by Nico Rosso
Ducking between a candy shop and a women’s dress store, Tom got his first look at the main street. Six or seven men stood in a wide ring around two fighters. One of them staggered on wobbly legs, trying to make fists. The other stood his ground, ready. Something flashed bright on his chest, making Tom blink away the bright streak. A tin star.
“Aw, hell,” Tom muttered. “Just the sheriff running some drunks out of town.”
The badge flashed again and Tom refocused his eyes on the sheriff.
It was Rosa.
“THIS STAR ISN’T a fashion accessory.” If only Rosa had a nickel for every time some drunken jackass thought he’d challenge the law just because she was a woman. “How do you think I got to be sheriff? By rousting a bunch of drunks like you out of town. First two rules of Thornville: no guns and no fighting.” The man still gathered himself to brawl while the others cheered him on. “Clear out before things get really rough.”
The drunken cowboy smiled, creasing his sunburned face. “I’m a rough rider.”
Rosa shook her head and pulled the leather gloves tighter against her fists. After this fight was done she’d have to give a good talking to Francis in the saloon. He’s got to know better than to keep serving hooligans once they’re this pickled.
“After I knock you in the dust,” she pointed at the man in front of her while keeping her eye on the others surrounding them, “none of y’all can show your caras feas in this town again.”
The drunk maintained his awkward grin. “Come on. Let’s do it in the dust.” Then he came swinging.
He was taller than her by at least six inches. And he might’ve had one hundred pounds on her. But he was slow and telegraphed his first punch. It was a looping right hook. She slipped under it and drove her fist into his ribs, right over the man’s kidney.
The crowd winced. The man grunted and spun, trying to slap her with the back of his hand. She anticipated this and easily ducked underneath. He wasn’t smiling anymore. The pain sobered him.
“Good.” She kept her fists high and ready. “I want you to be awake for every second. You might learn something.” She kept a mean face, but somewhere inside, she was actually enjoying this. Swagger, even in a fight. It hadn’t seemed possible until she’d seen Tom do just that in Porterville, one town downriver.
The inner joy died. Tom only fought when it was easy. High stakes had driven him out of town and out of her life. Three damn years ago. Rosa didn’t know when her hurt and anger would go away. At least she could take it out on the hooligan in front of her.
He swayed his big barrel chest from side to side, as if that would make him a difficult target. Before he could attack again, she faked to the left, drawing his guard that way, then sent her fist into his neck, just below his jaw. Sputtering, the man stumbled backward into the arms of two of his friends.
They weren’t laughing anymore, either.
Hissing and growling something into his ear, they shoved the roughneck back at her. He collected himself as much as he could and mounted another attack. She had to give up ground to his flurry of fists, but there was only so far she could go. His ring of rowdy friends hemmed her in and she couldn’t get too close to any of them.
One of the man’s punches caught her on the shoulder. She slid sideways in the dust of Main Street. It took all her strength just to stay on her feet. The man kept coming. Rosa stayed low. She kicked, catching him on the knee.
His leg buckled and the he hit the dirt with a thud. His friends were stunned silent for a moment while he writhed, clutching his knee.
“Pick him up and get all yourselves out of Thornville.”
The ring of men closed in. They weren’t interested in helping their friend. In fact, there was nothing friendly in their faces. This was deadly business.
She turned as the circle tightened around her. Trading fists with one man wasn’t always fun, but it was something she could handle. Taking on all these roughnecks could be too much. Then one of them sneered and drew a long bowie knife from behind his coat. The dark, pitted blade had seen a lot of use.
He raised the stakes, but she held a higher hand. Rosa put her palm on the butt of the revolver at her hip. “I’m still the law and I say get. That means all of you and it means now.”
Usually the threat of her drawing on someone was enough. There was one time when it hadn’t been.
Today might turn out the same. The men still approached, now led by the one with the knife.
She was done threatening them. A bullet said a lot more than words. Rosa tightened her hand around the familiar grip of the .45. But when she tried to draw the gun, she couldn’t move her arm. One of the men gripped her forearm tight. He smelled of liquor and cheap tobacco.
No son of a bitch touched her without paying a price.
She’d practiced a move for this situation. All she had to do was kick out her heels, dropping down and using her weight to break the man’s grip. If it worked just right, she’d draw her gun on the way to the ground.
Rosa coiled, but someone new suddenly rushed up to her. A tall, broad man, dressed in a cavalry uniform. He cocked his fist back and drove it into the face of the man holding her. The roughneck released his grip, out cold before he hit the ground.
She finally drew her gun, but the hooligans were already fleeing, hiding among the buildings. With the immediate threat out of the way, she looked at the Army man who had come to her aid.
“Tom?”
Her blood was already pumping from the fight, but seeing him standing there, in the flesh, sent new pulses of heat through her. Was it really him? Three years had etched the lines in his face a little deeper. And his shoulders seemed wider, filling out his cavalry uniform. It had to be him. The same hunger burned in his eyes when he looked at her, and her body responded with an old burn, like someone lighting a match a mile deep in a mine.
Unlike her flesh, she wasn’t so quick to forgive him.
“You lousy son of a bitch,” she spat.
He tore his eyes from her to glance about the town. “The fight’s still on.”
“You bet your ass it is. Coming back after all this time, like you’re still welcome here.” Maybe her anger could overpower the attraction that seemed to tug her toward him.
“The fight with those drunken bums. They haven’t left.” His broad hand came toward her and she recoiled, not knowing what his touch would do to her. He was only moving the barrel of her revolver aside. She hadn’t aimed it at him, but it was getting awfully close.
“I know damn well what’s happening in my town. Don’t need you to come back to tell me.” Didn’t need him to come back at all. That’s what she told herself nights, after her guns had been cleaned and the lamps were all dark and she felt his absence.
“Well, you might need a hand running these fools out of here.”
“You could show them the way out. I know how good you are at running.” She shouldered past him, toward where she saw some of the hooligans collecting. Despite her anger, touching Tom again, body to body, brought back too many memories. Hot nights under the stars. Cold nights wrapped in blankets. His mouth on her neck, hands on her hips.
She kept walking, eager to put her fist into one of the hooligans. And if rousting the drunks didn’t burn off all her steam, she might lay out Tom, too. God knows he deserved it.
The sound of his boots in the dirt told her he was following. She couldn’t turn and look at him. It was easier when she missed and hated a ghost. The real Tom complicated everything.
“Couple of them over at the farrier’s.”
“See ’em.”
“Saw you handle that one guy. Always knew you could hold your own, but that was something fine to watch.” He picked up his pace to stay close to her. That same wild spark still shined off him, unpredictable as lightning. “Where’d you learn that kind of fighting?”
“You’re not the only one who can leave town.” When he lit out those years ago, she couldn’t stay and see him in every shad
ow or hear his voice on the valley winds.
Just then she made the mistake of stealing a glance at him. He cut a powerful figure, striding across Main Street with the front placket of his cavalry shirt half undone, heavy pistol in its holster and steel blue eyes gazing ahead for trouble. “There’s a war on, lots of new jobs for a lady. Picked up a few things working the docks down in Santa Barbara, cattle auctions in Camarillo. Thornville’s not a sleepy little town anymore. Someone had to come back to keep the peace. Stick around long enough and I’ll show you what I can do with a knife.”
“Love to see it.”
“You might be feeling it.”
He slowed up a bit, allowing a safer distance between the two of them. She walked closer to the two men by the farrier’s. They were huddled together, making some kind of plan. Her pistol was still out, so she’d be ready, even if one of them had another bowie.
“I think a few of them are over at the telegraph office now.” Tom started to angle in that direction.
She stopped walking and Tom paused with her. Keeping an eye on the hooligans at the farrier’s, she turned her attention to Tom. “You’re not helping me. You left. What’re you doing back? Running again? You a deserter?”
His angry blue eyes sharpened to a dangerous edge. “I earned these stripes on my arm. And the scars in my leg and shoulder from Hapsburg bullets. I ain’t no deserter.”
“This time.”
It was a slap in the face and he showed the pain with a grimace. Good. He deserved it. And worse.
She pressed: “So what are you doing here?”
For the first time, she saw Tom searching for words. “I . . . couldn’t stay away.” Then that easy smile flashed across his face. Damn if that grin didn’t make the air feel lighter around her. “Good thing, too. Don’t see any deputies backing you.”
“Don’t need them.” And no one had ever volunteered for the job either.
“Today you do.”
A metallic clicking drew their attention to the hooligans by the telegraph office fifty yards away. One man was attaching an iron box to the side of the main telegraph pole with a leather strap while the other wound a crank on its face. Once the box was secure, one man pulled a thick wire from one side, strung it around the telegraph pole, and back into the other side of the box.
Rosa turned and hurried toward them.
Tom was right with her. “That’s a tree cutter.”
“I know what it is. What the hell are common roughnecks doing with it on our telegraph pole?”
Damn it, she wasn’t going to get there in time.
One of the men hit a lever next to the winding crank and the tension in the box released. It drew the wire tight against the telegraph pole and quickly ate into the wood. The wire continued contracting, slicing straight through the pole.
Suddenly, Tom’s arms were around her shoulders, stopping her dead in her tracks.
“Those aren’t common roughnecks.”
With a groan, the telegraph pole separated where it was cut and the heavy top fell straight toward them.
Chapter Two
POPPING LIKE GUNSHOTS, the telegraph wires snapped from the pole as it fell toward Rosa and Tom. He tightened his arms around her. The muscles of his body gathered up. They’d been to enough barn dances together for her to know how he was going to move, and she collected herself to follow. A second before the telegraph pole crashed into them, they sprang to the side, just out of harm’s way.
The wood sent dirt and rocks flying with a thundering clap. If she and Tom hadn’t moved, they’d be dead. He was right—these weren’t ordinary drunken hooligans.
He was quick to his feet and helping her up. Even through the leather of her glove she felt the heat of his skin. Her body woke up to it. She suddenly sensed every bit of clothing against her skin. There was a lot of history between their bodies.
Holding onto her hand, he smiled. “Like those britches on you.”
She meant to yank her hand away, but everything moved slowly, like a summer sunset. Her body needed more of his heat. Luckily, her vest was buttoned over her shirt; otherwise he’d have seen the blush she felt across her chest. The tips of their fingers lingered a moment before she was free from his touch.
“A sheriff can’t have her skirts getting in the way when she’s busting rowdies.” The dust had cleared, and the two men at the telegraph office were gone. “Or whatever these troublemakers are.”
Jaw set, he scanned the buildings for someone to fight. “They’re in a world of trouble, that’s what they are.” If she had had no past with Tom, no scars from him tearing away from her, this man would be mighty easy to watch as he moved purposefully through her town. She had to turn away before she spent too much time staring at his determined face.
Thornville citizens peered fearfully from behind windows. No one else was out on the street to back her. Except Tom. The trouble with the hooligans had spun out of control. She was reluctantly grateful to have his help. But she couldn’t tell him. She wouldn’t let it be that easy for him to return. And there was no way on Earth she was going to tell him how much she thought he’d changed, solidifying from a rowdy youth into a formidable man.
Movement by the farrier’s drew her and Tom’s attention, and they hurried in that direction. The two roughnecks were still waiting there, ready to fight. Rosa just reached the building, when three more men jumped out from a side alley, knocking Tom away from her.
He stumbled sideways for a few steps and slammed into the side of a building. He grimaced, then smiled.
“I got these guys. You take those two.” In a swift move, he launched himself off the building and into the three men.
Fists flew. Tom handled himself beautifully. He had been wild when he was younger, a troublemaker taking on all comers. But this Tom was a brutal and precise soldier. He didn’t hesitate to fight and his fists were aimed for maximum impact. The men felt the pain.
Rosa almost wished she could just watch him unleashing all the power of his body, but the men by the farrier’s came on quickly. If they joined the fray, the odds would turn against Tom. Rosa blocked their path.
“You saw what I did to your friend,” she said. “All bets are off now that you tried to kill me.”
They took one more step, then saw the .45 in her hand.
The fight continued behind her. Feet shuffled and men grunted in pain.
The roughnecks in front of Rosa looked like they wanted to join in the brawl and help their friends, but her pistol held them back. With each blow they heard behind her, they winced.
Tom was winning. “I was coming home,” he growled as he knocked the men to the ground, “for some peace and quiet and good applejack and a beer or ten.” One final groan and a heavy body hit the dirt. “And a nap under a tree after a blackberry pie.”
She glanced over her shoulder and saw him standing over the three fallen men. He slapped his hands against his thighs, dusting them off.
Rosa motioned with the barrel of her revolver for the men in front of her to join the others Tom had corralled. They moved reluctantly, but none wanted to challenge the .45.
Tom’s adversaries sat up in the dirt, wincing and holding their injuries. Tom was out of breath, but still standing. A little blood dripped from the corner of his wide grin. This was the troublemaker she remembered.
As soon as she turned her back on the farrier’s building, a scraping sound spun her back around. Tom turned with her, drawing his pistol in a flash. The heavy gun rattled briefly like a snake as he pointed its four barrels at the man they faced.
The hooligan with the knife had returned, murder in his eyes. The long clip point of the Bowie was ready to strike. Rosa and Tom cocked their pistols. But the man didn’t back down.
One of the roughnecks on the ground called out, “Go on, quit, Deak. They ain’t paying us enough for this.”
The man with the knife hissed back, “You shut the hell up. Unless you want to get the knife, too.”
The roughneck on the ground seemed more afraid of Deak than Rosa or Tom.
Rosa used her voice to overpower them both. “No one’s getting the knife.” Her gun aimed right for Deak’s heart. “Who’s paying you to do what?”
Deak kept his mouth in a thin line.
Tom encouraged him. “I’d tell her before she gets mad.”
The man didn’t talk and didn’t lower his knife.
Her patience thinned. “Someone pay you to kill me?”
Silence.
She shifted the aim of her pistol. “Drop that knife now or never use that hand again.”
Tom whispered out the side of his mouth, “How good a shot are you?”
“I’ll take an acorn at twenty paces. This skunk’s no problem.” She narrowed her eyes on the man. “You decide how much you like that hand?”
Deak breathed shallow and fast, preparing to attack. He took one step.
Rosa fired. The pistol bucked with the loud crack of the explosion. The bullet hit its mark, and the knife spun from Deak’s hand. He immediately crumpled into a ball, clutching his bleeding fist.
The fight drained out of all the men. Rosa let two of them go to their injured friend, hauling him gingerly to his feet. The roughnecks were easily herded down Main Street by Rosa and Tom, revolvers drawn. Some of the townspeople came out from behind their doors.
“Get Doc Chacon,” she called to Willoughby, the general store owner. “Tell him to meet me at the jail.”
The hooligans groaned with defeat. One of them looked like he was going to try and make a break for it, but Tom shook his pistol, rattling it.
“You country boys ever seen a U.S. Army Rattler before?” he asked. It was a formidable weapon, black steel and brass. “Six shots of straight-up forty-four-caliber bullets from the revolver. And below, three more barrels for shotgun shells.” All the barrels together formed a deadly diamond. He snarled, “Believe me, you wouldn’t make it.”
