The Gunman's Bride

“Remember how you shinnied down the oak tree by your bedroom window that night?” he was saying, his voice almost inaudible. “We ran through the fields to Reverend Russell’s place? You wore a white dress and lilacs in your hair. The reverend was drunk as usual, but we hardly noticed because we were so scared and excited to get married and—”

“No!” She pushed his hand away. “It was only a game, Bart. We were children. You said so yourself.”

Leaving him, she hurried to the wash stand, rinsed the tweezers and fumbled the medicines into the bag. Six years ago she had convinced herself that she had never married Bart Kingsley. No one knew except her pappy—and neither of them had ever mentioned his name again.

The disaster had been put away like one of Pappy’s old textbooks. Hidden on a back shelf. Forgotten. Denied so completely that Pappy had arranged for Rosie to marry Dr. William Lowell. Denied so totally that she had silently submitted, as she always did, to Pappy. Denied so thoroughly, that every night when she lay in Dr. Lowell’s bed in his big fancy house, she didn’t give Bart Kingsley a thought.

She didn’t remember the way he had held her hand, gently weaving his fingers through hers. She didn’t remember how he had touched her face, his green eyes memorizing every feature as though it were precious beyond belief. She didn’t remember his mouth moving against hers, his lips tender and his breath ragged.

“Rosie,” he said from the bed.

She stiffened, unable to look at him.

“I don’t play games, Rosie. You know I never have.”

“You’d better get some sleep, Bart. You’ll need it to climb out that window in the morning.”

She rinsed her hands in clean water, then she stepped to the wardrobe for a cotton petticoat she had brought from Kansas City. The strips of clean white fabric would make a good bandage. As she ripped the cloth, she resolved that Bart was part of her past and he must stay that way. Come sunup, he would be back in the past where he belonged.

She laid the bandages across his stomach. “I didn’t find the bullet, and you’re still bleeding. I’m going to put this around you until you can get to a doctor.”

“I reckon you’ve done me such a good turn I won’t need to see a doctor, Rosie.”

“You can’t go around with a bullet inside you for the rest of your life.”

“Most of the men I know have been shot so full of holes you’d think they’d leak every time they took a drink. They carry a few lead souvenirs just to make their stories ring true.”

“That’s a fine bunch of friends you have, Bart.” As she smoothed the cloth bandage over his skin she could feel his eyes on her. Watching her. “Men walking around with bullets inside. Great ghosts, who ever heard of such a thing?”

“Cole Younger’s been wounded upwards of twenty times. He reckons he’s got a good fifteen bullets buried in him.”

“Cole Younger!” she snapped, straightening suddenly. “So you really are in leagues with those outlaws, just like the sheriff said. Oh, Bart, how could you?”

“Rosie, it’s not like you think.” He reached for her, but she had already swung away.

A blanket bundled in her arms, she knelt to pull her pink hooked rug into the center of the room. One glimpse of the blood-soaked wool and she let out a gasp of horror.

“Bart Kingsley, you have ruined my rug! I brought it all the way from Kansas City on the train because it was the only thing I ever liked out of that ugly house my fiancé bought for us last—”

Catching herself, she clamped a hand over her mouth. Her eyes met Bart’s.

“You and I weren’t married,” she whispered. “We never were married. Not really, were we?”

When he didn’t answer, she spread her blanket on the bare wood floor. Then she curled up and pulled the edges of it over herself. Bart lay nearby, his breathing easier now. In the darkness she wondered if he could hear her crying.

Chapter Three

Rosie woke to find Bart sprawled half on and half off her bed, a sheen of feverish perspiration covering his body. He writhed in the agony of a dream, and she feared his moans would bring someone to investigate.

“Bart, wake up!” she pleaded, placing her hand on his damp shoulder. “Bart!”

At once he sat straight up and grabbed her arms in a powerful grip. His green eyes were bright with fever. “Rosie, don’t let them get me! Don’t let…don’t…”

He winced in pain, then sagged back onto the bed. “Ah, blast that good-for-nothing sheriff—”

“Hush, now!” Rosie ordered. She glanced at the door and wondered if the voice of a fevered man would carry down the hall. Brushing her hair back from her face, she studied the massive figure on the bed.

What on earth was she going to do with him? In the light of day, she felt foolish not to have sent for Sheriff Bowman immediately. It wouldn’t be long before someone would hear—or maybe smell—the intruder. She ought to head down the hall to Mrs. Jensen’s suite and confess the whole thing.

The truth of the matter was, Rosie didn’t owe Bart Kingsley one shred of kindness. He had wooed her, misled her, tricked her, abandoned her. And now he had endangered the one sure thing in life—her job as a Harvey Girl. If anyone discovered an outlaw in her room, her dream of teaching in one of the local schools would end. She would never have a home of her own, a classroom filled with eager children, freedom from her past.

“Rosie?” he murmured as his head tossed from side to side, his black hair a tangle on the white pillow. “Rosie, where are you, girl?”

Fingers knotted together, she fretted over her dilemma. She couldn’t let Bart stay in her room, but he was too ill to climb out the window and escape. If she called the sheriff, everyone would wonder why she had let the fugitive renegade sleep in her bed all night. Her bloody sheets would bear witness to the fact that he hadn’t been hiding under her bed forever.

“Oh, dear Lord, please show me what to do!” she whispered in prayer as she checked the gold pocket watch she had inherited from her mother.

Six-thirty! The uniform inspection bell would ring in half an hour. Then she would have to rush downstairs, eat a roll, sip some coffee and prepare the dining room for the eight o’clock train. Dare she go off and leave a feverish, groaning man in her bed?

As she turned away in search of her apron, Rosie decided Bart could stay through the first shift. She would return to her room before the lunch train came through and check on him. If he was the slightest bit better, she would insist that he leave.

“Rosie.” His voice startled her as he struggled to sit up. “I promised I’d go this morning. I’ll need my jacket.”

Her shoulders sagged. “Oh, Bart, you’re in no shape to go anywhere.”

“No, Rosie-girl. I made you a promise.” For a moment he sat hunched over, breathing heavily. Then he hauled himself to his feet.

Rosie watched him sway like a great tree about to topple. He means to do it, she thought. He actually means to keep his promise to me. One of his long legs started to crumple, but he grabbed the iron footboard to steady himself.

His guns and cartridge belts weighed him down as he shuffled across the room toward the corner where she had tossed his jacket. His bandage was stained with a dark red blotch. He propped one big brown hand on the windowsill and bent to pick up the torn buckskin.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Sorry I messed up your sheets and rug. Sorry about when we were young and how much I hurt you. I’m sorry I made you cry last night, too, and—”

“For mercy’s sake, Bart!” She snatched the jacket out of his hands. “You’re delirious, plain and simple. Now get back to bed this instant. I’ll check on you after the breakfast shift.”

“No, Rosie, I—”

“Let go of that windowsill and grab on to me before you fall down with a crash and bring Mrs. Jensen running.”

Rosie clenched her teeth and heaved Bart against her. This man could drive me to drink, she thought. All those ridiculous apologies. If he weren’t so sick, she’d give him what for. She didn’t need anyone’s apologies for the way her life had turned out. She had made her own choices and now she would live with them.

“Get in this bed,” she ordered, shoving him down. “And don’t get up until I say. You’re going to make me late for inspection, and then where will I be?”

Working quickly, she tugged off his boots and set them on the floor. My, but they needed a good polishing. She pulled the sheets and blankets over his chest and tucked the edges under the mattress.

Opening the window to freshen the room, she didn’t take her usual time to pray and gaze out over the little town of Raton and its encircling range of snow-capped mesas. Instead, she quickly washed and then stepped behind the changing screen to put on her uniform. Black stockings. Chemise. Corset—oh, she had to hurry! Black skirt. Black shirt buttoned up to the neck.

Rushing to the hook by the door, she grabbed a fresh white apron, tied it around her waist and buttoned the bib. In two short months she had worked her way almost up to head waitress, but one moan from Bart Kingsley could undo everything.