But of course he did; I sensed his lips part in a smile as he whispered, “You’ll do whatever I want or you’ll watch me bend her over the bed while I fuck her. Tell me how Malcolm knew to warn you. Who is the woman with him?”
“She’s Ruthann’s sister, from Minnesota. She came from the future to warn him you were on the way. Malcolm sent a telegram last night, from Muscatine, Iowa.” Marshall spoke without hesitation, advancing a step toward the bed.
“That’s far enough. How did the sister know?”
“We don’t know. We haven’t talked to her.”
Fallon removed his left hand from my breast and slid it down my belly, clutching my pelvis in an unrelenting grip. A growling protest rose from my throat even as I dared not struggle. Marshall hissed a low, enraged breath, hands fisted. The surge of violent energy radiating from him was nearly visible in the air.
“You’re lying,” Fallon said calmly.
“I will break every fucking bone in your body.”
“You’ll tell me the truth.”
“You fucking son of a bitch, I will kill you…” Teeth bared, feral with rage, Marshall was at breaking point and Fallon knew it.
His pleasure heightening with each subsequent taunting word, Fallon said, “Ruthann wants me to fuck her. I can feel it, right here between her legs. And then I’ll kill her before your eyes, Rawley, just like I once killed your mother, what do you think of that?”
I acted without thinking, terrified by the loss of control on Marshall’s face. Fallon’s left arm, pointed downward as he gripped my pelvis, no longer restrained me against his chest and I twisted sideways, grabbing his right wrist with both hands, using my weight and momentum to drag his hand – and the gun – toward the floor. The gun discharged, a bright orange flame exploding from the barrel, and annihilated all other sound.
Fallon’s vicious punch caught me between the shoulder blades, propelling all breath from my lungs; I sprawled flat on my belly, unable to break the fall, as Marshall lunged over the bed and took Fallon backward. I would have scrambled away if I could breathe. Straddling Fallon, Marshall seized his neck with both hands and slammed Fallon’s head repeatedly against the floorboards before bearing down with all his strength. From my vantage point I saw Fallon’s boots scraping the floor as he tried to heave upward and buck Marshall’s hold. And as I watched, mouth flopping like that of a hooked fish in an effort to draw air into my chest cavity, Fallon began fading.
No! He’s getting away…
Just before he vanished from view, Fallon lifted the gun and fired pointblank at Marshall.
Chapter Thirty
The Iowa Plains - June, 1882
MALCOLM AND I DRESSED IN YESTERDAY’S CLOTHES, GATH-ered our belongings, and left behind our room at the hotel before the day was an hour old. We checked in at the telegraph office, discovering no additional news, and then collected Aces High from the livery stable. Once Aces was headed northwest at a cantering clip we ate a breakfast of corn muffins the woman at the hotel had been kind enough to send with us, perplexed by our early, rapid departure. We shared water from Malcolm’s canteen when Aces slowed to a walk, the proximity of our bodies torturous in a way it hadn’t yet been yesterday. Yesterday we hadn’t fully realized, let alone tested, the depth of our connection. Today, we knew just how powerfully it bound us.
Yesterday, we hadn’t yet spent the entire night making love.
Rain loomed on the western horizon within the first five miles. I smelled it almost immediately, Malcolm and I watching as heavy pewter clouds released silvery sheets of water in the distance. There was no avoiding the downpour.
“At least we’ll be clean,” I said, trying to make a joke. I was shaky and distracted and overwhelmed, even sheltered as I was against his chest and within the circle of his arms. I’d braided my hair and slung the braid over my shoulder so my hair wouldn’t be in the way when I turned my face toward Malcolm’s neck, inhaling, sometimes resting my lips upon the skin his open shirt collar exposed. In turn, he pressed soft kisses to my temple, gliding his free hand – the one not holding the reins – in gentle, sensual patterns over my belly, my arm, my thigh.
“What if we started a child, last night?” he quietly asked at one point, resting the length of his hand flat on my stomach.
This had occurred to me as well. I had no earthly idea how to respond; he sensed this and didn’t push further.
But awareness of the possibility burned between us.
We rode toward the sheeting rain for perhaps thirty minutes before struck by the first sting of cold droplets; I couldn’t shake the ominous metaphors infiltrating my mind as we approached an inescapable storm. Malcolm reined Aces to a halt and quickly dismounted, rooting in his saddle bag, extracting and then shaking out a rain blanket. He paused for a second, resting a warm hand on my calf. In the ashy sheen cast by thick clouds he looked up at me, his dark eyes so full of feeling I realized I would never recover from loving him.
“We have hard riding ahead, love. I am sorry, I wish it wasn’t so.”
I held his gaze, aching and overcome. “I can do it.”
Once again in the saddle, he situated the blanket like a shawl around us and I tucked the ends near my breasts, creating as much protection as possible.
“Keep close, we’re in for a soaking,” he murmured, kissing the top of my head, shifting his hips to urge Aces into forward motion. The horse snorted and whooshed, tossing his long brown head, clearly communicating his displeasure at the crying sky. Malcolm leaned to pat his horse’s neck, murmuring, “We been through worse, ain’t we, boy? C’mon now, we gotta catch up with Cole.”
“How far ahead are
