“By golly, she would do that, wouldn’t she?” Cochinay’s voice held an edge of pride.
Travis shifted position in order to roast his posterior. Exactly like a cut of meat being turned on a spit, to evenly cook, front side and back. “What I’m wonderin’ is, does that old man have some kinda hold over her? I mean—damn, considerin’ he forced her off the ranch, she’s mighty chummy with him.”
“Dunno.” His brother yawned. “Maybe she just likes him. He may have been sheriff a long time ago, but one thing’s sure, he’s an outlaw now.”
“You plannin’ t’ take him back, along with the lady?”
Another yawn. Thomas slumped back against the pillow he’d been given, as if suddenly realizing how tired he was. “Dunno about that, neither. We’ll have t’ see what happens. Sleep well, boys. I’m off t’ dreamland.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
“Which one of you angels got the coffee started for us?” Elizabeth asked with amusement. She had emerged from her bedroom in a pretty pink shirtwaist atop her form-fitting trousers, looking as fresh and well-rested as if she hadn’t lost half the night to restless half-slumber.
“That angel,” replied Thomas, who peered around from the sink at her with a face full of shaving soap, “would be me. Help yourself. I reckon it’s cooked about as much as it needs t’ be, by now.”
“Thank you, I’ll do just that.”
A filled enamel cup, a tilt of some sugar, and she could lean back against the door jamb to survey the room. Which seemed awfully full of males, all of a sudden, in various states of undress and disorder.
Travis was sitting cross-legged in front of the sizzling fire, only half-awake and sock-footed, scrubbing occasionally at an itchy beard while cracking his jaws open in a wide yawn. As for Cochinay, despite the subdued noise and activity around him, he had not yet stirred. At least, so it was assumed. The long shapeless lump rolled up in his blanket certainly gave every indication of being the somnolent Apache charmer.
But the remaining member of the group…ah, the remaining member. Elizabeth turned her blue eyes back to him, the ostensible leader, who seemed absorbed in the task at hand.
Many women find it oddly seductive to watch a man engrossed in the ritual of shaving, and Elizabeth was no exception. The manipulation of muscles, the twisting of features this way and that, the somewhat dangerous application of a very sharp blade around very vulnerable components: all part and parcel of a fascinating masculine world, of which she was allowed only an occasional glimpse.
Besides all that, what female deserving of the name would be able to resist the complete package, as presented? The long sleeves of Thomas’ thin cotton undershirt had been rolled up to the elbow, and his collarless neckband unbuttoned halfway down his chest. Which allowed silky little tendrils of black hair to spill out, as if inviting touch.
Her mouth filled with water. In any other species, a condition known as drooling; perhaps in humans, as well. Then just as suddenly dry.
“No Baldy yet?” she asked abruptly, shutting down temptation.
Thomas, all unaware of the turmoil he was causing, had picked up the towel to dry off. “Ain’t seen him yet t’day. Gotta check on your babysittin’ duties?”
He sent her the smile of an angel, sunny yet mischievous. Maybe he wasn’t really all that unaware, after all. Damn him.
“I think he’s finding this damp weather hard to deal with,” she muttered an explanation.
“You mean the snow?” Unrolling sleeves, buttoning buttons, putting things back into place that might be, for her taste, better left out for view. Then on went the heavy flannel shirt, and a determined tucking into trousers all the way around. That drew her gaze involuntarily downward, from midriff to waistband to distended fly. Quite distended.
“Oh.” Her mouth rounded in amazement.
Another smile, this one of the devil, dark and dangerous as sin. “Ahuh. Usually happens in the mawnin’. And other times.”
Unexpectedly, annoyance prickled. In many ways, she might be an innocent, but she had grown up on a ranch, motating around randy men and raunchy animals every day of her life. She did have some idea of how things worked.
“I’ll fix Baldy his medicinal tea,” she said, with what might have been a flounce. “That will help get him going.”
It took an hour, and two steaming cups of steeped white willow bark, before the old man made an appearance. Somewhat sheepishly, it was true, for his less-than-prime physical condition by comparison to the three other men, all young and strapping, and moving rather slowly and stiffly. But with a smile, nonetheless.
By then both Travis and Cochinay, after a necessary visit outdoors and a couple helpings of coffee, were ready for the day, as well. Soon enough everyone was seated at the table, enjoying the hot breakfast Elizabeth was shoveling their way.
“How far d’you reckon it is from here back down to the Condor?” Thomas asked of their host.
“As the crow flies? Few hours, maybe. Ridin’ hawseback, figure half a day or so.”
“Half a day?” repeated Elizabeth, surprised. “But coming here took much more than—I mean, I wandered around in the woods for a long time, so I just—well, it seemed—” Eventually, running down, she dared not look up from her plate.
“Ahuh,” Thomas said dryly. “Well, half a day sounds good. You think you all could be ready t’ leave pretty soon, then?”
“Us all? You mean—both me and Baldy?”
“That was my intent, Miss—Liz.” Across the table, his own blue eyes met hers, cool deliberately expressionless azure and puzzled lovely lapis lazuli.
“But—this is his home. You can’t just yank him away from his home, willy-nilly.”
Thomas rose slightly to pull something from his front pocket. “Actually, Miss Drayton, I do believe I can. This gives me the authority.” And opened his hand to display the U.S. Marshal badge awarded by President Johnson not long ago.
“Oh, that old thing.” Nose in the air, she pooh-poohed any hint of his so-called authority. “Well, you must realize that Baldy is in poor health; you’ve seen that for yourself. He’s unable to travel. You can’t take him away, and I won’t let you.”
“I can’t?” Icicles to rival those hanging from the roofline, outdoors, edged into the Marshal’s voice; and the other spectators at the table, excluded from this back-and-forth conversation, watched the two combatants with an air of unease topped by interest. “You won’t?”
The nose rose another inch or so. “Absolutely not.”
Amusement won out over annoyance. Thomas planted one elbow upon the table, plunked his chin into the open palm, and squared off with the beginnings of a grin. “And just how d’you propose t’ stop me doin’ whatever I need t’ do?”
Leaning forward to confront his enjoyment with the disdain it deserved, so that their gazes were locked only inches apart, Elizabeth tossed her gathered-up curls back over one shoulder. “Well, I would be seven kinds of fool to tell you, now, wouldn’t I?”
Travis whooped and slapped his thigh. “She’s got you there, little brother. Game set, matched, and won.”
Time to intercede. Carpenter, feeling saddened only by the lengths to which he had inadvertently driven his erstwhile captive, spoke up. “It’s all right, girl. I reckon the Marshal has the lay o’ things, and there ain’t much we can do about it.” A glance at the group around the table, from Elizabeth to Thomas, to finish up. “Just like t’ have another look around outside first, Mr. Lawman, if it don’t inconvenience you none.”
“Not a’tall,” averred Mr. Lawman politely. And sent his own sharp glance winging its way to his twin: Watch him.
An almost imperceptible nod in return.
Win opened his front door to a world of whiteness, marred only by the boot prints of those who had already been out and about. Just a few inches of snow, so far; fresh-scented and pristine, to dust over any autumnal ugliness and enshroud low-hanging spruce in Christmas-card pretty.
One creaky
step out onto the porch, to inhale deeply and pleasurably. “Nice day,” he approved. Turning, he directed a repeat of his comment back inside. “I said, it’s a nice—”
Zzzzinnnng…splat! Zzzzinnnng…splat! Then an echo through the clearing, and another.
A look of surprise crossed the old outlaw’s face. “What—the—” before he slowly crumpled.
“Win!” cried Elizabeth. A frantic scramble across the room was followed immediately by the men, right behind her.
“Stop it!” Thomas shouted, snagging her at the threshold. He locked one hard arm around her upper body, holding her tight, to halt further advance. “Stop there, I say! Goddammit, Liz, that was a rifle shot!”
She was struggling fiercely for release. “Let me go. Let me go! He’s been hurt, can’t you see that? He’s been hurt, and he needs my help!”
The Marshall pulled her carefully back from exposure in the open doorway, away from Win’s body lying halfway into the snow. Red-tinged snow. In the frenzy of the moment, no one noticed that Thomas Yancey, tough and hardened officer of the law, had touched his lips to Elizabeth’s temple, right where the soft hair flossed and curled.
“I know he’s been hurt, darlin’,” agreed Thomas in a gentle, calming tone. “And we’re gonna do what we can for him. But I don’t need anybody else catchin’ a bullet from out there somewheres.”
“Sound advice, you hooligan,” Cochinay added his own worried sibling’s censure. “For once in your life, listen t’ somebody who knows more’n you do.”
From his kneeling posture to peer out one of the front windows, Travis had his rifle aimed and ready. “Anybody got an idea what’s goin’ on?”
“Not a clue.” Thomas had squatted with his arm flung in front of Elizabeth, barring any chance at escape. And just for an instant, even in the midst of danger and uncertainty, felt a shock of pleasure for the feel of his own sinewy flesh pressed against the warm cushion of her breasts. “Baldy,” he raised his voice to attract the old man’s attention, if possible. “Baldy. Can you hear me?”
A faint movement on the bloodstained floorboards. A slight scrabble of fingers, reaching out.
Zzzzinnnng…splat! Zzzzinnnng…splat, splat, splat! Bullets hitting wood: the step, the railing, the wall, the doorjamb. And everyone ducked for cover.
“Playin’—hell—” breathed the wounded man, raggedly, “—with my—rhumatiz…”
“Baldy,” Elizabeth whimpered over a throat full of tears.
“Where’dja get hit, ol’ feller?”
“Uh.” Silence, with another very faint movement. Forward. Toward the door, and temporary safety. “Leg. Right—in the meat of my thigh. Damn it.”
“Okay, then. Hang on, I’m comin’ out t’ haul you inside.”
“No,” Win dragged up strength to protest, from his face-down position on the cold wet floorboards. “No, you—goldarn—fool. Stay back.” As if to prove his determination, he inched forward. Almost indiscernible progress, but progress nonetheless, as shown by a thin trail of dark scarlet in his wake.
Zzzzinnnng…splat!
That bullet came too close, smacking into the threshold just inches away, splintering wood into infinitesimal missiles. Carpenter hunkered down, prostrate. Until Thomas and Cochinay each grabbed hold of one wrist to haul him bodily inside, with a great scraping of fabric and a great groan of distress.
The door slammed shut.
“Here, help me,” ordered Elizabeth. She had already spread a couple of blankets on the floor beside the fire, along with a pillow from Win’s bed. “Get him moved over here.”
With Travis keeping close watch out the window for anything that might flicker athwart his vision, his brother and the guide half-carried, half-dragged the wounded man across the room.
Grimacing with pain and reaction, Carpenter lay back only to jerk to attention when he caught sight of Elizabeth approaching, scissors in hand. “Girl, you ain’t cuttin’ off my pants,” he blustered.
“The hell I’m not. What good are they, anyway, with a big bloody rip through one leg?”
While she started working away, over her patient’s mouthful of protests, Thomas crouched down alongside. “You coherent enough t’ listen t’ me, Carpenter? All right, then. Any other way outa this place, other’n through the front door?”
No one missed the deliberate use of surname. At the moment, it didn’t seem to matter.
“Either bedroom window.” An indrawn hiss, and another choleric complaint. “Jesus Christ, girl, watch what you’re doin’ there. That’s a new-made bullet hole you’re fussin’ with.”
“Oh, hush up and show me what a big tough man you are.” Scoffing would, she hoped, distract his attention from the cutting off and removal of trouser leg and long underwear, along with the application of hot water.
Unfortunately, not so much.
While Win grumbled and demanded release from the torture she was performing upon him, Thomas head-motioned to his crew. “Coch, take up position by the front window,” he ordered. “Trav, with me.” Armed with Winchesters and revolvers, the two Yanceys slipped away. After the slight creak as Elizabeth’s bedroom window was carefully lifted, nothing could be heard but silence.
She sent a worried glance toward her brother, who was squinting out into daylight no longer sunny but growing overcast and chill. “Who do you think is out there, Thunder?”
“Dunno. If I had to, I could guess. But the reason for it doesn’t make sense. How’s the old man?”
“You keep a civil tongue in your head,” snapped Carpenter. “I ain’t dead yet, nor likely t’ be.”
“From what I can see,” Elizabeth, still washing gently but thoroughly at the wound, reported, “it’s a through-and-through. I suppose that’s a good thing, so no one has to gouge out a bullet. And it keeps on bleeding, which should help prevent infection. But I’m not a doctor; all I can do is get the worst of it taken care of.”
Finished cleansing, she tore her nice clean muslin nightgown into strips, soaked some in carbolic acid, and began wrapping them around the torn flesh of his lower thigh, still oozing blood. Raw ripples of pain had diminished into abject discomfort by the time the next layer, dry cloth swathes of greater width, had been arranged and tied carefully in place.
With a grunt, he relaxed his stiffened posture, then sighed with an easing of every taut muscle.
“That’s about all I can do for you right now, Win,” she said by way of apology.
A gentle pat on his shoulder, and she could rise to remove all the used, gory materials. Since this morning’s batch of willow bark tea was still steeping back on the cook stove, she headed to his bedroom to rummage for a whole pair of trousers and underwear.
“Any sign yet of that bastard who shot me?” Carpenter asked of the watchful young Apache at his window.
“Nary a movement,” came the reply. “No sound of anything, neither. Hard t’ tell, though, b’cause it’s snowin’ again. Comin’ down in big flakes.”
Returned with clean clothing and a mug of medicants, Elizabeth knelt beside the old outlaw to help him reassemble himself. Then, settled, he could sip at the tea that seemed to ease the achiness of his joints.
“Thank you, Liz,” he said quietly, looking across at her from his pillow. “You’re a blessin’ and a treasure, and I envy your paw that he can claim you as his.”
From half the room away, Cochinay’s keen hearing picked up on that low tone, and he hooted. “A blessin’ and a treasure, huh? Plain t’ see you never grew up with her.”
“Oh, you just hush, Thunder,” Elizabeth easily reproved him. “Let the man pay me a compliment, if he wants to. It’s rare enough I hear one from any of you.”
The door burst suddenly open, slamming hard against the interior wall, and in the doorway stood a tall figure silhouetted against the gloom outside, rifle leveled and ready for use.
“Itza-chu,” said Cochinay, as unsurprised as if he been expecting just this appearance. Deliberately and cautiously he rose,
still holding his own Winchester. “Great Hawk. Why come you here?” he asked in the Tonto Apache tongue.
“Shik'isn. Brother.” Aptly named, his sharp Great Hawk gaze swerved from one to the other in the room. The man of blood connection, no threat. The wounded old one, no longer a threat. The staring silent woman, of no threat at any time. “You. Put down.” A gesture indicated Cochinay’s weapon.
“Hmmph. Amazin’. You’ve learned some English in the last coupla days.”
If the intruder had allowed himself any display of emotion, it would have been a smirk. “So much you know, Yellow Thunder. Gun away. Or be dead.”
Still Cochinay stalled. “You shot the owner of this house.”
“Damn straight somebody did,” snapped Win Carpenter from his blanket. “Put me in a world o’ pain, you ignorant savage.”
Not so much as a sideways glance, nor an acknowledgement. “It was needed.”
“Why? You followed us here, didncha? Why?”
“Her.” The tip of his head indicated the only female: Elizabeth Drayton, of course.
Light dawned; grip tightened on the loose-held rifle, and finger clenched on its trigger. “Ransom. You heard about Liz bein’ kidnapped, about the ransom bein’ offered. And figured to collect it all yourself.”
“Is true. Much money.”
“Escavotil know about what you’re doin’?”
The black eyes narrowed. “Soon.”
From the corner of his vision, Cochinay could glimpse his sister gathering herself out of a seated position, ready to lunge. His free hand flattened in their childhood signal: Stay!
“Gun away,” repeated Great Hawk in a no-nonsense tone. “Now.”
“Why? You plannin’ to let the rest of us walk outa here, once you steal Lizzie away?”
“No.” At least he was honest about his plan. “I kill all.”
“Not while I’m standin’ here, you goddamned son of a bitch!” came Thomas’ steely voice out in the clearing.
Great Hawk whirled, rifle drawn and firing even as he ran smack into a volley of bullets from two very pissed-off U.S. Marshals. And collapsed, like a gunny sack full of sawdust, punched through and through by gunfire, to lie limp and still in a puddle of his own blood.
A Western Romance: Thomas Yancey Taking the High Road (Book 4) (Taking the High Road series) Page 8
