Her Lone Protector

by Pam Crooks

  Her mouth pursed. “No. Always, the tenements are full. One is never vacant long before the rooms get filled again. Mrs. Sortino says she has a waiting list of tenants who want to rent her apartments.”

  Immigrants like herself, Gina knew, with little money and desperate for a place to stay, no matter how crowded or poor the conditions.

  Creed grunted, clearly keeping his opinions of the landlady and the tenement she owned to himself. He slid from his horse to the ground. “The sun’s setting fast, Gina. We’d best unload our gear and get settled inside before it does.”

  His words tripped the rhythmic beat of her heart. Any doubts she might have had about being left alone fled. He intended to stay. It’d be just the two of them, and the cabin was far smaller than she could have imagined, could have possibly known….

  She bit her lip. “It is permissible to stay here?” she asked, half hoping it wouldn’t be. “You have not had time to tell your father we come.”

  He flung his saddlebag over his shoulder, hefted their groceries in one arm.

  “He’ll never know,” Creed said in a brusque tone.

  Without the city’s streetlights, their surroundings would turn pitch-dark quickly. She had no choice but to follow his lead and dismount, too. She peered at him around the bay’s long neck. “You will not explain to him?”

  “No.”

  Before she could ask why, he opened the shack’s door and disappeared inside. Within moments, a light glowed through the lone window. He came out again.

  “There’s a water pump out back,” he said. “Should be some wood stacked, too. I’ll bring in some of both.”

  Before he’d looked, he’d known the water and wood would be there. “You stay here before.”

  “Yes.” He frowned, as if he thought of the past all over again. “When I was a kid.”

  Her brow arched. “Alone?”

  “My father’s idea. He wanted me to grow up fast. Be a cowboy faster.”

  His resentment gave her pause. Clearly, he hadn’t liked the job. The desolation, the solitude, wouldn’t be for everyone, especially one so young.

  “But you do not want to be a cowboy?” she asked.

  “No.”

  Her curiosity compelled her to prod gently. “What then?”

  The frown returned. “A soldier in the United States Army. And wasn’t that a hell of a disappointment?”

  She wouldn’t have thought so, but evidently his father did. From the bitterness in Creed’s tone, she knew not to ask more questions, and he offered no further explanation. Her gaze lingered over him as he strode away.

  With every hour they spent together, he intrigued her more. Again, she found herself wondering about him. His likes, dislikes. The ideals and dreams that put him at odds with his family but shaped him into the man he was today.

  He believed in honor, in patriotism. That much she knew. A belief so strong that it inspired the respect of a man of Graham Dooling’s prominence in the American government.

  Her instincts insisted she could trust him, and yet…

  She could not forget he was still a stranger, and she would be staying with him in this desolate place. A stranger, rugged and virile, who made her mind jump at the prospect, who made her blood warm from a curious unease.

  And from anticipation.

  But she drew herself up with resolve. It was silly to dwell on such foolishness when her predicament allowed her no other recourse. Carrying her valise in one hand and clutching the sketches she’d refused to leave behind against her chest, she entered the line shack. Her curious gaze took in the table and a pair of chairs, a cast-iron stove and small cot.

  She laid her valise and sketches on the straw mattress, along with her coat, and she turned her thoughts to tidying up the place. By the time she gave the floor a hasty sweep with the broom she found tucked in a corner, Creed returned.

  He set a bucket of water down, then squatted next to the stove, opened a side door and began to fill the fire box with the wood he held cradled in his arm.

  She reached around him to put the broom away. He shifted, giving her as much room as he could.

  “The shack is stocked with some supplies.” After he lit the stove, he straightened, took a skillet and box of utensils off a nearby shelf, and set them next to their groceries on the table. “Nothing fancy here, but help yourself to anything you need.”

  She regarded him. “I do not need fancy, and you are sure we can come in here and use your father’s shack without his permission?”

  Creed fisted his hands on his hips. “We have an unspoken agreement out here on the range, Gina. A man is welcome to the hospitality a cabin like this can give. All that’s expected is that he leaves it in the same condition he found it. My father’s permission doesn’t matter.”

  Puzzled by his strange explanation, she found the veal cutlets and tore open their paper wrapping. “There is no lock on the door.”

  “Don’t need them out here.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. “And no one steals?”

  This she couldn’t believe. Never had she or Mama left their apartment without securing the lock firmly. They would not dare be so careless.

  “Can’t say it wouldn’t happen, but it doesn’t as a rule.”

  She eyed him doubtfully.

  “Not many folks know the shack is here. We’re out in the middle of nowhere.” His expression turned grim. “That’s why I brought you here. So the Sokolovs won’t find you.”

  The words were a cold splash of reality, a reminder of his intent to keep her safe. She found a pot and filled it with water for heating. “But still they look for me.”

  “Yes. Until I can arrange their arrest.”

  “And if you cannot?”

  “Don’t underestimate me, Gina.” He headed to the door. “I’ll see to the horses, then come in and help you with supper. It’s getting late.”

  His avowal for justice lingered in her mind after he left. She wasn’t so foolish to think Nikolai would let himself be put into the Americans’ jail easily. And Creed was only one man. Why would he think he could fight the brothers’ violence alone?

  Darkness had all but fallen. The anarchist meeting would start soon. She refused to have Creed whisk her away to a remote section of his father’s ranch and expect her to do nothing while he tried to make his arrest, no matter how skilled he thought he was.

  She had to find a way for revenge. For Mama’s sake.

  But mostly for her own.

  Gina perched cross-legged on the cot and watched him put on his disguise.

  His transformation amazed her. He wasn’t the Creed Sherman she knew before supper. Instead, he became a different man after, one Nikolai would never recognize. Or Graham Dooling. Or herself, if she hadn’t seen him do it.

  He sat at the table with his shaving mirror in front of him. Using the lantern light at its brightest, he worked carefully to apply a crepe wool beard to his chin and cheeks, tacking it in place with spirit gum. He did the same with a moustache and thick brows, all in deep burnished brown, the color of his own facial hair if he had had the time to grow it out.

  Already, he wore a crumpled black suit pulled from his saddlebags, and he’d traded his new Stetson for a felt bowler, which wasn’t so new.

  He looked like one of America’s poor. Someone who would understand Nikolai’s view on capitalism. A man who would fade into the crowd at one of his meetings.

  And he excited her like no other, stirring her blood from the kind of man he was. The illicit plan he intended to carry through left her fascinated from the sheer courage he’d need to see it done.

  Yet his recklessness frightened her, too. If he failed, if Nikolai discovered Creed spying on him for the American government, he’d be furious. Creed would certainly be killed. It was the way of the anarchists to meet in secret to plot their revolt against authority, always with the use of violence. Assassination, bombs and tyranny. They wouldn’t think twice about murdering Creed for interf
ering.

  He’d explained their strange beliefs to her at length while they ate. Their hatred of the way of life in the United States. Their dreams of free living without interference from the government. Their intent to transform society to conform to their ideals.

  A sobering conversation, for sure. But one she had needed to hear.

  He turned his head one way, then another, for a final inspection in the glass. Giving the beard a pat of satisfaction, he set the mirror aside and swiveled toward her. He waggled his wooly brows with a reckless grin. “What do you think?”

  Her heart skipped at that grin. “I think you enjoy yourself too much.”

  He shrugged and set the mirror on top of his shirt, folded neatly over his denim Levi’s, both stacked on one side of the table. “Going undercover appeals to me.”

  She thought again of his courage and all that could go wrong, no matter how fearless he was. “It is dangerous.”

  “If I’m not caught, it isn’t.”

  He rose from the table and slipped his deadly-looking knife into its sheath at his hip. She shuddered at the blood that would’ve spilled if he’d been forced to use it at her apartment this afternoon.

  “Know how to shoot a gun?” he asked.

  He produced a Colt pocket pistol with a gleaming silver barrel and held it out to her.

  She didn’t take it.

  “Papa taught my mother and me when his troubles with the Black Hand begin. I do not use a gun since.” She held his gaze. “Why?”

  “You’ll remember how, if you have to.” He laid it next to her on the thin mattress. “Keep it by you while I’m gone.”

  Now that the time had come, apprehension rippled through her at being left alone. Far away from anyone on his father’s ranch. And the night was so dark.

  “A few hours. No more,” he said, watching her.

  She uncoiled from the cot. “Why can you not take me with you?”

  It’d been there all long, she realized suddenly. Her need to see Nikolai again, to learn more about him so she could take her revenge when he least expected it—when she had the advantage.

  Thunder brewed in Creed’s expression. “No.”

  “You can disguise me. Make me look like a man, like you,” she said, the idea of infiltrating the meeting with him taking root. “No one knows I am Gina Briganti.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “He must pay for what he does to my mother and to all of us at Premier. He cannot get away with the terrible thing he has done.”

  “You think I don’t know that?” he demanded.

  Gina pushed on, relentless. “So I must do everything I can to see that he is punished, and if I go to the meeting I can—”

  “I’ll handle the Sokolovs.”

  Defiant, she stood. “I do not want to stay here!”

  “You don’t have a damn clue what you’re up against.”

  “I think I do!”

  “Nikolai will get what’s coming to him. But he’ll get it my way.” Creed pulled a Smith and Wesson revolver from its holster and stuffed it into his waistband. Beneath the ill-fitting jacket, its bulge wasn’t noticeable. “And I won’t have another word from you on it.”

  She pressed her lips together in frustration and glared at him.

  He glared back. “Understand?”

  She made him wait for her response. “Yes.”

  “All right, then.” He took up the last of his weapons, a slim Remington rifle he kept in one hand. With the other, he pushed the battered bowler onto his head. “I’ll get back as fast as I can.”

  “Fine.”

  “Try to get some sleep or something until I do.”

  She flashed him a look of annoyance. Like she was a baby to be hushed?

  He sighed at that look. “Gina. I can’t risk taking you with me. It’s out of the question.”

  “So you say.”

  His mouth tightened under the moustache. “Exactly.”

  He strode to the door, cast her a final glance, then left without saying goodbye. Within moments, the sound of the palomino’s hoofbeats faded away.

  Gina stood stock still. The silence in the little shack closed in on her, the knowledge she’d be spending several hours without him with nothing to do.

  Her glance swung to the shiny Colt lying small and unobtrusive on the cot. Papa had taught her how to shoot for good reason. He would want her to use the little pistol to avenge Mama. He wouldn’t want Gina to be weak and let Creed do it for her.

  Nikolai was no better than the Black Hand. Both struck against the vulnerable and the innocent to further their own demented causes. Each as ruthless as the other.

  Nikolai had to be stopped.

  If she didn’t fight, he would destroy her hopes and dreams, just like the Black Hand had destroyed Papa’s.

  Her veins surging with resolve, she flung open her valise and pulled out a dark fringed scarf. Quickly, she knotted it under her chin, hiding her hair in case some slipped from its pins. She threw on her coat, stashed the pistol securely into her pocket and flew out the door.

  Within moments, she mounted the bay and rode hard out of the valley toward Los Angeles.

  Chapter Twelve

  Creed listened to Nikolai’s ramblings with gritted teeth. Only sheer willpower kept him from bolting from his seat and stuffing his fist down the man’s throat to shut him up.

  The Russian had no remorse for what he had done to the Premier Shirtwaist factory. While he stopped short of admitting his guilt in setting the fire, he praised the results, seeing the building’s destruction in a positive light so that better things might come from it. He preached of a Golden Age in the near future, one without police or judges, no administrative authority and pure freedom. Through it all, he encouraged each man in attendance to apply complete devotion to his cause, even martyrdom if necessary, in pursuit of it.

  And, of course, to be generous with their donations to help him lead the fight.

  Even more disturbing, he had managed to scrape together a following, a ragtag group of America’s poor, troubled and dissatisfied. In their desperation for a better life, they gathered in anger and blind faith, as hungry for vengeance against their plight as they were for bread on their tables.

  Hell, they filled the room, once used as an office for the defunct warehouse. Nikolai stood at the front, an imposing figure with his thick moustache and burly shoulders. Beside him, sitting behind a battered desk, his younger brother, Alex, half his size, silent and pale.

  From his back row seat, Creed studied him. The two brothers couldn’t be more different. Alex was content to let his older sibling rant while his gaze meandered over the group, as if he had nothing better to do except distribute the propaganda stacked neatly on the desktop. Yet he was as guilty as Nikolai in starting the factory fire. He didn’t look strong enough to survive in the harsh world of an unemployed factory worker, but that’s where he was, and all from his own doing.

  It didn’t make sense to Creed. Not that it should. All that mattered was setting the trap for the Sokolovs’ arrest and getting them both off American streets.

  And fast, before President McKinley arrived.

  The sensation of cool air dissipated his thoughts. Alex’s gaze idly lifted toward the room’s back door; Creed’s followed to see a woman slip through and take the last empty chair in his row.

  With a half dozen men between them, he couldn’t see much of her beyond the scarf she wore low over her forehead. Why she’d want to get involved in the male-dominated anarchist world, he couldn’t fathom, and it rankled that her arrival left standing room only for Nikolai’s tirades. How many more of his godforsaken followers would arrive tonight?

  The Russian’s current diatribe ended, and he gestured for a drink to wet his throat. Alex handed him a glass of water, and Nikolai drained it dry; when he handed the glass back, Alex bent close and whispered something in his ear.

  Nikolai’s gaze lifted to the woman in the back row. A mix of wary astonishment
flickered in his expression. He straightened, and a faint smile formed on his lips.

  “Well, comrades, we have an unexpected surprise. A woman has joined us,” he said. “We are fortunate she is interested in helping with our cause, eh?”

  She didn’t move. Every head turned toward her. Including Creed’s.

  “Share with us your ideas,” Nikolai said.

  She remained silent, hunched in her chair. It seemed to Creed her breathing had quickened, as if it mortified her to be the center of attention.

  “Do not be shy.” Again, the Russian urged her, but his voice had taken on a slight edge, as if it annoyed him she didn’t obey him in front of his followers.

  “Leave her alone,” Alex said with a shrug. Clearly, he thought the tongue-tied woman was unworthy of the time it took to prod her. “It is only her first meeting with us. She does not know what to expect.”

  A moment passed while Nikolai considered whether to press the issue. In the end, he gave a relenting nod.

  “Maybe later we will get to know her better,” he conceded. He picked up a piece of paper and shifted his stance, his attention once more on his audience.

  But Creed’s remained on the woman. The profile he could barely discern through the scarf. That little hook to her nose…

  “…received word that someone important to the Americans, someone of the highest authority, is coming—”

  Creed’s thoughts jerked back to Nikolai.

  “—by train very soon.”

  Ominous murmurs went up amongst the men, the seeds of revolt, planted by Nikolai, budding in their minds.

  “And what an opportunity for us, eh, my comrades?” He smiled, cold and calculated.

  Creed’s stomach clenched.

  This was it. The intelligence Graham had received about the president. Somehow, via someone, the top secret information had sailed all the way from Washington, across the country, to land here, in California.

  Into this room full of misguided zealots, thirsty for blood.