Free When Love Comes by Leigh Greenwood Page B

ought to put that man in jail. He said he would if the fellow gave you any trouble.”
    “What are you talking about?” Amanda asked. “ Who are you talking about?”
    “The man who took you home the other night. He’s been talking to the sheriff,” Corby answered.
    “He went to the sheriff about us?” Gary’s face turned dark red. “I’ll kill the son of a bitch.”
    “I don’t trust the man myself,” his mother said to him, “but you will not use such language at my table. What did Mr. Kincaid say to the sheriff?” she asked Corby.
    “He told him you owed a lot of money and that Judge Pike was coming to auction off everything you owned if the debt wasn’t paid. The sheriff said he even threatened him.”
    “I can’t believe that,” Amanda said. “Whatever mistakes Broc has made, he’s not a fool.”
    “He is if he thinks he’s going to get us to pay a debt we don’t owe,” Gary said.
    “If he’s got a judge on his side, that could be trouble,” Corby said. “We all know what Reconstruction people are like. I could tell you—”
    “Don’t,” Amanda said. “It would upset Mother. I appreciate your coming to see us, but Mr. Kincaid said we weren’t to give him any money and that we should send someone to Crystal Springs to look into the matter.”
    “One person can lie as well as another,” Corby said. “It won’t make any difference that this Pike is a judge. That’s why I’ve come to offer to marry you so I can protect the whole family.”
    Considering the times, Amanda supposed quite a few women had received more unflattering proposals, but she didn’t personally know any. If Corby thought offering to protect her family from a flimsy threat would win her over whenshe’d refused all his previous offers of marriage, he understood her even less than she’d thought. But then Corby had never shown any real understanding of her—or a desire to acquire any. After her father’s death, he’d assumed he would be the one she turned to in times of need, the natural choice to become her husband. Every time she turned him down, he came up with a new reason why she should marry him. This time, however, he’d miscalculated. Not even Gary liked the idea of Corby assuming the role of protector of the family.
    “We can take care of ourselves,” Gary said. “I can handle Kincaid by myself.”
    “No, you can’t,” Eddie said.
    “I can, too,” Gary insisted. “Just because I don’t get into brawls don’t mean I can’t fight.”
    Amanda knew they should move into the parlor, but that would be an invitation for Corby to sit and stay longer. “This is a legal matter, not one to be settled by fists.”
    “It would settle his big mouth.”
    “I’ve made it plain to him that I want him out of town as soon as possible,” Corby said. “He says he has business with Carruthers and Sandoval, but if he’s lying, I’ll see he’s sorry.”
    Amanda had a strong suspicion Broc could take either Gary or Corby. “I appreciate your offer of help,” she said to Corby, “but we can handle this by ourselves.”
    “There’s no reason you should have to,” Corby insisted. “I want to marry you. I want to take care of things for you. And your family,” he added as an afterthought.
    “My daughter is too young to marry,” Mrs. Liscomb said.
    Amanda appreciated her mother’s help, but she wasn’t going to hide behind anyone. “I’m not too young,” she told Corby. “I just don’t want to get married yet.”
    Okay, she was hedging, but it didn’t seem necessary to hurt his feelings by telling him she would never marry him. She’d already told him she didn’t love him. He said love wasan invention of people who wrote poetry and silly plays to fill young girls’ heads with a lot of nonsense. He believed respect and admiration were the feelings on which successful marriages were founded.
    “You should think of your family,” Corby said. “They need a man to guide them as well as