by Jillian Hart
“Nobody’s here to care if you break the rules,” he told her. “I’ll go find the bones.”
Before long, he returned with a set of dominoes in a velvet drawstring bag, as well as a cribbage board and an elegant leather case holding checkers. He dumped the ivory tiles onto a low table. Meredith sat on the divan and the kids knelt on the floor. Jonah got a cushion and seated himself. “First we each draw seven bones from the bone yard.”
“Jillian don’t know her numbers,” Hayden said.
“That’s all right,” Jonah said. “Jillian, you can learn as we go. For now I’ll count out seven for you.” And he proceeded to do so. “You go first. Just pick any one of those and lay it in the middle of the table.”
“This one looks pretty.” Jillian selected a domino and slid it to the center.
“Each side of the one you played has six dots,” Jonah told her. He counted the dots aloud. “Now it’s Miss Abbott’s turn, and if she doesn’t have a six, she passes her turn.”
As much as Meredith enjoyed playing the game that had always been forbidden to her, she especially enjoyed listening to the marshal count the dots on every last domino so that Jillian had a concept of the numbers and the game.
“How many pearls are on Miss Abbott’s earbob?” he asked.
Jillian studied the pearls dangling from Meredith’s left ear. “One, two.”
“Perfect,” her teacher declared. “How many are there if you count both of her earbobs?”
“One, two and one, two.”
He nodded. “Yes, each one has two.” He slid two extra dominoes from the bone yard to her place on the table. “Two here.” He slid over another two. “And two here. Now we count them all together.” Jillian counted aloud with him. “Can you find four on one of the bones?”
She studied the dominoes at length. Finally, her serious expression softened, and she reached to point at a tile. “This one!”
Meredith met Jonah’s gaze and they shared a silent exchange.
“You’re a smart girl.”
After a couple of games, Jillian yawned. She climbed onto the divan and within minutes fell asleep. Meredith got a book and sat near her. Jonah set up the checker game. “Know how to play this?”
“Yes, sir.”
Turned out Hayden not only knew how, but was quite good at it. At one point when he had one of Jonah’s kings trapped, he laughed and slapped his knee. The two of them reminded Meredith of the gray-haired men she’d seen playing board games near a stove at the post office in Denver.
It was the first time she’d thought about Denver all day. Surprising how she’d nearly forgotten, when she was about to miss the Christmas ball and the proposal she’d seen coming this evening.
“You look lost in thought,” the marshal said.
“I was thinking about the ball this evening.”
“You would have attended with your young man?”
“More than likely, yes.”
“And you think he was ready to offer for your hand?”
He couldn’t tell in this light, but he guessed she blushed. “I think so.”
She was a strikingly lovely young woman. Her eyes had a greenish cast in this light. Though she appeared every bit the elegant socialite, there was a softness around her eyes and mouth that lent her an approachable appeal. While she was headstrong and opinionated, she’d been nothing but kind and generous toward him and the young stowaways.
“Would you have accepted?” he couldn’t help inquiring.
“He’s exactly the sort of man my father would have me marry. He’s very like my father and brothers. He has political aspirations, and I’ve been prepared for marriage to someone of his standing.”
“How did you prepare?”
“I attended school. I studied deportment, etiquette and manners. I learned how to manage a home and a staff.”
“Servants,” he clarified.
“Yes.”
He stacked the board games.
“What aren’t you saying?” she asked.
“You said he’s the sort of man your father wanted you to marry.”
“He is.”
“What about you? Is he the sort you want to marry?”
“Yes. Of course.”
“Well, then I’m sorry you won’t make it to your party. I’ll keep you safe and get you to Denver to meet up with your beau.”
“He’s not a beau,” she disagreed with a soft shake of her head that made the pearls on her ears swing
“Sounds like he is.”
“He’s a serious marriage prospect. Someone with whom to plan a future. If I choose to marry him, I shall run a grand house, entertain important guests and even travel.”
“Sounds…grand.”
“You’re being flip.”
He raised both hands and if surrendering.
“What about you?” she asked. “Have you a wife? A girl back home?”
Chapter Four
Jonah had been expecting the question. He’d inquired about her romantic interests, after all. “My life isn’t suited to that sort of thing. I rarely stay in one spot for longer than a day or two.”
“Sounds lonely.”
“Solitary. I like it that way.”
Once Jillian woke, Jonah taught Meredith how to make biscuit dough. She did a fair job, and they ate cheese with them. When it grew dark, he again covered all the windows with pillows. That evening, Meredith read to them from a book of poetry and then from a copy of Emma.
“What is this story about?” Hayden asked after a chapter.
“Emma is a matchmaker,” Meredith explained.
“What’s a matchmaker?”
She laid down the book. “I don’t suppose this story is exciting enough for children, is it?”
“Do you got any pirate stories?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“I like the book just fine, Miss Abbott,” Jillian told her. “I don’t understand all them words, but your voice is pretty, an’ it’s toasty warm in here. The blankets are soft and smell good. We had yummy food, din’t we?” She gave the others a sweet smile. “This is a good day.”
Meredith had no reply. Empathy for the child’s situation welled up in her chest. If being stranded in a snowstorm could be counted as a good day, Meredith wasn’t sure she wanted to know what the worst days had been like. Though she suspected well enough…?.
She couldn’t meet Jonah’s eyes because of the overwhelming flood of emotion that would be revealed.
“I liked listening, too,” came his deep-timbered comment.
She hadn’t been prepared for his approval, and she experienced a heady rush of self-consciousness she hadn’t felt around him before. In that moment their situation changed. They were a man and a woman trapped together in a snowstorm, secluded from their normal lives and from everything familiar…and now acutely aware of each other.
She picked up the book and read aloud another chapter.
Everyone grew tired early. Jonah bundled up and went out of doors to search the perimeter of the railcars and study the landscape beneath the night sky. When he returned, Meredith and the children were snuggled into their places, and blankets had been prepared on the divan for him.
He locked the door and made sure the coal heater had enough fuel to last several hours before he lay down. He’d fallen asleep when a sound woke him. He didn’t recognize the noise, but he got up and went to pull away one of the pillows and peer outside.
An enormous brown bear was investigating the area where they’d built their spit and cooked the rabbit.
“What’s out there?” Meredith’s soft voice came from near his shoulder.
He took a step back so she could see. As soon as she moved in front of him, her delicate scent reached him, eliciting a quick response. Rather than smelling like perfume, she carried a mild combination of clean clothing and fragrant soap.
Her swift intake of breath revealed her surprise at the scene out of doors. “What’s it doing?”
The animal turned toward the railcar and stood on its hind legs.
She took a step back, bring her soft curves right against him. “Is it going to attack the Pullman?”
“Nah. It’s just curious. If it knew we were watching, it would likely run away.”
She shivered, and he felt the tremors along the front of his body. It took all of his willpower not to wrap his arms around her.
“Are you sure it won’t try to get in?”
He rested a comforting hand on her shoulder. “I’m sure. He’s just looking for easy food. We don’t have anything, except the innards from that rabbit, that he can smell or find, so he’ll be on his way.”
“I thought bears hibernated all winter.”
“They can sleep for weeks at a time, but they don’t go the entire winter without eating. Weather was nice enough for foraging only days ago. This fellow probably got surprised by all the snow. Like we did.”
Meredith had draped her insubstantial robe around her shoulders, and now she tugged it around her more tightly.
“You should get back under your covers,” he suggested.
She turned, and he let his hand drop from her shoulder, but she was trapped between the window and his body. He didn’t have the willpower to move away and let her go.
She could probably see his face in the glow of moonlight on the snow that streamed through the window, but he couldn’t see hers. She surprised him by reaching up and tracing his jaw with her cool fingers. He wore a couple days’ worth of stubble, which she must have found interesting, because she brushed her fingertips upward and back down.
He caught her hand. “What are you doing?”
“I wondered all day what that felt like.”
He couldn’t have been more surprised.
“My father’s attendant shaves him in the morning and again before supper. Only once that I can recall did I ever see my brothers with hair on their faces. They’d just returned from a hunting trip.”
Her hand was soft, yet strong, with long fingers. He turned it over in his and discovered her ring with his thumb. He’d noticed it before, of course. It was a square ruby set into a wide gold band that she wore on her index finger. On each side of the gemstone in worn gold was a lion’s head in profile.
“Your ring looks like something a medieval king would wear, rather than a young woman’s jewelry,” he commented.
“It belonged to my grandfather,” she said. “My brothers inherited parcels of land and houses, along with stocks. My inheritance is in the form of a dowry, available only upon my marriage. I asked my mother for the ring, because I remember my grandfather wearing it on his little finger. He was a kind man.”
“You haven’t said much abut your mother.” He finally eased back and led her to the fainting couch, where she sat and raised her feet to tuck them under the covers. Jonah perched on the leather-upholstered footstool.
“She’s quite beautiful.”
“Could have guessed that.”
“She’s kind. She’s involved with numerous charities. She makes planning a banquet or a gala look easy, though it’s actually complicated and time-consuming. The servants respect and adore her, and most have been with us for many years. She’s generous to their families.”
“You’re close, the two of you?”
“I love her very much. I don’t often see eye to eye with my father, and she’s often caught between the two of us.” She shrugged. “She defers to him, of course.”
“What do you and your father disagree over?”
“I wanted to go to university and have the same opportunities as my brothers. He wouldn’t allow it. I was sent to a boarding school, but escaped at every opportunity. He finally gave up on keeping me there and allowed me to come home.”
“What did you do after that?”
“He consented to let me work at his campaign office, as long as I stay out of the limelight and remain in the background. I actually have a staff and a budget now, but it was hard won. And I had to promise to marry by the end of next year.”
Jonah said nothing, merely listened.
“I think he’s hoping my husband won’t allow me to continue with the campaigns or that perhaps I’ll transfer my energies to my husband’s campaigns.”
“What do your brothers do?” he asked after she’d been silent for several minutes.
“Morgan is a C&O attorney. He’s married and has two children. Peter is still at university, but upon his graduation he’ll be given a position as a surveyor. They were trained up in the railroad business alongside my father. He has high expectations for their futures.”
“And your future?”
“My only responsibility is to snare a husband with excellent prospects.”
“I doubt that will be a problem.”
“Especially not with the dowry inheritance, right?”
“I was thinking more that any man would appreciate a wife so clever and capable…as well as beautiful. Rich or not.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment. In the moonlight he made out her hands as she spread them on top of the covers. It was out of character for him to speak so openly to a woman he’d only met a few days ago. But the unusual conditions created an air of intimacy and familiarity.
“This fellow waiting for you in Denver…?” His question trailed off.
“Ivan,” she supplied. “Ivan Kingsley.”
“This Kingsley fellow, is he likely to want you to join his business or his campaigns? What does he do?”
“He’s in banking,” she replied. “And our conversations have never reached that point.”
“Will you still say yes if he wants you at home raising babies?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably not. He’s young, ambitious and successful. He’s not the worst prospect out there. And I may never find a husband willing to allow me to do as I wish.”
He was sure a great many women had settled for husbands or had been forced into marriages that weren’t of their choosing. At least she had a say so. Jonah intended to check out this Kingsley fellow as soon as he had the opportunity, however.
He stood and walked silently to the heater, where he added a scoop of coal before moving to the window. “Our night visitor is gone,” he whispered. He placed the pillow back in the opening and lay on the comfortable divan and covered himself. “Good night, Meredith.”
“Good night, Jonah.”
He liked his name on her lips. Entirely too much. Because he wasn’t a rich, successful businessman who esteemed a position in government. He was a U.S. marshal who’d roamed the country without putting down roots or making connections. The only people he knew in high places were those whose gold and trains he guarded.
Nearly all his earnings had gone into savings, however, because he had nothing upon which to spend it. One of these days he was going to buy a spread and settle down to raise a few horses.
So far one-of-these-days hadn’t arrived. He had only the foggiest picture of how the future would come to pass. A wife would be good. A couple of children maybe. He’d never given kids much consideration. Kids had always presented as a liability, victims to their parents’ thoughtless actions. He’d never considered all the children raised as Meredith had been, in loving families.
Looking at Hayden and Jillian, however, he suspected the percentage left fending for themselves was greater. Somebody needed to look out for kids like them, instead of bringing more into the world.
When had he become a philosopher? He scoffed at himself. If it ever became his job to fix life’s problems, the world would end tomorrow.
He checked the .45 under his pillow and closed his eyes.
Christmas Eve arrived and with it the sun. Sparkling snow as far as the eye could see hurt Meredith’s eyes when she stepped out of the Pullman. Beside her, Jillian and Hayden were bundled, Hayden with a shovel and Jillian with a broom. Meredi
th carried a shovel of her own, along with a bucket, and they made their way along the tracks, until she looked back and guessed this was as far as she and Jonah had searched for coal the last time.
She instructed them on moving snow from the ground, so lumps of coal could be discovered. The snow was deep and heavy now, and Jillian didn’t have the strength to shovel for long. Hayden was surprisingly strong and adept at the task, however, so he shoveled, and once the chunks were revealed, Jillian gathered them. Meredith worked the opposite side of the tracks.
Early that morning Jonah had taken food and a rifle and followed the rails in the opposite direction to explore what lay beyond and look for animal or human tracks, if any.
He didn’t return until well after noon. “There’s nothing as far as the eye can see,” he told her when they were alone. “But it’s stopped snowing.”
She’d been thinking of that, too. The weather was good for them, because it meant someone could come to their aid now, but it also meant the robbers might be the first to reach them.
Chapter Five
“The train has either arrived in Denver or was waylaid by Bloom’s gang,” Jonah said. “We have no way of knowing if the other marshals shot them or if the outlaws surrounded the train and figured out the mail car was missing. They’d have been forced to wait out the storm. Anything else would have been suicide.”
“But by now help should be on the way, shouldn’t it?”
He nodded. The engineer or the other marshals would have alerted the law. “They’ll put a plow on a locomotive and make their way to us.”
“It could be today yet,” she suggested. “We might be in Denver for Christmas.”
“Or tomorrow,” he suggested, considering all the logistics.
“Well, we’re here now,” she reasoned. “I want to make Christmas Eve as special as possible for Hayden and Jillian.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“Well…” She thought a moment. “It would be lovely to have a tree to decorate.”
“I can provide the tree, but what about decorations?”
“Let me worry about that.”