Imitations of a Lady Read online

  Imitations of a Lady

  Hearts of the West Book Two

  Kate Marie Clark

  Copyright © 2018 Kate Marie Clark.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.

  Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Names, characters, and places are products of the author’s imagination.

  Front cover images from Can Stock Photo

  Cover design by Amanda Conley

  Book Design by Jolene Perry

  Edited by Jolene Perry

  Printed by Kate Marie Clark, in the United States of America.

  First printing edition 2018.

  [email protected]

  www.katemarieclark.com

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Kate Marie Clark

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Kate Marie Clark

  Kate Marie Clark

  For a complete list of Kate Marie Clark’s books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit katemarieclark.com

  Chapter 1

  The door shook against its frame, threatening to give way. Wood splintered with the latest quake, and the vile man pounded once more, this time kicking his boots against the lower half. “I’m losing my patience, Cora, and you know what that means.” Milton’s voice was gruff, even more than usual.

  “Ask one of the other girls,” Cora said, folding her arms. There was no way she’d entertain that Gary Carpenter again. He’d already become too friendly, taking liberties that weren’t his to take. No thank you. Cora Burns would stay in the boarding house all day if it meant avoiding such a repulsive man. She cleared her throat in disgust.

  “The others won’t do, not for Carpenter,” Milton said. “He wants you on that stage, and I aim to please my customers. And, lest you forget, it better be your aim to please me. You’ve got three minutes, and that’s more than I give most. If you ain’t out there, I’ll break down this here door and drag you out myself.”

  Cora gritted her teeth. Let him do his worst. What did she care? If it wasn’t Milton, it was someone or something else. She’d already had enough of his badgering. She’d sung and danced three hours straight for Gary, despite his outrageous behavior. He’d slung her across his lap, tried to kiss her, and offered her a large sum in exchange for her services.

  Her services. She shivered. When Cora Burns had accepted the job at the saloon, Milton had made an exception. Cora wasn’t the type to provide services to men, unless it pertained to singing and dancing. And because of her voice and looks, Milton had agreed.

  Reluctantly.

  However, as time went on, Milton became increasingly insistent that Cora conform to the requirements set for the other women he employed. He’d called her a prude, a high and mighty, a girl that was itching for a set down. Milton had even gone as far as withholding wages unless she relented.

  But nothing he’d done had produced his desired results. Milton’s customers demanded Cora’s presence on stage, and she’d refused to go until Milton withdrew his disturbing demands. She was poor. And desperate. But nothing would induce her to become what her mother had. Nothing would induce her to sell her soul.

  “Your three minutes are up,” Milton said. His words were muffled, but there was no mistaking his anger. He’d reached the breaking point. He kicked a hole straight through the door.

  Cora startled. That was a first—Milton had never forced his way into her room. She retreated to the bed table, where she kept her revolver. She took the weapon from the drawer and clutched it to her chest. It was impossible to know what Milton was capable of. His anger knew no bounds, evident by his bandaged shooting hand. He’d murdered a man just months ago, and he’d nearly murdered Deputy Everett Myers in broad daylight last week. Luckily, Milton had received a shot instead.

  Milton threw another punch, creating an even larger hole, several feet higher.

  “What in tarnation are you trying to do to my door?” Maggie said from the opposite side of Cora’s door.

  Cora breathed a sigh of relief. Maggie was the only person that could talk sense into that thick skull, and she was the only person in Crooked Creek brave enough to try. Cora’s landlady was an aging wonder—strong and fiery, unimaginably intelligent, and uncommonly determined. It was a marvel the woman fit in such a short, thin frame.

  “Breaking down my door? Not on my watch,” Maggie said in her scratchy voice.

  “Mags,” Milton said, lowering his voice. “Help me out, will you? Cora won’t come down to the saloon, and Carpenter’s asking for her singing. I can’t lose his business.”

  Maggie laughed. It was a coarse, eerie sound, but one that Cora had grown to love. “Ain’t no matter of mine. Gary best take a break from the drink anyhow. He don’t hold it like he used to.”

  “Mags,” Milton plead. “Do me a favor.”

  “Now, off with you. If Miss Burns takes to her room, it’s my business to see the likes of men as you don’t go chasing after her. This ain’t the type of establishment you’re used to running. I don’t stand for that type of conduct here. No men in my girls’ rooms. Including you.”

  He grunted. “Don’t make me go against your wishes.”

  Maggie laughed once more. “I’d like to see you try. I’m liable to bend you over my knee and throttle you like your mother used to do, like she told me to do if ever you stepped out of line. She said, ‘Maggie, don’t let my boy turn into one of them no-good ones.’ I reckon she meant exactly this type of thing—hounding on a poor, tired girl. For shame, Milton.”

  “Confounded woman,” Milton said, slamming his hand against the door once more before leaving Cora’s room at last. His spurs clinked, and his footsteps started down the hall.

  “That’s right,” Maggie said. Her voice trailed after him, until Cora no longer heard either of the two.

  Pure grit. Maggie was fierce and dangerous and terribly intimidating. She knew just how to scare an opponent off course. Usually, threats were required, sometimes a gun. But with Milton, Maggie only had to bring up his mother. There was nothing more terrifying to Milton than imagining his mother looking down on him and the atrocities he committed. At least it seemed to Cora. She’d witnessed Maggie talk him down enough times.

  Cora set the revolver back in the drawer and dropped to the mattress. Thank goodness for that woman. Without Maggie, Milton might have met another bullet. Without Maggie, Cora would be without a home, without any semblance of family.

  Cora closed her eyes. She couldn’t keep on this path; that fact was obvious. The time would come when Maggie wasn’t there to protect her, and Cora would take things into her own h
ands. That scared her more than Milton—what she might do when given the chance. She’d thought of sending a bullet through that man’s heart more than once. After all Milton had done, he didn’t deserve to live. It only grated Cora that she considered finishing him off herself.

  “Tap, tap,” Maggie said, knocking her knuckles in the air through Milton’s handiwork. “Anybody there?” Milton’s hole was eye level with the woman, and Maggie placed a bulging eye near the opening.

  A smile snuck across Cora’s cheeks. She broke into laughter. “Might as well come in. I no longer have a morsel of privacy.”

  Maggie rattled her keys, trying five different ones before huffing. Her bony arm reached inside the hole, and she unlocked the door from within. “I tell you, these keys don’t work like they used to. I reckon I should have Milton punch in all the doors. Much more convenient.” She pushed open the door, then wiped the sweat from her brow. “That boy is as wicked a boy as I ever seen.”

  Cora sat up, surveying the woman across from her once more.

  Maggie’s gray hair had been fastened in a bun, but the wisps and stray hairs fanning her face outnumbered those pinned to her head. The old woman put her hands to her angled hips. “In any case, I can’t keep Milton at bay much longer. I’ve nearly worn out that talk of his mother.”

  “I know,” Cora said. She pursed her lips. “I’ll have to go back to the saloon before long, or we won’t hear the end of it.”

  Maggie’s jaw jutted forward. “Uh-huh, or at least let him know you’re done for good.”

  Not again. Cora fell back to her pillow and pulled the cover over her face. “There’s nothing else for me to do, Maggie. I don’t have the luxury of choice. This is what I’ve been allotted—a voice and rhythm.”

  “And looks,” Maggie said, squeaking the springs of the mattress as she sat beside Cora. She pulled the blanket from Cora’s face. “Look, I know you don’t like working in that saloon any more than I like handling Milton.”

  “But we still do it to survive.” Cora blew a puff of air, moving the stray curls from her face. “So why try convincing me again? Unless you’ve suddenly come to money, there’s no other option. No one else will hire me. I’ve got rent to pay, and food to find, Maggie, and I can’t have you lecturing me about morality any longer. You know I don’t like the saloon any more than you do.”

  Maggie nodded, and the muscles along her jaw tensed. “I get it, I do.” She threaded her shaky fingers through Cora’s now tangled hair. “You know I’ll take care of you as long as I’m living, but I doubt that will be enough.”

  Like steel in the forge, a ribbon of pain burned against Cora’s chest, her heart hammering against it. She couldn’t lose Maggie. Not now, not later. But wishing would not change the facts. Maggie was nearing seventy; she couldn’t live forever. And Maggie was right. Cora needed to get out of the saloon, possibly even Crooked Creek.

  Chapter 2

  Cora’s new rooming partner, thanks to Maggie’s generosity and sheer stubbornness on the matter, had taken more than her share of the covers. The bed was made for two, and Maggie had insisted Cora allow the girl to sleep beside her, saying something about the newcomer’s delicate state.

  Delicate indeed. Lettie Williams hadn’t left the bed since her arrival the evening before. In fact, the girl’s face was a sickly pale, almost green.

  Cora finished pinning her last curl and patted a smudge of rouge at the apple of her cheekbones. “You feeling alright, Miss Williams?” she asked, staring at the girl’s reflection in the mirror. “Maggie has breakfast hash on the stove.”

  Lettie groaned. “If only I could.”

  She had two legs. All the girl needed was to walk. Cora swallowed. It wasn’t kind to think such things. “Perhaps I can bring you some then?”

  Lettie shook her head against the pillow. Tears filled her eyes. “It would not do any good. I should think I might die in this God-forsaken place, if I did not know any better.”

  Cora had little experience with tears. She’d only cried a handful of times in her life. Her tears hadn’t ever helped. She stood from the dressing table and lowered to Lettie’s bedside. “You mustn’t say such things. Should I ring for the doctor?”

  The girl bit her lower lip, shaking her head against the pillow once more. A broken sob escaped. “It’s no use. I’m ruined.”

  “Nonsense,” Cora said, though she had to feign conviction. Whatever had happened in Lettie Williams’s life must have been dire indeed. From all appearances, the girl had been raised a lady, a real proper and mannered type of girl. Like the deputy’s fiancé. “You stay put. Maggie always knows just how to remedy such situations.”

  Cora hadn’t a notion of the type of situation Lettie faced, but Maggie did; it was the reason the landlady had insisted Cora allow Lettie to sleep beside her. The boarding house was full and remained so with Maggie. Any level-headed independent woman in Crooked Creek wished to stay there. Maggie was a force to be reckoned with, a loyal old crotchety that protected “her girls,” as she called them.

  Cora found Maggie in her favorite spot—a splintery and worn rocking chair on the boarding house porch. Maggie wore a dusty cowboy hat over her eyes, swaying in the warm breeze. Her feet swung in the air, inches from the ground. How such fire resided in Maggie’s tiny, frail body was a mystery to Cora.

  “About Miss Williams,” Cora began, bending to glance below the hat’s brim. Maggie fell asleep in that chair more often than not.

  “Lettie.” Maggie lifted her hat and set it on her lap. “She’s a good girl. Troubled, but good. I’ve seen her before, some years back when she travelled through Crooked Creek. Her Daddy brought her out West to see her aunt. They stayed here. Lettie used to be a vibrant, pretty girl—nothing like the shell she’s become.”

  A shell. The words stung. Sometimes Cora felt much the same—a shell of a person. It was only when Cora sang on stage that she felt the prickle of something more. “It don’t take much to gather Lettie’s in some kind of trouble. She’s distraught. She won’t eat. Is there something you can do to help her? I’ve got a shift to be getting to.”

  Maggie stretched her wrinkly fingers, tapping the tips of each hand together. “If only. Lettie has been sent as a companion to her aunt’s aging friend, but she’s frightfully nervous that her condition will be found out, and that her daddy and mama back East will catch word.”

  “Her condition?” Cora asked.

  Maggie’s balding brows knit together. “When you get to be my age and see as many women passing through the boarding house as I have, you learn to recognize the condition with a single glance. It won’t be long until she shows, no matter how full her skirts are.”

  “Miss Williams is pregnant?” Cora asked.

  “And it isn’t like it is here with the saloon girls. Lettie’s parents won’t understand, and neither will that companion of hers, far as I can tell. That baby is doomed.”

  Bile climbed Cora’s throat. That baby is doomed—the same thing might as well have been said of her. Cora’s mother had been worse off that Lettie Williams. Cora’s mother was all promiscuity, without purse or manners.

  Maggie reached into her pocket, pulling out a worn letter. “I almost forgot. I got a real letter today, arrived from Glendale Springs addressed to you.” She handed the letter to Cora, but a question loomed behind her clouded eyes.

  “For me? Glendale Springs?” Cora took the paper and scanned it. The lettering was slanted and curled, better than Mr. Lockhart’s lettering on shop windows.

  Dear Miss Burns,

  This letter may come as a surprise, but I hope it will be a pleasant one. I am, as I write, on my way to marry Deputy Everett Myers in Glendale Springs’s chapel. Everett plans to return to Crooked Creek to bring Milton to justice for my uncle’s death. However, I hope you will be long gone by then.

  I hereby leave all my belongings left in Everett’s house to you, Cora. Please accept them as my gratitude for your assistance in protecting me from Milton on
my first day in town and for your warning me of my brother’s arrival. All has turned out for the best, and I cannot help but feel it is, in part, because of your kindness.

  You will find my trunks stacked in Everett’s house and a note atop addressed to you. There, you will find at least fifteen dresses, boots, hats, and an assortment of jewelry and personal belongings.

  Warmest regards,

  Charlotte Albany

  Cora’s hands shook, and she dropped the letter.

  “Well, what is it?” Maggie asked, her voice crackling. “You look as if you’ve received a death sentence. Is it your no-good mama?”

  “No,” Cora said, bending to retrieve the letter. Her mother hadn’t such handwriting nor heart. “Deputy Myers’s fia—wife. She’s left me her belongings—fifteen lady dresses and all the fixings to go with them.”

  Maggie laughed, hooting and coughing simultaneously. “My, what will you do with such finery? Ain’t like you to wear such things.” She stood from the rocking chair and called to Terrance Wilkins across the street. “A word, Mr. Wilkins?”

  Terrance leaned into the sun and smiled a large, toothless grin. “Ever at your service, Mags.”

  Cora cringed. Terrance was harmless, but an offensive stench followed him. Perhaps it was his work-for-hire activities. He was willing to do anything to make a dime, including burying the dead. Cora grasped Maggie’s wrist. “What are you doing with Terrance?”