Hal nodded. “The thing is, Jake, if they’d died with nooses around their necks, it would have been because the law made it so. In case you haven’t noticed, there is a difference between obeying the law and taking the law into your own hands.”
Jake took a deep drag on his cigarette, and Randy watched, wondering where her next breath would come from.
“And there is a difference between taking the law into your own hands and just plain defending yourself and someone you love,” Jake told Kraemer. “That’s all I did, and these men here can attest to that.”
“And if we went out there and dug up their bodies, I’m betting the bullets in them all came from Colt .44s,” Kraemer answered, “with ivory handles and triggers so touchy that just a cough could set them off. Usually when there is a shoot-out, at least one man lives to tell about it…unless it was Jake Harkner doing the shooting.” He glanced at Lloyd again. “And I hear you can be just as ruthless and just as accurate.”
“If someone is threatening what’s mine? Sure I can.”
“Nobody is digging up any bodies,” Jake said flatly, taking Kraemer’s attention off of Lloyd. “There sure as hell isn’t much left of them by now anyway. The fact remains they came onto J&L land. They rustled up some of our cattle and were headed to Denver with them. As soon as I spotted them, I hurried my wife behind some rocks, because they’d seen us and were headed our way. They had us pinned down. I got a couple of them, and then Lloyd and some of my men here came along. None of us worried about aiming for places that didn’t kill. They all died, and that’s that. My wife even said a prayer over their graves, so they were properly buried, and we took their identifications and personal belongings to Denver to report the incident just like the law says we have to do. Nobody did anything wrong, so why in hell are you here? And why did you bring so many extra men?”
Hal grinned. “Well, Jake, it’s like I said. When I’m coming out to talk to a Harkner on Harkner land and surrounded by Harkner men, I figure I might need some backup.” He tipped his hat. “But I didn’t come here to arrest you, Jake. I only came to warn you.”
“About what?” Lloyd spoke up before Jake could. “We just told you Pa didn’t do anything wrong. Now get off our land!”
“Lloyd, let him speak,” Jake told him. “It might be important.”
“It is important, Jake,” Hal told him. “Seems as though one of those men you killed was the nephew of a Denver prosecutor, Harley Wicks. It’s true the boy was a no-good and always in trouble, but the fact remains that Wicks would like nothing better than to nail you for this. His sister, who is one of those high-society snobs in Denver, ordered him to have you arrested. But seeing as how you are who you are, and you’re pretty damn famous, and, well, you really didn’t do anything wrong that they can legally pin on you, Wicks couldn’t bring any charges. That’s what took so long coming out here. He tried every which way to find something to pin you with, but he couldn’t. I’m just warning you to look out for yourself, Jake. One wrong move, and Wicks will gladly oblige his sister’s wishes that you go back to prison or be hung.”
Jake drew on his cigarette and looked at Lloyd. “Am I that famous?” he tried to joke.
Lloyd shrugged. “Apparently so.” He turned to the others. “Is he famous, boys?”
Most of them grinned.
“I’d say his wife is the famous one, for that great homemade bread she makes us,” Pepper joked before spitting tobacco juice into the fire. It made a hissing sound against a hot coal. Jake and the others laughed at the remark.
Kraemer shook his head. “Just a warning, Jake. I think a lot of you, so stay out of trouble. I know about Mike Holt being on the loose. And word is he was seen in Guthrie.”
Evie stiffened at the words. Brian tightened his arm around her. Jake and Lloyd came alert.
“When?” Lloyd asked.
“A month or so, I guess. They practically tarred and feathered him before booting him out, the way I hear it. I came out here to warn you that he mentioned heading west before he left town, so that could mean he’s wanting to keep his promise about killing Lloyd. I figured that was reason enough to come out here…but that prosecutor did tell me to let you know he’ll be keeping an eye on you.”
Jake drew deeply on his cigarette and took it from his lips. “Marshal, I haven’t done a damn thing wrong. And if I want to take my wife to Denver to show her a beautiful time and treat her like the elegant lady she is, I’ll do it. And I’ll be going there to sell my cattle, so you tell that prosecutor he can keep his nose out of my business, and I’ll be sure to stay on the side of the law while I’m there. I’ve worn a badge, and I know the rules.”
Kraemer nodded. “Jake, I hold you in high regard, but I have a job to do, so I really hope I’ll never have reason to come after you. That’s not something I would relish doing at all.” He backed his horse. “These extra men are a fraction of what I’d bring along against the likes of Jake Harkner. Actually, we’re headed for Loveland. There’s a wanted man holed up there somewhere, or so I’m told. I just figured I’d do what that prosecutor asked and stop by to give you a warning.”
“You’ve done your job, so move on,” Lloyd answered. “As you can see, we’re in the middle of branding, and we have to get back to work.”
“I understand.” Kraemer rode his horse closer to Lloyd. “They say that Holt is after you because you shot his brother in the back after the man had given himself up. That true?”
Jake glanced at Lloyd with a warning look in his eyes.
“Yes,” Lloyd answered without a flinch, “but he wasn’t standing there giving himself up. He turned and ran. I was the law, and it was within my rights to shoot him, so I damn well did.”
“Well, your friends from Guthrie who were with you that day at Dune Hollow swear the same thing, so it’s the word of several good men against Mike Holt.” Kraemer leaned closer. “But I have a real distinct feeling they’re all just trying to protect you, young man, so you keep in mind that even as a marshal back then, you could have gone to prison for shooting a man in the back.”
Katie drew in her breath, holding Randy’s hand so tight it almost hurt.
“All I know is what those men did to my sister,” Lloyd grumbled. “You think about that…if it was your wife or your sister or your daughter, Kraemer. Would you give a damn?”
Kraemer sighed, backing his horse again. “No, I wouldn’t, Lloyd. I just want you to be careful if you come up against Mike Holt. Do you understand me?”
“I understand just fine.”
Kraemer turned to Jake and reached down, putting out his hand.
Jake shook it. “Good luck finding your man,” he told Kraemer. “I’m just glad I’m not the one you were after.”
“So am I, Jake, so am I—because that would mean I’d probably come out on the losing end.” He glanced at Randy and the others, then back to Jake. “Take care of that beautiful family of yours.”
“I’m trying to do just that.”
Kraemer tipped his hat to the women and rode off, his men following behind.
Jake turned to his men. “I’m damn grateful, boys.”
“Hell, Jake, we couldn’t let that sonofabitch try to pin you with something,” Cole told him. “You might have gone off to prison, and we’d lose our jobs. With all the consolidatin’ goin’ on around here and ranchers sellin’ out to corporations, jobs for men like us are gettin’ fewer every year.”
“Yeah, we didn’t do it for you,” Pepper spoke up. “We did it for our own selves…and maybe for the wife. If the law took you away, your wife might leave, too, and we’d lose out on that homemade bread.”
They all chuckled, and Jake thought about Randy’s remark about true friends. He shook Cole’s hand, then Pepper’s. “You boys took a chance yourselves,” he told them. “God knows most of you are probably wanted somewhere for something.” He stepped
back then. “Now get back to work, all of you, or you will be out of a job!”
The men grinned and shoved each other around before returning to what they were doing before the interruption. Jake looked at Lloyd. “Damn good men,” he commented.
“They are.”
Their gazes held, both realizing the thin line they walked. “Hal was right about one thing, Lloyd. Try not to react too quickly if you see Mike Holt.”
“I won’t have any trouble reacting if he has a gun in his hand.”
“Yeah, well, that’s what worries me.” Jake sighed, looking him over lovingly. “Lloyd, if you happen to see that man and he doesn’t do anything wrong against you, you come and find me before you make any decisions. Will you do that?”
“I don’t know, Pa. It all depends on the circumstances and if Katie is with me, or if Evie is around.”
Jake put a hand on his shoulder. “You have a family that needs you. You remember that. And I’m one of them.”
Lloyd nodded.
“Jake—”
Jake turned to see Randy standing near him, her eyes showing a lingering terror. “I thought they’d come to arrest you,” she told him, suddenly bursting into tears.
Jake pulled her into his arms. “Nobody is going to arrest me,” he assured her.
Lloyd put a hand on her shoulder, and Evie also hurried up to Jake to hug him.
“Hey, I’ve got two beautiful women hugging me, and I’m covered in dirt and sweat and God knows what else,” Jake tried to joke. “This is embarrassing.”
“Daddy, I thought they would take you away!” Evie wept. “Like that day the soldiers came.”
Jake kissed her hair. “You women have to stop worrying.”
“Jake, it ain’t fair that you get to hug the two prettiest women in Colorado while the rest of us have to get back to work,” Cole shouted.
Jake gave his wife and daughter a light squeeze. “The condition I’m in, they won’t be hugging me for long. I need a bath!”
“Yeah, but I bet they smell good,” Vance yelled.
“You men get moving!” Jake shouted back, keeping his arms around both women.
He heard laughter and more shouting as things returned to normal. Jake glanced at Lloyd, who stood there looking devastated. Jake knew his son had never quite overcome the fact that he’d ridden out of his mother and Evie’s lives in anger after Jake was arrested years ago. “It’s okay, Lloyd.”
“No, it isn’t. They were alone when those soldiers came for you. I should have been there for them.”
Katie walked closer and moved an arm around Lloyd, who kept watching his mother and Evie.
“Okay, you women have to stop being so upset,” Jake told them. He gave them one more hug. “You go on home now and rest,” he told Evie. He turned to his son-in-law. “Brian, go with her. We can get along without you the rest of the day. Teresa can take Sadie and Tricia over to Lloyd’s house, and I’ll keep Little Jake busy a while longer so Evie can lie down.”
Little Jake ran up to them. “I thought they would shoot you, Grampa.”
Jake touched his shoulder. “Little Jake, you need to learn to hold your tongue when strangers come around. I should have made you apologize to the marshal for what you said. Right now you get back to the branding. Your mother is going to go home and take a nap, so when you don’t want to watch the branding anymore, you go with Teresa to Lloyd’s house, understand? And you help watch your sister and Tricia.”
The boy rubbed at his eyes and ran off to rejoin the men. Jake noticed Ben and Stephen standing nearby, both of them also looking concerned. Jake threw up his hands.
“Okay, enough! Everybody get back to what you were doing! Ben, you and Stephen go on back to the counting pen. Everything is okay now.” He took Evie’s arm and led her to Brian. “Go. That’s an order.”
“I love you, Daddy.”
“And God knows how much I love you. I don’t like you getting upset, so go.”
Evie left with Brian, and Jake turned to Lloyd and Katie. He kept an arm around Randy. “Take Randy back to the house, will you, Katie? We’ll be done in a little while.”
Lloyd gave Katie a kiss. “Go ahead. And heat some water. I’ll have a lot of dust and sweat to wash off when I get home.”
Katie squeezed his hand. She walked over to Randy. “Let’s go, Mom.”
Randy left reluctantly, glancing back at Jake once more.
“I’ll be along soon,” he assured her before turning to Lloyd. “Let’s be glad we got out of this one and get back to work.”
“Yeah.” Lloyd folded his arms. “You too old and tired now to finish out the day?”
Jake knew Lloyd was trying to lighten the mood. He rubbed at a sore shoulder. “Well, that’s a borderline truth, Son, but by God, all you did was cull out those calves. I’m the one who wrestled them down, so I’d be careful calling me old. How about we change places and you do the wrestling for a while?”
“Hell, I told you I’d do it, but you insisted on showing off how strong you still are, so if you’re hurting now, it’s not my fault.”
Jake gave him a shove. “Get the hell back to work.”
Lloyd grinned and walked off, putting big hands at the backs of Stephen and Ben’s necks and shoving them along with him.
With a heavy sigh, Jake headed back to the branding pen. Deep inside he, too, had thought he was going to be arrested. The day somebody tries to take me back to prison is the day I die!
Eleven
Randy brushed out her hair because Jake liked it down. She’d washed up and put on a flannel gown, anxiously waiting for her husband. She would never quite get over the memory of the day the soldiers came to arrest him, the brutal way they’d beat him. He’d given up running, deciding not to put her through any more of it. For the next four years she’d lived with the agony of knowing the terrible conditions under which he lived in prison, fearing he would die there. After his release, Jake’s job as a U.S. Marshal meant being gone weeks at a time, hunting men who would gladly kill him. Randy felt worn out from constantly worrying.
She went to the kitchen and retrieved yet another kettle of hot water, carrying it to the upstairs bedroom and pouring it into the large tin tub for his bath, wishing he’d get here soon. He was late. Why was he late? What was keeping him?
She returned to the kitchen to heat more water, then set bread out on the table and checked a pot of stew. Other than Ben, they never knew how many children would want to stay overnight with Grandma and Grandpa. Sometimes all the downstairs bedrooms were filled with kids, another irony for Jake. Randy loved it, loved children, and to this day she mourned not being able to have more after giving birth to Evie. But tonight…tonight all she could think about was Jake and the fear that the law had come for him. She wanted nothing more than to feel his arms around her. She supposed it was her constant fear of losing him that kept their lovemaking fresh and warm and needy. It was their way of proving to each other that they were together and alive and nothing could separate them. They weren’t just husband and wife, but friends and lovers.
Finally, she saw him walking toward the house from the bunkhouse. She couldn’t get over the fact that Cole and Pepper and some of the others had tried to take part of the blame for killing the rustlers. Now maybe Jake would understand what she meant about having good friends he could trust. When Jake reached the veranda, she noticed he didn’t look all dusty and sweaty. She went to the door and opened it, seeing in his eyes his regret over the incident with the marshals. He understood what that had done to her.
In the next moment she was in his arms. He held her off her feet and whirled her around, and she burst into tears. Jake kicked the door shut and kept her tight against him, kissing her hair.
“Jesus, Randy, ever since what happened out there, I’ve ached just to hold you. I saw the terror in your eyes. I just felt like
after what the men did to back me up, I should stay and help a while longer.”
“It’s okay.” She breathed in his familiar scent, burying her face in his neck. “Jake, you took a bath at the bunkhouse?”
“I didn’t want to have to mess with all that when I got home. I knew I’d just want to hold you, and I didn’t want to be filthy when I did. That’s why I’m late.”
Only Jake would think like that. She couldn’t stop her tears. He picked her up in his arms and walked over to his big leather easy chair and sat down in it, keeping her on his lap.
“I hate it when you cry,” he told her. “Everything is fine, Randy. Please stop crying.”
“All I could see were those soldiers.”
“And all I could think about was that black eye that Lieutenant Gentry gave you back then.” He hugged her even tighter. “I’ve never wanted to kill a man as bad as I wanted to kill him that day!”
“Jake, I’m worried about that prosecutor.”
“Don’t give it another thought. I haven’t done anything wrong, and he knows it, or I’d already be in jail. I don’t intend to give him reason to put me there, either, so you just relax.”
“Sometimes I just want to go back to that line shack and never leave…just you and me, Jake.” Randy relaxed more, kissing his cheek. He met her mouth in a hungry kiss.
“I wouldn’t mind it either,” he told her between kisses. “Right now we’ll settle for home. Lloyd brought these clothes to the bunkhouse for me so I could get out of the dirty ones, and he’ll keep Ben at his place tonight. He knew what you were going through and that maybe we should be alone.”
“He has such a big heart. I wish he’d stop feeling so guilty for running off after you went to prison.”
“We talked awhile,” Jake assured her. “I reminded him all of that was as much my fault as his. That’s another reason I’m a little late.”
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