Walking on Air

  Gabriel chuckled and lifted her hand. She watched in stunned amazement as he drew her thumb into his mouth. It felt as if warm, wet silk had gloved her flesh. She jerked her hand, but he held tight. As he sucked, she felt the pulsating pain give way to a dull ache. She also felt a hot, drizzly sensation low in her belly that made her want to gather her skirts, leap to her feet, and run for her life. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

  When he finally stopped his ministrations, he smiled and said, “Next time, after you kick something and curse, pop the injured part in your mouth. Works every time.”

  Shaken by the unwanted arousal coursing through her, Nan managed to say, “Apparently you’ve hit your own thumb a number of times.”

  “A few. Once you get your swing perfected, you don’t miss as often.” Weight balanced on the heel of one boot, he shifted to glance over her shoulder. “A loose board, huh? I’ll fix that for you lickety-split.” He reached for the hammer. Nan’s good hand shot out and grabbed it first.

  “I can do it!”

  He closed his fingers over hers and came away with the tool. “Judging by the way that nail’s bent almost double, I don’t think so.”

  Oh, no. Heart in her throat, Nan watched as he located the nails she’d spit out, found another on the tabletop, and then knelt on one knee, hammer in hand, to pry the board loose again. Muscle rippled in his shoulders and across his back as he put his strength into the job. She knew he was bound to see the satchel when the board popped free, and for the life of her, she couldn’t think what she should say.

  “Well, now, what have we here?” he asked when the inevitable occurred. He reached through the crack and lifted the bag out. With a quick twist of his fingers, he opened the catch and stared at the money. Nan’s face went hot when he directed a questioning look at her. “Do you really think this is necessary?”

  “It’s mine,” she cried. The words came unbidden. “I won’t let you claim it. I won’t. I worked hard to earn every cent. Do you think I’m stupid enough to leave it in the bank so you can take it away from me?”

  Never in her life had she seen anyone’s expression change so fast. His face so grim that it frightened her, he closed the satchel, returned it to its hiding place, and nailed the plank down with hard, precise swings that filled the shop with deafening reports. She wondered if he was wishing he was hammering her instead of the nails. When finished, he straightened, tossed the hammer on her desk, and thrust her cloak at her. Nan flinched every time he moved. His anger was so intense that she could almost feel its heat.

  “Come with me,” he said.

  It was an order. Nan, who’d been liberated from masculine rule for eight years, protested. “I’m not going anywhere. I’ve a child to support and a business to run.”

  His dark eyes had gone as black and flat as smut in a stovepipe. “Oh, yes, you are, Nan,” he said with soft menace. “Either you put on your cloak and come with me willingly, right now, or I’m going to throw you over my shoulder and carry you. Given your love of propriety, I don’t think you want that to happen. Everyone on both boardwalks will see you riding my shoulder with your fanny pointed skyward. And if you think I won’t do it—try me.”

  Five minutes later, Nan was sitting beside her husband in front of Walter Hamm’s desk. In stunned silence and not quite trusting her ears, she attended the conversation between the two men. Gabriel instructed the attorney to draw up an affidavit stating that he, Gabriel Valance, Nan’s lawfully wedded husband, relinquished all rights to his wife’s assets. The title to her shop would remain solely in her name, and her husband would have no access to her bank accounts. After two copies were signed and notarized, Gabriel took one, folded it neatly, and slipped it into his shirt pocket. The other copy would be filed as a public record.

  Nan shrank in her chair, feeling . . . Oh, she couldn’t find words for how she felt. Numb, definitely. A little like the time she’d fallen off a horse, hit her head, and felt disconnected after regaining consciousness. And also ashamed. She’d badly misjudged Gabriel, and her actions had hurt him. She’d made him bleed way deep inside where no one could see—in that secret place where he cried over events in his past that could never be changed or erased. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she knew. Certainly his face didn’t give it away. Those strong features looked carved out of granite.

  When the business about her assets was completed, Nan stood, thinking that they would leave, but Gabriel indicated by gesture that she should sit back down. To Hamm he said, “Now I’d like you to draw up my will, and make Nan my sole beneficiary. It should be simple enough. I liquidated all of my father’s assets after he died, so there’s no real property involved, only some money in my Kansas City bank account.” He paused. “Well, that’s not exactly right. I do have a horse down at the livery.” He glanced at Nan. “When I die, will you take care of him for me? Maybe rent some pasture at the edge of town, have a shelter built, and see to it that he’s fed and watered every day? His name’s Brownie, and he’s been a loyal friend to me. I don’t want him sold.”

  Nan stared at her husband. She’d ridden often in New York, but she hadn’t been near an equine since, except for when she and Laney had traveled cross country, partly by stagecoach. “You’re not going to die, Gabriel. And you’ve made your point. There’s no need to draw up a will.”

  “Everyone dies,” he replied. “Will you take care of my horse or not?”

  “Of course. I just think—”

  “How you think is what got us here,” he snapped, cutting her off. To Hamm, who was staring at them both in bemused amazement, he continued. “That takes care of it, then. When I cock up my toes, Nan gets everything, including my horse. If anything happens to her, it goes next to Laney. I don’t give a damn about my personal effects.”

  Hamm shifted papers on his desk and cleared his throat. “I can certainly draw up a will for you, Mr. Valance, but in order to make it ironclad, I should include all the pertinent financial information, the name of your bank, the names or numbers of your accounts, and—”

  “There’s only one account.” Gabe gave the attorney the name of the bank and his account number. “It’s also under my name, Gabriel Valance.”

  Hamm hunched over his desk, jotting down the information. “And your middle name?”

  “I don’t have one. My mother just named me Gabriel. Maybe she didn’t know about middle names. I don’t think she came from educated folk.”

  Nan’s heart squeezed.

  “And, roughly estimating, of course, how much would you say is in the account?” the attorney asked.

  Gabe frowned thoughtfully. “It’s been a while since I looked at the balance, but the best as I can recollect, about one point five, give or take a few thousand.”

  Hamm’s pen jerked to a stop. He lifted his head to stare at Gabriel. “I’m sorry. You mean one point five thousand, surely. Fifteen hundred?”

  Gabriel’s mouth tipped into a humorless grin. “I don’t know where you learned your numbers, Hamm, but where I learned mine, you can’t give or take a few thousand from fifteen hundred dollars. My father left me all his money, plus gambling and whorehouses in four different states. After I sold all the damned businesses, I had a little over one point five million in the bank. I don’t live high on the hog and haven’t spent much of it, so I’m guessing what’s left is still on the plus side of one point five.”

  Walter Hamm emitted a sound that reminded Nan of a cat trying to cough up a hairball. He wasn’t the only one who was stunned. Nan nearly fell off her chair.

  After concluding business at Hamm’s office, Gabriel, without speaking a word, ushered Nan across the street to Simon White’s banking establishment, where he arranged to transfer ten thousand dollars into Nan’s bank account. During the transaction, Gabriel never looked Nan’s way. Feet numb, thoughts circling, she stood at his side, her gaze pinned to the muscle that ticked in h
is lean cheek as he signed the necessary paperwork. Ten thousand. Nan’s father was wealthy, and she’d grown up in palatial surroundings, but never in her life had she had access to so much money. And to top it off, Gabriel had signed away his right to touch a single cent of it.

  If his purpose had been to make her feel like a worm, he’d certainly succeeded by the time they exited the bank and started across the dirt thoroughfare to her shop. When they reached the boardwalk, Nan groped in her cloak pocket for the key. Gabriel didn’t follow her over to the door. When she turned to glance back at him, she felt sure the memory of him standing there on the boardwalk, feet spread, hands resting at his hips, would be forever branded in her mind. Black Stetson, black hair, black clothing, and black boots. He still looked like Satan himself, only Nan now knew he wasn’t. The anger had gone from his face. It was completely expressionless. She thought she preferred the anger. Behind those fathomless dark eyes, she suspected, swirled a world of hurt. And she was responsible.

  There was a lump in the middle of her chest that ached like a sore tooth. She owed him an apology. She knew that. But so many feelings were tangled within her that she couldn’t sort one from another to form a coherent thought, let alone a sentence. Besides, a busy boardwalk wasn’t the place to conduct that sort of conversation.

  “About that bet we made,” he said slowly and succinctly. “When I come back, you need to pay up. I want a hundred dollars out of that satchel.”

  “What?” Nan wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. “You nailed the plank back down at all four corners.”

  His eyes burned into hers. “In between waiting on customers, I guess you’ll be plenty busy, then, won’t you? I want my hundred dollars, no ifs, ands, or buts.”

  “You just transferred ten thousand dollars into my bank account. Why can’t you wait and let me withdraw a hundred?”

  “That’s my money.” He jabbed a thumb at his chest. “I want a hundred of yours.”

  Nan searched his dark face, but she found no trace of emotion there. What difference did it make where the hundred dollars came from? He’d just given her far more than that.

  “Gabriel, you’re making no sense.”

  He spun on a boot heel to walk away. Over his shoulder, he said, “Why do I have to make sense, Nan? You sure as hell don’t.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Nan spent an hour working the floorboard loose. Gabriel had not only nailed the silly thing down, but apparently glued it into place as well. Sweat trickled down her spine and dripped from her nose before she finished. Then she pulled, tugged, and finally braced her feet on the floor to pull the stupid satchel up through the opening. When the bag finally popped free, Nan was unprepared for the sudden give and lost her balance, staggering backward into shelving. Ouch. It was her second injury of the day. Now in addition to a tender thumb, she had an aching shoulder blade. And both injuries were her own fault for doubting Gabriel Valence.

  No sooner had Nan regained her balance than she heard Geneva out front, calling, “Na-an? Na-an, dear, where are you?”

  Usually Geneva’s habit of giving her name two syllables amused Nan, but today it irked her. She didn’t feel like dealing with a demanding customer right then, but she set the satchel on her project table and pushed aside the curtain anyway. “Well, hello, Geneva. How lovely to see you.” Please, God, don’t let her insist on another stuffed canary. “I spoke with Mr. White early this morning, and he mentioned that you’ve been talking nonstop about your new gown. I can’t wait to hear your ideas.”

  Geneva, who considered herself to be up-to-date on all the latest Parisian fashions, having as a cherished possession a six-year-old copy of a French ladies magazine, swept off her luxurious wool cape, an eye-popping blue one today, and hung it on a hook by the door. “I do, Nan. And I am eager to share them.” She fluttered her fingertips over her puffed sleeves, which were hopelessly passé, and then swatted her bustle, which ballooned behind her, giving the viewer a general impression of a ship approaching at full sail. Though Nan had tried at least a dozen times to tell the woman that subtler bustles were now in style, Geneva had turned a deaf ear. Laney called it selective deafness. Pressing her palms together as if she were at prayer, Geneva cried, “I have the most beautiful gown pictured in my mind! It is going to be astounding!”

  It would be astounding, all right, Nan thought grimly. Just then Prudence and Loretta swanned into the shop to pay for their trim, and before Nan could collect their money, three other ladies walked in. Nan felt like a curiosity on display in a traveling circus. Sometimes she had browsers in her establishment, but seldom five women at once. Perhaps Laney had it right, and Nan should sell tickets. Problem: Her husband, the main attraction, had vanished.

  Four hours later, after finally clearing her shop of customers, Nan had a brutal headache, felt sick to her stomach, and yearned to lie down before she had to start supper. Geneva’s gown would be memorable, but not in the way the fool woman intended. Silver and red sequins on a black day gown? Nan shuddered at the very thought.

  After closing the shop, she went upstairs and settled for dabbing lavender water at her temples. Glancing at her bodice watch, she determined that Gabriel had been gone now for more than five hours. She gazed solemnly at her bed. Even though she’d tidied the covers and drawn up the coverlet that morning, she could almost see him lying there, naked from the waist up, his muscular arms folded behind his head. He’d slept beside her for five nights running, and he’d yet to touch her in any improper way. Not that she was complaining.

  She sank onto the edge of the bed and rested her forehead on the heels of her hands. Oh, how she wished he would return before Laney came in from school. Nan needed to apologize to him, and she preferred to do it in private. Ten thousand dollars. The man was wealthy beyond most people’s measure, yet all he owned was a horse, a saddle, a bedroll, and clothing. From the moment he had appeared in her shop last Wednesday, Nan had believed he was after her worldly possessions. Or her person. Yet he’d laid claim to neither one, had made her the sole beneficiary in his will, and now . . . well, now she no longer knew what to think. She still wasn’t entirely certain he wasn’t after her person, but she’d had irrefutable proof that he wasn’t after her money.

  His appearance in her life made no sense to her. Absolutely none. Unless, of course . . . Oh, no, not that. It couldn’t be.

  Deep in her heart, Nan had always believed that her heavenly Father looked after her. Thinking back over her life, she couldn’t count the times, using all her fingers and toes, when divine intervention had either saved her from a dastardly fate, sent precisely the right person to help her, or led her directly where she needed to go. But Gabriel Valance? He was completely wrong for her, as well as for Laney, more of a catastrophic visitation than a blessing.

  All the same, Nan couldn’t deny how many times she’d failed to recognize a blessing in disguise until months or even years later. Barclay’s attack on her, for instance. At the time, Nan had felt that it was the most terrible thing that could possibly have happened to her, but in retrospect, she knew the assault and Barclay’s consequential death had been the catalysts that had given her the courage to grab Laney and run. A horrific occurrence, yes, and it haunted her to this day. But Nan knew, beyond a doubt, that if not for the events of that night, she would have been forced to wed Horace Barclay and would now be his desperately unhappy, browbeaten, physically abused broodmare. And Laney, raised by Martin Sullivan, would now be nearing a marriageable age and possibly even be already betrothed to a man she detested. Nan couldn’t help but feel that they’d both escaped a dire future and landed in a far better place.

  As for landing where they had, here in Random? Nan’s decision to stay in this town had not come about because she’d wanted to live in a tiny community off the beaten track, but because Laney had sickened with pneumonia during their journey west. Nan had rented a room at the Random Hotel an
d sent for the doctor, nursed Laney back to wellness, and then decided to remain for a few more days to let the child regain her strength. It had been turning spring at the time, and as happened in Colorado, the cold, stormy weather suddenly gave way to a delightfully warm day, enabling Nan to take her sister outside for a little walk. During that outing, Nan had spied the For Sale sign on a milliner’s shop. For an amazingly low price, the considerable inventory would go with the building, and the place had been in ready-to-open condition.

  According to the notice posted on the shop window, the elderly Mrs. Barker, who owned the shop, had taken sick and never recovered enough to resume her entrepreneurial duties. She’d decided to sell and had moved to the edge of town to live with her daughter. Nevertheless, she loved her store and came in weekly to dust and polish, keeping everything in excellent shape. Nan remembered how her heart had leaped with excitement when she’d peered through the windows. Then she’d pooh-poohed the idea, laughing at herself for being so ludicrous. She couldn’t become a milliner. She didn’t know the first thing about making hats.

  The thought had no sooner settled in her mind than a crackly voice behind her said, “Ah, interested, are you?” And Nan turned to see a bent lady with snow-white hair who just happened to be Mrs. Barker, the shop owner. She had taken an instant liking to Nan, encouraged her to buy the business, and then had come every single day to teach Nan her trade. Eight years later, Nan couldn’t say she’d gotten rich being a milliner-cum-seamstress, but she had managed to build a good life for herself and her sister. Random and this shop had become their salvation, something Nan never would have predicted when she first clapped eyes on this dusty little town.