Texas Rose

chapter 19

"Thtop it, Hothay," a tiny voice whispered indignantly. A rustle of bedcovers and a giggle followed.

Evie stirred. The whispers continued. "Stop it, both of you" came from a properly horrified Carmen. Evie wiped her eyes.

And realized where she was. Tyler was practically snoring in her ear, and he was jaybird naked beneath the blanket. She was lying across his bare thighs, and her fingers were curled in the hairs on his chest. Opening her eyes cautiously, she got a glimpse of his two-day beard and decided she had finally hit rock bottom. She was lying in the arms of a naked gambler with children tussling in the bed across from them.

At least there wasn't any liquor on the premises. She may have behaved like a drunken wanton, but she hadn't been drunk. Evie wasn't certain that was anything to be proud of. She grimaced as she moved her sticky thighs and tried to pull her nightgown down around her and keep Tyler covered at the same time. It wasn't an easy maneuver, but she managed it.

He was stirring by the time she got her feet to the floor, but she made a hasty dash for the dressing screen. This was not at all as she had pictured married life from her chaste bed in Nanny's house.

As she stripped off her nightgown, Evie gazed in dismay at the stains of red on the fragile lawn and the dried stains on her thighs. She scrubbed in the fresh water she had brought up last night, but the evidence didn't disappear with washing. She was bleeding. She dumped the dirty water in the chamberpot but didn't know how she could hide it from the others. She'd never had to live in such close quarters with so many people.

Hastily supplying herself with a cloth and dressing in yesterday's underclothes since she'd not had the forethought to put fresh ones behind the screen, Evie wrapped up in her robe, pulled a brush through her hair, and exited to see if she could keep the children from waking Tyler entirely.

It was too late. Maria had escaped while Carmen was trying to keep Jose from ransacking open trunks. The toddler had happily climbed up on the mountain of blankets and sheets that was Tyler and perched herself with a finger-sucking grin in his lap. Tyler scowled back at her through bleary eyes and stubbled jaw, but Maria only added a second finger to the first and continued to peruse him with wide-eyed wonder.

Tyler growled as Evie hurried to relieve him of his unwanted burden. Jerking the blanket around him, he rose with uncertain dignity and took advantage of the dressing screen while Carmen politely kept her back turned. If the fourteen-year-old thought it odd to wake and find a man in her teacher's room, she was too polite to mention it.

Evie flung Tyler's still-damp pants and shirt over the screen to him. It wouldn't do any good to go next door to Daniel for dry ones. Tyler would bust the seams. He should have thought of that while out playing hero the day before.

Maria's tiny gown was dry if spectacularly wrinkled, and Evie busied herself pulling that on the toddler while listening to Tyler splashing fresh water into the washbowl. Would he notice? What was he going to say? If she weren't so terrified, she would be hideously embarrassed. Would he think she lied? Of course he would.

Jose made a dash for the door, and Evie caught him by the collar just before he could escape. He wriggled and hollered, "I gotta go! I gotta go!" while she held him.

Tyler stepped out from behind the screen, menacing in his height and in his appearance, and the youngster silenced at once. The rough beard and wrinkled clothes made him appear more an outlaw than a handsome gambler, and when he reached for Jose, even Evie had second thoughts about letting him go. The look Tyler gave her was sufficient to release him.

"The privy is underwater," he rumbled as he deposited the boy behind the screen with the chamber pot. "Use that. That's what it's there for."

Having solved that minor problem, Tyler turned a stony look to Evie. So he knew. The color drained from Evie's face as he glared at her, and when he jerked his head in the direction of the door, she nodded faintly and followed him out.

The children's racket had apparently roused the guests sleeping in the hall, for the bodies that had been out there last night had disappeared elsewhere. They had the hall to themselves. Tyler watched as Evie pressed herself against the wall, trying to become part of the wallpaper.

"Have I done something to the child?" he demanded in a low voice that didn't sound as if he believed his own question. He rested his hand above her head, preventing her from escaping easily.

He was giving her an easy out. The lies came swiftly and surely to mind. She could tell him the doctor had warned her it would be a difficult pregnancy, but she hadn't wanted to worry him. She could tell him there was a history of miscarriage in her family. She had heard enough women's talk to make up a dozen different lies, each one better than the next, particularly since she didn't think Tyler knew all that much about pregnant women. The worst of it all was that she wasn't even sure what was the truth. Evie struggled with her conscience and fear.

"I don't know," she finally answered. That was as close to the truth as she could come.

Tyler scowled, but there was an element of worry in it this time. "Should I find the doctor?"

Evie shook her head, embarrassed at the idea. "There's no pain," she whispered.

Tyler removed his hand from the wall and stood in front of her, hands hooked in his front pockets as he stared down at her. "Could you have just been late?"

She was so embarrassed she thought she would burn right through the floor in another minute. She should have known that Tyler would know more about women's things than she did. A practiced womanizer would have to know.

"It's possible," she admitted. "It's never happened before."

Tyler sighed and rolled his shoulders back, looking anywhere else but at her. He clenched his hands against his pants. "I'll go find some coffee. What do I get for those birds in there?" He threw a grudging jerk of his head in the direction of the bedroom door.

Evie closed her eyes and tried to breathe. He'd had her almost fainting with fear. "Milk, if you can find it. Fruit and bread, if you can. We have no stove or utensils."

Tyler nodded curtly and stalked off. Evie peeled herself from the wall and stared after him. Her knees were still trembling. He was furious, she could tell by the set of his shoulders. He was furious, but he hadn't taken it out on her. She ought to count her blessings.

She hurried back into the room to find Carmen regarding her curiously, but she was in no humor for answering questions. She sent the children scurrying for clothes while she searched out something new to wear. She wanted something frivolous, something defiantly gay. Her choices were growing limited. She needed a laundry. There was little chance of Tyler helping them out now. She would be lucky if he didn't ride out of town by sundown.

Pulling out a sultry blue-gray silk with an almost immodest neckline, Evie grinned in triumph. It was then that Jose knocked over the water bowl and Maria fell down in it, screaming her lungs out. By the time Evie had grabbed up the little girl and comforted her, prevented Carmen from boxing her brother's ears, and restored order once more, she decided silk wasn't precisely the thing to wear today. She was beginning to understand why the women in town with children didn't wear anything but aprons and cotton.

She didn't own an apron, and her cottons were a far cry from the gingham and stripes of the town matrons, but Evie pulled out one of her schoolteacher gowns and made do. It didn't require a bustle or a hoop, and the dove gray would stand up to attack by a two-year-old. She would at least look clean and unrumpled for a while. Glancing at the loose gold ring on her finger, she carefully set it in her jewelry box. She wouldn't want to lose that; Tyler might want it back.

She looked in on Daniel and found him engrossed in a deadly game of checkers with Manuel. Neither of them paid her much notice, other than to complain that they were hungry. Evie glanced out the window, saw that the water had almost retreated to mud-puddle level, and left them to the battle. It was time she learned what had happened to Mrs. Rodriguez.

Benjamin was carrying the tray upstairs as she started down. Evie had him set it in Daniel's room and explained her problem. She wasn't about to ask where Tyler had gone. Maybe if they pretended this whole thing hadn't happened, it would go away.

Benjamin gave her a look that said he knew more than he was telling, but he agreed to go looking for Mrs. Rodriguez. After questioning Carmen, he set out, leaving the children to their noisy meal together.

Tyler didn't return. When the sun came out and set the spongy mud and puddles of the main street to steaming, Evie finally gave Manuel permission to check their home for clean clothes. He came back with tales of a snake in the rafters and mud over everything, and Evie's heart plunged a little lower. What was she going to do with these children?

She owed a gown and an explanation to Starr, but there wasn't a chance of going to her under the circumstances. Starr would certainly understand, but Evie could use the money the other woman had promised for the gowns. Eventually, somebody would come collecting for these rooms, and she didn't have the cash for both.

As the day wore on, Evie kept telling herself to be grateful that she wasn't pregnant. Watching Maria and Jose jumping on the bed and Manuel running up and down the staircase on mysterious errands, she was doubly grateful that she wasn't pregnant. She had always got along well with children, but children needed the firm hand and discipline that only a father could provide. Tyler was never going to be that father.

Jason Harding appeared late in the afternoon, hat in hand. He asked to speak to Evie alone, and when they were out of hearing of the children, he offered her a chair he appropriated from a nearby room.

"You'd better tell me straight out, Mr. Harding. After these last few days, my nerves aren't likely to take much hemming and hawing," she told him bluntly.

"There isn't anything to tell you straight out. We found the place where Mrs. Rodriguez went Friday night, but they say she left early in the evening." Jason's solemn face hovered near, his eyes a kind gray as he watched her.

Evie twisted her fingers in her lap, thinking of the four rambunctious children bouncing around in the rooms overhead. Mrs. Rodriguez would not have willingly left them alone all this time. She knew what Jason was trying to say.

"How do people usually cross the river?" she asked.

"It's usually so low, a horse can cross it."

"And Mrs. Rodriguez had a horse?"

Jason nodded slowly. "It was part of the deal when she sold the livery. Tom had to supply her with a horse whenever she needed it."

"And the horse isn't back, either, is it?" At Jason's shake of the head, Evie sighed. That was that, then. Mrs. Rodriguez had tried to cross the river to get back to her children. Somewhere, far down stream, they would find her body one of these days, if the coyotes and buzzards didn't get there first.

"Do they have any relatives in the area?"

Jason twisted his hat. "Rodriguez wasn't from around here. I don't know his family at all. Angelina grew up here. I don't remember the family name right off; I was just a boy when her folks died. She had a brother, I recollect. He went off to California to find gold. I don't know if she kept in touch. You might ask the kids."

Evie assimilated these facts and stood up. "Thank you, Mr. Harding. Have you checked the school yet? Will it be in any condition for use tomorrow?"

"I'm sending some of my men over to clean it out. It may be a week or so before we ought to put school back in session. There's too many need the children at home right now."

Evie was afraid to ask what that would mean to her pay. The money she had earned at the school in St. Louis had been so insignificant to her that she had never questioned when it came or how. She didn't have the experience to negotiate her way through these channels now that it was her only income.

"All right. If you don't mind, I'll help the children clean out their house tomorrow. I can't keep them here for very long. What will happen to them if we can't find their uncle?"

"Don't worry about it yet, Mrs. Peyton. If nothing else, the two oldest can find work and the youngest can go to good families. Let's take it one step at a time."

Jason Harding had all the tact of a buffalo. Evie held her temper since he was her boss in a manner of speaking, but she gave him a look that made him take a step backward. The fact that she didn't come up to his chin and was half his breadth had no effect on the fury blazing in her eyes. "You'll separate those children over my dead body, Mr. Harding. They need each other now more than ever before. Try thinking what it would be like without your own brother."

Swinging on her heel and stalking off before she could say more, Evie was halfway up the stairs before she realized Harding had called her Mrs. Peyton. Tyler hadn't told him of their marriage.

She didn't know whether that was good or bad. She didn't know how he could disguise the fact since the preacher traveled through here regularly. Ben and Daniel might keep their mouths shut if ordered, but what would that prove? They were still married, legally and in the eyes of the church. Closing their eyes to the truth wouldn't solve anything.

But she had too many other things on her mind to worry about that one right now. Tyler Monteigne could wait for another day.

Tyler wasn't in any humor to wait for another day. He had spent the day shoveling mud out of John's cafe and hauling supplies so there would be food to eat that night. He had struggled with his fury and nearly floored Ben for suggesting they check on Evie and the children at lunch. The battle between his conscience and his anger had taken more strength than the donkey work of cleaning and hauling.

But by the end of the day, his feet automatically turned back to the hotel. He wouldn't think "home." He didn't have a home, didn't want a home, didn't need a home. Coming to Texas had stirred him out of the rut he had fallen into in Natchez. He had always planned to travel. He had taken a few trips up and down the Mississippi, but he had seldom seen more than the card tables of the steamboat cabin. Now he meant to see the country. He'd settle things here and be moving on when he'd seen enough.

Evie would understand. He'd buy her a divorce in Houston. He'd heard it could be done. If no one knew they were married, then no one could complain of the scandal. She'd be as relieved as he, he was certain. It might take a bit of a bribe to make the Reverend Cleveland understand, but Tyler suspected it could be done. The preacher would be out riding circuit shortly anyway. When he came back, Tyler would be gone, a ninety-day wonder. A man of the cloth would be too sympathetic to say anything aloud.

Wiping his dirty face wearily, Tyler knocked at Evie's door. It wasn't home if you had to knock, he reasoned. He could hear them in there. Why didn't they answer? With a scowl, he threw open the door.

The first thing he noticed was the enormous bouquet Evie had created out of the flowers he had given her.

They made a spray of color on the dull wall over the bed where she had placed them on a shelf out of reach of little hands.

The next thing he noticed was the youngest boy scampering back into place behind the baby and in front of the next oldest boy. The girl and Evie stood behind them. Once the wanderer was in place, they beamed and began to sing about "Wayfarin' Strangers."

If that was supposed to mean him, Tyler wasn't impressed. The scent of fresh bread had his gaze wandering to a table beside the window. There hadn't been a table there this morning. A damask tablecloth covered what looked to be a plank braced up by four flat-topped trunks. Candles flickered in a silver candelabra. Bowls of fine china were set out, and he was more than certain that the kettle sitting on the dresser contained soup or stew. He was starved.

And they were still singing. For him. The table had been set for him, too, he realized. Panic began to rise in Tyler's throat. Childish voices rose in tremolo, and Tyler took a step backward. The baby grinned and broke rank, toddling in his direction. Jose reached for her, and the whole ensemble crumbled into chaos. Sweat broke out on his forehead as Tyler saw Evie approaching, a frown of confusion marring her face as she wiped her hands on the towel at her waist.

"I came to tell you I'm heading back for the ranch," Tyler announced loudly—too loudly—over the heads of the children. And before anyone could say otherwise, he backed out the door. "I'll see you next Saturday."

And he was gone.