by Jodi Thomas
“He wasn’t a Texan.” Rose waved a knife to make her point.
“He was if he died at the Alamo,” Sister Cel raised her nose in the air as if ending the argument.
“Forget the Alamo!” Adam shouted. “That was thirty years ago. What is happening now?”
The door to the hallway creaked. Everyone swung at once and aimed.
No one breathed.
The door opened wider, then Nance crawled around it, smiling with excitement. “Hello, Doc.”
Adam bent down to the child. “Maybe you can tell me what is going on.”
“You bet.” Nance sat crossing his legs in front of him on the floor. “About noon, Harry from the stage office came over to tell Lily that some men on a trail drive caught the raiders who burned his stage. He was real happy. He swung Lily around like they was dancing. He said word was there was a woman who could identify them as the stage robbers and as cattle rustlers and murderers.”
Nance shrugged his shoulders as if he doubted such a statement. “Then, a few minutes later, he comes running back to tell Lily . . . he likes to talk to her and I just listen . . . that two of the men escaped from the deputy and Mole who rode out to bring them in. Then,” Nance looked as though he were putting everything in order in his mind, “somebody started shooting at the house.” He shrugged again. “Nothing much happened after that.” He put his chin on his palms and his elbows on his knees, looking bored with the game. “Except every time I stand up more than two feet high, someone yells at me.”
“One shot came from the roof across the street,” Nichole announced as she studied the bullet holes. “Another from the second floor, back room of the house next door.”
“That’s Mole’s room.” Rose bit her knuckles.
“I know,” Nichole answered, not missing the quick turn of Adam’s stare. But there was no time for questions.
“Has the back or sides of the house taken any shots?” she asked, hoping Adam would forget about how and why she might know where Mole’s room was located.
“No,” Sister Cel said. “Only the front. And I’m thinking it’s one shooter, maybe two, no more. Every now and then they seem to have to take a break and we don’t hear anything for a while.”
Nichole looked out the windows. There were a dozen places where someone could wait with a rifle. The windows were wide and tall, but the porch shadowed some of the view. From twenty feet away she imagined someone could see no more than movement inside the house. That might account for the several shots and no hits. The collapsing shacks across the street would make perfect places to hide.
“They’re after me,” Nichole whispered. “There’s no need for me to put the rest of you in danger. The men who escaped the deputy have nothing to lose and everything to gain by killing me. I’m the only witness to both crimes. They have to have seen me ride in with you, Adam. So they are setting out there just waiting for a clear shot.”
“No,” Rose argued. “It could be Mole after me. He’s not a good shot, but if he drinks enough he thinks he is. He told me once that if I ever walked out on him, he’d see me dead. You already said one of the shots came from his room, and we all know he’s too much of a coward to come right up to the door again.”
“The shooter could be after me,” Sister Cel added softly, as if it were her turn at a quilting bee and she had to add another patch. “I was the only one in the room when the first shot was fired.” She cleared her throat. “And I’ve a few things I haven’t told you, Doc, about my life.”
Adam looked closely at her. “Now seems like a good time.” For a woman of the Church, she had her secrets. Her knowledge of words like perimeter and shooter made him wonder about her past. She also showed no sign of releasing her grip on his rifle.
“Well, he’s not gunning for me,” Nance volunteered. “I ain’t done nothing.”
“Quiet, all of you,” Adam ordered. “It doesn’t matter who he’s after, he’s not getting anyone.” He looked at Sister Cel. “There’s no time to hear all the whys. Later. Right now, we’ve got to get out of this mess.”
A shot shattered the glass on the front door. Adam grabbed his Colt and leaned against the wall. Rose screamed so loud he thought she was hit until he saw her dart across the room toward the kitchen. Sister Cel and Nick each took post beside a window.
Another shot echoed in the hall as the front door flew open as if it had been rammed. All weapons turned to the entrance.
A leather-dressed body rolled into the office like a huge cannonball and slammed into a bookcase, sending books flying.
“Wes!” Adam and Nick shouted at once.
Wes came out of his roll with his gun ready. After a moment, he cut his gaze to the others in the room. “Hell of a doorbell, brother.”
“Someone’s shooting at us.” Rose repeated her bobbing motion between each window until she reached Wes. “They’re trying to kill us all.”
“No lie. Couldn’t you tell them I don’t live here, I’m just visiting?” He glanced at Adam and sobered. “Everyone all right?”
Another shot hit the wall between two windows. Everyone in the room took cover once more. This time Rose didn’t run from the room, but found her cover behind Wes.
Wes checked his guns to see that they were fully loaded. He couldn’t help the smile of excitement that reached all the way to his scar. “I heard about the deputy losing the raiders we caught. One of my men was late leaving town this morning and rode back with the story. So a few of the boys and I rode in. I told them to meet me here, but they’ll hear the shots and take cover.”
Another bullet splintered wood on the porch as footsteps thundered down the stairs.
“This can’t be happening! I can’t stand it!” Bergette screamed as she entered the room in a cloud of peach lace and silk. “Someone simply cannot be shooting at this house.”
“All right, darlin’,” Wes volunteered. “It isn’t happening. Happy now?”
Bergette twirled around to look at Wes and pressed her lips together so hard they disappeared completely. “This is your fault,” she decided, staring at the newest arrival. “What are you doing here?”
“I followed you, darlin’. I couldn’t stand being parted. When I heard you were going to marry my brother, there was nowhere else for my heart to go but Texas.” His words were as false as a two-bit actor playing to an empty hall. “I was just praying I got here in time to change your mind.” Wes turned his scarred cheek directly toward her and winked.
“Stop calling me darling, Wes McLain, and go stand in front of the window!” Bergette shot him a look that plainly wished him dead as he laughed at her.
“Adam, can’t you do something?” Bergette whined as she turned to the younger brother.
Adam looked bothered. “About which request, the shooting, Wes calling you darling, or getting him to stand in front of the window?”
“About the shooting, you fool.” Bergette looked around her as if she’d been forced into a cage with monkeys. “This is the middle of town. How can someone be firing shots at us and no one be doing anything about it? I ordered Charles to stop it, but he’s proven himself a coward. He said he’d work as a cook on a cattle drive before he’d leave this house in a rain of bullets.” She stomped her foot. “I’ve had it with the lot of you men.”
Another shot rang out. Wes raised a hand and jerked Bergette to her knees. “Stay down,” he ordered as he moved to the side of the window, “or you’ll have a bullet in that powdered chest of yours.”
She squealed in embarrassment and crawled to cover beneath the desk.
Adam watched the street closely. When the next shot was fired, both he and Nichole returned the volley.
Several blasts bombarded the porch in answer. When the ringing stopped, a loud voice shouted, “Send the woman out by sunset, or you’re all dead!”
“What woman?” Adam yelled
back.
“Figure it out, Doc, or you’ll be worm meat by dark.” The shooter punctuated his sentence with a bullet.
For several minutes everyone in the room was still, not even breathing.
“I’ll go,” Sister Cel said quietly.
“No.” Adam shook his head. “They don’t want just anyone.”
“But what I’ve done was a terrible crime.” She stood proudly as she confessed her sin. “My brother was Nance’s father’s partner. When I visited him in prison, he told me they killed Jamison and he’d be next. I brought him a weapon. He killed a guard escaping.”
Everyone in the room looked surprised by her words except Nance.
“I’m responsible for a man dying,” she admitted. “I’ve been part of a crime.”
Adam let out a long breath. “Dead men don’t come back to shoot at you, Sister. And if the law wanted you, they’d knock, not fire.”
“They want Nichole,” Wes whispered, “but they’ll have to go through me to get her.”
“And me,” Adam added.
“And me.” Nance nodded once as he joined the men.
“Who’s Nichole?” Bergette looked around the room and noticed the tall woman in men’s clothing for the first time.
Wes couldn’t resist. “She’s the woman who slept in my arms just before dawn.”
Bergette opened her mouth in shock that he’d say such a thing in mixed company, and that it might be true.
“I’m the woman who didn’t sleep while in Adam’s arms all morning.” Nichole looked directly at Bergette, making sure the lady got her point.
Adam closed the distance between them and spread his hand around Nichole’s waist. His smile told much more than any words.
Bergette let out another little cry of horror.
“You’ve all lost your minds!” Bergette shouted. “I’m getting out of here. I’m sure whoever is shooting at us will listen when money talks.”
She stood, shoving away Wes’s offer to help. “You disgust me.” She slapped his offered hand away. “And you, Adam. I never expected you to behave so. I no longer believe you to be a gentleman.”
Adam moved his nose softly over Nichole’s hair without looking at Bergette. “It really doesn’t matter what you think of me, Bergette. I can’t live my life in fear of rumors you might spread. There are some things in life you can’t buy at any price.”
Nichole smiled and spread her hand over his at her waist.
Bergette turned and ran up the stairs. Five minutes later, she placed a white flag at her window and screamed continually while it was shot down.
Before the echoing from the bullets stopped, she thundered down the stairs, shouting, “Send her out before they kill us all! Send her out!”
No one even bothered to answer her.
Time passed slowly through the afternoon. Rose couldn’t sit still and finally left her knives in favor of cooking. Lily abandoned her post at the back to take care of Bergette. But Charles stood his ground. Everyone else took a shift in the office watching the front of the house.
Nichole walked around, checking each opening, hoping to catch sight of the shooter. She and Wes discussed all the options. Everyone in town must have heard the shots. Surely they’d come. But as the day passed and no relief showed up, Nichole knew there was only one way to ensure the others’ safety.
She crossed into her little corner of the study off Adam’s bedroom and dressed in black. With the windows boarded, she had to light the lamp to find her way back through Adam’s room. Carefully, she lifted his scissors from his shaving tray and stepped in front of the tiny mirror where he shaved. Silently, she pulled the curls from her neckline and began to cut.
Ebony locks fell like tears around her. “It’ll be a long time before I wear the ribbons,” she whispered as she prepared for what she must do.
TWENTY-THREE
ADAM STOOD AT the doorway of his room and stared at the circle of light around Nichole. She was dressed in black again, as she had been the night he’d first kissed her so wildly. Had it only been a few nights ago? It seemed a lifetime.
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered as he moved behind her. “As beautiful as moonlight and as fiery as the sun.”
When she looked up into the mirror and saw his face, her hand glided along the short hair close against her scalp and neck. “There isn’t enough left to curl around your fingers,” she whispered.
“It doesn’t matter,” he answered as he brushed his cheek against her head.
His arms slid slowly around her waist and gently pulled her to the length of him as he closed his eyes and breathed deep of the fragrance that was only Nichole, wild and warm with passion. “I know what you are planning is the only way but I’m not sure I can let you go,” he whispered. “One morning in the sun won’t last me a lifetime. I thought we’d have tonight to talk of all that needs to be said between us.”
She turned in his embrace and framed his face in her hands. “I know,” she whispered. For a moment this morning she’d believed there might be a forever for them.
His lips brushed lightly over her cheek, not kissing, but just feeling her skin. “I’d keep you here if I could.” His jaw tightened against her cheek. “I’d stop you from going if I knew how.”
“You can’t.” She closed her eyes loving the way he seemed to breathe her in with each breath. “I have to do this. It’s the only way.”
“I know. I’d be less of a man if I bound you to me. And you’d be less my Nick if you let me. If you stayed, I’d keep you safe with my life.” He raised his hand to the back of her hair, moving his fingers down the short strands.
She could feel his heart pounding against hers and knew if he gave his life to save her, hers would end.
“You’ve never said you loved me,” she whispered, needing to hear the words no one had ever said to her.
“I don’t think about saying it. Loving you is a part of me like breathing. I knew the night we met that I’d always love you and miss you beside me even though we only had that few hours in that old run-down farmhouse together.” He hugged her, rocking her slightly from side to side. “I want to hold you forever. Freeze you against me so that no one could ever pull us apart. I’m not sure after this morning that I can let you go this time.”
“We know it’s the only way,” she whispered as he buried his face against her throat. “The others need you and Wes to protect them.”
“I’ll come after you when it’s safe,” he promised. “I’ll find you.”
Nichole laughed with tears in her eyes. “Why do all the men in my life keep saying that to me?” Kissing his ear, she promised, “I’ll find you when it’s safe. If there ever is a time such as safe. It doesn’t seem to be on my map in this life.”
Wes bumped his way around the door and into the room. He took one look at them, and said, “You’re not thinking of really letting her go, Adam? Her plan is insane. She’s staying here with us and that’s final. The sheriff is due back in a day or two. This will all get straightened out by then.”
“Someone is shooting at us now,” Nick reminded.
“We’ve enough guns to hold the whole town at bay,” Wes answered. “Eventually my men will find a way to take out the shooter. You can’t go, kid, and that’s final.”
Adam raised his head but didn’t lessen his hold on her. “We’ve talked it out. Nick thinks she should go and her chances are better alone than with one of us following trying to help. She’s got to find a sanctuary until the sheriff returns and the men are behind bars. Any faith we have in the law vanishes with our deputy around. She has to be out of harm’s way, Wes.”
“Well, I don’t like the idea of sending her out in the dark all alone,” Wes grumbled. “I’ll go with her.”
“No,” Nichole argued. “I’ve already told Adam. Both of you have to stay here and
keep firing until I’m safe.”
Nichole raised her head from Adam’s shoulder. “Besides, where else would I be safe but in the night?” she asked. “You’re putting a fish back in water.”
Wes made a face, but didn’t argue anymore. Nick had a way, like no other woman, of looking at a man as though she thought herself an equal. And damned if he hadn’t started believing it. “All right. We’ll cover you.” He moved closer. “If you’ll turn loose of my brother, I’d like to show you a map I drew. It should get you to Daniel at the settlement near Dallas. I figure it will take you most of the night. If you run into trouble there’s a place about halfway there called Emery’s Post. It’s not more than an old drifter with a shack who makes his living selling half-wild horses. But he’ll help you for a price. Tell him I’ll be along in a day or two and settle up if you owe him anything.”
Wes raised an eyebrow as he saw her better in the poor light. “Cut your hair, I see.” His comment was a statement, not a judgment.
“It’s short.” She touched her head once more. “But it was getting so long I was starting to look like a woman.”
Wes laughed. “You could shave it off, kid, and this fool of a brother of mine would still look at you with cow eyes. What makes a woman beautiful is a lot more than curls and ruffles.” He looked up toward the second floor. “At least in most cases.”
Nichole reached for her hat. “It’s almost dark. I have to be going. I have to make it through the passage Nance told me about and out the shack across the street just at sunset. The shooter won’t be able to see me then.”
Wes opened his arms. “Take care, kid.” Nichole moved into his hug. “Keep an angel on your shoulder and your fist drawn till I’m there to cover your back.”
The old saying the McLain boys had never used except for a brother told Adam how dearly Wes cared for Nick.
“I’ll get everything ready while you two have a moment alone,” Wes called over his shoulder. “I don’t like the idea, but if Adam was willing to let you try it, I’ll not go against both of you. Besides, Sister Cel has told me more than once another will be watching you.”