She turned the horse back toward Phoenix about to kick him into a run when she saw a tiny speck between her and the distant town. She stopped, leaning forward to stroke the horse’s sleek, wet neck.
She had good eyes, but the riders, if the speck was riders, were too far away: just a tiny cloud of dark vapor, but something flashed a warning at her.
“You be careful, dear. Remember what happened to that other young lady.” She looked for cover and found it less than a hundred feet away. There was probably no need for this but…
She stifled her doubts. It would cost nothing but a little time to be careful. She waited a half hour before they came into sight. Recognizing them, she stiffened in surprise and rushed to cover her horse’s mouth so he wouldn’t snort and draw attention to her.
Dallas Younger and Tim Summers! What an unlikely duo! Especially since Tim had told Chane he was going to Tucson about family problems! Tucson was the other direction.
Her heart was pounding, a heavy ache in her chest. She was afraid, stunned, but she didn’t know why she should be. Tim could have a perfectly reasonable excuse for riding north into the mountains with Dallas Younger.
Could she follow them and find out what they were up to? She waited until they passed out of sight, and followed at a pace calculated to keep her well behind them. The tracks were plain in the soft, sandy loam. It should be no problem to follow them as long as they didn’t see her.
By sundown the cattle, stretching back as far as Ward could see, had begun to settle down to the drive. It would take time before they adjusted fully, and the drive—four days—would be over before they made it. Cedar Longley was in charge. He was the closest thing this bunch had to a trailwise drover who knew where they were going.
Ward didn’t stay in one position long. He rode lead and then drag and then rode ahead to see if the cook had found a suitable place to stop for the night. The heavily laden chuckwagon was already camped.
Dinner was simmering over the cook fires and Sandra lay on a pallet under a tree with blankets pulled up under her chin. When she saw Ward she came up into a sitting position.
“You can’t hold me prisoner forever,” she said angrily.
Ward dismounted and poured himself a cup of coffee. “I don’t intend to. I’m taking you home, where you belong.” He hunkered down between his horse and the campfire.
“I don’t belong at home! I belong with Dallas. He isn’t anything like you said. He’s nice, and he loves me.”
“After you explain to your father that I didn’t kidnap you, you can go anywhere you want, with anyone you please,” he said flatly.
“That’s all you care about, isn’t it? That’s all you ever cared about! You never cared about me—just your own skin!”
Ward grinned. “It has been on my mind.”
“Don’t you dare laugh at me!” she yelled, coming to her feet. “You won’t think this is funny when Dallas gets back! He’ll kill you! He’s not going to let you get away with this! Even if you did kill him, which you can’t, ’cause you’re not good enough, the others would kill you.”
“Got it all figured out, don’t you, Trinket?” he asked, still grinning.
“You’re crazy. You can’t possibly survive this! Why aren’t you worried? Why don’t you just ride away before Dallas comes back, and save yourself. I don’t really want to see you die,” she said, her eyes dropping away from his.
“I am worried,” he said evenly. “I think you’ve got it figured right.”
“Then why are you smiling?”
“Why not?” He shrugged. He stood up, reached into his saddlebags, and tossed her the necklace he was carrying for her. She frowned at him, fingering the chill necklace until a light dawned in her eyes. He was giving it back so she could give it to someone who would survive her. Someone who would be around to remember her. But now that Dallas loved her she no longer felt like she was going to die. She felt invincible.
Slowly, still looking into Cantrell’s eyes, she fastened the necklace around her throat. They didn’t talk anymore. Ward finished his coffee and rode back to rejoin his herd.
The sun had just slipped beneath the horizon, and the sky was ablaze with gold, red, and purple clouds when Dallas Younger spotted the herd milling around as the riders tried to drive them into a blind canyon to hold them overnight.
“Whoa,” Dallas said softly. “Whoa, Maverick.”
“So, we finally come face to face with Cantrell,” Summers said, a feral light glittering in his black eyes.
“No holds barred,” Dallas said grimly, checking his gun. He spun the cylinder, broke it, and added one bullet where he usually carried only five. It was a safety precaution to keep an empty chamber under the hammer when he wasn’t expecting trouble.
“What are you going to do?” Tim asked.
“Wait till they settle them steers down and most of ’em are around the cookfires eatin’. I reckon that’ll be as good a time as any to face him.”
“Your men behind him and you in front of him.” Summers grinned with satisfaction. Younger was a better man than he had thought. Too bad he didn’t need him any longer. He chuckled. “Too bad I can’t watch firsthand.”
“I thought you were riding in with me,” Dallas said, a frown pulling his straight black brows down.
“You know I can’t afford to have that many people know who I am,” he said testily, looking at Younger as if he weren’t too bright.
Dallas Younger’s cool dark eyes swept over him. “What did ya come along for?”
“To make sure Cantrell is dead. I told you that once, and I don’t like repeating myself,” Tim said, his tone harsh, cutting.
Dallas grunted to himself, thinking, or to finish me off if I survive killing Cantrell? Ever since Powers’s death he had been thinking like that. Last night when someone had tried to cut his throat—the same way Powers died—his suspicions had multiplied.
Since Cantrell had killed every member of Summers’s special troops, only Slim Parker and he knew who the real head of the gang was. It would be no problem for Summers to get rid of the trusting Parker. With himself and Parker dead, Summers would be in the clear for good. No one could tie the murders or the rustling back to him. He could marry Leslie Powers next Saturday and be a rich and respectable man.
Dallas settled down to wait for the right time. Dusk came, the sky turned smoky gray, and the riders wandered in one by one to the cookfires that burned like three beacons in the distance.
Finally Dallas stood up and mounted his horse. Summers maintained his stance by the oak tree he was leaning against.
“Mount up,” Dallas said tersely.
“What did you say?” Summers shot him an incredulous look, his pale face mirroring the disruption Younger’s insolent command caused in him.
“I said mount up. I’m taking you with me. If you’re worried about your reputation, you can go in as my prisoner. No one will know except me that you’re not.”
“This is ludicrous! You don’t need me,” he protested, fighting for control. He was furious, but this was not the time to vent that fury. He would settle with Younger later—after the man killed Cantrell.
“Mount up,” Dallas said softly, inexorably, drawing his gun smoothly to aim it at Summers’s chest.
Tim hid his venom behind his usual calm mask as he strode to his horse. He mounted. They rode boldly down the incline into the camp. There was still enough light so that one of the men, looking up from his bowl of beans, yelled: “Hey, it’s the boss!”
Dallas heard Sweetface give a glad cry, and grinned before he settled down to business. He singled out Cantrell and decided how he was going to proceed.
No one made a move to slow their progress. Summers rode in front like a hostage. There was complete silence when they stopped beside the cookfire Cantrell stood in front of.
With the fire between them, Younger and Cantrell faced each other.
“Welcome back,” Cantrell said quietly.
You
nger trained the gun on Cantrell’s broad chest and grinned. “It’s good to be back.” Then, without taking his eyes off Ward, he said, “Hey Cedar, you here?”
“Over here, boss.”
“Good. I want you to take all the boys and get that herd moving again.”
“What?” Tim asked incredulously, turning on Younger.
“You better learn to keep quiet,” Dallas growled.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Summers asked vehemently, ignoring Dallas’s warning.
“The boys are going to drive those steers to the railroad so I can settle my business here and join them,” he said coolly.
Cedar Longley looked at Dallas, saw that he meant what he said, and shouted an order for the men to get moving. There was a scramble of activity, some grumbles about the change, as men put down their bowls and coffee cups and began to run for the remuda and their horses.
Sandra came forward from the shadows. “Dallas, honey, I’m staying with you, aren’t I?”
Dallas frowned. He had forgotten her momentarily. “I reckon,” he said finally. “Don’t move, though. Stay outta my way.” She was behind Cantrell, between him and the chuckwagon but far enough to Cantrell’s right so she was out of the line of fire. “Summers, go stand by Cantrell so I can keep an eye on both of you without straining too much.”
Tight-lipped with fury, Tim complied. They waited like that while Longley and the others saddled up and moved out to start the cattle moving again. The cook started to move the wagon, but Dallas told him to leave it. He nodded and ran to find himself a horse. Soon they were gone, leaving Tim, Sandra, and Cantrell waiting silently across the fire from Younger, waiting for him to make his move.
Chapter Fifty
Ward turned and grinned at Summers. “You can relax now. No one can hear you anymore.”
“What do you mean by that?” Summers asked, contempt showing in the oily glitter of his black eyes.
“You’re Younger’s boss. It was a good ploy, but no longer necessary. I knew two days ago. I just didn’t realize I knew until you Came riding in here.”
“How did you know?”
“You’re the one who had something to gain by killing Powers and framing me, and you were the one in Kincaid’s office with the pull to cover your tracks.”
“Too bad you found out too late, isn’t it, Mr. Cantrell?”
Ward shrugged. “Better late than never.”
“Not in your case,” Tim said, his voice taut with fury. He turned to Younger. “Kill him,” he snarled.
“Not until you tell him I didn’t lead that raid on the Mendozas,” Dallas said.
“What the hell difference can that make to a dead man?” Summers demanded angrily.
“It makes a tolerable difference to me, Summers,” Dallas drawled. “I don’t go around killing helpless women and kids. I got my pride. It happens to be important to me.”
“Shit!” Summers sneered. “You’re a killer. What difference could three or four more make to you?”
“I don’t reckon you savvy gunfighters, Summers. I ain’t never killed an unarmed man,” Dallas said stubbornly.
“He’s helpless. That’s as good as being unarmed,” Summers sneered, pointing at Cantrell.
“I ain’t killed him yet,” Dallas said significantly.
“Well, what the hell are you waiting for?” Summers snapped.
“For them to get good and gone,” he said, nodding toward his riders. “Or did you forget, we’re still protecting your image? Might as well have a cup of coffee. We’ll be here a spell.”
Ward backed up slowly and leaned against the chuckwagon. All these weeks he was after the wrong man. Dallas Younger was exactly what he appeared to be: a thoughtless ruffian and a gunfighter-turned-rustler, but not a murderer. He should have known. Summers had left clues. He hadn’t seen them because he was thinking of him as Leslie’s lover. That was reason enough to hate him; apparently it clouded his mind as well.
In his mind’s eye he saw Leslie, slim, proud, defiant. As Tim’s wife I will have everything I need. She was unaware of her lover’s complicity. He knew that without question. Leslie Powers could not condone dishonesty in anyone associated with herself. She was a victim like the others.
“Hey, Trinket. Who took you to the Powers spread?”
Sandra’s eyes widened in surprise at being addressed. She looked mesmerized by events. “Why, he did,” she said, pointing to Summers.
Ward laughed. “I guess Summers is going to have to see to it that none of us gets away from here alive.”
“Don’t listen to him, Dallas. He’s trying to confuse you,” Tim said, shooting a reassuring look at Younger.
The herd was moving now. Conversation stopped. The rumble of hundreds of steers running was like thunder, loud and continuous, moving closer. They were almost a half-mile away, but sound traveled far in the clear mountain air.
Leslie stopped at the foot of the hill, ready to turn back. Dusk had come too soon and she lost their trail. Even by continuing in a straight line, she didn’t find them. She felt frustration and anger at herself for staying too far back. If she weren’t so timid…
She turned the horse, unwilling to continue the search. A low rumble, like distant thunder, stopped her. What on earth? She turned the horse and forced it to climb the hill. She could see from there if it wasn’t already too dark.
The hill was little more than a hump between mountains, but once she gained the uppermost hummock she saw a black mass of cattle, shaped like a triangle, moving slowly, at a safe distance. In the foreground, a covered wagon stood tall and ghostly pale beside three fires. She recognized Sandra, Tim, and Younger, but cursed the encroaching dusk, wondering if that lean tawny-haired figure beside the fire could possibly be Cantrell.
There was a sudden urgency in her. She had to know the meaning of this bizarre meeting. She spurred her horse and rode boldly down the hill. The wagon was at least two hundred yards away. They couldn’t hear one horse over that growing rumble. She rode within fifty yards of the wagon, then dismounted, remembering to take the gun. Leaving her horse with reins dragging, she walked the rest of the distance, to come up from behind the wagon.
She thanked the noise of the herd for covering her clumsy attempts to be stealthy. She was panting by the time she reached the tall covered wagon Kincaid had called a Conestoga.
She took a few seconds to catch her breath and bring the gun up into position. Then she peeked over the seat. At first all she saw was Dallas Younger with a gun, facing her. She moved slowly to the other end of the wagon, slipped around to the front, and peered over the edge of the low wagon bed. This time she saw Ward, Sandra, and Tim. Sandra was facing her, wearing the necklace she had admired at the dance, the same one she found on the vanity in Ward’s room in Buckeye.
She stepped back, trying to still the sudden pounding of her heart. Ward Cantrell had run off with Sandra! What a monumental liar he was! Or an excellent evader. She hadn’t asked. He had pretended innocence and she had fallen for it. Fool! Idiot! Now Younger was probably going to kill them—even Tim. Poor Tim. Of all the people who might deserve to die violently he certainly was not one of them. He was gentle, dull, and boring—the perfect administrator and bookkeeper.
Leslie leaned against the wagon, trying to get control of her pounding heart and shaking hands. She had to save them. Before she lost her nerve, she dragged in a ragged breath, lifted her chin, and stepped around the side of the wagon.
“Drop your gun, Mr. Younger,” she said firmly, both hands gripping the gun as hard as she could to keep from trembling.
Chapter Fifty-One
“Drop it! Or I shoot!”
Dallas Younger considered the alternatives. If he turned toward her Cantrell would draw. If he shot Cantrell she would shoot him. Could she hit him at twenty paces? She sure lord looked like she thought she could.
He dropped the gun into the dust at his feet.
“Tim, get his gun!” Leslie yelled, movin
g away from the wagon so she could cover the others.
Summers moved swiftly to comply. When he had Younger’s gun in his hand he waved it at Younger. “Get over there with the others,” he said tersely. He motioned Leslie to his side, drew her trembling body against him with his free arm and gave her a hug. “Thanks, darling, you just saved my life,” he said gratefully.
“What are we going to do now?” she asked, turning in his embrace to face the three in front of the wagon.
Summers considered that for a moment in silence, reassuring her with the warmth and pressure of his body. He would kill all three of them, but he mustn’t let her see it happen. She was idealistic and trusting now, but if she thought him a rustler and murderer, her stupid ideals would turn her against him. She must keep thinking of him as a model of perfection—at least until after the wedding.
“Leslie, darling, I want you to go for help.”
“I can’t leave you here…with them,” she protested.
“Darling, it’s necessary. I can take care of everything now.” He gestured with the gun at Cantrell, and Leslie dared to look at him for the first time. “Throw down your guns, Cantrell. Do it!” he said vehemently, with barely controlled viciousness. “Do it or I’ll drop you where you stand!”
In the firelight Ward’s eyes were in shadow, but Leslie saw the flexing of smooth muscles in his cheek as his left hand unbuckled the gunbelt at his narrow hips. Even knowing all she did about him, the life force in him—so vital and commanding, so resolutely masculine—urged her toward him. She shuddered at her own weakness. His eyes were probably spitting hate at her. Thank goodness she couldn’t see them!
“Hey, Dallas,” Ward drawled, “how long do you think he’ll wait to kill us after she leaves?”
“Reckon about five minutes,” Dallas said, “until she gets out of earshot.”
The Lady and the Outlaw Page 44
