A Stolen Heart

by Amanda Cabot

  Joan had not had a champion. Not even her parents, and that surprised Lydia. The Aunt Bertha she knew was a loving woman who’d gone out of her way to help Lydia, yet twenty years ago she had sent her daughter away rather than risk censure from the town’s other residents.

  Brushing the tears from her cheeks, Aunt Bertha looked at Lydia. “I’m not proud of my part. I should have taken a firmer stand, but I didn’t. Perhaps if you’d met my husband, you would understand. I loved Jonas dearly, but I wasn’t blind to his faults, either. When he made up his mind, there was no changing it. He was convinced Joan was a sinner. He claimed he wasn’t punishing her by insisting that she leave. In his mind, he was protecting her from the consequences of her sin.”

  Aunt Bertha took a shallow breath. “When I realized that Jonas would not relent, I arranged for Joan to stay with my cousin in Ladreville until the baby was born. That way no one here would know what had happened. Sterling and his wife would arrange an adoption, and Joan would come home. Only she didn’t. The day after the baby was born, Joan ran away, leaving the baby behind. I tried to find her—even hired a Pinkerton to search for her—but it was as if she’d never existed.”

  Two more fat tears made their way down Aunt Bertha’s cheeks. “Oh, Lydia, I’d give everything I own to see my daughter once more and tell her how sorry I am. I don’t want to die without her knowing that I love her. I know God has forgiven me for what I’ve done, but I need her forgiveness too.”

  Impatiently, Aunt Bertha brushed the tears away. “Can you imagine what it’s like for me knowing I have a granddaughter somewhere and that because of my weakness that girl has grown up without her mother’s love?”

  Like a single stone tossed into a pond, Aunt Bertha and Jonas’s decision had created ever-widening ripples that affected far more than themselves and their daughter. Joan’s daughter, the baby’s adoptive parents, even Aunt Bertha’s cousins had all been changed by that one decision.

  Though it was obvious that Aunt Bertha regretted her part in Joan’s banishment and that she’d paid for it through years of sorrow, Lydia’s heart ached for Joan. What must it have been like to give up her child? That could not have been easy, and Lydia suspected her life afterwards had been a difficult one. Though she had no way of knowing whether Joan had been like Opal and cherished her baby regardless of the way it had been conceived, Lydia could not imagine Joan not having at least some regrets that she had not been able to watch her daughter grow from an infant to a toddler and finally to a woman.

  But Joan had fled as soon as she’d given birth. Why? Aunt Bertha claimed the plan had been for Joan to come back to Cimarron Creek, yet she’d run away rather than return to her parents and her hometown. Where had Joan gone? Had she found a place where she was accepted, or had she succumbed to the dangers that threatened so many young women who were suddenly all alone?

  Lydia shuddered, remembering some of the stories she’d heard. Aunt Bertha had probably heard the same tales of some girls’ horrible fates. No wonder she had hired a Pinkerton.

  Lydia took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, trying to calm her nerves. The Pinkerton’s inability to find Joan greatly reduced the likelihood that she was still alive, and yet there had been no proof of Joan’s death. That left uncertainty, and uncertainty, as Lydia knew from Edgar’s disappearance, was painful. Aunt Bertha needed to know what had happened to her daughter.

  “There must be something we can do to find Joan,” Lydia said, laying her hand on the older woman’s arm in an attempt to comfort her.

  “I don’t know what. I’ve prayed every day that the Lord would send me an answer, but all I’ve heard is silence. Seeing Gussie die so young reminded me that my time on earth could end any day. Oh, Lydia, I want to see my daughter.”

  The utter despair in Aunt Bertha’s voice threatened to break Lydia’s heart. She took a deep breath as she searched for a way to help her. “If there are clues, they must be in that other town. What did you say the name was?”

  “Ladreville.”

  “That’s right, Ladreville. Have you been there since Joan left?”

  Aunt Bertha shook her head.

  “That’s what we need to do.” It might be a dead end, but at least they would have tried. “We’ll go to Ladreville.”

  “We? You’d go with me?” A note of wonder colored Aunt Bertha’s voice.

  “Of course. You don’t think I’d let you go alone, do you? I can’t do that.”

  “You can’t do that.” Travis stared at the woman walking beside him, unsure which surprised him more: her plans or the casual way she’d announced them.

  “Why not?” Lydia asked. “Aunt Bertha has done so much for me that it seems the least I can do is help her discover what happened to her daughter.”

  It was the day after Aunt Gussie’s funeral. Though Lydia had closed Cimarron Sweets for the funeral, she and Opal had worked all day today and had had more customers than normal, with the result that they’d kept the store open an extra half hour. Now Travis was escorting her back to Aunt Bertha’s and listening to her crazy plan.

  “I don’t disagree with your motivation,” he told her. “I love Aunt Bertha as much as you do. The problem is that you two shouldn’t travel that far alone. It’s one thing for you to take a short ride out of town, but it’s completely different to consider a journey of that length. Cimarron Creek and Ladreville aren’t on the same stagecoach line. That means you’d have to go to Austin, then back to Ladreville. I can’t imagine Aunt Bertha being able to do that comfortably. The alternative, which is to take a buggy, is too dangerous.”

  Though Travis had expected Lydia to begin protesting, she seemed to sense that he wasn’t finished and simply raised an eyebrow.

  “There are fewer bandits than in the past, but it’s still too dangerous for two women alone. I’d worry about you every minute.” He wouldn’t tell her that he worried about her even when she was only a few blocks away from him. He worried about little things like a pan of hot syrup spilling and burning her, and he worried about the crazy man who was behind the spate of crimes deciding she would be his next target. But Lydia didn’t need to know that.

  She nodded slowly, as if she agreed with his assessment of the danger. “Then we’ll hire someone to take us. There must be a man in Cimarron Creek who’d like to earn some extra money.”

  There were, but that didn’t help ease Travis’s worries. “The only ones I’d trust can’t leave home for that long.” And the rest . . . well, there was no reason to share his concerns with Lydia. He’d simply have to persuade her to wait.

  “I know this is important to both you and Aunt Bertha. I want her to find the answers as much as you do. That’s why I’m willing to take you to Ladreville, but you’ll have to wait until I hire a deputy.”

  To Travis’s relief, Lydia didn’t ask when he thought that would happen. If she had, he would have had to admit that he had no idea. As he’d told Porter and Warner, they were the two men he trusted implicitly. The other men who might be candidates for deputy had serious flaws, or at least they did in Travis’s mind. That was why he’d decided to advertise for a deputy. Someone with no previous ties to Cimarron Creek would have the impartiality he sought.

  “All right,” Lydia said. Though her reluctance was obvious, she made no protest. “What do I do in the meantime?”

  “Pray.”

  20

  Filled with a sense of urgency she couldn’t explain, Lydia turned to Opal. “I want to check on Aunt Bertha. I shouldn’t be gone more than half an hour.” It was odd. Unlike the day when she’d found Aunt Bertha crying, Lydia had no sense that she was needed at the big house on the corner of Cedar and Pecan. Instead, the need that pulsed through her was to leave the store. The only reason she could imagine was to check on the woman who’d become as dear to her as if they were blood relatives.

  In the days since Gussie’s funeral, Aunt Bertha had recounted stories of Joan’s childhood, but though she seemed unusually animated, Lyd
ia had also noticed that Aunt Bertha’s energy was flagging. When her daily dose of digitalis had not restored her to her prefuneral pace, Lydia had asked Warner about possibly increasing the amount of the powerful drug. His reaction had been instantaneous: adamant refusal.

  Lydia understood Warner’s reasoning. What she did not know was why she felt so anxious today. Fortunately, it was a slow time at the candy shop, and Opal would have no trouble waiting on customers while Lydia headed home.

  As she closed the door behind her, Lydia started to turn left, then reversed herself. When she and Travis walked together, they avoided Cimarron Creek’s business district by taking Oak east to Cedar, then following Cedar north to Aunt Bertha’s house. Though there was no logical explanation for it, Lydia felt compelled to travel Main Street today. It was a few yards shorter than her normal route, but the odds of meeting customers and having to at least greet them meant that it could actually take longer. Still, she headed north on Main.

  The light was on inside Travis’s office, telling her he had returned from his early afternoon rounds. On an ordinary day, Lydia would have stopped in to see him, but not today. Though she waved as she passed the front window, she did not slow her pace.

  The sense of urgency grew, and Lydia found herself looking in all directions, as if there were something important she must not miss. Everything looked normal. It was a typical Thursday in Cimarron Creek.

  Lydia was halfway across Mesquite when she stopped, transfixed by the sight of a man heading toward her. She squinted, wondering if her eyes were deceiving her. Was it possible? Was this the reason she had felt compelled to leave the store? Lydia’s pulse raced as she realized that other than the slight limp, he looked exactly the way she remembered him.

  “Edgar?”

  “Lydia?” he asked at the same time, his voice registering the surprise she heard in her own. There was no doubt about it. Edgar Ellis was back in Cimarron Creek. “What are you doing here?”

  He sounded confused and angry at the same time. It was hardly the reaction Lydia had expected from the man who had once asked her to marry him. Apparently Edgar had forgotten how they’d planned that she would join him here.

  Lydia looked around. For once Main Street was virtually deserted. While unusual at this time of day, that was also good. The fewer people who saw her reunion with Edgar, the better. She crossed the street, wanting to reassure herself that he was real, not an image she’d conjured.

  “You know why I came. The question is, where have you been?”

  Edgar’s face was the one she remembered, the right eyebrow a little shaggier than the left, a small scar next to his nose. Only his eyes were different. Though still the same shade of blue she recalled, they now reflected pain and something more, perhaps disappointment. Whatever had happened to him, it had changed him.

  “It’s a long story.”

  “I imagine it is.” Lydia hated the tart sound of her voice, yet she couldn’t help it. The man she’d once believed loved her enough to share the rest of his life with her was standing only a foot away, and all she could think was that, though he looked like the Edgar of her dreams, she no longer felt anything other than curiosity about him.

  Lydia fixed her gaze on Edgar, wanting to see his reaction to her next statement. “The sheriff and your wife will want to hear the story too.”

  He blanched. “You’ve changed, Lydia. You didn’t used to be so . . . I’m not sure of the word.”

  “Angry, hurt, disillusioned? Any of those would describe the way I felt when I arrived in Cimarron Creek and discovered you’d married someone else.” Though she had no trouble resurrecting the emotions that had colored those first few days, Lydia realized they’d lost the power to hurt her. Now she was filled with relief at the knowledge that Opal had been right when she’d said her husband was alive. Opal, dear, sweet Opal, would be overjoyed to see Edgar again, and her baby would have a father.

  “I don’t suppose saying I’m sorry would help, but I am sorry. The fact that you’re here tells me you didn’t get the letter I sent you.”

  “No, I didn’t.” And that, Lydia suspected, was a blessing in disguise. While it was true that she’d been hurt when she discovered that Edgar had married someone else, now that she was settled in Cimarron Creek, she couldn’t imagine leaving.

  “I couldn’t mail it here and leave a trail,” Edgar explained, “so I paid the stagecoach driver to post it at the end of the line. I guess he forgot.”

  He paused for a second, looking down the street as if searching for something. “Where’s Opal? I went to the Silver Spur looking for her, but Faith said she was working in the confectionary. Since when does Cimarron Creek have a candy shop?”

  “Since I opened one. Opal’s my assistant.”

  When Edgar shook his head as if he hadn’t heard correctly, Lydia wondered whether his surprise was that she owned a store or that she had hired his wife. “You have a store here? You’re staying even though . . .”

  “Even though you didn’t keep your promises?” Lydia finished the sentence for him. “Yes. I’ve discovered that I like being an entrepreneur. Maybe that’s because I like the town. Cimarron Creek has become my home in ways that Syracuse never was.” It was the first time Lydia had voiced the thought, but as she did, she realized how true it was.

  She looked at the man she’d once hoped to marry, the man who was now another woman’s husband, and realized she had no regrets. “Let’s not waste any more time. You don’t want Opal to hear about your return through the grapevine.” Once he’d been reunited with his wife, she would tell him what Travis had learned from the authorities in Syracuse.

  Edgar blanched as if the possibility of an active grapevine had not occurred to him and nodded as Lydia started to retrace her steps. When she reached the sheriff’s office, she opened the door and gestured for Edgar to follow her.

  “What are we doing here?” he demanded.

  “This is where you need to be.” There would be more privacy here than at Cimarron Sweets.

  “Edgar!” The shock on Travis’s face as they entered his office mirrored Lydia’s feelings when she’d seen the man they both believed dead. “Where on earth have you been?”

  “Not yet.” Lydia shook her head. “Let me get Opal. I’ll close the store and bring her here so we can all hear his story at the same time.”

  Walking as quickly as she could without actually running and drawing unnecessary attention to herself, Lydia reached the candy shop in record time. Fortunately, there were no customers, and Opal was seated at the table in the back room.

  “You’re here sooner than I expected,” she said, her expression relieved. “That must mean Mrs. Henderson is all right.”

  Lydia shook her head. “It’s something else. You need to come to the sheriff’s office with me.”

  Opal’s eyes widened with fear and she laid a protective hand on her abdomen as if to shield her baby from the truth. “It’s Edgar, isn’t it? The sheriff found out what happened to him.”

  Lydia smiled, more pleased than she could express that she had brought good news. “Opal, he’s alive. Edgar’s back in town.”

  The young woman’s face turned radiant with happiness. “I knew it! I knew he wouldn’t leave me.”

  Without waiting for Lydia, Opal ran down the street and into Travis’s office. When Lydia arrived a minute later, she found Opal in Edgar’s arms, her lips pressed to his.

  Travis gave Lydia an amused look, then cleared his throat. “I know you two want some time alone, but I need to get Edgar’s statement first. Let’s let the ladies sit.” Since there were only two guest chairs, Edgar stood behind Opal, his hands on her shoulders. Travis pulled out a sheet of paper and a pen. “Now, Edgar, tell us what happened. Why did you leave Cimarron Creek?”

  “It wasn’t my choice.” Moving so that he could gaze into Opal’s eyes, he said, “I would never have left you or the baby. You know that, don’t you?” He clasped her hand in his. “I got a message tha
t night from someone saying he might have a house for us. I knew how much you hated the idea of the baby being born in the saloon, so I’d been asking around, trying to find us a place of our own.”

  Once again Opal’s eyes filled with tears, but she said nothing. So far Travis had written nothing on the pad.

  “The note told me to meet him behind the saloon,” Edgar continued. “When I went out, he grabbed me from behind and hit me on the head. The next thing I knew, I was lying in a ravine, not knowing who I was and feeling as if every bone in my body was broken.”

  As Opal gasped, Travis scribbled something. Though she did not speak, Lydia’s heart ached for what Edgar had endured. He’d been battered in the fight in Syracuse, but this sounded much more serious. At least in Syracuse, he had had a chance to defend himself.

  “It turned out that both arms and legs were broken, plus a couple ribs and my right wrist. My head had a huge knot on it.” Lydia tried to imagine how a man with so many injuries had managed to move. It seemed that whoever was responsible had done his best to ensure that Edgar suffered.

  “Oh, Edgar!” By now Opal’s tears were flowing. “How did you survive?”

  “I don’t think I was meant to,” he said, confirming what Lydia had feared. “I think he meant me to die slowly and painfully.”

  “But you didn’t.” Travis spoke for the first time since Edgar had begun his explanation.

  “There were times when I wanted to, but God had other plans for me. The rancher who owned the land said he felt an urge to visit that part of his spread. When he found me, I was in pretty bad shape. As best we could figure it, I’d been lying there for two days. Lucky for me, the rancher had learned something about doctoring during the war, so he set the bones and we waited for them to heal.”