Apache Flame

by Madeline Baker

  Striding across the floor, Mitch flung the drapes aside. Standing at the window, he watched the raindrops run down the glass. They reminded him of the last time he had seen Alisha, reminded him of the tears that had slid down her cheeks…

  * * * * *

  “Why are you leaving?” She looked up at him, tears glistening in her eyes. “Where are you going?”

  “I don’t know. I only know I’ve got to get out of here. Away from this town. Away from him.”

  “Away from me,” she murmured.

  “‘Lisha.”

  “Please don’t go.” Tears spilled from her eyes and ran down her cheeks.

  “I’ve got to. I can’t stay here any longer. I’ll kill him if I do.”

  Sobbing, she had locked her arms around his waist and held on as if she would never let him go. He groaned softly as she squeezed his rib cage. He didn’t want to leave her. It was the last thing he wanted. But he had to get out of town, away from his old man. He couldn’t take anymore, knew with a cold crystal clarity that if the old man hit him one more time, he would kill him.

  “I’ll send for you, as soon as I get settled somewhere.” He slid his hand into her hair. “Will you come?”

  She looked up at him, hope shining in her eyes. “You promise, Mitchy?”

  Mitchy. No one else had ever called him that. “I promise, but it might take awhile.”

  “I’ll wait,” she said, smiling through her tears. “However long it takes. Forever, if I have to…”

  * * * * *

  Mitch grunted softly as he turned away from the window. Apparently four months had been longer than forever. But times had been hard back then, jobs scarce. He had finally found a job working on a cattle ranch in Wyoming and once he was settled, he had written to Alisha, telling her to come to him. He had sent her money and a train ticket. She had returned both, along with a brief note that had said, in part, that she had reconsidered his offer and had decided to marry Roger Smithfield instead.

  He had left the ranch at summer’s end. Being a cowboy had been hard work. Roundups, branding, long hours spent in the saddle. He quickly came to the same conclusion as the other cowhands. Cattle had to be the stupidest creatures the Good Lord had ever created, forever getting tangled up in barbed wire or mired in bogs. The job had been bearable when he was doing it so he and Alisha could be together. Without her, it had been just hard work.

  For a time, he had drifted from place to place. He had been a young man from a small town who’d been nowhere, seen nothing. An angry young man with a broken heart. He had tried to forget her, tried to drown her memory in booze, in the arms of other women. Nothing had worked but, in time, the ache had grown less and he quit running. He had stopped in a little Colorado mining town to spend a few days and ended up wearing a badge. He had stayed there for almost three years before the itch to move on hit. During those three years, the name Mitch Garret became a name to be reckoned with. The town had been wide open when he pinned on a badge; it had been a quiet, law-abiding community when he left, a place where decent folk would walk the streets without fear. He had been in a Nevada saloon when he got word of his father’s death.

  And now he was back in Canyon Creek, back where he had started.

  But not for long.

  Chapter Three

  Russell Faraday sat at his desk, his hands clasped in an attitude of supplication. It couldn’t be true. After all these years, Mitch Garrett was back.

  Russell closed his eyes, an urgent prayer wending its way toward heaven. For my daughter’s sake, don’t let him stay.

  Even now, over five years later, he could remember how shocked he had been when Alisha told him she was in love with Con Garret’s half-breed bastard son. Not only that, she’d said, but she was going to marry young Garret as soon as he found a job.

  Russell had stared at her, unable to believe his beautiful angel daughter had been spending time with young Garret.

  But worse things were yet to come. Two months after declaring she was in love with Garret, Alisha had come to him in tears to tell him she was carrying Garret’s bastard. Pain had clutched Russell’s heart, so sharp and intense he had been certain he was going to die.

  It was at that moment that he had fully realized how much he had relied on his wife. Angela had been his strength. When she died, a part of him, the best part, had died with her. He had needed Angela then as never before, needed her strength, her womanly intuition to guide him. For the first time since his wife passed away, he had admitted that he wasn’t strong enough, wise enough, to raise their daughter alone. Self-recriminations followed. He should have paid more attention to Alisha, spent more time with her, listened more intently, instead of shutting himself away from her. Obviously, she had been searching for the love and affection he had denied her.

  He had spent the rest of that night in his study, on his knees, fervently praying for help, for guidance, for wisdom.

  The following day, he had put Chloe and Alisha on a stage. He told his congregation they had gone east, for a visit, which was both the truth and a lie. They had gone east, but only as far east as the next town.

  He had been there when the child was born. He remembered how his daughter cried when he told her the baby had been stillborn. Two days later, he had taken Chloe and Alisha home.

  They had never mentioned that awful time in their lives again.

  Alisha had become the schoolmistress a year later when Mr. Fontaine retired. She was a respected member of the community. She played the organ in church on Sunday and for the choir on Wednesday night. She was engaged to be married to a decent, hard-working man. Her life was settled. Respectable. Above reproach.

  And now Garret was back.

  With a sigh, Russell Faraday sank to his knees, praying that the house of cards he had so carefully built would not come tumbling down around him.

  Chapter Four

  Alisha took off her gloves and tucked them in the pocket of her coat, then hung her coat and hat on the hall tree inside the door.

  “Father? I’m home.”

  “In here, Alisha.”

  Alisha followed the sound of her father’s voice to the study. He was seated at his desk, working on Sunday’s sermon. She felt a rush of tenderness as she looked at him. He had taken her mother’s death hard, and it had aged him. His hair, once dark brown, was now gray. His eyes, once a deep emerald green, seemed to have faded. He rarely smiled anymore.

  He looked up from his desk as she entered the room. “Good evening, daughter. How was your day?”

  “Fine.”

  She sat down on the arm of the sofa, wondering if he knew Mitch was back in town.

  Alisha took a deep breath. Might as well get it out in the open and get it over with. “I guess you’ve heard the news.”

  He didn’t pretend ignorance. “Yes. Are you all right?”

  “Of course.” She pasted a smile on her face. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “I know you once thought you were in love with him.”

  “That was a long time ago.”

  “Yes,” he said quietly. “A long time ago.”

  “How’s your sermon coming along?”

  Russell shrugged. “Fine, fine.”

  Rising, she walked around the desk and gave her father a hug. “I know it’ll be wonderful, like always. I’ll go fix dinner.”

  In the kitchen, she stared out the kitchen window while she waited for the soup to heat, sighing as her thoughts turned toward Mitch, as they had doing all day.

  Why hadn’t he sent for her? When her father insisted she leave town until the baby was born, she had made him promise he would forward any mail she received, but none had been forthcoming. Still, she had waited, hoping, for months and months. Every time her father went to the post office to pick up the mail, she had been certain that she would hear from Mitchy, but the days and weeks passed, and there had been no word from him and finally she realized he was never going to send for her, that his love, like his promise,
had been a lie.

  Even now, she could remember how devastated she had been when she finally admitted to herself that she was waiting for a letter that was never going to come. She had felt so lost, so lonely, so bereft. She had cried until she was certain she had no tears left, and then she had cried some more.

  She had been determined to put him out of her mind, and she had turned her every thought to the baby she carried. She might not have Mitch, but she would have his child.

  But even that comfort had been denied her. She had never seen her son. Her father had told her the baby was born dead, that it was for the best if she didn’t see the child, that she should put the whole affair behind her and go on with her life. For months afterward, she had dreamed that she heard her baby crying, that it was wandering in the dark, looking for her.

  Gradually, the dreams had stopped and she had sought to take her father’s advice, to put that period of her life behind her. She had thought herself quite successful at it until today, when just hearing Mitch’s name brought it all back, made her remember how desperately she had loved him, how her heart had ached when he left her, how empty her arms had been when the child she had longed for was taken from her.

  Tears burned her eyes and slid down her cheeks and she dashed them away. She would not cry for Mitch Garret. Not now, not ever again.

  She was going to marry Roger Smithfield. They had grown up together, gone to school together. He was a good man, an ambitious man, and she cared deeply for him. Soon he would have his own business. They would have a home of their own, a family of their own. She was going to be the best wife any man ever had. And if Roger didn’t make her heart sing the way Mitch had, if Roger didn’t make her flesh ache for his touch, well, she could just live without that. Love and lust had brought her nothing but misery and despair.

  Sniffing back her tears, she removed a pan of biscuits from the oven, filled two bowls with beef stew, and went to tell her father that dinner was ready.

  Chapter Five

  Mitch shook hands with his father’s lawyer then left the man’s office. Closing the door, he stood on the boardwalk for a moment, then shoved the legal documents into his back pocket. The ranch was legally his now, to do with as he pleased. Ironic, he mused as he descended the stairs and crossed the street, that the first piece of property he had ever owned should be a place that held nothing but unhappy memories.

  He muttered an oath as he stepped onto the boardwalk. Why had he come back here? Why hadn’t he just written to the lawyer and told him to sell the ranch, lock, stock, and barrel and send him the money?

  Shit, he knew why. He had come back to Canyon Creek hoping for a miracle, hoping that she would still be here, that he would have a chance to confront her, to ask her why she hadn’t waited for him, like she’d promised she would. Damn, after all this time, it shouldn’t matter anymore. But it did.

  Lost in thought, he didn’t see the woman exiting the mercantile until he had slammed into her, nearly knocking her off the boardwalk.

  “I’m sorry,” Mitch exclaimed, grabbing her arm to keep her from tumbling down the stairs. “I wasn’t looking where I was…”

  The words died in his throat. For a moment, all he could do was stare. “’Lisha.” She was every bit as beautiful as he remembered, with her honey-gold hair and sparkling brown eyes.

  Alisha stared at the man in front of her, scarcely able to speak past the lump in her throat. “Mitch.” She tried to smile, and failed. “I heard you were back in town. I’m…I’m sorry about your father.”

  He nodded. “Thanks.”

  She looked down at his hand, still holding her arm. It was a large hand, dark, calloused. Strong. She remembered the touch of it on her skin, the way the merest touch had made her tingle from head to toe. Mitch’s hand, caressing her, his fingertips gliding over thigh, his skin so dark against her own…

  He followed her gaze, then jerked his hand away. “Sorry.”

  Silence stretched between them.

  I never had trouble talking to him before, Alisha thought. Now he seems like a stranger. “How long will you be in town?”

  “I’m not sure. Until I sell the old man’s house, I reckon. How’s Smithfield?” He glanced at her hand, steeling himself for the sight of another man’s ring on her finger, then noticed she was wearing gloves.

  “He’s doing very well, thank you.”

  Mitch grunted softly, all too aware that they weren’t alone, that people were watching, staring. Remembering.

  Silence settled between them again, punctuated by memories of what might have been.

  “I have to go,” Alisha said. “It was nice seeing you, Mitchell.”

  Mitchell. She had never called him that in all the years he had known her. “Yeah,” he muttered. “Nice.”

  “Well, good day.” Head high, she turned and walked away, hardly able to see where she was going for the tears that flooded her eyes.

  Mitch watched her until she was out of sight. Going into the nearest saloon, he ordered a bottle of the best bourbon the house had to offer, then carried it to a table in the back corner of the room and sat down, determined to drown her memory in whiskey, to obliterate every thought, every memory, every regret.

  It wouldn’t work, of course. But then, it never had.

  He was about a fourth of the way through the bottle when he heard the gunshots. Years of being a lawman rose to the fore and sent him running out of the saloon, gun in hand. It took only a moment to size up the situation. Three men were exiting the bank, pushing their way through the handful of townspeople gathered on the boardwalk.

  Saul Jordan, owner of the Canyon Creek Cattleman’s Bank, was sprawled face down across the doorway. Blood oozed from his left shoulder.

  A woman screamed as one of the robbers shoved her out of the way.

  Mitch didn’t stop to think, just did what came naturally after being a lawman for nearly three years. He fired a warning shot in the air and hollered, “Throw down your weapons!”

  He didn’t expect the outlaws to comply, and they didn’t. They turned to face him, their guns swinging in his direction. Without hesitation, he fired at the man in front. The outlaw went down, and Mitch fired at the second man. The third bandit threw his gun into the street and raised his hands over his head.

  One of the moneybags had burst open when it hit the ground and greenbacks fluttered in the air like paper butterflies.

  A man swore as the scent of blood and gun smoke rose on the wind. Somewhere in the distance, a child cried for its mother.

  When the smoke cleared, two of the bank robbers lay dead in the dirt. The third outlaw hadn’t moved. He was staring at Mitch, his expression virulent. “You dirty half-breed! You killed my brother!”

  “Shut your mouth,” Mitch replied mildly. “Or you’ll join him.”

  The outlaw fell silent, but he continued to stare at Mitch, his expression filled with loathing.

  “Damn!” exclaimed a man standing near the newspaper office. “That was some shootin’.”

  “Like greased lightning!”

  “Never seen nothing like it!”

  Mitch nodded as men came forward to slap him on the back. Two of the bank tellers rushed out of the bank and began picking greenbacks up from the street and boardwalk.

  Someone called for the doctor. Another man ran forward with a piece of rope and tied the surviving outlaw’s hands behind his back.

  Holstering his Colt, Mitch turned away and almost bumped into old man West, who had left his rocking chair across the way to get a closer look at the dead men.

  “Where the hell’s your sheriff?” Mitch asked.

  Mr. West shrugged. “We’re sort of between lawmen at the moment.”

  “Not anymore!”

  Mitch glanced over his shoulder to see who had spoken, and saw two men walking toward him. They both wore dark suits, and they were both smiling broadly.

  The taller of the two pumped Mitch’s hand vigorously. He had wavy brown hair and g
uileless gray eyes. Mitch figured he was in his mid-forties.

  “Casey Waller,” he said. “I’m one of the city fathers. This here is Fred Plumber.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” Mitch said. He nodded at the second man. Fred Plumber had sandy-colored hair and pale blue eyes. He sported a handlebar mustache and thick sideburns, and appeared to be about the same age as Waller.

  “Unless I miss my guess, you’re worn a badge before,” Waller said. “How’d you like to be our new sheriff? Pays ten dollars a month, plus room and board.”

  Mitch shook his head. “I don’t think so, but thanks for the offer.”

  “Now, now, don’t be too hasty. We might be able to offer more. Say, twenty a month?”

  “Cowboys make more than that,” Mitch said, “and they don’t have to worry about getting shot.”

  “Twenty-five,” Waller said, “plus room and board.” He smiled expansively. “That’s a mighty sweet deal for the right man,” he glanced over at the activity in the street, “and we think you’re the right man.”

  “I was getting more than that in Virginia City. Anyway, it’s not the money. And I don’t need a place to stay.”

  Waller held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “All right,” he said, obviously exasperated, “We’ll pay you forty dollars a month, and pay for your ammunition, too. You can’t turn that down! No need to decide right now,” he added hastily. “Why don’t you think it over for a day or two? We’ll be in touch.”

  Waller pumped Mitch’s hand again, then hustled his silent companion into the street where a tall, lanky man dressed in unrelieved black was lining up the two dead bodies while a man Mitch assumed was a photographer for the Canyon Creek Gazette set up his equipment and began to take pictures.