Lake of Fire (20 page)

Not needing any trouble of his own, Cord almost turned away into the night.

Behind him, he heard a female voice. “But it’s too bad about that woman … his mother.”

Before Cord could change his mind, he strode toward the tipi his mother’s brother had entered. He drew back the flap and found the tent empty.

D
own toward the lake, it was dark and quiet. Cord half-slid down the fifteen-foot bluff to the beach and watched waves slap the shore.

Though he’d made a cursory search near the Wylie Camp, he had not been able to detect which way Bitter Waters had gone. The tipi was obviously a stage prop rather than the place he slept.

Perhaps it was for the best that Cord had not confronted Bitter Waters this evening. What would he have said to the man who brought about his parents’ death and destroyed his one true home? Though adopted by one of Salt Lake City’s most prominent families, Cord had never felt the sense of peace he’d experienced each night in his parents’ cabin.

When Franklin Sutton was not panning or digging, he had spent a lot of time “in the field.” Evenings he would turn up the lamp, bring out pen and ink, and make notes and drawings in a leather-bound book.
Cord would climb onto a chair next to him and gaze at fascinating images, cross sections of rocks that had been folded or faulted.

When Cord was older, his father was going to take him to see Yellowstone’s geological wonders: great waterfalls tumbling over cliffs, glacier-carved valleys, and geysers greater than the fountains in Franklin’s books showing London, Paris, and Washington, D.C.—the capitals they’d also visit.

Tears stung Cord’s eyes, while the white-capped waves of the lake blurred. What was the use of thinking back? He had taught himself through the years to keep his past locked up.

Bending, he chose a flat stone to skip across the water. The rocky beach reminded him of being on the point with Laura, where they had fished together.

Taking Constance into the stable this morning had been a test of his feelings. He knew the dark and quiet would permit them to renew their association in a way that would answer any question about which cousin he favored.

How he’d dreamed of Constance, a shining symbol of all that was unattainable to him. Her exquisite porcelain skin against his own bronze, the way her black hair shimmered like his mother’s. The dream had been worth having.

Until he met her cousin.

Cord cast the stone into the lake and climbed the hill with swift strides.

The hotel lobby and dining room were ablaze with
lights. Through the open doors, he heard the orchestra tuning up. Going closer, he saw the after-dinner crowd waiting for dance music.

Near the fireplace, Esther Giles smiled up at Hank Falls, her hand on his arm. He gave an answering smile and a nod … and moved away as an older man Cord recognized as her husband, Harold, approached.

The orchestra swept into “There Is Only One Girl in the World for Me,” a hit song from about three years ago. Couples formed, and the dance floor became a swirl.

Laura stood alone beside a wooden pillar, her hands clasped in front of her. She watched the dancers with the eager sparkle of a child, but the teal taffeta dress she wore accentuated a woman’s slender curves.

Cord strode toward the lobby door.

“May I have this dance?”

The voice of Sergeant Larry Nevers startled Laura, who had been waiting for a glimpse of Cord.

When she didn’t reply, he went on, “You did promise me a whirl.”

She looked up into his bespectacled face. With his blue dress uniform and neatly combed brown hair, he looked more presentable than he had when she’d spoken to him earlier. His hand extended, his manner was formal like all of the army officers who made sure no female guest sat out a round.

“Certainly, we shall dance,” Laura agreed in a pleasant tone.

Nevers drew her onto the floor, one hand at her waist. Right away, his lack of rhythm began to wreak havoc upon their steps.

“Do you ride, Miss Fielding?” he asked.

“Quite passably,” she allowed, thinking of a certain spirited black stallion.

“Then perhaps you might favor me with the pleasure of your company on an afternoon ride?” He sounded nervous. “There is a quite a nice filly from the bloodlines of the Nez Perce, a new addition to the military stable, that I believe you might enjoy. White Bird is a much better piece of horseflesh than the nags they usually rent to tourists.”

“She sounds very nice, Sergeant.”

“Larry.” He cleared his throat. “Tomorrow afternoon? I could stop for you in the dining room after lunch.”

Laura considered. His eager attention made her feel better about herself after seeing her cousin in Cord’s arms this morning. “I will try to borrow some appropriate clothes.”

Knowing Constance’s fear of horses, she could only hope Aunt Fanny had come west prepared to do some riding as she did weekly in Chicago.

The orchestra swept into another tune. Though some couples left the floor, Larry kept up his dogged rhythm. Laura tried to follow, her lips curving in a smile. She had been on the receiving end of this kind
of admiration before.

“Have you been long in the park, Sergeant?”

“Larry.”

“Have you been long in the park, Larry?”

His pleasant countenance darkened.

Ordinarily, she would not have pursued an inquiry, but with her father’s bank about to invest in a park hotel and Cord opposing him, she looked up at Larry. “What’s wrong?”

“For a start, the officer in charge while we wait for our new commandant. George Goode can’t get here soon enough.”

“What’s the trouble with the man in charge?”

A muscle in Larry’s jaw worked; she saw the boy beneath the soldier’s brass. “Captain Feddors is what you would call a martinet. He is drunk, not on the alcohol he abhors, but on power.”

“Aren’t there other officers in the park?”

“There’s Lieutenant Stafford, the superintendent’s second-in-command.” He nodded toward a mustachioed man with a deeply tanned face, brown hair, and incongruous pale gray eyes. Stafford was laughing at something one of the female guests said, and Laura thought he looked too nice to stand up to a man like Larry described. At his other elbow, she noted the red-haired, freckled young private Arden Groesbeck.

The music ended.

Before either Larry or Laura could speak of having another dance, a caustic male voice intruded. “If you can tear yourself away, Sergeant, I have need of a
soldier to stand night duty.”

Larry dropped his hands from Laura and turned toward a short, stocky man in uniform, who bore the ugly expression of a despot. Larry’s face took on the hue of a nearby crimson lampshade. “I would be pleased to assist you, Captain.”

Laura was left on the dance floor, wondering how much Feddors had overheard. The orchestra swept into “The Blue Danube.”

“May I have this dance, Miss Fielding?”

Vaguely, she heard a voice behind her while she watched Larry Nevers led away by his dreaded commandant. She turned and found she had to look up … into Cord’s eyes.

“Miss Fielding?” she echoed the formal address that felt strange after all they had been through.

Cord bowed. “I meant to convey respect.”

“Respect?” When he had dallied with her beside blue water, while Constance waved his betrothal ring beneath the nose of anyone who would look?

Though she had not accepted his invitation to dance, Cord put his hand on Laura’s waist. The place where his fingers touched her bodice warmed, and she wanted nothing more than to swing into the waltz with him.

But she held back.

He bent closer and put his lips to her earlobe. “If
you tell me to walk away, and if you mean it from your heart, I will.”

Her knees nearly buckled.

“Dance with me,” he went on.

The music swelled, Strauss played inexpertly, yet enthusiastically, by the amateur orchestra of employees who made beds or worked in the laundry by day.

Laura tried to dredge up her anger, but all she could manage was to stare at Cord.

Without further coaxing, he led into the waltz.

He was an excellent dancer, moving his tall frame with the grace of a beautiful animal. “You dance divinely, Miss … Laura,” he murmured.

Her taffeta skirts rustled as they moved together.

“You look lovely in that dress,” Cord went on, a compliment she’d heard thrown out on dozens of dance floors.

Constance had said it was the last she was willing to give up, and Laura knew she’d only gotten this garment because it fit her cousin too tightly. As if he were reading her mind, Cord glanced over his shoulder and Laura saw his focus on his fiancée.

Across the room, Constance held court in a beige lace dress Laura hadn’t seen before. It made her look naked, her curtain of black hair rippling like silk in the firelight as she nodded to Norman Hagen of the Northern Pacific. The burly Swede spoke with great enthusiasm, gesturing expansively with his large hands.

Anger swelled inside Laura as she remembered Cord’s hands on Constance in the stable. She made
her own right hand intentionally wooden in his.

Cord swept her on, one two three, turn two three. Round and round they swirled until the redwood paneling and pine floors made a blur.

She steadied herself on Cord’s shoulder. His hand holding hers tightened.

Slowly the distance between them narrowed. Laura’s taffeta-covered breast barely brushed Cord’s suit jacket, then he pulled her more firmly against him until the length of their bodies pressed together.

Constance glowered at her and Cord’s closeness.

Laura started to push away. “I should think you would be on the other side of the room protecting your interests.”

“Let me worry about where my interests lie.” Something in his tone brought back the moment on the lakeshore.

But there was Constance, still glaring.

Without thinking it through, Laura slid her hand up from Cord’s shoulder into his crisp hair and cradled the back of his head. Let Constance be slashed with pain as Laura had been in the barn.

“Good God!” Cord exclaimed.

Leading strongly, he waltzed her across the polished wood of the dance floor, through a swinging door, and into the hotel’s kitchen.

Cooks and servers rushed in all directions shouting orders. A massive, wood-burning stove as well as electric burners and kettles blasted out heat. Sweat rolled off the cooks’ faces.

Cord’s polished mask vanished. He dodged a buxom waitress carrying a tray above her head and shoved Laura against a long wooden table. “What in hell kind of game do you think you’re playing?”

“You are the one toying with two hearts.”

“I am not speaking of Constance. I’m talking about you.” His blue eyes turned dark. “You were coming to work in Yellowstone?”

“You didn’t tell me who you were,” she came back, crossing her arms over her chest. “Why did you pretend to be some kind of mountain hermit?”

Cord rolled his eyes toward the ceiling hung with rows of stainless and copper pots. “It seemed to suit your fantasy of being swept off your feet in the forest.”

Laura trod on Cord’s foot and managed to hit his instep with Aunt Fanny’s borrowed dance slipper.

Cord swore and hopped back, crashing into a tuxedoed waiter with a tray of salads. A bowl slid off the edge, scattering lettuce and tomatoes and leaving a pool of Roquefort dressing on the waiter’s black jacket. The bowl hit the floor and bounced once, then smashed, splashing more creamy liquid onto a Chinese cook’s shoes.

Cord grabbed Laura’s wrist and pulled her down the long aisle between worktables. Reaching the rear door of the kitchen, he pushed it open.

Cool air rushed to greet them, and he guided Laura down the short flight of wooden steps and across the hotel lawn. Halfway to the lake, they startled an elk in the shadows beneath a tree. With a snort and a clatter
of hooves, the animal ran across the crushed stone drive and disappeared in the woods near the small square cabins of the employees’ quarters.

Cord’s grip on her wrist softened, but he kept towing her toward a pier built out high over the water.