Mail-Order Groom

“And yet you’re starting it with a lie.”

“Finding myself a mail-order groom isn’t a lie. We’re both here willingly. We’re both lonely, and we don’t want to be.”

Mose made a gruff, tentative gesture. “You’re … lonely?”

His tone of sadness wrenched her. Savannah wanted to save him from it … but she couldn’t. She couldn’t lie about this. She swallowed past a lump in her throat. Wordlessly she nodded.

“But if all goes well, I won’t be lonely for much longer. And neither will he.” In dawning wonder, she and Mose stared at the man in the bed. “It’s him, Mose!” She breathed in. “It’s really him. My new life is finally beginning.”

Chapter Three

Adam dreamed of baby-faced killers and swinging tree branches and a dark swirling pain that centered on his skull. Hot and restless, he thrashed on the fallen pine needles.

“Shh,” a woman said. “It’s all right. You’re safe now.” But he wasn’t. “Mariana!” he tried to say. “Mariana!” His voice emerged in a croak, hurting his throat. The forest moved around him, dark and light, always changing. He needed to find his partner. He needed to find out what Bedell and his brothers had done to her. Soon it would be too late.

Something touched his head. At the contact, Adam flinched. A shameful groan burst from his chest, making the pain worse.

“Just raise your head a little,” the woman urged. “Please.”

Wetness touched his lips. It tasted bitter. Adam screwed up his face. If Bedell wanted to poison him, he’d have to do it without his cooperation. Swearing, he smacked away the liquid.

Something clattered to the ground. It rolled and smashed.

“He’s still fitful,” the woman said. “All night he’s been—”

He didn’t catch whatever else she said. Her voice, low and cautious, wavered in and out of his hearing. Several of her words made no sense. Adam thought he heard his gelding nearby. The horse shook its traces with equine impatience—or maybe with prescient concern. Once he’d been rifle-shot in an ambush, and his horse had carried his limp body all the way to Mariana.

Mariana. He had to rescue her. He was running out of time.

He tried to call her name again. All that emerged was another groan. Soft hands touched his face, then moved lower.

The hands patted his chest. With effort, Adam opened his eyes. The world wavered, showing him a lopsided view of a blond-haired woman. He knew her. But he didn’t. He couldn’t remember.

Weakly he grabbed her wrist. “Mariana?” he mumbled.

“Yes, it’s me. Savannah.” She slipped from his hold, then set aside his hand with a soothing pat. “Just rest now.”

Adam frowned. She was treating him like a child. Annoyed and still hurting, he clenched his fingers. They encountered soft quilted fabric, a cushy mattress. Where the hell was he?

“You gave me quite a scare,” she said. “But you made it here, and you’re going to be fine. That’s all that matters.”

Savannah. Savannah. Drowsily Adam pondered the name.

His eyes drifted shut. Damnation. He forced them open.

Savannah’s concerned face swam above him. She smiled as she tucked a blanket snugly around him. “I’m so happy you’re here.”

He couldn’t be happy. There was something wrong with Mariana. Something awful … But he couldn’t remember what.

A heartbeat later, Adam crashed into the blackness again.

The next time Adam awakened, he opened his eyes on a cozy, dimly lit room. Frowning with concentration, he took stock of his surroundings. They were small and modest, framed by split-log walls and crammed with furnishings. A medicinal tang hung in the air, along with a flowery fragrance he couldn’t place.

Beneath him was an unfamiliar bed. Nearby, an old bureau hunkered with a lighted oil lamp atop it. To his left sat an empty ladder-back chair. Rhythmic tapping came from the next room. Adam recognized the sound as a telegraph machine in use.

He was inside the telegraph station. Hazily he remembered confronting Bedell. He remembered going down, remembered hitting the man, remembered his last words: You do have a weakness.

They made less sense to him now than they had then, but Adam didn’t have time to consider the matter further. He had to get to Mariana. He threw off the coverlet, then wrenched upward.

The motion sent searing pain through him. Gasping with it, he clutched his middle. Gingerly he spread his fingers apart.

Two bandages met his unsteady gaze. He blinked at them, then sucked in another breath. Next, he twisted to touch his back. More bandages had been wrapped near his shoulder blade. Tentatively he patted them. He was hurt. That didn’t mean he could stop moving. He had to find Mariana and save her.

Another agonizing movement brought him to his feet. Adam teetered, clenching his jaw. Pain throbbed through his head, making him dizzy. His ribs hurt; so did his shoulder. His legs threatened to buckle beneath him. He grabbed the chair. A few more raspy, painful breaths fortified him enough to go on.

The tapping of the telegraphy equipment ceased. He sent a cautious glance toward the other end of the station, straining to hear. All he sensed was the occasional rustle of papers. A distant chair scraped across the floor; a shadow moved across the wall. He wasn’t alone here. Propelled into motion by the realization, Adam sighted the latched door. He surged toward it.

An involuntary moan escaped him. Tightening his jaw, he made himself keep moving. His fingers scrabbled clumsily on the latch. Frustrated, he tried again. The door finally swung free, revealing the darkened woods surrounding the telegraph station.

Adam staggered outside, leaving his shirt and suit coat behind him. Warm nighttime air swirled over his exposed skin. Sweating and breathing heavily, he lurched across the station’s yard, looking for his horse. He hardly felt the stones and grass beneath his bare feet. All that mattered was finding Mariana.

“Whoa there, stranger!” someone called. “Hold up.”

At the sound of that deep male voice, Adam whipped his hand to his belt. His empty belt. His usual firepower wasn’t there.

Hell. In his muzzy-headed haste to leave, he’d forgotten to arm himself, he realized. Too late. Instinctively Adam flexed his knee, but his backup knife was gone, too. He was forced to stand on weakened legs, defenseless and light-headed, as a big, dark-skinned man tromped toward him with a handheld lantern.

“Let me help you.” The man put his free arm around Adam’s shoulders. He looked older than he’d first appeared, but genial—and clearly determined. “I guess you’re looking for the privy.”

Warily Adam nodded. Deprived of his weapons, there wasn’t much else he could do. Besides, he recognized Mose Hawthorne. He doubted the station’s part-time helper posed a threat to him.

Together they crossed the yard, moving slowly toward the outhouse. Adam scanned the tree line as they went. If Bedell or his brothers were still out there, he needed to be aware of it.

He cleared his throat. “I’m looking for a woman. She ought to be around here someplace. Have you seen her? She’s—”

“Right in there, friend.” Mose nodded toward the station, interrupting before Adam could describe Mariana. He opened the outhouse door. “Savannah’s been waiting on you awhile now. You have no idea what kind of hopes that woman’s got pinned on you.”

Having read her letters to Bedell, Adam had a fairly thorough notion of what the confidence man’s mark might expect of her new beau. But that wasn’t what concerned him now.

“I meant another woman. Dark hair, about this high—” Adam held his hand to chest height “—foul mouth, dirty skirts most likely, probably packing a pistol or two? She might be hurt.”

“That don’t sound like any woman I ever heard of.” Mose frowned. “You hurt your head, though. I’m guessing you’re still a little confused.” He gestured. “You need help in there?”

Adam gave the outhouse a dismissive glance. “No. If you haven’t seen her, then I’ll have to go looking.” He wavered on his unsteady legs. Mose held him up. “Did you find my horse?”

“Your horse?” This time, the station’s helper cast him an even more fretful look. “You didn’t have a horse. I found your rucksack over there in the bushes, but that’s all. If you had yourself a horse back in Baltimore, it’ll be no help to you here in the Territory. Although Savannah will be relieved to know you had that much scratch. Between you and me, I think she thought you were near destitute. She’s just softhearted enough not to care.” Mose nodded at the outhouse. “Go on and do your business now. I’ll wait here and help you back inside when you’re done.”

At the man’s expectant look, Adam swore. He was too dazed to follow everything Mose had said, especially all that prattle about Baltimore and Savannah Reed’s softheartedness. He didn’t like knowing that Bedell’s mark was even more gullible than he’d thought … and so, by all accounts, was her only helper and friend. But further talking was a delay Adam couldn’t afford.

His work for the agency was important; Mariana’s safety was paramount. His partner mattered more to him than any mission.

He eyed Mose, wondering how to dodge the big man. If the station’s helper couldn’t give him answers about Mariana, he’d have to leave him behind. An upright man like Mose would expect a reason for his leaving—especially while injured. But Adam didn’t have time to explain. He couldn’t tell the station’s helper why he’d been trailing Bedell—or why he’d been lingering outside the station. That would only lead to more questions—questions he didn’t have answers for yet. He couldn’t tell Mose or Savannah the truth. Not if he wanted to nab Bedell.

He did. He wanted to nab Bedell like he wanted to breathe. That meant Adam couldn’t let Mose delay him any longer. He didn’t know how much time had passed. Mariana needed him.

Trying to reason out what to do, Adam hesitated. His mind still felt foggy. His head throbbed. His ribs ached. His back burned with a ragged pain that experience told him was a fresh gunshot wound. Even now, a telltale wetness trickled down his shoulder blade, warning him he was bleeding.

A short ways away, the station’s door banged open. Savannah Reed ran into the moonlight, a slight figure in a fancy dress.

“Mose! He’s gone!” she yelled. “He’s not in bed anymore.”

Providentially Savannah’s arrival made the decision for Adam. The station’s helper turned to look at her. Seizing his best and only opportunity to get a jump on the man, Adam shoved the outhouse door at Mose. Then he took off at a hobbling run.

Dizzily he surveyed the dark hillside, trying to get his bearings. If he remembered correctly, he’d pegged his horse a half mile away. Doubtless his gelding was still waiting there for him, unnoticed by Mose in the aftermath of the shooting.

“Mose!” Savannah cried out behind him. “Look! Stop him!”

Adam heard a grunt. He glanced back. Mose stood beside the outhouse, shaking his head as though to clear it. Savannah reached him, then pointed at Adam. “Hurry up! He’s injured!”

With grim resolve, Adam forced himself into the cover of the pine boughs and scrub oak. A few seconds later, the sounds of the station helper’s pursuit faded. So did Savannah’s voice.

He missed it, Adam realized. Stupidly and sappily, he missed Savannah Reed’s voice and her gentle touch, too. He’d scarcely gotten to know either, and yet he wanted both. Dragging in another painful breath, he put the realization behind him, then went to track down his partner—whatever it took to do it.

Struggling through the underbrush in her highbutton shoes and bustle-laden calico dress, Savannah burst into a clearing at last. Mose crouched a few feet away, his back to her. He’d gotten ahead of her as they’d chased their runaway patient, but now she’d finally caught up. Breathing heavily, she stopped.

Then she realized that Mose was hunkered down in front of a fallen-down, bare-chested, dark-haired man. His prone body was just recognizable in the lantern light. They’d found him.

With a cry, she rushed forward. “Is he all right?”

“I guess so. Looks like he plumb keeled over.” Mose glanced up at her, his face unusually pensive. In the darkened forest all around them, small creatures skittered at the edge of the circle. “He’s breathing. But he’s bleeding again, pretty hard.”

Concerned, Savannah dropped to her knees atop the fallen pine needles. She reached out to touch her mail-order groom’s heaving chest. “I’ll bet he’s fevered.” She gazed at his face. Even in sleep, his features appeared hard edged. “For a man who looks so formidable, he sure does behave foolishly. His head injury must be worse than Dr. Finney thought.” Worriedly she glanced at Mose. “Whatever would make him run like that, Mose?”

Her friend stared at the man, at first appearing not to have heard. Lost in thought, Mose frowned. Just when Savannah was on the verge of repeating her question, Mose shrugged.

“I reckon some men get antsy at the prospect of marriage.”

She gave him a chastening look. “That’s not funny. He wants to marry me, remember? He came out west specifically for me.”

“Are you sure you still want him? He’s a peculiar one.”

“You’re only saying that because he got the better of you with that outhouse door. That must have been an accident.”

“This goose egg on my head doesn’t feel like an accident.”

“I’ll fix up a poultice for you when we get back.” Savannah stood, gesturing at her fallen groom. “Come on, let’s get him back to the station and safely to bed. It’s been a long night.”

When Mose didn’t move, she glanced at him. Her longtime friend glowered at her, his arms crossed. There was definitely something he wasn’t telling her. “I say we leave him,” he said.

“Leave him? Of course we’re not leaving him.” Savannah trod around the man, trying to figure out if she could possibly drag him back to the station herself. She doubted it. He was as big as Mose and even more muscular. “If you’re planning on carrying a grudge just because he hit you with that door—accidentally, if I might remind you—then you’d better just stop it. He’s injured! He’s confused and fevered and not himself. And he’s a city man, too—a telegraph clerk. I doubt he’s clever enough to get the jump on a hard-as-nails, worldly stagehand like yourself. You’ve been around all the most dangerous people and survived.”

Of course, so had she. But that was all behind her now. And if she was overstating Mose’s toughness in order to spare his feelings. Well, at least it was for kindness’s sake.

“I reckon …” Mose pursed his mouth. “That’s likely true.”

“See? Have pity on the poor man. He’s liable to be in way over his head with Western life. Now he’s got a passel of healing to do, to boot. We’ll have to be very patient with him.”

“I guess.” Grudgingly but carefully, Mose lifted the man.

As her friend slung her wounded groom over his shoulder, a pitiful groan came from their patient. Heartsick at the pain-filled sound, Savannah rushed to his side. She stroked his hand.

As though he sensed her touch, his eyelids fluttered. But he didn’t awaken. That worried Savannah all the more.

“Please let us help you,” she whispered to him as they moved toward the station. “Please. And don’t you run away again, either. You are my best chance at starting over—that means I’m counting on you. You can’t let me down. You just can’t. Not now.” She inhaled deeply, then ladled as much fierceness as she could into her tone. “Not when I’m so close. You hear?”

He moaned but didn’t speak. Savannah didn’t say any more. All during the jostling trek back to the station, she watched her mail-order groom. and she thought about him, too. She might be eager, but she wasn’t naive. The undeniable truth was, her injured groom’s flight into the woods—like his guns and his knives—had unsettled her. Something didn’t feel right here.

She might be counting on her mail-order groom but she didn’t plan on trusting him. Not yet. They had a long way to go before that happened—if it happened at all. Suddenly Savannah had as many doubts as she did questions, and she needed answers.

Chapter Four

Vivid sunshine pushed open Adam’s eyes at a time he judged long past sunrise. Disoriented and aching, he tried to sit up.

Raw throbbing pain cut short his motions. Gasping, he sank back again. He was in a bed. In a room. In the tiny Morrow Creek adjunct telegraph station, far from his partner and his mission.

Mariana. Last night, he’d tried to find her. He’d trudged through the wooded hillside in the dark, bleeding and hurting. After what had felt like hours, he’d found his earlier trail.

He’d located the iron post he’d used to stake out his horse. But his progress had ended there. The rope attached to the post had been hacked off, its frayed ends still in place. His horse had been gone. Stolen, if he didn’t miss his mark.

Bedell and his boys had been thorough. With no horse, no sense of where the confidence man had gone or how long ago he’d left—and with a gunshot wound and other injuries to slow him down—Adam had little hope of tracking them. At least for a while.

What’s more, he still had a job to do here at the station. Bedell’s mark still needed him. Savannah Reed still needed him. If that sharper were still loitering around, waiting to make his move on an innocent woman, Adam had to be there to stop him.

Bedell didn’t yet have the windfall he’d planned to steal from Savannah, Adam reminded himself. If he waited at the station, he figured Bedell would return. Doubtless, he’d do it sooner rather than later, too. Roy Bedell and his brothers had never shown any signs of being less than greedy and impatient.

And Savannah Reed had never shown any signs of being less than trusting and gullible. You are my best chance at starting over, he remembered her telling him last night. That means I’m counting on you. You can’t let me down. You just can’t.

Her words had been truer than she’d known. She was counting on him. She had to. And he, in turn, had to protect her.

Last night, all Adam had been able to think about was helping Mariana. But in the clear light of day, with a lucid mind and the force of all his hard-won experience to guide him, he thought about Savannah, too. There were so many things she didn’t know about the mail-order groom she’d been waiting for.

Roy Bedell had lied to her from the start. He was a thief and a coldhearted killer. Adam had hoped to nab the knuck before it became necessary to make such revelations to Bedell’s latest target. Now that plan seemed nigh impossible. But, he wondered unhappily, how did a man begin to tell a woman that she’d made arrangements to share her life with a ruthless sharper?

Adam didn’t know. He’d figure out something later. Because as things stood now, he didn’t have much choice. He was hurt and weak, gunshot and dizzy. Bedell and his boys were out of reach. Mariana was missing. For now, all he could do was trust that his partner had done the right thing and stayed far away, like he’d told her to do. If he were lucky, Mariana had already ridden on to Morrow Creek to wire the agency for new instructions.

And maybe for a new partner, too.

Grudgingly Adam felt heartened by the thought. Mariana was experienced. She was strong and smart and resourceful. She might not even need him to ride to her rescue, like he’d planned.

Why, Mr. Corwin! Are you still trying to protect me?

Remembering Mariana’s brash, flippant words, Adam felt his heart give a sentimental squeeze. He devoutly hoped she was safe. If she wasn’t, he didn’t know how he’d forgive himself.

At least here at the station, though, he might still be helpful to someone else. He might still be able to warn Savannah about Bedell—to prepare her for a possible confrontation with the confidence man she’d unwittingly lured west with all her sweetly worded letters … and that pretty picture of hers, too.

Adam had spent far too much time gazing at the picture he’d pilfered. But he couldn’t regret that. Not after everything that had happened. Looking at Savannah’s picture had been the best part of this mission so far, he reckoned. Not that he intended to reveal as much in his mandatory report to the agency.

Reminded of that report, Adam grew newly alert.

Where was his agency journal? He usually kept it in his saddlebags, but …

But they were lost, he remembered, along with his horse.

His journal was gone right along with them, then. So was all the proof he’d gathered over the past year of Roy Bedell’s criminal nature. The official wanted poster. The newspaper clippings. The tattered correspondence from the family of the woman Bedell had murdered in Kansas City. They’d been the ones to contact the agency. They’d been the ones who’d specially requested Adam, counting on his past as a former U.S. Marshall to bring in the confidence man when others had lost his trail.

Looking into their grieving faces, Adam had sworn to bring their daughter’s killer to justice. He refused to fail them now.

Maybe he could convince Savannah to let him stay at the station awhile—to lay a trap for Bedell. With her cooperation, Adam could double his chances of catching the man, and he could protect her at the same time. It was the only way to proceed.

With that decided, Adam tried moving again. Helpless against the pain in his shoulder, head and ribs, he groaned.

Instantly Savannah Reed rushed into the room. Her rustling skirts warned him of her arrival—but nothing could have prepared him for the sight of her. In the light streaming from the room’s single curtained window, she appeared downright angelic. Her face was scrubbed clean, her golden hair was wound high, and her eyes were the same shade of guileless blue as the sky outside.

“You’re awake! Glory be. Now don’t strain yourself.”

She hurried to his side. She fluttered her hands in a moment’s indecision, then placed them on his arms to help him get upright. Next, she leaned to arrange the pillows behind him. The flowery smell of her skin caught Adam unawares. So did the hasty glimpse he caught of her bosom. He cursed himself for noticing it, even dazedly. Sternly he jerked his gaze upward.

That didn’t help. Her face was alight with warmth, her cheeks pink and her features filled with a caring he’d scarcely seen—much less been the recipient of. He’d been a foundling child, shunted from one distant relation to another. Growing up, Adam had convinced himself he didn’t need to be cared for. He didn’t need anything. He’d always been tough, and proud of it.

But now, upon seeing Savannah gazing at him with such evident care and concern, Adam felt plumb walloped with how much he liked being looked at that way. Especially by her.

His heart opened a fraction. Sappily he smiled.

“Oh, good. You must be feeling better.” Savannah beamed. “Now hold still while I give you more of Doc Finney’s tincture.”

Obligingly Adam opened his mouth for a spoonful of the medicine she offered. Too late, he realized he was never this trusting. But by then he’d already swallowed the foul stuff.

“That’s perfect.” Savannah smoothed the quilts over him. Her hands patted innocently over his chest and legs. Her face showed no signs that she realized what effect her actions might have on a man—even an injured one. “There. Is that better?”

Bedeviled by yearning, Adam pointed at his knee.

“I think you missed a spot,” he said in a raspy voice. “Right there.”

To his mingled pleasure and chagrin, Savannah patted his knee. Her gentle touch put all manner of unchivalrous thoughts in his head. Artlessly and agreeably, she tucked in the quilts all around him. Adam fought a powerful urge to kick them loose again, just to experience the tender way she had of touching him. He felt cosseted, cared for … downright beloved.