Chapter 17
Dorothy froze.
Sheriff Rafferty had told her to stay back and remain with the others at the town hall, where the mayor and his wife were tending to them.
But there was no way she could do that. Not with Warren and Mac in there.
She loved Mac like a father, and Warren, well …
She loved him too, she realized. Deeply.
There was no way she could leave them to deal with this horror on their own.
Just in case Rafferty needed backup, she’d sneak in after him.
Knowing the sheriff would make her turn back if he saw her, Dorothy followed at a discreet distance, keeping to the shadows since the sun had set and it was very dark out. With the rain still falling, there was a lot to obscure her from view.
Reaching the hotel, she watched the sheriff open the door with his weapon raised.
She ran up behind him as he went inside and quietly climbed the steps to the front door.
It would be only a matter of minutes, she thought, and this whole terrible ordeal would be over.
Mac would have his hotel back. Mr. Devlin would go back to New York, where the police would arrest Peter Harding for embezzlement—assuming Sadie had found the necessary proof—and then she and Warren …
She jolted back to reality as she heard a terribly loud bang!
Dorothy peeked around the door, and her heart stopped as she took in the scene.
“Oh no!” she said softly as she realized, too late, where the sheriff’s loyalty lay. It wasn’t with Mac, as she had hoped it would be. It was with Brett. That was why he was still standing while Mac lay on the ground in a pool of blood.
Her heart sank to the floor, and she turned away from the terrible sight.
Mac! Oh no! How can this be?
Then, as though her mind was a puzzle, pieces began to slot into place.
Of course. This explained a lot. It made sense.
Brett had bought Sheriff Rafferty’s loyalty somehow.
Through fear, money, or something else. That explained why Brett had never been properly arrested or even charged with anything.
And why Rafferty never seemed to be around to stop him from harming the folks in Pine Hill.
It wasn’t that Brett was wily; it was that he had bought the sheriff. But with what?
There was a shocked silence in the room. How long would that last?
There was no time to work anymore out now. She had to do something. Mac was down, but hopefully not dead. If she could just get Brett and Sheriff Rafferty out of the picture …
She peeked around the door again.
Warren and another man were there. They had a gun, and Warren was pointing it at the sheriff and at Brett, moving it from one to the other. But both Rafferty and Brett were armed. This would never work. Not unless she was able to even the odds.
“Don’t move!” Warren bellowed. “Don’t you even think about it! I will shoot you, Brett, without hesitation.”
“Then he’ll arrest you,” Brett said calmly.
He had to mean the sheriff. But that wasn’t important now. Dorothy had to even up the odds. Now, what did she have at hand? Did she have anything?
“I’ll take my chances,” Warren said.
Looking around, Dorothy was afraid she wouldn’t find anything.
It was clear that time was running out. Soon, Warren’s back-and-forth with Brett would run its course, and then there would be shooting.
Possibly shooting of the man she loved, followed by the death of her godfather.
She couldn’t have that. So, what could she use?
She looked down and there was her answer.
It took Dorothy a moment to unlace her left boot. She slipped her foot out of it and picked it up, hefting it in her hand. Then she decided to untie the other boot too. Stockinged feet were quieter.
Moving as quietly as she could, Dorothy slipped into the room. Warren was speaking, and all eyes were on him.
“… you don’t have to go down this road,” Warren said to Sheriff Rafferty. “You can still do the right thing.”
“Ha!” Sheriff Rafferty snorted. “The right thing would have been to shoot this miscreant when he first set foot in town.”
Brett laughed. “You wouldn’t do that. Not with my insurance policy neatly tucked away. You know it will go to the papers if you do anything but what I tell you to do!”
Rafferty shook his head. “There’s no coming back from this now. It ends for one of us today.”
He didn’t know how right he was.
Dorothy held her boot in her right hand so that the heel, made of good solid wood, was facing out.
It was a lot like a hammer in this position, solid, with a decent weight.
She snuck up behind the sheriff and brought the heel of her boot down on his head.
It only hit the lower part of the back of his head, but it was enough.
Rafferty yelled, there was a boom, and Brett screamed.
Then bullets began to fly and Dorothy fell to the ground, her hands over her ears. She lay there, not moving until the noise died down and the air was filled with the acrid smell of gunpowder. She sneezed a couple of times, before slowly sitting up.
Sheriff Rafferty lay beside her, motionless.
He had been shot in the chest and his sightless eyes stared at the ceiling.
On his other side was Brett. He too lay in a pool of blood, leaning against the wall.
The red bloom on his chest and the blank, staring look in his eyes made it clear he’d followed the sheriff to the final judgment.
Warren appeared from behind the reception counter. He had blood on his hands, but he was standing. He was breathing. He didn’t seem to be injured.
Thank you, Lord!
Relief rushed through Dorothy so powerfully that it propelled her to her feet and she ran across the floor to him, threw her arms around his neck, and hugged him for all she was worth. Warren awkwardly hugged her back, keeping his bloodied hands far away.
“Thank God you’re okay,” she whispered over and over, pressing her face into his neck and just breathing him in for a long, thankful moment before finally easing back. “Whose blood is that?” she asked, dreading the answer.
“It’s Mac’s,” Warren said soberly. “He’s hurt, but I don’t think it’s too bad. He’s breathing just fine. Paul is with him, putting pressure on the wound. We’re going to need the apothecary.”
Just then Michael and a lot of other men came running into reception, guns in hand.
“We heard the gunfire!” he yelled. “We just dealt with the last of Brett’s boys—” He stopped speaking as he looked around. “Wow. Is that the sheriff?”
“Yes. He was in cahoots with Brett, turns out,” Warren explained, his arm still loosely around Dorothy’s waist. “I still think El Aguila sent Brett in and?—”
The front door burst open, and all manner of men in dripping wet oilskin coats came running into the room.
“US Marshals! Put your hands up!” they yelled.
Shocked, Dorothy raised her hands and realized she was still clutching the boot that she had hit Sheriff Rafferty with. She didn’t dare move, though, as the marshals pointed their pistols at everyone.
“Well, this is unexpected,” Warren said. He had his hands up too. “I wonder who called them.”
And then their answer strode into the room. She was fighting off an officer as she stepped inside.
“Leave me alone! I need to see …” Sadie cried. She strode into the room and looked around. “Well, this is a fine mess.” Then she saw Dorothy, Warren, and Michael and she beamed. Her smile dropped, though, when she didn’t see Mac.
“He’s behind the reception counter,” Warren offered. “He’s hurt.”
Sadie rushed toward reception. Rough hands grabbed Dorothy and marched her out into the storm.
“And that’s when you entered the reception area?
” Marshal Todd asked. He was a burly man, but he had a kind face.
The only complaint that Dorothy had about the man was that he hadn’t let her speak to Warren, and he hadn’t told her much about Mac.
All he’d said was that Mac was being moved to a hospital in New York.
That in itself was worrisome. How were they moving him? Was it safe to do so? Were his injuries so grave that he couldn’t survive otherwise? Warren had said he seemed okay!
“Miss Davis?” Marshal Todd asked.
She sighed and nodded. From the glow outside the window, Dorothy could see that the sun was about to rise. The sky was clear, and it was going to be a beautiful day. How ironic that the sun would want to shine on a world that had seen so much pain in the last few hours.
“And you hit Sheriff Rafferty with the heel of your boot,” Marshal Todd said.
Was that a smile curling his lips ever so slightly?
“It was all I had on hand,” she said. “I gave the corkscrew to Warren.”
“That’s right, you did.” He checked his notes.
Marshal Todd was a voracious note-taker.
He had gone through almost a whole pencil as he interrogated, sharpening it at intervals as they talked.
That wasn’t unlike how Warren worked, she thought, remembering how she’d discreetly watched him in the cabin.
That made her want to get out of here and go to him right away.
“When can I see Warren?” Dorothy asked again.
“Soon,” the marshal said. “Can you tell me why you hit the sheriff?”
Dorothy wished he would stop asking her questions. She was bone-tired. She wanted to see Warren, find out how Mac was, and then go to her room and sleep for a week. “I hit Sheriff Rafferty because he was siding with Brett.”
“But he shot Brett,” Marshal Todd said, not looking up but still making notes. “Can you explain that?”
“Maybe he shot Brett by accident when I hit him. A gun fired in that moment. Maybe it was him,” Dorothy guessed.
“I was standing behind him, so I don’t really know.
I saw Brett turn and fall. Then it seemed like everyone started firing, and I remembered something Mac told me when I was little.
He said when things are flying through the air, no matter what they are, you’re supposed to get as low as you can and cover your head. So, I did that.”