Outlaw Hearts

by Rosanne Bittner

  “Good shot, mi esposa,” Jake muttered.

  Miranda looked toward the wagon then, and Jake could see she was in a kind of daze. “Jake!” she screamed. “Jake, where are you?”

  “Get the hell down!” he shouted. “Get down and stay there!”

  More shots slammed into the wagon. Jake jumped out then, running and rolling to the pump house. Two men came charging out of the main house, and Jake caught sight then of Hank running at the house from the back. Someone fired from the barn, hitting Hank in the back. The man cried out and sprawled onto his face.

  “Damn!” Jake fumed. There was only him and Charlie now, and Charlie was wounded. He whipped out his revolver and fired at the two men coming toward him from the house, swiftly ending their lives. Revolver in his left hand and rifle in his right, he made a mad dash for the bunkhouse, charging inside, revolver ready. The bunkhouse was empty. He scrambled to think as he shoved two more bullets into his revolver to replace those he had used. He had downed at least seven himself. Charlie and Hank had each got one, and even Miranda had killed one. That made ten, maybe eleven, if Miranda had shot someone back at the waterfall. He was apparently the only one left to end this, and his own left shoulder was bleeding and hurting. As far as he could determine, there was someone left in the house and in the barn. He couldn’t be sure how many, and now there was Miranda to worry about.

  “What the hell is going on?” a voice shouted from the house. “Who the hell is out there?”

  Jake scurried to a window. “That you, Latimer?” he shouted.

  “It’s me.”

  “It’s Jake Harkner! You’ve got my son, you sonofabitch! You’re gonna die for it!”

  “Give it up, Harkner! The boy is already dead! Leave now, or you’ll be dead too!”

  Jake closed his eyes. The man had to be lying! He had to be! Lloyd!

  Lying flat in the tall grass along the west fence, Miranda felt the tears coming. No! It couldn’t be true that her son was dead! God wouldn’t do this. She wanted to go and try to help Jake, but she knew the rest was up to him now. If she went running into the line of fire, she could be the cause of him getting himself killed.

  Neither of them knew that their son was hanging by his wrists inside the shed, his body battered by a whipping and a beating, as well as two bullet wounds. The nearly unconscious young man thought he heard a lot of shooting outside. He decided he must surely be dying, for he thought he’d heard his father’s voice. It’s Jake Harkner…you’ve got my son.

  “Pa,” Lloyd muttered, tears forming in his eyes. How he wished it could be true his father was coming for him, but that was impossible. He hated him all the more for being in prison where he couldn’t come to his aid, hated him for being the reason he was suffering this ungodly pain at the hands of Jube Latimer. His own father had been just as bad once, and it sickened him. That little voice that had plagued him since he had first deserted his family tried to tell him his father couldn’t have done the things Jube Latimer was capable of doing, that he still loved his father and it was his own fault he hung here now near death. But he didn’t like to listen to that little voice. If he could just have some whiskey, he could make the voice go away. Blood kept dripping from a bullet wound to his thigh, and wishing for the blessed relief of death, he slipped back into unconsciousness.

  “You’ve got one chance, Latimer,” Jake shouted from the bunkhouse. “Show yourself, and I’ll give you a chance in a fair gunfight. That’s the only way you can hope to live!”

  “Fair? Against Jake Harkner after I’ve killed his son? No way, Harkner. You’re gonna have to come in and get me. I’ll blow your guts out before you reach the back door!”

  “And you’re a goddamned coward, Latimer! You’re brave enough when you’re surrounded by your men, brave enough to torture and kill one helpless kid, but you can’t face a man one on one, can you?”

  “Jake! It’s Charlie! I’m comin’ in!” Jake whirled to see Charlie plunge into the bunkhouse by a back door. His left arm was bleeding badly. “I managed to work my way around here. You go on and rout them out in the barn! I’ll keep the ones in the house busy. I can do that much.”

  Jake nodded, heading for the back door. He ducked outside, and Charlie began firing toward the house, shattering windows. Jake ran for the barn, flattening himself against an outside wall. He was out of sight of the house now. He inched toward a door, then heard a click behind him. Like lightning he whirled and fired, hitting a man who had sneaked around the back side of the barn. At the same time someone shoved open the barn door where he stood, slamming the door into him and knocking him flat. Rifle and revolver both flew out of his hands, and he rolled onto his back just in time to see his attacker coming at him with a pitchfork.

  Jake quickly rolled away, but one fork gouged across his upper back, leaving a deep gash. Jake forced himself to ignore the pain, rolled to his knees to see the pitchfork coming at him again. He managed to grasp it at the base of the tines and push up. He could hear gunfire, knew Charlie was doing his best to keep whoever was left inside the house right where they were. He had no idea if anyone else was in the barn and could only concentrate on the huge, determined man who had attacked him. The man kicked at him, caught him in the chest, but Jake hung on, managed to get to his feet.

  The two men wrestled for the fork then. The bear-sized man managed to whirl the pitchfork around so that he held the handle crosswise in both hands. He forced Jake to his back, tried to shove the handle of the pitchfork against his throat. Jake grabbed on and pushed back, using his fury over the fact that these men might have killed Lloyd to draw on an inner strength he himself didn’t even know he still possessed. In spite of the decreased strength in his crippled right hand, he managed to shove back and roll his attacker off him and onto his back.

  Now it was Jake who pushed, just enough to make the bigger man think he was going to try to choke him the same way. Instead, Jake suddenly yanked upward, jerking the pitchfork right out of the man’s hands. In an instant he whirled the weapon forward and plunged it into the man’s belly.

  His attacker, so big that he had been too slow to roll out of the way, grunted, staring wide-eyed at Jake then. He began to tremble violently. Jake jerked out the pitchfork, his dark eyes on fire with the ruthlessness of the old Jake. “This one is for my son,” he growled. He plunged the pitchfork again, deep into the man’s throat, and blood spurted onto Jake’s shirt. “You fat, murdering bastard!” Jake shouted, enjoying the gruesome sight. He left the weapon where it was and went to pick up his revolver and rifle.

  It was then he saw her. Miranda was crouched behind a watering trough, gaping wide-eyed at the pitchfork sticking out of the man’s throat. Jake ran to the trough, crouching down beside her. “What the hell are you doing back here!” he demanded.

  She just stared at him a moment, as though she didn’t know him. “I…I followed Charlie. I thought if I stayed back here, out of the way, maybe I could still help somehow.” She looked again at the pitchfork. “I was going to try to shoot him, but I was afraid I would hit you instead.” She began to tremble. “I never saw anything like that. When he came at you with that pitchfork…” She looked at him again, her eyes dropping to the blood on the front of his shirt.

  “I told you before we left there would be no room for mercy in this! God only knows what they’ve done to Lloyd. All I can hope for is Latimer’s lying about him being dead. I’m going for Latimer! You stay put this time!”

  The look in his dark eyes almost frightened her. “You’re hurt.”

  “Not bad enough to keep me from killing Latimer!”

  A sob caught in her throat. “I killed two men, Jake. One found me back at the waterfall.”

  His eyes moved over her. “Did he hurt you?”

  She shook her head. He put a hand to the side of her face, reminding himself what killing meant to someone like her. “I’ve killed nine
men so far,” he said firmly. “You can’t think about it, Randy. You do what you have to do. Now stay here! Promise me!”

  She nodded her head. Jake left her then and moved inside the barn, quickly searching through stalls, looking up then to check the loft area. The building was empty. “Just the house now,” he mumbled, teeth gritted. “And Latimer.” He leveled his rifle through a barn window, aiming it toward the house. “You’re the only one left now, Latimer!” he yelled. “You and whoever is in there with you! Come on out!”

  “You’re a liar!”

  “I got nine of them myself. Go ahead and call out! Nobody will answer! The big one is lying at the back of the barn with a pitchfork in his throat! You screwed up when you decided to hurt my son!” He began firing, rapid shots that tore through windows and ripped into the back door so fast that those inside didn’t have a chance to shoot back. He charged out of the barn and headed toward the house. Charlie fired into two side windows from the bunkhouse, giving Jake more cover.

  Miranda closed her eyes and covered her ears, hoping the bullets were coming only from Jake’s and Charlie’s guns and not from men shooting back. The barn was between her and the house, and she couldn’t see what was happening.

  Jake reached the back door, setting the rifle aside then and pulling out his revolver. He burst into the house then, firing instantly at a man who lurched into a doorway between the kitchen and another part of the house. The man went down, and Jake heard someone running, heard a door open. He charged through the house to the front door, aiming his revolver. “Latimer!” he roared.

  The fleeing man stopped, turned, revolver drawn. Jake fired, opening a hole in his chest. The man went down, and Jake walked out to the body, his .45 smoking. The man lay panting, staring up at him. He was not a big man, actually looked thin. His dark eyes were full of terror, and his black hair was wet with perspiration. Jake stood over him. “You’re Jube Latimer.”

  “How did you…do it?” the man groaned.

  “You underestimate what a man can do when he’s out to save his son. Where’s Lloyd?” Jake sneered.

  “In the…shed. I hope…he’s dead. The sonofabitch killed two of my men…stole their horses.”

  Jake knelt closer. “That isn’t why you went after him, Latimer. You went after him to lure me up here, after you heard I got out of prison. You just didn’t count on things happening the way they did. Maybe you thought I was too old and getting too soft to take on you and your bunch.” He placed the still-hot barrel of his revolver against the man’s forehead. “You hurt my son just to get to me, Latimer. That was a big mistake!”

  He pulled the trigger, and Jube Latimer was instantly dead, his eyes still wide open. Jake just stared at him a moment, then wiped blood from the barrel of the revolver onto Latimer’s shirt before rising and holstering the gun. He called to Charlie and Miranda, and both came running. Miranda still carried the shotgun. She stopped short at the sight of Jube Latimer lying on the ground with a gaping hole in both his chest and his head. Jake turned to her, suddenly looking weary and spent. “He told me Lloyd’s in the shed. I don’t know if I can get my legs to move. I’m afraid of what we’ll find.”

  A look of ruthless revenge still lurked in his eyes. Charlie took the shotgun from Miranda’s hand. “Where’s your rifle, Jake?”

  Jake tore his eyes from Miranda’s and looked at the man, confusion in his eyes. “I don’t know. I think I left it at the other side of the house.” He put a hand to his head. “Do me a favor. There’s a dead man in there. Get him out of there. If Lloyd’s alive, I’ll bring him into the house so Miranda can tend to him. Then go check on Hank. I think he’s dead too. We’ll bury him later. To hell with the rest of them.”

  “Sure, Jake.”

  Jake noticed the man’s bloody sleeve. “You hurt bad?”

  “You tend to Lloyd. Once you get him inside, your wife can tie somethin’ around the arm to stop the bleedin’. I think the bullet went clean through. I’ll be all right. What about you? What happened to your back?”

  It was only then Jake began to feel the pain. “Pitchfork,” he answered. “Doesn’t really matter right now.” He took hold of Miranda’s arm. “Let’s go find Lloyd.”

  Miranda put an arm around him, feeling him tremble. The gun battle and his pent-up fury had drained him. She knew he was terrified of what they would find, and so was she. She felt his weight, realized he was half leaning on her, suddenly weak. “He’s alive, Jake. I know he’s alive.”

  He smiled bitterly. “My ever-faithful, ever-hopeful wife.”

  They reached the shed, and Miranda gasped at the sight of Lloyd hanging from a beam, his wrists tied together. He wore only the bottom half of long johns, and his body and face were covered with bruises and cuts, his leg bleeding from what looked like a bullet wound, another similar wound at his upper left chest. “Lloyd!” she cried.

  A new strength quickly returned to Jake’s body. He hastily dragged a stool over to Lloyd’s body and stood on it, taking a knife from his boot and cutting the boy down. He let the body slump over his shoulder.

  “Oh, Jake, his back!” Miranda exclaimed. “They’ve whipped him!”

  “I’ve got him. Let’s get him to the house!”

  Miranda hurried beside him, struggling to stay in control. Her beautiful son, so battered and wounded! What kind of men strung another man up like that and just beat on him? She knew that killing two men would always haunt her, but she did not regret it now. She would never regret it.

  Jake kept the boy hoisted over his shoulder and ignored his own pain as he hurriedly carried Lloyd from the shed into the house. Charlie was dragging the dead man out the back door. Jake headed for the one bedroom, and Miranda pulled the bedcovers back. “We can’t worry about his back right now,” Jake told her. “The bullet wounds come first.” He gently laid Lloyd onto the feather mattress, which was covered with a light cotton blanket.

  Lloyd opened his eyes, focused them on the man hovering over him, expecting it to be one of Latimer’s men come to bring him more pain. He saw his father’s face.

  “Pa?” He couldn’t believe his eyes. Had he died after all?

  “I’m here, Lloyd. Your mother is here too. We’ll get you through this.”

  “Pa?” the boy repeated. “How did…you…find me?”

  “That doesn’t matter right now. The point is we’re here.”

  Lloyd noticed his father was bleeding. He knew Latimer had a lot of men. How had Jake gotten through them? “Latimer…” he muttered.

  “Latimer’s dead. So are the rest of them.”

  Lloyd’s eyes teared. As much as he must have hurt the man, thought he hated him, here he was. He must have risked his life to get here, his mother too! “I’m…sorry, Pa,” he whispered, too weak to find his full voice.

  “Don’t be sorry, son. There’s no sense in anybody being sorry anymore.”

  Lloyd’s body jerked in a sob. “Hurts…everything…hurts.”

  “I know. I’ve felt the pain.” Jake sat down carefully on the edge of the bed, facing the boy. He leaned over and drew him up so that Lloyd’s head rested against his chest. Lloyd grabbed at one of his father’s arms, breaking into deep sobbing.

  “Pa,” he repeated. “Don’t let go.”

  “I’ll never let go, son. You’re not alone, Lloyd. You’ve never been alone, even when we were apart.”

  Thirty-four

  Miranda was not sure from where she drew the strength to bear the emotional drain the next several days presented to her. She had to remove two bullets from her own screaming son while Jake held him down. She was soon out of laudanum, and Jake had refused to let Lloyd drink any whiskey for the pain.

  “He’s got to get off the stuff,” Jake had insisted. “I don’t care what he has to suffer to do it.”

  She knew it was tearing Jake apart. Lloyd begged for a drink, suffered
terrible fits of tremors and periods of hallucination, screaming that snakes were crawling on him. He shouted obscenities at his father, calling him every horrible name he could think of, including murderer and rapist and bastard. Jake refused to buckle, but Miranda knew the words gouged deep into his soul, in spite of the fact that he knew they were spoken only because of Lloyd’s desperate need for whiskey. Along with a cleansing of Lloyd’s body of the need for whiskey, there also seemed to be a cleansing of the soul for both Lloyd and Jake.

  It was four days before all three of them enjoyed a solid night’s sleep. Charlie had buried Hank Downing the day of the shooting, and over the last few days more men from Hole-in-the-Wall had shown up out of curiosity, having heard that Jake Harkner had gone after Jube Latimer. They helped Charlie bury Latimer and his men, and Miranda did not doubt that word of what had happened here would be on the lips of men in these parts for a long time to come.

  On their fifth morning at the ranch, Miranda awoke and stretched to realize it must be later than she usually awakened. She was surprised she had slept so well. Jake and Charlie had brought in cots from the bunkhouse for her and Jake to sleep on in the main room of the house so that they could be close to Lloyd. Jake had not really slept much since finding his son, had spent most of the last three days and nights watching over Lloyd. Often Miranda would wake up in the night to catch him smoking in the dark. She knew the worry over Lloyd that kept him awake was only enhanced by the painful back wound from the pitchfork that had left a deep cut across his shoulders, so that every arm movement was agony.

  At last, this morning, Jake still slept. She looked over at him, hoping it would not be long before they could all just go home. Jake was only now beginning to return to the gentle, loving Jake who did not have that awful look in his eyes. It had taken the man time to control the rage he had felt over what had happened to his son, to calm the fierce temper that had given him the edge he needed to take on Latimer and his men. Right now he looked more peaceful than she had seen him look in years. She wanted to touch him, hold him, but she did not want to wake him. God knew he needed the sleep.