Nicademus: The Wild Ones (18 page)

Later –

“I need to bathe, get dressed,” she said as she lay on his chest.

“I accept what must be done,” he finally spoke.

She lifted her head. “I know it’s not what you want. That is why I—”

He put his finger to her lips and silenced her. Red Sun spoke with such emotion his voice was hoarse and strained. “What’s coming for you, for us, we will not run from. You are my wife, even if you never accepted the proposal. Where I go you follow, and I will do the same,” he said. He captured her face with his hand and brought her lips down to his. “We will do this together.”

She smiled and blinked away her tears. “I’m not going. I’m sending Honey in my place. Not because I don’t want to join the fight, but because I understand your point. It’s not my fight alone.”

His eyes stretched in surprise.

“The outlaw wants his turn. Everyone wants to put a bullet in Tyler Shepherd. We have to do this the right way. I think it wise to include him. Let his face be the one the others see. The less we connect this to the town the better,” she said.

Red Sun nodded. “Then we do this together.”

She smiled sadly. “And for the record, how could I have not accepted your proposal when you never asked?”

He rolled her beneath him. He touched her face and stared into her eyes. “Be my wife,” he asked.

“Forever,” she grinned.

**

“You sure you ready for the ride?” Annabelle asked. She watched him check the barrels of his guns twice. “You ain’t all the way healed you know.”

He laughed. “I think I’ve proven that I am healed,” he said, giving her a coy smile.

She laughed. He continued his inspection as if he thought the bullets had fallen out or something. She chewed on her nail. The men saddled his horse, and Red Sun’s.

“Jeremiah!” she grabbed his arm. “You sure about this? What they asking of you. You do this and there is no turning back.”

He nodded. Annabelle opened her mouth to say something when a few men whistled. Her head swung left. Honey emerged. Damn if she didn’t look like some rich woman out of the magazines. Her dress was fine. A royal purple satin fabric with black lace overlay. She wore a fancy hat and long gloves. Every man outside looked at her with adoration. Ms. Kitty was behind her like a proud parent.

“Listen up. Everybody, listen here!” Ms. Kitty said.

A hush fell over the crowd of townspeople. Everyone was out in the streets to see them off.

“I ain’t saying what we got planned won’t work,” Ms. Kitty said. “And if they don’t come back by sunrise you assume it didn’t. You get ready to defend this town. Do you hear me?”

The crowd hollered their response. Ms. Kitty smiled and hugged Honey. Annabelle had never seen Honey look so happy. It was odd for Honey, who never found happiness in many things, to be tickled pink over her mission.

Red Sun was the man to lift Honey so she could climb into her horse drawn wagon. Her driver was a cutthroat wrangler named Dixon. Honey lifted the side of her dress for the crowd and revealed her tiny silver pistol with the pearl grip in her garter. The crowd roared with laughter. Honey winked. The doctor came over to her and gave her a small black pouch. She kissed it and raised it for the town to see and then slipped it in her ladies’ bag. For the ride out to the open plains, Red Sun and Jeremiah would be at their side. Annabelle heard that once they made it to Shep’s railroad line, they’d fall back and she and Dixon would go it alone.

Annabelle turned to Jeremiah. She grabbed his collar and pulled him down to her to give him a deep messy kiss. He chuckled. She smiled. “Come back to me! Do you hear?”

“I intend to.” He tipped his hat, and then mounted his horse. He clicked his heels and started off behind Honey and Red Sun. He turned once, took off his hat, and waved at her. Annabelle waved in return. She watched them go. She refused to leave until they were gone out of sight.

“They won’t come back. Not all of them. You knows that, don’t you?” Jessiemae asked.

“Shut up,” Annabelle said. “That there is my outlaw. He knows what he’s doing.”

“Whatever you say, Annie,” Jessiemae said and walked off. Annabelle began to bite her nail again. God she prayed she was right.

**

“Boss?”

Tyler Shepherd looked up from his meal. He glared at the man now standing between him and his meal. It was Abraham, one of the few cockroaches he trusted to stand guard. No one got past Abraham. His presence now was curious. Especially since he made it clear to the men he didn’t want to be disturbed until the posse he sent for out of Tulsa arrived. “What is it?” he asked as he continued cutting his steak.

“You have a visitor. And, ah, she says you are expecting her.” Abraham’s usually stoic expression was creased around the eyes and brows with concern.

“She?” Shepherd paused. He arched his brows. He had a girl or two that he kept locked up for his amusement on his train. But rarely did he have one come calling for his attention. Especially along the isolated rail line in Oklahoma.

“A Negress. A fancy one. All dressed up. Said her name is—”

“Honey,” the woman spoke for herself. Abraham stepped aside so she could be seen fully. Her dark skin and her large almond slanted eyes under long black lashes were a complement to her full cherry red lips. He stared at her. She looked as ravishing as the girls did in the Quadroon ball when he spent time in New Orleans years ago. Though this one was far too dark for his taste.

“May I have a word, Mr. Shepherd?” she asked.

“Leave.” Shepherd said. His servant girl bowed her head, looked at Honey as if to warn her against the visit, and made a hasty departure. Shepherd wiped his mouth with his dinner napkin. He stood. Honey removed the hat from her head and placed it on the chair next to her.

“I seem to have caught you at dinner,” she smiled. She didn’t seem afraid. In fact, she stood there as if she were some long lost acquaintance stopping in to say hello. Shepherd smiled to himself. “I suppose you are surprised to see me?”

“Out here in the middle of nowhere? A fancy nigger like you coming to pay me a visit is a surprise,” he said.

She seemed flattered. “Please, I prefer you call me Honey.”

Shepherd chuckled. “Honey? Let me guess. You come from Niggademus? You here as a peace offering?”

She cocked her head to the side. There was something odd about this one. She looked the part. She even sounded sweet when she spoke. But her eyes were hard, and her stare unwavering. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but he sensed it.

“Why yes, I was sent as a gift. By someone you know,” she said.

“What the fuck are you talking about, gal?”

“Cora. You do know Cora, don’t you? We call her Ms. Kitty. But she say you know her by her true name. I work for her at the Blue Moon. Heard of it, sir?”

For the first time since the woman arrived he found no humor in the visit. In fact, he found himself unable to speak, to move. Cora was dead. That’s what his son told him the night she disappeared. The night he sent the dogs and his men after her. They said she had run into the swamp, drowned. They said the gators got her. It couldn’t be his Cora. His boy wouldn’t lie. Would he? The girl stepped closer to him. She taunted him with her smile.

“She said you would recognize this.” The woman reached up to her hair that was coiled into a fashionable style and pinned to the back of her head. She revealed the barrette he used to make Cora wear. The diamonds and pearls sparkled on the silver bracket. Shepherd accepted the barrette and inspected it.

The truth rocked him. His son had lied to him. He had conspired and sent his prize pet away. How he mourned Cora. How he punished so many after her for not being his sweet Cora, and she was here. Nearby. He glanced up. Honey stood directly before him. Dangerously close.

“Now do you believe me?” Honey asked.

He grabbed her by the throat. He squeezed until he felt the delicate bones in her neck. The woman’s eyes lowered with desire instead of fear. Oh yes, Tyler Shepherd was intrigued. “Cora was right to send you to me,” he said.

“Why is that, sir?” she asked.

“Looks like you have the same tolerance she does,” he replied.

“For pain?” Honey asked.

“For pain,” he nodded. “What does Cora want?”

She opened her eyes and looked into his. “If you let go of my throat I can tell you.”

He stared at her beauty. He let her go. He pretended at being distracted and pocketed the barrette. The woman reached to the small pouch on her hip. She opened it and removed something shiny, several nuggets of gold.

“Do these look familiar?” she asked.

He frowned. “More gifts?”

“They should be familiar to you. This is yours. In fact, this is what you came to Nicademus for. Before that messy ordeal distracted you down at Annabelle’s.”

Shepherd’s gaze shifted to hers. Honey dropped the golden nuggets back in her pouch. She walked through his train car touching a few things. She then stopped and smiled. “I like this place. Very cozy.”

“How’d you get the gold?” Shepherd asked.

“I lifted it off your outlaw when he paid us a visit. Just a nugget or two. I planned to keep it until I overheard the 9
th
Calvary. They come through and tell the tale of the outlaw on the run. Gave us a wanted poster. I found out where it was stolen from,” she said. “I told Ms. Kitty, ah, Cora. I told her the strange story that the outlaw shared with me. Of his family being dead because of a man named Tyler Shepherd. How he try to kill the man but couldn’t. So he took back his daddy’s gold.”

“Is that so?” he asked.

“Yes sir. Ms. Kitty say the gold is cursed. And he done brought us bad luck. She then get so worried when she found out what happened to Annabelle. So she send me to talk to you for her.”
             

Shepherd dropped his head and let out a deep chuckle. When the laughter died in his throat his gaze lifted under his creased brow and leveled on her. “Bullshit!” he said.

**

The Indian was right. There were only eight men gathered. One paced before the train car door and was tall as a giant. He must be new to Shepherd’s crew because Jeremiah didn’t recognize him. Several others sat or lay by a tall fire. The workers must be at a camp further up the railroad. He passed the binoculars to the Indian.

It was hard to see much at night, but thanks to the campfire they saw enough. They had to wait several minutes before luck swung their way. A man stood and walked off. He had his rifle strapped on his left shoulder. And it was clear he had a purpose in mind.

Jeremiah clucked his tongue. The Indian nodded and slipped back into the night. The man who looked to be the same height and age as him stood crouched in the bushes. At first Jeremiah would have passed him. But the small grunts of him releasing his bowels and the stench revealed his location. He charged right in.

Startled, the man dropped in his pile of shit with his pants at his knees. Jeremiah grabbed him up by the collar, causing the hat to fall off of the man’s head. The man got a good look at Jeremiah. He slammed his head into the tree. The man gasped and clawed at him, but the element of surprise was too great.

“You can thank Tyler Shepherd for this!” Jeremiah said and pounded his fist into the man’s face until it was covered with blood.

**

Honey didn’t like anything about the man, and his laughter only fueled her hate. The small pistol strapped to her thigh burned against her skin to be released. She wanted to use it. She should use it. Put a bullet in this cockroach and end it for them all. She hoped she could keep her emotions under control and hide her disgust from her smiles. She had to fiddle with removing her gloves to keep the tremors from her hands. But she would see this through.

To the very end.

Just as Ms. Kitty instructed her to.

Tyler Shepherd toyed with her. Pretended to be interested in her news. And it might partly be due to the shock of learning that Ms. Kitty was alive. The other reason for his calm manner she didn’t know, and that made him dangerous.

“You understand what Nicademus is? What we’ve built there?” Honey asked.

His gaze flashed up and burned hot with contempt. “A town of niggers pretending to be civilized? Is that what you mean? What you built is bullshit. What you come here with is more bullshit!”

“We have our town, our own lives. Freedom. Trust me, sir, freedom is never bullshit,” she replied. “It’s as sweet and homey as apple pie.”

“Not one of you ever earned freedom. You got it by default after the war. As I see it, you all still belong to someone. And your Ms. Kitty still belongs to me,” he said and rubbed his crotch.

Honey ignored the crude gesture. “That may be. But what I’m telling you is the truth. The outlaw did come to town. That is his gold I showed you. And I can explain why he come.”

“Can you?” Shepherd crossed his arm. “Go on, this fable is getting more entertaining by the minute.”

“A posse,” she said. The smug smirk on his face faded. “He came to recruit anyone outside of the law to help him. Told them that there was more gold where that there come from. They intend to attack you, and soon from what we gather—”