Dammit. There she went, being right again. Jess clamped his mouth shut.

“At least consider it. Won’t you?”

“Yeah, I guess I will.” Jess looked down at her standing at his elbow. “Since I’ve got these two children already and don’t need anymore borne for me tonight, would you mind setting the table instead?”

Sarah’s cheeks pinkened, but she laughed, and to her surprise, Jess laughed with her, a deep, masculine laugh that rippled through her.

Together they got the meal on the table, Sarah’s stew, old coffee that was too strong, milk for the children, and warmed-over lumps of what were probably intended to be biscuits. Next time, she’d bring bread, Sarah thought, before she could stop herself.

The children ate two bowls full and Jess had three, scraping the last of the stew from the kettle and licking the spoon standing at the stove.

“Can Miss Sarah stay and bake cookies with us,

Uncle Jess?” Maggie gathered dishes from the table.

Sarah’s gaze met Jess’s. She couldn’t tell what he wanted, but knew she should go.

“I have lessons to plan for tomorrow.”

“Please stay.” Maggie took her hand. “Please. - Make her stay, Uncle Jess.”

“Stay if you want.” Jess pushed dirty dishes around on the sideboard. “Besides, since I owe this meal to that Trenton boy I’d like to know what exactly 1 have to thank him for.”

“Oh yes, Luke.” Sarah carried a stack of bowls to the sink. “After your little talk with him in class the other morning, he’s behaved much better. I guess he doesn’t get much discipline at home. So, I wanted to thank you.”

Jess gave the spoon a final lick. “For stew this good I’ll rough up every kid in the class. You just say the word.”

His eyes crinkled at the corners and danced with flecks of blue. Sarah laughed with him.

A knock sounded on the back door. Jess pointed with the spoon. “Get that, will you, Maggie?”

Sarah’s heart skipped a beat as the door opened and Nate Tompkins walked into the room. He raised an eyebrow at seeing her there, but didn’t say anything.

Jess shook his hand. “Sit down. Have some coffee, Nate.”

“I can’t.” The deputy looked uncomfortable.

Jess stopped in the center of the kitchen and braced himself. “What’s wrong?”

“Sheriff Neville sent me over here, Jess. They’re having a hearing in town tomorrow. You’ve got to be there.” He looked at Sarah. “You, too.”

She touched her throat. “Me? What for?”

“Yeah, Nate. What’s going on? What sort of hearing?”

“Circuit judge will be here.” Nate pulled at his neck. “Sorry, Jess. They want to take the kids away from you.”

Chapter Four

Jess paced the boardwalk across the street from the Walker courthouse as townspeople streamed inside. He punched his fist into his open palm. Damn them. Damn them all. Bunch of busybodies who ought to be taking care of their own problems, not nosing into his.

He shook his head, anger tightening his chest. He ought to go into that courtroom and tell them off—every one of them.

“Jess?” Nate Tompkins rounded the corner and stopped in front of him. “I want you to know, Jess, I had nothing to do with this hearing.”

Jess jerked his jaw toward the courthouse across the street. “I know who’s behind it. The same people who’re always causing problems in Walker.”

“It’s Sheriff Neville who started it.”

“The sheriff?” Jess’s brows pulled together in a tight scowl. “What does he care about Cassie’s kids?”

“It’s not that, Jess.” Nate drew in a deep breath. “What you did over in Kingston, you know, with the sheriff there? Well, that sheriff was Neville’s cousin.”

Jess blanched and fell back a step. “Damn....”

“The other folks in town, well, I guess they’re really concerned about the kids. Everybody loved your sister, Jess. They want to see Maggie and Jimmy taken care of proper.”

“I don’t believe that, not for a minute.” Jess shook his head.

“Truth is, a couple of families already spoke up for them.”

Jess’s stomach tightened. Some other family raising Cassie’s children? No, he wouldn’t allow it. He wouldn’t let Maggie and Jimmy be handed over to strangers.

“You watch yourself in court today,” Nate said. “Judge Flinn would like nothing better than to throw you in jail. And Sheriff Neville would like nothing better than to be the one locking you inside.”

Jess nodded. They crossed the street and went inside the courtroom.

“All right, all right. Come to order.” Judge Percy Flinn rapped his gavel, silencing the murmur that rippled through the crowd. He shuffled papers and peered over the rim of his spectacles. “Jess Logan? You here, Logan?”

He and everyone else in town. Jess fought his way through the crowded aisle, feeling every hot gaze in the room on him. Damn bunch of nosy bastards, gawking at him like a circus sideshow. He wanted to slam his fist into each and every face, curse at them all until the knot in his gut unwound. Instead, he kept his eyes forward and stepped in front of the judge.

Judge Flinn gave the papers another cursory glance. “Logan, your past has brought into question your fitness to raise the children of your deceased sister. And judging from these reports, your actions of late only confirm it. What have you got to say for yourself?”

Jess squared his shoulders, blocking out the people leering at him. They were all here, Alma Garrette, the preacher, Emma Turner from the mercantile. Even Mrs. McDougal peeked in through the window. All here, all waiting to see him fail.

“Cassie was my only sister. When I found out she’d passed on I knew it was up to me to take care of her kids. I didn’t want them raised by strangers.”

The judge peered over his spectacles. “But you’d never seen them before. You’re a stranger to them, aren’t you?”

Jess shifted. “I’m their family.”

“I don’t like your past, Logan. I don’t like what happened down in Kingston.” Judge Flinn jerked his thumb toward an empty chair. “Sit down.”

Buck Neville rose and hung his fingers in his vest pockets. “I’ve got people willing to testify, Your Honor.”

“All right. Get them up here.”

Jess mumbled under his breath as Alma Garrette threw him a smug look and eased her wide frame into the chair at the corner of the judge’s desk.

“Well, Your Honor, we were all shocked that Jess Logan showed his face in town after all the trouble he’d caused here before. Wanting to raise those children—why, he never lifted one finger to help his sister and he never even laid eyes on the children before.” Alma jerked her chin indignantly. “I saw him in town with little Jimmy, and the boy looked like he hadn’t bathed in a week. His clothes were wrinkled and soiled. Jess Logan was wearing his gun, like some sort of gunslinger. I’d heard that’s what he was.”

A murmur rippled through the courtroom.

Alma pursed her lips. “I heard he’d been paid to shoot the governor of Texas a few years back.”

The crowd rumbled and Judge Flinn rapped his gavel again. “Order!”

“Well, then—then—I saw him leave little Jimmy sitting all by himself outside the Green Garter Saloon so he could go in and drink.”

Jess winced as the crowd grumbled, and Alma Garrette sailed back to her seat, her nose in the air.

Buck Neville glared at Jess. “Mrs. Turner, you want to come on up here?”

Emma, from the Walker Mercantile, took the chair. “I don’t know much about Jess since he left Walker years ago, except what I heard around town. And that story of how he disgraced that young woman down in Galveston, then refused to marry her really upset me.”

“Tell the judge about Jimmy,” Buck instructed.

“Oh, yes, that.” Emma cleared her throat uncomfortably. “The child refuses to speak, Your Honor. But Jess had him in my store bribing him with licorice to get him to talk. I just didn’t think that was right.”

The judge grunted and jotted a note on the papers in front of him. “Anybody else?”