Taken by the Cowboy (22 page)

Truman looped one thumb
through his gun belt. "Even if we did agree to give it to you, do
you think we'd be fool enough to keep it on us?"

Corey smiled, his mouth
curving in a manner that made Jessica wonder if he knew anything of
human kindness. "No," he said, sardonically. "I’ve never taken you
for a fool, Wade. You either, Junebug. That's why I came down here.
I figured it's time I cashed in on some of those smarts of
yours."

Corey paced back and
forth, pondering what to do. "I figure," he said, "if two people
have a common enemy, that just about makes them partners, don't you
think?"

Truman leaned at his
ease against a post. "Tell me more."

Smoke spiraled upward
as Corey took a deep drag off his cigar. "Bart's been vexing me
lately. He's been gettin' too big for his britches, acting like he
should be the new leader of this outfit."

Jessica noticed
Truman's patience wearing thin; he was tapping his thumb on his
empty leather holster.

"So what do you plan on
doing about it?" he asked.

"Them boys left me here
while they went into Dodge for some ladies. But the way I see it,
when they come back, you and me will have developed a proper
friendship, and you'll be takin' me to where you hid that little
piece of paper."

Jessica felt a spark of
adrenalin. Their plan was working, progressing as it should, yet
what they possessed was only a small shred of the information they
needed to save themselves.

"If you don't consider
me your friend," Corey continued, "I won't take too kindly to that.
I might just shoot you right here. The lady'll be more obliging,
I'm sure, when she sees how ugly a man can be when blood's drippin'
down his face."

Truman looked down and
kicked at the dirt with the toe of his boot. "I think we can work
something out."

"Good. Now, the bank'll
be open soon, so why don't you tell me where you hid that
combination?"

Jessica sucked in a
quick breath as everything began to make sense. Lou must have had
the bank safe combination in his possession when he was shot.

She slid a glance at
Truman, wondering what he was going to do next, when all of a
sudden, he grabbed her by the elbow and roughly pulled her
closer.

"You're gonna have to
ask the lady," he said. "She hasn't told me yet, and I've been
romancing her night and day. Maybe you can kiss better than I
can."

Jessica gasped in
horror, struggling. "Truman!"

His fingers bit into
her flesh.

Corey smiled and took a
step forward. “A kiss sounds good.”

Light from the lantern
swept across his stubbly face, deepening the shadows under his
craggy features. Jessica could smell him now—the stale odor of his
filthy body, the fetid stink of his breath. She shrank back in
disgust.

Corey puckered and
stepped forward. "No!" she screamed, struggling and hoping that
Truman would not let it happen. She wanted to follow his lead, but
she was also certain that at any moment, she was going to fight
this.

All at once, Truman let
go of her, punched Corey in the face and kicked him off his feet.
He fell against the stone wall, hit his head, and collapsed to the
ground with a tremendous
thud
.

Dropping to his knees,
Truman seized his gun and checked it for bullets. He clicked it
shut, grabbed Jessica’s hand, and without another word led the way
up the stairs.

"You were going to let
him kiss me!" she pointed out, none too pleased about it
either.

"No, I wasn't."

"Yes, you were! He was
only inches away!"

Truman stopped at the
top of the stairs and looked around at the small, deserted house.
"Just be glad, love, that he was so slow on the draw."

They ran outside to the
barn. Finding Thunder still saddled from the night before, they
mounted together and galloped up the road toward town.

* * *

Three hours
later

Eating breakfast with
Angus did little to calm Jessica's fears. Consuming an entire pot
of coffee didn't help matters either. Her mind became a stampede of
disoriented worst case scenarios, while she explained everything to
Angus and waited for Truman to return. He had ridden off to fetch
Dempsey and arrest the gang, who had spent the night at Rosalie’s
whorehouse.

She'd have to get used
to worrying, she supposed, as she rolled up her sleeves to wash the
dishes. It wasn’t easy loving a lawman – in this century or any
other.

She pressed down on the
pump handle and rinsed the plates with the cold water that gushed
out and splashed onto her shirt.

While she stared at the
sparkling drops, an agonizing question nagged in her brain. She and
Truman were from different worlds, and she still hadn’t told him
where she came from. When he learned the truth, would he even
believe her? Would he think she was insane or lying to him again
for some reason?

If she did end up
staying here, she certainly wasn't going to stay home and embroider
all day. She'd want to start up a business, and maybe a running
club. Or she could become an inventor and strike it rich with
everything she knew about industry and technology. At the very
least, she would open a pizza shop with delivery. She really missed
pizza—with extra cheese and pepperoni and bacon and hamburger.

Once she laid the
dishes out on the counter to dry, she went into the parlor to see
Angus. He was reading by the window with a silver pistol resting on
the cushion beside him. Jessica stared numbly at the weapon. When
had she become so indifferent to guns and bullets, and even death?
Did life mean so little here?

They both looked up
when they heard hoof beats approaching. Angus reached for the
pistol while Jessica pushed the white lace curtain aside with one
finger, but relaxed when she discovered their unexpected guest was
Deputy Dempsey.

Please, let Truman
be safe.

She watched Dempsey hop
off the horse, tie the reins to the front railing, and dig into a
saddlebag. She stayed indoors while Angus walked onto the covered
porch.

"Deputy Dempsey, I hope
things are well?"

Dempsey removed his hat
and climbed the steps. "Couldn't be better. The gang's behind bars,
and we’ve notified the bank about the stolen combination to the
safe. We’ll be following up on that in the next few days."

Jessica, hearing the
good news, exhaled a long-held breath. She walked out to the porch.
"Is Truman all right?"

"He's fine. Looking
pretty black and blue, though. The doctor's checking him over now.
I brought this for you." Dempsey held out her satchel. "It was in
the Russells’ barn."

Jessica reached out and
took it from him. She looked inside to find her red shoes still
tucked beneath her gowns.

"I just thought I'd
come out here and let you know," he added. "Sheriff Wade said he
was gonna do everything in his power to make sure the people of
Dodge learn to forget those rumors about Junebug Jess. He said he
knows there ain't no such person, and he wants you to feel that you
can stay in town if you want to." He tipped his hat. "Well, I
better be getting on my way." Turning, he stomped down the steps,
mounted his horse, and galloped away.

Jessica stared after
him.

Angus laid a hand on
her shoulder. "Looks like somebody wants you to stay in this
century."

Strangely,
however—despite everything Jessica had gone through with Truman,
and no matter how desperately she longed to be with him—something
deep inside her told her that this was not where she belonged.

* * *

The heels of Jessica's
shoes clicked along the dry, boarded sidewalk while a familiar
cow-scented breeze blew into her face and whipped up a torrent of
light dust in the street. It whirled in a circle, and then settled
down just as a horse-drawn wagon rolled by and stirred it into a
pirouette again.

When she reached
Zimmerman's Hardware Store, Jessica looked through the window,
wondering if the storeowner had sold her necklace yet. Not that it
mattered. Liam was long forgotten. Their relationship had been as
fake as its stone. She was better off without the necklace, so she
started down the boardwalk again.

She stopped a second
time, however, when another thought struck her. That necklace was a
piece of the future. Something told her she should have it. She
turned back toward Zimmerman’s and nearly collided with a dog who
must have been following her.

There, gazing up at her
with big brown eyes and an eager panting smile, was a white Jack
Russell terrier very similar to George, her dog back home.

A pain squeezed her
heart as she remembered how George used to sit on the floor between
her legs to wait for supper while she would stand with her feet
braced apart, opening a can of something. God, she missed him. She
hoped her parents were taking good care of him.

She knelt down and
scratched behind the dog’s ears. “Hi there, cutie. Where did you
come from? You look just like my dog back home.”

"Hello." Those familiar
black boots stepped into her range of vision.

Jessica immediately
stood. She hadn’t seen Truman since they parted after escaping the
gang’s hideout, and for some reason, there was a strange
awkwardness between them now. “Hi.”

Just then, the dog
nudged his nose under her skirts and sat down between her feet.

“This a friend of
yours?” Truman asked, looking down.

Jessica laughed. “No,
I’ve never seen him before, but this is exactly what my dog does.”
She lifted her skirts to let him out from under her petticoat and
knelt down again to pat his head. “Does he belong to anyone?”

“Yeah, the Peterson’s.
His name is Leo.”

Jessica continued to
ruffle Leo’s ears while he licked her chin. “Too bad, because I
would have loved to take him home with me.”

A young boy called out
from across the street. “Leo! Come on! We gotta go!”

Leo looked at Jessica
and hesitated.

“Go on,” she said,
waving a hand as she rose to her feet. “He’s calling you.”

Only then did the dog
dash off toward the Peterson boy.

For a long moment, she
watched them run together down the boardwalk and felt a deep ache
of longing in her chest.

"Care for some
company?” Truman asked. “I’d like to walk you home."

"That would be nice,”
she replied, “but I need to go into Zimmerman's. Will you come in?
I'll just be a minute."

"Sure." He opened the
door for her, and the bells jingled.

Jessica walked in and
approached the clerk at the counter while Truman waited at the
window, watching the street.

"Can I help you?" the
clerk asked.

"Yes. Do you still have
that necklace I sold you?"

"The diamond? Yes, just
a minute." He went out back, and returned after a few seconds.
"Here it is."

She admired the large
sparkling stone, which dangled from his fingers like a
pendulum.

"I was thinking of
making it into a ring,” the clerk mentioned.

Jessica cleared her
throat. "How much are you asking for it right now as a
necklace?"

"Forty dollars."

“But it’s not a real
diamond.”

“Looks real to me.”

She dug into her purse,
counting what she had. "Would you take thirty-eight?"

"It's forty
dollars."

"I see." She paused a
moment, thinking about the irony of it—that Liam probably hadn't
paid much more than that for it back in the twenty-first
century.

The merchant seemed to
be waiting for her to agree to the price, but unfortunately, she
didn't have enough money with her. The rest of her reward was at
Angus's house. "Could you hold it for me? I'd like it just as it
is."

"I suppose I could do
that. Only a couple of days, though."

"Thank you." She moved
toward Truman who was watching her with curious eyes.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Yes."

He opened the door,
nodded a thank you to the clerk, and escorted her out. As they
stepped onto the boardwalk, a voice called out from a few doors
down. "Hey, Junebug!"

Truman and Jessica
stopped and turned.

"I'd watch out for that
sheriff if I were you!” It was Virgil Norton and his gang of
rowdies. “He ain't gentle like I am!" They roared with laughter
from a bench outside the Long Branch Saloon.

"That man,” she said,
irritably, "lacks refinement."

"Just ignore him,"
Truman drawled. "He's drunk, and he's more gurgle than guts." He
placed a protective hand on her arm and guided her away. The other
hand rested on his gun.

She and Truman walked
past the storefronts and saloons until they came to the end of the
boardwalk and stepped into the dusty street.

"Careful," Truman
cautioned, as he guided her around fresh evidence that this was a
cow town.

"Thank you." She had
become quite adept at spotting these things, but today, her mind
was elsewhere. It was time, she knew, to tell Truman the truth
about where she came from. If she ever expected to feel genuinely
close to him, to end this persistent awkwardness, there could be no
more secrets. He needed to understand why she talked the way she
did, and why she had very modern ideas about feminist issues.

Truman's spurs chinked
as four chickens ran past them. "Must be a fire in the coop," he
commented.

When they reached
Angus's house, they stopped at the front gate. "Would you take a
walk with me out onto the prairie tomorrow?" she asked, feeling
nervous about the whole thing. "I think it's time we spent some
time together and had a talk – about that secret of mine."

Truman eyed her
speculatively. "I was wondering when you'd ask. I figured you’d be
ready to tell me, eventually."