38

THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1909

Nell left Augusta’s house in a fog of confusion. She’d just learned Jake knew about Hattie’s rape. Dear Lord. Nell could only imagine how her friend was taking it.

Nell didn’t pretend she hadn’t wondered how Hattie handled the explanations on her wedding night. She’d been fiercely adamant about Jake never knowing what was done to her, and by whom. So, it must have been incredibly difficult. Naturally, Nell hadn’t come right out and asked, although she’d had to bite her tongue more than once to stop herself from doing just that. She’d had to remind herself it was none of her business and be content knowing Hattie was radiantly happy.

Jake hadn’t offered much explanation when he questioned Nell. What she did take from their conversation was that Hattie had stuck to her guns. From the little he had told Nell, she was pretty sure he’d discovered the identity of Hattie’s rapist all on his own.

Nell hoped no one saw her talking to Jake outside the mercantile, because she’d sure as heck failed to disguise her shock upon hearing Jake’s first words. She’d greeted him as she always did, pleased to see him after her two-week sojourn in Seattle visiting her mother and sister, and anxious for news of Hattie, who’d been nothing short of radiant when Nell left.

But Jake wiped her smile away when he’d leaned over and murmured in a voice too low to be overheard that he knew Roger Lord had raped his wife and Jake needed to talk to her about it. Numbly, she had let him lead her to the Murdock mansion.

Apparently, he’d spent the past two weeks talking to everyone with any knowledge of Hattie’s attack. Why hadn’t Augusta said anything to her when she met her at the train last night? To be fair, Moses had been there, too, and it had been quite late when he brought her back to Augusta’s house.

Nell was worried sick about Hattie. How had her friend fared these past two weeks? Jake looked so closed off and grim, and knowing Hattie’s aversion to the idea of him finding out about Roger Lord, Nell had to wonder if the two of them had actually talked about it.

The whole confusing potluck of emotions was boiling through her mind as Nell walked past the livery. She didn’t see Moses until he suddenly materialized at her side and took her arm.

“Hiya, sweetheart,” he said, and when she violently started, he soothed a large hand down her arm. “Whoa there, little darlin’. I didn’t mean to startle you. What’s got you looking so serious?”

God, she wished she could tell him, but she couldn’t. It wasn’t her secret to tell. “Um, nothing,” she said without conviction.

Moses’ eyes narrowed. Leading her into the relative privacy of the livery, he crowded her up against the wall. “You’re not a very good liar, Nell,” he said, watching her closely. “So, what’s going on?”

Being caught fibbing rubbed her raw, particularly when, if it were up to her, she would unburden herself to him in a heartbeat. There were few people with more insight into Hattie than Moses Marks.

She couldn’t confide in him, however, so she took refuge in anger instead. Straightening away from the wall, she held herself erect, her manner prim and proper. “I’m not going to stand here and listen to you call me a liar,” she said coolly, her chin tipped up. “I’m leaving.”

“The hell you say.” Moses blocked her way by planting his hands on the wall on either side of her head. “Does all this sudden secrecy have anything to do with your conversation with Jake Murdock outside Norton’s Mercantile?”

Once again, her body jerked in shock. But she whispered stubbornly, “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Bullsh—” Moses shut up before he spewed something he might regret. But he knew his voice was perhaps overly inflexible when he said, “Quite clearly, you do. What in tarnation is going on, Nell?”

He crowded her against the wall and hooked a hand beneath her chin, forcing it up until her eyes met his. He could feel the pulse in the angle of her jaw beating like a captured rabbit’s. “What did Jake want? I saw him say something to you, Nellie-girl, and I saw you react as though you’d been shot. Tell me what this is all about.”

“I can’t,” she said miserably. “It was told to me in confidence.”

“In confidence by who?” he asked. He was struck by a terrible suspicion. “Murdock?” What the hell was Jake up to? Moses wracked his brain to figure out what Murdock could have said to make Nell react this way. Bastard better be taking care of his wife and not trying to start any funny business with my girl. But that didn’t make sense.

Until Nell blushed, thinking of the mortifyingly personal nature of the questions Jake had asked her this day.

Moses reacted violently to the sudden color in her face. If he’d been thinking straight, he would’ve known his suspicions simply weren’t feasible. But he wasn’t. The woman he loved wasn’t acting like herself, he’d witnessed Murdock’s effect on women before, and Moses panicked. “You stay the hell away from Jake Murdock,” he snarled furiously. “You’re mine!” Then he kissed her.

It lacked the gentleness he’d taught her to expect, possessed none of his usual ironclad restraint. This kiss was harsh, carnal, and out of control as he ground his mouth against hers, forcing her head back against the boards.

Nell struggled instinctively, not against his kiss but against the raw injustice of his lack of faith in her. Not that her attempt to evade his hold had any impact on Moses. He simply captured her hands, pinning them against the wall above her head.

Sliding his mouth away from hers, he kissed his way roughly down her neck, his free hand snaking around her hip to yank her against his lower body. The size, the hardness and heat of him, rubbing against the notch between Nell’s thighs, made her gasp. “Stop it,” she whispered and tugged against the hold on her wrists. They remained stapled to the wall by his big hand as his mouth moved onto her right breast, his breath hot and ragged through the thin material of her shirtwaist. “Moses, stop it.”

His teeth captured her nipple, which to her shame had distended beneath the cloth, and tugged it. How could she be the least bit excited when he’d just grievously insulted her?

“Would you use force on me, then, Moses Marks?” she asked hotly to disguise the fact that he could cast aspersions on her faithfulness one moment and still render her all too willing to grant him unlimited access to her body the next.

Moses went still against her. Releasing her wrists, he stepped back, allowing a small gap between their bodies. Nell’s hands dropped limply to her sides. Then she pushed him aside, abruptly furious. “How dare you?” she snapped. “First you treat me like I’m a prig, and now you think I’m having an affair with my best friend’s newly wedded husband?” Her voice rose incredulously. “And what part of ‘confidential’ do you fail to understand?”

Shit. Put like that, it sounded all kinds of muddled up. But Moses was still aroused and mortified by his treatment of her. At the same time, he wished like hell he’d pushed matters even further. And while he knew he should apologize, instead his voice emerged coated with frost. “Whose secret are you keeping, Nell? It’s sure not mine. Is it Murdock’s?” He thought about it a moment. “Hattie’s?” It was a stab in the dark, but the sudden stillness on Nell’s pretty face told him he’d hit his target. “It’s Hattie’s?”

“What difference does it make?” Nell snapped back irritably. “A confidence is a confidence. Or perhaps you only honor those given to you by certain people.” Nell immediately regretted her snide tone of voice. She knew perfectly well what it would mean to Moses to believe himself excluded from Hattie’s confidence. A large part of their problems on his side had originally stemmed from his conviction that she had usurped his place as Hattie’s best friend. Nell felt a sudden gaping divide crack open between them, leaving the ground beneath her feet feeling far too shaky.

“Hattie has a problem,” Moses said in a tone so carefully neutral it made the small hairs on the back of Nell’s neck stand up, “and you don’t think I can be trusted with it, am I correct?”

“No,” she said, wishing desperately she could fully explain. “Let me try to make you understand.”

“Oh, I think I understand very well,” he interrupted in that appalling might-as-well-be-a-stranger voice. He took her arm in a gentle grasp and ushered her to the livery door. “You best run along now,” he murmured distantly. “I need to get back to work.”

And the next thing she knew, Nell was outside the livery, staring miserably at the door Moses closed in her face.