Killer's Draw: The Circuit Rider (15 page)

He had been a soldier, a spy behind enemy lines in the Civil War, and
then a private investigator. But now, Mike Tower was forced to admit that those
professions seemed utterly tame compared to his time as a traveling preacher.

The lump on the side of his head would most likely agree.

He felt disoriented, as if he couldn’t get his balance, and then realized
that he was no longer on the ground, but riding in a wagon.

His hands and feet were tied, and he was blindfolded. He heard the
horses, felt the bounce of the wagon wheels, and reached his right foot out
until he hit the side of the wagon to brace himself against the jostling. Free
from the constant movement, he was able to get his bearings back.

On some level, he had suspected the barn was a trap, but there had been
little choice. He could have gone for help and looked for Bird, all while the
two men held Evelyn Egans inside the barn. If it was a trap, they would have
been doing nothing to her. On the other hand, if it wasn’t a trap and if he
hadn’t rushed in, they would have had all the time in the world to do whatever
they wanted with her.

It was foolish, but it had been the right thing to do.

Now, he had to deal with the consequences.

He stayed with his leg pressed against the side of the wagon until it
began to cramp, and just when he was about to shift position, the wagon
stopped.

Someone threw the wagon’s tailgate down and Tower felt a hand grab his
ankles. He was pulled from the wagon, dumped onto the ground, and then hoisted
to his feet. Someone pushed him forward and he stumbled on the uneven ground. A
heavy door opened and Tower smelled the dank interior of another barn.

The blindfold was torn from his head, and he was knocked to the ground.

He looked up at several men surrounding him, all wearing flour sacks like
the two men who’d held Evelyn Egans captive. They were all armed, their guns at
the ready. Common sense told Tower not to try to make an escape attempt. He
wouldn’t make it out the door.

The nearest hooded man held out a pair of shackles. Tower allowed himself
to be restrained. Another man chained the handcuffs with a lock to an iron peg
in the barn wall.

“Make yourself comfortable, it’s going to be a while,” one of the men
said. Some of the other men laughed as they left the barn.

The group parted and two more men, also wearing flour sacks, brought in the
Egans woman. They put her in shackles and chained her to the same.

Then the men left.

Evelyn Egans began to sob. Her shoulders heaved with each guttural moan
and Tower knew the woman was terrified.

He tested the strength of the shackles and that of the iron peg. There
was no way he could break them, they were solid and well built.

Evelyn Egans’ sobs gradually subsided to soft whimpers. Outside, Tower
thought he heard the wagon being moved, maybe heading back to town. He assumed
they had left Big River, but he couldn’t be sure. He had no idea how long he’d
been in back of the wagon.

Finally, he turned to Mrs. Egans.

She looked up at him, her face a mixture of grief and shock.

“Why don’t you tell me the truth?” Tower asked.

Bird hit the trail and the bottle simultaneously. She hated
being surprised, and although her first instinct was to shoot her way to a
resolution, this time she decided to think things through.

There was little doubt she would be followed, so she took
her time once she was past the outskirts of Big River. It was a dark night, a
thick layer of clouds obscured any light from the moon and stars. Bird didn’t
mind. The Appaloosa was a gifted horse in the dark, able to discern trails on
her own, and the ability to alert Bird at any signs of danger.

Which meant Bird was free to drink.

The bottle she’d started drinking from when she left the
saloon was nearly empty. She drained the rest of it, threw the bottle into the
air, waited for a hint of reflection from what little light existed, drew her
gun, and fired. The bottle exploded in a shower of glass, the pieces landing
silently in the dirt and grass.

Bird broke out a new bottle, a thick square vessel filled
with bourbon. She had bought it at the Big River General Store when they’d
first come to town, but she knew it was the cheap stuff so she’d avoided it. Now,
it would have to do.

She drank. The bourbon was raw and unrefined, burning her
throat as it went down. Instead of the usual warmth she felt at the start of a
good drunk, this time, the heat was fiery and jagged.

Bird shifted in the saddle as a pain in her lower stomach
blossomed with a bubbling intensity. She took another drink, but the pain only
intensified.

Damn Mike Tower
, she thought.

He’d gone and gotten himself kidnapped while she was putting
Martin Branson out of his misery. Where had they gotten him? At the hotel? No,
the front-desk clerk said Tower had left on his own accord earlier in the day.

Now what the hell was she going to do?

At the base of a narrow plateau, Bird halted the Appaloosa
and looked back at her trail. She heard nothing, but thought she caught a glint
of dull light on something metallic a long way behind her. It was too far for
someone to shoot her with a rifle so she paid it no mind. Her horse’s ears were
pointed forward, eager to get moving and perform her duties as a trail boss. Hell,
if her horse wasn’t worried about what was behind them, she wouldn’t worry
either.

Bird drank more of the rotgut bourbon and urged the
Appaloosa forward. They steadily climbed the plateau to the top, and started
their descent.

This side of the wide ridge was much steeper than the one
they’d just traversed. Bird’s horse slowed, then jumped quickly to avoid rocks
that tumbled past them, stirred by their passing.

At the bottom of the hill was a dry gully full of rocks. Bird
felt her horse gather itself, and then it leapt over the opening. She braced
herself, wincing as the impact came. The force of their landing seemed to drive
the pain in Bird’s belly deeper into her insides.

The pain exploded inside of her.

Bird held on to the saddle as the horse swung into an easy
canter, as eager to get away from the plateau as she was.

Ahead of them was a broad, flat plain she recognized. They
were only a quarter-mile or so from Killer’s Draw.

Bird thought maybe she would stop and drink from the creek. Her
throat was aching and the fire raced up her belly. Suddenly, she began to cough.
Blood spurted from her mouth. The coughing continued, and she felt herself
choking either on the blood or from the lack of air. Pain wrapped around her
face and the world began to turn blurry and white. Bird had the sense she was
floating and then her face hit something very, very hard.

White was replaced with black.

“I’m an actress,” Mrs. Egans said. “That man who accosted us
in the street was right. My real name is Rose Sutton.”

Tower shook his head. He should have known.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think anyone was going to get hurt. I’m
just a damned actress for Christ’s sake, and not a very good one.” 

It appeared to dawn on her that she was talking to a
preacher.

“I’m sorry,” she said again.

Tower had many questions but he forced himself to relax,
keep his voice even.

“It’s alright,” he said. “I understand. Everything is going
to be fine. Just let me ask you a few questions. First, who hired you?”

Rose shook her head. Her voice cracked and she started to
cry. “I don’t know.”

Tower understood the helplessness the woman was feeling so
he softened his voice. “Explain that to me,” he said, trying to sound as
reassuring as possible.

“I was hired through my manager back East. He wired me the
instructions, told me someone would pay two hundred dollars, minus my manager’s
commission, of course, to act like this dead preacher’s mother. So, that’s what
I did. They gave me a little background—enough that I could pull the part off,
I guess.”

“Did your manager know who was going to pay him? Did they
say why they wanted you to do this?”

The woman shook her head. “I don’t think so. He’s too busy
for that kind of thing. They probably sent in the request and he figured I was
the best choice for the part so he gave it to me. I probably only got it
because I’m one of the few actresses old enough to play the part of a mother.”

“How long were you supposed to stay? And what were your
instructions for afterward?”

“The job was for just a few days,” Rose Sutton said. “I was
supposed to make sure I was seen around town, gather whatever of the young
man’s belongings was still there, and then leave. Once I got home, which is
Baltimore, I was supposed to let my manager know the acting job had been
successful, and then I would be paid.”

“Why were you in the land office?” Tower asked.

“That was part of the job, too,” she said. “Apparently, this
young man had been doing some research on land ownership and—”

The door to the barn swung open and a group of men entered. They
all wore hoods with holes cut out for the eyes. Two of them went to Rose, undid
her chains, and led her from the barn. She struggled against them and then
looked back at Tower.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

Tower just nodded at her. He prayed they wouldn’t hurt her
and hoped they understood she was just a pawn.

The rest of the men formed a circle around Tower. They undid
his chains and then stepped back, and parted at the center.

A man stepped forward.

He was the only one not wearing a hood.

At first, Tower thought it was the man Bird had called Mr.
Seven. He was a giant. Not fat like Joseph Parker, just tall and wide, but lean.
Tower looked at his face. No, it wasn’t Mr. Seven, but the man had to be
related.

He looked at Tower, then carefully took off his shirt, folded
it neatly, and handed it to the nearest man.

The group of men widened as the man closed in on Tower.

He realized what was about to happen. He was going to have
to fight this giant. Tower also understood the significance of the hoods. All
of the men in the group still wore theirs, which meant they thought Tower would
get out of this alive.

But the man bearing down on him wore no disguise.

Which meant he had no intention of letting Tower live.

Tower shook his hands free.

“This is for my brother,” the man said.

The biggest fist Tower had ever seen came at him. He ducked it
and drove a short left hook into the man’s midsection.

It was like hitting the side of a horse.

The man’s stride hitched and Tower stepped back, lashed out
with a straight left that pulverized the man’s nose.

The big man swung and Tower ducked it, but the next one, he
never saw coming.

The face was ghostly white. That made sense to Bird, because
it had to be a ghost.

Cold rocks jabbed into her back, and Bird shivered. Everything
felt uneven to her, the ground, the sky, her mind. Various parts of her body
felt numb and she wanted to stand up but spent a long moment trying to figure
out which way that would be.

The face had been there, but now it was gone. In an instant.
What had it looked like? Bird couldn’t remember. It might have been an angel, but
she didn’t believe in them.

By instinct, Bird called out to her horse, and heard her
answer from not too far away.

That was good, Bird thought. Death loves a person without a
horse.

Pain twisted her insides and she cried out. Darkness
answered and when the light returned, Bird was no longer on the rocks. She was
on something soft. And there was a blanket over her.

A face appeared, but this time it was one she recognized.

It was her horse.

The Appaloosa’s eye glinted in the darkness and she seemed
to be willing Bird to do something.

Bird sat up, this time knowing where up was.

She looked around.

There was no one.

Had she actually seen the face? It had been a woman’s face.

Something odd struck her about the memory.

Why had the face looked so familiar?

EPISODE FIVE

Goddamn and what the hell?

Bird leaned over the pommel as her horse carried her forward. What was going on with her? For most of her life, she had always felt in control, even when an outside observer might say otherwise.

But not now.

Physically, things were unbalanced, spinning around, and her mind was following.

She leaned to the side and spit out a bloody glob. She was cold, her stomach ached, and her head hurt.

But most of all, she worried about what she may or may not have seen during the night. The face haunted her. It was ghostly, a blur of white, like a puff of smoke being carried by the wind. It had been there but was gone in an instant, barely long enough for her to register that it looked like a face.

Was she hallucinating? It wouldn’t be the first time, she thought. There’d been plenty of long, drunken nights when she wasn’t sure if something had actually happened or if she’d imagined it. Had the rotten whiskey and the fall from her horse caused her to have a vision? But she hadn’t imagined being covered with a blanket. Had she done that herself? Or had the ghost done so? And was that related to the strange voice and the sight of a child she’d seen before at Killer’s Draw?

Bird leaned back, winced in pain, and dug through her saddlebag.

Damn. She was out of whiskey.

She ground her teeth together, straightened in the saddle, and brought the Appaloosa to a stop.

What town had Conway said? Mumford? She knew it was northeast of Big River and a long, long ride. In her condition, it would take even longer. With the way she felt right now, the idea of riding over the mountains filled her with dread. She’d never make it.

There had to be a better way.

She went over a few possible scenarios, forcing her mind to work and stop thinking about how much she needed a drink.

Bird turned the Appaloosa around and headed back toward Big River. She rode for several miles before they came across a stream with pure, cold mountain water. She let her horse drink first, then knelt and drank deeply. The cold water soothed her throat so she drank more. She sat back, feeling the soothing liquid wind its way through her body.

She leaned down to the stream and drank again, then splashed some of the water on her face. It was ice cold and it revived her. Her entire body was cold, but in a good way. For some reason, the cold reenergized her and she suddenly felt like she had her bearings back.

Bird got to her feet, mounted her horse, and pushed across the stream, thinking through her options as she rode.

There was no doubt someone had followed her out of town and was now waiting for word from the telegraph operator that she had arrived in Mumford.

Anger flamed within her. Many things could set off her temper, but few could ignite this kind of slow fury—the kind that usually resulted in violence. But one of them never failed to put a razor edge on her anger.

And that was the idea of someone trying to control her.

To manipulate her.

To force her to do anything at all.

She had a simple solution for those people.

Make them pay.