Savage Thunder (4 page)

Surprisingly, the implications of that reasoning didn’t cause fear so much as anger. Blast the man! She had only been worrying that he might locate the ship in California before they got there. Now it was conceivable that he might know where they were at this very moment, or at least where they were heading. The only thing in their favor was that he didn’t have a ship at his command to make following them easy.

“Well, that just settled the matter of where we’re going,” Jocelyn said in a tight voice. “It won’t be to California.”

Vanessa raised a brow. “I was only speculating, my dear.”

“I know. But if it’s true, it would certainly explain why he’s constantly been able to find us, even when we’ve left the ship to travel overland, and that just to throw him off the scent. I swear, Vanessa, I’ve really just about reached my limit. It was bad enough when Longnose was just trying to kidnap me, to return me to England. But since I’ve turned twenty-one, he has twice tried to kill me. Perhaps it’s time I accepted the challenge.”

“I hesitate to ask what you mean by that.”

“I don’t know what I mean, but I’ll think of something,” Jocelyn assured her.

“I
don’ like the idear of killin’ no woman, Dewane.”

“Wha’d’ya care? It ain’t as if’n ya’d ever get a chance at ’er yerself, Clydell. An’ she’s a fur’ner, jes’ like hisself thar. Look at ’im, calm an’ patient as ya please. He don’ dress like us, don’ act like us, don’ talk like us. An’ he claims she’s English too. So wha’d’ya care?”

Clydell did spare a glance for the foreigner. Tall, slim, dressed in those fancy Eastern duds—or were they fancy English duds?—and a good ten years older than any one of them. The man was so out of place he stood out like a nose wart. And clean, even after sleeping out with the rest of them on the bluff last night. How did he stay so clean?

“Still…” Clydell started again, only to glance back and catch his brother’s narrowed gaze.

“Look, he got us outta Mexico, did’n he, when we thought fer sure we’d never scrape up enuf ta get back over the border? I don’ mind tellin’ ya I’m right glad ta be back whar a man can spit an’ piss without givin’ offense. We owe him, Clydell, ain’t no two ways ’round it. An’ ya don’ see none o’ these other boys gripin’, do ya? It’s jes’ a job, fer Gawd’s sake!”

When Dewane took that tone, his younger brother
knew it was time to shut up. Dewane could be pressed only so far to explain why they were doing something. Robbing stages hadn’t been so bad; neither had rustling a little cattle. And of course raising hell and picking a fight or two was normal whenever they hit a town. Clydell might have complained some about that bank job, but he’d done it anyway. That job had brought a posse after them that wouldn’t let up.

They’d been chased into Mexico, where they were safe at last, or thought so, until a lousy band of hill bandits had left them with barely their lives and not a cent to their names. The Englishman had been a godsend, coming along when they were at the bottom of the barrel, so to speak, working just for bread and board in a dirty little cantina where they didn’t even understand the lingo. The months had passed by, and Clydell had come to think he’d be dying down there.

He really shouldn’t complain or think twice about it. Dewane was right as usual. Those four boys they picked up in Bisbee, two of them ex-rustling partners they’d known in New Mexico, hadn’t even blinked when told what needed doing. Clydell was the only one who felt it just wasn’t right, killing a woman. And the way it had been decided she’d be killed, that kind of made him sick to his stomach. Of course, it might not work out that way, and thank God he wasn’t one of the two assigned to go after her if the boulder didn’t manage to smash her to bits. A piece of lead was a much cleaner way to go if someone had to go. But he was one of the four who would be shoving that boulder over the bluff, which was why he groaned inwardly when the Mexican, who had been stationed
farther back in the hills to watch for the victim’s arrival, showed up to say it wouldn’t be long now.

Elliot Steele opened his pocket watch to check the time. It was nearly noon. The duchess was late—as usual. But then she always managed to do something to disturb his well-laid plans. Why he should think this time would be any different, he didn’t know. But the hour, fortunately, was of no importance. There was only one trail and she was on it. There was no place else she could go except forward, directly into his trap.

How many times had he said that before, and yet she was still going about her merry way. The girl had the luck of the Gods. How else could she have escaped his traps time and again?

Elliot was good at his line of work, or had thought he was, until the Duke of Eaton had hired him. He had made a small fortune over the years working for the gentry in whatever capacity was necessary, no matter how unsavory, so he
had
been good at what he did. And what Maurice Fleming wanted done had been so simple. Just find the girl and return her to England, where he would then have complete control over her and her money, which was all Fleming had wanted.

Elliot had contacts in other countries, men in the same line of work. And he knew how to go about hiring the kind of men who came cheap and didn’t ask questions about what they were told to do. The job should have taken no more than a few months, just long enough to find out where the
Jocel
came to port. And yet for nearly two years, the length of time
the duke continued to pay all of Elliot’s expenses, his men had only once gotten their hands on her.

It was preposterous, because she was so easy to locate wherever she went—if not her ship, then her large entourage of coaches and wagons and mounted guards. It was not a caravan that could pass unnoticed, and she never tried to conceal it or change it or leave it behind. Her coach alone was the finest made, large, bright teal blue, and pulled by six high-stepping mares all a matched gray in color. She might as well have the ducal crest emblazoned on the doors, the vehicle was so memorable.

Yet no matter how many times he was able to locate her, it was never an easy matter to actually get to her. In point of fact, her small army of servants and guards made it frustratingly difficult, and she was never, ever, very far from them. The one time his men had been able to steal her away, she had been found and rescued the very same day, with his four men dying and not one of hers even wounded.

But those days were over. Now that the girl had come of age, Fleming would no longer have an easy time of manipulating the courts to give him control of her. He no longer wanted her, was no longer paying Elliot’s expenses to find her, and Elliot had earned nothing for all his time, trouble, and frustration before he was dismissed. Two years he had wasted with nothing to show for it. He was not a man to accept that with a shrug of nonchalance. Not by any means.

His purpose now was twofold. He was going to kill that red-haired bitch for the pleasure of it, but also for all the feelings of incompetence she had made him
feel, and for the ruin of the reputation he had built up, of being a man who could be counted on to see a job done quickly and without mistakes. And when he informed the duke that it was done, and that he had seen to it that she left no will, that Fleming could now claim her wealth simply by being her only relative, Elliot would finally be compensated.

He didn’t care how long it took or how much of his own money it cost, he would see it done. And killing her was much easier than trying to abduct her. It could be done from afar. It could be done in any number of ways. That he had twice attempted it and twice failed only proved she had not lost her luck yet.

Even the bloody countries she chose to cross were more often than not to her advantage. Mexico had been ideal for his purposes, or so he thought; huge, sparsely populated outside its cities, miles and miles of nothing but wildnerness where a massacre could go unreported for days, weeks. And the duchess conveniently set up camp in the middle of nowhere time and again. It was the perfect opportunity to attack in force, to hire an army to match hers. And hiring the army would have been easy and cheap—if it were for any other purpose. But getting a Mexican to agree to kill a woman was nearly impossible. He had tried and tried, and was turned down every time. She had beaten him again without doing a thing, simply through the character of the Mexican people.

Then he had found Dewane and Clydell Owen, two down-on-their-luck Americans who had that look Elliot always recognized as being available and willing for anything. He had sent them north across the bor
der, and they had come up with four others just like themselves, as well as a likely spot for an ambush. They were to meet up in the mining town of Bisbee, which he had finally located yesterday. He had spent the remainder of the day riding back and forth over the narrow mule track below, looking for the ideal spot for what he had in mind.

The spot wasn’t as perfect as he could have hoped for: nearly out of the mountains, and with the slope that the trail cut across extending on down to the bottom. Trees were in this area, at least below the trail on the lower slope, not in any great abundance, but enough to stop a rolling coach if the boulder should do no more than knock the vehicle off the track. That wasn’t likely to happen. With as steep a drop as there was directly below the boulder, and with the path wide at that point, the boulder was almost guaranteed to drop hard and go no farther.

If there had been time, he would have moved the bloody big rock to a better spot on the trail, where it would have wedged itself between two slopes and been impossible to move, making the trail impassable for horse or coach. He might have let the duchess pass through first if that were the case, simply for the pleasure of killing her with his own hands. But as it was now, if the boulder didn’t do as it was supposed to and land directly on the lead coach, the trail would still be blocked enough to keep the rest of the escort trapped behind the boulder, with Elliot’s men providing gunfire to hold them there for a while. As long as the duchess was on the opposite side of the boulder, the two men he had prepared for that contingency
could sneak down and take care of her without a problem.

They could just hear the horses approach now, coming slowly down the trail. “How many lead riders did you count?” Elliot asked the Mexican.

“Six, senor.”

Elliot nodded. He should have known her guards wouldn’t break habit just because the trail was narrow and not what they were used to. Six always rode ahead, and six behind the coach. It was just as well there was room below on that ledge for the lead riders to maneuver past the coach when the Mexican started the shooting, to draw their attention to the back of the train. There was little that could be done if they didn’t move back to investigate, for it was doubtful all six could be picked off before they had a chance to find cover. And if the coach did escape the boulder, that would leave too many guards to still protect it.

“Go back to your position,” Elliot ordered the man, “and wait for the signal to begin.”

Dewane watched him go before sneering, “Ya ain’t tol’ the Mex she’s ta die, have ya?”

Elliot stared coldly at the older Owen brother. It was his policy to explain himself as little a possible to his hirelings, and he saw no reason now to mention his experiences with the Mexicans and that he wasn’t taking any chances with the one he had hired to guide the duchess away from the main roads so she would be forced to come this way.

“Quite right,” was all he said, and that was enough.

These men were leery of him and that was as it should be. They shared a camaraderie of nationality from which he stood apart, which was as he would want it even if their differences did not enter into it. When you employed men as cold-blooded and merciless as yourself, a separateness had to be maintained so there was never any question of who was in control.

Elliot turned to watch the Mexican hurrying along the upper ledge to his assigned position. This spot really was ideal. With two ledges, the upper one concealed from below, it was absolutely perfect for ambush. There was even a path leading down the other side of the bluff to where their horses were hidden. And those below could not give chase even if they wanted to, because the two separate trails didn’t meet until they reached the bottom of the mountain on this side. The path leading down the other side of the bluff met the foothills on the western face of the mountain, but horses couldn’t maneuver up or down it.

Soon…soon he could get on with his life. Nothing was going to go wrong this time. It couldn’t. He was due some luck of his own.

He moved into his own position, which allowed a clear view of the trail below. He could see the lead riders now, and Sir Parker Grahame, captain of the guard, out in front as usual. He knew all of her people by name, and some of their histories too. He had spoken with them, bought them drinks, almost managed to seduce that silly French maid, Babette, while they were in Egypt. That they had no idea who he was or what he looked like made it easy. As long as
he never approached one of them unless they were alone, and never approached the same one again in another town or country, they never suspected a thing.

“Best get ready, gentlemen,” Elliot said quietly to the men behind him.

He lay stretched out to the left of the boulder. He would not relinquish his place, wanting to see the devastation firsthand. The huge rock sat on the very edge of the bluff. They had had to do no more than loosen it from the mountain’s grip beforehand, so all it needed now was a push.

The four men ready to do the pushing set their hands to the boulder and waited. Elliot waited for the lead guards to pass and the first of the coach horses to be directly below before sending the Mexican the signal to begin his part. Dewane joined him, a gun in each hand, though he laid one down for later use. The last man took out the mirror that would flash the signal to the Mexican.

“I want the driver of the coach eliminated before he applies the brake.” Elliot repeated this particular order. “He’ll stop the coach as soon as the guards up front start to turn around to investigate the shots from the rear, but whether the guards have passed behind the coach yet or not, the driver must be prevented from applying the brake. Without the driver, the coach horses will then move forward on their own.”

“No problem.” Dewane grinned, able to see the big man now who was driving the lead coach. “He’s no easy target ta miss.”

Elliot saw it was one of the grooms driving the duchess today. Too bad it wasn’t the Spaniard. That
man was a devil with knives, and had killed one of Elliot’s men in New York who had been caught tampering with the duchess’s coach.

The guards were passing now. In another moment, another…

“Send the signal,” Elliot ordered over his shoulder.

He waited tensely, holding his breath. The first pair of matched grays had passed, the second pair was nearly past. Bloody, bloody hell, if that Mexican…

They heard the shot. So did the guards below. They were all turning about, but Grahame sent only two back to investigate. The vehicles were all stopping. There were shouts filling the air, demanding to know what was happening. The driver of the lead coach was standing up to look back.