“Mista Fairfax don’t see nobody.”
“I’ll speak to Tyler, then. Please.”
The old woman’s features scrunched up warily, but she said, “I tell him you’s here.” Then she slammed the door firmly, leaving Dodge on the porch. He smiled wryly at the greeting he’d received and decided if Tyler Fairfax was going to come down and blow him to his maker, he’d might as well wait in comfort. He angled himself into one of the big wrought-iron chairs sitting dusty with disuse on the deeply shaded veranda. He was just positioning his crutches within easy reach when he heard Tyler’s low chuckle.
“Well, I’ll be damned. If it ain’t my favorite Yankee, come calling bold as brass.”
Smiling with deceiving good nature, Tyler strolled out onto the porch. Nothing even faintly affable shone in the cold glitter of eyes bruised from lack of sleep and hard drinking. He leaned against a pillar with a sloppy grace, waiting for his uninvited visitor to speak his piece.
“ ‘Morning, Mr. Fairfax. Forgive me if I don’t get up, but I just got down.”
Tyler waved a negligent hand. “No need to be polite on my account. I seem to recall telling you there’d be little politeness involved in our next conversation.”
“The situation is different now.”
“Not to my thinking.”
“Starla and I are married.”
Breath hissed between Tyler’s clenched teeth as he bared them in a fierce smile. “Did you come here for congratulations? When hell freezes over, Yank.”
“I came to see if we could bury the hatchet without any bloodshed for Starla’s sake. She’d like it if we could at least tolerate each other.”
Tyler’s grin twisted into a sneer. “I don’t think that’s gonna happen.”
“I thought you cared about your sister, Fairfax. Doesn’t her happiness mean anything to you?”
Tyler’s expression went taut, becoming all angles and hollows. “I’ve thought of nothin’ else my entire life. Don’t you lecture me on what Starla wants or needs to be happy. It ain’t you, Yank. You ain’t man enough to give my sister what she needs.”
Dodge went dangerously still. “I don’t think that’s something I care to have you speculating about.”
Tyler gave a harsh laugh when he took Dodge’s meaning. “My sister’d never let the likes of you touch her. That ain’t what I’m talking about. You can’t protect her, Yank. So you’re no good to her at all.”
With his thoughts now derailed from a challenge
to his manhood, Dodge blinked in bewilderment. “Protect her? Protect her from what?”
“The past, Mr. Dodge.”
“What kind of danger is she in? How can I help her if I don’t know?”
Tyler smiled again, that slow, thin smirk of contempt. “My point exactly. What good are you? Good day, Yank. Watch your back.”
When Starla didn’t appear with his noontime meal, Dodge had too much time to consider the consequences of what had replayed in his mind all morning. In the quiet interior of the bank, with the mournful tick of his clock tolling the monotony of minutes, he wondered how much damage he’d done with that kiss.
His back hurt, his head pounded, and his eyes felt gritty from lack of restful sleep. Conspiring to sour his mood was Reeve’s nagging prophecy that he’d want more from his marriage than a convenient bargain.
He hated to be proved wrong.
He’d been wrong to think companionship would be enough. Wrong to believe he could easily win over his bride. Wrong again to suppose this marriage could turn into the close family unit he longed for. He couldn’t fault Starla for any of his misconceptions. She’d been honest from the first. She’d told him she didn’t love him, that she wouldn’t sleep with him. Reeve had hinted that he was inheriting a whole host of troubles, but he’d chosen to ignore the warning.
The kiss was what had awakened him to the sham he clung to.
He’d married a woman weighted down with secrets, who feared his touch almost as much as she despised his background. He’d confidently assumed the role of her protector without knowing what challenges he’d face, or whether he’d be able to meet them. Tyler Fairfax vowed he’d fail. His own wife was doubtful enough to keep her worries to herself, unconvinced that he could solve them. He himself didn’t know where to turn to find the answers he needed to piece together the riddle of his wife’s past. Getting Starla to trust him hadn’t been the snap he’d vainly thought it would be. She was wary, and more than that, she was afraid. How could he protect her if he didn’t understand the danger?
How could he assure her of her safety when he was dependent on two sticks of wood to support his weight, when bullies like the Dermonts felt free to insult him, and the people of Pride were afraid to come to him for aid?
He rubbed his palms along the tops of his thighs. Just the feel of contact would have thrilled him a month ago, but now all he felt was the weakness, the debilitating numbness that lingered, laced with pain, reminding him of how far he had to go before he could guarantee the promises he’d made.
He’d have to push harder. He’d have to show Starla she could depend on him for strength as well as sympathy. He’d have to prove he was worthy of the fragile trust she’d extended with that soul-twistingly
sweet kiss before he could ask her to give him more.
He wanted more. He wanted more with an ache that sank to the bone, with a desperation clawing up from a well of loneliness so deep the echo went on forever. He wanted his bride to turn to him in passion and pride with the certainty that he wouldn’t fail her.
He couldn’t give those certainties now, not when he couldn’t stand alone. Not when the root of his passions remained frustratingly lacking.
The sight of his crutches leaning next to his desk symbolized all he struggled against. He’d fashioned them himself, with almost loving attention. He’d been so proud to take his first steps dependent upon their support. But now they were a barrier rather than a bolster. With a low, angry curse, he slapped them away, satisfied by the clatter they made as they hit the floor. Then, with a sigh, he recognized how infantile his behavior was, and that it would serve him right if he had to crawl after them.
He was in the process of fishing for the crossbar of the closer crutch when he heard the front door open. Relief and anticipation collided as he hauled himself upright, eager to greet his wife. Then he sat, blinking, in a moment of confusion.
“No hello?”
“Oh, my God,” was all he could mutter, as an eager young woman filled his outstretched arms.
Starla paused in the doorway, lunch basket hanging from the bend in her elbow as she stared in an odd clutch of dismay at the sight of another woman
in her husband’s embrace. The obvious joy in their faces sparked in her feelings of envy, hurt, and anger, as surprising as they were unexpected. As unexpected as her desire to tear the two of them apart.
She must have made some sound, for both tear-dampened faces turned her way. And Dodge had the temerity to grin.
“Starla, I want you to meet my sister, Alice.”
A sudden blow to the midsection couldn’t have left her more winded. While she stood in a slack-jawed daze, Alice climbed off her brother’s lap and approached with hand extended.
“So you’re the woman who managed the miracle of snaring my brother.”
The tang of accusation held in that claim was something only another woman would hear. Starla bristled and affected her brightest smile.
“He was most eager to be caught, as I recall.”
The two women shook hands. Alice’s grip was firm, almost mannish, her manner aggressively Northern. Starla was used to her husband’s bold assertiveness, but in another female, the brashness was less flattering. Obviously older than her brother, Alice shared his pleasant looks and stocky build, as well as the shrewdly direct stare. That stare dissected Starla into tiny pieces after finding the whole unacceptable.
“You didn’t travel all this way by yourself, did you, Allie? Is Frank with you?”
Alice reluctantly turned from her critical appraisal and smiled. “Frank is helping your father put together an order. You know them, nothing’s as important as work. I brought the children with
me, and your mother. They’re at the station, waiting for our bags. I came ahead. I couldn’t resist the surprise.”
“Yes, the surprise,” Starla drawled sweetly. “I had no idea we were having visitors.” Her gaze skewered Dodge’s. He met it with a blameless lift of his brows.
“When we got the letter from your friend Mrs. Garrett saying you’d gotten married, we just couldn’t stay away. She assured us you had room to put us up for a short stay … unless you’d prefer we went to a hotel, you being newlyweds and all.”
“Of course you can stay with us. It’s no bother.”
Two things struck Starla: Dodge hadn’t told his family of their marriage, and she didn’t have a voice in the arrangements now being made. Both added to the stiffness of her stance and to her sense of being pushed outside the warm circle of this reunion, a situation intensified with the arrival of Marian Dodge and Alice’s two children.
Being surrounded by the Dodges was like nothing Starla had ever experienced. Her own family was nonexistent, and glimpses into her friend Patrice’s family displayed the strict and proper decorum of a Southern home.
The Dodges, on the other hand, were boisterous, loud, and gushing with affection. They all talked at once, punctuating sentiments with hugs and fond touches. Her husband sat in the middle of the melee, a niece on one knee, a nephew on the other, grinning from ear to ear. Glad to be overlooked, Starla edged quietly on the outskirts of the conversation,
providing tea and milk with the sobriety of a well-trained servant … until Marian Dodge spotted her. Then the topic of talk turned uncomfortable.
“We were surprised to learn of your marriage from someone other than family.”
Dodge tried evading with a smile. “I didn’t know you corresponded with Patrice.”
“She and I began writing after your—accident.” Mrs. Dodge’s bespectacled eyes touched anxiously on the crutches, then darted away. “I had to have news from some source, since you were so stingy with yours.”
“I’m not much for letter writing.”
“Even wedding announcements?”
There was no eluding the pointed truth.
“I’m sorry, Mother. We planned to write you, now that we have even better news to share.”
“And what is that?”
“Starla’s expecting. We just found out yesterday.” He caught Starla’s hand, drawing her into the suddenly too quiet circle, where Marian looked alarmed and Alice stricken. “I was hoping Father had come with you so I could tell him face to face, seeing how rabid he’s always been about continuing the family tradition.”
“That would be rather difficult, in view of the fact that you’ve already chosen to break with it.”
“Alice,” Marian warned curtly, then turned a frigid smile upon her new daughter-in-law. “This is all so sudden—a new daughter, and now a new grandchild. I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you’re happy for us.”
She gave her son a lengthy stare, then said, “I hope you will be.”
Noting that she’d volunteered no opinion other than that vague wish, Dodge felt his smile fade. He drew Starla’s hand up to press a light kiss on her knuckles, the gesture one of possessive claim. “Starla, why don’t you take our guests home and see they’re settled in? I’ll close up early and be there directly.”
Wanting to be alone with the narrowed-eyed women about as much as she desired being shut in a room with two angry wildcats, Starla forced a malleable manner.
“I’m sure they’re tired after their long trip.” She withdrew her hand and leveled a commanding glare at him. “Don’t be long.”
Marian Dodge obligingly disappeared into the upper rooms with the children, but Alice lingered below, bent on dragging out all the details about Starla’s relationship with her brother. She began with a loaded observation.
“Expecting in what, two weeks’ time? My goodness, when Frank and I decided to start a family, it took us over four months to conceive.”
Starla gave a clenched-teeth smile. “We both wanted children right away.”
“I’d have thought you’d want to wait, what with my brother still recovering from his injuries.”
“He manages very well. You know how determined he is when he sets his mind to something.”
“And was he determined to marry you? Is that
why he chose to wed someone we’ve never heard of?”
Starla paused in the act of sugaring their second cup of tea. The entire contents of the bowl wouldn’t sweeten Alice’s innuendos. It was obvious what the woman was implying.
“It was a sudden decision but certainly not a rash one. Hamilton—”
“Hamilton? He lets you call him that? He loathes the name. Our mother is the only one he allows to use it, and then when she’s very angry with him.”
Starla hesitated. She could hardly admit that she called her husband by his impersonal surname. So instead, she manipulated a rosy blush and cooed, “We do have names we use for one another, but they are—private.”
Alice narrowed a look at her as if displeased by the idea of her brother sharing intimate pet names with a Southern stranger. She didn’t look the type to be swept away by anything cloyingly personal. Nor would she be put off with anything less than the whole truth.
“Tell me, how did you and Tony meet?”
Tony. Starla took a moment to equate the name to Dodge in her mind before replying. “At my best friend’s wedding. A romantic beginning, don’t you agree?”
“It must have been some wedding to shake him from his usually practical senses. I’ve never known Tony to be careless in his involvement with women.”
Enough, Starla decided. “Wouldn’t you like to
make sure your children are settled in? Children sometimes get frightened in a strange place.”
“Yes,” Alice agreed. “This is a strange place, for all of us. One I don’t think any of us will get used to.”
After the woman went upstairs, Starla chewed on those words. Were they supposed to apply to Dodge as well? Dear Tony who must have been out of his mind to have shown any interest in her at all? She was still stewing when the object of her ire arrived. She met him at the door with a glare as cold as a February freeze.