Wolf Creek Wife

He broke into a fit of coughing that had Dan Mercer looking over his shoulder.

“You all right, bud?” Dan asked.

“I’ll live,” he grumbled.

“Hope so.”

Will tried to smile but didn’t think he managed more than a grimace. He didn’t remember ever being this sick in his life. In fact, he could count on one hand the times he’d suffered from any kind of ailment. He closed his eyes, hoping to sleep, even though the wagon was wallowing in the rough ruts in the road and seemed to hit every hole. Despite the jarring ride, the sickness that left him weak and feverish finally allowed him to drift in and out of a light sleep.

* * *

Blythe sat silently in the buggy next to Win. She hadn’t spoken a word since she’d stepped out onto the porch and watched while Big Dan Mercer hitched up Will’s horse and wagon. No one had spoken to her, either; no one so much as looked at her. It hurt, but she’d refused to let any of the search party know just how much it hurt. She’d stood there with her arms folded across her chest, her chin high, refusing to let the tears that threatened slip down her cheeks. She’d never shed so many tears in her life as she had since late November, and she was sick of crying.

After tying her horse to the rear of his buggy and giving her a look of patent disapproval, Win had held out his elbow and she’d taken it, though she’d rather have grabbed a rattlesnake. Without saying a word, his every movement stiff with censure, he helped her into his buggy. Everyone else was on horseback. She should have known her stylish brother would not sit astride a horse; it might wrinkle his trousers, she thought unkindly.

The men had helped get Will loaded into the back of the wagon, making sure he was well protected against the cold morning air, and the silent group had started back to Wolf Creek.

And here they were, she thought with a heavy sigh. And here she was, smack-dab in the middle of another scandal.

“What on earth were you thinking, Blythe?” Win asked, glowering at her.

She clenched her hands in her lap and stared straight ahead, counting to ten in hopes it would prevent her from yelling at him when she answered.

“Oh!” she said, her voice dripping with contrived drama as she placed a hand over her heart. “Silly me! I was thinking that Mr. Slade was a very sick man I found passed out in the woods and that perhaps he should be inside, since a storm was brewing.”

“There was no way to get him to town?”

“Well,” she said in a lighthearted tone. “I suppose I could have dragged him back to town behind my horse.”

For the first time Win looked at her with curiosity instead of condemnation. “Drag him? What are you talking about?”

When she explained that she’d had no way to get him into the back of the wagon—if she’d known how to hitch it up—she elaborated on how she’d made the travois and added, “None of it was easy, believe me. Especially getting him up the steps.”

“Do you mean to say that you dragged him up the steps on a quilt?”

A feeling of frustration nudged aside her irritation. “I did. By the time I got him inside, the storm was in full force and it was getting dark. I thought about trying to ride to town for help, but he was burning up with fever and coughing his head off. I did what I thought was best at the time. And believe me, brother,” she added in a voice laced with sarcasm, “I did think about the consequences of my actions, but I figured there wasn’t much else that could be done to me.”

“That’s an abysmal attitude,” he said, shooting another disapproving glance at her.

Blythe lifted her chin and returned the look with scorn. “I prefer to think of it as a practical attitude. It isn’t as if my staying overnight will ruin my reputation or my chances of finding a husband.”

A muscle in Win’s jaw tightened. “Oh, you’ll have a husband within the week, if I have anything to say about it.”

So much for soothing the troubled beast, she thought, the annoyance draining from her. She was so tired of worrying about every move she took, every word she uttered. Part of her wanted to give up, give in and just go along with whatever Win told her to do, but the part of her that was tired of doing what her brothers thought was right asserted itself. She was an adult. A modern woman. She may have made a mistake, but she had learned from it, and that one transgression was no reason to treat her as if she had no more sense than God gave a goose! Her anger made a comeback.

“Are you insane, Winston Granville? This is the nineteenth century. You cannot force two perfect strangers to marry.”

“Of course I can.”

“Ooh!” she said. “Men!” She turned on him angrily. “Do you know what the incident with Devon taught me? That if men aren’t using women, they’re manipulating them or treating them like imbeciles.”

“That isn’t fair, and it isn’t true.”

“Isn’t it?” she challenged.

“Be reasonable, Blythe. Think about your future. This is your chance to pull yourself up and regain the respect you lost with the Devon fiasco.”

She looked at her brother as if he had lost his mind. Perhaps he had. Fiasco? She had fallen in love with a man who’d appeared to be everything she’d wanted in a husband; he’d taken her virtue, her money and her self-respect, and Win considered it a fiasco? Why was it no one understood that she’d gone into that marriage with trust and love? Why couldn’t they see how hurt and miserable Devon’s betrayal had left her? She sighed. She didn’t much like the problems that came with becoming an adult and living with the choices she made.

“So you think that if I marry a man whose wife left him, one who is rumored to have a fondness for whiskey, a man who has no desire to be married to anyone—especially me—” she added, recalling Will Slade’s hurtful words “—that all my troubles will miraculously be over. What kind of future would that be? Certainly not a happy one.”

“People marry for lots of reasons,” Win argued. “Happiness is often the least of it. At least you’d be settled.”

Ah. Settled. Translated, that meant that she would be out of his hair, no longer his and Philip’s responsibility. Oh, she knew quite well how the minds of her brothers worked. Both were geniuses when it came to solving problems. And if one solution took care of two dilemmas, so much the better. She also knew that if Win’s mind was set on this marriage, neither she nor Will stood a chance. She almost felt sorry for him.

Well, she hadn’t been a Granville all these years without picking up a few tricks along the way. Perhaps she could shame her brother into forgetting the whole preposterous notion.

“And you wouldn’t have to worry about what to do with me anymore, would you, Win? You could go on with your life with me stuck out in the country and there would be no constant reminders of my fiasco.”

“That isn’t fair, Blythe!” Win said, darting a shocked look her way. “That isn’t it at all. You know we all love you. It’s just that you sometimes make poor decisions.”

More of those dratted tears stung her eyes. “Well, that certainly isn’t fair!” she said in a low, intense voice. “When have I ever not been the soul of propriety? The epitome of good sense? Besides that one mistake with Devon,” she added.

“Don’t forget last night. The people who found you certainly won’t. It’ll be all over town before breakfast that you spent the night at Slade’s place.”

“To help him,” she emphasized and followed the statement with a lusty sigh of frustration.

“You know as well as I do that the why doesn’t matter. People will talk. They especially like gossiping about the missteps of others. Those who were willing to give you the benefit of the doubt will start wondering, and those who already condemned you for your mistake will rub their hands with glee, delighted to see one of the high-and-mighty Granvilles brought low. No matter the situation, everyone will expect Slade to do the right thing by you.”

“That’s just despicable of them, and it certainly won’t be the right thing for me.”

“Maybe not, but it’s the way things are. And you know how Brother McAdams is about even a breath of a scandal touching one of his flock.”

“It wouldn’t have to be a scandal if everyone would just listen to the truth and stop being so judgmental!” she cried. “Besides, Mr. Slade has been divorced. Do you want your sister marrying someone like that?”

“I admit it isn’t the perfect situation,” Win said. “But by all accounts the fault lies with his former wife. She left him, and she’s the one who filed for the divorce. Everyone says he was devastated.”

“See!” she said, throwing her hands into the air. “Even more reason not to do this. If he’s devastated, he must still love her. It’s ridiculous to push two people into a marriage neither one wants just to satisfy some silly convention of society.”

He shrugged. “He’ll get over her, sooner or later. Maybe you can help him.”

Blythe lifted her face to the heavens and threw her hands up into the air. “Lord, can you believe what I’m hearing?”

Once again she sought to strike a blow to her brother’s supreme confidence. “Forgetting someone isn’t something you do willy-nilly,” she said. “You, of all people, should know that.”

More than ten years earlier Win had lost his fiancée, Felicia, in a carriage accident while she was on the way to the church. Some drunk had not stopped at an intersection and tried to turn his horse at the last minute when he saw her carriage. His landau had spun around and plowed into Felicia’s, causing hers to roll over.

The gaze Win turned to Blythe was as bleak and cold as a winter’s day. His pain made her feel small and mean for daring to pick at his sorest spot. The feeling lasted until he spoke his next sentence.