Springwater Wedding

by Linda Lael Miller

J.T. grinned. “Speaking of your dad, who’s the little old lady he’s been squiring around? She’s the toast of the pie table, not to mention the horseshoe tournament.”

  “Her name is Abigail Tintall,” Maggie said. “She’s his Internet buddy.”

  The band was tuning up, the sun was setting, and kerosene lanterns were winking on, here and there, gleaming in the dusk. J.T. drew Maggie into his arms, and began a slow waltz beneath the branches of the cottonwood tree. She was excruciatingly conscious of the heat, hardness, and strength of his body, a perfect counterpoint to her own softness. “Ummm,” he said musingly.

  “Why are we dancing?” Maggie asked.

  J.T. laughed. “Because we’re in public,” he answered.

  She smiled, shook her head. Out of the corner of one eye she saw Quinn running toward them, trailed by Sadie, who was off her leash for the evening, as well as Blackie and Winston.

  “Hi, Maggie,” the boy crowed.

  She ruffled his hair. “Hi, Quinn,” she answered.

  Quinn’s attention turned to J.T. “Can Landry spend the night?”

  J.T. glanced at Maggie, and a look of rueful mirth lighted his eyes. “Sure,” he said, “if it’s all right with his parents.”

  Quinn gave a whoop and rushed off to tell his friend the good news, and then couples began to step out onto the improvised dance floor, swaying in each other’s arms, while the band played a cheerful accompaniment. Others lined up at the food tables, talking and piling their paper plates high. Over it all loomed the new barn, sturdy enough to withstand the next hundred years.

  J.T. took Maggie’s hand, led her through the grass and onto the board platform, and they continued the waltz they’d begun beneath the sparkling cottonwood tree.

  The next day, Springwater, Montana, made the national news.

  It wasn’t because J.T.’s barn had been torched and then rebuilt, or because Clive Jenson, his throat already slit, had been thrown from the top of the water tower out at the Jupiter and Zeus in a classic case of overkill. It wasn’t even because Travis DuPres and Randy Hough were dead of gunshot wounds, and Billy Raynor had been injured so badly that he’d had to be airlifted to Missoula for chest surgery. No, Springwater was the top story on CNN and all the other major networks because Odell Hough, after drinking for more than twenty-four hours straight, loaded his shotgun, climbed into his pickup truck, and set out to avenge the murder of his son.

  Both Purvis and J.T. happened to be at the Jupiter and Zeus when he showed up; J.T. wanted to look at the company records going back into the last century, and Purvis had come along out of curiosity. Ben Evanston was explaining that the precomputer-era stuff was stored on microfilm, when the plate-glass window at the front of the office shattered.

  Evanston’s secretary shrieked in fright, and J.T. tackled her, forcing her to the floor. Ben and Purvis took shelter behind another desk, just a few feet away.

  “Son-of-a-bitch,” Purvis breathed, in the throbbing silence that followed that first blast. “I left my service revolver in the car.”

  The secretary began to cry.

  “Put down your gun!” J.T. yelled to whoever was outside. It was an automatic response; though he’d been formally deputized, he wasn’t armed. He blinked; for a moment, he was back in the warehouse in New York, and Murphy still had a chance.

  “You killed my boy!” bellowed an anguished, whiskey-sodden voice, and another round of shotgun fire splintered the back wall of the office. “You dirty—murdering—piece of crap—”

  J.T. urged the middle-aged secretary under her desk, held a finger to his lips when he thought she would scream again, and raised his head far enough to catch Purvis’s eye. Ben Evanston lay between them, both hands over his head, but J.T. didn’t see any blood, so he didn’t figure the man had been hit.

  “Odell!” Purvis yelled. “What the hell are you doing? Put down that goddamned gun before you hurt somebody!”

  J.T. thought about the workers outside, and hoped they had the good sense to lay low.

  Odell’s voice was a ragged bellow of grief, and he was reloading. J.T. heard him cock the shotgun. “I got no beef with you, Purvis,” he shouted back. “You can come on out, and I won’t hurt you, long as you don’t try to interfere!”

  “You out of your mind, Odell?” Purvis demanded. “You can’t just go around shooting up public buildings, endangering life and property. And I’m sure as hell not going to waltz out of here and leave you with that gun in your hands. You’re all drunked up. You put the gun down, and we can talk. There’s still a chance, Odell. But if you keep up that shooting, I’m going to have to throw you in jail. My reckoning is, you won’t get out for a long, long time, if you let things go any further than they already have.”

  Odell made a sound reminiscent of a wounded bull. “You think I care what happens to me? My boy’s dead!”

  “I know that, Odell,” Purvis called reasonably, “and I’m sorry. But your breaking the law like this, maybe hurting somebody, won’t bring Randy back. Besides, you’ve still got your daughter, and a grandbaby on the way—”

  “You come out of there!” Odell raged. “I don’t want to hurt anybody but Jenson. That’s who I came to get, and I ain’t leaving until he’s as dead as my boy!”

  “Jenson?” Purvis echoed. “There’s nobody named Jenson here. It’s just me and J. T. Wainwright, a lady who works in the office, and Mr. Evanston.”

  “‘Evanston?’” The name echoed with scorn, with hatred, with unbearable despair. “That ain’t Ben Evanston in there.”

  J.T. stared at Daphne’s husband, and in that instant, he knew. The blurry mug shot boiled up from his subconscious mind, crystal clear. Steve Jenson, Clive’s son. The convict who had escaped from Washington State Penitentiary over in Walla Walla.

  Jenson lifted his head, moved toward one of the desks.

  J.T. was on him in a heartbeat, had both the man’s arms wrenched behind him before he realized that he didn’t have cuffs.

  “J.T., what the—?” Purvis began.

  “You’re right, Odell,” J.T. called, struggling with the prisoner. “Damned if you aren’t right as rain.” He subdued Evanston a second time, but not easily. “Purvis,” he rasped, “give me your cuffs.”

  Purvis unhooked the bracelets from his belt and slid them across the floor to J.T. Within a few seconds, “Ben Evanston” was properly restrained.

  “We got him, Odell,” Purvis called. “We’ll get to the bottom of this—you’ve got my word on that. Now, damn it, put down that shotgun and let the law take things from here.” With that, to J.T.’s furious amazement, the marshal stood, Gary Cooper–style, his hands out from his sides in the time-honored manner of a peacemaker on a mission. “You and me, Odell, we go way back. We’ve had our problems, I won’t pretend we haven’t. But until the first of August, I’m still The Man, and I can’t let you do this.”

  “Jesus, Purvis,” J.T. spat, “get down!”

  “Odell isn’t going to shoot me. Are you, Odell? He’s just upset about his boy. Has a right to be, too.” Purvis moved slowly toward the front of the office, shattered glass crunching under his feet as he went. “This isn’t an easy thing,” the marshal went on, without so much as a quaver in his voice. “I won’t lie and say you’re going to walk away from this without getting into some trouble. But I promise you, Odell, nothing you’re facing now will be as bad as doing a lifetime stretch for murder.”

  J.T. closed his eyes, sure that Purvis was a dead man. The secretary whimpered, crouched beneath her desk, both hands clasped over her ears. “Evanston” was momentarily still, which was not surprising, considering that he was shackled, not just by the handcuffs, but by J.T.’s grip on the back of his collar.

  Suddenly, Odell began to sob, and the shotgun clattered to the ground and discharged again. Purvis vaulted through the broken office window with the agility of a man half his age and recovered the gun. “Take it easy,” J.T. heard him say gently. “Just take it easy, old buddy. It’
s all over, and you did the right thing when the chips were down.”

  J.T. wasn’t sure if he agreed that Odell Hough had ever done anything right in his life, but one blessed fact was indisputable. It was over. He got to his feet and wrenched Steve Jenson along with him.

  Maggie stared at J.T., hardly able to credit what he was saying. Daphne’s husband, Ben Evanston, wasn’t Ben Evanston at all. He was Steve Jenson. He’d skipped out on his parole after leaving prison, encountered the real Ben somewhere in his travels, killed him, and taken over his identity. He’d married Daphne and taken the job at the Jupiter and Zeus, all under false pretenses. He’d killed Travis and Randy when he thought they were going to sell him out to Billy Raynor, and thus to J.T. and Purvis, and he’d murdered Clive, his own father, for pretty much the same reason. Clive, in on the con game from the first, evidently had started getting greedy at some point, and when Steve had refused to give him a bigger piece of the pie, the older man had threatened to go public. To prevent that, Steve had cut his throat in a cold rage, and then thrown the body off the water tower as a lesson to anyone else who might be thinking about blowing his cover. Charlie, the bartender over at the Brimstone Saloon, had fled right after Jenson’s arrest, and the state police were looking for him. According to Odell, Charlie had been a minor player in the game, but a player all the same.

  “What about the fire? And Billy?” Her knees gave out; she sank onto a bench at one of the trestle tables. “I don’t understand—”

  “It’s complicated,” J.T. admitted, sitting astraddle the same bench, facing her and taking both her hands in his. “Apparently, Travis and Randy set the fire for the hell of it. Billy was suspicious and thought he’d play hero and solve the crime. Instead, he got himself shot.” He paused, reflected for a long moment. “The rest of it goes way back. Clive found out there was copper on the ranch, and at some point he must have started digging, because I came across the crude beginnings of a mining operation a couple of days ago, up in the high meadow. No doubt old Clive expected to get rich. My dad would have refused—he didn’t want the land torn up for any amount of money, anymore than Scully and Evangeline did—and Clive killed him one day after an argument, probably thinking the land would come to Janeen. Instead, I inherited everything. He backed off for a while, but when I came back—”

  Maggie swayed slightly, caught herself. “My God. They were going to kill you?”

  “At some point, yes,” he answered.

  She took a while to get past that. “The rustling—Pete Doubletree’s poisoned cattle—?”

  “All part of the show,” J.T. said grimly. “Mostly meant to confuse the issue, though they made some money changing brands on the cattle they’d stolen and selling them to a couple of less than aboveboard meatpackers who, by the way, are chatting with the feds even as we speak.”

  “Daphne,” Maggie whispered, and started to rise again.

  J.T. pressed her gently back onto the bench. “Purvis is over there right now, explaining things. Give him a few minutes.”

  She nodded, feeling numb. “Daphne’s life—her marriage— everything was a lie?”

  J.T. sighed. “Her marriage, anyway.”

  “Oh, God.”

  Just then, J.T.’s cell phone rang. He pulled it out of his pocket and snapped it open. “Wainwright,” he said. Then he began to smile. “That is great news. Yes, I’ll spread the word. Thanks.”

  Maggie waited, still in something of a daze.

  “Billy came through the operation without a hitch,” J.T. told her. “The doctors say he’s gaining ground by the minute. They figure he’s going to make it.”

  A sob of relief escaped Maggie’s throat; she clasped a hand over her mouth.

  J.T. put his arms around her, held her close. “McCaffrey,” he said into her hair. “I love you.”

  She felt as though he’d just touched her with a cattle prod, and leaned back to stare into his face. “What?”

  “I love you. Not only that, I need you.”

  She blinked, not trusting her ears.

  “Is this the part where you tell me to take a hike?” J.T. asked. The grin lingered in his eyes, and he looked tired to the bone, even a little gaunt. “God, I hope not, McCaffrey. I’m a slow study—it took me a long time to work this out—but I mean it. I love you. I always have.”

  Her vision blurred, and she sobbed again. Then she flung her arms around his neck and wept in earnest. He held her until the storm of emotion had passed, and then kissed her wet, salty mouth.

  “When things calm down around here, McCaffrey—and I know it might be a while before that happens—will you marry me? Will you live on the ranch with me and have our babies?”

  “I—”

  “I know you’ll want to keep the Station open, and we can work that out. Please, McCaffrey? Marry me?”

  She started to laugh, even as tears burned her eyes. “Yes,” she blurted finally. “Oh, yes.”

  “And?”

  “And I love you, J. T. Wainwright.”

  He smiled, evidently satisfied, and kissed her again, this time at his leisure.

  16

  Reece McCaffrey led the Founder’s Day parade, which had been put off for a week so that things could simmer down a little, at the reins of an antique covered wagon drawn by two black horses. He looked magnificent in his old-time clothes and black, round-brimmed hat, and Kathleen, perched on the hard wooden seat beside him, made a very good June-bug. Maggie’s heart filled as she watched them roll by the Station, waving and smiling to a cheering crowd of townspeople lining either side of the street. In just a few days, they would be loading up the RV and taking to the road.

  The high school band followed, playing “You Are My Sunshine” with enthusiasm, if not grace, and behind them was the marshal, ensconced in the back of a borrowed convertible. Banners hung on either side of the car proclaiming, “Purvis Digg for Sheriff.” Nelly, his lady, sat beside him, smiling shyly.

  “Think he’ll win?” Wes asked, standing beside Maggie. Franny was at Reece and Kathleen’s with the kids, taking it easy.

  “Yes,” Maggie said, and smiled. “I do.”

  “How’s Daphne?”

  Maggie looked over at the familiar house across the street. “She’s in shock over what happened with Ben,” she said. She’d spent much of the past week with her friend, listening when Daphne wanted to talk, but mostly just being there for her. “But she’s a strong lady, and she has Tiffany. It’ll take time, but she’ll be okay.”

  “The adoption’s still in the works, then?”

  Maggie nodded. J.T. was riding past, mounted on that glorious paint gelding of his, with Quinn in front of him, waving and beaming. As her gaze connected with J.T.’s, a jolt went through her, and it must have been palpable, because Wes picked up on it right away.

  “Something going on between you and J.T.?” he asked, with a smile in his voice.

  Maggie didn’t look at him. She didn’t want to look away from J.T. “What makes you ask that?” she countered. Wes laughed. “Oh, I don’t know,” he teased. “Maybe it’s the blue sparks in the air, or the way the ground shakes when you look at each other.”

  She smiled. “We’re engaged,” she said, in a low voice, “but keep it under your hat. We’re not ready to make the announcement.”

  The amusement lingered in Wes’s voice. “Right,” he said.

  Again, Maggie smiled. J.T. winked at her, and she felt a happy blush climb her cheeks. Later, the look in his eyes said, as clearly as if he’d shouted it. When the surrounding crowd cheered and applauded, she realized that the word was out, and the whole town knew she and J.T. were back together, this time for good.

  Three months later …

  “You didn’t think I’d miss a chance to be a bridesmaid, did you?” Daphne asked, when Maggie turned around, clad in the newly altered heirloom wedding dress they’d found in the storeroom. Outside the sturdy log walls of the Springwater Station the air was crisp with the coming of autumn,
and the green wooded hillsides were dappled here and there with splashes of crimson, rust, yellow, and gold.

  Kathleen, who’d come back from her travels, along with Reece, to oversee her only daughter’s wedding and spend some time dandling Wes and Franny’s new baby on her lap, was kneeling on the floor, Maggie’s hem in hand, her mouth full of pins. Cindy had been helping.

  Maggie hadn’t seen much of Daphne since Steve Jenson’s arrest. It wasn’t that Daphne had withdrawn, because she hadn’t. But she’d had to cooperate with the authorities seeking to get to the bottom of the real Ben Evanston’s death—not much progress had been made on that score—and she’d been besieged by reporters for weeks. Then there had been endless sessions with lawyers and accountants, ironing out various legal and financial complications. Daphne had, of course, never been married at all, and “Ben” had spent a sizable chunk of her money, too, though she was far from destitute. She hadn’t closed the mine, since so many people depended on it for their employment, though Maggie knew she’d been sorely tempted.

  Now, here she was, thinner, the shadows in her eyes reflecting a season of intense suffering, but tanned and wholly herself. Smiling. She opened her arms, and Maggie embraced her.

  “I’ve missed you so much, Daph.”

  “And I’ve missed you.” Daphne stepped back to look her friend over again. “Mags, you look merely sensational in that dress.”

  Maggie admired Daphne’s Armani pantsuit, Italian leather boots and bag, and exquisitely crafted gold jewelry. “You don’t look so bad yourself,” she said.

  Daphne smiled. “Thanks, Maggie,” she said. A smile lit her eyes. “I just got word. The adoption is going through.”

  “That’s wonderful,” Kathleen put in gently. She’d gotten to her feet and put the pins neatly back in their red cushion, and now she approached Daphne and claimed a hug of her own. “You’ll make the best mother ever.”

  “What about you?” Daphne asked. “Are you and Reece staying in town, or hitting the road again?”

  “We’ll be here until after the holidays,” Kathleen said briskly, her green eyes twinkling with well-being and happiness. She’d branched out into painting landscapes in her travels, and seemed to be blooming like a young bride. “There’s so much to do, what with Maggie and J.T. getting married tomorrow, and Purvis Digg— he’s got this election won already, you know—is tying the knot with Nelly Underwood at Thanksgiving.”