The Gunslinger's Man (12 page)

And if he wasn’t, chances were so slim they’d cross paths again that he had nothing to lose by asking.

Predictably, Halloran heaved a put-upon sigh and flattened his mouth into a line.

Asher had given up hope for an answer when Halloran said, “For now, I am the closest thing he has to expendable infantry. He can send me out to do what he won’t waste his men on.”

“And what’s that? Slaying his so-called pals? Raiding towns and farms all over the valley?” Asher had no fondness for the vampires who might have come under Ambrose’s fire—except in a vague, ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’ sort of way—but he resented Halloran his willingness to wreak havoc on the mayor’s behalf when he wouldn’t even lift a finger for the humans who’d paid to bring him to Sargasso in the first place.

“Who told you that?”

They’d traded enough lies that one more wasn’t about to make a dent. “I ain’t as dim as you think. I know you’ve been wakin’ snakes all over the valley. Hope it’s worth it, whatever it is you sold your soul down the river for…”

Halloran gave a slow shake of the head. “This ain’t about me. Between all the droughts and the Depression, there’s a storm brewing in this desert. Ambrose reckons he can weather it if he’s got everyone else on their knees.”

“I see. And the reign of Ambrose continues,” Asher drawled. “Thanks for your contribution.”

“We’ll see.”

Asher snorted and rubbed a knuckle into the bridge of his nose. The bed mattress dipped. Halloran was suddenly within arm’s reach, propped up on one elbow at the foot of the bed. Asher’s every muscle seized, shock rendering him too slow to react.

“Where are you, Asher? It’s obviously not where you belong.”

“And where’s that?” Asher hitched his eyebrows. “Here? Tied to the bed, at your disposal whenever you damn well please?”

Halloran didn’t take the bait. “In Sargasso.”

“Sargasso’s just another town.” Asher affected a shrug, nonchalant to the point of a lie. “What’s it ever done for me?”

“You could have run away before,” Halloran pointed out, stubborn. “Others have. But you didn’t. You stayed and tried to fight—”

“And
this
is where it got me!” It took conscious thought, but after a few moments, Asher managed to tip back against the headboard, his legs splayed before him. He was relaxed. He wasn’t going to get worked up about this sorry state of affairs.

He wouldn’t give Halloran that satisfaction.

“You’re right.”

Asher arched his brow. “I am?”

“You’re not built to be anyone’s servant. And you were a lousy goddamn prisoner.”

Despite himself, a reluctant smile tugged at the corners of Asher’s mouth. “You were a piss-poor jailer.”

“Yeah, well…I’m a robber, not a kidnapper. Or I was.”

“Before you started answering to the law?” Asher wondered, mirth leaching from his voice.

Halloran’s gaze slid down his body, but he didn’t seem to be looking at Asher so much as through him. It didn’t prevent a guilty twitch of interest from Asher’s baser instincts, nor the shame that followed.

He shifted, pressing his knees together and locking his arms around them. “Tell me one thing.”

Halloran peered up, his expression at once wary and hopeful.

“Connie’s parents. Are they…?”

“Alive,” Halloran said. “For now.”

“How?”

“Malachi. Don’t ask me why. I can’t tell if Ambrose’s brood is the most calculating bunch of assholes I’ve ever met or just a clutch of spoiled wastrels.”

Asher whistled. “Does the good mayor know what you make of his family?”

“The good mayor,” Halloran said, “knows he’s surrounded himself with vipers. And if he doesn’t, which I very much doubt, then he’s a fool.”

He spoke with uncanny conviction. It was the most passionate Asher had heard him on any subject.

“Why didn’t you talk to me like this when I was at Willowbranch?”

Halloran clammed up at once. “Like what?”

“Like…you have a brain in that head of yours. Like you ain’t just a brute who’s only motivated by his next meal.” Whom Ambrose had gifted him in a rare show of generosity, and who incidentally happened to be a human being.

“What would I talk to you for?” Halloran sneered. “You made your feelings about my kind crystal clear ’fore we even met.”

He had to dredge up the past. He had bring up Asher’s colossal mistake.

Asher’s mood soured with the sharp, acidic burn of grief. “If you expect me to be sorry—”

“I expect you to be sensible. But apparently that’s too much for your species.”

“Sensible? And what’s that look like? Licking your boots?”

“It looks like thinking before you do something as half-witted as run off into the goddamn desert—”

“I’m not
in
the desert, you son of a bitch!” Asher blurted before he could stop himself. He regretted the admission as soon as he saw the corners of Halloran’s mouth tip up. “You scooped me in on purpose.”

“Did you think you was the only one who could take advantage of a short fuse?” Halloran propped himself up on his hands. “So you’re not in the desert no longer… Where are you, then? The train to Mesa? Some nearby town?”

Asher flexed his jaw, but it was too late. The answer was as good as written on his forehead.

“Ah,” Halloran drawled. “You’ve found sanctuary somewhere.”

“Stay out of my head.”

“Can’t.”

“Bullshit,” Asher snarled. “If this is my dream, then I want you
out
. I want you gone. You hear me?
I want you—
”

Halloran’s fangs dropped like two pistols drawn too fast for the eye to see. Asher’s breaths snagged in his throat as their bodies collided. The back of his head slammed into the plaster hard enough that he saw stars.

He came awake with a jolt, pulse racing in his ears. The ghost of a rough kiss lingered on his mouth. Lust surged through him, vindictive and dangerous.
Damn him.
But wanting Halloran was nowhere as bad as having revealed to him that Asher and his friends weren’t lost in the desert anymore. There were only so many towns a man could reach leaving Sargasso on horseback.

Redemption
happened to be the closest.

Chapter Fourteen

The smell of charred meat hit Asher long before he glimpsed the bustle in the kitchen. From the stairwell, he counted about five silhouettes moving to and from the stove, setting out plates and brewing coffee. The hum of voices was all but absent, which left Asher to wonder at nearly half a dozen women working in such regimented silence.

His stomach growled, putting paid to any notion of assessing his surroundings for much longer. The bite on his neck smarted as he clomped down the final handful of steps. With Moreau’s warning ringing bitterly in his ears, he took no pains to disguise his tread. If this was the mayor’s idea of a henhouse, Asher would as soon distinguish himself as a nonissue than a threat.

Wary faces greeted him at the kitchen threshold, casting a pall of doubt over his success in the matter.

“Good morning, ladies.” Asher tried on a smile. “I, uh… Something smells delicious.”

None of the women answered.

The kitchen was a busy hub, clearly the heart of the house even if it all belonged to a vampire. Its overflowing shelves marked a sharp contrast to the scarcity Asher had witnessed at Willowbranch, where a bit of porridge and a cup of Arbuckle’s was the best he could muster to break the monotony of hardtack and sharp cheese.

He cleared his throat and tried again. “My friends and I came to Redemption only yesterday… Mr. Moreau didn’t happen to mention it?”

Or that he insisted I enjoy his personal hospitality?
In his bed?

Asher didn’t know whether to be relieved or dismayed that the man himself was nowhere to be seen. His presence would’ve made this easier, but without it, Asher could always try to talk his way into taking in the sights before shackles tightened around his ankles once more. “Don’t suppose any of you know where I could find a vampire named Ivan?”

“Two houses down,” blurted one of the women. She seemed to be the youngest, with hair the color of sunburned grass and doe eyes that she quickly lowered when her response attracted glowers from the others.

Asher raised two fingers to the brim of an imaginary hat. “Much obliged.”

“Ain’t you gonna eat something first?” asked another woman. Her voice was gravelly with age but her face was still youthful. Asher might have mistaken the gray in her hair for blonde if not for the sharp contrast with her thick, black eyebrows. She pulled one of the chairs at the table. “Sit down, Mister…?”

“Franklin. Asher Franklin.”

“Mr. Franklin.” The woman nodded, as though committing his name to memory. “Sibyl, fetch us another chair.”

The girl who’d given away Ivan’s whereabouts scrambled to obey.

“I’m Darlene,” said the graying woman. “These are my sisters.”

She introduced each one in part, but Asher no sooner registered their names than they slipped his mind again. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was until he saw the sausages browning on the stove.

His distraction didn’t go unnoticed. Darlene ordered that breakfast be fixed for him and her orders were obeyed without argument by the other women. They all seemed to be human, which made whatever hierarchy existed between them far too obscure for Asher to parse. As far as he could see above the stiff collars of their plain, homespun dresses, none sported any garish bites. None carried themselves with the arrogance of men and women who knew they had a vampire’s favor, either.

Asher remembered this rigid sense of decorum from his few past trips through Redemption. It hadn’t struck him as odd back then.

To his surprise, all four women looked to Darlene once they’d sat around the table and joined their hands in prayer. She bowed her head and so did they.

Some townspeople still clung to the old ways in Sargasso, but in Uncle Howard’s home, family meals were as rare as to be anomalies. Asher couldn’t recall the last time they’d squandered precious time saying grace.

“Amen,” Darlene intoned gravely and, as if guessing his wayward thoughts, trained her gaze squarely onto Asher. “What do you want with Ivan?”

Don’t see how that’s any of your business.
With some effort, Asher swallowed back the retort. “One of my friends enjoyed his hospitality last night.”

“You have women friends?” Sibyl asked. Surprise widened her pretty brown eyes.

“I do,” Asher confirmed over the sound of cutlery scraping plates. “We grew up together.” But lest they think he was concerned with Connie’s well-being out of some other sentiment than brotherly affection, he made sure to mention Wesley and Uncle Howard too.

“If Husband gave your uncle to Miss Lucretia, he must be quite young and handsome still,” Darlene ventured over the rim of her coffee cup. “She’s none too fond of the old ones.”

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” muttered another of the women.

Darlene whipped her head around at the bold speaker and made a hissing sound, her gaze hardened in admonition.

Asher could’ve sworn he saw the plain brunette shrink lower in her seat. “Moreau didn’t
give
my uncle to anyone. He was merely concerned about us spending the night all crammed in one hotel room… That’s all.” As if saying it made it true. As if injecting confidence into his voice had anything to do with persuading everyone else.

He cut into his sausage with a little more fervor than was needed, all too aware that he was being watched. Halloran hadn’t shied from calling him a fool last night. What would he have said if he’d known the full extent of Asher’s circumstances?

Trying not to squirm under the intensity of their focus, Asher tried for a change of topic. “Um…where is Moreau this morning?” He hadn’t been in bed when Asher woke up, though the blood on the sheets was proof enough that Asher hadn’t dreamed
him
up too.

“No doubt conferring with his lieutenants,” Darlene replied. “Redemption must be defended day and night, particularly of late.”

Her eyes didn’t linger on him for long, though whether it was because she didn’t think him important enough to have played a part in her town’s recent misfortunes or because she didn’t know more, Asher couldn’t say. Ambrose’s campaign of harassing his neighbors hadn’t yet drawn to a close. The Red Horn Riders were still ravaging the valley on his behalf.

“You mean to stay in Redemption, then?” Darlene went on.

His mouth full, Asher nodded. At least the food was decent and plentiful. No one batted an eye when he stared yearningly at the skillet, silently begging for a second helping.

His plate was refilled, his coffee topped up.

In spite of where he was and what he’d left behind, he had begun to feel a little better by the time breakfast drew to a close. “Are you sure I can’t help you with the dishes?” he asked, idling at the table with the dregs of his coffee.

Most of the women had departed to see to their duties elsewhere in the house. Only Sibyl remained by the washbasin, left alone to wrestle with a mountain of dirty plates and a skillet that had seen better days.

She glanced over her shoulder. “No, Mr. Franklin. I’m quite all right.”

“Asher.”

“What?”

“Call me Asher. I’m hardly any older than you are.” Curiosity gnawed at him, but he held back a question as to Sibyl’s age. It wouldn’t be proper.

“Asher,” she repeated, two spots of color blooming on her cheeks. “Never known any Ashers before. A few Ashleys. Alecs, Alexanders… And there was old Abraham, of course, though he didn’t stay long.”

“Didn’t much care for Redemption?”

Sibyl shook her head. “Oh, no. Good Lord called him back to Heaven.”

Shit.
Asher bit his lip. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring up a painful subject.”

Death was no rarity in Sargasso. Between vampires and disease, life in the Arizona wilds had always packed a killer punch.

“Nothing painful about it,” Sibyl said. Plates clicked, one atop the other, as she laid them out to be dried. “Husband says to be human is to be of use. When Abraham got too tired to work, he wasn’t a bein’ like you and me no more.”