She saw doubt blink in his gaze and jumped on it with hope. “Yes, it is, Adam. You try as hard as you want to help others, you study without sleep, but you’ll never find what you’re looking for.” She smiled, hoping she was hurting him. “There’s no fire inside you. No man beneath the blood and bone. You look whole, but the war crippled you as surely as if you’d returned on crutches.”
“That’s a lie!”
“Then prove it,” she challenged. “Take me in your arms and kiss me. Take me to your bed, and we’ll seal our marriage right now. You’ll never find anyone more beautiful or more generous once we’re married. Take me in your arms and prove you’re a man. Prove you’re a man with an ounce of passion running in your blood.”
She held her arms open as if she were a saint sacrificing herself to save one poor soul.
“Stop it!” Adam turned away in disgust.
Bergette pulled the laces of her bodice open, revealing most of her well-powdered breasts as she moved before him once more. “Go ahead, prove you’re a man, Adam. Take me.”
“Get out, Bergette.”
His whisper was so low Nichole barely heard him but she could feel the anger in him from a room away.
“What’s the matter?” Bergette leaned forward, knowing the front of her dress would pull open slightly. “Haven’t you ever had a woman? Don’t worry, I’ll teach you what to do. I didn’t spend all the war locked away waiting for you.”
“Get out,” he said again in controlled fury.
“Or are you afraid you can’t satisfy me? You’re not man enough to even kiss me. Wait until everyone hears about you back home. One of the McLains isn’t a man at all but only a shell.”
Adam stood and opened the door with forced slowness. “Good day, Bergette.”
Bergette laughed. “You can’t even bring yourself to kiss me. I feel so sorry for you, Adam.”
“Good-bye.” His knuckles whitened on the doorknob.
“It’s not good-bye. I plan to stay another three weeks and have lots of talks with you.” She moved out the door. “We’ll discuss every detail of this problem.”
Adam closed the door behind her and turned the lock, then closed his eyes and leaned against the wood. His dream, his perfect woman, had turned to a monster even fairy tales couldn’t describe.
Nichole moved from the study. She didn’t know what to say. Bergette had hurt him, but he’d allowed her to without striking back. She would have cut the woman in half if she’d been Adam. But he’d stood the insults. In some strange way, he seemed the stronger for it. It would have been easy to kiss her and end her protest, or slap her and send her screaming from the room, but he hadn’t. And he hadn’t yelled or threatened to strike her. What Bergette saw as weakness Nichole suddenly realized was strength. A kind of strength proven only to himself.
“I forgot you were there,” he whispered when he opened his eyes and saw her at the doorway.
“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. She woke me up.”
They looked at one another, not knowing what to say. His brown eyes seemed full of pain and she had no idea what medicine could help him.
Slowly, Adam walked to her and circled his fingers around the back of her neck.
“Your hair is all a mess of curls.” He brushed the back of her head with his hand.
She looked down for a moment. “I didn’t comb-” When her gaze met his once more she forgot what she’d been saying.
With a sudden move, he pulled her to him and kissed her fully on the mouth.
Nichole pulled away. “Don’t,” she said. “I don’t know how to play games.”
“I’m not playing any game.” His hand still rested on the back of her neck.
There was loss in his eyes, and pain, and anger. He was searching.
“Then don’t try to prove something to yourself, Adam. You’re not really kissing me, you’re simply not kissing Bergette.” Nichole wanted her own kisses, not those denied his first love.
Adam slammed his fist into the wall behind her head. “I-” He couldn’t put his feeling into words. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pressed his lips against hers with bruising force.
Nichole shoved with all her strength and broke the hold, then slapped him hard across the face. She felt herself boiling over inside. She wanted Adam to hold her, but not this way. Not to prove something to himself.
Without a word, she ran back into the study and closed the door. There was no lock, but she knew he wouldn’t come in. She crawled into her covers feeling cheap and used. He’d kissed her because she’d been there and because he was angry and hurt. Somehow the kiss that had been so perfect before had soured and turned ugly.
Half an hour later someone tapped lightly on her door. When she didn’t answer, Sister Cel opened the door and placed a tray of food by her bed.
Nichole was awake, but she didn’t want to face anyone, not even the nun. By midafternoon, she gave up sleeping. There was no reason to cross over to the examining room. Dancing wasn’t there. So she began to pace, feeling very much like a caged animal.
“Nick?” Nance whispered from the doorway to the bedroom. “Nick, are you in here?”
She stepped from the shadows. “What is it, General Ears. You got news?”
“I got news like you wouldn’t believe. Lots of talk going round today. Some of the things Miss Bergette is saying I wouldn’t repeat to my own mother, ’course I don’t have to since that’s who Miss Bergette is telling them to. But first, Doc needs to see you if you can cross the hall safely, but he said don’t take any chances.” Nance added, “He said, ‘Please come.’”
She pulled on her coat and shoved her hair behind her ears. “I’ll come. Give me the sign.”
Nance stepped into the hallway where she could see him. After a few minutes, he rubbed his hand, with fingers spread wide, across his chest.
Nichole moved into the hallway. A moment later, she disappeared into the back room of Adam’s office.
Rose, Dancing’s friend, sat alone, fiddling with her dress as though the extra layer of clothing was uncomfortable. She looked up when Nichole entered and smiled her wide smile. “There you are, honey.” She cocked her head sideways, sending hair flying around her shoulders. “I was wondering where you disappeared to. When you weren’t at the funeral, I figured you had your reasons.”
“Is something wrong?” Nichole noticed a bruise covered with powder. “Mole hasn’t hit you again.”
“No, I’m fine. I went over to my bedroom and collected my things after the funeral. I knew Mole would be down opening the bar.” She smiled. “I ain’t working for him no more. In fact, I’m getting out of the business for good. When Dancing and I left home, I was a pretty fair cook, so I thought I’d come here and ask the doc for a job. Mole will kill me too if I stay with him, and I ain’t ready to meet my Maker yet. Have to do a few hundred good deeds to balance out the scale, you know.”
“What did Adam say?” Nichole wanted to hear about Mole and what he found in his saloon, but she couldn’t come right out and ask.
“He said he had a few people to talk to at the sheriff’s office, then he’d talk to me. He told Nance to go fetch you and Sister and to tell you both that he’d be back in a few minutes.” She tried to straighten her hair. “I know I don’t look respectable, but I’ll work on it.”
“You look fine,” Nichole lied. She didn’t even want to think about how Bergette would yell if the doc hired Rose for a cook. Bergette’s favorite hobby, besides picking on Adam, was complaining about Lily’s cooking.
“While I was packing up my things, I got to thinking about you. You were in this room with Dancing and you fought for her, but you didn’t come to the funeral. When the doc talked to the sheriff, he left out you even being in the room when Mole came in. Mole was so drunk, he couldn’t remember what happened.” She raised one painted eyebrow. “You do a good job of dressing like a man, but one good look told me you were a woman. So I figure you got your share of reasons and secrets.”