The Redhead and the Preacher: A Loveswept Historical Romance (12 page)

The men grinned at each other and slapped him on the back. “We understand. We’ve all been through it a time or two ourselves.”

“About Mrs. Mainwearing,” Bran persisted, “is she a member of the congregation?”

“No,” said the round-faced man who had been identified as Mr. Gooden, the local general store owner. “But if she likes you, maybe she’ll contribute some of her gold to build a church. Then we wouldn’t have to hold services in the saloon and we’d be able to provide a better parsonage for you than Kelley’s shack.”

“Parsonage?” Bran hadn’t considered that far ahead.

“It’s too small and pretty rough for a young wife,” Mayor Cribbs explained, “but it’s the best we can do for now. I
hope that Mrs. Adams will be tolerant until we can do better.”

Bran’s opinion was that Mrs. Adams would do better in the wilderness than in any kind of cabin. He was beginning to wish he’d never gone along with her ready acceptance of the misunderstanding. No matter how he looked at it, her pretense made no sense. And now he’d committed himself to being responsible for her safety. The whole thing had gotten out of hand.

Not only that, but she was already beginning to interfere with his reason for being in Heaven. Even now he was torn between pursuing his investigation and checking on her sudden illness. When he realized that the men were waiting for some response from him he asked, “Who is Kelley?”

“Kelley was a prospector,” Mr. Gooden explained. “Never found any gold that we know of, but when his wife was killed, he signed over his claim to the church and moved on. And it was the best of the vacant houses around Heaven.”

“So,” Preston Cribbs went on, “we accepted his generous contribution and fixed it up for our parsonage. It’ll be ready in another two or three days, if the weather holds.”

“And where is this claim—shack?” Bran asked.

Lorraine stepped out onto the sidewalk. “Out by Pigeon Creek,” she answered. “I hope you have a horse or you’re going to have a hard time ministering to your flock from out there.”

“No, I don’t, not yet,” Bran admitted. “But I’ll look into that.”

“We’ll be leaving you then, Reverend,” Mr. Cribbs said. “If it suits you, we’ll take you out to the parsonage in the morning. Maybe you’d like to give us a hand.”

Bran grimaced. Doing repair work on a miner’s shack wasn’t his first choice of duties. In fact, what he’d planned to do was use the time in the saloon to do some quiet asking around.

“Are you sure we don’t know each other?” Marshal Larkin asked once more as they turned back into the saloon.

“Don’t think so,” Bran answered casually. “Where’d you come from originally?”

“The Carolinas. Been up north of here mostly, trying to settle the disturbance with the Mormons and trying to keep the Indians on the reservation.”

“I’m from the South myself,” Bran admitted. “Maybe we crossed paths somewhere along the line.”

“Maybe,” the marshal agreed, rubbing his chin in thought as they walked back inside the saloon.

Lorraine met them. “How about something stronger than punch, boys?”

“Sounds good to me,” the marshal said.

Bran would have accepted a whiskey if they’d been alone, but carrying out his charade made him refuse. “Thanks, ma’am, but I guess I’d better go check on—Kate. Was she all right when you left her?”

“Your wife seemed fine. She was worrying about her wardrobe. She asked me to help her shop for something a little more stylish tomorrow.”

Bran knew his face reflected his surprise.

“Don’t worry, Reverend, I promise to make sure your wife looks as dowdy as the rest of the pious women around here. Unless you think our association will damage your cause.”

“Of course not, Miss Lake. I’ll be most appreciative,” Bran responded warily. He wasn’t at all sure that his new wife’s reputation would survive the gossip. But knowing Trouble, he’d be willing to bet that she wouldn’t care.

“What about you, Marshal?” Lorraine said with a smile and a fluttering of her lashes. “Are you going to let your job interfere with sharing an evening with me?”

“Of course not. I’m not on duty all the time and my superior isn’t looking over my shoulder, like yours, Reverend Adams.”

“A man doesn’t always know who’s judging him,” Bran
said. It wasn’t his superior who was worrying him. The citizens of Heaven might be a trifle too judgmental and Bran had already learned that the woman upstairs waiting for him was no angel.

He just hoped that she wasn’t the devil in disguise.

M
acky slept soundly. When she finally opened her eyes purple shadows cloaked the room. Like a cat, she stretched and closed her eyes once more, breathing in the sweet-smelling bed, experiencing the feel of cotton sheets against her skin, the slinky satin of the spread caressing her cheek. She felt deliciously wanton.

Then she remembered where she was and the precariousness of her position. She should have remained on the stage and kept going to Denver. Now Bran was at risk. Bran! In alarm she raised up and peered at the empty space in the bed beside her. She was alone. She hadn’t known what to expect, but she was relieved.

Or was she? For three days they’d traveled together, spending one night in each other’s arms. Granted, it was for survival, but she couldn’t deny that he made her feel safe. Time and circumstance, she reasoned, forced men and women to do what they must.

Even if her stomach felt like a field of clover drawing clouds of dancing butterflies, she’d managed to conceal her reaction from her protector. And he’d kept her warm, no, warm was much too mild for what she’d felt. There was a roiling heat, a kind of yearning with the promise of more.

But that was then, she admitted with an unwelcome sense of loss, and this was now.

From below she heard the tinny sound of a piano and the low murmur of conversation. She wondered how people slept in a place like this, then mentally chided herself as she realized that probably wasn’t a concern.

She wondered where Bran was. She wondered what a preacher might do in a saloon and how he explained his absence from his wife’s side. Obviously he wasn’t holding a prayer meeting, and from the sound of the laughter downstairs, the customers were enjoying themselves.

It was ironic, even to her, that the last person she wondered about was Pratt. Was he still in town? Was he traveling alone?

Pratt and the marshal, not Bran, should be her chief concern. He held her immediate future in his grasp and the marshal would, sooner or later, begin searching for the bank robbers.

Macky slipped from the bed, walked to the window, and unfastened the shutters. The moon overhead was full and bright. It was still early, maybe not even midnight, and there were horses tied to the rail in front of Heaven’s Bell. One of them, a small black horse, looked familiar.

Too familiar.

A closer look was what she needed. If she could see the saddle, she’d know if it belonged to Pratt. There’d be no mistaking the silver trim on the horn.

But what if Bran came and she was gone?

So what if he did? He had no claim on her. She could do what she wanted. Besides, the hour was long past the time a preacher should be at home with his wife. If he really was a preacher.

A shiver ran up her backbone. She had no claim on him, either. She wasn’t really his wife.

The window opened out onto the roof that covered the wood-plank sidewalk. If she could climb out, she could find a way down without being seen. Her mind made up, she quickly changed into her brother’s trousers and shirt. She had lost Papa’s hat, but if she covered her hair with something, she could conceal its color and the fact that she was a woman.

A sock would make a fine cap.

“Phoo!” The sock was too light in color. It would stand out in the moonlight like a beacon. No man would wear a white stocking on his head. Desperately she glanced around.

The fireplace. Without a thought she ripped the sock from her head and put her hand inside. Then, avoiding the dying coals of the fire, she wiped the inside of the fireplace, turning the sock black with soot. Pulling it back over her head, she was satisfied that, in the darkness, nobody would see her.

The window opened easily and the roof seemed steady as she climbed out on it and made her way across the front of the saloon to the side. The streets appeared empty. Now all she had to do was find a way down.

Bran, leaning against the wall of the general store next door to the saloon, watched the street and considered his next move.

He was uncharacteristically restless and out of sorts. Not just because he couldn’t get a handle on the situation in Heaven, but because, for the first time, he wasn’t working alone. Any decisions he made involved another person.

If Trouble hadn’t stepped forward and allowed the welcoming committee to think she was the minister’s wife, he could have corrected their impression. But she had, and Lucifer’s horns if he hadn’t gone along with her.

An unmistakable tightening in his gut reminded him
that traveling under the guise of being a minister was one thing, but keeping up the charade was going to be something else. He wasn’t normally a man who worried much about hoodwinking people if he stood a chance of finding the man he was after, but being a preacher could be difficult.

Having a wife could be even more.

Normally, he’d go to Sylvia Mainwearing as a half-breed drifter, looking for a job. But as the minister, he could call on anybody he wanted to under the pretense of soliciting funds and saving souls. And if he collected any pledges it would be a fair exchange for anonymity.

Each time he started a new job he hoped the man he was after could lead him to the cutthroats who’d killed his family. During the last fifteen years he’d located many men who started as Mississippi River bandits, but the man with the disturbing laugh remained free. And Bran couldn’t give up. The search kept him going, gave his life purpose.

This time he had a feeling that he was on the right track. His Choctaw father would have said it was his second sight, the kind of unique instinct that had given him the name Eyes That See in Darkness.

The end justified the means, he told himself, and if Trouble was part of the charade, so be it. She’d made her own choices. Now she’d have to put up with him and whatever happened.

But hell, it was going to be hard. He let out a laugh. No, he was hard already and the night was still to come. Sooner or later he’d have to retire to the room the townsfolk had arranged for the new minister and his wife. He’d put off confronting that temptation as long as he could by taking a walk down one side of the street and back up the other. Now he delayed once again to have a last smoke.

He’d spent one night holding the girl in his arms to keep her warm and another night wishing he could. Until they were able to move into the cabin, he could see no way out of sharing the same bedroom. What had started out as a necessity was turning into a real problem.

As he’d watched her discomfort at the social earlier, he’d seen how uncertain she was under her show of bravado. Obviously, she was completely out of her element. But she’d forced herself to go through the motions, never once asking for help. He was more than a little curious about her past; it was imperative now that he know. Ignorance of his accomplice could be fatal.

Then, in a lull in the merriment filtering out of the saloon, came a voice. “Ding dong bells! No stairs.”

The voice was little more than a whisper, but he instantly recognized the swear words of the woman he’d spent the last hour fretting over.

What in hell was she up to?

The sound of scuffling answered his question as two trousered legs suddenly dangled from the roof.

Bran stepped into the shadowed doorway of the store and waited. Whatever she was doing, she didn’t want to come through the saloon to do it.

Suddenly she let go, landed on her feet, and fell forward to her knees. “Ouch!”

Bran almost reached out for her, then caught himself and waited. He’d been standing there long enough for his eyes to become adjusted to the darkness.

After a moment, she stood and scurried to the edge of the building and waited. Apparently she was satisfied that nobody had seen her for, hugging the shadows, she made her way into the street toward the horses tied at the rail.

Was she about to steal a horse? That activity seemed more natural for her than attending socials. But the marshal was already too interested in Bran. Having the preacher’s wife guilty of horse theft was certainly not the kind of attention he could afford.

He almost called out to her when she moved around to the other side of one of the horses, examining the saddle. The sudden droop of her shoulders was obvious. What had she seen that bothered her so much? And what was she going to do?

Macky was wondering that same thing. She’d confirmed her worst fears. The horse was the same one she’d ridden into Promise in the company of the Pratt gang. Pratt must have claimed it and was still in town, looking for McKenzie.

Why?

He couldn’t know that the preacher’s wife was the McKenzie he was searching for, could he? She opened the saddlebag, running her hand inside. She didn’t know what she expected to find, but when her fingers touched the velvet and she heard the sound of coins clinking together a knot formed in her stomach.

Pratt had found her purse along the trail, the purse containing some of the coins from the bank robbery. Surely that didn’t prove anything. Would Pratt connect that to the robbery, to Heaven?

Her heart sank. She was about to be discovered. She’d lose everything and now she didn’t even have the brooch to sell. Jail was a distinct possibility, or even worse.

The cameo. It had been in the purse. It was hers, the last thing she had that belonged to her mother. Digging deeper, she found it, closed her fingers around it and something else. She drew the objects out.

At that moment the doors of the saloon swung open, throwing light across the startled Macky, catching her in the act. Instinctively she ducked and started running around the corner of the building, tucking the cameo inside her pocket.