Keegan's Lady (62 page)

Patrick riveted his gaze on Beiler, who stood on the boardwalk illuminated by torchlight. "This morning, bright and early, I went out to feed my hogs. As I bent over the trough, I saw a man up on the hill. I thought he'd come to talk to me. Only he shot me, instead." Patrick bared his clenched teeth as he struggled to raise his arm and point. "That man was Estyn Beiler!"

Everyone started to talk at once. Beiler shook his fist. "He's lying! That's a bare-faced lie, I tell you!"

"Not a lie. I saw you, Beiler." To the crowd, Patrick said, "Caitlin and I both guessed wrong. It wasn't Beckett who filched the five hundred dollars. It was Beiler. You all know he likes to drink and gamble, and that he usually loses. How could he afford those gambling losses in the early years before he had investments to bring in extra income? He got paid a pittance as our marshal, and we all know it." Patrick hauled in another breath. "I'll tell you how he afforded it! By cheating his friends. Camlin must have discovered the truth, and Beiler shot him to shut him up. Just like he shot me."

"You little bastard," Beiler shrieked with rage. "I should've made the first bullet count!"

Then, before anyone could anticipate what he meant to do, Beiler drew his revolver and took a wild shot. Patrick went down like a felled tree, Doc Halloway crumpling on top of him. Women in the crowd screamed. Men cursed. In retaliation, one of the men in the crowd drew his gun and fired back at Beiler. "You murderous son of a bitch! We elected you marshal. We trusted you!"

An incredulous expression passed over Beiler's round face. The next second, Beiler clutched his stomach and crashed to his knees.

Horrified by all that was happening, Caitlin was only dimly aware of a horse whinnying. Then the sound finally registered. She whirled toward Ace. The two men who'd been standing near the tree were trying to control the gelding, but the gunfire had spooked it. As one of the men leaped up to grab for the bridle, the horse flung its head, evading the man's grasp. And then before anyone could stop it, the animal bolted straight into the crowd, trampling everyone who got in its way.

Screams. People running. In the confusion, no one seemed aware of the man who dangled at the end of a lynching rope.

Caitlin had eyes only for him. Ace, swinging in the torchlight, his long, powerfully muscled legs jerking in a macabre dance of death. "No!" she screamed. "Oh, my God, no!"

In a nightmare of slowness, she dodged the horse and shoved people aside, desperate to reach her husband, knowing with every breath, every heartbeat, every step she took that she would be too late. He was strangling. Strangling before her very eyes.

It seemed to her time had stopped, that she ran toward him through a great void of nothingness with only the labored whine of her own breathing to break the awful silence. In those seconds, scenes from the last month flashed before her eyes. Ace, smiling down at her. Ace, walking into the house, dressed in all new clothing, just so her cat's hair would no longer show on him. Ace, throwing back his dark head to bark with laughter. Ace, making gentle love to her. He'd given her so much. And now his life was being snuffed out.

It was like looking at him through plate glass. Ace on the other side, beyond her reach. Needing her help. She would never reach him in time.

"No!"

Caitlin finally reached the tree. In a frantic attempt to save her husband, she hugged his legs and pushed upward, trying in the only way she knew to take the tension off the rope. Too late. Too late. His body already felt limp.

"Help me. Dear God, help me!"

Her screams finally drew attention away from the marauding horse back to her husband. Men rushed forward. Stronger arms than hers grabbed Ace's heavy body. Someone leaped up to cut the rope. Caitlin fell back, sobbing wildly, as her husband was gently lowered to the ground.

"Jesus H. Christ!" Banks cried. "Petrie, why didn't you have a better hold on the goddamned horse! We hung him. We hung the poor fellow."

Wailing with grief, Caitlin sank to her knees and gathered her husband into her arms. He couldn't die. He couldn't leave her. Not after making her love him as he had. He couldn't. He just couldn't.

Cradling his dark head on her lap, she caught his face between her hands. Her tears spilled onto his burnished skin, glistening like diamonds in the torchlight. "Ace! Oh, please, God. Take me. Not him! Please, not him!"

In a desperate attempt to bring him back, Caitlin pressed her mouth over his lax lips and heaved with all her might, trying to force breath into lungs that no longer had life. He'd made her a gift of his love. And now it was being torn away. She couldn't bear it. Couldn't live without him. If he was going to leave her, she wanted to go with him. It was as simple and as horrible as that.

"Caitlin. Miss Caitlin?" Gentle hands grasped her by the shoulders, trying to pull her away from her husband. "It's too late, honey. You have to let him go."

She wrenched away, fierce in her need, determined not to give up. Resettling her lips over Ace's, she forced her breath into him again. And again. Until her head spun. Until she felt weak. And still, he just lay there, completely lifeless.

Gone. The word slipped into her mind, cutting at her brain like an ice shard. He was gone, and death gave no second chances. Let him go, someone had said. Only she couldn't.

Finally giving up, Caitlin threw back her head and screamed. Screamed until it felt as if the sound were ripping her throat out. "Ace! Ace! Don't leave me! Please, God. Plea—ease, don't ta—ake him. Please!"

Someone grabbed her forcefully by the shoulders. Caitlin felt Ace's body being dragged from her arms. He was gone. Just like that. Gone.

Ace felt as if he were drowning in darkness. Far away from him, he saw a needle point of light. He wanted to move toward it. But he was tired, so awfully tired. A part of him wanted to surrender to the blackness. To rest and be at peace.

Only something tugged him back. He wasn't sure what. Then he heard it. Caitlin's voice. She sounded miles away. Her cries echoed and bounced off the darkness. "Ace! Ace! Don't leave me. Please, please! Don't leave me!"

Ace didn't want to leave her, but sometimes a man had no choice, and the darkness seemed to be pulling him deeper, its hold on him growing stronger. And yet he couldn't disregard Caitlin's voice.

He focused on the pinpoint of light, and in that tiny halo of gold, he saw Caitlin. She was weeping. Struggling to escape the arms of some man. Ace tried to move toward her. He'd sworn never to allow anyone to hurt her again. And now some man had his filthy hands on her.

Before Ace realized what he was doing, he was trying to reach her. Fighting against the drowning sensation, trying to pull himself through it toward her. Caitlin. God, how he loved her. There was nothing that had a stronger pull on him than that. Nothing.

"Don't leave me!" he heard her screaming. He tried to tell her he wasn't. That he was coming. Only the blackness seemed to have no end. No matter how he tried, he couldn't escape it. He went down into it. Down, down. And then, nothing. . . just an airless blackness that wouldn't turn loose of him.

"Holy shit, he's coming around!"

"The hell he is!"

"I saw him move, goddammit!"

The voices exploded inside Ace's brain. Simultaneously, an awful pain swelled in his chest. He gagged. Grabbed frantically for breath. Something was choking him. He wrapped both hands around his larynx and rolled onto his side, coughing, wheezing, trying desperately to get oxygen.

"Ace! Oh, Ace!"

Just as he dragged breath into his lungs, Ace felt Caitlin's arms come around him, felt her tears on his face. Air. . . and Caitlin. He couldn't live without either. It seemed right, somehow, to take that first breath and feel her body press so sweetly around him at the same time.

Ace blinked, tried to see her face. As she swam into focus, he managed to lift an arm, put it around her shaking shoulders. Caitlin. She was weeping. He wanted to comfort her, but right then, the need to breathe was far more consuming.

Slowly, inch by inch, reality came back to him. The faces of the mob. The rope that swung from the tree limb above him. Caitlin, crying as if her heart might break.

Ace blinked again, then tightened his arm around her shoulders, remembering the man who had so roughly held her. She was his. His. No other man was going to touch her. Not as long as he had anything to say about it.

"I'm all right," he managed to rasp. "All right, sweetheart. Don't cry. Please, don't cry."

Kisses. . . Sweet kisses, all over his face. The taste of her, like sun-warmed honey, seemed to linger at the back of his tongue. He smiled and drew her closer. "It's all right, Caitlin. Shhh. Don't."

She hugged him fiercely and continued to weep. Staring up at the empty noose that swung above them, Ace realized he'd been hanged. He remembered the horse bolting, then the awful pain. No wonder his throat hurt like hell. Jesus. He'd almost died. Would have died. Only Caitlin had called him back.

Gunshots. Someone had fired a gun, and the horse had spooked.

Patrick.

Ace stiffened, tried to sit up. Beiler had shot at Patrick. He'd fallen. Oh, God. Caitlin had suffered enough grief in her short life without losing her brother.

Commandeering all his strength, Ace pushed her away and managed to sit up. The world became a swimming blur of faces and bobbing torchlight. He blinked, swung onto his knees, hauled in a deep breath. Patrick. As everything came back into focus, Ace mustered all his willpower to stand. Staggering sideways, he swung his head, searching for his brother-in-law in the swarm of people. Caitlin jumped up to grab his waist.

"Ace, don't. You should lie still."

"Patrick," he told her hoarsely.

He felt her body snap taut and knew she'd forgotten all about her brother until he'd said his name. "Oh, dear God. Paddy!"

Ace half expected her to bolt into the crowd to find her brother. He would have understood if she had. Instead, she quickened her pace, tightening her hold at his waist and helping him to walk with her. The group of people that had gathered around Patrick and the doctor parted at their approach. Realizing that Caitlin meant to keep an arm around him, Ace pried her loose and gave her a little shove.

"Go on," he said softly.

It was all the encouragement she needed. With a low cry, she sank to her knees beside her brother. Patrick lay in Doc Halloway's arms, his expression like that of a cat who'd just swallowed a canary. Despite his chalky pallor, he met Ace's gaze and winked. "I'm okay, Caitlin," Patrick said shakily. "After the way I've acted, dying would be too easy on me. Beiler missed."

"Missed?" she repeated shrilly, then gave an hysterical laugh. "He missed? Oh, thank God!"

She ran her hands lightly over her brother's shoulders, then touched his bloodstained bandage. "You're bleeding, Paddy. Badly."

He flashed a weak smile. "I'll make it, Caitlin. Ask Doc. He'll tell you."

Caitlin glanced up at the elderly physician. "The blood, Doc. We have to get him back to the surgery."

Doc glanced around at the men who stood nearby. "I'll need help carrying him."

Ace yearned to step forward, but he barely had the strength to stand himself. Four other men volunteered. Caitlin fell back to get out of their way. When she stood, Ace slipped an arm around her waist. He could feel her trembling, and he knew how frightened she was.

As the men jostled for position to lift Patrick between them, the younger man searched out Ace's gaze again. "I don't suppose saying I'm sorry will count for much after what I did, but consider it said, Keegan."

Ace couldn't help but grin. There was still a trace of underlying animosity in Patrick's voice. "No apologies necessary," Ace replied in a voice so hoarse from the hanging noose it was little more than a gruff whisper. "Let's just consider it a disagreement between brothers and forget about it."

As the men carried Patrick away, Ace heard his brother-in-law muttering something under his breath about his not being related to any damned Keegan. He shook his head and glanced down at his wife.

"He's going to be all right, sweetheart."

She turned huge, luminous eyes on him. That look was all Ace needed to restore his strength. She needed him. More now, possibly, than she ever had.

"Trust me," he whispered. "He's going to make it."

With a stifled sob, she wrapped both arms around him and buried her face against his chest. Ace drew her close. He held her for a very long while, trying to regather his own strength while he bolstered hers. When she finally stopped crying, he whispered, "Come on. Let's wait inside the doctor's office. As soon as Doc's finished patching your brother back up, I'm sure he'll want to let us know how he's doing."

"What about this brother?"

Ace turned to see Joseph standing there, his leather riding hat drawn low over his head, blond hair drifting in the night breeze around his shoulders.

"Hey, Joseph. How'd you get out?"

"Some kind soul happened to remember we were locked up and fished the key out of Beiler's pocket." Joseph flashed a look at Caitlin, who still clung to Ace, her face hidden against his shirt. "He's dead, you know."

"I figured," Ace said hoarsely.