“So, I heard the newspaper almost had to shut its doors because the best artist they ever had skipped off to Trinidad.” Micah entered the kitchen and grinned at his brother. “I knew you didn’t have what it takes to preach.”
Papa shook his head. “Did I say four very fine men? Maybe I meant three.” He gestured to the pie sitting on the table. “What do you say, Mama, how about putting a knife to that pie and sharing it?”
Epilogue
Seven months later
Dodge City, Kansas
Mindy hauled her swollen body out of the chair and groaned.
“You’re just a bundle of nerves today, girl. You got too much belly on you to be popping up and down like that.”
Mindy looked at her ma who sat in her kitchen, drinking a cup of tea, and looking for all the world like a normal person. Calico dress, no face paint, her hair in a neat braid wrapped around her head. Mindy still had a hard time coming to grips with Ma. Once she and Jed and got their own little house, the first thing Ma did was hint—quite strongly—that she was ready to retire.
It had taken some convincing on both her and her Ma’s parts to assure Jed that Lizzie was, indeed, retiring and wanted to live with her ‘respectable’ daughter. Not able to deny his wife anything, he’d allowed Ma to move into the spare bedroom, and so far it had all worked out just fine. Ma had even gone to church with her one Sunday, and the roof had remained intact.
Mother and daughter spent time learning the basics of housekeeping. Several burned dinners, rock-hard biscuits, and uneven hems on dresses were all part of the learning process, Mama Nelson said as she shook her head at the women’s efforts.
“I’m just so ready for this baby to be born.” Mindy rubbed her back. “I feel like I’ve been as big as a house forever.”
Ma’s eyes narrowed. “Why do you keep rubbing your back?”
“Because it hurts. It started last night, and kept me awake for hours. It seems to be getting worse. It’s probably all the weight in my front.”
Her ma stood, her face pale. “I think I should go fetch Mrs. Nelson.”
“Why?” Mindy reached for her back again just as water gushed from between her legs. She looked at the puddle on the floor, horrified. “Ma!”
“I’ll be damned,” Ma blurted out. She jumped up and headed for the door. “You’re about to have that baby, girl. You go on to the bedroom and get yourself into a nightgown. I’m going for Mrs. Nelson.”
“Ma, don’t leave.” Mindy reached out.
“Get your backbone up, girl. I won’t be but a half hour or more. It’s gonna take a lot more time than that for that brat to come screamin’ outta you.” She gave Mindy a nudge on her shoulder. “I don’t know nothin’ about birthin’ since I hollered all the way through yours, so I need to get Mrs. Nelson here. That fool woman did it four times.”
Ma grabbed her coat from the hook by the door, and rushed from the house, leaving Mindy wringing her hands. Oh God, she wished Jed was here with her. A sharp pain caught her unaware, and she sucked in a deep breath, holding it until the pain passed.
She managed to get the water cleaned from the floor, and then wrestled out of her dress and into a nightgown. She was in bed no more than a few minutes when a blast of cold air whipped through the house as the front door flew open and slammed against the wall. “Mindy!”
Mindy breathed a sigh of relief at Jed’s voice. “I’m in here, Jed.”
He hurried into the room. Mindy took one look at his worried face and burst into tears.
Jed joined her on the bed. “Are you all right? Are you in pain? What can I do? Why isn’t my Mama here? Is the baby coming?
She cried through all his questions, then finally got ahold of herself. “I’m fine, but the baby’s coming, and I’m scared. Ma went to fetch Mama Nelson.” She wiped her cheeks with her hands. “Why are you here?”
“Your ma stopped by the newspaper only long enough to tell me to ‘get on home.’ She skittered away before I could ask any questions.”
Mindy grabbed Jed’s hand as another pain gripped her, running from her back to her front. She stared, mesmerized as her stomach clenched as the pain grew, and then relaxed. “Did you see that?” she panted.
“Yes.” Jed stared at her stomach and licked his lips. “Sure did.”
“What the hell are you doing here, boy?” Ma strode into the room with Mama Nelson right behind her.
“You told me to get on home.”
“So you could pace up and down in the parlor. Men don’t belong where women are birthin’.”
Jed raised his chin. “I’m the baby’s father, and Mindy’s husband. I will not leave her.”
“Suit yourself,” her ma said. “But I guarantee you won’t last long.”
Mama Nelson grinned at the words passing between her son and his mother-in-law. “I think she’s right, son. Once things get really going, you’ll want to leave the birthing work to us women.”
“I’m staying.”
* * *
Three hours later, with Mindy’s screams that the church people in Trinidad would blush at, Jed fled the room as if the demons from hell were on his heels. He kissed Mindy on the cheek and mumbled “I’ll be praying for you.”
Lizzie cackled as he raced from the room.
He thought it might do well for him to seek out his father. After all, Papa had been through this four times. How the man handled it more than once was a marvel. Jed swore at that point he would never touch his wife again. He’d never seen anyone suffer as much as she had. And Mama said it would still be hours before his child made an appearance.
Jed found his papa at home, his jacket off, sleeves rolled up, collar missing. “What brings you here in the middle of the day?”
“The baby is coming.”
Papa leaned back in his large leather chair, where he sat while working at his desk. “Ah. So that is where your mama has disappeared to. She was gone when I came back from visiting the Widow Spencer.”
Jed took the seat in front of the desk and ran his fingers through his hair. “How did you ever manage to get through four births?”
“I prayed.”
“I did that, too. This time it doesn’t seem to be working. I’m still scared to death that something will happen to Mindy and the baby.”
“Prayer doesn’t keep you from being scared, son. It works as a way to keep communication open between you and the Lord, so when you need help, he’s there for you.”
“Mindy needs help now.”
“The Lord knows, Jedediah, He knows.” Papa stood and swung his jacket on. “Come. Since your mama is busy helping birth your child, we should go get some supper.”
Once he and papa finished their meal at the Dodge City Cafe, they took a stroll through town, and then, too anxious to be away from home, they returned to Jed’s house. They could hear Mindy from half a block away. “Sounds like it’s getting close,” Papa said.
Jed broke out into a sweat. “I certainly hope so.”
Frantic movements in the bedroom, encouraging words from the two mothers, and Mindy’s groans almost drove Jed back out of the house again. Instead, he paced up and down, his stomach in knots.
Never again. They would have separate beds. Separate bedrooms. Hell, he might move Mindy into another house.
About an hour after they’d returned, and Jed had almost worn out the rug in front of the fireplace, he stopped and tilted his head in the direction of the bedroom door. “Did you hear that?”
Papa grinned. “Sounds to me like your little one has finally made his appearance.”
Jed waited about five minutes, then, growing impatient, eased the bedroom door open. Mindy lay in the bed, sweat beading her forehead, but a huge smile on her face. Mama wiped down a small body, then wrapped the baby in a blanket and handed the child to Mindy.
“Come here.” Mindy reached her hand out to him.
“Are you all right?” he whispered.
“Yes, I’m fine. Come meet your daught
er.”
“A girl?” He was thrown for a minute, since all his mama had ever produced were boys.
He moved closer to the bed and gazed down on a tuft of dark red hair. “She has your hair.” Gingerly, he sat alongside Mindy, and put his finger out to touch the softest skin he’d ever felt in his life. This was his daughter. A human being he and Mindy had created out of their love for each other. He told himself he was merely tired when tears formed in his eyes.
“So what do you think, son?” Papa had joined the group around the bed.
“I think we will have to come up with a girl’s name. We’d only thought about boys.”
Mindy leaned down and kissed their daughter’s head. “I want a perfectly normal name for our daughter.”
“Do you have one in mind?” Jed asked.
She looked up at Jed. “How about Mary?”
“That’s a fine name.”
Mindy looked at her ma with a twinkle in her eye. “Yes, Mary Nutmeg Nelson.”
The two women burst out laughing, and the sudden noise woke Mary and she began to cry.
The End
Turn the page to read Prisoners of Love: Becky.
Prisoners of Love: Becky
Becky Davidson has been on her own since she was thirteen years old. The last three years, she has been traveling the country with Dr. Snodgrass who sells elixir for all sorts of medical problems. They are generally run out of town by the third or fourth day, but this time Dr. Snodgrass has disappeared with all the money, abandoning Becky in Dodge City.
In jail for running a scam, Becky agrees to travel with three other female prisoners and Miss Nellie, a former brothel owner who is chaperoning them, on a wagon train to Santa Fe as a mail-order bride. As the journey begins, Becky is befriended by Mace Jensen, the Santa Fe County sheriff hired to escort the outlaws in skirts to Santa Fe.
Once they arrive at their destination, the unlikely friendship between Becky and Mace flourishes as she works with him in the jailhouse, dodging every man Miss Nellie presents to her as a potential husband.
Sheriff Jensen is the man Nellie wants, but he feels they would scandalize the town should they marry. He is a black man, and she a white woman. Can love overcome the problems the sheriff sees for them, or should he be sensible and let the woman he loves marry another man?
Prologue
"Dodge is the Deadwood of Kansas; . . . her principal business is polygamy without the sanction of religion; her code of morals is the honor of thieves, and decency she knows not. . . The employment of many citizens is gambling, her virtue is prostitution, and her beverage is whisky. She is a merry town, and the only visible means of support of a great number of her citizens is jocularity." —Hays City Sentinel, 1877
Dodge City, Kansas
April, 1877
Becky Davidson wrapped her hands around the jail cell bars, rested her head against the cool hardness, and wept. Things had been bleak in her twenty years of life, but she had finally reached the very bottom.
Locked up in jail.
Accused of running a scam. The amusing part of the sad tale was she never knew they were running a scam until she landed in jail.
Dr. Snodgrass had picked her up on the side of the road four years ago when she was sixteen. She had just been fired from her job as a maid, and, with no family and nowhere to go, she’d started walking, hoping her shoes would last long enough for her to make it to the next town.
The doctor had told her he sold medicinal liquids to cure all ills and said he needed a pretty assistant to work with him. She never thought of herself as pretty and admittedly had worried about her safety traveling with a stranger. He seemed nice. He had white hair—why that made him seem safe she had never worked out—her feet hurt like the devil, and her belly was empty. So, she took a chance.
For four years they traveled from town to town, selling the medicinal liquid. The last town they landed in was Dodge City. That was where Dr. Snodgrass left her behind, escaping with all the money they had collected.
To her amazement and horror, United States Marshal Dane Jones approached her in the lobby of the local hotel where she was trying to talk the desk clerk into letting her enter her room to retrieve her things. The innkeeper was holding them for payment due. Which, of course, she didn’t have.
Marshal Jones had asked if she was Miss Becky Davidson, assistant to Dr. Snodgrass. When she confirmed that bit of information, he advised her she was under arrest for running a scam. So here she was, with three other women behind her, sitting on the hard cots the jail provided.
Becky wiped her eyes and moved to one of the cots and dropped alongside a fellow prisoner.
“Marshal, when you gonna let us the hell out of here?” A young saloon girl, one of her cellmates, ran her shoe across the bars of the cell, making enough racket to block out the sounds from outside.
“Shut up, Cinnamon,” a man’s voice called. “The marshal left me in charge, and I ain’t letting you out until he says so.”
“Well, where did he go? He can’t just throw me in here and walk off. I demand to have my say.” She leaned against the door, gripping the bars. “And don’t call me Cinnamon.”
“That’s your name, ain’t it? And there ain’t nothing to say that he’s gonna wanna hear from you. You hit the mayor over the head with a pitcher of beer.”
“The old lecher deserved it!”
“Shut up, girl. And settle down.”
The girl, whose name was apparently Cinnamon—although she didn’t want to be called that—flounced over to the cot where a sweet, terrified-looking woman sat. She plopped her bottom on the cot, and, crossing her arms which pushed her breasts dangerously high, the saloon girl looked over at the woman sitting next to Becky. “What’re you in for?”
“Vagrancy.”
“What’s that?”
“Having no job, no home, and no money.” The woman’s sad voice was soft, cultured to Becky’s way of thinking.
“Well, hell, if you ain’t got no job, then there ain’t no way to have a home or money.” She adjusted the straps on her dress and tugged the neckline up. “My name’s Cinnamon O’Brien. But if you know what’s good for you, you’ll call me Mindy. What’s yours?”
“Mrs. Adelaide Markham.”
“You look like what my ma used to call a ‘good, God-fearing woman.’ How’d you end up with nothing?”
Mrs. Markham cleared her throat. “My husband and little girl died of influenza. Gerald was a gunsmith, and since I didn’t know the first thing about guns, I couldn’t keep his business going.”
“Family?”
“I’m an only child, and my parents drowned right after Gerald and I were married. Their buggy went over the side of a bridge during a rainstorm.”
Mindy reached across the small space separating the cots and touched her hand. “I’m so sorry, girl. You’ve had it hard, haven’t you?”
Fighting the tears once again, Mrs. Markham merely nodded. “I left my house and came to Dodge City. I got a job as a waitress, but having no experience, I didn’t last long. When I got fired, I started living in an abandoned building. The owner told me I could stay if I, um…‘warmed his bed,’ as he put it. When I refused, he had the marshal arrest me for trespassing. He said he would drop the charges if I reconsidered.”
“Damn men.” Mindy looked over at Becky. “What are y’all in for?”
Becky shrugged. “I worked with Doctor Snodgrass, selling medicine out of his wagon. I thought it was real good stuff. But it turned out it was just water he colored with beet juice. He skipped town and left me here. People filed complaints, so the sheriff arrested me. I don’t know why since I never got any of the money. Dr. Snodgrass took it all.”
“Damn men. What’s your name?”
“Miss Becky Davidson.”
Mindy gestured with her chin to the other woman. “What’s your story?”
For a full minute, the girl just stared at them. Finally, she wrapped her arms around her middle and wh
ispered, “I killed a man.”
* * *
Dodge City Marshal Dane Jones stood next to Miss Nellie Ward, his arm draped casually over her shoulders as the two of them watched the notorious Miss Nellie’s brothel burn to the ground.
With no one available to help put out the fire, Dane had made sure all the girls were out before he took up his position next to Miss Nellie. “Damn shame. You have the cleanest girls and the least watered-down whiskey in town.”
A young whore wrapped in a silk robe walked up to them. “What are we gonna do now, Miss Ellie? Where will we sleep tonight?”
“I guess the marshal here will have to put us all up in the jail.”
“I ain’t going to no jail,” the young girl huffed. “Miss Margie at The Palace is always looking for girls. I’m going there to see if she can take me in.”
“Me, too.” Two other whores joined the group, and before the last wall of the brothel had fallen in, all six of Miss Nellie’s girls had left her standing there with the marshal.
“Well, ain’t that the living end.” Miss Nellie glared at their backs, her hands on her hips.
Dane tucked a lock of hair behind Nellie’s ear. “Don’t worry. Once you get a new place set up, they’ll come back.”
“No.” She sighed and shook her head. “I’m too old to start over, Marshal.”
“Too old? Hell, woman, you’re not even forty.” Miss Nellie was not only still young-looking for her line of work, she was also a handsome woman with a fine figure who, in Dane’s opinion, didn’t need all the face paint she used.
“I’ve been in this business since I was fourteen. There are days I feel older than the Widow Charles, and she must be seventy if she’s a day.”
Dane turned to her and gave her a slow smile, his mind working furiously. She could be the solution to a problem he’d been wrestling with all day. He continued to stare at her, the idea forming in his mind sounding better all the time.
Prisoners of Love Boxed Set: Books 1-3 Page 21