Authors: Sabine Starr
Lady Gone Bad (2 page)
Chapter 2
“G
ot trouble,” Lady called as she burst into Manny’s Livery Stable, tossing back the hood of her forest green cape. Soon night would give way to dawn. She had to keep moving if she wanted to get away under the cover of darkness.
ot trouble,” Lady called as she burst into Manny’s Livery Stable, tossing back the hood of her forest green cape. Soon night would give way to dawn. She had to keep moving if she wanted to get away under the cover of darkness.
“When ain’t you got trouble?” Manny turned from feeding a horse.
“I had to teach a no-good lawman a lesson.”
“Was he happy to learn it?”
“Not very.”
Shaking his head, Manny spit tobacco toward a spittoon in the corner as he limped forward in faded blue jeans and a red plaid shirt. “How fast you got to leave town?” “Fast.”
“You want Jipsey?” He scratched his grizzled beard, and then raked fingers through his wild mane of black hair touched with silver.
“Please. I’ve got to change clothes.”
“Change from girl to boy, you mean.”
“I do what I have to do.”
“Can’t let the dead rest, can you?”
She paused, her hand on the ladder leading to the hayloft, and looked back. “Copper and Jipsey are all I’ve got left of Ma and Da.”
“Good horses.”
“The best! Da thought Copper would outshine any stallion he ever bred. If I don’t locate him soon, he’ll go lame.”
“You’ll find Copper before he’s put down.”
“I better.” Tears moistened her eyes. She blinked hard to get control.
“You cryin’?” he asked, sounding astonished.
“Not crying. Mad.”
“Don’t get mad. Get even.” Manny picked up a saddle and bridle. “Make your wishes come true.”
“If wishes were horses,” she sighed, “I’d have a remuda.”
“Copper and Jipsey will give you a line that’ll make all the other horses eat their dust.”
“Got to find Copper first.”
With her guitar strapped over her shoulder, Lady climbed the ladder as fast as her skirts would allow. She took deep breaths, drawing in the comforting, sweet scent of hay.
Her cozy nest upstairs was hidden behind strategically stacked bales of hay. Thick canvas sheeting covered the rough wood floor. A quilt and pillow added comfort, warmth, and beauty. A small mirror, wash basin and pitcher, hand towel, oil lamp, and a trunk to store necessities provided all she needed to survive in the Bend.
She gently placed her guitar in a special case, closed the lid, and set it aside. When she was sixteen, she’d worked an entire year to be able to afford the wonderful instrument. Now at twenty-seven years old, she left her guitar safely at Manny’s when she went on the road.
As she peeled off the satin gown she never felt completely comfortable wearing, she remembered the surprised look on the deputy’s handsome face. Lawmen counted on women who wore satin to be dumb. She counted on that misconception, but stayed on her toes every moment of every day. No other choice when you ran with wolves.
The patrons of the Red River Saloon would force the lawman out of the Bend. She wished she’d gotten to play with him a little more. He reminded her of a powerful stallion, and she did admire good horseflesh.
Tall, broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped, long-legged. He moved with the natural grace of a wild animal in his blue shirt, black leather vest, and charcoal trousers tucked into black knee-high cavalry boots. He wore his dark hair long, pulled back with a leather thong. A clean-shaven face revealed tanned skin, high cheekbones, and full lips. But most riveting of all were his eyes, a deep, smoky gray.
He was a man to make a woman’s blood run hot. Probably why she hadn’t resisted her impulse to touch him, tease him. Smiling, she thought about his handcuffs. She liked a man with enough guts to find her amusing rather than intimidating. Unfortunately, this one wanted to put her behind bars.
She stripped off her corset and all the other trappings men doted on. After she carefully folded the delicate fabric, she stored her clothes in the trunk for the next time she played Lady.
For now, she needed to obscure her curves, so she wrapped her breasts to flatten them. She slipped into a loose green, plaid shirt, big black vest, and baggy Levi’s. She tugged on fancy cowboy boots, her one concession to vanity. She tied a blue bandanna around her neck, pointed end in front, to conceal her throat and pull over her nose. She pinned up her long, thick hair and covered it with a wide-brimmed hat. Last, she put on leather gloves to protect and disguise her hands. She could pass for a boy if nobody looked too close.
A disguise. All her life was a disguise. The satin and the blue jeans, the saloon singer and the young boy who rode like the wind. She sometimes wondered who she really was under all the lies. Yet she couldn’t let it matter.
Now she was going into danger again, grateful Da had taught her how to use weapons. She quickly buckled on his holster belt, checked that his prized pearl handle Colt .44 was fully loaded, and slipped the revolver into place. She adjusted the weight on her hips. Finally, she slipped a knife into the sheath inside her boot. She was as ready as she was going to get.
When she hurried down to the stable, she focused her mind on the challenge ahead.
Manny already had Jipsey bridled, saddled, and set to go.
“Thanks.” She gently stroked the long blaze face of the chestnut. She stepped back to admire the dark red color with white left fore pastern, right fore sock, left hind sock, and right hind sock. The coloring worked well for camouflage. Picking up the reins, Lady swung easily into the saddle.
“Canteen’s filled. Cornpone and jerky in your saddlebags.”
She leaned over and kissed Manny’s rough cheek. “What would I do without you?”
“Swing on the end of a rope.”
“Don’t even say it.”
“Job came in for you.”
“Not now?”
“Yep. Hayes Brothers been up to their usual shenanigans.”
“Thought they were in Indian Territory.”
“Back in Texas long enough to steal two apple pies from Ma Engle’s farmhouse near Whitesborough.”
“She thinks they didn’t gobble them down first thing?”
Manny chuckled. “She bakes the best apple pies in the Red River Valley. Folks know it. Church social coming up. Stood to reason she’d be baking pies and letting them cool on the porch. She was coming back from the barn when she saw them riding off with her pies.”
“What does she want them to return? Apples?”
“Nope. She left her reticule out there, too. They grabbed it. Guess they figured she’d have some money.”
“She wants that back?”
Manny placed a hand on her boot. “Thing is, Ma had her daughter’s funeral jewelry in her reticule. She’d braided that child’s golden hair into a flower pin. Ain’t worth nothing to nobody but her.”
“That’s a real shame. But they probably threw her pin away by now.”
“She’s willing to pay a half eagle to the brothers and one to you, if you can get it.”
“That’d be ten dollars. Might be all the money she has in the world.”
He nodded. “She only had one daughter. Snake bite last summer.”
“This is going to be another one of those times when I don’t get paid, isn’t it?” “Reckon so.”
“Okay. I’ll keep an eye out for the Hayes Brothers.”
“Watch your back. Outlaws in Indian Territory are thick as fleas on a hound dog. Deputy U.S. Marshals are busy chasing their own tails.”
She pulled down her hat. “Except for the one I left in the saloon.”
Manny rubbed his beard. “Lawmen don’t cotton to being made fools.”
“I’ll be careful.”
Lady rode Jipsey out of the stable into a dark alley. The night was hot, humid, and oddly bright. The combined odors of liquor, refuse, outhouse, and sweat filled the air. She heard shouts and gunshots. What were the wild denizens of the Bend up to now?
She urged the mare up an alley and stopped in the shadows. She watched as angry patrons spilled out of the Red River Saloon onto Main Street. Their noise drew others from nearby saloons. Several men stood in the street, holding up burning torches to light the area.
Shouting and shoving, the mob forced a lawman,
her
deputy, down the street. With his hands cuffed behind his back, he struggled to get loose, digging deep ruts in the mud with his boot heels.
her
deputy, down the street. With his hands cuffed behind his back, he struggled to get loose, digging deep ruts in the mud with his boot heels.
When they reached a large tree, somebody in the necktie party threw one end of a rope over a low limb. Two men pushed a hangman’s noose down over the deputy’s head.
Still fighting to get free, he was thrust onto the back of a horse.
Chapter 3
I
f the lawman died, Lady would blame herself.
f the lawman died, Lady would blame herself.
She wanted him out of town. Not dead. He must have made the saloon patrons madder than a downed hornet’s nest. Couldn’t he tell when men were drunk and spoiling for a fight? The Bend was known for its lawlessness.
Still, it didn’t matter how he got on the wrong end of a noose. She had to save him, or she would have one more regret to add to her growing list.
Cursing, she took a deep breath. Outnumbered and outgunned, she needed surprise on her side if she had any hope of freeing him.
She wheeled Jipsey around and rode through alleys to the end of Main Street. In the shadows, she jerked up her bandanna to disguise her face. She made sure her rifle was loose in its leather sheath on her saddle. Finally, she leaned down and whispered in the chestnut’s ears. They took off like a shot.
Racing down the street at breakneck speed, the mare’s hooves kicked up mud and debris. Lady jerked out her Winchester and aimed over the heads of the lynch mob. She shot high and wide to scatter them.
Startled, the necktie party froze in shock. Not what she wanted. She clipped a couple of hats. Men scattered and ran for cover.
The deputy sat on a honey chestnut with a flaxen mane and tail. Gorgeous animal. Memorable. Seemed a poor choice for a lawman who might prefer to go unnoticed at times. Maybe he liked flashy. She needed to settle his dancing mount. If his horse bolted, it was all over. She whispered to Jipsey. The mare slowed, nickering loudly until the other horse focused on her, trembling but staying put.
Lady wished for more light so she could see better. She didn’t want to hit the lawman and complete what the lynch mob had started. She took careful aim, squeezed off a shot. Missed. She steadied her hands, took a deep breath and held it. Her second shot severed the taut rope.
The deputy slumped forward, noose around his neck, hands in cuffs behind his back. He was agile enough to stay balanced in the saddle as he gigged his mount into a canter.
Grabbing the reins of his horse, Lady turned Jipsey with the pressure of her knees. Together, they thundered back down the street. Shouts and shots dogged their tracks. She leaned low in her saddle to present less of a target. She depended on him being strong enough to hang on to his horse, but nobody could miss his chestnut’s pale coat. She hoped the necktie party was too drunk to aim straight, but she never counted on luck.
Safety lay not far away on the north side of the Red River. She headed there. As they left the Bend behind, she kept a firm grip on the other horse’s reins. She set a ground-eating pace, determined to cover as much territory as possible in case the lynch mob decided to mount up and follow.
The deputy presented a problem. He wasn’t outlaw. He was law. She didn’t want to cast him out of the frying pan into the fire by taking him into outlaw lairs. She also didn’t want him to discover hideouts where he might later return and arrest the very outlaws she needed to lead her to Copper.
Yet she didn’t have much choice. If caught, she’d swing alongside the lawman. A lynch mob in a hurry would never recognize her as Lady without the face paint and satin gown. They probably wouldn’t know she was a woman until too late. If she hadn’t been so cocky, she’d have finished her song and slipped out the back door without ever confronting him. Now she was stuck with rescuing the very man who meant to arrest her.
She hit the outlaw trail, tracking back to well-known territory. At the scrub brush near the high banks of the Red River, Jipsey slowed and eased around a blind bluff that carried them out of sight. She reined in the horses and leaped to the ground.
In the gray light of daybreak, she ran back down their trail with a branch. She stopped and listened for sounds of pursuit. Nothing. She quickly brushed away hoofprints with the leaves as she walked backward until she was concealed in the thicket again. No good tracker in bright daylight would be misled, but her efforts might buy them time.
The deputy marshal looked rough. No hat, split lips, bloody nose. They’d done a job on him. Even so, he sat his saddle with the strength bred of rugged, determined endurance.
She patted his knee in reassurance. His muscles tightened in response, sending heat dancing up her spine. She let her hand linger, unwilling to break their connection. Battered and bruised, he still conjured up visions of rutting stallions and mares in heat. If wishes were horses, she’d have met him when she was a real lady. As it was, she could never let their paths cross again.
“Thanks, stranger,” he said, voice a rough baritone.
She jerked her hand away, chiding herself for weakness. No matter his appeal, she didn’t need extra aggravation. He could never know she was Lady Gone Bad, so she must keep her distance from him.
“Noose off.” He leaned down.
She struggled with the rough rope, trying to get the knots to slip open, but she couldn’t make much headway. At the same time, she listened for sounds of the necktie party catching up to them. She yanked harder on the rope. He maintained balance with his knees, but it couldn’t be easy.
“Hurry,” he urged.
“Can’t budge it,” she said softly, disguising her voice. She lowered her hands, finally giving up. She needed to use her knife, but didn’t want to take the time. “Handcuffs. Key?”
“They took it.”
She sighed, glancing back toward the Bend. “Can’t shoot ’em off. Too loud.”
“I can ride.”
She patted his knee again, but this time felt sticky moisture. “You bleedin’?”
“Don’t matter.”
“Like hell. Pass out and you’ll fall off.”
If she couldn’t get the noose or the handcuffs off him, she had to find another way to keep him in the saddle long enough to get across the Red River. First, she’d bind his wound so he stopped losing blood.
As she stepped up to Jipsey, she heard a horse’s urgent cry in her head, once, twice, three times. She stumbled, feeling chills cover her body. Epona, her totem horse, was giving an early warning that nobody else could hear. She’d been alerted with that same warning the morning her parents had died. Danger was near.
A moment later came the jingle of harness back down the trail. Actual sound. Not a second to lose. She jerked her lasso off Jipsey, ran to the deputy, and tied him to his mount. “Stay quiet. I’ll get us away.”
She leaped into her saddle, tugged on his horse’s reins, and urged Jipsey forward. She couldn’t use Delaware Jim’s ferry or the narrow bend in the Red River. They’d be too visible, easily shot in their saddles. She had to take the more dangerous route overland to the east. Along the way, she’d need to find a likely crossing on the shifting sandbars.
And somehow keep them ahead of the lynch mob.
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