Harper's Bride Read online

  Melissa was a different story.

  When he came upstairs in the evenings for dinner and saw her standing at the stove, sometimes he wanted to turn around and run back down the steps. He found it so easy to take Rafe's matchmaking to heart. Carrying the scene a little further, he could envision a future with Melissa standing at the stove in another kitchen, the one he would build for her in Oregon with the money he'd earned. She would look beautiful—rested and happy, so different from the haggard, worn-out drab he'd met at the end of June. When she looked up at him, her gray eyes would hold a look of welcome, and the promise of something more intimate to follow. And there would be Jenny, a giggling toddler by then, and as blond as her mother, dragging around the wooden pull toy that he had whittled for her. He would never remember that he had not fathered her; in his mind she would be his and Melissa's. During the long winter nights in Oregon, he and Melissa would burrow deep into the warm bedding and explore each other's bodies with wonder, reverence, and passion. She and Jenny would be his family, one that he had made, one that loved him as his other had not.

  "Damn it," he swore aloud, and pushed away the tray, disgusted with himself. He was doing it again, painting that rosy, unrealistic picture in his head of an ideal life. Hadn't Melissa made it plain enough that the last thing she wanted now was a man? Who could blame her after what she'd been through? And what did he want with another woman? Elizabeth's greedy fickleness had cured him of the notion of settling down.

  All Dylan wanted was the chance to live a simple life, governed by his own rules and his own code, which were so different from Griffin Harper's. During their last confrontation, Dylan's enraged father had divulged something so staggering that upon hearing it, Dylan had felt as if he'd been punched in the stomach. Those words had been the last the old man spoke to him. Dylan had turned on his heel, packed up, and left behind a house furnished with stolen keepsakes and treasures, plunder taken from others less fortunate in loan foreclosures. Robber barons—that's what men like his father were called.

  He shook his head and wondered why he hadn't realized the truth before that moment. His brother, Scott, was a willing student of their father's cutthroat business practices, but Dylan had always felt like a stranger, the outsider in the family. The only thing he had in common with them was his last name.

  Dylan remained sitting at the counter with the plate of cold stew and his gloomy thoughts until the late July sky began to grow dusky. He knew he couldn't put off going upstairs any longer—it was almost ten o'clock. Sighing, he stood and grabbed his hat. Then he went to the corner of the store and picked up the bulky, tarp-draped shipment from the Athenian.

  *~*~*

  With Jenny asleep in her arms, Melissa pulled the rocker closer to the window and sat for a moment to look out on the rooftops of Dawson. The sun skimmed the far edge of the earth and touched the taller buildings with gold. Now that summer had ripened, for a few hours the sun would actually dip below the horizon and let the town sleep in full darkness.

  Watching the street, she decided that the milling throng of people on Front had diminished a bit over the last few weeks. Certainly, the circus atmosphere was still there—pianos jangled until morning, and men who'd worked hard in the gold fields all day came into town at night, eager to spend what they'd earned on a saloon girl or the turn of a card. The Novelty Theater featured a hootchie-kootchie girl named Freda Maloof, whose daring act consisted of a scarf dance, and the Oatley Sisters' Concern Hall packed customers in six nights a week. But every steamship that left Dawson carried away stampeders who had managed to scrape together the fare to return home.

  As Melissa sat and rocked, the gray and lavender shadows of the Arctic evening grew longer, and still Dylan didn't return. Behind her on the table, the place she had set for him waited, although she was certain the chicken she'd roasted had turned cold and dry over the past three hours. Too tired and anxious to eat anything herself, the meal would simply go to waste if he didn't return soon.

  Miserable, Melissa gripped the arm of the rocker. She knew it was her fault that Dylan hadn't come home. If she hadn't asked about Elizabeth Harper, he wouldn't have gotten angry enough to stay away. That had to be the reason he wasn't here now.

  What a stupid, nosy question she'd asked him, she thought. It was so unlike her to meddle in other people's business, but her curiosity had gotten the better of her. Well, she supposed it had been more than curiosity—a tiny demon of jealousy had prodded her. And a dreadful realization it was, that she would be jealous of a woman about whom she knew nothing. But Melissa had heard the ghost of an unmistakable yearning in his voice when he spoke of his brother's wife, and for an instant she'd wished that she was the one who held that place in his heart. That he was the father of the sleeping child she held against her breast.

  Finally, after the evening stars had begun to emerge, Melissa heard Dylan's boots on the stairs. She sat up straight in the rocker and listened intently. His footfalls were slower than usual, as if he were too tired or—please, no—too drunk to take the steps two at a time, as he often did. Outside on the landing, she heard a couple of loud thumps, like he'd sat down heavily, or staggered around and bumped into the wall. On the other side of the door he fumbled with the latch as though he couldn't remember how it worked—she knew that sound, she'd heard it often enough in her life. Oh, God, he must be drunk.

  With a shaking hand, she lit a match and held it to the wick in the oil lamp on the table next to her. Although Dawson had been wired for electricity, neither this room nor the store downstairs was equipped for the new technology. The lamplight filled the room with harsh brightness; if trouble was approaching, she wanted to see it coming.

  Despite the progress she'd made, her old fears and foreboding came rushing back over her like floodwaters after a storm. The last few weeks that she'd lived in relative peace hadn't been enough to make her forget a lifetime of hiding from an angry, drunken father, or her marriage to Coy, or completely convince her that Dylan would never hurt her, drunk or sober. Her palms damp with foreboding, she rose from the rocker and put Jenny down in her bed.

  No matter how drunk he might be, Dylan wouldn't hurt Jenny, she told herself; he liked Jenny. Her feverish thoughts fluttered around in her mind like trapped birds. Watching the door swing open, she took a deep breath, prepared for the worst.

  Then she saw the reason for Dylan's dragging footsteps and the thumping noises she'd heard on the landing. On his shoulder he carried a big canvas-draped object. She stood rooted to the floor, staring as he lowered his burden to the planking.

  Finally, he straightened and glanced at the waiting place setting on the table. "Um, sorry I missed dinner. I just . . . well, I can't explain—" He broke off and gestured at the canvas. "Anyway, I thought you might like this."

  Melissa took one step closer. He didn't seem angry any longer, and he certainly wasn't drunk. In fact, he appeared almost bashful. "What is it?"

  Jenny, awake now and watching the proceedings with great interest, followed Dylan's movements. It seemed to Melissa that the little girl fixed her blue eyes on Dylan's tall form whenever he was near. She wasn't the only one who did.

  "I didn't think it was right that the baby should have to sleep in that damned box." He pulled off the tarp to reveal an expensive-looking cradle.

  "Oh!" Melissa exclaimed and clasped her hands over her chest. She'd been prepared for the worst, but nothing in her experience had taught her to prepare for the best. "It's beautiful!" She crossed the floor in two steps and crouched beside the bed, extending a hand to caress the pale oak rails. She'd never seen a baby bed quite like it. Instead of having a base that rocked like her chair, this cradle hung suspended between two sturdy, fixed bases, allowing it to swing between them. Inside laid a snow-white feather tick and a lovely pale pink muslin quilt.

  Melissa's throat closed, and sudden tears stung her eyes. Her poor little Jenny, her baby, now had a proper bed to sleep in. She'd been born in a tent in the dead of a
howling Canadian winter to a frightened, exhausted mother and a lazy, bullying father. There had been no gifts for Melissa's child to welcome her to the world, no loving family of grandparents and aunts and uncles who vied to hold her, nurture her, guide her. Rather than the safe, downy nest a mother wanted for her child, Jenny's existence had been a precarious one.

  Until Dylan Harper had come along.

  "Do you think she'll like it?" He sounded uncertain—it was the first time she'd heard a note of hesitancy in his voice, and it surprised her. Everything about him bespoke a man who always knew exactly what to do.

  "Oh, yes, I know she will! She . . . I haven't been able to buy much for her." In truth, Melissa had longed to part with some gold to buy her baby a few things, but given Coy's outstanding debt to Dylan, she hadn't felt free to spend anything she earned, not even for necessities.

  Melissa looked up at Dylan now, and try though she would, she couldn't ignore his rugged appeal. He seemed as tall as a totem pole, and his sun-streaked hair gleamed in the lamplight. "Where in Dawson did you find something so nice?"

  Resting a hand on one end of the cradle, he said, "I didn't buy it here. I asked the captain of the Athenian to get it for me when he made his last run to Seattle. That's why I went down to the riverfront this afternoon—to pick this up."

  Melissa stood and gazed into his eyes. "Dylan, thank you," she whispered, clearing her tight throat. Unable to express the jumble of emotions she felt—relief, a mother's gratitude, guilt over her assumption that he was drunk, and one or two more she was afraid to examine too closely—she could say nothing more.

  "I hope maybe this will help make up for the lousy day you had," he murmured.

  "I've had days that were much worse," she answered, hearing the subtle change in the tone of his voice. It was warm, personal . . . intimate.

  Slowly, he took her hands in his own. Lifting them to his chest, he forced her to move closer and stand with her hands trapped between their bodies.

  With his touch the atmosphere around them became charged. In that instant the world seemed to contain only the two of them. Even Jenny, for a single moment, faded to the background, and Melissa's vision was filled with this green-eyed, sun-blond man. Suddenly, she felt hypnotized. She knew she ought to pull her hand away, but she had no desire to do so. Dylan's gaze skittered lightly over her face, connecting with her eyes, glancing over her mouth, her brow, her throat, searching, searching. She watched, unmoving, as he angled his head and lowered his face to hers, his lips parted and slightly moist.

  She did nothing but breathe in the scent of him and accept his kiss. It wasn't a kiss exactly—his lips just brushed over hers, lightly, teasingly. The sensation was like none she'd ever known—sweet, tender, exciting. Goose bumps raced over her scalp and down her back. She took a deep breath and a tiny moan formed in her throat.

  The sound jarred Dylan, and abruptly he broke off the kiss with a suddenness that was almost violent. He felt Melissa flinch. What the hell was wrong with him? This was exactly what he'd promised her would not happen that afternoon outside the Yukon Girl Saloon.

  But his body had made no such agreement. He felt his blood coursing through him, pounding to his groin where fierce arousal was in the making. His hair-trigger response was like that of a green kid instead of a grown man. What would he have done next? Given into his urge to wrap his arms around her and bury his face against her neck? And after that? He looked down into Melissa's startled face and released her hands.

  "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—"

  "Oh, but I didn't mi—that is, well, it's all right."

  "No, damn it, it isn't all right. And it won't happen again. I promised I wouldn't take advantage of"—he gestured around the room impatiently—"of this. Of you being here."

  Looking stricken, her face flamed with color. Obviously, he'd embarrassed her, and she was doing her best to cover it. Hadn't she suffered enough humiliation today? In her whole life? Whatever she might think of him, he wasn't about to have her think he was trying to seduce her by buying presents for her child.

  Yanking off his hat, he tossed it on the bed. It landed on the rice sack still firmly situated in the middle of the mattress. Shit. If that wasn't enough to remind him of their situation, maybe a horse kicking him in the head would do the trick. Not for the first time since Melissa had come to stay, he felt the confinement of this small room. He tried to tell himself it was because he didn't like sharing his privacy, but more often he realized the small quarters were making it harder to keep his word to her.

  "Shall we see how Jenny likes her new bed?" Melissa proposed as she fiddled with her cuffs.

  Grateful for the change of subject and activity, he jumped to agree. "Good idea." Dylan moved the cradle to the end of his bed, and Melissa retrieved Jenny from that damned crate that he so disliked.

  But after she laid the baby down on the new tick, the tension between them melted as they stood over the cradle and watched Jenny together, their arms brushing. He gave the bed a little push to start it rocking. The little girl smiled up at them, and Dylan felt a rush of tenderness greater than he'd ever known.

  Jenny was not his child, and Melissa was not his wife. They would never be his family.

  But right now he wished for all the world that he knew how to change that.

  *~*~*

  That night Melissa fell into bed, exhausted from the long, stressful day. But as she lay curled up against the sack of rice, waiting for sleep, she felt both contented and restless at the same time.

  From the beginning Dylan had made it plain that he had his own plans, and that he'd taken in Jenny and her as a simple act of temporary charity. And she had feared him as much as she had feared any man she ever knew; he could be violent and frightening and harsh.

  But not toward her. Time and again, he'd gone out of his way to do good things for her. When she thought of them—the clothes he'd bought, the rocking chair, the sign for her laundry, and now the cradle—why, no one had ever given her so much. Or been as thoughtful.

  Then tonight when he'd kissed her, she'd felt a wild quickening, an urge to respond. Rather than just enduring his caress, she'd wanted to take her hands out of his so that she could stroke his long hair and feel the muscles under his shirt. But he'd pulled back before she wanted him to. Even now she felt tempted to peek over the sack between them just for the pleasure of looking at him in the low light. In the relative quiet of this room, she listened to his breathing—he was so close, and she just knew he lay there in only his drawers with the sheet pulled up to his hips. She'd seen him thus many other times.

  Instead, she rolled over and punched her pillow with a long sigh.

  Fire, oh, she was playing with fire. For one thing, she didn't know for certain that Dylan was not somehow entangled with a woman back home. Indeed, she didn't know much about him at all, except that he was in exile from his family, just as she was. And like it or not, she was still Coy's wife. But even if she were not, and while Dylan might be as free as a bird, she knew that he valued his independence as much as his integrity.

  With this jumble of thoughts whirling in her head and plaguing her heart, she finally drifted off.

  Sometime later in the night, Jenny's cries pierced the layers of Melissa's exhausted sleep. She moved leaden limbs to tend her daughter, but when she hoisted herself to her elbows, she saw Dylan bending over the baby's cradle and carefully lifting her to his shoulder.

  "Hold on there, little Jenny," he whispered. "We'll let your mama sleep, okay? She had one hell of a day." The baby quieted immediately, and Melissa watched as he carried her to the rocking chair, where it sat in a shaft of moonlight. He wore only his drawers, and his hair brushed his bare shoulders. The noise in the street faded away, and Dylan rocked her child in his arms. They sat limned in silver. His hair looked almost white, and sharp shadows fell across his face as he smiled down at the baby and pressed a kiss to her forehead. When he spoke again, his whisper was as soft and light as a dandel
ion puff, as if he told a secret that only Jenny was meant to hear. "I love you, sweetheart."

  Melissa kept her silence and lay back against her pillow, her throat tight with emotion. She thanked God that Dylan Harper had found such tenderness and affection for her baby.

  Then she prayed that he might learn to feel it for her, too.

  Chapter Nine

  Two days later, Melissa sat down on a soap crate next to her washtubs and stared at the wet street, her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands. A soaking drizzle had fallen from the dull gray sky since morning, and it showed no signs of clearing. Pungent smoke from cook fires all over town hung in the air, held in place by the heavy clouds overhead.

  Fortunately, they'd had few rainy days; damp weather made her hard job even more difficult. Although she and her clotheslines were under the cover of a canvas awning Dylan had thoughtfully erected, the moisture-laden air kept the wet clothes from drying. Even her skirt was clammy nearly to her knees. Thank heavens Dylan had offered to let Jenny sleep in the store.