“Oh.”
“You’re a damned fool, Jed. You nearly had us caught at the pharmacy and at Kuhn’s house, and now this.”
Lily’s eyes flew wide. Bo Turner and Jed Archer were the thieves? Two men who she saw nearly every day in town—a man whose son was in her class—were responsible for the frenzy that had an innocent man, her brother, in jail and her friends the Flathead watching their backs?
A wave of fury washed over her. Christian was close enough to notice. He gripped her upper arms, then raised a finger to his lips. The crunch of broken glass and muttering continued below. She wanted to wriggle out of Christian’s grip and charge down into the store to tell the two men exactly what she thought of them.
“It ain’t here,” Bo growled.
“It’s probably in the back somewhere or upstairs.”
“What would a cashbox be doing upstairs?” Jed asked.
“I don’t know. You heard West say he doesn’t live there anymore, right? Maybe he put a safe up there.”
“Well, let’s go see.”
Christian moved fast. He lunged past Lily to the bureau beside the bed, yanking open the top right-hand drawer. Michael had asked her not to touch that drawer. She knew why as Christian took out a revolver.
“Thank you Michael,” he whispered.
He reached back into the drawer for a box of bullets and set about loading the gun. Bo and Jed were still arguing below, but their voices had moved to the storeroom. Lily glanced around, looking for something she could use as a weapon. She had no idea how to fire a gun, even if there had been another one. The best she came up with was an old candlestick sitting on a table beside the window. She scurried to grab it.
Christian was shaking his head when he turned back to her. He motioned for her to move against the wall, out of view of the stairs. She shook her head in defiance, gripping the candlestick like a club. Christian pointed to the wall so hard it would have cowered if it was alive. Lily refused to obey.
“I’m not going up there by myself,” Jed’s voice at the bottom of the stairs stopped their silent argument. “What if someone is up there?”
“No one is up there, you idiot. You said yourself that the place was empty now.”
“Yeah, but don’t it make sense that someone would be staying there? In case the place was robbed?”
“Jed, you’re an idiot.”
Footsteps sounded on the stairs, first one set, then another. Christian tightened his grip on the revolver and moved to shield himself behind the doorway. He peeked around the corner, waiting. The footsteps reached the upstairs hallway.
“This is the stupidest—”
Jed didn’t finish his sentence.
Christian twisted into the doorway, firing the revolver twice. Lily screamed and dropped her candlestick. Bo and Jed both roared with pain. Twin thumps told Lily they had fallen.
“Stay down!” Christian shouted, gun still pointed in his outstretched hand. He stepped into the hall and out of Lily’s view, flicking on the electric lights.
“Avery?” Bo yelped as Jed shouted, “Jesus!”
“One of you is right,” Christian said, then quickly followed that with, “Stay down!”
Lily bent to scoop up her candlestick and shot around the corner into the hall. Bo Turner and Jed Archer lay sprawled on the rag carpet lining the narrow hall between the wall and the banister of the stairs leading down to the storeroom. Both men were bleeding from leg wounds that they clutched, their faces contorted in pain. Bo saw her and grunted, struggling backwards like a wounded crab.
“Stay where you are, Bo, unless you want a bullet in the other leg too!” Christian ordered.
Writhe and swear as they did, neither man was going anywhere. Charlie and Michael’s hall rug was ruined with blood, but it was a small price to pay for catching the thieves. As the initial fear and shock of the situation ebbed, a strange elation took their place.
“How dare you!” Lily shouted at the men, coming to stand as close to Christian’s side as she could, candlestick wielded over her head. “Thieves! Scoundrels!”
Jed’s eyes were huge with terror and pain. Bo’s face contorted in hatred.
“All this time it was you who were causing so much trouble for the entire town! This is your town! These are your neighbors! Have you no shame?”
“No!” Bo barked. “I got no money either. So you can go to hell, you savage bitch!”
Christian fired and Bo shouted in pain, clutching his other leg. Jed screamed at a higher pitch than Lily and a dark patch formed at the seat of his trousers.
“That was unnecessary,” Christian said and rolled his shoulders. Whether he was talking about Bo’s insult or his own reaction, Lily wasn’t sure.
“Can we get them to the jail?” she asked. “Is anyone there at night?”
Christian winced. He swayed on his spot, lowering the revolver now that Bo wasn’t going anywhere. His expression didn’t soften at all. He looked at Lily as though about to deliver bad news. Her throat tightened at the doom that look foretold.
“Wilkins is probably there,” he said. “Someone has to be there since there’s a prisoner, but I doubt it’s Kent.”
“All right,” Lily nodded. “I can go for him if you need to stay here with these two.”
The dreadful wince returned to Christian’s face. “Lily, you can’t.”
Her back shot straight. “What do you mean, I can’t?”
He flexed his grip around the revolver’s handle and rubbed his stubbly chin. At last, he let out a breath on a growl and faced her fully.
“If you go out in the middle of the night to fetch Wilkins or Kent or anyone else to tell them that we caught the thieves, everyone in town will know in no uncertain terms that I spent the night with you.”
Lily’s blood turned to ice as the truth of the situation hit her.
“There won’t be any excuses this time,” he went on. “You know what that means.”
“I’ll lose my job,” she breathed.
She knew it as certainly as she knew the sun would come up in the morning. She’d only barely escaped the first time. Now the rumors would be proven. Mr. Prescott would dismiss her and she would be humiliated.
“I could let them go,” Christian said.
“Yes!” Jed sobbed. “Let us go! I won’t tell a soul you were here together, honest Injun!”
Lily glared at Jed. He cowered as he realized his mistake. Bo managed to shake his head even as he slumped, pale with pain. She felt as though she was the one who had been shot.
She turned back to Christian, throat closing up. “I can’t do that,” she insisted. “This madness has to end. If we take these men to the jail, they’ll have to let Seeks For Her go. People will stop harassing the Flathead. Life can go back to normal.” And her life, the life she had worked so hard to build, would be over. With each new truth, hot tears came to her eyes.
“Sweetheart, I’m sorry.” Christian sighed and slid his arm around her, squeezing her close. “I’m so sorry.”
She indulged in one moment, one deep breath that threatened to turn into a sob, as she rested her forehead against his neck. Then she stood straight and wiped her eyes.
“I’ll go for Wilkins.”
She marched forward, stepping around Jed and Bo as carefully as she could. Bo gave up and lay on the floor, possibly in a swoon. Jed burst into sobs. Lily walked right through them without fear for her person and fetched her coat, hat, and mittens from the sitting room.
“Are you sure you’ll be all right?” Christian asked her over the banister as she headed down the stairs.
She looked up at him, bristling with concern and regret, but something beyond that. He loved her. He’d been willing to let confessed criminals go free for her. That had to count for something. Still, all she could give him in reply was a nod. She couldn’t bring herself to lie to him and tell him she’d be fine.
Cold Springs was eerie in the pre-dawn. The cold was so penetrating that she was sh
ivering before she stepped down from the porch and into Main Street. Any tears she had left frosted in her eyes before they could be shed. Moonlight shone down from the black sky above. She ran from the store to the jail, guided by the dim, flickering light in the jail window.
Wilkins answered after only one knock. Bitter disappointment flooded her to discover that Christian was right. Of course he would be there. She stepped into the jail, hugging herself. Seeks For Her stood the moment he saw her.
“Singing Bird?”
“Seeks For Her.”
“Is that what this is? A family reunion?” Wilkins growled. His hair was messed and his eyes red-rimmed as though he had been trying to sleep.
Lily turned from her brother to Wilkins. “We’ve caught the thieves,” she said without a hint of triumph.
“You what?” Wilkins crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes at her.
“We caught the thieves,” she repeated. “They attempted to rob the West’s general store. I…Christian and I were upstairs and heard them.”
A sly grin pulled at the corners of Wilkins’s mouth. Lily nearly choked in disgust.
“Christian shot them,” she rushed on.
Wilkins dropped his smarmy grin. Seeks For Her rushed to the bars of his cell.
“Are they alive?” he asked. “Do they need medical attention?”
A fragment of hope caught in Lily’s chest. Her brother was a doctor. He could help Bo and Jed. He was willing to help the men who were responsible for his imprisonment.
“They are alive. Christian is waiting for Lieutenant Wilkins to bring them to the jail.” She would have time to feel proud of her brother later.
Wilkins lunged for his coat, slowing at the last minute. “How do I know this isn’t some trick for you to spring him from jail?”
Lily huffed. “I’ll come back to the store with you. You can lock the jail behind us.”
“Cuff my hands to the bars,” Seeks For Her added, thrusting his fists out. “That way you know I can’t break free.”
Wilkins narrowed his eyes as though he was considering it. He took in Lily’s stoic expression, then cursed.
“It’s not worth my time,” he said. “Come on.”
Lily led him back out into the cold and across Main Street to the store. By the time they got there, Christian had managed to get Bo and Jed down the stairs. They lay on the floor in the storeroom, Jed still sobbing and Bo half passed out. If Wilkins had any idea who the two were to Cold Springs, he didn’t let on. Between him and Christian they managed to carry the two across the street and lock them in the jail cell. Seeks For Her went to work right away assessing their wounds.
“I need medical equipment,” he said, ripping the leg of Jed’s trousers as Jed wailed. “Gauze, something to sterilize the wound. This one looks like he’s just been grazed, but if it’s more than that he should be operated on to remove the bullets.”
“Right,” Wilkins scoffed. “Like any man in his right mind would let you operate on them.”
“Operate! Operate!” Jed howled.
“Michael’s got a few medical things for sale at the store,” Christian said. “Thomas, if you come back with me, could you find what you need?”
“Yes.” Seeks For Her nodded.
“Are you out of your mind?” Wilkins said as Christian moved to open the door of the cell.
“Get out of my way,” Christian challenged him.
“I’m not letting a criminal out of jail.”
“He’s not a criminal,” Lily insisted. “The true culprits have been captured. They’ve confessed.”
“I haven’t heard any confession,” Wilkins said.
“We did it!” Jed cried. “Bo and I, we did it. We been robbing places since Christmas! Now let the Injun out so he can save my life!”
“Coercion,” Wilkins countered. “You’d say anything if you thought it could save your ass.”
“Ask Bo!” Jed insisted.
Wilkins crossed his arms and grinned. “I will when he wakes up.”
“If he wakes up,” Seeks For Her said. “With two wounds, he’s lost a lot of blood.”
Christian cursed under his breath. “I’ll fetch Dr. Greene.” He started to the door, turning to Lily as he opened it. “Will you be all right until I get back?”
She nodded. “Hurry.”
He sent her one final look that contained so much, his determination to do what was right, his regret that things had gone so wrong. When he shut the door behind him, she squeezed her eyes shut.
When she opened them a new kind of energy filled her.
“Bo and Jed are the thieves,” she told Wilkins in no uncertain terms. “They were talking while searching for the store’s cashbox, long before they came upstairs and found us. I heard them refer clear as day to the other robberies. You have a confession and a witness.”
“So?” Wilkins grumbled.
“So it means that you have no charges against my brother.” It felt good to say it. “Now or later, you will have to let him go.”
“What if I choose later?” he said.
“Then everyone in town will know just how much of a bigot you are,” she told him. “They will know that you have nothing to do with law and order, that you are nothing more than a tyrant in a uniform.”
Wilkins snorted. “I’ll take my chances.”
“Yes,” she said, walking to the side of the cell. “Fools often do.”
If only her words didn’t apply so sharply to herself.
Seeks For Her glanced up from what work he could do on Jed’s legs without supplies and met Lily’s eyes. “I knew you would be strong,” he said.
“I’ve had to be,” she answered. He only knew the beginning of it. Once the sun rose, she would have to be stronger than ever.
Chapter Twenty-One
Within an hour, Christian returned with Dr. Greene. The supercilious man took one look at the scene and heaped scorn on everyone there, from Seeks For Her and his insistence on helping with the treatment to Jed and his continual crying over the situation to Christian and Lily for carrying on with each other outside of every decent boundary of propriety. Kent Porter arrived as dawn was creeping over the edge of the horizon, baffled at everything that had happened in his absence.
Worst of all, Samuel Kuhn showed up minutes after Kent.
“What in God’s name is all this!” he demanded.
“They caught the thieves!” Kent bubbled with excitement. “What’d you bring?”
He tried to take the basket that smelled of breakfast from Samuel. Samuel glared at him and thrust the basket at Wilkins.
“Is that what’s really going on?” he asked Wilkins directly.
Scowling, eyes still bloodshot from lack of sleep, Wilkins said, “Could be. That one keeps confessing every chance he gets, but the other one’s just coming to.”
“Why is Dr. Greene here?”
“Both of these men have been shot,” Dr. Greene grumbled.
“They were trying to rob the general store,” Christian added.
Lily hung back as much as she could to let the men argue it out. Her head ached with stress and lack of sleep, but even more so with the knowledge of what the new day held in store.
That trauma began as soon as Samuel laid eyes on her.
“What is she doing here?”
“She was with Mr. Christian Avery when the thieves were apprehended,” Wilkins reported with a grin. “Seems they were having a little tryst at the store when they were interrupted.”
“Is this true?” Samuel demanded.
Lily glanced to Christian, the weight of the world pressing down on her shoulders.
Christian sighed, wiped a hand over his face, and said, “Yes.”
At least he had the good sense to keep it to that much.
Samuel came close to quivering with delight. “At last!” He beamed with more joy than he had at the prospect of the men who had robbed him being captured. “For months I have been telling the town council tha
t they made a damn fool mistake in hiring the likes of her! For months I’ve been trying to make them see the error of their ways.”
“Now just a minute there,” Christian interrupted. His face was wan and pale with exhaustion and the truth was too powerful even for him to change.
“The town council will hear about this today, now!” Samuel ignored him. “At last, we’ll be rid of you and your foolhardy, progressive ways for good!” He turned to Wilkins. “Are these men really the thieves who robbed my store and my house?”
Wilkins hesitated. He rubbed his temples, studying Jed and Bo as they lay on two beds in the jail cell as Dr. Greene and Seeks For Her stitched them up. His expression hardened on Seeks For Her, then melted in a puff of acceptance.
“Yeah, I think they are,” he admitted.
“Good!” Samuel barked. “Lock them up and throw away the key!”
He turned on his heel and marched out of the jail, sparing one last venomous look for Lily.
Lily rose from the chair where she sat watching her brother. “I should go too,” she told Christian, resting a hand on his arm.
Christian, took her hand and pulled her into a brief embrace. He kissed her forehead.
“It’s going to be all right,” he said, the confidence in his voice undermined by weariness.
She nodded, still not willing to lie by agreeing with him outright. She squeezed his hand then turned to fetch her coat. Seeks For Her watched her—watched the exchange between her and Christian—with thoughtful eyes. He tried to smile when she looked at him one final time before leaving.
Cold Springs was hazy with early morning light as she crossed Main Street to the general store. She let herself in and dragged herself back to the storeroom. Spots of blood stained the floorboards and the jewelry counter was a mess of shattered glass. She knew how it felt.
“Lily? Is that you?”
Michael’s call from the top of the stairs to the apartment would have shocked her out of her wits, if she’d had any left.
“Yes, it’s me,” she replied.
Michael charged down the stairs to meet her. “Thank God you’re all right! What happened here?”
“Christian caught the thieves last night,” she related the story too exhausted for emotion. “Jed Archer and Bo Turner. They were attempting to rob the store. We heard them and…and Christian caught them.”
In Your Arms (Montana Romance) Page 25
