Marry Me by Sundown

  “A lot more. It’s still not pure silver, but it averages eighty percent, which is considered high, and if the silversmiths back east want sterling, then they can process it further. That requires a lot more chemicals than I have here and huge machines that generate more heat than a small smelter like mine.” He finally glanced around at her. “I didn’t hear any shots while you were gone. No animals today?”

  “Only small ones, but Bo chased them off before I got near them.”

  “I don’t like you going off like that.”

  His protective instincts were rearing again? She felt like smiling. Maybe Aunt Elizabeth’s pointers were working. She wanted to hear him say that he’d been worried about her, so she asked, “Why?”

  “If something happens to you, then I have to waste time looking for your body.” And then he stared at the ribbon around her hips. “That’s a cute gun belt you’ve got there.”

  Her cheeks lit up angrily on both counts—she knew he’d say something snide about her ribbon, but that remark about wasting time was the last straw. She marched off to the cabin, but she was too agitated—and dirty—to take a nap, and a few minutes later she came out with the bar of brown soap and her last set of clean clothes. Crossing the yard to the gate, she yelled, “I have the gun, so I do not need your escort for this bath!”

  All he did was yell back, “You’re bathing again already? You just did that yesterday.”

  She growled under her breath. Had she really thought he might worry about her, the thorn in his side? Of course he wouldn’t. If anything, he’d probably hoped she’d get lost and not return.

  She was laughing at herself by the time she left the little pool. Nothing like a cold dunking to put things in perspective. She didn’t need the man to like her; she just needed him to admit that the partnership he’d made with Charles should and would continue with the Mitchell heirs. The reasons he’d partnered with Charles were still valid and hadn’t been satisfied yet.

  Good grief, for that very short time after he’d finally accepted that she was Violet Mitchell, they’d laughed and gotten along fine. She wanted that back. Then she could broach a plan to save her family’s home immediately. She needed Morgan to pay off the loan so she and her brothers could repay him instead of the bank. It would require coaxing the bear into being generous again. How hard could that be? Hadn’t he admitted he had a heart of gold? But she couldn’t ask him until he was in a more agreeable state of mind, and he wouldn’t get there if she kept arguing with him. What was wrong with her to keep deviating from Aunt Elizabeth’s advice?

  Returning to the cabin, she unhooked the improvised screen so she could sit on the bed to redo her braid without the blanket getting in her way. She was longing to sleep in a nightgown tonight. Should she dare to do so with Morgan in the cabin? Or was he going to smelt tonight after dark? He hadn’t exactly said.

  It was the first thing she asked when he returned to start dinner.

  “No, I told you, only every four days. I’ll crush rocks every day, but I need enough ore to make it worthwhile to light the smelter. You didn’t wash your hair?”

  She blushed a little. She hadn’t washed it because she didn’t want Morgan stirring her up again, as he’d done during the shooting lesson, by insisting he help her brush out the tangles. So she said, “I prefer not to wash it this late in the day, because if I braid it before it’s dry it will be all wavy tomorrow.”

  “So don’t braid it.”

  “It’s my habit to braid it before I go to bed, to keep it out of the way.”

  “That’s a good idea, considering all the tossing and turning you do when you sleep.”

  She was taken aback by his intimate observations of her. Had he watched her sleep? “How do you know that?”

  “Couldn’t help noticing when we were on the trail.”

  Oh, that. She was relieved until he added, “You talk in your sleep, too.”

  She gasped. She did nothing of the sort! But she really didn’t want to get into another argument with him, which his observations were priming her for, so she clamped her mouth shut and looked away from his still naked chest. Why couldn’t he put on a shirt after he left the mine? But she figured maybe he wanted to bathe first, which he left to do as soon as he’d gotten the meal started.

  She stared at the fire while he was gone, trying to calm herself. She shouldn’t let the man and his habits agitate her so. It seemed to work, because she was able to smile at him when he walked in, mostly because he was wearing his shirt now.

  He brought the food to the table. She smirked to herself when he grabbed a towel and laid it on the table before setting down the hot pots. One contained some sort of meat in gravy, the other buttered carrots. The bread he put on the table smelled fresh, so she guessed he must have made it while she’d napped yesterday.

  Once they started eating, he asked, “Who’s Elliott?”

  She almost choked. She did talk in her sleep? She must have been beyond exhausted for that to happen—well, she had been yesterday. There was simply no way that Sophie, with whom she had shared a room all those years, wouldn’t have mentioned something like that if Violet did it regularly.

  Morgan was looking at her expectantly, so she cleared her throat and said, “He’s the English lord I told you about, the man I plan to marry when I return to London.”

  “He’s already asked for you?”

  “No, but the London Season of endless parties was about to begin just as I had to leave to come home. I’ve been looking forward to the Season for years. I still can’t believe I’m missing it. And the balls—I do love dancing. Lord Elliott was immediately interested in me when we met, broke quite a few rules because he wouldn’t leave my side! So charming and debonair. He even told me he was looking for a wife, so I know he would have asked to marry me if I were there to enjoy the Season with him—instead of here sorting out this mess Papa left us with.”

  “You blame Charley for dying?”

  “No, of course not!”

  “Sounds like it to me,” he said with a shrug. “And this Elliott you’re going to pay to marry you sounds like an idiot.”

  “I told you, dowries are expected among the aristocracy, something you obviously know nothing about. So do us both a favor and finish your meal in silence, as I intend to do.”

  She ended that with a glare. Why did that make him grin? Had he deliberately provoked her and was pleased he’d succeeded? But she refused to say another word to him while she was so hotly smarting, or she would certainly say something she would regret.

  She finished her dinner quickly and retreated behind the screen so she wouldn’t have to look at Morgan for another minute. The new arrangement really did afford her some privacy. Much better. But they were still in the same room, even if she couldn’t see him now, so she couldn’t quite bring herself to undress and put on her nightgown. Sometimes she wished proper behavior wasn’t so bloody uncomfortable.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “WHAT IS IT, BO?” Violet yelled as the dog started barking up ahead.

  She ran toward him, hoping he’d finally figured out that she wanted him to find her father’s scent. She’d continued to let him sniff her father’s jacket before she began her search each day. But when she reached him, she saw that he’d just found a family of rabbits and couldn’t figure out which one to chase.

  Assuring herself that the dog just wanted to play with his find rather than eat it, she continued walking. She was becoming frustrated after four days of searching up and down these hills and finding nothing. She’d gone west down the hill yesterday, all the way down, and was utterly disappointed by the view beyond the trees, just another open vista of endless golden and green grassland. She’d walked around every pine tree on the way down, annoyed that none had any exposed roots or hidey-holes to speak of, so she considered that a wasted day.

  And the queasiness she’d been feeling wouldn’t go away. She was so dreading asking Morgan for that loan to save her family ho
me. But how else would her brothers be able to come west to work their father’s mine? Even if she found the money and sent it to them so they could make the next loan payment, Mr. Perry would surely seize the house when he found out both of her brothers had left town without paying back the entire loan.

  Violet had to make a deal with Morgan on their behalf without being able to consult them first. What if her brothers balked at the idea of working in the mine? After all, it would be very hard labor. They might want to find some other way to pay Morgan back once the house was safe, and then he might get mad and have them jailed if they didn’t pay up or start working toward that end right away.

  So many negative possibilities kept filling her head that she’d accomplished nothing over the last three days other than not getting mad at Morgan or arguing with him. But being afraid to broach such an important subject just increased her nervousness. A flat-out no from him would wreck all her hopes and dreams for the future.

  And although she’d been maintaining peace with Morgan, she hadn’t gotten the sense that he would be receptive to her loan proposal. In fact, his movements and actions such as banging plates on the table and stomping out to go work suggested he was still brooding. His mood seemed to have worsened since their dinner three nights ago when he’d asked her who Elliott was. Perhaps she’d gone on too long singing Elliott’s praises and complained too much about missing all the lovely parties during the London Season. She’d broken one of Aunt Elizabeth’s rules about charming a man: she’d talked too much about herself. And last night she’d annoyed him so much that he’d stomped out of the cabin and slept on the porch.

  But that hadn’t been her fault! She’d been unable to sleep because her legs hurt from so much walking and her calf muscles had cramped. She’d lifted her nightgown to rub her leg, having given in to sleeping more comfortably in the gown the previous night.

  He must have heard her groan and asked, “What’s wrong?”

  When she told him, the next thing she knew the bare-chested bear had swiped aside her screen and tossed a bottle of liniment on her bed. She’d gasped because her nightgown was still hiked up, giving him a clear view of her aching legs. But all he did was scowl, drop her blanket-screen back down, and go back to his bed.

  The cooking fire was still burning low, throwing off some light in the cabin, but it was too dark in her enclosure to read the label on the bottle. “What is this for?”

  “All sorts of things, one of them sore muscles.”

  Her eyes flared. “You had this and didn’t offer it to me when we arrived and I could barely walk?”

  “My friends from Nashart left a few things behind when they went home. I forgot about it. Just found it yesterday when I was looking for the fresh salt.”

  Appeased, she’d immediately started rubbing the liniment on her calves and sighed in relief, mumbling, “This works rather quickly. I’ll try it on my thighs, too.” A few moments later she was sighing in relief and pleasure again, then was startled when she heard Morgan stomp out of the cabin.

  Violet didn’t like remembering any of that, when all it did was assure her that Morgan still wasn’t ready for The Talk. How frustrating! Her father had found exactly what he’d come west for, a new fortune, but it was up to her to secure it for her family.

  Returning to camp later than usual, around six in the evening, she found Texas in the cabin instead of Morgan. He’d just made himself a cup of coffee and remarked, “Morgan’s mining late again. He’s been working like a demon these last few days.”

  She wouldn’t know, because she’d been out searching like a demon herself. “I’ve had no luck finding my father’s money, and I still seem to be annoying Morgan.”

  “Sounds like you could both use a break. You’d surely be less of a thorn in his side if you played poker with him. He loves that game.” And then he laughed. “He’s not as good at it as he claims to be. You might end up winning some money from him!”

  She thanked Texas for the advice before he left, thrilled that she had a new way to continue her charm offensive against the bear. So that night, her fifth in Morgan’s camp, she waited until they’d finished dinner before suggesting, “Teach me to play poker? Or are you too tired?”

  In answer, he took a small box off one of the shelves and set it on the table in front of her, saying, “Divide the nuggets while I clean up.”

  Violet opened the lid and lifted out a deck of cards, then stared in amazement at the layer of gold at the bottom of the box. Carefully dumping the nuggets on the table, she divided them into two piles of thirty each, putting the odd one back in the box.

  When he came back inside with the clean dishes, she guessed, “This is the gold you found in the creeks when you first got to this range, isn’t it?”

  “What’s left of it, yeah.”

  “What is it worth?”

  He shrugged as he sat down across from her. “Maybe twelve hundred or so.”

  She gasped. “But why haven’t you sold them?”

  “Because I told my family I was coming here to find gold, and I’ll take home whatever’s left of those nuggets to prove I did. In the meantime, when Tex and I feel like playing poker, I give him a couple nuggets in exchange for forty bucks since I don’t keep cash up here, while he does. ’Sides, he loves playing with nuggets in town games. It never fails to cause a ruckus and get him a pretty gal for the night—were you named for the color of your eyes?”

  She blinked at the question he’d tossed in, grateful that it kept her from blushing over his “gal for the night” remark. “No, I was told my eyes were baby blue when I was born. But violets were in bloom and my father brought a bouquet of them to my mother, and the name just occurred to her when she saw them. My eyes didn’t turn violet until I was about six months old, according to my father, and my parents laughed when it happened. Then again, my mother also had violet eyes, so she might have been expecting mine to change color. I don’t know. She died before I was old enough to ask her.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “So am I. But her absence was why I took on the mantle of being a mother to my brothers.”

  “When?”

  “When I was five.”

  He laughed. “No, you didn’t.”

  “I did, and they humored me, though it probably would have been in their best interests if they hadn’t, because I got better at it.”

  “Being a mother?”

  “Keeping them in line. They were so rambunctious at that age. Now, about this poker game?”

  He explained the rules. He even laid out hands to show her the different ways she could win, from a mere highest card to a royal flush and everything in between. Then he shuffled the deck and dealt five cards to each of them.

  “What about the bluffing you mentioned?”

  “Say you’ve got three aces. Odds are that’s going to be the winning hand. But you don’t want anyone to know that, so instead of betting three aces, you pass on the bet and hope someone else will think you’ll drop out if they bet. So when they do bet, you can be nice and just call, or go for blood and raise. Now they have to put in more money to see your winning hand, or they’ll fold and you get the pot.”

  “I’ve got three aces.”

  “No, you don’t, and saying so isn’t bluffing. You bluff with the way you bet, high or low, not by saying what you have or with the expression on your face. And it isn’t mandatory to bluff, it just makes the game more interesting.”

  Which was apparently what he was hoping for, so she smiled sweetly and asked, “But is it against the rules to say what’s in your hand?”

  “No, it’s just not a smart way to play the game, and it isn’t considered a bluff.”

  “Why not? You still need to decide whether I’m telling the truth, which by your poker definition would be am I bluffing or not. Besides, I really do have three aces, and you need to pay to see them, right?”

  He raised his brow at her and called her bet, but raised her two more nuggets. She ca
lled him and upped that three more, but asked, “Could I have raised with all my nuggets?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Yes, but this is a practice game, and you running out of nuggets on the first hand would end it. Besides, I’m calling without raising further, so that ends it.”

  She smugly laid down her cards. He burst out laughing, seeing her three aces along with a pair of nines. She was delighted, not about winning but because she’d managed to amuse him.

  They played for another hour, with Violet losing all of her nuggets. It seemed to leave him in a good mood, but it was late now and, he’d yawned a few times, so she decided that tomorrow, come what may, she would ask him for the loan and present her partnership proposal.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  FILLED WITH DETERMINATION, VIOLET started walking south right after breakfast the next morning, vowing to find the money. She would insist that Morgan immediately send it to her brothers. Two days ago she’d searched in this direction, but she’d covered only the slopes that were easy to navigate. Today, feeling more comfortable in the wilderness, she would venture into the rougher terrain where high, rocky ledges abounded.

  She got excited when she found some disturbed dirt. She pushed the dirt away with a sharp stone. Bo’s whining should have been a clue, but she was terribly disappointed when all she uncovered was one of the bones he’d buried. He quickly swiped it up and trotted off. She sighed and sat in the grass for a few minutes, looking around. The ledge she’d come across, which was only about five feet high, started a few hundred feet back, and up ahead she could see a black hole at the base of it. Thrilled to have found a potential hiding spot, she leapt to her feet and ran to it, then stared wide-eyed at what was crawling out of it.

  “Oh, aren’t you just too adorable!” she gushed as she picked up the puppy and cuddled it in her arms. It had a cream-colored belly, but its coat was mostly brown hair tipped with black. The lower part of its face was white. “We’re going to be best friends, you and I, and Lord Elliott will love you after I marry him, I will insist.”