Jake, Devils on Horseback, Book 2 (17 page)

His arms closed around her in a hug so fierce, she couldn’t breathe for a moment, which was all right. She wanted to remember his touch, his scent, his very essence in case that was all she had left of him. They were walking into very real danger and tomorrow one of them might not be alive to hug.

“Be careful.” He kissed her forehead then turned and walked toward the canyon entrance, Elmer close behind him.

Gabby looked at the other three men waiting expectantly for her. She took a deep breath and doused herself with courage.

“Let’s go.” She headed up the little hill in a crouch, creeping in like a predator seeking its prey. The Devils followed in a single file.

The battle was about to begin.

* * * * *

Jake trembled so hard, his teeth almost chattered. Thank God the others had understood his fear of small spaces. He wasn’t scared for himself anymore, he was scared for Gabby, a fearless, determined woman with the backbone of a man. Her actions reminded him what it meant to be brave.

Sweat rolled down his neck and into his collar. Elmer, bless his grumpy heart, sat ten feet away in a crouch, shotgun clutched in his hands. Jake heard muted noises from the canyon, nothing distinctive, just those of people and horses. Waiting was the hardest part of being a soldier. Even if it wasn’t wartime, Jake would probably always consider himself a soldier.

The drone of bees on a nearby clump of flowers, the screech of a hawk overhead, and the beating of his heart all sounded loud to his ears. He swallowed dry spit and leaned his forehead against the rock beside him.

For the second time in the past few weeks, Jake prayed.

* * * * *

Gabby’s heart resided somewhere in her throat. As they crept along the narrow passage, she kept her eyes down, aware of every pebble and stone, while her arms ached from the strain of holding her boots and shotgun up and balancing her body. Her hands burned beneath the bandages and gloves as sweat coated her palms. The men were incredibly quiet, more so than she ever imagined three large bodies could be. They made it into the canyon in only fifteen minutes, and without giving themselves away.

Gideon touched her shoulder and pointed to a small group of boulders. She nodded and crept over as quickly as she could. Her arms sighed gratefully when she was able to lower them. After brushing off the debris as best she could, she slipped her boots on. When the rest had joined her, they all leaned into a tight circle to talk.

“I counted six men, well-armed, and four buildings.” He pointed at Gabby. “You did your job helping us get in here, so stay put.”

She opened her mouth to tell him she wasn’t about to cower behind rocks when a woman’s scream pierced the air.

“Looks like they didn’t kill all their captives after all.” Lee’s grip on his pistol tightened.

“God knows what they did to them though.” Zeke’s growl sent goose bumps up Gabby’s arms.

“Lee, flank left, Zeke, to the right. I’m headed up the middle. Watch out for those damn prairie dog holes, we don’t need a broken ankle out here.” Gideon narrowed his eyes. “Miss Rinaldi, you’re not going to stay put, are you?”

“Probably not.” She fingered the barrel of the shotgun. “I’m a good shot. I can help.”

“You need to stay back. God knows what Jake would do if something happened to you and it was my fault.” Gideon’s sharp gaze told her he understood quite a bit about what drove her to be there. “Let’s go.”

* * * * *

Jake jumped to his feet when the woman screamed. Images of Gabby being tortured or killed raced through his head with sickening clarity. Elmer rose as well and looked at Jake with a ferocity he didn’t think a sixty-year-old man could muster.

Although it about killed Jake to stay put, he waited for the gunfire. Until then, there was no way of knowing who was screaming or whether or not the Devils had made it into the canyon. This time when Jake trembled it was from fury. Anger had finally reared its head and kicked his sorry ass out of the lake of self-pity he’d been swimming in. To his relief, Jake felt something besides hopelessness and despair.

He felt alive.

Dammit, he was going to survive the battle and so was Gabby. They’d get married and live forever in the little mill making wheat and babies. Nothing would stop him from loving her or being with her. Not even the sons of bitches who thought it was acceptable to slit a woman’s throat.

Jake pulled out both pistols from their holsters and gripped them tightly. He was ready for the battle.

* * * * *

Gideon, Zeke and Lee moved like lithe shadows, darting from rock to tree along the canyon floor. Gabby crawled along behind them, stopping to make sure they weren’t noticed. By the time the men reached the first building, a rundown shack with gray weathered boards and no windows, Gabby was fifty yards behind them, lying on her stomach in the tall grass, weapon loaded and ready.

The men signaled to each other with their hands, then crept forward.

“What do we have here?”

Gabby was yanked to her feet by her hair, eliciting a short yelp that echoed louder than any bullet around the rocky canyon. She lost her grip on the shotgun, but that didn’t mean she was unarmed. As the man started dragging her toward the building, Gabby slipped the derringer from her pocket. Her scalp radiated pain down her body as the bastard practically pulled her hair out.

She considered the best place to shoot him with the small gun. From what she’d been told, it could do a lot of damage if she aimed in the right spot.

“Hey, fellers, look what I found out in the grass.” They were nearly to Zeke’s hiding place and Gabby knew she had to do something.

She jammed the gun between his legs and squeezed the trigger.

* * * * *

Another woman’s cry made Jake inch closer to the canyon. Two more minutes and he couldn’t wait any longer. It was sheer torture to wonder if his best friends and the woman he loved were being massacred while he stood there.

A small pop echoed, like the sound one of those toy guns makes.

Holy God.

The agonizing roar from a man sent Jake’s hackles up. The shooting started seconds later. Jake nodded at Elmer and they both entered the canyon with guns at the ready.

It was about two hundred yards to the buildings through open country. Throwing himself into the fray, Jake ran faster than he ever thought he could toward the nearest structure as bullets whizzed past his head. He hoped like hell one of them wouldn’t find its mark.

A figure appeared in front of him with two pistols aimed straight at his heart. Without hesitation, Jake shot the man between the eyes. Jumping over the body, he almost slipped in the gore splattered on the grass and ground. Jake swallowed the protest from his stomach and kept running.

When two women, bloodied and bruised with their hands tied, ran past him, Jake almost turned around to ask them if they were all right. They were obviously headed toward escape and he didn’t blame them. Screams, shouts and rapid gunfire shrieked in Jake’s ears and the familiar tang of fear coated his tongue. This time he wouldn’t let it override what he knew he needed to do.

Jake saw Zeke trapped behind the corner of the building by gunfire coming from two men, and he immediately evened the odds. While the second man tried to scuttle away from the bloodied corpse of his friend, Zeke shot him in the chest. The gaping wound was a familiar, gruesome sight.

Zeke held up six fingers, indicating there were six men. Jake held up two fingers, letting his friend know he’d killed two, minus the third one Zeke had just shot left three men. Jake hoped there were only six to begin with because they’d just put the odds in the Devils’ favor.

More gunfire sounded from the right. Jake and Zeke ran about twenty feet apart toward the sounds, zigzagging to avoid being hit. When he saw Gideon wrestling with someone in a brown coat and Lee being held down by two men, Jake’s temper exploded.

He shot one of the men holding Lee then his gun dry-fired. Jake knew he didn’t have time to reload so he jumped into the fight with just his bare hands. He punched the man in the jaw and they grappled on the ground. Jake was fueled by fury, unwilling to give in to the smelly bastard below him until his eyes rolled back in his head.

Lee lay bloody and beaten. He waved his hand weakly to let Jake know he was all right.

Jake turned to find Zeke on his knees staring at the figure in brown standing above him with a gun aimed square at his head. It was Veronica Marchison.

“What the hell’s going on here?” Gideon stood, spitting blood onto the ground.

She laughed, a chilling sound that echoed unnaturally in the now still air. “I have to give you men credit. I didn’t think you’d ever figure out where my men were hiding.”

“Veronica, you are a bitch,” Elmer growled.

“Yes, but I’m a rich one, thanks to you men getting rid of the fools I hired to sell the women in Mexico.” She grinned at the man lying by Jake’s feet. “Except this one.” With startling accuracy, she shot the man in the head. The warm splatter on Jake’s pants told him her aim was true. “Alvin, you breathing?” she called out.

A big, dark-haired man appeared from behind another building, a pair of pistols in his hands and a cold, calculating stare marring his face. “Right here.” He was handsome, probably just a few years older than Jake.

He swallowed, wondering how the hell they found themselves at the mercy of a woman who was more ruthless and cunning than any man they’d ever come up against. That’s when he realized Gabby wasn’t there, and he hoped like hell she was hiding someplace safe.

“Why would you do this?” Jake knew what it meant to be tortured, at the mercy of those who would do harm. “These women were your neighbors.”

“Don’t you read the newspapers, Red? There’s Indians killing good white people, raping women and burning towns to the ground. I don’t plan on being one of those women.” She gesture to Alvin. “We came up with the idea of earning enough money to move back east.”

Jake was astonished. “This was about money? You destroyed the town and ruined people’s lives, not to mention murdering Allison, and it was all for money? What the hell is wrong with you?” His voice rose as anger turned to fury.

Veronica smacked Jake across the head with the barrel of the shotgun. “It’s never
just
money. I came from nothing and fucked my way into Matthew’s bed. Then I worked every damn day to give my son more than I had and you goddamn bastards killed him.” Her lips curled into a snarl.

“I fought for the Confederacy, same as your son.” Jake ignored the bells ringing through his head from the blow.

“He fought for the
Union!
” she screamed. “The foolish boy wanted to impress that slut Gabrielle when the Union army made him a lieutenant. You fucking killed him!”

Jake looked into the woman’s eyes and knew they’d probably never make it out alive. He was glad he’d told Gabby he loved her.

“What do you want from us?” Gideon wiped his bleeding lip on his sleeve.

“Nothing from you, you dumb cracker.” Veronica eyed Zeke. “I had a taste of the blond one so maybe we’ll keep him alive for a while.”

Zeke looked shocked, then shame burned his cheeks. Jake didn’t know what had happened between them, but he’d bet the two bits in his pocket Veronica had tricked him, perhaps when he was in the doctor’s care.

“What the hell are you talking about, Ronnie? Did you fuck this bastard?” Alvin’s face flushed as spittle flew from his mouth.

“You’re the one who kept that girl around to fuck her every damn day so it’s not all right for me to take what I want too? Just stand there and try to at least look smart.” Veronica’s snarl told Jake in no uncertain terms who was in charge. “Now I’ve got to take care of the rest of you. My contacts in Mexico aren’t interested in grown men, especially old ones.” She turned and shot Elmer in the back so suddenly, Jake barely had time to react before she turned the gun toward Lee.

Like a warrior woman of legend, Gabby rose from the tall grass, shotgun cocked and aimed at Veronica. A loud boom exploded from the end of the gun and the older woman screamed and grabbed her bloody arm. It distracted Alvin long enough for Zeke to knock the pistols away from him. As Alvin and Zeke rolled and fought on the ground, Veronica picked up the shotgun and aimed it toward Gabby.

Jake dove for the woman and shoved his pistol under her chin. Breathing hard with anger and retribution, Jake considered ending the woman’s life. There had been too much suffering in the last four years to allow a selfish, greedy bitch like her to inflict herself on the world for a second longer. Blood pounded through his veins as his finger tightened on the trigger. He swallowed hard as the absolute need to punish Veronica throbbed deep in his heart.

“Jake, please don’t.” Gabby stood beside him, her dirty face the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. “Let the law mete out her punishment.”

It took monumental self-control, but Jake took his finger off the trigger. After one more fierce right hook, Zeke finally got the big man under control.

“Holy shit, what just happened?” Lee finally got to his feet. “Did a crazy store owner and her crazy lover just try to kill us?”

Elmer moaned and Jake dropped to his knees beside his new friend. The older man’s eyes appeared unfocused as tears slid from the corners.

“That bitch shot me.”

Jake couldn’t help the pained chuckle that escaped. “Gabby shot her.”

“Good. Never did like her.” Bubbles of blood ran from his mouth. “I thought for sure Cindy was alive. I hoped like hell anyway.”

“I’m sorry, Elmer. Two women ran out of the canyon but I don’t know who they were.” Jake swallowed the lump in his throat. “Maybe one of them was Cindy.”

“Did one of them have green eyes and long blonde hair?” Elmer’s voice was barely a whisper.

Jake had no qualms about lying. “Yes, one of them did. I’m sure of it.”

“Thank God.” Elmer slipped away in Jake’s arms, leaving his murdered body behind.

“Sweet Jesus.” Gabby dropped to her knees beside Jake and touched Elmer’s still head. “I can’t believe she shot him like that. Why did Veronica do this?” Her gaze searched Jake’s for answers. “I don’t understand.”