Anger surged through him, followed by worry, which then turned into more anger. He prayed she had sense enough to find herself an escort home. Oh, he would have her hide! His hand itched to smack her disobedient backside, and he flexed his fingers against his palm. How he wished he could be back in Weston right that minute to yank her out of the wretched saloon and teach her a lesson about who was boss, but he was miles away and helpless to do anything.
“Damn and blast,” he said aloud and sank into the chair again.
He sat quietly then, listening to the ticking clock. Slowly, his anger dissipated, and in its stead came reflection. He stood and walked the length of the room. He placed a palm against the fireplace’s hearth and leaned into it, his other hand on his hip, a stance he adopted when he thought hard about something. He worked to make sense of his feelings about Lily. She was to be his wife. For a long time, he had felt the desire to protect her, like a father would his little girl, but she was also a woman, and as her future husband, he knew he had to try to make her happy.
The trouble was, the way he’d been seeing it, what made her happy endangered her. His natural reaction had been to forbid her from singing in the saloon because he believed her safety more important than her happiness. He wanted to protect her from gossip, lies, rough men, and the criticism that came along with being an entertainer. He believed her to be fragile. And she was fragile, there was no mistaking that, but when he thought about it further, he realized she was also strong. She had strength of will and character, and he had to acknowledge that.
He shook his head as he came to the realization that forbidding something that made her so happy wasn’t the right way to go about things. She was his Lily, his sweet little girl, but she was also a woman, a woman who desired to be the Red Rose. She needed a man who understood and supported both sides of her. With a giant sigh, he resolved to do just that.
His time in Tucson seemed to last forever. After he gave his testimony against Elijah, he didn’t stick around to hear the verdict, knowing he could find it out from the marshal later when word came. He left Tucson one day earlier than he had planned and set out home to Weston. He arrived on a Friday night around ten o’clock. By the time he’d rubbed his mare down, stabled her, and provided her with two extra scoops of grain, it was nearly eleven.
Jesse walked to the saloon. He heard her voice as he neared and was struck by the hush of the large crowd when he walked in. Patrons and employees alike focused their attention on her in rapt silence. And when he gazed upon her beautiful form and heard her angelic voice singing ‘It Is Well’ like she was at church and not inside a saloon, he joined everyone else in their wonder and awe.
Chapter Eleven: The Red Lily
Lily saw Jesse walk in during the last half of her song. There was no mistaking the look of recognition he focused on her. As she sang the last note, Lily could only vaguely hear the applause and the coins clinking around her feet. She kept her eyes on the man she loved. All she wanted in that moment was to be his little girl and to curl up in his lap. She wanted to hear him say he loved her and would forgive her for disobeying him.
Lily’s eyes filled with tears as he approached with a gentle but determined look on his face. He took her hand in his, which immediately made her feel a decade younger, and led her off of the stage. The audience whooped, hollered, and whistled as he led her up the stairs to his room. The owner of the saloon taking the Red Rose upstairs made for a perfect ending to the most exciting week-long show Weston had ever known.
Once inside his room, Jesse lit a lamp. He then removed Lily’s hat along with the netting covering her face, tossed it to the side, and wrapped his arms around her.
“I’m so sorry, papa. Please forgive me. I love you,” she said against his chest.
His words and the tone in which he spoke them warmed her heart. “Oh, how I love you too, little girl. But we need to have a discussion about obedience.”
She felt at peace then. He still loved her. She didn’t need to do anything but let him take care of her as he saw fit, and she would submit to any discipline he felt necessary.
He indicated that she was to sit on a wooden chair by his dresser. When she was seated, he removed the pins from her hair one by one, freeing her thick locks from the tight bun that had been hidden in her hat. Fetching the hairbrush from the dresser, he proceeded to brush the tangles out of her hair.
“Did you enjoy your time on the stage, honey?”
Her eyes closed from the pleasure she felt. She wouldn’t have guessed that his tending to her hair would feel so wonderful. She answered honestly. “Yes, papa, but I also felt sad thinking about disappointing you.”
“I’m not disappointed.”
She opened her eyes and met his in the mirror over the dresser. “You’re not angry with me then, papa?”
“No, but you disobeyed me, and little girls shouldn’t disobey their papas.”
She sighed. “I know. Are you going to punish me?”