Cole was ashen and tense. He didn't realize how hard he was gripping Matthew's shoulders until Captain Turnbill said softly, "Ease off, Colonel."
"How did you find us?" Jamie asked carefully. He was the only one who seemed to be capable of rational thought at the moment.
Matthew smiled. "Your location isn't exactly a secret, gentlemen. Kurt Taylor was out here with a scouting party a few weeks ago. Some of the higher-ups know where you are… They're just hoping the war will be over before they have to come in and clean you out." His smile faded, and he choked and coughed and then groaned in pain.
"Get him up and in the house!" Turnbill ordered. A half-dozen men quickly obeyed him, Jamie Slater tensely and carefully taking Matthew's head and his wounded shoulder.
"Slater! You've got to get there. You and your men, you've got a chance. Riding straight west —"
Cole followed after him. "There's a dozen Yankees on the ranch," he said tensely. "I know it."
'So does Zeke Moreau," Matthew gasped out.
Then he was suddenly silent.
"Is he dead?" Malachi asked tonelessly.
Turnbill shook his head. "Passed out from loss of blood. It's amazing that he made it here."
Cole didn't follow any farther. He paused in the yard in front of the farmhouse and looked around at the men who remained with him. Besides his brothers and the doctor, he had one sergeant, two corporals and twenty-two privates. They had survived a hell of a lot. How could he ask them to die at this point?
"I've got to leave you, boys," he said. The soldiers who hadn't helped carry Matthew into the house ranged silently around him. "This is a private battle, and some of you might say it's being waged against one of your own —"
"Hell, Quantrill and his kind were never one of my own," Bo Jenkins, a shopkeeper in peacetime, said. "My kind of Southerner ain't never shot down a man in cold blood."
"Glad to hear it, Private," Cole said quietly. "But still, I can't rightly ask you to come along and get killed —"
"Hell, Colonel, how's this any different from all the other times?" Jenkins said.
His brother John stepped up beside him. "Seems like we've been following you a long time, sir. We'll keep on doing that. I mean, what the hell, Colonel? You think we all want to live forever?"
Cole felt a smile tug at his lips. "Then let's get ready. We've got to ride fast. We've got to ride like the wind."
Armed and ready, Kristin came out of the house and moved quickly toward the barn, toward the bloody hand lying in the spring sunshine.
She paused at the gaping doorway and flattened herself against the wall. Then she kicked open the door and stepped inside, both her Colts cocked and ready to fire.
She heard nothing, saw nothing. She blinked in the dim light, then she saw that at least five men in Yankee blue lay on the ground and in the hay. Their killer or killers had interrupted them in the middle of a poker game. The cards were still sitting on a bale of hay in the center of the barn.
Someone had been holding a full house.
Kristin swallowed painfully.
"Drop 'em," came a sneering voice from behind her. It was one of Zeke's men. She didn't know his name, but she recognized the voice from its jeering tone. She had heard the man's raucous laughter when her father had died.
She froze, aware that she hadn't a chance in hell of turning quickly enough to kill the man. She wondered whether she shouldn't turn anyway and die quickly. Zeke surely no longer desired her. All he wanted was revenge.
Suddenly there was an explosion right over her shoulder. She screamed, stunned, wondering if she'd been hit. She hadn't. She stared toward the center of the barn, and there lay one of the Yankee soldiers she had thought were all dead. Blood was pouring from his temple, but he was smiling at her, and his pistol was smoking. She whirled around. The man behind her lay dead, very dead. There was a black hole burned right into his chest.
She slammed the Colts back into the gun belt and ran over to the Yankee who had saved her life, falling down on her knees beside him. "Bless you! What can I —"
"Lady, you can save yourself!" the man whispered, and he winced. "If all goes well, then you come back for me. Damn it to hell, but I can't help you no more now. My leg is all busted up. You go careful. He's in the house."
Chills swept up her spine. "He's… where?"
"Moreau, their leader. He's up in the house."
He was in the house, with her sister and her child. Kristin raced for the doorway. She found Samson and Pete slumped against the far wall of the barn. Pete was dead, his eyes wide open and staring. Samson was still breathing, a thin stream of blood trickled from his forehead.
She paused for a split second to tear apart her skirt and dab at the wound. She lowered him to the ground and pressed the hastily made bandage against his forehead. Then she raced into the yard, across the paddock and toward the house, easing the Colts from the belt once again.
Suddenly there was a shot. She stopped where she stood, feeling the dust rise around her feet where a bullet had bitten into the earth. She looked up, way up, to her bedroom window.
Zeke was standing there, a handful of Shannon's hair caught in his filthy fingers.
"Drop the guns, Mrs. Slater," Zeke drawled. "Drop 'em right now, else I'll let this pretty gold stuff in my fingers run red with McCahy blood."
Kristin stared up at him in despair. She heard a shuffling around her, and she knew that his men were emerging from the bunkhouse, from the far side of the house, from behind the watering trough. She looked around, and the faces spun before her. How many of them were there?
Twenty? Thirty? It was hard to tell.
"Drop 'em in the dust, Kristin, slow and careful!" Zeke laughed then, fingering Shannon's hair. "She sure did come along nicely, Kristin. Why, I think she's even prettier than you are. Hard to tell, though. You're both nasty as rattlers."
Shannon cursed and bit Zeke's hand savagely. Zeke swore in turn and cuffed her hard. Suddenly Gabe began to cry. Kristin cried out involuntarily and bit her lip.
Shannon screamed as Zeke tore at her hair. Zeke, shouting insanely, addressed Kristin again.
"Drop the guns or else I'll kill the kid first. Slow. I'll blow off his legs one by one, and then his arms and then, if he's still alive, I'll cut off his ears!"
Kristin set the Colts on the ground. She heard Zeke's wild laughter, and then he and Shannon disappeared from the window. The shuffling around her began again. She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the soft jeers and the horrible smell as the men moved closer and closer.
The door to the house burst open, and Zeke appeared, shoving Shannon before him. Shannon was white, but Kristin was, perhaps ridiculously, glad to see that her sister's hatred seemed to outweigh her fear. There would be plenty of time for fear.
Zeke, keeping his punishing grip on Shannon's hair, forced her into the center of the circle. He came close to Kristin, and he smiled. "I'm going to tell you about the afternoon, Kristin. Just so you can anticipate it all. Every sweet moment. See Harry over there? The guy with the peg leg and the rotten teeth? He's had a real hankering for you, so he gets to go first. I'm going for little sister here. Fresh meat. Then, well… hell, we've learned to share and share alike. We are going to make sure you stay alive, though. At least until we've had a chance to fire the house and the barn. You should get to hear the horses scream. That's a real fine sound. Then — maybe — Harry will scalp you. He learned the art real well from little Archie Clements himself. But we'll see how the afternoon goes. We may not have time for everything. There's lots of Yankees in these parts. Did you know that, Mrs. Slater? Sure you did. Your brother's a turncoat Yankee, ain't he? But don't worry about him none. I killed him last night."
Kristin's knees sagged, and she fell into the dirt. Matthew! It couldn't be. No!
Zeke started to laugh.
Something inside her snapped. She catapulted from the ground, flying at him in a fury. Shannon screamed but quickly rallied, and together
they fell on him, biting him, tearing at him with their nails. Zeke screamed but none of his men moved to help him at first. And they couldn't shoot. They might kill him.
Then they heard it. The unmistakable sound of hoofbeats pounding the Missouri earth, pounding like thunder, coming closer and closer.
"Take cover!" one of the bushwhackers shouted.
Zeke let out a terrible growl and threw Shannon down hard in the dirt. He slammed the back of his hand against Kristin's cheek, and when she reeled, stunned by the blow, he caught her by the hair and dragged her up the steps to the porch and behind the oak rocker.
The hoofbeats came closer, thundering like a thousand drums. "Bastard!" Zeke muttered. "How could they know…"
It was only then, as Zeke aimed his gun through the slits in the back of the rocker, that Kristin got her first glimpse of the riders.
They were dressed in gray, and they might have been a sorry sight had they not ridden with such grace and style. A rebel yell suddenly rose up in the air, and the horses tore around the front of the house. Dust flew everywhere. Gunfire erupted, and Kristin bit back a scream.
Cole was leading them, whirling his horse around, his head held high. Malachi was there, too, and Jamie.
The Union army had failed endlessly against the bushwhackers because the bushwhackers were so well armed and so fast. But now they were fighting a man who knew their ways. A man who was faster. A man with a company of soldiers who were every bit as well armed as they were, a company of soldiers who were
determined to salvage something of honor and chivalry from a war they were destined to lose. They fought their own kind, for their own kind had defied the very code of the South that so many had fought to preserve.
Kristin couldn't see for the clouds of dust the horses and the gunfire had churned up. All she knew was that Zeke was dragging her viciously along the porch.
She fought him. He swore he would turn around and shoot her, but she didn't really care. He had murdered Matthew, and he had murdered her father, and he was probably going to murder her. All she dared hope for was that Delilah had hidden somewhere, and that she had found Gabe. She wanted her son to live. She wanted something good to rise from the dust and ashes of this war. She wanted her child, Cole's child, to live, to remember, to start over.
"Damn you!" Zeke screamed. He twisted her arm cruelly behind her back, and she cried out in pain. He pushed her to the front door and then into the house. He pushed her toward the stairs, and the pain in her arm was so piercing that she had to stumble up the steps.
"Maybe we do have a little time. Maybe they'll all stay real busy out there for a long, long time. I wouldn't mind having you on Cole Slater's bed while he chokes on his own blood down below."
Suddenly the front door flew open and Cole was standing in the doorway. Zeke whirled, and Kristin stumbled and almost fell, but Zeke caught her and held her in front of him.
Framed by the doorway, the sunlight behind him, Cole was frightening and yet strangely beautiful. In his left hand he held his cavalry saber, and with his right he aimed his Colt.
"Put it down nice and easy, Slater, nice and easy," Zeke said. He pulled Kristin close against him, so close that she could breathe in the reek of his breath and feel the sweat of his body.
"You get your filthy hands off my wife, Zeke."
"You know, Slater, I started in with Quantrill late. That's why I didn't remember you the first time we met here. But now I remember you real well. And I've thought about this moment. I've dreamed about it. So you put the gun down. See how I've got this beautiful silver barrel aimed right at her throat? Think about how her blood will pour out where the artery's cut…"
Suddenly they heard a cry. It was Gabriel, crying in fear and rage. Delilah must have him in a closet close by, Kristin thought.
Her stomach twisted, and she saw that Cole had gone white. She sensed that Zeke was smiling. Now Cole was forced to think not only about her but about his son.
"That's a real fine boy you got there, Slater," Zeke drawled. He moved the barrel of the gun against Kristin's cheek. "A real fine wife, a real fine boy. You want to see them live, you'll set that gun down, slow and easy. No fast moves."
"No fast moves," Cole echoed tonelessly.
Gabe was still crying. Kristin bit into her lip.
As soon as Cole set the gun down, Zeke would shoot him, and there was so much she had to tell him. Gabe was walking now, could say so many words. She had taught him to say papa. He had the most wonderful laugh in the whole world, and his eyes were so very much like his father's…
"Cole, no!" she cried out.
He smiled at her. "I have to do this, Kristin."
Zeke laughed. "Yeah, he has to."
Cole was looking at her. A curious smile touched his lips. "I never got a chance to tell you that I loved you, Kristin. I do, you know. With all my heart."
"Oh, God, Cole!"
"I love you. I love you. Duck, Kristin."
"What?" she gasped,
He didn't drop his Colt. He aimed it right over her head. She screamed, and the world exploded.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Kristin fell, and it was as if the earth had opened up beneath her feet. All she knew was that Cole had fired.
And that Zeke had not.
Zeke's body was tumbling down the stairs after hers. Kristin came to a halt at the landing, and something fell hard on top of her. She stared up at Zeke, at his wide, staring eyes, at his forehead, where flesh and bone had been ripped away. She pushed away from him, desperate to get him away from her.
"Kristin, Kristin!"
Strong arms were around her, pulling her up from beneath him. She couldn't tear her eyes away from him. His face was still frozen in a sneer, even in death.
"Kristin!"
Cole turned her into his arms. "Kristin!" She looked up and saw his face, his eyes. Concern furrowed his brow as he eased his knuckles over her cheek. "Are you hurt?" he asked anxiously.
She shook her head. She couldn't speak. She stared at him blankly, and then she shrieked out his name and threw herself against him and started to cry. He stroked her hair and murmured comfortingly to her. Then he held her away from him and studied her anxiously. She struggled desperately for control.
"Oh, Cole! How did you know to come? They slaughtered all the Yankees… Oh, no, a few of them might still be alive. You have to help them. Him. One of them saved me." Tears flooded her eyes. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't keep from crying. "Cole! He killed Matthew! He found my brother and he killed him."
"Hush, Kristin, hush," Cole murmured. He pulled her against his body again and smoothed back her hair. Then he tilted her chin and sought her eyes. He had to make sure she understood. "Kristin, Matthew is fine. Well, I'm sorry, I suppose he's not fine. He's injured, but he's alive, Kristin. I would never have known —" He was suddenly unable to speak. It was all over, and now he was suddenly paralyzed by the fear. His hands trembled as he held her. "Kristin, Matthew's company was attacked. Zeke left him for dead, but he wasn't dead, and he got away in the night. Thank God, the Yanks knew where I had my men all along, and Matthew knew the area so well that he came straight to me."
Her eyes were wide with hope, with a joy she dared not feel. "Oh, Cole! Please, don't tell me that unless —"
"It's the truth, Kristin, I swear it."
"But they didn't come after you? The Yankees, they let you be?"
"I have a few friends in the right places," Cole said with a wry smile. "It gives me hope. Maybe, when this thing is over, some of the hatreds will be patched up. Some of them won't be. But, oh, God, I want it to end. I want it to be over!"
He pulled her against him again and she felt the beating of his heart. The rough wool of his frock coat tickled her cheek, and she had never been so glad of anything in her life. She wanted to look at him again. She wanted to study his features, and she wanted to see him smile, because he was young again when he smiled. She wanted to see the silver light in
his eyes when he held her, and most of all she wanted to hear him speak again. She wanted to hear him say he loved her.
Of course, this wasn't really the right time. There was a dead man at her feet, and though the guns had gone silent outside the house, dead men littered the earth there, too, and — please God — a few living men, too. She had to go back to the barn for the young Yankee who had saved her life, and she had to find her son.
"Kristin —" Cole began, but he was interrupted by an outraged cry.
"Miz Kristin! Mister Cole! Why, thank the Lord," Delilah called. She was at the top of the stairs with Gabe, who was struggling fiercely to free himself from her grasp. Cole stared at his son with the awe of a parent who has not seen his child in a long, long time. Gabe might have been a grown man the way Cole was staring at him.
Kristin's eyes twinkled. "He walks now. And he talks. I taught him how to say papa."
Delilah hurried down the stairs. She saw Zeke's body, but she didn't pause. She spat on it and stepped over it, and then she set Gabriel down. He tottered for a moment. Kristin watched Cole as he went down on his knees and reached out for the boy. Gabe waddled carefully over to inspect the stranger.
"Say papa!" Kristin urged him.
Gabriel wasn't interested in saying anything. He turned away from the stranger who was his father and buried his face in his mother's skirts. He reached out his arms, and Kristin laughed and picked him up. Then, suddenly, she crushed him against her, so hard that he cried out in protest. "Oh, Gabriel!" she murmured, holding him tight.
Cole came to his feet and rescued his screaming son. He lifted Gabriel very high and silver eyes gazed into silver eyes. "I'm your papa, little man!" He laughed. "And you'd best get used to the idea."
Gabriel couldn't possibly have understood what Cole had said to him, of course, but he smiled anyway, as if he had decided to accept the stranger in gold and gray. Cole lowered him at last and set him on his hip, smiling at Kristin.
Suddenly there was an awful commotion at the door.
"Put me down, you piece of trash!" Shannon shrieked.
Malachi — Shannon thrown over his shoulder — came through the doorway, his face dark and thunderous. "I don't mind bushwhackers, and I don't mind the damn Yankees, but Cole, I will be damned if I'll be responsible for this brat!"
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