Tales of Western Romance (3 page)

Macie wrapped her arms around Bowdry’s
middle, careful to avoid the wound in his side. It was rather
pleasant, riding behind him. His broad back blocked the wind and
made a nice pillow for her head.

Strange, she wasn’t more upset about finding
herself in the Old West with a complete stranger, one who had
recently killed a man. But then, there was no reason to be upset.
She was only dreaming, after all.

Chapter 3

The ghost town rose up out of the prairie
like a mirage, shimmering in the light of the setting sun, only to
fade to dull gray as the sun dropped below the horizon.

Macie shivered as Bowdry reined the stallion
to a halt in front of a dilapidated building. The sign over the
door read
The Palace Hotel.
She thought it a rather
pretentious name for a hotel stuck out in the middle of
nowhere.

The town itself had been little more than a
block long. Judging by the number of saloons, the inhabitants had
quite a taste for whiskey. Besides the saloons and the hotel, the
only other businesses in evidence had been a blacksmith and a
barber.

Swinging his leg over the stallion’s withers,
Bowdry dismounted.

Refusing any help, Macie slid off the horse’s
back. “Is it safe to stay here?”

Bowdry shrugged. “I reckon so. I don’t see
anybody else around, do you?”

“
No, but…” She shivered as a chill wind
blew a tumbleweed down the middle of the dusty street. “It feels, I
don’t know, eerie.”

“
Well,” Bowdry said with a grin. “It is
a ghost town.”

“
Maybe our ghost horse will protect
us,” Macie muttered.

“
Maybe so,” Bowdry said,
chuckling.

“
Shouldn’t we tie him up or
something?”

Bowdry shook his head as he slipped the
bridle from the stallion’s head. “He’s not going anywhere.”

Puzzling over his reply, Macie followed
Bowdry into the hotel. As was to be expected, the floors were
covered with dust, as were the chairs and the registration desk.
Lacey cobwebs dangled from the corners of the ceiling.

The steps creaked as they made their way up
the stairs. Bowdry opened the door to the first room they came
to.

“
I’ll take the next room,” Macie said,
though she wasn’t looking forward to being alone with night coming
on.

Bowdry shrugged. “Suit yourself, but I’ve
only got one blanket.”

Macie stared at him. “I don’t suppose you’d
let me have it?”

“
Sorry, but I’m willing to
share.”

She stared at him a moment, her thoughts
racing. Sleep alone and be cold, or share a bed with a remarkably
handsome, sexy man and be warm. It really wasn’t much of a
choice.

Bowdry stifled a grin as she followed him
into the room. She was a pretty thing, slender and not too tall,
with a mess of dark brown curls, a sprinkling of freckles across
her nose, and eyes as blue as the Pacific.

Bowdry obligingly shook the dust from the
faded sheet and the lumpy mattress while she swept the floor with
an old broom she found in a hallway closet. A stub of a candle
provided a bit of light.

Wincing, Bowdry dropped his gear on the foot
of the bed. Rummaging in his saddlebags, he pulled out a sack of
tobacco, and a package of papers. Under Macie’s curious gaze, he
proceeded to roll and light a cigarette.

“
I’ve never seen anyone do that,” she
remarked.

“
People don’t smoke where you come
from?”

“
The smart ones don’t. Smoking’s bad
for your health, you know.”

“
Says who?”

“
Doctors.”

He grunted softly. “Just where do you come
from, anyway?”

“
California.”

He arched one brow. “You’re a long way from
home.”

“
Longer than you think. Where am I,
anyway?”

“
South Dakota.”

“
South Dakota! What year is
this?”

“
Don’t you know?”

“
Would I ask if I did?”

“
It’s 1880.”

She blinked at him as she tried to absorb
that.
South Dakota. 1880. Imagine that.

He regarded her curiously a moment, then
said, “How is that you don’t know what year it is?”

“
You wouldn’t believe me if I told
you.”

“
Try me.”

“
You’re bleeding.”

Frowning, he glanced down at the bright red
stain that was spreading over his shirt front. Jaw clenched, he
dropped his cigarette on the floor, stubbed it out with his boot
heel. After taking off his shirt, he removed the bloody cloths
wrapped around his mid-section and tossed them aside.

“
Here, let me.” Using water from his
canteen, Macie pulled a clean strip of cloth from his saddlebag,
wet it, and washed the wound.

Bowdry held up one hand, staying her when she
would have bandaged it again.

She watched in amazement as he chewed a
handful of tobacco, then pressed it over the wound.

“
Okay,” he said, his voice tight with
pain, “bandage it up.”

Muttering, “I hope you know what you’re
doing,” she wrapped the last strip of clean cloth around his
waist.

Delving into his saddlebags once again, he
pulled out two hunks of beef jerky and handed one of them to
Macie.

Sitting at the head of the bed, Macie nibbled
on the dried meat. It didn’t taste anything like what she was used
to back home.

“
I don’t know about you,” Bowdry said
when he finished eating, “but I’m tuckered out.”

“
If that means tired, you’re not the
only one,” Macie admitted. She glanced at the narrow bed, then up
at Bowdry. Her stomach quivered when he smiled at her.

With every nerve on edge, she stretched out
on the bed, as close to the edge of the mattress as she could get
without falling off.

Bowdry chuckled as he stretched out beside
her, then covered the two of them with the blanket. “Relax, pretty
lady,” he murmured as he closed his eyes. “I’m too sore, and too
tired, to bother you tonight.”

He was snoring before she could come up with
a good retort.

Macie doubted she would get much sleep, lying
beside a strange man in a strange bed in a strange century, but the
next thing she knew, it was morning. When she opened her eyes,
Bowdry was propped up on one elbow, watching her.

Macie frowned as a rush of color warmed her
cheeks. “What are you staring at?”

He shrugged. “Nothing much else to look
at.”

At a loss for words, her gaze slid away from
his.

“
I guess I owe you my thanks,” Bowdry
mused.

“
You’re welcome.”

“
You never told me where you were
from.”

“
Yes, I did.”

“
Right. California.” He grunted softly.
“I’ve been to California a time or two, but I never saw anyone
quite like you.” His gaze moved over her again. “Or dressed quite
like that.”

“
You just weren’t there at the right
time,” Macie retorted with a grin, and then frowned, wondering how
she could make
Relampago
take her back to her own
time.

“
You got a first name?” Bowdry
asked.

“
Macie.”

“
That’s an odd name for a pretty
girl.”

“
Ace Bowdry is an odd name for an
Indian.”

“
My mother named me after my old
man.”

“
My mother named me after her
mother.”

Macie’s cheeks grew hotter under Bowdry’s
regard, even as wings of excitement fluttered in the pit of her
stomach. There was no denying he was an incredibly handsome man,
just as there was no denying that he looked exactly the way she had
always pictured the man she would marry, from his long black hair
and deep brown eyes to his tawny skin and six-pack abs. The fact
that he was an Indian intrigued her, which prompted her to ask,
“What kind of Indian are you?”

“
Cheyenne, on my mother’s side. White
on the other.”

“
Oh. Are your parents still
alive?”

“
No.”

“
I’m sorry.”

A muscle throbbed in his jaw.

She was tempted to ask what had happened to
them, but the look in his eyes warned her to keep silent.

Pressure on her bladder had her sitting up
and glancing around, then chiding herself for expecting to find
indoor plumbing in such a primitive place. Murmuring, “Excuse me,”
she hurried out of the room and out of the hotel.

The stallion whinnied at her as she ducked
around the corner of the building and took cover behind a fat bush.
If she had to go wandering through time, why couldn’t she have
traveled to some place with indoor plumbing and toilet paper?

Bowdry was waiting for her in the lobby when
she returned to the hotel. “Ready to go?”

“
Where are we going?”

“
Someplace with food and hot
water.”

“
Sounds good to me. How are you
feeling?”

“
Like I haven’t eaten in a week. Let’s
go.”

* * * * *

It was dark when they reached the town of
Whiskey Creek. Macie glanced from side to side as they rode down
the street, thinking it looked like a twin to the town they had
just left behind.

Bowdry reined up in front of the Montecito
Hotel. Swinging a leg over the stallion’s withers, he dismounted,
then lifted Macie from the horse’s back.

“
I could have got down on my own,”
Macie said, noting the fine lines of pain around his
mouth.

“
Yeah. Well…” He shrugged.

“
Are you sure we shouldn’t tie him
up?”

Bowdry shook his head. “He won’t go anywhere
until his reason for being here is done. Let’s get something to
eat.”

Macie followed Bowdry into the hotel dining
room, a quick gaze taking it all in – the tables covered in
red-and-white checked cloths, the cowboy hats hanging on the rack
by the door, the rough attire of most of the occupants.

They found a table near a window and sat
across from each other. A harried looking waitress appeared a few
minutes later. Bowdry ordered a steak “and all the trimmin’s” and
after a moment’s hesitation, Macie asked for the same. She wasn’t a
big meat eater at home, but hey, this was 1880. Cows in this day
and age probably weren’t shot full of hormones.

Bowdry leaned back in his chair, his arms
crossed over his chest. “So, I’m still waiting to hear why you
don’t know what year it is.”

“
You really want to know? All right,
I’ll tell you. When I woke up yesterday morning, it was April 8,
2010.”

“
No sh… I mean…” He shook his head, and
then he frowned. “You’re telling the truth, aren’t you?”

“
I guess you don’t believe me. Not that
I’d blame you.”

“
No, I believe you.”

“
You do?”

“
There are stories among my people of
medicine men who rode
Relampago
through the mists of
time.”

“
Really? How did they find their way
back?”

“
I don’t know. Same way they got there,
I guess. Why? You in a hurry to go back to where you came
from?”

Macie thought about it for a moment, then
shook her head. “No.”

Bowdry leaned forward. “It’s said the only
time
Relampago
appears to most people is when they’re in
danger. Is that what happened with you?”

Macie’s gaze slid away from his. How could
she tell him she had been about to commit suicide? Thinking about
it now filled her with shame. There were people all over the world
who had it much worse than she did. She lived in a free country.
She had a nice house, her health, a late model car, enough food to
eat, and money in the bank.

“
Macie?”

She blew out a breath. He was a stranger to
her. They would part ways, and she would never see him again, so
what difference did it make what he thought of her? But she
couldn’t admit the truth, so she shrugged, and said, “I don’t want
to talk about it.”

He looked at her curiously for a moment, then
shrugged. “If that’s the way you want it.”

Macie was relieved when the waitress arrived
with their meal. She didn’t know why she cared what Bowdry thought
of her, but she did. “You were the one in danger,” Macie said after
a time. “Why didn’t he appear to you?”

“
I don’t know,” Bowdry said, and then
he grinned. “Maybe he brought us together for a reason.”

“
Yeah? What reason would that
be?”

“
Well, since
you
found
me
, I thought maybe you’d know.”

“
I don’t have a clue.”

“
Maybe if we spend some time together,
we’ll figure it out.”

His words, combined with the teasing
expression in his deep brown eyes, sent a wave of heat spiraling
through her. Spending time with Ace Bowdry certainly wouldn’t be a
hardship in any sense of the word.

After dinner, Bowdry secured two rooms in the
hotel, then asked the desk clerk for lots of hot water to be sent
up to their rooms as soon as possible.

Macie felt somewhat lost when she entered her
room and closed the door, along with an unexpected sense of
disappointment that they wouldn’t be sharing the same room—and the
same bed. She shook the feeling away. What was she doing here,
anyway? Surely whatever fate had sent her here must know she could
end her life in this century as easily as her own.