By the time she reached her seat, transformed back to a bench instead of the bed, Erin was flustered and overheated. A glance at a sullen Pete and tight-lipped Jesse proclaimed that today’s travel might not be as pleasant as yesterday had been.
“Good morning,” she ventured softly.
She got a nod and partial smile from the older brother and a grunt from the younger.
The pungent smell of coffee roused her further. Perhaps once she had some food, she would feel more like herself.
Breakfast was a quiet affair, with Pete stuffing his face—thankfully, he didn’t make himself sick this time—and Jesse pushing all the fried potatoes on his plate to one side.
The table hadn’t been removed yet when Pete excused himself to use the washroom.
“Come right back,” Jesse warned him, and they exchanged another one of those unreadable conversations before the boy nodded tightly and went off.
“I’m sorry about the trouble last night,” Jesse said, finally looking her full in the face. He looked tired and worn this morning. About like she felt.
“It was kind of you to be up looking for him,” Jesse said, then quirked his lips. “Even if you shouldn’t have been going off alone in the dark.”
She pointed her fork at him, tines forward, an unladylike and flirtatious action that would have appalled her mother. “I’m old enough to look after myself.”
He shook his head, a small smile playing about his lips. With his chin covered in reddish morning stubble, the moment felt more intimate than it probably should’ve, teasing each other over breakfast.
“You’re remarkably patient with him,” Erin said, attempting to turn the conversation in a safer direction. She sipped her coffee, the brew hot against her lips.
Jesse hiked his brows, wrinkling his forehead as if in disbelief.
“You are,” Erin said with a little laugh because he didn’t even know how lucky Pete was to have his older brother. “If what happened last night had happened with my father, he would’ve lost his temper. He probably would’ve woken the whole car with his shouts.”
Jesse’s eyes darkened and he leaned forward, though the table still separated them. “Did your father...hurt you in some way? Is that why you left home?”
She was almost as shocked by the venom in his tone as by the absurdity of his words. “Of course not.”
He only stared at her with those hooded, unreadable brown eyes, so she went on.
“My father has never laid a finger on me. He might bluster and shout, but he would never be violent with me.”
Jesse sat back in his seat, considering her.
“To be honest, he is much more likely to try to manipulate me to do what he wants,” she whispered, looking down at the hands now clenched in her lap.
* * *
Jesse pretended a casual interest in what Erin said. It was the hardest lie he’d ever spun.
For a moment, he’d thought her father had hurt her, and the anger that had rushed through him, drowning out the sounds of other passengers and tinkling silverware, had taken him by surprise.
He was afraid his unthinking words had revealed how he was beginning to feel about her. Thankfully, she hadn’t seemed to notice, and she’d denied that her father had done such a thing.
She contemplated him thoughtfully, the tines of her fork indenting her full lower lip as she paused, her bright, expressive eyes showing that she wanted to understand him.
“What do you mean? Manipulates you?” he asked.
“We had a disagreement several weeks ago and, ever since then, he’s been arranging things to keep me away from doing what I wanted.”
A different kind of relief filled Jesse.
This, he could understand. She wasn’t as different from the other socialites he’d gotten to give him money. They were selfish, wanted things their way and when that didn’t happen, they got angry or petulant. It sounded as if Erin fit into that mold, as well. Her father wouldn’t let her attend whatever function she wanted to attend, so she’d run away.
On the heels of his relief came a rush of disappointment that settled in his gut like the heavy slab of bacon he’d just devoured. He’d wanted her to be different.
Pete returned at the same time the attendant was putting away the table, and Jesse visually checked him over for bulging pockets or any other sign he’d filched something that didn’t belong to him but could see nothing.
The boy wrinkled his nose at the scrutiny, likely guessing what Jesse was doing. He ignored Jesse completely, turning to Erin and asking, “Are we going to read some more?”
Jesse had to admire him. The kid knew that between the two of them, Erin was more likely to be sympathetic to his lies and pretending than Jesse would.
“Certainly,” she said with a wide smile, reaching for her satchel to bring out the book she’d been reading yesterday. Her Bible.
It had taken everything in Jesse not to get up and leave yesterday when she’d been reading to Pete. He’d heard the story before. Multiple times. Jim had read it aloud in their prison cell.
Jesse had been questioning his former cell mate’s preaching. Wondering if he could believe in a God that had let Daniel die. He’d still had so many unanswered questions when Jim had died and figured maybe Jim’s death was the end of it.
And he’d been shocked when Erin hadn’t preached at Pete or himself yesterday, only read part of the story and then put the book up. As if she wanted to let them make up their own minds. Her manner was nothing like the way Jim had been.
Now she began to pull out the worn, leather-bound book and another volume fell to the carpeted floor, flipping open.
Jesse bent to retrieve it, admiring the sketch on the open page, several pencil drawings of a bird. One of it sitting on a bare branch, two of it winging in flight, wings spread.
“Oh, that’s not— Here, let me—” Erin snatched the book from his fingers, closing it with a thwack.
“It’s a nice drawing,” he said. And it had been. The detail had made the pictures seem to be alive on the page. “Was it your work?”
“Are you an artist, Miss Erin?” Pete slipped the book from Erin’s hands and had it open before she could protest.
Watching the boy touch the pristine pages with his grubby hands, Jesse expected Erin to rebuke him or at least take the book from his hands, but she simply watched him, a flush rising in her face.
“It’s something I do for enjoyment... I dabble, really. They’re not—”
“They’re really good, Miss Erin,” Pete gushed. Jesse couldn’t tell by his manner if he was flattering her or if the boy honestly admired the pictures.
“Well, thank you, but I haven’t had any formal training...”
Was her modesty a ruse? Most of the women he’d met before preened and fluffed up when they received compliments. But Erin seemed genuinely embarrassed by the praise.
“What’s that kind?” Pete asked, not relinquishing the book but tilting it so Erin could see what he pointed at.
“This one is a common wren. A pair of them had a nest outside my bedroom window last spring. That one is a warbler.” She pointed to something in the book and Pete pored over it curiously. “You can tell it’s a male because of the coloring here...”
They continued flipping pages, Erin making some soft comments.
“Lookit that,” Pete said, tipping the book in Jesse’s direction. “Ain’t she got talent?”
Even with the book extended toward him, Jesse had to lean forward to see.
He admired the bold pencil strokes; they made it easy to recognize the bird with its jaunty black hat and gray wings—it was the same kind that often flitted outside his cell window. He could imitate its whistle, he’d heard it so many times. And with very few things available to capture his attention in t
he compound, the little bird had been memorable.
“What is it?” Jesse asked. “I’ve seen one like it before.”
Erin leaned forward in her seat, bringing their heads close together as they bent over the book Pete still held. Jesse could feel the warmth from her skin, could smell something flowery coming from her hair.
“A black-capped chickadee. Fairly common throughout the country. Most of the sketches in here are of ordinary birds.”
Her breath fanned his cheek with little puffs of warmth, making it hard for him to concentrate on the blurring image before him.
She seemed to realize how close they’d become and sat back abruptly. Her lashes fluttered against her cheeks as she glanced up at him and back down at the book. “I haven’t had much of a chance to view the more unusual types.” Was the flush on her cheeks getting bolder?
Jesse followed her example and sat back in his seat, allowing Pete to continue to pore over the sketches.
As he remembered the chipper little birds on the other side of the few square inches of freedom he’d been allowed, Jesse began to think Erin sort of reminded him of them. She was petite and had a cap of raven hair. And she chattered. She hadn’t been quiet since he’d pulled her onto the train and sat down across from her.
“So you like to draw birds?” he asked.
“Well, I consider myself a bit of an amateur ornithologist...”
His face must’ve looked blank, because she went on, “A bird-watcher. It’s sort of a hobby of mine.”
“Hmm,” he said. “Well, I’m not an orni—an...”
“Ornithologist,” Erin repeated softly, as if she didn’t want to embarrass him.
He nodded, running the word over again in his head. “But I’ve definitely seen some of those chickadees before. Sometimes with their chins all tucked up to their chests, riding a branch through the cold wind outside—” He broke off. He’d almost said “outside his prison cell.” He needed to watch himself. How did talking with Erin discombobulate him so?
Erin’s gaze rested on him. She tilted her head to one side, assessing him. “You know, I can see you out on the range in frigid cold, riding your horse to watch over the cattle. You and the chickadees.”
He hummed noncommittally. He could tell her he’d never ridden a horse—never even seen one up close, except for those attached to a cart or carriage on the Boston streets. But he wouldn’t.
“Maybe your brother would like to hear some stories about life as a cowboy,” she suggested.
Pete looked up at him, a look on his face as if asking, Now what’re you going to do?
Jesse shook his head, forcing a smile. “Maybe later. I thought you two were gonna read.”
He felt bad deceiving her. Something he’d never felt about one of his targets before. He counted on spinning stories for survival, but for a moment there, he’d wanted Erin to know the real Jesse Baker.
He could imagine the horror filling those expressive eyes if she knew who he really was, the things he’d done.
No, he could never tell her the truth about himself.
Not that they had that much time left together. By tonight, he’d been in Chicago, and she’d be on her way to Wyoming.
* * *
Erin accepted her sketchbook from Pete and opened her Bible to begin where they’d left off yesterday afternoon.
But even as she began to read, part of her wondered at the distance Jesse had enforced between them.
It was as if he didn’t like talking about himself. While most of what they’d shared in conversation over the past day had been general things fellow travelers would talk about, she’d shared part of herself with him. And now she realized he hadn’t opened up to her at all, hadn’t reciprocated.
It was strange, because she felt as if they’d shared much.
She forced herself to concentrate on the words in front of her, not the man in the seat across.
“‘And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.’”
She broke off to tell Pete, “Perhaps sometime your brother can tell you what it is like to be out in the fields at night, with all the stars overhead...” Something she wanted to experience in Wyoming and hoped to talk her brother into helping her achieve. She’d never been anywhere as wild as the West and wanted to experience things her father had kept her “safe” from.
She glanced at Jesse briefly. He gave her a tight smile, nodded for her to go on. At least he was listening. Perhaps he needed the story, too.
“‘And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.’”
“I’d be scared, too, if some angels appeared out of nowhere,” Pete muttered quietly from beside her. She kept going.
“‘And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
“‘For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.’”
Jesse tried to tune out Erin’s words, but her gentle voice wouldn’t be ignored.
“‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.’”
He just had a hard time believing God meant for Jesse to have peace or good will.
He’d spent years trying to improve his life, and what did he have to show for it? He’d lost everything, been in prison. Had to start all over.
If there was a God up there, He didn’t care one whit about Jesse.
Unbidden, Jesse’s last few moments spent with a dying Jim flashed to his mind. Why had Jim given his life for Jesse?
“‘Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.’”
The words came to Jesse’s mind, a quote his cell mate had said before. But Jim and Jesse hadn’t really been friends.
Jesse couldn’t fathom why his cell mate had done it, but he was determined to erase the burden of guilt he felt by bringing Jim’s brother back to his mother and sister.
But what could he do about the heavier burden—the guilt of Daniel’s death—that he’d carried for so long? He hadn’t spoken to his mother in a decade, doubted she would allow any action on Jesse’s part to redeem himself. How could he rid himself of that guilty burden?
Surely Jim hadn’t meant he could be free from it, as well?
Chapter Six
Jesse had been quiet and contemplative all afternoon, not reaching out to his brother as Erin had hoped. Pete seemed agitated and uncomfortable.
By the time the evening meal had been completed and shadows lengthened in the train car, both men were antsy and tense. Their time together waning, they were probably ready to get on with their new lives in Chicago.
It seemed Erin was the only one regretting their time together was nearing its end. She wanted to have time to encourage Pete’s curiosity about the Bible stories she’d been reading. She wanted to make Jesse’s eyes light up with laughter again, the way he’d laughed this afternoon when she’d told a story about watching two birds attack a woman’s feathered hat in the park.
She didn’t want their time together to end. How had she allowed them to sneak into her heart so easily? They were like the children in the hospital ward; she couldn’t help caring about them. But she also didn’t want them to see her distress. The brothers needed to get off to a good start together.
Lip wobbling, Erin excused herself to the ladies’ lavatory, determined to compose herself before the Chicago stop.
In the mirror, her face was pale compared to the roses she’d seen only yesterday.
Once she had shored up her smile, felt she could face them again and say goodbye, she slipped back out the door to return to her seat.
When she tried to
make her way back up the aisle, a man blocked her way.
“Excuse me,” she said politely.
He turned to face her and something lit in his eyes. His facial stubble and wrinkled clothing made him look disreputable, but then Erin considered that she probably looked just as wrinkled.
“Hullo, there,” he said.
“Hello.” Again she tried to angle her way past him, but the aisle was too narrow and he filled too much of it.
“Where ya traveling to, darlin’?”
She didn’t appreciate the endearment, but decided returning to her seat was more important than correcting his impropriety.
“Out West,” she said as kindly—and as dismissively—as she was able. There was something about the man that made her not want to be more specific. He certainly wasn’t trustworthy, not like Jesse Baker. “Excuse me,” she repeated.
He raised his brows, almost leering at her. She eyed the small space between him and the wall. What had she gotten herself into now? And more important, how could she get out of it?
* * *
Someone had followed Erin back to her seat.
The someone was a man who had a similar look to the one who’d tripped her in the Boston terminal, slick and predatory.
Jesse bristled; Pete shifted beside him.
“These are my friends, Jesse and Pete Baker,” Erin said with a look at Jesse almost as if pleading for help.
“Hullo,” the newcomer greeted them. His smile was a little too wide, his gaze leering at Erin. Jesse noticed he also didn’t give his name.
How had Erin attracted someone else’s unsavory attention? She hadn’t been gone that long.
“Nice to meet ya,” Jesse said, sitting forward in his seat and extending his hand. When the man met his grasp, Jesse gripped his hand firmly, met his stare unwaveringly, warning the man without words that Erin was off-limits.
Except that the Chicago stop neared with every turn of the train’s wheels. What if this character didn’t intend to get off there? Would Erin be subjected to his advances? She was a young woman, traveling alone. Vulnerable.
Counterfeit Cowboy Page 5