Lady Deception

by Bobbi Smith

  "I'm sorry to bother you, ma'am. There must be some mistake. My name's Jack Logan, and the clerk at the desk told me that room 211 was Cody Jameson's room."

  "It is."

  "Oh." Jack suddenly felt awkward, wondering why Jameson had brought his wife along. True, she was one good-looking woman, with her auburn hair and sparkling green eyes, and any man in his right mind would want to have her around, but with the kind of work Jameson did, it seemed dangerous. "Well, I wanted to speak with Cody Jameson, if I could."

  "Come in, Mr. Logan. I've been expecting you." Cody was smiling as she held the door open for him.

  "You've been expecting me?" He moved into the room, frowning in confusion.

  Cody closed the door behind him. "I'm Cody Jameson, Mr. Logan, and I'm interested in hearing about the job you have for me."

  "You're Jameson?" Suddenly he grinned as he stared at her. Now he understood a lot of what he'd heard about Cody Jameson-how few people had actually met him, but how effective he was at his job. No wonder! Jameson was a woman. Doubt shadowed his amusement, though, and his smile faded. "Miss Jameson.. .1 know you're supposed to be one of the best bounty hunters, but I don't know if this is going to work."

  "You know my reputation, don't you?" she asked icily, weary of always defending herself to men.

  "Well, yes."

  "Then I don't understand your problem. I take it there's someone you want brought in. That's what I do, and I do it very well."

  Jack stared at her, seeing the strength in her regard and the calm way she was dealing with him. He realized she was more than up to the job. "All right, Cody Jameson, here's what I want you to do."

  Jack told her only the most essential of information. That Majors had broken out of jail with the El Diablo gang, that the sheriff and deputy had been killed in the attempt, and that he wanted Majors delivered back to him-alive.

  Cody went cold at the news that the lawmen had been slain. Her own father had been a sheriff who'd been murdered in a jailbreak. His death had been what had inspired her to take up bounty hunting.

  "There's a big bounty on Majors. The town is offering a thousand dollars-dead or alive. But I will pay you an additional five hundred if you bring him to me here, alive."

  "Why are you willing to pay me so much more?"

  "I have doubts about Majors's guilt in any of this. I want to see justice done." Jack's expression was stony, revealing nothing. "It won't be served if he's hanged first and questions are asked later."

  "Why is this man so important to you?" Cody asked suddenly.

  Her question surprised Jack, and he realized then just how intelligent and perceptive she really was. He smiled wryly.

  "You find something amusing about this, Mr. Logan?"

  "Quite the contrary, Miss Jameson. I was just thinking how perfect you are for the job you've chosen. You're a worthy match for any man."

  For the first time in ages, Cody found herself liking one of the men she had to deal with. "Thank you. Your attitude is refreshing."

  His smile broadened with respect. "I hope you're as good as your reputation says you are. I need Majors brought in alive."

  "I'll deliver Majors to you alive. You have my word on it."

  El Trajar was a wild town, full of saloons, demon liquor, loose women, gambling, and a lot of sinners who enjoyed each and every vice to the fullest. The well-known decadence and hostility of the place didn't deter Sister Mary's Salvation Show from coming to town, though. If there were souls the revivalist could claim, she intended to do just that.

  Sister Mary's entrance into town stirred talk. The single wagon, the kind traveling salesmen used, had rumbled into El Trajar earlier that afternoon. The messages painted in bold red letters on the sides of the vehicle proclaimed salvation and justice at the hands of the Lord.

  REPENT AND BE SAVED! one slogan read.

  Another said, VENGEANCE IS MINE SAITH THE LORD!

  And on the very rear of the wagon was painted, HALLELUJAH!

  The prudish-looking, bespectacled woman of indiscriminate age who was driving, reined in before the busiest saloon in town, which was aptly named the Flames of Hell. Without a thought to her own personal safety, she climbed down from her wagon, grabbed up her Bible, and walked straight inside. She stood for a moment just inside the door, watching and waiting, her piercing green-eyed gaze sweeping over the sinners before her. Those inside were so caught up in enjoying themselves that they paid her no attention. Only when she started to shout at the top of her voice did they look up in amazement and irritation.

  "Hear the word of the Lord! Only he can save you from the fate you're so actively courting! Save yourselves! Save your soul from eternal damnation! Repent, sinners! Repent and be saved!" Sister Mary marched straight back through the saloon, Bible in hand, exhorting the men and women there to clean up their lives.

  "What'll it take to shut you up?" one cowboy asked. "How much do you want to go away? Five dollars? Ten?"

  "I don't want your money! I want you!"

  Raucous shouts of laughter surrounded them.

  "She wants you, Willy!"

  "Damn, I'd run if I were you, boy!"

  The cowboy flushed hotly and did as the other man had suggested, fleeing for another, quieter saloon.

  "Get out of here, woman!" the barkeep bellowed. He made a threatening move toward the stalwart female, but to everyone's surprise, two of the dance-hall girls came to her defense.

  "She's right, Henry. We are sinners," Lucy told him.

  "Don't blame her for speaking the truth," the one named Gena offered.

  Sister Mary gazed upon her two protectors and smiled at them warmly. "You are true angels of the Lord to come to my aid. Repent of your ways. Turn to God with your lives. Only with him will you find true happiness."

  "It's too late for us, Sister." Lucy smiled at her in a kindly way.

  "It's never too late. God always forgives-if you are truly sorry for your deeds."

  Sister Mary looked both women in the eyes as she spoke. She saw the good-natured sadness in Lucy's expression, but she also saw a glimmer of hope in Gena's.

  "Come to my show tonight, my children. I preach God's forgiveness and love." She spoke mainly to Gena, wanting to encourage the darkhaired, green-eyed beauty to forsake this sinful way of living.

  "Love!" a drunken Sully bellowed from where he was sitting nearby. In a lurching move, he snared the preacher woman around the waist and pulled her unceremoniously onto his lap. "If it's love you're giving away tonight, then I'll be there, Sister!"

  "You need to be!" she declared with dignity.

  "If I'm a sinner, I might as well enjoy it!" He tried to fondle her, but Sister Mary reacted quickly. She managed to swing her Bible and thump him heavily on the head. She took him so by surprise that she was rewarded with her freedom for her effort. "The Lord's justice can be painful to those who do not heed his call!"

  Those in the saloon had been laughing at her, but at her effective use of the Bible, silence reigned. Everyone knew how mean and ugly Sully could be when crossed. They waited to see what was going to happen.

  "Tonight at eight o'clock. All sinners are welcome," she stated. Holding herself ramrod straight, she walked with dignity toward the door, her manner controlled and completely civilized in the midst of decadence.

  "That was one ugly woman!" Sully snarled as she disappeared through the swinging doors.

  Everyone started laughing again, relieved that he hadn't taken any action against her.

  "She don't care if you think she's pretty or not. She just wants you to listen to her preach the word!"

  "I'll give her the `word,' "he went on, furious over being so humiliated in front of the crowd.

  "Take it easy, Sully," Lucy said as she came to sit on his lap. "If you want a good time, I'm your girl. You don't need to worry none about Sister Mary. She wants your money to save your soul. I want your money to pleasure you. Which one sounds better?"

  "Lucy, honey, you know
which one sounds better to me. Let's go."

  The fallen angel took the drunk upstairs.

  Gena watched her friend lead him off, and she was glad Lucy had helped to distract him from his anger with the preacher woman. Sully could be real mean when he was drunked up, and Gena didn't want anything to happen to the good woman. Strange as it seemed, Gena knew that somehow she would sneak away tonight and be at the tent at eight o'clock-no matter what.

  "How did it go?" Stalking Ghost asked when Cody joined him at the site of the revival.

  A lifelong friend of her father's, Stalking Ghost was Cody's partner in bounty hunting. He provided her with information she couldn't get through her own sources, and he accompanied her on each trek, always staying quietly in the background. While she was in disguise, he was her eyes and her ears. He protected her, hovering ever near, like a guardian angel. On this trip, Cody had dropped him off at the edge of town before continuing on to the Flames of Hell. He'd taken the time to look around and familiarize himself with El Trajar. What he'd seen, he didn't like.

  "It was wild in there. I was wishing I was openly armed with a gun instead of the Bible," Cody told him as she climbed down from the wagon.

  His expression revealed some surprise. It wasn't often that she thought about carrying a weapon. "You have worries about your plan?"

  "Tonight could be dangerous," she began, then paused and shrugged. "But then, it's dangerous every time we do this."

  He grunted in agreement and went about taking care of the horses. There was still a lot of work to be done. They had to set up the tent and the benches and get the torches ready to light the way. They only had a few hours left.

  "I saw no sign of anyone even remotely resembling Luke Majors in the saloon." She drew the wanted poster Jack Logan had given her out of her purse to stare at it. If the artist's likeness was close, and Jack had said that it was, then Majors was a very handsome man. Handsome or not, though, he was a fast gun... a killer, and he was running with the El Diablo gang. Everyone knew how terrible they were. They were notorious for their savagery throughout west Texas.

  "The hardest part will be getting him alone... if he shows up," she murmured thoughtfully. "There's no way to tell for certain that they'll be here. All we've got to go on is what we found out before we left San Antonio."

  Cody was a stickler for getting all the information she could on her quarry before she began her hunt for him. She'd questioned her main source of information-her father's friend, Sheriff Nate Thompson-about the El Diablo gang at length. The information he'd supplied had been sketchy at best, and most of it she'd already known. The El Diablo gang were murderers and thieves. They took what they wanted, when they wanted, with no concern about the consequences. They always seemed to know just when the next shipment of arms would be passing through on the way to one of the forts or when was the best time to rob the banks in the towns. They were coldly cruel. They would just as soon shoot someone as not. Wanting to know more, Cody had then sought out some of her father's less than savory acquaintances. While she'd been talking to them, Stalking Ghost had made his own inquiries. Between the two of them, the most reliable thing they'd been able to find out was that the gang regularly visited the town of El Trajar.

  Cody knew it wouldn't be easy or pretty bringing Majors in, but for the money Logan was offering, it would be worth the effort. If he showed up in El Trajar, she was sure that somehow everything else would fall into place. She still had to figure out how she would get Majors alone, but the minute she did, Stalking Ghost would be there to help her subdue him. Then with a change of disguises, they'd be on their way before any of the gang realized he was missing. It would be tricky, but she was confident she could pull it off. After all, she reflected as she adjusted her glasses, she did have the town convinced that her fire-andbrimstone preaching was real.

  "So, when will El Diablo be meeting up with us?" Luke asked the man he knew only as Hadley as they sat together at a back table in the Flames of Hell. Since joining the gang in their box canyon hideout after the jailbreak, Luke had been very careful to keep a low profile. He'd known they hadn't trusted him completely, so he'd done nothing to rouse their suspicions. El Diablo had yet to make an appearance in the camp, but from what Luke had been able to figure out, Hadley was the man closest to the outlaw leader.

  Hadley stared straight at Luke, his gray-eyed gaze hard and challenging. "All in good time, my friend. El Diablo is busy with many things. Why the rush?"

  Luke shrugged; he did not look away from the other man's regard, for he did not want to give him any reason to doubt him. "No rush. I've just heard so much about him, I wanted to meet him."

  The outlaw nodded, but said no more.

  Frustrated, but not showing it, Luke settled in for some heavy drinking. He hoped the whiskey would take the edge off the disgust he was feeling. He cursed the series of events that had thrust him into this brotherhood of murderers. The only thing he was thankful for as he sat there surrounded by El Diablo's henchmen was that he'd been able to save Sheriff Gregory's life during the breakout.

  He stared around at the Flames of Hell and wondered how he'd come to this. The saloon was a hellhole, just like the town it was in. It was lawless and wild, filthy and decadent.

  Luke took a stiff drink of his whiskey. In the two weeks he'd been riding with the gang, he'd done everything they'd asked of him. The day before they'd robbed a stage. Luke had hated being a part of it, but there had been no way out. He'd been relieved when no one had been killed. It was one thing to infiltrate the gang for Jack. It was another to watch innocent people shot down.

  The robbery had gone so smoothly that Hadley had suggested they come to El Trajar to celebrate. So Luke sat there, watching and listening, waiting for someone to give him some clue to the mysterious El Diablo's identity so he could get out of there. Had it really been only a few weeks before that he'd believed he could live a civilized life, that he could raise cattle and grow crops? If he'd been alone, he would have laughed at his own naivete. Instead, he downed more whiskey.

  It was growing late. The members of the gang were still drinking heavily. Most had forgotten about Sully's earlier incident with the preacher woman, until his slurred, drunken voice boomed across the room.

  "I think we should run her outta town!" Sully shouted, still angry. The more he'd thought about the way she'd treated him, the more he wanted to teach the arrogant woman a lesson. He wanted to see her on her knees begging for forgiveness from him.

  "Aw, hush up, Sully. Have another drink," Lucy coaxed. "That Sister Mary ain't hurtin' nobody. She was tryin' to help ya."

  Sully was in a mean mood. "She ain't nothing but a little slut, just like you!"

  At his insult, Lucy grew angry. She stepped closer so her words would have greater impact on him.

  "You listen to me," she said in a low, almost threatening voice. "That woman is brave and pure. If there are low women like me in this world, it's because of men like you. If no men wanted it, then women wouldn't have to provide it, would they?"

  "Barkeep, give me a double whiskey!" He drunkenly shoved Lucy away from him, ignoring her. He did't need to hear anything good about the preacher woman. She had embarrassed him in front of everyone, and he was going to pay her back. "After I finish this drink off, I think I'm gonna go get saved."

  "You want some more Bible thumpin' tonight, Sully? I thought you might have had enough for one night!" a drunken Carson taunted, then guffawed at his own humor.

  Sully drew his gun. Had he been of a mind, he might have shot Carson right then and there for his remark, but he had more important things to do.

  "I was just jokin', Sully," the other outlaw said quickly, suddenly nervous.

  Sully didn't answer; he just checked to see that the revolver was loaded. He downed the rest of his whiskey. "I want me a piece of that bitch, and I'm going to get it."

  Luke had witnessed the earlier exchange between Sully and the woman named Sister Mary from where he'd been
sitting in the back of the room. When he heard what was going on now and saw the other man draw his gun, he knew he couldn't just sit there and do nothing. He rose from the table and claimed a spot at the end of the bar.

  "All right. I think I'm ready for a little revivin'," Sully announced. "You comin' with me, Carson?"

  "Sure, Sully." He was relieved that Sully wasn't going to pick a fight with him. "Let's go have us some fun with Sister Mary."

  "She might talk like an old prude, but I bet there's one helluva hot woman inside those cold pants of hers. Let's go find out."

  Luke saw just how ugly Sully's mood was and knew the revivalist was going to be in for some trouble. He hoped she had a guard with her, someone to protect her from roughs like these two.

  "You know, it isn't my place to try to tell you what to do, but-"

  "You're right about that, Majors." Sully's expression was hard. He didn't like this fast gun that Carson and Jones had brought into the gang, and he wasn't shy about letting everyone know it.

  "But this Sister Mary is a good woman. She's a woman of God."

  He snorted in derision. "She's a slut, just like the rest of 'em. It don't matter none that she carries a Bible with her. Women are all the same," he sneered. "Just pieces of ass. That's all they're good for."

  Luke stiffened at his crudeness. He had been raised to respect women. Even Clarissa's betrayal had not darkened his feelings for the fairer sex. His mother had been a genteel woman of class and elegance. Women needed and deserved men's protection.

  "Sully ain't never met a good woman in his life," Jones joked from where he still sat at one of the tables with a saloon girl perched on his lap.

  "Good for what?" Sully came back at him, swilling more whiskey as he prepared to raid the salvation show. He glared at Majors. "If you think women are pure and chaste, you're a fool, Majors. Those kind don't exist. Every woman's a whore at heart. Some are honest and sell it for money. Some sell it for a wedding ring. Ain't no difference between them."

  Luke took a casual drink as he watched Sully. He tried to ignore what the other man was saying, but with each slur his hatred for Sully grew. Luke knew Sully was a longtime member of the gang. He knew he himself had only just been accepted into the inner fold and that there was still some distrust among the others about him. He knew he should play it easy and keep quiet, but there was no way he could let Sully hurt an innocent woman like Sister Mary. He had seen much ugliness in his lifetime. He could put up with a lot personally if he had to. But he would not stand by and let anything happen to an innocent woman.