The Lady Takes A Gunslinger (Wild Western Rogues Series, Book 1) (38 page)

"Where are they holed up?" he asked casually.

"El acueducto, y el monasterio de la plaza de Santa Cruz,
" replied Miguel, who sat down on a rock beside Magdalena.

She smiled patiently at the man. "Is true. They use the monastery for a surgery and for his headquarters. Why do you ask?" Magdalena inquired, glancing at Reese sideways.

"A man should know what to avoid, shouldn't he?"

"Well, it's about time!" Grace's voice rang clearly across the encampment. Infuriated, she stomped toward Reese with blood in her eye.

"You're not hurt, are you, darlin'?" he asked with as much solemnity as he could manage.

"Only if you don't count nearly asphyxiating on a noxious bandanna, and don't you darlin' me with that charming brogue of yours! You just sat there smoking away while that... that crock-headed, skunk-smelling outcast from a sailor's academy tied and retied my knots!"

Fire flashed from her eyes every bit as fierce as the one that crackled near their feet. Reese managed to keep a smile from breaking free. "I was a bit indisposed myself, ya know." He rubbed his head pitifully.

She shot a look at Magdalena, who took a casual pull on her cigarette. "Yes, well, there's indisposed, and then there's
indisposed,
isn't there?"

Good God, she was jealous! An odd feeling swam through him at the realization.

"So don't let me break up your little smoking party," she went on with her nose in the air. "You look much too cozy. If you have no more plans to torture me with ropes or gags, I have places to go, so if you'll excuse me—"

"Sit down," Reese commanded.

She spun around midstep and glared at him. "Perhaps you've forgotten that we came here for—"

"Darlin'," he warned.

"—Luke, and we're hardly getting any closer by cavorting with these scalawags."

Magdalena sat up straighter, her eyes alert with sudden interest. "Did she say, 'Luke'?"

"No," Reese answered, rubbing his temple.

"Yes, I did. My brother, Luke. He's been unjustly imprisoned by—"

"Grace!" Reese snapped tightly.

"What?" Too late Grace saw the warning in his eyes. Too late, for she had blurted out their mission in front of all of these strangers in anger. Had she read everything wrong? Was it possible Reese hadn't been taken in by this breathtaking bandita named Magdalena? That perhaps he was simply being cautious? She squeezed her eyes shut with the realization.

If she could swallow herself whole at this very moment, she would.

Magdalena got slowly to her feet. "Your name is Grace Turner?"

She glanced at Reese, whose expression said it was too late for lies. She nodded slowly.

"And your brother, he is Luke Turner, of Virginia?"

"You know him?"

The sound of pounding hoofbeats came from the darkness in the distance, cutting off Magdalena's reply. Within seconds, a dozen men on horseback nearly overran the camp, skidding to a stop near the fire where Magdalena stood. Several men rode double. Over the commotion they caused, the lead man shouted orders in Spanish. Reese, who happened to be closest, leapt to his feet just in time to catch the wounded rider who slid off from behind the leader. Two others were in nearly the same condition and were helped off, too.

Grace watched in horror as Reese flung the man over his shoulder and carried him to the clearing near the fire. The wounded man cried out in pain as Reese lowered him to the ground.

In the light, it was even worse. The man had been shot at least twice that she could see. His left arm was shattered near the shoulder. Another wound pierced his right thigh. He'd lost a horrifying amount of blood already.

"Dear God," she whispered, feeling faint, and sat down hard on the rock Miguel had vacated.

Reese tore his bandanna from his pocket and wrapped it around the man's upper arm to stanch the flow of blood. He was searching for something for his leg when the man lifted his head, his face illuminated with firelight for the first time.

"Well, now," he murmured with a vague smile, "ain't this some pumpkins."

Reese's hands went still as death over the man's bleeding thigh. His gaze moved slowly to the man's face and he went utterly pale.

The other man swallowed thickly. "I bet you imagined a million different ways for this to happen, but never pictured tryin' to stop the lifeblood from pourin' out o' me."

"Scully." The name was more growled than spoken.

Grace clapped four fingers over her open mouth.

"In the flesh," the man drawled with a shudder of pain, "in a manner of speakin'."

He was not what she'd pictured. Not a villainous face, but a regular one, with none of the telltale signs of a Judas. He was blond where Reese was dark; smaller too, but with a strong body forged by this harsh land just the same. If she hadn't known the awful things he'd done to Reese, she might have almost thought him handsome.

What happened next came so fast that no one, least of all Jake, had time to react. Reese's pistol was suddenly pointing straight at the spot between the other man's eyes.

In the same moment, Grace heard the click of a dozen guns pointed directly at Reese's back. Magdalena's was one of them.

"Reese, don't!" Graced warned him. He didn't even flinch.

Jake gestured quickly to the others with the lift of his upraised palm. "Don't shoot him,
amigos
. He's an old friend of mine and he surely does deserve to exact his moment of revenge. Go ahead," he told Reese in a gravelly rasp. "You can fix my flint in short order. Fact is, you'd be doin' me a favor."

No one in the camp moved. The tip of the gun shook in Reese's hand. Hatred burned in his eyes. "Son of a bitch."

"That's the way o' things, ain't it?" Jake gave a little laugh. "You ever notice that about timing, Reese? Whenever you get close, someone snatches it away." He swallowed hard. "Or maybe you just walked past it without even knowing. Or, if you're powerful unlucky, she dies on you."

Reese's finger tightened inexorably on the trigger. "It's not about Adriana, Jake," Reese said. "Not anymore."

The other man blinked hard. "Yeah, it is. It's all the same thing. Haven't you figured that out yet?" A shudder tore through him and his breath caught in his throat on a curse. "I loved her, you know," he said finally, not tauntingly, but with an endless sadness. "I suppose that doesn't matter to you now."

"Go to hell."

"Seems I don't need any help from you on that account."

"You set me up so you could take her."

One corner of Jake's mouth lifted. "You got me there, pard. When you shot Malchamp, you made it easy for me."

"It was self-defense and you know it."

"If I'd had the nerve, I would've shot you myself to have her. But you were my friend. An' I suspected, with your luck, you'd slip the noose in the end."

"Luck?" Reese echoed dully. "My luck?"

"You're still here, ain't you?" Jake shut his eyes and his jaw clenched as he fought for control. "Yeah, we saw the elephant, you an' me, didn't we, Reese? I reckon that old bastard stepped on me this time, though."

The ex-Ranger's sweaty face had gone deathly gray. The blood continued to pump from the wound in his leg. Reese glanced at it and hesitated.

Jake smiled, looking up at him through half-open eyes. "He's thinkin'—'Should I try an' save him? Or blow his brains to kingdom come?' That's the difference between us, Donovan. You'd actually consider tyin' me off, wouldn't you?"

"Shut up, Jake," Reese told him, lowering the gun.

He laughed weakly. "Wouldn't matter no how. I appear to be leakin' like a rusty pail. Oh, God." With blood-slick fingers, he clutched Reese's forearm until the wave of pain passed. Finally, Reese shook him off.

"She died of the measles, you know," Jake went on. "Passin' through Comanche country. Last word on her lips was your name. Ain't that a kick in the teeth?"

Reese's eyes flicked to Grace's. They glimmered in the firelight.

"Did you think about me all these years, pard?" Jake asked, drawing Reese's gaze back to him. "Chasin' me down, huntin' for a ghost?"

Reese didn't answer. He only stared at the dying man, a muscle working in his jaw.

Jake's breath rattled in his throat. "Want to know somethin' funny? Truth is," he said, gasping, "after she died? I hardly thought of you at all."

And then the life went out of him like a snuffed flame, his empty gaze fixed on the man who'd spent half a lifetime waiting for this moment.

Reese rolled a long, accusatory look at the night sky, then, without touching Jake again, got to his feet. Through the gauntlet of half-raised guns and hostile stares, his own pistol dangling loosely from his hand, he stalked off into the darkness alone.

* * *

Except for the gurgle of the water and the steady sound of the frogs, it was eerily quiet at the spring. She found him a few minutes later, sitting beside the water, washing the blood off his arm, then splashing his face with the cool liquid. When he'd finished, he just sat staring into the moon's reflection.

"Reese?" she called gently. When he didn't reply, she tried again. "Are you all right?"

"He was right, you know," he said so low she almost didn't hear him.

She moved closer. "About what?"

Droplets of water slid down his face and neck, sparkling in the moonlight. He didn't look at her, but at the bottomless pool before him.

"I've spent the last seven years hounding the bastard, turning the hills of Texas and Mexico inside out for him. I've lived for it. Some days, it was the only thing that kept me going. Then, just like that, it's over. He's gone. Not by my hand, mind you, despite my efforts, but all on his own at the hands of the Mexicans, the ones who truly owned that right in the first place."

"No man owns the right to take another's life, Reese," she said gently. "Only God."

"Perhaps this land strips men of their belief in God, Grace. Perhaps there is no God here."

"You don't believe that."

He stared at his hands. "I don't know what I believe anymore. I know I've wasted seven years on a man who wasted no thought on me." He looked up at her. "Who spent no endless nights fighting a memory. No days wishing he were somewhere else than where he was. And I'm the fool. I thought it mattered. I thought I had some control over it. If I tried hard enough I'd be rewarded with my revenge. But I wasn't. Not a lick. Not even a blasted crumb." His palm swept across the water, sending an angry spray halfway across the pool. "He lived his life and died when his time came with no help from me. Scully called me lucky. Does that make me lucky, Grace?"

"Brew always said, 'It's a lucky man who sees his opportunities and uses them well.' Perhaps this is an opportunity you shouldn't pass by."

He frowned at her, not understanding.

"Scully gave you a gift today and you don't even see it. He set you free. You can either put this behind you now, Reese, or let it eat you up. Use it, or let it use you. It's your choice."

She was right and Reese knew it. But he felt at loose ends, untethered, like some hot-air balloon cut adrift in a strong wind. He didn't know what to feel, or how to be, now that the driving force in his life was suddenly gone. The true irony was that when the time came and he'd stared Jake Scully in the eye, waiting for the old bitterness to rise over Adriana, it, too, was gone.

In its place was a growing need for the woman who'd begun to fill the huge hole in his heart that had remained vacant for so many years. The woman whose unflagging faith in him made him question his own truths. The woman who offered him an anchor. He remembered what she'd said that first day in the jail cell, when she talked about destiny; how things happened for a reason even though they seemed to have no logic.

There'd been no logic in the path his life seemed to have taken. But since he'd met her, all the threads that had lead nowhere seemed now to be coming together at last. She'd said it was better not to question those things either, and maybe she was right. Because if he thought about it, he knew what he had to do.

When this was all over, he'd head for the nearest saloon and tie on the biggest drunk he'd ever had. The devil with sobriety! He'd been good at being a drunk and he could be good at it again!

He tightened his fist. Ah, who was he kidding? Even getting drunk didn't appeal to him now. The thought of it made his stomach twist. Grace had effectively spoiled the sole part about being a drunk that made it worth doing—forgetfulness. Because he knew no matter how much liquor he consumed from now on, he'd never forget her.

You can use it, or let it use you.

He looked up at her. She stood watching him with those innocent eyes of hers, and a smile that made him want to take her in his arms and bury himself inside her. Why couldn't he have met her years ago? Why now? When the only thing he could offer her was... nothing. It would be kinder to push her away. To make her think he didn't care. And maybe that was the last vestige of good in him, because he knew in his heart he'd die before he hurt her any more.

Magdalena and the man who'd shared his horse with Jake Scully pushed past the foliage that surrounded the spring and stopped near Grace. Probably about forty, with wisps of graying hair at his temples and in his beard, the man had the look of a soldier, though he wore the peasant uniform of the
guerrilleros.
He was armed to the teeth and hard as granite, and he stared at Reese assessingly, without largess.