Caden's Vow

by Sarah McCarty

  Pain in her calf snapped her eyes open. She grabbed at her leg. Worthless was on his hind legs, clawing at her skirts. Flower tossed her head and sidestepped. Reality slapped her in the face as she looked ahead. It was not the scene at the pond but a sheer drop-off that faced her. Thirty feet down she could see a river cutting through the ravine. The mare tossed her head and took a step back. Maddie grabbed the horn.

  Dear God. She’d almost driven them over the cliff. Dragging her eyes away from the drop, she looked around. She didn’t recognize where she was. She didn’t recognize where she was going. Didn’t know how long she’d been drifting in her mind. Long enough for the sun to come up and the woods to change to clearing, but that didn’t tell her much.

  “Where did you bring us?” she asked Worthless. He sat down and flopped his wrinkles at her. Some help he was. She backed Flower away from the edge. “At least it’s pretty.”

  And it was. Hell’s Eight was up high on the cliffs where it was sparse and the environment was harsh, but down here things had a lusher feel. More like home. There weren’t so many sharp edges to the landscape. It rolled more than cut and grass grew around rocks and summer flowers sprouted along hillsides and leaves filtered sunlight. It would be a wonderful place to stop and picnic if she weren’t lost.

  “What are we going to do?” she asked the hound. He stood on his hind legs and pawed at her foot. Leather creaked as she leaned down and petted his head. Worthless wagged his tail, his expression blissful as she scratched behind his ear. Clearly, he shared none of her concern. And why would he? He was used to hunting with Hell’s Eight. For sure Tracker wouldn’t be lost. Neither would Caden, Tucker or Caine. They knew this country like the back of their hands, whereas she... She sighed. She only knew how to create pictures in her mind.

  She made a note of another one of her needs. She truly needed to learn how to find her way around the wilderness. The next time she brought it up with the men, she wouldn’t be fobbed off with a ruffle of her hair and the statement that there was no need, the way Sam had done. Hell’s Eight’s protection or not, she needed her own skills.

  She didn’t want to be watched out for. Protectors came and went. She’d had a lot of protectors over the years. Protectors had a way of losing interest, and when they did, she was always alone again and left to her own devices. At that point her choice was to rely on herself or to find another. With no skills to sustain her, there really was no choice. But she didn’t want a protector anymore. She just wanted herself. She wanted to be like the men of Hell’s Eight, like the women of Hell’s Eight. She wanted to be able to look trouble in the eye and knock its teeth out.

  She flexed her fingers, made a fist and tried to imagine what the face of trouble would look like, but it always came at her in so many different forms it was hard to pick just one to punch. Like now, trouble tended to be a sneaky bastard. She was lost. Her current trouble was as simple and as complex as that. She tried to remember all she’d heard about Fei’s mine. The stories were wild and exciting on one level, like something out of a storybook. But it hadn’t been a fairy tale. Shadow had lived it with Fei. When Maddie listened to them tell the story, all she could think of was the expression of confidence in Fei’s face as she talked about how she’d handled things. Maddie wanted to be that confident. She wanted people to look at her and know that she could handle things. She wanted Caden to look at her like that. She wanted to know it herself.

  She remembered the talk about the climb, how hard it was to get up the side of the cliff to the mine, which meant it was high. Her options in trails that were rideable were either to go back the way she came, to travel along the right side of the mountain or to take the steep drop down.

  With her heart in her throat, she turned the mare to the path along the side of the mountain. The sun was rising on her right, clearing the mountain. She didn’t know if that was good or bad, wrong or right. She didn’t even know if that was east or west. How could she be so ignorant about such important details? Of course, growing up in town, it was never important which way the sun came up. On Hell’s Eight she’d never been left alone; always someone guarded her. Another form of protection that had not served her.

  She urged Flower forward. The one thing she hated about being “here” so much was the uncertainty of the emotions that always ate at her. In her make-believe world, it was calm. It was peaceful. There were never any wild swings of emotion. No fear. No hate. No pain. No sadness. Just calm summer days by the pond or maybe an evening at a social where she’d dance with handsome gentlemen who treated her with respect and thought she was lovely. She shook her head. Sometimes she wondered if she’d known going with Tracker had meant that she would be “here” so much and what being “here” meant if she wouldn’t have done it. She shook her head again as the birds sang in her ear and the horse’s hooves clopped along the path. Maybe not. Her make-believe world hadn’t been as satisfying even back then, and it’d been harder and harder to hold on to her peaceful feeling. Maybe losing the ability to pretend would have happened anyway and instead of being safe at Hell’s Eight, she would have just been in...

  She sighed as the path turned around the hill. It’d been so much easier as a child to pretend. So much easier to shirk the responsibility of living. Until the day when a customer had stabbed her friend Hilda. Maddie moaned in her mind, remembering the horror of the blood, of putting her hands over the wounds, of trying to stop the pulsing flow, her only friend’s blood gushing over her hands in a steady stream. No matter which wounds she covered, no matter how quickly she covered them, she couldn’t stop the blood. All she could do was sit there and listen to Hilda gasp and groan as her life was ripped from her by an act of senseless violence, while around them the brothel girls and their customers went about their business. All because Hilda hadn’t undressed fast enough. Maddie bit her lip as sobs welled as fresh today as they were back then. Hilda had deserved better. It’d been so unfair. So wrong. Long after Hilda had stopped breathing, Maddie had been trying to clean up the blood, as if cleaning up the evidence would bring her back. But there’d been no bringing her back, no forgetting the words Hilda had whispered to her. I was going to...

  It’d been a game they played. When they got enough money, they were going to buy a house. When they met a nice man, they were going to have a home and children. When they saved enough, they were going to travel the world and live high. And Hilda hadn’t gotten to do anything except spread her legs for the dirty men who paid the money.

  I was going to.

  Maddie had closed her eyes, those words hanging in her heart. It’d been in that spilt second that Tracker had come into the saloon, and in that split second she’d found the courage to jump on his offer. And now here she was, in the middle of nowhere on an adventure chasing her life and completely lost. Somehow her escape wasn’t turning out the way she wanted. But then again, it wasn’t as if she’d gotten any of it right.

  At first she’d thought Hell’s Eight would be everything she needed—a nice house, cleaning, cooking, baking but no bedding. She really didn’t like bedding and no one there expected her to. And at first living there had been nice, really nice, but somehow it hadn’t been enough. In the past couple months, she’d been consumed with the same restlessness she so often sensed in Caden. A need for...just something. She needed more than safety. She needed her own dreams. Her own life.

  Lost in her thoughts, she didn’t even see the riders coming at her around the corner until she almost ran into them. Flower tossed her head, whapping Maddie on the chin. Stars shot between her eyes. Four riders pulled up in front of her, two abreast on the trail. Flower stepped back a quick two steps. Maddie would have taken six. They were a hard-looking bunch. Their clothes were dirty from the trail, whiskers sprouted on their cheeks, and they all had guns strapped to their thighs, but they weren’t unfamiliar. She didn’t know who they were, but they didn’t look any different from any of the saddle bums who’d frequented the Red Velvet Slipper look
ing for companionship. The look they were casting over her didn’t feel any different, either. It was the type of look men gave her when they came into the saloon parlor, hot and hungry, seeing her as a body, not a person, wanting her as a vessel, not a companion. Her stomach heaved the way it always did, and her mind rebelled the way it always did, but the pretend wouldn’t come. And she was left staring at them and the reality of what was likely about to happen.

  “Well, what do we have here?” the older man on the right asked, pushing his hat back and folding his hands across the saddle horn.

  She fumbled for a smile and turned Flower. “I’ll just move over here and let you pass.”

  He laughed and nudged his horse forward, cutting her off. Worthless snarled.

  “Best you hush that dog up before I shoot it.”

  Again, Maddie wished she’d had the forethought to steal a gun she knew how to work. The two men in back pulled their guns from their holsters. The rifle in the saddle scabbard looked good, but she’d only ever fired it once. And this close it wouldn’t do much good.

  “Hush, Worth.”

  As discreetly as possible, she untied Worthless from the saddle horn.

  “Are you alone out here?” the leader asked.

  What to answer? Holding on to her smile, she managed to say, “I got a late start.”

  It sounded like a lie even to her own ears. She wasn’t surprised when the men didn’t lower their guns.

  “You saying you’re alone out here?”

  “I have Flower and Worth, and I should catch up to my friend soon.”

  The men exchanged a look between them. Clearly, she was much better at fooling herself than others, which was a sad thing.

  “Does your friend know you’re coming?”

  She smiled brightly at them. “I imagine he’s expecting me momentarily.”

  “Honey, we’ve been riding on this path for an hour and a half and haven’t seen a soul.”

  “You wouldn’t if he didn’t want you to.” That was the truth. Caden was like a wolf in the night, slipping in and out of the shadows, being seen only when he wanted to be seen but always dangerous except when he was with her. She reached up and tucked her hair behind her ear, holding on to the strength of the memory of the brush of his fingers.

  “And who is this friend you’re trying to catch up with?”

  She licked her lips. Flower, sensing her tension, shifted her feet. Seconds seemed like hours as Maddie debated her options.

  “Don’t lie, girl. Just tell the truth.”

  Habit made her answer to the snap in that voice. “Caden Miller.”

  Another look exchanged between the men. “Caden Miller of Hell’s Eight?”

  She nodded.

  “You think Caden Miller of Hell’s Eight is here?”

  She nodded again. At least they knew Caden’s name. There might be some protection in that.

  “Shit. Come here, girl. Let me have a look at you.”

  There wasn’t any choice but to go forward. She kneed Flower in a gentle urge. The little horse walked sedately forward, showing none of the trepidation that she had. Why didn’t anyone but her see the danger here?

  As if on cue, Worthless growled, low and deep in a way that said he meant business. The leader pointed his gun. She had to do something. It was easy and natural to slip back into the role of coquette. Shameful, even, the ease with which she did it. Dropping her shoulders, tilting her head to the side, leaning just that little bit forward, Maddie angled the horse between the dog and the man.

  “Here, now. He doesn’t mean any harm.”

  “He’s not going to do any, either.”

  “But you might.”

  He cocked an eyebrow at her. “How’s that?”

  “Flower here isn’t used to guns.” She flipped her braid back over her shoulder and trailed her fingers across the top of her chest. “If you just go firing shots randomly, I might end up thrown, maybe even—” she ran a hand down her thigh “—breaking a leg.”

  The transition from weary to interest was subtle, but she could see it in the set of the men’s shoulders, the tip of their chins, the relaxing of their hands on the reins.

  The man in the back with the faded brown hat spat and said, “Would be a shame to break such pretty legs, boss.”

  As she suspected, the older man was the leader. His clothes were of better quality, and his face sported less stubble, as if he took more frequent care of his appearance. With a press of her knee, she shifted Flower’s direction, putting herself closer to him. This was the man she had to influence.

  His eyes traveled from the top of her head down to her waist and then back up, stopping at her breasts. Men always liked her breasts. She hated them. Fingers clawing, pinching; mouths slobbering. But there were advantages to having big breasts.

  “You’re lying, girl.”

  Yes, she was, but not in the way he thought. He brought his horse forward. The gelding towered over her little mare. He towered over her. He rode all around, checking her gear from front to back.

  “That horse doesn’t bear the Hell’s Eight brand.”

  No, she didn’t. Because Maddie wouldn’t let her be hurt that way. Caine had fussed. Tucker had pointed out the reasons. Even Shadow had tried to tell her that it was okay, that it was necessary. Only Caden had understood. Flower was hers. She wasn’t bringing her pain.

  She smiled wider, showing her dimples. Men loved her dimples. Sure enough, the man’s eyes dropped to her mouth.

  “I rode up for the wedding celebration.”

  “Rode up, hmm? Hell’s Eight’s a day and a half away from any town.”

  She shrugged. “I didn’t ride up alone.”

  “But you’re riding out alone.”

  She shrugged. “It wasn’t what I expected.”

  “I hear they aren’t too particular about the company they keep.”

  She was used to men hating others because of the color of their skin. It was always a cause for a fight in a whorehouse. The proprietors learned quickly to separate out the Indians, otherwise they’d be replacing the furniture every day. Maddie wasn’t sure the violence really had anything to do with the color of the skin. Men just seemed to like to fight. Any excuse would do. Skin color was just the easiest one.

  She nodded. “A girl’s got to have her standards.”

  One of the other men snorted. He was wearing the same dirty, dusty brown shirt and pants as the others. The only thing that distinguished him was his blond hair. “No way in hell the men of Hell’s Eight let a pretty little thing like this slip out.”

  “I heard all of them were married up anyway.”

  “Not all of them and they’ve been hiring help.” She shuddered delicately, feeding their assumptions. “Not a lot of single women up there.”

  “You think the married ones would let a whore in their midst, boss?”

  She raised her brows at the man. “Are you calling me a liar, sir?”

  She didn’t know what she’d do if he said yes. She wasn’t used to confronting people head-on. She thought of Bella and her fire and added for good measure, “Because if you are...”

  “If I am, what?”

  So much for Bella’s inner fire. She couldn’t copy that.

  “Then I would have to tell you, you’re wrong.” She put her hand to her chest, drawing the man’s gaze back to her best assets. The feel of her cotton dress was a shock when she’d been expecting skin. It was hard to flaunt your attributes when you were covered to the chin, but Tia had insisted nice girls didn’t wear low-cut dresses. It had been useless trying to explain to Tia that she wasn’t a nice girl, and while rape was something to be avoided, it wasn’t anything she couldn’t handle. But Tia was Tia and she always got her way.

  After Maddie’d gotten used to thinking of herself as unavailable, she’d loved her dresses. The material was cool and comfortable, and while men smiled at her, none had touched her. None had tried to corner her when their wives weren’t looking. No
one treated her with anything but respect. And even better, women didn’t pull away when she came close. She’d started to form friendships. As a result, she’d begun to think of her coming to Hell’s Eight as a new beginning, a wiping clean of her past. She’d kept herself pure. Felt good about it, even. Having a choice made her feel so...strong, in a unique way she’d never had.

  But it had been just another illusion like so many others. As, predicably, the men leered at her, Caden’s face flashed in her mind. She saw his frown as she smiled back, and her heart sank. He wouldn’t want her if these men touched her. The knowledge was a stab through her heart. Around the edges of her consciousness, the opportunity to escape presented itself. Worth whined. She shook her head. She couldn’t give in. Worth was Hell’s Eight. He would die for her. She was Hell’s Eight. She couldn’t abandon him. She checked to make sure Flower was still between the man and her dog. She was. “May I ask your name, sir?”

  “Who I am’s not important. Who are you?”

  She tossed her head again, wishing her hair was free so it could flow about her shoulders. Men loved her hair almost as much as they loved her breasts. “They call me Ginger,” she said, giving them her saloon name.

  His eyes went to her hair. “Your spirit as fiery as your hair?”

  She smiled the smile she knew he expected from her, the one she’d been taught to give, the one that came too easily for the proper woman she’d been training to be.

  “So I’ve been told.”

  “Hell’s Eight owes us, boss. We lost our last woman because of them.”

  Last woman? That sounded ominous.

  “True enough.” The boss stared at her a moment. “She’s got more meat on her bones than the last one.”