by James, Terry
Matt looked to the sky, a sigh punctuating the tension that worked the muscles in his jaw. He’d obviously been fishing for a denial. Ros on the other hand, hung on Jake’s every word, her brows drawn into a tight frown.
‘She dealt Blackjack in the saloon, nothing more. I know that’s the truth because I was the gunfighter she came back to every night.’
Matt’s jaw dropped. ‘You? But you’re a United States marshal.’
‘It’s easy to make mistakes when you’re young, kid. I was lucky, two good things happened to me: one was Sheriff Riley, the other was Ros.’
‘Our Sheriff Riley?’ Matt asked.
‘That’s right. He threw me in a cell one night when I was too drunk to hold my gun let alone draw it. Probably saved my life. When I sobered up, he told me he was gonna give me a chance to cut loose from the rut I was in if I wanted it bad enough.’
‘He gave you a new name and a new start,’ Ros finished with inevitability.
‘No. He didn’t make it that easy. He had a job that needed my particular talent with a gun, and my reputation. Doing that job was the first time I met Emmett Swain … and Ros.’
The knot in her stomach tightened some more bringing with it a swell of despair. ‘Why can’t I remember? I need to. I can’t go on this way with every day bringing a new surprise!’ Ros held up her hand for silence. ‘No, stop there. There are probably things Matt doesn’t need to hear.’ She turned to her brother. ‘Please, Matt, don’t ask him anymore.’
Matt placed his gloves neatly together, giving it some thought. ‘It seems there are things you two need to sort out. I shouldn’t worry about the past, only be happy you’re back. After all, I’m the one who refused to believe you were dead. Every morning since you left, I’ve stood on the L and waited for you to come home.’
Some of the uneasiness lifted.
‘You always did follow me round like a homeless puppy.’ She hadn’t given a thought for anybody else when she upped and left, but at least now she had a second chance to make amends, if Emmett didn’t kill her first. ‘So, what are we gonna do?’
‘Well, a third of the L probably belongs to Swain.’ Matt stopped playing with his gloves. ‘Did Bill know?’
Ros shrugged. ‘Not when I left’
‘If Pa had told us, things might be different. Bill and May might still be here. You never would have run away.’
‘You don’t know that. I thought I loved Emmett.’ She glanced uneasily at Rudd and saw him frown. ‘I would have followed him anywhere, done anything for him.’
‘What about now? Do you want to give him his share?’ Matt asked.
There was only one reason why they should – blood. But she could think of a few reasons not to, or at least doubts that begged an explanation. For starters, what had he done to make her hate him? And what had she done that he wanted her dead?
‘I might have, before he murdered Bill and May, before he tried to have me killed and stole my memories, but not anymore.’
‘What do you mean he tried to have you killed?’ Jake asked.
‘The other night at the Crystal Slipper, Emmett admitted he was the one who pushed me under that stagecoach.’
Matt’s eyes narrowed, his gaze taking on a faraway quality as he scowled. He reminded Ros of their father, a mild-mannered man until the gates of fury opened. Had Matt also inherited his murderous temper?
She took a deep breath. ‘It’s up to you, Matt. You’ve got more of a stake in the L than I have. I’ll fight ‘til my last breath to keep it, if that’s what you want, but if it’s not, tell me now. I’ve already wasted too much of my life on lost causes.’
He considered for a minute, his gaze turning towards the hall where the sound of a door opening heralded the arrival of a visitor. ‘One way or another, Swain’s tried to destroy this family and I think it’s time to settle the score, I really do.’ He wrapped his arm around Ava’s expanded waist as she joined him. ‘But truthfully, I’m scared. I don’t want to risk losing Ava or the baby.’
Spontaneously, Ava wrapped her arms around him and squeezed tight. Ros envied them at that moment. They all might die when the fighting started, and that fear made her yearn for the intimacy Matt had with his pretty wife.
She twisted free of Rudd. ‘You and Ava stay here, lock the doors, keep away from the windows. You’ll be safe. We’re going out for a while.’
‘Where?’ Rudd asked, following her as she shoved past her brother.
‘Somewhere I can find answers.’
CHAPTER 17
The clerk at the hotel looked surprised to see them then scowled when Ros asked for Rudd’s room key. Someone had repaired the door, re-hung it at least, but the splintered wood was still a stark reminder of the previous shenanigans. Ros swung it open and marched into the familiar room. Rudd followed close on her heels, the door slamming behind him, a testament to his mood though he hadn’t said a word on the way over.
For a while, they stood on opposite sides of the room, staring at each other.
‘Any reason you came back here?’ Jake asked.
‘Tom said something intense might trigger my memory. This seemed as good a place as any. It seems you and me have quite a history in hotel rooms.’
She sighed, the chill in the air cooling her enthusiasm for an idea that suddenly lacked good judgement. After all, she’d lived years without caring what was missing from her memory. Did she really need to know now? Nothing he’d said to Matt had even tickled her memory. Wasn’t it enough to know she was in danger?
A knot of anxiety twisted in her stomach. ‘It seems I’m not the whore I thought. I’m sorry. Was I always this stupid?’
He laughed, easing the tension as he invited her to sit with him on the bed. For the first time since she’d met him again, it felt comfortable.
‘You know, I don’t think Emmett’s as interested in the ranch as he was. When we showed up it stopped being about just taking what he thought he had a right to. That night, when he had me at the Slipper, he talked about me betraying him … and how you and I had cost him three years of his life. Do you know what he meant?’
He sat beside her, his mouth pressed into an unyielding line. Minutes passed and still he said nothing.
‘All right,’ she said, ‘I’ll start. I’ve had a nightmare since I woke up after my accident. I see a man’s body at the bottom of a ravine. I run away, back to a hotel and pack my bags. I run to the stage stop. I buy the last ticket. Someone tells me the stage is always late and I start to pace. Willing it to arrive. Then it does. I start to run, jostled by the crowd. Suddenly, I’m shoved in the back and.…’
Her voice had grown to a crescendo and she forced it back to calm. ‘You know the rest. It’s your turn now. Tell me who I’ve been mourning and why and what it has to do with Emmett.’
Jake picked up her hand and clasped it against his thigh. ‘Ros, I’m sorry. If I hadn’t let you leave that day.…’
His reasons remained unspoken, a secret as they sat quiet, both looking at their intertwined hands. In the end, Rudd broke the silence.
‘The gang I was running with was led by a man named Jim West.’
‘West?’ She balked at the coincidence.
‘That last night, you’d been dealing blackjack in the Golden Nugget and I was playing stud at a table in the back. I saw West come in, but it wasn’t me he was looking for. He checked, but he didn’t see me behind the beaded curtain, then when I saw him take you aside I got curious. I thought he was going to hurt you so I followed. He took you to a storeroom, but before I busted in I heard you laughing. There was a window, so I climbed up and.…’
‘And what?’ she asked, impatiently.
The confidence she’d grown accustomed to seemed to leave him and his voice lacked its usual warmth when he found the words to continue.
‘He told you to forget about me, said he’d give you a ticket out of there. I didn’t understand, thought he was threatening you until you hugged him, saying how happy you we
re.’ He shook his head in bitter denial. ‘You and me were close as ticks on a dog’s back, but it seemed you and West were closer. I don’t mind telling you I was mad, and jealous as hell. I ran out of there and went back to the hotel, only by the time I got to our room I’d convinced myself he was playing you. I was sure he must be threatening you, using something against you to get to me. After all, you were my girl, who better to find out what I was doing and let West know.’
She felt the weight of her betrayal on him. He’d warned her about opening up old wounds, trying to discover the past too quickly. Selfishly, she’d assumed he was worried about her feelings, but the facts shifted the burden of guilt.
‘I’m sorry, Jake.’ She wondered why she was apologizing for something she didn’t remember, but his sullen look seemed to mirror her own disbelief.
‘There was nothing you could have told him. You didn’t know about me and Sheriff Riley because I never told you anything. I thought it would be safer that way.’
Her relief was short-lived, denial bringing her to her feet. ‘But I must have known. Why else would West have seduced me?’
‘Believe me, you couldn’t have known. The only other person who knew was Riley and he was in Texas.’ He shook his head, dismissing any further argument. ‘Anyhow, by the time you got back that night, I’d decided what I was going to do. The next day we were gonna get out o’ town. To hell with Riley. I’d start a new life somewhere else, where nobody knew Jay Langerud and a man and his wife could make a good life.’
‘So you asked me to marry you.’
Somehow the idea appealed to her and she pictured Matt and Ava. Could she have been as happy as they were?
‘No. I never got around to it. You were hysterical when you came in. You said you had something to tell me, wouldn’t quieten down until you did. Turned out you’d heard West arranging a surprise for me out at Danson’s Rock. That’s why he wanted you out of town, so you couldn’t spoil it.’
‘If you knew it was a trap, why did you go?’
He glanced up, predatory yellow eyes fixing her with suspicion. ‘How do you know I was talking about a trap?’
‘Your tone suggested it.’
‘Mm. Well, you’re right.’
She let out her breath. With the tension mounting, she was starting to mistrust herself, confusing guesswork for knowledge. Maybe she’d lost her memory along the way but she’d never lost her feeling of morality. And from the first time he accosted her in this hotel room she’d felt a sense of belonging when she was with Jake.
‘Only instead of running,’ he said, ‘I decided to walk right into it. West was robbing stages and leaving bodies all over the territory. I wanted to send him to prison where he couldn’t hurt or kill any more innocent people.’
She was only half listening as she wondered how she could have got mixed up with a murderer. And where had Emmett been while all this was going on?
‘What is it?’ Jake asked.
‘What you said about me and West…it bothers me. If you and I were lovers, I don’t believe I would have betrayed you with another man. I know I’m not that kind of woman.’
‘We all do things we regret from time to time,’ he said philosophically.
‘Agreed, but I spent nearly three years in a whore-house. I know my limits.’ She read confusion in his expression. ‘The Mission of St Mary? You assumed it was a religious sanctuary and I wasn’t in the mood to correct you.’ Standing up, she began to pace. ‘But now things have changed. I’ve got questions of my own, starting with who West was and what he might have had over me.’
Jake’s breath formed a cloud as he exhaled loudly. ‘This is where things get complicated.’
She stopped and looked askance, a hint of amusement easing some of her tension. ‘You mean they’re not already?’
He didn’t indulge her attempt at humour. ‘I’ve seen West recently.’
Before she asked, she had a feeling she knew what he’d say. Emmett had as good as admitted he pushed her under that stagecoach. The only flaw in his confession had been his reasons for doing it. Jake saved her the trouble of wasting a question.
‘You’d know him better as Emmett Swain.’
The knowledge winded her. ‘That explains a few things. Why else would Emmett push me under that stage?’
‘Bastard.’ Jake reached up and pushed the hair away from her face, tracing the white scars etched into her forehead. ‘If for nothing else, I’ll kill him for that.’
Ros met his glare with a shiver of trepidation. He’d shown compassion to a boy, friendship to her brother and stayed with her when she needed him. But when the layers of affability were stripped away, the killer beneath shone bright as polished steel.
Still, everything considered, he didn’t frighten her. Whatever happened, he wouldn’t use his anger against her. Suddenly, the feelings she’d tried to deny smothered her. She slipped her hands around his neck, tentatively feathering kisses on his mouth until they softened the anger that had turned him to steel.
‘There’s no going back now,’ he mumbled, as he kissed her.
‘I know. Emmett said we were living on borrowed time.’
‘What else did he say?’
She stopped and thought for a minute. ‘He said you had a lot of forgiveness in you.’
She swung round and sat on the edge of the bed next to him. For a long time she couldn’t say anything as an inexplicable feeling of foreboding crept over her.
‘Will you do something for me?’ she asked.
His eyes narrowed.
‘Take your jacket off and turn around.’
It was a simple enough request, yet she sensed reluctance. ‘Please, there’s something I need to know.’
He turned his back towards her and faced the window. His reflection in the dark glass showed fear. Without being asked, he lifted his shirt. Winter had brought the night in early and she moved in close, smoothing her hand across his back…and a scar the size of bullet wound.
‘I did that?’
He let his shirt drop and faced her. ‘You thought you were shooting Parley Jones.’
‘Parley Jones … but Emmett said you.…’
‘Remember the trap West was laying for me? Well, I got the jump on Jones that day, switched my clothes and hat with his and marched him out into the ambush. West was up in the rocks somewhere and he shot the man he thought was me.’
‘So Emmett shot you. He was lying when he blamed me.’
Jake frowned. ‘I could let you believe that, but later when you’ve had time to think about it, the doubt’ll drive you mad. He shot Jones thinking he was me. When I turned to get a shot off at him, you fired.’
She jumped to her feet, refusing to believe it. ‘But I saw your body in the ravine. I know I did. It’s all I’ve dreamed about.’
He grabbed her arm, stepping in close as she tried to run from him. ‘It was Jones. Same hair, same build, same clothes. Believe me, I wish I had no memory of it, especially at night when I wake up in a cold sweat, shaking until the whiskey kicks in, wishing it had been me.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’ve never forgotten that look on your face when you turned around and saw me on the ground and realized what you’d done. You thought I was dead and I was too weak to tell you otherwise. That’s why you ran.’
She wrapped her arms around him, her fingers tracing the outline of the scar she’d caused. In her lowest times she’d never imagined anyone else might be living a nightmare equally as terrifying as hers, or that the truth might be worse than the dream.
‘I’m sorry, Jake,’ she said over again.
He kissed her as though he might take the pain away, hard and soft, long and slow. Beneath her hands, his muscles strained as his mouth sought the taste of her and together they peeled away the last barriers between them.
She let the final layers drop away, relishing her newfound liberation. For a long time she’d been crippled by guilt and ashamed of her disfigurement. The h
orses’ hoofs had left their imprint on her body and her mind, leaving scars to hide behind like a shield. As Jake’s eyes and hands and lips found each imperfection, she revelled in the beauty and freedom he gave her. For a short while, there was no past and no future, only a shared moment in time.
CHAPTER 18
The sky hung grey and foreboding and ice formed a new frame around the window. It took a minute or two before Jake rolled out of the warm blankets, tearing himself away from the softness of the woman beside him. Landing silently on his knees beside the bed, he tugged on his socks then tiptoed to the dresser to throw water over his face. Glimpsing himself in the crazed mirror hung on a nail buckled into the wall, he stroked his beard thoughtfully. It felt thick and unkempt and, searching under the bed, he found his carpetbag and inside a change of clothes and his shaving gear.
After stropping the blade, he lathered his face with soap and drew the razor precisely across his cheek. As the beard disappeared, he heard movement behind him and glanced around, wary of the response he might get. She hadn’t remembered anything last night despite everything he’d told her and the familiarity between them that had come as easily as breathing. Still, awakening dormant memories might be more than she could handle coming on top of everything else. However, for now, Ros stayed asleep curled into a ball beneath the blankets, which wound tightly around her.
Jake chuckled as he stroked off the last of his beard and splashed his face. He’d forgotten she snored. Forgotten a lot of things. Like the way she enjoyed sleeping with her back curled against his front. How good she made him feel, as though he’d do anything for her.
He ran his fingers across his bare cheek. It felt strange after hiding behind whiskers for so long, but a lot had changed in the hours between dusk and dawn. Now all that remained was to finish his transformation. Quickly, he changed into something more practical than the suit he favoured; rough cotton trousers, a blue calico work shirt and a black leather waistcoat. As he finished dressing, Ros rolled onto her back and opened her eyes, lids fluttering.