Never Love A Lawman. Jo Goodman

of respiration would somehow influence the outcome. Had she won or lost? The pressure in his chest was heavy now, but he refused to surrender to it. He waited it out, nose pinched, lips pressed tightly together.

      It was the footfalls that told him what he wanted to know. He lost track of the progress of her light tread in the hallway as he emptied his lungs and drew in a great, gulping breath. It was a mere moment, though, and he was able to steady the rise and fall of his chest by the time she reached his door. He opened his eyes and waited.

      The bedside lamp lent just enough light for him to make out the turn of the handle. It occurred to him that perhaps he should pretend to be sleeping, but there was no time to consider it properly and just as little time to act on it. He kept his gaze fixed on the door as it opened only those inches necessary for her to slip into his room. Her entrance wasn’t stealthy but representative of the economy she practiced in all things. Extravagance and excess had never impressed her favorably, and he was reminded of that as she closed the door quietly behind her and made her way to his bedside.

      She was simple elegance in a room given over to every sort of indulgence, from the Chinese silks and Italian vases, to the Gothic-like imposition of the massive marble fireplace imported from a sixteenth-century French chateau.

      Wearing a voluminous ivory cotton nightgown, she moved toward him like a wraith. He would not have been surprised to learn her slippered feet never once disturbed the intricately patterned Persian rug beneath them, and the fanciful notion stayed with him as she seemed to hover at his bedside.

      It was a long moment before she spoke.

      “It’s time,” she said.

      He nodded. Even though he had been expecting it, in some way even hoping for it, he was robbed of his voice.

      “You’ll forgive me, won’t you?”

      It was more to the point that she would have to forgive herself, but saying so seemed deliberately hurtful, and she would never accept that there was nothing to forgive. Instead, he reminded her of what was true.

      “It was my idea,” he said, and saw her smile a little at that. He recognized the smile for what it was. She was indulging him, not accepting it as fact. He saved his breath for what was important. “Did he hurt you?”

      “No.”

      Her answer was too perfunctory to hide the lie. He saw she had the grace to blush, but the rosy color did not conceal the deeper stain along her jawline.

      “No worse than I’ve known,” she amended.

      As a description of her injuries it left a great deal to his imagination and filled him with sick dread. “You should leave now.”

      “Yes.” But she didn’t move.

      “Before he comes around.”

      Looking down at him, unable to look away, she only nodded this time.

      “At his best he’s impatient. Intolerant at his worst.” He saw her smile again, this time as if he’d said a profound truth. She surprised him then by seating herself at the edge of his bed and angling herself toward him. She lifted the covers enough to find his hand, drew it out, and placed it between both of hers. He wondered if it felt as small and frail in the cup of her palms as it seemed to him.

      “I don’t want to leave you,” she said. “You should never believe that I wanted to leave you.”

      He said nothing for a moment, absorbing the truth of it, concentrating on the tender fold of her hands around his. “I know.”

      She did not offer to take him with her. That was an impossibility and discussing it as if it could be otherwise was painful beyond what any person could bear.

      “You mustn’t be afraid that he’ll bully you,” she said.

      “I’m not afraid of him.”

      “Of course you’re not. I only meant that he won’t bother you once I’m gone.”

      He knew she believed that, and he said nothing to contradict her. He could have told her that while he wouldn’t be bothered, he would also no longer be of any use. There was nothing to be gained by reminding her.

      “You’ll do what’s expected, won’t you?” she asked.

      “Yes.” She meant the nurses. She would have already given instructions to them, made certain they knew what he should eat, his likes and dislikes, how often he should be exercised, how to care for his linens, what he enjoyed reading, how he cheated at cards and chess if you let him, and how to respond when the mood of the moment was fair or foul. She would have done all this gradually over time, all of it in the course of mothering him, smothering him, and without once raising suspicion that she was preparing for the possibility of abandoning him.

      “I’m depending on your good sense,” she said.

      “I won’t disappoint you.”

      Her smile was gently mocking, tinged with genuine humor. “I am almost convinced.”

      He smiled in return and grieving was pushed to the back of his mind. He felt her hands slip away from his. She braced herself on either side of his narrow shoulders and bent down to kiss him. He felt her lips settle lightly on his forehead. It only lasted the narrowest margin of time, but he knew the feather-soft sweep of her lips on his brow would remain with him long after she was gone.

      When he opened his eyes, he was alone.

      Chapter One

      Reidsville, Colorado, September 1882

      Watching her was a pleasure. A mostly secret pleasure. Wyatt Cooper braced his hands on the wooden balustrade and leaned forward just enough to make certain her progress down the street remained unobstructed. His second-story perch lent him a particularly fine view of her gliding toward him.

      Give or take a few minutes, she was right on schedule. He didn’t have to look away from her to confirm that he wasn’t alone in his appreciation. He could safely predict there were upwards of a dozen men loitering on the wooden sidewalk between Morrison’s Emporium and Mr. Redmond’s Livery. Abe Dishman and Ned Beaumont were almost certainly glancing up from the checkers game they played every afternoon in front of Easter’s Bakery. Johnny Winslow would have set himself to sweeping out the entrance of Longabach’s Restaurant just about now, whether or not Mrs. Longabach needed him scrubbing pots or hauling water. Mr. Longabach, too, generally found some reason to wander outside the restaurant, even if it was only to remind Johnny not to dawdle.

      Jacob Reston managed the bank and employed two tellers, both of whom had surely moved quietly from behind their cages to crowd the doorway. Jacob had the best view, a consequence of the position of his desk, the window, and the convenience of a chair that swiveled. Ed Kennedy had likely stopped pounding out a shoe in his blacksmithing establishment long enough to watch her take her daily constitutional, and because Ed liked to impress the ladies, he’d be standing almost at attention, making the best of what God and hard work had given him: broad shoulders, upper arms like anvils, and hands as big as dinner plates.

      Wyatt’s fingers tapped out the steady cadence of her walk as she passed Caldwell’s Apothecary and the sheriff’s office. She slipped out of his sight when her path took her under the sheltering porch roof in front of the Miner Key Saloon, but Wyatt kept tapping, and she reappeared at the precise moment he predicted she would, just as his index finger hit the downbeat.

      She was within moments of reaching her destination when he was joined at the rail. He didn’t pretend he was doing anything but what he was, and the fact that he didn’t try to hide it brought a throaty chuckle from his companion.

      “I don’t suppose you have a jealous bone in your body, Rose,” Wyatt said.

      “And I reckon I don’t have any reason to be jealous. Purely wasteful emotion.” She matched Wyatt’s pose at the rail. The ruffled hem of her petticoats fluttered as a light breeze was funneled down the street. Small eddies of