Susan Johnson (30 page)

“Good,” Empress declared, her answering smile winsomely ingenuous with that paradoxical hint of seductive invitation Trey always found so intriguing. “Because I’m not at all the kind of woman you can take for granted.”

His smile, she thought, could bathe the world in shimmering glory. “I would never be so foolish,” Trey responded softly. “In fact, after finding you for sale at Lily’s and half killing Rally and myself tracking you back to Winter Mountain, I’d be the last man in the world to take you for granted. You’re not exactly the stay-at-home type a man could get complacent about.” The teasing light in his eyes compared favorably with radiant sunbeams.

“There are complacent women by the bushel,” Empress retorted with a tiny, denigrating sniff. Count Jordan’s daughter had not been raised to defer; there were those back in France who would have said deference had been bred out of the Jordans long before the Crusades. The family motto was “Stand aside,” and their escutcheon motif, of sword and lightning, dramatized a tradition of aggressive impulses.

Trey groaned faintly, recalling all the pursuing women. “True,” he replied with a rueful grin, “literally by the bushel.”

“
I
shall never be complacent.” Although the words were pointed, the opulent resonance of her voice, underscored by the piquant glance she cast him from beneath half-lowered lashes, intimated auxiliary meanings.

No, he thought, recalling the numerous occasions when she reminded him of living, breathing flames. “My good fortune, sweetheart,” he murmured pleasantly.

“And one more thing,” Empress declared, vivacious, her eyes brilliant with joy, “you must love me forever and ever and ever.”

“Your servant, ma’am,” Trey replied in a low, husky murmur and pulled Empress into his arms.

Into this elysium of bliss, a knock intruded.

Trey only tightened his embrace. “Go away,” he shouted.

“Your father wishes to speak to you, sir.” It was Timms. Trey’s brows rose fractionally. Unusual. Why wasn’t a footman sent up, Charlie or George … Timms didn’t deliver messages.

“Must be a royal command,” Trey murmured ironically, setting Empress back against the pillows. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

“Don’t go … I want to tell you how much I love you,” she teased, reaching out to run her finger lightly down his straight, perfect nose.

“And you shall for eternity, darling, as soon as I return,” he replied smilingly. Leaning over, he brushed her mouth with a kiss. “Don’t go away,” he whispered.

When Trey opened the door, he saw Timms waiting at attention in the hallway. Blowing Empress a kiss, he pulled the door shut behind him and raised his eyebrows in inquiry. “Is this an execution, Timms?” he joked.

“Your father didn’t take me into his confidence, sir.” But Timms understood, too, that under normal circumstances an underservant would have been sent for by Hazard to deliver a message. And it was unmistakably clear that Mrs. Braddock-Black had been crying.

“I
t’s out of the question!” Trey exploded furiously. “
Absolutely
out of the question!”

Hazard looked across his desk at Trey, who’d come to his feet, infuriated, and was standing bristling with anger and affront, his veins pulsing noticeably on his neck.

“You tell that bitch she can find some other scapegoat!” Trey exclaimed resentfully. “Better yet, I’ll tell her myself!”

“They’re threatening Gray Eagle and Buffalo Hunter or any other two Absarokee. Duncan made it perfectly clear that they were unconcerned about whom they accused,” Hazard quietly reminded Trey, his heart heavy with despair. For two days Hazard had been trying to determine some way out; he’d made an added offer to Duncan Stewart just the previous day, an outrageous offer, enough money to stagger an ordinary blackmailer. But apparently they were holding out for a much larger amount. As Trey’s wife, Hazard reflected with foreboding, Valerie would share all his wealth.

“There must be something we can do about that. Good Lord, she’s the one who seduced
them.
”

“She’s white.”

Trey began pacing, as well aware as his father of the ominous implications in those two words. “There wouldn’t even be a trial, would there?”

“The Indians hung on the Musselshell didn’t have one.”
¹⁰

“She won’t take money?”

“I already tried.”

“Damn cunt. That’s someone else’s child she’s having. Not mine.” Contempt lashed through his words.

“Are you sure?” The inquiry was tactful, and the answer mattered less than simply knowing it. Hazard would support his son regardless of the circumstances, but it never hurt to be fully cognizant of the facts.

Trey stopped pacing and, facing his father, grimaced ruefully. “Look, I know what the general consensus presumes about my relationships with women, but contrary to popular belief, I am not prodigally reckless and rash; my capacity for liquor is excellent, and the last time I noticed, making love does not impair the senses. So I’m very much aware of what I do and where I am and … I haven’t been with Valerie for four months. And even
that
night I fell asleep—so it’s longer than four months. Give her credit for nerve!”

“I think we
all
agree on that.”

Trey dropped back into the chair opposite his father, slid into a dejected slump, and, lifting his gaze, said, “I asked Empress to marry me.”

Hazard’s breath lodged with a suffocating sensation half-way up his throat, and it took him a moment to reply. “I’ll go to see Judge Henry and Pepperell tomorrow morning. Maybe they can be persuaded.”

“They won’t,” Trey replied quietly, their relationship with the judges strained, since the railway right-of-way case had been reversed in their favor at the appeal level. Henry and Pepperell had vested interests in that right-of-way and had lost a great deal of money.

“I’ll try, anyway,” Hazard said, his voice firm.

“And when they say no? With great satisfaction, I might add.”

“We up the offer to Duncan.”

“And if he says no?”

Hazard looked at his son. “We’ll try something else.”

“Fucking bitch,” Trey growled, knowing there were limits to the options, knowing Valerie and her father had been aware of those limits. If anyone knew the dirty underside of political chicanery and social malevolence better than the Stewarts, he hadn’t met them.

Hazard pushed the George III inkwell off-center, then restlessly slid it back again, reluctant to ask Trey the next question. He sighed twice, picked up the obelisk that had served for the sand, and twisting it, distastefully asked, “Will you marry Valerie if need be?”

“You know the answer,” said Trey evenly. “Of course.” He’d grown up with Gray Eagle and Buffalo Hunter. As young boys they’d learned to ride and hunt together, they’d gone on their vision quests at the same time, fasted, walked on the mountain together, seen the legendary beings in the night sky. They held a bond of brotherhood in their hearts. His first allegiance was to his clan. There was no need to remind him where his loyalties lay. “How long do I have to stay married to her?” was his next coldly practical question.

“Until the child is born. No longer than that.”

“And the child?”

“I imagine the Stewarts will bargain for its right to inherit.”

“Do we agree?”

“Frankly I don’t see a choice at that point. We pay now, which they won’t accept, or we pay later. At least the clan is safe. She will
not
be allowed near the village in future. We’ll hire white guards if necessary.”

“There’s a possibility Valerie won’t accept a divorce.”

“I can persuade a judge to grant a divorce with the proper inducement. The divorce laws are tractable. Not hanging an Indian who raped a white woman is another story. At the worst, we can get a divorce somewhere else.”

“Nothing’s very sure.”

“Nothing except Gray Eagle and Buffalo Hunter are sure to hang if you don’t marry her. But we’ll try the judges and more money first.”

“I’m going to talk to her.”

“It’s worth a try.”

“Could Valerie and her father just disappear—I don’t mean permanently, although the temptation is keen, but say, a trip to Europe for a decade?”

“It would have been possible when I was young,” Hazard said softly. “Retaliation on one’s enemies was accepted. Expected. But she’s a woman. Then, as now, it alters the circumstances; one doesn’t make war on women and children.” Leaning back in his chair, he wearily closed his eyes. “We’ll try,” he murmured, “to deal with these people in the white man’s way.” His head came up, his eyes opened, and his voice took on the trenchant resolution that many men had come to fear. “I promise you, the marriage will be brief.”

“And if the divorce can’t be arranged amicably?” Trey was still sprawled in his chair, his father’s terse voice not meant for him, the acid of discontent enervating his body and mind.

“Like Jake Poltrain, the Stewarts will be dealt with by Absarokee means. You understand—” Hazard rubbed his hand across his eyes, and a rueful sigh broke the silence of the room—“the decision is yours to make … this sacrifice for your clan. But once your duty is fulfilled, I promise you, on my warrior’s oath, if the yellow-eyes methods don’t work, the Absarokee ways will be used to rid you of an unwanted wife.”

Trey understood his father wasn’t forcing him to marry Valerie. He also understood that honor demanded it. Gray Eagle and Buffalo Hunter’s lives were at stake. “Before I say anything to Empress, I’d like to see Valerie myself. Tomorrow morning. Maybe she’ll change her mind.” It was a mechanical, instinctive compulsion, separate from any reasonable motive. And fueled by an unpleasant hate. “Maybe I can
convince
her,” he added, nothing moving in his lounging form except a flash of menace in his silver eyes, “to change her mind.”

“I hope so,” Hazard said, his voice suddenly threadbare with tiredness.

Valerie’s reception was gracious and friendly when Trey was shown into the parlor early the following morning, as if
none of the blackmail threats had been made. “You’re up very early,” she said in her low, sultry voice. “Have you eaten? Would you like coffee?”

Trey stood with his back against the door he’d firmly closed behind him. “I’d like your head on a silver tray, Valerie,” he said in a deep growl. “Care to accommodate me?”

“Really, sweetheart, you always did have a macabre sense of humor,” she chided in that sweet Southern belle voice she affected on occasion. “Come, sit down and tell me how you’ve been. It’s plain to see you’ve recuperated superbly from the—ah—contretemps at Lily’s.” Her blue eyes slowly raked Trey’s tall form. He was dressed in black except for the bottle-green silk of his vest lapels and the glittering gold of his neck charm. His long raven hair was pulled back behind his ears, accenting his high cheekbones and the harsh beauty of his face. His silver eyes were cold.

She ignored the menace in his stance and expression, secure in her position. She held all the cards.

He had come to her.

“Come, sit,” she repeated, and delicately patted the aqua damask of the sofa she was disposed on with a careful eye to display. Her peach wool gown was effective, she thought, against the sleek blue-green. She was right; it made her appear almost naked.

Unfortunately, in Trey’s present mood, the imaginative spectacle was lost on him. It was necessary he’d come, and necessary he carry his charade through to the end, he thought distastefully, even though he wasn’t optimistic about his chances after his father’s last substantial offer had been refused. But the effort had to be made, so he pushed away from the door, walked to a chair opposite Valerie, and sat.

“Coffee?” she inquired again. “Tea? Or perhaps something stronger?” she added in her perfect hostess voice.

She was slender still, he noted, his glance quickly ranging over the pastel gown she wore, and it made him feel better. The last time he’d been with her was four months ago. “No thank you,” he said, and leaned back in tentative ease.

“No coffee, tea, no spirits? If not social, to what, then,”
she purred dulcetly, “do I owe this extremely early-morning visit?”

“It’s been a while, Valerie. I thought I’d drop by and see how you’re”—he paused—“looking.”

“It’s not been all that long, Trey, darling,” Valerie replied with equanimity, her poise intact. “Remember last November?”

“I remember,” he drawled. “More importantly, I particularly recall that nothing happened.”

“How would you know?” she retorted archly, her hands composedly clasped in her lap. “You passed out.”

“I fell asleep. There’s a difference. I remember what happened, or rather, what didn’t happen. And I haven’t seen you since then, Valerie. That was four months ago. You and I both know this child isn’t mine.”

Her faint smile was undiminished by his blunt declaration. “It’s your word against mine, sweet, isn’t it?” she replied conversationally. “And everyone knows your—” her brows rose slightly—“fascinating reputation. In contrast,” she went on, smoothing her skirt with a delicate gesture, “I’m the innocent Miss Stewart. I teach Sunday School, Trey, honey.” Her eyes came up from the brief adjustment to the drapery of her skirt and met his with a practiced winsomeness.