Chasing Rainbows (22 page)

“No, thank you,” she replied and pointedly looked away.

“I don’t think you heard me,” he said slowly. Before Annie could anticipate his next move, he reached down, grabbed her by her upper arms, and jerked her to her feet. His hot, whiskey-tainted breath fanned her face. “I said, do you want to dance, outlaw gal?”

She shot him a furious glare. “And I said, no, thank you.” She struggled to free herself from the man’s grasp, but he was simply too strong.

A lewd smile curved the man’s lips as he tightened his grip on her arms. His gaze traveled slowly over her body, then his eyes darted toward the dark alley that was visible through the back exit of the town hall.

She went perfectly still. “I’ll give you one more warning. Let go of me.”

His grin broadened. “What are you gonna do about it if I don’t?” A burst of rough male laughter sounded behind him as his friends crowded in closer.

Annie reached instinctively for her guns — and came up empty. Only then did she remember that she had turned them in at the door.

Jake leaned back in his chair, his gaze drifting slowly around the saloon. As most of the townsfolk had decided to attend the party at the town hall, the crowd was fairly sparse. As it was, he had only been able to find one man interested in a game of poker. The gambler proved to be nothing but an annoyance, however, making Jake wish that he had accompanied Annie after all. The man was drinking steadily and soon became so drunk it was obvious to even the most casual observer that he couldn’t tell the difference between a poker chip and a cow chip.

Stifling a sigh of impatience as his opponent fumbled with his cards, he let his thoughts drift toward Annie, wondering if she was having a good time. By his reckoning, she would probably have at least a half dozen gentlemen suitors crowding around her by now, asking for a dance. And given Annie’s innocent enthusiasm, she would no doubt accept each and every invitation. The thought did nothing to improve his mood.

He was painfully aware of how much courage it had taken for her to go alone, and felt a stab of guilt for not accompanying her. He pushed the unwanted emotion away, shaking his head. He was with Annie in order to trap the Mundy Gang, and for no other reason. Kissing her, touching her the way he had done, had been nothing but foolish curiosity on his part. If he had an ounce of brains, he would keep that in mind.

He shifted uncomfortably in his chair. While he could argue all he liked about the impossibility of a match between them, that impossibility was slowly turning into something that looked and felt more like an inevitability. His instincts told him that the kiss they had shared had only been the beginning of something bigger. If there was one thing he had learned in life, it was that there was no sense fighting fate. A man most often met his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.

Jake didn’t like to be vulnerable. Nor did he consider himself a sentimental or a mystical man. But there were some things in life that had the power to move him very deeply. Things that demonstrated his own insignificance and showed that there was perhaps a grander vision than his own.

He remembered the first time he had held a newborn babe, a tiny girl barely two days old. He certainly hadn’t wanted to hold the fragile-looking, squalling creature. But she had been eagerly thrust into his arms, all pink and wrinkled, her little hands and legs flying, and he had had no choice but to accept her. At first, Jake had felt nothing but fear that he might drop the squirming infant. But his fear had gradually eased as the baby had settled down. For a fleeting moment, their eyes had met, then she had wrapped her little fist around Jake’s pinky and held on tight, as though she would never let it go.

He remembered the aftermath of the battle of the Wilderness. General Lee had ridden Traveller through the ranks, his face tight with strain and loss. As he did, a hush had fallen among the men. Men who were hungry and cold, bleeding and sick, and dressed in threadbare clothing had stood and come to attention on no orders but their own, in silent tribute to their beloved leader. They would have walked through fire had General Lee ordered it; often he did.

All of it had touched Jake very deeply. He had no illusions about what he was. A drifter, a cardsharp, a gambler with few morals and even fewer principles. But moments such as those made life a little grander, a little nobler than it really was. They made him aware, for however brief a time, that there was perhaps a greater purpose in life than that for which he had been living.

And for whatever reason, no matter how absurd it seemed, Miss Annabel Lee Foster struck a similar chord in him. Holding her in his arms, kissing her the way he had, had been as dramatic and yet as commonplace as the change of the seasons, filling him with a sense of deep satisfaction. It was an odd sensation for him, and one that he was not entirely comfortable with. Jake was accustomed to feeling lust for women, along with a certain amount of respect and affection — but never before had he experienced what he felt when he held Annie.

Unable to get her out of his mind, he decided to fold his cards and call it a night. No sense hanging around the saloon. He might as well head over to the town hall and see how she was getting on.

“Wait a minute,” the drunk slurred indignantly as Jake stood. “You won my money, now you’re walking out before I get a chance to win it back?”

“Why don’t you sober up a bit, then I’ll give you another chance.”

“I ain’t drunk.”

Jake sighed and put on his hat. “You’re holding your cards backward, mister.”

The drunk looked at his hand in astonishment, then let out a deep bourbon-scented guffaw.

It was at that moment that an angry chorus of shouting and screaming echoed into the saloon from down the street. Less than a second later, a young boy burst in through the bat-wing doors. “Fire!” he screamed, his eyes wild with excitement. “That outlaw woman set the town hall on fire!”

Annie stared into a sea of hostile faces, her heart thumping wildly. The town hall of Two River Flats smoldered and sparkled behind her, glowing an eerie crimson and orange against the ink-black sky. Thick, acrid smoke filled the air. The taste of ash coated her mouth and felt heavy on her skin. At least the screaming and shouting of the townsfolk had quieted down somewhat now that the fire had been put out. Only a few remaining embers hissed and popped.

Her focus, however, was on neither the fire nor the angry townspeople. Instead she looked beyond the crowd, her attention caught by the activity in the northern end of town. For amid the pandemonium, amid the running and shouting, the buckets of water, the creaking timber, and the general melee that followed the conflagration, Annie had heard the distinct, rapid-fire blast of gunshots in the distance. Her ears were attuned enough to the sound of gunplay to recognize it when she heard it. She searched the horizon, her stomach tied in knots, looking for trouble.

Something told her that the night had just gone from bad to worse.

Her suspicion that she was headed for trouble was confirmed with the appearance of a tall man who strode confidently down the street toward her. He was handsome enough in a lanky, blond way. His face was boyishly youthful — except for his eyes. He had the flat, cool, judging eyes of the law. Annie saw no badge beneath his thick wool jacket, but there was no mistaking that he was in charge. He was flanked by a pair of big men with rifles grasped casually in their hands.

A respectful silence fell over the crowd. The sheriff stopped and surveyed the wreckage of the town hall, his expression grim. “Somebody want to tell me what happened here?” he said to the crowd at large.

A flurry of excited voices erupted at once.

The sheriff lifted his hand for silence and pointed to a middle-aged man attired in a snugly fitted three-piece suit. “Parnell. Talk.”

The man named Parnell threw back his shoulders and cast a superior glance at the rest of the crowd. He drew himself up and pointed a chubby finger at Annie, his florid face indignant. “That outlaw woman set the hall on fire, Sheriff Pogue, that’s what happened.”

The entire town seemed to angrily second that opinion. Why, they acted as if she had deliberately charged in, taken a torch, and lit the hall afire. The sheriff listened for a minute, then turned toward Annie and intently surveyed her from head to toe. She knew she looked a mess, with her new dress singed and burned, her hair undone and loose around her shoulders, and ashes coating her skin, but there was nothing she could do about it.

She stood her ground and met the sheriffs eyes, refusing to cower. She would accept part of the blame for the fire, but not all of it. It had been an accident, pure and simple — no matter what the townsfolk said.

“I reckon you must be Outlaw Annie,” the sheriff remarked.

Annie tilted her chin and drew back her shoulders. In a manner straight out of Winston’s Guide, she replied politely, “I prefer Miss Foster, if you don’t mind, Sheriff.”

“All right,” the sheriff replied coolly, his eyes giving nothing away. “You want to tell me your side of the story, Miss Foster?”

“That man there asked me to dance,” Annie replied, singling out the rough cowhand who had bullied her. “When I said no, he got real insistent-like and tried to pull me out on the dance floor. I told him to let me go, but he wouldn’t listen. We tussled for a little bit, and I reckon Cat saw me wrestling with him and didn’t like the look of his mangy hide any more than I did. She jumped on his shoulder and took a swipe at his arm.”

“That damned beast near clawed my arm off,” broke in the cowhand.

The sheriff coolly waved him to silence. “You hold on a minute, Dwight. You’ll get your chance to talk. Go on,” he said to Annie.

She shrugged. “That’s mostly it. He staggered back, trying to knock Cat off his shoulder, and knocked over a couple of oil lamps instead. That’s when the fire started.”

The sheriff turned to the cowhand. “That what happened, Dwight?”

Dwight’s lips worked in silent, angry willfulness. He spit out a long brown stream of tobacco and wiped the dribble from his chin with the back of his sleeve. “If she didn’t want to dance, then what the hell was she doing there?”

Jake Moran’s voice carried over the excited murmur of the crowd. “Seems to me that the lady has a right to go anywhere she pleases.”

Annie felt an immediate, inexplicable rush of relief at the sound of Jake’s voice. She spotted him making his way through the crowd, standing a good head and shoulders taller than most folks there. As his eyes met hers, she no longer felt quite so alone.

“You let me handle this, Jake,” the sheriff said.

“You go right ahead, Walt.” His tone was friendly enough, but as he scouted the faces in the crowd, there was an underlying firmness to it. “I just don’t want to see Miss Foster blamed for something that doesn’t appear to be her fault.”

“Nobody’s getting blamed for anything. At least, not yet.” The sheriff turned to face the crowd. “All right, folks, the party’s over. Those of you who want to help my deputies clean up are welcome to stay. The rest of you can go on home. And as for you, Dwight, I want to see you in my office tomorrow morning at eight. You don’t show, and I’ll send my deputies out to Parker’s ranch to bring you in and fine you a day’s wages for wasting my time. You understand me?”

Dwight nodded glumly and turned away. The crowd broke up and slowly dispersed, grumbling but compliant.

Annie turned to head back to the hotel, but the sheriff’s voice stopped her. “If you don’t mind, Miss Foster, there are a few questions I’d like answered. Would you follow me to my office?”

The question was framed as a polite request, but the sheriffs gaze was unrelenting. Annie shot a glance at Jake. He shrugged, and the two of them stepped into line behind Sheriff Pogue. Funny how just a few weeks ago Annie would have bridled at Jake’s intrusion. But now his presence felt perfectly natural. They made their way to the sheriff’s office and stepped inside. Walter Pogue took a seat on one side of a broad rough-hewn desk, then motioned to two chairs across from him.

Once she and Jake were seated, the sheriff quickly got to the heart of the matter. “Heard you went for a little ride this morning, Miss Foster.”

Annie didn’t bother to question where he had gotten his information. In a town the size of Two River Flats, nothing went unnoticed. “Any law against that, Sheriff?”

“Depends. You talk to anybody while you were out there?”

“My horse.”

Sheriff Pogue steepled his fingers, his expression flat. “I can talk all night if you want me to, Miss Foster. But I reckon you’d like to get out of here, go back to the hotel, and maybe get some sleep. You answer my questions straight and you’ll leave that much sooner. You understand me?”

Annie leveled a cool, hard look at him. “I understand you.”

“Good.” He leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on his desk. “Then, why don’t you start by telling me who you met with when you rode out of town this morning?”

“I didn’t meet with anyone.”

“Well, you didn’t ride out there just to enjoy the view. Who were you looking for?”

Annie hesitated, then reluctantly answered. “Someone’s been trailing us the past few days. I thought it might be a fella by the name of Jim Garvey. Folks who know him call him Snakeskin Garvey.”

“Snakeskin?”

She nodded. “That’s about all he wears. Fancy snakeskin boots, snakeskin belt, snakeskin vest, even the band on his hat is made out of snakeskin.”

“Did he ride with the Mundy Gang?”

“Not for long. Pete kicked him out, whopped him so bad he almost killed him. Garvey blamed me for what happened. He swore he’d come back and even the score with me once Pete was gone.”

“Why’d Pete kick him out of the gang?”

Annie stiffened, then lifted her shoulders in what she hoped was an indifferent shrug. “Snakeskin… gave me a hard time.” She felt Jake’s gaze on her, but couldn’t bring herself to meet his eyes.

“I see.” The sheriff exchanged a veiled look with Jake, then continued, “You find any sign of this Snakeskin fella?”

She shook her head. “I didn’t find anything. I rode back into town about noon.”