The Whippoorwill Trilogy - Sharon Sala Page 0,60

bolt. Ever since that gambler had been killed, she’d been impossible. He’d tried to tell her she couldn’t keep causing all that trouble or she’d put him out of business. She’d laughed in his face and then ordered Eulis to bring her a bath. Even Eulis was keeping his distance from the heart-broken woman who seemed hell bent on making everyone as miserable as she was.

He didn’t know that she’d lost the last bit of hope that had kept her going through all these years or that she no longer spent evenings out on her balcony listening for the whippoorwill’s call. All he knew was that she refused to sing. Pete pounded the keys of the piano as he’d always done, but without the accompaniment of Letty’s voice. Even the customers sensed all was not right at the White Dove, but the whiskey still flowed and the music still played, and if their luck was just right, they might get a dance with the soiled dove still flying at the White Dove Saloon.

But Letty wasn’t the only woman in the territory dealing with her grief in a manic way. Even though they didn’t know each other, Charity Doone was also a victim of the circumstance of men.

Ever since Charity Doone’s night with Randall Ward Howe, she’d been in a bad way. More than three days had passed since she had fainted in Beau James arms and she had yet to speak a word about what had happened to her. Her eyes were all but swollen shut from crying. She wouldn’t come out of her room, and she was refusing to eat.

Mehitable was beside herself with worry. She had coaxed and begged, promising Charity everything from a trip back East, to a ship’s ticket to Europe. Once, the very mention of such delights would have sent Charity running to pack, but no more. In Charity’s eyes, her future was ruined before it was over. Since she was no longer pure, being a nun was out of the question. And no decent man would have her now that she was no longer a virgin.

Mehitable was in a panic but she wasn’t the only one. The delay in going after Randall Howe was making Beau James nervous. With each passing hour, he feared the preacher was getting farther and farther away from justice. But Beau had also seen the state Charity was in. She would never have been able to travel, and leaving her alone seemed impossible, as well. He wanted to pack up and go after the man alone, wreaking his own kind of vengeance. But the fear that when he came back, Charity Doone would have done herself in, kept him here. Like Mehitable, he loved Charity enough to wait.

Charity had been trying all day to die.

It wasn’t as easy as she had believed. On the surface, it seemed simple. A simple cessation of breath and a few seconds later—blessed peace. But no matter how much she tried, she couldn’t hold her breath long enough to even pass out. So she’d tried bargaining with God instead.

She stretched out on the bed, crossed her arms across her bosom like a laid out corpse and closed her eyes. Maybe if she prayed the right prayer, God would just take her. In fact it would be better if it happened that way. She’d accomplished nothing by holding her breath except given herself a terrible headache, so she laid on her bed, trying to relax and waiting for God to do the deed for her. All she did was fall asleep.

She woke up later, still in her room, still on the ranch, and still yet a deflowered virgin ashamed to show her face. It would seem that even God had let her down. The disappointment was too much to bear. She lay silent and despondent, not knowing where to turn. She stared at a water stain on the ceiling until her eyes burned, and the longer she lay there, the angrier she became. Her anger began rising, pushing past her shame, building and building until, suddenly, her rage at Randall Howe spilled forth.

She leaped from her bed and began running in circles, sobbing and tearing at her hair. Across the room, a Cheval mirror reflected her momentary insanity. She stopped in mid-step, staring at the image without recognition. When it finally dawned on her that she was seeing herself, she snapped.

Grabbing the nearest object, which happened to be a Dresden figurine of a shepherd and