Montana Wife (Historical) (6 page)

Dayton knuckled back his hat, emitted a look of great satisfaction and headed off toward the alley.

What had that lowlife said to her? A bad feeling settled like a lead ball in his gut. He dismounted, wrapped one of the reins around the closest post and hopped onto the boardwalk.

There she was—he could see her through the wide front windows at the postal counter window. Looking composed, she counted out change from her reticule,
exchanged a polite nod to the postmaster and headed for the door.

One thing she couldn't hide were the circles beneath her eyes. They were so bruised, she looked as if she'd been hit. The strain showed on her face and in the curled ball of her fists.

She saw him through the glass door, the bell jangling as she walked through it. Frowning at him as he held the door, she said, “Mr. Lindsay. I'd hoped to see you next. Seeing you here saves me a ride out to your place.”

“I noticed you on the boardwalk.” This was business, nothing more, but that didn't explain the return of the emotions aching like arthritis beneath his ribs. “I spoke to Wright at the bank. What I have to say isn't easy. Maybe you'd want a more private place—”

“The bank is my next stop. It's best to say what's on your mind.” Along the side wall of the mercantile she spotted an empty bench washed in the wan sunlight that speared through the gray streaks of the clouds above. “Shall we sit?”

“Sure.”

Good. It was a start. She released a breath she didn't realize she was holding. Oh, she was overset with all this worry. She was depending so much on his ability to purchase the ranch. The mountain of debt was staggering.

If he could buy the place, it would be the best solution. He'd certainly earned the right, he would be good to the land and she couldn't think of a more deserving rancher. Anticipating Mr. Lindsay's answer, she settled on the rough wooden bench.

All she had to do was to glance up into his face. His honest face. But he wasn't smiling, and surely that was
a poor sign indeed. His dark eyes were troubled, and she knew. While he didn't say a word, the last smidgen of hope died along with the last of the sunlight.

“The banker would not accept my offer.”

“I see.” A cold gust of wind left her catching her breath. “That's too bad. I think Kol would have approved of you farming the land. He'd always thought well of you.”

“And I of him.” Towering over her, a long, lean man in a black overcoat, he seemed as bleak as the rain that began to fall. As severe as the days ahead to come. “You haven't heard what I have to say.”

“I already know. There are notes on everything. The house, the land, the livestock. The buggy. There is no chance of coming out with cash in hand. It's obvious, but somehow I had been hoping—”

“I was hopeful, too. There is too much debt on the land. I cannot buy it for the total of what is owed. It would be beyond what cash I could fork over.”

“Of course, it would be a poor investment for you. What will happen when the bank takes it?”

“Likely there will be an auction. The land will go to the highest bidder.”

“You'd do better to try then.”

“I'm likely to have stiff competition. Dayton, for one, has his eye on it.”

“Yes, and a half dozen others.” To think that was to come of the life she and Kol had built. That it could disappear as suddenly as he had vanished from her life. That other people would live in their home. Another man would till and harvest their fields.

And Kol had let it happen.

She tamped down her anger. She couldn't bear grieving him and being furious at him, too. She'd give any
thing to be able to hold him in her arms, debt or no. And it was impossible, of course, and her arms felt so empty. Her heart wrung dry.

She did her best to clear the lump of emotion from her throat. “I would like to offer you the load of wheat we managed to save.”

“I'll sell it for you.”

“No. I meant to give it to you. You lost your crop, as well, and of the two of us, it's my hope that at least you can remain on your land.”

A muscle twitched in his jaw. “I will take the wheat.”

“Oh, thank you.” Why that seemed to lift away a part of her burdens, she couldn't say. But it felt right to cancel out the obligation she felt to this man.

No, she wouldn't be beholden to any man. Look at how Dayton had viewed a woman's need. Shivering, forcing the ugliness from her mind, she clutched her reticule, stood and smoothed her skirts.

Daniel Lindsay looked ten times more muscular than her rude neighbor did, and Daniel gave the impression of a good and upright man. Yet it wasn't right to be in his debt. She had enough debt to handle as it was. “Please come and fetch the wheat when you can. Perhaps tomorrow, after a good night's rest. You look as exhausted as I feel.”

“I wish I could've done more, ma'am. If you need money—”

“No!” She answered too quickly, startling them both. Seeming so rude. And how wrong that was, when he was only being kind, she was sure of it. “I only mean, I have enough to get by on for now. You have repaid Kol's kindness twofold already.”

“It's my opinion I have not.”

“There is nothing more to be done, Mr. Lindsay.” She gripped her reticule so tightly, her knuckles hurt. “Good day to you, sir.”

With all the composure she possessed, she walked carefully away from the tall, somber man watching after her. One foot placed in front of the other until the boardwalk led her to the busy corner.

Over the din from the busy street, she swore she could hear him call her name, but when she turned, he was gone from the corner.

It was just as well. Daniel Lindsay had his life. And her future…why, it lay in an unknown direction. For the first time in fifteen years, she was truly on her own.

Alone, she crossed the street. Marched right up to the front door of the bank and didn't let her terror lead her as she lifted her chin, pushed wide the door and asked for Mr. Wright. She waited, fighting the cold trembles that were taking root in the pit of her stomach.

How long would the process take? Would she be allowed to take the savings from the bank without Kol, for the account was in his name? Wondering what on earth she would do if she couldn't, she saw a familiar pinto passing by the side windows and she twisted in her chair to watch the man riding the mustang.

Daniel astride the horse rode nimbly, straight and strong and dark in the shadows as the rain fell in earnest against the glass panes of the bank's many windows.

In a blink, Daniel was gone, leaving the sight of the street as other riders and horse-drawn wagons scurried by, hurried along by the change in weather.

T
here had been no mercy from the bank.

Rayna sidestepped the worst of the puddles and tried to hold no ill will against Mr. Wright, who'd only been doing his job. But with her feet aching in her new shoes that were not meant for a mile and a half of walking, it was plain impossible. He could have waited to repossess the horses and buggy. They had a buyer and in these hard times felt as if they couldn't let the opportunity pass by.

Fine, she understood that, she didn't have the funds to cover the debt, but did it have to be today, when the rain was only getting worse?

The rattle of a harness above the rush of the wind was the only warning she had. She gathered up her skirts and sidestepped the water collecting in the ruts. Her toe caught in a wet tangle of toppled bunch grass and it was too late. She was falling toward the ditch. Her hands shot out, her reticule went flying, oh, Lord no, not in the—

Her knee cracked against a rock, her gloves skidded through the tough thorny vines of dying blackberry bushes and the ditch rose up to meet her. Cold silt slicked her face as she hit the unforgiving ground.

She popped her face out of the trench water, leveling herself up on her stinging hands. She was mud and wet and bleeding and her face—oh, mercy. It was runoff from the Dayton's cow pasture.

Wasn't that the frosting on the cake of her day?

The jangling crescendoed. The muffled thud of horse hooves in the mud stopped and she could feel the great animals towering over her. Every inch of her body protested as she rolled over and recognized Samson and Ash, her matched bays. Her buggy. And Clay Dayton staring down at her, his arms crossed on his knobby knee.

He'd bought her team? He'd been the one to approach the bank? Rage fueled her, streaming into her blood as she climbed to her feet and out of the road. Mud and worse sluicing down her chin and staining her bodice, she hiked her chin higher when she realized Dayton was looking entertained from behind the transparent rain curtains.
Her
rain curtains.

Not anymore, Rayna.

It hit her then, seeing Dayton on her buggy seat, driving her team. All of it was now his. This was the way it was going to go, losing everything in small pieces, bit after bit after bit until nothing remained.

No, that wasn't quite true. She would be left with everything that was more important than any house or any buggy. She would have her sons. Her sons. She loved them with every fiber of her being, and she was deeply lucky to have the boys in her life.

Gratitude washed through her and she found it easier to find the strength she needed to keep going. To wish Mr. Dayton a good day as he passed, the wheels splashing mud droplets on the hem of her coat and dress. She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket that was only
slightly wet and washed the sludge off her face the best she could.

Now to get home and get to her housework. She'd go through her closets and dressers. Divide up Kol's things to donate to the church or for things she could cut down for Kirk.

Then she would divvy up her pantry of preserved goods between her best friends and offer her cooking utensils and kettles to Katelyn, the new neighbor down the road she had befriended. As a newlywed, Katelyn would be in need of various household items.

Yes, that would be a help, to start clearing out her house as soon as possible. She'd sell what she couldn't pack—as far as she could tell there were encumbrances on her fine furniture. Then she would be ready to move when Kol's brother replied to her letter with an invitation to come.

Or, rather, she
hoped
Kol's brother would be the family member to offer them shelter.

There was no way around the bankruptcy. Not with the entire crop of wheat destroyed. How was she to tell the boys? Lord knows they had it hard enough. They would be leaving their friends and schoolmates behind to start over in a new town with children who were strangers to them and as guests in a different household—

The splash and plod of what sounded like a double team of draft horses and the clatter of an empty wagon had her checking over her shoulder. She saw a man on the seat, his wide frame obscured by the bulk of a raincoat. His Stetson was pulled low against the rain and hid his face from her view, but she'd know those working man's shoulders anywhere.

Was it just her lucky day or did it have to be Daniel Lindsay coming her way? Her clothes, her face, her
smell.
Oh, she reeked of a cow barn. She wiped a hank of dripping hair out of her eyes and tucked it beneath the brim of her sagging hood. Lord, she was mortified that he'd recognized her and was slowing his team to a stop right beside her.

“Ma'am.” He bobbed his head as he set the brake. “It's a bad day to be on foot.”

“I'm rather enjoying the rain.”

“You could appreciate the weather from up here just as well.” He climbed down to offer her a hand up.

She could only stare at his leather-covered palm, wide and broad, as steady and sure as Kol's had been. It was a comfort somehow to know there were men like him in the world. “I would be obliged for a ride. I thought you were on horseback?”

“Doin' some hauling this afternoon.”

“To the weigh station?” Her fingertips brushed his glove as she bounced up onto the slick wooden step, and then she was up on the seat and away from him. She slid over to make room for him.

“I took your load of wheat, tarped it down good, what with the downpour, and then mine. I had three trips in all.” He rose up on the steps, towering over her so that her breath caught in her throat.

Had he always been that tall? Heavens, every time she saw him he seemed to grow. Maybe men of good character did that, she reasoned as he released the brake and took charge of the thick leather straps. He looked in control, and his tone was firm and low as he murmured to the horses. The double team of giant Clydesdales lunged, jerking the wagon into motion.

She should have been expecting the sudden move
ment, but she wasn't. Her torso rocked back and then her head rolled forward and Daniel's hand gripped her upper arm, steadying her.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes.” The word scraped up her windpipe. The heat from his grip was a shock.

“Rayna, you're like ice. Here.” He wound the reins into a twist and wedged the thickness between his knee and the dash, leaving his hands free as he struggled out of his rain slicker.

At once she saw what he was doing. “No, Daniel, you'll only get chilled and there's no sense to having both of us dripping wet.”

“Don't you worry about me.” He draped the oiled cloth around her shoulders, his movements awkward, as if he'd never done such a thing before. But he was gallant enough to do it anyway, shaking water off the unused hood and bundling her up. “Better?”

She could only nod. Shielded from the bite of the wind and rain, she began to shiver hard. Every inch of her being felt utterly weary. Every corner of her soul drained. Grateful for this chance to relax, she let her eyes drift shut and ignored the slide of the rainwater down her face as Daniel turned west toward home.

Home. She knew the sound of the willows at the corner of her driveway, their vibrant leaves whispering and their supple limbs groaning. Even with her eyes closed, she could feel the change of the land when Daniel guided the horses along the driveway that curved in a lazy circle toward her house.

Peace. She felt it wash over her and breathed it in. There had always been a sense of serenity in this swell of prairie land. She opened her eyes and the beauty of the two-story farm home, with its cheerful windows and
wraparound porch, struck her down deep. She had to find a way to leave this home she loved and take all the precious memories made inside that house with her. But how?

“Do you have somewhere to go?”

“That's one of the reasons I was in town. To mail letters to relatives. I hope to hear back before the bank comes for the keys to the front door.” She looked up to see Daniel studying her, his brow furrowed, his jaw set.

Unmistakable pity softened his whiskey-rough voice. Pity. How had it come to this? That people she hardly knew would look at her and feel sorry for the poor widow. Sure, he meant to be kind, but it grated on her pride and she had to fight a hot, rising wave of anger.

“Are they good people, these relatives?”

“I don't know. The only one I've met is Kol's brother. He's come out on the train to visit twice. The others are on Kol's side of the family and he's always—” There she went again, talking in the present tense. She had to stop doing that. Her husband was no longer here and yet she ached to reach out to him. To rest against his barrel chest, the safest place in all the world—

Hold on, Rayna. You have to do it.
Kol would want her to do her best for their boys. And that thought steadied her. Made it easier to force words past the grief coiled in her chest and to sound almost normal.

“He had always kept in touch with the relatives he was close to growing up. It's my hope they will help me now, for the sake of our sons. Someone is bound to have an extra room we can stay in, until I find work—”

She stopped. She couldn't look beyond that. The future was unthinkable. There was this horrible gaping emptiness in her life to come. An emptiness she had to
confront and keep going. For her boys. She would give them a good life, if she had to break her back cleaning houses and toiling in the fields to do it. Kol had wanted his sons to graduate from public school, and they would be the first in his family to be so well educated.

Daniel murmured to the horses, reining the great animals to a gentle stop. Without the pleasant rasping and occasional squeal of the wheels and the bell-like jingle of the harnessing and the creak of the boards of the empty wagon bed, the downpour rumbled like a Mozart concerto across the expanse of the prairie. She shivered, wrapping her arms around herself, but she wasn't only cold.
I will miss this place.

“Ma!”

The front door blew open and there was Hans, his hair mussed and several strands sticking straight up at his cowlick. His little blue flannel shirt had come untucked from his denims and dark circles marred his sweet face. “Ma!”

Mindless of the wind and wet, he tore down the front steps and she didn't remember leaping to the ground until she was suddenly there, a little boy wrapped around her legs, holding her with all the strength in his small being.

Love as pure as a blessing shone within her and nothing else mattered. Nothing really did. Just this child as she unwound his tenacious grip and knelt to wipe the worry lines from his brow. But they remained deep creases that had never known real anxiety.

I will protect you, little boy.
She was alone to do it, and she would. The world was a harsh place, but she was strong. And perhaps Kol would be watching over them from heaven. She wiped the wetness from his
cheeks, some rain, some tears. “Guess what I have in my reticule?”

“P-p-peppermint?”

“You'd better look inside and see.” She handed him the small cloth bag, sadly sodden, but the candy was well wrapped inside.

His cupid's mouth puckered up in concentration as he plunged his hand into the depths and withdrew a red-and-white striped candy stick.

“See?” It was a tradition that whenever she returned from town there was candy in her bag. “Now, hurry inside because you forgot your coat.”

Ignoring her, Hans shot a hard look in Daniel's direction and he clutched her hand so tight, her bones crunched. “You were g-gone. I waited and waited.”

My poor baby.
“I'm here now. Let's go inside out of the rain.”

He nodded, allowing her to nudge him along. He didn't take his gaze off Daniel until they reached the porch steps. She turned to thank him for the ride and for his compassion, but he was already halfway around the loop of the drive, too far away to call to over the drum of the hard rain.

Oh, well, perhaps there would come another time to thank him for his kindness, as for now she had her hands full enough. Hans's need was as loud as the rainfall, as endless as the sky. As soon as she had her little boy inside the house and out of the weather, she knelt and held him in her arms. Breathed in the sweet, little-boy scent of his hair as he held her right back.

Her heart wrenched. Kol hadn't meant to leave them in such dire circumstances, and she was angry, but not at him. She was furious at fate, that's what, for snatching
him away and for the world that was so often without any mercy.

Thank goodness for people like Daniel Lindsay.
While no man could have saved her wheat, he'd been a good neighbor and his intentions had given her hope. And that had lent her strength for the tasks to come. She'd start in the kitchen first—

“Rayna, it
is
you.” Mariah, in a crisp apron and her long hair tied back for kitchen work, smiled at her from the archway. “It was getting so late, Katelyn and I were wondering if one of us ought to ride into town and check on you. But here you are, safe and sound.”

Dismayed, she realized Mariah had probably come to leave off a prepared dinner. It was just the kind of thing she'd been doing since the funeral. But her neighbor Katelyn, too? “You two shouldn't have gone to the trouble.”

“What trouble? It's no bother to help you, dear friend. Wait until you see all we've been able to get done this afternoon.” Mariah's gaze sparkled with delight, as if she were keeping a big secret.

“What did you do?”

“You'll see.” Mariah spun with the snap of her apron and led the way into the kitchen.

Rayna froze in the doorway, not trusting her eyes. She blinked, but the view remained unchanged. Elegant Katelyn at the table ladling stewed green tomatoes into prepared jars. Half a day's work covered the counters, the last of the garden vegetables put up. Her friends had done this. For her.