MARRIED AND WELL SUPPLIED, THEY MADE IT TO THE EDGE OF TOWN WITHOUT TROUBLE. Perched on the wagon seat, rather than hide her face or hunch her shoulders, Roslyn sat straight and proud. Her eyes bored into those who dared glare disdainfully in her direction.
Beauregard was used to the treatment, so it bothered him none, but his face grew grim as he spied a gathering at the end of the street.
Homer Roseberry and the Twins blocked the road.
Lightly pulling the reins, Beauregard brought the wagon to a stop.
Roslyn’s inhalation was reedy. She gripped the edge of her seat to brace herself. Crowds would forever make her anxious. “Beau?”
He touched her cheek. “Stay here.” Jumping down, as graceful as the predator cats roaming the mountain ranges, he calmly picked up the rifle. His eyes deadened to flat gold, and his jaw locked. He turned to the three men sat on horses. Growled, “Move.”
“I’m not letting you take my sister anywhere.” Homer drew his gun spitting brown juice at Beauregard’s feet. “Prairie nigger.”
The Twins chortled.
Unease rippled through the crowd.
Beauregard didn’t react.
Roslyn gasped, and struggled to remember the order to stay put. She wanted nothing more than to kick her brother right between his stubby legs. “Don’t talk to my husband that way.”
“Hobble your lip, little sister.” Homer’s sagging gut joggled under his shirt as he struggled to control a storm-coated hot blood too much horse for him to handle. “What is the matter with you? If you had a lick of sense you’d get down off that bastard’s buggy and waddle your fat ass over here. I’ll deliver you home where you can spend your spinsterhood fighting to regain a shred of respectability.”
“Homer Roseberry, I am ashamed of you.”
“Like I care what the cock sucking whore of an Injun thinks.”
The ladies witnessing the confrontation from the shelter of the dressmakers twittered in specious astonishment at the crude insult. A freckled miss in off-white calico swooned into a puddle of lace.
Beyond a rational rejoinder, Roslyn nearly swallowed her tongue.
Contrasting his wife’s disbelief, a lethal stillness fell over Beauregard. The spectators inched away from the feral narrowing of his eyes.
“And you people call my Beauregard criminal. I’ve never heard anything of the like from him as what just came out your mouth. I doubt Kohkahycumest would ever say such a thing in my presence.”
“Kokawhat?” Tim Twin asked, baffled.
“My Cherokee acquaintance. A true gentleman.”
Gloved hands to mouths, the scandalized ladies went wild.
“No more talk. We’re settling this.” Homer extended his arm. “Right here, right now.”
“Agreed,” Beauregard said then fired.
A female scream rivalled the explosive discharge.
Before the Twins could get off a shot, Beauregard blasted the ground between their horses’ hooves. The animals reared, and forced the men to abandon return fire to stop from being thrown.
Folk with the temerity to congregate behind Homer skedaddled. In a heaving mass exodus the sandy thoroughfare was forsaken. Shutters rattled and doors slammed.
Slumped in his saddle, blood ran through Homer’s fingers as he clutched his shoulder. He sneered a warning, and his face broke out with beads of sickly, pinkish sweat. “This isn’t over, Kellington. You’re a dead man. You hearing me? A dead man.”
Turning sharply, he galloped towards Roseberry Ranch.
The Twins raced after him.
Beauregard strolled to the wagon and retook his seat.
“See how I didn’t move?”
Keeping his eyes on the trail, Beauregard muttered, “I thought you’d be upset.”
“Actions have consequences.” Spotting her oldest friend emerging from the bakery on her husband’s arm, Roslyn waved cheerily. She giggled when Emmalee looked as if she’d swallowed a bug. “My brother may not be the smartest of men,” she continued, twisting to face Beauregard on the seat, “Truly, he’s as dumb as a bucket of rocks, but he should know better. His language was appalling. It’s sweet you took the time to further his education in manners.” She wet her thumb and rubbed at a smear on his hollowed cheek. “There’s earth on you.”
Turning his head, he pressed a kiss to her palm. “Quit fussin’.”
HALF WAY BACK TO THE RANCH, A DUST TRAIL IN THE DISTANCE SIGNALLED A RIDER. Beauregard rested his hand on the rifle. He eased back when the sun glinted off a metal star pinned to the man’s chest.
The men eyed each other in that aggressive, manly way males do, and Roslyn couldn’t stop the nervous words bubbling in her gut erupting from her mouth. “Well, hello Sheriff Cooley. How nice it is to see you again.”
“Miss Roseberry.”
“It’s Ms Kellington now. Officially.”
Emmitt flicked his hat back then patted Legs between the ears. He finally took his eyes off Beauregard, and his expression softened at the young woman addressing him. “I have to say I’m surprised to see you. The both of you. Like this.”
“We needed supplies, and look.” She thrust her left hand under his nose. “Isn’t it beautiful? Beau bought it for me. His matches.”
Emmitt’s shaggy brows tried to climb into his salt and pepper hairline. “Well.” That seemed to be all he had to say about that.
“Got to keep movin’, Sherriff,” Beauregard said politely. “I want my wife out of the sun.”
“Lord, Beau, I’m not made of snow. A little sun won’t hurt.”
“Without a bonnet your skin will brown.”
“So?”
“Thought you’d mind.”
“As long as it won’t bother you, I no longer care for those upstart highfaluting ways that don’t make sense. Besides, I won’t brown so much as turn bright red and freckly.”
“Okay, Lioness.” Beauregard got the horses moving. “You don’t have to convince me.”
“I’ll plod alongside a ways,” Emmitt interrupted. He was disgruntled over how they seemed to have forgotten him. He turned Legs around rather than take his leave. “If that’s agreeable with you?”
“Of course,” Roslyn replied before Beauregard could think up a polished way to say, “Go to hell.”
“Was your visit into town eventful?”
She deflected. “Define eventful.”
“Was anybody dead who was alive afore you arrived?”
Casually, Beauregard offered, “Maybe.”
Mouth fixed into a whitened line, Emmitt griped his pommel and fought anger. Beauregard Kellington was not a man you enraged unless you were prepared to deal with the cost. “Hunting folk for revenge won’t fix nothing. You’ll end up with another mob in your yard.”
Roslyn gave her husband a troubled look.
Without looking her way, he patted her hand while directing a piercing look at the Sheriff. “A man calls your wife a cock suckin’ whore. What do you do?”
Emmitt sighed. “Put a bullet in him. Which man?”
“Eldest Roseberry son.”
“God dang it, Kellington. As if that family needs another reason to hate you.”
Beauregard shrugged.
“And what about your brothers?”
“What about them?”
Emmitt worried he’d grind his teeth to powder. “You mean to tell me they had nothing to say to you?”
“I remember a visit. Roslyn wasn’t impressed.” Eyes smiling, Beauregard glanced at his wife. “Ran them right out the house, didn’t you, Savage?”
Confused, Emmitt looked at a beaming Roslyn for illumination.
“I took a pistol to them.”
“Why!”
“They tried to take me back to Roseberry Ranch.” She turned defensive when the Sherriff’s gritty expression didn’t change. “Wyatt yelled at Beau, said all these horrible things. I couldn’t have that. Not with him recovering.”
“What is the matter with you young’uns? So you’ve offended both your families?”
“When you put it like that it sounds unpleasant.”
“Miss Roseber–” Emmitt bit that sentence in half when the couple shot him dark looks. “Ms Kellington, it’s unpleasant whichever way you look at it. Family’s important.”
“I agree.” She slid closer to Beauregard, and rested her hand on his knee. “Tonight I’ll thank my lucky star for my husband.”
Slouching in his saddle, Emmitt gave up. It was too hot, and he was too old to be talking sense into these obstinate fools. “Well then. Try not to kill anybody, and take care. Kellington, get a dog.”
Emmitt nodded goodbye, turned about, and rode towards town.
Beside herself, Roslyn looked a question at Beauregard. “Can we, Beau? I always wanted a pet.”
“If we must.”
Startling him with a squeal, Roslyn flung her arms around his neck, and didn’t even care if it made him uncomfortable.
Beauregard grumbled, but didn’t push her away.
HIS BODY DEALT WITH THE RIDE TO AND FROM TOWN BETTER THAN EXPECTED. The next day Beauregard resolved to ride out and check the pastures. Roslyn spent most of the evening trying to talk him out of it, worried he’d push too far too soon, but he was done with lazing about.
“May I come with you?” Roslyn bustled behind him. “I can ride.”
“I don’t have a side saddle.”
“Can’t I ride astride? I never was allowed before because of, well, you know. It’s not proper for an unmarried lady. So, may I?”
“May you ride with me, or can you ride astride?”
“Both.”
“You don’t need permission to ride with me, and I have seen you ride before, once, but it was the lady way.”
She huffed. “I’ll manage. Which horse can I use?”
Pausing, Beauregard considered her carefully. “You’ll ride with me.”
“But I–”
“No buts.”
“Why?”
For a moment he looked stumped, as if nobody had gone so far as to question his thought process before. “I don’t know how skilled you are. There are steep gullies and tricky streams to cross. Worryin’ about you will distract me.” He mounted and held out his hand. “Comin’?”
“I can ride by myself.”
The hand closed. “See you later then.”
Wind blowing her loose hair into a flaxen cloud, she watched him ride until he was a dot in the distance. Then she cried and berated herself for being so stubborn. Then she cursed him for being so laconic he couldn’t say outright he wanted her safe, even if it was an exaggeration of the truth to soothe her ruffled feathers.
Weren’t husbands supposed to humour their wives when they were being finicky?
Stomping back into the house she slammed down a recipe book she’d found on the bookshelves, and decided to try a simple cake mixture she’d pondered over for days.
That evening Beauregard didn’t speak on his return. He spent a full minute studying the lopsided, burnt lump left on the dining table with a single fork sticking from its centre. Rather than complain about a lack of dinner, he drank a glass of milk, ate a slice of ham then undressed and went to bed. His ribs and head hurt. Worse, he felt bad for how he handled things earlier, but he’d been impatient to get going, and he’d worried she might fall and hurt herself during the ride.
He decided to make up for his curt dismissal by helping her work on her horsemanship when she asked to ride with him again. Problem was she didn’t ask. They fell into a routine that should have pleased him, but they spent more and more time apart. It bugged him enough concentrating on the warm bloods became a challenge.
A week after their quarrel, Beauregard was so focused on how to break the ice between them he walked though the door and made it three steps before realising something was different.
A full roast was set out, and an attempt at a formal place setting had been made. A plain cake sat in the middle of the table, and on a plate where he usually sat was a picture frame with a green ribbon tied around it.
“Happy Birthday Beau.”
Roslyn was dressed in her blue gown and had done something pretty to her hair. Her eyes shone as she sashayed up to him, and shyly slipped her hand into his.
“How...?”
“The date was printed on a bible I found on the bookcase. I’ve been practicing how to make a cake all week. There’s preserve in the middle, see? We can pour cream on it.”
Beauregard picked up the picture frame and stared.
“It’s our wedding certificate.” Roslyn wiped her sweaty hand on her hip. She babbled since he hadn’t changed his shuttered expression. “I wanted to buy you something, but we haven’t been to town in a while, and we both know I’m not brave enough to go lonesome, but this is special though, don’t you think?”
Blinking finally, he turned to look at her. His chest was tight with emotions he hadn’t felt since boyhood. He dipped his mouth towards hers meaning to take her right there, supper be damned, but stilled when the sound of hooves drifted through the open window.
Still unable to not panic whenever there were unannounced visitors, Roslyn immediately grabbed the revolver.
Shoving aside a curtain to peer into the yard, Beauregard waved her off. “It’s my family.”
“So why no guns?”
“They look peaceful enough.”
Ducking under his arm, Roslyn joined him at the window and snuggled into his side. He thought she’d purr if she were a cat.
“Who is that lady?” she asked.
“Wyatt’s wife.”
Roslyn tried not to feel wary of the copper-headed vision draped in green silk gliding towards the house. “She’s awful pretty.”
“Beautiful suits me better.”
DECIDING THE BEST WAY TO HANDLE THIS WAS WITH A HEALTHY DOSE OF SOUTHERN CHARM HER CAROLINIAN GRANDMAMMA TAUGHT HER, ROSLYN FLUNG OPEN THE FRONT DOOR AND BEAMED A WELCOME. “Well, hello. Come on in.”
Ignoring her completely, Wyatt glowered over her head. “Beauregard.”
“Greet my wife afore I shoot you.”
“What?”
“I don’t repeat myself.”
Wyatt directed a narrowed look at Roslyn and said, “Evening, Miss Roseb–”
“Ms Kellington,” Roslyn and Beauregard corrected, her voice amiable, his pissed.
“So it is,” William said affably, slinking past his eldest brother to take her hand. “Welcome to the family.”
She simpered, pulled her hand free to wave them in.
Up close Caroline Kellington lost some of her grandeur. Not that she wasn’t fashionable looking. She was with her pale oval face, pouty lips, fair eyelashes and slender brows. But it was the unbridled fear that streaked across her expression and turned her body stiff when she saw her brother-in-law that made her genteel beauty pale next to Roslyn’s dazzling vivaciousness.
This time Roslyn had sweet lemonade and butter cookies to offer as refreshment. Making up a tray, she flushed with pleasure as she tended to the first guests she’d had as a wife. This she trained all her life for. It was easy as breathing.
Dragging two dining room chairs towards the sofa, Beauregard straddled his and leaned bronzed forearms across the back.
Slicking sweat-dampened hair from his forehead, William sprawled into his with a gusty sigh.
Putting the tray on the low table, Roslyn hovered over Beauregard until he ordered her to stop fussing, and then took a seat on the rocking chair, hands neatly folded on her lap. The silence was unnatural. She tried smoothing the way by opening with a happy subject. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised to see you considering what a special day it is.”
Handsome Will blinked. “Special day?”
“Oh, you know.”
Lost, he futilely looked at his younger brother for enlightenment.
Roslyn forced laughter. “Now, now. I know I’m the new sister and ripe for picking, but there’s no way you’ve forgotten.”
William looked puzzled, Wyatt impatient, and Caroline afraid.
Perched precariously on the edge of the sofa, Wyatt’s wife was glued to his side while the man himself sat rigid, his large, scarred hands fisted on his knees.
“Leave it alone,” Beauregard warned.
A chilling realisation stole Roslyn’s breath. This time she became too furious to back down. “I will not.” She glared at the Older Kellingtons. “Y’all should be ashamed of yourselves.”
“What are you harping on about?” Wyatt’s question held the distinct manner of disrespect.
Beauregard’s eyes narrowed dangerously.
To Roslyn’s annoyance Caroline whimpered in response. Was it not her husband being hideously rude to his hosts?
“His birthday.”
Still unclear, William asked, “What about it?”
“Is today.” Roslyn stabbed a finger at the table. “Do you think we have cake and presents every night? You forgot.”
Bewildered, Caroline finally spoke, “But we never celebrated it before.”
Roslyn’s eyes widened, and her hand pressed over her heart. “I beg your pardon?”
“I didn’t even know it was today.” The woman had enough grace to look discomfited. “If I’d known I would have....” She trailed off.
Roslyn knew the sickening truth. Even if Caroline had known she would have done nothing to observe her husband’s special day.
“You were the lady of the family.” Roslyn’s voice shook as she took up her glass of lemonade. She needed something to focus on to calm down. A screeching wife would humiliate Beauregard. “It was your duty to know. It was your responsibility as the only female to remember and commemorate such days for the unmarried relations.”
Caroline’s mouth opened in protest then closed with a solid snap. After a deep breath she said coolly, “You have no right to speak to me thus.”
“Then you have no right to be in my house.” Her resolve not to screech was gone. “Get out.”
“Roslyn,” Beauregard warned. “Settle.”
Infuriated, she did as he asked, but pinned the other woman with a malicious glare until she dropped her eyes and shrivelled in her seat.
“It’s not her fault,” William said. “We never acknowledged it before.”
“It doesn’t matter. A lady is taught her responsibilities at her mother’s knee. She knows how to behave.”
“This coming from you?” Caroline straightened her spine. Her green eyes flashed. “The loose woman who paraded around town telling the world the monster who raped her is her husband to save face after she snuck away from her family to visit him unchaperoned?”
Beyond offended to be spoken to so cruelly in her own home, Roslyn’s hand convulsed around her glass. She was a second from flinging the lemonade in the woman’s increasingly ugly face. Hell, the glass would be flung too. See how the self-righteous heifer liked that.
“Savage.” Beauregard delivered his third warning in a voice deceptively calm. His eyes were wolverine. “Don’t.”
Roslyn slammed the glass down on the table. Chin mulish in its angle, she crossed her arms and huffed.
“Carrie.” Wyatt’s voice was icy. “Shut your mouth, and do not open it again. I’ll deal with you when we get home.”
Caroline flinched.
Good, Roslyn thought viciously. She hoped Wyatt spanked her in lieu of being popped in the mouth by her new sister-in-law.
“I suppose you’re right, Lyn, and it’s all our faults.” Embarrassed, William raked a hand through his hair and knit his brow. “I’m not sure why it’s this way. Just is. I’m mortified to admit it in front of you, but that’s the truth.”
“But you’re his family.” Roslyn struggled to not hate the polite young man. She liked he felt comfortable enough with her to use a pet name, but her new kin was proving as distasteful as the old. “If not you then who? How would you feel if the day of your birth was never recognized by those who were supposed to love you?”
William looked devastated, Wyatt uncomfortable. Caroline unmistakably just wanted to leave.
Roslyn decided these people weren’t worth her sparkling conversation. Gaze directed above their heads she clammed up tighter than an armadillo.
“Well,” Beauregard drawled into the lengthy hush. “Isn’t this nice?”
“I bet you’re loving this.” Wyatt gritted the words through pressed lips. “Making us seem the ones in the wrong when you’ve done nothing but wrong our whole lives.”
Silent, Beauregard stared impassively.
“Of course, you have nothing to say. You never do.”
“Exactly what should I say, Wy?”
“Give us an explanation to start. You owe one.”
“Now you want me to explain? Nearin’ three months later?”
“I’m here asking aren’t I?”
“Funny, seemed to me you’ve already made up your mind about what happened.”
“Don’t pretend ill-treatment. After talking to Sherriff Cooley we came right over to talk to you.”
“You stormed my sickroom yellin’ threats while I lay one foot in the grave.”
“Naw, Beau. It weren’t that bad.” William’s objection was tinged with regret. “Your face was black-and-blue, but you weren’t dying.”
“The bruising was all over,” Roslyn interjected quietly. “Every inch of him was covered. I tried to tell you that, but you didn’t listen.”
Will sank deeper into his chair, clearly trying to recall what his brother looked like that day. Whatever he remembered made him look decidedly unwell.
Beauregard kept his gaze fixed on Wyatt who returned the unwavering stare. “You’ve already decided I’m abusin’ Roslyn. Forcin’ her to lie to everybody about being married so I can keep her stashed here at the ranch where I take my pleasure with her delectable body.” His lips twisted as his eyes turned devilish. “And it is delectable. Never thought I’d touch something so luscious.” He studied his brother who slowly turned red. “Isn’t that right, Wy? I bring to mind a time last autumn you walked a might bow-legged when Roslyn passed us in town. As I recall, you muttered my wife has the most luscious–”
“Enough.” Wyatt shot a cagey look at his sour-faced wife of three years. “Past observations over Roslyn’s ample charms don’t change the fact that you’re a violent murderer who has no business pretending a well-bred lady is his wife.”
“What?” Roslyn rejoined the conversation, her voice feeble.
“Do you not remember, Roslyn? It happened on the border of your family property.”
Her gaze flew to her husband. “That’s why they’re sure you’re a killer and hurting me? Because of what happened back then?”
Beauregard chilled her with a terrorizing glare. “Not another word. This time you will obey and settle.”
Swallowing, Roslyn nodded anxiously and looked at the floor. She startled when Wyatt spoke, risking a glance at him because it would be rude not to.
“Roslyn, come with us.” His timbre was soft and coaxing. For the first time while addressing her there was no anger or distain, only concern. “It’s past time you’re returned where you belong.”
Rising, Beauregard’s movement was stiff, as if he suppressed some violent emotion. His heavy breathing made his chest lift and fall steeply. “Time for you to leave.”
“I want her to answer me.” Wyatt gained his feet. He was the tallest of the three. “Or is she too frightened once we’re gone you’ll beat her for not heeding your command to ‘settle’? Christ, Beauregard. She’s not one of your goddamned fillies.”
“Mind your own wife. Don’t think on mine so hard.”
“She’s a flesh and blood woman who needs affection, not the possessive manhandling of a brute.”
“Wy,” William began, dismayed. “We didn’t come here for this. Going off with our cannons half cocked.” He looked beseechingly at Beauregard. “We wanted the truth, is all.”
“Is all?” Beauregard snorted. “Wy came to bully me into doin’ what he wanted. Roslyn’s mine. The end.”
“Forcing yourself on a woman doesn’t make her yours.”
Roslyn gasped.
She jumped to her feet and got in Wyatt’s face. Her own distorted with anger. “You still believe that? How stupid do you think I am? Of course I’d leave if I was being abused.” She waved her hands up and down her body. “There isn’t a mark on me. There hasn’t been a new one since that morning.”
“There are ways a man can damage a women that won’t leave signs.”
“Like?”
“Sex,” Wyatt said bluntly. “For one.”
Livid as she was, she didn’t even blush. “We are married.”
“That again?”
Roslyn marched to the table and snatched up the framed certificate. She stomped back to the stubborn man and shoved it in his face. Rather than feel triumphant at his dumbfounded expression, she felt nauseous. He truly hadn’t believed they were married. He thought she gave herself to a man not her husband. He honestly believed his sibling was capable of those awful rumours. “It’s not a sin for us to love each other, and not that what goes on in my marriage bed is any of your cotton picking business, but Beauregard loves me well. So well, all he has to do is look at me and I want him.”
Sipping lemonade, Caroline spluttered and thumped her chest.
William stood to look at the certificate from behind his older brother’s shoulder. His brows lifted, and his face took on a contemplative expression.
Wyatt pushed the frame from under his nose with the side of his hand. “Never picked a bulb of cotton in my whole life.”
“You listen good.” She clutched the treasured frame to her chest. “He’s only ever protected me. He protected me when the mob came, and as for Franklyn Buckley Senior–” She squealed when Beauregard yanked her into him by the shoulders.
Despite the secret she’d almost betrayed, Roslyn felt so mad when the Older Kellingtons tensed as if to take their brother down.
“He is not going to hit me.” Roslyn shrugged until her husband’s grip loosened. “What is the matter with you all?”
“Roslyn–”
“I won’t let them insult you in our home. No more.”
Rather than argue, Beauregard sighed then simply left. Not the room, but the house.
Roslyn turned to her guests. “Are you happy? You ruined my surprise. The last few months have been so hard, and all I wanted was to share a special meal with my husband. Now he’s mad at me.”
Wyatt’s gaze snapped to her. “If you’re worried he’ll hurt you we can take you with us.”
“I’m worried he’ll sulk and spend his night bedded with the horses instead of bedding me.” Roslyn felt the unladylike urge to snarl. “Get out of my house. You are no longer welcome, and will not be welcome until you learn how to behave in a manner equal to my husband’s.”
Looking just miserable, William took her hand and patted it. “Take care.” He kissed her cheek then left.
Caroline stood and left without a word.
Roslyn shook her head in dismay. The woman offered not a word of apology, nor a look of remorse for her vulgar words. Roslyn had looked forward to having a sister, but the spineless gossip strutting from her home wasn’t worth a jot of her time.
Wyatt remained, studying her. “You don’t like my wife.”
“She is rude, careless with her ill-formed opinions, and proved she’s unable to think for herself, or conduct herself in a manner befitting a lady of her station. No, I do not like your wife.”
“You don’t like me either.” He seemed genuinely uneasy. “But you like my brothers.”
“William is too darn cute for peace of mind.”
“And Beauregard?”
“He’s everything I never knew to want.”
“Say I take the time to listen to your version of what happened out here. Can you honestly say you won’t diminish the truth to protect yourself?”
Roslyn turned speculative. “Can you honestly say you’re ready to hear the truth? Are you ready to learn what kind of man your brother is?”
Declining to answer, Wyatt left with a brooding expression.
Saddened, Roslyn watched the Older Kellingtons ride into the night until they disappeared.