The Rancher’s Inconvenient Bride. Carol Arens

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СКАЧАТЬ be akin to seeking relief in a small blue bottle of laudanum. She would gain strength by standing on her own two feet and no other way.

      Plucking her wrap from its hook on the wall, she tugged it tight about her. If she was to become a woman whom men would respect, she had to be a woman that she respected first.

      Surely she could be as brave as Ivy’s pet mouse. That sweet creature ventured out nightly.

      The moment she stepped outside a small shaggy dog met her at the bottom of the steps.

      “Where were you at feeding time, Miss Valentine?” A short time ago the dog had been star of the show, well-groomed and pampered. Now that she was beginning to show her age she’d been cast off, left to fend for herself or die.

      As far as Agatha could tell, no one cared about her fate one way or another. It was the same for the other mutts Agatha fed with the scraps left over from dinner.

      “Come along. We’ll stop by the chuck wagon and see what’s left.”

      Valentine wagged her curly tail and limped along after Agatha. The poor creature hadn’t been limping yesterday. Perhaps that was why she didn’t show up with the other dogs to be fed.

      Bending low, she scooped Valentine up. “It’s a crime how they tossed you out. Why, if you were earning them money I reckon they would have the veterinarian look at your foot right off.”

      The distance to the cook trailer was not so far, maybe a couple of hundred yards. But the path was dark, isolated and a bit unnerving. The shifting light cast by the torches seemed creepy rather than reassuring.

      This was a challenge, nothing more. The shadows at her back didn’t really cry her name. The rush of leaves across the ground was only that. It was her imagination turning them into light, quick footsteps pursuing her.

      Hilda Brunne was dead. Everyone believed it. There was no reason not to. Because her body hadn’t been found, Ivy and Travis had hired the Pinkerton agency to search for her.

      Even the professionals presumed Hilda was dead. The moaning presence pursuing her was nothing but a dark, emotionless wind.

      Agatha no longer needed to fear her. What she did need to fear was what her nurse had tried to make her. A girl afraid of everyone—believing she could only trust one, twisted woman.

      Until she became be strong enough to live among strangers, she would never be free of Hilda Brunne’s ominous ghost.

      All at once the shadows gave way to bright light, crowds and laughing people.

      Tattooed Joe stood on a stage flexing the tiger emblazoned on his back. Near him, Sword-Swallowing Smithy consumed red-hot flames.

      From inside a tent Agatha heard the guffaws of the Fat Lady.

      Couples strolled arm in arm, gazing more at each other than the bizarre things happening around them. Parents covered their children’s eyes at every turn while their own eyes popped wide open.

      Over to the right, a group of young men gathered around a painting of three-breasted Josie. It seemed they could not hand over their quarters fast enough for the chance to see the oddity. They were, of course, being duped. Josie was as two-breasted as any other woman. But the fool boys would see what they expected to see in the dim light of the tent.

      Valentine wriggled in Agatha’s arms, trying to lick her face.

      The distraction nearly caused her to slam into the back of a tall gentleman who had stopped at the fortune-teller’s stall. A finely dressed woman clung to his arm.

      “I see your future, young people.” Leah Madrigal, the fortune-teller, tapped her red fingernail on a glass globe filled with colored water. “For a penny, I’ll share it with you.”

      “Oh, yes—please do tell.” The lady clapped her hands. “Mr. English, do you have a penny?”

      Mr. English!

      Agatha stumbled backward. It couldn’t be—but yes—it was! She knew that silhouette! Indeed, she’d half recognized him earlier in the day when he’d been climbing the hill toward town. The sense of familiarity she’d felt had not been misplaced.

      “Come now, Mayor!” The woman fairly bounced on her toes. “I know you have a penny!”

      William—her very own William was here! He was mayor?

      She wanted nothing more than to hug him about the ribs and feel safe. He’d made her feel that way once before—safe and protected on that awful afternoon when no one knew what her sister’s fate might be. If not for William standing between her and an evil blue bottle she might have succumbed to it.

      Leah noticed her cowering in the shadow, nodded and winked.

      She prayed that William would not see her! How would she act? What would she say? No doubt she’d trip over her words. It had been some time since she’d seen him. He hadn’t been to the ranch since Ivy turned him down.

      What if he didn’t remember her?

      The bouncing woman snatched the penny out of William’s fingers then dropped it on the fortune-teller’s brightly decorated table.

      “What do you see for us?” The eager miss clung to William’s hand. His fingers had to be going numb, her grip looked that tight.

      Leah caressed her glass ball, made a show of staring into it. All at once her brows arched, her lips curved. She leaned sideways to peer around William and his lady. Her puzzled-looking gaze held Agatha’s for five full seconds before she returned her attention to her customers.

      “I see marriage—for you both. But not to each other. You, my dear girl, will make a lovely match that will make your parents proud and your friends jealous. But you must be patient. This will not happen in a moment.”

      The lady started to protest because clearly she wanted William and she wanted him now.

      Dismissing her, Leah turned her gaze on William. She smiled at him, then oddly, she winked one more time at Agatha.

      “Now you, my handsome one, you will marry sooner than you think. It will come as quite a surprise to you—and to your bride. Oh, I see you are worried, but this will be a long marriage blessed with many children.”

      “I don’t believe her!” the woman exclaimed. “You don’t, either, do you, William?”

      It was an odd reading. Agatha had heard a few of Leah’s fortunes and they all ended with happily-ever-after for the hopeful lovers who paid their pennies.

      “I believe I was entertained,” William said. Agatha imagined he was smiling, although she could only see the back of his head. “Thank you, ma’am.”

      With that, he placed another penny on the table and walked away with the woman who, very clearly, had not been entertained.

      With a crook of her finger, Leah motioned for Agatha to come out from the shadow.

      “Most of the time, this is no more than a ball of water—but once in a while it does see things.”

      “How СКАЧАТЬ