Prairie Fire Read online

  The auburn-haired beauty who had penetrated Jack’s solitude stirred something inside him. Women had a certain softness about them, he recalled. A musical sound to their voices. A magic to their walk. He remembered now the whisper of silk skirts against petticoats. The fragility of a single curl at rest against a blushing cheek. The touch of a slender finger to the hollow of an ivory throat.

  Miss Caitrin Murphy was certainly among the prettiest women Jack had ever seen. In fact, she might be perfect—except for that tongue of fire. Clearly she was no velvet-petaled flower just waiting to be plucked. The woman had thorns. Sharp, prickly spikes.

  She had labeled him wicked. Called him trouble. Sit down, Mr. Cornwall. Wait here, Mr. Cornwall. Don’t be ridiculous. And what was that business about his soul needing a good cleansing?

  High and mighty is what she was. Bossy, too. Just the sort of female to avoid.

  “Now then, Mr. Cornwall,” Caitrin Murphy said as she stepped into the barn, a wicker basket looped over one arm and a pail of water in the other hand. “I shall set you right, as a good Christian woman should. And then I’ll rejoice at the sight of your backside heading out of Kansas.”

  “My pleasure,” Jack returned. “I wouldn’t live in a place like this for love nor money.”

  “And we wouldn’t want you.” She set down the pail and basket. “All the talk in the soddy is about you, so it is. ‘That wicked Jack Cornwall attacked our Seth and tried to steal little Chipper,’ says Sheena. ‘Good riddance to bad rummage,’ says Jimmy. You can thank the good Lord there’s a flurry of tucking the wee brablins into bed or I’d never have made off with this food. Here, I brought you a loaf of bread, some apple cider, and a sausage.”

  She set the food in Jack’s lap and busied herself with the water pail. He stared for a moment in disbelief. He had left home with twelve dollars in his pocket. When that ran out, he had resorted to eating what he could shoot or pick from kitchen gardens. But fresh bread? A whole sausage? And apple cider?

  He picked up the loaf and tore off a hunk. The yeasty aroma beckoned, the crisp brown crust crackled, the center was spongy to his touch. He put the chunk in his mouth and closed his eyes. Bread.

  “You like it?” Caitrin asked.

  When he looked up, she was studying him, her head tilted and her eyes shining. Green eyes. Long dark lashes. He took another bite.

  “It’s good,” he said.

  “I baked it myself.” Her lips curved into an impish smile. “Wouldn’t my sister have a fine fit if she knew I was feeding our bread to Jack Cornwall? Sheena and I bake the loaves for sale, you see. There’s a little mercantile across Bluestem Creek on the Hunter homestead. Rosie and I market goods to the travelers passing down the road.”

  “Rosie?”

  “Rosie Mills. She’s to be Seth’s wife, so she is.”

  “Wife?” Jack frowned, thinking of his sister Mary and how deeply—and foolishly—she had loved Seth Hunter.

  “Sure, it happened tonight after the ballyhooly died down,”

  Caitrin explained. “Rosie loved Seth all summer, and he loved her, too. But they were both too blind and stubborn to admit it. This evening she tried to leave on the stagecoach, but Seth fetched her back again and announced to everyone that she was to be his wife. So all is well, and in a few weeks’ time, Seth will have a lovely wife, and Chipper will have a mama to call his very own.”

  Jack stiffened. “Chipper’s mama—his one and only mama—was my sister Mary.”

  Caitrin wrung out a rag and took a step closer. “Take off your shirt, Mr. Cornwall. And while you do, I trust you will bring to mind the sad circumstance of your sister’s death. Seth told us about the loss of his wife and your sister, and I’m sorry for it. But life does not always unfold as we wish.”

  “What do you know about life?”

  Her eyes flashed as he shrugged off his shirt and tossed it onto the hay pile. “I know a great deal about life,” she said. “Life is about losing, letting go, and moving on. I have lost more than a man like you could ever understand. I have lost love. Hope. Dreams. Everything I had lived for. But I did not go off in a rage of bitterness and revenge as you did, Mr. Cornwall. I am Caitrin Murphy. You destroy. I create.”

  She pursed her lips and began washing the bloody wound on Jack’s shoulder. At the touch of the wet rag, flames of pain tore through his flesh, searing deeply into muscle and bone. He knotted his fists and stared down at the tips of Caitrin Murphy’s shiny black slippers. Could this sharp-tongued snippet of a woman possibly be right? Had his life become a path of vengeance and destruction—a path so narrow he could find no room to turn around?

  “You’re a fiery little thing, you know that?” he said. “Aren’t you the least bit afraid of me … big ol’ blazing Jack Cornwall roaring into town and scaring the living daylights out of everybody?”

  She gave a shrug as she began working on his back. “Fiery Caitrin Murphy and blazing Jack Cornwall. Sure, we’re a matched pair, the two of us. But where I’ve given myself to God to be used as his refining fire, you’re naught but a swirling, raging, blustering prairie fire bent on destroying everything in sight.”

  “Fire’s fire,” Jack hurled back. “I’m a blacksmith by trade, and I know my business. Don’t pride yourself, Sparky. One flicker of that refiner’s fire can set a prairie aflame.”

  “Or draw precious gold from raw ore. ’Tis all in how a person chooses to make use of his fiery spirit, Mr. Cornwall. A contained blaze is a good thing, but you’re a wildfire out of control. You need taming.”

  “Fight fire with fire, as they say.” He touched the woman’s arm. “Maybe you want to try taming me, Miss Murphy?”

  “Wicked man. ’Tis no wonder they call you a devil.” She pushed his hand away, rinsed the rag, and began to wash again. “This wound is frightful. Sure, you must get yourself to a doctor, Mr. Cornwall. You might lose this arm, and then where will you be with your blacksmithing?”

  “I don’t need a doctor. Couldn’t pay one even if I did.”

  “You have no money? But what have you been doing all the years before now?”

  “Fighting.”

  “A soldier? Then a doctor will surely see you at no charge. You did battle for the honor and glory of your country.”

  “I’m a Confederate. I fought to save the South from the aggression of Yankees like Seth Hunter. No Kansas abolitionist doctor will treat the likes of me.”

  “Well, I’ve just come from Ireland, and I don’t know much about your war and your silly politics.” She dropped the stained rag back into the bucket. “But I do know you’ll find better medicine at an apothecary than you will on Jimmy O’Toole’s homestead. Here’s a salve he uses on his sheep when they’ve got the fly. You must keep it near and use it often. And I brought clean bandages.”

  Jack studied the pile of lace-edged fabric strips she pulled out of her basket. “These are bandages? They look more like handkerchiefs.”

  “They were once a petticoat stitched by my own hand and edged in fine Irish lace. I could find nothing else to serve the purpose.”

  She handed Jack a swath of white linen and a crock of salve. “You tore up your petticoat?” he asked.

  “’Twas an earthly treasure.” With a shrug, she took his elbow and unhooked the lamp. “Come with me, Mr. Cornwall. You must sleep in safe hiding tonight. Perhaps Jimmy will take it into his head to check on his mules. Here’s a little storage room the dear man built for me under the loft. We take more goods in trade than we can possibly display in the mercantile, so I use this room to stockpile the surplus. By the by, I shall thank you not to steal any of our inventory tomorrow when you leave. I keep careful records, and I shall know what’s missing.”

  Using the key that hung from a ribbon around her neck, she unlocked the door to a tiny room stacked with bulky flour sacks and tinned goods. After spreading a pallet of quilts on the floor, she arranged a few things beside it. The bandages, salve, sausage, and bread she set into the basket. Then
she rummaged around in her storage boxes and took down a comb, a razor, a small hand mirror, and a cake of soap. Finally, she lifted the lid of a square biscuit tin.

  “Take this, Mr. Cornwall,” she said, bringing out a handful of money and setting it into his palm. “It’s my part of the earnings from the mercantile. I haven’t much use for it out here on the prairie. Get yourself to a doctor, sir.”

  Caitrin turned toward the door, but Jack stepped in front of it, blocking her path. A look of dismay crossed her face as she realized he had trapped her inside the room. The light in her green eyes faded … to be replaced by a flicker of fear that Jack had seen all too often in his years on the battlefield. He didn’t budge.

  “Tell me something, Miss Caitrin Murphy,” he said. He held up the wad of folded bills. “Why? Why’d you do this?”

  “I told you, I … I have little use for money.”

  “I don’t believe that.” He took a step toward her. “Nobody does something for nothing. What’s your motive?”

  She swallowed hard. “Mr. Cornwall, I must go. Sheena will be looking for me. If Jimmy finds you—”

  “Tell me!” He grabbed her wrist. “Nobody ever gave me anything for free. Now why’d you do it? Tell me.”

  “Because … because I found you here … and you’d been injured.”

  “Pity?”

  “Only the weak are to be pitied.” As she said the words, a strength seemed to fill her, and she lifted her chin. “I helped you because I am a child of God, and so are you. You were created for good, for a future and a hope. Though you may have burned out of control in your life, you are still precious to the Father. And because of him—with his love—I love you, Mr. Cornwall.”

  Before he could respond, she slipped around him and squeezed through the door. Jack stood for a moment, stunned, as if a bolt of lightning had shot through his head and come right out his boots. And then he shook off the daze, made a dash across the barn floor, and caught the woman by her arm.

  Clapping her hand over her mouth, she stifled a cry. Her eyes widened in fear, and a curl of auburn hair tumbled to her shoulder. Jack didn’t care if he scared her. Didn’t care what she thought. Didn’t care about anything but knowing. Knowing for sure.

  “What did you say?” he demanded.

  Breathing hard, she searched his face. “I said, you are precious to the Father.”

  “Not that part. What you said after. Say it.”

  “With the Father’s love, I … I love you.”

  “Again.”

  “Why must I? Surely you’ve heard those words before!”

  He stared at her, tongue-tied, trying to make sense of things. And then her face softened. The tension slipped off her shoulders.

  “Oh, Mr. Cornwall,” she murmured. Reaching out to him, she touched his injured shoulder with her fingers, and then she ran their tips down the length of his bare arm. Her green eyes softened and filled with a warm light that radiated to the smile on her lips.

  “You are precious to the Father, Mr. Cornwall,” she said, squeezing his hand. “Hear the words and believe them in your heart. You are precious, and with his love, I love you. I love you.”

  She held the lamp before her as she turned again. Then she moved away from him, out of the barn, out of reach. The golden light faded, and he was left again in darkness.

  CHAPTER 2

  CAITRIN rolled over on the corn-husk mattress and gathered her niece in her arms. Young Erinn barely stirred. In the same bed, four-year-old Colleen snored softly against her auntie’s shoulder, while tiny Jamie lay snuggled at their feet. At two, Jamie was already a bright, clever child, and Caitrin loved him dearly. Resting her cheek against Erinn’s bright copper hair, Caitrin gazed out the window at the rising sun.

  Jimmy had left the house well before dawn, and Sheena was already outside gathering eggs for breakfast. Will still slept in his parents’ bed, but baby Mollie was stirring and beginning to coo. A wonderful family, the O’Tooles. Caitrin felt blessed that her sister had welcomed her into their crowded household after her long journey from Ireland. Busy with the mercantile and consumed by her chores, she had been happy enough … until last night.

  Her thoughts turned again to the man who had trespassed into Jimmy’s barn. Jack Cornwall had evoked the only welling of emotion inside Caitrin since she left Ireland. Moving through life with numb determination had kept her from facing the pain of losing the man she had planned to marry. But Cornwall’s intrusion into her safe little world had sparked a conflagration of feelings … feelings she didn’t want and couldn’t seem to stuff away again.

  Fear. Oh, he had frightened her. Lying there in the hay, shadowed by darkness, he had scared her half-balmy. And then later, when he caught her arm, blocked her path, and chased after her through the barn, she had known the taste of terror. After all, the man was a criminal. He had shot at Seth Hunter more than once. Rumor had it, he’d even spent time in a Missouri jail.

  Aversion. When had she last seen a man so greatly in want of a cake of soap and a tub of hot water? He must have been on the trail for months, with little food, no place to sleep, and the definite lack of a place to wash. Jack Cornwall carried on him the scent of horses, tobacco, and dust. His wound had horrified her, too. She could not imagine how such an injury could heal unless he saw a doctor and agreed to rest. The touch of his blood on her fingertips … the scent of his leather jacket … the warmth of his calloused hand …

  Caitrin closed her eyes, remembering. What was that other emotion the man had aroused in her? She could hardly put a name to it. Confusion? Dismay? Fascination? Yes, that was it. He had fascinated her. Intrigued her. His voice was deep and resonant, almost husky coming to her out of the darkness. He spoke of himself with firmness, certainty, even pride. And those shoulders! But of course—he was a blacksmith. Even now, the image of Jack Cornwall’s shoulders was planted firmly in her memory. Broad they had been, woven with thick sinew, and as hard as flint. Sure, the man had been blessed with enough muscle for two.

  Caitrin opened her eyes and studied the rosy light filtering into the soddy. Jack Cornwall would be long gone by now, far to the east, heading for Missouri and his family. She hoped he would find a doctor. And forgiveness. Hope. Love.

  Father, please send Jack Cornwall someone who will love him, she prayed silently as she hugged Erinn’s warm little form. Let him hear the words again and again until his dark, empty heart is filled with the certainty of love. And, Father, may he find you. May he know the taming of your …

  “Jack Cornwall’s here!” Jimmy shouted, bursting through the door into the soddy. His hair stood out on his head like a red flame, and his green eyes flicked around the soddy from bed to bed.

  “Where’s Sheena? Gather the children! Caitrin, are you still abed? Get up! Get up, everyone!”

  The baby burst into a wail like a banshee. Erinn jerked awake and grabbed Caitrin in a stranglehold about the neck. Colleen tumbled out of bed, hitting the floor with a thud. And then she began to howl.

  “Caitrin!” Jimmy hollered over the hubbub. “You must bar the door. Hide the brablins. I’m after Sheena.”

  “Jimmy, wait!” Caitrin struggled out of bed, Erinn still hanging from her neck. “Jack Cornwall walked away from the Hunter homestead after the fistfight last night. Everyone saw the man leave. How can you say he’s here?”

  “His devil of a horse! ’Tis hobbled out behind the barn, so it is.”

  “Sure, you must be mistaken.” A wash of chills skidded down Caitrin’s spine. She swallowed. “Have you searched the barn?”

  “That I have, and he’s nowhere to be found. Not a sign of the sherral but his horse. I fear he’s stolen away my Sheena.”

  “Oh, Papa!” Erinn burst into tears.

  “Now then, lass,” Caitrin said, prying the child from her neck and looking straight into the pair of fearful green eyes. “If Mr. Cornwall’s horse is hobbled behind the barn, he won’t have gone away with your mama, will he? You must calm you
rself, Erinn.” She turned to her brother-in-law. “Jimmy, how can you frighten the children so?”

  “Where is Sheena then?”

  “She went to fetch eggs for breakfast. Have you looked in the coop?”

  “The coop! Sure, I’m a fair googeen this morning.” Jimmy picked Colleen up off the floor and set her firmly on the bed. “Caitie, bar the door. Will, stand guard with the shotgun.”

  Jimmy thrust the double-barreled weapon into his son’s arms. Just as quickly, Caitrin grabbed it away. “What can you be thinking, Jimmy O’Toole? The boy is only six!”

  “Look, there’s Mama!” Erinn cried out, pointing to the soddy window.

  Caitrin and Jimmy raced to the window to discover the plump little woman sauntering toward the house, a basket of eggs over her arm and a smile on her lips. The ribbons on her bonnet fluttered in the morning breeze as her skirt danced like a flag. On a whim, she set the basket of eggs on her head and broke into a little Irish jig, her feet deftly picking out a set of jaunty steps.

  “Glory be to God, Sheena!” Jimmy roared through the open window. “Get your backside into the house, woman. There’s trouble afoot!”

  Sheena’s head jerked up, and the basket toppled. Caitrin sucked in a breath as it fell … but Sheena reached out and caught it before it hit the ground. Clutching her prize to her stomach, she glared at her husband.

  “The eggs, you old goat!” she shouted. “I nearly dropped them.”

  “Jack Cornwall is here. On our farm!”

  “Awkk!” Sheena’s hands flew up, the basket tumbled, eggs bounced to the ground and broke open. She grabbed her skirts, lifted them knee high, and raced to the soddy. “Cornwall! Lord save us, Cornwall!”