Capture the Sun (Cheyenne Series) (52 page)

      
“Mebbe. But till I do, yew cain't cross thet road ta git yer hoss 'er Carrie, kin ya?”

      
“Maybe I don't have Carrie. Ever consider that, runt?” He edged through the grass, trying to pinpoint exactly where his adversary was hidden. With the rifle he had a decided advantage.

      
“Yew got 'er, right 'nough, jist th' way yew'd have ta git any woman, bound 'n' gagged,” Kyle taunted.

      
Rider swore and lunged out of the bushes, crashing toward the sound of the drawling voice. “Time to finish this,” he yelled as he sighted on the crouched form of the. wounded man, propped up against the side of a rock. It was a bad tactical blunder. He had to aim the rifle, awkward in the close confines of the narrow creek bed. Before he could do so Kyle got off one shot, which knocked Rider backward as it slammed into his left arm. The killer scrambled for cover when he hit the ground.

      
Hunnicut swore as he pitched forward. “Purely meant thet bullet ta hit center.” Then everything went black.

      
Hawk heard the shots. He had left K Bar to take a desperate gamble, guessing, as Hunnicut did, that Rider would head for his border hideout with Carrie. He had no time to backtrack to town in hopes of picking up a trail. Now as he pushed his exhausted bay nearer, he feared what he would find. Had Rider had a run-in with some of his fellow rustlers, or had Carrie somehow gotten hold of a gun? Either way he didn't like the direction of his thoughts as he came upon the sharp outcropping of rocks on the hillock overlooking the. dry stream bed.

      
Catching the glint of a gun barrel, he slid off Redskin, with practiced ease, rolling quickly into some thick dry brush with his rifle in his hand. A bullet glanced off the rock over his head, causing the soft shale to flake, showering him with fine particles. Rider was across the trail in the gully, but where was Carrie? Who else had exchanged shots with Rider?

      
The killer answered his unspoken question. “That little bastard you ride with is dead, half-breed. You're next. Think of me and your woman, all cozy in my cabin tonight—after I kill you.”

      
So it had been Kyle. Hawk could see what a natural place this was for an ambush. Hunnicut would have, too, if he had not been so intent on galloping after Carrie. Of course, he had been doing the same thing himself. If Kyle hadn't stopped Rider first, he, not his friend, might be the one dead now. Quickly Hawk slipped off his boots and dropped the rifle noiselessly to the ground. Never in all his years with the Cheyenne had Hunting Hawk stalked his prey with such single-minded concentration, forcing grief for Kyle and fear for Carrie out of his mind.

      
After almost half an hour, Caleb Rider began to sweat. It was as if the rivers of perspiration rolling off him took his bravado along with them. He had been under fire many times in his life, faced uneven odds and deadly killers. And he had always walked away from death. But after Hunnicut got off that last lucky shot and then pitched face forward, Rider had been shaken. Not by the bullet, for the wound in his arm was slight and had already stopped bleeding. He had taken far worse punishment in the past, but no sooner had he recovered his rifle and seen the still form of the Texan lying in the dust than Redskin's pounding hoofbeats foretold Sinclair's arrival.

      
Some gut instinct told Rider that Sinclair would come. That was what unnerved him, the premonition and the fact that his adversary was fighting on his terms, in close quarters on rough terrain that could hide a dozen armed men. His own perfect ambush site now became an insidious trap. Carrie and his horse were across a wide-open space in the rocks beyond. Why didn't that damned savage make his move? Since he had vanished in the brush, dropping from his horse as if he knew Rider had a bead on him, Sinclair had not made a sound. Was he still over there waiting? Or was he coming after his prey?

      
Now Rider's adversary was not a wounded, weakening man, but a deadly alert killer, a savage. Terror clawed at his guts, but Rider forced it down, tasting the sour bile in his throat as he swallowed.

      
Hawk could hear the faint sounds Rider made from his crouched hiding place. No matter how quiet a
veho
tried to be, he could never truly succeed. He recalled Iron Heart's words to him as a youth.
White men disturb the spirits of the earth. Listen, and you will hear their complaint
.

      
Grimly he moved closer. When he caught sight of Rider's boot heel, sticking out from behind the rock where he was squatted, Hawk stopped and knelt. Then he took a small stone and tossed it between them. It landed with a loud thunk in the dust, causing Rider to whirl at the sudden noise behind him and fire wildly. It also led him to abandon his cover as he stood up, his eyes frantically searching for the source of the noise.

      
By the time he saw Sinclair, it was too late. He had no time to draw a bead on his target, and his bullet only grazed Hawk's shoulder. Hawk's shot found its mark, dead center. He was only six yards away, and the impact carried Rider's body back into the rocks, sprawling his broken corpse grotesquely over them. Hawk approached cautiously to make sure Caleb was dead. Then he heard the moan, faint and low, coming from around the bend of the narrow stream bed. Kicking at Rider's body and satisfied that he would never kill again, Hawk rushed toward the sound.

      
“Kyle!” He spied Hunnicut in the dust, a widening stain of red across his upper body. Carefully he turned the small man over, laying him flat and checking for a heartbeat. He barely found it. “Tough old rooster, don't you go and die on me now,” he said as he frantically tore off his own shirt and wadded it against the hole in Kyle's chest. In answer to his friend's words, the Texan's eyes opened in an unsteady flutter. “I missed, but yew didn't, I reckon.” His voice was as faint as his pulse. “Leave me be 'n' find Carrie,” he attempted to command, but only succeeded in croaking.

      
Carrie had spent the past half hour in frantic exertion, rubbing her bloody wrists and arms against a rough piece of rock, all the while listening to the sounds of the ensuing fight. Forcing down her tears when she heard Rider's claim to have killed Kyle, she persevered.

      
Hawk found her just as she finally broke the last of the bonds off her wrists and was fumbling with the ones on her ankles. When he cut her free and pulled her up, her numbed legs gave way. She collapsed against him. “Where's Kyle? Oh, Hawk, is he—”

      
“He's not dead yet, but it's bad. If I put you on Rider's horse, can you hold on?”

      
She nodded. “Yes. Just get back to Kyle. I'll manage. We've got to get him to a doctor!”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

      
The nightmarish ride to Miles City took until well past dark. Carrie clung stubbornly to Rider's horse, dizzy and aching but desperate in her determination not to further slow their progress by passing out. Hawk held Kyle in his arms, torn between a desire to urge Redskin to gallop and the need for a gentler pace lest the Texan start to bleed once more. Hawk had stopped the hemorrhage with some herbal concoction he gathered near the dry creek bed, bandaging the wound with his own shirt. Both he and Carrie prayed the crude remedy would work.

      
Phineas Lark was less than overjoyed to see the bedraggled trio—the bare-chested half-breed soaked in Kyle's blood, the gravely wounded Texas gunman, and the scarlet woman who was now wanted for murder. After seeing a light in the doctor's front parlor, Hawk had kicked open the door to Lark's private residence. By the time the irate, pompous physician came puffing up to them, Hawk was already depositing his burden on a table in Lark's home examining room.

      
If Lark had even fleetingly considered ordering Sinclair to take his stricken friend elsewhere, one look into those savage black eyes choked his indignation in his throat. Wordlessly he went to work, peeling away Kyle's soaked clothing and the makeshift bandage Hawk had made from his own shirt. He removed the grass poultice, muttering something beneath his breath, but seemed surprised that the bleeding was now so slight. While he dug the slug out, disinfected the wound, and sewed up the torn flesh, Hawk assisted him calmly. Carrie collapsed in a chair, fighting to remain conscious as her head injury and exhaustion took their toll.

      
After he had finished with Kyle, Lark looked up at Hawk and spoke somewhat hesitantly, uneasy now that his technical skills no longer put him in command of the situation. “He's lost a lot of blood and his collarbone's fractured badly. Frankly, I'm amazed he's still alive, but after surviving this long, well, he might make it. Incredibly tough man.”

      
“How soon can we move him?” Despite the flood of relief the doctor's words brought him, Hawk's face was impassive.

      
“If he doesn't bleed during the night and his temperature is stable, I'd say he could be transported as far as a comfortable bed in the Excelsior in a couple of days.”

      
Both men's attention was drawn to Carrie then as she slowly stood up and said, “You're sure he'll be all right? Thank God....” Her voice was faint, and the dark smudges beneath her eyes made her pale face seem even more deathly.

      
Lark noticed the bloody raw abrasions on her wrists and the torn, disheveled state of her clothing, but he did not offer to treat her injuries until Hawk ordered him. “She's had a bad knock on the head. Take care of her.”

      
Remembering the disdainful way the doctor had announced his refusal ever to treat her again after Perry was born, Carrie shook her head stubbornly. “No, Hawk. All I need is a bath and some sleep. Just so Kyle's all right.”

      
“Shouldn't you be more worried about the marshal?” Dr. Lark looked at the tall half-breed out of the corner of his eye as soon as he blurted out the question.

      
“First some medical attention and rest, then we'll settle with the law. What's this about a marshal?” Hawk pinned Lark with an obsidian gaze.

      
“Sheriff Woods was found dead this morning, and she was missing. The mayor sent to Helena for a federal marshal to investigate,” Lark said defensively, suddenly beginning to sweat as the realization struck him that he was standing next to a murderess and her accomplice.

      
Hawk scoffed. “Don't worry, Doctor. We're hardly going to run off after coming all this way back.”

      
They left Dr. Lark's house after Hawk gave him an ultimatum to care for Kyle or face consequences the physician would not like. Lark’s head had bobbed so hard it was a wonder he did not snap his own neck. Promising to return shortly, Hawk was satisfied that his friend would be well tended while he was gone.

      
Carrie and Hawk rode along the deserted streets to the hotel. They were exhausted, and now that the crisis with Kyle seemed over, their spent emotions left them silent. The Excelsior clerk almost collapsed behind the desk in gape-jawed amazement when Hawk walked in with the town's infamous jailbreaker. However, he was even more easily quelled than Lark, quickly giving Hawk two room keys and agreeing to send up hot water and some first-aid supplies.

      
Before he availed himself of the luxury of a bath, Hawk quickly took the horses to the livery stable. By the time he returned to the hotel and cleaned up, Carrie had refreshed herself with a long soak and was quietly sitting at the table in her room, struggling with the salve and bandages for her wrists. She felt as if no part of her body was free of scratches, bruises, or lumps, but the wounds to her spirit were the worst.

      
Hawk entered her room after knocking. Carrie looked so wan and vulnerable that it grabbed at his heart. More gruffly than he intended, he said, “I don't know why you didn't let Lark do that for you. Here, let me.”

      
“I could scarcely take a bath with bandaged arms,” she replied in overly sweet reasonableness, some of her old fire evident in the tone of her voice now.

      
As he picked up the jar of salve, he grunted and began to apply it to the slim, fine-boned wrists. Seeing the way she had struggled against the cruel ropes and the damage they had done, he was struck with renewed fury at Lola and Rider, and, irrationally, at Carrie, too. “How the hell did you get yourself into this mess anyway?”

      
He felt her stiffen as he wrapped a wrist with the clean linen. “Do you think I had a tryst with Krueger and shot him in a jealous rage? That's what Woods said.”

      
Hawk snorted in obvious disbelief and kept on bandaging. “No, but if you hadn't tangled with that damn German in the first place, you wouldn't have fallen into Lola and Rider's hands so neatly, that's for damn sure!”

      
Just like him always to blame her for everything! “So generous of you to think I didn't shoot Krueger, at least,” she snapped, wrenching her wrist away as soon as he tied the bandage. His touch still made her tremble, and now her response was intensified by anger and exhaustion.

      
He sat back on the wooden chair and rubbed his eyes. “I ordered that slick-eared clerk to send a meal up here. Now, tell me everything that happened while I was gone.”

      
Carrie calmed down and went over the past two days of harrowing events. He interrupted with questions several times and rose abruptly to leave when he was satisfied with all the facts.

      
“I'm going to check on Kyle. Eat when the food comes and get some sleep. That's a nasty knot on your head.”