To Wed In Texas

ELEVEN

THE NEXT FEW DAYS PASSED WITHOUT SLEEP FOR Karlee. She took care of the twins, doctored Daniel as best she could during the day and cleaned at night. Long after midnight, when all the work was done, she curled into the chair beside Daniel's bed and tried to rest a few hours before starting over.

On the second evening, Valerie passed by on her way home from her last delivery of bread. The girl stopped to talk and noticed Karlee was doing laundry by the firelight. Without a word, she began to help, cutting the chore in half.

After that Valerie was a constant and greatly appreciated guest. She'd drop off fresh baked goods each morning. Then she'd usually stop by to play with the girls for an hour while Karlee changed Daniel's bandages in the afternoon. Since Valerie said her grandfather had been Apache, Karlee trusted her with the secret of the man being held in the barn loft.

From that moment on, the young girl gave Wolf no peace. She wanted to see the savage. He finally conceded to allow her to take the boy water at noon, nothing more. She might hate the idea that he was tied up; but Wolf convinced her that if he were free, the boy would be dead within the hour. There were people in town who would shoot him on sight.

“I promise.” She jumped around the kitchen in delight. “Nothing more. But, I have to know you're not hurting him. I'll never sleep another second until I know.”

Wolf growled at Karlee. “The only reason I'm agreeing to this is because Adam and Wes are bound to be here tomorrow. If her mother knew I was letting Valerie near the savage, she'd slice me up and serve me between two pieces of fresh bread. But Adam and Wes will take him off my hands for good when they ride in. I've only had the kid a few days and I've already done a month's worth of worrying.”

“What harm can come?” Karlee reasoned. “He's tied up, and you're usually within shouting distance.”

While Wolf issued a final warning to Valerie, Karlee slipped into the parlor to check on Daniel.

It bothered her that he lay so still. She'd expected to have to fight to keep him resting quietly. But since the doctor bandaged his eyes, he didn't even respond most of the time when she checked on him. He swallowed a little water from time to time, but he wouldn't allow her to feed him and he made no effort to feed himself. She felt as if all his senses had been wrapped with the blind-fold.

Each time the doctor came by to rebandage his leg, Karlee watched silently from the shadows. The cut would leave a long scar across a leg that already bore the marks from a bullet he'd taken in the war. Wolf said Daniel had worked for over a year after the shooting until he could walk without a limp.

She knew Daniel had asked the doctor to do the bandaging because he didn't want her to see his scars. Though he was a full-grown man now, she suspected he must have been in his teens when he was injured and not far out of them when May left him with two daughters to raise.

No wonder the darkness seemed so complete around him. It wasn't as if he'd given up, but more like he'd made a stand in his midnight world. He was a proud man who resented his helplessness.

As she watched him from the parlor door the next dawn, she made up her mind to somehow break through the wall he'd built around his private hell.

“I brought you some coffee.” She knelt by the bed so that she could be closer to his level. “I didn't even burn it this time. Wolf says it's near drinkable.”

Daniel didn't respond.

“Would you like me to hold your head up and give you some?” She touched his shoulder. He turned his head away. It was going to be another day without communicating.

“Fine.” She sat the cup down beside him and began unwrapping his hand. Each day there was less blood on the bandages. The salve was working. Even the swelling had gone down.

“You don't have to talk to me,” she said as she worked. “You don't ever have to talk to me again for as long as you live, but you do have to see the twins. They've been asking about you every few minutes. I'll not go another day keeping them away from the parlor.”

She wasn't sure he was listening. It seemed he'd hidden deep into the caves of his mind and never planned to come out.

“I don't need your conversation. I'm used to being all by myself. I've gotten where I like it that way, so don't feel the need to be chatty with me around. Most folks just rattle on with nothing to say, anyway.”

Karlee bit her tongue realizing she was doing the same thing. But talking kept her from thinking about the feel of his hand beneath hers and wondering what it would be like to touch him when there were no wounds to treat. She couldn't help but wonder whether his caress would be gentle if he ever chose to touch her.

When she finished with the bandages, she hurried back to the kitchen to make the girls' breakfast, calling herself a fool for even thinking about something that would never happen.

The twins loved Valerie's warm fresh bread with butter and cinnamon piled on top. When they were both around her, there seemed a pleasant chaos that drew her full attention.

“After we eat.” Karlee laughed as they tried to help prepare the bread. “We'll go in and have a quiet-asa-mouse visit with your father.”

One twin looked interested in seeing her father while the other sprinkled more cinnamon in her hair than on the bread.

“We'll be quiet,” the first one promised. “We'll use our go-to-church voices.”

“If you do, I'll work on your dolls.”

Ten minutes later, the girls sat beside Daniel's bed playing with the scraps of material Karlee had cut for rag dolls. They asked about their father's bandaged eyes but didn't seem overly concerned. All they needed to know was that he was near.

One stood by his bed and kissed his blind-fold to make all the hurt better. When she moved away, he whispered, “Cinnamon.”

Karlee braided rag strips together in a bracelet of red and blue and tied it around the girl's wrist. Then she made another of yellow and green for her sister. Both loved their bracelets.

Karlee knew she now had a way of telling them apart.

They chattered and talked as she worked on the dolls. When they talked to one another, Karlee couldn't understand them clearly. It was as though they had their own language, secret from the world. Every few minutes, one would stand and pat her father, reassuring herself he was there.

Daniel didn't speak, but turned his head toward them, listening to their voices. His strong features never moved a fraction to smile, but she knew they brought him peace.

Near noon, Karlee collected the scraps and the half-completed dolls. “Say good-bye to your father. It's time for lunch. He needs to sleep a while.”

The twin with the red and blue bracelet stood and kissed Daniel while the other said good-bye.

To Karlee's surprise, he leaned into the golden curls of his daughter. “Good-bye, my little cinnamon angel,” he said.

All day, Karlee watched the two girls. Now that she knew them apart, she noticed how very different they were. The one with the smell of cinnamon in her hair was quieter, letting her sister take the lead every time. She was also the most loving in her manner.

The other twin, with the yellow and green bracelet, was far more questioning. Her words came faster and more clearly. As night fell and they ate their supper on the back porch with Valerie and Wolf, this twin asked one question after another about the stars. She said that when she grew up she wanted to be a star.

By the time she dressed them for bed, Karlee had began calling one Starlett and the other Cinnamon. Though they were asleep, she knew she'd never think of them as twin again. Even without the bracelets, she'd know which one was which. They were so different, she found it surprising she hadn't noticed.

When she tucked them in and went back downstairs, Wolf was sitting beside Daniel's bed. The huge, hairy man twisted his hat in his beefy hands as if determined to strangle the covering before it could get away.

“We've got to do something,” Wolf's gravel voice filled the hallway. “Gerilyn heard about the fire and wired the sheriff as to your and the twins' condition. Old Hank didn't know no better than to wire back the truth. Like a snake smelling spring, she's on her way.”

When Daniel didn't answer, Wolf added, “If Gerilyn sees you like this, she'll insist on taking the twins back to New Orleans. She may say it's just for a while, until your eyes heal. Once she has them, there will be hell to cross to get them back.”

Daniel didn't respond. Karlee couldn't help but wonder if he was awake enough to care. She moved to the foot of the bed and watched his face carefully for some clue. Wolf swore under his breath, telling the world how he felt about the woman's arrival.

“Do you know May's sister?” Karlee asked Wolf.

The big man shook his head. “I've just heard about her. She got all upset when he brought the twins, as newborns, to Texas. Swore she'd find a way to take them from him. She's visited a few times, but I've managed to be several hundred miles away. I figure if she don't like the McLains, finest men I know north or south, there isn't much chance she'll like me.”

“I've met her.” Karlee let out a long breath. “She was three years older than May and, as far as I know, she's always gotten everything she ever wanted. When I met her, she considered May… and me… nothing more than pests.”

“What else do you know about her?” Wolf had given up trying to talk to Daniel.

“I know she married a well-to-do man, so if she had the girls, she could take good care of them. She has no children of her own that I've heard about. Aunt Rosy corresponded with her from time to time.” Karlee frowned. “From what I remember when I visited, Gerilyn wouldn't talk to May most days. And I was invisible. It's surprising that she'd want to raise her sister's children. I'd never thought of her as a nurturing woman.”

“If you ask me, she doesn't,” Wolf grumbled. “ Gerilyn just can't stand Daniel, that's all. Seems he married May, the youngest girl, before she was eighteen, leaving Gerilyn to have to bear the social shame of being the old maid in the family. I heard Daniel talk about how she tried to stop the wedding.”

Karlee wasn't surprised at Gerilyn's hatred. She remembered being given some of the girl's hand-me-downs when she was leaving their house. Gerilyn's mother had insisted on packing the dresses, now too small for her daughter, in Karlee's box. All the time she packed, she apologized that they couldn't keep Karlee as long as planned, but “things come up, you know.”

Gerilyn resented having her dresses passed on to someone else. Two days later when Karlee opened the box, the dresses had been cut to shreds. The book May gave her had been ripped in half.

The memory frightened Karlee, but never so much as it did now. For now it wasn't a few dresses at stake, but two little girls.

“What can we do?” Karlee fretted.

Wolf shook his head. “If Daniel's brothers get here, they might can stall Gerilyn. After all, they've as much right to the girls as she has, since Danny has no wife.”

“But he'll never give up his girls. Not to anyone.” She brushed her hand across the bandage covering Daniel's arm. Maybe he was using all of his energy trying to think of something. Maybe he was too wounded to know there was a problem.

But one thing she knew, if there was an ounce of life left in him, Daniel McLain still cared about his daughters. Even blind and hurt, he wouldn't give them up.

“We have to think of something.” She understood why he held on so tightly. They were all he had. She saw him as far richer than her, and knew she'd fight dearly if the twins belonged to her.

“He could let Gerilyn have them now and then go after the twins when he recovers. I'd ride by his side.” Wolf's tone was dull. They all knew he voiced no option, only a fear of the inevitable.

“No.” Karlee patted Daniel's hand lightly. If she hadn't met Gerilyn as a child, she would never believe a woman would do such a thing. Even at eleven, her eyes had been the crystal blue of one without a heart. “He can't let her take them away.”

Wolf stood, wanting action. “I'll go check on the boy out yonder. Maybe if I walk, my brain will work better and I can think of something.” He stormed out without another word.

Karlee knelt beside Daniel's bed. She knew he was awake. She told herself she didn't blame him for not talking. There was nothing to say. A blind man was no match for Gerilyn.

Leaning her head against the mattress, Karlee fought back the tears. She knew what it was like to grow up in a home where no one wanted her… where no part of the house belonged to her… where love and caring were things she watched but never felt.

Silently, she cried, wishing she could reach out and comfort Daniel but unsure what he'd do if she tried. She pushed her tears onto the sheet and swallowed any sobs.

A rattle sounded beyond the kitchen and Wolf was back wrinkling his beard with a huge smile. He slapped his leg with such force Karlee jumped.

“I got it,” he boomed. “You could marry Danny.”

“I don't think so.” She wiped her eyes and tried to guess if the man could have gotten drunk in the time it took him to walk to the barn and back.

“Of course you can. You're not married, he's not married. That's the way it works. If Danny had a wife, there'd be no question about the twins staying.”

“No.” Karlee began shaking her head and moving away. “I don't plan ever to marry. We'll have to think of something else. He wouldn't want to be married to me anyway.” Daniel had run when he kissed her. There was no telling what he'd do if he had to marry her.

“You care about him and the twins, don't you?” Wolf paced beside the bed with a finger in the air, obviously his vision of a great orator.

“Well, yes, but I'm not the kind of woman he'd want in a wife.” Karlee had to put an end to this idea before Daniel did. Better that she said no, than hear it from him.

“Do you care about the man?” Wolf frowned like an angry father and brought his finger down to point at Daniel. “You must know. You've been living under the same roof for near a week now.”

“Well, yes, I care about him. He's a fine man.”

“You figure some better man will ask you? Some man with no children to raise that ain't your own? Some man with more to offer?”

“No!” Karlee resented his statement. “I love the girls. I want to help raise them. No better man would ever ask me, but don't you see… he deserves better than me.” There, she said it. That should put an end to Wolf's idea.

She didn't want to have to list all her shortcomings; she'd heard others list them all her life. Daniel was an intelligent, brave man who could have his pick of women. He didn't need to be saddled with her. She was too big, too clumsy, too…

As she pulled away, a bandaged hand caught hers.

He didn't try to argue or reason. He only held her hand and pulled her slowly back to the side of the bed. She tugged, trying to break free. Then she saw the bloodstains along the cotton covering his knuckles. The effort to hold her was costing him dearly.

She stopped struggling and moved close, allowing him to guide her.

“You said,” he took his time with each word. “You said you'd stay with me until the dawn.”

Karlee straightened, her pride keeping her silent. She didn't have to tell him what a poor wife she'd make. He could probably guess. To marry him with no love between them was crazy, by far the most half-baked scheme she'd ever been part of.

“You don't have to worry about better or worse, it can't get much worse than this,” Wolf mumbled. “He hasn't got much money so the poorer is a sure bet. And in sickness has already fallen.”

“Shut up, Wolf, I can talk her into it without your help.” Daniel's voice sounded forced, drawing all his energy. “Marry me, Spinster Whitworth.”

Talk her into it-she almost laughed. Never would she have guessed that anyone would try to talk her into getting married. She never thought the question would come up, but now and then she'd allowed herself to dream. And in her dreams the only answer was yes.

Daniel cleared his throat. “But one thing. I'll have no make-believe marriage, even to keep my girls. If you say yes, you'll stay by my side until death separates us. A real marriage, a forever marriage or no marriage at all.”

“Until death separates us,” she repeated his words. What a fine way to end a promise.

An hour later they were married by the Methodist preacher from a church across town. The bride wore her best faded dress. The groom slept through most of the service. There were no rings, no flowers and no wedding night in one another's arms.

… but there was forever.