Hunting The Gunslinger

Chapter Thirteen

Where was she? Gray got increasingly annoyed the longer it took Jessie to get back. Casey and Butch were having a good time discussing whatever it was they were talking about. Both laughed and ordered rounds of drinks, not concerned about the scene they were causing with how loud they were being. They seemed like two old friends getting together to catch up.

His anger mounted to the point that his hands shook on the table as he stared at Casey and Butch. He thought about how easy Casey’s life seemed right now—having fun in a restaurant while he and Luke were on the run, afraid Luke would be captured.

He glanced to the front door. It felt like hours had passed as he waited for Jessie to walk in. Every thought Jessie had ran across her face, and he was too good at reading her to be fooled. There was no way he’d been wrong about her intentions. She’d been sincere when she said that she would be back as soon as possible to help.

He’d come this close to capturing Casey and clearing Luke’s name. But now he was going to have to leave because something was wrong.

His eyes darted between Casey and the door, torn about what to do.

Casey wouldn’t leave town quickly, if the number of shots in the restaurant he’d done with Butch was any indication. If Gray was going to get a good chance to take Casey in, now was it. They were both distracted and drunk. Gray could take Casey by himself. He didn’t need Jessie.

But the back of his neck tingled—his instincts telling him that something was wrong. He needed to figure out what.

Swearing under his breath, he took one final look at Casey and Butch across the restaurant and left the building to find Jessie.

Nothing stood out as suspicious on his way to the inn. People were acting normally, back to ignoring him now that Jessie wasn’t at his side. The only thing that looked out of place were some tracks in the dirt road a few yards before he got to the inn, like someone had been dragged into the alley.

His heart started to pound in his chest, thumping so hard it was almost painful. Had someone taken Jessie? When she’d said she didn’t want to wear women’s clothing, he thought she was just being a pain in the ass. He didn’t really believe someone might recognize her from her wanted poster. It had been years since those had gone up, she’d told him. He should have listened to her, and now she might be in trouble because of him.

He stepped into the alleyway, and immediately noticed his pack lying on the ground. He knelt and opened it. Her old clothing was still inside. There was no way she’d leave without the clothing of Kid Aaron—if she had run away, she’d have changed first. That meant she had been taken.

Jessie had been acting strange at the restaurant, but he’d assumed it was because she was concentrating on Butch and Casey. But maybe she had known that other person in the restaurant, and it hadn’t ended well.

Or maybe someone just found her so beautiful they decided to take her. Fury rose inside his chest, making it difficult to breathe at the thought.

He followed the tracks out of the alley to a set of hoofprints that led out of town. The horse tracks were fresh and undisturbed; the person didn’t bother to hide them. If Jessie had been taken, he was certain he could track her.

He threw the valise on the ground, cursing. Dust flew up, and the clothing inside spilled out across the ground.

He was so close to getting Casey—had him right where he wanted him. But he had to find Jessie, especially since it was probably his fault.

He stuffed all the clothing back inside the valise and left to grab his horse.

He hadn’t waited too long before he’d left the restaurant to find her. She must have been gone for half an hour, max, before he’d decided to look for her. If he’d listened to his instincts earlier, he wouldn’t be riding after her now to save her. He groaned at the irony.

He just hoped that the tracks were made by the person who had taken her and not some random horse. If that were the case, it wouldn’t be long before he caught up.

It took him a little longer than he had hoped, but he found them a few hours after leaving town. He wasn’t an expert tracker and had lost the trail a few times more than he’d like to admit. Luke was better at tracking than he was, and he wished he had made the time to grab his brother before running after Jessie. But he didn’t have the time to go for help. Instead, he ran after Jessie much like how Luke acted—without thinking. And if she was taken by her father… A knot of dread filled his stomach at the thought.

The silhouette of a man riding a horse ahead caught his attention, and every instinct told him that it was Jessie and her captor. As he got closer, he saw it was only one horse and man. The man didn’t look like a bounty hunter or a gunslinger, leaving Gray to wonder what he was doing kidnapping a woman. The man was a little overweight and carried all the fat around his middle. His brown hair was peeking out under a cowboy hat, and Gray quickly took note of the six-shooter at his hip.

The man was turned toward Gray, watching as he got closer. His hand hovered over the gun.

Gray stopped his horse a few feet away from the man, keeping some distance in case things went south. They faced each other, stopped on the dirt road. There was no cover—nothing around to shelter behind. A few thin trees grew alongside the road, but they wouldn’t provide any cover at all.

Jessie was draped over the shoulders of the horse, not moving. She had to be unconscious, because if she was awake, she’d be fighting. Her arms were tied to her torso, rendering her incapable of getting away.

She stirred, but he was careful to keep his attention off her and on the man who had taken her. Gray needed to come across as aloof and unattached as he assessed the situation.

Jessie started to struggle on the saddle, kicking out at the man behind her. But he held her down with no effort by pressing his hand to her back.

“You have something that belongs to me,” Gray said, looking the man up and down.

The man scoffed. Apparently, he wasn’t even going to try to pretend he didn’t know what Gray was talking about.

Jessie stopped fighting at the sound of Gray’s voice, and tried to turn toward his voice, but was unable to.

“If you were hoping to turn her in for the reward, you’re out of luck. She’s mine now. Been paid a pretty penny by her father to come and get her. Can’t let her out of my sight, so I suggest you just go back to town now,” the man said.

Jessie started fighting in earnest, but it was no use. “Gray!”

The fear in her voice tugged at his heart, but he kept his face neutral. He wasn’t used to seeing Jessie scared, and guilt punched him in the stomach.

“Yeah, well, I would,” said the rider as his hand moved down closer toward his gun, “but I can’t let you take her. Like I said, she’s mine.”

Gray saw the flicker of a decision flash across the stranger’s face. Gray’s instincts took hold before he fully understood what was happening.

The man’s hand flew to the six-shooter, but before he could even draw, Gray pulled his revolver and fired, shooting him straight in the chest.

He was dead before he hit the ground.

The horse bucked and sprinted away. Gray raced after it, but it raced away from his grasp. Jessie desperately tried to catch herself before she fell off the horse, but she tumbled onto the ground with a sickening thud alongside the dead man.

“Jessie!”

Gray jumped off his horse and sprinted to her, panic building in his chest. His hands shook as he knelt beside her and scooped her up in his arms. She was crying, her sobs wracking his heart. He’d never heard her cry before. He cut the ties away from her body and hugged her fiercely to his chest. Her face tucked into the crook of his neck, and she grasped his shoulders with all her strength as she sobbed.

He rubbed her back, trying to calm her as he crooned sweetly at her. Gently, he held her away from him to see that she was okay.

Surprise rippled through him when he saw that she had a black eye forming from where the man must have hit her. Her eye had almost sealed shut from the swelling.

“He hit you!” Gray yelled, making her flinch a bit. If he could kill him all over again, he would.

Jessie wiped the tears from her eyes and took deep breaths. “You shot him!” She was frantically looking between him and the man.

Gray grasped her chin and turned her face to his gently, staring into her eyes that were glistening from tears. He never wanted to see her cry again.

“He hurt you.”

“You didn’t know that.” Gray could tell she was in shock from witnessing a man dying. Even though Jessie was a bounty hunter, she probably wasn’t as used to being around death as much as he was. “You couldn’t have known that when you shot him.”

“Red, a man who kidnaps you was probably going to hurt you.” The sympathy slowly drained from Gray and was replaced by exasperation. She couldn’t believe something as naive as that, right? “You’re too trusting. He was willing to kill me to take you back to your father.”

“If he was going to take me back to my father, he wouldn”t have hurt me.”

“He gave you a black eye!” He practically roared it. “You’re not arguing with me that the man wasn’t going to hurt you. He was about to shoot me. And if he was willing to shoot and kill me, who knows what he would have done to you.”

Jessie pushed herself away from him with force and stood up, glaring down at him. “Stop yelling at me!”

Gray groaned in exasperation and stood up as well. How had they gotten into a fight?

“Fine! But I only shot that man because he was about to shoot me. I did it to protect you,” he snapped. He didn’t want her to think he was a monster. He didn’t know when her opinion had started to matter, but it did. It mattered to him a lot now.

He’d killed before, and he knew he would kill again, but this had been in self-defense. His frustration mounted. He had put his life in danger to save her, and she didn’t seem to care.

“You did it to protect yourself.” She put her hands on her hips, and her brows drew together in an angry frown. “Don’t try to pretend you did anything for me.”

At least the defiance and strength had returned. He wasn’t used to seeing her vulnerable, or in tears. He completely disagreed with her, and she wasn’t being fair, but he admitted that he preferred the anger that she was now displaying.

They stared at each other in silence for a few moments, before Jessie relented and timidly asked, “So, did you get Casey?”

“No. I left him and Butch in the restaurant when you didn’t come back. I thought you had run away,” he lied. It was better for her to think he believed she was going to run away and he came after her to stop it, rather than know the truth that he was concerned about her.

Jessie bent her head and studied her hands. “You left Casey to come find me? I said I wouldn’t run away.” Guilt flashed across her face.

“Well, you can’t be trusted.”

Her head shot up and her mouth dropped open. “Apparently I can. I didn’t run away. I was taken, because you insisted I wear a dress even though I told you it was too risky.”

He didn’t need a guilt trip, and he was exhausted from this whirlwind of a conversation. One minute she was crying, sad, clinging to him in fear. The next, she was yelling at him and acting like he’d done something wrong by trying to protect her. He gave up trying to understand what she was thinking.

“I didn’t think you were serious. Years have passed since the wanted posters went up. How was I supposed to know someone would recognize you?”

“Because I told you someone would,” she gritted out. “So don’t blame me that you had to leave Casey. I didn’t ask you to save me. I did ask you to let me wear my normal clothing. If you had listened to me, we wouldn’t be in this mess.”

She blamed him for coming to rescue her? He should have left her to rot. He knew he couldn’t trust her, and she was doing nothing but prove him right.

“If I hadn’t saved you, you’d be back home, married off to an old man. Is that what you want?” He mounted his horse and turned it around toward town. “Fine. Next time you need saving, I won’t do it. Good luck to you!”

She stood staring at him, refusing to move. “Then let me go. I don’t want to spend another hour with you,” she spat.

“Just get on the horse before I leave you.” He held out his hand for her to join him. Reluctantly, she took it and got on the horse with him.

Jessie was quiet for what felt like forever, refusing to talk. The silence was thick and uncomfortable, but neither one of them wanted to break it first.

Her eye hurt badly, and it was sealed shut so she couldn’t see through it at all. She hoped that it didn’t stay like this for too long; it was going to make her job significantly harder if it did.

She couldn’t believe that Gray had come for her. She’d woken up from the first punch while the man was riding out of town with her. She had been terrified that Gray would think she’d run away, and he’d abandon her so he could bring in Casey. The fact that he had left Casey to come after her… She couldn’t believe it.

“Thank you for looking for me. I know how much it means to you to find Casey, and he was right there. You didn’t have to leave, but you did.”

He looked at her in surprise before steadying his gaze to become hard and unmoving again. “Yeah, when you didn’t return, at first I thought you’d left. But when I went back to the inn, it was obvious something had happened. I figured it’d be easier to look for you right away than to wait. Casey will probably still be there when we get back.”

“Still. I know how important it is to you to get Luke’s name cleared, and the easiest way to do that is to prove that Casey is alive. If I hadn’t been taken, you would have been able to do that. I know you didn’t have to do it, so thank you for doing it.”

He nodded but didn’t say anything further. She couldn’t tell if he was still angry about their fight, angry he’d had to come after her, or if he was just mad that she’d been taken.

She swore she’d heard anger in his voice when he was confronting the man who took her. That might mean he thought of her as more than a bounty hunter who was supposed to help him save his brother.

“I have to return to wearing my regular clothes.” She kept her tone firm, to allow no more room for discussion.

“We are about to bring in Casey anyway, and for that, we need you to go back to being Kid Aaron,” he said. She almost thought she hadn’t heard him right at first. Getting him to agree to anything was a battle. “So yes, I think it should be okay. Your father hasn’t given up on finding you, apparently.”

“Yeah, we’d only been in town for a day before I was caught.” It was shocking how fast it had happened. Maybe her father had been onto her for a while. She needed to get out of Virginia City as fast as possible. She’d been in this area way longer than she had any other. Maybe that’s what had made it easier to find her.

“Do you know who that man was?” Gray asked.

She thought about it for a moment, wracking her brain for memories from her past. “I think he is one of the men who works on the ranch next to my father’s. He wasn’t a bounty hunter. I don’t know if it was a coincidence that we were in the same town or if it means that my father is close to finding me.”

“Then we better find Casey quickly.”

“Right.”

They reached Virginia City and headed straight for the restaurant. Enough time had passed that Casey wasn’t there. Butch was nowhere to be found either. Gray and Jessie went back to the inn, and the innkeeper mentioned that Casey had left a while back. She wasn’t sure what time, but she knew he was gone.

They looked around town and asked about Casey. Everyone said the same thing the innkeeper had—he’d left town.

Damn. She thought he might at least stay in the town for the night.

They stood outside the inn, thinking about what to do next. Townspeople walked past them, about their daily lives, not paying any attention to Gray and Jessie. It was lunchtime now, and people were coming in for food after the morning’s shift. If they figured out a plan now, they’d be able to act quickly.

“What’s the nearest town to this one?” she asked. “Casey doesn’t strike me as a man who likes to be out camping if he can help it. If I had to guess, I think he’d stay in a town, in a hotel with a comfortable bed.” She was already trying to think of where he could be next.

“Livingston is about a day’s ride from here. He couldn’t have gotten far yet. Let’s go get Luke and head out.”

Jessie held her ground and didn’t move.

Gray looked at her with an expectant look on his face, waiting for her to come along with him.

“You told me if I helped you with Casey, you’d let me go,” she reminded him. “You said if we found him here, that’d be the end of it. I expect you to hold true to your word. I’m sorry that we didn’t end up capturing him, but you said if I got you this far it’d be over. It’s time for me to go on my way. I have a life I need to get back to.”

Gray paused, seeming to be struggling with words. After a few moments, he said, “You’ve done more in two days than Luke and I have been able to do in months. We need you.”

She was caught off guard by the admission. It was big for him to say that he needed her. She had a feeling he wasn’t so vulnerable with others. But she needed to think of herself and her safety. “Even though that is true, I don’t work for free, and I need to get back to work. I’ve wasted enough time trying to help you two.” She was deliberately harsh with her words, leaving no room for argument. “You know where he’s going to go next. If you can’t catch him at this point, you have bigger problems than whether I’m going to help you or not.”

She turned to go find her horse, dismissing him from her mind. But he reached his hand out and grasped her gently around the elbow. Stopping her in her tracks. Her eyes met his and she studied his face, waiting for him to say something.

“I think you’re pretty good at this,” he admitted. “Plus, you’ll get a bigger reward for Casey than you will cattle thieves. It will be much safer if I help you than if you go after a murderer on your own. If you help me bring him in, I will let you keep the reward.”

His hand still grasped her elbow gently, not letting her go.

The thought was appealing, but Jessie’s confidence was shaken at the thought of trying to find a murderer. She’d blundered the capture of Luke and Gray so badly, who was to say what might happen with Casey. She’d been found by her father. She couldn’t do what Gray was asking her to do. She wasn’t good enough.

“Finding killers isn’t for Kid Aaron. I’ll go back to finding cattle rustlers.” She gently pulled her elbow from his grasp, creating space between them.

“What? You’re kidding, right?” His voice was filled with disbelief, and she looked away, not wanting to see the disbelief that also showed in his eyes.

He was trying to manipulate her into going with him. She had to applaud his determination not to take no for an answer, but after almost being caught by her father, the whole thing was too much of a risk.

Jessie shrugged. “Shouldn’t make any difference to you. You promised to let me go. Thank you for the offer of letting me keep the reward if we find Casey, but I’ve tried my hand at bigger bounties and it’s not for me.”

She turned away to leave, but he called out to her again and she stopped.

“Red, if you want to retire, you have to do something bigger than look for cattle thieves.”

Damn him again for using what she’d told him in confidence against her. She made a mental note to stop trusting him with details of her life.

Frustrated, she splayed her hands out in front of her. “I’ll just work harder. I’ll bring in more cattle thieves, and eventually it’ll be enough. If I just get more efficient, it will work. It’s safer than looking for murderers.”

Yes. Enough cattle thief bounties and she could retire and live a life with just herself to take care. Her thoughts drifted to what it would be like to have someone else to be with. She thought of Gray—it might be nice to have a relationship that had so much trust and respect like he had with his brother. But she pushed the thought aside. She needed to find a life without gunslingers or criminals. No chance of being caught. No risks.

“That’s not how it works, and you know it. You can’t just ‘work harder’ and magically get enough money to retire.” The condescension had returned to his voice, and her anger mounted again. He had a knack for making her angry.

“Not your problem,” she said, not encouraging any further conversation.

“What if I help you with your situation, after you help us with ours.” She thought she heard a note of desperation in his voice, and it caused her to look at him.

She’d never considered that someone might want to help her. She knew the problem he was talking about was that she was being hunted as well.

“How can you help?” she scoffed. Even if he wanted to help, there was nothing he could do.

“Marry me,” he said.

Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. Marry him?

Laughter escaped before she could stop it. It was loud and heartfelt. She hadn’t laughed that hard in forever.

He reached out and clasped her hand, clutching it in both of his. “Don’t you want something better for yourself?” he asked.

She withdrew her hand from his, but before she could leave, he grabbed her by the elbow again and spun her back around. She gasped at the contact but didn’t say anything else.

“It’s just marriage,” he said. “In name only, to get your father off your case. We can live our lives separately, and nobody needs to be the wiser.”

As if it would be so easy. She wouldn’t marry someone just to solve her problem.

“I told you, I’ll only marry for love. Not because I’m running from my father,” she reminded him.

“If you won’t marry me, then we will find another way. I give you my word.”

The touch of his hand on her elbow burned her. She liked the feeling of his touch, but it clouded her ability to think clearly. She shook him off so she could think better.

Hope began to rise within her. Was it possible to actually solve her problem instead of continuing to run from it?

She shouldn’t trust him after he’d already broken his word to her. But she was so desperate to get out of her situation that maybe she needed to try putting her trust in someone.

What if he really could help her get out of this?

“Okay,” she said after a few moments.

Gray grinned, a truly happy smile that went to his eyes. She liked it better than the cocky grins she was used to seeing from him.

It would be worth the risk. Having someone on her side helping her was something she’d never tried before. Something about Gray made her feel like he could help. She wasn’t sure how, but if she had his help, she stood a chance.

“We bring in Casey, and you help me,” she repeated.

“Yes.” He was firm and confident in his answer.

“Let’s go get Luke.”