My Desperado (28 page)

His gaze lowered again, and he brought the ends of the thong together, though a bit shakily. "Now's as good a time as any," he muttered.

"What's that?"

He hesitated for just a moment, with his hands poised at her lower thigh. "Now would be a damned good time," he said, rising slowly.

They stood mere inches apart.

"For what?" Katherine breathed.

They both knew they were falling back under the forbidden spell and felt themselves leaning together, as if a strong wind blew at their backs.

But Travis pulled away with a jolt and clenched his fists at his sides. "Damn good time for a lesson."

"Yes." Katherine backed away a cautious step, feeling as though the distance was necessary to clear her head and sweeping back a stray lock of hair from her face. "What now?"

Travis blew out a long breath and set his palm to his own revolver, as if the feel of the handle would remind him of his mission. "You grip it like this, see?"

Regardless of Kat's determination to keep her mind on track, his movements seemed sensual to her.

"Firm, but not hard."

She watched his hand curl around the smooth wood.

"You slip it in real easy."

His index finger did just that, nestling carefully against the trigger.

"And you pull straight up."

Their eyes met—Katherine's wide, and Travis's clefted by sun-bleached brows. The woods were utterly quiet, waiting for them to weaken.

"Damn," Travis breathed, but he fought against his desire and gripped the gun harder. "Don't yank at it," he instructed.

"No. I wouldn't," she vowed.

"Then you... hold it..." The gun was out, and his eyes dead level on hers. "Hold it like you would a..."

"How's it going?" Finch asked from the sheltering woods.

Katherine jumped, and Travis swung about, the revolver moving like part of his arm to point directly at the intruder's heart.

"Didn't mean t' startle y'." Finch grinned, sweeping his gaze from Travis to Kat and back. "I was just curious how someone with Ryland's reputation would learn a gal t' shoot."

Katherine wondered how much he had heard and seen and could feel the blush seep down toward her toes.

"It looked real interesting, Rye. But I was a wonderin', what do you hold that gun like? You hold it like you would a..." He paused with his grin broadening until it threatened to split his face.

"Rolling pin!" Katherine supplied suddenly. "Just like a rolling pin, firm, but not hard."

Finch laughed out loud, and Travis's brows lowered ominously.

"How'd you find us?"

"I followed the mutt." He cocked his head toward the left, though the dog was not in sight. "He was sniffing round, looking all forlorn, like. Then he picks up a scent, right amidst all them cattle tracks and everything, and his head comes up. Off he goes." Finch lifted his hand to scoot it forward, as if sliding it uphill. "Led me right here."

Travis's revolver finally eased into his holster. "You going to tell me why?"

"Yeah." Finch laughed again, seeming to find something irresistibly funny about the entire situation. "Jimmy up and found him a couple of strays. Blackfeather thought you might be interested."

"Strays?"

"Yep. Matter of fact, we met up with these two fellas before. Couple of brothers riding a white nag. One's been shot, and both of them is looking half starved."

"Luke and Jacob," Katherine said.

Travis scowled. "What's it got to do with me?"

“They had them a little run-in with Delias," Finch said with a nod. "Cody thought you'd maybe wanna know."

Chapter 27

Katherine noticed Jacob Jameson's pallor when he spoke to Travis.

"Delias, he was having him a discussion with his boys. Talked about a horse, and somebody named Grey, and about... about a fella they called The Ghost," said Jacob, lifting a bony hand to rub his opposite arm. "One fella, he says they had t' head back t' town before you got there and riled up the folks. Then this other, he says nobody'd believe Ryland, cause all the folks thought you had killed the mare." For a moment Jacob looked completely baffled.

"The
mayor
," Travis supplied. "Mayor."

"Oh! A man. Yeah. That makes sense now. Anyhow, this redheaded fella, he says the people in town all thought you'd killed him. They didn't know this Grey had hired Delias t' steal the payroll."

"Grey?" Katherine asked. "He hired Delias to steal his own miners' wages."

Travis nodded. Everything had suddenly become very clear to him.

“Then he hired me to kill Delias, and set me up as the thief. Only Grey had the money all along. The money the townspeople had thrown in the pot to put a stop to Delias."

"We have to go back to Silver Ridge," Katherine said quietly. "We have to tell the people what Grey has done. Then our innocence will be established."

"Is my brother gonna live?" asked Jacob weakly.

"Which way did they go?" Travis asked, his tone deep.

"I don't know. Could be—"

"Which way?" Travis leaned closer to grab a handful of Jacob's shirt.

The young man pulled weakly back. "I couldn't say. But it looked t' me like Delias had plans of heading back t' town."

There was a moment of silence, then, "If you're lying, I'll have your liver for supper," Travis vowed grimly.

Jacob paled another shade, and for a moment Katherine thought he might faint.

"I ain't lyin', mister. I swear it." Suddenly there were tears in his eyes. “They shot my brother. Woulda shot me too if'n they could."

Travis's fist loosened, allowing the boy to lie back against the log again. "Why didn't they?"

Jacob shifted his gaze nervously to Cody, not sure if he could trust him any more than he did Travis. "They was having them a disagreement. The fella named Red, he wanted t' shoot us straight off. But the old buzzard, Delias, he had him a branch that was a burnin' on the end, and he lifted the thing and looks at us and says... He says they'd have them some fun with us first," he finished.

Katherine felt the small hairs rise on the back of her neck, realizing the extent of the evil the boy had encountered.

Travis stood very still, clenching his fist above his revolver. "What happened?"

“There was a fight broke out amongst the men. Me and Luke, we saw our chance and hightailed it."

"You sure they didn't follow you?"

"I'm sure. We wasn't nothin' t' them. Just..." He swallowed again. "Just sport. But..." His gaze caught on Travis's. "They wanted you something fierce."

Ryland stepped back a pace, visibly trying to relieve his tension.

"Listen, fellas, me and my brother, we seen the light. We ain't gonna be outlaws no more. And if'n you could fix him up..." He paused long enough to swipe the back of a hand beneath his nose. "We'd stay on the straight and narrow till hell freezes up solid."

The announcement was delivered with such honest desperation that Katherine felt like crying herself.

"He'll live." Cody's tone was flat. "We got the bullet out, but he's not likely to want to sit for a while."

With that news the tears actually exited Jacob's eyes. "Pretty damn low, ain't it? Shootin' a man in his backside?"

"The two of you will sleep in the wagon until he's healed up," Cody ordered quietly.

Not needing to be told twice, Jacob hurried over the tailgate and out of view.

"Pick up any more damn strays and we won't have 'nough food t' last till morning," Saws grumbled.

"You brought enough supplies for a hundred foot soldiers, old man," Finch argued.

"And a good thing, too, the way we're packin' in extras. Hell, you'd think my wagon was a sickbed on wheels, makin' me stow my goods on them raw-boned broncs like..." His voice trailed off as he bent to stir the stew.

“This change your plans?" asked Blackfeather.

"Yes," said Kat. "We've got to get straight back to Silver Ridge to expose Grey's true nature."

"No!" Travis turned toward Cody. "She'll be safest here with the crew. We'll stick close until we reach the ranch."

"But Travis—"

"No!" The word was issued from his throat like a savage growl. "You'll go to Latigo, and you'll stay put like you said."

Katherine spent the remainder of the day doing nothing but drawing, cocking, and releasing the trigger of Finch's gun. It was tedious and tiring, and it made her wonder if Travis had any intention of teaching her to shoot at all, or rather planned to waste her time until they reached Latigo's ranch, where he would let her rot like an aged cut of beef.

But if such was his plan, he could think again.

Katherine pulled the revolver smoothly from the holster, staring over the barrel and into the distance. Travis Ryland would not be facing Delias alone. Of that she was certain.

"Wake up, lady," Travis ordered brusquely.

Katherine rolled over, noticing the sky was only slightly lighter than pitch. Her right arm ached all the way to her shoulder. Her fingertips were chafed, and her thumb hurt from scraping against the fine metal ribbing on the hammer of Finch's Colt. "What do you want?" she asked in a voice still husky with sleep.

"You're the one wanted to learn to shoot, remember?"

With the Jameson boys in the wagon, she'd found a sheltered spot not far from camp and had make her bed there. Dimly she wondered if Travis had slept at all, or if he had climbed to some distant ridge to scout the country for any sign of trouble, as Finch said he had done on the previous night.

"You want to change your mind, it's fine with me. It ain't giving me no joy knowing you'll be wandering around thinking you can protect yourself."

Regardless of the kink in her back, Kat sat up now. "What have you got against teaching me to shoot, Ryland?" she asked, still groggy with sleep. "You afraid I'll become a faster draw than you?"

"Lady." She saw him shake his head in the dim beginnings of dawn. "You're probably faster than I am now."

"What?" Her mouth fell slightly ajar. "I thought you were a deadeye shot."

"I'm steady," he said with no show of pride. "I ain't fast."

"But Finch said—"

"Finch's been listening to Latigo too long."

She scowled, but he answered before she voiced a question.

"Like Saws said, Latigo collects stray boys like a crow collects shiny rocks. He takes them in, intending to give them a meal and send them on their way. Only they stick around, and pretty soon he thinks he's their pa."

"Is that what happened to you?" she asked softly, trying to remember not to care.

But Travis turned his face to the east and hardened his jaw. "If I'm going to teach you to shoot, I'm planning to do it right. We don't have no time to waste."

"I think I have a right to know, Travis."

His gaze was pulled slowly back to her face. Her hair was crumpled and her oversized shirt slightly askew, but despite it all, she looked beautiful.

"I was nine. Maybe ten. We lived down in Kentucky. Had us a couple of slaves. Pa was home, and he was drunk, but not drunk enough, so Rachel, she sent me off to pick apples." Strange how the memories still made his gut feel raw. "When I came back, the Negroes were gone...and Pa was dead."

Kat's inhalation seemed louder than her words, which were breathed out like a secret prayer, "I'm sorry."

Travis shook his head. "I never could care, lady. It used to make me feel bad that I didn't. Thought Rachel would be disappointed that I wasn't sorry for his death. She always said he wasn't a bad man. It was just missing Ma that made him mean. And the whiskey that made him blame me for her passing."

"That's ridiculous," Katherine murmured in a voice as pale as her face in the darkness.

"She died just after birthing me."

“Travis, I—"

"I never knew her, so I didn't miss her. And anyhow, Rachel was more a mother to me than I could of ever hoped to have." He turned his gaze away, somehow not able to look at Kat's perfect face when he said the next words. "Only she was shot, too. Found her when I come running back, spilling apples all the way. They'd..." He drew a deep breath. "God knows what they did to her before they shot her." His throat hurt as if it had been cut. "She was only fourteen." His hands were shaking, and he pressed them against his thighs to stop the trembling. "She was gut shot, but she lasted three days, and then she cried. Cried cuz she didn't want to leave me alone."

From the hill where the cattle had bedded down, a cow lowed and was answered.

"Was it Delias?" Her voice was very soft, and painfully husky.

Travis turned his gaze back to Kat. Her eyes were wide, and her body seemed no less tense than his. "How did you know?"

"You wouldn't agree to kill him otherwise. Not unless he was truly evil."

Ryland drew a deep breath, knowing he should turn away from her before weakness overcame him and he took her in his arms. "You don't know me, lady."

Her eyes did not falter from his. “The hell I don't!"

"I killed more men than—"

"When?" she interrupted.

"Latigo, he found me, took me west with him. But I thought the Yankees had killed Rachel." He shook his head, trying to clear it of the horrors that haunted him.

"You fought for the Confederacy?"

"I wore the gray colors, but I didn't fight for no one but me."

"And Rachel."

It was difficult to breathe when she looked at him like she was now. "Don't make me out to be no hero. I'm a long shot from that."

"Not to me."

Suddenly he stood, his heart all bound up in his chest and his head aching. "I killed innocent men! Don't you see that? And for what? Nothing!"

She rose slowly, biting her lip and watching him. "That's what war is, Travis. You didn't invent it."

He took a deep breath, trying to steady his will. "Latigo, he never told me it was Delias that killed her. But he knew all along. Then, a few months ago, when Delias began causing trouble in Colorado and I started asking questions, he told me the truth." For a second Ryland squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed his fingers across his brow, which throbbed with a well-remembered pain. "I wanted to kill Lat when he first said it."