Never Love a Lawman (35 page)

“The weather’s going to slow us down, too,” Will told him. “And if there’s not a new layer of snow laid down, every trek the men make out there will be visible to anyone who goes looking for a trail.”

“We can’t do anything about the weather,” Wyatt said. “We’ll do what we can and hope for the best.”

Rachel had been eating quietly during this exchange. Now she looked up and asked carefully, “What happens to the spur and the mine if I die?” She noted they shared a similar reaction, although that was hardly surprising. They both recoiled, very nearly to the same degree. Wyatt’s face was the paler of the two, and after last night’s confession, she knew something of the pain he was experiencing. “I think there must be a clear plan,” she said. When they remained silent, she added, “For inheritance. We have to think about that.”

“You’re Wyatt’s wife,” Will said. “Doesn’t that mean it will go to—” He stopped, shook his head. “I don’t like talking about this, and I’m not sure it’s any of my business. I’ll just finish my meal and go back out and get to work. You’ll be in the office later, Wyatt?”

“I expect. To clean my guns, if nothing else.”

Will nodded, bent his head, and wiped up his plate in record time. The silence at the table unnerved him, and he was glad to be heading out before the shouting started. He thought about seeing Miss Rose first, maybe try to dodge a few of her darts before he spoke to Sir Nigel; then he decided to save her for last. Could be that she’d let him escort her back to his room above the sheriff’s office, maybe let him take her to bed. He sure wasn’t going to bunk down with her in a brothel, at least he was pretty sure he wasn’t. It was hard to say which one of them was going to give in first.

“Will?” Wyatt said. That no-account Beatty boy was staring at his empty plate. “You want seconds?”

Will’s head jerked up. “What? No. Oh, no.” His chair scraped the floor hard as he jumped to his feet. “Sorry about your floor, ma’am. Wyatt says you’re particular.” He failed to take note of her puzzled expression but saw her start to rise. “No. No point in you gettin’ up. I know the way out. Thanks for breakfast.” He continued his nervous chatter as he backed out of the kitchen and fumbled with his jacket, scarf, boots, and hat. “Damn fine biscuits,” he said, opening the door behind him. Wind and snow swirled into the mudroom, and his very last words were lost in an eerie howl.

Wyatt and Rachel stared at each other, then shook their heads in unison. “You scared him off,” Wyatt said. “Scared me, too, for that matter.”

“But you’re still here.”

“That’s right. I am.” He stood slowly. “You want to pick a fight with me?”

“Kitchen?”

“Bedroom.”

Her smile appeared slowly. “Not as viscerally satisfying perhaps but more widely respected.”

Wyatt yanked her out of the chair and tossed her over his shoulder; then he headed for the bedroom to prove precisely how wrong she was.

Rachel wrapped a cardinal-red woolen scarf around her head, face, and neck, forgoing a bonnet entirely, and braced herself to entertain the cold. Other than short trips to the spring, the woodpile, or the outhouse, she hadn’t been outside for three days. It was easy for Wyatt to say that she was better off indoors because he was getting out daily. He’d spoken to nearly every household about Foster Maddox’s impending arrival, but he’d have made rounds to check on folks whether or not he had an agenda. He and Will Beatty were not only the intermediaries for news and gossip during the storm; they also helped people get around when it was essential for them to do so.

One of Sid Walker’s granddaughters survived a breech birth because that no-account Beatty boy was able to bring the midwife in time, and Wyatt stopped a drunk and staggering Bud Fuller from leaving the Miner Key in nothing but his union suit after literally losing his shirt.

Rachel appreciated Wyatt’s entertaining stories when he returned home each evening, but she felt a desperate need to get out herself. She’d always left the house regularly, even when she was discouraging visitors. During those first fifteen months in Reidsville, her isolation was on her own terms. It was another thing entirely to have it imposed on her by the weather.

And Wyatt.

She understood why he was discouraging her from leaving. In the main, it was simply dangerous. Several times during the storm, the snowfall reached the whiteout conditions that Sid had predicted. The potential was there for someone who hadn’t taken proper precautions to get lost on their way to the outhouse. To prevent that, Wyatt had run ropes to the only places he decided Rachel needed to go.

It was helpful and appreciated, but it wasn’t enough. Rachel wanted a guide rope that stretched all the way to Artie Showalter’s, and not having it wasn’t going to keep her from leaving home—not any longer.

Wyatt’s trail was easy for Rachel to follow. He had cleared a path in the snow all the way to the end of the flagstones. Beyond that, he’d simply pushed his way through. She did precisely the same, although her passage was made easier by his earlier ones. Snow fell lightly but steadily, and Rachel had no difficulty seeing where she was going. She’d fashioned a pack for herself from scrap material and carried it on her back. It was stuffed with two gowns in different states of completion, one a traveling dress intended for Virginia Moody, the other a pink-and-white sateen tea gown that Gracie Showalter had ordered for Molly’s birthday.

Rachel paused to catch her breath when she reached the corner of Aspen Street. Most of the shop owners had cleared the sidewalks in front of their businesses, not that there was much in the way of pedestrian traffic. Stepping up to the walk, Rachel suddenly felt conspicuous. She was entirely alone.

It was a sharp reminder of the other reason Wyatt did not want her venturing out alone. She made a clear target. Erring on the side of caution, Wyatt did not want to suppose that Foster Maddox and his companions would arrive at the same time. He had to consider that Foster might have sent some of his men ahead of him. Even when the names Will collected at the Commodore, the boardinghouse, and the brothel revealed none that were familiar to Rachel, Wyatt remained stubbornly wary.

Rachel lifted her scarf a fraction higher so that only her eyes were visible. Glancing at her reflection in the emporium’s large window, she was hardly recognizable to herself. That gave her the confidence to continue.

It was late in the afternoon by the time Rachel finished with her errands and arrived at Wyatt’s office. She stood in the door and stamped her feet. No one was in the front, and no one came from the back to greet her. She called for Wyatt and Will, but neither answered. Fully expecting that one or the other of them would appear soon, Rachel unwound her scarf and draped it over a chair. She unbuttoned her coat, but didn’t remove it, and stood in front of the stove warming herself for a few minutes before she took off her kid gloves and shrugged off her backpack.

There was a pot of coffee on the stove, and she poured herself a cup. It was slightly bitter—the last of the morning brew, no doubt—but it was warm and satisfying. Since the news of her marriage to Wyatt had become known to everyone, she visited his office at least once a week, occasionally bringing him something to eat, but more often because she liked to see him sitting behind his desk with his long legs stretched out at an angle, his boot heels perched on the lip of a drawer. She never shared the reason that she made a point of dropping in, but she never tried to deny it to herself.

The unvarnished, and sometimes uncomfortable, truth was that he could make her heart stutter.

By way of an experiment, Rachel took up Wyatt’s position at the desk, swiveled in his chair exactly as he did, and propped her feet on the edge of a drawer that she’d opened for just that purpose. She clasped her hands together over her abdomen and tilted her head at what she thought of as a mildly inquisitive angle. She lowered her eyelids to that sleepy, vaguely bored position at half-mast in which he often contemplated the comings and goings of nearly everyone in town.

“You planning on running for office?” Wyatt asked from the doorway.

Rachel didn’t flinch. Conversationally, she asked, “Did you know you can see right through a crack in the back of the rolltop when you sit like this?”

“Is that right?”

“While you’re just about invisible back here to anyone passing by or coming in from the street.”

He grunted softly, tapping his snow-covered boots against the doorjamb before he closed the door behind him.

“I imagine people are always surprised how you know who’s coming to see you.”

“They’re not surprised at all. They think I’m prescient.”

Rachel laughed, dropped her feet to the floor, and rolled the chair out from behind the desk. “You, Wyatt Cooper, are a fraud.”

“Only if you reveal the well-kept secrets of my trade. Otherwise, I’m prescient.”

She stood, crossed the distance to him in a few long strides, and flung her arms around his neck. “Hello, Sheriff.” She gave him a loud, smacking kiss on the lips.

Wyatt’s arms circled her at the waist. When she would have skittered away as quickly as she’d come, he had a good grip on her. One of his eyebrows shot up. “I bet you think that kiss answers for everything.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Which means you know
exactly
what I’m talking about. What are you doing here?”

“I thought it might be nice if we walked home together.”

“Rachel.”

She made a face at him. “Oh, very well. If you must know, I couldn’t stand being confined to the house a moment longer. I couldn’t work on Virginia’s traveling dress without another fitting, so I went to see her, and I thought if I was walking that far, I might as well stop at Gracie’s with the tea gown that she ordered for Molly’s birthday. I just finished a little while ago.
Then
I thought it might be nice if we walked home together.”

“We agreed you wouldn’t go out.”

“No. You said I shouldn’t leave. I didn’t agree to anything.” She noticed that his hands had dropped to his sides. She removed any lingering temptation he had to shake her by backing away from his easy reach. “I know what you wanted, Wyatt, but really, it was becoming intolerable.”

He wasn’t the least sympathetic. “I’d think you’d find that being abducted by one of Maddox’s men is not to your liking, either.”

“You have no proof that anyone in his employ is here already. And where would they take me? The bend’s still blocked, and the trains aren’t running. The snow’s made it almost impossible to get from here to anywhere except by sled and pack mule. I think you’re being overly cautious.”

“You’re merely convincing me of all the reasons Foster might find it more convenient to kill you.”

She sighed. “I should never have mentioned making a will. Foster’s never made that kind of threat against me.”

“He never had so many reasons. Millions of them.”

Rachel held up her hands, palms out. “Please. Don’t.”

Wyatt exhaled slowly, nodded once. “I was just going to look over some papers. I’ll be ready to go in a few minutes.”

“All right.” She stepped out of his way. “Where’s Will?”

“With Jake Reston at the bank. He’s helping Jake close.” He sat at the desk and began going through the papers scattered across the top.

“No one’s locked up in the back?”

“Not a soul. I thought I’d have to bring in Ezra Reilly for drunk and disorderly. Virginia’s got him spinning in circles about the wedding. He doesn’t believe she’s not working over at Rose’s since she’s still living there. He made some threats to shoot up the place, but we got his gun, and Rudy agreed to let him sleep it off in the back of the saloon. That seemed kinder than throwing him in here for the night.”

Rachel opened the door to the cell area and poked her head in. It was the first time she’d looked back there since the shoot-out. With some trepidation, she glanced at the floor, breathing easier when she saw it had been scrubbed clean. “What’s behind that door on the left?” The right one, she knew, led to the alley. “Is that where you keep your guns?”

“Yes, and it’s also a broom closet,” he told her, squaring off the papers and setting them aside. “I used to use it as a darkroom.”

“Really? May I look?”

He shrugged. “Help yourself but be careful. You’ll need a lamp.”

She smiled, recognizing it as an invitation to leave him alone. She took the lamp from the shelf behind his desk, slipped into the narrow corridor, and closed the door.

Shaking his head, amused, Wyatt lighted another lamp for himself and continued working. He studied the descriptions provided by the detectives’ association that Artie had received over the wire, aware all the while that Rachel was rummaging through his things. He could hear her moving crates around, rearranging his perfectly settled clutter. He’d be fortunate if he could find the mop and broom the next time he went looking for them.

Wyatt found himself wincing when he heard the clink of glass jars being knocked together. Or was it his photographic plates that she’d found? Then there was the scrape of something wooden against the floor. His tripod? There was a thud. Lord, but he hoped that was a broom.

He closed his desk and stood. “Rachel? Don’t make me sorry that I’m coming back there.” He thought he heard her chuckle, which was hardly a good sign. When he stepped into the hallway, he caught her in the act of hoisting his camera and tripod over her shoulder. He stayed where he was and held his breath, afraid a movement of any kind would upset the precarious balance she’d managed to find.

Rachel carried the equipment carefully, making certain she didn’t bang it against the door frame as she left the darkroom. “It’s heavier than I thought. Do you want to take it now?”

Wyatt didn’t require a second invitation. He quickly removed it from Rachel’s shoulder and put it on his own. “There’s a plan, I imagine.”

“I want to take it home. You can teach me how to make photographs.”

“And that’s all?”

“Well, as long as it’s there, I thought you might like to use it yourself.”

“Hmm.”

“When the weather’s improved you could take it with you. It had
cobwebs
on it, Wyatt. That’s really a very sad state for something that can capture so much beauty.”

“Are you thinking I’m going to argue with you?”

“Well?”

“Get the lamp, Rachel. I’ll carry this home today, but the other things I need will have to wait.”

“Tomorrow?”

“We’ll see. I need some sort of darkroom.”

“All right. We’ll think of something.”

He believed her, but if she thought he was going to mix chemicals in the pantry, she was mistaken. “The lamp,” he said again, jerking his chin toward the door behind her. “And then home.”

The meeting took place around the dining room table. Abe Dishman was present to report on the progress of clearing the pass, and Sid Walker and Henry Longabach each had information on various aspects of the mining operation. Wyatt came with notes on what he and Will had learned about every stranded stranger in town, and Rachel had a journal with questions that she’d scribbled down since their last meeting.

“Have you considered that Foster Maddox will attempt to buy the answers he wants?” she asked.

Henry took out a handkerchief and cleaned his wire-rimmed spectacles. “Sid and I discussed it. We don’t think there’s anyone that’s likely to be tempted.”

“They’d be givin’ up more than they’d be gainin’,” Sid said, absently rubbing his shoulder.

“What about Miss LaRosa and her girls? They’re relatively new to town. It’s my understanding that none of them have been here more than five years. They don’t have the same investment in the mine as the families who have been here better than twenty. Could they be bought?”

Every man at the table simply stared at her.

“What?” she asked. “Did I misspeak?”

Abe, Henry, and Sid all swung their heads in Wyatt’s direction.

Wyatt’s mouth twisted wryly. “Now I know how Caesar felt in his final moments.” He shook his head at them, feigning disgust at their cowardice. “I guess it’s up to me.” He saw that Rachel was looking at him expectantly, and he addressed her. “The town supports one brothel. Only one. It began in the days when there were hardly any women in Reidsville. The men, well, the men got lonely and…they…well, they decided they—”

“They decided they would operate their own establishment,” Rachel said. “Is that right?”

“More or less,” Wyatt said. “They built the house and furnished it; then they hired a madam to run it. Paid her good money to keep a nice place and fill it with girls that were friendly and accommodating.”

“I’m sure.” Rachel wasn’t certain how she managed to appear unaffected by what she was hearing. It helped that Abe, Sid, and Henry were all blushing deeply. She supposed one or two of them had been accommodated by that first wave of friendly girls. “I imagine those women are all married now.”

“I imagine they are,” he said carefully. “And the ones that came after them.”