The Dream Place
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“I’ll tell you what’s wrong with me,” he said, sitting up. “This whole dream thing is crazy.” He put his legs over the side of the bed and walked into the bathroom without saying another word. He didn’t even bother to look at her until she came out wearing a robe over her nightgown.
She’d gotten a little taller, but the long blond hair hadn’t changed much. She looked like the woman he remembered. The same eyes—green and piercing as hell. His mother had the same eyes. And his father … God. His father was just one man who liked to get what he wanted, but his son would have to make up his mind about that in time.
Light snow fell outside on the street. It was still dark. They were probably going to close down for the night soon. He didn’t know if they stayed open later because people couldn’t drive safely in the dark or simply because some business owners thought it made good economic sense to keep operating through the wee hours of the morning.
Whatever their reasoning, he had no choice except to take a chance and head downtown to his office first thing tomorrow morning.
“You need anything?” he asked her after she came back into the bedroom.
“No. I’ve got what I came here for.” She picked up her overnight bag from where she’d left it near the door and put it on the floor.
He sat up, looking at her for a second before he put his feet on the floor and went over to the closet to pick out something to wear. He took one shirt and then changed his mind. He opened his suitcase again and pulled out one of his dress shirts instead.
“Why are you staying at a motel when I happen to be offering free rooms?” he asked as he walked into the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face.
She followed him into the bathroom and stood beside him while he brushed his teeth and shaved. When he finished washing his face, she turned off the water and grabbed his towel.
“Here.” She held out the towel to him, but he didn’t want it. “I’ll use the other one,” he said as he wrapped his wet hands around his neck to dry them. She stepped closer to him and he moved out of her reach. She took another step forward, her eyes holding his own.
He backed up, not willing to let her push him. He wasn’t ready for that kind of commitment yet. If this woman was a figment of his imagination, there wasn’t any reason to get involved in a relationship.
The look on her face seemed sincere. And if she could stay with him for one more night, maybe he would find out if she really existed. Maybe he’d find some answers. But it sure as hell looked like the woman of his dreams had a lot more going on than just an imaginary life.
He’d thought her mother was dead when he found her that morning. Now she was alive? It just wasn’t possible. Not after all these years.
“Don’t be stupid.”
She didn’t move away from him, but she didn’t push either. “Why did you come back?” she asked as she came even closer. “You don’t owe me anything.”
“Yes, I do,” he said. “If you were here and alive, my family might have known about it long before they did. It’s a little late to apologize now.”
“My husband killed your brother-in-law. That should make you feel a lot better.”
He felt his temper flare. “What did I do to get my wife murdered?” he said as he moved in front of her again, his hand going around her waist. For a split second, he thought she was going to pull away, but then her arms went around his neck and pulled him down so he could kiss her.
This time, when they broke apart, she turned away. He grabbed her chin and forced her to look at him. “You were the one who wanted him dead,” he said, his voice low and gruff. “I just followed your lead.”
She pushed him away and he almost fell. “You’re not thinking straight,” she told him. “Let me go, Jack.”
He didn’t let go of her. “You killed my father.” He was surprised at how much his voice had risen when he talked about his father. The man hadn’t been a saint, but he’d raised him right. Jack knew exactly what the old man would say if he found out that his son had killed his brother-in-law. “And then you disappeared into thin air with your husband.”
“Don’t be stupid,” she said again. “There was no such thing as an affair. Just like there was no such thing as you killing my husband.”
“How can I believe you?” He couldn’t. It wasn’t possible. “I want answers,” he said as his eyes bored into hers. “I’ll never be able to stop thinking about this until I find out where you’ve been all these years and why my sister thought you were dead. You think I could have forgotten something like that?”
“It was a long time ago.” Her voice seemed very far away as if she wasn’t really talking to him anymore.
He stepped closer to her and reached for the strap on her purse, but she quickly snatched it off her shoulder and put it down beside her overnight bag. He took a deep breath and released her from his stare, looking away.
“I know you killed my father, but maybe he did kill you first,” he told her. “If I’d known it was your husband who got rid of him, I might have hesitated before I killed him too. But I didn’t know any better.” He looked back at her, his face serious. “Now I’m going to ask you a question and don’t try to avoid the answer.”
She moved away from him so fast, she bumped into a table on her way through the kitchen. He watched her stand up and move back until she stood beside him again. The look on her face made him wonder if she was going to cry. He reached over to take her hand in his, but she pulled away. He was confused. What was he doing wrong?
“I didn’t kill anyone,” she finally said. “My husband did.”
The shock on his face must have been clear because she laughed. “Don’t worry, I wasn’t hurt. It wasn’t even his first time. There’s nothing to worry about. We just needed money.”
He looked at her, his head spinning from her words. How could this be happening? If his wife had an affair with a married man, that would explain what happened to his father. But if she wasn’t dead… “Are you telling me he killed you and then took your child?”
She nodded. “But not for long. He got tired of raising another man’s baby, so we split up.”
“What?”
She sighed as she ran her hands through her hair. “You’re probably wondering how you could have married a woman who has been dead these past twenty-five years. Let’s just say it wasn’t a very good marriage and it ended a lot sooner than either of us expected.” She stopped to catch her breath and took a deep breath. “Why did you tell everyone I was dead?”
His mind went back to the day that his father died. “I never forgot about you, Sarah. You were always there in my mind. My family thought it best to leave town, so they could get away from the gossip and all the unwanted attention.
But I couldn’t do that.” His eyes searched hers. “How long were you gone? Why did you return now? What are you doing here? Do you remember me? How could I have married someone like you?”
A sad look passed across her face before she pulled him close and hugged him. “Jack, don’t be so harsh,” she said into his ear. “I was lonely. I missed my husband and wanted him to love me again, but when he got rid of my child, he lost my respect.
When he left, I realized how much I had loved him and I knew I didn’t want anyone else.” The look on her face seemed sad and regretful, but he couldn’t let it go unchallenged. He pushed her away and turned away from her, looking out the window.
He watched her stand up. She walked over to him and grabbed his hand, pulling him to her side. She put her arm around his waist, hugging him. For a moment he was shocked, and then he remembered how this felt to hold her after all these years.
She rested her head on his shoulder for a second before moving away. “What would you think if I told you that we might make a great team?”
“Make a…” He couldn’t believe what she was saying. “What?”
She smiled and reached into her purse. It took a few moments to pull something out of the bag that looked like a pistol. She held it out to him.
He grabbed it and quickly checked it. It appeared to be loaded, which made sense since she’d just been shot by her husband. She was still holding the gun when she pulled him toward the front door. “Come with me, Jack.” She led him back through the kitchen, leaving everyone behind, except for a couple of waitresses.
***
They went out onto the porch and walked to the front of the building, passing a group of men who were sitting outside on the street corner talking and smoking cigars. They walked across the street to where a wagon was parked at the edge of town, but he saw it wasn’t their wagon. “This isn’t our wagon,” he told her.
She nodded. “But it is the same one my husband owned.”
He didn’t know what to say. His mind was reeling from everything he’d heard. But what surprised him most was that Sarah had been married and lived as a widow for all these years without telling him about any of it.
“Why now? Why do you come back after all this time?” he asked. “I never knew anything about your family or where they moved to.”
“Because of this!” She handed him a note.
The writing was clear and crisp, and the message made him laugh. “You’re not serious.” He glanced over the letter again and laughed. “Don’t you ever worry about the future?”
She laughed at his words. “Of course, I worry.” Her voice softened. “But when Jack’s father died and I lost the only person in my life who cared for me, my worries became even worse.” She paused and sighed before continuing. “But I knew if I wanted to have any kind of future, I had to make a change.”
Jack put the note down, still shaking his head. “So let me guess, this has something to do with a man named Tom Johnson?”
“It does.” She smiled. “Tom is an old friend who was working as a hired gunman until last month when he quit. My husband took off because Tom was trying to protect me from his father’s abuse. Jack, please help me stop my ex-husband.”
Her words left him speechless. She had known about him all these years and never once tried to reach out to him? If he hadn’t known better, he would say that she hated him. Instead, he realized that the reason she didn’t want to meet him again was that she didn’t trust him anymore. “You know I can’t do that.”
“Jack, there are things happening here that you wouldn’t understand.” She reached into her purse again, pulling out another pistol. “I’ve been doing a little research on you. It appears that some of your past has come back to haunt you.” She pulled the gun toward herself and pointed it at his stomach. “Don’t think you can talk your way out of this one.”
He was stunned. “What are you saying?”
“Jack, I want you to kill my ex-husband,” she said.
***
Sarah held the revolver in his direction. For a moment he didn’t know what to do, but then his anger boiled over and he pulled his gun out of its holster. He pointed it right between her eyes, causing her to gasp. The barrel wasn’t even aimed at his intended target when she screamed and pulled away.
She threw the gun to the side and jumped into his arms, hugging him tightly.
For a moment he just stood there, unsure if he should hug her or push her away. After several seconds, he put his arms around her waist. “It’s not true what they say about women with guns,” he whispered against her hair.
They stayed like that for a while, but then her arms loosened and he moved away from her. “This has been a mistake,” he told her, his voice firm, although his mind was screaming no. She stared at him and didn’t try to argue any longer. “Let me see the note.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the folded paper and handed it to her. He wanted to read it before reading it aloud. Her face flushed red when she saw what it said, and she turned away and buried her head in her hands. The sound of her crying made his heartache, which was probably exactly what she wanted. He’d done it again; he was hurting someone who had trusted him.
He looked down at the piece of paper in her hand and saw that the message had changed since the last time he read it. He took another look at Sarah’s letter and saw the change. But what really caught his attention was the fact that the first line of the message had been crossed out and then re-written in pencil.
This new writing wasn’t a misspelling or an accident. It was deliberate. And this time she didn’t use her maiden name, instead using her married one.
Jack held the note between them and noticed that the word kill was missing from the message. That was it! If Tom’s father had been able to get the note back from the hotel after he’d thrown it, then it meant only one thing. The note had been forged.
Jack couldn’t believe that she would lie like this. She’d known he wouldn’t kill her ex-husband and now she was trying to blackmail him to do what she wanted. He was still shaking his head when Sarah took off down the street and he ran to catch up.
***
She was right there in front of him when he rounded the corner. His first impulse was to push her against the side of the building and pull her into his arms, but he knew that would make things worse. Instead, he kept his distance, watching her every move until she pulled open the door of the saloon where Tom had just come out.
“Where did you find this?” Tom asked.
Sarah handed Tom the note. “Jack took it from me.”
Tom grabbed Jack’s collar and tried to force him toward him, but Jack stepped back and refused to be moved. Tom released him, but instead of taking his gun out again, he pushed both his hands against his chest. Jack could feel his heart pounding.
“It’s not true,” Tom said. “You wouldn’t shoot someone over something like this.”
Jack ignored him; instead, he turned toward Sarah. She wasn’t looking at him. Her shoulders were trembling and she was breathing rapidly, but other than that, she seemed calm. Was this her way of making a decision? She would either kill Tom or refuse to help Jack.
He waited for several long minutes before Tom spoke again. “I’m sorry about your husband, Sarah,” he said, sounding sincere. “And I really don’t care what happens to me if you kill my dad.”
Her gaze moved away from him and focused on Tom. “If you won’t stop trying to get me to take this man’s life, then there will be another one to replace you.” She reached into her purse again and pulled out her gun, pulling the hammer back with the motion. She looked straight at Jack when she pulled the trigger.
Tom didn’t move as he watched the bullet fly toward him. He felt the pain before he saw the hole in his chest. But even so, it was too late for him. The next moment, his gun fell out of his hand and he fell forward to the floor of the saloon.
Jack rushed toward Sarah, pulling his own gun out. She held her finger on the trigger and her other arm was up in front of her, blocking the bullet with her forearm. “That was my shot, not yours,” she yelled at him. He lowered his weapon and turned away, but then stopped and faced her again.
“I have no intention of killing you,” he told her. “This is your last warning.”
***
Jack didn’t know how to deal with her now that Tom’s death had changed everything. She hadn’t fired at him so obviously, she still meant what she’d said. But she wasn’t the same woman who had been sitting in his office two days ago; instead, she’d grown hard-eyed and stubborn.
She wouldn’t talk to him unless it was about work, and even then, she would only speak to him when he asked a question.
His frustration grew day after day and he couldn’t figure out what to do. If she refused to cooperate, then there was nothing else to be done except give her a few weeks to cool down or try to force her compliance with some kind of threat.
But she knew how to take care of herself so it wouldn’t make any difference if he killed her. She’d just leave him for good. That was why he kept his hands to himself most of the time when they were alone. She could have easily killed him in an instant; all he had to do was put a hand on her shoulder and pull her away from the saloon, but that was something he never wanted to risk.
He was glad he’d finally convinced Tom to go home to Denver. Tom didn’t like the fact that Jack was going ahead with the murder plans without consulting him, but he also had to admit that this was Jack’s problem now. The sooner they left the better, and he would be back in a few weeks.
Sarah had given the sheriff the name of her ex-husband’s killer, so the arrest warrant went through, and Jack was surprised to see a couple of town marshals waiting for him before he rode off to join the rest of the posse.
They were armed with Winchester carbines. When Jack rode up, they stopped him and one of them handed him an order of arrest signed by Judge Hinton. “I don’t suppose you know where this woman is staying?” one of the marshals asked him.
“No,” Jack told him. He wasn’t sure if they were looking for Sarah or Jack himself since Tom had gone into hiding, but there was no need to tell them his own business.
One of the marshals turned to the other and said, “You get in touch with her. You find her and bring her back here.”
They watched Jack ride away, and when he reached the edge of town, Jack took the opportunity to ride to the outskirts and wait for her. It was early in the day so she hadn’t left the hotel yet. Her hat hung down over her eyes; she looked as if she might be sleeping on top of the covers in that bed, but Jack didn’t bother to look through the curtains.
He rode around and waited for her to leave the hotel, but he couldn’t be sure whether it was her leaving or not because it could have been a woman walking toward the front door.
The sheriff’s deputy brought her back to town a little while later and he was riding beside her horse as she rode slowly to the saloon. The marshal followed him with their horses. Jack didn’t want to waste any more time so he rode out of town ahead of them to make sure she would get the warning.
He was just coming back into town when the first shot rang out from behind him. It wasn’t until the second shot that he turned around to see Sarah had pulled his pistol away from her body. She was leaning over her gun with the barrel pointed at the floor when she looked up at him.
She was breathing hard and staring at him in surprise, but the moment seemed to stretch out forever before either one of them moved. He’d never expected this response from her. He should have known that if she wanted to kill him then she wouldn’t let go.
Now all that was left for him was to finish what he started, and she would pay for every shot she fired. His hand reached toward her shoulder. She dropped the pistol and held out her arm. But instead of pushing her away, he grabbed her waist with both hands and lifted her up onto his saddle.
“Let’s go,” he told her. “It’s time I put an end to this.”
***
Jack pulled his horse to a stop by the side of the trail. There was no point in going back to Denver. He’d be too worried about Sarah. They hadn’t spoken since Tom’s funeral; it would have been a disaster if she found out how close he’d come to kill her. Jack thought he saw her riding along the main road heading east so he turned toward the mountain range instead.
By nightfall, he was on the high ridge where he could get a good look at the land below him. There were no towns, just the wide-open plains that went on for miles and miles. If he had wanted to, he could have covered that distance in three or four days.
As far as he knew, there was only one small ranch within a hundred miles. But it wasn’t worth going back now that he was on his way to meet the rest of the posse. It didn’t make much sense for Sarah to follow him, and he certainly wouldn’t want anyone following him.
The wind blew in a few puffs of powder smoke and he looked up. Clouds were forming over the peaks, so they would be getting some snow that evening. The wind picked up even more, and Jack rode on in silence. Snow flurries came down in a flurry, but he kept watching for signs of Sarah.
He’d gone two more hours when he heard something coming through the grass on the hillside. There was the sound of hooves and then the pounding of heavy boots on the hard-packed earth. Then suddenly she was right in front of him.
Her hat was still down over her face; her hair streamed out behind her and fell forward like a mane. She must have seen the look on his face because she dropped into a half crouch to keep from falling off. But she held onto his saddle horn with both hands instead of dismounting.
“What are you doing here?” Jack asked in confusion.
She said nothing. But she did lift her hat, and he knew instantly who it was. He’d seen the scars on her head and shoulders when he took the bandages off, and he also knew exactly what had caused them.
Sarah pulled herself up on his saddle. She put a foot in the stirrup and swung up onto the back of his horse. She leaned forward to whisper, “I know you don’t remember, but we’re supposed to meet the others.”
***
Jack rode away from her and she followed. But before long she fell off. “I’m sorry,” she called after him, and then he was alone again. He hadn’t ridden far when she caught up to him. This time they stopped so he could see her. It was as if it was only yesterday when they had ridden to Denver together. They were silent for a while until Jack finally said, “What are you doing here?”
“It’s not safe to go any farther. I can lead you to our meeting place.”
He didn’t say anything, but his mind went over what she told him about their meeting. They weren’t just trying to find the rest of Tom’s men. There was more than one thing at stake. If they found enough of the outlaws, then they would also be hunting for the treasure. The gold wasn’t worth that much, but finding out who killed Tom might be.
“Did you see anyone else on this trail?” Jack asked.
She looked confused. “Who would want to follow us? There aren’t many places we could go.”
But then suddenly Jack thought of someone. “Why do you think it was Tom’s brother who killed him? He had the money hidden away where nobody would find it except his family. Who knows how long he could have kept his secret alive without the money.”
“Tom must have known that, too,” Sarah said quietly. “Or perhaps he never cared to tell me.”
Jack looked down at the tracks she’d made in the sand, and he was amazed. The ground wasn’t hard-packed like the dirt roads in the area, so the prints would have been easily visible even from a distance. And they weren’t like any he’d ever seen before; the hooves left behind two distinct marks instead of a single print.
“They’re horse tracks,” Sarah said. “And not just any horses, but yours.” She reached up with both hands and stroked his chestnut horse’s nose. It looked like there were two sets of hoof prints.
Jack was still watching them when she took her hand away from his chestnut. The other set of footprints was so small that it had almost vanished into the soft earth. But Jack had the strangest feeling that he knew exactly what they meant.
He looked down at his own tracks, and then he was riding off at a fast trot, hoping that this time Sarah would follow after him. He went another hour without seeing any sign of her until finally, he heard a faint cry coming from the hillsides above. “I’m coming!” he yelled back, and then he was galloping across the open space to reach the edge of the hillside.
Sarah stood on the side of the ridge, holding onto one of the scrub oaks as if it was a support. She was staring toward the north end of the valley that led to the town and the main road. She turned around and pointed with her finger in the direction where Tom’s men had gone. Then she jumped up and ran to him. “We have to catch up to them before they make it into Denver.”
The End