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Those swinging doors opened easily as he pushed his way inside. He’d never seen the saloon so packed and barely made it to the bar without getting an elbow to the gut. Squeezing his way in, he caught Vern’s attention, the man’s eyes widening a bit before he headed his way.
“Well, look who decided to come back home.”
Aaron leaned an elbow on the bar. “It’s lonely out in the world all by yourself.”
Vern laughed. “I’ll not argue with that.” He slung the towel in his hand over his shoulder. “What can I get for ya?”
“Whiskey, and I want the good stuff, not that mess you mix up in the back.”
Vern grinned and grabbed a glass, then reached for a bottle on the back wall. “Now would I be doing such a thing?”
Aaron snorted a laugh. “Absolutely.”
Vern slid the shot his way and turned when someone else yelled his name. Aaron sniffed the drink and tossed it back, the burn enough to make his eyes water. Yeah, this was the good stuff. He sat the glass down and turned, looking around the saloon for anyone he knew. A couple of the cowboys from the Avery ranch were there and a glance up to the second floor balcony offered nothing but the same worn out women he’d seen the last time he was here.
The noise was borderline deafening, the tinny piano music barely heard from where he stood. The platform Vern had built to hold the piano was high enough off the floor it gave everyone looking that way a clear view of who was up there and for some reason, most of the men in the bar were pushing toward it.
There was another loud yell from the men up front and they all seemed to throw their hands into the air at once. The ruffled red silk and black lace was what he saw first, then the woman they’d tossed onto the stage staggered, then caught herself and laughed while standing up straight. She was singing, it appeared, but the noise was so loud he couldn’t hear her.
She swished her skirts, walked toward the piano and lifted her head. It took his brain longer than it should have to recognize those golden blonde curls framing her face and when he realized that was Betsey—his Betsey—up there flashing her legs, her breasts all but spilling from her dress while those grabbing hands of the men at her feet reached for her, the whiskey he’d justswallowed burned in his gut and licked across every vein to heat his blood to near boiling. When she batted someone’s hand away, Aaron was pushing his way through the crowd as that anger seemed to burn its way straight to his head. He shoved people out of his way and was seeing red by the time he reached the stage she stood on.
The song she was singing was the bawdiest ditty he’d ever heard and just hearing those words come out of her mouth … he surged through the crowd, pushed his way next to the stage and jumped up to the platform next to the piano. Betsey turned and saw him, her mouth open but nothing coming out, her eyes as wide as he’d ever seen them.
“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?” he yelled.
She raised one eyebrow at him, the look on her face going from shock to anger if the red tint blooming on her cheeks was any indication.
“Get off the stage and let her sing!”
Aaron had no idea who shouted first but that one request turned into dozens. Betsey gave him a sneer and turned her back to him and once again started singing as if he wasn’t even there. She bent over and her breasts—which looked impossibly larger than they had the last time he’d seen them—all but spilled from her dress. When the first hand shot up to grab her, a noise that sounded a lot like a growl crawled up his throat. He reached her side in three steps, turned her around and tossed her over his shoulder without a word. Her shriek of outrage was lost as the men near the stage started yelling. They shifted enough he saw the steps and was down them and pushing his way through the crowd before he felt Betsey’s fist start pounding on his back.
He ignored the shouts, Betsey’s dainty fist, and Vern yelling at him to stop and didn’t pause once before pushing his way out onto the sidewalk. He stomped away from the saloon, pushing people out of the way and turned down the narrow alleyway between the mercantile and telegraph office to the grassy areabehind the store. He set Betsey on her feet and waited until she lifted her head to look at him before opening his mouth but never got a chance to say a word before she slapped his face so hard he was sure his teeth rattled.
“Just what do you think you’re doing, Aaron Hilam! You’ve got no right—“
“—The hell I don’t,” he interrupted. “You’ve—“
“—I beg your pardon? Last I checked, I don’t belong to you so what I do is no concern of yours!”
He stared down at her red face, his own still stinging from where she’d slapped him. He inhaled a deep breath, let it out and counted to five in his head before saying, “What are you doing working in the saloon?”
“None of your business.”
He ground his back teeth. “Betsey—“
“—Don’t Betsey me.” She glared up at him, her mouth set in a harsh line. “Just who do you think you are dragging me away from my job like that?”
He snorted a laugh. “Who do I think I am? I’m …”No one to her.The thought hit him hard enough to make his breath catch.
The anger shining in her eyes was something he’d hoped to never see directed at him again but it was there, and that wasn’t all he saw, either. The light was dim here under the trees and he hoped it was either a trick of the light, because if not, then those were tears lingering in her eyes and his gut clenched tight at the sight of them.
“No one to me,” she said, repeating back what had already whispered through his head. “I’m just the girl who distracted you from your troubles, who you then turned your back on when things didn’t go your way. Any friendship we had died the moment you told me there was nothing here worth staying for. Since you left me standing by the creek, I’m assuming that included me as well.”
Those tears he thought he’d seen fell from her eyes and sheswiped them away, still glaring at him. “What I do is my business. Where I work is my business. Where I do it is my business, so you worry about yourself and leave me alone.”
She stormed off before he could say a single word and as much as he wanted to grab her and make her stay, he let her go because—she was right. He was nothing to her, just as he’d said to her all those months ago under the willows. He knew now why the words looked as if they’ve carved out a piece of her heart the day he’d yelled them to her because that’s exactly the way he felt at the moment, his chest aching and hollow.
He wasn’t sure how long he stood there staring at the dirt path between the buildings but by the time he walked back to the livery stable, the sun had lowered in the sky, painting it in shades of pink and orange.
