I agreed with my friend. The only holes in a body I was interested in were hers. All three of them, and we’d claim each one of them soon enough.
3
G RACE
I SWIPED AT MY BROW, tucked a long strand that had come loose from my braid behind my ear. My emotions were restless. Unsettled.
Instead of remembering the look of Father and Travis bleeding and writhing, nor their sounds of anger and pain at being shot, I couldn’t get the other two men out of my mind. The rugged build of the dark-haired sheriff. The strong jaw and muscled torso of the other. Both of them appealed to my feminine senses and that had never happened before. I hadn’t even realized I had any. Until them.
These lingering thoughts did nothing to ease the heat that had built within me, and it wasn’t from the strong sun. I crouched down beside the creek’s edge, letting my fingers dip in the cool water, watched as a leaf floated by, swirling and working its way downstream. I wondered where it would go, what it would be like to go with the current and see where it took me. Away from here, away from the life in which I was trapped.
While I may have shot my family—and without a bit of remorse—they were the least of my problems. Surely, the sheriff was leading them back to town now and to jail. The doctor would tend to their wounds and they’d be fine, at least until they were hanged. But Barton Finch…
I cupped my hands together, leaned down and splashed water on my face. Again, then again, as if I could ever get clean from what he’d done. What he’d intended to do.
He was still out there, and now not only evil, but ornery as hell by being bested by a mere woman, and would want revenge. I’d kneed him in the balls and he’d dropped like a stone, then curled up in a ball on the floor in his filthy house. I’d fled when he began to vomit. That hadn’t been the payment he’d expected out of me. Once recovered, he’d go straight to the house. He’d hear soon enough of the Grove gang’s capture. Instead of giving him money, Father had given Barton Finch me. Father had told him I was virgin pussy to be broken in. It wasn’t a prize he’d be denied. He’d come looking for me. To claim payment.
I had no doubt. The man was more ruthless and cold-hearted than Father. I hated my family—enough to shoot them in cold blood—but I was scared of Barton Finch. I couldn’t return to the cabin as it would be the first place he’d look for me once recovered. Not that I had any interest in returning to the cabin. Ever. There was nothing there for me. Nothing of sentimental value. This shack, a place I’d come to in the past when I’d needed to be alone, would be my shelter until I considered my options.
I sighed and pulled a handkerchief from my pants’ pocket, wet it, then ran it over the back of my neck. Undoing a button on my shirt, I slid it over my skin above the binding on my breasts. That snug material did the job of hiding my figure, but it also made me hot and sticky. I was ready to s
trip and bathe in the cool water, don clean clothes I’d put in my saddle bag along with some food I’d grabbed from the house this morning, enough for a day or two.
I was safe here. It wasn’t much, but there was no one around for miles.
Or so I thought.
A sound had me whipping my head about. I stood abruptly at the sight of a man. My hand went to my hip out of habit for my gun, but it wasn’t there.
“Looking for this?” It was the sheriff, holding up my weapon. Barton Finch’s weapon I’d taken from him. I’d set it and its holster upon a large rock.
With a finger, he tipped the brim of his hat back, cocked his head and eyed me. His casual stance made me think he wouldn’t shoot me, but I’d seen crazier things happen. It was the wry turn of his lips, that bit of taunting, that had my gaze narrowing.
No, he had no intention of shooting me. His eyes were as dark as night and focused squarely on me. It was the same look he’d given me when I’d stood upon the bluff, but this close, I couldn’t miss the disconcerting intensity. He stood only ten feet or so before me and I could see the dark whiskers on his square jaw. His light blue shirt clung to his sturdy frame, highlighting the breadth of his shoulders. With the sleeves rolled up, I couldn’t miss the corded forearms. The tin star on his chest glinted in the sunlight, reminding me of what I was. The daughter of the remaining members of the Grove gang. Hell, to him, I was part of that group that had robbed and killed their way across the Montana Territory. He, himself, witnessed me shooting two people in cold blood.
He was good and I was bad. Bad clear through. Bad blood. Bad lineage.
But what was he doing here, eyeing me with an intent to capture, but not put in jail? He’d come after me with a purpose, could have shot me by now, or at least had me cuffed. Why not? He should have been seeing to Father and Travis, but he wasn’t. Had they been left where they’d fallen? I’d intentionally aimed to hurt, not kill, although if left for too long, they could die. And still, the sheriff wasn’t taking them to Simms. He was here. Studying me.
It was difficult not to squirm as he took his time scrutinizing every inch of me. After years of practice, I was used to being patient and waiting to discover a man’s mood before I reacted, but couldn’t wait any longer. “What… what do you want?” I asked finally, my voice slow and calm. Much calmer than my racing heart, but I still stuttered. Dammit.
I sighed when the red-haired man slowly came around the side of the shanty. I should have expected him, too, but the sheriff’s handsomeness had definitely distracted me.
“We want to thank you,” the second man said.
But his words had me puzzled, especially with the unusual accent. I frowned as he stepped closer… and closer so I had no escape; water behind me and two men in front. “Thank me?”
I lifted my foot to retreat, then realized I’d step into the water.
He grinned and lordy, I swear my heart skipped a beat. Up close, he was tall, an inch or two more than the sheriff. He had a few pounds on the lawman as well, but it was all well-defined muscle. His pants were a dark black, the cut didn’t hide his thickly muscled thighs, the narrow hips. “I assume you weren’t one of the ones who robbed the bank and decided to take a larger cut.”
My eyes widened and I stared at him for a moment. He thought I was one of them? I was a Grove, but I didn’t rob the damned bank. “Fuck, no.”
“You saved our lives,” Hank continued. “You’re a really good shot.”
“I never miss,” I replied, stating plain fact. It was a bold, ego-filled statement, but it was true. “If I aim, I hit my target.”
He pondered this. “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind. A few words of thanks are the least we can offer.”