Emma's Wish

Maddie didn't realize just how tall the marshal was until he was standing on level ground. Even though she was standing on the porch, she barely reached past his shoulder, and she had to crane her neck to look up at him. When he took a few steps, she felt her fingers tense on the butt of the rifle. "I told you--"

"Just stretching my legs, ma'am."

As he moved, Maddie noticed he had a slight limp, and wondered if he was injured. She wasn't about to ask, though. She didn't care anyway. It could be a trick to make her let down her guard. One of Caleb's friends had tried that, too, the day she'd buried Caleb. She might not have much education, but when it came to common sense, she had more than her share.

She squinted as the setting sun moved behind his shoulder, putting his face into shadow. As if he sensed her unease at not being able to see him clearly, he took off his stained brown Stetson and ran his jacket sleeve across his forehead.

He really was a remarkable looking man. Square-jawed, with a hint of a cleft in his chin, tanned skin, and golden highlights in dusty brown hair just a shade too long to be respectable. But it was his eyes that trapped Maddie's attention. Hazel with tiny flecks of gold that seemed to sparkle in the sunshine, framed by long dark lashes.

Their eyes met, and he smiled.

For no reason, her heart began to flutter with the speed of a hummingbird's wings. Stop it! Maddie admonished herself. Didn't you learn anything from Caleb? Just because a man is nice to look at on the outside doesn't mean he's the same on the inside. If nothing else, you found that out the hard way. Don't go making the same mistakes again, taking men at face value. They turn on the charm when it suits, and then when it's too late, you find out what they're really like.

She forced her gaze away from his until her heartbeat slowed. "Now tell me what you want and then leave. I have work to do, and as you can see," she looked up at the sky, where the sun was hugging the mountains in the distance, "I'm running out of daylight."

"Do you know Caleb's brother, Tyler?"

"What about him?"

"He escaped three days ago from the state prison in Laramie. We think he's headed back here."

Maddie couldn't prevent the gasp escaping from her lips. Her heart began to thump in her chest. "Why?" she asked. "There's nothing for him here."

"There's a lot of money waiting for him here," the marshal responded. "Over ten thousand dollars that Caleb hid from the robbery that got Tyler sent to prison."

"Ten thousand dollars?" The words were little more than a whisper. Caleb had ten thousand dollars stashed somewhere, and she'd had to scrimp just to buy enough flour to make bread to feed them? Maddie shook her head in denial. "That's impossible."

"The money from the bank robbery was never found, and we know ..." he paused, as if he was judging how much information to give her, "Caleb hid it."

Maddie didn't know anything about the robbery at the bank in Eagle Creek other than what Caleb had told her. And he certainly hadn't told her he'd been part of it. Caleb had forbidden her to go into town after the robbery. She'd wondered why at the time, but she knew better than to question him. Because she'd been isolated, she didn't know anything other than that Tyler had been arrested and sent to prison.

"There's no money here, and Caleb couldn't have had anything to do with that robbery." Why she was defending him, she couldn't say. It just seemed as if she she should.

"What makes you so sure?"

Good question.

"I don't know," she replied softly. "I just can't imagine ..."

The marshal stared at her, frowning. Suspicion was evident in the firm set of his jaw. "You trying to tell me you didn't know Caleb was in on that robbery right up to his neck."

"No. I swear I had no idea." She searched the marshal's face for a sign that he believed her. For some unfathomable reason, it was important to her that he did.

"Seems to me a wife would know what her husband is doing when he's not home," the marshal said.

"That depends on the wife ... and the husband."

"Caleb didn't tell you where he went when he went out?"

Caleb hadn't told her much of anything after the first few weeks of their marriage, and if she was being honest, she didn't want to know.

"Your husband was just as guilty as his brother, Mrs. Boone, but the sheriff couldn't get enough proof. One of the girls at the Broken Horse Saloon gave him an alibi. There wasn't much evidence against Tyler either, but when it looked like he might get away with it and want his half of the loot, Caleb testified against him. We figure Tyler's headed back here to settle the score."

Maddie's thoughts strayed from the stranger to Tyler Boone, the man Caleb had introduced her to at their wedding. Tyler was even more handsome than Caleb had been, dark-haired and with a tongue smooth enough to send the hearts of half the women in town aflutter. At first, she'd even been taken in by his flattery and attention. Then, she'd learned different, just as she had learned her husband wasn't the kind, gentle man she'd fallen in love with in Denver.

Later, when she'd heard about the robbery at the bank, and Tyler's arrest for the murder of three people, one of them a little boy, she'd been horrified.

"Do you think you could put the gun down now? I'd like to get my weight off this leg, but I don't want to spook you into firing that thing. Looks like your arms are getting a bit tired, too."