Lake of Fire (15 page)

“My sources didn’t know then that Falls would make an offer. He’s making it sound like you don’t know a thing about managing a hotel.”

“Did you tell them … ?”

“Of course I told them about the Excalibur.” Edgar’s voice rose, and Cord was glad there were no other customers in the shop.

He thought of driving up Temple Square in a four-in-hand, amid the streetcars and clouds of dust in Salt Lake City. Pulling up under the porte cochere that accommodated at least a dozen carriages, while the liveried doorman made order out of chaos. Inside, the tall marble lobby of the Excalibur would have echoed save for the fine rugs and tapestries strategically placed to mute the voices of hundreds of travelers.

The pride Cord felt in owning half of the finest hotel in Salt Lake City had palled lately with the realization that the business was not big enough for both him and his adopted brother, Thomas Bryce. Cord loved Thomas’s father, Aaron—Cord’s father now, too—the man who had taken in a young refugee of the Nez Perce War and treated him as his own. But Thomas, a fervent Mormon who stored food against the apocalypse and kept his plain-looking wife, Anna, constantly pregnant, had never approved of anything Cord did, from the day he arrived in the big town house in rags.

Though Excalibur was Cord’s creation, the banks had refused to loan money to a man who was one-quarter Nez Perce. Therefore, the hotel officially resided in the name of Thomas Bryce, a fact that filled Cord with more bitterness and humiliation each day.

The barber approached with a warm towel in his hands. His chocolate-colored face wore the blank, thousand-yard stare that Cord had taught his hotel employees signified a good servant.

“Cut it short and shave all but the mustache,” Cord instructed politely. It would make the scar on his face more prominent, but he wanted to appear as well groomed as possible.

“I’m thinking of growing one.” Edgar fingered his clean-shaven upper lip. “Maybe it would make me look older.”

Cord ignored him, still seething at the news he had competition.

“I needed you here days ago.” Edgar tapped his leather boot on the foot rail of the barber chair.

Preoccupied, Cord let the truth slip out. “I’d have been here sooner, but I met a woman on the road who needed help.”

“You were a fool for letting anything slow you down getting here.”

As Cord exited the barbershop, he almost ran into a statuesque older woman with too-black hair and a
Spanish hair comb set with fake glass rubies. “Pardon me,” he murmured.

Rather than move aside, she blocked his path, her blue eyes evaluating him.

From that familiar expression, he recognized her.

Though the eligible girls of Salt Lake stayed out of his way at their mother’s behest, the women who overnighted at the Excalibur were another story. He’d lost count of how many times he’d been offered a few hours’ dalliance.

“Mrs. Giles.” He kept his voice neutral. Esther Giles had taken it particularly hard when he’d indicated no interest in helping her cuckold her older husband, Harold.

“I beg your pardon?” Her expression turned frosty, and she sidestepped him, heading for the stairs to the upper floors.

The woman knew damn well who he was. Especially after he’d forcibly unwrapped her arms from around his waist in the Excalibur serving pantry. She’d followed him there and ambushed him while he waited to discuss the week’s menu with the head cook and Thomas Bryce.

As soon as he’d set her aside, he had wished he’d not reacted violently. But she was older, married, and her sly overtures repulsed him.

“Who needs you, then?” Before he had realized what she was about to do, her hand came out of left field and cracked smartly across his cheek.

“Hold there.” Thomas had grabbed Cord’s arms
and held them at his sides. “What’s all this?”

Cord, who had not raised a finger to retaliate, almost fought free of his brother’s grip. But before he could, Esther Giles, with a face as scarlet as her satin blouse, slipped past Thomas through the door.

“What were you doing to her?” Thomas demanded.

Cord flexed his arms and was free. “Nothing.”

Thomas, staid and pompous, sniffed. “A woman doesn’t strike a man like that unless he has behaved like a savage.”

I
s there any word on your young man?” Laura fumed while her father bent solicitously toward Constance. He dug into the pocket of his too-tight vest for a Havana Rosa Bouquet, put a match to the cigar, and blew a wreath of smoke.

Constance lifted her chin. “William should have been here days ago.”

Even with her obvious distress, she looked resplendent in blue satin with bands of darker velvet at her wrists and neck. She placed her small hand on her uncle’s sleeve and stretched on tiptoe to kiss him on the place where his forehead and bald spot met.

Forrest patted Constance’s arm. “May I get you a glass of sherry?” Too late, he included his daughter by sending an inquisitive look her way.

Laura set her jaw, half-surprised he didn’t ask her to fetch their drinks.

“I’ll take care of your daughter, Forrest.” Hank
Falls appeared at her elbow, his blond hair slicked back. “You look lovely this evening.”

His gaze swept over Laura, clad in Constance’s green-and-white striped dress. The sweeping skirt was newly trimmed at the bottom with rows of black braid to make it long enough. Though Constance’s figure was more full, her feet were tiny. Thankfully, Laura and Aunt Fanny were the same shoe size, so a pair of the older woman’s satin slippers peeked from beneath the hem.

His perusal complete, Hank took Laura’s fingers in his. Instead of air kissing above the back, as style would have it, he turned her wrist and kissed her palm, letting his lips linger too long.

Laura pulled her hand away and darted a glance at her father to see if he’d noted Hank’s familiarity. He was again inquiring about Constance’s missing betrothed.

Everyone seemed to have accepted Laura’s safe arrival as she related, a simple uneventful journey … back in her place as “dutiful” daughter, niece, and cousin, just plain Laura who always did what was expected of her. Traveling with Cord had made her realize she was truly unhappy in her role as mistress of Fielding House.

Well, perhaps she had known, or she would not have canceled her Northern Pacific train ticket and taken the southern route with its necessity of traveling by stage. Her gaze went to the window and the lake. Inside the lobby, all was formal, proper, gentry with
the trappings of civilization. What if she told the assembled company about Angus Spiner’s blood on the snow?

“Miss Fielding?” Hank looked toward the bar. “Will it be sherry?”

She remembered Cord’s flask. “I’d like a glass of bourbon.”

“We have ice, cut from the lake during the spring.”

“Neat.”

Hank raised a pale brow. “I like a woman who knows what she wants.”

Laura looked away from his direct gaze.

Across the lobby, two men stood outside the barbershop. She passed over the shorter, younger one, with curling brown hair, to the more striking fellow. Tall and trim, he wore an expensive-looking black suit; his freshly cut ebony hair waved above his brow. Cleanshaven save for a sleek mustache, he had a whitened scar that slashed from the corner of his mouth up across his cheek. Despite his handsome profile, the three-inch stripe of pale flesh made him look dangerous.

He turned his head; sharp blue eyes roved over the crowded room. For a heartbeat, Laura thought he looked right at her, but his gaze moved on smoothly to her cousin.

That was nothing new, men were usually drawn to Constance, but her pulse began to pound. A moment later, she knew there was no mistaking it.

“William!” shrieked a woman across the lobby.

With a shock, Cord discovered that Constance Devon was just as lushly lovely as she had been in St. Paul, sparkling at him from across the floor. He left Edgar behind and cut a path through the guests enjoying the cocktail hour.

Surrounded as Constance was by a group that included her mother, Cord did not embrace her, but bowed from the waist.

Ignoring his formality, she lunged at him. Plump arms went around his neck and drew him down for a kiss the like of which they had never shared in St. Paul’s spring gardens. Her full lips clung to his.

It should have been the ultimate greeting for two people who yearned to be reunited, and perhaps it was for her. As soon as he could, Cord straightened to greet her mother, Fanny, who looked at him with familiar violet eyes and a subtle boldness he believed was not for herself but to advance her daughter’s position.

Constance clung to Cord’s arm. Her sleek, satin-covered bosom grazed his sleeve. “Where have you been? I’ve worried so.”

Cord set his teeth against the memory of Laura. “I asked for you at the desk this morning. They said you weren’t here.”

“That must be because we’re in Uncle Forrest’s suite.” She tugged at Cord’s sleeve, her face turned up. “You remember I told you about my cousin in Chicago?”

He didn’t, but turned to accept an introduction.
In the hubbub of Constance’s greeting, he hadn’t noticed the other woman who stood a few feet back.

The instant he looked at her, blood rushed to his cheeks. Green eyes glared at him from a sunburned face that managed to seem drained of all color.

“This is Laura,” Constance burbled.

He could barely hear through the roaring in his ears. Constance’s cousin, in the Lake Hotel lobby dressed for dinner.

“William?” Soft, but with steel in her tone. She gripped a glass of amber liquor so tightly her fingers whitened.

He bowed again. “William Cordon Sutton, at your service, miss.” He hoped she’d accept his cue and pretend, at least for the moment, that they had not met.

“Sir.” Laura extended her free hand.

He took it, feeling her fingers tremble. He hesitated and settled for a handshake, as though she were a business associate. She rewarded him with a faintly mocking look that suggested he was a coward for not kissing her hand.

Cord bit off telling her how beautiful she was, with her tawny hair piled on top of her head, faceted green glass drops at her ears, and black velvet rimming the neckline that accentuated her slender shoulders.

“So you are going to marry my cousin,” Laura said.

“I beg your pardon?” He’d proffered the garnet ring to Constance as a simple gift … asked her to meet him here in the park as a trial, to see if they were suited
once she saw his land. Above all, he had never in so many words asked Constance Devon to be his wife.

Constance reacquired her grip on Cord’s arm.

“You’re Sutton.” The sharp voice came from the tall, thin man Cord had already noticed watching him. He stopped himself from offering his hand in time, as the man closed both of his onto Laura’s elbows.

Everything was out of whack, as Constance hung on him and he wanted to smash this fellow’s face for touching Laura. “And you are?”

“Hank Falls. I built the Lake Hotel, and I’m the manager.” His thin-lipped smile verged on a sneer.

Cord knew he’d really hit bottom when Falls indicated a stout and balding man nearby. “This is my backer, Miss Fielding’s father, Forrest.”