An Outlaw to Protect Her

by Harper St. George

  Accepting that it was too late to stop the fire, she rushed back around the block to Victoria House. They needed to get water ready so that the fire wouldn’t spread across the courtyard. Some of the women had already run for help, but the rest were huddled in a group. She caught sight of Able organizing the servants who stood huddled at the far end of the street. Checking that the women were fine, she hurried past them to talk to Able.

  “Able, we need to get a line formed so it doesn’t spread.”

  He shook his head and pointed. “There are already flames from the first floor toward the back.”

  She saw that he was right. One of the windows in back had been broken out and flames could be seen within the room. What was happening? It was like the world had turned in just a few hours.

  “Have you seen Zane?” She realized he wasn’t standing with everyone else.

  “I thought he was with you. Is he still inside?” Able asked.

  “Yes!” she called over her shoulder, already running inside to find him. The sound of thunder shook the night. She drew up short, because it couldn’t be thunder. There was no rain and somehow it had come from inside the house.

  An explosion rent the air. Before she realized what had happened, someone pulled her back, and right before her eyes, half of the house went up in a roar of flames.

  “Dynamite!” someone yelled, and everyone screamed and started running.

  All she could think about was Zane trapped inside. She fought the hands that held her, trying to get free so that she could go find him. Half the house was unaffected and she hoped that’s where he was, but the hands wouldn’t let her go.

  “No, Glory! There could be another explosion!” Able yelled.

  She didn’t care. She had to make sure that he was safe. The entire time she fought them she kept her eyes on the front door, willing him to come out. All of a sudden the hands let her go and she ran as fast as she could toward the house. She had to see if Zane had survived. Dear God, he could be dead now!

  “Dammit, I’ll go. You stay here!” Able’s voice was harsh in her ear as he pulled her away again. Letting her go, he rushed around her and disappeared inside.

  There was no way she was standing here by herself while the two people she loved were inside. She’d pull them both out with her own two hands if she had to. Faintly, she was aware of a horse nearby. Its frantic whinny entered the haze of her consciousness, but she didn’t dare look away from the house in case she caught sight of Zane through one of the windows.

  Someone stopped her again. A strong arm went around her waist, but instead of simply holding her back, it lifted her and her feet came off the ground. Something heavy and dark went over her head, blocking out the light. She screamed, but even she could tell it was muffled in the cacophony of sound around them. She felt herself falling and then landing on something hard. The floor of a carriage she figured out as the door slammed behind her and a male voice yelled, “Go!”

  The horses whinnied again and took off at a run. She could feel the momentum as they rushed through the streets. Someone grabbed her roughly and, although she fought as best she could, they tied her wrists behind her back and tossed her onto the bench seat. She landed on her hands and pain shot through her arms as she tugged at the bindings. What she suspected to be a burlap sack was still over her head, threatening to suffocate her. When she opened her mouth to scream it seemed to cling to her lips, making it difficult to take in air.

  “Good evening, Anabelle.”

  It had been over a decade since she’d last heard that voice, but she recognized it immediately. Her blood chilled in her veins. A sense of weightlessness settled over her, as if she was in a dream and none of this could be real.

  “Cat got your tongue, darling?”

  “Justin.” The hated word crossed her lips in a whisper, but loud enough to carry through the burlap and make him laugh. She knew that laugh. She hated every condescending note of it. Reality came crashing into her, settling over her with a heaviness that moved through her limbs, making her feel as if she were moving through a thick fog.

  “That’s better.”

  “What do you want?” Justin had set that fire to lure her out. He could’ve killed them all. Maybe he had killed Zane. Sorrow and anger opened a hollow within her. If he was dead she knew that she’d never be whole again.

  He laughed again. “Why, you, of course. You’re my wife. I want you home.”

  Wife. That word tore through her, savaging the edges of a wound that had never healed. She had never been his wife. Yes, her parents had given her to him in exchange for him paying off her father’s debts. Yes, there had been a signing of papers and words spoken before an officiant. But there had never been a marriage. Glory—Anabelle—had never spoken a word to bind herself to him. She’d never pledged one vow to the loathsome man everyone had called her husband. It hadn’t mattered to them that she hadn’t participated in the wedding.

  But it mattered to her. Justin had never been her husband as far as she was concerned.

  “I’ll never go with you anywhere.”

  He laughed again. Dear God, how could he be so nonchalant about it all? He sounded as if they were in a parlor having tea while discussing the latest gossip out of Charleston. Cold fear moved through her veins. If she left town with him, she knew that she’d be dead soon. He’d kill her.

  The creak of the leather told her that he was leaning forward, and then she could sense him over her. Her heart pounded as she tried to figure out what to say to him that would make him release her. Suddenly, the burlap sack was removed and she could make out his form across from her in the meager light from the streetlamps that seeped in around the edges of the curtains. He’d aged quite a bit in the decade she’d been gone. He was over fifty now and he looked it. His hair was streaked with more gray than brown, and the lines on his face had deepened. He was still handsome, though now it was as if his true nature had been revealed. Not only was his mouth twisted with a permanently cruel smile, but his whole face seemed to carry the look stamped on his features.

  She opened her mouth to scream, hoping that someone would hear her, but as soon as she did he drew back his arm and slapped her with the back of his hand. Her ears rang from the impact.

  “Let’s not stoop to dramatics, shall we, darling? I’ve amused myself the past week imagining you scurrying about trying to find me, but I’m done now. It’s time to go home.”

  Heavy curtains blocked her view of the street, so she couldn’t see where he was taking her. She struggled against her bindings and kicked out at him with her feet. “I won’t go anywhere with you.” She was gratified when one of her kicks hit him in the chest, but it only infuriated him.

  He drew back again and she screamed and lunged for the door. She’d open it with her teeth if she had to even as they were driving fast down the road. He yanked her by the hair and pulled her back, shoving something between her lips. He tied the strip of fabric behind her head and then pushed her away.

  “You’re feistier than you used to be,” he said, retaking his seat on the opposite side of the carriage. “I can break you again. I did it once.” He leaned forward and touched the cheek he’d hit. “I must say, you’re more beautiful than I thought you’d be. At fourteen you were like a precious little doll. Now you’re a woman. A whore, but all woman.” He tightened his grip in her hair, sending pain shooting through her skull. “I never thought I’d find you in a whorehouse.” He laughed. “Not only in a whorehouse but running the damn thing. How do you think I can bring you home now? Word will get out about what you are.”

  She shook her head to dislodge his hand and tried her best to speak through the gag. “Leave me alone. Leave me here.”

  “What’s that?” He made a show of leaning forward even more. “You want me to leave you?” He gave his head a sad shake. “I wish I could, darling. Believe me, I stopped looking fo
r you long ago, but I hope to be the next lieutenant governor of South Carolina. Politics have a way of bringing the past to light.” He sat back, grinning at her. “Now you probably don’t know this, but there was gossip when you left. Some people said that I’d killed you in the middle of the night and buried you in the swamp. Some people said that you’d run off with Hiram, since he’d disappeared at the same time. As you can imagine, both of those are a detriment to my chances in the election.”

  She didn’t know what he was up to. He couldn’t honestly think that she’d go home with him and play the dutiful wife. Could he? There was no way he would trust her to play that role. Something else was happening here.

  The carriage drew to a sharp halt, making her neck jerk and her head bang against the seat behind her. The door swung open and a man she’d never seen before appeared in the opening. He was big like Zane, but mean-looking with a snub nose that was crooked, as if it had been broken and not reset properly. The worst part of him were his eyes. They were cold when he looked at her, as if he didn’t care who she was or what part he was playing in destroying her life.

  “Get her inside, Jenkins,” Justin said and put the burlap sack over her head again.

  She struggled but the man’s hands were unyielding as he tossed her over his shoulder. Before the burlap sack had gone on her head she’d noticed they were at the train station. The early train usually departed well after six in the morning. She had no idea what time it was or how long they had before Justin took her away.

  They walked down the wooden platform that ran next to the cars, but she could feel when Jenkins took the steps down to the dirt along the tracks. His boots crunched on the gravel. That probably meant that he was taking her to a private car. Those were hooked on in the back to make it easier to connect and disconnect them when they reached their destination. Her last hope of escape faded away. No one would even know she was on the train if they didn’t check. The conductor would have no reason to check the private car for tickets. Private cars paid per car for passage, not per passenger.

  Panic spurred her to resist even more, but it didn’t seem to help. Jenkins only tightened his grip, and then they bounded up some steps and a door closed behind them. When the burlap sack came off, she was sitting on a narrow bed facing the window. An orange glow lit up the sky in the distance. She knew it was the fire from her home. Despite herself, tears burned her eyes as she realized she might not get away from Justin before morning.

  She ran for the door that would lead her into the main part of the car, but Justin stood in the way and Jenkins jerked her back before she even reached him. The ominous clink of metal drew her attention and she saw him grab one end of a shackle that was attached to the bed frame.

  “No!” She screamed the word over and over but it was muffled against the gag. The cold metal tightened around her wrist. Jenkins tossed her down onto the bed so roughly that the breath was knocked from her chest. She gasped through the cloth in her mouth, and he was able to tighten another shackle to her ankle. The rope tying her wrists together was cut, but it was too late to do anything about the shackles. She grabbed at them with her free hand, but they were locked tight.

  “We don’t need to tie her down just yet.” Justin intervened and Jenkins stopped short of strapping down her other ankle. He glared at her though, silently daring her to kick him.

  Justin opened a cabinet set into the wall, temporarily blocking him from her view, but when he came around it her blood ran cold. He grinned as he held up a hypodermic needle. A drop of brown fluid oozed from its tip.

  “It’s like this, Anabelle. We see if this can work its magic and make you a biddable wife. If yes, then we’ll have some interesting years together. If not, then one day soon I’ll find your body at the base of the stairs dead of an apparent suicide. You see, I’ve told everyone that you spent the past twelve years in a sanitarium in France. They know you’re touched.” He tapped his temple as he walked over toward her.

  He nodded toward Jenkins, who leaned over her, pressing his weight into her thighs to keep her still. He twisted her free arm so hard that she was certain she’d hear the bone crack in a moment. It didn’t, but she felt the prick of the needle as it broke through her skin and the burn of the drug Justin injected her with. She closed her eyes, desperate for some way to escape. Instead, she only saw Zane as he’d been the moment he’d told her that he loved her.

  She screamed against the injustice of it all. She screamed so hard that her throat felt raw, and the shackle bit into the skin of her wrist. Her body felt heavy, as if her blood had become too leaden to make it all work. Still she screamed.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Zane coughed as he pushed out from under the bar in the dining room. He’d dove behind it the moment he heard the blast that came from the large pantry off the kitchen. Plaster fell from the wall as he pushed a hunk of the wooden bar back into it in his attempt to pull himself out.

  “Pierce!” Able’s deep voice was unmistakable.

  “In here!” Zane kept trying to get himself out and got to his feet as Able came through the open doorway.

  “Come on.” Able led him through the smoke and dust to the front of the house.

  It was like they were in a dream. Zane could feel the coolness of the night air blending with the heat from the fire in the distance and realized that half the house was gone. He coughed again, nearly doubling over, and Able helped him the rest of the way out. When he looked back, he could see that the back of the house was rubble. The front might be salvaged if they could work fast enough. Fire blazed in the back and he figured the boardinghouse was a lost cause.

  It was chaos outside. People scrambled around them running in all directions. A group of women who worked at Victoria House stood in a huddle, watching it all come down. He expected Glory to be there taking care of them, but he didn’t see her anywhere. Able was running off to help when Zane caught up to him. “Where’s Glory?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. She was going in to find you, but I told her to wait here and let me go.”

  They both looked around. Zane’s stomach churned with the knowledge that something very bad had happened. What if the fire had been set to lure them out? What if she’d been taken?

  “Glory!” He screamed her name. Turning in a circle in the middle of the street, he couldn’t see her anywhere. She should be there with her ladies or at the very least with the people who’d formed a bucket line. He searched them all for her face, but she wasn’t there.

  He ran over to the women and asked, “Where’s Glory?”

  They all looked at him with blank faces. He turned back around to see Able doing the same thing, walking down the street and asking every person he saw. Everyone shook their heads. Dubose had her. He knew it with a certainty he felt deep in his bones.

  It was utter chaos. Everyone was so consumed by the fire, and stopping it from spreading to the other buildings, that he had no hope of finding his men in the crowd. Miraculously, they found him. Two of them came out from behind Victoria House, covered in soot and smoke.

  “It was dynamite,” one of them said. “Probably thrown through a window in the back of the house.”

  He nodded. It wasn’t what he was concerned with at the moment. “Where’s Glory?”

  “I kept my station over the general store after the fire broke out,” Raul said. Zane had stationed him on top of the building diagonally across the road from Victoria House. “I saw a carriage stop and take her. They were headed toward the train station.”

  They hadn’t had her long, but he couldn’t shake the thought that Dubose might want her dead more than he wanted her back. It wouldn’t take long to accomplish that task. He caught up to Able, and the four of them made a mad dash across town on foot. The sun was starting to crest the horizon to the east. As they turned the corner that would bring the depot in sight, a black carriage pulled away going
in the opposite direction.

  “Is that the carriage you saw?” Zane asked Raul.

  “Looks like it. The curtains were drawn like that one,” the man answered.

  “Odds are she’s on that train,” Able muttered, his narrowed gaze scanning the platform.

  The station hadn’t yet woken up. The train would leave in about an hour, but with the fire Zane figured everyone was caught up in the excitement. They had no way of knowing if Dubose had men staked out watching for them to attempt to rescue her, but Zane couldn’t stand here while she was possibly being hurt.

  “Stay here,” he said. “Get your guns ready. If someone starts shooting at me, shoot back.” He started to step out of the shadows of the building, but Able grabbed his arm.

  “You’re not going without me,” said Able.

  Zane nodded. “All right. Once I get to the platform, I’ll take cover and you cross.”

  Able nodded his consent and let Zane go. No shots rang out as Zane crossed the road and in a few minutes they were all safely hidden in the shadow of the station. They made their way through the gap between two cars in the same way, one at a time and as quietly as they could until they were on the side facing away from town and the road. If the carriage happened to come back by, they’d be hidden by the train.

  On silent feet they passed by each car. It was unlikely Dubose would take her to one of the public cars, so they focused their attention on the private cars in the back. There were three in all. Each of them identical black lacquer and without markings except for numbers on the side, meaning they were owned by the rail line and leased to elite clients. The men stood at each one, listening for sounds coming from inside before moving on to the next one. It was from the last one that they heard the muffled sounds of men talking.

  Zane brought his finger to his lips and stepped away from the car. It only took a minute to form a plan. There were four of them. Two would get on the roof and come in through a window on each side. One would come through the door that faced town, and the last one would come through the door in the back. He hoped it was a good sign that he didn’t hear her. Maybe it meant she was simply tied up and gagged, not hurt and unconscious...or worse. He couldn’t allow himself to think of that possibility. Every time he closed his eyes he saw her sitting on her bed, tears in her eyes as he’d callously left her.