Tamsin fell as Ash's opponent whipped his pistol up. Powder and heat scorched Ash's cheek, but he came in hard with a strong right fist.
It caught the pistolero on the chin and dropped him like a poleaxed steer. Spooked by the pain and gunfire, the bay horse bolted away down the draw.
Tamsin sat white-faced and breathless, holding her bleeding upper arm. "It's not my fault. I didn't go with them-"
"Come on!" he said, grabbing the fallen bandit's pistol. "Before the reinforcements get here."
He slipped an arm around her and helped her up. She leaned against him, struggling to stay on her feet.
The gunman was regaining consciousness. Ash knew that he should kill him. He lifted the weapon, but was stopped by the frightened look in Tamsin's eyes.
"That's murder," she said.
With an oath, Ash lowered his aim, putting a bullet into the fallen killer's injured knee. "Does that suit you, woman?"
She turned her face away. "I'm all right. I can walk."
"Like hell." Gathering her in his arms, he plunged into the trees, ran a hundred yards, then stopped. Sitting her down, he pushed her to the ground and crouched over her, protecting her with his body. "Don't make a sound," he whispered.
Two horses trotted up the ravine and stopped. The rock walls echoed with curses.
"Jack! Carlos is dead!" Ash would have bet his daddy's spurs it was Boone's voice.
Ash had heard the story that Jack Cannon had tried to hang his brother Boone when the two were boys. Whatever the reason, Boone spoke in a harsh rasp.
A volley of shots peppered the trees.
"Save your ammunition!"
Ash wondered if that was Jack. It had been years since he'd heard the outlaw speak, and he couldn't be sure. He leaned close to Tamsin's ear. "There were five of them, weren't there?"
She nodded, trembling under him like a wounded bird. "Jack, his brother, and Carlos. You shot Carlos."
"I killed two of them. Who was the fifth man, the one whose horse went lame?"
"I don't know. I never heard them call him by name." She shuddered. "The other one-the one who tried to rape me. He's Billy."
"You should have let me finish him when we had the chance."
She drew in a ragged breath. "That would make you as bad as him."
"It might make me alive."
Her lower lip quivered. "Jack said he was going to do things to me…" She jammed a hand against her mouth to keep from crying. "I didn't think you'd come in time."
"You're all right. I have you." Tamsin's hair was tangled with twigs and leaves, but beneath the dust, she still smelled as sweet as he remembered.
Alone, he would have gone after the remaining three, but with Tamsin to worry about, it seemed wiser to run.
She twisted to look up at him. "I didn't want to go with them. They threatened to kill me."
He nodded. "I guessed as much."
"You did?"
"Shhh, darlin'." He allowed himself to touch her cheek for just an instant. "I'm going to get you out of here in one piece, but you've got to help me."
"There's tracks from a single horse," Boone called.
"Just one animal?"
"That's all I see, Jack."
"You asshole! If there's only one horse, then there's only one shooter. Find him!"
Black hatred thickened Ash's throat, and he forced back the killing rage. When it came to besting human vermin like the Cannons, anger was a man's worst enemy. Ash knew he needed to use his wits. The odds were three to two, and Tamsin was weak from loss of blood. Jack was a crack shot. Given half a chance, he would kill them both.
Ash grabbed Tamsin and ran uphill, not stopping until he was out of breath. Then he drew her down into a hollow behind a rock. "Keep your head low," he told her. "I'm going to get us a mount."
She clung to him. "Don't go," she said. "Dancer will find me."
Ash brushed her mouth with his. "You're hurt, darlin'. You need to lay still and let me worry about Cannon."
"But Dancer-"
"He's scared. We can't wait for him to lead them to us." He ripped off his scarf and bound it around her arm. "It looks bad, but I think the bullet missed the bone."
"No. Don't go. They'll kill you."
"Be brave a little longer, darlin'. We can't get out of here without a horse."
"Promise me you won't let them catch me?"
He tilted her chin and looked into her eyes as icy dread seeped through his gut. "Did they abuse you?"
She shook her head. "A slap or two, nothing more."
"It doesn't matter. You can tell me the truth."
"I am telling the truth, you idiot," she snapped at him. "You stopped them." Tears filled her eyes. "I'd rather be dead than have those monsters-"
"Alive is better, woman. Always choose life. But it won't come to that. I swear to you." He stood up. "Wait here, and don't make a sound."
"Don't leave me."
"I'll be within earshot. You just call out if you need me."
Pistol ready, Ash moved from tree to tree, scanning the forest for any sign of movement. The shooting had stopped, and he could no longer hear voices below.
He'd turned Shiloh loose after he'd killed the first of Jack's gang with the rifle. The gelding wouldn't roam far, but the trick was to get him before Cannon's boys did.
He needed to get Tamsin safely away to wash her arm before it swelled with infection. And he needed to finish off Jack and his two remaining accomplices. If he didn't, he knew Cannon would track them down.
Maybe Tamsin was right, he thought. He should have brought along a posse. Maybe, for once, he'd bitten off more than he could chew.
Chapter 23
When Ash returned to the spot where he'd left Tamsin, he found Dancer standing beside her nuzzling her shoulder. "I told you he'd come back."
"If you don't mind, woman, I'm not in the mood for your reminders."
"All right." Her face was bloodless, but she smiled at him. "Have they gone? The outlaws?"
"Maybe. Maybe not." He looked at the sky, gauging the hour and how long it would be until dark. He didn't think they were far from Leon's cabin. He hoped Cannon would decide to go there rather than chase Tamsin through the woods all night.
"Dancer's hurt," Tamsin said. "I need to wash those cuts on his side and rump. I must have pulled out a dozen splinters. I hope they don't get infected."
"What about you?"
"I'll be all right."
She didn't look all right to him.
"You didn't find Shiloh."
He shook his head. "I did locate a spring higher up the ridge. We can camp there tonight."
"And in the morning?"
"Sweetwater is east of here."
"You're taking me back." She nodded. "Jail looked pretty good to me a few hours ago."
He didn't lie to her. He just couldn't tell her the truth, that he'd have to leave her and go after Cannon. His rifle was almost destroyed; they had two pistols and one horse between them. They couldn't outride Jack's gang, and they couldn't outshoot him. As long as they stayed hidden, they might be safe. But when they started back toward Sweetwater, he knew Jack would come after them.
He put her on the stallion and led Dancer uphill to the spring. They couldn't risk a fire tonight, and they were without food, but they could survive with water.
It took a half hour to reach the spot. He helped Tamsin down and let her drink her fill before he led the horse to the small run-off pool between the rocks. Tamsin sat stoically while he tore up a clean shirt from his bedroll to cleanse the bullet hole and stanch the bleeding. Next he packed the wound with moss that he scraped off a boulder and bandaged it tightly.
"You might have brought us some dry biscuits or bacon in that pack of yours," she chided when he was finished with his doctoring. "And you need to take care of Dancer's injuries."
"I'll wash the damn horse's scratches."
"They aren't scratches. They're puncture wounds. He could get lockjaw."
"Maybe I should have put a vet in my pack as well."
"Fried chicken would have been nice. Or apples, ripe red apples."
"Would have if you'd given me notice you were runnin' off again." He grumbled as he cared for Dancer's cuts.
"You can't blame that on me. I was kidnapped."
"So you say." He grinned at her and spread a blanket on a pile of pine needles, then gestured for her to sit on it. "You're more trouble than any owlhoot I've ever gone after."
"Sorry."
Carefully, he reloaded Billy's pistol and placed it within reach. "This one's for you. Use it, if you need to." He settled down beside her and put an arm around her shoulder. Tamsin's head fell naturally against his chest as though that was where it belonged.
She looked up at him, and he winced at the sight of the dark circles under her eyes. "What happens in the morning?"
"I told you, let me worry about that," he said. "You sleep. You look like you need it." He pulled her close, mindful of her injured arm. "I've got no intentions of dyin', Tamsin. Once this is done, we can start living."
Gray smoke billowed from Leon's chimney in the early morning light. Ash lay on his belly near the house spring and thought about Tamsin while he waited for Texas Jack to show his face.
She'd be fightin' mad when she found out that he'd gone off without her again, but he figured she'd forgive him once Jack was permanently out of the way.
It seemed impossible to him that they'd only known each other such a short time. She was part of him now, as close as his right hand, as necessary as his lungs for giving him life.
Horses, cows, or kids, he didn't give a tinker's damn what she wanted to raise or where she wanted to raise them. He could turn his hand to just about anything, and he was tired of hunting men.
It was time someone else tracked down the Texas Jack Cannons and the James boys. His belly was empty. His arm hurt like hell, and he had blisters on both heels from walking half the night. Damned if he wasn't getting too old for this business.
He'd left a note for Tamsin under Billy's pistol. He'd drawn a map showing her the way back to Sweetwater and left instructions to get to Max Spence's place and have Max contact Dimitri.
If he didn't make it back, she could take Dancer and ride. He'd have to put his faith in Dimitri to get her out of trouble with the law. Nobody else could do what he had to do this morning.
The back door opened and Billy limped out, using a barrel slat for a crutch. He had a thin mustache, wore bloodstained rags wrapped around his head, and carried a shotgun.
"Three left," Ash muttered under his breath. He hadn't expected the injured man to be able to walk this morning, let alone carry a weapon. It showed that outlaws had grown tougher than they used to be. Or that he was a complete fool for letting Tamsin talk him out of killing Billy where he'd found him.
A trickle of sand rolled down from the bluff above him, and Ash tensed. Had Jack or Boone slipped out and come up behind him?
A cold sweat broke out on his skin. He didn't dare move and give away his position, but neither could he lie here and wait for a bullet through his back.
Slowly Ash turned his head. No silhouette of a man loomed above him. The grass and wildflowers that sprouted from the overhang seemed undisturbed. What then could-
He froze as something heavy slithered over the back of his calves just above his boot tops. His breath caught in his throat, and his heart bucked against his chest. A long second passed, and then another.
From the corner of his eye Ash detected motion. At the same instant, a dry buzzing turned his gut inside out. Ash's mouth shriveled as though he'd eaten a green peach when the rattlesnake's diamond-shaped head appeared inches from his right elbow.
The serpent's body slid over Ash's legs, and the flat expressionless eyes gleamed with moisture as the snake flicked a long, thin tongue. Ash remained motionless. He knew it wasn't possible, but he would have sworn he could smell it.
The rattler smelled of death.
Sweat dripped into Ash's eyes. His lungs began to burn for lack of oxygen, and his fingers cramped on the damaged rifle stock. Somewhere high above, he heard a hawk shriek a plaintive cry. Ash's parched mouth tasted of lead.
Slowly the scaly, gray-green patterned body coiled and sounded another lethal warning, a dull vibration like the rattle of seeds in a dried gourd.
The snake turned its huge striped head to stare at him with frigid, glassy eyes, and Ash's bowels clenched. When he was twelve, he'd seen a boy bitten by a big diamond-back. His leg had swollen to gigantic proportions and turned black. And all his parents' prayers hadn't been enough to save him from a screaming death.
A prairie rattler wasn't as volatile as a diamondback, but one this size packed enough poison to kill a horse.
Ash didn't know how much longer he could hold his breath, but instinct told him that any movement could trigger a deadly strike.
Then something rustled in the grass. The snake's head snapped around as a white-bellied deer mouse popped into sight. The tiny rodent rose on its hind legs and sniffed the air.
The rattler bunked.
Emitting a faint squeak, the mouse darted off. The snake leapt after it, and both vanished from view. Ash inhaled deeply, remembering Billy and his shotgun just before the weapon blasted.
Ash snapped his rifle up, preparing to return fire, then realized that the outlaw hadn't been shooting at him.
Ash's breathing slowed and his heart quit jumping as he watched the man walk into the tall weeds and lift up the rattlesnake.
The back door flew open, and Boone Cannon showed his face. Boone had aged a lot since Ash had last seen him. His blond hair had darkened and thinned, and one side of his face bore an ugly scar. "What the hell you shootin' at, Billy?"
"Thought it was a rabbit," the man with the shotgun answered. "Ain't nothin' but a damned ole rattler." He heaved the headless body of the twitching reptile over the top rail of the corral, and the horses shied and crowded to the far side. Billy laughed. "Skittish, ain't they?"
"Jack don't like being woke up this early by you actin' the ass," Boone said. He walked out a few steps from the back door, scanned the valley, and fumbled with the front of his trousers.
As Boone relieved himself, Ash's finger tightened on the trigger. If he fired now, he could drop both of them before they could shoot back.
Common sense told him that's just what he should do, but he couldn't. He'd killed more men than he wanted to remember, but he didn't like the way he'd felt when he'd shot that man out of the saddle yesterday.
"You'd be no better than they are," Tamsin had said.
Maybe he'd lost his taste for killing when he thought that trash like these two deserved more than being mowed down with no more thought than Billy had destroyed the snake.
"Drop your guns! You're under arrest!" he shouted.
Billy jerked the shotgun to his shoulder, and Ash drilled him through the heart with a single bullet.
Boone drew his Colt and started firing as he backed toward the house. Ash's bullet caught him in the groin.
Boone staggered back and fanned the hammer, spraying the ground near Ash with lead. Ash's next round caught him through the throat. He fell, half in and half out of the open doorway.
Ash leapt to his feet and ran for the house. Then Jack Cannon appeared at the front corner of the cabin with a rifle in one hand, a pistol in the other.
Bullets whizzed past Ash's head like angry bees. One shot. He dived for the ground and rolled as Jack kept up a steady hail of lead.
Sand exploded in Ash's face as he scrambled to find some shelter from the bullets. He hunkered down behind a pile of rotting fence posts, and got off a shot at Jack as he dashed for the corral.
Jack was already over the corral fence. Ash took careful aim and fired. The bullet plowed through a railing and drove into Jack's left knee. He swore, fell, dropped the rifle, and struggled to his feet. Panicked horses milled around him, and Ash saw him grab Shiloh's sa
ddle.
Jack twisted and tried to get off another shot. When the pin clicked on a spent shell, Ash was up and running toward him. The outlaw swung up onto Shiloh and lashed him toward a low place in the fence. Then Ash saw something out of the corner of his eyes. He glanced in the direction of the spring and saw Tamsin riding toward him on Dancer.
Swearing, Ash whirled back toward the corral as Jack galloped toward the broken rail. Ash's final bullet hit him in the right breast.
Jack sagged forward and dropped the reins. Ash whistled. The gelding turned hard to the left, nearly throwing the outlaw out of the saddle. Jack grabbed a handful of horn and stayed with the horse as he shied and came to a trembling halt halfway between Tamsin and Ash.
"Don't shoot me!" Cannon yelled. "I give up! Don't shoot!" He slumped forward and raised one hand over his head. "I'm dropping my gun. See." He let the empty pistol fall.
Ash's finger tightened on the trigger of his Colt. He'd never wanted anything so badly in his life as he wanted to put two shots into Jack's belly and watch him die slow and ugly.
The outlaw with the pretty-boy features had aged since Ash had seen him last.
He wanted to kill him just the same.
"You don't deserve to live," he said. "Give me one reason, Jack, why I shouldn't-"
" 'Cause I know you, Morgan. You ain't got the balls to kill me. Just like you didn't have the balls to satisfy that pretty little wife of-"
Cannon's eyes widened as a crimson flower blossomed on his chest. "I… I…" Blood spilled from his open mouth, and he toppled out of the saddle.
Tamsin lowered Billy's smoking pistol. "He had a derringer hidden in his boot. He would have murdered you, Ash."
He stared at her, still unable to believe what he'd seen. "You killed him."
"What was I supposed to do, let him kill you?"
"Hell, woman," he said as he lifted her down off Dancer. "I'm glad you did. I just can't believe you made that shot from the back of a horse. Do you know how many marksmen would miss-"
"I couldn't miss." She tilted her face up to kiss him. "I was the only hope you had."
Morgan's Woman Page 22