Jillian Hart

by Lissa's Cowboy

  "Stop this." She pushed him again, hard in the shoulder.

  "Damn it, Lissa. I know this isn't easy—" His feet slid on the ice, and he struggled for balance.

  "Jack?" She said his name, hoping he would hear, would stir. "Jack?"

  More footsteps, then arms trying to tug her away, but she fought them. Blood dripped into the snow. She was determined to lead the gelding away from the group of milling deputies. Jack needed help. He needed a doctor, he—

  "I'm right here." Doc James broke through the crowd. "Give me the reins, Lissa."

  It was hard to let go, to let the leather slide through her fingers.

  "I'll take good care of him," the doctor promised.

  "Hey, you can't take my prisoner." Palmer stopped the doctor, one hand resting on his gun. "We'll take him to the jailhouse. You can treat him there."

  "Ike, no. There's no heat in the cell." Lissa grabbed at him.

  He pushed her away, so hard she slid on the ice. Doc James grabbed her arm, held her up. Fury licked through her veins when she looked up at the sheriff, his expression smug and triumphant.

  "I don't know what's happened. Something has changed you, and it isn't for the better." Her words lifted in the snow-filled air, carried by the harsh winter wind. Bystanders along the street fell silent again.

  "Do you want to know what happened?" He jerked the gelding's reins, bringing the horse and his unconscious passenger closer. "I lost my wife."

  "I lost my husband." Her gaze traveled briefly to Jack, bleeding—heavens, but he was bleeding. "And this one needs medical help."

  "No one cared about my Stella." Ike's voice was lowered, grew cold as steel. Where there should have been emotion, his words were cold, final. "She labored in that bed trying to give birth to my son, and Sophie Johanson was too good to come help—"

  "She was bedridden with a troubled pregnancy—"

  "She didn't care. And good old Doc here was running all over the countryside, tending the rich governor's son over in Swift Creek. There was no one to help her. What good were you people, then? Friends stayed silent, family could do nothing."

  "I came as fast as I could," the doctor argued, grabbing back the reins and leading the gelding toward the jailhouse. "It's not my fault there isn't another doctor in this town. I've been saying it for years, but folks around here would rather spend their tax money on more deputies. I don't know what good that's done, you sitting around with your men while criminals run free."

  "I got a criminal, Doc. You can't complain."

  Bitterness, that's what it was—hard and cold, lacking heart. Palmer had suffered a loss no worse than her own, and she knew the pain, knew the hopelessness.

  "I gave you a chance, Lissa, but look at you." He spit out the words, so low only she could hear. "You bedded down with that bastard. Who would want you now?"

  Lissa staggered, shocked. The jailhouse loomed in front of them, a gray shadow of stone and timber in the falling snow. How close had she come to being just like Palmer? How close had she been to closing up her heart, replacing love with nothing at all?

  Loss was a part of life. She knew that all too well. But so was love, so was laughter, and so was caring about family, friends, and neighbors. Just like the seasons, life kept turning, from birth through death, and no one could stop it. No one could snatch back lost moments, or breathe life into a loved one gone and buried. The strength was in the letting go, in finding the courage to go on and love again.

  Lissa watched the man who had done neither, who had let his heart remain as cold and dead as winter where nothing could grow. Look how ugly he'd become, his only pleasure inflicting pain on others.

  "He took a bullet to the head." Doc's voice rumbled low, speaking only to her. "This is very serious, Lissa. I wish I could give you hope."

  Hope. Lissa considered the word, felt it resonate in her heart. "We've come this far. We will just have to believe."

  "Jack." Fathers voice, this time not slurred by drink. "You boys hop up into the wagon. We're taking this load in."

  "Yes, Father. "Jack took his little brother's hand and helped push him over the tailgate. Laughing Joey jumped up and into the pile of sweet dried hay, as fresh smelling as a Montana morning.

  "Get up!"Father ordered the oxen, and the wagon squeaked to a start.

  Jack caught hold of the tailgate and pulled himself up the rough, scarred wood and into the bed of soft hay, falling back beside his brother.

  "I wanna be just like Father when I grow up, "Joey said on a sigh, basking in the heat of the summer sun, shining with the kind of hope only the innocent had.

  "Not me." Sure, Jack loved the animals and the wide-reaching openness of the Montana plains, but wanted something more. He was going to be a sheriff, and make sure no little boy's mother died the way his had.

  Ike Palmer blocked the threshold with his considerable bulk. "You're not going in there, Lissa."

  "Yes, I am." She saw red when she looked at him, this man who took pride in shooting down her husband. "Jack is innocent until proven otherwise. And he is innocent, I guarantee that. You shot a good man, the man I love."

  "He's a cattle rustler. It's high time you faced the truth."

  "I know the truth." Anger twisted inside her, hard around her stomach.

  "The truth is he's a cattle rustler from Wyoming. I have the wanted poster and a name to match. Blackjack Thomas. Look." Palmer pulled the poster from his shirt pocket and unfolded it several times, the paper shaking.

  She took it from him and studied the rather general picture. Blackjack Thomas was a man under six foot, with dark blond, shoulder length hair, a handlebar mustache that he shaved now and then, blue eyes, and a cleft in his chin. Lissa looked at the picture and saw a stranger. She knew her Jack's face well enough to fill her dreams.

  "You can't fool me, Ike." Lissa shoved the poster back at him, slamming her fist against his chest. Paper crinkled, echoing in the cell.

  Lissa heard a groan. Jack! "Let me by." She planted her feet and shoved, but Ike's hands banded her wrists, imprisoning her.

  "Since when did you lose respect for a pregnant woman?" Doc said, his voice low with censure. "I need an extra set of hands. Let her by."

  The sheriff met the doctor's gaze. Lissa felt the lawman's cold hate, and shivered. Without a word, Ike shifted, just enough to let her through.

  "He's conscious," Doc told her, "but I don't want Palmer to know yet. Jack is drifting in and out. He isn't making sense."

  "Maybe this isn't as bad as last time, when I found him on the road. He was unconscious for a long while, and he still woke up. He didn't have his memory, but—"

  "No, Lissa." Doc took her hand. "This time is different. I've seen it before. He's drifting away."

  "He'll come back to me." Certainty rang through her, holding her up, as strong as hope. "I'll sit with him. I want to be with Jack."

  She pulled her hand away, heading straight toward the open cell door. A lantern licked a thready light across the man lying still on the cot. Frost clung to the stone walls and crackled beneath her shoes. Her breath fogged in a great cloud as she fell to her knees.

  "Jack." He looked dead, he really did, so ashen that he was gray, so motionless that she couldn't even see his breath. Only the faint traces of clouds lifting in the air marked that he lived at all.

  He mumbled, turned toward her. His eyes opened, but he didn't focus on her. He looked through her, never blinking, so very far away.

  "Joe." He rasped the name, then closed his eyes.

  He was lost to her, lost in memories forgotten for so long.

  "Lissa." Doc's hand was on her shoulder. "It's too cold for you here."

  "I'm wearing my coat." Her chin came up.

  "It's freezing in here."

  "I can't leave him." Her back hurt, and she was cold to the bone.

  "What about the baby?" Doc's voice came gently.

  She knew he was right. She'd been worried about that, yet every time she thought o
f leaving Jack defenseless and unconscious, she couldn't do it. He was her husband, and how she loved him.

  "Lissa." Doc's gloved hands covered her own. "It's nearly midnight. It's important to think of your own health. You're carrying something mighty important."

  "I know." Tears stung her eyes. "I've been thinking of nothing else."

  "Good. Blanche said she's keeping the stove hot, and has a bed ready for you. Go to her house. Eat a good meal. Sleep the night through."

  "How can I leave him?" Despite the blankets, Jack shivered so. "He might not wake up."

  "I will stay by his side." Doc helped her to her feet. "I know it's a hard decision to make, but you must take care of your baby. It doesn't mean that you are abandoning Jack."

  "It feels that way." How could she sleep, worrying so?

  "You'll be warm and rested. That's what you need," the doctor assured her. "Besides, there's nothing more we can do but wait."

  It was like leaving her heart behind. "You'll send for me if he starts slipping away?"

  "I will."

  Her back ached, low and hard. It was not good for the baby—Jack's baby—that she was here in the bitter cold. The deputy keeping watch in the corner barely glanced at her as she let herself out into the street, into the full force of the blizzard.

  The snow swirled around her, blocking out the world, even the ground at her feet. Tiny pellets of ice slammed into her, drove deep into her wool clothes. She could not see anything but darkness, could not hear anything but the howling power of the wind.

  She found her way by feeling along the storefronts, then along the length of the picket fences, to the shadow of Blanche's home. She stepped up onto the sheltered porch and out of the driving snow. A lamp burned in the window, in the kitchen where Blanche was waiting.

  She hoped Jack would find the way out of his storm, too.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  "I didn 't mean it."

  Jack looked up from the floor, saw the big man standing in the shadows, his head down. A blizzard beat at the north side of the house, the scouring sound of ice against the thin walls, the howl of the angry wind. Snow blew in through the cracks. A single lamp burned on the table, the wick low, barely illuminating the room.

  "I didn't mean it at all." Father wept, his grief as powerful as the storm outside, as dark as the night. He grabbed a whiskey bottle from the top shelf and cracked the seal. "Now she's gone."

  They had buried Mama that morning with snow falling on the casket, with only a few mourners gathered. Grandma, refusing to look at them, cried how she'd known her daughter's marriage to an Emerson would come to no good. Violence was in the blood. Like father, like son. A person couldn't expect more from a man whose own father put two wives in the grave.

  "She made me do it." Father sniffled, sucking down alcohol, trying to forget. Hopelessness cloaked the room, muffled the world outside until there was only Father's grief, only his endless sorrow. "She just got me so damn mad."

  Jack felt the bitter bite of winter at his toes and fingers. He wanted to go to bed with his brother, cuddle into the cold sheets and shiver until sleep claimed him. He tried to sneak away, but Father called after him.

  "Don't think you can escape it. Judge me all you want, but you will be like me one day, boy. You mark my words. There are some things in life a man can't escape."

  Jack ran from the room, fighting tears. The bedroom was freezing. He stripped down to his long Johns and snuggled into bed, his little brother already breathing slow and even, fast asleep. Jack shivered, aching for warmth, for a lit hearth where a fire always crackled merrily, for the scents of cinnamon and sunshine and an apple pie baking in the oven...

  "Jack." A woman's voice. Rich as music, drawing open his eyes.

  "Hello there, sleepyhead." Lissa's smile was like coming home, like the deep abiding warmth and safety of no place else on earth. "I've been waiting for you to wake up."

  How tired she looked—as beautiful as an angel, but dark shadows smudged the smooth skin beneath her eyes and drew in her cheekbones. His heart caught. "This jail cell. It's freezing. And Lissa, you are carrying our child."

  "I am watching over my husband, the man I love." Her touch felt like paradise.

  He leaned into it, cherished it.

  "Let's see how you're doing, Jack." Doc drew a stool close, the clatter of wood against stone echoing in the chamber. "I frankly didn't think I would be talking to you again."

  "I remember what happened. I remember a bullet being fired from the bushes up ahead. Palmer and his men ambushed me like a bunch of cowards."

  "I can't believe I ever called that man a friend." Lissa's voice tightened. She sounded angry, yet he knew she was hurt, too.

  "People change, that's all. Sometimes things change people." Jack winced against the pain in his head and the sharper hurt when Doc looked beneath the bandage. "How long was I out?"

  "Less than twenty-four hours."

  Lissa left the room, a swish of skirts and elegance, taking his heart with her. Jack saw the concern on Doc's face.

  "You are the luckiest man I know." Doc leaned back and tugged on thick wool mittens. "How's your head?"

  "Hurting like son of a gun." Jack tried to sit up. Nausea dropped him back onto the pillow. "Palmer's arrested me for the cattle rustling."

  "He claims that his evidence is irrefutable," Doc said, though he looked skeptical.

  "Irrefutable, huh?" Jack breathed in and out, trying to think through the black, suffocating pain. Palmer was just trying to shift the blame, trying to frame Jack for crimes he couldn't have committed.

  He knew who he was. Well, maybe not entirely, but he had memories, a family, a past, a childhood, and a name.

  "Here's some hot tea. This will help warm you up a bit." Lissa smiled, and made his heart stop.

  She loved him. It shone in her eyes like the brightest sun, like moonbeams and stardust and dreams. He would give anything to be the man she needed. Jack accepted her tea, accepted the heated brush of her kiss. She was heavy with his child; the fabric of her skirt stretched over the generous curve of her belly when she settled down on the stool at his side.

  He thought of all he had promised her, of the commitment he made to her. He'd had no right, no business marrying her in the first place. He could see that now, and wished he had made different choices.

  He could never claim a wife and child of his own. He was his father's son, a man who killed, a man who didn't blink in the face of violence. That was the one truth he could no longer escape.

  "I'm going to get you out of here." Lissa's determination was as big as a Montana sunset, all fiery color and light. "Jeremiah's friend is a lawyer, and—"

  "No." Jack gave her back the cup of tea and sat up. His skull pounded and dizziness swam through his head, but he gritted his teeth. He could be determined, too. "Send a telegram to the district judge."

  "But he's talking about hanging you." She choked back tears.

  "I deserve a trial. It's the only way I'm going to prove my innocence—and I am innocent." Jack covered her hand with his. Her hands were like ice even in the middle of the day. "Do it, for me. Only a higher authority can make Palmer come to heel."

  "But—"

  "Just do it." His words were harsher than he meant, but there could be no argument.

  Hurt glittered in her eyes. "Jack, I—"

  "Do it." He softened his voice, but held back all the gentle feelings she made burn to life in his chest.

  Sheriff Palmer was a dangerous man. He preyed on his friends and neighbors, and he intended to kill an innocent man to cover his own crimes.

  Lissa was not safe near such a man. She was not safe here with him, her own husband. Jack turned to the doctor. "Take Lissa out of here. And don't let her back in."

  "It is too cold for her, and with the problems she's had before, I agree." Doc stood, took the empty teacup from Lissa's fingers.

  "No. Jack needs me. I'm fine, really—"

  "I don't
want you here." It was only the truth. Looking at her tore him apart, so he turned away. "Get her out of here, Doc. And make sure she gets in contact with the judge, like I asked."

  "Will do." Concern crossed Doc's brow, but he didn't ask, didn't judge. He took Lissa by the elbow. "Come, let's get you some rest."

  "No. I can't believe—"

  "Believe it." Jack felt his chest tighten, his heart harden. "And sign the telegram from me—Jack Emerson."

  "Why can't I see Pa?" Chad asked as soon as Lissa cleared the table.

  "Because your pa is in jail."

  "With Ike?"

  "Because of Ike." Lissa bent to fill the basin from the stove.

  "But I wanna see him."

  "We can't." She straightened, set the enamel basin on the counter.

  "But he's my Pa! I gotta tell him about how well I'm ridin' Comet."

  "I know you miss him, Chad." Lissa's heart ached with the loneliness, with the injustice of it. "We just have to be patient."

  Will pushed open the back door and ambled in, his snow-covered coat dripping on the floor. He shrugged it off and hung it on the peg by the threshold. "I'm going to town, Lissa. Did you want to come?"

  "Yes." She reached for a bar of soap. "Can you wait for me, or are you in a hurry?"

  "I'll be pleased to wait." Will glanced at the stove. "As long as you provide me with a cup of coffee and a couple of your sweet rolls."

  "You have a deal." Lissa grabbed a knife and began shaving lye into the washwater.

  "Folks are saying he's guilty." Will waited until Chad had fled the room, excited about a trip into town on the sleigh. "Folks say Palmer has the proof he needs."

  "I've heard what folks say." She slid the cups into the water, then the flatware. "Do you believe it?"

  "Of Jack? No." Enamel clanked on iron. Will set down the coffeepot and padded over to the table. "I think Palmer has the wrong man, and he's being stubborn about admitting it."

  "He wanted me to send a telegram for him. I had to have Jeremiah ride all the way up to Sweet Creek Flats to send the wire."