Wild Star (Star Quartet 3)

She made a sign of a cross over her breast. “I promise.”

“It’s kind of silly, I guess, but I was riding out of Denver, at night, and there was this bright star overhead. I just kept riding toward it, thinking that it was like me in a way, always moving, never staying in the same place long, free, if you will, and wild. I decided then if I ever settled in one place, I’d harness that star, but keep the illusion that it was still free, still moving, still wild.”

“That’s not silly at all,” she said after a moment. “You’re a romantic, Brent, and that’s a good thing for a man to be.”

“And a poet, no doubt.”

“Perhaps,” Maggie said. “Now, I can see you’re itching to be off. Will you do me a favor? Could you ask Saint to come over? Lisette isn’t feeling too well.”

“Sure thing. Nothing serious, I hope?”

“Just woman problems, that’s all.”

“Mysterious,” he said, giving her a wicked look.

“You men are so damned lucky,” Maggie said.

“Not always. Celeste just got mysterious on me.”

He cocked his hat at her and strode from the stiflingly glorious parlor. Maggie loved yellow. He felt like he’d stepped into a giant daffodil. At least it was better than Belle Cora’s garish and tasteless gold-and-red whorehouse.

“It’s not at all what I expected,” Byrony said to her new half-sister. “It’s so barren, but the hills are beautiful and the city is so vibrant.”

“Yes, that’s true. But we love San Francisco. And there are so many changes. Always changes.”

Byrony set down her teacup and looked about the salon. “You’ve built a lovely house, Ira. Very impressive.”

“Thank you, my dear. Do you like your room?”

“I’d be crazy and blind not to! Did you decorate it, Irene?”

“No, Ira did, before he left for San Diego. He wanted everything to be perfect for you.”

A silent black woman gently removed the tea service. “Thank you, Eileen,” Byrony said.

Eileen nodded, her eyes meeting Byrony’s for a brief moment.

Byrony yawned. “Oh dear,” she said, “please excuse me. I suppose I’m tired. It certainly isn’t the company.”

“Why don’t you rest until dinner, my dear? I’ll escort you to your room.”

“I should like that,” Byrony said, and rose.

Irene rose also. She gave Byrony a brief hug and said, “Thank you.”

Ira left her at her door. “I’ll see that you’re not disturbed, my dear. Eileen will call you at seven. We dine normally at eight o’clock.”

She nodded, and slipped into her new bedroom. She stood for a moment in the center of the room. Her bedroom at Aunt Ida’s had been as fussy as her aunt was, crammed with all the bric-a-brac that wouldn’t fit into the other rooms. Her bedroom in San Diego had been small, bare, and cold. But not this room. She drew a deep, pleased breath. Large, airy, with huge bow windows facing south to sparsely housed hills. The walls were painted cream and all the furnishings were a pale blue. There were no things cluttering any surface. It was her room and it would be she who made it personal. The bed was covered with a pale blue-and-white counterpane.

I’m happy, she thought suddenly. I’m starting a new life. I am in control of it. Well, not really, she quickly amended to herself, her smile fading. She was now, she supposed, officially pregnant. She remembered Irene’s soft thank-you. She was relieved. She’d wanted no tears, no apologies, no scenes. How different Irene was from Ira. Ira, fair and slender as an angel, and Irene, small, dusky-complexioned, with deep brown eyes. She seemed somewhat reticent, perhaps shy, but Byrony guessed that the seven months they would spend together would bring about a better understanding of their respective characters.

Byrony stepped to the windows and drew back the heavy cream-colored draperies. She hoped she’d be able to see San Francisco before Ira took them to Sacramento. She’d felt the stirring in her blood when they had arrived, docking at the Clay Street wharf. Life, she thought, that’s what San Francisco has, boisterous wild young life. Ira had laughingly told her that he was an old man here, where the average age was well under thirty.

The gambler is here, she thought, and felt a peculiar rush of excitement. But it is too late. I am a married lady. It is too late.

“Fool,” she said to herself. “You’re behaving like a child, weaving a patched dream from scraps of memory. He’s just a man, a man like all the others.”

She dropped the draperies over the windows and walked slowly to her bed. She slipped off her shoes and lay on her back, staring up at the cream-painted ceiling. She wanted desperately to recapture that noble image of herself she’d nourished when she’d agreed to Ira’s plea, but there was nothing inside her save a growing feeling of despair and disbelief. She would become a mother in the eyes of the world. Irene’s child would be called hers. How would they all act? How would she feel then, living this lie? A life of lies.