“You were in an orphanage?”
Mattie nodded, intent on shaping dough into the pie plates. “For as long as I can remember.”
Gloria took a bite of her potatoes, not wanting to pry into Mattie’s life. But she couldn’t help wondering how a girl so young had gone from living in an orphanage to being employed in a brothel.
“I, uh—”
“Go on?” Gloria encouraged her with a nod. “I’d really like to hear what you have to say.”
Mattie shrugged and stopped her work to look at her. “It’s just that, in the beginning I had hope of being adopted. But as time went on and I got older, there was less and less chance of that ever happening. Most people picked the young boys. Sister Marie said it’s because boys are extra help on the ranches and farms. Saint Catherine’s isn’t a bad place really. It’s where I learned to cook.” She beamed a big smile.
“Sounds as though you were happy there.”
“Yes, for a time. I was beginning to understand that I might never leave. Until one day when the sisters came for me. They said they had a family who wanted me and just days later I was living at the Clemons’ homestead in Stockton. One week later, I ran away.”
“What happened?”
Mattie closed her eyes as if shutting her mind off to a terrible memory. She shook her head. “Mrs. Clemons was more ill than she let on to the sisters. She had taken to her bed, the consumption pretty much keeping her down all the time. And Mr. Clemons…uh, he was always looking at me funny. He came to me wanting—”
“Wanting?”
Mattie took a big swallow.
“He wanted…favors?” Gloria asked, knowing it for truth.
Mattie nodded, biting her lip. “But I ran away. I left Stockton and headed to San Francisco. That’s where I met Lorene. She took me in and hired me as a cook.”
“You can cook anywhere, Mattie. You didn’t have to come here.”
“I tried to find employment, but nobody wanted to give me a chance. I guess I don’t look sixteen to most folks. But I am. I swear it. And Lorene is paying me to do what I love. There’s no harm in that.”
Gloria understood that a young girl, desperate and feeling beholden to the madam of the house, wouldn’t find fault in that. But Gloria certainly did. The problem was, she wasn’t in any position to help Mattie
right now. If she could, she’d convince her not to stay on here.
Gloria finished what she could of the food, her stomach satisfied for the moment. “Thank you. That was delicious.”
Mattie flashed her another smile and reached for her plate. “You’re welcome. I’ll have this cleaned up straight away.”
Gloria waved her away. “No, please. Let me do it. I want to help.”
The girl blushed. “Heavens, I can’t have you washing up the dishes.”
“But I’d like to help. There’s nothing for me to do up in that room. And I’m feeling much better. At least let me help with the pies.”
Mattie glanced at the eight pies she had yet to finish. “Well—”
“Please.”
Mattie cast her a wide grin. “Okay.” She handed Gloria a white cotton apron.
“Let’s get to baking,” Gloria said, anxious to do something. She stood behind the worktable, glancing at the large tins ready for filling. “How many girls does that woman employ?”
“Eight.”
“Eight? You make one pie for each girl?”
Mattie chuckled. “Oh no, no. But we always have dessert ready for, um, the male guests.”
“Oh.” The reminder made Gloria’s stomach knot with tension. She stared down at the pies she’d pretty much begged Mattie to help with, suddenly unsure what she should do.
Make the best of it, dear girl.
Her father’s words rattled in her head and Gloria
recognized her fate once again. She didn’t have to like it, but the fact remained, she was living at Rainbow House for the time being so she might as well make herself useful.
“If you’ll fill up the pies with strawberries, I’ll cut the dough to make the topping,” Mattie said, taking command of her kitchen and making Gloria smile.
They worked together for twenty minutes, filling the tins, criss-crossing the strips of dough on top and setting them in the cookstove. Then ignoring Mattie’s admonishments, Gloria helped her clean the worktable.
“Something smells awfully good in here, Mattie.”
“What is baking to make my stomach talk?”
“I’m starving, Mattie, honey. Sure hope you have our meal ready.”
Gloria turned abruptly to see three “ladies” saunter into the kitchen dressed in flowing silk robes, varying in colors from sapphire-blue to cherry-red to meadow-green.
“Look who we have here. If it ain’t our new house-guest.” The woman in red spoke in a polite enough tone, but there was no welcome in her eyes.
“Dio,”
the woman in green declared.
The woman dressed in soft blue smiled. “Hello. I’m Emmie.” She came forward and searched Gloria’s face. “You’re healing real good.”
Gloria stood rooted to the spot. “Y-yes. Th-thank you. Steven told me what you’ve done.”
“All I did was give him salve for your injuries. He did the rest. I see he also gave you one of my gowns.”
“Oh! I, uh…” Gloria put a hand to her chest. “My clothes burned in the fire.”
A dark-haired woman stepped up. “Steven is very clever, is he not? He knows what dress to fit you. Steven understands about women, no? And now you wear the clothes of a
soiled
woman.” The full-bodied woman with a heavy Mexican accent glanced at the others, nodding.
Mortified, Gloria wanted to dash from the room.
“Oh, hush, Carmen.” The woman in red turned to her. “Don’t you pay attention to Carmen. She has a mouth on her. I’m Ruby and I’m in charge while Lorene is away.”
Ruby eyed her up and down, then let go a pained sigh. “I suppose you don’t want to be here any more than we want you here.”
Gloria nodded her agreement. “I…don’t.”
“But you are, so we’re just going to have to deal with it.”
“She is one who thinks she is better than us. The murderer,” Carmen announced coolly, “should not be so eager to judge us.”
Gloria’s ire sparked, lit like a candle on a moonless night. “You’re right. I don’t want to be here. If I could, I’d shut down this place, along with all the other brothels. What you do is—”
“Is by choice,” Ruby cut in. “We do what we do. You don’t have to like it. But Carmen is right. You should not judge us. You killed your husband defending yourself. You did what you had to do…to survive. We’re not all that different.”
“Lorene is good to us. We have a good life. Much better than if we hadn’t come here,” Emmie offered with softness in her tone. “And now, you’re here, among us. Steven is bent on protecting you.”
“I didn’t ask for his help,” Gloria responded irrationally.
She knew if Steven hadn’t rescued her, she would have died alongside Boone that night.
Carmen snorted, a most unladylike gesture.
The others scowled.
“But I’m grateful to him,” she added quickly. “He saved my life.”
And that’s all she’d allow herself to feel for the man whose life was worlds apart from hers. She couldn’t condone who and what he was any more than she could these ladies, who stood tall and proud defending themselves. “I’d better go. Thank you for the meal, Mattie.”
A sad smile lifted Mattie’s mouth up slightly. She, too, thought she judged the “ladies” too harshly. “I appreciate the help with the pies.”
Gloria raised her chin and walked out of the kitchen as regally as she could manage. She’d confronted the prostitutes on their own ground, and hadn’t cowered. She held firm her resolve. The brothels had no place in Virginia City or any other town. They brought in rowdies, people like Denny Pratt, a drunken drifter who had quarrelled with Lorene Harding and had pulled a gun on her. Gloria’s unsuspecting father had gotten caught in the turmoil and lost his life over a mindless squabble with a whorehouse madam.
Gloria would never find forgiveness with these women. She’d never understand the choices they made. If the good Lord wanted that, then He asked far too much from her. She climbed the stairs slowly contemplating her life and headed back to Steven’s bedroom.
Her prison.
Chapter Five
A
lone in her room, Gloria peeked out the heavy curtain to the street below. Situated on the corner of Union and C, Rainbow House sat in the heart of the rowdiest part of town, a place where saloons, music halls and brothels attracted miners by the hundreds. Tonight was no different. Drunken men swaggered with women on their arm and from her third-floor perch, faint sounds of music from the street below drifted up, rivaling the lively piano playing coming from just three flights down in this very house.
Gloria shuddered involuntarily. The notion of where she was living still came as quite a shock. “Lord, what am I to do?” she muttered, closing the curtains and lowering her head. Even though her faith had been tested at times, Gloria still believed in the Almighty, His power and wisdom. There must be a reason for all this, she mused. He must have a grand plan, a motive for placing her here now, amid the kind of life she so adamantly and wholeheartedly denounced.
A beautifully ornate grandfather clock made of brass and carved walnut struck the eleventh hour.
Gloria had left the kitchen earlier in the day in a huff, grateful to be away from the fallen women who defended their profession with all the dignity of heroic soldiers. With nothing to do and not a soul around, she’d fallen into a deep, mindless sleep. She’d woken up an hour ago well rested and completely bored.
“Well, Glory,” she said, trying out the name on her lips, debating whether she preferred it, as her father had…and Steven. “What now?”
“What now?” The door creaked open and she whirled around. Her traitorous heart rejoiced at seeing Steven, somewhat weather-beaten, standing in her doorway. He stepped inside quickly, shutting out the boisterous music and laughter from downstairs, as he closed the door.
She was lonely and he represented company, someone to quell her boredom tonight for a moment or two, she rationalized. She tamped down the joy she felt watching his beautiful eyes move over her softly, in an assessing way, as if checking on her well-being. She could never have warm feelings for this man, despite the fact that he’d saved her life.
“Are you talking to yourself?” he asked, a quick grin flashing across his face.
She gestured with a swipe of her arms. “Do you see anybody else here for me to speak with?”
“Yeah. I’m here now.”
She bounced her bottom on the bed, much like a child who hadn’t gotten her way. “Why are you?”
Steven moved closer and his scent, the smell of earth and fresh air and leather, assailed her instantly. It was a brutal reminder of her plight. She was a prisoner in this house, this very room. She longed to go
outside, to be free again. To have that right would be the grandest gift she’d ever receive.
“I came to see you.”
She glanced at him, his rugged, handsome face appearing road-weary. “You look tired.”
“I worked all day at the ranch. Building the house with my own hands, and setting up the corrals for my horses.”
“And you came all this way to check on me? To make sure I hadn’t escaped?”
Steven walked over to the window, pulled the drapes apart and leaned heavily on the window frame. With his back to her, he spoke in an edgy tone. “You’re not a prisoner here, dammit. If you want to get your hide thrown in jail, walk down those stairs and out the door.” He turned to face her. “I guarantee you’d find Sheriff Brimley’s jail cell a lot less accommodating than this room.”
Gloria bounded up from the bed to face him evenly. “I’m sorry. I do apologize. I suppose that wasn’t at all gracious of me. I, uh… I don’t know exactly how to handle this.”
The hardness in his eyes softened a bit. “Did you go downstairs today?”
“For a short time. I met Mattie.” She smiled, remembering how good it felt to make those pies. “We baked strawberry pies.”
He raised a brow and nodded, apparently in approval.
“But then some of the…the ladies came into the kitchen.”
Steven scratched his chin and sighed. “They give you a bad time of it?”
Gloria winced. “I think we gave each other a bad time.”
“They’ll come around,” he declared, as if that would heal the situation.
“I’m not sure I want them to.” She lifted her chin defiantly. “I’m…we aren’t…”
“Doesn’t your God believe in forgiveness, Glory? Doesn’t He believe we can all live in the world, differences and all?”
Gloria put her head down. “I used to believe that. I don’t know anymore.”
And then, Steven was there, placing a finger under her chin and lifting it up so that their eyes met. He searched her face for a moment, then smiled. That smile, a brief glimpse into the tender man who had nursed her injuries, created a stirring once again in her heart.
“I’ll let you rest. You must be tired.”
“I’m not a bit tired,” she stated, stepping away from his touch, his soft scrutiny. If she sounded the shrew, she couldn’t help it. A moment’s visit with Steven wasn’t enough. How would she endure the long torturous night without benefit of something to do? “I came up here early in the afternoon and slept away the entire day and most of the evening. I’m awake now, in the middle of the night, with nothing to do.”
Steven took a step closer. The gleam in his earth-brown eyes caused her heart to flutter momentarily. “Whatever you’d like to do, in the middle of the night,” he said in low whisper. “I’ll try to accommodate.”
“Really, Steven? You’d get me some material and sewing implements? I need different clothes. I can’t
go around wearing gowns of this sort.” The thought of sewing up new garments took hold with thrilling excitement. She’d have something to concentrate on and the result of her endeavors meant more appropriate attire.
He glanced at her gown, his gaze flowing over the dress with interest, until finally, he settled on her chest. “You don’t, uh…that gown looks perfect on you.”
Her hand flew up to the skin exposed by the low bodice of the gown, the very area that held Steven’s direct attention. “It’s unsuitable.”