Marry Me Page 28

  Not to mention that I am hardly the one to talk about quick marriages to a man your sisters haven’t had time to approve, am I? I can only hope that it turns out as well for you as it did for me. I have every faith that you’ve chosen well.

  No, I’m writing to you about Kate. I’m just the slightest bit concerned about her, you see. She sent me the oddest letter, something about treasures and adventures and…Emily, can you think of a person less suited to an adventure than Kate? She posted it from New York, but I wired the hotel and received no answer. I’m sure she must be tucked away at some posh resort, soaking her toes, too busy fending off admirers to write to either one of us, but I’d feel more comfortable if I knew exactly where. I must have a sister to worry over, you know. Did she happen to mention her plans to you?

  I’m sure it’s nothing for you to fuss over, though. Fuss over that handsome man of yours instead (he simply must be handsome, I insist upon it) and be happy, my dear. Be happy.

  Awaiting details and, hopefully, a visit—

  Your devoted sister,

  Anthea

  December 23

  The snow fell fast and thick, revenge for the mild autumn. Inside the house three pies—two mince, one dried peach—cooled on the table, while beside them three bowls of yeast dough rose high and white beneath cloths. Emily pulled a batch of nutmeg cookies from the oven, the warm, rich spice scenting the air.

  She poked at the puffy dough. Needed another fifteen minutes or so, she judged. Which meant she could drink a cup of coffee and stare out at the storm without guilt.

  The world swirled with white. Here and there a long piece of dried grass pierced the snow, like the few sparse, stiff hairs on Mr. Biskup’s head.

  Jake came out of the half-finished office where he’d been, under protest, setting type. But given a choice between throwing the next edition of the Register or Emily having the time to bake one more pie, he’d immediately picked the type.

  “Jeez, it smells good in here.” He wandered over to join her, slipping his arms around her waist, a gesture that had become utterly natural to them both. He nuzzled her neck. “Smells even better right here.”

  “It’s really coming down. I can hardly see the stables.” Smiling, she leaned back into his embrace. “If this keeps up, the Blevinses and Art won’t make it here for Christmas dinner.”

  “You mean I’d have to eat it all?” He tsked. “Such a shame.”

  “You’ll just have to force yourself.”

  “The things I do for you.” He kissed her neck, her cheek, and let the simmer of desire, the promise of more to come, warm them both. “Too bad I couldn’t get the house all done in time for Christmas.”

  Three weeks ago they’d moved into bare rooms and unfinished walls, the air sharp with the smells of sawdust and fresh paint. Emily loved every inch of it.

  She turned in his arms, and her heart caught and sang. Would the day ever come, she wondered, that she would see him and not feel this? The lift, the warmth, the giddy joy? “Some things,” she said softly, “are worth waiting for.”

  “I—” He looked over her shoulder, squinted. “What the hell’s that?”

  “What?” She spun, following his gaze. A dark shape, bulky and big, took form out of the snow. “A coach?”

  Yes, a coach, the likes of which had never been seen in that territory, bigger than their old claim shack, glossy black sides glinting through a thick dusting of white.

  “Who could possibly be out in this?” she asked.

  “Must have gotten lost,” he murmured. “Followed the first light they saw.”

  The vehicle had been mounted on skids and slid right into the yard. Four perfectly matched gray horses, their blankets a deep royal blue, pulled it, huge hooves churning the snow.

  The coachman, swaddled in scarves and buffalo robes, climbed down and opened the side door. He reached inside and handed down a tiny, cloaked figure that shook off the assistance and leaped down with alacrity.

  “What—” Jake’s hold on her loosened and she felt his sudden, sharp alertness. And as the figure turned, took one step toward the shack, he burst into motion, sprinting out the door and into the snow.

  “Mom?” Four fast steps, and then he stopped cold. “Mom?”

  Emily saw the woman lift her head, and then Jake scooped her up, hugging her so her toes dangled off the ground, brushing the top of the layer of snow. Emily, who’d been a few seconds behind, finally caught up.

  “Em! Em, look who’s here.” He set her down, but kept her hand. “This is my—”

  “I know. This is your mother.” Emily extended her hands in welcome and was pleased when Mrs. Sullivan took them both. She was tiny, smaller than Emily, who came up to Jake’s chest on a tall day. She peered out from between a low, fuzzy cap and a big swath of fuzzy blue scarf, wrinkled and bright-eyed as a storybook elf, but her grip on Emily’s hands was strong. “I’m so delighted you’re here.”

  “As am I.” Mrs. Sullivan beamed, sunshine through the swirling snow. “Though I suspect the very best Christmas present I’ve ever had, my dear, is you.”

  “But how did you—?” Flakes melted on Jake’s dark cheeks, glistening droplets, and caught on his lashes. “What are you—?” He couldn’t seem to get the questions out, as if there were too many to settle on any one.

  “The Bateses invited me, of course.”

  “But—” He frowned. “They fired you. Right after Julia and I—”

  “Yes,” she said serenely. “But things change.” She touched his cheek. “You’ve no coat, and there’s much to talk about. Let’s get inside.”

  “I’m not cold.” Irrevocably drawn, his gaze arrowed to the massive black coach. “Emily, go ahead. I’m going to—” The words stuck in his throat when another figure, larger, wearing a huge dark great-coat, lumbered down from the coach.

  “Oh, I’m not going anywhere.”

  Jake didn’t move. Emily thought he probably didn’t even breathe.

  The man, slow-moving, impressively distinguished even with snowflakes catching in his gray-streaked beard, went to Emily first.

  He stabbed his beautiful mahogany cane into six inches of snow and leaned upon it. “You must be Emily,” he said, and extended a broad hand. “I’m Barnett Bates.”

  “I’m pleased you’re here.”

  He patted her hand and scowled. “Not sure I can say the same.”

  “Wait. Wait, wait, wait!” Jake came out of his stunned silence with a roar. “What the hell’s going on?”

  “We’ve come for…” He looked back at Emily. “You mean you didn’t tell him? Oh, that’s rich.” His laugh boomed as he bent over with it, so deep only the support of his cane kept him from tumbling into a drift. “That’s the best fun I’ve had in…” He sobered. “Two years or so.” He was just as Jake had described him. Proud, intimidating, confident in his own opinion. But he’d come this far, Emily thought. It was enough. “Wilomene’s had some trouble with a cough. Her lungs—” For a man like Barnett Bates that slight, potent pause said more than an anguished cry from another. “The doctor suggested that the Western climates might be more beneficial for her. And when we began receiving letters from your wi—” It was more than he could bring himself to do, call another woman Jake’s wife. “When Emily wrote to us—”

  “She wrote to you?” Jake broke in.

  “Yes. Several times. Charming letters.”

  “Oh, she’s charming, all right,” Jake said flatly.

  “She invited us to visit. Very prettily, I might add, which is more than you ever did.” Snowflakes coated the black fur collar of his coat, sparkling like sugar. “When Emily mentioned that there might be several plots available here, and that in her considered opinion the air might be helpful, Wilomene and I decided the time had come to inspect it.”

  “We?” Jake paled. “Is…Mrs. Bates is here?”

  “In the coach. She’ll be down when the nurse gets them bundled up.”

  His mouth formed a word.
No sound came out but Emily could read it clearly. Them?

  He turned for the coach, made his way to it, moving like a sleepwalker through a shifting dream.

  The coachman reached inside, helping down another person, as small as Mrs. Sullivan but requiring far more assistance. Swathed in cloaks that seemed to weigh down her fragile shoulders, Mrs. Bates gripped tightly to the coachman’s proffered arm with both gloved hands. She stood clinging to him for a moment, waiting until she could stand on both feet before turning to face Jake.

  “Hello, Jake,” Mrs. Bates said.

  “I—” He broke off, his attention, his whole being, focused on the slight woman climbing down from the coach with her arms full. “Em—” Hand shaking, he reached out, as if he knew she’d be there.

  “I’m here,” Emily said, gripped his hand, and hung on.

  “God.” He swallowed once. And again. “Oh God. Would you look at her, Emily? Look at her.”

  “I see her,” she whispered. “She’s beautiful.” And she was, pale blond curls wafting out from beneath a snug pink cap that matched her cheeks, eyes as bright and round as blueberries.

  “Jenny looks like her mother, of course,” Wilomene said, imperious and proud.

  “Jenny?” His head swung briefly toward Wilomene, back a second later, as if he couldn’t bear not to be looking at his daughter. “You call her Jenny?”

  “That’s her name, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. I thought maybe you’d change it, after we—”

  “You thought I’d change the name my daughter gave her?”

  “I didn’t know.” He reached out slowly, as if he couldn’t take one inch nearer for granted. And then he lightly fingered one cotton-white puff of hair, as if he was afraid she might vanish if he touched more.

  Jenny abruptly wailed and buried her face against her nurse’s shoulders.

  “She’s shy when she first meets someone,” Wilomene said. She clung to her pride and disapproval to the very last. But then, her gaze resting fondly on her granddaughter, she dared one step. “But she’ll warm up to you quickly. And once she does, she loves with all her heart.”

  “Like her mother,” he murmured.

  “Yes. Like her mother.”

  “Now then.” Barnett stamped over to join them. “I may be having second thoughts about all this if you’re still fool enough to keep us standing around in the snow.”

  “Please. Go in. We’ll be there in a moment,” he said, and paused. “Make yourselves at home.”

  Barnett ushered the women in, then turned back halfway through the door. “My daughter loved you.”

  “I know. Almost as much as I loved her.”

  “Don’t let her down.”

  Jake nodded, accepting. “I don’t intend to.”

  Jake stared at the closed door for another full minute, stunned, as if afraid to believe his daughter was truly on the other side. And then, as slowly as if he’d aged a hundred years in the last few minutes, he turned to face his wife. His cheeks gleamed with water, his hair was powdered white, and he blinked the snowflakes off his lashes.

  Bracing herself, Emily waited. And waited some more. And finally, because she’d never been good at waiting: “Are you angry?”

  “Am I angry?” He stepped nearer, so she could see each individual flake as it fell and caught, a frozen star that lasted a mere second on his cheek before dissolving into a tear. “You’re the one that’s so good at reading people. Can’t you tell?”

  “I—” She had to be breathing. Her heart had to be beating. Intellectually she understood the physiology but she couldn’t feel either one. “No. I hope, too much, and the hoping’s getting in the way.”

  “You always were good at hoping.” He shook his head. “I never was.”

  “That’s okay. That’s why you have me.”

  “Do I? Have you, I mean?”

  There was no point in denying it. “If you want me, you do. You’ve known that for a long time, though.”

  “Yes. Yes, I guess I did,” he said. “You’re shivering. You’re cold, let’s—”

  “I’m not cold.” Scared and worried, but not cold. She was never cold with Jake. “Please, I can’t stand it any longer, what are you thinking?”

  “What the hell did you tell them that could have possibly persuaded Barnett Bates to haul himself to Montana?”

  “I don’t think it was anything I said,” she admitted. “If anything, it was Julia. Once they got past the grief enough to remember what she would have wanted.” And then the cold did hit, down to her bones. “And, too, Wilomene’s health is not strong, and Barnett…they’re not young anymore, and the last few years have been hard. Maybe they just didn’t want Jenny to lose as much as they have.”

  “Can I do it, do you think? Do right by her?”

  “Of course you can!” she cried, seizing his hand, and nearly wept in relief when he didn’t pull away. “You’re going to be damn wonderful at it. The best ever. I guarantee it.”

  “You do, do you?” he said. And then, “I love you, Em. I do. With all I am now, with everything I’ve learned, I love you.”

  And then everything began again. Her breath, her heart, her life.

  “I didn’t want to, you know. I fought it.”

  “I know,” she said softly.

  “But I never had a chance. Everything that’s ever happened to me all brought me to this point, so I could love you with every cell in my body, every corner of my soul. And I’m just sorry it took so long for me to know it.”

  “I told you, Jake. Some things are worth waiting for.”

  “Yeah. That they are.” Then he bent his head and kissed her, friend to friend, lover to lover, husband to wife, a vow more powerful than the one they’d taken the day they’d married. “Thanks, Em. For knowing I had it in me. And for loving me enough to see it.”

  “You’re very welcome.” She linked her arm with his and turned for the door. The house looked beautiful, roof frosted in white, windows glowing warm and gold. A home, she thought. Yes, a home. “Let’s go get to know your daughter.”

  Epilogue

  December, 1921

  December in Montana was cold. Cold enough, some said, to freeze your nose—and a few other parts polite people didn’t mention—right off your body the instant you stepped outdoors.

  But that didn’t stop the residents of McGyre. No, they were born of heartier stock, especially when there was a celebration to be had. And so they thronged the streets, noses as bright a red as the bunting swagged from every storefront. Toes jigged to the proud, brassy marches blasted by the McGyre City Band, including, their director announced proudly, their tuba player, who’d overcome a severe mouth injury when his lips froze to the mouthpiece in order to be here.

  The sky arched overhead, the kind of blue it only got when the temperature hovered well south of freezing, shining on snow as white as Mrs. Sullivan’s sheets. Red, white, and blue, the people told each other happily as they thronged in the streets, swilling the hot chocolate and steaming coffee Wilber Bunku was selling from the front porch of his store. Appropriate weather, they said. A little cold wouldn’t stop McGyre.

  Not when they had such a momentous occasion to celebrate. Not when tiny little McGyre was sending off one of their own to Washington, D.C.

  And what a distinguished senator he’d be, the ladies murmured to each other. Such a handsome figure he was, broad and tall, that dashing streak of silver in his hair, and, oh, so obviously in love with his wife! They found it so romantic that when Senator Jacob Sullivan, the famous “Proof Sheet King,” resplendent in a black jacket and charcoal-striped pants, climbed out to the back platform of the train (which, they congratulated themselves smugly, they had the senator to thank for bringing to town) to address the crowds, feminine sighs rolled down the streets of McGyre like stampeding cattle.

  Wilber, disgruntled because he was a Democrat, damn it, and it was his God-given responsibility to be grumpy on a day like today—not that he’d m
inded the business, of course—leaned over to Imbert Longnecker, his boon companion, to give his opinion on their new senator.

  “I suppose it’s an honor, having him come from McGyre, but you know damn well the fella wouldn’t have gotten elected if we hadn’t given women the right to vote.”

  Imbert craned his long neck to get a good view. “It’s done now, Wilber. Might as well accept it.”

  “He’s supported the women’s vote from the beginning,” Wilbur complained. “And you know, I think some of them voted for whoever they pleased instead of who their husbands told them to! Which was exactly why they shouldn’t have gotten the vote in the first place, if you ask me.”

  “I don’t know why a wife would ever disagree with her husband,” Imbert said dryly. “Besides, think of it. The man’s got five daughters! Can you imagine how little peace he would ever have had if he hadn’t supported women’s suffrage?” Imbert shuddered at the thought. He’d only one daughter himself, but his precious Lana could make him agree to all kinds of things he’d started out saying no to.

  “It’s more than that, you know. Why, he even moved all the way to Kansas for two whole years so that wife of his could attend the Women’s Medical College.” The thought required Wilber to finish his own coffee—spiked with the extra kick only his best customers received—in one fell gulp.

  “That’s enough,” Imbert said sharply. “I probably would have lost my wife, and my son, too, if Emily hadn’t been there when she had a hard time.”

  Wilber had forgotten Ellen had had such difficulties giving birth. And that Imbert had always had a fondness for Mrs. Sullivan. “Sure, and she’s a fine physician, she is. Doesn’t mean women should be meddling in the affairs of state.”

  The crowd that had gotten there early enough to get a prime spot roared. Sullivan was giving a right rousing speech, from the sound of it, though Imbert and Wilber couldn’t hear a word. Didn’t have to. You could always judge the success of a stump speech by watching the crowds. If they were nodding, if they laughed now and then, well, you had ’em. The words themselves didn’t matter a bit.