Outlaw Hearts(5)

Harkner quickly rolled to his knees, then eyed Miranda as he stood up. His dark, angry eyes fell on the pistol she held, and with his own gun still in hand, Miranda was sure he was going to shoot her too. A survival instinct made her pull the trigger. The small pistol cracked, and Jake Harkner stumbled backward but did not fall. His eyes widened in astonishment as he looked down at his middle to see a spot of blood.

Miranda wondered which of them was the most surprised, Harkner at being shot by a woman, or she, for pulling the trigger in the first place. She waited, expecting him to shoot back, but he just shook his head. “I’ll be damned,” he muttered. He turned and stumbled out of the store, nearly tripping over Putnam’s body. Miranda stood frozen. The rain had let up slightly, and she heard shouted voices, heard someone riding away.

“Mrs. Hayes! Dear God!” Monty Lake was coming from behind the counter, his face bleeding from where flying glass had cut him. “You shot him! I saw it! You shot that one called Jake Harkner. That bounty hunter said he was worth five thousand dollars!”

Miranda looked down at her pistol, wondering if she had just dreamed all of this.

“I’ll get the sheriff,” Lake told her. By then several people had gathered outside. Lake hurried out and began explaining what had happened. Miranda heard more shouts as men quickly gathered to form a posse to try to find the wounded outlaw, who had ridden off before anyone realized what had happened.

“Mrs. Hayes! Are you all right?”

It was Sheriff McCleave. The middle-aged, big-bellied lawman had been sweet on her for a year now, but Miranda had no desire to be courted by anyone. She saw the genuine concern in his kind brown eyes.

“I’m fine, Sheriff.” She looked over at the counter, wondering what the sheriff would think if he knew she was actually feeling sorry that Jake Harkner had left without being able to collect the supplies he had apparently needed. Stranger still, she felt sorry for having shot him. She couldn’t understand why she should, after hearing the things he was wanted for—robbery, murder, abduction, and rape. Hadn’t he denied being guilty? But then what man wouldn’t try to deny it? It was ridiculous to feel sorry about what she had done. Maybe it was the fact that her father had been a doctor in Illinois before they had come to Kansas. She had grown up being taught it was important to save lives, not take them.

People were pressed around her now, praising her, telling her that if the posse could catch Jake Harkner, she would be a rich woman. She watched some men carry off Luke Putnam’s body, heard someone say he was dead. She thought about how quickly Harkner had acted, lunging fearlessly at a man who was ready to shoot him. He had drawn his revolver with such lightning quickness that she was hardly aware he had moved his hand. Most vividly, she remembered the look in the outlaw’s eyes after she shot him, such astonishment, even a hint of respect. He could so easily have shot her, or he could have threatened her, used her for a shield in order to get out of town. Instead, he had just left her there unharmed.

The sheriff rode off with a posse, and a friend from church, Bonnie Kent, was suddenly at Miranda’s side. “Randy!” she exclaimed, using the more familiar shortened form of Miranda that her father had used for her practically from birth, the name by which all her friends knew her. “Oh, you poor thing! Are you hurt? Are you okay?”

“I don’t know.” Miranda put a hand to her eyes. “It all happened so fast!”

“Oh, this is terrible, and you still in mourning! Come to the house for a while and rest, Randy. I’ll give Mrs. Denver your list and she can see that you get everything you need here.”

In a kind of daze, Randy followed Bonnie out of the store. A crowd of curious people followed, and she answered their questions as best she could while hurrying with Bonnie through a now-steady downpour. By the time they reached Bonnie’s house at the west end of town, two men who reported for the Kansas City paper had also reached her. They peppered her with questions until Bonnie told everyone they must leave and let Randy rest.

Finally the door was closed, and both women removed their rain-soaked capes. Bonnie led Randy into the parlor of the small frame home she shared with her husband of one year. “I’ll get you some tea,” she told Miranda. “You sit right there in front of the hearth and warm yourself.” She left, and Miranda remained standing, staring at the flickering flames of a small fire in the fireplace.

Suddenly everything was quiet, except for the ticking of a mantle clock. She looked up at the timepiece, shocked that it was still only ten o’clock in the morning. So much violence in one short, spring morning! And she had been a part of it! Out there somewhere rode the dangerous-looking stranger named Jake Harkner, with her bullet in his belly.