Taken by the Cowboy (13 page)

"Sheriff Wade," he
said. "You're here to pay out that reward, I presume?"

"That's right. This
here's Miss Jessica Delaney."

“Ah, yes, it is an
honor indeed,” he said. “I’ll be right with you.” The banker
finished writing something on a slip of paper, placed it a drawer,
then went hunting through another drawer for the reward
information.

Truman turned his back
on Webster, leaned both elbows on the counter and looked out the
window. He felt Jessica’s arm next to his, and a sudden ripple of
sexual awareness rushed through him, but he did his best to focus
on the wagons rolling by in the street.

"Would you like to open
an account, Miss Delaney?" Webster asked.

"Uh, no. I'd like to
have it all in cash."

Truman suddenly lost
interest in the morning traffic. "You're not planning to carry that
around with you, are you?"

“No, I’ll keep it at
Mr. Maxwell’s.”

“It would be safer here
at the bank.”

“But I don’t know how
long I’m going to be staying in Dodge,” she replied. “I may need to
leave town on a moment’s notice.”

Mr. Webster peered at
them over the gold rims of his spectacles. “Perhaps I’ll give you
two a moment to discuss it in private while I go fetch the money.”
He turned to go into the back room.

"What's the hurry?”
Truman asked. “Is Dodge not good enough for you?"

"It’s not that,” she
replied. “It's just not my home, that’s all."

"Home." He studied the
green hue of her eyes. "Topeka, right?"

"That’s right," she
firmly substantiated.

Truman shook his head.
"You oughta’ know I did some checking, and there ain’t no record of
any Delaney’s in Topeka. I sure as hell would like to know where
you really come from."

"Is that why you
haven’t talked to me in the past few days? Are you mad about that?
And I thought we agreed you’d stop trying to investigate my
past."

Truman wanted to kick
himself for having promised the impossible, and wished he didn’t
care either way, but he had no excuse to give. He was a hot-blooded
man who hadn’t been with a woman in three long years, and Jessica
was a spirited creature with a voluptuous figure and legs like he’d
never seen – smooth, contoured and golden from the sun. He wanted
to do things to her that he shouldn’t even be thinking about,
because he was a lawman who had enough commotion in his life.

He really needed to
stop thinking about her legs.

And stop checking into
her past.

“I’m not
investigating,” he said. “I’m just making conversation.”

Maybe it was a good
thing she wanted to leave town.

Jessica began to twirl
a silver ring around on her middle finger. Truman stared down at
her tiny pale hands, then followed the line of her narrow wrists
covered by lace cuffs, upward to her arms and gently rounded
shoulders, then to her face. His blood grew hot with the shock of
wanting her, and it annoyed the hell out of him.

She sucked in a breath
as their eyes met.

Mr. Webster returned
and counted out five hundred dollars. Truman shifted his gaze to
the window again.

Jessica shoved the
money into a blue velvet pouch and drew the string. "Thank you, Mr.
Webster. Have a very nice day."

She turned and walked
to the door, leaving Truman in the bank, leaning against the
counter. As soon as the door swung shut behind her, he quickly
followed.

Jessica stood on the
boardwalk, waiting for him. "Truman, I know you don't believe a
word I've told you about anything, but the truth is, I have
secrets, and it’s going to have to stay that way."

He chuckled with
disbelief. “That was about the worst thing you could have said to
me. Now I’m obsessed.”

She stared at him for a
moment while her skirt billowed and flapped in the wind. “Please
trust me,” she continued. “I've never done anything dishonest or
illegal, but there's a reason why I can't tell you these things, at
least not yet. I wish you could just leave it be until I’m ready to
tell you."

"Sorry darlin’," he
said.

Jessica tucked her
upswept hair behind her ear. “Why not?”

“Because.” What a
damned stupid answer. In a moment of weakness, he said, “Why won’t
you just tell me where you’re going after you leave Dodge? In case
I want to find you.”

She scoffed. “Because
you wouldn’t believe me.”

“Then tell me why it’s
so important for you to leave.”

For a long time, she
struggled with that question, then said simply, “You’d think I was
insane." She turned and hurried down the street.

“But I already think
that!” he shouted after her.

Truman moved to follow,
but thank God, he was able to restrain himself. He removed his hat
and combed his fingers through his hair.

* * *

"Jessica!" Wendy
greeted her at the door of her boardinghouse room. "What are you
doing here?"

"I went shopping."
Jessica held up a large box on a string. “I like to shop when I’m
confused.”

Wendy stepped aside,
and Jessica entered the sunny room.

"I got my reward money
and bought a ready-made dress,” she explained. “Why I bought it, I
have no idea. With any luck I’m leaving town soon, and where I’m
going, this is very passé." Jessica set the box down on the
bed.

"Can I look at it?"

"Of course. I'm going
to wear it to the circus tonight."

"You're going?"

"Yes,” Jessica replied,
“and that's why I’m here. I would love for you to join Mr. Maxwell
and me."

Wendy sat down on the
bed. "Mr. Maxwell, the solicitor? Goodness, I don't know about
that."

"Oh, please come. I
need some female companionship. There's way too much testosterone
in this town."

"Testos..."

Jessica sat down, too.
"It means there are too many men waving their pistols around."

Wendy nodded gamely. "I
think I know exactly what you mean."

Jessica smiled. "So
will you come with us?"

Wendy crinkled her
nose. "I don't think it would be right. You two will be sitting on
the west side. Those folks up there on the hill...they think I'm...
Well, you must understand."

"Oh, that’s a load of
bull,” Jessica said, waving a hand through the air. “I’ve told
Angus you're a fine, upstanding young lady. And you know, where
Angus and I come from, just about every girl has waited on tables
at some point in her life. Half the waitresses in the summertime
are college students."

"Really?” She frowned
skeptically. “That seems odd. Waitresses are going to college?"

"Yes!"

Wendy glanced down at
the dress folded in the box. "Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

There was a pause.
“Well… I suppose," she reluctantly replied.

Jessica flopped down
onto her back next to Wendy. "Great. Now I need to ask you a
favor."

"What is it?"

She leaned up on an
elbow. "Could you come over to Angus’s house early and help me get
ready? I haven't got a clue how to fasten this corset by
myself."

Wendy laughed, looking
curiously at Jessica. "You don't know how to fasten a corset?"

Jessica tried to
backtrack. "Well, this particular one is complicated. I’ve never
worn one quite like it.”

Wendy sat back. "Sounds
interesting. I'll come over to help."

"Five o'clock?"

"I'll see you
then."

* * *

That evening, Wendy
helped Jessica dress in her new gown. It was dark red plush velvet,
trimmed with satin pleats along the bottom. More satin was draped
across the front—from hip to hip—and it cascaded down the back,
over a small bustle. The fitted bodice had long sleeves and a
buttoned front opening with a high neck. It was like nothing
Jessica had ever worn in her life.

Wendy stood behind her,
straightening the pleats and drapery. "He's clever, isn't he?" she
asked.

Jessica presumed she
was referring to Mr. Maxwell. "Very."

Wendy stood behind her,
fluffing and poofing. "I don't think I've ever talked to anyone as
clever as him. I’m not sure what to say. What if I bore him?"

"Don't be silly,”
Jessica replied. “He's very knowledgeable when it comes to legal
matters, but other than that, he's just a regular man. I don't know
anything about the law, but we hardly ever talk about that. There
are so many other things to talk about."

"Such as?"

Jessica hesitated,
wondering how, if ever, she would explain the conversations they’d
had about daytime talk shows, processed foods, and all the other
things Angus missed about the twenty-first century, like airplanes
and toilet paper.

"We talk about the
weather," she said ridiculously. "What goes on in town, who's on
the front page of
The Times
and what they did."

“I can talk about
that,” Wendy said. “I read the paper today.”

“So did Angus. There
you go. You’re all set.”

After fixing each
other’s hair, Jessica and Wendy left the house and walked down the
hill toward the circus grounds. They met Angus outside the main
entrance to the tent.

“Angus, may I present
Wendy Burchell?” Jessica said, introducing them formally.

“It’s a pleasure Miss
Burchell,” Angus replied.

They smiled warmly at
each other, so Jessica decided to enter the tent first and let them
get acquainted.

She stopped just inside
to look up at the tall peaks of white canvas. Bleachers lined both
sides of the three hundred foot long ring, and both sections were
filling quickly. The other side was glutted with cowboys,
bartenders, and colorfully dressed women who made their presence
known with whoops and hollers.

Jessica led the way to
their seats, high at the top. Looking across the ring, she scanned
the crowd for Truman. Her stomach fluttered with nervous
anticipation at the mere thought of seeing him, and for the first
time she was thankful for the distraction – for if there truly was
no way home, letting loose with a man like Truman Wade would be a
fine consolation indeed.

Maybe that’s why she
was here, she thought suddenly. Maybe he was her true soul mate,
and there were other cosmic forces at work....

At that moment she
spotted him. At the far corner of the tent, he stood leaning
against the side of the wooden stands, watching everyone enter and
cross in front of him. Jessica grew suddenly warm under her tight
corset, flustered by her body's intense reaction to one man in a
room full of hundreds.

Could this possibly be
her destiny? she wondered with unquenchable desire. Maybe Angus was
right. Maybe all she needed to do was simply surrender to it and
accept that this was where she was meant to be.

From the far corner of
the tent, the ringmaster entered and turned a slow circle until the
audience hushed. "Welcome! To Ed Roper’s Strictly Moral
Circus!"

On the west side the
crowd cheered, whistled and whooped. On the east side, they
applauded politely.

The entertainment began
with elephants circling the ring, followed by giraffes. A woman
named Marla Peru walked blindfolded on a tight wire, one hundred
feet above the ground. Another was hurled three hundred feet across
the tent by what they called Ancient Rome's War Engine Catapult.
She emerged unharmed, and the crowd cheered, but Jessica couldn't
have been more preoccupied than she was by Truman’s presence on the
other side of the tent.

Later, after the circus
performers took their bows, Jessica, Wendy and Angus followed the
parade down Front Street, where a crowd gathered around a crackling
bonfire. A young cowboy filled the night with music from a fiddle,
and another cupped his hands around a harmonica and joined in. Soon
everyone was dancing and Jessica was interlocking arms with
strangers, twirling around, and kicking up her heels.

Perhaps she could live
this life. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad.

A short while later she
stepped up onto the boardwalk under an overhang to watch Wendy and
Angus, who were holding hands as they danced a jig. Jessica smiled
and clapped her hands.

"Enjoying yourself,
Junebug?"

Jessica started at the
sound of Truman’s quiet, sultry voice behind her. He was leaning
against a wall in the shadows with a thumb hooked into his gun
belt, his black hat dipped low over his forehead.

"Hi," she casually
said, while her body erupted with heat. She wondered how long he
had been standing there and if he had been watching her the entire
time.

Truman’s spurs clinked
softly as he moved to stand beside her. "You look pretty
tonight."

His gaze slid down the
length of her body, and she felt it like a soft caress over her
skin.

“Thank you.”

“Is that a new
dress?”

“Yes, I bought it with
some of the reward money.”

He glanced at her
approvingly. “I’d call that money well spent.”

She warmed at the
compliment. Then a waltz began.

While cowboys took
partners and the merchants danced with their wives, she gazed up at
the full moon against the black velvet sky.

"Will you dance with
me?" Truman asked, his voice close to her ear.

Gooseflesh tingled
deliciously over her body. "I’d love to."

Did he know what she
was feeling? Could he see what he did to her?

His hand came to rest
on the small of her back, and a pleasurable shiver of awareness
rippled up and down her spine as he escorted her off the boardwalk
to the center of the crowd.

He placed one hand on
her waist and held the other out to the side. She stepped into the
waltz and was careful to keep her elbows high, which helped to
maintain a safe and proper distance between them, while their eyes
remained locked tightly together.