by Cat Cahill
Mr. Fain reached out for her arm, and just as his grip clenched around her wrist, Jack lurched toward them, unsteady on his feet. “Don’t you touch her! It’s me you want. She has nothing to do with this.”
Mr. Fain jerked Celia around, away from Jack’s reach as Shane threw Jack back to the ground. Celia tried to shake off Mr. Fain’s grip, but he only held tighter and grabbed her other arm for good measure. Shane pulled a fist back again, aiming squarely at Jack’s face.
Celia opened her mouth to yell, plead, beg, offer anything for him to stop—but someone else did so first.
“You leave that man alone!” a woman’s voice shouted from somewhere back in the trees.
Mr. Shane stopped, his fist in midair, and Mr. Fain jerked around, placing Celia in front of him. She strained to look through the trees. She didn’t have to search for long when Penelope Purcell, armed with a closed umbrella, stepped forward.
Mr. Shane began to laugh, slowly at first, and then building, until Celia could also feel the stoic Mr. Fain chuckling behind her.
“All you’ve got is a bunch of women coming to your rescue, Wendler.” Shane laughed again as Jack looked between Celia and Mrs. Purcell, clearly confused.
“Leave,” he said to Mrs. Purcell. “Please.”
“I’ll do no such thing, Mr. Wendler. And neither will these ladies.” And behind Mrs. Purcell, women began to emerge, one by one, until it seemed the entire town of them stood there.
Chapter Twenty-one
The women stood there, holding the line like an army battalion and wielding shovels and pitchforks and fireplace pokers. A few even held pistols or shotguns. Crouched on the ground, the side of his face feeling as if it were swelling rapidly, Jack lost count of them. Here and there, he recognized a few he’d met from his time in town. They couldn’t have simply wandered over here. They’d come to help him.
He glanced at Celia. Had she organized this? But she looked as surprised as he was
“Why don’t you leave that be?” Mrs. Graham, the woman Jack helped with her saddle several weeks ago at the livery, aimed her shotgun at Fain, who’d reached for his pistol. “Mr. Wendler? If you’d be so kind as to relieve your friend of his pistol, we’d all be grateful. And please, sir, do release the lady.”
Jack rose slowly, half expecting Shane to take the opportunity to land another fist in his stomach, but Shane remained put, gaping at the crowd of women.
Fain had released his grip on Celia, and the moment Jack pulled the man’s pistol from his belt, he turned to his wife. She nodded at him, and he breathed a little easier.
“Gentlemen, why don’t we go have a little chat with our new sheriff? I’m sure he’ll help us see you onto the next stage back to wherever it is you came from. Or perhaps a jail cell,” Mrs. Purcell said. And with that, a few of the women moved forward and led a befuddled Garrity Shane and his companion away, back through the trees and toward town. The rest of the ladies began to follow, a few coming to ask Celia and himself if she and Jack were all right.
Still stunned by the turn of events, Jack couldn’t call up his most pressing question until Mrs. Purcell came to check on them.
“I don’t understand,” he said. “Why were you all here?”
“Last Chance protects its own,” she said, standing a little taller, her umbrella in hand.
“But I’m—”
“You’re one of us, as you’ve shown us time and again. Of course we’d do everything we could to help.”
“I ran into Mrs. Purcell when I was searching for you,” Celia added.
“It’s a good thing you did. You folks let me know if you need anything.” The older woman smiled warmly at them before following her friends back through the trees.
“I don’t . . . I still . . .” Jack shook his head, trying to make sense of it all. “You came for me. They came for me.”
“Of course I did. You’re my husband,” Celia said. She smiled as she looked at the trees where the ladies had disappeared. “Mrs. Purcell told me just this morning that you’d helped her carry some purchases from the mercantile one day. Mrs. Zack, the woman with all the children I asked you to bring meat to, found you thoughtful and kind. Mrs. Young appreciated you helping her daughter when she slipped on some ice. Gretel said she was grateful for you chasing down her little son when he went running across the road. And there were so many more.” Celia gazed at him, pride in her eyes.
She was proud of him. Moreover, all of those women remembered kindnesses he’d done through instinct. “I’ve never had so many people . . .” He raised a hand, unsure what to say next.
Celia reached for it. She wore no gloves, a sign she must have left in a hurry. And she’d done it to look for him. Jack wrapped her frozen hand in his own.
“We need to get you inside to warm up,” he said.
“Please, let’s stay here, just for a moment.” She looked up at him, searching his face. “I’m so glad you’re safe. When I found George gone, I didn’t know what to think. I couldn’t think. I was so afraid I’d lost you for good.”
Her words were like a balm to his bruised face. And yet . . . He pressed his lips together and glanced down at their hands before meeting her eyes. “You deserve better than me, Celia. If you’d like to annul our marriage, I won’t fight you on it. You ought to have a man who isn’t so ashamed to share the mistakes he’s made with you.”
She furrowed her brow. “I don’t wish to have any other man. I only want you, Jack.”
Hope burst through him like the sun through the clouds, and yet, he didn’t dare rely on it. “But I kept information from you that could have gotten us both killed, because I was afraid you’d think less of me. It was selfish and dangerous.”
“Is there anything else I should know?” Celia asked.
“No,” he said. “I once courted a woman whose father ran me off at gunpoint, though.”
Celia grinned. “It’s a good thing my father is in Mississippi.”
“And that we’re already married.” That feeling of hope began to well up inside him again. This time, Jack dared to trace a finger along the side of Celia’s face.
“That we are,” she said softly, her eyes fluttering closed.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t entirely honest with you. It will never happen again.” He cupped her cheek, the skin smooth and warm under his hand despite the cold surrounding them.
She opened her eyes. “All right. I accept your apology, and I’ll hold you to that promise. But I might need reassurance.”
“Reassurance?” He raised his eyebrows.
“A kiss might do.” Her cheeks colored, and that was all Jack needed. He dipped his head down to meet her lips. She melted into him, and he knew there was no other place he would rather be. No city, no great business opportunity, no grand idea. Only here, in the cold Nebraska plains, with Celia and their farm.
She sighed and wrapped her arms around him. He broke away for a moment to look her in the eyes. “I love you, Celia Wendler.”
Her sweet lips curved upward. “I love you, too, Jack.”
He took her hands in his. “Let’s go see Sheriff Darcy so we can get home.” Home. The word felt so right, as if all his life, Jack had been meant to find his home here.
With Celia as his wife.
Epilogue
August 1879
Celia eased down the porch steps, her hands resting on her stomach. She was due to give birth in about two months, and it couldn’t come soon enough. Heather Barnes, the town’s midwife, had visited earlier that day and proclaimed that she’d be surprised if Celia made it two more months. Celia caught her breath at the bottom of the steps before making her way across the yard to where Jack stood, hat dangling from his hand, looking out over their crops.
Celia stopped by his side. He wound his free hand around hers and they stood in companionable silence, watching the stalks of wheat and corn wave in the breeze. Beyond that grew the hay that would keep their livestock and many of those in town fed through the
winter. With the money they’d make, not only would they have enough for themselves, but also enough to pay off the remainder of the men who’d invested in Jack’s ideas back in New York.
“I never thought I’d say this, but have you ever seen such a beautiful sight?” he asked.
Celia turned to look at him. He’d grown a short beard and his face was tanned from hours spent outside. It only served to make him even more handsome. “I haven’t,” she said. “You’ve done so well.”
“I had a lot of help.” He squeezed her hand and Celia smiled. She’d only helped some, offering bits of knowledge she’d picked up from years living on a farm. Jack had befriended some of the other men nearby. Most were raising cattle, but a few others farmed their land, and together, they shared what worked and what didn’t.
Now, it was all up to the weather. And so far, it had treated them well.
“How are you feeling?” He laid a hand on her stomach and smiled.
“The same as I did the last time you asked.” She was teasing him, and he knew it. He’d fretted so much about her health since they found out she was expecting and asked her no less than six times a day how she felt. “Tired, hungry, and happy.”
“Well, then, let’s get you fed and rested. You, Ermilia, and John Junior.”
“Ermilia?” Celia made a face. “If one of these babies—or both—is a girl, she most definitely will not be named Ermilia.”
“What if—” Jack paused, his eyes widening. “What if there are more than two?”
Celia’s jaw fell. The doctor had heard two heartbeats, and it had taken time for that information to sink in. She couldn’t imagine having more than twins.
Jack burst into laughter, and she swatted at him. “Don’t tease me like that!”
“I’m sorry,” he said, still grinning. “Come on, I’ll dish up the dinner while you sit down.”
Celia let him lead her back to the house, where they enjoyed a meal of chicken, hearty bread, and green peas. It was quite the change from last winter, when it seemed all they’d ever eat was small portions of salt pork, bits of ham, and carefully apportioned amounts of potatoes. Celia ate as much as she could. It was strange—she was hungrier than ever, but her stomach filled so quickly with the babies resting against it.
Jack went to feed the animals while Celia cleaned up the kitchen. Then they sat together on the porch as the stars began to appear in the inky sky.
“I forgot to tell you how kind your sister was to me when I was in town yesterday,” he said. “It’s as if she’s an entirely different person.”
Celia grinned into the darkness. “I told you she’s much happier now.” Faith had taken her sweet time choosing a letter to answer—to the point where Celia was certain she never would. But then, out of the blue, a man arrived in town—one with whom Faith had apparently been secretly corresponding for a while. And before Celia knew it, her sister was Mrs. Beau Landry.
“She invited us to Sunday dinner.”
“We ought to take her up on it. I don’t know how much longer I’ll be up for that drive to town.” She turned to look at Jack. The details of his face were hazy in the darkness, but it didn’t matter. She had his smile, his eyes, that small scar etched into her memory forever.
He grinned at her then, more content than she’d ever seen him. “I can’t wait to meet our children.”
“Me either.”
“What do you think of Wendursula? Or perhaps Egbertorf for a boy?” His voice was teasing, and Celia shook her head.
“Just you wait. I might agree to Egbertorf instead of John Junior, and then you’ll be disappointed.”
“You wouldn’t do such a thing.” He looked at her with a mock appalled expression.
Celia burst into laughter. And as the stars winked above them and the night cooled, she sighed.
Last year, she never would have guessed at the trials she would go through—and all the joy that had come from them. Here, with Jack at her side and their family just beginning to grow, she was more than content. She was happy.
And excited to see what the future might hold for their little family.
*****
Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed Celia and Jack’s story. If you’d like to read more of The Blizzard Brides series, you can find all of the books listed here: http://www.theblizzardbrides.com Linda Applebee and Sheriff Michael Darcy’s story is up next in A Groom for Linda. Trust me when I tell you that you’ll want to find out why Linda spent the night of the blizzard in jail. I’ll also be writing Faith’s story in 2021.
I want to thank all of my loyal readers—you all mean more to me than you will ever know! If you’re new to my books and you enjoyed this one, you might also like my Gilbert Girls series. The first book in that series is Building Forever.
To be alerted about my new books, sign up here: http://bit.ly/catsnewsletter I give subscribers a free download of Forbidden Forever, a Gilbert Girls prequel novella. You’ll also get sneak peeks at upcoming books, insights into the writer life, discounts and deals, inspirations, and so much more. I'd love to have you join the fun!
Turn the page to see a complete list of my books.
More Books by Cat Cahill
Books in The Gilbert Girls series
Building Forever
Running From Forever
Wild Forever
Hidden Forever
Forever Christmas
On the Edge of Forever
The Gilbert Girls Book Collection – Books 1-3
Other Sweet Historical Western Romances by Cat
The Proxy Brides Series
A Bride for Isaac
A Bride for Andrew
The Yours Truly: The Lovelorn Series
Confused in Colorado
Dejected in Denver
The Blizzard Brides Series
A Groom for Celia
About the Author, Cat Cahill
A sunset. Snow on the mountains. A roaring river in the spring. A man and a woman who can't fight the love that pulls them together. The danger and uncertainty of life in the Old West. This is what inspires me to write. I hope you find an escape in my books!
I live with my family, two dogs, and a few cats in Kentucky. When I'm not writing, I'm losing myself in a good book, planning my next travel adventure, doing a puzzle, attempting to garden, or wrangling my kids.