Susan Johnson (35 page)

Empress sighed, confronted by Trey’s soft challenge. “Her stories are very good.” Her lashes lowered minutely in skepticism at the faint accusation in his expression. “She mentioned your lunch with Judd Parker,” she said softly, wondering when and how he would refute the fact, or whether he would bother at all, “and the soup stain on your shirt. And
she returned these …” Sliding the gloves that had been taunting her all evening closer to Trey, she watched his face.

Trey swiftly glanced at his gloves, lying on the small table beside Empress’s chair. “Bloody hell!” he exclaimed softly, and Empress read the exhalation as exposure. Walking over to the table, he touched the colorful flowers surrounding the beaded black cougar. “At least the bitch brought them back,” he murmured, his pantheistic reverence for his father’s totem and his good-luck charm adverse to Valerie’s contact. “She must have had someone following me.”

“That sounds a bit farfetched.”
Good God
, she wanted to shout,
can’t you do better than that? Someone
following
you?
Her eyes traced the perfect symmetry of his dark, sweeping brows, the defined authority of his arrow-straight nose, the harsh, unmitigated strength of his jaw, then came to rest on the luminous beauty of his eyes and wondered whether the degree of passion he offered each woman varied.

“Nothing’s farfetched for Valerie; the woman’s unprincipled. Look,” he said, genuinely tired after a long, fatiguing day, and suddenly weary of Valerie’s continual machinations, “I lost those gloves somewhere last week. I haven’t seen her since the wedding, and that’s the truth.” Picking up his gloves, he walked into the dressing room.

Somewhere, indeed, Empress thought, embittered, watching him stroll away, the subject closed, his infidelities disposed of with a casual disclaimer. Bristling with temper, she came to her feet and followed him into the dressing room. “Whatever the truth is,” she said to his back as he stood inside one of the open mirrored doors, a sudden image of Valerie’s smug expression flashing into her mind, “it really doesn’t matter where you left your gloves.”

He swung around with a suppressed violence. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” he replied, his tone a shade too soft.

“I’ve been trying to tell you for weeks, I’m uncomfortable here,” she said, thinking of the gloves, made, no doubt, by another devoted woman. “Your
wife’s
visit,” she continued sullenly, “and her fascinated recital of your amorous history simply forced me to recognize exactly
how
uncomfortable.”

“I didn’t realize you were
uncomfortable
,” Trey said sarcastically. “You could have fooled me. And I don’t have a
wife,” he hotly contended, “I’ve eight months’ insurance against a lynch mob in a society that measures the value of your life by the color of your skin. Damn,” he said in the next rush of breath, his voice lowering perceptively, “don’t listen to her version of my amorous history. I don’t want to fight. You see, that’s exactly what she wants. Let’s not argue. All I have to do is last a few months and I’m rid of her.”

His words suddenly sounded coldly selfish, as though nothing mattered but Trey’s feelings, and in Empress’s current frame of mind, where doubt predominated, she wondered whether Trey would be saying the same thing about her in a few months’ time. For all she knew, six months ago he could have been telling Valerie it was she he adored. “I think the children and I will pass those six months elsewhere,” Empress said quietly, her emotions volatile, unstable.

“I don’t want you to.” His expression was grim.

“But
I
do!”

Her ferocity surprised him. “Don’t let her do this,” Trey said quietly, his tone grave. “Please don’t. It’s what she wants.”

Even those words held an ambiguous meaning tonight, as Empress listened, as if Valerie’s words were right when she’d said, “He wants us both.” Was it true? Was Trey only interested in his own pleasure and, like a child unable to choose between two treats, insists on them both?

She loved him, but every woman in his life loved him. Today, for the first time, Valerie’s visit had underlined that fact. And the overheard conversation between the three young ladies, where Trey’s reputation as a notorious womanizer had been discussed, reminded Empress of his taste for pleasure, for female pleasure. “It’s what I want too,” Empress said levelly, feeling as though she were going to break into a thousand pieces.

“Do you believe her?” His voice was flat.

Empress hesitated, and in that hesitation, Trey’s temper flared. The entire episode with Valerie, his damn sacrifice for duty, his giving up of his freedom for his clan, the restraints necessary in the ensuing six months so
his dear wife
couldn’t find some further coercion to control him, the overwhelming sense of being
trapped
—all suddenly exploded. “I see,” he
said almost inaudibly. Beneath his lips, his teeth were closed tightly.

“I don’t know what to believe,” Empress replied truthfully, and to a man momentarily frustrated past endurance, a cushioned lie would have been better.

“Fine,” he said curtly, his nostrils flaring in an effort to keep his temper. “Believe some stranger you’ve never met before. A stranger, I might add, I’ve described in some detail as a cheat and a liar. Believe her, not me. Thank you, at least for your sudden”—his mouth twisted distastefully, as though the word were tainted—“honesty. I hadn’t realized how superficial were your protestations of love. I thought you loved me.”

“I do love you.”

“And I you, ma’am,” Trey replied with a curt, mocking bow. “Now that we’ve assured each other of our undying love, please excuse me if I retire for the night. It’s been a long day,” he said with restrained understatement, “and tomorrow promises an equally hard fight to keep greedy hands off the Indian lands. Although I forget,” he murmured with a bitter smile, “that I was supposed to have spent the day dallying with my wife. Well, whatever—forgive my fatigue and good night.”

Today had been one of the hardest, closest-won fights so far. Each year it became more difficult to save the reservation land from encroaching interests. Each year the long hours became longer, the old arguments less convincing. All anyone seemed to care about was money. Land was money. And the big tracts of reservation land were tempting prizes. Sometimes Trey felt as though the struggle were too much. Pointless. Never-ending. You win last year, this year, today, only to face a stronger attack tomorrow, next month. It seemed as though he and his father and their clan were trying to turn back the tide single-handedly. He was tired, cynically, bitterly tired, and now Valerie must be explained away. Again. And Empress must be comforted. Convinced of his love. Again. Tomorrow—he could face it all with renewed heart tomorrow.

Trey awakened early. Now an attempt was being made on the Blackfeet Reserve. Good God. It never ended. Kissing Empress softly in the gray predawn light, he smiled at the
tucked, childlike pose she held in sleep, then rose to dress hurriedly. He left a note of apology on the pillow near her head, telling her he loved her more than Rally and Clover
combined
, and tonight, when he returned from Helena, he would clear all her doubts about Valerie.

Trey ramrodded through a resounding defeat for those attempting to gain the Blackfeet land. And when Hazard congratulated him on his fierce energy and adroit maneuvering, Trey replied, “Had to. I’ve got to get home early tonight. No excuses. And I’ve got some shopping to do. See you tomorrow.”

Shopping? Hazard thought, watching his son sprint down the marble staircase. Now that would be a first.

Trey arrived back at the ranch early, laden with gifts for Empress and the children, to be greeted by a surprised Timms. “They’re gone, sir,” he said. “Didn’t they meet you in Helena? Miss Jordan and the children left at eleven to meet you in town. Did you miss her?”

Trey went still. He took a deep breath. “How did she get into Helena?” he asked tersely.

“The sleigh.” Timms swallowed. His master’s voice was much too quiet. “Rudy drove them.”

“Is he back?” Clipped, bitten-off words like lethal weapons.

“Yes, sir.” Sweat stood out on Timm’s forehead. “He arrived back at four.”

“Bring him to me,” Trey said urgently, abruptly, and deposited the packages he was holding onto the foyer table. The presents he’d selected himself instead of leaving it up to Timms, as he’d always done. Timms and Bolton, his father’s business manager, knew every eligible and not-so-eligible female’s address within a hundred miles. And prided themselves on their taste in jewelry. “Immediately,” Trey added, a scowl appearing as he glanced at his watch. “In the library.”

He still wore his coat and gloves when the groom entered the room five minutes later. Seated behind the desk, Trey’s posture was rigid, his gloved hands palm down on the desktop. “Where did you take Miss Jordan?” he inquired
swiftly. No anger showed. His voice hadn’t risen above a carefully modulated resonance. His face was expressionless.

“To Irwin’s Department Store, Mr. Braddock-Black. She said she was meeting you.”

“What time?”

“When we got there?”

Trey nodded.

“About one-thirty, sir.”

Unbidden, the disastrous thought struck his brain. Two-twenty for the Union Pacific to Laramie. His next thought refuted the first. She wouldn’t. How long, he asked himself in the next instant, would it take to discover her trail? There was no need for her to leave. None at all, damn Valerie’s black soul. He was on his feet and halfway to the door before he remembered Rudy. Checking in mid-stride, he turned back. “Thank you,” he said, “and tell the engineer I’ll be going back into Helena in ten minutes.”

He took the stairs at a full-out run and threw the bedroom door open with a crash, as though she might materialize before his eyes with the violence. The room was utterly still, strangely empty now that he was used to her presence. His eyes scanned the untenanted vacancy, looking for some explanation, hoping there was some mundane reason for her absence.

When he saw the note propped next to his on the pillow, a sickening feeling washed over him. Walking over to the bed, he only stared at it for long moments, delaying the expected blow. He picked up his note first and turned it over to see that it had been opened. It had. He dropped it and very slowly reached for a similar white envelope with his name centered on the textured surface.

It was not a brief note, nor an angry one. Empress’s small script told him of her decision to leave, words he’d already heard last night, with added phrases to the effect that she felt it better for everyone if she waited for him elsewhere. With relief he read the sentence telling him of her love. “We’re going back to France,” she ended, “to see to Guy’s inheritance. I’ll send you our address when we’re settled. All my love, Empress.” In a postscript she asked him to care for Clover and the animals at the farm.

He went back into Helena, anyway, on some farfetched
hope that she might still be in town. A phone call would have accomplished as much, but somehow he had to see for himself. He checked the railroad station first, and then there was no need to check the hotels. The ticket agent remembered the young lady with the four youngsters in tow. She’d bought tickets for New York. With gold.

The saddlebags with Empress’s gold hadn’t come back down-mountain with them because of their weight. Without horses, no one was strong enough to handle the two heavy bags. Trey had been burdened with Empress, and Eduard and Guy didn’t have the strength for nearly a hundred pounds of gold. At his insistence Trey had replaced the gold for her last week, wanting Empress to feel independent of his family, with her new misgivings about staying and being beholden to him. More of a fool, he. A little less charitable benevolence and she’d still be here. He smiled ruefully at his touch of misanthropy and thought that at least he had the satisfaction of knowing that Empress had funds for her journey.

As he stood on the station platform, looking out into the evening gloom, a chill north wind buffeted him, a wind as bleak as his thoughts, and he damned Valerie to hell a thousand ways. For the first time in his life he felt like murdering someone, and if killing Valerie would have brought Empress back, he would have dispatched her cheerfully.

The stabbing cold eventually numbed his fingers and toes, forcing him to move, to go back to his carriage … to his life, which suddenly seemed utterly empty. Speaking softly into the blowing wind and black, silent night as he traversed the deserted platform, he murmured, “You’re not gone forever … right, fierce kitten?” But no reassuring reply returned, only a wailing north wind and scattered snowflakes. Reaching the end of the long wooden platform, Trey paused at the corner of the building, drew a deep breath, overwhelmed by frustration, his spine tense, and slammed his fist into the solid, shingled wall. Swearing aloud at the pain, he abruptly sprinted down the steps to his waiting carriage. After indicating his parents’ town house as his destination, he slumped back into the cold leather and nursed his aching hand.

During the legislative session his parents resided almost entirely in Helena, and only Trey had entrained home each evening to be with Empress. No need for that now, he thought
bitterly. And for a brief moment he considered going after Empress and forcibly bringing her back or calling ahead and having her taken off the train. In the next moment, though, reason dismissed harsh emotion.

Maybe she was right to go if her feelings demanded it. Empress was much more sensitive to society’s shibboleths than he; uncomfortable, she’d said, being his lover with all the world knowing. He’d lived too long doing exactly as he pleased to appreciate that sensitivity. With a sigh he alighted at the mansion on Homer Street, thanked his driver, and started up the swept granite steps. Snow was falling lightly, and through the parlor windows he could see the party his parents were hosting. Walking around to a side entrance, he took the servants’ stairs to his bedroom suite. Tonight he wasn’t in the mood to trade pleasantries with anyone.

Going directly to his desk, set in a bow window enclosure, he picked up a brass-edged calendar and, walking over to the bed, lay down. The snowflakes on his hair and shoulders melted in the warmth of the room, and he felt sensation coming back into his toes. The calendar balanced on his chest, the heaviness of the brass sinking into the black beaver of his coat, he flipped through the months, counting and recounting, as if there were solace in seeing an end to his misery. Six months. Six months until he saw Empress again. He held up July and looked at August with a frown.
When
in August? He’d never asked Valerie when her child was due. It hadn’t mattered before, but suddenly it did. Rising from the bed, he retraced his steps to the desk and reached for the phone.