Silken Thunder

by Fayrene Preston

  Now she realized that toward morning she must have fallen into a deep sleep But it didn't matter how badly she had needed the sleep, she thought, she shouldn’t have allowed her exhaustion to catch up with her.

  From across the meadow she heard her horse nicker.

  A bird called out and took flight.

  A stone rattled. All her senses became alert.

  With great care not to move, Brianne opened her eyes to a narrow slit. A man with a drawn gun was creeping up the path that led to the cave. He was perhaps thirty feet away, and he hadn’t yet noticed that she was awake.

  Peering through her lashes, her gaze flew to her gun belt, lying about four feet away. There was no way she could reach it. And there was no way she could wake up Sloan without warning the man who was advancing toward them with such menace.

  In the next moment she reacted. She rolled over, grabbed up the gun, and fired — all in one smooth motion. The man cried out and went down.

  “What the hell!” Sloan awoke and tried to sit up.

  Simultaneously a barrage of rifle- and gunfire began to rain around them.

  They were trapped.

  She lunged for her rifle, then motioned to Sloan. Keeping their bodies as flat as possible, they slithered on their stomachs toward the pile of boulders that not only blocked the trail to their right but also part of the cave.

  Sloan’s mouth was drawn tight as he strained to propel his body along the ground. Sweat beaded his face. Each foot of ground he covered cost him dearly in pain.

  Brianne longed to help him, but she had the responsibility of the guns. She had to be content with staying beside him and sending him anxious glances as they made their torturous way to the boulders. His face was absolutely colorless, and pain had drawn his face into a mask she had come to know well over the last few days.

  Finally they gained the cover of the boulders. Sloan’s chest lifted and fell as he struggled to drag air into his overexerted lungs. For a split second his eyes met Brianne’s. Seeing her fear, he silently cursed himself. She had risked her life to save him, and now, because of him, she was in even greater danger. And he couldn't even offer her reassurance, because they both knew there was no way out.

  A bullet knicked the corner of the rock. Another hit the back of the cave.

  For the moment, anyway, his strength was depleted, and he couldn’t help her. He felt so goddamned useless. He stretched his legs out, using the rock to hold up his shoulders and head. As she checked the load in her gun, he asked, “Can you tell how many of them there are?”

  She shook her head. “All I saw was the one coming up the path.” She glanced across Sloan, toward the ledge where the man was lying motionless in a pool of blood. “He’s dead.” She felt faintly sick. “I’ve never killed anyone before.”

  Briefly he touched her arm. “You did what you had to do. And you saved our lives.”

  But how long will we be able to stay alive? She saved her breath and didn’t ask the question. Bullets were flying fast and furious, and it was hard for them to hear what the other was saying.

  “I’ve got to go back and get your guns, plus the rest of our ammunition.”

  “Are you crazy?” he demanded. “Stay put, for heaven’s sake.” But she was already crawling across the floor of the cave. He was too spent either to make a grab for her or to lay down a covering fire. God, he hated being this weak and helpless, completely powerless to give her any aid.

  Brianne hooked the saddlebag with their ammunition supply over one arm, then grabbed Sloan’s rifle and pistol. As she crawled back to the cover of the boulders, her gaze searched the meadow intently. By judging where the shots were coming from, she made the calculation that there were five men. With their limited ammunition, she was going to have to make every shot count.

  She sat back down beside Sloan and forced a smile. “It’s five against two. Hardly seems fair to them, does it? After all, one of us is a Delaney.”

  Sloan stared at her in angry amazement. They were outnumbered, with their backs to the wall, and she was making a joke. Then he saw the fear in her eyes, and he felt a rush of pity mixed with admiration. Almost like a child caught in a frightening nightmare, she was braving it out.

  The cave was being eaten up by bullets. The men below were laying down a hail of them, and for the last ten minutes Brianne had been kept busy returning fire. Occasionally Sloan managed to gather his strength, raise up, and get off a shot. It was enough to remind the men who were doing their best to kill them that there were two of them up there.

  Brianne paused to wipe a film of sweat from her brow. Was it her imagination, or was the sun hotter today than it had been yesterday? She reached for one of the canteens, unscrewed the lid, and took a sip. A shot kicked up dirt and rock not two feet away from her. She tapped Sloan on the shoulder and offered him the canteen.

  “How much do we have left?” he asked, shouting over the gunfire.

  “This one and one other that’s about half full.”

  His mouth tightened at her answer, but he took a short swig of the water. It was the hottest part of the day, and it wouldn’t do to get dehydrated. He watched Brianne squeeze off a careful shot with her rifle. “For God’s sake, don’t give them too much of a target.”

  She nodded and took aim again.

  He narrowed his eyes against the blazing sun. Damn Wes McCord’s black soul! Because of Wes, for the second time in his life he was broiling under a hot sun in a situation that looked like it would end in his death. The first time David had died. This time it could be him … and Brianne. Dear God …

  The firing was getting heavier now, as heavy as it had been when they’d first been attacked. What was going on, he wondered. Suddenly out of the corner of his eye he caught a movement. A man was crawling over the boulders that blocked the right-hand path up to the cave. Brianne’s back was to the man as she knelt and fired down into the meadow.

  Sloan swung up his pistol and fired, killing the man with a bullet between his eyes.

  Brianne instantly whirled around and saw what had happened. She lunged for the man's gun, but the man slid down the opposite side of the boulders, and she couldn’t reach the rifle without exposing herself to the gunfire from below.

  Brianne sank down beside Sloan, badly shaken. “That was too close.”

  He nodded in agreement. “They’ve been covering him for the last ten minutes, keeping us occupied while he crawled up here. We’ve got to be more careful.”

  Fear was so thick in her veins it felt as if her blood had stopped flowing, but she couldn’t stand to see the same emotion in Sloan. “There’s only four of them left now.”

  Only four. Brianne closed her eyes for an instant but then quickly opened them. She couldn’t afford to be this frightened. Yet how could she help it?

  All her life she’d thought she was brave, but she knew now that what she had believed to be courage had been mere bravado. She'd never really faced a true test until now.

  “Dear God, I don’t want to die,” she whispered almost to herself. “I never knew I was such a coward.”

  Sloan threw her a quick look. “You're no coward, Brianne.”

  Her hands tightened on her rifle. “I didn’t think I was, but now I’m not sure. There are so many things I want to do. So many places I want to see.”

  A wrenching pain tore through Sloan. She said she was afraid, but she didn’t realize that the mere facing of that fear showed an amazing courage. “Brianne, you’re not — ”

  “No,” she interrupted. “I’m sorry … I’m being stupid.” Just for a moment the dreams she had had for her life passed before her eyes. She’d believed that adventure, love, marriage, even children were hers for the asking. It hadn’t been a question of if these things would come to her, but when. Now all that possibility that could have been her life was about to be snuffed out by the men down there in that meadow.

  She drew a deep breath and smiled determinedly. “But you can damn well believe when we
get out of this, I’m never going to take anything for granted again.”

  Then, choking on the sickness of her fear, she raised up on her knee and fired off a shot.

  “I’m hit,” Red yelled, grabbing his right arm, then screaming in pain.

  Dan Cummings crawled over to him to look at the wound and saw immediately that the bone had been shattered. The two people up on that ledge were demoralizingly and dangerously accurate. If a man was foolish enough to give them a target, they’d hit it. “You’re out of the action,” he told Red with disgust. “Bandage yourself up and stay low.”

  “The hell you say. I need a doctor.”

  “We'll get you to a doctor when we get them.” Dan jerked his head toward the cave.

  “That could be days, and I'm not waitin'. By then the lead in that slug could kill me. I’ve seen what gangrene can do to a body, and I’m not about to go that way. I’m headin' back to town.” There was a pile of boulders as big as a Conestoga wagon where their horses were tied. Red struggled to his feet and made a quick dash toward them.

  Dan waited until he reached the cover of the boulders. A slow smile curved his lips. “Red?” he called softly.

  The man turned toward him.

  “No one leaves.”

  Dan’s bullet hit Red squarely in the center of his heart.

  Without a backward look Dan made his way over to Collins and Becker, knowing that they’d both witnessed what had happened.

  Collins wasn't shocked. He'd lived all his thirty years in the West, and he’d learned early that man was the most merciless animal of all. But that could have been him instead of Red. He scratched at the dark stubble on his chin. “There was no call to do that.”

  Dan leveled eyes like flint on him. “We can’t afford to have anyone know what’s goin’on out here.”

  “I don’t like the situation,” Becker said. “Thomp- son was kilt this mornin'. Wills took it between the eyes a few hours back. Now, with Red dead, there’s only the three of us. Them people up there are too damned good.”

  Dan's lips thinned. “They may have the high ground, but we’ve got the advantage. We can’t take any more chances, that’s all. There’s no way they can get off that ledge, and sooner or later they'll run out of ammunition. All we got to do is wait them out.”

  Becker nodded. “Just shoot enough to keep them pinned down?”

  “Right. And force their fire if you can. We’ll take turns keepin’ watch. They’ll get tired before we will.” “Ya think they’ll decide to give up?”

  “Maybe.” Dan smiled with the same pleasure he’d displayed when his bullet had torn into Red. “But it won’t matter either way.”

  Patrick made a wide circle around the tent city for the second time, then headed west. A trail this old was hard to pick up, especially one of Brianne’s, but the six men following her hadn't tried to hide their tracks. He wasn’t interested in them, though, only his sister.

  She was his twin. She was the other half of him. She had always been there for him when he’d needed her, giving him comfort in times of sorrow and laughing with him in times of joy.

  He knew her almost as well as he knew himself. They’d been constant companions as children, playing and learning together. And one of their favorite games had been Hide and Track, where she would hide and he would track until he found her, then vice versa.

  She was in terrible danger. He sensed it, felt it. Just like the time he’d known she was in trouble and he had found her trying to help a wounded wolf. The wolf would have turned on her at any moment, but Patrick’s arrival had undoubtedly brought the attack on sooner.

  He'd been able to help her then. He prayed he could help her now. If there was one person in the world who could find her, it was he. He just hoped he would be in time.

  For two hours Patrick headed west, choosing the path he thought she’d take rather than relying on what damnably few signs she’d made. Only occasionally would he run across a succession of broken twigs, half-formed hoof marks, or bits of fabric that would tell him he was still moving in the right direction.

  Gazing up at the sky, he saw that clouds were fast coming in from the west. Tonight was going to be overcast, and that meant he’d have to stop earlier than he wanted to. He pulled Stormy to a stop. Turning around in his saddle, he scanned the horizon to the east. Something was bothering him. Something wasn’t right.

  Flame stabbed the night as a shot rang out.

  A second shot rang out. The bullet hit the boulder beside Sloan, sending pieces of rock spraying into the air.

  Brianne returned the fire, then sank out of the way.

  “They’re playing it smart now,” Sloan said, “shooting only enough to make sure we stay put.”

  “There’s no place we could go anyway.”

  Tonight there were clouds across the moon, and Brianne was sitting in one of the darker shadows, her back to the rocks. He couldn’t see her very clearly, but he heard the fatigue in her voice. It sent him into action. Rolling clear of the boulder, he took aim at the spot where he’d seen the last burst of flame come from, and fired. By the time he regained cover, he was bitterly regretting the precipitous move. It’d taken too much out of him.

  “This is so damned futile.” Pain added a harsh bite to his words. “There’s no way we can know if we hit anything unless they yell.”

  “On the other hand, they can’t know if they hit us either.”

  He turned his head toward her. “I suppose you’re right.”

  Every muscle in Brianne’s body was trembling with weariness and stress. It seemed as though their death was certain — either by a bullet or by starvation and dehydration. But as frightened as she was, the very idea of surrender frightened her even more.

  “How’s our ammunition supply?” Sloan asked.

  “Not good.”

  She once again went over their options and admitted to herself they had practically none. “There’s always our friend down there on the path. The man I shot this morning. It's dark. I could crawl down there and get his gun and ammunition.”

  “Don’t be a damned fool!”

  She looked at him in surprise.

  “I didn’t mean that.” He said wearily. “I just feel so … You can’t go down there. It’d be too risky.”

  “Sloan, our situation couldn’t get any worse than it is right now.”

  “That ammunition wouldn’t do us that much good anyway.”

  “It would help keep us alive a little longer. If there were just some way we could hold out until my uncles and the riders from Killara reach us.”

  “What makes you think they’ll be able to find us if they even come? Never mind. We won’t even have one more day unless we can think of something.”

  A bullet hit close on their left, kicking up dirt on the ledge. Sloan felt Brianne flinch, and cursed. The men down below were firing at randomly picked spots so that he and Brianne couldn’t guess where the next shot might hit. In that way Cummings and his men were effectively keeping them pinned down, telling them without words that to move from behind the boulders would be suicide.

  A shot ricocheted off the front of the rocks that were shielding them. Brianne raised up and fired, letting the men down below at least hear the sound of her Model 1873 Winchester .44/40, so that they’d know their quarry was very much alive. Cummings had built a campfire behind an outcropping of rocks, and although Brianne could see only its glow, she used it as a target. “Damn them. They’re probably drinking hot coffee and having a plate of beans.” Brianne slid to the ground and ran her fingers through her hair. “What are we going to do? Any ideas?” Sloan tried to shrug and then winced as pain ran through him. “How the hell do I know? I can’t — ” His words came to an abrupt halt as he suddenly realized what they were going to have to do.

  The sun had just eased over the top of the butte when Collins moved over to crouch behind the cover of the rocks and talk to his boss. “They haven’t been returning our fire for a while. Think we mi
ght’ve got them in the night?”

  Dan Cummings took a swig of coffee from his mug. “I suppose. We've been shootin’ up there pretty regular.”

  “There’s no way they could be asleep,” Becker put in. “Not with our guns goin’ off every few minutes.” He grimaced in disgust. “I haven’t even been able to catch a catnap.”

  “We’re all beat,” Dan snapped, directing his gaze toward the cave. He couldn’t see any movement at all. “Pour some fire in there, Becker. Let’s see if we can’t stir somethin’ up.”

  Becker did as he was told, and for a few minutes it sounded as if the box canyon were exploding.

  Silence.

  Dan turned his head and spat to the side of him. “Damn … ” He pondered the matter, then rounded on Becker and Collins. “I want you two to make your way up there and see what’s what.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “Are you forgettin’ Wills and Thompson? They died doin’ exactly that.”

  Dan’s gun was suddenly leveled at them. “Have you forgotten how Red died?”

  Becker and Collins looked at each other. If they climbed up to the cave, they might have a chance to live. Down here there would be no chance. They were going to do it, and they knew it.

  Keeping low to the ground, they made use of anything they could for cover — arroyos, boulders, brush — until they reached the ledge that led up to the cave. Cautiously they followed the narrow path upward until they reached the place where the body of Thompson lay, eyes staring sightlessly at the sky. This was not the time for sympathy even if they were so inclined. Stepping over him, they peered into the cave. A bed of sorts had been made near the back wall. Two people were lying in it.

  Both men opened fire, emptying their guns into the still figures beneath the blanket.

  They’d gotten them!

  Down below, Dan grinned in triumph. The ledger was sure to be in one of their saddlebags. Wes McCord was going to feel as if he’d lassoed the moon. Well, let the son of a bitch be happy for the time being, he thought, his grin of triumph turning to one of malice. McCord was going to be in for a little surprise.