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“There’s ‘knowing’ and ‘knowing,’ Mrs. O’Donnell. I sure as h—sure as hens lay eggs wasn’t expecting anything like you.”
“Mr. Pinkerton selected me especially for this assignment. It will be easier to disguise my purpose in Smoke River. Being a woman, I mean.”
He fanned his gaze over her body again. “There’s not a way in hell to disguise that fact, Mrs. O’Donnell. Seems Pinkerton didn’t think this all the way through.”
She watched him study her face. Oh, my. The sheriff’s eyes were such a dark blue they looked almost black. And tired. And mysterious in a way that made her knife hand tremble.
She laid her shaking hand in her lap. “Mr. Pinkerton always thinks things through. A woman can be in plain sight and still be in disguise. No one will question a female being in your company.”
“Yes, they will,” he said. “I’m pretty much known as a loner around these parts. A woman in my company, especially one like you, will have tongues wagging all the way to Gillette Springs.”
“Not if I am your sister, on a visit.” She picked up her knife.
“Not possible.”
“Oh? Why not?”
“I was raised in an orphanage. I’ve no idea who my parents were, save that they were in a hurry to get rid of me. So I don’t have any sister, and the whole town knows it.”
Maddie thought for a long moment. “Your cousin, then. We will tell people I am your cousin.”
“My cousin!” His left hand jerked and his fork skittered off the table.
“Once removed,” she purred.
Rita appeared, rescued the sheriff’s fork and supplied another. “Want me to cut up your steak for you, Johnny?”
He grunted. The waitress made quick work of the sheriff’s meat and retreated to the kitchen. He speared a bite left-handed, then swigged down a gulp of coffee.
Again she noticed something unusual about him—the way he handled his coffee cup. He turned the handle away from him and picked it up by covering the top with his fingers and lifting up by the rim. He slurped in the liquid between his thumb and forefinger. But he never took his eyes off her face.
“If you are my cousin,” she admonished, “you should stop looking at me like that.”
He clanked the cup onto its saucer. “Like what?”
“Like you have never laid eyes on me before.”
He stared at her. “Shoot, lady, I haven’t laid eyes on you before.”
Maddie swallowed. She had never encountered anyone like this man. He was tall and he moved quietly, like a big cat she’d seen in the zoo once. He was short-spoken to the point of rudeness. He was amusing in a backhanded sort of way. He was...fascinating.
“Well, Cousin...Jericho, should we not get acquainted?”
“Acquainted?” He frowned.
“Of course. To start with, my given name is Madison. Maddie for short.”
“Maddie.”
She watched his mouth when he said her name. She liked it best when his lips opened for the “mah” and she glimpsed straight teeth so white they looked like fine fired china from England.
“Cousin or not, Mrs. O’Donnell, I don’t need you.”
“Oh, but you do. I have observed that you have been wounded and cannot use your right hand. I am here not only to cover your back but to serve as your gun hand.”
“No, you’re not,” he grumbled. “Tomorrow you’re getting on the train back to Chicago.”
“But you cannot—”
“Try me.”
His lips were not as attractive pressed in the thin straight line they were in now.
Rita popped up to take their plates. “Like some dessert tonight? Got some fresh rhubarb pie, Johnny.”
“No, thanks.”
“Rhubarb!” Maddie’s mouth watered. “My mother’s cook made rhubarb pies every summer. I would simply love a piece of pie. A big one.”
The sheriff’s eyebrows did their little dance again.
“And a scoop of ice cream on top, please.”
The sheriff looked at her as if she had cotton bolls growing out her ears. “You don’t like rhubarb?” she asked.
“Love rhubarb. Just lost interest in the idea right now. We were talking about the train to Chicago.”
“You were talking. I was not.”
“Look, Mrs.—Cousin Madison—”
“Maddie,” she reminded.
“The Tucker gang’s not just dangerous, they’re mean. All five of them are escaped convicts, and they’re desperate.”
Her coffee cup paused midway to her mouth. “Do you know their identities?”
“Only one of them. Tucker. I saw the whole gang once, after they pistol-whipped a train engineer so bad he couldn’t see for a month. Saw their dust when they rode off, and counted five horses.”
“Did you recognize any of the horses?”
“Yep. All stolen from the Bevins ranch up north. Didn’t see the gang again until the next gold shipment was stolen.”
“Is that when your arm was injured?”
“Yeah. I was on the train, but just as I got to the mail car, one of them fired on me. Bullet caught my wrist.”
She fished her notepad and pencil out of her reticule. “And how long ago was that?”
“Eight days. Why all the questions if you’re leaving in the morning?”
“Sheriff Silver...Jericho.” She smashed her spoon into the scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of her piecrust. “The Smoke River bank manager hired me for a reason, Sheriff. I have a job to do and I intend to do it. The last thing—the very last thing—I am going to do tomorrow is leave.”
A forkful of rhubarb-stained ice cream disappeared past her lips.
Jericho sat back in his chair and stared at the woman across from him. What she was doing to her ice cream was exactly what he felt like doing as well, only not with a slab of pie.
“I don’t need you, Mrs. O’Donnell.”
“I am not leaving tomorrow,” she replied calmly. Her lips, he noticed, were colored rhubarb pink.
“Yeah, you are.”
“No,” she said calmly, “I am not. For one thing, with your arm in a sling you are not strong enough to force me onto the train. And for another, you do need me. I am a crack shot.”
She couldn’t be. She was full of baloney and a liar to boot. He had to get rid of her before she got all tangled up in something she didn’t know squat about and got herself hurt.
The thought sent a knife into his gut, a knife he’d thought long since forgotten.
“You realize I could have my deputy arrest you.”
She just grinned at him. “Your deputy is already swoony over me. He would never arrest me.”
Well, damn. He couldn’t let her stay. She could be dangerous to have around. He couldn’t shoot straight enough left-handed to protect himself, let alone protect her, too.
Somehow he had to scare her off.
“Listen, lady, I don’t know any way but blunt, so here it is. It’s no dice. You’ll get us both killed.”
“I would not. I would be an asset.”
“Don’t kid yourself. I’d spend more time looking after you than catching up with Tucker. I can’t risk it.”
Her eyes flared into green fire. “You mean you won’t risk it. All outlaw chasing is risky and every Pinkerton agent accepts that. I did not take you for a coward, Sheriff.”
Jericho stared at her. She could sure talk a blue streak. Pretty convincing, too, with her chin jutted out like that and those ivy-colored eyes boring into him.
He massaged his chin. “You wouldn’t be a help, lady. You’d be a damn nuisance.”
She stabbed her fork into the center of her ice-cream-soaked pie. “Would you care to bet, Mr. High and Mighty? Within the next fifteen minutes, I will prove my worth to you. And when I do,” she added in a voice that could cut glass, “you can buy my breakfast tomorrow morning. Is it a deal?”
Hell’s bells, she made him so mad he couldn’t think straight. “If you’re finished mauling that pie, I’ll escort you to your hotel room.”
She laid her fork down with deliberate care. “I said, is it a deal?”
“Deal,” he bit out.
She scooped up the last mouthful of rhubarb-flavored ice cream and folded her napkin beside the plate. “Seeing me to the hotel won’t be necessary, Sheriff.”
“Don’t argue,” Jericho shot back. “We’re not in Chicago, ma’am. In this town at night it’s necessary.”
Once outside the dining room, she marched along beside him, talking a mile a minute while Jericho clenched his teeth.
“What a pretty little town this is.” She gestured across the street. “Just look at all those lovely green trees.”
He grunted. She might talk a lot, but again he noted her gaze was always moving, taking in everything from the street to the boardwalk to the storefronts.
Jericho only half listened to her chatter. “...in Philadelphia, where I was raised...and then Papa...I guess you could say that I ended up in a fancy cage with a rich, very dull banker. Just when I couldn’t stand it one more minute, he caught pneumonia on a sleigh ride and made me a widow.”
She paused for breath. “My goodness, what smells so sweet?”
“Honeysuckle. Along the boardinghouse fence.” He gestured with his sling arm, then winced.
“Do you think the owner would mind if I picked some for my room? What heaven, to smell that delicious fragrance all night long.”
“The owner is Mrs. Sarah Rose. Lost her husband at Antietam. She won’t mind, she picks it herself when somebody’s ailing or havin’ a baby.”
She stepped off the boardwalk and darted across the street to the white picket fence. From somewhere she pulled out a tiny pair of scissors. After a few delicate snips, she returned to his side clutching a straggly bouquet in her gloved hand.
“Oh, look, there’s the mercantile. I must visit the mercantile, and I must find a dressmaker, as well.”
Jericho groaned. A woman could spend hours in the mercantile choosing flower seeds or fabric or...whatever women bought. He followed the lady detective inside, where the proprietor, Carl Ness, slouched behind the counter reading a newspaper. At the sight of Maddie, he straightened up, ramrod stiff.
Jericho didn’t like the way Carl was staring at her, but Maddie seemed unperturbed. Her gaze scanned each shelf.
“Have you any scented bath soap?”
Carl sent Jericho a puzzled look. “What kinda scent?”
“This is Mrs. O’Donnell, Carl. She’s my...”
Maddie turned her attention to the proprietor. “Gardenia is my favorite. Have you any gardenia-scented soap?”
“Nope.”
“What about carnation?”
“Nope.”
She bit her lip. “Heliotrope? Rose?”
“All I got is lavender, ma’am. Take it or leave it.”
“I will take half a dozen cakes. Large ones.”
Jericho bit back a laugh. Half a dozen! She’d be the cleanest person in Smoke River.
Carl wrapped up her purchase in brown paper and tied it with string. “Anything else?”
