CHAPTER 27
Annabelle’s heart quickened when she heard the front door open twenty feet away on her left, as she faced her captor.
She cast the two federal lawmen a quick glance—seeing one tall man with an upswept, gray mustache and a shorter man who appeared younger and who also wore an upswept mustache, brown, as though he were trying to pattern himself, or at least his mustache, after the older lawman. They were both in three-piece suits, the older man with a blue shirt, black vest, and black ribbon tie, the younger man in a white shirt, burgundy vest, and a black foulard tie. Both wore tan Stetsons. As they glanced around the room, removing their hats, the older lawman smoothing his straight, gray hair into place, Annabelle dared another quick glance.
The older man appeared somewhere in his fifties.
The younger man was a good thirty years younger. He wore a congenial smile while the older, more experienced lawman’s eyes showed little emotion as they darted quickly around the room, getting the layout and likely trying to identify any possible threats. He was likely well aware that, like so many towns on this remote prairie, Lone Pine was another wide-open settlement populated with outlaws fresh off the owlhoot trail. The businesslike expression on his long, angular face told Annabelle he was one federal lawman who would not avoid such a town but take any trouble he found there head-on.
Or so she hoped as she reached for her wine glass, noticing with a wince that her hand was shaking. She suppressed the shaking as she sipped the wine, which she couldn’t taste, suppressed it again as she set the glass back down on the table.
The two lawmen made their way to a table halfway between Machado’s and Annabelle’s table and the dining room’s long, mahogany bar running along the wall straight out away from Anna. She wasn’t sure if her captor had seen the two lawmen. He’d cast a quick glance toward the front of the room when the door had opened, but if he’d noted the badges pinned to the lawmen’s vests he hadn’t let on. Annabelle chose to believe he had. A man like Machado, for all his seeming ease and menacing lack of expression, took note of things like badges.
However, he’d made no attempt to sit with his back to a wall, which he could have done because several tables near walls were available. That told Annabelle the man was confident no one would try to shoot him in the back. That was the intensity of the air of danger that the man moved through the world firmly ensconced in. He was a confident brute, a killer without even the good manners to remove his ridiculous top hat with its hawk feather jutting from the band.
Why the charade? she couldn’t help wondering as the waiter, humming pleasantly, disappeared into the kitchen through a swinging door to the right of the long bar at which a half-dozen men in trail garb stood, a few conversing, one reading a newspaper, the others enjoying their drinks in silence.
Did Machado have feelings for her?
The thought was almost laughable.
On the other hand, that was probably the reason she was still alive after several escape attempts.
She found him regarding with her a dubious expression on his hideously scarred, one-eyed face. He turned his wine glass by its stem with his enormous right index finger and thumb. She was surprised he didn’t break the stem off the glass.
She had trouble meeting his gaze.
She also had trouble keeping her eyes off the two lawmen sitting ten feet away from her. They’d set their hats on their table, ordered beers from a slender, middle-aged woman with an apron and no-nonsense air, and were conversing in low but pleasant tones, the younger one smiling and occasionally looking around with his affable, blue-eyed gaze.
Annabelle’s first thought when she’d seen the lawmen ride up to the restaurant—her first hope—was that they were here looking for her. That hoped died in her, however, for neither man had the air of hunters. Neither one had so much as given her and Machado a passing glance, and Anna didn’t think either one was feigning nonchalance. Something told her they were just passing through Lone Pine, maybe hunting other outlaws. Their only interest in the restaurant was likely drink and food.
No different from the other customers.
She looked at the menu cards on the table, wedged between a green cut glass vase with blue paper flowers in it and a black, stone horse standing on its back feet, clawing at the sky with its front hooves. The horse seemed to be looking at Anna a little askance, as though it was somehow aware of her dangerous situation.
Anna glanced at the menu cards again, heart fluttering.
The backs of the cards were blank. The stub of a pencil rested on the table before them.
She had to get a note to the lawmen.
But how . . . ?
She turned to Machado again. He sipped his wine, set it back down on the table, and returned his gaze to her, one brow slightly arched, as if he were waiting for her to say something.
“Well,” she said, deciding to oblige him. He was certainly no conversationalist, and if his mind was anywhere on the two deputy U.S. marshals, she wanted to try to get it off them. “Shall we try to have a conversation?”
“About what?” he said in his deep, throaty voice. His tone sounded a little defensive as though he were silently weighing her motives.
Well, she was weighing his, as well . . .
“Why?” she said, taking her glass in both hands, slowly turning it between her palms, trying to keep them from shaking. They were moist with nerve sweat.
“Why what?”
“Why . . . this?”
Machado shrugged a heavy shoulder. “You’re tough.” His eyes bored into hers. “And beautiful. I wasn’t expecting such a beautiful woman to be so tough.” He shrugged again. “I admire courage. Even most men don’t have that much courage . . . to stand up to Saguaro Machado.”
He gave a crooked smile. His lone, dark eye glinted with self-satisfaction.
Again, he shrugged his shoulder. “You might even come to like me . . . someday.”
She couldn’t help betraying a little of the exasperation with her voice. “You kidnapped me. Intend to sell me to slave traders.”
“We’ll see.”
“We’ll see what?”
“If Corazon appreciates you as much as I do.”
“I don’t understand.”
Machado topped off her wine glass then topped off his own. “You will.” He set the bottle back down on the table. “I might get more money for you in Mexico. Unless . . .”
He sipped his wine deeply, taking several swallows, the way most men drink beer. His lone-eyed gaze was getting glassy. Anna wasn’t sure if his getting drunk was good or bad. Likely, bad. On the trail when he’d been drunk, he’d gotten quiet. Dark. Brooding.
He pursed his lips, canted his head to one side, and made an off-hand gesture with his hand. “Unless you decide to be my woman.”
Annabelle wanted to laugh. She wanted to laugh and slap the table.
But she kept her face stony, impassive. She wasn’t sure what to say to that, so she said nothing. Her honesty might only hasten her demise. On the other hand, was this man really stupid enough to believe that she would ever willingly become his woman? If so, then she would take advantage of his stupidity for as long as she could. At the very least, it might keep her alive. For how long, was anyone’s guess. If she was turned over to the slave trader named Corazon, she had little doubt she’d want to be dead.
So far, Machado and his men—aside from Big Nick, that was—had resisted ravaging her. Machado had warned them off. She hadn’t seen it or heard it, but she sensed it by the obviously frustrated way the other men eyed her sometimes.
“You miss your husband,” Machado said. It wasn’t a question.
“Of course,” she couldn’t help snapping, wrinkling her nose at the big man with brash disdain.
He smiled, showing tobacco-stained teeth. “He is weak. He couldn’t protect you.”
“You jumped us. Hunter was outnumbered.”
“You think about it,” Machado said. “I might not be so bad.”
She didn’t respond. She knew what he meant. He wanted to her think about becoming his woman, though now the thought wasn’t laughable but very grave, very frightening, indeed.
When their meals came, Annabelle almost felt sick looking at it. She was hungry, but she was also nauseated. She wasn’t sure she could hold any of it down. Machado ordered another bottle of wine, and as she poked at her food, trying to eat small bites, and the waiter returned with another bottle of the French wine, her thoughts returned to the marshals.
Somehow, she had to let them know she was in trouble. She knew they’d both seen Machado, for she’d seen their gazes slide across him, hold briefly, then continue to sweep the room. Obviously, the big, one-eyed man was attention grabbing, but neither lawman had seemed to recognize him. They’d probably seen that he was trouble—obviously so!—but their interest, Anna could tell, was on other quarry.
Picking at her fish, she glanced again at the small menu cards and at the pencil stub. Deciding there was no way to get a note to the two marshals without Machado noticing, she decided to try another tactic. There was no way she could leave the restaurant without at least trying to get word to the lawmen that she needed help.
Her heart quickened again when a thought occurred to her.
She looked around as though for the waiter, frowning.
“Excuse me,” she said, setting her napkin on the table and starting to slide back her chair. “I need some milk. The wine isn’t going down very—”
“I’ll tell the waiter.” Machado looked around for the man.
“I haven’t seen him in a while,” Anna said. “I think he must be occupied with something in the kitchen.” She could hear him talking back there with two other men beneath the sounds of cooking food and pots and pans clattering together, the squawk of an opening and closing stove door.
She slid her chair back a little farther. “I’ll fetch him.”
“No!” Machado gave her a hard, commanding look. “I will.”
He slid his chair back, rose, and walked toward the door to the right of the bar.
Immediately, Annabelle grabbed one of the menu cards and the pencil, and scribbled HELP ME in large, dark letters on its back. Hearing Machado’s gruff voice, she returned the pencil to its place beside the vase, then folded the card quickly and slipped it into her low-cut bodice, shoving it down out of sight in her cleavage and smoothing it down so it wasn’t noticeable.
She looked up quickly to see Machado moving back to the table in his slow, heavy-footed way, his big, broad face a little red with pique.
Had he seen her stuff the card in her bodice?
Her heart raced. She felt a bead of sweat pop out on her brow.
But he merely grunted, returned to his chair, and dug back into his meal which he’d nearly finished eating with animalistic fervor while Annabelle had hardly touched her own.
Annabelle stuffed a few more forkfuls of fish and oyster stew into her mouth, drank some of her milk, and said, “I have to use the privy.”
Machado lifted his head, reached across the table, and placed his big left hand on her right one. He gave another, louder grunt and cast her a threatening look.
“I’m too exhausted to try to flee again,” Anna said with a sigh. “Besides, how could I possibly try to run in this get-up?” She kicked her left foot out from under the table, held it high. “And in these shoes.”
Machado looked at the shoe, grunted again, smiled, then released her hand and went back to work on his nearly empty plate.
Anna rose, moved around the table, and headed toward the back door in the room’s rear wall, adjacent to the door to the kitchen. Her route would take her past the lawmen’s table. She was so weak from anxiousness she thought she would pass out. Her feet felt heavy and the room sort of swirled around her.
She was six feet from the lawmen’s table when she glanced into the back bar mirror. Machado was still hunkered over his plate, his back to her and the lawmen, giving his full attention to polishing off his meal. Anna quickly slipped the folded menu card out from her bodice and, as she passed the lawman’s table, dropped it on the table between them, giving it a little toss so they’d be sure to see it right away.
Both men frowned down at the folded card. They frowned up at the pretty redhead, deep lines of incredulity cutting across their foreheads. Anna gave them each a dark look of silent beseeching, then continued across the room and out the back door. She went into the two-hole privy and endured the stench issuing from another customer in the compartment beside her for a couple of minutes, wondering what was happening inside the restaurant.
The silence was frustrating.
Would the lawmen help her, or had they recognized Machado and, as afraid of the outlaw as most other men, decided they’d leave well enough alone and live to arrest less dangerous criminals another day?
Curiosity added to Annabelle’s anxiety.
Finally, hearing her neighbor grunting and cursing under his breath in the other stall, Anna tripped the latch, opened the door, followed the deeply worn path to the restaurant’s back door, and went inside.
The lawmen had been served and were eating.
They spoke as they cut their food and chewed, both men not looking at Anna though she knew they’d seen her enter the restaurant. The note was no longer on their table. Anna walked past them, her feet feeling even heavier than before. Still, the two lawmen did not look up at her.
She walked past them, and their seeming indifference to her made her want to cry.
Shakily, she moved past Machado and retook her place across from him.
His plate and hers were gone.
He looked up at her with reproval. He’d bought her a meal, most of which she hadn’t eaten. The second bottle of wine was nearly gone. Machado’s glass was half-full. But not for long. As soon as Anna had retaken her seat, he threw back the rest of the glass in three deep swallows. He scrubbed his shirt sleeve across his mouth with a snort and a grunt, adjusted his hat and, holding his holstered revolver in place against his right thigh, rose from his chair.
He fished some coins of a pocket of his black, sun-coppered trousers, tossed them onto the table. Without even looking at Anna, he turned and headed toward the restaurant’s front door. Anna followed, glancing quickly at the two lawmen who were still talking and eating, wiping their mouths with their cloth napkins, the old man raising his left forearm and sneezing into it, loudly.
“Bless you!” said the other man over a fork load of fried chicken and potatoes.
Crestfallen, deeply frustrated, even exasperated at the lawman’s inaction, Anna followed her tormentor out onto the porch fronting the building then down the porch steps toward where the old, scrawny man whom Anna assumed was a liveryman still sat in the smart-looking carriage’s driver’s seat. The ribbons were wrapped around the brake handle. He didn’t look at either her or Machado, who opened the carriage door for her. She was on the verge of tears.
She’d just started to climb up into the rear seat when the Inn’s front door opened.
The two lawmen stepped out, the older one first, followed by the younger one, both men smoothing their hair and thick mustaches down and setting their hats on their heads. Machado froze in place beside the carriage’s rear, open door, regarding the two men blandly. He cut a quick look at Anna, then returned his attention to the lawmen.
“Excuse us, there,” said the older lawman, moving down the steps a little stiffly, as though his knees bothered him.
When he reached the bottom of the steps, he turned to face Machado who stood roughly eight feet away from him, on the street fronting the boardwalk. The younger lawmen stopped beside the older one and turned to face Machado, as well. His earlier good nature seemed to have soured. Now it was the older man who was smiling, his gray eyes lit with ironic humor, though Annabelle could see he was merely trying to disarm Machado. The outlaw stood hulking before the two lawmen, the older, taller one standing a good four inches shorter, the young one a whole head and a half shorter than that. Both lawmen let their right hands hang down over the walnut grips of their revolvers.
“What do you want?” Machado growled.
“Just wondering if everything’s all right,” asked the young lawman, who made the somewhat cocky mistake of hooking his thumbs behind his cartridge belt. Right away, Annabelle saw it was a mistake. Machado was fast. She’d seen him shoot. And the younger lawman had far too much brass for his own good.
He was trying to show off for Annabelle, she knew, a dark wave of dread washing through her. He drew a deep breath, canted his head slightly to one side, and spread his feet a little wider apart.
“Is it?” he asked the silent Machado. He glanced at Annabelle, then returned his all-business gaze to the outlaw.
Machado said nothing. He just stood staring down at the two men, a slight grin twisting his lips.
Seconds past. Long, stretched seconds.
A minute.
The two lawmen glanced at each other uneasily.
The older lawmen said, “Just want to make sure the young lady’s all right is all.”
Machado glanced at Annabelle. “You all right?”
Anna sobbed. She couldn’t help it. The emotion exploded out of her.
Then another sob exploded out of her, and her vision became blurry for the tears rushing to her eyes.
The lawmen shared another uneasy glance.
Stiffly, they looked at Anna and then returned their gazes to Machado, who stood as before, that odd frown twisting his thick, chapped lips, bits of his meal clinging to his bushy, tangled beard.
Oh, God, Anna thought, sucking back a scream that wanted very much to bound up out of her lungs. Oh, God!
The younger lawman drew first.
He was the first to get a bullet drilled into his guts.
Before the older one had even started to pull his own gun from its holster, he, too, went twisting around on the boardwalk, yelling and clutching his hands to his belly from which blood and bowels were erupting. The two men, losing their hats, piled up beside each other, writhing and yelling, dying hard.
Machado laughed.
The liveryman drew back hard on the reins of the horse hitched to the carriage; it leaped in place and regarded the two loudly dying, writhing lawmen with terror in its eyes. A terror akin to that nearly making Annabelle’s heart explode.
Laughing, leaving the lawmen dying on the boardwalk from the agonizing belly wounds, Machado climbed into the carriage, closed the door, and slapped the seat back ahead of him.
The liveryman, trying desperately to keep the frightened horse from bolting, swung the carriage out into the street and turned the skitter-hopping horse back in the direction from which they’d come.
Machado lolled back in his seat, holding his own belly against the mirth making his ribs ache, roaring.