LaceysWay (6 page)

Lacey stared after Matt, but he didn’t slow down and he
didn’t look back, just stalked out of the room like a man possessed. Fearful of
being left behind, Lacey slammed the door and ran after him.

Matt passed by three saloons before he turned into one
called the Red Ace. Lacey swallowed hard as she followed him inside. She had
never been inside a saloon before, and she could not suppress a rush of
excitement as she glanced around. A long plank bar took up most of one side of
the room. There were rough-hewn tables scattered around the floor, most of them
occupied by men playing poker or faro. Lacey blushed when she saw the painting
hanging over the bar. It was of a plump woman with long red hair, bare breasts
and long legs.

Lacey quickly looked away, and saw three women she had not
noticed before. Saloon girls, she thought disapprovingly, and could not help
staring at them. They were all young, dressed in short red skirts, low-cut silk
blouses, black net stockings, and high-heeled slippers. One was a blonde, one a
brunette, and one a redhead. The blonde was sitting on a man’s lap,
nonchalantly smoking a cigar.

“It’s not polite to stare,” Matt whispered, giving Lacey a
sharp poke in the ribs. “Behave yourself.”

“But she’s smoking!” Lacey exclaimed. “A cigar!”

“Do you want one, too?” Matt queried, his voice faintly
mocking.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Stay close to me,” Matt warned, serious once more. “And
keep your mouth shut. This is a rough bunch, and I don’t want any trouble if I
can avoid it. Understand?”

“Yes,” Lacey answered sullenly. “I understand.”

Matt nodded. Then, releasing a long breath, he walked over
to the nearest table. “Mind if I sit in?” he asked, nodding at an empty chair.

“Help yourself,” invited a thin man in a light blue shirt
and denim pants.

“Obliged,” Matt said, and slid into the chair. Reaching into
his pants pocket, he pulled out their meager bankroll and placed it on the
stained green baize tabletop.

Lacey stood behind Matt, nervously twisting a lock of her
hair between thumb and forefinger. Besides Matt, there were four other men in
the game. She felt terribly out of place standing there. Around her she could
hear a loud hum of conversation, punctuated now and then by a shriek of
high-pitched feminine laughter, or a crude oath as one man or another lost a
great deal of money on the turn of a card.

Lacey watched Matt as he put a dollar into the middle of the
table. She had no idea how to play poker. Her father had played often, but he
had forbidden Lacey to watch, and had refused to teach her how to play when she
asked. “Poker’s a man’s game,” her father had declared firmly. “Women and cards
don’t mix.”

Matt placed ten dollars in the pot, and two of the men
tossed their cards into the middle of the table. With a shake of his head, a
third man tossed in his cards, and now only Matt and the man in the blue shirt
were in the game.

Lacey peered over Matt’s shoulder. He was holding three
kings and two aces, and she decided it must be a pretty good hand by the way he
was betting on it.

The man in the blue shirt scowled blackly as Matt slid
another five dollars into the pot. Muttering an oath, Blue Shirt threw his
cards into the center of the table, face down. Wordlessly, Matt raked in the
pot.

He won four hands out of the next six, and Lacey was
suddenly aware of the tension building at the table. Matt had won a sizable
amount of money, and the other men didn’t seem to like it.

“You’re awfully lucky, stranger,” remarked a tall, thin man
sporting a black eye patch.

Matt nodded. “Tonight I surely am,” he agreed affably. And
then he smiled. “But I’m due. Lady Luck’s been avoiding me the last few
months.”

The man wearing the eye patch grunted as he dealt a new
hand.

Lacey glanced across the table and her eyes met those of a
man wearing a red hat. He looked at her for a long time, his gaze filled with
what could only be described as lust, and then he slid a glance in Matt’s
direction, his expression thoughtful. Lacey quickly took her eyes from him, and
thereafter carefully avoided his gaze, but she could feel him watching her over
his cards. It made her feel dirty, the way he stared at her, as if he were
trying to imagine what she looked like unclothed.

Matt won another hand, and then another, and the men at the
table began to grumble about his so-called good luck. The man in the red
trapper’s hat glared at Matt.

“You’re a little too lucky for my taste,” he growled, his
hand stroking his bearded jaw.

“Maybe you’d do better if you kept your eyes on your cards
and off my woman,” Matt suggested gruffly.

Red Hat shrugged. “I think maybe you’re helping Lady Luck
along.”

“Are you accusing me of cheating?” Matt asked. His words
were softly spoken, but the whole saloon was suddenly dead quiet.

The man in the red hat pushed away from the table. “I’m
accusing you of being a little too lucky,” he replied ominously.

Matt’s eyes bored into those of the other man, his thoughts
racing. He could not risk a shootout, not here, not with Lacey standing behind
him, directly in the line of fire. Nor could he take a chance on getting
himself killed and leaving Lacey to face this ragtag bunch of men alone.

“There’s no crime in being lucky,” Matt said with a shrug.
“But if it bothers you, I’ll leave.”

The man in the red hat nodded. “Do that.” He stood up
slowly, his hands dangling at his sides. “But leave the little lady here.”

Lacey swallowed hard. Surely the man was kidding!

Now Matt stood up. “I’m afraid I can’t do that,” he said,
his voice deceptively mild. “She’s my wife, and I’m kind of attached to her.”

“Leave her,” Red Hat insisted, “or she’s gonna be your
widow.”

“Lacey, go outside and wait for me,” Matt said, not taking
his eyes off Red Hat.

“No.”

“Do as I say!” Matt said curtly.

“Please, Matt.”

“Dammit, Lacey, I don’t have time to argue. Get the hell out
of here!”

Frightened, Lacey turned and walked toward the saloon’s
double doors. No one tried to stop her. She halted just outside the doorway,
refusing to go any further. Whatever happened between Matt and the man in the
red hat, she intended to be there. Standing on tiptoe, she peered over the
batwing doors.

Matt and the man in the red hat were glaring at each other.
The atmosphere inside the saloon was charged with morbid anticipation as the
spectators waited to see what would happen next. There was little doubt that
there would be a shootout because of the woman, and one of the two men would
die. A man in a striped vest made his way to the bar and began taking bets on
the outcome.

The other three men who had been seated at the table with
Matt and the man in the red hat moved away, out of the line of fire.

The tension and the waiting seemed to stretch into eternity.

Matt cursed softly under his breath. He couldn’t back down
now. Vainly he wished for a better weapon than the two-shot derringer shoved in
the waistband of his pants.

Lacey held her breath as she waited to see what would happen
next. She did not have to wait long. The man with the red hat made a grab for
the gun holstered on his left thigh. Matt drew his derringer in the same
instant, and there was a long, rolling report as both weapons were fired
simultaneously. The smell of gunpowder filled Lacey’s nostrils.

For a timeless moment no one moved, and Lacey had the
feeling that everyone in the saloon had been trapped in some mysterious limbo
between life and death. Then, as though all the bones in his body had melted,
the man in the red hat slowly sank to the floor. It was then that Lacey noticed
the dark red stain blossoming across the front of his shirt.

Matt took a step back, his gun still in his hand, his eyes
narrowed as they swept the room in a long, challenging glance. “Anybody else
think I was cheating?” he asked in a hard tone.

No one spoke up. The man in the blue shirt shook his head
vigorously.

The man wearing the eye patch shrugged. “There’s no crime in
being lucky, just like you said.”

“You,” Matt said, speaking to the man nearest him. “Hand me
his gun.”

The man quickly did as bidden, and Matt shoved Lacey’s
derringer into his pocket as he took hold of Red Hat’s .44. It was a new Colt,
and it felt good in his hand.

“I’ll be leaving now,” Matt said curtly. He gathered his
winnings from the table and stuffed the greenbacks into his pocket. “Don’t
anybody follow me.”

Slowly Matt edged toward the door, his cold blue eyes
sweeping back and forth as he crossed the room.

Outside, he grabbed Lacey by the arm and pulled her into the
alley behind the saloon.

“Matt—”

“Be quiet.”

He stood there, listening for several moments until he was
certain they weren’t being followed. “Let’s go.”

They followed the alley to the livery barn. Matt paid the
man at the stable for putting up Lacey’s horse, bought a tall bay gelding for
himself, and then, riding side by side, they went to retrieve Lacey’s saddle.

“I guess we won’t be spending the night here after all,”
Lacey remarked as Matt saddled the mare.

“No. We’re going to buy some grub and ammunition and get the
hell out of here.”

She did not have to ask why. Matt was worried that the dead
man might have friends, and that they might come looking for revenge.

Lacey stayed with the horses while Matt bought provisions.
In addition to food and ammunition, he bought a deck of cards, a pint of
whiskey, a black Stetson, and a sack of tobacco, and then they were riding into
the desert. Lacey strained to hear some sound that would indicate they were
being followed, but she could hear nothing but the sounds made by their own
horses.

“Relax,” Matt said. “Nobody’s following us, at least not
yet.”

They rode for over an hour before Matt reined his horse to a
halt in a shallow draw. “We’ll bed down here for the night and pick up the
trail first thing in the morning,” he said, dismounting.

Lacey nodded, suddenly overcome with weariness. She hadn’t
realized how tense she had been the whole time they were in that squalid little
town until now. Spreading her bedroll on the sand, she crawled under the
blanket and closed her eyes. She could hear Matt unsaddling the horses,
hobbling them nearby, then getting into bed.

She closed her eyes, but sleep would not come. A niggling
question kept repeating itself in the back of her mind. She had to know. “Were
you cheating?” she asked, sitting up. Matt cocked an eyebrow at her. Then,
without a word, he pulled a deck of cards from his saddlebag. He shuffled the
deck several times, then dealt the cards. He gestured for Lacey to pick up her
hand. She had a full house, jacks over tens. She glanced up at Matt, a question
in her eyes, and Matt turned his cards over. He had a full house, aces over
kings.

Matt looked at her, one black eyebrow arching upward as he
scooped up the cards, shuffled them, cut them, and dealt her another hand. This
time she had four kings, Matt had four aces.

For the next fifteen minutes he shuffled the cards, making
the ace of spades appear on the top of the deck time after time, and then he
dealt two hands. Lacey had a full house, queens over jacks. Matt had four aces.

Lacey tossed her cards on the ground. “You didn’t answer my
question,” she remarked, although the answer seemed obvious now.

Matt shook his head. “I wasn’t cheating, but I would have if
it had been necessary.”

“Oh.” It troubled her, his knowing how to cheat at cards
like that. What other nefarious talents did he have? Did she really want to
know?

Matt Drago stared into the darkness long after Lacey was
asleep, his thoughts troubled. It was never easy, killing a man. Had he been
alone, he might have turned and walked away from the fight, but Red Hat wore
the look of a man who would have shot him in the back without turning a hair.
Matt couldn’t risk that, couldn’t take a chance on leaving Lacey alone in a
strange town, at the mercy of men who had little or no regard for a decent
woman.

Loosing a long sigh, he closed his eyes. He had tried
gambling for a living once, but it had been a rotten way of life. Spending most
of his waking hours in crowded, smoke-filled saloons, depending on the luck of
the draw, or his own nimble fingers, to earn his keep. Having to defend himself
when he was accused of cheating. And he had faced that accusation more times
than he cared to recall, because he was lucky at cards, just plain lucky. Like
tonight. So he had given up gambling and earned his living breaking horses,
working at one ranch or another until he had enough money to move on, drifting
until his money ran out, and then working again. He drifted off to sleep, his
dreams haunted by the faces of the men he had killed over a game of cards. Red
Hat’s face was there, too, only this time it was Red Hat who cleared leather
first. Matt uttered a strangled cry as he saw Red Hat’s finger squeeze the
trigger. Time slowed and the images warped and he saw the bullet leave the
barrel of the gun and head straight toward him.

“Matt. Matt!”

Lacey’s voice penetrated his nightmare, and he woke to find her
kneeling beside him, a worried expression on her face, her long russet-colored
hair falling over her shoulders.

“Are you all right?” she asked anxiously.

“Yeah.” He looked at Lacey, at the horses resting nearby. It
had only been a dream after all.

Lacey sat back on her heels, a quizzical expression on her
face. “Were you having a nightmare?”

“Yeah.” He hated to admit it, it seemed so childish. Damn!
It had seemed so real.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“It might help.”

It might at that, Matt thought, but how could he tell her
about the nightmares that plagued him? He was a grown man, not a little boy
frightened of the dark.