Tymber Dalton - Hernando Heat

She returned her gaze to the window. “Just try it,” she whispered. “Just try it and see.”

Secretly, she hoped Mase and Joe would swoop in and rescue her, no matter how improbable she knew that scenario would be. Besides, she couldn’t sully their reputation. Wouldn’t let Senior and Junior have the satisfaction of ruining her men.

And in her heart, they were still “her men.” They always would be.

That thought nearly started her crying. She choked back her tears and steeled herself for the lonely days to come.

Joe sat at the table and stared at the note as Mason read. “She wouldn’t leave willingly,” Joe insisted. “I don’t give a damn what this note says, there’s no way you can convince me she would ever willingly leave us. She was finally happy for the first time since Paul died. She told us so.”

Mason handed the note back to Joe and started pacing the kitchen. “What in blue blazes is going on?”

Joe looked up at his cousin. “I don’t know, but I’ll be damned if I’ll let Junior steal the woman I love from me twice in one life. She’ll have to look us in the face and tell us she meant what she said in this note.” He balled it up and tossed it across the kitchen before standing and heading for his bedroom.

He strode down the hall, pausing at the door to what used to be Katie’s room. “Hey, Mase.”

“What?”

“Come here.”

Mason joined him in the doorway. “What?” Mason looked into the room.

“Now I know for sure she didn’t leave willingly. I don’t care what that blasted note says. Dorchester forced her to write it.”

“Why?”

Joe pointed. “What do you see?”

“Son of a bitch.”

Paul’s picture and the clock still sat in their places on the shelf. “There is no way she would ever willingly leave those behind,” Joe insisted as he turned to Mason. “Not if she was leaving of her own volition. You know that as well as I do.”

“You think they kidnapped her?” Mason asked.

Joe grimly nodded. “I think they forced her to write that note. Either at gunpoint or by some other threat.” He met Mason’s gaze. “Maybe threatened us somehow to make her do it, and you know how protective of us she is. Otherwise, she would have put up one hell of a fight.”

For the first time since discovering Katie’s departure, Mason smiled. “I’ll be damned. I bet that’s it. She would do that. She’s so blasted worried about people talking bad about us.” He slammed his fist against the doorway. “One of these days, we’ll get it through that thick, pretty skull of hers that we could care less what people think about us, and that we can take care of ourselves and her just fine.”

Joe headed for his bedroom, where he stored his guns. “Exactly. So you know what I plan to do?”

Mason turned toward his bedroom to get his own weapons. “You’ll have to keep up with me as we chase down that damned train.”

The men raced down the drive a scant fifteen minutes later. Mason had saddled fresh horses while Joe readied their guns and ammunition. They knew there was no time to waste, that they’d have to ride like the Devil himself to catch the train.

“Any idea when the train pulls out of Dade City?” Joe called out to Mason, who rode ahead of him.

“No,” Mason yelled over his shoulder. “I know they have to stop there for mail, passengers, and water. So at least an hour. It’s usually due into the station by five, I think.”

Joe knew they wouldn’t make it. “I know where we can get some fresh horses there. We’ll be chasing this damn train halfway to Tampa.”

The ride into Dade City felt like forever. Sure enough, the train had already pulled out by the time they reached the depot. Fortunately, they’d only missed it by an hour, meaning they had a chance to catch it.

The sun lay low in the sky to the west when they jumped on their fresh mounts and took off after the train, following the railbed. Mason had Sherriff Birch telegraphed from Dade City to let him know what was going on and to ask him to telegraph ahead to Zephyrhills to alert the station and sheriff there to stop the train.

The sun lay low in the sky, golden shafts of light stabbing through the pines along the railbed. Neither man talked. Joe didn’t hear the sound of the horses’ hooves pounding into the dirt, their sharp breaths as they spurred them into a full gallop, or the creaking of saddle leather and jingle of bridles.

All he heard in his mind was the sharp report his gun would make while putting a bullet through Junior and Senior’s heads.

After another twenty minutes of riding, they caught sight of the train ahead of them. Joe screamed in triumph and dug his heels into his lathered steed’s side. The game animal responded with a snort and another burst of speed that took him past Mason. He heard Mason whooping behind him, using his reins to slap his horse’s withers to keep up.

In another minute, they’d gained on the train. Relentless, they charged alongside, catching up and gaining ground, passing several stock and cargo cars before passing the five passenger cars. They didn’t bother trying to look in the windows as they passed, their goal the locomotive at the head of the metal beast.

Joe pulled alongside the train and drew his pistol as he screamed at the engineer.

“Pull the brake!”

The soot-covered fireman looked up, startled, and reached for a rifle in a rack against the back window when Mason also rode up and pointed at the deputy star pinned to his shirt. “Stop this goddamned train right now! You’ve got a kidnapped woman on board!”

The engineer and fireman looked at each other and shrugged. The engineer reached over and threw the brake while the fireman blew off the boiler.

Katie heard but ignored the mild commotion on the other side of the train. One minor consideration she was glad for, she didn’t have to sit on the hotter western side of the train with the sun beating in on her through the window.

She heard Junior and Senior remark about whatever was going on. When the train lurched and began to slow, Senior sent Junior up front to check it out. When the train finally came to a stop, Katie briefly considered jumping from her seat and bolting for the rear of the car. She entertained fleeing into the woods and evading the Dorchesters, maybe to find her way back to Brooksville.

Then Senior’s meaty hand cruelly clamped down on her shoulder. “You wait here. If I have to hunt you down, no one will ever see you again.”

She didn’t look away from the window, but managed a soft, chilly tone despite her fear. “If you don’t take your hand off me, Mr. Dorchester, you will wake up with a bloody stump.”

Katie didn’t believe it when he released her as if she were a hot coal. “Watch your tongue with me,” he growled low enough no one else could hear. “You might awaken one morning without any teeth.” She didn’t breathe a trembling sigh of relief until she heard his heavy, lumbering stride head toward the front of the car.

She closed her eyes and struggled against the tears threatening once again to flow. She wouldn’t cry in front of them.

She wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.

“There’s at least two men, the Dorchesters, with a woman. You see ’em?” Mason yelled over the sound of the steam blowing off.

The engineer shook his head. “I don’t pay no attention to the passengers. That’s the conductor’s job.”

“Where’s your conductor?”

The engineer spit a mouthful of tobacco juice out of the cab, but away from the two mounted men. “In the caboose. Where the hell else you think he’s at?”