The Lawman's Bride (26 page)

She stood.

“Margaret would be very disappointed if she knew what you’d been up to this evening,” Garrett said to the other man. “What do you think she’d do if she knew you’d been caught in your altogether in a beautiful woman’s hotel room?”

“How do you know about Margaret? And how would she find out?”

“I know everything I need to know. And she’d find out when Rudy and I went to your home to do the right thing and let her know that her husband is a fornicating bastard.”

“You wouldn’t.” A nervous sheen of sweat glistened on Frank’s face and chest. “Why would you?”

“I would if I didn’t have motivation not to.”

“You that sore of a loser, Morgan?”

“You’re the loser, I’m afraid. Don’t feel bad, though. There are only a handful of men alive who can resist Elizabeth’s charms.”

Frank looked from Garrett to Sophie. She shrugged. It all became perfectly clear in that clarifying moment, and his befuddled expression turned thunderous. “You son of a bitch! You set this whole thing up!” He turned a glare on Sophie then, and she looked away before he could call her names.

“Don’t worry, we’re going to work something out,” Garrett told him. “You’ve just transferred all those funds from cattle sales.”

“My investment money, you wanted it all along.”

Where was Clay? Surely they’d heard enough by now. He was here, wasn’t he?

Frank turned his fury toward Sophie. “You tramp! You set me up. You no good whorin’ bitch!”

He lunged toward her, and Garrett jumped out of his way. Frank reached her as she turned to run. He grabbed for her and came away with a fistful of blond hair. His momentary shock gave Sophie time to move away to a safer distance.
Where
was Clay?

Garrett drew his pearl-handled gun and aimed it at Frank. “Don’t make it any more difficult on yourself than it needs to be. Let’s discuss money and leave her out of it.”

This was going all wrong. Garrett had never pulled his gun on the mark before! Sophie’s heart pounded at this unplanned development. She’d been eager for Clay to arrive, now she prayed he didn’t.

Frank threw the wig toward Sophie as the voice split the air.

“Hands in the air, Garrett.”

Clay was here.

He stood with his .45 directed at Garrett’s back. “Drop the gun. Your game is over.”

After a mere second of shock, Garrett cast Sophie a hateful scowl.

She cringed under the magnitude of his fury and sensed desperation take over his instincts. Slowly, he turned the barrel of his revolver so that it pointed to her chest. “Go ahead. Let’s see who can shoot first, shall we?”

Marshal Vidlak and Deputy Owen Sanders flanked Clay inside the doorway, all three with weapons drawn.

Clay glanced from Garrett to Sophie and back again. A muscle jumped in his jaw. “Three to one is pretty good odds in my favor,” he said, his voice a soul-deep reassurance.

Garrett turned slowly without changing the direction his pistol was aimed until he faced the three lawmen. “You’re probably right.”

Shit, shit, shit.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. Sophie’s heart was beating so loudly she was afraid it would drown out their words ’til she couldn’t hear.

“You would probably kill me,” Garrett said matter-of-factly. “But I’ll kill
her
first. Any time you’re willing to risk it, go right ahead.” He used his thumb to cock the hammer, and Sophie could almost feel the air leave the room as the men all drew a breath. The thought of dying flitted through her mind, and she wondered if death would be quick or if she’d linger in pain.

Clay’s eyes never left Garrett’s face. A trickle of sweat rolled down his cheek. “Just put down the gun, and nobody gets hurt.”

Garrett chuckled. “And you’re the big hero, and I swing from a rope. Not an option for me, get it?”

They would hang him for murder. Maybe her, too. He would never give himself up, Sophie realized.

“Risk it.” Sophie’s words hung in the humid night air. “Shoot him, Clay. If he hits me, I might live. If not, it’s okay. If he’s a bad shot, don’t let me suffer.”

“Now, isn’t that touching?” Garrett said. “When did you become so brave, Gabriella? You’ve always been stupid and ungrateful.”

“
Shoot him,
Clay,” she ordered. “Don’t let him get away with it. With
any
of it.”

Clay understood what she was saying. She was begging him not to let Garrett get away with what he’d done to her. She knew how livid Clay had been when he’d learned Garrett had taken advantage of her as a young girl. The stories Sophie’d told him were vivid images in his mind.
I submitted,
she’d told him.
I survived.

The man before him had used her body and soul for his own gain. He’d manipulated and demeaned and controlled—but he hadn’t broken her. She’d waited for the time and the place to escape him. She’d planned this whole fiasco to trap him and make him pay. Sophie needed to show Garrett he hadn’t gotten the best of her.

“Her name’s Sophia,” Clay said. “Not Gabriella, not any of the dozen other names you’ve given her. Sophia.”

“What the hell do
you
know?” Garrett asked. “You’re one of the pawns she’s using to get what she wants. I should know. I taught her how.”

Garrett was a master at using people’s weaknesses—some sixth sense had alerted him to Clay’s internal struggle.

“Guess we’ll just have to see who has the last laugh,” Clay said. “After all, she set
you
up on this one.”

Garrett’s nostrils flared. He glared daggers at Sophie.

She figured poor Frank had probably peed himself and the sheet by now if he hadn’t already jumped out the window. She didn’t dare look.

“You’re a revoltin’ excuse for a human bein’,” Clay told him. “You bought a young girl and used her for illegal gain. Used her just like you use everybody. But you couldn’t turn her into you. And you couldn’t break her spirit. She waited for the right time and place and she hightailed it away from you.”

“I found her, though, didn’t I? She didn’t want to hide that badly.”

“You didn’t win, Garrett. She set you up. You thought you had her under your thumb, that you were settin’ up this night, when all along, she was the one with the reins. She told me exactly what you’d do and exactly how to catch you. She used your own bait and trapped you.”

The air in the room was static with tension.

Garrett’s face was beet-red above his white shirt. “Guess I just have to kill her then.”

This was it. Clay had no choice. If he told his men to stand down and let Garrett go, Garrett would take Sophie with him. Clay should have planned for something like this.

Sophie’s words played in his head.
Risk it. Risk it.

He’d told her once she was a risk he was willing to take. But not like this. Not risking her life.

Either way was a risk. This entire setup had been dangerous. A chance Sophie had been willing to take.

Clay wasn’t sure who moved first. With a flurry of green satin, Sophie flung her wrapper over Garrett’s gun hand. A burst of gunfire exploded and she was thrown back on the floor. Clay fired. More gunfire erupted. Clay squatted and the men on either side of him ducked and rolled.

Garrett’s body bucked from the force of the bullets pounding into it. He fell to his knees and his gun hand, encased in green fabric, fell to his side. With eyes wide open, his upper body swayed. The cigar he’d been holding fell. He collapsed forward with a slam.

Clay looked at both the other lawmen who immediately jumped toward Garrett’s prone body. He scrambled to Sophie where she lay on the wooden floor and rolled her to her back. She clutched at her side, curling her body protectively. Blood pooled in the cracks between the floorboards and ran in a rivulet away from her body. The entire side of her white corset was soaked in crimson.

Chapter Twenty-One

H
e’d seen dozens of men shot. The sight had never affected him like this—as though the world spun out of control and his own life hung in the balance. He grabbed a towel from the washstand and pressed it against the wound in her side. “Go get the doc!”

Sophie was staring up at him, her dark eyes glistening. “Is he…did he?”

Clay glanced at Hershel who shook his head.

“He’s dead,” Clay told her.

She tried to turn to see for herself, but Clay held her down with a hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t move. You’ll bleed more.”

She nodded and closed her eyes. Her breath was coming short and fast. “We did it.”

“
You
did it, Sophie.”

“Thanks,” she managed. “For those things you said to him.”

“Don’t talk now. Dr. Chaney will be coming.” He glanced at the doorway in panic. “You hurtin’ bad, Sophie? Course you are. Damn.”

“Get me a sheet or something. I’m in my underwear.”

Clay stood and turned to Frank Wick, forgotten in the chaos. “Hand over the sheet and get your clothes on before anyone sees you here.”

Frank just looked at him.

Clay jerked the sheet away. “Get the hell out!”

Clay covered Sophie while the man fumbled with his pants and shirt, then edged toward the door. No one stopped him.

Clay plucked away the pins that had held Sophie’s hair in place under the wig and ran his fingers through the dark tresses. “You were brave.”

She bit her lower lip against the pain. He didn’t know what he’d do if he lost her.

It would be his fault for not foreseeing that Garrett wouldn’t docilely be arrested and led off to trial. The man had no scruples; Clay should have known he wouldn’t hesitate to turn a gun on Sophie to save his hide.

“Sorry,” he said. “Should’ve known he’d do somethin’ like that.”

“Thank you for taking the risk,” she said with a weak smile.

“I didn’t. You moved first.”

“I was mad.” She closed her eyes.

“Stay awake until the doc gets here.”

She blew out a couple of harsh breaths. “It hurts like the very devil.”

He grasped her hand and held it to his lips. He’d never felt so helpless in his life. “The doc’s comin’.”

There was a commotion on the stairs and Caleb Chaney entered the room, carrying his bag. He paused over Garrett’s body.

“He’s dead,” Clay said. “She’s the one needs a doctor.”

Caleb knelt over her. “They said she was
shot?
”

Clay edged over so the doctor could move in. Caleb pulled the sheet aside and raised the blood-soaked towel.

“Is it…is it bad?” Clay asked.

“There’s so much blood, it’s hard to tell.” He looked at Sophie’s face. He checked her pupils. “I think the corset is helping staunch the blood flow. Let’s move her to my office before I take it off to examine her.”

Dr. Chaney motioned to the men just inside the doorway. “Bring in the stretcher.”

Clay lifted her upper body by grasping her under the arms.

“Shit!”
she shouted.

They maneuvered her onto the canvas sling, Clay taking one end as Owen got the other, and carried her down the stairs.

By the time they put her in a wagon and arrived at the doctor’s office, Sophie was unconscious.

“It’s okay,” Caleb assured him. “I don’t think she’s in shock. It’s probably just her body’s way of dealing with the pain.”

“What can I do?”

“Go take care of things, make your report. I’ll take good care of her.”

“She might wake up and call for me.”

“I’m going to make sure she’s out, Marshal. She won’t be in any pain once I give her an injection. I have to see how much damage the bullet did and whether or not it’s still in there. You won’t be any help to me.”

Clay pursed his mouth in a hard line, hating the helplessness.

“Let me do my job,” the doctor said finally.

Entrusting Sophie to the man’s capable hands was the most difficult thing he’d ever done. He backed out of the building and stared sightlessly at the lights in the windows before turning away.

Sophie came to consciousness in a dizzying wave of pain that radiated from her left side. The sun coming in the window of the room where she lay was blinding.

Caleb Chaney looked into her eyes one at a time. “I’m going to give you something to let you sleep a while longer.”

Thank God. She nodded.

“Before I do, the marshal would like to say something to you.”

Clay was there.

“Sophie?” His hand was warm and large as he enveloped hers. “I have something for you.”

“What?”

He held up a shining gold ring—a wedding band. Was he proposing? What an odd time to think about marriage. She didn’t know if she was going to live or die, and if she did live, she wouldn’t be free to be a wife.

“Garrett had it on him. It’s yours, Sophie.”

She blinked at him.

“Your mother’s ring. It has your parents’ names inside.” Clay slipped the ring on her finger. It was warm from his skin. The weight was solid and satisfying. Tears formed in the outer corners of her eyes and rolled back into her hair. Clay wiped them with his thumbs.

She grasped his hand. “Thank you,” she said, her voice hoarse.

He kissed the backs of her fingers.

“He’s dead then?”

“He’s dead.”

Somehow she didn’t feel this was over, couldn’t shake the feeling that Garrett might appear at any moment. He’d controlled every second of her life for so many years, she couldn’t shake the sensation that he was hovering just out of sight.

Her side throbbed.

“That corset saved your life,” he told her.

She listened.

“Doc says the bullet glanced off a bone stay and tore a groove along the flesh. It’s all stitched up, but it will heal.”

“I’m not going to die.”

She thought she saw a glimmer of moisture in his eyes before he closed them and whispered, “No, thank God.”

Jail then…or a noose.

“You’ll get well and there will be a hearing. I’m doin’ everything I can,” he promised. “I won’t let anythin’ happen to you.”

What could he do? He couldn’t turn back time. He couldn’t change the things she’d done.