Lucas left her at the mail dispatch office while he went to see if Emery’s stage had left on schedule that morning. “There was something I forgot to tell him yesterday,” he explained, “and if the stage is late as usual, it will save me having to write him about it.”
“What am I supposed to do while I’m waiting for you?”
“Make three copies of the notice, and I’ll pay to post them when I get back. You know better than I do how to describe the kind of feline Charley will like. Wilber will give you paper and pen. And check to see if we’ve got any mail while you’re there.”
“But wouldn’t the mail have been delivered to the ranch?”
He shook his head. “You have to pick the mail up here.”
“You mean I could have had a letter sitting here and not even known it?” She was horrified.
Lucas gone, she quickly went inside the office and spoke to Wilber at his desk. As quickly as her hopes had risen, they were dashed. No letter from Stephanie. There were two letters for Lucas, one from Monsieur Andrevie, New Orleans, and the other from Emery Buskett in Newcomb. She grinned. She supposed Emery had forgotten to tell Lucas something, too.
She composed her inquiries carefully. Imagine, advertising for a mate for Charley. It took a man who had advertised for a mail-order bride to think of ordering a cat the same way. It also took a male to think of a male’s needs. She sighed. She had never thought of getting a mate for Charley. A lady didn’t think of things like that. Did she?
Lucas did find Emery at the depot, just as the stage rolled in.
“It was good of you to come see me off, Lucas.”
“Don’t flatter yourself.” Lucas grinned. “I had to bring back a buggy I hired.” He helped Emery load his trunk onto the back of the stage.
“I left a letter for you,” Emery said, “explaining in detail my meeting with Newcomb.”
“Good, but there’s something else I want you to do, aside from what you’re working on now.”
“Anything, Lucas,” Emery replied eagerly. “That’s what you’re paying me for.”
“That friend of yours, the detective?”
“Jim?”
“Yes. I want you to find him as soon as you get back.”
“I doubt he’ll still be in St. Louis, Lucas.”
“I don’t care if he’s on his way back to New York, just find him. I want you to get the rest of the information he has on that Hammond girl. I want her name, description, everything he knows about her.”
“Is she related to your fiancée after all?”
“Sharisse isn’t sure, but she remembered having some cousins in New York, people her family lost touch with. She’d like to find out more about the girl.”
“It will be a pleasure to oblige such a beautiful young woman,” Emery said agreeably. “I’m just sorry you didn’t bring her to town so I could tell her so myself. I would have loved seeing her.”
“You forget that she’s spoken for,” Lucas said, a sudden cold edge to his tone.
Emery grinned. “A woman like that is worth stealing, Lucas, even from one’s friends.” His smile widened as Sharisse caught his eye. “Ah, so you did bring her.”
Lucas looked down the street. Sharisse had just stepped out onto the sidewalk, and not twenty feet away, Leon Waggoner was making his way toward her.
“Have a safe trip, Emery,” Lucas said absently as he walked away.
“But, Lucas…”
Emery fell silent, knowing when he’d been dismissed. A strange man, Lucas Holt. Agreeable most times, sometimes coldly indifferent. He had stopped trying to figure Lucas out. It didn’t matter what kind of man he was, as long as the pay was good. And it certainly was good.
Twenty-six
Sharisse barely had time to shield her eyes from the glare of the sun before the clink of spurs made her turn around. The cowboy stopped as she turned. He was stocky, not young but not old, either. Something about the way he looked at her made her uneasy. Had she met him at Samuel Newcomb’s party? If so, she didn’t remember him.
