by Tamara Gill
Compassion softened Arnold’s features. “I know that. We have to plan how to get her back without getting you both killed.”
Wes gave a despairing chuckle laced with irony. “I can’t even think straight. All I want to do is drag that scum out of the cell and trade him for Anna.” He blew air from between his teeth. “And I know you’re right. They’ll kill her anyway.”
After sitting with his eyes closed for a few minutes, the only sound in the dark room the men’s breathing, Wes pointed at Arnold. “All right, this is what we’ll do.”
***
As much as she tried to sleep, the tug on her shoulders from her cinched wrists kept Anna awake. “Can you please untie my hands?”
“You complainin’ again, girl? I’d probably do yore husband a favor by shootin’ you dead.” Buck let loose with a stream of tobacco juice from where he sat by the window, watching the still woods.
“Buck, untie her hands. Her caterwaulin’ is keepin’ me awake,” Noah grumbled as he rolled over on the cot.
“All right. Anything to shut her up. If I didn’t have to keep her alive long enough for the marshal to git here, I’d kill her now.”
Noah threw off his thin blanket and moved to her cot, yanking her up. With one quick slice of his knife, her hands sprang free. The pain in her shoulders shot downward, and the tingling as the blood rushed into her arms almost made her wish they were still tied. Anna eased down on her back and gently placed her arms on her body. She bit her lip to keep from moaning as the pain increased.
Her face still ached from where Buck had slapped her. She felt so helpless, and angry that she was a trained police officer, but still unable to save herself. But then the academy had never covered being kidnapped by an 1870s outlaw gang. Not that it mattered; she had experience in law enforcement and should be able to carry out a plan to escape before Wes came for her. Good police procedure would prevent him from dragging a prisoner out here to make an exchange. And the loose cannon was Buck, wanting revenge for the death of his son. The only thing that would satisfy the man was to see Wes witness the horror they had planned for her and then shoot him dead.
The thought of her husband dying filled her with so much fear, she couldn’t breathe. Life without him would be unbearable. As corny as it sounded, even to her own ears, he was her soulmate. She fought down the tears that threatened to unhinge her.
Now that her arms weren’t in as much pain, she shifted to her side. Pushing the unpleasant thoughts away, she ran ideas through her mind to escape. But within minutes, and before any plan had developed, she was fast asleep.
***
“Mather, show yourself!”
Wes’s deep shout jolted Anna awake. The sun shone through the small window, casting dappled shadows on the floor. She blinked rapidly at the two outlaws asleep underneath the windows, their weapons clasped loosely in their hands. Before she even thought about it, she jumped up and raced for the door.
An iron fist gripped her ankle and she went down, banging onto the floor so hard she bounced. Her head hit the doorjamb and black dots swam in front of her eyes. She was brutally dragged back and kicked in the ribs, before Buck shoved the barrel of his gun in her face. “Don’t try that again, girl.”
Buck lumbered to the door, his gun cocked and pointed. “‘Bout time you showed up, marshal. Me and my boy was about to have some fun with yore woman.”
“You touch her and you’re a dead man, Mather.”
“Well now, since I got yore wife, and I’m pointin’ my gun at ya, I’d say I hold all the winnin’ cards.” He released a stream of brown-tinted saliva. “Where’s Joe?”
While Noah and Buck were occupied with Wes, Anna crawled to the window and looked out. Her husband stood about twenty feet from the cabin, legs spread, hands on his hips. Her eyes teared at the sight of him. Then terror slammed into her like a fist when he slowly unbuckled his gun belt and dropped it to the ground. He held his arms out, palms upward. “I want to come in and see my wife.”
“And I asked ya where my boy is.”
“You can’t think I’m dumb enough to bring him out here until I’m sure Anna is all right. Let me come in and talk to her.”
Buck studied him for a minute, then waved him in.
***
Wes cleared the doorway, his eyes quickly searching the room until he saw Anna. Blind rage swept through him at the purple bruise on her face, one eye swollen. She moved from where she stood by the window and winced.
Buck Mather would not leave here a prisoner, but a dead man. Wes held his hand out. “Honey?”
Anna moaned and flew into his arms. He quickly released her when she cried out in pain as he hugged her. “You all right?”
“Now that you’re here.” She leaned in as if to kiss his cheek, but whispered into his ear. “You shouldn’t have left your gun outside.”
“Now ain’t that a purty sight?” Buck snickered, the sound lacking mirth. “Get over here, marshal, now you seed yore little lady is just fine.” He pointed his gun at Wes. “I’m askin’ this for the last time. Where’s my son?”
“About two miles down the road, guarded by my deputy. If you want to see him alive, let my wife go. Then I’ll lead you to him.”
Buck moved his mouth in semblance of a smile. “Ain’t you the clever one.” In two seconds he was across the room, his Colt shoved against Anna’s throat. “Now here’s how it’s goin’, marshal. Noah here will go with you to get my boy, and I’ll keep yore charmin’ wife company. Once I see that my boy’s all right, I’ll let her go.”
“No deal.”
“I hate to keep pointin’ this out to you, boy, but you ain’t got no say in this. I have the gun, I have your wife, and you got nothin’.”
“He has Joe,” Anna said, then winced when Buck backhanded her again.
Wes rushed Buck and tackled him to the floor. The two men rolled, Wes reaching for Buck’s gun as the man tried to raise it. Wes slammed Buck’s hand against the floor, and the gun flew across the room, skidding into the corner.
***
Noah fired a shot in the air, but both men ignored him. The boy looked confused as he tried to aim at Wes, but with the two men rolling, he hesitated, apparently not wanting to shoot for fear of hitting his father. Anna took advantage of his distraction to scurry over to the corner and pick up Buck’s gun.
“Hold it.” The sound of her voice was lost with Noah shouting encouragement at this father. The men grunted as they pummeled each other, fists flying and bodies banging against the scanty furniture.
Noah turned quickly as she picked up the weapon, his cruel eyes boring into her as he aimed. Before he could shoot, Anna fired. The boy fell to his knees, clutching his middle. He looked at her in surprise, blood gurgling from his mouth. With a slight grunt, his eyes closed and he hit the floor, face down.
With shaky hands she lowered the gun, taking in deep gulps of air. Her attention was drawn to Wes, straddling Buck, his hands wrapped around the outlaw’s throat. The man clawed at Wes’s hands as his face grew a deep red.
“Wes. Let him go,” Anna gasped.
Wes swung his gaze to her, then relaxed his hands briefly. With a curse, he drew back his arm and smashed his fist into Buck’s chin, knocking him out. Anna crawled to him and Wes wrapped his arms around her, resting his chin on her head. They sat clutching each other for a minute until their breathing returned to normal.
He eased away and studied her. “You stay here with him.” He gestured in Buck’s direction. “I’ll get Arnold and Joe. Don’t trust the scum when he wakes up.”
Anna nodded. “I know. I’ll get the rope they used on me and tie him up.”
“Jack is outside if you need him.”
***
Wes rode Nektosha through the woods to where he’d left Arnold and Joe. He’d planned to lure Buck away from the cabin to give Jack a better chance to get her out with only Noah for a guard.
“All clear,” Wes called as he approached the group. “Let’s
head back to the cabin and get the others.”
“Where’s Buck?” Joe asked from where he sat on a horse, his hands tied behind his back.
“Knocked out cold. He’ll be joining you in that jail cell.”
“Anna all right?” Arnold asked as they escorted Joe to the cabin.
The sight of her injuries still tore at him. He should’ve killed Buck when he had the chance. Anna had been right to stop him, though, but he would get a lot of pleasure from watching the man swing from a rope.
At this point all he wanted to do was put the entire gang out of his mind, and get his wife home where he could tend to her injuries. He increased the horse’s speed as they neared the cabin.
Anna stood in the doorway when the group arrived. “Who’s watching Buck?” Wes asked as he dropped from his horse.
Anna started down the path. “He’s still out cold.”
“Jack?”
“He’s searching his saddle bags for more rope. The one they used on me was cut into pieces.”
“Hey!” Arnold shouted as Wes and Anna whipped their heads around to face the front door of the small house. Buck stood in the doorway, leaning heavily against the frame, his gun aimed at Wes’s chest.
“No!” Anna ran the few feet toward Wes, their eyes locking.
Everything moved in slow motion while Wes watched Anna’s frantic expression as she raced toward him. Then Buck fired his gun, and Anna screamed and threw her head back, collapsing to the ground. Arnold fired a shot at Buck, hitting him squarely in the chest.
Fear gripping him, Wes dropped to where Anna lay and turned her over. Her bruised face was covered with dirt, her damp tangled hair matted with blood. Her eyelids flickered a couple of times, then she whispered, “Wes,” and her eyes slid closed, her body slumping in his arms.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Relentless pounding on the front door barely made it through Wes’s whiskey-soaked brain. “Go away,” he mumbled, resting his head on his crossed arms at the table.
Arnold’s voice grew louder as he opened the door and entered the kitchen. “Goddammit, Wes, this place is a pig sty.”
Wes peered at the man through bleary eyes. “Leave me alone.”
His friend pulled out a chair and straddled it. “Everyone’s left you alone since the funeral, but this has to stop. You’re drinking yourself to death.”
Turning his head away, Wes growled, “I don’t care.”
Arnold reached out and touched Wes’s arm. “You know Anna wouldn’t want this.”
Rubbing his eyes with fisted hands, Wes groaned. “I failed her, Arnold.” His chest ached with the pain. “I failed her, and I lost her.” He closed his eyes, burning with the lack of sleep. “I always knew she could disappear one day, but never like this.”
“What’re you talkin’ about?” Arnold studied him, his brows furrowed in confusion.
Realizing what he’d said, Wes gave a weary shrug. “Nothing.”
Arnold propped his arms along the back of the chair. “The town council sent me over. They want to know when you’re coming back to the jailhouse. They’re sympathetic and all, but the town needs a marshal. I can only cover emergencies and even though everyone’s feeling sorry for you, they want your word that you’ll return soon.”
Wes stumbled as he bolted from his chair. “The only thing I need is gone. I don’t need anyone’s pity. I don’t need this town, or that goddamn job.”
“What’re you saying?”
“I don’t know.” He stared at the empty bottle on the table. “I need a drink.” He grabbed his hat from the hook by the door, leaving Arnold sitting there.
The humid night air hit him with a sobering effect, as if someone had thrown a blanket over his body. The feeling of suffocation came not only from the dampness, but the crushing heaviness in his heart.
He’d sat all last night with his loaded Colt alongside the slowly diminishing bottle of whiskey, staring the weapon down, daring it to leap up and end his miserable life.
Twice he’d raised the gun with a shaky hand, but a hushed tone teased him, a whisper of Anna’s voice, gliding like silk over his skin, an echo of when she’d said his name for the last time. For a moment his heart stilled when he swore he heard her ask him to wait, that it would get better. He’d smashed his fist into the wall and stormed from the house into the late summer downpour.
This night he wandered the town, remembering. Dark storefronts stared back, the yawning caverns reinforcing the emptiness inside him. His life had become hollow, the sunshine that was Anna snatched from him, leaving him dead inside. A slight smile forced its way to his lips as he stopped in front of the newspaper office. Then the agony of loss drove him away, his heart fractured.
He made it as far as the batwing doors of the saloon before coming to a decision. His steps slowed until he turned and headed in the opposite direction.
***
“I’m quitting.” Wes dropped his marshal’s badge on the mayor’s desk.
The overcast morning cloaked the room in dimness as Clem Gardner sat back in his chair and peered at Wes from behind thick spectacles. “I don’t suppose I need to ask you why. But I will ask if you’ve given this enough thought.”
“I have to get out of here.” He turned to leave.
The mayor called him back. “Where ya going?”
Wes raked stiff fingers through his hair. “Home.”
***
After a day and a half of travel through woods and plentiful farmland, small towns and open prairie, Wes arrived at the Potawatomi compound in Indian Territory. His mother’s family had lived on a Kansas reservation when Wes made his visits there as a child, but a few years ago they’d split from the Prairie Potawatomi, and along with other Citizen Potawatomi had traveled to Indian Territory where they’d purchased land. Now settled in a village of small homes and neat farms, Wes felt a pull to these people as he rode through the settlement.
Laughing, brown-skinned children ran around, shouting gleefully and chasing each other. Several dogs raced alongside them, barking and enjoying the play. Women, gathered together and busy with their hands, visited with each other, the younger ones casting a glance in his direction under lowered lashes.
Free of whiskey for a couple of days, his mind was clearer, and his body protested the lack of food. Welcoming smells swirled in the air, bringing a growl to his belly, the first indication he was still alive.
He’d never been to the compound, having last visited his mother’s people after he’d been discharged from the army back in sixty-five, two years before they left Kansas. But the new location had been set up the same, and he easily picked out his grandparent’s hut. He guided Nektoska toward their tidy home, stopping to enjoy the sight of his grandfather sitting in a rocking chair, smoking his pipe.
The old man regarded him with a widening toothless smile as Wes hobbled his horse and walked up the path to the small hut. Childhood memories washed over him. The soft, melodious voices of his mother’s people as they told stories over campfires at night. Feasts, with an abundance of food, dancing, and laughter. He and the other children sitting wide-eyed as the elders told tale after tale of these great people, their heritage and strength.
“Yankobcakin.” The old man cried out the Potawatomi word for ‘grandson.’ He put his pipe aside. “Bozho!”
Wes returned the greeting and embraced him, his grandfather’s frail bones a stark reminder that numerous years had passed since Wes had sat at the man’s feet and listened to tales of the Potawatomi people. “Koyake'?” he asked, referring to his grandmother.
“Your grandmother visits with Laughing Star, who has just given her man another fine son. She will return to me in a few days. Are you hungry?”
“Yes, mIshomes.” Wes honored his grandfather by using his formal name. “It has been a long time since I’ve eaten.”
“Come into the house. Your koyake' has left enough food for you and all the other villagers.” He smiled and led Wes into the hut.
<
br /> Warm, familiar smells almost brought tears to Wes’s eyes. So many of his happy childhood memories were tied up with this wonderful couple who grieved the loss of their beautiful daughter, yet had accepted her son into their hearts.
His grandfather placed dishes of food on the crude table, indicating Wes should fill his wooden bowl, not satisfied until it overflowed with meat, smashed beans and wild onions. They talked of many things while Wes ate his first full meal since Anna’s death. The older man encouraged Wes to talk, but he couldn’t tell him about Anna. The words would not come.
After Wes finished eating, they returned to the front of the hut and Wes accepted the pipe from his grandfather. The man eyed him carefully. “Koyake' saw great sadness for you before she left to visit Laughing Star. She told me you would come to her. As always, she was right. I am glad you’re here, yankobcakin. Perhaps we can soothe your heart.”
Wes shook his head and handed the pipe back to the older man before staring into the distance. “My heart will never heal.” He placed his fist on his chest. “It is dead, mIshomes, and I wish it to stay that way.”
The older man sat back in his rocking chair and remained silent.
***
A week went by, and while Wes stayed apart from the rest of the villagers, he enjoyed his grandfather’s company, finding a certain amount of peace in the man’s presence, and for a strange reason, a sense of hope. They sat together for hours, and once again mIshomes taught Wes the skill of carving small animals from wood. As a child, Wes had many that he’d treasured, but always left them with his grandparents when he returned to his winter home with his father.
Despite the amount of months he’d spent each year with Mike Shannon, Wes never felt as if he knew the man. Tall, broad shouldered and handsome, he’d been a good father, but shared very little about himself with his son. On many long, dark winter nights, after a few gulps from the whiskey jar, he’d speak a bit about his beloved Sings Like Angel. He’d eventually grow silent and then shuffle off to bed, the pain of loss etched on his face. Pain that Wes now understood only too well.
