Willow: A Novel (No Series) by Linda Lael Miller Page A

shrugged into it. “What will happen now, Dev? Will Willow still marry Norville Pickering?”
    “Good God,” sighed the judge, “I hope not.”
    “That’s why you haven’t tried to dissolve her marriage to Gideon Marshall, isn’t it?”
    Devlin was deeply troubled; Dove didn’t need to look at him to know that. She’d felt it, even before she’d heldhim in her arms, given him the only solace she had to offer. “I’m not sure that’s possible,” he muttered. “Both Gideon and Willow claim they haven’t consummated the union, but there’s a—well, there’s some kind of charge between those two. If they haven’t been together already, they soon will be.”
    “Would you want Gideon Marshall for a son-in-law, Dev?”
    His chuckle was raspy, humorless. “I don’t think my personal opinion matters much, one way or the other. I can’t say I dislike the man, but . . .”
    “But?” prompted Dove.
    Devlin gave a ragged sigh. “Gideon came here to track Steven down—at the behest of the railroad. He told me that, straight out.”
    The pit of Dove’s stomach quivered. “Do you suppose he can find Steven? Succeed where Vancel Tudd has failed?”
    “I sure as hell hope not,” breathed Devlin, and then he approached Dove, bent to kiss the top of her head, and was on his way out of the house.
    *   *   *
    The morning hadn’t gone at all the way Gideon had planned it. He’d meant to find Steven Gallagher; instead, he’d ended up on the ground with Willow.
    Swinging back into the saddle of the horse he’d borrowed from the judge’s stables, he rode away from the scene of his downfall without looking back.
    Willow’s challenge rang through his mind and heart— And you aren’t faithful to her anyway, are you?— all the wayback to town. He hadn’t been strictly true to Daphne, that was a fact, and up until now that had never seemed important. Every man had at least one mistress, didn’t he?
    Gideon swallowed hard. His pride smarted and his groin ached and his thoughts were all tangled up with each other. Fidelity was something Daphne, sophisticated as she was, had never demanded of him, probably never even expected.
    It was the way of the world.
    Men of means provided well for their wives and children; in his world, that was understood. A mistress, discreetly maintained of course, was considered his due.
    But things were different with Willow, and Gideon knew he had a bitter choice to make. He could appease his physical needs with other women and let his “wife” do as she pleased, or he could be faithful—to a woman he couldn’t, in good conscience, bed.
    “Shit!” he yelled to the blue summer sky.
    *   *   *
    Willow sat quietly on the ground, long after Gideon rode away, her arms wrapped around her knees, her eyes burning with unshed tears. Lord have mercy, what a mess her life was.
    One tear trickled down her face and she dashed it away angrily.
    A long shadow passed over her. “Willow?”
    Willow’s head shot up and she gaped at her brother, both alarmed and relieved. He had the most disconcerting way of appearing and disappearing, like some kind of stage magician. “Steven! What are you doing here?”
    Steven crouched to face her, the wind lifting his sandyhair, his blue eyes bright with affection and mischief. He looked as Devlin must have, in his youth, powerful and handsome and arrogant, and for all of that, ingenuous.
    “I came to see my sister,” he answered mildly.
    Willow flushed, remembering what she and Gideon had done, conscious of the possibility that Steven might have seen at least some of the exchange.
    God forbid . “You took a terrible chance, Steven,” she scolded, testing the waters. “What if I hadn’t been alone?”
    “You weren’t alone,” he said, taking in her rumpled clothes and misbuttoned shirt with discerning eyes, “unless I miss my guess.”
    Willow colored again and averted her eyes, but she was still self-possessed enough to make an attempt at