Page 7 of Texas Glory
Dallas slashed his hand through the air. “It makes no difference to me. I want a son, goddammit! She doesn’t need a nose to give me a son.”
Houston picked his hat off a nearby table and settled it low over his brow. “You know, until this moment, I always felt guilty for taking Amelia from you. Now, I’m damn glad that I did. She was a gift you never would have learned to appreciate.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Dallas asked.
“It means for all your empire building, big brother, you’ll never be a wealthy man.”
CHAPTER
TWO
It was a woman’s lot in life to live within the shadows cast by men.
Cordelia McQueen knew that unfortunate truth and understood its ramifications only too well.
With her hands folded primly within her lap, she gazed out the window toward the horizon where the sun boldly retreated. She had never blamed her mother for wanting to run toward the majestic blues and lavenders that unfurled across the sky. Her mother had called it an adventure, but even at the age of twelve, Cordelia had recognized it for what it was: an escape.
Her mother packed one carpetbag and told Cordelia and Cameron to bundle up their most precious possessions. She explained that Boyd and Duncan were too old to go on the journey, Cordelia and Cameron too young to stay behind.
They were walking down the hallway when her father trudged up the stairs, his face flushed with fury.
Cordelia pulled Cameron into a far corner, hiding his face within the crook of her shoulder while her father ranted and raved that Joe Armstrong wouldn’t be taking his wife—his property—anywhere.
Horror swept over her mother’s face. She turned for the stairs, and her father jerked her back. “That’s right! I know! I know everything!” He backhanded her across the face and sent her tumbling down the stairs.
Her mother’s scream echoed clearly through Cordelia’s mind as though she had heard it this afternoon. For ten long years she had cared for the woman who had once cared for her. The accidental fall—as her father referred to it—had left her mother an invalid, with woeful eyes housed within an immobile body, her thoughts trapped by a mouth that could no longer speak. Only when her mother’s eyes had welled with tears, did Cordelia know for certain that her mother lived within the withering shell that held her prisoner.
Her mother had simply exchanged one prison for another, and now it seemed as though Cordelia would do the same.
“Goddammit, Pa! There are other ways to get the water we need,” Cameron said. Six years younger than she was, Cameron had always been her champion. Often his blond hair and pale blue eyes reminded her of the foreman who had disappeared the day her mother was injured. “You don’t have to give Cordelia to that man!”
Thatman. Cordelia had only seen Dallas Leigh once, and then only from a distance. He was taller than she was, broader than she was, and when he’d announced that the land he’d roped off was to be used for a town, the wind had been gracious enough to carry his deep voice to everyone who had gathered around him. She didn’t think he was a man who would have accepted less.
Now he was demanding that she become his wife. The thought terrified her.
“This matter isn’t open to discussion, Cameron,” Boyd said. A tall dark sentinel, he stood behind his father’s chair. Since they had moved to Texas from Kansas following her mother’s death, her father’s health had diminished considerably. Within the family, Boyd blatantly wielded the power. Only his love and respect for his father allowed him to let outsiders think his father remained in charge.
“When I want your opinion on a matter, Cameron, I’ll ask for it,” her father said.
“I’m only saying—”
“I know what you’re saying, and I’m not interested in hearing it. I’ve already given him my word.”
“Well now, you won’t be breaking your word if he happens to die tonight, and we can certainly arrange that,” Duncan said.
Cordelia kept her gaze focused on the pink hues sweeping across the horizon. She had no desire to see the depth of their hatred for this one man. She had seen hatred that deep once before: when her father had confronted her mother. She knew of no way to stop it. As a child, she’d hidden from it in a shadowed corner.
As a woman she had a strong desire to hide again, in her room, deep within one of her books. She feared Duncan was not in a mood to jest. As her father continued to hold his silence, she became concerned that he thought murder might have some merit.
“Killing him won’t get us the water!” her father finally bellowed. “That’s what this is all about. The water!”
“Leigh will treat her no better than a whore!” Duncan roared.
Flinching, Cordelia clenched her hands in her lap. She hated the anger and rage, hated the way it distorted faces that she loved—for she did love her brothers—into faces that she feared.
“Cordelia, go to your room. Your brothers and I obviously have a few details to work out,” her father barked.
She rose to her feet, her hands aching as her fingers tightened around them. She had considered weeping. She had considered dropping to her knees and begging, but she had learned long ago that when her father and Boyd set upon a path, nothing would deter them. She salvaged what little pride remained, angled her chin, and met her father’s glare. “Father, I’m not opposed to this marriage.”
