He just hoped Dinah would be on board with it.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ruby had lost all sense of decorum as she paced in Doc’s exam room.
Heaven help her, she’d actually snapped at the infirm Mrs. Moorcroft in her desperation to speak with Dinah.
Of course Dinah and Doc were out making rounds.
Of course Mrs. Moorcroft didn’t know when her husband and his assistant would return.
Of course the local whorehouse madam wasn’t allowed to wait inside the Moorcrofts’ home. Mrs. Moorcroft hadn’t even offered to let Ruby wait on the property, suggesting that she return later in the evening. After dark.
To hell with that.
Ruby had let herself into the examination room. Doc could deal with his sputtering and indignant wife about the “liberties” she was taking. She planned to remain right there until she could talk to Dinah about what the devil had gone on in the past three weeks that she’d been in Deadwood.
Jimmy had seen the open door to the exam area. If he’d been shocked to see Madam Ruby muttering to herself and pacing, he hadn’t shown it. He’d agreed to do a favor for her and return the horse and buggy to Blackbird’s Livery, and he’d left her to her pacing.
Two full hours passed while she waited. She forced herself not to run out when she heard a buggy come to a stop.
Mrs. Moorcroft came out of the house—no doubt to head off her husband and complain about his patient who’d refused to leave the premises.
As soon as Dinah had seen Ruby in the exam room doorway, she sent Doc and his wife into the house and returned alone, closing and locking the door behind her.
“Where is Jonas?” Ruby demanded. “And don’t give me some cockamamie story about that being him on the ranch. I rode out there as soon as I heard what happened with Silas and Zeke West. The man who greeted me like we were goddamned…strangers is not my Jonas McKay. Where is he? God. Is he okay? Please tell me he’s not dead.”
Dinah studied her.
Ruby knew she looked a fright. Her chest heaving. Her sweaty face the same crimson color as her gown. Her hair hanging down after she’d pulled the pins out while pacing.
As much of a mess as she was on the outside, inside was worse. Her heart raced. Her stomach churned. The tears she’d been holding back threatened to overflow like a spring dam.
“Sit.” Dinah pointed to a chair.
“You cannot—”
“If you want to hear this, you’d better sit down before you fall down, Ruby. Because what I’m about to tell you will send you into shock.”
That got her butt to connect with the chair.
Dinah dragged another chair across from her, sat and took Ruby’s gloved hands in her own. “Your Jonas is alive as far as I know.”
“As far as you know? Where is he?”
“That, I do not know. What I’m about to tell you…just hear me out until the end, all right?”
“Then you’d better start explaining every single detail right now.”
As Dinah relayed the story, Ruby’s dismay increased. While she genuinely understood Dinah’s panic and fear at the hands of Zeke West, she forced herself not to snap at Dinah to get to the part of the story where Jonas disappeared.
“So I shot Zeke.”
Ruby’s mouth fell open. “You did?”
“Yes. That part is as clear as day. It’s the aftermath that is a complete blur for me.”
“Why?”
“Because Doc dosed me with laudanum. He believed me to be traumatized because I’d watched Silas kill Zeke. Then he’d seen the body trauma Zeke had inflicted on me and kept me sedated to heal. I didn’t witness Jonas hauling Silas off to jail. While I was under sedation, Silas broke out of jail and left town to avoid hanging for Zeke’s murder. When I finally could function again, a week had passed. Zeke was in the ground, Silas was a fugitive, and Jonas had resigned as deputy.”
“Except that’s not really what happened?”
She shook her head. “Mrs. Agnes saw Silas pick up the gun after I’d shot Zeke. She didn’t see what’d happened, but she told everyone she did. Doc wasn’t certain how it’d gone down but he couldn’t call his wife a liar—”
“Even when a man’s life and freedom were at stake?” Ruby demanded.
“Even then. Maybe especially then. Because everyone heard Silas threaten Zeke at the racetrack that day. If I would’ve called Mrs. Agnes a liar and confessed to pulling the trigger, no one would’ve believed me anyway. No one, Ruby. They would’ve accused me of protecting Silas. When the truth was…he took the blame to protect me.” She swallowed hard and looked down at her hands. “I think Doc might’ve known what Silas and Jonas intended to do and if I was unconscious, I couldn’t be a party to it.”
Ruby wanted to yell at her for allowing Doc and his wife their manipulations. “Go on.”
“As soon as I could, I rode out to the ranch to talk to Jonas, because I honestly believed Silas had skipped town. As soon as I saw Silas…I knew what they’d done.”
“Switched places,” Ruby said.
“Yes.”
“So it wasn’t Silas taking the blame to protect you, but Jonas. Jonas, who had to leave town, and remain on the run as an outlaw so his twin brother could pretend to be him for the rest of his life? Christ almighty. How is that fair to Jonas?”
Dinah raised her tear-filled gaze to Ruby’s. “It’s not. I never wanted this. Silas never wanted this. Jonas never wanted this. The only person who wanted to annihilate the McKay family was Zeke West…and he succeeded.” She started to cry in earnest. “I should feel horrible for killing Zeke, but I don’t. Not at all. But I do feel guilty for Silas and Jonas having to say goodbye forever. For Silas having to pretend to be someone else as long as he lives. For Jonas to be all alone and having to start his life over as someone new. I will blame myself for that for the rest of my life, so don’t you dare think this is easy for me.”
Ruby patted Dinah’s shoulder as she cried. Her sympathy was half-hearted at best…but only because the wheels in her mind were churning as fast as a locomotive.
Her Jonas was getting a fresh start. Her thoughts scrolled back to all the times Jonas had spoken of an outlaw’s mistakes. How personal connections were impossible to sever for most people and almost always created a followable trail which would get a man caught.
As far as anyone in Crook County knew, Jonas didn’t have any personal connections besides his brother.
No one besides Dinah knew that she and Jonas had a connection.
For the first time ever, she believed she’d made the right choice to tell Jonas no whenever he’d asked to court her. She’d known nothing would ever change who they were in the eyes of the community: the whore and the lawman.
During their picnic he’d told her about his restlessness. How he’d considered making a change and taking his outlaw-chasing buddy’s offer. Granted, this situation might’ve been forced on him, but she suspected that he’d volunteered to uproot his life since he hadn’t really set down roots here. Not like Silas had.
Jonas knew how to think like an outlaw and a lawman. He’d utilize both skills until he found which skin fit him best. In a place where no one knew he had a brother who looked exactly like him. Where no one knew he’d given his heart to a whore.
He’d drift for a while, just to make sure he hadn’t left a trail. Maybe he’d even become a city-boy to cover his tracks. But Ruby knew he wouldn’t stay in a city forever. He’d eventually end up in the area he called the most beautiful place on earth.
No one besides Ruby knew where that was.
“Ruby?”
Her gaze met Dinah’s. “I’m sorry. I’m just in shock. I wasn’t listening to you at all. What did you say?”
“I asked how…Jonas responded when you went out to see him today.”
“Confused as to why Madam Ruby was making a social call, to say the least.”
Dinah laughed and dabbed her eyes.
“I knew immed
iately, of course, that he wasn’t my Jonas.” Her eyes narrowed on Dinah. “You didn’t tell your McKay about me being his brother’s dirty little secret?”
“First of all, didn’t you inform me nothing that happened between a consenting man and woman was dirty?”
Ruby rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean, virgin.”
“And you know what I mean, madam. What you and I talked about? Is between us. No one else. Not my McKay. Not yours. If your Jonas told Silas about you, Silas is keeping mum to me about it because he hasn’t mentioned it to me, so fair is fair. But given what happened while you were gone, I have to know why you weren’t here the one time you should’ve been.”
Ruby explained about Madam Marie’s funeral and settling her estate. What she didn’t share was receiving the shock of her life when Marie had left all of her earnings to Ruby—more money than Ruby could’ve imagined. But that caused a different issue: how to transport those earnings, mostly in gold. She’d never trusted the stagecoach line nor any livery-for-hire services. The railroad didn’t connect to any larger towns. She wasn’t competent enough with a horse to make the return trip to Labelle on her own. All’s it would’ve taken was a whisper about her inheritance—not a far-fetched fear in a town Deadwood’s size—and she’d be set upon by bandits.
She’d discreetly hired a bodyguard rumored to be a Pinkerton and they’d taken a convoluted route to Gillette in a carriage he’d purchased in Spearfish. He’d posed as her husband “Mr. Ruby” which allowed her to convert the gold into cash. Then as Mrs. Ruby, she was able to open an account with a progressive bank that allowed her to deposit—and withdraw—money without the presence of a man. “If I would’ve known things were dire here, I would’ve returned sooner.”
“Why couldn’t your girls send you a telegram about the situation in Labelle?”
“Because like I told you, no one knew Jonas and I were involved. So they wouldn’t see his resignation as anything other than a nuisance as we wait to see who’ll take Deputy McKay’s place.” Ruby bit her lip. “But we do have cause to worry.”
“Why?”
“Big Jim barely tolerates our presence. If the sheriff allows him to choose a new deputy with the same mindset, we will be closed down sooner rather than later.”
“Is that such a bad thing?”
“Excuse me?”
Dinah lifted her chin and challenged, “Do you see yourself doing this for the rest of your life? Did your madam friend intend to die in her bawdy house?”
No. That’d been Marie’s last request. That Ruby didn’t end up like her.
Now she had enough money to give each of her girls a chance to do something different with their lives. They were young enough to move on.
So are you.
Some days she forgot to subtract the three years her brother had added to her age, making her thirty-one, not thirty-four.
Over the past year, Mavis had suggested turning Ruby Red’s into a “real” boardinghouse with a restaurant since there wasn’t one in Labelle. While that had never been in Ruby’s wheelhouse, Mavis and the other girls should have the opportunity to choose before the choice was taken from them by the law.
“Ruby?”
She glanced at Dinah. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”
“Nothing yet, but I was about to ask if you’re going after your McKay.”
“He’s not my McKay.”
“Yes, he is, and you know it. You also know that he would’ve taken you with him if you’d been here.”
“I would’ve refused to go and saddle him with more worries!”
“Bull. Your mouth is telling me one thing but your eyes say something completely contrary.” Dinah stood abruptly. “You’re good at giving me advice, so I’ll return the favor. Don’t be scared or stupid or both. Your McKay loves you. I recognized it because I saw it every time that mine looked at me the same way.”
Cheeky little thing.
“Don’t let doubt get a foothold because once that happens…it’ll trample you until you feel you can’t get back up.”
Ruby stood and latched onto Dinah’s arm. “What makes you say that? Nothing has changed for you.”
Dinah whirled around; her chin wobbled before she firmed it. “Let’s set aside the obvious fact that I took a life and don’t have to answer to the law for it as an action that has changed me profoundly.”
Damn. It’d been callous for Ruby to disregard that ugly truth.
“Everything has changed for me. Silas gave up his brother. I worry that he already regrets it. He’ll have to spend the rest of his life acting like someone he’s not and he resents me for that too. And if that’s not bad enough, everyone in the community is eyeing me with pity. Which they’ll continue to do when ‘Jonas’ decides to start courting his brother’s former fiancée—not that many believe we were a love match anyway because everyone reminds me that Silas couldn’t be bothered to give me an engagement ring.”
Ruby’s heart hurt for this couple.
“I miss Silas, the man I fell in love with, not the shell he’s become. We can’t go back to how we were before. I can’t spend a Saturday night with him at the cabin. There won’t be any surprise visits during the week with him bearing gifts and kisses. We have to keep our distance. I worry that the relationship we’d started to build isn’t strong enough to withstand this immense…damage. Not to mention we’d just started to explore the passion between us. I’m still a virgin. Now I’ll remain one until my wedding night. Because with my luck, if I threw caution to the wind, I’d wind up pregnant, forcing my McKay into a hurry-up wedding that would make me look even more like a charity case.”
Dinah burst into tears.
It was useless for Ruby to try and hold back her tears. So she hugged Dinah tight and wept right along with her, for what they’d both lost.
But she had to believe there was something good to be gained out of this.
When they were down to ragged sniffles, Ruby stepped back and handed Dinah her extra handkerchief and then dabbed her own eyes.
Dinah shuffled over to the cabinet and pulled out a flask. She took a generous swig and then waggled the silver flask at Ruby. “Rum?”
“Just a taste.” She palmed it and tipped it back. The sickly sweet, boozy taste kicked in her gag reflex, but she forced herself to swallow it. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Dinah knocked back another slug. “I’m finding rum helps me make it through the day.”
“Don’t rely on it,” Ruby warned. “It’ll become a habit faster than you can blink. Take it from someone who has watched that ‘helper’ do serious damage to many, many friends. What you need is a plan to get your McKay back.”
“Excuse me?”
“Remember when I said you needed to talk to your man about what you wanted from him in the boudoir? You still need to do that, Dinah. Maybe now more than ever because he is finding his way in what amounts to a new life. You need to assure him that what’s between you two might look different to the outside world, but in your private time, in your private space, you’re still those two people who fell in love. You need to reestablish your place in his life, Dinah, so he can reclaim his place in yours.”
“What do you suggest I do?”
Ruby shrugged. “Start with a French perversion…or as we called it in Deadwood, a French cocksucker. That’ll get his attention.”
Dinah opened her mouth. Shut it. Blushed bright red and gulped another mouthful of rum before she blurted out, “I need specific instructions on how to do that.”
Upon finishing the demonstration with detailed directions, Ruby said, “After that, you get to the most important part: talking.”
“I’m pretty sure after I do this, he’ll consider that the most important part,” Dinah said dryly.
Ruby laughed. “Perhaps. But it truly is just a door that reopens intimacy.”
“Thank you.” She exhaled. “I’ve been floundering. Wallowing. Replaying the past instead of forging a
new future. Now I feel ready to fight for what I want with him, based on what we had.”
“Exactly.”
“Now let’s talk about whatever plan you’ve concocted to get your McKay back.”
Ruby fussed with her heart necklace. “My plans will take more time to implement than just riding my horse over to his place and getting on my knees.”
“But you are going after him.”
“Yes.” She squared her shoulders. “He—we—deserve the life we were denied here.”
“Amen, sister.”
They stared at each other. Then they both started to speak at the same time.
Dinah laughed. “Sorry. You go ahead.”
“No. You first,” Ruby said.
“I would’ve liked to have you for my sister,” Dinah said shyly.
“Same goes.” She reached for her hand and squeezed. “But in our hearts, we’ll always be connected by the men we love. Even if they have different names. Even if they’re unaware that through them we’ve created this bond.”
“Agreed.” She gave Ruby another hard hug. “When will you go?”
“Soon. Change is in the air and I had a good run here. But I’m ready to move on.”
“Please try and get word to me. It doesn’t matter if it’s next year or in ten years, but I need to know that you’re all right.”
Ruby frowned. “I’ll try. But won’t it be obvious—”
“No. Like you said, he won’t have the same name and I doubt you will either.” She smirked. “Jimmy told me about your secret codes. Ours will be you mentioning being my friend from Cheyenne, and I’ll know it’s you.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, because I haven’t kept in contact with anyone from Cheyenne.”
She laughed. “Done.”
“Take care, sister.”
“You too.”
Ruby felt lighter on the walk back to the boardinghouse. She kept her head held high as she bypassed the deputy’s office. Neither Big Jim nor the weaselly looking man leaning in the doorjamb, wearing a shiny new tin star, acknowledged her.
No matter.
Silver-Tongued Devil Page 28