STANDING
BETWEEN LOVE AND BETRAYALSTANDING
BETWEEN LOVE AND BETRAYAL
The soft glow of the moonlight tonight had been perfect for romance. He lies quietly on the hotel bed, which much to his dislike has become the center of their relationship; next to Hannah who is sleeping in a dream contented slumber.
Jimmy briefly wonders if her dreams are centered with him being her knight in shining armor. Romance. Jimmy smiles at his foolishness. He had thought that Buck was acting somewhat naïve when he had mentioned to Jimmy that he wanted there to be romance between him and Jane before lust overtook their bodies. How absurd Jimmy had thought at the time of his and Buck’s conversation. He had simply chalked it up to Buck’s being inexperienced with women. But, now the thought of romancing Hannah is the only emotion Jimmy has on his mind. He is falling head over heels in love with Hannah, but all he is to her is a romp in this repetitious old hotel room.
Jimmy gazes at Hannah and gently tucks a strand of her molten black tresses that have fallen onto her face, behind her ear. He ponders the thought of being a good husband if Hannah would allow herself to fall in love with just one man. Her negative attitude concerning love and marriage has Jimmy wondering if Hannah can even feel the emotion of love. Hannah certainly respects her father, but does she really love him? She is protective of Charlene and Phillip, but does she really love them? Would she tend to them if they were ill? Would she stand by them if they were in some kind of trouble? Jimmy doesn’t see those feelings in Hannah for her father or her siblings. She can care deeply, but can Hannah really love another person? It is also possible that Hannah has built up a wall around her emotions to avoid getting hurt.
Jimmy carefully pulls back the blankets from his body, and exits the bed quietly not wishing to arouse Hannah from her blissful dreams. He glances back down at a sleeping Hannah. The black leather gloves are still harping at his mind to figure out the truth behind them. Jimmy doesn’t want to believe that the woman he is falling in love with could be a cold-blooded killer, but the evidence has been right in front of his eyes on two separate occasions. He turns away from a princess-like sleeping Hannah, and with a hesitant feeling in the pit of his stomach, he searches the room for her purse. Before Jimmy’s feeling become too intense for this woman, he needs to find out the truth behind her gloves and behind the murders going on around Rock Creek.
Jimmy’s eyes focus in on Hannah’s purse stationed on the chair close to the window that faces the Doc’s clinic. If he ignores the purse then Jimmy figures he’ll never really know the truth. He doesn’t want to lose Hannah. He tries to avoid looking at her purse that is just waiting for him to take a peek inside. Jimmy hesitates. He can’t allow anyone else to lose their life simply because he doesn’t want to lose her.
“Damn,” Jimmy spoke cursing his intolerance for law breaking.
Jimmy walks with hesitance over to the chair. He slowly picks the purse up from the chair and prays silently that his suspicions about Hannah are wrong. He fumbles with the opening of the clasp that holds the purse shut to intruders. He doesn’t make a visual inspection of the contents. With his one hand holding the purse, he uses his other hand to rummage through the contents. Jimmy breathes a sigh of relief when the items that he finds are just normal female possessions. He pulls out of her purse and places a mirror, make-up, handkerchief, keys, and money on the chair beside him.
Jimmy places his hand back inside the purse, and a sudden feeling of despair comes over him! He pulls out the cloth that his fingers became entangled with. His hands reveal to his eyes a pair of black leather gloves! Jimmy carefully spies the gloves over cautiously for bloodstains! He holds his breath until he realizes that the gloves are clean.
“Jimmy, why are you always going through my purse?” Hannah asked, smiling warmly at the marshal of Rock Creek who is standing naked holding a purse in one hand and a pair of woman’s gloves in the other hand.
Hannah’s somewhat loud voice startles Jimmy from his intrusion of her belongings. “Jimmy, do you have some sort of sexual fetish that involves a woman’s purse and her black leather gloves?”
Jimmy puts the purse down onto the chair, but he holds onto the gloves. He ambles over to the bed, and stands at the edge facing Hannah. “Why is it that everything you think about ends up having something to do with lust?”
“Isn’t that why we are in this hotel room together, Jimmy?”
Hannah has pretty much confirmed Jimmy’s earlier thoughts of their relationship from her standpoint; she simply has no feelings of love for him. The feelings she has for him are lust or nothing at all. “Yeah. I suppose that’s why we come to this stylish hotel room,” Jimmy spoke disheartened, as he briefly glances around the room.
Hannah stares at her leather gloves that Jimmy keeps caressing with his hands. “Would you like for me to put them on and do naughty things to you?”
“Hannah, please. This is serious,” Jimmy spoke angrily.
“Yes, I know. We only have a few hours till dawn. If you want me to satisfy your appetite one last time, you best crawl back into this bed and warm me up!”
“Hannah, we really need to talk.”
It had taken Hannah a while, but she now notices the serious tone of Jimmy’s voice, and the slight frown fixed on his face. There is something definitely wrong. Hannah only hopes that it isn’t another conversation that includes love and marriage. For Hannah, those two topics take away the passion in her.
“I’m listening,” Hannah spoke tiresomely of all the talk between them.
Jimmy holds up the black leather gloves so Hannah can receive a real good look at them. “Why do you carry leather gloves in your purse?”
Hannah’s reaction to Jimmy’s question is pure confusion. She wonders silently if Jimmy has lost his mind. “They are my riding gloves. Mister Marshal Hickok, I don’t believe it is against the law to have in your possession a pair of riding gloves,” Hannah spoke a bit angrily at Jimmy.
Jimmy senses Hannah’s anger at his intrusion into her private world. He feels the need to explain why he had rummaged through her purse in the first place. “The person who is doing the killing near and around Rock Creek has been wearing a pair of black leather gloves just like yours.”
Hannah is shocked when the realization hits her that Jimmy believes she is the person behind the killings. “You think that I am a cold-blooded killer?”
Jimmy keeps quiet for a brief moment trying to figure out in his mind exactly what he does believe. “No, I don’t believe that you could harm another person that way.”
A smile slowly replaces the frown on Hannah’s face. She holds her hands out for Jimmy to come back to bed.
Jimmy places the gloves on the night table, and takes hold of Hannah’s hands. He allows Hannah to guide him into their bed.
Jane had succumbed to a hot lavender bath before the rest of the Hunter household awakened. She had hoped that the refreshing water would wash away the passion that she had felt with Buck the night before outside in Rachel’s garden, and then in his bedroom. As Jane strolls quickly over to the bunkhouse, she comes to realize that last night’s kissing and touching between her and Buck will stay embedded in her mind and heart for a very long time, not to mention what these feelings of heated rage with Buck are doing to her body!
After the onslaught of passion that she and Buck had released onto one another, she had been completely ready to surrender her heart and body to him! She had wanted him more last night than ever before! But, she left the warmth of his embrace when she removed his shirt revealing his bandaged chest that brought all the emotional turmoil back to the surface that she has concerning her inability to love him totally because of an outlaw’s revenge. ‘It is better to leave you than to love you and than have you taken away from me because of a vengeful outlaw.’ Jane had tried, on her way to the bunkhouse and Cody, to convince her heart that for her, Buck is her past.
To help make her mind forget about Buck Cross and all the feelings that are raging within her, Jane has decided that today will be the start of a new life. She walks up onto the creaky wooden porch of the bunk-
house that leads to her new life.
Jane raises her fisted hand to knock on Cody’s door just as Cody is opening the door to ride into town.
Cody’s smile stretches across his entire face when he opens the door and he sees a warm smile attached to the woman he intends on making his wife. Cody walks up to Jane and lowers his head to place a friendly kiss on her awaiting lips. “What are you doing here so early?”
Even though Jane couldn’t allow her heart and body to make love to Cody last night, she is thankful that he appears to be elated to see her. “I’ve been up all night thinking about last night.” She tries convincing her heart that she really isn’t lying to Cody. She was up all night, but her thoughts were of Buck. Cody had not entered her mind or heart at all! At least the part about being up all night is the truth even if she needs to fabricate the rest of her story. “I want to start a new beginning for the two of us.”
Cody is speechless. The only feeling on his mind is how happy Jane has made him with her declaration of love for him. He lowers his head again to kiss her; only he allows a bit more passion on his part, to pass between them.
Louise and Kid are walking across the ranch to get to the Hunter homestead. They both witness the shared kiss between Jane and Cody.
“Jane still doesn’t kiss Cody the way she had been kissing Buck,” Louise spoke flatly.
Kid takes Lou’s hand and tries to hurry her steps to Rachel and Teaspoon’s home. “It isn’t any of our business.”
Louise halts their forward movement to watch Jane’s body language as Cody tries to kiss her senseless. “Cody sure does have to put a lot of effort into kissing Jane. Jane acts as if she’s trying to break free of his hold and kiss. Jane always seemed like she wanted to devour Buck whole,” Louise spoke with a naughty smile.
Kid gently places his hand on Lou’s back, and he pushes her forward. “Come on.”
“I know, I know. It isn’t any of our business,” Lou spoke as she mocks her husband’s earlier words.
Jane stops the kissing between her and Cody. It’s obvious to her that Cody would never stop. She is beside herself with worriment because Cody’s kisses still don’t bring out the passion in her that she’ll need to convince him that she wants to make love with him. She’ll have to work on feeling passion for Cody. How does one work on feeling passion for someone when passion is not there? She surmises that perhaps she’ll have to fake it!
“I’d like for us to try last night over again,” Jane spoke disheartened, almost not believing the words that came from her mouth.
Cody is dammed near stunned right out of his boots over Jane’s words that he has waited so long to hear.
Jane waits patiently for an over exuberant Cody to say something about her request. She wonders why all men are so dumfounded when a woman makes her intensions known to him. Buck had always been so fretful about their encounters that he couldn’t get them past the state of kissing each other senseless. She never really minded though. At least with Buck she wanted the kissing to never end. Then last night happened. Buck had willingly allowed her to remove his shirt. All she could see were the bandages that covered his wound! A wound that a notorious outlaw put there. Jane shuts her eyes tightly from the memories that she wants to forget.
“Perhaps we could have dinner in Rock Creek, and then a romantic night here in the bunkhouse,” Cody spoke as calmly as his over excited body would allow him to.
Cody’s monotonous voice snaps Jane out of her reminiscing about last night with Buck. “That sounds wonderful.”
“Good. I’ll see you this evening,” Cody spoke, as he kisses Jane good-bye and heads out toward the barn to retrieve his horse.
Jane stands alone at the bunkhouse wondering how in the world she will get through this night without constantly thinking about how much she wants Buck Cross!
By early afternoon Jimmy strolls into the marshal’s office in a foul mood unlike any mood that Teaspoon has witnessed before. He watches Jimmy as the young man walks in, doesn’t speak one word, and slumps down into the chair in front of Teaspoon’s desk.
Teaspoon wonders what it is that has the boy in such a grumpy mood. He gives Jimmy a reasonable amount of time to come clean with whatever it is that is troubling him. Jimmy doesn’t speak a word within the reasonable amount of time that Teaspoon gives his boys before he has to start the talking.
“Beautiful day out there today,” Teaspoon spoke loudly trying to awaken Jimmy from whatever his mind is being tormented by.
Jimmy glances up at Teaspoon. “What?”
“I said, what’s troubling you son? Teaspoon spoke softly. Teaspoon has found since he took on the job eight years ago on raising all these boys, that occasionally you’ve got to trick them into opening up, and telling you what’s on their minds. It hasn’t failed him yet, so he figures he’ll use whatever method it takes until the day it fails him.
“Hannah,” Jimmy stated flatly.
“Oh. I see.”
“No. You don’t see, Teaspoon,” Jimmy spoke more harsh to Teaspoon than he had intended to.
“I can see that Hannah is stirring up other feelings in you other than lust.”
“Yeah. Well that’s just Buck’s foolishness, and look where it got him.”
Teaspoon sighs heavily. “Jimmy, Buck isn’t the only one of you boys that is capable of falling in love. Buck just happens to fall in love entirely too fast, and it just takes you a bit longer to admit you’re falling in love.”
“Where does Cody fit?” Jimmy asked trying to divert the conversation away from him.
“Cody. Well Cody is always falling in love with himself. Take him and Jane for instance. I don’t think Cody is really in love with Jane even though he claims he is. He hasn’t been with her long enough to fall in love. With Cody just having a woman gives him a reason to gloat about his being a man.”
“Yeah. Well Buck fell in love with Jane without really knowing her for very long, and Buck doesn’t act nothing like Cody.”
“Buck and Jane that was a little different. You could see it in their eyes almost right away how they felt about each other. But, enough about the three of them. I want to know what’s going on with you.”
“Teaspoon, you’re either going to lecture me, or you’re going to tell me, I told you so.”
“Let me be the judge of that. What is it about Hannah that has you all agitated today?” Teaspoon asked wanting to make sure Jimmy’s bad mood isn’t because he found information that would incriminate Hannah to the murders.
“I was with Hannah last night. I couldn’t sleep not knowing whether she’s involved in these murders. I went snooping in her purse, and I found another pair of gloves.”
“Go on,” Teaspoon pleaded.
“Hannah woke up and bluntly asked me why I am always going through her purse. I told her about the leather gloves being worn by the killer, and that her gloves are an exact replica of the one’s used by the killer.”
“I see. What did Hannah have to say about that?”
“She said they are her riding gloves,” Jimmy stated flatly.
“Well that’s a logical explanation.”
“Yeah, it would be except that Hannah doesn’t use riding gloves when she’s out riding.”
“Oh Lord. Are you thinking she could be the killer?”
“Who is the killer?” Cody spoke as he stands in the doorway of the marshal’s office.
Teaspoon and Jimmy glance at one another cursing themselves that they allowed Cody in on their little secret before they could find out the truth themselves.
“I asked you both a question?” Cody spoke harshly.
A few hours later after Cody had listened to Jimmy’s suspicions and Teaspoon’s doubts, he rode onto the Anderson ranch with Jimmy and Teaspoon escorting him.
Cody had arrested Hannah for the murders of six army soldiers, a member of Jesse’s gang, Mister Carson, Henry Walker, Joseph Foster, and Andrew Johnson.
As Cody is placing Hannah onto the buckboard with two soldiers guarding her, she is staring back at Jimmy with pleading eyes to help her out of this situation.
Jimmy who is beside himself with sadness, turns away from Hannah and rides in front of the buckboard.