To Hell and Back (5 page)

At first the wooden seating of the metal bars held firm along the sill, but when he withdrew and returned again with even more determination, they both heard the groaning, splintering of weakened wood. An instant later one bar popped free with a shower of glowing embers. He smothered the lively flames with the blanket, scattering embers and soot.

Amanda managed to snuff them out as Jake forced a second bar. When it gave way he shifted his grip on the threadbare blanket and tossed it over the smoldering wood, unleashing a thick column of white smoke that backwashed into the cell. Amanda gasped and gagged between stifled, hacking coughs.

Jake slid through the smoking, barless window with the agility of a cat, landing on his feet outside, clothing scorched in several places. Amanda hastily piled the remnants of their dinner in a napkin, stuffed half of a juicy peach in her mouth, and hopped back up on the cot, to follow him through.

He was waiting for her when she dragged herself through the still-hot, sooty opening and caught her when she was about to topple, drawing her the rest of the way out to place her lightly on the ground close beside him.

He paused only an instant peering into the surrounding darkness, then Jake’s left hand enfolded her cooler, smaller right one in a grip of warm strength before he moved out swiftly, pulling her along in his wake. Amanda clung to their extra bit of food, and whispered urgently in his ear as they approached the livery.

“Where are we going?”

“The horses,” he nodded to the phantom shapes visible through a crack where the door stood ajar. “Hope my gear is still with them.”

“Both of them are yours?”

There must have been something doubtful in Amanda’s tone because Jake gave her a look that could have withered desert grass.

“What? You figure I’m not a bank robber, but more than likely a horse thief? Do you really care?”

Amanda shifted on her feet. For an instant she had cared, but she decided quickly that her inherently honest upbringing could be damned. This was a matter of life and death. Hers.

As if reading her thoughts Hollander gave her a half grin.

“If you’ve gotten that out of your system I can tell you, I rode in with both of them, and I aim to ride out with what I rode in with. You stay here. I’ll get ’em.”

Amanda nodded then crouched down in the darkest shadows to wait. For some reason it never crossed her mind that he might be thinking of abandoning her. A few minutes later, she heard the soft, rhythmic clip-clopping of horses at a walk and stepped out of the shadows to meet him the rich, earthy animal scent curling out to her nostrils.

“Let’s go,” Jake’s voice caressed the darkness, “I’ll give you a leg up.”
 

He didn’t wait for her consent, he just tossed her into the saddle as if it were the most natural place in the world for her to be. Now, with sooty, grimy skirts bunched beneath her legs and buttocks, she decided, was not the time to tell him she had ridden a horse only twice before in her life, both times side-saddle. The first time she had been terrified, and the second time, thrown.

“Here.”
 

He handed the reins up and the horse beneath her began walking even as Jake vaulted into his saddle. Jake led the way, at a walk, out of town toward freedom.

Once clear of Phoenix, Hollander put his horse to an all-out run. Amanda’s pony followed suit, more of its own accord being used to pacing Jake’s mount, than because of any urgings on her part. Her jaws snapped together, teeth catching her tongue and she tasted blood. From that instant on it was a hell-for-leather ride into the blackness of the night and all Amanda could do was hold on to the saddle horn with fingers curled and locked into place. To be left behind meant recapture. That meant death. Holding Jake Hollander back meant the same thing, but for both of them. The facts of Amanda’s new life were abundantly clear. There could be no turning back to the old.

Chapter 4

Jake, in the lead, set a killing pace until the first glimmer of morning brightened the eastern sky. Amanda could only assume the mountains thrusting up out of the desert before them were their final destination. Not a word had passed between them since they had left the dark alley behind. In tight-lipped silence Amanda had borne the grueling pace. Now, already tired and sore, expecting it to go get much worse, she was attempting to school her mind to numbness when, abruptly, Jake pulled his horse to a halt, then turned in the saddle to look behind them. Amanda turned with him then gasped at the knife-like pain that burned down the back of each thigh at the movement. She could see nothing, not so much as a smudge of dust on the distant horizon.

“We better walk the horses a spell,” Jake said swinging down.

Stepping around his horse to give Amanda a hand, he noticed her hesitation.

“We have to give the animals a breather.” He frowned a little, misinterpreting her hesitation for reluctance to climb down rather than the inability to do so.
 

Amanda grit her teeth, barely able to stifle a groan, and unhooked her right foot from the stirrup. She almost had to lie down across the horse’s sweat-soaked neck to allow her leg to swing over the back of the saddle, and slid to the ground.

Weak and aching, her knees rebelled at the sudden change in position, refusing to straighten completely, nearly buckling beneath her slight weight. A raw, burning sensation plagued the inside of each thigh while her ankles kinked, threatening to topple her into the dust.

Jake instinctively put out a steadying hand when she staggered against him.

“You all right?” he asked sharply, his tone more short than concerned.

Well, why shouldn’t he be short? She hardly knew him. Didn’t know him at all in fact. He undoubtedly could make better time without her. What would it take, she wondered, for him to abandon her out here in this sun-baked wilderness.

“I’m fine,” Amanda lied. “Just a little stiff.”

She gathered herself again and took a couple of uneven steps to loosen the knots in her joints, then smiled wanly at Jake. She wasn’t going to admit her total unfamiliarity with a horse. For now she would watch carefully and do whatever Jake Hollander did. Watch, imitate, and distract him, hoping he would not become too aware of what a burden she truly was.

“Best we get moving.”

Jake broke into a brisk walk, his appaloosa striding in fluid motion alongside him, the reins drooping between them. Amanda jumped to catch up and walk beside him, her borrowed sorrel just as amenable to walking as his companion. Only a few strides revealed new problems to the city girl as she staggered and stumbled along in her town shoes. She doubted it could be comfortable for Jake, striding along, tiny puffs of dust rising from beneath his underslung boot heels, but she’d be willing to trade on an instant’s notice.
 

“What are those mountains up ahead?”

“Superstitions,” Jake bit out the answer. “If we’re lucky we’ll be getting into their foothills before nightfall.”

Amanda blinked at his last statement. The rocky crags seemed closer than that. An hour’s walk, maybe two. It was only coming onto dawn. Oh God, did he mean they were going to continue on at this pace until then?
 

Small rocks rolled beneath her feet, and her skirts were conspiring to trip her at every step, as the hem quickly shredded. At least, she reflected, the morning sun, warm against her skin, chased the night’s chill from her bones.

“Are we stopping there?” Amanda tried to mask the hopeful inflection of her voice.

Jake nodded and kept walking, long legs carrying him right over most of the dips, swells and loose rock that slowed Amanda.

“I know a few places where we can find water and hide out long enough to figure out what to do next.”

He gave her a weak smile. “We can rest then. Probably have time to get so bored I can tell you some of the stories about lost gold mines and ghosts that the Superstitions have spawned.”

Amanda stomped, tripped and careened along in his wake, praying for stronger ankles. She stared at the rocky, forbidding mountains heaving themselves off the desert floor ahead in naked cliffs that appeared impossible to penetrate. She felt ever more vulnerable and dependent on Jake Hollander, a total stranger whose only background she’d heard from his own lips.

“What about Indians?”

“Might be a few renegades around,” Jake admitted with a shrug. “But most of the Apache keep their distance. They think it’s a land of evil spirits.”
 

“That’s encouraging.”

“We’ll make out.”

Jake was well aware Amanda was not having an easy time of it. Her garb was far from suitable to this terrain, but that aside, she was as green as they get. Under different circumstances he would have been easier on her, even coddled her some, but now was not the time.

To her credit, she had more spunk than he had figured her for in the beginning. She had to learn and learn fast to survive.
 

Jake Hollander had always been a direct man, a man of forceful action when needed; a man of positive thoughts and firm decision. He had ram-rodded trail drives through what many had considered to be hell and survived, bringing his crew, for the most part, through with him. He regretted the loss of Kid Keller whenever his thoughts wandered back to the kid’s death, but times were tough and the country wild. Sometimes there was just no dodging it when death came calling.
 

He had been a trapper, and another time, a scout. He had fought the Indians and lived with them. He’d married an Indian woman and had a son with her. Both had been lost in a great flood along the Mississippi, and grieving, he had pulled his freight and headed further west. His experience was broad, but this wasn’t something he could face head-on with mule-headed stubbornness and raw courage. They had the devil by the tail, and there did not seem to be any turning loose. So, what was he going to do with Miss Amanda Cleary?

The practical side of his nature was already warning him it would be wisest for him to be rid of the woman as soon as he could shake her with a clear conscience. Strangely, he was oddly hesitant to do so. Posters would be out on both of them damn quick, and since they’d already been convicted, few would care if it was dead or alive. Bounty hunters would be trailing them.
 

Yep, no doubt about it, they should both run like hell and not look back. It was a big country. Plenty of room to change your name, change your look and fade into the background. It made lots of sense until he cared to think about his boss, Eli Sanders, and all the money he’d lost as a result of that damned back robbery. Eli was bound to lose everything. Worse, Eli would be told Jake was the thief. He wouldn’t want to believe it, but when they sold his ranch out from under him and he never heard from Jake again, he’d have to be a saint not to believe the worst.

If that wasn’t enough, there was the small matter of those yahoos getting away with it all. Still, getting himself, and possibly Amanda, hung for nothing, didn’t make sense either.
 

He glanced at her stumbling, unquestioningly along just behind him. Damned if her disheveled appearance didn’t make her look prettier than when he had first seen her in the bank. Nonetheless, she was exhausted and they still had a way to go. Her long skirts tripped her and her shoes were not suited for hiking, or riding. Part of the solution was in the saddlebags slung behind her saddle. Amanda’s horse, having belonged to the Kid, was still packed with his belongings. The kid had been tall and slim with a narrow waist and shoulders strong enough to work alongside the men, but not yet heavily muscled from the labor. His clothes would do for her. Boots in there too though they’d be too large for her.

He was about to open his mouth, tell her to take what she could use and change when he spotted the plume of dust in the distance behind them. There wasn’t time for it now. They had to hit those mountains well ahead of any posse, and disappear up the winding canyons.

“Mount up,” Jake commanded shortly, “and let’s get moving.”

Quick to obey, Amanda swung stiffly back into the saddle. She couldn’t decide which was worse, riding, hour after hour, or stumbling over rocks and cactus, but the internal debate did much to take her mind from the grueling hours of hard travel.

She spotted the thin spiral of dust curling up behind them. There was only one thing it could be. The thought of a posse bearing down on them made her move a little faster than her protesting muscles would have liked to allow.

Jake led the way at a brisk walk. Tight-lipped, Amanda fought the folds of her skirts, trying to arrange the material between her sore, raw legs and the saddle leather to cushion her abused flesh while she sat the horse counter-point to the sorrel’s gait. She was amazed to feel that, at least for the moment, her other aches had faded.

Jake urged his sturdy appaloosa into a gallop. Amanda followed suit, the easy roll much more tolerable than the sharp, bouncing trot the horses favored for long stretches.

The mountains loomed larger before them as they pressed further into the day, the sun becoming a much less beloved presence. Pinnacles, knobs, and domes of bare rock, thrust into the sky, breaking the monotony of a rough stubble of scrub brush and occasional stunted trees. Though tired, stiff, sore, and thirsty, Amanda, in an inexplicable way, felt at home. A new sense of freedom sprang from God knew where, welcoming the life of the trail. What lay ahead, she couldn’t begin to anticipate, but she knew instinctively that it was here that she would eventually free herself from the helplessness that had plagued her most of her life.