The Lady Takes A Gunslinger (Wild Western Rogues Series, Book 1) (44 page)

"Darlin'?
Hah! I'm nobody's darlin', least of all yours!"

"How much of that tequila did you drink?" he asked, plopping her down sideways on the ebony-colored horse Dominguez had given him.

"Ow! Hardly any. Not enough."

Reese launched into the saddle behind her, drawing her up practically into his lap.

"Let me down! Where are you taking me?" she yelled, prying his hands away from her waist. He clamped them back in place.

"Out of temptation's reach."

She was angry. That much was clear. She didn't speak to him all the way up the ridge that overlooked the camp. It took all of ten minutes to get there. Huge boulders precariously perched on ancient sandstone fulcrums littered the way. The evening air was scented with sage and palo verde. Beyond the ridge was a dramatic sweep of horizon cast in the purples and blues of the setting sun, the rolling valley, thick with foliage.

Drawing the gelding to a stop, he dismounted and reached up to help Grace down. She menaced him with a glare for a moment, then hopped down all by herself.

She took two steps out of his reach, folded her arms tightly against her chest, and turned her back on him.

He said, "You're angry."

"How observant."

"This isn't easy for me either."

"Oh? I'd say you're taking the easy way out, wouldn't you?"

"No."

"Yes, you are. Because you're too much of a coward to risk your heart. You're not leaving for my sake. You're leaving for your own."

Anger flashed through him, hot and unexpected. He grabbed her arm. "That's not true and you know it."

"Do I? You've wanted to leave since that first day. You've admitted as much. Now that it's over, you can't wait to make good your escape. It's so much simpler, isn't it, than facing the truth?"

"Which is what?"

"That you love me. That we're meant to be together. That together we're stronger than apart. And whatever happens, nothing,
nothing
could be more powerful than that."

A red-tailed hawk sailed effortlessly on the air currents fifty feet from where they stood, watching them like a spectator at a fight.

Reese's hands tightened on her upper arms. "It can't always be your way, Grace. As much as you want it, life doesn't work that way."

"Not in your world, certainly. Because you leave no room for hope, Reese. You're so dead certain that life will always kick you in the teeth, you can't imagine the other side. Well, there
are
no guarantees. There's no blueprint saying this will happen just so, or that will. We take chances, risks. And we can choose to do it alone, or together. Who's to say what tomorrow will bring? Maybe it won't turn out the way we hope. But maybe it will, Reese. Maybe it
will."

He gritted his teeth, releasing her. "You'd be implicated just by being with me, don't you see that? I can't bring this thing down on you."

"You won't, you mean. Well, who are you to decide for me what risks I'm willing to take?"

He had no answer for that. Damn her woman's logic. Everything she said made perfect sense, yet no sense at all. He knew what he had to do. He'd thought of every angle for weeks. There was no getting around the inevitable.

The evening breeze picked up just then and tore at their hair and clothes, cool and angry as the words between them. She forced him to look at her by stepping practically under his chin.

"Tell me you don't care for me, Reese. Say it to my face. And I'll walk away now. Forever. Go on, say it."

He looked her in the eye, and lied. "I don't care for you."

"Liar." She shoved him, hard.

Caught off guard, Reese stumbled back toward the edge of the cliff. He saw her eyes widen with fear as she realized what she'd done. She reached out instantly and grabbed his arm, yanking him back toward her. Off balance, Reese stumbled forward, taking her with him. They landed hard on the ground, rolling away from the cliff's edge in each other's arms.

Their breathing fell into a harsh, angry unison. "Liar," she choked out, her eyes filled with tears.

"Why can't you just let me go?"he murmured, his mouth a heartbeat away from hers.

She gulped back a sob. "Why can't you just let me love you?"

There was nothing left but to drop his mouth on hers in an angry, desperate plea. She met him halfway, twining her arms around his neck and drawing him closer yet. His tongue took posession of her mouth, as hers did of his. There was nothing vaguely like gentleness in the kiss, only the frustration of two people being torn apart from the inside out.

Never again would he find a woman who matched his soul stroke for stroke the way she did, who knew him better than he knew himself, who made him almost believe that all things were possible. How could he ever walk away?

The metallic click of a gun's hammer locked into place from somewhere close by. He froze, opening his eyes to see the devil watching him from a rock.

"Well, now, ain't this touchin'?" Ephram Sanders said, pointing a pistol at the spot between Reese's eyes.

Chapter 23

Grace looked up in horror. "Reese—"

"Couple o' lovebirds, eh, Hee-dalgo?" Sanders said.

"Si,
patron."
Hidalgo leered at them, his Henry rifle marking the same spot as Sanders's.

"Reckon the last we seen of her," Sanders said, getting to his feet, "she was a he. Ain't that right, Smith?"

Reese glanced up to find the deputy standing off to the left, clutching his rifle across his chest with both hands. He said nothing. A heavy shadow of a beard covered his jaw and he looked worse for the pace they must have kept up these past weeks.

"Get up," Sanders ordered.

Slowly, they did. Tucking Grace slightly behind him, Reese lifted his hands away from his gun, weighing the odds. Check that. There were no odds. If he went for his gun, they were both dead. If he didn't go for his gun, they were just as dead. And too far from camp to be heard.

He glanced at the tracker. "You're even better than I've heard, Hidalgo. Tracking us down the Gulf. That was real clever."

"Your friend, Newcastle, left a paper trail a mile wide. Everyone in Bagdad knew he did business out of Tampico," Sanders admitted. "After that, trackin' you here was easy as a Pair-a-Dice whore. Fellow named Kiddwell-Winthrop the Third was of particular help."

The greenhorn he'd bought the boat from, Reese remembered with a tightening of his jaw. He wondered if he was still alive. "You're just a little out of your jurisdiction here, aren't you, Marshal?"

Lifting his gun slightly, he said, "Judge Colt, here, disagrees. Now pull your gun out of your holster, easy like."

"Reese," Grace whispered.

"It's all right," he lied, lifting his gun out of its holster with a hiss of metal against leather. He turned to Sanders. "Your argument's with me, not her. Let her go and we'll settle this between us."

"On the contrary, Donovan. The girl made a fool of my deputy in my own jail. I don't cotton to that sort of thing. Nor do I need a witness floating around telling folks I stretched the boundaries of the law. Drop your gun, Donovan. Send it over here."

Reese let his pistol fall to the ground, then kicked it in Sanders's direction. The marshal gestured to Hidalgo, who lifted his rope from his saddle, sending the lariat into a flat spin. It sailed easily over Reese's shoulders, cinching around his arms. Reese grunted as Hidalgo yanked it even tighter.

"Don't!" Grace cried. "Please don't do this. I beg you."

"You beg?" Sanders echoed. "I wonder how far a woman like you would go to save her man?"

Reese took a step forward. Hidalgo jerked the rope, cutting painfully into his arms.

"Stay away from her, Sanders. Or so help me—"

"You'll what? I don't think you're in any position for threats, Donovan."

Grace waved an accusing finger at Sanders and backed up a step. "You won't get away with this, do you hear? If you kill us, my brother will find you and shoot you down for the low-down cur you are."

"Is that so?" Sanders laughed, unmoved by the threat.

"Yes. That's so. You, masquerading as an officer of the law! You are a huckleberry below everybody's persimmon!" she sneered as if that were the lowest insult she could sling. It probably was, Reese decided, shooting her a warning look. She ignored him, as usual.

"You railroaded Reese into jail and you know it," she went on, her heels crumbling the ground at the edge of the cliff. "Your scurvy sense of law and order falls far short of the mark."

"Grace," Reese warned.

"Your brother, Deke, asked for it, harassing me like he did. Why, he practically assaulted me right there in the saloon! And he was set on challenging himself against Reese's gun. He drew first. Reese was only defending himself. You can't hang a man for—"

"Grace."

"-self-defense!"

"Shut her up," Sanders warned, lifting the tip of his rifle in her direction.

That was a feat God himself couldn't manage, Reese mused, glancing at the edge of the cliff they stood on. It angled sharply down a steep dirt-covered hill more than seventy-five feet. Dangerous, but not lethal—if she fell right.

"And you, Deputy, to go along with it when you know—"

There was one chance and one chance only, Reese decided as she ranted on. If the slide didn't kill her, then maybe at least she'd get away.

Reese threw his weight to his side, colliding with her hip and sending her sailing airborne off the side of the cliff.

She screamed, grabbing Reese's shirt midair, pulling him with her. Hidalgo's rope tightened, jerking him backward. Unable to break his fall, he landed hard, half on and half off the edge of the cliff, with Grace dangling from his shirt front.

Sanders cursed. "Get them back up here!"

Grace's bloodless fingers clutched in a stranglehold around the fabric of his shirt. "I'm slipping!"

"Let go," he said. "For God's sake, Grace, let go and you'll have a
chance
."

Hidalgo backed his horse up, dragging him inexorably away from the edge of the cliff.

Grace looked down. "Oh, my—!"

He implored her. "Please, Grace, you can do it. Let go. Go get help!"

Grace's eyes widened as Sanders's head, shoulders, and pistol appeared over the edge of the cliff. She could see directly into the dark cylinder of the barrel.

She let go, sliding down the incline with alarming, bone-jarring speed. Tiny rocks and roots abraded her hands and her skirts flew upward around her waist. Then she started to roll.

Bullets pinged into the ground near her. The world was upside down and backward and she lost sight of Reese altogether. Desperately, she clutched at every rooted object for a handhold. To no avail.

Reese rocked to his left, rolling his weight hard against the marshal's legs, throwing him into an off-balance sprawl at the edge of the cliff. His gun fell beside him and Sanders reached for it. At the same moment, the sharp retort of a gun exploded nearby. Reese waited for the impact, certain the bullet was meant for him. Instead, Hidalgo pitched forward off his saddle, dead before he hit the ground.

Where had that come from? Had someone from camp found them?

Sanders whirled, his gun seeking the same answer.

"Don't try it, Marshal."

Reese looked up at the strained sound of Connell Smith's voice.

"Smith?" Sanders said incredulously.

"Put down the weapon," Smith instructed, keeping his gun aimed at Sanders's heart.

"What are you doin'?"

"What I should have done weeks ago. Put it down."

"Not on your life, you lily-livered turncoat," Sanders said slowly, lifting his gun to meet the deputy's.

"I won't let you kill them," Connell said evenly, unflinching in the face of his own certain demise.

"Like hell you won't."

"Go ahead, shoot me. I'll take you with me. I have time."

"I'd listen to him if I were you," Reese advised, sliding his gaze to Sanders. "He sounds like he means it."