The Sheriff (Historical Romance)

by Nan Ryan

  And finally she became angry.

  Angry with him.

  Angry with herself.

  With him because he had obviously taken perverse pleasure in showing her just how easily he could seduce her, if he so desired.

  She chastised herself for falling right into his arms and proving him right.

  Tears springing to her eyes, Kate cursed his name and vowed she’d never speak to him again, much less kiss him.

  Twenty-Seven

  His blood up, Travis stopped, picked up his shirt, put it back on and headed directly to the Golden Nugget and the arms of the beautiful Valentina Knight.

  He caught her in her bath. Her French maid was there, kneeling beside the tub, scrubbing her mistress’s back with a long-handled brush.

  “Darling!” Valentina happily greeted Travis and snapped her fingers at the maid. The woman nodded, rose and promptly disappeared. “I’ll just be a minute, my love,” Valentina said, and then squealed with girlish delight when Travis stalked over to the tub and snatched her up out of the sudsy water.

  Dripping all over the fine Aubusson carpet, Valentina joyfully threw her arms around his neck and leaped up onto him, wrapping her legs around his waist. While she clung to him and scattered kisses all over his face, Travis unbuckled his gun belt and dropped it to the floor.

  As agile as an acrobat, Valentina climbed all over Travis, quickly saturating his clothing. Then she delighted in stripping those wet clothes from his body. Swinging on him, laughing merrily, she unbuttoned his shirt and pushed it off his shoulders and down his arms.

  She was sprinkling kisses along his bare shoulder when Travis sank to his knees and sat back on his heels with her astride his spread thighs. Valentina didn’t hesitate. She knew just what to do. Kissing his well-cut chin and firm jawline, she deftly reached between them, unbuttoned his trousers and freed him.

  “Well, what have we here?” she teased, and rubbed her wet body against his awesome erection. “Is this for me?”

  “Just for you,” Travis said, wishing he meant it, knowing that he did not.

  Still, she was incredibly beautiful and a skilled and innovative lover, and when she clasped him in her soft hands and guided him up inside her, Travis momentarily lost himself in her. Physical ecstasy was theirs for a few fleeting minutes. The slippery Valentina glided up and down the throbbing length of her lover with a mastery honed earlier. She knew how to please, how to take a man almost over the top, then pull back just in time.

  She didn’t do that this afternoon.

  Travis wanted, needed to climax quickly. She sensed it. Sadly, she sensed as well that this sudden burst of burning lust had not been generated by or for her. An astute woman, Valentina suspected she was in danger of losing her lover, but for the moment she put that thought out of her mind. For this pleasurable minute, he was hers, and she gave him her all, determined to please him. Within minutes the two of them were shuddering in shared release.

  Later, when both were fully undressed and lying stretched out in Valentina’s big soft bed, they made easy small talk. Valentina told Travis about her brief stay in San Francisco, said she’d gone to her dressmaker’s and had some exquisite gowns fitted. She’d done some shopping, went to the theater and dined at her favorite restaurants.

  “But I missed you,” she said. “Now, tell me about last night’s street dance.” She turned onto her stomach beside Travis and folded her arms over his chest.

  “It was pretty much like last year’s wild celebration,” Travis said. “All the miners got drunk and danced with all the women.”

  “Did you?”

  “Get drunk?”

  “No, silly. Dance with all the women.”

  “I danced a time or two.”

  “Did you dance with Kate VanNam?”

  “Yes, once,” he said.

  “Was she there with Winn Delaney?”

  Travis nodded.

  Valentine made a face and said, “There’s something going on there that puzzles me, Travis.”

  “What’s the mystery?” he said. “DeLaney is ardently courting Miss VanNam. I would assume he has marriage in mind.”

  “Perhaps. But when he’s not with Kate VanNam, DeLaney—so I hear—is in bed with the new girl who works at the Whiskey Hill Saloon.”

  Travis said nothing, but his lean body automatically stiffened. Valentina felt it. She continued, “You may have seen the woman. She’s not exactly pretty, but she’s exotic looking. She’s dark complected with green eyes. She wears a decorative golden dagger in her black hair.” Valentina paused, looked thoughtful, then added, “And, the strangest thing, she has a blue trinity tattoo on the side of her neck. Now why would a woman do that to herself?”

  Travis eased Valentina’s arms off his chest and sat up. “She wouldn’t,” he said as reached for his clothes. “A blue trinity tattoo is the mark given to Australian prisoners. Apparently the lady in question is a felon.” He stood up and stepped into his trousers.

  “What are you doing? So she’s been in prison, who cares?” Valentina said, and scrambled up out of the bed. She laid her hands on his chest. “Don’t go, darling. We have another hour before I’m due downstairs.”

  Travis thrust his arms into his shirtsleeves. “I promised Jiggs I’d hurry back to the jail so he can have dinner with Alice Hester.”

  Feeling as if her world was spinning out of control, Valentina pressed herself against Travis and said, “To hell with Alice Hester! I don’t care if that plain-faced widow ever has dinner with Jiggs. Let her bake some more of her overpriced pies!”

  “Now, Val, it’s not like you to be unkind.” He gently tore her arms from around him. “I have to go.”

  “So go!” she said angrily, “Get out of here.”

  Travis smiled, touched her cheek affectionately, turned and left. For a long moment Valentina stood there and stared at the door he’d closed behind him. She felt tears come to her eyes. She had the sinking feeling that the handsome sheriff might never come through that door again.

  And she knew why.

  Her keen intuition told her that what she’d suspected for weeks was true. The man she loved was falling for the Boston blonde.

  “You back already?” Jiggs said when Travis walked into the jail at five minutes of seven that evening.

  “Val ran me off,” Travis said. “She has to get dressed for tonight’s performance.”

  “So I can go on over to Alice’s?”

  “Sure, Jiggs.” Travis dropped down into a chair behind his desk. “One thing, before you leave…I hope you’ll continue keeping a close eye on Kate VanNam. Just in the daylight hours. I’ll handle the nights.”

  “Something happened that…?”

  “No, no.” Travis cut him off. “It’s just that she’s such a pretty, naive young thing and I don’t completely trust DeLaney.”

  “Me neither,” said Jiggs, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “There’s something about that fellow I can’t quite put my finger on.”

  “Well don’t worry about it,” Travis said. “Go on. Enjoy your evening.”

  Travis was still seated at his desk when, at shortly after eight, he glanced up and caught sight of Winn DeLaney and Kate. They were across the street, strolling down the sidewalk. When they went into the Bonanza Hotel, Travis pushed his chair back and got to his feet. DeLaney had a suite at the Bonanza. Did he mean to take Kate up there?

  Travis wasted no time.

  He looked in on his three prisoners. All were sound asleep in their cells. Travis left the jail, crossed the street and went into the Bonanza. He nodded to Dwayne, the room clerk, and crossed the lobby to the dining room. He stood in the arched doorway and looked inside. Kate was seated across from DeLaney at a linen-draped table for two.

  Travis turned away, chose an overstuffed chair in the lobby and sat down to wait. An hour passed before the couple came out of the dining room. Travis stayed where he was. But if DeLaney had made one move to take Kate upstairs, Travis would have int
ervened immediately.

  “Why, if it isn’t the town sheriff,” DeLaney said, looking up to see Travis. “What terrible mischief is going on in the Bonanza this evening to bring out the law?”

  Travis rose to his feet and acknowledged the pair. “Delaney. Miss VanNam.”

  Kate said nothing, just nodded silently, but Travis caught a look in her eyes that he’d never seen before. He wondered if that same expression was mirrored in his own.

  “My sweetheart is quite tired this evening for some unexplained reason.” DeLaney broke into Travis’s thoughts. “Kate insists I take her straight home, despite the early hour. Why don’t you come along with us, Marshal?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “It would save you the trouble of following us,” DeLaney stated sarcastically, and slipped an arm around Kate’s waist. “That’s what you’ll do, isn’t it?” He laughed then and ushered Kate out the door.

  Travis sat back down.

  He debated doing just what Delaney accused, but decided against it. Instead Travis returned to the jail, where he took out a deck of cards and played Klondike.

  But his mind wasn’t on the game.

  It was on the beautiful blond-haired Kate. He kept seeing her lying on that sun-heated rock in her underwear. He kept feeling her lips moving sweetly beneath his own, and he kept hearing her softly sigh as he caressed her.

  Travis was helplessly drawn to Kate even if she aroused conflicting emotions in him. He was not, however, confused about Winn DeLaney, and after what Valentina had told him about the woman who was DeLaney’s mistress, Travis was doubly worried.

  He looked up from his card game when he heard a loud knock on the frame of the open door.

  Winn DeLaney walked in. “Evening again, Mc-Cloud.”

  “Something on your mind, DeLaney?” Travis said.

  “You’re following me, Sheriff, and I believe I know why. You want Kate for yourself and—”

  Interrupting, Travis said, “DeLaney, I don’t know what you’re doing in Fortune, but I can’t help but wonder. Did you somehow know that the heiress to the old Cavalry Blue claim was here?”

  Travis saw the other man nervously swallow. “That’s nonsense,” DeLaney said defensively.

  “Is it? Or did somebody tell you that the mine might actually hold a fortune in gold?”

  “Don’t be absurd! Everyone in this flea-bitten town knows there is no gold in that worthless claim of Kate’s.”

  Travis pushed back his chair, rose and circled the desk. Towering over DeLaney, he said calmly, “Trifle with Kate or that mine and I’ll kill you.”

  Twenty-Eight

  September came, and with it the rains.

  Sudden and violent thunderstorms rumbled over the mountains. Their furious squalls were often followed by hours, then days, of steady rain that dampened Kate’s already flagging spirits. The roof of the mansion leaked badly and she had no money to have it repaired. She stepped over puddles no matter how many times she mopped up the water. She had to shove the sofa against the wall to stay half-dry in bed at night.

  And the nights were turning chilly.

  Almost as chilly as the town sheriff.

  Since the hot August afternoon on the rocky promontory, Travis McCloud had, without a doubt, gone out of his way to avoid her. Which was fine with her, if somewhat puzzling. She couldn’t understand why he had kissed her and held her as if she were his treasured sweetheart, then abruptly pushed her away and left as if he loathed the sight of her.

  But she was, in fact, relieved that McCloud had lost interest in tormenting her. The enigmatic sheriff was not the kind of man any woman in her right mind would choose to love. A broken heart would be the outcome.

  Kate had enough real worries without giving Travis McCloud a great deal of thought. She was growing more and more doubtful that she was ever going to strike it rich, and she was nearly ready to concede that indeed there was no gold in the Cavalry Blue.

  None.

  All summer she and Chang Li had worked long hours, searching in vain for treasure. If there were any, they would have found it by now.

  The meager amounts of placer had long since been taken from the streambed. The tiny gold-specked pebbles had provided precious few dollars, most of which Kate had already spent. She worried about what she would do once it was all gone.

  Kate lay in her bed nights pondering her fate. She did not have the money to get back to Boston. How could she possibly support herself here?

  They had to find the gold.

  And soon.

  Throughout that rainy September and on into a cold October, Kate and the loyal Chang Li continued to spend their days down in the abandoned mine shaft, hacking away at stubborn rock.

  “What’s the use,” she said one bleak afternoon. She tossed her shovel aside and sank down onto the mine’s rocky floor. “There’s no gold here.”

  “Not to give up, Missy,” Chang Li scolded. “We find treasure, you see.” He smiled then, extended his hand and helped her to her feet. “You just tired. Work too hard for young slender woman. Look pale. Go home, rest.”

  “Good idea. Let’s quit and—”

  “I stay and work. Not tired.”

  Kate shook her head. “Of course you are.”

  “No, not weary, feel fine. You go.”

  Kate sighed and nodded. She knew Chang Li. It was no use arguing with him. The little man never faltered in his optimism. He started and ended each and every day with the belief that this could be the day good fortune would smile on them.

  When Kate left him he was humming and hacking at the rock with the same enthusiasm he had on that very first day he had come to work with her.

  How she envied him.

  Kate stepped out of the mine and blinked in surprise. The rain had stopped. The sun had come out. The air was crisp and clear. The sky was an unclouded cobalt-blue. And in the northeast, just above the highest mountain peaks, a beautiful rainbow arched down from out of the heavens.

  Kate hoped it was an omen.

  She immediately felt better.

  She took a page from Chang Li’s book and walked home humming. Cal met her at the front gate and seemed to sense her lightened mood. He meowed and jumped up on her trousered leg with his front paws. She laughed, sank down on her heels and affectionately stroked his head. His eyes closed in pleasure.

  Cal followed Kate into the house, zipped past her and raced down the hallway to the kitchen. Kate laughed again. He was hungry. As usual.

  Kate fed the cat, then ambled into the drawing room, stripping off her work clothes as she went. She spent the rest of the afternoon lying on the sofa, reading a book Doc Ledet had loaned her from his extensive library.

  “I believe you’ll enjoy Sir Walter Scott’s The Lady in the Lake,” he’d said when he’d handed her the leather-bound novel. “It was a favorite of my dear wife, Mary.”

  Kate was enjoying the romantic tale. And she was enjoying being sinfully lazy for one lovely autumn afternoon. Chang Li was right. She was tired.

  Well before dusk had settled in, the book she was reading had slipped from her hand and fallen to the floor.

  She was asleep.

  She was so physically exhausted that she slept soundly and didn’t turn over all night.

  Just before dawn Kate was violently shaken awake when her bed began to fiercely jump, the legs of the sofa slamming up and down on the wooden floor. Startled, unsure what was happening, she bolted up, looked around and ran out onto the porch, fearful that the walls would fall in around her. Cal was right behind her. Kate fought to keep her balance on the rolling, pitching porch.

  Earthquake!

  That’s what it was. She’d heard about the California earthquakes and the destruction they could cause, with great fissures opening up and swallowing everything. Terrified, wondering if this was how she was to die, Kate offered up a quick prayer.

  The tremor was over in less than a minute, but that minute seemed like an hour. Trembling, her heart r
acing with fear, Kate sank down on the porch steps. Cal climbed onto her lap and she hugged him close, taking comfort from his nearness, anxiously rubbing her cheek atop his head.

  The calico tom would tolerate being held for only a short time. Soon he began struggling to free himself, and Kate released him. Both went back inside. Kate lit a lamp and walked through the mansion, checking for damage. There were a few broken dishes, an overturned chair, but otherwise the mansion was solidly built and had withstood the quake. Kate was relieved. The earthquake had scared her, but it had changed nothing.

  Or so she thought.

  Cal accompanying Kate to the mine each morning had become a habit. He walked at her side as though he were a dog.

  Once they reached the Cavalry Blue, Cal would usually stay only long enough to go inside the mine, look around and check everything out. Then he’d get bored and disappear for the rest of the day. In the evening he would return just as Kate and Chang Li were quitting. The big calico seemed to have a built-in clock.

  This morning Cal rushed on inside the mine ahead of Kate. He zipped right past Chang Li and vanished down into the darkness. Kate and Chang Li worked and talked about the early morning earthquake. The curious Cal was off somewhere in the mine exploring.

  An hour had passed when Kate looked up to see Cal coming out of the dark reaches of the mine. When he stepped into the flickering light of the carbide lantern, Kate noticed that he was covered with dust and that tiny specks of rock clung to his fur. He was rumbling with annoyance and trying to shake himself clean.

  “Look at him,” Kate said to Chang Li. “Always into mischief.” To Cal she said, “Come here, you bad cat. I’ll brush you off.”

  She laid down her pick and sank to her knees. When the cat came to her, she grabbed his face in her hands and said, “Serves you right, always nosing into everything.”

  She began brushing the dust and particles from him. Suddenly she stopped. Her brow knitted. Atop Cal’s back, in the rich thick coat, a tiny speck of rock gleamed. Her lips falling open in astonishment, Kate plucked the fleck from the cat’s back, and her blue eyes grew large and round.