Part 46 (2/2)

”I don't know anything for sure,” Chris answered. It was the truth.

”Now you know I ain't asked you anything about where you been before,” Roberts started, leaving the rest to Chris's imagination.

”Sure. And don't think I don't appreciate it.”

”But something in my gut says you know something about this.”

”You can take my piece, if you like,” Chris offered. He left out that he had another in his room, and that he'd be going right for it after his heart started to slow down.

”I didn't say I thought you did it, Broadmoor. I said you know more than you're telling, and I want to hear it.”

”I don't know anything, Sheriff. If I did, I'd come right to you.”

”Then guess for me.”

Chris let his eyes drift shut and took a long, deep breath. He considered the idea for a minute. He could do it, too. Wouldn't even be that hard. All he'd have to do was come out with as much or as little information as he absolutely had to. Roberts was trying his d.a.m.nedest to be clearjust a hint would be enough.

The problem was, though, that just a hint would be enough to get him into the room. It would be enough to put him into a situation where he'd just get himself shot.

Chris couldn't do that. He wouldn't. ”I don't know anything, Sheriff.”

All he could hope for was forgiveness after he dealt with it himself.

Thirty-One.

Marie watched the events unfolding in front of her with a cold, twisting gut and a feeling that whatever was behind it, Chris was taking it worse than the likely death of someone he probably didn't even know. Marie had never seen the injured man before in her life, not that it meant much of anything. She hadn't seen half the town before.

And yet, there Chris was, at the center of this maelstrom, as people whispered in voices too low for Marie to make out. It was easier to make out the disconcerted looks on their faces, and much easier to figure out what they were staring at. The Sheriff came before too long, in the tow of a young man with a low hat-brim, and a moment later Roberts helped Chris to take the body away.

Something told her that she ought to have helped, but she just... froze. She should have known what to do. She'd done it enough times, back in New Orleans, but... with all that blood... The man was already nearly knocking on heaven's door, and the odds that he could be saved for love or money were so slim.

She tried to move to follow, but her body wouldn't move. All she could do was watch the blood-so much blood-soak into the gra.s.s. She felt strangely detached, almost numb, as if she weren't really being affected by any of the things going on around her. As if none of it were real.

She snapped out of it when someone-a big man, the one from the bar who had left them to their privacy only a little while ago-wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pulled her away.

”You oughtn't see this, ma'am,” he was saying softly. She heard him in the same way she heard all the voices around. Where had Chris gone? She'd lost him, when he'd moved away. When she hadn't followed him, even though she'd thought that she would, she'd thought that she wanted to.

Marie's mind started to catch up to the situation a minute later, when she had finally gotten far enough away. When she couldn't smell the acrid, unpleasant smell of gunpowder and the hint of coppery sweetness that was blood hanging in the air. She looked around. Recognized her surroundings.

And more than that, she recognized Chris coming out of the doctor's place, his shoulders set low and hard and a mean look on his face. He glared right at her, but he didn't see her. Whatever he was seeing, she knew the expression because she'd seen it before.

The teacher slipped out of the big man's arms. He made a half-hearted attempt to stop her, but then an instant later he saw Chris and decided that he didn't want to be there any more. Marie understood the doubts but didn't have room to indulge them.

She pressed herself against him as he walked. He looked down at her, from wherever his mind was a million miles away. Then he looked back up. ”Go on, Marie, I can't talk right now.”

She stood and let him pa.s.s, but she didn't leave. ”When will you be able to talk?”

He looked back at her for a second, and then seemed to decide that it wasn't worth answering after all. Marie followed after, taking long steps and leaping up the stairs two at a time, regardless of what it might have done for her skirt.

”Christopher Broadmoor, you answer me. If you're going off with your pistol, then you at least tell me why. Tell me what I'm supposed to tell Jamie, if he asks for you.”

Chris stiffened when she said Jamie's name. His jaw pressed together like a vise, but after a long moment he turned again and stepped through the back door. It was different, this time. She'd been up to this room twice before, and both times it had been an experience, to say the least.

Now, though, it was silent as she stepped through the door. Must have been that everyone who might have been up here was outside, gossiping. And they'd be gossiping about her all the more, in a little while. This was no place for a lady. Was she even a lady any more? She'd given away whatever little virtue that she might have had in their eyes.

Chris's door was closed when she got to it, a moment after him. She opened it softly. When she'd first run after him, she'd seen it all playing out in her head, all fire and brimstone. Hit him with the full force and fury of G.o.d. But now, she just wanted to stop him. Just get him to see reason because if he didn't then it wasn't just her who would be suffering.

”Why does it need to be you? I know you didn't tell the Sheriff about wherever you're heading.”

”I don't know what you're talking about. I don't know anything, and I'm not headed anywhere.”

He was packing a bag, though, sure as anything. She watched him pull a box of cartridges out from behind the bed and slip it into a sack.

”Don't you lie to me, Chris Broadmoor, not after-”

She didn't finish her sentence, and she knew she didn't need to. He stopped, at least for a moment, and turned to face her.

”You're right,” he said finally. ”I shouldn't lie to you. I'm going to deal with this once and for all, and I'm doing it because I have to.”

”No,” she said, insistent. ”You don't have to. You can just let someone else handle it, just this once, Chris. You don't have to handle anything at all.”

He smiled. ”You're a smart woman, Miss Bainbridge,” he said softly. ”But in this one case, you don't really know what you're talking about at all.”

He tested the weight of the bag on his back.

”Tell me what I'm supposed to tell Jamie. Tell me what I'm supposed to do when the Governor's people come and try to take him.”

He closed his eyes, and she knew she had him. She might have hurt his feelings, deep down. If he had any feelings to speak of. But she did what she had to do, and just for once, just for now, that was enough.

Thirty-Two.

Chris set down on the bed and dropped his bag, suddenly tired as a wave of something that wasn't entirely unlike regret hit him. Marie was right, as much as he didn't want to admit it. He'd already made his decisions, and there wasn't going to be any take-backs, no matter what he might want. No matter who might get hurt, he'd made his bed and now it was time to lie in it.

”You made your point,” he said softly. ”You don't have to wait.”

The sound of her feet not moving was unsurprising. Then they started moving the wrong direction. His bed sagged as she set down in it beside where he lay. He didn't move the arm that covered his face. There wasn't any reason to move it, not now.

”You know, Chris, it's funny.”

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