Boom, boom, boom.
Rowena flinched at the sound. No one had ever pounded on her door like that before. Then again, she’d never been late with her rent before. In her haste to put down her mending, she pricked her fingertip with the needle. She muttered an unladylike word, sucked away the drop of blood and hurried across the cluttered boardinghouse room to the door.
On the landing outside, Marshal Hunter stood on the hooked rug, looming as tall and straight as one of the pines in the forest. The sight of him robbed Rowena of speech. His features reflected the winter chill outdoors, and a gun belt circled his lean hips. She’d never seen him armed before, but the ease with which he wore the pair of heavy pistols told her he was more used to being with them than without.
He must have noticed her wide-eyed stare, for he said, “They don’t allow guns in the courthouse. And the sheriff refused to let me carry firearms when I visited you.”
“Quite right, too,” she muttered. “I’m a dangerous felon and I might have tried to escape.”
Marshal Hunter’s mouth quirked into a smile. “You did snatch Lonergan’s pistol from the holster. That gives you a prior record.”
Rowena rolled her eyes, a habit her teachers had never quite managed to stamp out. She inspected her finger but conquered the urge to ease the sting by licking the tip. Her nerves rioted. “I’ll be riding out tomorrow,” the marshal had said yesterday. Only now did she realize how much those words had been weighing on her mind.
“How did you get on with Mr. Carpenter?” she asked.
“We need to talk.”
She made a vague gesture, meant to usher him away from her doorstep. “There’s a parlor downstairs for receiving guests.”
Ignoring her comment—and the requirements of propriety—Marshal Hunter edged into the room. The air of determination about him made Rowena scoot backward, granting him clear passage. Once inside, he lifted one booted foot a few inches from the floor and used the heel to kick the door shut. He surveyed her private domain. “It’s preferable we talk in here.”
Had he changed his mind about paying her fine? In terrified silence, Rowena watched him negotiate his way across the room to the window. She’d been overhauling her wardrobe, assessing the damage caused by sleeping fully clothed in the jail. Items of female clothing lay scattered upon every surface—a chemise on the back of a chair, drawers in a tangle on the small bureau, stockings draped over the nightstand.
The marshal halted by the window. Not turning around, he spoke with his back toward her. “According to Carpenter, to best pursue the claim for Twin Springs, we both need to travel to Wyoming. You may need to prove who you are, and you will need to refute any claims that you or your father had previously sold the property to someone else. And, instead of giving me a bill of sale, it will be better if we marry and I make my claim as your husband. That way, we don’t have to prove the validity of the sale from you to me, but I can simply file my ownership based on our marriage certificate and your father’s will.”
An ugly, unreasonable wave of anger surged in Rowena. Nothing to do with Marshal Hunter, but the memory of Freddy Livingston, and the callous way in which he had rejected her after their engagement had already been publicly announced. Since she’d left Boston, she’d never told anyone about the heartache and humiliation she’d suffered.
Her voice gained a bitter edge. “If you are asking me to be your wife, you ought to at least have the courtesy of looking at me.”
Marshal Hunter pivoted on his boot heels. The daylight through the window silhouetted him, leaving his face in shadows, but Rowena could feel the scrutiny of those cold green eyes.
“What I’m proposing is a business arrangement,” he informed her. “You said you wanted to go back to Twin Springs, settle there. If we marry, I can make that possible. We could share the property.”
With both her anger and her fear of going to prison after all finally ebbing, Rowena felt a stab of shame at her outburst. She’d been on edge all night, barely sleeping. She’d told herself it was the uncertainty over her future, but now she admitted to herself it had been the sense of unfinished business between herself and Marshal Hunter. Not just about Twin Springs, but the friendship they had forged during their afternoons in her jail cell. Somehow, that closeness needed to be acknowledged. And perhaps now it had been, in the form of a marriage proposal, albeit one of a very practical nature.
She tried to make up for her sharp comment with honesty. “I’ll...I’ll not deny that I’ve dreamed of going back to Twin Springs. And I need a man to help me fight for the land. The right kind of man, one capable of winning such a fight. And I admit that from the moment I first saw you I believed you might possess the required qualities.”
Marshal Hunter spoke with amusement. “I did wonder why you gave me those assessing looks, like a drill sergeant inspecting a new recruit.”
Rowena ignored the flash of humor and went on, “Since I possess no money to hire a gunfighter, perhaps I’ve known all along that my only chance to get a man to help me fight for the land is by marrying him. I am even prepared to admit that when I offered you Twin Springs, it might have crossed my mind that such an arrangement could benefit the both of us. But I want you to be absolutely clear on the nature of the property.”
She knew she was talking like a land agent, prattling out facts, but she had to contain the confusing emotions that whirled inside her head, push them aside until she could understand them. Barely pausing to draw a breath, she ticked off the facts with her fingers. “The land is not the best. It is at the top end of the valley, on high ground, and the grass is thin. The house is neither large nor elegant. My father built it with his own hands, and his main concern was to keep the heat in and the enemies out. The cattle—if any remain—are not great in number. However, the water is good. The two springs that feed the stream through the valley are on my father’s land. That is why the neighbors covet the property.”
While she’d been talking, the marshal had been looking around the room, as if bored by her speech. Now he returned his attention to her. “The details were in your father’s will. I don’t have any illusions about the ranch. And I hope you have no illusions about me as the kind of husband you might find in a Boston ballroom. Do we have a deal?”
Such a cold, businesslike approach. Rowena controlled a frisson and brushed aside the fleeting regret. She’d had a proposal that came with kisses and declarations of love, and those had turned out to be false.
“Yes,” she replied. She wanted to maintain the businesslike tone by enumerating the benefits a marriage brought to her, now that she most likely had lost her job and had no money to pay her rent. But instead, she found herself talking softly. “I have no objection to marrying you. So far, you have treated me with courtesy, acted with honor and shown remarkable generosity. I believe that my chances of finding happiness with you are as great as they are with any other man.”
The marshal’s jaw tightened. At first, Rowena thought he was going to avoid meeting her eyes, but he ceased his restless movements and contemplated her squarely. The starkness of his features seemed to deepen, like a storm cloud settling over the landscape. His voice was gruff. “Don’t expect too much of me.”
It hurt, not to have even a pretense of romance, but Rowena hid her disappointment behind a flippant comment. “I have a right to a few expectations. To start with, marriage makes supporting me your responsibility, which removes one of my worries. Further, there is gossip in town that I sacrificed my virtue in order to lure you into paying my fine, and marriage is an excellent way to restore my reputation.” She gave a careless shrug, as if discussing an afternoon outing instead of the rest of her life. “How could I not agree?”
The marshal was fiddling with the frill of a chemise slung over the back of a chair. “What kind of marriage do you want?”
The married kind, she wanted to yell at him. The loving kind.
But she didn’t say it. Didn’t say anything. She had an inkling of which particular aspect of their union the marshal wished to negotiate, and she reined in her tongue. He was hiding all his emotions while drawing out hers. If he wanted to strike another deal, this time he had to put his cards on the table before she revealed hers.
“What do you mean?” she prompted him when she could no longer tolerate the silence. “Are there many kinds of marriages, like the selection of cakes on the bakery counter?”
She could see a flicker of emotion in his eyes, but couldn’t tell if it was anger or amusement. He kept his attention on the frills of the chemise he was toying with. “Even though it is a business arrangement, I want to consummate the marriage.”
It was unfair that the light fell on her, revealing her blush. She had anticipated the topic, but had not been prepared for such bluntness. Rowena started to say something, not quite sure what, but the marshal held up a hand to silence her. She expected him to launch into a sermon about men and their carnal needs, but instead he explained how Mr. Carpenter had advised him to take the precaution, to stop her from engaging in a devious female ploy of using a man to gain something and then proceeding to discard him.
She spoke in a low voice. “Don’t you trust me?”
“The people in Pinares trusted you.”
“I—” She took a deep breath, started again. “I may have failed my fellow citizens but in doing so I proved my loyalty to the men who once saved my life. I believe I did the right thing, and so far no one has convinced me otherwise. However,” she went on, “I have no objection to consummating the marriage. According to my limited knowledge, it is what one must do if one wishes to have children.”
The marshal’s fingers tightened around the chemise in a convulsive grip that threatened to snap the lace. When he spoke, his words came out strained. “Let’s go and find the judge. He has cleared his docket and will ride out this afternoon. There isn’t much time.”
He didn’t offer her an opportunity to change into her best dress, not that she really had one. But she might have liked to comb her hair and pinch a bit of color to her cheeks, instead of simply hurrying after him, like a dog following its master.
Out in the street, several people called out a greeting to the marshal. It occurred to Rowena that although he’d spent his afternoons visiting her at the jail, he must have done something else with his mornings and evenings—settled local disputes, gambled in the saloon, chased light-skirted ladies, helped the elderly, contributed to a barn raising.
She had no idea what. And that drove home how little she knew about the man she was about to marry. He was born in Louisiana, a coyote had once tried to have him for supper, he had a sister who had come to a bad end, and he had joined the Marshals Service because he had nothing better to do. That was the sum total of information he had revealed about his background, and the last item she suspected to be a lie.
At the thought, her feet grew heavier and heavier. The marshal, a step ahead of her, halted to wait for her to catch up. “Second thoughts?”
“I...” She met his eyes, and all those secret hopes, all those feelings she hadn’t admitted even to herself, washed over her. Somewhere in the back of her mind the image of Freddy seemed to fade away, like an old newspaper cutting. She felt a physical pull, as if her body obeyed the will of the man standing in front of her instead of her own.
“No,” she said, and set into motion again. “No second thoughts.”
They found the portly judge alone in the deserted courtroom. Hunched over the vast desk, he was turning over the pages in a ledger with one hand while eating from a meal tray with the other.
Upon hearing their footsteps, he looked up. “There are no refunds for fines.”
“I’m not here for a refund,” Dale replied. “I’m here to be married.”
The judge tore off a piece from a chicken leg with his teeth while using his free hand to gesture them closer. When they were standing in front of his desk—and when his mouth was empty again—he contemplated Rowena with a notch of concern between his bushy eyebrows. “Miss McKenzie, are you entering into a marriage out of your own free will or are you taken into bonded servitude to pay a debt?”
Baffled, she faltered for a moment. The judge took another bite of his chicken and spoke through the mouthful. “It is only noon, but I have already had a dozen people barging into my courtroom, interrupting my work, to tell me that they are happy to forgo reimbursement for their losses if it means that Miss McKenzie will avoid going to prison.” The judge swallowed, patted his mouth with a linen napkin. “So, you do have a choice.”
The surge of delight and gratitude nearly made Rowena’s knees buckle. They had forgiven her. They didn’t hate her for what she had done. She could feel the judge’s probing eyes upon her. Fearing he might have misunderstood her relief, Rowena hurried to speak. “No, no, Your Honor. Thank you for your concern, but everything is perfectly fine. Marshal Hunter didn’t buy himself a bond woman. I am entering into this marriage of my own free will because it is an arrangement that suits both of us.”
Appearing to be satisfied with her answer, the judge nodded, and intoned in a mechanical voice, “Do you, Marshal Hunter, take this woman, Miss McKenzie, to be your wife?”
“I do.”
“Do you, Miss McKenzie, take Marshal Hunter to be your husband?”
Disappointment over the lack of ceremony made Rowena hesitate. The judge, always in a hurry, hadn’t even bothered to find out their given names. And, instead of looking at them as they spoke their vows, he had dipped his pen in the inkwell and was scribbling on a piece of paper.
“Do you or don’t you?” the judge prompted her. “I haven’t got all day.”
“I do,” Rowena replied with a touch of annoyance in her tone.
“Sign here.” The judge slid the piece of paper across the desk and offered the pen to her. That careless scribbling had been their marriage license. Rowena bent down and signed her name. Her hand was unsteady, and the signature didn’t come out anything like her usual even letters. It looks like a forgery, she thought with a touch of hysteria.
When it was Marshal Hunter’s turn to sign, the pen was almost dry of ink and she could hear the nib rasping against the paper. She leaned to peek over his shoulder. On the bold curve of the capital D of his first name, the ink had smudged, making a blot. She fought to hold back a nervous groan. Her marriage was starting with a forgery and a blot, and what looked like a stain of chicken grease from the judge’s lunch.
Judge Williams inspected the completed document, made an entry in his ledger and handed the marriage license to Marshal Hunter. “One dollar,” he said. “Another dollar if you want the marriage to be entered in the courthouse records.”
Marshal Hunter dropped two silver coins on the table. Rowena tugged at his sleeve. She wanted to get out of there. Out of the courtroom where she’d been declared a criminal. Away from the judge who’d wanted to send her to Yuma prison, to mingle with hardened criminals. She wished she’d insisted on a church wedding, on being married by Reverend Poole, anything but this.
When they were halfway to the door, the judge called out, “Mrs. Hunter?”
It took Rowena a moment to realize he was addressing her. Her feet rooted to the floor. Not because she wanted to halt and listen to whatever further chastisement the judge might see fit to deliver, but because her married name had suddenly put a stamp of reality on the proceedings that up to now had seemed like a scene from a poorly enacted play.
She curled her fingers over Marshal Hunter’s arm for balance and craned her neck to look back. The judge was bent over the ledger, talking quietly, as if to himself. “I know what you’re thinking, Mrs. Hunter. That I’m a monster. A cruel man, willing to send you to prison and ruin any chance you might have of a decent future.”
“I’m—”
The judge cut her off. “It is my duty to administer the law. I send men to prison, or to their death. I break up families. I leave behind grieving widows and orphans. I can’t afford to see them as people. If I did, in every man’s life I could find an excuse for the evil they have done, for the crimes they have committed. I must uphold the law, and the law allows no pity.”
Judge Williams stopped talking and looked up. In his eyes Rowena could see the humanity and compassion he had just denied he possessed. “I understand,” she told him quietly. “Wrong is wrong, even when it is done for the right reasons. I allowed a fraud to go ahead, and I take full responsibility for my actions and I accept that you were fair in passing your sentence.”
Dale ushered his bride along the busy street. He felt on edge, the way he did when preparing to arrest a dangerous criminal. It made no sense to feel that way about marriage. But he did, and the town, the people covertly observing them, the residue of a week of hanging around in enforced idleness, suddenly felt suffocating.
He tugged Rowena to a halt. “Could you be ready to leave at once?”
“Leave? Now?” Her eyes darted about, taking in the curious glances of the ladies going about their shopping, of the men loitering outside the saloon. She straightened her spine. “Yes. I can be ready. I don’t have many possessions.”
“Good.” He took her by the elbow and steered her along.
She dragged her feet. “I don’t have a horse and the stage only goes once a day, first thing in the morning. How do you expect me to get to the railroad?”
“I’m not expecting you to sprout wings and fly, if that’s what’s worrying you.” He directed her toward the hardware store.
Inside, the short and stocky owner, Mr. Atkinson, was stacking kegs of nails, muscles bulging beneath his rolled-up shirtsleeves. He straightened and walked over to them. “Marshal Hunter. What can I do for you?”
“We just got married, and I’m eager to take my bride home. Are you by any chance headed out to Holbrook to pick up a delivery from the railroad depot?”
Mr. Atkinson wiped his brow with a brawny forearm and swept a shrewd look over Rowena. “Married? Well, now, that is news, good news indeed.” His heavy features eased into a smile. “Congratulations. Congratulations to you both.”
He rolled down his shirtsleeves, all friendliness now. “I’m not going this week, but Mr. Wheaton told me he has ten barrels of grain coming tonight on the westbound train.” The storekeeper peered at the grandfather clock ticking in the corner. “By my reckoning, he should be leaving right about now. You need to hurry.”
Dale nodded his thanks and tugged his bride along. She was half running to keep up with him. “Are we going to catch a ride to the railroad in Mr. Wheaton’s wagon?” she asked.
“You are going in the wagon. I’ll ride ahead. I need to return the horse to the livery stable in Holbrook and take care of a few errands.”
He bundled her into the feed store and explained the situation to Mr. Wheaton, a lively man with ready laughter and an endless supply of jokes. “Married?” Mr. Wheaton said. “Oh, my...oh, my. Don’t that just about beat everything?” Shaking his head, he called to the back of the store. “Pete!”
His son, a fair-haired boy of around eighteen, sauntered out of the storeroom. “What is it, Pa?”
“You’ll have a passenger to the railroad. Mrs. Hunter. The marshal’s wife. You mind your manners around her, son.” Wheaton turned to Rowena. “I’m right pleased for you, Miss Rowena. I mean, Mrs. Hunter. Right pleased.”
They arranged for the boy to collect Rowena outside the boardinghouse, and Dale escorted his wife back to her lodgings. In the room, he surveyed the feminine disarray. All those flimsy garments. They tied his gut in knots.
“I don’t understand...” Conscious of the need to make haste, Rowena was snatching up undergarments draped around the room and stuffing them into a leather traveling bag, while talking to him at the same time. “I thought people had forgiven me, but they seem pleased that I’m leaving town.”
“Some of them will be glad to see the back of you.” At her stricken expression, Dale tried to soften his comment. “You tried to counsel them against making a bad investment, but they failed to listen. Seeing you reminds them of their lack of judgment. And having you around creates a conflict between those who have forgiven you and those who still want to blame you. If you are gone, it is easier for everyone to put the incident in the past and move on.”
“I see,” Rowena replied in a forlorn mutter. Her movements slowed down, no longer swift and agile. Dale cursed himself. Despite her plucky spirit, Rowena was sensitive. She needed harmony around her. Needed everyone to be friends, at peace with each other. No wonder she’d run away from a fight over her father’s ranch. His mood sank at the thought of the hardships ahead. What business did he have taking her back to a place that might turn into a battleground?
Dale held on to the bridle of the stocky Clydesdale harnessed to the feed store wagon to keep the horse steady while young Peter Wheaton secured Rowena’s leather bag. Up on the bench, Rowena sat in ladylike calm, dressed in her green wool dress and a matching fitted jacket.
A cold wind swept along the street, biting through Dale’s clothing. He looked up at his wife. “Don’t you have a warm coat?”
“I’ll be fine.”
Fine, my ass, Dale thought. You’re already shivering.
He waited for Peter Wheaton to climb up beside Rowena and pick up the reins. The boy looked young for eighteen, not quite a man yet, but with a man’s instincts, and right now he was staring at his traveling companion with knightly chivalry shining in his eyes.
Dressed in a warm sheepskin coat, the boy would soon feel compelled to take off the garment and wrap it around Rowena’s shoulders. Stripped to his shirtsleeves, young Wheaton would damn near freeze to death. And if he failed to offer the coat to Rowena, she would be cold. Whichever way it went, one of them might end up with pneumonia.
“Wait here,” Dale ordered. “Don’t go yet.”
From the look of respect on young Wheaton’s face Dale surmised the boy would obey the command. He strode off along the boardwalk, went into a dress shop. “Do you have an overcoat? Thick and bulky. Sheepskin or wool.”
The pretty brunette, almost cut in two by a tightly laced corset, looked aghast. “We sell fine gowns for ladies. Not outdoor garments for farm wives. Try the general store.”
“I have no time to go trawling through every shop in town. Don’t you have anything warm for a woman to wear?”
“Well...” The woman surveyed the racks of satin and silk and lace. Her expression brightened. “A shawl. I have a selection of shawls. Ladies use them with low-cut evening gowns, to cover their arms and shoulders against the night chill.”
“Give me one of those.”
The woman flounced off into the rear and came back with a shawl in bright orange. Dale smirked. The storekeeper was clearly trying to use his hurry to get rid of the least attractive merchandise.
“You said a selection,” he pointed out. “Show me other colors.”
With a huff of frustration, the woman whirled around, fetched a stack of soft wool shawls and dumped them on the counter. Dale rifled through the colors, chose one in dark red, another one in pale cream, and a third in forest green to match Rowena’s gown. After paying for his purchases, he hurried back to the wagon. “They didn’t have any overcoats but these should keep you warm.”
Upon his insistence, Rowena wrapped all three shawls around her shoulders right away. “Knot them up tight at the front, so they don’t fall off,” Dale instructed. With satisfaction, he watched his wife’s slender figure disappear beneath layers of wool thick enough to protect her even from the fiercest of winds. “Have a safe journey,” he said and stood back from the wagon. “I’ll see you in Holbrook.”
Dusk had fallen over Holbrook and there was still no sign of the feed store wagon. Dale buttoned up his duster against the evening chill and paced the railroad station platform, the urgent beat of his boots on the timber planks betraying his concern.
He should have ridden in with Rowena and young Wheaton. But he’d had business to take care of, telegrams to send. One to his friend Roy Hagan, now settled down with a wife and child in a nearby town called Rock Springs, to let them know that he needed to postpone his planned visit. The other to the elderly rancher in California, to advise the old man that the sale could not go ahead.
Of course he could have sent the telegrams from Pinares. However, some deeply ingrained sense of privacy had stopped him from doing so, even if it meant a day’s delay in getting out the messages. There was no need for the townspeople to learn of his shattered dream, to know how dearly it had cost him to pay Rowena’s fine.
His ears picked out a new sound. Dale halted his pacing, cocked his head to listen. His senses had not deceived him. Over the tinny music streaming out from the saloons he could hear the rattle of wheels and the steady thud of a large, lumbering horse.
Dale curbed the urge to run down the street. As he stood still and waited, a wagon emerged into the sphere of the gaslights that illuminated the platform. Relief poured over him. Up on the wagon bench, Rowena sat beside Peter Wheaton, wrapped up in her shawls, appearing completely at ease. When she spotted him, she smiled and gave him a jaunty wave.
Dale strode over, waited for young Wheaton to rein in the big Clydesdale and apply the brake. Only when the wagon was securely halted did Dale reach up with his arms, locate his wife’s narrow waist beneath the layers of shawls and swing her down to her feet.
“Did you have a good journey?” he asked, studying her face.
“Lovely. Peter has a wonderful voice. He entertained me with songs.”
His hands still curled around Rowena’s waist, Dale turned toward young Wheaton and spoke with the respect of equals. “Thank you for taking care of Mrs. Hunter. It is easier for a man to go about his business if he knows his wife is safe.”
At the remark, the boy appeared to grow in stature. “It was no trouble. It was nice to have company.”
For a few moments longer, they exchanged the polite pleasantries of acquaintances about to part. Squirming a little at revealing his ignorance, young Wheaton asked, “Will there be anyone to unlock the depot so I can load the wagon?”
Dale stepped closer and lowered his voice, so the men who had arrived to wait for the eastbound train would not overhear. “A word of advice, if I may. Once you load your wagon the goods become your responsibility. It is better to leave them overnight at the railroad depot and return to get them in the morning.”
The boy nodded and muttered his thanks.
“Where do you plan to stay the night?” Dale asked.
“Pa gave me money for the boardinghouse.” The way young Wheaton’s eyes flickered toward the nearest saloon revealed where those funds would likely be spent. The boy would end up sleeping under a tarpaulin in his wagon.
Dale dipped into his pocket, pulled out a silver dollar. “Perhaps I could buy you a drink to thank you for taking such good care of my wife. I’d join you, but we’re taking the night train.”
The boy hesitated, wanting to be gallant but he also wanted to sleep indoors. He accepted the money.
“Do you have a gun?” Dale asked.
“No. Should I?”
“No. And when you go into the saloon, keep aloof. Some men like to make a game of riling strangers, trying to pick a fight. If someone shoves you, apologize. If anyone calls you a coward, ignore them. It takes more courage to avoid a fight than it takes to lose one.”
After young Wheaton had rattled away to park his wagon in a safer place before hurrying to taste the delights of the saloons, Dale turned his attention to his wife. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes sparkling. She looked happy. Like a bride should on her wedding day, a thought crossed his mind.
“What has put you in such high spirits?”
“To be truthful, it was a relief to get out of Pinares. And I am eager to see Twin Springs again. And...” She paused, looked down at her toes, looked up again and met his eyes with a disconcerting directness. In a low voice, she went on, “I’d like you to know that I don’t face the start of our married life with reluctance. Our circumstances might be unusual, but the apprehension I feel is the same as any other woman might feel on their wedding night. No more. No less.”
The platform was filling with people, the eastbound train due soon. Dale glanced around. No one appeared to be eavesdropping. He sought for the right words but could find none. Tension coiled within him. A hundred times he’d faced death. He’d killed, had almost been killed, but he’d never felt so exposed, so defenseless. He cleared his throat. “About the wedding night... It needs to be postponed. The journey is complicated... Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad to Santa Fe...change there to Denver, Rio Grande and Santa Fe Railroad...then take the Denver Pacific to Cheyenne...”
Blue eyes searched his. “Can’t we stop here for the night?”
“This town is a rough, lawless place. I don’t want to...” He gave a small, awkward shrug. “Not here.”
“Are there no sleeping cars on the train?”
“They only put in enough sleeping cars for passengers who’ve booked all the way through and have paid in advance. There may be a few berths left free but we won’t know until we get on the train. I’ll go and buy the tickets now. I didn’t want to get them earlier, in case you arrived too late. Will you be all right for a few minutes on your own?”
Her eyes darted about the crowd. “Oh, yes. I like to watch people.”
Dale pivoted on his boots and stalked into the ticket office. His heart was beating too fast and his hands were so unsteady he dropped a coin when he paid. Despite the extra cost, he bought first-class tickets, since only first-class passengers had access to the sleeping cars.
Never in his life had he been torn with such conflicting forces. His body ached to take what Rowena was offering. He’d give anything to taste her sweetness, to gain a moment of oblivion in her arms. But doubt held him back. How would Rowena react when she saw the scars that marred his body—if she ran her hands down his chest and felt the puckered lines on his skin—if her feet tangled with his and she could feel the ridged, uneven shape of his lower legs? Would she recoil? Would she shudder in disgust, pull away? Pretend not to notice? Go through the act anyway, despite her revulsion, because it was her duty?
The truth of it was that he was a coward. The longer he put off consummating the marriage, the longer he could avoid facing Rowena’s reaction, could cling to the belief that his scars wouldn’t matter. That she would accept him as he was, a man with a damaged body that bore evidence of the violence and lawlessness in his past.