Mary Connealy (74 page)

“Belle Harden, this is no time to turn into a weakling.” As she drew heat from his body, he talked, hoping she’d respond. “I’ve got heat to spare, darlin’, and strength. This time you’re going to have to depend on me. Just like you did on that cattle drive.” His belly ached as if her icy feet were absorbing the cold from his deepest core.

Her shivering came again. Her whole body was wracked with it. She began to moan through chattering teeth, and after a while she struggled against him and murmured again. “Feet hurt.”

She kicked at him, but it was so feeble his heart clutched to think of her usual strength, now so reduced. He thought it was a good sign that his warmth was causing her pain. He hoped that meant her feet weren’t dangerously frozen.

“Wolves!” Belle’s hands flew wide, and Silas had to scramble to keep her from getting too close to the fire.

“The wolves are gone, Belle.”

“Wolves!” Her arms flew up as if she were dreaming that one sprang at her right now. “No!”

“You’re safe, Belle honey. The wolves are gone.”

Belle clutched at her chest, the shivering wracking her body. “Betsy!” Her hands flailed at the place she kept Betsy strapped on. Then she cried out in terror.

“Betsy’s fine, Belle. She’s fine.”

Belle twisted as if she planned to get up.

Silas kept a firm grip on her feet. “Emma has Betsy. You shot all the wolves, Belle.” Silas crooned to her, afraid to let her feet go when they were so cold. The rest of her seemed to be working just fine. “You won.” He reached out and caught one of her thrashing hands that had flopped on the ground too close to the fire. “You’re safe.” She jerked against the hold, but he wouldn’t let go, afraid she’d be burned. “Your girls are safe.” He thought there was some pink behind her blue-white fingernails and her hands weren’t the flaccid, lifeless cold they’d been earlier.

“Stop! Gerald, stop. Please!” She kicked hard at Silas’s stomach and cried out Gerald’s name in a voice so laced with fear and pain Silas ground his teeth together to contain his rage at what Belle had suffered at the hands of men. Belle’s words were almost begging. To think of strong, courageous Belle being reduced to begging by one of her husbands was infuriating.

“I’m here, Belle. Gerald is gone. This is Silas. I’ll take care of you.” To think she was mixing Silas up with Gerald was heartbreaking. He continued to talk to her, trying to pierce her muddled thinking.

“You’re going to be all right. The girls are safe.” Out in this cold night. Without Silas or Belle to protect them. But he was confident in his statement. They’d be fine without any help from him.

At last the tremors eased. Belle at last lay calm, her eyes closed.

Silas pulled her feet out from against his stomach and saw that the alarming white had pinked up a bit. He heaved a sigh of relief and pulled on her socks, then carefully arranged her close to the fire. Silas stretched out beside his wife on the side away from the fire to surround her with warmth. He pulled a blanket over them, one he always carried behind his saddle. He held her close, tucked his feet beneath hers, and prayed.

The shivering came again but it didn’t last so long. There was more time in between the next bout. The color seeped into her cheeks, and Belle’s movements became more languid. With a sigh of utter relaxation, she said, “Silas, I love you.”

Some of Silas’s anger at Belle for risking her life eased away when she talked to him so sweetly. It reawakened the excitement that had been buzzing through him when he’d ridden home so many hours earlier. He whispered in her ear, “I think we’re going to have a baby, Belle Harden.”

“I can’t have a baby.” Belle shook her head frantically, eyes still closed. “I can’t.” And she started to cry.

Something in Silas turned as cold as the Montana wind that howled outside this little niche of warmth. His wife, cuddled safe in his arms, cried over the thought of having his child.

Belle was just barely conscious. He knew she was only vaguely aware of what she was saying. Did that mean he should pay no mind to what she said? Or did it mean she had no strength for anything but the truth? Did it mean Belle was truly, deeply heartbroken to think she was carrying his child? Whether she was expecting or not, her tears meant she didn’t want to be. So why had she let him make love to her? Belle was a grown woman. She knew what caused babies.

Silas knew the answer. Pleasure.

It was new to Belle. She wanted the pleasure and had found it irresistible. But she didn’t want to move over and give up being boss of the
Tanner
Ranch, and she didn’t want his child growing in her body.

She was using him. She’d support him and feed him, probably even dole out spending money if he asked, all so she could keep him around. But the ranch was hers alone, and his baby was a cause for tears.

Any way Silas thought of it, he came out sounding like…like his mother. Earning money in the upstairs of a saloon.

That’s what a man got for coming to a rich woman when he had nothing to offer. He’d known it was wrong, but he’d married her anyway because he wanted her so much. And he thought love was enough. And now he had to pay the price of being a man with no honor and no pride.

He’d lost two ranches in his life by turning coward. Running away was getting to be a habit, because right now he hurt so badly from hearing her cry, he wished himself halfway across the country from Belle.

He tested her warm, supple limbs and saw that she’d fallen into a natural sleep. He checked her toes, and even they were warm and pink in the crackling firelight. Trust Belle to tackle a pack of wolves and freezing cold and then shake it off with no damage to herself.

He wrapped her up good and snug. “You’re all right now, Belle. You’re going to be all right.” Knowing he shouldn’t, he held her close, thrilled that she was safely warm.

She wound her arms around his neck. She tilted her head to reach for his lips.

He met her searching lips and thought about the baby she was most likely expecting and never wanted to bear. He broke off the kiss.

She protested but settled back into a deep sleep.

He held her through the long night while he nurtured his anger and vanquished his love and planned how to be a man who could stand to look at himself in the mirror.

It was still dark when Belle woke the next morning.

Silas was shaking her. “We’d best be on the trail home.” She sat up and a wave of nausea lurched in her stomach.

The baby.

Silas was fully dressed. When she moved, he stood away and started quickly packing up the meager camp. She remembered everything. Crying herself to sleep. The wolves. Emma’s smoking rifle. Silas.

Things were foggy after Silas had picked her up off her horse and started fussing over her and scolding her for working her ranch. Like she hadn’t put up with enough already yesterday.

She’d never had a husband quite like this before. The others had complained and whined and laid low when chores were being handed out. But she’d never had one not only refuse to help but get upset when she did it herself. It was just a new twist on the same old story, but she couldn’t figure out why Silas didn’t just shut up and let her get on with her work.

Once her stomach settled, she thought of Betsy needing breakfast and got up to start packing the camp.

Silas had everything done except dousing the fire. “You up to the ride home?” Silas almost growled the question.

Belle had beaten back one pack of wolves only to face another this morning. “Yep.” She brushed his question aside brusquely.

Beyond that, they didn’t talk.

Both horses were already saddled, so they were on the trail within minutes. They had no food, and she was in a hurry to get to Betsy, so they set a brisk pace.

Her husband was obviously angry. Belle assumed it was because she’d gone and done another chore he considered his. She didn’t have the strength this morning to deal with his infernal wounded pride.

They made good time in the sharp cold, and the sun wasn’t fully up when they rode into the ranch yard.

Without making eye contact, Silas said with tight sarcasm, “If it’s all right with you, I’ll take care of the horses.”

Belle looked at him through narrow eyes, disgusted at his temper. She checked the impulse to tend her own mount because she was eager to be away from his surly company. “Thank you.” Tossing him the reins, she dismounted without checking to see if he caught them and headed to the house.

She got inside in time to pick Betsy up where she lay kicking in the wooden crate Belle had fashioned into a bed. She sat down and nursed her baby and fought back tears by building up the fire under her temper. She fumed and rocked and looked down at Betsy, not the youngest anymore.

Emma and Sarah slept on, even though it was well past their normal waking time. The night had been a late one.

Betsy ate and surprised Belle by falling back to sleep in her arms. Just as Belle laid her back down, the front door slammed open with so much force the rickety thing shattered into pieces and fell onto the cabin floor, letting the icy wind blast through into the cabin.

Emma surged out of her bed. Sarah sat up with a startled scream of fear. Betsy awoke with a loud cry. Belle whirled around, and her temper flared to white hot.

She stalked over to face Silas with only inches separating them, ready at last to put him in the place he needed to be. Ready to chalk him up as another mistake. So enraged, she was ready to plant him under the lone oak with the rest of the husbands without waiting for him to turn up his toes!

She’d trusted him! She’d thought she could believe in him! Well, so far he’d been a bigger disappointment than anyone she’d ever married. And in that instant, Belle decided she wasn’t going to put up with it. She wasn’t going to just accept this lazy, no-good polecat of a man and carry on doing everything herself while he lazed about and lived off her labor.

Silas was going to hear exactly what she thought of his no-account ways. And when she was done with him, he was going to measure up to her idea of what a husband should be or she was going to march him straight down the road. Things were going to change around here! “Silas, things are going to…
mmph.”

One hard hand settled over her mouth, and the other clamped over the nape of her neck. He jerked her forward so hard it next to knocked the wind out of her.

T
hings are going to change around here!”

Silas leaned down until his nose nearly touched hers. “Do you hear me?”

Belle grabbed his wrist. His arm left her neck and wrapped around her waist as immovable as a band of iron while his other stayed firmly on her mouth. “Settle down and shut up and listen to what your husband has to say for once in your confounded, stubborn, bossy life.”

Sarah snatched up the cast-iron skillet and waved it in front of her. Silas thought she looked pretty cute with the skillet in one hand and the baby in the other. Not real threatening.

“You get your hands off of my ma.” Emma erupted to her feet and dove for her shotgun.

That impressed Silas more than the skillet. But, unlike when Lindsay had threatened him that first morning, now he wasn’t afraid. He could handle all of these women with one hand tied behind his back. He noticed right now it was taking two hands just keeping Belle quiet, so maybe, just to be on the safe side, he wouldn’t tie one up. He’d let things go on too long while he worked on his
idea.

He’d been happily toiling away for them while thinking they loved him and trusted him. But it appeared that wasn’t true. Still, he knew Emma. He knew what she was made of. Sure, she might shoot a man who hurt her ma. He’d expect her to. He wouldn’t respect her if she didn’t. But she wouldn’t hurt him.

“Put down that gun.” He kept Belle’s mouth covered and kept his unshakable grip on her but his whole attention focused on Emma. “I’m not doing anything but making your hardheaded mother listen to me, and you know it.”

Emma half raised the gun. She had her eyes riveted on Silas, then glanced at the hold he had on her ma and lowered the muzzle to the floor.

Silas noticed that Belle had quit fighting and squirming. He had the impression she did that because it was upsetting Emma. And just maybe his wife’s heart wasn’t in having him shot. Either was encouraging.

“And Sarah, you mind Betsy and set that pan aside. You are the most contrary bunch of females I have ever been near. I am going to give you
one more chance
to back up and make room for me in this family.”

“Make room?” Sarah said in disgust.

Emma gave Silas a narrow-eyed look, but she didn’t raise the gun again.

Good sign.

“Like you haven’t been sneaking off every day while we do all the work,” Emma said. “Like we wouldn’t have let you help.”

Belle made a garbled noise of accord with her daughter and gave a firm nod.

Betsy chose that moment to start crying. Silas supposed she could be hungry or wet or have a pin sticking in her little bottom, but he reckoned the truth was she was just female and decided to add to the commotion on principle. Silas wished he had enough hands to shut them all up.