The Independent Bride (15 page)

“I think we ought to go west. I don’t see why anybody should bring a herd this far east when it’s away from the streams coming out of the mountains. Besides, we’ll be going in the direction of the Lavater ranch.”

“What do you plan to do if you find the trail?”

“I’ll follow it, because it means the cows are on their way to the reservation.”

“What if you don’t find a trail?”

“Then we’ll head toward the ranch. Sooner or later we’ll find the herd. Come on, let’s go.”

The terrain looked more wild and threatening the farther from the fort they rode. She didn’t find coyotes friendly animals. They looked far too much like small wolves. Seeing the bones of a buffalo reminded her that even large animals faced death. Even the leaves of the plants looked more gray than green.
Stop being silly,
she told herself.
You’re only seeing the dangerous side of everything because Bryce isn’t here.
He wasn’t going to be at the fort forever. She had to learn to depend on herself.

“Do you think we’ve gone far enough to have found the trail?” she asked Zeb after they’d ridden for what seemed like an hour. They had pulled into the shade of a cottonwood tree to rest their horses.

“We’ve gone too far,” he said.

That was what she’d been afraid of. They hadn’t found the trail because the herd hadn’t gotten this far. Just as she started to speak, she heard a sound. “Did you hear that?”

“It’s gunfire.”

“Someone’s after the herd.”

“You don’t know that. It could be someone out hunting.

“That’s not just one gun. It’s rustlers,” Abby said, slapping her horse on the shoulder with the reins. “I’ve got to help Lavater.”

“How’re you going to do that?” Zeb asked, riding after her.

“I won’t know until I see what’s happening.”

Abby discovered she had a great deal more time to come up with a solution man she’d expected. After a mile the gunfire didn’t sound much louder than before.

“Sometimes gunfire can be heard for ten miles,” Zeb said.

“You’re the soldier,” Abby said. “What do you suggest we do?”

“Get close enough to see how many there are, then go back for the colonel.”

“They would have the cows halfway to Denver by the time Bryce got here.”

Something made Zeb look over his shoulder. “Uh-oh!” he said.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s the colonel. And he’s galloping his horse. He swears at any soldier who gallops his horse across the plain. He says it’s a sure way to get killed.”

“Then why is he galloping now?” Abby asked, greatly relieved at Bryce’s presence.

“Because he’s mad as hell. He’s probably going to kill one of us. You being a lady means he’s going to kill me.”

“If he wants to kill anyone, he can kill the rustlers,” Abby said, urging her horse into a gallop. The sound of gunfire was growing louder. She suspected Bryce meant to force her to go back to the fort, but she didn’t intend to give him the chance. She topped out on a rise of ground that overlooked a wide, shallow canyon carved by a rock-strewn stream. On the far side she could see the herd of cattle and the cowhands defending them. Down below, with their backs to Abby and Zeb, were the rustlers.

“Zeb and I can catch them in a crossfire,” Bryce said as he pulled his tired mount to a gravel-spewing stop. “You get back out of sight.”

“I can help,” Abby said.

“Get back or I’ll tie you in your saddle.”

Bryce didn’t give her a chance to argue. He jumped down from the saddle, grabbed her horse’s bridle, turned him around, and gave him a biting slap across his rump with a riding crop that sent him galloping back toward the fort.

It took Abby several hundred yards to convince the ornery beast he wasn’t going back to his comfortable stall just yet. By the time she got him turned around, she was too angry to think of danger or Bryce’s reaction to her refusal to obey his orders.

The fighting was over by the time she reached the canyon.

“I told you to stay out of sight,” Bryce said, still very angry.

“That herd represents my future,” she said, even as she flinched at the look in his eyes. “You have no right to tell me what to do.”

“You’ll soon find I do,” he said. “The rustlers have run off. I’m going down to see how the cowhands fared.”

“I’m going, too,” Abby said.

She wouldn’t have been surprised if he ordered her back to the fort on pain of being lashed to the nearest cottonwood. Or cactus. “Bring your horse up between Zeb’s and mine,” he said after a pause. “Cowhands are usually a pretty rough crowd.”

She couldn’t imagine what danger cowhands could pose when she was accompanied by two soldiers, but she wasn’t willing to push Bryce’s temper at the moment. She tried to concentrate on the fact that he was protecting her rather man ordering her around as if she was one of his soldiers. He didn’t speak as they rode down into the canyon. Nor did he acknowledge the body of one of the rustlers.

“That’s a man we just passed,” she said.

“Someone in the patrol will see to him,” Zeb said.

“There is no patrol,” Abby said.

“There will be,” Zeb assured her. “The colonel would never leave without ordering a patrol to follow.”

Abby turned to Bryce.

“They ought to be here by the time we’ve talked to the cowhands.”

Two rough-looking men stepped out into the open. Both carried rifles. They waited for Bryce to ride up to them.

“Is this the Lavater outfit?” he asked.

“Who wants to know?” one of the men asked.

“I’m Colonel McGregor, commander of Fort Lookout. I have a patrol following to make sure the beef gets to the Indian reservation.”

“You’re welcome to what’s left of it,” the man responded. “Those sons-of-bitches struck us yesterday and ran off half the herd. We can’t move because we got two men wounded.”

“There’s a medic with the patrol. He’ll do what he can.”

The cowboy cocked his head toward Abby, a sneer on his cracked tips. “Did our fight interrupt your picnic?”

“This is Miss Abigail Pierce,” Bryce said. “She holds the contract on that beef. She rode out to see why you were late.”

His expression held for a minute before changing to one of curiosity. “You must be from back East,” he said.

“I don’t see what that has to do with anything,” Abby said.

“You will,” the cowhand replied, before turning back to Bryce. “You intending to take these cows to the reservation yourself?”

“I’ll detail some men to help you if you want,” Bryce said, “but first we’re going after the cows they stole.”

“They ran them off during the night,” the cowhand said. “They shouldn’t be too far away.” He looked from Abby to Bryce. “You seem to be taking a mighty personal interest in this.”

“Any trouble with the Indians becomes a problem for the army,” Bryce said.

“The army never worried about us before,” the cowhand stated, “and we was robbed every time we set out.”

“I was never called on to help,” Bryce pointed out. “Baucom accepted the losses as part of doing business. Miss Pierce won’t.”

“Maybe if Baucom had been pretty enough, he could have asked the army to help him.”

“Where are the wounded men?” Abby asked, hoping Bryce wouldn’t bristle at the cowhand’s insinuation. “Maybe I can help.”

“Are you a doc?” the cowhand asked, his tone and stance indicating he thought she was just a pretty female who’d never done anything for herself.

“No, but like every woman, I’ve helped nurse sick people.” The cowhand said nothing. “Maybe we should ask the injured men if they want to reject my help.”

“Follow me,” the other cowhand said.

Abby found the two men next to the creek under the shade of a peach willow and box elder thicket. One had been shot in the chest, the other in the stomach. Both men had had their wounds bound up with bandages that were dirty and soaked with blood.

“See to Rufus,” the man with the stomach wound said. “There’s nothing anybody can do for me.”

Abby didn’t need a doctor to know he was right “I’ll need some warm water,” she said to the second cowhand.

“We got hot water, but we got nothing for bandages,” the boy said.

“I’ll use my petticoat.” Abby turned to Bryce. “Do you have a knife to cut some strips from my petticoat?”

“In front of these men?” Bryce asked, shocked.

“I’m sure they’ll turn away,” Abby said impatiently. She would worry about decorum when she was safely back at the fort.

If the situation hadn’t been so dire, she would have enjoyed Bryce’s discomfort as he approached the task of cutting bandage strips from her petticoat. He couldn’t bring himself to raise the hem of her dress, so she did it for him. The ladies in his family must have been very formal to have instilled in him such a rigid sense of decorum. She wondered how he’d ever been able to relax enough to enjoy relations with his wife. Abby was horrified that such a thought would have entered her head. Thank God Bryce couldn’t read her mind. She’d have died of embarrassment.

But the thought wouldn’t go away. She wasn’t experienced at love, but she knew men placed a lot of importance on the physical side of marriage. Her aunt had said if she and Moriah wanted to keep their husbands satisfied and faithful, they had to embrace this need men had and welcome them to their beds. Abby wondered if Bryce’s wife had ever welcomed him into her bed.

“I think that’s enough,” Bryce said, holding up two large pieces of cotton cloth, “but your petticoat is ruined.”

”Tear them into strips while I clean this wound.”

“I hope that dust cloud is your patrol,” the first cowhand said to Bryce. “I’m not up to another fight.”

Abby hoped no one would guess she’d never taken care of such a serious wound, or that the sight of the dirty, bloody bandage caused her stomach to heave. She forced herself to remove the bandage and clean away the caked blood. The wound itself was a small hole with darkened edges.

“You don’t have to worry about digging out no bullet,” Rufus said. “It came out the back.”

The exit wound was much worse, ragged and large. “The army doctor will have something to help prevent infection,” she told Rufus. “The best I can do is clean it and apply a fresh bandage.”

“You got any whiskey?” the man with the stomach wound asked. “That’s about all that can help me now.”

“I’m sure the doctor will have something to make you more comfortable.”

“How about a bullet to the head?”

Abby did her best to control her shock at the man’s suggestion that someone shoot him to put him out of his misery.

“The doctor will have some morphine,” Bryce said. “Just hang on for a little longer.”

Abby looked to Bryce for guidance, for what to say to this man, but she found no help in his bleak expression. She turned to the approaching patrol, hoping the army doctor would have an answer.

She had expected to see at least a hundred men. She didn’t know how the dozen who approached, riding two abreast, could take care of the wounded men, recapture the stolen cows, help deliver the herd to the reservation, and chase down the rustlers.

“Is that all that are coming?” she asked Bryce.

“Yes,” he said as he moved toward the young lieutenant who seemed to be in command. Bryce sent the doctor to see to the two wounded men, men gave the lieutenant orders to capture the rustlers and recover the herd. Once they had done that, they were to escort the herd to the reservation. Zeb would stay to help the doctor. As soon as Bryce got back to the fort he would send a military ambulance for the two wounded men. That done, he turned back to Abby.

“Mount up. We’re going back. I have a good deal to say to you.”

Chapter Nine

“Shouldn’t we stay and help?” Abby asked.

“The best way we can help is by getting you back to the fort.”

Bryce couldn’t decide whether he was more relieved to see that Abby was safe or angry that she could do something so crazy and suffer no consequences to make her understand how dangerous it was.

To keep from thinking of the many grisly fates that could have befallen her during that lonely ride, Bryce had rehearsed what he’d say when he found her. Hearing gunfire, he’d expected to arrive to find Abby and Zeb in a desperate fight with the rustlers. It hardly made him feel any better that she was preparing to catch them in a crossfire.

Now that she was safe and they were headed back to the fort, all the dangers poured into his mind like an onslaught of screaming devils. Did she have any idea of the number of ways she could have been killed by now? Had she given any thought to what the rustlers might have done if they’d captured her? Feeling as if he was about to explode, he realized his feelings were as much a release of tension as an expression of frustration. Before he spoke, he had to calm down. He was a professional soldier. He couldn’t lose control.

“How did you know where to find us?” she asked.

“A child could have followed your trail.”