focused her waning attention on Angel and smiled. “We’ll make it again. It’ll help with two people. Whipping the egg whites becomes tiring for one.”
“It certainly did,” Angel admitted. “And turned out as hard as rocks. Good thing Pa didn’t break a tooth. He was the only one brave enough to try it.”
“That sounds like something my father would have done,” Constance admitted.
“Oh? Where does he live?”
“He used to live in Virginia, but he passed away many—” A thud outside the front door had Constance jumping to her feet. Regardless of Angel’s earlier assurance that Ellis was fine, was used to working in such extreme conditions, Constance couldn’t help but fret for his well-being.
The noise came again, and Angel ran from the parlor, pulling the front door open as Constance turned the corner.
The bitterly cold wind swirled into the house, stinging Constance’s face and eyes, but it was her heart that froze. The blizzard had made her compliant. Let her believe travel would be hampered. The man lying on the front porch wasn’t Ellis. It was a complete stranger. Could he be the authorities? All the way from New York? Who else would travel through a blizzard? Though fretful, concern for his lifeless state flared inside her. “Help me get him inside.”
Between the two of them, Angel tugging and Constance pushing, they managed to roll the man over the threshold. His face was beet-red and ice hung on his eyelashes.
“Mr. Homer?” Angel patted the man’s ruddy cheeks. “What are you doing here?”
The man groaned, and Constance sighed with relief he was indeed alive. “Mr. Homer?” she asked, brushing aside the snow covering his clothing.
“One of the men from town. He works at the bank,” Angel explained as she pushed the door shut.
Constance now recognized the man as the one she’d compared to a rain barrel yesterday. “What’s he doing out here?”
Angel, with her long blond curls bouncing about, shook her head ruefully. “My guess would be to claim you.”
Constance pressed a hand to the alarm thudding in her chest, recalling the men outside the stage. “In a storm like this? He must be crazy.”
The man groaned again.
For a few hours the reason for her being at the Clayton home had escaped her. The panic in her chest turned into annoyance. It was a dismal situation she found herself in, but in all circumstances there was a solution, and she’d find one now, too. As soon as she saw to the tasks at hand. Constance huffed out a puff of frustrated air. “Help me drag him into the parlor so he can thaw out. The poor man’s lucky he didn’t freeze to death.”
Along with much tugging and pulling, she and Angel managed to get Mr. Homer in front of the fireplace in the parlor. Pressing her hands against her muscle-strained thighs, Constance took a moment to catch her breath from the laborious job before she began removing the man’s coat by rolling him from side to side while Angel went upstairs for a blanket.
After a few minutes, the man regained consciousness. “Oh, thank you, thank you,” he mumbled several times as he flopped closer to the fireplace. “Heat. Heat.”
“Not too close, Mr. Homer,” Constance warned, glad the grate kept the man from climbing into the flames.
A rap sounded on the front door. She and Angel stared at one another for a brief moment before they rose and went to the door again. This time the man was upright on the porch, but he leaned heavily on the door frame, shaking and shivering from head to toe. “G-g-g-goo-d-d-d d-d-d-ay.”
Constance ran a hand over her aching forehead. This was too absurd to be happening. Surely these men didn’t believe she was so destitute she’d—A lump formed in her throat. She was destitute. Lord knew where she’d be right now if not for Angel and Ellis.
Angel grabbed the man’s arm. “Good day to you, too, Mr. Aimes. Get in here before you freeze to death.”
Constance took his other arm as the man stumbled in, mumbling and leaving a trail of snow on the rug.
After that, there was barely time to get one man settled when another would be knocking, or in some cases, falling against the door. The final count was five. Mr. Homer, Mr. Aimes, Mr. McDonaldson, Mr. Westmaster and Jeb. Angel said she didn’t know Jeb’s last name, and the way his teeth chattered, Constance couldn’t understand what he’d said.
Constance had just removed Jeb’s frozen coat when the front door slammed shut. “Oh, no, not another one,” she groaned, much louder than intended, but she was quite exasperated. Was every man in the Wyoming Territory without a lick of sense?
“Not another whaaat the hell?” Ellis stared into the front parlor from the doorway, his gaze making a full circle of the room.
Constance held her breath. It was quite a scene. Men wrapped in blankets, some holding hot water bottles on their frozen heads, others soaking their feet in tubs of warm water. Some had water dripping from the ice chunks still clinging to their hair, and most were groaning with shivers or their teeth were chattering loud and uncontrollably.
“They came,” Angel said, squeezing around her father to enter the room, “to claim the bride.” She walked over and flipped the blanket in her arms around Jeb. “I knew they wouldn’t wait. I should’ve made a post with the date we’d start the interviews and left it with Link.”
Constance’s heart sank, and then jolted. Quickly, she stepped around and between the men. Though his face held an astonished look, Ellis must be furious. Rightfully so. This was all because of her. Stalling until she could come up with an appropriate explanation, she asked, “Mr. Clayton, can I get you some hot coffee?”
He glanced at the steaming cups set beside some of the men. “Is there any left?”
“Yes, I just put on a fresh pot.” Constance froze midstep. His broad frame filled the doorway and she didn’t dare squeeze around him as Angel had. “It should be about done,” she offered, glancing toward the kitchen door on the other side of the arched opening.
He stepped aside, providing the space she needed to slip through the doorway. His attention remained on the parlor. “This explains the horses that showed up at the barn door.”
Constance scrambled across the foyer to the swinging kitchen door. Once beyond it, she took a breath and slowed her pace, wishing she could slow her pulse as easily. The pot was perking loudly on the stove, and she grabbed a cup from the cupboard along the way. The last thing she’d expected was a horde of men traveling through a blizzard to claim her hand in marriage. A heavy foreboding once again pressed on her chest. Besides being overly disconcerting, it gravely added to the long list of debt she owed Ellis. He’d probably send her back to town with the men—tired of the problems she caused in such a short span of time. Heat stung her palm and she pulled her hand away from the hot pot.
“Did you burn yourself?”
Shy of jumping out of her skin, Constance shook her head. How had he come to stand right beside her and she not hear him? Ignoring the smart in her palm, she grabbed a towel before attempting to lift the pot this time.
“Thanks.” He took the cup and moved a few steps away to drink the coffee.
