The Rustler's Bride

by Tatiana March

  One. Two. Three. All met their aim. The fourth missed. He inspected the two remaining blocks in his hat, selected one and tossed it through the air. It landed with a clatter in the cage with the others. No one spoke as he walked up to the corral gate to retrieve the squares. Even Stan had fallen silent, aware that some hidden current was whirling beneath the surface of what they could see.

  Declan returned, fell down on one knee, the hat in his hand, four squares in it. His fair hair shone in the sun. He arranged the blocks into a row on the ground, stood straight again and shoved the hat back on his head. In the distance, the herd of cattle waiting to be driven to market broke into a restless mewling and the beating of hooves.

  “I’d better go and have that bath,” Declan said and walked off.

  Victoria craned closer.

  L-O-V-E.

  Stan pushed beside her. “What does it spell?”

  “I don’t know.” Her booted foot shot forward and kicked the blocks into disarray. “He must have made a mistake. I don’t know what it was supposed to mean.”

  Her hands curled into fists as she ran back into the house. Why did he keep doing this to her? Pushing and pulling. Tempting and rejecting. Everyone, including her father, took it for granted that Declan would to stay with her after his year was up. And yet, every time she tried to look ahead, every time she mentioned some practical arrangement that involved planning for the future, he refused to be drawn into the conversation.

  At school, she had read romantic novels some girls smuggled in and passed around. In those, this sort of thing happened, but there was always a happy ending, and the couple resolved the differences that kept them apart. In real life, she realized, there was no such guarantee of a happy future. The torment of waiting and hoping might be all she ever got.

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  Chapter Eight

  The ladies were dressed in formal gowns with bustles and the gentlemen wore suits with long jackets. Oh, the joy of it! To see her friends gathered at her table. To be at home at Red Rock again for good. Victoria blinked back tears, but they gathered anyway, and she lifted a hand to wipe the corners of her eyes.

  Her father frowned. “Ria, is something wrong?”

  “No, no.” She sent a watery smile all around the table and fanned a hand in front of her flushed face. “It’s just that I’m so happy to be back. I hated being away at school.”

  “Were the other girls horrid to you?” Jade Ritter asked.

  “No. Most were nice. Some were interested in the West. One girl asked me to teach her to shoot. But I was sooo homesick,” Victoria replied, and then she spent a few minutes telling her guests anecdotes about boarding school life, some of which drew a flurry of laughs and others disbelieving protests.

  Her father sat on her left. On his other side were Carl and Jade Ritter. Jade’s father owned a fruit farm. She was a halfbreed who had until recently hidden her Apache blood, and was still a little touchy about the possibility of social exclusion. A few months ago, she had married Carl Ritter, a former bounty hunter, and they were expecting their first child.

  Annelise Krauss on Victoria’s right was a young widow with a small son. Her husband had been much older, in his fifties. When he died six months ago, Annelise had inherited his ranch and was trying to run the property alone. Victoria had hoped that her father might take an interest in the young widow, who was a delicate beauty with pale gold hair and cautious gray-green eyes. Watching them now, she realized her hopes were in vain, for she could detect no spark of attraction between them.

  Beyond Annelise sat Rebecca Eastman and Charles Foster. They were engaged to be married. Rebecca’s father owned the bank in Mariposa, and the Foster family ran the mercantile. As Victoria let her eyes linger on the pair, it struck her that they too lacked a spark of attraction. Charles was slender, sandy haired, with even, unremarkable features. Rebecca was tall, with reddish brown hair, bleached by the sun into a mix of cinnamon and honey. She possessed a forceful, driven nature. It seemed clear to Victoria that in their marriage Rebecca would lead and Charles would follow.

  Annelise Krauss leaned forward and spoke in the timid way most men seemed to find enchanting. “Mr. Sinclair, may I ask why you have gathered a herd to be driven to market?” She hesitated. “I mean, it is a little late in the season, is it not?”

  Andrew Sinclair touched a napkin to his mouth. “Those heads of cattle are sold to the Indian Agency,” he replied, appearing reluctant to discuss the matter. “It’s winter supplies for the White Mountains Apache Reservation. I guess you’ve all heard the rumors that sometimes unscrupulous Indian Agents switch beef destined to the reservations for inferior quality. I’ve delayed delivery to minimize the chances of that happening.”

  Victoria saw it then, a flash of admiration and respect in her husband’s eyes as he watched Andrew Sinclair. Then Declan’s features grew grim again, as if he had dug into some hidden store of hostility, and the moment was gone.

  “Thank you,” Jade Ritter said in a low voice. “What is left of my mother’s tribe is up at the reservation. I appreciate what you’ve done.”

  A hushed silence fell over the table. They all knew how hard the Apache were fighting for survival, and how quickly their numbers were dwindling, from massacres and famine and the new diseases the white man had brought with him.

  “Declan is going to drive the cattle up to the reservation,” her father said, smoothing over the awkward moment.

  Bless him, Victoria thought. Her father really was trying. He had invited Declan to take host’s place at the end of the table. And now, in front of their guests, he had recognized Declan’s contribution to the running of the ranch. Why couldn’t Declan accept the overtures of friendship but instead chose to cling to some hidden resentment?

  “I’m just helping,” Declan replied. “Hank’s riding ramrod.” His mouth tightened, and he directed a challenging glare across the table at Victoria’s father. “You’ve done your share of cattle drives, haven’t you, Sinclair? All the way through Kansas?”

  “That was before the war, in the eighteen-fifties, on the old route to St. Louis.” Her father sent a warm smile in her direction. “That’s when I met my wife, Victoria’s mother.”

  The hostility that radiated from Declan hung in the air like a poisonous cloud. People were starting to notice, Victoria realized, as she saw Rebecca Eastman and Charles Foster exchange a puzzled glance.

  She rushed to ease the tension. “You haven’t heard the story of how my parents, met, have you, Declan?” With a forced cheerfulness, she rambled on. “I mean, you know she died when I was small, but before then, it was such a romantic—”

  Her father laid a restraining hand on her arm. “Ria, this is not the time and place for family reminiscing.”

  She lowered her gaze to her plate, her cheeks aflame. “Of course not. I’m sorry.” On her plate, the spicy smell of the roast beef she’d been too nervous to eat sent a wave of nausea rising up in her throat.

  “Charles is going on a cattle drive next year,” Rebecca put in.

  “But he’s a merchant, and your father is a banker,” Annelise said.

  In plain sight on the table, Rebecca curled her fingers around her fiancés hand. “We are going to buy a ranch when we get married. My father has promised the bank will lend us the money. I’ve always wanted to live on a ranch. Before my friend Laura died, I spent most of my spare time on her father’s ranch. That’s when I discovered I wanted to be a rancher.”

  The party grew quiet as they paused to think of Laura Carmichael. They had all gone to the tiny, one-room school in Mariposa together. She’d been a quiet, shy girl, and at sixteen she had died, together with her mother, when train robbers blew up a railroad bridge and the carriage they were in fell into the ravine.

  “Where will you plant the rose bush?” Annelise asked.

  Victoria managed a smile. “In the front, by the porch steps.” Before she went to Boston, she had admired the white roses Annelise gre
w in her garden, and now she had received one as a gift. Jade and Carl had also brought her a gift, a basket of shiny, red apples. Rebecca and Charles had given her a book on livestock breeding.

  “My mother had a rose garden.” Declan’s tone was harsh. “Do you recall ever seeing one on your way through Kansas, Sinclair?”

  Her father twirled his wineglass, his lean fingers curled around the stem. “Can’t say that I do.”

  “That’s too bad,” Declan replied.

  By now, everyone had caught on to her husband’s morose mood. Victoria saw Rebecca Eastman glance at Declan, a little awkward. “Mr. Beaulieu, I saw you last week talking to my father’s clerk, Howard Peterson. You were standing on the boardwalk outside the mercantile, and you seemed friendly with him.”

  Declan nodded. “We are acquainted.”

  “I thought I ought to warn you.” Rebecca hesitated. “This is in confidence, of course. My father suspects he might be…unreliable. He talks too freely about the bank’s business, and he boasts about his success in investing on the stock exchange in New York, even though it is clear that he possesses no wealth of his own.”

  Declan’s face lost all expression. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  As the evening wore on, a sense of despair settled over Victoria. She had hoped that introducing Declan to her small circle of friends would create harmony. Instead, it had raised the discord between her father and Declan to a new, public level. Grudgingly, she had to admit that her father was not to blame but the fault lay with her husband.

  ****

  Declan tossed and turned on the narrow brass bed, unable to sleep. Outside, the autumn heat had given way to another storm. Thunder rumbled in the air, and jagged forks of lighting rent the sky apart, bathing the room in bright glow before the darkness took hold again, even more solid than before.

  So, he’d been noticed, talking to Howard Peterson in town. The banker’s daughter was quite right—the clerk was selling client secrets, and Declan had been buying those of Andrew Sinclair. It didn’t matter if people found out about it, for he had already discovered everything he needed to know.

  A loan repayment was due in three days and Sinclair’s account was empty.

  Rolling onto his back, Declan threw an arm over his eyes to block out another flare of lightning. The strain of waiting for his revenge to unfold had become almost unbearable. Most evenings, he dined with Victoria and her father. Occasionally, he claimed fatigue and slept in the small room behind the kitchen, but on other nights he marched into her bedroom, as bold as a soldier on parade, as if wanting to gloat about it to her father.

  And perhaps he did.

  The roar outside grew continuous, and yet the flashes of lightning had ceased. Icy shivers rippled down Declan’s spine as he recognized the sound for what it was—the restless mewling of a herd of cattle on the verge of stampeding. He’d last heard the sound more than twenty years ago. He’d been a boy then, but he’d never forgotten the deep, bellowing noise that had heralded his mother’s death.

  He got up and yanked on his pants, shirt and coat, and slammed a hat on his head. In the big foyer, he found Victoria holding up a storm lantern. Andrew Sinclair stood beside her, dressed in a long duster, dripping wet, a sign that he had already been outside.

  “No,” he was saying as he took the lamp from Victoria. “You stay indoors, girl. And that’s an order.”

  “Father—”

  Sinclair cut her off with an impatient gesture. Hearing Declan approach, he whirled around, the long duster flapping about his ankles. Spurs rattled on his boots and droplets of water flew from the brim of his hat.

  “She’s your wife now, Beaulieu,” Sinclair said. “You tell her to stay inside.”

  Terror pierced Declan at the thought of another tragedy. He strode up to Victoria, curled his hands around her upper arms and stared down into her fear-filled eyes. “If you leave this house, I’m going to pull every hair from her head. I’m going to thrash your ass until it’s black and blue. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” she muttered, eyes downcast.

  “Good.” He ducked down for a brief, hard kiss. For one second, uncertainty tore at him. He shouldn’t tackle a herd of stampeding cattle without telling her that he loved her. He took a deep breath. “I—”

  “What are you waiting for?” Sinclair bellowed, holding up the lamp. His boots thudded in an urgent cadence as he headed for the door. “If you’re coming, follow me.”

  Declan released Victoria and hurried after his father-in-law. As he stepped out of the door, the wind whipped around him, almost knocking his hat from his head. He lifted a hand to force the black Stetson deeper over his head, and then he ran after Sinclair, following the flickering light of the lamp toward the stable through the rain that came down like a solid sheet of water.

  “Be careful.” The brittle, frightened voice reached out to him.

  He glanced back, saw Victoria standing on the porch. She was framed by the open doorway, the light behind her rendering her into a ghostly silhouette. For an instant, he was hurtled back in time, to the day at the hanging oak, and he recalled his words.

  I want the face of a pretty woman to be the last thing I see before I die.

  She’d given him so much in the weeks that followed. Her love. Her faith in him. She’d given him her passion. She’d sided with him against her father, shared her friends with him. It occurred to Declan that despite the internal battle between love and revenge, he’d never been as happy as he had been since he married her.

  And he had given her nothing in return.

  Not even the words, unless you counted L-O-V-E spelled in alphabet blocks.

  With a sinking heart Declan realized it would be best for Victoria if he died.

  ****

  The herd was small, only three hundred head, and it hadn’t stampeded, yet. The animals were in restless motion, the steers pushing against each other, bellowing in fear. Sinclair rode his black stallion, Declan his blue roan gelding. Hank and Stan followed close behind, and Lenny and Clyde were already out by the herd with a small remuda of cutting horses.

  “Don’t risk your good horse,” Sinclair yelled at Declan through the deluge, pointing at the temporary corral where the cutting horses were huddled in a tight group, water sluicing down their flanks.

  “No time,” Declan yelled back. The night darkness was easing toward dawn, and he saw the brim of Sinclair’s hat dip as the older man nodded his agreement. Neither of them was prepared to waste time unsaddling one horse and transferring the saddle to another.

  Sinclair slowed his pace, waiting for him to catch up. In the pouring rain, Declan could make out the pale oval of his father-in-law’s face. The wind roared and the cattle bellowed, drowning out all other sounds. Declan could tell the words Andrew Sinclair spoke as much by the movement of his lips as by hearing his voice.

  “I’m going to try milling the cattle,” Sinclair was saying. “Will you help?”

  “I’ve never seen it done,” Declan shouted back.

  “I’ll tell you what to do.”

  They rode to the head of the herd. For a moment, they hoped to calm the animals, but just before they reached the leading steers, the panic that had been brewing for some time broke loose. With a roaring bellow, the cattle surged into motion, undulating like a rolling sea. As the herd picked up speed, the animals crashed into each other. Some slipped on the muddy earth, falling over, getting churned to death beneath the hooves of the others.

  It was turning into carnage.

  Just as Declan knew a stampede would.

  Urging on his mount, he followed Sinclair, the pair of them thundering past the surging cattle, gaining on them, reaching the steers at the head of the herd. Sinclair butted into the flank of the leading animal and attempted to turn the direction of the heard, forcing their path to veer sharply to the left.

  Declan took his cue from the older man and did the same. Together, they tried to chase the racing herd into a circle
. If they managed to direct panicking animals into a whirl that grew tighter and tighter, the stampeding cattle would first slow down, and then grind to a halt as they became so tightly packed they ran out of space to move.

  No longer riding alongside the herd, Declan was deep in the milling sea of huge animals, the cattle jostling him from all sides. Keep the circle tight, flashed in his mind. He pushed the running steers into an ever decreasing circle. He’d lost his hat, although he hadn’t noticed when, and now the rain was lashing like needles into his hair, into his face, and gathering inside his collar to run down his back beneath his clothes.

  The panic around him had a smell to it, a ghastly combination of mud and blood and manure, mixing with the familiar, reassuring scents of wet leather and horse.

  Ahead of him, he could see Sinclair waving, right in the center of the seething mass of animals. The cattle were no longer running. Some were walking, some butting against others without advancing. A few stood still, their heads raised for the loud, plaintive bellowing that drowned out the stomping of hooves, but not the thunder that had resumed its rumble in the sky.

  “What is it?” Declan shouted, rising up in the stirrups, staring into the rain.

  Sinclair pointed his arm back toward the remuda. Then he turned his black stallion around and started forging his way out of the herd. Declan followed. They were almost clear of the crush when an injured steer charged toward Sinclair. The black stallion reared, came down again. His hooves slipped on a wet rock. For an instant, he hovered out of balance, and then he fell over with a slow tumble and roll.

  Twenty yards away, Declan could see Sinclair get thrown from the horse. Here, on the outskirts of the milling circle, the cattle still had enough room to move, and some surged into restless motion again. Declan dug his heels into Vali’s flanks and rammed his way through the herd, butting into the steers, forging a path between them.

  Sinclair had scrambled back up to his feet by the time Declan reached him. Like a matador, he was stepping nimbly, left, right, forwards, backwards, a delicate dance on the slippery ground as he attempted to dodge the butting horns and remain standing while the huge, heavy animals crashed into him from all directions.