Chapter 20
The sound of screaming bolted Red straight out of his chair. “Stay inside, Cass.” Shouting that order, he hoped Cassie picked today to be obedient and ran.
He saw Libby before he’d gotten out the door of the diner. Libby Jeffreys, his good friend who only minutes ago had left the diner with a tray of food for the sheriff and his prisoner. Libby now staggered onto the board sidewalk covered in blood.
He sprinted toward her and almost collided with Wade Sawyer, who reached her at the same moment from a different direction. Red caught Libby’s shoulders, looking for the source of the bleeding. “Wade, get the doctor for her.”
“No.” Libby’s voice shook. “I mean yes, get the doctor, but not for me. It’s Merl.”
“I’ll go.” Tom Linscott was a single pace behind Wade. He wheeled and raced for the doctor’s office.
“He’s knocked cold, bleeding, maybe dead.” Libby burst into tears.
Red took one more hard scan of Libby’s bloody but uninjured body. Then as Seth from the general store came up beside Red, he thrust the sobbing woman into Seth’s capable hands.
“Take care of her.” Red let her go and headed for the jail.
Wade beat him in the door.
They entered to find a trail of blood leading from the single front room of the sheriff’s office through the swinging door to the back room. A room where Red’s prisoner had spent the night in one of the two small cells.
Red rushed to the door and swung it open to find Sheriff Dean face down on the floor, lying in a pool of blood. The cell where Merl had locked up Red’s prisoner last night stood empty, the door swung open.
Dropping to the floor, Red felt sick to think the prisoner he’d brought in had done this. Red looked up at Wade, who was kneeling on the other side of Merl, and said, “It didn’t happen long ago. The blood is too fresh. I didn’t hear a gunshot.”
“Let’s roll him over. Be careful.”
Red and Wade eased the burly older man over, and he groaned, giving Red a rush of hope. The sheriff had received what looked like a single blow to the head—a nasty gash, swollen and bleeding into his salt-and-pepper gray hair, but not a bullet wound.
Merl’s eyes flicked open, and he struggled to sit up.
“Lie still.” Red pressed on the older man’s shoulders. “The doc will be here in a few seconds. You’re all right. Just got knocked out cold.”
Red prayed silently. A quick glance at Wade’s moving lips told him Wade had joined in with his own prayers.
No other wound showed up. Merl reached for his head with a moan of pain. “What happened?”
“Just stay quiet. Looks as though your prisoner or maybe his partner hit you over the head and escaped.” Red had hoped the prisoner would talk, especially after he’d been locked up overnight.
The man hadn’t seemed possessed of any great supply of courage, judging by the way he’d lain frozen under the onslaught of Belle’s and Emma’s gunfire.
And if the prisoner talked, then the ring of outlaws could be broken up for good.
Now the area ranchers had their cattle back and the hideout uncovered, but they didn’t have a line on the outlaws.
The doctor hustled into the narrow hallway that ran along the front of the jail cells.
Red got to his feet and moved toward the rear of the building…where the alley door stood barely ajar. “Wade.” He strode over to examine the latch. “They must have gotten in this way.”
Red stepped outside, though it was far, far too late. He crouched and studied the dirt torn up with hoofprints.
“Look at this door. The knob isn’t broken.” Wade rattled it. “They must’ve had a key.”
“Door probably takes a skeleton key. Easy to find.” Red stood and rubbed one hand into his hair. “I should have stayed all night instead of going back to Grant’s Hotel to sleep. We knew he had a partner.”
Wade tugged the brim of his hat low over his eyes. “Tell me how you caught him.”
Tom Linscott rounded the building, Morning Sun…Abby right behind him. Red blinked. How the two resembled each other. Not many folks had that unusual shade of white-blond hair. “The doc is taking Merl over to his office. Looks like he just got a hard blow to the head. He should be all right.”
Red dipped his head. “Morning, Tom. Find any cattle of yours in that mob we brought in?”
“My men are checking. This gang’s been hitting us for a few head all winter. Tough call with the brands, but we should be able to identify ours.”
Red looked from Tom to Abby again, then shook his head to focus on what was important. “I brought in a man to the sheriff I found holed up with the cattle. He had a partner with him who got away.”
Red quickly told them as many details as he could. Then they started studying the tracks. In the lightly traveled alley, they could tell which way the gang went, straight for a clump of trees that led into the rugged hills around Divide.
Abby did a better job of tracking than any of the rest of them. Finally, the ground turned to rock, and the riders seemed to vanish. Frustrated, they headed back to Divide.
“At least we got these cattle.” Wade slapped Red on the shoulder. “Maybe with their hideout found, they’ll move on. But I hate passing our troubles on to some other ranchers. I’ve got to get headed for home now. We’re in the middle of roundup.”
“You’re still doing roundup?” Red was amazed.
Wade scowled. “Yes, we’re still doing roundup.”
Red was sorry he’d said anything. “Send your men on home and take a few more minutes to decide if there’s anything to be done about these rustlers. It won’t take long.”
Wade agreed.
Their group headed for Libby’s Diner, where Cassie was now waiting tables with Susannah hanging from one ankle and Michael strapped on her back. Red’s wife was amazing. She just would not stop working.
“How’s Merl?” Cassie came up with a coffee cup and a pot as Red settled at the table. Michael blinked sleepy eyes at Red over Cassie’s shoulder and smiled.
“He’s at the doctor’s office. Doc said he’s making sense and sitting up, so he’ll be all right, but someone must have come up behind him, because he can’t remember a thing.
” Red got up to relieve Cassie of her burden and also because he couldn’t get enough of holding his little redheaded son.
He settled Michael on one knee, Susannah on the other, and still managed to drink his coffee without burning tiny fingers.
He was getting real good at this father stuff.
Wade came in next, holding the door open for Abby.
A cranky-looking Tom Linscott tried to come in with Wade still holding the door, but Wade stepped in front of Tom and dropped the door in Tom’s face.
The two shoved at each other for a few seconds as if fighting to see who could get in the door first.
“I told you, I’ll start building a cabin today.” Tom was talking to Abby. Was Tom trying to convince Abby to marry him?
Red’s eyes slid to see how Wade was taking that. It hadn’t taken any leap of great genius to see that Wade was sweet on this woman.
“Come and talk to us when it’s done.” Wade wasn’t taking it a bit good.
“You can move out to my place in a week if we push hard.” Tom ignored Wade and talked to Abby. “And we will push hard.”
Abby ignored both of them and looked down at Susannah.
“She’s not coming out there, Linscott. She’s got a job at the M Bar S.”
“Let me help you.” Abby swooped in and plucked Susannah off Red’s lap and began talking to her as if there wasn’t a wrangle going on behind her…about her.
“Why’re they fighting over you?” Red jerked his head at the two men.
Abby studied Red for a few moments as if he’d asked her to explain the mysteries of the universe. “I am Tom Linscott’s sister.”
“You are?” Red lowered his coffee to the table, clicking it hard.
Abby rounded the table to sit straight across from Red. “It would seem so. In fact, I believe I remember him. Of course, he was much younger.”
“No sister of mine is going to work for a living. And especially not for the Sawyers.” Tom headed for the seat beside Abby, but Wade beat him to it. Scowling, Tom went to sit on the bench next to Red, right across from Wade. Handy—now they could glare at each other full-time.
“Are you sure of this sister thing?” Red asked.
Cassie appeared with more cups and the steaming pot. “What sister thing, Red?”
“Abby and Tom Linscott are brother and sister.”
“Family.” Cassie smiled at Abby. “That’s so wonderful for both of you.”
“She’s not working for an outfit so worthless, they haven’t even gotten spring roundup done yet.”
Abby snorted.
Tom bared his teeth.
The soft sound of pouring liquid and the chatter of others gathered in Libby’s Diner weren’t enough to draw Red’s attention from this new development.
“He has a pocket watch with a picture of my parents.” Abby’s brow furrowed. “I resemble my mother closely. And I…I remembered…earlier with Wade…that my last name was Lind. But now that Tom says Linscott, yes, I know that’s right.”
“Well, I’m happy for you. Finding out you’ve got a family has to be good.”
“Good? To have more white men wanting me? I do not see how that is good.”
Red laughed.
Abby relaxed a bit from her frowning, and her eyes went to Tom, who was so busy arguing with Wade that his sister might as well have not existed.
Red had noticed the resemblance, the pure blue of their eyes, the white-blond hair. But now he saw that Tom had a lot of features similar to Abby’s—a more rugged, manly version, of course, but no one would be surprised to find out they were kin.
“Well, you’re welcome to come out to our place.” Cassie was still serving coffee, but she’d heard the end of the exchange. “I need more help with my knife throwing. Belle spent a couple of days working with me, and I’ve improved. But I can’t seem to hit the target dead-on.”
Susannah reached for the blazing-hot stream of liquid Cassie was dispensing into Abby’s cup. The two women moved together in a way music could have been put to it to keep Susannah from burning herself and still get done what they wanted.