by Chloe Garner
“I’m sorry, Jimmy,” she said.
He put his mouth against hers, one long, slow kiss, both of his hands finding her face, then there was a jerk as he kicked the door closed behind him. He pulled her face against his harder, sliding his hand up over her hair and holding her with his forearm as he wrestled with the shoulder of her jacket. She twisted away again.
“Jimmy Lawson. What’s got into you?”
He stood straight, hard eyes on her, reading something she didn’t know was there. She shrugged back into her duster and stooped to find her hat.
“There’s work to be done, Jimmy,” she said. “Town needs us.”
He took a step to the side, easing as she tried to go around him and shaking his head.
“No. There are no emergencies out there. You’ve got the boys doing the cleanup that needs to happen, and if anyone needs someone to tend to something right now, they’ll be looking for Doc, not you or me.”
That look.
Not the desperate man, afraid that she’d caught a death of sand out there. That look.
That was the one that made her chest feel tight and like maybe her duster were a might heavy and maybe here in the dim of Kayla’s shop, alone, the sand and the sun and all the absenta in the world didn’t matter.
He put out a hand, just offering it forward a couple inches.
“Let me get that for you,” he said.
She swallowed, taking the duster from across her shoulders and letting it trail across the carpet as she handed it to him. He fully turned his back, hanging it up on the peg by the door.
“The hat?” he asked, and she dipped her head to take it off, letting him have it as well.
“S’pose you’ll want my boots, too,” she said, watching his face. He looked down at the work-scarred leather and frowned, the corner of his mouth betraying the humor there.
“The boots you can keep.”
She shook her head and he took a step to close the space between them, watching her face.
“You scared me, Sarah. That doesn’t happen very often.”
She shook her head.
“No. Jimmy Lawson’s always in control.”
He nodded.
“I’d forgotten how unpredictable Lawrence was,” he said thoughtfully, watching her mouth through his eyelashes. He looked her in the face once more, playing his fingers along the back of her arm.
“It’s the town that took both your mama and your daddy,” she said, and he nodded slowly. Calmer now, his fingers found buttons that he’d fought just moments before.
“They should know,” he said, touching his nose against hers and letting his eyes drop once more. “If they take you from me, there aren’t going to be any survivors.”
“We’d cause a helluva storm, either one of us,” she agreed, sucking on her lower lip and trying to remember what she was supposed to be doing.
Hell.
She popped all three of the buttons on his tailored vest and slid it over his shoulder as he dropped his arm to let it past. His lips brushed against hers, and there was a phantom instinct to go find her knife again, but it passed as bit by bit, button by button, they coiled into each other.
Her last organized thought was that she was never, ever, ever going to tell Kayla about this.
--------
Of course, that was how she found them.
“Well,” Kayla said. “I guess that means you’re both alive.”
Sarah closed her eyes. There was no good to jumpin’ up and actin’ caught, so she just rolled onto her side, letting her knee fall onto the carpet and her arm across her chest.
“Mornin, Kayla,” she said.
“Everyone ride out the storm okay?” Jimmy asked.
“Not as well as you two, apparently,” Kayla said.
“Plenty,” Sarah said. “That’s plenty, Kayla.”
“Could at least close the door,” Jimmy commented, and the beam of light across the two of them extinguished. Sarah blinked several times, getting her vision back.
“Little Peter just came back and said that you thought Sarah had died, out there,” Kayla said.
“Didn’t,” Sarah answered. Jimmy rolled up off of the floor and grabbed his trousers, pulling them on, then threw his shirt at Sarah.
“You wish, Lawson,” she commented, holding it in front of her without putting it on as she sat up. He didn’t look back.
“Everyone in the houses doing okay?” he asked.
“We were all inside the whole time,” Kayla said. “The generator gave out, and Thomas says that he thinks we’re going to need an electrician to get it up and running again… Lise is really mad, Jimmy. Says there’s no way she can live out here pregnant and without air conditioning. She says she’s going to move back into the main house.”
“Like hell,” Sarah commented.
“We’ll get it figured out,” Jimmy said. “Thank you, Kayla.”
Kayla laughed. It might have been a giggle.
“Are you turning me out of my own shop?”
“So it would seem.”
She laughed again.
“I’m going to have to open the door, again, then.”
“Could hardly expect you to leave any other way.”
She covered her mouth to hide a grin and slipped back out, closing the door behind her.
Jimmy pushed Sarah’s clothes across the floor with his foot and came to sit down next to her again.
“Need that,” he said, putting out his hand.
“What are you gonna do about Lise?” she asked. He shook his head.
“Got too much to worry about,” he said. “She doesn’t make the top page. You think the storm put down enough sand to stop the train?”
She pictured the landscape in her mind, then shook her head.
“It’ll be late, takin’ it easy, but no reason they can’t make it here. Might send out a cleaner ahead of the train.”
He nodded.
“Sounds about right to me, too. We still have a meeting in Preston with the investors, and we need to be on that train when it gets here.”
She stood, letting his shirt fall where he could reach it, and started dressing again. He watched her for a moment before he resumed redressing himself.
“What were you saying about a message?” he asked.
“Granger,” she said, looking back at him. “They tried to hit Granger. I knew they was gonna try it, and that was how I missed the sandstorm comin’ up. Dumber than bald cows, but I missed it.”
“How did you make it here in time?” Jimmy asked.
“Was already at a run when it hit,” Sarah said. “Just angry enough to make it the rest of the way, I reckon.”
“Gremlin okay?” he asked.
“Only thing gonna kill that beast is me when he finally makes me angry enough,” she said, catching his expression and ignoring it. He liked making a point of how much he thought she was attached to her animals, no matter how often she told him you don’t do that in Lawrence.
Animals die more than men do.
“Need to check on the men,” she said. “Weren’t nowhere for them to go, with Granger locked up in a holdup and the tavern shut down.”
“They aren’t going to take it much longer,” Jimmy warned. “Willie and Paulie need to make a living, too.”
“They promised housin’, and I expect ‘em to deliver,” Sarah said, shoving her feet back into her boots and going for her hat.
“But what about a message?” Jimmy asked. She frowned.
“Two places you could hit most likely to make me angry,” she said. “Name ‘em.”
“Granger is certainly one of them,” Jimmy said. “Surely you aren’t suggesting the wedding was another.”
“If’n you don’t know me, you might think it,” Sarah said. “Bandits know. Know I don’t take it, know I’ll hunt ‘em down for foolishness like that. Know there weren’t anything worth takin’, in it. Someone else sent ‘em, Jimmy. I know it like I know my feet on the ground.”
He nodded, buttoning his shirt and pulling his vest back up over his shoulders.
“I can see what you see, but we don’t have the time to deal with it right now.”
“Investors first,” she said darkly, and he pressed his lips.
“We’ve had that argument, and you know where it goes,” he answered. “I’ll go down and make sure that Petey and the rest of them take turns sitting the counter at Granger’s, if that will make you feel better, but we have to go. We can put things together later.”
She pulled her duster over her shoulders and shrugged it into place.
“I know it. Just don’t like leavin’ everyone out, like that. They’re just as important as anyone else in this town.”
He frowned.
“Who are we talking about, now? Granger, still?”
She shook her head.
“Everyone. Leavin’ the day of a dust storm, leavin’ ‘em all to their own devices. Not even checkin’ in on the homesteads. Not like me. Not like who I used to be, anyway.”
“I told you I was going to cause messes,” he said. “That’s what I’m doing, and you need to get used to it.”
“That ain’t gonna happen any time soon,” she muttered, and he gave her a flicker of a smile.
“The day you start going along just to get along, I’m going to know that you’ve finally given up on me and are planning to kill me in my sleep.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“I’ll make sure not to tip you off like that, then.”
He opened the door and held it for her, and Sarah passed him, going to get Gremlin.
“I need to pack,” she called over her shoulder. “Bring the buckboard back in an hour?”
“I’ll make sure everything’s taken care of here,” he answered, and she took off back toward the house. She didn’t like the idea of being the type of woman who traveled with baggage, but business drove certain requirements in her attire that she could only meet with a suitcase.
She packed quick enough, not happy that Jimmy had hired itinerants to move her worldly belongings from her pa’s house to the Lawson house, but at least it was all there where she expected it to be. And at least Little Peter was gone. The house was quiet and still, the way it had been when she’d crept around it as a child, sneakin’ up to Jimmy’s room to talk and watch the stars.
This was her favorite way of experiencing Elaine Lawson’s house.
They’d done a tour of the east coast, recruiting investors when Jimmy had first come back at the news of absenta, and she’d bought modern business clothes at need, so now she dug those back out and packed them, finding the grooming supplies to match. Lawrence might have been out to kill her, but at least it was easy to dress each morning.
She found nothing prepared for Jimmy, so she pulled together his more formal attire and put that in with her own, then went back to the front door and pulled it closed behind her. She found the boy at the stables.
“You ain’t dead,” he said, squinting up at her.
“Harder to kill than that,” she answered. “Need the black mare for the buckboard.”
He squinted harder, wrinkling his nose, then dashed away to fetch the horse.
She waited, watching Gremlin wander along the side of the barn, sniffing at varmint holes like he were darin’ em to jump out and spook him, then the boy was back with the little mare. Sarah hitched her, herself, then took to the buckboard with the suitcase loaded behind her and drove into town.
She found Jimmy at the housing site, where all of the investors had so recently stayed, and where the Lawsons were now encamped. Lise was shouting at Jimmy as Sarah stopped the cart, hopping down and going to pat the black mare’s nose, watching. Lise saw her, and Sarah saw the gorgeous blond woman’s temper explode, as her volume went up and the way she pointed her finger into Jimmy’s chest became staged. For Sarah’s benefit.
Sarah couldn’t find it anything but amusing, despite her best attempt, and she looked over as Rhoda leaned against the buckboard.
Her hat had come in from Jeremiah, and she was wearing worked cowboy boots what looked more fit for Preston than they did Lawrence.
“Can we talk?” Rhoda asked. Sarah looked back at Jimmy and Lise.
“Gotta meet the train,” she said.
“Train’s gonna be late,” Rhoda answered. “And so is Jimmy.”
“Unlivable, that woman,” Sarah commented, giving the mare one more friendly pat before turning to follow Rhoda into her new home.
“S’pect this ain’t what you accustomed to, back east,” Sarah said, looking for a place to hang her hat.
“Back of a chair is fine,” Rhoda answered, motioning to the table. “I really am from a little town just like this one.”
“You know,” Sarah said, sitting. “From a little mining town or not, I don’t see what Jimmy saw in you.”
Rhoda sat down across the table from her.
“All right. Let it all out. I want every bit of it. I know you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you,” Sarah said. “I even see why Jimmy went ‘long with it. Big charade to fool me, make me see things his way. Worked, didn’t it? He got what he wanted, you got to play the puppet master.” Sarah looked at her hands as they were spread open on the table. “Nice furniture they got y’all in here. The boys out there would kill for somethin’ to take their meals on.”
“Don’t get distracted, Sarah,” Rhoda said. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you ever since, but there just wasn’t ever the time.”
“It ain’t that Jimmy went along, nor that you thought it would be a fine way to make your introductions around town. Bein’ seen as Jimmy’s pretty young thing, it ain’t a bad splash. What’s surprisin’ to me is that Thomas went along with it. I used to thought I knew that young man, and the idea of lettin’ the woman he loved share a bed with his own brother… That ain’t the man I thought I knew.”
Rhoda looked at the ceiling, swallowing once and nodding.
“Yes. I don’t think either of us realized what it was going to take, to sell you, but I knew it the minute I saw you on the train platform - if you loved Jimmy as much as Thomas said you did, that was what it was going to take. Sarah, I know you. I was you.”
“Hell,” Sarah said. “Not on your life. How many men you pointed a gun at and made dead?”
Rhoda pressed her pretty red lips.
“None,” she said. “But I went to Intec acting just like you do. Like I was so much tougher than anyone else.”
Sarah blinked, seeing it on Rhoda’s face. How had she not seen it when it mattered?
“You’re lyin’ to me,” she said. Rhoda blinked quickly, drawing her head back.
“Excuse me?”
Sarah stood.
“I ain’t in the mood to be lied to some more by the likes of you,” she said. “You may be Thomas’ betrothed, and I wish him luck masterin’ a woman like yourself…”
“Fine,” Rhoda said standing. “Fine. It was my best friend.”
Sarah only gave her a moment’s pause, and Rhoda put her hands up. Surrender.
“She… They took her when she was little. No one found her for ten years, after that, and when she came back… She was different. Like you. Tough. Hard. No one could get close to her. Not even me. And I watched her burn every relationship she had, with her parents, with her brothers, with all of her friends. But… I loved her like a sister, and I kept after her for years, long after everyone had given up on her ever being… like she had been.”
“I ain’t ever been nothin’ but this,” Sarah said. “Ain’t nothin’ to change me back to.”
“No,” Rhoda said. “I’m not saying that you’re broken like she was. Well, maybe you are, but not the way she was. I don’t want to fix you. I just know that, when there was something she wanted, she’d destroy it to make sure no one could take it away from her. And that the things that made her happy… She thought they were a risk, and she had to avoid them. She was miserable, but she was co
nvinced that that was the only way she was going to survive.”
Okay, that might’a struck Sarah a bit personal, if she hadn’t had a vendetta goin’ on already.
“I ain’t in the mood to be the one you fix to make up for the one you lost,” Sarah said. “You might’a done me a good turn, you might not, we’ll see how it goes, but we ain’t gonna be friends. No more than any of ‘em. I ain’t got a problem with you. Honest truth. Just don’t assume you’re gonna get any more from me than that.”
“I want to be friends,” Rhoda said. “I knew there was a risk, when I came, that you’d hate me forever, no matter why I did what I did, because… yes, it was manipulative. I’d hate me for it. I just… Thomas wants you to be happy, and I want Jimmy to be happy, and we both think the two of you might really be able to do that. To make each other happy.”
“Thomas Lawson, you don’t get in here and speak up for your wife, I really will never respect you again,” Sarah said to the air in general. Thomas came in from the kitchen like a dog dragging his tail.
“Sarah,” he said. “Look…”
“No,” she said. “I’m done lookin’ and seein’ and bein’ told. Here’s how it is. The two of you done played me like a fool. Even at the time, I could see Thomas, you weren’t likin’ it, but you went along. Never will understand how or why, but you did. Y’all gotta live with that, now. Thomas, you and I go back a long way, and that buys you somethin’, but your lovely young bride-to-be here needs to know that I ain’t the type to go along. She’ll be around, she’ll stay a Lawson so long as you say she is, but ain’t gonna be more than that.”
She looked from one to the other, then picked up her hat from the back of the chair and put it on her head.
“No,” Rhoda said. Sarah turned, surprised. Thomas looked stunned, but hardly surprised. Rhoda shook her head again. “No. I told you I want to be friends, and I meant it. I meant what I did with Jimmy and I’m not going to be sorry for doing it or sorry for how it turns out. If you two kill each other, that’s between the two of you. I gave you the best shot I could at it, and I’m glad I did. But you’re the smartest and the strongest woman in the whole town, and we’re going to be sisters, and while I love Kayla, honestly I do, I want someone who can talk to me about real things. Jimmy won’t because he’s Jimmy, and I refuse to surrender to a future where the only person who talks to me about things that matter is my husband. So… no. You don’t get the last say on this, and we’re going to be friends, I don’t care how hard I have to work on it. Because I can see, without a doubt in my mind, that you’re worth it.”