An Unwilling Husband. Tera Shanley

I have arrived safely in Rockdale, and though I have a considerable amount of adjusting to do, Roy met me with open arms and made me feel right at home once again. I feel a freedom here, Uncle. From the moment I stepped off the train, I could inhale fully for the first time in a long time. I have met an Indian girl here named Lenny who I have decided I was meant to be bosom friends with. She is wonderful, and beautifully exotic and intelligent. She doesn’t speak a bit of English, though I suspect she understands it just fine.

       Now for the saddest part of this story. Roy passed away a day after my arrival, to my heartbroken regret. How is it that I am only to have one day with him? It seems eternally unfair to me. Am I blessed to have spent that one day with him before his fate took him? Or, did I bring this bad luck to Rockdale?

       And now, take heart. I’m no longer Miss Flemming, ill-reputationed bastard child. Oh, cease your sputtering, my dear uncle. You and I both know it was the most common name thrown about when I was in town. I am now Mrs. Shaw, first lady of the Lazy S Ranch. Are you impressed by my fortitude in securing a husband so quickly, when years in Society didn’t produce such a miracle? I am surprised and impressed right along with you. Don’t worry about me, Uncle William. My husband is handsome, and honorable, and terribly arrogant, but I suspect you all are at this age, am I right? I’ll write again soon.

       Maggie Shaw

      

      She’d made the letter sound as if she were happy and well adjusted. So what, if that couldn’t be further from the truth? It wouldn’t help anything to have Uncle William worry about her, or Aunt Margaret spouting I-told-you-sos.

      The pen cleaned and set in its holder, she sat back in the desk’s wooden chair. She wasn’t tired, and would talk to Garret about the situation they had found themselves in. Preferably in a civil manner, but one could never tell how any discussion would go with that insufferable man. More likely than not, the conversation would end with her wanting to choke the life out of a fence post, but she was willing to give talking a try.

      Garret probably was staying out on purpose, to avoid confrontation. Did he think she would jump out and molest him? Not likely!

      She took the candle into her room, left it there and picked her way carefully through the unfamiliar house. In the chair in the den, she waited. Sure enough, within minutes, booted feet clomped on the porch. The door creaked open slowly, and a slash of moonlight and the slight glow of the candle from the bedroom revealed Garret’s tall form.

      “Ha!” she said, victorious.

      Garret jumped like a jack rabbit and skittered backward. He scowled at her. “You scared me near to death, woman. What are you doing, sitting there in the dark?”

      “Waiting for you, naturally.” She tried not to smile, but scaring him made her feel better. “I think we should talk.”

      With a sigh, he dropped his hat on the table. “No.”

      When he tried to sidle past her to the bedrooms, she sidestepped and stood in front of him, arms crossed. She hadn’t waited around all evening to give up so easily. “No, you won’t even talk to me? I am your wife, Mr. Shaw. You don’t like me. You have made that abundantly clear. It doesn’t, however, pardon you from showing me the respect of a conversation about your intentions.”

      “Look here, Margaret—”

      “Maggie.”

      He squinted at her. Likely he was having as much trouble seeing in the dark as she was. The candle in her bedroom offered little in the way of illumination. “Maggie, I have to be up to drive those cattle at dawn tomorrow. I’m tired, I’m hungry, and in no way up to fighting you tonight, so please...” He gestured for her to scoot aside.

      Compromise it was. “Fine,” she said. “We’ll talk on our way into town tomorrow, then?”

      He gave a harsh laugh. “Oh, no. There is no way you are coming with us on this drive. I saw the way you ride a horse, and I can’t be saving you every two minutes. You’ll stay here. I’ve already talked to Lenny and she has agreed to stay with you. She’ll show you around.”

      Oh, sod it all. You couldn’t compromise with a rattlesnake. “When will you be back?”

      “A week at least,” he replied testily.

      No doubt, he loathed that he might have to answer to anyone. “A week? Why so long?”

      “Because we only drive the cattle fifteen miles a day so they don’t lose weight,” he said in an overly patiently tone, as if she were a petulant child. “It’ll take us a few days to get them to the train station, and then we have to corral them and negotiate a price. In the day we waited to bury Roy the price might have dropped, I don’t know. If it has, we may wait a couple of days for it to come back up. Won’t know ’til we get there.” Garret sighed. “You ever use one of those?” He nodded toward the three rifles mounted on the wall by the door.

      “Of course I have,” she lied, not about to admit any more weakness.

      He raised an eyebrow. “Great. Well, use one if there’s trouble. Good night, Maggie.” Then he stepped around her and disappeared into his bedroom, slamming the door behind him.

      Worst wedding night ever. Her life was so terribly different from what it had been.

       Chapter 4

      Maggie woke from a fitful sleep to the sound of murmured orders, the jingle of harnesses, and the rooster, which seemed to have an irrational need to crow continuously. Burke yelled at the unknown someone who’d taken the last buttered biscuit, and wood slamming against wood reverberated as boxes of supplies were loaded into the back of the wagon. The men were preparing for the drive at dawn and they weren’t being quiet about it.

      Her bedroom was at the front of the house, so the window gave a great view of the bustling activity. A shawl tightly around her shoulders against the crisp coolness of the morning, she peeked through the window searching for…something.

      Garret. Giving orders and tightening the cinch on a big, dark chestnut horse. The animal was tall and well bred. The early morning light reflected off twitching muscles as he stamped his front hoof. Irritated or not, the animal was beautiful.

      He flattened his ears testily as Garret finished saddling him, and she snorted. The horse seemed as arrogant as its rider. No less an animal would have done for such an unapproachable man as Garret Shaw.

      Her heart ached when the men headed out. She hadn’t expected him to say goodbye, but a look back in her direction would have been nice. How obnoxious, that she felt anything for her impossible and infuriating husband.

      Husband. She plopped un-fetchingly onto the bed. Idiot was more like it.

      Having washed, and dressed in a light blue silk gown, she headed into the kitchen, where Lenny waited at the table. The girl pointed to the stove and sat back, eyes bright and lips quirked in amusement.

      “Me? Make breakfast? My cooking would more likely kill you than fill you.” Maggie shook her head. “Huh uh.”

      Lenny repeated the gesture, then got up and took stoneware canisters of salt and flour and pans out of various cupboards, holding each up in front of Maggie in turn. Then she pointed in the direction in which the men had disappeared and made horns on her head with her fingers.

      “I don’t understand,” Maggie said. “Garret?”

      The girl nodded enthusiastically.

      “Garret is a bull? I know he’s a bull-headed man. Is that the symbol we are using for him? Bull?”

      Another nod and a smile

      “We need the symbol for donkey.”

      Lenny frowned, head cocked, and Maggie brayed like an ass. A peal of laughter came from the Indian girl, and she couldn’t help but join her.

      Recovered,