by Judi Lind
In moments, the grumbling drinkers had turned into a lynch mob. Right now, they were prowling through the high desert area between town and Rafe Wilson’s shack. They wouldn’t waste any time stringing Verity from the nearest tree if they found her.
But before Jericho could sneak her down to the Apache encampment, he had to get her to Doc Greavy’s. It was obvious to Jericho that, at best, the girl had gone loco; at worst, she might be dying.
Chapter Three
The sun rose, a bright golden orb peeking over the edge of the mountains, bringing much needed warmth. During the long, silent night, Vera had remained grateful for the cushioning warmth of the quilt. But she was as confused as ever about the sequence of events that led to her rescue the night before.
After riding for what felt like hours, Jericho had finally relented enough to allow a brief respite. Vera felt she’d no sooner fallen asleep than Jericho’s booted foot nudged her awake. Without so much as a cup of bracing coffee, they remounted.
Jericho rode almost silently, only occasionally pointing out a potential pitfall. He hadn’t uttered a single conversational word since they’d mounted up outside the mine.
Vera shifted in the saddle for the thousandth time in the past hour. The pain in her backside had passed sore, gone beyond miserable, and was well on the way to agony, but she didn’t complain for fear the strange man leading the way might just go off and leave her alone in the wilderness.
Suddenly, he stopped and turned, pressing his index finger to his lips. “Shhh. Don’t make a sound.”
Slipping off his own horse, he led hers behind a large boulder and helped her dismount. Rubbing her weary rump, she started to ask what was wrong when he shook his head. “Shhh. Wait here.”
He handed her the reins and, taking off his black broad-brimmed hat, stole back around to the other side of the sandstone boulder. In a few seconds, he tiptoed back and said in a hushed voice, “About nine of them, but I think they’ll pass us by.”
“Nine of whom?” she whispered.
“Lawmen.”
“Good! Maybe they can—” She broke off when he cupped a hand over her mouth.
“Don’t talk so loud!” He cast an anxious glance over his shoulder. “You know how sound carries out here.”
Finally, he pulled his hand away, but the warm imprint tingled on her face for long seconds afterward. Making sure to keep her tone barely audible, she cautiously probed, “But aren’t they looking for us?”
“Yeah, they’re on your trail.”
“Then why don’t we just let them know where we are?”
His dark eyes blinked rapidly as he patted her hand, an oddly pitying gesture. “Verity—Vera, sugar, you’re going to have to trust me here. Seems like you don’t recall much about what’s happening, and I hate to be the one to bring unwelcome news, but... but those men want to hang you.”
“What! You must be joking.”
“I’m afraid not. Now, please, keep your voice down.”
Stunned silent, Vera leaned against the rock, certain she’d collapse if not for its cold support. Everything around her was off-kilter, askew, as though she’d strayed into the fun house at the carnival and was hopelessly lost in the bizarre darkness. “B-but why would they want to arrest me? I mean, I didn’t even know they still hung people, but what is it they think I’ve done?”
“Murder.”
A cold chill washed through her like someone had poured a bucket of ice water down her throat. “This is crazy, Jericho! I haven’t killed anyone, and I certainly haven’t been tried and convicted.”
“And if Jess Wiggins and that bunch have their way, there won’t be a trial.”
Vera’s head started pounding again, and she unconsciously raised her hands to rub her temples. Weary beyond belief, she tried to make sense of his dire words. “Mr. Jackson, I can’t imagine what you’re talking about. Who is it I’m supposed to have killed?”
“Rate, as if you didn’t already know. Course, it’s a pure miracle to me that somebody didn’t plug the old bastard long before now. But you know how they feel in these parts about...well, about you being part Indian.”
A fresh wave of dizziness washed over her, adding to the throbbing in her temples. What did the trace of Indian blood she carried have to do with anything? Who was Rafe and why would anyone imagine she’d killed him?
Suddenly, she remembered leaving the rental car keys on the dresser at the motel. Maybe someone had stolen her car and this Rafe person had been killed in a hit-and-run. And if the plates were traced to the rental company, then, of course, she would be implicated. It had to be something like that. Something easily explainable. If she could get to town and speak to the authorities...
“Mr. Jackson, please listen to me. I’m a CHP officer from California. I didn’t kill that man, or anyone else. I can show the deputies my badge—they can easily verify my credentials. The accident can easily be explained if I—”
He snorted. “I don’t rightly know how you can accidentally shoot someone in the back. but I’m willing to listen. Unlike those men down there.”
“Shot in the back! This doesn’t make any sense.”
Vera stared hard at Jericho who was watching her closely, a nervous look on his handsome face. What did she really know about him? So far, she had only his word that she was wanted by the law. Was he inventing this horrible story to instill fear in hopes of keeping her under his control?
Closing her eyes, she tried to remember everything she’d ever heard about stalkers and serial killers. Someday, if the hiring freeze ever lifted, she intended to transfer to the San Francisco PD. Although her investigative skills weren’t utilized very much in her CHP duties, she still attended seminars and read a great deal of law enforcement literature to keep her knowledge current. And her training offered a great deal of insight into the serial killer mentality. They liked their victims meek, yielding. Frightened and feeling helpless. Well, that’s the last face she’d present to Jericho Jackson—if that was even his real name.
Straightening up, she forced a steely edge into her voice. “This has to be some kind of sick joke, and I want you to stop right now.”
A flash of empathy shone in his dark eyes, before be quickly looked away, avoiding her beseeching gaze. “I wish to God I had the power to do just that. For your mother’s sake, if for no other reason.”
“My mother! You—you knew my mother?” The moment she blurted out her question, she regretted showing him even a momentary weakness. Everyone had a mother; it took no great wisdom to realize that referring to her mother would evoke strong emotion. She had to remember to act cool, in control. “Stop lying to me! You don’t know me or anyone in my family.”
He jerked around to face her. “I said keep your voice down!” Crouching low to the ground, he eased around the side of the boulder and watched the horseback riders who were now trailing away like a stream of hungry ants. “I don’t think they heard you, but it might be a trick. They might go around that bend and double back. We’d better hurry.”
He rose to his feet, as smooth and fluid as a puma preparing to pounce and started for his horse.
The quilt sliding unnoticed onto the ground, Vera quickly scrambled to her feet and grabbed his woolen sleeve. “I’m not moving a muscle until you tell me the truth.”
She planted her feet and crossed her arms, partly for effect and partly to ward off the brisk chill penetrating her thin chambray shirt. She only wished she felt as confident as her stance would lead him to believe. During the course of her career, Vera had held her own against a number of mentally disturbed individuals and armed felons. But now, without the equalizing implements of side arm, baton and Taser, Vera was unarmed and largely defenseless.
Jericho cocked his hat with his thumb, flapped his arms a couple of times in obvious exasperation, then stalked over to stand in front of her. Uncomfortably close. Despite her best intentions, Vera took an involuntary step backward.
Lifting her eyes to meet h
is, she stood in apparent calm, waiting for his response. She didn’t have long to wait.
Speaking between tightly clenched teeth, he muttered, “I realize you’re not thinking too clearly on account of that fall. But we don’t have time to dwell on this, Verity, you’ve got to—”
“Hold it right there!” she interrupted. “Why do you keep calling me by that name?”
“Because it’s yours.”
She tossed her head in frustration and poked her own chest for emphasis. “I’m not the one who’s confused, Mr. Jackson. Verity McBride is the girl your local legend is built around. I’m Vera McBride—an extremely distant relative of Verity, that’s true, but I’m a bit younger. In case you hadn’t noticed.” About a century younger.
“Oh, I noticed all right A man would have to be blind not to notice your...attractions.” He cast a blatantly appraising look along the length of her body, pausing to stare at her cold-hardened nipples prodding the thin chambray fabric. “But younger? The Verity I know is a gawkish girl, but you, Miss Vera McBride, are most definitely a full-grown woman.”
Vera held a hand to her head, which was whirling in confusion. What kind of sick game was he playing? The way he kept talking as if he knew Verity, when the girl disappeared decades before he was even born.
Fear clenched like a tight fist in her stomach. Obviously Jericho Jackson, sexy though he might be, was...mentally unhinged. He was no more a part of a search-and-rescue effort than she was. Somehow he’d stumbled into the mine, and for that she should be grateful. But he was so strange, so unpredictable, that Vera wouldn’t feel truly safe until she was well away from him.
“Mr. Jackson, I simply can’t argue any longer. Just take me into town and I’ll see that you’re amply rewarded for your efforts.”
He grinned and tossed his head. “Not so fast, Miss Vera McBride. We never finished our discussion. So you’re a distant relative who just happened to be holed up in the very mine where Verity asked me to meet her? I’d say that was a powerful coincidence, wouldn’t you?”
Sorry she’d ever begun this conversation, Vera chewed her bottom lip and considered his strange demeanor. Obviously he believed she was some kind of...reincarnation...of Verity McBride. Which at least explained the murder charge she was supposed to be fleeing.
Maybe if she blurted out the truth he’d snap back into some kind of awareness; she’d heard of people who drifted in and out of derangement. And he seemed to have at least a few periods of relative lucidity. “Mr. Jackson, I don’t know who Verity McBride asked or didn’t ask to meet her before she disappeared. But that was over a hundred years ago!”
He bucked backward and roared, his unexpected laughter loud and disconcerting in the silent dawn before he abruptly choked it off. “Your mother always said you had a knack for weaving tall tales. That one ought to be written up in a penny dreadful.”
He reached out and roughly grasped her shoulders. “Now you listen to me, sugar. This is no time to be funning around—that posse is hot for the smell of your blood. I owe your mother, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let ’em hang her daughter. But I’m not anxious to get strung up beside you. Now quit this nonsense and let’s get going.”
Vera had been willing to concede to anything just to get him to lead her into Jerome. Until he’d called her sugar. Now she wanted nothing more than to raise this pseudocowpoke’s social consciousness a notch or two. “I don’t know what you good ole boys get away with around here, Mr. Jackson, but with the millennium approaching most men have outgrown the caveman tactics.”
His head reared back. “Beg your pardon?”
Vera counted ten, and kept reminding herself that the man she was dealing with was obviously a few spokes short of a wheel. “I’m saying, Mr. Jackson, that men don’t call women sugar anymore.”
He shook his dark head. “No. The other part. About the milli-something.”
“The millennium. The twenty-first century, 2001.”
“2001?” His voice was suddenly weak, barely audible. “You’re talking about the year 2001, is that right?”
“Of course. Everyone is looking forward to the new century. With the scientific evidence recently uncovered, maybe they’ll discover life exists on Mars after all.”
He slumped against the boulder and washed his face with his palms. Drawing a deep breath, he stood up again. “Miss Vera...er, is Miss all right?”
“It’ll do, but I prefer Ms.”
“Uh-huh.” He fingered his mustache thoughtfully. “Well, ma’am, I’m truly hornswoggled here. Exactly what date do you think this is?”
Vera rolled her eyes. December eleventh wasn’t it, when she’d gone into the mine? And they’d ridden through the rest of the night. “Today must be the twelfth.”
His eyes lit up in obvious surprise. “That’s right! December 12, 1896.”
Glad they’d finally reached an agreement, Vera had bent over to pick up her quilt when his words finally struck home. She straightened slowly and turned to face him once more. “Mr. Jackson, did you say 1896?”
That wary look crept back on his face. “Sure. I’ve owned the saloon almost two years now. Remember when I opened? New Year’s Eve, 1894. You were just a young gal but you must remember that big party we threw? Everybody in town came.”
When she didn’t respond, he reached over and tipped up her chin until their faces were scant inches apart. “Come on, Verity, the game’s over. You’re starting to spook me...what’s wrong?”
She sank to the ground and hugged her knees against her chest. A sick, horrible certainty was boiling in the pit of her stomach. Jericho Jackson wasn’t just a little “off.” He was a complete lunatic. One who thought he was living over a hundred years in the past.
Because he’d deliberately steered them away from the main highway, Vera had no idea how to get back to Jerome. Even in December, the harsh landscape could be lethal. Winter storms or unseasonal hot spells were equally possible. Heatstroke, snakebite, scorpions and freezing nights lay in wait for the inexperienced traveler in this unfamiliar and hostile land.
She had to stay with him until they reached civilization. No matter what it took, she had to play along and not let him see her fear. Humor him. Get to safety. Then run like hell and never look back.
Looking up, she shielded her eyes against the bright sun that was rapidly moving higher in the sky. “How much farther to Jerome, Mr. Jackson?”
“About two miles,” he said as he untied the reins and led the horses toward her. She noticed he didn’t obligingly indicate which direction.
Still shaky, but determined to outwit him somehow, she rose to her feet and draped the folded quilt across the saddle. Maybe the additional padding would offer some relief for her aching rear. Hitching her backpack onto her shoulders, she drew a deep fortifying breath and approached the chestnut mare.
Jericho laced his fingers and Vera stepped into his hands and hoisted herself up onto the smaller horse. When he’d mounted, she softly clicked her tongue to urge the horse, but Jericho stayed her hand with his. “We’d better head back the other way.”
Filled with a sudden sense of dread, she whispered, “Why?”
For an answer, he raised his arm and pointed at the valley below, where they’d last seen the band of riders.
Vera’s gaze followed the course of his finger. At first all she could see was a cloud of dust, building and swirling like a mini tornado sweeping through the dry valley. After a moment, however, she could pick out figures in the midst of that brown cloud. Nine men on horseback. Riding hard. Right toward them.
GRABBING THE REINS from her hand, Jericho swung around and started back the way they’d come. He forced a more rapid pace than they’d previously traveled and, despite the quilt’s extra padding, Vera’s tender bottom thumped painfully on the leather saddle.
About a mile back up the path, he took a sudden detour to the right and pointed to a steep, narrow trail leading down the mountain. “Didn’t want to take Dead Man’s Trail
with you so shaky and all, but...now we don’t have a choice.”
Vera understood perfectly. In his mind, she was Verity McBride and if they didn’t evade the encroaching vigilantes, she would be captured, or worse, hanged. While Vera would rather take her chances with the nine riders, she knew Jericho would never be persuaded to wait.
His apprehension was palpable in the still mountain air and she wondered for the first time who those men really were. If they weren’t chasing her, who were they after? A certain lanky cowboy in a long black coat and black Stetson? She had a sudden clear recollection of old cowboy movies on TV; the bad guys always wore black.
Taking her silence for assent, Jericho tied the reins of her horse to his saddle and they began picking their way down the treacherous trail.
After a single, horrifying glance over the edge, Vera kept her eyes focused straight ahead. In that one quick look, she’d estimated the bottom to be over a thousand feet below. Jericho, she noted, kept casting anxious glances over his shoulder as if he expected the riders to appear behind them at any moment.
As they continued their slow descent, the path steepened so sharply that a single misstep would plunge them over the precipice. To quell the terror that mounted with each crunch of hooves on the rock-strewn trail, Vera thought about the men following them. They had to be after Jericho. What had he done that they pursued him so intently, with such determination?
The full extent of her predicament started to sink in and her stomach lurched with the unwelcome realization. Jericho hadn’t saved her out of the goodness of his heart; maybe he’d seen an opportunity to acquire a hostage. By tying her reins to his saddle, he insured she couldn’t escape. But at his own peril. If one of them went over the cliff, the other would surely follow. A man that desperate wouldn’t hesitate to trade her life for his.
