Susan Amarillas - Wyoming Renegade

Zeke groaned against the searing pain. “Damn you, ‘breed!” he spat.

“Absarokee,” his captor corrected flatly. “Are you ready to tell me?” His voice was soft, almost serene, as though he hadn’t been torturing Zeke for the past several hours.

Zeke knew he could end it, knew what the bastard wanted. Damn ‘breed had said so plain enough at the beginning. He wanted the names of the other two who’d gunned down a group of Indians a couple of weeks back.

Zeke had denied everything, not that it had done him any good. Zeke liked to drink and he liked to brag. He had made the mistake of doing both at the local saloon. He figured that was how this coldhearted scum had gotten on his trail.

Now Zeke was trying frantically to come up with a way out of this—an excuse, an alibi, a deal. So far nothing had worked.

A sage-scented breeze rustled the leaves of the tree, but it didn’t do a thing to ease the sweat that beaded on his forehead. He swiped his face on his sleeve. He was determined to outlast this bastard. No Indian was gonna get the best of him!

“Are you ready to tell me?” his captor repeated.

“I don’t…know nothin’.” Zeke ground out the words between clenched teeth. That bit of defiance earned him another slap in his throbbing wound.

“Son of a bitch!”

“Tell me.”

Zeke wanted to stay alive, at least he did if he could get free of this. He knew the other man meant business, knew that once he told the bastard what he wanted to know, there was nothing and no one to stop his captor from killing him.

Another sudden slap against his wound and he wasn’t so defiant anymore. Pain pulsed and trembled through him, searing his mind and body in a blinding red haze. The scent of his own blood filtered into his nostrils, his sweat-soaked shirt clung to his chest.

It wasn’t any kind of loyalty that kept Zeke from spilling his guts; it was spite, and the knowledge that this information was the only thing keeping him alive. Besides, there wasn’t much to tell.

They’d split up right after their little “party.” Cordell had said he was headed south. Hell, that could be anyplace from Colorado to Texas. And there was the kid, Gibson. They’d picked him up in Gunlock. He had been working in a bank, of all things, and when they’d said they were headed out to look for ranch work, he’d come along, eager for excitement. Well, the tenderfoot had gotten his share, and then some.

A few days out of town, they’d spotted a bunch of Indians camped by Lazy Horse Creek. Zeke didn’t know one tribe from another, didn’t care. Everyone knew them redskins were causin’ trouble, slipping off the reservation, stealing horses and cattle. There were way too few soldiers to keep them in line, teach ‘em just who this land belonged to.

It hadn’t taken much talking, or much drinking, for the three of them to decide to ride on in and put the fear of God into them heathens. Why, it was a white man’s patriotic duty. Hell, they were only doing what the army did. They were probably saving some rancher’s life, they’d told themselves. It had seemed a mighty fine idea then.

Zeke lifted his head slightly to see that his captor had stepped directly in front of him. The breeze stirred the ‘breed’s shoulder-length hair and the moonlight caught on the beading of his buckskin shirt. Without a word, he put his gun barrel next to Zeke’s thigh and fired, the bullet ripping through flesh and muscle.

“You bastard!” Zeke snarled, then clamped his jaw down hard to hold back the scream. He yanked at the restraining ropes, wrapped skin-tearing tight around his wrists.

His captor only smiled, a slow menacing smile. “Tell me.”

Zeke remained silent. He tried to think of something, anything, but the constant pain. But no matter what he tried, the only thoughts that came were ones of them Indians. One in particular. He’d never seen such hatred in a pair of eyes, not that he’d cared. She was just some whoring squaw. He’d held her down and forced her legs apart. He’d rode her hard, ignoring her screams.

When he let her up, she’d charged at him, claws bared. He’d had to kill her—self-defense and all.

The sharp metallic click of a gun’s hammer being pulled back brought reality clearly and painfully into focus an instant before the gun fired, the bullet ripping through his other leg.

This time Zeke did scream. Blood soaked his clothes and his skin. Pain was a living force inside him. There were no other senses, no other emotions, only the pain and the knowledge that this was just the beginning. A man could last like this for days if he let himself.

“Anything! I’ll tell you!” he screamed.

“I’m waiting,” the man said quietly.

“Cut me down, dammit. I’ll tell you.”

There was a moment of hopeful silence, then the sound of the gun hammer being cocked again.

Zeke sagged in defeat. He told the man everything, the names, the smallest detail of descriptions, every little bit he knew about destinations. When he was done, he said, “Kill me. Just kill me and be done with it.”

“You mean quick?” his captor said, sliding his gun back into his holster. “Or do you mean slow, the way you killed my sister, you bastard?”

“Sister?” Zeke’s head came up and he was eye to eye with his tormentor. Moonlight illuminated the man’s face and eyes, hard eyes, black as Satan’s.

He knew then his fate was sealed. Reason was lost. “Well, just so as you know, the squaw was good. Real good. The way she clawed and bucked under me—”

The scream of rage that came from the half-breed’s throat bore no resemblance to human sound. It pierced the night like a war lance tearing through human flesh.

“I’ll see all of you in hell,” the half-breed snarled, and plunged the blade of his knife into Zeke’s throat.

Alexandria Gibson stood in the elegant parlor of her Nob Hill home. She pushed back the curtain covering the double French doors, and the delicate white lace brushed butterfly soft against her hand. The night was ink black, the barest beginnings of fog drifted up from the bay.

“I’ll be leaving in the morning.” She didn’t look at her father, who was seated five feet away on one of two matching love seats. She could practically feel his icy gaze boring into her. “Eddie will be here bright and early.”

“What do you mean, Eddie?” her father demanded, his baritone voice seeming to fill the. highceilinged room.

Alexandria looked at him along the line of her shoulder. Even at fifty her father was a fine figure of a man—tall and lean, his brown hair graying, but thick enough to make a younger man envious.

“New evening clothes?” she asked, ignoring his question. She didn’t want to get into another long discussion. They’d been going around and around about her trip since Monday, when she’d announced her plan.

“Yes,” he muttered, momentarily distracted. “I’m playing poker with Strickland later at the club.” Anger sparked quicksilver bright in his blue eyes. “Never mind my clothes.”

She sighed inwardly. Well, if he was intent on being stubborn, she could be equally stubborn. She was her father’s daughter, after all, and that gave her more than a fair amount of hardheadedness.

“What’s Eddie got to do with this?” her father grumbled.

“He’s going along.”

“As what, your chaperon? Ha! If I can’t keep tight reins on you, then Eddie sure as hell can’t.”

“Don’t be difficult.”

“Me? I’m not the one who’s being difficult.” He shook his finger at her in a way that made her feel like a child, which she wasn’t, not at twenty-five. That short temper of hers was moving up the scale faster than mercury on a July day.