“There was a whiff of scandal a few months ago with a salesman who’d just arrived in town. But when Flagler got wind of it and tried to get that man to marry his daughter, he’d already gone. Can’t blame the fellow, really,” Stuart said.
“There’s no way out of this.” Nate stared into the fire and tried to imagine what his life was about to become.
“You could—”
“I’mnotleaving town.” Even if it meant being tied to the likes of Sissy Flagler, Nate was home. Cañon City was just as much his home as it was Flagler’s, and he refused to leave.
Stuart sighed. “Then I don’t—”
“I have an idea,” a soft but strong voice said from somewhere behind Nate.
He whipped around to see Ruthann standing in the doorway. With wisps of hair falling gently around her face and her blue eyes wide and unassuming, she looked like an angel. His heart immediately tripped over itself, and his mind went right back to that moment six years ago when he’d summoned all the courage he possessed and kissed her.
Try as he might, kissing Ruthann Joliet was impossible to forget.
“Ruthann?” Stuart frowned at her. “I thought you were out?”
“Clearly I’ve returned,” she said, a note of irritation in her voice. “And I know all about Nate’s predicament.”
Stuart slid Nate a look. “The gossipmongers are already at work, it seems.”
Nate could picture the ladies in town whispering behind their hands and in their parlors—abouthim. He winced at the thought.
“It doesn’t matter how I discovered it.” Ruthann waved a hand. “But we must put a stop to it.”
“We?” Stuart said, but Ruthann pointedly ignored him.
“Sissy Flagler is not a . . . kind woman,” Ruthann said, clearly choosing her words very carefully. “Stuart was right when he said you needed a solution that her father couldn’t tear apart. And I have an idea.”
“By all means, let’s hear it.” Stuart’s words held a note of brotherly irritation.
Ruthann shot a glare at him before folding her hands together and glancing at Nate and then down at the floor. She seemed suddenly shy, her pretty features tingeing pink. Nate pushed away the irrational urge to take her up into his arms.
She took a deep breath before looking up at them again. “Stuart had a good idea when he suggested you claim to be engaged, but that doesn’t go far enough. What if you were already married?”
Nate furrowed his brow. “But I’m not.”
Ruthann looked at him for a moment, and her meaning sunk in slowly.
“You mean him to make up a wife?” Stuart said, casting an incredulous glance at his sister. “That’s an even bigger falsehood than I’d proposed.”
“Yes, it is. But no. Maybe a little.” She paused and drew in a breath. “He wouldn’t be lying about having a wife—if he married immediately. Then he couldn’t possibly marry Sissy. And his wife can say she was present in a back room while Sissy was at the studio. That part would be a lie, of course, but it’s a good one, isn’t it? To save Nate’s business? It would be her word against Sissy’s, and few people in this town will give credence to Sissy’s story when another, more reputable woman says otherwise.” Ruthann smiled, seemingly more brave now that she’d gotten the words out.
Stuart blinked and said nothing for a moment, while Nate could hardly catch the thoughts tumbling through his head.
Marry now.
But how?
And to whom?
A rising note of panic clawed its way up into his chest, choking off the ability to ask any of those questions out loud.
“How? And who would be the bride?” Stuart asked the questions for him.
“Surely any minister in this town wouldn’t turn down a plea from a couple desperate to marry,” Ruthann said.
Stuart nodded slowly. “And the lucky lady? Do you have someone in mind, Ruthie?”
