Besides, Amos couldn’t compete with Dunbar’s packaging. He had accepted that truth about himself long ago. Squaring off with such a physical specimen would only play to his weaknesses. No, if he was to win the war, he had to alter the playing field, set aside the primitive and focus on the sensitive. Instead of pitting himself against his rival, he would discount the man entirely and focus on the person who truly mattered—Grace.
Amos planted himself by Grace’s side and offered silent support as she read through the papers. He’d seen the letter of introduction Detective Whitmore had written for Dunbar, addressed to a Mr. Herschel Mallory. It couldn’t be easy for her to see her father’s name like that, as if he were still alive.
Her hands trembled slightly as she scanned the letter. “Were you there?” She didn’t look up from the letter, but Amos knew who she addressed. “At the café?”
Dunbar dragged his hat off his head and dipped his chin. “Yes’m, I was there. Sittin’ in the café, waitin’ on yer pa. We never suspected . . . The street was crowded with people. It should have been safe. I . . .”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Grace said, still not looking up as she folded the papers back into their creased rectangles.
Amos held out his hand to take them from her, wanting to ease her burden in some way. And to keep as much distance between her and Dunbar as possible.
She handed him the papers, and her gaze finally touched his for the first time since the Pinkerton waltzed into the office. The mix of emotions swirling in the brown depths of her eyes caught Amos off guard. Grief for her father, hope that her troubles might be at an end, and confusion—over the Pinkerton’s sudden appearance, perhaps? Amos had questions about that, too.
Amos’s fingers stroked hers as he took the documents from her hand. Her chin lifted slightly, as if his touch had bolstered her, and her eyes sharpened into the determined focus he was accustomed to seeing.
Good.
Feeling stronger himself, he slid the papers across the counter toward the Pinkerton. Dunbar nodded his thanks and tucked them into his coat pocket, his manner polite. Except for the amusement in his gaze when Amos finally made eye contact with him.
Amos recognized that look. It wasn’t one of good humor or a sunny disposition. It was the look of someone who found it funny that a man like Amos thought he had a chance with a woman like Grace. A look that said Amos was so far beneath him in masculine appeal, it was laughable.
Well, Amos knew how to deal with such looks. He ignored the offended jab in his gut and met Dunbar’s amused gaze straight on. He lifted his left eyebrow just a hair and stared. Not enough to project defiance. That would only deepen the amusement. Amos had come up with a look that incorporated just enough self-assurance to cast doubt into the egotist’s brain.
I’m a man of depth and integrity. Are you?
Dunbar blinked, and some of the amusement faded from his gaze. It was enough. Amos turned back to Grace.
As did Dunbar, apparently. “I understand your father had some documents to turn over to us,” the Pinkerton said, striding down the length of the counter until he stood directly in front of Grace. There’d be no subtly blocking his view now. “Do you have those, miss?”
“I’m afraid they aren’t . . . readily available.”
Interesting. She didn’t mention the books, a fact Amos found immensely encouraging. Dunbar might have stellar good looks and authentic credentials, but he didn’t have Grace’s trust. Not yet.
The Pinkerton frowned. “Well, I, ah . . . don’t aim to frighten you, miss, but there’s reason to believe your possession of those documents has placed you in danger. I’m under strict orders to collect any evidence you have and get it to Whitmore before Chaucer Haversham learns of your location.”
“He already has.” That grim pronouncement came from the marshal.
Dunbar glanced at the lawman beside him then aimed an unrelenting stare at Grace. “If that’s the case, we ain’t got time to spare. Why don’t you and I step over to the café, get some coffee, and discuss how best to get those documents?”
Grace’s gaze flew to Amos, then to the marshal before finally resting on Dunbar. “All . . . right. If Mr. Bledsoe doesn’t mind tending the office while I’m away.”
Of course I mind! Amos wanted to refuse, but he held his tongue and gave a tight nod of assent instead.
The café was a public establishment. She wouldn’t be alone with the Pinkerton. But for all intents and purposes, she’d be alone with him. Private conversation. Cozied up at a corner table. Dunbar’s long limbs crowding her space, giving him an excuse to accidentally bump her thigh with his knee or brush his hand along her arm. He’d no doubt fire a barrage of masculine machinations at her to find out what she knew. And as much as Amos would like to believe that Grace was too clever to fall for the detective’s ploys, she’d already shown a wooly-eyed susceptibility.
She stepped over to the hook on the wall and collected her shawl. “I just need to send one quick telegram before I leave. It will only take a minute.”
Dunbar nodded.
Amos frowned. What telegram? Nothing had come in except that note from the Alamo Wheelmen. He hadn’t seen any completed telegram blanks lying around.
Nevertheless, she walked straight to the office table and delicately perched on the edge of the seat he had vacated when their guests arrived.
She reached for the key, but she didn’t open the circuit. Did Dunbar have her so rattled that she’d forgotten the basic operations of the telegraph? Amos was about to step close and whisper the oversight into her ear when he recognized his call sign at the beginning of her message.
It took a great deal of control not to let his surprise or growing delight show. He busied himself with straightening the stack of extra telegraph blanks in the box on the near side of the table so it would appear as if he was paying Grace no particular mind.
A—When D and I are at café, take items back to E. Lock in vault. Let no one see. Will follow my father’s example.
Amos instantly recalled the story she’d told about the hatbox and her father’s insistence on hiding the documents until meeting with the Pinkerton to ascertain his motives.
Grace pushed back from her chair and stood. “I won’t be long,” she said, her eyes meeting Amos’s for no more than a heartbeat, but he understood the message. He wasn’t to dawdle.
“I’ll take care of things, Miss Mallory.”
She nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Bledsoe.”
Then she left. On the arm of a man who threatened everything Amos hoped to gain. Yet it wasn’t Dunbar who Grace trusted with her father’s books. It was Amos. The spectacle-wearing, bicycle-riding telegraph operator who listened to her secret messages and took them to heart.
He just prayed Dunbar didn’t switch her loyalties.
14
Helen scowled at the stranger bleeding all over the path to her cabin. “You got no business bein’ here,” she groused, not that he cared anything for her opinion. He was too busy dying.
Without his boots on.
Helen frowned. Gray wool stockings were the only things covering his feet. Odd. No horse, no boots. The horse could have been spooked, but the boots? Unoccupied footwear rarely bolted on its own.
Adjusting her grip on the branch she carried in case he proved dangerous when roused, Helen prodded the sole of his right foot with the toe of her shoe. His mouth tightened and he groaned, but he didn’t lurch to his feet or attack her.
He posed no threat. That was good. But he wouldn’t be getting up and walking out of her life any time soon, either. That was bad. Or, at the very least, inconvenient.
Blowing out a breath, Helen dropped the branch and lowered to her knees beside the fallen man. She cast one more cautionary glance at his face before turning her attention to his leg. He’d managed to tie a bandana around the wound, which had probably slowed the bleeding enough to keep him alive. But judging by his pallor and lack of awareness, he wouldn’t be alive mu
ch longer without help. And thanks to an ill-timed prayer on her part, the Almighty had just volunteered her for the duty.
“What were you doing skulking around out here, anyway?” Helen muttered as she stripped off her pecan-stained gloves and pried the bandana back to examine the wound. A dark hole in his trousers that continued into the flesh below confirmed her earlier suspicion.
Gunshot.
Which begged another, more bothersome question. Who shot him? And where was that person now?
None of the ladies came out this far. Most of them rarely left town, and the ones at the farm would have said something about shooting a man. As much as that gaggle loved to gossip, they’d probably not be able to stop talking about it.
“So are you the good guy or the bad guy?” Helen arranged the bloody bandage back over the wound, then studied the man’s face as if that would give her some insight.
She knew better than most that a man’s character had no correlation with his appearance. Her father had been handsome enough to fool an entire town into believing him a saint. Ladies thought she and her mother were the luckiest females alive. And when her ma’s battered body finally gave out, womenfolk lined up with food and sympathy for the widower left behind. Helen had done all she could to scare the fools away. The women might be stupid, but they didn’t deserve the nightmare of living with Judson Potter behind closed doors. No female did.
Thankfully, her father enjoyed the attention from his admirers too much to settle on just one lady. And since he had Helen to work his frustrations out on at home, he kept the ruse up for nearly two years before he had the decency to drink himself blind, tumble headfirst off his horse, and break his neck.
This fella didn’t have the look of a charmer, at least not from what she could tell by the side of his face not planted in the dirt. A day’s growth of whiskers darkened his jaw, his clothes were practical rather than fancy, and his left stocking had a hole on the side of the heel. Helen’s gaze traveled back up to his head. His hair was longish, overlapping his collar, as if he couldn’t spare the time for a trim, but his mustache was impeccable. Thick, brown, and long enough to hide the top line of his upper lip, yet well-groomed and tidy.
Helen smirked. “Found yer vanity, didn’t I?” Somehow that made him less formidable, knowing he had a weakness. Besides the hole in his leg, of course.
Which she really needed to do something about.
Unfortunately, grabbing his feet and dragging his carcass the last ten feet to her cabin door was probably not the best option. He looked far too heavy, and yanking on that bad leg would do him no favors. She might not want to help him, but now that she’d been assigned the task, she wasn’t about to sabotage her results.
Helen glanced up the path to the line cabin and frowned at the closed door. Transporting an unconscious stranger was going to be hard enough without having to deal with a latched door. She pushed to her feet, jogged over to the cabin, and opened the door. Worried the wind would blow it closed before she returned, she grabbed the one chair the small room boasted and propped the door open.
She hurried back to the fallen man and hunkered down by his head. “All right, Mr. Mustache, you have to wake up enough to help me move you.” She squeezed her arms beneath his right shoulder and lifted. “It ain’t far,” she grunted, barely managing to roll his torso a few inches off the ground. Heavens, he was heavy. “Just a few steps. Then you can pass out again. I promise.”
His head jostled as she struggled to roll him. Another groan, louder this time, rumbled from beneath that bushy brown caterpillar on his lip, and his eyes cracked open.
Helen nearly dropped him, not expecting such vivid green eyes on a man with dark coloring. His gaze was glassy and unfocused, but any consciousness was better than no consciousness, so Helen doubled her efforts, determined to take advantage of whatever awareness she could wrest from him.
“Wake up, mister. I can’t get you to the cabin on my own. I need your help.” She spoke right next to his ear, her head bent close to his as she searched for the right leverage. “Come on. Help me!”
“Rachel?” he croaked. His body stiffened as he raised his head to look at her. His cloudy gaze meshed with hers for a breath-stealing instant, then something snapped inside him. He started thrashing, desperate to get up.
“Easy, now,” Helen warned. “You’re hurt.” She wanted him to get up, but she didn’t want him to kill himself in the process.
The stranger only clenched his jaw and continued his ungainly rise. He was half dead, yet somehow, by sheer force of will, he crawled to his feet. He could bear no weight on his left leg. Helen tried to wrap an arm around his waist and duck under his left arm as a human crutch, but he pushed her away.
No, not away. He pushed her behind him. Planted himself in front of her like some kind of crazed guardian.
“Don’t worry, sis. I won’t let Pa hurt you. Go hide where I showed you. Everything will be all right.”
Helen froze, her heart pumping a frantic rhythm. He thought she was his sister, and he was protecting her. Despite what must be excruciating pain, he stood in her defense.
How many times had she dreamed of a strong older brother to stand between her and her father?
But he wasn’t her brother. He was a stranger, out of his head from fever and loss of blood. He wouldn’t be able to stay on his feet long. She had to get him to the cabin.
“I’m safe,” she murmured in an attempt to calm him. “You’re the one hurt. Let me help you.”
He shooed away her hands. “He might come back. You need to hide where I showed you. Pa won’t find you there. I’ll make sure of it.”
By putting himself in harm’s way and taking the beating himself. She knew. Hadn’t she done that herself when her mother had grown too weak to withstand her father’s “discipline”?
Ma had done her best to shield Helen when she’d been a child, but over time, she grew too tired and worn out to divert her husband. Helen had been twelve when she took over the role of protector, trying to spare her mother the brunt of her father’s wrath. In the end, he’d still killed her. A person could only be broken so many times before they lost the ability to mend.
“Pa’s gone,” she said, playing along with the man’s delusion. She locked her arm around his waist and wedged herself beneath his left shoulder. “You can protect me when he gets back. If you can stand, which you won’t be able to do unless we get to the house and tend that leg.”
His brows peaked in confusion. “You’re sure he’s gone?”
Helen nodded. “I’m sure. Now let’s get you to the house.” She took a step toward the line shack. Then another. He hissed in pain, but limped along beside her.
“One more year, Rach,” he said, his words slurring slightly and his weight growing heavier as they reached the door she’d propped open.
Helen trudged forward, afraid they wouldn’t make it to the narrow bed inside if they slowed.
“Grayson said he’d hire me as soon as I turn sixteen. We’ll leave that very day and never come back here again. I swear it.”
Thank heavens the room was small and sparse. Just a chair, the bed, and a rickety table by the stove in the far corner. Nothing to trip over or climb around. Three strides, and she’d have him to the bed.
After one stride, his leg gave out.
He groaned and collapsed against her. Helen nearly crumpled beneath the weight. A cry tore from her lips as she staggered.
Her cry must have galvanized him, for he strained to regain his footing, releasing a primal growl that sent chills over her as he forced himself upward. Tears came to her eyes that had nothing to do with the throbbing in her shoulders as he used her body as a crutch. Her eyes misted for the man who gave everything he had to protect her. He protected her from an enemy of the past and from the burden of his weight in the present, and whispered promises of a future where they would be free.
She had no doubt this man would kill himself trying to spare her, and the certaint
y of it split her heart wide open. All the hatred, fear, and distrust she’d harbored for so long leaked out, leaving her raw and aching. Yet strength rushed in to fill the emptiness, like nothing she’d ever felt before.
She no longer cared who the stranger was or what he’d been doing out here. She didn’t even care if he was the Haversham fellow Grace had warned them about. He was Rachel’s brother. A protective, selfless man who didn’t deserve to die. And Helen aimed to do some protecting of her own.
“Hold on, mister,” she ground out between clenched teeth. “This ain’t gonna be pretty.”
Helen tightened her grip on the man’s waist and lurched forward. His leg couldn’t take the jostling, but she’d anticipated that. She bent over, taking his weight onto her back as much as possible as she dragged him one step closer to the bed.
Her vision tunneled until all she saw was the narrow wood bedframe and the patchwork quilt she’d made from flour sacks last winter.
One.
She gritted her teeth and scraped her right foot along the floorboards.
More.
The man went lax, his full weight coming down on her. Helen’s knees threatened to buckle, but she refused to give in. She leaned forward, her focus zeroed in on the bed.
Step.
Feeling the stranger toppling and knowing she could do nothing to stop it, Helen tumbled with him, her only goal to control the location of his landing.
They fell awkwardly atop the bed, his head knocking slightly against the wall and her chin digging into his sternum. Their legs were a tangled mess, and her right arm was pinned beneath his back, but they’d made it.
Elation gushed upward through Helen’s chest and erupted in quiet laughter. Praise God! They’d made it.
As she caught her breath, it occurred to her what she must look like, and a second burst of laughter bubbled out of her.
If Katie could see her now, her friend would faint dead away. Helen Potter in bed with a man. And smiling.
The world must surely be coming to an end.