~ Cissy Cain and Abel ~

by

Mallery Mitchell

It seemed like he’d been asleep only minutes when a loud crash jolted Abe awake. He sat upright nervously taking in his surroundings as his gathered his wits. “Cissy?” Getting no answer, he stood and hastily pulled his pants on, pausing only to button his fly. leaving his boots and shirt beside the trundle bed.

He walked into her room. Her bed was neatly made and empty. He also noted it was light outside. He heard another noise, an odd thump. She was in the kitchen.

“Cissy?” he rushed down the steps. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

Her tight smile told him otherwise. She sat in a chair and on the floor was a broken piece of crockery. “You hurt yourself?”

“Mmmm hmmmm.” The affirmation was all she could probably manage. She lifted up her skirt and revealed a deep gash across the top of her foot.

He walked over and swept her in his arms, placing her on the kitchen table.

“Do you have any clean rags?”

“There.” She pointed to a muslin bag hanging from one of the pegs. “Watch out for that broken pitcher.” She warned.

“Okay, I am going to clean it and check it.”

“I broke my water jug,” she whispered. “I don’t have another jug like that one.”

“You may have broken your foot, if the thing was full of water.”

He frowned and examined the cut. He stopped as Cissy began sniffing. “Does that hurt? Are you getting ready to cry?”

“No, but I smell the biscuits. Can you get them out of the cook stove before they burn?”

“You beat all. You’re more worried about the food than your well being.” He walked over the stove and opened the heavy door. He put the pan of biscuits on the other side of the table then covered them over with a piece of cloth.

“You seem at home in the kitchen,” she said.

“If I was bad growing up, my father would make me work in the kitchen. I spent a great deal of time in there.” He admitted with a laugh.

“I can imagine.”

He poured water over her cut and checked for broken bits of pottery in the gash, talking as he wrapped the wound. “I learned how to make sourdough bread and sugar pies. Hattie used to make the best squash pie in the world.”

“I’ve never tasted a squash pie. Was she an aunt or cousin?” Cissy winced as he tied the bandage.

“Hattie was a woman who lived near us. She would always leave a few squash to get real big and knotty. That’s when you make them into pies. The seeds won’t go through the colander that way.” He whispered the last part as if it were a great secret. “I’ll tell you what. If you leave some of those squash in the garden until they get really big and too tough to eat, I’ll make you a pie.”

“You will?” She was obviously skeptical.

“Yeah, and I make a mean pie crust, too.” He winked and she blushed.

Abe felt a gnawing in his stomach again. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He couldn’t be falling for the outlaw’s sister.

“Here let me kiss it better.” He sure did like kissing Cissy.

Five

“Abe?” Cissy was dizzy from his kisses. “I have to take a basket up to the house.”

“You need to sit down and stay off your foot. I’ll take that food up there.”

He was too sweet. She was overwhelmed. When had anyone ever offered to help her. Now here was this handsome man waiting on her, forbidding her to move.

“I have enough food for an army. I made a ham, and black-eyed peas. Then we have some red eye gravy for the biscuits.” She got up and hobbled around packing a basket of food. “Thank you for wrapping up my foot and cleaning up the mess and for being such a gentleman last night.”

“Believe me, I don’t usually act like that. For some reason you bring out the best in me. And you need to sit down. That is just going to start bleeding again if you don’t put it up for a while.” He put a hand under her chin and lifted her face up to his. He had just pressed his lips to hers when the wooden door creaked open.

“Knock. Knock. Good morning, Sleepyheads!” Vivian entered with a tight smile and overly cheerful voice. Her strawberry blond hair had been piled high and ringlets fell around her face “There is no food on the table, Cissy dearest. The boys sent me to check on you. I told you Cis, if you set schedules people complain if you don’t stick to them. It’s always best to be undependable and leave them guessing.” She spoke her pearls of wisdom in a sing song voice, pausing pointedly as she pretended to finally noticed he was shirtless, shoeless and holding on to Cissy’s shoulders.

Her painted green eyes narrowed. “Well, well, well, if it isn’t Cain’s new hired gun. Where are the rest of your clothes? Hmmm?” She kept a smile on her face. “Has he been bothering you, Cissy?” There was no warmth in the woman’s eyes.

“No, Viv. He hasn’t been bothering me. I had an accident.” Cissy picked up her skirt to reveal her bandaged foot. “That’s why there’s no food yet.”

“I was going to take it up there.” Abe volunteered. He combed a hand through his pale hair. Vivian had taken one look at Abe and jumped to conclusions. Viv was peeved, Cissy could tell.

“How sweet. Isn’t he a gentleman?” Viv crooned. She turned on him. “And such a handsome one, too. Don’t you think he’s handsome, Cissy?” She walked around him and looked him over.

“Yes Viv,” she looked at Abe with an apologetic expression, “he is very attractive.”

“Attractive, you say?” Viv raised an eyebrow and circled the young man inspecting him. “That’s true and even better than a mere handsome. And such a nice little derriere.” Abe’s eyes widened in shock when she ran a hand along his backside.

“Now wait just a cotton pickin’ minute.” Abe took a step back.

“Sooo, Abe, which of my girls did you romance last night.”

“That’s none of your business.” Cissy snapped at her sister.

“Oh, but it is. That is exactly my business.” She growled. “And there are plenty of willing women around here. Any of my girls would be willing to oblige.”

“Thank you for the information, but that kind of girl really doesn’t interest me.” He lowered his voice.

“My, a haughty young gun, aren’t you? A back East fellow, and do I detect a bit of a drawl? Hmmmm, a southern gentleman. I bet you even went to one of those fancy colleges.” Abe’s eyes smoldered with contained anger as Vivian came closer to him. She squinted in scrutiny. “You might not stoop to go to a woman such as myself, but yet you don’t have a problem spending the night with my sister.”

“Stop it, Viv.” Cissy stepped forward. “He slept in the sitting room. He is a gentleman. So much of a gentleman you have no idea how he would act!”

“It’s okay, Cissy. No need to get angry. I’ll just go get my boots and my shirt. I’ll take the food up to the house. You two can talk.” Abe ascended the stairs and quickly pulled on his boots and shirt. The basket was in hand as he walked out the door.

Cissy waited until Abe was out of earshot. “Was that truly necessary? Did you have to embarrass me?”

Vivian paused with her mouth opened as if searching for just the right words. “I think Rosie was hoping to be the one to welcome him to the fold.”

Cissy threw down her dishcloth. “Rosie better keep her cotton pickin’ hands off Abel. He is mine.”

“No, he’s not yours and he or no man will ever be, the sooner you learn that the better. Gentlemen don’t exist. They’re just like all the rest, only they’re disguised so you don’t know to be defensive.”

“How can you sit here lecturing me? You have no right.”

“I have every right. I knew a gentleman once. He was a Captain in the Union army. A college man, mind you. I wanted to get away from home, away from the ruins left by the war. He promised to take me up north with him. Oh, and I believed him. I used to meet him in the barn when Mama was too busy with you to wonder where I was. I thought what I felt was love and I believed every word out of his lying mouth. He had a wife. I met her in town with her children at the mercantile. And later when I asked him how he could leave them, he laughed at me and told me he would never leave his wife. He let me know what a trusting fool I was. Then when I told him I wouldn’t see him anymore, he told me he would kill my family if I didn’t.” Vivian hugged her arms tight to her body.

Cissy listened soberly. She didn’t know much about Vivian’s past. She didn’t know why she had chosen to be what she was, until now. Vivian recomposed herself and sighed.

“So, do with him what you will, little girl. Have your little fling. Just don’t let him have your heart.” She advised. “He isn’t worth it. No man is.”

“You can’t judge all men by one man. You don’t know Abe,” she argued.

“I know him alright,” she said.

“You’re just a cynical old trollop.”

“That I might be, Madelaine, but I am also a realist.”

Viv spoke Cissy’s given name only when the gravity of the situation merited it. Cissy’s head jerked up to meet her sister’s stare. “The notion of love is for fools and children and you are neither, my dear. Wake up and smell the coffee, honey. Smells like it’s burning.”