In The Sheriff's Protection

“And you walk? Carrying a smoked pig?”

The look of shock on his face almost made her sputter her coffee. Swallowing, and wiping her lips, she shook her head. “Mr. Ryan often gives us a ride home, or if busy, will deliver the pig later.”

“Oh, well, that’s better.” Looking over at Billy’s empty plate, Tom then asked, “You need more?”

Billy nodded.

She pushed away from the table again, but Tom shook his head as he stood. “Bring your plate, Billy. I’ll fill it while filling my own.” He then asked her, “How about you? You need more while I’m up?”

“No, thank you. I’m fine.”

“How about coffee?”

“Good there, too.”

She couldn’t pull her eyes away as the two walked to the stove, and couldn’t stop a smile that formed when Tom asked Billy if he wanted one or two biscuits.

“Two,” Billy answered.

“Me, too. They are the best I’ve ever had.”

Her smile gradually slipped away when she realized she only had the supplies to make the biscuits because of money that Hugh had brought last winter, during his last visit. That was going on five months ago, which meant he’d probably be stopping by anytime now. Not ever the best provider by far, since Walter had died, Hugh usually managed to visit three times a year and leave enough money to keep her and Billy fed during his absences.

The irony was that today, that money was feeding a lawman.

Her appetite hadn’t been great before, but now it was completely gone. She pretended to eat while the other two finished their breakfast and spoke about what they’d get done today. Not only did Tom fully engage Billy in the conversation, he asked questions and then offered explanations on how they’d repair the porch roof and what they’d each need to do and in what order.

She’d wondered about him long and hard last night. Actually, since awaking and discovering him in her house yesterday. She understood she was lonely and that any visitor would occupy her thoughts, but he was different. He made her question things that she had no business questioning. Like why he wasn’t married. A woman would be lucky, extremely lucky, to have him as a husband, and a child wouldn’t know a better father. She’d never thought about a man in those terms before, or in the other terms she found herself thinking about. The kind of thoughts that made those butterflies take to dancing.

“Ma’am?”

Snapping her head up, she pinched her lips at the heat flowing into her cheeks. Praying he didn’t guess where her thoughts had been, she said, “Sorry, I was woolgathering.”

“What were you doing?” Billy asked.

“Thinking about how good that new porch roof will look,” Tom said, with a grin that made her heart skip a beat.

She nodded. “Indeed, it will look wonderful. I’m sure.”

“We’ll get started on it, if you don’t need us to do something first?” Tom asked.

“No, nothing I can think of.”

“Well, then, Billy,” Tom said while standing up. “Carry your plate to the counter and we’ll get started. Don’t forget your glass.”

Billy followed the instructions and headed out the door while Tom was still setting his things on the counter. He walked to the door and collected his hat, but then turned around. “What are you doing here? So far away from town? Far away from neighbors?”

Her throat clenched up and her cup rattled as she set it on the table. “It’s our home.”

He glanced out the door Billy had left open before saying, “There are lots of homes out there, ma’am. Lots of homes. Lots of places to live.”

She stood and started to clear the table. “I’m sure there are.”

“It’s an awful lot of work for you and Billy, out here all alone.”

Her hands started to tremble. “I don’t mind the work, and I prefer it that way. Just Billy and I alone.”

“Don’t you get lonely? Scared?”

Keeping the truth deeply hidden, she said, “Billy chatters too much for me to get lonely, and what good is being scared?”

His frown deepened, but then, as if not able to come up with another response, he nodded. “Thank you for breakfast. It was one of the best I’ve ever eaten.”

Clara bit her lip as she nodded. She’d wanted to tell him that she was lonely and scared all the time, and that all those other homes out there were for other people. Not her. She was where she belonged.

Very irrational thoughts started racing across her mind then, at the sound of Billy’s laughter and Tom’s low chuckle. He’d said he’d leave today, after the roof was repaired. She was trying to think of other repairs she could ask him to take care of. Something, anything, to keep him here just a bit longer.

Not for herself of course, but for Billy. Her son needed this. Needed a man to model, to learn from, to grow up to be like. One who was trustworthy and kind and would be there at all hours of the day and night. One a boy could be proud of.

A wife needed that, too. When her husband rode up the road, the wife should be happy to see him. Excited. Thankful he was home.

She’d thought about a man like that before, just hadn’t imagined she’d meet one.

Flustered by her own thoughts, Clara set into cleaning up the breakfast dishes. Then, with Tom and Billy busy on the roof, and needing to have her mind occupied, she set into washing clothes, including the sheets off the beds.

That was where she was, hanging clothes on the line behind the house, when she heard hoofbeats. Dropping the sheet she’d been clipping on the line, she ran around the house, fully expecting the worst.

What she saw made her heart drop out of her chest.

It wasn’t Hugh riding in, but Tom riding out.

She opened her mouth, but seeing the moisture on Billy’s cheeks, she closed her lips and her eyes, trying to ignore the pain in her chest.

Chapter Four (#u437de0cb-c7ec-5c07-a6bf-738c8b4ca527)

The porch roof had been done well before noon, as were all the chores and a few other tasks Tom had decided he needed to complete. When he couldn’t find anything else to justify staying longer, he’d saddled up his horse. Billy had wanted to ride with him, and had been upset when he’d said there wouldn’t be room.

There wouldn’t have been. The pig was a good-sized one. Quartered and wrapped in burlap, it hung off his saddle both in front and behind him.

Guilt at not telling Clara where he was going ate at him, but he hadn’t been completely sure where he was going. It was to the Ryans to see about a pig for her, and he’d told himself, depending upon what he’d learn, he might not be back. Just leaving wasn’t his way, but it might be easier in this instance.

Easier wasn’t his way, either.

How? Why had a woman and young boy gotten under his skin so thoroughly, so intensely that he wasn’t acting like himself? Thinking like himself.

He hadn’t even known them that long. But he did know them, and knew more about them after visiting with Donald and Karen Ryan.

The couple had been Clara’s closest neighbors for five years and had never met Hugh Wilson. Not once. But they’d heard plenty about him from her uncle. Walter hadn’t thought much about the man his niece had married. They didn’t believe that Walter had fallen in a ravine, and didn’t hold back in their opinion that he’d either been pushed, shoved, or shot and then thrown down the ravine. It just so happened that Hugh had been home during Walter’s fatal accident. Supposedly helping the old man round up cattle, which had been driven off the ranch and up to Montana, where they were sold within a week of the uncle’s death.