Beautiful Bad Man by Ellen O'Connell Read Free Book Online Page B

about us and the wedding,” she said. “You promised us a story.”
    Norah had decided on the whole story except for a few details about the visit from Preston and his men and how nasty her conversation with Sutton had turned at the end.
    At first Mabel and Becky interrupted with exclamations and questions, but before long the whole Carbury clan sat silent around the table, listening.
    “So that’s why I could bake oatmeal bread,” Norah finished. “At least for a few more weeks, I’m eating as well as Mr. Van Cleve. In fact I suspect I’m eating his food and burning his wood.”
    Her audience came out of its collective trance and began reaching for coffee cups, finishing the last of their slices of oatmeal bread.
    “I can’t believe it,” Mabel said finally. “One of Van Cleve’s men, I mean. They don’t look like the kind who feel obligations the way ordinary folks do, much less try to repay.”
    “Well, this one does,” Norah said. “Of course he didn’t give a hoot how I felt about it. He decided what he wanted to do and did it.”
    Less curious and more prosaic than his womenfolk, Archie said, “So you have provisions and you’re safe from Van Cleve for a while. How are you going to get by when what he gave you runs out? You don’t want his kind hanging around. Once we get you to town, you stay there. Sell out to Van Cleve and you can live on that long enough to find yourself a good man.”
    Archie Carbury didn’t usually hand out unsolicited advice, and Norah wished he hadn’t bothered this time. For one thing, there was no chance at all of Caleb Sutton hanging around. He’d probably turn in the other direction and put spurs to his horse if he saw her again.
    For another — “Joe hasn’t even been gone three months. I’m not looking to remarry so soon, maybe ever.”
    “You should be,” Archie said, getting to his feet with a grunt. “If Becky here can find someone to put up with her, so can you. You’re still a young woman.”
    With that he led the parade of his sons back to work.
    After washing dishes and putting the kitchen to rights, silent except for a few words about the chores, the three women sat at the table with cups of coffee and shared the last of the oatmeal bread.
    “There’s nothing for me in town,” Norah said. “I don’t want to sell to the man who killed Joe, I don’t want to live in town, and I don’t want another husband.”
    Mabel patted her hand. “I understand, but what can you do? Archie’s right, you know.”
    Archie’s rightness was one of the pillars of Mabel’s existence, and Norah had to admit Archie was no fool.
    Becky’s face lit up with excitement, and she set her cup down so hard Norah looked to see if it or the saucer had broken. Oblivious to Norah’s concern or her mother’s tsk of disapproval, Becky said, “I know. I know what you can do.”
    Her face fell as fast as it had lit up. “Oh, except you wouldn’t want to. No one would I guess.”
    “What could I do that I wouldn’t want to do?” Norah asked.
    “Ethan told me Mrs. Tindell is looking for a housekeeper again. They’re taking bets in town how long a new one will last.”
    Mabel gathered their plates and cups and slid them in the wash pan. “That’s why no one would want to do it. She’s been through half a dozen girls that I know of and not one of them was good enough for her. She works them to death and complains day and night they don’t do anything right. You know at least some of those girls were good workers. If you don’t want to marry again so soon, we can find you something else.”
    “Like what,” Norah said. “A job working in Mr. Tindell’s saloon instead of his house? He never — bothered the girls who worked at the house, did he?”
    “Heavens, no. He’s as afraid of that mean old woman as anyone else. She’s the problem, not him or the sons.”
    “Did you ever wonder if part of the problem is that he owns the saloon?” Norah said. “Sometimes I