Page 48 of A Steadfast Heart
“Do you even care what this will do to Tillie?”
Her shoulders twitched, but she didn’t answer, didn’t look up. A tear slipped down her cheek.
He paused. That didn’t make sense. If she wanted to leave, why was she crying? “Why, Kaitlyn? Why are you packing?”
She shook her head, keeping her face tilted downward. Everything inside him tensed, sharpened. He needed to see her eyes. “What did the marshal say?”
Another tear slid down her cheek.
“Kaitlyn, sweetheart?—”
She looked up, and his blood froze in his veins. Her tear-streaked face was white, her gaze bright with fear.
“Tell me what’s wrong. Please, sweetheart. I need to know.”
“I can’t.” She turned the trunk to face her and picked up another dress. Her hands shook as she folded it, or attempted to fold it. When she placed it in the trunk, it sprawled across the open space.
“You have to. Have you thought about what your leaving will do to Tillie?” He strode around the bed, then paused. She was afraid. He didn’t want to scare her more. He took her hands and gently pulled her toward him. A shudder shook her.
She met his gaze. More tears joined the first. “You don’t understand.”
“Then explain it.”
She took a deep breath. “It’s my brother. It always is. My own personal nemesis.”
He wiped a tear from her face. She stilled, but didn’t pull away. “And Danna, I’d guess, since she was here. What did she say?”
“Michael sent a telegram. To her office. He knows where I am. He knows about you. And probably the kids.” She bit her lip, slipped away from him, and reached down to drop a folded dress into the trunk. If only her hands would quit shaking.
He took the dress out, dropped it back on the bed. It landed in disarray. Good. That would slow down her packing. He caught her hands in his, then closed the trunk. “You’re not leaving. We’re facing this together. You might as well tell me. I can always ride into town and find out myself.”
She sighed. “It said I wasn’t in my right mind, that I couldn’t have agreed to marriage. That you coerced me into marriage.”
“Coerced?” Drew’s brows furrowed.
“And the town knows what the wire said.”
A tingle ran down his back. He needed the town’s goodwill if they were going to help him prove up Ed’s homestead. He shook his head. Coercion was just too far-fetched. “Knowing he said it and believing it are two different things.”
She pulled her hands from his, then opened the trunk. “You don’t understand my brother. He always finds a way to get what he wants.”
The tingle along his spine chilled. Kaitlyn had chosen to face a three-day trip on a train to a place she didn’t know to marry a man she’d never met. She didn’t give into fear easy. “Give me an example.”
She spun back around, and the hope in her eyes nearly did him in. Had no one ever asked so simple a question? He swept the trunk and clothing out of the way and sat on the mattress, pulling her to sit next to him.
“You know he wanted me to marry his friend.”
Drew nodded.
“It was the same man I hid from when I was sixteen.” She pressed a fist against her mouth, then lowered it. “Brian bought up Michael’s gambling debts, promised he would forgive them the day we wed.”
Drew bit back a curse. “He’d sell his sister for the price of debts he ran up himself?”
She nodded, yet another tremor passing through her. How much of her life had she spent in fear of her brother? “Has he always been this way?”
She tilted her head, considering. “He was twelve and I was six when I caught him laughing while he whipped my pony.” She shuddered and her eyes filled with tears. “Blood ran down poor Buttercup’s flanks.” Her gaze hardened. “I tackled him and took the whip away.”
“You were Tillie’s age? You shouldn’t have been able to do that.”
