A Bride for Logan by Barbara Goss (free children's online books TXT) 📗

Logan passed the meat platter to Emma. “Have some chicken but don’t take the part that goes over the fence last. That’s my favorite.”

Emma grimaced. “You can have it.” She took a small chicken breast.

“I ordered your sewing machine today,” Logan said.

“Really? Thank you. How long before it arrives?”

“We can pick it up at the general store in about a month.”

“Thank you.”

“What are you going to do about Dallas?” Emma asked.

“I reported him to the sheriff, and we plan to set him up. I’ll appear to pay him off, and the sheriff will be there to see him accept it.”

“Be careful. That man is evil.”

“I will. Alan will be there, too.”

At exactly ten the next morning, Alan and Logan dismounted and walked behind the hotel. They saw Sheriff Billings behind the hotel outhouse as they turned the corner of the building, but there was no sign of Dallas.

They waited nearly fifteen minutes before Logan became impatient. Something didn’t seem right to him. He whispered to Alan, “Wait here—I’ll go up to his room and see what’s keeping him.”

Logan knocked on the door to Dallas’s room, and a maid opened it.

“I’m looking for a man named Dallas who was in this room yesterday.”

The maid opened the door to the room wider. “The room is empty, as you can see. The gentleman checked out this morning.”

“He’s no gentleman,” Logan said before sprinting back outside and to the rear of the hotel.

“He’s gone,” Logan said loud enough for the sheriff to hear.

“What?” Billings and Alan said at the same time.

“He’s checked out,” Logan said. “Now, why would he…Oh, no! Emma! He’s gone after her. He set this up to get us out of the way!”

Chapter Ten

Emma could hardly wait for her sewing machine. She’d use it for the larger things she wanted to sew like the bedspread and curtains. In the meantime, she sewed doilies and knitted potholders and hot pads. Emma followed a strict color scheme for her cottage of rose and light gray. She could hardly wait to move in.

She heard a horse coming down the lane to the house. It hadn't taken Logan long to pay Dallas off. She would finally be free of the horrible man. Emma couldn’t wait to hear how things had gone with the money exchange. She heard Logan's footsteps in the hall, and she rose to meet him, but the figure that came into the sitting room was not Logan.

Dallas was dressed in all black, and he had a coil of rope on his shoulder.

“So, we meet again.” He walked over and grabbed her.

She tried to fight back, but he pressed a handkerchief over her face. She tried to concentrate on not breathing in the acrid smell on the cloth. Emma kicked, soon she felt limp, and then she knew no more.

~~~**~~~

Logan and Alan were accompanied by the sheriff in case he was needed. They thundered down the lane to the house. Logan slid off his horse and raced into the house. Alan and Billings followed.

Logan ran into the sitting room and picked Emma’s sewing up from the floor. “Emma!” he called.

Alan and Billings went into the other rooms, calling her name.

Irma came out from the kitchen.

“Irma, have you seen Mrs. Sinclair?” Logan asked.

“She was in the sitting room sewing when I saw her last,” Irma said.

“What’s this?” Billings asked. He picked a white cloth up near the front door, and Logan ran to grab it.

He smelled it. “Oh, no! He knocked her out. Smell.” He handed the cloth to Billings who smelled it and grimaced.

Alan grabbed the cloth and smelled it. “Chloroform. He must have dropped it on his way out.”

“Let’s see if we can catch them,” Logan said.

They walked out into the yard and looked at the hoof prints. “There’s more than one horse,” Billings said, “and they went that way.” He pointed south.

The three men mounted and headed south. Logan wondered who the other riders were.

Logan gripped the reins so tightly, his fingers grew numb. He knew Dallas’s intentions weren’t good. He would ravish Emma and then…his heart pounded heavily in his chest. They had to find her.

Fortunately, the tracks were easy to follow. Logan guessed there were three horses, but only one’s hoof prints stuck deeply in the earth. The roads were wet from that morning's rain. It told Logan that two of the horses had no riders, which meant that Dallas had also stolen two horses.

They rode for several miles before the tracks left the road and went into the woods. The forest floor was mostly strewn with pine needles, and they lost almost all of the tracks, but they followed the broken tree limbs and whatever prints they saw.

Luckily, Logan knew the area since he’d played in the woods and surrounding area as a young boy. He wondered where Dallas was taking his wife, as the area was nothing but fields and forests.

~~~**~~~

The bumpy ride finally roused Emma. She’d been thrown over the front of a horse and was facing the ground as they sped along. Emma peeked upward, saw Dallas, and it all came back to her. Where was he taking her? She heard hoof beats behind them and thought that someone might be coming for her, but then she glimpsed the two unsaddled horses that Dallas was pulling behind them—he’d also stolen two of their horses.

Emma felt the horse slowing until it came to a halt.

“So, you’re awake,” Dallas said. “Good. We’re almost to our destination.” He dug his heels into the horse’s side and they started galloping again.

Emma felt vomit pool in her mouth. She thought it might be the mix of the substance Dallas had used to knock