Gus unwound the bullwhip from around his saddle horn. He handed it to Sean without another word.
“You wait here,” Sean said. “And whistle if another rider comes this way.”
He didn’t wait for Gus’s answer but rode back down the hill, removing his gloves. Joey was aiming his rifle right at Sean’s chest, but his hands were shaking. He’d never shot at a man before, and he clearly wasn’t eager to begin now.
“Put that down, boy,” Sean said softly. “You don’t really want to start any trouble.”
“You…you back off, McCarrick,” Joey stammered.
“Just put the rifle away and we’ll talk.”
“I don’t got nothin’ to—”
Joey yelped as Sean uncoiled the whip and snapped it at the boy’s horse, startling the roan into a sudden hop. Joey lost his balance for a critical moment and was bumped out of the saddle. The rifle spun away and landed out of his reach.
Sean dismounted and walked casually toward Joey as the boy clambered to his knees. “We’ll have that talk now,” he said.
Though he wasn’t pleased to admit it, Sean could almost admire the way Joey took his punishment. He bore it stoically for the first few lashes, covering his face with his arms to make himself as small as possible. But by the eighth blow, he’d begin to whimper like the pup he was.
“Mr. McCarrick!”
Gus pulled up beside him and jumped off his mount, sweating so profusely that his bandanna was soaked through. “You could kill him!”
“Wouldn’t that be a pity.”
The man made a grab for his arm. “The kid’s taken enough. Let him go.”
“I’ll stop when I’m ready. Or would you prefer that I tell the sheriff who broke into that lawyer’s office in Heywood?”
Gus backed off, rubbing his hand over his mouth and twitching like a bug on a pin. Joey had uncurled enough to look, tears streaming over his cheeks and hatred burning in his eyes.
“When…when Holden gets here—” he croaked.
Sean raised the whip again just as something dark and low raced toward him, and he caught a flash of white teeth before they clamped down on his right arm.
He screamed in pain and instinctively tried to loosen the animal’s hold. Gus scrambled away, his face pinched in fear. The wolf’s jaws ground through cloth and flesh until its teeth found bone. Sean felt his bladder loosen as the wolf began to pull him down.
“Shoot it!” he cried.
If Gus answered, Sean didn’t hear it. He was fighting for his life, and the wolf was winning. Its eyes were glaring red slits, its rangy body so powerful that no one man could hope to overcome it. It pinned Sean underneath its heavily furred chest and snarled in his face. Dizzy with pain, Sean thought he could hear its voice promising him a slow, painful death.
Somewhere a gun went off. The bullet should have hit the wolf in the middle of its skull, but the animal was no longer in the bullet’s path. It stood several yards away, grinning at Sean through a muzzle stained with his blood.
“Kill it!” Sean yelled. Another bullet whizzed past him, and another. The wolf danced out of the way with a few neat steps. Sean would have sworn it was laughing. He fumbled for his gun with his left hand, but by the time he got it out, the wolf had disappeared.
“Mr. McCarrick!”
He heard Gus’s voice through a haze of pain. “Go after it,” he said. “Hunt it down!”
“I can’t leave you like this,” Gus said. “I’ve got to bind up your arm, and—”
Sean lashed out blindly, catching Gus across the face. “I want that vermin’s hide, do you hear? I want it skinned alive.”
El knelt beside Gus. “He’s half-crazy, Gus,” he whispered. “We got to get him back to the house right quick, else he’ll bleed to death.”
A long shadow blocked the sun from Sean’s face. “Now, wouldn’t that be a cryin’ shame.”
Sean raised his head, struggling to focus on the man standing over him. Renshaw, grinning just like the wolf, all teeth and bloodlust. Joey leaned against him, shivering but smiling just as triumphantly.
“You done a very stupid thing, Sean,” Renshaw said in a low, easy voice. “You hurt one of my boys.”
Sean pushed himself to one elbow, cradling his mangled arm against his chest. “Gus,” he said, “help me up.”
“I think you’d best stay put,” Gus said, the words coming out as if someone were holding him by the throat.
“That’s right good advice,” Renshaw said. He glanced down at Sean’s wet trousers. “Best send your boys to bring you some clean britches before the Blackwells see what a coward you are.”
The humiliation almost gave Sean the strength to rise, but he couldn’t get any farther than his knees. His gun had fallen to the dirt beside him. He felt for it carefully, pretending to catch his balance.
Renshaw’s boot connected with his wrist, knocking his arm from under him. “Now, that ain’t polite,” he said as Sean lay drowning under another wave of agony. “Joey, you have anythin’ to say to this fly-blown skunk?”
Joey spat with perfect aim at Sean’s feet and leaned more heavily against Renshaw. The foreman shifted his hold around the boy’s shoulders.
“We got to get you home,” he said gently. His eyes fixed on Sean again, tearing at Sean’s flesh as viciously as the wolf’s teeth had done. “I can’t give you the whuppin’ you deserve right now, but this ain’t the last you’ll be hearin’ from me. I ain’t no little boy.” He turned his back on Sean, every motion shouting his contempt, and helped Joey into his saddle. He jumped up behind the boy, took the roan’s reins and urged the horse alongside his own waiting mount while Joey slumped against his chest.
“Help me up!” Sean snarled. Gus and El lifted him to his feet. He pulled off his bandanna with one hand and tried to bind it around his arm, compelled to accept Gus’s help to tie it off. He was already weak from pain and loss of blood, but if he were of a mind to be grateful, he would have been forced to admit that he was lucky to be alive. A slightly different angle of attack and the wolf could have torn out his throat.
The torment was excruciating as the hands half carried Sean to his horse and maneuvered him into the saddle. He refused to allow the animal to be led; he’d already shown far too much weakness in front of the men.
He looked over his shoulder. Renshaw and the boy had gone only a short distance, moving slowly to accommodate Joey’s lacerated back. Sean turned Ulysses around to watch them. They were still within rifle range for a man with the necessary skill.
“Shoot him,” he ordered Gus.
Gus and El stared at him as if he’d lost his mind.
“I don’t want you to kill him. I just want to give him a little taste of what he can expect if he ever tries to make good on his threats.”
“But…but, Mr. McCarrick, he’ll come after me.”
“I’ll protect you.”
“But he’s—”
“You’ll be safe from him at Blackwater, but you won’t be safe from me.”
Like most men, Gus was ill equipped to conceal his true feelings. He was scared to death—more scared, at the moment, of Sean than Renshaw. He pulled his rifle from its scabbard and lifted it to his shoulder.
He was good. Sean saw Renshaw jerk and slap his hand against his shoulder. Sean wheeled Ulysses in a tight circle and rode down the other side of the hill, Gus and El on his heels. He only slowed when he was sure that Renshaw hadn’t come after them.
His assumption had been accurate; the foreman was soft when it came to the boy. He would want revenge, but he wasn’t going to seek it at Joey’s expense.
Sean reined Ulysses to face the hands, swallowing a cry of agony. They refused to meet his gaze.
“You didn’t see what happened here today,” he said in his softest voice.
El blinked and licked his lips. “I wouldn’t say nothin’, Mr. McCarrick.”
Sean looked at Gus. He was hesitating just a little too long.
“Do you
have some difficulty with my request?” Sean asked.
The hand kept his eyes fixed on the ground. “Won’t Renshaw tell?”
That was a question Sean had already asked himself and answered with hardly any thought at all. Renshaw wouldn’t have the nerve to approach the law or the Blackwells. He wouldn’t tell anyone in Javelina. There was no predicting what he would say to Rachel, but Sean didn’t think Renshaw would involve a woman. His pride would prevent it. He would keep the whole incident to himself until he could take justice into his own hands.
“He won’t talk,” Sean said. “He knows my word is worth fifty times as much as his and the boy’s.”
“You are goin’ to protect me?”
“Oh, yes. And you will always be on my side, Gus, because if you don’t do as I tell you without question or complaint, I’ll inform everyone that you tried to kill Renshaw.”
“I…I understand, Mr. McCarrick.” Gus’s Adam’s apple bobbed under his bandanna. “What about the wolf?”
“I will inform the Blackwells of the attack and advise them to gather a hunting party, which I will lead myself.”
Neither of the hands had anything more to say. Sean ordered El to stay with the Blackwater cattle and told Gus to ride with him back to the house.
Half-delirious though he was, Sean struggled to keep his mind on the consequences of what he had done. He’d begun by thinking he would provoke Renshaw into an open attack, but he couldn’t have predicted that he himself would be incapacitated and unable to defend himself.
He had miscalculated this time, but so had Renshaw. Yes, Sean had to admit that Renshaw was physically stronger than he was; he had never let himself be provoked into an open battle for that very reason. Renshaw would try to get Sean alone, challenge him to a bare-knuckle fight and beat him to within an inch of his life, believing that Sean would never confess to suffering such a humiliating defeat.
But he continued to underestimate Sean, believing the primitive laws by which he lived were the only ones that mattered. When the foreman came to fulfill his promise of retribution, Sean would be prepared. The fight would be on Sean’s terms.
And if that didn’t settle things, there was still the possibility of framing Renshaw for Jed’s death. Either way, he would destroy Renshaw completely. Just as he would the wolf. They were two of a kind, the man and the beast, vermin to be eliminated without hesitation.
Chapter Seven
RACHEL HEARD SOMEONE yelling outside. She put the baby down on the bed, made certain he was secure and ran to the door.
The voice belonged to Maurice. He had run out into the yard, his blacksmith’s leather apron flapping, to meet the rider who had just come in. As Rachel burst through the door, Maurice reached up and caught the boy Holden was easing down from the horse’s back.
Joey. Rachel left the door open and ran to meet them as quickly as her skirts would allow. She slowed only a little as she approached Holden’s horse, finding her courage and taking part of Joey’s weight in her arms. The shreds of his shirt, crimson with blood, hung around his thin shoulders.
“He has been whipped, Madame McCarrick,” Maurice said. “He is badly hurt.”
It was not the time to ask how it had happened. “Get him inside,” she told Maurice, glancing up at Holden.
“Can you help him?” Holden asked in a hoarse voice.
He was slumped over Apache’s neck, his mouth set and grim with anger and worry. His eyes were almost yellow in the harsh afternoon light.
“I’ll do what I can,” she said. “We’ll need—” She broke off in shock. Holden’s shirt and vest were soaked in blood from his collar to his waist, and down the length of his right arm.
“You’re injured!”
“It looks worse than it is.” He eased out of the saddle with far less than his usual grace. “What do you need?”
She clung to her composure by a thread. “As many clean cloths or rags as you can find. Use clean shirts, if you must. Hot water, of course. And I’ll need Lucia. She has gone out to the creek.”
“I’ll find her. Get inside and help the boy.”
“But your injury…” She looked into his eyes and understood that there was no point in further argument. She ran back into the house, where Maurice had eased Joey onto the bed in the second bedroom, which Lucia now occupied. The boy was stretched out on his stomach, and the look of his back brought the gorge into Rachel’s throat.
“If you will, Maurice, please help Mr. Renshaw find supplies. I’ll do what I can here.”
The Frenchman nodded and hurried out of the room. Rachel knelt beside Joey, whose dirty face was streaked with the tears he was trying so hard to hide.
“It will be all right,” she said, stroking his hair. “Lie quietly now.”
He shut his eyes and tried to nod. She strode into the kitchen, took a cast-iron pot out of the cupboard and filled it with water. Once she had the water set to heat, she unfolded several dishcloths and wet them under the pump. She wrung out the excess water and hurried back into the bedroom.
It was difficult to know where to begin. She knelt on the foot of the bed and bent her head close to Joey’s.
“I will be as gentle as I can,” she said, “but this will hurt.”
“Yes’m,” he whispered.
The strips of his shirt were already glued to his flayed skin. Rachel wanted to weep. She laid the wet cloth against his left shoulder. Joey flinched, and she could hear him fighting sobs.
“I’m sorry, Joey,” she said.
“It’s…all right, ma’am,” he croaked. “Can you sing?”
She tugged gently at one of the strips, freeing it from his back a fraction of an inch at a time. “A little,” she said. “Would you like me to?”
“My ma used to sing to me,” he said, “when I was a baby.”
In so many ways, he still was. She wet another portion of his ragged shirt and began to sing.
When the blackbird in the Spring,
‘Neath the willow tree,
Sat and rock’d, I heard him sing,
Singing Aura Lea.
Aura Lea, Aura Lea,
Maid with golden hair;
Sunshine came along with thee,
And swallows in the air.
She was about to begin the chorus when Holden walked into the room, followed by Lucia with her baby. The Mexican woman exclaimed and rushed to the bed.
“Madre de Dios! Pobrecito!”
Rachel paused in her work, meeting Holden’s eyes over Lucia’s dark head. His gaze was as steady and unrelenting as ever, but there were deeper lines bracketing his mouth. Lines of pain.
“Lucia,” she said, “will you see to the baby?”
“Sí, sí!” Lucia hurried out.
Holden crouched beside the bed, setting down a bulging flour bag.
“How you doin’, boy?” he asked in the gentlest voice Rachel had ever heard from him.
“I’m okay,” Joey said. He moved as if he was trying to get up, and Rachel uttered a word she hadn’t spoken in years.
“Don’t move, Joey! Please, Holden, keep him still.”
Gray-green eyes flashed to hers. “Keep on singin’.”
If it hadn’t been for the severity of Joey’s condition and Holden’s obvious pain, she would have blushed and stammered like a schoolgirl. But she sang, steadily pulling the saturated cotton from Joey’s wounds. When Maurice popped his head in, Rachel asked him to fetch the hot water. Its warmth eased a little of Joey’s discomfort, and once his shirt was off, she was able to clean the lacerations. She took great care to remove any threads or bits of cloth that might have entered the wounds during the whipping.
“Did you find cloths for bandages?” she asked Holden when she was finished.
He opened the flour sack and held it out to her. As their fingers touched, Rachel forgot the verse she had been singing. His hands had been coated with blood when she’d seen him in the yard, but he had carefully washed them.
“What will yo
u do now?” he asked.
“Bind him up as best I can and let him rest. Time is the great healer.”
“Holden?” Joey murmured.
Renshaw leaned closer. “I’m here, boy.”
“Why did that wolf help me?”
“I guess he just knew Sean was no good.”
“I ain’t never…seen a wolf like that before,” Joey said, his voice growing fainter. “I don’t want no one to shoot it. I…”
He trailed off.
Rachel paused in her work and glanced anxiously at Holden. “How is he?” she asked.
“He’s out cold.”
“He’s probably fainted from the pain. That would be a mercy.”
Holden’s lip curled up, exposing his even white teeth. He looked like nothing so much as a hungry wolf ready to savage its prey. Rachel was almost afraid to speak again.
“I’m almost finished with Joey,” she said. “I’ll need to examine your shoulder.”
He stared at the bare wall, now bereft of the painting that had hung there. “I don’t need no healin’.”
“Please. Let me see your injury.”
“It ain’t necessary.”
Rachel got off the bed and approached him as she would that very wolf he so resembled. “I am afraid I will have to disagree, Mr. Renshaw.” She swallowed. “Would you remove your waistcoat and shirt, please?”
If he chose to ignore her, she knew very well that she couldn’t do anything about it. His will was more than equal to her own, and his strength many times hers. But he eased out of his waistcoat, making not a sound, and with a swift, awkward movement pulled the shirt over his head.
Rachel caught her breath. His entire right shoulder was painted with blood, and there was a small hole in the hard muscle at the top of his arm. She pressed her hands to her mouth.
“You’ve been shot,” she said faintly.
“I told you, it’s nothin’.”
Indeed, the wound wasn’t bleeding now, in spite of the wealth of gore. If she hadn’t known better, she would have said that it was closing even as she watched.
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