The Damaged Heroes Collection [Box Set #1: The Damaged Heroes Collection] (BookStrand Publishing Mainstream)

by James, Sandy

  Harry shook his head. “What happens here can’t change their pasts. They were born. They will live on.”

  “But I have to get back to them. They’re my destiny.”

  Harry stood up and walked to the altar. He laid a hand on it for a moment before closing his eyes. Figuring he was praying, Susan didn’t interrupt. Harry was probably no different than anyone else she’d ever known. He needed divine guidance just to deal with her.

  He opened his eyes and turned to face her. “Destiny’s a fickle thing, Susan. It must have its way. I assure you, you’re here for a reason.”

  “Fine. Then tell me. What’s the reason? What could possibly be so important that God had to send me to 1880?” Barely able to allow a couple of seconds to pass for effect, she plowed right on. “Well? What’s my destiny?”

  Harry shook his head. “It’s not that easy. You must find your own destiny, and that takes patience. Lots of patience. It will be revealed to you in time.”

  “Time? Time? You mean I’m going to stay here?”

  “Destiny must have its way.”

  She shot to her feet. “Okay. I get it. I do. I’m ready to face whatever this destiny is. Bring it on.” Yeah, bring it on! She was spoiling for a fight, and if she could wrestle with destiny, that would suit her just fine. Then she could get back to the mess that was her life. “C’mon. I’m ready for this.”

  “If it were only that simple.”

  Her brain whirled again, trying to solve this whole ridiculous dilemma. With a snap of her fingers, she tried the most obvious answer. “The rock. If I find the rock, can I go home? Then can I go back to my life? That’s it. I’ll find the rock.” Shit. She couldn’t seem to stop babbling.

  Harry shook his head again.

  “But it’s a magical rock, right?”

  “It didn’t used to be.” His laugh seemed warm and genuine. “I had a limited amount of time to plan. It was the best I could do on short notice. I think it was in the museum for people to sit on to rest their feet.”

  “So I don’t need to find it?”

  “Of course you need to find it. It’s the key to your return. That and finding your desti—”

  Susan suddenly interrupted him as a new idea popped into her overwrought brain. “James. Have you seen James?”

  “Didn’t need to. He’s not…fighting this. He’s accepted this quest, this gift.”

  Harry might as well have smacked her. James had accepted this gift? No wonder. It got him the hell away from all his responsibilities. No more work. No more being a parent. No more being a husband. This place represented ultimate freedom for a guy. Since he’d never had a chance to sow his wild oats when he was young, this weird situation was tailor-made for a middle-aged man like James.

  Susan couldn’t walk away from her life and her responsibilities that easily, not like he’d walked away from her. “Well, I don’t accept this. I don’t want this stupid gift. I’ll find that damn—” She quickly crossed herself for cursing in a church. Some habits died hard. “—that darn rock, and I’ll go home.”

  Harry’s chuckle echoed through the room. “Oh, Susan. You won’t find the rock until the time is right. Not until destiny’s satisfied.”

  She almost stomped her foot in irritation until she realized that she would look like some child throwing a tantrum, although after everything she’d been through, a tantrum didn’t seem horribly out of line. She wanted to growl her frustration and scream at the old man. But, in the end, she didn’t. All she did was sit back down on the bench, prop her elbows on her knees, and hold her head with her hands again. She wondered how far the saloon was. There had to be a bottle of alcohol somewhere in this hellhole with her name on it. She’d show that flippin’ marshal what drunk really looked like.

  Harry came back to sit next to her. “Destiny must—”

  Through gritted teeth she warned, “If you say ‘destiny’ one more time…”

  “—have its way. You need to live here. You need to find where you lost your way. You need to find yourself again. Find Susan, the Susan you lost somewhere. Live in this time, in this place, with these people. Watch. Learn. Listen. And become the person you always wanted to be. Only then can you find your—”

  “For pity’s sake,” she begged, “please don’t say it.”

  He didn’t. She was so surprised that she glanced up. Harry was gone. In his place was another old man, this one with a reverend’s collar. “Are you lost, child?”

  “Lost? Are you kidding me?”

  Chapter 6

  After Reverend Charles introduced himself, he led Susan to his parsonage and presented her to his wife, Mary. The kind woman filled Susan’s stomach with a breakfast that probably raised her cholesterol level a good fifty points. Eggs. Bacon. Fried potatoes. Strong coffee that refreshed her sagging energy level. Once Susan’s stomach stopped complaining, she could think again.

  Mary didn’t stop with a good meal. She dragged Susan right back into the church to a small room filled with clothes for the poor and insisted on helping her find a proper outfit. A shirt. A skirt. A layer of petticoats. A camisole that seemed a lot like one of Susan’s summer nightgowns. But there was nothing that looked, or better yet worked, like a bra. There was gravity to consider. The camisole would have to do. Susan hadn’t even entertained the idea of the corset Mary wanted to put on her. No self-respecting woman of the twenty-first century would ever wear one. Stockings. Leather shoes. A complete 1880 makeover.

  Project Runway?

  No. Project Prairie.

  Susan walked away from the church with a new attitude to match her new outfit. Carrying her old clothes in a tied-up bundle, she waved over her shoulder at Reverend Charles and Mary. Finally settling on a plan of action, Susan headed back to River Bend.

  Her scheme formulated a little more with each step she took. She’d put things back to right. First, she would find James, suck up her injured pride, and apologize. They would kiss and make up, just like they always did whenever they quarreled. Then they’d work together to find that ridiculous rock Harry had told her she would have to locate to get home. Of course, he hadn’t said so in those exact words…But right now, she needed to focus on something, anything that would help her maintain some hope for returning to her own time. She had to see her kids again. She just had to.

  Her plans to find James had one major flaw. She didn’t want to apologize, wasn’t even sure if she could force the insincere words from her mouth. This tiff wasn’t her fault because she hadn’t really done anything wrong. The marshal had been rude and deserved to be put in his place. James had been rude too, especially when he’d claimed they hadn’t really been married. The apology should come from him, not her. Why did she always have to be the one to bend, even if she often bent enough to break?

  James hadn’t believed her. The stubborn man didn’t even want to consider that she knew what was happening to them. She was the one who’d read all those books, those romance novels that had been such an integral part of her life. She was the one who’d figured the whole thing out. She was the one who could possibly find a way to get them out of this absurd mess.

  The more Susan walked the angrier she got, near to boiling over. James didn’t want to be married to her? Then she would be glad to oblige him. He didn’t believe her? He wanted to stay in this 1880 nightmare? Fine! He could just stay. She was going home to her children.

  As she entered the town, the sunshine hit something small lying in the dust, causing a quick twinkle to catch her eye. Susan knelt down to satisfy her curiosity and gawked at a gold ring winking at her. Picking it up, she rubbed the dirt off with the edge of one of her petticoats.

  Even before she read the inscription, she already knew who it belonged to. You’re my world. Such a simple little message that wasn’t at all creative or inspirational, but it had meant everything to her when they’d married. James had really been her whole world. The words didn’t match the ones in her own discarded ring. No, James had chosen t
hat message himself. Happy to be stuck with you. So like him to choose the lyrics from the Huey Lewis song he called “their” song.

  Holding his ring up, she stared at it.

  Now what?

  Now she would make her way in this perplexing new world alone.

  Putting her pack down, Susan reached into the bodice of her shirt and grabbed one of the thin blue ribbons tying her camisole. Threading the end through the ring, she knotted it to hold it snug then shoved the ring and ribbon back inside her shirt. Some comfort came from knowing James’s wedding band rested close to her heart. That ring had clearly meant more to her than it had to James. Tears sprang to her eyes.

  No. No, damn it. No crying.

  Sniffing, Susan rose from her crouch. She’d just have to find her way home herself. She would get out of this place, out of this time, and back to Lynne and John. They needed her.

  Didn’t they?

  That monumental time in life had hit when her kids might not truly need her anymore. Oh, she knew they would always love her. And she knew they liked to spend time with her. But need her?

  Empty nest blues slammed into her so hard it was like a sharp punch to the gut. Lynne and John didn’t need her anymore. James had left her. And her heart still felt hollow at the loss of her baby. Susan had never felt so alone in her whole life.

  What did she have left?

  Her gaze roamed the tiny town and settled on a small red building set aside from the businesses. A schoolhouse. River Bend had a school. What Susan had left was her ability to teach.

  It would have to do.

  With purpose in her stride, she went to find a job doing what she did best.

  * * * *

  Daniel Miller had been having a nice chat with the Golden Nugget’s owner, but when he saw the woman in the distance, his train of thought derailed.

  It had to be her. The new woman in town. Who else could possibly be marching down the street and right into the empty schoolhouse without a single word?

  She was exactly as they’d all told him. Brown hair so short it defied gravity in an oddly pretty way. Confidence most men couldn’t boast of possessing. The pants she was reported to have been wearing were gone, though. That had been the main complaint. Not that Daniel ever truly listened to gossip, choosing to form his own opinions with his own senses. Watching the seductive sway of her hips as she went up the steps to the school’s door, he wished for a moment he’d seen her in a man’s clothing. Pants would have given him a better idea of her true shape, not that he didn’t like everything he’d already seen.

  Shaking his head, Daniel scolded himself for thinking about the woman in such a lustful way. It wasn’t gentlemanly in the least. Perhaps being a widower had left him a little…needier than he’d realized.

  “Daniel?” Li’l Jim said. “You ever gonna finish that sentence?” The saloon’s owner chuckled. “Told you. She’s a might fetching, short hair and all.”

  Daniel nodded. He’d come to town for supplies, but the busybodies had descended on him the moment he stepped off his wagon. The marshal was the worst of the gossips, and he led a pack of old hens who all wanted to complain about the wanton woman who was, in their collective opinion, laying waste to the morality of their fair town. Now that he’d seen her for himself, Daniel could see their fascination, although she hardly seemed a danger. As a town councilman, he needed to follow her to the school, simply to be sure she wasn’t about some trouble.

  “I better see what mischief she’s getting into,” he said to Li’l Jim, inclining his head the direction of the school.

  Li’l Jim chuckled again. “You do that, Daniel. You go see her for yourself. Ain’t been as close as I wanna be, but the day ain’t gone yet. Maybe she’ll come near the saloon later. Then I’ll get me a good, long look. Way the town’s been carrying on, you’d think she was Jezebel herself. Not that it would matter to the menfolk here desperate for a wife.”

  With a nod to his friend, Daniel went in search of a female who had stirred his fascination more than any he’d met in a long, long time. Not that women were in plentiful supply. The last single woman who came to River Bend found herself courted by every unmarried man in the territory in less than a heartbeat. But this woman?

  Wouldn’t matter. Her reputation might be sullied, but her looks would bring the men sniffing after her skirts pretty damned quick.

  She obviously hadn’t heard him come in, because she didn’t stop for a second, simply kept moving around the big room. Daniel folded his arms over his chest and leaned his shoulder against the wall, content with watching her merely out of curiosity.

  Her slim fingers glided over the teacher’s desk as she slowly walked past. Her lips held a melancholy smile that seemed to reveal an attachment to that piece of furniture. The same delicate fingers slid over the slate board as she glanced up, seeming to take in the placards of print and cursive letters posted higher on the wall. Her gaze then fell on the stack of books piled on a student desk and covered with an old sheet. She tentatively lifted the corner and reached underneath to retrieve a McGuffey Reader. Handling it as gently as if she’d just found the Holy Grail, she opened the book.

  Daniel was as mesmerized by the woman as she was by the book. That short hair grows on a man, he thought before grunting a small laugh at his own pun. The noise must have startled her because she dropped the book. The thud echoed through the cavernous room.

  Those eyes were now as wide as any woodland doe surprised by a snapped twig. A deep brown, they entranced him. Pushing away from the wall, Daniel cleared his throat, trying to find the voice that seemed to have escaped him. Then he realized he was still wearing his hat. He doffed it and shifted the brim nervously between his hands. “Sorry, ma’am. Didn’t mean to startle you. I came to check on what you were…Why are you in the school?”

  She blinked a few times before she seemed to restore her aplomb. Stooping down, she picked up the book and slipped it back under the sheet. “I came to see if this town needs a teacher.”

  Any other time, he might have chuckled. River Bend had been cursed with more than enough holier-than-thou women who thought they should educate the children. It had taken him considerable effort to get the townsfolk to accept Miss Ketchum for the job, even though she’d actually completed some time in a real college. “Sorry to say we’ve already got a teacher.”

  “I’m a good teacher. A great teacher. I really need a job…” She glanced around the schoolhouse. The melancholy returned to her features, and Daniel feared for a moment she might cry. He wasn’t sure how he would handle it if she did. The sadness quickly passed, and when she faced him again, it was with determination. “I’d do a good job for you. Maybe I can talk to the School Board. Maybe they’d hire me.”

  Grit. The woman had grit. He couldn’t help but admire her. From what he’d heard, some man had brought her here. They’d spent the night in the rooming house as if they were a married couple, but then the man had abandoned her right in the middle of the boardwalk. Rumor was they weren’t married, that the man had shredded her reputation, marched away, and left her weeping without even turning back. Her clothes had clearly come from the church’s poor closet. Daniel figured he should feel sorry for her. When she didn’t seem to express any self-pity, his admiration of her rose.

  Unfortunately, as much as he’d like to, he couldn’t give her what she wanted. “I don’t doubt that you’re a good teacher, ma’am, but we’ve got a teacher, and speaking as a member of the School Board, one teacher’s all we can afford.”

  “Maybe another town? Surely a good teacher is hard to find.”

  Daniel wanted to help her, but he wouldn’t lie to her. “None I know of.”

  All she did was draw her pretty pink lips into a grim line and give him a curt nod. Then she grabbed a small bundle resting on one of the student desks. “I’m sorry to have taken up your time.” She strode toward the door, trying to hurry past him.

  Daniel reached out and grabbed her upper arm. She
stopped, but she wouldn’t look at him, choosing instead to stare at the door and worry her bottom lip between her teeth. “It was no bother, ma’am. Is there anything I can do to help you?”

  A small rueful laugh slipped from her lips. “No one can help me.”

  “Surely it’s not that bad.”

  Pulling her arm away, she shook her head and headed out of the schoolhouse without another word.

  Watching as she walked down the long street, Daniel put his hat back on and wondered why he felt so guilty letting her leave.

  * * * *

  James had no idea where he was heading, but he knew he had to get away from anything or anyone tying him to his old life. Susan, in his opinion, had become a casualty of war—the war to carve himself a new life. One that meant something.

  God, he loved her. Always had. Always would. But now he needed to find out who the hell James Williams really was.

  He’d wandered away from the town for a while, choosing to stop at the river the town had clearly been named for. First, he’d doffed his shoes and soaked his tired feet in the cool water. Just sitting by the gently moving current had been soothing. The river sounded like the miniature waterfall his boss had in his office because the noise it made was supposed to be calming.

  A new start. This whole situation could become a new start. James loved his wife and his kids, yet he didn’t love himself anymore. He’d become everything he despised.

  He’d become his father.

  Work had always been his father’s main focus. The man said more times than James could remember that a man was only as good as the work he did. When James told him he wanted to be a math teacher, his father laughed right in his face, telling him that not only would he be poor, but he would have absolutely no respect. Then he’d insisted, with James’s outstanding mathematical abilities, he become an engineer.

  Wanting to be a teacher rose from his desire to work with people. Being an engineer meant the only people James interacted with were pissy contractors and unreasonable clients. He spent more time staring at the four walls of his office, four walls that some days seemed to be slowly closing in on him, than he ever did with people. Sixty hours was the norm for his work week, and he hated every damned minute of it.