Brave the Wild Wind (15 page)

C
HASE had become quite fond of the bottle and its magic cures. He had even gone on a binge for an entire week when he first got to town. But after he sobered up, he got down to the business of making money—money that would get him to Spain. It was time. Spain was so far away. He needed the distance. In Spain, he wouldn’t be tempted to come back to this area.

It was difficult staying there in the meantime, though, and that was why the bottle was never far from his reach. The point was, he kept telling himself, the railroad came through Cheyenne, and there were many saloons for a gambler’s needs. It just didn’t make sense to go on to Denver or back to Kansas to catch the train east, not when he could do that from where he was.

The difficulty was in being only a day’s ride away from that jewel-eyed termagant who kept coming to his mind no matter how much he drowned his thoughts in drink. Twice it had even been so bad he’d considered riding back out to the Rocky Valley Ranch. But Rachel wouldn’t welcome him, and Jessie never had.
He got drunk enough to stop those foolish notions whenever they came over him.

He was drunk just then, after hearing that Jessie had come to town. What the hell was it about her that made it so difficult to put her out of his life? She had damn well turned his life upside down already. He had never before had this trouble forgetting any woman he’d gotten involved with. And liquor didn’t seem to help this time, not even a little. With Jessie so close, he needed something more.

His eyes roamed the saloon from where he stood at the end of the bar. He saw Charlie and Clee, Bowdre’s two obnoxious sidekicks, sitting at a table by themselves. Chase could have shot them for telling him Jessie was in town. To get his mind off her, which the drink wasn’t doing, he considered picking a fight with them. But then he spotted Silver Annie crossing the room. She would suit his needs even better than a fight.

Annie was the prettiest of the girls who worked this saloon. Unfortunately, that wasn’t saying much. She got her name from the silver ribbons she always wore in her hair and around her neck, and also from the color of her eyes, more silver than gray, especially because of their glassy appearance. Her eyes hinted at something stronger than drink. Chase didn’t care. He couldn’t judge someone else’s weakness when he was developing one of his own.

She had approached him before, but he hadn’t been tempted. Maybe that was a mistake. What was the old saying about one woman helping you forget another?

A little while later and a lot drunker, he
found himself in Silver Annie’s room. The lights were out, and he was inundated by the smell of cheap perfume. Some of him was just sober enough to know he didn’t really want to be there. But he was there, and he vowed he
would
forget Jessie in the arms of another woman.

But when he finally crawled naked into bed, Chase couldn’t find that other woman. She wasn’t there. He felt all around the bed, but she still wasn’t there.

“Well, where are you, Annie?” he demanded belligerently, determined to go through with it.

He heard her giggle from one side of the room, and then there was a deeper snicker from the other side. Before Chase could make any sense of it, a man spoke.

“You reckon he never got enough from the mama and daughter?”

“Damn you, now he knows we’re here!” growled another man.

“Think I care, when I got this?”

“Shit!”

Chase struggled up from the bed. “What—”

A fiery pain stabbed into his back, driving him facedown on the bed. He tried to rise but couldn’t quite manage it. And then it didn’t matter anymore. A black void engulfed him.

“You dumb asshole!” Charlie swore. “What’d you do that for?”

“I owed him,” Clee said defensively. “’Sides, I weren’t scared of him like you sure as shit were.”

“Were we told to kill him?” Charlie asked on a rising note. “Were we?”

“Ah, what’s the difference?”

“Laton didn’t want no trouble, that’s what, not when the gal will be hearin’ soon about what he did up north. He means to drive her out without the law comin’ into it. He likes to do things his way, and you sure as hell just messed that up for him.”

“It was stupid, anyway, if you ask me. There was no guarantee the Blair girl would fire this one just ’cause he was found here, passed out. Laton was just gettin’ worried with him bein’ in town all these weeks. Fired or dead, he won’t be tellin’ the girl even if he did find out anythin’ he shouldn’t have.”

“You better hope Laton sees it that way. And what about Annie?”

“Shoot, she won’t say nothin’, not if she wants the stuff she was promised. Will you, Annie?”

The girl could only barely see the outline of the two men. She felt sorry for the good-looking gambler, but he was dead and she was alive, and she did need that stuff they’d promised her.

“It’s dark in here,” she replied quickly. “I didn’t see nothin’.”

“That’s a good girl, Annie.” Clee chuckled.

Charlie wasn’t amused. “Well, the sheriff will have to be called. We’d best go through his pockets so they think this was a robbery.”

“Well, shoot, if you’re gonna do it that way, it’d be better just to take his pants with us, wouldn’t it?” Clee suggested reasonably. “See, he’s dead, and she’s screamin’ her head off, so would a robber stick around long enough to go through the man’s pants?”

“All right, all right,” Charlie grumbled, not
liking the way this had turned out. He was just glad that Clee was showing some sense in covering all the angles of the new plan they were now stuck with.

“D
O you know who he is, Ned?” Doc Meddly asked.

The deputy shook his head and looked at Silver Annie. She could hardly sit still.

“He calls himself Chase Summers, but what does that tell you?” she said peevishly, wishing they’d hurry up. “It’s prob’ly an alias. They usually are.”

“Ned, why don’t you get her out of here? She’s a bundle of nerves,” Doc suggested.

“Well, what do you expect me to be, a man gets stabbed in my bed?” Annie shrieked. “And I’m stayin’. Just hurry up and do what you got to do, then get him out of here so I can clean up this mess. I can’t afford to stop workin’ tonight just ’cause of this.”

“Callous, isn’t she?” Doc mumbled to the deputy.

“Aren’t they all?” Ned agreed. Annie ignored them both as she yanked a brush through her flaxen hair.

“Where’s he staying, Ned?”

“At the hotel, I imagine.”

“Don’t you know? Where’s the sheriff, anyway?”

“Now don’t get all put out, Doc. There wasn’t any reason to wake him. I can handle this.”

“Find out if this young fellow knows anyone around here. He’s gonna need looking after for a few days.”

“What about Mrs. Meddly? Don’t she usually—?”

“God-fearing folk only, Ned. She’d just have to hear where he got hurt to know he don’t fit in that category. Now I could insist she tend him, but I’d be living with a shrew the whole time, and I’d rather not.”

“He knows the Blair girl,” Annie volunteered. It had been a shock to Annie to find the gambler wasn’t dead after all. Clee might pay her extra if she continued with their original plan. It was worth a try.

“Jessie Blair?” Doc said absently as he continued cleaning Chase’s wound. “She was in town today. See if she’s at the hotel, Ned, and—”

“Get her over here quick,” Annie interrupted shrilly. “So we can get this over with.”

Meddly looked up sharply. “Miss, this is no place for a young lady like her.”

“Why not? I heard she’s tough as nails. Any gal who can pack a gun can come into a saloon without fainting.”

“Not when it isn’t necessary,” the Doc told her indignantly, then turned to Ned. “Just tell Miss Jessie this man has been hurt and have her wait for me at the hotel in Summers’s room. And send up a couple of men to help me get him over there.”

Ned left the saloon for the hotel, but he
wouldn’t find Jessie there. She had entered the saloon just moments before, and was listening inattentively to the talk of the robbery. She had her mind on other things. She had come to find Chase. She hadn’t been able to sleep at all after Billy left her, and she had done a good deal of calm, logical thinking. She’d come to a decision that still surprised her.

She didn’t see Chase anywhere in the crowded room. And after she looked a second time, she finally began to really listen to the spurts of conversation going on all around her.

“If you gotta go, by God, that’s the way to do it—lovin’ a woman!”

“Yeah, but to get it in the back, without even a chance to fight.”

“I heard they stole his pants and all.”

“He’s been winning a lot lately, but I didn’t see him gambling today. It’d be a good one on the snake who stabbed him if his pockets were empty.”

“Yeah.”

“I seen him once with the Blair girl. I think he was workin’ on her spread for a while.”

“Well, I wish they’d hurry and bring him down. I’d like a turn with Silver Annie tonight to find out what really happened.”

Jessie ran to the stairs. Four men were coming down, and farther up, on the landing, more men stood near an open door, peering inside. She moved slowly up the stairs. She didn’t realize the saloon below was quieting down, now that she had been noticed.

When she got to the open door, Doc Meddly’s voice came to her clearly.

“It might help, Miss Annie, if you happened to have a spare pair of pants around. Do you?”

“What would I be doin’ with men’s britches? The men who visit me take them off, but they always take their pants with them when they leave. Cover him with a blanket, for cryin’ out loud. He ain’t gonna know the difference.”

Jessie’s gaze moved from Doc Meddly’s back to the heavily painted face of the blonde, who was clad in no more than a skimpy corset and knee-length drawers. She then looked at the man on the bed.

“Is he dead?” Her voice was harsh, almost a scream.

“Why, Miss Jessie!” the Doc exclaimed. “Now, what’s wrong with that deputy? I told him not to bring you here.”

“Is he dead?” Jessie repeated in a much louder voice.

Meddly saw the ashen color of face, the horror in her eyes. “No, no,” he quickly assured her, trying to make his voice as gentle as possible. “The young man will be just fine, with proper care.”

Jessie’s body almost collapsed. She grabbed the doorframe for support. Meddly smiled encouragingly. But then Jessie’s whole demeanor changed. Her back straightened, and an expression as hard as flint closed over her features as she looked at the injured man sprawled on the bed, and then at Silver Annie.

Doc Meddly hastily threw a blanket over Chase as Jessie walked into the room and approached the bed. “Now, Miss Jessie, you
shouldn’t be in a place like this. I was just about to have him moved to the hotel.”

“What happened?” Jessie asked in a hard voice.

“Robbery.”

“Was there a fight?”

“You ought to be askin’ me, honey,” Annie said in a too-sweet voice. “I was the one in the room with him when it happened.”

Jessie whirled around, and the older woman shrank from the look in her eyes. “Is that so? Well, then, why don’t you just tell me,
honey?
”

“There…there weren’t no fight,” Annie replied uneasily. Then she continued more confidently, “The gambler was too drunk to fight. But I guess the thief didn’t know that and he stabbed him. I thought he was dead, I surely did, and I commenced to screamin’, see? Well, that sure made that back-stabber turn tail. He swiped up the gambler’s duds and lit out of here like a wolf-chased rabbit.”

“Is that what you told the deputy?”

“Well, sure.”

“And somebody can verify your story?”

Annie frowned. “Now what do you mean?”

“What I mean, woman,” Jessie said in a soft, thoroughly icy voice, “is, who else can prove what you’re saying is true? Was this thief seen coming out of your room?”

“How should I know?” Annie retorted defensively. “Men come and go from the rooms up here all day and night. No one takes notice of them.”

“Did you see the intruder?” Jessie asked.

“I didn’t see nothin’. The lights were out.”

“Then how did you know Chase had been stabbed?”

“Know? I…just did.”

“How? Did he bleed on you? Was she covered with blood when you got here, Doc?” Jessie asked him without taking her eyes off Annie.

“Not that I recall, Miss Jessie. But why are you asking all these questions?”

“That’s what I’d like to know,” Annie grumbled. “Ned didn’t bother askin’ me all this stuff.”

“Maybe he didn’t,” Jessie replied. “But he didn’t know that man lying in your bed like I do.”

“Is he close to you, Miss Jessie?” Meddly ventured.

“Close enough.”

“Holy—”

Jessie gave him a sharp look, and the good doctor said no more. He knew exactly what she meant. It was a shame she had to find her man here, but if anyone had a right to be asking about how he got hurt, she did. What a situation! And he couldn’t even tell anyone about it.

With Meddly silent, Jessie tore into Annie again. “I want to know why there is blood all over that bed, but none on you?”

Annie crossed her arms stubbornly over her ample breasts. “I don’t have to be answerin’ your questions.”

In a flash, Jessie’s compact Smith and Wesson revolver was in her hand. “But you will.”

“Doc!” Annie shrieked.

“Jessie Blair!” Meddly exclaimed.

“Shut up!” Jessie said furiously. She moved back to the door and kicked it shut, keeping the gun level on Annie. “Now you’ll tell me, damn you, and if I have to shoot you first, well, that doesn’t make any difference to me.”

“Tell you what?” Annie screamed.

“You stabbed him yourself, didn’t you? That’s why there’s no blood on you.”

Annie backed up against the wall, stunned. “No, no, I swear! I wasn’t even near him. I was over there, on the other side of the bed!”

“You expect me to believe that?”

Annie drew frantically from her past experience. “He was so drunk, I was hopin’ he’d fall asleep and I could wake him, well, you know, like it was all over with, and get paid for nothin’. I don’t do it often, honest, only when a feller’s as full to the gills as he was.”

“You’re lying. You lured him up here and set him up!”

“I didn’t! God, I swear! I was after him for weeks, but he wouldn’t have nothin’ to do with me until today. He wasted half the evenin’ drinkin’ first, said he had things to forget. I figured he could hold the whiskey, so I waited it out. But he couldn’t. A man ain’t no good when he’s that drunk. But he insisted on comin’ up here.”

“Liar!”

“Doc, Doc, stop her!” Annie was crying hysterically by then. “She’s gonna shoot me!”

“What the hell is going on in here?” The door burst open, and a big, ham-fisted, ugly brute of a man loomed in the doorway.

Jessie swung around. “Who are you?” she de
manded, not at all intimidated by his size. She, after all, had her gun.

“I happen to own this place you’re causing so much ruckus in, and I’ll thank you to take your little self out of here, pronto.”

For all the belligerence of his words, his manner was quiet and conciliatory. He was eyeing her weapon. Jessie lowered it when she felt Doc Meddly’s hands on her shoulders.

“Come on, girl,” he said gently. “Let’s get your friend out of here and into a clean bed at the hotel. I’m sure it happened just the way Silver Annie said it did. Let’s go.”

Jessie looked back at Annie, who was still wide-eyed, and in shock. “All right,” she conceded, and put the gun away. “But no one messes with what’s mine and gets away with it. You hear me, Annie? If I find out you lied about this, I’m going to put a ball through your heart.”

She let Meddly lead their way out of the saloon, with three men following, carefully carrying Chase wrapped up in an old wool blanket. They handled him like a newborn babe, for they’d been standing outside the door and had heard what the little spitfire said. They weren’t going to give her any reason to think they had mishandled what was hers. No, sir!