The Ruination of Essie Sparks (Wild Western Rogues Series, Book 2) (30 page)

Chen Lee hadn't locked his door, having chained him in place, but that was his mistake. He'd been here long enough to realize that the old man's belly had only one soft spot. A small window of time, every night, when most of the girls were working and he'd chained Little Wolf in his room, Chen Lee took the pipe himself. Not a lot and not enough to put him to sleep like it did his clients. But for a few minutes, his hawk-like eyes relaxed and he felt safe.

Little Wolf opened the door, peeked down the hall, then slipped out to find her.

* * *

A banging on the jailhouse door woke Cade from a fitful sleep. He jerked awake and instantly regretted it as pain knifed through him. It took him only moments to remember where he was and why. He lowered his head back down to the thin pillow. The heavy pulse in his ears made his head ache again.

From somewhere nearby, he heard the creak of a jail cell door opening and the sheriff stumbling around, muttering in the dark. Earlier, the sheriff had kicked the drunk out who'd previously occupied that cell and had bunked down for the night here. Cade supposed the sheriff had reason to be cautious. He had a real "murderer" in his jail cell and sentiments in town were, no doubt, running hot against him. He guessed he should be grateful for the protection, but it didn't really matter now. They would have their pound of flesh one way or the other soon enough.

The banging started up again and, with his Colt drawn, the sheriff looked through the window at the person doing the banging. "I'll be," he muttered. He lit a lamp and unlocked the door.

Rolling a look in that direction, Cade's curiosity was piqued.

"Sheriff Sampson? My name is Essie Sparks and as you can see, I'm very much alive."

Cade's heart sank.
Oh, Essie... no.

The tall man ran a hand down his face and stepped back from the door. "Ma'am? If you are, indeed, who you say you are, it's good to see you lookin' so... healthy. Come on inside. Ollie? Pink? I suppose you knew about this earlier?"

Ollie made no reply, she just glanced in Cade's direction with apology. Apparently, she'd no sooner left him than she broke her promise not to tell Essie about him. A girl he hardly recognized walked in after Ollie. No longer the ragged girl who'd survived four days in the mountains with him, Essie was so pretty it almost made his heart stop.

"I assume," Sampson continued, "I can get folks to vouch that you are who you say you are."

"Anyone at the school knows me." She lifted her gaze to Cade.

Her first good glimpse of him, as he rolled slowly to a sit, made her bite her lip and turn away. He could only imagine how he must look after getting worked over by Laddner.

She swallowed thickly before turning back to the sheriff. "There's been a misunderstanding."

"Well," Sampson said, "I can see you're breathin', which is a clear improvement over the supposition we all had. Bein' taken by a renegade—"

"It
was
a renegade, a Crow, I think, but it wasn't this man. I've never seen this man before in my life."

Sampson wasn't fooled. "Is that so?"

He glanced back at Cade, who watched, feeling the weight of the lie on his shoulders.

"Yes. It is." She lifted her chin, her gaze straight and steady at the sheriff.

"You surprise me, Mrs. Sparks, you bein' a respectable widow woman and all. Teacher of children. I'm afraid that dog won't hunt."

His accusation seemed to throw her. "What do you mean? It's true."

"He's been identified by that scar on his cheek and by that Appaloosa that is well-known to be his. And not just by Mitchell Laddner, but by the Reverend Dooley himself." He lifted a wanted poster from his desk and handed it to her. It was a picture of Cade, right down to his silver-gray eyes.

"So now what do you have to say?" Sampson asked.

"Say nothing, Essie," Cade told her.

Eyes downcast, she looked young. Impossibly young, standing there trying to lie for him. And pretty. So pretty. Ollie had cleaned her up and put her in some yellow thing that made her look like a ray of sunshine, all tucked and cinched and proper. And her hair... she'd put her hair up away from her face. It made that sprinkle of freckles stand out on her suddenly flushed cheeks.

He drank in the sight of her, pinning her in his memory the way she looked right now. Because if she was lucky, Jedediah Sampson would let her get off with a warning because of her lie and by morning, she'd be on that train heading east.

"You're right," she said at last. "I was hoping not to have to reveal what really happened, for all of our sakes. And especially because... no crime occurred."

"Essie," he warned again. "Stop talking."

"The truth is he didn't kidnap me. I went willingly with him. In fact, I was... we were running off together."

With a groan, Cade dropped his head in his hands and dragged his fingers through his hair. "She's lying," he muttered. "You know she's lying."

"You're sayin' you ran off with him with a knife at your throat?"

Her fingers toyed with her gold locket. "Whatever they
think
they saw, there was... a lot of confusion that morning. A lot of chaos with gunfire, but Cade did nothing to hurt me," she said. "In fact, he saved my life several times."

"He did, did he? You mean while he was bein' chased down for kidnappin' you?"

"He was protecting me. From the beginning. They were shooting at me that morning as well, and doing nothing to make sure they didn't hit me. Cade was the only thing standing between me and their guns and he took a bullet in the leg for it. And if that's not enough, you should know that Mitchell Laddner intended to shoot me if he found me, sheriff. To put me down like a ruined dog after he saw me go off with Cade. It would be a mercy, he told his friend, Moran, having been tainted by contact with a Cheyenne. A mercy
.
Did he mention that to you? Did he mention that we overheard him say those very words as we were hiding from him at the buffalo jump?"

For the first time, the sheriff's expression shifted. "He did mention losing you two at the jump, but said nothing about—"

"Of course he didn't. But if he'd caught us, you can be sure I wouldn't be standing here telling you this now. He had his own plans for me, because I gave him the mitten back at the Industrial School—monster that he is. And he wanted Cade dead, as well, for something he witnessed years ago. I believe it involved Laddner's cold-blooded murder of an innocent Cheyenne woman and child in an unprovoked raid of a peaceful camp at the Powder River. So, yes, we ran for our lives from them, because they intended, wholeheartedly, to murder us both. And I suppose the only reason Cade is even alive now is because there was a reward offered. Am I right? God forbid, Laddner would miss the chance to cash in on Cade's demise."

"Jedediah, listen to her," Ollie implored. "There is no crime if there is no victim. She says she wasn't one. I know Cade, too. He's not the devil they're saying he is."

Sampson went silent, rounding his desk and glancing back at Cade. "No use ganging up on me. This whole thing smells like a two-day-old trout. And I ain't sure what to believe. On top of that, he claims you're lying, Mrs. Sparks," he said, glancing at Cade. "Anyway, it ain't up to me. A judge will decide what's what. And besides the fact, there's a horse thievin' charge attached as well. A nice paint pony from the school went missing. Not to mention the other ones got loose."

"I happen to know that paint horse they're looking for," Essie said, "is sitting in a stable down the street, boarded there by two drifters who clearly stole it themselves and tried to sell it to Hiram Klingman."

Cade lifted his head, the first inkling of hope fighting through his darkness.
They found the horse? What about the boy?

"So how do you connect that to Cade, who wasn't even in town when those men brought that horse in?" Essie asked.

"Well," Sampson allowed with a shake of his head. He folded his arms across his massive chest. "I reckon I could ask how it is you know which horse got stole, if it wasn't Cade who took it. But I imagine you'd have an answer for me about it, am I right?"

Cade got slowly to his feet and wrapped his hands around the bars, hoping Essie would hear his thoughts:
Don't tell him about Little Wolf
.
Keep him out of this tangled mess.

Looking the sheriff dead in the eye, all she said was, "I can show you where the horse is."

Essie flicked a look at Cade and sent him a secret smile as Sampson shuffled through a stack of wanted posters.

"There's two sides to every story," he said at last. "And all of that will require some lookin' into. But you should know, ma'am, you ain't doin' yourself no favors with your tellin' of it. And I'm advising you now for your own good."

Seáa... you'd have better luck telling an owl to crow.

"I appreciate the warning," Essie told him, "but the opinions of people who care nothing for me matter even less to me. Now, if you don't mind, I'd like a private word with Cade."

"I suppose it's all right. Just for a minute though. You've got no guns on you, do you?"

She released a nervous breath and held her arms out. "No."

"All right, then."

Ollie and Pink reluctantly walked outside and the sheriff moved to the other side of his desk and shuffled papers.

"What do you think you're doing?" Cade demanded when she moved close enough to speak in a whisper.

"Saving your neck." She wrapped her fingers around his on the bars, her eyes brimming with moisture. "Cade, are you all right? You look terrible."

He tried for a smile, but didn't quite make it. "I've been better. I warned you to stay away from me. Now look what you've done."

"Yes. Look," she whispered back. "I knew I shouldn't have left you back there. Alone."

"I let my guard down. It was my own fault. What about the boy? Do you know where he is?"

"Not yet. But we think he might be somewhere in the Chinese quarter."

A bad feeling crawled up his throat. "How do you know?"

"The gold coins those two were tossing around for Hiram Klingman were in a bag marked with Chinese lettering. I think those two men... I think they might have sold him for money."

Cade felt the blood drain from his face. He cursed silently.

"But to whom," she said, "we just don't know. If we can find those men—"

"Only the dodgiest of businesses would risk that kind of thing," he said, feeling suddenly lightheaded again. "And if I had to guess, I'd try the seedy little opium den down by the river, run by a weasel of a man named Chen Lee."

"You know him?"

"Of him. Worst-kept secret in Billings is his little drug and whoring operation. He brings them up by wagon from the riverfront brothels of San Francisco. They're no better than slaves there, muddle-headed by that opium the customers smoke. Rumor is Lee murders the girls who are no longer useful to him, though no one has actually caught him at it yet."

"Oh, no," she breathed. "Cade—"

His bruised fingers tightened on hers. "Find him quietly. Don't get the sheriff involved. I don't want the boy in the middle of this whole mess."

"All right. But what if we—"

"If all else fails, go to my father. Tell him the boy is White Owl's son. She was my mother's sister."

"But... how will I find him?"

"Ollie knows his spread. He won't do it for me, but he might for White Owl's sake. Now go. And don't come back here. You've done enough damage to yourself already."

Stubbornly, she pulled her fingers away from his and whispered, "Don't tell me what to do."

Ignoring her, he gripped the bars harder. "When you find him,
if
you find him, you give him to Ollie, then get on that train and get out of town. Make yourself a good life somewhere. You hear me? Don't look back."

Lowering her gaze, she sniffed and leaned closer. "You're right. It makes no sense for me to care what happens to you. I should just turn away and try to live what's left of my life with as much dignity as I can muster after this... this debacle. And in truth, what we know about each other could be fit inside a thimble. Except," she added, "for the things that really matter. Like the fact that I trust you. Like your compassion and your bravery."

He said nothing, but lowered his eyes now too, unable to look at her face. Knowing what he'd see there. She was ripping him apart.

"Time to go, Mrs. Sparks," the sheriff called over to her.

She turned back to Cade. "So, I'm going to go now. And I'm going to find the boy and after that? Well... you're just going to have to live with whatever happens."

She left him standing there, gripping the bars like a caged animal. Alone.

Chapter 19