Bodyguards Boxed Set

by Julianne MacLean

Angus hesitated. “Do you?”

  Truman hesitated for a moment as he thought about it. “I love her, Angus. So I guess that means I’ll believe just about anything she tells me.”

  Angus smiled and laid a hand on his shoulder. “Good. Because it’s true. Every last word.”

  They started walking again.

  “Has she talked to you about her family?” Truman asked.

  “Yes. At first, it was all she talked about—getting home to them—but as time moved on, she spoke of them less and less, and began to talk of other things. You, for one.”

  Truman looped both thumbs through his gun belt. “Will she be happy here, do you think?”

  “Two weeks ago, I would have said no. She was determined to get home, no matter what it took, but now I believe she wants to stay. Even though we finally know how to get back.”

  Truman stopped in his tracks. “You know how to get back?”

  Angus gazed uncertainly at him. “Oh, dear. Perhaps I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “She told me there wasn’t a way.”

  “There wasn’t, before today, but last night I figured it out. I believe, if we do everything just right, she can go back anytime she wants.”

  Truman swallowed over the peculiar dread and apprehension that had been eating away at him all morning. He tried to make sense of everything, to understand where he stood in all this.

  “Can she travel back and forth?” he asked. “I mean, could she go there, and then come back here? Like, on the stagecoach?”

  Angus wrinkled his nose. “I don’t think so, not without risking her life. She was lucky to have survived the first time.”

  Truman’s gut began to churn. “Could she take someone with her?”

  “I’m not sure. I don’t think so. But you could always try.”

  Truman suspected Angus’s was just being polite.

  All at once, his mood darkened. He knew the town wanted to hang Jessica. Was it selfish of him to keep her here? To help her break the law, ride out of Dodge, and turn her into an outlaw?

  Maybe she was destined to go home. Maybe Angus figured this out yesterday for a reason.

  “So, how does it work?” he asked, facing Angus. “How can she get home? I want to know everything.”

  On the way to the jailhouse, Angus explained it—from the car crash to the missing watch. Truman listened carefully to every word.

  “She has to wear exactly what she had on when she arrived?” he asked.

  “Yes, I believe so. The watch had been missing, but now we have it. I don’t think there’s anything stopping her.”

  Truman turned away, leaving Angus in front of the jailhouse. “Tell Jessica I’ll be back soon. There’s something I gotta do.”

  * * *

  JESSICA PACED BACK and forth in the cell, while frantic thoughts bounced around in her head. She surprised herself sometimes. All along, she had dreaded making the decision of whether to stay or return home, but now the answer was clear. The dread was gone. She was going to do what her gut was telling her to do. She was going to stay, no matter what the cost.

  Of course, she would always miss her old life and her family especially, but surely in time, it would get easier. At least she had Truman to help her through it.

  Moving to the cell door, she rested her chin on one of the bars, and thought about how handsome he was the night before, when the moonlight had shone through the window and illuminated his face.

  He filled the empty place in her heart, the place where a little voice had always insisted that something was missing from her life.

  She had never been truly happy. She’d always wanted what she didn’t have, what was beyond her reach, what was one day ahead. She spent days, week after week, seeking something better, working harder at her job, dreaming of something that would change her life and finally satisfy and her allow her some peace from the little voice.

  Even when she thought she was in love with Liam, she wasn’t happy. Something had been missing, and she foolishly believed that once they were married, she would stop dreaming and longing for whatever it was that remained so vague in her mind. Now at last, she understood what it was.

  Contentment, peace, and fulfillment. Today was a better day. Even with all the danger and uncertainties, she was happier now than she had ever been, and she truly believed that everything would work out for the best. She was innocent of the crimes. The truth would come out.

  And Truman loved her.

  Just as she closed her eyes to rest for a moment, the front door opened.

  “I’m back.” Truman stepped into the office and removed his hat. “And I have good news.”

  “You found out who killed Virgil?”

  “Well, not that good.” He reached into his pocket and removed a set of keys. Crossing the room toward her, he jingled them. “Angus paid the bail and you’re free, at least until the trial. That’ll give us some time to do some investigating.”

  “What about the lynch mob?”

  Truman unlocked the door and swung it wide open. Jessica walked out, straight into his arms.

  “Don’t worry. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

  “Thank God,” she murmured.

  He kissed her deeply, with superb skill and relentless passion, and she came away, dizzy with longing, locked in his gaze, touching her fingertips to his lips.

  He laid soft, moist kisses on her palm. “There are things we need to do,” he said. “We shouldn’t be standing here wasting time.”

  “You call this wasting time?”

  He smiled, and the seduction in his eyes was an exhilarating balm to her senses that left her reeling with desire. “We need to go.”

  “I’m sure you’re right,” she breathlessly replied, but she couldn’t seem to make her body move in any direction—not when he was dropping hot, sweet, tender kisses up her arm and sending her into a heated pool of sensual yearnings.

  “We need to stop this,” he said with a devilish grin, “before it gets out of hand…”

  A moment later, after no shortage of wicked fits and starts, he led her out the front door of the jailhouse, and locked it behind them.

  “We’ll start by riding out to Henry Gordon’s place,” he said, “to ask a few questions.”

  He freed Thunder from the hitching rail.

  They mounted, and Truman sat behind her.

  “I get to sit in the saddle this time?” she asked.

  “I reckon that’s the best thing. That way, I don’t lose sight of you.”

  “You’re giving me goose bumps,” she said huskily, as his breath tickled her ear.

  He turned Thunder toward the edge of town. Soon they were out on the prairie, talking about their plans for escape should it come to that.

  Later, the bright sun in Jessica’s eyes and the swaying motion of the horse, plodding slowly along, weighed heavily upon her eyelids. She had slept only a few hours the night before, waking every hour or so to make love. She tipped her head back upon Truman’s shoulder and closed her eyes.

  It was not long before she encountered the sweet sensation of drifting off...into another dreamy existence, where she stood outside a hospital emergency room, peering through a round window, watching a doctor’s back as he leaned over an unconscious man.

  In her dream, she was home again in a modern and familiar world. Electronic devices beeped and florescent lights hummed. She heard footsteps hurrying behind her and turned to see two nurses approaching.

  Jessica moved aside to let them pass. They pushed through the door without acknowledging her—as if she weren’t even there—and she watched through the window as the doctor leaned over the patient.

  “What are the vitals?” he asked one of the nurses, his back to Jessica.

  The nurse wrapped a blood pressure band around the patient’s arm and pumped air into it. “One-seventy over eighty.”

  Another nurse said, “Pulse is ninety-six.”

  The doctor leaned over the body a
nd lifted the patient’s eyelids, one at time, while he shone a penlight into his eyes. “Patient has a blown left pupil.”

  He paused, staring at the far wall. He reached a hand up and combed it through his hair, as if frustrated.

  The nurse walked toward him. “Doctor, are you all right?”

  He nodded, but stood motionless, as if he had seen a ghost. “Yes. I need a stat Chemstrip, and order blood work, and start an I.V. right away. Lift the bed so he’s sitting up. Get him ready for intubation, and someone call neurosurgery. This guy’s gonna have to go to the O.R.”

  When the doctor moved aside, and the head of the bed slowly lifted and came into view, Jessica sucked in a quick breath.

  The man on the bed was Truman.

  “Doctor, are you all right?” a nurse asked again.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You don’t look fine. You look pale.”

  From the door, Jessica watched him shake his head, though he still stood with his back to her.

  “Something’s not right here,” he said. “I have a bad feeling. He’s not going to make it.”

  Just then, the doctor turned around and looked directly into Jessica’s eyes. Their gazes locked and held through the window. Her whole body began to tingle. It wasn’t possible.

  The doctor was Truman, too….

  She jerked out of her sleep. “Where are we?” she asked, her heart pounding wildly in her chest. She felt Truman’s hand on her stomach and said a silent thank you when she discovered they were still on the Kansas prairie.

  “We’re almost there,” he said. “You fell asleep.”

  “I know.” She licked her dry lips. “I dreamed I was back in the future.”

  “Did you see your family?”

  “No. I saw you. Only it wasn’t you. You were in a hospital. You were the patient, but you were the doctor, too.”

  “A doctor? Me? That’s comical.”

  “Why?”

  She felt his body heave with a sigh. “Me, saving lives. All I’ve ever done is take them.”

  Jessica turned in the saddle. “That’s behind you, now. All that matters now is the future. You can be anything you want to be.”

  He tightened his grip around her stomach, nuzzling the hair at the back of her head. “I love that you have such confidence.”

  “More than anything.” They rode in silence, while Jessica imagined Truman being something different than a lawman. “You could go to school, you know. There’s a future in medicine. So much to learn.” She turned her cheek to nuzzle his. “I could help you.”

  Then she realized what she was doing…

  Listen to yourself, Jessica. Do you really want to change him? Is that what real love is about?

  He smiled. “Let’s take one day at a time. First, we need to prove your innocence.”

  Jessica inhaled deeply. Then she remembered the dream.

  Truman, unconscious on the operating table, just like her brother, Gregory….

  Thank God it was just a dream, she thought, looking down at the strong hands resting on her stomach.

  Touching the rough, sun-bronzed skin, she imagined those hands pulling a trigger to kill a man.

  Six men.

  A shiver ran through her.

  “Will you ever do it again?” she asked.

  “Do what?”

  “Kill someone.”

  He was silent for a long moment. “I hope not,” he softly replied.

  “I wonder about it sometimes,” she continued. “It’s a side of you I don’t know.”

  She sensed his unease as he gazed across the prairie.

  “It’s a side of me I hope you don’t ever have to see,” he said. “I can’t erase my past, Jessica. It happened. It’s part of who I am.” He paused. “Sometimes I....”

  A hawk soared above them—a dark, ill-omened figure against the bright blue sky. “Sometimes you what?”

  “Sometimes I wish I didn’t have a conscience. I wish I didn’t feel regret, but it’s there in my head, constantly.”

  Jessica rubbed his hands. “I’m glad. It makes you human.”

  “It’s not something I’m proud of,” he continued, “killing those men. Every time I think about it, something inside me aches, like an old wound on a rainy day.”

  Thunder swung his tail to slap at a fly, and a gust of wind blew Jessica’s hair away from her face.

  “The first time I killed someone,” Truman told her, “I did it for the reward. I was seventeen. After it was done, I sat under a tree and drank half a bottle of rotgut whisky. Then I had to drag a stiff body across the dirt and lift him onto my horse.”

  Jessica squeezed his hand tighter.

  “I didn’t sober up for days,” Truman continued. “I had a saddlebag full of cash from the reward, and I spent most of it on booze. I can’t remember much else about it. Afterwards, I got numb. I didn’t think much about what I was doing. I just pulled the trigger and got paid for it. But when Dorothy....” He paused. “When that happened, everything changed.”

  Jessica reached back and touched his cheek. “I hope you never have to do anything like that again.”

  “I just wish I could make up for it somehow.”

  “You are making up for it,” she told him. “As Sheriff of Dodge, you protect people. You’re a good man, Truman. I know you don’t think so, but it’s true. And I intend to keep telling you that for the rest of my days—until finally, God willing, you believe it.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  * * *

  HENRY GORDON WAS a loner. He lived in a small rented house on the side of a hill, overlooking a narrow, winding creek.

  When Truman and Jessica trotted into the yard, the curtains were drawn. The door was shut.

  There was a goat tied to a post out front, complaining with a noisy bawl.

  Truman dismounted and helped Jessica down. “Maybe we missed him. He’s probably at the office by now.”

  They climbed the steps to the small, covered porch and walked to the front window. “Try knocking, Jessica.”

  She raised a fist and pounded on the door. “Mr. Gordon? Are you home?”

  Only insistent complaints from the unhappy goat filled the silence.

  “He must have left for work,” Jessica remarked.

  “Looks like it.”

  “And we wasted all this time coming out here.”

  Just then, the front door ripped open. Mr. Gordon reached out, grabbed Jessica by the wrist, and hauled her inside.

  Truman drew his gun and was aiming by the time she whirled around in the open doorway to face him. But Gordon was shielded behind her, holding a gun to her head.

  “Drop your gun, Wade, or I’ll shoot her!” he shouted. “I swear on my life! I’m scared enough to do it!”

  Truman was only four feet away, but in Jessica’s eyes, from where he stood, it seemed more like a mile.

  Her heart was pounding so fast, she could barely breathe.

  Truman gave her that apologetic look. His voice was low and dangerous. “Drop it, Gordon.”

  “No, you drop it, or I’ll kill her!”

  Truman shut one eye to look down the long barrel of his Colt .45. “Drop it, I said.”

  Jessica felt Henry begin to hyperventilate behind her. “I’m gonna shoot her!” he said. “I swear! I can’t take it anymore. I’m gonna shoot her!”

  “No! Please!” Jessica screamed. “He’ll do it, Truman!”

  The little man flicked his gun around. “You heard her! Drop your weapon.”

  Jessica met Truman’s gaze. She saw helplessness in his eyes—a look she’d never seen before.

  It spooked her.

  Like death.

  His forehead creased with silent rage, then slowly, he lowered his six shooter.

  No one said a word for a full ten seconds.

  Henry nodded his head. “That’s better. Now drop it and kick it behind you, down the stairs.”

  ‘I don’t give up my gun,’ Truman had once said.r />
  Jessica’s breath caught like a stone in her throat.

  Then slowly…carefully…Truman bent down and set his weapon on the porch floor.

  Jessica felt her hopes sink as he kicked it away. It clattered down the steps and landed not far from the goat.

  “Let her go, Gordon,” Truman said.

  “Not yet.”

  Truman raised his hands. “What do you want? We can talk about it.”

  Jessica suspected this was the first time Truman had ever tried to handle a situation like this, without shooting first.

  He was doing just fine.

  Henry’s arm tightened around her neck.

  Jessica struggled to breathe.

  Suddenly, another gun cocked. Jessica’s gaze darted toward the sound, as Rosalie came around the side of the house aiming a rifle.

  “What a sight,” she purred. “Sheriff Truman Wade with his hands in the air. I’ll never forget it as long as I live.”

  “What are you doing here, Rosie?” he asked.

  She scoffed. “What does it matter? It’s me you want to talk to, not Henry. That’s all you need to know.”

  Jessica squirmed in Henry’s arms, but he pressed the revolver tighter against her temple.

  “Is that really necessary?” she protested.

  Rosalie laughed. “Truman, that lady of yours likes to complain. I don’t know what you see in her.”

  “What do you want, Rosie?” His voice was deep and controlled—a clear sign that he was angry enough to do serious damage.

  “I want you, Truman,” she flirtatiously replied. “I always have. You know that.”

  “Rosie?” Henry whimpered. “What do you mean? I thought—”

  “Shut up, Henry,” she snapped.

  An edgy grumble escaped him, but Jessica was the only one to hear it.

  Rosalie kept her eyes locked on Truman’s. “I just wasn’t good enough for you, was I? I was beginning to think you weren’t even a real man, until Miss Junebug came to town.” She glanced over at Jessica. “How’d you do it, anyway? How’d you get him to wake up finally?”

  Jessica didn’t respond, but deep down, she could feel her anger kicking and bucking, as if it had a personal, dangerous aim of vengeance all its own.