Badlands Bride Page 2

  If only she'd been born a man.

  Her mother had forced her into dresses and threatened her with Miss Abernathy's if she didn't take an interest in her hair and clothing. Hallie had conformed to their expecta­tions—to the world's expectations—and resigned herself to her unchangeable, unappreciated gender. But she could not accept the role they wanted her to play. Hallie wanted more.

  Should she give up or go on printing the same outdated page of her life over and over? Neither of the choices ap­pealed to her.

  Finding herself across from the tearoom, Hallie stared dis­mally at the brownstone facade beside the hotel and recalled her interview with Tess Cordell. Charles had said the real story was where Tess was going. There must be some way Hallie could keep in touch with her. Perhaps, even though the mail took weeks, she could convince Tess to correspond with her for future articles. Maybe Tess would send infor­mation about the other young women, too. It wouldn't be anywhere close to as in-depth reporting as she needed, but it was the only answer she had.

  She set out for Miss Abernathy's, realizing she'd an­swered her own question. She couldn't give up. Not when the result meant settling for a superficial existence.

  She found Tess Cordell hurriedly packing, arranging and rearranging, discarding items she couldn't fit into the two small bags open on the bed. Hallie surveyed the disarray in the small room. "Whatever are you doing? Yesterday you were all packed except for your overnight valise."

  ""I've changed plans, Miss Wainwright." Cheeks flushed, her fair hair atumble, she tucked a cotton night rail into the battered valise and clasped her hands together. Her blue eyes sparkled with excitement. "I'm going to Philadel­phia."

  "Philadelphia!" Disappointment sank in Hallie's stom­ach. "What about the Dakotas?"

  Tess managed to look a little sheepish. She busied herself stuffing items back into the trunk against the wall. "I was engaged until a few months ago. Eric—he's my fiancé— well, his family put pressure on him to call the engagement off. He did, and I was devastated."

  The strength left Hallie's legs and she wilted onto a wooden chair.

  "Mr. DeWitt's ad seemed the only thing for me to do at the time," she explained. "But last night Eric came to see me. He's taken a position in a Philadelphia law office, and he realized he couldn't go without me. You know that ex­pression 'smart as a Philadelphia lawyer'? Well, that's Eric. Rich, too. And he loves me. So you see there's nothing else I could do but go with him."

  "But this DeWitt fellow…"

  Tess reached toward the bureau and turned back, tossing two envelopes on the bed. "Eric gave me money to replace what I spent. Of course, it must be returned to Mr. De-Witt…. Will you be a dear and see to it for me?"

  Hallie stared at the envelopes, her plans dashed.

  Tess buckled two leather straps around the last case. "I've asked Miss Abernathy to store my trunk until Eric can send someone for it." She tidied her hair and settled her bonnet on her head. "I hope I didn't ruin your story, Miss Wainwright, but this is the best opportunity I'm ever going to have. Please understand."

  In disbelief, Hallie watched her pick up her bags and hurry through the doorway. "Good luck," she said to the empty room.

  She sat in the silence, absorbing yet another wash of dis­illusionment. As far as she knew there were still three other women planning to leave on the stage the following day. Perhaps one of them would agree to help Hallie with her articles. None had been as young or as personable as Tess, but she would have to make do.

  She moved from the chair to the rumpled bed and picked up the envelopes. One contained the letter she'd seen Tess with. Hallie unfolded it and read the scrawled handwriting.

  Dear Miss Cordell,

  My wife must be able to read and write. Enclosed is a cashier's check to purchase whatever you will need. There are no women's shops here. The Territory is far from the life you are used to, but the land is beautiful and you will have everything you need. I've never been married. I trapped for many winters and now operate a freight company and stage line. A justice will meet us at the Stone Creek Station next month.

  Sincerely,

  Cooper DeWitt

  Hallie tucked the letter back into the envelope and picked up the other, pulling out a stage ticket and two hundred dollars. No wonder Tess had been impressed.

  She fingered the ticket, took it out and turned it over a couple of times. The real story's on the other end of that stage line.

  With a little thrill of excitement, she realized what she was thinking. No. It was too dangerous! She slid the ticket back into the envelope. She would cash it in, buy a cashier's check for the amount plus the cash and return it to DeWitt.

  We could have had a real follow-up story there. The voices from the other side of her father's door haunted her. Get Hallie off our backs…let's hope the Journal doesn't think of it…Turner's condescending tone came to her. What are you pouting about now, Precious?

  What if she did it? What if she used this ticket to get her to the Dakotas? She could interview the men who sent for wives. She could get the follow-up story on the other women—the real brides.

  But what about this DeWitt person? He was expecting a wife. Hallie turned that question over a few times before a solution came to mind. She could simply explain the situ­ation to him, give him his money back and call it square. She could get her story, and he could send for another wife. He'd have to anyway, since Tess had backed out.

  Enthusiastic now, she planned her departure. She couldn't tell her family. They'd never allow it. Her mother would have a conniption fit. It would most likely take them a day to notice she was missing, and by then she'd be long gone. She'd write from the first station.

  Satisfied with her plan, Hallie tucked the envelopes into her reticule and stood. She had packing to do if she was going to catch that stage tomorrow.

  Cooper paced the dusty expanse of hard-packed earth sur­rounding the stage station and surveyed the broad horizon, temporarily forgetting its stark beauty. He saw only the bar­renness of the land…the lack of people and buildings. He'd told her in the letter, but seeing was believing. And by now, wherever the coach was, she'd had time to see plenty.

  Cooper frowned at the vista before him. The stage should have arrived sometime that morning. It was now early af­ternoon and there was still no sign of it. In his mind the delay signaled only one thing: trouble.

  "Sky's clear here," Stuart Waring, another of the impa­tient grooms, said from behind him. "But that don't mean they didn't run into rain or mud."

  Cooper turned to the two farmers sitting on crates against the log wall. Stuart wore a faded shirt with a string tie cinched around his scrawny neck. His scarred boots had been polished and shined. The ever-present wind snatched at his hat, and he secured it quickly.

  "Coulda had a horse go lame," Vernon Forbes said. His jacket bore threadbare spots at the wrists and elbows, and he held a small, battered package. A gift for his bride? Coo­per hadn't thought of that.

  Angus Hallstrom, the station operator who worked for Cooper, leaned against the doorframe and picked his teeth with a piece of straw. "Fact that the stage's been robbed three times in as many months ain't sittin' well with me."

  Cooper had been thinking the same thing. He didn't like the uncomfortable feeling that tiptoed up his spine and set­tled on his shoulders. Having money stolen or losing a month's mail was one thing…harm coming to the woman he intended to marry was another.

  George Gaston, the portly justice, sat in the only chair and sipped black coffee from a dented metal cup. Cooper observed the motley group of men and imagined what the city women would think of them.

  A strange uncertainty rippled in his chest, and he glanced down at his clean buckskin pants and fringed shirt. What would Tess Cordell think of him?

  Fifteen years ago, even ten years ago, content living, hunting and trapping with the Oglala, he'd never have imag­ined he would pair himself with a white woman. Time had changed that, as it had
the existence of his people—rather, the people of his heart—and most of them were surviving on reservation land.

  Buffalo no longer roamed the grasslands in great herds, like rippling black seas. The Oglala, Santee, Yankton and other Sioux had been forced to make treaties in order to receive food.

  Cooper paced to his team of horses, waiting in the shade of a wind-bent tree. He ran a hand down the black's hide and noticed his own skin, callused and rough, sun-darkened nearly to a shade like that of his Sioux family.

  His white skin had given him an advantage over the men he called his brothers. He'd taken a land grant offered only to whites. He'd traded and sold years' worth of furs for wagons and tools, caught his own horses and purchased ev­erything else he'd needed to start his business.

  For now, he could only take food and winter supplies to the reservation, but someday, and he hoped it would be soon, he would be in a position to really help his people. And Tess Cordell would help him do just that.

  Hallie covered her mouth and nose with her damp hand­kerchief and tried not to choke on the thick dust gusting in around the drawn shade. The wheels hit another gully and her groan was drowned out by the other women's cries.

  Zinnia Blake held her wilted, green-feathered hat in place on her head with a dirty-gloved hand and Hallie tried not to laugh at the way the flesh beneath her chin jiggled. They hit another indentation and Zinnia flattened the hand over her enormous bouncing bosom. Even in the dim interior, her face glistened as red as a freshly washed tomato. "Isn't it awfully hot for this late in the fall?"

  "It can't be much farther," Olivia Mason predicted. She pounded on the roof with the heel of her hand and peeled back the shade. "Mr. Tubbs, is it much farther?"

  The monotonous sounds of the creaking coach and the horses' hooves were the only reply.

  The wind stuck a coil of red hair to Olivia's pale cheek and she dropped the shade back into place. "He promised we'd be there this morning."

  "Mr. Tubbs is doing the best he can," Evelyn Reed said, coming to the driver's defense. Hallie hadn't heard her speak more than a dozen words the entire ten-day trip and figured she must be as tired of the other women's complaints as she. Zinnia had been sick from the steamer's constant chugging up the river. Olivia had insisted on changing clothes twice a day, and then complained about having no clean ones.

  Once they'd crossed the Missouri and boarded Mr. Tubbs's stage, things had grown progressively worse. Zinnia had a case of heat rash that drove her to tears. Olivia thought there should be a laundry at each rustic relay station. The meals were horrible, facilities for tending to nature's call primitive to nonexistent, and Hallie had a crick in her neck from sleeping sitting up.

  But she was having a glorious adventure. She took co­pious notes, describing the weather conditions, the vegeta­tion, the stark but beautiful outcroppings of stratum eroded by time and nature. She would have a story to beat all stories when she got home. Maybe she would even write an article for a magazine…or perhaps a book!

  The jarring motion of the coach slowed, and the women glanced expectantly at one another.

  "Thank God!" Zinnia panted. "We must be there. And, good heavens, I no doubt look a fright."

  Olivia tucked stray red coils into her neat chignon.

  The stage picked up speed again. Overhead, Mr. Tubbs shouted unintelligible orders to the horses. Inside the coach, the farers bounced and jostled. Hallie flipped up the shade and peered through the dust, gritting her teeth at the jarring of her backside against the poorly padded seat.

  Appearing from a cloud of churning dust, horses and rid­ers drew up with the stage. Shots were fired, and piercing screams erupted beside her. Heart pounding, she watched the riders gain on the stage. "Stage robbers!" she cried.

  She'd stayed up many a night, thrilling to the excitement and action depicted in dime novels. Now, here was she, Hallie Claire Wainwright, participant in an adventure as ex­citing as those! Her heart pounded and terror shivered up her spine. She strained to see through the thick haze of dust, trying to impress each detail into memory for later.

  Finally, after what seemed like hours, the stage slowed to a halt. The door was flung open and the barrel of a gun poked inside. Zinnia shrieked.

  "Come out!"

  Hallie glanced at the women's panic-stricken faces. As long as they were being delayed, she might as well make the best of it. Her father would love the firsthand story of a stage holdup! Let Evan Hunter try to top this one.

  "Let's do as they say." She gestured to the others, gath­ered her skirts and stepped out into the sunshine.

  Chapter Two

  Three bandanna-masked men in sweat-stained shirts and ill-fitting trousers pointed guns at the women exiting the coach. With their hats pulled low, the invisibility of faces and expressions was as threatening as the weapons. Two others in the same disguising attire sat atop horses. Another, this one barrel chested and short legged, held Mr. Tubbs at gunpoint on the ground.

  The grizzled old driver squinted from the bandits to the women, one side of his unshaven cheek jerking in a nervous twitch.

  "White women," one of the three standing men said in awe. He wore a battered and wide-brimmed black hat.

  The tallest, standing near Hallie, jerked his gun barrel toward the back of the stage. "The bags."

  The riders dismounted and lithely leapt onto the coach, unfastening the leather straps and tossing trunks and cases to the ground. Jumping back down, they opened the bags and trunks, pausing only seconds to shoot off resisting or locked latches.

  The bullets frightened Zinnia to hysteria. She threw her hands toward the sun and wailed.

  "Quiet!" The black-haired man moved forward and struck her with the back of his hand. Olivia couldn't support her, and she wilted into an unconscious heap in the dirt.

  "Take what you want and go," Olivia objected. "There's no call to hurt women."

  He yanked Olivia's hair. She yelped, and her red mane tumbled across one shoulder. Grasping a strand in his leather-gloved fingers, he tugged her closer.

  She slapped his hand away and stepped back.

  "Open that pouch." The man in front of Hallie, who appeared to be the leader, indicated her reticule.

  He stood too close; his eyes were black and unyielding. The men's aggressiveness frightened her. She'd never seen women treated disrespectfully. This was what the papers called the untamed West. There was no law. No one would even hear the shots. They could die out here and not be found for days or weeks.

  Wisely, Hallie chose to open her bag and withdraw the contents. Three men darted forward, taking the other women's possessions. At the same time, one climbed inside the coach.

  The leader stuffed Hallie's money into his pocket. She swallowed her objections. It was only money, after all, and her life was more important.

  'Tom don't cry."

  Hallie stared into his black eyes, her heart jumping into her throat.

  "Do you talk?"

  She raised her chin without reply. He circled her slowly, keeping the gun pointed at her. Halfway around, she had to turn her head and wait for him to approach from the other side. The way he looked at her body sickened her and made her feel naked.

  "Lift your dress."

  She took a step back. "I beg your pardon."

  "You do talk." He lowered the gun barrel to the front of her open jacket and nudged the material where her blouse buttoned. "Lift your dress, or I will."

  Nervously, Hallie glanced at the others. The bandits searched Olivia and Evelyn's bodies roughly through their clothing, and the women screamed. Stoically, rather than have this man touch her the same way, Hallie raised her skirt and petticoats to her waist.

  He squatted and patted her cotton-clad hips and legs with gloved hands. She clenched her teeth, nausea suffusing her insides.

  Beside her, Olivia cried out and sprawled on the ground. The man wearing the black hat straddled her. Her red hair spilled across the dirt, and her skirts bunched beneath her.r />
  "Wait just a gol-durned minute!" Mr. Tubbs cursed from his prone position.

  The leader, still in front of Hallie, paused with a hand on her calf. She could see plainly that the bandit on top of Olivia had no intention of stopping. The others stood watch­ing.

  Hallie had a good idea of what that ruffian intended to do to Olivia, and it probably wouldn't take long until the rest of them figured it was a fine idea and stopped being spectators. The leader, crouching before Hallie, bracketed one of her thighs with his gloved hands. With a strength born of terror, she kneed him in the face, knocking his hat off and releasing her skirts.

  He yelped and dropped the gun, reaching for his nose and scrambling for balance.

  Before he could stand, Hallie grabbed the gun and aimed it at him, securing both trembling index fingers on the trig­ger.

  Since the bandanna was still tied across his face, only the top of his head, his black brows and obsidian eyes were visible. Hastily he grabbed his hat, jammed it over his black hair and stood, bright red blood soaking through the ban­danna. He backed away.

  "She won't shoot," said one of the others, now standing quietly.

  If she didn't, one of them would take the gun away from her and she'd be in an even bigger fix. Before she could think about it, Hallie turned the gun toward the man on Olivia and squeezed. The weapon jumped in her hands, jerked her shoulders and set her off balance. Acrid smoke curled from the barrel and Hallie steadied herself. The black hatted man clutched his arm and backed away. "Kill her!" he shouted to the others.

  Hallie's insides quaked and she waited for a bullet to impact with her skull. That shot had been a miracle. She could never shoot the rest before they killed her. A brief regret for the grief and shame she would cause her father and mother streaked through her head.