Pray for the Dead by Dusty Richards

Author:Dusty Richards [Richards, Dusty]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2016-01-11T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 16

On a cold night under the stars, with most of the snow gone, Chet sent Cole and Valerie off on the stage to find his little man and bring him home. Those two were still mad lovers. They’d make a honeymoon out of their trip. And he didn’t begrudge them any of it.

“You’d think they’d just got married,” Jesus said, laughing.

“Worse than Chet and I?” Liz asked him.

“Maybe not that bad,” Chet teased as they mounted the buckboards to head back home. “Maybe we’ll learn his name before they get back.”

“Have you tried to guess it?” She hugged his arm as he drove home under the stars.

“Not really. There are so many things I’ve wondered about since I learned there was another son, but not that. Kathren and I could have been married, but her strong loyalty to her parents kept her from doing that. The tables had been turned on me and I flat could not have stayed.”

“It really was a tragedy.”

“It was. But the real tragedy in my family was back when the Comanche took my brothers and sister. They took a boy one summer and a year later a pair of twins, a boy and girl. My father went out to find him. He stayed out too long with no water and food, and some rangers found and brought him back, but he was never right mentally after that. That loss about killed my mother. It was a bad deal, but really nothing he or she could have done about it. At fifteen I was running the ranch on my own. We never heard a word about those kids. Lots of children were taken by the Comanche in those days. They said their women rode horses and lost babies and they needed replacements. There were some boys that escaped, and came home, then went back to the Comanche.”

“Why would they do that?” she asked.

“The tribal men were warriors. The women did all the work. Back home, they had to work cotton and crops and hay. It was a damn site easier being an Indian male than all that work they found back at home.”

“I’d never even dreamed of anything like that,” she said. “I guess this new boy is really your first son, then?”

“I guess he is. If he was a prince, he’d be in line for the king’s job.”

“Firstborns they say are the leaders. Look at you.”

“Well, my poor younger brother never wanted to lead,” Chet said with a shake of his head. “Bless his heart, it was hard to get him to do anything when it required him to make a decision. But he could sure bitch all day about how I did it.”

She laughed. “That stage line is in your thoughts right now, isn’t it?”

“I think since the railroad is coming so slow, it could make some money for us. Lot depends on Hannagen. He may not be all he says he is. Some guys talk a good game, but when it comes to putting up, they don’t have anything.

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