The Cowboy Encounter Read online

  But, she realized with a sad twang in her heart, if this 1870 Joel wasn’t real, then that meant that this 1870 Warwick also wasn’t real. But as he slipped off his jeans and unbuttoned his shirt, she decided she didn’t care. And when he slid between the sheets and pressed against her, she knew that he was the most real thing she could ever imagine.

  #

  As they rode into town, Becca couldn’t help but wonder how the Denver of 1870 compared to the twenty-first century Denver. The shops and businesses mostly, if not all, were wooden structures rising from the muddy streets. Some had as many as three stories.

  Warwick drew the horse up to the Dove’s Inn, and held up his hand to help Becca down. “You going to be okay here on your own?” he asked.

  “Of course,” she said brightly.

  The clock in the bell tower struck six. The businesses lining the streets had already drawn their shutters. Denver was larger than she’d imagined. From the boardwalk, she could see a YMCA, a building named The Ladies Relief Society, blacksmith’s shops, a Methodist Church, and a street car.

  “I just have to talk with the banker. It shouldn’t take too long. I’ll meet you for dinner.” He nodded at the Dove’s Inn double door.

  “Mrs. Henderson generally serves dinner around five,” he told her, letting her know that he had been here before.

  Her gaze wandered down the street, taking note of the many busy taverns and saloons. She didn’t know why, but she was glad that when he had traveled to Denver before, he had chosen to stay with the quiet, and probably much more boring, Mrs. Henderson than at the taverns. She smiled at him.

  “I have some things I want to do, too.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Like what?”

  “Joel…I want to say goodbye.” She took note of the flush rising beneath Warwick’s collar. “I owe him that much.”

  “Why is that?”

  She placed her hand on his chest. “I want to tell him I’m married—that whatever we had is over.”

  She smiled, watching the red flush on Warwick’s neck subside.

  “Then let me come with you. We’ll go together as soon as I get back from the bank.”

  “No. This is something I need to do on my own.”

  The flush returned.

  Becca grabbed Warwick’s belt and pulled him to her. “Go do what you need to do, and don’t think about me. I’ll be here waiting when you get back.”

  The flush didn’t back down, but he did relax against her. “He’s a dangerous man, Mrs. Warwick.”

  “Not as dangerous as you, Mr. Warwick.” She tapped his nose. “Besides, he’s behind bars. How dangerous can he be?”

  CHAPTER 9

  1870 Joel—or Joseph Connelly—looked thinner and scruffier than Becca ever remembered seeing the twenty-first century Joel. They are not the same person, Becca reminded herself. But she was glad that her subconscious mind had turned Joel into this grubby and seedy man. It made what she needed to do easier.

  The Denver jailhouse was considerably larger than the one in Everwood. Where Everwood had only one cell, Denver had many, although only one was occupied.

  Joseph gripped the bars of his cell with white-knuckled hands, and his eyes shone with a look she’d seen a million times in the mental institution. She waited for the rush of giddy breathlessness she always felt around Joel, and inwardly smiled when she realized that the giddiness had finally ended. She’d truly put her crush behind her. She needed to tell him so, and then she could get on with her real life. Wherever that real life might be.

  “I want you to know that I no longer love you,” she blurted out.

  “I beg your pardon.” 1870 Joel had a drawl, and she found it disconcerting that someone who looked so much like Joel would sound so little like him.

  She gave a small shake, reminding herself that what she needed to say was for her own benefit and not for Joel’s. She needed to vocalize her feelings…if she could…to emotionally move on. “For years, I imagined myself in love with you. I know you knew my feelings. I was just a girl when we first met, when I first…” She gave a small self-depreciating laugh. “Remember how I used to go to your soccer games—even your practices. I would sit in the bleachers next to Mia and your mom, just worshipping you.”

  He stared at her with a blank look, his mouth slightly ajar.

  “I know this can’t surprise you.” She took a deep breath, feeling strong, and oddly free—as if liberated from a crippling emotional tie. Boldness welled within her, straightening her shoulders and stiffening her spine. Reaching out, she touched his hand. “You and I—we were never—”

  In surprise, she swallowed the rest of her speech when he took hold of her and yanked her to him. Before she could cry or call out, he crushed his lips against hers. His tongue invaded her mouth, and revulsion swept through her.

  Laying both hands on his chest, she pushed him away. He stumbled, grinned, and wrenched her bag from her hand.

  “Give that back,” she demanded, lunging for it.

  With a tug and a grin, he pulled the bag into the cell. “You want this, you gotta come and get it.”

  Becca thought of the gun and tried to set her features into nonchalance. “Deputy!” she called out with a quivering voice.

  “Just keep your pants on,” the deputy called out from the other room. Keys jingled as he approached.

  “Bring your gun,” Becca yelled, but the sound of a single gunshot drowned out her words.

  The deputy clutched his chest, and blood spurted around his splayed fingers. His knees buckled, and he braced himself against the wall as the color drained from his face.

  “I’m a doctor,” Becca said, rushing to him. “I can help you.” But seeing the location of the wound, she wondered if that was true.

  “Give me the keys,” Joel demanded, and aimed the gun at Becca’s head.

  The deputy fumbled for the key chain.

  “No, don’t!” Becca cried. “Don’t trust him—” Her voice trailed away as the deputy tossed the keys into the cell. They skittered across the floor and landed near Joel’s boots.

  The moment Joel had the cell open, he grabbed hold of Becca and tossed her inside with so much force her head banged against the wall and her knees gave way. From the cell’s floor, she watched him drag the deputy inside and prop him up against the wall.

  “You’re lucky I let you live,” he growled, reminding Becca of a frothing dog. After a quick twist of the key in the lock, he ambled out the door, checking the gun’s cylinder.

  Beside her, the deputy gasped for breath, clutching his chest. She gathered him into her arms and led him to the cot. Kneeling beside him, she tried to inspect his wound. He kept his hands over his heart in a feeble attempt to slow the blood flow. Becca wondered if all his attempts would be useless. Could she help him? She realized that she couldn’t even help herself.

  “Help!” she called. “Sheriff?”

  No one responded.

  This, she decided, would be a good time to wake up. That’s the way nightmares worked, right? You always wake up before the unthinkable happens. But as the deputy took another deep, ragged breath, she knew that if she woke and found herself in the twenty-first century, this innocent man would die, and it would be all her fault.

  With shaking hands, she pulled up her skirt and ripped her petticoat into long strips, and began the gruesome task. The deputy passed out from the pain. The stench of blood filled the cell.

  Hours later, she heard footsteps outside the cell’s lone window.

  “Becca?”

  Warwick. Finally.

  “You in there?”

  After another glance at her unconscious patient, she clambered onto the cot so she could see out the window. Grasping the bars, she tried to pull herself so she could see Warwick’s face.

  He pushed his hat back and looked up at her. “What are you doing?”

  She swallowed. “It’s a long story.”

  “It seems like I got all night.” Warwick glanced
up and down the deserted alley.

  The moon and stars surprised Becca. How much time had passed? She gave her patient another scrutinizing look. Would he live? She wasn’t sure. The bullet she’d pulled from his chest lay on top of the mess of petticoat strips like a gruesome trophy. Blood stained the knife she’d pulled from the deputy’s pocket and her hands.

  “Are you alone?” Warwick asked.

  “No, the deputy is with me…he’s…not well.”

  “Not well,” Warwick echoed. “Where’s Connelly?”

  “I don’t know,” Becca admitted, her voice quivery.

  “You want to tell me what happened?”

  “No, but I will. Can you find the sheriff so I only have to tell it once?”

  #

  Becca, Warwick, and the sheriff sat at a scarred wooden table in the middle of the jailhouse. “Why didn’t anyone come when the gun went off, or when I screamed?” Becca asked the sheriff after she’d given her account.

  “Now, girl, gun shots and screaming are just a part and parcel of living in the Wild West,” Sheriff Lawson told her.

  Becca felt her nostrils flare. She smelled alcohol on the sheriff’s breath and she suspected why he hadn’t been around to hear her cries. He lowered his bushy eyebrows, returning her scowl. With his bristly salt and pepper hair, he reminded Becca of large, portly, porcupine.

  “Well, I hope you make herself mighty comfortable in here,” the sheriff said, looking pointedly at the row of cells.

  “Wait. What?” Becca asked.

  “Now see here,” Warwick began, standing. “You don’t intend to keep my wife in this jail.”

  “Well, I most certainly do,” the sheriff said, remaining in his seat and looking smug. “For the time being, at least.”

  “Why?” Becca cried and Warwick demanded.

  “Well, I lost one prisoner, and I can’t have that happening.”

  “Well, yeah, but it’s not like prisoners are interchangeable,” Becca said. “You can’t hold me. I didn’t do anything wrong!”

  “The hell you say! From the way I see it, you aided and abetted a convicted felon, AND,” he raised his voice, “you pert-near got my deputy killed.”

  “But I didn’t mean to do any of those things. And I saved your deputy’s life!”

  “I got no one here that can tell me otherwise.” Sheriff Lawson climbed to his feet and jingled his keys. “By my reckoning, the only fair thing that could make anything in this situation right is for Warwick here to capture Connelly and bring him in.”

  Becca shot Warwick a worried glance. “He’s not a bounty hunter! He could get killed. Joseph Connelly is a dangerous man!” Unwittingly, she echoed Warwick’s words.

  The sheriff leaned forward and pinned her with his beady black eyes. “Guess you should have thought of that before you waltzed in here carrying a gun!”

  “He’s got a point,” Warwick said.

  “Yeah, and if he wasn’t wearing a hat it would be a lot more obvious,” Becca muttered.

  “What’s that?” The sheriff’s scowl deepened.

  “None of this is fair,” Becca said. “What happened was my fault, not Warwicks. I should be the one to chase down Connelly.”

  The sheriff barked out a laugh and Warwick joined in.

  “Why is that so funny?”

  The sheriff shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe her stupidity. She wanted to slap him and blurt out her MCAT scores, but she did neither. “You should at least let me go with him.”

  “Not happening, princess. If I let you out the door, I bet you dollars to dead dogs that I’ll never see hide or hair of either of you again.”

  “That’s not true!” Becca said, although disappearing into the Rocky Mountain wilderness was pretty much what she had in mind.

  The sheriff placed his hand on her shoulder, guided her to the cot, and pushed her down. She landed with a plop on what would now be her bed for the unforeseen future, if she didn’t come up with a convincing plan. She bounced back up, refusing to be manhandled.

  “You can’t keep me in here!”

  “The hell you say,” the sheriff said over his shoulder as he passed through the bars.

  Becca stared open-mouthed as Warwick followed him. The cell clanged shut, and the sheriff turned the key in the lock.

  “Warwick!” She strode to the bars and gripped them.

  He turned, his smile apologetic. “I’m sorry, sweetling. This is probably for the best. You’ll be safe here.”

  “Are you seriously going to hunt down Connelly?”

  “Yeah…I seriously am.”

  “Why?”

  He cocked his head and gave her slow grin. “Because I want my wife by my side.”

  “Then take me with you!”

  He shook his head. “That’s never going to happen.” Reaching through the bars, he extended his hand, as if to cup her cheek.

  She slapped him away.

  Chuckling, he turned and left.

  Becca sat down on the cot with a huff, considering her options. That took a remarkably short amount of time, mostly because she couldn’t think of any.

  The sheriff’s wife, Amy, came by with a bowl of chili, a dry cornbread muffin, and some sheets and blankets. The local pastor dropped in to tell her about hell and the dangers of fraternizing with hoodlums and hooligans. Women belonged in the home, he told her, not in jail cells.

  Lying on her cot, watching the moon rise in the sky, she thought about home, Warwick, and which way her future would take her. Sighing, she pulled the blankets up to her chin. A tear trickled down her cheek and into her hair.

  #

  One day bled into the next. Every time she went to the privy she thought of escaping, but since she had nowhere to go, she stayed. Besides, she could see Deputy Clarkson shooting her in the back as she tried to run in her long skirts and raggedy petticoat. It didn’t seem to matter that she’d saved his life—he still hated her and only answered her questions with grunts.

  Day one, she thought she would die of boredom.

  Day two, she wanted something other than chili to eat.

  Day three, she would kill for the chance to shower or bathe.

  On day ten, something wonderful happened. Somewhere, a fire started.

  CHAPTER 10

  Becca stood on the cot on her tiptoes, trying to see out the window. Smoke rolled in through the bars, carrying with it the noise and commotion from the street she couldn’t see.

  The sheriff huffed into the room, his keys jangling.

  “What’s going on?” Becca asked without turning around. “What’s burning?”

  “Pert-near everything,” Sheriff Lawson said, inserting his keys in the door.

  Becca climbed off the bed. “You’re letting me go?”

  “You’s a doctor, ain’t you?”

  Becca nodded.

  “And from Deputy Clarkson’s account, a fine one. Not that I have truck with women folk doctoring, but the way I see it, lots of people are going to be in need of some mending so beggars can’t be choosers.”

  “Huh, thank you?”

  “Besides, Doctor Fleming told me to fetch you. He’s up to his eyeballs in people hurting and cursing.”

  Becca wanted to kiss the sheriff, instead, she brushed past him.

  “Don’t you go escaping on me!” Sheriff Lawson shook his finger at her. “I’m still counting on your husband to bring back Connelly!”

  “You know I’m not my husband’s keeper, right?” Becca asked. “I have no idea where Warwick is. I don’t know if he’s looking for Connelly or scouting for horses.” Her voice broke when she said, “We have no way of knowing if he plans on ever coming back.” She choked up. “Besides, Connelly isn’t going to come in without a fight. He’ll kill Warwick if he gets the chance.”

  Sheriff Lawson patted her arm. “Don’t you worry, princess. Your man will be back for you, and if I’m not mistaken, he’ll be bringing back Joseph Connelly with him, dead or alive.” He took a deep brea
th. “But right now, we got some sick people who need care. You’ll find the doc in his office off Main.”

  Outside, bedlam met her. Wagons, children, women with babies tucked under their arms, merchants with wares piled into wheelbarrows, horses with wild eyes and flared nostrils, crowded the street. Beneath her feet surged dogs, cats, birds, rats, and raccoons. Pushing through Main Street was like swimming upstream in a river of animals and humanity. As the smoke grew thicker, the crowd lessened and changed. Men, grim faced and already blackened with soot, worked in lines passing buckets from one hand to the next. From her vantage at the top of the hill, she saw the bucket brigade lines snaked all the way to Cherry Creek. Men, boys, and even some women worked side by side, buckets sloshing with the precious water.

  Smoke filled her nostrils and lungs. It pressed down on the townsfolk. She saw the fatigue in the arms, shoulders, and backs of the fire fighters around her. Urgency pushed her into a jog.

  Ten days of captivity had made her muscles stiff and sluggish, but the needs of the people around her urged her on. This is why she had become a doctor. She was, at heart, a healer.

  Hope had been burned out of the bucket brigade. The citizens that had fought with water and vigor, now mostly watched as the flames devoured the remainder of the city. The dogs loping up the hill seemed to have a greater sense of purpose and destination than the crowd milling the streets, overwhelmed by the fire’s magnitude.

  Taking the back alley, she paused at the pump to scrub her arms and hands. She was filthy, but glancing in the windows at the burn victims crowding the doctor’s small office, she knew that no one would care.

  Becca booked herself a room at the same boardinghouse where she, Doc Fleming and a handful of volunteer nurses set up a makeshift hospital. Occasionally, Sheriff Lawson would come in, chew the end of his cigar, look things over and stroll away.

  Weeks passed in a sleepless blur. The autumn sun faded into a gray November sky, and chill filled the air. When she had a rare empty moment, Becca would wonder and worry about Warwick, but mostly, she devoted herself to the burn victims, using both her medical and mental health skills. But as more time passed, Becca became preoccupied with a pressing concern of her own.