Had it not been for her dear Joe bleeding so bad, Fiona would have grabbed the bowie knife from his sash and in one quick, final motion of defiance and liberation, she would have slit her own throat and died beside her poor mountain man.
Holt broke into her terrible thoughts. “Do you think he's going to make it?”
“I don't know,” Fiona replied. “If he had to be shot, why didn't you tell your ambusher to shoot my husband in the legs?”
Holt scratched at his beard. “It was a long-distance shot and a running man's legs are too hard a target.”
“Well,” Fiona said, “I can stop the bleeding, but my husband is going to need a doctor and some mending time in bed.”
“Not a chance,” Holt snapped.
“If Joe doesn't get a doctor and some time to rest and heal, then he'll die for certain.”
“Too bad,” Holt said without a shred of real sympathy.
“Too bad for
you
,” Fiona managed to summon up the courage to say. “Because from what I've just overheard, if Joe dies, it is going to cost you a lot of Peabody's blood money.”
Holt was impressed by her insight. “You got a skinny body, but your hearing and reasoning is still good.”
Fiona rested her head against Joe's back and listened. “The slug didn't hit him in the lung,” she said more to herself than to Holt. “That means that he's still got a fighting chance.”
“Oh,” Holt said, “he'll survive. I've heard enough stories about Joe Moss to know that he's almost impossible to kill.”
“He is,” Fiona said with as much pride as she could muster. “And someday you'll find that out and it will be the last lesson you'll ever learn.”
Holt threw back his head and laughed at the sky. “I'll give this much to you, Fiona Moss. You've got sand. Yep, you've got sand in your craw. So how did Jedediah and Ike treat you in the dugout while I was coming?”
She twisted her head and gazed up at the huge man. “They treated me like a dog. But I'm alive now and they're dead. So what does that tell
you
?”
He laughed again. “It tells me that I don't have to pay Jedediah and Ike a thing and that means more money in my own pocket, which suits me just fine.”
“Are you going to even bury them?”
“Hell, no!”
“Then at least drag them into that filthy dugout and set them on fire so the animals don't eat their bodies,” Fiona said. “You owe them that much.”
Holt hooked his big thumbs into his cartridge belt and frowned. “Why should you care what happens to their bodies after they treated you like a dog?”
“Because I'm a human being, Mr. Holt.”
“Yeah, so I've heard. And you murdered Chester J. Peabody one night at your little house in Virginia City.”
“I didn't murder him! Someone else did!”
“Yeah, well, then, why did they find Chester dead in your house with a knife still sticking out of his back and blood all over you
and
your front room?”
“Because he was murdered outside my house and I dragged him inside to see if I could save his life. But Mr. Peabody was already dead.”
Holt shook his head in obvious disbelief. “I don't buy a word of that,” he told her. “And it doesn't matter anymore. Your husband killed two more of the brothers down by St. Mary's Church when you got on your horse and ran out on him.”
“He made me go,” Fiona said quietly with fresh tears coming to her eyes. “I didn't want to leave Joe, but he said that if he was killed, I needed to stay alive for our daughter.”
“How very, very touching,” Holt said, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Well, you can tell your sad story to Garrison Peabody. He's the only one left standing and now he's the sole owner of the Shamrock Mine in Gold Hill. That means he's as rich as a king, and he won't ever stop until he sees you and Joe swinging side by side at the end of a strangler's noose.”
Fiona shivered. “If I could talk to Garrison Peabody, maybe I could convince him that I really didn't kill his brother that night.”
“And what damned good would that do?” Holt asked with amusement. “Because even if you somehow did convince Peabody that you didn't murder his oldest brother that night on the Comstock, how would you explain that your husband shot his other two brothers and also blew up his mine with dynamite?”
She looked away, thinking hard, and the best she could say was, “Joe was only acting in self-defense.”
“Ha! I want to be there when you tell Peabody
that
story.”
“No, you don't,” Fiona countered. “You're not interested in the truth. All you're interested in is the bounty on our heads and the gold it will bring you when we are delivered to Peabody.”
Holt cocked his massive head a little to one side as he studied her closely. “Hmmm, she hears and reasons quite well and is actually smart. I like that! If you weren't so skinny and dirty, I might take a shine to you, Mrs. Moss. I'm hung like a horse and I could put my meat halfway up your shrunken belly, if I had a mind to rut with you some.”
Inwardly, she shivered. Outwardly, she raised her chin and glared at Ransom Holt. “Don't you even think of touching me!”
“I would do more than touch you, if I found you attractive . . . which I definitely do not,” Holt told her. “But I can't say what Dalton and Eli will think once you get cleaned up and fattened a little.”
“If you let them touch me, I'll kill myself!”
“No, you won't,” Holt said with supreme confidence. “If you were of that mind, you'd already have done it when Jedediah and Ike were each raping you five or ten times a day and night in their dugout.”
Fiona swallowed and knew that the man was right. She'd been raped over and over, humiliated, dirtied, and degraded so badly by the dead men lying nearby that nothing mattered. No one could hurt her any more than she'd already been hurt. She would endure anything to survive. To save Joe and to be reunited with their sweet daughter, Jessica.
“I'm right, aren't I,” Ransom Holt said with satisfaction. “I could let Dalton and Eli rut on you any time they please and you wouldn't hurt yourself. And as for your husband, well, I'm damn sure that he's not going to be of much use to you either.”
Fiona looked down at Joe. His breathing was shallow but regular. The bleeding was not nearly as severe as it had been, and she couldn't help but be amazed by the strength of his constitution . . . his sheer will to live.
“If you want the extra gold you'll get from Mr. Peabody for bringing my husband back to the Comstock Lode alive, then you have to get him to a doctor and give him time to mend.”
“Don't be making demands on me, Mrs. Moss. I just hate to be told what to do.”
“I'm sure that's true,” Fiona said, “but I also know that you are greedy and you want all of Peabody's bounty gold.”
He smiled and actually winked. “Just don't tell that to Dalton and his brother.”
“I won't,” she promised, “so long as you keep them away from me.”
“That might not be possible.”
“You can do it if you want,” Fiona persisted. “You have to do it, or I will tell them you plan to murder them before they can reach the Comstock.”
“You're only guessing at that,” he said, voice hardening. “That's just crazy talk!”
“Is it, Mr. Holt? I just can't see someone like you sharing the bounty money.”
“You don't know a thing about me, Fiona.”
“I know all I need to know just from looking into your animal eyes,” she replied with contempt.
His huge body tensed and he balled his fists. For a moment, she thought he was going to strike her down. And he was so large and powerful, and she now so weak and thin, that a single, well-delivered blow from his fist would likely have killed her. But at the last instant, Holt got control of himself and unclenched his big fists.
She stared into his feral eyes and he finally looked away. Deep inside her heart, Fiona knew that she had just won her first small, but important, victory and that Holt really would keep the brothers away from her already ravished and violated body.
“Don't ever come that close again to making me lose my temper,” he warned. “If you do, I don't care how much money I'll lose because it'll be your pickled head that will arrive on the Comstock Lode.”
Fiona nodded because she knew that he was telling her the truth and that she could never again push him quite so hard.
“Here are some rags,” Dalton said, coming up to her. “Is he still alive?”
She took the dirty rags and began to stuff them into both the entry and exit wounds.
“Did he bleed out already?” Eli asked with mild curiosity.
“No, he did not,” Fiona replied.
“Hey, boys!” Ransom Holt called. “Drag those scalped bodies into this dugout and let's set it afire.”
“Why does he want us to do that?” Dalton whispered to his brother.
Overhearing this, Fiona whispered back, “Because Ransom Holt doesn't want to leave any trace of anyone who helps him in this bloody business.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Eli demanded.
Without bothering to look into their faces, Fiona said, “It means you had
both
better watch your own backs from now on.”
The two exchanged quick glances, and then Dalton managed a short bark of a laugh. “You little whore! You're just trying to get into our minds. But you know what?”
“What?” she managed to ask.
“We're going to get into your pussy about as soon as we get finished burning those bodies.”
Fiona froze with her blood turning to ice. She tried to summon up some bluster, but failed. Dalton reached out and put his hand on her breast. “There's still a little there to suck on. That's good!”
Suddenly, Fiona grabbed the bowie knife from her unconscious husband's sash and tried to bury its blade in Dalton's throat. But he was too quick for her and she had no strength. Twisting her wrist and tearing the knife away from Fiona, Dalton laughed. “You got a little fire left in the belly, huh, bitch? That's good, too.”
Fiona shrank back. “If you touch me, Ransom Holt will kill you. He's going to kill you both anyway, but if you touch me before we get to Virginia City, he's going to kill you even sooner.”
The brothers looked at one another and something passed between them. Then Eli actually whispered, “I suppose that could actually happen, bitch, if we don't kill Ransom Holt first.”
So there it was. Fiona understood that before they reached the distant Comstock Lode, people were going to murder people in order to claim all of the bounty gold.
Once again, she saw a slender but definite ray of hope for herself and her husband, Joe Moss.
4
FIRE WAS SHOOTING out of the dugout, and Fiona listened to its roar, trying to ignore what she thought was a sizzling sound as the bodies of Jedediah Charles and Ike burned and boiled.
“Satisfied?” Ransom Holt asked. “Maybe now that I've disposed of those bodies so that the animals can't eat them, you'll actually view me as a human being.”
Fiona almost shook her head, but caught herself in time. “Thank you for doing that. It was the Christian thing to do.”
“Well, I'm no Christian and neither is anyone else here, so that doesn't matter much at all. Mostly, what I did it for is to eliminate any evidence or trace of that sorry pair.”
“Joe's wound has closed, but he still needs a doctor,” Fiona said, reminding Holt again.
“I've been thinking on that some,” Holt replied. “And I think that Joe Moss is strong enough and you are a good enough nurse to keep him alive while we are on the move to the Comstock Lode.”
“No!”
“My decision has been made,” Holt said. “And I won't brook any arguments.”
“Please be reasonable! My husband can't ride a horse! Look at him. He's pale and too weak from the loss of blood even to sit up.”
“Yes,” Holt said, “of that I am well aware.”
“Then whatâ”
Holt cut off her question with a dismissive wave of his hand, then glanced over at the brothers. “Hey, boys, come on over here.”
Dalton and Eli had been sorting through a few odds and ends they'd scavenged from the dugout, and now they sauntered over to look down at Joe Moss.
“He don't look too healthy,” Eli said with an indifferent shrug. “Still think he's gonna make it?”
“He will,” Fiona said. “If he gets a doctor and some bed rest.”
“No doctor,” Holt snapped. “And as for bed rest, well, that's what I wanted to talk to these boys about.”
Dalton and Eli turned their attention to the big man.
“Boys,” Holt said, “we're needing some supplies and a wagon.”
The brothers frowned in serious concentration. Finally, Dalton said, “Why don't we git 'em on the way to Virginia City?”
“Because,” Holt told him, “I don't want to deal with the Mormons and after we leave this part of the country, there isn't much of anything between us and the Comstock Lode except Paiute Indian villages.”
“Paiute women sound good to me,” Eli said with a cackle as he and Dalton leered at Fiona. “This 'un ain't gonna hold up too good with all three of us fucking her. She's way too skinny and weak.”
Fiona colored and bit her lip. She was just thankful that Joe Moss wasn't awake and aware of this conversation. If her husband had been awake, he'd have tried to kill all three despite his grave condition.