The Confidential Life of Eugenia Cooper Part 14

It might have been amusing had Anna's excitement not turned to abject terror the moment her well-shod foot landed on Beck turf. "You go ahead," she said, thrusting Gennie toward the ma.s.sive front doors. "I've changed my mind."

Gennie linked arms with the reluctant neighbor and urged her forward. Anna took three steps, then froze.

"Come on, Anna."

Stricken, the Finch woman could only shake her head. When she finally found her voice, she'd managed to worry herself into a panic. "I'm not good at this. I want to be, but I'm not."

"Good at what?" Gennie patted her new friend on the shoulder. "I don't understand."

"Well, of course you don't," Anna said with vehemence. "It's likely you've never been in love with a man like Daniel Beck. Oh, Gennie, I know you work for him and probably are immune to his charms, but I swear every time I come near him, I turn into a puddle and start saying the most idiotic things." She paused to take a long breath. "I'm hopeless. That's the long and short of it. Have you ever felt like that? Unable to speak anything but nonsense while your heart's doing this silly fluttering and your mind's gone totally blank?"

Gennie thought of the man she'd met only briefly at Fisher's. "Yes," she said, "I think I know exactly what you mean."

And then that very man opened the door of Daniel Beck's house.

The trouble Mae dreamed up was nothing compared to the wind blowing away everything that wasn't nailed down outside the cave. The sky went from gray to black to green, and b.a.l.l.s of ice pelted the ground and rolled inside, confusing poor Lucky into thinking someone was aiming at her.

The fair female knew a fire might prove disastrous, so she remained in the dim light and waited. She might have been there until the sun shone again, for she could have happily slept once more even with the threat of marriageable dreams, and in fact had settled down for just that, when the hordes were released.

Bats.

The last person Daniel expected to find standing on his doorstep was Blue Eyes herself. George must have given her his address. He smiled. He owed old George a substantial tip the next time he traded at Fisher's.

"Well, look who's here," he said. Then he spied Anna Finch. "And look who else is here." His voice faltered a bit before he found it again. "Please, both of you, do come in."

"It's terribly late," Anna said, "and I'm sure we're imposing." Her soft brown eyes darted toward the blonde, then back to Daniel. "Well, I am, anyway."

Instead of wasting time trying to decipher the Finch woman's statement, Daniel allowed his attention to fall on Blue Eyes. He had no name for her. As he offered her his arm to lead her inside, he made what he hoped would be an offhand comment. "I'm sorry, but I'm at a loss, Miss..."

"Cooper," Anna supplied from where she still held the door frame. "Really, Mr. Beck. Her name is Eugenia Cooper, and she's named after the wife of Napoleon III. Stop teasing us."

Miss Cooper seemed as much at a loss as he. She'd been easily led to the parlor, but would she remain? She looked ready to flee at a moment's notice. Unlike Anna, who never seemed comfortable around him, she just seemed confused. Or perhaps she was wary of him for some unknown reason.

He was generally good at reading people, but Eugenia Cooper stumped him. At Fisher's she'd shown more than adequate interest, but here she seemed as though she'd changed her mind. Still, she'd convinced his neighbor to accompany her on a late-evening social call. That alone spoke volumes.

If only he could figure out what it said.

"Really, Anna," Blue Eyes said, seeming fl.u.s.tered, "it's just Gennie."

"Just Gennie." Daniel offered a place on the settee to the blonde, then watched while she settled there. "Gennie is a lovely name."

"It suffices," she said stiffly.

"But I wonder," he said slowly, "whether you've had your Wild West adventure yet, Gennie."

"No, actually, not yet." She glanced at Anna, who still stood frozen at the front door. "But it's going to happen very soon. I can feel it. Do come and join us, Anna."

"Yes, do join us," Daniel said as he straightened and made for the chair nearest the settee, then watched Anna wedge herself between them.

For all her awkwardness, Anna Finch was a nice enough young woman who might be a great beauty should she learn to relax. Other than her insistence on openly pursuing him and her inability to complete an intelligible sentence in his presence, she was decent company. She'd certainly earned his respect a few years ago, when she befriended a grieving Charlotte and allowed the little girl to tag along to tea parties and other innocuous events.

If only his daughter still wished to play the part of a well-heeled debutante. He'd hoped the new Miss McTaggart could accomplish this, but the combination of the letter and tonight's bathing fiasco had dashed all chances of such a thing.

But he'd not think of the irritating woman likely hiding in her room and praying his ire would pa.s.s. He'd been about ready to fire her through the door, when this vision of loveliness landed on his doorstep. The Lord had presented him with a rare and lovely gift in the form of Eugenia Cooper, and he'd not miss a moment of getting to know her.

"So," Daniel said as casually as he could manage, "what brings you here tonight?"

Anna's giggle surprised him. "Don't you recall mentioning you'd be spending an evening with your daughter playing charades?"

"She's upstairs, asleep." He shrugged. "I did hope to spend the evening with her, as I'll likely not be in Denver long, but she was exhausted and fell asleep in the middle of dinner." He tempered his words. "I blame the torturous scrubbing she endured this afternoon."

"Torturous scrubbing?" Miss Cooper let out an inelegant snort that stunned and delighted him in equal measure. "I hardly think a bath will ruin a child. What do you think, Anna?"

"A bath?" Miss Finch sought his gaze and seemed to be attempting to formulate a response. "Yes, well, I'm for them, of course. I do enjoy a bath, though I've been known to stay too long in the water and cause my skin to prune up."

"Is that so?" Daniel replied, trying not to smile. "It must be something of a problem for you, Miss Finch."

"Oh, it is," she said. "Why, you'd be surprised that even my toes are affected."

That was not an image he cared to have in his mind. Gennie Cooper's wide blue eyes, however, were quite another matter. "So, Miss Cooper, are you thus afflicted as well?"

"Afflicted?" She leaned toward him. "Actually, I find bath time to be the best hour of the day. I do love a hot bath, and if rose bath salts are available, I partake liberally. And daily. Always torturously scrubbing every inch of me. And," she added, seemingly to torture him, "I wash and comb my hair. Daily. Torturously. Without fail."

The scent of roses would never again conjure the same image. Daniel tugged at his collar and cleared his throat. "Where are my manners? Might I offer you ladies something to drink? Perhaps a treat from Elias's kitchen?"

"My, but you're quite the host tonight, Mr. Beck," Anna said.

"Am I?" He never took his eyes off Miss Cooper.

Anna shook her head. "Yes, you're acting like you don't even know who-"

"Actually," Miss Cooper interrupted, "I am a bit parched."

"Coffee." He shook his head. "No, lemonade perhaps. Or tea. Oh, I'll see what I find. How's that?"

Daniel left his chair so fast he didn't bother to ask what she'd like or even extend the courtesy to Anna. He retreated to the kitchen, where he wondered what he'd done to have the Lord reduce him to the state of a blathering schoolboy.

"He's acting very odd," Anna said. "And I should know. I'm usually the one making a fool of myself." She gave Gennie a sideways look. "What's going on here, really?"

Gennie sighed. "I'm still trying to figure it out."

Daniel Beck could not possibly be the horrid ogre who regularly abandoned his daughter and bullied governesses from the other side of bathroom doors. He also could not possibly be the man who'd swept her off her feet in the Fisher's Dry Goods Store.

And he certainly couldn't be the man she'd just decided to match up with her new friend Anna Finch.

Gennie leaned against the back of the settee and closed her eyes. How could one man possibly be two?

She bolted upright, her eyes opening to see Anna's shocked expression as she grasped her friend's hands. "Anna, please tell me Daniel Beck has a brother."

Anna smiled. "Yes, actually, he does. Remember, I mentioned him just a bit ago?"

"I knew it!" She let go of Anna, then rose, only to fall back into the settee again and slap her knees with her palms. "I knew he couldn't be the same man I met. He just couldn't. Oh, the voice was the same, and he certainly looks like him, but that man and Daniel Beck absolutely cannot be one and the same."

"What are you talking about, Gennie?"

How to explain to her new friend that she'd shamelessly flirted with a stranger, then actually entertained romantic thoughts of him? Even someone who'd known her for years would likely not understand. For that matter, Gennie didn't understand.

And yet there was no denying her meeting with the stranger in Fisher's would remain forever etched in her memory. At least until she accepted Chandler Dodd's offer of marriage.

But that had not yet happened.

"Gennie?"

"It's all very complicated." She turned to Anna. "Mr. Beck's brother, they're twins, right?"

"Twins?" Anna laughed as she shook her head. "I don't know. I've never met him."

"But he's here in Denver, and it's possible they could pa.s.s for twins?"

"No, and no. From what I understand, Daniel and his brother had some sort of falling out years ago. Something to do with the family business Daniel built, then gave to his brother to run. Cook surmised a woman must have come between them. I always wondered if it might have been Charlotte's mother, but I was never brave enough to ask."

"And there's no possibility of a recent reunion? Perhaps a mending of the ways?"

Anna looked confused and then, by degrees, thoughtful. "I'm just going to admit this to you, Gennie. I've got my spies, and I know almost everything that happens over here. If some kind of long-lost reunion had happened with Daniel and his brother, I would have heard about it." She looked away. "And, yes, I am that pathetic. I can't explain why, but Daniel Beck has always fascinated me."

"I understand completely." And then it hit her. First the realization, then a sinking feeling that began in her gut and traveled quickly to her brain. "Oh, no, no, no. I flirted shamelessly with a man I abhor, detest, and despise. The man I couldn't stop thinking about is the man I'm plotting to make my escape from."

Anna grasped Gennie by the shoulders. "What is going on, Gennie? You're babbling on and not making a lick of sense. In fact, you you sound like sound like me. me."

"That's because it makes no sense. I actually liked him, Anna. I liked liked him." Gennie leaned back once again and closed her eyes. "I'm such an idiot. A Wild West adventure does not include donning buckskins and boots and playing the coquette with Daniel Beck, no matter how much I enjoyed it." him." Gennie leaned back once again and closed her eyes. "I'm such an idiot. A Wild West adventure does not include donning buckskins and boots and playing the coquette with Daniel Beck, no matter how much I enjoyed it."

"Wait a minute." Anna's grip on Gennie's arm caused her eyes to fly open. "You flirted with Daniel Beck?"

"Yes. No. Oh, I don't know."

Anna's eyes narrowed. "Explain yourself."

"I can't. I don't know what happened. I was at Fisher's, and then he was at Fisher's, and then there was the Mae Winslow novel and a pair of boots and the fringed jacket that looked and smelled just as I imagined the Wild West to look and smell. Well, not the West but the people who populated it." She paused to take a breath. "I'm not making a lick of sense, am I?"

All poor Anna seemed capable of was shaking her head.

"Look, here's the thing," Gennie quickly said. "I don't even like Daniel Beck. He's an absent father and a complete autocrat who undermines my authority as governess. And while I'm on the topic, I never intended to be a governess at all. I only traded train tickets with the real governess so she could get married. She and her husband are expected in a few weeks, and then the jig's up and I'm gone."

Anna rose and backed away from the settee, nearly upsetting an awful beaded floor lamp in the process. She caught it before it-and she-hit the floor, but neither appeared to have the ability to remain upright much longer.

"I'm leaving, Gennie. It's late and there's obviously something wrong between you and Daniel that Daniel has no idea about. I might be a goose-headed fool, but I notice things, and I've seen how he looks at you." Dissolving into tears, she made short work of retracing her steps to the door.

"No, wait!" Gennie scrambled to catch Anna. "I've got a plan, and it won't work without you."

Her new friend paused, one hand on the doork.n.o.b and the other swiping at fresh tears. "What plan? To steal my chance of having Daniel Beck notice me? Well, congratulations. It looks like your plan's working."

She yanked at the door and ran out into the night. Gennie chased after her and caught her hand.

"Listen to me," she said in a tone just harsh enough to get the sensitive woman's attention. "I do not have any interest in Daniel Beck. Yes, I admit I felt a temporary attraction to him at the dry goods store, but only temporary, and only because I had no idea who he was. I am a soon-to-be-betrothed woman from Manhattan who has no intention of remaining in Denver beyond the end of the month."

Anna said nothing.

"Are you listening?" Gennie continued. "When you saw me at the Windsor, I'd left my job and was trying to get a room there until my friend Hester wired money."

Anna shook her head. "Why should I believe you?"

"I don't suppose you have any reason to." Gennie released her grip. "If someone had told me two weeks ago I would be standing in front of a silver baron's mansion in Denver explaining why I flirted shamelessly with someone I now find an atrocious excuse for a man, I'd have called them crazy. And if I were told I'd finally be given the chance to have a Wild West adventure only to waste precious time trying to find a mother for a child who detests me, I would have, well..."

Gennie ran out of words. She looked up at the clear night sky and took a deep, long breath of Wild West air. To her surprise, Anna began to giggle.

Gennie reluctantly swung her gaze from Orion and the North Star to Anna Finch. "I fail to see what's so funny."

"That's just it," Anna said. "It's not funny. And yet, it's so-well, I don't know-remarkable."

"Remarkable." Gennie shrugged. "Well, I suppose one could make an argument for the use of that term. I can think of a few others, however."

"No," Anna said, "don't you see? I've been praying for a wife for Daniel and a mother for Charlotte since Georgiana's funeral. Somehow over time, that wife and mother became me."

"And that's what I want too." Gennie pointed back to the house, every window save one lit up like Christmas. "That's a house in dire need of a woman's touch. Would you believe there's a jungle-themed guest room upstairs? And have you seen seen the jeweled chicken?" the jeweled chicken?"

Anna doubled over laughing, even as she continued to swipe at her tears. "I think it's supposed to be an ostrich. Tova is quite proud of it, though I understand Daniel refers to it in less-than-glowing terms when his housekeeper's not in earshot."

"Well, imagine poor Charlotte growing up in a house where she must face the jeweled chicken every time she walks up the staircase."

"I heard that!"

Gennie looked up to see the object of their discussion hanging halfway out of the nursery window. "Go back inside this instant, Charlotte Beck, or you'll fall."

"I'm going to tell my papa you were laughing at his chicken."

"Say what you want," Gennie called, "but you'll have better luck telling him if you're inside and not lying on the ground in a heap."

The girl seemed to ponder the point only a moment before disappearing back into the nursery.

"Well," Gennie said with a sigh, "I've won that battle but will likely lose the war. Do you see why she needs a mother? I'm hopeless at this."

"You did keep her from landing on her head." Anna shrugged. "I'd say you're not completely hopeless."