Bushedwhacked Bride (26 page)
Sipping her tea, Jessica glanced at Cole’s angular,
handsome face, trying to assess how much mischief was
lurking in the depths of his dark, sexy eyes. “All right,
we’ll begin again. Why did you come get me?”
“I need to tell you some things.”
“Yes?”
Surprising Jessica, Cole turned solemn. “First of all,
I’ve been wanting to tell you that I’m glad you made us go
to church, Jessie. I’m glad because I’ve been able to learn
some things, things I should know. You were right about the
people of this town. The mining families. They do need our
help. I especially realized this when I visited the mines.”
She frowned. “It’s bad?”
He nodded. “If they go on drilling, there’s bound to be a major collapse—and a lot more widows in this town.”
“What can we do?”
“Maybe if the gang harasses the owners enough,
they’ll shut the mine down.”
“Then the miners will have no livelihood.”
“I know. That’s what several of the men have already
pointed out. But isn’t it better to be out of work than
dead?”
“I suppose.”
Thoughtfully, he murmured, “Maybe there is some
thing we can do.”
“What?” she asked.
He flashed her a stiff smile. “I really can’t say anything
more about that now. But I need to discuss another mat
ter with you. Billy and I have to be away for a few days.”
She frowned.
“Now, we’re not going whoring,” he quickly added. “Or gambling or drinkin’. It’s business.”
“You’re going to pull off a robbery somewhere else.”
“No, sugar. We’re not robbing anyone.”
“Then what?”
“It’s business,” he reiterated. “Every couple of months,
we have to tend to it.”
Jessica waved a hand. “This is beginning to sound like
that movie
The Godfather,
when Al Pacino told Diane Keaton not to ask him about his business.”
“Huh?” Cole asked, clearly bewildered.
“Never mind. You’re not going to tell me, are you?”
“Nope.”
“You scoundrel.”
He smiled at that. “Gonna miss me, sugar?”
Jessica stared daggers at him, but her flaming cheeks
gave her away. “You wish.”
He leaned closer, ardor gleaming in his eyes, and spoke
huskily. “Give me your hand, Jessie.”
Horrified, Jessica glanced about, and saw the owner’s
wife smiling at them as she wiped glasses. Wide-eyed,
she turned back to Cole. “Have you lost your mind?”
“No.” He extended his own large hand across the table
and repeated, “Your hand, sugar.”
“No!” She shoved her hand into her lap.
He reached under the table and firmly grasped it.
She struggled to pull her fingers free. “Stop it, Cole!”
His strong fingers tightened over hers. “Keep resisting
and I’m gonna cause a scene you’ll regret.”
She ground her teeth.
Cole opened her tight fist and began sensuously
stroking her wrist, her palm. “Come on, sugar. Settle
down.”
Jessica fought his insidious assault on her senses, even as the passionate look in his eyes thoroughly rattled her. “You trying to humor me now?”
“Don’t you miss me at all, sugar?” he asked tenderly.
The words, his sensual caresses, further weakened her
embattled defenses. She gave a tremulous laugh. “Miss you? You’re here, aren’t you?”
“You know what I mean. Exactly what I mean.”
Jessica gulped. “Yes. I know.”
“I sure miss you, sugar,” he whispered.
Jessica shut her eyes and groaned.
“I know you feel we got the cart before the horse,” he
went on gently. “And that’s why I’ve tried to be patient.
But don’t you want me anymore?”
Her eyes flew open. “Of course I do,” she acknowl
edged miserably.
He smiled a smile that brightened even his eyes. ‘Then
why do you keep me at arm’s length?”
“Because we still have problems to address.”
“And we’re gonna work them out apart?”
“We sure didn’t work them out together.”
His thumb drew suggestive circles on her sensitive
palm. “We were good, sugar.”
Jessica was coming unglued. “That’s not what I meant.”
“We can work out the rest.”
“Cole!” she exclaimed. “You have your entire life to
work out!”
“I know. Maybe I’m starting to do that.”
“How?”
“We’ll talk about that more when I get back. For now, I
want you to promise me you won’t run away while I’m
gone.”
“Why would I run?”
He stared straight into her eyes with an intensity that
made her stomach curl. “I think you know why. You want
to run away from me, Jessie. From us. From what you’re
feeling.”
Oh, he’d spoken the truth. Jessica turned away, as if the
passion radiating from his eyes might burn her.
“Promise me you won’t leave,” he reiterated. “It would
drive me crazy if I lost you, darlin’.”
She shuddered. “Cole, stop tormenting me.”
“Promise.”
Miserably, she met his gaze. “All right. I promise.”
“Good.” Pleasure shone in his expression. “Do you
want me to come to your bed tonight, before I go?”
Jessica felt as if her heart had climbed into her mouth.
“Cole! Of course not!”
“Really?” he teased. “You may say that, but your blush
says different, that and the way your pulse is beating
against my thumb. Where else am I making you throb?”
Oh, he was killing her, an unbearable death by inches, in public, no less! Jessica felt wet, weak, as if she might
dissolve in a puddle. “Cole, please, no more. Have you forgotten I have to go back to the school and teach?”
Undaunted, he replied steadily, “When I get back,
sugar, we’re settling this. I’m through waiting for you,
Jessie, so you’d best be ready.” In a voice raspy with pas
sion, he added, “I’m claiming that other pulse of yours,
the one deep inside you.”
Breathless, she could only stare at him.
“Now kiss me.”
“Absolutely not!”
Cole leaned over the table and claimed Jessica’s lips in
a brief, tender kiss. Afterward, as she eyed him raptly, his
voice held a note of steel. “When I get back, Jessie.”
He stood and offered her his hand.
Jessica’s expression betrayed her torn feelings. “Damn
you! Why did you make me promise I’d stay first?”
Cole only grinned, and as they left the restaurant to
gether, Jessica noted a broad smile on the face of the
owner’s wife.
Chapter Twenty-three
Dressed in his best Sunday suit, Billy Reklaw sat on a fine
silk brocade and rosewood settee in the large, lavish sec
ond-story parlor of the Teller House Hotel in Central City,
known to the locals as “Central.” He was smoking an ex
pensive cigar and sipping the fine brandy brought to him
by the room’s hostess as he and the others waited to be
called for luncheon. The strains of a waltz drifted in from
the piano in the music room as people chatted and milled
about him—two lovely ladies in bustled silk gowns admiring a richly carved table at the center of the room, a dapper
elderly gent peering into a glittering diamond-dust mirror,
and nearby, two couples sitting at a small table, engaged in
a game of cards. The hostess had informed Billy that one of the couples was none other than Horace Tabor and his
second wife, Baby Doe, the creature who had scandalized all of
Colorado
by breaking up Tabor’s first marriage. The
lovely woman with her lush, curly hair and classic features
caught Billy’s perusal and glanced briefly in his direction
before lowering her gaze to the cards she held.
Billy smiled to himself. Baby Doe was every bit as beautiful as her reputation alleged, but his thoughts and
feelings were firmly focused on another. Dumpling. How he missed that girl—her spirit and sass, even her big, lush
body. When he was around her, he found himself lost in
those cornflower blue eyes, beguiled by her dimpled
smile, and dreaming of things he’d never before imag
ined—marriage, young ones, even giving up his life of
crime. For what would Dumpling think if she knew what
he and his brothers really did for a living? Surely she’d be
just as riled as Jessica was, for she was a respectable
woman from a good family. For so long Billy and his brothers had assumed they were pursuing a just cause.
Now he wasn’t so sure.
“May I get you anything else, sir?”
Billy set his cigar in an ashtray and glanced up at the
smiling middle-aged hostess in her black silk gown. “No,
thank you, ma’am. I’m just waiting for my brother to re
turn from Little Kingdom Bank.”
The woman nodded. “You two staying for the show at
the Opera House tonight?”
“What show is that?”
The hostess laughed. “You didn’t know that Buffalo
Bill Cody and his troupe are expected in town later today?
Most of them are staying right here at the Teller House.
Why do you think the Tabors have come down from
Den
ver
? Cody’s troupe is performing a melodrama at the
Opera House tonight to help interest the townsfolk in their
Wild West Show tomorrow. Why, you and your brother
should try to attend.”
“Why, thank you, ma’am. I’ll mention the shows to
him.” Glancing toward the archway, he laughed. “And
speaking of the devil . . .”
As the woman moved on, Billy watched his eldest
brother stride into the room, wearing a black suit. He mo
tioned for Cole to join him, and Cole folded his large frame into the chair next to Billy’s.
Billy lifted his brandy in a salute to Cole. “Want a
drink, brother? You just missed the nice hostess lady.”
Cole shook his head abstractedly. “No, I’m fine.”
Billy lowered his voice. “Get our business taken care
of?”
“Yep.”
Billy chuckled. “You know, big brother, we’ve got
bank accounts, and safety deposit boxes stuffed with
gold, all over Colorado now. Pretty soon we’re gonna run
out of banks.”
Cole smiled cynically. “Pretty soon we’re going to run
out of a lot more than banks, I’d say.”
“What do you mean?”
Cole sighed. “Billy, have you thought about how much
longer we can keep up this—er, life of crime—without being arrested?”
His expression troubled, Billy sipped his brandy.
“Yeah, it does seem we’re on the verge of wearing out our
welcome around Mariposa.”
“We’ve been lucky so far. Too lucky.”
“Yeah.” Billy scowled. “Matter of fact, I was just
thinking about the gang—and Dumpling. You know what
her people would think if they knew.”
“It’s a grim prospect,” agreed Cole.
“I reckon you’ve been thinkin’ about Jessie, eh?”
Cole nodded tightly. “I have.”
“So what do you think we should do, big brother?”
Cole leaned forward, lacing his fingers together. “I’m thinking it’s time we pull up stakes, move much further
west.”
“Pull up stakes?” Billy was aghast. “What about our
women?”
“Well, maybe we should take them with us.”
Billy mulled this over. “Maybe. If they’ll go.”
“We gotta start thinking ahead, Billy.”
“Yeah, I suppose.”
“I mean, what if we should stay put? What if you marry
your Dumpling, or I marry Jessie? What do you picture your son saying some day? ‘My daddy’s an outlaw’?”
Billy shuddered. “The thought does give a man pause.”
He brightened. “So you think I should marry Miss
Dumpling?”
“Billy, that decision is yours.”
Billy’s jaw tightened. “Wes, Gabe, and Luke still tease me about her—you know, her size and all.”
“They also tease you about being the runt of the litter,”
Cole remarked. “How does that make you feel?”
“Like murderin’ all three of ‘em.”
“And how do you think Miss Dumpling feels when
people tease her about her size?”
Billy ruminated for a long moment. “Are you saying Dumpling and me have something in common?”
“Could be. But what I’m really telling you, little
brother, is that it’s high time for you to become a man and
quit fretting about what your brothers think. It’s what
you
think that counts.”
“Yeah,” Billy agreed.
“So what do you think of Miss Dumpling?”
Billy grinned from ear to ear. “I think that lady’s a
pure-dee piece of heaven—and a big piece at that.”
Cole chuckled. “Then there’s your answer.”
Billy licked his lips with relish. “Yeah, her and me go
together just like chicken and dumplings. Hell, she makes
me feel like the cock of the walk.”
Cole shook with laughter.
“So what about you and Jessie?” Billy added.
Cole’s expression turned thoughtful. “I think I’d marry
the woman in a minute if she’d have me.”
“So she’s another reason you want us to give up the
gang?”
“Sure is.”
“You know, our brothers seem plenty serious about
their own sweethearts. Maybe we should all many up,
pack up Ma and our wives, move west, and get a fresh start. Maybe it could work.”
But even as Billy was pondering the prospect, Cole’s expression sobered. “I wish it were all that simple.”
Billy was taken aback. “It ain’t?”
“What about Mariposa?”
“What about it?”
“The miners, Billy. The men and their families, the people we’re
supposed
to be helping.”
“Oh. You mean, we still ain’t convinced Miser to shut down the mines?”
“Right.”
Billy snapped his fingers. “Well, we could buy the mines, couldn’t we? Then shut ‘em down?”
Cole violently shook his head. “Why should we give
that villain Miser one plug nickel? Besides, even if we
did somehow manage to close the mines, the people of
Mariposa would still be left destitute.”
Billy scowled at Cole’s word. “Huh?”
“Dirt poor, little brother.”
“Oh.” Billy nodded gloomily. “Reckon you’re right.”
“I have a much better idea. In fact, I’ve already set the wheels into motion. I just spoke with the banker about
setting up a trust fund for the miners of Mariposa. It’ll be
a special account to be used to see to the needs of the var
ious families after we leave the area.”
“But why would we do that?”
Cole was irate. “Why? Wasn’t the entire purpose of our
life of crime to help those families?”
Billy grimaced guiltily. “Well, yeah, I guess.”
“We’ve been kidding ourselves, Billy. We haven’t re
ally helped them at all. We’ve just been raising hell at the
expense of those good people. In fact, indirectly, we’ve
been robbing them.”
Billy’s features twisted in perplexity. “Robbing? Well,
I reckon that don’t sound right.”
“That’s why I’m setting up the trust. And I’ve arranged for all of our assets from Trinidad,
Georgetown
, and Sil
ver Plume to be transferred here, as well.”
Billy whistled. “Hey, that’s most of our money, Cole.”
Cole laughed, then spoke in a whisper. “We already
have enough stashed away at our hideout to buy half the
Territory
of
Wyoming
, and you know it.”
“I reckon so.”
“Anyway, the banker will have all the paperwork ready
for me to sign tomorrow. He’ll begin administering the trust sometime after we’re all out of the state, when I no
tify him by mail.”
“You have this all planned out, then.”
“I do.”
Frowning, Billy glanced about the parlor. “So does that
mean we have to hang around Central till tomorrow?”
“Yeah, that’s how it looks.” Cole elbowed his brother.
“Guess you’d rather be back with Dumpling, eh?”
“Yeah. Guess you’d rather be back with Jessie.”
“Yeah.” Cole flashed his brother a wistful smile. “I’m
just hoping she misses me as much.”
***
Jessica missed him.
Much as she hated to admit it, while Cole was gone her
thoughts were centered almost exclusively on him.
Where was he, and with whom? When would he return? Had he told her the truth, or was he even now in the arms
of another woman?
Such thoughts obsessed her when she was holding
school in town or at the farm. When she watched an Inca
dove fly off in a flash of flame-tinged underwings. When
she observed a mule deer romping through a meadow
with its mate.
Memories of his lovemaking enticed her. The promise of his passion enthralled her. He’d vowed to settle things between them when he returned, leaving no doubt as to what he expected.
Did he presume he would rape her? This she could
never believe. Overwhelm her? He already had.
And while she still harbored doubts, she could no
longer deny that her feelings toward him were deepen
ing, her resistance softening. After all, from the things
he’d said before he’d left, he was beginning to think se
riously about the dangerous game the gang was playing, about the fates of the miners, perhaps even about chang
ing and living his life differently. Was it so important
that she continue to resist him when he might at last be willing to meet her halfway? And when she wanted him
so badly?
If only she could be certain he was sincere, and not
off misbehaving. But so little was certain in love—or in
life. Her own adventure in time was certainly proof of
that.
On a morning two days after the men left, Jessica sat
on the front porch swing, missing Cole, petting Inkspot,
and watching a hen and a rooster battle in the barnyard.
She was smiling over the sight when Dumpling pulled up
in a buckboard, looking ready to meet her sweetheart in
starched blue gingham and a straw hat with jaunty silk
flowers.
“Howdy, ma’am,” the girl called. “Is Bobby around?”
“‘Fraid not. Come sit with me a minute.”
Wearing an expression of intense disappointment, the
girl clambered down from the buckboard and lumbered
up the steps. Breathing hard, she sat down heavily next to
Jessica, vigorously rocking the swing.