OverTime 1 - Searching (Time Travel) (26 page)

"I know those names too!" I insisted in a hiss, gasping for breath. "Not
Bassett, but the others. How do I know them? And they scare me. What—what if I'm an outlaw?"

He smiled. Here I was, about to pass out, choking on thoughts of jail and nooses and train robberies, and he had the nerve to
grin
? I didn't care how momentarily handsome he suddenly looked when his expression softened. When he asked, "When'd you last eat?" I almost hit him for his condescension.

"This is important!" I insisted, pulling away from his support and only belatedly regretting it. His hand had felt good on me, dangerously so. But at least I was farther from passing out than I
'd been before anger gave me a resurgence of energy. "What if I'm running from the law?"

"Get farther on a full stomach," he drawled, and offered his arm.

Two soldiers went around the roadblock I presented, doffing their hats as if they were the ones in the way.

I hesitated between my panicked anger and buying into his calm...and the humor that lingered in his gray eyes, even after the quick disappearance of that smile. Here I was, battling the overwhelming confusion of the big picture—or rather, the big jigsaw puzzle—and he took one little manageable piece and snapped it into place. Lunch.

No contest, really. I glared, frustrated—but I took the arm. The gesture felt surprisingly formal and comforting, all at the same time. Something about the Boss just made him a hard man to panic around.

When he began walking, I went where he led, glad I didn
't have to battle the clusters of mostly men around us on my own. "If I
am
running from the law, would you help me get away?" I asked.

He said, "No," and stopped several doors down, at the corner marked as Front Street—the main street down Dodge—and First Street. The window said,
Beatty and Kelley's Restaurant—Fine Foods, Meals Served at All Hours
.

Heaven. He
'd taken me to heaven. A real restaurant! And I couldn't accept. When he moved to open the door for me, I tugged at his arm. "You've done so much already," I protested, determined to do the polite thing if it killed me. "You shouldn't have to feed me too. Let's go someplace where I can at least buy...my own...."

He was scowling now. "Keep yer egg money," he ordered.

My what...? Ah. So he was one of those men who saw going Dutch as an insult, right? I
really
should have guessed that, shouldn't I?

And I
really
wanted to eat in a restaurant. I'd been living for it, all week. And I already owed him, big time. And at least this wasn't a date or something, where I would have to worry about him wanting to collect on the price of dinner later on.

I mean, Mr. Propriety?

"Is that an order?" I asked, accepting my defeat with a grin, which seemed to startle him. Then, while he was still off-guard, I beat him to the door.

C
hapter 12 – Lunch Date

It was certainly awkward enough to be a date.

First of all, Garrison got sulky about me opening my own door. I could barely keep from laughing while I let him pull out my chair at the table, to make up for it. He did
not
miss my amusement, and once we were seated he punished me by staring out the window at Front Street instead of at me. He looked different, younger, without his hat. Maybe it was because his hair was darker where the sun hadn't bleached it. Or because he'd had his beard trimmed since yesterday.

The inside of Beatty and Kelley
's was still warm; so far, the coolest place I'd been in recent memory was the Peaves' sod house. But it was also refined, especially for a place that sat flush on a broad dirt road with a railroad track going right by it. The walls were paneled with carved wood that had been painted white, and were hung with landscape paintings, tilted between wall and ceiling to better face down at the room. The floor was shiny hardwood, though a green carpet runner ran up the middle of the room, and the chairs were heavy and also intricately carved. Crisp white linen covered the tables, and crystal bud vases held fresh flowers. What looked like fancy gas lamps, polished and shiny, hung from the ceiling. The waitress was dressed more like Mrs. Staunton—or Belle—than like me, bustle and all, and heifer-branded with a full-length, white ruffled apron. Starched.

Heaven, all right.

I realized almost immediately that I was more comfortable in these surroundings than Garrison was, despite that there were far more men than women here. I was the one who automatically asked for a menu and who talked easily with the waitress about the special of the day while my companion scowled at the table.

The menu, though, threw me. The food selection was as fancy as the decor—but all the dinners cost fifty cents. The numbers swirled around on the menu for a moment, and I almost asked Garrison:  Does this say fifty
cents
, or fifty
dollars
? But the desperate need to stop looking so out of place kept my mouth closed, and I took a deep, steadying breath through my nose. Whatever this cost, he probably knew what he was doing, right?

A fifty-dollar dinner made me almost as nervous as one for fifty-cents...just for different reasons. Why
was
he being so nice to me today, after being so anxious to "git shed" of me yesterday?

It took the longest time for the waitress to come take our order; when Garrison noticed me turning to see if I could spot her, he asked, "You decided?
" He sounded annoyed, like he'd been waiting for some time, and that startled me. But then again, I'd been unbalanced all day, right?

"The beef Stroganoff," I said, figuring that it would only be polite to eat beef around a cowman. He nodded at the waitress, and she came immediately to his side, and he ordered for both of us. For some reason, that unsettled me too.

But at least his discomfort speaking with the waitress—he'd reverted to gruff monosyllables as much as he could—kept me from asking,
Who are you, and what have you done with the Boss?

Well, that and the exasperation I knew would greet my calling him
Boss
.

The waitress brought our drinks—coffee for him, despite the heat, and lemonade for me—and then we fell into our wait for the food. Garrison stared out the sparkling clean window. I glanced out the window too, but couldn
't see anything other than horses, wagons, cowboys, soldiers, and dust to watch, so I surreptitiously watched the other patrons, playing a guessing game with myself about them, and just enjoyed being there.

Five tables held businessmen, eating alone, two of whom looked to be cowboy businessmen—one of those had exchanged nods with the Boss, early on. Two tables held older couples, both of whom seemed to be married. I fidgeted surreptitiously with the skirt of my new dress and wondered what Garrison and I looked like to them. Nobody would probably guess the truth in a million years. Heck,
I
didn't know the truth.

The lemonade was very good.

When finally I caught Garrison glancing at me, I took the liberty of initiating conversation. "This is nice," I said brightly.

He nodded.

Well there you go! That took care of us until the soup arrived.

Much though I hated to admit it, he was probably right about insisting I have something to eat. The soup, some kind of bisque, was delicious, and I felt surprisingly better after eating it. When the entrees arrived, my Stroganoff didn
't disappoint. Why did the quality of the food surprise me so? I asked about Garrison's schnitzel—yes, he ordered schnitzel, which turned out to be veal, the calf killer—and he nodded again. I guess that meant it was good, too.

I
'd known he wasn't much of a talker, but this was ridiculous. Obviously, luncheon conversation would be up to me.

"I
'm pretty sure I've done this before," I shared, between bites of heaven. "It feels right. I've felt so out of place, this whole week. But here I know things, almost instinctively. I know which fork is for dessert, and what kind of wine we should have. If we were having wine that is. I know to tip 15% for decent service and 20% for good service—it's all just sort of
there
. Accessible. Do you know what a relief that is, after having felt so stupid around the cows?"

It was almost funny—he
'd seemed content to carefully eat and watch me, listening to me babble, but as soon as I threw a question at him, he froze and looked worried, like a kid caught out of a daydream by a teacher's sudden question.

"Weren
't raised near livestock," he finally conceded, hoarse.

"That
's a kind way to look at it," I said with a grin, and he relaxed again. "The store wasn't bad, either. Apparently, shopping is
not
foreign to me. Oh, there were some glitches. Something doesn't seem quite normal about this wrapper, but other than the weird name, I have no idea what that would be. After all, it
is
a lovely dress," I assured him, when he looked worried again. He obviously didn't need to hear about the Corset Incident. "And the shoes. Also lovely, but do you know, I had no idea how to button them? I couldn't have been rich enough to have someone to button my
shoes
for me...could I?" I rolled my eyes. "That would be a little much."

He took another bite of his veal, still watching me, and I wondered if he was eating partly as a defense against further questions.

"So I guess Benj was right, and I'm a city girl," I said, and he frowned and swallowed. "The big question is, what city?"

Garrison said, "Best eat yer dinner."

"I am." I even took another bite, and smiled. "Mmm."

He turned back to his own plate.

"But," I added after I'd swallowed, pausing with my fork mid-air, "you've got to be curious too, aren't you? I mean, I could have a place waiting for me somewhere. Someplace where I know what to do, and people know me...and there's indoor plumbing. You've been great, taking care of me and all, but wouldn't it be a relief to hand me over somewhere that you know I'll be safe and taken care of?"

He was frowning at his plate—because I was talking too much? When I ducked my head closer to his, to better read his expression, he sighed defeat and hit me with both gaze and commentary. "Someone left you," he reminded me. "No one
's been lookin'. Leastways, not 'round these parts."

I stared at him.

He qualified with a gruff, "Not yet, anyhow." But it sounded more like a warning than encouragement.

"You think someone
tried
to get rid of me?" I asked, stunned.

He took a deep breath, but didn
't look away.

"I don
't understand," I insisted, my voice shrinking from small to tight. "If someone wanted me dead, they would have just killed me, wouldn't they? Maybe I got very ill, and wandered away in a delirium. Or maybe there was an accident, and I'm just blocking it from my mind. Or...or I could have been kidnapped, and held for ransom, but I got away, and right this very moment my father or my husband or someone is trying desperately to find me, but he just doesn't know to look in Kansas."

The Boss didn
't even nod at my theories, which made me mad.

"I mean...
Kansas
!" I added.

He sat very still, then finally said, "May be.
" With those two words, he reduced all my wonderful possibilities to mere fantasy. Sure, any of them
could
have happened. But it was just as likely that I'd simply been disposed of, just as likely I had been alone and unloved even before I lost my memory. Maybe I'd been so alone and unloved that I'd taken off on my own—without clothes. I didn't want to consider the possibilities behind that theory.

I looked down at my plate and suddenly had no appetite. I pushed it away from me.

"Eat," the Boss urged, gruff.

"I don
't want any more, thank you."

"You will later.
" And no, he didn't say it gently. The way he nudged the plate back toward me was overbearing, not concerned, and I'd about had enough.

But at least I
'd learned better than to say,
Screw later!
Instead I said, "I'll pay you back for dinner," and I hoped it wasn't fifty dollars worth.

"No," he responded, through clenched teeth. "You will not."

"Well I'm not eating more and you can't make me." Oops. That was a stupid thing to say. He probably could. But we were in public, and he was on good behavior. Instead of hauling me across the table and stuffing beef Stroganoff—or worse, veal—down my throat, Garrison flushed and looked down at his own plate, muttering a word to himself. I heard it anyway, and it was "Willful."

"Yeah, well you
're going to be one unhappy trail boss if I vomit on you." That earned me a glare.