Rico (The Rock Creek Six Book 3)

by Lori Handeland

  Did everyone know about his misfortune? Trust Nate and Cash not to be able to keep their mouths shut about anything they thought was funny.

  “Those two think you can seduce any woman, given enough time,” Reese continued. “But maybe, just maybe, you can’t.”

  Rico couldn’t take that lying down, even though lying down was what he wished for. “I can, too.”

  “Don’t say that around Eden or Mary,” Sullivan said. “They’ll damage you permanently.”

  “Grow up, Rico. I’ve been expecting it for years. The war didn’t help. Riding with us didn’t, either. Maybe a woman will.”

  “I doubt even that would help,” Sullivan murmured.

  “I am grown. I have taken care of myself since I left mi casa at fourteen.”

  “Have you? Or have we always been there for you?”

  Rico thought back on the years before he had met these men. “Not always.”

  “All right.” Reese dipped his head. “But taking care of yourself, being tall, strong, wielding a knife better than anyone, doesn’t make you a grown-up, Rico.”

  “What does?”

  “That’s something you’ll have to figure out for yourself.”

  Rico rubbed his aching eyes. “That is what I was afraid of.”

  Reese and Sullivan stood. Their shadows spread across the rocks. Though Rico was taller than both of them, he always felt smaller.

  “Come on.” Reese held out a hand. “Let’s go home.”

  Rico had no home and hadn’t for a very long time. It hadn’t bothered him, either, because once he’d met these men, home had always been them, not a house or a town. Perhaps home had never been a place. Just as being on your own didn’t make you a grown-up.

  Rico let Reese pull him to his feet. Sullivan slapped him on the back hard enough to make his head throb some more. “In the morning we’ll look everywhere all over again. We’ll find her, Rico. I promise.”

  Sullivan’s promise was as good as a fact. Still, Rico went back to Rock Creek feeling worse than he had when he’d left that morning, and that was saying a lot. His mood did not improve when he approached the saloon and heard Cash shouting. Cash rarely shouted; he just shot, then there was no more reason for shouting.

  Reese and Sullivan started running. Rico followed more slowly. Moving fast made his head hurt. What he saw inside the saloon made his stomach hurt, too.

  The women were having a lovely time, or should be if the yards of fabric spread over every table were any indication. Where dirt and dust had reined only yesterday, the Rock Creek saloon now sparkled and shone. Where there had been only cards and booze and men, there were now women, children, and—

  “Are those cookies?” The horror in Cash’s voice was matched only by the expression on his face.

  Nate merely looked confused, as if perhaps they’d wandered into the wrong building or the wrong town.

  The children, used to Cash by now, ignored him. As soon as Georgie and Fiona saw Rico, they squealed and hugged his knees, just as Carrie used to. Rico cleared his throat, always thick and tight after he drank too much, then knelt to receive a wet, cookie-crumbled kiss on each cheek. He returned the favor, minus the cookie crumbs, and the girls joined hands and toddled back to the other children.

  “What in holy hell is going on here?” Cash towered over Lily.

  When Lily began to stand, Eden put her hand out and stopped her. If anyone could handle Cash, it was Eden. Rico moved a bit closer to the action, anyway.

  “What does it look like, Daniel?” Eden asked.

  “Purgatory.”

  “A myth,” Nate stated. “I believe purgatory is life itself.”

  Everyone ignored him.

  “We’ve had a hellish day, girls, and now we need a drink and a bit of companionship.” He headed for the stairs. No one moved. Cash stopped and turned about. “Kate?”

  She swallowed, glancing at Eden, then Lily. Her back straightened, and she lifted her chin. “No, Cash. I’m not goin’ with you. Lily says I can have part of the profits from Three Queens.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The name of this place,” Lily said.

  “Sounds like the kind of name a woman would give the place.”

  “I won it with three queens.”

  “You’d have needed a flush to win it from me.”

  “Lucky for me it wasn’t yours to lose.”

  His dark eyes narrowed, and Rico stepped forward, but Sullivan waved him back.

  “The profits from this place won’t feed you, Kate. I will. Now, come on.”

  “I’m sewin’ dresses for the ladies. I won’t need to be with men anymore if I don’t want to. Not that you aren’t good, Cash. I just want to try life a different way to see if I can.”

  “Who gave you this idea?”

  “Eden and Mary.”

  “Uh-oh,” Reese and Sullivan said at the same time. They moved forward to collect their wives and children.

  “Laurel,” Cash snapped, “let’s go.”

  “No.”

  Cash shook his head as if he had water in his ear. “What was that?”

  “I’m gonna help Kate. Lily’s gonna help us both.”

  “This could get good,” Nate murmured.

  “This is your fault!” Cash pointed at Lily. “You’re in town one day, and you’ve reformed all the perfectly good fallen women. I knew you were trouble the minute you walked in the joint.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Hey, I’m not fallen,” Laurel protested. “I stand up better than Nate. Don’t talk down to me, Cash. I did what I had to do. Right, Lily?”

  “Right.”

  “Now I don’t have to anymore. You can quit orderin’ me around, Daniel Cash. I don’t need you, either.”

  “That’s it.” Cash’s voice was so low and deadly, everyone went silent.

  Cash started toward Lily. Rico stepped between them. Cash bumped into him, snarled, then slammed his shoulder into Rico’s chest.

  Rico grabbed Cash’s arm. “You don’t want to do this, amigo.”

  “You want to let go of me, Kid, before you lose your busy fingers.”

  “Fine.” Rico let go. He wasn’t a complete fool. “But you will leave Lily alone.”

  Hurt flashed in Cash’s cold, dark eyes so fast, Rico must have imagined it. “You afraid I’m gonna damage her?”

  “I will not let you.”

  “You think your knives are faster than my gun?”

  “Nothing and no one is faster than your gun. But I can’t just stand here and let you—”

  “What?” Cash shouted, and tore himself from Rico’s grip. “What do you think I’m going to do?” He looked at the others. “Do you think I’m going to shoot a woman in cold blood just because she’s the biggest pain in the ass to hit town since Eden?”

  No one answered.

  “Shit. I’m leaving.” He tromped up the stairs.

  Rico stood where he was until Nate walked past. “You don’t have to go with him.”

  Though he’d been drinking steadily all day, Nate’s eyes were sober as a gravedigger’s. “If a friend isn’t watching his back, an enemy will be.”

  “He’s going to die one day, Nate. He’s set on it.”

  “We all die one day. If I die helping a friend, maybe my life will be worth something.” He followed Cash.

  “Reese.” Rico turned and bumped into Lily. She gave him an odd look he hadn’t the energy to figure out, then backed out of his way. “You’ve got to do something,” Rico continued.

  “Maybe it’s best if they leave for a while. You know they always come back calmer than when they left.”

  “But, James,” Mary said, “they’re going off to fight with guns.”

  “That’s what they do, honey. That’s what we all did once.”

  Sullivan and Eden had their heads together. “It’s not my fault, Sin! We were just helping the girls. What’s so wrong with them getting a worthwhile job? Maybe Cash and Nate should
try it. It wouldn’t even hurt Rico.”

  “You think I have no worthwhile job?” he asked.

  Eden flushed as if she hadn’t realized she’d spoken aloud, or perhaps Rico did not understand plain English. “You don’t.”

  “What do you suggest I do with my many talents?”

  “I don’t know. Something other than teach Carrie to sneak around and play poker.”

  “Carrie!” Mary exclaimed. “Did you find her?”

  Reese scooped up Georgie, who was hanging on his knee and smearing cookie globs all over his pants. “Not yet.”

  “Oh, James, she’s so little.”

  Putting his arm around his wife, Reese kissed the top of her head. “We’ll find her tomorrow.”

  “We’ll find her tomorrow,” Cash mimicked as he came down the stairs, Nate at his heels. “You make me sick. I can’t stay here and watch the disintegration by females of what was once an unbeatable unit.”

  “You need to watch yourself, Cash, before you say anything you’ll be sorry for.”

  “I’m only sorry I didn’t do something before you and Sullivan succumbed to temptation.”

  “Temptation is the game of Satan,” Nate announced.

  “Shut up, Rev. I’m talkin’ here. You two are going to be worthless if there’s any kind of gunplay. You’ll be worrying about your wives or your passel of children or the next brat your sweetheart is going to squeeze out, and you’ll get shot in the head or let me get shot.”

  Fiona started to cry, so Georgie joined her. The tension and the anger in the room had reached the little ones. The older children remained silent but watchful.

  Cash made a disgusted sound. “You can’t even have boys; you’ve gotta make girls and increase the wailing population. Then they dimple at the Kid and he’s just as bad as the two of you.” Cash glared at Rico. “You chose a woman over me, and I don’t take that kindly. As far as I’m concerned, this six has just become two. Let’s go, Nate.”

  Cash stomped out. Nate glanced at Reese. Reese jerked his head at the door, and Nate gave one slow nod before he followed. Moments later, the staccato rhythm of hoof-beats faded into the distance.

  “That didn’t go well at all,” Eden observed. “Sin, how are you going to get them to come back?”

  Sullivan picked up Fiona; she stopped crying. “I’m not.”

  “What?” Eden glanced frantically at the door as if she’d go after them herself. Sullivan, knowing what she was capable of, grabbed the bustle of her skirt. “You can’t let them ride off like that.”

  “I just did. It’s their choice, Eden. If they stuck around here, drinking, gambling, and getting more bored by the day, they were going to do something stupid. Then I’d just have to put them in jail.”

  “You wouldn’t!”

  “Of course I would.”

  “Then I would have to break them out somehow.” Rico sighed. “And we would have chaos.”

  Reese snorted. “They’ll be fine. Now, let’s go home. I’m exhausted.”

  The two families went on their way. Yvonne was nowhere to be found. Kate and Laurel were engrossed once more in their sewing. Considering how much time they’d spent with Nate and Cash, they sure didn’t seem concerned that the two were gone, which depressed Rico even more than the events of the day.

  How many women in saloons across the West had fallen all over him and told him they loved him? For how many had he returned the favor? And how little had any of it meant to him or to them?

  “Thank you.” Lily stood at his side.

  “Don’t mention it.”

  “I appreciate your standing up for me. You didn’t—”

  “I said, ‘Don’t mention it.’ I’m not happy about what I did, and I certainly did not do it to help you.”

  “Why did you?”

  “To get you into bed.”

  She stared at him as if she had never seen him before. “You’re not a sex-as-gratitude kind of man. Too much pride for that.”

  “I am a sex-for-any-reason, any-season, kind of man.”

  Her fingertip tapped at her lips. If he hadn’t been so tired and sad, Rico just might have been interested in the shape of those lips and the taste of that finger. “Maybe that’s not so bad.”

  She joined the girls. Had that been a compliment? If so, what did it mean?

  One day in town and the woman was driving him crazy. Rico had no idea what to say or do or how to behave.

  Lily Fortier was going to be more trouble than she was worth.

  Chapter 7

  Carrie stilled at the footsteps on the stairs. She knew those steps as well as she knew her own. The man she adored beyond all others was back.

  Rico was the tallest, the handsomest, the best. He had saved her from the bad cougar cat and made sure her granddad took better care of her than he had before Rico arrived in Rock Creek.

  She never told him how sometimes her granddad hit her when she was sneaky or pinched her when she wouldn’t shut up about Rico. The bruises never showed, and even though her granddad was mean, he was her granddad, and she had nobody else.

  “Big baby.” She snuffled. “None of the Rock Creek Six would cry because their mean granddad dropped over dead when he was screamin’ at ‘em.” Maybe because none of the six would let anyone scream at them.

  Now she was hidin’ to prove to Rico she was the sneakiest kid around. Then maybe he’d let her ride with him. If he didn’t, she had no idea what she would do.

  Her granddad had always told her horrible stories of what happened to orphaned little girls. Carrie huddled against the head of the bed. She didn’t think there were people in the world who were actually that awful, but you never could tell.

  If she could just keep things the way they were for another eight years or so, her life would be fine. Because one day she was going to grow up, be as pretty as... as... as Mrs. Sullivan and as sweet as Mrs. Reese, then Rico would marry her and never look at another woman the way he looked at Lily Fortier.

  “Cherie,” Carrie muttered. “In a pig’s ear!”

  The door opened, and the piano player slipped into the room. How had he sneaked up on her? She’d heard Rico’s footsteps, and Rico walked quieter than anyone. But she hadn’t heard a whisper of this boy’s approach.

  He stared at her with solemn eyes. She’d been slipping about the saloon all day; no one had seen her so she’d heard a lot. The boy’s name was Johnny, and he was Lily’s brother.

  Though he had black hair and blue eyes, Johnny looked nothing like Lily, and while Lily’s skin was pale, Johnny’s was darker, like Rico’s. He was nearly as handsome as Rico, too. But the boy was spookier than Cash, and he talked a whole lot less.

  “Whaddaya want?” she demanded.

  He pointed first at the bag in the corner, then at himself, then he opened his palm in a graceful movement to encompass the room. He had the longest fingers she’d ever seen, and he used them to play that piano as if he’d invented the thing. Carrie knew nothin’ of music, but she could tell good when she heard it.

  “This is your room?” He nodded. “I didn’t know.” He shrugged. “Are you gonna tell on me?”

  He stared at her.

  “You can’t talk, can you?”

  He spread both hands in a gesture at once foreign and yet familiar—maybe yes, maybe no.

  “That’s what I thought. So you won’t be telling on me at all.”

  Johnny put his fingers to his mouth as if to whistle.

  “Don’t.”

  He dropped his hand, tilted his head, and waited.

  “If I hide long enough, Rico will be impressed.”

  He gave one slow nod.

  “And if everyone is scared that I’m lost or hurt or dead, they’ll be sorry, and they’ll let me stay with him.”

  Johnny looked skeptical. He came over and sat on the bed. For some reason, she liked him. Maybe because he listened better than anyone she’d ever known.

  Carrie scooted closer. “If you let me stay here
just a little longer, I promise I won’t be a problem.”

  He stared at her shoulder and not at her face. Her dress—the only one she owned, which was a size too big because Granddad always bought ready-made and there weren’t too many sizes to choose from—had slipped down. The last bruise her granddad would ever make shone dark on Carrie’s pale skin.

  Johnny lifted his gaze to hers, and fury heated his eyes. He jabbed a finger at her arm.

  “M-my granddad.” She dropped her head. “I was a problem.”

  Johnny put his finger to Carrie’s chin and lifted. He shook his head emphatically. She wasn’t a problem.

  Her smile blossomed. “So I can stay here?”

  He nodded, and she let out a sigh of relief. “How come you’re so nice?”

  He raised the sleeve of his shirt to reveal white scars along his forearm. The sight of them made Carrie mad. She growled deep in her throat, furious that someone had done that to him. He tugged on the sleeve as if embarrassed. His eyes—blue-black and tender—reminded her of the bruise along her collarbone.

  “I’ll be your friend,” she whispered. “I bet you don’t have too many.”

  He shook his head.

  “Rico says one good friend is better than a hundred acquaintances.” She slipped her hand into Johnny’s and squeezed.

  He stared at her as if she were the oddest creature on earth, then his hand tightened, released, and his lips curved into the sweetest smile Carrie had ever seen.

  Johnny was the kind of friend you didn’t make every damn day.

  * * *

  Almost a week after arriving in Rock Creek, Lily stood in Rico’s room, waiting for him to return from his daily search for the little girl. She hoped they found Carrie today, because the sadness in Rico’s eyes was making Lily sad too.

  She had no idea what was wrong with her. Ever since Rico had stepped between her and Cash, she’d been unable to think of anything but him.

  Or maybe her fascination had begun earlier, when Eden and Mary had discussed his decorative appeal, his lack of a job or any marketable skills, his incredible charisma with women of every age. Each time she closed her eyes, she remembered his kiss. He’d been very skilled. He’d made her feel things she hadn’t believed possible. He was probably going to be the biggest mistake of her life. But then, what good was life without a few unforgettable mistakes?