Chapter Twenty-One
She was going to kill him. Elizabeth tugged on her gloves, adjusted her bonnet, and grimaced as her corset bit into her side. Killing Asa was certainly justified for him forcing her to wear the contraption again, but, today she was going to kill Asa for slipping off the ranch and sneaking into town like a thief with Cougar and Aaron. Theirs was a partnership based on honesty. If he thought she was going to let him sully it with sly protective measures, he had another think coming.
She opened the door. Cold wind nipped her nose. She sighed, unpinned her wrap and grabbed her wool pelisse. Just as she reached to close the door, she paused and reconsidered. A woman had to be prepared. After retrieving and closing her reticule, she marched down the steps and got into the buggy. Willoughby snorted his protest at being out on a day like today.
“Take it up with Asa!” she informed him as she snapped the reins over his back. “Right now, you just get me to town.”
He plodded across the yard. She sighed. At this rate, she’d be too late for dinner, let alone to talking sense into her husband. Clint came out of the barn. He removed his hat and asked, “Heading into town now?”
“Yes, if I can get Willoughby to pick up the pace.”
His grin was a smooth motion of his lips. As free and easy as his personality. He slapped Willoughby on the haunch. “He does hate the cold.”
“He’ll have to get over it.”
“I imagine he’ll see it your way.”
She sighed. “I hope. Thanks for hitching him up.”
“No problem.” His expression became serious. His hat twirled in the lazy rhythm she associated with the man. He watched it spin. It loped through three revolutions before he said, “Boss man was kind of funny this morning. Seemed almost like he was saying his goodbyes instead of good morning. Boys and I were wondering if you planned on bringing him back with you?”
“Kicking or screaming, in one piece or four, I’m bringing him back.”
He looked up. His mouth twitched while his eyes crinkled at the corners. “Begging your pardon, ma’am, but Old Sam said I was to ask if you made any promises, whether it was Miss Coyote speaking or Mrs. MacIntyre?”
She straightened her shoulders and tightened her grip on the reins. She looked up at the Guardians and let her gaze sweep across the plains. Wherever she looked, it was Coyote land. Bought with blood and sacrifice. Not the least of which was her own, but there wasn’t going to be any more sacrifice for this land. She was going to keep it, but, through brains, not sacrifice. There’d been enough of that. In her life as well as Asa’s.
As she brought her gaze back to the man before her, she identified the strange feeling she’d been trying to place for weeks. Confidence. As if waiting for her acknowledgment to take its rightful place, it sank into her bones and spread its strength through her body until it reached her voice. She smiled and looked down the road to town. “You tell Old Sam I’m going hunting and I’ll not be coming back empty-handed.”
Clint went absolutely still, another first, as he stared at her intently. “And who’d be doing the hunting, ma’am?”
“Why myself, Mr. Clint.” She snapped the reins and clucked Willoughby into motion. “Who else would you be expecting?”
He resettled his hat on his head. As she passed by, he gave her a slight smile and a nod. “I’ll be happy to pass that message along, ma’am.”
“Thank you.”
* * * * *
Her confidence lasted until she got to town and saw the crowd in front of the saloon. Then it transformed into exasperation. What had those fools done now?
She pulled the buggy up in front of the bank. Everyone was so intent on the confrontation going on, they took no notice of her. Deciding if she waited for someone to lend her a hand, she’d be frozen to the seat until spring, she gathered her skirts and hopped down from the buggy. Her right foot twisted in a frozen rut as she hit the ground. She righted herself, checked the angle of her hat and marched through the crowd in time to hear the sheriff say, “Those are mighty harsh accusations, MacIntyre. You got any proof?”
“You’ve got my word.”
That was Asa’s voice. Hard, rigid, and packed with enough conviction to set tongues wagging. A large set of shoulders in a black coat blocked her view. She jabbed the man in the back with her finger. He shifted but didn’t move.
“I’m sorry you’re not able to pull the ranch out of trouble, but I assure you, I have nothing to do with any of this.” Aaron’s voice was equally easy to recognize. It was also as confident as Asa’s.
“Uh-huh.” The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end in warning. The men had left the range as tight as coons at a garbage pile, and now Asa was tossing out those provoking Uh-huhs like a man with a twelve-prong buck in his sights. What could have happened?
“Tell me, Aaron.” Asa continued. “When are you planning on driving your cattle over to the railroad?”
“You surely can’t blame me for making a profit?” Aaron asked. “The rail crew has to eat. If the Rocking C isn’t going to make the profit, I don’t see why the Bar B shouldn’t.”
“Seems funny that you’re right there ready to fill the hole.”
That low drawl belonged to McKinnely. She knew he had to be here somewhere. Had he and Asa hatched a plot against Aaron between them? She poked the man in front of her again. She might as well be poking a wall for all the attention he paid her.
“I gotta agree, Aaron,” the sheriff muttered uncomfortably. “It’s mighty convenient that MacIntyre’s been having these problems and the one picking up the profit is you.”
Elizabeth took out her hat pin and applied it to the man in front of her. On a howl, he got the point. She broke through to the center of the crowd in time to see Aaron hold his hands up in a helpless gesture.
“The Bar B is the second biggest ranch in these parts. We’ve worked closely with the Rocking C in the past. Who better to step in and fill the hole? Would you rather have an outsider profit?”
He had a point. A very, very good point.
“Elizabeth!” She winced at Asa’s bellow. As one, all eyes fell upon her.
Mustering all the calm she could manage, she re-secured her hat with the pin and gave Asa her best wifely smile. “Hello, Mr. MacIntyre.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I told you I’d be along.” She smiled at the other ladies present. “You know how men are. Always in such a rush, there’s never enough time for a woman to get herself properly together.”
Several of the ladies nodded in sympathy. A couple of the spinsters reserved their opinions. From the frowns on their faces, she suspected they’d seen her apply the hat pin to the undertaker’s posterior. Rats!
“What in the heck are you up to?” Asa asked.
He needn’t sound so suspicious, she thought. “I was just checking out the commotion.”
“Check it out from the ranch.”
She smiled at him patiently. “But then I’d miss it all.”
His response was a growl. Aaron stepped to her side protectively. “I, for one, am glad you’re here, Elizabeth. Your husband is operating under a misunderstanding.”
She looked into Aaron’s handsome face and kept her expression to simple curiosity. “He is?”
Sheriff Mulden stepped forward. He was an aging bear of a man who was shy with every woman except the Widow Foster. With her, he fought like a dog protecting the last bone on Earth. He tipped his hat. “Miss Coyote.”
“Mrs. MacIntyre,” she and Asa corrected in unison.
The poor sheriff flushed to the white of his hairline. “I’m right sorry for the mistake, Mrs. MacIntyre.”
“It’s perfectly natural, Sheriff Mulden. Mr. MacIntyre and I haven’t been married all that long.” She had to think of the scandalous things she’d done to her husband last night to create the proper maidenly blush.
“Yes, well, that’s part of the problem. Mr. Ballard is an upstanding member of the community. Mr. MacIntyre, who casts a mighty long shadow himself, is making accusations against Mr. Ballard, which are, quite frankly, hard to believe.”
“What sort of accusations?”
“Mr. MacIntyre is accusing Mr. Ballard of running the Rocking C into the ground.”
Damn. She turned to Aaron. “How did Asa come to these conclusions?”
“I assure you, I have no idea.”
She stared into his blue eyes and wanted to believe him. For all the years he’d been her only friend, for all the childhood dreams she’d attached to him, she wanted to believe what he said, but there was the twitch in his eyelid as he met her gaze. He was lying.
“I don’t understand.”
Aaron patted her hand while Asa glared daggers. “There’s no reason you should.”
Elizabeth thanked Aaron politely for his concern, then wiggled her way back into the fray with a simple, “But it appears I must if we want to resolve this unfortunate situation.”
“Yeah,” someone said from the crowd. A quick glance told her it was the undertaker, looking to get his own back for her poking him with the pin. She sighed. There were days when it didn’t pay to get out of bed.
“Let’s hear Miss Coyote’s side of this.”
“That’s Mrs. MacIntyre,” Asa corrected over her head, ignoring the undertaker. Sheriff Mulden showed no such inclination.
“Now, John,” the Sheriff counseled, “don’t go taking sides. Right now, we’ve just got us a misunderstanding.”
“There’s no misunderstanding,” Asa said, his low drawl carrying. “For the last couple of years, Aaron Ballard has been doing his level best to drive the Rocking C into the ground so he can pick up the pieces.”
Asa shifted his weight, and Elizabeth saw he had his guns unstrapped. Good God, was this a charade or wasn’t it?
“What are you saying?” she gasped, leaning against Aaron with what she hoped was proper, ladylike distress. She needed to stall until she figured this out, and playing stupid was the one gambit wide open to a lady.
“I’m saying that when a man starts taking advantage of women, rustling cattle, and poisoning wells, someone has to belly up to the bar and call a halt.”
Aaron stopped patting her hand halfway through Asa’s statement. He looked around, and donned the superiority he wore like a cloak. Elizabeth had seen him do it all his life when he wanted to gain the upper hand. It was a very impressive maneuver in a man of his stature. She was so caught up in her admiration that she almost toppled when Aaron took a step to the right.
Aaron caught her, supported her while she found her balance, and then returned to the argument. “And this is what you’re doing?” he questioned Asa. He took another step to the right, motioned to the audience surrounding them and continued, “Out here in the street? In front of the whole town? ‘Bellying up to the bar’?”
Asa showed no sign he shared Aaron’s distaste for such lack of propriety. He merely smiled, leaned back against the doorjamb, hooked one foot over the other and nodded. “Would appear so.”
Aaron turned to Elizabeth. “I’m sorry you have to suffer this public humiliation, Elizabeth.”
“She wouldn’t be suffering anything,” Asa drawled, “if she’d kept her keister where I put it.”
The crowd gasped at his disrespect. Elizabeth frowned. Did the man think to send her flouncing off in a huff? If so, he had another think coming. “Why are you doing this in the middle of town?”
“That snake in the grass you’re cozying up to is dead set on having the Rocking C. While you and everyone else in this town might think he’s a lily-white character, I know him for what he is.” He ended the statement with a wave to her right. Cozying up to? Aaron was sidestepping faster than she was breathing. She followed the motion and had to swallow a gasp when she saw Jimmy, not three feet from Aaron.
“And that would be?” Aaron asked Asa with a superior smile.
Asa’s smile reflected the same arrogant superiority. “Why, a back-stabbing, ruthless, yellow-bellied S.O.B, of course.”
“There’s no need for name-calling.” Sheriff Mulden interjected.
If he’d hoped to head off this confrontation, Elizabeth could have told him to save his breath. When Asa got a bee in his bonnet, there was no stopping him.
Aaron was no better as he said, “I’d be glad to drop the subject, Sheriff, but Mr. MacIntyre seems reluctant to allow it.”
Asa pushed his hat back and shrugged. “Go figure.”
This was getting ugly. Elizabeth turned to Asa.
“You have no proof,” she reminded him. Without proof, they couldn’t do anything except embarrass themselves. She stared at him, willing him to let it go until they did have it. Asa didn’t seem to be getting the point.
“I have enough to know there’s no way you’ll be safe until he’s six feet under.”
“That’s pretty harsh words,” Sheriff Mulden said.
“It’s a harsh world.” Asa pushed away from the building. He encompassed the crowd in his gaze as he continued. “Of course, I wouldn’t have to dig up false proof against Ballard if Jimmy here would just confess.”
Never at a loss for words, Jimmy’s “You’re crazy!” was as immediate as his bluster.
Elizabeth shook her head. He would have been better served by making a run for it, because, while he was sputtering, Aaron moved in and locked his arms behind his back.
His “Hello, Jimmy,” was eminently cordial.
Red-faced and struggling, Jimmy demanded an explanation.
“Yeah,” Sheriff Mulden echoed. “I think that might be timely, seeing as you started by accusing Mr. Ballard and now have this one hog-tied.”
Asa pushed away from the wall. Elizabeth lost sight of him when someone jostled her. She surged forward with the crowd, trying to get a good look.
“I apologize for that, Sheriff. Needed to pass a little time while I waited.”
“Your idea of passing time is getting town folks worked up?” Sheriff Mulden didn’t sound pleased.
“He’s goddamned loco,” Jimmy protested.
Sheriff Mulden didn’t appreciate the interruption as evidenced by his scowl. “I’ll thank you to remain quiet, Jimmy. I’m basing my listening on how many times I’ve had the pleasure of a body’s company in my jail. Those that don’t disturb my Saturday nights get first shot.”
A titter of uneasy laughter rippled through the crowd. Jimmy was a regular at the tiny jailhouse. Sheriff Mulden turned back to Asa. “You said you were waiting on something, son?”
“Yeah.”
Elizabeth waited with the same breathless anticipation as everyone else.
Sheriff Mulden shifted his feet. “You planning on getting to the point before lunch?”
“You might want to hurry it along,” Aaron agreed.
She couldn’t see, but Elizabeth bet the reason for the tension in his voice was because Jimmy was objecting to being restrained. Bullies rarely enjoyed being subjected to the treatment they handed out.
“He was waiting on me,” Cougar called from somewhere behind her.
Like a scene from the bible, the crowd parted. He passed within two bodies of Elizabeth, carrying a branding iron, a bag of something, and an aura of grim purpose.
She followed his progress until he stopped in front of Asa, who asked, “That what I think it is?”
Cougar twitched the bag. “If you’re talking about this, it’s pure poison. The kind a man might want to drop in a watering hole if he’d a mind to do some damage.”
The crowd’s united gasp stirred a little breeze. The person on her left jostled Elizabeth again. She stuck out her elbow in self-defense, but she didn’t take her eyes from the drama unfolding.
Sheriff Mulden pointed to the other objects in Cougar’s hand. “Could I see that brandin’ stick?”
Cougar gave it a toss. The sheriff caught it. He studied it briefly, then frowned. “Where’d you boys find this?”
Cougar jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Stashed under Jimmy’s bedroll at the hotel.”
Speculation ran rampant through the crowd, starting with a murmur and rolling into an annoying roar that drowned out everything but bits and pieces of the conversation between the Sheriff, Asa, Aaron and Cougar, but Jimmy’s howls of innocence kept overpowering the parts she really wanted to hear. And what they didn’t drown, the crowd’s repetitions did. The best she could determine, the men were doing the same as the crowd, indulging themselves with drawn out speculation when the person with the answers sat right before them.
Finally, unable to contain her frustration, she called out, “Oh, for heaven’s sake, someone ask him why!”
The crowd chose that moment to fall silent, leaving everyone in no doubt as to who’d given the order. Well, spit!
The reactions of the men concerned were predictable. The Sheriff and Aaron frowned repressively at her. Cougar wore that halfcocked grin, and Asa merely offered, “I guess we could do that.” He said it like she was taking all the fun out of his day.
“If you don’t mind, son,” Sheriff Mulden interrupted, “I’ll be handling the questioning.”
Asa surrendered his role of interrogator with an open gesture of his hands and a nod.
The sheriff accepted the invitation and turned to Jimmy. “You got an explanation for all this?”
“I ain’t got no explanation for nothing.” Elizabeth still couldn’t manage a glimpse of his face, but his voice sure sounded sullen. “I don’t know how that stuff got under my bed, but I sure as hell didn’t poison good beef and didn’t shoot nobody.”
The crowd shifted to get a better view. Elizabeth didn’t move with them, held up by the disgust in Jimmy’s voice as he talked about poisoning good beef. It was genuine. Elizabeth knew it as surely as she knew she was going to have a raw spot from the darned corset. She bounced on her toes, trying to get Asa’s attention, but the undertaker took advantage of her dawdling and moved in front of her, leaving her with a bird’s eye view of his black wool jacket. She fingered her hat pin, and scouted for a parting in the crowd.
“You saying you didn’t run off any cattle or change any brands either?” Sheriff Mulden asked.
“Or terrify my wife?”
That was Asa’s voice. She’d recognize that low drawl anywhere, and, from the careful way he was shaping his words, he was furious.
She shifted to the right, but the opening she’d been aiming for closed up as Jimmy shouted, “I branded a few cattle, scattered a few cows, but that’s all.”
The precisely spoken “I don’t think so” belonged to Aaron.
“All right. I hassled Miss Coyote, but only until she married up with him. After that, there wasn’t much point.”
Now that, Elizabeth thought, was an interesting way to phrase it. The subtlety was lost on Asa. “Bothering my wife was a huge mistake.”
“We’re already square on that!” Jimmy hollered. The edge of desperation in his voice made her wonder if Asa was advancing on him.
“If we want to nail this,” Cougar jumped in, “I got Clint fetching the railroad man.”
Clint must have ridden like the devil to get here before she did. She wondered if he’d been given the job of watching her again and, as soon as she’d left the ranch, he’d headed for the shortcut she couldn’t take in the buckboard.
“What good will that do?” Sheriff Mulden asked, interrupting her speculation.
“He can verify who told him Rocking C cattle were diseased,” Aaron pointed out.
The crowd shifted, and, for a brief moment, Elizabeth had a glimpse of Jimmy, Aaron, and half of Asa’s face. Aaron was having all he could do to hold Jimmy. Asa was wearing the quirk-of-the-lips smile that boded ill, and Jimmy—well, he just looked desperate.
“I didn’t talk to no railroad man!” Jimmy hollered. “Let go of me, damn you.”
“I think we’ll wait until Mr. MacIntyre’s witness gets here before we do that, son,” Sheriff Mulden said congenially.
Elizabeth bounced on her toes again. She poked the undertaker, but he didn’t move. Since there was no hope of catching Asa’s eye, she settled for shouting, “Ask him why there wasn’t any point in hassling me after I married Asa!”
“Yeah!” someone shouted. She thought it might be Millicent. “Why was marrying up with her so important?”
The person behind her bumped Elizabeth again. She spun around to give him or her a piece of her mind and froze. Brent!
“I can answer that for you,” Brent said to Elizabeth only, yanking her to him so hard, her hat pin went flying out of her hand. “I was paying him good money to drive you into my arms.” He tossed her up and around, slapping his hand over her mouth, cutting off her cry.
She glanced around frantically for help, but her previous hesitation had left her at the back of the crowd. Unless Millicent really did have eyes in the back of her head, no one was going to notice Brent carrying her off, which was what she thought he intended from the way he was backing up.
Her heart pounded in her ribs, leaving a thundering pulse in her ears. She’d been right! Brent was the mastermind behind this. He’d used Jimmy, Aaron, and herself, but the plan and its implementation were all his. She bit down on his fingers just as Jimmy hollered, “Brent Doyle asked me to scare her so she’d look favorably on him. He wanted to speed up the courtship!”
Brent hissed and shook his hand free. He wasn’t as bulky as Asa, but he was lightning quick. Her “why” was smothered before she could get it past her throat. So was her scream as he hauled her back against him, crushing the corset into her waist. It turned out she didn’t need to scream to get the crowd’s attention. As soon as Jimmy yelled, they’d started searching for the new face in this drama. In another one of those biblical moments, the crowd shifted, searched, and then parted when they found their quarry.
For the first time, she had a clear view of Asa’s expression. It wasn’t encouraging. Along with the dismayed realization as to what was going on, there was also a certain amount of accusation. No doubt, to his way of thinking, her being here was tantamount to walking up to Brent and inviting him to take her hostage. She met his accusation with a glare of her own.
“Let her go, gambler.” The drawl was low, more like a growl than speech. Elizabeth had never seen Asa so cold. So dangerous.
Cougar’s “You can’t hope to get out of here,” all but covered Aaron’s “You’re a dead man.”
Brent shook his hand free of her teeth and countered, “Like hell I can’t.”
Taking a desperate breath, Elizabeth redirected her glare to Aaron. “This isn’t the time to be making threats.”
“You can think of a better one?” Asa asked conversationally, one eyebrow winging up, shifting his position so he was clear of the door and his hands hovered near his guns.
She felt the cold muzzle of a gun press against her temple. She swallowed carefully. “Yes.”
She tightened her grip on her reticule, closed her eyes, and prayed.
“Get back!” Brent warned the crowd, twisting her about as he made sure everyone saw the gun. He switched his grip to her throat, pulling her back against his chest. He waved the gun at Asa before snapping it back against her temple.
“You ruined everything,” Brent snarled at Asa, who stood, gun drawn, his face a calm mask of determination. “I would have had the ranch, my revenge, and Elizabeth if you hadn’t come along.”
“You most certainly would not,” Elizabeth protested, testing Brent’s hold but finding no weakness. “I don’t care how desperate I became; I never would have stayed with a no-account wastrel like you!”
“Shut up, Elizabeth!” Aaron and Asa bellowed simultaneously.
While she couldn’t see Aaron’s face, Asa’s eyes were flat gray with tension and worry. Brent’s forearm around her throat made it hard to talk, but she wanted this point clear. “I am not shutting up. This is my reputation the man is smearing!”
“I’m going to smear a hell of a lot more than your reputation if you don’t shut up,” Brent growled.
No he wouldn’t. She knew that. Not until they were clear of the crowd at least. She gathered the cord on her reticule and closed her mouth. Brent started backing away. Behind him, the crowd must have parted because he didn’t slow down. She stumbled once and he dragged her until she found her feet. She twisted, but accomplished nothing more than losing her balance and getting dragged again.
“For God’s sake, Elizabeth,” she heard Asa call. “Don’t fight.”
She ignored him and tried pulling Brent’s arm from her throat. She might as well have been tugging on a tree. As Asa had pointed out before, her weight was nothing to a man.
She checked the crowd for signs of rescue and found no comfort there. All the men had guns drawn and were searching for a shot. Unfortunately, few of those guns were in sober hands. The best she could hope for was that some drunken idiots wouldn’t let off a shot by mistake.
She tried to tangle her feet in Brent’s. “If you don’t lay off, you’re going to meet the same end as your mother.” He hauled her higher, choking her in the process.
Time stopped. Hardly caring about her lack of breath, she wheezed, “My mother?”
“She wouldn’t cooperate either. Killed herself when Coyote Bill caught me at the ranch. Stupid bitch fought me for the gun.” As he spoke, he continued to drag her uncompromisingly backwards, toward his safety. Toward her death.
“Why?” She had to know. Even if she died, she had to know.
He shrugged against her back, then she felt his muscles pull as he scanned behind him. “I would have had the ranch years ago. All I had to do was seduce your mother, kill your father, and I could have married into the best piece of property this side of the Mississippi.” He stumbled on a rock. The gun rapped her on the temple; pain slammed her eyes closed, but not her ears. “A place like that could fund a man for a good many years.”
In her mind’s eye, she pictured her gentle mother’s face. She remembered her father’s devastation upon her death. The suspicions she’d harbored against him. “You killed my mother because you didn’t want to work?”
“No.” Grunting, he picked up the pace, dragging her around a water trough. “I killed her because she didn’t have the sense to appreciate what I offered.”
“My mother was a very smart woman.”
She whispered a prayer to her father, asking for forgiveness for thinking he had killed her mother, before she opened her eyes.
The first thing she saw was Asa. He was behind Cougar and Aaron, staying back, but following. Waiting. Watching. She met his gaze through the dust kicking up at their passage, and shivered. The man she was looking at bore no resemblance to the easy-going man she’d married. The man she saw now was pure warrior. This was the man who would follow her to the grave if they allowed it.
A strange calm settled over her. “Let me go, Brent.”
“In a minute.”
“Now.”
“You never did as you were told.” He made it sound like a failing.
He swore as he tripped in a rut. She could smell the acrid sweat of his fear. Or maybe it was hers. There were a couple of things she was sure of in her life. One of them was she wasn’t prepared to die since she’d just discovered how much fun life could be. The other was she was done being tossed about like dandelion fluff on the capricious breeze of a man’s whim.
“I’m not going with you, Brent.”
“You might want to wait until you’re asked,” he grunted as her weight began to tell on his strength.
“I mean now,” she said calmly, sliding her hand into her reticule. “I’m not going any further with you now. You have to let me go.”
“Not likely.” He yanked viciously on her throat, hauling her to the left. “Seeing as how you’ve made a habit of ruining everything, I’ll be making the decisions.”
“No. You won’t,” she said softly before letting her body twist into his, closing her eyes, and pulling the trigger on the derringer she’d hidden in her purse.