Free Wanton Angel by Linda Lael Miller Page A

would need to have a firsthand look at the plant itself and to examine the books. “Seth warned me about Durrant,” Eli muttered, in place of answering Genoa’s question.
    “I never understood Grandfather’s confidence in that man,” Genoa said quietly, her gaze, like Eli’s, fixed on the sparkling waters of the pond. “He said Forbes was a ‘scrapper.’”
    Remembering Bonnie’s accusation the night before concerning her father’s store, Eli felt a cold rage toward Forbes Durrant. The appropriation of that insignificant store, a place unaccountably precious to Bonnie, had surely been his doing, since Eli had had no knowledge of the matter. “Grandfather told me often enough that Forbes would bear watching. I just didn’t listen. I was too busy with other things.”
    “You mean Grandfather didn’t trust Forbes?” Genoa’s eyes rounded.
    Despite everything, Eli had to grin. “He told me that a mind as quick as Durrant’s was as likely to be devious asloyal. I imagine a good look at the company books will show Forbes to be a most inventive man.”
    “I should have done something,” Genoa fretted. “I knew Forbes was living beyond his means—why, no one on a salary could afford to build an edifice the likes of the Brass Eagle Saloon!”
    Eli sobered again, reminded of the ballroom and the woman who danced there every evening, in exchange for dollar tokens. He was going to have to do something about that: The thought of Bonnie being held so intimately by any bastard with a buck to spend was unbearable. He’d bought up all her dances the night before, but that had been a short-term solution, to say the least. “It does seem that Grandfather’s fair-haired boy has been skimming the profits, but if he’s as smart as the old man thought, it’s going to take some digging to prove anything.”
    “Surely you’re going to ask him to resign!”
    Eli tossed another stone into the pond. “At some point, I’ll probably have to fire Durrant. Right now, I’d rather he went on believing that I’m too distracted by the situation with Bonnie to be concerned with the smelter.”
    Genoa’s shock had not subsided. “Eli, you can’t be serious! The man has probably been stealing from us for years, and there are rumors that he’s been hiring toughs to drive out the union people and the workers that support them!”
    Eli hurled the last stone into the pond. “The responsibility for this godawful mess is mine, Genoa, and I’ll straighten it out. But it’s going to take time, and it’ll be done my way.”
    “I just hope it isn’t too late,” Genoa replied and, in a swish of cambric skirts, started back toward the house.
    Menelda Sneeder entered the mercantile with understandable reluctance and, despite her street encounter with the woman the day before, Bonnie felt her sympathies rise. According to Forbes, it was those very leanings toward forgiveness that caused her business to teeter on the brink of bankruptcy.
    “Good morning, Mrs. Sneeder.” Wearing her hair in a soft, billowing topknot, clad in a modest, sprigged-calico dress instead of a low-cut silk, her face unpainted, Bonniemight not have been the same person who danced the hurdy-gurdy at the Brass Eagle and, for Menelda’s sake as well as her own, she pretended this to be so.
    “Good morning, Mrs. McKutchen,” Menelda replied miserably, her eyes catching on Rose Marie, who was sitting in a highchair near the counter, busily chewing on her favorite rag doll. In that moment, Mrs. Sneeder’s unhappy expression faded to a certain guarded wistfulness.
    “Is there something I can help you with?” Bonnie asked, with a brisk kindness meant to preserve Menelda’s pride.
    “It’s about my account,” Menelda said after a long pause, and she cast anxious eyes in one direction and then the other, to make sure that no members of the Friday Afternoon Community Improvement Club were about. “I can’t pay anything this week, but my little one needs some