by Eli Easton
Emmie’s eyes watered, and she turned away.
“Aw, Emmie, what’s wrong?”
“It’s all right.” Emmie sniffed. “I’m not mad. Only . . . I liked Rowena so much. I’m sad she won’t be my sister.”
Marcy nodded in agreement, her eyes tearing up too.
Robby heaved a sigh, guilt eating at him. And sadness too. “Maybe I won’t be your sister. But can I be your brother? I’d like to be.”
Emmie blinked at him, thinking about it. “I never had a brother.”
“Well, not one like you anyway,” Marcy said with a quirk of her lips. “If you’re my brother then I can tell ya to get your butt back to bed and rest.”
Robby nodded. But he gave them each a hug before he went.
Chapter Thirty-Five
When Trace got back from town, he couldn’t wait to see Robby. Marcy said he was sleeping, but Trace didn’t care. He needed to make sure Robby was all right. So he let himself onto the porch, quietly, and sat in a chair next to Robby’s bed.
He looked so young lying there. It was hard to believe such an innocent-looking creature could have caused all the havoc he had. Or gotten under Trace’s skin so deeply.
Robby opened his eyes, cool as day, and looked at him.
Trace licked his lips, feeling unsure of himself. “Sorry I yelled at ya at lunch.”
“You should be sorry,” Robby said, but he didn’t sound mad.
Trace sighed. He wanted . . . He didn’t even know what he wanted.
“Get over here and hold me a minute,” Robby demanded.
Trace glanced at the door. “I shouldn’t.”
“No one’s coming in here. Come on. I’m a wounded man. I’m in dire need of comfort.”
With an exaggerated huff, Trace got up and sat on the edge of the bed. He put his arm out and Robby snuggled under it, lying on Trace’s lap. God, it felt so good. Why did it have to feel so good? Why did he want Robby like this?
Why did Robby have to love him?
Love.
Last night, Pa had told Trace and his brothers about their mother’s death all those years ago. Trace had been fit to be tied, but it seemed like the wrong time to yell at his pa about lying to the family, so he’d let Wayne do the ranting and raving. Wayne, who remembered more about those days than any of them, said he’d stood at the end of the driveway looking for their mother to come home every day at sunset for a whole year. And his voice had broke. Pa admitted he’d done wrong and said he was real sorry. Seeing both Wayne and Pa emotional like that shocked the hell out of Trace.
He didn’t know how to feel about his mother’s fate. Of course, it meant a lot that she hadn’t left them on purpose. She never would, Pa said. And maybe that would take some time to sink in. But on the other hand, it just went to show that a body could ride off on a whim someday and never come back, like Robby had nearly done. And Trace wasn’t sure how much more of that his heart could take.
“I know ya thought you were doin’ the right thing. But it would have ruined me if I’d found you dead out there,” Trace said finally, his voice thick.
“Yeah?” Robby tilted his head to look up at Trace.
Trace touched Robby’s jaw. “Yeah. Idjit.”
Robby yawned and smiled. He looked up at Trace with warm, happy eyes, gazing at him as if just the sight of him was wonderful. It made Trace feel awful.
He cleared his throat. “Ya must be in pain.”
Robby’s smile faded. “Yes. I feel like I was run over by a wagon train. A long one.”
“Well. Just rest. Doc says it’ll get easier.”
Robby shifted in his lap, frowning. “You know I have to leave, right?”
“Ya don’t have to. My family knows about ya now, so you could stick around.”
Robby barked a laugh. “And do what? Muck out the stables?”
“Actually, Carson Meeps has that job,” Trace said, with a hint of a smile. “I dunno. Maybe you could be a deputy or something.”
Robby shook his head. “My dearest darling, I’m an actor. There’s too much life out there waiting for me. But . . . you could come with me.”
Trace gave him a long, measured stare. He couldn’t make himself say the words—I can’t. But he didn’t have to. Apparently, it was written all over his face because Robby’s expression closed up. He sighed and turned into Trace’s shirt.
“Ya have to at least stick around till the marshals get here. Ya should give ’em your testimony. Then ya won’t have to worry about the Bowery Boys comin’ after ya again.”
Robby fiddled with one of Trace’s buttons, not meeting his eyes. “When do you think the marshals will get here?”
“Shouldn’t be too long now. Week or two?”
“All right,” Robby said slowly. “Maybe I should move to Mrs. Jones’s place. I don’t want things to be awkward for your family.”
Trace thought about it, his hand soothing Robby’s back. “Maybe it’d be good for them to get to know ya as Robby.”
“Why?”
Trace didn’t have an answer, only that he wanted it. He didn’t want their last memory of Rowena to be one of confusion and betrayal. He wanted them to know Robby the way he did.
Well, not exactly the way he did.
“Why don’t ya stay a day. If it don’t feel right, I’ll take ya to Mrs. Jones.”
Robby nodded. Okay.
Trace wanted to kiss Robby, wanted to climb into bed where they could hold each other, skin to skin. Pull the blanket over their heads and shut out the rest of the world. Forever.
Trace dropped his voice to a whisper. “You could come to the bunkroom tonight, just so’s I can hold ya.”
“As long as I’m here, Trace, nothing could keep me from you,” Robby said with quiet gravity.
Trace nodded. He felt the same. As for the pain in his gut, sometimes life hurt. And a man just had to live with that.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Robby stayed at the ranch for two more weeks. He had an interesting position in the family, not quite family and not quite a guest anymore. Not quite one of the men, nor one of the women any longer.
Sometimes he helped Marcy and Emmie in the kitchen or with sewing braid or buttons on the new clothes. Sometimes he helped with barn chores along with the boys. The children were fascinated by Robby’s life on the stage. He organized a play, such as it was, the way his mother used to do when he was small. Trace and his brothers insisted on being “the audience” but Pa-Pa took a part and played it with gusto. None of the Crabtrees kids would ever be star talent, bless their hearts, but they had fun.
Robby stayed long enough to meet with two U.S. Marshals in the Flat Bottom sheriff’s office. They told him Mose McCann was in custody and faced a slew of charges including the murder of a banker Robby had witnessed. They wanted Robby to return east with them for the trial. But Robby was tired of being tossed around by the fates and letting that one night rule his life. So they figured out a compromise. He wrote a detailed statement and signed it in front of three witnesses. And that was the end of it.
Robby stayed long enough to see Clovis begin a formal courtship of Miss Harriet Stubbens. They could be seen most evenings sitting on the steps of the schoolhouse or on the porch at the ranch trying to catch the evening breeze. Clovis tried his best to look presentable and Robby, Marcy, and Emmie all helped by sewing him new clothes and encouraging him to, for the love of God, keep shaving. Robby was happy for Clovis, and it helped assuage his own guilt. But the more time Harriet spent at the ranch, the more Robby felt he needed to move on. Not that there had ever been anything between he and Clovis, but he wanted to spare the new couple any awkwardness.
The story quickly got around town about the fugitive eyewitness from New York, and how he’d hidden out at Crabtree Ranch in the guise of a woman. The Crabtree men, led by the town’s own dear sheriff, had taken down those bloodthirsty Eastern killers along with the infamous Durby Gang. They became the talk of the territory.
Robby
let out a few hints to Mrs. Jones that the Crabtrees had been in on the subterfuge the entire time. It was about then that Pa-Pa began to like the story. A lot. Everyone said he’d never been seen in town so often, nor with his head held quite so high. Pa-Pa embellished the story each time he told it, until you’d have thought Clyde Crabtree was on friendly terms with President Hayes, and that he’d agreed, as a personal favor to the president, to give sanctuary to Robby Riverton before he ever left New York City.
Pa-Pa took to ribbing Robby at mealtime, and Robby ribbed him back. The smarter Robby’s mouth was, the more Pa-Pa was tickled by it. His cackle—and it really was a cackle—became commonplace.
During those weeks, Trace stayed in the bunkroom in the barn. Robby snuck over there every night when the house was asleep and later snuck back to the porch, sated and warm and missing the feel of Trace’s arms. They didn’t talk about Robby leaving again. It was too painful a subject. But each time they touched they made love with an intensity that said it might be their last.
Eventually Robby bought his stagecoach fare, heart in this throat, and packed the small carpetbag with the few items he had left to his name. He gave Rowena’s things to Marcy and Emmie, including an old gold-plated locket that had been in Rowena’s trunk, the one he’d used to convince Pa-Pa he wouldn’t run away. And then Robby found himself with nothing to do but leave.
He said his good-byes at the ranch on a Tuesday afternoon. Everyone gathered on the porch, including Clovis and Harriet. There were a lot of hugs and good wishes and promises to write. Robby felt a hole open inside him as he and Trace rode on Bella and Jasper toward town. The Crabtrees weren’t perfect. Or even close. But, much like his own large family back in Pennsylvania, the family unit had an energy, a pull all its own, like being part of a pack. They were honest and had no airs and graces. He would miss them.
But the worst part of leaving Flat Bottom by far was leaving Trace. They didn’t talk about the future. Not in those last two weeks of late-night rendezvous, not in the quiet moments they’d caught together at the ranch, and not on that final ride to town. It wasn’t until they were within sight of the brown buildings, riding side by side, that Trace spoke.
“Where ya headin’?” he asked, breaking the unspoken agreement.
“Pete said if you travel south from Santa Fe, you can take the Gila Trail to California. It’ll take a while, but eventually I’ll reach San Francisco. Maybe it won’t be what I think it is. But it’s been in my head long enough, I figure I should give it a try. After all, I’ve come this far west.”
“Yeah,” Trace said, his face solemn. “Ya should.”
“You can still change your mind and come with me.” Robby glanced over at Trace. He looked for some sign in his expression that he was at least sorry.
Trace glowered. “Christ on a crutch, Robby. I’ve only known ya a month. I can’t just up and leave a good job, and my family, and everythin’ I’ve ever known.”
“No that would be risky. Though not as risky as running off to be a sharpshooter in the army.”
Trace glowered harder. “Well, maybe I’ve learned better since then.”
Robby nodded solemnly. “Maybe you have. No, you’re right. You should stay here. Sit on the porch all by yourself. Nice and quiet. For years. Nothing to worry about except the flies. And you can spend lots and lots of time with your family.”
Trace narrowed his eyes. “Don’t think ya can talk me around, the way ya do Pa.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Robby sniffed.
“This ain’t the same as the gals’ clothes or table manners or fake archways in fake castle walls. This is a serious matter. A man’s life. My life.”
“I know,” Robby said sadly. “Really I do.”
“I don’t have a thing in San Francisco.”
“You’d have me.”
Robby could have said a lot more—about adventure and taking risks and about how it wouldn’t be the first time either of them had run away to the great unknown. But what was the point? Trace knew all those things. But he chose to stay. Robby had to respect that. He owed Trace his life. The least he could do was not make this more difficult for him.
They reached Mrs. Jones’s boarding house, and Trace went upstairs with him. Robby put his bag on the bed and they stood in the small bedroom looking at one another. Robby felt heartsick, an ache deep inside him. Trace licked his lips. “Wanna come next door for a bit?”
Robby would take any opportunity to postpone the inevitable. “Sure.”
His hands shaking, Robby shut the door to his room and they trooped downstairs, over to the sheriff’s office, and up to Trace’s apartment above. Robby had only been there once, after he’d been saved from the Bowery Boys, and he’d been half-delirious at the time. He looked around at the plain space.
This is what Trace chooses over me? It hurt. It was irrational, but it hurt.
Trace looked at him, his eyes tormented. Robby undid his pants and pulled off his shirt. Soon they were both naked in Trace’s bed. They came together with a heat born of sorrow.
Robby couldn’t bear to think that he’d never be with Trace again. He wrapped his legs around Trace’s hips, hardly able to let go long enough for Trace to prepare him. Trace filling him up was exquisite pain. The ache stemmed from his chest and not from the invasion, but it was unbearable all the same. So Robby took over, rolling Trace onto his back, riding him relentlessly, squeezing Trace’s chest with strong fingers—hard. Hard enough to hurt. Trace’s fingers, in return, dug into his hips. It was as if the pain needed somewhere to go, some outlet in blood and flesh. As if bruises were all they’d have left of each other tomorrow.
I love you, Robby said with his eyes. He’d said it out loud once before, and it hadn’t mattered. He wasn’t going to say it now, when it mattered too much. He didn’t need to.
I love you and I hate this, Trace’s eyes said back, or so Robby believed. But it wouldn’t change anything. Because Trace believed a man simply had to accept things, things like two men being unable to share a life. And Robby hated that too.
Afterward, they lay sweaty in each other’s arms. It hurt more than the knife wound Robby had taken, but he would have stayed the night anyway. Trace was the one to push him gently away and sit up on the edge of the bed, his back to Robby.
“Want me to go?” Robby asked.
Trace sighed then nodded. “I have to take care of some things tonight.”
“Right,” Robby said, feeling the cold creep into his heart. “Right.”
He got up and put on his clothes slowly, feeling like he might shatter.
He went to the door. “I’ll write to you,” he said without turning. “Maybe you’ll decide to come visit sometime.”
“Yeah. Let me know where ya are. Okay?”
Robby nodded and ran down the stairs before he could do something stupid, like beg or cry like a little child.
He hesitated before heading next door to Mrs. Jones’s. He went into the saloon and bought the cheapest bottle of whiskey Stan had. He took it up to his room and drank until the despair floated away.
In the morning, Robby felt like something stuck to the bottom of Clyde Crabtree’s boots as he washed his face and packed up his few belongings. The coach was on time this morning, thank the Lord. And it was going in the direction it was supposed to, toward Santa Fe. This time he actually wanted to go there.
He got on board. It was still early, and the streets were quiet. Robby laid his head back and closed his eyes. No one had come to say good-bye. It was just as well. He’d said his good-byes the day before, and it was too hard to have to say them again.
The coach swayed as someone stepped onboard. There was the feeling of a heavy body landing beside him on the bench seat.
Too close. Robby opened his eyes to glare at the new passenger.
“Sorry,” Trace said, shifting over a little. “Don’t mind me.”
He was freshly shaven, his shirt was clean, and his hat had been brushed
. He wore a long canvas coat. He gave Robby an assessing look from the side, the corner of his lips quirking up. “Good mornin’, sunshine. You goin’ to San Francisco too? What a coincidence.”
“What are you doing?”
“I am accompanying you on your journey West,” Trace said with formal politeness. “I’d have thought that much was obvious.”
“But. But you said . . .”
“Aw now, it’s not very Christian of ya to throw a man’s nonsense back in his face.”
Robby stared.
“Truth is, I was scared to try to hold on to ya. I couldn’t see how it would work. So I dug in my heels. But, Robby—” Trace swallowed, his golden eyes intent on Robby’s face. “Turns out, I’m more scared to let ya go. I don’t seem to be able to bear it. So. Looks like you’re stuck with me.”
A bubble of happiness rose in Robby’s throat, threatening to burst out as a laugh. “Do you mean it?”
“Sure looks that way. Already spent two dollars on the fare, and ya know how tight we Crabtrees are. Told ya I always wanted to see San Francisco. I figured this was the best motivation I was ever going to get to move my lazy behind in that direction. That is, if ya don’t have any objections.”
Robby shot a quick look around, but they were the only two in the coach so far, and he didn’t see anyone out the windows. He threw his arms around Trace’s neck and gave him a kiss. Trace returned it, patting Robby’s back. But then he straightened up.
“We’ll have to be a tad more circumspect on this trip,” he drawled.
“I can’t believe you’re coming with me!”
Trace’s expression grew serious. “I didn’t have much choice in the matter, since you’re so all-fire determined to go. Hard to imagine my life without ya. Don’t really want to. I’ve never felt that way about anyone, and I doubt I ever will again. So. Here I am.”
Robby swallowed hard. It was the best “I love you” he’d ever heard, and it was coming from the heart of the best man he’d ever known.