"We're not here to cause any trouble. We're not deputies or anything like that. Floyd was best man at a wedding in town today." Kate spoke slowly and kept her voice pitched perfectly to soothe the rancher and his wife. "Something terrible happened, and Floyd might give us some insight into the reason."
Dunwoody silenced his wife's outburst. He turned a fraction, to get the rifle into better position.
"What's Floyd got to do with anything?"
"Parson Thomas was gunned down during a wedding ceremony," J.D. said. He held back anything about Jesse Smith. For the moment. "Floyd was right by him and might have seen who pulled the trigger. Or maybe he could give us a clue as to the killer."
"So you're bounty hunters?"
"We're helping out the Hurst family."
"Horace, I told you there was a reason for him being as nervous as a cat laying next to a rocking chair. He was getting married to that Abigail Hurst!"
"You don't want Floyd, do you? You want to talk to Jesse Smith. He's gone. He rode out early this morning and hasn't been back."
"So he and Floyd work together? Bunk mates?"
Horace Dunwoody snorted like a bull ready to attack.
"Jesse don't talk to nobody much. Floyd's the only one who even acknowledges his presence."
"Why's that?" Kate asked.
"He's not a sociable sort. It's his own doing. When the boys gather 'round the campfire, he never spins a yarn or tells of his wild days. Hardly answers, even when spoken to. He does his job fairly well, but nothing special. If hands weren't so hard to find this season, I'd have let him go on general principles. A good crew has to rely on each other out on the trail. When a hand doesn't fit in, nobody knows what will happen during a stampede or a flood."
"You keep him on because you have a soft spot in your heart for strays." Mrs. Dunwoody crossed her arms and defied her husband to contradict her.
"He's not here. Floyd's not, either."
"Much obliged," J.D. said. In a low voice, he said to Kate, "Our luck's just petered out. Floyd didn't come back. He lit out and kept running."
As he wheeled his horse around, a thought came to him. He stopped and asked Dunwoody, "Are you having any problems with rustlers? In the past couple weeks?"
"The foreman's worried we might have lost a couple dozen head. This time of year it might be wolves, but he thinks it's cattle thieves. Why do you ask?"
"The marshal said a gang of road agents lead by an owlhoot going by the name of Ben Blackmun started causing trouble aplenty a few weeks back. Floyd and the outlaws might be in cahoots."
"Floyd?" scoffed Dunwoody. "He doesn't have the spine for it. The boy's afraid of his own shadow. Now Smith, that's something else. There's a darkness in him."
"Horace."
The rancher shushed his wife.
"Smith never gave me a moment's doubt about his honesty, but if someone turned bad, it'd be him." Dunwoody hesitated, then went on. "If you and your lady there are so inclined, I'll put up a five hundred-dollar reward if you can stop the rustling. Another ten dollars a head for any cow you return with a C-Bar-C brand."
"That's mighty generous, sir. You have any notion where we ought to start hunting for the rustlers?"
"Ten miles farther on is Cedro Peak. Funny looking pile of rock like a big busted wolf fang poking out of the ground. North of that a half mile is a trail that goes back into the mountains. It would take a full cavalry troop to flush any rustler from that country. If this Blackmun gang you're hunting for is back there, and if they've been dining high, wide and fancy free on my beeves, that's where I'd begin looking for them."
"Much obliged, Mr. Dunwoody."
"Water your horses yonder. Let me know when you bring them varmints to justice."
His wife tugged on his arm and whispered. From the set to his jaw, he denied her request to invite the two strangers in for dinner. J.D. wasn't sure if he wanted to join the cowboys in their celebration. Looking them over, asking a question or two about Floyd—and Jesse Smith—would take the edge off any meal they might receive.
Rather than let the woman prevail, J.D. edged around and crowded Kate ahead of him to the watering trough Dunwoody had mentioned. Their horses drank noisily while they splashed water on their faces to get the trail dust off.
"Do you think he knows more about Floyd and Jesse?"
"I don't think so, Kate. He might eat with his crew but that's not something he does often. I'm not so sure he will tonight at suppertime or again anytime soon."
She laughed.
"He might eat two meals. From that gut hanging over his belt buckle, he's the kind who never misses a meal offered him."
Pulling their horses back, J.D. said, "We had better ride hard. There's another hour or two of sunlight. Finding that trail in the dark might be hard."
They rode steadily, changing gait from a gallop to a walk and hitting a canter and trot to cover as much ground as possible without unduly tiring the horses. Finding the broken tooth peak was easy enough. Within a half hour they sat astride their horses looking up the trail leading back into twilight-cloaked mountains.
"We ought to camp here for the night and go in, first thing in the morning."
J.D. considered his wife's suggestion and immediately disregarded its wisdom.
"We push on. The more we close the distance between us and the gang, the better it will be for us. We might overtake them when they camp."
"You're making some big assumptions," she said. "The only thing we know is that this is a trail. That's all. We don't know any gang responsible for breaking any law's come this way today or ever."
J.D. kicked free and dropped to the ground. He poked at a pile of horse flop, walked a few yards farther up the trail, then turned and waved for her to join him. Kate stopped when he pointed to recently broken limbs of a low bush.
"More 'n one rider has come this way today. The sap is still running. The horse pie is dried on the outside but fresh inside. I can't make out the number of horses cutting up the trail, but it's more than a pair of riders."
"That still doesn't mean a thing. The Blackmun gang or another? We can't say."
"I'm not much of a betting man, but I'll put my chips on it being the outlaws that shot up Abigail's wedding." He stepped up into the saddle.
"The only chips you'd ever bet are cow chips."
"Was the rancher beating his gums or did he mean it about a reward? We're not getting much from the Hursts for finding Jesse. That might go good with a reward Marshal Nesbitt mentioned."
"We're not taking a penny from the Hursts. And it's not like you to count your chickens before they're hatched. We have a whale of a lot to find out before we can claim any money from anybody." They rode in silence a half mile before Kate spoke again. "Why would an outlaw like Ben Blackmun want to grab Jesse like that? From the altar on his wedding day?"
"Too many questions are going begging for answers. I have a bit of curiosity about them, but mostly it doesn't matter to me. Jesse can tell us everything when we find him."
The silence hung heavy between them this time. Their thoughts thundered along the same path when it came to Jesse Smith—and the path led straight over a cliff. Drunken cowboys might shoot up a town to blow off steam. The raid on the church had been done with military precision. Killing the preacher had frozen everyone in place far better than any command to do so, then the masked outlaws had swarmed in. They had only needed to shoot a few of the crowd before they grabbed Jesse and hurried him out.
Jesse Smith had been the reason for the raid.
"We won't find him hanging from a tree," J.D. said. "There's more to this than—"
Kate hissed like a snake. In the twilight he saw her hold up her hand to quiet him. He reached for his Colt slung in the cross-draw holster the instant that he spotted a foot-long tongue of orange and yellow flame up in the rocks to his left. The whine of the bullet ricocheting off a rock past him and the rifle report came at the same instant. He slid his six-shooter out and fired a
round in the direction of the muzzle flash. The light still burned in his eyes, letting him more accurately fire for the hidden gunman.
"Take cover," he needlessly called. His wife had already slipped off to the right of her horse, using it as a shield.
Kate kept the horse from rearing as she pulled it off the road and into a rocky ravine. All around her bullets met rock with a spang! The night filled with the combination of rifle fire and ricochets. J.D. wasted no time joining Kate in the ravine. The bank was taller than his head, giving good cover to both them and their horses. He looked around. They could ride back down the dry river stream in the direction they had come or press on and go deeper into the mountains. It was hard for him to think with the fusillade tearing away at the roots of a tree clinging precariously to the edge of the ravine inches above his head.
"There's more than one firing at us," Kate said. "Nobody fires that fast without reloading. There's no break between rounds."
"The church raid was close to military in the way it was executed. These drygulchers might be ex-Army."
"It won't matter if they were all medal-wearing generals in the Grand Army of the Potomac if they kill us. What's our best chance for getting away without holes where we don't want new ones?"
J.D. handed her the reins and pulled his Winchester from the saddle scabbard. He levered in a round and began hiking in the pea-sized gravel along the ravine bottom. He found a broken spot in the bank and dug his toes in, climbing to the lip where he flopped flat on his belly. He steadied his rifle and waited for a shot. It came seconds later. Twin muzzle flashes gave away the spot where the snipers hid. A slow squeeze after sighting in just above the muzzle sent a bullet whining through the air. He was rewarded with a loud curse. He hadn't wounded the rifleman but had let him know he was in a fight.
Patience was a virtue, and J.D. was feeling downright virtuous at the moment. The second sniper fired. J.D. began firing rapidly, sending one .44-40 slug after another in the proper direction. He drove the gunman back.
Considering his next move took some time. Circling the two snipers had some merit. After being driven from their secure spots, they would get careless. Either they'd be mad their trap had failed and do something stupid or they would hightail it. That had its advantages. And a big disadvantage.
How many rode in the gang?
If these were the same owlhoots who had shot the parson at least three were willing and able to come after him and Kate. In his gut, he knew there were more. Maybe a half dozen total, but what mattered more was not staying pinned down in the ravine. He eased himself back down and hurried back to where Kate held her own rifle.
"That took you long enough," she said. "What are we up against?"
"At least two. I sent them on their way but not, I suspect, with hunks of lead in their worthless hides."
"They'll fetch the rest of the gang."
"That was my thought. We need to find a better place to stand them off."
"Or retreat."
"Or retreat," he agreed.
They each vanished into their own thoughts before J.D. finally said, "Retreat. We don't know what we're getting into."
"The dark makes it even more dangerous."
He nodded. They led their horses down the ravine, back in the direction they had come to reach this point. Some strange sense caused J.D. to suddenly stop. Kate knew better than to ask what troubled him. For all he knew, she felt the same grinding uneasiness in the pit of her stomach that he had causing his gorge to rise.
Using his rifle, he pointed to a narrowing in the ravine twenty yards ahead. His eyes were adapted to the dark so the tiny flare of a cigarette came to him. A slow inhalation caught a whiff of the smoker's cheap tobacco. He edged back to where he could whisper.
"At least one sentry ahead. We'll never get past them."
Kate reversed direction. They went back to where they had first entered the ravine, then kept walking. This time she halted their advance.
"Ahead."
J.D. strained to hear the low voices as two men argued.
They were caught in the ravine between two parties of armed men.
Chapter 4
"We're boxed in here. Do you think they know that?" Kate gentled her horse as it tried to rear. Somehow, the horses picked up on the perilous situation and tried to bolt. A firm grip kept both horses from betraying their location to their attackers.
"They can't." J.D. considered their dilemma, then worked out the problem they faced. "If they did, the men on either side of us would be moving in on us by now. They'd have us caught in a crossfire impossible to escape."
"They won't be content to sit on their butts," Kate said. "Eventually Blackmun or whoever is their leader will wonder what happened to the riders they fired on."
"And who fired back at their sentries. We might get lucky and sneak past the guards, then take them from the rear."
Kate looked around. The road stretched out up the slope and disappeared into the night-cloaked mountains. Either direction along the ravine took them into gunfire they wouldn't survive. All it took was one side to hold them back for a few minutes and allow the other to rush up from behind. She faced the blackness in the only remaining direction, then led her horse to the far side of the ravine away from the trail.
J.D. silently followed. He worked to keep his movement as silent as possible, but his boots dislodged rocks and the click of steel horseshoes against the rock carried in the still night as the horse walked. They reached the far side of the ravine where the bank had broken down. During spring runoff, this dry stream would flow bank to bank. During the summer months between storms higher in the mountains, the ground dried out and crumbled. A narrow cut in the bank allowed them to wiggle through. The horses tried to protest, then struggled with the steep slope leading higher onto the hillside.
"Here," Kate whispered. In a canyon even her soft voice would carry and betray them.
The cave was large enough for them to lead their horses inside a few yards, then narrowed so sharply further progress proved impossible. A quick survey of the cave showed no trace of big, nasty critters living here. J.D. disturbed a few mice but nothing more showed itself. They tied the reins around rocks and then took off the saddles, letting them drop to the dusty floor. J.D. took his rifle and went to the cave mouth, settled down and rested his rifle on a conveniently sized boulder. As Kate worked in the cave behind him, he stood guard. In the distance he saw faint shadows moving about and knew the outlaws actively sought them.
Finding the shape the farthest away that he considered a reasonable shot, even in the dark, he built up rocks into a protective channel on either side of his muzzle to hide the flash. Only if the men seeking them were directly in front of the rifle would they see the flare. With infinite care he sighted in, took windage into account, then waited for a mounted dark form to appear far down the road. The trigger came back smoothly and the rifle bucked into his shoulder. He pulled the rifle away hurriedly, then held his breath.
The shot missed the rider but had the desired effect of fooling the outlaws. They thought the round had been fired from farther downhill. A half dozen dark shapes galloped along the road, all headed back in the direction the Blazes had come. If the search stretched even farther away, the outlaws would be off on a wild goose chase all night long.
"You lured them away?" Kate knelt beside him.
"Thanks for keeping the horses quiet."
"They're used to gunfire. Neither of them did more than paw the ground."
J.D. fell silent. He rested the rifle against the cave wall and sat back, taking his wife into his arms. For some time they simply enjoyed the feel of the other's body, but eventually when it became apparent they weren't being sought any longer, the need for comfort turned into something more passionate. He bent and lightly kissed lips almost invisible in the dark.
Kate scooted up, put her arms around his neck and pulled his face down to hers for a decent kiss that deepened. When her lips parted slightly
his tongue invaded her mouth, lightly stroking over her tongue. Then she pushed back and their tongues played hide and seek in each other's mouth. They were panting with need when he broke off the kiss.
He began unfastening her blouse. When it fell from her shoulders, her skin showed ghostly white in the darkness. But there was nothing ghostlike when he reached out to touch that flesh. Warm. Vibrant. Trembling under his fingers as he moved down to her left breast. He caught the nipple. The nub had already turned hard with need. He bent and lightly kissed the nipple. Kate moaned and leaned back so he could better reach that luscious mound. He wetted it with his lips and tongue, then lightly blew. The wetness turning dry caused it to feel as if the nipple was shoved into ice. She shivered and desire spread in all directions.
"More," she whispered. "This is so nice, but I want more. I want this."
Her fingers pressed into the bulge in his jeans. She began massaging until he groaned. With quick movements, she popped the buttons on his jeans and released his manhood. Her fingers circled it immediately. Tugging, she moved him away from the cave mouth to where she had spread their bedrolls.
She held herself up on her elbows and let him work off her tight jeans. She sighed when his fingers moved across the tangled thatch between her legs. Then the aroused woman lay back and lifted her knees on either side of his body. Reaching down she grabbed his manhood once more and insistently pulled it toward her heated center.
He moved between her upraised legs and let her agile fingers guide him to the portal. He bumped against her tender nether lips, moved up and down in the damp canyon of flesh, then found the proper angle. The head of his shaft parted those meaty curtains. He hesitated. Kate began moaning. She reached up and gripped his upper arms with a fierceness that spurred him on. He sank another inch into her hot core. Another and another and then he could no longer hold back. His hips levered forward, and he sank all the way into her.
Blaze! Western Series: Six Adult Western Novels Page 33
