Chapter 1
Okee
“How much are they paying you to bring me in?” the prisoner asks. A day’s worth of begging behind us, his voice is nearly lost under the steady trot of hooves and the creak of wood and leather.
We’re in Indian Territory now. Winter will be here any minute judging by the bite in the air. After this, one more job and we’ll have enough to keep us in bullets, beans, and cheap whiskey all winter.
“Ain’t I told you to hush back there,” Boone says. He holds the reins loose, a plug of tobacco lumping at his bottom lip. His icy blue eyes cut sideways at me, then he shakes his head.
“What a goddamn pain in the ass,” he mutters.
I shrug. They’re all pains in the ass. “No man gets hauled in irons across God’s wide country cheering,” I say. If they were the sort to go quiet, the company man would not have paid us so well to fetch him, and rail men have money to throw.
Boone rubs his stubbled chin. “Reckon we’ll hit the junction ’fore nightfall. Rail agent’ll be waiting with our pay—if he ain’t run off with it.”
The prisoner pipes up. “I have a sister. Real pretty. You turn this wagon around, take me back home, I swear you can do anything you want to her.”
Boone and I look at each other.
His brow furrows deep. Then he turns slow and stares over his shoulder.
“Goddamn, boy,” he says, voice low with disgust. “Glad you ain’t no kin o’mine.”
Boone turns back toward the trail and spits a brown line of tobacco off the side of the wagon.
“Christ almighty,” he mutters, mostly to himself. “You ever hear something so sorry? Selling your sister like she’s a breedin’ mare. Company man said you was a thief; he ain’t said you was a pimp.”
“A man must do what he can to live,” the prisoner says, like that’s sage advice. “That accent of yours—you’re from the mountains, yes? I’d bet your mother doesn’t know which cousin your daddy was.”
Boone grins, a deep dimple denting his cheek. He raises his brows at me. “That was a good one.”
“And your friend up there,” the prisoner goes on, “the one with the mixed blood. You tell him he’s just as good as any white man so long as he takes bullets for you?”
The muscles in my shoulder clench for a fraction of a second, just enough to recognize the insult, before the predictability of it all makes me turn my face.
Typical border militia moron. If I wilted over every insult from men like him, who view the tribes as being in the way, I’d have broken long before now.
Boone’s hands tighten on the reins. “Hup—whoa,” he commands, pulling back. The wagon jolts and teeters to a halt, horses snorting, dust rising around us like smoke.
“Boone,” I call, but he’s already off the bench, boots hitting dirt.
“The hell you just say, boy?” Boone growls, fists tight as knots.
I jump down after him. The bastard’s insult isn’t even half as bad as the worst I’ve heard in a dozen counties—sure as hell not worth losing our pay over—but he’s been burning away at Boone’s fuse for a day since Fort Smith.
“You heard me.” The prisoner grins, foolish and blood-hungry. He’s chained up, but men like that don’t need much rope to hang themselves.
Boone’s fist slams into the man’s jaw, knocking him back against the wagon sideboard hard enough to rattle the frame. Blood sprays, bright in the sun.
Christ. We just need to get this bastard to the junction. Get our pay. Keep moving. One more job on the horizon, then we’re done. We cannot have him be the reason we start winter hungry.
“You don’t know a goddamn thing about being a soldier,” Boone snarls. “While you were home fuckin’ your sister, this man was savin’ lives—saved my goddamn life. You ain’t fit to spit his name.”
He hits him again, and the prisoner spits blood, laughing through it.
“What’s the matter, cocksucker?” the prisoner wheezes. “That Indian your sweetheart? That why you ride with him instead of decent folk?”
Boone freezes—just for half a heartbeat.
Then he’s on him again, wild, each blow landing heavier than the last.
Boone screams, “I don’t mind explaining why you fell off the wagon, you filthy son of a bitch—I’ll goddamn kill you!”
I move fast, hook my arms around his waist. He’s still swinging, still cussing, breath hot against my cheek as I drag him off.
“That’s enough,” I call out.
His fists loosen. He sags against me, chest heaving, sweat and dust sticking to his face.
The prisoner’s a heap in the dirt now, moaning, blood all down his chin. One eye’s already swelling shut.
Boone spits once.
I keep hold of him until his breath slows, both of us standing there in the dust. The horses flick their ears, restless, then settle again. The prisoner is still, but he’s breathing.
I glance around. Just miles of flat, open earth and the hiss of icy wind through dry grass. No lawmen. No witnesses.
“Was that necessary?” I ask.
He nods once, body still trembling. “Reckon now we can get some peace and quiet at least,” he mutters, fingers sliding through mud-brown hair that hangs to his shoulders.
I brush it back, cradling the back of his head in my palm. My other hand clamps onto his shoulder, grip tight.
“One more job,” I remind him.
He swallows hard, contrite. “I know.”
“One job, then a well-stocked, quiet, peaceful winter. All right?”
“Yeah.”
“Good,” I say, releasing him.
Unholstering my pistol, I amble to the bound man in the dirt, point it at him, and pull back the hammer. “On your feet.” He doesn’t dare look at me now as he struggles to his knees.
I shove him into the wagon, then join Boone on the bench. He spits in the dust and clicks his tongue at the horses to start them forward, wheels crunching over dry earth.
I look out at the plains, the breeze coming in sharp, bending the tall grass. Boone’s attention is on the trail, the reins, the horses, and the wide open country. It’s under a mile before his shoulders relax. He looks over with a wink, calm as still water.
He hums a few lazy bars, then sings.
“I come from Alabamy with a banjo on my knee.
Goin’ to Lou’siana, my true love for to see—”