Chapter Seven

 

An incessant blaring made me groan and tug the feather pillow tighter over my head. Where was that horrible screeching coming from?

I stretched open one eyelid and realized both alarm clocks were screaming blue murder at me.

No! 5:14 in the morning.

Bleary eyed, I remembered what day it was. Trek Day. I scrambled to get out of bed, my feet tangling in the sheets. I’d tossed and turned all night until my covers were a jumbled mess. I half fell to the floor, trying to get my legs under me. Twenty-two minutes to shower and dress before sunrise, which would happen at 5:36 whether I was there or not.

Jumping into the stream of water in the shower, I didn’t even wait for it to warm up, just slapped on some soft-soap and scrubbed my body. Rinsing the shampoo from my hair, I skipped conditioner though I need it more than most. I’d be wearing a bonnet, so who was going to see it anyway?

Tying up the long mass of damp curls with a few hair clips that I suspected were not exactly period pieces, I shimmied into my new fancy underwear and tugged on my long gown. Oh boy, doing the buttons up was going to take more dexterity than I possessed this early. Plunking the bonnet on my head, I went in search of Rose for help doing up the back of my gown.

I knocked loudly. Two minutes before I absolutely had to leave the café. She answered on the second knock, bed headed and rubbing red-rimmed eyes.

“Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“No time to talk. Dress, please.” I turned around and pointed at the problem.

“What are you going to do on the trail?” She fumbled with the fastening and I swallowed hard. How fast could I make the edge of town at this hour? At least Sweetwater had no rush hour, a major traffic jam being two cars waiting to turn onto Main Street.

“I don’t know? Never take it off?”

“How about shoes?” she asked, pointing at my feet sticking out from under the pink-checked gingham gown.

“Shoot.” I tore off back into my apartment and located the old-fashioned footwear hidden under the coffee table. I’d put them on later. I thrust my feet into my bunny slippers, sat down on a chair for a few seconds to avoid bad luck at forgetting something, and counted myself ready.

Shutting the suite door while carrying my shoes, I made a dash for the stairs. I thrust my hand into one of the big pockets my mother had thoughtfully sewn into the skirt. The journal was still tucked safely inside. The last image that stuck with me as I sprinted off was of Rose shaking her head, a lopsided grin directed at me before she closed her door.

To say I envied her would be an understatement. I tore off for the wagon train, certain that getting away, much as I didn’t want to go with Jack Samson, might just be the ticket to some relaxation. I mean, how much work could riding on a wagon seat all day long be? He was doing the driving.

The wagons were to convene on the south end of town. When I got there, I discovered to my horror that everyone was either perched on a wagon or saddled up and ready to leave. The odor of animal manure salted the air and the din of animals stamping about added a suppressed excitement.

Anticipation filled me, for at this moment it became real. I really was going on my very own ‘westward ho’ journey.

Now, where was my wagon? My feet hurt from running over pebbles on the sidewalk in my thin bunny slippers and I limped along the lineup, trying to get my bearings. Why oh why was I running late this morning of all mornings in my hopefully long lifetime?

“Daisey, over here.” The sound of Jack’s voice calling out grounded me and I hurried towards it, discovering our wagon was the second in line, right behind the Wagon Master’s. Sweet. Less dust today kicked up by only one wagon in front of us was a boon I’d accept with grateful thanks.

“I was ready to send the posse out for you. What happened? Your plan not work for you this morning?” He raised an eyebrow, and I remembered my instant anger the night before when he’d warned me about New York. Great, he had a good memory along with all those other fine attributes.

I accepted his hand up with reluctance and joined him on the all-too firm seat. All day on this sucker might not be the lark I had thought. “I had a plan. The alarms didn’t work.”

“Didn’t go off?’

“Oh, they both went off all right, but I just couldn’t hear them. I need to find one that sounds like a host of blaring trumpets.”

He chuckled. “Late night?”

“Please, tell me you have coffee?”

“As a matter of fact, I did bring some.” He reached down behind his seat and pulled out a tin cup and a small pail with a lid he pried off. Dipping the cup in the pail, he wiped off the drips with a clean rag and handed the steaming coffee to me. “Sorry, no cream or sugar, but it’s strong and should get your heart rate up.”

He tucked the coffee container away and took up the reins for the two yoke of oxen that would pull our wagon.

“Thanks, you’re a lifesaver.”

“I’ll bet you say that to all the men.”

“No. Only the ones that bring me coffee at 5:30ish in the morning.” I took a few sips, the heat of the brew warming my body. “Good coffee.”

“Thanks.”

“Wagons Ho!”

Jack snapped the lines that led to the four oxen and we were off, lurching ahead, along with the other dozen wagons in our troop. Shoot! Coffee spilled, of course, right down the front of my new dress. I dabbed at it with the piece of cloth he had used earlier, trying not let it get to me.

Now I would spend the day looking like the klutz I so-o didn’t want to be seen as by Mr. New York. I sighed and forced myself to settle down, take a look around, and ignore my sorry state.

The sunrise, a spectacular series of ever-changing red-hued streaks of glorious light, swept across the wide-open prairie skies as soon as we headed south of Sweetwater and away from the interference of buildings. That big red ball we all count on for survival looked surreal this morning, and my fingers fairly itched for my cellphone to snap a photo. None was allowed though.

Just one locked away by the Wagon Master for use when photos were deemed important enough to catalogue and preserve this amazing event. What they couldn’t hide away was my in-the-moment appreciation for the view. Best kind there is.

I sipped my coffee, working to gain perspective. I had not made much of an impression with Jack so far, but I could certainly try to do a better job of it today. Keep my temper in check and act like the cool professional I knew myself to be. Remember my New Year’s resolution. Listen more, speak less. But then, how would a gal ever learn what she needed to know without asking?

“You okay with being roped into driving a wagon when you’ve just gotten back to our part of the world?” I asked, noting his strong fingers holding the reins.

His hands were lean and tan like the rest of him, and he wore a period outfit. Instead of looking contrived, the home-spun fabric suited him, the pants looking just fine with their accompanying suspenders. Even his choice of hat sat at a good angle and flattered.

Thinking of the haphazard mess of curls hidden by my bonnet made me cringe.

“I’m fine with it. At least I get the prettiest girl in town to ride on my wagon.” His cocky grin made my heart flutter.

So, romance novels do get the imagery correct. Well, if nothing else, spending time with Jack was going to give my future writer-of-novels self some new fodder to work with. I’ve never spent time with a man seasoned by the outside world before and seeing it as a quest for knowledge—that worked for me.

“Only in town?” The question slipped right out.

“Quite frankly, I can’t imagine a prettier girl anywhere on the planet, truth be told. This fits in well with one of my favorite Marcus Aurelius quotes, ‘Very little is needed to make a life happy; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking’.”

I nudged him in the ribs and he gave a mock grimace of pain. “I’ll bet you say that to all the women you meet in New York City.”

His expression shifted. “No, I’ve learned my lessons all too well on that score.”

“Really,” I scoffed. “Women are women; they love a good compliment. Why would the Big Apple be any different?”

He shrugged. “Perhaps, but in a big metro like New York, it’s harder to put down your guard and the persona you project to others is often not the truth of who you are. Leads to problems down the way when your real self slips through the cracks. You can’t hide who you are forever.”

This conversation was a tad deep for so early in the morning, but at the same time I never got to talk about such things with a man. It intrigued me to a surprising degree.

This was not the usual getting-to-know-you scenario. “Well, that would only be a problem if the person you were hiding wanted something very different from what they were saying they wanted. If that makes any sense?”

“That makes perfect sense. Yes. Lots of people say one thing and yet want something entirely different.”

I shrugged. “People do that here too.”

“Probably so, but I don’t think they make subterfuge quite the art as New Yorkers do, or any folks in a big city for that matter. Most of the people here are who they say they are. Honest and truthful. That’s what I’m looking for in a relationship. If a woman is attracted to me, I like her to say so, not make a game of it. Tell me what she wants. If I can, I will help her achieve it.” He punctuated his remarks with a direct look at me.

My breath stilled. This was the deep end of the pool and I was right out of my depth, but I got it on the most elemental of levels and it stung. He was right. I was attracted to him and I was denying it. At least I had a good reason to. This couldn’t go anywhere. Not with my future plans locked in place.

I turned my face away and took a drink of my now cold coffee. “You’re forgetting one very important aspect in all this.”

“What’s that?’

“How you feel about things. Maybe the women you’ve met in New York wanted you to declare yourself first? Nothing more painful than unrequited love, or so I’ve heard.”

“Yes, but it doesn’t change the fact that if the other one isn’t being themself, and you base your life on a lie, it can all crumble when times get rough.”

“Who says times have to get rough?” That seemed a safer subject.

“Ha, are you one of them?”

“What do you mean?”

“The cup half full kind?”

“Yeah, you got me. I take it you aren’t?”

“You know, since we’re being candid and all and not doing anything strange like driving a covered wagon over the prairies like our ancestors did before us, I’ll admit to being that way most of my life, before the NYPD experiences taught me different.”

“Was it that hard being a policeman there?”

“I went into the service wanting to help people, like most of my brothers in blue, but somewhere along the line the constant barrage of crimes that never stopped coming, with never enough time to get to the bottom of every case before more crimes were committed, it wears on a man. I did it for ten years and I have no regrets. It’s made me who I am today and I was happy to serve the people, but you’re looking at a man very grateful to be back in Sweetwater now.”

“Wow, and I’m just at the beginning of my journey. I can’t wait to go to New York and embrace the experience of living there. Hone my writing skills, meet other like-minded people.”

He was silent for a few seconds, his expression solemn. “Well, I do wish you well whatever you choose to do. I personally think you can make it big right here in Sweetwater. What with the internet these days, no need to live there to be a famous writer. In fact, I think you could better hear your own unique voice staying in town. In New York, with everything clamoring for your attention, how could you focus?”

“I beg to differ. I’ve always believed that to understand enough to write about bigger ideas, you need to live that way. To spend time around big thinkers. Find your muse. Follow your passions. Just because those are clichés doesn’t make them any less true.”

“Maybe so. I think there are lots of big ideas all around you. Not all people who live in small towns think small. That’s just plain wrong and short-sighted to make that judgment.”

“True.” I liked the idea, liked his vision of the population of Sweetwater. I have to admit, a lot of really interesting people live here. I mean, we were on a fabulous journey this morning; no doing this in New York anytime soon. Nostalgia hit me with a vengeance, realizing just how much I would be giving up. I suppressed the traitorous thought and concentrated on studying the horizon.

“You got any superpower I should be aware of?” I had to ask. I had one of my own that I was itching to share.

“Superpower? Like a photographic memory? Or being able to recite pi?”

“Yes. Mine’s being able to tell if someone is lying to me. With one hundred percent accuracy. Ask anyone in town, they’ll tell you. If you want to know the truth, just get Daisey Winslow to ask the question.”

“No one can be that certain someone is lying or not.” Those were fighting words, delivered in a neutral tone, but I flared up anyway.

“Yes. They. Can.”

Offended? Me?

I took a deep breath. Stay calm. Stay professional. Besides, once he’d spent enough time around me, he’d know the score. Daisey Winslow 100, liars 0.

The cacophony of sounds surrounding us broke through the bubble of our conversation. Children squabbling, the din of animal hoofs on the grassy ground, the squawking of a wagon wheel lacking grease, a flock of birds lifting from a poplar tree on the side of the road disturbed by our passing. Homey sounds. None of which lowered my escalating blood pressure.

“How can you be that certain?” he asked.

“Some things you have to take on faith, but if there’s one thing I know, I can tell if someone is lying. A gift I’ve had since kindergarten when I figured out who stole the Halloween candy bar I hid in my desk.”

“And that makes you an expert?”

I bit my tongue to keep from saying something I might regret. “I’m so good at it, in point of fact, I scare people. Just ask around. Anybody will tell you that Daisey Winslow’s not one to trifle with. She’ll call you out.”

“Are you aware you’re referring to yourself in the third person?”

I leveled a glare at him. “Are you aware you’re being condescending and acting all big city?” I admit to a bit of a temper on occasion, and this guy seemed to know how to draw it out.

We were silent for a moment as he gave me a look, a smile playing about his mouth, his steadfastness not affected nearly as much as my own. “Let’s put it to the test.”

I took a deep breath. “What do you have in mind?”

“How about a game of truth or consequences? If I can stump you, I win, and you owe me. And vice versa.”

“I didn’t bring any money.” Too bad, I would clean him out. Just to make my point, of course.

“No need. I have something else in mind, but since you’re so sure of yourself, I don’t imagine you need to know what it is until we finish, right?”

“Only if I get to ask the questions?”

He shrugged. “Works for me.”

“And when you lose, which is a forgone conclusion, you owe me a meal.” That would be perfect, save me from cooking one of the nights at least. Maybe we could bet every day and I could win each time and avoid cooking entirely. I narrowed my eyes. This was looking better and better.

“And when I win, you owe me a kiss. Fire away, beautiful.”

A kiss. Hmm, pretty harmless, right? Then why were my lips tingling at the suggestion? I marshaled my forces and laid out my most important rule. “One more thing, when you answer my questions, you have to be looking at me. Got it?”

He nodded. “No problem. My pleasure.”

I took a deep breath. “What year were you born?”

“Nineteen eighty-seven. I just turned thirty-three.” He leveled those deadly blues at me, allowing his sincerity to shine through. I swallowed, my mouth gone dry. “That was a baseline question, right?” he asked.

“I guess you could call it that. It helps if I know a person a bit.”

“So, did I tell you the truth?”

“Of course, but I’m just warming up.” A surge of emotion rose inside me. This was already proving to be fun.

“How old are you?” he asked.

“Never you mind. I’m asking the questions here. Besides, my mother always says that’s not the kind of question a gentleman asks a lady.”

He chuckled. A low, throaty sound that made me feel good to be alive on this wonderful summer morning, moving through the sweet misty, air hovering over the wheat field we were now passing. Darn it, he made it too easy to forget that I should still be mad at him for doubting my ability to sleuth out the truth.

“Now it’ll get tougher.” Time to ask a bombshell. “Did you fall in love with anyone in New York City?”

“What?” His calmness vanished. So, he could be riled. Turnabout is fair play, Deputy.

“Just answer the question.”

He frowned. “But people define it in so many ways. How can one know for certain?”

“I don’t agree. It’s an easy one to answer.”

“How so?” He looked genuinely mystified.

“If you can’t live without them, that’s the real test. Love is unconditional. Freely given and a gift above all others.” A soft sigh slipped out as I thought of how many books I’d read that ended in happy-ever-after. The world knows what it is. Just got to fess up.”

“If that’s the definition we’re using—”

“It’s not a definition, it’s what it truly is. If you’ve ever experienced it, you’d know.”

“Then no, by that standard, I’ve never been. What about you? How can you know what it really is if you haven’t experienced it?”

“How do you know I haven’t?”

“Then where is the guy? If you can’t live without him?”

I rubbed my forehead. The twist in the conversation brought on an instant headache, like an ice cream brain-freeze. “Fine. You’ve just told me the truth.” I needed to find a safer question. What on earth had possessed me to ask him such a thing in the first place?

“Next,” he said, a muscle twitching under one eye. “But now I get to make a statement, and you tell me if I’m telling you the truth.”

“Of course.”

“I made detective first grade this past year working for the force.”

Ah ha! Now he was looking to impress me. So he’d succeeded. I nodded. “My turn. Have you ever arrested—”

A sudden lurch into a deep pothole brought the schooner to a bone-jarring halt, throwing us forward. The tin cup flew out of my hands, landing somewhere outside the wagon in the three-foot high weeds. I clutched at Jack to keep from spilling over the edge of the seat and onto the ground. His strong arms braced us and he pulled me back against his chest.

Nice. Even in the shock of the abrupt stop, I was all too aware of how sweet a position it was, tucked securely against him. I took a deep breath, filling my lungs with his intoxicating scent. Oh. My.

“Whew, that was a close one. That rut was hidden by the deep grass. My apologies. I should have been paying closer attention.” We untangled our limbs—I was clutching him far too tightly—and he helped me to settle back safely onto the seat. However, the wagon was tilted at a weird angle and the oxen stayed still, waiting for us humans to sort it out.

“I think we’ll have to rock it back and forth.” Jack jumped to the ground and then helped me down, offering another unsettling moment with his hands clasped tight around my wished-for-but-impossible-on-Rose’s-food wasp waist. Sigh. How did earlier women manage it? Ah, the magic of a corset, I’d bet.

A few more men came up and they set to work. I went searching for my tin cup, worried that we’d be short of dishes without it. Just how far had that sucker flown? I scrambled about, using my foot to knock away the vegetation in efforts to uncover it. I kept sneezing from the dust and pollen I was stirring up with my actions.

It took a few minutes, but I located the errant drinking vessel leaning against a large rock. I thrust it into a deep pocket and discovered the journal. The men were still busy, using some lumber now to pry the wheel up out of the rut. I perched on the rock and opened the cover, settling in for a read of the beautiful cursive script.

 

Day 1: As I sit here in the shade of our prairie-schooner, I marvel at the devoted men and women that surround me. How do they have the strength to undergo this journey into the unknown? I feel strangely above it all. I go because Seth, my husband of five months, wants us to have our own piece of land. Says it will be our legacy to our children. That only land has permanence in this world.

 

I have not shared as yet that we shall have our first baby this fall, as I do not want to worry Seth when he has so much to do and think about. I pray it is a boy to help his father in the difficult years ahead, though part of me wants a girl badly.

 

I am concerned about my abilities as his wife to be able to provide well for him on this trip. I’m not a good cook. I burned the bread last night and though my darling husband said it was fine, just scrape it off a bit, I know differently. I must try harder. Maybe one of the women will help me learn how to do it better?

 

I have made a pledge to write something down each day. I hope I shall manage to keep this commitment.

 

Yours truly, Sadie Rose Winslow.

 

I sat back and stared out at the endless prairie grass not seeing the modern power lines and other marks of civilization, but the landscape through the eyes of an eighteen-year-old bride just learning about life. Stunning, to think she was carrying a child. Frightening too. I wanted to slip to the back pages to see if everything had worked out, but I forced myself not to cheat. If she could do such amazing feats, I could wait until I got there as well.