Chapter 19
I’m waiting in the front parlor for him when he finally comes down the stairs in the very late morning, a nearly frigid cup of coffee in my left hand and a newspaper in my right.
I pretend I don’t see him, but I know he sees me and, by the looks of it, has half a mind to turn back around before he decides to descend the last few stairs.
Based on the bags under his eyes and the several nicks on his chin from his morning shave, I’m guessing he could have used a few more hours of sleep. And, honestly, I would be happy to help him sleep forever if it weren’t for the fact that he’s still needed. Apparently.
“Good morning,” I say cheerily as Maddock approaches. My mood lighter without me even having to pretend, because last night, unlike him, I had one of the best night’s sleep I’ve had in a very long while. “You want some coffee? It’s strong stuff.”
“No,” he says, still looking a bit green under the collar. “Think I’ll wait.”
“Perhaps a seat then?” I offer, gesturing toward the extremely uncomfortable-looking wingback chair across from me. “To catch your breath?”
Maddock frowns, but he sits, though I suspect it’s mainly because he’s not sure he can keep his feet.
“Appreciate you…” he starts, then takes a deep inhale through his nose.
“Appreciate you helping me to my room last night. I think…I think the bartender might have been pouring a bit too liberally there toward the end.”
I shake my head, clicking my tongue in sympathy, even though we both know the most liberal pours last night came directly from the flask inside his coat. “Sore head?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe.” Maddock closes his eyes, but opens them again to see my expression as he adds, “Can hardly remember a thing from the last few hands.”
“Ah, well,” I say with a shrug, not at all surprised he’s choosing to plead his ignorance rather than admit his responsibility. “Might be a blessing. I’m not sure there is much you’d want to recall.”
There it is. That twitch of his eye. That tiny little indication that he very much does recall.
“Had me wondering if we were going to make the papers,” I continue with a laugh. “Can see the headlines now…” I raise a hand, pretending to place the letters in the air. “The Bad Draw: How Maddock Douglas Was—”
“Would’ve been fine,” Maddock interrupts, abandoning his amnesia alibi with alarming speed. “Wasn’t planning on actually shooting.”
“I know,” I say, making my voice soothing.
“I know your character, but some people do tend to jump to conclusions. Especially when weapons get involved. And add a famous gunslinger to the mix?” I shake my head.
“I believe you were right, though. Plenty of people in the bar probably would’ve liked to see him in action. ”
“Of course they would,” he says, brushing off his pants while he sits as though he can brush the thought away, too.
However, I know I successfully baited him when he says, “Especially when it would be one of the only times he actually had a fitting opponent. Someone to truly test him shot for shot.”
“Of course,” I say, repeating his words back to him, because in the end, that’s all he really wants. “Not that you were actually planning to shoot…”
“No, no. Not then,” Maddock agrees, and I don’t miss the way he doesn’t deny the scenario so much as the timing. “But as you said, people get overexcited over nothing. Clayton calling for the sheriff…I won’t forget it, I’ll tell you that much.”
“Did he?” I ask, playing ignorant while knowing that even if Clayton had given the directive, Arty had been the one to make a go for the jail.
He’d divulged as much to me after Maddock was back in his room, wondering if he should come clean.
I’d told him that he should take it to his grave and that I’d make sure Clayton did the same.
And I will, though I doubt I’ll have to do much convincing. Seems a good man…
“There’s one thing I can’t figure out though,” Maddock continues. “No matter how many times I think about it.”
“Oh?” I ask, taking another sip of cold coffee and immediately regretting it, though I’m careful not to let it show on my face. “And what might that be?”
“My gun,” he says, frowning and staring down at his folded hands in his lap before he looks back at me. “I’m certain I had it on me when I walked in. But then all of a sudden…it’s nowhere to be found.”
“Was in your room, wasn’t it?” I supply, reacquainting myself with the familiar sensation of trying to balance on an exceptionally narrow line. “Last night when you got back, you found it on your desk. Or don’t you remember?”
“I remember all right,” he says simply. “I remember having it on me in the saloon.”
“How strange.” I lean back in my chair, hands resting over my chest as I mirror his posture. “But surely you don’t think someone took it, do you? Would be extremely polite of them to then leave it in your room for you if they did.”
His forehead creases in frustrated thought. “Suppose it would. But I think I’ll ask Arty about it in any case.”
The genuine surprise must show on my face, because he rolls his eyes and chuckles. “Beginning to think you must have been the one to overindulge last night. You didn’t notice that either? That he disappeared right before my gun did?”
Damn. I’d been so focused on shielding Arty from blame for the sheriff that it hadn’t even occurred to me that Maddock would think to blame him for the missing pistol.
“Arty isn’t exactly…he doesn’t exactly seem like a seasoned criminal,” I start to say, hoping to let what Maddock has witnessed with his own eyes speak for what he didn’t. “Do you really think he’d be able to? To steal it without being noticed? From you of all people?”
Maddock’s chest puffs up at the purposefully implied compliment, and the inflated egos of less-than-mediocre men should truly be studied.
“Ordinarily, I would say there’d be no chance.
That kid can barely tack his horse, but I’d been hard on him earlier to try to help him learn.
Then after, I’d been so focused on making sure Aiden didn’t do anything rash, that he didn’t hurt someone. ”
“That Aiden didn’t?” I repeat, and likely not with the tone I should have used as I try to keep up with the history that Maddock is rewriting even from the beginning of this conversation.
I blend my indignation into something that more resembles curious intrigue.
“He seemed opposed to the idea of the demonstration, no?”
“It’s all a show,” Maddock replies, rolling his eyes. “Didn’t want me calling him out is what it is. Wants to keep everyone fooled. But he won’t me. I’m more discerning than most.”
“How tragically true,” I reply, sighing deeply. “You’re that certain, though, that the claims about him are exaggerated?” I ask, setting my coffee down on the table so that I can rest my left hand on my thigh. “That the papers made too much of him?”
“Course they did.” He shrugs. “Makes a good story, doesn’t it? A poor boy playing vigilante? Fills headlines and sells papers. Meanwhile, those of us who are really worthy, who are moving this country forward, are left to toil in obscurity. Paving the way for industry with nothing to show for it.”
“Except a fortune,” I say, wondering how deluded he must be to believe any of this, and I have little doubt that he does—with the type of true devotion you’d be pressed to find in most cathedrals. “Surely the large piles of money must ease the sting a little?”
Maddock smirks. “It does help. Although my parents…let’s just say we have very different ideals on how that fortune could be best put to use.”
“How frustrating for you,” I say, contemplating picking my coffee back up to have something else to focus on but not entirely trusting myself not to hurl the mug at him if I did. “To have parents that cannot see your vision.”
“Yes, that’s precisely it,” Maddock says, clapping his hand against his leg.
“They can’t see the possibilities that I can.
Nothing exists for them outside of our land and our cattle, but me?
I can see it. I see the opportunity, and I have the conviction and the resilience to make it happen.
The courage to make the tough choices when it comes to the obstacles in our country’s way. ”
“I’ll bet you do,” I say, afraid to ask just how many of those obstacles are actually human lives. “Tell me, have you considered a career in politics? Your mentality seems perfectly suited for it.”
“I have,” Maddock says, smiling proudly before he frowns.
“Another area of disagreement between my family and me, as it happens, but they’ll come around eventually.
It’s partially why…” He pauses, considering whether to press on until the temptation of a willing listener once again proves to be too much for him.
“It’s partially why I originally brought the gunslinger on. I figured with him at my side…”
I think back to what Maddock said yesterday morning about helping Aiden make a name for himself again, the true reason now revealing itself. “You figured you could make some headlines,” I guess. “Ones that might help launch a campaign?”
Maddock nods, eagerly leaning forward. “You saw how Clayton practically tripped over himself last night simply to shake his hand. People…people like Clayton…the little people—”
I laugh, picturing the towering older man. “Is that how you would deem him?”
“You know what I mean,” Maddock hedges. “He’s not like us. He doesn’t come from the same…he made his money quick. What’s to say he won’t lose it just as quickly? Not that I wouldn’t take a donation all the same.”
“Of course not.”
“But these people, they look at Aiden and see a hero. Practically a king.”
“A god.”
“Yes, and who can blame them when they’ve so little to look toward? But still…a powerful weapon in the right hands. The kind that could make real change.”
“As interesting a picture it is that you’re painting, Maddock, I don’t see him agreeing to be your weapon.”
“He is already. The whole reason he’s in town at all is by my request. By my order.”
“And what will your next order be?” I ask, wondering how much Maddock knows about Aiden’s plans to leave, the ones he’d told me about last night.
“When we reach the next town? Same as it was here.” He sits back in his chair, looking deeply satisfied with himself. “I told you I don’t believe in letting opportunities pass by, and this trip we’re taking up to Kansas—”
“The cattle drive?”
He rolls his eyes again. “Yes, the drive. Why not treat it as the beginning of my campaign trail? Why not have it be the start of something that actually matters?”
“I see,” I say, understanding more why he and his parents might be having some differences of opinion if he’s treating their business and their animals as little more than a ticket to get from town to town.
“Well, certainly a packed agenda that you’ve laid out for yourself, which reminds me, I should—”
“You should be getting in on this,” Maddock says, shooting forward to grab my arm when I begin to stand. “You’re like me. You’re someone with vision.”
“Oh, I most certainly have a vision,” I reply, glancing down at my arm. “Though perhaps I’ll have to get my own gunslinger by my side to execute it.”
Maddock laughs, letting go of me as I get to my feet and reclining with a smile.
“Let me know if you find a better one than what I have. Or at least one more agreeable.” He tips his head back against the chair, closing his eyes.
“Although, you know, he doesn’t really have to be on your side. Not if you play things right.”
I pause, studying him closely. “Oh? Do tell.”
He shrugs. “All you really need is the name. Hardly matters if they’re standing next to you or…across from you.”
“Across from you? As in…you do plan to fight him?” I ask, needing to make sure I have it right. “I thought you said that people looked to him as a hero? A king? What would that make you then?”
“Something new. After all, what better way for a new king to rise than by exposing a false one?” He surveys me, and I know I need to say something, do something. To react in some way, but there’s a rare thread of panic wrapping around me, holding me in place.
“As I told you, Cypress,” Maddock says, hopefully mistaking my speechlessness as consideration.
“The courage to remove obstacles. Also,” he continues, with a half-laugh, “wouldn’t mind not having to look at his self-righteous face anymore, you know what I mean?
” He shakes his head, pleased with his own humor.
“Well, I suppose I’ve kept you long enough.
Thank you again for your help last night and for your conversation this morning.
It’s not often I find someone who truly understands. ”
“Oh, I understand,” I reassure him. “Have no doubt about that.” I grab my coat from the back of my chair. “Until tonight then.”
“Until tonight,” he says when I’m already halfway to the door. “I can hardly wait.”
And neither can I, it would seem. I’m running out of time.