The Outlaws: Rafe

by Connie Mason

  The Outlaws: Rafe

  by Connie Mason

  Copyright 2011 by Connie Mason

  Prologue

  ORDWAY, COLORADO 1868

  Rafe Gentry swallowed past the lump in his throat, imagining the bite of the noose as it tightened around his neck. He was going to hang. The lynch mob was storming the jailhouse and the sheriff was doing little to stop them. Damn! He never thought he'd end up swinging from the end of a rope.

  Suddenly the mesmerizing strains of music wafted through the air from the revival tent set up in the town square. The angelic voice raised in song was so profoundly inspiring that Rafe's anguish slid away for a few short moments. Only an angel could sing so sweetly. She was singing a hymn, her voice rising above the shouting outside the jailhouse door. Rafe paused in the midst of his morose thoughts to listen-and to recall the events that had brought him to this sorry place,

  It had been a miracle that he and his brothers, Jess and Sam, had survived the war, though their father hadn't lived through the first battle. All four of the Gentry men had joined the Confederate army despite the twenty thousand Kansans who supported the Union. Having migrated from Tennessee to Kansas, the family's sympathies had been with the South. Jesse had enlisted as a doctor, using his medical training to save lives, while Rafe and Sam had served in the Cavalry.

  Rafe was the first to arrive home after the war ended. Jesse and Sam showed up late in 1866. Unfortunately it had been a sad homecoming. Quantrill's raiders had destroyed their crop and burnt most of the outbuildings back in 1863. Worn out from trying to keep the family farm solvent, poor Mama had died scant weeks after her sons returned from war. Rafe, Jess and Sam had managed to put in a crop, but for two years running dust storms had destroyed their hopes of raising money to pay back taxes. Jess had hung up his shingle in Dodge City, intending to practice medicine, but no one came to use his services.

  As a last resort they had gone to the bank in Dodge City for a loan to put the farm back on its feet. Being a staunch Union supporter, Banker Wingate had refused their request, but he did offer them a deal that could save the homestead if one of them was willing to make a small sacrifice. Rafe chuckled despite his grave situation when he recalled how he and his brothers had reacted to Wingate's shocking deal and the unforeseen outcome.

  Wingate said he would give them the loan if one of the brothers would take his pregnant daughter off his hands. The offer had been outrageous. Though all three brothers had dallied with Maris Wingate, none of them had bedded the girl, and so they had refused to marry her, never dreaming the outcome of their refusal would send them fleeing for their lives.

  Had he and his brothers realized how angry and desperate Wingate was they might have done things differently, but in retrospect, Rafe supposed nothing would have changed. They were leaving the bank when Wingate burst out of his office and screamed, "bank robbery," at the top of his voice. Rafe remembered how they had turned around, expecting to encounter a desperate criminal, and saw Wingate pointing at them.

  Bank robbers? The Gentry brothers? Confederate soldiers, but not outlaws. But there had been no time for explanations. From the corner of his eye Rafe had seen the sheriff and his deputy running toward the bank. Fearing they would shoot first and ask questions later, the brothers had ridden hell for leather out of town. They had returned to their homestead for their belongings and divided what little cash they had on hand, taking off scant minutes ahead of the posse. They traveled a short distance together, then split up by mutual consent to confuse the posse.

  Jess had ridden north, Sam south, and he had headed west. Before they parted they made a solemn pact to meet one year from that day at the Antlers Hotel in Denver. If one of them failed to show up, the others would know he hadn't made it.

  Rafe hated like hell to think that one of his brothers might not survive after having gone through the war with little more than a few minor injuries, but it was something they had all accepted. Hell, he doubted he'd live through the night.

  The event that had brought him to this sorry mess was a stagecoach robbery and the murder of five innocent people. Hell, he'd only been trying to be a good Samaritan and look where it brought him? He'd crossed the border into Colorado and was riding along, minding his own business, when gunshots brought him to a grinding halt. Without thinking, he had drawn one of his matched pair of service revolvers and ridden toward the shots. He arrived in time to witness a pair of outlaws shooting off the padlock on the stagecoach's strongbox.

  He'd frightened them away before they had time to make off with the money, but all three passengers inside the stage as well as the driver and man riding shotgun, were dead. Rafe had been found standing over the strongbox, still holding his gun, by cowboys from a nearby ranch who had heard the shots and came riding out to investigate.

  His explanation was cut short when the dead bodies were discovered, and he was hustled off to jail in Ordway, the nearest town, to await trial. The evangelists had shown up the next day.

  The angelic songbird began another hymn and Rafe walked to the narrow window of his jail cell and stared through the darkness at the revival tent, where the glow from a hundred lanterns lit up the night. Her name was Sister Angela. He had encountered her when he stopped to buy trail supplies at the general store in Garden City, Kansas before crossing the border into Colorado.

  Rafe had been stowing his supplies in his saddlebags when he saw a blond beauty being accosted in the street by a pair of drunken cowboys. Aware that bringing attention to himself was dangerous, Rafe still felt compelled to intervene. He had made short work of the drunken cowboys and received Sister Angela's undying gratitude. He would have liked more than her gratitude but her religious calling made her off limits to him. She had asked his name and invited him to attend the revival that night, but of necessity he had declined.

  Rafe knew it was Sister Angela's voice he heard floating to him through the barred window for he'd overheard the sheriff telling his deputy about the beautiful Sister Angela, with the voice of an angel and a face to match. If he could hear but one thing before he met his maker, he would want it to be Sister Angela's sweet voice easing his way to the hereafter.

  Rafe's thoughts were violently shattered when the door to the jailhouse burst open.

  Chapter One

  Ordway, Colorado 1869

  Wearied after the intense three-day revival, Sister Angela Abbot gathered up the sheet music and placed it in a folder. Those attending the revival that night had already drifted away, followed soon afterward by Reverend Conrad and Sister Grace, his wife. Angela intended to seek her own bed as soon as she straightened up and packed away the music that had been used during the lengthy four-hour revival. Only one more city remained on the schedule before the Reverend and his wife would return to their home base in Wichita.

  Being offered a place with Reverend Conrad and his wife had come at a time when Angela desperately needed to remove herself from Wichita. Her mother had just recently died of lung fever, leaving her in the care of her odious stepfather. A few weeks later her father's letter, forwarded by his lawyer, had reached her.

  Angela's mother and father had divorced when she was very young, but Simon Abbot had kept in touch with his only daughter over the years. The gold mine her father owned along with a partner was what had separated her parents. Angela's mother had hated being stuck in a miners camp in Colorado and her father had refused to abandon the mine, which at that time had yet to show any sign of color.

  Angela was ten years old when her mother had taken her back to Wichita, obtained a divorce and married Desmond Dexter, a man Angela couldn't abide. During the ensuing years, Simon Abbot had taken a partner and struck a vein of gold that made him a wealthy man. Then Angela had received tha
t final letter from her father. According to the lawyer, Simon Abbot had died in an unfortunate accident and she had inherited his share of the mine and all his worldly assets.

  Angela recalled her father's letter as if it were yesterday. For some reason her father had anticipated his own death, and he'd told his daughter to look to his partner should he die suddenly or suspiciously. Shortly afterward a letter arrived from Brady Baxter, her father's partner, arrived. Baxter informed her that the mine had played out and he offered to buy her share at a ridiculously high price for a supposedly worthless mine.

  Angela had no intention of selling her share of the mine to Brady Baxter without first inspecting her property. Flaunting Desmond Dexter's authority, Angela secretly planned to travel to Colorado as soon as arrangements could be made and check out both Brady Baxter and the mine for herself.

  Angela's stepfather had promptly produced a fiancé for his stepdaughter, and Angela knew that both Desmond and Anson Chandler were more interested in her inheritance than in her future. Against her wishes, plans were afoot for a hasty wedding. Then Angela happened to hear at the church she regularly attended that a Baptist evangelist intended to carry the word of God to the Western frontier, and that Reverend Conrad and his wife, Sister Grace, were looking for a vocalist to lead the singing. As lead vocalist in the church choir, Angela knew that God had intended for her to travel with the Reverend to Colorado.

  Lying didn't come easy to Angela, but somehow she had convinced Reverend Conrad that she had her stepfather's approval to travel with them. She compounded the lie by inventing a fiancé who was to meet her in Pueblo, where they would marry before traveling on to her father's mine near Canyon City.

  So she had used some of the money sent to her over the years by her father to secretly outfit a wagon. And hours before her wedding she quietly disappeared, leaving nary a word of explanation behind to either Desmond Dexter or Anson Chandler. She knew they would eventually discover what she had done, but she hoped not too soon. Only six months remained until her twenty-first birthday, placing her beyond Desmond and Chandler's influence. She'd be in charge of her own life and free to pursue her father's murderer, for she knew in her heart her father's death had been no accident.

  Angela suddenly became aware of a commotion in the street outside the tent and sensed trouble. She rushed into the street, her gaze riveted on the crowd gathered outside the jailhouse across the road. Even as she watched the crowd seemed to swell and undulate closer to the building. Some held torches, all were armed. She started to choose an alternate path to her hotel when she saw a man with his hands tied behind his back and a rope around his neck being dragged from the jailhouse.

  A lynch mob! She'd heard such things existed in the uncivilized West but she never thought to experience that travesty firsthand. She watched in abject horror as the hapless man was hoisted upon a horse and led to a sturdy tree growing at the edge of the town square, well within sight of the revival tent.

  Angela's heart nearly stopped when she saw someone throw one end of the rope over a thick branch above the prisoner. They were going to hang him! What kind of barbarians would do such a terrible thing?

  Then the condemned man turned his head in her direction and the raw desperation of his expression was like a kick to Angela's gut. She recognized him immediately. The horror etched on his face matched that of her own. The man wearing the noose around his neck was the same man who had rescued her from the drunken cowboys in Garden City!

  Forces beyond reason and past explanation made Angela react as she did. She had no idea what Rafe Gentry had done to warrant hanging, but she knew she couldn't allow it to happen.

  "What has he done?" Angela asked the first man she encountered at the edge of the mob.

  "Don't trouble yerself none over that one, Sister Angela," the man said, obviously recognizing her from the revival. "The man is an outlaw. He robbed a stage and killed five people."

  Angela's blood froze. Murder? No, it wasn't possible. The condemned man might be many things, but murderer wasn't one of them. Her eyes met Rafe's. The moment stretched, held. But in that brief eternity she had learned all she needed to know about Rafe Gentry. One had but to look into his unwavering silver gaze to know he was a hard man, but not a cold-blooded murderer.

  She sensed the moment he had accepted his fate for all vestiges of emotion drained from his face and his shoulders stiffened as his gaze slid away from hers. A scream gathered in Angela's throat as she pushed and shoved her way through the crowd.

  "Stop! You can't hang him. He didn't do it!"

  The man whose hand rested on the horse's rump froze, staring dumbly at Angela.

  "Ain't you one of them traveling church people?"

  "I'm Sister Angela. You can't hang this man."

  "Now, Sister Angela," the man cajoled. "This ain't none of your concern."

  "Saving souls is my concern," Angela persisted, "and hanging an innocent man is against the law."

  A rumble of unrest rolled through the crowd.

  "Has he had a proper trial?" Angela pressed.

  "Don't need no trial," a man from the crowd shouted. "The stagecoach driver and man who rode shotgun were good men; they're dead now. So are the passengers."

  "He gunned down five people, sister," Pete explained with growing impatience. "Move aside. This ain't gonna be a pretty sight."

  "No, please!" She swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and said, "Rafe Gentry is the man I'm going to marry, he couldn't have killed five people. He came here to meet me, not rob a stage."

  Rafe's gaze returned abruptly to Sister Angela, his dark brows raised in askance. What in the hell made her say he was her fiancé? Did she think to reform him?

  She appeared fragile, almost ethereal in the harsh glare of torchlight, her golden hair a gossamer halo about her head. Her face was a perfect oval, her generous mouth sweetly curved, and there was a hint of sensuality in the slanted blue eyes that were focused on him with an intensity that startled him.

  "Are you saying you and this man are gonna get hitched, Sister Angela?" Pete asked with disbelief. He scratched his thatch of dark hair, clearly bewildered by this unforeseen turn of events.

  "That's exactly what I'm saying," Angela insisted. "He was to meet me in Pueblo, but obviously he decided to join me in Ordway instead."

  "He was caught red-handed," Pete argued.

  Rafe was more than a little stunned when Sister Angela turned those fathomless blue eyes on him and said, "Tell these men what really happened, darling."

  Before Rafe could open his mouth, Sheriff Tattersal pushed his way through the mob. "Go home, all of you. There won't be a hanging in my town. Let the judge and jury decide his guilt."

  "Let the prisoner talk," Pete said, glowering at the sheriff. "Maybe Sister Angela is telling the truth and maybe she ain't."

  Outnumbered, Tattersal apparently knew when to back down. "Very well, let's hear what Mr. Gentry has to say."

  "I talk much better without a rope around my neck and a nervous horse under me," Rafe said.

  "Talk, mister," Pete growled. "We'll decide later if tonight will be your last on earth."

  Rafe sent Sister Angela an inscrutable look, his gunmetal eyes shuttered. He cleared his throat and launched into a telling of how he had come upon the pair of outlaws after the killings and chased them away before they could make off with the money from the strongbox.

  "See, I told you," Angela gloated. "Rafe wouldn't harm a flea."

  Rafe stifled a grin. Obviously Sister Angela didn't know a damn thing about him if she thought that. Suddenly the mob shifted restlessly and the horse beneath him grew agitated. Rafe squeezed his legs in an effort to subdue the animal's flightiness. He breathed a sigh of relief when the horseflesh beneath his thighs quivered, then quieted.

  "Everything I told you is the truth," Rafe vowed. "I emptied my guns at the outlaws, not into the passengers or driver."

  "Is Sister Angela your intended bride?" Sheriff Tattersal aske
d.

  Rafe looked down at the sweet-faced angel who for some unknown reason had lied through her teeth to save his life and wanted to grin from ear to ear. Instead, he composed his features with difficulty and said, "Sister Angela has no reason to lie. Think about it. She's an evangelist, a holy woman who spreads God's gospel. If I were guilty would she go out of her way to lie?"

  Pete glanced at Sister Angela and looked away, as if ashamed of doubting her. But he still didn't look convinced.

  "What's going on here?"

  The booming voice belonged to Reverend Conrad, the man responsible for bringing the revival to Ordway. Rafe felt his muscles tauten as he watched the Reverend push his way through the mob. He stifled a grown, certain that the preacher's interference would seal his fate. The fire and brimstone preachers he had known in the past held a dim view of theft and murder, even though Rafe had committed neither.

  Reverend Conrad saw Angela standing at the center of the mob and rushed to her aid. "Sister Angela, what's going on?"

  "Thank God you're here," Angela cried. "You have to talk some sense into this unruly mob. They're going to hang an innocent man."

  Rafe stiffened as the Reverend fixed him with a steely gaze. "What makes you think this man is innocent, Sister?"

  Sister Angela looked at him squarely, neither flinching nor backing down. Rafe marveled at her temerity. She lied with such ease that had he not known better he would have believed he actually was her fiancé.

  "Rafe Gentry is my fiancé, Reverend Conrad. He's the man I was to meet and marry in Pueblo. We were to travel to my father's mine as man and wife. I had no idea he decided to meet me in Ordway instead. Rafe couldn't have held up the stage and killed innocent people. It had to have happened just like he said. He came upon the outlaws and chased them away. Regrettably, he arrived too late to save the passengers and driver."

  The Reverend returned his attention to Rafe. "Is that true, young man?"