McKettrick's Choice - Linda Lael Miller [156]
Instinctively, she bent low as they bolted through the doorway, over the porch, into the fresh air and sunlight.
There were bodies on the grass, but Frank and the Captain and Gabe Navarro were still standing upright. Then she saw Tillie, shot through the chest. John was kneeling on the ground, rocking her in his arms, tears streaming down his face.
“No,” Lorelei croaked, her throat parched from the smoke and the fear, holding Pearl even more tightly.
“No.”
Holt leaned to set Lorelei on the ground, and she swayed on her feet, stricken with grief. He dismounted, touched her shoulder, just briefly, as he passed, knelt next to Tillie, facing Mr. Cavanagh. “She’s gone,” he said quietly.
Tillie’s eyes stared sightlessly at the sky.
John let out a long, plaintive wail of grief and protest.
Lorelei put a hand to her mouth, to stifle a sob, and the Captain took Pearl from her arms.
Mr. Cavanagh clung to Tillie.
“We’ve got to take her home now, John,” Holt said.
A long time passed. Then John nodded, very slowly, and allowed Holt to lift Tillie’s body off the ground.
Lorelei remembered little of the sad, seemingly endless trip back to the Cavanagh place. She rode Seesaw, and Holt carried Tillie on the Appaloosa, as gently as if she were a sleeping child. The Captain brought Pearl, and Gabe stayed close to John.
It was all there was to do, for any of them. Keep riding. Keep breathing. Keep groping from one heartbeat to the next.
One week later
HOLT CROUCHED BESIDE Tillie’s grave, marked with the simple wooden cross John had carved himself, and tied Lizzie’s blue ribbon around one of the bars. He’d done everything he came to Texas to do—gotten Gabe out of jail, found Frank Corrales, put the Cavanagh ranch back on its feet, but at what cost?
He rubbed his eyes with a thumb and forefinger. “I’m sorry, Tillie,” he said, grinding out the words.
“It’s not your fault, Holt,” Rafe said, from somewhere behind him. Holt hadn’t heard his brother approach.
Holt picked his hat up off the ground, put it on, and stood. He wasn’t ready to face Rafe just yet, Rafe or anybody else. “You ready to ride for home?” he asked. John was grieving, but he’d be all right, with Heddy to love him through the rough spots. Gabe and Melina were properly married, and already making plans to build a cabin on the site of Lorelei’s ranch house.
He didn’t let his thoughts stray beyond that burned cabin, to the woman herself.
“I’m ready,” Rafe allowed, “and Frank’s saddled up, too. I reckon the question is, are you ready?”
At last, Holt turned. Rafe was watching him, arms folded, eyes wise. Seeing half again too much.
“I’ve done all the damage I could,” Holt said, with a slight shrug and an attempt at a grin, which fell flat.
“You’re just going to go off and leave Lorelei?”
Holt took his hat off again, turned it in his hands. Lorelei was inside the house, with Heddy and Melina, doing the kinds of things women did after a death. Cooking. Crying. Talking quietly. “You heard her. She means to buy Heddy’s place in Laredo and go into the room-and-board business.”
“You could talk her out of that, and you know it.”
Holt sighed. “I wouldn’t be doing her any favors.” He gestured in that direction, with his hat. “She needs a different kind of man. One who won’t get her shot at.”
Rafe shook his head. “Seems to me, you need to make a choice, here. Ride out, leave a good woman behind, like you did once before, and regret it for the rest of your days. Or have the plain grit to claim what you want and take your chances, just like the rest of us.”
Frank came out of the barn, leading their three horses, saddled and ready for the long trip ahead. Holt pretended an interest in the event. The goodbyes had all been said—except the one to Lorelei. There would be no looking back.
Lorelei was going to be fine. Gabe and the Captain would get her safely