High-Riding Heroes (25 page)
“I was maid of honor at their wedding, you know. She was so beautiful and he so handsome. They had been seeing each other only a few months when they decided to get married. They were happy. Well, Nick was. Annie was a dreamer.
She wanted more out of life. This was okay for now, but she had delusions of grandeur about the future.
She eventually wanted out of Glory Town and Nick could never understand it. But I saw trouble brewing between Annie and Nick right off. Just after that Luke fella came aboard.”
Buck and Wes looked at each other, perplexed, and back to her. “Luke?”
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“Yeah. Luke, Luke…I can’t remember the rest of his name. Fancy roper. Fast-talking dude with pretty eyes and the way he looked from the back, broad shoulders and a cute butt. He took a liking to Annie and she flirted with him a time or two. Nick found out and was furious.”
Wes made a motion for her to hurry up with her story, his hand making circles in the air.
She took a deep breath and continued. “Annie’s interest was purely silly. She never took any man serious except her Nick. She worshiped him. Still, she wasn’t beyond looking at a fine man. Smiling at him. That’s when I found out how jealous Nick could be. That streak of envy was nasty. It’s the only thing about Nick that’s, that’s maybe a little on the dangerous side.”
“I need a drink,” Buck muttered and walked back to the door, still within earshot but able to look about his fine town. He tried to find some solace in the daily routine. Some sanity.
“Be quiet,” Wes demanded. “Hurry up, Sally.”
“He took Luke out behind the water tower and beat knots on his head. Beat him up bad. And Luke was no little fella either. Nick told him if he didn’t leave Glory Town he was coming after him to rearrange his
face.
Luke left. Most of them perty men are all saunter and no guts. Anyway, he confronted Annie with her flirting and teasing and she admitted it but said that it was only a game. He yelled at her, screamed, and threatened to punch her lights out. But he didn’t. He wouldn’t hit a woman. He was just that furious. She was backing away from his tirade when she fell over something. He didn’t hit her. She came to my trailer that night, blood spurting from where her tooth went through her lip.
After she cleaned up and wiped away the tears, she admitted to me that she had been wrong and Nick only right. She was his woman.”
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“God’s britches. This is the twentieth century.” Wes took his Stetson off and wiped sweat from his brow.
“Not to those two. This was their home. Their way of life. I think that’s why he clings to it so. Don’t think too bad of him. He never raised his voice to her again and she never looked at another man. They were happy and so in love.
And then…”
Wes ripped the chair out from under himself and threw it across the room and yelled. “And then what?”
“She got pregnant. She wasn’t supposed to. Doctor’s orders. Some female problem. But Nick wanted a family. A big one. Remember the night the ambulance came, Buck? She had started to bleed. Bleed bad. Nick had her in his arms and had come running over to my trailer, beside himself. Scared silly. He kept talking and crooning to this near unconscious woman. We got her to the hospital but it was too late. She died. And the damn doctor had the nerve to ask Nick why he let her go against his orders. Nick looked like he’d been dunked by a bronc. She had never told him. Of course, he felt responsible since he had pushed her into starting a family. It was his fault, he thought. He blamed himself. For weeks after we buried her, he simply sat and stared into space.
That’s when the headaches began. That’s when I saw part of him slip away and out of control at times. I worried, but over the years it never amounted to much.
Glory Town and the action here are what saved him from going stark raving mad. He used to talk to me about killing her. Sometimes the self-imposed guilt was too much for him. He’d snap. He’d go somewhere else in his mind…Glory Town. The
real
Glory Town. And then he’d cry and then he’d twitch out of it and not mention it for months. More and more, I saw him live here, in this pretend place, and think it was real. All of it.”
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Buck felt his old heart grow weak. He’d always kept himself apart from the others. He was a boss, and business and friends didn’t mix. Besides, a lot of people had passed through Glory Town and he hadn’t thought of that many of them again. If he developed a certain fondness for some along the way, he kept it to himself.
Wes felt perspiration roll down his spine. Unbalanced. Grieving. In need of a woman. In need of the feeling a woman left a man with. He sympathized with Nick’s problem, but that didn’t make him feel any more confident that he wouldn’t hurt her in some way if he remained out of control for too long.
“Where are they?”
“I don’t know this for sure, but he and Annie used to go up to that old line shack. You know, Buck, the one about twenty miles up in the high country. To be alone. To plan their life. To dream. If he has her, he took her up there.” She grabbed Wes’s shirt sleeve as he swept past her. “Go easy on him. He’s talked to me about Victoria. He worships her. Don’t push him into doing something stupid.”
Wes nodded. One look and Buck sided him. They ran to the truck and jumped inside.
Trying to head off disaster, Buck muttered, “Boy, I know what you’re thinkin’.”
“I don’t think you do,” Wes grumbled darkly.
“You go chargin’ in up there and there’s no tellin’ what he might do. When we get up there, let me go in first.”
Wes turned the key in the ignition and popped the clutch, tires spitting rooster tails of dust behind the truck.
Buck put his hand on his arm. “Promise me, boy.”
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“You want to stay here, Buck, I’ll turn around and drop you off. I promise you nothing.”
“Sally knows Nick better than any of us. She says he won’t hurt her.”
Wes swung the truck onto the macadam road. “Which way to the line shack, Buck?”
“West.” Buck didn’t like the tone of Wes’s voice or the reckless way he handled the truck.
A bull charging into that shack would only cause alarm and confusion. He could render Wes unconscious. He almost chuckled to himself. Those days were probably over. Wes was a strapping, powerful
young
man. He tried to settle back in the seat. It would all have to wait. He’d have to play it by ear.
Nick and Victoria. It was getting dark. Wes tried not to let his mind conjure up pictures he couldn’t stand. He couldn’t stop them.
“Come on inside, Vic. You need to get some rest.”
The chill had her bones aching but she was reluctant to go in that shack. Nick stood up and took her hand. Pulling her up off the step, he slipped his arms around her waist.
The breeze played with her hair, swirling it around her shoulders. He brushed at it and the gentle touch of his warm fingers, the intimacy, caused her to shiver.
“See, you’re cold. You’ll feel better in the morning and then we can talk. We can plan. We can dream about how nice our life is going to be. And how many babies we’ll have. I’ve seen you with Katie. You’re so good with kids. Me and Annie,” she saw the wince crease his forehead and then disappear, “we never had time to have little babies, but you and me…” His lips brushed her temple.
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Her pulse beat jumped, but not from passion, from fear. “And together we’ll run Glory Town.”
He was a strong man. She could feel it in the muscles that roped his forearms, in the solidness of his chest. His heart beat steadily beneath hers. She had to keep from screaming. She didn’t want to do anything to pluck this man’s strings. But the sound of her scream was loud in her head and trapped in her throat, strangling her.
They went inside the line shack. He moved to the corner to light a lantern and set it on the table. It showered the isolated dwelling in an eerie yellow light.
Victoria swallowed the bitter metallic taste of fear.
The dim light only served to set the mood of dreaminess.
He unbuckled his gun belt and threw it on the table. Loaded? She’d bet it didn’t contain the blanks used in the shows. Nick pulled his belt from his jeans and tossed it away. Pulling his shirt out of his pants, he unbuttoned it and dropped it to the floor. His bare chest only proved his strength. Scared he was going to shed all his clothes, Victoria hurriedly reached for her bag. She needed to change. “Wait outside while I change to my night clothes, Nick.”
He laughed then and shook his head. “Don’t be afraid of me, Vic. I’m not going to force you into anything. Besides, you’re still feeling bad. After we’re married we’ll…”His eyes traveled the length of her and back again. “After we’re married. Just for now, I’ll turn my back.”
She dropped on the bed. “I’m too tired to change.”
He walked to the table and, with his heated gaze on hers, turned the knob to douse the light.
He followed her to the bed and the creak of the old springs railed through her like nails on a chalkboard. He plumped the ratty pillows up against the
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shaky headboard and sat back against them. Pulling her to lie against him, he sighed contentedly.
He had his arm wrapped around her like a steel band. Her head rested on his chest. His heartbeat echoed in her head like the gong of a clock’s chimes, ticking away the minutes, reminding her of her isolation. She’d wait. She’d wait until he fell asleep and then she would be able to slip from his embrace and out of the shack, into the night. It didn’t matter what was out there or how far away they were from anything. She’d just run and run. She’d be free.
“Vic?”
His voice was soft and she almost felt sorry for him. “What?”
“Tell me this can work out.”
She became instantly alert. Was he coming out of the other world and drifting
back into reality?
She wasn’t sure where she wanted him.
“This isn’t the way…or the place to talk about this, Nick.” It was so dark.
Her eyes were open, yet she could only see the haziest of forms in the room. She couldn’t see Nick but she could feel him, hear his breathing. His hand moved slowly through her hair.
He pulled her closer to him. “I reckon it isn’t…but it doesn’t matter. We’re here. And here we’ll stay for a few days.”
Remaining quiet, Victoria now hoped that Wes didn’t find out where they were. Nick sounded resolved. Nick sounded dangerous. She closed her eyes and tried to relax. Nick’s hand rubbed, easily, gently up and down her arm. He began to hum some Western tune she couldn’t put a name to but recognized. He’d slipped into never-never land. How did he see things from there? Surely there was no rationale in the state this man was in.
Oh God. What’s going to happen next?
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Buck ordered, “Cut the engine here. We’ll walk up.” Wes had already shut down the motor, pocketed the keys, and begun the sprint up the hill toward the building.
They saw the outline of the shack in the moonlight. The night was still. No sign of life other than Nick’s truck parked beside it. No night birds sang their song. No animals rustled in the brush. Even the wind had lessened to a whisper.
Wes realized he was holding his breath and let it out in a fury.
“Calm down, boy. You’re going to screw this thing up,” Buck whispered, a hand on Wes’s arm, jerking him to the ground beside him in a clump of trees.
For the first time in his life, his analytical mind failed him and his gut emotions took over. “We’ll storm the place. You from the back and me from the front.”
Buck shook his head. “Just like the damn cavalry. You
have
been in Glory Town too long. If you weren’t in love with her, I’d sure be disappointed in you.
We don’t know if he’s armed or what. Let me sneak up the hill and see if I can get a look inside. If he spots me, it might not panic him like seeing you would. You stay here, hothead.”
“There’s no light on in there. How the hell are you going to see anything?”
“This old man’s got eyes like an owl. Stay put.” Buck felt Wes’s turmoil but he knew one of them had to keep a cool head.
Wes sat. If he didn’t, he’d be up there like a shot, pushing his way through the door, pounding Nick into the ground and grabbing Victoria and going home.
She’d never get out of his sight again. The fact that she had been cool and aloof after the fire only attested to how deeply all this had affected her. So much had happened to her in the last few days, she was beginning to buckle from the weight of it all.
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He watched as Buck’s shadow snaked its way, too slowly and too quietly, up the hill. Instinct moved to take over. His nerves crackled. This went against his nature.
Charging in was his way. But in this instance, maybe this time Buck might be right. And if his actions ended up hurting Victoria in any way…or if his lack of action…damn. He began his climb.
Nick was asleep. His breathing had evened out and his hold on her relaxed a little. She’d wait. Just a little longer until he was deeply asleep and then she’d make a run for it. She forced her eyes to remain open even though her body cried for sleep, her mind yearned for release. Did she dare make a slow dive with her fingers in his pocket for the truck keys? She moved her hand to the edge of his pocket. He stirred and nestled into the mattress a little more, banding her even tighter to him. No matter. She’d go without them.
Buck creeped along, not wanting to disturb any night creatures that might raise a fuss.
Knowing that the old porch on the shack would creak under his weight, he made his way around back in a wide circle. Closing in on the building, he targeted the window on the left.