True to the Law Read Free Page B

creativity, was even a tad flattered by his motives, but was careful not to encourage either. She listened with half an ear when he prattled on about the most recent visitor to Bitter Springs and nodded at what she hoped were the proper intervals when he gave a full account of the birth of a foal in Mr. Ransom’s livery just that morning. He also added a rapid, if somewhat incoherent, story about the milliner’s daughter accepting Mr. Irvin’s proposal of marriage. Finn wasn’t clear if it was Millicent Garvin who was marrying the undertaker, or her younger sister Marianna, but there was definitely a wedding being planned because Mrs. Garvin was ordering catalogs and silk from Paris.
    Tru thought that even if she hadn’t been apprised of some of the town’s more interesting citizens when she interviewed for the teaching position, it would not have taken her long to identify Heather Collins, grandmother of Rabbit and Finn, as the one who invariably had her ear to the ground and her tongue positioned for wagging. While her husband was the station agent for Bitter Springs, and privy to all the comings and goings of the trains and travelers, he was still merely the human hub. Mrs. Collins, on the other hand, was the human hubbub.
    Tru had a suspicion that Finn’s ear was similarly pressed and his mouth similarly positioned.
    Pulling her scarf up so that it covered her mouth and the bottom half of her nose, Tru stepped out of the schoolhouse. Wind whipped at her skirts. She ignored the flare of her petticoats but surrendered to the shiver that rattled her teeth. She tucked her chin against her chest and watched her step on the uneven sidewalk as she bucked the wind.
    She would have been knocked to the ground if the same force that stopped her forward progress had not also stopped her downward plunge. In that first moment, she lost her breath. In the next, she recovered it.
    And promptly lost a little of it again when she met the direct, crystalline blue gaze of the man who was at once an obstruction and her protection.
    “I beg your pardon,” he said.
    Feeling rather foolish, Tru sought purchase on the ground with the toes of her boots. He immediately set her down.
    “Better?”
    “Yes.” Tru could feel her bonnet slipping backward. She made a grab for it, exposing her tightly coiled hair to the wind’s icy teeth, and set it properly on her head before it could blow away.
    Still watching her, he frowned. “Are you all right?”
    Tru realized that her scarf had muffled her answer. Rather than expose her face to the cold, she nodded.
    “I’m afraid I wasn’t watching where I was going,” he said.
    She nodded again and pointed to herself, hoping he understood she was offering the same explanation.
    “Are you certain you can walk? You didn’t twist an ankle?”
    The answer to the first required another nod. The answer to the second required a shake. It would be too confusing if she did both. Tru pulled the scarf just below her bottom lip. “Really, I’m fine.” Her moist breath was made visible by the cold air. She burrowed her mouth and nose into the warm wool again. When he continued to stare at her as though gauging the truth of her words, Tru took a step sideways. The wind slipped under her petticoats and her skirt fluttered wildly against his legs as she made to pass.
    “You’re Miss Morrow. The schoolteacher.”
    Tru stopped. She supposed that if he had any doubt about her identity, the simple act of pausing was sufficient to confirm it.
    “My name’s Bridger,” he said, touching the brim of his pearl gray Stetson with a gloved hand. “Cobb Bridger.”
    She sighed and tugged on her scarf again. “I know who you are, Mr. Bridger.”
    “You do?”
    She felt strangely pleased that she had surprised him. “I eliminated all the faces I know. Since I don’t know yours, that makes you new to town and therefore the gambler who has taken up lodgings at the Pennyroyal.”
    “I’m staying at the