Chapter Sixteen

When he was sixteen, a bronc he had been trying to gentle had thrown Nacho and stomped on him a few times, busting him up so that he had to spend three weeks in bed. That had hurt pretty bad. So far, what Dove had done to him hadn't been much worse than getting stomped by that bronc.

But Dove was just getting started.

His feet smeared with blood from the razor-thin slashes all over them, Nacho sagged against the ropes that held him to the chair. Dove had gone outside, taking Livingston with her, in an effort to curb her impatience and anger. If she let her temper run away with her, she might kill the prisoner too soon, before they found out what they wanted to know. That rage was the white side of her coming out, Nacho decided, trying to make some sense out of the fog of pain that had descended on his brain. The Comanche side wouldn't have any trouble staying cool and calm through the torture.

Graham was the only member of the gang inside the cabin at the moment. All the others had found excuses to go outside when Dove started working on Nacho with the knife. Now Graham stood in front of the captive and said, "Mister, you're crazy. You'd better give Dove what she wants, or she's liable to take until tomorrow to kill you."

Nacho managed to shake his head. "You should have killed me . . . when you had the chance . . . that day when you held up the stagecoach."

"Yeah, I should have. Reckon I felt grateful. It's not every day you run across twenty thousand dollars in one place."

"What did you do . . . with the money?"

"What could I do with it? You see any place to spend it in these woods? We've still got it cached under the floor, 'cept for a few hundred Dove and the preacher took for expense money. They've got to stay lookin' respectable, you know."

"Respectable," Nacho repeated bitterly. "I'll never tell them anything."

"Hell, then I'd be doin' you a favor if I put a bullet through your brain right now." Graham gave a snort of derisive laughter. "But then she might take that knife after me, and I wouldn't want that."

"Wouldn't want what?" Dove asked as she stepped in the door, Livingston following behind her.

Graham moved quickly away from Nacho. "Nothin'. Just pesterin' the prisoner so that he wouldn't get any rest while you were outside."

Dove gave him a hard stare. "He's my prisoner. I'll decide what to do with him."

"Sure," Graham murmured in reply to the rebuke. He went back to the wall and leaned against it.

Dove stood in front of the chair and lightly touched a fingertip to the gash on Nacho's cheek. So far, that was all she had done to his face, concentrating her efforts on his feet instead. Now she frowned in thought and said after a moment, "I think we'll move on to your hands next. Then the chest, and then your face. Unless you want to talk to me now."

He sat there, silent, his features stony.

"All right," she sighed, slipping the knife out of its sheath. "If that's what you want."

She must have cleaned the blade, Nacho thought. All the bloodstains were gone.

"Rider comin'!" one of the other men called from outside.

Dove whirled around, tensing. Livingston reached for his gun, and so did Graham. But then came another shout from the sentry. "It's your pa, Dove!"

"What does the old man want now?" she muttered, sliding the knife into its sheath.

"You'd better send him back to his cabin," Livingston told her. "I don't like the idea of our back trail being unprotected."

"Neither do I. Come on."

She stepped outside, accompanied by Livingston and Graham. Nacho could see them through the door that she left open behind her.

The three of them stopped and waited on the porch. Looking past them, Nacho caught a glimpse of a big, bearded man on horseback approaching the cabin. He recognized Seamus O'Shea. The old Comanchero rode right up to the porch before he reined in.

"What do you want?" Dove asked him sharply. "I told you to keep an eye on the trails and get rid of anybody who followed us."

"That's what I done," O'Shea grumbled, leaning forward in the saddle, shifting the Sharps he carried across the cantle and easing his old bones. "Figured you'd want t' know that lawyer fella an' Jake Maxwell showed up, lookin' for th' Meskin."

"You ran them off, didn't you?"

'Told 'em to go home. Had t' take a couple shots at 'em 'fore they got th' idea. But I reckon they'll be back, an' they'll bring a sheriff's posse with 'em next time." O'Shea took off his battered black hat and ran blunt fingers through his tangled hair. "Dove, I been thinkin'. You can't keep this up. From what Cambridge an' Maxwell said, they know th' preacher's mixed up in this, an' I reckon they even suspicion you are, too. It's time t' cut an' run, darlin'."

She glared at him and shook her head. "I don't run. Not anymore. I don't care what anyone knows about me."

"But if you stay, th' sheriff'll root you out sooner or later. Even ol' Massey ain't totally useless. But if you leave now, head for the high plains or the Panhandle, maybe, you got a chance t' get away clean. Just leave th' Meskin with me. You ain't killed him yet, have you?"

"He's alive," Dove said contemptuously. "But he won't be for long. What you just told me means there's no reason not to go ahead and kill him."

"I'm askin' you, Dove . . . don't do it."

She laughed. "Why the hell not?"

O'Shea's grip tightened on the Sharps as he brought the barrel around. "'Cause I'll stop you, girl."

She stared at him in amazement for a second, then laughed again and said, "Somebody kill this old fool."

Graham stepped forward, a savage grin on his face. "Be glad to, Dove," he said, and then his hand whipped toward the gun on his hip.

From the woods on the right side of the cabin, Jake Maxwell fired his Winchester.

The slug took Graham in the chest, driving him back against the wall of the cabin with a shocked look on his face. He hung there for an instant, his hand still reaching instinctively for his gun, then fell forward, dead before he crashed to the planks of the porch.

O'Shea twisted in the saddle, ignoring Dove and Livingston for the moment and going for one of the other outlaws who already had his gun out. The Sharps boomed. The heavy caliber bullet blew a fist-sized hole through the desperado and flung him backward. O'Shea kicked his feet free from the stirrups and tumbled out of the saddle.

Cambridge came in from the left, triggering his Colt. Two more outlaws dropped and the others who had been spread out in front of the cabin darted for cover. Livingston finally got his gun out as Cambridge reached the end of the porch. O'Shea had told the lawyer that Livingston wasn't very fast with a gun, and Cambridge saw now that was true. But the preacher managed to get a shot off as Dove ducked back inside.

The bullet whined past Cambridge's ear. Cambridge threw himself full-length on the porch and fired. Livingston staggered back a step, a bright red splash appearing on his white shirtfront. He groaned as he twisted sideways and collapsed.

Maxwell was still peppering the rest of the gang with rifle fire from the trees. Kneeling on one knee, O'Shea hauled out an ancient revolver and joined the exchange. Some of the outlaws tried to fight back, but others grabbed their horses and lit out. They were hardcases when the odds were overwhelmingly on their side, but they weren't willing to go up against the three grim-faced attackers.

Inside the cabin, Nacho had heard the sudden outbreak of gunfire and guessed that somehow Billy Cambridge had found him. He thought he recognized the sound of Jake Maxwell's Winchester, too. As Dove ran back inside, he caught a glimpse of Livingston shooting at something, then the phony minister was jolted back out of Nacho's line of sight by a bullet.

Dove headed straight for him, the knife appearing in her hand as she came, and for an instant, Nacho thought she was going to drive the blade into his heart. But then she went past him, crouching behind the chair and putting the razor-sharp edge to his throat.

Seamus O'Shea appeared in the doorway, with Cambridge at his side. "Back away from him, Dove," O'Shea ordered.

She was pressed so close against the chair that Nacho could feel the shake of her head. "You back away," she said. "Let me ride clear or I'll slit his throat."

O'Shea looked over at Cambridge. Sweat trickled down Nacho's brow and into his eyes, even though it wasn't hot at all today. A muscle twitched in Cambridge's cheek, and then he said, "She can go. Nacho's life is worth more to me than hers."

"You heard th' man, Dove," O'Shea said. "Let him go."

"Get out of here first, all of you. I want everyone to ride away. Then you can have him back."

Nacho met Cambridge's eyes and somehow conveyed the message to go along with her. She had proven over and over that she couldn't be trusted, but they had no choice now.

"You'll be all right, Nacho," Cambridge said, trying to sound reassuring.

"Sure, Billy." Nacho forced some of his former jauntiness into his voice. "I'll be fine."

Cambridge and O'Shea backed up, but before they got out of sight, the lawyer called out, "All the rest of the gang took off for the tall and uncut, Dove, the ones that still could. You'll be leaving alone."

"Get the hell out of here!" she cried in response, and Nacho could tell from the quiver in her voice that she was walking a fine line now.

Cambridge and O'Shea disappeared, but a few minutes later they rode into sight again, this time accompanied by Jake Maxwell. Turning so that Dove could still see them from the cabin, they rode away, not looking back.

Dove took the knife away from Nacho's throat, and a second later, he felt it slice through the cords holding him to the chair. "Stand up," she said.

He sagged forward, fighting off the pain and weariness that were trying to claim him. "I . . . I don't know if I can walk."

"You'd damn well better be able to, if you want to live a little while longer. You're coming with me."

Nacho put his hands on his knees and forced himself up. While he was doing that, Dove pried up a loose board from the floor and took out a large canvas bag that appeared to be stuffed full. She slung it over her shoulder by a rawhide strap that was attached to it. The loot from the gang's holdups, Nacho thought. He staggered toward the doorway, biting his lip against the agony every time his lacerated feet came down on the rough planks of the floor. The point of Dove's knife pricked the middle of his back, right above his heart, and stayed there.

When they reached the porch, Dove said, "Wait a minute." He glanced back over his shoulder and saw her looking at the sprawled body of John Livingston. There was no remorse, no grief on her face, only the faintest hint of a smile.

Those soldiers back at Fort Griffin had been responsible for more than the death of Dove's mother, Nacho realized. The girl's soul had died that day, too.

She stepped away from him but didn't give him a chance to try to escape. Scooping up Livingston's fallen six-gun, she trained the barrel on him and said, "Keep going. Grab a couple of those horses."

Several saddled horses were milling around in front of the cabin, no doubt belonging to the handful of outlaws who had been killed in the attack. Nacho saw the bodies lying here and there around the outside of the cabin, including Graham's. He felt sick at the sight and stepped down from the porch, calling softly to the nervous animals. In a matter of minutes, he had the reins of two of them.

"Mount up," Dove said, taking one of the horses from him. He put a bare foot in the stirrup, gripped the saddle horn tightly, and clenched his teeth. It hurt like hell as he swung up into the saddle.

Dove was ready to go. She took the canvas bag from her shoulder and hung it from the horn. With her other hand, she kept the gun pointed in Nacho's general direction. She glanced back at the cabin and said, "It wasn't a bad hide-out. I'll miss it. But there'll be another one."

"And another gang?" Nacho asked. Out of the corner of his eye, he looked around for any sign of Cambridge and the others, certain that they hadn't deserted him.

"Of course. There's plenty more like Graham. The West is full of them."

"What about Livingston?"

"I'm not going to waste any tears over him, if that's what you mean. He said he loved me, but he didn't mean it. He'd have left someday . . . just like my mother left. Just like my father . . ." She spat on the ground. "People who say they love you always leave."

"Dove . . . when I first saw you . . . I loved you, too."

Her features twisted with hate and he knew he shouldn't have said it. As she brought the gun up and eared back the hammer, she said, "Well, that's just too damned bad for you."

The slug drove her out of the saddle, spinning her to the ground. She didn't even cry out as she died.

Nacho looked toward the sound of the shot. It had come from a rise a good three hundred yards away. A hell of a shot. A shot that Billy Cambridge couldn't have made on his best day, and Nacho had a feeling Jake Maxwell couldn't have, either.

That only left one man—Seamus O'Shea.

Nacho reached out and lifted the bag of stolen money from Dove's horse. He didn't look at her as he turned his own mount and urged it into motion, riding out to meet the other men.

It was a long way and he hurt, but he felt pretty sure he could make it.