Taken by the Cowboy (2 page)

All at once, the world
became silent except for the echoed thumping of her heart in her
ears. There was no pain, only blackness. She felt as if she were
floating, detached from everything but the extraordinary quiet, the
complete absence of all cares and misgivings. She felt no fear now.
Was this death? Maybe she would see her brother....

Something wet trickled
down her forehead and onto her eyelashes.

The distinct visceral
sensation sucked her out of the tranquil beyond, and when her eyes
fluttered open, she found herself lying on her back, gazing up at
the dusky sky, watching silvery clouds roll and twist and turn in
the most fantastic way.

Then real, conscious
thoughts began to form in her brain.

She’d been in a car
accident. She was lying in the grass. Her hair was wet. Was it
blood?

Blinking in panic, she
touched her throbbing temples but discovered the wetness was only
rain. Relieved, she sat up and realized she was sitting in a puddle
of mud. A damp chill rippled up her spine.

Had she been thrown
from the car? She couldn't remember anything that violent. Of
course, she had shut her eyes and blacked out. Or at least she
thought that’s what happened.

With trembling hands,
she rose up on her knees and rubbed the side of her neck where the
seatbelt had chafed her. Next, she touched her scalp, feeling a
gritty, sandy residue. Shattered glass, she realized, as she
studied the pads of her fingers. And her head—
Good Lord
. A
bump was already sprouting at her temple.

Wondering if she had a
concussion, she carefully tried to stand. She pressed her hand into
the gooey muck to keep her balance and rose to her feet. Her
stiletto pumps sank deeper into the puddle, right up to the ankles
of her skinny jeans. She noticed that her favorite black belted
jacket was ruined. A button was torn off, and the pocket was
ripped.

She glanced around,
searching for her car.

Where was it? And why
couldn’t she hear traffic from the road?

Bewildered, she scanned
the rolling prairie for the vehicle. Surely it was somewhere.

She rested her hand on
her stomach that churned with nausea. It was a normal reaction, she
knew, after what she’d just been through. In fact, it was a miracle
she was even able to stand.

But where was her
car?

The only explanation
she could come up with was that she must have been wandering around
in shock for the last little while and had left it behind — along
with her purse and cell phone. And the strange floating
sensation.... That must have been some kind of dream state.

So where was she,
exactly? To her left were miles of flat, green prairie. To her
right, a small hill. She decided to climb it to see what was on the
other side.

When she reached the
top, she stepped onto a country road pocked with puddles and wet
stones. She pushed her damp hair away from her face to look around,
and her heart sunk.

More miles of prairie.
In every direction.

How had she gotten this
far? And which way should she go?

She stared transfixed
at a distant flicker of lightning far off, just above the misty
horizon. A quiet breeze fanned the odor of cow manure into her
face, and nervous dread swelled inside her.

Something didn’t feel
right. She couldn’t possibly have walked much of a distance. Could
she?

Well, she thought,
taking a deep, steadying breath and resolving to stay rational.
There was no point standing around doing nothing. That road had to
lead somewhere.

Off she went.

* * *

After walking a few
miles on the dirt road through the pouring rain, Jessica wished
miserably that she had worn her running shoes instead of her stupid
“sexy-girl” shoes, but there wasn’t much she could do about it now.
All she could do was try to ignore the excruciating sting of the
blisters—which felt like hot coals burning the balls of her
feet—and walk with an awkward limp.

A short while later,
she sighed with relief when the setting sun finally peeked through
the thick blanket of clouds. Raindrops glistened like tiny diamonds
as they fell, weightless and softer now. Lifting her wrist to check
the time, she realized she'd lost her watch.
Damn. It was brand
new
.

Reaching a fork in the
road, she stopped to look at a dilapidated wooden sign that read:
DODGE CITY. The sign pointed left, so with little choice, she
limped in that direction.

By the time she spotted
a town up ahead—unfortunately it didn’t look like Dodge City-—the
rain had stopped and darkness had folded over the terrain. Though
she felt like a drowned rat, she was relieved to have found some
signs of civilization.

She couldn’t wait to
find a phone and call her parents. They were probably worried
sick.

As she limped across an
old plank bridge that led into the town, she heard the faint music
of a brass band, and each time its cymbals crashed together, it was
once too often for the pounding sensation in her head.

Then a horse-drawn
wagon rumbled by.

She stopped abruptly
and stared at it—
what the heck?
—then stepped off the
bridge and walked up the wide main street. She glanced around for a
phone booth, but found herself distracted by the buggies, the
cowboy costumes on the men, and the music from inside a place that
looked like an old saloon. A piano man played "Oh! Susanna," and a
banjo plucked along with it.

That song
again
.

She stood shivering at
the corner of two unpaved streets, looking left and right. Wide
boarded sidewalks and hitching rails fronted the buildings; saddled
horses and mules were lined up side by side.

Good God, there had to
be at least six inches of slop underfoot and it smelled like horse
poo.

What kind of place was
this? Had she stumbled onto the set of one of those reality shows
where they throw people into a historical time-period and watch how
crazy they go?

When a couple of ragged
looking cowboys staggered by, waving whisky bottles and revolvers
in the air, Jessica decided to walk a little faster. She hadn't
seen any women yet, only men, and she suspected this wasn’t the
safest place to be standing around, taking in the sights, because
it all looked pretty sketchy.

Stepping up onto the
boardwalk, she paused outside a bar called the Long Branch Saloon,
which made no sense because the Long Branch was part of the Dodge
City Museum—a re-creation of historic Front Street, mostly visited
by tourists. But this didn’t look anything like that. It seemed far
more real. Almost too authentic.

She backed into a post
to let a group of men in tattered cowboy costumes pass by, then
glanced at the swinging doors. From where she stood, she could hear
glasses clinking and dice rolling. There was a click and clatter of
poker chips and billiard balls while a man hollered above the
music, "Twenty-five-to-one!"

Her stomach churned
again. She really needed to find a phone.

She decided to try the
saloon, but shrank back when she glanced at the window. June bugs.
She hated June bugs. When she was seven years old, her best
friend's little brother had planted some in her bed during a
camping trip and they’d given her the heebie-jeebies ever
since.

Trying not to think
about that anymore, Jessica shivered with disgust, pushed through
the doors, and collided with a thick wall of cigar smoke. Her nose
crinkled. Stifling a cough, she gazed uneasily over the crowd.

Most of the men wore
hats and looked as if they'd just walked out of an old movie.

Focusing on what she
had come in for, she approached the bar. "Excuse me. I've been in a
car accident and I need to get to a phone. Do you have one that I
could use?"

The bartender, who wore
a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, topped by a brown vest,
stared at her while he polished a shot glass.

"Sir?" she asked again.
"Can you at least tell me how I can get to Dodge City? The
real
Dodge City?"

"This is it, darlin’.
You're exactly where you want to be."

Now this was getting
ridiculous. "No, you don’t understand. I've been in an accident and
I need a phone."

"Don't have no phone,
but I’ve heard about ’em."

Jessica stared at the
man for an agonizing second, then turned on her heels and walked to
the window. A snake handler wandered by carrying a lantern.
Following closely behind him was a squealing pig.

She rubbed her
throbbing temples and squeezed her eyes shut. Maybe she did have a
head injury and this was all a hallucination, or maybe she was
unconscious and dreaming.

She returned to the
bar. "Is there a telephone
anywhere
in this town?"

"Not that I know of."
He turned around and placed the polished shot glass on a shelf.

Enough was enough.
Jessica pushed a damp lock of her hair behind her ear and took a
deep breath to calm herself.

"Are you fixin' to buy
a drink, ma’am,” he asked, “or are you just gonna stand there and
stare at me all night?"

Jessica glanced around
the saloon at the rough and tough looking clientele, and held up a
hand. “No thanks. I’ll find help elsewhere.” Struggling to keep it
together, she walked out.

Squinting through the
darkness, she searched for a friendly face or a shop with some
lights on, but all she saw were those same two drunken cowboys
flinging bottles, laughing uproariously and spitting tobacco.

Suddenly a shot rang
out in the street. Panic exploded in her belly, and she ran back
into the saloon. "Is there a police station nearby?” she said to
the bartender. “I really need some help."

"You'd be looking for
Sheriff Wade,” he casually replied. “He's just over that way in the
city clerk’s office, not far from the depot and the water tank." He
pointed a bottle of whisky toward the window.

"Is it far? I have to
walk there by myself."

"Not far, but a young
woman ain't safe roaming these streets alone during cattle season.
These cowboys have been on the trail a while, and have a hankering
for more than just the chuck wagon, if you understand my meaning."
He leaned over the bar and glanced down at her skinny jeans and
muddy red pumps. "They'll be takin' a shinin' to you, even dressed
the way you are in those britches."

"I'll be fine." She
turned and walked out the door.

She hopped off the
boardwalk and down onto the street with a splash, groaning when she
sank ankle-deep into the mud. No matter. She'd be at the sheriff's
office soon enough, and this whole thing would be straightened
out.

She stopped, however,
when something tickled and buzzed behind her ear. She scratched and
tousled her hair, then realized with a terrible surge of panic that
a June bug was stuck in her hair!

Jessica shrieked. She
tried to brush it away, but it was tangled in her long wet locks.
She tossed her head around, flailed her arms in all directions, and
jumped through the puddles to try and escape.

Boom!
Another
gunshot ripped through the night. Her heart exploded with fear, and
she tripped backwards over a plank in the street. Down she went,
splashing into a puddle on her backside. No sooner than her butt
began to throb, she looked up to see a man falling out of a second
story window!

He dropped onto the
over-hanging roof and rolled straight toward her. Jessica scrambled
to her feet and slipped through the slick muck, barely escaping the
plummeting man's path. Just as she slid out of the way, he landed
heavily in front of her, splashing muddy water onto her cheeks. A
second later, a metal object dropped into a puddle beside her.

"Sir!" she hollered,
dropping to her hands and knees to help him. "Are you all
right?"

He was face down in the
mud, and Jessica was just about to roll him over when the saloon
doors swung open, smacking against the outside wall. Men and women
poured out and gathered on the boardwalk to stare at her in shocked
silence.

"What in God's name
happened?" someone asked.

“This man fell out of a
window,” Jessica replied. “He needs help.”

The stranger ran toward
her and together, they rolled the injured man onto his back.
Jessica stared in horror at his face. A clean bullet hole gaped
between his eyes, and blood trickled down his nose.

“Dear Lord,” the
stranger said. He stood up and quickly backed away.

“Somebody call 911!”
Jessica shouted. She pressed her ear to the man’s chest to listen
for a heartbeat. When she heard nothing, she knew there was no
hope, but she still wanted an ambulance. A cop car, too.

If there was such a
thing in this backward place.

“Will somebody call an
ambulance?” she shouted in frustration.

“Now...just be calm,
miss,” the stranger said. “We don't want any trouble.”

“What are you talking
about?” she replied. “I don't want to cause trouble. I’m trying to
help him. Doesn’t anyone have a cell phone?”

That particular request
was met with blank stares.

“I saw her wavin’ a gun
around like some kind of lunatic!” someone offered.

“I wasn’t waving a
gun,” she explained. “I was trying to kill a June bug."

There was a series of
'oohs' and 'ahs' from the crowd as everyone backed away in
unison.

Realizing she was
quickly becoming a primary suspect in this man’s murder, Jessica
raised both hands in the air and stood. "Look, everyone needs to
stay calm. It wasn't me. I was just trying to help him."

"Do you know who this
is?" the stranger asked.

Jessica shook her head.
“No.”

"That's Left Hand Lou!"
someone called out from the crowd.

Before Jessica had a
chance to comprehend what this meant, people rushed over to get a
look at the corpse.