Bullet Creek (23 page)

Real stopped and, holding a bottle in each hand, strained his ears to listen. After a minute, he heard two voices coming from the same direction as the laugh. He moved down the dark corridor and past the faded paintings and tapestries the don had brought back from trips to Mexico City.

He followed the sounds to a door on the right side of the hall, stopped, and listened through the thick mahogany. A minute later, he threw the door wide and stepped into the big, candlelit room, where Isabelle knelt beside the bed, a medicine bottle in one hand, a tuft of cotton in the other.

On the bed sat the tall, shaggy-headed boy Pepe, soaked to the skin, his muddy cotton slacks pulled down around his ankles. A long cut angled across his brown thigh, red with fresh blood and the lighter red of iodine.

Seeing the door open, the girl jerked her head up with a start and drew air sharply through her teeth. The boy looked up, as well, his back tensing and his eyes widening with alarm. His right hand reached automatically for the old rifle lying beside him on the bed, then froze on the Burnside's gray stock.

“And what do we have here?” Real said through a lascivious grin.

The girl flushed and dropped her eyes demurely.

His gaze glassy with fear, Pepe's mouth worked several times before he said, “Real, it's not what you think. Cayetano and I did what you told us to do. We were chased. I was grazed by the Bar-V riders and simply came to the hacienda, hoping someone would tend the wound.”

“Oh, don't shit your pants over it,” Real said. “I know all about you and Senorita Flores. Don't think you've been pulling the wool over my eyes.”

Pepe stared at him, the color draining from his cheeks.

Real chuckled. “I know you killed the don. It was my idea.”

Pepe glanced at Isabelle, who returned the look with a guilty glance.

“I thought your aim would be truer if you did it for love,” Real said, staggering into the room. “And my hands would be clean. Tsk-tsk. It is a very grave sin, you know, to kill your own father.”

The girl said softly, “Pepe, I—”

“Shut up!” Real snapped. He looked at the boy. “Tell me about what happened at the Bar-V. Did you and Cayetano accomplish your mission?”

Pepe lifted his gaze to Real, still in shock over the girl's manipulations and what they meant about her and Real.

“Sí,”
the boy said quickly, nodding. “I mean, we think so. We know Cayetano hit someone, and we were pretty sure it was Vannorsdell. But we were far away, and we had to flee quickly, because the Bar-V riders were shooting.”

“Where is Cayetano?”

“He went from the stables to the bunkhouse. We just rode in a few minutes ago. They gave us a hard chase, but the rain turned them back.” The corners of Pepe's mouth rose proudly. “Cayetano's horse slipped in the mud and fell down a cliff. We had to ride back on my pinto.”

Real stood just before the open door, considering what the boy had told him. If Vannorsdell indeed was dead, there would be much to celebrate. He canted his head toward the door behind him. “Pull your trousers up and go on back to the bunkhouse. I'll be along shortly.”

Pepe glanced at Isabelle, who still knelt before him, holding the iodine bottle and the cotton tuft. She did not return Pepe's joyful, relieved glance. “Does this mean I will become one of your riders?”

“Don't push your luck this evening, young one,” Real growled. “You still have much to prove. And I don't like all this sneaking around my house.”

The boy grabbed his soggy hat and rifle and hustled out of the room.

When Pepe was gone, Real took another step forward. The girl looked up at him, her eyes dark with apprehension. She set the bottle and the cotton on the floor and rose slowly, keeping her eyes on Real, standing stiffly before the door. She must have seen some subtle change in his expression, because she ran forward suddenly and wrapped her arms around his waist.

“Oh, Real,” she cried, “now we can be together always!”

“But first you must decide,” Real said, smiling as though thoroughly enjoying his charade, placing his right hand beneath her chin and gently tilting her head back, “which one of us you love more.”

Tom knew neither where he was nor how long he'd been asleep when his eyes snapped open. He'd heard something. A dark figure moved in the darkness.

His heart began hammering when a starlike glimmer of vagrant light flashed off something shiny, and then his left hand snapped up, his fingers closing around a slender wrist.

“Bastardo!” came the sound of Lupita's voice.

Tom stopped the knife's descent but not before the tip had penetrated his neck, piercing him like the bite of an angry wasp.

Fighting the hand wielding the knife back away from his face, he reflexively jabbed his right fist straight up with savage force, connecting soundly with the woman's face. Her full lips cracked beneath his knuckles, blood spurting across his cheeks.

Lupita cried out and fell back across the bed. “Damn you!” she sobbed.

Knife in his own hand, Navarro stumbled out of bed. He peered both ways down the hall. Seeing no one, he closed the door, reprimanding himself for his drunken stupor. Then he lighted the lamp.

The butter yellow light revealed Lupita lying on her back across the foot of the bed wearing only a copper-colored night wrapper. She lolled from side to side, with one knee raised. She sobbed and held the back of her right wrist across her bloody mouth.

Tom could see the naked inside of her raised left thigh, but it didn't do anything for him. His chest burned with fury. That pretty thigh belonged to a cold-blooded killer.

“Bastardo!” she snapped, then sniffed. Tears streaked her gaunt cheeks.

“What the hell do you think you're doing?” He was tempted to punch her again.

“Trying to kill you. What do you think, you stupid gringo?” Through a raspy cry, she added, “No one refuses Lupita de Cava!”

“No wonder you're lonely.” Navarro tossed the knife into a far corner and stared down at the crying, bloodied woman. The angry light in his eyes softened, and the skin across his cheeks slackened. She was like a lonely, spoiled child, he decided. Grumbling a curse, he turned and poured water into the bowl atop the washstand.

“Who is she, Navarro?” Lupita asked angrily. “Who have you refused me for?”

“None of your business,” Tom said. With the bowl in one hand, and a towel in the other, he sat down at the end of the bed and dipped one end of the towel in the water.

“It's that stage station gringa, isn't it?”

Tom looked at her. “How do you know about Louise?”

Lupita's voice was muffled by the hand she held against her nose. “I manage to get to Tucson once a month. I have heard the rumors.”

Tom looked at her hard, not liking the fact that she knew about Louise. On the other hand, Louise Talon was fully capable of taking care of herself.

“It's still not any of your business.” Navarro squeezed the excess water from the end of the towel, then leaned toward her. “Move your hand away.”

“No. You've made me ugly.”

“You did it to yourself. Now move your hand away from your face.”

She looked at him, slowly removed her hand from her face. Turning toward him, she drew her robe closed and pulled her knees toward her waist. Tom dabbed at her torn lower lip. She winced and jerked away.

“Hold still. It's gotta be cleaned. Could even use some catgut.”

“No stitches.”

“Hold still, damn it.”

She did as he told her, and he dabbed at the split lip. When he got the blood away, he saw that it wasn't as bad as he'd thought, though both lips were already swelling. The top one was only bruised.

She stared at him as he worked, dabbing the blood away and rinsing the towel in the bowl. When he'd wrung the towel out the fourth time, he glanced into her eyes. Her anger seemed to be gone, but the bridge of her nose wrinkled as tears rolled down her cheeks. He brushed at the tears with the towel.

“It's stopped bleeding,” he said, squeezing the water from the towel and rising. “Better go back to your room. You can pick up your pig sticker tomorrow . . . after I've gone.”

“Let me stay,” she said, resting on her side, her left elbow beneath her, her feet curled together. When he turned to her, she added, “I don't want to go back to my room. It's cold after the rain. I won't try anything funny.”

He set the bowl on the washstand and regarded her severely. At least, if he had her here where he could keep an eye on her, he wouldn't have to worry about her sneaking back into his room with another knife. “Get under the covers.”

Again letting the robe flop open, she crawled up to the head of the bed, peeled the covers back, crawled beneath them, then drew them up to her shoulders. She slid over to the far side and patted the sheets.

“There is room,” she said.

Navarro pulled the chair out from the table and sat down. “I'm gonna sit up and have a smoke.”

She watched him as he got out his makings and built the cigarette, touched fire to it, and inhaled deeply. By the time he was finished with the quirley, her eyes were closed, and she snored softly, her swollen lips parted. Despite the pain of the split lip, all she'd drunk had finally knocked her out.

“Thank Christ,” Navarro said through a sigh.

He got up, blew out the lamp, sat back down in the chair, crossed his arms and ankles, and lulled himself to sleep with thoughts of Louise and their future life together up north.

When he woke, he opened the shutters. Milky dawn light shone in the window. He turned to the bed. Lupita slept beneath the single quilt, her back to him, her raven hair mussed, knees drawn up to her chest. Turning away, he rolled the kinks out of his neck and shoulders.

His back ached when he bent down to retrieve his clothes and quietly began dressing. When he'd stepped into his boots and wrapped his cartridge belt around his waist, he donned his hat and glanced at Lupita once more.

She lay as still as before, breathing slowly, deeply.

He eased the door open, stepped out, and eased it closed.

A minute later he walked out the front door and strode across the house's main courtyard, inhaling the fresh morning air fragrant with desert rain and the faint smell of lemons. It was so still that he thought he could hear the rain sifting through the orange caliche beneath his boots.

Tramping across the main yard, heading down the grade toward the stables, he kept his hand close to his pistol butt and swung his gaze around warily. He didn't trust Real as far as he could throw the firebrand into a stiff wind.

As he neared the stables, one of the big, rectangular doors opened. He stopped suddenly as a short, bandy-legged figure with dark skin and a white mustache stepped out, a Spencer carbine in his hands. Navarro's heart sputtered, then resumed its normal rhythm when Sanchez beckoned him forward.

“I was wonderin' where you were,” Navarro said as he stepped into the stable's musty shadows.

Sanchez drew the door closed, barred it, and turned to Navarro. “I rode out before the storm to haze a small herd of cattle from a canyon.” Sanchez frowned and shook his head with distaste. He kept his voice just above a whisper. “Real's idiots did not think of it. The cattle would have drowned. When I returned to the headquarters, I learned that Real had sent three men to the stables, to wait for you to retrieve your horse.”

Tom glanced around, his hand returning to his pistol butt. “To send me off in style?”

“Sí.
Grand style. I got up early, found them still sleeping off last night's booze—Real had quite a card game going in the bunkhouse—and bashed all three over the head with my rifle butt.”

“Ouch.”

Sanchez strode back into the shadows and returned a moment later, leading two saddled horses, his own and Navarro's. “They didn't feel a thing. We must leave before Real wakes up from his stupor.”

Navarro looked at him. “We?”

Silently, Sanchez peered out the stable doors, looked around the yard, then swung both doors wide. The two men led their horses into the yard and swung up into their saddles. As they reined the mounts toward the main gate, Navarro noticed his rifle wasn't in his saddle scabbard.

“Bastards got a good Winchester,” he groused.

“Be glad that is all they got. What happened to your neck?”

Navarro touched the spot where Lupita's knife had pierced his skin. “Cut myself shaving.”

The segundo did not turn his head to look at him, but the upswept ends of his mustache rose in a slight, knowing grin. He cantered his horse down the grade toward the rock wall lining the yard's western periphery, barely visible through the dawn shadows.

“I don't know if the guards at the main gate are aware of Real's plans for you.” Sanchez drew his carbine and cocked it, snugging the butt up against his hip. “We better be ready.”

Riding off the segundo's right stirrup, Navarro flipped the safety thong from his Colt's hammer but left the pistol in the holster. As they neared the wall and the gate, the two Winchester-wielding lookouts standing on the ledge near the wall's lip turned to them. Navarro slid his hand up his thigh toward the Colt, but the guards kept their rifles turned away. With a pulley rope, one of the guards opened the gate while the other said good morning to Sanchez and, in a sneering tone, asked him how he got his old bones out of the mattress sack so early on a wet morning.

“He doesn't have a fat whore to keep him warm,” said the other.