Pete (The Cowboys) (18 page)

He poured more oil into his hand and rubbed it on her side.

She twisted away from him. “That tickles.”

“Sorry.”

She backed up to him again. He wished his body tickled. That would have been a relief from the throbbing pain in his groin. He had to get this over with before he exploded. He quickly rubbed oil over her lower back, refusing to let himself think how close his fingers came to the flare of her hips.

“I’m done,” he said, stepping back and setting the bottle of oil on one of the tables. “I’m going to take a short walk. That’ll give you a chance to get ready for bed.”

He didn’t want to give her a chance to tell him he didn’t need to leave. He might stay. And in his present frame of mind, that would be disastrous. His willpower had dropped to a dangerously low level.

Neither did he intend to let himself dwell on the look of surprised disappointment on her face. He had just enough presence of mind to do what honor required of him. If he spent so much as a minute thinking she might be disappointed, he would certainly do something his conscience would never let him forget.

Anne slipped into the bed. She wondered when Pete would come back.

This evening had been a revelation to her. She liked Pete. No, she told herself, she loved him. Meeting him as an adult after so many years had been a shock. It was stupid of her not to have realized he would change. Everybody did. It had taken her a while to realize she didn’t
want
Pete to have stayed the way he was as a boy. She was glad he was proving everybody wrong. She had actually begun to feel proud of him.

Despite his kindness and thoughtfulness, she hadn’t felt close to him until this trip. Maybe it was the buying spree in The Emporium. She hadn’t expected him to buy her more than one dress. To be turned loose in the store and told to buy anything she wanted had stunned her. He obviously really did love her. Neither Uncle Carl nor her father would have spent that kind of money on her.

Telling her she was beautiful, that he was proud to be her husband, further dissolved the reserve between them. But what had actually melted her, what canceled any desire to keep her distance from him, was his offer to wash her back.

She couldn’t explain what it did to their relationship. She certainly couldn’t say why it had happened, but it had the effect of making her feel very close to him, as if he were a kindred spirit. No, that was wrong. They were too different for that. He was calm, confident, and competent. She was timid, tiny, and tentative. But somehow his washing her back, rubbing oil into her skin, had brought her inside the circle of his protection.

Now she wasn’t making any sense. He’d protected her from the moment he arrived on the ranch, even before by marrying her by proxy so she’d be safe until he arrived.

But there was a difference. Maybe it was all on her side. Maybe she’d finally stopped being afraid of him. She didn’t know, and trying to reason it out was giving her a headache. She only knew that now she felt like his wife.

So why didn’t he want to make love to her?

According to Dolores, a man couldn’t wait to spill his seed inside a woman. Every man. Any woman. They weren’t particular about time or place. Then why had Pete escaped into the night rather than stay with her?

He had said she was beautiful. She knew she was clean, that she smelled good, that her night dress was pretty. They had time, opportunity, the perfect place. The only conclusion she could reach was that he didn’t love her anymore.

That frightened her. She wanted to be loved. She desperately needed it. No one in her life had ever made her feel loved except Peter. She’d held the two years he lived at the ranch close to her heart. They had become more precious as the world around her grew colder and more cruel. She had held tight to her little-girl memories, content to know that one person in the world loved her honestly and truly, without reservation.

When Peter agreed to marry her, she had been certain she would never be alone again. She had waited for his arrival, prayed when he was late, despaired when the last day arrived and he still hadn’t come.

Then, miraculously, he was there, more magnificent and more wonderful than she could have hoped. Surely he loved her. He
had
to love her. It would be too cruel if now, when everything she’d ever wanted seemed within her grasp, he didn’t.

But thinking about it wouldn’t give her any answers. She’d ask Dolores. And if he didn’t love her, maybe Dolores could tell her how to make him fall in love with her again. Anne had the distinct feeling she’d never be truly happy otherwise.

A light burned by the bedside when Pete entered the room on silent feet. He felt like a thief in the night, like a miserable coward, like the weak-willed ninny Peter Warren was supposed to be, but tonight he didn’t trust himself to get into bed with Anne while she was awake. He was too vulnerable.

He walked around to her side of the bed to turn out the lamp. He paused. Her face was turned toward the light. She looked so damned sweet and innocent, it was enough to make a grown man cry. No woman like her should be shunned by merchants because she had Indian blood. Miserable coyotes like Belser shouldn’t be allowed to yap at her heels. As far as he was concerned, her uncle and Cyrus ought to be hanged for what they had tried to do.

And she had pinned all her hopes on a poor, weak failure like Peter Warren. Didn’t she understand that purity of heart and intention meant nothing in a world where both were considered weaknesses? No, she’d married Peter certain that once he arrived in Wyoming, everything would be all right. She probably had no notion that Peter’s arrival would have been the beginning of a string of tragedies that would have ended with Peter’s death, the loss of the ranch, and probably being married off to Cyrus.

She had no one to help her. Even that old crone, Mrs. Dean. If she was half as smart as her husband thought, she ought to have realized that a fake Peter was just what Anne needed.

Pete turned out the light and undressed in the dark. He couldn’t afford to look at Anne’s face any longer. Not and keep the promise he’d made to leave her as innocent as he’d found her.

“There he is,” Mrs. Dean announced as she pointed her finger at Pete. “I demand that you arrest him immediately.”

With a fatalistic sigh, Pete turned. One look at the gathering blocking the door of The Emporium told him it wasn’t going to be so easy to talk his way out of it this time. Belser stood at Mrs. Dean’s shoulder, his smile indicating that he was certain Pete would at last be unmasked for the liar he was. Anne’s uncle stood in the background, visibly quivering with excitement. But it was the banker standing right next to the sheriff who bothered Pete the most. It also bothered him that Bill Mason was present. What interest could he have in this?

“I knew he wasn’t Peter the first time I set eyes on him,” Belser said. “I said it over and over, but nobody believed me.”

“They’ll believe me,” Mrs. Dean declared.

Pete and Anne had returned to The Emporium after breakfast. He wanted her to pick out a few pieces of jewelry, several pairs of earrings, a bracelet, and a necklace or two. But most of all they were there to pick out a wedding ring. He knew women put great store in things like that. Besides, with a wedding ring on her finger, people wouldn’t question her marriage. They had just completed their purchases and were about to return to the hotel in preparation for their trip back to the ranch.

Pete looked at Anne. Her face had lost all its color. No more smile of pleasure when she learned he really wanted her to buy the gold earrings. No more pure joy in choosing between two expensive necklaces. No more tears of happiness when he slipped the wedding ring on her finger. That haunted, frightened, unhappy-little-girl look was back.

Pete cursed inwardly. Why couldn’t they have arrived an hour later? He and Anne would have been out of town by then. He looked at Belser, grinning with triumph. Pete would have a great deal to say to him when they got back to the ranch—if he was still in control of the ranch by then.

“What have you got to say for yourself?” the sheriff asked. “Mrs. Dean has made a very serious accusation against you.”

“It’s not an accusation,” Mrs. Dean said. “I’m stating the truth.”

“Are you here as spectators or as part of the prosecution?” Pete asked the banker and Mason.

“I have to be concerned with any accusation of this nature,” the banker said. “I just advanced you a great deal of money. If you’re not who you say you are, I’ll have to ask the sheriff to put you in jail.”

“Jail!” Anne exclaimed. “You can’t do that.” She turned to Mrs. Dean. “I told you he was Peter. I said—”

“Stop.” Pete put his finger to her lips to still her protests. “They’re not going to put me in jail.” Her uneasy glance at the sheriff told him she didn’t have a lot of confidence in his assertions. “All they have is the word of your uncle, who’s trying to get rich by selling you to an old lecher, a man who’s angry he didn’t get the ranch, and an unbalanced busybody.”

“Busybody!” Mrs. Dean snorted. “Unbalanced!”

“Judging from the way you treat your husband, you’re probably a bully as well,” Pete added.

If the situation had been less serious, he would have been pleased at the sheriff’s smothered smile, the amusement in the banker’s eyes.

“Owen, I demand you arrest this man at once,” Mrs. Dean declared to the sheriff.

“Now wait a minute, Bea. We haven’t heard what he has to say.”

“I
have heard it, and I don’t need to hear it again.”

“Well, I’ve got to hear it. I can’t arrest a man on your say-so.”

“I say he’s an impostor, too,” Belser said.

“Me, too,” Anne’s uncle added.

“But you don’t have any proof,” the banker said.

“He’s not a thing like Uncle Carl said he was,” Belser said. “The real Peter Warren couldn’t ride a horse or run a ranch. He was afraid of his own shadow.”

“His bone structure isn’t right,” Mrs. Dean said. “My family has exceptionally fine bone structure. I’ve made it a study all my life, and I’m never wrong. This man is much too handsome.”

“What have you got to say for yourself?” the sheriff asked Pete.

“What do you expect of other men when they come to your town and say who they are?”

The sheriff looked uncomfortable.

“We pretty much accept them for what they say they are,” the banker said. “But the ownership of the biggest ranch in the area is in question now.”

“I can’t give you any more proof than I offered Belser days ago,” Pete said. “Someone tried to kill me and stole all my papers.” From the surprised expression on the faces of the sheriff and the banker, Pete gathered Belser had neglected to mention that. “Anne and I went to the lawyer’s office yesterday, and I instructed him to have my lawyer send duplicate copies of everything. Until then, all I have to show are some letters Anne wrote me.”

“You kept them?” Anne said, surprised.

“I’ve kept everything you ever wrote.” Pete was certain Peter Warren would have.

“You never showed me any letters,” Belser said.

“They’re none of your business,” Pete said.

“I guess I’d better see them,” the sheriff said.

“No, you won’t,” Anne announced. “Nobody will see them.”

Chapter Ten

“Those are my private letters to my husband,” Anne stated when everyone turned to her. “I refuse to allow anyone else to read them.”

From the astonished expressions all around him, Pete could tell nobody had anticipated such an outburst from Anne. Neither had he, but he noted a difference between the young woman who’d ridden into town with him the previous day and the woman who now stood at his side. Before, Anne had always been quiet and sweet-tempered. This woman was angry and didn’t care who knew it. Anne would never have spoken up for herself. This woman looked willing to take on anyone who crossed her path. Anne had been uncertain, unsure of herself. This woman knew exactly what she thought.

“They seem to be the only evidence we have,” the sheriff said.

“I demand that you hand those letters over to the sheriff immediately,” Mrs. Dean said to Pete.

“Since they’re
my
letters,” Anne said, “you should direct that request to me.”