Outlaw Hearts (9 page)

A tear slipped down her cheek. “I have
principles
, Jake Harkner! Now I'm trusting that
you
have principles too. Don't betray me! And you just remember that if you shoot those men out there, you'll have to shoot me too, because I'm a
witness
! More than that, I'll get Pa's rifle and I'll kill you myself if you shoot down my friends! That will mean you'll have to defend yourself, as you keep talking about, and
kill
me! That rifle isn't any little derringer. You won't survive if I shoot you with that! What will it be, Jake? Will you kill me too? I thought that was one thing you
did
have principles about!”

He pressed the revolver against her throat. “Don't get in my way, Randy. Don't say a word to them, and don't get in my way, or I can't guarantee anything. I've never hurt a lady on purpose, but if it comes to a shoot-out, that's a different story. You stall those men and keep them outside. Don't you betray me, woman, after all your fancy talk about not being able to take money for a man!”

Miranda swallowed, feeling the cold steel against her throat. “It's time for you to learn about friendship and trust, Jake,” she said quietly, realizing the sheriff must be quite close to the cabin by now. “You just revealed some very intimate things about yourself to me, and I listened and understood. Do you really think I would turn around now and let the sheriff shoot you down or haul you away? Do you really think that?”

He took the gun away and slowly stepped back. “I don't know, but I'll damn well keep my ears open. Now get out there and make sure there is nothing around to give away my presence. And try to keep the sheriff outside!”

Miranda breathed deeply, struggling for composure. She walked back into the main room, pulling closed the curtain at the bedroom doorway, then started for the main door when she noticed the little pile of black hair on the wooden floor. Jake's hair! She quickly grabbed a broom and lifted a hand-tied rug, sweeping the hair under it and feeling Jake's dark eyes and cold gun watching her every move.

She put the broom back, glanced around the room. She smoothed her dress and ran her fingers through her hair. She opened the door then, stepping out and closing it behind her to greet Sheriff McCleave.

Miranda walked off the porch, giving Sheriff McCleave a smile as he rode closer with two deputies. “Sheriff! What brings you out this late in the day? It's nearly dark!”

“Evening, Mrs. Hayes. Just checking on you. Heard a rumor that someone suspected of belonging to Bill Kennedy's bunch was snooping around town asking about the shoot-out between that Jake Harkner and Luke Putnam. Grapevine has it Kennedy is looking for this Harkner fellow just as hard as the law is. Seems they had some kind of falling out, although we don't know why; but just knowing the man might be in the area makes me uneasy. We've been out scouting around, checking with other farmers and such to make sure there's been no trouble.”

Tell
him! Tell him!
Miranda could not understand why she could not obey the small voice that commanded her to do what was right and logical. Did she really believe Jake could shoot down all three of these men? Or was her reason for not speaking up more illogical and unbelievable—that she didn't want Jake to be hurt?

“I've been fine,” she told McCleave. “Since I'm the one who shot Jake Harkner, it's awfully far-fetched to think I would have anything to do with the man afterward, so it isn't likely this Kennedy person would come here looking for him. People must have told him that Mr. Harkner is probably dead or in Indian Territory by now.”

“That's true, but we have to make sure. Bansen, who owns the farm east of you, said a bunch of suspicious-looking men stopped at his place and asked for food and permission to water their horses. Bansen says they looked like the kind who would just as soon shoot you as look at you, so he didn't ask for any money—gave the men what they wanted and they rode on. One of them said something about ‘looking for the skunk' down in Cherokee country. My hunch is that it was Kennedy and his men, and if so, they've headed on south by now. Bansen is just damn lucky they were in an obliging mood, or him and his wife would be dead, or they might even have taken his wife with them and made her
wish
she was dead.”

Jake listened from inside. So, Kennedy was on his trail too, just like he thought. The man had gone on south, so this might be a damn good time to head north rather than into Indian Territory like he had planned. He was glad it wasn't Miranda's place Kennedy had stopped at. If he'd found her there alone…

He heard the sheriff apologizing for his reference to what Kennedy and his men might have done to Bansen's wife. “I hate to be so crude, but you've got to understand how dangerous it is for you out here, Mrs. Hayes,” the man was saying. “Why don't you come back to town with us tonight? You've got friends you could stay with. Kennedy and his bunch are a bad lot, believe me. Personally I hope that Harkner fellow is dead. Anybody who would ride with men like that has to be as bad as the rest of them.”

“I'm just fine right here, Sheriff. Besides, I couldn't pick up and leave at this hour. Why, I just started a pot of dumplings, and I have bread rising. You said yourself Kennedy and his men headed south, and in just a few more days I'll be leaving here myself, heading for Independence. You really must stop worrying about me.” She smiled for the man. “I have a fresh-baked pie on the table. Why don't you take it back with you and share it with your men? I'll get it for you.”

Jake pressed his back against the wall near the curtains as Miranda came inside. His gun was cocked and ready to fire. He heard a horse whinny, heard footsteps on the porch then, heavy ones, like those of a good-sized man.

“Sheriff,” he heard Miranda say, sounding surprised. “I was just wrapping a towel around the pie to bring it out to you. It's apple.”

Jake waited, every muscle and nerve end tense and alert. McCleave was inside the house! He listened intently.

“Mrs. Hayes, I didn't really come here because of Kennedy and his bunch. I have good reason to believe they're long gone from here. I just…I needed an excuse to come and see you once more, since I was gone when you came into town four days ago. I feel like I have to try once more to convince you to stay in Kansas City, mostly for your own safety, but also…because I'd like very much to court you.”

Jake grinned a little, relaxing slightly. So, that was the reason he had followed her inside. He couldn't blame the man for being infatuated with Miranda. He expected a lot of men desired her. “Please stay, Mrs. Hayes. I beg you again, not just for my sake but for your own, don't go to Nevada. It's just too dangerous. Not only is it wild, untamed country full of unruly men, but there's a lot of Indian trouble out west.”

Jake waited through a moment of silence. He couldn't see Miranda, but he could see the sheriff through a slit in the curtains. He was a big, stout man who needed to lose some weight off his middle.

“Sheriff, I have explained before why I can't stay. There are simply too many bad memories here, and I truly feel obligated to find Wesley. After that, and after I've had some time away from here, maybe I will come back.”

“Well, I'll be wishing for it real hard,” the sheriff told her.

Jake could see how the man looked at her, and it brought a surprising jealousy to his own heart. He had a distinct urge to shoot the man on the spot. He watched Miranda hand him a pie.

“You have to stop thinking about me and just take care of yourself, Sheriff McCleave; but I do appreciate your concern. You're very kind.”

McCleave sighed deeply, bringing the pie to his face to smell it. “Well, you can't blame a man for trying.” He shook his head. “What a waste. Not only are you a right handsome woman, but a good cook on top of it. It smells wonderful in here.”

Miranda put a hand on his arm and walked toward the door.
That's it
, Jake thought.
Get
him
back
outside. You're real good, Randy
Hayes.

“Well, now you can take some of that wonderful smell home with you,” she was saying. “And thank you, Sheriff, for coming out here to make sure I'm all right.”

The sheriff followed her out, holding the pie, and Jake thought what an easily fooled man he was. He listened as Miranda talked sweetly to all three men. Finally he heard the horses riding off, heard the door close.

He peered through the curtains again to see Miranda leaning against the door, looking relieved. “They're gone,” she said loudly.

Jake stepped out and walked past her to look out a front window. He saw the three men riding off in the distance. “Good work,” he told her.

“I didn't do it for you,” she answered, going back to stir the dumplings, not wanting to believe in her heart she cared anything for Jake Harkner. “I did it for them. I have no doubt you could have shot down all three of them in the blink of an eye if they tried anything. Men like that are no match for you, and I didn't want to see them die.”

He turned to her. “Then if you thought they could take me, you would have told?”

“I didn't say that. I only meant that if there was trouble, if they had perhaps seen you or some sign of you, they would have foolishly tried something and they would all be dead or at least hurt. I won't have that on my conscience.” She tested a dumpling. “You might have been hurt too,” she added, so softly Jake barely heard her. “Sit down and I'll give you something to eat.”

Jake moved to the table, still watching her, wondering at the way she had of ordering him about, wondering more at why he felt compelled to obey. It touched him that she seemed to care he might have been hurt again. He studied the lovely form that her yellow dress fit so well. The sheriff was right. It did smell wonderful in the house. She was a “right handsome” woman and a good cook. What man
wouldn't
want someone like her for a wife?

The thought so startled him that he drew in his breath and looked away from her, picking up his gun and whirling the chamber again to remove the bullets. He reasoned he had better get out of here as quickly as possible, before he lost his mind completely, if it was his mind he was losing. Maybe it was something else, though—maybe his heart. Did he still have one? He almost laughed out loud at the ridiculous thought and directed his attention to the gun then, warning himself to stop thinking about women altogether. When he was out of here and on his way north he'd find some whore who could get a few things out of his system. He reasoned that was why he thought about Miranda Hayes more fondly than made sense for a man like him. He'd just been too long without.

Miranda was setting fresh bread on the table now, and he struggled to ignore the soft look of her as she moved about the room, the way she was softly humming. The crazy woman actually seemed happy! She had just sent away a man who could have gotten a notorious outlaw out of her house. She'd just turned down an opportunity to make five thousand dollars for herself, and she was walking around humming! She poured both of them some coffee and set a bowl of dumplings and vegetables in front of him, then took a chair across the table from him.

“Well, it's nice to have someone to share a meal with,” she spoke up, “and good that you can sit at the table instead of me having to carry a tray to the bed. Just go easy on that stomach of yours. Don't eat too much too fast. It will be nice to see you hold something down for once.”

Jake set the gun aside and picked up a fork. He stabbed a dumpling and took a bite. “Real good,” he told her. “A couple more meals like this and a little more rest and I'll be out of here. You can return to whatever kind of life is normal for you, get yourself to Nevada, whatever.”

Miranda looked at him, again surprised at herself for thinking how she would miss having him around. “You still going to Indian Territory? Sheriff McCleave says that's where that Bill Kennedy probably headed.”

Jake swallowed more of the dumpling stew. “I'll go north, then maybe west to Oregon or California. It's not likely anybody out west will know who Jake Harkner is. I've got a little money—might even figure out a way to live on the side of the law, kind of start over. What do you think of that?”

Miranda found herself smiling wryly. “The notorious Jake Harkner, a farmer, perhaps?”

He shrugged. “Sure. I could do that.” He frowned then. “Well, maybe not a farmer—a gunsmith, maybe.”

Miranda laughed lightly. “That sounds more like an occupation you could handle.”

Jake watched her eyes, astounded that for a moment she looked at him almost lovingly. He looked back down at his food and took another mouthful.
Jesus, it is definitely time to get out of here
, he told himself. “What the hell am I saying?” he said aloud. “I'll never be anything but a man on the run. And why should I work for money when I can get it the easy way? There's no law farther west—perfect place for a man like me.”

Miranda frowned. “You mean I nursed you back to health just so you could go back out there and rob and kill again?” She watched him stiffen at the words, watched his dark eyes quickly turn angry again as he broke off a piece of bread from the loaf she had set on the table.

“It was your choice, lady. Maybe you should have turned me in to that sheriff.”

Miranda watched him dunk the bread into the juice of the stew, then bite off a piece. Y
ou
don't fool me, Jake Harkner
, she thought.
You
really
were
thinking
about
changing
your
ways. You just don't want anyone to know that sometimes you actually have decent thoughts.
There was the little boy again. It had come out when he smiled and talked about living a normal life. It was the young boy who wanted that, but the man was telling him he couldn't hope for such things. He had gone too far down the wrong path.

Miranda picked up the bread and used a knife to cut off a piece for herself. The room hung silent except for the sound of clinking forks. Miranda thought how easily defensive he was, realized that to get him talking again she had to change the subject. He was not about to continue discussing the possibility of being a settled man and leading an ordinary life. “How old are you, Jake?”

He took a swallow of coffee. “Thirty.” He finally met her eyes again. “You?”

Miranda buttered her bread. “Twenty.”

He stabbed another dumpling. “That's not very old for a woman who's been through all that you have. You must have been pretty young when you married.”

“I was sixteen.”

Again, Jake could not look at her. Sixteen. He thought how good it must have been, bedding a sixteen-year-old virgin beauty like her. Now that she had known a man, she'd probably be even better in bed. Maybe she even missed it. Damn her! He had to quit allowing those thoughts! He grabbed up his coffee cup and took another swallow, suddenly rising and scooting back his chair. “I can't eat any more. I've got to get my gear so I can oil my guns. If I can get a good night's rest, I'll be out of your way tomorrow.” He headed for the bedroom to find his socks.

“Jake, that's too soon. You can't go riding off the first day you start feeling better. You're still healing.”

Jake turned to meet her eyes, saw the true concern there. They just watched each other for a moment, and he knew she was feeling the same thing he was—he didn't really want to leave, and she didn't want him to go. “It's best I go,” he told her. “You know I'm right, Randy.”

Their eyes held in mutual understanding.
Yes
, she thought,
perhaps
it
is
best
you
leave
at
that
. She felt her cheeks getting hot, wondered at her own stupidity at allowing herself to be concerned for the very kind of man she should despise. She turned away. “I'll go get your gear for you.” She hurried out, unable to meet his dark eyes again, and unable to control the tears that were forming in her own.