and lashes too thick to be real. Although little more than a child, she was already developing the shape of a woman. It was easy to see what Daniel was seeing. And her love of books was no strike against her with a bookworm like Daniel.
Evie had intended to make pallets in Daniel's room for the boys and put the girls on the floor in her room when dark came. But by that time the pain in Daniel's face was evident, and Manuel and Jose were bickering and had to be constantly separated. Resignedly, she directed Manuel to move the overstuffed chair in Daniel's room to her room, then sent him back to make a pallet for himself with Daniel. Carmen and the two youngest she installed in her own bed.
Tyler wasn't going to like it, but she hadn't seen more than his hat all day. Apparently a boat had been found somewhere, and the rescue mission had spread to stranded families throughout town. The hotel was filling with people. He couldn't object too mightily to just these children.
After they settled down to sleep, Evie folded her muslin gown and hung up her petticoats and donned her nightgown. She didn't fool herself by wearing chemise and pantalets beneath it. If Tyler was coming, he had enough to object to. She wouldn't give him more.
Removing a spare blanket from her trunks, she curled up in the chair and rested her feet on the seat of her bedroom chair. Tyler would have to find a place on the floor if he returned. For all she knew, he'd gone over to the saloon to fortify himself. She couldn't object. He hadn't wanted to marry her any more than she had wanted to marry him. She wasn't certain what their relationship could be called, but it certainly wasn't husband and wife. She wouldn't pamper him by playing a role they both knew to be false.
* * *
Tyler had to walk across sleeping bodies in the hall by the time he returned to the hotel. He was drenched to the skin and had survived the day on little more than black coffee and the flapjacks he'd had that morning. There was only one thing on his mind at the moment, and that was getting out of these clothes and into bed with Evie.
He had his coat and hat off and was starting on his shirt by the time he reached her room. Ever since he had returned from that federal prison camp to learn he no longer had a home or family, he had turned his back on the life he had known and created a new one. There wasn't any place in that life for a wife and children, but there was always a place for a woman in his bed. As long as he thought of Evie like that, he would do just fine.
The room was dark and silent when he entered, but Tyler hadn't expected anything else. It was late. He dropped his coat and hat on the floor, and stripped off the soaked shirt. He could see the outline of the dressing screen near the window, and he started for that, knowing he would find the washstand and towels there. He stumbled over an unexpected object, and his hand caught on the back of a chair that hadn't been there this morning.
Eyes adjusting to the dark, he glanced down to a pair of blanket-wrapped legs. He followed the blanket upward to thick chestnut hair falling over a white-clad shoulder huddled on a pillow laying over another chair arm. He knew only one woman in this world with hair as thick as that. Evie.
Cursing silently, Tyler sat down and removed his boots, then tiptoed to the bed. He didn't think Evie was the type to give up the comfort of her bed just to get even with him for some imagined wrong. He looked down at three sleeping heads and ran his hand through his hair. He hadn't known she was the mothering type either, but then, there was a hell of a lot he didn't know about Miss Evie Peyton.
He didn't like having those children in here. He didn't want anything to do with children. But he could see where she couldn't put them out for the night. Silently Tyler went behind the screen and stripped off the rest of his clothes. He didn't even have a clean shirt in here. He hadn't planned on an extended stay in town. His