Preacher's Wife (Sweet Town Clean Historical Western Romance Book 5)

by Sarah Christian

  Her eyes caught Matt's as he approached her from the pulpit. "Bell just slipped out. I'm going with the sheriff to find him."

  Beulah turned toward the front doors, just as Kit disappeared through them. "Oh my word," she cried out as the panic threatened to engulf her again. She let go of Lucy's hand and grabbed the lapel of Matt's jacket. "You be careful and come back safe, you hear me?"

  "I'll do that, but you promise me to stay here in the church."

  By then several others had gathered around them. Lucy, Emma and Bridget said that they would stay with Beulah. Postmaster Gregor Behr offered to stay with the women and provide protection. Hunter, Lore, and the new carpenter in town, Mack Coffman, volunteered to go with Matt and Kit.

  As the men left, Emma strode to the pulpit and picked up a hymnal there. "Page two hundred and forty-three." she said. Pages rustled around the room as the remaining parishioners opened hymn books and slowly their voices merged in a song about finding comfort and safety in the Lord.

  With Bridget on one side and Lucy on the other, Beulah joined them . The words to the old song were familiar and she had no need of the book, but that familiarity also meant that her mind was free to wander. She glanced back at the front doors once again and saw that the men were gone. Even more than wanting Hiram Bell behind bars, Beulah realized she wanted Matt to be safe, but again, she was left waiting on fate.

  "Hiram Bell," Matthieu called to the man's retreating back. It turned his stomach to even say the man's name.

  Hiram had walked a ways down the path from the church doors, then stopped in his tracks at the sound of his own name. He turned slowly and his eyes met Matt's, upper lip curled slightly with disgust. "How do you know my name, boy?"

  Being addressed that way and sneered at after all his time in Sweet Town struck Matt like a slap. How quickly a few words made a difference. Before he could react, Kit Price laid a hand on his shoulder.

  "I'm the sheriff here and I know your name because a woman in town gave a report that you abducted her, held her captive, abused her, and left her newborn son for dead. I don't know what you've heard about the west, but I can assure you we don't turn a blind eye to these crimes in Sweet Town."

  A play of emotions went across Hiram's face, first shock and then anger, before he caught control of himself and smiled in a congenial fashion. "Now, Sheriff, I just got here. When would I have the time to do all those dastardly deeds?"

  "Before you arrived here," Lore spoke up. "Just before Christmas, I found the wee lad and my friend Neal found the woman."

  "It's a long way to a judge and I hate to put a woman through the sort of questioning I expect she'd get, so I think it would be best for all involved if you moved on today," Kit said. "If you leave now and don't come back, we won't have to bother with any legal trouble. Do you understand what I'm telling you, Mr. Bell?"

  Instead of looking concerned at this, Hiram laughed. "Now let's be sensible here, gentlemen. I was traveling with a woman, but she was only my maid. The girl has a tendency to spin wild stories. She stole from me when I ran into some trouble in Deadwood and then she ran off. If anyone left her baby anywhere, it would have been her."

  "Neal found her in Deadwood, after I found the lad. You're lying," Lore said.

  Hiram didn't speak for a moment, his eyes darting off to the side. The fact that no one was accepting his obvious falsehoods might have sunk in just then, Matt thought. He wondered how many times the man had lied about Beulah before and been believed.

  "Sheriff, she's just some jezebel," Hiram protested. "You're not protecting a proper young woman's virtue. She's only a - "

  The sheriff's hand on his shoulder didn't stop Matt that time. He lunged forward to catch a fistfull of Hiram's shirt and shoved him back into one of the church's hitching posts. His other hand went to his hip before he remembered he didn't have his sidearm. he'd carried it with him while traveling across the territory, but never would have seen need for it during the Sabbath before. Whatever Hiram had been about to say - and Matt had a fairly good idea of that - no good would come of letting him get the words out.

  "You should hang for what you did to Beulah and her son." Behind him, Matt could hear Price coming closer, likely worried about what he might do in his anger. Matt let go of Hiram and stepped back, wiping his hand off on the leg of his trousers as though he'd touched filth. "But I'm not the one to make that decision."

  "Thank you, Pastor," Price said, then took Hiram by the arm to pull him back straight on his feet. "We can help you out of town and you can settle somewhere far away from Miss Douglass, or we can handle this as a matter of law. The choice is yours, Mr. Bell."

  Hiram Bell chose being ridden out of town. His belongings were all at the hotel, which was near empty save for the sickly Mrs. Nováková. Lore tried to explain to her what was happening in stilted Czech, but from the look on her face he was as incomprehensible to her as he was to the rest of them. Hopefully Therese could explain it all later.

  Bell didn't have much, but what he did have was loaded into the back of Hunter Franklin's wagon. Matt sat in the back of it with Hiram, as far from the vile man as he could get without taking his eyes off of him. he'd never felt such hate, which unsettled him. Even when people had wronged him, even when he was beaten back in Minnesota, none of it compared in his mind to what Hiram had done, and the harm he sought to continue through his slanderous lies against Beulah.

  They rode out for several miles before Sheriff Price nodded to Hunter and he stopped the wagon. Lore and Mack Coffman kicked Hiram's belongings out of the wagon. Matt dragged the man himself off, though he was sorely tempted to kick him like one of the bags.

  "It's still early, so you have plenty of daylight." Price pointed. "Head that way and you'll be in Rapid City by midnight if you don't stop."

  "You can't do this to me. You can't send me off into the wilderness on nothing but the word of some woman," Hiram protested.

  At least he had the sense not to call her any names that time, Matt thought dryly.

  Price shook his head. "I'm just giving you a choice, Mr. Bell. If you'd prefer I take you with me and we speak to a judge about all this, I can arrange that instead."

  Hiram glared as he picked up his bags. He slung them both over his shoulders, then took off down the road. The five of them watched until it seemed clear he wasn't going to turn around any time soon, then they headed back towards town.

  "Before you'd said a judge was unlikely to listen to Beulah's side of things," Matt pointed out to the sheriff.

  "I did, but just because a judge might not listen doesn't mean Bell's innocent. Some laws go deeper than the laws of men." He cast Matt a sidelong look. "Of course, I don't need to tell a man of God that."

  Matt shook his head. "Marriage has changed you, Sheriff. That's not the sort of thing you would have said when you first arrived here."

  "I don't think you can blame my Lucy for this one. Bridget's the culprit there." Price gave a nod to Lore. "I should have moved faster when the O'Cuinns were being harassed. Being slow and careful and trusting in distant justice when we're so far out here can get people hurt, if not killed."

  He hadn't been closely involved, but Matt remembered the incident Price was talking about well. A trio of failing prospectors were trying to shake Lore down for money. They burned his barn and then abducted his fiancee. It all turned out well in the end, but that was as much luck as anything else. It could have gone far worse.

  Matt turned in the back of the wagon to look down the road. Hiram was no longer in sight. Had he walked far enough to disappear, or had he left the road and was going somewhere else? Matt felt a chill down his spine. Hopefully that was the last they'd ever see of him. Hopefully Beulah and Jonah would be safe. Perhaps there was something he could do, to provide them with greater protection.

  Jonah's chuckle echoed through the church as Emma bounced him on her hip. Beulah watched distractedly, her thoughts on where the men were, if they had caught up with Bell, and mos
t importantly, was Matt alright.

  Everyone had left except for the four women and Postmaster Behr. The excitement of a posse being formed during church services had probably delayed the congregation's reaction to Matt's disclosure, but Beulah knew that before Sunday dinner dishes were washed, every household would have revisited the pastor's words.

  Bridget and Lucy were calmly sitting and Beulah marveled at their composure. Their husbands were out there, too, chasing down a man who, except for fate in the form of Lore O'Cuinn, would have murdered her baby. Bridget licked the end of her pencil and continued writing something in her ever-present journal. Lucy had one hand on the rounded dome of her belly and was looking off into a distance that no one else could see, a small smile playing on her lips.

  Finally she could stand it no more. "How are you all not worried sick, as I am?" Beulah said to the room.

  "Worrying won't bring them home any faster, Miss Douglass," Mr. Behr said kindly.

  The sound of horses outside drew them all toward the door. They spilled out onto the churchyard as the makeshift posse reined in their horses.

  "Hiram Bell won't be a problem for you anymore, Miss Douglass," Kit said.

  Beulah barely dared hope that what he said was true. Had they killed him? As much as the man had made her life misery, she didn't want his blood on the hands of these innocent and good men. She looked at Matt, drawn to his quiet strength. Though he had been deceitful about his heritage, she understood his reasoning and knew instinctively that he would never deliberately and openly lie to her.

  He swung his leg over the horse and dismounted, wincing slightly at the pain in his ribs. "We took him aways out of town and told him not to come back. We didn't hurt him."

  Although she was relieved, she couldn't imagine such a lukewarm warning would actually keep the scoundrel away. "What's to stop him from returning?"

  Kit's horse skittered sideways and he leaned forward to pat her soothingly on the neck. "I threatened the law on him."

  "I thought you said there wasn't much you could do legally."

  The sheriff rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "I don't think he wanted to gamble on that." He tipped his hat to Beulah and the others. "I hope the rest of this day is a lot more pleasant. Lucy, are you up to riding double?"

  She laughed. "If you think she can handle the two of us, I'm willing."

  After the small group had dispersed, Emma leaving with Bridget and Lore, and Gregor Behr with the other men going their separate ways, Matt and Beulah stepped back inside the church.

  "I can see the worry on your face, Beulah."

  She glanced at him as she began walking down the rows of pews, putting hymnals back in place. "There have been many times I thought I'd gotten away from Bell but he's lied and gotten others to believe him and they helped him get me back. They helped him, Matt. Now I have Jonah to worry about. I can't take that risk." She turned away from him, her eyes burning. Every awful thing Bell had said about her was permanently etched on her mind. The good folks who believed him, their faces turning from concern to scorn as they turned her over to him. No, she couldn't take that risk.

  "You're not alone now, not anymore."

  "It's true I've made some friends here but they can't protect me all the time. I'm still a woman alone, an unmarried mother living in the territories where laws don't always count." She dusted off her hands and looked at him. "You know, I can't change my complexion, nor do I want to. My skin is brown and my hair is curled and I'm proud of it. But it makes it harder to just live my life since other people already have ideas of what people who look like me might be like. I think that's why, when Bell makes his accusations, white folks just accept it as true. They don't even question it."

  "I know, Beulah. I've seen the injustices my family experienced because of those same assumptions. It wasn't until I left them, and began living as a white man, that I was able to see how much the opinions of others affected me."

  "And now you'll have to leave and start over, where others won't know your story." he'd taken off his hat and she allowed herself the opportunity to look at him, openly and honestly. "I don't have that choice. There are so many ways I feel helpless and I hate that feeling, being at the mercy of others. A woman alone is always vulnerable, and I have two other strikes against me."

  "I can't fix the world, but I can take care of that part." His eyes were glittering green with emotion, and a flush had risen on his strong cheekbones.

  Everything around her slowed down, her awareness narrowed to him and the current moment. He was building to something, she was sure, but couldn't guess what and it left her uneasy. "What are you talking about?"

  "Marry me, Beulah. You won't be alone and Jonah will have a father."

  Shock at his proposal left her light-headed and she automatically took a step back from him, struggling to believe her own ears. "Pardon me?"

  Matthieu stood in silence, as shaken by her response as she looked by his proposal. It had been sudden, though, he reminded himself. Allowing her to care for him during his injury wasn't much of a courtship. Perhaps offering her the protection of a marriage hadn't been as noble an offer as he'd thought it was. "Will you marry me, Miss Beulah Douglass?"

  She stared at him. It only lasted a few heartbeats, but each one felt like it dragged on for an eternity. With the slightest inclination of her head, she nodded. "I will."

  "You will?" he asked, certain he'd heard her wrong.

  Her nod was more firm this time. "Of course I will. You're a good man and you'd make a fine husband."

  There was no talk of love or affection in that and there had been none in his proposal either. It shouldn't have bothered him, he knew, yet it nagged at him just the same. Perhaps it was a choice born out of practicality on her part and he could hardly blame her for that, but the need for something more struck him like a bolt of lightning. She deserved love and he wanted nothing more in the world than to give it to her.

  "I hope I will," he said. "Since we have no judge here and I'm the only pastor, we'll have to go somewhere else to get married."

  "Oh." She exhaled the word, lowering her eyes to the top of Jonah's head. "How soon?"

  "Why wait? We could leave this afternoon for Deadwood."

  Now her eyes flew up to meet his, wide with alarm. "Why?"

  Matt hesitated, unsure of if she meant why so soon or why Deadwood. "Hiram Bell was left on the road to Rapid City. I think it's wisest to go in the opposite direction."

  "There isn't a thing to stop him from going north, though," Beulah pointed out.

  "No, but I have a sidearm and a rifle. We can bring them with us. We have my horse and we can borrow one, too, while he was on foot. It should be as safe as possible."

  Despite his reassurance, she didn't look pleased by any of this. Her arms held her son close to her chest and she rocked a bit, a faint frown pursing her lips. The soft curve of them caught his attention and he realized he hadn't kissed her or given her a ring. Troubled as she was at the moment, he doubted asking for a kiss would be appreciated, and it wasn't that sort of marriage anyway, was it? Perhaps that general subject was what was upsetting her.

  He took a step closer to her and touched her upper arm to bring her attention back to him. "Beulah, I know you've been through things no woman should ever be subjected to."

  Her eyes fluttered shut and she leaned into his touch until he folded his arms around her. The feel of the petite beauty and her son against his chest was like the answer to a prayer he didn't know he'd given.

  "The world doesn't seem to care much about what should and shouldn't be," she said. "What is and what ought to be are hardly ever the same thing. If we can just be safe now, that's the best I can ask for."

  "I'll do everything I can to ensure you are safe, both of you."

  "And where will we be safe?"

  It was a good question. The peace and prosperity they'd all hoped for after the war wasn't in much of a hurry to arrive. Sweet Town had been a nearly perfect home s
ince he'd moved there, but after today he wondered just how perfect it would remain. Particularly once he and Beulah were married. "If we have trouble keeping the church here, then we could always stay in Deadwood. I know things are a bit rougher there than here, but we could make do."

  She tipped her head back to meet his eyes. "Most all I saw of Deadwood was a saloon. It didn't fill me with a sense of welcome."

  "There are saloons there, but there's more than that. I know of at least one church for the black community there, and I thought that's where we'd be married. I doubt they need another pastor, but if it comes to it, I'll find work there." He still had the blacksmith skills he learned from his father, and those might be needed. Farming could sustain them, provided they could get land. It would all be so much harder with a family than when he was alone - and alone hadn't been easy - but it would be worth it. He held Beulah a little tighter as he tried to muster enough optimism for them both.

  "I'd really wanted Sweet Town to be home," Beulah murmured.

  His eyes flicked over to the pew where the Bjugstad's had sat. They were the most vocal critics of his honesty, but not the only ones. "So had I."

  Lacy curtains fluttered in the breeze, framing a view of the Chinese Quarter's main street in Deadwood. Beulah was thankful the pastor's wife had given her the room upstairs in the parsonage to use in preparing for her wedding, as well as volunteering to watch Jonah while she bathed and dressed. Two days of riding had left her dusty, and weary.

  She looked at the dress hanging over an airing rack. Lucy had been kind enough to loan it to her. When the sheriff's wife had first offered, Beulah had been reticent to accept knowing how her friend favored loud colors and flamboyant styles. Quickly she had reasoned that Lucy would never know if she didn't wear it, but that it would always be a sore spot if she refused. The dress had turned out to be a lovely, pale lavender. A fern pattern in the fabric was subtle, being of a slightly darker lavender, but perfectly complimented by crocheted lace trim on sleeves and bodice. There was no room in the saddle bag for a bustle but privately Beulah thought bustles were silly so that didn't matter. She shook out the dress once more and then slipped it on over her freshly washed body and clean underthings.