The Outrider (Redbourne Series #5 - Will's Story) (6 page)

Grace leaned close. “Don’t worry,” she whispered,
“these Redbourne men won’t let anything happen to you.” She wrapped an arm
around Elizabeth’s shoulders and squeezed. “And, I thought you might want to
know that Will is still out of town, so you don’t have to worry about running
into him. It’s just supper at the ranch. With his family,” she added with a
grin.

“
Just
supper. At Redbourne Ranch.”
Elizabeth snorted. Her eyes shot open and her hand flew to cover her mouth and
nose. Heat filled her cheeks as she lowered her hand. “With the Redbournes.”
She inhaled, then exhaled slowly. “Did you know…”

Bite your tongue, Elizabeth Archer.

Grace giggled. “I’m excited for you to meet Leah,
their mother. You’ll love her. Everyone does. And she loves smart, educated
women. You’ll fit in just fine.”

Elizabeth tried to smile, but the flutters in her
stomach would not be calmed, and a twinge of disappointment crept in that the
prize fighter would not be joining them. Entertaining thoughts of Will
Redbourne was dangerous. She couldn’t blame him for what had happened, but he
might blame her. She’d wanted to leave her life behind, to start over in a
place where no one had ever heard of Sterling Archer or his family, but she’d
obviously not gone far enough.

“When will he be back?” she asked Grace, trying
to mask the interest in her voice. She needed to leave before he returned. To
get as far away from him as she could.

“Ethan said he would be back by the end of the
week.”

“Friday or Saturday?”

Grace shrugged and raised her hands lightly,
palms up. “Friday?”

“Friday,” Elizabeth confirmed with a nod.

That gives me about five days.

Surely she would be able to find a way out of
town by then. A little voice crept inside of her head as she looked over at her
new friend and suddenly she wasn’t at all sure she wanted to leave…Will Redbourne
or not. Grace was the first person she’d met since coming to this little town
to whom she felt a kinship and she dreaded the sense of loss that would come when
she left. At least for the short while she would be staying in Stone Creek she
hoped they could be friends.

Leaving home had come at a cost. Friends, family,
everything familiar and comfortable were all a continent away. But the price of
staying would have been greater. It had been a long time since Elizabeth had
been able to talk to anyone and it felt good to have someone in her life she
felt she could trust. Almost.

As they crested a large hill, Elizabeth looked
down at what could only be the heart of Redbourne Ranch. Several outbuildings
surrounded by trees, corrals, and open fields dotted the landscape around the
largest home she had seen since coming to America.

“Suddenly, I am not feeling so well. Maybe we
should go back and I will lie down for a bit.”

Grace laughed. “You are going to love them,” she
said with a smile. “And they are going to love you. The Redbournes appreciate a
woman with smarts.”

That is exactly what I am afraid of.

Just
Outside Colorado City

“I think there are three of them,” Sven whispered
from his place behind the large tree trunk.

Will closed his eyes and took a deep breath, his
gun drawn, and his wealthy charge huddled up behind him. They had been ambushed
just outside of Colorado City. Several masked gunmen had fired on the stage and
they’d had to pull up behind a crag jutting out from the side of the road for
protection.

The driver now lay on the ground just a few yards
in front of them, blood oozing from a shot to the shoulder. Will quickly
assessed his surroundings. There were not a lot of places to take cover and
bile burned his throat at the idea of taking a man’s life. He’d come all too
close to that once already and he hadn’t needed a gun to do it.

“Stay put!” he warned his friend.

Otis, the stagecoach driver, groaned, tossing his
head from side to side.

Will could not leave him exposed. As one of the
riders came into view, Will stuck his head out from behind the stage long enough
to get off a warning shot.

“We’re going to die out here in the middle of
nowhere, aren’t we?” whined the sniveling man he’d been charged to protect.

Will glanced over at Mr. Warding as his tall,
gangly assistant pulled a perfectly folded white handkerchief from his pocket
and handed it to his employer, who dabbed at the little beads of sweat forming
on his brow.

“Thank you, Kells,” Mr. Warding spoke under his
breath.

Will shook his head. “Not if I have anything to
say about it,” he returned gruffly, marveling at how differently this man
handled his wealth than his father. Jameson Redbourne would no more allow a man
to follow him around to attend to his every need than he would wear a woman’s
dress to church on Sunday.

Another shot sped by and Will backed up tighter
against the wheel of the stage. His mind raced. He knew what needed to be done,
but he prayed there would be another way to keep those under his protection
alive and unharmed. He looked over at Sven who nodded his willingness to do
what was necessary.

“Stay!” he commanded his charges.

“And just where do you think I’m going to go with
ruffians like that out there?”

Will narrowed his eyes at the annoying man, his
lip curling slightly into a snarl.

“I’m staying,” the man affirmed, his hands up and
patting the air in front of him.

“You?” Will asked the man behind Mr. Warding.

He dipped his head affirmatively.

He stared at them both another moment. Satisfied,
Will turned to look at Sven with a nod. He waited only long enough for his
friend to return the gesture before darting out from behind the stagecoach. He
fired off a couple of shots amidst those Sven sent to the other side of the
ravine, as he traversed out into the open, wrapped his hands beneath the
driver’s shoulders, and dragged him back behind the protected ridge.

A shot whizzed just above his left ear, grazing
the tender flesh there, but he did not stop moving. To his amazement and
relief, the team of horses strapped to the stage, while anxiously prancing
about and pawing at the dirt, had not bolted. Luckily, the back half of the
oversized wagon was tucked up behind a rocky ledge, providing extra protection
against the attack.

“We’ve got to stop the bleeding,” he told Mr.
Warding as he laid Otis down at his feet. “Where is your man?” he asked as he
glanced around, but the attendant, Mr. Kells was nowhere to be seen.

Mr. Warding looked behind him as if he hadn’t
noticed the man was gone.

Idiot!

How was he supposed to protect a man who was
senseless enough to run off in the middle of a robbery? Or a gunfight?

“He’s…um,” he shook his head in frustration. “I
don’t know. Maybe he’s gone for help. Yes, that’s it. He went to get help.” He
wiped his head again with the little white hankie as he leaned against the
spokes of the wheel and heaved out a sigh.

“Listen to me, Warding. This man is going to die
if we don’t help him. Do you really want that on your conscience?”

The man’s eyes grew wide. “What am
I
supposed to do? I’m not a doctor.”

Will’s patience with the wealthy land baron had
all but run its course. “Your jacket.”

Mr. Warding opened his mouth as if to protest,
but quickly shut it again, pulling off his sleek overcoat and handing it to
Will who had already pulled a knife from the side of his boot.

As he stabbed into the thick material, Mr.
Warding whimpered and bit his lip.

“Do you have any idea how expensive that coat
was?”

Will shot a look at the man that shut him up. He tore
a few strips of material away from the jacket and pressed one of them up against
Otis’s shoulder. The driver groaned softly, color quickly draining from his
face.

“Press here,” he directed Mr. Warding, who scrambled
to do as he’d been directed. He knelt down next to the injured man and held the
cloth in place.

CRACK!

Several shots rang through the air. Will glanced
over at Sven, who lifted his shoulders in a shrug and glanced out from behind
the tree he was using as cover. He shook his head.

Silence passed for an uncomfortable amount of
time.

“Anybody hurt over there?” a familiar voice
called out.

It can’t be.

Will’s brows scrunched together.

Rafe?

Will pulled himself up off the ground and moved
cautiously to the edge of the stagecoach to peer out from behind the
splintering red-painted wood. There, walking toward him was his older brother,
Rafe, pushing along two men whose hands had been tied behind their backs.

Will stood up straight and stepped out into the
open, a grin spreading wildly across his face. Rafe had always had good timing.

“Rafe?” Will called out to him.

“Hey, Oxford, is that you?”

The brothers exchanged a quick hug, and Rafe
slapped Will on his shoulder, a wide smile on his face. It had been ages since
the siblings had seen each other.

“I’m sure glad to see you,” Will said, his smile
fading. “Otis has been shot.”

The stagecoach driver was a personal family
friend of the Redbournes. He’d taken many meals at their family table, often recounting
his many adventurous tales of life on the road. Will couldn’t bear the thought
of losing him this way.

“How bad is it?”

“It’s bad,” Will responded.

“Where is he?” Rafe asked, a sudden urgency
lacing his voice.

The two men in his custody stumbled as he roughly
urged them forward. Suddenly, his arm shot into the air, his revolver cocked
and aimed perfectly at Sven’s head.

“Ought not try to sneak up on a man,” Rafe said
without even looking to see who was there. “A man could get himself shot like
that.”

A branch cracked beneath Sven’s feet as he
stepped out from behind his tree. “Don’t shoot. I’m a friend. A friend,” he
said, his hands raised.

“He’s my riding partner,” Will assured when Rafe
glanced at him for confirmation as he stepped between his brother and his
prisoners.

“That was incredible,” Sven cooed as he
approached. “How did you know I was even here?”

“I could smell that cologne you wear from across
the ravine,” Rafe said with a chuckle as he returned his gun to his hip.

Will laughed too, then, his eyes narrowed as he
thought about the attack. Rafe had two men in custody, but there had been at
least three. “Where’s the third man?”

As if on cue, a rider on horseback came around
the angled rocks and charged directly at them, gun drawn, and bullets flying.
Will sidestepped the assault, retrieving his pistol, and bracing himself on one
knee, his gun aimed at the bandit.

Rafe slid one of his pearl handled, red colt
revolvers from its holster and just as the man dared take aim, he fired. The
would-be thief tumbled backward off his horse, landing with a thud in the rocky
dirt road.

“I’m going to kill you, Redbourne,” one of the
captured men spat, lunging forward at Rafe, his hands still behind his back.

Will stuck out his foot and the man fell forward
onto his face in front of them.

Rafe knelt down with one knee in the center of
the man’s back. “Wasn’t such a smart move, now was it, Gruber?”

The man squirmed beneath Rafe’s significant
weight, his feet flailing behind him.

“Where’s McElvoy?”

“Get off me, Redbourne, or you won’t live long
enough to regret it.”

Rafe laughed derisively. “You say that like it’s
the first time I’ve heard a threat.” He looked over at Will. “Hey, little brother,
will you get me that rope?” He pointed to the fallen man’s horse that had
rounded back.

“How many more do you think there are?” Will
asked as he slipped the braided cord from the strap at the side of the mount’s saddle.

“The bounty note had four listed,” Rafe said,
returning his gun to its holster and taking the binding from Will. He tied up
the man’s feet. “I imagine that McElvoy isn’t too far away.” He looked over at
Sven, then nodded at the bearded prisoner still standing across from them.
“Make sure he doesn’t move. I’ve got to check on Otis.” He stood up and strode
to where Will had tucked the stagecoach driver behind the ridge.

Mr. Warding was gone.

Coward
. Nothing surprised him anymore.

Movement at the top of the cliff caught Will’s
eye.

“Rafe, look out!” he shouted.

It was too late. Mr. Kells had already jumped at
Rafe from the top of the ridge, a knife in one hand. He toppled on top of his
brother, lashing out with a cheap punch to his jaw. Luckily, Rafe had been able
to deflect the man’s stabbing arm and rid him of the weapon.

How had Will not seen it? He’d been travelling
with the man for days, but had been too annoyed with the man under his
protection to suspect anything sinister about the attendant. The more he
thought about it, the more he realized that there had been way too many
coincidences and mishaps on this run to ignore. Something was off and just
didn’t sit well with him, but there wasn’t time to figure it out right now.

Will considered jumping into the fight, but he
knew all too well that Rafe could handle himself—especially hand to hand. He
shook his head. Either this Mr. Kells had no idea who he’d just attacked, or he
had a death wish. Will considered himself a pretty good fighter, but admittedly,
Rafe was better—at least outside of the ring.

“Will!” Sven yelled.

Will looked back to see his friend lying on the
ground, holding his head, and the prisoner who’d been restrained just moments
ago coming at him with a large branch in his hand. He waited until the bearded brute
was within a few feet before he shifted his weight, leaning to one side,
allowing the man’s momentum to take him beyond his intended mark.

“You all right, Sven?” Will asked without looking
behind him.

“Yeah.”

“How did he get loose?” As far as Will knew, Rafe
had never tied a knot that a man could shake without help.

Kells.

“Don’t…know.”

By the time the charging man had turned back for
him, he was prepared.

One, jab. Two, hook. Three, cross. Down for the
count.

That was easy.

Rafe still tussled on the ground with his attacker.

Otis lay in a lifeless heap, no longer tossing
his head about. Will rushed to his side. The man’s breathing was shallow,
almost non-existent. He pressed down against the wound with the torn cloth,
trying to slow the bleeding.

Damn that Mr. Warding. Where is he?

“Rafe, what’s taking you so long? Otis needs you.
Now!”

It wasn’t like his brother to prolong a fight.

“Just…give me…one…more…minute,” Rafe grunted the
words as his fists connected with their target. The two fighting men had worked
their way down a little slope to the bottom of a small gulley.