And she ignored the sensitive currents that raced up her arm when he gripped her hand and shook it as if she were another man. Were foolish schoolgirl feelings going to pop up now when she least needed them? And when to show them would embarrass both her and this complex man?
* * *
Brennan halted the team outside the narrow storefront. In the window, a small white placard read simply Government Office and beneath that a smaller placard—Agent Present. He went around and helped Miss Rachel down. She looked sturdier than she felt as he assisted her. She was such a little bit of a woman—with such big ideas.
He seriously doubted she would be allowed to register for a homestead. The idea was crazy. Still, he asked, “Do you want me to come in with you?”
She looked up at him with a determined expression, her large gray eyes flashing and direct. “No, I can handle this myself.”
He listened for any sign she might want him to accompany her. But he caught only a shade of tartness in her tone. He accepted her decision. He didn’t like people hovering over him either. “Then I’ll be going to find me a room.”
“Very well. If I am not here when you need me, look for me at the General Store.” Without waiting for his reply, she marched to the door and went inside. He wondered idly why she never wore any lace or pretty geegaws. And she skimmed her hair back so severely. Didn’t she want to look pretty?
He stood a moment, staring after her. Northern women were different all right and up to now, Miss Rachel stood out as the most different he’d met. Lorena’s biddable face flickered in his mind, stinging as it always did. He walked resolutely away from the starchy Yankee and his own taunting memories.
He paused, scanning the lone dusty street for a likely place to ask for a room. This little dot on the shore of the Mississippi hadn’t progressed to having a boardinghouse yet.
Whom could he ask? Then he noticed the saloon at the end of the street, the kind of place where he always found an easy welcome—as long as he had money in his pocket.
No doubt it would irritate Miss Rachel if he went in there. So he strode toward it, reveling in the ability to walk down a street healthy once again. He pushed through swinging doors into the saloon, almost empty in the late morning. A pudgy older man leaned back behind the bar.
“Mornin’,” Brennan greeted him.
“What can I do for you?” the man replied genially.
Brennan approached the bar. “I’m new in town, need a room. You know any place that’d be good for me to ask at?”
They exchanged names and shook hands.
“You’re from the South?” Sam, the barkeep, commented.
“Yeah.” Though bristling, Brennan swallowed a snide reply.
After eyeing him for a few moments, Sam rubbed his chin. “Most shopkeepers have family above their place or build a cabin behind their business. Got a blacksmith-farrier in town. Single. Think he’s got a loft empty. Can’t think of anybody else that has room.”
“Don’t have many businesses in this bump in the road,” Brennan drawled, leaning against the bar, suddenly glad to have someone more like him to talk to. The Whitmores were good folk, but he had to watch his errant tongue around them.
Sam smirked. “You got that right.”
A look of understanding passed between them. Brennan drew in a deep breath. “Thanks for your advice about the room.”
“Glad to help. Drop in some evening and we’ll have a tongue wag.”
After nodding, Brennan headed outside. Miss Rachel probably hadn’t finished in the government office yet. So under the hot sun, he ambled toward the log-constructed blacksmith shop. The clang of metal on metal announced a smithy hard at work. Would the blacksmith be anti-Southerner, too?
He entered the shady interior and fierce heat rushed into his face. A broad-shouldered man in a leather apron pounded an oblong of iron, shaping it into some long-handled tool, sparks flying. Finally, after plunging the tool into a barrel of water, the sweating blacksmith stepped back from his forge. Over the sizzling of the molten iron meeting cold water, he asked, “What can I do for you, stranger?”
Brennan moved forward and offered his hand. “Name’s Merriday. Ah’m lookin’ to rent a room.”
Pulling off leather gloves, the blacksmith gripped his hand briefly. Brennan felt the power of the man in that grip.
“You sound like you’re from the South,” the man observed.
“I am.” Brennan said no more, though smoldering.
“Comstock’s my name. Levi Comstock,” the tall man said. “How long you staying here?”
“A few months maybe.” These few words cost him. He never spent a month in any place anymore. The disorienting flashes of memory and restlessness always hit him after a few weeks. He hoped in Canada he could finally settle down. But I owe Miss Rachel. “You got room for me?”
The blacksmith studied Brennan.
Brennan didn’t like it and pressed his lips together to keep back a nervy comment that itched to be said.
The man finally nodded toward a ladder. “I built me a lean-to to sleep in for the summer. Get the breeze off the river. Not using my loft now. It’ll be hot up there. I’ve been meaning to cut out two small windows for some air. Maybe you could do that.”
“How much do you want a week?”
“Four bits?” Comstock asked.
“That’s all?”
The man’s blackened face split into a grin. “You ain’t seen the loft yet. No bed. Just a dusty floor.”
“And two windows when we cut them.” Brennan knew he’d just taken a liking to this practical man and dampened down the lift it sparked in him. He’d be here only as long as Miss Rachel needed him. Then he’d move north and get settled before winter. The two men shook hands.
“When you moving in?”
Brennan considered this. “Soon. Maybe tomorrow.”
“See you then.” The smith turned back to his forge.
Brennan stepped outside and gazed around at the nearly vacant main street and sighed. What would he do in this little berg for a few weeks? And how was Miss Rachel faring with the land agent? He headed toward the office. Maybe Miss Rachel needed some backup by now.
* * *
Just inside the door of the government office, Rachel paused to gird herself for battle, quelling her dislike of contention. She knew she faced one of the the biggest battles of her life, here and now.
The small, middle-aged man in a nondescript suit behind a small desk rose politely. “Miss?”
She smiled her sweetest smile and went swiftly forward. “Good day, sir. I am Miss Rachel Woolsey.” She never used sir. Quakers didn’t use titles. But she couldn’t afford to be Quaker today. After she told him what she’d come for, she was going to brand herself odd enough as it was. Their hands clasped briefly.
“Please take a seat and tell me what I can do for you, Miss Woolsey.”
She sat primly on the chair he had set for her and braced herself. “I’m here to stake a claim.”
Shock widened the man’s pinched face. “I beg your pardon.”
“I am here to stake a claim,” she repeated, stubborn determination rearing up inside.
“Your husband is ill?” he asked after a pause.
Hadn’t she introduced