16

She ignored him, wiping furiously at the tears cascading down her cheeks even as more replaced them. How much more would be taken away before it was considered enough—that she'd paid for her parents' mistakes? Would that day ever arrive?

"You're moving as fast as a cat with its tail on fire." Shepard quipped, walking next to her with a look of concern creasing his brow. "What's wrong?"

Hazel shook her head and clamped her mouth shut, afraid if she tried speaking, she'd break down in sobs.

Shepard stared at her in frustration and concern. Had he said something to upset her? He ran through their conversation in his mind, picking apart his words in the hopes he'd discover the ones at fault. It had something to do with the money; he was almost sure of it. But the exact issue escaped him.

They walked in silence all the way back to their cottonwood tree. He glanced at it as they passed, wondering if other people claimed ordinary spots as theirs after a momentous life event took place in their vicinity.

Did a first kiss with the woman he loved even count as momentous? A smile tugged at his lips at the thought. It certainly did for him.

He snuck a peek at Hazel, and his heart squeezed painfully in his chest at seeing her so miserable—which was the reason they had walked past their tree instead of to the saloon to check on Jeremiah, he silently reminded himself.

A vision of Hazel sifting through the soot in her bedroom moments before clutching a shard of charcoal to her chest filled his mind.

He'd told her everything could be replaced.

And she'd looked as though he'd crushed her soul.

"Jonesy, I'm sorry," he murmured, pulling her to a stop. "I didn't mean to upset you." He swallowed and cradled her face in his hands, wiping away the tear tracks with the pads of his thumbs. "Not everything can be replaced, not even with all the money in the world."

Hazel sniffled and closed her eyes, losing the battle against her emotions as she brokenly wept, "It was all I had left of her."

Shepard pulled her into an embrace and gently murmured, "What was it?"

"A picture of my mama," Hazel cried into his shirt, clenching the material in her fists at his back.

Pressing a kiss to the top of her head, Shepard held Hazel while she sobbed, feeling her heartache as though it were his own, and decided he would try to find a way to make it up to her.

A little while later, once Hazel's tears were spent and her frayed emotions more firmly in check, Shepard took her hand in his, lacing their fingers together, and refused to let go while walking to the saloon. Hazel was so drained from all her crying she ignored the cautious inner voice reminding her of the necessity of keeping him at bay.

She would go back to listening to it tomorrow. Today, she wanted to bask in the glow of being cared for by the man she loved—even if it was only a tender friendship on his part.

Her hair was nearly dry by the time they walked through the Morning Glory's batwing doors. A smattering of people sat at several tables in the main area, some playing cards, others quietly conversing and eating beef pot roast and potatoes. She nodded greetings to Sheriff Douglas sitting at a table with Thomas and a new man in town that she'd met named Lawrence Howard.

Thomas tipped his imaginary hat her way and winked, his gaze hardening when it fell on her hand still clasped firmly in Shepard's. His cheeks flushed an angry red, and he snapped his attention back to the Sheriff, though Shepard noticed his eyes flitted back to watch them walk upstairs.

Once they reached the landing, Jeremiah's coughing carried to them long before they arrived at his room.

"Jeremiah," Shepard called out as he rapped his knuckles against the door, loud enough to be heard over the deep, hacking sounds within.

A few minutes passed, punctuated by two more rounds of painful-sounding coughing before the door was unlocked and slowly pulled open to reveal the Marshal in a long, sweat-stained nightshirt.

"Come on in," he quietly rasped, wincing as he clutched his throat. He shuffled toward his bed, waving a weak hand Shepard interpreted as a request to close the door and make themselves comfortable.

Jeremiah collapsed into bed with a hoarse groan the instant he was close enough, looking as though he'd expended all his strength just to walk the fifteen feet to let them in.

"You look worse than yesterday," Shepard murmured, tossing his hat on a hook by the door. He crossed to the bed and touched the back of his hand to Jeremiah's clammy brow. "You've got a fever, old man."

Jeremiah softly grunted, rolling to his side as his body convulsed with a round of deep, wracking coughs. Once it passed, he wiped his bandana against his mouth and face and scowled at Shepard with bloodshot eyes. "It's not a damn fever, son; I've been up dancing the night away to that incessant piano music."

Shepard bit back a chuckle, glad Jeremiah's sense of humor was still intact, and hoped it meant it wasn't a serious illness afflicting him.

Hazel opened both windows and then hurried over to the water pitcher on the washstand. Peering inside, she clucked her tongue before whispering, "I'll be right back."

Shepard shook his head and blocked her path as he took the pitcher from her hands, "You stay; I'll go get it filled."

"I'm perfectly capable of doing it, Shepard," Hazel grumbled, giving him a dirty look.

"It isn't safe," he muttered with a pointed stare, his fists planted firmly on his hips and feet braced wide.

Hazel growled low in her throat.

Shepard swooped down and kissed Hazel on the mouth. First, because he needed to, and secondly, because it was the only thing he could think of that might keep her diverted long enough to let him escape without any drawn-out discussion—then plastered a smile on his face before leaving.

Hazel stared at the closed door in shock, though it was difficult to decide if she was more stunned by Shepard's quick and yet delightfully possessive kiss or the fact he'd all but ripped the empty pitcher out of her hands while kissing her and then slammed the door. In her face.

"He's in love with you, you know," Jeremiah rasped, watching her with a small smile bending his lips while resting his hands on his stomach.

Hazel turned to him, her heart racing. Then, at his nod, she looked at the door, "Surely not."

"Surely, yes, Miss Hazel," Jeremiah chuckled. But, unfortunately, it quickly transformed into a horrible bout of coughs that had Hazel rushing over to support his weakened frame.

She sat on the bed, bracing a hand against his back, and wiped his gray hair from his sweaty brow until it ended.

Grabbing up the glass of water on the bedside table, she held it to his lips, all the while wanting to ask how Jeremiah could be so sure about Shepard's feelings. But she feared drawing him into a conversation would only send him into another round of wracking coughs. And from the frail look of him, he might not survive.

Jeremiah, however, seemed to believe otherwise. Or didn't care. It was hard to tell. He stared at her and patted her hand resting against his shoulder. "Don't look so shocked, m'dear," he hoarsely murmured. "I dare say you share his affliction."

"W-we're friends; of course, we love each other."

"Loving someone and being in love with someone isn't the same thing, darlin,' and that boy is in love with you."

Hazel shook her head and walked to the window with the full water glass still in her hand. She stared unseeing, fighting against the urge to cry. "Has he admitted his feelings to you?"

A heartbeat of telling silence pierced the air before Jeremiah said, "No, but he didn't need to."

Hazel scoffed.

"It's plain enough to see every time the man looks at you," he murmured as his shoulders lifted in an unapologetic shrug.

"But he can't love me," she whispered with a hard shake of her head, "not that way."

Jeremiah studied her for a quiet moment before saying, "'Course he can. You're a good woman with a kind heart." He covered a cough and then softly continued, "You deserve a good, strong, and handsome man, and I've known him long enough... under trying circumstances... to know that fella's one of the best."

Hazel turned and stared at him, her mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water without making a sound.

Jeremiah nodded and closed his eyes on a weary sigh, his chest rising and falling with wheezy, rattling breaths that made Hazel's own chest ache.

She sat on the bed and offered the cup to him, helping him hold it to his lips in his weakened grasp as he took a drink. When he was done, she took her time refilling the glass in a futile attempt to keep her mind busy, then set it on the bedside table.

"You seem to be having a more difficult time coming to terms with it than I thought you would," he murmured, cracking his left eye open to meet her gaze before closing it again. "Why is that, I wonder?"

Hazel looked at her lap, surprised when a teardrop splattered on the back of her hand. Wiping the moisture from her face with her wrist, she sniffled and quietly admitted, "He deserves better than the daughter of a prostitute."

"Bull snot and buckles, Miss Hazel, but that's a load of manure, and you know it," Jeremiah quietly rasped.

Both of his eyes opened to bare slits as he stared at her, a look of sharp disapproval on his flushed face. "Ain't a woman alive more deserving of the kind of love that boy holds for you, even if you'd been born in a pigsty and raised by wolves."

He watched her, coughing into his bandana before saying, "Now, you stop that, you hear?"

"Stop what?"

Jeremiah grunted. "Trying to come up with other reasons you're a terrible person undeserving of love; I'll shoot 'em down too, fevered or not."

Before Hazel could even think of a response to that, Shepard pushed the door open and walked in. She quickly stood, giving him her back as she wiped away the remaining tears on her cheeks.

Shepard crossed to the washstand, casting a worried glance at Hazel as he poured the water into the washbasin before setting it down.

"Everything all right while I was gone?" He dipped a clean cloth in the bowl and wrung it out, then swaggered to the bed and tried to lay it on Jeremiah's brow.

But Jeremiah wouldn't let him and weakly ripped it out of his hand, then spread it across his brow himself.

"What'd I tell ya about treating me like an invalid," he grumbled. "The only person I allow to fuss over me is my Bertie, and since she's prettier and shorter than you, don't think for-" he turned and coughed into his right hand while holding the cloth on his forehead in place with his left.

Hazel handed him the glass of water once the coughing ended, then refilled it when he drained it dry. Darting a nervous glance at Shepard and blushing when he caught her, Hazel forced a swallow and quickly looked at Jeremiah, who winked and took another sip of water.

"Don't think for a second," Jeremiah softly continued as though he hadn't been interrupted by his illness, "you can fool me, even in this weakened state, Shepard."

Shepard's gaze darted between Jeremiah and Hazel, wondering what he'd missed while getting fresh water.

Something had definitely occurred in his absence. Hazel refused to look at him and was acting cagey, entirely out of character. Jeremiah, on the other hand, was smiling like the cat who'd eaten the canary.

Silence descended.

The awkward kind that tended to feel like a shout and made a person's ears ring. Or, at least, it would have been silent if not for the piano downstairs belting out a discordant yet bawdy melody.

Jeremiah sighed and rubbed his temples, "That infernal thing needs to be tuned—or chopped into firewood and burned."

Hazel bit back a grin and looked at Shepard to find him doing likewise. Their gazes collided, sending a bolt of awareness straight to her heart, where it landed with a thud. Her stomach fluttered.

Fear and euphoria fought for dominance, coalescing into a strange, heady mixture that left her unable to resist Shepard's tempting allure. The piano music faded away, drowned out by the rush of blood in her ears and three simple words tripping over themselves in her mind. He loves me.

"Jonesy," Shepard said, his brows arched in a comical look of exasperation. "Did you hear anything I just said?"

She blinked and straightened, "Yes, what?"

Jeremiah chuckled, and Shepard shook his head, then said, "Thomas and his hair have decided to gather a bunch of men to begin clearing the damage at your shop; they're waiting downstairs for you."

Hazel glanced at the door, then turned and looked out the window at her shop. She didn't want to go back there today, possibly not even tomorrow. She couldn't. Just thinking about stepping foot in her bedroom again made her stomach lurch and threaten to expel its contents.

Shepard came up behind her and settled his hand on her shoulder as he softly murmured, "You don't have to go over there if you don't want to, Jonesy."

Hazel nodded and clenched her eyes shut against the scene out the window. "I know." Clearing her throat, she took a steadying breath, squared her shoulders, and turned to face him. "Will you go with me?"

"Of course," Shepard said without hesitation. He kissed her brow and smiled as he took her hand in his, "Consider me your personal bodyguard...."

She stared at him, her heart skipping a beat at the heated look in his eyes. "You'll be all right by yourself, Jeremiah?" She asked, unable to tear her gaze away from Shepard.

Jeremiah chuckled, then coughed. After a moment, he rasped, "Doc Graham dropped by this morning and topped off my medicine bottle before he left, so I'll be having me some pleasant dreams while you two are toiling away."

"He'll be fine," Shepard murmured, tugging her gently toward the door. He plunked his hat on and looked over Hazel's shoulder to Jeremiah as he said, "Holler if you need anything."

Jeremiah nodded and started coughing as he motioned for them to leave.

Hazel closed the door behind them, but instead of Shepard leading her to the stairs, he ushered her to the room she'd slept in. "I thought you said Thomas and the men were waiting."

"They are," he muttered as he opened the door and pulled her inside, "but I just remembered I forgot something in here."

Before the door clicked shut, he had her in his arms and was delivering a passionate, toe-curling kiss that made her head spin. It was unexpected and over before she had time to fully savor the moment. When he pulled away, she swayed and blinked at him as though she'd over-imbibed on strong spirits.

Shepard chuckled and pressed a tender kiss to her lips, "We better go before Thomas decides to come searching for you."

She stared at him wide-eyed, "What was that for?"

Shepard winked as his shoulders lifted in a shrug, and a devilish smile curled his lips. He'd kissed her because every instinct he possessed had demanded it, and he couldn't find the desire to deny himself. "Thought I'd give you something more enjoyable to think on for the next little while, is all."

"How do you know I enjoyed that?" She teased, folding her arms across her chest and arching a brow. "It was over and done with so fast-"

Whatever else she meant to say—which even Hazel wasn't sure of—was silenced when Shepard settled his mouth atop hers once more. He pulled Hazel flush against him even as he pinned her to the door and cupped the back of her head.

Hazel wrapped her arms around his shoulders, anchoring him in place, afraid he would try to end the exchange before she was ready. She soon realized it was a baseless worry and gave herself over to the heady sensations he stirred to life. He kissed her hard and deep, drinking from her lips in an unhurried exploration as though he'd been wandering in the desert for years, and she was his oasis.

His mouth worshiped hers, demanding one moment and then tender the next, seeking supplication. Time seemed to slow, and the world disappeared.

The piano music, the hum of conversation and laughter from the saloon downstairs, and Jeremiah's coughing carrying to them through the wall were forgotten. All that mattered was the two of them and his lips against hers, kissing her with blatant ownership.

Shepard attempted to end the kiss several times. His self-control was close to evaporating. But every time he gentled his passionate assault, Hazel made a soft mewling sound of dismay, and he couldn't find it in his heart to break away.

He rationalized that it would have been cruel to end it, and where Hazel was concerned, cruel was something he never wanted to be. And so, he gave in to the intoxicating emotions and settled into delivering a long and thorough kiss.

He knew Hazel cared for him; it was there in the way her eyes softened and warmed when meeting his, the touch of her hand, and the equal fervor in her kiss. But he wanted more, needed more. He wanted to own her heart and soul entirely as she owned his.

They were both panting for breath when Hazel ended the kiss a little later. She clung to him, her arms wrapped firmly around his waist, and pressed her face into the crook of his neck. His hands stroked and caressed her back, careful to avoid the perimeter of her bruises.

"You've certainly given me something to think about for the next few hours," she whispered with a smile against his throat.

Shepard chuckled and stepped away but kept hold of her hand as he opened the door. "You and me both, sugar." And with a wink that brought a heated blush to Hazel's cheeks, they left the sanctuary of the bedroom.

Within minutes of stepping into the saloon, Thomas and seven other men stood and crossed to meet Shepard and Hazel.

Thomas looked at Shepard with unbridled hostility in his eyes, letting him know without saying a word precisely what he thought of him. Then, turning his attention to Hazel, his gaze softened, though his overall expression remained disapproving.

"How are you feeling this morning, Miss Isadora?" He asked, his tone gentle. "You had us worried last night."

Hazel clutched Shepard's hand tighter and forced her lips into a smile.

She'd never enjoyed being the center of attention, but it was even more uncomfortable when it came from Thomas. He'd been kind to her from the moment she arrived in town, but it took less than a week for his kindness to border on suffocating.

His eyes narrowed, and he took a step back as though sensing her unease, either that or he heeded the irritation and banked animosity rolling off of Shepard.

Hazel believed it to be the latter.

"A little bruised, Thom," she said, striving to remain polite, "but otherwise healthy as a horse, thank you for asking."

"The men and I thought we'd start clearing away the debris now that it's cooled," Thomas motioned to the men gathered in a disorderly group behind him. "If that's all right with you?"

Hazel nodded. "It's very kind of all of you to offer," she said, casting an appreciative gaze on the whole group staring at her.

The men smiled and nodded back, some of them flicking cautious glances at Shepard before shuffling out the saloon doors. Hazel watched them go, finding it difficult to get her feet to move. The soles of her boots seemed to be glued to the floorboards.