Midnight Rider (42 page)

He stepped closer to the guard who stood beside the door to the jail holding a scatter gun in his hands, a fat cigar clamped between his teeth.

“Pleasant evening for a smoke, no?”

The big man whirled toward the sound of the voice. “Who the hell are you?” he said around the cigar.

Ramon's long-barreled Colt swung up in answer, the smooth wooden stock clipping the man on the chin. He went down with a muted groan, his long body crumpling into the dirt, the cigar broken in two, one end still glowing, a wisp of smoke drifting up.

Ignacio stepped from the shadows. “The sheriff and two more men are inside his office. There is only one guard inside the jail.”

Ramon nodded and rapped twice on the thick jail door.

“That you, Wilkins?” sifted through the heavy oak planking.

“Let me in,” Ramon said, working to hide his accent. He must have done it because the door swung open, and the minute it did, the barrel of his rifle cracked hard against the man's balding head. “Get the keys,” he commanded Ignacio, who wrested them from the pocket of the guard lying on the floor, a thin stream of blood running down his forehead, along his nose, and onto his cheek before it pooled on the floor.

“Don Ramon!” Pedro Sanchez rushed forward, gripping the bars of his cell along with Santiago Gutierrez and the other two vaqueros.

Ramon smiled, glad they appeared to be in good health. “It is good to see you,
compadres.
”

“Far better seeing you, my friend,” Pedro said. Ignacio worked the key, the heavy iron lock grating, and the minute the door swung wide, the men stumbled out of the cell and into the small airless room.

“What about Angel?” Pedro asked, reading a moment of indecision in Ramon's hard face.

“I ought to let him hang.”

Pedro smiled, crinkling the lines at the corners of his eyes. “
Si,
but I do not think you will.”

Ramon shook his head. “No, I do not suppose I will.” Striding to the end of the corridor, he unlocked the door to Angel's cell, then wordlessly turned and walked back toward the other three men.

“
Vamanos, amigos.
We have spent too much time here already.” He didn't look to see if Angel followed, just strode out the door and swung up on his night-black horse. “We ride out through the old arroyo that circles the town. Once you are safely away, cut back and head into the hills.”

“
Si
 … El Dragón,” one of the freed vaqueros said with a grin. Four saddled horses waited for the men, who swung hurriedly up on their backs. Ramon whirled Viento, made a high sign to the men, touched the horse with his spurs, and galloped off down the street toward the dry wash leading out of town.

*   *   *

I'm not going to make it! The frantic thought tore through Carly's mind as she raced her horse across the grassy square in front of the mission. A little to the right of the huge carved doors into the church, she reined the mare to a sliding stop and leapt down from the sidesaddle, losing her balance, landing hard, and twisting her ankle.

Muttering an unladylike curse, she jerked her plum silk skirts to mid-calf and started limping as fast as she could through the heavy wooden door and up the stairs leading to the choir loft and the ropes that rang the bells in the
campanario,
the towering bell wall beside the church. By the time she had spotted Ramon, he was already riding into the town and it had been too late to stop him. Her only chance now was to warn him.

She knew the risk she was taking. Her daring plan put him in even more danger, yet it was the only chance he had.

She prayed he would know what her frantic warning meant.

Wincing with every step, she made her way up the stairs and looked up at the bells mounted with rawhide thongs in each of the three arched openings. She grabbed the long dangling length of hemp tied to the one at the top, pulled with all her might, and began to ring the huge iron bell.

The loud clang of metal sent a vibration down the rope, up her arm, and rang out over the big church plaza. It carried past Segundo Street, down Castro, and started to rouse the town. Curtains flew open, heads ducked through windows, people came out of their houses to see what was going on. Nothing was scheduled at the church this time of night, no weddings, no socials, no funerals. Something had to be wrong.

At the edge of the city, Ramon cursed the sound. In seconds the entire town would know about the breakout. The sheriff and his men would be behind them in hot pursuit. He wondered who the hell was sounding the alarm, then frowned at the irony that whoever it was had chosen to ring the big bell. First Andreas had fallen to the sound, now it appeared to be his turn.

Ramon's stomach tightened as a cold fissure of warning sliced through him, a feeling so strong he could not shake it. They had almost reached the arroyo, were just seconds from disappearing out of sight in the dry old wash that would carry them to safety.

Or would it?

“Hold up!” he commanded, raising an arm to the men who thundered along in his wake. “We will take the alternate route, ride through the plaza, down the hill to the river. Go! Do it now!”

They did not wait for an explanation. Too many times in the past El Dragón's instincts had been right—the only thing that had saved them. And now that instinct was telling him the way to safety lay not in the way they had planned but in the opposite direction.

The men whirled their horses, dug in their spurs, and urged their mounts into a flat-out run. A rifle shot rang out, then another and another, the shots not coming from town, but from somewhere behind them. Over his shoulder, Ramon saw a wave of men, mounted and riding full tilt, surge out of the arroyo and thunder toward the town. His own men answered fire, but didn't slow down. One man fell, another took a lead ball in the shoulder but kept on riding.

Ramon jerked his pistol from the bandolero across his chest and fired over his shoulder, bringing one man down, while Ignacio wounded another. They rode past the front of the church and the men, now riding ahead of him, dropped over the ridge off toward the river. Ramon didn't follow. Instead, the moment he dropped out of sight, he wheeled his horse, leaned low over Viento's neck, circled around to the left, and came up at the back of the mission.

Making his way toward the high bell wall, he saw what he knew he would see. Caralee's palomino mare, his wife limping frantically toward her.

“Ramon!” she cried out when she saw him. He was down from his horse, running toward her, catching her up, and tossing her into the saddle before she could say any more.

“Ride, Cara—back through the arroyo. The men are no longer there and I will be right behind you.”

She spun the little mare and the horse leapt forward. Shots still rang out but they were coming from the riverbed below them, more sporadic now and echoing from different directions. The men had split up, their pursuers would have to do the same.

Ramon smiled grimly. His vaqueros were the finest horsemen in the world. In a life and death contest like this one, he did not doubt the Californios would win.

He glanced ahead, saw his wife leaning over her horse's neck, riding hard through the arroyo ahead of him. Her plum silk skirts rode well above her knees, her petticoats white in the sliver of moon, her seat on the horse sure and steady. If he hadn't been so worried for her safety, he might have smiled at how much she had learned. Instead, he closed the distance between them, shielding her from whoever might follow, then they settled into a steady lope over the rocky terrain.

They had just rounded the corner leading out of town to safety when hoofbeats sounded behind them. A rifle shot rang out, cutting the air beside his head, then another and another.

“Keep riding!” he shouted to Caralee, drawing his pistol once more. He fired at their pursuer, once, twice, saw the man stiffen as the lead ball slammed into his shoulder then snap off a return shot before he careened off his horse.

Ramon grunted in pain, the hot lead hitting him like the blow of a hammer, burning into his back and tearing out through his chest. The scorching pain nearly knocked him out of the saddle.

Unconsciously, his hold grew tighter on the reins and Viento began to slow.

“Ramon!” Carly shouted, her voice high-pitched with fear as she whirled her mare and rode up beside him.

“We have to keep going,” he said through teeth clenched hard against the pain. “We will not be safe until we are far from here.”

“But you're wounded!”

“We will stop as soon as it is safe.”

“You need a doctor. We have to—”

“We must ride,
querida.
There is no other way.”

“A-are you sure you can make it?”

He smiled grimly, fighting the dizziness, trying not to succumb to the beckoning lure of unconsciousness. “Do not fear, Cara. I have much to live for. I will make it.”

They rode without stopping till they were well into the mountains south of town, then looped back toward Las Almas. By now, the others would have scattered. The safest place Ramon could be was at home.

Fighting his dizziness and the pain knifing into his back and chest, he glanced at the woman riding close beside him, her face tense with worry. Austin and his men had been waiting in ambush. Just a few seconds more and the trap would have been sprung. He and his men would be dead if it hadn't been for Carly and the ringing of the bell.

He thought of it with an odd sense of rightness, just before he slid from his horse.

“Ramon!” Carly jerked rein on the mare, her heart leaping hard against her ribs. Scrambling down from the saddle, she limped back to where Ramon lay in the dirt. He was conscious, she saw, but only barely, groaning softly as he tried to sit up.

“Dear God…” Biting back a sob, she eased him down on the ground. “Don't try to move,” she instructed, trying not to sound as frightened as she was, “just stay where you are until I can find some way to slow the bleeding.”

He settled heavily onto his back and lay still for a moment, his breathing harsh and labored. Carly tore open his shirt with shaking hands. Dear Lord, there was so much blood! A jagged hole yawned from a place just above his heart, the skin badly torn and already turning purple. The bloody entrance hole wept a stream down his back. It was a vicious, painful wound, one he could die from, yet she could not—would not—entertain the thought. They had come too far, suffered too much. The God she loved would not be so cruel.

“Rest easy, my love,” she said softly. “Everything's going to be fine.” She bit hard on her lip to stifle the trembling in her limbs. Instead of giving into her fear, she yanked her silk faille skirt out of the way and hurriedly began to tear strips from her white ruffled petticoat. Folding the lengths into a pad, she pressed them against the exit wound in his chest, ignoring Ramon's hiss of pain.

“The shot went all … all the way through,” she said, blinking back tears at the agony etched into his features. “I-I suppose that's good, if we can get the bleeding to stop.”
If.
Such a frightening word when someone you loved might be dying.

Dear Lord, she prayed, I'll do anything you ask—if you'll only just let him live.

“I-I need to move you a little. I'll try not to hurt you.” With gentle care, she rolled him onto his side and placed a second thick cotton pad over the entrance wound in his back. By the time she finished binding the makeshift bandages in place, using a strip of petticoat wrapped around his broad chest, her hands were shaking so badly she could barely tie the knot.

Ramon's long fingers gently tightened around her wrist. “Do not be frightened,
querida.
We have made it this far, we will make it the rest of the way. We can do anything … as long as we are together.”

A painful lump rose in her throat. “I didn't tell them, Ramon. I don't know who did, but it wasn't me—I swear it.”

His eyes came to rest on her face. “Never once did I think that. You have never betrayed me. If one of us has failed the other, it is I who have failed you. Mine is the only betrayal.”

She glanced away from him, her heart aching, unwilling to meet his gaze. “There's something I have to tell you. Something I should have told you long before this.” She turned to look at him, uncertainty making the words come out soft and a little too strained. “I-I'm not who you think I am. My family wasn't wealthy … the way my uncle made everyone believe. I was born in a Pennsylvania mine patch. I'm nothing but a poor miner's daughter. Compared to your family's lineage, I'm not fit to carry a de la Guerra's shoes.”

“I wondered how much time it would take before you told me.”

A mist of tears touched her eyes. “You knew? How could you possibly have known?”

“You talked about it when you were ill, those days at Llano Mirada. It made no difference then. It does not matter now.”

“But surely—”

He pressed a long dark finger against her lips. His hand smoothed her hair, slid under the thick dark auburn strands at the nape of her neck. Urging her toward him, he brought her mouth down to his for a soft, gentle kiss.

“Te amo, mi corazon,”
he whispered.
“Te amo como jamas he amado.”
I love you, my heart. I love you as I have never loved before.

She started crying then. Big, salty tears that scalded her cheeks and splattered onto his bandaged chest. She loved him so much. She couldn't bear it if she lost him.

Ramon smiled with tenderness, lifted her chin with his hand. “Now is not the time for crying. You can cry along with my mother once we are safely back home.”

Carly sniffed and her head came up. “You're going to ride?”

“
Si,
that is the only way we will get there.”

“But you've lost so much blood, and—” Carly stiffened her spine. The thick cotton bandages were helping. The blood pumping out of the wound had begun to slow. If they could make it back to Las Almas, his mother and Tia could help her take care of him. They could make him well again—she would make sure of that herself. “Can you make it to your horse?”