Each Time We Love (36 page)

Bodene concurred, and escorting Adam through the darkened, now
deserted rooms of The Golden Lady, he said, "I agree—and hopefully it
will be soon!"

Adam laughed and was on the point of walking through the
elegant mahogany doors of the establishment when he asked casually,
"Have you heard or seen any sign of Micajah or Jeremy since you have
returned?"

Bodene shook his dark head. "No. I've ordered several people
that I trust to keep their eyes and ears open, but so far there has
been nothing. It is as if that pair of scoundrels simply vanished. What
about you and Jason?"

Adam shrugged. "It's not me that Micajah wanted in the first
place—I doubt he even knows of my existence—so there is no reason for
him to be looking for Adam St. Clair of Natchez. Now, Jason Savage is
another matter, but since we know what they are up to, Jason is
forewarned and armed and ready for any plan they may spring—if they are
foolish enough to return to Terre du Coeur or any other place that
Jason inhabits!" Adam smiled grimly. "Jason can take care of himself,
and Micajah and Jeremy no longer have the element of surprise to their
advantage."

The two men began to stroll in the general direction of Adam's
hotel. Having been mistaken once for his half brother and not wishing
to experience that dubious pleasure again since Jeremy and Micajah were
still unaccounted for, Adam was not staying, as was his usual wont when
in New Orleans, at the Savage town house! He had taken a set of rooms
in one of the very elegant hotels in the fashionable part of the city,
and as they ambled in that direction, they continued to speak of
Micajah and Jeremy. Both men were convinced that, having failed in
their attempt to extract the information they wanted from the man they
believed to be Jason Savage, and being unable to follow the twisted
trail that Adam had left, they had no doubt continued on their quest
for the gold and were probably either dead or hopelessly lost on the
endless plains of Texas.

Neither man would have been quite so casual about this subject
if he had known that, far from being in Texas, Jeremy and Micajah were
in fact nursing their frustration and disappointment in one of the
notorious saloons along Silver Street in Natchez, and that Adam St.
Clair was the very topic of conversation!

Micajah had been nearly convulsed with fury when he had
returned to camp and discovered what had happened, and for one very
long moment, in his rage and disgust at finding that Savanna was gone
along with the only person who could lead them to the gold, he had
coldly considered cutting Jeremy's throat. Only one thing had stopped
him—Jeremy at least knew the area where Davalos had died. Little time
had been wasted trying to pick up Adam's trail—they'd needed to be
refitted before attempting any sort of elaborate search. Riding hard
for Nacogdoches, they had traded in their worn and wind-broken mounts
for new horses and, resupplied, had returned to search for Adam and
Savanna, casting desperately about in ever-widening circles for some
trace. In the end they had faced defeat and the unpleasant fact that
they were lost. It had taken them several miserable weeks before they
stumbled into an area that looked vaguely familiar, and it was with
heartfelt relief that they'd eventually managed to find their way back
to Nacogdoches. Their supplies, money and horses had been exhausted by
now and they had had to remain skulking in that area for some time,
robbing and killing anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path. They
had finally slain a rich Spanish merchant who carried a tidy sum of
gold, and, mounted on the dead Spaniard's fine horses, his gold
jingling in their saddlebags, they had lit out for Natchez, arriving in
the nether regions of that lovely city two days after Adam had left for
New Orleans.

Having spent the past several months living in the utmost
squalor—even for them—they had both gotten roaring drunk and, with the
help of a pair of harlots, stayed in that condition for nearly a week.
They had only sobered up and faced reality when their money was nearly
gone.

Micajah had not given up on going after the Aztec gold—he
might have been a reluctant partner in the beginning, but some of
Jeremy's blind lust for that hidden cache of gold had infected him. He
had become convinced that he deserved the gold; that in view of the
misfortunes that had plagued him since Savanna and that damned
blue-eyed bastard had disappeared, he was
owed
that gold!

The loss of Savanna had been an infuriatingly bitter blow for
Micajah; he had lusted after her for so long, and to have had her in
his power and not to have tasted her soft, silky flesh ate at him like
a cancer. So obsessed was he by her that there were even times when
Micajah actually spared a thought about her fate—he suspected that she
was dead, that her captor had used her until satisfied and then had
slit her throat and dumped her somewhere in the vast untracked
wilderness, as he'd half planned to do. It bothered him, though, the
idea of Savanna being dead, and he had cursed himself roundly for not
having slaked himself on her body when he'd had the chance. His cold
blue eyes hard, he vowed that if Savanna was alive and if luck ever
shone on him again and brought her into his clutches, he'd not hesitate
to finally have her writhing beneath him.

But dreams of what he'd do to Savanna O'Rourke didn't help him
right now, and as he and Jeremy were hunched over a battered table at
The White Cock, nursing a glass of cheap whiskey, he muttered, "We need
money. And there's only one way that I can think of laying our hands on
it in a hurry."

Bleary-eyed, Jeremy glanced at him. Micajah smiled cruelly. "I
think," Micajah said slowly, "that it's time I seriously set about
finding Adam St. Clair and earning the other half of the money that is
owed me…"

JEREMY
CONTINUED TO STARE at Micajah, the whiskey fumes making
his already slow thought process even slower. But eventually the
meaning of Micajah's words came through, and there was a spark of
interest in his drink-dulled eyes until something unpleasant occurred
to him. Uncertainly he said, "But you were supposed to do that months
ago—will the fellow still be willing to pay?"

Micajah shrugged and took a big swallow of his whiskey. "If he
wanted St. Clair killed bad enough to hire me to do it in the first
place, I can't see that the passage of a few months will have changed
his mind."

But Micajah had made one little miscalculation—he had no idea
how to find the man who had originally contracted with him to kill St.
Clair! Rubbing his rusty-stubbled jaw, he considered his problem. When
he had been given the first installment of gold at Spanish Lick, it had
been agreed that, once the deed was done, the remainder of the money
would be hidden at Spanish Lick. How could he have been so stupid? What
if he had killed St. Clair and the rest of the money hadn't been
forthcoming? He'd have no recourse, nor any way to take revenge on the
man who had cheated him, and he wondered sourly where he had left his
wits.

Furious with himself for his lack of foresight, Micajah
scowled. He'd look up Jem Elliot and see if Jem knew more about the
fair-haired gentleman than he did. And he could find out if St. Clair
was back in residence at that fancy estate of his, Belle Vista. If
worse came to worst, he could go ahead and kill St. Clair and hope that
the gentleman would keep his end of the bargain. And if the gent
didn't… Micajah shrugged. At least he'd gotten two thousand dollars for
the job, and he'd killed for a damn sight less than that on more than
one occasion.

Finding Jem Elliot proved easy enough, and Jem did have some
interesting news to relate. Micajah and Jeremy found their cohort in a
favorite haunt of his, another shoddy tavern farther down Silver
Street. Jem was seated in a corner, hunched morosely over a glass of
whiskey, and when he looked up and caught sight of Micajah and Jeremy,
a grin crossed his face. "Well, well, if it ain't my good friend
Micajah Yates! Where in hell you been?"

"Don't matter," Micajah growled, sliding into a chair beside
him. "I want to know more about that gent you introduced me to—the one
who wanted that Adam St. Clair killed."

"Why?" Jem asked with a hard gleam in his hazel eyes. "You
disappeared with the money and left me to face a very unhappy client."

"You saw him again?" Micajah asked excitedly. "Did you get a
name?"

"No, I didn't get a name!" Jem replied sharply. "What I did
get was an angry tirade about what base-born, lying, cheating rogues we
are! The gent was so furious that you had taken his money and not
killed St. Clair that I think he seriously considered laying the whole
matter before a magistrate—
that's
how mad he was!"
Jem sent Micajah a dark look. "You didn't do my reputation any good and
you can be sure that we'll not have any other jobs to do for that
particular gent or any of his friends either!"

Micajah grunted. "Think it would turn him up sweet if I
finally completed the task? More importantly, do you think he'd pay the
rest of the money?"

Jem sat up straighter, a bright gleam of avarice in his eyes.
"Are you going to do it?"

"Might… if I thought the money would still be forthcoming."

Jem licked his lips in anticipation. "I'll see what I can find
out. You still staying at the widow's place?"

Micajah nodded. The three men talked briefly abut the latest
happenings in Natchez—Micajah and Jeremy adding little to the
conversation. They did not remain there for long, and soon they parted
from Jem and made their way to the widow Blackstone's boardinghouse.

The lack of money was a pressing issue, and early the next
morning they left the immediate area and disappeared into the vast
wilderness along the Natchez Trace. The Trace was a dangerous area,
notorious for the thieves and murderers who lurked in the heavy
underbrush and canebrakes waiting for the unwary traveler. Micajah and
Jeremy had ridden up the Trace specifically with robbery and murder on
their minds and they didn't have long to wait. Two days later, a father
and son, well-to-do merchants from Nashville, traveling homeward from
New Orleans, had the misfortune to cross their path. Since dead men
told no tales, Murdering Micajah lived up to his name and viciously
dispatched both men, hiding their bodies deep in the underbrush. The
saddlebags revealed nearly four thousand dollars in gold, and with
money in their pockets once more, Micajah and Jeremy returned to
Natchez to consider their next step.

Jeremy was all for resupplying themselves and even without a
map heading immediately into Texas, but while Micajah was eager for the
gold, too, he was also not so keen to subject himself again so soon to
the rigors of the trail—and without the information in that blue-eyed
devil's head! Micajah had brooded a lot about the escape of Jason
Savage and, bitterly aware that they had lost the element of surprise,
he doubted that they'd ever have another chance of getting their hands
on the man. And without Jason Savage, Micajah was going to have to rely
on Jeremy to lead them to where the Spaniard had died, and from there
he could only hope that they would find some clue that would lead them
to the treasure. Micajah wanted the gold, now almost as badly as
Jeremy, and though he hadn't given up on it, he wasn't looking forward
to the prospect of months on end of being led through the wilds of
Texas by Jeremy! With ample gold jingling in their pockets, Micajah saw
no reason why they couldn't travel to New Orleans and enjoy themselves
for a while before setting out for Texas. And though he would have torn
out his tongue before admitting it, Micajah wanted to talk to Bodene
Sullivan about Savanna. It would be a damn tricky conversation, but he
was confident that he could find out what he wanted to know without
revealing his part in Savanna's disappearance. And if anyone would know
about Savanna, if she was alive or dead, it would be Bodene Sullivan!