Love's Sweet Revenge (39 page)

Jake looked at Lloyd.

“It's too dangerous,” Lloyd commented. “That damn crack could have changed or moved, and they could get trapped in there, let alone the kind of men who are in that cabin. The boys could be shot. We can't risk it.”

“But, Pa—” Stephen begged.

“I'm not putting any of you in that kind of danger,” Lloyd interrupted. “If your grandmother lives through this, it would break her heart to realize one of you was hurt or killed over it.”

The three boys pouted. “We can do it, Pa!” Stephen declared boldly. “We can ride, and we know all about takin' care of cattle and horses, and you've been teachin' us how to handle rifles and how to handle the men.” He sat straighter in his saddle in an effort to seem bigger than he really was. “You gotta see we're getting to be men now, too. Grandma says we are.”

“And you took us hunting last fall,” Ben put in. “If I can shoot a deer, I can handle a rifle good enough to help give cover for you and Jake once Stephen and Little Jake chase off those men's horses.”

“You gotta let us do this, Uncle Lloyd,” Little Jake added with a dark, determined look in his eyes. He glanced at his own father, sure Brian was just as against this as Jake and Lloyd were. “We know how to herd cattle and rope calves, and we know you have to make sure they don't overgraze certain sections, and we know how to store feed and hay and how much to give the horses,” he said proudly, turning to his grandfather. “You and Uncle Lloyd don't realize how much we already know, Grampa. And we'll be safe in that crack in the rock. They'll never know we're there.”

“Yeah!” Stephen put in. “We promise to come right back out if we can't make it through. We won't do anything stupid. Please, please let us do it. You said we could help save Grandma.”

“You
gotta
let us help,” Ben spoke up. “We saw what they did to her, and I don't think I can ever forget not bein' strong enough to help her. If you ride up to that cabin to help and they shoot you dead before you can even get there, then
nobody
can help her. And if you go around behind and start shootin' from there, they can run out and ride out through the valley before you get all of them. By the time you got your own horses to go after them, they'd have a big head start.”

“With Grandma inside the cabin, you wouldn't have time to go after them,” Stephen added.

Jake looked at Lloyd. “They have a point. We can't waste one extra minute getting your mother out of there. Going up through the valley will take longer, and we risk being target practice for them.”

Lloyd turned to Brian. “You're Little Jake's father. You have just as much say in this as anyone.”

Brian sighed, turning to Little Jake and seeing the excitement in his eyes. “I haven't been able to stop my son from doing much of anything he really wants to do.” He looked at Jake. He remembered the time in Guthrie when Little Jake was much smaller. He'd run out of the house and down the street when Jake was in the middle of a shoot-out. Little Jake had thought he could help his grandfather. “You know how stubborn he is. If I don't let him do this, he'll grumble and stomp and pout for weeks. And be that as it may, I think these boys need and deserve to help any way they can. They need to feel they're an important part of this. I can't believe my own words, but that's how I feel.”

Little Jake grinned. “Thanks, Pa! Grampa will make sure nothin' happens to us.”

Brian kept his gaze on Jake. “You know how it feels, Jake, to not be big and strong enough to stop your father from what he did to your mother. You've lived with that your whole life. Maybe we should take the chance on the boys not having to live with the same memories.” He shifted his gaze to Lloyd. “I hate to say they're right, and I hope to hell I don't live to regret it, but I think you should let them try this.”

Lloyd studied the boys, then turned away for a moment, torn with indecision. He looked at Jake. “What do you think?”

Jake looked down at Ronald Beck's body. He shivered from the bitter cold, again feeling sick at how cold Randy might be right now…if she was still alive. “I think we don't have a whole lot of choice.” He met Lloyd's gaze, his eyes bloodshot from no sleep. “And I think we have to hope this is due to your sister praying over this. Maybe the boys finding that crack was a godsend.” He shared with Lloyd the weight of what this could mean—both of them feeling the horror of what it would mean if they lost one of the boys over this.

Lloyd took a deep breath and looked across the open land toward Little Jake's Valley. “I'm going to trust in Evie's prayers.” He walked over to his horse, pulling out his repeating rifle. He handed it out to Stephen. “Take this with you—just for protection in case it's needed.”

The boys squirmed excitedly in their saddles.

“Thanks, Pa!” Stephen answered, taking the rifle and shoving it into a boot on his saddle.

“These are dangerous men, Stephen,” Lloyd warned. “You and Little Jake stay right inside the crack in that cliff where they can't see you if you think for one minute you can't get those horses out of there without being seen, understand? If you see your grandmother, don't go try to help her.
We'll
take care of that. You just get those horses out of there. You're men in a lot of ways, but you aren't man enough yet for the kind of men at that cabin.”

“We'll be careful,” Little Jake promised.

Lloyd glanced at Jake. “I don't know any other way to get to that cabin unseen than on foot, like they said.”

“If we get going right now, we can get there by dawn.” Jake headed for Midnight and mounted up.

“What about Beck's body?” Brian asked.

“Leave it for the wolves,” Jake answered coldly. “They're plenty damn hungry this time of year. By spring there won't be enough of him left to recognize.” He turned his horse and scanned the rest of the men. “And remember one thing. As far as we know, none of the men involved in this even has family. I know for a fact Brad Buckley has none left. They could all disappear from the face of the earth and no one would know or care, so it doesn't make much difference what we do with them.”

Cole nodded. “We get your meanin'.”

“It would be like none of this happened,” Jake added. “I never want one word of this to go outside of this ranch—or for the public to know my wife was involved in any of this. I'll not have her talked about. You men keep that in mind.” He turned Midnight and rode off.

The men looked at each other, thinking the same thing. None of them cared to cross Jake Harkner.

Little Jake glanced at Ronald Beck's dead body. “Is Grampa gonna kill the rest of 'em?” he asked his father.

Brian rubbed at his eyes. “I expect so.”

“Good,” Ben added.

“He'd probably try to handle this differently if this didn't involve your grandmother,” Brian added. “And after what happened to your mother, Little Jake, I don't blame him. But you boys need to keep it straight in your heads that you can't always handle things this way.”

“We know, Uncle Brian,” Stephen told him.

“Let's get going,” Cole told them. He deliberately rode his horse over Beck's body before heading out after Jake and Lloyd. Everyone else charged ahead to catch up with Jake, leaving a bloody, broken Ronald Beck behind for the wolves.

“Are you scared, Stephen?” Little Jake shimmied ahead of his cousin as they made their way through a literal crack in the earth.

“Kind of,” Stephen answered, looking up a good seventy feet or more at the sunlight above. He clung to his father's rifle, trying to be careful not to scrape it against the rocks as he skimmed sideways through the crevice, which in places seemed almost impassable. “I'd be more scared if we were doing this alone, but Grampa and my dad will be out there in the rocks, covering us when we make off with those men's horses.”

“I wish Ben could have come with us, but he's gettin' real big. I don't think he would have fit.”

“Heck no.” Both boys spoke just above a whisper.

“Will you shoot one of 'em with your rifle?” Little Jake asked.

“Pa told me to use his rifle just for self-defense if I have to.”

“What if they see us and come after us? I'm gonna shoot 'em.”

“How are you going to do that?”

Little Jake stopped and reached under his shirt, pulling out a Colt .45 from the waist of his pants.

“Little Jake!” Stephen stared wide-eyed at the handgun. “Where'd you get that?”

“Cole's saddlebag. I seen him put it in there for a spare when we packed to leave the ranch.”

“You could accidentally shoot yourself—or
me
! You shouldn't have that gun! Grandpa will be
really
mad! So will your dad!”

“I don't care. Them men did bad things to Grandma, and I'm gonna
kill
'em!”

“You'll get in trouble, that's what! Or get shot!”

Little Jake shook his head. “I'm not scared at all.” He put the gun back and started shimmying along the crack again. “What do you think they'll do to Grandma?”

Stephen sucked in his belly to get through an especially narrow space. “I think Grandpa is scared they'll do something men do to women only in a nice way when they love 'em. Grandpa sure wouldn't want them doin' that to Grandma, 'cause she's his and she's old and she'd feel bad. He loves her an awful lot. My pa loves Katie, too. I hear them at night sometimes. Pa says it's okay when you love a woman, but you gotta love her a lot. You're not supposed to do stuff to her if she doesn't want you to.”

“What about the bad women?” Little Jake knocked away a spider. “I think they're the kind that don't care. Do you think Grampa used to be with a lot of women like that?”

They both giggled. “I think Grampa did a lot of stuff like that when he was younger. But I'll bet Grandma really would punch him if he did that now.”

They giggled again, the conversation helping relieve their nervous fear of what might happen.

“It's warmer in here out of the wind,” Stephen remarked. “Grampa says another snowstorm might be coming. We have to get Grandma home so's she doesn't get sick.”

“How much farther do you think before we reach the cabin, Stephen?” Little Jake asked.

“I don't know. Just keep going. We have to reach Grandma before they hurt her too much. If they kill her, Grampa and my pa are gonna feel really, really bad. I don't think they would maybe ever smile again. I'm scared Grampa might even ride away and never come back. I think he'd go crazy without Grandma.”

“My mom said that once,” Little Jake answered. “She prays for him all the time on account of he gets kind of crazy sometimes, like when he shot that man in Denver.”

“He just loves all of us too much,” Stephen told him. “That's what makes him crazy.”

“I wouldn't never be happy if Grampa left us…or if he died,” Little Jake commented. “Would you?”

“I don't think so. I can't even picture life without Grampa around. He's so…I don't know…
big
! It's like he fills everything up, even outside. Do you know what I mean?”

“Yeah. Uncle Lloyd does, too.” Little Jake giggled again. “My mom is always complaining how he looks like an Indian 'cause of his hair. I'm glad he didn't die when that man in Denver shot him.”

“My pa is tough. I knew he wouldn't die. He's a big, strong man.” Stephen stopped for a minute. “Little Jake.”

“What?” Little Jake looked back at him.

“Let's make a pact.”

“What do you mean?”

“You and me. We'll be like Grampa and my father when we grow up. I mean, we'll get along like they do, and we'll be tough like they are.”

Little Jake frowned. “Sure we will! But Grampa and your pa sometimes get in fights.” He started shimmying through the rugged crack again.

Stephen followed. “That's just them carin' about each other. We might fight sometimes, too, but it won't mean we don't care about each other. We should always get along and watch out for each other like Pa and Grampa do. And we gotta remember that Grampa would want to always treat Ben like his real son. Ben had a bad father like Grampa did.”

“I know.” Little Jake giggled again. “Heck, I just thought about it. Grampa adopted Ben, so he's my uncle!”

Both boys laughed over that. “He's more like a brother or a cousin. I never thought of him as an uncle!” Stephen said.

They moved along silently, blinking against stone dust that kept getting in their eyes. Because of the size of the crack, they couldn't wear their hats, and their hair was starting to cake with dust. Little Jake buried his face in the crook of his arm to sneeze. The boys froze.

“Do you think they heard that?” Little Jake whispered.

“No. We're too deep in these rocks, and you muffled it. Hurry up now! We're almost there!”

Little Jake walked faster when they reached a wider area, then sucked in his belly when the crack narrowed again. “We're real close,” he whispered. “I remember that big part was just a little ways from where we climbed into the crack where it comes out by the cabin.”

Hearts pounding, the boys finally reached the opening. “I see it!” Little Jake whispered excitedly. “I see the cabin!”

“Do you see Grandma?”

“No. She must be inside.” Little Jake peeked farther out. “I don't see nobody. I see the horses, though. They're over to the right. You ready?”

“Ready as I'll ever be,” Stephen whispered in reply.

“I'm scared, but we gotta do this for Grandma.”

“Yeah.” Stephen hung on tight to the rifle. “But Pa and Grandpa are out there waiting. Let's go!”

Little Jake didn't hesitate. He ran out, Stephen right behind him. The boys made a beeline for the horses, quickly untying them from the tether line. One of them whinnied.

“Shit!” Little Jake yelped. He couldn't climb up on the unsaddled horse he was trying to grab. Stephen laid down the rifle and gave him a boost. He handed up the reins to two horses.

“Go! Go!”

Little Jake took off, hanging on to the two extra horses.

“Hey!”

Stephen turned to see Clyde Pace standing at the corner of the cabin. “What the hell—” He stood there with no gun. “Brad! They're takin' our horses!” Clyde started after Stephen.

Stephen bent down and grasped his rifle.

“It's the goddamn Harkner kids!”

Stephen raised the rifle and fired. Clyde whirled and went down.

“What the fuck—” Someone inside yelled the words.

Stephen couldn't believe what he'd just done. Clyde started moving and got back to his feet. To his surprise, Little Jake rode back up toward the cabin and took out the Colt .45 he'd stolen from Cole. He held it with two hands and shot at Clyde but missed.

“Ride, Stephen!” Little Jake yelled.

“Get out of the way!” Jake roared the words from the rocks above. “Get the hell out of there!”

The boys heard rifle fire, and Clyde flew forward into a watering trough.

Stephen dropped his rifle and jumped onto another of the horses. He grabbed the reins to one other, leaving the last horse behind as he and Little Jake kicked their horses into a hard ride, flying down the hill as more shots were fired.

Stephen wasn't quite sure whether to be glad or sorry he'd shot a man. He remembered Jake telling them once that it wasn't a good feeling…killing a man, but at least Clyde got back up. More likely it was the second shot that killed him, and it probably came from his father or grandfather.

He could hear Little Jake behind him, whooping like an Indian. He caught up to Stephen as they neared the bottom of the hill. The boys yelled in victory and laughed.

“We did it!” Little Jake rejoiced. “We chased off their horses, and we got one of 'em!”

“Let's go find Grandpa!” Stephen yelled, turning his horse to the left and heading up into the high rocks at the side of the cabin. More gunfire rang out, bullets from the cabin, pinging against the rocks as the boys headed into them. Return gunfire was blasting the cabin to pieces. By the time the boys reached their father and grandfather, the shooting had stopped.

“Hold up!” Jake ordered. “Randy could get hit from a stray bullet! We need to flush them out of there.”

“You're dead meat, Harkner!” Brad Buckley yelled from the cabin. “Leave now, or your wife is
dea
d
!”

Stephen saw puffs of smoke where someone fired at them from the cabin windows. Clyde Pace was still alive and trying to drag himself out of the watering trough.

“Stay back!” Lloyd screamed to the boys when he saw them climbing up toward them. “Get behind some shelter!”

The boys clambered into the trees and ducked behind a large boulder.

“You don't have a chance, Buckley! There's no place to run!” Jake yelled. “I've got Lloyd and three other men with me, and you've got no horses!”

“How'd you get up here, you bastard!” Brad yelled. “We've been watchin' clear across the valley for you!”

“Those men with you don't know this land as well as they thought!” Jake answered. “My grandsons know it even better than
I
do!
They
got us up here, you sonofabitch! You messed with the wrong Harkners this time!”

Both boys grinned excitedly, feeling like men now.

“I've got your wife, Jake! You're the one who'd better give up, or she's dead!” More shots came from the cabin. “I've hated you ever since you killed my pa and brothers, you murderin' sonofabitch!” Brad screamed. “I've got you back for it. Takin' your wife is better than killing you!”

“You'll live to regret it!”

“And you'll never get out from behind those rocks alive!”

Jake noticed Clyde still struggling to get out of the trough. He aimed his rifle and fired, and Clyde cried out and tumbled back into the water.

“Just three of you left, Brad!” Jake yelled. “Three of you and six of us! Ronald Beck is dead, too! You shouldn't have left him behind to tell us where you were.”

“You always were a stupid sonofabitch!” Lloyd shouted, moving as far behind the cabin as he could get. It was impossible to get directly behind it because of the steep cliff that rose up in back of it.

“Bring my wife out of there, and we might let you live!” Jake ordered.

“Like hell! You don't never let
nobody
live, Jake Harkner!”

“You should have thought of that before you took my wife!”

“I'll
kill
her, Harkner! I'll kill her because you're gonna kill me anyway! And you're gonna live the rest of your life knowin' the last man who had her was
me
, Brad Buckley! She ain't bad for her age, Harkner!”

“And I'll fucking take three days to kill you, you bastard! You bring her out of there, or I'll skin your hide off when I get hold of you and plant you on an anthill! And I'll damn well cut your balls off and shove them in your mouth! Bring her out now, and all I'll do is put a bullet in your head!”

“That ain't much of a choice, Harkner!”

“You think about it! I never lie, Buckley! If you kill my wife, what I did to you back in Guthrie will seem like a picnic!”

Things got quiet. Lloyd moved around to confirm that there were no windows at the back of the cabin. He'd brought a rope along in case he might need it, and indeed, he realized he might be able to use it to get behind the cabin. He scurried up through the rocks, finding an area where he could slide down the cliff on sheer, flat rock and land in the small area between the face of the cliff and the cabin. He waved to Jake, then set down his rifle and tied one end of the rope to a small pine tree at the top of the cliff. It wasn't very strong, but it was his only choice. He clung to the rope and shimmied down the cliff for about fifteen feet. The sapling broke, and Lloyd fell the rest of the way, a good ten feet. He landed hard just behind the cabin but got to his feet, silently waving that he was all right.

“What's it going to be, Buckley?” Jake shouted. “Do you want to die easy? Or do you want to take two or three days to die? You've trapped yourself by your own stupidity! Dying one way or the other is your only choice!”

“You bastard! I had her, Jake. I've got that much to go out of this life with! And it wasn't the way you think! I figured I wouldn't enjoy it much on account of her age, so I shoved it in her
mouth
!” He laughed, and Jake felt like someone was ripping his heart out. “She practically choked on it, Harkner! She had to swallow Brad Buckley's shit!
Twice!
Clem's too! He figured since she was a whore, she'd probably like it. You ever do that, Harkner? Hell, a big man like you could break her jaw!”

More laughter.

Stephen and Little Jake looked at each other. “What's he mean?” Little Jake asked.

“Something real bad,” Stephen answered, his hands moving into fists. “It's a dirty, low-down thing. I wish we'd been big enough to stop them, Little Jake. I can't wait till I get big like Pa and Grandpa.”