* * *
The back room was a mess. Spilled grain and flour decorated the floor where bags had torn. He had never gotten around to putting away three crates of coffee and one of tea. Hiring Cathy full time had probably been a good idea. He was too busy to properly care for everything himself.
It took him two hours to clean the back room, longer than it should have taken, but his bruises ached, and his arms still protested the abuse he had put them through. Moving two flour sacks revealed the trapdoor leading down to the cellar, but he had no need to go down there today because the cellar was always kept perfectly neat. The potatoes and onions he kept down there were too new to need checking for rot or mold. In a separate room, ice cut from nearby lakes last winter, was packed in thick layers of sawdust. He looked at the now neat room, cast a small curse at the flour sacks and swore he would never again be so stupid as to cover the trap door.
"I won't!" Cathy's voice rose high from inside the main store.
Quickly turning, Aaron lifted his head, suddenly alert to trouble. Cathy knew better than to argue with customers.
"No!"
Something crashed. Cathy screamed, and Aaron ran into the store.
Crazed eyes set in a thin whiskered face surrounded by wild uncut black hair jerked toward him. One hand held Cathy pressed against the counter. The other hand groped under it.
"Prong it," the man cursed when he saw Aaron. Releasing Cathy, he raced around the counter and out the door. Voices shouted outside. Cathy slid slowly to the floor.
Glancing at the open door, Aaron ignored the thief and ran to the girl. Her shoulders shook with noiseless sobs.
"How badly are you hurt, Miss Bayne?" He reached out to touch her hair, thought better of it because she was a young girl, and drew his hand back. The spilled money box lay beside her; coins scattered across the floor.
`"Mister Turner--I'm so sorry. I tried to--to stop h--him." With a rough swipe, Cathy rubbed angrily at her damp eyes. "I'll pay back what is missing. I--I swear it, sir." Her voice dropped to a whisper.
Pity and grim anger welled up inside Aaron. He rubbed his own eyes with a quick flick of his wrist. "There will be none of that, Miss. There's nothing for you to pay back. Being robbed is one of the chances a person takes when they open a business. However, in the future, Miss Bayne, don't resist. Let them have what they want. Your well-being is worth far more than the money from a single day's sales."
Her silent sobbing slowed and then stopped. "In the future?"
"Good gods, I'm not going to fire you because you were robbed."
"I can--?"
"Mister Turner, are things well in here?" Wearing a worried frown, the bow-legged miller peered through the doorway.
"Miss Bayne has been struck, Mister Townsend, and some money is missing. The money is of no account, but I am extremely angry over the treatment Miss Bayne received."
"I tried to stop the thief," Townsend said, "but I'm afraid he is much quicker than I."
"Is he a known person?"
"Not to me." The miller shuffled his feet uncomfortably. "This is a bad time for you, but I have an order out here on the wagon. I've a need to get back to the mill. My boys will lax off if I don't hurry."
Aaron sighed. "Just set the order outside the door. How much do I owe you?"
"Pay me later. I've no fear of your account, Mister Turner. Your word is always good. Besides, if it wasn't I'd just tell my Sarah to whack you harder during your next lesson."
"There are advantages to having the Town Marshal as your daughter," Aaron observed.
"That there are, and one of them is that I usually know where she is. Mister Turner, don't you worry about a thing, I'll tell my Sarah about what happened here. Cathy. Miss Bayne, I wish you well." With a half wave, the miller turned away from the door, closing it behind him. Moments later a thump sounded as the first hundred pound sack hit the boardwalk.
Cathy pulled herself upright. "Did you really mean it? I'm not fired?"
"I mean it."
"Oh--thank you." Even with the darkening bruises on her left cheek, her thin face turned almost beautiful. Leaning forward, she suddenly hugged him. "Thank you, sir."
Aaron shifted uncomfortably, far too aware of her breasts against him. The sensation of her soft roundness pressing into his body was…was--unsettling: new. Due to the crippling effects of his childhood injuries, physical contact with any female except impersonal nurses was something he had not experienced since he was a child. In fact, intimacy of this type was not something he had ever dared dream of before coming to Last Chance and discovering that his body somehow miraculously healed itself when it entered this world.
Fingers trembling, Aaron tried to draw slightly away to lessen the feel of Cathy's body pressed against his.
Sensing his discomfort, she released him and pulled back. "Forgive me, Mister Turner. I'm just so relieved. I'll continue the inventory after I clean this mess up--that is, if you have no objection?"
With a supreme act of will, Aaron kept his eyes from straying down to the faint hint of her cleavage. Damn-it, Cathy was a child--but the hug had felt good. "Um, I'll clean up here, Miss Bayne. You go ahead and finish the inventory."
Apparently oblivious to the direction of his thoughts, Cathy nodded. "Yes sir."
Once Aaron gathered himself back together, he took stock of the damage done. The thief had only stolen one gold and a dozen coppers. The two quarter silvers, each one worth twenty-five gold, had been missed by the thief's hurried grab; however, the cabinet containing the knives had taken some small damage. Aaron made a mental note to have the damage repaired.
Cathy finished inventory at five, and he paid her, telling her to call it a day. She tried to buy some food, but he forced her to take it for free since she had worked through her lunch, and then he chased her out of the store, telling her she was not to return until noon the next day. After all, she deserved something for her bruises.
It was only when he went to close up that he saw the flour and meal sitting outside his door. He had forgotten all about the order Townsend had left. More than a half-hour passed before he finished hauling and stacking it all into the back room. By the time he finished, his bruises ached even more, and his arms trembled. Looking at the quivering limbs, Aaron felt a small sense of pride. One year ago he could not have managed one tenth of the effort he had expended this day.
Just as he finished his moment of self admiration, Sarah Townsend entered the store, wearing worried eyes and a slight sheen of sweat.
"Did you catch him?" Aaron asked.
She shook her head no. "I don't know who he is or how he escaped. Mistress Gunther saw him hanging around with three or four other men when she went to the bank earlier in the day, but they aren't to be found either."
Momentarily frowning, Aaron looked down Last Chance's dusty street. "I suppose he's gone for good. Thank you for your efforts, Marshal Townsend."
"If he's not gone for good, he's going to regret it."
Aaron took care to close his door tightly when she left. After a few quiet moments passed, he went into the back room, lifted the trapdoor, and entered the cellar. Bags of onions, potatoes, and carrots were stacked neatly against three of the walls. The fourth wall was bare except for two large doors which closed off a single six foot opening. He pulled one door open and was enveloped by the cold air of the ice room. Walking inside, he closed the door and then lifted another trap door set in the corner of the room. At the bottom of the ten foot ladder was a thirty foot by thirty foot room. Two of its walls were rough hewn rock showing jagged crevasse where miners' tools had marred its surface. The other walls were wooden structures that sealed his secret room off from the rest of the abandoned salt mine beneath Last Chance. Crates filled just under a quarter of this room from floor to ceiling. The rest of the space was empty. A hoist hung from a beam over his head, its hook shiny from recent use.
Aaron reluctantly climbed down the ladder. Standing at the bottom of the rungs, he
worked to build up the want, the need. Longing rose, more reluctant than ever before. It rose from deep inside his being, pulled at that part of him that was his soul. His breathing grew shallow and slow. Like a slow rising pool of reluctant magma, his ability rose, filling him, strong, more consuming than when he used it for his smaller needs.
Heart stopping, his mind grasped unto something that was not there.
Flicker
Aaron looked at his new location and frowned.
"Damn."
He was home.