Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
Sheila was not taking their threats lightly. These were hard, tough men.
The three of them had been riding for some time—Wendell in front, then her, then the despicable Dodger behind her. The sky in the east was brightening, but there were times in the last few hours when she wondered if she’d live to see another dawn.
After they took her prisoner, she and Wendell had waited and waited for Dodger’s return.
It seemed like forever for him to come back with a horse from the livery stable, and the older man had stood fuming by a front window the entire time.
And with every passing minute, his hawkish face grew darker and angrier.
The duster she’d worn out to Marlowe’s ranch was hanging on a peg by the front door.
While they waited, she asked if Wendell would mind if she wore it—the night air being so cold.
She’d hoped he’d unbind her hands, but he didn’t.
The villain only yanked it from the peg, threw it around her shoulders, and buttoned it roughly at her neck. He was not going to untie her.
As the heavy cloth settled around her, Sheila thought unwillingly of the ride to Caleb Marlowe’s ranch.
Of moonlight, gunfire, and the man who had frightened her, mostly because he had not tried to be reassuring.
He had simply been capable. At the time, she had mistaken that for coldness. Now she was not so certain.
When the vile younger man finally showed up with a horse for her, Wendell practically dragged her out to it.
He hoisted her up into the saddle and snapped orders at Dodger to fetch the surgical instruments and supplies.
The tension between them was obvious, though, and Sheila didn’t want to get in the middle of any trouble.
Wendell had not minced words. If she made so much as a sound as the three of them rode out of Elkhorn, he’d shoot her dead.
If she tried to make a break for it, he’d shoot her dead.
After all, he said, the things they really needed were in that valise and that case.
If he had to shoot her, he told her, Doc would never be the wiser.
She’d decided she had no choice for the moment but to go along willingly. The threats were real.
But going along was not the same as surrendering. She told herself that over and over as they rode through the sleeping town. She would watch. She would listen. She would remember.
When they headed east out of town, no lamplight showed in any window.
No one was out and about on the sidewalks, except in front of the saloons farther down Main Street.
But she had no illusions concerning the raucous, drunken men reeling about in the distance.
Even if she’d screamed at the top of her lungs, not one of them would have turned a bleary eye in the direction of the sound.
Not one of them would have come and rescued her from these two villainous rogues.
They rode in silence, the bright light of the setting moon casting shadows on the road in front of them. An hour or so outside of town, Wendell led them off the Denver road onto what seemed to be a little-used trail.
Sheila chided herself bitterly for putting herself in this position. She’d been a fool believing Wendell’s story about his injured wife. What made her believe him? How could she have simply put the shotgun down?
If Wendell had revealed his true colors at that moment, though, could she have shot him?
She knew, even now, that firing that gun would have been problematic.
But the other one? In spite of her feelings about killing another human being, she had a strong sense that she could have pulled the trigger and blasted Dodger.
He’d terrified her. But Wendell had intervened, putting himself in front of her.
And the way he’d presented himself was far less threatening than his partner.
Out on his ranch, Marlowe told her he’d killed those rustlers in defense of himself and his property.
It had been much the same situation for her.
But if her conscience had stricken her after the first death and she hadn’t been able to fire that gun again, what would have happened to her?
She shuddered at the thought of what Dodger would have done to her if he had her alone.
For the first time, she understood Caleb’s grim response to her questions that night.
Violence was not theoretical here. It was not something discussed at a polite distance over newspapers and drawing-room tea.
It arrived in doorways and dark roads and gave a person only seconds to decide what exactly was required to survive.
Now, with the sun beginning to edge up over a forested mountain ridge, with the relative law and order of the town far behind her, Sheila knew she was in greater danger than she’d ever faced in her life.
“Get going, you prissy bitch,” Dodger called out sharply from behind her.
It was not easy for Sheila to control the horse on this trail. Her hands were still bound in front of her, and the saddle was anything but comfortable. She urged the horse on with a light kick of her heels, but the change was negligible.
It was astounding how drastically her life had changed in a matter of one month. Back in New York, she’d found herself in a dreadful predicament. Her grandfather, J. T. Spencer, had suggested she should accept the offer of marriage from his financial partner.
Suggested was too kind a word. Her grandfather had given her an ultimatum. She would marry Rudd Hughes. Period. There was no alternative in the matter.
The idea of such a union was ridiculous.
True, at twenty-five years of age, she was getting a little old for marriage, but she had no desire to marry the man.
Mr. Hughes was a widower in his fifties.
He had daughters older than Sheila. Even if he didn’t look like a troll in fine clothing, the age difference made the match absurd.
Then, there was the obvious fact that she didn’t have any affection for the man. She’d seen him, spent time with him socially, and was a friend of one of his daughters. She’d witnessed firsthand how poorly he treated his own family. No, it wouldn’t do.
Sheila could never consider such a marriage that was so obviously intended to unite their financial holdings under one roof. But to stay in New York meant defying her grandfather, and he was a man accustomed to having his own way.
J. T. Spencer had grown up in a fairly well-to-do old New York family, but his real fortune came during the Civil War.
Sheila had only recently learned the details of it.
Through political connections in Washington, he’d managed to have his bank syndicated at the outset of hostilities.
The federal government needed money to fund the war.
Acting as an agent of the Treasury Department, he had used his bank in the effort to sell war bonds to the general public.
In the process, he’d accumulated substantial wealth for himself.
After the war, he partnered with Mr. Hughes, a man keen on investing in railroads, mining companies, and heavy industry. The two of them had been making a fortune together ever since.
Sheila never realized it until a few months ago, but as the sole heir to the Spencer family wealth, she had been educated and raised specifically to secure her grandfather’s financial holdings for future generations.
Presented with his demand that she marry his partner, she’d found there was no way to reject the proposal. Not if she wanted to remain with her grandparents in New York.
She had few places to turn for help. Her mother had died young, and her father had left her to be brought up in the house of her mother’s parents.
She’d made her decision practically overnight.
She left New York, the only life she’d ever known, and boarded a train west. In Denver—a bustling, riotous city—she climbed into a stagecoach bound for Elkhorn and her father.
And here she was, in the wilds of the frontier, kidnapped by dangerous outlaws. But no matter what happened, she hadn’t one single regret about walking away from the future her grandfather had arranged for her.
That realization steadied her. She had not come all this way merely to be afraid. In leaving New York, she had chosen her own path. She would have to keep choosing it, hour by hour, breath by breath, until she found a way free.
A sharp cry startled her. Looking up, she saw two ravens harassing a hawk just above them. She took a deep breath, pushing the thought of her past behind her. The birds disappeared into the trees.
Here, on this mountain trail, there was a comfortable coolness in the air.
Except for the dull, clopping thuds of their horses’ hooves, the squeak of leather, and the occasional jibe from Dodger, it was peaceful and quiet.
They passed beneath bulging stone ledges and soaring bluffs, through evergreen forests and groves of trees just opening their leaves, through open meadows of silver grass.
It was all so different from the smoke and the smells and the constant noise of the city she’d left behind.
It was beautiful, this dangerous country. Beautiful enough to break a heart and strong enough to swallow it whole.
Sheila had lost any hope of finding her way back to Elkhorn, if she were ever able to break away from her captors. She only knew, from the direction of the bright sun, rising above distant peaks, that they were continuing to ride to the north and east.
The sight of her father’s medical leather bag and his surgical case, hanging securely from Wendell’s horse ahead of her, did provide some comfort to Sheila. He had to be alive, or these two wouldn’t bother to bring his things back with them.
She no longer imagined that it was for Wendell’s wife, however. She could only think it was one of their outlaw friends who’d been injured. Whatever role they intended that she play in their nasty game, though, remained a mystery.