by Jodi Thomas
“True,” Jennie whispered. “You can trust me.”
Jennie thought she heard a sniffle from beneath the seat and tried not to think of how the child was probably wiping a dirty nose with an even dirtier sleeve cuff.
“I have to, lady,” the child answered. “You’re all I got right about now.”
Chapter 2
Mind if I sit with you for the next leg of this trip?” A woman’s voice forced Delta Criswell to raise her head from the warm wool. She pulled her wine-colored coat close around her aching shoulder as the woman continued, “I was sitting up front before we stopped for lunch, but I thought it might be a little less smoky toward the back.”
Delta forced the pain from her mind and tried to bring the woman before her into focus. She was tall, six feet or more, and her long, rust-colored braid of hair was as thick as a man’s forearm. The word pretty would never be joined to her name, but she had a beauty about her that was ageless.
“I guess you’re like all of us in this car. You’re heading to Florence to work at the Harvey House.”
The woman moved into the seat beside Delta, seeming to pay little notice to Delta’s silence.
“I’m Audrey Gates from Flatwater, Missouri. Had to travel all night to hook up with this train.”
The stranger paused as if waiting for Delta to comment, then continued, “Flatwater’s not much of a town really. Just a little place along the river. In fact, from time to time most of the place is under the Big Muddy rather than next to it.”
As Delta looked puzzled, Audrey laughed. “I guess no one outside of Flatwater has laughed at that in years.”
When Delta didn’t make a sound, Audrey changed the subject without taking any offense. “I noticed you didn’t get off the train at the stop. Can’t say I blame you. I heard the men say all they had in the saloon was rifle whiskey.”
Tilting her head, Delta looked questioningly at the woman.
Audrey giggled. “Haven’t you ever heard of rifle whiskey? They say the bartender has to take a man’s guns away from him before serving a round, or a fellow’s likely to shoot himself when the whiskey hits his throat.”
Delta managed a smile as Audrey continued, “Course, we won’t have anything like that where we’re going. I’m so excited about this job, my nerves are full of fleas. Part of me wants to jump right out and run to Florence, but I’ve been on one train or another for so long I’m not sure my legs would work.” She glanced out the window. “You know, I think I could probably make better time than this train. Once we’re moving, it’s fine, but seems like we don’t finish gathering speed from the last stop before we start slowing for the next one.”
Attempting to keep her eyes open, Delta smiled wanly at Audrey. Delta had spent all night and most of this morning huddled in the last seat trying to keep warm and awake enough to watch in case anyone passed through the car looking for her.
“I guess I’m like everyone else.” The woman straightened her red braid as though it had only one proper place on her shoulder. “I want to go out west somewhere and find a handsome man to marry. Well, hell! I don’t care if he’s all that easy on the eyes as long as he’s big enough to lift me off the ground when he hugs me. The only eligible men in my hometown were the town drunk and my four brothers, so it was either answer the Harvey ad for a pastry cook or mark ‘old maid’ by my name in the church record.”
The woman’s constant chatter caused the pain in Delta’s head almost to rival the pain from the knife wound in her shoulder. Delta cuddled against the cool window.
“Not that I haven’t tried other occupations.” Audrey folded her arms. “My parents are firm believers that a young lady should test her wings. I tried being a schoolmarm for a year before I figured out I hated kids, then I went to nursing school. Nursing wasn’t bad except for the blood. I did get tired of that after a spell. Dear Lord, you wouldn’t believe how much folks tend to bleed! I can still smell it now.”
Audrey smiled at Delta. “Course, I didn’t tell the Harvey people I’d been a teacher. I heard they don’t like to hire teachers. Too set in their ways most of them.”
Finally, Delta could hear the woman no more. She leaned against the window and welcomed the quiet river of unconsciousness that flowed over her as Audrey’s voice faded.
The river ran swift with memories in Delta’s mind. All the sadness and loneliness washed across the years of her life in dark waves. Delta couldn’t remember ever feeling like a child. Even her first recollections were of trying to take care of her mother. There never seemed to be enough food for the table or wood for the fire, but somehow Mildred Criswell had always found the pennies needed for the dark bottles she called her medicine. Delta’s visions of her father were always gray and fuzzy. He was no more than a tired, broken man who shuffled in after working in the mines, his back permanently bent, his face always stained with coal dust. They’d finally moved back to her mother’s parents’ farm, hoping to stop his cough, but the cough continued, as did the poverty.
“Wake up, miss.” A voice floated over the river of dreams to Delta’s mind. “I can’t hold you much longer. Please, wake up.”
Delta opened her eyes and saw the redheaded woman’s face only inches from her own.
“You need a doctor, honey,” Audrey whispered. “There’s blood all over your coat sleeve.”
“No!” Delta didn’t want to draw any attention to herself. “I’ll be fine. I have some more bandages in my bag. I only need to wrap it again. Please don’t alert the conductor. He might put me off the train.”
Audrey studied her closely for a long moment, then whispered, “Can you walk?”
Delta nodded slowly, mistrusting any quick offer of help. There was goodness in the woman’s eyes, but Delta had seen goodness turn cold more than once.
“Well, let’s go freshen up.” Audrey stood and pulled her up with little more effort than a child would use to carry a doll at her side. “If it’s just bandaging, I can do that with flying colors. Now, if you had locked bowels or some such, we’d be in a heap of trouble ‘cause I skipped that lecture in school. Figured it’d be something I’d face if the time ever come. Some things it don’t do any good worrying about in advance.”
Before Delta could argue, they were moving down the aisle and out the door. Audrey was stronger than Delta figured any two men would probably be. By the time they reached their destination, she was leaning on the redhead heavily.
While the self-appointed angel of mercy helped Delta off with her coat and set to work, she never stopped talking. She washed the wound and commented, “The cut’s not deep, but we probably need to have it seen about when we stop. A slip of a girl like yourself don’t have any extra blood to lose.”
Delta looked into honest brown eyes. “I’d rather no one knew about this, Audrey.” She decided to try honesty herself. “You see, there’s someone following me, and if we reported a wound, he might find me.”
Audrey put her fists on her hips. “You’re not wanted for a crime, are you? If you are, I heard a man near the front say he was a federal marshal.”
“No.” Delta smiled, thinking if her stepfather or his son ever crossed her gunsights, she would be. “There is no need to bother the marshal.”
“Then I’ll say nothing. And don’t you worry, honey. When we get to the Harvey House, you’ll be safe as a babe in her mother’s arms. I’ll keep an eye out for trouble, and there ain’t many men who can get past me.”
“Thanks.” Delta offered her hand. “I’m Delta … ah … Smith, from nowhere in particular.”
Audrey shook her hand. “Glad to meet you, Delta … ah … Smith. But you can’t be from nowhere. That makes folks too inquisitive. I tell you what, you can be from Flatwater, Missouri, too. Now that I think of it, you grew up not a mile down the road from me. By the time we get to Florence, Kansas, I’ll tell you everything that’s happened in Flatwater for twenty years. Living there might not have been so wonderful, but it’s a nice place to be from.”
Delta cradled her arm and agreed. Somehow the nightmares of her life didn’t flow as close to her mind with Audrey by her side. She’d never been offered friendship so readily, but something about the woman was so solid and good. Delta felt as if she’d finally met the very friend she’d been looking for all her life.
As the two women stepped onto the platform between the cars, gunfire suddenly shattered the rhythmic rattle of the train. Men on horseback galloped alongside the track shouting and shooting in the air.
Audrey shoved Delta inside and pushed her low in their seat. “Hell’s bells and buttermilk!” she shouted. “We’re goin’ to be robbed!”
Then, for the first time since Delta had met her, Audrey Gates had nothing else to say.
Chapter 3
The clatter of the train’s wheels blended with the low rumble of horses’ hooves, rivaling the iron machine’s speed. Women screamed and ducked for cover while the few men on the train scrambled for the best defensive positions from which to fire. The whistle blew a long cry and was answered by gunfire.
Men on horseback galloped close to the windows, waving rifles as Jennie had always imagined a war party of Indians would brandish their spears just before the kill. She’d been told to stay down, but fascination ran with fear through her veins. Never in her life had she seen such excitement.
“Fire back at them!” she shouted at the marshal who shared her bench seat.
Austin McCormick leaned against her shoulder for a closer look at the riders, showing little more interest than a bachelor who looks at a baby.
Jennie shoved him away prodding him with her finger, tapping hard against his chest. “Do something! They’re trying to stop the train.”
Though Austin still appeared only mildly interested in the men outside the window, the woman beside him had finally drawn his full attention. “How about I break your finger if you poke it in my ribs again, lady?”
If looks could have killed, Jennie Munday would have had the marshal staked and burned in a blink of her green eyes. She hadn’t left home to be shot by robbers her first day out. “I’m not standing by and letting innocent people be attacked. Give me that gun! I’ll do something myself.” She grabbed for the Colt at his side. “Those things couldn’t be very hard to operate if you can handle one.”
Suddenly, Austin came alive. Before her fingers closed around the handle of his gun, he’d jerked her arms and twirled her in the seat until her back was flat against his chest. “Never lay hands on a man’s sidearm!” he whispered with deadly calm. “Call it a matter of pride, but a man’s gun is his alone.”
Jennie struggled, thinking she’d like to wound more than the man’s pride. Between clenched teeth she answered, “Then do something or we’ll all be killed.”
The marshal didn’t ease his hold on her. His grip was so tight, she could feel his heart pounding between her shoulder blades, and the slow rise and fall of his chest moved her a fraction with each breath. Suddenly, fear won the race in Jennie’s mind. A fear that had nothing to do with train robbers. A fear unlike any she’d ever known in her quiet, calm, dull life in Iowa. She realized this man would be deadly to cross and probably just as dangerous to care for. Yet a tiny part of her longed for the warmth of a man’s body against her in a caress and not in anger.
The marshal shifted slightly so that his words came close to her ear. “If you’ll take a minute to notice, Miss Munday, you’ll see they’re firing in the air. My guess is the worst we’ve got here is a robbery by a handful of greenhorns, and with any luck no one will get killed.” He paused and slowed his words even more, as if she were a child who needed time to digest each sentence. “If they were trying to kill us, they’d be shooting at the train not at the clouds; and, as crowded as this car is, someone would already be dead.”
Jennie felt his words warm the side of her face. His breath brushed lightly against the lace of her high collar. The faint smell of cigars and leather blended with the hint of whiskey, reminding her of how totally different this man was from any she’d ever met.
“I’ll not stand by and be robbed.” She tried to pull an inch away, but his grip was iron. “I’ll not let them have my life, or even my bag without a fight. It’s all I have to my name.” She tried to hold herself stiff, but she could feel his warmth against her back. Her heart pounded louder than the thunder of horses outside, and for the first time in her life she felt she had touched adventure. She could feel it, see it, smell it in the air. Adventure all wrapped up in fear and noise and panic around her … and in the man beside her. Adventure better than any dime novel could ever have painted.
Austin chuckled suddenly. “I doubt there’s much of interest in your bag to a train robber. More likely, they’ll take only jewelry and money. Maybe a payroll riding in the mail car.”
He relaxed his grip on her arms and slid strong fingers along her sleeves to rest at her waist. “If I let you go, will you promise not to try and shoot anyone?”
“Excluding you?”
Austin laughed again. “Tell you what. If I promise not to let anyone bother your bag, or the child you keep hidden beneath your skirts, will you promise not to shoot me? Then we both might get through this robbery alive.”
Fire danced up her neck and onto her cheeks. A million words came to her mind, but none seemed to form in her throat. She nodded and twisted in his arms until she could see his eyes. Something dark and bottomless flickered in his stare, a flash of summer gold inside the brown depths. Perhaps a look of passion sparkled there, as she’d seen only when men looked at other women. She was too much a novice at the games men and women played to read the look.
“How did you know about the child?”
“I’m a man who makes a habit of knowing what’s around me. The kid’s been wiggling for an hour.”
“You won’t tell anyone?” The train was braking to a stop, but Jennie couldn’t take her gaze off the man only a breath away. Her need to protect True suddenly outweighed the threat of robbery. The marshal was right—except for her novels, she had nothing of value in her bag. But the child, that was another matter.
Austin didn’t answer, but only held her to him as though his arms could stop any harm from reaching her. In the glint of his eyes, she saw it then, the last glimpse of a knight long ago buried by life’s hardness. The armor might be tarnished from battles fought, but the metal was still solid and pure.
“I won’t tell anyone.” His words were low, rusty from the few times he’d used total honesty in his speech. “Your child is safe.”
All the dreams lonely little Jennie had ever dreamed came true. She looked into the eyes of a real hero, and for a moment, she believed what she heard.
Then she remembered that dreams are never real and heroes exist only in the pages of the books. His words were somehow a trick, a deception to lure her into a belief in him that might not hold true. Well, Jennie Munday wasn’t some moonstruck schoolgirl! She was a woman long past marrying age and long past falling for a washed-out marshal’s tricks.
She straightened, pushing him away with her thoughts more than with her body. “I’m sure the child will appreciate your silence.”
Austin’s eyes narrowed to slits. “And you?”
Jennie raised her chin. “The child isn’t mine but …”
“Don’t bother to lie.” His words were steel as he turned toward the gunmen outside. He hadn’t even noticed they’d stopped, but now his trained gaze took in the number of robbers and every detail about them.
“I’ve never lied in my life, Marshal McCormick.” She could feel the muscles along her spine tighten. How dare he think the child beneath the seat was hers! How dare he call her a liar!
“I noticed how open and forward you were with introductions when I sat down.” The spinster beside him drew Austin’s attention as though the robbers were no more than flies compared to the tiger by his side.
“The child was there when I took the seat.”
“I wasn’t born yest
erday, lady. You’ve been guarding that youngun like a mother hen this whole trip.”
“I’m surprise you noticed, Marshal. You were so busy sleeping and drinking your lunch. I’ve had to sit next to a snoring drunk, and you dare mention a harmless child wiggling beneath the seat.”
Both ignored the noise outside as armed men filed into the car, frightening the other passengers into silence.
Few things bothered Austin more than parents who didn’t take care of their children. Memories mingled with anger as he raised his voice. “It’s not any of my concern, but the little one couldn’t be too comfortable down there huddling on the cold floor.”
Jennie wasn’t about to apologize for something she had no control over. In fact, she had been concerned about the child’s comfort as well, but knew she didn’t have enough money to buy another ticket. She stood and yelled, “I’m telling you, the child is not mine!”
He unfolded from the seat and looked down at her. “And I’m telling you, you’re about as sorry an excuse for a mother as I’ve run across …”
The leader of the gang of robbers jabbed the butt of his rifle hard into Austin’s side. But as the masked man cleared his throat to order the loud couple back into their seats, Austin swung around and slammed his forearm into the bothersome intruder’s face.
In one bone-shattering second, all hell broke loose. The man who’d interrupted Austin and Jennie’s argument fell backward into a cluster of women huddled together in fright. His rifle fired wildly, shattering the windows above Jennie’s head. He dropped the weapon and grabbed his nose, jerking the bandanna mask from his face to try and stop the gush of blood.
Austin completely ignored the man he’d harmed. He grabbed Jennie and dropped to the floor between the seats. In less time than it took her to blink, the marshal pulled his Colt and fired at another masked robber blocking the car’s entrance. The gun dropped from the robber’s hand as he fell backward out of the car, his shoulder splattered in crimson.