The finality of it hit her, and when it did, tears rolled down her cheek. She turned her head to swipe them away. He covered her hand with his. “I’m sorry, Jenny, but this is the way it has to be. But I’ll still want that photograph after you’re gone.”
She nodded and said nothing. Her voice seemed trapped in her throat. But she did know one thing. She could not turn her back on him. Not now. Not ever. And if he chose to flee from justice, she’d stay by him as long as he’d have her.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Two days after they returned from Central City, the four remaining brides had packed their belongings and were prepared to move into the new hotel. The building had been completed for weeks, but because the brides were comfortably settled in Jason’s house, he'd put no pressure on them to leave. The fact that he’d told them it was time to go led Jenny to believe that he knew his time was running out and wanted the women out of the house when it did, just as he wanted her and Lily on an eastbound stage.
Though she wanted to bide her time, tonight she would tell Jason about her meeting with Jack Bishop. If Jason were innocent, he needed to plan what to do, where to go. If he were innocent, that is. Much of what Jack Bishop told her she knew to be true. But some was speculation, and that’s what she’d been holding onto, the thin strand of hope that Jason was an honorable man who’d been wronged. She also had to find a time to slip away and inform Jack Bishop that she would be selling him the Dusty, but that Jason must never know. The Dusty and the signed confession would change hands concurrently.
It was late evening when Jason came home. Unlike the past two nights, when he’d come in late and gone directly to his bedroom, this particular night he went to Lily’s room, taking an inordinate amount of time to play with her before tucking her into bed. Jenny put no pressure on him to let Lily settle down and go to sleep. Before long, Lily would be out of his life, and Jenny didn’t want to deny Jason these last precious days with the child who was in all respects but blood, his daughter.
When he left Lily’s room and passed Jenny’s dressing table, where she sat in her night dress brushing her hair, Jenny rose quickly and positioned herself in front of the door to his bedroom. “I need to talk to you, Jason,” she said.
Jason raised his hands to take her by the shoulders and move her aside then dropped his arms and said, “If I don’t go in my bedroom and shut the door, we’ll have a repeat of what happened at the hotel. You know it, and so do I. It’s all I can do to keep my hands off you right now, with you standing there in that night dress with nothing between us but a slip of cotton so sheer it hides nothing.”
“Don’t worry. It’s not my intent to seduce you again,” Jenny clipped. But the profound longing that closed around her heart like a vise was so strong she had to knot her fists to keep from guiding her hands up Jason's chest and around his neck and kissing him until the invisible wall he kept between them was shattered and they were united as husband and wife again.
Clasping her hands together at her chest to assure him she was not primed for seduction, she said, “I need to talk to you and it’s very important.”
Jason folded his arms. “Go ahead."
Entwining her fingers to keep from reaching out, she said in an anxious voice, “In Central City when you were gone so long, I went looking for you, and while I was in the hotel lobby, Jack Bishop approached me and told me he wanted to talk to me, so I let him.”
The expression on Jason’s face darkened and the muscles rippled up his jaw. “You could have turned and walked away, but you couldn’t let it be, could you?”
Jenny squared her shoulders. “No, I couldn’t. I told you before, I don’t care what you did years ago, but you refuse to talk to me about it and at least give me a reason to leave you and stay out of your life forever. So I listened to what Jack Bishop had to say, and he told me some very disturbing things.”
Jason gave a snort of disgust. “I’m sure he did,” he said, the corner of his mouth tipping up in a rueful smile. Then the smile flattened and he said in a solemn voice, “So now you know why you have to take Lily and go.”
He wasn’t denying anything! “Don’t you want to know what he said?”
“It doesn’t matter what he told you or whether it was lies or not because it doesn’t change a thing. I still intend to put you on an eastbound stage as soon as the divorce papers are ready for you to sign.”
As simple as that. Sign the papers and go! His cold, impassive response to her leaving was like an arrow moving slowly and surely into a heart that was already dying. But then, he’d never made any promises, so his indifference was not so surprising. But that didn’t change the fact that she loved him with all her heart and cared what happened to him, even in her absence. “It does matter what he told me,” she said, “because if it’s true, you could be hanged.”
Again, that one-sided smile. “My days are numbered anyway, so a noose coming sooner rather than later wouldn’t make much difference.”
Jenny saw in his face the resignation that made her want to thrash him into doing something, anything, but this indifferent acceptance of his fate. “Well, it makes a difference to me!” she said in a high, wavering voice that bordered on hysteria. “He told me he had enough evidence to have you arrested for murdering Myles! He also said you murdered his brother, Clay. Is that true?”
Jason shrugged as if what she’d told him was nothing more than a minor nuisance, and said, “That I murdered your husband and his brother, no. That Bishop has enough contrived evidence to have me arrested, probably. Another reason for you to take Lily and go." He took her by the shoulders and moved her aside, then went into his bedroom and pulled the door shut, leaving Jenny staring at the door, her heart thumping like the flapping of a dying bird’s wings.
But she would not be shut out. Jerking the door open, she rushed after him and grabbed his arm. “You can’t just ignore this, Jason,” she said, tears prickling her eyes. “If Jack Bishop has enough evidence to have you arrested you could hang for a crime you didn’t commit. You said that the only justice here is vigilante justice. The town could hang you before you had a chance to face a judge.” She started shaking and her voice wavered as she said in a high-pitched, panic-stricken voice, “Do you really want to hang by your neck until you’re dead?” Her words were like a noose around her own neck, choking off her wind and sending tears of fear and frustration rolling down her cheeks.
Jason heaved a weary sigh and gathered her against him. “No, of course I don’t.”
Jenny threw her arms around him and pressed her face against his chest. “Then pack up and leave!” she said, tightening her arms around him. “Go where they can’t find you.”
Jason rested his cheek against the top of her head. “Not anymore,” he replied. “Running from the past eventually catches up with you, and I’m tired of running.”
“I don’t want to lose you,” Jenny said in a faltering voice. “I could adjust to being your wife a thousand miles away from you, but I couldn’t adjust to losing you... forever. Please don’t just do nothing.”
Jason curved a finger beneath her chin, lifting her face so she had to look at him, and said, “What do you propose I do?”
Jenny curved her arms around his neck. “Make love to me one more time before Lily and I go, then leave here and make a new life for yourself, somewhere far away. And maybe some day we’ll find each other again.”
Jason dropped his forehead against hers. “I can’t run anymore and I won’t make love to you. When I put you on that stage you will not be carrying my child. Neither of us need that complication in our lives” Then he took her arms from around him and held her at arms length. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but that’s the way it has to be. So you can either go back to your room and shut the door between us, or I’ll stay somewhere else tonight.”
Jenny stood staring at him, but the resolve on his face was unwavering. “I’ll stay in my room,” she said at last, then turned from him and shut the door between t
hem.
Alone in her bed, Jenny stared at the confusion of ethereal shadows cast across the room by the light of an unclouded moon, while listening to Jason’s restless tossing behind the door dividing them, and resigned herself to the realization that she’d had her one night of love with her husband, and it would have to carry her through a lifetime of hoping and waiting and longing for the only man she wanted in her life.
***
As Jason expected, Ned Beckett returned. It was rumored that the bounty hunter was staying with Jack Bishop at Bishop’s compound across the ravine from Jason’s house. Jason found that curious, at first—the long-overdo score Beckett had to settle with him had nothing to do with Jack Bishop or Jenny's husband. But after months of speculation, it was at last clear to Jason why Jack Bishop was after him. Bishop's brother, Clay Hutchins. For whatever reason, the brothers had not shared the same last name, so Jason had not made the connection until Jenny mentioned the name. The irony of it was, Bishop and Beckett should be bitter enemies. But they shared a common goal. They both wanted Jason Colby dead.
When he returned to the house that evening, it was the eerie silence that hit Jason first. For months the house had been alive with chatter and laughter, and often he’d find Jenny in a circle of women enjoying each other’s company. But now the brides were gone, and the house was silent. The brides had served him well for a time, giving him an excuse to shower Jenny with affection she’d presumed was feigned, but which came from his heart. He could touch her face or press his lips against her neck or kiss her on the cheek or lips, as any husband would. And always he’d been rewarded by her loving and affectionate responses, whether it was her fingers brushing his face, or her lips finding his, or her hands on his shoulders as she kissed him on the cheek. And he’d imagine how it could have been in the life he might have had. He sighed. The life that could have been.
But the near empty house, and his need to keep Jenny at arms length until she left on the eastbound stage, added a stressful finality to his brief marriage to the only woman he’d ever take as his wife. A marriage he’d soon hold only in memory.
What he’d give for just one night alone in this house with Jenny as his wife, one night to be free to hold her and kiss her and make love to her as a husband would. Or just sit with her in the parlor, Jenny knitting or sewing as she did in the evening, while he cleaned his guns or oiled his leathers. Or maybe he'd sit on the floor and play with Lily while chatting with Jenny about Lily’s latest achievement, or how Seth and Cora were doing, or if Jenny wanted to redecorate the house or buy a new dress or invite friends for dinner, as any married couple might do.
Just one night alone together in the big house.
He looked up the long flight of stairs. Jenny would be in her bedroom now, and Lily would be tucked in bed. And he’d simply go to his room, stare at the closed door that separated them, climb into his bed and attempt to sleep just inches from his wife.
But when he passed the parlor, he was surprised to find Jenny in a rocking chair by the fireplace, knitting—much as he had imagined—but with Lily sitting on a blanket that was spread on the rug, toying with a little sock monkey that Jenny had made for her.
Engrossed in thought, Jenny was not aware that he was watching her as she bent over her task, lips parted, brows gathered in concentration. For a few moments he stood staring at his family, the only family he’d ever known. And for the first time in his life he looked upward and asked silently, if you’re up there, God, do something to make me worthy of the two most precious people in my life. Then he discarded that idealistic notion as the foolish imaginings of a desperate man, and asked God instead to grant him a few more minutes just to look at them.
That small prayer was answered.
He studied Jenny’s face as she sat nibbling absently at her lip, her fingers moving quickly, the knitting needles clicking as tiny rings of wool slipped from one needle onto the other. Before Jenny moved into this house, he’d never watched a woman knitting or sewing or reading. He’d been so long around dance-hall girls and seductive sirens that what most men took for granted—a wife rocking and knitting, and a child smiling at a doll made from an old wool sock—was for him a minor miracle.
A loop of hair escaped from the knot at the back of Jenny’s head, and he had the almost irresistible urge to take that loop of hair and tuck it back into the bun then plant a kiss on the side of her neck, or pull out the pin that held the knot in place and watch the long coppery curls cascade over her shoulders...
As though she’d heard his unspoken thought, Jenny reached back and tucked the loop of hair into the bun. Then she lifted her head and caught him watching. “How long have you been standing there?” she asked.
“Not long,” he replied.
Hearing Jason’s voice, Lily looked up and squealed, “Dada,” then held up her arms. He walked over and crouched beside her, kissed each little outstretched hand and lifted her in his arms. “How are you, sweet thing?” he asked.
“Dada,” she replied, sandwiching his face between her hands and patting his cheeks. Then leaning precariously over Jason’s supporting arm, she reached for her sock monkey. “Yes, princess, I’ll get it.” Holding Lily snugly against him, he snatched up the sock monkey and gave it to Lily, who chortled with glee.
Lily raised the sock monkey. “Iss,” she said, pressing the monkey against Jason’s mouth.
He grabbed it, moving it from his mouth. “I can think of other things I’d rather kiss, sweet thing,” he said, looking over Lily’s head at Jenny, who smiled up at him, “but okay—“ he kissed the sock monkey, to Lily’s delight, triggering a burst of gleeful, baby laughs. He sat in a chair across from Jenny and settled Lily on his lap.
Jenny looked up from her knitting. “Do you notice anything?” she asked, a little smile playing about her lips.
Her casual question seemed in some ways the answer to his wish for just one night as husband and wife, rocking and knitting and talking and playing with Lily. Though incomplete—they would not share a bed tonight—it would give him his night. Their night. He also got the distinct impression that it was what she wanted too.
“Well?” She waited for his response, lips curved in a devious smile.
Enjoying their playful repartee, Jason looked around the room. Finding nothing out of the ordinary, he said, “Is this a trap?”
Jenny's smile widened. “No love. Not a trap. Just an observation.”
“Will I be in trouble if I say something evasive like, I notice a beautiful woman sitting across from me, knitting something....” he paused and raised questioning eyes to meet her amused ones. “Is it what you’re knitting that I’m supposed to notice?”
Her eyes danced with delight. “No, love, try again.”
Jason looked down at Lily. “Help me, sweet thing. Mama’s messing with my head and I’m too dense to figure it out.”
Jenny laughed. “It’s our first evening completely alone together in the parlor.”
Jason felt a tightening around his heart. It was also almost their last. “So here we are, old wedded folks who've married off our eleven daughters and at last have the house to ourselves,” he said lightly, wanting to hold onto to the comfortable companionship they were sharing.
“Except for your little sweet thing there,” Jenny added, looking at Lily. “One daughter left for you to walk down the aisle."
A long silence stretched between them, a long drawn-out silence that lengthened into a lifetime of Lily growing up while Jason envisioned a toddler chasing after a butterfly, a little girl helping her mother in the kitchen... a young woman tasting her first kiss... some nameless bloke, married to her mother, walking Lily down the aisle...
The noose that had wrapped itself around his heart tightened.
“But that’s a long ways off,” Jenny said lightly. “Meanwhile, have you been to see Seth and Cora lately?”
Jason shrugged, shattering the images of Lily growing up without him. But the heaviness in his hear
t remained. “I was there yesterday,” he said, struggling to recapture the jovial moments before reality interrupted their pretense.
“How are they?” Jenny asked, glancing over at him, offering a smile.
Jason knew the smile was feigned. Still, he'd keep the act up a little longer. “Happy. Cora’s good for Seth. She’s made a man of him.”
“No, love,” Jenny said, looking up from her knitting. “You made a man of Seth. Cora just clipped his wings and made him livable and lovable."
The sock monkey hit Jason across the side of the head. He looked at Lily, who was giggling. “Mama’s right, princess,” he said to Lily. “Every man needs a good woman to keep him on the straight and narrow—" he winked at Jenny, glad for the monkey diversion, then returned to Lily "—and I suspect you’ll have many a young buck wanting you to do just that before you’re through toying with their poor, tattered young hearts.”
“Don’t give our daughter ideas too soon, love,” Jenny piped in. “I’d rather she not think about taming young male hearts until she’s well past twenty.”
“Mama wants you to be an old maid,” Jason said, bouncing Lily on his knee.
“Not an old maid, just a prudent young woman who’s wise enough to ask lots of questions before—” Jenny stopped short and looked at Jason. “I didn’t mean to say that. It slipped out.”
And Jason knew their charade as husband and wife sitting contentedly around the fire while chatting about ordinary things was over. “But it’s true,” he said, looking at Jenny’s distraught face, “and Lily will need you to remind her of that while she’s growing up. You have to do that, Jenny. Don’t let Lily fall in love with a man with a hidden past. Promise me.”
“How can I promise you anything at this point, Jason, when I don’t even know how I’m going to get through the next few months without you?”
“You have family in Iowa, don’t you?” Strange he was asking about her family now, months after he’d married her. Why had the subject never come up? Why had he not been curious enough to ask before? Easy to answer that one. Because if he’d asked about her past and her family, she’d have the right to ask the same of him.
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