“Do you think any man in this territory wouldn’t check the brand before he paid for a horse? Do you think anyone in the territory wouldn’t recognize my brand? And do you honestly think there is even a remote possibility that your brother didn’t recognize my brand?” He gave her a minute to consider his questions before adding, “Besides, they had no bill of sale. If a man in this country buys a horse off a stranger, you can bet your . . . hat, he’ll get a bill of sale.”
Rose didn’t respond. She couldn’t argue that the LeMasters brand was well-known, and certainly Frank would have recognized his brand. And she couldn’t argue the fact that most men would think to ask for a written bill of sale. She also knew there had been some bad blood between Morgan and her brother for a long time, but she didn’t know the cause. No one ever talked about it at home.
Morgan stared at her. He didn’t know what else to say. She obviously believed her brother would never do anything as nefarious as steal another man’s property. Was she naïve, or had she chosen to ignore Frank’s evil ways? Morgan told himself not to worry about what she thought. One way or the other, Frank was going to hang. Today, or two weeks from now, it was going to happen.
Frank broke the silence when he yelled out, “Hurry up and give him what he wants so he’ll let us go!”
Rose glanced back in her brother’s direction and frowned. “What do you mean, Frankie?” Before Frank responded, her eyes darted back to Morgan. “What do you want? Money?”
“He wants what every man wants. Just do it and get these ropes off our necks,” Frankie shouted.
That did it. Morgan turned and stalked to Frank in a few long strides. He glanced at his man holding the reins of the horse. “Untie him, Grady.”
Grady leaned over and pulled the rope off of Frank’s wrists and removed the noose from his neck. Frank rubbed his wrists and smirked at Morgan. He missed the murderous look in Morgan’s eyes.
Morgan reached up and hauled Frank off the horse by the front of his shirt and slammed his fist in his jaw.
Frank hit the ground hard, dazing him. A few seconds passed before he moved. “You’re real brave with my legs gone numb from sitting on that horse.”
“Take your time, I’m not going anywhere.” Morgan stood over him, waiting for him to react. Part of him wanted a reason to beat him into oblivion. He might not have a hanging today, but he’d have the satisfaction of giving Frank the good thrashing he so rightly deserved.
Within seconds, Frank jumped to his feet and charged Morgan headfirst. Morgan read his intent and braced himself, barely moving an inch when Frank’s head slammed against his chest. He grabbed Frank by the front of the shirt and quickly landed another punch to his face. This time Frank went down with blood gushing from his broken nose.
Rose rushed to her brother, who was writhing on the ground holding his nose with both hands. She kneeled down beside him and held Morgan’s bandana to his nose to stop the bleeding. “Frankie, are you okay?” When Frank didn’t respond, her eyes snapped up at the man looming over them. “Why did you do that? You just said you would take him back to Whispering Pines! What do you want? And how will you ever face my grandmother after this?”
Of all the ungrateful . . . Morgan stopped himself from saying aloud what he was thinking. He glanced at Murph and saw him shake his head. Didn’t she have enough sense to know that her precious older brother had insulted her? It took every ounce of effort he had left to be civil.
“It might interest you to know that I spoke to your grandmother before I left Colorado to trail your brother. I’ve seen her a heck of a lot more than you have over the last several years. She understood what I had to do.” He didn’t mention that Granny Langtry said something to him before he left that had been nagging at him ever since. She’d told him to make sure he was going after Frankie for the right reasons, and not because he sought vengeance for past deeds. Well, he couldn’t think about that now; he had enough Langtrys to deal with at the moment.
He grabbed Faithful’s reins, but before he mounted he turned back to Rose, who was mollycoddling her brother. “Like I said, I’ll take them back. And I’ll do one better than that, Miss Langtry. Your brother can even ride in the stagecoach with you, since I don’t want his sorry carcass on one of my horses. But don’t get any ideas that he will have an opportunity to take off. We will be right behind you all the way to Whispering Pines.” He turned his hardened gaze on Frank. “And you can ask this miserable excuse of a man what he thinks I want from you.”
Chapter Two
Two hours later, Morgan was still fuming over Frank’s comment. He fought the temptation to pull Frank out of that stagecoach and take his anger out on his face. Once his temper was under control, he pulled his horse beside Murph’s. “You said the passengers weren’t armed?” Before he’d allowed Frank inside the coach, he’d asked his foreman to check the passengers for weapons.
“They weren’t wearing holsters, and there were no rifles inside the coach. One of the men said he had a pistol in his valise, and I put it on top of the coach. That tall fellow looks like he can hold his own if Frank gets out of line. Seems like I’ve seen him before, but I can’t place him.”
Morgan thought it odd neither man in the stagecoach was heeled, but then again, they were from back East. “I didn’t ask George if he found the problem with the wheel.”
“He said he didn’t see anything wrong,” Murph said.
Morgan glanced at the stagecoach in front of them, but saw nothing amiss with the wheel. His thoughts moved to the woman inside the coach. He figured Rose and Frank were having a reunion of sorts. Frank was probably filling her head with more lies. The thought rankled him. Frank had a silver tongue, and more than one person had fallen under his spell, accepting every lying word out of his mouth as gospel. It appeared Rose was one of those who believed his lies. “You think the men understand why I didn’t hang him?”
Murph nodded. “The men don’t blame you. None of us would have hanged Frank with his little sister watching. It was going to be tough enough to face Granny once we hanged him. We couldn’t let Rose witness something like that.”
“Yeah.” It meant a lot to Morgan that his men felt the same way he did. After all the problems Frank and his gang had caused them, they had every right to demand the satisfaction of a hanging.
“Still, I wish you had beaten him within an inch of his miserable life for being so disrespectful to his sister.”
“I considered doing just that,” Morgan said.
Murph grinned at him. “Well, I did hear some of his teeth rattling from that one punch.”
“I think he spit some out.”
Murph chuckled. “His nose will never be the same.” He inclined his head toward the stagecoach and said, “She sure turned out to be a beauty. ’Course, she was a pretty little girl.”
Morgan stared at his foreman. He was surprised Murph remembered her. “You remember her?”
Murph laughed. “Just because I’m almost thirty-six don’t mean I can’t recognize a pretty face when I see one. She’s the youngest of the three girls, and she was the prettiest little gal I ever saw. I remembered those green eyes of hers. I never saw eyes that color. The other two girls have blue eyes and dark hair.”
“How do you remember so much about the girls? They ran every time they saw me.”
“Can you blame them? You’d scare anyone to death with that scowl of yours,” Murph teased. “When you’d send me over to do some work for Granny, the girls would bring me something to drink. The two older girls would talk to me, but Rose would never say a word. She was real skittish. Don’t you remember when we’d sit behind them in church, Rose’s pretty blond hair was always hanging over the back of the pew? She would always turn around and stare at you like she thought you might sprout horns.”
“Yeah, I do remember that.” Most of the time, Morgan wanted to sit behind the Langtrys just to put the fear of God in Frank. Preacher’s sermons didn’t seem to have much of an influence on
him.
“Maybe she’ll talk to me now that she’s older,” Murph said.
Morgan thought he heard more than a passing interest in Rose Langtry. “Whoa, Murph, she’s way too young for you.”
“I figure she’s about nineteen now. I don’t reckon she’s too young. Some men marry women twenty years younger than they are.”
If Murph was right about Rose’s age, Morgan calculated she’d left Colorado when she was fourteen if she’d been gone five years. He would have been twenty-six. That must have been why he’d never paid much attention to the girls. He was working nonstop building his ranch back then, and he didn’t have much free time for anything else. “How old are her sisters?”
“I think all the kids are a couple of years apart. Seems like Granny told me that her daughter-in-law was having a baby every other year. It darn near killed Granny when her son and daughter-in-law died.”
“Yeah, Granny had a tough time.” Morgan thought the death of her son seemed to take the life out of her. It was a long time before she started smiling again, and he suspected raising the grandchildren had a lot to do with bringing her back to life.
“I reckon Rose is coming home to take care of Granny now that she’s getting on in years.”
“Yeah.” Morgan was thinking about Rose’s age. He was surprised he was only twelve years older, but then, he was always older than his chronological age. Sometimes he felt like he was born an old man. It came from the responsibilities he carried on his shoulders. Even though his ranch was considered a success during these hard times, he rarely took time to enjoy what he had built.
Like most of the men who worked for him, Morgan wanted a wife and kids. But unlike his men, he didn’t make much of an effort to find a woman to marry. Of course, there wasn’t a wide selection of available ladies in Whispering Pines. His men made it a point to go to Denver at least once a month in hopes of meeting some eligible females, but he rarely joined them. Even though Denver was only an hour away, his days started before dawn, and by the time it ended he needed sleep more than he needed to spend another hour in the saddle. Most of his nights were spent reading about breeding cattle, and doing paperwork into the wee hours of the morning. Not exactly a life conducive to attracting women.
He recalled Granny telling him, after Preacher Langtry died that she wasn’t ready to meet her Maker until she saw her granddaughters married, and had a few great-grandbabies to enjoy. If all of his men reacted to Rose like his foreman, he figured Granny’s wish would be granted within a year.
* * *
“Frankie, why does Mr. LeMasters think you stole his cattle and horses?” Rose asked once they were on their way to Whispering Pines.
Leaning back on the seat, Frank lifted the bandana from his nose. Seeing he was no longer bleeding, he turned to his sister. “You know LeMasters, he thinks he’s better than everybody else. Since I was a boy, he was always blaming me for something.”
“But why would he do that?” For the first time, Rose started to question her brother’s opinion about Morgan.
“You’ve been gone a long time, Rose. You don’t know how things are at home anymore. LeMasters is a rich man now, and everyone does his bidding. Someone’s been rustling his cattle and he’s pinned it on me. He’s had it out for me for years. That old Indian, Joseph Longbow, will say anything LeMasters tells him.” He put his arm around Rose’s shoulders and pulled her closer. “Granny warned me that LeMasters was out for vengeance. It didn’t matter that I didn’t do nothing to him, or his cattle.” He grinned at her, certain he could charm her the way he charmed all women. “It’s a good thing you came along when you did, or me and the boys would be swinging.”
“Frankie, Mr. LeMasters said Mr. Longbow saw you stealing.”
Frank removed his arm from her shoulders, slid away from her and gave her a mutinous glare. “You mean to tell me you’d believe that old Indian over me?” He looked her up and down and curled his lip in disgust. “I should have known. Look at you. You’ve changed. Why did you come back here? To show us poor folks how you’ve lived with all your finery?”
“I think you should show your sister more respect after what she did for you back there,” the stranger on the opposite seat said.
Frank’s eyes snapped to the stranger. He was a big man, but Frank figured he was just a city man wearing boots. “And I suggest you mind your own business, or I’ll give you a reason to keep your mouth shut.”
“You talk real brave for a man absent a revolver,” the other male passenger said.
Frank looked him over. He’d seen Hank Murphy check to make sure the two men weren’t armed. “You ain’t heeled yourself.”
The man patted his waistcoat. “Who says I’m not armed?”
Frank knew the man couldn’t be carrying anything larger than a derringer in the getup he was wearing. “It would take more than a little derringer to stop me if I decide to come after you.”
“Frankie! Stop it this minute,” Rose insisted. She looked at the gentlemen opposite her and said, “I apologize for my brother’s ill manners.” The two men had been excellent traveling companions, and she wouldn’t allow Frankie to threaten them, no matter how much she loved him.
She glanced back at Frank and lowered her voice. “I’m just trying to understand why Mr. LeMasters would think you stole those animals, and why Mr. Longbow identified you as the thief. Do you know those other men they were going to hang?”
“Yeah, they are my boys.”
“What does that mean?”
“We work together on the ranches when we can find work.”
Rose was no closer to understanding what was going on. “Why don’t you tell me about the trouble you’ve had with Mr. LeMasters.”
A loud cracking sound halted Frank’s response. Thinking it was a gunshot, he leaned to the window and looked out just as the stagecoach violently lurched to one side.
“Jump out!” George yelled as he leaped from the driver’s seat.
One of the men inside the coach tried to open the door, but it was too late. The coach started to slide down the steep incline, and the momentum prevented the passengers from escaping the plummeting tomb. The big man inside the coach tried to brace himself, and he stretched out his arm in an effort to grab Rose, but he lost his grip when the coach picked up speed.
Within seconds, the coach began to roll over and over, and the passengers were tossed about like rag dolls with each revolution. Trunks were flying through the air, breaking apart on impact as the coach tumbled over the rocky terrain. The dresses and petticoats from Rose’s trunk floated through the air, resembling rainbow-colored clouds before they settled in vibrant heaps over the rugged landscape. The ear-piercing roars from the horses were deafening as they struggled against their yokes, trying to escape their certain death. The stagecoach began to splinter apart as it bounced over tree stumps and larger boulders on descent.
Morgan jumped off his horse and shouted orders as he raced down the incline. “Ken, watch those men. Murph, check on George. Dan, you and Grady come with me.” As the three men made their way down the slope, half running, half sliding, they saw one of the male passengers fall out when the doors were ripped off the coach. The man rolled to a stop next to a downed tree. “Grady, see to him.” Morgan didn’t know if it was Frank or not, and he didn’t care. It wasn’t Rose. He didn’t slow down. He’d never experienced such a helpless feeling as he raced after the fast-moving coach. There was no way he could catch the coach as it vaulted down the incline with increasing speed. He reasoned it would be the lesser of two evils if Rose fell out before the coach slammed into the creek bed below. Right before his eyes, the coach started breaking apart, and the horses were freed from their tethers when the frame rolled over a large boulder.
“Take care of the horses, Dan,” Morgan yelled above the melee. Within seconds, Morgan heard one shot behind him, and he knew Dan had put one horse out of his misery. Another shot rang out a few seconds later.
Suddenly, t
he coach slammed against a cluster of rocks mingled with spiky tree stumps and came to a crashing halt. What was left of the structure was little more than jagged fragments. Morgan came to a sliding halt near one of the larger pieces of wood. He started throwing the rubble aside, looking for Rose. Several feet from him, he saw a large slice of one wooden door tossed aside, and Frank rolled from beneath the wreckage. Frank tried to stand, but from Morgan’s vantage point, it looked as though he fell back to the ground. Morgan thought he must be injured or dazed. He hurried toward Frank, thinking Rose had to be nearby because he hadn’t seen her fall from the carriage.
Before he reached Frank, he saw Rose’s hat lying a few feet from him. Blood stained the blue cloth brim. “Frank, where’s . . .”
Before he finished his question, Frank stood, holding his sister by the waist. Rose was hanging limply over Frank’s forearm, and he had a Remington double-barrel derringer pointed to her head.
“Stay where you are, LeMasters!” Frank shouted.
Morgan could hardly believe his eyes. Even for a lowlife like Frank Langtry, this was beyond reprehensible. Morgan pulled his Colt and aimed it at Frank’s head. “Put that derringer down, Frank.”
“Holster your iron or I’ll shoot her! I swear I will!” Frank threatened. “Now back off.”
“How do I know she’s not already dead?” Morgan countered.
“She ain’t dead,” Frank assured him. “She’s unconscious.”
“There’s blood on her hat.” Morgan knew he could easily blow Frank’s head off, but he didn’t know if that cocked derringer had a hair trigger. He couldn’t risk Rose getting shot accidentally.
“She’s got a gash on her head. Now, for the last time, holster that iron.”
“What are you going to do, Frank? Where are you going to go? You know we’ll hunt you down.”
Frank smirked at him. “Me and my boys are going to ride on down to Mexico and party with some pretty señoritas. No one will find us where we are going. Even if some cowboy was dumb enough to try to find us, the Comancheros would gun them down for us. We keep them supplied with whiskey and guns in exchange for protection.”
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