The Horseman's Bride (17 page)

But she couldn’t let him refuse. Jason Tanner Denby was the proudest, most stubborn man she had ever known. But she knew how to be stubborn, too. She would get through to him if she had to stand outside his cell all day.

After dropping Annie off at her friend’s house, Quint and Clara drove up Main Street and parked the auto in front of the marshal’s office, which fronted the city jail. Sam Farley was at his desk. He rose to greet them. “Your friend’s back there in his cell,” he said. “But he won’t be here for long. Just got a telegram from Missouri. The folks back there aren’t wasting any time with this. They’ve already sent a U.S. Deputy Marshal from Springfield with the extradition papers. He’ll be arriving today on the three-fifteen, with just enough time to pick up his prisoner and get him on the eastbound train at four.”

Clara felt the blood drain from her face. Her knees were wilting beneath her. She clutched Quint’s arm and
forced herself to stand ramrod straight. “I want to see him,” she said.

The marshal frowned, looking more uncomfortable than stern. “Don’t know if I can do that, Clara. He gave me a specific request that you weren’t to be allowed back there.”

Quint stepped forward, blocking the marshal’s view of the hallway that led to the cells. “Well, how about this? What if you and I were talking, and you took your eyes off her for a few seconds, long enough for her to slip out of sight? You couldn’t be blamed for that, now, could you?”

“Well, I don’t know…”

Quint grinned. “Say, who are you picking to win the pennant this year, Sam? Don’t know about you, but I’ve got my money on the Red Sox.”

“The Red Sox? Those bums? You’ve gotta be kidding. Let me tell you…”

Clara couldn’t be sure if the marshal was going along with the ruse or if Quint had sucked him into it, but there was no time to wonder. While the men continued their good-natured argument, she ducked behind Quint and made for the hallway.

As she stepped into the shadows, a distant sound chilled her to the marrow of her bones.

It was the mournful whistle of an approaching train.

Slumped on the edge of his metal bunk, Jace had heard the whistle, too. Sam Farley, who’d shown him nothing but kindness, had informed him that the U.S.
Deputy Marshal would be coming to take him back to Springfield. Jace could only pray he’d be gone before his sister arrived. Whatever the cost, he had to keep her out of this mess. All Ruby needed to do was open her pretty mouth, and everything he’d endured over the past three months would be for nothing.

Rising, he stretched his cramped limbs. For a man used to an active life, confinement was hell. Being hanged couldn’t be much worse than this. In a way, it would set him free.

Since his arrest he’d had plenty of time to think—too much time. Needless to say, most of his thoughts were of Clara. Memories of their loving haunted his dreams and tormented his days. There’d been moments when he would have bargained away his soul just to hold her one more time. But Jace had willed those moments to pass. His soul was the one thing of value he had left. Throw that away and he would no longer be a man.

But that didn’t keep him from wanting what he couldn’t have. Impossible fantasies plagued his mind—Clara as his wife, wearing his ring, sharing his home and his bed, mothering his children. Even worse was the mocking voice in his head, the voice that taunted him by the hour, reminding him that he could have everything he wanted for the price of a few words—words he’d vowed to carry in silence to his grave.

“Hello, Tanner.” Clara’s voice was barely a whisper but Jace would have known it anywhere. She stood in the shadowed hallway outside the row of cells, looking small and sad. Jace stifled a groan.

He’d asked the marshal to keep her away. Not because of pride, but because he’d feared her presence would be the one thing that could push him over the edge. And he’d been right. Just seeing her was torture.

“I didn’t want you to come, Clara,” he said.

“I know.” She moved forward to press against the bars of his cell. “I’m sorry but I had to see you.”

The urge to reach through the bars and clasp her close was eating him alive, but he forced himself to stay back. Wanting her could break him. He couldn’t let it happen. “We already said goodbye. Is this the way you want to remember me, as a criminal behind bars?”

“You’re not a criminal! You killed a man defending someone you loved! Any fair judge and jury would see that. If your sister’s lawyer can get the trial moved, and if she tells her story—”

“Leave my sister out of this! There’s nothing she can do except make things worse. No thanks to you, she’s going to be wasting a long train trip. Go home to your horses and forget me, Clara. That’s the kindest thing you can do.”

He expected her to back away or burst into tears. Clara did neither. “I love you, and I’m not giving up on you, Tanner,” she said. “So you mustn’t give up on yourself.”

Her hands stretched through the bars—those small, callused, work-stained hands he’d fallen in love with the first time he’d met her. They reached out to him, silently begging for his touch.

Jace felt himself beginning to weaken. He seized
her fingers and pressed them to his lips. “I love you, too,” he murmured. “I’ll always love you. But you have to go. Please, before I do something I’ll regret to the end of my days.”

“I don’t want to leave you,” she whispered. “Not till it’s time.”

They were still clasping hands when Clara heard the rising sound of voices in the office out front. The wooden floor in the hallway creaked under the weight of approaching footsteps.

There was no mistaking the U.S. Deputy Marshal. He was a big man with a jowly face and a middle-aged paunch that overhung his belt. His silver badge was pinned to his vest, half hidden by the jacket of his brown suit. His narrow eyes were steely gray beneath the brim of his Stetson.

“Let’s go, Denby. We’ve just got time to make that train.”

Tanner had released Clara’s hands. She felt the pressure on her arm as Quint drew her back against the wall. The lawman waited while Sam Farley opened the cell and handcuffed the prisoner. Tanner made no effort to resist.

Their eyes met one last time. Clara fought back a surge of tears. She didn’t want him to remember the sight of her crying.

In a loose procession they filed back through the corridor. Sam Farley led the way, followed by the U.S. Marshal and his prisoner. Clara and Quint brought up the rear.

Emerging from the hallway, Sam halted abruptly. The people behind him almost collided before they moved forward again and spread out into the office.

Standing in the doorway was a stunning woman. She looked to be in her early thirties, strikingly tall, with a wealth of red-gold hair spilling from its pins. Her dove-gray traveling suit was wrinkled. Her cobalt eyes—the same blazing hue as Tanner’s—were bloodshot with weariness. Beside her, the bespectacled man clutching a briefcase seemed a mere shadow.

Clara heard a subtle groan from Tanner.

Ruby Denby Rumford had arrived.

Her first words were for the U.S. Marshal. “Where,” she demanded in a throaty, imperious voice, “do you think you’re taking my brother?”

The federal lawman was not intimidated. “He’ll be going back to Springfield for trial, ma’am. I’m escorting him to the train now.”

“I can’t allow you do that.”

The man shot her a contemptuous glare. “You don’t say? Step aside, ma’am. We’ve got a train to catch.”

Ruby stood her ground. “I said you can’t take him. My brother is innocent.”

“Ruby, for God’s sake—” Tanner blurted, but she cut him off.

“No. It’s all right, Jace. I can’t let you do this anymore.” She turned back to the federal marshal. “He’s innocent. My lawyer has proof, a signed confession right here in this briefcase.”
All eyes were on her as she squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. “Jace didn’t kill Hollis Rumford,” she said. “I did.”

It took time for the full story to emerge. Jace—whose real name Clara was still getting used to—was freed from his handcuffs. Sam Farley ordered coffee for himself and the four people sitting around his desk, as well as for Clara and Quint, who’d been allowed to stay and listen. The four-o’clock train arrived and departed with two empty seats.

When all was said, it came down to this. On the night in question, Hollis Rumford had been pounding on the bedroom door, threatening to kill his wife. She’d had seconds to place a frantic call to her brother before Hollis smashed his way into the room and began beating her. To save her own life, Ruby had seized her husband’s loaded pistol from the drawer of the nightstand and shot him dead.

Soon after that, Jace had arrived in response to her call. Knowing that murder charges would destroy Ruby’s future and leave her two little girls without a mother, he’d convinced her to let him take the blame for the shooting. Still in shock, Ruby had agreed, and Jace had fled into the night.

Weeks later, a conscience-stricken Ruby had gone to her lawyer and told him the truth. The lawyer had been confident of winning an acquittal on a plea of self-defense, but he’d advised her to wait until Jace could be located to serve as a witness. With Jace missing and
out of touch, the matter had hung unresolved until Clara’s frantic telephone call.

Clara listened in amazement as the story unfolded. Emotions surged, clashed and faded—relief, dismay, admiration, anger. Had Jace lied to her? As she recalled, he’d never really admitted to killing Hollis Rumford. But he’d implied it and let her draw her own conclusions. Wasn’t that the same as lying?

He could have trusted her with the truth. But how could he? In her desperation to save him, Clara would almost certainly have betrayed his secret. Jace had been prepared to give his life for his sister and her little girls. His loyalty and courage astounded her. How could she not love such a man?

By the time the interview was finished and a decision made, shadows were long in the room. Jace would go back to Springfield with Ruby and do whatever was necessary to wipe the slate clean. They’d be leaving on the early morning train, in the company of the federal marshal and Ruby’s lawyer. The case could take weeks or months. But neither Jace nor his sister could move on until everything was resolved.

“I’ll come back, Clara,” Jace promised as he kissed her goodbye. “And when I do, it will be to lay everything I own on the table and ask your father for the honor of your hand in marriage.”

“You already have my answer,” she whispered.

“And you have mine,” he said, holding her tight. “All I ask is that you trust me and wait.”

C
lara and Jace were married on the last day of August under a sky as blue as the groom’s eyes. The aspens below the peaks were just turning gold, and the late-summer roses were still blooming around the ranch house. It was as perfect as any day could be.

Quint and Annie had come from San Francisco for the wedding. A glowingly pregnant Annie had brought Clara’s finished gown with her, a fantasy creation of the white Indian silk shot with silver threads, now crowned by a veil of floating tulle. Ruby, exhausted after the trial that had acquitted her of her husband’s murder, had taken her daughters on an extended trip to Europe. But in her absence she had left a gift—Galahad’s pedigree tucked between the folds of an exquisite Irish linen tablecloth.

The couple planned to live near the ranch on a section of land Judd had given them as a wedding present. Their house was already under construction
and would be finished by the time they returned from their honeymoon. Clara would pursue her dream of raising fine horses. Jace, who could work from anywhere, would carry on with his consulting business.

As time for the ceremony approached, the house and yard bustled with activity. On the lawn, Daniel was busy arranging rows of chairs for the arriving guests. Katy, in peach organdy, was draping a garland of ivy and fresh flowers over the archway where the ceremony would take place. Mouthwatering aromas drifted from the barbecue pit in the backyard, where long tables had been set up on the grass.

Upstairs, in the master bedroom, Mary, Hannah and Annie were dressing Clara for the ceremony. It was a happy scene, replete with jokes, hugs and laughter as they buttoned her into her gown, pinned up her hair and added the sheer veil to her tiny pearl tiara.

Clara studied them—the three strong women who’d shaped her life. Mary, who’d pioneered a new land with her husband, given him seven children and carried on alone after his death. Hannah, who’d married to give her unborn baby a name, then fallen in love with her husband. And Annie, who’d loved and wed the father of her sister’s child. What magnificent examples they’d been to her. How lucky she was to have them here today.

Clara’s questions about her parentage remained unasked. But the answers no longer mattered. Hannah belonged with Judd. Quint belonged with Annie. And she belonged to all of them. That was enough to know.

“It’s time!” Katy came pounding up the stairs, her face flushed, her hair ribbon askew. Clara straightened the ribbon, then waited for her grandmother, mother and aunt to go outside and take their seats. Katy would walk behind to look after her train and veil.

Judd waited for her at the bottom of the stairs, his eyes bright with pride. He was the only father Clara had ever known, and he’d more than earned the right to walk beside her today. Smiling, she took his arm. Together they moved out through the open doorway into the sunlit afternoon.

Every face turned toward her, but Clara saw only one. Jace stood at the end of the aisle, with the preacher on his right and Quint, his best man, on his left.

Jace’s eyes warmed at the sight of her. A tender smile lit his face as she took her place beside him and waited for the words that would make them husband and wife.

Everything was as it should be. They stood together on the threshold of a new life, surrounded by love.