Abbie's Outlaw. Victoria Bylin

With Robbie out of earshot, Abbie faced John.

      “I want to be very clear,” she said with deadly calm. “I have no desire to spend the night with fleas or vermin of any kind. All I want is a basin of clean water, a bed that’s not moving and a bit of privacy.”

      His eyes burned into hers. “You can have those things at the parsonage. I promise—you’ll be safe.”

      From me.

      He’d said the last words with his eyes, but she didn’t believe him for a minute. She’d never feel safe again and certainly not with Johnny Leaf. Stay angry, she told herself. Stay strong.

      “I appreciate the offer, Reverend, but I’d rather keep company with the fleas.”

      His spine turned rigid, giving him another inch of height so that she felt like a sparrow looking up at one of the ravens in her backyard. The creases around his eyes deepened, telling her that she’d struck a nerve. It didn’t matter. Hurting John’s feelings was the least of her worries. “If you’ll excuse me—”

      “I’ll take you to Sally’s,” he said. “But just for tonight. When you’re rested, you and I have to talk.”

      “Tomorrow, then,” she said. “While Robbie’s washing dishes.”

      She pivoted and hurried down the street, keeping her eyes on her son while John followed her. The thud of his boots on the wood planks reminded her that she was in an unfamiliar town and had no idea where to go. When she reached the corner where Robbie was standing, she stopped to orient herself. Across the street, she saw a dress shop, a newspaper office and the yellow facade of the Midas Emporium. Later she’d go out for flea powder and something to read so she could fall asleep, but right now she wanted to be rid of the Reverend.

      He was motioning down a street that led to the outskirts of the town. “Sally’s place is this way,” he said.

      As she peered down the strip of dirt, Abbie saw a sign advertising baths for a nickel and a splintered storefront with the swinging half doors of a saloon. Her insides sank with dread. The Reverend had been telling the truth about Sally’s clientele, but she refused to change her mind about the parsonage. Even standing on a street corner in the middle of the day, she could feel the old connection between them.

      So little about him had changed. His dark eyes still had a hawklike intensity, as if he could see the tiniest secrets in her heart. At the same time, she saw a loneliness in his gaze, a reminder that each of God’s creatures had boarded the ark with a mate. Abbie felt her insides twist with a mix of longing and hateful memories of her marriage. If she didn’t get away from John soon, she’d be a nervous wreck.

      To keep her composure, she looked him square in the eye. “I can find it from here. Just tell me what the house looks like.”

      “Not a chance,” he replied. “I’ll introduce you to Sally and get you settled. I also want to be sure you can find me if you need anything.”

      Abbie wanted to ignore the offer, but she wasn’t a fool. Whether she liked it or not, she was in a rough part of town and Johnny Leaf was her only friend. She tapped her son’s arm to take his attention away from the Emporium. “Robbie? You need to listen.”

      As the boy turned around, the Reverend pointed at a white steeple on the other side of town. “That’s the church. The parsonage is across from it. It’s a two-story house with a wide porch. That’s where I live.”

      Confident she understood John’s directions, Abbie continued down the street. The three of them walked in silence, but she couldn’t block out the awareness of John matching his long stride to hers. It was like walking together in Kansas. Only now she was wearing black instead of red calico. She also had scars while he seemed more confident than ever.

      Eager to reach their accommodations, she peered down the street until she spotted a sign offering rooms for rent. It was hanging in front of a box-shaped house with cracked windows, peeling paint and a yard full of weeds.

      “This is it,” John said.

      Abbie schooled her features. “It’s just fine.”

      John gave her a skeptical look, but she hadn’t been lying. She didn’t care about a comfortable bed or a fancy washbowl anymore. She just wanted to be away from the Reverend and the feelings he stirred up. As soon as he left, she’d feel safe and that’s what mattered most.

      Chapter Three

      John pushed back in the chair on the porch that wrapped around the parsonage and lit a cigarette. He usually enjoyed the end of the day, when the sun dipped below the horizon and the air cooled, but tonight his stomach was in a knot. After leaving Abbie at Sally’s, he’d renewed his promise to fetch Robbie for breakfast and had walked home.

      He’d spent the rest of the afternoon trying to write Sunday’s sermon, but he’d gotten as far as “love thy neighbor as thyself” and tossed down his pen. He hadn’t been in the mood to think about loving anyone, so he had picked up his tobacco pouch and gone outside for a smoke.

      That had been four cigarettes ago, and he still wasn’t in the mood to think about love. At least not the kind of brotherly devotion he’d intended to preach on Sunday. His mind kept drifting back to Abbie, Kansas and the night he had talked his way into her bed.

      What a fool he’d been. Up until then he’d only been with whores. Sex had been for sport, and he’d cheerfully gone upstairs with every woman who’d asked. With Abbie things had been different. He’d been the one to do the asking, or, more correctly, the persuading.

      The smoke turned rancid in John’s lungs. Seducing a virgin had been a game to him. Abbie had been an untouched girl who smelled like bread instead of whiskey. She had also been the first woman he’d been with who had known less about sex than he did.

      With the sunset glaring in his eyes, he didn’t know what shamed him more—that he’d taken her innocence or that he’d done such a piss-poor job of it. It wasn’t until it was all over that he’d realized how clumsy he’d been. With tears in her eyes, she’d huddled against him, whispering that she hurt and was afraid.

      God, he’d been an idiot. He hadn’t learned the finer points of lovemaking until he’d befriended a madam named Rose. He wanted to think he would have made things good for Abbie if he’d had the chance, but her brother had barged in on them. Only her pleas had kept John from pounding the kid into pulp. Instead he had held his Colt Army pistol to the boy’s head and ordered Abbie to get dressed and meet him in the barn.

      John stubbed out the cigarette in a pie tin full of sand. That night had been hell. With Abbie struggling to be brave, he had felt lower than dirt as he’d saddled his horse.

      You can come along to Oregon if you want.

      I can’t leave my mother.

      She’d been wise to refuse his halfhearted offer. After Kansas he’d slid deeper into the hole he called a life, while she had married well and raised two fine children. At least that’s what John wanted to believe. The other possibility was too bitter to bear. Had he left her with child? Had she been forced to marry to hide the shame?

      A daughter…his flesh and blood…

      John’s heart thundered against his ribs. The western sky was on fire and the mountains were as black as soot. As a coyote howled in the distance, another joined in the lament. The wailing reached one high note after another, ceaseless and haunting, until the night was full of pain.

      Was this how Abbie had felt when her monthly hadn’t started on time? Had she wanted to hide from the facts as badly as he did now? There was no getting around the evidence. Someone had told Susanna that he was her father, and Abbie hadn’t flat-out denied it. The girl was fourteen years old and, judging by Abbie’s description, looked just like him.

      He could only hope Robert Windsor had been a good man who had married Abbie for love. Perhaps he’d been a childless widower who’d wanted a family. The thought