Devils Unto Dust(81)

“I’m all right, Sam,” I say. “Let’s go home.”





64.


It’s slow going. I keep looking back at the station, half expecting to see a posse riding out to round me up. My boots scratch at the dirt, and it’s that sound more than anything that calms me. It’s steady, like a heartbeat, but more rhythmic than my own erratic heart. Every noise startles me, sends me skittering to one side like an insect under a turned rock. I’m not afraid, exactly; McAllister most likely assumes I’m dead or running, so I doubt anyone will think to look for me heading back to Glory. But I know what can happen out here now, and I’m wary. I scan the desert with wide eyes, looking for dark shadows against the sand.

“Relax,” Curtis says when I glance over my shoulder yet again. “We got a good head start. And we ain’t gonna let any hunters truss you up and carry you off.”

I can’t help but laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Sam asks.

“Two hunters protecting me from other hunters. I never woulda believed it.” I look down at my feet, feeling grateful and undeserving. All that time I spent hating hunters, and now I trust these two with my life.

“I told you, we don’t go around killing clients if we can help it,” Curtis says. “Bad for business.”

“Speak for yourself,” Sam interrupts. “I’m turning her in first chance I get. Gonna buy me a horse with that money.”

I turn around to punch his shoulder and pause, fist midair; a cloud of dust rises lazily from the road behind us.

“We got company,” I say loudly. A single gunshot echoes out, and Curtis swears.

“So much for slipping out early. Let’s get this over with,” he says, firing a shot back.

“Stay behind us, Willie,” Ben orders, and he moves to stand shoulder to shoulder with his brother.

I hear the other hunter’s heavy tread before I see him; he stops in front of the Garretts, bending over with his hands on his knees.

“Mornin’,” Curtis says pleasantly.

“Y’all thought you could sneak out and no one would notice?” the man says, panting. I frown; his voice is harsh and familiar.

“That was the idea,” Curtis says. “You look mighty beat. Up too late or drinking too early?”

I peek around Ben’s shoulder as the man catches his breath and stands up.

“You,” I say with a sneer, recognizing the hunter who stole my biscuits back in Glory.

“You know him?” Ben asks.

“His name’s Grady.”

Grady glares at me angrily. He rests his hand on his gun, but doesn’t draw it.

“I don’t want any trouble,” he says, his eyes darting nervously. “Just give me the girl.”

I open my mouth to give my own opinion but Sam puts a restraining hand on my shoulder.

“Why don’t we let them handle it,” he says softly, which is his way of asking me to not make it worse. I sigh and keep my thoughts to myself.

Curtis smiles blandly at Grady. “You’re outnumbered and outgunned, friend. Now you go on your way and we’ll go on ours.”

Grady screws up his mouth in thought, which I’m sure is hard for him.

“I’ll split the bounty with you,” he says abruptly. “We take her to McAllister, split it fifty-fifty.” I don’t like the way he’s looking at me, like I’m something to be eaten.

“You’re not hearing us,” Ben tells him, sounding annoyed and thoroughly unimpressed.

Grady licks his lips. “Sixty-forty,” he says, getting desperate. His hand trembles ever so slightly on the butt of his gun.

“I don’t think—”

“No,” I interrupt Curtis. “It’s a good deal.”

“What are you doing?” Sam hisses at me, but I shrug off his hand to shoulder my way between Ben and Curtis. I face Grady squarely, drawing my neck up so I’m just as tall as him.

“I’ll go with you,” I tell him. “But I get the share. Sixty-forty.”

“Willie—” Curtis starts, and I hold up a hand to silence him.

“We have a deal?” I ask.

Grady blinks wet and hungry eyes at me. He’s calculating in his head, trying to figure out if McAllister will pay before or after he kills me.

“Deal,” he says, nodding once.

I move closer and hold out my hand; he hesitates a moment before he moves his own off his gun to shake on it. Then I knee him, hard, in a place where no man should be hit. Grady grabs himself and drops like a stone, his face white. I bend down and pluck his gun off him and hand it to Ben, who doesn’t try and hide his amusement.

“Geez, Will,” Sam says, sucking in his breath. “You coulda just punched him.”

I glare down at Grady, who’s busy moaning.

“That’s for eating my biscuits,” I tell him.

Curtis claps me on the back and steers me back toward home. We leave Grady alone in the dirt, where I reckon he belongs. I lean heavily on Sam as we start walking again, tired but vindicated.

“Pleased with yourself?” he asks dryly.

“Yes,” I say, and my lips crack as I smile.





65.