Wild Ecstasy Read Free Page B

and flat told me to let you wear it. Of course I burned it as soon as I got it home.”
    Again he turned and stared out the window, anger filling him at the thought of Josiah Snelling and of their relationship long before they had met again while Fort Snelling was being built. Victor had assumed that Josiah Snelling was in his past when he brought his family to the Minnesota wilderness.
    But after all those years they were forced to endure one another’s company again, for Victor was not about to move his successful trading post to rid himself of the colonel again. He had even had to place all thoughts of vengeance against Colonel Snelling from his mind, finding the supplies at Fort Snelling too valuable not to go to the fort and buy them when necessary.
    Mariah often accompanied him, only because he had seen her worth in assisting him choose the proper kitchen supplies.
    Otherwise she would have been kept at the trading post, away from the wondering eyes of Colonel Snelling. Should the colonel have ever looked close enough, he might have seen too much that was familiar about her.
    Victor turned abruptly and went back to Mariah. He grabbed her by the wrist and turned her so that her back was to him. He yanked the scissors from his pocket and lifted them to her hair. “Now, let’s not hear any more argument about this haircut,” he snarled. “It’ll be done in a flash.”
    Tears began streaming from Mariah’s eyes when she felt the first yank on her head as the scissors began to slice through her thick hair. “Oh, Papa, why? Why?” she demanded, sobbing. “I’ll never understand! Never!”
    â€œFirst, Mariah, there’s that damnable Tanner McCloud. I’ve got to put his ideas of wantin’ you from his mind once and for all. I’ve got to make you as unpleasant to look at as possible. Cuttin’ your hair seems to be the only way. That damn Tanner. He’s been askin’ me every day for permission to marry you. Now he won’t bother me with such nonsense.”
    â€œYou don’t have to cut off my hair because of him,” Mariah wailed, feeling ill at her stomach when she saw her first lock of hair fall at her feet. “You know that I’d never let that man get near me. Papa, I have a mind and will of my own. And I can shoot a firearm same as you. You taught me well enough. If that man came near me, I’d not hesitate shooting him.”
    â€œIt’s not only him,” Victor said, continuing to snip away at her hair. “Your mother’s prettiness got her in trouble with men more than once. I’m here to make sure that don’t happen to you.”
    A sob lodged in Mariah’s throat when another thick hunk of hair fell at her feet. She closed her eyes, knowing that she would end up being the ugliest woman in the world!
    â€œWhat do you mean by that?” she finally said, slowly opening her eyes again, forcing them away from the hair piling up on the floor. “What sort of trouble did my mother get into with men?”
    Victor momentarily drew his scissors away from Mariah’s hair. He stepped around in front of her. He looked down at her with narrowing gray eyes. “You forget I ever said that,” he flatly ordered. “That was a slip of the tongue. Just remember that when you’re as pretty as a picture, men are drawn to you like bees to honey.” He stepped behind her again and resumed his cutting. “That’s what I meant about your mother. She had men fallin’ at her heels from all walks of life. It’d be the same with you, if I’d allow it. But I ain’t. So don’t give me no more mouth about it.”
    Mariah stood numbly quiet until her father was finished with the dreaded chore. When she heard him place the scissors on her nightstand beside her bed, she stared blankly down at the hair on the floor, and became choked up all over again with the need to cry.
    But