Matt (The Cowboys) (44 page)

Matt turned to see Ellen bending over him. He didn’t know how she’d gotten here. He released Hollender, who lay still, unconscious.

“Why did you come?”

“I couldn’t let you sacrifice yourself, not even for Hank. There are too many people who need you, who love you.”

Matt warned himself not to hope, not even to think, but he couldn’t stop himself. “Do you love me?” he asked.

“Yes, I love you. I’ll always love you.”

“I wasn’t going to kill him,” Matt said between ragged breaths. “I wanted to, but I wasn’t going to do it.”

Ellen wanted to believe him, but he’d come far too close for her comfort. “Where’s Hank?”

“In the barn.”

“Is he okay?”

“He said he was, but I didn’t check. I couldn’t let Hollender get away.”

It was dark inside the barn, but the sun shining in from the back door fell on Hank. He was lying in the dirt, his feet and hands tied. He lay so still, Ellen worried for a moment that he was dead.

“Did you get him?” Hank asked.

“Yes,” Matt said.

“The sheriff will be here soon to take him to jail,” Ellen said.

“I wanted you to kill him.”

“I know, Hank, but you can’t just kill a man. Not even when he deserves it.”

Matt knelt next to the boy and cut the pieces of cloth Hollender had used to tie him. Hank lay there, his body pulled up in the fetal position. Ellen moved around Matt to get a better look. Hank’s face, shoulders, and back were covered with bruises, several of them bloody. He looked as if he’d been beaten nearly senseless.

“Is anything broken?” Matt asked the boy.

“I don’t think so.”

“I’ve got to check. I’ll try not to hurt you.”

Ellen stared in disbelief. Even the boy’s legs were covered with bruises. It looked as though Hollender had systematically beaten every inch of his body. Matt handled Hank as gently as possible, but he moaned in pain several times. After a couple of minutes, Matt stood. “I’ll get some water to clean him up,” he said to Ellen. “I’ve got some salves in my saddlebag. We’ll have to stay here tonight. He’s in no shape to ride.”

“Did he … I mean, can you tell if…?”

“Yes.”

Ellen felt waves of revulsion roll through her like nausea. Not even Matt’s description had prepared her for this. She knelt down next to Hank, cupped his face in her hands. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I should never have agreed to let you come to the ranch.”

“It’s not your fault. He would have gotten me sooner or later.”

“It is my fault,” she said angrily. “My fault, the sheriff’s fault, the town’s fault. Everybody’s fault. Matt told them what that man was like, but nobody believed him. Let me help you up.”

“No.” His voice was urgent. “I don’t want to move. I’ll just lie here for a while.”

“But you’re lying in the dirt.”

“It doesn’t matter as long as I’m safe.”

Ellen cried tears of helpless fury, rage, guilt. Everything was so wrong, and she didn’t seem to be able to do anything to keep it from getting worse. “He won’t ever touch you again. I promise. Why did he beat you?” It seemed a stupid question to ask, but she couldn’t understand it.

“He always beat me,” Hank said. “This time it was worse.”

“But why?”

“He said it was better for him.”

She didn’t understand. She didn’t want to think she could understand. It was too horrible for words. “Do you mean he …” She couldn’t get the words past her tongue.

“He said it was better for him,” Hank repeated.

Something inside Ellen snapped. From her parents’ deaths to Eddie Lowell’s attack, Hollender represented everything that had ever happened to her and the people she loved. She got to her feet and strode from the barn. She passed Matt coming in but didn’t stop. She went straight to his horse and took his rifle from the scabbard. She cocked it to drop a bullet into the firing chamber and marched over to where Hollender was trying to sit up. She pointed the rifle at his head.

“I’m going to kill you,” she said in an unusually calm voice. “But I’m not going to make it easy by shooting you in the head.” She shifted her aim to his groin. “I’m going to make sure you never touch another boy, never ruin another life. Then I’m going to watch you bleed to death. If one bullet doesn’t do it, I’ll keep shooting you until you look like a sieve.”

“Ellen, give me the rifle.”

She moved out of Matt’s reach. “You saw what he did to that boy. He beat him because he liked it better. I wish I were strong enough. I’d beat him the same way.
Then
I’d kill him.”

“Give me the rifle.”

She continued to evade Matt while keeping the rifle pointed at Hollender.

“You can’t kill him for the same reasons I can’t. What would happen to Noah and Tess?”

Ellen felt like her brain was being pulled through a narrow tunnel.

“Give me the rifle, Ellen. Take this water and bathe Hank’s wounds.”

The sound of hoofbeats brought Ellen out of her mental paralysis. She looked down to see the rifle in her hands. Horrified at what she’d been about to do, she backed away from Hollender and threw the rifle down. It went off, discharging its bullet harmlessly in the distance. Hollender backed away from her.

“I was going to—”

“The sheriff is here,” Matt said. “He can take care of Hollender. You and I need to see to Hank.”

“Drop!”

The shout startled her, but not nearly so much as Matt’s grabbing her and throwing her to the ground. She heard two shots, figured she must have blacked out. Nothing made any sense.

“What happened?” she asked as she pushed herself into sitting position.

The sheriff had ridden up and dismounted. “Matt was so busy trying to keep you from killing Hollender, neither one of you saw him take a gun from his saddlebag. If Matt hadn’t thrown you to the ground so quickly, he’d have hit one of you before I could get a bullet into him.”

She looked at Hollender. He didn’t move. Matt walked over to where he lay, knelt, and turned the body over. “He’s dead.”

“I was afraid of that,” the sheriff said. “I had to get a shot off real quick. I didn’t have time to aim properly.”

Ellen could see the bullet hole. It was exactly between Hollender’s eyes.

“I would have killed him,” Ellen said. They were sitting around the fire they’d used to cook their supper. The sheriff had taken Hollender’s body back to Bandera. They had cleaned Hank’s wounds and bandaged them as best they could. He was asleep in Matt’s bedroll. “I don’t know what came over me. I couldn’t see anything except what he’d done to Hank. I had to make sure he would never do that to another boy.”

Matt put an arm around her and pulled her close. He poked around in the coals of the fire.

“That’s how you felt about Will, wasn’t it?”

He nodded.

“If I had killed him … would you have considered me a murderer?”

“No.”

“Why?”

He turned toward her. She could barely see his expression in the firelight, but his eyes glowed luminously. He knew what she was feeling because he’d been there. No theory, no
what ifs.
He’d done it and lived with it ever since.

“Because you couldn’t do anything else.”

It was that simple. He’d been willing to sacrifice himself for Will. Though no one had ever punished him for what he had done, he’d punished himself every day of his life. Why couldn’t she have seen this before? She had to tell him about herself. She owed him that much.

“I never told you, but when I was fourteen a man killed my parents in a fit of anger. I got a gun and went after him. I didn’t find him, so it came to nothing. Afterward I was so horrified by what I might have done, I wouldn’t let myself think about it. When you told me about your uncle, I couldn’t accept you without accepting myself first. I was too much of a coward, so I turned my back on both of us.

“But when I thought Hollander might kill you, I couldn’t avoid it any longer. I would have killed Anthony Howard if I’d found him. What I did tonight proves it.”

“I’m sorry. I wish I’d known.”

“I’m not telling you about my parents, I’m telling you about me.
I could have killed two men!”

“You wouldn’t have.”

“But I might if circumstances had been different.”

“I’d still love you.”

She wanted to shake him, force him to display some emotion. He was so damned calm and understanding, it was infuriating. She’d have been yelling at him, telling him men never understood, men never—But Matt wasn’t men. He was Matt, and there was only one of him. Fool that she was, when would she realize she loved him because he wasn’t like any other man?

“I love you,” she said.

He leaned over and kissed her lightly. “I know”

She gripped him by the shoulders. “I said I love you. I don’t want to move to San Antonio. I want to stay with you, be your wife, adopt all five children, and have that many of our own.”

Matt looked like he’d been turned to stone.

“Do you hear me? Do you understand?”

“I killed my uncle.”

“I know.”

“Doesn’t that make any difference anymore?”

“Yes, but not the way I thought it did. When I saw what Hollender did to Hank, I wanted to kill him. I would have done the same to protect Noah. If I can live with myself knowing that, how can I condemn you?”

Matt looked like he didn’t quite believe what she said. “You’re not afraid I’ll lose my temper if something like this happens again?”

“No. I probably should be depending on you to keep me away from a rifle.”

His gaze became intense. “You don’t think I’m too boring and quiet?”

“No. Well, maybe sometimes, but I’ve got some ideas about how to fix that.” She could see the excitement building in him.

“You won’t get upset if I want to adopt some other kid?”

“I expect we’ll adopt several. We still have six to go before we match Jake and Isabelle.”

“You really mean it?”

“I really mean it. I’m sorry I—”

Without warning Matt let out a war whoop that probably woke every living animal within a distance of five miles. He grabbed her, kissed her so hard she saw stars, then fell back and pulled her over on top of him.

“Something wrong?” Hank asked, his voice heavy with sleep.

“Everything is just fine,” Matt said. “Go back to sleep.”

“Matt, I—”

“You don’t have to explain or justify anything. All that’s past, for both of us.” He grasped her chin and kissed her, but his grin was so broad she couldn’t help smiling.

“I’ve never seen you like this,” she said.

“I’ve never felt like this. I’m a new man.”

“Not too new, I hope.” She kissed him lightly. “I sorta liked the old one.” She kissed him on the end of his nose. “He’s real cute.”

“You’re not too bad yourself.”

“All the women in Bandera are jealous.”

“The men hate me.”

“Looks like we have nobody but ourselves. What are we going to do about it?”

“As soon as we don’t have one of our boys sleeping right next to us, I’ll show you.”

“I don’t want to wait.”

“Neither do I, but we have the rest of our lives.”

She snuggled down next to him. “I like the sound of that. I like it
very
much.”

Epilogue

“You sure you don’t mind keeping them for a week?” Ellen asked Isabelle.

“There’s nothing she likes better than a house full of people she can boss around,” Jake said. “She hasn’t been completely happy since the boys grew up.”

“Don’t believe a word he says,” Isabelle retorted. “There was so much they needed to make them human, I could only hit the high points.”

“You think you can make Toby human?” Matt tousled the boy’s perfectly combed hair.

“I doubt it,” Isabelle said. “He’s pretty much ruined already.”

“That’s not what Tammy Jackson says,” Toby said. He took out a comb, walked over to the mirror, and restored his hair’s perfect order.

“The less you listen to Tammy Jackson, the easier life will be for the rest of us,” Matt said.

But things had changed drastically in the weeks since Hollender’s death. Wilbur Sears’s influence had sunk to such a low level, he’d left town in search of another congregation hungry for his hand to guide their collective conscience. He had not even tried to approach Ellen, much to her relief. The formal adoption of the children had made Toby much more acceptable to the parents of impressionable girls. He was no longer a nameless boy without expectations but a full-fledged member of the Maxwell clan. Practically overnight he became a charming boy with just enough devil in him to make him interesting.

To quote Tulip, the other kids were as happy as pigs in mud. Orin and Hank felt safe, and Tessa and Noah felt wanted. Suppertime was an exciting time in their house, with everybody talking at once and Matt calmly keeping the whole crew under control.