Chase the Fire

by Barbara Ankrum

  Chapter 24

  "I... won't... scream," Libby rasped, scrambling backward as he dragged her away from the door. His harsh grip on her sent fear shooting down her limbs. "Please, d-don't... hurt me."

  A self-satisfied chuckle rumbled in his chest. "Ain't so high an' mighty now, are ya, Libby?" Bodine edged toward the window to look out. In the distance, the circled crowd concealed the two fighting men.

  Libby's heart sank. No one had even noticed she'd slipped away. Why hadn't she stayed out there with the others?

  "What's goin' on out there?" Bodine demanded. "I thought you was gettin' hitched."

  "Chase... and Jonas..."

  Bodine gave her neck a mean little jerk. "Whitlaw and Harper, fightin' over you are they? That ought to work out just fine fer you an' me."

  "Wh-what do you want from me?"

  He hauled her backward toward the next room. "Only what I'm due. And maybe a little more."

  Bending her awkwardly in front of him, he reached for the flour sack he'd left on the sideboard before sneaking up on her in the parlor. The bag thudded against her. It was money. Harper's money. The loose coin clattered musically, but paper bank notes also filled the sack.

  "Feel that?" he gloated. "That there's poetic justice a-janglin' against yer hip, lady. My future. Harper made it easy for me with all these fine folks he invited here. I just waltzed in, pretty as you please, an' nobody was the wiser." Bodine pulled her through the house toward the back door in the kitchen, his arm still tightly around her neck. Keep him talking, she thought desperately. "You came to rob him?"

  "I come here to pay him back. See he made the mistake of underestimatin' me. I don't take that"—he shoved the pistol closer to her temple—"from nobody."

  There was no mercy in his grip on her. No half-measure in his voice.

  He was going to kill her.

  The realization struck like a sharp blow to the solar plexus. It made her dizzy and angry at the same time. She tasted the coppery tang of blood on her lip where his hand had crushed her mouth against her teeth and she tried to get a grip on her breathing, to slow it down. If she let him rattle her, she had no chance of fighting him. And she wasn't about to go down without a fight.

  "I never underestimated you, Bodine. I always knew you had enough nerve for ten men." She felt him pause fractionally. "You have quite a reputation in these parts already."

  "That's right. They're gonna be writin' about me someday in them little dime novels."

  "I'm sure they will. I wonder what they'll say about you, though, when they learn you hid behind a woman to make your escape?"

  "I ain't hidin' behind you," he argued. "I'm takin' you with me. Like a... a hostage." He laughed then, as if he'd made a joke. She stumbled over the carpet when he dragged her toward the kitchen at the back of the house.

  Heat, from the huge cooking fireplace on the other side of the cocina, hit them like a wall. The contents of a large kettle simmered fragrantly over the unattended fire. Several cloth-covered tables full of prepared foods and desserts crowded the kitchen in readiness for wedding feast.

  "You don't need me," she pleaded, in the calmest voice she could muster. "No one will see you go. Everyone's out front—"

  "You don't get it, do you?" Bodine's grin was icy. "Takin' you is the perfect revenge. I'll have me his money and his woman."

  "You're wrong, Trammel. I'm not his woman. I know he betrayed me. That's what Chase came to tell me. He found out you were working for Jonas all along—"

  Bodine's arm tightened around her neck. "How?"

  "C-Clay Allison told him."

  "That son of a—"

  He edged over to the small wood-barred window and looked out. Cal Stembridge was about thirty feet from the door, watching the fight from a distance. Bodine let out a foul curse.

  "Don't you see?" she pressed. "If you take me... it will... be for nothing."

  "Shut up!"

  "You'll ruin him when you take his money. Just take it and go."

  "Shut up, I said! I need to—"

  The back door swung open suddenly. Maria, Jonas' young Mexican cook, froze in the opening when she saw them and went slack-jawed with surprise. Her huge brown eyes widened with fear. "Madre de Dìos—"

  "Maria! Look out!" Libby cried in warning.

  Trammel instinctively swung his gun in her direction and fired. But the bullet merely furrowed into the wooden door Maria had slammed shut at the last second as she'd ducked out of the way. "Damn it!" Bodine bellowed, momentarily loosening his hold on Libby.

  Seizing the moment, she sent her elbow crashing into his side. With a groan, he doubled over, releasing her and dropping the bag full of money. "Bitch," Bodine moaned, gasping for air.

  Libby twisted free of his grip, but only got two feet from him before she felt his hands on her gown. She heard a scream and realized it had come from her. The delicate batiste shredded in his grasp. Her strength was far outmatched by his. He hauled her toward him. She fought him with her fists until he captured one in his steely hand.

  Though she saw it coming, she was helpless to stop it. Lights exploded in her head as the side of his pistol slammed viciously into her temple. The blow sent her flying backward against a table of food, knocking it and its contents to the floor against the door. She crumpled into the debris.

  With horrifying awareness, she watched the unlit coal-oil lamp that had sat on the table with the food shatter on the hard tile floor. Its liquid fuel splashed about and bled in a swift, resolute runnel toward the blaze in the fireplace.

  Gunshots roused her from her stupor. She blinked up at Bodine. He was pressed up against the thick adobe wall to avoid the bullets whizzing through the small barred window. Maria must have told someone.

  Desperately, Libby fought the blackness that threatened to engulf her. The ringing pain in her head blurred her vision. The room seemed to be spinning slowly and something warm and wet trickled past her ear. With dull, awkward movements, she rolled to her hands and knees just as the stream of coal oil met a tongue of flame. A sheet of fire roared to unholy life, racing toward her, engulfing the table cloth and lapping at the edges of the upturned pine table beside her.

  A scream caught in Libby's throat and she fell backward, scuttling along on her bottom to get away from the heat of the blaze. The door was barricaded by debris that was afire. Her only hope of escape was to go back the way they'd come.

  "Holy hell!" Bodine yelped, ducking underneath the window. He shielded his face from the intense heat with one hand. "Get back here, you little she-wolf," he yelled, reaching for her ankle. "You ain't goin' nowhere—" For a moment, he had her and she kicked at him with the heel of a white kid boot.

  "Let... me... go!" she screamed. "We're both going to die in here, can't you see that?"

  "Oh, no we ain't. Not when I got all this money to—" Too late, he saw the sack catch fire. He let out a foul curse and made a grab for it anyway, stomping on the flames with his booted foot.

  Libby edged away, choking on the thick black smoke pouring from the fire. Flames licked the ceiling, where pine rafters supported thinner wood planks. They raced hungrily along the dry wood, devouring everything in their path.

  Fighting dizziness and the mind-numbing pain in her head, Libby got to her feet and scrambled into the dining room. Just let me make it to the door, she prayed. But smoke was already pouring into that room too, eating up the light and making it nearly impossible to see. Her eyes smarted and teared and her lungs burned with each breath.

  In the smoky light, she collided with a table and fell to the floor. Fire clawed at the doorway to the dining room now and it was racing up the crisp, calico cloth that hung on the walls. Libby gathered up the hem of her gown and pressed it against her mouth. She crawled a few more feet before she realized she'd lost all sense of direction in the fall. Her vision blurred and the blackness seemed to spiral around her.

  Pulling her knees to her chest, she curled up into a ball and turned her face to th
e floor in a vain search for air. A thousand regrets flashed through her mind in those last seconds of consciousness: she wished she'd kissed Tad goodbye and given him his father's locket, she wished she'd told Chase how much she loved him, she wished...

  The darkness closed over her like a raven's wing, obliterating the dreams she would never fulfill, spinning her into its cocoon of oblivion.

  * * *

  Chase's fist dented Harper at the waist, doubling the rancher over in pain. Both men were bloody and spent, heaving like draft horses yet staggering at each other again. Lips bleeding, knuckles split, neither was willing to concede to the other.

  "I should kill you." Chase spat out a mouthful of blood.

  Harper staggered, unwilling to give in. "Go to hell, Whitlaw." He swung ineffectually at Chase, missing him completely and no longer caring, before stumbling forward and landing on hands and knees just beyond Chase.

  Chase dropped to his knees beside him and shoved him over onto his back. In his fists, he gathered Harper's bloodied shirt and pulled him up against the tree trunk behind him. "Tell them," he snarled. "Tell them how you tried to have me killed and maybe I won't kill you myself."

  "Jonas! For God's sake, tell him," Nora cried, unable to hold it in any longer. "Can't you stop this?" she pleaded with the marshal. "He's going to kill him."

  Elliot came up beside her, taking her arm. "That's enough, Chase. You've proved your point."

  "Like hell I have."

  Marshal Pratt laid a hand on Chase's shoulder. "Bradford's right, both of you. Nothing's going to be resolved this way. What do you know about this, Miss Nora?"

  Her anguished gaze went from her brother to Chase and back to Pratt. Regretfully, she shook her head. "Nothing. I—nothing." But clearly there was something. Something it would rip her heart out to say.

  Jonas scowled at her. "Leave her out of this. She's done nothing wrong."

  Pratt took her elbow. "He may be your brother, but with attempted murder on the table, it's your duty to—"

  Elliot stepped between them. "Back off, marshall."

  Chase spit at Harper's feet. "You gonna make your sister do this, Harper? Where's your backbone, man? If you have any decency left in you Harper, tell the truth."

  Harper swiped at the blood on his mouth and tipped his head back against the tree, exhausted. "It wasn't what you thought, Nora. I swear. I know you saw Bodine at the house that night Chase was shot." He looked at Chase. "But I didn't have anything to do with trying to kill you... I swear. I never wanted that. Bodine hated you... for his own reasons. I just wanted you off the ranch... away from my Elizabeth." His face was a study in guilt as he looked at Chase.

  "You expect me to believe that?"

  The crowd around them muttered ominously.

  "I don't care what you believe," Harper answered, still breathing hard and fingering his bruised ribs. "I'm telling you the truth. Bodine wasn't the man I thought he was when I hired him. He was completely without scruples. Yes, I told him to make trouble for Elizabeth, to push her toward marrying me. But I only wanted what was best for her. She was too stubborn to see she couldn't make it on her own. She would have killed herself trying to make it work and I... I wanted her." Harper's eyes reddened and his face contorted with emotion. "Damn it, was that so wrong? To want to give her a good life when she had... nothing?"

  Chase released him with an angry shove and Harper lowered his swollen eyes. "Yes, damn it," Chase bellowed. "It wasn't your choice to make."

  "I never meant to hurt anyone. Bodine went way beyond what I'd hired him for out of pure... maliciousness. He blackmailed me when I tried to get rid of him. That was the night Nora saw him. God help me, I didn't mean for any of this to happen."

  It took a moment for those gathered about them to assimilate the sound they heard next, but when it came again, they had no doubts about it. It was gunfire.

  John Pratt drew his pistol from his holster and took two steps toward the back of the house. "What in Hades is going on?"

  Chase's frantic gaze took in the crowd. Something inside him turned to ice when he couldn't find the one face he sought. "Where's Libby?"

  Early looked around, too. "She was right here when the fight started."

  Chase turned back to the house just as Maria came tearing around the corner of it, shouting in rapid-fire Spanish. Tears streaked her face.

  "Fuego! Fuego!" she cried. "Ay, Dìos! La Señora Honeycutt esta en la cocina con el gringo!"

  The color drained from John Pratt's face as he translated the one word every Anglo learned and dreaded hearing. "Fire."

  Harper staggered to his feet. "No... no-o-o!"

  Alarm tore through the crowd as smoke billowed from the adobe. "Get buckets from the barn!" Pratt ordered. "Form a brigade, starting at the troughs. Hurry!"

  With Nora showing the way, the men scattered to find buckets and the women ran to form a line at the back of the house.

  Chase grabbed Maria, who was still crying hysterically and shook her by the shoulders. "Speak English!" he shouted. "Where's Mrs. Honeycutt? Where is she?"

  "In the house! El hombre... the man, he has... a...una pistola—a gun!"

  "What man?"

  "I don't know him," she sobbed. "He shot at me. He is holding la señora with the gun!"

  "Bloody hell!" Chase exclaimed. "It's got to be Bodine! He's got her."

  "No, it can't be," Harper murmured in shock. "The damn fool, wouldn't come back here."

  Chase didn't waste time arguing. Dear God! Libby was in there! He tore off at a run toward the nearest water trough, stripped off his gunbelt and quickly submerged himself in the water.

  El, who had followed him, grabbed a wool lap blanket off a nearby carriage and plunged it into the water, then wrapped it around himself.

  "What do you think you're doing?" Chase demanded, picking up his pistol.

  "I'm coming with you!"

  Already on the run, Chase waved him off. "Stay here!"

  "But you might need help."

  "Libby may need a doctor," Chase shouted to him. "I don't want to worry about getting two people out."

  "Take this, then," El answered, tossing the sodden blanket at Chase. "It may buy you a little more time."

  Chase wrapped the blanket around his head and shoulders as he ran. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Harper lurching toward the hacienda, rifle in hand, a look of stunned disbelief on his face. In a matter of minutes, Harper's whole world had collapsed: he'd lost his fiancée and his reputation, and now his house was going up in smoke. Chase didn't spare the man a moment of pity, but he could see Harper was planning on going in without taking any precautions.

  "Harper! Get back!" Chase hollered in warning. The man ignored him. "You won't last two minutes inside."

  "I'll kill him!" Harper ranted.

  "You'll get yourself killed."

  "He's got Elizabeth."

  "Harper, wait!"

  The warning proved futile, for at that moment the front door crashed open and Trammel Bodine staggered out under the portico, holding his smoke-blackened neckerchief to his mouth with one hand, firing his pistol with the other. Chase dove for the ground, but Harper made a convenient target as he headed directly toward the door. Incredibly, the bullets that tore into his body didn't stop him.

  Harper raised the rifle and fired into the smoky cloud surrounding Bodine, who ran for the cover of the trees at the far end of the yard. The first shot merely ripped Bodine's hat from his head, the second hit him in the leg, knocking him off his feet. He coughed and rolled to his knees dragging the pistol back up to point it at Harper.

  Chase took aim and fired before Bodine could squeeze off his last shot. A splotch of red blossomed on Bodine's chest and his eyes opened wide with surprise. As his pistol slipped from his hand, his pain-glazed eyes turned on Chase; then he collapsed face-first into the dirt atop his singed bag of stolen money.

  "Jonas! Dear God, no!" Nora screamed and ran toward her brother. Elliot followed clos
ely behind her, dropping to his knees beside the fallen man.

  Chase was on his feet already and running toward the house. He yanked the blanket over his head, gulped in three deep breaths of fresh air and ducked into the doorway. His pulse thudded like a wild bird beating against the wall of his chest.The recurrent nightmare flickered through his thoughts and he was seized by a sudden, unreasonable panic. Shoving it ruthlessly down, he staggered into the room. He couldn't lose her now. Not now.

  His eyes watered immediately. The smoke was thick and it smelled of burning wood and wool and singed leather upholstery. He wrapped the blanket over his nose and mouth and tried to see past his own hand.

  "Libby!" he called.

  No reply. Only the whooshing sound of igniting wood as the ceiling caught. Fear clawed at him. She'd been in there much longer than he and already he could scarcely breathe. A racking cough assailed him. "Libby! Damn it... where are you?"

  He ducked low and discovered the smoke was thinner near the floor. He sucked air through the wet wool blanket, but every breath tortured his lungs. With one hand out in front of him, he swept the floor searching for her. He ran into tables and chairs. Nothing else.

  "Dear God"—it was a desperate, raspy prayer—"help me."

  He was just about to turn in another direction when his hand connected with her hair. "Libby!" He reached out to find her curled, like a limp rag doll, on the floor. Oh, no, no, no! Don't be dead. Don't be dead, Libby.

  She moaned as he scooped her into his arms. Hope surged through him. He faltered on the way to his feet. What was left of his strength was fading. He had to get out, but which way should he go? He took another hacking breath and tried to see the door.

  "Chase!"

  It was El's voice he heard. He followed the sound like a beacon, stumbling toward the door. "Keep talking," he shouted in a raspy voice which dissolved into a fit of coughing. "I can't... see... the... door."

  "This way! Come this way," El shouted. "That's it. You're almost here."

  El appeared, ghostlike, at the doorway, beckoning Chase toward him. Before Chase was even clear of the doorframe, he felt strong hands pulling him out. From behind him came the sound of splintering wood as part of the ceiling crumbled in the conflagration. Chase nearly collapsed before staggering out the door. El relieved him of Libby and John Pratt caught his other arm, dragging him across the yard, away from the thick, billowing smoke.