To Hell and Back (17 page)

“You know,” the Comanchero said brightly, “I have many friends, very many friends.” There was a low muttering of agreement from all around. “And they must be very much like your friend, because some of my friends went hunting as well. Two went that way,” he gestured up canyon along the eastern wall, “and two went that way.” He gestured up canyon, again, this time along the western wall. It takes much to feed so many,” he rambled expansively. “Perhaps,” he added as if it were of little interest, “my friends will run into your friend and they too will become friends even as we are becoming so now.”

A knot jerked in the pit of Hollander’s stomach, but he gave away nothing.

“Perhaps,” he mouthed the word quietly.

The Comanchero’s eyes narrowed to glittering, black slits. “I theenk you are running,” he said with shrewd deduction. “Running from something, or maybe after someone, eh?”

Jake Hollander’s face remained closed.

“Believe what you like.”

Hollander fought the urge to blow this insane butcher right out of the saddle. Christ, he didn’t want to think about what would happen if Amanda was flushed from cover. They usually amused themselves with women captives for awhile then sold them, either to the Indians or south of the border. He could only pray she’d learned enough and wouldn’t panic while the leader played his light-spirited game of cat and mouse. It would in all probability end here, unless his scouts turned up Amanda.

* * *

Seconds ground past like hours for Amanda sitting amongst the huge boulders, thoughtfully chewing the jerky she had stuffed in her mouth before the Comancheros had come into clear sight below. She drew her gun and laid it across her lap. Below, the men were moving and talking. Hollander kept the Henry rifle pointed unwaveringly in one man’s direction. The leader. Amanda felt the tension from the camp emanating all the way to where she sat sheltered by rocks and darkness. Her nerves strung tight as fiddle strings, she remained absolutely still and quiet.

Some of the men turned their horses and galloped off. She waited, aware there was someone close by. Then, tinglingly, her senses snapped into focus and she heard it. The slow, soft steps of a horse walking only a few steps at a time, guided by an expert hand. A hoof clicked sharply off stone. She’d been schooled about men who could keep even their horses so quiet as to make their passage unnoticed. This night, though, seemed to be conspiring to protect her.
 

Time dragged. The band of Comancheros was restive, eager to be away, but nearby she could still hear the horse walking in that slow, muffled, searching gait. Long silences were punctuated by a click or a scrape of iron shod hoof against stone. Amanda held her breath. They were close, very close. Silence. The skitter of a pebble down rock. One rider was above her and a second below. A horse snorted so close by she felt the hot, moist breath whip across the back of her neck.

Frozen in place, her gun in her lap, her hand curled around it, Amanda did not breathe. For one breath-taking moment her heart was beating in her throat and she was sure the frantic pounding of it would be heard by the searchers. Then, they passed on, as slowly as they had come up on her, still searching. Her breath hissed out in a strangled, muffled sigh and the knotted, burning muscles the length or her body begin to slowly relax.
 

Amanda licked her lips and settled back into the rocks a bit more, fighting the urge to gulp air like a half-drowned woman. She lacked Hollander’s experience, so she decided to make up for it in patience. She thought of the stew she’d been forced to leave back in camp and stuffed another piece of jerky in her mouth, chewing slowly and leaned forward slightly to keep watch on the scene below.

* * *

“Well,
Senor
, it has been a pleasure meeting you, but my friends and I, we must be going. We only came this way for water.”
 

He wheeled his horse, then stopped, looking at Hollander thoughtfully. “Perhaps, if we see each other again and do not find it necessary to attempt to kill one another, you would like to join me and my friends?”

“Perhaps.”

The Comanchero slapped his big-rowled, Mexican spurs to his horse’s sides and took off at a gallop, calling back over his shoulder as his men followed and the drum of hoofbeats began again.

“I will signal you if we find your friend!”

Hollander watched them go, and then the waiting began.

Chapter 15

Hollander had slept only fitfully, alert to any sound signaling Amanda’s return. She still wasn’t back near dawn when Hollander saddled their horses, turned the extra loose and loaded their supplies. The campfire long dead, he’d made several trips up and down the creek scouting for sign to be sure the Comancheros had cleared out, each time finding nothing other than tracks leading out of the canyon.
 

And no sign of Amanda.

At first he had credited her with playing it smart, but Hollander was beginning to worry. What if the Comancheros had caught her unaware somewhere and dragged her off?
 

He had just about decided to pile into the saddle and follow the tracks left by the renegades when he heard the low bird whistle coming from nearby upslope. The unexpected sound made him jerk as if he’d been shot. He answered it, and a moment later saw her slipping and sliding down the slope toward him, skirting the low, ground-clinging brush and heftier trees that grew nearer the water.

He couldn’t help the sigh of relief which escaped him at her approach.

“Planning on going somewhere without me, partner?”

“What happened out there?” he demanded, catching her in his grip.

“Riders.” Amanda returned bluntly. “I could feel them more than hear or see them. They passed close enough for me to reach out and touch them. I couldn’t follow their movements very well, kept thinking they’d circle back, so I stayed where I was.”

“You did the right thing.” Hollander stepped quickly away from her, averting his gaze. “We better mount up and get out of here.”

Amanda gave a short nod and accepted the reins from his hand, glad to be putting the place behind them. She swung up, settling into the saddle as a wave of weariness passed over her. Until that moment she had not realized how exhausting the night just past had been. She had barely dozed, dropping off only a couple of times, always half listening for some faint sound that would warn her before it was too late.
 

Then, from somewhere deep inside, Amanda felt a surge of new energy. It left her wide awake, her limbs tingling, her mind clear.
 

Hollander mounted up, casting a concerned glance in Amanda’s direction. She’d had a rough night. One that could play havoc with even a strong man’s nerves. But she wasn’t one to be coddled.
 

“All right. Let’s go. He’s already got a jump on us. We’re going to have to move fast. You going to be able to handle it?”

“Don’t baby me, Hollander. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

With a last glance in Amanda’s direction, one which she parried with a solemn, steadfast look of her own, he led out, heading for the ridge where he had lost their quarry the night before.

With the breaking dawn Hollander easily picked up the outlaw’s trail and they pounded after the man they knew only as Ben.

They pushed hard all that day into open desert, a mountain range looming in the distance to the southwest
 

“He’s doubling back,” Amanda offered when they stopped to let water the horses, let them blow and to eat lightly from their stores, “circling.”

“Picked up on that, did you? Good.”

Hollander dampened his neckerchief with a splash of tepid water from his canteen, rubbing it over his face and neck, then over his horse’s muzzle.
 

“He’s going to come after us, isn’t he?”

“Likely. We best keep an eye peeled from here on out.”

He poured some water into his hat for his mount, then did the same for Amanda’s Colorado, each horse in turn eagerly slurping up his share.

“Let’s walk the horses a spell. There’ll be water up ahead. We’ll camp there and start fresh in the morning. Maybe we can make him sweat a little and try whatever he’s got it into his head to do.”

After they made camp, watered the horses and ate, exhaustion overtook Amanda and she slept like she’d been drugged, while Hollander stood watch.

Up with the sun again the next morning, they bolted their food and saddled up. She had to suppress the urge to glare at him. How the hell did he do that night after night; wake up clear-eyed and alert after standing watch?

Still, there was no slow-up in Amanda either. Their futures lay in their capturing the fleeing outlaw alive.
 

The sun was just past its zenith the following day when they caught up with him in some low foothills tumbled at the base of a looming mountain range ahead.
 

“We’re riding into trouble,” Hollander said to Amanda as they rode. “I can feel it.”

Not surprising since they’d been heading in a bee-line hard after the outlaw, following closely in his tracks.

“He’s been back more than once to keep an eye on us, ” Amanda noted.

Hollander froze as the words left Amanda’s mouth, eyes still fastened on the tracks at their feet.

“Wasn’t smart of him, leaving those tracks—unless . . .”

Hollander jerked his head up in time to catch a flash of movement on the hill which rose steeply on their left. Reflexes took over and he kicked free of the stirrups, throwing himself sideways out of the saddle, catching Amanda and dragging her down in the dust along with him. They hit the ground with a bone-jarring thud as a rifle cracked sharply and the bullet whipped across their saddles sending their horses into a nervous spin.

There was no momentary confusion for Amanda when the ground suddenly came up and slammed into her. Instinctively she rolled away from Hollander, came to her knees and scrambled for cover as the staccato burst of gunfire swept over them. Dust and rock chips flew up all around them as Amanda and Hollander bolted part way up a hill opposite the outlaw, diving in amongst the larger rocks for cover. Bullets ricocheted dangerously close as they drew their own weapons and pressed tightly against the rocks for shelter.

“Hold your fire,” Hollander called softly across to her.

Amanda waited, curled tightly around a boulder, while Hollander laid down a heavy pattern of fire along the opposite hilltop. Their attacker withdrew momentarily. Silence hung about them like a fading echo until their quarry started shooting again.

Amanda raised up a bit, levering herself forward on her elbows and prepared to return the fire, but Hollander stopped her again. She frowned. If he was trying to protect her again . . ..
 

With no little effort, Amanda wormed her way around to where she could get a better look at Hollander where he lay sprawled among the rocks, his gun kicking in his hand the sound blending into one deafening roar.

When a bullet ricocheted dangerously close she flinched, then the odd, tension-spiked silence descended over them again. Hollander wormed around to where he could face her.

“I want him to think one of us is down,” he mouthed the words as he reloaded, the sound behind the breath barely enough to be heard. “He didn’t reckon with that,” Hollander gestured toward a notch a short distance away where two hills nearly butted and a low ridge connected them. “If I can work my way over there I can get up behind him, but you’re going to have to keep him pinned when I start to move. ”

By craning her neck Amanda glimpsed the notch Hollander had picked as his strategic destination.
 

“We have to take him alive.”

Amanda didn’t have to be convinced of that. She nodded her agreement.

An instant later the firing started up again from the hill above them, bullets flying in amongst the rocks. They cut deep, white scars where they struck, whanging off stone in angry, skin-tingling ricochets. Their horses danced away, driven by the fusillade, disappearing farther up the draw.

Amanda huddled behind her rock barricade and waited while Hollander reloaded. He held his gun up, gave a short nod in her direction and got ready to run. She braced her right shoulder against a rough surface, leaned forward slightly, and caught sight of a flash of shirt on the opposite hill. She shifted her aim and began methodically flinging lead. That bit of shirt she’d spotted disappeared behind some scrub, and Hollander slid past her, moving off across the face of the slope angling toward the notch.

He faded into new cover as Amanda spent her sixth shell.
 

Gunfire erupted from the opposite hillside when she tucked herself into her minor fortress to reload with swift, sure movements while bullets whipped around her like a swarm of hornets.

Hollander flinched at the gunfire, but he laid quietly where he was. Amanda had to hold her own if they wanted a chance it to take Ben Miller by surprise. He couldn’t protect her and do what they had set out to do. He waited tensely for Amanda to begin firing again. He had to clear the notch that connected the two hills. Once he did that he would be able to move faster, and cut up behind their quarry.