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“Your suggestion that I marry was perfectly valid, and I considered it fully before making my decision.”
He sat back in his seat and regarded her coolly. “So, why didn’t you consult me when you went husband-hunting?”
“Why would I?”
“Because I could have guided you past the most obvious bad choices?”
She brushed a piece of lint from her skirt and grabbed hold of her patience. “Who would you have suggested I pick that I haven’t already thought of?”
“Willy Samuel?”
“Willy Samuel is sweet on Jane Hendricks.”
“He’d throw her over in a heartbeat for this ranch.”
That said about all she needed to know about his honor. “And spend the rest of his life comparing me with the love of his life? I don’t think so.”
“Jason Miller?”
“He’s fonder of whining than of working.”
“But you could control him.”
“So could anyone else with enough wits and a big enough bribe.”
He sighed. “Yeah. I guess you’d never be able to trust him. He’s also a bit of a mamma’s boy.”
“Between the two of them, I’d spend my marriage sleeping with my eyes open.” He opened his mouth to trot out another suggestion, and she forestalled him by holding up her hand. “We’ve already eliminated half the eligible bachelors in the vicinity, but just let me go through the remaining two. Jeremiah Palmer drinks when he’s not working and I will not take up with a drinking man. Brian Pallante hates the territory and has every intention of going back East as soon as he gets his sister married to someone who’ll take that puny spread of his. Offering him the Rocking C would only be an incentive for him to sell more of this territory.”
“Can I speak now?”
“Of course.”
“I wasn’t going to suggest either of those men.”
“Well, if you were going to suggest one of the hands, I have to say it’s a poor choice. Most of the men couldn’t stand a tie if it came with whiskey and saloon girls attached.”
“Elizabeth!”
Damn! She’ forgotten in the ease of long companionship that ladies didn’t know of saloon girls, let alone mention them. Especially with Aaron, who had rigid ideas about women and their roles. “I’m sorry.”
“You should be.” He gave her one of those I-expected-better-of-you looks and then sighed. He waved his hand. “Sometimes, I forget who your mother was.”
So did she. She glanced at her hands in her lap. Her grip on her fingers was so tight, her knuckles were white. She hoped her mother had attained some fun out of life before she died. She counted to ten and eased her grasp. “My mother was from a respectable family back East.”
“My pa said she was beautiful, but wild as a March hare.”
“She wasn’t crazy!”
“You know the stories as well as I do. What would you call her?”
Desperate. She’d call her mother desperate. Living with her father had a way of provoking that reaction in a woman.
“My mother, for all her supposed faults, was my mother.” She met the pity and censure in his gaze without flinching. “I prefer to think of her as a good woman who made some bad choices.”
The first one was thinking her father was lovable. The second was thinking she could save him. The third one had killed her—thinking she could escape him.
“I’m sure you would, but people around here have long memories.” Aaron reached over and placed his hand on hers. His palm was rough and hard. “You’ve got to be careful, Elly, or your reputation will go the way of hers.”
She freed her hand under the guise of smoothing her skirt. “I prefer to think people will accept me as I am. I’ve done nothing to be ashamed of.”
“Marrying two men in the space of two days has set a few tongues wagging.”
She was sure it had. “No matter who I married, people were going to gossip.”
“They’d gossip a lot less if you hadn’t plucked your latest from that cesspool Dell’s!”
“At the time, I didn’t have any choice.”
“You could have come to me.”
“It was a situation that required my personal attention.”
“Any situation that requires entering a saloon requires a man to solve it.” He sat forward in the chair, his hands digging into the upholstered arm. “Dammit, Elly! If you don’t want to end up like your mother, you need help. You’re running wilder than she ever did!”
His anger, his opinion, hit her like a fist in the gut. “Is that what you think of me?” she asked in a whisper.
“Ah, hell, runt.” He ran his hand through his hair. “Of course not. You just get me so mad, I forget what I’m saying.”
She didn’t think he forgot a thing. She wondered if Asa shared Aaron’s opinion of her character. She wondered if he was just waiting for the moment when she dropped her ladylike demeanor and shamed him. She’d have to be careful, she decided. Very careful not to mess up. Asa had bargained for a lady. If she saw to it that’s what he got, he’d be satisfied. He wouldn’t leave.
