No Strings Attached. Susan Andersen

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      “There’s the bank.” Derek pointed to his left and reined Charlie to a halt. “You want to look around town while I meet with Edwards?”

      Gideon pulled up next to him. “Yeah.” He tilted his hat, deepening the shadows that shielded his face, and slanted his good eye toward Derek. “I do.”

      Derek dismounted and tethered his horse, while Gideon did the same. “I’ll meet you at the mercantile in thirty minutes,” said Derek as he headed for the bank.

      Arriving, he probed the lobby with a keen gaze. Dark mahogany woodwork dominated the room, polished to a high shine. A marble-topped counter, graced with ornate scrolled bars, divided the room. A sour-faced clerk frowned silently from the safety of the teller cage.

      “I’m looking for Frank Edwards.”

      Wordlessly, the man pointed to a door with Franklin Bacon Edwards, Bank President inscribed on its window glass. Derek knocked once, entered, then closed the door behind him. The man seated at the large, mahogany desk looked up, irritation sketched clearly on his features.

      “Edwards.”

      The man’s eyes grew wide, but then a smile lightened his expression and he stood. He was of average height, but his stomach protruded with amazing girth. His large drooping mustache and graying mutton chop whiskers swallowed half his face, except for sharp, rapidly blinking eyes that gave him the look of a large, overfed rodent. His dark, tailored suit enhanced the effect.

      “Ah, Mr. Fontaine, I presume?” Edwards said with forced cheer as he offered his hand. “You look remarkably like your uncle.”

      “So I’m told.” Derek accepted the handshake but withheld his smile.

      “Your message came from Chicago—quite a distance from Charleston. I tried to reach you there first.”

      Derek shrugged, not tempted in the least to explain how he had ended up in Chicago after the war. He had no reason to trust this man with his confidences, so he merely said, “There wasn’t much left in South Carolina. I decided to move on.”

      Edwards nodded solemnly. “The war reached us here, as well. The blockade, you know. And south Texas was occupied by Yankee troops for a time.”

      “So I’ve heard. Does that explain the condition of the Double F?”

      “Down to business, is it?” Edwards’s smile seemed to wear a bit thin. Derek studied the man, wondering why he would be reluctant to discuss the ranch. Or was it just Derek himself, imagining things because his own desire for privacy made him impatient with polite chitchat?

      Edwards gestured to the chair opposite his desk. “Please sit down, and we’ll talk.”

      Derek sat, resting one ankle on the opposite knee. “All right, Mr. Edwards. What can you tell me about the ranch and its present state of neglect?”

      Edwards wrinkled his brow in a frown. “It’s never been a matter so much of neglect, Mr. Fontaine. Richard would not have allowed that. He loved that ranch like some folks love a person. He came here just after the Andrews brothers settled this place, and built his ranch up from nothing, just a few wild mustangs and some longhorns he rounded up. He worked and sacrificed—he would have done anything to preserve that place.”

      Edwards shook his head, as though Richard’s devotion quite eluded him, then continued. “When so many men left to join the fighting, there weren’t enough left to work the big ranches. The Double F did well during the first years of the war. But being shorthanded for so long took its toll. Supplies and necessities became impossible to get, and what we did have, we shared or donated it to the Cause to keep our boys fighting. Richard did his part—and more. He supported the Confederacy with everything he could spare.”

      Another staunch Confederate. “I see.” Derek blew out a weary breath. “So I’ve inherited a broken-down ranch years past needing repair, cattle and horses scattered to hell and gone, and nobody left to work it.”

      “There are still hands there, aren’t there?” Edwards’s cheeks flushed and his eyes widened in alarm.

      “Don’t you know?” Derek tried to pin the banker with a sharp frown, but the man refused to meet his gaze. “Your letter said you were overseeing the place until I got here.”

      “I…” Edwards paused as though reconsidering whatever he’d started to say, then merely nodded. “Yes, of course. I haven’t been there in a while, though. Busy here, you know.” He waved a hand to indicate his desk, which looked remarkably clutter-free.

      Derek swallowed a sigh. What the hell was the use? No one seemed inclined to confide in him. “The place isn’t quite deserted.” He made no effort to keep the displeasure from his voice. “There are two old men, a couple of Mexican families, a boy too young to have seen much of any kind of work and a woman. Those are my ranch hands?”

      “Six Parker worked for your uncle from the very beginning, and the Mexicans stayed through the whole of the war.” Edwards counted off the workers on his pudgy fingers. “Whitley Andrews may be young and inexperienced, but he’s willing. As for Micah Smith and Amber Laughton, they came together—a pair, you might say. They moved to the ranch when she was run out of town.”

      “Run out of town?” The incredulous question slipped out before he could think better of it. Derek snapped his mouth shut, effectively cutting off any other indiscreet remark, but his earlier observations taunted him.

      Why would a beautiful young woman confine herself to keeping house at a remote ranch, and for a man old enough to be her father?

      And his reply to himself: Unless she defined friend differently than he did.

      “I am not one to carry tales, mind you,” Edwards said in a prim voice that told Derek otherwise. “However, since Amber Laughton is living under your roof, I feel obligated to warn you that she was involved in some trouble with a number of men. She consorted with them after her father died—or so they say. Your uncle—well, I don’t know if she bewitched him, or if he thought to do a good deed and take the hussy from our midst. In any case, she moved to the ranch, and she’s been there since.”

      Derek said nothing for the space of a heartbeat. “Amber was Richard’s mistress.” It was more a statement than a question. Dozens of other questions raced through Derek’s mind, but a particular reluctance to ask them of Edwards kept him silent. He’d already said too much. He would get his answers, but he’d get them from Amber.

      “Only she can tell you that for sure, now that Richard is dead,” said Edwards stiffly, without meeting Derek’s gaze. “But I believe so, yes. I, certainly, will have nothing to do with her.”

      Derek tightened his jaw. He couldn’t risk unleashing any emotion over Edwards’s announcement. He had certain secrets from his own sordid past that he wished to leave behind him; he couldn’t afford to start something he wasn’t prepared to finish. He’d already revealed too much in his desire to learn more.

      “All right, Mr. Edwards,” he said. “And just what is it you suggest that I do as the new owner of the Double F?” He had no real interest in Edwards’s opinion, but it seemed an easy diversion for the moment.

      He was right. Edwards’s mouth flattened in a self-deprecating smile. “It’s your ranch now, Mr. Fontaine. Nothing has to remain as it was. You are under no obligation to maintain the same workers your uncle employed. At the very least, I encourage you to disassociate yourself from Amber Laughton once and for all.”

      “I see.”

      “Times are changing, people are moving west.” Edwards leaned forward as though warming to his topic. “We’ve had two new families settle in Twigg, a man to take over the newspaper Amber’s father once owned, and a man who plans to build a new hotel. More Mexicans are drifting farther north again, without the Yankee army to get in their way.”

      He paused expectantly, his features smoothing themselves back into their thin, rodentlike