Author's Muse (Sweet Town Clean Historical Western Romance Book 12)

by Sarah Christian

  “Yes,” she said shortly and then looked to the children. Their faces were red from their exertions and Erik’s was particularly shiny. “If you would excuse me, I’m going to take Erik to lunch. Maeve is welcome to join us, if you like.”

  “I don’t understand?” He stepped closer to her.

  “You seems so engrossed in your conversation with Miss Berg, I assumed that you would appreciate the freedom to carry on as long as you liked.”

  He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Carry on? I was just talking to her. She’s a nice woman and I got to know her while we traveled together.”

  “Of course you did.” She never glanced in his direction.

  “Whoa Nellie,” he said in a deep voice his hands in the air as if pulling on the reins of an imaginary horse.

  “My name is not ‘Nellie’ nor am I a mare.” She motioned to Erik to come to her side.

  “No, I would say you are more like a filly.” He winked broadly at her and was gratified to see a small smile flicker on her lips, though she tried to suppress it. “Listen, Belle, it’s a beautiful day. Let’s see if the hotel can pack us a picnic lunch. I’m sure Therese can suggest a place to enjoy it, too.” He turned to Laura briefly, “Good to see you again, Miss Berg.”

  ***

  The spot Therese had given them directions to was a grassy area on the banks of the small stream that coursed through town. Violets grew thickly on the edges of the soft green lawn and several trees hung over lending shade. An elm had fallen at some point in the past and its trunk now hung over the water, effectively a bridge. That alone was high entertainment for the two children who dared one another to walk across it. Theo had checked to make sure the water was shallow, and the bottom silty before letting them.

  After they had all eaten their fill, and the basket had been repacked with plates and napkins and empty dishes, they lay back on the blanket provided by the hotel and watched sunlight dapple through the leaves above.

  Theo put his arm behind his head for a pillow and turned on his side toward Belle. Erik was laying next to her, his eyes glazed as if he could fall asleep at any moment.

  “Do you ever think about getting married again?”

  She turned to Theo in surprise. “Where did that thought come from? Is it something you’ve thought of?”

  He flopped onto his back and stared up at the tree overhead. “Well, sure. I was happy being married. I would prefer to have a wife, a mother for Maeve, perhaps even more children.”

  “Ideally, of course, that would be perfect. But how could you ever be sure you weren’t choosing wrongly again?”

  “You’re forgetting, I chose well the first time around. It was fate that ended my marriage, not incompatibility.” He smiled. “I think I’m a pretty good judge of character.”

  “Are you? Actually, I think I am as well. I don’t know that I’ll ever take my father’s advice again, though.” She plucked a dandelion and began pulling the petals from its blossom.

  “Would you be willing to try?”

  She glanced at him. “Try what?”

  “I don’t know. Try getting to know one another better.”

  She laughed. “After three years of correspondence, I should think we know each other quite well.”

  Drat her, he thought. She was deliberately being obtuse. “I mean as a man and a woman, not an editor and an author.”

  She looked fully at him and he drank in the sight of her face, heartshaped and lovely. Her hair was slightly mussed where she’d lain on it, and her eyes were open wide. “Do you mean like courting?” Her voice was small, as uncertain as he had ever heard it.

  He reached out and pulled the mangled flower from her hand, dropping it to the blanket, and wound his fingers through hers. “Exactly like courting.”

  She gently squeezed his fingers and he decided that was as much acquiescence he would get from her while they were surrounded by children.

  “Mommy,” Erik whined. “I need Bun.”

  Theo laughed. “Don’t tell me you’re still hungry, fella.”

  Belle corrected him. “He means his stuffed bunny. I forgot to look for it when we were at the apartment earlier. He missed it last night. He can only go to sleep with it or Edward Bear, but we left that toy in Chicago.” She sat up and smoothed her hair. “I’ll just run over to the store and look for it. It probably got kicked under the bed.”

  “Hurry back,” Theo called after her as he watched her cross the street and duck into the back door of the mercantile.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  “Do you think Mack’s right?”

  Belle slipped in the back of the general store as quietly as she could, still a bit skittish about coming in the front and facing Lucy alone. Through the curtain, she could hear Mrs. Price speaking to someone in scandalized tones.

  “It certainly makes more sense than it being an accident, but I just don’t know who’d do such a thing,” her husband the sheriff responded. “Have you and Neal been able to figure out if something’s missing?”

  “There’s nothing of value missing as near as I can tell, other than Mrs. Lindholm’s manuscript she came in here complaining about. A few bottles of ink, some candles. Little things the Beacham kids probably snatched up and we didn’t notice until the inventory.”

  Hearing that didn’t fill Belle with any new confidence in the solution to the puzzle. Nothing valuable had been taken from the store? But if the target had been her manuscript all along, why leave it in Theo’s room? She shook her head at the puzzling thoughts and continued her way up the stairs.

  Inside it was every bit as smoke-stained and wet as it had been the last time she entered, but now she saw it with new eyes, vindicated by the expert opinion of the architect, Mack Coffman. On the couch, the fire had spread out, making it more difficult to follow the trail of the kerosene, but the table had swirls of it practically etched into it. And despite what the blacksmith had thought, obviously the fire had started at the table, Belle realized. How could it have started anywhere else? Once the lamp was broken at the end of the couch, all the remaining oil had spilled on the floor. No, the trail of kerosene had been poured from the lamp, following from the table across the settee, then tossed on the floor when it was no longer needed. Her fingers trailed the burn scars across the top of the table, envisioning the way it would have raced from there to the settee. The cushions would have soaked up the kerosene so that they looked like a huge torch. The cloth would burn faster than the new wood of the table, so that it might appear at first glance to have been the source of the fire, but now she knew better.

  But there was no kerosene on the manuscript. It had to have been picked up before the arsonist began, she realized. Held in the criminal’s hand, soaking up smoke as it filled the apartment, yet untouched by flame.

  She could picture it all so perfectly now, except for the face of the one responsible!

  Belle huffed and drew away, intending to go into the bedroom and search for Erik’s beloved stuffed rabbit as she’d planned, yet something caught her eye. A glint of silver in the dim light, beneath the table. Holding her skirt so as not to get it filthy, she crouched down and reached out with her free hand, stretching until her fingers could close on the object. When she brought it up to her eyes, she frowned. It wasn’t silver after all. Just a nickel.

  She rolled it between her fingers, not nearly so dexterous with the coin as Theo was. Her fingers came away sooty and black, the nickel having picked up a good coating from sitting through the fire. She was quite careful with her money, so how had it come to be under the table and forgotten?

  Then she remembered. Theo had tossed it to Clara and she had missed catching it. Buy a couple candy sticks for the kids, if you would, he’d said. She looked so deeply offended by it, too. Offended enough to not even bother picking up the coin she’d dropped. Belle closed her fist around the nickel, carefully thinking over everything that had happened after that. She and Theo had eaten and spoke alone, then taken the child
ren with them when they’d gone to speak to Postmaster Behr.

  But where had Clara been? She’d seen Theo speaking to her and the woman had looked so angry. Then Belle hadn’t laid eyes on her again until... until when? Clara hadn’t been at breakfast. What in the world had happened to that sour-faced woman?

  Belle’s heart was pounding, mouth dry. Clara would have had access to her manuscript at the publisher’s office. As Theo said, she did work there. She was clearly familiar with the Wyatt Burton books by Jamison Ross. She’d even seen the manuscript shortly before the fire, not even batting an eye that Belle had it when she shouldn’t have known Belle was the one writing it. Every last reason Belle had for discounting Theo as a suspect didn’t apply to the woman. If she had found out who Belle truly was, if she’d had some reason—

  “But what could the reason be?” Belle breathed.

  She herself had plenty of motive for wanting Paul dead and would have never done it in a million years. Why would a stranger? Someone whose only connection to her was being the daughter of her publisher? It didn’t matter, she decided. Motives could be drummed up for anyone, given enough thought. The evidence spoke more strongly. She had to tell Theo. If she was right, he’d been leaving his child alone with a murderer. She had to warn him.

  A creak on the stairs stood the little hairs on the back of her neck on end. “Theo?” she called, hopefully. That was how he’d unintentionally announced himself when he’d been creeping about before.

  “No,” a grating feminine voice answered. The hammer of a pistol cocked into place. “It’s just the two of us now.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Flopped back on the blanket with the thick soft grass cushioning Theo’s body, he let his mind wander. Contrary to Belle’s belief that Erik couldn’t fall asleep without his toy, he was soon snoring, and even Maeve dozed off. Contented, Theo drifted along with his thoughts, serenaded by a bumble bee and the birds overhead.

  Had I been asleep? he asked himself, sitting up and blinking his eyes. He looked around. If he had, it couldn’t have been for more than a moment or two. The children were still napping and Belle wasn’t back yet. He looked across the street at the back of the store. Surely it wouldn’t take long to look under the bed and either rescue Bun or come back and deliver the sad news that it couldn’t be found.

  Further along the street was the orphanage, a large house, sturdy and square. Several saplings were staked in the yard, showing the occupants looked forward to many long years there. Laura Berg and the lady of the house, Emma Leonetti, were on the porch and he waved at them. When he had their attention he pointed at the sleeping children. As soon as they nodded, he took off, running in the direction of the store.

  Rather than enter through the back, he went around to the front. Before pushing the door open he looked up and down the street. He wasn’t sure why he felt such a sense of urgency, other than it simply wasn’t like Belle to be so lackadaisical in her attention to Erik. She would have returned before going off on another errand, even if it was merely to tell him that she was going to look at the hotel.

  Inside Lucy was near a display of fabrics, straightening the bolts of cloth. “If she was here I never saw her. Perhaps she came in through the back.”

  He raced upstairs, but there was no sign of her. Clattering back down the steps he didn’t even acknowledge the storekeeper as he ran out front, towards the hotel.

  Therese didn’t seem alarmed, even when he ran in sweaty and red-faced. “I haven’t seen Belle since you two picked up the picnic basket.”

  “What about Clara? Is she here?”

  “Miss Bader? I haven’t see her either come to think of it. She left shortly after you did for your lunch.”

  “And she hasn’t been back either?”

  Therese shook her head. “I just said that. No, neither one.”

  Theo considered himself an even tempered fellow, not prone to jumping to conclusions, but in this case he was sure something bad had happened. He headed back up the street, toward the sheriff’s office.

  Mayor O’Cuinn was just coming out as Theo approached. “What’s your hurry man?”

  “I’m looking for Belle Lindholm. And I suppose Clara Bader as well.”

  Lore smiled widely, a gold tooth winking in the sunshine. “Aye, then I can help you. I saw the two of them strolling out of town earlier, heading toward the foothills.”

  Theo was dumbstruck at that confusing report. For one thing, Belle and Clara had barely exchanged a dozen words and those had not been particularly friendly. Why would they suddenly decide to go for a walk together, especially considering Belle’s son was waiting for her to return. “What’s out that way?” He turned to look in the direction Lore had mentioned.

  “Not much. A few miners have claims out there but that’s quite a distance away. Though, I do recall, I had a conversation with Miss Bader the day you arrived. She was very curious about the countryside here.”

  Theo thought he would crawl out of his skin while he waited for the mayor to tell his story.

  “I told her about an old shack out that way. I found an abandoned baby there once. It was in the midst of a blizzard. Quite the sensation around town, I can testify. Miss Bader seemed most interested in the story.”

  Theo grabbed Lore’s coat lapels and pulled him near. “Where is that shack?”

  Directions clear in his mind he ran south along the street once more to directly across from the hotel. The mayor had said Hunter Franklin, the blacksmith, rented horses. While he waited for a horse to be saddled for him, he tried to think what purpose Clara would have in taking Belle into the wilderness. Suddenly he realized with a sinking sensation that Clara had always had access to Ross’s manuscripts. She had even had access to the apartment, and his hotel room as well. No one had seen her around the time the fire had started, and in fact, had not seen her since.

  Hunter brought the horse to him and held it next to a mounting block. Theo stepped onto the chunk of wood and slid his foot into the stirrup, throwing his other leg over the back of the horse in one smooth motion. He hadn’t ridden very much; living in the city it hadn’t been necessary, but he knew how to do it.

  As he turned the animal toward the north end of town he shuddered to think of Clara’s motivation.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Every time Belle stumbled over the unfamiliar ground, she worried she’d get a bullet in the back for her clumsiness. And then when Clara also struggled with the terrain, she had to worry that the woman would shoot her accidentally. If she had to die from gunfire, somehow it seemed far more meaningful for it to be done on purpose.

  “I don’t understand what you’re after here,” Belle said, keeping her voice as soothing and calm as she did when talking Erik down from a nightmare. “If you want Mr. Tulloch’s attention, you have it. There’s no need to fuss with me.” His attention was entirely negative and he couldn’t stand Clara, but she felt no need to point that out. Antagonizing the woman would only make it all so much worse.

  “I don’t care about his attention. I’ve seen your work before he starts editing it. His isn’t the voice I’m concerned with.”

  “Voice?” Belle dared to turn her head slightly to try to look at Clara and was rewarded with a jab in the ribs with the pistol. Her knees went weak and she almost fell from her terror, but she forced herself to keep going. Up ahead, a rough wooden shack rose out of the hills as though part of them. “You mean this is about the books?”

  “Yes,” Clara hissed with relish. “Open the door.”

  Belle did as she was told, wondering what she might find beyond. Some sort of torture chamber? A butchery for disposing of her body? Instead, there were candles set all around the little shack. The rough table on one side had a stack of paper and bottle of ink, ready and waiting for her. Clara pushed her inside, then lit a match for a candle and began alighting every wick in the shack until it was burning so bright Belle had to squint her eyes.

  “That clumsy oaf
Theo broke the ink bottles I was bringing - you write by hand unlike on a typewriter like all those other hacks - but luckily the mercantile had a few on hand,” Clara said, as though that explained everything.

  With the pistol trained on her again to force her to the table, Belle settled uncomfortably into the chair. One of the legs was shorter than the others, or else the seat was crooked. Whatever the cause, it rocked if she leaned forward at all. “How long have you known I was Jamison Ross?”

  “Since shortly after you put Danger at the Lake in the mail. I’d been trying to figure out who you were for months. I’d hunted down one man who had the right name and used the right bank, but he was obviously no literary soul, so I determined which post office the packages and letters were coming from and began watching.” Clara beamed with triumph, nostrils flared.

  The longer Belle could keep Clara talking, the longer she had to live, she reasoned. Perhaps she could even find an opening to escape or wrestle the gun from her. “That’s very clever. Worthy of Wyatt Burton, I think.”

  “It was, wasn’t it?”

  “But how did you figure it out from there? I could have been Jamison’s secretary or wife.”

  “Simple. I followed you and watched. I could see you writing for hours every day through the window and you were the one responding to the letters from Theodore, with no man there to dictate to you.” Clara frowned, hugging the gun to herself. “I can’t tell you how disappointed I was. I’d been hoping I could marry a man like Jamison and he didn’t even exist. Instead, there was just some harlot living alone with her child. I had to punish you for that.”

  “Killing my estranged husband doesn’t seem like much of a punishment,” Belle pointed out carefully. “He was the one to suffer, not me.”

  “Oh, but you see, you were going to suffer so wonderfully. I copied the murder from your book to frame you and then sent a copy of the manuscript to the police, so they’d be sure to make the connection. You’d hang, of course, but first your reputation would be ruined and you’d die knowing your son would grow up thinking you a murderer!” Clara laughed in mad delight, sending a chill down Belle’s spine.