Falling into Your Arms (Love in the Old West Book 3)

by Bess McBride

  Jeremiah looked over the top of her head toward Henry. “Can we discuss this? You can buy a ticket tomorrow, can’t you?”

  Sarah pivoted to look at Henry. “Can I buy a ticket tomorrow morning, Henry? Is there any chance they’ll sell out?”

  “Yes,” Henry said. “I think there will be seats left, but probably not a sleeping compartment. I’ve already sold tickets for those. Across country is a long way to go sleeping on the benches.”

  “You cannot travel that far without a sleeping compartment,” Jeremiah said with another glance at Henry, who eyed his pocket watch pointedly. “We should discuss this in private. I believe Henry is closing now.”

  Sarah’s shoulders sagged. “Okay. I don’t need a sleeper though. I can sit on a bench. Thank you, Henry. I’ll see you tomorrow if all goes well.”

  She pretended not to see Jeremiah’s extended arm, and she turned and headed for the exit. Jeremiah jumped forward to open the door for her.

  “Sarah,” he said as he closed the door behind them.

  She heard Henry locking the door.

  “Did you actually follow me over here?” she asked, looking up at him.

  “I did. I am sorry, but I was worried about you.”

  “You were worried about me? What? That I might take a train?”

  “Yes!” he admitted. “Yes! That you might take a train and disappear.”

  Sarah clamped her mouth shut.

  “No. I am sorry—I did not mean that. I did not mean that you would ‘disappear,’ only that you would—” Jeremiah paused.

  “Only that I would what? I have to try to go home, Jeremiah. Why would you want to stop me?”

  “I don’t want to stop you. I only want to make sure that you know where home is.”

  Sarah’s jaw dropped. “Every time I think you have finally accepted the truth, you surprise me. I know exactly where home is. It’s in Richmond, Virginia, in 2020. And the train has to be my only way to get home. There is no other way to re-create how I got here.”

  Jeremiah reached out a hand as if to touch her arm, but she backed away.

  “I’m starting to feel more trapped than I need to, Jeremiah. It’s bad enough that I’m here in the past, that I’ve lost everything, but now you’re trying to...restrain me. I won’t let you do that.”

  “No! Not restrain you. Surely you do not see it that way. I am concerned for you, Sarah. That is all.”

  “Can’t you be concerned for me and just wish me well? I know it’s hard to worry about people yet let them do what they think is best, but that’s what I need from you.”

  Sarah’s throat tightened when she saw Jeremiah’s broad shoulders sag.

  “Yes, of course,” he said. “You are right. I should only wish you well.”

  “And loan me forty-two dollars, though I’m not sure how I can pay you back.”

  “There is no need. Shall we return to the hotel? Are you hungry?” He held out his arm again, and Sarah took it.

  “I am, actually. Thank you for understanding.”

  Chapter Eight

  Jeremiah didn’t understand though. He truly did not, nor did he feel particularly understanding. To his surprise, he had discovered that he did not want Miss Sarah Chilton to leave. Further, he found himself distressed by her lack of a plan. She seemed not at all upset that her luggage had gone on to her final destination without her. She asked not whether she could recover her luggage but whether she could hop aboard a train to Richmond, Virginia. Yet she stated she had come from the future.

  Even were he to entertain the notion, what would she find in Richmond, Virginia? Surely her home was not yet there approximately 130 years into the future, was it? If so, perhaps another family might be living in the home in 1890? Her parents had not yet been born? How could that possibly work?

  Jeremiah opened the door to the hotel and allowed Sarah to precede him. Eric nodded at them from behind the counter but said nothing. They entered the dining room, where Jeremiah threw a hasty greeting toward customers and guests as he passed their tables on his way to the rear of the room. He selected a table and pulled out a chair for Sarah.

  “I’ll just go get a menu from Nancy for you.”

  “Thanks,” Sarah said, pulling her hatpin and removing her hat. “Is this okay? Can I take my hat off in the dining room?”

  He noted she scanned the room to see that several other ladies did not wear hats.

  He pursed his lips. “Yes, that is fine.” He paused and spoke in a low voice. “If I am to give credence to your story of living in 2020, don’t the women wear hats?”

  “Some do, sometimes. I think they fell out as a regular dress-up outfit in the forties or fifties.”

  “The forties or fifties?”

  “Nineteen forty or nineteen fiftyish.”

  Jeremiah’s eyes widened. It was inconceivable. He turned only to see Nancy emerging from the kitchen with a tray. She blinked when she saw him, her eyes dropping to Sarah.

  “Good evening, Nancy. Sarah and I are going to dine in tonight. I’m just going to go get a menu.”

  She nodded and moved past him to carry her tray to an elderly couple who dined at the hotel once a week, the Riordans. He went into the well-appointed kitchen and picked up a menu. His mother had insisted on the latest appliances when she was alive, and his father had improved the modern kitchen, perhaps to please Nancy, though she never asked for anything. She kept her own shopping accounts and provided Jeremiah the paperwork once a month.

  He returned to the table to see Nancy filling their water glasses.

  “Thank you, Nancy,” he said. Sarah thanked her as well. He sat as Nancy left, then handed Sarah the menu.

  “Are you kidding?” she exclaimed almost immediately upon studying the thick paper. “I didn’t see this menu when I ate here earlier. Samuel ordered, and I felt so guilty that he paid.”

  “There was no need for that,” Jeremiah said. “You may charge meals to your room. Is something wrong with the menu?” He leaned over to see what troubled her.

  “The prices!”

  His cheeks bronzed. “They are quite reasonable, I assure you. I make very little profit from the dining room.”

  “They’re not high. They’re astronomically low. Salad for ten cents?”

  “Do you think that is low?”

  “Salads can cost over ten dollars in my time, and regularly do.”

  Jeremiah’s eyebrows shot up. “Highway robbery! Lettuce simply does not cost that much.”

  “It does in my time.”

  He heard the term “my time.” “If, as you say, you traveled back in time, why? Why did you come to 1890? Why did you come to Benson, to the hotel? Have you some affinity for the time, the town, the hotel?”

  “Maybe,” she said. “My mother was born and raised in Fort Huachuca. Her dad was in the army. She loved it here and always wanted us to come visit, but it just never happened. Then she died.”

  “And you think you are here to honor her wishes?”

  Sarah shook her head but shrugged. “Maybe. I doubt it. Maybe. I have no idea. I have no answers. I can’t even figure out the physics of the thing.”

  “A lofty subject for a woman,” Jeremiah said.

  Sarah scrunched her nose and eyed him as if pained. “No, it’s not. I’m not a physicist, but women are fully capable of understanding physics. Same size brains, you know.”

  “If I offended, I apologize.”

  “That’s okay.”

  Nancy appeared. “What would you like to eat?” she asked.

  “A salad for me,” Sarah said.

  “Is that all?” Nancy and Jeremiah answered in unison.

  “Yes, that’s it.”

  “Very good.”

  Jeremiah placed his order, and Nancy left.

  “Are you feeling well? Have you no appetite?”

  “No, I’m fine.” Sarah paused. “Okay, I’m tense and nervous about tomorrow, and my stomach is tied up in knots. I usually have a pretty good app
etite.”

  “Tomorrow,” Jeremiah murmured.

  “Tomorrow,” she repeated without hesitation.

  Jeremiah fell silent and toyed with his water. An uncomfortable period of silence passed, and he bestirred himself to be polite. “Do you live with family?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “My father died a couple of years ago, and my mother before that. I was a teenager when my mother died.”

  “My mother died when I was young as well,” Jeremiah said. “I am very sorry.”

  “I’m sorry for you too. I know how hard it is.”

  He nodded, his eyes sweeping over the dining room. “The hotel was her passion. My father, a banker, indulged her. He kept it running until I took over when I was old enough.”

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “It is,” Jeremiah agreed, more honestly than boastfully. “Where exactly were you traveling to when you found yourself waylaid here?”

  Sarah chuckled. “Waylaid. That sounds about right. I was just on a coast-to-coast train ride. I had some time on my hands and wanted to see America.”

  “And your final destination?”

  “Los Angeles, then I was going to fly home.”

  “Fly?”

  “In 2020 we have vehicles that fly through the air and transport people. Planes. We can fly across the US in about five hours. In fact, I think they’re working on the first motorized flight now, or will be very soon.”

  “I have seen hair balloons. Is that what you mean?”

  “No, not quite, but we still have those.”

  Jeremiah puzzled over the word planes, but he put it aside for the moment. “Whom do you live with then?”

  “I live on my own in a condo, an apartment...just a little bit bigger than the room upstairs.” Her humorous smile captivated him.

  His next question seemed rude, but he must ask. “How do you manage? That is, did your father leave you comfortable such that you can live alone?”

  “I work for the State of Virginia. And no, my dad didn’t leave me a fortune, but he did have life insurance. Yours did though, huh?” She scanned the dining room, and Jeremiah knew she saw the luxurious ruby-red papered walls his mother had installed, the paintings she had collected and the bronze fixtures and chandelier she had commissioned.

  Jeremiah nodded. “Yes, I have been fortunate. How do you work for the state?

  “I issue business licenses.”

  “How interesting!”

  Sarah smiled. “It’s probably not exciting to some, but I enjoy it. It’s steady work.”

  Their food arrived, and when Nancy departed, Jeremiah asked one of two questions uppermost in his mind. His delivery was more abrupt than he intended. “Is there a gentleman in your life?”

  Sarah paused with her fork in midair. Her cheeks reddened. Jeremiah cursed himself for his graceless attempt to snoop.

  “No,” she said, resuming her meal. “Not for a couple of years.”

  Jeremiah didn’t know the appropriate response. Would pity be correct? More inquiry? What did “not for a couple of years” mean? Had she been engaged?

  “What about you?” she asked, eyeing him from under her long dark lashes.

  “Me?” he prevaricated.

  “Yes, you. You asked about me. What about you?”

  “Not for a couple of years,” he said, his lips broadening into a smile.

  Dimples appeared in her cheeks. Charming, simply charming.

  “Were you engaged?”

  “No, I have never proposed to anyone. Nor do I know what I meant when I said ‘not for a couple of years.’ I simply said it to echo you.”

  “Well, how long then?”

  “How long until what?”

  “Since. How long has it been since you were in a relationship?”

  “A relationship? Do you mean with a lady? I have never ‘been in a relationship,’ per se. I am not at all certain what that involves. I did say that I had never been engaged.”

  “Well, you’ve dated, haven’t you? You’re what? Late twenties or so? Tell me that you’ve dated.”

  Jeremiah fervently wished that he had not asked if there was a gentleman in her life. The topic had gone terribly awry.

  “Dated. I have had dinner with people, but no specific lady, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Oh, my goodness! Why are you being so obtuse about this?”

  “I am not attempting to be. Your terms are probably not nineteenth century.”

  “Hah!” She tapped a finger in the air in his direction. “Then you do believe I’m not from your time.”

  “I do not know if you come from the future or the past, but you are certainly different from any woman I have ever encountered.”

  “That’s not quite the same thing.”

  Jeremiah chewed on his lower lip. “I am largely convinced generally more than not.”

  “Nothing decisive about that statement,” Sarah said with a broad grin, to which he responded.

  “It is the best I can do.”

  “So, not engaged, never engaged, not dating, maybe never dated. Is that right?”

  “Yes. And you? What does ‘not for a couple of years’ mean?”

  “I’ve had a couple of boyfriends but no one for a couple of years.”

  “I see,” he said, unsure of the context of boyfriend but unwilling to ask too many more questions on the subject. Perhaps he didn’t wish to know more than he did. It seemed likely that she too had never been engaged. Somehow, the idea pleased him.

  “Sarah,” he began. “About the train...what will you do if you get on the train and reach whatever destination you choose to find that you remain in 1890? What will you do if you have no home, no income, no family?”

  Sarah set down her fork and sat back in her chair, folding her hands in her lap.

  “I have no idea.”

  “Then perhaps you should simply stay in Benson. Here, you have friends in Faith and Agnes and me—people who can help you.”

  Sarah’s cheeks colored again, and she dropped her eyes.

  “Thank you, Jeremiah. I didn’t know we were friends.”

  “I hope that we are. I know our introduction was inauspicious, but hopefully, we have moved beyond that.”

  “I hope so too.”

  “The question remains though...perhaps you should simply stay here?”

  She looked up at him, her amber eyes sparkling with moisture.

  “I can’t stay. I have to go.”

  Chapter Nine

  Sarah wondered at the expression on Jeremiah’s face. Maybe he just loved Benson so much that he was taking her desire to leave as a slight against the town. Maybe she was acting too superior, as if 2020 was infinitely better than 1890. Privately, of course, she thought that was probably true, especially in the medical field, but she hoped she wasn’t overtly messaging that opinion. If so, then she needed to change what she said. She wanted to go home. Wasn’t that enough? Wasn’t that just a basic human desire?

  She softened her tone and put her hand on Jeremiah’s. The sensation sent a wave of warmth up her arm. She forced her words out. “Jeremiah,” she said, her voice husky. “I just want to go home, to my home. You understand that, right?”

  Jeremiah seemed mesmerized by her hand on his. He nodded but said nothing. She removed her hand and placed it in her lap.

  “The salad was wonderful! My compliments to the chef,” she said with a smile, hoping to lighten the moment.

  Jeremiah looked at her as if trying to focus. She wondered what had distracted him. She doubted it was her presence. She just wasn’t a distracting sort of woman. No one had ever said “I can’t concentrate when I’m around you” or “You fill my every thought.” Her two boyfriends—one in high school and one in college—had been very nice guys, great friends really, but hardly passionate about romance. They had been scientific sorts, geeks like her, and she had spent many fun-filled hours gaming on computers with them.

  “I will let Nancy know,” Jeremiah
said in response to Sarah’s compliment.

  As if he’d conjured her up, Nancy emerged from the kitchen and paused by their table.

  “Do you need anything else? Dessert? I have some apple pie.”

  “I would love a piece of apple pie,” Sarah said. “Yes please!”

  Jeremiah blinked, as if in surprise. He had thought her appetite was off.

  “One for each of us, Nancy. Do you have any ice cream?”

  “Wait! You have ice cream?” Sarah exclaimed.

  “Yes, I made vanilla today. Would you like some?”

  “Yes, yes!” Sarah said.

  “That would be lovely,” Jeremiah said. “Thank you, Nancy.”

  She nodded and returned to the kitchen.

  “Ice cream?” Sarah repeated.

  “Yes. Don’t you have ice cream in your time? Well, of course you do. You seem to know what it is.”

  “Yes! But we’re in the middle of the desert in 1890. The last thing I would expect to find is ice cream...or ice, for that matter.”

  “Hmmm, how odd. Yes, of course we have both. I see Nancy found the way to your heart.”

  Sarah grinned. “Yes, indeedy. Anything with sugar—pastries, ice cream, chocolate, oh yes!”

  “I am certain Nancy would have chocolate in the kitchen. Would you like some? Perhaps a cup of hot chocolate?”

  “Really? No, I don’t think I can fit it in, but maybe tomorrow?”

  “For breakfast then. You will not have time later.”

  “That’s right,” she said quietly. “Jeremiah, I really appreciate the ‘loan’ of the money for the ticket. I truly don’t know how to pay you back in this time, but I can’t thank you enough.”

  “I would like to say ‘it is my pleasure,’ but I can’t. Let me just say ‘you’re welcome.’”

  They fell silent until Nancy reappeared with dessert. As Sarah had imagined, the pie was excellent. Nancy was a great cook. The ice cream was heavy on sugar but surprisingly cold and delicious.

  “How does she keep it cold?”

  “We keep ice in the cellar. It is quite cool down there.”

  “I would not have thought.”

  Jeremiah nodded. “Life in the desert is not without its comforts.”

  “I guess so.”

  “I presume that you miss the comforts of your home? Virginia?”