The guard was not at his door, but when she knocked, she found her uncle answering the door. That surprised her, but he seemed more surprised, glancing into the hallway—where his guard was supposed to be. She didn’t like the look in his eyes, but since her grandfather seldom left his room, she’d come determined to get in. She didn’t want to invade his privacy, yet more-and-more she suspected there might be more to this than any one of them could have guessed.
“I came to talk with my grandfather,” she said.
He glared at her. “He’s asleep.”
“Who is it?” she heard. She pushed past her uncle and entered the room. “It’s me, grandfather,” she said.
She found her grandfather lying in a small bed near the window. He tried to smile at her. “I’ve been hoping you’d come,” he said weakly. “I even asked for you,” he eyed her uncle, then glanced back at her. “Did you get any of my messages?”
Now, she eyed her uncle too. “No, grandfather,” I didn’t,” she said, pointedly.
She looked around. She needed Jake and Kid. She needed them, and she’d suddenly realized she didn’t dare even leave her grandfather to go searching for them.
As her gaze swept the room, several things occurred to her at once. The main one sat at the forefront of her thinking.
She wasn’t leaving him alone again.
Her uncle glared at her when she turned, facing him—crossing her arms in front of her chest. He didn’t move—but neither did she. Finally, he turned and left the room. She heard him quarreling with someone in low tones in the hallway—probably his missing guard.
She sat down to wait for Kid and Jake—to figure out where she’d disappeared to.
Kat turned to stare at her sick grandfather. He’d quickly fallen asleep—and she had a sinking feeling she knew why.
She still hadn’t figured out how she could go home—and she’d been feeling as though, one day, she’d lose Kid because of it. She didn’t think it because he wouldn’t allow that to happen. She knew it because she could never allow him to harm himself, by trying to live here with her. She could feel it—because this place had already brought him down, in a way she’d never seen before. He couldn’t survive here. She wouldn’t let him.
She knew if he tried—it would be a lot like putting a wolf in cage. She’d lose him in ways that would destroy her—almost more than it was going to destroy her to try and live here herself.
But—simply put—she could never leave her grandfather at the mercy of these men again.
She glanced up as George came into the room. Turned out, he’d come to see what had caused her to wall herself off in their grandfather’s room.
He stared at his grandfather. Then, turned and looked around the room before his gaze settled on the same bottles she had spotted—when she’d first entered the room.
He turned and looked at Kat. “I had no idea,” he said. “I wish I would have realized they’d actually go this far….”
Kat bit her lip. She wanted to hit him. He’d been right here, after all. But then, so had she, for weeks now—and so had Kid—and Jake. Yet, this had gone on right under all of their noses. She wanted to say that George should have known better. He’d been the only one of them that truly suspected her uncle and cousin.
But she could see how it could happen. She could see how it had happened. What she couldn’t understand—was how her uncle governed her grandfather’s estates.
She voiced this, now, to George. “How is it that they have so much control?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “They’ve had that doctor in here many times. They told me that he was trying to help grandfather the best he could,” he said. He looked away, closed his eyes. “They wouldn’t let me see him. I should have realized….”
And so they talked while they waited for Jake and Kid.
Chapter Nineteen
Living in Shadows
Kid sat near the barn in the shadows where he’d been waiting patiently all night. He didn’t like being here. Kat had been right about the city. He didn’t think he’d survive it if he had to be tied to it for very long. But nothing would make him quit on Kat. He wasn’t leaving here, until she could leave here with him.
His patience paid off just before dawn. He saw her cousin walking his horse down the drive just as the sun broke the horizon. Funny, that. He didn’t ride his gelding in. He walked him in. Kid had to wonder why.
He didn’t know who he distrusted more—Kat’s cousin, Ethan—or the other one, George. But he didn’t see her grandfather’s right-hand man, Liam, as a threat. Strange, he trusted her grandfather’s judgment. And that made him trust who her grandfather trusted—before he could trust who her grandfather did not.
Still, everything about Liam told Kid that, for a city-boy, he was extremely dangerous.
Kid stuck to the deepest of shadows, as he watched Ethan slip his mount into the barn. He didn’t hear much, once he went inside, but he waited anyway.
And when Ethan headed for the house, Kid followed. He slipped in the back of the house, and through the kitchen, spotting Ethan heading for the study. Kid slipped through the darkened room blending with it, coming to stand by the door.
Ethan sat at the desk, sipping a drink he’d poured. He stared down at a paper with a deep scowl on his face.
Curiosity ate Kid up. He couldn’t imagine why, it was probably only a paper. But that made him want to see that paper—which meant more waiting. Yet, Kid had mastered waiting, long ago. He’d been taught well about hunting, and so he hunkered down into the shadows, once more, and waited.
Close to dawn, Ethan left the study, locking the door behind him. Kid couldn’t imagine what made these Easterners stay up ‘til dawn. Back in the West, they were much more prone to going to bed with the sun and rising with it.
Taking out his blade, he carefully pried at the latch. It gave easily enough. It wasn’t really meant to keep anyone out, Kid decided. It appeared to be more for looks. Did these people trust everyone, too?
Kid moved like a panther through the shadows towards the desk. He fumbled around with the papers, searching for what might have caught Ethan’s attention. One caught Kid’s eye, and he lifted it to the first rays of the sun, to see it more clearly.
Kid’s eyes widened in his surprise. Interesting. He scanned the page, then went back to the desk for more, but nothing more enlightened him.
Slipping from the den, he stuck to the shadows until he was well outside, then he went searching for Jake.
He found him with the colt. Dawn broke the sky fully now, and although still very early, Kid wasn’t surprised to find Jake awake. Jake was from the West, where normal people lived—and woke with the dawn.
Jake raised a brow at him, when he saw Kid moving across the corral. “You look as if you’ve been up all night like these Easterners,” Jake said.
Kid scowled. He was glad he wasn’t the only one who thought the practice of staying up all night a bit odd.
“I followed Ethan, tonight.” He scowled. “I mean, last night,” he said.
Jake scowled, now, too. “I trust he didn’t see you.” He shook his head. “No, of course he didn’t.” He went back to gentling the colt. “Find anything of interest?” he asked, staring up at Kid. But Kid knew that Jake already knew he had, or he wouldn’t be there, right now.
Jake nodded, glancing back at the colt. “Of course you did,” he said.
Kid grinned. “I found a wire from Ethan to someone named Hank in Cheyenne,” he said. He shook his head. “Unfortunately, it just said to bring her home.” He gave Jake a hard look. “He only seems interested in her being home.”
Jake nodded. “He just might be.”
Kid frowned. “You know that you don’t have to stay here,” he said. “No telling how long this could take.”
Jake ran his hand down the colt’s neck. “Something’s not right,” he said. “Kat’s born and raised in the West. They drag her here, telling her that she belongs here. And everyo
ne just seems to have her best interest at heart.” He glanced up at Kid. “Call me an old cynic, but I’m not buying it.”
Kid’s lips compressed together for a long moment. “I can’t argue with you there, old man,” he said, earning a dark glare from Jake.
“I’m not old enough to be your father,” he reminded Kid.
Kid grinned. “Sure you are,” he reminded.
Jake gazed out at where the sun broke over the horizon and flooded the earth with full light. “Just think of me as your older brother, Kid,” he teased lightly.
Kid’s brown shot up. “I’ll do that,” he said.
Jake tested the colt’s front leg, starting him to gentle with having his feet picked up. “So why does it seem as if we don’t know the full story?” he asked.
Kid gave him a hard smile. “Why, indeed,” he agreed. “Who do you think is the mastermind behind this plan?” he asked.
Jake glanced up at him from where he held the colt’s hoof. He glanced down and set the colt’s foot gently back down. “I favor Ethan,” he said. “He makes my trigger finger itch.”
Kid couldn’t help but grin at this. He nodded. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Something about him does make a man want to beat the truth out of him, doesn’t he?”
“Well,” Jake nodded, coming around the colt to test another foot. “But something about Liam tells me that he’s a few of his own secrets to share.”
Kid frowned at that. “Yeah, I was afraid you were going to say that.” He glanced out across the grounds. He still refused to wear the Eastern duds and avoided the ground keepers here. “So what is it that you suppose they’re hiding? And how do you suppose we go about getting at it?”
Jake turned to watch him. “Well, we can’t just call them out,” he reminded Kid.
Kid glowered at him.
“And we can’t trounce either of them, either,” he said.
Kid scowled.
Jake grinned. “I guess that leaves out-maneuvering them into giving up their truths,” he said.
Kid glared at him, waiting, as if Jake had been joking.
“This is not the Wild West,” Jake said, frowning.
Kid frowned, too. “So we can’t—just do a little encouraging….”
“No,” Jake said.
“Hmmm,” Kid said. “I guess that leaves only one thing to do.”
Jake grinned. “Don’t worry. They’ll never even see you coming.”
Kid grinned.
They stood there in silence for several long moments, each in their own thoughts before Kid thought to ask. “Have you seen Kat?”
Jake shook his head. “Come to think of it—I didn’t see her all afternoon yesterday, either.”
Kid frowned. He turned to look back at the large manor, then turned back to stare at Jake—and they started for the manor at once.
Twenty minutes later, Kat stood gazing at the two of them, as they came barging into her grandfather’s room. She stared at them. “Well, it is about time,” she said, turning to give her uncle a hard glare.
Kid glanced around the room. “I take it that you decided you would stay with your grandfather,” he said, taking a second look around. His gaze narrowed on the bottles.
Jake’s head jerked, and his steely-gaze, too, swept the room. His lips pressed together. “We’ll take turns taking watch,” he said.
Her uncle turned, glaring at him. “I assure you, sir, that won’t be necessary.”
Jake gave him a rare smile, yet the look in his eyes made Kat’s uncle flinch. “We don’t mind,” Jake told him.
Her uncle appeared to want to argue. He opened his mouth, then closed it. Finally, he stomped out of the room.
Kid turned to stare at Kat. “Are you okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “But I think they’ve been drugging my grandfather,” she said, picking up one of the bottles.
Kid walked over, taking the bottle from her hands. “He might not survive coming off of this,” he said.
She gazed up at him. He’d spent several years around Doc because of Hawk, and he apparently knew what they’d been using to drug her grandfather. She’d known it was a form of opium, but she hadn’t known that taking him off it might kill him.
Jake stared at the two of them. “I’ll get someone to go for the doctor,” he said and went to the door, then flung over his shoulder, “and whatever passes for a sheriff around here.”
Kat wanted to smash something. How could this have been happening right under the noses of an entire staff? How could Liam have not known—or George? Couldn’t they see what her uncle had been doing? How could someone hold someone prisoner in their own home—and no one do a damn thing to stop it?
Her eyes narrowed on the bottles. The time would come for answers. She could wait—because when that time came—they’d be lucky if she didn’t chose to go after those answers the way she’d surely go after them back home.
Kid stared at her from midnight eyes.
Her cousin, Ethan, came into the room as she stared. She turned her hard glare on him. He stared at the bottles by the bed, like the rest of them had, then lifted his gaze and stared back at her—and waiting. “You have to stay and protect him,” he said.
She glared at him. “You should have been doing that.”
But she could see in his eyes that he knew he’d appealed to her senses. He knew she’d do as her grandfather had asked—and take care of her grandfather’s estates. He knew she’d stay to protect him.
Her cousin had won. He knew it, and she could feel it.
She turned to look at Kid, but Kid’s usual humor had completely disappeared. Kat had never witnessed this happen to him before. And in its place was a murderous rage.
Fire burned in the depth of his eyes. She sensed Jake come around the corner, and she was never so relieved to see him in her life.
She couldn’t go home. She had to stay. He knew it. She knew it as well. She couldn’t comprehend that this would actually be her fate. The world had contrived to bring her here—and here she would have to stay.
Then, why did if feel like part of her had just died.
Toward evening, Kat slipped out of her grandfather’s room and went for a walk while Jake stayed behind to watch. She desperately needed the air. She couldn’t believe any of this. She had donned her leathers—perhaps out of spite—perhaps out of comfort. She only knew she needed to feel normal today.
She headed to see the colt—quietly walking in the gloom of the day. The ground lay wet beneath her feet.
Half way across, a shiver snaked up her spine, then she saw the flash in the dark before she heard the muzzle report. Out of habit, she rolled across the wet ground, melting into the shadows of the tress, reaching for her skinnin’ knife, without even having to think about it. Smiling to herself, as she tensed to spring like a cougar after its prey.
Well, now, she thought. This was more like it.
She peered across the grounds, pinpointing exactly where she’d seen the flash where the shot had come from, moving quickly through the shadows to capture her quarry.
Kat moved through the shadows like she belonged to the night. Running on silent feet, hugging the night as naturally as if she’d been born with the darkness. She spotted him, still trying to figure out where she’d gone and was on him with a blood-curdling cry.
Her left hand took his head into a killing grip, her right pricking his neck with her menacing hunting knife.
She heard him suck in his breath, felt the shock that coursed through his body, stunned at how quickly she’d got the jump on him. Frantic, he realized he was about to die.
She smelled the sweat that poured from him, as this realization dawned. “You have one chance to tell me who sent you,” she hissed near his ear.
He licked his lips. “I don’t know his name,” he whined.
“And yet, here you are—knowing exactly where I’d be….”
His eyes widened in fright as she yanked back on his head, exposing his throat to her dea
dly blade, the silver of it glinting under the light of the moon.
He stunk with fear, and her nostrils flared at the anticipation of the kill.
“Okay,” he sniveled. “I can tell you only that he had dark hair,” he said, pleading, not daring to move even a hair. “He was older—and he paid handsomely for your death….”
Kat grinned, then taking the hilt of her blade, she hit him with it. He sank to her feet with a thud, the sound of it punctuated by the shadows of the night.
She glanced sideways, the hunt still pounding through her veins. She spotted Jake, coming straight across her grandfather’s well-manicured lawns, heading directly for her. He couldn’t possibly see her, but she knew her war-cry had told him exactly where he’d find her.
When he reached her side, he glanced down, then sighed. “Good,” he said. “I see you left me something.”
She grinned, as he picked up the six-foot man and deposited him over his shoulder like he were a sack of grain, and she envied the ease with which he’d done so, following him as he headed to the barn.
“Kid’s going to be mighty sorry he missed this,” Jake said quietly into the dark.
“Is he with my grandfather?” she said, as they slipped into the livery stable with their prize.
Jake grinned, the white of his teeth flashing in the night. “Yes, but I think tonight, he’ll be going on a hunt of his own.”
Much later into the night, George stepped in to see how their grandfather was doing. He stood there for so long, Kat began to fidget. He just appeared to watch him, then finally, he turned to look at her.
“I did some checking,” he said. “My father has control of grandfather’s estates.”
Kat stared at him. Jake had stepped in the room, heard the last of what he said. She turned and watched him, wondering what he’d thought of this.
Jake walked toward George, his head tilted to one side, his hat in his hands. “Do you think they got that doctor to convince the judge your grandfather wasn’t fit to run his estates?”
Dark Warrior: Kid (Dark Cloth Series Book 2) Page 13