"What about the half-breed and the horse?"
"What about them?"
"What do they have to do with the blonde?"
Kate shrugged a shoulder and splashed more whiskey into her glass, slammed the bottle back down on the table. "It's unclear to me. All I know is that the blonde—"
"Yes, yes, she's a threat." Sebastian patted Kate's pudgy hand patronizingly. "But what do you propose to do about it, my dear? You can't very well send your men out and have her flogged because you dreamed about her and smelled ... what was it?"
"Oh, shut up, Sebastian!" Kate hissed. "I didn't call you here for counsel. I know this is out of your realm. Can't you just sit here quietly and drink with me?"
Sebastian lowered his shot glass, wincing. "Isn't that what I usually do?"
"There they are." Kate was staring wild-eyed across the street.
Sebastian leaned forward, craning his neck to see out the window and around a parked freight wagon. Heading toward the saloon on the opposite boardwalk was a pretty blonde in a new-looking dress and cape, her thick hair piled atop her head.
Beside her walked what looked like a mountain man or a fur trapper. A half-breed, possibly a Metis, by the cherry-brown skin and the flat angles of his handsome face. The half-breed carried tack and a rifle, and he and the girl were both carrying store parcels.
They passed the brothel and turned down a side street.
"Heading for that Rooshian's hotel, probably," Kate said, staring at the spot where the two had disappeared. "He'll rent to a breed."
"Want me to have them arrested? Zahn will find out what they're up to." Ray Zahn was Gold Cache's town marshal and a business associate of both Sebastian Kirk and Crazy Kate Sweney. He was paid to overlook the fact that Kate's roulette wheels were weighted with lead and that her blackjack dealer was a mechanic from Omaha.
A self-satisfied smile on his lips, Sebastian threw back the rest of his drink, then reached for his hat, preparing to leave.
Kate grabbed his arm while staring out the window, blue veins throbbing in her forehead. "Don't be an imbecile."
After a moment, Kate added darkly under her breath, "It has to play out."
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The Russian hotelier was a short, barrel-chested hunchback with coal black eyes, close-cropped white beard, and a knee-length antelope-hide coat. He didn't bat an eye when Yakima and Faith asked for a room. He barely even glanced up from the doe he was skinning in front of his small log hotel to take the coins Yakima tossed into his bloody glove.
When he'd dropped the coins into his coat pocket, the Russian tossed a hunk of bullet-ruined meat to the cur sitting nearby in the bloodstained snow then gestured at the open, pine-timbered door.
"All da way back," he said. "Rooms in da back. You pick."
The place was nearly as rustic as the cabin in which Yakima and Faith had spent the previous two nights, though it owned a mahogany backbar with a baroque mirror that had obviously been hauled in from much fancier digs and that looked about as at home in the small log shack with greased-paper windows and iron stove as would a crystal chandelier in a two-hole privy.
Either the Russian's hopes for prosperity here in Gold Cache had already been dashed, or he was still hoping ...
Yakima and Faith chose the largest of the six rooms in the back, all of them boasting musty Indian blankets for doors but reasonably large and with solid beds with pine-log legs, grass-filled mattress sacks, and real goose-down pillows. When they'd gotten their gear situated, Yakima built a fire in the stove in the corner, and he and Faith napped together under the hide robes naked, too exhausted from the long ride even for love.
When he woke forty-five minutes later, Yakima got up and dressed quietly so as not to wake Faith. He took a long drink of water from his canteen, chunked another log into the stove, and sat down at the table by the shuttered window. He rolled a cigarette, then took his revolver and rifle apart and cleaned and oiled them, working by the slate gray light filtering through the cracks in the shutter.
He was reseating the revolver's cylinder when Faith groaned softly on the bed and turned her head to look at him through her mussed hair. She wrinkled her nose. "What's that smell?"
"I think there's a pigpen behind us. You should be stayin' over at the Denver."
"Without you? Never." She rolled onto her back and crossed her arms behind her head. "Besides, I grew up in a place like this."
She'd never told him where she'd come from, or what had led her to whoring. He couldn't help nudging the door a little, now that she'd cracked it. "In Colorado?"
She shook her head. "Chugwater Buttes, Wyoming. Godforsaken place. Pa was a rancher, though I never saw many cattle, mostly tumbleweeds. The water stank like that pen over yonder."
She scratched her head thoughtfully. Outside, the wind howled under the eaves. "When Ma died, he shipped my brothers off to an Englishman neighbor, and I went to the preacher who had a little chicken farm. I wasn't there long before the preacher started visiting me in my room off the kitchen, if you catch my drift. Told me to keep quiet or I'd go to hell." She glanced at Yakima, an ironic glint in her eyes. "You know, I believed him?"
Yakima snapped the Colt's cylinder home and took a drag off his cigarette.
"The preacher's wife must've figured out what her husband was sneaking down to my bedroom nearly every night for. One day she took me to town for the week's shopping and left me there. I was filled out even at fifteen, so it didn't take me long to find work at the local saloon. Had a room much like this one, a little colder and more barren, and I could burn only a few logs a day during the cold time."
She dropped her legs over the side of the cot, and stood, wrapping one of the robes around her naked body, hair curled up above her shoulders. She walked over to him, knelt between his legs, and rested her head in his lap, hugging his thighs.
"Yakima, let me go over to Crazy Kate's alone tonight. You stay here."
He looked down at her; a frown carved deep in his forehead. "Why?"
"I've caused you enough trouble." She lifted her head, stared up at him, eyes beseeching. "This is my game."
"No."
"Kate's funny about Indians. She won't let you in."
"Let me worry about that."
Faith shook her head. "Yakima, you're the only man I've ever loved. Don't let me get you killed."
He set the gun on the table, reached down, and took her naked arms in his hands, lifting her slightly, causing the robe to fall to the floor. “This is our deal. Remember? Our stake. Besides, there's a little matter of a horse. Crazy Kate and I have to straighten that out."
Faith smiled wanly, lifted her chin. He leaned down and kissed her, then stood, picked her up in his arms. Leaving the robe on the floor, he set her down on the cot. She lay naked and dusky-skinned in the firelight.
She watched, smiling, eyes glistening behind a thin sheen of tears, as he kicked out of his boots and undressed.
It was seven o'clock and good dark in spite of the braziers and torches as Yakima led Faith across the frozen, crusty street toward the front porch of Crazy Kate's Saloon and Pleasure Palace. They climbed the steps and entered the steady, low hum of card players and drinkers, miners in overalls and hobnailed boots and cloth caps dickering and laughing with half-dressed pleasure girls.
The roulette wheel clattered, and the craps dice clicked. Lantern light shunted shadows around the broad, deep room. Smoke swirled like breeze-torn spiderwebs.
More than a few eyes shifted to Yakima and the beautiful blonde as they made their way to the bar, and conversations closest to them died. They didn't have to stand at the bar long before the big, black-haired bartender with gray-flecked sideburns moved toward them, taking their measure as he cleaned his hands on his apron. Something in his demeanor told Yakima the man had been expecting them.
"Is Kate Sweney around?" Faith asked.
The barman ran his eyes over Faith again appreciatively and gave a knowing smile. "Miss
Kate's in her office. Second floor. Far right end of the hall."
Faith glanced at Yakima, who arched his brows and set his elbows on the bar. He'd left his rifle in the hotel room, but he'd tucked his six-shooter back behind the capote. "Sure you don't want me up there?"
"She'd see you as a threat. I'll give a yell if I need help."
As Faith started toward the back of the room, the barman leaned toward her. "Miss."
Faith turned. The barman jerked his head at Yakima without looking at him. "No Injuns on the premises. House rules."
"He's with me," Faith said.
The barman raised his hands and canted his head, keeping his eyes hard.
Yakima smiled. "You didn't make the rules, but you sure as hell better break 'em. I'm not goin' anywhere as long as the lady's upstairs."
Two big men in three-piece suits and bowler hats, wielding bung starters in their hamlike fists, had moved around behind him while the handful of miners standing nearby had shuffled away. Yakima had watched the pair in the periphery of his vision. The barman slid his dark eyes to them.
They moved in fast, one on each side of Yakima, raising the hide-wrapped mallets. "Nice and easy now, breed," said the taller of the two.
Out of the corner of his left eye, Yakima watched the man reach for his left arm. Yakima swung swiftly, smashing his left forearm into that of the bouncer. The man grunted, stepped back, and raised the bung starter behind his shoulder. Before he could bring the hide-wrapped club forward, Yakima lunged toward him, ramming his own head into the man's chest. The man's bung starter continued over Yakima's head, connecting with his partner's wrist.
The second bouncer screamed as he grabbed his injured wrist, his own mallet hitting the floor with a heavy thump.
Yakima buried his right fist in the first bouncer's solar plexus. As the man curled up with an echoing grunt, Yakima wheeled. The second man held his right wrist down low, pain etched on his face. Snapping curses through gritted teeth, he reached inside his coat with his left hand.
Yakima lifted his right foot above his head and slammed his heel against the man's right cheek.
"Ahhh!" he cried, half a wink before hitting the floor on his left cheek and shoulder. He rolled onto his back, clutching his face, which looked like a broken clay mask, dislocated jaw hanging askew, the blood draining out of it. He howled like a gut-shot bear.
Yakima backed away from both men, his hand on his pistol grip but leaving the gun in its holster. The first bouncer was down on his side, groaning, knees raised toward his chest, hands clutching his belly. The other man lay with his cheek to the floor, too pain-wracked to move or do anything but grunt.
The bartender stood scowling over the bar, shuttling his disgusted gaze between the bouncers.
Yakima glanced at Faith, staring at him from about ten yards down the bar. He jerked his head toward the stairs. Reluctantly, she turned and headed toward the back of the room, casting cautious looks behind her at Yakima and the fallen bouncers.
The rest of the room was so quiet that Yakima could hear someone puffing on a wet cigar. Then someone chuckled, and more laughter followed. Yakima glanced around. Seeing no one else coming after him, he bellied up to the bar.
"I'll have a beer," he told the barman.
The man told the bouncers to haul themselves over to the doc's, and when they'd risen from the puncheons and staggered outside, he pulled a beer. The conversations and the gambling had started again, and one of the whores was snickering.
The barman set the beer on the bar before Yakima, his eyes hard. "Where'd you learn to fight like that, breed?"
Yakima shrugged, sipped the beer as if to judge its quality, then sauntered over to a table to the left of the front door. He sat down with his back to the wall, kicked out a chair across from him, and propped his feet on it.
Sipping the beer, he relaxed and kept his ears pricked for Faith's call for help. His eyes slowly swept the room. Near the back, near the roulette wheel to the left of the broad staircase, a face was turned toward him, peeking out around the black-clad gent dealing faro. When Yakima's eyes locked on the man staring at him, the man jerked his head back behind the faro dealer.
Yakima edged his gaze to the right, saw another man sizing him up. Sandy-haired, shorter than the first, and wearing a shabby bowler and brown suit coat too tight for his stocky frame.
Yakima stared across the room as the sandy-haired man's eyes widened. He turned away quickly.
Yakima licked the foam from his lips and smiled.
When Faith reached the second-floor landing, she cast a glance down the stairs behind her. The fight seemed to be over, and Yakima was apparently out of trouble for the moment. She turned right and strode down the pine-paneled hall lit with red and purple bracket lamps. Under her new half-boots, a thick, amber-colored carpet runner muffled her footsteps.
Behind the doors on both sides of the corridor, grunts and passionate groans kept time with squawking bedsprings and the occasional hammering of a headboard against a wall.
At the end of the hall, she stopped before an unnumbered door. She lifted her fist to knock, but before her knuckles touched the oak, a familiar voice rose from the other side of the door.
"Come in, my dear."
Faith's chest tightened. What if the woman was waiting for her with a gun? Faith felt the lump of the pocket pistol inside her cape, snuggled into the makeshift holster Yakima had sewn into one of the folds with a scrap of burlap. Could she get to it in time?
Faith opened the door, peeked inside.
On the other side of the carpeted and wallpapered office, Kate sat behind a broad cherry wood desk adorned with two elaborately scrolled pink lamps. Before the desk, turned sideways to look behind him, sat a middle-aged man with a bald pate and scraggly gray hair tufting out from the sides of his head. His round, silver-framed spectacles reflected the light from the fire at the right of the door.
Faith stepped into the room and closed the door behind her without taking her eyes from Kate, who stared back at her, painted lips stretching a broad, welcoming smile.
"Ah," Faith said, offering a stiff smile of her own. "Crazy Kate's sixth sense."
"Never fails."
"You were expecting me."
"Of course."
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Kate stood up behind her desk. She wore a cream silk gown that hung on her like a kimono, revealing a good deal of heavy cleavage. Twin raven braids were coiled up around her ears and pinned behind her head. The hair was pulled back so tightly from her temples that it slanted her eyes, making her look like some pagan priestess.
Small skulls shaped from metal hung from her ears on long chains. They glistened in the firelight.
Kate held out a hand to indicate the man sitting on the other side of the desk. "Faith, my business associate, Sebastian Kirk. He's the superintendent of Gold Cache Mining and Smelting."
The man, dressed in brushed serge and wearing a wine-colored, gold-buttoned vest beneath his claw-hammer frock coat, stood awkwardly, his bright eyes riveted on Faith. "How do?" He stuck out his pale, bony hand.
Faith strode forward and shook it.
"Join us in a drink?" Kate asked, lifting the cut-glass decanter from the silver tray on her desk. Half-filled brandy goblets sat on the desk before Crazy Kate and Sebastian Kirk, and long Mexican cigars smoldered in ashtrays.
"No, thanks," Faith said. "I won't be here long. I came only to tell you why I was here in Gold Cache because you'll find out sooner or later."
Kate sank back in her plush red chair, her face tensing. "And that is ... ?"
"Not to open old wounds, Kate." Faith's voice betrayed her anger at what had happened in Fort Dodge, and she paused for a second to get a leash on it. "Though I have to admit that when I started out, I did have other intentions. But now I'm here merely to set up my own business establishment. Nothing else. I'm sure there's room in Gold Cache for another saloon."
Kate looked at the chair angled beside Ki
rk, who sat puffing his cigar and gazing up at Faith with appreciation in his weak, watery eyes. Kate was aware of his stare, and annoyance gnawed at her.
"You have time to sit for a spell, don't you, dear?" Kate said pleasantly.
Faith grasped an arm of the chair, slid it out a little farther from the desk as well as from Sebastian Kirk—she could feel his eyes burning into her—and sat on the edge of it, her hands in her lap. The pistol was a comforting weight under her right arm. She was glad she hadn't been frisked.
"There's room here for another saloon, of course. But why don't you come work for me? If we've buried the hatchet, let's smoke the peace pipe. I bet we can come to a financial agreement that will prove most rewarding for both of us."
"I'm not turning tricks anymore, Kate."
Kate pursed her lips knowingly. “The ... gentleman you rode into town with."
"Yakima. We're going into business together."
Sebastian blew a smoke stream over Faith's head. "A ...saloon! His eyes swept her once more, no doubt imagining what she looked like beneath the cape and the dress.
Kate caught the look. It was like a dull knife poking her ribs. She kept smiling.
"Just running a saloon would be a waste of your assets. Dear Faith, you're the loveliest whore I've ever known. Men swoop to you like coyotes to fresh meat. Why, just sitting there ogling you, Sebastian is about to unload in his pants!" Kate glanced at Sebastian and threw her head back, laughing.
Sebastian turned brick red and busied himself flicking ash from his cigar.
"I appreciate the offer," Faith said, rising. It was almost over. She would get out of here alive. 'Those days are over for me."
Kate stood suddenly and walked around the desk. She stopped two feet in front of Faith and narrowed her eyes, as if trying to peer into the depths of Faith's soul, wary, skeptical. "No blackmail? No running to the town marshal with word of what I did to you in Fort Dodge? Come, now, Faith—do you really expect me to believe that?"
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