Chapter 24
Everything that happens next seems to happen all at once.
The second shot aimed too high, the shouting from Maddock and his men, the brush of Cypress’s shoulder against mine as he turns to fire back...
In the initial scramble, we’d ended up closer to one another, both choosing the same old stack of barrels and crates to duck behind, which makes it easier for me to intervene, my arm coming down on top of his to force him into a crouch and to force both of his pistols toward the ground. “Don’t.”
He looks at me, clearly surprised. “Don’t what?”
“The kid,” I snap, having to bend closer to be heard over the noise. “Don’t shoot him.”
“I wasn’t going to shoot Arty. Just scare him a bit,” Cypress replies, appearing slightly hurt. “Although, I might point out, he is trying to shoot us.”
“Yeah, well…” I back up against the alley wall as I wait for the next shot. “He’s doing a piss poor job of it.”
“True,” Cypress concedes, but then he leans forward and takes a peek around one of the crates. “They might do better, though.”
I don’t need to ask who. The shot that splinters the crate a moment later, no more than an inch from where Cypress’s head had just been, lets let me know that Maddock and the rest of his men have made good use of the distraction to reclaim their weapons.
“Fuck,” I mutter. “Where the fuck are those deputies?”
Cypress laughs. “Home. With their feet up.”
“I sent the old guy to go get them,” I say, counting shots as another series hits the containers beside us. “The one with the cigars.”
“Clayton?” Cypress asks, and I wonder again how he seems to know everyone and why he seems to want to. “I’m sure he’ll try, but…at this point, I have more faith in divine intervention than I do lawful. If they arrive, it likely won’t be to help us.”
“Don’t need them to help us,” I reply, not needing him to explain this to me. “I just need them to inconvenience Maddock enough that he might decide you’re not worth killin’.”
“Not sure that’s going to happen.” He ducks down lower as another bullet flies over our heads. “But I admire your sudden bend toward optimism.”
I roll my eyes, count off four more shots. “They’re all shootin’ at once. In a second, they’re going to have to reload. Run when they do. Got it?”
Cypress nods, looking toward the back alley behind the buildings. “We can both swing right, head west. I can draw them after me while you go get our horses out front.”
I curse, thinking of the message he’d made that boy at the stable bring me. “Is this why you had him tell me to ride my horse down here? You knew this was gonna happen?”
“Wasn’t thinking it would tonight, but always a possibility. So best to be prepared. Which is why I should’ve—” Cypress stops himself, barely audible over another round of shots and yelling when he starts again. “Wait, why did you think I wanted you to—”
“God only fucking knows,” I reply, not sure why I suddenly feel embarrassed in addition to everything else. “All right, wait two more shots, then you run for your horse.”
“What about you?”
“Let me worry about me.”
“Aiden—”
“Now.”
I break from my position, Cypress right next to me as we both sprint for the alley and somehow manage to turn the corner without either of us being gunned down. Certainly a mark of success, but I’m far from letting it make me cocky, considering I can hear them right behind us.
“Go,” I order, pointing toward the next side alley as we come up on it fast. “That way.”
He shakes his head, matching me stride for stride. “We’ll be separated. I’ll go with you.”
“No,” I reply, not wanting to waste the air in my lungs on talking. “Go.”
“But—”
“Cypress. Go.”
He looks like he wants to argue again, hesitating long enough for my eyes to meet his, for my gait to falter a bit, too, as I realize this might be the last time I see him. That there’s a part of me that doesn’t want it to be.
“We’ll find each other,” I tell him, a bit softer this time. At last, he nods, cutting down the other alley before I can say anything else, my moment of relief fading fast when I hear Maddock and his men emerge into the alley behind me.
The first shot that rings out from their newly reloaded guns strikes the building next to me, the wood siding splintering as I dash down a different street.
The second strikes the ground, scattering the dirt near my feet once I break for the other side of the road.
The third strikes truest to its mark, singeing a streak along my left arm before it cracks through storefront glass.
I don’t think it’s deep, but even if it is, the blood loss will take me a lot slower than another bullet might. The stable is a few more blocks away. I only need to get there.
“Stop!” There are new voices behind me now, people that had been out on the street, and I don’t know if they’re yelling at me or the men chasing me, but I’m pretty sure if I do stop to look, I’ll be dead before I figure it out.
“Stop!”
I’m so close. If I can just get to the barn. If I can—
There’s hoofbeats now, too. Falling like a drum beat, growing louder and louder and louder until—
A dark streak flies by me at full speed.
A demon on a black horse, neither of his hands on the reins because they’re too busy firing behind him.
I don’t stop to look this time either, not just because I’m afraid to die but also because I’m afraid to know how many names I’ll have to put on my ledger if I live.
Close on Cypress’s heels, three men tear after him on horseback, straight for Soldana’s border, and I wonder how far he’ll get before they catch him. If we really will get the chance to find each other again like I said.
My lungs are burning by the time I reach the stable, a metallic taste in my mouth, another bullet connecting with one of the barn slats as I race inside and tuck myself behind the open door.
My chest rapidly rises and falls as I try to catch my breath, my eyes doing a quick count of the now eight men outside. “Fuck, where is the fucking law—”
“Told ya you should have brought your horse.”
My head jerks up at the small voice intruding from the direction of the hayloft, and I see the stable boy peering back down at me. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
“Get out of here,” I snap at him. “You’re gonna get yourself killed.”
“Not if you get out of here first,” he argues, listening to the sounds of a few more shots hitting the stable. “They seem awful mad. What’d you do?”
“I got involved,” I mutter back, glancing out the door and stepping forward just slightly to let the men out there see me and my pistol. Fortunately, rather than receiving a bullet, I’m rewarded by the sight of them scampering back a bit.
“Hey,” I shout toward the boy. “Sid, I need you to—”
“Simon,” he replies, rolling his eyes at me.
“Right, Simon, you know how to tack a horse fast?”
“Sure do,” he says. “For the right price.”
“Little extortionist,” I grumble. “How about this? You tack up the mustang, and I’ll give you some very quick pointers on how to fight.”
“I don’t know…” he says, still lolling about in the hayloft while a few more shots go off. “You don’t seem to be doing too great with that right now.”
I glare at him, then show myself once more to the men outside to a similar effect as before. Doubt it’ll last much longer, though. Not without a casualty. My hand starts to shake.
“You can have whatever is left in my wallet,” I offer instead, starting to get desperate. “How about that?”
“Deal,” he replies, and I think maybe it’s worth it when I hear him start running away up there, dropping down in the aisle a safe distance back near the mustang’s stall.
“Tell me when you’re ready,” I shout his way, and sure enough, I do have to resort to firing a shot in the air a few moments later when the men outside start getting close enough for adrenaline and instinct to kick in.
“You want the saddlebags, too?” asks Simon, when the sound of the shot fades. “Or you leavin’ em here?”
I stare at him briefly before returning my attention outside. “Why would I leave—”
“I’m only askin’.” I fire another shot in the air. “But I suppose you aren’t coming back anytime soon.”
“Suppose not,” I reply, having no choice but to aim a shot at the dirt in front of Maddock when he doesn’t retreat as far as I would have liked after the last round. “Not willingly.”
“All right,” the boy shouts. “Ready!”
I nod, shoot once more to scare, then I turn and run for the stall, thinking to take the mustang out the back until I realize that will likely bring them into the barn and right past the boy.
Instead, I whistle for the mustang right as I reach the knot still keeping his door closed, and I have to admit, it does come loose fast in a pinch.
“Stay out of trouble,” I tell the boy, unintentionally brushing against the watch in my pocket before grabbing my entire pocketbook and throwing it his way.
The mustang bursts through the opening stall door a moment later, as if he knows he’s charging into battle, kicking into full speed down the aisle past several other startled horses as soon as I grab his mane, swing myself up, and land on his back.
For the first time in a long time as we thunder toward the front doors, I remember what it feels like…that suspended weightless moment, where you’re still able to experience the frantic hope of evading an unavoidable fate. Only this time...
“Aiden.” A shout from my left immediately once we’re out under the night sky draws me toward a black horse and its rider racing to my side, a rifle now in his hands as we turn and head straight for the dark expanse laid out before us without slowing.
Without a single shot managing to eclipse our escape.
As I start to let myself believe we’re actually going to get away with this, an elated laugh escapes me.
The short-lived sound drowning out whatever it is that Maddock is screaming, even if it can’t drown out the quickly dawning realization of what I’ve just done while I turn to watch him grow farther and farther away over my shoulder.
“Wolf,” Cypress calls to me again, and I look at him in time to see his grin before we reach the end of the stable’s lantern light. “Don’t look back.”