Hubert sat at the small, dinged-up desk he’d been given in the cramped office of The Haskell Times, chewing the end of his pencil, his thoughts a thousand miles away from the article he was supposed to be writing. The upcoming Christmas pageant at the church just wasn’t all that exciting compared to the drama of his own life. He couldn’t get his encounter with Bebe two days ago out of his mind. She’d been beautiful, fiery, bold, and miserable. And no matter what she said, he’d been able to feel the heat between them. It was as if she were forcing herself to ignore the sparks between them, and for what, her family?

He snorted and tossed the pencil down on his desk. The Bonnevilles were a family in name only. No one who treated each other the way Rex and his girls did deserved the title of family, not like the massive jumble of love and teasing that he came from.

“Everything all right there, Hugh?” Jameson asked from where he was setting the type at the printing press that took up one whole side of the office.

Hubert blew out a breath and rubbed a hand over his face. Like his colleagues in San Francisco, Jameson had taken to shortening his name to Hugh. He didn’t mind, and in fact, he liked the shorter name. What he didn’t like was getting caught with his head in the clouds.

“I’ve just got something on my mind,” he answered, sitting straighter and picking up his pencil.

“Well, I doubt it’s that Christmas pageant,” Jameson chuckled. “After all the excitement of reporting the news in San Francisco and Tokyo, I can’t imagine stories about local goings on are much of a challenge.”

“I don’t mind,” Hubert said, even though the itch down his back told another story.

Jameson shook his head, and fit a few more pieces of type into the composing stick in his left hand. “I’m not sure I believe that.”

Hubert could only hum in response. If he were honest, he wasn’t sure he believed it either, as much as it pained him to admit. Haskell was home and always would be, but nothing was like he had assumed it would be when he returned.

But he wasn’t about to give up and run. Not a second time.

“If it helps,” Jameson said, “I can give you that piece about cattle rustling on some of the smaller ranches to investigate.”

Hubert perked up, not so much because of Jameson’s generosity, but because his comment hit on another thing he hadn’t been able to shake from his mind since talking to Bebe. Investigating.

“Speaking of ranches,” he started, trying to be subtle but knowing he was anything but, “what do you know about the situation the Bonneville ranch is in, if anything?”

Jameson shrugged, finished sliding metal sorts into his composing stick, then looked up. “It was starting to fail when I moved here. Although, if you ask me, that was just due to mismanagement.”

Hubert hummed and rubbed his chin. “I can believe that.”

“Old Rex had the place mortgaged up to the rafters, as I understand it,” Jameson went on. “And the irony is, it’s his own son-in-law who holds that mortgage.”

Hubert frowned. “Solomon Templesmith?”

“That’s the one.” Jameson picked up another composing stick and started on the next line of type.

“That can’t be right. Rex hated Solomon. And I mean hated,” Hubert said. “He couldn’t stomach the fact that his daughter had run off to marry a black man. He tried to ruin Solomon. Why would he then go on and take out a mortgage on his ranch from the man?”

“I don’t know, but he did,” Jameson said. “And now, rumor has it, if they don’t pay back the full amount of the loan by New Year’s Day, the bank will foreclose.”

“But Solomon wouldn’t do that to Honoria’s family.” Hubert shook his head. Something wasn’t right.

“You sure about that?” Jameson asked.

“Yeah. I know the man.”

“Knew him,” Jameson corrected, pointing the long tweezers he used to pick out type from the rows and rows of sorts around him. “You’ve been gone for a long time. And granted, I haven’t lived here all that long, but I do know that folks change with time. Sounds like this Solomon fellow has changed since you knew him.”

“Possibly.” Hubert doubted it, though. The Solomon Templesmith he’d known was an honorable man who cared about people. Although it was possible that something had happened between him and Rex while he was gone that would have caused even more enmity. But if that was the case, how come no one had told him about it, either in letters or since he’d come home? And was there really an explanation for why Bebe felt so honor-bound to save her family by marrying Price in there?

Jameson blinked as though a thought had just occurred to him. “You were sweet on Bebe Bonneville before you left, weren’t you?”

“I still am,” he admitted freely. “I’d marry her in a heartbeat.”

“If she wasn’t a week away from marrying that Price Penworthy,” Jameson finished his thought. He sent Hubert a sympathetic look. “Hard luck, that.”

“More than hard luck. It’s suspicious.”

“Suspicious?” Jameson shrugged, focusing on his work. “What’s so suspicious about a spoiled young woman marrying a man with money.”

Hubert frowned. “Price has money?”

“His family does. At least, that’s what folks keep saying.”

The pieces started to tumble into place, like blocks of typeface lining up to tell a story. The Bonneville ranch was in danger of being foreclosed on. Price had money, which could pay off the debt. But the blackguard must have demanded Bebe marry him in order to get the money. It was the oldest trick in the book. And for some reason, Bebe felt duty-bound to sacrifice herself to save the ranch.

Hubert saw red. He pushed out of his chair and strode across the room to fetch his coat. “I need to….” He didn’t know what he needed to do, but he couldn’t stand to sit at a desk when he’d just figured out part of the mystery of why Bebe was keeping herself at arm’s length.

“You need to go work off some frustration. I get it,” Jameson said with a knowing grin.

“You’ve got that right,” Hubert growled, then headed for the door.

But even as he stomped through the frozen streets of Haskell, the scent of snow in the air, he couldn’t shake the sinking feeling that he hadn’t figured out as much as he thought he had. It was too easy to think that Bebe was marrying for money in order to save her family. She didn’t like her family. Or at least she hadn’t when she’d almost run off with him. There had to be more of an explanation than the one staring him in the face.

* * *

“Ugh.” Vivian let out an undignified grunt and thumped her fist on the table.

Bebe glanced up from the petticoat she was mending. It was the third frustrated outburst from her sister in the past ten minutes. “What?” she asked, not sure she actually wanted to know.

“It’s the accounts,” Vivian answered with uncharacteristic candidness, glaring at the ledger in front of her.

“What about them?”

“They don’t make any sense. This mortgage…. I swear, the next time I see Solomon Templesmith, I…I’ll…I won’t be responsible for my actions.”

Bebe pressed her lips together. Plenty of things didn’t make any sense, and there were more than a few actions she should have been responsible for. Why she hadn’t thrown herself into Hubert’s arms and kissed him in Kline’s Mercantile the other day, for one. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about their conversation for two days. Hubert had been so honest, so bold. And so thick-headed. He wanted her to leave Price and run off to marry him. If she were honest with herself, there was nothing in the world that she wanted to do more. Every time she saw him, her resolve cracked a little more.

But on the other hand, only a blind fool would expect her to throw off all of the responsibility that had been heaped on her shoulders. Only a man who didn’t understand how impossible it was for a woman to change her fortunes in the world could fail to see how crucial it was to have a home, even if that home was miserable. And only a man who had run off could fail to see how terrifying it was to be left behind, or how desperately hard it was to trust after being abandoned. Unless….

She cleared her throat. “Vivian, there isn’t a chance…you couldn’t have….” She fumbled for a way to confront her sister.

Vivian sighed heavily. “Can’t you see I’m trying to sort out our finances here?”

“Yes, but—”

“I’m trying to find a way to pay for your wedding.”

“I don’t really care about my wedding,” Bebe muttered.

“Well I do,” Vivian snapped. “It has to be the event of the season. It has to look like we’re not in any trouble at all.”

Bebe rolled her eyes, then shook her head. “That’s not what I was going to ask you about.” She took a deep breath, entertaining the suspicion that had wheedled its way into her thoughts after her conversation with Hubert. “It’s just that….”

“What?” Vivian growled, glaring at her.

“Hubert said that he wrote to me from Japan,” Bebe blurted. “Did you hide those letters from me?”

“Hide? No!” Vivian sniffed and took up her pen once more. “That pitiful excuse for a man is lying to you about writing. If you can’t see that, you’re an even bigger imbecile than I thought.”

Bebe clenched her hands into fists in the petticoat, nearly pricking herself with the mending needle as she did. Hubert was no liar. If he said he’d written, then he’d written. The problem was, Vivian was a terrible liar. If she truly had stopped his letters from reaching her, or vice versa, she would be fumbling to hide her deceit. Instead, she’d gone back to frowning at the ledger in front of her, biting her lip, and ignoring the fact that Bebe had brought up the possibility at all.

No, Hubert’s letters must have been genuinely waylaid. Not that it made her feel any better to know he was right about their troubles being the result of a simple misunderstanding. She tried to focus on repairing her petticoat again, but her stitches came out uneven. If there had been any proof that she and Hubert had been separated by her family’s deceit, then Bebe would have had the perfect excuse to cast them all off and run to Hubert. It didn’t seem fair that she couldn’t find a legitimate reason to run, or that she still felt beholden to them. Although there were times….

“Ugh,” Vivian growled yet again.

“What?” Bebe snapped, her patience wearing thinner than the petticoat she was patching.

“Don’t take that tone with me,” Vivian barked.

“I wouldn’t have to if you’d just say what has you so angry instead of yipping about it.”

“Yipping?” Vivian’s back went straight.

“If the shoe fits.”

“How dare you?” Vivian’s voice rose an octave and doubled in volume. “I’m doing everything it takes to save our ranch while you—”

“While I am marrying a man I couldn’t care less about for his supposed money, when the man I love has returned home,” Bebe finished, shouting herself.

Vivian looked as though she’d been slapped. Before she could launch a new attack, Melinda burst through the door from the hall.

“Will you two stop fighting? I have a splitting headache, and your grousing isn’t doing it any good.”

“I don’t care about your headache,” Vivian yelled.

“Well, I never!” Melinda pressed a hand to her chest.

Bebe threw her sewing on the table, on the verge of bursting into tears. She was ready to take it all back, everything she’d been thinking just moments before. She was fighting to save a home that felt more like torture than a place to rest. Hubert had betrayed her, and she didn’t trust him as far as she could see him, but Vivian and Melinda made her life a living hell. If only she had the wherewithal to pack her bags and leave town to start a new life, the way Hubert had. She’d even consider a life as a prostitute, or maybe a new life in England, like Bonnie Horner had found for some of her girls years back, if she could just leave this senselessness behind her.

“Will you two please stop fighting?” she shouted, standing and kicking her chair back.

“I will not be spoken to like that.” Vivian jumped to her feet too. “I’m working my fingers to the bone trying to figure out why the ranch is in such dire shape, and you’re no help at all.”

“No help at all?” Bebe balked, her mouth dropping open. “I’m marrying Price to save this pile of dirt.”

“It is not a pile of dirt, it is our home,” Melinda gasped.

“If you care about it so much, why don’t you marry Price?”

“Don’t be absurd,” Melinda squeaked, turning puce and looking as though she might vomit. “I would never debase myself for a man the way—”

“The way I am?”

Melinda snorted. “You said it.” She crossed her arms and tilted her chin up.

“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Vivian snapped, glaring at Bebe.

“Me? Why?”

“Price is a noble and handsome man. He comes from a good family. He’s gone out of his way to do things for us without any promise of reward.”

“Fine. Then you marry him,” Bebe shouted.

“I asked. He didn’t want me,” Vivian yelled back, then recoiled as though she’d spoken out of turn. Her face went red, and she slapped a hand over her mouth. A moment later, her eyes went glassy. “He said I was too old and used up and that no one wanted a withered thistle when they could have a juicy peach.”

For a second, for the barest hint of a heartbeat, Bebe felt sorry for her older sister. She should have known that Vivian fancied Price on some level. The two of them would have made a much better match than she and Price would. And after the wretched marriage to their cousin Rance that Vivian had endured, maybe she deserved a sliver of happiness.

But before Bebe could voice any of those thoughts, Melinda said, “I can only imagine the kind of juiciness that a little harlot like Bebe would present to a man.”

“Melinda!” Bebe whirled to her sister, hot with rage. “Do you actually think I would stoop so low?”

Melinda tilted her chin up and sniffed. “The way you went after that Strong piece of trash makes me wonder what you’ve already given away to Price to keep him interested.”

“I would never let Price take liberties before we’re married,” Bebe protested, sickened at the thought.

Vivian snorted. Melinda made a face at Bebe. “Once a whore, always a whore.”

“I am not…I never….” She was too angry to finish her protests, and even more furious when Vivian and Melinda both looked at her as though she were either lying or stupid or both.

And that was what she was working so hard to be so loyal to. She was ruining her life for a pair of sisters who thought she was loose. She didn’t know whether to laugh or scream.

“I have to go,” she said, stepping away from the table and marching toward the hall.

“Where do you have to go to?” Vivian called after her.

“Nowhere,” Bebe answered.

The truth stung, but it didn’t stop her from grabbing her coat, hat, and mittens from the peg in the hall and rushing out the front door. It didn’t stop her from heading to the stable and saddling her gelding, Glory. Vivian had balked when she’d learned to saddle a horse by herself, but had stopped complaining when she saw how much money they saved by not having to employ a stable hand. She pulled herself onto Glory’s back and nudged him out of the stable. As soon as she reached the road, she kicked Glory into a run.

By the time she reached town, she wasn’t any less agitated, but her misery had focused. She had to know. She had to be absolutely certain she was doing the right thing.

She pulled Glory to a stop on Main Street, in front of the office that housed The Haskell Times. It was the middle of the afternoon, so she figured Hubert would be working. But when she burst inside the office, only Mr. Ellis was there.

Mr. Ellis glanced up from the printing press where he was working and blinked at the sight of Bebe. “He’s not here,” he said without greeting. “He needed to get out and move around a little.”

“Move around a little?” Bebe repeated to herself. Her eyes went wide. “He wasn’t…he hadn't left again, has he?” Fear harsher than anything she’d known swirled down to her gut.

“No,” Mr. Ellis laughed. “He just went for a walk.”

Relief made her knees weak. She nodded to Mr. Ellis, then rushed back outside, mounting Glory in a hurry. A walk could mean any number of things, and after riding up Main Street, then around toward the school and the church, she headed to the south side of town. Hubert was staying at Vernon’s house, after all. He was likely to have gone there.

Luckily for her, she was right. Cold as it was, he had his coat off and his sleeves rolled up as he mucked out his brother’s small stable in back of the house.

“Hubert,” she called to him, walking Glory up to the stable, then dismounting in a flurry of skirts, heart pounding. “Thank God I’ve found you.”

Hubert spun away from the fresh hay he was shoveling into an empty stall. His eyes went wide with alarm. “Bebe? Is everything okay?” He tossed his pitchfork aside and stepped toward her. “Are you all right?”

“I….” Bebe worked to catch her breath after the frantic search, but as Hubert came near, that seemed like an impossibility. There he was, right in front of her. Not in San Francisco or Japan or somewhere far out of her reach. “I….”

“Yes?” He walked right up to her, grabbing her arms to hold her steady and looking into her eyes with deep concern.

He cared about her. Unlike Price or Vivian and Melinda, Hubert actually cared about her, whether he’d run out on her or not. More than her father, more than anyone, he loved her. And he was home.

“I need to know….” Her brain tripped over her words. She needed to know that he would never leave her. She needed to know that he was there to stay, and that he would save her from the misery her life had become. She needed to know that she could trust him. “I need to know what you wrote about in the letters that went missing.”

She blinked, surprised that, after everything, those were the words that popped out.

Hubert’s worry melted into a smile. “What I wrote from Japan?”

Bebe nodded. “What was it like there?”

“Well….” He took a half step back, removing the thick gloves he’d been wearing as he worked, and running a hand through his hair. “Uh, Japan was beautiful.”

He glanced around, then took Bebe’s hand and drew her into the shelter of the stable. Bebe started to go with him, then gasped and went back for Glory. She directed him into the stall that Hubert had just cleaned out as Hubert shut the stable door to block out the cold. Not that the stable was much warmer, but at least the small, potbellied stove in the center of the building lent some warmth.

Hubert settled on a hay bale, gesturing for Bebe to come sit with him. “Tokyo is a thriving city,” he went on. “It’s a blend of old and new. It sits on a river by a bay leading out to the sea, but you can also see a great mountain, Mount Fuji, in the distance. You could say it’s a city balanced between extremes.”

Bebe nodded, watching his mouth as he spoke. His words were beautiful, certainly those of a writer, but she barely heard them. Instead, she felt the heat of his body, followed the line of his neck down to where his shirt was unbuttoned at the collar.

“I wrote to you about that,” Hubert went on, his voice taking on a warmer tone. “I wrote to you about a trip up the river in a fishing boat. I wrote about the cherry blossoms in spring, and about the music I heard that makes your heartstrings vibrate.”

He reached for her hands, pulling off her gloves, then unbuttoned her coat. His hands slipped to her waist. “I wrote about how much I missed you,” he said in a near whisper. “How I dreamed about you at night and wished you were there with me. I wrote about how the moonlight on the morning glories reminded me of your skin, even though it was nowhere near as radiant.”

He leaned closer to her until she could feel his breath on her lips. Her whole body ached to mold to his. The feeling was exquisite and torturous.

“I wrote about how much I love you,” he said, and closed his lips over hers in a kiss.

It was gentle at first, but as she surged against him, it became more demanding. She opened her mouth on a sigh, and he slipped his tongue along hers. His hands spread across her sides, inching up toward the tender swell of her breasts.

“You didn’t come here to ask about my letters, did you?” he whispered, touching his forehead to hers.

Sudden tears stung Bebe’s eyes. She shook her head.

“You came here because you want to be with me.”

She nodded, raising a hand to cradle the side of his face. She kissed him, refusing to wait for what she wanted. She’d waited long enough and suffered for it as well. When they were apart, she worked so hard to convince herself that she was doing her duty by sticking with her family, giving her all for the ranch, but when she was with Hubert, it was the easiest thing in the world just to love him.

“Say you’ll forget Price, that you’ll marry me instead.”

Her heart squeezed, but as much as she wanted to shout yes, her head wouldn’t let her make the promise. What if it was too late?

As if sensing her hesitation, Hubert lifted her into his arms, settling her across his lap. She slid her arms over his shoulders, and when he kissed her again she felt as though she were floating in his embrace.

“I love you, Bebe,” he said, reaching for the hem of her skirt, then sliding his hand up over the top of her boot and her knit stockings. She shivered at his touch. “And I know you love me,” he went on. “However hard this is, we can figure it out and get through it together.”

He dipped down to steal a kiss, but it wasn’t his lips that had her blood pumping as though she were on fire. His hand continued up over her knee. The worn fabric of her drawers did little to dull the sensation of his touch as he stroked her thigh. The throbbing sensation between her legs flared as he nudged her knees apart. There wasn’t anywhere for her leg to go, but it didn’t seem to matter, he’d created just enough space to inch his fingers toward the top of her drawers, then further still through the split in the fabric. Her breath came in shallow gasps as his touch brushed dangerously near to her most intimate places.

“Do you trust me?” he whispered, nuzzling the side of her face as his fingers played with her curls.

The question was almost enough to douse the arousal that his teasing had raised in her. She didn’t trust him, as much as she wanted to. She didn’t trust him not to abandon her a second time. She didn’t trust him with her heart. Her body, however, was another matter.

She nodded, cradling his jaw and straining to bring her mouth to his. He kissed her the way she wanted to be kissed, with a fullness that had her whole body singing. He brushed his fingers through the curls between her thighs, delving into the heart of her. And as soon as he touched the part of her that was hot and wet with wanting, not only tracing the tingling folds of her opening but slipping inside, she gasped.

Thoughts zipped through her mind so fast that she couldn’t grab on to a single one of them as his fingers worked their magic. He brushed in and out of her, reaching for something inside that felt just out of reach. His tongue mimicked what his fingers were doing as it slid along hers, but soon she was panting too hard to maintain a kiss. She wanted to sigh his name, but even that was beyond her. Her body coiled tighter and tighter as he gently invaded her, and all the while she waited, waited for what she wanted more than she’d wanted anything in her life. She jerked her hips against him, urging him to do more.

He shifted his hand, and his thumb rubbed up against her clitoris as his fingers continued their exploration. And with a flash, the coil inside of her flew apart, sending throbbing tremors and shards of pleasure through her. She cried out as her inner muscles squeezed around his hand, and he, too, let out a moan of victory.

“Yes, my sweet,” he groaned, kissing her chin, her neck, her lips. “Come for me.”

Her body obeyed his command, throbbing with pleasure for a few seconds more before spinning out into a warm sea of loose muscles and lost inhibitions. She wanted to feel his hand around those intimate parts of her forever, to give that and more of herself to him for all time. That part of her, along with her heart, belonged to Hubert forever. There was no way she could even think of sharing such intimacy with Price. She knew what she had to do next, and she knew that once she did, everything would fall apart.