Friday, 30 March, 1870

     “Before you respond, Michaela, there is something I wish to say,” Mrs. Quinn spoke suddenly.

    Beside me, I felt Michaela immediately stiffen, anticipating the worst.  I reached down and gently squeezed her shoulder, nodding to her ever so slightly.  “Give your ma a chance,” I whispered to her, my voice barely audible.  “She might surprise you.”  Might surprise us both, I thought to myself, with an irrational sense of hope.

    Resistance shadowed Michaela’s eyes for a moment, but then she relented.  “Very well,” she said guardedly.  There was a pause, as her ma appeared to gather her thoughts.  Finally Mrs. Quinn spoke again.

    “I thought that nothing you could say would sway me, Mr. Sully—I was convinced of it, in fact,” Mrs. Quinn began, her eyes meeting mine.  “But I confess you have surprised me.  Your honesty and frankness regarding your difficult history, both touched and impressed me.  I was especially moved by your eloquent expression of love for my daughter,” she added.

    “And after hearing you describe the—illness—that resulted from your grief, I’ve come to believe I was wrong to question your—“

    “Sanity?” I broke in, with a crooked smile.

    “Let’s say ‘stability,’” she suggested, with a small smile of her own.  This time the smile was genuine.  “Over the years, as the wife of a physician, I’ve learned something of the devastating effect of grief and melancholy.  Recently, in fact, I’ve had the opportunity to observe it firsthand.”  Her odd and unexpected remark made Michaela study her curiously, but Mrs. Quinn didn’t elaborate.  Instead she went on, “I believe now that the source of your affliction was indeed melancholy—and that it was most unfair for me to criticize you, or suggest that your mind was less than sound, simply because you were experiencing the effects of long-delayed grief.

    “I hope you will accept my apology for any injury I caused you,” she offered sincerely.

    “Apology accepted, Ma’am,” I said respectfully.

      “I also accused you earlier of being Michaela’s intellectual inferior—but I see now that this second assessment was likewise in error,” she went on.  “Though events in your life conspired to prevent you from receiving a formal education, it’s obvious you’ve been blessed with both intelligence and sensitivity—as well as a liberal dose of common sense.  I believe I’m beginning to understand why my daughter loves you, and is so fiercely loyal to you.”

    I looked at Michaela, pleasantly surprised and gratified.  Was it possible?  Had I really managed to redeem myself in Mrs. Quinn’s eyes? Was she finally going to grant us the approval she’d been withholding for so long?   Michaela met my glance, and I could see she wanted to believe, just as I did, that we’d turned a corner in our relationship with her ma.  But wariness lingered in her eyes.  She couldn’t quite bring herself to trust that her ma’s opinion had truly changed.

    “I would very much like to offer you my blessing,” Mrs. Quinn continued—and inside I breathed a tremendous sigh of relief.  We’d done it—we’d made her understand.  She was in our corner—at last.  I gave Michaela a fleeting smile of triumph.

    “—but I am afraid I cannot,” her ma finished.

    I felt like I’d been sucker-punched—all the wind knocked out of me.  In the space of just seconds, she’d managed to raise my hopes to the loftiest heights—and then send them plummeting.  Sharp as my disappointment was, however, I dreaded even more how Michaela would react.

    I looked into her eyes, and my spirits sank even further.  She was regarding her ma bitterly, hectic spots of color blazing in her cheeks, and her lips pressed together so tightly they were white.

    “I knew it!” she lashed out suddenly, the air charged with her anger.  “I knew you were incapable of accepting Sully, despite all your gracious manners and pretty speeches!

    “I had hoped that once—just once—you would be on my side, Mother.  But I should have known better.  Hasn’t experience taught me by now?  You’ve never supported me, and you never will!”

    “Easy, Michaela,” I tried to mollify her, as Mrs. Quinn recoiled from her daughter’s venom.  “Hear her out.”

    “To what purpose?” Michaela said dully.  She appeared to have spent all her rage in her brief tirade, and now she just slumped in her chair, her eyes flat and lifeless.  The sudden change in her mood, as if all the fight had gone out of her, worried me even more than her outburst.

    “Because you’d want her to do the same for you,” I reasoned gently.  “It don’t cost nothing to listen, Michaela.”  I glanced over at her ma, who was sitting in injured silence, her face averted.

    “But don’t you see it already has?” Michaela said miserably.  “It’s cost you your privacy and your dignity . . .  Being forced to bare your soul like that . . .  And for what?  The price is too high, Sully.”

    “No, it ain’t,” I told her softly.  “Not if it’s for your sake.  Nothing’s too hard, Michaela, if I’m doing it for you.”

    “Thank you,” she managed.  “Your generosity—your forgiving spirit—they touch me more deeply than I could ever put into words, Sully.  But I can’t allow you to be further humiliated on my behalf.  This was the final straw.  After all these years of struggle, I am finally past caring what she thinks.  There’s nothing left between us.”

    I hunched down next to her chair and took her hand in mine.  “I don’t believe that,” I said.  “You’re hurting and angry now, but that’ll fade.  You and your ma—you’re blood, Michaela.  That’s never going to change.  You can try to erase your ma from your life, but you can never wipe out the bond that connects you.  And deep down, I don’t think you want to,” I added.

    “Give her one more chance, Michaela,” I urged.  “Do it for me.  Do it for us.  But most important, do it for yourself.  Because your heart’s never going to heal if you don’t try.”

    Her mouth trembled with the effort of holding back her tears.  “For you,” she whispered finally.  “Only for you.”

    I lifted her hand to my lips and kissed it gently.  “It’s going to be all right,” I promised.   I got to my feet, then faced Mrs. Quinn.

    “We’re ready to listen, Ma’am,” I told her.  “Both of us.  What were you going to say?”

* * * * * * * * * *

     “I am aware that I often appear cold and remote—a fact about myself that I cannot deny—and which I’ve often regretted.  Even toward members of my own family, it has always been—difficult—for me to express affection,” Mrs. Quinn began slowly, taking me by surprise yet again—the rigidity of her posture and the halting quality of her tone plainly hinting at her discomfort in revealing this hidden side of herself.  I’m not sure what I’d been expecting her to say, but this startling foray into self-confession or examination surely wasn’t it.  As I watched her hands unconsciously twist together in her lap, I found myself feeling a renewed sense of compassion toward her.

     “My parents were not what one would term—‘warm,’” she continued quietly.  “Oh, I am quite certain that they loved me, in their own fashion—just as I am sure that they loved my brother and my sisters.  But my father was frequently absent, attending to his business, and on the rare occasions when he was at home, his attitude toward us was—at best—merely polite.   Far more often he seemed both distracted and disconnected from his children . . .”  Her voice trailed off momentarily, and she stared into space, as if at something only she could see.  Inside me was the certainty that in her mind’s eye, she was envisioning herself as a little girl, innocently pining for the pa who was never there.

    Abruptly she gave us a guilty glance, then kind of shook herself—simultaneously squaring her shoulders and  pressing her lips together as if ashamed of even this small lapse into wistful vulnerability.   “As for my mother,” Elizabeth continued (and yes—to me suddenly she’d become an ‘Elizabeth,’ maybe even a ‘Lizzie’—no longer the chilly, forbidding woman who sat before me, but someone who had once been a young girl with hopes and dreams and longings of her own).  “—well, she, too was distant and removed . . . occupied with her numerous and never-ending social obligations,  preferring to leave the details of our day-to-day upbringing in the hands of nannies and governesses.  We would see her at breakfast, and occasionally she would reappear at dinner—that is, on the rare occasions she and my father were not hosting a dinner party, or accepting one of their numerous invitations to dine out.  And at bedtime, if she was at home, she would visit our rooms and bestow obligatory—but fleeting—good-night kisses.

    “But I don’t believe I ever recall her singing a lullaby, or reading a story, or coming to our bedsides in the middle of the night, offering comfort if one of us had a nightmare . . .” she went on thoughtfully, straying back into the landscape of her memories.  “As for our deportment—we were expected to be well-mannered, respectful and quiet, always.  In those days—at least among the circle in which we moved—children were expected to be ‘seen and not heard,’” she added by way of explanation.

    “Yet this was not unusual,” she hastened to say, as if anxious to convince us that while her parents may not have been affectionate, they’d been no worse than anybody else’s.  “Personal affairs among the families of my parents’ ‘set’ were almost universally conducted in this manner.  It was not considered—fashionable—to indulge children, or lavish affection upon them.

    “I confess that as a child, I sometimes didn’t understand my parents’ seeming lack of interest, or their apparent inability to demonstrate filial devotion,” Elizabeth continued.  “I can even recall—after some emotional slight or other—promising myself that I would never be like my mother and father . . .  that I would never withhold love and affection from my own children.  But as the years passed, and I came to realize that my parents’ distance was the rule rather than the exception, I began to . . . change.  To—to ‘harden,’ I suppose one would say.  The emotional detachment in my home was all I had ever known; thus, after a time, it began to feel natural to me.  Even necessary—as a defense against the emotions of others.  I found myself mimicking my parents’ behavior more and more frequently—until, at last, I was incapable of acting any other way.

    “Josef understood,” she said softly, unexpectedly—and I heard the minutest tremor in her voice.  “Somehow, from the time we first met, he was able to see past my reserve, and refused to be put off by my—prickly—exterior, and frequently sharp tongue.  Sometimes, he even called me ‘Kate’—after the character in ‘Taming of the Shrew.’  Josef managed to love me, despite my faults.  And with our daughters, he compensated for my difficulty in displaying my feelings, by showering them with all the attention and affection that they craved.

    “While in part, I was grateful that from their father at least, my children would never suffer the emotional neglect that I had experienced through so much of my life . . . still, as time passed, I found myself feeling jealous of the relationship Josef enjoyed with our daughters.  Somehow, he had found the key to expressing love freely and without reservation . . . a key I’d never known, or had forgotten long ago.  And since it was with Michaela that Josef shared the closest kinship—it was toward Michaela that I directed most of my jealousy, and resentment.”

    I had been so caught up in listening to Elizabeth as she painfully confided her innermost feelings, that I had temporarily forgotten to look at Michaela for her reaction to her mother’s words.  But now I stole a glance at the woman beside me, and saw that she was staring intently at her ma with her lips slightly parted, regarding Elizabeth in astonishment.  In that moment I suspected—no, I knew—that Elizabeth’s startling confession was as much of a revelation to Michaela, as it was to me.

    Elizabeth paused, as if expecting Michaela to make some sort of response.  When none was forthcoming, Michaela’s ma spoke again.

    “Have I shocked you?” she asked, with a dry sort of irony.  “I imagine I have.  But it’s true, Michaela—what you’ve always suspected.  As much as I loved you, I was jealous of you—and jealous of your place in Josef’s affections.  It was an ugly emotion, and part of me hated myself for feeling it—but I couldn’t seem to stop.  And I was far too ashamed ever to admit to being so base.

    “I would not be at all surprised if you confessed to hating me,” Elizabeth asserted calmly after a moment.  “Not only did I resent your closeness to your father—a bond that seemed to exclude me—but I went so far as to believe that you’d usurped my role in his life.

    “But far worse—is that for all these years I’ve encouraged you to believe that our estrangement was as much your fault as mine.  I even went so far as to suggest that you’ve been the transgressor, rather than myself.  I can offer no excuse, no justification for what I’ve done.  I’ve been insecure, petty and bitter—and because I’ve been incapable of admitting the truth to you or to myself, I’ve punished you for my own inadequacies.”

    Elizabeth stared at her daughter—her face vulnerable, stripped of the smug, aloof mask she’d always worn as if it were a second skin.  “Have you nothing to say to me, Michaela?” she said at last.  “I’ve just confessed the worst of sins to you—surely you must want to express your indignation, your anger—perhaps even your hatred—toward me.  You’re certainly entitled.”

    Suddenly I felt like I had no right to be here—that the brutal truth and naked emotions Elizabeth had revealed were too tender, too raw—to be glimpsed by the eyes of a stranger.  As I glanced from mother to daughter, the expressions on their faces twin mirrors of the pain in their souls, I murmured, “Maybe I should go . . . let you talk alone . . .”  But Elizabeth immediately turned to me, her steely eyes capturing and holding mine.

    “No, Mr. Sully—don’t leave.  We began this painful and arduous journey together—we are all obligated to see it through to the end, no matter how difficult the cost.”  Her eyes strayed back to her daughter and she waited for Michaela to speak.  I could see how desperately Elizabeth needed to hear a reaction—any reaction—from her child.  But I also knew she wouldn’t ask again.  Whatever happened next, was up to Michaela.

    After a long, agonizing pause, Michaela said softly, “Why are you telling me this now?”

    It was Elizabeth’s turn to be silent.  The fingers of her right hand toyed with the ornate wedding band on her left.  Presently she sighed, and answered, “Perhaps . . . perhaps because admitting how I’d wronged you, was the only way I could think of  to prove that I genuinely *do* love you, Michaela.  That I want only the best for you.  So that you’ll believe me when I say that even though I sympathize with your love and devotion for Mr. Sully, my fears for your safety are too strong for me to bless a union that might ultimately hurt you, or bring you to grievous harm.”  She turned to me.

    “I know you love my daughter, Mr. Sully.  I am sure you would do everything in your power to make her happy.  But I also know that you live an existence fraught with uncertainty, frequently attended by danger.  A life that clearly, you are unwilling to sacrifice—even for Michaela’s sake.

    “I may have already lost my daughter forever, through my own actions,” she went on quietly.  “And if so, then that is a mistake I must live with for the rest of my life.  But I can’t live with the constant fear that at any time, any moment—I may lose my child to the violence that seems to follow in your wake.  I heartily regret that I must come to this conclusion—but it is the only decision I can reach.”

    After that, there didn’t seem to be anything else to say.

* * * * * * * * * *
 

CHAPTER FORTY

     Elizabeth rose to her feet, her demeanor subdued.  “I suppose it’s best that I leave now—our discussion seems to have come to an end,” she said stiffly, echoing Sully’s thought and broadcasting it aloud.  No one protested or made an effort to stop her; and after a long moment in which she lingered mutely by the door, she exited the room, the whisper of the crinolines beneath her skirt the only sound in the sudden stillness.

     The silence was tangible, a thing with weight and substance that seemed to lay heavily over everything, muffling their emotions and constricting their hearts.  At last, unable to bear the quiet, Sully pinned a determined smile on his face.

     “Well, that’s that,” he said lightly into the suffocating silence.  “We didn’t expect to change your ma’s mind, and we weren’t disappointed.  So now, we just move on.”

     Michaela didn’t reply.  She stared at the chair her mother had vacated, the intensity of her gaze seeming to pierce the very essence of its structure.  Tentatively Sully touched her shoulder.

     “Michaela?  You all right?” he ventured.

     Still she didn’t answer, and Sully knew that he needed to provoke a response from her—that he must somehow make her talk about what she was feeling.  Even if her articulation of her emotions proved painful—for her, or for them both.  He knelt down by her chair and gently cupped her cheek, turning her head so that she was forced to look at him.  As her eyes met his, his hand dropped away.

     “What are you thinkin’?” he asked softly.

     Michaela focused her distracted gaze upon him, and gradually her eyes cleared.  “Can you believe what just happened?” she spoke suddenly.  “Can you imagine what it must have cost her to make such an admission?”

     Anticipating Michaela’s anger, or hurt—or any of a number of tempestuous scenes or reactions, Sully was unprepared for the measured calm of her response.  Clearly the daughter had as much power to surprise him as the mother.  And was that actually sympathy he detected in her eyes?

     “It took guts,” he agreed finally, feeling suddenly as if he were on unfamiliar ground, the terrain ahead mysterious and unknown.

    “Never in my life has my mother been so frank, so forthcoming.  So . . . vulnerable,” Michaela went on after a pause.

    “Are you sayin’ . . . you ain’t mad?  That you understand her?” Sully asked uncertainly, finding it nearly impossible to believe that this could be the case.

    Michaela faced him, her emotions in turmoil.  “I’m not sure,” she responded slowly after several seconds had elapsed.  “All these years, through all our battles, I was always so consumed by my own anger, my own sense of injury.  I never stopped to consider that she could be in pain as well.

    “But the courage it must have taken for her to admit the truth . . . to lay open her soul to my scrutiny and criticism . . . I’m not at all certain that if I were in her position, I’d be capable of being so honest, Sully.”  A dart of guilt lanced at her inside, and she flushed with shame.

    “Sure you would,” he said readily, soothingly.

    But Michaela was shaking her head.  “I never have,” she said flatly.  “Through all the altercations we’ve had over the years, not once have I ever confessed my own failings—or even allowed for the possibility that I had any.

    “I’ve always accused her of being so cold, so unfeeling . . .  Yet I’ve been just as rigid, just as uncompromising.  Perhaps more,” she insisted, the echo of her recent hateful words grating harshly in her mind.

    “You had cause, Michaela,” Sully reminded her, as distressed to see Michaela shoulder the entire blame for hers and Elizabeth’s estrangement, as he had been to see her lash out at her mother earlier.  “Your ma—she ain’t an easy woman to know, or to live with.  She said it herself.  You can’t be blamed for feelin’ hurt and rejected,” he asserted.

    “But don’t you see?” Michaela queried him, her expression tense and strained with the need to make him understand.  “By admitting her inadequacy, my mother has granted validation to the feelings of hurt and rejection I’ve had all these years.  As if finally, she understands both my pain, and my right to feel it.  It’s her gift to me,” she said.

    Sully nodded.  “A gift of wisdom,” he said.

    “Yes—that’s it precisely.  A gift of wisdom, for both of us,” Michaela confirmed.

    Sully was silent for some moments, attempting to frame his thoughts into what he wanted—no, what he needed—to say.  Finally he stared levelly into her eyes.

    “Do you agree with her?” he asked simply.

    Her expression was puzzled.  “Agree?” she echoed.  He chewed on his lower lip.

    “Yeah . . . agree,” he repeated.  “That we ain’t got a chance—that the life I live is too complicated, too dangerous—even to think of draggin’ you and the kids into it?”

    Michaela felt a sudden rush of panic and confusion.  “My mother has a flair for the melodramatic—she often exaggerates, Sully,” she ventured, the words sounding lame and unconvincing to her ears.

    “Maybe so—and maybe, you think there’s a germ of truth in what she says,” Sully said pointedly, confirming that he hadn’t been fooled by her transparent response.

    Feeling suddenly apprehensive at pursuing this ominous line of discussion—or perhaps a better word would be “frightened,” she admitted grimly to herself—Michaela placed the flat of her hands on the desktop, and pushed herself to her feet.  Sully followed her lead, rising from his crouching position.  “It’s been a difficult morning,” she announced.  “Our nerves have been frayed.  I believe we need to take some time to reflect, before we go on with this, Sully.”

    “I think we need to talk it out, Michaela,” he said warningly, recognizing what she was trying to do, and attempting to head off her retreat.

    “We will—I promise—but not now,” she maintained.  “I need to get back to work, Sully.  Please—you must excuse me,” she concluded, putting a period to their conversation.

    Reluctantly accepting defeat, he backed away quietly toward the open doorway.  “I’ll be here—if you need me,” he added, but with little hope that she’d take him up on the offer.

    Michaela nodded rapidly, refraining from looking at him.  She resumed her seat and took up her pen again, bending to the patient file before her.  There was a long and painful pause—then soundlessly, Sully left.

* * * * * * * * * *

     He stood in the hall, uncertain what to do next.  His heart thudded against his ribs, and there was a cold, unpleasant knot in the pit of his stomach.  Vainly he tried to ignore the sensations, for to acknowledge them meant he would be forced to consider where they were coming from, a question he was loathe to examine too closely.

     Michaela just needed some time, after that scene in the clinic, Sully told himself.  Sparring with her ma, being torn between Elizabeth on one side and himself on the other . . . and then Elizabeth’s startling confession, coming when they’d least expected it . . .  Michaela had been upset, her feelings all jumbled up inside.  She needed to sort things out—to find her balance and her perspective again.  He had to allow her the freedom to do that.  After some time to herself, she would be ready to talk.

     . . . he hoped.  But truth was, he didn’t know—not for sure.  Why else would his gut be clenching right now with something approaching fear?

     For all that Michaela fought with her ma, and claimed to deny Elizabeth’s values, the mother’s  influence over the daughter was considerable.  Michaela would never admit it—might not even see it—but to him it was plain.  He’d seen it in Boston—had watched the ease with which Michaela had slipped back into her old life, clearly enjoying the elegance and refinement of her mother’s privileged world.

     He remembered the night he’d arrived on Elizabeth’s doorstep, pushing his way into the dining room amid Harrison’s protestations.  He remembered the shock in Elizabeth’s eyes at his appearance—and the shock in Michaela’s.   Shock, and maybe even a trace of embarrassment?

     He didn’t want to believe it.  He told himself it was the strain of their confrontation with Michaela’s ma, that was coloring an imperfect memory.  But the sinking feeling in his heart said otherwise.

     He never should have gone in there, Sully reproached himself.  He should have listened to his instincts, and stayed out of it.  If he hadn’t interfered, then Michaela wouldn’t be so confused and stirred up now . . .  And she wouldn’t be feeling  . . .  what?  Sympathetic toward her ma?  Maybe even willing to forgive Elizabeth for her mistakes?

     But that’s what he’d wanted, wasn’t it?  Why else would he have encouraged Michaela to hear Elizabeth out, give her a chance?  He understood how much the rift with her ma was hurting Michaela, and how much she needed to heal—how much they both did.

     Oh, yeah—he was “noble” all right, Sully thought bitterly—as long as Michaela making up with her ma didn’t threaten his own place in Michaela’s life.  But if it came to Michaela siding with Elizabeth over him—then suddenly he wasn’t willing to be so generous.  And if Michaela should decide that her ma was right in believing that a life with him was too dangerous—that marrying him was a mistake . . .  Elizabeth didn’t even know about the threat from Bloody Knife and Custer—and frankly, he couldn’t imagine what she’d do if she found out.  But Michaela knew.  She was scared for the children.  And he’d been responsible for putting her in that position.  She had to be thinking about that right now.  Weighing the danger they faced against the advantages of being with him.  Advantages that seemed to be shrinking more and more with every passing moment.

     Sully swallowed with difficulty, staring at the door which separated him from Michaela with tortured eyes.  What if she decided it wasn’t worth the risk?
 
    The heavy tread of footsteps on the stairs intruded rudely on his thoughts, and made Sully look up, startled.  He groaned inwardly as Brendan appeared on the landing and descended the bottom flight.  The day was going from bad to worse—and it wasn’t even noon, yet.

     Brendan looked equally leery as he spotted Sully, but after a fraction’s hesitation he arranged his features into a polite expression.

     “Sully—good morning,” he said pleasantly as he approached.

     ‘Mornin’,” Sully answered briefly.

     “How is Dr. Mike today?  Much improved, I hope?” Brendan inquired.

     “She’s just inside—you can ask her yourself.”

    Brendan’s eyebrows raised in surprise.  “Back at work?” he said.  “Then she must be feeling better.  I’m glad to hear it.”

    Sully shrugged slightly.  “She’s doin’ well enough,” he allowed.  “So—what are you up to?” he added after a moment.  “Goin’ *explorin’* again?”  He was unable to completely disguise the derision in his voice.  To be honest, he didn’t try very hard.

    “Actually, I’m on my way to send a telegram,” Brendan replied blandly, choosing to ignore Sully’s baiting tone.  “I’ve had a wire from William Jackson.”  Belatedly Sully noticed the folded sheet of paper in Brendan’s hand.

    “That right?” he replied casually.  “So when are you headin’ down to Mesa Verde?”

    “I’m not,” Brendan said smoothly.  “At least, not for some time.  Jackson’s been called back by Hayden, to assist with the geographical survey—he’s been forced to temporarily abandon his exploration of the cliff dwellings.  Which essentially leaves me at loose ends.”

    Sully felt a trace of alarm.  He studied the towering young man before him, his height and the breadth of his shoulders seeming to fill the narrow hallway.  He noted Brendan’s striking features, and the clear, luminous eyes which regarded him confidently.

    “Then what’ll you do?  Go back to chasin’ after Cheyenne burial sites again?”  His mouth was dry, and he felt the nervous beat of the pulse in his throat.

    “No, I’ve abandoned that idea,” Brendan told him.  “As you said last evening, there are very few left now.  But more importantly, I didn’t want my interest in the Cheyenne burial sites to be a source of distress or dissension.”

    “Don’t do me no favors,” Sully said sharply, his tone laced with sarcasm.

    “Don’t worry,” Brendan shot back, his eyes mirroring the hostility in Sully’s own.  “In matter of fact, I was thinking of young Brian.  When I realized that—certain aspects—of my work disturbed him, I didn’t want to do anything that might upset him further.”

    “Well thanks for that, at least,” said Sully grudgingly.

    Brendan nodded slightly, then fixed him with a penetrating look.  “Exactly what is it that you have against me, Sully?”

    Sully stiffened, and he fumbled for a response, caught unprepared by Brendan’s boldness.  “Told you,” he muttered finally, furious that Brendan had put him at a disadvantage.

    “Yes, you ‘told me,’” Brendan repeated.  “The trouble is, I don’t buy it.  Oh, I believe that you revere the Cheyenne, and that the thought of their resting places being disturbed genuinely bothers you.  But the grudge you’re nursing against me goes far deeper than that.”

    Sully opened his mouth to protest.

    “Don’t bother,” Brendan said quickly, and Sully froze.  “You’ve resented me since the moment we met, Sully—long before you learned what I do for a living.  The truth is, your reason for disliking me is much more personal—and her name is Michaela Quinn.”

* * * * * * * * *

     As the door closed behind Sully, Michaela replaced her pen in its holder and pushed aside the patient file in which she’d writing.  With a heavy sigh, she propped her chin on her hand, her elbow resting on the desktop.  A ray of sunlight slanting through the window at her back, caught the cut glass of the inkstand before her, silently exploding the ordinary crystal into shimmering bands of color—a tiny rainbow for the benefit of her eyes alone.  She stared at the glorious jumble of hues painting the worn surface of the desk, seeing but not really registering their beauty.

     Why had she suddenly been seized with panic when Sully questioned whether she agreed with her mother?  Why had she consequently felt so nervous in his presence, that she’d been compelled to send him away?  Was it simply the shock of her mother’s confession, leading her to believe that she’d never really known Elizabeth at all?  Was it just that she needed to be alone, to examine and come to terms with this heretofore unknown side of her mother’s personality?

     It seemed like a fair assessment.  Elizabeth’s comments had been more than unexpected—they’d been stunning in the extreme; leading Michaela to feel that without warning, her entire world had been turned on its ear.  Suddenly, she hardly knew what to think, how to act, what to believe.

     But Sully understood all that.  He had been willing, even anxious, to talk it through with her, help her make peace with her mother’s feelings.  So why had she rejected him?

     Michaela realized she was avoiding the issue; using the shield of her confusion to hide from  thoughts that were deeply disturbing.  There was no other help for it—she must confront the reality of her feelings, in her own mind, at least.  If she didn’t, how could she hope to face Sully?

     Had he been right? she thought dismally.  Was her fear getting the best of her—both of their current peril, and the potential for danger in the future?  Was Elizabeth right to accuse her of putting the children at risk by staying with Sully?  God help her—did she agree with her mother after all?

     Had circumstances reached a point where she had to consider that—as much as she loved him—the cost of marrying Sully might be too great?  Had the time finally come for her to give him up forever?

     Her heart twisting inside her, Michaela buried her face in her hands.

* * * * * * * * * *

     “You’re crazy,” Sully said flatly.

     “Am I?” Brendan retorted.  “Protest if you like—but if you do, you’re lying to me and to yourself.  You’ve been consumed with jealousy ever since I entered the picture.”

     “Jealous?  Of you?”  Sully’s voice was mocking.

     “Of me—or perhaps someone else.”

     “You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”

     Brendan ignored his comment.  “What bothers you so much, Sully?  Is it my connection to William?”

     Sully bristled.  “He ain’t got nothin’ to do with this.”

     “No?  He and Dr. Mike had a relationship.  He proposed to her.”

     “And she turned him down.”

     “So she did,” Brendan said mildly.

     “She didn’t love him—she told me.”

     “That’s true—she didn’t love him enough to marry him.  William understood that, which was why he knew he had to let her go, even though it pained him.”

     “So why even bring him up?” Sully challenged.

     Brendan regarded him shrewdly.  “Because what happened between William and Dr. Mike is the whole point of this, isn’t it?  It’s obviously eating you up inside.”

     “What are you sayin’?”  Sully’s body was rigid with barely restrained anger, his hands clenching into fists at his sides.

     “Clearly, Dr. Mike deserves a suitor—a husband—who is successful and accomplished.  Someone with polish and refinement equal to her own, who can offer her the type of life to which she’s always been accustomed.”

     “Michaela don’t care about things like that,” Sully countered.  “She proved it when she left her life in Boston to come out here.  She proved it when she rejected your brother.”

     “According to William, Dr. Mike claimed that she came to Colorado because prejudice against women physicians barred her from establishing a practice in Boston.  And she rejected William’s suit because she didn’t return his affection—not because of a lack of common background,” Brendan replied.

    “Besides,” he added provocatively,  “just because one Burke failed to win her heart, doesn’t mean the other must necessarily suffer the same fate.”
 
     “She don’t feel nothin’ for you,” Sully said hotly, his rage at Brendan’s smug superiority escalating to the boiling point.

     “Really?” Brendan goaded him, pressing his advantage, pushing him to the brink.  “Are you  absolutely sure?”

     He just had time to register a blur of motion, coupled with a gust of air whistling past his cheek, before Sully’s fist connected solidly with his eye, sending him crashing to the floor.

     Dazed, he lay at Sully’s feet, a thread of blood slowly tracking its way down his temple.  Sully stood over him, breathing raggedly and massaging his bruised knuckles as the door to the examination room burst open, revealing a horrified Michaela transfixed on the threshold.

     “Sully!” she gasped, appalled.  “What in God’s name have you done?!”