"I remember," he retorted defiantly.
"Your pa went because he wanted to go. I didn't want him to leave, Tad. I was begging him not to go. That's what you heard us arguing about."
"You didn't like Chase. That's why you sent him away."
"That's not true. I did... like him. But it was time for him to go."
"He didn't even say good-bye to me," Tad said in a small voice.
"He was sorry about that, Tad. He said so."
"Is he gonna come back?"
She slowly shook her head. Tad sent her one last accusatory look and disappeared at a run out the back door.
Libby sat staring after him, feeling suddenly as fragile as an autumn leaf in the wind. Tad's words about his father had hurt. She'd had no idea he'd blamed her for his father's going.
Perhaps she should have told him the truth about Chase. He had a right to know what happened to his father, after all. But no. As painful as it was for her to know—at last—the circumstances of Lee's death, it would be twice as hard on Tad. Someday she'd tell him all of it and give him the locket—his father's last legacy.
Tell her I loved her. How she'd longed to hear those words from Lee when he was alive. Now they were all she had left of him. Those and the locket.
Her fingers tightened around the keepsake in her hand. Slowly she sprung the lock and opened it. Inside was her photograph, the one Lee had made her have taken in Santa Fe one month before the war had stolen him away. How young she had looked then. How naive she'd been before life had taught her such hard lessons.
She took a deep breath, holding back the latest round of tears that threatened. Guilt lay heavily upon her, for the tears she'd shed that day weren't so much for Lee. She'd done her grieving for him years ago. This time they were for Chase, the one man who'd made her believe she could love again—the man who'd done nothing, but lie to her from the start. She'd cried until her chest hurt, then she'd cried some more.
But her tears had changed nothing.
The foolish notion of love had died in her this very day. She had to be practical now. Wasn't that the word Jonas Harper had used? When he'd said it a few days ago, it had sounded so cold and hard. Now she knew he'd been right. She couldn't make this ranch work with three men and a boy. With Bodine, Chase and most likely Elliot gone now, there was no way she could meet her deadline for the Army contract. Without that contract, her ranch would be taken over by the bank that held the mortgage.
She had no choice, really. No choice at all. Tomorrow morning she'd do what she should have done a long time ago. She would lay to rest all of her romantic notions and be practical for a change.
* * *
The setting sun bloodied the snow-covered slopes of the Sangre de Cristos with crimson light. Dark clouds scudded along behind the craggy peaks, shadowed by approaching night. To Chase's right, thick stands of aspen and arrow-straight spruce marked the subtle rise in altitude. At nearly seven thousand feet, the air temperature dropped perceptibly as the sun began to sink behind the mountains. Chase indifferently shrugged on his leather-caped duster and stared straight ahead at the sage-dotted high desert without really seeing it.
Neither the eerie beauty of the mountains nor the darkening sky captured Chase's interest. He'd headed Blue, for lack of a better destination, toward the box canyon at the edge of Libby's ranch, where El was standing watch. But he felt no particular need to hurry. For the first time in years he had nowhere to go and nothing to occupy his thoughts but regrets. He paid little notice when Blue stopped now and then along the way to crop at the tufts of blue-green grama grass or to trim the delicate yellow flowers from the tips of sage.
His thoughts weren't on the cold or the raw, sacred beauty of the land around him, but on the woman he'd left behind. Guilt ate at him. A hollow ache, the kind he'd never expected to feel again, twisted his insides. How had everything ended up so wrong? He'd meant to help her and had ended up hurting her.
What did you expect? That she would forgive you for lying to her? No.
That she would welcome you back into her arms after she learned you shot her husband?
No, damn it. She has every right to hate me. I got exactly what I expected and certainly what I deserved.
Except you didn't expect to fall in love with her, did you, Whitlaw?
With gut-wrenching intensity, the realization hit him. Chase reined in his horse with a jerk and took a few deep breaths. Blue stamped impatiently, snorted and gave a shake to his bridle.
It was true, by God. He was in love with Libby. He'd thought himself incapable of ever feeling such a tender emotion again. The death and destruction he'd seen during the war had hardened him against ever again taking such a foolish risk. But Libby hated him now and would always hate him for his part in Lee's death. There wasn't a damn thing he could do about it.
A whisky-jack's shrill cry came from the branches of a nearby stand of aspen and the jay swooped in a flash of gray out of the trees. Blue's ears pricked up at the sound and Chase leaned over to lay a soothing hand on the horse's neck.
He heard the distinctive click of a gun's hammer and saw a flicker of movement in the trees, just as he was struck across the right temple with a fiery blow. Lights exploded in his head and he fumbled frantically for the gun strapped to his hip. His hand closed around it, but before he could lift it up, two more bullets tore wickedly into his side and shoulder.
Chase groaned and doubled over the saddle as he fought the hot, branding agony. Bloody hell! He hadn't even seen it coming. Fury rose like bile in his throat.
Bodine.
Gritting out a curse, he made a grab for the saddle horn and hung on as Blue lurched into a jarring run. Darkness closed in on him in an ever-tightening spiral. He sensed that his hands were losing their grip as he slipped inevitably into that nebulous black void. He felt himself falling, falling.
As the hard earth rose up to meet him, his last conscious thought was of Libby. He should have told her he loved her. This time there'd be no one to tell her that when he was gone.
Chapter 14
Jonas Harper felt every one of his forty-two years as he led the spirited sorrel gelding into the fragrant barn and lit the kerosene lamp that hung from the rafter. Yellow light spilled across the straw-strewn floor, illuminating the large well-equipped stable. He rubbed a hand tiredly across the back of his neck.
It had been a long day, spent branding and earmarking the late spring calves. His foreman, Cal Stembridge and most of his men were gone from the ranch, driving the herd south to Fort Sumner and the Bosque Rodondo for sale to the Navaho and Apache reservations. So Jonas had worked hard alongside his small crew of ropers and dallymen. But his muscles were complaining from the work. He wasn't as young as he used to be. He worried about that as he slid the heavy saddle off his gelding and led it into the freshly strewn stall.
The order and cleanliness of the barn suited him. He'd worked hard for this, had built his ranch with his own sweat out of nothing more than dirt. Now it boasted one of the finest haciendas in the territory and stock barns to make the wealthiest Eastern landowner jealous. Through sheer determination and know-how—and an economy hungry for cash—he'd acquired almost as much land as Manuel Delgado or Fernando Ortiz, two of the largest of the old Spanish land-grant owners in the territory.
Only two things were still missing from his life: a woman to share his bed and an heir to take it all over when he died. Elda, his wife of eight years, had died three years ago, giving birth to their fourth still-born child. She'd been a fragile city-bred woman, like his sister, Nora. Not at all suited to the hardships of territory life.
When he set his sights on finding a new wife, his first requirement was that she be young enough for childbearing, white-skinned—he'd be damned if he'd leave all this to some half-breed greaser brat—and accustomed to the rigors of New Mexican life. That the flaxen-haired Elizabeth Honeycutt fit perfectly into all those requirements and had extraordinary beauty as well, only made Jonas want he
r more.
He had fantasized for months about her lying beneath him on his bed, her golden hair wrapped around him as he plunged himself into her ripe softness and got her belly hard and swollen with his seed.
Jonas felt himself grow hard just thinking about her. He decided to seek out Maria tonight, the Mexican whore who worked in his kitchen. She was a lusty one, more than happy to take care of his needs. But every hand on the ranch dipped into her honey pot from time to time and that dulled the pleasure he took from her. It wasn't like having a regular woman in his bed, one he could call his own. He wanted Elizabeth there and he meant to have her. She'd be so grateful to get out of that shack she and her boy lived in she'd...
The scent of burning tobacco cut off the thought and a shuffle of straw behind him sent Jonas spinning around. In the shadowy light, Trammel Bodine leaned casually against the stall door. The tip of his cigarette glowed red in the dark. It took a minute for Harper's heart to settle back into place. Bodine's long, aquiline features were accentuated by the pall of shadows cast by the lantern light and by a two-day growth of beard.
"Bodine, what the hell are you doing here?"
"Evenin', Harper." He grinned broadly, blowing a smoke ring that drifted lazily toward the other man.
Harper yanked the cigarette from Bodine's mouth and put it out in the water bucket in the corner of the stall. "Are you trying to burn my barn down? Nobody smokes in my barn."
Bodine threw his hands up in front of him. "Okay, okay. Don't get yer dander up."
Harper pulled the headstall off his horse, clapped it on the backside and sent it toward the manger already filled with hay. "What are you doing here? You're supposed to be at Elizabeth's."
"Yeah, well, there's been a change in plans."
Jonas's gaze narrowed. "What the hell does that mean?"
"It means she cut me loose today."
"She fired you?" Harper exploded. "Hell and damnation! For what?"
"It ain't my fault," Bodine argued, setting his jaw so the lean muscles there bulged. "It was that bastard Whitlaw. Somehow, he had it all figured out how I been fixin' things to go wrong on her ranch. Flat out accused me of it in front of everybody."
"And she believed him?"
"I told you she has eyes fer him. Hell," Bodine grumbled, "if she was a chicken she'd a bought a bag of feathers from him. She swallowed the story lock, stock and barrel. Only thing Whitlaw could prove was that I'd been up in the loft goin' through his things."
Harper raked his fingers through his graying hair. "Damn it!" He paced back and forth for a few seconds before turning back to Bodine. "Did you at least find out who he was—what he wanted—like I told you to?"
"Yeah, but that ain't important no more."
Harper narrowed his eyes. "What are you talking about? You just got through telling me—"
"I mean Whitlaw ain't gonna stand in the way of your courtin' the Honeycutt woman from now on, that's what."
Harper stared at Bodine for a long moment. "You mean he... left Elizabeth's?"
Bodine smiled coldly. "You might put it that way. I like to think that I discouraged him like you told me to. Permanent like."
A cold sensation crept up Harper's spine and settled in the pit of his stomach. "You... killed him?"
"He had it comin'," Bodine said, rubbing his sore neck. "He tried to kill me first."
Harper leaned a flattened palm against the fragrant barn siding. "God Almighty, I never told you"—he swallowed hard—"to kill him."
"See, I don't remember it that way. I remember you wanted him dealt with. I dealt with him. My way."
"I said to stay within conscionable limits, you fool!"
"Ah, see, there's the basic difference between you an' me." Bodine's mouth twisted into an ugly smile. "Good Lord didn't saddle me with a conscience. But I figure that's why you hired me for this job. 'Cause you didn't have the stomach for it yerself. Ain't that right?"
Jonas stared at him disbelievingly. He suddenly felt himself sinking into the mire of his own well-laid plan. "I paid you to convince Elizabeth to marry me by making it impossible for her to manage that place on her own—to see she didn't meet that contract she needs so badly. But I didn't pay you to kill anyone. Now, by God, you've botched that job and implicated me in a murder."
"I done my job, just like you asked. The way I see it, with Whitlaw and me gone, her choices just narrowed down to one. You. Ain't that what you wanted, Harper?"
"Hellfire and damnation!" Harper paced restlessly, but he grudgingly admitted the hardhead might be right. "Are you sure he's dead?"
Bodine pulled Chase's engraved Colt pistol from his belt. "The coyotes are fightin' over what's left of him by now. You think he would'a parted with this willingly?"
"Put that thing away! Did anyone see you?"
He snorted. "Nobody saw me, but Whitlaw. But it's a fact, we didn't part on the friendliest of terms. There's a fair chance the law might try to match me with the doin' of it. But nobody's likely to find his body 'til I'm long gone and there ain't nobody to connect me with you. Unless, of course, you don't see this thing my way."
Harper's black eyes leapt to Bodine's. "Your way?"
"It's gonna be my neck ridin' under a cottonwood limb if I get caught. The money we agreed on at the start of this job ain't gonna be enough. I figure I need some more to get out of the Territory for a while 'til things cool down."
Sweat trickled down past Harper's ear. "How much more?"
"Five thousand should just about cover it."
Harper let out a snort of disbelief. "You're insane."
Trammel's smile faded and he took a step toward the older man. "Maybe I am. Maybe I'm just crazy enough to tell yer little blond-haired widow what you been doin' to win her over."
"Are you threatening me?"
"If I don't get what I came for, it ain't a threat—it's a promise."
Jonas curled his hands into tight fists. "You little bastard. I paid you well for this deal. You've got no right to blackmail me for your mistakes."
"When you play dirty, you get dirty, Harper. Just ain't no way around it. You keep the money in your house?"
"I don't keep that kind of money around," Harper denied, straight-faced.
"Bullshit," Bodine barked. Cocking Chase's gun, he aimed it at Harper. "Everybody know's you don't hold no cotton with banks. I ain't playin' games here Harper."
Harper stared at the gun and thought briefly of the one still strapped to his thigh. He had no chance of getting the drop on this bastard now. "All right. There's no need for that. I'll get it for you. You wait here."
Bodine grabbed his arm and pressed the barrel against Harper's throat, a wild look lighting his eyes. "Do I look stupid to you?" He slipped Harper's gun from its holster and stuffed it into the back of his belt. "I ain't waitin' anywhere's fer you. We're a-goin' together."
Heat lightning lit the eastern sky, illuminating the way back to the house. They passed beneath the expansive adobe archway that led to the outer courtyard of the fine rectangular-shaped hacienda. The mica-specked sand that made up the adobe's smooth outer layer glittered and winked in the moonlight.
The prospect of imminent death heightened Harper's senses and cleared his mind. It had been a mistake to get involved with Bodine in the first place. When you play dirty, you get dirty. That was right. He felt irreconcilably dirty now, his good intentions turned into something else altogether. It was he who'd been stupid to trust Bodine with Elizabeth. He'd kill him for this. Someday, he'd kill him.
* * *
Nora was walking into the parlor with a cup of tea when Jonas came out of his study with the stranger and led him to the ornately carved front door. The two were exchanging quiet words she couldn't quite hear. Suddenly, the stranger turned toward her and caught her watching them. Though a hat shaded most of his face, she saw his mouth curve into a slow smile. The man's insolent gaze traveled the length of her before he slipped out the door into the darkness.
Nora fro
wned. The stranger had looked familiar somehow and though she couldn't place him, she knew she'd seen him before. His look had sent a chill right down to her toes. She clamped a hand on the throat of her thin cotton wrapper and watched her older brother shut the door. He turned back to her slowly, his expression clouded with anger and something else that kept him from meeting her eyes.
"Jonas?"
He brushed past her. "Did you save some supper for me?" he asked abruptly.
"Of course," she answered, following him toward the kitchen. They passed through the well-appointed dining room with the lace-covered mahogany dining table and sideboard they'd had sent West from New York. Beneath their feet, a colorful rug imported from Persia cushioned the cold earthen tiles.
"I saved you a plate," Nora said, reaching for the plate she had warming on the black iron stove that heated the corner of the kitchen. "You were very late. I didn't even hear you come in."
"We had a lot more mavericks than we expected this season. We're still not finished with the branding." He settled himself at the small wooden kitchen table with his food.
Nora sat tentatively beside him. "Jonas, who was that man?"
"Nobody." Harper stared at his plate of food.
"He couldn't very well be nobody," she persisted. "I saw him with my own eyes. Who was he?"
Harper's fork hesitated on its way to his mouth. "Just a cowboy lookin' for work."
"At this time of night?"
"He was just passing through."
"Did you hire him?"
"No." His fork twisted in his beefy hand. His agitation was growing.
"I'm glad. I didn't like the looks of him."
"You forget about that man," Jonas nearly shouted. "Forget you ever saw him. You hear me?"
Nora stared at Jonas, shocked by his harsh words. Then she tipped her chin up in anger. "Don't make the mistake of thinking you can speak to me the way you did Elda, Jonas. I'm here at your invitation and I can go back to Richmond the same way I came. I won't be talked to as if I haven't a brain in my head. If you're hiding something from me, I have a right to know what it is."
Chase the Fire Page 18