The door was opened by thirteen-year-old Birdie Bidwell, a neighbor of Millie’s who helped out with the chores to supplement her family’s meager income.
“Hello, Birdie,” the sisters called as they stepped inside.
“Good morning, Miss Diamond, Miss Pearl, Miss Ruby, Miss Jade.”
“Birdie,” Jade said with a warm smile, “Pearl tells me you’re her best pupil.”
“Not for much longer,” the girl said. “Pa thinks it’s a waste of time for a girl my age.” She held out her hands. “I’ll take your shawls.”
When Ruby reached for hers, Diamond shot her a withering look. At once the buxom beauty smiled and said, “I think it’s a bit chilly. I’ll just keep my shawl, if you don’t mind, Birdie.”
If the girl was puzzled, she kept her thoughts to herself. The summer sun was already high in the sky and threatening to turn the day into a sizzler. But if one of the Jewel ladies wanted to keep her shawl on, it certainly wasn’t her place to ask questions.
As she hung the other shawls, her hands lingered on Jade’s.
“What is this made of, Miss Jade?”
“Silk.”
“It sure is soft,” the girl said, running her callused palms over it. “It must cost a fortune.”
“I suppose so.” Jade gave the girl a gentle smile. “Maybe when you’re older, you can buy a silk shawl.”
As she walked away, Birdie shook her head. Silk was all right for a fine lady like Miss Jade. But the most she would ever hope for was a new gown of simple homespun. Birdie had never worn a new gown. All her clothes were made over from her mother’s castoffs.
She gave one last glance at the fine Jewel ladies, then hurried off to finish her chores.
“Morning, Millie,” Diamond called out as she entered the dining room. “Can you accommodate us today?”
“Good morning.” Millie tucked up a stray strand of flaming hair before lifting the coffeepot. “Take a seat. You know there’s always room for my best customers.”
Her smile bloomed when she caught sight of the preacher.
“You’re just in time,” she called.
He made his way across the room, stopping to talk to the other guests before pausing beside Jade. He held her chair and settled in beside her. His thigh brushed hers, and she felt the heat all the way through her skirt.
“I would have thought you’d be at Agnes Thurlong’s, having a leisurely Sunday meal with her family,” Jade said.
“And sit idly by while they try to ensnare me?” His smile grew. “I thought I’d be safer here at Millie Potter’s.”
Just then Millie and her young helper began to serve the meal. As she paused beside Wade, Millie placed several biscuits on his plate. “I baked these especially for you,” she murmured. “With extra sugar and cinnamon just the way you like them.”
Jade nearly choked on her laughter. Everyone in Hanging Tree knew that Millie, a widow, was hoping to snag a daddy for her three little girls. And who better than the town preacher?
“Oh, yes,” Jade said in an aside. “You’re definitely safer here.”
She savored her moment of victory while, beside her, Wade Weston dug into his meal in silence.
“That’s an awfully big building you’re putting up, Miss Jade.” Marshal Regan forked eggs onto his plate and passed the platter to Doc Prentice. “Folks in town are concerned.”
Jade felt the curious looks from the others. “Concerned, Marshal?”
“That your…business might attract the wrong sort.”
Jade gave him a cool, reassuring smile. “I think you and the people of Hanging Tree will be pleasantly surprised with the results. The Golden Dragon will be a place of music, culture and fine food. I intend to run the Golden Dragon just the way my mother did in San Francisco.”
“Sounds like a mighty big job for one little female,” Doc Prentice muttered.
Jade lifted her chin and bit back the words that threatened. Instead, sipping her tea, she merely smiled. She would show them. She would show all of them what one little female could do.
Beside her, Wade Weston detected the tiny flicker of emotion. The lady was very good at hiding her feelings.
Doc turned to the marshal. “I hear there was another shooting.”
The lawman nodded. “The other side of Poison Creek. Six outlaws ambushed Samuel Fisher on his way home from the sawmill where he’d been working for Farley Duke. Samuel was lucky to escape with his life. If it hadn’t been for his wife and four boys riding up just then, he swears he wouldn’t have made it.”
“Did he recognize any of the gang?” Doc asked.
“Not a one. Had their faces hidden behind bandannas. But from the sounds of it, they’re the same ones that have struck before.”
“Maybe it’s time to swear out a posse and go after them,” Doc suggested.
“I don’t like to take so many men away from their families. Especially with a vicious gang like this.” Quent Regan washed down his meal with hot black coffee, the fourth of the morning. “These outlaws seem to enjoy killing.”
“You think they’ll strike again?” Diamond asked quietly.
Quent shrugged. The badge pinned to his shirt winked in the rays of sunlight streaming through the dining-room window. “I don’t know what to think. But I’ll tell you one thing. No one’s going to terrorize the citizens of my territory. Not while I’m marshal. My deputy and I are taking every precaution to protect the town.”
Pearl shivered. “Such violence. I’m afraid I’ll never get used to it.”
“It’s part of Texas,” Diamond muttered.
“It’s part of life,” the marshal added.
“But it doesn’t have to be.” Wade’s words, though spoken softly, held a hint of steel.
Jade turned to study him. In profile, he didn’t resemble the man who had spoken so lovingly from the pulpit. With flaring nostrils and tightly clenched jaw, he looked as though he could lead a posse himself.
“It’s easy for you to say,” the marshal remarked, “when you carry a Bible instead of a gun. But you don’t earn your living chasing outlaws.”
“In a way, I do.” Wade’s tone softened, though the fire was still in his eyes. “You chase them to punish them, while I chase them to offer them the chance to seek forgiveness from those they’ve harmed.”
“Well,” Quent said, fiddling with his knife, “you may offer them forgiveness, Reverend. I offer justice. At the end of a rope.”
Doc Prentice nodded, his pencil-thin mustache twitching as he smiled. “It’s how our town got its name.”
Everyone knew that the doctor, though a relative newcomer to Texas, had a fascination for the history of the town.
“Have there been many hangings?” Pearl asked.
“I’ve been told there were dozens,” Doc replied.
“Was there an actual tree?” Jade asked.
“It’s gone now.” Doc Prentice helped himself to another biscuit and slathered it with Millie Potter’s wild cherry preserves. “They say that old oak was here a hundred years or more. It stood on a hill just outside of town. The branches stuck out like long, spindly arms. Just perfect for hanging a man. The first hanging was for cattle rustling. Folks came from miles around. Afterward they stayed and had a picnic on the banks of Poison Creek.”
He popped the biscuit into his mouth and chewed, then washed it down with a swallow of coffee. “After that it became a kind of tradition. Folks would flock to a hanging, then stay around to visit with the neighbors they hadn’t seen since the last time.”
Jade shuddered. “I can’t imagine having a picnic after such a horrible event. It seems so uncivilized.”
The marshal nodded in agreement. “Most of it was before my time. I hear it got so bad, folks were eager for the next hanging, just so they could have an excuse for another picnic. The sheriff finally had to request a federal judge be sent all the way from St. Louis.”
“What good would that do?” Jade asked.
“
He figured a cool head was needed to keep the townspeople from making hasty decisions that might cost an innocent man his life.”
Beside her, Jade realized that the reverend had gone very still. When she glanced at him, he lowered his gaze. But in that brief moment when their eyes met she caught sight of a blazing anger. His hands were clenched so tightly in his lap, the knuckles were white from the effort.
Suddenly he pushed away from the table. “If you’ll excuse me,” he called to Millie Potter, “I have a lot of visits to. make today. I promised Yancy I’d bring him some more tobacco. And I told the Thompsons I’d stop by and share a Bible reading with their boy who was thrown from a mustang and suffered a broken arm. Since the widow Purdy took another spell, I thought I’d stop by there, as well.”
“Sounds like you have a full day, Reverend.” Millie filled the marshal’s cup, then set down the coffeepot and wiped her hands on her apron before crossing the room. “But I should have expected as much. After all, it is Sunday. Will I see you later?”
He shrugged. “There’s no telling. If I find myself too far from town, I’ll just sleep along the trail.”
“Then you’d better take this.” She handed him a linen-wrapped bundle. “Just in case.”
“Thanks, Millie.” He turned to the others at the table and said his goodbyes.
Jade watched him pull on a cowhide duster and take his leave. She found herself wondering at his reaction to the marshal’s words. She’d sensed anger in him. And pain. Not so surprising, she told herself. After all, he was, as Marshal Regan said, a man who carried a Bible instead of a gun. The thought of mob violence would be repugnant to such a man.
Still, for a man of peace, his reaction had been almost violent. And his violence, though carefully banked, was frightening to behold.
Chapter Five
It was late afternoon and Wade had been on the trail since breakfast at Millie Potter’s, bringing whatever comfort he could to those who lay sick or dying.
As his horse topped a rise, he stared across the wide expanse of barren land to where a carriage stood tilted at a crazy angle. When he rode closer he found Jade standing alongside her rig, examining a broken wheel.
“Are you hurt?” He swung from the saddle and hurried to her side.
“No.” She was so relieved to see someone, anyone, she could have hugged him. “Fortunately the team was moving slowly, otherwise I’d probably have been thrown to the ground. There’s no telling how much damage might have been done.” She rubbed a tender shoulder. “As it is, I was bounced around a good bit.”
He studied her with grave concern. “Are you certain nothing’s broken? Your arm? Your shoulder?” He ran a hand across her shoulder, down her arm, probing gently.
She was surprised at the tenderness of his touch. And jolted by it. To cover her shock she muttered, “The only thing broken is that wheel.”
Wade was genuinely concerned for her safety. And annoyed by the rush of feelings the simple touch of her evoked. “With his fears relieved, he gave in to a wave of unexpected anger. “What in heaven’s name are you doing all alone in the middle of nowhere? There isn’t a living soul for miles. Did you want to tempt the fates? To see if you could outrun a gang of outlaws again?”
At his heated words, her relief was forgotten as her anger surfaced. “I don’t owe you an explanation, Reverend Weston. But for your information, I was visiting the graves of my parents.”
That stopped him, but only for a moment.
“Then you should have taken some of your wranglers along for protection.”
“They have a ranch to run.” She touched a hand to the knife at her waist. “Besides, I told you. I always carry protection with me.”
He swallowed back a snort of anger. “As I recall, your knife was useless against the gang that stopped you on the trail.”
She glared at him, but before she could protest he said crisply, “Maybe you enjoy tempting fate, to see if your…guardian angel will save you again.”
“Instead,” she said with a frown, “I have only you.”
“Sorry to disappoint you.” He turned his back on her and studied the broken wheel. “I’m afraid I don’t have the tools to repair this. But I can take you to your ranch….”
She brightened.
“As long as you don’t mind a few stops along the way,” he finished.
She sighed. Her plans for the rest of the day would have to be postponed. But at least she wasn’t stuck unhitching the team and riding bareback to the ranch. She managed a smile. “Thank you, Reverend. I’d be grateful for the ride.”
He unhitched her team and led them to a shady knoll with grass and water, then tied them to a rope stretched between two trees. Assured that the horses were secured, he swung into the saddle, then reached down and pulled Jade up behind him.
The slit on both sides of her silk skirt allowed her to straddle the horse’s back without tearing the fabric. It also exposed a great deal of her flesh, from ankle to knee.
Jade was surprised by the flare of feelings when her arms encircled his waist. As the horse broke into a run she was forced to hold on tightly. With her cheek pressed to his shoulder, she clung to him as the horse’s hooves ate up the miles of Texas landscape.
While he guided his mount, Wade fought a battle of his own. He was achingly aware of the breasts flattened against his back, of the thighs pressed to his, of the small, delicate hands holding firmly to him. The wind caught Jade’s hair, swirling it like silk around him. He inhaled the exotic scent of her perfume and found himself thinking things he had no right to. Things that quickened his heartbeat and made his blood run hot.
The direction of his thoughts threatened to distract him and make the rest of his day completely unsettled.
“It was good of you to come, Reverend.” The widow Purdy lay in the big bed her husband had made for her more than fifty years earlier. “And what a lovely surprise to find Miss Jewel with you.”
“You two know each other?” Wade had thought the widow, living in such isolation, would have no knowledge of this newcomer to the territory.
“Diamond had her wranglers slaughter a cow and deliver it to my place to see me through the winter. When she couldn’t accompany them, Jade came in her place.”
Wade arched a brow in surprise. It was another layer to the mystery that surrounded Jade Jewel.
“What brings the two of you together?” the widow asked.
“The reverend was just being neighborly. My wagon broke a wheel,” Jade explained.
“That’s just like Reverend Weston. He’s been so kind to us. Please make yourselves comfortable.” Mrs. Purdy’s skin was the texture of aged parchment after a lifetime of working the fields beside her man. Hair as white as the cotton fields in her childhood home of Louisiana drifted around a face that still bore traces of faded freckles.
Though her frayed cotton nightgown was modest, with high neck and long sleeves, she insisted upon draping a shawl around her shoulders out of deference to her houseguests.
“You’ll have some coffee? My daughter, Martha, will fetch some.”
“Yes, thank you.” Wade hung his leather duster on a nail beside the door, then set a chair next to the bed for Jade, and another for himself. That done, he accepted a steaming cup of coffee.
The daughter, her own hair threaded with gray, took up a vigil on the other side of the bed, her knitting needles making a steady, rhythmic clacking that matched the shallow breathing of the old woman.
“Do you need anything, Mrs. Purdy?” Wade asked.
“It’s kind of you to ask, but the folks from town look out for me. And Martha sees to my daily needs.”
Mother and daughter shared a loving look.
“You’re lucky to have family nearby,” Jade remarked.
Mrs. Purdy nodded. “Martha’s the last of ‘em. Lost a son and son-in-law in the war, and both my parents. Thought I’d lost Beauford, too. But he came back to me. We came here back in ‘50. It was wild, untame
d. Untried. But we were young and adventurous.” She sighed deeply. “All in all it’s been a good life, Reverend. But I won’t be sorry to leave it.”
“Hush, Ma,” the woman beside the bed whispered. “Don’t talk like that.”
“Martha doesn’t like to think she’ll be alone.” The widow patted her daughter’s hand, then closed her eyes. “But it can’t be helped.”
“I’ve never been truly alone,” Martha said softly. “There was always Ma. And then Jed. And when Jed didn’t come home from the war, there were the children. But now they’ve all scattered. And Ma…” The knitting needles moved faster. She looked up with tear-filled eyes. “Have you ever been alone, Miss Jewel?”
Jade shook her head. “Not really. Though my father didn’t live with us, he visited when he could. And there was always my mother. When I lost her, and my father, I discovered three wonderful sisters to fill the void.”
“You’re very lucky.” Martha glanced at the man beside Jade. “Do you know much about being alone, Reverend?”
“Yes, ma’am. I’d say I know a lot about it.”
Jade turned to him. She hadn’t given much thought to his life before his arrival in Hanging Tree. She had assumed there was a family somewhere. A father, mother, perhaps sisters and brothers.
“You’ve been alone a long time?” Martha asked.
He nodded. “Most of my life, ma’am.”
Was that a thread of pain? Jade wondered. She sipped her coffee and studied him more closely.
“How do you stand it?” Martha’s words came out in a frightened whisper.
“I’ve never thought much about it,” he said gently. “It’s just the way my life has always been.”
“That will change,” the old woman said, her eyes suddenly opening to focus on him. “You’re young, healthy. You’ll find a good woman.” Watery blue eyes fixed Jade with a piercing look before shifting back to the reverend. “And then you won’t have to be alone anymore.”
“I doubt that, ma’am.” Seeing the looks exchanged between mother and daughter, he deftly changed the subject. “You say you came here in ‘50? I’ll bet you have some stories to tell about the early days here in Hanging Tree.”