Scandal at the Cahill Saloon - By Carol Arens Page 0,25
for Harlots was a success. It was plain as a penny that Massie would soon be returning home with a husband and a bright, shiny ring to lead the way.
It was for the best, really, that the opening of Leanna’s Place was off to a slow start. Her mind wasn’t as sharp as it ought to be this evening.
It hadn’t been for a couple of nights. The daytime hours passed easily enough, full of things to keep her mind focused. But when the sun set, so did sound thinking.
As soon as Cleve arrived for work, moths flipped about in her belly, the same as they battered the lamps hanging on the porch.
Every time he looked at her, and it was often, she felt his kiss warm her lips all over again.
The blush heating her cheeks was not the worldly image she sought to portray. How was she to play the part of a world-wise saloon keeper when it wasn’t only her mouth growing warm when he glanced at her with a secret and a smile.
She really ought to stop reliving that kiss in her mind, nurturing and polishing it as though it were a gold nugget.
Cleve had wanted a job, and had been very persuasive in applying for it. She ought to leave what had happened between them as simply that. A simple kiss, a onetime kiss.
The man was a flirt to the bone, she understood that, and still she couldn’t shake the feeling that there was quite a bit more to the kiss than “Won’t you hire me?”
In case the kiss hadn’t been enough to sway her, he had pointed out that Leanna’s Place needed a man for the sake of the ladies. He would watch over them in ways she might not be able to.
He’d taken on the role of champion to her girls. Maybe that is what made her feel so tenderly toward him, that made her long to kiss him again.
Just now Cleve leaned against the frame of the open front door with his arms folded across his chest, gazing out at the drippy night. His black suit and white shirt indicated that he was ready for business. His necktie was knotted in a bow of the latest fashion and his boots reflected the light of the lanterns hanging on each side of the door.
He looked polished, suave, a professional gambler to the core.
She and Cleve were alike in some ways. They weren’t fully what they appeared to be. How many women knew that beneath the natty clothing his muscles were firm and warm? How many knew that one of his kisses could melt the most tightly bound corset strings? How many guessed that the quick-fingered man of cards had an honest heart and that he cared for the plight of helpless women?
She didn’t want to guess how many women knew those things, but she knew them and they touched her. Cleve Holden was quickly winning a piece of her heart.
Cleve straightened away from the door, then crossed the room. He pulled out a chair at her poker table and sat down.
“It’s early,” he said. “Things are bound to liven up.”
“What do you think of the young man with Massie?”
Cleve plucked the cards from her fingers. He shot her the smile where one side of his mouth lifted slightly higher than the other and a pair of creases flashed in his cheek. “Let’s draw high card to see who gets to have a word with him.”
He shuffled the deck, then set the cards between them.
Leanna drew a jack of spades; Cleve claimed to have picked a queen of hearts.
“I’ll catch him on his way out.” Cleve shuffled again. “One more round?”
“What are we playing for?” She drew a card and left it facedown on the table.
“I draw high, you go riding with me.”
“And if I drew high?”
“I go riding with you.”
Leanna turned over the ace of clubs.
Somehow, Cleve pulled out the ace of diamonds.
“Imagine that?” he said with a lift of one brow.
“We go riding with each other,” she answered with her mind full of visions of a day alone with Cleve.
“You have a lovely blush.”
“I don’t…” How could she? She had never been the blushing type before.
She wasn’t able to argue against the telltale color in her cheeks because in that instant customers walked into the saloon.
Leanna stood. She tweaked the silk gathers of her skirt, then walked forward to welcome Willem Van Slyck, Cahill Crossing’s banker.