“Yes?”
“Tell us what you know of Ship Campbell.”
Emmaline froze, focusing very hard on meeting the stranger’s eyes to ensure that she wouldn’t flinch. Though she had known deep in her bones that he was there looking for Ship, it was still a shock to hear the words. A million thoughts went through her mind at once. What did they want with him? Had they really come all this way to find him? If the strangers were looking for Ship, then it meant that Ship was still alive. But what had he done this time? Dear God, the man was too foolhardy to go off robbing banks. Why hadn’t she tried harder to stop him? Lord knows they bumped heads more often than not, but she didn’t want him dead. He’d taken her in like she was his own daughter—though that wasn’t saying much—and they needed the meager supplies he brought them.
She was staring too long. Say something! Damn Ship and Pete! She was the one in immediate danger just then, not them. Did the men know who she was? Her instinct said no, since they hadn’t immediately noticed her upon coming into the saloon. All three of them had looked over the other customers first. That meant they thought that Ship might be there. Did they know where he lived? Had they already ridden out to the farm and found her sisters alone?
Before she could let her fear run wild, she licked her suddenly parched lips and tried for a nonchalant tone. “The name sounds familiar, but I don’t believe I know him.” Partial truths. That way the lies sounded more believable. Pete had told her that once and she’d wondered why it was something she’d needed to know. Apparently he’d been preparing her for the day someone came looking for them. Oh, God, what had they done?
The Spaniard stared at her as if trying to decide if he believed her. With careful precision, she removed her gaze from his stare and looked to the pretty one. He’d moved forward, elbows resting on the table with his hands cupped around the tumbler he’d just splashed whiskey into. He stopped swirling the liquid around the clouded glass to watch her. His gaze was narrowed on her face, trying to catch a tell, anything that proved she was lying.
And then he smiled. A small, almost imperceptible upturn of his lips on the left side. It was followed by a clarity in his eyes, a softening of the intensity that had been leveled on her as he’d tried to figure her out. That clarity was a knowing that hadn’t been there before. That’s the moment she suspected that she was a terrible liar.
“Can I get you anything else?” She did her best to level her gaze on the Spaniard. He didn’t bat an eye as he stared her down, but knowing that she was quickly losing her grip on her composure, she raised an eyebrow and glanced to her wrist where he still held her. She needed to get away from them.
After a moment, when she would have sworn her heart stopped beating, he let her go. Giving them a tight smile, she somehow managed to keep her walk steady all the way back to the bar. She couldn’t tell if they knew that she was Ship’s stepdaughter. She couldn’t tell if they’d bought her lie. The only thing she knew was that she had to get home to her sisters. The thought of Ginny and Rose home alone, vulnerable to those dangerous men, made a jolt of panic threaten to suck the air from her lungs. At twelve and nine, she hated to leave them home alone anyway, but she had little choice in the matter when they needed food and Ship left them with so little. Sometimes the meal she brought home from Jake’s was all she and the girls had. The small garden she managed to tend during the warm months barely kept them supplied with enough vegetables to last through the winter, and the chickens wouldn’t lay when the days got shorter. Not that they had many hens left after Pete’s last drunken binge when he’d demanded a feast for himself and the men.
Stifling her anger along with the disturbing images of what might happen if the outlaws found her sisters alone, she set her tray on the bar and tightened her hands into fists to stop their shaking. “I have to go home, Jake.” Trying to appear casual and in control, she dared not look back over her shoulder at the table.
“What did he say to you?” Jake topped off the beer he was pouring and set it on the bar, careful to not look too interested in what she had to say.
“He asked about Ship. I don’t know if they know who I am, but I have to get home and check on my sisters.”
He nodded in understanding, but in the very next breath warned her against leaving. “They’ll get suspicious if you turn tail and run now.”
“Maybe, but what if they sent someone there already? He could be hurting them.”
“Yeah, what if?” He wiped at a drop of beer on the unvarnished bar and slanted her a dubious look. “You think you can help them now?”
“I think my revolver could do some damage.”
Jake sighed and looked out at the men talking in small groups near the stove, anywhere but at the table with the three strangers. “You shouldn’t go alone, Em. I don’t like it.”
“Me neither, but I have to. I’ll wait a few minutes and pretend it’s the end of my shift.”
He grimaced, but didn’t argue. “At least take Bette. She’s over at the stable.”
Bette was a swaybacked horse that was at least thirty if she was a day. Emmaline figured she had a better chance of making the four-mile trip faster on foot. “Thanks, but you know how I feel about horses. Besides, it’s too dark to see the road and I’m afraid I’d break both our legs before I made it home.”
“I’ll come out after closing and check on you and the kids.”
“I’d appreciate that.”
He gave her a nod and she made herself look busy until she could slip out the back. She didn’t even take the time to change as she would have on a normal night. Instead, she pulled Pete’s old coat on over her costume and tucked her winter dress under her arm as she stole out the back door, heart beating wildly, her only thoughts of getting home.
The hastily erected buildings of the town showed their age. Even in the light of the half-moon, it was clear they were nothing more than unpainted clapboard held together by a few nails. The alley she stepped into was a mess of mud and muck left over from the storm that had rolled through almost a week ago. She took in a breath as she stepped off the back stoop and into the bog, grimacing as it sucked at her boots and thankful the trail leading out of town would be an easier walk. Everywhere else had dried out, while the town’s roads stubbornly held on to the mud.
Her little part of the world was still cold in early April, particularly at night when the sun disappeared, leaving the valley to languish in the shadow of the mountains. A bitter wind blew in over those peaks and often didn’t let up until morning. Sometimes it blew so long, Emmaline feared that it would never let up, that it would just keep blowing until it blew every trace of their lives away. She’d oblige it and leave if she could ever scrape up enough money. But with Ship’s schemes, Pete’s drinking, and everyday expenses like food and clothing, it didn’t look like that day would ever come. Besides, there was only one way to get the kind of money she’d need to take her sisters with her and ensure their safety, but it was so abhorrent, she couldn’t consider it.
But then there were the nights that came later into spring and summer. The wind could be gentle and warm, and the moon was clear, lighting stars in the sky for as far as the eye could see. On those nights she loved it here in her quiet part of the world. On those nights she didn’t mind the long walk home. On those nights she could actually begin to think that everything would be all right, eventually.
This wasn’t one of those nights.
Casting a harsh glance toward the swells in the distance still covered in snow, she took a deep breath and pulled the collar of her coat up to cover her ears. It was going to be a long walk.
*