Claudia Dain (45 page)

"Why'd you kill him?"

"He deserved it."

"What
's
the rest of it?" Lane pressed.

"I'm dying," the old man said easily. "Couldn't wait no more for Tucker to do something where I could catch him. My time's up and I wasn't leaving the world with him still in it."

Lane studied the man in front of him. There was no reason for him to lie, and what he said fit in with other things he'd been finding out about Tucker and his land deals.

"What was your sister's name?" Lane asked.

"Mary Claire Hancock."

It was a name on his list. It fit.

"You going to string me up?"

The sheriff studied the foam on his beer and thought about it. "How long did you say you have?"

"I'll not make it to summer."

"Hell, I'm not going to waste county money on a trial for you," Charles said. "Besides, there ain't no evidence connecting you with Tucker."

The old man studied the sheriff with bright eyes and murmured, "Thank ye," before he ambled off to his corner of the saloon.

The sheriff bought him a fresh beer before he left.

* * *

"You don't tell her that was her pa, that's my advice," Miss Daphne said to her daughter as they walked home.

"I agree. No child needs to see her father killed. I wouldn't burden her with that," Nell said. "It sure is a strange ending though, isn't it?"

"I find much of what goes on in this world more than passing strange," Daphne said, "but the Lord's ways are mysterious. At least to me."

"Why, Ma, you hardly ever talk like this. You all right?"

Miss Daphne took one of Nell's hands and held it in her own. "I'm just sorry that it had to come to this for you. I sure thought the world of Tim Ross when you married him. It's not easy being that far wrong."

"It's so long past now, and we were all wrong," Nell said. "We couldn't have known he'd turn. He was a good man once."

"You were right to leave him. He would have ruined Anne," Miss Daphne said. "He would have ruined you." She gave Nell a quick squeeze of her hand.

"Well, not a one of us is ruined and it's mostly because of you."

"That's enough of that kind of talk. I didn't do any more than any mother would and you know that for a fact."

"True enough," Nell said. "But I thank you anyway."

"With you feeling this obliging, you might want to take a bit more advice from me today," Daphne said.

"My, you're
asking
me to take your advice? You really aren't yourself, are you?" Nell teased.

You hush," Daphne said, dropping Nell's hand. “You tell Anne that you left Tim. She's old enough to know the truth of that. It might even help her some."

"I think you're right. I'll tell her."

"And another thing."

"Here it comes."

"You tell Charles Lane that I won't have another wedding in my house until I have a better show of flowers. Poor Anne didn't even have daisies."

"You might need to tell him that yourself."

"Then I will," Daphne said as she climbed the porch steps. "Don't think I won't."

"Oh," Nell said with a smile as she followed her mother inside, "I know you will."

* * *

"Why did you do it?" Anne asked.

"You know why. There's no need for you to face all that," Jack said.

They were walking out toward the house, Jack limping and taking it slow. It was going to take them a while, but they had plenty of time.

"You didn't need to, you know."

"I surely did. Don't go telling me what my job is, Anne. I'm going to protect you whether you like it or not. I'd advise you to make up your mind to like it." He stopped and leaned against the wall of Powell's livery. "Why did you do it?" he asked softly.

"You know why," she said, looking up into his face. He sure was beautiful.
 
He surely was that sweet-eyed boy Martha O'Shaughnessy remembered. "I wasn't going to stand around and watch you get killed. I'm not going to lose you, you know, just make up your mind to it. I'm keeping you around."

"It was a hard thing you did today. You're going to be living with it a long time."

"Jack," she said, wrapping her arms around his waist and burying her face against his shirtfront, "as long as I'm living with you, I can live with anything. He wasn't worth spit and you... you," she said, tears filling her voice and flooding her eyes, "you need to do a better job of taking care of yourself. I can't always be around to fight your battles. You need to learn how to fight back. Some things are worth fighting for, you know."

"Yeah?" he said, wrapping his arms around her, watching the Walton kids playing in the street, smelling the tobacco of Powell's pipe somewhere behind him, hearing the whistle of a train just coming into town. "Like what?"

She lifted her face, her light blue eyes huge and fierce.

"Like us."

The End

Author’s Note

If you’ve wandered into this book first, you probably don’t know that Jack’s ancestors were first introduced in To Burn, a novel that takes place in Britain as the Roman legions have left the Romanized Britons to face the barbarian Saxon invasion alone. Melania and Wulfred begin Jack’s line.

In The Willing Wife, a romance set in 12
^th
century England, Nicolaa is a descendant of Wulfred and Melania and the ruins of Melania’s Roman villa are described in that book, the land still in Nicolaa’s control. In fact, the legend of Wulfred and Melania’s love is a story told in the halls of England at that time.

A Kiss To Die For brings the family line to a conclusion in Jack Scullard. Because Rowland was from France and held land there even after he married Nicolaa, Jack’s branch of the family tree settled in France permanently during the time of Cromwell in England. In the 1790s they emigrated to New Orleans, and in the mid-19
^th
century Jack’s parents moved to Texas to begin a new life. Jack was born in Texas.

While each book stands very much alone, I hope you’ll enjoy recognizing character traits that have been passed down from one generation to another. It’s a family tree anyone would be proud to be a twig on.

I should also mention for anyone familiar with The Courtesan Chronicles, my Regency England series, that if you recognized the names of Jack’s two friends, John Grey and Josiah Blakesley, you’re not losing your mind. These two men are the grandsons of the men introduced in The Courtesan’s Daughter, the first book in the Courtesan series. How these men ended up in America and became friends will be the subject of a future story.

Excerpt from

To Burn

by

Claudia Dain

© 2002, 2011 by Claudia Welch

Chapter 1

Melania tried moving her right leg to ease the cramping and banged her knee against the rough wall of the clay vent instead. Reaching down to rub the throbbing joint, she managed to wedge her hand against her rib cage so that she could hardly breathe and then scraped off half the skin on the back of her hand as she wrenched it free.

Through the funneling of the hypocaust, she could hear the scrape of movement above her. And the crackle of fire. It would be wonderful to bake herself warm in front of a fire, her very own fire in her very own house, its light warming the room as much as its heat. It was very cold in the underground hypocaust and very dark.

Her father was dead. This she knew. She had heard the full-throated cry, like wolves howling in animal unison; she knew it meant the Saxons had won. In the winning, they would have killed. It was their way.

Was it night? Probably. They had attacked at the cusp of daylight and darkness. It must be full dark now or perhaps even morning. She had no sense of the passage of time. She knew only that the raging heat of her fury had hardened to a cold knot of revenge fed by pride.

They would not gain victory over her, and they would never defeat Rome. She was hidden according to her father's plan. Let them think they had won. She had eluded them and they didn't even know it.