A tic of triumph jerked a muscle in Glory’s cheek. She took another step closer to Abel Justice. She didn’t want to miss. And told him, “My only regret is I don’t have enough bullets to shoot you once for every time I owe you. I will tell you this—the name of J. C. Lawless will be on the first one.”
Her Papa’s killer dared raise a hand in supplication to her and cry out, “I ain’t armed. You cain’t shoot an unarmed man.”
That was the wrong argument. Glory raised an eyebrow. “Why not? You did. Carter Brown—your own partner—didn’t have a gun in his hand when you put a bullet through his head. But more important to me—and worse for you—the other was my papa.” Through talking, Glory shifted her weight, distributing it evenly on both feet. Her finger tensed around the trigger.
“Glory, don’t.”
The soft voice calling out to her startled her. Gasping, she jerked a quick look to her right. Miracle of miracles, Riley was on his feet. A surge of love and intense relief—and fear gripped her. Riley was alive, but his shirtfront was also covered with blood. “Riley! Oh, thank God you’re alive! Are you shot?”
She glanced back at Justice, saw he hadn’t dared to move, and then jerked her attention back to Riley. He was shaking his head. “No, it’s Justice’s blood. He shot himself when I hit him.”
Glory again sought the tracker. Now she noticed the blood oozing wetly down his shirt. “Good. I’m glad. Then all I’ve got to do is finish him off.”
Justice’s mouth opened to a dark O. His eyes held that fearful look a trapped animal gets when it sees the trapper and knows its death is imminent. Good. Glory narrowed her eyes, ready to complete the deed.
“No, Glory. Don’t,” Riley called out, again stopping her. “He’s already dead. He just hasn’t fallen down yet. Listen to me. I don’t want you to kill him.”
“How can you say that? He killed Papa, Riley. He was unarmed. And this coward killed him when he was lost in his grief and was bending over Mama. How can I just forgive him?”
“No one’s asking you to forgive him,” was Riley’s reply. “I know what he did, honey. But he’s not armed now. Look at him.”
She did. She flicked her gaze up and down Abel Justice. Terrified and sniveling, he held his empty hands up for her to see. She called out to him. “Where’s your gun?”
“I don’t know,” he cried, his voice thin and reedy. “Don’t shoot me, Miz Glory. Please. I’m already done for. Just let me be to die on my own.”
Before Glory could even react to that speech, Riley recaptured her attention by calling out, “I don’t think he’s lying, Glory. He’s got a bad wound and will probably die pretty quick. But it’s not him I’m concerned with. It’s you. You don’t have to have his blood on your soul. You don’t want to live with that.”
“No. I have to shoot him,” Glory screamed, suddenly tired of everyone telling her what she could and couldn’t do. “But first he’s going to give me some answers. There’re a lot of things I still don’t understand. I have questions about that day—that day when he killed Papa.”
“I understand. But are you sure you want to know more, Glory? Look where you are now, this minute, for all your knowing. Look at the hurt it’s caused you. Maybe there’re just some things that are better not known. Honey, you may never know the whole truth. And that may be a good thing. So let him be. Let him go die.”
Everything Riley said made good sense, she admitted. But good sense had nothing to do with vengeance. “You may be right, Riley, but he tore my family apart. He killed my Papa and hurt me and my sisters. And what about Biddy and your mother? Look what he did to them. He was going to kill me, too. And you. He deserves to die.”
“Yes, he does. And he will … by his own hand … as it should be. Not by yours. He’s not worth what killing him would do to you, Glory. I’m asking you—please, put the gun down. Because I love you, and I don’t want to see you suffer later for this. Do it, Glory. For me. I’m asking.”
Glory gulped back a sob and a whimper. Suddenly overwhelmed with it all, she looked over at Riley, wanting only for him to hold her, to make the hurt in her heart go away, make it quit aching.
As if he sensed this, he held his hands out to her, inviting her to take the steps that would have her in his embrace. “I love you, Glory. And your sisters do, too. You can be proud—you kept your promise to them. Abel Justice is dying right now because of the brave things you did to keep my mother and Biddy and even me alive. You never gave up, you risked your own life, doing what you had to do to fight for us. We owe you our lives. But it’s over now. Put the gun down … so we can start our lives over. But this time, together. Forever.”
Staring at him, hearing his words of love, knowing she wanted the same things, Glory weakened, suffered second thoughts. Her arms felt heavy, slipped down a notch.
And that notch was apparently big enough for Riley to see, because he jumped in with, “You’d be doing the right thing, Glory. There’s a Higher Justice waiting to deal with him. Let Him. It’s not your place. One man’s quest for revenge—it’s what put Abel Justice on the trail here from Mexico. That same wrong desire took your sisters away from you, too. I asked you before, when will it be enough? When, for God’s sake, are you going to be through hating?”
Glory blinked at the note of impatience in Riley’s voice, and bit at her bottom lip. Finally, she called out, “Riley, I don’t want to hate anymore, can’t you see? I don’t want to be afraid. I want my sisters home. I want my life back and some happiness again. I want you, Riley. I want our babies.”
“I want that, too, sweetheart. More than anything in the world.”
Riley’s warm words and tone pierced the tiniest hole in her heart’s armor, her defense against the shattering grief of finding Mama and Papa dead that September day. Her awakening heart spoke to her, telling her that only by talking this out with Riley would she be able to finally let go—of the hurt, the hate … and the gun. “Riley, I don’t want to do this anymore, but I can’t put the gun down. I can’t. Help me. Talk to me.”
“Will you give the gun to me, Glory?”
“No!” Her grip tightened. She leveled her Papa’s pistol again at Justice, saw that he was pale and sweating. He licked at his lips and stared unblinking at her. She frowned, thinking, He certainly is hanging on pretty good, for someone who’s supposed to be dying. “Talk to me, Riley,” she cried out.
“Okay. Just listen to me. Think of our babies. They’d be beautiful, Glory, just like you. And think about how happy Biddy’d be. And Smiley. They’d be like grandparents to our kids. Just like my folks. Honey, there’s no more land feud—not between my family and yours. My father apologizes. We could live on your land or mine. We could build our own house.”
“No, I want to live in Mama and Papa’s house, Riley.”
“We can do that, too. All of us. Me, you, our ten babies, Biddy, Hannah, and Jacey, and their families when they have them. And Skeeter, too. Don’t you think he’d like lots of babies pulling on his ears and playing with him?”
Glory grinned at that. Somewhat against her will, but a grin nevertheless. This picture Riley was weaving … she’d thought this before. Her dream. The realization struck her with the force of a slap. And Riley Eugene Thorne knew it, understood it … had said it. He was also the center of it. With his love in her life, she could face whatever she had to.
Even bad news. Even if it was about her sisters. No! They’d come home. She couldn’t bear anything else. They’d come home and find her married to a Thorne. Well, Riley came first in her heart now, not her sisters. And they’d have to understand and accept him. Glory blinked at that thought. It was true—Riley was first in her heart.
A sudden notion assailed her. She was a grown woman now, no longer clinging to the loyalties and affections of her childhood. She wanted Riley. She belonged with Riley. It wasn’t the ranch at all. Not the land, not the house. They weren’t home. Because wherever Riley was, that was her home. Her love for him and h
is love for her—and only that—could save her, could finally take away this hate that threatened to crush her soul.
Thinking of hate brought Abel Justice into focus. Cowardly, merciless, wounded … pitiable. No, she couldn’t do it. Not in cold blood. Not like this. It was wrong, plain and simple. She’d be just like him if she ended him like this. That was what Riley meant. It was over. Glory gave up the fight. She relaxed her shoulders, bent her elbows, and raised the gun until its barrel pointed harmlessly at the sky.
Only then did she look over at Riley. He smiled and nodded at her. And then he put his hands to his waist, let his breath out, and closed his eyes, obviously relieved. A smile for him began to form on Glory’s face, but died at the sound of Abel Justice’s voice.
“You stupid little bitch—you might just as well be a Lawless for all yer gutlessness. You stand there with a gun in yer hand and talkin’ about love and babies. I knowed you didn’t have the gumption to shoot me.”
Glory stared at the gun in his hands. He must have had it behind him, stuck in his waistband. Wherever it had been didn’t matter, because at the moment it was now pointed at her. That gloating look was back on his face. “I ain’t shot up half as bad as he thinks. Hell, I’m going to live. But not him”—he indicated Riley—“and not you. Because you’d rather talk than do somethin’ about it. All that sappiness about love. Here’s how much I care about love.”
He then made the mistake of pointing the gun at Riley. Who was a picture at that moment of helplessness. He was also unarmed. Glory didn’t even think. She raised her Papa’s gun and fired, hitting a very stunned-looking Abel Justice in his left shoulder. Glory saw Riley jump back out of the way and knew he wouldn’t say one word this time to distract or to discourage her as she faced her enemy.
“This is J. C. Lawless’s gun I just shot you with,” she explained to the tracker in a murderously calm voice. “And that bullet in you is for J. C. Lawless. You had your chance to walk away. You should have taken it.”
She fired again. “This is for Catherine Lawless.” She didn’t stop. Not when Justice jerked and finally dropped his gun. “This is for Peter Anglin, a crippled old cowboy who never hurt anybody.” Justice spun around as the next bullet hit him. “And this is for all the animals he loved. And for Skeeter, who lived to hate you and to hunt you down.”
Finally, Abel Justice fell to the ground, spread-eagled … and dead. But still, Glory advanced on him, pulling the trigger again and again. “For Hannah. For Jacey.” When all she got was the metallic click-click-click that told her the chambers were empty, she kept squeezing the trigger. And might have continued to do so forever had someone not gripped her shoulders and turned her away.
She looked up, blinking in confusion. Riley’s handsome face filled her vision and her world. “He left you no choice. You did what you had to do, what I should have done a long time ago. It’s over now.”
Glory’s mouth worked. She heard him, she nodded. Riley then pried the gun out of her fingers and stuck it in his waistband. Watching him as intently as she was and loving his every move—knowing it meant he was blessedly alive, Glory startled when something wet and cold nuzzled her palm. Looking down, she saw Skeeter. When had he come back over here? She smiled down at the big hound, who turned soulful eyes up to her. “He’s dead, Skeeter. He can’t ever hurt you again. He can’t ever hurt any of us again. It’s over.”
Skeeter blinked, appeared to think about what she’d said. Then, he swung his large, squarish head to stare at Abel Justice’s unmoving, bloodied body. A low woof escaped him, and he humped his back. Padding away from Glory, he adopted a stiff-legged walk that seemed to raise the hair on his back, and finally stood over the man who had shot him. He sniffed the body and then raised his head to bay loudly, to announce this victory, this triumph. His rich and throaty cry filled the air, carrying on the wind for all the prairie to hear and to know.
Watching him, Glory was suddenly moved to tears. Her fog lifted. Her eyes filling with the hot and salty drops of long-held emotion, she turned and stepped into Riley’s warm and loving embrace. The smear of blood on his shirt didn’t matter. Not now, when she needed so badly to rest her cheek against his broad chest and hear for herself his beating heart. Only this way would she believe that he was really and truly alive. And that she was, too.
Riley held her as tightly as she did him. He kissed the top of her head, smoothed her hair out of her face, and told her, “There’s still a lot to be done, to be faced—and forgiven. I know that. But I’ll be there with you every step of the way. I swear it. Every day and every night. I’ll keep you safe and warm. I swear I will. But for right now, put everything else out of your mind, sweetheart. Right now, think only about how much I love you today. And about tomorrow—and how much more I’m going to love you then. And the day after that. Forever.”
His words of love. Riley’s for her. Could any woman anywhere, in any time, ever be loved so much? Glory blinked, her chin quivered, and again fat, hot tears spilled over and ran down her cheeks. She cried for all that had happened. For all that was yet to be. For her real parents’ fates. For those of Mama and Papa Lawless. And for the as-yet-unknown fates of her sisters. But above all else, she cried for her happiness … for the love she’d found to help her through it all.
Pulling back in his arms, she turned her face up to Riley’s, capturing for herself the depth of his love in his deep, dark eyes. “I love you,” she whispered.
Riley smoothed away her tears and smiled down at her. In that instant, Glory knew that with him, her heart could finally rest. For, in him, she saw the cherished reality of all her dreams. “I love you, too. I always have,” he answered her in that deep, quiet voice of his that chased gooseflesh over her skin, that voice that would be waking her every day for the rest of her life. He then raised his head and, looking around, considered the falling darkness. “The night’s coming on. Everyone will be worried. I need to get you home.”
Glory reached up to cup his cheek, to run her fingers over his lips, to draw his gaze back down to her face. “Riley,” she said when he again looked into her eyes, “we need to go, yes. But in my heart, I’m already home. Because you’re here.”
Epilogue
“Well, Sutfield,” Ben Thorne was saying, “we’re all kin now. You, me, and the Lawlesses. What? Why, it is too true! See, your Janie married my Henry today. And Riley married Glory. The grooms are brothers. Yep, Lawless kin. Ha! You ever think we’d live long enough to say that?”
At his side, Louise Thorne tugged on his sleeve. “You hush up that loud talk. I don’t want Reverend Bickerson hearing you and thinking you’ve had too much to drink.”
“How’s he going to hear me? He’s in the kitchen with Sourdough and feeding the leftover food to Skeeter.” He turned back to Sutfield. “That’s what I was telling you. Riley says when the gunfire started, that danged Skeeter made himself scarce. Didn’t show up again until Justice was dead. Turns out, betwixt those two times, he’d been sittin’ on Riley’s coat and chewin’ on his hat.”
The burst of laughter from the enthralled knot of friends and neighbors clustered around Ben and Louise Thorne, all of them dressed in their wedding finery, caught Biddy’s attention. She and Smiley joined their group. “That Skeeter, he’s a fine one. Has taken to sleepin’ in me kitchen, he has.”
Smiley teased, “She’s spoiled that dog until he’s worthless. Done the same with Heck Thompson, too, babying him over that lump on his noggin. Oh, you didn’t know? We found him that night a week ago out in the bunkhouse, dazed and his scalp opened up. Yep—Carter Brown’s doings. Wonder he didn’t kill the boy when they fought over that missing money a while back. You didn’t know about that, either? Where you been, Sutfield?”
Pressed into a group of well-wishers at Smiley’s back, Glory smiled and nodded at her wedding guests’ congratulations, saying how pleased she was they could make it on such short notice. As soon as was politely possible, though, she excused herself to seek he
r groom. Careful of her wedding gown, an ivory-satin creation Biddy and Louise Thorne had sewn feverishly to complete, Glory threaded herself through and around clusters of chatting folks in the gaily decorated great room.
Now where had Riley gotten to? Just then, as if she’d asked it aloud, the happy throng shifted. And Glory saw him. As always, her breath caught, her heart thumped. Across the room from her, he stood in front of the huge fireplace with his brother Henry. Next to him was his bride, Janie—a slender, blond-haired girl. If not for her quiet influence on Henry, Glory knew, she and Riley would have had to wait months for Reverend Bickerson’s next visit before they could marry.
Her tall and handsome groom. Glory sighed, raising a hand to her chest. A possessive smile claimed her features. He cut quite a figure in his black Sunday suit and holding a crystal glass of whiskey. As she watched, he laughed at something Henry said, and Janie’s face turned red. Glory shook her head. She needed to rescue her sister-in-law. Then it hit her, rooting her to the spot. She had a sister-in-law.
It was true. She and the Thornes, as of today, December 5, 1873, were now family. She prayed that the ties that now bound them together would hold strong when—she clung to “when”—Hannah and Jacey came home.
Glory blinked back her emotion and realized Riley’d spotted her, had apparently been watching her for a while. Because his dark-eyed stare questioned her, asked what was wrong. Glory meant to reassure him with a shrug and a smile, but they wouldn’t come. Riley tensed, handed his drink to Henry, excused himself, and then started toward her.
Honing in on her, like an arrow to its target, he held her gaze. The sheer weight of his burning stare weakened Glory’s knees, made her breathing irregular, made her wish they were alone as they’d been every night since … that awful day. As good as his word, he’d stayed here with her, slept with her, held her, but nothing more as they awaited their wedding day. And now, here it was.
Seasons of Glory Page 33
