CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Lori twisted in the fine feather bed. Her right wrist was handcuffed to one of the bedposts, held in place by a ridge in the carving. She suspected the proprietor would be horrified that his furniture was being used in such a fashion.

She had never been in so fine a bed. She wished that was the reason she couldn’t sleep, but it wasn’t Morgan Davis was. Her brother was. The very real prospect of her departure from both was.

And her betrayal was.

All were reasons for her inability to sleep. The steak, at least what she could eat of it, had settled miserably in the pit of her stomach. Why did she feel so terrible about doing something that might save Nick? She squirmed again, trying to rid herself of guilt.

In the room where she had taken her bath, Lori had found pen, ink, and paper in a desk and had scribbled a telegram to her father while she made splashing noises. Lori had hidden the telegram, together with a note, in her clothes, and when she’d had the opportunity, she tucked them under one of the empty dishes for the porter, along with the last coin she had. She could only hope that the porter who fetched it would do as she asked. She had given him her most heart-affecting smile, a tear hovering artfully in the corner of her eye.

She had composed the note carefully. She hadn’t wanted to put off the man she hoped would send the telegram for her. Traveling through mountains, heading for Pueblo. Meet us there. Will try to move slowly. Lori. Together with the earlier telegram sent from Laramie, Jonathon would know what to do.

And Lori knew that meant ambush. Jonathon and Andy and Daniel Webster would be no match for Morgan Davis. They would have to lie in wait for him, just as she had done. She doubted whether Andy and Jonathon would be as scrupulous as she about where their bullets might go.

She shouldn’t care.

But she did. Dreadfully.

All of Morgan’s instincts were firing cannon balls. He lived by those instincts. He always heeded them. And now they wouldn’t let him rest, though he needed it.

He worried, too, that it might not be instinct at all, but just Lori Braden. She always managed to send off another kind of rumbling, the kind located in his lower regions.

Yet he haunted the window. He’d given Braden the bed, he told himself, because he needed to keep watch, because it was easier to handcuff Braden to the poster than to hog-tie him so completely he couldn’t be a threat. But truth be told, he was feeling increasingly uncomfortable with what he was doing. He was even beginning to question his own motives. Was he transporting Nick Braden because he was wanted, or because the similarity of their faces had made Morgan’s life awkward?

Braden was sleeping as peacefully as the innocent. If he had a guilty conscience, it sure as hell didn’t show. But Braden’s hatred did show. It had all the way through dinner. What Morgan didn’t understand was why it bothered him. God knew he didn’t expect prisoners to like him, particularly when they were charged with murder. But the enmity went so much deeper than the usual hostility and defiance. It went gut-deep.

And Morgan knew it had hardened tonight Braden didn’t want Morgan touching his sister. And Morgan had touched her. He and Lori had touched each other—hell, seared each other—with glances alone. He still felt the heat, like a furnace in his loins.

He looked back down to the street—one more time, he decided, before retiring to the chair for several hours of sleep.

And then he saw them. Three men riding into town. One man wasn’t wearing a hat, and his hair was white in the moonlight. Three of them now. Where had they picked up a third? He followed their progress to the Nugget down the street. They dismounted and went inside. Morgan waited. One of the men soon came out and led the three horses toward a livery stable.

They were bedding down for the night. Their questions would come in the morning. Morgan didn’t want to be there in the morning.

He thought about their entrance into town. He had shaved this morning; his prisoner had not, which meant the resemblance was not as striking as it might otherwise be. He had left no indications that a prisoner was being held at the hotel, fearing the reluctance of a good hotel to harbor a wanted murderer. He hoped Stark wouldn’t inquire about his presence at the Hotel de Paris, never considering Morgan would bring Braden to such a place.

How did Whitey Stark know they would head to Georgetown? Had they been followed? Or had Stark already checked out Denver, recruiting other bounty hunters to stake out other towns along possible routes? With the reward so high, he could easily have found more hands. Morgan only knew he didn’t want Stark on his tail. He didn’t want another ambush. He didn’t doubt Stark’s aim, nor his ruthlessness. Morgan knew they had to get lost in the mountains soon, before Stark realized they had stopped there.

Morgan lit the oil lamp and shook Braden. He woke immediately, his eyes holding none of the drowsiness of deep sleep. Morgan wondered if he had been sleeping at all.

“Bounty hunters,” he said. “We’re leaving.”

Braden sat up abruptly. “What about Lori? The stage?”

“We can’t chance that now.” Morgan’s jaw set. “You don’t want Whitey Stark any place around her, and if he thought he could use her to get to you or …” His mouth clamped tightly together.

“Hell, you already have me,” Braden said.

“That won’t make any difference to Stark. He’ll try to kill us both.”

“That’s supposed to bother me? I’m a dead man, anyway. I wouldn’t mind taking you along to hell with me.”

“You don’t want a chance to do it yourself?” Morgan taunted, antipathy gleaming in his usually hooded eyes.

Braden smiled. “You have a point, Ranger.”

“I don’t want trouble with you. No disturbance.”

“I’ve been the soul of cooperation, Davis,” Braden said.

“Because of Lori.”

“Because of Lori,” Braden confirmed, though he didn’t have to. Morgan’s remark hadn’t been a question.

“Remember that,” Morgan warned him.

“I don’t want her with us.”

“You think I do?”

“Yes, dammit,” Braden retorted angrily. “Convenient, isn’t it, Morgan? You know she would do almost anything to help me. You didn’t mind taking advantage of that fact at the cabin.” He hesitated, then added very deliberately, “You sure you saw bounty hunters?”

Morgan barely kept himself from going after his throat. “If it wasn’t for her,” he said, “I’d turn you over to them now.”

“No, you wouldn’t, Ranger. You wouldn’t admit defeat that way. You’d rather take your trophy in yourself.”

These were almost the same words Lori had used, and Morgan didn’t feel one whit better when they came from Braden’s mouth. Christ, they were good at goading him. Morgan decided it was stupid to continue in this vein. They were wasting valuable time. He went to the connecting door, which was partially open, and with the light from his own room, he looked down at Lori Braden.

She was sleeping. Her hair was spread out over the pillow, and her face was relaxed. Her arm looked awkward handcuffed to the bedpost, and he felt that peculiar mixture of guilt and something stronger, something that stirred a part of him never disturbed before. He didn’t want to think it was his heart.

He had sometimes wondered whether he even had one. He’d never really had anyone to love, unless he counted various Rangers who had tossed around the role of piecemeal fathering. But they kept dying on him, and he’d steeled himself against caring too much, against counting on anyone.

The war had made him even more of a loner. Too many of his friends had been killed. You couldn’t hurt if you didn’t care. He’d tried desperately not to care; he’d tried so hard that he thought he’d succeeded until the day he’d learned Callum had been killed. Rough and demanding Callum, who had never once touched him with affection, but who had been his one constant. For the first time that he could remember, he’d cried. He’d gone into the prairie like a wounded animal and cried like a baby. He had never done it again. He’d never allowed himself to care again.

And now he did. But he cared for a woman who’d tried to kill him, and who would probably do it again—who would always hate him for doing what he had to do.

God help him, he cared. The sudden understanding was so strong, it nearly gutted him. He’d denied it until now, had convinced himself it was only lust. But his heart had never stilled before just by looking at a face. He’d never felt so damn weak in the knees, so awkward when he was around her. He’d tried to cover it with abruptness, with indifference, by banishing her. He couldn’t do that now. Not without putting all three of them, including her, in more danger than she’d ever considered.

He knew Whitey. Unfortunately, he’d never been able to prove anything against the man, not in Texas, but Whitey Stark always left bodies behind him. And not always just those who were wanted.

His fist tightened around the doorknob. More days with her. And nothing was going to improve. If anything, the hostility between him and her brother had festered into a powerfully malignant thing.

He started to walk in, to wake her, and then decided to let her sleep while he went down to pay the bill and offer a small bribe to the night clerk to forget he ever saw them. Thank God he hadn’t stabled the horses in the public livery. The decision to stay there had been the right one, he realized, even though he admitted now to himself that his motive had been as much to give Lori some comfort before shipping her off to Denver as to throw off any pursuit.

Morgan hadn’t taken off his gunbelt. His hand went to it now, almost automatically, reassuring himself it was there. He gave Braden a fast, warning glance. His prisoner was sitting up, his feet on the floor, his eyes alert and watchful.

Morgan slipped from the room. It must be around two, he thought. The saloon down the street had just closed.

The clerk looked up, obviously surprised.

“Bob Dale,” Morgan identified himself. “We’ll be leaving early in the morning,” he said. “I’d like to settle now.”

The clerk nodded, gave a sum, and Morgan paid it without comment; then he added several bills. “My wife … well, we just got married, and her pa isn’t too happy about it. I’d appreciate it if you just forget about us.”

The clerk’s eyes widened. “Of course, sir.”

“He sent some men after her. No telling what he might say. He’s tried every trick known to mankind,” Morgan added confidentially. “You see he wanted … Elizabeth to marry his business partner. An old man … and …”

The clerk nodded with understanding.

Morgan smiled his gratitude. “Do you have a back door?” He already knew they did. He always checked such matters. He also knew it was locked.

The clerk nodded. “It’s locked, though.”

“Can you unlock it?”

The clerk hesitated. Morgan added another bill to the pile. At the rate he was going, he would be broke before long.

The clerk grinned. “I’ll unlock it now. Good luck to you and your missus.”

Morgan gave him a rare smile.

Lori woke reluctantly. It had taken her a very long time to fall asleep. Now she didn’t want to leave that state of oblivion.

“Lori.” The voice was insistent. “Lori.”

The voice was deep, like Nick’s, but the intonation was different. Harsher. She moved. Something had changed. And then she knew what. Her right wrist was free.

She kept her eyes shut another minute, knowing what she would see before she saw him. She felt weighed down with sleep, or lack of it. She didn’t know which. Surely, it couldn’t be dawn yet. It couldn’t be time for the stage.

Dread filled her at the thought of leaving Nick.

“Lori!”

She opened her eyes. The Ranger was standing there, fully dressed, the gunbelt in place as always. Why did he always have to look so confident, so powerful?

Lori stretched in the comfortable bed. Wallowed in it, actually. She kept her gaze away from him. Yet instinctively, she knew she was provoking him. Or something else. Sweet Mary and Joseph, she wanted a reaction from him. Some kind of reaction—any kind.

“Lori.” This time his voice was lower. Even harsher. Rather strangled, in fact.

“Do you always walk into ladies’ bedrooms?” she asked sleepily.

He grunted an unintelligible reply.

Lori looked toward the window. Only darkness came from behind the curtains, not the first rays of sun.

“We’re leaving,” he said abruptly. “Get ready.”

“What time is it?”

“Early morning.”

“Very early,” she guessed.

He shrugged, as he did so many times when he didn’t want to answer a question. Her gaze fixed itself on his, and she sat up, hugging the quilt to her. She didn’t need to. She was still clothed in the shirt she’d been wearing for the last few days. “What’s wrong … Nick …?”

His gut tightened again. Nick. Always Nick, goddammit. Why did she care about the murdering bastard? It didn’t make him feel one damn bit better that he was jealous of her blood relative. “Bounty hunters,” he said. “Rode in an hour ago.”

She stiffened. Despite what she’d said a day ago about Morgan not being any better, she knew her brother stood little chance with any bounty hunter.

“Where are we going?”

“South. Along the river. Too many tracks out of town for them to follow, and the creek bed will keep our signs to a minimum.”

“How did they find us?” She felt fear for the first time. She hadn’t felt it in Laramie. She’d been too angry, too determined to free Nick—too sure of her ability to do that.

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “They might just be checking all the mining towns. We lost time during the snowstorm.”

And because she had shot him. She was grateful he didn’t remind her. She merely nodded. She’d learned by now that there was no arguing with him. Once he’d decided on something, there was no reprieve. She wondered briefly if he ever bent and decided he didn’t. He’d crack wide-open first. If, she thought bitterly, there was anything inside him to crack.

He abruptly left, leaving her to pack what few things she had. She hesitated as she looked at the dress, then rolled it up in the bedroll. She didn’t want anything from him … but it was something else to wear, and she didn’t doubt she might need it. Despite the bath she felt dirty and grungy in the clothes she had been wearing. She had kept them on last night, purely in self-defense. The Ranger gave her privacy only up to a point.

She wondered now whether he’d had any sleep at all, wondered if there was a way to take advantage of that possibility. And then she warned herself against underestimating him again. As long as he had the gun and the irons, he had the upper hand.

Until Pueblo.

In just a few minutes she joined the two men in the other room. Nick had a days-old beard; the Ranger still had not permitted him to shave. Her brother was wearing his coat, but his hands were cuffed in front of him, though his ankles were free. The Ranger gave him one pair of saddlebags to place over the handcuffs in case they ran into anyone. Then Morgan Davis eyed her warily for a moment. “I hope you know what’s at stake,” he said.

Lori nodded, her hands loaded down with her bedroll. The Ranger also gave her Nick’s, and he took his own in his left arm, leaving his gun hand free, Lori noticed.

“We’ll go out the back to the hotel stable,” he said. “You two go first. To the right and down the back stairs.”

Lori felt the weight of too little sleep. Her mind was muddled with the lack of it. So was Nick’s, she noticed; his steps lagged, the usual energy drained from him. She wondered how the Ranger could be so decisive, his eyes so alert, and she silently cursed him for it.

She and Nick exchanged glances. He gave her a wry smile, and her heart ached. There was defeat in that smile, something she rarely saw in him. She knew it was partly because of her. He’d wanted her on that stage as much as the Ranger did. She hadn’t told him she’d had no intention of going all the way to Denver. She wasn’t going to leave the two men alone, not after seeing the anger between them nearly explode last night.

Lori knew now that the Ranger would not shoot her brother in cold blood. She also knew, though, that Nick was reaching the point of doing something reckless, of not giving the Ranger a choice, or what the Ranger saw as a choice. She reached the stairs and started down them. All three of them were silent, careful in their steps. Doing as the Ranger ordered. Resentment boiled up in her, and she measured the steps. Perhaps if she stumbled … Nick could back into the Ranger, and the two of them, she and Nick, could …

“Don’t even think about it, Lori.” His voice was low, almost inaudible, and Lori swallowed. Had she hesitated a moment? Or did he already know her that well? She didn’t bother to deny it, just kept moving, balancing her load to open the door.

In minutes they were riding out of town at a gallop. An opportunity lost, but at least, Lori thought, she wasn’t on the stage.

And there was Pueblo.

Whitey Stark swore. He stared at the note at the telegraph office. He had missed them again, and this time only by hours. Still, he had what he needed.

“Pueblo,” the copy of the telegram said.

He was surprised the Ranger had permitted the girl to send the telegram. But, then, in Whitey’s opinion Morgan Davis was often a fool. The Ranger had a code of honor Whitey didn’t understand, would never understand, and because he didn’t, he held it in contempt. A weakness. Whitey distrusted weakness.

And he hated Morgan Davis. Davis had foiled several of his intended captures. Whitey had been close three times to nabbing a wanted man, spending months in tracking, only to find that Davis had beat him to it.

Now five thousand dollars was at stake. So was his pride.

He had been tailing Morgan a month earlier, knowing that the man was after Nicholas Braden. An acquaintance had told him a Ranger had been asking questions in Harmony. Whitey had thought he would trail Morgan, save himself time and trouble. He’d even played with the thought of shooting Davis and taking him back as Braden, but he didn’t dare do that in Texas. He didn’t want the Rangers on his back the rest of his life. He wanted it to look as if Braden had shot the Ranger, and then he, Whitey, had killed Braden. He had to kill them both.

Everything had gone well enough, until the Ranger had backtracked once and found him. He’d disarmed Whitey, taken his rifle and his treasured pistol with the pearl handle, and thrown them into a river. Whitey hadn’t been able to find them, even after days of searching. That pistol had been important to him. He’d taken it off a gunfighter he’d killed, and it represented his prowess, his power. Davis had not only humiliated him but had taken his most prized possession.

He’d had just enough money to purchase a new pistol and rifle, neither near as fine as the ones he’d had. And he’d recruited Curt Nesbitt, whom he’d worked with before, and Curt’s brother, Ford. Curt and he had the same philosophy. No value in taking a wanted man alive. Whitey had made it clear, however, that he would have the pleasure of shooting the Ranger, and that he would take two thirds of the bounty. The woman would be a bonus, and then they would have to kill her, too.

Whitey turned away from the telegraph office, where he had bribed the operator. A clerk from the Hotel de Paris, the man had said, brought in the telegram.

The Hotel de Paris! He never would have suspected Morgan Davis would stay there. He hadn’t even checked there, by God, though he had checked the other hotels, the sheriff’s office, which was empty, and the town doctor, who reported no callers. Morgan Davis was a hell of a lot smarter than Whitey had thought. Still, the Ranger had made a mistake. The telegram was a big mistake.

Whitey studied his own map, every town anywhere close to the mountain trails that led to Pueblo. He and the Nesbitt brothers would separate, cover each of those trails. The woman would slow the Ranger down. So would his prisoner. The telegram had promised as much.

Daniel Webster visited the Denver telegraph office as he had done every day since that telegram arrived more than a week ago. He ignored the stares that always accompanied him. He had learned long ago not to care.

Andy was in the saloon, getting knee-walking drunk again. He’d been consumed by guilt ever since his brother was almost hanged for saving his hide. Daniel had some sympathy but not a lot. It was time that Andy grew up.

Daniel approached the counter, which came to just about the top of his head. He stood on tiptoes. “Any messages for Jonathon Braden?”

The operator handed him a telegram with a smile. Daniel smiled back. The telegraph operator had stared at him years ago when he’d first come in, but now, again like so many others, he had discovered that Daniel was like everyone else and treated him that way. He’d even interfered several times when another customer had cruelly teased Daniel about his tiny size. Some people never accepted Daniel. Some took great pleasure in taunting him, calling him a freak, to make themselves feel superior.

Daniel took the telegram and opened it. He was a part of the Braden family. There were no secrets, and he was as worried as all of them about Nick and Lori. He remembered the previous telegram word for word. He had gone cold when he read it. Nick Braden had been his protector since Nick had been ten and started towering over Daniel, though Daniel had then been around twenty-five. Anyone, even adults, who teased or taunted Daniel had Nick to contend with, and Nick, when he was angry, could be dangerous.

Daniel loved Nick and Lori as if they were his own brother and sister. And they were. Jonathon had found Daniel when he was eight, little more than a starved animal. He had been sold to a circus by his family, who was ashamed of giving life to a dwarf. He’d been displayed in a cage for several years.

Jonathon had bought him from the circus owner, though it had gone against his grain to buy and sell human beings, and had patiently taught him to read and write, had even raised him as his own. Daniel had been fifteen when Jonathon had come across Fleur and the baby so many years ago.

It was Daniel who had helped care for them, particularly the boy, after they found the mother and child in Texas. And then Jonathon and Fleur had fallen in love, and they’d seen no reason that the child shouldn’t think of both of them as his real parents. After Fleur and Jonathon were married, they had registered the father of the boy as Jonathon. And Jonathon had always considered Nick his, even after the other two children came.

Daniel had kept that secret all his life. He would carry it to the grave with him if that was what Jonathon wanted.

And now Nick was in grave danger. The first telegram from Lori had been sent from Laramie. It had simply said that Nick had been taken prisoner by a Texas Ranger who planned to return him to Texas. She would send another telegram as soon as she could.

Daniel had known exactly what that meant. She would try to rescue Nick on her own. Lori had always been full of confidence, and she had reason. She was unusually bright and intuitive, quick to master a variety of skills, particularly anything involving coordination and concentration, and used to getting her own way. And she did it so charmingly, flashing that bright, open smile, that no one would gainsay her.

But a Texas Ranger? Daniel Webster was an observer. He had to be. And the Medicine Show had traveled Texas enough that he knew the breed. Hard and relentless. It took a particular kind of man to withstand the loneliness and isolation of that kind of life. A sheriff was different. He lived in a town and had good times as well as bad. The Rangers had few good times. They had only each other.

He read the telegram again. Lori had been unusually brief, which meant she was being watched. Traveling through mountains. Headed for Pueblo. Will try to move slowly.

“Try.” Which meant she was with them.

Daniel walked over to the saloon and found Andy. He ignored the usual jocular commentary on his size and simply handed the telegram to Andy, who read it quickly. He jerked upright, knocking over the chair, spilling the beer on the table. “Come on, Daniel,” he said as he threw several coins onto the table, which had righted itself.

Daniel ran to keep up with the long-strided Andy, uncaring of the comical sight he presented, and didn’t voice his usual protest when Andy tossed him up into the saddle of Andy’s pinto and mounted behind him. Andy spurred the horse, and they raced the mile to the cabin where the family was wintering.

Three hours later Andy was heading for Pueblo on the pinto, and Jonathon, Fleur, and Daniel were behind him in the Medicine Wagon. Fleur wouldn’t even think of being left behind. She couldn’t shoot, but Nick was her baby, her firstborn. And Lori … Lori was everything any parent could want. So passionate about life. She embraced it as few others did.

Traveling through mountains. Daniel snapped the whip over the head of the horses harnessed to the wagon. They would have to move fast, but they were taking the faster plains route. They should make good time. If only Lori succeeded in moving “slowly.”

If anyone could accomplish that, Daniel knew, it was Lori.