Lips That Touch Mine (36 page)

She took his coat from the closet. "How about
Grandfather in private, Mr. Edwards in public?"

"That pleases me." He pulled on his coat,
then wrinkled his brow at her. "Are you going out this
evening?"

"Yes." She buttoned her heavy coat, then
linked their arms. "I can't give you up just yet, so I'm walking
you home."

He argued, but she insisted, until finally
they both laughed and walked out the door arm in arm.

They walked slowly, but Addison was huffing
and trembling so badly by the time they reached his house on Spring
Street, Claire walked him right to his front stoop. Desmona met
them at the door, scowl lines an inch deep between her gray
eyebrows.

Claire was immensely grateful that she was
free of the stifling prison of marriage. She would live with the
loneliness and the longing that nagged her. She had learned that
she could welcome a night of passion without shame. And why not?
She was a grown woman, a widow who had risked her life to win her
freedom. Boyd Grayson wasn't the only man in town.

But he was the only man she wanted. And he
was in Buffalo.

For the fourth day in a row, Boyd banged on the door of the huge
white mansion with stately pillars. To his relief, a lanky man with
graying hair and brilliant blue eyes answered his knock.

"Is Bennett Dawsen at home?" Boyd asked.

"You're addressing him," the man said in an
imperious voice.

Boyd ignored Dawsen's arrogance, and held out
his hand. He'd been waiting for Claire's family to return home from
wherever they'd been. "I'm Boyd Grayson, a friend of Claire's. We
need to talk."

Bennett Dawsen invited him inside, and
introduced him to Claire's mother, a fashionably dressed lady with
dark hair and regal features. But Boyd was too worried about Claire
to be overly cordial to her mother or impressed by the opulent
house.

Claire was treading into a dangerous
situation, and he just wanted to get back to Fredonia and make sure
she was all right.

If only she would have agreed to marry
him.

He thought she would have wanted to. Every
woman he ever romanced had angled for marriage. They wanted him.
They wanted security. They wanted too much. He never considered
proposing to a single one of them. Not once. Not until he made love
to Claire. Not until he realized that his name could protect her,
that he could keep her safe, that he could make love to her every
night.

He wanted desperately to marry her.

But she wanted an affair. For the first time
in his life, Boyd received the same proposition he'd given to
countless women over the years, and it stung his conscience. He
never realized how callous he'd been.

"I'll leave you gentlemen to your business,"
Mrs. Dawsen said, then quietly left the room. She was pretty, but
darker and shorter than Claire.

"If you're a friend of my daughter's,"
Bennett said, "then you must know we aren't in communication with
each other."

"You'd better change that, Bennett, if you
want to keep your daughter alive."

"Dear God, what's happened?" Bennett's face
paled. The starch left his rigid body, and he sank into an
overstuffed armchair.

"Claire has been lying to you, or rather
Lida, about her life with Jack." Boyd repeated what Claire had told
him about her marriage to Jack and about Jack's death. "She said
she would have come back to you on her knees, Bennett, but she was
afraid Jack would find a way to hurt you. She stayed away to
protect you. Now she thinks it's too late, that you hate her."

"How could she think that?" Bennett asked,
his voice filled with pain.

"How could she not? You disowned her without
a penny or even a wish for luck."

Claire's father was every bit the arrogant
rich man Boyd had imagined, yet Bennett Dawsen loved his daughter.
When Boyd told him about the temperance marches and the danger
Claire was putting herself in, Bennett insisted on taking the first
train back to Fredonia.

"You need to talk some sense into your
daughter," Boyd said later that day as they crossed the Common in
Fredonia. "I'm overhearing some nasty grumbling from my patrons."
He told Bennett about some of the conversations he'd overheard in
his saloon, and that the other saloon owners were reporting the
same unrest from their patrons. "I'm afraid these men are going to
start retaliating. I've tried to explain this to Claire, but she
insists on marching."

"Impulsive chit." Bennett shook his head.
"She's been rash and reckless from the cradle."

"She's certainly reckless. She and her
friends are agitating every drinking man in town, and the liquor
salesmen are furious over their lost income."

"I don't blame them. They depend on those
sales."

"I'm afraid they care more about their sales
than being gentlemen. They're too greedy, and that scares me."

Bennett kept stride with Boyd without
exerting himself. "Wanting to make money doesn't make one greedy.
Desire can drive our ambition and help us achieve great things.
Greed is when that desire gets out of control."

Boyd cut his eyes to Bennett's chiseled face.
"Greed can also cause a man to disown his own daughter.

"I offered Claire the chance to stay,"
Bennett retorted. Boyd saw it as the confidence and arrogance of a
wealthy man. "She chose to go with that wretch Jack Ashier
instead."

"You gave her terms she couldn't live with,"
Boyd explained firmly. "Jack isn't the only man who has hurt
Claire." Boyd slowed his pace, needing to speak his mind before
reaching her door. "Jack was an abusive son of a bitch. But you
didn't help. You tore Claire's heart out when you disowned
her."

Bennett jerked to a stop and glared at him.
Boyd didn't blink. He was prepared to go as many rounds as
necessary with this man to get him to own up to the mistakes he'd
made with Claire and with his mother.

"Claire may have survived her mistake with
Jack, but it's very possible this temperance nonsense could get her
hurt. You need to talk to her, Bennett."

"I tried to do that four years ago, but
Claire was too damned hardheaded to listen."

"Make her listen. You're her father. Your
daughter thinks you hung the moon. She needs you in her life, and
she needs your common sense to keep her from making another
dangerous mistake. If you're going to worry about being right, or
about protecting your pride rather than your daughter, then stay
away from her. Because if you hurt her again, I swear I'll break
your neck."

Bennett's nostrils flared, but he didn't say
a word. He faced Boyd man-to-man, eye-to-eye, seeming to study and
measure him. Boyd stood unflinching and let him look.

He didn't give a damn if Bennett approved of
him. All he cared about was keeping Claire safe.

What began as an amused chuckle in Bennett's
throat grew into a robust laugh that forced his head back and
echoed across the Common. "Where the hell were you when Claire was
eloping with that wastrel Jack Ashier ?" he asked, slapping his
hand over Boyd's shoulder.

"Making my own mistakes, I'm sure."

o0o

Sailor's presence was a mixed blessing. The
dog kept her company, but every time he curled against her, Claire
thought of Boyd doing the same to Martha Newmaine.

Why else would he have gone to Buffalo?

Why else would his travel plans be
uncertain?

Maybe he was considering Miss Newmaine's
suggestion to open a saloon in Buffalo. Maybe he was simply
enjoying himself too much to return. He'd been gone five days, and
it was killing her to think of him in Martha's arms.

"What's bothering you?" Addison asked,
lowering his hand of playing cards. "You look positively
heartbroken."

She was. Her life was empty without Boyd.
Only weeks ago she would have given her last nineteen dollars to
shut down his noisy saloon and get rid of the rakehell, but now,
"despite being two dollars away from broke because of his saloon,
she missed him so desperately it hurt. The irony made her want to
laugh and weep at the same time.

She had given him her heart. Every aching
inch of it. She wanted him to be her lover, but he wasn't her
lover. He was a rake who was in Buffalo with another woman. He was
a handsome man, bent on seducing her. She'd known that. And yet,
she had fallen in love with him anyhow.

How pathetic.

How stupid.

How typical of her.

"Do you want to call the game?" Addison
said.

"Would you mind?" she asked, knowing she
couldn't keep her mind on it. She was at a crossroads with Boyd,
and she didn't know which way to go.

"Of course not." The old man tossed his cards
onto the sofa cushion between them. "Truth is, I'd rather pester
you with more questions."

Since Addison had read the journal, he'd
visited each day, asking about Claire and her father and Marie.
"What do you want to know?"

"Why you're pining over that young fella
across the street, for one thing," he said, a teasing twinkle in
his eye.

Claire adored her grandfather, and thoroughly
enjoyed his company, but on this cold, dreary day, her heart ached
too deeply to appreciate his teasing. She longed for Boyd, needed
him, missed him so deeply she wanted to curl up in bed and sleep
until he got back.

The knock on the door made Sailor yelp and
scramble to his feet. Claire's heart leapt, and she followed the
dog to the foyer, praying it was Boyd who was knocking.

Would he stay for a while? Would he allow
their friendship to continue? Would he finally close his saloon and
give her business a chance to flourish? Or was he only here to take
Sailor?

When she opened the door, she gasped in
shock.

Her father stood on the porch, a tall,
imposing man with silver sideburns and salt and pepper hair,
handsome despite the telltale signs of age in his face. The blue
eyes that had once looked at her with pride were filled with
sadness.

"Why didn't you tell me about Jack?" he
asked, his strong voice wobbling. To her shock, he stepped into the
foyer and pulled her into his arms with a gentleness and compassion
she hadn't felt in a very long time.

After so many years of missing him, Claire
burst into tears. She clung to his broad shoulders as he rocked her
and let her cry like the little girl she'd left behind so many
years before.

"Oh, Daddy. I'm so sorry. I made a terrible
mistake when I turned my back on you."

"I didn't know you were unhappy," he said,
his voice gruff. "Lida said your letters were filled with joy."

"They were." Claire sniffled and wiped her
eyes. "I couldn't tell anyone the truth." She searched her pocket
for a handkerchief, but came up empty-handed. "I'm sorry I broke
your relationship with Grandmother. I'll regret it for the rest of
my life."

He retrieved a crisp monogrammed handkerchief
from his jacket pocket and handed it to her. "Your grandmother
acted irresponsibly. I trusted her to chaperone you and keep you
safe. Instead, she let you run off with a wastrel and ruin your
life. How can I forgive her for that?"

She'd forgotten how unrelenting he could be,
how stubborn and unforgiving. She slipped his damp handkerchief
into her pocket, then curled her fingers around the carving,
needing Boyd's comforting presence. "What brought you here?" she
asked, feeling the distance grow between them.

"Your young man paid me a visit."

She looked at him in confusion. "What young
man?"

"Your suitor. Mr. Grayson. He's a bold
rapscallion, but I rather like him. He told me I'd better take care
of business with my daughter before she got herself into trouble
again. "

She stared in disbelief. No one told her
father what to do, not even his business partner.

"I believe that boy would have spoken as
frankly to our good President Grant without batting a lash."

She didn't doubt it. Boyd was like her father
in that way. "I'm sure he didn't mean to insult you, Daddy."

"That boy meant every word he said. He
suggested I've been acting like a pompous ass. I'm afraid there's
some truth to that." He caught her hands and squeezed them. "Why
didn't you tell Lida you were unhappy?"

"What good would it have done?"

"I would have brought you home."

"You disowned me. You told me I was no longer
your daughter." Tears flooded her eyes and spilled over her lashes.
"You stopped loving me."

"Never." Regret filled his eyes, and he
pulled her back into his arms. "I never stopped loving you. I only
wanted what was best for you, sweetheart. I'm sorry I hurt
you."

She could barely believe that her father was
standing in her parlor, hugging her and apologizing for hurting
her. But more unbelievable was that Boyd had gone to Buffalo to
give her wealthy, powerful father hell.

Claire waited three days for Boyd to come by her house, but he
didn't set foot on her porch. He'd answered her note with his own
note of apology, and he'd paid the bill at the Harrison Hotel, and
reimbursed her lost income without complaint. But the saloon
remained open and Boyd stayed away. He hadn't been in the bar
during Claire's marches. Claire and her temperance friends had
pleaded their case with his bartender, Pat, who promised to give
Boyd their message.

Sailor ambled between their houses like a
nomad, eating like a king, sleeping wherever he flopped down, and
returning to the noise and excitement of Boyd's bar each night.

She spent her time at the temperance meetings
and marches, or with Addison and her father, watching them play
chess and talk about politics. She hadn't worked up the nerve to
tell her father about the journal or Addison yet. Addison was
leaving the timing up to her, but he obviously wasn't about to miss
the opportunity to spend time with his son.