They were ragged-looking men. Unshaven. Unkempt. Disreputable. Charlotte pushed Lily behind her back and forced her chin up.
“You look to be in need of assistance, ma’am. I guess it’s a good thing we happened along.” The leader’s gaze raked her from head to toe, his eyes cold, hard, and full of lascivious intent.
“Thank you, sir,” Charlotte stated in her best schoolmarm tone, the one that usually erased a man’s interest faster than a cloth erased chalk. “But we do not require assistance. We were just about to resume our journey. Please feel free to continue on.”
Instead of dulling the man’s interest, her authoritative tone appeared to ignite something in the man, something that had him peering at her face as if he were trying to memorize her features.
Charlotte cast a quick glance at Stephen, thankful to see he’d left the shotgun in its hiding place. It would serve no purpose against so many, beyond putting the boy in greater danger.
“Wouldn’t be gentlemanly of us to let a woman travel unescorted,” one of the men closer to her said. “A female as handsome as you deserves special treatment.” He reached out a hand to stroke her cheek.
Charlotte jerked away from the touch, feeling violated. And more frightened than she’d ever been before. Lord have mercy. If these lechers got their hands on Lily . . .
The men laughed at her show of spirit—dark, ugly sounds that made her flesh crawl. All except the leader. He frowned.
“You’re a teacher, ain’t ya?” he asked, nudging his mount closer to where she stood.
She didn’t answer. Just glared at him defiantly. She’d not cower.
All at once a grin broke out across his face, his tobacco-stained teeth doing nothing to aid his appearance.
“I’ve got it!” He slapped his knee, causing his horse to sidestep at the sudden movement. “You’re that teacher the feller from Houston was lookin’ for.” He glanced back at the wagon and eyed the boys. “Yep. Three kids, just like he said. Well, boy howdy. Men, we just found ourselves a fugitive with a big, fat bounty on her head!”
Charlotte didn’t take time to think. She launched herself at the man closest to her, pulling him out of his saddle even as she screamed for Lily to run. “Run for Stone!”
She threw her body atop the villain and rained blows upon his head, her only thought to create enough of a distraction to give Lily a head start. Stone would be on his way. He always watched over them.
Unless he’d been scouting ahead. Dear God, please don’t let him be scouting. The men had come at them from behind. Stone wouldn’t have seen them coming.
Even as the thought ran through her head, an iron arm wrapped about her middle and yanked her off. The leader had dismounted and now held her firm against his front. She kicked and flailed until she heard a revolver being cocked.
“Quit your fightin’, teacher, or Winston’ll put a bullet in the boy’s head.”
She glanced up. One of the riders on the far side of the wagon had his pistol aimed straight at Stephen’s temple. She stilled instantly.
“Everett?” The leader nodded to the second man on the near side of the wagon, the one still sitting on his horse. “Go after the girl.”
The man kicked his mount and headed off in pursuit.
“No!” Charlotte tried to run after them, but the man holding her lifted her feet off the ground with a shift of his stance, his arm cutting off her cry as it squeezed her middle.
“Don’t worry, darlin’,” he drawled in that sickeningly sweet tone of his. “You’ll be reunited real soon.”
Tears blurring her vision, Charlotte watched helplessly as Everett closed in on her daughter.
19
A monster horse crashed through the trees a few yards in front of Lily. The dark figure on the animal’s back let out a war cry that nearly set the earth to rumbling. Then a gun exploded. Everett jerked backward. Tumbled from his horse. Lily screamed. Halted. Covered her ears with her hands and bent over into a ball.
Until the newcomer shouted her name and ordered her into the woods.
Charlotte gasped. Then blinked. Hammer Rockwell, just as the dime novels had described him. Brown duster whipping back and forth in the wind, hat pulled low, gun in one hand as he steered his mount in front of Lily, guarding her retreat. Merciless, dangerous, and the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
Stone.
The leader’s grip around her middle loosened at the distraction, and Charlotte wrenched free. She shoved past her captor and lunged for the wagon, only to have the man grab her from behind.
“Not so fast, missy.” He swung her around in front of him like a shield then started backing toward his horse. “I’m takin’ you with me.”
The other three men opened fire on Stone.
“Stephen!” Charlotte gestured with her head toward the wagon bed. “Take John into the back and lie down.” She didn’t look away from them until they’d successfully scrambled into the back and taken cover, Stephen sheltering John with his arm as they huddled behind the wooden siding.
The firing continued. Her team grew restless. Please don’t let them bolt, Charlotte prayed. Not with the boys inside. Though it would take them away from the gunplay. These men obviously didn’t care about innocents in the crossfire.
Stone did.
The truth slammed into Charlotte with stunning force. He hadn’t fired a single shot since the one that felled Everett. He was protecting the children. Protecting her. But that protection left him vulnerable. It emboldened the enemy. Yet he continued to ride toward them. Low in the saddle. As if he were invincible.
She had to do something to help him. But what? She was a hostage, a shield. Yet only her midsection was compromised. Her hands were free. She needed a weapon, something to . . .
Charlotte reached to her throat and tore the cameo brooch from her collar. With a flick of her thumb, she had the clasp open. She palmed the face and brought the silver pin down with all her strength into her captor’s thigh.
He cried out and dropped her while yelling a vile curse. She paid him no heed. Instead, she leapt for the wagon, threw herself over the side and into the bed, and immediately jabbed her pin into the nearest enemy horse’s flank. The horse screamed and reared up, knocking into the horse beside it.
If she couldn’t stop the bullets, at least she could skew their aim.
She sidestepped the boys, intent on reaching the third horse positioned behind the wagon, but the chaos she’d created spooked her own team. The frightened animals jerked in their traces and sent Charlotte sprawling. She dropped her cameo as she threw out her hands to break her fall. The brooch skittered into the corner, near the tailgate. She clambered after it, only to catch sight of a man’s boot descending toward her head out of the corner of her eye. She jerked back and twisted away, but the boot still landed a glancing blow at her temple. Down she went, dazed. She blinked and tried to shake off her stupor. A glimpse of her captor straddling the side of the wagon, boot raised for another kick, jarred her back into action. Charlotte curled her arms around her head and ducked.
A quiet whistle sounded above her as something whizzed over her head. An instant later, her tormentor let out a second howl of pain and fell backward, a knife lodged in his shoulder. A roar echoed behind Charlotte at nearly the same moment. She barely had time to turn her head and lurch sideways as Stone leapt from Goliath’s back, arms outstretched.
He tackled the two men closest to him. His momentum launched all three of them into the wagon bed. Guns flew out of hands. Horses spooked and ran. Bodies slammed into wood.
It proved too much for the team. They lunged forward until the brake gave way then galloped down the road without a driver at the helm.
Charlotte braced herself against the tailgate as the force of the sudden motion threw her backward. Clinging to the side of the speeding wagon, she gestured wildly to the boys. Stone’s momentum had carried the men to the far side of the wagon bed, but they were already stirring. Soon fists would b
e pounding, legs would be kicking, knives might even be brandished. She had to get the boys out of the way.
Stephen nodded to her, grabbed John’s arm, and half crawled, half rolled to her as the fight began in earnest. Taking advantage of his position on top, Stone grabbed the collar of the man beneath him and slammed his head into the wagon floor. Twice. The second man lunged at him from the side, wrapping his arm around Stone’s neck as if to choke him. Stone answered with a ferocious backward jab of his elbow into the man’s stomach.
“Look!” Stephen pointed behind them as he reached Charlotte’s side. “They’re leaving!”
Charlotte glanced away from the fight to check on the other men. Sure enough, the one who’d not been injured—Winston, the leader had called him—was fleeing around the bend. The leader, a hand to his chest where the knife had been, sat astride his horse, heading in an altogether different direction. Toward the trees where Lily had run.
“Stone!” Charlotte whipped her head back around. “He’s going after Lily!”
Stone heard Charlotte’s shout, jammed his knee into the belly of the man beneath him, then twisted far enough to slip his arm through the second man’s legs. With a groan, he lifted the man off his feet and tossed him over the side. The pinned man took advantage of his inattention to retrieve a knife. Stone spotted the blade and immediately grabbed the man’s wrist.
He didn’t have time for this.
Stone curled his tongue and let out a shrill whistle to bring Goliath to him then pounded the man’s arm into the wagon until he finally lost his grip on the knife. Once that was done, he smashed his fist against the man’s temple with enough force to leave him unconscious then rolled him over the side.
“Hurry, Stone!” Charlotte cried. “He’s almost to the trees.”
Stone pushed to his feet, widening his stance to keep his balance in the speeding wagon. He gripped the driver’s bench as he made his way to the place where Goliath galloped alongside. Stone grasped the edge of the wagon then propped his left boot atop it. His gaze skimmed over Charlotte and the boys, clinging to the tailgate.
How could he just leave them? They could hit a rut and be thrown. The team could veer off the road into a ravine and turn the wagon over. He hesitated.
“Go, Stone.” Charlotte nodded at him. “Lily needs you more than we do. I can stop the wagon.”
She could fall to her death, too.
“Go!” she demanded.
He did. Stone pushed off the edge of the wagon with his left leg and landed astride Goliath. Pain shot up his right thigh from where one of the bullets had taken a hunk out of his flesh, but he ignored it. With a prayer in his heart for those he was leaving behind, he grabbed Goliath’s reins and steered him toward the man disappearing into the trees.
Winded as the beast was after charging the villains and keeping pace with a runaway wagon, Goliath responded to Stone’s urging with a champion’s heart. His long legs ate up the ground at a pace that matched the thundering of Stone’s pulse.
Would Lily know to hide? What if she heard the villain’s horse’s approach and thought it was Stone coming to retrieve her? She’d run right into the scoundrel’s hands.
Stone clenched his jaw and leaned farther over Goliath’s neck. Not on his watch. No one was gonna harm a hair on that girl’s head.
The terrain shifted from flat prairie to scattered woods as Stone urged Goliath up the slope. Forced to slow in order to navigate the trees and uneven ground, Stone tuned his ears to his surroundings. With all the cover afforded by the trees, he’d be more likely to hear another rider’s position than spot the man himself. Of course, his own position could be forfeited just as easily.
He slowed Goliath to a walk. A rustling sounded to the east. Stone peered between the oak trunks. There. A dark brown hat. Moving north. Not high enough off the ground for the man to still be on his horse. Stone slipped his revolver from his holster then dismounted quietly from Goliath’s back. Minding his steps, he crept closer, his attention focused on the man ahead and to the right. One of his arms hung uselessly at his side, but the other clutched a pistol—a pistol aimed at a scraggly bush that couldn’t quite conceal the pink calico dress quivering behind it.
“Come on out, girl,” the man ordered in a gruff voice. “I ain’t gonna hurt ya. I’m gonna help you get home.” He took two steps closer to the bush. “There’s a feller lookin’ for you. Works for your grandpa. I’m just gonna take you to him.” Another step. “No reason to be scared.”
Stone slid his second revolver from its holster and lifted both guns into position. “On the contrary,” he threatened, “there’s every reason to be scared.”
The man spun toward Stone and fired. At the same instant, Stone dropped, rolled to his back, and fired twice. The first shot relieved the man of his hat. The second, his gun.
Stone cocked his weapons as he rolled into a crouch, his feet once again under him. “I’d prefer not to kill you in front of the girl, but if you reach for that knife at your back, I’ll empty the next two chambers into your chest.”
The man stilled then slowly brought his good arm out from behind him and raised it in the air.
“Lily,” Stone called, “come stand behind me.”
He didn’t have to ask twice. She dashed out from behind the bush and ran to him. Giving the other man a wide berth, she ducked behind Stone and immediately wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned her face against his lower back.
Stone’s muscles leapt at the contact, ready to defend, to protect her at all costs. He narrowed his eyes at the man. “Get on your horse, collect your comrade, and go.”
“But Everett’s dead. You killed him.”
“Nope,” Stone contradicted. “But he will be if you don’t get him to a doctor.” He’d seen the man up on all fours when he’d ridden Goliath past him moments before. He’d been in sorry shape for sure, but not dead. “Fairfield’s just a few miles back. You can make it.”
The man hesitated, but then apparently decided whatever reward Franklin had promised wasn’t worth his life. He edged away from Stone.
“Go!” Stone shouted.
The man ran, leaving his pistol in the dirt.
Stone didn’t have the luxury of waiting to ensure the fool followed his instructions. Now that Lily was safe, all he could think about was Charlotte and the boys.
After holstering his guns, he peeled one of Lily’s hands from around his waist, clasped it in his own, and started jogging toward Goliath. Once there, he lifted Lily up in front of the saddle horn then mounted behind her. He settled her across his lap so his back would be her shield, then took up Goliath’s reins.
“Where’s Miss Lottie?” Lily’s voice quivered as she asked the question.
Stone wrapped an arm about the girl, hating the broken, bloody images that came too readily to mind, visions of the wreckage he might encounter. He steeled himself against the possibilities and focused instead on the lines of determination that had been etched into Charlotte’s lovely face when she’d ordered him to retrieve Lily. Charlotte Atherton was not a woman who failed easily.
“She’s with the wagon,” Stone ground out, praying the equipage in question, along with its passengers, was still intact. Then he nudged Goliath into a canter and set out to find the truth.
20
How on earth was she supposed to stop this wagon on her own? Clasping the wagon side with both hands, Charlotte gained her feet only to feel a tug on her skirt. John looked up at her from his place in the corner, trust in his eyes and something closed in his upraised fist. She held out her hand, and he placed her mother’s cameo in her palm. An inanimate object shouldn’t have the power to instill such hope, yet it did. She closed her fingers around it and nodded her thanks to John. Then, before her doubts could reassert themselves, she stuffed the brooch into her skirt pocket and made her way toward the front of the wagon.
Help me, Lord. Please help me. She repeated the prayer over and over in her mind with each shaky st
ep she took, her body hunched as she gripped the side of the wagon for balance, her hair whipping around her head and slapping against her cheeks, her eyes stinging and tearing from the wind.
She reached the back of the driver’s bench and stopped. She had to climb over. No easy task in a long, gored skirt.
“Want me to do it, Miss Lottie?” Stephen touched her arm, startling her. She’d had no idea he’d followed her. “I’m good with climbing stuff.”
“Absolutely not!” Dear Lord. If he fell, she’d never forgive herself. “Stay back here and tend to John.”
Trusting him to obey her, she turned back to the bench. Using the small trunk of books and clothes that Lily had packed and Stone had tied down at the beginning of their trip as a step, Charlotte hiked her skirt past her calves and swung her right leg over the bench. She held onto the seatback with both hands, rested her stomach across it, and dragged her other leg over. Blowing out a heavy breath, she eased from her knees to a normal seated position and latched onto the bench arm.
The reins had fallen from the brake bar, of course. They dangled above the wagon shaft between her two panicked grays.
“Whoa, now!” Charlotte called to the horses as she gingerly scooted to the middle of the bench. Not that her command did any good. The animals were too crazed to listen. But she repeated it anyway. “Whoa.”
The horses thundered on. As did her pulse. She was going to have to retrieve the reins.
Charlotte glanced up. No traffic, thank heaven. The road looked relatively flat. But a curve loomed ahead. A rather sharp curve. More of a corner, really. One they’d never make in one piece if the horses didn’t slow.
Twisting on the bench, she hooked her fingers over the back of the seat then leaned forward and stretched toward the reins. Not even close.
If Stone were here, he’d probably leap over the footboard, land on the shaft, grab the reins with one hand, and slow the team with a single tug on the lines. But Stone wasn’t here. And if she tried to leap over the footboard onto the shaft, she’d probably slip off the narrow pole and fall prey to sharp hooves and unforgiving wheels. Her heeled boots and long skirts just weren’t made for such acrobatics. So what could she do instead?