Chapter 4

                                                  

"Did you have to stick me with the horse toothed giant?"    Heyes asked Kid under his breath as he watched Violet faltered her way ungracefully towards the entrance of the gardens outside the governor's mansion.   

Kid gave his partner a look scathing look.  "There's no need to be mean, Heyes.  Besides, would you rather have had the bearded lady, instead?"  he asked, as he watched Daisy waddle her way along beside her sister.  

Heyes grimaced slightly as Violet stumbled over her own enormous feet and almost fell.  He breathed a huge sigh of relief when she found her balance and continued her way clumsily down the cobblestone pathway.  He felt pangs of guilt at using the poor young ladies just to gain access to the mansion and hopefully to Evie.  But the old saying "all things are fair in love and war"  came to mind.   He would do whatever he had to to get to the woman he loved and to get to the bottom of what was going on.   But with their freedom possibly at stake they had to be extra cautious. Violet and Daisy, being new to town had no idea who they really were.   And this party was outside, so the boys were able to keep their derby hats atop their heads,  hiding the fact that they had been recently in prison.   They could move about freely and search for Evie.  

The governor's mansion was a splendid estate with high brick walls surrounding it.    A large double iron gate marked the main entrance to the property.   But tonight those gates were closed and all buggies and surries were left outside the gates.    All guests entered through a  single wrought iron gate located on the western side of the brick wall.    Attendants were there to make sure that only those guests with invitations were permitted inside the gate.  

The gardens were exquisitely beautiful.   Heyes and Kid found themselves surrounded by flowering trees and shrubs,  hedges ornately trimmed and  flowers of too many kinds to number.  Daisy and Violet squealed with delight as they made their way through the maze of rose bushes.  The boys were thankful that the only thing they seemed to desire more than an eligible man was a glimpse of the governor's fabled gardens and to meet his beautiful new daughter-in-law.

"Well, Heyes, we made it inside without any problems.  Now let's hope we can find Evie and Livvy before anybody that we don't want to see, sees us."

"Remember, Kid, the governor and the stony faced man both know what we look like,  so steer clear of them.  And the stony faced man carries a gun and I'm pretty sure he won't think twice about using it if he has to."

Kid patted the small Derringer pistol hidden in the pocket inside of his suit coat.  "I'm ready if there's trouble. From the way you describe it,  he's the governor's personal bodyguard."    Kid and Heyes let their eyes sweep the entire grounds from the gated entrance they had just walked through.  "There's lots of security here, Heyes.   If you're going to contact her, it better be tonight, because it would be almost impossible to get back in here without a party and an invited escort for an excuse."

Heyes had also spotted the guards that were situated at every corner of the house and were scattered throughout the grounds.   It made him nervous.   But he was even more nervous still about finally getting to see Evie and talk to her. 

Heyes had been anxious all day.  But now, when he was so close to where he knew she was,  he had butterflies in his stomach.  He couldn't remember the last time he'd had butterflies.   If he thought really hard, he believed it was when he was ten years old and the teacher had asked him to spell  a word that he knew he didn't know how to spell.   

As they came nearer to the enormous brick mansion,  Kid could see the nervousness on his partner's face.  Violet and Daisy had run ahead to flit from blossom to blossom of the innumerable different colors of roses.  "Just calm down, Heyes.   This is Evie, remember.  We're here for answers,  so try to think with your head and not your heart.   There will be time for that later.   I hope."    Heyes had not said so, but Kid could tell what his friend was thinking.   He was afraid of finding Evie happily married to another man.   Kid's gut told him that wasn't going to be the case,  but Heyes was thinking with his heart and not his head. 

Tables laden with all sorts of food and drink were situated on a veranda on the west side of the mansion.   It was on the balcony above that veranda where Heyes spotted the red haired lady called Martha.   He saw her only briefly when he was making a mental picture of every window and door of the mansion.   That must be where Evie was staying.   Was she there in  that room or was she here in the garden somewhere among all these people?  And if that was her room,  was she sharing it with her new husband?   That thought took away some of Heyes nervousness,  and replaced it with anger and dread.   

"Oh, my, look!"  Violet screeched in her nasally voice.   "It's the governor's new daughter-in-law!"  Violet and Daisy both gasped in delight.    "Isn't she absolutely breathtaking?"

Heyes followed their gaze and was met with the most magnificent sight he had ever seen.   She had just emerged from the house and was standing on the veranda.   The abundance of lanterns and torches that had been placed everywhere provided ample light.   He could see her clearly.   She looked like a princess out of a fairy tale.  Her dark hair was pulled away from her face to hang in long, loose curls down her back and over her bare shoulders.  Her brilliant blue, silk gown made her eyes seem even more vivid than he remembered.   He had thought he would never see a more lovely sight than the sight of her that day in the warden's office.  But tonight her beauty far surpassed anything he had ever witnessed.  Day and night for the past year he had dreamed of her.   That vision had kept him sane and alive.  Every inch of his body seemed to become alive and alert because she was so close.   She was  what he had lived for.   And he didn't want to be without her one minute longer.     

He was just about to head straight for her when Kid grasped his arm to halt him.   Heyes looked behind him to find Kid shaking his head slowly back and forth telling him that now was not the time.    No sooner had the Kid stopped him than a handsome man of about twenty-five, slim, well dressed,  well groomed,  stepped out of the house to stand beside her.  And so Heyes had to stand behind the cover of a tall shrub and watch with a clenched jaw as the young man loosely draped his arm around her waist.  It was a good thing that he had spent the last  year  learning to control his need to verbally express himself,  because when the dark haired young man leaned in closely and kissed her cheek, he wanted to scream in outrage at another man touching the woman he loved.  The woman who belonged to him.   Unwanted visions of her in this strangers arms were enough to send him into a blind rage.   It was  also a  good thing that he didn't have a gun.  

Kid could sense the angry heat coming off Heyes' body and knew what was going through his mind.  He stepped closer to his partner, in case he decided to rush to her and cause a scene.   "Calm down, Heyes.   Just look at her.  Take in her body language.  She doesn't want that guy touching her. She's trying to pretend that she does, but  I can tell she's not comfortable."

Kid was right.   Heyes forced himself to calm and just watch for a moment.  She did look uncomfortable and her smile was definitely forced.     The man at her side was obviously her new husband and he acted like he was standing next to a scarecrow instead of the most beautiful and desirable woman in the world.   Heyes' breath was knocked from his lungs as he watched her.   She was perfection.   There was nothing  about her he could find fault with.  Except perhaps her choice of husbands.   

He seemed a little soft to Heyes.  His clothes were expensive and immaculately tailored.   His hands looked manicured and not one of his inky black hairs was out of place.  He seemed to have a perpetual smirk beneath his pencil thin mustache.   The stupid oaf seemed bored and his eyes were scanning the crowd of people who were beginning to gather around the foot of the steps that led up to the veranda where he and Evie stood.   How could any man be bored with his Evie nearby?   He watched the man make eye contact with someone in the crown, and then he gave them an obvious flirtatious smile.    Heyes' eyes darted in the direction of the buffoon's gaze and found a young teenage couple standing on the fringes of the crowd that grew ever larger.  Heyes wanted to strangle him.   How dare he ogle a girl that looked to be no more than fourteen when Evie stood not more than a foot away?      Kid wasn't going to stop him this time.  He started to step around the shrub when the crowd erupted into applause.  The governor had emerged from the house and stood on the veranda next to his son.    Heyes stepped quickly back behind the shrub and turned with wide eyes to find Kid exhaling the breath he had been holding.  "Heyes, we can't let the governor see us.   You know he's probably behind this whole thing and he knows both of us,"   Kid said angrily under his breath.  "Now if you can't be the Heyes I know and control yourself,  you're leaving and I'll find Evie and talk to her myself."

"Alright, alright.  I'm under control.  But, Kid, did you see that guy she's married to?  Flirting with a girl while she's  standing right there beside him.  He acts like she's not even there.   The thought of her being with any other man is bad enough, but the thought of her being with that guy makes me fighting mad,"   Heyes said through gritted teeth.

"We've got to find a way to get you alone with her so you can talk to her.   And I need to find Livvy."

Heyes only had time to nod in agreement before Violet and Daisy came squealing and screeching up beside them.   "Oh, Joshua.  I'm so excited.  Mrs. Ramsey is going to favor us with a song on the piano.   I hear she is the most gifted pianist that anyone has ever heard.   Let's go inside and listen,"  Violet squeaked out so fast that Heyes hardly understood what she said.   

"Yes, we simply mustn't miss it.   I think  she must have stepped right out of the pages of a fairy tale book.   If we don't get to hear her play I will simply die,"   Daisy dramatized as she hooked her arm around Kid's elbow.

"Uh,  you two ladies go on in and me and Joshua will get us a glass of punch.  Make sure you hurry and get a good spot up next to the piano so you can hear real good.   We'll be in shortly."

The boys smiled politely as the girls giggled and pranced off inside the house to follow the crowd to hear Evie play.  "Let's split up.   If you get her alone, you keep her with you and find me,"  Heyes said.   He went inside the house while Kid stayed out in the yard with the very few people who had not packed inside the large sitting room of the governor's mansion where the grand piano stood.   Heyes could hear the faint beginnings of the music as Evie started to play.   As he got closer,  the music became louder and he recognized the tune she played.  He should have known.   She played the hauntingly familiar  Moonlight Sonata.    The strains of the song forced memories into the forefront of his brain.   Memories that strangely seemed like half forgotten dreams from long ago and yet seemed as clear as if they had happened only yesterday.  He came to the large archway that led to the parlor where she played.   He had to stand behind many others to even see her.  But see her he did.   He watched with a furrowed brow as her hands glided effortlessly over the keys, making the piano seem almost to come alive and sing.   Her eyes were closed as she let the music transport her to another time and place.   He knew that's what she did,  she had told him as much.   He wondered if the music was taking her to the same place it was taking him,  back to the oak tree.  Back to that perfect afternoon when she had given her body to him and she had wrapped her soul around his so that he didn't know where his ended and hers began.   He watched her play, like he had done so many times before.  She had the crowd enraptured like she always did.  But it was not music that held Heyes spellbound, it was the woman creating it.  For a moment he let himself imagine that they were the only two in the room.   He would make his way slowly towards her and reach from behind her and touch her slender hands as they made the piano come alive with music.   He longed to touch her hands, her face, her entire body.  He ached with a longing to see the sunlight in her hair and a smile on her face.   He wanted to hear her laughing and singing.  He simply wanted her.  She was what his life was about.  She was his.  Had always been and would always be.   When did he know that?   He tried to remember the exact moment that he knew she was what he was meant to live for.   The moment he had first kissed her in that cave while the rain poured outside?   The moment he had professed his love for her on the small balcony overlooking the dusty streets of Alpine, Texas?   Or was it the moment his body had become one with hers and she had given him her most precious gift - her innocence?  He didn't think it was any of those times.  By the time those things had happened he had already made up his mind.   He had already decided that  he would never let her go.  Even when he had left her in Rising Gulch,  he had known it would not be forever.  He would have eventually found her and begged her forgiveness.  He knew now the exact moment, although in that moment he hadn't  realized it.  The moment he knew that she was the reason he had been put on this Earth was the moment he had pushed her tangled mass of hair out of her unconscious face the day he had found her in the valley of the Trans Pecos.  In that moment both of their lives had become intertwined.  Both their souls, each a different color, had blended to make a new, magnificent, brilliant color.    And now there was a dark, black spot in the center of all that splendid hue.   Heyes' eyes fell on the man who now called himself her husband.   He stood beside the piano,  a drink in his delicate hand,   trying to pretend he was listening.  He didn't even know the man, yet he was beginning to hate him.   

Evie finished her song and stood to face the applauding crowd.   He ducked out of sight into the hallway before her eyes could find him.   He had to get her alone.  He had to see her face to face.  He had to hear from her own lips that she had married of her own free will and that she had not been forced.  

The crowd began to disperse and to make their way back out into the gardens.  There were several small alcoves lining the dark walls of the long hallway.  Each was framed with heavy velvet drapes and contained a marble pedestal which held a large vase of the fresh cut flowers from the garden.   Heyes ducked in behind one of the pulled back drapes.  He had a clear view of the doorway through which all the guests were exiting into the gardens,  but none of them could see him.   And there he waited.   She would have to pass by sometime.  Then he would pull her inside the alcove.  He would have his answers before he left here.  

~~*~*~*~*~*~~*~

Evie's pasted on smile faded as the last of the guests left the parlor and returned to the gardens.  She  couldn't help but have a genuine smile though for the two young ladies who kept looking shyly at her and giggling behind their hands.   They were obviously caught up in the whole fairy tale idea of her marrying the governor's son.  They were not classic beauties, and Evie was ironically reminded of the tale of Cinderella and her two ugly step sisters.  Not that she would ever call anyone ugly.   Some people just had more inner beauty than outer.  They were probably very sweet young ladies who had been escorted by the most handsome men here tonight.  Probably men who saw past their superficial flaws and appreciated the beauty of their spirits.   She was struck with a sudden urge to go to them and strike up a conversation.  She had the feeling they would be delighted.  But the governor's  announcement that champagne was being poured on the garden veranda had everyone rushing to exit and the two young ladies were rushed out along with the crowd.   Evie was glad really.   She had not wanted to play the piano at all.  But she had managed to get through one song.  She didn't think she could stomach faking her way through another.  She was hoping everyone would get drunk and not notice that she had slipped off to her room.   She had made her required appearance and now she just wanted to be alone.  She would claim a terrible headache.   In fact she really did feel one coming on.  She didn't know if she could take the stress the all this pretending.   

A blast of hot breath fell upon her ear suddenly, but the voice that came with it made her stomach heave.  "Bravo, darling.   No one would guess that you're as miserable as I am."   The man she was now married to kissed her cheek in a sarcastic gesture before following the crowd outside, leaving her alone in the parlor with her father-in-law and his ever present watchman whom she had learned was called Bartholomew.  .  

"I think I'm beginning to have a headache.  I really should go lie down,"   Evie said without looking at him.   She walked briskly towards the door, but he had seized her elbow before she could make it out.

"Not before we have a little talk.   I hope you know that I am fully aware that your outlaw friends could show up at any time.  I also want you to know that if they should show up here,  they will be detained before they can ever make it to the house.   I don't expect them to show up here tonight.  Not with such a crowd here.  Besides it's an invitation only event and they would have little chance to make it past all of my guards.   But I just want to make one thing perfectly clear to you my dear,"    he reached out and brushed a lock of her hair off of her shoulder and let his hand rest there,  "I will not tolerate you speaking to either of them.   If you so much as breathe a word of our arrangement to them,  I will not hesitate to make sure that Hannibal Heyes and Kid Curry start to regain their reputations as notorious criminals.  Only it won't be robbery that they will be guilty of this time.   There are crimes far worse.  Crimes for which men will hunt down and hang a man without benefit of a trial.  Do you get my meaning, my dear?"

Evie looked down at his hand that was slightly caressing her shoulder and then into his dark eyes.   She brushed his hand away from her shoulder.  He let his hand drop slowly back to his side.  "I think we've had this conversation before.  I'm not stupid, sir, and I don't need to be reminded of the consequences of revealing the agreement.    I gave you my word that I would do my part to make this marriage seem real to the public.    I think I've lived up to that and I expect you to live up to your part.   Mr. Heyes and Mr. Curry are not to be harmed in any way."

"And they won't be as long as you keep your mouth shut and your distance from them."

"It's rather difficult to have contact with anyone when you keep me locked in this house with your guard dog on duty twenty-four hours a day."   She glared at the stone-faced man who was never far away,  always watching.    

"You may go into town whenever you choose, Evangeline.   You simply must be accompanied by Bartholomew."   He gestured towards his guard.   "You can't blame me for protecting my investment now can you?"

She didn't bother to answer.  She was weary of this whole thing.  "If you will excuse me,  I don't feel well and I am retiring to my room.  You'll make my excuses to our guests I'm sure,"  she said as she turned to head for the door.  But she turned back again and quickly added,   "Alone.   Please do not have your  watch dog follow me.   And I expect to not see him standing outside my door when I come out of my room tomorrow.   If I come out at all.  And one more thing, Governor,  I know all to well what lengths a man will go to to find the man who harms someone he loves.   If you recall,  that is precisely how Harlan Mathis met his fate.  He dared to lay a finger on me.   And for that he wound up swallowing some on his own teeth before Hannibal Heyes decided to have mercy and let him live.   Otherwise I think he would have killed the man with this bare hands.   So I don't want him to come here any more than you do, sir.   Because if he did, he might just kill you and your son.  And I don't want to be the cause of him losing his freedom when I've paid so much to gain it."  

Clayton smiled at the retreating graceful figure of the woman who left the room.   She was quite a woman.    A challenge like her was just what he needed to rid him of the boredom he had been choking on lately.   But her words also stirred a wariness inside of him.  What if she was right?   What if in a crime of passion, that outlaw made it into the mansion and murdered his son?   Or worse the governor himself?   "Bartholomew,   you can stop the nightly watch outside her door.   I don't think that's necessary.   But don't stop watching the outside walls or the balcony outside her room.   And don't let her leave the grounds without you or one of my most trusted men with her."    The silent man nodded his understanding.   "Go and make sure the outside perimeter of the property is secure.   I don't want those two outlaws getting within five feet of this property."

Evie pressed her hands to her temples as she headed down the hallway towards the back stairway that would lead her to her room.   Her head was beginning to pound.     She was completely absorbed in her pain when she was grabbed from behind and her mouth covered by a hand.    She was pulled back against a man's chest.  His hand was gently yet firmly placed over her mouth.   She was pulled into one of the small alcoves along the wall used to display the governor's prize roses and exotic flowers.   Again she felt the warm caress of breath against her ear, but the voice that spoke the words she heard sounded like the sweetest music to her ears.   "Don't scream, sweetheart.  It's just me."

She whirled around as she sucked her breath in.  She had recognized his voice the moment the first syllable came out of his mouth.   It was like realizing your greatest dream come true while being in the midst of your worst nightmare.    She had been longing to see him, to touch him.   And she wanted to leap into his arms right now and never let go.   She wanted him to take her away and tell her everything would be alright.   Damn the consequences and the man who would bring them about.   This was the man she loved.  This was the man she wanted to be with.  This is the man she belonged to.   That was the dream.    But then visions of newspaper headlines, declaring Hannibal Heyes a murderer or a rapist or both flashed before her eyes.  Innocent people being murdered so the governor could blame him.  Then the sound of men on horses, hunting him down, not to bring him to justice, but to exact revenge for dead or violated loved ones,   rang in her ears.   That was the nightmare.   She wanted to tell him the truth.   She wanted him to know everything.    But she couldn't tell him.  For his own safety she had to keep him in the dark and get him out of here.     "What are you doing here?"  she asked in a whisper as her eyes began to tear.  

"You're here.  Where else would I be?" 

Evie almost choked on the sob that threatened to explode from her throat.   She reached out and put her hand on his smooth cheek and let her thumb caress the dimple there.   She peeked around the velvet drapes.  There was no one in the hallway.  She loosened the tasseled cord that was holding the drapery back and let the heavy fabric fall,  secluding her and Hannibal inside the alcove.  

"You shouldn't be here,"   she whispered with a trembling voice.   "You can't be here."

"No, it's you who shouldn't be here."

"Please, you have to go.  You have to leave before someone sees you."

Heyes looked down for a moment.   Evie could see the hurt and disappointment in his eyes and it was killing her.   "Wow.   That's not exactly the greeting I was hoping for,"   he said with a half-hearted smile. 

The look on his beautiful face tore at her heart.  She couldn't resist stepping closer and wrapping her arms around his shoulders and hugging him close.   

Heyes enfolded her in his arms and just held her,  taking in the feel of her, the smell of her.  "I'm so sorry,"   she whispered against his ear.

"For what?"

She stepped from his embrace.   "You have to leave,"   was all she could manage to say.  She nervously peeked again around the curtain to make sure no one was around.

"I'm not leaving here until I get some answers, Evie.   The most important of which is,  did you marry that guy in exchange for my freedom?"

Her silence spoke volumes.   She couldn't look him in the eye.   

"I see.   And whose idea was it that you should never see me again?   Yours or his?"

"The governor's.   It's part of the deal."

"So you marry his son,  never see me again and we go free.  Is that all?   Why is the governor so all fired anxious to marry his son off?   He's a decent enough looking fellow with his black hair and his fancy clothes.  Why couldn't he find his own wife?   Or are you telling me you love the guy?"

Her eyes met his.  "No.  Of course I don't love him."

"Did he force you into this?"

"No."

"Then you married him of your own free will?"

What could she say?    She couldn't tell him about the contract.  Or could she?   She trusted this man with her life.   But she knew if he knew the truth he would throw her over his shoulder right now and probably be shot down trying to escape with her.    "Yes, I married him of my own free will."

"Even though you don't love him?"

"I despise him.  But there was no other way to gain you a pardon.   You have to believe me when I say that there really was no other way."

"So you're trapped in a loveless marriage with a man you despise?   In other words you exchanged my prison for one of your own?"

"There was no other way.   It's not like opportunities to get a man pardoned from prison,  especially someone like Hannibal Heyes and Kid Curry,  come along everyday.   And you are putting everything in jeopardy by being here right now.  Please,  hurry and go,"   she pleaded with him,  her voice beginning to break.   Dear, Lord, what if the governor or Bartholomew found him here. 

Heyes couldn't believe his ears.   She was actually begging him to leave.  He never dreamed in a million years she would ever want him to go.  "I came here tonight, not knowing what to expect, but I never expected to hear you begging me to leave.  I came here tonight, Evie, because for fourteen solid months you are all I have thought about, dreamed about, lived and breathed for.   You are the only thing that has kept me from going insane.  Knowing that if and when I ever did get out of that place, you would be waiting for me,  kept me from going completely mad."   His face became like that of a little boy who had just been punished.  His eyes became large and watery, his lips turned down in a frown,  "Evie,  I came her tonight because I love you."

The damn broke and tears began to fall down her cheeks.   She took his hand in hers and kissed the back of his fingers.   "I know.  I know that you love me."    She held his hand against her cheek.   "If you love me, then you'll go.   Please.   Please leave now before something bad happens."

Something bad was going to happen alright,  Heyes thought.   "I don't have to worry about being recognized anymore.   I'm free to go where ever I please.   I've been pardoned remember.  Unless of course there's some other reason why you want me to go so bad."

She was growing desperate.   If he didn't leave soon,  they were bound to be discovered.   "I can't give you the answers you're looking for.  I just can't.   But you have to trust me when I say that if you don't leave soon,  we could lose everything."

"If I leave here without you, I've lost everything already."    He could see he wasn't going to sway her.  She wanted him to leave.  But he knew it wasn't because she didn't love him.  He had to remind her of that love.  "Alright, fine.  I'll go,"   he said as he stepped  closer to her, hovering over her, backing  her into the corner of the small alcove.   "But before I go,  I want you to do one thing."

"What?"

"Kiss me."

She released a shaky breath as he crowded her further into the corner.   The look in his brown eyes was enough to make Evie's legs grow weak and her body to tingle.   

"Come on.  Kiss me.   You kiss me one time and then look me in the eyes and tell me without lying that you want me to leave and I will.   I'll walk out those gates and I'll leave you alone for the rest of your life.  If that's what you really want."

His nearness and his scent were threatening to overwhelm her.   How could she possibly resist the temptation with him so close?  She couldn't.  She lifted her head and touched her lips to his.   It was like throwing a match to dry kindling.  The fire was instant and it was hot.  He immediately grasped her head in his hands and pinned her into the corner where he took over the heated kiss.   They strained toward each other as their mouths laid claim to each other.   She was his.   He felt it and she knew he felt it.   She could never fool him.   She clutched at his back as he drew moans from deep within her.   She had been longing to see him, to touch him.   And she wanted to stay here in his arms and never let go.   

He let his hands roam the familiar curves of her body that lay beneath the layers of silk and lace.   Oh, how he had missed her.   Words would fail him if he tried to explain how he had longed for her while he was locked away.   He tried to show her instead as he deepened the kiss.  His tongue invaded the warm, wet recesses of her mouth, sipping of her taste.  He felt her go soft and limber in his embrace.   He wanted to make her forget that she was a prisoner in this palace.  He wanted to make her remember the love they had shared and the love they had made before their lives had been ripped apart.   His kiss became even more demanding,  almost fierce in its desperation.   

When at last he lifted  his mouth from hers,   he sought her eyes and found them, full of desire and need.  "Now tell me you want me to go,"   he demanded huskily.

"It's not what I want.  But it's what has to be.  I'm so sorry."

His face transformed as she was speaking.   She saw the dejected look, she saw the hurt and she saw something else, something darker in the depths of his brown eyes.  But what could she do?  He turned to leave.  As desperate as she was for him to leave, she couldn't let him leave with such hurt and anger on his face.

"Where are you staying?"  she blurted as he parted the curtains.  

"Does it matter?   You can't have any contact with me anyway, right?"

"No.  I'm not supposed to.  And there is always someone watching.   But I can send messages through Martha."

He turned again to face her.   "I don't want to send messages, Evie."    He grabbed her around the waist and pulled her flush to his body.   "I can't do this in a message."    And with that he kissed her again, only this time with a tenderness that made Evie weep.  

He tasted the salt of her tears as they fell across their joined lips.   He pulled back and gazed deeply into her stormy eyes.   "I have loved you from the moment I saw you, I believe.   I may not have realized it for a while, but I think I fell in love with you the moment I held you as you cried after your family was murdered.   Thinking of you and knowing that you would be waiting for me when I got out of that place was the only thing that kept me sane.   And now I'm out and I can't have you anyway.   That may be what drives me insane.   So I don't know which is worse.  Holding on to a shred of sanity in prison, thinking you're waiting for me, or losing the last shred of it as a free man, watching you pretend to be another man's wife?"    He released her from his hold and turned to walk away.    "I'm staying at the Dyer Hotel in Cheyenne.   For now."

Evie stood there behind the velvet drapes as he disappeared around them.   She wanted to run after him.   She wanted to hold on to him for dear life.  She wanted....she wanted.....oh, dammit why did she ever think she could pull this whole ridiculous thing off?    Did she really think he wouldn't find her and did she really think he wasn't going to be angry and demand answers.   And had she really thought he would simply accept things the way they were without becoming bitter and hurt.   She didn't want him to leave.   She hadn't even told him she loved him.   She had to find him.  She couldn't let him leave like this.   She would tell him everything.   He would help her find a way out of this mess.    If she went after him now, she could catch him before he got out of the hallway.  She yanked the velvet curtains apart and looked down both ends of the long corridor.    He was gone.      

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Martha pressed a cool cloth to Evie's head.   The young woman had burst into the room an hour ago,  unable to catch her breath from the sobs that wracked her body.   She had run to the balcony to frantically scan the crowd of people below in the gardens.   Martha had managed to make out enough of her stuttered speech to figure out that Mr. Heyes had indeed shown up as she had expected he would.   But things had not gone as Martha had hoped.  

She was sure that one look at each other and Mr. Heyes and Evangeline would leave together.  Martha had always prided herself on being able to discern people after only one meeting.  And she had not liked Mr. Clayton Ramsey from the moment she had laid eyes on him.   But she knew that Hannibal Heyes was a good man with a good heart.  And there was no doubt that he and this precious young woman who now lay across the bed sobbing her eyes out loved each other and were meant to be together.  She would much rather think of her living in seclusion and secret with the man she loved, than to watch her bound to a man she didn't love, rotting away in misery.  

She had not stopped crying for the past hour.   Martha could not stand to see one of her girls cry.   "Love, would you like James to take me into town tomorrow and send Ms. Olivia word to return immediately?"

Evie raised tear swollen eyes and sniffled.   "No.   I want you to go into town and tell the man I love that I love him and tell him I'm the biggest ninny headed fool that ever lived."   

She threw her face into the pillows, sobbing her despair into them.  

"Did he say where he was staying?"

"He's staying at the Dyer Hotel.  But it won't do any good.   If you try to go see him the governor's hound dogs will be on your heels the whole time and you would never make it past the lobby.   He's going to hate me now.    Oh, Martha, what have I done?"

Martha gathered the young woman she loved so dearly in her arms and stroked her head.   "Don't worry your pretty head another minute about it."    Martha would go see that young man.   As soon as the first light of day appeared over the horizon, she and James would be on their way.  

*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~

"Mr. Heyes and Mr. Curry checked out this morning."

Martha just stared at the desk clerk at the Dyer Hotel with her mouth agape.   "How long ago?"

"About an hour, I'd say."

"Did they say which way they were headed?"

"No, ma'am.  I'm sorry." 

Martha's heart sank.   Her plan had backfired.  She had thought that this nightmare would be over once Evie and her beloved had seen each other.  She had been sure that helping Mr. Heyes figure out the truth was the best thing.  Now she wasn't so sure.  If only she could have talked to him once more.   But now he was gone and there was no telling where he might be.   She hung her head as she walked back to the private coach.   She must hurry before the governor's men caught up to them.   If they didn't see her coming out of the hotel then they wouldn't ask questions about her trip into Cheyenne.    

"That was a short trip,"   James said from the front seat of the coach.

"They've gone.   They left an hour ago and the clerk doesn't know where."

"Was there any other place you wanted to go, Martha?"

"Yes.   Back to two weeks ago, so I could put a stop to this whole stupid thing,"   she said bitterly.  "Back to the mansion, James."

The ride back was far too short.  She needed more time.   She needed time to figure out just how to tell Evangeline that she had not gotten the opportunity to tell her beloved that she loved him,  and the reason she didn't tell him was because he was gone.