Scarlet Lies (Author's Cut Edition): Historical Romance

by Jo Goodman

  Brooklyn nodded. How could she not be warm? she wondered. She had more clothes on now than at any other time she went to bed.

  "Scared?"

  "A little," she answered. "Do you think they'll come tonight?" It had been two days since Doc Firth's warning. The bounty hunters had not made it into the valley yet. Brooklyn was weary of being vigilant during the day. She was tired of sleeping alone at night. "Perhaps it was all a mistake."

  "It was no mistake, Brooklyn. If Jordan and Kittridge haven't been injured trying to traverse the mountain, they'll be here." Ryland was also fairly certain the men would come to the house at night.

  Any strangers entering the supposedly cut-off valley would have been under suspicion at once. The hunters would not want to put Ryland on his guard by suddenly appearing during the day. "Do you want me to stay with you tonight?"

  "No." Her arm circled the mound of pillows and blankets that had been arranged beside her, making it look as if Ryland were lying against her. Brook's hand that was hidden beneath the covers held the ivory-handled revolver. "I'll be fine."

  Ryland kissed her cheek. "I'll be in the next room," he said quietly. He left quickly before his need to be beside Brooklyn got the better of his judgment. Once in his own room he got beneath the covers, clothed except for his shirt, and arranged the pillows and blankets beside him in the same manner Brooklyn had. He closed his eyes briefly, praying that when the bounty men came, they came to his room first. He did not want Brooklyn to face their guns. Better that she should be the one to take them unaware from behind. There was more safety in that position.

  He knew she did not sleep any better than he. They caught naps in the afternoon, taking turns resting so they would be more likely to be awake at night. The hardest thing for Ryland to do was to remain on his side facing the door. He did not want to give the hunters his back.

  Brooklyn came awake abruptly, her heart thudding heavily. At first she could not imagine what had drawn her out of a sound sleep, but then she remembered the danger and lifted her head, listening. For several moments there was nothing and she chided her overactive imagination. She was prepared to relax again when her ears heard the soft tread of feet on the stairs. Her muscles bunched, fingers tightening around the butt of her revolver.

  She tried to remember everything she and Ryland had discussed. He had cautioned her that neither of them could afford to fire warning shots. If they were threatened by the bounty hunters their only choice would be to shoot to wound, and if they must, to kill.

  Brooklyn heard movement across the balcony hallway. She shivered, wondering if Ryland was awake. What if he hadn't heard the intruders? Everything hinged on being able to confront the hunters.

  She cocked her head, listening to the sound of the first bedroom door being swung open. There were murmurs from two distinct voices, wholly unintelligible. Almost immediately the steps quickened, moving closer, and the middle bedroom, the one where Ryland was sleeping, was investigated. Brooklyn held her breath.

  Jordan nudged Kittridge as they shouldered their way into Ryland's bedroom. They both blinked several times, trying to make out the shapes in the bed as shadows and light from the fireplace played over the sleeping figures. Kittridge stepped closer to the bed, light-footed and sure, his gun drawn. He glanced back at Jordan, nodded once, took careful aim and pulled back the hammer.

  There were two shots within a moment of one another. Kittridge's blasted into the pillows that Ryland was holding and buried itself in the mattress. Ryland's found its mark in the bounty hunter's chest. Kittridge was slammed backward by the force of the bullet and collapsed on the floor, dead before he understood what had happened.

  Ryland threw himself off the far side of the bed and onto the floor as Jordan fired into the mattress, aiming for the depression that had been Ryland's body.

  "Drop your gun," Brooklyn said with gritty purpose from the doorway. "Drop it!"

  Jordan's head jerked upward in surprise. His thick fingers unfolded slowly, and the revolver fell to the floor. He kicked it away when Brooklyn prodded him in the small of his back with the barrel of her gun. His hands fell uselessly to his sides as the skin at the nape of his neck prickled with alarm.

  Brooklyn took a few steps backward so Jordan couldn't swing on her. "Ryland? Ry, are you all right?"

  Ryland pulled himself up and massaged his right elbow. "I'm fine," he said. He glanced at the bounty hunter on the floor. "Dead?"

  Brook nodded. "What are we going to do with this one?"

  Jordan's weight shifted uneasily. The slight movement brought Ryland's weapon up immediately. "Hey!" he interjected, shaking his head from side to side. "I don't want no more trouble, folks. Seems to me there's been a misunderstanding."

  Ryland's smile was cold and humorless. "Is that a fact?" He ignored Jordan's quick nod. "Brook, move to your left so you're not in my line of fire if this man decides to drop." When she obeyed Ryland concentrated on the bounty hunter again. Jordan's looks were probably deceiving, Ryland decided. He appeared slow and dull-witted; his expression was still faintly surprised, and his mouth was slack. He was stockily built with a bull neck and thick, heavy limbs. His belly pushed out full and round above the waistline of his pants. He wore a long gray riding coat that came almost to his ankles. It was completely unbuttoned but it revealed only one empty holster. Ryland could not see if the hunter was still armed. It would have been a grave mistake to underestimate the man. After all, he had gotten this far.

  "Who sent you here?" asked Ryland.

  "Names don't mean much to me," Jordan said. "I take a job and don't ask a lot of questions." His rounded chin jerked toward his fallen partner. "That was Kittridge's business. And he's not talking to no one."

  "Who sent you?" Ryland repeated.

  Jordan merely shrugged, lifting his brawny shoulder and palms in an eloquent gesture of ignorance. When his arms settled back into place, his hands thrust inside the deep pockets of his long coat. The movement was natural and unthreatening. He felt certain neither Brook nor Ryland realized he was groping for the revolver hidden beneath the coat.

  "What exactly were your orders?"

  "Funny thing about that," Jordan said, "can't seem to recollect them."

  Brooklyn's mouth pursed in frustration. "You remembered well enough a short time ago."

  Jordan pivoted on his heels so he was facing Brook. "You got it all wrong, ma'am. I told you, it was Kittridge's business to keep things like that straight."

  Agitated by the bounty hunter's lies as well as his nonchalance, Brook glanced at Ryland. "What are we going to do with—"

  Brooklyn never finished her question. In the brief time her attention strayed, Jordan's fingers curled in his pocket and found the butt of his gun. Without missing a beat he drew and fired his weapon in a single fluid motion, blowing a hole in his coat when the gun did not clear the material. He should have made the shot, he thought dully, disturbed by the sudden ache in his chest. He should have made the damn shot. Instead his pain-glazed eyes were drawn to the splintered mantelpiece where his bullet had strayed. His gun thudded to the floor, discharging the bullet he had been ready to fire at Ryland. Jordan pulled his hands from his pockets, holding them up, palms forward, in a useless gesture of surrender. His thick fingers folded inward so that his hands became white-knuckled fists.

  He was afraid to look down at his chest, afraid to touch the crimson blossom that was the center of his terrible pain. Instead he stared at the smoking barrel of Ryland's gun leveled steadily at him. "He told me you was good," he said weakly, his voice a strangled whisper. "Didn't believe there was any better than me... or Kitt."

  "There's always someone better," Ryland said without pity.

  As if nodding in agreement, Jordan's head fell forward. His eyes closed and he groaned softly. At the same time his knees buckled under him and his trunk-like body was felled at last.

  Ryland placed his gun on the bed and immediately went to Brook, gently withdrawing the weapon from
her trembling hands. He tossed it on the bed and then led her from the room, keeping her head averted from the carnage. Once they were in the hallway Brooklyn broke free, running for the bathroom. Ryland let her go and waited outside the door in the master bedroom, listening to the sounds of her sickness.

  When she came out of the bathroom Ryland's brows lifted in a silent question. She nodded that she was all right, slipped her arm around his waist, and walked with him toward the edge of their bed. Without protest she allowed Ryland to undress her, leaving her linen shift as a nightgown, and tuck her under the covers. Turning her cheek toward him, she felt the soft brush of his lips against her cool skin.

  He touched her shoulder. "I'll be back. Give me about an hour or so."

  Brooklyn immediately raised herself on her elbows. "I can help you. The bodies... you'll need—" Ryland shook his head. "No, I'll take care of everything. I want you to stay here." He started to walk away but Brook's hand snaked out quickly, circling his wrist and holding him back. "What is it, Brook?" he asked gently. His cinnamon eyes darted over her face and saw she was upset by something other than the death of the bounty hunters.

  "I couldn't... couldn't shoot," she whispered.

  "You were in danger... out of the corner of my eye I saw Jordan go for his gun... and I still couldn't fire. You could have been killed. It would have been my fault. I would have failed us both."

  Ryland sat beside Brooklyn and opened her fingers from around his wrist. He held her hand in one of his, and with the other he smoothed a damp curl of hair from her forehead. Gradually he felt tension drain from her body, and she relaxed enough to lie back against the pillow. "You failed neither of us," he said. "You came when I needed you, held Jordan off while I recovered. It doesn't matter that you weren't able to shoot. I never wanted it to come to killing, but it did, and I'm glad it was me and not you that had to do it."

  "But—"

  "No buts. I wish I had sent you away with Doc. I must have been mad to endanger you."

  "You couldn't have sent me away," she pointed out. "I wouldn't have left you."

  "I know." That was the argument Ryland had used with himself, but now it seemed a shabby one. He needed time alone to think on what had happened. There were pieces of the confrontation with the bounty hunters that did not fit neatly into Ryland's idea of what should have occurred. "Go to sleep, Brooklyn. I promise I won't be gone long."

  Ryland searched the dead men, looking for something that would indicate who had hired them. Disappointed that there was nothing to find, he nevertheless wrapped the bodies of both the hunters in sheets, dragged them to the window of the bedroom, opened it, and awkwardly lifted the dead men, depositing their bodies into the night air, snow, and cold. It was an ignominious exit from the house for two gunslingers who had killed some thirty men between them.

  After he scrubbed the hardwood floor free of bloodstains so Brook would not be confronted with them in the morning, Ryland went outside and dragged the bodies toward the stable. The ground was too hard to dig even the shallowest of graves. Ryland was just as glad. He wasn't sure he wanted them buried on North land.

  Laying the shrouded bodies side by side on the lee side of the stable, Ryland returned to the house. He stripped off his clothes in the bathroom, washed quickly, and hitched a towel about his waist. He sat on the curved edge of the tub for several minutes, cleansing his mind in the manner he had cleansed his body. Like the water, his thoughts were icy cold.

  Jordan and Kittridge had not been after him. They certainly would have killed him because they would have wanted no witnesses, but he was not their priority, not the reason they had been sent. Brooklyn was.

  Did she suspect? Probably not, Ryland thought. She hadn't been in the room when Kittridge entered. She hadn't seen him aim his gun deliberately at the pillows and blankets that were supposed to approximate Brooklyn's shape. Kittridge hadn't missed his target. If Brooklyn had been in bed with Ryland she would have been dead. If they had entered her bedroom first she would have been dead. If Ryland had not been alert to Jordan going for his guns she would have been dead.

  The bounty hunters hadn't tried to kill her because she stood in their way against Ryland. They had tried because she was their quarry. And Ryland was left with one last thought: Why?

  When he slipped into bed beside Brook she was already asleep. Ryland didn't disturb her, but hours later, when she whimpered softly and tears slid beneath her lashes, he stirred from his own sleep and held her, drawing her head to his shoulder and murmuring words of comfort and love until she quieted.

  In the morning Ryland announced they were leaving. Brooklyn paused as she poured pancake batter onto the hot griddle. Batter dribbled and danced; grease splashed her. She stepped back from the stove, put down the measuring cup, and wiped her hands quickly on her apron.

  "Leaving?" she asked. "Today?"

  "After breakfast."

  "But the pass? Surely it's not open."

  "We'll take the tunnel. I'll ask Joe to spare a few men to look after the animals we'll have to leave behind." And to do something with the bodies, he added silently. "I'll hire someone in town to come out to the house and look after it until we return."

  Brooklyn nodded, though she didn't understand the urgency. Surely the danger was past. She sniffed, smelled the batter burning, and turned her attention back to their breakfast. She served Ryland a half dozen flapjacks and two small ones for herself, which she forced down in tiny bites simply because Ryland was watching her. "Where are we going?" she finally asked.

  "First to Virginia City. We'll find a preacher." He saw her start of surprise. "You don't mind a quick service, do you?"

  She shook her head in bewilderment. "No, it's not that. I just wasn't thinking about marriage."

  "I'll find us a room at one of the hotels," he said. "I want you to stay there while I buy our train tickets for Frisco and take care of matters concerning the house. We'll probably have to spend the night." He also had to speak with the sheriff about the bounty hunters, but he said nothing of this to Brooklyn.

  "Why can't I come with you?" she asked. "What if I don't want to stay in the hotel room?"

  "I'll feel safer if you're there," he told her calmly, his face grave.

  Brook frowned deeply, pushing her plate to one side. "Do you expect someone to make another attempt on your life? Is that why you don't want me around?"

  Perceptively Ryland heard what she was really asking. He reached for her, cupping her chin in his hand. "It's not because I think you can't protect me," he said. "I know you could, in spite of your fear last night. It's because I'm afraid I can't protect you."

  "Me?" She thought about that a moment. "Oh, you mean a stray bullet or something."

  He nodded, removing his hand. "Or something," he said quietly, enigmatically. "I don't really expect trouble. There's no way for whoever sent Jordan and Kittridge to know they failed yet. We have some time, unless these two hunters aren't the only ones... after me."

  Brook wondered at his pause. What was he really thinking? "You won't leave me alone long, will you? I have no liking for being forced to stay in a hotel room."

  Ryland feigned great hurt, putting his hand to his heart. "What? Leave my bride alone for hours on her wedding day? I shall be gone long enough for you to luxuriate in a tub of jasmine-scented water and think on all the liberties I intend to take when I return."

  She laughed at his foolishness. "I may take some liberties myself," she said slyly.

  Ryland stood, his brows arching wickedly. "I'll look forward to it." He kissed her on the mouth and left her before she sensed the desperation in the kiss.

  They were married a few minutes after noon. Doc Firth and the parson's wife served as witnesses. If the doctor thought there was something odd about witnessing a marriage he thought had already occurred, he was wise enough not to question Ryland. It seemed to him that Ryland would not have taken kindly to questions of any kind. Although Firth counted himself an acquaintance of
Ryland's and not a friend, he knew Ryland well enough to observe that the tension in his features, in the taut cords of his neck, was unnatural. Doc Firth wouldn't have called himself much of a physician if he hadn't recognized the signs as something other than wedding jitters. He couldn't help but wonder what had happened with the bounty hunters.

  Brooklyn knew Ryland was troubled as well, and she suspected his wariness was due to the events of last night. She was right in her assumption, yet not completely correct, for she would have been stunned to learn that he feared for her and not for himself.

  The service itself took very little time, imbued with the right proportions of solemnity and charm. Ryland held Brooklyn's hand in his and spoke his vows in clear, certain tones. Brook's voice never broke a whisper, but no one who heard her doubted her sincerity or the intensity of her love for the man at her side.

  After the ceremony Doc Firth kissed Brooklyn on the cheek and shook Ryland's hand, wishing them both well. He was about to leave when Ryland drew him to one side while the parson's wife had a heart-to-heart with Brooklyn.

  "I need to see the sheriff," Ryland told the doctor. "I'd like you to come along, report the conversation we had a few days ago. It will help put everything in perspective."

  Firth nodded, his eyes downcast. He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "The hunters? They showed up?"

  "Last night."

  "Dead?"

  Ryland's humor was black. "Well, they didn't show up that way."

  Doc's mouth lifted in a wry, lopsided grin. "Sure, I'll go along with you to see Sheriff Young. He's not going to be grieving about the loss of either Kittridge or Jordan. Like as not he'll probably thank you."

  Ryland escorted Brooklyn to a local hotel, secured a room for them, and saw her as far as the door. "Don't hesitate to ask for anything you want," he told her, kissing her cheek distractedly. "The manager knows I'm good for the bill. Joe Greer promised that everything we packed at the house will be brought down to the station. I'll get a few of our things, whatever we need for the night and for traveling tomorrow, when I buy our tickets. You'll stay here?"