After the Storm 2
I don't own these characters; I just like to spend time with them. No other profit to be had than that.
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Matt stood apathetically in the jail, staring blankly out of the window at the gray, overcast skies outside, a forgotten cup of cold coffee in his hand. His thoughts were as gloomy and turbulent as the weather. This day was turning out to be as nasty as the one in which Kitty had taken her leave on the east bound train to Boston. At least that's where Sam said she was heading.
The memory of that day filled him with such intense pain and self loathing; it was hard to deal with it. Yet at the same time, he was relieved she was gone. The storm, that had taken her from him, had been the roughest one of his life.
The agony of knowing that he might never see her or his child again, might never get to know his child even, was difficult to bear yet it was muted somewhat by the knowledge that she and the baby would be safe. No one would ever be able to harm them as long as they were gone from Dodge. Matt figured he could stand just about anything as long as he knew that.
Doc shuffled in and silently watched his friend standing there lost in his depressing thoughts. Though he said nothing, Doc knew where Matt's mind was. "She's safe, Matt," he pointed out. "You've got to remember that as long as she's out of here she's safe. No one will be able to get to her, and no more of those accidents will happen to her."
Matt turned to glare at Doc, his temper momentarily flaring. "Don't you think I know that? I know she's safe. She and the baby are both safe, but it doesn't make it any easier to deal with, you know." He slammed his cup down on the corner of his desk, sloshing cold coffee all over it.
Doc stepped over to the stove, and quietly poured himself a cup of the lukewarm coffee, taking a sip before answering. "I know, Matt," he finally sighed. "But you've got to stop beating yourself up over this. You did the only thing you could do. Kitty wasn't going to leave otherwise. You know how stubborn she is."
"Yeah, I know alright" he muttered, once again staring out the window. "And I know I did the best thing for her but…" he stopped, not sure how to put his anguish into words.
"But it hurts something awful" Doc finished for him. "And it will for a long time to come. But you gotta think how bad it would hurt if they got a hold of her and the baby. No matter how good you are, and no matter how many men you put to guarding her, she wouldn't have been safe here, Matt."
Matt didn't answer or even acknowledge that he had heard the physician as he spoke.
"Right now, you and Kitty are enduring the worst kind of heartache," Doc continued, "but you'll survive that. I don't think either one of you, would survive the misery those men are trying to inflict."
Angrily Matt's glare returned as he stomped over to the door, took his hat and almost ran from the office without a word to Doc. Tears stung his eyes as he slammed the door behind him.
The things Doc had said were true, and he knew in his heart, he had done the only thing he could in this appalling situation, but it did little to ease the almost unbearable agony and guilt.
Kitty, HIS Kitty, was gone, along with his child, and life for him would never be good again unless luck stepped in and made it so. He didn't believe in luck.
When he had destroyed Kitty's love for him, he had in effect destroyed himself. He would continue to do his duty as Marshal to the best of his ability. But his heart would no longer be in it, because Kitty had taken that with her, when she left.
Marching down the sidewalk, Matt thought about the evil men that had forced him to such desperate lengths, to protect the woman he loved.
Al Updegraff, Andrew Mowery and James Duncan along with several other men had set up a scheme, whereby they could scam the citizens of Kansas out of thousands of dollars of bond money by pretending to set up a town called Smallwood, in Comanche county.
The scheme had worked at first, and the men were fast on their way to making themselves deceitfully rich. But someone in Government caught on, and as the nearest US Marshal to that part of Kansas, Matt was dispatched to arrest the men and bring them in.
Faithfully Matt had gone after them. Though it hadn't been easy, he had succeeded in bringing most of the suspected guilty parties in. Those three had escaped justice and two had died, but despite that the operation was deemed a success.
It had, at the time, seemed a simple matter, and once the men had been tried and convicted of their crimes Matt had almost instantly forgotten them, until the threats and accidents started.
He had ignored those at first as they were only against him. But they continued to come, and each one was more violent than the last and they began to include Kitty. The secret of their relationship was no longer a secret.
The latest threat had arrived just last week when Matt had walked into his office after making his morning rounds. No one, including himself, had been in the office all morning long, so he was surprised when he saw a sealed envelope lying on his otherwise clean desk.
His heart in his throat, he opened the unaddressed letter, knowing exactly who it came from. In an ugly scrawl, he could make out the vile threats, each one more frightening and heinous than the one before, and sweat began running down his temple in spite of the cooler temperature inside the small jail building.
Later, without telling Kitty all of the details, he stood gravely in her office trying to talk her into leaving town, as least for a while until he could get to the people behind everything. But she refused. He then tried to talk her into going out to Jake Worth's. Again she declined. Dodge was her home, and she wasn't running.
Finally, in frustration, he had recruited Sam and Chester and several other men around town to guard her, praying he could keep her safe that way. And it had worked but barely.
Ruefully, he remembered the seemingly drunken cowboy who had staggered into the saloon, pulled his gun and started indiscriminately firing. If Sam hadn't been so quick to pull Kitty down behind the bar, and he hadn't been there just at that moment to stop him, Kitty would've been dead. Her safety wasn't guaranteed.
Then Doc, aware of the threats and the cowboy and various other incidents, told him about the baby.
Doc had, of course, told Kitty first and she was ecstatic, but she was stubborn also. Though she agreed to be more careful, and even agreed to go out to Jake's place if things heated up, she refused to leave Dodge altogether. Not when the father of her child, and the man she loved, was there. She reasoned the only safe place for her was with Matt.
Initially she had even refused to tell Matt about the baby, not wanting to worry him while he had so much on his mind. That was why Doc took matters into his own hands, and he told Matt about his impending fatherhood.
Matt was thrilled, alarmed and scared all at once. For a week he wrestled with what to do. He couldn't tell her he knew and betray Doc's confidence, but he had to protect her and now his baby as well.
Without letting on that he knew, he had thrice more tried to get her to leave, using every argument short of her pregnancy, but she continued to say no.
Finally he latched onto a desperate and despised plan that he knew would be the only way to save her and his child.
Knowing Kitty would not tell him of the child, until she felt it safe, he informed her that the threats were over and the culprit found. Kitty was elated and invited him to dinner that night to tell him about the baby.
All that day, Matt glumly went about his duties, dreading the evening ahead. He knew what he had to do, and he knew there was no other choice, but he hated it. If only she would agree to leave, but she wouldn't.
Finally, when 8 o'clock rolled around, he presented himself at her rooms and carried out the horrible and desperate plan that finally, once and for all, drove her away from Dodge, and out of his life.
TBC