Yesterday's Magic (28 page)

Toomay leaned back in his chair and yawned
widely. “Gentlemen, thank you for the entertainment. But I’ve
traveled far today and I’m tired. Let’s say we call it a night,” he
said.

Stroud stood and with one long arm, swept the
money in his direction. But nobody was looking at him. Everybody
was looking at Lenny, who had tears running down his cheeks. The
only thing that stopped them from spilling onto the table was that
they were getting sopped up by his big beard.

No man was comfortable watching another man
cry and Jed was no exception. It was no surprise when one by one,
the crowd turned away and started gathering up their things. Jed
watched everyone and everything in the room. Many a poker nights
had ended badly when somebody had decided that they didn’t like the
way the cards had fallen.

Pete pushed his chair back. “Let’s get out of
here, Lenny,” he said. He stood up and put his coat on.

Jed started to relax. The two had lost big
but it looked like they weren’t going to make a fuss about it.

When Lenny continued to just sit at the table
and cry, Pete braced his arms on the table and leaned across it.
“It’s over,” he said to his friend, his voice soft.

Lenny started to cry harder, his shoulders
shaking.

Maybe it was seeing his friend cry. Maybe it
was the realization that he needed to go home and face his wife
after losing what would easily have fed his family for the next
three months. Or maybe it was the pure despair of losing after
being so sure he had a winning hand, but whatever it was, it hit
Pete like a train going downhill that had lost its breaks. The man
whirled toward Stroud, his gun pulled.

Lenny looked up. “No, Pete,” he yelled.
“Don’t do it.” He pushed his chair back, stood up, and lunged in
front of Stroud just as Pete fired his gun.

When the bullet hit, it was Lenny who dropped
to the floor. It was as if his skull had exploded, with bits and
pieces of it flying everywhere.

Jed felt the whiskey in his stomach lurch
upward and he swallowed hard.

“Oh, Christ, no!” Pete dropped his gun onto
the table, ran to his friend’s side, and fell to his knees. “Lenny.
Oh, Christ, no. Oh, Lenny. I’m so sorry,” he cried. He picked up
the man’s body and hugged it to his chest.

Stroud dropped into a chair, his movements
uncoordinated, his mouth open. He stared at the blood pouring from
Lenny’s head and his eyes held the knowledge that it could easily
have been him on the floor.

Grown men, used to seeing violence, had their
hands over their mouths and their complexions were taking on
various shades of yellow and green. Pete, his shirt covered in
Lenny’s blood, looked up. Tears ran down the man’s broad face. “I
didn’t mean it. I don’t know what came over me. Jesus.”

Pete looked at Jed, like he somehow expected
him to be able to fix it. “Sheriff?” he said, his voice quivering.
“He was my best friend.”

“I know,” Jed said. That didn’t much matter
now. It was his job to arrest Pete. “You need to come with me,” he
said. He bent down and cupped his hand around Pete’s elbow.

Pete leaned forward and gently laid his
friend onto the floor. Now big sobs wracked the man’s body.

Jed helped him up and once he was on his
feet, Jed gave his back a gentle shove, to get him started toward
the door.

He glanced around the room. “Somebody needs
to go get Doc Winder to come and see to the body.”

Yancy stepped forward. “I’ll do it,” he
said.

Jed nodded his thanks. He looked at the crowd
of people. “The rest of you, go home.”

Nobody argued. And nobody seemed inclined to
want to finish their drink.

Jed and Pete were just feet from the door
when Jed caught a motion out of the corner of his eye. It was
Toomay. He was shuffling his cards. It wasn’t his calm indifference
to the killing that caused Jed to practically miss a step. No, it
was the look on his face. He looked…Jed searched for the right
word. And when he came upon it, he felt the whiskey in his stomach
roll once again.

Satisfied.
Toomay looked
satisfied.

***

Jed had had less than two hours of sleep when
he saw Bella drive her rig into town. It wasn’t as cold this
morning and she’d left her hat off. She had her hair piled on top
of her head and her cheeks and lips were pink. She looked fresh and
young and in comparison, he felt soiled and old. After leaving the
saloon, he’d escorted Pete to the jail and handed him off to Bart.
Then Jed had saddled his horse and taken a cold ride to Shinoah.
Once there, he’d gotten the marshal out of bed and the two of them
had ridden to Lenny’s house to tell his widow and six children of
his death. Then, they’d ridden to Pete’s house and told his wife
and four children that Pete was in jail for his best friend’s
murder.

He’d gotten back to Mantosa in the wee hours
of the morning. He’d sent Bart home and laid his head on the desk.
He’d been awakened around dawn, by Pete’s screams. The man had been
having a nightmare.

Jed hadn’t been sleeping all that soundly
himself. In his dreams, Toomay had been dealing his cards to an
empty table. When Jed had ventured forward to pick up a hand, he
hadn’t seen hearts and spades and such. No. Each card was a picture
of Bella, in the rose colored dress she’d worn to the dance. He’d
run around the table, gathering up cards, and every hand had been
the same. He’d tried to rip them but that had proven impossible.
He’d tried to burn them but they wouldn’t burn.

When he’d looked at Toomay, there’d been that
same satisfied look on his face that he’d had the night before.

Bella would be having lunch with that smug
son-of-a-bitch in just a few hours and that made the coffee in
Jed’s stomach surge up. What the hell was she thinking?

What had made Toomay pick Mantosa? Was it
merely coincidence that he’d arrived just days after Bella?

Jed didn’t believe in coincidence. He did
believe, however, in paying attention. Sometimes it wasn’t what a
man saw or heard that mattered—sometimes it was something he just
felt. Jed had felt a connection of some sort between Toomay and
Bella. They’d acted as if they were strangers but there’d been
something there—something that had not escaped Jed’s attention.

He hated puzzles. Hated not knowing how each
piece fit up against another, hated not seeing the whole.

Once Bart had arrived this morning, Jed had
left the sheriff’s office, intending to walk a bit and clear his
head. That was before he’d seen Bella drive into town.

Now, he pushed up the brim of his hat and
walked toward Bella’s rig. When she saw him, he didn’t miss how her
spine straightened or the slight jut of her chin. She was wary of
him. She had good reason. Yesterday, when he’d kissed her in the
barn, he’d given her cause to wonder just what he might do
next.

He wanted to assure her that he had
everything under control but in fact, he wasn’t all that confident.
It seemed like when she was around, he wasn’t himself.

“Good morning,” he said. He held out his hand
to assist her. She hesitated but he held his hand steady. Finally,
she put her hand in his. She had her gloves on and her hand felt
small and soft. Once on the ground, she removed her hand
immediately. He expected that she might scurry away but instead she
tilted her face up.

“You look tired,” she said.

He supposed he did. He felt about a hundred
years old. “It was a long night,” he admitted. “I’ve got a prisoner
at the jail,” he added, surprising himself. He never talked about
his work—hadn’t with his mother, didn’t with his sister.

“What did he do?” she asked.

“Killed a man. His best friend.”

She sucked in a sharp breath. “How
awful.”

“Yeah. He lost at cards and he meant to shoot
the winner. His friend got in the way. Right now I don’t think
that’s making him or his friend’s widow feel any better. Between
the two families, there are ten children that have lost their
fathers.”

She grabbed the side of the wagon. “What
happens now?” she asked, her voice sounding strangled.

“We wait for the county judge to come. I’ve
already sent a wire, advising him of the matter.” Out of the corner
of his eye, he caught movement. He turned slightly, as did
Bella.

Toomay stood across the street. He had on his
fancy coat again and he was lighting a cigar. He flicked the match
onto the street and took a big puff. He looked out onto the street,
like a king looking out onto his kingdom.

Son-of-a-bitch.
Jed dug the toe of his
heel into the snow that had been packed down by heavy wagon wheels.
“He was part of the card game. I don’t think he helped matters
any.”

Bella didn’t respond.

It made Jed want to shake her. He’d given her
the perfect opportunity.
Oh, really. Well, then, maybe I don’t
want to have lunch with him.
But no, she kept her mouth
shut.

“I don’t much care for strangers,” he said.
“I think it’s time for that man to ride on.”

“But…” Bella started, then stopped.

“But what?” Jed prompted.
Tell me.
He
wanted to beg.

Bella shook her head. Her face had lost its
color. Now, it could have been his going on about Pete’s troubles
but he thought it had more to do with Toomay. What was the link
between the two of them?

“I’ve got to open the Mercantile,” Bella
said.

He reached for her arm but she twisted away.
“I’m late,” she said, already moving. She lifted her dress a few
inches, perhaps to keep it from dragging in the snow, perhaps to
aid her fast retreat.

He wanted to race after her. He wanted to
hold her close, to convince her to tell him the truth. Hell. What
he really wanted was to take her back to his house and keep her in
bed for about a week.

That’s what had him turning the other
direction.

He needed to stop thinking about her.
Something bad was about to happen. He could feel it. And he needed
to keep his wits about him.

***

By lunchtime, Bella’s stomach was so tight
with nerves that she didn’t know how she would be able to eat
anything. Tomorrow, almost exactly thirty-six hours from now,
unless she somehow managed to kill Toomay first, her father would
follow Toomay up the stairs and set in place a series of events
that were too horrible to contemplate.

Her family would be slaves to Bad Magic. It
would be an eternity of pain and deprivation, a future so bleak and
so terrifying that it almost paralyzed her.

She left the Mercantile at just minutes
before twelve. She pushed through the doors of Hawkin’s Saloon and
her heart sank when she didn’t see Toomay. There were six other
men—four playing cards at a table and two standing at the bar,
sharing a bottle of whiskey. All of them turned to look at her and
she realized that she knew one of them—Yancy Tate.

She tried to smile but she caught her
reflection in the mirror above the bar and realized that it looked
more like a grimace of pain. Her jaw was so tight that it felt as
if it was wired shut.

Hopefully Snake served soup for lunch.

Yancy studied her. Then he nodded and turned
so that his back faced her once again.

She kept her eyes off the floor. There was no
way she’d be able to do this if she happened to look down and saw a
dark spot on the wood, evidence of the blood that had been cleaned
up.

She heard one of the card players tell the
table that she was Freida’s niece. That got her a couple friendly
nods, even a smile or two.

She gave a general nod in return and sat down
at the table, facing the door. Her hands were trembling so she put
them in her lap. She heard a woman’s laugh and turned her head,
just in time to see Delilah come from the back. She was carrying
two plates of food which she sat in front of Yancy and other man
who was standing at the bar. When she saw Bella, her eyes
narrowed.

She approached Bella’s table. “I wouldn’t
have expected to see you here,” she said. She wiped her hands on
the towel that was slung over her shoulder.

“Lunch was really good yesterday,” Bella
said. “I thought I’d see what today’s special was.”

Delilah assessed her. “I don’t need no
preachin’ from you.”

“I know that,” Bella said. If her father and
Averil could only see this. She was getting scolded for giving
someone advice. Bella was usually on the receiving end of advice.
Nobody needed to tell her how irritating it was. But she’d only
been trying to help. And if Delilah only knew what she knew?

But she didn’t. And Bella couldn’t tell her.
“Really, all I want is lunch.”

“Snake doesn’t serve lunch to anybody who
doesn’t buy a drink.”

A really nice glass of Pinot Noir would hit
the spot. But she didn’t think Snake had a wine list. “Excellent.
I’ll take a whiskey.”

Delilah had just returned with Bella’s drink
when Rantaan Toomay walked in. Bella could feel the general stir in
the room; evidently everyone had heard about the shooting. He wore
all black—trousers, shirt, vest, and hat.

He brushed past Delilah, his front to her
back, close enough that his body touched her. Bella caught just a
hint of the woman’s involuntary shiver. However, the expression on
Delilah’s face never changed.

“I’ll take a whiskey, darling,” he said. He
pulled enough money out of his vest pocket that he could have
bought everybody in the bar their own bottle. “Keep the rest for
yourself,” he added.

Delilah had been right—Toomay was a big
tipper. It made it easier to understand why Delilah would invite
Toomay upstairs tomorrow night. She probably figured that if the
man was willing to tip that much for whiskey, then a couple hours
in his bed would net her enough that she might be able to return to
her mother’s place, to her son, earlier than she’d expected.