The Sheriff's Sweetheart

“Was that a yes, Miss Prissy?”

She nodded again, flushing pink. Her blush was so charming, Sam nearly leaned over and kissed her, but he knew better than to do such a thing. Even if she did not object to his boldness, her father might very well be watching through a window.

He allowed his grin to widen. “That’s settled, then. Give me a couple of days to get settled into this sheriffing job, and then it will be my great pleasure.”

“Sam, I hope you don’t think I’m being very forward. But it’ll be Sunday day after tomorrow…” Her voice trailed off, and she looked at him expectantly.

He went blank, wondering what she was hinting at. For years, Sunday mornings had been a time when he lay in some dingy hotel or boardinghouse room and groaned at the church bells that woke him up early to a headache.

“Would you—I mean, if you wouldn’t mind, and if there are no desperate criminals in the jail at the time for you to guard—will you sit with Papa and me when you come to church?” she asked him, glancing up at him from under those thick lashes.

His heart sank. She assumed he was a churchgoing man, that he’d attend Sunday services as a matter of course. And suddenly he realized that in this little town, almost everyone did attend church as a matter of course, and if they didn’t, it was noted. Mayor Gilmore probably wouldn’t allow a man around his daughter who wasn’t a churchgoing man, and he wouldn’t keep the goodwill of the town for very long if he didn’t go to church, either.

He’d just have to fake his way through it—for Prissy.

“Of course I will, Miss Prissy,” he said with great heartiness, as if he’d always intended to. “What time do services begin?” There were worse things, he was sure, than spending an hour or so in a pew beside a beautiful girl dressed in her Sunday best. Though it was hard to imagine her any prettier than she was right at this instant.

“Ten o’clock,” she said, looking very pleased.

“Until Sunday, then, Miss Prissy,” he said. Houston ran up to them, as if knowing Sam was departing, and yipped. Prissy picked him up, and Sam reached out a hand and ruffled the fur on the little dog’s head.

“You be good for Miss Prissy, boy,” he admonished the dog. “No more chasing the cat.”

“Sam,” she said, looking suddenly worried, “will you miss him very much? Perhaps I should give him back to you, for company.”

He was touched that she’d make such an unselfish offer, for he could tell she already loved the little beast. “No, I’ve got Delbert Perry to keep me company, at least tonight. I’m sure the dog’s better off with you. Besides, it gives me another excuse to come calling, doesn’t it?”

Prissy smiled at him. “It does, at that. Good night, Sam.”

As he left the grounds of Gilmore House, Sam could hardly believe how much he’d accomplished in a single day. New town, new job, new girl.

Yes, he could get used to Simpson Creek.

Chapter Four

“Thanks again,” Sam said as he walked Nick Brookfield to the door of the jail.

“You’re welcome. Flora’s quite a cook, isn’t she?” the Englishman said.

Sam grinned. “That she is.”

Nick started to go out the door, then turned. “If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask. Dr. Walker’s been a deputy—” he pointed at the doctor’s office and home across the street “—and I come into town frequently. And you’ll have to come out to the ranch for Sunday dinner after the baby comes.”

Sam saw a softening in Brookfield’s eyes as he spoke of his wife and coming child, and for a moment he envied the man his settled existence.

“—I know Milly’d love to have you,” Brookfield was saying. “Ordinarily, I’d say you’d meet her in church on Sunday, but she’s not finding that wagon ride into town very comfortable right now, so she’s sticking close to home.”

Again, that assumption that he’d be warming a pew in a couple of mornings. “I’d like to come out, when she feels up to company.”

The two men shook hands. Sam watched him stride out into the street, no doubt heading for the livery and his horse.

Brookfield had thawed quite a bit from his initial distrust, but there was still something in the cool blue eyes that warned Sam he’d be an implacable enemy if Sam played fast and loose with the mayor’s daughter.

Don’t worry, he thought as he rounded the corner and went down the side street that led to the livery. I’m going to treat Prissy like a queen. She was exactly what he’d hoped for—a beautiful girl who for some reason he could not fathom did not already have men from six counties lined up to court her. Were the men in this part of Texas blind? Once he convinced her to marry him, they could live happily ever after. He’d make sure she was never sorry he’d won her heart. It seemed he was not going to have to live a hardscrabble life as a dirt-poor farmer after all, and he couldn’t find it in himself to feel guilty—only grateful.

He went back inside and locked the door, though he didn’t think there was much chance of anyone trying to break Delbert Perry out during the night. The town drunk was now sleeping peacefully, the dishes and silverware from a supper brought from the hotel laid neatly on a tray on the floor. Brookfield had reported he was much closer to sober than he had been and would no doubt be fit to be set free in the morning, with an order to do some good deed like sweeping the saloon floors for a month in penance for his drunken spree.

Sam walked down the short hallway that led to his quarters and started putting away his things, stowing the clothes from his saddlebags in an old brassbound trunk that sat at the foot of his bed. It didn’t take long, because he’d always believed in traveling light. Then he eyed the small bed, with its bare mattress of blue ticking, and the pillow and neatly folded sheets and blanket atop it. He was tired and ready to sleep, but he’d have to make the bed first.

As he bent over the mattress, something shifted in his pocket—the heavy gold ruby ring he’d taken from Kendall Raney’s safe back in Houston. He couldn’t explain, even to himself, why he didn’t just put it at the bottom of the old trunk—no one was going to be searching through his possessions. Simpson Creek was the kind of small town where no one thought to lock their doors, and it wasn’t as if Kendall Raney would ever trace him to this place. Maybe, if things worked out with Prissy Gilmore, he could make up some fanciful story of a rich uncle back East or the like, and have the ruby reset into a pendant for her. But for now he was going to hide it away.

Taking his boot knife, he cut a small slit in the underside of the mattress, then pushed the ring into the cotton stuffing. It’d be safe enough there.

A slight twinge pricked his conscience as he realized he’d just been planning to lie to Prissy, a woman who’d just invited him to church.

Perhaps he wasn’t so guilt-free after all.

“You’re up and about early,” Sarah Walker commented as she opened the door for Prissy the next morning. “And who’s this?” she said, spotting the little dog attached to Prissy by a braided leather leash.

“This is Houston,” Prissy said, smiling as he yipped and wriggled on the Walkers’ porch, clearly thrilled by the opportunity to meet yet another human. “I got him yesterday, and look, Antonio’s already fashioned a collar and leash for him out of old bridle leather. Can he come in? I’ll keep him on the leash so he won’t get into anything he shouldn’t.”

“Of course. How are you, Houston?” Sarah said, laughing as the dog sat down and offered his paw. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Oh, Sarah, I have so much to tell you!” Prissy exclaimed. “If you’re not too busy baking, that is,” she added, seeing that her friend wore an apron and had a dot of flour on one cheek. Tendrils of golden hair had escaped from her braid to curl around her forehead. “Mmm, it smells wonderful in here,” she said, sniffing the air. “Molasses raisin cookies, unless I miss my guess?”

Sarah smiled back and gestured for Prissy to have a seat at her kitchen table. “Yes, and of course I’m not too busy to listen to your news. Might it have to do with the new sheriff of Simpson Creek?”

Prissy felt color flooding her cheeks. “Horsefeathers. I might have known I wouldn’t get to be the one to tell you about him.”

“George Detwiler told his mother about the incident in the saloon yesterday, and his mother told me when I went in the mercantile this morning. And Mr. Wallace was there, and he told me how he just happened to be peeking out of the post office window and saw y’all meet, and saw him give you the dog,” Sarah explained with a grin.

“That’s Simpson Creek for you,” Prissy muttered. “No secrets here.”

Sarah rolled her eyes in rueful agreement. “Why did he give you his dog?”

Prissy nodded. “Well, the dog apparently latched onto him in Houston—hence his name—and stayed with him all the way to Simpson Creek, but Sam says he was only keeping him till he could find him a good home, so when we met, he offered him to me.”

“Sam? You’re already on a first-name basis?” Sarah teased.

Prissy blushed again. “Well—only since I walked him to the gate last evening,” she confessed. “I’m sure in public and in front of my father it must be ‘Sheriff Bishop’ for a while…” Prissy felt a little proprietary thrill as she said his name. “Sarah, he came to dinner last night! I was so surprised when Papa agreed he could come! Papa said he wanted to look him over, and he tried to act all stern and gruff, but I think he found him as charming as I did.”

“Is that a fact?” Sarah said with a wry twist of her lips. Then she bent over and peered into the oven. “I think these are done,” she said, snatching a potholder and pulling out a sheet of perfectly browned cookies. The savory aroma filled the small kitchen, making Prissy’s mouth water. “Let’s eat a few while they’re still hot—that’s when they’re the best, don’t you think?” She scooped a half dozen of them onto a small plate and laid it on the table between them.

Prissy broke off a piece of cookie, popped it into her mouth, then fanned herself. “Too hot! That’s what I get for being impatient,” she muttered, as Sarah rose and poured her a glass of cold lemonade from the pitcher on the windowsill.

“You still haven’t told me what this paragon of charm looks like,” she prodded.

“Oh! Well, let me remedy that,” Prissy said. “We were just leaving the jail after paying Nick a visit, Papa and I, and he came riding up, and Papa figured out he was the man who’d come to apply for the sheriff’s job. Just wait till you see him—dark hair, and he has the most speaking brown eyes! And he’s tall, taller even than your Nolan—I should say six feet or so. And lean…”