The Bounty Hunter and the Heiress (17 page)

“If Eva did manage to capture the man she is chasing she might have headed for Satan's Bluff,” Blackowl said, breaking into Raven's troubled thoughts. “The freight trail that connects the mining camps to Canyon Springs and Mineral Wells is traveled more frequently. For certain, she didn't reverse direction. Otherwise we would have encountered her already.”

Raven nudged his paint pony past the hanging tree and set a swift pace. He glanced skyward, noting that another bank of threatening clouds had gathered northwest of the mountain peaks. This was not a good time for a rainy spell, not when Eva was who knew where, trying to apprehend Gordon single-handedly.

“Life was easier when Eva was underfoot,” he muttered. “At least I could keep up with what that little daredevil was doing. Now I don't know what has happened to her.”

“And that disturbs you greatly,” Blackowl commented. “Be careful, cousin, your weakness is showing and that is not a good sign.”

“It's only because I feel responsible for her,” Raven defended himself.

“If you say so,” Blackowl said, and smirked.

Raven glared at his cousin's wry grin and continued somberly. “The other possibility is that neither man, who was about to be hanged, was Gordon Carter. Perhaps
my
bushwhacker overtook Eva. He might be holding her captive. Maybe he intends to contact us so he can lure us in for the kill. In which case, Eva becomes an eyewitness who must be silenced permanently because she knows too much.”

The comment wiped the teasing smile from Blackowl's bronzed features. “I will personally kill any man who harms one hair on Eva's head.”

Raven arched a dark brow.

Blackowl grunted. “She is the only paleface I like besides Hoodoo.”

Raven hated to admit that he'd grown overly fond of Eva himself. Which probably explained why apprehension was tying his thoughts and his emotions into knots. He wanted to strangle Eva for riding off alone to encounter any number of unexpected catastrophes. But he didn't want another man to lay a hand on her. That was his exclusive right.

Once again, he chose not to delve too deeply into why he felt so protective and possessive of her. He was afraid he wouldn't like what he discovered about his ill-fated feelings for Eva. If he knew what was good for him, he would continue to consider that hellion a royal pain in the ass.

E
va ducked into a grove of trees when she heard the clip-clop of horses approaching from behind her. To her dismay, Frank and Irving rode into view.

“What are you two doing here?” she asked, exasperated, as she sidestepped down to the path.

“Can't go back to Purgatory Gulch, now can we?” Frank said. “Those spiteful miners are looking to hang us.”

“Besides, we figure we owe our lives to you so we're going to serve as your bodyguards until your husband catches up with you,” Irving added.

“I don't need bodyguards.” She had dismissed the two she had so she wouldn't have to fret about placing them in danger.

“Suit yourself, but we're still going to be your traveling companions, Eva—”

She flung up her hand to shush him. “The name is Evan Hall,” she informed them. She figured the shortened version of
Evan
geline
Hall
owell would suit her charade perfectly. “No sense having a woman's name when I'm disguised as a boy.”

“Makes sense,” Frank agreed, smiling conspiratorially. “Wouldn't want to accidentally reveal your identity by calling you by the wrong name.”

Irving nodded pensively. “A woman in these parts has to be particularly careful.”

“I intend to be.”

Eva nudged the bay into a trot. She was anxious to locate Gordon. If everything went according to plan, she could have him in shackles and tossed over the back of a horse like a feed sack by sunset. The prospect inspired her. For the first time in almost a week, she had positively identified Gordon. She suspected he was also her would-be assassin who had taken more shots at her than she cared to count.

Who else could it possibly have been? she asked herself. When Gordon realized she was following him, he must have tracked her all the way to Raven's cabin. Otherwise, he would have come up the wagon trail between Canyon Springs and Satan's Bluff since it was more familiar to travelers.

Once she had Gordon in custody she would demand all the details, she mused. By nightfall, she would reach Satan's Bluff and overtake Gordon.

She glanced over her shoulder at her companions. On second thought, she might need to enlist Irving and Frank's assistance at some point in the capture. But when she had Gordon bound up like a mummy he wouldn't be any trouble.

Anticipation spiked inside her once again. She could accomplish her mission and transport Gordon to Canyon Springs tomorrow. She could turn him over to the sheriff for safekeeping and have him stand trial somewhere besides Denver to curtail unwanted publicity. Then she could take the train home to inform Lydia that justice had been served.

Eva knew she would never see Raven again, unless it was a chance sighting from a distance, while he was in town turning over his prisoners to Marshal Doyle.

The thought caused waves of emptiness and longing to swamp her. For a woman who had sworn off men three years earlier, she had recently changed her tune. Well, she would have to change it back, she told herself resolutely. Mooning over Raven was a waste of emotion.

The sooner she accepted the fact that he didn't want or need her to make him happy the better off she would be. Still, she was going to miss him terribly. She'd miss ruffling Raven's feathers, miss their playful banter, the mental challenges and the incredible passion.

He was still her pick as a husband. Eva smiled ruefully, knowing that if Raven ever decided to take a wife she wouldn't even be on his list of prospective brides.

She glanced skyward, noting that another storm was building on the horizon. She had the uneasy feeling that she wouldn't be able to dodge this one. Hopefully, she would have Gordon bound and gagged by the time the storm descended on Satan's Bluff.

Determined of purpose, she quickened her pace to lead the way up the steep mountain trail.

 

Two hours later Eva watched the storm clouds form an ominous line from northeast to southwest. Above the lofty summits lightning flashed and thunder rumbled. If she planned to apprehend Gordon before the storm descended, she needed to locate him quickly.

She studied the wide, well-traveled road that angled down the slope toward Mineral Wells and Canyon Springs. To the right was the narrow trail that she presumed led uphill to Hell's Corner—the third raucous boomtown in the mining district.

Ducking her head to conceal her identity, Eva rode into the community that was home to hundreds of individual prospectors.

Satan's Bluff was a rough-and-tumble town that sat on an elevated cliff overlooking a craggy canyon. Two meandering streams divided the canyon. They were lined with tents and wooden lean-tos. Like its sister city, only one street ran through the middle of town. Log cabins, false-front buildings and oversize tents lined the street. Banjo music filled the air and it seemed that most of the miners had called it quits for the day, in anticipation of the storm. They had congregated to take their leisure in the saloons, gaming halls and cafés.

Eva glanced from one hitching post to the next in search of the brown horse Gordon had been riding when he hightailed it out of Purgatory Gulch. She spotted the horse in front of a tent that served as a gaming hall. She scanned the area, wondering if the soiled doves had also set up shop in this community. No doubt, Gordon would become an eager client after he drank his fill in one of the nameless saloons.

She panned the street again. Sure enough, three shanties—connected by a boardwalk and sporting red-globe lanterns—sat on the edge of town. The small red-light district was butted up against a steep, rock-strewn hill.

“Now what,
Evan?
” Frank asked, grinning conspiratorially. “If you don't mind, I think I'll wet my whistle and try my hand at monte. Will you be okay for a while?”

“I'll be fine,” she insisted, anxious to be rid of the gamblers.

This was her personal crusade, after all.

“The first order of business should be to trade or
lose
the horses you rode in on,” she reminded them. “Eventually someone from Purgatory Gulch will show up here and remember you're the ones who were sitting on those borrowed sorrel horses and were about to swing from ropes.”

Both men tugged nervously at the collars of their shirts. “Point taken,” they mumbled in unison.

“And it wouldn't hurt to dress like the locals,” she advised. “I'll be too busy to save your necks this evening.”

Frank stared somberly at her. “Be careful, you hear?”

“I will,” she assured them before she rode over to the dry goods store to purchase canned food for her supper.

Eva also purchased a chain and leather straps to serve as manacles for her prisoner. Once she captured Gordon, she would find an out-of-the-way place to stash him for the night. First thing in the morning, she would head down the mountain to Canyon Springs.

It was almost dark when Eva stationed herself outside the gaming hall where Gordon was entertaining himself—on the money he had extorted from Lydia, no doubt. She conjured up and discarded several ideas to entrap him. Shooting him out of his chair held the most appeal but she figured she would be swinging from whatever passed as the hangman's tree in Satan's Bluff by midnight.

When a haggard-looking man, whom she guessed to be in his late fifties, hobbled past she reached out to tap him on the shoulder. “Sir, I need a favor.”

The stoop-shouldered man with leathery features glanced over at her. He arched a curious brow as he leaned on his makeshift cane that was carved from a tree branch. Eva had noted earlier that most miners were younger than forty. No doubt, the grueling physical labor required to chisel gold from rock was a strain for older men. Most of them became freighters, café owners or shop managers.

“What is it, boy?” the man said in a wheezy voice.

Unlike the burly Irish saloonkeeper who had demanded payment for information, this man didn't thrust out his gnarled hand, palm up. Eva felt exceptionally generous so she shook his hand and passed him a large banknote.

His eyes widened in surprise. “You don't have to—”

“I want to,” she interrupted. “I need you to deliver a message to the man who is sitting at the corner table.” She craned her neck around the tent flap to single out Gordon. “Tell him that one of the ladies of the evening saw him ride into town and she wishes to make his acquaintance.”

The crusty old prospector looked at Gordon then squinted speculatively at her, causing deep grooves to wrinkle his forehead. “Are you sure you want me to do that? If you're out for some sort of revenge, which I expect you are, you might be wading into deep water.”

“I have two assistants.” Sort of, she amended silently.

If things went sour, she could prevail on Frank and Irving to assist her. However, nothing would please her more than to apprehend Gordon by herself—and she would never let him hear the end of it.

“All right then,” the miner said finally, and nodded his shaggy head. “I'll direct the gent to the shanties on the edge of town.”

When the prospector hobbled off, Eva tugged on the bay's reins and led him toward the poorly constructed shanties. With her pistol tucked in the waistband of the doeskin breeches, she flattened herself against the outer wall and lingered in the shadows to await Gordon's arrival.

Two minutes later she saw Gordon exit the gaming hall and stare at the three red-globe lanterns that hung outside the shanties. He rubbed his hand absently over his chest and belly then slicked back his hair. Eva grinned wickedly, certain the voodoo magic was at work, thanks to Hoodoo's curse.

As Gordon approached, she tried to recall every word of instruction and precaution Blackowl had tried to pound in her head during her crash-course training. She waited, her senses on high alert, her heart thumping in her chest, her hand folded around the butt of her pistol.

The reckoning,
she mused as she watched Gordon's swaggering approach. This bastard was long overdue.

 

Raven rode hell-for-leather, pausing only to let his horse catch its breath when absolutely necessary. The paint pony's stamina didn't match Buck's and the thought made Raven lament losing such a good horse.

The sense of urgency driving him to reach Satan's Bluff was born of his concern and the uncertainty about whom Eva had confronted at the would-be hanging. Her good deed might have backfired in her face, especially if the men realized she was posing as a boy. Either that or Eva had located Gordon and who knew what kind of trouble she faced.

To make matters worse, the line of storms building in the northwest looked ominous. Lightning flickered in the distance. The unsettled weather was as disruptive as the unsettling emotions Eva had touched off inside him since she exploded into his life with the force of a cannonball.

Raven breathed a gusty sigh of relief when he spotted the glowing lanterns on the bluff. This place was aptly named, he mused as he pulled back on the reins, allowing the winded skewbald pony to slow to a walk. The golden lantern light reminded him of coals burning against the backdrop of mammoth slabs of rock that jutted helter-skelter from the mountains. He likened it to the flaming embers in the white man's image of hell. Black clouds billowed up like angry fists and lightning bolts struck down the tormented souls congregated on the devil's playground.

“Getting a mite philosophical, aren't you?” Raven scoffed at himself.

“Come again?” Blackowl stared quizzically at him as he eased his horse up beside him.

Raven angled his head toward the mining camp perched on the windswept bluff. “If there is a devil, I swear he's in attendance here tonight.”

Blackowl nodded. “Evil spirits seem to be swirling about. Makes me twitchy. I have a bad feeling about tonight.”

“So do I.” Raven urged his pony into a trot. “I want Eva under wing before hell breaks loose.”

 

Eva waited nervously as Gordon strutted up to the door of one of the brothels and raised his hand to knock. She pounced from the shadows and rammed the barrel of the pistol into the back of his neck.

“Don't move,” she growled menacingly as she dug the pistol barrel a little deeper into his flesh. “Hands up where I can see them, Gordon.”

He slowly raised his arms, as she demanded. “Eva? Is that you?”

“None other. Too bad your aim was off the mark when you tried to bushwhack me repeatedly. But at this close range, I doubt I'll miss. One careless move, Gordon, and you'll be lying in a pool of your own blood.”

When he tried to shift sideways, she kicked him in the back of the knees as Blackowl taught her. Gordon grunted uncomfortably then stiffened when she shifted the pistol barrel to the base of his skull.

“Lydia sends her warmest regards, of course.” Eva took grand satisfaction in taunting the devious bastard. “She also knows you lied to her when you tried to turn her against me.”

“I was just annoyed at you because you rejected my affectionate attention,” Gordon had the nerve to say. “You were the one who interested me. Lydia was my second choice.”