Suddenly she heard gunfire crackling in the air, but it wasn't coming from Jet. Taking a chance and peering up, she saw Nash charging towards their campsite from the base of one of the hills. Jet was already in motion abandoning the back of the wagon and leaping onto his horse. Digging his heels in hard and shouting, he took off. Riker and Sara charged onto the scene, and he paused only a moment to call out to see if she was all right.
“Don’t worry about me! I’m fine! It’s the Langstons! They came back for the girls! That’s Jet getting away and he’s got my gun! Get him!” she hollered as Riker hastily reloaded his weapon before dashing towards his horse.
Her brother was on Abel's back instantly, thundering after the sole surviving Langston brother. Sara was standing agape, looking at the corpse. The ground was a ring of dark red spilling out through the man's ruined eye socket. Then her eyes flew about in a panic McKenna had rarely seen.
“Oh my God, it’s them! I can’t believe they came back for us! Where is my baby! Where is Lilybelle?”
“Right here! You can simmer down!”
McKenna shared Sara’s relief at the sight of Lilybelle’s head poking out of the back of the wagon. Quickly, she scrambled down and into the waiting embrace of Sara’s arms. McKenna’s relief deepened as she saw the girl’s clothing was still intact. Still, she had to ask.
“He didn’t?”
Lilybelle shook her head, “No, he was all just kissing on me is as far as we got. His breath made an outhouse smell like a flower garden compared to it!”
McKenna chuckled and shook her head, thankful that the girl had her spunk and spirit about her and was none the worse for wear, despite the terror of the last few minutes. Worry, however, quickly clouded over her as off in the distance somewhere down the length of the escarpment came the sound of a gun battle.
***
Riker rode stewing in a cold, hard fury that these men had been unwilling to let go of their constant harassment of the Keene sisters to the point they had returned. He was going to see it come to an end here and now! The marshal had followed the desperado into the gap between the series of hills and the towering wall of the slope that rose above them on the left. Riker was gaining on Langston when he was forced to duck as the man took a shot back at him before leaning to one side to return fire. Langston swerved around some fallen boulders that littered the bottom of the escarpment and Riker followed suit veering around the big rocks until he came up short behind another boulder the size of a small wagon. Cursing softly to himself, he guided Abel around it and picked up the chase.
Not today, you are not getting away he thought as another shot zinged through the spring air and rang off a nearby rock. Riker snapped off two more at the man as he navigated Abel around the limestone obstacles, keeping his speed up the best he could before Langston could get too far ahead. Abel picked up the pace and Riker let loose with another shot, reminding himself he only had two left. Up ahead he saw Langston pointing back and ducked. Nothing happened and then he spied the man throw his clearly empty gun away and reach for his belt yanking out another weapon that had to be McKenna’s. Nash leaned down next to Abel’s neck, trying to get closer to his ears. Langston was pulling further ahead now, and he urgently prodded the Mustang faster.
***
Ahead Jet could see in the distance the enormous pile of rubble that had broken off the cliff face as well as the cleft in the wall. Alarm mushroomed within him as the way ahead was blocked and on his other side were hills that attempting to go up would only slow him down, allowing his pursuer to catch up. In desperation, Jet yanked the reins and turned into the cleft. Years ago, he could recall traveling through a similar one back in Texas that emerged on the far side into a valley. He could only hope this would be similar and not a dead end. Looking back, he saw the man had followed him in. As tendrils of panic took root, he swung the gun around they had liberated from the woman. They … there was no more they. Cole! How could he be dead? How could this have gone so wrong?! Angrily, he blasted another shot over his shoulder at his pursuer.
Deeper into the cleft he rode, praying this would be his way out and lead to his salvation. Instead, he unleashed a growl, laced with an obscenity as he saw the walls closing in on him, becoming narrower the further into it he traveled. It wouldn't matter if he could just kill the tall man on the Mustang. Twisting around in his saddle, hot lead spewed from the stolen gun and heard the ricochet off of rocks seconds before he felt a bullet whiz past his head as soon as he heard the shot from the damn samaritan. He felt the blood begin to drain from his face as the cleft grew narrower still and he could see it was indeed coming to a dead end. Desperately he fired over his shoulder until he'd emptied the woman's gun and the clicking sound of the hammer striking an empty chamber felt like a funeral dirge.
***
Riker had entered the cleft after Langston marveling at the man's either desperation or outright stupidity. He had ridden hard and had returned a shot before hearing a ricochet off a nearby rock. The way was getting too narrow to avoid the bullets for long, Riker thought, gritting his teeth in determination. As he approached the dead end, he saw Langston jump off his horse and toss McKenna's gun aside, needing both hands as he began to scale the wall. The man was launching a last desperate bid to escape, and Riker knew it was the break he was waiting for.
“Stop, Jet Langston! Come down or I’ll make you the hard way!” Riker shouted at the man and rode to a stop, staring up at the fugitive struggling on the cliff face. The jasper didn’t answer and just kept going making Riker shake his head while raising his gun. The light inside the narrow confines of the fissure was dim but he had no problem sighting one of the man's hands as he reached for a protruding boulder. Riker's finger floated on the trigger, but then he froze at the sudden occurrence of a low, ominous grinding sound.
The hand Riker had been targeting had seized hold of a protrusion above him that proved to be a precarious boulder jutting out from the wall. As Jet had pulled on it attempting to haul himself up higher, the rock began to come free from the cliff. The fleeing lawbreaker was twenty feet up as the notoriously unstable limestone rock came loose amidst a nerve-jangling scraping sound. Riker knew Jet's flight was about to come to a bloody end.
Accompanied by Langston’s wailing cry of frustration and loss, the boulder came free and both it and the man clutching it became airborne tumbling downward. Jet crashed to the ground with the boulder slamming his chest, pulverizing muscle and bone beneath it as it landed. Riker leaped off Abel and ran over, stopping to pick up McKenna’s gun as he eyed the pathetic mess that had been one of the leaders of the wagon train. Shoving the gun in his belt, he watched Jet Langston was gasping for air. With his chest crushed, he coughed and groaned weakly as a flood of dark blood gushed out of his mouth, pooling around his head. Suddenly like a candle being blown out, his whole body relaxed as he passed into the waiting embrace of death.
***
Dismounting back at camp, McKenna quickly brought Riker up to speed on the Langston’s ambush and Lilybelle’s status. The teenager was still swaddled in Sara’s arms, but he was grateful that no harm had come to Sara’s sister. He and McKenna worked together to wrap the corpse into a blanket and secure it to the back of Cole’s horse that was tied up to a nearby tree, side by side with the horse bearing the similarly wrapped body of its master, Jet Langston.
As they walked away, they paused for a moment and looked back over their shoulders. McKenna’s face shown with mirth as she nodded back towards the ill-fated bandits.
“You know … this the first time that the jaspers we’ve gone up against –”
“-managed to kill themselves and save us the trouble of bringing them to justice!” he finished for her as he slung his arm around her shoulder, and they walked back towards two very grateful young women.
CHAPTER 5
BULLET, CALIFORNIA
“This is so good of you to give us such a fair price!” Sara Keene bubbled as she laid the bills into t
he hands of a dashing man. His head was crowned with flowing locks of blonde hair that for all the world reminded her of illustrations she had seen of General George Armstrong Custer who was making a quite a name for himself in the Army. The man chuckled as he made the money vanish in his pocket and nodded at McKenna Riker who was standing by Sara in the trading post.
“I’m not gonna nickel and dime you after McKenna here brought me the business of an entire extra wagon train.”
“I’m just glad the wagon master laid up here turned out to be you, Hans!” McKenna said, and there was something about the arch of her eyebrow that suggested to Sara there was more going on here than met the eye.
“Just how do you two know each other?”
“Well, let’s just say that I’m well-traveled in the West and meet a lot of people and Mister Johansson is one of them.” McKenna and the wagon master exchanged a look and suddenly Sara had a feeling they knew each other in the so-called biblical sense.
“Why don’t you run along and meet up with Nash. I know you have … plans.” The female deputy said and let her words hang there. How much did she suspect? Sara wondered. Probably everything she concluded, given how close she appeared to be to Nash.
“I’ll look after Lilybelle when she comes back from meeting up with the friends she made on the wagon train.”
Sara needed no further prompting, and she thanked the woman and made to hustle out the door. As she was leaving, McKenna remarked that Johansson seemed to have made a remarkable recovery from the fever. That last thing she heard before she closed the door behind her was the wagon master’s laugh and the words,
“You can’t keep a good man down. I’m up for anything … anything at all, McKenna.” And then Sara knew her suspicions were correct.
Sara hurried past the long line of covered wagons that had been parked in Bullet, now supplemented by the convoy she had been a part of. So much had happened since the events of earlier she could hardly believe it. As she bustled along, waving and nodding to familiar people from her wagon train, her mind ticked off everything that had occurred since the Langston brothers’ attack.
Bearing the bodies on their horses, their wagon still pulled by the Rikers' horses had caught up to the convoy which had just successfully crossed the river that had subsided enough for safe passage. Marshal Riker and his sister immediately dropped down off their wagon as they finished their own crossing. A figure on horseback was galloping alongside the line of wagons heading towards them … Dieter Langston.
The man hadn’t even had a chance to open his mouth to start blustering when Riker had marched right up to his horse and yanked the man down off from it. Dieter’s arms had begun wind milling as he tried to break free from the lawman’s grasp, but it was to no avail. Riker snapped the man’s arms behind him and hustled him to the back of their wagon. Releasing the man, he had pushed him forward towards the two horses tied at the rear.
Dieter's angry, red face had immediately drained away to a sickly pale white as he recognized the horses and saw their grim cargo. No words came from the man's mouth as he tried to speak. Finally, he had turned around with a dazed look on his face. For a fleeting moment, Sara had felt a flicker of pity for the man. Losing loved ones was the bitterest of pills life had to offer.
“You…you killed them! You killed my boys!” the corrupt wagon master finally managed to blurt out through his clenched teeth with a wild look in his eyes.
“They were out to rape and murder the Keene sisters—but no, the fools managed to kill themselves in the process.”
“H-how,” The man barely managed to mumble as McKenna had drawn close to him.
“That doesn’t matter right now. There’ll be an undertaker in Bullet that can see to your needs. As for now, we’ll give you a few moments to grieve and then you're going to go to the strong box that Sara said you keep the payment from all these good people in and refund each and every one of them. After that, I'm taking the convoy to Bullet and see if they use their refunds to join a convoy already there. You, sir, however, are out of business, and I don't want to hear about you ever leading another one of these trains again. Understood?"
At that point, the man had gone completely numb and just shook his head. An hour later, the money was in the pockets of the head of each pioneer family and the convoy had rolled out, leaving behind Langston, his wagon, and his pair of dead sons.
Sara’s path took her past the undertaker’s shop and she saw Langston had caught up with them eventually, and his Conestoga was parked out in front of it. Jet and Cole’s horses were tied to a hitching post, but the bodies of the two were nowhere to be seen, most likely being fitted for pine boxes, she thought.
Finally, she caught sight of a tall form leaning against the front wall of the general store. She was still marveling over the fact that he had been a marshal all along, but it had made sense in retrospect given everything she had witnessed from him. He held a basket in his hand for their planned dinner along the banks of the Somerset as it flowed past Bullet. Nash had proposed it earlier as the convoy had made their way towards town, and she had wholeheartedly accepted. They had business to finish!
With a warm smile on his face, Riker greeted her, and they set out for the edge of town. Soon it had receded behind them as they neared the edge of the Somerset. The setting sun created a beautiful, radiant glow in the distance; a glow which the river mirrored through its rolling, gliding waves. As soon as they arrived hand in hand at the bank of the river, Sara let her eyes take in the beautiful scene before she let out a soft sigh. She was excited; any woman would feel such lust if they had such a handsome man like Nash Riker setting their skin on fire with his smooth blend of charm and rugged good looks.
As if Nash could read her mind, he caressed the middle of her palm with his fingers and glanced sideways to smile at her. "Sara …," he whispered, staring passionately into her eyes and then grinning mischievously. "This looks like a place to pick up where we left off before the Langston brothers' ambush, don't you think?"
She beamed back at him, stepping in front of him so she could wrap her arms around his neck. "Aye. It will do just fine," she answered as she took the picnic basket and cast it aside. That could wait; this was a different kind of hunger they both shared.
He smiled once again, and she put a stop to his mischief by smashing her lips against his. He groaned softly into her mouth, holding her waist and dragging her close to him. Her soft breasts smoothed against his solid chest while she could feel his shaft hardening against her abdomen. Lost in the immediate desire, she searched for his hand until she found it and then guided it to her left breast.
Nash took the hint instantly. He squeezed gently at first, nibbling on her lower lip. Afterward, his other hand slid up her dress, caressing her thigh and then inching upward to cup her butt cheek.
"Nash." she moaned, instantly worried he would take that as a command to slow down, but she needn't have worried as he had no such intentions. Riker stepped backward, taking her with him until they were both on their knees underneath a small tree that sprouted by the bank. He broke off their kiss then, hurrying to unbutton his shirt and pants. Sara stared at his body, marveling once more at his broad shoulders and muscular chest, only this time it was his bare glistening bronzed flesh she was taking in. His massive arms flexed as he moved, and she felt electrifying jolts coursing through her spine just by staring at his god-like body.
“Wait, let me do that.” she offered, stopping him before he pulled down his pants.
She inched forward, slipping her hand through his waistband and gripping his cock like a prize. He let out a soft sigh and closed his eyes while she gripped harder, loving the feel of his warm cock in her palm.
“Sara!” he breathed, his massive chest rising and falling.
She was about to unleash the beast in him and she didn’t have to stare into his hazel eyes to see it. When she finally slid down his jeans and underwear, freeing to her delight his nine-inch cock, he held her sho
ulders, slowly pushed her down to the bare sand and he worked his magic on her.
Sara had no idea how he did it, but her clothing was stripped from her body in a jiffy and free of any constraints she widened her legs. Riker caressed her bare thighs with his fingers while his lips tasted the sweat off her arms, neck, shoulders and then her small conical breasts. She closed her eyes, allowing the warmth between her thighs to be the only feeling her brain could understand. Soon, she felt his finger rubbing her beneath the triangular jumble of black hair below her waist and she let out a loud moan, unable to take it anymore.
"I want you now," she told him. "I want you!"
He stared up to look at her, nodding that he was ready too. Widening her thighs further for him, she watched as he placed himself atop her and slowly shoved himself into her, his huge pleasure maker filling her wet, slippery hole.
“Oh my….”
Words couldn’t describe the rippling ecstasy that she felt. Her thighs shuddered with the effect of his hard thrusts while her heart beat rapidly against her chest. When he thrust deeper and faster into her, letting out a few grunts, she closed her eyes and willed her body to give in to her orgasm. Her slick pussy throbbed against his dick until eventually, what she saw was darkness, and bliss.
“Sara!” Nash groaned, thrusting his last before erupting deep inside her, pumping mightily until spent he fell to one side of her, grabbing her as he did so, pulling her on top of him.
"That was—that was…." she gasped, but words escaped her as she lay with one side of her head on his chest. Her glazed eyes barely registered the sight of a fish suddenly leaping from the water before disappearing once more below the surface. Riker was smiling at her as he caught his breath while toying with her hair. They lay there in bliss for several long moments before he finally helped her to her feet. He made a move towards the chilly river and held out his hand to her.
Six-Guns Or Surrender (Lincoln's Lawman Book 1) Page 4
