Tin-Stars and Troublemakers Box Set (Four Complete Historical Western Romance Novels in One) by Rice Patricia & deWolfe Adrienne & Ihle Sharon & Hagan Patricia

Author:Rice, Patricia & deWolfe, Adrienne & Ihle, Sharon & Hagan, Patricia [Rice, Patricia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ePublishing Works!
Published: 2013-04-10T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

Thunder rocked the house as Fancy quietly closed the door on the Applegates' spare bedroom. From below, she heard the rumbling bass of the sheriff himself, telling his wife he was going to town to wait for Brand. She heard the porch door bang, and she thought she heard the squishing of horse's hooves. It was hard to tell, given the din of the rain on the roof.

She bit her lip as she glanced once more toward the bedroom. Poor Wes. He'd spent three sleepless days tracking Diego north from the Barclay ranch. He'd needed rest so badly that he'd dozed off twice during the short ride to Applegate's homestead.

Yet nothing short of Cord's threat to exclude him from the posse could convince him to retire to a bedroom. The boy had been the unfortunate one to find the smoking ruins of the ranch and the slaughtered hands who'd stayed behind to help Lally run it. He'd also found Diego's note stabbed to the charred remains of Ginny's crabapple tree.

I have the old woman and the boy. Bring me the plates. Signale Mountains, near Wild Horse Creek. Come alone or they die. I'll be watching.

Diego was headed for Indian Territory, where lawlessness reigned. Rustlers, smugglers, murderers, and counterfeiters were known to seek refuge there. No wonder Wes had been so desperate to catch the kidnappers before they crossed the Red River.

But he hadn't dared risk Zack and Lally by trying their rescue alone. Hurrying back from Blue Mountain station, where Diego had holed up, apparently to ambush the next day's stage, Wes had made the two-hour ride south to Fort Worth in record time. He had hoped to enlist Applegate's help with the rescue and somehow send word to Cord.

When Cord learned the full story, he'd had nothing but praise for the boy's quick thinking and grit. But Wes had refused to take solace in either Cord's or Applegate's assurances that he could have done nothing more.

Fancy's heart had broken to see the way the boy punished himself. Unable to bear the sounds of his anguished pacing, she had finally gone to the bedroom to try to ease his mind.

"Please stop blaming yourself, Wes," she'd murmured, taking his freckled fingers tightly in her own. "Zack has ridden home alone hundreds of times. You couldn't possibly have known this was the one time he would be ambushed. No one blames you, Wes. No one. It's not your fault."

It's mine.

She hadn't had the courage to speak the truth, though. Clearly, it was her ciphered message to Diego, not Wes's harmless night of revelry, that had placed Zack and Lally in danger.

When she had composed that message in the book, she had never dreamed Diego could break out of a state penitentiary. She had never imagined he might set a fire two days after their meeting and escape with six inmates.

But she should have known better.

She should have known.

Today, tomorrow, the truth would come out. It was inevitable. Cord would learn how she'd betrayed him, and he would hate her.

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