Taken by the Cowboy (24 page)

He threw an arm up
under his head like a pillow. “You look like you want to tell me
something, and I really hope that’s the case, because I’ve been
waiting a long time.”

“I do. I’ve wanted to
tell you this since the first night we met, but I was too
afraid.”

“Afraid of what?”

She rubbed a finger
over the smooth, warm surface of his chest. “That you wouldn’t
believe me. Or that you’d think I was crazy.”

“I’d never think
that.”

She tried to smile, to
make light of this, but it was impossible. “You might change your
mind about that after you’ve heard what I’m about to say.”

He frowned with some
concern.

Lord. This was harder
than she thought it would be.

"It’s about where I
come from," she said at last.

“Whatever it is, it
can’t possibly be any worse than the things I’ve told you.”

“It’s not like that,”
she said. “It’s not something I’ve done. It’s something I had no
control over, and….well....brace yourself."

"I’m braced."

She leaned forward to
kiss him. His lips were soft and moist. As she withdrew, he put his
arm around her and coaxed her to lie beside him. His warm hand
swept the locks of her hair across her shoulder.

Preparing herself for
his shocked response, Jessica drew in a deep breath, and finally
confessed the truth.

"I’m from the
future."

From where Jessica lay
with her cheek on Truman's chest, he did not seem shocked. But of
course, he was a cool-headed gunslinger.

Alert to any reaction,
she waited nervously, but observed only that he continued to
breathe at the same pace he’d been breathing before she’d dropped
the bomb. His heart, which beat inside him directly below her ear,
did not quicken. He simply lay there, twirling his index finger
around a lock of her hair, staring at the ceiling.

"I traveled through
time to get here," she continued, when she felt ready to reveal
more.

Still, he failed to
react as she imagined he would.

Bewildered, she began
to ramble. "I was born in 1981. In Missouri. I don't know what
happened to get me here, but here I am."

His hand stopped moving
through her hair. At last he said, "I don't understand what you're
saying."

"I don't understand it
either." Jessica rolled off him and sat up. "When I came here—it
was the night Lou was killed—I was driving to my mother's house."
She glanced down at him. "I was driving in an automobile. You don't
have them here. They're like wagons without horses, but they go
much faster and run on gasoline. I was traveling at a speed of
sixty miles an hour. It’s very fast. You’d really like it."

His eyebrows
lifted.

"The road was wet, and
I hydroplaned and flipped my car. I’m not sure how it happened, but
lightning struck, then suddenly I was here. I have no explanation
for it. I certainly didn’t know anything like this was possible.
Not even in the future.”

Truman held her hand.
"Jessica, I really want to believe what you’re telling me—"

"I know it seems
impossible. I couldn't believe it myself at first, but you have to
trust me. I'm not making this up."

"I do trust you,
but—"

"No buts." She squeezed
his hand. "Think back to that first night."

Truman said nothing for
a moment or two. Then he sat up beside her. "I remember you were
confused and disoriented. You talked about walking from a car
wreck. I thought you meant a train."

"No. It was red
hatchback."

His eyebrows pulled
together in a frown. "And the things you wear under your
trousers..."

"Panties."

“And that...zipper
thing.”

"All from the future.
But there’s so much more."

He looked at the
window, opened his mouth to say something, but didn’t.

Jessica said a silent
prayer that he would believe her. If he didn't....

She simply couldn’t
bear to think about that. She needed him in her life here. He was
her rock in this century. Her only anchor.

His expression stilled
and grew serious. "It's the craziest story I've ever heard."

"I know."

He scratched his head.
"Time travel...."

"Yes."

"It sounds insane."

"I know, but it's true.
How can I prove it to you?" She paused, staring. "Look. See how
perfect my teeth are...how straight they are?"

"They're very
nice."

"Thousands of dollars
to straighten them. Imagine that, will you? Braces."

"Never heard of
them."

"That's because they're
not invented yet. We also have cell phones – little communication
devices that people carry around everywhere. Some people carry
their BlackBerries in a holster like yours, but it’s a phone, not a
gun. We can take our phones anywhere, and punch in a number and
call someone, or text a message to them, like a letter that gets
delivered that second. And medicine… I wouldn’t even know where to
begin. Surgery has come a long way, let me tell you. People are
going under the knife to get their noses changed or their double
chins removed. They call it a facelift. And there’s air travel,
too. You wouldn’t believe it.”

He stared at her, and
the amusement in his eyes faded away.

Jessica said nothing
more. She waited uneasily, watching as everything settled into his
mind.

Maybe she shouldn’t
have mentioned the face lifts.

"It almost makes
sense,” he said.

She regarded him with
hopeful surprise. "It does?"

"Yes. I knew you were
odd, and I haven’t been able to find you in any town records. I put
the word out everywhere. No one has ever heard of you."

"That's because I never
existed before the night Lou was killed." Jessica sat nervously,
watching his expression change as he stared at her.

He sat up abruptly and
pulled her into his arms. After a moment, he drew back and looked
her in the eye. "Will you be going back there?"

"You believe me?"

He blinked slowly, his
gaze uncertain. "I don’t know.” He paused. “That day, out on the
prairie...."

"I was trying to find a
way home,” she explained. “I thought if I spun around very
quickly…but it didn't work."

He sat in silence.
Jessica knew he was remembering everything he'd ever seen her do or
say, and he was putting the pieces together.

"You still haven't
answered my question," he said, leaning back with both arms propped
behind him.

Jessica combed her
fingers through her hair. "Even if I wanted to go home, I don't
know how to get there. I've been trying to figure it out, but I
don't even understand how this happened in the first place. If I
knew, I might be able to duplicate it."

"I don't want to lose
you."

She looked into the
blue depths of his eyes. "I don't want to lose you either."

They shifted onto the
blankets, Jessica on her back and Truman leaning down.

"I haven’t always said
the right thing,” he told her. “I didn’t trust you when I should
have. I kept things from you about Dorothy and what really
happened, but I trust you now. You're in my blood."

Jessica kissed his soft
lips, and soon the urgency of the kiss mounted.

"Stay," he whispered
into her hair. “Don’t go back.”

Jessica squeezed him.
"I wanted to go back before, but now I'd rather die than leave
you."

He pulled her roughly,
almost violently to him.

"But what are we going
to do about Virgil’s murder? What if the judge sentences me to
hang?"

"We'll leave
Dodge."

She swallowed,
nervously. "We'd be outlaws."

"Yeah, but we'd be
alive—and together."

Jessica considered
that, hesitating before she made any suggestions that could change
the course of their future.

"Wouldn't it be
better," she asked, "to locate Angus and get him to defend me and
try to find the real killer? I didn't do anything wrong. There’s no
real evidence against me, other than that newspaper article which
is all lies. It's just because I have a reputation. That’s why
people believe I did it, but that won’t hold up in court."

Truman ran a hand over
her shoulder and down the length of her arm. "We need to find out
who provided the information for the articles.”

Jessica nodded. "Yes,
but I asked Mr. Gordon about it when the first article came out. He
said he wouldn't reveal his sources."

Truman kissed the
hollow at the base of her throat. "I'll ask him about it in the
morning."

She squirmed with
pleasure and moaned softly with ecstasy as he rolled on top of her
and began to lay scintillating kisses down the side of her neck.
"And what makes you think he'll tell
you
?"

"What makes me think
that?" Truman’s head drew back with surprise, then he smiled a
wicked grin. "How about the overwhelming size and thrust of my
six-shooter?"

It was enough to bring
a swift end to the discussion.

* * *

The morning sun poured
through the jailhouse window, landing a decorative square of light
on Truman's paper-strewn desk. Outside, a small herd of cows was
driving by, their clamoring hooves and constant moo's a distraction
for Jessica, who was walking into the jail cell again. Truman
guided her in, then swung the cell door shut on its squeaky hinges
until it came to a final, clanging close.

"If anyone comes in
here today,” he said, “tell them I guarded you all night. Act like
you know nothing about the hanging." He turned the key, and it
clicked. "I'm sorry to have to do this."

"It’s necessary. I'll
be fine."

"I'll bring you some
breakfast, then I’ll try to find Angus. I’ll also head over to the
newspaper office to talk to Gordon. If I can't learn anything or
get a retraction, we’ll leave here tonight."

She reached through the
bars to take hold of his hands. "I trust you.”

"I'll be back soon." He
kissed her one more time, and left.

When the door closed
behind him, Jessica sank onto the crackly straw mattress on the
cot, tipped her head back against the wall, and stared at the
cobwebs near the ceiling.

A short while later,
the front door opened, and Jessica leapt to her feet.

Angus, appearing out of
breath, walked straight in. "Jessica?"

She hurried to the
bars. "Oh, thank God! Angus! Where were you? I’m so glad you’re
back. You wouldn’t believe what’s happened.”

“I know all about it,”
he said. "Where's Sheriff Wade?"

"He's gone for
breakfast. What have you been doing? You look like you know
something."

He crossed the room and
stopped in front of the bars. His brown eyes sparkled with
excitement. "I have wonderful news. I've figured out how to get
home."

Jessica took an abrupt
step back. “What do you mean?”

Angus reached into his
pocket, searching for something. "It's this. It’s as good as any
plane or train ticket."

Jessica stood staring,
her heart racing like a runaway wagon. With trembling fingers, she
reached out to touch the shiny object in his hand. "You found my
watch," she said.

"Yes. Isn't it
amazing?"

To see this golden
object that had once been a part of her old life, sent a prickle up
her spine. "But what does this have to do with anything?"

"I’ll tell you.” He
reached into his pocket and dug around some more. “I finally found
my belongings from the twenty-first century, and I remembered my
watch was missing, too, just like yours had been. So I went to the
place on the prairie, where I traveled through time, and searched
for a while, and there it was—in the grass.” He held out his own
watch. “I searched further, and I found yours, too, only a few feet
away.”

"Mine is still
ticking," she said, holding it up to her ear.

"Yes, but look at the
date."

"July 19th, 2011.
That’s a month after the day of my accident."

"Yes. It's incredible
isn't it? It's a piece of the future, the only thing we have that
connects us to it. According to this, time in the future is still
rolling along, parallel to our existence here."

"But how will this get
me back?" she asked.

"This may sound
far-fetched to you—”

“Believe me, nothing at
this point will sound far-fetched.”

He nodded knowingly.
“After I found our watches, I walked around on the prairie for a
while until I stepped on a piece of ground that looked like it was
wet, but it wasn’t wet at all. There was a glimmer on the grass,
almost like dew, and when I stood on it, I felt a tingling
sensation all over.”

Jessica felt her eyes
widen. “What happened? Did you pass through a tunnel or something?
Is that where you were? Did you go home and come back for me?”

“No, nothing quite so
dramatic as that. It was nothing more than the tingling. So I
marked the spot and went home to think about everything. I tried to
remember what happened when I passed through the tunnel the first
time ten years ago.”

“And?”

"I was driving, just
like you, and lightning struck the car as I drove over that spot on
the highway. Time seemed to stand still for that instant while the
car was sizzling with light. Then I began to spin through the
tunnel. At the far end, I could see brown prairie grass, and I felt
like I was going to crash into it. But before I came out of the
tunnel, my watch came off. It didn't rip off either. It just came
unclasped, almost gracefully. I watched it float along beside me,
and then I thought: ‘I can't lose my watch. I have an appointment.’
But then I fell out of the tunnel and landed on the prairie—in
1878."

Jessica shook her head
skeptically. "I still don't understand how this can get us
home."