Chapter 38
CHAPTER 38
The first rider to catch up to Max and the others the next day on the long ride home was Bart’s ranch hand Nick, who met up with the slower-moving James family cavalcade as they were arriving at the Fielding ranch, where Matthew and Marilee had resumed their residence.
June, dressed like Livia in one of those long calico dresses, had just pulled her large, gray, built-for-long-distance buggy to a stop in the shade of a cluster of cottonwood trees to the right of the rustic front porch of the Fieldings’ log house, the buggy’s wheels crunching over the packed dirt. Cally, just ahead of Max in a dark riding skirt and long-sleeved lavender blouse of heavy cotton, had stopped Apollo in front of a hitching rail off to the left, on the other side of the porch steps, her hair in a long, dark braid beneath her cowgirl hat.
Stocky and grim, Nick brought his red-and-white pinto horse to a halt between them. Sweating in the hot sun, he recounted with a solemn face the news that Hugo had left town two hours after Max and the others—after hiring a group of former Pinkerton thugs from Laramie, who were expected to arrive at the Crown of the West in two days.
June gasped, Livia gasping beside her in the buggy. Astride Zeus, Bart, dressed in denim trousers and a faded-green Western shirt, tensed at the news, his face turned as grave as stone.
Max’s heart began to pound. He’d known somehow today would be the day he had to kick Hugo out of Wyoming once and for all. The deep foreboding he’d woken with that morning, a sense of danger and finality traveling down his spine, had been too like the ones he’d had the day he’d traveled to the past for him to ignore.
Nick had followed Hugo, who was traveling with his henchman Wulfdag, his black-suited equerry who’d accompanied him to the Sky Top five days ago, his personal doctor, and his butler—all the Evil Prince had left of his household—along the wagon trail from town, until they’d branched off onto the side trail that split off toward the Porter place and the Crown beyond, then Nick had raced as fast as he could to get the news to Bart, taking multiple shortcuts.
Max frowned as he brought Ares to a stop at the hitching rail, beside Cally and Apollo, his own face grim. “Hugo’s digging in,” he said as Bart thanked Nick, and Nick turned and rode his horse around to the back of the house, toward the Fieldings’ barn, where the rest of the ranch hands who’d accompanied the family from town had gone to water their horses. “He’s not turning tail.”
“Did you expect him to?” Bart said, dismounting from Zeus on Cally’s other side.
“I’d hoped.” The tension that had accompanied Max the entire ride deepened. Even he understood the danger of the Pinkertons.
“I wonder how he’ll pay them,” June said, descending gracefully from her buggy, Bart striding to the buggy’s other side and helping Livia down.
“It’s possible he won’t,” Max said, dismounting from Ares and untying his canteen from his saddle, hot and sweaty in his denim trousers, red Western shirt, and the dark-brown leather vest that matched his cowboy hat and boots. “He might use them to get his revenge on us and his neighbors, then leave Wyoming without paying his financial obligations.”
“I wouldn’t want to make an enemy of that gang of former Pinkertons,” Cally said, lithely jumping down from Apollo.
Livia leaned heavily against Bart for a long moment, worry in her eyes. “Perhaps Stubby can head them off with a counteroffer.”
Max, wanting to hold Cally’s hand, wanting to put his arm around her, wanting to hold her close to his body and kiss her until the foreboding that had traveled with him all day went away, took a long drink from the canteen instead, then wrapped Ares’s reins around the hitching post. “Perhaps,” he said, moving to Cally’s side. He’d debated a hundred times during the long ride whether to tell her he loved her, but every time, the foreboding had held him back. “But I’m not going to wait around to find out.”
Starting Livia toward the front porch, Bart narrowed his eyes. “What are you thinking, Max?”
“It’s time to use our secret weapon,” Max said.
“Which is?” June said.
Max smiled, but it was grim. “Me.”
A bird called out in a rough squawk from the cottonwood trees—a blue jay, if Max remembered Cally’s lessons on Wyoming flora and fauna correctly. More birds—the small, lark- like, redheaded ones predominant in the area—dived and chirped.
The sound of the creek that flowed beyond the back of the house across the Fieldings’ grasslands came faintly on the hot, dry air, the scent of nearby pine and of something baking in the house carried on a light breeze.
Max pulled an expensive piece of fine ivory-colored paper from his buttoned shirt pocket beneath his vest, the paper folded tightly into a small square the size of a credit card, in the way the old king—Hugo’s father—used to fold his letters. A flat, circular blob of the king’s royal-blue wax sealed it closed, the wax impressed with the king’s seal, which Max was wearing on his finger.
“What’s that?” Cally said at his side, that unique scent of hers that he was coming to realize was a mixture of rosewater, woman, horse, and leather, wafting from her.
“A letter from Hugo’s father, demanding his return to Zalgravia.”
“Where’d you get that?” she said, surprise on her pretty face.
“I wrote it last night after the party.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You reckon he’ll believe it’s from the king?”
“It’s pretty close to the king’s handwriting. My sisters and I used to study letters from our ancestors when we were younger, letters to other countries, starting or ending wars, and then we’d pretend to write our own. Yes, I know that sounds strange,” he said at the appalled look from Livia, “but it’s actually good practice for potential rulers to realize the power they have in their hands to affect the lives of millions of others.” He tucked the letter back into his pocket, careful not to dislodge the wax. “And the king’s seal is a big deal. Unless King Maximilian’s telegram the other day to Hugo was along the lines of ‘Doing a good job there, son,’ Hugo won’t dare question it.”
“You think he’ll go?” Bart said.
“It’s worth a try,” Max said. “I don’t want to give him another chance at trying to harm any of you.” His heart missed a beat. At trying to harm Cally. “Let’s give him the silver trophy cup he so covets and send him back to Zalgravia.”
A stubborn expression crossed Cally’s face. “It’s mine,” she said.
“I know,” Max said and took her hand. “And you earned it. But Hugo needs to take it back to Zalgravia, so I can have it in the future before I come here.” If not, if Hugo didn’t end up with the silver cup, Max wouldn’t be able in the future to hold it on the bridge at the wildlife sanctuary, and if he didn’t have it at the wildlife sanctuary, then he wouldn’t end up in the past, to stop Hugo from harming Cally.
She frowned at him for a moment as his head spun at the intricacies of time travel, then understanding lit in her eyes. How much of it she’d guessed, he wasn’t sure. “All right,” she said. “But I’m coming with you.”
“Cally,” Max said in a quiet voice. He knew her well enough to know she’d balk if he told her she wasn’t coming. “I need to do this on my own.”
Distress crossed her beautiful face. Her hand gripped his tighter. “You can’t trust him, prince. You know that.”
“I don’t trust him, Cally. That’s why I need you to stay here. So I can focus on running him out of town.”
“You’re afraid he’ll hurt me.”
“I am.”
“You’re concerned he might win this time.”
“He came too close to you yesterday. My God, his man nearly shot you from your horse.”
“I reckon it was Apollo the man was aiming for,” she said, the frown back, a cold rage mixed in with it. “Prince Hugo didn’t want to lose.”
“Either way, you’d have been harmed.” Harmed in a way Max hadn’t expected. Until yesterday, he’d thought her death had been because she’d rejected Hugo’s advances, not because she’d been about to win a horse race.
She gave him a long look. “All right,” she said grudgingly. “But I want a kiss before you go.”
Halfway up the four porch steps, Bart closed his eyes, brotherly pain on his face.
Livie tried to hide a smile.
Ma caught her breath, but she didn’t say no.
Cally gazed into Max’s eyes. He was goin’ to sacrifice himself for her. She knew he was, though he would never say so. Sometime in the near future, something was going to happen between his ancestor and her that she wouldn’t survive, or wouldn’t come out on the right end of, something he’d learned of before he’d traveled to her time. It was the only reason she could think that he would endanger himself when he didn’t have to.
He loved her.
She loved him.
She loved him fiercely.
It had caught up with her all silent and swift like. She hadn’t been expecting it. He’d been a handsome stranger who’d come from the future and had raced her on horseback, and beaten her at checkers, and argued with her about the best way to aim a rifle. Not like any of the other fellers she knew. Not like any of the young men she’d grown up with, here in the mountains, or where she’d gone to school in town. Not like any of the young men she’d met in Denver and Cheyenne, though they’d done their best to win her favor.
No, Max had washed up from the future, practically at her feet, and had proceeded to make her life a joy she’d never imagined life could be.
And now he was goin’ to confront his ancestor, with the disadvantage that he couldn’t harm him in a way that would cause his death, not if he wanted to survive himself. All because his heart had decided he was hers.
“A good kiss,” she told him. “A good, long, ‘I might not ever see you again’ kiss, prince. You get ready to go, then I’ll be waiting for you outside.” She glanced at her mother. “I’m going to kiss him in front of everyone, Ma. I want everyone to know I’ve made my choice.”
Inside the house—a modest log house, larger than a cabin, but smaller than the ranch house at the Sky Top—Matthew and Marilee welcomed everyone with lemonade, sandwiches, and an abundance of questions about the town dance and the horse race the day before. Half-listening to the conversation, Max swiftly ate and drank. Now that he’d decided to take action, he wanted to get it over with.
Finding a moment when June was alone in the kitchen, with Marilee occupied on the back porch with her young son Jeremiah, Max joined Cally’s mother with a serious expression on his face. “The third quest, ma’am,” he said in a low, formal voice: to get Hugo out of their hair for good, something he’d promised her yesterday afternoon. He knew this was the moment to end things with his ancestor—that damned foreboding just wouldn’t let go. He knew he must go alone, trusting that his family resemblance would protect him, whether Hugo still believed he was the Duke of Balmont or not, Max trusting that he could bluff Hugo with the king’s seal.
Hugo might try to beat him up, but he wouldn’t try to kill him.
The most important thing was to ensure that no one else tried to kill Hugo.
Setting down a metal coffee pot, June gazed at him gravely, her expression so like Cally’s, the same blue eyes, the same oval face. “You acquitted yourself with honor on the first two,” she said in her own quiet, formal voice, and he felt as if he were at the monarch’s side, being acknowledged for his successful missions, with a third still to be accomplished. “You stepped aside and encouraged her suitors at the dance, and charmed their parents.”
“Not to mention completing the first three tests for her suitors, too,” Livia said softly from the doorway, the others behind her in the living room still talking loudly about the events in town. She stepped into the kitchen, a concerned expression on her face, for his future safety, he thought, and Cally’s future happiness, and he wondered if she felt the same foreboding he did. “If she were to somehow end up in the future with you, Max…”
June sent her a concerned look.
Max said, “I don’t see how…”
“But if she did,” Livia insisted.
A fierce emotion swept through him. “I would beg her to marry me. I would pledge the rest of my life to her. I would love her with every bit of heart and soul that I had.” He took a deep breath, and put his hand over the heart he’d just pledged, his gaze on June. “I would treat her with honor, ma’am. I swear on my life I would always treat her with honor.”
June’s grave expression deepened. “Must you go alone to confront Prince Hugo?”
“Yes,” he said. “I can’t afford to let anyone else be a part of it. It puts Hugo too much at risk if things turn violent.”
She gave a slow nod. Beside her, Livia’s brow furrowed, tears building in her eyes. “Then go with my gratitude, Max,” June said, clasping his hand between hers, “for what you’ve done for my daughter. For what you’re about to do.”
Feeling like a knight in shining armor, except his horse was a bay stallion, not a white charger, and his armor a leather vest, he gave the two ladies a low bow and strode past them into the living room and out the front door.
Cally was waiting outside at the foot of the porch when Max stepped out of the house, the horses and buggy having been taken around to the barn by the ranch hands. The trail dust had been washed from her lovely face and brushed from her riding skirt and lavender blouse. Her cowgirl hat hung on her back from the cord around her neck.
Sitting on one end of the lowest porch step was her silver racing trophy.
He took the steps down to her side, her sweet body leaning toward his.
Despite her announcement that she would kiss him in front of everyone, everyone other than the two of them had made themselves scarce. “I reckon you know something about my future that I don’t know,” she told him in a quiet voice. Tears—my God, tears —glittered in her beautiful blue eyes. “I reckon you aim to prevent it if you can.” Her fingers pressed to his lips. “I know you can’t tell me.”
He wrapped his hand around hers and kissed her fingertips. “I love you, Cally.” The words seemed to burst from his heart. “With my heart. With my body. With my very soul. I wasn’t going to tell you. I didn’t want you to mourn my love after I returned to my time, but I have a feeling you already know how I feel about you.”
“I reckon I do.” Her free hand gently touched his cheek. “I love you, Max,” she said in a soft, fierce voice, “I ain’t never letting you go,” then he caught her in his arms and kissed her.
‘A good kiss,’ she’d told him, and he made it the best he knew how, infusing his lips with the love in his heart, filling the arms that held her with the desire and tenderness he felt, holding her tightly to him, in case he never saw her again.
His heart sang at the touch of her. His desire drew down deep, deeper than he’d ever felt, and he cupped the back of her head in one hand and kissed her deeper.
All those womanly feelings Ma and Livie had told Cally about flooded her body, and she held Max tighter, pressing her body harder to his, wanting him in a way she didn’t understand, but the want was powerful strong, and she met his mouth with need and love.
Someone cleared their throat.
Cally held Max tighter.
“Cally,” Bart said in a low tone.
Reluctantly, she pulled away from Max.
“Say goodbye,” Bart told her.
That’s what she’d been doing, she thought, but she didn’t say so to Bart. She knew he could have told Max to be on his way long before there’d even been a kiss.
Bein’ respectable was a mighty confusing thing.
Max’s eyes met hers, warm and loving, a promise in them, that he would come back.
She sent him her own promise in her gaze, that she would be waiting for him when he returned. She left out the part that she was coming after him.
Someone had to have his back.