by D. L. Snow
“Miss Sullivan?” There was no mistaking the quiet, gentle voice of Cap’n, gazing down at me with compassion in his liquid brown eyes. With a jerk of his head, he told me to follow him outside where a wagon sat, loaded with goods and supplies for the saloon.
“What is it, Cap’n?”
“Go easy on Kitty. She’s doing the best she can.”
“Doing the best she can?” I kicked a stone in anger and frustration. “Cap’n, she plans to sell me like a common whore. You have no idea what that’s like.”
“Don’t I?” His stern tone caught me off guard. He cast a surreptitious glance in either direction before carefully rolling up his sleeve and showing me his forearm. Nasty scars ran up and down the length of his skin, each the size of a nickel. “Cigars,” he said quietly.
“Kitty did that?”
“Oh no. Kitty would never do such a thing. I’ve worked for much worse, Miss Sullivan. Much worse.”
I looked up into Cap’n’s kind, mahogany face and realized what a fool I was. I was so concerned about my own situation that I had never even considered what others were dealing with. People like Camille and Cap’n.
“You were a slave?”
He shook his head. “No, I was born a freeman. But, not everyone has the same idea about what that title means.”
With a sigh, I leaned against the wagon. “How do you do it? How do you manage?”
“I do my best not to stir up those who think they control me.” A rare smile flashed across his features. “All the while doing what I please when no one’s looking.”
“That’s my problem,” I sighed. “People are always looking at me. But nobody really knows me.” I stopped and stared off into space. No one knows me? Was that true?
“Maybe that’s because you spend an awful lot of time pretending to be someone that you ain’t. Stop wasting all your time pretending and start using it for figurin’ out who you wanna be.”
I slowly turned my head up to Cap’n. A warm feeling spread through me as he smiled down at me.
“I reckon you’ve got more choices, more freedom than you ever imagined.” His gaze left my face.
Following Cap’n’s line of sight, I found Morgan Hawes standing at the back fence, smoking a cigar.
“He’s a fine gent.” Cap’n squeezed my shoulder then hefted a keg from the wagon and turned to carry it inside.
I stayed put, watching Morgan for a few minutes, thinking about what Cap’n said. When Morgan turned toward me and our gazes met, my heart skittered inside my chest and I realized how right Cap’n was. It was time to stop playing Joss Jones or Jo-Jo Sullivan for that matter. It was time to be me, the real me; Josslyn Angela Jones, and it was time to act on my feelings because Josslyn Angela Jones had a burning desire to seduce Morgan Emerson Hawes.
Chapter 11
Once I’d made my decision, it was like a light went on. The overcast sky broke apart and a ray of sun shone through like a spotlight from God following the path Morgan Hawes cut across the yard. He stopped beside me, dropping his cigar butt and grinding it beneath his boot.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Hawes. I hope you’re finding your accommodations comfortable.” I said, a little out of breath.
“Don’t.”
I was not prepared for the sharpness of his tone or the hardness in his eyes.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t speak to me like Kitty does. I think we can dispense with formalities now that each of us has seen the other in less than formal attire.”
Heat infused my cheeks as I remembered my completely transparent petticoat at the pond. I was unable to lift my gaze to his face and found myself staring at the open collar of his shirt where thick cords of muscles created a delicious hollow at the base of his neck. Suddenly, I was overcome with the vision of him wearing nothing but a towel around his waist.
“Take a walk with me, Joss.” His voice sounded even deeper than usual.
“O-kay,” I said as I carefully slid my arm through his.
Instead of Main Street, he led me to River Road and we walked along the creek, taking the same route I’d taken up Turtle Mountain. Morgan walked at a quick clip and I had a hard time keeping up. After what seemed like an eternity of silence, he said, “Stay away from James Ellis.”
I stopped walking and pulled my arm from his. “Is that a request or a demand?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes, it does. I don’t take orders from men who have no right to issue them.”
A muscle ticked along Morgan’s jaw. “No right?”
With hands on my hips, I said, “No right. You have no claim on me.”
“Is that so?” He grabbed my hand and pulled me toward a stand of trees that lined the creek. Once beneath the canopy of cover, he pushed me up against a tree and covered my mouth with his. It was a desperate, hungry kiss and I met his hunger as if I too hadn’t eaten in far too long.
“Tell me that I have no right to make demands,” he whispered harshly against my mouth.
“You have no right,” I said, softly kissing the corner of his mouth.
“Oh God,” he moaned as he kissed me with such ferocity I could hardly breathe but it was what I wanted, exactly what I wanted.
He tore his mouth away. “Look at me,” he insisted.
I did. There was nowhere else I could look.
His carefully combed hair was messed. Had I done that? His eyes had a wild gleam to them. His jaw was rigid with something that looked like anger, but I couldn’t be sure. “Promise me you’ll stay away from Ellis.”
“I promise.”
He exhaled deeply, though he kept me firmly trapped inside his arms. “I should take my own advice,” he murmured. “How I’ve tried to stay away, but every night I find myself searching for you.” He shook his head. “What have you done to me?”
“The same thing you’ve done to me.”
“Stop playing the trollop!”
I slapped him. “I am not a trollop.”
His eyes flashed and then softened. “No? What are you then?” He curled a tendril of my hair around his finger and studied it. “Maybe you really are a siren,” he looked into my eyes, “sent from hell to test and tempt me.”
I lifted my chin. “No. I’m not a siren. I’m from the future and so are you. You are Kyle Copeland.”
“Stop!” His nostrils flared and the green flecks in his eyes sparked with torment. Was he starting to remember? Was he starting to believe me?
It was those flecks that made me press on. “I can’t stop, Kyle. You brought me here for a reason.” I touched his cheek, the line of his jaw. “Maybe this is it.”
He grabbed my hand and held it tight. “No. It can’t be true. I am not this person you speak of.”
“But you are.”
“No. I’m Morgan Emerson Hawes, do you hear? Say it. Say my name.”
“Kyle Copeland.”
His grip tightened as he fought to retain control of his features. “Say. My. Name.”
I opened my mouth to say ‘Kyle’, but no sound came out. Perhaps because he’d dropped his fierce gaze to my parted lips sending an overwhelming flush through my entire body. Without warning, he closed the distance, smothering any words I’d hoped to utter.
The kiss ended all too abruptly with Morgan pulling away and then taking my hand and yanking me back onto the path towards the hotel. He left me at the back gate with the instructions, “Come to my room tonight. There is something I need to show you.”
*****
That night the saloon was the busiest and rowdiest I’d ever seen it. I offered to help serve food and drinks but Kitty wouldn’t hear of it.
“The Siren of Bandit Creek acting as a serving maid? Oh no, Dearest. You’ll be performing tonight. Got to give these fellas something to rouse their spirits after the fire last night.”
The performance started at nine o’clock and I sat at the piano playing a few of my own songs but mostly taking requests. After a string of the old fa
miliar songs, I’ve Been Working on the Railroad and my Wild Irish Rose, I got a request for a song called Eight Hours.
“I’m sorry I don’t know that song,” I said.
But the men were in a boisterous spirit that night and a couple of them stood up and began to sing to the accompaniment of clapping hands and stomping feet. I soon realized that it was a sort of union song and the miners were singing in protest to their long work weeks. By the time the chorus came around, everyone in the place was singing and stomping their feet, Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest, eight hours for what we will.
Was I the only one who noticed James Ellis slipping out the backdoor? No. Kitty noticed too and a cold hand tickled my scalp when I saw him nodding curtly in my direction. Kitty caught me staring and she came forward while the men were still shouting and cheering over their song.
Without meeting my eyes, she said, “They’ll pay for that act of mutiny next week, mark my words.” Then Kitty sat down at the piano and played a tune about the difficult life of a woman who was always controlled first by her parents and then by her husband. Somehow Kitty made the cautionary tune fun and raucous.
“Mr. Sullivan sure had his work cut out when he met you, didn’t he, Kitty,” a man from the back of the room shouted when Kitty finished.
“That he did, but then…” Kitty smoothed her hands down her ample figure. “Mr. Sullivan didn’t marry an ordinary woman.” The room roared with laughter while she gestured for me to sit back at the piano. “Play that soft song you always do. Let’s bring the excitement down a smidge.”
I nodded and played Promised Land.
The saloon was so quiet by the time I finished you could have heard a pin drop.
“That was beautiful, Miss,” an old toothless man said, his hat crushed between his hands. “If you married me, I’d treat you like a princess.”
“Marry me, Miss, and I’ll treat you like a queen!”
So much for bringing things down a notch. The cries from the crowd grew rowdy again as each man tried to outdo the other. By the end I was a goddess, worthy of worship.
“I promise to take all of your offers under serious consideration.” I smiled a true and genuine smile. “But for now, I bid you all goodnight.”
There was a resounding cry for me to stay as every man except one tried to get me to change my mind. The lone, silent man stood at the back of the room, taller than the rest, his green-flecked eyes smoldering even from the distance.
“I’m sorry,” I said much too softly to be heard over the noise. “But a girl needs her beauty rest.”
My legs trembled as I mounted the stairs to my room. I’d been able to think of little else but Morgan’s invitation. What did he want to show me? My hands shook as I undid the line of pearl buttons on the front of my blouse, imagining he was there watching me. I hoped he planned on showing me what his hands might feel like on my bare skin. And then? Perhaps he’d show me what his lips felt like kissing me. All of me.
The thought had me pressing my knees together in anticipation. By the time I was undressed down to my corset and petticoat, I could hardly breathe. What did one wear to a seduction?
I had just slipped on the sheerest of nightgowns when I heard footsteps outside my door; one set of heavy boots followed by much lighter, quicker footsteps.
“Mr. Hawes,” Camille called softly outside. “You’d best let Miss Sullivan alone.”
I threw a sheer lace dressing gown – something I never thought I’d wear in a million years – over my nightgown and opened the door to find Camille blocking it. She looked back and forth between me and Morgan. “Don’t do it,” she whispered.
“It’s okay, Camille. Go back downstairs.”
Camille shook her head. “Kitty will be so upset.”
“Why would Kitty be upset?”
Camille didn’t answer and her lack of a reply told me everything I needed to know. Kitty had made a deal with James Ellis.
I patted Camille’s hand. “Stay in the room,” I whispered. “Kitty doesn’t need to know.”
I slipped down the hall to where Morgan waited for me outside his door. My heart thudded so loudly, I could hear it pounding between my temples. Once inside his room, Morgan shut the door, throwing us into near darkness until he lit a kerosene lamp that stood on the dresser and another that sat on the table beside the bed.
He removed his jacket and hung it on a peg behind the door then he motioned to the bed. “Sit.”
“Morgan,” I began.
“Shh,” he said. “Don’t speak.” He went to the bureau and opened the top drawer, pulling out the tin box I’d seen him with that morning. God! Was it only this morning that he’d arrived? Was it only last night he’d lost everything? Was it only this afternoon I’d decided to seduce him?
He stood over me and then placed the box in my lap. It had been cleaned of soot, but was still discolored from the fire. Carefully I opened the lid to look inside while he sat beside me, making sure, it seemed, not to sit too close. There wasn’t much in the box but some papers, old photos and a ring.
“That ring was my mother’s. She was very strict, but always fair…and kind. She died when I was fourteen.”
I picked up the ring. A sapphire surrounded by small diamonds. It was beautiful. Carefully I placed it back into the box. Morgan stood over me and reached for a slip of paper. He unfolded it and handed it to me. It was a birth certificate with the name Morgan Emerson Hawes, born 1872 to Martha Catherine Hawes and Morgan Douglas Hawes in Chicago, Illinois. There was also a picture of a young man standing on an outcrop with a floppy hat, a pick axe and a huge smile.
“That picture was taken when I was sixteen, staking my first claim up on Turtle Mountain.”
I looked at the faded picture. There was a definite resemblance between the boy in this picture and the one in the basketball photo back home. But there was no question the boy in the picture was the man who sat beside me now.
“This is all I have left of my life, what is here in this box. But it is my life. Here. Now. Do you need more proof that I am who I say I am?” I could tell by the way his jaw tensed that his teeth were clenched tight.
I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He was right. He had proof. He belonged here, in this time. But then what the hell was I doing there?
I was about to close the box when something caught my eye. At first I thought it was another Silver Certificate. But when I unfolded it, I saw it did not have those words on it. This note had ONE DOLLAR written at the bottom, and FEDERAL RESERVE NOTE across the top. The series was from 2001.
In triumph I held it up, waving it in front of his face. “This! What about this?”
At first I thought Morgan was going to snatch it from me, claiming he knew nothing about it or that it was counterfeit. But he didn’t. He took the note from my hand and sighed. “This is the reason I have not passed you off as a raving lunatic. This is the reason your story has plagued me from the moment I first saw you.”
Chapter 12
Morgan stared at the note in his hands. “I am Morgan Emerson Hawes, you understand?”
I nodded, not because I necessarily agreed, but to keep him talking because I was dying to know what he was going to say next.
“Ten year ago I was set upon by thugs while I was working my claim up on Turtle Mountain. They shot me. Here.” He pointed to his chest and I remembered the scar I’d seen when he was in the washhouse, half-naked. “I should have died.” He turned to face me and his eyes shone, the green flecks glowing in the low light. “I think I did die a little, if that is possible.
“I remember seeing myself, lying there on the ground, bleeding, like my spirit had left my body and was looking down on it. But then suddenly I was on the ground again and my spirit was above me. I watched my spirit remove his shirt and press it to my chest. It was while he dug a finger inside my wound that I passed out.”
Morgan studied his hands. “I don’t remember anything else until I woke up on Doctor Lo
vatt’s operating table. The doctor had spent extra time cleaning my wound. He was confused, you see, because he couldn’t find the bullet.” He raised his eyes to stare at me. “What the good doctor did find was this,” he held up the note. “It was in the pocket of a torn shirt that had been used to staunch the flow of my blood.”
“Oh my God,” I whispered as chills ran up and down my legs. “You saved yourself.”
Squeezing his eyes shut, Morgan shook his head. “No, that’s not possible.”
“But it happened,” I insisted. “That was you, the future you. You pulled the bullet out, you stopped the bleeding with your shirt.”
“It can’t be.”
“How else can you explain it?”
Thrusting his hands through his hair, Morgan stood and began to pace. “I don’t know.”
I watched him pace the room like a caged animal. Then I stood and approached him, cautiously, as if he might attack if I made any sudden movement. Taking his hands in mine, I placed them on the tie of my dressing gown and helped him to loosen it.
“Joss,” he said, shaking his head, his eyes flashing.
I ignored his feeble protest and spread my dressing gown open, letting it slither from my shoulders to pool at my feet. “Do I look real to you?”
“Don’t.”
“Answer the question. Do I look real?”
His jaw flexed and he whispered, “Yes.”
“Touch me.”
His smoldering gaze was enough to burn me, but he didn’t make a move.
“Fine,” I said, taking the step required to close the distance between us. With trembling hands I began to undo the buttons on his shirt.
“What are you doing?”
“If you won’t touch me, I’m going to touch you.” I continued to undo his shirt. Although his breathing became more and more uneven with every button I undid, he didn’t protest again. Once his shirt was open, I spread it wide, gently pushing it off his shoulders, trapping his fisted hands at his sides.
He sucked in a quick breath when I traced the outline of the scar. “I know it seems impossible,” I whispered. With the backs of my knuckles I stroked the bold lines of his pectoral muscles, letting my hands roam where they wanted, up to the hollow of his neck and down to the line of hair that split his abdomen. “Yet you’re alive.” I looked up into his face. His nostrils were flared, his pupils fully dilated.