Way Out West (6 page)

Rand
started to place his hat back on his head, but
thought better of it and tucked it under his chair. “I assume it will be safe
under there?” He turned a questioning eye to her.

She smiled sweetly and
let him return to his game. Peering over his head, she studied the cards, but
the game just didn’t hold her interest. At least nowhere near as much as the
lustrous black waves of Rand’s hair now exposed right in front of her. They
smelled clean and fresh, and very masculine.

She inhaled deeply,
closing her eyes, picturing him combing his hair into place like in a
commercial for a popular shampoo. She hummed the catchy jingle, lost in the
fantasy of the two of them replacing the actors in the ad. He was so handsome,
so masculine, a far cry from crude Spider.

“Miss Callie?”

Hearing her name, she
opened her eyes. “Huh?” From the look on everyone’s faces, her humming had been
louder than she thought.

Rand
reached around, took her hand and stood up. “Gentlemen,
would you count me out of this round?”

Holding her hand firmly,
he led her back to the bar.

“I’m sorry,” she begged.
“I was sort of daydreaming. I didn’t mean to distract you again.” With a rustle
of satin, she sat on the stool he pressed her onto.

Leaning over her, Rand placed his hands on the bar, caging her between his big arms. With his face just
inches from hers, she caught the faint scent of cigar on his mustache. He
breathed rapidly, but his eyes skimmed over her slowly.

In a low, simmering
tone, he drawled, “You are probably the best distraction I’ve had in a long,
long time, but I’m here to play a game of cards and you’re here to learn your
job. It’s my fault for asking you to accompany me and I apologize. Now, if you
will do as you are supposed to do, I will return to my table and try to salvage
some of my respect along with my losses.”

Embarrassed by her
wayward thoughts, and angry that she’d let them get away from her, Callie could
only answer with a blink and puffed out lip. He was right. She wasn’t here to
snag a man. She was here to learn to stand on her own two feet and gain some
self-respect.

Rand
put a finger to her chin. “And don’t you pout
like that for anyone else.”

* * *

The cards in Rand’s hand blurred into one indecipherable glob. No matter what he did, he couldn’t
concentrate. The woman had gotten to him. Her searching fingers on his back and
shoulders, her sweet humming, had kept him from the game. He’d thought that
having her stand behind him would keep his mind on the cards while assuring him
she was safely within his reach.

It hadn’t worked that
way. Aside from the fact that she’d physically distracted him, she’d managed to
filter into his nostrils, his brain, everywhere. He smelled her when he
inhaled. He tasted her when he licked his lips. His arms ached to hold her like
when they’d rode in together.

But her lips. Ahh. The
pout of her lips drew him dangerously close. He’d wanted to nibble the cherry
red delights like ripened fruit.

A hard fist slammed down
on the table across from Rand. “I call,” said the grumpy stranger challenging Rand.

Rand
focused on his cards and realized he’d bet his
remaining chips on a pair of jacks. He looked at the size of the pot then at
the other two players who shrugged and folded their cards. He knew he was in
trouble, especially since this man had glared menacingly at Rand and Callie all
evening.

The menace nodded. “Well,
what have you got?”

Mustering as much
dignity as he could, Rand turned his cards. “Pair of jacks.”

The stranger sneered. “Three
nines.” He drew in his winnings. “Guess it ain’t your lucky night after all.”

Rand
felt he’d missed something, but what? If he hadn’t
been so preoccupied, would he have caught it? He blew out a heavy breath and
sank back in his chair. His hand eased down and rested on his gun, feeling the
cold metal against his warm, sweaty palm. Something didn’t sit well.

“The night’s not over
yet.”

The stranger, stacking
his chips in neat little rows, quipped, “Yeah, but you’re plum out of chips.”

Scraping back his chair,
Rand got up. “Forgive me, were we talking about cards?” While the other two
men snickered, he retrieved his hat then retreated to the bar.

Becky had joined Callie.
With their heads close together, Becky pointed out familiar faces and what she
knew about them.

“Conspiring against the
customers, ladies?” Rand was greeted with two smiles, but Callie’s far outshone
Becky’s.

Becky straightened up. “Oh,
just giving Callie the lay of the land, so to speak.”

“Well,” Rand said as he hiked an elbow on the bar, “maybe you can tell me a little about that
stranger who was sitting across from me. What do you know about him?”

Becky shook her head. “Nothing.
He came in on the stage this afternoon. Never seen him before.” She furrowed
her brow. “Why? Trouble?”

Brushing his mustache
with one long finger, Rand looked back at the table. “Don’t know. There’s just
something about him that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.”

“Hmm,” Becky murmured. “I’ll
talk to Smitty, see if he knows anything. We’ll keep an eye on him.”

Nodding, he glanced at
Callie. “Staying out of trouble?”

She squirmed in her
seat. “I wouldn’t call knocking off your hat a couple of times trouble. You
should see me when I really get going.”

Rand
let a smile split across his face. She was a
charmer, without a doubt. “Thanks for the warning.” He watched her eyes dance
like the flames in the oil lamps above the bar and her lips twitch as she held back
her laughter.

“Miss Becky, would you
mind if I kidnapped this lovely lady for a bit. I’m in need of some fresh air
and her company would be greatly appreciated.”

Becky eyed him
cautiously. “Normally, I’d say no. But seeing as it’s you, Rand, all right.
Just don’t keep her away too long. She’s got a lot to learn.”

Taking Callie’s hand to
help her down from her stool, he raised an eyebrow. “You don’t say?”

* * *

Outside, the cool night
air felt refreshing after the stuffy, cigar smoking, whiskey drinking, leather
and saddle soap smells of the saloon. Callie appreciated the change of scenery
and she tilted her head a notch higher being on the arm of a strong, handsome
gentleman like Rand.

The hollow click of
their heels on the boardwalk pre-empted any conversation. She noticed how
easily he synchronized his large booted steps with her small high-heeled ones.
Whenever they passed another lady, he deferred to let her pass with a tip of
his hat, then returned his hand to cover Callie’s fingers in the crook of his
elbow.

She was beginning to
like this lady and gentleman stuff.

“So, what do you think
of our little town so far?” he finally asked.

“I think I’ll reserve my
judgment for now. I haven’t seen enough of it yet.”

For a moment, she
thought about what she actually had seen today and it amounted to very little.
She’d gone from the bus station in Barstow to some God-forsaken, no name, speck-on-the-map
town in southern California. From there everyone had been transported to the
way station in cute little Conestoga buses.

So what she’d seen was
desert, mountains, plains, and a long bumpy road on the back of a horse.

“Why all the secrecy
getting here?” she asked. “Why can’t people just drive up, park their car and
change their wardrobe?”

“It’s not secrecy so
much as capturing the essence of the winning of the West. The travel, leaving
possessions behind, assuming new identities. I find it to be a cleansing
process.”

They reached the end of
a boardwalk. Rand stepped down and held up his hand to assist her down the three
steps. She eyed him curiously as they walked across the dirt alleyway and up
the steps of the next boardwalk.

“You really do love
this, don’t you?”

Rand
tilted his head. “Do you mean walking with you,
or coming to this town?”

Callie tipped her head
to hide a smile. “The town.”

“Yes, I do. Here I can
be me, at least the me that’s inside struggling to get out.”

“It sounds like the you
that’s on the outside isn’t very happy with his life.”

He stopped and turned to
her. “Let’s just say, some things can’t be changed.” Then, in a lighter tone,
he nodded toward the building behind her. “Care to visit the general store?”

She peered in the
window. “Wow, they’re open late.”

“Everything stays open
late to accommodate all the guests so they can make the most of their stay.”
With a hand at the small of her back, he ushered her inside. “Come on. I want
you to see what they have.”

“Howdy, Rand, ma’am.” The small, thin man behind the counter looked right out of the Old West. His
oiled-down hair, parted in the middle, was slicked behind protruding ears that
barely held a pair of wire-rimmed glasses. He wore a white shirt with armbands
and a soiled apron tied around his middle. “Anything I can git fer you folks
this evenin’?”

Amazed at the assortment
of goods, Callie shrugged at Rand.

“I think we’d just like
to look around a bit, Lloyd. We’re just out for a little stroll,” Rand explained.

“Take yer time and give
a holler if you need anything.”

Callie smiled and began
a closer inspection of the goods displayed here, there and everywhere. She
ogled the licorice and peppermint candy, the leather strips and bolts of
fabric. There were all the usual staples—beans, flour, sugar, coffee, tea, salt—in
old tins and sacks. One table held simple children’s toys like slingshots, and
tops, and kites. A counter on the far wall had personals like ladies’ combs,
men’s razors, shaving creams and such.

“This is wild!” She
giggled, looking back at Rand.

He smiled a pleased
smile. “I thought you’d like it.”

“But how do you buy
anything? We couldn’t bring money in.” Just then it occurred to her that Rand had used some strange sort of currency to purchase his poker chips.

He raised an eyebrow. “Still
haven’t finished the manual, huh?” When she sheepishly shook her head, he
explained. “What was the one modern item you brought in with you?”

She thought for a
moment. “Oh! The ID card.”

“Right. It’s the only
concession to the modern world, for reasons of necessity and security. At the
bank, there’s a closed-off room which houses a sort of teller machine. By using
your ID card, you can transfer funds into an account at the bank and withdraw
our WOW currency for spending money. When you leave, those transfers will be
tacked on to your final bill, to be paid in real money.”

Callie frowned as she
digested the well-thought-out scheme. “So there’s electricity at the bank?”

“Just in that one room.
The lines run underground to the main office at the way station where all the
records and transactions are kept. It’s also where all the profiles of the
guests are. The ID cards hold the key if we need to know something in case of
emergency.”

She moved to the display
in front of the window and ran her fingers over the delicate patterns of a
kite. The paper made a rustling sound beneath her touch.

She turned back to Rand. “You keep saying ‘we’ and ‘our’.”

“Do I? Slip of the
tongue. I come here so often I think of it as my home.” He gestured toward the
counter. “So, see anything you’d like?”

“Oh, I don’t think so.
At least not tonight. I need to get a feel for the place first.”

The bell above the door
jingled as they left the store and went back out into the night. Callie hugged
her bare arms against the cooling night air.

Ever alert, Rand hastened to take off his jacket and place it over her shoulders. When he did, he didn’t
bother to remove his arm. Instead, he pulled her to his side and walked with a
possessive arm around her shoulders.

The warmth from his body
heat permeated the jacket and settled on her arms and shoulders. She found it
so easy to snuggle in to him as they walked hip to hip. With each inhale, she
caught his scent from inside his jacket and smiled knowing it would stay with
her throughout the night.

Once again they reached
the end of a boardwalk, but this time there was no other walk ahead. They’d
reached the end of the street. Rand stopped and looked toward the sky.

“Have you ever seen
anything so beautiful, Callie? Stars like diamonds, a sky that goes on forever
until it dips to the horizon, air as fresh as the day the earth was born.”

Before she could answer,
the lone cry of a coyote sounded in the distance. “And wild animals looking for
a meal,” she said, shuddering.

He turned to face her.
In the darkness, she could only see the white of his shirt beneath the black
vest and the sparkle in his eyes as he placed his hands on her shoulders.