-between (i.e., p[k]) are used to decide whether a current sampling phase is lagging or leading. The sampling phase is then corrected accordingly. Unlike baud-rate CDR, bang-bang CDR is not sensitive to pre-cursor ISI. However, making bang-bang CDR work with a Decision-Feedback Equalizer (DFE) based receiver is not trivial.
In a baud-rate CDR circuit, the received signal is sampled at the baud rate, or once every UI. Hence, oversampling does not occur in the baud-rate CDR circuit. The sampling phase can be chosen based on different criteria. For example, in an MMSE baud-rate CDR circuit, the sampling phase that yields a minimum MSE is chosen. In a Mueller-Muller baud-rate CDR circuit, the sampling phase is chosen such that a first pre-cursor of an equalized pulse and a first post-cursor of the equalized pulse are equal about the sampling point. The sampling point chosen can be at a point other than in the center of the equalized eye if the equalized pulse is not symmetrical in terms of first pre-cursor and first post-cursor.
Referring to FIG. 1, a diagram is shown illustrating a normalized graph of an unequalized channel impulse response 10 and an equalized channel impulse response 12. In a baud-rate CDR circuit where a convergence point (i.e., a settling point τ) relies on a first pre-cursor matching a first post-cursor (i.e., h(1)=h(−1), where h(1) is the first pre-cursor of the channel impulse response and h(−1) is the first post-cursor of the channel impulse response), a residual pre-cursor sample 14 (i.e., p−1(0)) can have a major impact on the settling point τ of a Mueller-Muller baud-rate CDR circuit. The residual pre-cursor sample 14 causes the Mueller-Muller baud-rate CDR circuit to shift the sampling phase to the left of the peak of the impulse response 10 (ideally the unequalized sample 16 at time=0) so that a first pre-cursor 18 (i.e., p−1(τ)), with respect to the sampling point τ, has an amplitude close to zero. Accordingly, the magnitude of a first post-cursor 20 (i.e., p1(0)) in the unequalized impulse response 10 increases from p1(0) to p1(τ) because of the shifting of the sampling phase to the left.
Referring to FIG. 2, an eye diagram is shown illustrating a conventional slicer input eye 30 of a Decision-Feedback Equalizer (DFE) receiver with un-cancelled pre-cursor inter-symbol interference (ISI). The DFE can cancel post-cursor ISI in the unequalized impulse response 10. Pre-cursor inter symbol interference (ISI) resulting from the communication channel can cause the baud-rate CDR circuit to settle to the left of the optimal sampling point of the received eye opening. The baud-rate CDR settles where h(1)=h(−1). With a decision feedback equalizer (DFE), h(1) is reduced to zero. However, in a conventional system h(−1) cannot be reduced to zero due to a lack of pre-cursor ISI cancellation. As a result, a phase of the baud-rate CDR moves left from the optimal sampling point on the impulse response until the point of h(1)=h(−1) is reached. When the sampling point moves left, h(1) slowly increases and h(−1) slowly decreases. The SJT (i.e., 2*HL) is reduced compared with the ideal sample point at time=0. Thus, in optical applications where a transmitter finite impulse response (TX-FIR) filter is not available, the Mueller-Muller baud-rate CDR suffers from poor SJT compared with the more costly and complex bang-bang CDR.
The resulting equalized impulse response 12 has the first pre-cursor sample 18 (i.e., pe−1(τ)=0) and a first equalized post-cursor sample 22 (i.e., pe+1(τ)=0). The superscript “e” is used herein to denote an equalized sample. The first pre-cursor sample 18 and the first equalized post-cursor sample 22 have magnitudes near zero. The conventional slicer input eye 30 is asymmetric about the sampling point τ. In particular, a left horizontal eye opening (i.e., HL) is smaller than a right horizontal eye opening (i.e., HR).
It would be desirable to have a baud-rate CDR receiver circuit that can provide pre-cursor ISI cancellation. |
package uk.gov.dft.bluebadge.common.security;
import java.util.Map;
import org.springframework.security.oauth2.provider.OAuth2Authentication;
import org.springframework.security.oauth2.provider.token.DefaultAccessTokenConverter;
public class BBAccessTokenConverter extends DefaultAccessTokenConverter {
@Override
public OAuth2Authentication extractAuthentication(Map<String, ?> claims) {
OAuth2Authentication authentication = super.extractAuthentication(claims);
authentication.setDetails(claims);
return authentication;
}
}
|
import React, { useMemo } from 'react';
import SwiperCore, { Navigation, Pagination } from 'swiper';
import { Swiper } from 'swiper/react';
import { Testable, useBuildTestId } from '../../modules/test-ids';
import { Context } from './context';
import { MARGIN_WIDTH, Styled } from './styled';
SwiperCore.use([Navigation, Pagination]);
export type Props = Omit<
React.ComponentProps<typeof Swiper>,
'navigation' | 'pagination' | 'slidesPerView' | 'spaceBetween'
> &
Testable;
export const Component = ({ children, 'data-testid': testId, ...otherProps }: Props) => {
const { buildTestId } = useBuildTestId({ id: testId });
const context = useMemo(() => ({ testId }), [testId]);
return (
<Context.Provider value={context}>
<Styled
{...otherProps}
spaceBetween={MARGIN_WIDTH}
navigation={{
prevEl: '.swiper-button-prev',
nextEl: '.swiper-button-next',
}}
pagination={{
clickable: true,
el: '.swiper-pagination',
}}
breakpoints={{
// SIZES.md
768: {
slidesPerView: 'auto',
},
}}
data-testid={buildTestId()}
>
{children}
<div className="swiper-button-prev" data-testid={buildTestId('btn-prev')}></div>
<div className="swiper-button-next" data-testid={buildTestId('btn-next')}></div>
<div className="swiper-pagination" data-testid={buildTestId('pagination')}></div>
</Styled>
</Context.Provider>
);
};
Component.displayName = 'Swiper';
|
Büssing A5P
History
The Büssing company had received its first orders of military vehicles in 1910, producing artillery tractors and supply trailers. By November 1914, the German Army had become aware of the potential of the armoured car by the hit-and-run tactics employed by the Belgians with the Minerva. The Oberste Heeresleitung decided to produce its own armoured vehicle and the manufacturing companies Ehrhardt, Daimler and Büssing were requested to develop an armoured car with all-wheel drive.
During 1915, Büssing delivered the ordered prototype. In contrast to the Belgian armoured cars, the A5P was a massive vehicle, using a 'double-ended' layout that could at least pose a tactically useful high ground clearance. Its powerplant was Büssing's successful 6-cylinder truck engines. It had a large steel armoured body and was crewed by ten men. Six of the crew operated three 7.92 mm machine guns, usually the MG 08 or MG 15nA. Some vehicles even received two Becker 20 mm cannons.
In 1916, the A5P began production. Nevertheless, the German Army considered the Ehrhardt design more effective to fulfil the demanded operational tasks. As a result, only one vehicle was produced. The A5P, together with several other armored cars, served in a column on the Romanian Front in 1916 and on the Russian Front in 1917. |
An experimental study on mobile social network centrality and educational performance We collected required social information about a group of female students in university from their mobile social network for preparation the social graph and their centralities. Their educational performance compared with four centralities in order to evaluate how their educational performance is related to social centralities. Finally the suitable centralities were considered and discussed. |
SOME NEW HARDY TYPE INEQUALITIES AND THEIR LIMITING INEQUALITIES A new necessary and sufficient condition for the weighted Hardy inequality is proved for the case 1 < p ≤ q < ∞. The corresponding limiting Polya-Knopp inequality is also proved for 0 < p ≤ q < ∞. Moreover, a corresponding limiting result in two dimensions is proved. This result may be regarded as an endpoint inequality of Sawyers two-dimensional Hardy inequality. But here we need only one condition to characterize the inequality whereas in Sawyers case three conditions are necessary. |
/*
*******************************************************************************
\file ww.h
\brief Arbitrary length words
\project bee2 [cryptographic library]
\author (C) <NAME> [<EMAIL>}]
\created 2012.04.18
\version 2015.11.03
\license This program is released under the GNU General Public License
version 3. See Copyright Notices in bee2/info.h.
*******************************************************************************
*/
/*!
*******************************************************************************
\file ww.h
\brief Слова конечной длины
*******************************************************************************
*/
#ifndef __WW_H
#define __WW_H
#include "bee2/defs.h"
#include "bee2/core/safe.h"
#ifdef __cplusplus
extern "C" {
#endif
/*!
*******************************************************************************
\file ww.h
Реализованы операции с двоичными словами произвольной конечной длины, т.е.
элементами {0,1}*.
Двоичное слово задается массивом машинных слов: word w[n].
Разряды слова w[0] нумеруются от 0 (младший) до B_PER_W - 1 (старший),
разряды w[1] -- от B_PER_W (младший) до 2 * B_PER_W - 1 (старший) и т.д.
Запись [n]w означает, что слово w состоит из n машинных слов.
\pre Все входные указатели действительны.
\pre В функциях работы со словами по адресам памяти для слов
зарезервировано ясное из конекста либо уточняемое в описаниях функций
число машинных слов.
*******************************************************************************
*/
/*
*******************************************************************************
Псевдонимы
*******************************************************************************
*/
#if (B_PER_W == 16)
#include "bee2/core/u16.h"
#define wwRev2 u16Rev2
#define wwTo u16To
#define wwFrom u16From
#elif (B_PER_W == 32)
#include "bee2/core/u32.h"
#define wwRev2 u32Rev2
#define wwTo u32To
#define wwFrom u32From
#elif (B_PER_W == 64)
#include "bee2/core/u64.h"
#define wwRev2 u64Rev2
#define wwTo u64To
#define wwFrom u64From
#else
#error "Unsupported word size"
#endif /* B_PER_W */
/*! Корректное слово [n]a? */
#define wwIsValid(a, n) memIsValid((a), O_OF_W(n))
/*! Буферы слов [n]a и [n]b не пересекаются? */
#define wwIsDisjoint(a, b, n) memIsDisjoint(a, b, O_OF_W(n))
/*! Буферы слов [n]a и [n]b совпадают или не пересекаются? */
#define wwIsSameOrDisjoint(a, b, n) memIsSameOrDisjoint(a, b, O_OF_W(n))
/*! Буферы слов [n]a и [m]b не пересекаются? */
#define wwIsDisjoint2(a, n, b, m) memIsDisjoint2(a, O_OF_W(n), b, O_OF_W(m))
/*! Буферы слов [n]a, [m]b и [k]c не пересекаются? */
#define wwIsDisjoint3(a, n, b, m, c, k)\
memIsDisjoint3(a, O_OF_W(n), b, O_OF_W(m), c, O_OF_W(k))
/*
*******************************************************************************
Копирование, логические операции
*******************************************************************************
*/
/*! \brief Копирование слов
Cлово [n]a переписывается в [n]b:
\code
b <- a.
\endcode
\pre Буфер b либо не пересекается, либо совпадает с буфером a.
*/
void wwCopy(
word b[], /*!< [out] приемник */
const word a[], /*!< [in] источник */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Перестановка слов
Cлова [n]a и [n]b меняются местами:
\code
a <-> b.
\endcode
\pre Буфер b не пересекается с буфером a.
*/
void wwSwap(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] первое слово */
word b[], /*!< [in/out] второе слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a и b в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Проверка совпадения слов
Проверяется совпадение слов [n]a и [n]b.
\return Признак сопадения.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
bool_t wwEq(
const word a[], /*!< [in] первое слово */
const word b[], /*!< [in] второе слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a и b в машинных словах */
);
bool_t FAST(wwEq)(const word a[], const word b[], size_t n);
/*! \brief Сравнение слов
Cлова [n]a и [n]b сравниваются обратно-лексикографически.
\remark a > b, если a[n - 1] == b[n - 1],..., a[i] == b[i], a[i] > b[i].
\return 1, если a > b, или -1, если a < b, или 0, если a == b.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
int wwCmp(
const word a[], /*!< [in] первое слово */
const word b[], /*!< [in] второе слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a и b в машинных словах */
);
int FAST(wwCmp)(const word a[], const word b[], size_t n);
/*! \brief Сравнение слов разной длины
Cлова [n]a и [m]b сравниваются обратно-лексикографически (см. wwCmp())
после дополнения нулями до слов одинаковой длины.
\return 1, если a > b, или -1, если a < b, или 0, если a == b.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
int wwCmp2(
const word a[], /*!< [in] первое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
const word b[], /*!< [in] второе слово */
size_t m /*!< [in] длина b в машинных словах */
);
int FAST(wwCmp2)(const word a[], size_t n, const word b[], size_t m);
/*! \brief Сравнение слова c машинным словом
Слово [n]a сравнивается с машинным словом w.
\return 1, если a > w, или -1, если a < w, или 0, если a == w.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
int wwCmpW(
const word a[], /*!< [in] сравниваемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
register word w /*!< [in] машинное слово */
);
int FAST(wwCmpW)(const word a[], size_t n, register word w);
/*! \brief Cложение слов по модулю 2
Определяется поразрядная по модулю 2 сумма [n]с слов [n]a и [n]b:
\code
c <- a ^ b.
\endcode
\pre Буфер c либо не пересекается, либо совпадает с каждым из буферов a, b.
*/
void wwXor(
word c[], /*!< [out] сумма */
const word a[], /*!< [in] первое слагаемое */
const word b[], /*!< [in] второе слагаемое */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a и b в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Добавление слова по модулю 2
К слову [n]b добавляется слово [n]a. Сложение выполняется поразрядно
по модулю 2:
\code
b <- a ^ b.
\endcode
\pre Буфер b либо не пересекается, либо совпадает с буфером a.
*/
void wwXor2(
word b[], /*!< [in/out] второе слагаемое / сумма */
const word a[], /*!< [in] первое слагаемое */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Обнуление слова
Слово [n]a обнуляется:
\code
a <- 0.
\endcode
*/
void wwSetZero(
word a[], /*!< [out] слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Присвоение слову значения -- машинного слова
Слову [n]a присваивается значение w, которое является машинным словом:
\code
a[0] <- w, a[1] <- 0, ..., a[n - 1] <- 0.
\endcode
\pre n > 0 или w == 0.
*/
void wwSetW(
word a[], /*!< [out] слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
register word w /*!< [in] значение */
);
/*! \brief Заполнение слова машинным словом
Всем машинным словам [n]a присваивается значение w:
\code
a[0] <- w, a[1] <- w, ..., a[n - 1] <- w.
\endcode
\pre n > 0 или w == 0.
*/
void wwRepW(
word a[], /*!< [out] слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
register word w /*!< [in] значение */
);
/*! \brief Нулевое слово?
Проверяется, что слово [n]a нулевое.
\return TRUE, если a - нулевое, и FALSE в противном случае.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
bool_t wwIsZero(
const word a[], /*!< [in] проверяемое слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
bool_t FAST(wwIsZero)(const word a[], size_t n);
/*! \brief Принимает значение -- машинное слово?
Проверяется, что слово [n]a принимает значение w, которое
является машинным словом:
\code
a[0] == w && a[1] == ... == a[n - 1] == 0?
\endcode
\remark Пустое слово (n == 0) принимает значение 0.
\return TRUE, если a = w, и FALSE в противном случае.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
bool_t wwIsW(
const word a[], /*!< [in] проверяемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
register word w /*!< [in] значение */
);
bool_t FAST(wwIsW)(const word a[], size_t n, register word w);
/*! \brief Повтор машинного слова?
Проверяется, что все машинные слова [n]a принимают значение w:
\code
a[0] == w && a[1] == w && ... && a[n - 1] == w?
\endcode
\remark В пустом слове (n == 0) повторяется значение 0.
\return TRUE, если a составлено из w, и FALSE в противном случае.
\safe Имеется ускоренная нерегулярная редакция.
*/
bool_t wwIsRepW(
const word a[], /*!< [in] проверяемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
register word w /*!< [in] значение */
);
bool_t FAST(wwIsRepW)(const word a[], size_t n, register word w);
/*! \brief Размер значащей части слова в машинных словах
Определяется размер значащей части слова [n]a. Размер полагается равным
индексу последнего ненулевого машинного слова, увеличенному на единицу.
\remark Размер пустого (n == 0) или нулевого слов равняется 0.
\safe Функция нерегулярна.
*/
size_t wwWordSize(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Размер значащей части слова в октетах
Определяется размер значащей части слова [n]a. Размер полагается равным
индексу последнего ненулевого октета, увеличенному на единицу.
\remark Размер пустого (n == 0) или нулевого слов равняется 0.
\safe Функция нерегулярна.
*/
size_t wwOctetSize(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*
*******************************************************************************
Операции с битами, кодирование
*******************************************************************************
*/
/*! \brief Проверить разряд слова
В слове a определяется разряд с номером pos.
\pre По адресу a зарезервировано W_OF_B(pos + 1) машинных слов.
\return TRUE, если бит ненулевой, и FALSE в противном случае.
*/
bool_t wwTestBit(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t pos /*!< [in] номер разряда */
);
/*! \brief Получить разряды слова
В слове a определяется разряды с номерами pos,..., pos + width - 1.
\pre По адресу a зарезервировано W_OF_B(pos + width) машинных слов.
\pre width <= B_PER_W.
\return Машинное слово, составленное из разрядов a с номерами
pos (младший), pos + 1,..., pos + width -1 (старший).
*/
word wwGetBits(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t pos, /*!< [in] номер первого разряда */
size_t width /*!< [in] число разрядов */
);
/*! \brief Установить разряд слова
В слове a разряду с номером pos присваивается значение val.
\pre По адресу a зарезервировано W_OF_B(pos + 1) машинных слов.
\pre val == FALSE || val == TRUE.
*/
void wwSetBit(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] обрабатываемое слово */
size_t pos, /*!< [in] номер разряда */
register bool_t val /*!< [in] устанавливаемое значение */
);
/*! \brief Установить разряды слова
В слове a определяется разряды с номерами pos,..., pos + width - 1
устанавливаются равными последовательным разрядам val
(от младшего к старшему).
\pre По адресу a зарезервировано W_OF_B(pos + width) машинных слов.
\pre width <= B_PER_W.
*/
void wwSetBits(
word a[], /*!< [out] слово */
size_t pos, /*!< [in] номер первого разряда */
size_t width, /*!< [in] число разрядов */
register word val /*!< [in] значение разрядов */
);
/*! \brief Инвертировать разряд слова
В слове a инвертируется разряд с номером pos.
\pre По адресу a зарезервировано W_OF_B(pos + 1) машинных слов.
*/
void wwFlipBit(
word a[], /*!< [out] слово */
size_t pos /*!< [in] номер разряда */
);
/*! \brief Количество первых (младших) нулевых битов
Определяется длина серии из нулевых битов в начале слова [n]a.
\return Длина серии.
\safe Функция нерегулярна.
*/
size_t wwLoZeroBits(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Количество последних (старших) нулевых битов
Определяется длина серии из нулевых битов в конце слова [n]a.
\return Длина серии.
\safe Функция нерегулярна.
*/
size_t wwHiZeroBits(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Размер значащей части слова в битах
Определяется размер значащей части слова [n]a. Размер полагается
равным индексу последнего ненулевого разряда, увеличенному на единицу.
\remark Размер пустого (n == 0) или нулевого слов равняется 0.
\remark Если wwBitSize(a, n) == m > 0, то для a как числа выполняется
2^{m - 1} < a <= 2^m - 1.
\return Размер значащей части.
\safe Функция нерегулярна.
*/
size_t wwBitSize(
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t n /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
);
/*! \brief Расчет NAF
В [2n + 1]naf помещается кодированное представление оптимальной знаковой
формы (NAF) слова [n]a. Рассчитывается оконная NAF с размером окна w.
\remark NAF(a, w) представляет собой последовательность символов
(a_0, a_1,..., a_{l-1}) такую, что
- a_i \in {0, \pm 1, \pm 3, ..., \pm 2^{w-1} - 1};
- если a != 0, то a_{l-1} != 0;
- a как число равняется \sum {i=0}^{l-1} a_i 2^i;
- среди любых w последовательных символов a_i только один ненулевой.
.
\remark Известно, что l - длина NAF - не превосходит wwBitSize(a) + 1.
\remark Кодирование символов состоит в следующем
(\<b> -- двоичная запись числа b):
- нулевые a_i представляются одним двоичным символом 0;
- положительные a_i представляются w двоичными символами 0\<a_i>;
- отрицательные a_i представляются w двоичными символами 1\<|a_i|>;
- кодированное представление - это конкатенация кода a_{l-1}
(первые символы), ...., кода a_1, кода a_0 (последние символы).
.
\remark Для кодирования w последовательных элементов a_i потребуется
не более (w - 1) * 1 + 1 * w = 2 * w - 1 битов. Поэтому при w < B_PER_W
для хранения всего кодового представления потребуется
не более 2 * n + 1 слов.
\remark Если при расчете NAF получен суффикс \alpha, 0,..., 0, 1,
в котором w - 1 нулей и \alpha < 0, то этот суффикс заменяется на
\beta, 0,..., 0, 1, в котором w - 2 нулей и
\beta = 2^{w - 1} + \alpha > 0.
Суффиксы описывают одинаковые числа:
2^w + \alpha = 2^{w - 1} + \beta.
Длина второго суффикса и соответствующей NAF на единицу меньше.
\pre 2 <= w < B_PER_W.
\pre Буфер naf не пересекается с буфером a.
\return Размер naf (число символов l).
\safe Функция нерегулярна.
*/
size_t wwNAF(
word naf[], /*!< [out] знаковая форма */
const word a[], /*!< [in] слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t w /*!< [in] длина окна */
);
/*
*******************************************************************************
Сдвиги и очистка
*******************************************************************************
*/
/*! \brief Сдвиг в сторону первых (младших) разрядов
Слово [n]a сдвигается на shift позиций в сторону первых разрядов.
Освободившиеся разряды заполняются нулями.
\remark При интерпретации слов как чисел сдвиг означает деление на
число 2^shift с приведением результата mod 2^{n * B_PER_W}.
*/
void wwShLo(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] сдвигаемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t shift /*!< [in] величина сдвига */
);
/*! \brief Сдвиг в сторону первых (младших) разрядов с заемом
Слово [n]a сдвигается на shift позиций в сторону первых разрядов.
Освободившиеся разряды заполняются разрядами carry.
\return Машинное слово, составленное из вытесненных последними разрядов.
*/
word wwShLoCarry(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] сдвигаемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t shift, /*!< [in] величина сдвига */
word carry /*!< [in] машинное слово заема */
);
/*! \brief Сдвиг в сторону последних (старших) разрядов
Слово [n]a сдвигается на shift позиций в сторону последних разрядов.
Освободившиеся разряды заполняются нулями.
\remark При интерпретации слов как чисел сдвиг означает умножение на
число 2^shift с приведением результата mod 2^{n * B_PER_W}.
*/
void wwShHi(
word a[], /*!< [in] сдвигаемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t shift /*!< [in] величина сдвига */
);
/*! \brief Сдвиг в сторону последних (старших) разрядов с заемом
Слово [n]a сдвигается на shift позиций в сторону последних разрядов.
Освободившиеся разряды заполняются разрядами carry.
\return Машинное слово, составленное из вытесненных последними разрядов.
*/
word wwShHiCarry(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] сдвигаемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t shift, /*!< [in] величина сдвига */
word carry /*!< [in] машинное слово заема */
);
/*! \brief Отбросить первые (младшие) разряды слова
В слове [n]a обнуляются разряды с номерами
0, 1,..., min(pos, n * B_PER_W) - 1.
*/
void wwTrimLo(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] обрабатываемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t pos /*!< [in] граница обнуляемых разрядов */
);
/*! \brief Отбросить последние (старшие) разряды слова
В слове [n]a обнуляются разряды с номерами
pos, pos + 1,...., n * B_PER_W - 1.
\remark При pos >= n * B_PER_W никаких действий не выполняется.
\remark При интерпретации слов как чисел отбрасывание разрядов означает
приведение mod 2^pos.
*/
void wwTrimHi(
word a[], /*!< [in/out] обрабатываемое слово */
size_t n, /*!< [in] длина a в машинных словах */
size_t pos /*!< [in] номер первого обнуляемого разряда */
);
#ifdef __cplusplus
} /* extern "C" */
#endif
#endif /* __WW_H */
|
SDCC 2014: ‘The Walking Dead’ Panel
San Diego Comic-Con’s Hall H The Walking Dead panel began with moderator Chris Hardwick (of The Talking Dead) introducing executive producer and showrunner Scott Gimple, executive producers Robert Kirkman, Gale Anne Hurd, and Dave Alpert, and special effects makeup supervisor and executive producer Greg Nicotero.
Hardwick asked Gimple if the cast finally make it out of the train car they were stuck in at the end of season four. Gimple said that he brought a clip that might offer a hint to that. The clip opens showing Rick with long gray hair and beard playing cards with Glenn, who’s also fully bearded. We then see Maggie, who looks like an old lady with gray hair in a bun, knitting. Back to Rick and Glenn, it turns out they are playing for food — the remains of their comrades!
Gimple said that “Once the cast lost Herschel they discovered that they can’t go back, but those changes made them more formidable. You’re going to see them each grow as characters.” Kirkman said that “Terminus was a major departure from the comics, but fairly quickly in season five it’ll fall back in place with the storyline in the comics. All the characters are now prepared to deal with the threat of Terminus.”
Gimple noted that while season four ended with Rick saying, “They’re screwing with the wrong people,” the Blu-ray will feature the line accurate to the comic, “They’re fucking with the wrong people.”
Hurd said that this year the locations will feature more suburban locales directly from the comic book. They’ll be some pretty spectacular scopes.
Dave Alpert said that new cast will feature Seth Gilliam (Det. Carver on The Wire) joining the cast. Nicotero said that this year they’ll top last season’s walker scenarios by putting our team of hunter/survivors in set-pieces that they haven’t dealt with yet, such as a flooded basement filled with waterlogged, rotting walkers. He said they’ll visit some old places, but they’ll be a lot of new landscapes to explore. Hurd introduced a video featuring the first sneak peek of season five.
After the preview Hardwick introduced the cast, which included Andrew Lincoln, Norman Reedus, Steven Yeun, Lauren Cohan, Danai Gurira, Melissa McBride, Chad Coleman, Emily Kinney, and Michael Cudlitz.
Hardwick said it’s nice to see angry Rick back, to which Lincoln agreed, “It’s great to be sweaty and dirty again.” Hardwick asked, “How do you get prepared for the process of being angry Rick?” Lincoln said that it’s a quiet process. Hardwick said, “Well, we have a clip showing your process.” The clip was a reel of outtakes showing Lincoln thrashing around the set in frustration, before and between takes.
Hardwick noted to Yeun that the apocalypse has made Glenn a man. Yeun agreed that now that he’s got love, a family, and someone to protect, he’s got a lot to lose. Last season Glenn held out hope when he lost Maggie and this season he still holds out hope for the whole team.
Cohan joked that since last season’s blood-splattered scenes with Maggie that she sometimes preps for this season’s scenes by pouring blood on herself. Newcomer Cudlitz said when he first saw his character Abraham in the comics, the image seemed unrealistically intimidating to live up to. The cast made it easy for him to feel a part of. The first season he described like sleeping on a couch as a guest, and this year it’s like they’ve built him a room.
Gurira said it was initially more challenging to meet the physical demands for playing Michonne, and now it’s more challenging to stretch her character emotionally since Michonne is so vulnerable now.
Hardwick presented Melissa McBride with a bouquet of flowers, a reference to the scene where Carol tells Lizzie to look at the flowers so she could shoot her. She tried to give the flowers to other cast members on the panel, but everyone wisely didn’t want to look at them. McBride said that Carol felt grounded after the episode with Lizzie because she feels justified in her actions to protect the group.
Coleman said that for his character he finds that if you don’t have hope, you don’t have heart, and that allowed him to forgive Carol for what she did to Lizzie. Carol did an incredibly brave thing in a harsh, twisted world. That’s what hope looks like.
Emily Kinney said that although she can’t say anything about where Beth is, she’s gotten stronger, and Daryl has taught her survival skill that she’ll use in season five.
Hardwick asked Reedus if he had any inkling at the beginning of season four that this would be the emotional journey Daryl would take. He noted that none of the characters are who they started as at the beginning of the season. Lincoln said that all the characters have been on an emotional journey, but none more than Chandler Riggs, who plays Carl, At that point Lincoln introduced Riggs to the panel. Riggs brought an open industrial-sized can of chocolate pudding to the stage. He said that growing up on stage has been so much fun, it’s been a third of his life, and he’s had some great mentors to learn from. He also noted it’s his first time at Comic-Con.
Hardwick then opened the panel up to questions from the audience. Someone asked Reedus how much of himself he sees in Daryl. He said “There is definitely a whole bunch of me in Daryl and a whole bunch of Daryl in me,” then apologized for how awkward that sounded. He said they’re cut from the same cloth.
A disabled audience member asked if there might be a disabled walker in an upcoming episode. Gimple said that there was one in episode six of season four when went Rick went to get the propane tanks. Gurira added that on occasion she works with amputees in many of the scenes with Michonne’s pets.
A zombie-dressed member asked what the cast and crew are doing to raise awareness of the infected. Cohan joked that in August there’ll be a marathon, “Walking for Walkers,” McBride said he should just “look at the flowers.”
Season five of The Walking Dead premieres October 12.
Photo Gallery |
<filename>deepchem/utils/fragment_util.py
"""A collection of utilities for dealing with Molecular Fragments"""
import itertools
import numpy as np
from deepchem.utils.geometry_utils import compute_pairwise_distances
def get_contact_atom_indices(fragments, cutoff=4.5):
"""Compute that atoms close to contact region.
Molecular complexes can get very large. This can make it unwieldy to
compute functions on them. To improve memory usage, it can be very
useful to trim out atoms that aren't close to contact regions. This
function computes pairwise distances between all pairs of molecules
in the molecular complex. If an atom is within cutoff distance of
any atom on another molecule in the complex, it is regarded as a
contact atom. Otherwise it is trimmed.
Parameters
----------
fragments: List
As returned by `rdkit_util.load_complex`, a list of tuples of
`(coords, mol)` where `coords` is a `(N_atoms, 3)` array and `mol`
is the rdkit molecule object.
cutoff: float
The cutoff distance in angstroms.
Returns
-------
A list of length `len(molecular_complex)`. Each entry in this list
is a list of atom indices from that molecule which should be kept, in
sorted order.
"""
# indices to atoms to keep
keep_inds = [set([]) for _ in fragments]
for (ind1, ind2) in itertools.combinations(range(len(fragments)), 2):
frag1, frag2 = fragments[ind1], fragments[ind2]
pairwise_distances = compute_pairwise_distances(frag1[0], frag2[0])
# contacts is of form (x_coords, y_coords), a tuple of 2 lists
contacts = np.nonzero((pairwise_distances < cutoff))
# contacts[0] is the x_coords, that is the frag1 atoms that have
# nonzero contact.
frag1_atoms = set([int(c) for c in contacts[0].tolist()])
# contacts[1] is the y_coords, the frag2 atoms with nonzero contacts
frag2_atoms = set([int(c) for c in contacts[1].tolist()])
keep_inds[ind1] = keep_inds[ind1].union(frag1_atoms)
keep_inds[ind2] = keep_inds[ind2].union(frag2_atoms)
keep_inds = [sorted(list(keep)) for keep in keep_inds]
return keep_inds
def reduce_molecular_complex_to_contacts(fragments, cutoff=4.5):
"""Reduce a molecular complex to only those atoms near a contact.
Molecular complexes can get very large. This can make it unwieldy to
compute functions on them. To improve memory usage, it can be very
useful to trim out atoms that aren't close to contact regions. This
function takes in a molecular complex and returns a new molecular
complex representation that contains only contact atoms. The contact
atoms are computed by calling `get_contact_atom_indices` under the
hood.
Parameters
----------
fragments: List
As returned by `rdkit_util.load_complex`, a list of tuples of
`(coords, mol)` where `coords` is a `(N_atoms, 3)` array and `mol`
is the rdkit molecule object.
cutoff: float
The cutoff distance in angstroms.
Returns
-------
A list of length `len(molecular_complex)`. Each entry in this list
is a tuple of `(coords, MolecularFragment)`. The coords is stripped
down to `(N_contact_atoms, 3)` where `N_contact_atoms` is the number
of contact atoms for this complex. `MolecularFragment` is used since
it's tricky to make a RDKit sub-molecule.
"""
atoms_to_keep = get_contact_atom_indices(fragments, cutoff)
reduced_complex = []
for frag, keep in zip(fragments, atoms_to_keep):
contact_frag = get_mol_subset(frag[0], frag[1], keep)
reduced_complex.append(contact_frag)
return reduced_complex
|
For other uses, see Chartreuse
Chartreuse ( pronounced [ʃaʁtʁøz]) is a French liqueur available in both green and yellow versions that differ in both taste and alcohol content. The liqueur has been made by the Carthusian Monks since 1737 according to the instructions set out in a manuscript given to them by François Annibal d'Estrées in 1605. It was named after the monks' Grande Chartreuse monastery, located in the Chartreuse Mountains in the general region of Grenoble in France. The liqueur is produced in their distillery in the nearby town of Voiron (Isère). It is composed of distilled alcohol aged with 130 herbs, plants and flowers. It is one of the handful of liqueurs that continue to age and improve in the bottle.[1]
Types [ edit ]
Elixir Végétal de la Grande-Chartreuse
Green Chartreuse [ edit ]
Green Chartreuse (110 proof or 55% ABV) is a naturally green liqueur made from 130 herbs and other plants macerated in alcohol and steeped for about eight hours. A last maceration of plants gives its color to the liqueur.
Yellow Chartreuse [ edit ]
Yellow Chartreuse (80 proof or 40%) has a milder and sweeter flavour and aroma than green Chartreuse, and is lower (albeit not low) in alcohol content.
Chartreuse VEP [ edit ]
VEP stands for Vieillissement Exceptionnellement Prolongé,[2] meaning "exceptionally prolonged aging". It is made using the same processes and the same secret formula as the traditional liqueur, and by extra long aging in oak casks it reaches an exceptional quality. Chartreuse VEP comes in both yellow and green.
Élixir Végétal de la Grande-Chartreuse [ edit ]
Élixir Végétal de la Grande-Chartreuse (138 proof or 69% – also 142 proof or 71%) has the same base of about 130 medicinal and aromatic plants and flowers but is more alcoholic. It can be described as a cordial or a liqueur, and is claimed to be a tonic. Sold in small wood-covered bottles.
Liqueur du 9° Centenaire [ edit ]
Liqueur du 9° Centenaire (47%) was created in 1984 to commemorate the 900 year anniversary of the foundation of the abbey. It is similar to Green Chartreuse, but slightly sweeter.
Chartreuse 1605 – Liqueur d'Elixir [ edit ]
Chartreuse 1605 – Liqueur d'Elixir (56%) was created to commemorate the return of a mysterious manuscript concerning an elixir of long life to the Carthusian monks by Marshal François Annibal d'Estrées.
White Chartreuse [ edit ]
White Chartreuse (30%) was produced and sold between 1860 and 1900.[3]
Génépi [ edit ]
The monks make a Génépi which is the general term in the Alps for a homemade or local liquor featuring local mountain flora. There are hundreds or even thousands of different Génépi liquors made, many simply by families for their own use each year. As they have been making Chartreuse from local plants for centuries, the monks started in the 2000s to make a Génépi as a sideline product. It is labelled "Génépi des Pères Chartreux" and is generally only available locally in a 70cl bottle, usually labelled 40% alcohol.
Cuvée des Meilleurs Ouvriers de France [ edit ]
In 2007, a special edition was created by the Cuvée des Meilleurs Ouvriers de France Sommeliers (Best Craftsmen of France) in partnership with the distillery. It is yellow in color (40% alcohol).[4]
Flavour [ edit ]
Chartreuse has a very strong characteristic taste. It is very sweet, but becomes both spicy and pungent. It is comparable to other herbal liqueurs such as Galliano, Liquore Strega or Kräuterlikör, though it is distinctively more vegetal, or herbaceous. Like other liqueurs, its flavour is sensitive to serving temperature. If straight, it can be served very cold, but is often served at room temperature. It is also featured in some cocktails. Some mixed drink recipes call for only a few drops of Chartreuse due to the assertive flavour. It is popular in French ski resorts where it is mixed with hot chocolate and called Green Chaud.[5]
History [ edit ]
Chartreuse cellars
According to tradition, a marshal of artillery to French king Henry IV, François Hannibal d'Estrées, presented the Carthusian monks at Vauvert, near Paris, with an alchemical manuscript that contained a recipe for an "elixir of long life" in 1605.[6] The recipe eventually reached the religious order's headquarters at the Grande Chartreuse monastery, in Voiron, near Grenoble. It has since then been used to produce the "Elixir Végétal de la Grande Chartreuse". The formula is said to include 130 herbs, plants and flowers and secret ingredients combined in a wine alcohol base.[7]
The book The Practical Hotel Steward (1900) states that green chartreuse contains "cinnamon, mace, lemon balm, dried hyssop flower tops, peppermint, thyme, costmary, arnica flowers, genepi, and angelica roots", and that yellow chartreuse is, "Similar to above, adding cardamom seeds and socctrine aloes."[8] However the recipe remains a secret. The monks intended their liqueur to be used as medicine. The recipe was further enhanced in 1737 by Brother Gérome Maubec.
The beverage soon became popular, and in 1764 the monks adapted the elixir recipe to make what is now called Green Chartreuse.[7]
In 1793, the monks were expelled from France along with all other Religious Orders and manufacture of the liqueur ceased. A copy of the manuscript was made and kept at the Monastery. The original left with the monks. On the way there, the monk was arrested and sent to prison in Bordeaux. He was not searched and was able to secretly pass the manuscript to one of his friends: Dom Basile Nantas. This friend was convinced that the order would remain in Spain and never come back and that the manufacturing of the liqueur would cease. He sold the manuscript to a pharmacist in Grenoble, Monsieur Liotard. In 1810, Napoleon ordered that all "secret" recipes of medicine be sent to the Ministry of Interior for review. The manuscript was sent and returned as "Refused" as it was not a secret but well known. At the death of the pharmacist, his heirs returned the manuscript to the monks who had been back at the Monastery since 1816.[7]
In 1838, they developed Yellow Chartreuse, a sweeter version of the Green Chartreuse, 40% alcohol liqueur (80° proof).[7]
The monks were again expelled from the monastery following a French law in 1903, and their real property, including the distillery, was confiscated by the government. The monks took their secret recipe to their refuge in Tarragona, Catalonia, and began producing their liqueurs with the same label, but with an additional label which said Liqueur fabriquée à Tarragone par les Pères Chartreux ("liquor manufactured in Tarragona by the Carthusian Fathers"). At the same time, the "Compagnie Fermière de la Grande Chartreuse", a corporation in Voiron that obtained the Chartreuse assets, produced a liqueur without benefit of the monks' recipe which they sold as Chartreuse. While the French corporation was acting legally in France, the monks successfully prevented the export of the liqueur to many other countries, since the order retained ownership of its foreign trademark registrations, largely because the recipe had been kept secret.[9][10] On the night of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, one of the proposed dishes for First class was a Chartreuse based dessert.[11] Sales at the French company were very poor, and by 1929, it faced bankruptcy. A group of local businessmen in Voiron bought all the shares at a low price and sent them as a gift to the monks in Tarragona.[7]
After regaining possession of the distillery, the Carthusian brothers returned to the monastery with the tacit approval of the French government and began to produce Chartreuse once again. Despite the eviction law, when a mudslide destroyed the distillery in 1935, the French government assigned Army engineers to relocate and rebuild it at a location near Voiron where the monks had previously set up a distribution point. After World War II, the government lifted the expulsion order, making the Carthusian brothers once again legal French residents.[7]
Until the 1980s, there was another distillery at Tarragona in Spain.[12][13]
Today, the liqueurs are produced in Voiron using the herbal mixture prepared by two monks at Grande Chartreuse. They are the only ones to know the secret recipe. The marketing, bottling, packaging, management of the distillery and tours are done by Chartreuse Diffusion, a company created in 1970.[7] Other related alcoholic beverages are manufactured in the same distillery (e.g. Génépi). The exact recipes for all forms of Chartreuse remain trade secrets and are known at any given time only to the two monks who prepare the herbal mixture. Chartreuse is commonly used as an ingredient in cocktails, such as a Cloister.[14]
Accolades [ edit ]
Chartreuse liquors generally have performed well at international spirit ratings competitions. The basic green offering has won silver and double gold medals from the San Francisco World Spirits Competition. It has also earned an above-average score of 93 from the Beverage Testing Institute and has been given scores in the 96-100 interval by Wine Enthusiast.[15] The VEP Green and VEP Yellow have generally earned similarly impressive scores.[16] The basic Yellow Chartreuse has received more modest (though still average or above) ratings.[17]
Influence on color [ edit ]
Chartreuse gives its name to the color chartreuse, which was first used as a term of color in 1884.[18]
See also [ edit ]
Chartreuse yellow, a color originally named "chartreuse" in 1892 after Yellow Chartreuse liqueur, but since 1987 called "chartreuse yellow" to avoid confusion with the green version of chartreuse
Stellina, a similar monastic liqueur made in the same region as Chartreuse
Frangelico, an example of a liquor created in recent times "based on" a legend or story about a monastic recipe
Bénédictine, an example of a liquor created in recent times "based on" a monastic recipe
Centerbe, an Italian liqueur of pale green color made of mountain herbs.
References [ edit ]
Works cited |
LONG BEACH, California – You know the scene in Jurassic Park. Sam Neill's character Dr. Alan Grant and a group of naïve visitors enter the dinosaur island's birthing lab just at the moment a large egg begins to wobble and crack. The determined creature inside pecks its way out of the shell, and suddenly a velociraptor is born – more than 70 million years after its species was supposed to have become extinct.
Only in the movies, right?
Not if you’re paleontologist Jack Horner, the inspiration for Neill's character, who is on a mission to bring dinosaurs back – or at least the modern-day version of one.
Horner, curator of paleontology at the Museum of the Rockies and regent’s professor at Montana State University, has been working with researchers to produce a dino-chicken or chickensaurus – a chicken with prehistoric features such as a tail and hands. The research has been featured on 60 Minutes and elsewhere.
Chickens, and other birds, are descendants of dinosaurs and carry the dino DNA. In the embryo stage, chickens actually have a tail, which disappears before the bird hatches. Horner believes that if researchers can find the gene that turns off the tail – and turn it back on – they can hatch a chicken that resembles a dinosaur.
Horner will be speaking about his work at the Technology Entertainment and Design conference on Friday. He talked about his dino project with Wired.com in advance of his presentation.
Wired.com: Why did you choose a chicken for your experiment and not an ostrich or some other bird? Is there a reason a chicken is more suitable?
Jack Horner:They're easier to come by. Ostriches cost a lot of money. That really is the only reason. And the generation time is quicker. A chicken grows up in a little less time than an ostrich. An ostrich takes a whole year. A chicken takes a few months. You'd probably be better off using a smaller bird, but there gets to be some logistical problems with them. You can go and get plenty of eggs of chickens, but it's pretty hard to go and get plenty of eggs of robins.
Wired.com: Have you been able to identify the gene responsible for the tail yet?
JH: We’re still trying to identity two genes – the tail and the hands. The [researchers] knock out one gene per embryo. It will probably take hundreds [of embryos] to find the gene.
Wired.com: How many have you gone through so far?
JH: It's probably around a dozen or so – a carton of eggs. We don't have a great deal of funding for this, as you can probably imagine, so it's a slow process right now. We’re still trying to figure out what the best protocols are.
It's done in the very simplest stages of embryo genesis. When you're trying to knock out a gene, you haven't let the embryo develop more than a few rounds of duplications. And then you're just letting whatever you create develop in the egg, but it doesn't hatch. In fact most that have been made, are lethal. [The experiment] kills the embryo.
JH: That's a good question. You'll have to ask a geneticist. There are just some genes that are on, and some that are off, that are not good for the animal, for the developing embryo.
Wired.com: You're not changing the DNA at all in these experiments.
JH: We're not changing the DNA, and we're not making real transgenic animals. In other words, we're not doing anything that actually changes them at the level of DNA. But that is another tool [we could use], as well. I mean they make GloFish, right? There's a company that makes a thing called GloFish and they take genes out of jellyfish that glow, and they put them into the DNA of Zebrafish and make them glow pink or some other color.
Wired.com: And then sell them to 6-year-old girls going through their princess phase.
So that's a possibility – take a gene out of an animal and stick it into the chicken, but we just don't know enough about what all the genes do. All we’re trying to do right now is just figure out the simplest way to make a chicken or any bird look like a dinosaur.
Wired.com: Why is it important to create a dinosaur or chickensaur? What will it help us or tell us?
JH: It’s not going to put food on the table or gas in the car, but it's certainly going to tell us a lot about evolution. The whole point is to actually see what's involved in the transformation between dinosaurs and birds – to see what happened. When the embryo is growing, it starts producing a tail. But what happens is, a gene turns on – at least this is our hypothesis – that actually resorbs the tail, gets rid of it, during embryo genesis. The same thing happens with humans. We start growing a tail, and then, it's probably the same gene [that is in the chicken], turns on and resorbs that tail.
What we’re trying to do is identify that gene and keep it from turning on, and just let the animal hatch out with its tail.
Wired.com: In 2009, you predicted you would have a dino-chicken in five years. Are you on track to meet that?
JH: I think it’s still reasonable. But it does depend on funding. We need to hurry up here pretty soon, but I think it's still a reasonable deadline. |
package com.saywut.flutter_foreground_service_plugin;
import android.app.Notification;
import android.app.NotificationChannel;
import android.app.NotificationManager;
import android.app.PendingIntent;
import android.app.Service;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.os.Build;
import android.os.Handler;
import android.os.IBinder;
import android.os.Looper;
import androidx.annotation.NonNull;
import androidx.annotation.RequiresApi;
import androidx.core.app.NotificationCompat;
import java.util.Timer;
import java.util.TimerTask;
import io.flutter.embedding.engine.FlutterEngine;
import io.flutter.embedding.engine.dart.DartExecutor;
import io.flutter.embedding.engine.plugins.shim.ShimPluginRegistry;
import io.flutter.plugin.common.MethodCall;
import io.flutter.plugin.common.MethodChannel;
import io.flutter.view.FlutterCallbackInformation;
import io.flutter.view.FlutterMain;
public class FlutterForegroundService extends Service implements MethodChannel.MethodCallHandler
{
// flutter background channel
private static final String BACKGROUND_CHANNEL_NAME = "com.saywut.flutter_foreground_service_plugin/background_channel";
private static final String BACKGROUND_CHANNEL_INITIALIZE = "backgroundChannelInitialize";
// service intent action
public static final String RESTART_FOREGROUND_SERVICE_ACTION = "RESTART_FOREGROUND_SERVICE_ACTION";
// service commands
public static final String START_SERVICE = "START_FOREGROUND_SERVICE";
public static final String STOP_SERVICE = "STOP_FOREGROUND_SERVICE";
public static final String REFRESH_CONTENT = "REFRESH_CONTENT";
public static final String START_TASK = "START_FOREGROUND_TASK";
public static final String STOP_TASK = "STOP_FOREGROUND_TASK";
// service properties
private String action = START_SERVICE;
private SharedPreferencesHandler preferencesHandler;
private Timer taskTimer;
private FlutterEngine engine;
private MethodChannel androidToFlutterChannel;
private PendingIntent mainActivityIntent;
private long lastTimeTaskExecute;
private long taskStartTime;
@Override
public int onStartCommand(Intent intent, int flags, int startId)
{
super.onStartCommand(intent, flags, startId);
preferencesHandler = new SharedPreferencesHandler(getApplicationContext());
if (intent != null)
action = intent.getAction();
switch (action)
{
case START_SERVICE:
mainActivityIntent = getLaunchPendingIntent();
if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.O)
startForegroundOreo();
else
startForeground(1, buildNotification());
if (preferencesHandler.get("isTaskRunning"))
{
createFlutterEngineAndBackgroundChannel();
executeFlutterTaskCode();
}
return START_STICKY;
case STOP_SERVICE:
stopPeriodicTask();
stopForeground(true);
stopSelf();
return START_NOT_STICKY;
case REFRESH_CONTENT:
startForeground(1, buildNotification());
return START_STICKY;
case START_TASK:
createFlutterEngineAndBackgroundChannel();
executeFlutterTaskCode();
return START_STICKY;
case STOP_TASK:
stopPeriodicTask();
return START_STICKY;
default:
return START_NOT_STICKY;
}
}
/**
* starts foreground service for android 8 and above.
*/
@RequiresApi(Build.VERSION_CODES.O)
public void startForegroundOreo()
{
// gets the notification channel params
final boolean notifEnableSound = preferencesHandler.get("notifEnableSound");
final boolean notifEnableVibration = preferencesHandler.get("notifEnableVibration");
final String channelID = preferencesHandler.get("channelID");
final String channelNameText = preferencesHandler.get("channelNameText");
final String channelDescriptionText = preferencesHandler.get("channelDescriptionText");
final int channelImportance = preferencesHandler.get("channelImportance");
final int channelLockscreenVisibility = preferencesHandler.get("channelLockscreenVisibility");
// creates a notification channel
NotificationChannel notifChannel = new NotificationChannel(channelID, channelNameText, channelImportance);
notifChannel.setShowBadge(false);
notifChannel.setDescription(channelDescriptionText);
notifChannel.setLockscreenVisibility(channelLockscreenVisibility);
if (!notifEnableSound)
{
notifChannel.setSound(null, null);
}
if (!notifEnableVibration)
{
notifChannel.enableVibration(false);
notifChannel.setVibrationPattern(null);
}
// sets the channel in the notification service
NotificationManager notificationManager = (NotificationManager) getSystemService(Context.NOTIFICATION_SERVICE);
if (notificationManager != null)
notificationManager.createNotificationChannel(notifChannel);
startForeground(1, buildNotification());
}
/**
* builds a notification based on the received param
*
* @return the build notification
*/
public Notification buildNotification()
{
// gets the notification params
final String notifTitleText = preferencesHandler.get("notifTitleText");
final String notifBodyText = preferencesHandler.get("notifBodyText");
final String notifSubText = preferencesHandler.get("notifSubText");
final int notifIconID = preferencesHandler.get("notifIconID");
final int notifColor = preferencesHandler.get("notifColor");
final boolean notifEnableSound = preferencesHandler.get("notifEnableSound");
final boolean notifEnableVibration = preferencesHandler.get("notifEnableVibration");
final int notifPriority = preferencesHandler.get("notifPriority");
final String channelID = preferencesHandler.get("channelID");
NotificationCompat.Builder notifBuild = new NotificationCompat.Builder(this, channelID)
.setContentTitle(notifTitleText)
.setSmallIcon(notifIconID)
.setContentIntent(mainActivityIntent)
.setCategory(Notification.CATEGORY_SERVICE)
.setPriority(notifPriority)
.setOngoing(true);
if (!notifEnableSound)
notifBuild.setSound(null);
if (!notifEnableVibration)
notifBuild.setVibrate(null);
if (notifColor != -1)
notifBuild.setColor(notifColor);
if (notifSubText != null)
notifBuild.setSubText(notifSubText);
if (notifBodyText != null)
{
notifBuild.setContentText(notifBodyText);
notifBuild.setStyle(new NotificationCompat.BigTextStyle().bigText(notifBodyText));
}
return notifBuild.build();
}
/**
* creates a pending intent that points to the main app activity
*
* @return pending intent that points to the main app activity
*/
public PendingIntent getLaunchPendingIntent()
{
String packageName = getApplicationInfo().packageName;
Intent launchIntent = getPackageManager().getLaunchIntentForPackage(packageName);
PendingIntent launchPendingIntent = PendingIntent.getActivity(this, 0, launchIntent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
return launchPendingIntent;
}
@Override
public IBinder onBind(Intent intent)
{
return null;
}
/**
* creates the flutter engine and background channel that used to communicate with the flutter code
* when the app is terminated
*/
public void createFlutterEngineAndBackgroundChannel()
{
engine = new FlutterEngine(this);
FlutterMain.ensureInitializationComplete(this, null);
String pluginKey = "com.saywut.flutter_foreground_service_plugin.FlutterForegroundServicePlugin";
FlutterForegroundServicePlugin.registerWith(new ShimPluginRegistry(engine).registrarFor(pluginKey));
androidToFlutterChannel = new MethodChannel(engine.getDartExecutor(), BACKGROUND_CHANNEL_NAME);
androidToFlutterChannel.setMethodCallHandler(FlutterForegroundService.this);
}
/**
* Execute the flutter code of the periodic task function
*/
public void executeFlutterTaskCode()
{
long rawTaskHandler = preferencesHandler.get("rawTaskHandler");
FlutterCallbackInformation callbackInfo = FlutterCallbackInformation.lookupCallbackInformation(rawTaskHandler);
String dartBundlePath = FlutterMain.findAppBundlePath();
engine.getDartExecutor().executeDartCallback(new DartExecutor.DartCallback(getAssets(), dartBundlePath, callbackInfo));
}
/**
* Schedules the specified task for repeated fixed-delay execution, beginning after the
* specified delay. Subsequent executions take place at approximately regular intervals
* separated by the specified period.
*
* @param delay sets the delay to wait before starting the task first time
* @param period the period between each execute
*/
public void startPeriodicTask(long delay, long period)
{
if (taskTimer == null)
{
taskStartTime = System.currentTimeMillis();
final Handler handler = new Handler(Looper.getMainLooper());
taskTimer = new Timer();
taskTimer.schedule(new TimerTask()
{
@Override
public void run()
{
handler.post(new Runnable()
{
@Override
public void run()
{
lastTimeTaskExecute = System.currentTimeMillis();
androidToFlutterChannel.invokeMethod("invokeFlutterFunction", null);
}
});
}
}, delay, period);
}
}
/**
* stops the periodic task
*/
public void stopPeriodicTask()
{
if (taskTimer != null)
{
taskTimer.cancel();
taskTimer.purge();
taskTimer = null;
}
// destroying the engine to clear some of the used memory
if (engine != null)
{
engine.destroy();
engine = null;
}
}
@Override
public void onDestroy()
{
super.onDestroy();
// this is to check if the service got stopped by the system
// if it is then restart it
// you can read farther explanation in the RestartForegroundService class
// if (!action.equals(STOP_SERVICE))
// {
// if (taskTimer != null)
// {
// // if the task is running and the OS kills the service the task is stopped
// // this is to calculate the task delay on restart to continue from where it stopped
// long serviceStopTime = System.currentTimeMillis();
// long taskDelay = preferencesHandler.get("taskDelay");
// long taskPeriod = preferencesHandler.get("taskPeriod");
// long passedTaskTimeFromStart = serviceStopTime - taskStartTime;
// long passedTaskTimeFromDelay = taskDelay - passedTaskTimeFromStart;
// long passedTaskTimeFromLast = serviceStopTime - lastTimeTaskExecute;
// long passedTaskTimeFromPeriod = taskPeriod - passedTaskTimeFromLast;
// long restartServiceTaskDelay = passedTaskTimeFromDelay >= 0 ? passedTaskTimeFromDelay : passedTaskTimeFromPeriod;
// restartServiceTaskDelay = Math.max(restartServiceTaskDelay, 0);
// preferencesHandler.put("taskDelay", restartServiceTaskDelay);
// preferencesHandler.apply();
// }
// Intent restartForegroundServiceReceiver = new Intent(this, ForegroundServiceReceiver.class);
// restartForegroundServiceReceiver.setAction(RESTART_FOREGROUND_SERVICE_ACTION);
// sendBroadcast(restartForegroundServiceReceiver);
// }
stopPeriodicTask();
}
@Override
public void onMethodCall(@NonNull MethodCall call, @NonNull MethodChannel.Result result)
{
switch (call.method)
{
case BACKGROUND_CHANNEL_INITIALIZE:
long taskDelay = preferencesHandler.get("taskDelay");
long taskPeriod = preferencesHandler.get("taskPeriod");
startPeriodicTask(taskDelay, taskPeriod);
result.success(true);
break;
default:
result.notImplemented();
break;
}
}
@Override
public void onTaskRemoved(Intent rootIntent){
action = STOP_SERVICE;
stopPeriodicTask();
stopForeground(true);
stopSelf();
super.onTaskRemoved(rootIntent);
}
} |
export * from './middlewares/notFoundHandler'
export * from './middlewares/healthCheckHandler'
export * from './middlewares/errorHandler'
export * from './middlewares/handleValidationErrors'
export * from './middlewares/currentUser'
export * from './middlewares/protectedRoute'
export * from './middlewares/adminRoute'
export * from './errors/BadRequestError'
export * from './errors/NotFoundError'
export * from './errors/AuthorizationError'
export * from './types/Role'
export * from './events/nats'
export * from './events/Publisher'
export * from './events/Listener'
export * from './events/types/Event'
export * from './events/types/Subjects'
export * from './events/event-types/UserCreatedEvent'
export * from './events/event-types/UserUpdatedEvent'
export * from './events/event-types/CauseCreatedEvent'
export * from './events/event-types/CauseUpdatedEvent'
export * from './events/event-types/AllocationsUpdatedEvent'
export * from './events/event-types/UpdateUserPointsEvent'
|
/// Create a new `ReplayClient` instance reading and writing to the specified target.
pub fn new(target: RecordingTarget) -> Self {
ReplayClient {
config: ClientConfig::default(),
target: target,
force_record_next: AtomicBool::new(false),
}
} |
When the lawyer is called in your best friend is a good set of records. Not too many physicians consider the care and keeping of medical records one of the more exciting elements of their practice. But in this age of accountability, and with so much creative effort going into the art of malpractice litigation, that once-tedious chore of paperwork is achieving a new respect. Witness to that respect is Dr. F. Norman Brown, secretary treasurer of the Canadian Medical Protective Association, who is urging physicians to become much more vigilant not only about the shape and content of records, but about what happens to them after a physician retires from practice or dies. The defence of physicians and their estates against actions of varying kinds is a growth industry. There is rarely a time, says Dr. Brown, that CMPA is not involved in defending two or three physicians' estates concurrently. CMPA data show that inquiries concerning defence of members are increasing, and so is the size of settlements. In 1945, while representing 3367 members, the CMPA was involved in nine new legal actions, or one per 374 physicians. By 1974, the ratio had increased to one new action per 132 physicians. In 1970, the association was involved in 80 served writs; in 1974, 220 served writs. In 1970 it was involved in 32 actions pending; in 1974, 124 actions pending. In 1950, CMPA paid an average $2942 to conclude each of 11 malpractice claims. By 1974 the average amount per claim had risen to $13 386. There is clearly a heightened sensitivity among Canadian physicians to malpractice action. It would be unusual if that sensitivity was absent, considering some of the horror stories coming out of the US concerning malpractice. There are differences in legal process between Canada and the US, and these differences have to date allowed Canadians more protection against malpractice suits. But the differences are not so vast that one can rule out the possibility of malpractice abuses spilling over the border. A couple of years ago, Dr. Bette Stephenson, then CMA president, warned against malpractice complacency. She said: "We have been repeatedly assured by legal luminaries, ministers of the crown, members of the judiciary and others that the causes of the current medical malpractice fiasco in the US have their roots in peculiarly American institutions and situations that most of these bear little or no similarity to their Canadian counterparts. "Yet there persists a lingering sense of disquiet that our relative freedom from the epidemic may not continue. In my opinion, the Canadian medical profession cannot afford the luxury of smug, chauvinistic complacency." |
SCHALKE have no intention of selling Max Meyer this summer, according to the German club's sporting director.
Reports last week suggested Liverpool had enquired about the availability of the 20-year-old.
The Reds were apparently lining up a £28.1m bid for the midfielder.
However Schalke sporting director Christian Heidel has claimed Meyer won't be leaving the Gelsenkirchen side this summer.
"There's no ambition to sell Max Meyer," Heidel told German sports paper RevierSport.
“Meyer is a really good player but a move to Liverpool is nonsense. I’ve known Mr [Jurgen] Klopp for a while now and I have spoken with him recently.
Meyer impressed for Schalke last season, scoring five goals and providing eight assists in 32 appearances for the club.
The 20-year-old, who has one international cap, is due to feature for Germany at the Rio Olympics next month. |
//
// DKStatusBarHUDController.h
// DKStatusBarHUD
//
// Created by 丁科 on 16/5/26.
// Copyright © 2016年 b. All rights reserved.
//
#import <UIKit/UIKit.h>
@interface DKStatusBarHUDController : UIViewController
/** 显示普通信息 */
+ (void)showMessage:(NSString *)message;
/** 显示普通信息和图片 */
+ (void)showMessage:(NSString *)message andImage:(UIImage *)image;
/** 显示成功信息 */
+ (void)showSuccess:(NSString *)SuccessMesssage;
/** 显示失败信息 */
+ (void)showError:(NSString *)ErrorMessage;
/** 显示正在处理信息 */
+ (void)showLoading:(NSString *)LoadingMessage;
/** 隐藏指示器 */
+ (void)hideStatusBar;
@end
|
Research on Discharge Characteristics of Three-Electrode Load Under the Pulsed Power Supply Low-temperature plasma water treatment technology has attracted more and more attention due to its nonselectivity and no secondary pollution. However, high energy consumption limits its further development. In this experiment, a three-electrode structure combining a needle-plate structure and a dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) structure is proposed. The discharge characteristics of the three-electrode structure are studied under the matched all-solid-state pulsed power supply. The results show that three discharges are generated at this three-electrode load within one pulse period. It greatly increases the number of discharges per pulse. Under the same pulse voltage condition, the injected power of the three-electrode load is much higher than the power of the single DBD load. When the voltage is 13 kV, the input power of three-electrode load is increased by 70% compared to single DBD load. When the needle-plate gap is constant, with the increase of DBD air gap, the injected power of the three-electrode load has a maximum value. When the DBD air gap remains unchanged, the injected power of the three-electrode load decreases with the increase of the needle-plate gap. |
# python3
"""A benchmark based on the paper from <NAME>."""
# The paper can be found here:
# Overview and Comparison of Gate Level Quantum Software Platforms
# https://arxiv.org/pdf/1807.02500.pdf
#
# We write the benchmark in Python and then generated the various flavors
# from it, eg., libq, projectq, qasm, etc.
import random
from absl import app
from absl import flags
from src.lib import circuit
flags.DEFINE_integer('nbits', 28, 'Number of Qubits')
flags.DEFINE_integer('depth', 28, 'Depth of Circuit')
# Informal benchmarking on my workstation shows that
# this xgate accelerated benchmark runs in about:
#
# qubit time
# 26 7 secs
# 27 14 secs
# 28 29 secs
# 29 58 secs
# 30 122 secs
#
# A 28/28 libq based circuit runs in about 3 seconds. But that's
# because this (kind of silly) benchmark does not introduce a
# lot of states with non-zero amplitudes. In other words,
# this is a good benchmark for full-state sims, but not for
# simulations based on spare representations, like libq.
def main(argv):
if len(argv) > 1:
raise app.UsageError('Too many command-line arguments.')
print(f'LaRose benchmark with {flags.FLAGS.nbits} qubits, ' +
f'depth: {flags.FLAGS.depth}...')
qc = circuit.qc(eager=False)
qc.reg(flags.FLAGS.nbits, random.randint(0, 2^flags.FLAGS.nbits), name='q')
for d in range(flags.FLAGS.depth):
print(f' depth: {d}')
for bit in range(flags.FLAGS.nbits):
qc.h(bit)
qc.v(bit)
if bit > 0:
qc.cx(bit, 0)
qc.dump_to_file()
if __name__ == '__main__':
app.run(main) |
/**
* Created by mariam on 1/11/16.
*/
public class DesktopFlurry implements FlurryManager {
private String LOG = "Flurry: ";
public DesktopFlurry() {
}
@Override
public void init() {
}
@Override
public void logEvent(String eventName) {
System.out.println(LOG+eventName);
}
@Override
public void logEvent(String eventName, HashMap<String, String> parameters) {
System.out.println(LOG+eventName+" "+parameters.toString());
}
@Override
public void logEvent(String eventName, HashMap<String, String> parameters, boolean isTimedEvent) {
System.out.println(LOG+eventName+" "+parameters.toString());
}
@Override
public void endTimedEvent(String eventName) {
}
@Override
public void endTimedEvent(String eventName, HashMap<String, String> parameters) {
}
} |
Using telemedicine to facilitate training in cardiotocography (CTG) interpretation Electronic fetal monitoring is a controversial practice in modern obstetric care and is frequently an aspect of medicolegal cases involving the management of labour and delivery. The interpretation of the cardiotocograph (CTG) produced by such monitors is a skill required by those caring for the pregnant woman. Studies have shown that most experts do not interpret CTGs in a consistent manner, when compared with either other experts or themselves. However, it has also been shown that consistency can be improved with training. Telemedicine has been used to advantage in the training of obstetrics and gynaecology registrars in CTG interpretation. |
Choroidal vasculature in diabetic rats. This study aims to evaluate the diabetic influence on the choroidal vessels morphology. Twenty Wistar rats were divided into a control (CG) and a diabetic group (DG). The animals had the diabetes induced by an intra-venous injection of Alloxan (42 mg/kg). Transmission electron microscopy analysis focusing the choroidal vessels was done one (T2) and twelve (T3) months after the diabetes induction. The CG rats in T3 showed vesicles and dense bodies in the endothelial and pericytic cells; the same structures were observed in the DG at T2. The DG rats in T3 had even more and intense changes than the T2DG rats. The morphological evaluation indicates that the choroidal vessels are affected in diabetes and the disease accelerates degenerative processes in the rat choroidal vasculature. |
Dexamethasone increases production of C-type natriuretic peptide in the sheep brain. Although C-type natriuretic peptide (CNP) has high abundance in brain tissues and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), the source and possible factors regulating its secretion within the central nervous system (CNS) are unknown. Here we report the dynamic effects of a single IV bolus of dexamethasone or saline solution on plasma, CSF, CNS and pituitary tissue content of CNP products in adult sheep, along with changes in CNP gene expression in selected tissues. Both CNP and NTproCNP (the amino-terminal product of proCNP) in plasma and CSF showed dose-responsive increases lasting 12-16h after dexamethasone, whereas other natriuretic peptides were unaffected. CNS tissue concentrations of CNP and NTproCNP were increased by dexamethasone in all of the 12 regions examined. Abundance was highest in limbic tissues, pons and medulla oblongata. Relative to controls, CNP gene expression (NPPC) was upregulated by dexamethasone in 5 of 7 brain tissues examined. Patterns of responses differed in pituitary tissue. Whereas the abundance of CNP in both lobes of the pituitary gland greatly exceeded that of brain tissues, neither CNP nor NTproCNP concentration was affected by dexamethasone, despite an increase in NPPC expression. This is the first report of enhanced production and secretion of CNP in brain tissues in response to a corticosteroid. Activation of CNP secretion within CNS tissues by dexamethasone, not exhibited by other natriuretic peptides, suggests an important role for CNP in settings of acute stress. Differential findings in pituitary tissues likely relate to altered processing of proCNP storage and secretion. |
Genetic Algorithmic Filter Approach to Mobile Robot Simultaneous Localization and Mapping This paper presents a genetic algorithmic filter (GAF) approach to mobile robot simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM). A Genetic algorithmic approach is used to solve the SLAM problem by concurrently optimizing appropriate cost functions defined over two sets of chromosome populations representing the robot pose and the environmental map. As such the methodology has the potential to produce globally consistent solutions to this highly non-linear, non-Gaussian SLAM problem. Similar to Monte-Carlo probabilistic localization, particles or chromosomes are used to represent the belief state of the robot and the environmental map. However, unlike in the case of a particle filter approach such as FastSLAM, the genetic algorithmic approach presented in the paper does not rely on environmental feature extraction and data association. Further, it is shown how the problems of sample impoverishment associated with re-sampling which is common in a particle filter approach can be systematically and effectively overcome through the application of a parallel variant of the genetic algorithm with associated operators. Simulation and experimental results are presented to demonstrate definite performance gains achievable through the use of GAF-SLAM and its potential to yield globally consistent SLAM results |
package com.serviceenabled.dropwizardrequesttracker.it;
import io.dropwizard.testing.junit.DropwizardAppRule;
import org.junit.ClassRule;
import org.junit.Test;
import org.junit.rules.RuleChain;
import javax.ws.rs.client.Client;
import javax.ws.rs.client.ClientBuilder;
import javax.ws.rs.client.ClientResponseContext;
import javax.ws.rs.client.Entity;
import static org.hamcrest.MatcherAssert.assertThat;
import static org.hamcrest.Matchers.equalTo;
public class CustomIdSupplierBundleApplicationIT {
private static final DropwizardAppRule<BundleConfiguration> DROPWIZARD_APP_RULE = new DropwizardAppRule<BundleConfiguration>(CustomIdSupplierBundleApplication.class);
private static final IntegrationTestSetupRule INTEGRATION_TEST_SETUP_RULE = new IntegrationTestSetupRule(DROPWIZARD_APP_RULE);
@ClassRule
public static final RuleChain chain = RuleChain
.outerRule(DROPWIZARD_APP_RULE)
.around(INTEGRATION_TEST_SETUP_RULE);
@Test
public void suppliesCustomId() throws Exception {
Client client = ClientBuilder.newClient();
client.target(INTEGRATION_TEST_SETUP_RULE.getInitialUri()).request().post(Entity.json(null), ClientResponseContext.class);
assertThat(INTEGRATION_TEST_SETUP_RULE.getMockTestResource().getRequestTrackerId(), equalTo("12345"));
}
} |
<gh_stars>1-10
#include "EZVisual/Controls/Canvas.h"
#include <cmath>
namespace EZVisual{
const int dx[] = {-1, 0, 1};
const int dy[] = {-1, 0, 1};
const int dxnum = sizeof(dx) / sizeof(dx[0]);
const int dynum = sizeof(dy) / sizeof(dy[0]);
Canvas::Canvas(rapidjson::Value& json) :
Marginable(json),
Backgroundable(json),
VisualElement(json){
if(json["LayerCount"].IsInt())
SetLayerCount(json["LayerCount"].GetInt());
else SetLayerCount(1);
if(json["LayerWidth"].IsInt() && json["LayerHeight"].IsInt()){
SetLayerSize(make_pair(json["LayerWidth"].GetInt(), json["LayerHeight"].GetInt()));
}
else throw "LayerSize must be set for Canvas.";
}
void Canvas::Draw(cv::Mat& target){
if(measured_height == 0 || measured_width == 0) return;
if(target.rows < measured_height || target.cols < measured_width)
throw "Canvas::Draw() need more space.";
if(control_border_width > 0 && control_border_height > 0){
cv::Mat content_roi(target, cv::Rect(margin[0], margin[1],
control_border_width, control_border_height));
UpdateGlobalXY(content_roi);
background->Draw(content_roi);
for(int i = 0; i < layer_count; ++i)
for(int x = 0; x < min(layer_width, control_border_width); ++x)
for(int y = 0; y < min(layer_height, control_border_height); ++y)
pixels[i][GetIndex(x, y)].Cover(content_roi.at<cv::Vec3b>(y, x));
}
}
void Canvas::Measure(int desired_width, int desired_height){
this->Marginable::GetFreeSpace(desired_width, desired_height);
if(control_border_width == 0 || control_border_height == 0){
measured_width = desired_width;
measured_height = desired_height;
return;
}
if(width == FILL_PARENT) measured_width = desired_width;
else{
control_border_width = min(layer_width, control_border_width);
measured_width = control_border_width + margin[0] + margin[2];
}
if(height == FILL_PARENT) measured_height = desired_height;
else{
control_border_height = min(layer_height, control_border_height);
measured_height = control_border_height + margin[1] + margin[3];
}
}
VisualElementType Canvas::getType() const{
return VisualElementType::Canvas;
}
void Canvas::PaintColor(const Color& color, int layer_index){
for(int i = 0; i < pixels[layer_index].size(); ++i)
color.Cover(pixels[layer_index][i]);
}
void Canvas::PaintImage(const cv::Mat& mat, int layer_index, const std::pair<int, int>& origin_point){
if(origin_point.first + mat.cols < 0 || origin_point.first + mat.cols > layer_width
|| origin_point.second + mat.rows < 0 || origin_point.second + mat.rows > layer_height){
throw "Image exceeds the layer.";
}
if(mat.channels() == 1){
for(int x = 0; x < mat.cols; ++x)
for(int y = 0; y < mat.rows; ++y){
u_char v3 = mat.at<u_char>(y, x);
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].a = 255;
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].r = v3;
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].g = v3;
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].b = v3;
}
}
else if(mat.channels() == 3){
for(int x = 0; x < mat.cols; ++x)
for(int y = 0; y < mat.rows; ++y){
cv::Vec3b v3 = mat.at<cv::Vec3b>(y, x);
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].a = 255;
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].b = v3[0];
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].g = v3[1];
pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(origin_point.first + x,
origin_point.second + y)].r = v3[2];
}
}
else{
throw "Illegal channel count: must be 1 or 3.";
}
}
void Canvas::ClearLayer(int layer_index){
pixels[layer_index] = vector<Color>(layer_height * layer_width, 0);
}
void Canvas::SetLayerCount(int count){
if(count <= 0){
throw "Layer count not legal.";
}
layer_count = count;
pixels.resize(count);
}
void Canvas::SetLayerSize(const pair<int,int>& size){
if(size.first <= 0 || size.second <= 0){
throw "Layer size not legal.";
}
layer_width = size.first;
layer_height = size.second;
for(int i = 0; i < pixels.size(); ++i) pixels[i].resize(layer_width * layer_height, 0);
}
int Canvas::GetIndex(int x, int y) const{
return x * layer_height + y;
}
int Canvas::GetLayerCount() const{
return layer_count;
}
int Canvas::GetLayerWidth() const{
return layer_width;
}
int Canvas::GetLayerHeight() const{
return layer_height;
}
void Canvas::PaintCurve(const std::vector<std::pair<int,int>>& points, const Color& color, int layer_index, float point_size){
if(point_size == 0) for(auto p : points) PaintPixel(p, color, layer_index);
else for(auto p : points) for(auto p : points)
PaintCircle(make_pair((float)p.first, (float)p.second), point_size, color, 0, layer_index, 0);
}
void Canvas::PaintRect(const pair<int, int>& origin_point, int width, int height, const Color& fill_color, const Color& border_color, int layer_index, float border_thickness){
const int inner_left = origin_point.first + border_thickness;
const int inner_right = origin_point.first + width - border_thickness;
const int inner_top = origin_point.second + border_thickness;
const int inner_bottom = origin_point.second + height - border_thickness;
for(int i = origin_point.first - border_thickness;
i <= origin_point.first + width + border_thickness; ++i){
for(int j = origin_point.second - border_thickness;
j <= origin_point.second + height + border_thickness; ++j){
if((i >= inner_left && i <= inner_right
&& j >= inner_top && j <= inner_bottom) || border_thickness == 0)
PaintPixel(make_pair(i, j), fill_color, layer_index);
else PaintPixel(make_pair(i, j), border_color, layer_index);
}
}
}
void Canvas::PaintCircle(const pair<float, float>& center_point, float r, const Color& fill_color, const Color& border_color, int layer_index, float border_thickness){
if(r < 0){
throw "Radius not legal.";
}
if(r == 0){
PaintPixel(make_pair((int)round(center_point.first), (int)round(center_point.second)), fill_color, layer_index);
return;
}
const double fake_r = r + border_thickness;
const int txb = (center_point.first - fake_r);
const int txe = (center_point.first + fake_r);
for(int tx = txb; tx <= txe; ++tx){
double dy = sqrt(fake_r * fake_r - (tx - center_point.first) * (tx - center_point.first));
const int tyb = round(center_point.second - dy);
const int tye = round(center_point.second + dy);
for(int ty = tyb; ty <= tye; ++ty){
const double dis = sqrt(((double)center_point.first - tx)*
((double)center_point.first - tx) +
((double)center_point.second - ty)*
((double)center_point.second - ty));
if(fabs(dis - r) < border_thickness) PaintPixel(make_pair(tx, ty), border_color, layer_index);
else if(dis < r) PaintPixel(make_pair(tx, ty), fill_color, layer_index);
}
}
}
void Canvas::PaintPixel(const pair<int, int>& point, const Color& point_color, int layer_index){
if(point.first < 0 || point.second < 0 ||
point.first >= layer_width || point.second >= layer_height
|| !point_color.a){
return;
}
point_color.Cover(pixels[layer_index][GetIndex(point.first, point.second)]);
}
void Canvas::PaintLine(const pair<int, int>& a, const pair<int, int>& b, const Color& line_color, int layer_index, float line_thickness){
const int dx = a.first - b.first;
const int dy = a.second - b.second;
if(!dy && !dx){
PaintCircle(a, line_thickness, line_color, 0, layer_index, 0);
return;
}
if(abs(dy) > abs(dx)){
const double k = ((double)dx) / dy;
const double t = b.first - k * b.second;
const int d = dy > 0 ? -1 : 1;
for(int y = a.second; y != b.second; y += d)
PaintCircle(make_pair((int)round(k*y+t), y),
line_thickness, line_color, 0, layer_index, 0);
}
else{
const double k = ((double)dy) / dx;
const double t = b.second - k * b.first;
const int d = dx > 0 ? -1 : 1;
for(int x = a.first; x != b.first; x += d)
PaintCircle(make_pair(x, (int)round(k*x+t)),
line_thickness, line_color, 0, layer_index, 0);
}
}
} |
<filename>src/main/java/com/amazon/alexa/avs/config/ObjectMapperFactory.java
/**
* Copyright 2016 Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. All Rights Reserved.
*
* You may not use this file except in compliance with the License. A copy of the License is located the "LICENSE.txt"
* file accompanying this source. This file is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
* KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations
* under the License.
*/
package com.amazon.alexa.avs.config;
import org.codehaus.jackson.map.DeserializationConfig;
import org.codehaus.jackson.map.ObjectMapper;
import org.codehaus.jackson.map.ObjectReader;
import org.codehaus.jackson.map.ObjectWriter;
public class ObjectMapperFactory {
private static final ObjectMapper OBJECT_MAPPER = new ObjectMapper()
.configure(DeserializationConfig.Feature.FAIL_ON_UNKNOWN_PROPERTIES, false);
private static final ObjectWriter OBJECT_WRITER = OBJECT_MAPPER.writer();
private static final ObjectReader OBJECT_READER = OBJECT_MAPPER.reader();
private ObjectMapperFactory() {
}
/**
*
* @return A generic object reader
*/
public static ObjectReader getObjectReader() {
return OBJECT_READER;
}
/**
* Get an ObjectReader that can parse JSON to type clazz
*
* @param clazz
* Type of class to parse the JSON into
* @return
*/
public static ObjectReader getObjectReader(Class<?> clazz) {
return OBJECT_READER.withType(clazz);
}
public static ObjectWriter getObjectWriter() {
return OBJECT_WRITER;
}
}
|
A television studio is a dark, windowless room with professional lighting and sound equipment, a studio audience and cameras. It’s a light-controlled, soundproof environment in which everything is focused on a stage area. Content is tightly managed to fit within an established time parameter.
I worship God in a room like this every week.
Churches used to build sanctuaries. Many had soaring ceilings. Decorations and symbols told the story of the Bible. Natural light poured through windows (both clear and stained glass).
But the worship spaces we build today are dark, cavernous rooms designed to capture sound and images and broadcast them to the world. The studio audience (aka, the congregation) is almost an afterthought.
To understand why our churches now resemble TV studios we must go back to the 1970s.
Radio and TV preachers and televangelists were a big deal in the disco era. Pulpiteers such as Billy Graham, Pat Robertson, Robert Schuller, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, and Jerry Falwell reached millions of viewers each week via the airwaves.
Churchgoers began watching and listening to their broadcasts. Predictably, they compared these superstar communicators to their own pastors, who couldn’t possibly measure up.
This created dissatisfaction among churchgoers. For the first time people realized they didn’t have to put up with lousy preaching and mediocre music. They could jump into their big, shiny 1970s cars and drive on brand new, mostly-deserted-on-Sunday-morning freeways across town to sit under the best preacher.
And thus the church-hopping movement began. Big churches got bigger, while smaller churches shriveled.
Add to this the significant number of people who simply stopped going to church and watched it on TV. Televised ministries grew rich off their donations, while small, local churches withered for lack of support.
Church innovators of the 1980s such as Rick Warren, Bill Hybels and Chuck Smith noticed the trend. They invented the “seeker friendly” church model, in part to compete with TV.
From the beginning, seeker friendly worship was designed to capture the TV generation. These churches blacked out the windows, hung professional lights and rolled in the cameras. A rock band warmed up the crowd. Worship services were planned down to the minute. And sermon length increased to give these gifted communicators more pulpit time.
They also eliminated many of the interpersonal elements of worship that would throw things off schedule. Small-church staples such as personal testimonies, prayer-and-share and recognizing visitors were tossed overboard in order to fit everything into the allotted 58 minutes and 30 seconds of broadcast airtime.
In 1970, only about 50 churches in America drew a crowd of more than 2,000 worshippers on a weekend. Today, well over a thousand U.S. congregations regularly eclipse that number. Almost every one of these king-size congregations worships in a room specially built for TV.
YouTube has accelerated the TV-studio-as-sanctuary trend. Pastors can now reach tens of thousands of viewers online. The crowd that actually comes to church plays the role of studio audience for a much larger congregation out in cyberspace.
So, is it wrong for churches to resemble TV studios? Not at all. Jesus didn’t leave behind any church blueprints. He made it clear that where we worship is not nearly as important as how we worship (John 4:20-24).
If our Sunday worship services are made-for-TV, why attend them live? That’s the very question many Christians are beginning to ask.
You see, almost everything we do in our worship services today can be recorded and distributed online. That’s presenting a huge problem, which I’ll examine in my next post. |
Nuclear Hormone and Orphan Receptors: Their Role in Neuronal Differentiation and Cytoprotection and in the Pathogenesis of Parkinsons Disease Human nuclear hormone receptors (NHR) and orphan receptors (NOR) act as transcription factors in response to a wide range of circulating hormones and unknown ligands. A role for NHR and NOR in disorders of the subcortical dopaminergic pathways such as Parkinsons disease (PD) is suggested by a wealth of recent data including experimental observations. Both classes of receptors promote the formation of specific neuronal identities, tissue patterning during embryonic development and the maturation of vulnerable monoaminergic and cholinergic neurons. NHR and NOR are also known to exert a neuroprotective function on adult neurons. The scope of this review is to revisit the functional profile of these receptors with particular reference to their activity in the development of selected neuronal populations relevant to the pathophysiology of PD and to discuss how they may relate to the neuropathological and clinical expression of the disease. |
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has pushed back against calls to remove GST from electricity bills, expressing concern about the multibillion-dollar impact on state and territory government budgets and observing other taxes could just be increased to compensate for the shortfall.
Parliamentary Budget Office costings for libertarian senator David Leyonhjelm show the idea would cost the states and territories - the recipients of GST revenue after it is collected by the federal government - a maximum of $2 billion.
Senator Leyonhjelm has argued the move, which could wipe hundreds of dollars off power bills, should be considered because power is an essential service just like water, which is exempt from GST.
The PBO advice projects household electricity prices would fall 9 per cent under the change and inflation would slow. |
<filename>crusoe_orient/src/app/shared/models/vulnerability.model.ts
export interface CVEResponse {
CVE: Response[];
}
interface Response {
vulnerabilitys: Vulnerability[];
}
interface Vulnerability {
description: string;
in: Software[];
}
interface Software {
version: string;
on: Host[];
}
interface Host {
nodes: Node[];
}
interface Node {
has_assigned: IP[];
}
interface IP {
address: string;
part_of: Subnet[];
resolves_to: Domain[];
}
interface Subnet {
note: string;
range: string;
}
interface Domain {
domain_name: string;
}
export interface CVE {
__typename: string;
access_complexity: string;
access_vector: string;
attack_complexity: string;
attack_vector: string;
authentication: string;
availability_impact_v2: string;
availability_impact_v3: string;
base_score_v2: string;
base_score_v3: string;
confidentiality_impact_v2: string;
confidentiality_impact_v3: string;
description: string;
integrity_impact_v2: string;
integrity_impact_v3: string;
obtain_all_privilege: string;
obtain_other_privilege: string;
obtain_user_privilege: string;
privileges_required: string;
published_date: string;
scope: string;
user_interaction: string;
impact: string;
}
|
<reponame>AnnaIvanova73/SpringData<filename>Exercise_ Spring Data Intro/springintro/src/main/java/softuni/springintro/controllers/RunLastTask.java<gh_stars>0
package softuni.springintro.controllers;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Autowired;
import org.springframework.boot.CommandLineRunner;
import org.springframework.core.annotation.Order;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Component;
import softuni.springintro.services.impl.BookServiceImpl;
import static softuni.springintro.constants.MagicStrings.FOURTH_TASK;
@Component
@Order(value = 4)
public class RunLastTask implements CommandLineRunner {
private final BookServiceImpl bookService;
@Autowired
public RunLastTask(BookServiceImpl bookService) {
this.bookService = bookService;
}
@Override
public void run(String... args) {
System.err.println(FOURTH_TASK);
System.out.println(this.bookService.getBooksByAuthor());
}
}
|
def put_record(self, record):
data, partition_key = record
log.debug('Sending record: %s', data[:100])
try:
call_and_retry(self.connection.put_record, self.max_retries,
StreamName=self.stream, Data=data,
PartitionKey=partition_key)
except:
log.exception('Failed to send records to Kinesis') |
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
"""
Created on Mon Jan 26 10:37:52 2015
@author: shanshan
"""
################################################### Preprocessing ################################################
''' Import packages '''
import pandas as pd
from pandas import DataFrame, Series
import seaborn as sns
import numpy as np
''' read_csv()
The read_csv() function in pandas package parse an csv data as a DataFrame data structure. What's the endpoint of the data?
The data structure is able to deal with complex table data whose attributes are of all data types.
Row names, column names in the dataframe can be used to index data.
'''
data = pd.read_csv("http://archive.ics.uci.edu/ml/machine-learning-databases/auto-mpg/auto-mpg.data-original", delim_whitespace = True, \
header=None, names = ['mpg', 'cylinders', 'displacement', 'horsepower', 'weight', 'acceleration', 'model', 'origin', 'car_name'])
data['mpg']
data.mpg
data.iloc[0,:]
print(data.shape)
data = data.dropna()
data.head()
''' describe()
Sometimes, describing the statistics of attributes is useful such as : mean, std, min, max, percentiles, etc.
The describe() function can do this. It can be also combined with groupby() function to go deeper into the data.
'''
data.mpg.describe()
data.groupby(['cylinders']).mpg.describe()
''' pivot_table()
Sometimes, aggregation of values in different groups separated by different ways is interesting.
The pivot_table() function can specify the definition of groups, an attribute of interest and an aggregation function
to perform on the attribute.
'''
pivot_table = data.pivot_table(index='cylinders', columns='acceleration', values='mpg', aggfunc=np.mean)
pivot_table.head()
############################################## Visualization #######################################################
''' Import the essential package
matplotlib.pyplot is the most basic one.
seaborn enhances the visualization ability with statistical models.
plotly enables interactive ploting.
'''
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import seaborn as sns
#import plotly as py
''' Initial Plotting Parameters'''
plt.rcParams
rcDef = plt.rcParams
plt.rcParams.update(plt.rcParamsDefault)
''' Simple histogram '''
def hist_plot():
''' Create a canvas with width 10, height 7.5 '''
fig_obj = plt.figure(figsize=(10, 7.5))
''' Place an 2-D axis system on the Canvas '''
ax = plt.subplot(111)
ax.spines["bottom"].set_visible(True) # Set the spines, or box bounds visibility
ax.spines["left"].set_visible(True)
ax.spines['right'].set_visible(False)
ax.spines['top'].set_visible(False)
''' Plot the histogram of '''
p = plt.hist(data.mpg, bins = 30)
plt.title("MPG", fontsize=14, fontweight='bold')
''' Save figure '''
plt.tight_layout()
plt.savefig('histogram.png', bbox_inches='tight')
plt.show()
''' Scatter plot'''
def scatter_plot():
''' Create a canvas with width 10, height 7.5 '''
fig_obj = plt.figure(figsize=(10, 7.5))
ax = plt.subplot(111)
p = plt.plot(data.mpg, data.weight, 'r.')
plt.savefig('scatter1.png',bbox_inches='tight')
plt.show()
def scatter_plot2():
sns.lmplot("mpg", "weight", data, order=2);
plt.savefig('scatter2.png',bbox_inches='tight')
plt.show()
def line_plot():
''' Read the data into a pandas DataFrame. '''
gender_degree_data = pd.read_csv("http://www.randalolson.com/wp-content/uploads/percent-bachelors-degrees-women-usa.csv")
''' These are the "Tableau 20" colors as RGB. '''
tableau20 = [(31, 119, 180), (174, 199, 232), (255, 127, 14), (255, 187, 120),
(44, 160, 44), (152, 223, 138), (214, 39, 40), (255, 152, 150),
(148, 103, 189), (197, 176, 213), (140, 86, 75), (196, 156, 148),
(227, 119, 194), (247, 182, 210), (127, 127, 127), (199, 199, 199),
(188, 189, 34), (219, 219, 141), (23, 190, 207), (158, 218, 229)]
''' Scale the RGB values to the [0, 1] range, which is the format matplotlib accepts. '''
for i in range(len(tableau20)):
r, g, b = tableau20[i]
tableau20[i] = (r / 255., g / 255., b / 255.)
''' You typically want your plot to be ~1.33x wider than tall. This plot is a rare
exception because of the number of lines being plotted on it.
Common sizes: (10, 7.5) and (12, 9)'''
fig_obj = plt.figure(figsize=(12, 14))
''' Remove the plot frame lines. They are unnecessary chartjunk. '''
ax = plt.subplot(111)
ax.spines["top"].set_visible(False)
ax.spines["bottom"].set_visible(False)
ax.spines["right"].set_visible(False)
ax.spines["left"].set_visible(False)
'''Ensure that the axis ticks only show up on the bottom and left of the plot.
# Ticks on the right and top of the plot are generally unnecessary chartjunk. '''
ax.get_xaxis().tick_bottom()
ax.get_yaxis().tick_left()
'''# Limit the range of the plot to only where the data is.
# Avoid unnecessary whitespace.'''
plt.ylim(0, 90)
plt.xlim(1968, 2014)
'''# Make sure your axis ticks are large enough to be easily read.
# You don't want your viewers squinting to read your plot. '''
plt.yticks(range(0, 91, 10), [str(x) + "%" for x in range(0, 91, 10)], fontsize=14)
plt.xticks(fontsize=14)
'''# Provide tick lines across the plot to help your viewers trace along
# the axis ticks. Make sure that the lines are light and small so they
# don't obscure the primary data lines. '''
for y in range(10, 91, 10):
plt.plot(range(1968, 2012), [y] * len(range(1968, 2012)), "--", lw=0.5, color="black", alpha=0.3)
'''# Remove the tick marks; they are unnecessary with the tick lines we just plotted. '''
plt.tick_params(axis="both", which="both", bottom="off", top="off",
labelbottom="on", left="off", right="off", labelleft="on")
'''# Now that the plot is prepared, it's time to actually plot the data!
# Note that I plotted the majors in order of the highest % in the final year. '''
majors = ['Health Professions', 'Public Administration', 'Education', 'Psychology',
'Foreign Languages', 'English', 'Communications\nand Journalism',
'Art and Performance', 'Biology', 'Agriculture',
'Social Sciences and History', 'Business', 'Math and Statistics',
'Architecture', 'Physical Sciences', 'Computer Science',
'Engineering']
for rank, column in enumerate(majors):
'''# Plot each line separately with its own color, using the Tableau 20
# color set in order. '''
plt.plot(gender_degree_data.Year.values,
gender_degree_data[column.replace("\n", " ")].values,
lw=2.5, color=tableau20[rank])
'''# Add a text label to the right end of every line. Most of the code below
# is adding specific offsets y position because some labels overlapped. '''
y_pos = gender_degree_data[column.replace("\n", " ")].values[-1] - 0.5
if column == "Foreign Languages":
y_pos += 0.5
elif column == "English":
y_pos -= 0.5
elif column == "Communications\nand Journalism":
y_pos += 0.75
elif column == "Art and Performance":
y_pos -= 0.25
elif column == "Agriculture":
y_pos += 1.25
elif column == "Social Sciences and History":
y_pos += 0.25
elif column == "Business":
y_pos -= 0.75
elif column == "Math and Statistics":
y_pos += 0.75
elif column == "Architecture":
y_pos -= 0.75
elif column == "Computer Science":
y_pos += 0.75
elif column == "Engineering":
y_pos -= 0.25
'''# Again, make sure that all labels are large enough to be easily read
# by the viewer. '''
plt.text(2011.5, y_pos, column, fontsize=14, color=tableau20[rank])
'''# matplotlib's title() call centers the title on the plot, but not the graph,
# so I used the text() call to customize where the title goes.
# Make the title big enough so it spans the entire plot, but don't make it
# so big that it requires two lines to show.
# Note that if the title is descriptive enough, it is unnecessary to include
# axis labels; they are self-evident, in this plot's case. '''
plt.text(1995, 93, "Percentage of Bachelor's degrees conferred to women in the U.S.A., by major (1970-2012)", fontsize=17, ha="center")
plt.text(1966, -8, "Data source: nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/2013menu_tables.asp"
"\nAuthor: <NAME> (<EMAIL> / @randal_olson)"
"\nNote: Some majors are missing because the historical data "
"is not available for them", fontsize=10)
'''# Finally, save the figure as a PNG.
# You can also save it as a PDF, JPEG, etc.
# Just change the file extension in this call.
# bbox_inches="tight" removes all the extra whitespace on the edges of your plot.'''
plt.savefig("percent-bachelors-degrees-women-usa.png", bbox_inches="tight")
plt.show()
|
package com.ph14.fdb.zk.ops;
import static org.assertj.core.api.Assertions.assertThat;
import java.util.Collections;
import java.util.concurrent.CountDownLatch;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import org.apache.zookeeper.CreateMode;
import org.apache.zookeeper.KeeperException;
import org.apache.zookeeper.KeeperException.Code;
import org.apache.zookeeper.Watcher;
import org.apache.zookeeper.Watcher.Event.EventType;
import org.apache.zookeeper.proto.CreateRequest;
import org.apache.zookeeper.proto.CreateResponse;
import org.apache.zookeeper.proto.ExistsRequest;
import org.apache.zookeeper.proto.ExistsResponse;
import org.junit.Test;
import com.hubspot.algebra.Result;
import com.ph14.fdb.zk.FdbBaseTest;
public class FdbCreateOpTest extends FdbBaseTest {
@Test
public void itCreatesADirectory() {
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH));
}
@Test
public void itDoesNotCreateTheSameDirectoryTwice() {
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH));
result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapErrOrElseThrow().code()).isEqualTo(Code.NODEEXISTS);
}
@Test
public void itDoesNotCreateDirectoryWithoutParent() {
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(SUBPATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapErrOrElseThrow().code()).isEqualTo(Code.NONODE);
}
@Test
public void itProgressivelyCreatesNodes() {
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH));
result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(SUBPATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(SUBPATH));
}
@Test
public void itUpdatesParentNodeVersionAndChildrenCount() {
Result<ExistsResponse, KeeperException> parent = fdb.run(tr -> fdbExistsOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new ExistsRequest("/", false))).join();
assertThat(parent.unwrapOrElseThrow().getStat().getCversion()).isEqualTo(0);
assertThat(parent.unwrapOrElseThrow().getStat().getNumChildren()).isEqualTo(0);
long initialPzxid = parent.unwrapOrElseThrow().getStat().getPzxid();
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH));
parent = fdb.run(tr -> fdbExistsOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new ExistsRequest("/", false))).join();
assertThat(parent.unwrapOrElseThrow().getStat().getPzxid()).isGreaterThan(initialPzxid);
assertThat(parent.unwrapOrElseThrow().getStat().getCversion()).isEqualTo(1);
assertThat(parent.unwrapOrElseThrow().getStat().getNumChildren()).isEqualTo(1);
}
@Test
public void itCreatesSequentialNodes() {
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(
REQUEST, tr,
new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), CreateMode.PERSISTENT_SEQUENTIAL.toFlag())).join());
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH + "0000000000"));
result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(
REQUEST, tr,
new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), CreateMode.PERSISTENT_SEQUENTIAL.toFlag())).join());
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH + "0000000001"));
Result<ExistsResponse, KeeperException> exists = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbExistsOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new ExistsRequest(BASE_PATH, false))).join();
assertThat(exists.isOk()).isFalse();
exists = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbExistsOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new ExistsRequest(BASE_PATH + "0000000002", false))).join();
assertThat(exists.isOk()).isFalse();
exists = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbExistsOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new ExistsRequest(BASE_PATH + "0000000001", false))).join();
assertThat(exists.isOk()).isTrue();
}
@Test
public void itTriggersWatchForNodeCreation() throws InterruptedException {
CountDownLatch countDownLatch = new CountDownLatch(1);
Watcher watcher = event -> {
assertThat(event.getType()).isEqualTo(EventType.NodeCreated);
assertThat(event.getPath()).isEqualTo(BASE_PATH);
countDownLatch.countDown();
};
fdb.run(tr -> {
fdbWatchManager.addNodeCreatedWatch(tr, BASE_PATH, watcher);
return null;
});
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH));
assertThat(SERVER_CNXN.getWatchedEvents().peek()).isNull();
assertThat(countDownLatch.await(2, TimeUnit.SECONDS)).isTrue();
}
@Test
public void itTriggersWatchesOnParentNode() throws InterruptedException {
CountDownLatch countDownLatch = new CountDownLatch(1);
Watcher watcher = event -> {
assertThat(event.getType()).isEqualTo(EventType.NodeChildrenChanged);
assertThat(event.getPath()).isEqualTo("/");
countDownLatch.countDown();
};
fdb.run(tr -> {
fdbWatchManager.addNodeChildrenWatch(tr, "/", watcher);
return null;
});
Result<CreateResponse, KeeperException> result = fdb.run(
tr -> fdbCreateOp.execute(REQUEST, tr, new CreateRequest(BASE_PATH, new byte[0], Collections.emptyList(), 0))).join();
assertThat(result.unwrapOrElseThrow()).isEqualTo(new CreateResponse(BASE_PATH));
assertThat(SERVER_CNXN.getWatchedEvents().peek()).isNull();
assertThat(countDownLatch.await(2, TimeUnit.SECONDS)).isTrue();
}
}
|
When Dylann Roof pulled a gun at a Bible study in Charleston, South Carolina, his shots rang through history to the roots of the ideology of white supremacy, which justified genocide of indigenous peoples and the enslavement of black people from Africa. We deny this at our own risk.
Roof attacked the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, which by the early 1800s was at the center of black resistance to slavery in Charleston, according to African-American history scholar Gerald Horne. Black people, Roof feared, threaten the existence of the white race. Events in the church’s history play a role in Roof’s fear. Inspired by a slave rebellion that began in 1791 in what is now Haiti, Emanuel parishioner Denmark Vesey of Charleston began organizing an insurrection against slavery, using the Charleston AME church as a base.
We need to revoke that grant of privilege by working to correct the injustice that still stains our nation with the spilling of blood.
Roof might have been unaware of the specific history of “Mother Emmanuel,” but he had immersed himself in a narrative that is deeply rooted in our nation’s history, a narrative that takes into account the history of Charleston’s historic congregation.
Roof told a participant in the Bible study, “I have to do it. You rape our women and you’re taking over our country. And you have to go.” Horne and other social scientists believe Roof inherited the fear of murderous blacks raping white women from a common historic narrative of white supremacy.
Horne says that after the bloody slave revolt, American newspapers were full of stories salaciously describing “marauding blacks with sugar cane machetes hacking the white slave-owners to death.” Regardless of their veracity, these stories informed a historic narrative that was seized upon by the founders and early members of the Ku Klux Klan.
After the Civil War, the Ku Klux Klan “was largely halted following federal legislation targeting Klan-perpetrated violence in the early 1870s,” said Klansville, U.S.A. author David Cunningham in a PBS documentary. In 1905, Thomas Dixon, Jr., wrote The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan, later turned into the silent film The Birth of a Nation in 1915. The white supremacist frame of black men pillaging, raping, and murdering was returning to the mainstream.
Dylann Roof looked beyond our native anti-black texts. His website was The Last Rhodesian. Roof allied himself with the cause of Rhodesia because, according to the racist right, the failed struggle in the 1960s to preserve African white nationalist societies, including South Africa, was a warning about the communist conspiracy to use black people to pave the way for totalitarian tyranny. This thesis was purveyed by the John Birch Society, whose historic and current conspiracy theories are today utilized by Glenn Beck. A decade before he was appointed to the Supreme Court, Justice Clarence Thomas joined the conspiracy theorists when he became affiliated with the Lincoln Institute, a right-wing think tank that embraced apartheid in South Africa as a bulwark against communism.
As the world is wired today, these theories are a click away. Jennifer Earl, the co-author of Digitally Enabled Social Change: Activism in the Internet Age, is one of several sociologists to have shown that the internet can mobilize people into movement participation. Right-wing groups from the militia to the neo-Nazi movements were early adopters of online technology, even before the internet created a world wide web of unedited communications that brought racist and anti-Semitic (and now anti-Islamic) rhetoric into our homes.
Roger Griffin studied terrorism for the British government. His Terrorist’s Creed: Fanatical Violence and the Human Need for Meaning, describes the phenomenon of “heroic doubling,” which can turn a “normal” individual into someone who carries out acts of fanatical violence as a media-carried clarion call to arms to defend an idealized pure community under threat from a demonized “Other.”
Roof was influenced by the Council of Conservative Citizens. The CofCC’s racist rhetoric provides the most extreme versions of the demonization of blacks and white liberals, while a more muted—sometimes coded—version of white supremacy is routinely broadcast on cable news and AM radio talk shows. The first black president continues to provide a lightning rod for racist rhetoric.
White nationalism infuses our political ideology as a nation—from our major political parties to the armed extreme right. We need to confront the color line that bestows on white people unfair advantages. We need to revoke that grant of privilege by working to correct the injustice that still stains our nation with the spilling of blood. As Dr. King warned us, either we build community or we will face chaos.
Chip Berlet is the co-author of Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort.
See also: “Mapping Organized Hate“ |
/*
* Copyright 2016-2019 Talsma ICT
*
* Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
* you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
* You may obtain a copy of the License at
*
* http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
*
* Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
* distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
* WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
* See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
* limitations under the License.
*/
package nl.talsmasoftware.umldoclet.logging;
import org.junit.jupiter.api.Test;
import java.util.Locale;
import static org.hamcrest.MatcherAssert.assertThat;
import static org.hamcrest.Matchers.hasToString;
import static org.hamcrest.Matchers.is;
import static org.hamcrest.Matchers.notNullValue;
public class MessageTest {
private static final Locale DUTCH = new Locale("nl", "NL");
@Test
public void testAllMessageAvailability() {
for (Message message : Message.values()) {
assertThat(message.name(), message, hasToString(notNullValue()));
}
}
@Test
public void testAllMessagesInDutch() {
for (Message message : Message.values()) {
assertThat("Dutch " + message.name(), message.toString(DUTCH), is(notNullValue()));
}
}
}
|
def annotation(name, provider=None, lines=None):
genomepy.head_annotations(name, provider, n=int(lines)) |
China's Ambassador to the United Nations Liu Jieyi speaks with representatives after he voted against a measure to adopt the agenda of human rights violations in North Korea.
BEIJING - China's permanent representative to the United Nations has called for all sides to avoid escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
China's UN representative Liu Jieyi also called for calm and restraint on the peninsula, according to a statement posted on China's Foreign Ministry's website on Tuesday.
The remarks came after the UN Security Council decided on Monday to override China's objections and formally add allegations of grave North Korean human rights abuses to the council's agenda. |
package frc.robot.auto;
import com.pathplanner.lib.PathPlanner;
import com.pathplanner.lib.PathPlannerTrajectory;
import com.pathplanner.lib.PathPlannerTrajectory.PathPlannerState;
import edu.wpi.first.math.geometry.Pose2d;
import edu.wpi.first.math.trajectory.Trajectory;
import edu.wpi.first.math.trajectory.TrajectoryConfig;
import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj.smartdashboard.SendableChooser;
import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj.smartdashboard.SmartDashboard;
import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj2.command.Command;
import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj2.command.InstantCommand;
import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj2.command.RunCommand;
import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj2.command.WaitCommand;
import frc.robot.subsystems.Superstructure;
import frc.robot.subsystems.climber.Climber;
import frc.robot.subsystems.drivetrain.SwerveDrive;
import frc.robot.subsystems.indexer.Indexer;
import frc.robot.subsystems.intake.Intake;
import frc.robot.subsystems.shooter.Shooter;
public class AutoOptions {
// list of choosable commands that decides what is run in auto
private SendableChooser<Command> autoOptions = new SendableChooser<>();
private PathPlannerTrajectory tripleRightTrajectory = PathPlanner.loadPath("TripleRight1", 1, 1);
public AutoOptions(Climber climber, SwerveDrive drivetrain, Indexer indexer, Intake intake, Shooter shooter, Superstructure superstructure){
autoOptions.setDefaultOption("Nothing",
new InstantCommand(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
);
autoOptions.addOption("TripleRight",
superstructure.autoShoot(1.5)
.beforeStarting(()->{
drivetrain.resetOdometry(new Pose2d(
tripleRightTrajectory.getInitialPose().getTranslation(),
tripleRightTrajectory.getInitialState().holonomicRotation));
})
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"TripleRight1",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(superstructure.autoShoot(3))
.andThen(superstructure.stop())
);
autoOptions.addOption("FenderTripleRight",
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(2)
.andThen(()->{
shooter.stop();
indexer.stop();
}, indexer, shooter)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"TripleRightFender1",
AutoConstants.kSlowSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
)
.andThen(
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(3)
)
.andThen(superstructure.stop())
);
autoOptions.addOption("DoubleLeft",
new InstantCommand(
()->intake.setExtended(true),
intake
)
.andThen(new WaitCommand(2))
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"DoubleLeft1",
AutoConstants.kSlowSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(superstructure.autoShoot(3))
.andThen(superstructure.stop())
);
autoOptions.addOption("DoubleLeft but troll",
new InstantCommand(
()->intake.setExtended(true),
intake
)
.andThen(new WaitCommand(2))
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"DoubleLeft1",
AutoConstants.kSlowSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(superstructure.autoShoot(4))
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"DoubleLeftTroll2",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.dumpCargo()
.withTimeout(3)
)
);
autoOptions.addOption("FenderDoubleLeft",
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(2.5)
.andThen(()->{
shooter.stop();
indexer.stop();
}, indexer, shooter)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"DoubleLeft1",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"FenderDoubleLeft2",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
)
.andThen(
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(3)
)
.andThen(superstructure.stop())
);
/*
autoOptions.addOption("-1auto",
new WaitCommand(2)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.dumpCargo())
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"sabotage",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
true
)
)
.andThen(superstructure.stopDrive())
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"sabotage2",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(
superstructure.autoShoot(2.5)
)
);
*/
/*
autoOptions.addOption("QuintupleLeft",
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"QuintetLeft1",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.autoShoot(2.5)
)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"QuintetLeft2",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.autoShoot(2.5)
)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"QuintetLeft3",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.autoShoot(2.5)
)
);
*/
/*
autoOptions.addOption("FenderQuintupleRight",
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(1.75)
.andThen(()->{
shooter.stop();
indexer.stop();
}, indexer, shooter)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"TripleRightFender1",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
true
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(1.5)
)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"TripleRightFender2",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
new WaitCommand(0.75)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo())
)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"QuintupleRightFender3",
AutoConstants.kFastSpeedConfig,
false
)
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.fenderShootHigh(3)
)
.andThen(superstructure.stop())
);
*/
autoOptions.addOption("QuintupleRight",
superstructure.autoShoot(2)
.beforeStarting(()->{
drivetrain.resetOdometry(new Pose2d(
tripleRightTrajectory.getInitialPose().getTranslation(),
tripleRightTrajectory.getInitialState().holonomicRotation));
})
.alongWith(
new InstantCommand(()-> intake.setExtended(true),
intake
)
)
.andThen(()->{
shooter.stop();
indexer.stop();
}, indexer, shooter)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"TripleRight1",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo(drivetrain::getLinearVelocity))
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.autoShoot(2.5)
)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"QuintetRight2",
AutoConstants.kMediumSpeedConfig,
false
)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo(drivetrain::getLinearVelocity))
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
new WaitCommand(0.5)
.deadlineWith(superstructure.intakeIndexCargo(drivetrain::getLinearVelocity))
)
.andThen(
autoFollowTrajectory(
drivetrain,
"QuintetRight3",
AutoConstants.kFastSpeedConfig,
false
)
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
.andThen(
superstructure.autoShoot(3)
)
.andThen(superstructure.stop())
);
//Don't use, no odometry; only as last resort
autoOptions.addOption("TaxiLastResort",
new WaitCommand(2)
.deadlineWith(new RunCommand(()->drivetrain.drive(0.6, 0, 0, false), drivetrain))
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
);
autoOptions.addOption("ShootThenTaxiLastResort",
superstructure.autoShoot(2)
.andThen(()->{
shooter.stop();
indexer.stop();
}, indexer, shooter)
.andThen(
new WaitCommand(2)
.deadlineWith(new RunCommand(()->drivetrain.drive(2, 0, 0, false), drivetrain))
)
.andThen(()->drivetrain.stop(), drivetrain)
);
}
/**
* @param trajectories Any number of trajectories to perform in sequence
* @return A command suitable for following a sequence of trajectories in autonomous.
* The robot pose is reset to the start of the trajectory and {@link OCSwerveFollower} is used to follow it.
*/
private Command autoFollowTrajectory(SwerveDrive drivetrain, Trajectory trajectory, boolean firstTrajectory){
final Pose2d initial = (trajectory instanceof PathPlannerTrajectory) ?
new Pose2d(
trajectory.getInitialPose().getTranslation(),
((PathPlannerState)((PathPlannerTrajectory)trajectory).sample(0)).holonomicRotation)
:
trajectory.getInitialPose();
Command followCommand = new OCSwerveFollower(drivetrain, trajectory);
if(firstTrajectory){
followCommand = followCommand.beforeStarting(()->drivetrain.resetOdometry(initial));
}
return followCommand;
}
/**
* @param config The config for this trajectory defining max velocity and acceleration
* @param storedPathNames The names of the PathPlanner paths saved to this project for use in this trajectory
* @return A command suitable for following a sequence of trajectories in autonomous.
* The robot pose is reset to the start of the trajectory and {@link OCSwerveFollower} is used to follow it.
*/
private Command autoFollowTrajectory(SwerveDrive drivetrain, String storedPathName, TrajectoryConfig config, boolean firstTrajectory){
Trajectory trajectory = PathPlanner.loadPath(storedPathName, config.getMaxVelocity(), config.getMaxAcceleration(), config.isReversed());
return autoFollowTrajectory(drivetrain, trajectory, firstTrajectory);
}
// Network Tables
public Command getSelected(){
return autoOptions.getSelected();
}
public void submit(){
SmartDashboard.putData("Auto Options", autoOptions);
}
}
|
Operationalizing and measuring language dominance The aim of this article is to show how measures of lexical richness (Guiraud, 1954; Malvern, Richards, Chipere, & Durn, 2004) can be used to operationalize and measure language dominance among bilinguals. A typology of bilinguals is proposed based on these measures of lexical richness, and the validity of the typology is then investigated in an empirical study among two groups of bilingual informants with different language dominance profiles (25 DutchFrench bilinguals from Brussels and 24 FrenchEnglish bilinguals from Paris). The most important advantage of the proposed operationalization is that it allows researchers carry out precise measurements of bilingual ability in languages or language varieties for which no standardized tests exist and that these measures can be calculated on oral data that have been collected in an informal and unobtrusive way, in a naturalistic setting. Introduction In this article I hope to show how measures of lexical richness can be used to shed new light on what it means to be bilingual. While most researchers concur with Grosjean (1997, p. 167) that 'bilinguals are specific and fully competent speakers-hearers who have developed a communicative competence that is equal but different in nature to that of monolinguals', few researchers study the precise nature of this specific competence any further, and there is no universally agreed classification of bilinguals (Altarriba & Heredia, 2008, p. 19). Many researchers use the term language dominance without providing any measurements of their subjects' knowledge of either language, thereby leaving it unclear what language dominance means in linguistic terms; that is to say, they fail to specify which components of the language system are more developed in one language than in the other in bilinguals. Some researchers are reluctant to engage in precise assessments of bilinguals' language ability because this often leads to negative views of bilinguals. A comparison of bilinguals with monolinguals often leads to the bilingual being seen as deficient, in particular if bilinguals are compared to monolinguals in one of their languages only -often their weaker language (see Cook, 1997 on the monolingual bias that is built into SLA research). As Grosjean (2008, p. 20) has pointed out, researchers who adopt a holistic view of bilinguals need to study both languages of a bilingual, and not just one of his/her languages. Skutnabb-Kangas (1981, p. 194) expressed reservations about measuring bilingualism because 'we are not yet able to describe bilingualism in individuals securely enough to be able to base any principle of measurement on sound foundations'. This argument is no longer valid, however, because over the past 25 years or so a range of tests and computational tools for the analysis of spoken (and written) language which make it possible to measure receptive and productive language ability in bilinguals have been developed. The question remains: which test or tool is most suitable for a particular group? The main aim of this article is to show that, if applied rigorously, measures of lexical richness are valid indices of (lexical aspects of) language ability in both languages of a bilingual. I also hope to show how lexical richness measures can be used to operationalize language dominance. These measures are being calculated with the help of computational tools for the analysis of spoken language that are available under CLAN, the computerized data analysis tools developed by MacWhinney and colleagues. The approach taken here is similar to that of Yip and Matthews, although they operationalized language dominance among bilingual children on the basis of MLU scores in the two languages. As the informants in this study are adults, MLU scores cannot be used, and an alternative measure of language dominance for older bilinguals needs to be found. This article is a follow-up to an earlier study into language dominance and lexical diversity among French-dominant bilinguals, Dutch-dominant bilinguals and L2 learners of French (Treffers- Daller, 2009), which focused on French and showed that measures of lexical diversity are very powerful tools for measuring differences in French language ability among these three groups of speakers: no less than 63 per cent of the variance was explained with a single tool, namely D (Malvern & Richards, 1997;Malvern, Richards, Chipere, & Durn, 2004). In the current study, we look at both languages of these bilinguals with the aim to show how lexical diversity scores calculated on oral samples of the two languages can be used to measure language dominance. Bilingual ability: constructs and measurements Although there is no widely accepted typology of bilinguals, a good overview of different psychological dimensions of bilingual ability can be found in Hamers and Blanc (2000, p. 9). The first dimension they mention is based on the notion of language dominance, that is, the relationship between the competencies in the two languages of the bilingual. A distinction is often made between balanced bilinguals who have equivalent competence in both languages, and dominant bilinguals whose competence in one language is more developed than that in the other (Hamers & Blanc, 2000, p. 8). It is interesting that Hamers and Blanc do not assume that being balanced necessarily implies a high level of competence in both languages: rather they assume it refers to a state of equilibrium. It is not entirely clear though when such a state of equilibrium is achieved, as the authors claim this does not necessarily imply being able to use both languages for all functions and all domains. Many researchers point out that completely balanced bilinguals are very rare. Rather, it is much more common for bilinguals to be dominant in one or the other language (Baker & Prys Jones, 1998, p. 12). To Grosjean (2008, p. 24) language dominance is a reflection of the complementarity principle, in other words, the fact that bilinguals use their two languages for different purposes (or different domains) in daily life. Before addressing the key issue of how bilingual ability or language dominance can be measured, it is important to define the construct of language ability in some detail, as the conceptualization and operationalization of concepts must precede their measurement (Hamers & Blanc, 2000, p. 14). As Bachmann and Bachman and Palmer have argued, language ability consists of different components, but many researchers in a range of different theoretical frameworks, currently consider the lexicon to be the core component of language ability (Long & Richards, 2007). Bates and Goodman contend that the lexicon is important because the development of grammar in L1 acquisition is to a large extent dependent on the development of vocabulary. In addition, they claim that the 'richness and diversity of linguistic forms within any particular language are now captured almost entirely by the lexicon ' (1997, p. 508). This view is congruent with Chomsky who sees the lexicon as potentially the locus of all variation. Under this view, it becomes particularly relevant to establish how individuals vary with respect to the knowledge they have of the range of lexical items that are available in the language and how they use that knowledge. Therefore, in my view lexical knowledge is conceptually the most important component of variability in language ability, and ways to measure variation in lexical knowledge and deployment urgently need to be developed. Although many researchers think that the lexicon is important, they appear to work with very different views of what vocabulary knowledge is, and how it is best measured (Read & Chappelle, 2001). Many vocabulary tests are based on the assumption that vocabulary is a separate component of language ability, which can be measured through the analysis of individual word forms without taking into account the contexts in which these words occur. Vocabulary tests such as the Yes/No format (Meara & Buxton, 1987), the Levels Test, X-lex and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary test (PPVT) (Dunn & Dunn, 1959 belong in this group because they all consist of a selection of individual lexical items which are offered without making reference to contexts in which they may occur. Other researchers question the existence of vocabulary as a separate construct or claim that the case for a modular distinction between grammar and the lexicon has been overstated (Bates & Goodman, 1997, p. 507). Researchers working on vocabulary richness do not always explicitly say how they see the relationship between vocabulary knowledge and other aspects of language ability, but often take the view that vocabulary deployment should be tested in specific usage contexts, preferably on the basis of more naturalistic tasks, such as interviews or storytelling (Daller, Van Hout, & Treffers-Daller, 2003;Dewaele & Pavlenko, 2003;). A possible disadvantage of discrete, context-independent tests such as the Peabody Vocabulary Test is that they focus on a selection of lexical items only, whereas more naturalistic assessments are comprehensive in that they take into account all the vocabulary that is used in the context of the task. On the other hand, an advantage of discrete, context-independent tests is that some of these, for example the PPVT, have been standardized, that is to say there are norms for its administration and interpretation, and results obtained from individuals or groups can be compared against a set of norms for different samples of the wider population. To my knowledge this has not been done for measures of lexical richness, which make these less useful for practitioners, such as those working in clinical contexts, who need to refer to a set of standardized scores. Measuring the language abilities of a bilingual person is complicated by having to develop indices that can be applied to a range of languages, which may not be easy because of typological differences between them (see section 3). In their detailed overview of different ways in which bilingual ability can be measured, Hamers and Blanc also point to the difficulty of comparing measures across languages, and they propose that the results of measures among bilinguals should be compared to monolingual standards in each language. This may not always be easy to do, when there is a wide range of abilities among monolinguals (a problem Hamers and Blanc recognize too), or when it is very difficult to find speakers who are monolingual. However, the main problem with this approach is that the monolingual then becomes the yardstick against which bilinguals are measured, which is inappropriate under a holistic view of bilingualism. Using monolingual norms can therefore be not only unrealistic in practical terms, but theoretically questionable too. In research on bilingual first-language acquisition, language dominance is often invoked, but there is no consensus on how it should be defined and measured (Yip & Matthews, 2006, p. 98). Instead of comparing with monolingual control groups, Yip and Matthews proposed to operationalize language dominance by calculating the difference between MLU scores for a child's two languages at a given sampling point or (expressed as a mean) over a period of development, and they show that this measure correctly predicts the directionality of code-mixing and children's language preferences. Important support for the need to carry out precise measurements of vocabulary knowledge and use comes from the psycholinguistic literature on lexical access in bilinguals and L2 learners. According to Kroll, Bobb and Wodnieczka (2006, p. 128) we do not yet have a comprehensive overview of how language ability and relative language dominance affect the processes engaged during the planning of spoken utterances, but they point out that this is an important variable that researchers need to take seriously. Many researchers have shown that bilinguals are slower in picture-naming tasks or lexical-decision tasks, probably because using two languages has the consequence of lowering the functional frequency of each (). The bilinguals' disadvantage may however disappear if one controls for vocabulary size. Bialystok, Craik and Luk show that bilinguals whose lexical knowledge is matched to that of monolinguals (using the PPVT) outperform monolinguals on a task of letter fluency and word naming, because bilinguals have an advantage over monolinguals in tasks that involve executive control. Their study illustrates the importance of obtaining precise measurements of informants' vocabulary knowledge, which in this case, far from reinforcing existing negative views of bilinguals, contributed to the discovery of exciting new information about the advantages of being bilingual. As language ability is multidimensional, it is hardly possible to measure it with a single index that covers all its different components. Richards and Malvern (2007, p. 82) put this very aptly when they say that no 'single index can represent competence or performance in relation to vocabulary, or for that matter, any other linguistic domain'. It is, therefore, important to argue why a particular dimension of vocabulary knowledge should be measured rather than another dimension. Psychologists often use the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test or the Mill Hill Vocabulary Scale or X-lex (Meara & Milton, 2003) to measure receptive vocabulary size, but there is no discussion in the psycholinguistic literature on the reasons for choosing a measure of receptive rather than productive vocabulary knowledge. While vocabulary size (or breadth of vocabulary knowledge) is no doubt important, other dimensions of vocabulary knowledge (e.g. depth) are not being considered. The availability of standardized tests for receptive vocabulary knowledge is of course an important argument for using the PPVT, but very often researchers as well as practitioners are confronted with a situation in which monolingual or bilingual informants speak languages or varieties for which no standardized tests exist. In those circumstances, using measures of vocabulary richness, calculated on the basis of a sample of naturalistic language, to assess language ability is a good alternative. Lexical richness is a multifaceted variable which consists of four main components : lexical diversity, which can be defined as 'the range and variety of vocabulary deployed in a text by either a speaker or a writer' (McCarthy & Jarvis, 2007, p. 459), lexical sophistication (the use of rare words in a text), lexical density (the proportion of content and function words in a text) and the frequency of errors. As it is not possible to study all these aspects of vocabulary richness in one study, in the current study the main focus will be on diversity. Lexical diversity has been chosen because new tools to calculate lexical diversity have recently become available under CLAN (see section 3), which makes studying this dimension of vocabulary richness more accessible. In a study that focused on the use of French, I have used these new tools, for example, to show there are significant differences between Dutch-dominant bilinguals from Brussels and the French-dominant bilinguals from Paris in the diversity of the lexical items they used (Treffers- Daller, 2009). While it is not possible to review all the studies in which measures of lexical diversity have been used, there is abundant evidence that generic measures such as the Index of Guiraud and D (Malvern & Richards, 1997;) are reliable tools and that they can bring to light important differences in lexical diversity between language samples from a range of sources, including learner language (see van Hout & Vermeer, 2007 for an overview and a critical discussion of the different measures), but to our knowledge apart from the studies of Dewaele and Pavlenko and Daller et al. measures of lexical diversity have hardly been used to measure bilingual ability across the two languages of bilinguals. There are many advantages of using lexical richness measures to measure bilingual ability. First of all (because oral samples can be used), informants who cannot read or write in one of their two languages are not disadvantaged; second, elicitation materials (such as a story board) can be used which are appropriate for the ages, backgrounds and cultures of the target group. Third, all the vocabulary used in the language sample (not just a selection) can be analyzed, and, moreover, analyzed in context (not just isolated words) in a naturalistic setting (not a laboratory). Fourth, both languages of a bilingual can be studied, so that a comprehensive picture of a bilingual's language can be obtained. Finally, it is possible to avoid a monolingual bias in the analysis of the language samples; for instance, instead of disregarding borrowings or code-switches that occur in the language sample, a researcher can decide to include these in the analysis, thereby recognizing the specific competence of the bilingual. On the other hand, it should be noted that when measuring lexical richness, the data need to be transcribed and formatted in order for the calculations to be carried out. This process is very time consuming, which makes it possibly less suitable as a tool for some clinical applications. A potential disadvantage, which may affect the results of the current approach using story boards to elicit speech, is that not everyone is a good storyteller or feels comfortable with a story telling task. The results for alternative approaches could however also be depressed because there may be some informants who are uncomfortable with standardised, more formal tests. Consequently, the choice between elicitation tools or tests is a key issue that all researchers in the field need to consider. The current study In this study we propose to measure bilingual ability with the help of two indices of lexical diversity, the Index of Guiraud, that is, the ratio of types (V) over the square root of tokens (N), and D (), which represents the single parameter of a mathematical function that models the falling curve of the type-token ratio (see also Jarvis, 2002 andMcCarthy andJarvis, 2007 for an appraisal of this measure). I have chosen to work with these two indices as new switches have recently become available under CLAN which make it possible to calculate lexical diversity on lemmatized data sets, in a variety of ways (see later in this article for details). The availability of these tools under CLAN makes them attractive options for researchers wishing to measure language ability among their subjects. In the current study, we compare two bilingual groups with different language dominance profiles with each other, rather than with monolingual groups, in order to avoid a monolingual bias (see section 2). All informants speak French, but they differ from each other in their command of French, as I have shown elsewhere in Treffers- Daller. The first group is made up of 25 Dutch-dominant people from Brussels who live in Anderlecht, one of the 17 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital region. They all speak the local varieties of Dutch and French, and some of them also speak the standard varieties of either language. The second group consists of 24 French-English bilingual students from a business school in Paris where English is used as the medium of instruction. 1 They grew up with French only but learnt English (and other languages) at secondary school. This group is clearly French-dominant, as is obvious from their language history, even though they use English on a daily basis for all subjects of their studies. A controlled productive task was chosen rather than a free productive task to ensure the comparability of the content across the three groups, which is particularly important in studies that focus on lexical items. Because the Brussels bilinguals regularly use French in conversation but are not necessarily biliterate, written language tests were not considered appropriate for the target group. Mayer's storybook Frog Where Are You?, which has frequently been used to study language use of monolinguals and bilinguals (e.g. Berman & Slobin, 1994), was used to elicit semi-spontaneous speech from all individuals in French. In order to avoid translation effects, all informants told another frog story (Frog Goes to Dinner, Mayer, 1974) in Dutch or English. All informants were given some preparation time before telling their story individually to the researcher, either in their own home (the participants from Brussels) or in the university they attended (the students from Paris). All data were transcribed in CHAT format, and subsequently a morphosyntactic coding tier (the mor tier) was added to the transcripts with the help of the MOR and POST commands under CLAN. Any remaining ambiguities, errors or inconsistencies in the resulting mor tier were corrected by hand. In addition, all proper names, filled pauses and other hesitation markers, exclamations as well as metalinguistic comments were excluded from the calculations of lexical richness (but see section 4 for a separate analysis of metalinguistic comments). There were many French borrowings in the Brussels Dutch stories (for example plateau 'tray', garon 'waiter', voil 'there you are', surtout 'above all', caresseren 'to stroke', content 'pleased'), as well as a few Dutch borrowings in the Brussels French stories (e.g. kadeike 'little boy', kapot 'broken'). As these borrowings are characteristic of the local varieties spoken in Brussels (Baetens Beardsmore, 1971;Treffers-Daller, 1999) they were left in the data. Taking them out would have meant penalizing bilinguals for displaying language behavior that is typical of bilinguals, which is not correct in a holistic view of bilinguals. For several reasons, using the mor tier for analyses of lexical richness is particularly useful. First, because this tier makes it possible to distinguish between homophones (e.g. tu 'you' as a personal pronoun and tu 'was silent' as the past participle of the verb se taire 'to be silent') which is only possible on the main tier by adding disambiguation codes by hand. Second, on the mor tier all entries are lemmatized. The mor tier offers a lemmatization standard that can be used by everyone. Third, new switches that can be used with the frequency command FREQ have recently become available under CLAN. These make type and token analyses of individual syntactic categories on the mor tier possible, which is extremely useful for studies of lexical richness. One of the problems involved in using the mor tier is that the codes used on this tier for the different languages are somewhat different. This is understandable as different codes are needed for languages that are typologically different (see the CHAT manual, p. 101), but even for languages as closely related as French, English and Dutch, the coding systems are different. For French, for example, different forms of the verb trouver 'to find', for example, are categorized on the mor tier with codes that appear before the pipe separator '|'. Past participle forms are indicated with the code 'pp' (v:pp|trouver), infinitives with 'inf' v:inf|trouver, progressives with 'prog ' (v:prog|trouver) and other forms with a simple 'v' v|trouver. In English, codes for participle forms are found before the pipe separator and codes for progressive forms are indicated after the pipe separator, so that talking is coded as follows: part|talk-PROG. In Dutch past participle are coded after the pipe separator, so that gesproken 'talked' is coded as v|praat&PERF. In order to make calculations on the mor tier comparable across languages, I therefore needed to bring into line the codes that are used to classify verbs into different subcategories in the three languages. For the purposes of this article I decided to erase the subcategories of verbs with the help of the change string command (CHSTRING), leaving only the codes for modal verbs (v:mdl) and auxiliairies (v:aux) in place, as the distinction between lexical uses of verbs such as avoir (il a un livre 'he has a book') and auxiliary uses of this verb (il a achet un livre 'he bought a book') are obviously important for analyses of lexical richness in the three languages under study. 2 All other verbs were therefore categorized as 'v|' only. The morphosyntactic coding on the main tier also needed to be checked by hand for inconsistencies as the post program (which is used to disambiguate the output of the mor program) is not error-free. For Dutch, the mor tier needed to be disambiguated by hand, as there is no post program available for Dutch, and the lexicon needed to be supplemented with dialect items such as vors 'frog'. Finally unintelligible speech that is represented on the main tier with xxx is coded as unknown word (unk|xxx) on the mor tier. In order to avoid CLAN counting these codes as separate types, I decided to erase the codes for unintelligible speech on the mor tier too. I then calculated the number of types and tokens for each transcript with the help of the following command, which counts all stems with their parts of speech, while merging all different inflections: freq +t%mor -t* +s@r+*,|+*,o+% +f. The output of these calculations (a total number of types and tokens per individual for both languages) were entered into SPSS, and used as the basis for the calculation of the Index of Guiraud 3 for Dutch (Gd), French (Gf) and English (Ge). After that, I calculated D with the following command, which calculates D on the mor tier while merging all different inflections: vocd +t%mor -t* +s"*-%%" +s"*~%%" +s"*&%%" +f. The results of these calculations for Dutch, English and French were also entered into SPSS. Types, tokens and lexical richness Before calculating any measures of lexical richness, it is interesting to see how the two groups differ from each other in the number of types they use for the frog stories in Dutch and French (Brussels), or French and English (Paris). Figure 1 gives the percentage of word types in each language, as calculated from the sum of the number of types produced by the informants in both languages. This graph clearly shows that the bilinguals from Brussels are Dutch-dominant in the sense that they use significantly more types for Dutch than for French (t for paired samples = 3.25, df = 24, p <.01), whereas the Paris group produce more types in French than in English (t for paired samples = 5.10, df = 23, p <.001). The differences between the groups in their use of French types or tokens are not significant however, which is why more sophisticated ways are necessary to demonstrate the existence of the subtle differences between the groups from Brussels and Paris with respect to their use of French words. The differences between the groups from Paris and Brussels become significant if we calculate D for French (Df) (t = 3.70, df = 47, p < 0.01) or the Index of Guiraud for French (t = 2.45, df = 47, p <.05). It was then decided to use D for the operationalization of bilingual ability because the h 2 (a measure of the effect size) is higher for D (h 2 =.23) than for the Index of Guiraud (h 2 =.11). These h 2 values are considerably lower than those reported in Treffers- Daller, but this is because the range of scores is much smaller in the current study, in which L2 learners are not included. In this project, only two groups are included (not three), and all informants are bilingual. Although many of the Brusselers in the current study are Dutch-dominant, their ability in French is significantly higher than that of the L2 learners of French from Aalst (Flanders), which were included in the previous study. As Figure 2 demonstrates, there are a few outliers in the Brussels group, which indicates that there is more variability among the bilinguals from Brussels than among the Paris group. The three outliers in the Brussels group are probably strongly dominant in French (informant 45) or strongly Dutch (28 and 42). In order to find out whether that was the case, the D scores were used to operationalize language dominance for both groups of bilinguals. Operationalizing language dominance First of all, the mean, median and mode of the D-value for all three languages was calculated. As Table 1 shows, the mean and the median for the English D scores are relatively low in comparison with the D-value for the other languages. The reason for this difference is probably that the informants who told the story in English all learnt English later in life. No stories were told in English by speakers who spoke English from birth, whereas the mean D-values for Dutch and French were calculated on the basis of stories from speakers with a wide range of abilities, including those who learnt Dutch or French early in life. In order to divide the informants into a low ability group (group 1) and a high ability group (group 2) for all three languages, an overall group median was calculated for all D-values from all three languages. Thus any informant with a D-value below the overall group median was allocated to group 1, and informant with a D-value above the median was allocated to group 2 for each language. This way, for French for example, fifteen informants in the Brussels group were allocated to group 1 and ten to group 2. Among the Paris group, eight informants were assigned to group 1 and sixteen to group 2. Language dominance was then operationalized using the D scores for both languages of each informant. Informants who were in group 1 for French and group 2 for Dutch were classified as Dutch-dominant, whereas those who were in group 2 for French and group 1 for Dutch were considered to be French-dominant. The remainder were split over two groups of balanced bilinguals: a higher group (in group 2 for both languages) and lower group (in group 1 for both languages). The resulting classification is shown in Table 2. The fact that there are six informants in each group who obtain low scores in both languages may be an indication that these informants were not entirely comfortable with the storytelling task. This cannot be investigated further here. Of course a classification such as the one in Table 2 is only valid if it turns out to have a predictive value with respect to other variables. The validity of the classification will therefore be checked in three ways: first of all using Lanza's (2004, p. 173) proposal that the directionality of mixing can be an indicator of dominance in that bilinguals switch to the dominant language more often than to the non-dominant language. Second, I checked whether the classification into Dutch-and Frenchdominant bilinguals correctly predicts whether they use the prefabricated formula il y a NP qui 'there is an X who/which' to introduce new referents. This simplified way of introducing referents in stories is often found in French children's stories (Jisa & Kern, 1998), and it is also a common feature of the storytelling of bilinguals from Brussels (Treffers- Daller, 2009). If the dominance classification is correct, this phenomenon should be found less often among French-dominant bilinguals or highly proficient balanced bilinguals than among Dutch dominant or less proficient balanced bilinguals. Third, according to the classification in Table 2, there are a large number of balanced bilinguals among the Brussels group, but not among the Paris group. If this classification is valid, there should therefore be a significant correlation between Dutch and French D-values obtained for the bilinguals in Brussels, but not between the English and French D-values found among the Paris group. Language dominance and the directionality of code-switching among Brussels bilinguals The first question that needs to be answered is whether the informants from Brussels are more likely to switch to Dutch than to French. It is very common for bilinguals to use code-switching for a variety of purposes (cf. Gumperz, 1982;Appel & Muysken, 1987, p. 120) and twelve of the 25 informants from Brussels make use of this strategy by switching to Dutch when telling the story in French. They code-switch almost exclusively for metalinguistic reasons, as the task was to tell the story in French or Dutch, which did not encourage spontaneous code-switching. Some informants comment on the difficulty of the task, such as: 'I have to look for French words' (informant 5) or asked the interviewer to provide words when they experienced word-finding problems: 'what kind of animal is that?' (informant 7), while others used code-switching to alert the interviewer to their French ability, saying 'that's easy enough for a Francophone' (informant 21) or 'that goes much faster than in Flemish' (informant 10). Code-switching in the other direction (to French during the Dutch storytelling) is much more limited. Of the two informants who switch to French, one makes a metalinguistic comment on how she thinks something needs to be explained in Brussels dialect (informant 7), the other corrects herself that the animal on the picture is not a tortoise but a frog, using French non 'no' to mark her correction (informant 25). 'Yes right, tortoise, no frog.' The fact that code-switching to Dutch is much more common among the informants than switching to French confirms the assumption that Dutch is the dominant language for a considerable number of speakers in this group. It is not possible, however, to predict the code-switching behavior of individual informants on the basis of the language dominance criteria used here. Whether or not a bilingual decides to switch is not just dependent on his/her language ability but on a wide range of factors that cannot be discussed here (see Myers-Scotton, 1993). There is hardly any code-switching to French among the Paris group, probably because the informants were aware that the researchers who collected the data in English were not fluent in French. A further investigation of the directionality of code-switching among this group is therefore not very useful. One informant in the group makes a metalinguistic comment, but he chooses to make this comment in English rather than in French (informant 710), and another one uses a few French words the verb aterrir 'to land' and the noun calin 'cuddle' while telling the story in English (informant 610): After just before leaved the house, he make a calin en franais with his dog. ' he gave his dog a cuddle, in French.' There are no further examples of code-switching among the Paris group. The use of a prefabricated formula by Brussels bilinguals The bilinguals' use of a prefabricated formula provides interesting information that can be used to validate our operationalization of language dominance. The focus is here on the construction il y a NP qui 'there is NP who/which' illustrated in. L le chien il pousse l'arbre et il y a la la ruche qui tombe. (informant 22) There the dog pushes against the tree and there is the the beehive which falls down. Jisa and Kern show that French children frequently use this strategy to introduce new referents in frog stories, and the Brussels bilinguals use the same strategy to present new referents or new developments in the story. The prefabricated formula il y a NP qui is also frequent in L2 learners' spoken and written language (Guillot, 2005, p. 120). According to Guillot it is not necessarily an indication of non-nativeness however because it also occurs in unplanned native speaker speech. As we can see in Table 3, the bilinguals from Brussels appear to use the relative pronoun qui 'who/which' slightly more often than the students from Paris, but the difference is not large enough to become significant. Upon closer scrutiny, this difference is due to the fact that the groups differ significantly from each other in their use of the prefabricated formula il y a NP qui (t = 5.18, df = 47, p <.001). The bilinguals from Brussels use this formula more frequently than the informants from Paris. If the prefabricated formula is omitted from the calculations (see under 'corrected qui' in Table 3), the slight disadvantage for the Paris group disappears. The two groups are then not significantly different in their use of the relative pronoun qui. The differences between the two groups are probably best explained on the basis of language dominance, in that it is mainly Dutch-dominant bilinguals who overuse this relatively simple prefabricated frame to introduce new referents. We can test this hypothesis by counting the use of the prefabricated frame in the stories of French-dominant bilinguals and Dutch-dominant bilinguals, using our operationalization of language dominance as the independent variable to create four groups of speakers. The results in Table 4 show that Dutch-dominant bilinguals use this prefabricated formula most frequently, and the French-dominant bilinguals use it least frequently. The Dutch-dominant bilinguals differ significantly both from the French-dominant bilinguals (t = 4.15, df = 8.03, p = <.01) and from the balanced bilinguals (higher level) (t = 3.48, df = 11.07, p <.01), but not from the balanced bilinguals (lower level) (t = 1.91, df = 11.2, p =.08). Most importantly, if language dominance as defined here is used as the group variable, the h 2 value obtained (h 2 =.399) is higher than when we use the classification based on the geographical origin (Paris versus Brussels) of the speakers (h 2 =.360). Thus, the language dominance criteria, based on D, are more powerful in predicting the use of the prefabricated formula 'il y a NP qui' than the geographical criteria. 4 As there are no English-dominant bilinguals among the Paris group, we can only study the use of the relative pronoun who among French-dominant bilinguals and balanced bilinguals here. Table 5 shows that who is used most frequently by balanced bilinguals (higher level) and least frequently by balanced bilinguals (lower level). The number of informants in each group is too small for these differences to become significant, however. The absence of informants with a high level of English also explains that the h 2 for this variable is not very high (h 2 =.03). However, a clear indication that most of the students in the Paris group are French-dominant is the fact they produce almost twice as many relative pronouns in French (1.11) than in English (0.55) per 100 words, and these differences are statistically significant (t = 4.51, df = 23, p <.001). Correlations between D-values As we have seen in Table 2, there are twice as many balanced bilinguals in the Brussels group (namely 16) than in the Paris group, where there are only eight. If this classification is valid, we should find significant correlations between the D-values for both languages among the Brussels group, but not among the Paris group. This prediction is borne out: a positive, fairly strong correlation exists between Dutch and French D-values (r =.484; df = 24, p <.05) but there is no significant correlation between the English and French D-values (r =.269, df = 24, p =.205). These results provide strong support for the validity of the language dominance criteria used here. Conclusion In this article I have tried to demonstrate that measures of lexical richness are valid indices of (lexical aspects of) language ability in both languages of bilinguals and that measures of lexical diversity can be used to operationalize language dominance. The data on which the analyses were based were obtained from a group of 25 Dutch-French bilinguals from Brussels and a group of 24 French-English bilinguals from Paris. All informants told the frog story (Frog Where Are You?) in French and another frog story (Frog Goes to Dinner) in Dutch or English. All recordings were transcribed in CHAT format and carefully checked by hand. The calculations of lexical richness were made on the morphosyntactic tier of the transcripts, on which the data are lemmatized, to avoid indices of lexical richness in French being higher than those in Dutch or English simply because there is a wider range of inflections in French. As the morphosyntactic coding on the mor tier is somewhat different in the three languages, some changes had to be made to this coding to ensure comparability of the calculations across the three languages. The median of the D-values for all three languages was then chosen as the cut-off point to divide the informants for each language into a lower ability group and a higher ability group. This classification was then used to allocate the participants to four different subgroups: Frenchdominant (high French, low Dutch/English), balanced at a high level (high French and high Dutch/English), balanced at a lower level (low French and low Dutch) and Dutch/English dominant (high Dutch/English and low French). According to this classification, the majority of the informants from Paris were French-dominant, and ten of the 25 Brusselers were First of all the directionality of mixing was studied, as this can be an indicator of dominance in that bilinguals switch to the dominant language more often than to the non-dominant language. This was found to be the case among the Dutch-French bilinguals, who switched far more often to Dutch than to French to make metalinguistic comments. The French-English bilinguals hardly switched to French, but this was probably because the researchers who collected the data were not seen to be proficient in French. Second, the informants' use of the prefabricated formula il y a NP qui 'there is an X who/ which' was investigated. This confirms the findings of Jisa and Kern who established that children often simplify the introduction of referents in stories in French using this formula, and the current study shows this is also a common feature of the storytelling strategies of bilinguals from Brussels (Treffers- Daller, 2009). This phenomenon was found far less often among French-dominant bilinguals or highly proficient balanced bilinguals than among Dutchdominant or less proficient balanced bilinguals. Most importantly, a calculation of the effect sizes showed that the language dominance classification, based on D, is more powerful in predicting the use of the prefabricated formula 'il y a NP qui' than the geographical criteria: the h 2 value obtained (h 2 =.399) is higher when the dominance classification is used as the group factor than when the geographical origin of the speakers (Paris versus Brussels) is used as the group factor (h 2 =.360). Third, according to the classification, there are a large number of balanced bilinguals among the Brussels group, but not among the Paris group. If this is indeed the case, positive, significant correlations should be found between D-values for both languages among the Brussels group, but not among the Paris group. This turned out to be the case. The results of these analyses support the claim of this study that language dominance can be operationalized with the help of indices of lexical richness and that the operationalization of language dominance used here is a valid means to distinguish different groups of speakers in the current data set. The most important advantages of using this method are that it can be used for languages and language varieties for which no standardized tests exist, that these measures can be calculated on oral data that have been collected in an informal and unobtrusive way and in a naturalistic setting (not in a laboratory), that all words used by the informant are being analyzed and not just a selection chosen by the researcher, that borrowings or code-switches can be included in the data analysis, and that elicitation tools (wordless storybooks) can be used that are appropriate for the ages, cultures and backgrounds of the informants in question. The main disadvantage of this approach is that obtaining, transcribing and formatting the data is a laborious process, which makes this way of measuring language dominance less suitable for contexts where results need to be obtained quickly, such as in some clinical applications. Another issue that would need to be addressed in future studies is the choice of the storytelling task. As some informants obtained low scores in both languages, this could be an indication that the task was not appropriate for all informants. Finally, in the current study only typologically similar languages were used. It is not clear at this point whether calculating lexical diversity scores across two languages works for bilinguals who speak languages that are typologically very different, nor do we know to what extent the measures obtained correlate with standardized measures such as the PPVT. These things, therefore, need to be investigated in future studies. |
<filename>neuronmd/hhmodel.py<gh_stars>0
import os
import imageio
import numpy as np
from tqdm import tqdm
from math import exp
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
class HHNeuron():
def __init__(self):
self.v = -65
self.vinit = -65
self.gnamax = 1.20
self.gkmax = 0.36
self.vk = -77
self.vna = 50
self.gl = 0.003
self.vl = -54.387
self.cm = 0.01
self.m = 0.0530
self.h = 0.5960
self.n = 0.3177
def change_params(self, params):
for key in params:
setattr(self, key, params[key])
def simulate(self, t, I, reinit=True):
self.t = t
dt = t[1] - t[0]
niter = len(t)
if reinit:
self.v = self.vinit
self.vhist = []
self.mhist = []
self.hhist = []
self.nhist = []
if type(I) not in [list, np.ndarray]:
I = I*np.ones((len(t),))
if I.size != len(t):
assert("The sizes of the currect vector doesn't match with that of the time vector.")
self.I = I
for idx in range(niter):
gna = self.gnamax*self.m**3*self.h
gk = self.gkmax*self.n**4
gtot = gna + gk + self.gl
vinf = ((gna*self.vna + gk*self.vk + self.gl*self.vl) + I[idx])/gtot
tauv = self.cm/gtot
self.v = vinf + (self.v - vinf)*exp(-dt/tauv)
self.am = 0.1*(self.v + 40)/(1-exp(-(self.v + 40)/10))
self.bm = 4*exp(-0.0556*(self.v + 65))
self.an = 0.01*(self.v + 55)/(1-exp(-(self.v + 55)/10))
self.bn = 0.125*exp(-(self.v + 65)/80)
self.ah = 0.07*exp(-0.05*(self.v + 65))
self.bh = 1/(1+exp(-0.1*(self.v + 35)))
taum = 1/(self.am + self.bm)
tauh = 1/(self.ah + self.bh)
taun = 1/(self.an + self.bn)
minf = self.am*taum
hinf = self.ah*tauh
ninf = self.an*taun
self.m = minf + (self.m - minf)*exp(-dt/taum)
self.h = hinf + (self.h - hinf)*exp(-dt/tauh)
self.n = ninf + (self.n - ninf)*exp(-dt/taun)
self.vhist.append(self.v)
self.mhist.append(self.m)
self.hhist.append(self.h)
self.nhist.append(self.n)
def plot(self, ylim=None, save=False, name=None, show=True, image_directory="images"):
if not hasattr(self, "vhist"):
assert("The model should be simulated before plotting the results! :)\nRun model.simulate()")
if name == None:
name = str(round(self.I[0],5))
if save:
try:
os.mkdir(image_directory)
except:
pass
plt.figure()
plt.plot(self.t, self.vhist)
plt.grid()
if ylim != None:
plt.ylim(ylim)
plt.xlabel("Time (ms)")
plt.ylabel("Voltage (mV)")
plt.title("Hodgkin & Huxley Neuron; Voltage across Time; $I=$"+name)
if save:
fig_name = image_directory+"/hh_"+name+"_v.png"
plt.savefig(fig_name)
plt.figure()
plt.plot(self.t, self.mhist)
plt.grid()
plt.xlabel("Time (ms)")
plt.ylabel("$m(t)$")
plt.title("Hodgkin & Huxley Neuron; $m$ across Time; $I=$"+name)
if save:
fig_name = image_directory+"/hh_"+name+"_m.png"
plt.savefig(fig_name)
plt.figure()
plt.plot(self.t, self.nhist)
plt.grid()
plt.xlabel("Time (ms)")
plt.ylabel("$n(t)$")
plt.title("Hodgkin & Huxley Neuron; $n$ across Time; $I=$"+name)
if save:
fig_name = image_directory+"/hh_"+name+"_n.png"
plt.savefig(fig_name)
plt.figure()
plt.plot(self.t, self.hhist)
plt.grid()
plt.xlabel("Time (ms)")
plt.ylabel("$h(t)$")
plt.title("Hodgkin & Huxley Neuron; $h$ across Time; $I=$"+name)
if save:
fig_name = image_directory+"/hh_"+name+"_h.png"
plt.savefig(fig_name)
if show:
plt.show()
plt.close("all")
def animate(self, t, current_list, ylim=None, name="1", image_directory="images"):
try:
os.mkdir(image_directory)
except:
pass
images_arr = []
for I in tqdm(current_list):
self.simulate(t, I)
self.plot(ylim=ylim, save=True, show=False)
fig_name = image_directory+"/hh_"+str(round(self.I[0],5))+"_v.png"
images_arr.append(imageio.imread(fig_name))
print("Generating the GIF and MOV files... This might take a while...")
imageio.mimsave(image_directory+"/hh_"+name+".gif", images_arr, duration=0.2)
imageio.mimsave(image_directory+"/hh_"+name+".mov", images_arr)
|
# Dedication
For John—thanks for the laughs. And the love.
# Contents
1. Cover
2. Title Page
3. Dedication
4. Contents
5. Chapter 1
6. Chapter 2
7. Chapter 3
8. Chapter 4
9. Chapter 5
10. Chapter 6
11. Chapter 7
12. Chapter 8
13. Chapter 9
14. Chapter 10
15. Chapter 11
16. Chapter 12
17. Chapter 13
18. Chapter 14
19. Chapter 15
20. Chapter 16
21. Chapter 17
22. Chapter 18
23. Chapter 19
24. Chapter 20
25. Chapter 21
26. Chapter 22
27. Chapter 23
28. Epilogue
29. About the Author
30. Also by Stephanie Evanovich
31. Copyright
32. About the Publisher
# Chapter 1
Zoey Sullivan didn't mind the cold. She liked the feel of the wind in her hair, even when it bit at her ears and made her nose run. It encouraged her to walk briskly, just like natives of the Big Apple did. Since Zoey had arrived from a Cleveland suburb nine months ago, she made it her mission to avoid the "tourist stroll." Not only did it aggravate people hurrying to get where they were going, but she also had been sufficiently convinced the night before she left Lakewood, Ohio, that slow walking made you a target of thieves, rapists, muggers, and murderers that lurked on every corner. So, when her phone started vibrating in her coat pocket, she ignored it. _Don't pull out your phone, don't flash any cash._ _Walk confidently with your head up and purpose in your eyes. Ax the headphones. Keep a loose but firm grip on your bag, like there is nothing important in it._
_Keep moving, even when walking down Park Avenue on the Upper East Side. Anyone not sporting a borderline sneer is either being watched over by someone else or carrying a weapon._
While growing up, she was often accused of taking things too literally.
Zoey's phone vibrated again and she picked up her pace, this time sticking her free hand into her pocket and around the phone while her other hand tightened around her magic bag. Surprisingly, she was unable to identify the caller through telepathy. Then it shook again. It became a series of one vibration after another, a veritable calling frenzy. What if it was her appointment canceling on her? The very thought was a mixture of disappointment and relief. Zoey ducked into a Duane Reade and pulled out her cell phone. There were only two callers, her sister and an unknown number. Neither had left a message. As she looked down at her phone, her older sister's name became visible on the screen and the phone shook again. Her sister did love her drama, as long as it wasn't too real.
"Ruth," Zoey answered, "I just left our apartment a half hour ago. Why are you calling me every thirty seconds?"
"Not me." A snicker came through the phone followed by the warning. "I've been waiting a minute or two. I wanted to make sure you weren't caught off guard."
Ruth and Zoey were the oldest, born a year and a half apart, in a family that inadvertently ended up with six children. Not originally their parents' plan, but they were passionate people who often threw caution to the wind when Barry White came on the radio. All their siblings were welcomed and loved, even if money sometimes got tight. Their mother had read every book on parenting available in those early years, before her hands became permanently full, and had acted accordingly. The firstborn is the perfectionist, the serious one, the rule follower. The second (and last child if it had gone according to plan) was supposed to be the quirky daredevil, who faced life fearlessly, the risk taker.
The only problem was, nobody told the girls. Zoey got the whimsical name; Ruth got everything else. Well, not everything. Zoey got the pretty face and attention to detail; Ruth got the rocking bod and the swagger. Ruth was carefree and vivacious, perfectly content grinding out her nine-to-five inputting insurance claims for a big company in the financial district and cutting loose every weekend. She broke hearts like peanut shells and could break a bone on any would-be assailant just as fast. Ruth lived setting her own rules and without regrets. The boss at her first job when she was eighteen learned that lesson the hard way, along with the one about keeping your hands to yourself. After settling out of court what would have been a hefty sexual harassment lawsuit, Ruth packed up and never thought about Ohio again. She was so much damn fun, when she offered to let reserved, cautious Zoey become her roommate, it was a no-brainer, even if Zoey did have to acknowledge she was living vicariously through her sister . . . and sometimes woke up to nearly naked stockbrokers, lawyers, and/or piano bar players roaming around their Lower East Side apartment.
"What's up?" Zoey got to the point after Ruth's ominous leadoff.
"Derek figured out you got a cell phone."
Zoey closed her eyes tight for a few seconds, leaning against the cap at the end of the candy aisle until she felt it start to give way. She quickly straightened back up, her grip tightening around both the phone and her precious bag.
_No, no, no . . . this is not what I need today._ At least now Zoey had a pretty good idea who the unknown caller was.
"Zoe?" Ruth asked when she got no immediate answer.
"Yeah, I'm here. What did you tell him?"
"Right now, I'm sorry I answered the phone, but he's becoming a pest. I don't mind lying by omission. But he flat out asked me if you had gotten one. I told you once you started screening his calls on the landline that he was going to know something was up."
Zoey knew Ruth harbored a soft spot for Derek, probably because they both embraced their selfish sides. "What did you tell him? Did you give him my number?"
"Of course not!" Ruth sounded slightly put off. "I don't ever give out anyone's cell phone number without their permission. But I did promise him I would ask you if it's okay."
"Well, you know the answer to that."
Zoey heard Ruth's heavy sigh. "I'm too late. He did recite me your correct number, but I swear I didn't give anything away. I just said that I would ask you."
"I have one caller other than you. It keeps coming up as unknown. I don't think there is a scam in the world that wants to robocall me that much." Irritation whistled through her teeth. "This is the last thing I needed today."
"You're going to have to talk to him eventually. He is your husband."
"Only because he doesn't know when to quit." Zoey was loud and quick with the response. After noting the glances in her direction from other, usually aloof Duane Reade shoppers, Zoey brought her tone back down to a whisper and took a few steps toward the door. "I can't deal with this right now. And I'm creeped out enough as it is."
"Ah. The secret customer with his penchant for all things NOLA," Ruth said, back to being jovial. "Maybe he's the one who's been calling?"
"Nope. I have him in my contacts by name."
"Of course you do."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Zoey snapped with pent-up tension. She wasn't the one who collected phone numbers for a hobby.
"I just meant that you're as conscientious as ever. Get ahold of yourself, little sis. Don't worry, I remember what you told me to do. If I don't hear from you by three that everything is on the up-and-up, I'm to call you. And if I get no answer, then call the police to tell them that you've been abducted by the Craigslist Crawdad Killer."
Ruth was making too light of a situation she thought was serious. Zoey gave a quick "That's right. Gotta go or I'm going to be late. Thanks for the heads-up." Zoey pushed the end button on the phone, cutting off Ruth's follow-up. Then she powered the phone down, even though that meant there would be no way to track her if she was kidnapped and thrown into the trunk of a car in the next twenty minutes. She dropped the phone back into her coat pocket and pushed the drugstore door open. She was back on the street. There was no problem with the pacing, since she felt the all-too-familiar urge to run. She also no longer appreciated the chill; all she felt was the heart-pounding flush that came with the feeling of having no control.
Zoey didn't want to admit it, but just the mention of a potential return of Derek Sullivan into her life was enough to turn her inside out. And she was already on shaky ground since accepting a job offer from one Tristan Malloy.
It started innocently enough, with a phone call inquiring about private catering. Zoey had placed the ad on Craigslist and other NYC-based platforms in the hopes of appealing to small dinner parties and wealthy romantics who wanted something a bit more intimate than making reservations. She had no official culinary training, just an honest love of cooking and a large family to experiment on. Once she broke free from the Midwest and Derek, she drove her twenty-year-old Chevrolet Cavalier through the Lincoln Tunnel into the electric, pulsating city. When the car promptly seized up and died on Forty-Second Street, the song playing on her radio was "Empire State of Mind" by Jay-Z and Alicia Keys. And if her dreams of conquering the concrete jungle included watching her car get towed away for scrap as soon as she got there, then she was off to a great start. She took it as a challenge. Zoey knew within weeks of working in a cubicle three floors down from Ruth that an office job was never going to cut it. But she was a terrible singer and all of the acting jobs in town were probably taken, so she settled on trying to make something out of the hobby that she loved. Within the first month of running the ad, she had yielded a kid's birthday party where she tested her skills on chicken nuggets and hot dogs with fries for ten kids who were only interested in the cake, a pseudo BBQ for some foreign exchange students from Turkey, and a jerk-ball who upon their first meeting asked her if she was going to be the dessert at his dinner. So much for conquering the concrete jungle. Still, Zoey refused to be daunted. Thanks to her sister's vast network and her own word of mouth at the monotonous day job, she soon was booking all her weekends. Four months later, she was able to abandon the nine-to-five, pay her half of the rent, and still have something left over. She even scored a few regular customers. She had three months to prove she could make it on her own. None of it prepared Zoey for when the landline rang last week.
"Good evening. May I please speak to the person who placed the advertisement for a personal chef?"
"Speaking," Zoey sang, then, not recognizing the voice, she dialed it back to a more professionally courteous, "My name is Zoey. And I just need to clarify, I'm more like a private caterer."
"May I ask what you see the difference as?" the caller asked politely.
"Well, a personal chef is usually a full-time position with a single client. I'm more along the lines of the person you call when you want to impress your boss or a date. A full-fledged caterer would be able to feed as many people as you want, but I max out at about twenty guests." Zoey wasn't doing a very good job at selling herself, but the leering perv who wanted her to jump out of a cake was impossible to erase from her mind. And she thought it vital that whoever was on the other end of the line know she was her own boss and wanted to remain that way. "May I ask who I'm speaking to?"
"Certainly, please excuse my bad manners," the masculine voice continued. "My name is Tristan Malloy. And I'm not looking for a personal chef, at least not yet. Can you prepare Cajun food?"
Not yet? One of her pet peeves was people who assumed if they offered her something, she would automatically want it. This man sounded different. Zoey had never gotten much further than looking up a Cajun recipe, but she did know how to read and measure, and she always had her little bag of tricks. "Mr. Malloy, that happens to be my specialty. Would you like to set up a meeting to discuss a menu and I can quote you a price?"
"A meeting won't be necessary. I'm interested in a five-course meal, including sorbet, with a Cajun theme, not too heavy on the fish. For myself and seven guests. Nothing that requires a lobster bib or can get a person messy. Just the staples are fine, you don't have to go overboard with creativity. Are you available next Thursday?"
She was; her work mostly filled up her weekends. That served a dual purpose. She made money and had a built-in excuse for preventing her sister from dragging her all around town. She wanted to take this time in NYC to clear her head, not cloud it further, and it was working for her. But this whole conversation was becoming highly unorthodox. He didn't want to meet her, wasn't asking for references. He wanted to give her free rein. "I do happen to have that day open. I would need a few hours to work up a price quote."
"Would it be possible to give you my number and you can call me back with the details?" the ultrapolite Tristan Malloy asked, making Zoey all the more intrigued, and slightly suspicious. She wanted to insist on a meeting, to verify that he wasn't wasting her time with some prank.
"Do any of the guests have food allergies?" Zoey asked.
"Not that I'm aware of. Let's keep away from peanuts, just in case. Shellfish should be fine for at least one course. Mix it up though?"
"Would you like me to email you the details so you can have them in front of you as we chat?" Zoey offered.
There was a long pause before "That won't be necessary. Just call me back with your final total. Feel free to add the cost of a server on too."
Zoey made a mental note to bump up the price and do the serving herself. She could present to eight people with her eyes closed. And a man who wasn't interested in dickering about the price probably had a nice kitchen . . . or was a psychopath. She took his phone number then checked the expiration date on the can of pepper spray she'd bought when she arrived but had yet to use. Why didn't he want an email? Everyone wanted some sort of confirmation in writing. That was just good business. Unless it's someone who doesn't want to leave a trail. A chill ran through her and she chastised herself for watching too much _Law & Order: SVU._
Zoey did her research and called him back with a menu of Shrimp and Sweet Potato Bisque and Broccoli Salad for starters; Sausage Jambalaya, Crawfish Mac & Cheese, and green beans for the main course; with a bread pudding for dessert. She recommended lemon sorbet for the palate cleanser.
He listened patiently and then there was a pause after she wrapped up her spiel, quoting him two prices, one with him providing the food and one if she had to buy it.
"Don't worry about having to purchase the food, Zoey," Tristan said. "But the mac and cheese dish is a bit much if you're serving it with jambalaya. Let's switch that up with an eggplant and corn casserole I have a recipe for. If you would be so kind as to fax me the rest of the menu and the ingredients that you need at this number, I'll make sure it's all here when you arrive."
Zoey knew what she'd be doing this week. Trial running recipes. But she had to admit, the eggplant and corn dish sounded delicious.
It also wasn't unusual for a customer to buy their own ingredients to prevent her from marking them up. But fax him? It was so odd. Tristan Malloy didn't sound like a dinosaur. After taking a minute to wrack her brain about where she might find a fax machine, Zoey remembered Ruth's office had one that was gathering dust. "Is it all right if I get it to you tomorrow, Mr. Malloy?"
"That will be fine."
He gave her his address and a noon arrival time. Before hanging up, he added, "And, Zoey?"
"Yes, sir?"
"Please call me Tristan. I look forward to meeting you next week."
And then he was gone and she was left staring at her landline's receiver.
Zoey spent the days leading up to Thursday buying a cell phone and trying to anticipate all the things that could go wrong while Ruth teased her for being overly paranoid. Then when she tested the recipes she had chosen, the end result on some of the dishes was less than she had hoped for. By the time she was ready to leave the apartment, she was strung tight as a drum. Now Derek was incessantly calling a cell phone number he wasn't supposed to know. It added a layer of foreboding.
She should've insisted on a meeting. Then she wouldn't be walking into this whole situation blind. But he sounded so . . . what was the right word? _Polite_? _Honest_? _Shy_? Maybe the word she was looking for was _innocent._ If Zoey wanted to take advantage of him, she would have no problem doing so. It was the levelheaded politeness that had set her off-kilter. Now was not the time to let her guard down.
Zoey made her turn onto East Seventy-Ninth Street and began looking at building numbers. When she found 139, she breathed a small sigh of relief. A beautiful high-rise, complete with front awning and a doorman. If she was walking into some sort of trap, at least there would be a witness who "saw her last."
She announced herself and the older man with the row of shiny buttons didn't call up to any apartment, just directed her to the end of the hall on the twelfth floor.
Zoey got off the elevator, taking her first few steps. She hated the huge buildings with the long hallways. They were broken up by nothing but closed doors, waiting to pop open as she passed them. It was eerily quiet, and with each of her footfalls on the carpet getting her closer to her final destination, she could almost hear "Redrum" in the background.
_This is just another job. Get ahold of yourself._
She reached the end of her walk, took a few centering breaths, and lightly rapped on the door.
# Chapter 2
There was no immediate answer. After waiting thirty seconds, Zoey lifted her hand to knock louder, but before she could, the door opened.
She tilted her head at the spectacle standing before her. Her eyes tried to take it all in at once, but it was too much. Between the bright, silky, salmon-colored polo shirt and the plaid pants that were interwoven with the same color as well as teal and purple stripes, she fleetingly wondered if a Cajun clown had been hired to answer the door. It was March—maybe there was a whole Mardi Gras theme going on.
"Zoey?" the man in neon plaid asked. "Hi. I'm Tristan. Come on in."
"Hi, Tristan," she replied, remembering his request to drop the formalities while stifling a laugh. All the worrying seemed silly now. "It's a pleasure to meet you. I hope I'm not too early."
"You're right on time. Dinner isn't supposed to be until seven, but I wanted to give you time to acclimate yourself to the setup. Can I take your coat?"
He opened the door wider. She stepped into the foyer, looking down at the floor, until she was sure she wouldn't break out into a fit of giggles. Half expecting to see him wearing red, floppy shoes, she was relieved to see standard white sneakers. By the time she looked back up, he was already leading the way through the living room toward the kitchen. She followed behind him, watching his long strides. Thanks to the pattern of the pants, she couldn't tell where his butt ended and his legs began. He was dressed bright enough to be located in an avalanche.
Tristan pushed a swinging door and her breath caught in her throat. What a magnificent kitchen it was, and she had been in enough kitchens to know.
Recently remodeled, it was a paradise of granite, gleaming chrome, and stainless steel. There were dozens of spotless white wood cabinets. Cabinets that were so high, even six-foot-plus Tristan would need a step stool to reach the top shelves. It smelled of coffee and freshly baked cookies.
"I was going to pull out pots and pans, but I figured you would want to explore the space yourself," he commented while opening two drawers in the center island. "There are both warming and refrigeration drawers here. I turned them on for you."
He had to know he possessed a kitchen worthy of the culinary gods, despite the nonchalant way he moved across the room and pointed out the twin Sub-Zero refrigerators stationed side by side with paneling that matched the cabinets.
"I put everything from your list in this one," he said while opening the one on the left. It was fully stocked and shelved neatly. He closed it and then regarded her curiously. Zoey had yet to utter a word, still bowled over by the room itself. She couldn't wait to start opening drawers and turning on burners.
"Do you carry that around in case you inadvertently poison someone?" he asked, gesturing to the bag she still held in her grip.
This time Zoey didn't hold back the giggle. The old worn-out doctor's bag was the first purchase she had made when she decided to go into business. She had found it in a secondhand store in the East Village. She placed it on the nearest counter, where it looked woefully out of place in such a shiny space.
"I call it my magic bag, but it really holds my apron, knives, a clean shirt, and spices," Zoey explained. "Spices are the key to unlocking flavor. Unfortunately, if anyone gets food poisoning, they're going to need more help than I can give them. I do taste all the food before I present it, so I'll be going down for the count with the rest of you."
"Now that's what I call dedication," he quipped, adding a small grin.
Zoey liked him already. "I'm not doing such a great job at building your confidence with my abilities, am I?"
"I wouldn't call it your strong suit."
"I can only promise I haven't poisoned a client yet." She held up a hand in pledge.
"Then you're doing just fine. I like honesty. And a doctor is on the guest list tonight."
"If you point him out to me, I'll serve him last. Just in case," she teased back, and he laughed.
It was then that Zoey got her first good look at Tristan, without the distraction of the clothing. She placed him at close to thirty. His hair was a little nerdy, too long, with a part straight down the middle. Somehow it suited him. It was full and brown, highlighted by either the sun or John Frieda. His eyes were green, already showing crinkling on the outside corners. His clean-shaven chin was strong. There was simply no way to judge his physique given his current state of dress, but he was lean enough to tuck his shirt into his pants. There was a cuteness to him, but she'd be hard-pressed to classify him as sexy. His voice was deep and strong, but not overbearing. His laugh was welcoming. Zoey couldn't think of anyone less intimidating than her newest client.
He was giving her a quick once-over too, she could tell. She hoped he could see beyond her hazel eyes, figure that showcased her love of food, and brunette hair that no matter how many times she had it cut always found its way back to the curls she had in her teens. She wanted him to see beyond the exterior to all the things she was—intelligent, confident, and conscientious. He wasn't leering at her, it was more like a brief yet thorough assessment.
"I'll let you get settled in," he suddenly said, turning on his heel and pushing through the swinging door. "Holler if you need me."
Left alone in the gorgeous kitchen, Zoey's first instinct was to spread her arms open wide and give a twirl, like Julie Andrews did when the hills came alive. But she'd end up looking like a loon, so she opted for pulling out drawers and opening cabinets to familiarize herself before starting to get down to work.
He had every utensil a gourmet chef could want, all neatly lined up in rows in the drawers next to the six-burner stove. Both Calphalon nonstick and top-of-the-line stainless-steel pots and pans were housed in spacious drawers beneath it. There were multiples of every size of mixing bowl and matching serving dishes she could imagine. She opened up a cabinet next to the stove and found all his spices. Dozens of labeled glass jars, again neatly marked and rowed. She took a quick inventory.
"There is no way this guy has his own fenugreek," she said under her breath, right before her gaze settled on it, right in between the jars of fennel seed and garlic powder.
Alphabetized spice cabinet and exceedingly easy to work for. This guy was a treasure. Zoey thought she might actually wet herself and left the kitchen in search of the bathroom, unable to recall if she had passed one on the way in.
She stepped into the living room and stopped. Tristan was standing in front of a big picture window, feet slightly apart. He wasn't admiring the view, he was looking down at his feet, his hands loosely balled, one resting on top of the other. He shifted his feet from side to side then swiftly pulled his arms across his body and to the right, hands still together and eyes still downcast, before swinging them to full extension on the opposite side, his eyes finally lifting. There were two things that became clear to Zoey. The first was he played golf, which explained the clothing. The second was that with the stretching of his body, the silky shirt was tightly flush against his torso. The result was the detailing of some sleek abdominal muscles. His biceps and triceps clearly defined.
The verdict was in—golf clothes made for outrageous fashion statements and were designed for comfort and not style, unless the wearer was aiming for bizarre. Zoey cleared her throat to get his attention. His hands dropped back to his sides as he turned to her. Not startled per se, but like he had been forced out of deep concentration.
"Sorry to interrupt. I was just looking for the powder room?"
"Right down the hall. First door on the left from where you came in." He went back to lining up his golf swing.
When Zoey returned to the kitchen, Tristan was waiting. Now he was wearing a purple visor and a matching windbreaker.
"I have a one-thirty tee time in New Jersey. I want to leave you a key to the apartment in case you need to run out for anything," he said, placing the key next to her now-unneeded spice bag.
"That's not necessary. You seem to have more than enough of everything." Zoey picked up the key and tried to hand it back to him.
"Take it anyway," he politely insisted. "Just in case you need a breath of fresh air."
He had an awful lot of trust for someone who lived in the city. Never once had she ever been left alone in a client's home. Maybe someone else was here? She didn't want anyone sneaking up and surprising her.
"If I have to leave, maybe your cleaning lady can just let me back in? Or your wife?"
His curious look was back, only this time he added a pair of pursed lips. "I don't have either one of those."
"I'm sorry," Zoey said quickly. "I'm not used to someone leaving me alone in their home, especially after knowing each other ten minutes."
"Were you planning to rob me?"
"Of course not!"
"In that case, I should be back by five, five thirty at the latest. Make yourself at home," Tristan said over his shoulder as he left. Zoey waited to hear the front door close before shoving the key in the front pocket of her standard black serving pants. When dealing with food, there should be nothing extraneous around it. The best way to turn this gig into a nightmare was for one of the guests to scoop up access to the host's home in their soup. She pulled out her apron then dropped her bags on the floor in a corner. She found cleaning wipes and ran one over all the surface areas, although the place was clean enough to eat off the floors. Better safe than sorry.
"Ruth!" Zoey exclaimed to the empty apartment, rushing back to the closet and retrieving her phone from her coat. After turning it on, she saw that her husband had called several more times. She quickly texted an "All good, see you tonight" to her sister and powered the phone back down. Double-checking that her apron was tied tight, she got to work.
Once all the vegetables were cut and the shrimp shelled, cut, and cleaned, Zoey made up the salad and set it in the adjoining fridge to chill without exposing it to any fish smell. The other fridge looked like a typical bachelor refrigerator, filled mostly with bottled water, beer, and several take-out containers. There was more than enough room.
She set the soup stock to simmer and went to see about how to set the table. Zoey left the kitchen in search of the dining room and the fine china through another swinging door on the opposite side of the kitchen.
The dining room table was already set, complete with sorbet dishes at the top of each place setting and a gorgeous centerpiece of fresh flowers.
Did Tristan Malloy do all this himself or had someone lent a feminine touch? Zoey gathered up the sorbet bowls and salad plates, taking them back to the kitchen. Then, with curiosity getting the best of her and a little time to kill, she set off to investigate the apartment. He had told her to make herself at home, after all.
Tristan's apartment held more secrets than clues. Zoey meandered from room to room and down the halls. There wasn't much furniture, save the basics. A large couch and several chairs in the living room. The elegant dining room set that could accommodate twelve, given the extra chairs pushed up against the walls. All the floors, be they marble or wood, were polished and bare. Was she dealing with a germophobe, perhaps?
But all the walls had artwork. Exquisite works, museum caliber.
She opened up the first closed door and her breath came out in a giant rush. It was a library full of books. Shelves that went from the floor to the ten-foot ceiling of all four walls were lined up with books. Hardcovers, paperbacks, classics as well as reference volumes. She couldn't resist running her fingertips along them until she made her way across the room. Not a speck of dust. In the center, a large oak desk and leather chair. On one corner of the desk was a Mac desktop computer. Next to the computer, the archaic fax machine. Zoey smiled. Tristan Malloy was an enigma wrapped inside a riddle with a side of time warp.
There were three bedrooms with nothing in them except more paintings and large leather benches that she assumed were to sit on to admire the art, like a museum. When she came to the last room, the farthest down the hall, she felt her conscience give a tug. She was going to take a peek into his most personal space, his sanctuary. She should be ashamed, she thought as she opened the door. The first thing Zoey noticed was the familiar smell of what she best remembered her grandfather for . . . Old Spice cologne.
_Who is this guy, and why do I even care?_
His bedroom, like all the others, was stark but masculine. A king-size bed with a geometric-patterned black comforter and crisp white sheets. A table next to the bed served as a nightstand. There wasn't a dresser, but she could see the open door that led to his walk-in closet. She took several steps toward his bathroom when she spied the gorgeous sunken tub and stopped. This was wrong. If you're doing something that would embarrass the hell out of you should you get caught, then you shouldn't be doing it. This would certainly qualify. Zoey closed the door and swiftly made her way back to the kitchen.
But there was one other thing she noticed. Unless it was hidden in a wall somewhere, there wasn't a single television set. After seeing the number of books in his library, it made sense. But with the exception of the kitchen, the apartment was far from cozy.
The kitchen was where she stayed and where Tristan found her when he returned promptly at five fifteen.
"This place smells heavenly," he announced when he came through the door. She was in full swing, with pots on the stove and the oven working. She wondered which smell was tantalizing him. And whether the tint on his cheeks and forehead was from sun or windburn.
"How was your game?" Zoey asked, like she had a clue about any of it. She knew nothing about the sport and hoped her simple inquiry wasn't taken as an invitation to engage in a full-fledged conversation on the topic.
"I double-bogeyed four holes. Not one of my best rounds."
"Sounds like you were attacked by the bogeyman." _I'll be here all night, folks. Don't forget to tip your waiters._
Tristan looked at her and deadpanned for a beat before shaking his head. "I think you mean _boogie_."
"Why? Was he dancing?"
"That's very funny."
Clearly it wasn't all that clever and he was just being polite. They stood in awkward silence for a minute until Zoey lifted the lid of the nearest pot and stirred it to look busy.
"If you don't need me for anything, I'm going to go shower and dress for dinner," he said.
It sounded vaguely like he was asking for permission. It was the strangest thing. He had this way of making her feel like she was a guest that he was hosting and not the hired help. She was more accustomed to being ordered around. And she was loath to admit, she was way more interested than she should be in what he looked like cleaned up.
When he returned nearly an hour later, she got her answer.
# Chapter 3
If Zoey had to choose a single word to describe Tristan, it would've been _geek._
She had assumed that a man living on the Upper East Side would be dressing in a suit and tie for a dinner party. Tristan was wearing khaki pants, complete with pleats and relaxed fit, the outline of his suspenders stopping at the trousers' high waist, a white shirt, and a red sweater vest. He topped it all off with a bow tie that had musical notes on it. The only things missing were a pocket protector and a pair of glasses being held together with tape. His hair was still damp and slicked back but devoid of any gel or product.
He was the cutest Brainiac she'd ever laid eyes on.
"Can I borrow an oven for a few minutes?" he asked while going to the fridge and pulling out what she had also wrongly assumed were the take-out containers. "After we got everything all settled, I forgot that an appetizer might be nice, so I whipped up some boudin balls."
"Sure." Zoey walked over to the double ovens, turning the bottom one on to preheat. "I'm only using one. And I must say I'm impressed."
"Don't be. I tried stuffing them with pepper jack cheese. They could be a disaster."
"Do you want me to try to get a quick dipping sauce going?"
"No need." He held up the other container. "I made a pepper jelly."
Tristan pulled out a cookie sheet and started spreading the balls out on it, then halted.
"Do you think it's too much pepper?" he asked, looking truly concerned.
Zoey scrunched up her face. Should she be honest or just placate him? It was too late to do anything about it now. "I'm not sure. I haven't tried it. On a positive note, if it burns out their taste buds, my job got a whole lot easier. They'll never notice if I made a mistake."
"Pitchers of water," he said, settling on a solution. "We need pitchers of water."
"Already done. There's one in the fridge and one on the wet bar. And if anyone complains, you can just blame me."
Tristan visibly relaxed. "I would never do that to you, but I can't thank you enough for offering."
"We're in this thing together."
Zoey would've never been able to answer why she was considering them a team. It was not how these things usually went down. She had been told on more than one occasion the new Golden Rule—he who holds the gold makes the rules. Her services were a luxury, not a necessity. Every time she stood her ground, she ran the risk of losing a repeat customer. Positive word of mouth was crucial. But Tristan Malloy was different. She wanted to help him.
"If you want me to, I can taste one before I bring them out. If they don't work out, I'll just start serving a little sooner," she said from her side of the island. That was another thing she noticed—he kept a healthy distance between them at all times. He didn't overcrowd or overstep. "Now why don't you throw those things in the oven and go pour yourself a glass of either water or wine and get ready to greet your guests?"
"Thanks, Zoey. You're a lifesaver. This is my first time doing this. I think I'm a little nervous."
"With a kitchen like this? You should be entertaining all the time."
"I love to cook," he admitted, "but I normally only do it for myself. And I don't know that I'd classify this as entertaining. It's more of a business meeting. I don't have many, but the ones I do have are held in stuffy offices and crowded restaurants. They make me antsy. I don't think I'm a very good city person."
"Are you obsessive-compulsive when it comes to germs?" Zoey blurted. They had lapsed into relaxed conversation. That might have been a tad too personal. She was a cook, not a therapist. "I mean, the whole place is spotless. The floors look clean enough to eat off of."
He seemed to genuinely consider it. "I don't think so. I just came from a very different upbringing. Moving to New York was one of those things I did jumping in with both feet. But here I am, almost two years later, and I still haven't embraced the life."
"It's a huge culture shock. I'm from Cleveland and I'm still trying to adjust to the difference."
"How long have you lived here?"
"About ten months. I'm starting to get the feeling that you either love it or hate it immediately."
"You may be onto something there."
Zoey would've loved to engage him more, get the full backstory, and find out why his home was more like an art gallery. But they were interrupted by his intercom buzzing. His guests had begun to arrive.
"It's officially showtime. Don't worry about a thing. I've got your back."
She gave him a reassuring smile and he gave her a nod of his head and left the kitchen. The next thing she heard was music beating softly out of the speakers above her head. Jazz. A little mood music.
"Nice touch, Mr. Malloy," she softly mused.
The first thing Zoey did was taste the sauce and add a bit of fresh squeezed lemon juice to it to tame the pepper flavor before warming it. It did the trick. When she quietly slid into the living room to place the plated tray on the bar where the party of six other men and one woman were gathered, Tristan was the first to grab one of the appetizers by the toothpick she had inserted in each of the boudin balls, dunk it in the sauce, and eat it. His eyebrows rose and he gave her a covert wink. She had saved his balls, and he knew it. She snickered to herself when safely back in the kitchen.
The men were all dressed in the usual corporate attire, suit and tie. The woman, a sleeveless navy-blue dress. Zoey gave a silent prayer of thanks for being able to break away from convention and having to wear the dreaded sleeveless dress, a garment that had to have been designed by men, to make sure that ladies worked overtime at the gym. Not only did it leave even the most secure woman running the risk of "bat wing" if she so much as extended her arm, but men got to wear jackets to hide their sweat stains, while women got to freeze in the winter to accommodate the style. At least Tristan was the grand equalizer, dressed casually enough to make any guest feel comfortable.
They worked in unison the entire night. Zoey plated the salad and left it for him, taking the soup bowls back with her into the kitchen. Within minutes, Tristan was moving the party into the dining room.
The evening would have been borderline as magical, save for one thing. As a professional, Zoey had to take into consideration the kind of event she was working and have her own behavior reflect that. The Turkish guys wanted to talk to her the entire time. A kid's party was more her wisecracking while serving them. This particular situation called for her to remain as unobtrusive as possible. And she was.
She wouldn't admit to herself that she was trying to glean information about Tristan while she moved about the room, serving and cleaning. But she couldn't get anything that she would define as helpful. Mostly because everyone else in the room would take note of her presence and promptly clam up. They seemed to resent her being there. Every glance she made in Tristan's direction revealed little more than that he didn't care if the rest of the party were uncomfortable. Whenever she entered to serve or quickly clear, the conversation would all but stop. The silence was strained, before someone would bring up the weather or where they had just been on vacation. Once she made eye contact with him and he gave her the smallest hint of a smirk. But the other times, he just let the members of his party sit there awkwardly fiddling with their forks or taking a sip of water and looked from one to the other, bemused. They seemed to tolerate it. None of the people acknowledged her when she cleared anything away from them. Tristan was the only one to thank her, and he did it for everything.
Except for one time, while she was serving dessert. Zoey had already made up her mind that she would do the final cleanup after all the guests had left. They had made it abundantly clear she wasn't welcome. She knew how to take a hint. There was plenty to keep her busy. She tried to wash things as she used them, but there was still plenty of suds-dunking to do after it was over, no matter how big a dishwasher. When she brought out the little dishes of bread pudding with a scoop of fresh whipped cream infused with vanilla, the only woman in the group was in the middle of a sentence. Something about encrypting fees. Innocuous really, she was quoting something in _Forbes,_ so it couldn't have been classified material.
"I think what she's trying to say is, she keeps up with current events. While on _vacation_. Where was it you went last month? Hawaii?" One of the men spoke up, shifting his eyes quickly to Zoey and then back to the woman, who stopped talking and now had pink tingeing her cheeks.
Zoey could also feel the heat start to rise. The guy she had pegged as the ringleader of the group had completed the classic slam dunk. With only the condescending tone of his voice, he was trying to put the woman in her place. And he was trying to make every man at the table take a moment to picture the attractive young blonde in a bikini. Zoey tried to place the dishes as fast as she could before she misbehaved and ruined Tristan's whole evening.
"The truth of the matter is—" the man went on.
Then she heard Tristan's voice.
"Doug, I'd like to let Kristin finish her thought. She makes a valid point. I read the article as well, and I agree with what she's said so far."
Zoey finished placing the dishes in the much more familiar silence. She beat it out of there to the safety of the kitchen. But she had to give props to Tristan for having the woman's back.
She loaded the dishwasher, digging the jazz and thinking about how she was having way too much fun tonight. She played around a spectacular kitchen with all the freshest ingredients she didn't have to buy. And the man footing the bill seemed like a genuinely nice guy. By midnight she'd be leaving the ball and her fairy tale would come to an end. And because she had been able to bite her tongue, maybe one of those bozos would want to throw a gig her way.
The party broke up soon after. It wasn't long before he was pushing through the swinging door to the kitchen and found her up to her elbows in sudsy water.
"You don't have to do this," he began earnestly.
"Sure, I do. It's part of the service," she replied. "I leave the place exactly as I found it."
"I'm certainly getting my money's worth. And everything was delicious. You did a great job tonight, Zoey, thank you. And I see you didn't bring a server."
"Don't worry"—she gave a relaxed laugh—"you still got billed for one. And normally I wouldn't be so candid, but it was the right call. I don't think your guests appreciated me being there. One more person serving would've made conversation next to impossible."
Tristan pulled a dish towel out of a drawer before closing it with a hip check. He leaned against the counter, still keeping to his side of the room. His eyes were downcast so that she couldn't see them. But his voice had a ring of boyish guilt.
"Since we're being honest, I have a confession to make. And an apology. I used you as a decoy of sorts."
Zoey wasn't sure what her correct reaction should be.
"You did?"
"I'm the inventor of a computer software program that compiles data. Lots of it. It's able to pull it out of multiple sources and combine them. I realized after I sold it, in the wrong hands, it's capable of doing great harm. People who always want to meet in crowded restaurants have the ability to communicate with each other with their target unable to hear everything they say over the noise. I don't want any distractions when I'm conducting business. And who doesn't like a home field advantage, right? I had a hunch that I could also use an extra pair of eyes and ears in the room. You can tell a lot about people by how they behave toward those that have nothing to offer them."
"Sort of like, you can tell a lot about a person's character by how they treat the waitstaff?"
He looked like he might apologize again. Zoey wasn't referring to the rude indifference of the guests who had just left; that was nothing more than an uncomfortable annoyance. Turned out, he was angry on her behalf.
"I really take offense to men disrespecting women. Women are the original multitaskers, and men know it. I think strong women make them nervous, so they resort to the only thing they can fall back on—brute force. Where is the honor in that?"
"I'd be lying if I didn't say how much I enjoyed you sticking it to that one guy."
"My grandfather used to say, 'Being male is a matter of birth. Being a man is a matter of age. Being a gentleman is a matter of choice.'"
"That's pretty profound."
"Isn't that what all grandparents are supposed to be? Full of wisdom and life experience?"
"Yes, but I think people forget that these days. Or just don't care enough to take the time to listen. My grandmother spent her last years telling us to stick her on a block of ice and set her adrift."
"She wanted to die alone?"
"Nah, we think she just had a thing for Eskimo folklore."
They shared a chuckle before his face got serious again. "In this particular instance though, I took their silence whenever you came into the room as them having to keep their guard up. Everyone who approaches me knows I can't sell them the original program. It belongs to the government. And when you work with the government, they don't take kindly to you working for anyone else. Corporate bigwigs get through the door under the guise of wanting something similar, but it usually ends up the same—they want me to do something that's not only morally wrong, but also could get me sent to prison. I get when the government acts all secretive, but these people were from a pharmaceutical company. I seriously doubt they were worried about you finding out where they stash the erythromycin. My guess is that they wanted to find a way to circumvent HIPAA guidelines."
He had such great wit for someone with an expert poker face. The combination was most likely dangerous as hell, but he was too noble to utilize it.
"I figured, if you were treated like an interloper, chances are the people that want the program had something to hide. You never said one word to them. For all they knew, you didn't even know English."
"You're right! I was quiet the whole night. Looks like your sketchy meter was spot-on."
His face clouded over with what she could only describe as melancholy. "I'm not always the best judge of character. I shouldn't even be entertaining these requests."
"You could've fooled me."
"I'm a little too trusting. I do much better when I can observe as an outsider."
He had begun taking pots and pans to dry and put away as Zoey washed them. It reminded her of home when she was a kid. Ruth and Zoey would take turns washing when they were little. Once Ruth started painting her nails and bedazzling them with artwork, she only wanted to dry. Not long after that, the chore was handed down to their younger siblings and they were put on laundry detail.
"Where are you from?" Zoey asked, enjoying the company and the conversation.
"Born in Rhode Island, but did most of my growing up in the Virgin Islands."
"That's a pretty big switch."
Tristan paused. "Okay, so this is the part where I'm going to make you unnecessarily uncomfortable. My parents died when I was three."
"I'm so sorry," Zoey said.
"It's all right. Seriously. I barely remember them. Dense fog, drunk driver, they were together and it was quick, which is the best anyone can hope for when you think about it. My grandfather was retired military. Loved golf. My grandmother was a dedicated army wife who loved to entertain. Both hated the cold. They bought and ran a small resort right near a golf course in St. Croix. A glorified bed-and-breakfast, if you will. Most of our guests were cronies of my grandfather and their wives. It was quiet, peaceful. I spent my whole young life barefoot, learning golf, and helping maintain the property. My grandparents thought they had really made the leap into the twenty-first century when they got dial-up Internet. They would let me have access to it, but it's not like I could do much. One time I tried to play a game online, I think it was Sonic the Hedgehog, and the thing froze for hours. My grandparents were so uninterested, they didn't even notice."
His explanation solved the mystery of why he seemed stuck in a time warp of manners, courtesy, and pleated pants. "I can see why after two years in New York, you still feel like a deer getting caught in the headlights."
"Am I that obvious?"
She couldn't tell if his behavior was that noticeable or she was just tuned into him. She felt the same level of protective instinct that she felt for her younger siblings. What Tristan Malloy had in years, he lacked in experience.
"I wouldn't have guessed if you hadn't told me," she answered honestly.
They kept washing and drying the dishes together, quietly enjoying the smooth jazz still playing from the surround-sound speakers.
"How did you end up here?" Zoey asked.
Tristan put his dish towel down, crossing his arms over his chest, a faraway look taking over. He didn't appear put off talking about it, but more like he wanted to get the chronological order of events correct.
"One of the regulars at Paradise Cove was a retired lieutenant colonel who was working for a government contractor. He was a good guy, loved to talk about technology. By the time I was sixteen, my grandmother made the announcement that I was done with homeschooling. After that I spent all my spare time trying to figure out everything I could about that computer with its dial-up, how to make it work better, faster."
"Ambitious little cuss, weren't you?"
He preened a little. "I like to think so. Long story short, with some help from the colonel, I devised a program that links databases. The colonel took it to his former superiors and they bought it for what I consider an outrageous sum of money. The program renews every year with a few updates. Now I spend a half hour every year striking a few keys on the keyboard and collect my check."
In no way did it sound like he was bragging, merely answering the question. She was dying to know what he considered an outrageous sum of money but knew that was a question she didn't deserve the answer to.
"So you decided to take on the Big Apple?" Zoey asked instead.
"Not originally. I would've been more than happy to stay on the island, totally remodel Paradise Cove, and hire a full staff so that my grandparents could retire in style, but I didn't get that chance."
He sounded melancholy again, and Zoey bit into her lower lip in response to it.
"They died, didn't they?"
He nodded.
"I'm sorry I brought it up."
"It's okay, Zoey. Not talking about it doesn't change anything. My grandmother died first, after a relatively short bout with Alzheimer's. A blessing really, when you think about how long that agony can go on. My grandfather and I took care of her ourselves, with some help of course. He didn't last six months after she was gone. It's strange, when he was in the army, he would be gone for months at a time. I guess as long as he knew she was waiting for him to return, he could take it. After she was gone, he just gave up."
Zoey gave him a consoling pat on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry, Tristan."
He didn't recoil from her touch, but within seconds, he was back on his side of the room, grabbing a beer out of the fridge.
"Thanks, Zoey," he said, before twisting off the top and taking a long swig. "After they were gone, all I knew was I needed to get away. From the resort, from the island. I had heard, and overheard, so many stories about the mainland over the years. In a moment of grief and determination, I decided on New York."
He didn't sound like he was proud of his accomplishment. He hadn't embraced city life; he endured it. The evening was turning from a success to a downer, and that was the last thing she wanted. She turned off the water, squeezed the sponge one last time, and put it back in its hiding place.
"What made you decide on Cajun tonight?" she asked to change the subject.
He gave her a small grin. "I've never been to New Orleans."
Was he telling the truth or did he feel like he had exposed himself enough? Zoey took the dish towel he'd left on the counter and started wiping down the already clean counters, aware that he was watching her as she did so. She surveyed the room to make sure that everything was put away and clean, then added, "This is the most beautiful kitchen I've ever had the enjoyment of working in."
He smiled again, this time relaxed and real. "Thanks. You did a great job tonight. All the way around."
"It's easy in a setup like this."
He reached into his pocket and handed her a wad of cash she didn't bother to count. This man was not ripping her off. "Would you rather get paid by check?"
"Heck no! Not only is cash king, but it's virtually untraceable by the IRS. It's called—getting paid under the table."
"What table is that?" he inquired.
Zoey threw her hands up in the air with a shrug. "Beats me. Maybe the table you would write the check on?"
"Can I call on you again?"
"Certainly," Zoey said quickly, already looking forward to the prospect of working for him again. "And if you don't mind spreading the good word, I'd sure appreciate it. Word of mouth is great for advertising in this business."
He paused before picking up her faded doctor's bag and handing it to her with a reluctant "Sure."
They walked together to the front door, where he helped her with her coat and she gathered the rest of her things. "Can I call you a cab?"
"Nope. I'm all good," she said as he opened the door. "Thanks again, Tristan. It's been a pleasure."
"I assure you, Zoey, the pleasure was all mine. Good night."
He closed the door and Zoey started back down the long hall. It was her turn to feel an indescribable sadness. Tristan Malloy had been the dream client, so kind and accommodating. Then she pushed the down arrow elevator button and reached into her pocket to count the money he gave her.
That's when she realized she still had his spare key in her pocket.
# Chapter 4
Zoey was annoyed. She prided herself on her attention to detail. She trudged back down the hallway to his door, weary from a night on her feet. She gave a knock. After waiting a minute and not getting an answer, she knocked again, harder. Loud enough that it resounded through the empty hall. Again, she waited.
"Odd," she mumbled under her breath, pulling out her phone and finding his number. She waited for it to ring ten times before disconnecting. It didn't forward to voice mail.
She stood outside Tristan Malloy's door and slowly built up the steam that ended in her mind completely running away with her. She had just left him not five minutes ago. What the hell could've happened to him? She stared at her phone, silently begging the screen to light up with his callback to no avail. Panic mounted with indecision and she pounded on the door, then pushed the tiny button that was supposed to act as a doorbell, then gave up. She stuck the key in the lock.
She swung open the door and then froze.
Aerosmith?
Gone was the jazz music. The whole apartment throbbed with Steven Tyler screaming the lyrics to "Walk This Way."
"Tristan?" she called out, knowing her voice wasn't much above a whisper, given the level of the sound system. The only response she got was a droning, blasting demand for her to keep putting one foot in front of the other and continue.
It was hypnotic, commanding. She began the systematic search of the apartment, similar to the investigation she had made earlier, but with quick glances. The rooms she had looked in earlier were all still empty. When she approached the open door to his bedroom, her skin prickled with anticipation and sweat broke out on her upper lip.
She stopped short as soon as she caught the first glimpse of his reflection in his bathroom mirror.
Gone were the bow tie, sweater vest, and perfectly pressed khakis. His dress shirt was still on, unbuttoned and shirttail pulled out, covering the top of the black leather pants he was now wearing. They weren't skintight, but as he shook his hips and moved his feet and arms with the music, the white shirt rose and fell. There was no mistaking . . . hiding under that hanging crisp white cotton was an extraordinary pair of buns. His chest was broad, her first impression of seeing his abs in his golf shirt now confirmed. His hair was flying free in playful disarray, the ends damp with sweat. And man could he dance, better than any boy band rock star she ever crushed on. He was singing into a pantomimed microphone, which looked only slightly less silly than if he were improvising with a hairbrush. The song went into the next verse, and he could've won a lip sync battle. He had all the moves and the muscles to match. Lean, tight, flexible.
"Holy cannoli," she breathed as she continued to spy on him while he cut loose. This was a complete departure from the man she had been with all day. Now all she could think of was—this dancing machine had no business being kept hidden from the world. When he belted out the line about giving him a kiss, she was tempted.
He stopped the action the moment he caught sight of her shadow in the mirror, accompanied by an actual mic-drop. He swiveled quickly, coming face-to-face with her, still standing a few feet away in his bedroom. They were both embarrassed, but for different reasons. He rushed past her to turn down the volume control knob on the wall in his room. She caught a whiff of leather mixed with sweat and the last remnants of Old Spice.
"Zoey," he said, making a concerted effort to sound steady while trying to catch his breath. "I wasn't expecting you."
Despite her legitimately having broken into his home, he still couldn't stop being polite.
"I forgot to give you back your key," Zoey stammered. She held out her hand to show it to him, unable to take her wide eyes off his mostly bare chest as the shirt opened wider. "I tried knocking. And calling. But I guess you didn't hear it over the Aerosmith."
Tristan cast his eyes downward, noticed the state of his shirt, and grabbed both sides of it to close the gap. "Sorry."
Zoey wasn't sure if the apology was meant for missing her knocking or for the unexpected peep show. "I was going to leave it on the kitchen counter, but, you know, I was just doing what Steven Tyler told me to."
"Yeah, I get that," he replied, concentrating on his fingers fumbling to get his shirt buttoned back up. "He's very persuasive."
The trance of seeing him in all the skin and leather-clad glory began to wane, replaced with an irrational anger. Forget that Zoey had stumbled upon him uninvited in the privacy of his own bathroom and his first response was an apology. Forget that in reality they were little more than strangers. Her head was spinning with a hundred questions. On the top of that list—just what kind of game was Tristan Malloy playing?
"When you didn't answer, I was worried something happened to you," she told him, her voice registering irritation. "I'm not sure if I still should be. Nice pants."
"I bought them online," he said sheepishly. "I think they're too big."
"You're supposed to buy them a size smaller than you would normally wear, because they stretch. And most people go to a store and try them on." What she was really thinking was, if they were any tighter, she may have had a stroke. Then she mentally cursed herself for not checking out his closet, since it was obviously where he kept his secrets. "Getting in touch with your wild side, were you?"
Tristan looked down again at his white sock–wearing feet and shuffled from one of them to the other before saying sheepishly, "It's how I let go of stress. By pretending I'm a rock star."
He sounded so contrite, when he had every reason to be mad. He was perfectly within his rights to tell her off. The lost boy was back. Zoey's ire evaporated. "I didn't know you were stressed. I thought the evening went very well."
Not yet brave enough to meet her gaze, he went over to the corner of his bed and sat down, running a hand through his hair. "It did, as far as the food was concerned at any rate. But like I told you, I'm terrible in social situations."
Zoey let out a heavy sigh before going over to sit beside him, their legs nearly touching. "You seemed so relaxed with those people. I had no idea."
He finally looked at her. "You're right. You really don't."
"Do you want to talk about it?"
She watched the emotions play across his face. He was debating whether or not he wanted to open up. If he could trust her.
"You'll think I'm an idiot."
"Probably," she said. "But that doesn't mean you won't feel better unloading. I already think you have a freaky Jekyll-and-Hyde thing going on."
They exchanged small smiles, and the tension started to ease.
"Remember me mentioning I'm a terrible judge of character?"
"Of course." She remembered the entire night from start to finish.
"My first stop in the States after my grandfather died wasn't New York. It was Las Vegas."
"You wanted to move there?"
"I was considering it. I thought it would be warm, which I was used to. I didn't think it would be as hot as it was. There's no ocean breezes in the desert. But I had heard it was amazing there, full of every sight and sound imaginable. I didn't care all that much about gambling. There are casinos back home, though I could count on one hand the times I had been to them. But I had money to burn and wasn't opposed to it either. I booked myself a fancy room at a ritzy hotel for an extended stay. I figured I'd take a little time to live the high life and splurge myself out of my grief."
He paused. They sat alone together in silence until Zoey reached out, placing her hand on the butter-soft leather covering his leg. "That's hardly a crime, Tristan. Even if you lost a fortune, it was yours to lose."
"Agreed. But I don't know, I didn't expect so many people being rude and drunk and inappropriate. And everyone seemed to be with groups of other people they knew. Bachelor parties and brides wearing sashes and tiaras, all partying with their friends, having a blast. Extended families on vacations and reunions. Stuff I watched from the safety of a slot machine. I was in the adult entertainment capital of the world, and within two days I felt like I was alone on Mars."
He began to frown. Zoey got it. It was a feeling she knew well.
"That night I went to the bar to have a nightcap. That's when I met Veronica. She was beautiful, effervescent, friendly. I got up the nerve to nod in her direction and she struck up a conversation. Next thing I knew, I was buying her a drink and we ended up talking the rest of the night away. We started meeting every night at the bar, around the same time. We talked about deep and meaningful subjects. It was like she was reading my mind most of the time. I really felt a connection with her. I was smitten even before she turned on the flirting and touching."
Zoey thought she would save him and cut directly to the chase. "Let me guess, she was a gold digger who took you for everything you had?"
He gave a pained shake of his head. "Not everything. Just the thousand dollars she said I owed her."
"Oh, my God." She raised a quick hand and added a cough to mask the laugh that escaped before adding, "She was a hooker."
This time Tristan nodded. "She used the term _call girl,_ which is kind of ironic, since I never got her phone number."
"You knew prostitution is legal in Vegas, right?" Zoey felt so sorry for him.
"Yeah, but I thought you had to go to an actual bordello. It felt so natural being with her. When she suggested going back to my room to have sex, I couldn't get her out of the bar fast enough. The whole elevator ride she was all over me. I thought I was the luckiest guy alive."
"She didn't make herself clear?" Zoey asked in disbelief. "Isn't there some sort of protocol for those things? Like, don't you have to agree to the price or something?"
He shrugged before returning all his concentration to his sock-covered big toe. "She may have, I don't remember. I already felt guilty for having sex without any emotional commitment. As soon as it was over, she started putting her clothes back on. To lighten the blow, she told me she was giving me her discount rate because she had genuinely enjoyed talking to me. To say I was humiliated is an understatement."
"So why did you pay her? You could've told her to get lost." Zoey asked the question despite knowing the answer. He was a gentleman who sounded like he spent his young life taking orders like a good soldier.
"I was so mortified by my own stupidity, I just wanted to get her out of there. It was a small price to pay. What if she called the cops or made a scene? I would've died on the spot. And I've read stories about pimps. I don't know if she had one, but I wasn't willing to take the chance of finding out."
"I forgot about them. Yeah, you did the right thing." She wanted desperately to say something that would wipe the self-recrimination off his face.
"We used a condom, but I walked around for a year waiting to drop dead from some disease before I went to a doctor here in Manhattan and confessed. The only saving grace was what a nonissue the whole episode was to him. He told me with what he'd seen over his career, on a scale of one to ten, my story was a two."
"You checked out okay, right?"
"I'm fine." He tried to smile and shrugged again. "Still a pretty pathetic way to have your first sexual encounter."
_Oh,_ hell _no!_ Zoey's inner voice shouted. He was too nice a guy to have been dissed and dismissed in such a fashion. Did guys value their virginity the same way girls were supposed to? It didn't matter what the correct answer was. She hadn't known Tristan long, but she was sure he valued his.
"Almost everybody's first time is a train wreck. You are not alone in that." It was the best she could come up with. "So, what happened next?"
"Isn't all that bad enough?" Tristan's chuckle had a ring of a weight being lifted off his shoulders.
"It is!" Zoey laughed in agreement. "But you might as well finish the story of how you got here."
"I stayed in that hotel room, in the dark, for a week. I didn't get out of bed. The thought of running into her again made me want to throw up. The next time I left that room was when I checked out of the hotel. I took a cab to the airport, decided on going to New York, and that was it."
There were still scads of questions Zoey wanted to ask, but it was hard to broach the topics without revealing that she had scoped out his place while he was gone. Luckily, she didn't have to.
"I had all these great visions in my mind of how I would blend in with the scenery here. I could play golf after a short ride in almost any direction. I could visit museums and enjoy fine dining. But I couldn't shake what had happened in Vegas and felt like an enormous loser. That made it next to impossible to make any real connections, let alone friends. Eating alone in public all the time left me feeling like more of a misfit. Even in the public library, I thought I could hear people laughing at me. I had my first panic attack in the Metropolitan Museum of Art."
Hard to remain impassive when a man looks like he's about to cry. This poor guy couldn't seem to catch a break, no matter how luxurious his surroundings. "So you turned your home into a museum."
If he had realized she had given herself away as a snoop, he didn't let on. "It didn't start out that way. It started out with the purchase of a few lithographs of famous works. Then I got up the nerve to venture out to art auctions, where all I had to do was hold up a little paddle. Once word spread that I had money, sellers came to me. Before long, I had my own collection. I had the kitchen remodeled so that I could cook for myself, something I always enjoyed doing with Grandma at the Cove. Golf supplies the fresh air and exercise, but I can do it by myself. I spend the rest of my time cleaning this place and trying to fend off people like the group you met tonight."
"Did it put an end to the panic attacks?"
"It did. Only now I'm afraid I'm not just awkward, I'm paralyzed."
There are times in one's life where you reach a crossroads. When your only options are to stay in your comfort zone or take a leap of faith. Zoey had taken that leap when she came to New York, and while it wasn't all rainbows and unicorns, it was a million times better than what she had left behind. Tristan had already proved he could take care of himself. Now he just needed to enjoy life. He deserved it as much as she did. The things they held in common vastly outnumbered their differences. The words tumbled forth from her mouth.
"Tristan, I'd like to think you consider me a friend. And it looks like you could sure use one. I think I can help you, if you'd let me."
# Chapter 5
When Zoey returned to her own apartment, it was well past midnight. Tristan insisted his car service drive her home. She'd spent most of that ride devising a plan that she could implement without overwhelming him. She wasn't a psychiatrist, she was a kindred spirit, after all. If she went too fast it could make matters worse for the gentle loner. It would be a tragedy to end up leaving him so jaded, he would spend the rest of his life a bitter man. Kind, respectful men were a hot commodity, and he just needed to add a little self-esteem to be quite a catch. He had willingly put his trust in her, and she didn't want to fail him.
The driver who picked her up gave her a quiet hello and nothing more. The company likely had the instructions that the rides from this address had a "no interaction" policy.
From the safety of the Lincoln Town Car and its silent, focused driver, she pulled the money Tristan gave her out of her pocket and counted it. Tristan had given her double her price quote, a 100 percent tip. She had to toughen him up, or the city would eat him alive.
Ruth was on the futon in the living room, waiting for her, wearing pajamas decorated with cows jumping over moons, the television on for background noise.
"I was starting to worry about you," she said, looking up from the magazine in her lap.
"I can't believe you're home," Zoey replied. She tossed her bags in their designated spot. "Aren't you supposed to be up to your ice cubes in Thirsty Thursday?"
"I was out, but when I texted you and you didn't answer me, I cut the night short."
"Sorry." Zoey pulled her phone out of her coat pocket, turning it back on. "I forgot I had it off. I didn't want to be disturbed while working."
"You mean you didn't want to deal with Derek. How did the job go?"
Before Zoey could recap the evening, her phone started to ring.
"Speak of the devil." Ruth smirked.
Zoey rolled her eyes and answered the call. She headed to the bedroom for some privacy.
"I'm not finished with you yet!" Ruth called out. Zoey gave a backward wave while still moving.
"Hello?" Zoey said, closing the bedroom door behind her.
"Where were you so late?"
She saw no point in playing dumb.
"Derek, if this is supposed to be a friendly call, you're going about it the wrong way. And if it's the beginning of an interrogation, you're on the fast track to me hanging up."
"I'm sorry." He instantly scaled back the heavy handedness. "But I don't think you know how much I worry about you up there."
"That's nice, but I'm a big girl. And I don't see you showing the same level of concern for my sister."
"That's because she's not my wife. And Ruthless can take care of herself."
Zoey's jaw began to clench. "You know what? I have always hated the little pet name you have for my sister, no matter how amusing she may think it is. Now how did you get this number and why exactly are you calling me at this hour?"
"I gave up my job at the club," Derek said, ignoring her question.
"Gave up or got fired?"
"I quit. I gave up drinking too. Got a real respectable job installing drywall."
"And just how long are you planning to stay in the glamorous world of spackling?"
She could hear him starting to tense up. "I'm also working on getting my real estate license. So why don't you stop all of this foolishness and come home?"
"Because we agreed on a year's separation."
"I don't need a year to know you belong with me. You wanted me to change. I've done everything you asked."
Even if Zoey wanted to believe him, she'd still have doubts. She'd put in hours of overtime waitressing for four years as he drifted from job to job, never lasting for more than six months. Except for bouncing at a nightclub in town. Once he passed the six-month mark, Zoey knew it was a job he enjoyed, which made her uneasy. Derek always found time to get to the gym, something she never managed, with all the running around she did. He had the stature to see above a crowd and liked to exude authority. Not only did the job mess up both their schedules, but he would also bring home that air of aggressiveness and reeked of booze and stale cigarette smoke. That made it easy for Zoey to keep her distance. It also taught her just how comfortable a big bed was for sleeping alone.
"I've heard all this before, Derek."
"Where were you tonight?" His voice started to rise. "Are you seeing someone?"
The accusations were more like it, and what she was used to when he didn't get his way. "I was _working_. You didn't mind the late hours when you were sitting on the couch, drinking beer, placing profiles on OkCupid. And random hookups were more your style."
"Damnit, Zoey! We can't move forward if you keep bringing up the past!"
And with that, she hung up.
Their marriage hadn't started out that way. Her high school sweetheart, Derek, would talk about all he wanted them to do, all he wanted to be. When he had gotten down on one knee and asked her to hold out her hand, he had promised her adventures and traveling and discovery, not to mention a lifetime of love and security. She left the tiny diamond ring behind when she took off. She was tired of feeling owned.
They shared dreams and aspirations while she cooked for him in their tiny kitchen, giggling and teasing the whole time. Derek's transformation to sullen and moody was so gradual, she'd hardly noticed. It wasn't until she detected the familiar alcohol on his breath early in the afternoon that she was forced to acknowledge the honeymoon was over. How she hated that smell.
They stopped going out when a subscription to Netflix seemed like a good idea for cozy nights and the ease of an order on Grubhub. They'd stuck a lot of forks in toss-out containers over the last couple years, but his favorite recliner only had room for one. Every time Zoey tried to join him out of romantic spontaneity or just to feel some human contact, the protests from the chair and the man were equal. She got too tired to cook for him, and he began to nitpick and criticize when she did. Then he started working at the nightclub and they were little more than ships passing in the night.
Worst of all was his dogged insistence that they should start a family. It came up each and every time she mentioned trying something new or adventurous. Whether it was trying to find a way to go to culinary school or packing up and moving to a new city, the conversation was always the same. It went from discussion to arguing. Then he would want to make up by wrapping his arms around her in bed and whispering in her ear—"Let's make a baby."
No matter how charming he was, Zoey wasn't buying it. Derek didn't have some deep-rooted longing to be a parent. He wanted to trap her, seal the deal, make it that much harder for her to have any interests she could pursue on her own. He refused to listen when she listed her reasons for wanting to wait. Soon she would be turned off as soon as he said it. Why couldn't he say "make love"? "Get down"? "Do the nasty"?
She stormed in and told him she was leaving while he was at the club. Then she stole her own car out of the parking lot and drove to New York. They hammered out the trial-separation-for-a-year deal from Ruth's apartment, with Ruth playing mediator from a second handset. Derek never lasted more than three days before calling to check up on her. Now he knew she had acquired a cell phone.
Zoey went back out to the living room and flopped down on the futon beside her sister. "Ugh."
"It couldn't have gone that bad," Ruth said. "I didn't hear any screaming."
"Never underestimate the power of the end button."
"You're really going to make him sweat this one out, aren't you?"
"You seem to forget my original intention was not to go back at all. If I had any backbone, this whole thing would already be over."
"You said that when you first got here and were all fed up. Are you really thinking about not going home?"
"Are you tired of me as your roomie?"
"No. But by the way you work and then just hang around here, I figured you were missing him as much as he misses you."
Zoey could've pointed out that she was trying to get a business up and running but didn't want to rehash the same dialogue. Ruth sometimes made her affection for Derek a little too well known. To the point where Zoey sometimes wondered where her sister's loyalty stood. Ruth had been living in New York for years with holiday visits, when everyone was on their best behavior. The Derek Ruth remembered was from back in the day, when they were dating. Zoey would be the first to admit, she missed that Derek too.
"Can we talk about something else?" Zoey asked, pulling off her black sensible shoes and wiggling her toes. Ahhhh.
"We certainly can. How did the ragin' Cajun work out?"
"Hasta la pasta!" Zoey exclaimed, taking her feet off the table and sitting up straight with the energy surge. In the madness of the phone call, she had forgotten. "You are not going to believe this one."
Ruth sat up too, tucking her legs beneath her and reaching for her half glass of white wine. "Oh boy. Did he turn out to be a creeper? Start talking."
"Okay. So, this guy is a transplant from the Virgin Islands. Some techno geek who spends all his time cleaning and playing golf. Completely a fish out of water. Strange apartment that looks more like the MoMA but with a kitchen like something out of a magazine. Food went well, he made the appetizer on his own. He was super nice, paid me double my quote, and went out of his way to stick up for the only other woman who was there."
Zoey stopped short of telling Ruth about the forgotten key and what transpired after.
"You're leaving out the most important detail," Ruth hedged.
"What's that?"
"You know, is he cute?"
Zoey paused to take another moment to recall the abs, the backside, the leather, and the booty shake. "Yeah. But sheltered. Way sheltered."
"Like baby duck cute? Or Adam Levine cute?"
"I don't know! I guess he's the kind of cute Adam Levine would be if he were a baby duck."
"Hmm." Ruth was always too good at reading her. "There's a piece missing here. You didn't get this excited over the Turkish guys. And they all played soccer. Did he end up offering you a job, like you thought he might?"
Zoey couldn't hold back the little smile, remembering the green eyes that registered all that relief before he took her up on her offer. He had asked if they could start tomorrow. She told him she'd meet him in front of his building at noon.
"I wouldn't exactly call it a job. It's more of a project."
Ruth drained her wineglass and narrowed her eyes. "What kind of a project?"
Zoey was being guarded, and she wasn't sure why. Ruth was not only her sister but also her best friend. It was stupid to think she could hide anything from her, and why would she want to? If she was going to nurture a friendship with Tristan, Ruth was eventually going to be in the equation as well.
"This poor dude is really having a hard time getting the most out of city life. He came here not knowing anybody."
Ruth scoffed. "Sounds like somebody I know. And _you_ are going to be the one to help him with that?"
"I beg your pardon. I knew you! And I've adapted fine here. Sure, I don't spend my weekends clubbing, but that's more out of respect for Derek and our agreement. I'm not going to cheat on him just for the sake of hooking up." _Even if that's exactly what he thinks I'm doing._
"Looks like you're lining someone up for when that clock counts down. . . ." If Zoey didn't know better, she would swear she heard some judgment in her sister's tone.
"Seriously, not this guy, even if what you're thinking was true. Which it's not. He's a little skittish, not to mention he dresses like an old man. He just needs a friend."
"I'll be Adam Baby Duck's friend," Ruth offered with her usual vixen grin.
"Oh no." Zoey held her hand up. "No way. You'll eat this poor soul alive. He's not even remotely ready to handle the likes of you."
Ruth stuck out her lower lip in her patented pout. "But you promise to let me know when he is?"
Zoey nodded, thinking that while she may hate the Ruthless nickname that Derek gave her, there were times when it did apply.
# Chapter 6
Zoey wasn't the least bit surprised when she turned the corner onto East Seventy-Ninth at 11:55 and Tristan was already standing outside, his back fully pressed up against the building wall. He wasn't wearing his purple windbreaker but a blue, puffy down jacket that he could've put back in the closet a month ago. Spring was just around the corner, but encased in all that coat, he looked like he was ready for an expedition to the polar ice cap. Then she remembered the climate he came from and realized forty-five degrees may, in fact, feel like the tundra to him. Still, she hoped she could get him to try on a little more leather. His hands were jammed into the pockets of his brown corduroys up to the wrist. He kept his head down, only periodically lifting it to glance both ways down the street. Zoey couldn't wait to teach him her city walk. As soon as he saw her, he straightened up to his full height and a toothy smile appeared. The kind of smile that was contagious.
"Hi, Zoey!" His voice was overflowing with excitement. Or nervous energy. It was so endearing, in a boyish sort of way.
"Did you bring your credit card and a desire for some fun?" Zoey could've bitten her tongue off. What a rotten opening line to say to a guy who got snookered by a prostitute. But she didn't need to beat herself up. She was with a gentleman. And in being such, he only thought gentle things.
He nodded and with his hands still in his pocket said, "I'm ready. Did you want to grab a cab or should I call for a car?"
"Neither. I thought we would start at Barneys on Madison, try on some new clothes. It's about twenty blocks. It's a beautiful day. Let's stroll, if you don't mind."
"I'm game if you are."
They started walking. Zoey decided to hold off on the talk about how to stomp through the city with purpose. That speech would likely scare him right back into hiding. But there was something else. With Tristan next to her, she felt like taking her time. She wanted to enjoy all the smells and sounds, like the gyro and pretzels guys with their carts, music pumping out of storefronts, and people walking their dogs.
"Do you have ideas on what you want to do with me?" he asked.
"I was watching on the _Today_ show this morning about the new spring fashions. Colors that are in and styles. Did you happen to see it?"
"Nope."
"What do you like to watch?"
"I don't have a TV. I like to read."
"And listen to music," she remined him with a knowing grin.
"That too." She couldn't be sure, but he may have started to blush.
When they reached the corner of Madison, they waited for the crossing light with a family, a mother who had a toddler by the hand and the dad pushing a stroller. They looked happy.
"Tell me about yourself?" Tristan asked. The timing was impeccable. Zoey stared at the baby carriage and debated just how much information she wanted to give him. "You said you were from Cleveland?"
"A suburb. I have one older sister, two younger sisters, and two younger brothers. My older sister, Ruth, is my roommate. Everyone else is still either at home or living near home."
"What made you want to move here?"
An innocent question. But also, a moment of truth.
"Adventure" was the answer she settled on. Not quite a lie, Zoey told herself. There was no need to drag him into her mess.
"Did you find it?"
"I certainly did. I'm having one right now," she quipped.
As they got closer to Barneys the crowds got thicker. People sidestepped one another in the effort to keep moving and retain their personal space. Others would abruptly stop and further mess up the flow of foot traffic. A man bumped into her with a disgusted "Geez." Zoey glanced at Tristan. His smile was gone, replaced with a grim expression, his hands still jammed in his pockets. Was he on the verge of a panic attack? She gingerly hooked her arm in his and began to match his step.
"He didn't even say 'excuse me,'" Tristan said.
"Hey. We're okay. We all have a right to the sidewalk. And I have pepper spray in my bag." She whispered up at him cheerfully in encouragement. "We only have a few more blocks to go."
He stared down at her, and she could feel him start to relax. She guided him over to the inside of the sidewalk, so that the faster walkers could hurry by.
"What do you like to read?"
"Everything! My favorite books are history. I have a library at home that's full of books. It's the one thing I had sent over from Paradise Cove. My grandfather devoured the military and war stuff. My grandmother loved her romances, so when you visit again and I show you the room, please don't judge. Although if I'm being honest, I have to admit, I've read almost all of them."
"If we're being honest, I guess I should admit . . . I've seen the room."
With their arms still hooked together he stopped short, looking down at her again, this time with a tilt of his head and laughter-filled eyes.
"What? You told me to make myself at home."
"You little devil," he said, and she wondered if he had picked up that come-hither look from those romance novels. He pulled her arm closer to his and they resumed their walking.
"I swear I didn't stay in any room long enough to take an inventory. I did notice you didn't have a television but thought maybe you had one hiding in a wall. And let me add, you are a heck of a housekeeper."
"Thank you." He continued to smile, unoffended by her confession. "Cleanliness is next to godliness, my grandmother used to say."
It was hard to believe they had known each other for only twenty-four hours. They had slipped into such easy conversation. Of course, Ruth had men who had proposed to her after one date, so it probably wasn't that big a deal. Zoey couldn't remember the last time she had let her guard down so quickly. They had reached their destination and unlocked arms, with Tristan opening the door and allowing her to enter the bustling building first. She led them straight to the men's department.
"Just so you know," Tristan said, "I do own a couple suits."
"I'm sure you do and I bet they're very nice. But I was thinking of us getting more in touch with your Steven Tyler side."
"I don't think I'm ready to start modeling leather pants yet." He was wary.
"How about a leather jacket?"
"Maybe."
Zoey shooed off the salesman asking if they needed help and went over to the folded jeans displays. She asked him his size and wrinkled her nose when he rattled off his thirty-two-inch waist, several inches smaller than her own. She stayed away from the ultraexpensive Saint Laurent and Balmain brands and began pulling jeans for him to try on, Rag & Bone, Citizens of Humanity, R13. She dropped them in his waiting hands until the stack almost covered his face. He drew the line at ripped holes in the knees. The look on his face when she touched the ones that had been fake-rubbed with dirt or grass was laughable.
"I'm looking for stylish, not derelict," he stated firmly on his way to the dressing room. "My grandmother would roll over in her grave."
Zoey waited for him, sliding the shirt-holding hangers along the racks for colors that she thought would highlight his green eyes and bring out his all-around coloring.
"What do you think?" she heard from behind her.
She should have been ready for when she turned around. She knew from the leather pants episode that he had a hidden sexy. He had taken off his coat in the dressing room. Underneath it was a burnt orange velour V-neck long-sleeve shirt that he must've acquired back on the island. It was easily two sizes too small and clung to him like Saran wrap. Because the jeans were so low, it rode up to display a tiny portion of his flat belly, something he was able to avoid with the high-waisted pants he was used to. In short, he was magnificent.
He turned to give her a view from the back, and her jaw started to unhinge.
"Do they fit right?" Tristan said over his shoulder. "They feel so low, like they could fall off."
"They're skinny jeans," Zoey said, with her mouth suddenly dry. She wasn't sure about the old adage that "clothes make the man," but in this particular instance she would have to say clothes made this man hot as hell.
"I'm not skinny," he replied stubbornly. It was the first exhibition of him having any ego.
Zoey smiled and shook her head. "No, it's the style of jeans. Skinny jeans. Check the tag yourself if you don't believe me."
"Oh!" He tapped his forehead with three fingertips in a mock effort to turn on his brain. "Got it. I hope I don't have to bend over to pick anything up. They feel like they would take my underwear with them."
It took real effort to strive for casual and keep her eyes above his neck. "They look pretty good. They'll get softer. You'll get used to them. And we'll pick you out the right kind of belt."
_Like leather. And long. Long enough to wrap around my wrists and then tie me to a bedpost, with those jeans slipping lower and lower as he does so, until he unzips them. . . ._
Without realizing it, Zoey started biting down on her lower lip.
"What are you thinking about?" Tristan asked innocently.
"Um." Zoey turned her focus back to the racks to hide the telltale blush. "Shirts that will go with it. Why don't you go try on another pair?"
He came back out a few minutes later. "I think somebody already wore these and returned them."
She bit back a giggle. "Those are what is called the distressed look."
"Why? Because you feel dirty and uncomfortable wearing them?"
"No, silly. The denim is distressed. It's a process they put the material through to make them appear faded and worn. That's why it's mostly on the knees and thighs. Just think of it as the manufacturer breaking them in for you."
"If you say so. They are comfy though."
This time, Zoey was able to watch him walk back to the dressing room without fear of him catching her.
They spent the majority of the afternoon in Barneys. Tristan was the ultimate shopping companion. He didn't balk at any price tag and was willing to try on anything, even the garments he viewed skeptically, such as pants covered in studs or obvious bleach stains. And he was correct in his assessments: the more outrageous things didn't work for him.
"I don't mind distressed, as you call it. I just don't like sloppy," he told her, and Zoey agreed. Threadbare patches and strategically placed holes or tears were a little too much fashion for him to handle. Excessively baggy was a no-go as well, and Zoey was fine with that. He had hidden that spectacular physique long enough. Tristan fell in love with long shorts after telling her that all the shorts he owned fell above his knees.
"You mean like Bermuda shorts?" she asked.
"No," he replied seriously. "We got them right in St. Croix. But I don't know, maybe they were imported."
His adorable innocence was endless. In all, he ended up purchasing five pairs of jeans, three pairs of other pants that didn't settle under his armpits, six pairs of shorts, at least a dozen button-down shirts in various colors and patterns, and a slew of pullovers, polos, and sweaters. She picked out both brown and black leather belts but had no idea how to approach him about underwear, so she didn't. He even unwittingly indulged her fantasy by letting her pick out a leather jacket for him. They both agreed on a hooded bomber style after he complained about the other ones having too many zippers. Zoey didn't bother mentioning the other style made him look like a frightened Harley rider . . . or Fonzie. The jokes would likely have been wasted anyway. Zoey courteously stepped away and wandered the racks as he paid the exorbitant Barneys bill, telling him she'd meet him at the men's fragrance counter.
"How about an update to your cologne or aftershave?" Zoey asked when he met up with her, both his hands full of shopping bags.
Tristan grimaced. "I don't think so. I don't want to smell like a lady."
Zoey smiled to herself, thinking, _Baby steps_. She was able to talk him into a pomade though, for when he wanted a more updated look to his hair.
"It's time to ditch the part down the middle, dude," she suggested.
"Do you want to look for anything for yourself?" he asked, adding, "My treat, to thank you for all your help."
She could've told him a hundred things. Like friends don't have to reciprocate all the time, and just dressing him was all the treat she should be allowed for one day. Or that what he had paid her the night before was thanks enough. Or that she would rather be dragged behind a cross-town bus than have to model whatever she took into the dressing room, an exercise that would make her more distressed than the jeans he had to be talked into buying. She settled on, "Thanks, but I think I'm all shopped out."
"Then can I make you dinner? If you don't have any other plans, that is."
There was such a hopefulness to his voice. Luckily, she didn't have a job booked.
"That sounds awesome. I'd love to."
"Let's call my car service. These bags are weighing me down," he suggested.
"Sounds good to me."
"Can I borrow your phone? Or maybe Barneys will let me use theirs?"
"You forgot your phone?"
"I don't have one."
He had just spent so much money that someone from Barneys would've been willing to call them a car. Maybe even carry them both home on the salesman's back. Instead she handed Tristan her phone and thought, _This throwback-to-a-simpler-time stuff is getting ridiculous_.
# Chapter 7
If Zoey lived to be a hundred, she doubted she would ever meet someone as courteous as Tristan. With him it wasn't an act or something he turned on and off. His grandparents had raised him well. He loaded the bags into the car himself and refused help from the doorman when they returned to his apartment.
Zoey sat on a stool at the island in the kitchen pondering her dilemma while he took his new clothes to his bedroom. When would she tell him about Derek? Should she just spit it out, or mention it in passing? Would he be disappointed in her? Would he put the instant kibosh on their friendship and ask her to leave? Things that others took for granted in this day and age were monumental to him. It wasn't like neglecting to tell him she got suspended from school for pot smoking or about having her tonsils taken out. She couldn't even say she was divorced. Whatever the outcome, she would have to face it then come to terms with it. The longer she waited, the worse it would be in the end. If he cooled off their friendship after hearing the news, it would sting. If they truly bonded, it would be heartbreaking, for both of them.
Music started playing from the overhead speakers. This time it was reggae. Just when Zoey thought she was on the verge of figuring him out, he threw her another surprise.
When Tristan returned, it was with a bottle of white wine and two long-stem wineglasses.
"How do you feel about Italian?" He opened a drawer and pulled out a corkscrew, driving the pointy end into the top of the bottle.
She watched him opening the liquid courage. "Always delicious. Tristan . . ."
The cork released with a resounding pop. He began to pour half glasses. "It's just a little glass of wine. I wanted to use it in the recipe tonight. It's too good to go to waste."
"Sounds wonderful." She was grateful for him presenting his back to put the bottle opener away. "Look, Tristan, there's something you should know. Not that I think it's a big deal, but I'm technically married."
She saw him stiffen again and he slowly closed the drawer before turning back to her. The expression on his face was new to her, tight-lipped anger.
"It's a very big deal. The word _technically_ is just semantics. You're either married or you aren't."
The heat of his stare was enough to burn a hole right through her. "We're separated."
"Technically separated? Such as, I'm in Tristan's apartment and can't see my husband right now?"
If she wasn't feeling so awful about this latest misunderstanding, she would be able to appreciate the fire in his eyes. It was nice to know he wasn't a total pushover.
"My husband is back in Ohio and if I had my way, we would already be divorced. But I agreed to wait a year before filing. I thought it was ludicrous then and I think it still is now. But I agreed to it. I don't want to go back on my word."
She blinked back the tears that were burning her eyelids, furious that she couldn't stop the reaction or the shakiness in her voice.
"Did you run away from him because he abused you?"
His follow-up question was fraught with a different kind of anger, the chivalrous kind. The way all his muscles tensed in the too-small velour shirt, he looked perfectly capable of holding his own in a fight.
"He wasn't physically abusive," she said, forcing her gaze away from the sight of him. "But there's a lot of ways to abuse someone, you know?"
She stared at the white swirls in the black granite countertop until he slowly pushed her wineglass into her line of vision.
"It's going to be all right, Zoey," he said quietly. "I apologize for my initial overreaction. Thank you for being honest with me."
She looked back up into his eyes. All the kindness was back in them, and she was relieved. He had no interest in berating or casting judgment on her. "I'm never quite sure how to work it into conversation. 'Hi, my name is Zoey and I'm counting down the days till I can get a divorce' seems like overkill."
"Do you want to talk about it?" Tristan repeated the same question she had posed to him the night before. It was an open-ended invitation, not an interrogation.
She felt the lump in her throat starting to form. "There are so many ways my marriage went wrong, I don't know where to start."
He had gone back to puttering about the kitchen, pulling out pots and pans, going to the fridge to remove chicken, mushrooms, and eggs. He balanced all the items in his hands and plopped them down on the counter. Then he held up a stick of butter. He said very matter-of-factly, "I hope you're not one of those zealots who hates butter. Olive oil has its place too, but I prefer to use butter when I can."
"Do I look like I hate butter? Sometimes I use both. Everything's better with butter and batter."
Tristan picked up his wineglass and leaned against the counter. He extended it in a toast. "To new beginnings. All kinds."
Zoey picked up her glass as well, and from across the center island, they tapped them lightly together with a ping. "I think Derek was cheating on me. Plus he didn't fulfill one promise he made me before we married."
He quirked an eyebrow and chuckled. "I'm used to saying 'cheers,' but I guess that works too." Then he took a more serious tone. "I'm sorry that happened to you. I don't think a lot of people realize going in just how hard being married is."
"My parents made it look easy," she replied.
"My grandparents did too. They only talked about how hard it was."
Tristan was starting to assemble all the things he would need to make what Zoey guessed was Chicken Marsala. She felt so comfortable with him. The more they got to know each other, the more they seemed to have in common. He set up his work area the same way she did. And for the first time she was content to sit back and watch, instead of trying to jump in and actively participate. She wasn't sure how long being a spectator would last. He was still wearing the same clothes as when she picked him up that morning, despite now having a king's ransom's worth of new duds. She got the distinct impression that material things didn't really matter to him; people did. It likely made his self-imposed solitude all the more frustrating, even if he didn't show it. He was a fascinating specimen.
"Derek kept saying he wants to start a family." Zoey said the words for the first time out loud. Ruth was the only one who knew about Derek's pressure of trying to get her to conceive.
Tristan turned around from the counter. "And you don't?"
She toyed with the stem of her wineglass. "Even when I believed our marriage was on solid ground, every time someone asked me when I'm going to have a baby, I wanted to scream. Does that make me a horrible person?"
"Certainly not. It's your body, you call the shots."
In one sentence, the man who knew her just over twenty-four hours was able to break it down to its most basic principle. He got it.
"I have nothing against kids, but I had four younger siblings," she continued to explain, because she wanted to, not because she felt she had to justify. "Not that my parents were lying down on the job, but Ruth and I were expected to help out. Ruth was . . . is . . . the fun one. I'm the conscientious one, the worrier, the perfectionist. Ruth fought for her right to party, which gave me one more person to worry about and have to take care of. I put in my time changing diapers and warming bottles and chasing after toddlers."
He was studying her, listening to her, periodically nodding in agreement but saying nothing.
"And I know that no matter what he says, deep down inside he only wants to start a family to keep me under his thumb. So he can be free to go and do what he likes while I'm stuck at home being responsible for the life we created. He never talked about wanting children while we were dating."
Tristan finally spoke. "He wants to take advantage of all your best qualities. That's not right."
"To be fair, I'm not much better than he is. We'd been together on and off since eighth grade. He played sports, was popular, didn't go to college because he thought he already knew everything there was to know. I bought into all of that. Derek had a real take-on-the-world attitude. But it was all puffing. He's lazy and always looking for the easiest way to do things instead of the right way. I never in my wildest dreams thought I was settling for someone who peaked in high school. I wanted to move away and try new things, but he was content to stay right where he was. By the time I figured it out, it was too late."
"That's what I like about you, Zoey. You're not only a thinker, you're also willing to take some responsibility for your situation. And take it from one who knows, it's never too late to make a change."
He went back to making dinner and she went back to sipping her wine.
"For what it's worth, babies seem like a lot of hard work. They're not toys, they're people. And this world is a dangerous place. If you can't commit, you shouldn't."
They were silent for a spell, lost in their own thoughts. But it wasn't long before Tristan shifted his eyes up from what he was doing with a small knowing grin.
"You're just dying to do something, aren't you?"
She smiled back with a little roll of her eyes. "This is the sort of kitchen that inspires cheffery."
"Chef-fer-y? That's a new one."
"I made it up," Zoey said brightly, getting up off her barstool to join him. He tossed her an onion and she pulled out a knife from the drawer where she knew he kept them. He handed her a small plastic cutting board. They were back to working in unison and the mood became lighter. It wasn't long before Zoey was jammin' to the music.
"This music is awesome," she commented, stepping away from her task to fight back onion tears. He picked up a mallet with spikes on one side.
"I discovered the radio station that played it in St. Croix," he said, banging on the chicken breasts to flatten them. "It was during my teenage rebel years. My grandparents knew eventually I would get sick of listening to all their Perry Como and Frank Sinatra records. Still, they checked my eyes for months to see if I was smoking 'the funny stuff.'"
"Were you?"
Zoey was nearly floored when he gave a careless shrug and replied, "A couple of times."
She stepped away from the onion again, this time to stare at him, aghast.
"Don't look at me that way," he protested. "The island is full of it. They did fire the landscaper once they found out he was the one I was smoking it with."
"I used to love smoking pot," Zoey said wistfully.
"Did you want me to try and get you some?" Tristan asked, clearly disappointed in her statement. "Those pharmaceutical people from last night told me they could get me almost anything. Come to think of it, so did one of the overnight doormen when I first moved in."
"Oh no." Zoey was quick with her reply, although she would've given her eyeteeth to see what he would be like after a bong hit or two. "I should clarify. I wanted to be a pot smoker but I was never able to make an exact connection. I would watch movies and TV shows where people made one call and it was delivered right to their door. I was always having to go through like two or three people to score any. It got to be a hassle. It felt like begging. I took it as a sign that it wasn't supposed to be my vice, so I just got over it."
"I like you much better virtuous," he said with relief.
"Don't get carried away."
Together they playfully finished making dinner. Zoey minced cloves of fresh garlic and tossed some into the spinach Tristan was sautéing. She filled a large pot with water and went to search the pantry for some penne she remembered seeing. He was going back to the fridge for some fresh mozzarella and they banged into each other. For Zoey, it was like smacking into a wall. So much unexpected muscle to come up against, she nearly bounced off him.
"Whoa there," he said after the contact, grabbing her by the shoulders to steady her. His grip was firm, his hands large. Nobody had touched her in almost a year, and her response was like a jolt of electricity coursing through her. She could smell his sweet wine-tinged breath and fought off a head rush.
"Sorry." She ducked her head so he wouldn't see her visceral reaction. After that, it was Zoey's turn to make sure there was adequate space between them.
Tristan had created a most delicious dish. After lightly frying the chicken, he topped it with the spinach and cheese and put it in the oven with a mushroom and white wine sauce to finish up. They carried their plates and what remained of the wine into the dining room. Then they both ate like they were going to the electric chair, devouring every morsel.
"I'm glad we decided against a salad or bread," Zoey said after the last bite was consumed and she was wiping her mouth with a cloth napkin, feeling not an ounce of regret for her part in polishing off her half of a box of pasta. "This dish was amazing."
"Just my version of cheffery," he quipped, reaching for his wineglass. Afterward, he offered to move the party to the library to have dessert.
"Forget dessert. I have no room left," she said with a satisfied sigh, wishing she could unbutton her jeans. "And I'd much rather see some of the art."
"Do you want to start with impressionist, mosaic, or modern?" he asked excitedly, rising to pull out her chair for her.
"Let's go with impressionists," she said.
"Do you know art?"
"Don't have a clue."
Tristan laughed and grabbed both their wineglasses before leading her down the hall. "Then I guess I don't need to worry about you telling the reals from the fakes. Allow me to enlighten you a bit. Impressionism started in the nineteenth century. You can tell it mainly by all the small, thin brushstrokes, usually oil paints. Mosaics are pieces made up of small stones, pieces of glass, or tiles. Basically, materials that are flat, small, square, and colorful. The impressionist style is named after Claude Monet's work _Impression, soleil levant_ , the translation meaning _Impression, Sunrise._ "
"I've heard of him!" she exclaimed, mainly from having seen the movie _Titanic_ over a dozen times. As they entered the room, she brought her voice down to a whisper. The lights turned on automatically, bathing the room in a soft glow with single-bulb lights that shone directly on the artworks themselves. "Do you have one of them? You know, the _Sunrise_ one?"
"It just so happens that I do." Tristan handed over her wineglass and sat down on the long leather bench in the center of the room, patting the space beside him. "Come. We're right in front of it."
"Is yours real?" she whispered, sitting down next to him.
"No." He gave her an indulgent smile. "The real _Sunrise_ is in Paris."
"Oh." She giggled at her own ignorance. "Sorry."
"Don't be," he teased. "It's probably happy there."
They sat in silence, sipping their wine and looking at the serene picture, with all its mostly pale tones of the sky and sea, with the exception of the bright orange spot that made up the sun and the strokes of orange that served as its reflection on the water.
Zoey could understand why he found the rooms of art so inviting. The speakers here were turned down to enhance the ambiance. It was peaceful and quiet, with only the faint sounds of music thumping in the distance. She could hear him breathing. It was profoundly romantic.
_Hold up. Not that word. Not here. Not with this guy._
"It's getting late," she said, breaking the silence that just a moment ago was comfortable and now was charged with an energy she had no business experiencing. She stood up. "I should probably go."
She didn't know if he felt it too, but he didn't try to make her stay. He rose as well. "Can I call you a car? Walk you home?"
"No thanks." She gave him a smile but refrained from looking him in the eye. "I'm going to race-walk off the penne."
She couldn't get out of his apartment fast enough. She needed fresh air on her face. She needed to clear her head from the long-dormant feelings that suddenly threatened to surface. Whether that was from the wine or the company, now was not the time to analyze it. He helped her into her jacket and she gathered her purse, all the while thinking about how if the circumstances were different, she'd be wanting and waiting for a good-night kiss. A kiss she would've been willing to initiate. A kiss that she could only imagine would be as thorough and thought out as all the other things he did. It only added to her fluster.
"Are you busy tomorrow?" Tristan asked, opening the door.
"I am," she replied, eternally grateful she didn't have to lie to him. She would need at least a day to get herself back in check. "I'm catering a brunch in Tribeca for a very nice lady and her new in-laws. It should be interesting."
"Good luck with that. Not that you need it."
She got out to the street and took a gulp of air. She began walking briskly in the direction of home, lecturing herself the entire way. With his initial reaction to the news she was married, it wasn't hard to surmise that even if he felt a fraction of the chemistry she just did, he wouldn't act on it. She needed to build his confidence and get him up to speed to meet the woman of his dreams. She couldn't fail him as a friend or violate his trust.
But she was ashamed of herself for just how many ways she wanted to.
# Chapter 8
Tristan communicated with Zoey every day, with the first time being an unexpected text. Zoey was home after the in-law brunch, feeling the rush that came with success. Her eggs Benedict were perfection. The poached whites of the eggs were fully cooked, and the yolks showed no signs of hardening. The hollandaise sauce just the right consistency. The potatoes that accompanied them were crunchy on the outside and soft inside with just the right amounts of peppers and onions to make them savory. She squeezed her own orange juice for the mimosas. All the fruit in her fruit salad was ripe and delectable. She went above and beyond to make sure her stressed-out host looked like the lady of the manor in her mother-in-law's eyes. She walked away with a one-hundred-dollar tip for her efforts.
She was in the middle of a postwork nap when her phone pinged. She almost didn't answer it, fearing that it was Derek, who had already sent several texts since she hung up on him two days prior. With one eye closed, she picked up the phone to confirm and saw an unknown number and the words: HELLO OUT THERE!
Curious, she wrote back: HI. I THINK YOU HAVE THE WRONG NUMBER.
After less than a minute she got: ZOEY?
She had a sneaking suspicion, which made her smile, but asked anyway: WHO IS THIS?
IT'S TRISTAN. I WENT OUT AND GOT A PHONE TODAY. ALL BY MYSELF.
LOL
YOU THINK YOU'RE TRICKY, BUT I KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS.
OH YEAH? WHAT DOES IT MEAN?
LEFT OVER LAUGHTER
CLOSE. IT MEANS LAUGH OUT LOUD
I KNEW THAT, SO LOL ON YOU. WHY ARE YOU LAUGHING AT ME?
I WASN'T REALLY. IT'S ONE OF THOSE THINGS YOU WRITE WHEN SOMEONE SAYS SOMETHING FUNNY. OR YOU DON'T HAVE A READY RESPONSE.
WHICH ONE IS IT FOR YOU?
A LITTLE OF BOTH. MOSTLY YOUR ALL BY YOURSELF COMMENT. PROUD OF YOU.
ONE OF MY NEW JACKETS HAS AN INSIDE POCKET SPECIFICALLY FOR A PHONE, SO I THOUGHT IT WAS TIME.
He texted her every day. Usually nothing more than a hello, or wishing her a nice day. Sometimes she would start a conversation. Other times she would thank him and wish him the same. But she made sure to text him something worth learning daily. It was usually an often-used acronym, though he was too proper and set in his ways to use them, preferring to spell out each word in its entirety.
With the distance, Zoey was able to regain some of her equilibrium. Tristan was out of sight, but not quite out of mind. She suffered through Ruth's uninvited half-hour diatribe about how men and women are incapable of being just friends. It was all the more disconcerting because Zoey had made no mention to her sister about the way she fled his apartment when her thoughts turned to departing the friend zone. But Zoey had to be careful. Getting too defensive would only give Ruth more ammunition.
"That's ridiculous," Zoey argued.
"No matter what anybody says, one side or the other is in it for the attraction." Ruth did everything short of pointing her finger at Zoey in accusation.
"What about gay people?"
"That's a nonissue. A gay man being friends with a woman is different because there's no chance of sex. The same applies to gay women being friends with straight men."
"Okay, so then by your theory all the lesbians you're friends with are really wanting to hit on you?"
That stumped Ruth enough to make her drop the argument. But it also gave Zoey a lot of food for thought. In the end, Zoey laid the blame on the wine for her reaction to Tristan.
That didn't stop Zoey from feeling a mixture of panic and thrill when Tristan texted her early Friday morning.
I THINK I'M READY TO GO OUT AND EXPERIENCE THE NIGHTLIFE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO JOIN ME?
Zoey doubted he would follow through if she declined. Or maybe not. He was known for jumping right into the deep end. Maybe it was time to get him out there. The sooner he embraced all New York City had to offer, the sooner she would be able to get back to her own agenda. The clock was ticking, and she wanted to make sure she had enough to afford a lawyer if Derek tried to fight simple mediation. Besides, it was common knowledge that once somebody found a significant other, all their other playmates were slowly left in the dust. What's the worst that could happen, he would begin to develop a network of friends?
"Okay, Ruth, now's your chance." Zoey looked up from her phone after responding to Tristan that it sounded like a great idea. "Tristan wants to go out and party. Not only can you meet him, but I can also prove to you that my motives are pure and his are innocent."
Ruth immediately started making plans for Saturday night.
* * *
Saturday afternoon Zoey took her first long look in the mirror. She'd just survived another hectic kid's birthday party. It was easy money menu-wise, but murder having to listen to a bunch of kids screaming up and down the stairs of a Brooklyn brownstone all while keeping a smile plastered on her face. After a much-needed shower, Zoey gave her reflection a long-overdue assessment and was not thrilled with the final analysis. She always wore the same clothes for working, black pants and a white shirt. Her hair was always tied back for sanitary reasons. She avoided makeup—it was a total waste once she started sweating over the stove. When she wasn't working, it was jeans or yoga pants and whatever shirt she put a hand on first. She stared at herself in the mirror. She had the nerve to think Tristan needed a makeover? Well, charity begins at home. With a heavy sigh, she began opening vanity drawers and shuffling stuff around, not sure what she was looking for.
At the back of one drawer, she spied teeth-whitening strips. It was as good a place to start as any. Who doesn't appreciate a bright white smile? Zoey read the instructions on the box and pulled out a package for both her upper and lower teeth. They seemed so large, even after folding them in and anchoring them to the back of her teeth. They had a slimy feel and a faint aftertaste. She double-checked the package. She needed to wear them for thirty minutes. Sigh. She checked her phone for the time and left the bathroom. She turned on the television and sat down on her futon to wait. Clamping her jaw shut was increasing the slight pounding at her temple. Before long, she was leaning her head back against the futon. The next thing she knew, Ruth was gently shaking her awake.
"Hey," Ruth said. "What time do you have to meet Mr. Manners?"
"What time is it now?" was Zoey's still-drowsy and mumbled response. Her mouth was dry as a bone, and her lips felt chapped.
"Almost five thirty."
"FIVE THIRTY?!?" Zoey jumped up and made a run for the bathroom, stubbing her toe on the coffee table in the process. She hopped down the hall, making random grabs at her pulsating foot with one hand and ripping the film out of her mouth with the other. There was no time to check for blood or broken bones. She'd kept the teeth-whitening strips in her mouth for nearly four hours.
She didn't need to turn on the light in the bathroom to get a good look, but Zoey did it anyway. With her mouth still tightly shut, she stood in front of the mirror and took a deep breath. She gave her reflection a shaky smile.
Zoey had often thought she showed too much of her gums when she smiled. That problem had been solved. Zoey's teeth didn't look all that much different. Her gums, however, were bleached completely white. From where her teeth met the gum line all the way to where it attached to her lips. It was impossible to tell where her teeth ended and her gums began, making her mouth look like it was all teeth. Even her tongue had spots of discoloration.
Zoey took big handfuls of water and repeatedly rinsed her mouth out. It lessened the icky taste in her mouth but did nothing to weaken the brightness of all that white. She tried to brush her teeth, but the mistreated gums were sensitive, and she was afraid they would bleed. She was already envisioning the gums sloughing off and leaving her with nothing but exposed bone.
She tried to talk herself down. It was going to be dark. She would adjust her smile a bit. She tried a few subdued, controlled grins in the mirror. The ones that didn't look faked and pained resembled lecherous grins. Maybe every time someone said something witty, she could put her glass up to her mouth and take a drink. Suddenly heavy drinking sounded like a good idea.
"You okay in there?" Ruth gave a quick knock.
"Fine," Zoey sang. After all the arguing, the last thing she needed was her sister suspecting she was going to any special lengths for going out tonight. It was bad enough she suspected Zoey was harboring secret feelings for Tristan. She closed her mouth and opened the door.
"You took off like a bat out of hell there." Ruth leaned against the doorway and crossed her arms. "Is your toe all right?"
"Yeah." Zoey gave a quick glance to the slight bruise that was starting to form at the tip of her pinky toe. She put the toilet lid down, set the foot with the injured toe on top of it, and bent down to examine it, moving it around so she'd appear to be checking if it was broken. It was the perfect excuse to keep her sister from getting a look into her mouth. "I guess no dancing for me tonight. I told Tristan I would meet him at his place around seven."
But Ruth wasn't paying Zoey much mind. In fact, it looked like she had stopped listening. Her attention was focused on the box of tooth-whitening strips that Zoey had left on the counter. She was studying it, with a perplexed look on her face. Then Ruth shrugged and plucked the box off the counter, then tossed it in the trash.
"I meant to throw these out. There is something wrong with them. They didn't do a damn thing for my teeth."
Zoey didn't know whether she wanted to laugh, cry, or scream but she refrained from making a choice because all of them would involve opening her mouth.
# Chapter 9
Zoey decided to wear one of the two dresses she'd brought with her when she fled Ohio. It was nothing like Ruth's cocktail dress, black, form fitting, thigh high, and complete with the dreaded bared arms and matching four-inch heels. Zoey's was a more reserved royal blue with three-quarter sleeves and a flared skirt that fell just above her knees. She accessorized with black tights, ballet flats, and a half sweater jacket. She had much bigger things to worry about, namely her blinding white gums. Zoey blow-dried her hair and left it down, applied a little blush, shadow, mascara, and lip gloss, then made for the door. Not wanting to break a sweat from either exertion or anxiety, she left, telling Ruth they would meet up with her at the bar, and skipped the walking, taking a cab uptown. The entire ride she practiced ways she could be sparkly and talkative without having to fully open her mouth.
She forgot about her dilemma entirely when Tristan answered the door upon her arrival. It's easy to keep your teeth covered when your mouth drops open.
He was wearing his skinny jeans, with a button-down white-and-black-striped shirt and a gray two-button slim-fit jacket with lapels. A jacket she didn't remember from their trip to Barneys. He must have taken the initiative and ventured out on his own. He had used the pomade, but she still detected the scent of Old Spice, so he hadn't gone hog wild. Ruth was going to lose her mind when she got a gander, and that was problematic, for a multitude of reasons.
"Wow." Zoey nodded approvingly. "You do clean up nice."
"Lady, you are on fleet!" Tristan said in appreciation, stepping back for her to enter.
"Thank you. I think."
"Maybe that's not it." He shook his head before trying again. "You are on FREAK!"
"I'm not sure what you're trying to tell me."
"That you look perfect," he replied before pausing, then saying softly, "Beautiful. In every way."
He was so open. Honest. It was so refreshing not to have to fend off all the machismo, the posturing. Zoey resisted the urge to wrap her arms around his neck and go in with both lips. Although _on fleet_ may have applied last Memorial Day weekend, she mused, when Ruth had more sailors floating through their apartment than the USS _Independence._ "I think the word you are looking for is _fleek._ You are on fleek."
And he was.
"On fleek?" Tristan repeated, adding a chuckle. "I think I'm going to have to start paying more attention. But either way, you are it."
Zoey felt her cheeks start to heat up under his gaze. "Thanks. And don't worry, you shouldn't be talking like that anyway, unless you just graduated from high school."
When she got to the living room, another surprise was waiting for her. Mounted above the fireplace was a seventy-inch television. To her horror, it was on the E! channel, where the programming was almost exclusively about the rich, beautiful, and famous.
"I see you got a new toy."
"I did. Did you know this thing has over three hundred channels? Mind boggling."
"Have you christened it with an extensive channel surf?"
"I'm ashamed to say it's been on for days and I can't tear myself away."
"Watch anything good?" she said, covertly trying to see how much damage control was going to be needed.
He scrunched up his face in thought. "Hmmm. Well, apparently housewives exist all over the country and they spend all their time together, even though it's clear they despise each other. There are people who weigh over six hundred pounds and I guess there is only one doctor in Texas that wants to help them, and he does it by removing part of their stomachs. I found out there are people who are called hoarders that have so much nasty stuff in their homes they can't move around. I like how people come to the rescue and help them, but I'm still worried for them. Oh, and there's a crazy lady who owns a dance school for young girls who spends most of her time being mean to them and screaming. And the mothers tolerate it!"
"Look, those are called reality shows, but there is nothing real about them. Those shows are mostly staged. They have directors and producers and make sure that no matter how much film footage they take of the people, they only broadcast the parts that are outrageous. Do yourself a favor and stick to game shows or comedies."
"There was one other thing I noticed. People on this channel right here? They go to see plastic surgeons a lot. Don't like your face? Change it. Breasts or backside too big or too small, go under the knife and wake up with your heart's desire. Apparently, there is no ugly, there's only poor. Tragic really, since most of them look just fine. Nobody seems as concerned with being a good person."
He sounded sad. Zoey wondered if she had done the right thing, trying to break him out of his media blackout. It was starting to feel like she was the one in need of a makeover.
"That's enough of that," Tristan said, grabbing the remote on the mantel and turning the television off, bringing them both back to the moment.
"What do you feel like having for dinner? There are some great restaurants in Chelsea near where Ruth is meeting us later. We have plenty of time." Zoey rolled her eyes. "The club doesn't open till eleven."
Tristan's reaction was nothing short of glee. "We may stay out all night! Very exciting."
Zoey smiled at his delight. She just couldn't help it. His enthusiasm was infectious.
Tristan's smile instantly faded. "Do you feel all right?"
She gave him a bemused look and then remembered. "I'm fine. I fell asleep with these strips that make your teeth whiter in my mouth. I ended up bleaching my gums."
He didn't laugh. "Your teeth are already white. And you can barely notice it. I'm just captivated by your smile. It lit up my whole apartment the first time I met you."
Zoey had heard about how happy people only see the good in others, and Tristan was living proof. Then she smelled it, dumbfounded that she hadn't noticed before. The faint smell of onions and garlic and . . . was that thyme? She actually lifted her nose in the air to see if she could decipher any other spices.
"I can see you answered your own question about dinner this evening," Tristan said with a grin. "I haven't completely lost my roots. Tonight, I want to show off some of the first things I learned to cook from the islands."
They went into the dining room, and it almost took her breath away. The table once again was beautifully set. The floral arrangement was new, a huge glorious bouquet, not of romantic roses, but tulips and sunflowers, purple asters and daisies. It was placed directly in between and above the two place settings at one end of the table. In another life, she might have swooned.
"Sit," he said, pulling out her chair. "It's all ready and in the warming tray."
He dashed off, returning with two bowls and setting one in front of her then taking his own seat.
"This is callaloo soup, although I used spinach. I got the idea a little too spur of the moment and had spinach left over from the other day." Tristan stopped when she raised an eyebrow. "Yes, I used week-old spinach, but it's a soup, for crying out loud."
"Didn't seem to affect it," Zoey said after taking a spoonful. "This is delicious."
He brought out the main course and Zoey was blown away. "This is unreal!"
Tristan grinned with pride. "This is Fish and Okra Fungi. Normally, you would cook the fish in a saucepan, but I broiled it. The fish is fresh, but I didn't want to run the risk of stinking up my kitchen. And I love the smell of the cornmeal cooking, so, yeah, I'm selfish like that."
Then he took his napkin and tucked it into his shirt at the neck like a bib. Zoey laughed behind her napkin.
"If I drop something on these clothes, I'll kill myself. It took me all day to pick out this outfit."
He was onto something there. Zoey tucked her napkin into the neckline of her dress as well.
The fungi wasn't as spicy as Zoey thought it would be, but there was plenty of pepper and onion. The cornmeal had a marvelous texture, and Tristan proved his love of butter. Instead of her original plan to only pick at her food to keep from bloating, Zoey once again was cleaning her plate while their easy conversation flowed.
"Do you miss home?" Zoey asked.
"I used to." Tristan smiled at her from across the table. "I wanted to make a change, but I had no idea just how big a change New York was. Or just how well my grandparents had sheltered me. Lately, I don't miss it so much. I have you to thank for that."
"Wasn't there anyone else you trusted to show you the ropes?"
Tristan paused, put down his fork, and stared at her hard. It felt like he was looking through her, trying to see inside her. He placed his elbows on the table and made a steeple with pointer fingers over his mouth. It looked like he was praying for a sign on whether or not he should confess something.
"I've seen things, Zoey. I've seen things and I know things."
The words and the way he said them were gloomy, with a touch of chilling.
"The key to my success was also to my paranoia, I'm afraid," he continued. "It was all right in front of my face and I missed it. Once I made the discovery and realized I should've known better, I started to question my own ability. About everything."
"I'm trying to follow, but I don't get it." Zoey set down her fork. "Is this about your work?"
He paused again, then nodded. "It is. Sort of."
No help there. "Tristan, I don't want you to betray a confidence, but if you're worried about whether or not you can trust me, I promise you that you can."
"It's not so much about trust. It's more about not wanting to stick you in the same boat with me."
"I'm smart. And I'm strong. Try me."
He took a moment to measure his words. "The software I created enables the government to learn as much as they want to about its citizens with the touch of a button. Do you realize the implications of that? They can know where you are at any given time. Who you know. What you like and don't like. What scares you. I'm not saying that they use it for nefarious purposes, but it only takes one bad apple to make another person's life a living hell. The thought of that crushes me."
"If it wasn't you inventing the program, it would've been someone else."
"Still, it's an invasion of privacy. Even more frightening is the number of people who found out and have approached me to create something similar for them. I became the go-to guy without saying a word. I decided to hide in plain sight, stay away from social media and the online world. I only use my computer to order my clothes and my groceries." Tristan gave her a little wink. "Or at least I used to."
"Sounds like your world got awfully big really fast. That's enough to overwhelm anyone. And paranoia is like an open wound—if you don't do something to treat it, it's bound to fester. I let my mind run away with me too, sometimes, but the solution is to go out into the world and live your life. The way you want to live it. In another ten years, everyone will know everything about another person with the touch of a button anyway."
Tristan threw back his head and laughed. "I knew you would understand. The more time I spend with you, the more I realize I—what's the phrase—can't fight city hall? And I don't think I want to anymore. At least not tonight."
"Speaking of tonight, what are your goals, Tristan?" Zoey knew she didn't have to ask him about the random hookup scenario or getting blitzed off his rocker, but she also wanted to be sure exactly what her role was supposed to be.
"I don't know," he responded, some of his shyness returning. He got up to clear the plates and she picked up her own before he could stop her. Together they took them back to the kitchen. "Maybe meet someone who wants to dance?"
# Chapter 10
_I could really get used to this_ , Zoey thought on the quiet ride back across town in the back of a cushy Mercedes.
There were so many amazing things about New York City, and one of them was how alive it became the later it got. Back in Ohio, the sidewalks were empty well before midnight. The "nightclub" that Derek worked in was little more than a bar with a dance floor and a house DJ on Saturday nights. It closed at 1:00 a.m. and the parking lot was a ghost town by two. In Manhattan, the streets were just beginning to buzz with nightlife at midnight, especially on Saturday nights. Zoey wondered if it would have been better to start with something less manic, like a Broadway show?
She should have known by now that Tristan Malloy was full of surprises.
Their destination was a nightclub called Marquee, on Tenth Avenue. It was a hot spot that Zoey was familiar with only from Ruth's frequent chatter. It was a place that Zoey feared Ruth had chosen not for Tristan's comfort, but to show off. When the car pulled up in front of the building, the line outside was already long. The bouncers standing guard at the door were looking straight ahead. Clearly nobody would be flirting their way in tonight. Zoey hoped all of Ruth's bragging was not her sister just blowing smoke or they'd be looking for another venue ASAP.
"You ready?" she asked Tristan as he reached for her hand to help her out of the car.
"Let's do this thing," he replied.
"Before we head to the back of the line, let me call my sister. She's probably already in there." Zoey pulled out her phone from her tiny handbag, then heard her name being called.
"Zoe!"
They turned around to find Ruth and her girlfriends, in fabulous faux furs and stiletto heels. They were standing in the middle of the line with the rest of the crowd. Great.
Ruth was clearly miffed, which seemed appropriate, because so was Zoey.
"What is this?" Zoey asked as she approached the velvet rope that separated them, careful not to appear like she was going to cut in line, not that it mattered. The line wasn't moving, and the only activity was from people walking past them with the smug looks of VIPs. It looked like everyone standing outside was going to be waiting a long time. "I thought you had an in here?"
"There's some big party going on," Ruth told her defensively, her fingers tapping wildly on her phone.
"I tried calling for tickets when we got here, and they were all sold out," Ruth's friend Abbie chimed in. Her voice would best be described as half excuse, half complaint.
"Who is she texting with?" Zoey jerked a thumb in her sister's direction.
"Blake. He's part of the bachelor party going on in there, taking up all the space."
"I only chose this place because he said it would be fun," Ruth grumbled at her screen. "Sure, fun for him, he got in."
Blake Burton was an attorney in the legal department where Ruth and the girls worked. Recently divorced and in his early thirties, he was determined to get back into the swing and had spent the last six months saying yes to any sort of group activity. It started with lunch, and soon he was invited every weekend to join in whatever they were doing. Sometimes he brought friends, but he was no dummy—why share the company of the four or more girls? He also came in handy when one of the ladies needed to brush off unwanted attention in a hurry—he was always happy to pose as someone's boyfriend.
"This may be a blessing in disguise," Zoey said with a returning optimism as she looked down the never-ending line of increasingly anxious partyers. This place might be a little much for Tristan on his first clubbing adventure. "Why don't we take the party someplace a little more—"
"Zoey!" She heard her name being called. When she turned toward the direction of the sound, she found Tristan not only standing near the front door, but also waving them over.
Zoey and Tristan waited at the door while Ruth and her friends weaved their way through the mass of people on their side of the velvet rope.
"What did you just do here?" It was a question that didn't need asking, but she wanted the verification. The mere fact that he was able to engage the stoic doormen in dialogue could only mean one thing.
He gave her a sly grin. "Money talks."
"How much exactly did you slip these guys?"
"Now that's just impolite," he told her with a newly confident and adorable wink. Then he turned his attention to Ruth and her friends, who had caught up. "Good evening, ladies. I'm Tristan."
Zoey watched with mounting irritation as Ruth and the girls openly looked Tristan up and down and greeted him with coy smiles.
Not only were they let into the club, but someone was waiting to lead them over to a single booth on the first floor, right near the bar but not below the DJ setup or too close to the dance floor. It was a prime location in a club that was rapidly becoming packed to the rafters.
"I call bullshit." Ruth got up close to Zoey's ear to be heard above the noise as she walked closely behind her after they checked their coats, except for Tristan, who didn't want to break up his ensemble. "This dude is way too smooth."
While Zoey would've liked nothing better than to scream back in Ruth's face, she settled for a careless backward wave of her hand and a shake of her head as she kept one eye on Tristan's back and the other on the people who were mingling and dancing. The whole bar was thumping with the LED lighting flashing to the music. She was no longer worried about Tristan having a panic attack as much as she was about all of them having epileptic seizures. Now she knew why her sister often never heard a word Zoey said to her the day after clubbing.
Waiting at the table was a server, with a bottle of Dom Pérignon chilling in a bucket next to the table. Zoey watched Tristan move in close to the ear of the server, who bobbed her head repeatedly as her smile grew wider. Then she popped the cork on the bottle and filled the glasses before leaving. Tristan placed a glass in each of the girls' hands before raising his own in a wordless toast. Above the din, Zoey could hear them all shout "Cheers!" except for Abbie, who said " _L'chaim!_ " and Erin, who shouted " _Salud!_ "
Then Ruth ordered them all shots of Belvedere and, with the help of her friends, pulled Tristan to the dance floor, leaving Zoey behind to fume at the table alone.
She craned her neck to watch them all form a tight circle around Tristan, shaking their booties to the pulsing beat that reverberated against her eardrums. From the glimpses that she was able to catch of him, he looked like he was having the time of his life, completely in his element, not like someone who was trying something for the first time. Simmer was ratcheted up to seething. But she had no vested interest in him, Zoey reminded herself. And jealousy had never been her bag.
The server dropped off the shots and Zoey's gaze traveled over the five tiny glasses lined up in front of her and she briefly deliberated whether drinking them all would make her feel better or worse.
To his credit, Tristan was still too reserved to cut loose the way she had seen him do in the privacy of his own home. But he was able to find the bass line with ease, and Zoey's eyes became glued to him.
"Didn't anyone ever tell you that pretty girls aren't supposed to drink alone?"
Zoey looked up at the faint sound of the voice. It was a man, and a handsome one at that. And young, possibly a year or two out of college. He was sporting one of those expensive tattered sweaters. He also had a close-cut beard that outlined his jaw, and a small mustache to match.
He took a seat without being invited, forcing Zoey to slide over to accommodate him. And she did, thinking, _Why not?_ It was better than being the matron table monitor.
"I'm not alone. I'm on roofie patrol, watching the drinks," she said, pushing one of the shots in front of him. "Go ahead and make my job easier."
"Join me!"
All the yelling to be heard over the music was giving her a headache. She held up her champagne glass to appease him. She watched him down the shot and give the little head shake that often accompanies the action. The music had switched up and she watched as the rest of her party started returning to the table. She felt a surge of satisfaction when she saw Tristan's smile become tight and guarded as he made his approach.
"Everything okay here, Zoey?" She lip-read him perfectly.
She gave a bright smile and said, "It's fine," not caring if he could hear her. Ruth's friends were already squeezing in beside him and yelling their introductions, with Ruth leaning over the table to make hers, treating college boy to a healthy shot of cleavage. Zoey slid over to the far end of the booth, grateful that this was one of those problems that was going to take care of itself.
Tristan sat down next to her before she could leave the booth entirely. The girls tried to hand him his shot, but he waved it off with a point to the other man, who happily drank that one as well. The music switched again, had slowed down. For the first time since they arrived Zoey didn't have to scream her own thoughts to hear herself think. Then she felt a faint brush of fingertips down her forearm. The kind of touch that set her skin to tingle.
"Dance with me," he said as he stood back up and held out his hand. It was the first time he hadn't asked for her permission on something. It was more of a gentle command. She took it and let him lead her to the dance floor. The last time Zoey had done any dancing was at her wedding. She didn't care. He found them some space, gave her a twirl, and when he stopped, they were face-to-face.
And they danced. They began to move with the music. Zoey was clumsy at first, feeling like she was dancing in cement shoes. She closed her eyes to try and block everything out and find the rhythm. When she found the beat and reopened them, his stare was still fixed on her, intense and overwhelming. She looked down at her feet.
Tristan moved in close for a moment to bring his mouth to her ear. "Relax, girlfriend, we're doing fine."
Zoey looked back up and this time was able to recognize the elation in his eyes. It was like he had given her an engraved invitation to cut loose. She accepted.
They swayed and grooved in unison, their gazes now locked on each other. They didn't touch, didn't bump or grind. But it was sensual, oh, so sensual, and Zoey felt all the other dancers fade off into the background until it was the two of them alone on the dance floor. His arms didn't freakishly flail. His feet didn't look like he was stomping grapes. All the energy and motion generated from his hips. Music was putting him at ease, and Zoey was eager to follow him there. It ended much too soon. When the song was over and the spell was broken, he extended an arm for her to walk ahead of him back to the table, and she did so on legs that threatened to wobble.
Tristan had danced himself into a sweat and abandoned his jacket, tossing it into the booth. Zoey noted that his shirt had a strategic amount of shirttail not tucked into his pants. She found it unlikely that he came upon the carelessly casual look by accident.
Zoey sat back down and fanned her face, blaming her glistening forehead on the excursion on the dance floor. Ruth and her friends were well into the festivities and there was little room left at the table. College guy had called over his wingman, and the table was littered with glasses as the server tried in vain to keep up with clearing the empties. Zoey didn't dare look directly at Tristan for fear he would be able to read her thoughts, but she could feel him watching her. She reached for a random champagne glass she hoped was hers and took a sip, peering at him momentarily from above the rim. Tristan's attention was diverted when Abbie grabbed his arm and dragged him back to the dance floor. He continued to dance with anyone who asked, and Zoey went back to watching. This time though she no longer felt any unexplained animosity as she did so. It turned out his full attention was more than she could handle. A strange role reversal, worrying about herself instead of him.
Ruth continued to dance the night away, alternating between Tristan, college guy, wingman, and several of Blake's fellow bachelor partyers, who had joined Blake when he made his way down from the party on the second floor of the club upon spotting her.
"Come on." Ruth literally tried to pull Blake onto the dance floor to no avail. "Loosen up that tie and let's get this party started."
Blake didn't budge from where he was standing. With a slight shake of his head and a knowing look, he took a sip from the bottle of beer he was holding.
"Don't worry, sexy lady, I got my boogie shoes on." One of Blake's friends, who'd been introduced as Randy, got between them. "Let's show the man what he's missing."
Ruth blew Blake a little kiss and grabbed Randy's hand. He lifted his arm, gave Ruth a twirl, and they went off to the dance floor.
Zoey liked Blake well enough, even if he was, at times, too serious. The girls often teased him about his RBF—Resting Brood Face. He was an odd addition to Ruth's circle of zaniness. Zoey had never seen him out of a suit and tie, no matter the weather, and tonight was no exception. He was the observe-and-analyze type, with iron self-control. The same could not be said for his friends. They were older and boisterous, openly evaluating the women in the bar, blatantly looking them up and down, going so far as to point out their attributes and flaws. Unsurprisingly, all their ring fingers were bare. Zoey wondered if they had slipped off the wedding rings to get a little side action. Ruth wasn't particular about who joined the party. Once again, Zoey's sister was holding court.
"Nice to see you, Zoey," Blake said when the music died down. She got up from where she was sitting to join him. "It's been a while since you've come out on a Saturday night."
"About as long as it's been since you've seen a dance floor?" she teased. She didn't want to tell the tale of Tristan. The way Tristan was acting, dancing, smiling, and carrying on, no one would believe he was a shy computer nerd.
"A crowded dance floor is no place for a guy with two left feet," he replied with his own brand of humor. "Not with everyone having a cell phone set to record."
His excuse was a valid one. Zoey had seen Blake dance before, in the early days when he was eager to fit in, and he was not in Tristan's league.
At precisely one forty-five, Tristan began to make his good nights and good-byes. Through the chorus of urging him to stay, he merely smiled and politely declined. He told Ruth and her friends to enjoy the rest of the night—the tab was already taken care of. He turned to Zoey and asked, "Are you ready to go?"
He could've ended the question with anything. Get a tattoo, have something to eat, jump off the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, her answer would be the same. She would go with him anywhere. With a nod of her head and a wave to the table, she picked up her handbag, and together they made for the exit.
The cold air when they took their first step out the front door was welcome and invigorating. Wall-to-wall people working up a sweat made for the kind of stifling heat that the air-conditioning couldn't keep up with. Zoey noticed there was still a line of people waiting to get inside. She leaned her head back and took a deep inhale.
"The car is supposed to be here at two," Tristan said with a glance at the row of cars in front of the building. "We may be a few minutes early."
"Enjoy the rest of your weekend, kids."
Zoey turned around to the voice behind her and saw Blake approaching them. She was surprised. He had followed them out.
"You're leaving already?" Zoey asked. "The night is still young in there."
"I've been on and off a party bus since three o'clock this afternoon. It may be selfish, but I wanted to make my getaway before the puking started. Scraping the groom off the floor is the best man's job. I'm not even in the wedding party."
"Can we give you a lift?" Tristan offered. "I have a car coming."
"No thanks," Blake said. "I'm not going that far."
They watched Blake's back as he walked off into the shadows.
"You looked like you had fun tonight," she said to Tristan, still refraining from looking at him straight on or for too long.
"I did!" was his cheerful response. Then he turned deadly serious. "Now I have to ask you. Abbie told me to look her up on Tinder after I got rid of you. She said something about 'totally swiping me right.' Do you have any idea what she's talking about?"
Zoey had no desire to hold a grudge against Abbie. By all rights, Tristan was fair game. She had less of a desire to explain the ins and outs of Tinder to him. And while she had no problem being magnanimous, she wasn't batshit crazy.
"It means she's a free Veronica."
"Oh." His eyebrows arched in alarm. "I don't want any part of that."
"I didn't think so."
"Your sister is completely different from you."
A bubble of laughter escaped. "She certainly is her own woman. Derek calls her Ruthless."
With one sentence, Zoey had managed to ruin the night herself. Without thinking, she had brought up her husband. She was able to refrain from literally slamming her palm into her forehead, but mentally she gave herself quite a whack.
Tristan looked back at the bar and made a face. His concern returned. "Those guys were moving in pretty close to your sister. Do you think we did the right thing leaving her?"
"I have always been worried about Ruth and her shenanigans. But she always lands on her feet. You should be way more concerned that she's going to use your generosity to buy drinks for the entire bar."
"They don't have my credit card. If she can manage to spend all the cash I gave them, more power to her. But some of those guys she was dancing with looked creepy. The way one of them was staring at her backside made me want to punch him square in the nose."
Zoey laughed again, a little relieved. Tristan had been too preoccupied with chivalrous distraction to pick up on her slip of bringing up Derek. "You would've only robbed her of the pleasure of clobbering him herself. That is one woman who has no problem making it known she can take on all opponents. She once stabbed a guy with her car key. He needed seven stitches and still asked her out again."
The car pulled up, ending the conversation. And though she was loath to say the words, Zoey gave the driver her address to drop her off first, since her apartment was closer. This time, instead of looking out at the city during the silent drive, she snuck peeks at Tristan's profile as he watched the scenery through the windshield. His head was slightly swaying to the music the driver was playing. A delighted grin tugged at Tristan's lips, the evidence he had indeed enjoyed himself. He started to turn toward Zoey and she snapped her head forward just in time to keep from being caught watching him.
"I had a wonderful time tonight," he said softly. "I couldn't have done this without you. Thanks, Zoey."
She should've been proud, even if he was exaggerating. He didn't look like it took too much effort to get him relaxed. She had done what she set out to do, help him conquer another hurdle in his wish to really appreciate all the best things in life. But the only thought that was drumming in her head was that another magical night was over. Another night with a perfect gentleman. A needle in a haystack. A needle she unfortunately had found a little too late.
In too short a ride, the car pulled up in front of her building. Tristan stopped the driver from getting out to open her door and asked him to wait. He got out and ran around to her side to do it himself and walked her to the door.
"I'd like to walk you to your apartment," he said in a tone that brooked no argument. "Just in case some vagrant is hanging around the halls."
They got to the door of her apartment, and it was an awkward moment. The kind of moment that, if they weren't on different paths that somehow collided, would end in a kiss. She looked at his lips, watching them move.
"Thanks again, Zoey. Have a good night."
Unable to stop herself, she reached out her arms and wrapped them around his neck, giving him a tight squeeze. "You're welcome, Tristan. Good night."
At first his arms remained stiffly at his sides, but she couldn't bring herself to pull back and away. Then she felt first his arm then his hands draw lightly over her hips to settle around her waist as he awkwardly hugged her back.
# Chapter 11
The last time Zoey was so restless was before she'd left Ohio for New York. She tossed and turned for hours in bed as the entire evening rewound in her memory. From the intimate discussion over the dinner Tristan had cooked for her, to the open looks of hunger from other women in the club, to his smoldering eyes on the dance floor and the hug he was too considerate to rebuff. She had only wanted to help him. Now she wished they could just hook up and get it out of the way. Break the tension so she could go back to grinding away at work instead of checking her phone a hundred times a day, in the hopes that he'd texted. The single silver lining of the night was that she couldn't recall having smiled once. There were sultry looks and pouting, but her secret neon gums were effectively concealed from Ruth and her crowd.
As soon as Zoey was done admonishing herself, a little voice inside her head would speak up. It would tell her how in just a few months, if all went according to plan, she'd be divorced. But then her logical side would counter that Tristan had never actually expressed an interest in her. There was no way of knowing where he stood without flat out asking him. When she got to questioning whether it would be worth the risk of ruining the friendship, the debate would start all over again.
It felt like she had just fallen asleep when Ruth shook her awake.
She didn't need to ask Ruth if she was just getting in. Ruth usually stayed out all night on Saturday, sometimes bringing the party back home. Letting Zoey have the bedroom on the weekends was mutually beneficial. Ruth was still wearing the same clothes, but her silky hair was now flat, her makeup all but gone, and her smoky eyeliner looked smeared. Her voice sounded giddy and a little buzzed. Ruth was always able to hold her liquor without stumbling. She had likely danced most of it off.
"What are you doing home?" Ruth asked.
Zoey sat up in bed and rubbed her face. "Where am I supposed to be?"
"I figured you went home with Mr. Good-boy." Ruth gave a smug snort. "I told Abbie he was never going to get in touch."
Zoey's jaw tightened with the reminder of Abbie's invitation for Tristan to join her on Tinder. After last night, all her good will toward other women had come to a screeching halt.
"I told you he wasn't that kind of guy," she said irritably.
"Yeah," Ruth continued to scoff. "You also told me he was a nerd and looked like a baby duck. That was a boldface lie. That man is scrumptious."
"He's not for you." Zoey issued the warning.
"Of course he's not!" This time Ruth added a laugh. "He's way too square and noble for me. I'm more the bad-boy-aching-to-be-tamed type."
"What's the matter, none of those available last night?" Zoey wanted to talk about Tristan. Ask if Ruth noticed him staring at her with longing or displaying some sudden outburst of jealousy. Anything to suggest that he was harboring feelings for her. But Zoey knew her sister. Ruth was all about Ruth. If it didn't concern her, or you didn't specifically send out an SOS, it didn't hold her interest.
"It was an off night." Ruth yawned and kicked off her shoes. Zoey lay back down and Ruth curled up beside her, just as she had when they were kids. "Once Blake left, his bachelor party friends all became animals. One of them grabbed a handful of my ass near the end of the night. I kneed him in the nuts before the bouncers tossed him out. They didn't show me the door, since I was the offended party, but they did make it clear it was time for us to call it a night. We all went out for breakfast. I think Erin and Abbie took those young guys home."
Zoey giggled. Nothing sends a message that this girl isn't worth it quite like watching a fellow comrade falling to his knees with his hands covering his groin. For all her faults, Ruth was true to her own code of conduct. Look all you want, but don't touch her unless invited. Thank goodness they had already left. Tristan might've thought he'd landed on a reality show.
"It was nice of Tristan to pick up the tab," Ruth murmured drowsily. "Please thank him for us. Did you have fun?"
Before Zoey could make up her mind how best to answer, she heard Ruth's breathing change to deep and nasal. In typical Ruth fashion, she had fallen asleep before Zoey could respond. She should've known the question was rhetorical, Zoey mused, closing her eyes again as well.
* * *
The next time Zoey woke up, it was four hours later and she was still tired. She eased herself out of bed, careful not to disturb Ruth, threw on some clothes, and went down to the corner. Sundays when she didn't have a job were spent with coffee and bagels from the local café followed by being lazy and binge-watching Netflix or playing on iPads. If Ruth was feeling up to snuff, they might have dinner at one of the hundred restaurants within walking distance. If Ruth was feeling wrecked, they called for takeout.
Zoey's body may have gotten the lazy message, but her mind was having no part of it. It swirled in a storm of indecision. It was the same sort of pattern that she had adopted when things got rough with Derek, when she went to bed every night with a lump in her throat and a twist in her gut. She didn't like it, and she was the only one who could make it stop. It was time to start making her own needs paramount again. The problem with her line of thinking was, she wasn't sure what her needs were anymore.
She had accomplished breaking Tristan out of his shell. He didn't have a disability and he wasn't a child that needed to be babysat. She didn't need to hold his hand through every step of his journey. The only flaw in that logic was that she very much wanted to hold his hand. And kiss his full, sometimes pouty lips. And rip off all the fancy new clothes she helped him acquire. She could also call Derek and tell him that she was sorry, but she didn't want to wait the extra time and she had decided to act now. If she was thinking about another man, the marriage was surely over regardless. But going back on her word left her with a rotten taste in her mouth. And a two-month chaste courtship would be right up Tristan's alley anyway.
Ruth dragged herself out of bed around noon. She came down the hall on autopilot, microwaved her cold coffee, and covered a bagel with cream cheese, making intermittent groans. She collapsed on the futon, next to Zoey.
"I need to talk to you," Zoey tentatively began. "About Tristan."
"I knew it!" Ruth's sluggishness evaporated and she perked right up. Apparently Zoey's crisis of confidence was better than a cup of coffee. "Did you let him down easy?"
"Wait. What are you talking about?"
"What are you talking about? You did tell him about Derek, right?"
Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. In her jumbled state, Zoey had forgotten Ruth's fondness for Derek.
"I'm the one who has feelings for Tristan. Not the other way around. I can't tell if he finds me desirable, and I'm scared to tell him."
"But you did tell him that you're married?" Ruth repeated.
"Yes, not long after we met. It's the main reason I'm in this quandary now. You and Derek talking me into this stupid agreement. Tristan is too proper to make any sort of move with me while I'm still attached to someone else. But if I wait, I'm going to miss my chance. And if I'm wrong altogether, I'm setting myself up for heartbreak."
Ruth chewed her bagel and Zoey waited with growing impatience for her to weigh in.
"I think the first thing you should do is wait for him to make contact. Do _not_ contact him, for any reason. He's not the kind to play hard to get, so if he's interested, he'll reach out sooner rather than later."
Zoey picked up the other half of her sister's bagel and took a bite, more out of nervous habit than hunger. This idea already stunk. Before last night, she didn't have to worry about him getting in touch. In fact, he texted so often, he was on the border of becoming a nuisance. After last night, it all felt different. Everything had changed. "And if he never makes contact?"
Ruth gave an uncharacteristically sympathetic shake of her head. "Then you have your answer, even if it's one you don't like."
Zoey began to grimace. "And if he does reach out?"
"If he texts, it's easy. Be cordial, friendly, stick with your usual banter. The idea here is to keep both of you from coming up against that wall until the year is over. You don't want to burn either bridge until you're sure. If you go back to Derek, none of it will matter, because you'll be on your way back to Cleveland."
Zoey didn't know how to express what her gut told her—the decision had already been made. She had fallen for Tristan. But right now, she needed her sister's help, not to get into a useless argument with her.
"And what if Tristan calls?"
Ruth gave that angle a tad more thought. "That's easy too. Just let it go to voice mail for a couple days. It'll buy you more time. Then, when you do pick up, if he's calling just to chat, you have to run. You're on your way to a job. You make it quick but cheery."
"What if he's calling me to do a job?"
"Only you can make the call about that one. That's business. And he has no problem opening his wallet. Turning him down would be cutting your nose off to spite your face. But then you have every reason to act professionally instead of chummy. See the pattern here? The key is getting him to make a move."
"I don't want to hurt him," Zoey said, hating every bit of what Ruth was telling her. Their friendship was based on honesty. All of this ducking and diving reeked of deceit.
"Zoe, there's a broken heart for every light on Broadway. He has money, he has looks, all the resources to help him get over it. He'll find another friend to fawn over him."
Suddenly Zoey regretted not telling Ruth the full story. About just how wholesome and uncorrupted he actually was. What a mess he was when she met him. That his only lover had been a call girl he was too naive to spot. Not that her sister would believe her after last night. Ruth would just accuse her of being oversensitive and sentimental.
"And if it turns out he feels the same way I do?"
"Hey, girl," Ruth said with a smile. "I can't dictate your life story for you. That one I'm staying out of. You are on your own there."
Ruth resumed eating her bagel and sipping her coffee. Zoey went back to daydreaming. Then Ruth spoke up again, with her final thoughts on the matter.
"I don't much see the point in all of this anyway. You know you're going to go back to Derek. You guys have been together since you were kids. You two are lifers."
Zoey hoped it was just coincidence that _lifers_ was the word for people stuck in prison forever.
# Chapter 12
Nobody expects an uninvited knock on their door on a Sunday evening. When Zoey looked through the peephole and saw two blue uniforms, she feared the worst. Someone was dead.
"Is this the residence of Ruth Dixon?" the older of the two asked, double-checking the name on the paper he was holding.
They didn't have guns drawn, but it also didn't look like a social call.
"I'm her," Ruth said, getting up from the couch. She didn't look like she expected them either.
"We have a warrant for your arrest, miss."
"A what?" Zoey and Ruth said in unison.
They didn't look like the cops you saw in the movies, all grizzled and by the book. These cops were more relaxed. Official-looking, but more like they were running an errand, not making an apprehension. The police handed over the piece of paper they had brought with them. Ruth scanned the document for the key words. It was easy to see when she got the gist by how pale she turned and her hands started to shake.
"I'm being arrested for assault. From that perv last night in the bar!"
"I don't think we have to cuff her," the younger cop said, and the older cop gave a single nod.
"I don't think you understand. He assaulted me first!" Ruth's pale face was replacing itself with a flush of anger. She handed over the warrant for Zoey to read.
"You can tell your side to the judge. We don't want to use the handcuffs on you, if you're willing to just come along with us. And you can make it easier for everyone if you leave all your valuables behind."
"The offense you're talking about is a misdemeanor. Aren't there actual crimes that you guys could be dealing with? You know, murders, muggers . . . ," Zoey tried to point out.
"We don't make the rules, miss, we enforce them. They consider assault a felony when the victim is a federal employee, in this case a judge. Rumor has it when he swore out the complaint, he was taking it personally. The bouncers in the bar weren't very gentle."
Only Ruth would try teaching a hands-off lesson to a judge.
"This is ridiculous," Zoey said, crumpling up the warrant when fisting her hand. She started to try and undo the damage by flattening it against the wall and hand ironing it. "A complete abuse of power."
"I don't know what I'm supposed to do here." Ruth looked down at her grungy Sunday sweatpants and black tank top, an attempt for normalcy as it started to sink in. "Can I change?"
The cops exchanged glances. The older one gave a half nod. "What you have on is perfect for jail. It's not going to be like a night at the Ritz. We'll let you grab another shirt. It gets cold. They probably won't uniform you up. It'll take most of the night to process you. You'll be arraigned first thing tomorrow morning. We'll wait right here. Just don't close the door."
"You do have the right to remain silent." The young cop started reciting her Miranda rights as Ruth took off down the hall.
Ruth went to get a sweatshirt while the cops waited inside the open doorway. Zoey followed closely behind into the bedroom.
"Oh, my God." Ruth started pulling shirts out of drawers in search of her most comfortable one. "I'm going to spend a night in jail."
"What do you want me to do?" Zoey said.
"I don't even know what I'm going to do. But if I get an inkling, I'll call you. I do get to make one phone call, right?"
"I feel like I'm supposed to come with you or something," Zoey fretted.
"Unless you're going to spend the night staging a protest outside, there's no point in that."
"Do you know any lawyers? Do you want me to call Blake?"
"I want you to call them all, but I get the feeling it's not going to do any good right now. I can't believe the nerve of this guy. Right now, my only regret is not kicking him harder."
"Ruth, now is not the time to go all balls to the wall. This is one of those situations where apologizing would go a long way. You can plot his demise after you get out and lawyer up."
"This is a nightmare," Ruth said, taking one last look at herself in the mirror as the reality hit her full force. She gave herself a quick finger comb.
"They're waiting," Zoey said quietly.
"There is something you can do," Ruth said, her voice shaky. "Call work for me in the morning? Tell them I'm sick, can't stop throwing up. That's not far from the truth."
The cops led Ruth down the small hall to the stairs and away. The apartment, despite the television still being on, now seemed eerily quiet. Zoey started to pace from room to room. She picked up and put down her phone half a dozen times, resisting the urge to call Tristan. She picked up her phone one last time, this time to place a call. To Derek.
"Hey, baby," he greeted her. "I was just thinking about you."
"They just hauled Ruth off to jail," she blurted. "I don't know what the hell I should be doing!"
Normally, his chuckling was aggravating. This time, it lent an air of feeling that everything was going to be all right. "Oh shit, Ruthless must've really messed up if she wasn't able to talk herself out of it."
Zoey told Derek the story of her night with Ruth and the handsy judge. She left out any mention of Tristan.
"I don't think this guy would want to take it all the way. A good defense attorney would make him look like a pervert, and that's rotten publicity whether it's true or not. Sounds like he's trying to prove a point."
"Like what? That he has great power at his disposal and he uses it to crush women who aren't interested in him?"
"That. Or maybe he doesn't appreciate a kick in the jewels. She'll probably get a fine, maybe some community service."
"Don't forget a criminal record!" Zoey said hotly. This was serious. Ruth was behind bars. "Dixons are a lot of things, but we aren't jailbirds!"
"You aren't a Dixon anymore." Derek, as usual, took the most inopportune moment to get back to his agenda. "You're a Sullivan. You should be grateful you aren't sitting in that cell with her."
"Derek, please don't make me regret reaching out to you."
"I'm sorry. I can't help it. But when you call me late on a Sunday night to tell me your sister just went to jail for losing her cool after a night of partying, I have to worry. You've been cleaning up after your sister's misadventures since we all were kids. You can't fix her and she doesn't want to be saved. I'm afraid you're going to get caught up in one of her messes."
So much of what he said was the truth. But Derek wasn't known for his timing. Zoey's response was silence followed by a long, drawn-out sigh. Before hanging up, Derek left her with one more attempt at comforting.
"Look, Ruth is going to be fine. She's going to spend a night in jail, something that in the long run might do her some good. There's nothing you can do for her between now and the morning, so get some sleep tonight and then just go pick her up."
* * *
After the second night in a row spent tossing and turning, Zoey had barely fallen asleep when she was awakened right after sunrise by another pounding on the front door. Luckily, this time when she looked through the peephole, she saw Ruth's eye up close, blinking back at her from the other side.
Zoey opened the door with a sigh of relief. Her sister didn't look too worse for wear, other than the dark circles under her eyes.
"That was harrowing," Ruth said while breezing in and flopping down on the futon.
"How did you get out so soon? They said last night you wouldn't be arraigned until this morning."
"It's all about who you know." After all she'd been through, Ruth still was able to appear haughty.
"I'm too tired to play guessing games or congratulate you on your network of friends. Just answer the question."
"I would've picked up coffee," Ruth continued, "but as you know, I left here without my wallet."
"We can make coffee. Are you still in trouble or what?"
"I probably could've gotten the guys at the bagel place to front me a couple of cups, but it'd be over my dead body that I'd let them see me dressed like this."
"RUTH!!" Zoey's already frayed nerves had reached their breaking point.
"Okay!" Ruth laughed. "I knew a couple of detectives at the station. They were just as surprised as I was, since not once did they ever tell me they were cops. Or maybe they did and I just forgot."
"Ruth," Zoey repeated, this time as a growl.
"Relax! While they were booking me, these guys intervened. I never saw the inside of a jail cell. They called and woke up a judge they knew, who didn't take kindly to having an already overextended justice system being burdened by the hurt feelings of an out-of-town traffic court judge. They couldn't get me out of the court date, but they were able to spring me on my own recognizance. And I scored a date for the fireworks on the Fourth of July, on a boat in the harbor, no less."
Sometimes Ruth's free spirit and the way she ranked her priorities were enough to make Zoey homicidal.
"So, this guy isn't even a judge for New York City?"
"He's not even a resident of the state. Lives and works in some sleepy little town in New Jersey. Allenhurst? Allenwood? Allentown?" Ruth gave a dismissive wave of her hand. "Something Allen, I forget."
No wonder Zoey was often tired. Ruth was exhausting. Why be bothered with retaining the pertinent information regarding the man who wanted to put you in jail when you can line up a date for something three months away?
"I did find out the judge's last name is Hollister. Randolph Hollister. Even his name sounds uptight."
What Zoey should've done was remind Ruth that she wasn't out of the woods yet, that this man was still gunning for her. But she settled on "What are you going to do now?"
Ruth stood up and took off her sweatshirt. "Right now, I'm going to go take a Silkwood shower. That police precinct was grungy as hell. Did you call work for me?"
Zoey shook her head, dumbfounded. "It's barely daylight. I was going to wait for HR to open."
"That's okay," Ruth said, heading for the hallway. "I'll call them myself. I need a day off. Why don't you get dressed and grab us some coffee? And breakfast. I'm starving."
Zoey watched her sister stroll out of the room, resisting the urge to jump out of her chair, run down the hall, and commit a sneak-up strangulation. Why was Ruth always able to adopt a laissez-faire attitude? An even better question was, how could Zoey become more like her?
After a shower and some clean clothes, Ruth returned to the living room. She curled up next to Zoey on the futon, laying her head on Zoey's shoulder. Ruth had been more rattled by the whole ordeal than she was letting on.
"Maybe you should call Blake?" Zoey suggested, breaking the silence.
"Maybe" was Ruth's response.
Why was Ruth hesitant?
"Chances are if Randolph Hollister was part of the bachelor party, Blake is going to get wind of the story anyway."
"Then I guess I won't need to call him," Ruth said with a yawn. "I'll be getting his advice whether I want it or not."
"Why don't you want to get Blake's advice? He has to have some tips."
Ruth gave a heavy sigh. "Because he would jump right in to try and save the day, usually with some well-meaning lecture at the end. About how if I would cut back on the partying and take myself seriously, I could really be going places. And he would refuse to take money, which would piss me off all the more."
If Zoey had half a brain, she would steal Ruth's phone and make the call herself. Currently she wasn't feeling strong enough to withstand Ruth's wrath for butting in. The mere way Ruth said "piss me off" was enough to make her cringe.
"Oh, the horror," Zoey said instead. "A nice, handsome guy that's actually a good friend and wants the best for you. I can see where that would cause a problem."
"Now you're getting it." Ruth laughed weakly. She paused, then added, "Blake is a great guy, but he's a doofus. He never dances. He drinks only bottled beer that he has to watch the bartender open 'cause he's worried someone will slip him a Mickey. And believe me when I tell you, he never puts that bottle down unless it's right in front of him."
Not drinking random liquids poured into glasses and left alone in crowded nightclubs didn't seem stupid to Zoey—it sounded downright logical.
"And those suits!" Ruth continued, having built up a full head of steam. "I mean seriously, who wears a damn suit to go to the movies? Or bowling?"
"Only you could take issue with a man who likes to wear a suit."
"Abbie and Erin swear this summer they are inviting him to the beach to see what he shows up in. His legs are probably all pasty white."
"Haven't all of you seen him without his suit? I mean, even you hooked up with him once."
"I have to admit; his birthday suit is fine," Ruth conceded before adding, "but the sex was so polite. 'Is touching you here all right? Are you sure about this?' I'm one step from coming all over the place and he's asking me if I'm having a good time. Maddening."
There was nothing left for Zoey to say. Blake had done exactly what every man is supposed to do. But Ruth would never understand that if she didn't already. What Blake apparently didn't understand was that if Ruth didn't like something, not only would he know it, but everyone for an entire city block would know it as well.
# Chapter 13
Zoey refused to sit on the sidelines and watch the crisis with Ruth play itself out. She looked up all the courts in New Jersey and the judges who presided over them until she found Randolph Hollister. While Ruth was at work the following day, Zoey took the train to New Jersey and a cab to the courthouse where Randolph Hollister was officiating over Tuesday's traffic court. She sat among the sea of scofflaws and lawyers waiting their turns to plead out on speeding tickets and running red lights. It was a huge line of the guilty and the presumed innocent. She waited, then stood with everyone else when the bailiff called the court to order.
Without the club lighting, the throbbing beats, and the frenzied dancing, the questionably Honorable Randolph Hollister cut quite the dashing figure, right down to the wedding ring he was now wearing. The robe made him look way more dignified than the goofy dude on the dance floor, trying to make the most of the two steps he knew. Before he was just another schlub in the club making moony eyes at her sister and laughing at his own pickup lines. When you take people out of their context, they appear differently, something Zoey realized she should've figured out by now. Lesson learned. Again.
Zoey wasn't sure how to approach him and what she'd say when and if she got the chance. She watched as he delivered the same monologue time after time, asking what their crime was and if they willingly entered their plea, and saying what the typical sentence was for each offense. Then he'd rattle off their fine and the court costs and it would be on to the next person.
He was empathetic in his dealings with the people who stood before him, even matter-of-fact in his delivery. He didn't go off on long tangents at the litigants. He waited as long as he could before he issued bench warrants for people who didn't show up to answer their summonses, calling out their names with a quick look around the room, before finally handing off the paperwork to his clerk.
Zoey knew he recognized her when during one of his scans of the courtroom, his gaze rested on her and he did a double take. Then he looked directly at her and his stare turned icy. The whole encounter took less than three seconds, but it was enough to make her blood run cold through her veins.
_This is a huge mistake_ , Zoey thought. She watched, glued to her seat near the back of the room, as the judge became less and less tolerant of the defendants that stood before him. Fines began increasing and sentences became stiffer, accompanied by stinging lectures about responsibility, and he barked orders of silence when people tried to explain themselves. All done with intermittent glares in her direction.
After one of those scowls, Judge Hollister motioned to the bailiff by crooking a finger. The bailiff bent his head toward the judge while covering the court microphone with his hand. They shared a muted exchange and they both looked at her. When the bailiff headed toward where she was sitting, Zoey's flight response kicked in. She jumped out of her seat and out the closest door.
She ran until her chest hurt when she tried to draw breath and the pain in her side was unbearable, her legs turning into cramp-filled logs. She slowed down to a hurried walk back to the train station.
Safely on the train back to the city, Zoey was unable to quell the shudders that continued to plague her. It would've been one thing if Randolph Hollister was nasty and abrupt to everyone, but until he caught sight of her, he seemed logical and compassionate. He knew he was no innocent victim when it came to what happened with Ruth. One look at her was all it took for him to have what she considered a public temper tantrum. And that made Zoey feel worse. Thanks to her efforts, all she managed to accomplish was doubling the fine for a guy with an expired insurance card and a woman receiving a ten-minute scolding about how she shouldn't be speeding with kids in the car.
* * *
"Of all the arrogant, pigheaded, sanctimonious . . . ," Ruth sputtered after Zoey reported the news.
At least she wasn't angry at Zoey for trying to approach him on her behalf. She waited patiently for Ruth to settle into a more obscenity-laced tirade. Ruth could swear better than the average sailor on shore leave.
"You know what?" Ruth threw her Lean Cuisine dinner into the microwave and slammed the door. "I had no idea that the bouncers face-planted him on the street, and if he wasn't such a first-rate ass clown I would almost feel sorry for him."
"What are you going to do?" Zoey asked.
Ruth watched her sesame chicken spin around in the microwave. Zoey could practically hear the wheels turning as Ruth considered her options. She turned back to Zoey with an evil smile.
"I'm not going to do anything."
"You're not going to show up to court?" Zoey was aghast.
"Oh, I'm going to show up to court all right. And I'm going to show up looking like the most innocent, proper damsel they ever saw."
"Don't you think your money would be better spent in hiring a lawyer instead?" Zoey longed to introduce Blake back into the conversation. If nothing else, he would give her good advice.
"I wasn't going to buy anything. I thought maybe I could borrow some of your clothes?"
If Zoey wasn't so apprehensive of where Ruth was going with this, the insult might have stung more. "I don't own anything like that. And we are not even remotely the same size. You mean you're going to go for the baggy matron look?"
Ruth briefly looked Zoey up and down. "You're right. Looks like I'm going shopping."
"You need to be shopping for an attorney."
"I'm not throwing away money to try and fight a rigged system," Ruth scoffed.
Zoey was nibbling on her cuticles—a bad habit that she thought she'd beaten years ago. "I think that's a bad idea."
"Which is why you're you and I'm me. I'm going to make this joker look like the worst kind of creeper."
The verdict was in. Ruth was going insane. She was going to go full throttle against someone Zoey had just explained was a first-class jerk. Explaining to his wife what happened to him that night must have been quite inconvenient for him. Randolph Hollister didn't seem like a man who would let go of a grudge. From all she had witnessed, she seriously had to question if he even had a moral code. Ruth was a force to be reckoned with, but he had a much better arsenal. Zoey knew where her loyalty had to lie, but it didn't mean she was at all comfortable with it.
After sending a text to Tristan asking if she could stop by and seeing his warm reception to her text, Zoey grabbed her purse and left, without another word.
# Chapter 14
Zoey made one stop before getting to Tristan's. When he answered the door, he was back in his goofy golf clothes, this time red plaid knickers that tucked into his white knee-high socks and a white polo shirt. Given the recent turn of events, they, and he, were a sight for sore eyes.
"I didn't want to miss you, so I was waiting to clean up until you got here," he said, reaching for the shopping bags she carried. "I was starting to think you had changed your mind."
"Not a chance," Zoey replied excitedly. "I just got an idea and made a pit stop. To thank you for the other night. Take those to the living room."
On the way over to his apartment, she had thought about telling him about Ruth's latest escapade, then decided against it. She was tired of Ruth. She needed a break from the stress of it. After remembering how Tristan released stress, she got an idea. Zoey made a small detour to the GameStop.
"Zoey," Tristan said, pulling the guitar out of the bag by its long neck. "I think your guitar is missing some strings. Like all of them."
"No, it's not." She laughed. "I remembered what you said about Sonic the Hedgehog. I figured it was time to get your gaming into the twenty-first century."
And if he was going to like it as much as she was thinking he would, it would curtail some of his television watching. She pulled the used gaming console out of the box, complete with cables already plugged in. "This is a PlayStation Three. Sorry I had to buy one used. The new ones are a little out of my budget. And if you hate it, then I can say I tried and not feel awful."
"I've heard of these," he said with fascination, still staring at the black plastic guitar with its colorful buttons on the neck and lever used to strum. "But all the commercials have them being used for games where you shoot people. Or steal cars while shooting people. Then you team up with other players and shoot people. They look too violent for me."
"Not all of them, my friend," she replied while pulling the final object out of the bag, a DVD case. "This game is called Guitar Hero. And don't worry, you can play it alone without being noticed by anybody else's system. There are a whole bunch of versions, but I picked out the one that is all Aerosmith."
"You didn't." They exchanged grins, remembering the night they met.
"Don't get too excited. I'm not sure 'Walk This Way' is on the playlist."
Their grins turned into full-blown smiles.
"Come on, techno guy, let's figure out how to plug this thing into your television and get to rocking."
Between the two of them, they were able to hook up the console without directions. When they were done, he picked up the guitar and held it out to her. "You want to do the honors?"
Zoey shook her head. "No way, this is your toy. But I'd be willing to pick the song."
Excited to get started, they skipped the tutorial. She chose "Sweet Emotion." "Now remember, the colored stars coincide with the colors on the frets. You push the colors and strum with that lever where the hole in a normal guitar would be."
Tristan flicked at the thin metal arm that extended out from the guitar. "What the heck does this thing do?"
"I think that's called a whammy bar. It's for when you want to riff like crazy. But one thing at a time, okay?" She pushed the button to start the game and raced to the couch for a front-row seat to his first concert.
"What am I supposed to do about all those people standing in front of the stage?" He pointed to the television as the music keyed up.
"They're your crowd, waiting for the show to start."
"Amazing."
And in his plaid golf knickers, he proceeded to butcher "Sweet Emotion." He started out well enough. When he blew that first chord, he winced like he'd been electrocuted. The virtual crowd let out a yell of discontent. Then it turned into pure torture to her ears. His fingers struggled to keep up as the stars moved faster across the television screen. Some of his sour notes created such a screech, Zoey waited for the glass in the windows to shatter. By the time the game labeled him a total failure and the crowd rained down their disapproval, the other players in his band throwing down their instruments to walk away in disgust, Zoey and Tristan were both laughing so hard, they were wiping away tears.
"That was awful!" He fell down onto the couch beside her.
"Cringe worthy," she agreed when she finally caught her breath, still clutching her sides.
"I think that audience called me a lot of things. Hero wasn't one of them."
"Yeah, they were a tough crowd. I think your bandmates stormed off to have a meeting and fire you."
Tristan refused to be daunted. Zoey kept picking songs and he kept trying to play them. Her attempts fared no better. Plus, it was much more fun to watch him. He was so engrossed, he never bothered to change out of his golf attire, which added to her overall enjoyment. Somewhere around midnight, they had a pizza delivered, another first for him.
"You know," he said sincerely, after tearing into his third slice of Ray's Works, "Guitar Hero and pizza may be the best things that ever happened to me. Next to you, that is."
She wished he wouldn't do that. Look at her that way, with the big wide eyes and disarming smile. Say things that were borderline what a lover would say, even though she knew he always spoke from the heart. Zoey concentrated on her pizza.
"Is it corny to say that's music to my ears?" she said.
"Maybe, but I don't think there's enough corny nowadays. It's a welcome reprieve from sarcastic."
They played until almost three in the morning before Tristan said, "I hope you don't have to work tomorrow."
"Luckily, I'm off till the weekend." For the first time since she started being her own boss, she wasn't completely overexcited with taking another step in her adventure. In the moment, with an old worn-out PlayStation, a pizza, and Tristan was where she wanted to be. It was a strange reversal; instead of getting him out in the world, staying cloistered in his little part of it was infinitely better.
"That doesn't mean I don't have to start heading home."
"You're welcome to stay here," he offered. "You can take my bed. I'll sleep on the couch."
Hospitality was what he was raised on. There was nothing untoward in his invitation. Spontaneous sleepovers were for the friends who didn't mind it when they saw you with bedhead or sheet lines on your face or film on your teeth. Or who were going to see you naked, possibly misplace your panties.
"I appreciate the invite, but I have stuff to do first thing in the morning."
The words were barely out of her mouth and he was pulling the phone out of its cradle to call his car service. Maybe he had second thoughts about the spontaneous invitation idea as well.
"There's no way I'm letting you go without making sure you get home safely," he said while dialing.
"Tomorrow I wouldn't mind picking up where we left off." she hedged, wanting to gauge his reaction.
He looked up from the phone and smiled. "It's a date."
Zoey came home to an empty apartment and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow, too tired to worry about Ruth's whereabouts. She woke up briefly when Ruth got home to change for work. Ruth quietly went through her get-ready routine, their conversation little more than "good morning" and "have a good day," and Zoey fell back to sleep with the sound of the front door closing. The next time she opened her eyes, it was nearly noon and Tristan had texted he'd be home after two.
When she got to his place, added to the guitar was an additional guitar, an entire video game console drum kit, and a microphone complete with stand.
And he was wearing his leather pants. Those hot, delicious leather pants. A black ribbed tank top showed off his golfer's tan, cutting the color off midsinew on his biceps.
"What's all this?" Zoey asked, averting her eyes from him to keep from drooling.
"After you told me that Guitar Hero had lots of other versions, I went to check some of them out. That's when I learned there's a game called Rock Band. I couldn't resist getting the entire setup. Now we can play together."
There was no way for her to tell him that watching him had become her favorite game. She loved to watch the way his face scrunched up in concentration and how he unconsciously bit into his lower lip when he had to speed up his movements to keep from missing notes or a long drawn-out chord. Add all the leather and muscle, and it was a no-brainer.
"Tristan Malloy, I think you're obsessed." An easy statement for her to make, since it was how she felt as well. Only her obsession had nothing to do with music or silly video games.
"I'm not going to deny it. Did you know in the most recent versions, the crowd isn't quite so rude? The guys in the band still get pretty pissed though."
"What a bunch of divas."
"Do you want to play?" he asked, slinging the guitar strap over his shoulder.
The only playing she wanted to do with him had nothing to do with instruments. If she didn't know him better, she would swear he had begun to tease her.
"Sure." Zoey sat down at the drums and picked up the sticks. Not only did she want to spare him her singing, but she also thought it would be the easiest instrument to keep up with. It would also ensure that he was standing in front of her, so she could watch the leather pants in action. She tried to twirl one of the sticks between her fingers like a pro and promptly dropped it.
Tristan was a quick learner. Most of the booing was directed at Zoey's drumming skills. She missed most of her cues after any drum break she had because she was too busy watching him. She didn't feel the least bit guilty. They switched the instruments up here and there, with them both on guitars next to each other being Zoey's favorite.
When he moved over to the microphone and picked "Learn to Fly" from the Foo Fighters, Zoey was mesmerized. Not only did he have a lovely baritone, something he now felt comfortable enough to share, but he also felt free to add some of the dance moves she still had trouble erasing from her memory. Her opinion hadn't changed. She couldn't remember the last time she'd seen hips that swiveled like that. Tristan seemed to get off on the crowd cheering, going so far as to point at the TV screen as if they could see him. He knew the chorus without needing the words that scrolled across the screen and belted them out with his eyes closed. It was nothing short of adorable, and when he was done with the song Zoey realized she hadn't played a single note. Thankfully, Tristan had been so into his performance, he hadn't noticed her watching him.
"That was so fun," he remarked, sticking the microphone back in the stand.
"I have to go," Zoey said quickly, taking off the guitar. "I forgot I have some price quotes to work up."
It was an excuse, but the walls felt like they were closing in and she needed to get out of the room before she did something she'd regret.
Tristan looked confused.
"Oh. Okay," he said, trying to mask his disappointment. "I was going to make dinner tonight."
"I'm going to have to take a rain check. I'm late with these quotes as it is," she lied. She gathered up her things and hustled out the door, unable to look him in the eye.
Her feet dragged as she made her way back home. It seemed fitting. Her spirit had begun to drag as well. Maybe it was the lyrics to the Foo Fighters song, the symbolism she was mistakenly attaching to them—about looking for someone to save him—and the heartfelt way he sang them, the way he already knew most of the words. Maybe Ruth had been right all along, about the unlikelihood of being able to make a platonic friendship work. It didn't matter. There was no way around it.
She had fallen for Tristan Malloy.
# Chapter 15
When Tristan called her the next day to chat, Zoey told him about what was happening with Ruth before he could extend any invitations. She stopped short of telling the part about her sister's ill-conceived idea to handle the situation without a lawyer. She was grateful that this time she had a valid excuse for telling him that the next few days were going to be busy.
"That guy was a judge? Wow. Is there anything I can do to help?"
His words and genuine concern were comforting, but all Zoey felt was stress. She had betrayed their friendship by falling for him. And now she was too scared and selfish to tell him for fear of him backing off. She was too drawn to him to have any hope of walking away herself.
"There's nothing for you to do, but thanks," she told him. Her voice was shaky, something that she hoped he'd interpret as worry.
"Do you want me to come along for support?" Tristan persisted in his desire to lend a hand. "I was there and can testify that he was buzzing around her all night."
"Hopefully, it won't get that far. But I hope that offer stands if it does."
"It certainly does. Good luck with all of it. Keep me posted?"
As Ruth got closer to her court appearance, her bravado started to nose-dive. Zoey accompanied Ruth on her shopping trip to transform herself into a prim schoolmarm. She wanted to make sure Ruth was dressed as conservatively as possible and be there to talk her out of wanting to wear something more Ruthie if she gravitated toward it. It was an eye-rolling ordeal.
"Is this made of polyester or sandpaper?"
"This is not cashmere. It feels more like dog hair."
"The neckline on this piece of crap is trying to strangle me."
"Are we trying to conceal my figure altogether?"
"I wonder if wearing this would entitle me to a senior citizen discount?"
Zoey bit her tongue and figured Ruth was lashing out, trying to hide her worry about her potential sentence. But she was also hurt. The majority of the garments Zoey selected she personally found attractive. As she presented countless armfuls of clothing that were ridiculed she reflected on two thoughts:
This wasn't half as fun as when she took Tristan to Barneys, and she remembered why she stopped shopping with her sister in the first place.
Ruth finally settled on a lovely three-quarter-length flower-patterned dress with a navy-blue cardigan that Ruth declared she would gladly donate to Zoey when she was done if it fit, which they both knew it wouldn't. Luckily their feet were within a size of each other's, which mercifully saved Zoey having to replay the whole rigmarole while shoe shopping too. Ruth was content to borrow a pair of plain black flats.
Neither of them had any appetite the morning of Ruth's hearing. The entire cab ride to the courthouse was an ongoing lecture of how Ruth needed to keep her mouth shut unless she was spoken to and to take whatever chip she had on her shoulder and brush it off now, before she came face-to-face with her accuser. Once they got to the courthouse and took a good look around, all of Ruth's defiance about raging against the machine came to a grinding halt. After going through the metal detectors, they found their courtroom and took their seats among a multitude of other grim and dazed faces. The people who didn't look fazed by what was going on around them were even more frightening. It was a real eclectic group of potential homicidal maniacs and their weary-looking public defenders. They waited as one by one defendants stood before the judge. Some of them were already wearing prison jumpsuits. Others were completely shackled as they shuffled their way to the front of the room to utter the one or two words required of them while their attorneys did the rest of the talking before being led back to wherever they came from. Some looked hopeless, others helpless. If they weren't so worried about the fate that awaited Ruth, they would've been depressed just being there. At times, Ruth grabbed Zoey's hand and gave it a squeeze. They waited as the process continued and there were only a handful of people left in the courtroom. They heard the judge call her case and Ruth went up to stand behind the defendant's table. At the same time, the prosecutor began searching through the amassed papers and folders that were stacked in front of him.
"Are you represented by counsel?" the judge asked Ruth.
"No, sir," Ruth replied.
"Are you waiving that right?"
"I'm throwing myself on the mercy of the court," Ruth said in all seriousness. The judge remained completely deadpan.
"If I may interject, Your Honor," the prosecutor chimed in with the paper he was looking for now in front of him. "The victim in this case no longer wants to press charges and we are recommending a dismissal."
"I have no record of that, counselor. Would you approach the bench, please? Bring your document with you."
The prosecutor did as he was asked while Ruth turned around to shrug her shoulders at Zoey. They exchanged puzzled looks and Zoey began to hold her breath. Maybe everything was going to be all right after all.
"Well, Miss Dixon," the judge began, and Ruth turned quickly back around, standing as straight as she could. "Looks like it's your lucky day. The injured party has rescinded his complaint, and per the prosecutor's recommendation, I'm going to dismiss your case. You're free to go."
"Thank you, Your Honor," Ruth said, the relief evident in her face.
The only sound that could be heard in the silence that followed as the judge updated his records was the whoosh of Zoey releasing her pent-up breath. Just like that, it was over and Ruth was joining her. Ruth's relief was apparently left at the defendant's table, replaced with an eye-rolling annoyance.
"Can you believe the nerve of that guy?" Ruth huffed as they left the courtroom. "Puts me through all this and then doesn't have the balls to go through with it."
"You know what I can't believe?" Zoey hissed right back. "That you are looking this gift horse in the mouth. A half hour ago you were looking at a fine, or a jail sentence. Don't forget that."
"Who in their right mind shows up to a felony hearing without an attorney?"
Zoey and Ruth turned in unison to the direction of the sound. Blake was already making his way toward them. Had he been in the courtroom the whole time, or had he just arrived? He looked positively handsome in his navy suit, gold-cuff-link-wearing, clean-shaven sort of way. Zoey had already seen this side of him, something that Ruth refused to acknowledge. He also looked uncharacteristically mad as hell, something Ruth may have been more familiar with.
"Why on earth didn't you bring a lawyer?" Blake repeated when he caught up with them.
"Because we both already know who was holding all the cards. Why would I throw money away when it was clear judge clown shoes wanted to make sure I suffered? I might've needed that cash to buy cigarettes," Ruth replied.
"You don't smoke," Blake said.
"No, but I wanted to have them to trade and buy myself out of work detail. Or getting beat up."
Blake's face showed no signs of appreciating her joke.
"Relax," Ruth went on, giving Blake a playful tug on his sleeve. "I did my own research. I was pretty sure a jackass like him wouldn't take it all the way, so I just went in and played dumb. If he did show up today, the judge would probably call a continuance and insist that I get a lawyer. So, you see, it all worked out. Now, come on, let's hit the nearest pub. I'm buying."
Blake didn't move, even as Ruth started walking toward the exit doors.
"Do you want to know why Randy Hollister didn't show up today?" Blake said.
Ruth halted, turning back around. "I just told you why."
"And maybe you are right," Blake replied. "Maybe he didn't show up because it wasn't worth the trouble. But maybe it's possible he called it all off because I threatened him."
"You did what?" Zoey and Ruth said in unison.
Blake showed the smallest hint of a smile. "Let's say I appealed to his practical side. I told him that if he thought you made a scene at the bar, imagine what you could do on a witness stand. If nothing else, you would turn him into a laughingstock. And I warned him that I would do everything in my power to see you represented by the kind of publicity-hungry attorney who would find and publicly parade every girl he hit on that night. I told him that if he continued with this pride-fueled vendetta, by the time this was over, he would likely lose not only his wife, but also his job. Maybe even get disbarred."
"How did you even know about this?" Ruth said, trying to mask her surprise.
"I was at the party, remember?" Blake said in exasperation.
"Told you," Zoey said.
"I don't recall asking for your help." Ruth huffed.
They engaged in a brief stare down, Blake looking disenchanted and Ruth, indignant.
"Thanks, Blake," Zoey finally said to try and break the tension. "You're a lifesaver."
Ruth rounded on Zoey. "Don't speak for me. I didn't ask for anyone's assistance."
"Enough." Blake's voice stopped Ruth in her tracks.
Ruth and Zoey both looked at Blake, who was shaking his head and running a hand through his neatly combed hair.
"I can't do this anymore," he said, once he was sure he had Ruth's attention. "I don't want to."
Blake no longer looked angry. He looked deflated. He was always brooding, but now his whole posture held the weight of a sadness that was near to breaking Zoey's heart.
Ruth must have noticed it too, because she was back to trying to sound airy and carefree.
"Look, I'm sorry." She laughed cheerfully. "Thanks for coming to the rescue. I'm grateful. Now don't be mad at me, okay? I've had a rough day."
Blake's face didn't change. In fact, his frown got deeper. Zoey thought he was going to turn and walk away but instead he said, near to a whisper, "I wanted you to need me."
"What kind of bullshit is that?" Ruth replied crossly.
"I wanted us to need each other. Ruth, I've been waiting almost a year to catch you in between hookups and drama. So that maybe I could convince you to give a relationship with me a try. I've had feelings for you since the first time I saw you. I've replayed the night we spent together in my mind a thousand times. After my marriage broke up, I never thought I'd feel that way about another woman again. I'm sorry if I stuck my nose in where it didn't belong. I waited for days after your arrest for you to tell me about it. It hurt so much that you didn't, but I thought that maybe you were too embarrassed. Now I realize, you'll never need me. I don't think you'll ever need anybody. But I don't want to be your secret bodyguard anymore. And I can't be your friend. I'm sorry, Ruth, but the party's over for me."
His voice had started to tremble by the end. He was crushed—it was written all over his face. Any fool could see. Zoey wished the floor would open up and swallow her, to remove her from being privy to this painful conversation.
Blake didn't wait for a response. As soon as he finished, he turned on his heel and walked away. Zoey looked to Ruth, waiting for her sister to follow him and not let him get away. But Ruth was watching Blake leave too, her arms crossed over her chest and her mouth slightly agape.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" Zoey said accusingly, breaking Ruth out of her reverie.
"What? Don't look at me like that. I had no idea he felt that way."
"Well, now you know."
"I'll call him later, it'll be fine." Ruth tried to resume her breezy tone.
"You think a man like Blake makes that sort of speech just to hear himself talk?" Zoey spat, shaking her head in pure disgust. "You're an idiot."
Zoey thought she might actually start to scream. Not only had Ruth come out on top in another one of her escapades, but another man also had been kicked to the curb after having jumped through enormous hoops to get her attention. Only this was a good man, who didn't deserve a casual blow-off. With a snort of derision, Zoey followed Blake out the door, ignoring the single time Ruth called her name. Ruth was on her own with this one, Zoey reflected.
Back out on the street, Zoey blinked at the sun, which temporarily blinded her, then headed in the direction of home. _Everything always works out for Ruth_ , Zoey once again marveled. The only lesson Ruth had learned was that she really did have the power to make men act like morons. Shaking her head and muttering to herself, Zoey turned into the first liquor store she saw.
* * *
When Tristan opened the door, Zoey was already light-headed and leaning against the wall beside it.
"I'm seeking refuge," she said.
"This can't be good," he murmured as she sauntered past him into the living room, carrying a brown paper bag with a bottle in it.
"It went badly for Ruth?" Tristan asked when he joined her.
"Oh no," Zoey said dramatically, taking another swallow out of the bottle after landing on the couch. "It went just dandy. All the charges were dropped and she got off without so much as a warning."
"Then why have you taken to getting drunk in public?"
"Who says I'm drunk?" Zoey countered.
"What you're doing right here is what I like to call 'Classic American Wino.'"
Zoey held up the bottle by the top of the neck and let the bag slip off and fall to the ground, revealing a single bottle of Mike's Hard Lemonade. "For your information, this isn't wine, it's a malt beverage. Unfortunately, they wouldn't sell me a single bottle, so I took it upon myself to distribute the rest of the pack to some legit winos, but they didn't care about hiding them. So there."
"I stand corrected."
"I would also like to point out that the whole notion that your weight is somehow relevant to how much liquor you can hold is a bunch of tripe," Zoey added after draining what was left in the bottle. "Another one of these and I'd be seeing double."
"Have you eaten?"
"No." She snorted. "I was busy getting the Teflon Dominatrix ready for court."
Tristan laughed a little and sat down on the couch beside her. "I'm not sure I understand what the problem is. It sounds like a positive outcome, so why is your nose so out of joint?"
"Because this has been happening for the better part of my life! For as long as I can remember, Ruth has been doing irresponsible stuff and someone, usually me, is always covering for her or picking up the pieces. I'm sick of her always getting exactly what she wants. I'm sick of her not caring if she hurts people."
Zoey stopped, midrant. There was so much more she wanted to vent. How Zoey had become sick to death of catering to Ruth's need for immediate gratification. Zoey wanted to rage and then weep with the realization that she had jumped from the frying pan into the fire when she married Derek, who had many of the same characteristics.
She looked over at Tristan, who hadn't even attempted to get a word in edgewise. He was merely listening, with the occasional nod of his head.
"Ruth fought for her right to party and she's been partying ever since." Zoey sighed wearily. "I'm tired of always having to be the grown-up."
"I hear you. It sounds infuriating. As someone who doesn't have any siblings, I can't really relate. But maybe because she knows she can count on you to catch her if she falls, she feels free to take bigger risks?"
He was calm and levelheaded as always, refusing to see anything but the good side of people. Through the buzz of hard lemonade and the fog of anger, Tristan still managed to soothe her.
"I think you've been under a great deal of stress. It's completely understandable."
He put a gentle hand on her knee. A friendly gesture that managed to send her already scattered nerves reeling. With an impulse brought on by dizziness and a myriad of emotions, she reached over and wrapped both arms around his neck.
He didn't return the hug, didn't rub her back and coo to her that everything was going to be all right. He stiffened, his arms awkwardly at his sides until she pulled back and placed her lips against his smooth cheek.
"Thanks, Tristan," she whispered in his ear after the kiss. "You're a sanity saver for sure."
He clumsily gave her back several pats. Zoey felt the hesitation and pulled away from him, took note of the discomfort written on his face, and flushed with guilt and embarrassment. Being attracted to him was a mistake. Touching him was a bigger one. She hadn't shown up at his door looking for commiseration, she was looking for him to save her. The thought triggered a surge of renewed anger. The only thing she could do was fall back on her old standby of making a hasty retreat.
"I have to go," Zoey said abruptly, standing up.
Tristan stood up too. "Zoey, wait. Don't leave. You're tipsy. I'll make you something to eat."
"I'm fine," she said quickly, handing her empty bottle to him. "Can you throw this out for me?"
"At least let me call—" he began.
"Don't you dare say it!" She cut him off with a talk-to-the-hand motion in his direction. "I don't need your car service. I don't need your food. I don't need your attempts at chivalry. I know how to both walk and hail a cab. I'm sorry I bothered you with this."
The last thing she saw was his dumbfounded look when she turned back around at the door.
"This isn't your fault. I just have to get back to doing what's best for me."
He nodded silently, with bewildered eyes, as the door closed behind her.
# Chapter 16
When it came to Tristan Malloy, it was time for Zoey to start implementing some self-control. The crush had gotten too big. She wasn't going to be able to wean herself off him; she was going to have to go cold turkey. Armed with Ruth's original and knowledgeable advice, Zoey went about the business of keeping her distance from Tristan. She was prepared to deploy all the polite ways to avoid him, but she couldn't shake the rush when she so much as thought about him. For the first day, every time her phone chimed, she was filled with dread that it was Tristan, followed by disappointment when it wasn't. She had gotten used to hearing from him daily. The way she had stormed out of his place had likely freaked him out. She tried to look at that as a positive thing.
Ruth didn't return to their apartment until the morning after her court date. She walked in as if nothing unusual had happened the day before. In fact, she looked like she was basking in afterglow.
"You're in an awfully good mood," Zoey said begrudgingly.
"It is a beautiful day," Ruth replied, still looking dreamy.
"Guess you found a replacement for Blake?" Zoey couldn't help delivering the jab. Did Ruth understand the consequences of taking someone for granted?
"As a matter of fact, I did." Ruth was beaming. "I like to call him Blake 2.0, the reboot."
"I don't get it."
"After I was so rudely abandoned at the courthouse, I did some thinking. You were right, I had turned Blake into Mr. Dependable. I didn't appreciate him. I texted and called him about a hundred times until he finally answered. I insisted that I was coming over to his apartment. I apologized profusely, then sat like a good girl while he vented his spleen. His ranting had nothing to do with me. There was a lot about this wedding coming up that the bachelor party at the Marquee was for. About how his ex-wife was going to be at the wedding with her new boyfriend. How disgustingly sweet they were. Now Hollister would be shooting daggers at him through the whole affair as well. I waited until I was sure he was almost done, then I kissed him. Mostly to shut him up. Then I told him I would go with him to the wedding as the most refined dame he ever saw. Then we had the most impolite night in recent memory."
"Who doesn't love a happy ending?" Zoey's voice was half awe, half sarcasm.
"He's so proper. I thought he was too buttoned up. But this time?" Ruth gushed, accompanied by a long languid stretch. "A complete freak between the sheets!"
Considering just how many freaks Ruth had kept company with over the years, that was quite an endorsement. Zoey prayed she wouldn't offer details. She didn't want her impression of Blake tainted with images of him wearing a leather full-head mask with a zipper for a mouth or trussing Ruth up like a turkey. But there was something else. Ruth's voice changed when she spoke about Blake. She sounded . . . respectful. And sweet, even. When Ruth packed a small bag before leaving for work and told Zoey she was spending the night at Blake's, Zoey knew it was serious. Blake was getting two nights in a row, during the week, no less. That was unprecedented.
All Zoey knew was that she was going to be left alone, which she thought was a blessing. She needed time to figure out her own next move, starting with pushing her life's reset button, even if that meant ghosting Tristan Malloy. She couldn't bring herself to delete his phone number, but she would forget it existed. One day turned into two, then to three. Zoey's spirits started to sag on day four and she waged an internal battle with the urge to text Tristan a quick hello. What if he had overdosed on late-night television or was shaking in a cold sweat after binge-watching _The Walking Dead_? But she couldn't run that risk. If that hello led to an invitation, she would be tempted to accept. She had to stop the cycle for his sake as well as hers. She spent days four and five questioning why she would take love life advice from her freewheeling heartbreaker of a sister to begin with. Ruth, who had resurfaced while Blake went out of town for business, resumed making herself scarce after Zoey nearly bit her head off after a casual question or two.
By day six of the cold turkey, she conceded all hope was lost. He had never gone that long without making some sort of contact. Adding insult to injury, she hadn't received a single call for a job booking. She spent the whole day systematically eating everything she could get her hands on, emptying both the fridge and the pantry.
On day seven, she was downright pissed off. A stupid kiss on the cheek and a hug scared him off? She hadn't groped or propositioned him. She hadn't thrown herself at him. Why would she want to be with someone so timid and skittish anyway? The anger lingered through the weekend despite numerous invitations from her sister to get out of the apartment. She spent that Sunday snarling on the couch, with Ruth shooting her sideways glances of genuine concern. She ordered takeout all day, at one point tipping the delivery person a handful of dimes, nickels, and pennies because she'd run out of money. Not completely out of money, but she would need her quarters if she was ever going to wash clothes again.
Zoey started that Monday with an attitude adjustment. A new week called for a new perspective. A pity party was fine but turning it into a vacation was not. Tristan Malloy hadn't asked for her help; she had offered it. Having an extended temper tantrum because things didn't work out as planned was not only childish, but also plain old stupid. She was the one who deviated from her original strategy of taking this year to work on herself. It was time to get back to it. She promised herself, starting today, she was going to dig in. Her sole focus was to start drumming up some business. She would place new ads, call on previous clients to say hi and tell them all the new things she was working on. She would test new recipes. Zoey checked her bank account on her phone and sighed. She refused to dip into the nest egg she had put away. She had drawn up a budget, and she was sticking to it. How many ways could she dress up Kraft mac and cheese?
Then a text came through. A text from Tristan Malloy.
MORNING! CAN YOU WORK FOR ME WEDNESDAY NIGHT?
She shook her head in disbelief. What the hell? She had just released him into the universe an hour ago. Now he was back. And worse, he reentered with the only offer she couldn't refuse. With hands that needed steadying she texted back.
SURE
GREAT! I'LL HAVE EVERYTHING YOU NEED HERE. ARRIVE AT FIVE. THINK FRENCH.
There was no further conversation. No playful banter. No sharing any new tidbits of discovery on his part. Tristan didn't even let her suggest the menu. Her heart wouldn't stop fluttering, even as she reminded herself that it really was time to let him go. They could still be friends, a conclusion that left her feeling successful and at the same time forlorn. But, if nothing else, she was able to redirect her focus back on what she had set out to accomplish. The clock was nearly out of time before she was getting back her name and going out all on her own. Nothing and nobody was going to get in her way.
# Chapter 17
When he opened the door to let her in, he still looked so good. This time, however, Tristan's nervousness echoed the night she met him. All the gaming equipment was gone from the living room. He made no mention of the way she had stormed out the last time they were together, which was depressing in its own right. Once she followed him into the kitchen, she found out why.
"I have a favor to ask of you," Tristan said. "A big one."
"Okay," Zoey said warily as she scanned the very simple menu and the recipe for the main course he had placed on the center island. There was something foreboding; this was a dinner for two.
"I only have one guest coming tonight." Tristan rushed through the words as he watched her read through the directions. "A woman. A date. I have a date."
"Oh." Zoey managed to get the one word past the tightening in her chest. Suddenly, trying to tell the joke about not poisoning anyone didn't seem so funny. She managed to plaster on a smile. "That's great. You really came out of your shell. I could've delivered a pep talk over the phone."
"That's not the favor though. I want you to stay in here." He began to trip over his words. "I don't want her to know you're here."
Anger began to mix in with the heartbreak. "Tristan, you know how to cook. You don't need me."
"But I do. I really do."
"Then let me get to work and I'll leave as soon as I'm done."
"This isn't about the food, Zoey. Do you remember Kristin, from the night we met?"
"Hard to forget the only other woman in the room." Zoey sighed. A good veal and cream sauce was going to go to waste being fed to that little slip of a thing. She could picture the plate coming back into the kitchen with all the vegetables being picked out and the rest of it going into the trash. Tristan was too preoccupied to catch her frown.
"I got up the nerve to call her and ask her out for dinner last week."
He had taken Kristin out on a date. Zoey had been eating her weight in comfort food for over a week while he was out having fun. She had done so well on her little makeover project, and the final outcome was like a sudden and unexpected punch to the gut. At least there was one saving grace: she had never made her true feelings known. She had managed to save face, even if she was going to spend the next week in bed, crying until there were no tears left.
"It was a horror show. She's educated and knows a lot about a lot of things. But conversation kept reverting back to politics and current events, stuff I don't feel comfortable with."
"Nobody should bring up politics on a date." Zoey's face scrunched up in what she hoped looked like aversion, while she was secretly pleased as punch at his misstep. "Talk about a mood killer."
"I thought that maybe you could stay in here and if I get stumped on something, I can rush in here and ask you."
"I don't know diddly about politics other than it can turn any family dinner into a brawl."
"You've got to know more than I do."
He did have a point there. Zoey stuck the tip of her pointer finger into her mouth and began to chew at her cuticle. She forced her hand back to her side before she drew blood.
"This sounds like a backward _Cyrano de Bergerac._ "
That solicited a smile from Tristan. "It does, doesn't it? Only there's no love triangle going on."
Yes, there was. He just didn't realize it.
"Can't you segue the conversation to art and literature? Things you know about?"
"I tried. But she's an activity person, likes the outdoors."
"What about golf?"
"She plays tennis. And it looks like golf is a sticking point for her to boot. All the guys at work play and she's never invited."
"Music?" The vision of him as his Aerosmith alter ego flashed before her eyes. She cursed herself.
"That's a good one! I'll use it tonight." He brightened, which hurt her case more than helped it. "See? This is what I'm talking about. You can throw me lifelines when I need them. I felt so lost on our last date, I almost had a panic attack in the middle of dinner."
Zoey wondered if he knew he was pulling at her heartstrings. Then she wondered if he kissed Kristin good night.
"I can't begin to list all the ways this is a bad idea. You should start a relationship as the real you. It's more than enough, trust me."
He spoke like he hadn't heard her. "Please, Zoey? You can name your price to stay. And if you hadn't told me to not watch the news, I'd at least know some of the things she's talking about."
She didn't think he had it in him to play the blame card. To remind Zoey that she was partially responsible for the mess.
"By the way, I did start watching the news this week. You're right. It's depressing as hell," Tristan added. "But I don't think it's going to be enough. You're my rock, Zoey. I need you here."
Zoey tried one last time. "Okay, that's fine. But hiding me is dishonest."
"Not if she doesn't know you're here and I don't bring it up."
Zoey shook her head at her own disgrace. She had successfully turned a wonderful upstanding spirit into every other self-serving human on the planet. If his next sentence turned out to be "You owe me" she might start to cry. There would be plenty of time for tears. But right now, she needed some income, and that meant swallowing her pride.
"This is the first and last time I'm going to do this," she relented.
"I just need to get one successful date under my belt." Tristan's optimism returned with his relief. He was oblivious to her turmoil. "If I can get through one date without breaking out into a cold sweat or passing out, I'll be golden. Thanks, Zoey, you're a good friend."
"You're welcome." She tried to keep the disappointment out of her voice. "Now please step away from the fridge, so I can get started."
He didn't notice her curtness. She couldn't help noticing he had already done most of the prep for the meal. She'd be spending most of her time watching pots boil and skulking behind the doors whenever they opened. She drew the line at sitting on the floor behind the island or pushing herself up against the wall. Zoey put on one of his aprons and went to work while Tristan paced the apartment. She tried to keep her head down and focus, but she would look up every time he made a lap by her, leaving the familiar trail of Old Spice in his wake. It was the only thing she recognized in the man she'd originally met.
"Why don't you go put on some music?" Zoey suggested, mainly to give herself something to listen to other than the voices in her head telling her all the ways she could ruin his evening. Dangerous thoughts to have when handling raw meat. Or holding a knife.
"Excellent idea." He bolted out of the kitchen. A minute later, chamber music started playing through the speakers above her. Classy. She sliced an onion she didn't need in half and began to chop it, looking forward to the watery eyes it might produce.
"How do I look?" he asked when he came back into the kitchen, checking the clock again.
_Gorgeous_ , she thought, checking out the new power suit he was wearing. Something he had bought himself. He had also gotten a haircut, shorter on the sides and longer on top with a healthy waving that flipped to the side. It looked smashing. He no longer needed her, which she should be viewing as a blessing. After this was over, he was on his own. She meant it this time. She had to stop being a glutton for punishment. It only added to the heartbreak.
"Perfect," she said. It was gruffer than she intended.
"Any last-minute advice?" Tristan asked.
There were so many things she wanted to tell him. At the top of that list was screaming "Pick me! Can't you see how I feel about you?" The next would be to tell him that this whole affair was doomed to fail, which should've brought her more joy. Guilt always made for a good motivator. She stopped working and studied him.
"People's favorite topic is usually themselves. If you feel yourself slipping, just encourage her to talk about what interests her. It'll keep the conversation flowing. And don't worry about not knowing what she's talking about, just ask her to explain, only look fascinated when you do it. I've been with people who I didn't get a word in edgewise with all night. If you're a good listener, it has the added bonus of learning a lot about a person."
"Keep her talking about herself," Tristan repeated. "Got it."
All conversation stopped when the doorbell rang.
"It's showtime." He stole her phrase while pulling at his jacket and double-checking his tie.
"Good luck," she told him. After he left she added, "I think you're going to need it."
Zoey moved about the kitchen as quietly as she could and decided that no matter how this scheme played out, this was the last time she was going to see Tristan Malloy. She had the best of intentions and made her mistakes, but she no longer had the strength or desire to watch him find his happily ever after. Even sadder, if the evening played out the way he wanted it to, he wouldn't miss her. He'd be on his way to new adventures.
As soon as she was done putting the finishing touches on the salads, he came through the door adjacent to the dining room to retrieve them.
"Things are going great," he whispered, way too close to her ear, his breath tickling the back of her neck. "Your advice was stellar."
He grabbed the salad plates and left before she could respond, careful to not let the door swing open too wide.
He didn't want soup, and she knew why. It's a course that could get sloppy. Zoey sulked. There would be no napkin bibs making an appearance this evening. It was becoming more and more apparent that he wanted her there only for moral support. An interesting turn of phrase, since morals obviously weren't on tonight's menu.
Tristan snuck back through the door with the empty salad plates a half hour later.
"We have a few seconds." He still was whispering. "She went to the ladies' room."
Zoey hastily started to plate the main course. "Then here, let's get this on the table and you can meet her in the living room when she comes out."
"It's going so well." Tristan beamed while reaching into his pocket and pulling out several one-hundred-dollar bills. "I can't thank you enough. Being in my own space makes it so much easier."
"Home field advantage, right?" she muttered, reaching for the money he held out to her.
"Listen, I think I can handle dessert on my own," he said, and Zoey felt like she had fallen on her own knife.
"As soon as you two are back in the dining room, I'll just slip out the door." All pretense of them being in some grand conspiracy together had vanished. She had been paid for services she hadn't rendered and that was fine by Zoey. He could clean up his kitchen on his own. She just had to hold it together for a few more minutes and she would be free of this whole surreptitious affair. And him.
She garnished the plates with parsley and he dashed out to the dining room.
"Just wanted to see if I could lend a hand."
Zoey whirled around and was face-to-face with Kristin, who had decided to take a detour back from the bathroom through the kitchen. Kristin's expression was one of mild surprise. When Tristan burst through the door to the kitchen, his was more akin to horror. Zoey, in the middle, looked from one to the other, feeling the heat rush of embarrassment.
"Kristin!" Tristan exclaimed, cemented where he stood. "I'd like to introduce you to Zoey."
Zoey turned back to Kristin with a feeble "Hi."
Kristin approached Zoey, extending a delicate hand. "It's nice to meet you, Zoey. I can see you have everything under control in here."
"I was just finishing up. And getting ready to leave." Zoey tried to sound light and breezy as she shook Kristin's hand with her now-clammy one. "Nice to meet you too."
"Well then, don't let me get in your way. Dinner smells delicious. Tristan, I'll wait for you in the dining room." Kristin passed by both of them, and through the dining room door.
Zoey took a quick look at Tristan, and they exchanged panic-stricken wordless shrugs before he took off after Kristin.
The proper thing for Zoey to do would be to leave. This was not her problem. Her prediction had come to fruition. It served Tristan right to have this thing explode on its own accord.
Zoey tiptoed over to the dining room door and tentatively placed her ear to the tiny crack available. The only sounds she could make out were muffled voices in quiet conversation. She held her breath to try and get a better listen when the voices became more hushed. She did everything short of pushing at the door to get a better view. Being busted twice in one day was more than she thought she could handle.
"That did not go well," he said from behind her. Zoey instantly straightened back up, caught red-handed when he came back into the kitchen through the other door. Busted anyway. At this point, what did it matter?
"I would say not." No point in mincing words either.
"Kristin called it a night. I should've listened to you. Turns out hiding a woman in your kitchen looks sketchy to the one in the dining room," he said with a smirk. It was odd, given the gravity of the statement.
"Who knew? Oh yeah, I did." Gloating was wrong, especially when secretly elated. He didn't appear too devastated. "You don't look too worse for wear."
"It wasn't a total loss. She left me with some insight."
"Is that the reason for the grin?"
"Very astute. Kristin prides herself on being astute too. She remembered you from the first time she was here. She said when she caught us, we had the kind of guilt on our faces that was disproportionate to the situation. She told me we should never play poker with anyone but each other."
"That's probably solid advice too. I'm guessing your love connection was just cut off at the knees?"
"Turns out we both had ulterior motives. It's not that you were here that she took issue with, it was the plot to keep you out of sight. According to Kristin, I did this to get your attention, maybe make you jealous. She wasn't all that hurt. She thought I was attractive enough to go along with dating me. If she managed to get me to take the offer her company tendered, it would be a real coup. And she'd get a chance to upstage her obnoxious boss. She is hardly heartbroken. I kept telling her that you and I were just friends, but she wasn't convinced. And I think she may be right. Once again, I did it all wrong. I really am a hopeless case. I'm so sorry I made you a part of this. You're a much better friend than I deserve. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go drown in a bottle of chardonnay before I embarrass you, or myself, any further."
Tristan left the kitchen before Zoey could think of the right words to say. That Kristin was only partially correct. All three of them had ulterior motives, but currently, only two of them had come clean. Zoey didn't want to leave any room for any further misunderstandings when it came to Tristan. She started to untie, then took off her apron.
# Chapter 18
Zoey was waiting for Tristan when he came back into the kitchen. He didn't appear drunk and wasn't holding any wine bottles, but he had removed his jacket and tie. The first two buttons of his shirt were undone. If she wasn't so nervous, she may have gotten a better laugh out of his initial look after he stopped short. It was one of complete and utter astonishment.
"I wanted to make sure you were all right," she said casually, watching him struggle to keep eye contact. Then she giggled.
"Did you?" he replied with widening eyes that were incapable of tearing themselves away from her. "At this moment, I have to confess, I don't know what I am."
Zoey had been busy while he was indisposed. A no-holds-barred, last-ditch effort to force his hand into admitting how he felt or telling her once and for all that he felt nothing. She had stripped down to bare skin, and the only thing standing between him and the full monty was the strategically placed apron she had put back on. She leaned against the counter, the granite making contact on her bare back like ice on her hot skin, and cocked a hip, generating a provocative sway in the apron's skirt.
"How about aroused?" Zoey made an exaggerated move to double-check that the apron bib top was covering her nipples by sensually running her hands along the sides of her breasts to underneath them. Then she gave them a slight push up. She peered up at him with feigned innocence from beneath long lashes. "Aroused would be good."
"That works." Tristan breathed, his gaze following the slow movement of her hands.
He had gotten bolder with taking her all in. His eyes alone were generating heat. She brazenly let her gaze settle on the zipper of his pants. Nope, not quite excited enough. She slowly turned around and looked back over her shoulder.
His eyes were riveted on her round, full, bare bottom.
"How about now?" she asked, giving her booty a shake.
His pants and what was in them finally got with the program and gave the proper response. The look on his face left her wondering if she may have done too much too soon and he was going to take her right there, bent over the kitchen counter.
"I've never been good at taking a hint." He mustered the strength to look up and meet her gaze. "But this one is hard to miss."
She turned her head around to the wall again and ever so slowly pulled at the bow tied at the small of her back until she felt it give way. Then she turned to face him, aware that the now-untethered apron was rewarding him with another quick glimpse, this time from the front.
"I thought it was time that I stopped being stupid and told you how I really felt about you, but I was having trouble finding the right words."
"Message received," Tristan said, his hands moving to the front of his shirt.
It was right about then that the tide turned and Zoey began to lose her advantage. A moment ago, his eyes were smiling. Now there was nothing but smolder.
"I like my guests to feel comfortable," he said, his hands moving to his shirt. He began to work the third button, which was still fastened.
"Well, you were raised in the hospitality business," she teased, her eyes now glued to his hands moving on to the next button down.
"One of us here is completely overdressed," he said, and another button was released.
"Guess we better fix that." She jokingly made like she was going to remove the apron but only pulled the skirt of it up to her thighs. She heard his sudden intake of air and then let it drop to her knees again. None of it stopped him from his task, but he did skip the last button and pulled the shirt over his head, taking his undershirt with it. She could only stare at his chiseled upper body and give a quick prayer of thanks that breathing was an involuntary act.
"You are a very naughty girl." He had gotten comfortable, playful. He had been worth the wait. "Not to mention you could catch your death of cold and I wish I was in my leather pants."
"I thought we were taking clothes off, not putting them on." Her voice took on a throaty tone. He began taking steps to close the distance between them.
When he reached her, he watched his own hand brush his knuckles along the side of her breast. She heard her own gasp, when his hand went under the apron to cup her full breast, his thumb toying with the now-tight little bud in the center. He gave her nipple a slight pinch and Zoey leaned back against the counter, her hands grabbing onto the sinewy arms when she felt the blood rush to her head.
"I hope this isn't the only time we do this." His lips were getting closer, already starting to pucker. "Every fantasy I had about you included taking your clothes off."
He pressed his lips to hers while his free hand moved to her other breast. He cared. Had fantasized about her. All the needlessly wasted time to make up for. She wrapped her arms around his neck and opened her mouth to let her tongue brush along his bottom lip. It was all the encouragement he needed to plunder her mouth, and his tongue delved inside to steal what was left of her breath away. His hard sex pressed through his now-inconvenient pants and against her. She shifted to grind against him, starting to shake with need. His hand traveled lower beneath the apron, over her rib cage, and down her hip. His hand splayed across her stomach and then went lower. He started her wiggling when a thick nimble finger slipped inside her. She arched her back and tore her mouth from his to gasp for air when a second finger joined in the gentle massaging that set all her nerve endings to pulsate.
"Zoey, please tell me this isn't some kind of joke." He groaned as his lips grazed past her ear on into her neck and his fingers returned to her hip, freeing her from his exquisite torture. "Please tell me this isn't my punishment for what I made you do tonight."
She held his head in her hands, and they both stilled.
"I don't want to punish you and I don't want to tease you. I want to feel you. All of you. Inside me."
Without another word, he took her hand and they raced down the hallway to his bedroom.
"I would carry you," he said halfway to their final destination, "but I feel weak in the knees."
"Then we're even. In every fantasy I've had about you, you picked me up and whisked me away."
"Next time," he said, stopping short and pulling her to him then kissing her hard.
Upon reaching the bedroom, he released the clip that held her hair back, then pulled at the last remaining apron tie. Zoey rushed to unzipper his pants while they were still in motion to reach the bed. Tristan impatiently kicked off his remaining clothing and tumbled them both back onto the crisp, clean comforter. She longed to touch every part of him.
His lack of experience was easily made up for by his hunger. He took his time worshipping every inch of her. She could feel him smiling up against all her most sensitive spots as he kissed them, the back of her neck, along her rib cage, and behind her knees. She was soon engulfed in all-encompassing lust. Zoey wanted them to take their time, make the connection meaningful for both of them. But she was losing that battle, touch by skin-scorching touch. His kiss returned to her lips and she felt his hardness, inches away from her throbbing core.
"Condom," she murmured into his neck as her fingernails raked lightly down his back.
"Right," he growled while pushing himself off the bed. "Right, right right."
"Please tell me you have one." She sighed, missing his touch already.
"I don't only have one," he said while sprinting to the bathroom, his backside a glorious feast for her heavily lidded eyes. "I have a box of them."
"Check the expiration date!" Zoey called after him.
"They're good," he replied, rushing to jump back on the bed. "I celebrate New Year's with a fresh box."
If Zoey had her way, he'd be needing a new box by the end of the week, not December.
Together they fumbled and giggled their way through putting the condom on. He shivered with her touch and he hissed through clenched teeth as she rolled the latex to his hilt and ended the exercise with a nip at his belly.
"I can't hold back much longer," he ground out.
"I don't want you to." She panted as he pushed her down onto the bed, and kissed her all the way back to the pillows, where her head came to rest.
She opened herself to him and he thrust himself deep inside her. Both their worlds went still. Tristan hovered over her, staring down at her intently.
"Am I doing something wrong?" Zoey asked, grabbing onto his arms and wriggling beneath him.
"I want to remember you like this forever."
There wasn't a single part of her that didn't feel the impact of the heartfelt wonderment written on his face. The affection in his voice, the passion in his eyes. She could already feel herself starting to tingle, in the deepest recesses of her soul.
Then she wrapped a leg around him and smiled.
It was all the encouragement he needed. They began a different kind of dance. The kind that left her reeling.
# Chapter 19
Several condoms and a surprisingly refreshing sleep later, Zoey was awakened to the scent of coffee. Her eyes fluttered open, adjusted to the daylight, and found Tristan sitting on the bed beside her, a steaming mug in his hand. He had showered and thrown on a pair of shorts but nothing else. He was as sexy in the light of day as he was the night before.
"Did I overstay my welcome?" she asked, snuggling under the covers, and the coffee smell mixed with the intoxicating scent of him on her pillow. She ran her tongue over her teeth and resisted the urge to dash off to his bathroom to brush her teeth with toothpaste and her finger.
"Not at all," he replied, taking a sip out of the mug. "I was taking a minute to enjoy watching you sleep."
If anyone else had said that to her, it might've sounded creepy. But Tristan was just basking in the same afterglow she was also feeling. Never before had Zoey been treated to lovemaking that was completely about her. Her comfort, her desire, her pleasure. All his enjoyment was derived from watching and taking part in hers. It took intimacy to a whole new level. Her orgasms were shattering and he was left shuddering for minutes after his. The memory alone was enough to set her skin ablaze all over again. For him, it was new and amazing, and she found herself getting caught up in it. She wanted him to feel appreciated too. It wasn't just sex with Tristan. It was lovemaking, in every sense of the word. She couldn't remember the last time it all felt so real.
"When I woke up and saw you next to me I couldn't believe it. Part of me thought it was a dream."
"I must look a wreck," she said, sitting up and running a hand through her tousled hair. Muscles that had long gone unused voiced protest. She gingerly wrapped the sheets halfway around her. It wasn't something she did out of modesty, but she knew that tone of his voice. A thorough sexing was sure to follow. He may have time he wanted to make up for, but she needed to try and ensure that they rested for a while. She needed to build up some stamina. She eyed his coffee, and without saying a word, Tristan held out his mug.
Zoey wrapped both hands around the cup and blew at the hot brew within it. Tristan reached out and tucked a wayward lock of her hair behind her ear. Then he brushed his hand across her cheek and cupped her face, tilting her head up to meet his gaze.
"You are so beautiful," he told her tenderly, each word perfectly enunciated, "in every way."
He sounded sincere, which only served to embarrass her. False flattery she could handle. There was nothing false about Tristan.
"I think you need this more than I do." She thrust the coffee back in his direction, trying to laugh the statement off.
"Not before you have some." He smiled, then looked serious. "Unless you want a cup of your own?"
"Now we're going to worry about swapping germs? I think that ship has sailed." Zoey giggled and brought the cup to her mouth. She peered at him from above the rim and marveled. He liked his coffee the exact same way she did, not too light, not too sweet.
"Any regrets this morning?" Tristan asked, again in all seriousness.
"Just that I wish I hadn't ditched my yoga when I moved up here," she responded, blushing. "You?"
"One big one. All the time I wasted fighting how I felt about you. It's probably time I come clean about Kristin as well. I only asked her out to try and get you out of my head."
"And if I didn't feel so honor bound to get through this year before insisting on my divorce, I would've made my feelings known a lot sooner too."
Silence lingered. She had just introduced the elephant in the room. But pretending Derek didn't exist wasn't going to make him go away. The timing, however, after their first night together, was awful. Zoey was new at this too.
"Regret is a wasted emotion." She handed the coffee back to him, followed by winding her hand around his neck and pulling him in for a long, lingering kiss. Her morning rituals could wait. He had already made her take leave of all her senses, and she was more than willing to throw morning mouth slime onto the pile. His breath was sweet and fresh and she couldn't care less. His fingertips traced up along her spine and weaved into her hair. He shifted and pulled her closer to him. His kiss deepened, had turned greedy in the need to plunder her mouth. Screw resting and stamina building. Whenever his lips touched hers, it triggered her want for more of him. All of him.
Suddenly, to her dismay, he pulled away.
"Hold tight," he said, reaching for the phone. "I have to cancel my tee time."
Her smile grew wide. He wanted to cancel playing golf to play with her. Maybe she had two regrets, starting something she herself wasn't sure she felt up to finishing.
"Don't cancel," she said, halting him in middial. She wanted to see him doing what he loved. She wanted to send the clear message that if it was something that was important to him, then it was important to her too. It wasn't all about her, no matter how much he was willing to prove otherwise. Zoey wanted to give back.
"I don't want to leave you," Tristan protested.
"I second that! I want to come with you."
"You want to play golf with me?"
"Well, I don't know about playing . . . but I'd be more than willing to try and learn." _More like watch you_ , a correction she kept to herself. And see what the maximum speed of a golf cart was.
He looked so genuinely excited, her eyes began to glisten.
"I would love that," he said.
"Sure, you say that now. Let's see how you feel when eighteen holes takes eighteen hours."
"I have all the time in the world." He winked at her and gave her knee a squeeze. "I'll let you shower. We leave in thirty minutes."
* * *
Their car called to take them to the golf course but had to wait an extra fifteen minutes when Zoey became infatuated with Tristan's shower. It was nothing like the shower in Ruth's apartment. For the last eleven months, she had stood under the calcium-coated two-output showerhead that spit water of various temperatures ranging from icy to scalding. Zoey hadn't given it much thought until she experienced the luxuriousness that was this shower. Not only was it as big as some apartments, but it also had a giant, square showerhead that provided sheets of rain at a stable temperature of her choosing. She shamelessly indulged in a twenty-minute shower, one that only could've gotten better if Tristan had joined her. When she finally emerged from the bedroom, he was dressed in another goofy outfit. She was in her clothes from the night before, a true crime, given how clean she was.
"Oh, that just won't do," Tristan said, handing over her purse with one hand and holding the door open with the other. "Our first stop, the pro shop."
This was coming from a guy who prided himself on being a graduate from the clown university look. "You don't have to do that."
"Yeah," he replied, looking her over, "I do."
From the back of the Escalade that was taking them out of the city, Zoey compared herself to Cinderella, only instead of a ball gown, she was going to be adorned in ill-fitting neon plaid. When Tristan took her hand and began to trace sensual circles with his thumb over her knuckles, it was a small price to pay.
Luckily, she didn't have to make the sacrifice. After entering through the front door, Tristan led her past the raised eyebrows of the country club staff and other members, with his hand surrounding hers. He smiled in return to every greeting with a nod of his head and didn't stop until they were at the door of the pro shop. He held the door open for her, and they stepped inside.
"Good morning, Mr. Malloy!" the clerk greeted him and tried to stifle her surprise at the sight of Zoey still firmly attached to him.
"Good morning. I'd like to have my girlfriend outfitted for a day on the course, please."
He was still polite, but there was a new air about him. Maybe he was merely adapting to his surroundings, but now he sounded more authoritative than accommodating. And he called her his girlfriend. The moment set her heart fluttering again.
"It would be my pleasure, Mr. Malloy," the clerk said.
Tristan finally let go of her hand and said brightly, "I'm going to go see if I can switch up our tee time. Have fun."
He gave her a quick kiss and made for the door, adding over his shoulder, "Whatever she wants. Just add it to my account."
As the clerk profusely nodded her head and reiterated her delight at the task, Zoey took a look around the opulence and thought, _Forget Cinderella, this is right out of_ Pretty Woman.
As she began to look through the racks, Zoey was also pleasantly surprised to find out that women's golf clothes were a million times more fashionable than men's.
Without Tristan in the room, the clerk's focus turned to Zoey. She gave Zoey a look up and down. Zoey did the same, making note of her name tag—erica. The two women pasted smiles on.
"So, what are we looking for today?"
Erica's voice was syrupy sweet and that meant only one thing. Artificial, which leads to probably bad for you.
"Something to divide my boyfriend's attention between me and his game." Zoey grinned. She normally wouldn't be so liberal with the word _boyfriend,_ but she had encountered this kind of woman before.
Erica immediately walked over to the rack and pulled out a pair of black capris, presenting them to her.
"These hide a multitude of sins," Erica said.
Zoey was willing to give the woman the benefit of the doubt. After all, she was wearing her work outfit, which consisted of black pants and a white button-down.
"All my sins take place when I'm not wearing any clothes at all," Zoey replied pointedly, returning to her search of the racks. "And you see how he's dressed. I have to at least try to keep up."
Whether Erica's subsequent laugh was in response to embarrassment or appreciation of her joke, Zoey didn't care. Then her sight alit upon something.
_Oh yeah. This should hit him right in the meatballs._
She pulled it off the rack and held it up for Erica to see.
"I want to start with this," Zoey stated firmly. "I don't suppose you have it in plaid?"
After Erica's initial surprise, given away by the raising of her brows, she broke out into a smile. "Afraid not. But I think I know where you're heading with this. I've got just the things to complete the look."
Sometimes all a person needs to get on board is the knowledge that you don't hate your own body. Erica gathered some other things, and the two of them went to the dressing room giggling.
When Tristan returned, almost an hour later, it was his turn to hide his astonishment, but his reaction was more of a carnal nature.
Zoey was dressed in a white pleated golf skirt that settled midthigh. She had waved off the skort version with a conspiratorial wink to Erica, who supplied her with white spandex boy short panties. It was paired with a pink polo shirt, tucked in at the waist, and a black belt. She topped it all off with knee-high socks. It was Catholic schoolgirl, golfing edition.
The sight of Tristan's jaw unhinging was priceless.
"I'm glad they had the right shoes for you" was his poor attempt at hiding it.
"I know," Zoey replied casually, forcing his attention back up her curvaceous, muscular legs. You don't hoof around New York City for almost a year without reaping some sort of reward. "I'd hate to slip and get grass stains on this white skirt."
Golf was now the last thing on her mind. By the look on Tristan's face, it had fallen down the ranks of his priorities as well.
He signed the sales slip and took Zoey by the elbow to lead her out the door.
"You should've bought ten of this outfit." He breathed seductively in her ear.
Mission accomplished.
"Can I drive the golf cart?" she asked, using her best sexy voice. "Please?"
"Of course." He smiled, picking up on it. Then he shook a stern finger at her. "But don't you dare drive it on the green. They will kick me out of the club so fast, my head will spin."
His next order of business was to cancel the use of a caddy.
"I don't normally use one," he explained. "But I thought we could use a chaperone."
"You thought wrong, mister."
"I think I can forget about trying to show off my skill. I have the funny feeling I'm about to have my worst round on record."
They loaded her rented clubs beside his in the golf cart, and they set off for the first tee.
It was slow for a Thursday afternoon at the club, with most of the dedicated members having chosen the earliest tee times. Some of them could be seen as small dots on the horizon smattered on the course. It was quiet, with the exception of the cart's low motor-running hum and intermittent birdcalls. And lush. So much rolling green, with the strategic placing of sand traps, trees, and ponds of water off in the distance. The air smelled clean and fresh. Wildlife peeked out and dashed from behind trees and out of bushes. It was easy to see why Tristan was so dedicated to the sport and the serenity it provided.
She had also forgotten how much she loved to drive. She looked over at Tristan to tell him so. He looked deep in thought.
"Don't worry. I have a license to drive a real car. This thing is a piece of cake."
"It's not that. I was just thinking that I'm supposed to have come up with some sort of nickname for you. You know, a term of endearment that only I use. Like honey or baby or darling."
"So, what's the problem?"
"All of them sound stupid and disrespectful. Belittling. Shouldn't these sorts of things come naturally?"
She stopped the cart and grabbed his hand, looking into his eyes.
"Tristan, there is nothing more endearing to me than to hear you say my name. I get butterflies inside every time you do it. If something suddenly comes to you, fine. If not, you're still giving me all the feels."
He instructed her where to stop near the first-hole tee and hopped out of the cart to grab a club, eager to get started.
"Do you mind if I just watch you for a hole or two?" Zoey asked. Not only did she want to take some time to adjust to wearing the skimpy outfit, but she also wanted to watch him in action. If he looked anything like he did in his living room the day they met, she would need a while to adjust to that too. She wasn't disappointed. First it was the precious look he got as he concentrated on the ball. Then it was the delicious way his hips and tush wiggled as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other before he swung. As he teed off and his upper body responded with the motion, she officially abandoned the notion that golf was boring. Maybe it was because he was in his element. Maybe it was the way his body twisted that reminded her of the night before. She lost sight of the ball as it rocketed through the air, mainly because she hadn't watched it. She was preoccupied with looking at him. Her excitement over driving the golf cart was all but forgotten, replaced with an entirely different desire.
At first, they sporadically encountered other golfers. Some were making their way back to the clubhouse, others moving farther away as their games progressed. Most of them were dressed in solid colors that were both neutral and matched.
"I just have to ask," Zoey said after making that observation. "What is your obsession with all the crazy outfits?"
"I think I picked it up from my grandfather. He spent most of his life in colors designated by the army, which basically meant beige or green, with the occasional camouflage. But you think I'm bad? He really made some fashion statements on the course back in his day. For such a disciplined man, golf clothes were where he cut loose."
She wondered what Tristan must have been like as a boy. He painted a picture that had her imagining waking up to a bugle every morning at dawn and being tested to see if a quarter could bounce on his bed ten minutes after that. A little towheaded Tristan, dressed in fatigues.
On their way to the third tee, she was ready. And not just to play golf.
It started with bending over in front of him to put her ball on the ground. After finally getting the ball to balance on the little tee, but before standing up, she coyly looked over her shoulder in his direction. His eyes were riveted on her backside. One of his arms was crossed over his chest, gripping the elbow of the other, his hand with a firm grab on his chin, his mouth slightly agape. She would never tire of that look.
"What do I do now?" she asked innocently.
Tristan shook his head to break the stare. He pulled a club out of her bag.
"Drivers are the most accurate, but you sacrifice distance," he explained while approaching her. "But since you're just beginning, let's start with a three wood."
"That's made of iron," she pointed out while taking it.
"I know." He chuckled. "Wood is the name of the club. They have longer shafts and rounder heads, to drive the ball farther."
"I think I just found a term of endearment nickname for _you_!"
She waited for him to catch on to the joke, thinking, _Good grief, didn't this dude's grandfather have at least one_ Playboy _or_ Penthouse _lying around for him to stumble across?_ She knew he had caught on when he started to blush ten shades of red.
"You are not only naughty, you're dirty," he admonished her with a bashful grin.
"You have a problem with that?"
"Not in the slightest."
"If I had known just how much sexual innuendo came with golf, I would've taken an interest in the sport years ago. What do I do next?"
Tristan got serious. "While you might believe golf is all about the swinging of your arms, you really want to work your game from the ground up. Your footwork and interaction with the turf is vital. It's not all about the hands."
"You might want to rethink that in your case. Your hands can get pretty magical."
"Thanks for the compliment. I realize you want to play, but I'll feel like a complete failure if I don't at least teach you the basics. Can you keep your mind on the game for one hole, please?"
"Trust me, it already is."
Tristan narrowed his eyes, and she peered up at him with feigned innocence with hers.
"Sorry," she said. "I'll get serious."
"Good. Now you don't want to grip the club too tightly, because that would engage more of your wrist. You don't want that. What you want is more like your arms becoming an extension of the club. You don't want to break your wrists. Does that make sense?"
"Yes," she replied. She had been so busy watching his mouth, she hadn't heard a word. But she didn't want him to regret bringing her along either. Zoey stationed herself behind the ball and imitated his foot-to-foot shifting.
"You need to adjust your grip. One hand over the other, not too tight."
She shot him a knowing look.
"Spread your legs a little and keep your eye on the ball. Bend your knees a little."
He had to know that sounded downright perverted.
She put her head down to look at the ball, but when she swung the club, she closed her eyes. The end result was her looking out to see how far it went and finding it still on the tee.
"You're swinging too fast without keeping your focus on the ball. You have to hold the cock."
Zoey purposely flipped the club, sending it flying. It landed several feet away.
"Now you're just asking for it," she told him, landing her hands on her hips. It was her turn to blush.
"What?" he asked, all innocence given away by his twisted grin. "It's when you pull back your arms before the swing."
"Now I realize why guys play with guys and women with women," she mumbled while trying again, with a marginally better result.
"Good job." He congratulated her effort. Her ball had landed what looked like miles away from his.
For the sake of keeping the game from taking forever, she asked if they could take her ball and put it closer to his. What Zoey didn't know was both of them were losing interest in the game.
They scooped up her ball on the way to his and he took his next shot. She didn't bother getting out of the cart. When he made it close to the green, after sinking his put, he insisted on giving her a putting lesson. He dropped her ball about ten feet from the hole and she situated herself behind it. Then he pressed himself flush up against her from behind, his hands wrapping around hers on top of the club.
"Now when you are putting, it's more about the shoulders. You gauge how far to pull back by the distance you want the ball to travel." His mouth was only an inch away from her ear. His breath was hot and tickled the back of her neck. She was hot all over. Keeping her eye on the ball was impossible and her eyes drifted closed as she leaned back against him.
He guided her through the motion, and to her own surprise, when she forced her eyes open, the ball had disappeared.
"Look at that." He smiled into her neck before giving it a kiss, his voice and proximity setting her ablaze. "It went right in the hole. We're pretty good on the short putts."
She dropped the club and twisted herself within his arms. Her hands went to his neck and she pulled his lips to hers.
They drove to the next hole, and he promptly teed off into the trees.
"You did that on purpose," she accused him.
"Damn straight," he replied, grabbing her hand and racing for the cart, commandeering the driver's seat. "I know this course like the back of my hand."
They drove to the edge of the woods and she hastily got out with him, grabbing his hand and pulling him into the forest. They passed his ball on the way and both ignored it. When they were deep within the woods and far enough for his satisfaction, he gently steadied her against a tree and after an intense open-mouth kiss, he dropped to his knees.
This gentle man had hidden wolf tendencies, and it was driving her mad. The fact that he was just as turned on and willing to take the risk of doing this someplace where they could be caught had her throbbing all over.
He started a trail of kisses that began at the top of her knee sock, his fingers brushing against the back of her legs. Zoey grabbed onto handfuls of his hair until his head began to disappear under her skirt. Then it was all she could do to remain standing.
"Oh. My." She gasped as his fingers began to push aside the material of her boy shorts to gain better access to her. She heard his grunt of impatience, and with a forceful tug, he pulled her panties down. They pooled around her ankles. With his hands firmly gripping her bottom, he kissed her there.
"Yes, Tristan, yes." He added his tongue, and she brought a hand to her mouth to stifle the impending scream that she was sure would follow.
She heard him saying her name repeatedly through the haze that lingered after he stood back up, reaching into his back pocket. He ripped the foil packet open with his teeth and began to quickly roll on the condom. She tried to help him, but he pushed her hand away.
"No time," he groaned into her mouth while lifting her. "If you touch me, I'm done."
In the next breath, he lowered her onto his sex, thrusting himself deep inside her.
* * *
He helped her back into her panties, righted his own clothing, and brushed the bark off the back of her clothes before taking her hand, and on shaky legs, they returned to the cart.
"I can't believe you were capable of that," Zoey said when she was once again able to think rationally.
"I've overheard men talking in the locker room in the past. If half of what they're saying is true, it happens more than you think. Did I overstep?"
"It was my favorite lesson today, hands down."
"Well, you know what they say. Practice makes perfect."
"I can honestly say that right now, there is nothing I care less about than golf." The memory of what they had done was still so fresh, she was light-headed and swoony.
"I hope I didn't ruin the sport for you."
"On the contrary, I will never look at it the same way again."
"That makes two of us."
"That's really saying something. I'll take that as a compliment."
"It was certainly meant as one."
Instead of driving to the next tee, Tristan turned the cart back in the direction of the clubhouse. Zoey turned to Tristan, puzzled.
"I was only kidding before. Sort of." Zoey could feel herself blushing furiously while looking at him. He had once again left her feeling weak, in a multitude of ways. She suddenly felt shy and had trouble telling him that he had provided the most climactic experience of her life. She settled on telling him, "I love watching you play."
"Zoey, you have sapped me of all my concentration for golf. And I'm hungry, for you and for food. What do you say we head back to my place, order more pizza, and spend the rest of the day in bed?"
They were still quiet in the car on the way back into the city. But he had already changed. From the backseat of the car, he boldly placed his hand on her knee. Then he slowly let it creep up her thigh before coming to rest just under her skirt. He gently stroked her over her panties while still maintaining his gaze out the window.
"Insatiable." She wiggled then leaned over and whispered in his ear. "And really not fair."
He turned away from the window to bestow a most devilish smile and politely returned his hand to his own lap. When they got back to his place, she was going to teach him some lessons of her own to try and even the sensual score.
"Can we stop at my place, so I can pick up a few things?" Zoey asked.
"Certainly," he replied, kissing her, then gave her address to the driver.
Tristan asked the car to wait and accompanied Zoey up to the apartment. He wasn't through touching her, he was so caught up in their euphoria. Before she opened the door, he stopped to give her one more thorough kiss, and she stuck the key in the lock.
From the doorway, she saw a hulking figure standing in the middle of her living room with its back to the door. It turned around at Zoey's sharp intake of breath and began to smile.
# Chapter 20
"Derek." Zoey stood the kind of straight that had Tristan taking his hand off the small of her back when she uttered the single word.
"Hi, Zoey."
"What are you doing here?" she said as the initial shock started wearing off.
Derek looked different. His eyes were clear, his posture straight. Gone was the belligerent slouch. With a congenial smile, he crossed the space between them while outstretching his hand toward Tristan.
"Hey, man, Derek Sullivan. Nice to meet you."
Another first. He was nonconfrontational in his greeting upon seeing her with another man. Tristan took his hand with a brief nod. "Tristan Malloy. Pleasure."
Tristan's manner was polite, but Zoey could feel the tension in his voice as well as in the room. After the handshake, Derek took Zoey by the shoulders and placed a light kiss to her forehead.
"I'm sorry, babe. I just couldn't wait any longer. I missed you so much. You're a sight for sore eyes."
He was saying all the right words, had struck just the right tone. It was more unnerving than anything else.
"Where's Ruth?" Zoey stammered, still trying to come to grips with what was occurring. Why hadn't she texted her some sort of warning that Derek had come to the city?
"Her and Blake left right after they let me in," Derek said. "She told me I could stay here tonight to save myself a hotel stay. She seems really happy. Maybe this guy is the one for her?"
Derek was casual in making with the chitchat, like he had no problem at all with his wife walking in, dressed in a tiny skirt, with another man. New Derek was so confusing. Zoey could feel her face start to flush again, this time with unexplained shame. Though she hadn't done a thing wrong, she couldn't bring herself to look directly at Tristan. She didn't need to see him take several steps away from her; she could feel him moving away.
"I think it's best if I leave," Tristan said gallantly. "Give you two and this reunion some time alone."
Zoey wanted to beg him to stay, to help her be strong and fearless, but the words couldn't get past the lump in her throat. Her mouth wouldn't open. All she heard was the pounding in her ears when she finally worked up the courage to turn toward him only to see his back walking away.
"Later, bro," Derek called after him. "Nice to meet you."
Once Tristan was gone, the fog started to lift and only the confusion remained. When she turned back to Derek, he was looking her up and down.
"What's with the getups?" he asked once his gaze reached her face and they made eye contact. "You two at a costume party?"
"We were playing golf," she replied slowly, so slow as to appear absentminded.
"Look at you, city girl living the high life." His attempt at humor sounded more like an insult.
She felt her backbone trying to slip back into place.
"Derek, what are you doing here?" she asked again.
"My therapist told me if I took the chance and showed up early, it would be a good gesture to show you just how much you mean to me."
"You went into therapy? Why am I just hearing about this now?"
"Because I was the one who screwed up and needed help," he replied. "It wasn't easy at first. I knew if I was going to make the changes you asked for, I wasn't going to be able to do it alone."
He sounded contrite, something that was new for him as well. But Zoey was still far from convinced.
"What angle are you working here, Derek?"
"No angle, babe. No games. When you left me, it was a real wakeup call. It sent the clear message that I needed to make some changes if I had any hope of getting you back. I passed the test for my real estate license. I already have a job waiting for me back home. Waiting for us. I want to give you all the things I promised you when we got married."
"What about your other women?"
"I flirted, okay? I flirted a lot." He sounded defensive then quickly reined it in. "And that was unfair to you. But I never slept with anyone else."
"Not even while we were apart?" she probed.
"I was as loyal as I'm sure you were." It was a perfectly designed dig to get her to back off the topic. And it worked.
"Let's not get stuck in the past," he said, real emotion starting to show. "I take full responsibility for our breakdown. In the ten months I've been sober, I've been doing a lot of reflecting. I was a rotten husband. Looking back, it's easy to see why you wouldn't want to start a family with the likes of me. I not only have you to thank for pushing me to change, but you're also the reason I did it all."
"I told you before"—she felt her own emotions start to come to life—"I'm not sure I want children."
"That's fine," he was quick to concede. "Maybe we can talk about it again once you see what a great provider I can be."
Zoey's head was spinning. It was too much, too new, too soon. He was much like the Derek she fell in love with, only more mature and accommodating. To her own surprise, she heard herself say, "Maybe."
"All I know is you told me I needed to be a different man, and I've been working hard toward that goal. I know I don't deserve another chance, but I came here because I'm strong enough to hear your decision now. I'm hoping you'll say yes. No, I'm begging you to say it. This is the last time. I swear."
Zoey had heard his speech before, more times than she could count. But he had managed to accomplish all the things she insisted he do, something she never thought possible. And he had done them quietly, without grandstanding. Took those painful steps alone toward her. For her. She thought about all the times he had called her and ended up snapping at her when she accused him. He was battling his demons, maybe trying to reach out to her for support. Now he was here, with his hat in hand and on a singular mission, to win her back.
But then there was Tristan. Sweet, sexy, chivalrous-to-a-fault Tristan. They had no real history. There had been no declarations of love, just a gradual buildup of attraction that inevitably exploded in passion. He didn't even stick around long enough to fight for her. That alone said something. He had gone through changes too, but his changes were all for and about himself. Tristan had only begun to tap into his potential. Even if he did have strong feelings for her, what were the odds that they were going to last? Didn't he deserve the opportunity to experience all that was out there? Did she really want to spend her life walking him through the paces of the modern world?
When Derek spoke up again Zoey was forced to stop thinking before she could get to her own answer.
"Look, Zoey, I know Ruth said I could stay the night, but I want to go home now. And I want you to come with me. I don't want to pressure you, but if you've given this as much thought as I have over the past year, it should be an easy choice to make. I love you so much, but more than that, I care for you and want to take care of you. I know I can be a better man with you by my side."
He had said every single thing she had always longed to hear, because he already knew all her soft spots. And he was right, there was no reason for her to wait until morning. After all the legitimate sacrifices he had made, she owed it to them both to give their marriage another chance.
"Let me gather my things," she said, without any enthusiasm.
It was close enough to yes for Derek, but he made no moves to seal it with a kiss. He didn't even try to touch her.
"I promise you won't regret it," he told her confidently. "If you make it quick, we may even make it home before midnight."
Zoey went to the bedroom to throw everything she owned into the same suitcase she had arrived with, while Derek watched TV on the futon. Her movements were systematic and almost robotic, refusing to focus on anything other than the task at hand. Until she began packing her magic bag of spices. She ran her fingers over the tattered leather and fought back an unexpected wave of tears. She'd had such optimism when she'd bought it, so many dreams she was sure she would fulfill. She shook her head, angry at herself, and zipped up the suitcase. Then she sat on the edge of the bed and pulled out her phone. She knew she didn't have much time. After texting Ruth that Derek was taking her back home, she found Tristan's number and wrote him the following:
HEY. I'M GOING BACK TO OHIO. IT'S THE RIGHT THING TO DO.
She hit send, watched the text get delivered, and waited. Waited for some answer, any sign of him telling her not to go. Or to think it over. Or wishing her luck. Anything to show her that he cared one way or the other. After five minutes without any response, she dragged her bag into the living room and told Derek she was ready.
# Chapter 21
Three hours later, they sat side by side in the souped-up Honda Civic Derek had acquired in her absence. To Zoey they might as well have been on opposite sides of the Grand Canyon. She stared out the window and wondered if he felt the emotional distance too.
Her guess was no. The farther they drove out of the city, the more the old Derek began to peek out. He had assumed his usual driving position, reclined way too far back for comfort, his wrist propped up by the steering wheel, daring the car to waver out of his control. He was merrily droning on about all the things he had accomplished in her absence. How trying it was to work a full-time job and get his real estate license. How difficult it was to give up his old ways. How much happier he was now that he had. Simply rehashing all the same rhetoric he used to get her to go with him, only now with more self-congratulatory old Derek overtones. Then he ventured to how good she looked. That the few extra pounds she put on made her more curvy and luscious. He was really putting on the hard sell. She managed to keep up with bits and pieces of his soliloquy, nodding and smiling in the right places. The whole time, the same thought kept looping in her head. _If I made the right decision, why do I feel so lousy?_
It was unlikely she would be able to stay silent the whole eight-hour drive home without him noticing. When she finally thought up something to say, it wasn't much better. She blurted it by accident.
"I feel like I lost my best friend."
"Ruthless has the right to move on. The fact that she settled on a lawyer is hilarious. I can't wait to tell everyone back home."
Home. She wasn't heading home, she was leaving it. When had that change occurred? She knew the answer. For the first time, she was grateful that Derek was so self-absorbed, he didn't have a clue what she meant.
"Blake is a nice guy," Zoey murmured at the window.
"Only your sister could get a dude to take on a judge." Derek laughed. "He probably bangs her better than a gavel."
Some things hadn't changed. No matter how clean he looked, how handsome and well put together he now appeared, Derek was still crude. She considered the possibility of this whole ordeal being one big fraud. Would he really go to such great lengths to paint a picture of success just to claim her? Sadly, she knew the answer. In the past, Derek had often thrived on spite. Convincing her to come home might be the only victory he wanted.
Five years ago, she would've laughed at that joke. A year ago, she would've put up with it. Now, she wasn't inclined to do either.
"I've always wondered what your fascination was with my sister's sex life," Zoey pondered aloud.
Derek sat up straighter and put both hands on the wheel.
"Damn, baby, relax. It was just a joke. Or did big-city life beat the humor out of you?"
He became defensive too quickly, like she had struck a nerve. Old Derek was reappearing in record time.
"We're from Cleveland, not the outback," she snapped. "I'd like to think I would've outgrown tasteless jokes no matter where I lived."
"Point taken, _Mom_ ," he said sarcastically.
Zoey bit her tongue. She silently promised herself that if he so much as tried to start the motherhood conversation, she was going to open the car door and tuck and roll herself out onto the highway. She opened her window and let the warm exhaust-filled air blow through her hair.
"Do you mind?" he said, using the button on his side to reclose her window. "I've got the AC on."
They drove in silence for several miles, his knuckles now white on the steering wheel. Then he tried a different approach.
"Now that I'm going to be a real estate mogul, you'll have plenty of time to get your little business going."
Zoey could only sigh. Despite all the condescension, she knew he was trying to extend an olive branch. He was so arrogant, automatically assuming that a Realtor's license was going to be his golden ticket to riches, never dawning on him the amount of work that lay ahead of him if he had any hope of being successful. Equally depressing, she no longer had any desire to keep doing what only months ago was near an obsession. She knew the reasoning behind that disinterest as well.
"I don't think there's a market for my kind of service in Cleveland."
"Wow. I can't tell if you're being defeatist or elitist. Either way, don't beat yourself up. Not everyone has what it takes to be their own boss. You're a good worker bee though."
Derek had apparently forgotten that he hadn't held down a steady job for the majority of their marriage. He always did have a selective memory. Zoey didn't bother responding.
"Maybe it's your fancy uptown boyfriend that's made you so classy?"
Zoey remembered all their discussions that quickly turned to arguments. Only his opinion was the right one. What he didn't count on was her newfound capacity to ignore his goading.
"Maybe." She went back to staring out the window.
"You like real men. You would've been bored with that Popsicle in no time."
She turned back to Derek. "Popsicle?"
"Yeah." Derek went back to reclining in his seat, mistaking her soft-spoken demeanor for submission. "You know, like he has a stick up his ass?"
Only someone of Derek's caliber would mistake good manners for snobbishness. As he laughed at his own joke, she pictured herself wrestling the wheel from him and driving them both into a ditch. A calmness came over Zoey. It wasn't too late to rectify her situation. No need to kill anyone. All she had to do was make it to the next rest stop. She would call a cab from the bathroom and escape from a window if necessary. She didn't even need to go back to New York. Since she'd burned her bridges with Tristan, there was nothing to get excited about back in New York anyway. At any rate, she would clean toilets in a prison to keep from continuing this farce.
"If I had known that was my competition, I wouldn't have rushed to the rescue."
Zoey turned to him and tilted her head curiously. "Rescue? Really? I'm still wondering why you showed up at all."
"When Ruth called me, she told me I better hurry or I was going to lose out to someone who had turned your head."
"Seriously?" Her sister had betrayed her.
"She didn't mention that the man in question was a scrawny pretty boy. A robust girl like you needs a hard-muscled guy to stand next to, make you look proportionate. A dude with a gene pool like that will only give you chubby girls and wimpy boys."
"Stop the car."
Derek took his eyes off the road to give her a look that accompanied his now–half smile. "Say what?"
"Pull the car over, I'm getting out." Zoey replied as casually as if she were asking him to turn the car radio to a different station.
"Don't be ridiculous. We're on the turnpike. I'm sorry about the chubby girls comment, okay? I like your cushion, it's better for the pushin'."
Zoey laughed, the kind of laughter that would've been a warning to a wiser man. She shook her head. "I don't care about that comment. Or any of the others. I don't need to worry about any children we would have. My biggest mistake was getting in this car with you. And luckily, it's the easiest one to fix. Now pull this car over before I call nine-one-one and tell them you kidnapped me."
He pulled the Honda to where the shoulder met the dirt. "You're a crazy bitch."
"That's right," Zoey said while opening the door. "I am. I'm the craziest bitch you ever laid eyes on. I can make Ruth look like a Girl Scout."
He popped the trunk and got out along with her, yelling across the car. "You're going to be sorry about this."
"Got that right. I'm already sorry. Sorry I met you."
Derek took out Zoey's suitcase, his anger and voice ramping up more with each word. "What the hell makes you think you're so perfect? You think anyone else would go through what I did to get you to come home? You're not even worth it."
Then, after taking a few steps and a windup, Derek launched her suitcase down the embankment. He stomped back to get into his car, but right before he did, he bared his teeth and pointed a finger.
"Good luck!" he shouted from across the roof in an attempt to be heard over the passing traffic.
He got back into his car and rolled down the passenger window. Like an idiot, she took a step over to the car and peered in. "And just to set the record straight, I didn't come to New York for you. I went there for Ruth."
She could read his lips as if she couldn't hear him loud and clear. By the end they had curled up in a sneer. Even if it was a lie, there was truth behind it. She backed away from the car, standing straight up, looking off into the horizon. Even when she didn't care one whit about him, he still managed to hurt her.
With the tires screeching loud enough to be heard over the muffler and kicking up dust, he peeled away, accompanied by the sound of a car horn blaring as he merged. She saw his hand thrust out the driver's side, middle finger up. Whether it was directed at her or the honking driver was immaterial. He had managed to kill two birds with one stone.
Zoey watched his car, and the finger, until it was out of sight. Then she half stepped, half slid her way down the steep embankment, scooping up what she hoped was her own toothbrush as she passed it. Her suitcase had opened up upon landing, likely with some unzippering help from Derek before he heaved it. As she gathered up her remaining possessions from the shrubs and weeds, she began to laugh again. Never had she seen karma work so quickly.
"This is nothing less than I deserve." She pulled a pair of her panties out of a thorny bush and contemplated the ironic significance while chucking it back in the suitcase. "I never made an impulsive decision that didn't end up kicking me in the ass."
It became a game, retrieving her scattered garments, balling them up, then shooting them in the direction of the open suitcase. She wanted to take her time, because as soon as she climbed back up the small hill, she would have to get back to deciding what she was going to do next. There were only a few hours of daylight left. If she didn't find a way off the highway, she was going to be in deep trouble. She seriously doubted taxis picked up from the side of a toll road, especially when you couldn't tell them exactly where you were. Then she spied her magic bag, open with at least half the jars of spices broken in the impact, sprinkling a dust of their own on the ground. All her laughter came to an end and her eyes burned with tears she refused to shed.
How had it come to this? Only hours ago she was making love on a golf course with the man who made her feel like the most cherished, beautiful woman in the world. Now she was battling bees for what was left of her toiletries. Was there a part of her that secretly deemed her worthy of only drama and failure? She had stayed with Derek long past their relationship's expiration date. She was having trouble remembering why she married him. Had she gone to New York for adventure, or to try and watch over her sister, or for something else entirely? And what about her business? She had been so gung-ho when she started it. So much so, she curtailed all other activities to make it a success, then threw it all away to go back to Ohio.
"Heeeeyyy!" Zoey turned toward the sound coming from the highway.
Zoey squinted through the sun up the ditch. It was a woman, standing on the shoulder. At least it sounded like a woman. It was hard to tell. All she could make out for certain were a baseball cap and sunglasses. Her hands were planted on her hips. The backdrop, an eighteen-wheeler.
"You okay down there?" the figure asked.
"Yeah!" Zoey called back, hustling to gather up the rest of her things.
"Need any help?" Zoey's savior took a few steps in making her way down the embankment.
"No, I got it." Zoey zipped the suitcase closed and started dragging it back up the hill.
When Zoey reached the shoulder, she stood the suitcase up and brushed the dirt off her butt and the backs of her legs. She took a seat on the suitcase to catch her breath, finally able to take it all in. It was a woman, and a petite one at that. She was dressed in jeans and a tee shirt that upon closer inspection read keep calm and carry bacon. A woman after her own heart. The brunette hair under the cap was in a ponytail. She looked to be near to forty, with a cautious smile.
"Thanks for stopping," Zoey said, wiping the sweat off her brow with a dirty hand.
"I was driving by when I saw that guy make the throw. What a dick."
"Yeah. Soon-to-be ex-husbands can get pretty touchy."
"He's lucky I can't stop on a dime, or he would've been staring down the barrel of my forty-five. I got his plate number when he passed me before I turned around. You want me to call the cops?"
"Hell no," Zoey replied. "Believe it or not, this was the best-case scenario. With any luck, I'll never see him again. Ever."
"Well, all righty then. Come on, I'll give you a lift to the next rest stop. Name's Phyllis."
Phyllis motioned for Zoey to stand up, and she took the suitcase to store in the big rig's lower storage compartment. She was surprisingly strong for such a tiny woman.
"I'm Zoey. Thanks again." She knew about the dangers of accepting rides from strangers, but this was the kind of serendipitous moment that you don't take for granted.
Phyllis was not only strong, she was also wiry. While Zoey scaled the side of the truck cab like she was trying for an attempt at Mount Everest, Phyllis had already swung herself back in the saddle with the ease of a well-oiled spider monkey. She leaned way over and opened Zoey's door for her final heave-ho.
Zoey settled into the passenger seat, preparing to share space with a cloud of stale cigarette smoke, a slew of empty coffee cups, and stacks of lady porn.
But she was mostly wrong. The inside of Phyllis's cab was pristine and smelled like bubble gum. There was a cup of coffee in the cup holder, next to a liter bottle of water. Phyllis buckled her seat belt, cranked the mighty shifter into gear, and after checking that the coast was clear, the big rig jolted forward and they eased back into traffic.
"Where you headed?"
Phyllis had unwittingly asked the million-dollar question. Zoey didn't want to go to Cleveland. It wasn't just because of Derek either. Her parents would try to push her back into Derek's arms. In their eyes, marriage was for better or for worse with few exceptions. There was nothing for her back in New York either, other than a sister who had deceived her and the love she had stupidly cast aside.
"Honestly?" Zoey said. "I don't know."
"You're welcome to ride along with me for a spell. This load dumps in Detroit."
The Motor City. It was as good a place as any. "Thanks. I'm going to take you up on that, if you don't mind."
"I wouldn't've asked if I did."
From all the stereotypical things Zoey knew about truckers, Phyllis was supposed to be longing for company and conversation. But there was nothing typical about the woman who had come to her rescue. Phyllis wasn't chatty. Zoey couldn't even consider her as overly friendly. She had no interest in probing Zoey for details on how she ended up a damsel in distress. She kept her eyes on the road and her vibe screamed that she didn't suffer fools lightly. It was a safe assumption, considering she was willing to point a gun at Derek. That alone was reason enough for Zoey to like her.
"What made you want to be a truck driver?"
"I wanted to travel, but hate to fly. I figure, when I see everything there is to see here, then I'll bite that bullet."
Was her response designed to start the conversation, or end it? Zoey was too weary to analyze or worry that she needed to fill the dead air.
A Garth Brooks song began to play inside the cab, one of her mother's favorites. A random memory flashed in her head. Zoey and Ruth as children, in the backseat of their parents' minivan during countless road trips to various, usually historical family vacation destinations. The memory in question involved a trip to Williamsburg, Virginia. It was a game they played to kill time. Whenever they passed one of those big rigs, they would wait to see if the truck driver would look, then hold up one of their arms and pull it down repeatedly, a universal sign used as a request for the truck driver to sound the horn. The giggling that would result when the truck driver complied, the way they would stick their tongues out when they didn't. It was Garth on the radio when Zoey knew they had outgrown the game and Ruth switched to giving a one-finger salute to stone-faced drivers who dared to ignore them. Ruth and Derek really did have lots in common.
Ruth. Always making up her own rules, usually ruining the game for both of them in the process. The same Ruth who sided with Derek. It was more than she wanted to think about right now. Zoey opted for closing her eyes, and within minutes she was asleep.
Zoey was startled out of her nap by the sound of the truck's horn. It was a loud rapid beeping sequence, like the trucker's version of Morse code. Another truck, on the opposite side of the highway, began doing the same. It was a volley of deep, rowdy, ear-vibrating sounds that had her bolting upright in her seat. It was almost dark.
"Sorry," Phyllis said with a sideways glance. She flipped on the CB. "Nothing's wrong. That was my husband."
"You're married?" Zoey asked, still trying to gather her bearings out of the sleep cobweb.
"Yeah, he's my Bubba."
"His name is Bubba?"
"His name is Jeff." Phyllis gave a Zoey a smile. "Bubba is a little nickname that truckers call each other. Sometimes I call him Billy Big Rigger when I want to tick him off. He drives a route too. He's heading to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania."
It was the first real emotion she had displayed since picking Zoey up.
Suddenly the CB lit up and came alive. A man's deep voice rang in the cabin.
"Hey, little mamma. Is that a seat cover I saw in there?"
Phyllis pushed the button on the side of the microphone and laughed into it. "That's an affirmative. Glad to see you're wearing your glasses."
"I was getting worried about you, was afraid you got bit by a bear in the bushes. I expected to see you about an hour ago at the split."
"Yeah, I was helping a damsel in distress. Say hi to Zoey."
"Hi, Zoey." Jeff obediently complied.
She pushed the button and the microphone in Zoey's direction.
"Hi, Jeff."
"Keep an eye on my girl there. Make sure she's not having any shutter trouble."
"Okay," Zoey said, without having the slightest clue what she had agreed to.
Phyllis brought the CB handset back to her own mouth. "So, yeah, the only thing in the bushes for me today was a snake in a roller skate."
Zoey didn't need much clarification there. She had an excellent idea of just who the snake was.
"Bet you showed him a thing or two." Jeff added a laugh of his own.
"That's a negatory. Didn't get the chance."
"The Lord was with him today."
"Or the devil. How you doing, Bubba?"
"Had to mash the motor after some road-rager went greasy-side up. Had me brake-checking for miles. Luckily, the coop was all locked up so I saved some quality time. I'll make it to the yard tonight, but might miss the lumpers. I'll fingerprint that shit myself to get out of there."
"Flex those muscles, handsome. Me and seat cover here are going to pull into the next rest-a-ree-a and fill up on some go-go juice."
Zoey could hardly contain her glee at the exchange taking place. It was true, truckers did have a language all their own. She wasn't sure exactly what they were saying, but it was every bit as amusing as she'd hoped it would be. She was, however, pretty sure that she was the seat cover.
"Be careful they don't confuse you two for a couple of lot lizards."
Phyllis let loose a hearty laugh. "Fat chance. You be careful out there now, ya hear? This life ain't no fun without you."
The last thing Zoey heard, before Phyllis turned the CB off, was Jeff saying, "Love you, baby girl."
"That was amazing." Zoey giggled, completely enthralled.
Phyllis released a much more subdued laugh, shaking her head, and said with true affection, "He's been waiting for that since we knew we were going to pass each other. It makes his day when I play along. And he really gets off talking like that when he knows there's a captive audience. He's such a goofball. I only turn the radio on when I pass him, or I'm stuck in traffic."
"I figured you would have it on all the time."
"Honey, this is the twenty-first century. We use cell phones the same as everyone else."
"What the heck is a lot lizard?"
"A prostitute that works lined-up rigs at a rest stop."
"Oh," Zoey said. "They really have those?"
Phyllis graced Zoey with a look that translated her disbelief that a person could be so naive. "Yeah. They're also referred to as commercial company. Guy ones are called male buffalo."
Zoey may have been ignorant, but it didn't curtail her fascination. In fact, it added to it.
They exited at the ramp into the rest stop and slowly pulled into the lanes to get gas. Phyllis swung down from the cab to deal with the go-go juice. Zoey carefully got out to make a beeline for the bathroom on the other side of the parking lot, keeping an eye out for any sign of lot lizards on the way.
"How long have you two been married?" Zoey asked from her side of the table after they met up at the stop's main building and ordered some burgers and fries from the Burger King.
"Almost twenty years. Probably lasted that long 'cause of all the time apart."
"I guess absence makes the heart grow fonder?"
"It probably sounds unconventional to most folks. But it works for us."
"People need to mind their own business."
"Hallelujah, sister."
They finished eating and went back to the truck, where Phyllis took a nap and Zoey mostly kept watch for any sign of the activity Phyllis alluded to. It was a lizard- and buffalo-free night, and Zoey was mildly disappointed. As soon as Phyllis woke up two hours later, they were back on the road.
"I log a crap-ton of miles during the nighttime hours," Phyllis said.
* * *
Zoey stayed with Phyllis for three days, stopping at countless greasy spoons and truck stops along the way. They made for good traveling companions. Phyllis had an aversion to extraneous small talk, although she would swear a blue streak when reckless idiots cut her off. Jeff checked in with his wife several times a day, mostly by phone. It was heartwarming to see Phyllis's softer side during those conversations.
Zoey let her phone battery die and never bothered to recharge it. She had nothing to say. To anybody.
Zoey was finally able to hear herself think. During the days, she watched hundreds of miles of scenery fly by the passenger window. It was different from the road trips she had taken as a child. This time, there was no final destination to get excited about reaching, just miles of open road. She tried to associate it with where she was in her life. All her roads were open. Now she just had to choose one.
After they left Detroit, Zoey insisted on treating Phyllis to a night in a nice hotel, mostly because she was starting to get a backache from all the sleeping she did sitting up and she was desperate for a good shower. She got them separate but adjoining rooms, saying both of them were probably ready for a little privacy. Phyllis didn't argue.
They showered and met up to head down to the hotel's restaurant for a good meal. Zoey did a double take. Phyllis was dressed in a flowery sundress with a cropped jacket. Her hair was down around her shoulders in waves, and she had applied some lipstick. She looked adorable.
"I know." Phyllis grinned. "I clean up nice."
They sat over prime rib and a bottle of wine, both of them savoring a meal that wasn't fast food.
"I'm looking forward to getting home," Phyllis said during dessert. "I haven't been in the same room with Jeff in almost a month. That's not to say I'm not going to appreciate the hell out of that bed upstairs tonight."
"Do you ever get lonely?" Zoey replied.
Phyllis was thoughtful for a moment. "Sometimes. Not too often. I like my own company. And you know, there is a huge difference between being lonely and alone. Both serve a purpose. When you're alone, you can listen to what your heart really has to say without other people's opinions getting in the way. You just have to be strong enough to live your truth after you hear it. And you can be in a room full of people and still be lonely."
For a woman of few words, Phyllis really knew how to drive a point home. Zoey took the statement and reflected on how it applied to her own life. Was it a fear of loneliness that kept her with Derek as long as she did? After all, she didn't have to move to New York to get rid of him. She could've crossed the bridge and moved to Cleveland. But at the time, she just couldn't bear the thought of running into Derek and having him see her struggling.
And was it a fear of loneliness that kept her as Ruth's roommate? She knew the kind of life Ruth led. It was easier to wallow in disapproval than strike out on her own.
Which brought her to Tristan. It was likely she was so gung-ho about making him over because she projected her own fear of being lonely onto him. No, that wasn't true either. He may have started out alone, but it was clear he had gotten lonely. It's what made him reach out to her in the first place. Their backstories might have been different, but a lot of their motives were the same.
"I think I'm ready for you to drop me off," Zoey stated with conviction.
"Good," Phyllis replied with a grin. "Because I was getting ready to kick you out. I like you and all, but it's time to get back to your own way of life."
"Thanks for letting me ride along. I think I just needed the time to get my head on straight."
"Did it work?"
"I think it did."
"Where do you think you're going to land?"
Zoey was able to answer without hesitation. "New York City. I'm not sure if it's my final stop, but I have some apologies to make there. And a fight to have."
# Chapter 22
There was only one other time Zoey had forgotten to return a key. The night she met Tristan. There was no indecision about what she would do with the key she kept this time. After busing her way back to New York, she let herself in to lie in wait for Ruth. She weighed the possibility that tonight might turn out like that time in middle school when they both ended up with missing chunks of hair and temporary bald spots.
The apartment already looked different to her since she had left it. It was tidy. No dishes in the sink, no random garments on the floor. There wasn't a single piece of evidence that any partying had taken place.
Zoey plugged in her phone and turned it on while she waited. The only calls she had received during her sabbatical were job opportunities with deadlines that had passed. Figures. There were no texts at all.
Ruth came in, hours after she would've gotten off work. Blake was behind her.
"Zoe." Ruth showed little surprise at finding Zoey perched on the edge of her futon. "Where have you been?"
"Worried about me, were you?" Zoey replied. "I'm sure Derek called you the minute after he shot-put my suitcase."
Blake interjected with a judicial "You ladies have a lot to talk about, so I'm going to cut out." He gave Ruth a quick kiss. "Call me later."
"Derek did call and told me all about it. It gave me one more chance to call him a shit gibbon," Ruth said as she closed the door behind Blake. Then she asked, "If you didn't want to go with him, then why did you?"
"Who are you to question me when you need to explain why you told Derek to hurry up and get here?"
Ruth didn't try to mount a defense. "To get you to make a damn decision."
"How can I make one of those if you're busy sabotaging me? Your loyalty has always been with Derek! You've been meddling since the day I left him."
"Maybe it's time you took your own inventory. Nothing reeks of meddling and misguided loyalty more than your little experiment with Tristan."
"Leave Tristan out of this," Zoey growled. It was bad enough Ruth was right.
"Which, by the way, you weren't honest about _at all._ "
Ruth didn't seem angry, which succeeded in making Zoey all the more frenzied.
"What's the matter, afraid you were going to lose out on some action? Maybe you secretly harbored feelings for Derek all along too. I'll bet it was you who gave him my cell phone number in the first place."
Ruth refused to be baited. "You see what you're doing here, right? I'm not going to let you deflect your way into making this about me. Don't you think you owed it to yourself to see the best Derek had to offer and then make a move in any direction? Don't you think you owed it to Tristan?"
"I said leave Tristan out of this!" Zoey's guilt exploded out of her in a shout.
"You don't get to control this fight, Zoe, like you try to control everything and everyone else!"
"Control you? Don't make me laugh. I wish! I've spent the majority of my life cleaning up after all your messes!"
"Oh yeah? Well, if I'm the one who is so messed up, why are you the one who's homeless after picking all your shit up off the highway?"
The shouting stopped. Zoey's anger deflated and she wilted back onto the couch and dashed at the tears that suddenly threatened to roll down her cheeks. She wasn't just homeless, she also felt terribly alone. So much for Phyllis's theory.
"I didn't do what I did to hurt you, Zoe," Ruth said quietly, sitting down next to her. "But you know what I think? I think you get so involved with everyone else's life to avoid taking a risk with your own."
"Oh my gosh, you won the fight, isn't that enough? You have to kick me when I'm down?" Zoey jokingly sniffed.
Ruth wrapped a comforting arm around Zoey's shoulders. "I'm just trying to clear the air. Explain my motives. That is what you came here for, right?"
Zoey nodded weakly, not trusting herself to speak for fear of bawling.
"I never understood why you stuck with Derek as long as you did. I hated him. He's such a dog. I never told you, but he hit on me before you two got married. Who does that?"
"Believe it or not, I'm not the least bit surprised," Zoey said. She had never voiced her suspicions on that subject to Ruth. But Derek's wandering eye was common knowledge. If this was Ruth's idea of clean air, Zoey was going to need a gas mask.
"Everyone in town knew what a jerk he had turned into. But if he was your choice, that makes him family and I have to support you. And there's nothing wrong with that. Who am I to judge how two people navigate their relationship? I just tried to keep my distance from him and kept the lines of communication open with him to help you. And yes, it was me that gave Derek your cell phone number."
"You lied to me." Zoey wept.
"I did. And I'm sorry about that. But you kept harping about him pressuring you to start a family. I kept thinking, _That's just a smoke screen_. If you're so hell-bent on proving your point about your body being yours, then don't get pregnant. It really is as simple as that. There are only about a dozen ways to prevent pregnancy that don't require the man's participation. But it's not enough for you to just take control of your own life, you have to have some approval or recognition from other people in order to do it. I took all your waffling and excuses to mean that deep down you still cared for Derek."
"You're probably right," Zoey was forced to admit. "Not about my feelings for Derek, about the smoke screen. I wanted so much for him to be the person I initially fell in love with. Mom and Dad stuck together, grew together."
"It takes two people, working full-time at it, to make a relationship work. And Dad wasn't a hound dog. But their marriage isn't really our business, is it? You had finally come into your own with the cooking thing. You were seeing some real success. But every time you leaped forward, there was Derek, on the phone, making you take two steps back. I would've given anything for you to show Derek the door, so I made that judgment call. You needed to be pushed to decide, instead of hiding here."
"You did the exact same thing you accuse me of, you do realize that?"
"I do. That makes the score meddling Ruth one, Zoey a hundred."
"Well played," Zoey said. "Only your score is two. You also got Derek to drive up here."
"True. But I was sure once you saw that you were able to feel desirable again, it would give you the strength to finally show Derek the door. And I had no idea Derek was going to go full throttle in his attempt to make a good impression. He really should've been an actor. What an asshat."
They sat together in silence, Ruth's arm still across Zoey's shoulder. It was the first time that Zoey could recall feeling like the little sister. Overwhelmed, Zoey put her face in her hands and let the tears flow until they were little more than shuddering sobs. Her sister was the only person who she ever let see her cry. Ruth waited until Zoey was all cried out before speaking again.
"You changed a lot after Tristan entered the picture. You started being much more fun after meeting him. You two are way more alike, starting with being ethical, to a fault. At the very least, he got you to venture out of this apartment for something other than work."
Zoey picked her head up, not sure if her sister was just trying to lighten up the mood and get her to stop crying.
"Ugh. Tristan. I'm afraid I blew that one right out of the water."
"I was hoping that's where you'd been all this time. Hiding out at his place."
"No. I went to Detroit with a trucker named Phyllis."
Zoey had finally achieved the impossible. She had managed to shock her sister.
"Stop it," Ruth said, her eyebrows high in disbelief.
"No, it's true. She scraped me up off the highway. My guardian angel drives eighteen wheels and carries a loaded gun."
"I'm so disappointed. I wanted desperately to believe after you didn't come back here that it was because you guys had patched things up."
Zoey shook her head sadly. "A guy doesn't need to be a social guru to know breaking a relationship off in a text means it's really over."
Zoey had known all along that Tristan would do exactly what he did. He stepped aside. Maybe he was simply too gentle. But that didn't mean he deserved to be cast aside so callously.
"You are so good at being there for everyone else, maybe it's time you start doing for yourself. I don't know what happened between you two, but I do know you. I know you can live with whatever the outcome is if you try to make it right. And that is the last piece of advice I am going to give you."
They sealed their reconciliation with a hug and Zoey's vow to stay out of Ruth's affairs moving forward.
"I promise to keep my nose out of your business," she said. "But when disaster befalls you because of some dumb-ass decision, can I say I told you so?"
"Only if you're looking to start wearing dentures," Ruth replied with a squeeze and a laugh.
Zoey started to laugh as well, but she took Ruth's advice to heart.
"I see Blake hasn't gotten to all your rough edges yet."
"Of course he did. Maybe they're just the parts he likes best."
Zoey looked to Ruth for any sign that she was being tested in the art of minding her business. Ruth's subsequent grin confirmed she was.
"Which brings me to the in-other-news department. You're still homeless, unless you can afford the rent here on your own. Blake is convinced I'd make an excellent litigator. He talked me into going back to school and then law school. He offered to let me move in with him to save some money. I'm not about to show him my bank statement, but I still said yes."
Zoey couldn't believe her own ears. "Is this another test?"
Ruth smiled. "Afraid not. My party days are over, at least for the time being. Blake makes it sound pretty great. And who knows? Maybe I'll take domesticity on a test drive."
"Isn't this all a bit sudden?"
"I've kissed a lot of frogs, little sis. I know a prince when I see one. Now why don't you take a cab uptown and try to win back yours?"
# Chapter 23
As soon as the door opened, there was a brief spark of surprise in Tristan's eyes, then . . . nothing. She wasn't foolish enough to think he'd be happy to see her, but she wasn't prepared for him to look so aloof either.
"Tristan," Zoey said in a rush, in the unlikely event he was going to slam the door. "I had to come and apologize. Face-to-face."
"There's nothing for you to be sorry for," he replied, opening the door wider to let her in.
"There certainly is. Whether you are aware of it or not, breaking up with someone in a text message is about as low as a person can go."
He was working overtime to keep from meeting her eyes. "There was a lot going on. I could tell you were reeling."
Zoey knew he would be polite and understanding. His empathy was one of his most admirable traits. At this particular juncture, it was heartbreaking. She wanted to throw herself in his arms, kiss him until his lips turned blue, but she didn't dare. He was standoffish, rightly so. She had hurt him, and it was evident. "I wanted to try and explain. . . ."
Her words trailed off. All the rehearsing she had done on the way over was for naught after taking one look at him. There was no good explanation for what she had done, other than a knee-jerk reaction based on a mistaken sense of duty to a marriage that should've ended a long time ago.
"You don't have to explain why you went back to your husband," Tristan stated, turning his back on her and walking down the hall. "But I'd be lying if I said I didn't wonder what you're doing here now."
"After Derek tossed my stuff onto the highway, I took a little detour back to the city. Rode shotgun in a big rig for a couple states."
Tristan turned back to her again. His lips twitched into what was almost a smile. Maybe a touch of sympathy. Then he went back to aloof, turning on his heel without asking her anything further.
"It was a lady trucker, just so you know," she explained.
"Thanks for clearing that up," he said. Just when did he start applying sarcasm to his sentences? Zoey's heart sank. Her being here was only making it worse.
His apartment was spotless as always. Conspicuous by its absence was all of the Rock Band equipment in his living room. Further evidence that she had crushed him. She began to prattle in her effort to make amends.
"I knew inside of three hours after getting in a car with him that I had made an awful mistake. When Derek showed up clean and sober, I thought that I didn't have a choice. I stupidly felt that I had to hold up my end of the bargain. He had done everything I wanted. It wasn't until we were alone that I finally realized he hadn't changed at all. Not on the inside." The words sounded lame to her own ears.
"No, Zoey. You don't get to take all the blame. And that's not just me being noble either. If I hadn't held back on telling you how I felt about you, we could've spent that time cementing our relationship and you might have made a different choice."
His words were clipped, his tone biting. They had a distinct ring of finality to them. He wasn't going to accept her changing her mind. He didn't really go out of his way to accept her apology. He kept shuffling things around, refusing to look at her directly for more than a second. She had hurt him so badly he was back to his own version of solitary confinement.
But he hadn't asked her to leave, so there was still a glimmer of hope.
She followed Tristan to his library. One half of the room was stacks of full boxes and empty shelves. The other half, empty boxes to fill. He swept a handful of books off a shelf and began arranging them in the closest box.
When the books had been standing straight up, wedged together on the shelves, their spines looked sturdy, ageless. Upon closer inspection, many were weathered. Book covers and jackets had faded on some. Yellowed pages in danger of becoming unglued from fragile, brittle spines on others. They were similar to their owner, hiding their vulnerability beneath an exterior of even temperedness.
"You're getting rid of your library?"
"Yes. I don't know why I brought them." Tristan gave a half laugh. "They're turning out to be the most tedious part of my packing."
"You brought them because they hold your memories." The meaning behind his words were slow to register.
"You're right, there were many times they gave me comfort. I could've kept them at Paradise Cove. The place is just sitting there until I decide what to do. Now that I've made that decision, this seems like a pointless exercise."
"You're going back?"
"I can't stay here," he said wistfully.
"I'm so sorry. This is all my fault. If I hadn't intervened . . ."
"Oh no, Zoey. Don't look at it like that."
"Then tell me how to look at it," she pleaded. "Enlighten me."
He paused, and for a split second, his look softened. When he spoke again, his words were measured, nearly clinical. "My grandfather used to say, 'It's okay to quit any job, but you have to master it first.' It's easy to abandon something out of fear. But in doing so, you could be missing out on something spectacular. If you learn all you need to and still want to walk away, you're making an educated decision. When we met, I was paralyzed, terrified to take a step in any direction. Your friendship gave me the strength to take a chance. I'm glad I did."
"We turned out to be so much more than friends, Tristan." She could feel an anger starting to build at the way he was trying to sweep aside what had happened between them. "So now you're just going to pack it all in and call it quits?"
"Why not? It worked for you."
If his intention was to sting, he had succeeded. But at least he was showing signs of some spirit. And that he wasn't over her, not by a long shot.
"It most definitely did _not_ work for me. Why do you think I'm here?"
"To make amends? Ease a guilty conscience, maybe? Either way, you can relax. I'm not holding any ill will. I accept your apologies. Now that the matter is settled, I hope you don't mind showing yourself out. The movers are coming at the end of the week and I still haven't started packing up the kitchen."
The kitchen. The center of where their friendship, as well as their relationship, had started. Had he brought up the kitchen on purpose?
"I could stick around and help?" she offered.
"Not necessary." His reply was brusque and immediate.
Zoey was exhausted from trying to always stay one step ahead. But if there was one thing she had gotten good at, it was fighting. Despite all the things she had helped teach him, it was the one lesson she had neglected. Not anymore. She owed him that much. She owed it to herself.
"For the love of God, would you show some blasted emotion for once in your life?!?"
And to her surprise, he did. He slammed the books he was holding into the box and his voice rose with every word until he was near to shouting. "What would you like me to say, Zoey? That I loved you and you shattered my heart? Because you did. What you did to me was worse than the hooker in Vegas. You gained my trust. All of it. Then you tossed me aside, something you swore to me you wouldn't do. You told me your marriage was over but he shows up and you kicked me to the curb!"
When he was done with his rant, he was heaving. And though she was left stunned, she still wasn't finished. "Well, I didn't see you sticking around to fight for me!"
He had lowered his voice, was already back in control. With sorrowful eyes, he said, "I don't own you. I said I should leave and you let me. I was completely blindsided. Next thing I know, I'm getting a text that you're gone. How many times do I have to be kicked in the teeth?"
She wasn't as good a fighter as she thought. This made twice in one day that she had lost an argument with a single statement. The only difference here was, Zoey refused to let him see her cry.
"Tristan," she began, surprised by the shakiness in her voice. "I'm here now. I'm here because I love you. I love you for every single thing you are. Goofy clothes, bad hair, I adored it all. And I'm truly sorry I let the surprise at seeing Derek lead me into making a wrong decision. But I'm human and old habits die hard. I've spent a lifetime doing what I thought was expected of me. And I know you're hurt right now, but I refuse to believe that higher forces brought us together only to have this be the end."
With each heartfelt word she spoke, his eyes got glassier, and by the time she was finished, they were brimming with tears. She wanted to embrace him, but she didn't dare.
"I used to tell myself it was higher forces that brought us together too," he confessed, a single teardrop rolling down his cheek. "I wanted to change, prayed for it. Every move I tried to make only left me feeling more helpless, more afraid to trust. When I called you, I prayed that if I could just make one good friend, it would make all the difference. And when I felt an instant attraction to you, I got scared all over again. Because of you, and your willingness to help me, I was able to take those first steps out of the dark. How could I not forgive you? You saved me."
They had made such a muddle of things, all while trying to do the right thing.
"I guess when it comes to matters of the heart, truth is the right way to go. And if I was being brutally honest, I would've admitted I felt something shift the night we met too. How many times in your life are you lucky enough to meet someone who feels the same way you do? I wish I had told you how I felt when I started feeling it. I wish I hadn't tried to change you. I wish I had joined you. You were perfect the way you were. You still are."
"Oh no." He was quick to contradict. "I wouldn't have traded that experience for anything. I never felt so alive or laughed so hard as when you were introducing me to the world."
"Then can't we move past this? Can't you change your mind and stay?"
Tristan slowly shook his head, his eyes drinking her all in, filled with the need for her understanding. "I don't want to. I've experienced this life as much as I care to. It isn't for me. I want to go home."
"I get that," Zoey said, trying to curb the misery. Despite them baring their souls and the connection they had, it wasn't enough.
"I used to think my hasty departure from the island was to escape the ghosts of my grandparents. And Paradise Cove was indeed their dream. I never had to make it mine, but I felt an obligation to. I think I still do. And I love it there. I miss it. I'm so grateful to you for everything you did to show me the big city. I can make this decision with no regrets. I'm not missing anything, except the rat race."
"I get that too. It's the right call." Without realizing it, Zoey had begun to take books off the shelves and fill an empty box. An unconscious attempt to keep busy so that she wouldn't have to deal with how to move forward in her life without him. "None of it means I can't help you pack. Maybe we can share one last pizza."
"Lady, you've got yourself a deal."
They resumed packing up the books and the silence was comfortable, broken up sporadically when she discovered books she knew.
"Your grandmother really had a thing for Jackie Collins and Rosemary Rogers."
"Those were definitely her favorites."
Zoey struggled to keep the conversation light, when she longed to beg him to stay. He had made his decision and it was based on all the right reasons. To lay a guilt trip on him wouldn't be fair. He wasn't saying much either, a sign she took to mean he was having a difficult time as well. But she wanted to remember him confident and sure. She loved him enough to plaster on a brave face.
When she started with a fresh section of books, Zoey pulled one off the shelf and literally hugged it to her, before holding it out to show him.
" _The Joy of Cooking._ It's the first cookbook my parents gave me. I set it on fire by accident when I put it too close to the stove." She laughed at the memory while fanning the pages. "A pot boiled over and caused a flare-up and POOF! Singed pages soufflé."
When she looked at him again, Tristan was studying her. Zoey started to blush. She would miss that look and everything that came after it.
"What's the first thing you're going to do once you get back?" she said, to get her mind off it.
"Wow. I almost don't know where to start. Paradise Cove is going to undergo a complete remodel. I'm going to modernize it and reopen it as a luxury resort, maybe with a spa."
"That's pretty ambitious."
"I know! But if I can put people to work, that has to be a good thing, right?"
She couldn't hold back the sigh. How rare was a person who always thought about the good he could do? She wondered if he had any idea just how special he was.
"I was looking to hire someone to help with that," he continued. "A right-hand man, if you will. Only it doesn't have to be a guy. Someone with good organizational skills and attention to detail. And preferably who likes to cook."
His intention slowly dawned on her as he continued to stare. "I think I know someone who fits that bill."
He gave her a grin and a wink, which was all she needed to rush to him, in perfect timing with the opening of his arms to welcome her back into them. His mouth crashed down onto hers and his arms wrapped around her.
"What the hell took you so long to ask?" she scolded him when he finally let her up for air.
"My finesse needs work. And I didn't want to pressure you. And as soon as you walked through the door, I had made up my mind you were coming with me, even if I had to kidnap you."
"Gotta love those higher forces at work." She kissed him again. Nothing would ever feel as good as being in his arms.
"With you by my side, I feel like I could conquer the world and at the same time no longer need to."
"Isn't it funny how those things work?"
He started to sway side to side with her still tightly in his grasp. "I can't wait to spend all our days and nights together, dancing and playing Rock Band. Maybe smoking some pot."
"You're getting a little more modern every day." She allowed him to dance her around the library floor until they were both dizzy from the twirling, and the joy.
He continued to hold her close and stared down into her jubilant eyes, brushing the hair off her forehead.
"I will love you forever, Zoey. You're my one. My only."
Zoey thought she might start to swoon. Before he could recapture her mouth with his, a frown began to furrow her brow. One he noticed immediately.
"What's the matter?"
"There's still my feelings about starting a family. I love you so much, but that hasn't changed. I can't promise that it ever will."
Tristan set her at arm's length and gave her a tender smile. Then he let her go and struck a perfect Steven Tyler pose. "A baby would cramp my vicious style."
She giggled, and his smile got wide. Then he returned to being serious. He slid closer to her and brushed his knuckles across her cheek before gently tilting her chin up to meet his penetrating gaze.
"Zoey," he said reassuringly. "I've said it before, it's your body, your baby. Between the work that I do and all you did to enlighten me, I've seen enough of this world to make a valid argument for either side. As long as I have you, I have everything I need."
In the end, it was Tristan who taught Zoey the most important lessons. About what love really looked like and how it was supposed to be shown. It was the unwavering, unflinching ability to support a partner throughout their changes. Or no changes at all.
# Epilogue
One year later . . .
It was the easterly trade winds that allowed the breezes in St. Croix to blow cool and kept the humidity low. On the return from her morning walk on the beach, Zoey turned her face toward them.
They had been there only a week before she had drawn two conclusions. Tristan must have been in the darkest stages of grief when he left this beautiful oasis with its sweeping vistas and tropical waters that came in every color blue she could imagine. And she didn't care if the cold never nipped at her ears or nose again.
The island wasn't the desolate place she first imagined when he told her about it. It had all the comforts of the mainland, including a Kmart and an OfficeMax. But as they got closer to the property, it was easy to see why Tristan had grown up so isolated. It was quiet and secluded. She could see no reason why his grandparents would ever have wanted to leave it.
When they first arrived, Paradise Cove was in a minor state of disrepair. The people Tristan paid to watch over the place did their best. But it was already weathered when he left, and without a steady stream of funds, the maintenance was minimal. Zoey thought about those first nights they spent chasing out geckos that scurried across the tile floors after taking up residence in the cupboards and closets. Not quite as amusing was the mongoose she found in a bathtub. But her hero assured her that it was more scared of her, and she believed him.
Tristan spent their first night showing her around St. Croix, and then the two of them hit the ground running. Within days of their arrival, a contractor he had hired from the mainland arrived, and not long after that, local workers appeared every day, ready to get to work. There were times Zoey was certain Tristan was employing every able-bodied worker in town.
They worked hard as well. Side by side and room by room, they revitalized every square inch of his grandparents' legacy, careful to preserve the intimacy that drew them to the place to begin with. Except the kitchen, which Tristan insisted be upgraded with every modern convenience imaginable until the original structure was unrecognizable and the only part left intact was the original frame. Tristan wanted the new kitchen to be a place for people to gather, not merely someplace to cook food to be carried off to another room. Zoey couldn't agree more. She had always said old habits were hard to break. As soon as the kitchen was fully functional, they were cooking for all the people who helped work on the house.
In those early days before the workers arrived and the big house was constantly abuzz, Zoey lovingly roamed the premises in search of the spirits of his grandparents, a sign telling her they approved of her being there. She imagined her husband as a boy, running up and down the halls and splashing in the nearby surf. A young lad in Bermuda shorts with tanned limbs, and hair just a tad too long. The kind his grandfather would always say needed to be cut.
They had married, in a simple ceremony performed by a local judge on a palm-fringed beach exactly three months after they arrived. Two weeks earlier, her divorce decree from Derek arrived via FedEx. She never had the misfortune of having to deal with Derek again after he left her on the side of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Whether it was that he didn't care or that Tristan's lawyer scared him into signing the papers, she would never know. Tristan secretly had a magnificent gazebo built during the eight-day waiting period for their marriage license.
"Money talks," he reminded her with a grin, not sounding the least bit guilty for abusing his position.
Now Paradise Cove was all but finished, but the idea of filling it with tourists had lost its luster. They attributed that change of heart to being newlyweds. In December, Tristan spent his half hour doing keystrokes on his program and by January he didn't need to worry about customers again.
Zoey suggested that they run Paradise Cove the same way his grandparents had, by keeping it open for people they knew and loved. When he reminded her that he didn't really know anybody, she lovingly reminded him that she had five siblings and he better get ready to be known.
Tristan gave Zoey a few more golf lessons. They used better discretion, but she would talk so dirty to him when he tried to instruct her, they still had yet to make it past the sixth hole.
As Zoey neared the house, she could hear the familiar sound of Aerosmith blasting. Tristan was enjoying his morning session of Rock Band, before guests started to arrive and things got hectic. She quickened her pace to get inside, hoping she wasn't too late. Tristan had long since abandoned his leather pants, citing the heat. That didn't hinder her desire to watch him put on the show, since now he did all his concerts shirtless. His golden tan and rippling muscles more than made up for it. He had let his hair grow longer again, which added to the overall rock star vibe.
She dashed past the artwork that adorned the hallways, still taking a second to appreciate her favorites, and found him in the great room, guitar in hand, whammy bar being shaken hard enough to break. He was biting into his lower lip, his face twisted in rock-'n'-rolling concentration. She stood as close as she could without him noticing her and watched, wondering for the umpteenth time just how she managed to get so lucky. She fisted sweaty palms against the skirt of her cotton sundress and enjoyed the familiar tingle that coursed through her.
As if he could feel her presence in the room, as soon as the song was over, he stopped and turned in her direction. He put down the guitar and smiled his way over to where she stood to give her a proper kiss.
"Good morning, Mrs. Malloy. You ready for some breakfast?"
He never did settle on a personal term of endearment to call her and she found out that the only thing better than hearing him call her Zoey was the way he had taken to addressing her since they wed.
They walked together arm in arm to their marvelous kitchen. Zoey pulled a plate of mangoes, papaya, and banana figs out of the fridge, but wrinkled her nose when he asked her if she wanted eggs. Tristan didn't press her and pulled a box of Lucky Charms out of the pantry, setting it in front of her where she had taken a seat at the island. It was her current obsession, consuming bowls of it a day, sometimes pulling handfuls right out of the box.
"How about some cheese?" he asked. "A little bit of protein wouldn't be a bad thing. We've got a long day ahead."
"Swiss sounds good." She brightened at the thought and popped a chunk of mango into his mouth as he passed her.
"You ready for today?"
Zoey laughed. "I know most of these people. I think the better question is, are _you_ ready?"
"As ready as I'm going to get. Do you think they'll like me?"
"Ruth and Blake have been singing your praises since the last time they were here. They're not just going to like you. They are going to love you. But not nearly as much as I do."
He rattled off his checklist. "The caterers will be here at ten to start setting up. Flowers show up at eleven. Your parents, brothers, and sisters arrive at noon and Blake's mother at two. The bride, groom, and best man get in at four thirty, and I've got the cars ready to pick them all up. The maid of honor, of course, is already here."
He stopped to give her one of his sexy wink-smile combos and added, "So is the flower girl."
Zoey caressed her still mostly flat belly. "Excuse me, this could very well be the ring bearer."
"I can't wait to find out," he said, moving closer and placing his hand over hers. "You feeling okay?"
She smiled warmly. "Never better."
Higher forces and self-preservation are powerful things, Zoey had come to realize with a shock. After a spontaneous, mutually wild night when passion overruled protection, and as her cycle got later and her symptoms began to show, she didn't fill with dread, like she had been so sure she would. She filled with indescribable wonder. But her views had started shifting long before then. There was so much beauty here, so much peace and joy, she thought it was a shame to waste it. When she told Tristan the news after having her suspicions confirmed, he curtailed any real excitement and instead sincerely started weighing their options, including his getting a vasectomy.
"If you want to stop at one, I can make sure you don't have to face this kind of decision again," he said, holding her gently in his arms, as if she'd suddenly become fragile.
It brought her to tears. There wasn't a selfish bone in his body. A piece of his beautiful soul was already growing inside her, and there was only one thing she wanted to do.
"We don't need to think about that right now," she told him with shiny, red-rimmed eyes they both blamed on hormones. "And on the bright side, for the next six or seven months, we can have all the unprotected sex we want."
"Yay! Unprotected sex!" He whooped, kissing her tummy then lowering his voice. "Good morning, little one."
They'd been having unprotected sex daily and he'd been doting on her ever since, something she didn't think was possible. He was already a first-class doter.
That day and that revelation struck her like a bolt of lightning. Her worries about having children were just another self-erected roadblock to detour her away from the path she was destined to travel. The path that led her to Tristan. And Tristan was her home.
# About the Author
**STEPHANIE EVANOVICH** is a full-fledged Jersey girl who attended New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts, performed with several improv troupes, and acted in a few small-budget movies, all in preparation for the greatest job she ever had: raising her two sons. Now a full-time writer, she's an avid sports fan who holds a black belt in tae kwon do.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
# Also by Stephanie Evanovich
* _Big Girl Panties_
* _The Sweet Spot_
* _The Total Package_
# Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
under the table. Copyright © 2019 by Stephanie Evanovich. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
first edition
_Cover design by Elsie Lyons_
_Cover photographs © Evgeniia Trushkova/Shutterstock_
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for.
Digital Edition APRIL 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-241593-6
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-241592-9
# About the Publisher
Australia
HarperCollins Publishers Australia Pty. Ltd.
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Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia
www.harpercollins.com.au
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HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
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United States
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www.harpercollins.com
|
This invention is concerned with the production of titanium dioxide which is characterized by recovery of reusable H.sub.2 SO.sub.4, high pure Fe oxide and hydroxide and fractional recovery of Mn, V and Cr, etc., from FeSO.sub.4.nH.sub.2 O and waste acid of 20 - 40% H.sub.2 SO.sub.4 containing abundant heavy metallic ions, which are by-products of the production of TiO.sub.2 by dissolution of Ti raw materials, such as, ilmenite, steel production slag, such as, electric furnace slag, convertor slag with H.sub.2 SO.sub.4.
In the conventional production of TiO.sub.2 using H.sub.2 SO.sub.4, the required amount of 98% H.sub.2 SO.sub.4 per 1 ton of TiO.sub.2 product is 3.5 to 4.2 tons. Nevertheless, an economical treatment of FeSO.sub.4.nH.sub.2 O and waste acids produced in abundance as by-products after the separation of Ti compounds by the hydrolysis process has not been found and the practice of retaining or discarding them in the untreated form has given rise to serious pollution problems. This invention has been developed to overcome the faults of the conventional production process described above. |
Salient region detection for stereoscopic images In this paper, we propose an effective saliency model, which combines region-level depth, color and spatial information, to detect salient regions in stereoscopic images. Based on region segmentation results of stereoscopic images, depth contrast, depth weighted color contrast, and spatial compactness of color distribution are measured for each region, and combined to generate the region-level saliency map. Experimental results on a public stereoscopic image dataset with ground truths of salient objects demonstrate that the proposed saliency model outperforms the state-of-the-art saliency models. |
"""
examples.dash
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Create DASH streams and manifest
:copyright: (c) 2020 by <NAME>.
:website: https://www.aminyazdanpanah.com
:email: <EMAIL>
:license: MIT, see LICENSE for more details.
"""
import argparse
import datetime
import sys
import logging
import ffmpeg_streaming
from ffmpeg_streaming import Formats
logging.basicConfig(filename='streaming.log', level=logging.NOTSET, format='[%(asctime)s] %(levelname)s: %(message)s')
def monitor(ffmpeg, duration, time_, time_left, process):
"""
Handling proccess.
Examples:
1. Logging or printing ffmpeg command
logging.info(ffmpeg) or print(ffmpeg)
2. Handling Process object
if "something happened":
process.terminate()
3. Email someone to inform about the time of finishing process
if time_left > 3600 and not already_send: # if it takes more than one hour and you have not emailed them already
ready_time = time_left + time.time()
Email.send(
email='<EMAIL>',
subject='Your video will be ready by %s' % datetime.timedelta(seconds=ready_time),
message='Your video takes more than %s hour(s) ...' % round(time_left / 3600)
)
already_send = True
4. Create a socket connection and show a progress bar(or other parameters) to your users
Socket.broadcast(
address=127.0.0.1
port=5050
data={
percentage = per,
time_left = datetime.timedelta(seconds=int(time_left))
}
)
:param ffmpeg: ffmpeg command line
:param duration: duration of the video
:param time_: current time of transcoded video
:param time_left: seconds left to finish the video process
:param process: subprocess object
:return: None
"""
per = round(time_ / duration * 100)
sys.stdout.write(
"\rTranscoding...(%s%%) %s left [%s%s]" %
(per, datetime.timedelta(seconds=int(time_left)), '#' * per, '-' * (100 - per))
)
sys.stdout.flush()
def main():
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument('-i', '--input', required=True, help='The path to the video file (required).')
parser.add_argument('-o', '--output', default=None, help='The output to write files.')
parser.add_argument('-hls', '--hls_output', default=False, help='publish hls playlists')
args = parser.parse_args()
video = ffmpeg_streaming.input(args.input)
dash = video.dash(Formats.h264())
dash.auto_generate_representations()
if args.hls_output:
dash.generate_hls_playlist()
dash.output(args.output, monitor=monitor)
if __name__ == "__main__":
sys.exit(main())
|
Safe surgical hip dislocation for acetabular osteoid osteoma excision Excision of acetabular osteoid osteoma is technically difficult. We report osteoid osteoma of the quadrilateral plate in a 9-year-old girl who presented to us with persistent nocturnal pain, limp and restricted hip joint movement. The child was investigated with CT scan, MRI and triple-phase bone scan. The 0.7cm nidus was located in the central portion of the cancellous bone in the quadrilateral plate, 1.94cm inferior to the triradiate cartilage. The child was operated on through the safe surgical dislocation of the left hip. The location of the lesion was gauged from the preoperative CT scan measurement data and intraoperative fluoroscopic aid. The nidus with a sclerotic rim was burred down completely. Postoperative X-ray and CT scan revealed complete excision of the tumour, and the patient was pain-free. At 18 months follow-up, the patient is completely asymptomatic and walking normally. |
. BACKGROUND Recently, the oral allergy syndrome (OAS) has been classified according to the foods that induce it: phenotype I, when it is caused only by plant-derived foods; phenotype II, when it is caused by foods of both animal and plant origin. OBJECTIVE To determine the prevalence of OAS in late teenagers according to the new classification. METHODS A cross-sectional study in which data from 1,992 teenagers, aged 15-18 year-old, was analyzed; the information was obtained through a structured questionnaire, where questions were asked about oral symptoms according to the type of food that had been ingested. RESULTS The overall prevalence of OAS was of 1.7% (95% CI = 1.2-2.4); for phenotype I, it was of 0.85% and, for phenotype II, it was of 0.85%. According to the phenotype, there was no difference by sex and personal history of atopic disease; instead, the onset time of the symptoms did show an association with the phenotype (p = 0.048). The frequency of skin and mucosal symptoms and respiratory ailments differed between the groups. Regarding gastrointestinal symptoms, diarrhea was markedly more frequent in phenotype II (p = 0.044). CONCLUSION Two phenotypes with OAS were clearly identified: the first one was associated exclusively to foods of plant origin, and the other was related to foods of both plant and animal origin. |
Recognition of unvoiced stops from their time-frequency representation The recognition of the unvoiced stop sounds /k/, /p/ and /t/ in a speech signal is an interesting problem, due to the irregular, aperiodic, nonstationary nature of the corresponding signals. Their spotting is much easier, however, thanks to the characteristic silence interval they include. Classification of these three phonemes is proposed, based on the patterns extracted from their time-frequency representation. This is possible because the different articulation points of /k/, /p/ and /t/ are reflected into distinct patterns of evolution of their spectral contents with time. These patterns can be obtained by suitable time-frequency analysis, and then used for classification. The Wigner distribution of the unvoiced stop signals, appropriately smoothed and subsampled, is proposed as the basic classification pattern. Finally, for the classification step, the learning vector quantization (LVQ) classifier of Kohonen is employed on a set of unvoiced stop signals extracted from the TIMIT speech database, with encouraging results under context- and speaker-independent testing conditions. |
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