Angel

Chapter 38

It was nearly dark by the time they got home, but that didn’t stop Cassie from saddling up and riding out. She did it without her mama knowing, of course. Only old Mac, who had the care of the Stuart horses, saw her. She asked him to tell her mama that she’d felt the need for a brisk ride before dinner — if her mama asked. If she rode full out, she just might make it back in time before Catherine got around to asking.

She was going back to Cheyenne.

Seeing that man who was the image of Rafferty Slater hadn’t merely shocked her, it had set her to fretting all the way home. Her mama undoubtedly had the right of it. He was probably Slater’s brother, more than likely his twin brother. And his showing up in Cheyenne, where both she and Angel hailed from, was just too coincidental for her peace of mind.

Even if he wasn’t here seeking revenge for his brother’s death, she had to warn Angel about him. Rafferty had tried to shoot Angel in the back, and dirty tactics like that tended to run in the family. At any rate, she wasn’t taking any chances, not where Angel was concerned. She wasn’t about to lose him to a no-account, cowardly back stabber just when she’d decided to keep him.

She reached Cheyenne faster than she ever had before, but it was still dark when she rode in, and the clouds that had been hovering all day were going to hold back the moon, so she wouldn’t be able to ride as fast on the return trip. She might not make it home before dinner after all, but she’d worry about explaining to her mother when the time came.

She knew where to find Angel. It was standard knowledge that he resided at Agnes’s boardinghouse because the old lady was so fond of him, and never rented out his room to anyone else, even when he was gone for months at a time. Whether he was actually in at this time of the evening was another matter. She hoped she wouldn’t have to wait around or go hunting for him in town, but if she had to, she would.

She tied up her mare in front of the boardinghouse. Only a dim light from a parlor window was lighting the porch, but it was enough to keep her from tripping on the steps leading to the door. Cassie didn’t quite get that far.

“Don’t move lessen I tell you to, little lady, and don’t make a sound.”

A gun jabbing against her back reinforced that order. Cassie had no difficulty recognizing it even through the thickness of her jacket. And she wasn’t wearing her own. She never did to Cheyenne, and she hadn’t wasted time to fetch it at home before she’d returned to town.

Obviously she should have. But she hadn’t been thinking of danger, just of getting to Angel to warn him. It was too late to berate herself for not examining Agnes’s porch more closely, too. She knew better. Such carelessness could easily cost a life. It was possible she was going to find that out firsthand.

A hand on her shoulder turned her, so that the gun was now jabbed into her belly. She’d had a feeling she would recognize her accoster, and she did.

“Nice of you to come back to town to make this easy for me.”

She didn’t acknowledge that remark. She knew him, but she had to ask, “Who are you?”

“They call me Gaylen,” he said. “But you know my last name, don’t you? Folks don’t usually forget someone they help to kill.”

Cassie went quite pale, though common sense made her insist, “You’re not Rafferty.”

“ ‘Course I’m not, but no one ever could tell us apart, so if s the same, ain’t it? Lookin’ at me is lookin‘ at the man you killed.”

It wouldn’t do to point out that Rafferty had deserved it. “What do you want?”

“I was gonna take care of that Angel fellow first, then you after, but now that I have you, I’ll have to rethink on it. Come along. My horse is tied up out back.”

Cassie wasn’t given much choice with his hand clamping on the back of her neck and his gun moving to her side. She thought about screaming, but didn’t care to get shot for the effort. And he wouldn’t hesitate to shoot. It was dark, with no moon and nothing but flat plain behind the boardinghouse. He’d be gone before the smoke cleared, while she wouldn’t be alive to say who’d done it.

He put her on his horse in front of him. He didn’t holster his gun, so she didn’t consider trying to jump off yet. They rode out onto the plain so he could circle around the town without being seen; then he headed toward the foothills in the east.

It was nearly five hours later before he found the small, one-room cabin. Cassie had a feeling he’d been lost for the past two hours. Smoke curled out the chimney. Another horse stood in the lean-to nearby. Seeing it, she finally remembered that he’d had a friend with him in town earlier.

The friend was sleeping, curled into his bedroll before the fire, when Gaylen pushed her into the cabin. He didn’t bother to wake him yet. The only furniture in the room was a table with one chair. Neither looked very sturdy.

He gave her a brief glance as he set his saddlebags on the table and started to rummage through them. “Your folks got money, don’t they? Lots of it?”

“Yes, why?”

“Some of it might compensate me for my loss.”

“Then you won’t try to kill Angel?”

“Didn’t say that.”

He pulled out a bandana and a strip of rawhide and motioned Cassie into the far corner. The bandana ended up around her wrists, the rawhide around her ankles — after he’d yanked her boots off and tossed them across the room.

“I’ve decided to send Harry down with my demands,” he told her when he had finished. “This has worked out better’n I first figured on.”

“How’s that?”

“It�ll be easier killin‘ that fast gun up here. Won’t have to rush off after or worry about no posse. Your ranch ain’t far from here, is it?”

“How should I know?” she said unhelpfully. “I couldn’t tell where we were going.”

“I reckon if s not far.”

Never once had he raised his voice or sounded like a man enraged over his brother’s death. His attitude wasn’t natural, but she took some small hope from it. Maybe he wasn’t as bad as Rafferty had been. Maybe he wasn’t all that happy about the killing he felt he had to do. And maybe he didn’t even know what kind of man his brother had become. She decided to enlighten him, just in case.

“You know, your brother was no good. He stampeded cattle. He tried to—”

“Don’t be talkin‘ against my brother,” was all he said, and even that was said mildly.

He ignored her then to go over and kick Harry awake. They conferred quietly by the fire for a while, with Harry glancing her way more than once. He wasn’t as tall as Gaylen. His eyes were a dull gray, his brown hair long and stringy, his clothes ill-fitting and stained. He was, in fact, an ugly little man, the kind easily led by others.

Cassie strained to hear them, but couldn’t catch more than a word or two. After they did some scribbling on an old newspaper, using soot right out of the fireplace, Harry shrugged into his jacket and left. Gaylen settled down in the vacated bedroll by the fire.

Cassie waited a few minutes, but it really did look like the man was going to go to sleep, and never mind that she hadn’t been fed, or offered a blanket or even a position closer to the fire. Warmth wasn’t her immediate concern, however.

“Just how did you plan to get Angel up here?”

“He’s gonna bring me your ma’s money.”

“What makes you think he’ll do that? It’s more likely my mama will send—”

“She’ll send Angel, or if s no deal.”

“She might ask him, but that doesn’t mean he’ll agree to come,” Cassie pointed out.

“He’s a gun for hire, ain’t he? So your mama can hire him if he don’t want to do it for nothing. And he don’t know who’s got you or that I aim to kill him, so why wouldn’t he come? ‘Sides, I heard you got hitched to him ’fore you two left Texas. It would look pretty bad if the man didn’t come to get his wife, now wouldn’t it?”

Cassie didn’t hear much beyond the mention that Angel would be coming up here unaware of what was waiting for him. That hadn’t occurred to her. She wished it hadn’t been pointed out now because with it came a sick feeling of dread. Would her mama remember that she’d seen Rafferty’s brother in town and draw the right conclusion? Would she even mention it to Angel if she did?

Cassie had to do something, get away, or think of some way to warn Angel. If Gaylen hadn’t tied her hands behind her back, she could have scooted over to him and hit him with one of the logs stacked next to the fire. If he hadn’t removed her boots, she would have tried kicking him senseless. There was nothing but two logs in the fireplace, so she couldn’t even fish out a burning stick to maneuver against the cotton bandana. And sticking her hands in the fire completely to burn off the cloth just didn’t appeal to her, nor did it guarantee she’d be alive afterward to do anything.

Her only option at the moment seemed to be to help Gaylen into rethinking the matter. But as she stared at him lying there, his arms tucked behind his head, looking so peaceful, as if he weren’t contemplating murder, she wasn’t the least bit confident.

She still had to try. “Would you kill a man who’d tried to shoot you in the back, Slater?”

“Sure I would.”

“Well, that’s why Angel shot your brother.”

“Lady, I heard what went on down there. That man of yours was lookin‘ for my brother to kill him, and he’s known to be faster’n lightnin’. Either way Rafe woulda died, so what he tried was the only chance he had, as I see it. You gonna tell me that there Angel of Death wasn’t out to kill him?”

She couldn’t very well do that. “Your brother tried to rape me. That�s why.”

He glanced over at her then, showing her the first bit of emotion. It was surprise. “Well, shoot, what�d he want to do that for? You ain’t nothin‘ much to look at.”

Heat stole up Cassie’s cheeks. “That doesn’t change the fact—”

“Even if he did rape you,” he broke in, “thaf d be no reason to die.”

With that attitude, he’d never admit his brother might have deserved what he’d got, so she changed tactics. “You won’t get away with this. If you succeed in killing Angel, I’ll hunt you down myself. There won’t be anywhere—”

He cut her off again with a snort “Lady, what makes you think you’ll be leavin‘ here alive? The only reason you ain’t dead yet is in case that fast gun wants to see you ’fore he comes in close enough for me to shoot him. You’re the reason he killed Rafe, so you gotta die, same as him.”

He probably thought that would shut her up. It nearly did. “You — you still won’t get away with it. I saw you in town today. I told my mama. She’s smart enough to figure if s you, so the name Slater will be on Wanted posters in every state and the Western territory. You’ll never have another moment’s peace if you murder us.”

“So I’ll leave die country,” he replied with a shrug. “That won’t bother me none. But you’re botherin‘ me, so shut it up, girlie, ’fore I stuff something in your mouth. They won’t be able to get the money until the bank opens in the mornin‘, so that gunfighter won’t be gettin’ here until near noon. I need some sleep ‘fore then.”

Cassie decided against telling him that her mama would have him hunted down, no matter where he went. His answer would probably be that he’d kill her, too.

She gave up for the time being. She’d have time in the morning to work on him some more, and his friend Harry, too. The smaller man would be easier to scare, and maybe he could talk some sense into Slater.

But she refused to let him have the last word.

“I’m hungry,” she complained.

“I ain’t wastin‘ food on a dead woman.”

She let him have the last word after all.