Lori nodded. “She deserves some pampering.”
He smiled. “I think you do, too.”
“No,” she said, and Daniel heard pain in her voice. “I don’t deserve anything.” She turned Clementine’s head toward Pueblo. “I am so glad to see you, Daniel, you and Andy.”
Daniel only wished she didn’t sound so terribly sad as he watched her start back down the road, her slender back drooping slightly, so unlike the explosively joyful Lori he knew.
Whitey Stark was growing impatient. So was Curt’s brother, Ford. Curt should have turned up by now. So should have Davis and his prisoner. Whitey knew Morgan Davis, knew he didn’t waste time. He didn’t like the idea he might have been outfoxed, that the telegram could have been a hoax of some kind. Someone in Laramie said the Ranger seemed sweet on the girl, though Whitey couldn’t imagine Morgan Davis being sweet on anyone. He had, though, apparently put the girl up in the fancy Georgetown hotel.
Maybe the Ranger had gone so soft, he’d decided to let Braden go. Maybe in exchange for certain services. If what he was told about the girl was right, he could understand. Almost. Whitey never let women get in the way of money. They were too easily bought—the kinds he liked, anyway. Those who were easy and enthusiastic. He wondered what kind of woman might attract Davis. He might have to find out for himself. If he couldn’t get Nicholas Braden, he could take Morgan Davis. They looked enough alike, for sure. Whitey liked the idea. Exchanging a dead Ranger for five thousand dollars in cash. It appealed to his sense of humor. Nick Braden might even be grateful and throw in some more cash.
Whitey was lounging outside one of the saloons when he saw the woman riding a palomino mare. Alone. His eyes slid over her. How many young women rode palomino mares? Especially young women who rode astride in a split skirt, and whose hair was somewhere between gold and light brown?
Lorilee Braden!
His gaze followed her as she rode down to the town livery and disappeared inside with her horse. He went into the saloon and fetched Ford with a gesture of his head, knowing he would follow him back out. Ford was afraid of him—Curt wasn’t, but his little brother was.
“The girl’s in the livery,” Whitey said. “Let’s get her.”
“Why do we want her?” Ford complained.
“Hell, she could lead us to them … or we might be able to make a little trade. She’ll be useful, one way or another.”
“You think they’re around here, then?”
Whitey nodded.
“What about Curt?”
“Maybe he’s trailing them. Maybe he was killed by a bear or some damn thing. How should I know?” Whitey said impatiently.
Ford stopped. “You think that Ranger got him?”
“How should I know?” Whitey repeated as they reached the livery. He stopped just outside the door. The girl was inside talking to the livery owner. He heard some of the words: “… oats … the best, and rub her down. As soon as possible. I might need her again today or … do you have a horse I can borrow for a short time? You’ll have Clementine.”
Whitey didn’t hear the answer. He looked down the street. A few people were hurrying along it. A couple of kids were playing with hoops. He looked back into the livery. The owner’s back was to him. He put his hand on his pistol and whispered to Ford, “You take the man from the back. Use the butt of your pistol. I’ll grab the girl.”
The girl’s attention was centered on the horse, her hand running along its neck as Whitey and Ford approached. The livery man was just turning around at the sound of their spurs when Ford’s pistol hit the back of his head. The girl looked up, her mouth opening in a scream when Whitey clamped his hand over it, and his hand hit the back of her head. He caught her as she started to slump to the floor.
“Get our horses,” he ordered Ford, lowering the girl to the floor. As Ford did so, Whitey got his saddle and bridle. In minutes the two horses were saddled.
Whitey tied the girl’s hands, then mounted and told Ford to hand her up to him. He placed her in front of him on the saddle. Ford went first, checking out the street. He nodded to Whitey, and they trotted out of the livery stable and away from town.
Jonathon nursed his beer. He liked drinking, sometimes to the point of excess, but he also knew when to control it. And that time was now. He had been sipping on the same beer for an hour. If he heard nothing soon, he would ride back to where Andy and Daniel were guarding the road. He was also keeping an eye on the two men who had been showing Nick’s wanted poster all over town.
He saw them leave, and he wandered out on the porch, lighting a cigarette. When they went into the livery stable, he shrugged. Perhaps they were giving up. He went back into the saloon, wishing he were a younger man. Age was finally catching up with him. He was sixty now, really a few years over sixty, but he’d stopped counting. Nick had been right about settling down, but he’d refused to listen, and now his son was paying for that bit of self-indulgence on his father’s part. He would pay the bill and ride out to where Daniel was watching. Nothing was happening in town, no strangers other than the bounty hunters. He hoped that Lori had been right about Pueblo. He hoped she was all right, but he knew that Nick would make sure she was. They had always been close, those two. He and Fleur had loved their children, but he was the first to admit they hadn’t been the best of parents. He’d always been a dreamer more than a practical man, and Fleur sometimes had spells. She’d be often completely divorced from reality, talking about places and times none of them knew.
Jonathon loved Fleur, had from the first moment he’d seen her so desperately clutching that baby when she was near death herself. But whatever happened during the preceding days had affected her. She remembered little about that time and grew distant when he or Daniel questioned her. She would, instead, start singing a lullaby, her eyes looking beyond them into another world. They had learned not to ask, or to mention the past, and Jonathon had accepted Nick as his own.
He reached the stable where his horse was kept and went inside. He almost immediately saw the man stretched out on the wood floor near a palomino horse. Clementine! His heart pounded, thudded against his chest with abnormal rhythm. He leaned against a wall, then stooped down and shook the man on the floor. There was no effect. He found a pail and filled it with water from a pump, then splashed it on the fallen man.
Eyes fluttered open, stared at him. “What happened?” Jonathon whispered harshly.
The man’s eyes were bewildered, trying to make some sense. His hand went to his head, and he groaned with pain.
“What happened?” Jonathon insisted.
“I don’t … know. I was talking to a young lady, and then … I don’t remember anything.” He tried to sit, then moaned again.
“A pretty girl. Blond hair, amber eyes?”
The man nodded. “Fetch the … doc.”
Jonathon nodded. He went out the door and hollered at someone in the street to fetch the doctor and sheriff. Then he went back in and saddled one of the two riding horses the Bradens owned. Andy had the other.
Without another word to the livery man, Jonathon raced the horse out of town toward Andy and Daniel.
They made a ridiculous party, Morgan knew, with that infernal pig trailing along behind. Not for the first time he wished there was some way of making pork chops out of it without breaking a child’s heart.
But there wasn’t, any more than there had been a way of reasoning with Lori or Nick Braden.
He couldn’t stop thinking of her, couldn’t keep his mind from remembering those tears. Or Beth’s words. She really does love you.
Morgan didn’t know much about love. He’d never had any. He supposed he’d loved Callum, but they’d never exchanged any kind of affection. He questioned whether he expected too much because he’d had so little experience with it. But surely it included some measure of trust.
He wondered, as he had during this whole day, what in the hell she was up to. She’d tried to enlist the aid of a sheriff in Laramie.
Might she have done that again? Could he expect a hostile lawman? She didn’t have any money, nor a gun, though that hadn’t proved an impediment before. He still didn’t know where she got the gun that she ambushed him with. She hadn’t said, and he hadn’t asked, knowing she wouldn’t answer. It had been one more battle he had avoided, since he was only too well aware that his prospects of winning were slim.
So he had kept his eyes open, forced himself to stay alert, though he was exhausted from lack of sleep and tension. He’d found himself casting frequent glances at Nick, each time looking for more and more familiarities. He’d tried to talk to Nick, but received only blank, wary stares for his trouble. Morgan looked behind him. Mrs. Andrews was struggling valiantly, but she was obviously tired and straggling behind. He stopped, waiting for her to catch up. The pig with the ridiculous name was trailing right behind, evidently knowing where its bread was buttered or its bacon saved. Morgan wondered for a moment whether the pig wasn’t a hell of a lot smarter than he was. Nick was abreast of him now, his hands rising to brush hair that had fallen over his forehead.
“Are you all right, Mrs. Andrews?” Morgan asked.
She smiled wanly, readjusting a fussing Maggie. “I think Maggie’s getting restless.”
“Can I take her?” Morgan had hesitated before saying the words, afraid Maggie would decline.
Beth Andrews whispered to Maggie, who looked at him suspiciously.
“I don’t bite, Maggie,” he said awkwardly, inwardly flinching at the reluctance in the girl’s face. “I promise,” he added with a small, wry smile.
The girl looked at Nick longingly.
“Go with him, Button,” Nick said. “You wouldn’t be comfortable without a saddle.”
Beth Andrews whispered something else, and finally Maggie nodded. Morgan wished he knew what the bribe was, or then again, maybe he didn’t.
He reached out and took Maggie, setting her gently in the saddle in front of him, one of his arms going around her to anchor her. She turned around and looked up at him, wide blue eyes that seemed to search his soul. Such innocent eyes. Even trusting eyes now as if he’d passed some kind of test. He smiled back, and he felt as if he had finally broken some kind of lock that had always kept part of him isolated and alone. It had started to break loose with Lori, and then with his complicated feelings toward Nick Braden, and now …
He was feeling. Pleasure at being touched, at the prospect of being loved. Pain in the uncertainty. But caring all the same. That fierce caring which made him understand why Lori did what she did, that enabled him to accept, even envy, that loyalty between Lori and Nick, the self-sacrificing that was so new to him. It was still uncomfortable, like a pair of new boots, this feeling. He suspected, though, that when he’d adjusted to it, it might become well worth the pain.
He felt a lump forming in his throat as Maggie leaned against him, as he looked toward the man he thought might well be a brother. When exactly had he cut himself off from feeling, from personal contact with other human beings? During the war? When Callum had died? Or had Callum instilled that within him when he was a boy? Your father would be alive if he hadn’t married. Rangers can’t afford families. Your father was the best there was until he met …
Morgan had been trained to be the best there was. Like Callum. And Morgan suddenly knew he didn’t want to end like Callum. A hard man mourned only by other hard men. He wanted some softness in his life.
He wanted Lori. He wanted children. He wanted a family he’d never had. He wanted them all desperately now—but these were all frightening desires to him. He didn’t know whether he could be good at any of that. He’d been good at only two things in his life: hunting and killing.
His arm tightened around Maggie instinctively as he heard a gunshot. Dust on the road just feet ahead spurted up, and he started to move his hand toward his gun, realizing suddenly that if he did, Maggie would fall or might be in the line of fire. He heard Beth scream, Nick curse as his eyes scanned the sides of the road. One man stepped out, a tall, lanky youth with hair the color of honey, his rifle pointed directly at Nick. On the other side Morgan saw another rifle.
And Morgan was helpless. Anything he did would endanger the child and Beth. If he took a chance and spurred his horse, a wild shot might well kill Maggie. He checked his horse, and slowly raised his left hand.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“Andy!” Nick greeted his brother as his knees moved his horse abreast of Morgan Davis’s mount. He looked around. Daniel Webster was standing now, a rifle in his hands.
Davis had stopped, raising his free hand, his other one balancing Maggie.
Nick grimaced. He didn’t want it like this. He saw the fear in Beth’s face, terror in Maggie’s, resignation in Davis’s—understanding, even, as he looked at Andy, then at Nick.
“It’s all right,” Nick told Beth. “My brother and a friend.” He turned to Morgan, holding up his hands. “Hand Maggie to her mother and give me the key to these. Then you can unbuckle that gunbelt real slow. I may not have been able to pull the trigger, but I wouldn’t guarantee the same from my friends.”
The Ranger handed the child to Beth and took the key to the handcuffs from his pocket, handing it to Nick, watching as Nick unlocked them, then rubbed his wrists for a moment God, it felt good to be free of them. He wanted to throw them away, but he had use for them now. It was time Davis learned some of the humiliation of being chained like an animal.
“The gunbelt,” Nick urged.
“Don’t do this, Nick,” Davis said. “Don’t keep running.” There was an urgency in his face Nick hadn’t seen before, but, then, the Ranger had been acting strangely all day, casting searching looks toward him. It was almost as if he had been holding a secret to himself. But there were no secrets between them. None Nick could figure.
“Easy for you to say, Ranger,” he said, making the last word almost a curse. “Now hand me that gunbelt before my impatient brother does something we might both regret.”
Morgan Davis looked toward Andy. Nick saw him taking measure, probably seeing the obvious resemblance to Lori in the blond hair, the golden eyes, the tall, slender grace. Andy tightened his finger around the trigger.
Davis unbuckled the gunbelt and handed it to Nick. Nick, in trade, handed him the handcuffs. “Lock them on,” he said. “I think it’s past time you knew exactly how they feel.”
“What are you going to do?” The question was calm, the tone merely curious. Nick had struggled against his growing respect for Davis, but he had to admit to himself now that he was impressed with the man’s integrity. He knew the only reason Morgan Davis had surrendered was because of Maggie and Beth.
“Merely make sure you can’t follow me for a couple of days. Unless you make more drastic steps necessary. Now lock them, before Andy’s finger starts itching any more.”
“Lori?”
The question was aimed at Nick, who looked toward Andy for an answer.
“She went into town to get Papa.”
Nick smiled. “They’re all here?”
Andy nodded. “Ma’s about a mile away with the wagon.”
Nick turned back to Davis. “Satisfied?”
The Ranger didn’t say anything, but his eyes seemed to bore right into Nick.
“We’d better get off this road,” Andy warned.
Nick nodded. “The handcuffs,” he reminded his former captor. “I’d hate to patch up another bullet hole in you.”
Davis smiled ironically, then closed the bracelets on his wrists.
Nick dismounted and took the reins of Morgan’s horse. “I think we’ll do a little swapping here,” he said. When the two men had changed mounts, Nick was on his own horse, Dickens. He rose in the stirrups, stretching, savoring the feel of leather underneath him again. Pure luxury. His horse. His hands free. He turned his attention back to Beth.
“Andy, this is Beth Andrews and her daughter, Maggie. Take them to Ma. I’ll be there later to say good-bye. Daniel and I will tak
e care of Mr. Davis.”
Andy protested. “Why can’t I …?”
“Because I would feel better if I knew you were taking care of them,” he said. He grinned. “And I want to see how you herd pigs.”
For the first time Andy’s attention went to Caroline, who had finally waddled up to the rest of them. “Awww, Nick, you don’t mean that … pig goes with us?”
“Caroline?” Nick said innocently, but a smile lit his eyes. “But of course. She’s Maggie’s best friend, isn’t she, Button?” he said, his voice softening as he leaned over and smoothed back a curl from the child’s face. Maggie giggled, and Andy looked from one to the other, astonished.
Nick chuckled. “If my dour companion here tolerated Caroline, I suppose you can, too,” he said. The smile disappeared. “And Andy … thank you.”
A smile of pure pleasure shone across his brother’s face. He nodded. “How long should I tell Ma?”
“No more than an hour. We’ll just find a nice quiet place for my friend to get some much-needed rest.” His voice was ironic.
Andy cradled his rifle in his arms and disappeared over the rise, returning in minutes mounted on a chestnut horse. He grinned at Beth and Maggie, the charming devil-may-care smile that had won him women’s hearts all over Colorado—the same smile that had started all this trouble.
He bowed to them. “My pleasure, ladies.”
Beth looked toward Nick, her face worried. He rode over to her, leaned over, and kissed her lightly. “I’ll see you soon.”
Beth hesitated. “Are you … sure about this?”
He gave her a slow, lazy grin and nodded. He wished he were sure, but he was committed now. Andy and the family had risked everything to free him. And the Ranger would be all right. For now.
But Nick knew Morgan Davis would come after him again. And again. Unless Nick killed him.
Nick reached down and took the rifles from Daniel, putting one in the scabbard and throwing the second the few feet to Andy. He watched Andy ride off with Beth, Maggie, the pack horses, and Caroline before giving Daniel a hand up to sit behind him. Then Nick turned away from the road, toward the hills and trees.
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