LaceysWay (21 page)

He dealt the cards smoothly. He had given his word to play the
cards the way they fell, and he did. As usual, the house won more than it lost,
but then, that was to be expected.

No matter what was happening at his table, Matt was aware of
Lacey. Once she overcame her initial nervousness and embarrassment at being inside
a saloon, she handled herself well. She smiled at the customers, but it was a
cool smile, not one of invitation. She frequently glanced in his direction as
if to assure herself that he was still there if she needed him. But the men
were polite, pleased to see a new face, and a pretty one at that. The word
quickly spread that she was not one of the regular girls, and that she was only
there to serve drinks, nothing more.

J.J. Tucker’s eyes were frequently on his newest saloon
girl. She was a comely wench, pretty as a picture but with an air of innocence
that intrigued him. Her figure was nearly perfect, her face without blemish,
her hair a mass of soft red-gold waves. Many a man lost a hand at poker or faro
because he was watching Lacey’s voluptuous curves when he should have been
watching his cards. But no one complained.

J.J. also kept a close eye on the man who called himself
Matt Walker. The gambler was as good as he said he was. J.J. sat in for a
couple of hands, and he noted that the gambler’s hands were deft and sure when
he dealt the cards, and Tucker had no doubt in his mind that Matt Walker could
slide an ace off the bottom as easily as off the top when it suited him.

At ten o’clock the sheriff stepped into the saloon on his
nightly rounds. Matt felt his mouth go dry as Henderson sauntered over to his
table.

“You’re new in town,” the sheriff said, his eyes going over
Matt in a long, measuring look.

“That’s right, Sheriff,” Matt replied coolly. He met the
lawman’s eyes, one hand on the tabletop, the other resting on his thigh.

Henderson nodded. “I don’t like trouble in my town. If you
want to stay, you’d best keep that in mind.”

Matt nodded, his heart slamming against his ribs as the
sheriff studied him for another long moment.

“Remember what I said,” Henderson remarked tersely, and left
the table.

Matt felt the tension drain out of him as he watched the
lawman leave the saloon.

It was going on eleven o’clock when the batwing doors swung
open and three men sauntered in. Matt felt the muscles tighten in the back of
his neck. Two of the men had been in the Black Horse Saloon the night Billy
Henderson died. Both had testified under oath that Matt had gunned the kid down
in cold blood.

Matt watched the three men make their way to the bar. They
stayed only long enough to drink a beer, and then they were gone, but Matt was
satisfied. At least two of the men he was after were still in town.

Lacey glanced at the clock over the bar. Another hour and
she would be finished. Her feet were killing her, yet she had rather enjoyed
the work. Most of the men had treated her with respect. A few had tried to get
fresh, but she had only to remind them that her husband was a very jealous man
to cool their ardor. There was something about Matt that made the men wary of
him, though Lacey could not put her finger on what it was. He looked the same
as always to her, yet, as the night had worn on, she had sensed a subtle
difference in him that she could not quite put a name to.

The thought stayed in her mind over the next few days, and
she began to notice a new wariness in his eyes. He seemed tense, like a snake
coiled to strike at the slightest provocation. At first she thought it was only
her too vivid imagination, but then she realized that Matt was a different man
when he sat behind a poker table. His senses seemed sharper, his nerves always
a little on edge, as if he were expecting trouble and wanted to be ready for
it. And yet, it was more than that, and Lacey realized that Matt Drago would be
a very dangerous man to run afoul of. And the men who played cards with him
knew it.

Lacey stifled a yawn as she carried a tray of drinks across
the room. She had been working in the saloon for almost two weeks and the
newness had long worn off. Sometimes she felt as though she had worked in a
saloon all her life.

She smiled a cardboard smile as she placed the drinks on the
table and made change.

“How about a dance?” asked one of the men. He was tall and
thick-set, with sharp brown eyes and a square jaw. There was a long scar on his
left cheek.

“No, thank you,” Lacey replied.

She was walking away from the table when the scar-faced man
gained his feet and took hold of her arm.

“Just one dance,” the man insisted.

“I said no,” Lacey said, her voice cold and final.

“And I said yes.” Taking the tray from her hand, he pulled
her into his arms and began to waltz her around the floor.

Lacey looked around for Tucker, but he was nowhere to be
seen. She gasped as the scar-faced man pulled her closer, his eyes moving to
the swell of her breasts.

“Take your hands off her.”

Matt’s voice was hard and cold. The piano player took his
hands from the keys, and the whole saloon went suddenly quiet as the scar-faced
man whirled around, his arm still locked around Lacey’s waist.

“Who the hell are you?” the man asked.

“I’m her husband.”

“Husband! No shit?”

“No shit. Now take your hands off her.”

“Sure,” the man said. “I don’t want any trouble.”

He released his hold on Lacey, made as if to leave, then
pivoted on his heel and drove his fist into Matt’s face. Matt staggered
backward. The hand he lifted to his mouth came away covered with blood.

He ducked, quickly stepping out of the way as the scar-faced
man lunged at him. Reaching out, Matt grabbed the man by the arm, spun him
around, and slammed his fist into the man’s midsection. As the man doubled
over, Matt grabbed him by the hair, jerked his head up, and hit him in the
mouth. A second blow to the jaw rendered the man unconscious.

“Okay, folks, show’s over.” J.J. Tucker elbowed his way
through the crowd. He took a long look at the big man crumpled on the floor,
and the expression on Matt’s face. So, it had finally happened. He was
surprised there hadn’t been trouble before this. He wasn’t surprised to find
that Walker was as good with his fists as he was with a deck of cards. “Come
on, break it up.”

Matt took Lacey aside. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” She dabbed at his mouth with a towel. “Are you?”

“Yeah.”

“My hero,” she murmured under her breath.

“I told you to stay home where you belonged,” Matt growled.
“But you had to work in a saloon.”

“And you had to be a gambler.”

“Okay, okay, I surrender.” Taking her face in his hands, he
brushed a kiss across her lips.

J.J. Tucker cleared his throat. “Think you two could get
back to work?” he asked with a wry grin.

“Sure,” Matt said. Giving Lacey’s arm a squeeze, he went
back to his table, whistling softly.

As time went on, Lacey began to grow acquainted with the
saloon’s regular customers. Most of them were businessmen who stopped by for a
cold beer and a few minutes’ conversation before going home to the wife and
kids. Cowboys from the outlying ranches came in on the weekends, eager to spend
their money on good whiskey and bad girls. Lacey often saw the two men Matt had
pointed out to her, the men who had accused him of killing Billy Henderson. The
other man who had accused Matt never showed up at the saloon, and Matt remarked
that he might have moved away, or died, or was simply out of town.

J.J. Tucker frequently took Lacey aside to talk to her,
ostensibly about business, and she began to realize that the saloon owner was
growing fond of her. It was a fact that troubled her deeply, mainly because she
wasn’t sure how to handle it. Tucker never said or did anything that could be
construed as forward, yet she knew, in the way a woman always knows, that J.J.
Tucker found her attractive. He was a handsome man. His hair was dark brown,
his eyes pale green, as cold as the Pacific in winter. He dressed immaculately,
favoring dark suits and flowered brocade vests. He wore a large diamond ring on
his right hand, a ruby stickpin in his cravat. Tucker was about the same height
as Matt, but Matt was all whipcord and muscle while J.J. tended to be a little
on the heavy side. Despite the fact that he was unfailingly polite, Lacey did
not trust J.J. Tucker. There was something about him that made her uneasy,
though she could not explain what it was.

Lacey had assumed that Tucker lived in one of the rooms over
the saloon, but Matt told her he owned a large house near the end of town. His
sister lived there as well. She was somewhat of a recluse, people said, but
Matt remarked that he had heard from one of the men that she was a little crazy
in the head.

Lacey frowned at Matt. “There’s something you’re not telling
me.”

A muscle worked in Matt’s jaw and his eyes grew hard. “She
was engaged to Billy Henderson. They say she hasn’t left the house since he was
killed, not even to attend the funeral.”

“Matt, it’s not your fault.”

“Maybe it is. Maybe I did kill the kid.” He slammed his fist
against the wall. “I wish I could remember what happened that night.”

“Matt—”

“I hear tell she’s a pretty woman,” Matt remarked, “or was
before she took to hiding in the house all the time. They say she hasn’t been
out of that house since he died. Just sits in the parlor waiting for him to
come calling.”

Lacey shook her head, her heart filling with compassion for
the woman who had turned her back on the world.

“She must have loved Billy very much,” Lacey mused, and
wondered how she would react if anything so tragic happened to Matt.

“Maybe. But people die, and life goes on. You can’t change
the past by pretending it didn’t happen.”

“I wouldn’t want to go on living without you,” Lacey
murmured.

“But you would,” Matt replied. “You wouldn’t stop living.”

Lacey shrugged. Who could say how they would react to
something as awful as the death of a loved one until it happened?

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” Lacey said.

But she couldn’t put the woman out of her mind. The next
time she went shopping in town, she walked to the end of the street and gazed
at the large house where J.J. Tucker’s sister lived. The house appeared well
cared for. The paint was fairly new, the grass was green and neatly trimmed,
shrubs and flowers grew near the front porch. The curtains were all drawn,
Lacey noted, the front door closed against the world.

Curious, Lacey walked past the house looking for some sign
of life. For a moment, she thought she saw a face at the front window, but it
was such a fleeting image she decided it must have been a shadow or perhaps her
own reflection as she passed by. Somehow the thought of a woman locking herself
away from the world bothered Lacey deeply, and she puzzled over it and fretted
about it for days. She thought about Matt and how deeply she loved him, how much
a part of her he had become. What would she do if she lost him? Would she want
to go on living? Would she have the courage to face the world without him
beside her, or would she react like Tucker’s sister and simply withdraw from
reality?

Taking her courage in hand, she brought the subject up to
Tucker one night when business was slow.

“I…I heard some of the men talking about your sister,” Lacey
began somewhat hesitantly.

“Did you?” Tucker replied, his voice void of expression.

“Yes. They say she never goes out.”

“That’s right.” Tucker shrugged helplessly. “I tried to
cheer her up at first, tried to make her see that her life wasn’t over, but she
just stared at me like I wasn’t there.” Tucker snorted with disgust. “I tried
to tell her that Henderson wasn’t worth one of her tears. The little bastard,
always snooping around the saloon as if he had every right to be there just
because he was engaged to Susanne…”

Tucker broke off abruptly, his expression becoming blank. “I
shouldn’t be boring you with all this.”

“You aren’t,” Lacey assured him, somewhat mystified by
J.J.’s outburst. What had he been afraid Billy Henderson would find? “How old
is your sister?” Lacey asked.

Tucker frowned. “Twenty-two, twenty-three, I’m not sure.”

“She’s so young!” Lacey exclaimed. “You can’t let her waste
away in that house any longer.”

“Just what do you suggest I do?” Tucker demanded. “I’ve
tried everything I can think of.”

“I don’t know. Would it be all right if I went to visit
her?”

“You can try, but I doubt if she’ll let you in.”

Lacey bit down on her lip, wondering what she had gotten
herself into. “She’s not…dangerous, is she?”

“Susanne?” Tucker laughed softly. “No, she’s not dangerous.
Just alone.”

Matt was less than thrilled when Lacey told him she was
going to pay a call on J.J. Tucker’s sister.

“Why do you want to get involved in that?” he asked
incredulously. “Haven’t we got enough troubles of our own without you going out
and looking for more?”

“I’m not looking for trouble,” Lacey retorted. “I just—I
don’t know, I can’t explain it, but I feel so sorry for her.”

Matt shook his head. “I don’t like it, but you do whatever
you think is best.”

Lacey nodded. “Matt, do you think Tucker could have had
anything to do with Billy Henderson’s death?”

“J.J.?” Matt shrugged. “Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know. I was talking to him last night and I got the
impression that he wasn’t very fond of Billy. He said something about Billy
always snooping around the saloon and oh, I don’t know. It was just a thought.”

“You be careful, Lacey. Don’t be sticking your nose in where
it doesn’t belong.”

Lacey went to the Tucker house the following afternoon.
There were butterflies in her stomach as she climbed the stairs and knocked on
the front door.