Shepherd's Song

by Moore, S. Dionne

  Tyler calculated that Marv had made himself comfortable in the main house by now, tearing things apart in his desperate search. His disadvantage would be his greed. If Marv had waited to get the information from Tyler, he would have saved himself time. The man’s impatience seemed out of character. That he left the rest of the gang to fend for themselves, too, was unlike the calculating methods Tyler knew Marv to pos-sess and utilize.

  Could it be that the heat was becoming too much for the main man of the Loust Gang? Marv was smart, but he was getting older. At fifty-five most men didn’t want to be on the run. Age would cause his action and reaction time to slow. And the serenity of a nice, warm fire in a place of his own, far away from threat of capture, might be just the thing Marv sought. He’d probably hoped Tyler would break quickly and when he didn’t, Marv had come up with this alternate plan.

  The low, flat roof of the bunkhouse came into view. Tyler surveyed the ground for evidence of a horse, or a man on foot. When he finally arrived at the bunkhouse, he found no sign of Tate or Jesse. Their gear indicated their presence, but they were either far out in the fields, shot, working, or tied up somewhere. Satisfied that they would not be victims in a shootout between him and Marv, some of the tension melted from his shoulders.

  It took Tyler two hours to make a sweep of the bunkhouse, corral, and other outbuildings before he satisfied himself that the hands were out working and not in danger. They would be returning for supper, and judging by the angle of the sun, Tyler knew he had about four hours to find and deal with Marv.

  thirty-four

  Supports held stalwart beneath the sagging overhang of Rich’s front porch. Tyler studied the roofline then the windows of the ranch house. Smaller than some he’d seen, the place had provided a warm haven for him the fall and winter of his recovery. It had become home to him. Even in the days on summer pasture, he looked forward to returning for the winter months. To sitting with Rich and talking about growing the herd or debating the merits of raising sheep versus cattle.

  Tyler cut off the flow of memories. If he didn’t pay attention, he would lose his edge. Marv would recognize a moment of weakness and take advantage of it, and it didn’t take long for a bullet to kill.

  He entered the house with the Navy revolver Renee had lifted from Lolly, clearing the corners, stabbing glances in the places a man could hide. The kitchen was a mess of cooking utensils, pots, and plates scattered across the floor. Cupboard doors hung open, emptied of their contents. Ash and soot from the fireplace settled a black mess all over the floor, showing boot prints leading to the room next door but disappearing as the soot wore off the sole of the shoe. Marv would be the only one with reason enough to tear everything apart. The outlaw must be angrier than a bronc not to have found the money. The damage to the house became more immense as Tyler swept through the back rooms. Floorboards had been pried up in places. Walls sported holes where Marv must have thought a hollow space hid a secret.

  Tyler’s tension mounted. The last place he wanted to check was the spot where the money was hidden. If Marv had given up and lay in wait, watching, he would expect that to be the first place Tyler would go.

  On stiff legs, Tyler left the ranch house, scanning the area in front of him. When he reached the barn, he hesitated. Something moved inside, scratching along the front wall of the building. Tyler drew air into his lungs and swung the door open just enough to slip inside. His eyes, adjusted to the light outside, rendered him blind in the dim interior. He held the Navy loose but ready. He sank to a crouch as soon as he cleared the door and swung in the direction of the sound. A shot whizzed over his head.

  Tyler took aim and fired. Marv grunted and rolled along the ground. Tyler scrambled, ducking behind the half wall of a stall, leveling his other gun on the bale of hay behind which Marv had taken cover.

  “You thought they’d kill us all,” Tyler taunted the outlaw. “They won’t come riding in to save you now, Marv. Not after you crossed them.”

  Silence greeted his words, but Tyler knew Marv’s methods. The man would reload, his mind skipping ahead to escape routes. Always analyzing. Always one step ahead.

  “I’m dying, Tyler. Don’t matter none to me what you do.”

  Dying. Such a cold word. Even colder because of the life Marv had chosen for himself. But was it a ploy? A statement meant to distract? Then why was he here? After the money?

  “You near ruined us over that girl. Dirk got ya, though, didn’t he?”

  Bait. Marv was trying to get him angry, distract him enough to shoot wild or do something dumb and make himself a target. But he held the trump card. “I’m the only one who knows where that money is.”

  “Not the only one, son. Rich told me where to look.” Marv’s dry chuckle grated against Tyler’s ears. “Men will do most anything when there’s a gun pointed at their head.”

  Acid stirred in Tyler’s gut, yet he was hesitant. Rich wouldn’t betray him.

  “Seems I’m not the only one who knows how to double-cross.”

  Tyler closed his mind. Marv was playing him. He knew it. Had witnessed the man do it countless times to get his way. Tyler steadied his grip and aimed the gun at the spot where Marv hid. “Are you sweating yet, Marv?”

  “I just want to ride out of here, Tyler. You let me go and I won’t put a bounty on your head. That money can buy even a dead man some loyalty.”

  “Not if the rest of the gang catches you first.”

  Tyler forced himself to think. If Marv had the money, what was he doing in the barn? There were no horses inside and Sassy was back at the bunkhouse. It didn’t make sense, so it must be a pack of lies.

  “Let me go, Tyler.”

  “Where’s your horse?”

  “Behind the barn.”

  Twisted with indecision, Tyler licked his dry lips. “Throw your guns over here. Both of them. Then you stand up, slow-like. I’ll be drawing a bead on you the whole time.”

  Tyler heard the guns slide across the dirt floor and raised his head enough to confirm. “Now get up and head out the doors.”

  Marv got to his feet, his eyes cold, haughty. Tyler ignored the man’s smirk and motioned with the gun for Marv to precede him. When they emerged, Marv started toward the back of the barn. Tyler wrestled within himself. He’d come so far, protected the money for so long. He couldn’t let Marv ride off with it if what he’d said was true. There was only one way to be sure.

  “You put your hands against the wall of the barn. Turn around and I’ll cut you down.”

  When Marv did as he was asked, Tyler sidestepped to the well. Rich had built a shelter over the hole and a platform around it. With his gun on Marv, he used his other hand to reach under the roof. He felt the small latch, grunting as he twisted his arm to feel in the cavity there for the two sacks. Tyler’s stomach soured. Empty.

  Rich had betrayed him.

  Marv dived to the side and skidded in the dirt.

  Tyler’s moment of indecision made him too slow, and his bullet went wild. Marv popped up just outside the barn door. He wrestled with the door. Tyler aimed and fired. The bullet spit dirt beside Marv’s hip. Marv slid inside the darkness of the barn. Tyler sprinted to the barn door and stood beside the opening. He couldn’t see but neither could Marv, and he knew exactly where Marv was headed. Tyler sprang through the air, arms wide, in the direction of Marv’s guns. He caught the man, toppling him to the ground. He grabbed Marv’s right hand as they rolled in the dirt. Marv launched a wild punch with his free hand that choked the breath from Tyler.

  A strong patch of sunlight swept over the place where they struggled.

  “Let him go, Tyler,” Rich Morgan’s voice rent the air.

  Marv took advantage of Tyler’s distraction and landed a kick to his kneecap. Marv leveled his gun at Rich just as Tyler struck out and connected with the side of his face. Two guns sounded as one. Marv staggered, clutched at his leg where blood spurted through his now-empty hands. Rich lay still in the barn door.

 
; Tyler lunged for the outlaw, kicking away the gun. Marv dodged him and sprinted for the doorway, out into the open. Tyler panted for air, his lungs cramping, as he gave chase. He skidded around the corner, but Marv already had the horse in a gallop.

  Tyler closed his eyes, the reality of Marv leaving with the money a fresh punch to his stomach. With slow steps, he retraced his path and dropped to his knees in the dirt beside Rich. The bullet had caught the man high in the shoulder. He sucked air with every breath, pained over the betrayal. “You double-crossed me!”

  Rich’s eyes peeled open and a grin split his face. “Is he gone?”

  Tyler bunched his fist in Rich’s shirt, yanking him to a sitting position. “You double-crossed me!”

  Rich grimaced, his hand hot iron around Tyler’s wrist. “What are you talking about? I almost got myself killed to help you. Where’s Marv?”

  “Rode out,” he spat. “With the money.”

  Rich shoved Tyler and pressed a hand to his bloody shoulder. Tyler didn’t move to help him. “No he didn’t. I’ve got the money.”

  Tyler frowned. “He said you told him where it was. I checked. It’s gone.”

  “Like I said, I’ve got the money.” Rich struggled to stand, sending Tyler a scathing look. “If you’ll help an old man to his feet, I’ll show you.”

  Tyler was numb. Even as Rich led the way into the ranch house, as his gaze came to rest on Renee’s slender form at the cookstove, he felt oddly hollow. She barreled into him and he embraced her absently, as if watching a mirror image of himself making the motion.

  “Is he dead?” she asked against his shirt.

  “Rode off.” His lips felt stiff. “With the money.”

  Over Renee’s shoulder, he watched as Rich wadded a piece of linen and placed it over the wound at his shoulder. “Don’t mind me; I’m just bleeding to death.” He leaned forward and hefted a sack with his good arm, slapping it on the table, the thud and jingle belying the weight and contents of the bag. “There’s one.” He bent double again, and when he straightened another bag joined the first. “Told you he didn’t get the money. He must have fed you that line hoping you’d get nervous and show him where it was hid.”

  Tyler gulped, choked by the truth that stared him in the face. He knew Marv’s ways. Why had he ever doubted Rich?

  Renee filled in the blanks. “Rich circled around the back of the barn and we got the money first thing. He knew Marv would eventually find it or trick you into showing where it was.”

  “But I got to thinking”—Rich continued, sinking into a chair—“that you might need some help, so we kept an eye out. Waited for hours out back here, watching as Marv made mincemeat of the house. When you came in later then headed for the barn, we were watching.”

  Tyler pulled Renee closer. “If you hadn’t come back I probably would be dead.”

  “Which is the very reason why I wasn’t going to leave you here by yourself.” Rich lifted the linen from his shoulder and blanched.

  Tyler released Renee and went to the man, straddling a bench. He ripped open the shirt and scanned the wound. “I’ll have to get that ball out.”

  Rich made a face and swayed. “Would like that right well, so long as you can do it with me sitting down.”

  Tyler didn’t bother to tell the man he was already sitting. He took Rich’s good arm and got him vertical. “Let’s get you in bed; then I’ll get to work.” He glanced at Renee, already stuffing wood into the cookstove to encourage a fire. “Hot water, as soon as we can get it.”

  Rich leaned hard on him, and a new worry crawled up Tyler’s spine. “I’ll send Tate to get the doc.”

  “I’ll be all right. I’m a tough nut to crack.”

  Tyler guided Rich to the edge of the bed and helped get him settled.

  “Upping the ante on you, son.”

  Tyler’s concern burgeoned at the disconnected muttering. “Try to rest.”

  Rich gripped Tyler’s arm. Tyler turned back and caught the distinctive twinkle in Rich’s dark eyes. “I’m not daft; I mean it. I’m upping the ante on you.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Six instead of five.” Rich fell back on the mattress with a deep sigh.

  “Six what?”

  “Grandchildren. By my reckoning, taking this bullet for you’s worth one more.”

  thirty-five

  Tyler’s boot hit the bottom step of the ranch house porch when the door swung inward to reveal a healthy, robust Rich Morgan.

  “The prodigal has returned!”

  “And the lame can walk again!”

  Rich’s face twisted into a scowl. “Wasn’t quite that bad. Tate bugged Doc to stop by again last week, and I told him to stay away or I’d shoot him. I’m not a cast sheep and the buzzards aren’t circling me.”

  Tyler embraced the man, glad to feel the fitness of his frame and see him on his feet. “So Jesse and Tate were good nurses while I was gone.”

  Rich shouldered past him, dipped water into the coffeepot, threw in some grounds, and put it on to boil. “Not nearly as pretty as Renee, though their cooking might be a mite better.”

  Tyler slumped into a chair, relieved to have the long trip behind him and to see Rich in good spirits and stronger. “I won’t tell her.” He longed to ask if Rich had heard from her but didn’t. She’d wanted so much to get home after finding out Rich was going to survive. They’d ridden together, Renee on Sassy, he on a bay mare, until reaching territory Renee recognized. Their good-bye had been rushed when one of her father’s hands spotted them and rode out to accompany her home. She’d started throwing a thousand questions at the man as they trotted off. But she’d remembered Tyler long enough to gallop back and share a quick kiss and peel off a promise of, “I’ll come back” before galloping away with the hand.

  The time had come for him to get back down to Cheyenne with the money anyway. Fear of returning to the site of the robbery had left him lame long enough. So he’d kept riding, knowing the long days ahead would be lonely but would also give him time to think. Rich’s last words to him offered a measure of comfort. “They give you a hard time, you let me know and I’ll get Tate to bring me down stretched out in a wagon to set them straight.”

  Tyler stretched his legs out under the table. “Jesse got the sheep off the mountain, I see.”

  “Said Teddy was right where you left him. Guess he’d found his share of rabbits, picking his teeth with their bones when Jesse got there. Sheep hadn’t strayed nearly as far as they would have if Teddy hadn’t been with them.”

  Though Rich hadn’t come right out and asked, Tyler knew the man waited for his report. “They were glad to have the money.”

  “Why, sure.”

  “In the end, they let me go. Said it was a fair trade, if not way too late.”

  “And Anna?”

  Tyler jerked his head toward Rich. “Anna?”

  “Did you put her to rest while you were there?”

  Riding into Cheyenne again had been a trip back in time. Tyler had visited the store out of necessity, but also a perverse need to face all that his dishonesty had set into motion. He’d asked the sheriff about Anna’s parents, but they’d left town and he didn’t know where they’d gone.

  “Best thing you can do for yourself is move on.”

  Tyler knew that to be true; the emotions and disgust over what he’d done didn’t grip him as hard as they used to. The sheriff had summed it up best as he rode with Tyler to the outskirts of Cheyenne. “You’ll always live within the grip of regret, but don’t let it rule your life.”

  “All we have to do is wait for Renee to return.” Rich’s words tugged Tyler back to the present, the smell of coffee as comforting as the crackle of the fire. Yet he felt unsettled. Something was missing.

  Tyler gulped the brew Rich placed in front of him, realizing he had no taste for it at all. The brevity of Renee’s good-bye rolled through him, accusing, suggestive in its very brevity. He scooted out of the chair and ros
e to his feet. “She might meet someone else. It might be for the best anyway.” He spun and headed for the door. He’d lose himself in work around the ranch, but he didn’t want to hear Rich’s voice on the matter. The man retained high hopes for the two of them, and Tyler didn’t know if he hated the disappointment of Renee not returning more for Rich or for himself.

  ❧

  Renee wondered if Tyler had returned to the Rocking M or if he was still in Cheyenne. She eschewed the ribbon of color marking the sunset, her gaze stroking the horizon to the northeast. How many times had she regretted the swiftness of her good-bye kiss, sure she would see Tyler within a month or two, the past laid to rest, Thomas alive and well, and her relationship with her father repaired?

  How wrong she had been.

  “Renee?”

  She turned, her father’s tall, slender figure a shadow in the doorway. “I’m here.”

  “It’s a beautiful night.”

  “Yes.”

  Knot Dover sagged into one of the rockers on the porch. “He’s done better since you got back. You know that, don’t you? I think the worry over you was hindering his recovery.”

  She gripped the porch railing tighter, swallowed hard.

  “Keller is working with him on getting the strength back into the leg.”

  Yes, she knew that. Keller, a man her pa had found in town and hired to work with Thomas, had a way with injuries such as the one her brother had sustained. “He should be back East getting an education as a doctor.”

  “We’ve talked about it. He’s surely more a doctor than most of the ones over in Cheyenne.”

  From the corral, Sassy spotted her and whinnied. Renee pushed away from the railing and shuffled to the animal, scratching her ears and rubbing her sides. She didn’t know her father had followed her until he spoke again. “Time you took her home.”