Her Runaway Heart's Safe Harbor, page 9
Miss Carter couldn’t be a spoiled little rich girl, he silently mused, as he returned to his bedroom for freshening and changing, or she wouldn’t have been seeking the position as mail order bride to a complete stranger.
But he had noticed the slight arch to her brow, as she surveyed the mess he had left behind him on the stove and the sink, and the slight curl to her upper lip. Sardonic, was it? Contemplating his sloppy bachelor habits with the mild disdain of a woman who held a passion for neatness?
Well, too bad.
He thrust one arm through a sleeve of his favorite, red-checked shirt, then the other. Then the vest, with its impressive badge, then both boots. Washed, perked up, brushed, and straightened within an inch of his life, Cooper pulled on his Stetson, buckled on his gun belt, and went out to join his house guest.
The sound of light, feminine voices, and a few girlish giggles, reached him before he even got to the front door.
Oh-oh. Trouble afoot.
With a sigh, and an air of girding his loins, he stepped outside.
“There he is! Sheriff, good mornin’ to you!”
That was Clytie, the woman he’d been on-again, off-again steppin’ out with. In deference to the warm weather, or more likely, to the chance of a lengthy visit with the man who had been squiring her about, she was wearing a soft yellow dress, flowing yet artfully arranged in such a way as to accentuate her ample charms.
Her partner in crime, vivacious brunette Rosamund Whorter, had already taken possession of the remaining chair near where Miss Carter was ensconced on the settee and was smiling up at him.
In Cooper’s opinion, both young ladies had too much free time, too much attention from doting parents, and too much money to spend on fripperies. Shallow and occasionally seeming scatter-brained, neither one appeared to have any purpose in life other than that of hooking up with some wealthy husband to enjoy an existence of ease.
“Well, ladies.” He was forced to greet them with patience and cheer, although he felt as if the hands of the clock were working against him as far as his duties for the day. “And what brings you out and about so early?”
Clytie skirted over to take his arm and press it tightly to her bosom in a display of possession. “Why, Coop, darlin’, we just come over to congratulate you.”
“Congratulate me? For what?”
“For your heroic deeds yesterday, of course. Gossip spread from stem to stern about how you spotted that fire at Lolly’s and kept the whole town from bein’ burnt to a crisp.” She beamed up at him as if they were already wedded and bedded and on their way to starting a family.
“It seems you’ve made quite an impression on the founding fathers,” Almyra put in at this point.
“According to your friends here, the mayor is considering some ceremony to award you a medal.”
Cooper sent her a sharp, discerning look. There was that expression on her lovely face again, not snooty or arrogant, but somehow conveying the sense that she understood his situation and was silently laughing about it. As if his relationship with Clytie was some sort of predicament!
Huh. Well, come to think of it, maybe it was. He didn’t appreciate such moony-eyed adoration of him, as if he were a national statue set up on a pedestal. Nor did he appreciate feeling already mud-wrestled and hog-tied into whatever plans Clytie was hatching up.
That was the surest way any gal had of guaranteeing he would bolt, which evidently, she hadn’t yet learned. Wrap him up in cotton wool and red silk garters like he was already hers, and it was goodbye and good luck to the hapless female.
Carefully he disengaged from Clytie’s firm grip and stepped away.
“Well, it’s all in a day’s work,” he shrugged off the praise. “You gals headin’ elsewhere from here, are you?”
Clytie inched closer. “Oh, Rosie wants to poke her nose into the bookstore downtown, and I said I’d go along. Unless, of course, you’d like me to spend time with you today?”
Her voice, her posture, her lighted-up blue eyes all implored. But Cooper, who hated like sin to hurt a lady’s feelings, especially one as cute and cuddly as Clytie, even if she was turning out to be more than he had bargained for, shook his head.
“Sorry, don’t really have time right now. But you two enjoy yourselves.”
“Oh, Coop. You never said a word about my new dress.” She pouted just a little. “How about a compliment, just to show your appreciation?”
While the purported lovebirds were jousting back and forth, Rosamund had been conversing with Miss Carter, who appeared amused, if nothing else, by her host’s entanglement.
“Have you recently arrived here in Jamboree?”
Almyra dragged her attention away from such mild entertainment. “Why, yes, I have. I haven’t seen much of the town yet, but—”
“Oh, I’ll be happy to take you on a tour, when you are free.” Rosamund’s dark eyes crinkled with good humor. “Since it seems that Clytie may have other things on her mind. How do you happen to be sittin’ on the sheriff’s veranda, at this hour of the mornin’?”
The question was asked so innocently, with no ill intent, that Almyra was taken aback. “Um. Just passing by. As you and your friend apparently were.”
“Oh, yes, Clytie likes to be seen in public early, y’ know, in case somethin’ is happenin’ that she wants to be part of. Where are you stayin’?”
Over and above Clytie’s meaningless chatter, the sheriff shot another look of warning at his inadvertent house guest. Of all times to stay silent and dumb, this was it!
“Well, I’m still considering that,” admitted Almyra, after a minute.
“You’re sure to find a place,” said Rosamund comfortably. “Mrs. Noonan runs a real nice boardin’ house, over on Sycamore Street. Last I heard, she had a couple rooms empty, dependin’ on how long you plan to stay. Where are you from, Almyra?”
Cooper was just about growing a set of rabbit ears, trying to listen to what was being said over Clytie’s single-minded prattle that hummed along like a bee’s buzz. He was far more interested in hearing the answer than anyone else in this little group.
“Oh, here and there. Life brings funny twists sometimes, doesn’t it?” Then, turning the tables, she refocused the exchange. “Have you always been residents of Jamboree, the two of you?”
The easy talk went on for a few more minutes, back and forth, but Cooper, attempting to unsnare himself from Clytie’s web, was able to catch nothing more of import.
Evidently true to her nature, the elusive Miss Carter was holding onto her secrets, suppressing any facts which might have led to an insight of her character and antecedents.
As the lone male trapped on his own front porch, he was being a bit engulfed by femininity.
“Well, ladies, I hate to break up this confab, but I got places to go, and I need to head back to the stable and hitch up Pepper. If you’ll excuse us…”
Feeling as if he were physically tearing himself free of a spider’s sticky filaments, he was finally able to gently shoo their visitors off the premises.
“Gosh dang it,” he muttered, striding off to fetch the piebald from his pasture. “Already eight o’clock, just lookit that. Dunno what’s goin’ on at the office. Well, maybe Doc Murray will have some good news, when we get to the Sisters of Mercy. C’mon, Pepper, time to vamoose.”
Besides, being pleasant to town residents, no matter how annoying on occasion, was all part of the job. He’d just paste a smile onto his face and good manners into his delivery, and deal with the public as best he could.
It was just that, for some reason, he was beginning to question his lack of judgment when it came to the round robin of dalliances he had been conducting with any likely female inside of a forty-mile radius. Maybe that wasn’t the wisest course of conduct.
Maybe he was getting to be a bit long in the tooth for such carryings-on. Maybe some male relative or spurned suitor of one of those he had loved and discarded was gunning for him on the side.
At that disturbing thought, ole “Cut to the Chase Casanova” shook his head once again, handed Miss Carter into the surrey, and climbed aboard.
“Do you often have members of your entourage stopping by at all hours?”
This morning’s encounter had apparently nudged his passenger from doldrums. He could swear there was a spark of something glinting in those perceptive dark green eyes when she glanced his way. He played dumb.
“Entourage?”
“I gather that these ladies are but two of your… admiring throng?”
Cooper couldn’t remember the last time a blush had washed up over his cheekbones.
“Dunno what you mean, ma’am,” he said stiffly. “It’s true I’ve stepped out with Clytie Freeman a few times. But that Rosamund well, I’ve never…”
“Of course not.” Her emerald gaze shifted frontward, to survey the landscape and the homes of the area through which they were traveling. “But, if a survey of all accessible Jamboree females were taken…?”
He snorted. “Huh. Well, folks are quick to gossip. And tell untruths. Anyway, who I see durin’ the few hours I have free ain’t none of your business, now, is it?”
“No, it certainly isn’t. Until their presence intrudes upon my own privacy. However.”
She made a sudden jerky movement that, in a less-composed woman, he would have considered a flounce, and raised her chin an inch or so higher above her lacy white collar. “It is your home, Sheriff Grayson, and your life. As a newcomer, dependent upon your charity, I have no right to criticize either.”
“Well, thanks for that much, at least,” he grumped.
She turned her head, with that wealth of rich, reddish-brown hair tidily tucked up under a small-brimmed hat, to study him once more. “It seems that being with me is forcing your normally pleasant façade to crumble. Is it reality, this face you present so cordially to town residents, or is it, in fact, a mere façade hiding your true emotion?”
By gum, if she hadn’t read him alright! Astonished he might be by her perception, but he wasn’t about to let her see it. He was as expert as she at erecting barriers between himself and the rest of the world. Much safer that way.
Didn’t that make them quite the pair?
“You figure to be snipin’ at me from here on?” he mildly inquired.
Silence filled the space for a few minutes, while Pepper, with a looser grip on his reins, cavorted a little as they approached the sanatorium.
Finally she said, in a small voice, “I apologize, Sheriff. I have no excuse for my discourtesy, other than being somewhat out of sorts. Pray, do forgive me, and I shall do my best to contain my shrewish mood.”
“Fair enough.” He changed the subject to admonish the piebald in his harness. “Too late to kick up your heels now, my friend. Move it along if you please.”
Diverted, Almyra shifted her glance toward the horse. “Is he hard to control?”
“Naw. He just don’t like bein’ hitched up to the rig—thinks it’s beneath him. Offends his dignity, or somethin’. So he’s quick enough to let me know that things had better change in a hurry. Well, Miss Carter, here we are. Gimme a minute, and I’ll help you down.”
Chapter 11
Miss Rozinski, the dragon attendant described by Sheriff Grayson, was nowhere in sight when he politely opened the door and then stood back so that Almyra could enter.
Nothing had changed in the hall’s appearance since yesterday’s visit, she noted.
The large desk, front and center, with several comfortable chairs scattered about; long low cupboards probably used to hold medical records and any other pertinent information; framed portraits on the paneled walls and a number of potted plants for ambiance—neat and orderly furnishings not usually found in charity sick wards, but put to good use in this private facility.
“Perhaps we’re too early for anybody to be on the premises,” she suggested, glancing uncertainly about an area empty of humans.
“Naw. Probably just off tendin’ to folks. Let’s go on to… what the blazes!”
Just down the hall, a door had slammed open, followed by the pound of running footsteps approaching in a flurry of activity. A heavy body seemed to be lurching toward them, banging into walls as it came; then a wild-eyed man burst forth to crash into Almyra before reeling away into the distance.
Almost immediately, another man, no doubt one of the caretakers here, sporting a bloody chin and a torn collar, as evidence of some sort of altercation, rumbled along in hot pursuit.
The collision had thrown Almyra straight into the astonished arms of Sheriff Grayson, who caught her before she could be slammed to the floor.
“Well. Long time no see,” he joked, pulling her closer into his embrace as if reluctant to release hold.
Blushing furiously, both in embarrassment and with temper, she scrambled to push against that bulwark of a hard chest and pull herself free. “Don’t be an idiot,” she snapped. “What on earth was that all about?”
Unfazed, he reached out to straighten her off-kilter hat and brush lightly at the shoulder seams of her striped gown. “It’s common knowledge that there’s a couple of folks, kinda off their heads, kept here by their families. Looks to me like one of ’em got loose.”
“Running amok, you mean?” She was horrified. “They’re confined, and one escaped…? But that’s, well, barbaric; it’s—”
“Not as bad as you think. Doc Murray and his staff provide good care at the Sisters. Would these poor souls be better off stuck in one of them asylums somewhere, without proper lookin’ after? You okay, Miss Carter? Didn’t get hurt in that fracas, did you?”
Blinking at the abrupt change of topic, Almyra decided it was time to move from the realm of his spell to a safer location some little distance away. Her heartbeat was still racing and her breath coming fast, and not all due to a near collision that might have caused serious injury.
What was wrong with her? The man she had promised to marry was still lying on his sickbed, probably not yet returned to the real world; and here she was, playing along, of all things, with the wiles of this flirtatious man about town. She was disgusted with her own behavior. Could she be any shallower?
After all, she owed Thomas Buchanan, as her affianced, every drop of fidelity in her veins. It was true that, other than rather trivial information contained in the letters to her father, which she had read and re-read several times, she knew nothing intimate about Mr. Buchanan’s character and personality.
It was nearly impossible to consider attempting closeness with anyone reposed as still as stone and completely oblivious to everything around him.
Why, she knew more about, and had felt infinitely comfortable with Porter Brown, for heaven’s sake! And truth to tell, had she not been already promised to another, she might have returned her rescuer’s intense interest.
“I’m quite fine,” she asserted shortly, shaking out her skirts as if for proof. “Just a bit shaken, that’s all.”
“Huh. I ain’t surprised. Fallin’ against me like that saved you from harm. Reckon I’m good for somethin’, after all.”
“Most assuredly.” Her voice was tart, her green eyes snapping. “As a brick wall.”
Before he could respond in kind, a ruckus at the other end of the hall announced success in the retrieval of an inmate. Not exactly a prisoner, in these surrounds, but not at liberty, either. At least, Almyra was relieved to see, the man being returned to his quarters was not shackled, nor did he seem to be hurt. He even smiled and winked at her as two husky retainers walked him past.
