Jake by Cynthia Woolf Page B

him.” She shivered and Jake didn’t think it was with excitement. “To think he would actually sell me. I guess I’m lucky he hadn’t done it before,” she said sadly. “I knew he was a bastard, but I was sure he loved me. I was wrong. I was just another possession to him. One he could sell if he wanted to.”
    Tears welled in her eyes. Jake opened his arms and she ran into them, burying her face in his shoulder. “Some bride I make. I can’t even do my own wedding right.”
    “What would you have different?” he asked, rubbing her back gently while her sobs subsided.
    “I’d have done it in a real church and I’d have worn a dress,” she looked down at herself, “or at least a clean shirt and pants.”
    Jake laughed and put her at arm’s length, holding her by her shoulders. “We just escaped Billy’s machinations and you’re worried about what you wore. When I’m exonerated for Elizabeth’s murder, I’m going to get you the fanciest dress you want and marry you in a church like you want. Deal?”
    She nodded. “Deal.”
    They climbed onto Busters back and returned to the Finnegan camp to get Becky’s things. She’d remembered to take her money stash with her before they left, afraid that Billy would find it.
    When they got back to camp, Billy was gone. Her things were pulled out of the tent and tossed to one side. He’d been searching and would have found her money had she not taken it with her. There was a hole dug in the ground where she kept the box with the money in it.
    Together Becky and Jake gathered her belongings, including her cot. Jake didn’t think she’d like sleeping on the ground like he did. He was used to it and it didn’t bother him anymore but the ground was damned uncomfortable if you weren’t accustomed to it.
    He loaded Buster with the cot, packed the saddle bags with her books and clothes. She grabbed her gold pan and her rubber waders and carried them. They walked along the path to Jake’s campsite only one hundred yards away.
    “Do you think he’s gone for good?” she asked.
    “I doubt it. He still doesn’t know what we’ve done. He probably thinks you’ll come get him at The Gem , like you always do. That’s not going to happen. Not tonight, not ever again.” He narrowed his eyes. “Understand?”
    Becky nodded. “I understand. You don’t have to keep telling me.”
    He held her at arm’s length, his hands resting lightly on her shoulders. “I think I do. I know how much you want Billy to love you. It would be easy for you to fall back into those habits.”
    She shook her head. “No. Not after he sold me like last night’s supper. He’s going to have to deal with Mr. Winters and if Al’s reaction was anything to go by, Mr. Winters is not going to be happy with Billy at all.”
    Jake chuckled. “No, he isn’t is he. Maybe he’ll give Billy a taste of his own medicine after all.”
    After they walked the short distance to Jakes camp, he held the tent flap open. “You’re new abode, Madam,” he said bowing low.
    Becky giggled and went into the tent. It was much the same as hers, but bigger because he didn’t have a cook tent. Everything Jake owned was in here. Clothes, cooking utensils, food. The tent was where he slept, got out of the cold, sat in the rain…lived. And now she lived here, too. She stood there in the middle of the tent not knowing what to do. She’d never expected her life to turn out this way. But it could have been so much worse. She owed Jake so much. She owed him everything.

CHAPTER 9

    Becky stood in the middle of the tent while Jake set up her cot next to his pallet. It was so close she could hear him breathe when he slept. This was her wedding night. Becky wasn’t so stupid as to think Jake wouldn’t want to bed her. She knew what men wanted. The whores in town could provide that as far as she was concerned. No way was anyone, Jake included, going to do that to her.
    “Jake.”
    “Hmm.” He continued setting up her