Bruises – An ATC to Breckenridge
I don't own these characters. I just like to spend time with them. No other profit to be had.
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"Breck! You mind keepin' a gun on your client?" Dillon growled as he glared down at Sled Grady.
"Not at all." Breck answered resignedly as he stepped up and pulled his gun, holding it on Grady while the fearless Marshal of Dodge gently helped Kitty to her feet.
"Are you alright?" Dillon asked her tenderly.
When Kitty nodded, he led her over to an overturned crate near the barn and had her sit down. Neither one said much, but Breck wasn't blind. He could see the connection between them. With a sigh, he turned back to his former client and now temporary prisoner, to give them a moment's privacy.
Groaning, Grady rolled over onto his back and started to get up, but Breck cocked his gun and leveled it at his head. "I wouldn't if I were you." Breck told him. "I don't much like shooting people, but in your case, I'd be glad to make an exception."
Grady slowly sat up, bringing his knees up under his chin, and looked over to where Dillon and Kitty were sitting, talking quietly. "I didn't hurt her none." Grady pouted. "He didn't have no call to hit me like that. I'm gonna be bruised from head to toe now."
Breck glanced in their direction and then looked back at Grady. "You deserve to be bruised. I think he had more than call. If she was mine…" He didn't finish that sentence. He'd realized from the moment the Marshal had grabbed Jocko's lapels, and demanded to know where she was, that Kitty Russell belonged to him and him only.
When he'd first met her the night before, he'd briefly entertained thoughts of courting the beautiful red head. But that was until she'd mentioned Matt Dillon. He had nothing concrete to go on at that time, of course, but the look on her face had told him quite a bit.
Still, when he'd heard that Kitty had been taken, he couldn't help but plead to go along, a part of him, hoping against hope that perhaps Dillon's concern was nothing more than that of any lawman for a citizen and that when Kitty learned that he'd volunteered to ride with the Marshal and come after her, she might look on him with favor.
But not now. Not after seeing the way Dillon looked when Sled Grady dragged her out of that house. Pure unadulterated rage at the bandit and undiluted love for the captive played equally along the strong planes of his face. Any hope, no matter how faint, Breck may have had, was now gone.
Out of Breck and Grady's earshot, Matt knelt down beside Kitty, forcing her to meet his gaze. "Kitty? Did he…" He nodded towards the front of her dress, where the button was missing.
"No, Matt." She offered a weak smile. "He… he was going to try but… well, he saw you riding in. He didn't really hurt me."
"You sure?"
Kitty nodded and laid her hand atop his. "I'm sure, Matt. I'm alright. Few bruises maybe, but nothing to write home about." She looked over at the dog that had saved her. "Guess I owe him a steak." She looked back to Matt. "I owe you a lot more."
"You don't owe me anything." Matt told her. "Cept, maybe a kiss later."
The corners of her mouth twitched upwards for a moment and a hint of a twinkle lit her eyes. "I think I can do better than that."
Once Matt and Breck had gotten Sled Grady on his horse and secured his hands to the saddle horn, Matt helped Kitty into the old couple's buggy and tied Buck in behind it. While Breck mounted his own horse and took control of Sled's reins, Matt climbed into the wagon with Kitty and started them back towards town.
"You know, when we find that elderly couple, we're gonna have to switch to my horse and let them have their buggy back." Matt told Kitty as they set out.
Kitty wrapped her arms around Matt's and laid her head on his shoulder for a moment. "I won't mind."
From his perch on his horse, Sled Grady watched the two with a mixture of envy and irritation. He'd wanted that woman bad. And he almost had her. But that Marshal had to go and show up and then that nasty dog attacked him.
He couldn't believe his luck. One minute he had a load of money and the woman he'd wanted forever and the next he was tied to a horse and being taken to jail, by his own lawyer no less. Shaking his head ruefully, he wondered if Breckenridge Taylor could get him out of this. Glancing at the glowering countenance of the big lawman, he doubted it. Bruises. All of this and the only thing he was going to have to show for it was bruises.
After leaving the farm, it hadn't taken them too long to catch up to the elderly couple who'd found a spot beside the road to sit and rest and wait. As Matt helped Kitty from the wagon and then onto his horse, the old woman whispered, none too quietly, to her husband. "Look at that baggage. First she's with one man then another. I told you, she ain't no better than she oughta be."
Matt stiffened and turned around to her with a scowl on his face. "Ma'am." He started.
But Kitty placed a hand on his shoulder to calm him. "Matt, it's alright. She doesn't know."
Matt glanced up at her. "She will." He looked back over at the old woman who now sat rigidly in the wagon seat, waiting for her husband to join her. "Ma'am, it seems you have a little misconception about Miss Russell, here."
"I have no idea what you're talking about." The old woman pointed her nose into air, refusing to look at Matt or Kitty either one.
Matt stepped close to the wagon and directly in front of the old woman to make sure she couldn't avoid him. "Miss Russell was kidnapped last night, old woman." He snapped. "She was forcibly taken from her home at gunpoint by that man over there and made to go with him. She's not baggage and she's better than a lot of people oughta be."
Kitty swallowed hard, as she listened to Matt defending her. He rarely said much when it came to things like that, usually chalking it up to people's ignorance, but this time he did and it warmed her.
The old woman's nose drifted south and soon she was staring at her hands.
"Well, Martha?" The old man put in. "Marshal's right. You owe her an apology."
"I'm sorry." She half whispered finally.
"What?" Matt demanded loudly. "I don't think Miss Russell heard you."
"Matt…" Kitty tried but Matt waved her off.
"No, Kitty. What's happened to you in the last couple of days is bad enough. You've got enough bruises. I'm not going to stand here and let someone, anyone, demean you as well." He looked back over at the old woman. "Well?"
Breck watched the old woman as she forced herself to look up and at Kitty. He didn't know this Marshal that well but the vehemence of his words surprised him a little and further worked to make him understand just how strong the bond between he and Kitty.
"I said, I'm sorry." The old woman finally raised her voice and looked over at Kitty with a contrite expression. "I didn't know."
Kitty offered her a smile. "I know." She nodded. "It's okay. I understand."
Matt stood still for a moment, prepared to say more, but Kitty again placed a hand on his arm. "It's okay. It won't change anything and it's over." She told him softly, never relinquishing her hold until she felt him relax.
Saying nothing more, Matt turned and mounted his horse, behind Kitty. There was a lot more he'd wanted to say but Kitty was right. Nothing would change what had happened to her or make people, like that old woman, see in Kitty what he saw.
There were just some battles he could never win, no matter how hard he tried. But at least, in this one instance, he'd forced at least one person to acknowledge that they were wrong about the woman he loved. It was a tiny victory and a short term one, but still a victory.
Glancing over at Breck, to make sure he had a tight hold of Grady, Matt urged Buck forward into a canter and moved up ahead of the group and out of ear shot. "I'm sorry, Honey." He lowered his lips close to her ear, sending a slight shiver up her spine. "I'm sorry for all of this."
Kitty glanced up at him with a smile. "You have nothing to be sorry for, Matt. You didn't do this. You came for me, like I knew you would."
"Yeah," Matt shook his head. "Lot a good it did. If it hadn't been for that dog…"
"Matt." He took his hand and squeezed it tightly. "Don't. I'm alright. I'm in your arms and I'm safe. That's all that matters. Okay?"
"Okay." He sighed. "But tonight I plan on visiting you to inspect for damage." His voice was light at last and teasing.
"Promise?" She looked up at him with a grin and an arched brow.
"Promise."
Later that night, as promised, Matt let himself into her rooms after things had shut down for the night. He found Kitty already in bed, loose fitting nightgown covering her slender frame and a book open in her lap. She looked up when he entered, but she didn't say anything as he began to get undressed.
"What's wrong, Kitty?" He finally asked when he'd doffed his boots and vest and shirt. "Do you want me to leave?"
Shaking her head, Kitty put the book, she hadn't really been reading, on to her night table and reached out, taking his hand. She was worried. When she'd finally undressed and saw how bad some of the bruises were, she worried about Matt's reaction. But she didn't want him gone. "You know better than that."
"Then what's wrong?" He asked again. He knew her too well to think she was fine.
Kitty looked down, took a deep breath and then raised troubled eyes to his. "Promise you won't get mad?"
"About what?" He tensed and she could feel it.
"I won't say another word, Matt Dillon, and you can sleep in the jail tonight unless you promise me you won't get mad."
Matt's brows knit together in worry and anger. "How bad are you hurt?"
"It's just a few bruises, Matt. Honest." She didn't question how he knew. She didn't need to.
"I thought you said he didn't hurt you?"
"He didn't." Kitty hastily reassured him. "Not directly anyway." She added in a low voice.
But no so low, Matt didn't hear her. "What do you mean 'not directly'?" When Kitty didn't immediately answer, he rose from the side of the bed and reached for his boots. "Alright, if you won't tell me, I'll get Grady to tell me, if I have to skin him to do it."
"No, Matt. Please." She got up from the bed and grabbed his arm, pulling him to her and wrapping her arms around him.
"When we were riding out of Dodge, he slapped the rear end of my horse and it bolted. I couldn't hold on and fell off of it. And then, well, you saw how I fell when that dog made Grady let me go. I got bruises from that, Matt. But that's all they are, bruises. And those bruises will heal. I just don't want you mad when you see them."
"I'm already mad, Kitty." He hugged her carefully, not wanting to hurt her, placing a tender kiss on the crown of her head. "You should've never been in a place where that could've happened to you."
Kitty leaned back and frowned up at him. "You don't blame yourself for this, do you?"
Matt sighed with a slight nod of his head. "I do, to a degree. And I blame Breck and I blame Jocko and Grady. If I'd ignored Breck and actually made sure that Grady left town instead of just trusting that he would, he couldn't have come back to rob and kidnap you. And if Breck hadn't of brought him back into the Long Branch…"
"Matt," She said sternly. "The only ones responsible for all of this is Sled Grady and Jocko. Now, you have Sled in jail and tomorrow you can decide what to do with Jocko. But I will not let you spoil tonight with recriminations against yourself and Breck. Do you hear me?"
Matt nodded and pulled her back to him, another soft kiss to her temple. "I just hate to see you hurt." He whispered.
"I know you do." She answered. "But like I said, they're just bruises and bruises heal if you let them." She gave him a pleading look. "Let them heal, Matt. Other things are going to come our way in the future and I don't want to be unable to deal with them because I'm still bruised. Do you understand?"
"What about that old woman?" He asked. "What she said about you left bruises too. Will those heal as easily?"
Kitty shook her head. "Bruises like that don't heal so much as they fade and lose their sting. I've had bruises like that most of my life. But they don't matter anymore than the physical ones do. What matters is what we have here, right now, between us."
Matt bent down and captured her lips in a sweet, soft kiss that deepened before he finally pulled away and picked her up, carrying her back to the bed. "I'm gonna kiss those bruises away, Kitty." He vowed as he laid her down.
Kitty shook her head with a saddened smile. "You can't, Matt. And even if you could, I'd just get more. But you can take the pain away, at least tonight, by getting in this bed with me." She gave him a mischievous grin and Matt returned it.
"Yes, Ma'am." He answered as he swiftly got undressed and got in beside her.
Later that night, as Kitty quietly slumbered beside him, Matt laid back and thought about what she'd said. The 'few' bruises she'd told him about were a lot worse than that and he would have Doc check her out in the morning. But he knew it was the other bruises that he couldn't fix, or Doc either, that were worse and those bothered him a great deal.
Kitty had overcome tremendous odds to get to where she was and she'd done it without selling out her soul or hurting others. She was, in his estimation, someone to be proud of knowing and to be around. But there were still people like that old crone and some of the 'respectable' people around town who couldn't or wouldn't see how good she was simply because of what she did for a living.
Simplistically, he'd love to think that he could fix that by marrying her and taking her out of the saloon. But realistically, he knew that wouldn't heal all of her bruises and it wouldn't prevent her from getting more. People were going to be jealous of Kitty Russell for her beauty and grace as well as her place in his heart and they were going to bruise her for it in one way or another, regardless of what he or anyone else did or said.
Kitty had been right. He couldn't heal or kiss away her bruises or even see to it that she never got more. The only thing he could do, right then any way, was to stand in front of her as a shield when he could and beside her as support when he couldn't and always let her know how much he loved her.
Finally giving way to his exhaustion, Matt rolled over and gently pulled Kitty close to him. He couldn't do what he wanted but he would do what he could and maybe someday, some far off someday, those bruises would be gone completely, never to return.
The End