The inevitable sadness of leaving her colored Zane’s every thought of Glory. It was like the sweetness of going home to his mother’s people. Seeing their faces brought back so many memories of his childhood that the initial arrival felt good. It made him feel warm and whole for a time, but the feeling didn’t last. Deep down he knew he didn’t belong there and soon those feelings overshadowed the good ones. Then he’d leave.
Looking at Glory and holding her was like that. The initial feeling was amazing, but he knew it’d change eventually. He didn’t belong in her world any more than she belonged in his. His scar tingled with the reminder of what had happened last time he’d forgotten that.
He dropped his hands from her waist and forced himself to step back. She was wearing one of those decorative hats ladies sometimes wore. The kind that was somehow attached to the hair piled high on her head with a little black veil that didn’t even come down enough to cover her forehead. It sat more slanted than usual, so he reached out and pushed it back into place. He recognized it as an excuse to touch her again, but didn’t check the impulse. Life was too short not to do the things that felt good; the trick was to keep his heart out of it. He had a feeling it was going to be damned tough to do with her.
“Oh.” She dipped her head and reached up, pulling at pins and rearranging them to settle her hat. When she walked over to the mirror in the corner, he slipped into the back room to quickly change back into his own clothes.
She was ready to go when he returned to the front of the shop, and she looked as poised and confident as she ever had, with her chin titled the slightest bit upward and a smile on her face as she bid goodbye to the assistant and called out to Sainsbury, who was still hidden in one of the alcoves in back.
“They’ll have your suit altered and sent over by evening. I’d appreciate it if you’d wear it tonight when you join us downstairs.” They stepped out onto the boardwalk and she hailed her carriage, which was tucked inside an alley off the larger street. This part of Helena was just off the main street, Last Chance Gulch. It was more fashionable here and had progressed from the years of mining to a more cosmopolitan atmosphere. She looked like she belonged. Hell, she could walk down the Champs-Elysées in Paris and fit right in.
“What?” She’d caught him staring and looked up at him, a slight smile on her face.
“I’ve never had anyone buy me a suit before.”
She gave a soft laugh. “No? Then maybe you need to find better friends.”
He grinned at her, enjoying the teasing. “Is that what we are? Friends?”
She nodded. “I’d like to think so.”
“Then why don’t you call me Zane and stop it with the formal Mr. Pierce?” He knew he had her when her face blanked. She tugged on her bottom lip with her perfect white teeth and dipped her head. When she looked back up a moment later, she was smiling again.
“Well played, Mr....Zane.” Pink colored her cheeks. It was a good color on her.
His smile widened, and he realized that he’d smiled more in the past couple of days with her than he had in the whole of the past two years. Somehow over the course of the afternoon they’d broken down a wall that had been between them. Now, here they stood on the boardwalk, grinning at each other like a couple of love struck idiots.
The thought sobered him. Not love struck. They were simply a couple of people who’d only just begun to realize how very much they liked each other. Liked, not loved. It was an important distinction. He immediately changed the subject. “Should we wait for Able?”
Her carriage rolled to a stop in front of them, and the driver jumped down to open the door. It was by far one of the fancier contraptions on the street. Since Helena was made up of all types of people, the streets were full of open wagons, hansom cabs and simple buckboards. Hers was one of the few carriages with glass windows and the plush, dark blue interior he saw when the driver opened the door.
“He has a few errands to run. I’ll send the carriage back around for him once we arrive home,” she said over her shoulder as she allowed the driver to help her in.
The man gave Zane a quick once-over. Like most men in town, the driver was a little grizzled and without the polish of a proper manservant like the ones he’d seen on his one trip back East. He was probably a workman who’d come too late to see any real luck in the mines, and had found work at the brothel. He didn’t say a word as he waited for Zane to enter and then closed the door behind him.
“What do you know about the driver?” he asked in a low voice when he’d settled in the seat across from her. The carriage swayed a little when the driver pulled himself up into his seat in the front.
“Harold?” She laughed. “You really do see danger in everything don’t you?”
He shrugged. “I like to be thorough.”
“Harold’s an old man who came out here to live with his adult daughter and her new husband. He buried them both a few years ago when the influenza swept through town. He keeps the carriage in good order and takes care of the horses.”
“You don’t think he’d enjoy a few thousand dollars?”
“He might.” She gave an elegant shrug of her shoulder. Something about the gesture managed to be completely feminine, and completely Glory. He’d miss it when he was gone. “But he wouldn’t know anything more about me than anyone else does.”
Zane frowned, acknowledging that she was right. Anyone could be a suspect with the amount of clues revealed in that letter. The only way to find the person was by narrowing down the timeline. He sighed as he sat back, enjoying the soft upholstered bench. He’d never ridden in a carriage so nice. Never ridden in a carriage at all aside from the cab he and Cas had hired to convey them from the train station to their hotel in Boston. Even when he’d stayed with the Jamesons out at the ranch, Zane hadn’t taken the opportunity to ride their carriage into town, always preferring his horse instead. A man could get used to this, he decided as he stretched his legs out in front of him.
She sat across from him but over to the side and smiled as she arranged her skirts out of his way. “You’ve never ridden in a carriage like this before?”
He shrugged. “I’ve never ridden in a carriage.”
She tried, but she couldn’t quite hide her surprise and only just managed to stop herself from gaping. “Surely you jest.”
Shaking his head, he said, “No. Never had any carriages on the reservation. We used packhorses and the occasional buckboard.”
“And after you left?”
“I travel light.” He grinned.
She nodded her understanding, but he was sure she didn’t. A woman like her had to be accustomed to just about any luxury she could want. She had running water, electric lights, an actual telephone. All of them more things that separated them. He scraped his hand over the back of his neck, messaging the tension there. He was making himself dizzy with his back and forth over her.
He changed the subject instead of thinking about it. “Do I need to do something about Harvey? What does he want anyway?”
She gave a bitter laugh and stared out the window. “The same thing they all want. Power and money. He thinks he can scare me into giving him control of Victoria House.”
He thought she gave herself too little credit. Even without Victoria House she was prize enough for many men, especially men like Harvey who needed trophies and accolades to guard against his insecurity. “You’re not worried about him then.”
She shook her head. “No, not really. I’m more concerned about the upcoming vote and what it’ll mean for Victoria House. It’s no secret that Helena is becoming more civilized. There’s less tolerance of saloons and other houses of vice. I very much doubt Harvey will have the means to save it though.”
“What do you plan to do? Would you close?”
“Able and I have taken steps over the years to guard against this. We’ve expanded the dining and gambling business to help stay afloat once the inevitable happens. Though I can’t say it won’t hurt if we have to close the brothel. The brothel funds 100 percent of the boardinghouse and relocation expenses of the women and children we help.”
He frowned as he wondered what changes the next year would bring for her and Able. Would she be able to dodge her past without the safety of Victoria House to protect her? She’d created her own little kingdom there.
“I haven’t had a chance to tell you about my conversation with Charlotte this morning.”
“Oh?” A worried crease appeared between her eyes and her hands tightened to fists in her lap as if she were bracing herself for whatever he had to say.
“She claims to have had a conversation with a man who asked her to deliver a letter to you.” He quickly relayed the story of Charlotte talking to the man downstairs. “She thought it was a love note.”
Glory frowned as she studied the beaded reticule in her lap, anxiously plucking at a tassel. “You believe her?”
“I do. Does the timeline sound right to you?”
After a moment she nodded. “We were busy that night. You remember.”
He inclined his head and breathed a sigh of relief that the story seemed to check out. It would be better for Glory if the conspirator were a stranger and not in any way associated with someone she knew. It’d be painful otherwise. “Do you believe Charlotte?”
She nodded again. “Yes. I only wish I remember seeing the man she described. I don’t remember talking to him. Does she know who the man was? Did she get a name?”
He told her the description of the man, but he’d come directly from his talk with Charlotte so hadn’t been able to search. “I’ll make a sketch tonight with Charlotte’s help and go to the hotels. Maybe someone will remember him.”
“Let’s start with The Baroness. Martin Hines, he’s the manager there. He runs that place with an iron fist. Show him the drawing and he can tell you if the man stayed there. I’ll ring him when we get home and he’ll come right over. How long do you think you’ll need for the drawing?”
Zane tried not to show it, but a flare of jealousy sprang to life inside him at how casually she spoke of Hines and how confident she was that he’d do her bidding. Zane saw her every night downstairs at Victoria House charming the customers. She knew Sainsbury, Harvey and probably every man they drove past. It was her job, and the jealousy wasn’t fair but it was there nonetheless. “That’s a good plan. Shouldn’t take me longer than an hour, depending on how much Charlotte remembers.” Which didn’t seem like much from what she’d told him earlier.
His words must have come out stiffly because Glory frowned, cocking her head to the side as if she was trying to figure him out. Then she gave him a knowing smile. “My employees are very conscientious.”
He frowned, wondering what the hell that had to do with their conversation.
“Martin Hines. He’s an employee. That’s why he’ll come right over when I ring him.”
He heard what she was saying but he didn’t know how her words fit in their conversation. How was Martin Hines of The Baroness Hotel her employee?
“I own The Baroness, Zane,” she said, putting him out of his misery.
He couldn’t react, he could only stare at the woman across from him. She’d amazed him yet again.
She shrugged in response to his unspoken question. “I bought it early last year when the talk of statehood picked up. I created a company with which to purchase it, that’s why it’s not common knowledge that I’m the owner. Seemed to be a good investment at the time.”
“You own The Baroness?” He couldn’t seem to wrap his mind around it. It was one of the best hotels in town. In a town filled with mining riches, that was saying something.
“And a few buildings over on State and over on Sixth. I lease them out.” She sighed. “So you see, losing Victoria House will hurt if it comes to it, but I’ll hardly be destitute. My main concern is for all those who depend on the House. I’m afraid I won’t be able to keep up the boardinghouse without it. With my funds tied up in real estate, they’re not very liquid.”
By all accounts she’d arrived here with nothing. In scarcely more than a decade she’d been able to do what so many others wouldn’t have been able to accomplish. “You really are something.”
She blushed again and shrugged. “You say that, but you also saw what happened back there with Harvey.”
“I did. I saw how brave you were.”
“Not brave. I couldn’t move. God knows what would’ve happened had you not been there. I couldn’t have stopped him.” She gave a bitter shake of her head and looked out the window.
He moved quickly before he could think better of it and sat on the seat beside her. “Glory, I can’t pretend to know what you’ve been through. Since you won’t tell me I can only guess and I pray that my guesses are a hundred times worse than reality. But on the off chance that they’re not...” He tipped her chin up so that she’d look at him. He waited for her eyes to meet his, a thrill of pleasure tingling down his spine at the heady contact. “You’re the bravest person I’ve ever met, and what you’ve been able to do with your life... I can hardly fathom it. Even queens need knights to protect them sometimes.”
Her full bottom lip trembled before curving into a soft smile. “Is that you...you’re my knight?”
He stared at her mouth, wanting to take it beneath his. Needing to dip his tongue into her heat and taste her again. The two sides of him were at war again with one side urging him to indulge while he could and the other warning him away from the horrible pain he’d experienced with Christine. She wasn’t Christine. She knew her own mind and wouldn’t let her family stand in the way. But the truth was that nothing good ever lasted, he’d learned that lesson long ago.
She was Glory, and for the moment that lesson didn’t matter. She was good and kind and fiery. She was everything. Her fingers clutched the fabric of his shirt, drawing him closer. He leaned down, her breath was hot and sweet on his lips. The tiny gasp she made curled down into his belly, tightening and pulling him even closer to her. The second his lips touched hers the carriage came to a jarring halt. The heavy tread of boots on the cobblestones outside the carriage had them jerking apart just as the door opened. Victoria House loomed above them.
Her eyes were wide in shock but he couldn’t tell if it was discomfort that he’d tried to kiss her or surprise that they’d nearly been caught. Whichever it was, he allowed her to flee and sat in the carriage for a moment, trying to catch his breath.