In The Sheriff's Protection

In Tom’s eyes, Hugh wasn’t much of a husband or father, but there had to be a reason Clara stayed here, waiting for him to return. It was called love. The very thing that could tear a person apart like no other. He’d seen it numerous times. And he’d seen people who by rights were completely unlovable, yet there always seemed to be someone else who’d give their life for that same person, all because they loved them.

His hand slid inside his pocket, where it fiddled with the badge he’d taken off before riding into the homestead. His other hand was on his vest, right where the badge had left two tiny and permanent holes. He’d seen Clara’s face today, more than once, gazing fixedly at that spot. She’d never said anything, but the way she wouldn’t look him in the eye after staring at his vest had him believing she’d figured it out. Knew why he was here.

Up until tonight, she hadn’t mentioned her husband, and he hadn’t asked. Billy had said more than enough for him to know he had the right homestead. For some reason, one he couldn’t quite explain, he’d refrained from calling her Mrs. Wilson. Actually, he only called her ma’am. In the full scheme of things, that didn’t mean much, but from the time he’d entered the house and saved her from hitting the floor, he’d felt a draw to her. An uncanny one that just couldn’t be explained. He felt sorry for her, that was a given, but this went beyond sorrow.

His reputation of being a straight-shooting lawman who stuck to the law and didn’t let anything get in the way of that was the reason why the folks of Oak Grove had singled him out and asked him to move to their small town when their acting sheriff was killed during the Indian Wars. He’d been proud of his reputation, proud to serve the town, and hadn’t let a single resident down.

Oak Grove’s mayor, Josiah Melbourne, who, for Tom to keep on the straight and narrow, was probably the most trying man in town, had known about how Julia had been killed during a stagecoach robbery years ago and how, as a newly sworn-in deputy, Tom had brought her murderer in and seen justice was served. That was what Melbourne, and the entire town of Oak Grove, wanted again, and that was what he had to do.

Whether Hugh had a family or not shouldn’t matter. In most cases it wouldn’t, because in most cases he wouldn’t have met them.

Maybe that was what he should do something about. Hendersonville was a two-day ride. He could travel there and get the local sheriff to gather up a posse to stake out the place and arrest Hugh.

No, he had no way of knowing if Hugh would show up here or not. He had to get back out there, find Hugh’s trail. When he found him and arrested him, Clara wouldn’t know it had been him.

But she would eventually find out. And where would that leave her and Billy? She had no income, no way of surviving without the money Hugh dropped off at intervals. That was what it appeared happened. Billy said his father came home every once in a while with lots of presents and money for Clara to give to the neighbors to buy supplies for them whenever they traveled to Hendersonville.

The boy said he’d never been to Hendersonville. Not once. And that Clara hadn’t, either.

In all aspects, if anyone was to ask him, he’d say Hugh Wilson, outlawing aside, should rot in jail for the way he treated his wife and son.

* * *

Although his thoughts had kept him up most of the night, that didn’t prevent Tom from rising early. He’d barely finished his morning routine that included a quick shave before he heard Billy at the well, collecting a pail of water.

“Morning,” he shouted from the open barn door.

“Morning, Tom!” Billy called back. “Ma said if I see ya to say breakfast will be ready shortly! It’s biscuits and gravy! My favorite!”

“Sounds good! I’ll be right there.” Tom turned about to finish packing his gear in his saddlebags. During his sleepless night, he’d determined what he had to do. Leave. He’d told Clara that the work would be done this afternoon, and it would be. In fact, if he got right down to it, it would be done before noon, giving him a good start on getting back to tracking Hugh.

Mind set and gear stored, he headed toward the house, only to stop dead in his tracks at the doorway when he saw Clara.

* * *

The aching in her leg had awoken her early, only because it had been stiff from being used yesterday after lying around for so long. She’d known what would help, and it had. Long before the sun rose, she’d heated water and filled the washtub she used to bathe herself and Billy, and to wash clothes. It wasn’t large enough for her to completely sit in, but it was deep enough for her to soak her leg. Afterward, she’d given herself a thorough scrubbing, and before the water had completely cooled, washed her hair.

It felt good to be clean and to no longer smell like a saloon from the whiskey dousing Tom had used to bring down her fever. She hadn’t taken a bath in a real bathtub since before moving out here, before Billy had been born. It was just one of many things she wanted to do again, but she also knew that most of those things were little more than pipe dreams. This was her life, like it or not.

Tom was the reason she’d even thought about some of those things. Watching him with Billy, talking with him last night, had made her wish harder than ever that there was a small iota of hope that someday things could be different for her and for Billy.

She had put on one of her nicest dresses. A yellow one that she never wore because it would show the dirt too easily, which was silly because there was no one but her and Billy to notice if she got it dirty or not.

Furthermore, she always wore an apron to prevent stains.

Turning, because she’d heard Tom’s footsteps on the porch but had yet to hear him enter the house, she frowned at how he stood in the doorway as if scared to enter.

For a split second she was afraid to have him enter. He must have just gotten done shaving. His face was glistening, as was his hair that still showed the comb marks smoothing it back off his forehead. Even if she hadn’t already witnessed what a good man he was inside, she’d have to admit he was handsome. Maybe that was what took her breath away, knowing he wasn’t just good on the outside, but on the inside where it mattered, yet a person couldn’t see. How different her life would be if she was married to a man like that. Good on the inside. Then she’d have something to be proud of.

Tossing her head slightly to catch her wits, she said, “Good morning, Mr. Baniff. Please sit down. Everything will be ready shortly.”

He stepped forward, twirling his hat with his hands. “It smells good.”

“It’s just biscuits and gravy and some fried potatoes. I’m sorry I don’t have any bacon or ham, but with my injury I haven’t made it over to the Ryan place to pick up a smoked pig lately. I usually do that every few months, and will need to go get one soon. Oh, let me get you a cup of coffee.”

“I can get it,” he said while hanging his hat on the hook by the door.

“No, I’ll get it. You sit down.” Her insides were splattering about like water tossed in hot grease. She was talking as much as Billy usually did, too. It was all because she wasn’t used to a man like Tom. One who didn’t expect to be waited on. One who didn’t bark orders or snarl like a rabid dog just waiting for the chance to bite.

She poured him a cup of coffee and set it on the table. “Sit down. I’ll have your plate ready in a second.”

“What can I do to help? How’s the leg this morning?”

“Nothing, and the leg is fine. You really know a lot about doctoring. I hardly know it had been injured.”

She quickly filled a plate for him and set it on the table, then filled one for Billy, and walked back to the stove. With the coffeepot in one hand, she returned to the table.

“My cup is still full.” Glancing at the table, he frowned at Billy already eating before asking, “Aren’t you going to join us?”

When it was just she and Billy, she did sit at the table, but when Hugh was home, he expected her to be at the stove, ready to bring him a second helping.

“Oh, I’ll wait until you’ve had your fill.”

“This will be more than enough,” he said. “And if I want more, I’m perfectly capable of getting it.” He pushed his chair away from the table. “Actually, you’ve been on that leg long enough already. Sit down while I fix you a plate.”

Taken aback, she found it was a moment before her heart slowed down enough for her brain to function. He was already at the stove, piling food onto a plate. Hurrying toward the stove, she said, “I can do that.”

“So can I,” he said, taking the coffeepot from her hand. “While you sit down.”

He set the pot on the stove and with an expectant look, said, “Go on. Sit down.”

She did so and smiled, though it felt wobbly, at Billy, who was grinning from ear to ear. When a plate was set before her, as well as a cup of coffee, she thanked him, and withheld the need to insist this wasn’t necessary. Although it truly wasn’t. She’d never been waited on and wasn’t sure how to react to it. Or him. Merely looking his way made her stomach fill with butterflies. Lots and lots of precious little butterflies. She’d never felt anything even close to that and had to press a hand against her stomach.

“Where do you usually get the smoked pig?”

Her heart sank. “You don’t like it.” Pushing away from the table, she stood. “I’ll make you something else.”

“No, sit down. This is good. Very good, actually. I was just wondering where you get the pig from.”

“The Ryans are our neighbors,” Billy said. “It’s a long walk, but they have two kids. They’re girls, but still fun to play with.”

“How far is it?”

Clara had sat back down, and noted he was eating the meal as if it tasted good. She sincerely hoped it wasn’t just for show. “They live about ten miles from here.”

“And you walk? Carrying a smoked pig?”

The look of shock on his face almost made her sputter her coffee. Swallowing, and wiping her lips, she shook her head. “Mr. Ryan often gives us a ride home, or if busy, will deliver the pig later.”

“Oh, well, that’s better.” Looking over at Billy’s empty plate, Tom then asked, “You need more?”

Billy nodded.

She pushed away from the table again, but Tom shook his head as he stood. “Bring your plate, Billy. I’ll fill it while filling my own.” He then asked her, “How about you? You need more while I’m up?”

“No, thank you. I’m fine.”

“How about coffee?”

“Good there, too.”

She couldn’t pull her eyes away as the two walked to the stove, and couldn’t stop a smile that formed when Tom asked Billy if he wanted one or two biscuits.

“Two,” Billy answered.

“Me, too. They are the best I’ve ever had.”

Her smile gradually slipped away when she realized she only had the supplies to make the biscuits because of money that Hugh had brought last winter, during his last visit. That was going on five months ago, which meant he’d probably be stopping by anytime now. Not ever the best provider by far, since Walter had died, Hugh usually managed to visit three times a year and leave enough money to keep her and Billy fed during his absences.

The irony was that today, that money was feeding a lawman.

Her appetite hadn’t been great before, but now it was completely gone. She pretended to eat while the other two finished their breakfast and spoke about what they’d get done today. Not only did Tom fully engage Billy in the conversation, he asked questions and then offered explanations on how they’d repair the porch roof and what they’d each need to do and in what order.

She’d wondered about him long and hard last night. Actually, since awaking and discovering him in her house yesterday. She understood she was lonely and that any visitor would occupy her thoughts, but he was different. He made her question things that she had no business questioning. Like why he wasn’t married. A woman would be lucky, extremely lucky, to have him as a husband, and a child wouldn’t know a better father. She’d never thought about a man in those terms before, or in the other terms she found herself thinking about. The kind of thoughts that made those butterflies take to dancing.

“Ma’am?”

Snapping her head up, she pinched her lips at the heat flowing into her cheeks. Praying he didn’t guess where her thoughts had been, she said, “Sorry, I was woolgathering.”

“What were you doing?” Billy asked.

“Thinking about how good that new porch roof will look,” Tom said, with a grin that made her heart skip a beat.

She nodded. “Indeed, it will look wonderful. I’m sure.”

“We’ll get started on it, if you don’t need us to do something first?” Tom asked.

“No, nothing I can think of.”

“Well, then, Billy,” Tom said while standing up. “Carry your plate to the counter and we’ll get started. Don’t forget your glass.”

Billy followed the instructions and headed out the door while Tom was still setting his things on the counter. He walked to the door and collected his hat, but then turned around. “What are you doing here? So far away from town? Far away from neighbors?”

Her throat clenched up and her cup rattled as she set it on the table. “It’s our home.”

He glanced out the door Billy had left open before saying, “There are lots of homes out there, ma’am. Lots of homes. Lots of places to live.”

She stood and started to clear the table. “I’m sure there are.”

“It’s an awful lot of work for you and Billy, out here all alone.”

Her hands started to tremble. “I don’t mind the work, and I prefer it that way. Just Billy and I alone.”

“Don’t you get lonely? Scared?”

Keeping the truth deeply hidden, she said, “Billy chatters too much for me to get lonely, and what good is being scared?”

His frown deepened, but then, as if not able to come up with another response, he nodded. “Thank you for breakfast. It was one of the best I’ve ever eaten.”

Clara bit her lip as she nodded. She’d wanted to tell him that she was lonely and scared all the time, and that all those other homes out there were for other people. Not her. She was where she belonged.

Very irrational thoughts started racing across her mind then, at the sound of Billy’s laughter and Tom’s low chuckle. He’d said he’d leave today, after the roof was repaired. She was trying to think of other repairs she could ask him to take care of. Something, anything, to keep him here just a bit longer.

Not for herself of course, but for Billy. Her son needed this. Needed a man to model, to learn from, to grow up to be like. One who was trustworthy and kind and would be there at all hours of the day and night. One a boy could be proud of.

A wife needed that, too. When her husband rode up the road, the wife should be happy to see him. Excited. Thankful he was home.

She’d thought about a man like that before, just hadn’t imagined she’d meet one.

Flustered by her own thoughts, Clara set into cleaning up the breakfast dishes. Then, with Tom and Billy busy on the roof, and needing to have her mind occupied, she set into washing clothes, including the sheets off the beds.

That was where she was, hanging clothes on the line behind the house, when she heard hoofbeats. Dropping the sheet she’d been clipping on the line, she ran around the house, fully expecting the worst.

What she saw made her heart drop out of her chest.

It wasn’t Hugh riding in, but Tom riding out.

She opened her mouth, but seeing the moisture on Billy’s cheeks, she closed her lips and her eyes, trying to ignore the pain in her chest.

Chapter Four

The porch roof had been done well before noon, as were all the chores and a few other tasks Tom had decided he needed to complete. When he couldn’t find anything else to justify staying longer, he’d saddled up his horse. Billy had wanted to ride with him, and had been upset when he’d said there wouldn’t be room.

There wouldn’t have been. The pig was a good-sized one. Quartered and wrapped in burlap, it hung off his saddle both in front and behind him.

Guilt at not telling Clara where he was going ate at him, but he hadn’t been completely sure where he was going. It was to the Ryans to see about a pig for her, and he’d told himself, depending upon what he’d learn, he might not be back. Just leaving wasn’t his way, but it might be easier in this instance.

Easier wasn’t his way, either.

How? Why had a woman and young boy gotten under his skin so thoroughly, so intensely that he wasn’t acting like himself? Thinking like himself.

He hadn’t even known them that long. But he did know them, and knew more about them after visiting with Donald and Karen Ryan.

The couple had been Clara’s closest neighbors for five years and had never met Hugh Wilson. Not once. But they’d heard plenty about him from her uncle. Walter hadn’t thought much about the man his niece had married. They didn’t believe that Walter had fallen in a ravine, and didn’t hold back in their opinion that he’d either been pushed, shoved, or shot and then thrown down the ravine. It just so happened that Hugh had been home during Walter’s fatal accident. Supposedly helping the old man round up cattle, which had been driven off the ranch and up to Montana, where they were sold within a week of the uncle’s death.

Walter, it seemed, had plenty of questions when it came to Hugh, and had confided in Donald about them. The old man felt that Hugh had ambushed and killed Clara’s parents while they were on their way west, and then ridden in and rescued her. A scared young girl, distraught after burying both of her parents on the Nebraska prairie. When they’d arrived at his place, Clara was already pregnant, and Donald said Walter rued the day he’d done it, but thinking it was best, he’d forced Hugh to marry Clara.

Hashing over all Donald had said during the ride back to her place stirred a powerful bout of anger inside Tom. One he hadn’t felt since chasing down the outlaw who’d killed Julia.

He’d never expected to feel that way again, and knew he shouldn’t in this instance, but couldn’t stop it. Had no control over it.

Mrs. Ryan had told him something else, that she’d once asked Clara why she stayed out here all by herself and that Clara’s only response had been to say, “And go where?”

If he’d ever considered not going back to her place today, Tom had completely changed his mind. Clara was afraid to leave because Hugh would find her wherever she went. She hadn’t said that, nor had Mrs. Ryan, but his gut said that was the main reason Clara stayed put. She was afraid for herself and afraid for her son. Afraid for what Hugh would do when he discovered they were gone and found them. His gut told him something else. Hugh had done something to make her that afraid. That goaded him like nothing had before. That a man could treat his wife in such a way. Then again, Hugh Wilson wasn’t much of a man. Anyone who robbed, thieved, killed, was a beast, not a man. People like that deserved to be caged up, sent to prison, where they couldn’t hurt anyone else, ever again.

Especially not a woman as gentle and kind as Clara.

The more he thought about that, the more he wanted to know.

Both Clara and Billy were in the front yard when he rode up. He’d watched Billy run from the barn to the house and then saw Clara rush out the door while he was still riding down the hill into the valley where the house sat. He tried to ignore what the sight of that did to him, how it lit up his insides, but in the end, gave in and let the smile that tugged on his lips form as he rode in the yard.

“We thought you’d left,” she said.

There was a hint of accusation in her voice, and though it shouldn’t, for he’d said he’d planned on leaving, it bothered him. He didn’t want to cause her any unjust pain. She was good at pretending. He’d seen how she’d favored the leg, but acted as if it was already healed. She was good at keeping things hidden. A lot of things. So was he.

“I did.” He patted one of the burlap quarters hanging off the saddle. “I went to get that smoked pig you talked about this morning.”

“I hadn’t meant for you to go get one,” she said.

The utter surprise on her face made his smile grow. “I know. But it’ll be a while before that leg’s good enough for you to walk that far.” He stopped Bullet and swung out of the saddle to walk the horse the rest of the way to the house.

She shook her head while fighting to hide a smile that kept creeping forward on her lips. “Well, you left before lunch and it’s nearly supper time. You must be starved.”

“I had two helpings of your amazing biscuits and gravy to tide me over.”

“Two helpings weren’t enough for all day.”

“Want me to help you carry that pig down into the cellar?” Billy asked.

“Can’t do it without you,” Tom replied.

“Can I unsaddle Bullet for you afterward, and feed him, too?” Billy asked.

“He’d like that,” Tom said, watching how Clara’s face shone at her son’s offers.

Catching him watching her, she patted her hair, as if checking that the coil was still pinned to the side of her head. Then, as if embarrassed by her actions, she spun around. “I’ll have supper ready by the time you two are done, so wash up afterward and come inside.”

“Don’t have to tell us twice,” Tom said, rubbing Billy’s patch of wayward hair and watching her step onto the porch. “Does she?”

“No, sir,” Billy replied while making a fist and pumping one arm.

A short time later, when walking into the house, Tom was still grinning at the boy’s antics, and hers, or maybe it was just that he was happy. It had been a long time since someone had been there to greet him upon arrival. Someone happy to see him, anyway. Most folks weren’t smiling when a sheriff rode into their yard.

It was more than that, though. Sitting down at the table, sharing a meal with Clara and Billy, carrying on conversations with them, all of those were things he was looking forward to. He’d shared many meals with families back in Oak Grove, and enjoyed them, but this was different. This was something he wanted. There was something else he wanted, too.

“I hope you like fried chicken, Mr. Baniff. I had a hen that was pecking at the others.”

“I do like fried chicken, but I’m wondering if you’d mind calling me Tom.” He shouldn’t be so forward, but if he was going to convince her to leave, he needed her to consider him a friend. Someone she could trust.

“Boy, it smells good in here, doesn’t it, Tom?” Billy said.

The boy’s timing or comment couldn’t have been more perfect. Tom didn’t say a word, merely lifted a brow that he hoped she read as saying that if Billy could use his first name there was no reason she couldn’t.

Her cheeks turned pink as she bowed her head slightly before turning to the stove. “Sit down, both of you.”

Other than the platter she was piling pieces of fried chicken on, the table was set, so he waited until she’d forked the last piece out of the pan before he lifted the platter, signaling he’d carry it to the table.

She didn’t protest as she wiped her hands on her apron while walking to the table. He appreciated that. A woman should expect a man to assist her in all aspects of life, and a man should want to.

As they ate, Billy talked about all the kindling he’d chopped that afternoon, and about helping Clara pluck the chicken clean, stating it had been a long time since they’d had fried chicken. It had been a long time since Tom had eaten fried chicken, too, and doubted he’d ever had any this tasty.

“That was the best chicken I’ve ever eaten, Clara, thank you,” he said when he couldn’t take another bite. Food, no matter what it was, tasted better when shared with others, but that chicken had been exceptional.

“Me, too, Ma,” Billy said.

“I’m glad you like it,” she answered. “Both of you.”

“We liked it so much, we’re going to do the dishes for you,” Tom said.