Trevor had nothing to tell about Hunter. He hadn’t seen him for five damned years. In five years behind the same prison walls, the men hadn’t been allowed to lay eyes on each other.
After Jacy left the station with the old mail carrier, Trevor searched it, thinking maybe Drummond had stayed behind. He didn’t find him, or much of anything else except one old trunk. Opening it, his heart stopped at sight of Jacy’s doeskin riding habit, designed for the roundup parade that last year. That’s when he gave her the cross, damning himself for the sentiment all the while.
He almost left the cross in the trunk, but at the last minute, stuck it in his pocket. Just what he would do with it, he had no idea. He picked up the mail wagon’s trail down the next hill, his mind still on Jacy. Seeing her had shaken him. No doubt about it. Her dismal circumstances were only partially to blame.
She had kept little of their former life, and he wondered why. The Jacy Kimble he knew took to the accoutrements of wealth like the proverbial duck to water. He couldn’t conceive of her giving up everything.
Why had she brought so few possessions? What had happened to their lives. Nothing he had learned in Arizona explained their present situation.
Regardless, she kept the cross and he wondered why. Studded with lapis instead of the more common turquoise, it was unusual but far from rare. It matched the doeskin outfit, but he wasn’t ready to believe that was the only reason she kept it. More to the point, why had she been holding it when he walked in? That, now, was the intriguing question.
When she left the mail wagon and headed for the heart of El Paso afoot, Trevor was further confused. Like most Westerners, Jacy Kimble never walked farther than from the house to the corral. He followed on horseback, keeping well out of sight. Not until she reached the plaza, did his own naïveté astound him. What if it weren’t Drummond she was meeting, but some other man—a husband?
The thought unnerved him. He fought the swelling of anguish with anger. If she had a husband, the scoundrel damned sure wasn’t providing for her. Trevor swore under his breath, feeling a stab of jealousy, which was both unwelcome and unwarranted.
Curiously he watched her approach an old drunk who was passed out on a bench in the plaza, trebling his confusion. Coming as close as he dared, he watched her prod and pull the old man, cajoling him to his feet.
Could this be Drummond Kimble? At first Trevor refused to believe it. But who else? The thick thatch of hair was right; the color, snow-white, wrong. The height, a couple of inches short of six foot, was right; the limp body, shabby clothing, debauched demeanor all were wrong. As was the man’s obvious lack of control, even over his own body.
Five years ago Drummond Kimble had been one of the most powerful men in Arizona, spoken of as the next territorial governor. Even the murder trial hadn’t broken the man’s blustering spirit, not so Trevor had noticed. Day after long day in the courtroom Drummond Kimble appeared the same posturing, swaggering, self-styled despot who had scorned Trevor as not good enough to be friends with his son; definitely not good enough to court his daughter.
From the message board across from the new plaza, Trevor watched the man stumble and fall. When Jacy tripped, his heart jumped to his throat. He had to help her. He couldn’t watch…
Two steps. He stopped. Damnit, time was running out for Hunter. Trevor knew he wouldn’t get two words with Drummond if Jacy saw him within ten miles of this place. No, he had to hide and watch, pick his time and place, catch Drummond alone.
The idea further unsettled him. He and Jacy had always been honest with each other. He respected her too much to go behind her back. Yet, from the way she reacted today, he saw no choice.
As he watched, a carriage pulled up to the curb. A man stepped out and handed a lady onto the path. Help had arrived. Trevor’s overworked conscience relaxed.
He saw the couple pause, say something to Jacy, then turn away. In the space of a heartbeat, Trevor saw the truth. Reality.
Even from the distance, the snub was obvious. Trevor’s gut clenched; his fists clenched. He wanted to knock that cocky son-of-a-bitch’s head off and feed the woman’s black ostrich hat to the alligators.
While he steamed, Jacy recovered. Gaining balance, she steered the teetering old man back the way she had earlier come. Trevor felt exhausted and sick, watching her, wanting to help, yet holding himself back.
By the time Drummond stumbled again, Trevor was past caring whether she followed up her threat to turn him in to Constable Selman. She needed help, and by God, he was going to help her. He stepped away from the post.
A kid dashed around the corner, raced in front of him. Jacy glanced toward the boy, called to him.
“Todd!”
Todd? Hunter’s eldest. Something soft caught in Trevor’s throat. The boy had gone everywhere with them, ridden the ranges, rounded up cattle. He’d been only ten or so, which would make him no more than fifteen now. Again Trevor marveled at how much he missed those kids.
That family, he corrected mentally. Hunter and Mari had taken him in, a stranger, a hired hand, and made him one of them. Hunter truly was the best friend Trevor ever had. And Mari. Instead of resenting the time the two of them spent together, Marielena welcomed Trevor into her home and her life.
He smiled, recalling how she badgered him about holding little Carter. He resisted, for already he had come to care for these people too much for his own good.
“Todd!” Jacy’s second call brought Trevor out of his reverie. Yes, he had missed this family. He watched Todd slow, then toss a defiant glare toward his aunt. His stance shouted disrespect. The kid needed a whipping, that’s what he needed. A man’s firm hand.
From the looks of things Drummond Kimble was fresh out of firm hands. Pushed by the debt he owed his friend, by his love for this family, and, who was he kidding, by his unnameable feelings for Jacy, Trevor stepped toward the unruly boy.
Jacy saw him. When their gazes locked, he read the same rebuke in her eyes he had seen earlier when he tried to speak to Carter. Rebuke, combined with more raw fear than Trevor had seen outside prison walls. It was a blow he had not expected.
She was afraid of him. Afraid he would taint the children? Afraid he would speak to her father? He looked back at Todd, who still had not seen him. The kid was too busy showing his aunt who wore the pants in this family.
From the little Trevor had seen, it was obvious who was trying to wear the pants. And Jacy Kimble had never been one to fail. Not at anything.
Although at present she had her hands full. He could help her, if she would let him, which she had no intention of doing. For the time being, he wouldn’t challenge her.
With a finger to his hat brim, he nodded in dismissal, and for the second time today turned his back and walked away from this woman and her problems.
Down the street, he entered the first open door. It happened to be the Gem Saloon. He ordered rye at the bar and belted it down. The bartender hit him again. After he downed three jiggers of rough liquor, a man appeared at his elbow—a well-dressed gentleman, with black mustache and a reserved demeanor that issued a cautionary welcome.
“Name’s Hardin,” the gentleman offered. “Wes Hardin. Could I interest you in a game of dice?”
“Why not?” Trevor considered the man, who was known far and wide as the killingest outlaw ever to come out of Texas. John Wesley Hardin, recently released from Huntsville Prison, practicing law in El Paso. Even in Yuma Prison that had made news.
“Not that it’s any of my business, mind you,” Hardin began, striking a match on the heel of one of his black stove-tops, lighting a cigar before offering one to Trevor, who refused. “But I’ve been watching you watch that lady.”
Trevor tensed. John Wesley Hardin and Jacy? His stomach knotted. “So?”
“It’s a rough town,” Hardin allowed. “Lady like that bears watching.”
Hardin rolled the dice. Five and seven. He shoved the cup toward Trevor. “It’s a small town, too. Small and rough. P
lace like this, word travels fast. Doesn’t take a fool to figure out who you are.” He nodded congenially. “You may know that of the many things folks have called me, foolish never stuck.”
Using the cup, Trevor scooped up the dice, dropped them in and shook. “I mean her no harm.” He pitched the dice. They rolled to a stop, an eight and a deuce.
“Didn’t figure you did.” Hardin held the cigar between thumb and forefinger, considering it. “Best thing for you, if you don’t mind my saying so, is to get off the street. If I figured out who you are, you can bet others will, too.”
Speaking, the former outlaw fished into the pocket of his black worsted vest and withdrew a door key. “To my apartment,” he explained. “Go south to Overland, two blocks up, second floor, number seven. If Rosa’s still there, send her back across the river.”
Trevor took the key, downed the last of his whiskey, and grinned. “Wouldn’t want to come between a man and his pleasure.”
Hardin clapped him on the shoulder. “Who knows? You might be saving my life, son. Rosa’s old man’s been threatening to swim the river and cut off my you-know-what if I don’t leave his señora alone. Besides, I’m anxious as a polecat with his tail caught in a trap to talk to the man who escaped from Yuma Prison. In all my years, the only place I couldn’t break out of was that joint down in Huntsville. I’m fairly itching to learn how you accomplished such a feat.”
Three
Jacy stood as still as her racing heart would allow, watching until Trevor disappeared down El Paso Street. Her legs trembled so badly, she felt like she was the one who needed a helping arm.
Todd had disappeared again, too. This time she was glad, for he would recognize Trevor right off. He had looked up to Trevor most of his life. Now the man he called uncle was an escaped convict, and Todd would take to that like most boys took to summertime.
Jacy couldn’t allow it, wouldn’t allow it. Yet, at the moment, she felt powerless to direct the course of their lives. With Trevor obviously serious about finding Drummond, the little control she had over the welfare of this family evaporated into the dry desert heat.
What could she do? She wasn’t a mother hen who could sit on her chicks to keep them from the wolf. The wolf had come down from the hills and there was nothing she could do to protect her father from him, or Todd.
Or even herself. Especially herself, she thought, acknowledging the shameful way she responded to the merest sight of Trevor. Foolish as it was, looking at him eased her burden; speaking to him had been a renewal; knowing he was here, close by, somehow made things easier.
And ever so much more difficult. But what could she do, short of turning him into the constable? The idea was so abhorrent, her stomach tumbled. Cowardly, she thought perhaps he would get caught on his own.
For a man on the run, escaped or not, he was foolish to appear on a public street. But he always had possessed steel for nerves. And stew for brains, she recalled telling him once. Drummond pegged him right, though, from the beginning.
“He’s been down, Sis. All the way to the bottom.”
“Rubbish, Papa. You know nothing about the man.”
“I know the look. Those eyes are like vault doors, locking out the world. But nine times out of ten when a man gets that sort of look, there’s nothing left inside to protect. Nothing but meanness.”
Jacy argued, of course. It wasn’t until later she learned how right Drummond had been, how very little there was left inside Trevor. No emotion, no warmth, no love. He proved that by coldly refusing to see her during the trial and by allowing Hunter to be convicted of murder.
“Fallon has defeat written all over him,” Drummond warned, well before the murder. “A defeated man has nothing left to lose, Sis. And when a man has nothing left to lose, he’ll charge hell with a bucket of water to keep from being defeated again.”
The recollection sent a shiver down Jacy’s arms. Trevor certainly had nothing left to lose now. She must stay alert and wary, even though that seemed akin to locking the barn door after the cow escaped.
After they had hobbled a couple of blocks from the plaza, Drummond found the strength to walk on his own, but he didn’t speak until they were almost home. Then he surprised her by taking note of her agitated state.
“What’s ailin’ you, Sis?” he wanted to know.
“Ailing me? Now, that’s a funny question. I find you passed out in a public park, and you ask what ails me?” She had never really lost patience with Drummond, for his loss was immeasurably greater than her own, than the rest of the family’s put together. The sun bore down on them. It was unbearably hot this time of day.
“Puttin’ the alligators to bed,” he mumbled.
“Save that for the children.” She wiped a roll of perspiration off her neck and wished she had thought to bring a parasol. A few steps more, she added, “I don’t need an explanation. If I were a man, I might be driven to drink, too.”
“You worry too much,” he observed.
She let it pass, having long since decided that to make it through this dreadful stage of their lives, she must focus only on the day at hand. Which, considering the way this day began, might well be enough to drive her mad.
“You’ve gotta let that boy be a boy,” Drummond advised in the slurred speech she had become accustomed to.
“Todd? Since you brought it up, I am worried about Todd. He admires the wrong people. The plaza and saloons are no places for a boy.”
Drummond knocked a caliche clod out of his path with his walking stick. “He misses his father,” he said in one of the most lucid observations she had heard from him in a while.
Which was doubly aggravating to Jacy. If he knew Todd missed his father, he should be trying to fill Hunter’s place. But Drummond was Hunter’s father, and Hunter was in prison awaiting execution. Jacy often thought that must be the cruelest thing a parent could experience.
“We all miss his father,” she said, attempting to console even as she wanted to reproach. “When Hunter gets home—”
“Hunter’s not coming home, Sis. You might as well get that through your head. That brother of yours is in prison for life.”
She sighed. “I won’t let him hang, Papa. Wes Hardin won’t give up, either. We’re going to get him a new trial.”
“You’re wasting your time.”
“Maybe,” she acknowledged, then quieter, “I can’t let him hang.”
“He won’t hang, Sis. Trust your ol’ papa.”
She didn’t argue. If he wanted to believe that, she couldn’t stop him. Each one of them must cope with the tragedy in his or her own way. If Drummond’s way was rejecting it, that was his choice.
A block from the stage station, she became aware of a commotion coming from the house. Screaming. Wailing. She strained to better make sense of it.
“Hurry, Papa.” Catching Drummond’s arm again, she pulled him ahead. Little Carter was the first sign of life. He flew out the front door like he’d been propelled by a strong wind. Seeing Jacy, he raced to her and flung himself around her legs.
Fast behind him came Sophie, who caught Carter and tried to drag him away. The child held on, burrowing his face into Jacy’s skirts.
All Jacy could make out was “Constable…Constable…”
Her heart skipped a beat. “What has happened?” Releasing Drummond, she knelt, partially because her legs were so weak she could no longer stand. Had Trevor been caught?
“Constable Selman isn’t going to take Tía Bella away,” Sophie soothed. But Carter continued to sob.
“No, of course he isn’t, darling,” Jacy soothed. “Of course he isn’t.” He’s taking Trevor. It was best. Of course, it was best. But at the moment, it was the hardest blow of all. Lord, was her heart so fickle?
“Jacy,” Mari called from the porch. “Thank goodness you’re here. You can do something. Talk to him.”
Talk? To whom? In answer to her unspoken questions, John Selman’s hulk formed a black shadow in the doorway. The
same doorway in which Trevor had earlier stood. Obtusely, that offended Jacy. She would hear Trevor’s fate spoken from the same doorway where hope, however foolish, had so recently sprung.
With mechanical movements, she tugged Carter’s little arms from around her legs and handed him to Sophie.
“Help Grandpa,” Jacy said quietly. Instead of arguing like she usually did about everything, the girl took the old man by the arm. From somewhere distant, Jacy heard her speak softly.
“Come, Grandpa, we’ll take Carter around back. Mama made buñuelos when she returned from Mass.”
By the time Jacy reached the porch, her heart was steeled, her brain dead, and her face a mask, or so she hoped.
“Constable?”
The old man swung around. He was too old to be a lawman, she thought. Too old to seal another man’s fate. Although Trevor had sealed his own fate five years earlier. And two weeks ago, when he took things into his own hands and broke out of Yuma Prison.
If he broke out of prison, she thought, marveling at her loyalty to the man.
“Ma’am.” The constable bowed slightly, polite, but not overdoing it. These were, after all, second-class citizens. And it wasn’t election year.
He pulled a folded letter from inside his striped vest and handed it to her. “This here complaint was filed a while ago,” he said, “by one Señor Miguel Flores and signed by him personal in my presence.”
So what, Jacy wanted to retort. But she held her tongue, trying to make sense of the matter, while inside her, dread built a nest large enough for a vulture.
“Sorry to tell you, ma’am, but I’ll have to take the señora in.”
“Who?”
“The señora,” Selman repeated, nodding toward a corner of the large earthen-floored room, where Tía Bella huddled in a rawhide-bottomed chair beside the adobe hearth, black rebozo wrapped tightly around her shoulders. She cradled Gato, her calico cat, in her lap. She was a small woman, white-haired, old and wrinkled, but full of vinegar. Her expression would have lighted a fire if they’d had kindling in the hearth.
Branded Page 5