Read The Diamond of the Rockies [03] The Tender Vine for Free Online Page B

Fairplay.”
    “I’d have to get there.”
    “Aye.”
    Quillan shook his head. “I just left Carina. How would it look to go again?”
    Alan’s silence said too much. Never worried about that before. Ye must be smitten sure, lad. And it’s about time . Quillan could hear it well enough without Alan speaking aloud.
    “Then I’d have to wait in Fairplay for a reply.” Quillan raised his hands, frustrated.
    “Aye.”
    Quillan dropped his hands to his lap. “She won’t understand. You should have seen her.” He recalled her face as he’d told her he was going to Leadville with Makepeace. The twisting started inside him. Ah, that was the root of it now. Leaving Carina alone with Alex Makepeace. He could hardly take the man along this time.
    “She’ll bide.”
    Oh, she’d bide all right. With Makepeace to make the biding easier. Never had Quillan felt such possessive malice. But then, he’d never loved before, never allowed himself to love. “I can’t do it, Alan. If Makepeace—”
    “Ah, boyo. ’Tis a jaundiced eye ye have.”
    “You said yourself she could love him and would if—”
    “That was before ye put your trust in the Almighty.”
    Quillan sat silently. How did Alan know? Did it show on the outside, the surrender? And what exactly was Alan saying? That God would keep Makepeace away from Carina? Lord? Quillan searched his heart. How did faith work? All the sermons his foster father had spoken, all the truths Cain had touted; had they told Quillan how to live? How to handle this jealousy, this doubt, this aching fear that he’d lose Carina and it would be his own fault?
    “I don’t know what to do, Alan.”
    Alan drew long on his pipe, puffed out the smoke. “Pray, Quillan. Ask God. Then trust He’ll see to your business better than you.”
    The thought of turning Carina’s safety, Carina’s fidelity, over to God, even the God to whom he’d surrendered in his father’s cave . . . It was easier to surrender himself than Carina. He shook his head. “I’ve made a mess of it.”
    “ ’Tis bought and paid for ye are, Quillan. Whatever ye’ve done or failed to do, sure Christ the Savior has taken it on himself.”
    Why didn’t it feel that way? If God forgave him, if Carina forgave, why couldn’t he forgive himself? Just the thought of telling Carina he had to leave town again brought a burning shame. She’d known before he spoke the last time; she had expected it, seen it coming—and why not? It’s all he’d given her. His back.
    But without D.C.’s okay, he couldn’t go forward with the sale. And with the lines down . . . He sighed. Mae had told him to learn to be still. Alan said pray. Maybe today he could do that much. He leaned forward and patted Alan’s shoulder. “Thank you, old man.”
    Alan covered his hand with his dry, callused palm. “Seek Him first, and the rest will come.”
    Quillan nodded. The feelings he had for Alex Makepeace were certainly not rooted in God. And he couldn’t let those feelings rule his decisions. Maybe he would do better to learn God’s mind in it. He left the livery and returned to Carina’s room, hushing Sam’s eager greeting. Carina was still sleeping, and he stood for a moment looking down on her and wondering how he could have been such a fool.
    Then, taking Cain’s worn Bible from his pack, he sat on one of the two chairs beside the small table as Sam settled at his feet. He laid the book down and opened to the gospel of Saint Matthew. It was the first of the gospels and seemed as good a place to start as any. He was certainly familiar with the scriptures. He’d committed whole books to memory at the instigation of Reverend and Mrs. Shepard, his foster parents. But though he’d memorized the words, he’d never taken them to heart.
    Now he looked at the book, wondering if he could learn it differently. He’d read it two nights ago, and that phrase he’d quoted to Carina had jumped out at him from the page as though he’d never