Kiss an Angel(23)

“You’re not going to the trailer are you?” she asked.

“Not until I have to get into costume. Why?”

“There are a few things I still need to do in there.” She had to get back to the trailer before he saw the mess she’d made. When she’d started to clean up, she should have left the cupboards and storage closet until last, but she’d wanted to be thorough, so she’d unloaded everything to scrub the shelves and start fresh. Now the cupboards were clean, but she hadn’t had time to put anything away, and there wasn’t a single surface of the trailer not covered by clothing, bedding, tools, and an alarmingly large collecting of bullwhips.

“I’m sure I can get the job finished when I’m done here,” she said hastily, “so don’t worry if you see some things lying around.”

He nodded and left her alone.

The next few hours passed without incident. She enjoyed chatting with the people who came to buy tickets, and in several instances when the families were obviously poor, she invented wonderful reasons why they had just won free passes.

Word had spread that she was Alex’s wife, and a number of the circus people made excuses to stop by the office to satisfy their curiosity. Their friendliness to a stranger warmed her. She met the men who ran the “joints,” as the concessions were called, as well as a few of the clowns and several members of the Lipscomb family, who performed the equestrian act. She could tell that some of the showgirls had to work hard to hide their jealousy over the fact that she’d managed to snare Alex Markov, and she appreciated their generosity of spirit. For the first time since her arrival, she felt a sprig of hope. Maybe this would work out after all.

Perhaps the most interesting person to appear was Brady Pepper, Heather’s father. He walked in wearing his costume, a white body suit cinched at the waist with a wide gold belt. Bands of gold edged the scooped neck and circled his ankles.

A showgirl named Charlene had already told her that Brady was the most attractive man in the circus next to Alex, and she found herself agreeing with them. Brady Pepper reminded her of a more rough-cut version of Sylvester Stallone, complete with muscles, a cocky walk, and a New York street accent. His tough-guy looks were appealing, although the manner in which he appraised her told her he was a dedicated womanizer. He sat down on the corner of the desk, legs splayed, a man very much at home in his body.

“So you come from circus?”

He asked the question in the aggressive, almost accusatory tone many native New Yorkers seemed to adopt for even the most mundane of inquiries, and it took her a moment to figure out what he meant.

“Me? Oh, no. My family hasn’t been at all involved with the circus.”

“That’ll make it tough on you around here. At Quest Brothers, you don’t really count unless you can trace your bloodline back at least three generations. Just ask Sheba.”

“Sheba?”

“She owns the circus. Bathsheba Cardoza Quest. She used to be one of the most famous flyers in the world. Trapeze,” he said, when he saw her confused expression. “Now she’s training the Tolea brothers, who are flying for us. They’re Rumanians. She also choreographs some of the other acts, supervises costumes, that sort of thing.”

“Since it’s her circus, why doesn’t she manage it instead of Alex?”

“It’s a man’s job. The manager has to deal with drunks, knife fights, heavy equipment Sheba doesn’t like that kind of thing.”

“I haven’t met her yet.”

“That’s because she took off for a few days. She does that sometimes when the pickings aren’t good enough around here.”

It must have been obvious she didn’t understand what he meant, because he went on to explain. “Sheba likes men. She doesn’t stay with any of them for long, though. She’s what you call a snob. No man counts in her book if he’s not from an old circus family.”

The impression she’d had of the circus owner as an elderly widow faded, and the way his mouth tightened made Daisy wonder if Sheba Quest was more to him than a boss.

“Me, my old man was a Brooklyn butcher. I hooked up with a traveling circus the day I graduated high school, and I never looked back.” He regarded her almost angrily, as if he expected her to argue with him. “My kids got circus blood though, through my wife.”

“I don’t believe I’ve met her.”

“Cassie died two years ago, but we’re divorced twelve years, which means I’m not exactly in mourning. She hated the circus, even though she grew up with it, so she moved to Wichita and got her real estate license, but I liked performing and stayed with it.”

So she and Heather had both lost their mothers. She found herself wanting to know more. “I understand you have children.”

“Heather was raised in Wichita with her mother, but Cassie had trouble handling the boys, so they started to travel with me when they were youngsters. I put together an act with them, and we’ve been doing it ever since. Matt and Rob are twenty and twenty-one now. They’re hell-raisers, too, but what can you expect with me as their old man?”

Daisy wasn’t interested in his hell-raising sons, and she ignored the unmistakable note of pride in his voice. “Then Heather’s just recently come to live with you?”

“Last month, but she used to stay with me a couple of weeks every season. Still, it’s not the same as having her around full-time.”