Hi Patty! I’m so excited to be sharing your story, ‘The Lawman’s Lessons’. Your story is just one of 5 western Historicals included in The Sons of Johnny Hastings box set.

First, you can answer this question then we’ll get to the good stuff 🙂

 

 Patty, if you could be transported back in time to the nineteenth century, what is the most appealing thing about it? The least appealing thing?

This question goes hand in hand. I would enjoy the lack of technology to some extent. How life would slow down, and more one on one time could be spent without the pressure to answer the next text or email.

On the other hand, the lack of technology when it comes to medicine and extended family would be a very sad side of going back.

I have to agree with you on both counts, Patty.  We’ve come so far in finding cures and have a lot more medicine available now than they did many years ago. With no email, television or text we would have much more one on one time. <laughing here>

The Lawman’s Lessons by Patty Devlin

Choose one of the two men, or take the return ticket and head home. It wasn’t much of a choice. Celia had worked and studied so hard to have a school of her own. And she had known that they might be a little upset. She knew exactly what they had wanted. It was stated very clearly in the advertisement and she could probably read and write better than anyone one of them.

Jackson sure never planned to marry, and how could he when his name would be a disgrace to his bride? So why had he fought so hard to keep her from marrying the other man? He could have shrugged it off and gotten out of there, but he just couldn’t do it. The new school teacher needed someone who would stay on her tail and teach her a lesson or else she’d run right into danger.

But, he’d have to be honest with her and tell her about that no good scoundrel who had sired him. She at least had a right to know he was a bas—illegitimate, that the man who fathered him had left his mother alone to fend for herself. Then if Celia could handle that, well, they could work the rest out. Besides, there weren’t any other good choices and she simply couldn’t be without a husband.

 

Excerpt:

Jackson turned slowly back toward her; his boots making a lonely echo on the old wood floor as he closed the distance between them. Her board-stiff back, while she grabbed the broom and pretended to sweep, told him she was not as unaffected by his presence as she let on. He didn’t want her to be afraid of him, but a great deal of respect was born out of fear.

He gently removed the broom from her hands, and she didn’t put up as much of a fight as he thought she might. She stood frozen on the spot with her back to him, while he leaned the broom against the wall again.

 

“Miss Whitman, if there is anything you’d like to take with you I recommend you kindly fetch it so we can be on our way. Every minute you waste here now is another minute my mama is worrying about you. If I have to wrestle you out of here, I will. But I won’t hesitate to warm your seat first, something you’ve obviously been lacking.” He braced himself as she spun around. He expected her to take a swing at him. She surprised him by stomping past him and almost out the door of the school house, but she stopped just inside.

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