Twice Blessed

by Jo Ann Ferguson

  Noah tensed, noting again how taut the man’s shoulders were. “Is something wrong, Lewis?”

  “I’m afraid so.” He pulled a piece of paper out from under his coat. “Over the telegraph tonight, I received this warrant giving me the authority to make an arrest.”

  Emma gave a moan so soft Noah doubted any ears but his had heard it. Her fingers tightened painfully around his. Her voice broke as Sean’s had when she began, “Lewis, you must let me—”

  The sheriff paid her no attention as he said, “The warrant is for your arrest, Mr. Sawyer.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Emma stared at the sheriff. She must have heard him wrong. If he had said the warrant was for her arrest, she could have understood that her first marriage was returning to destroy her second one. But Noah …

  She looked at Noah, but he was staring straight ahead, his face wiped clean of any emotion. Why wasn’t he saying something?

  She must! “Lewis,” she asked, “would you repeat what you just said?”

  The thin sheriff gave her a sorrowful glance, and his stern voice softened as he said, “I sure am sorry to be bringing this on your wedding day, Emma, but it was waiting at the telegraph office.” He held up the page. “I sent a message back to make sure there hadn’t been a mistake. There wasn’t. I’m supposed to arrest Noah.”

  “Arrest Noah?” Emma jumped to her feet. “Why would anyone swear out a warrant on Noah?”

  Noah put his hand on her arm as he stood more slowly. He took the page Lewis held out to him. His lips tightened as he read it.

  “Noah, what is it?” she asked.

  When he handed it to her, she ignored the fancy lettering at the top. She scanned the page and choked back a gasp. Kidnapping! He was to be arrested on a charge of kidnapping? This made no sense.

  “Lewis, this must be a mistake,” she said, her voice breaking as Noah plucked the warrant out of her numb fingers.

  The sheriff sighed. “I didn’t want to interrupt your wedding reception, so I figured it’d be just as easy to come out here to deliver this. I knew you’d be returning here after your wedding.”

  “It has to be a mistake,” Emma said again. She gripped the porch pole to steady herself before she could be thrown back to the first time she had said those exact words to a lawman. She had been standing in the parlor of her comfortable house in Kansas. Then, her sister had been with her, so shocked by Miles’s treachery that she could not speak.

  Emma would not let Noah be tarred with someone else’s wrongdoing as she had been. She would speak up! But why was he saying nothing in his defense? Tell Lewis the truth, she wanted to shout.

  “Whether it’s a mistake or not, it’s official,” replied Lewis. “Straight from Chicago.”

  “Chicago?” she whispered. Staring at Noah, who was still silent, she sat back on the swing before her legs gave out from beneath her.

  She looked through the window at the furniture in the parlor and the dining room beyond. When she had asked about it, Noah had reacted as if she were attacking him … or accusing him of some heinous crime. She reached out and took his hand.

  He flinched, and tears thickened in her eyes. She could not ask him how he could believe that she would turn against him when her lips still smoldered with the heat of his slow-burning kisses.

  Then he put his other hand around hers and looked down at her. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. This isn’t what I thought our wedding night would be like.”

  “Noah, why would anyone accuse you of kidnapping?” She faltered, then asked, “Who are you supposed to have kidnapped?”

  “Belinda.”

  Emma pressed her hand over her heart that seemed to be trying to leap out of her chest. “Belinda? This is nonsense.” Setting herself on her feet, she said, “Lewis, if this is someone’s idea of a shivaree, it isn’t funny.”

  “No,” the sheriff said, his eyes focused directly on Noah, “it isn’t funny.” His rigid pose eased as he looked at Emma. “I wish I could tell you that this was a jest on the newlyweds, but it isn’t.”

  She whirled to Noah. “Tell him that it’s a terrible mistake, that someone has mistaken you for someone else. How can you kidnap Belinda?”

  “Emma, enough.”

  She bit her lip, recognizing the fury in his tightly restrained voice. So many questions needed to be answered, but she must not say anything that would create more trouble. That she had learned, as well, when the authorities came in search of Miles. Her own words of concern for her husband had condemned her even before he was found and lynched.

  Noah folded the page and put it beneath his coat. “What’s the next step in this process, sheriff?”

  “Noah!” she cried, then clamped her lips closed.

  Lewis shuffled his feet, abruptly looking as uneasy and uncertain as Sean had the day the sheriff had caught him with Noah’s hammer and bag of nails. “My instructions are to keep you under guard until the authorities from Chicago can come to deal with you.”

  “Where? There isn’t a jail in Haven.”

  “True.” He grimaced, and Emma thought of the many times he had asked the town fathers to allow him to have a secure room at the back of the livery stable. “If you promise not to flee, Noah, I guess you can stay here tonight.”

  “I’m not running away. I’m going to fight this.”

  Lewis’s face brightened, and Emma realized that her friend would have rather swum the length of the Ohio than bring this warrant here to Noah. “I’m glad to hear that.”

  “Do you know an attorney hereabouts?”

  “I’ve heard that Samuel Jennings read the law before he decided to buy land outside of town and farm it.”

  Noah arched a brow. “I’d hoped to have someone with a bit more skill in the law to help me fight this. I have no doubts that the best lawyers money can buy will be sent here to make sure I hang.”

  When Emma moaned and pressed her face against Noah’s chest, he put his arms around her. She pulled back with a choked gasp when she heard the crackle of paper beneath her ear. His thumb gently tilted her head back. She almost recoiled from the fury blazing in his eyes. What she had seen the night of the flood was only a hint of the rage he was trying to govern now.

  The door opened, and Gladys and the children burst back out onto the porch.

  Emma glanced at Noah as the children’s joyful voices flowed around the porch, silencing the soft song of the peepers. His eyes were focused, as she had expected, right on Belinda.

  “Sheriff,” Gladys said, “as long as you’re still here, you might as well join us for another toast to the newlyweds.” She balanced the tray on the rail.

  Sean took two glasses and Belinda one. With a grin, Sean held out one to the sheriff.

  “I really am not thirsty,” Lewis said as he took the glass.

  “Nonsense!” Gladys laughed as Sean handed the other glass to Emma.

  Her fingers trembled so hard she could barely hold it. Sean’s smile faded, and she wished he was not so perceptive of the emotions around him. The skills that had served him well when he lived with just his little sister on the cruel streets could tell him too much tonight.

  “Emma, is something wrong?” he asked, his voice quivering like her fingers.

  She tried to make her answer cheerful. “I thought you two were off to sleep.” Even Belinda stared at her when her strained voice broke, and she wished she had remained as mute as Noah.

  “Noah,” said Lewis as he set his untasted glass back on the tray, “it might be better if we discuss privately getting you a lawyer.”

  “Lawyer?” choked Gladys. She looked at the sheriff’s face, then at Noah’s. The tray teetered and fell off the railing with the crash of splintering glass as she reeled back in horror. Noah leaped forward and caught her before she could collapse.

  Emma ran into the house and to the kitchen. She dipped the first cloth she could find into the water bucket on the table in the middle of the room. Whirling to go back to the porch, she
was astonished to see Lewis standing in the doorway. She had not thought he would follow her instead of staying on the porch to watch his prisoner. She shuddered at the thought.

  When he glanced over his shoulder, she realized he could see Noah through the dining room window. He looked back at her, but said nothing.

  “Sean, take this to Noah,” she said quietly when the boy skidded to a stop behind the sheriff. “Then take Belinda and go upstairs and get ready for bed. I’ll be up to read you a story … sometime.”

  “Emma—”

  “Go and help Gladys, then go to bed.” She met his fearful eyes evenly. “Please, Sean.”

  He nodded and, taking the cloth, raced out the front door.

  Lewis cleared his throat. He opened his mouth and then closed it.

  “You might as well say what you want to say.” She wiped her hands on her gown, not caring if the water stained the silk.

  “I’m really sorry.”

  “I know that, Lewis.”

  “I had to deliver the warrant.”

  “I know that, too.”

  He faltered again before saying, “Emma, I trust you to remind him to do the right thing and stay here.”

  “Noah said he’d stay here. His word is still good, even though someone else clearly has perjured himself.”

  “But will you make sure he stays here?”

  If the circumstances had not been so grim, she would have laughed at the very idea that she could halt Noah from doing whatever he wanted to do. His muscles had been honed by his work in his woodlot, and his will was just as strong.

  “I’ll make sure he doesn’t leave Haven.”

  Lewis’s head shot up. “Haven? That’s a good idea, Emma. In the morning, all of you need to move into your house. It’s right in the center of town.”

  “My house is much smaller—”

  “But there are lots of folks in town who would be willing to share the duty of watching to make sure he doesn’t jump the next train out of town.”

  This time she could not halt her bitter laugh. “Listen to you, Lewis Parker! You’re making Noah into a vaudeville villain. We’re talking about Noah Sawyer here. He won’t run away from a fight, especially when he knows he hasn’t done anything wrong.” As I did. She must not say anything to make the situation more complicated.

  Apparently no one had noticed in the darkness when the sheriff spoke of a warrant for someone’s arrest how her face grew so cold that she knew all color had washed from it. She had had no doubts someone in Kansas had traced her here, determined she finally pay for a crime she had not been part of. In the split second before Lewis had continued, she had imagined being ripped away from the love she had discovered with Noah and Sean and Belinda. The idea that the warrant could be for Noah had not even entered her mind.

  Emma took a steadying breath, then asked, “What should we do now?”

  “I’m going to stand guard on the house tonight.”

  “Really, Lewis! Do you think that’s necessary?” When he regarded her with a stony expression, she relented and nodded. He was doing this as much to protect Noah as he was to guard him.

  “You should move back into town at daylight. You need to persuade Noah that doing anything stupid now will mean his losing everything.”

  “I don’t think Noah Sawyer has ever done anything stupid in his life.”

  He lowered his eyes. “Except—”

  “Lewis, he couldn’t kidnap his own daughter!”

  The sheriff’s strained face eased a bit. “That’s true. I was so blasted upset when the order to arrest him came through and was confirmed that I didn’t stop to think about the fact Belinda is his daughter.” He frowned again. “Something isn’t right about all this.”

  “That’s what I have been trying to tell you.”

  “In the morning, I’ll send a telegram to Chicago and start getting this cleared up.”

  “Thank you.” She resisted the temptation to give him a big kiss on the cheek. Her gratitude would embarrass him.

  “But until it is all cleared up, I must still keep him under guard.”

  “I understand, and so will he.” Walking to the door, she patted Lewis’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. This will all work out.” She wondered if he shared her amazement at how ridiculous this whole situation had become. She was comforting the very man who had arrested Noah.

  He held the door for her, and she went out to see Noah helping Gladys to her feet.

  When Emma looked around, Noah said, “Sean and Belinda have gone upstairs. Just as you told them to. Let me help Gladys to her room and then …” He looked at Lewis.

  The sheriff clapped Noah on the arm before walking down the front steps. From the shadows of a nearby tree, he drew out a rifle. Coming back to the house, he sat on the steps.

  Emma followed Noah and Gladys into the house. She started to close the door, but Noah shook his head. She understood what he did not say. There must be no hint that anything they said could not be heard by the sheriff.

  “I can get to my room on my own, Mr. Sawyer,” Gladys said in little more than a wispy whisper. “You two need to talk.”

  “Thank you, Gladys.”

  “If I did anything to—”

  He shook his head. “You know it isn’t anything you did.”

  Emma’s confusion must have been visible, because Gladys said, “You’d better talk to her right away, Mr. Sawyer.”

  Before Emma could ask a single question, Noah put his finger to her lips. Not here, he mouthed.

  She fought not to look over her shoulder to see if Lewis was watching them. When Noah went to the door, she was surprised to hear him say, “If you need it, there’s coffee in the kitchen. Help yourself.”

  “Th-thanks, Noah.” Lewis turned back to look out over the fields that dropped down into the Ohio.

  Noah came back to her and held out his hand. She put hers in it, and he smiled with relief. Did he think she would turn her back on him? She understood what he was going through better than anyone else in Haven, but she could not tell him that … not now.

  As he led her up the stairs, she said nothing. He opened the first door on the right. When she was about to step through, he put out his arm.

  “There are some traditions that shouldn’t be ignored.” He scooped her up into his arms and grinned. “The groom should carry his bride across the threshold of their bridal chamber.” His smile dimmed as his deep sigh pressed against her. “We need all the good luck we can get right now.”

  Emma buried her face in his shoulder as he took her into the bedroom. When he set her down on the bed, he went back and turned the key in the door. Then, pausing, he unlocked it and opened it enough to give him a view of the stairs that were still brightly lit by the lamps on both floors.

  She started to stand, but instead stared at the headboard of the bed. Their initials were carved into a twisting pattern of flowers and vines within a heart. Running her fingers along the “E,” she slid them to the “N” that was on the far side of the much larger “S” in the center.

  “This is beautiful,” she whispered. “I had no idea you could do such wondrous work.”

  “I thought you’d like it.”

  She looked at where he still leaned on the wall beside the door. “This is the reason you wanted to delay the wedding, not Belinda.”

  “Guilty.”

  She closed her eyes to hold back her tears. “Noah, don’t tease me now.”

  He crossed the space between the door and the bed in a pair of steps. Pulling her to her feet and into his arms, he held her as if he feared she would vanish. The paper rustled between them, and she stepped back again.

  He drew it out and placed it on the chest of drawers. Then he turned and went to stand beside the door where he could have a good view of the stairs.

  “Tell me, Noah,” she said as she sat on the wide windowsill. A mistake, she discovered, because the empty bed was between them, a reminder of how this evening should have been spent.
“Tell me why you didn’t tell Lewis right away that you couldn’t be guilty of kidnapping Belinda. You can’t kidnap your own daughter.”

  He glanced toward the stairs, then back at her. “I’m not Belinda’s father.”

  “What?” She had not guessed she could be any more shocked, but she was.

  “I’m her uncle.”

  “But she thinks you are her father.”

  “Yes, she does, because no one has ever told her differently. Her mother was my brother’s wife.”

  She swallowed roughly. “The woman in the photograph downstairs on the parlor mantel. Gladys said it was a picture of your sister.”

  “My sister-in-law. Martha married my brother Danny.” He met her eyes without emotion as he said, “They both were killed in the great fire in Chicago five years ago.”

  “Noah, I—”

  “Let me talk, Emma.” A hint of desperation came into his voice. “Please.”

  She nodded, biting her lip.

  “I told you how I was able to save Belinda, but I couldn’t save anyone else.”

  She nodded again.

  “I didn’t tell you that the ones I couldn’t save were my brother and his wife. The fire was swallowing their street with a wind shift by the time I arrived. I’d been trying to keep my furniture factory from burning to the ground, but it soon became clear it was lost. When I heard how widespread the fire was, I rushed to where my brother and his family lived. Danny tossed down the baby to me. We were set to catch him and Martha. Then something exploded in their house.” He hung his head as his hands fisted at his sides. “And they were gone.”

  Tears overflowed her eyes, but she did not wipe them away. She went to him and drew him down to sit beside her on the floor. He put his arm around her, but kept looking over her head to make sure no one was coming up the stairs to hear what he was telling her. She put her hand over his left one and felt his fingers quiver.

  With anger, she realized when he added, “If I’d not tried to save that damned factory, I might have been able to save them.”

  “You don’t know that. They must have thought they were safe if they stayed in their house.”

  He nodded. “Almost a dozen people died on that block alone. For a few minutes, I wasn’t sure if we would escape the inferno.” His gaze turned inward. “I’m no longer afraid of hell, because I have been there.”