Sherri Shackelford - A Family For The Holidays

The two boys stared up at him with similar wide brown eyes that marked them as brothers. Since they were bundled head to toe in woolens, he had difficulty gauging their ages. Judging by their conflicting expressions, the taller one was old enough to be terrified by the sudden turn of events, and his little brother was young enough to be enthralled.

Thankful the hostile weather had kept most folks inside, Jake frantically searched the deserted street. He’d rather be rounding up murderous outlaws than this bunch. Killers were predictable. They didn’t faint at the least provocation.

Was he really that menacing?

The younger boy blinked. “I’m Peter and this is Sam. What’s wrong with Miss Lily?”

“Miss Lily fainted.” Her name rolled off Jake’s tongue. The floral moniker suited her. As he adjusted her in his arms, his chin brushed against her silky blond hair. “Sometimes ladies faint.”

“It’s true.” Sam nodded sagely. “In St. Joseph, our mom had a whole couch just for fainting. She kept it in the parlor.”

Which was probably a better explanation than anything an adult might concoct.

“Exactly.”

“You never answered Peter’s question,” the older boy spoke. “Are you an outlaw?”

“That depends on what you consider an outlaw.”

Peter cupped his hand over his brother’s ear and whispered loudly, “I think that means he’s an outlaw.”

Jake rolled his eyes.

He’d done his job well. Everyone in town thought he was a gun for hire, and he’d never corrected the assumption. Gazing into the troubled faces of these two young boys, he loathed his deception.

Except this was not the time to dwell on the subject. “Let’s get Miss Lily out of the cold.”

The boys were wary, but with no other choice, they reluctantly agreed.

Avoiding the restaurant entrance, Jake made his way toward the hotel lobby. The fewer people who saw them together the better. The desk clerk rarely left the back room unless she was summoned by the bell.

Anonymity was key in his profession.

As a marshal for the United States government, he’d traced a shipment of faulty guns sold to the Cherokee back to Frozen Oaks. He had a hunch, but no proof. The man he suspected, Vic Skaar, never sullied his own hands. Vic hired others, rarely using the same outlaw twice, which made his illegal activities difficult to track. For the past eight weeks Jake had cultivated his reputation as a hired gun.

Holding an unconscious woman while being trailed by two youngsters was bad for his false reputation.

He carried Lily across the foyer and into a small parlor. As he rested her on a mustard-colored damask settee, her eyelids fluttered.

The two boys hovered over her, and a band of guilt tightened around his chest. Admitting his true identity risked all their lives, which meant there was little he could say to put them at ease. In order to be a good guy, he had to play a bad guy.

“Is Miss Lily your sister?” Jake asked the older boy.

“She’s our chaperone. Miss Lily Winter.”

“I see.”

He should have realized immediately she wasn’t related. She was too young to be their mother and her coloring was far lighter than the brothers’ dark hair and eyes.

“She traveled with us from St. Joseph,” Peter said. “To keep us safe.”

They should have sent a fourth person along to keep Lily safe. Jake brushed a wisp of blond hair from her pale forehead. The wool collar of her coat had bunched beneath her chin and he released the top button. The thread was darker, indicating a recent mending. The new porcelain button with its painted yellow daisy was a dash of color and extravagance that didn’t match her drab wool coat.

Much like the whimsical fastening, Lily didn’t belong among these plain surroundings either.

To begin with, she was tiny. The older boy, Sam, nearly topped her. Her clothing was simple and purposeful, which might have dulled another woman. On Lily, the unadorned style perfectly showcased her elegant features. Her heart-shaped face held enormous blue eyes and a mouth in the shape of a bow. Her flaxen hair was shot through with lighter and darker strands, creating a cascade of molten color. In a town where the men outnumbered the women five to one, Lily stood out like the first flower of spring.

His gut twisted. Lilies tended to get trampled underfoot around here.

Peter sniffled, yanking Jake back to his current dilemma.

Jake placed a comforting hand on the child’s shoulder. “Has Miss Lily been ill?”

Surely he hadn’t felled her with his threatening stance alone.

“Maybe. I don’t know.” The boy shrugged. “We’ve been traveling for days and days. I don’t think she slept very well last night. She read my book and lost my page.” A guilty flush spread across the boy’s cheeks. “Not that I minded or anything. She’s actually really nice and she let me buy a penny candy at all the train stops.” He snapped his fingers. “I think trains and stagecoaches make her sick. She holds her stomach and turns green. But when we’re not moving, she’s fine. This morning she gave most of her breakfast to Sam and she only ate the toast. But that might have been because Sam is always hungry.”

Sam chucked his brother on the shoulder. “She told me I could have it.”

The telling sacrifice brought back memories of his own mother, and Jake fought against the tide of the past. In a blink the years slipped away. He’d been little older than Sam when she’d been murdered by outlaws. In what began as an uneventful day, she’d dragged him along on her errands, and her last stop had been the bank. Bored, he’d leaned against the counter and passed the time spinning a penny on its narrow edge. His mother had promised a visit to the general store when they finished.

In a flash there’d been gunshots and shouting. His mother had shoved him behind her, but she hadn’t dropped to the ground like the other bank patrons. Her hesitation had cost her her life. The rest of that day was a blur. In an instant his future had been rewritten.

From that moment on, his path had been set. When outlaws roamed free, innocent bystanders were hurt. He couldn’t bring his mother back, but he could prevent other tragedies.

“It’s not your fault, Sam,” Jake said. “I had a brother who took sick every time he traveled by train.”

Lily groaned and he reached for her hand. Her pulse kicked robustly beneath his fingertips.

“She’ll feel better after she rests and has a good meal.”

Judging by the brothers’ explanations, Lily was cold, tired and hungry. Not to mention she’d encountered a gun-toting outlaw in her path. No wonder she’d fainted. Jake sat back on his heels and rested his hand on his gun belt.

Some days the deception weighed on him heavier than others. “What brings you three to Frozen Oaks?”

Sam and Peter exchanged a glance.

“Our grandpa Emil,” Sam said.

“Emil Tyler?”

“Yep. Our parents died in Africa. We’ve come to live with our grandpa.”

Jake’s misgivings increased tenfold. Emil was an irascible old man who ran a barbershop out of the front of his store, and a high-stakes poker game out of the back. A rumor had been floating around Frozen Oaks that Vic Skaar had recently lost deep to Emil. If Vic had lost money, there was one surefire way to erase his debt that didn’t bode well for the boys. While Jake didn’t peg Vic as a murderer, he wasn’t above hiring someone else.

“Yeah,” Peter said. “Except Grandpa didn’t meet us at the livery like he was supposed to.”

A sharp sense of unease pricked Jake. Emil was missing and Miss Winter was fluttering about like a helpless dove in a nest of grackles. “How far have you traveled?”