The Bride’s Secret_A Western Romance Story

by Elliee Atkinson

  Knowing there was nothing they could do, they gently told him they were going to the sheriff’s to take care of what they had set out to do.

  He’d looked up at them with tears in his eyes. “I’ll try to help you if I can. If you have any questions, just ask. I’ll… I’ll be here. With my wife.” He lowered his head as his tears came again.

  They rode in silence down the street. Everything had returned to normal. The women weren’t crying anymore. They had returned to what they normally did during the day.

  “Business as usual,” Adam said in a deep voice, looking at everyone going about their daily routines.

  Sam nodded. “Yes, it was not their loss.” He looked at Adam. “I think once this is finished with Max and Ryan and Emily, you should go back and help him. You’ve been through this before. You’ve lost a wife. He needs to talk to someone who has been through the same thing.”

  Adam nodded. He thought about his first wife, Holly. She was his current wife’s sister. Holly was taken very suddenly. During his grieving period, Holly’s sister, Alice, helped Adam with his two small children, Riley and Max. They slowly fell in love, initially fighting the feelings because it would not look good on their reputations for him to marry the sister of his deceased wife.

  They couldn’t help their feelings and it turned out to be a blessing. Adam and Alice had their daughter, Carrie, and had been married for almost 12 years. Alice was a blessing to Adam in his time of need. He couldn’t provide the level of care that Alice did, but he would surely reach out to his new friend.

  “At first, I didn’t care for Andrew,” Sam confided. “I thought he was arrogant and pompous. He showed me the error of my thinking quickly. I’m glad he did. I’m glad we were here to help him with this and he was here to help us.”

  “I could see what you thought, Sam. I know you well. That’s why I asked you to hear him out. He really seemed like he knew what he was talking about. Turns out his instincts were right the whole time. If he overheard Max saying he didn’t care whether Ryan was guilty or not, I believe the man to be innocent.”

  “Yep. Andrew was right about everything. Sad that it took him two years to find out he was hunting the wrong man. Any other hunter would have taken Ryan in for the money, whether he was guilty or not.”

  “I think so, too.”

  They’d reached the sheriff’s office. Both got down from their horses and went inside. They removed their hats once they walked through the door.

  The room was bare except for the desk in the corner. To the right there were three cells. The sheriff’s office was to the left. He was sitting at his desk, reading something on a piece of paper. He looked up at them, his eyes falling on Adam. He smiled.

  “Good afternoon, Adam,” he stood up. “Sam. Come in. What’s the trouble?”

  “There’s been a lot going on around here, Jim,” Adam said. “I think it’s time someone brought you in on this.”

  The sheriff’s face turned grim. “Oh? What can I do to help?”

  “Do you know who Ryan Whittaker is?”

  The sheriff looked at them both blankly. He thought about it for a moment and then shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “He was supposed to have killed a man in cold blood, stabbed him behind a saloon in a town here in Nevada.”

  Sam looked at Adam. “Do you know if it was here in Nevada?”

  He looked back at the Irishman. “Does it matter? If it didn’t happen here in Wickenburg, the chances are slim we will find out anything at all.” He turned back to the Sheriff. “Jim, do you have any warrant posters that you haven’t put up on the board?”

  The sheriff looked down at his desk, searching through his mind to see if there were any in the drawers there. He stood up.

  “Let me look out here. If you want to see the ones we have, they are over there on that board. However, there’s no Ryan Whittaker there, I can tell you that. No one by that name. But if your man is going by a different name, you might recognize him by the face. The drawings have always been real accurate in my opinion. Some better than others. Depends on the artist drawing it.”

  Sam and Adam got up, going back into the main room of the jail. They both went to the board that held the wanted posters on it. Both scanned the faces of the men in the posters and one woman, which surprised them. They didn’t see any that resembled the face of Ryan Whittaker.

  “He’s not up here,” Sam mumbled, scanning the faces.

  “Nope,” Adam said.

  They both turned and looked at the sheriff, who was rustling through some papers in a drawer in the desk where his deputy was usually sitting. “Where’s Bob? He should be here.”

  The men looked at each other and then him. They both shrugged. He looked up at them and shook his head. “I wasn’t asking you fellas. I was talking aloud, that’s all. I don’t think there are any more warrants here. What is this about? Who is this fellow you’re looking for?”

  “We’re not looking for him,” Adam said, following the sheriff back to his office. “We know where he is. We’re just trying to sort through whether he is a wanted man. Well, we know he is a wanted man based on a false testimony by another party who said that he killed someone. We also have reason to believe he didn’t do it and was set up by someone so that they could then extort money and labor from him.”

  “That sounds very complicated.” The sheriff sat back in his stiff chair, pressing his fingers together in front of his mouth. “Do you know all the parties involved? You can’t possibly be talking about residents of Wickenburg. People I know?”

  “No, no,” Adam shook his head. “That would be terrible if something like that was going on right under our noses.”

  “That’s why we spotted something was wrong, really,” Sam said. “Good instincts.”

  “So fill me in on the details and we’ll see what we can come up with.”

  They told him what they’d heard, each one filling in when the other left out a fact or an instance that was important. It took about a half hour to relay everything they knew in bits and pieces. As they told him about it, they sorted through the facts.

  The sheriff shook his head. “That is terrible about Andrew and his wife. I am surprised I didn’t know anything about that until now.”

  “It just happened an hour ago,” Adam said. “We stayed in the doctor’s office with him. Right now, I’m wondering what’s happened with Emily.”

  Sam nodded. “I haven’t stopped thinking about her the whole time.” He was telling the truth. He’d been staring out a window every time he was near one, hoping to see Emily walking down the street. He wondered where she was the entire hour they had been in the doctor’s office. It seemed like such a long time. His heart ached with worry, even though he felt she was probably okay.

  “The first priority is to make sure Emily is okay. I understand you have men out there searching for her?”

  “Yes. Some of the rodeo men are out there riding with Mark. He knows the area as well as any of the rest of us. If she’s out there, they will find her. The fact that we haven’t heard anything is good. That means they didn’t find her unconscious or, God forbid, dead. Nevertheless, yes, that’s the first thing we need to do. Since there are men out there looking, I propose we figure out a plan to rustle out Ryan and Max. I would prefer not to have a gun fight. I don’t want it to be a confrontation in town and I don’t want it at the rodeo site because there are people in both places that could get hurt. I don’t want anyone shot in the process of trying to capture these two. Once we have them, though, we can get to the bottom of this whole thing.”

  “I don’t know how we’re going to accomplish that.”

  “I’ll go have a talk with Ryan,” the sheriff suggested. “I won’t tell him what I know. I’ll ask him about his sister; tell him we have people out looking for her and that he shouldn’t worry. That might get him to come back to town with us. We can separate them. Ryan might be easier to deal with.”

  “That’s
a thought.” Adam looked at Sam. “What do you think?”

  “Well, I know I can’t go talk to him,” Sam replied. “And I think he might get a little paranoid seeing the sheriff at his door. He’s got a lot of guns and he knows how to use them just as well as his sister. I don’t want you getting shot, Jim.” He looked at Adam. “Why don’t you go? He knows you. You talked to him in the bar. I think he thought a lot of you.”

  Adam nodded. “You’re right about that. I don’t want either of you getting shot. All right. I’ll go and have a talk with him and see if I can’t get him to come back to town with me.”

  The sheriff nodded. “I like that plan. In the meantime, Sam, you and me, we’ll go search through town for clues to the location of Miss Emily.”

  The three men stood up and moved toward the door. Adam and Sam stepped back to let the sheriff pass by them. He went into the main room and walked to the door. Before he opened the door, he reached up and got his hat from the hook by the door. He plopped it on his head and opened the door.

  Sam and Adam followed Jim out into the street.

  “I think we should stay on alert, in case one of these men comes gunning for you, Sam,” Jim said, turning to look up at him. “Adam, you take care. We don’t know the state of mind of either of them. If Max is with Ryan when you get there, don’t confront them. Wait till Ryan is on his own.”

  Adam nodded. “Good thinking.” He walked off the walkway to his horse and pulled himself up. “I’ll let you know something as soon as I can.”

  “Be careful, Adam,” Sam said as his friend rode away. Without turning around, Adam raised one hand in the air to acknowledge that he’d heard.

  Sam and Jim walked to their horses as they talked.

  “Where are we going to look? She could be anywhere.”

  “I think we should head out to where the men are looking for her in the woods. We can help them. See if they’ve made any progress at all.”

  “Are you sure? They would have sent someone back if there was anything to say.”

  “I don’t know if she would come to Wickenburg but if she did, where do you think she would go?”

  Sam thought about it for a moment. There were only a few places he knew of that a woman would go to for sanctuary. The church, the hotel, the restaurant. He mentioned that to Jim, who looked down the street at the hotel.

  “I don’t see why we can’t check those places first. That won’t take long at all.”

  Sam nodded. They rode down to the hotel, which was the first on the main street. Sam dismounted and handed the reins to Jim to hold while he went in to check.

  He opened the door and stuck his head in, looking from left to right. The lobby was empty. He went in and looked at the empty reception desk. Elizabeth popped up from where she had been bent over behind the desk.

  “Oh! Mr. O’Connell! I didn’t…” she cleared her throat. “I apologize. How can I help you?”

  “Have you seen a young woman in breeches come in here at all today?”

  Elizabeth raised her eyebrows. “Breeches? Uh, no, I haven’t. You mean the girl from the rodeo? The sharp shooter?”

  “Yes. That’s the one. How did you know?”

  Elizabeth leaned forward on the desk with both elbows, clasping her hands in front of her. “That poor woman that got killed earlier, Sheila? She was a talkative one. She told me about what she and her husband were doing here.”

  Sam frowned. “Do you think she told anyone else?”

  Elizabeth shrugged, shaking her head. “I don’t know. I don’t think she had a lot of time to make any other friends but me. And maybe Tom. And Sue.”

  Before Elizabeth could mention the rest of her friends and perhaps her brothers, too, Sam said, “Tell me, Beth, do you know whose horse it was that kicked Sheila into the path of that wagon?”

  Elizabeth’s eyes grew wide as she realized the implication of what he was saying. “Uh. No.”

  Sam licked his lips. He touched the tip of his hat. “Thank you, Beth. I think this is going to lead us in a new direction.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  A MOTHER’S INSTINCTS

  A MOTHER’S INSTINCTS

  Sam stepped out of the hotel and went back to his horse. Jim tossed him the reins after he was up in the saddle. They turned the horses to go to the restaurant when Sam heard his name being called behind him. He moved his horse so that he could look back to see who was calling him.

  He was surprised to see Emily’s mother, looking clean, fresh and energetic, her long black hair tied behind her, bouncing on her back as she rode the horse.

  “Please, Mr. O’Connell,” Mrs. Whittaker said when she got closer. “Please, may I speak to you?”

  “Of course, Mrs. Whittaker,” Sam said turning his horse to meet her halfway. Jim stayed behind, looking around nonchalantly as if he had no idea what was going on. The older woman pulled her horse up close to Sam’s reaching out to grab his arm. When his horse moved away from hers, Sam reached out and took her outstretched hand. “Mrs. Whittaker. We are doing everything we can to find Emily. I promise you, we are. I’m sure she’s safe.”

  Mrs. Whittaker nodded. “I know she is safe.”

  Sam narrowed his eyes, his heart quickening. “Have you seen her?”

  The woman shook her head. “No, I haven’t seen her. I just know she is okay. I can feel it. If she were… if something had happened to her, I just know I would feel it in my bones. She is my only baby girl.”

  Sam nodded, feeling a warm sensation flood his body. She was a good woman caught in a bad situation. His heart went out to her.

  “What can I do to ease your mind, Mrs. Whittaker? If it isn’t about Emily, is this about Ryan?”

  “He’s a good boy, Mr. O’Connell. He really is. It’s the owner of the rodeo that is the problem. He is a vicious monster. He has hurt everyone in the rodeo in some way or another. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Where is Ryan now?”

  Mrs. Whittaker blinked rapidly in an attempt to hold back tears that were stinging her eyes. “I… I…”

  “I don’t want to hurt him, Mrs. Whittaker,” Sam said gently. “In fact, one of our local townsmen is going over there to attempt to speak to him. We know Ryan and Emily argued about something before she left. And we don’t think Ryan did her any harm. But he needs to come in and talk to us. There are a lot of questions he needs to answer. You must remember, my dear, this town is filled with fun-loving families and individuals. We have celebrations all the time for any reason you can think of. We have to keep our citizens safe from harm. Don’t you agree?”

  Mrs. Whittaker nodded, obviously trying not to bawl in front of the two men. “I’m worried about his safety. If your friend goes to our trailer he will be there. Does your friend know Ryan?”

  “They have spoken before.”

  “On good terms?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “That is a relief.”

  Sam turned his horse so that it was facing the restaurant. “We are looking for Emily now. Would you like to join us?”

  Mrs. Whittaker nodded. “I don’t think she will be in town. I think she is out in the woods. I don’t think she’s hurt. I just don’t think she’s in town.”

  “It’s better to check and cover all of our bases,” Sam said. He looked over his shoulder to where Jim was slowly following behind them. He gestured with his head for the sheriff to catch up to them. “Mrs. Whittaker, the sheriff here is going to help look, too.”

  The woman’s eyes widened, seeing the sheriff ride up next to her on her other side.

  Sam grinned at her when she looked back at him. “Don’t think of it as intimidating, ma’am. Think of it as being protected by two honorable men.”

  A slow small smile pulled her lips to the sides. He thought she looked pretty. He could see her youthful looks behind the pain in her eyes and the soft wrinkles in her face. The death of her husband had taken a true toll on her.

  “There’s a smile. Don’t
worry, Mrs. Whittaker. We’re going to do everything we can to fix this situation.”

  “Mrs. Whittaker,” Jim spoke up and she turned her head to look at him. “What can you tell us about this situation? You are the closest to everything and it would be helpful if you would tell us what you know.”

  Mrs. Whittaker hesitated, looking back at Sam for reassurance. He smiled at her. “It’s all right. You can tell us. We aren’t going to hurt your children.”

  Her eyes softened. “I know you wouldn’t hurt my Emily, Mr. O’Connell.”

  “You can call me Sam. And I’m glad you know that. How can you tell?”

  “I remember the way my husband used to look at me when we were first together. He was so proud to be with me. He was so confident and strong because I loved him like I did and he loved me the same. We took care of each other. I see that in you. I saw it in your face when you went to the woods. You looked so distraught when you walked away. She noticed it, too. She was watching you.”

  A tingling sensation ran from the top of Sam’s chest to the middle of his stomach. She had turned around. She had come after him. She had watched him as he walked away. He was flooded with emotion. He wanted to find her and plant the biggest kiss on her lips. The first kiss of many, he was sure.

  “That makes me feel very good. Thank you for the compliment, ma’am. And please call me Sam.”

  “You may call me Caroline,” she replied. She turned her head to the sheriff. “You also.”

  He gave her a small smile. “I’m Jim. Tell me, Caroline. When we find your daughter and sort this situation out with the owner of the rodeo, what do you plan to do? Will you leave with the rodeo?”

  Caroline gave a small laugh. “Oh, no. If I have a chance to leave the rodeo, I will. I don’t like traveling. I don’t like the trailer. I am only there because after my husband died, I had nowhere else to go. I joined them. I have never liked traveling. I wanted to have my own home back. That’s what I would do. I have some money saved. I would find a nice little cottage somewhere and live out my days in peace.”