Moonshine Massacre

Chapter 11

As they rode, Matt was all too aware of how Frankie’s firm, apple-sized breasts pressed into his back. The warmth of her breath against his neck and the strength of her supple arms around his waist made tingles of delight go through him. Despite her name and her mannish clothes, she was all woman—and having her so close like this was causing a definite reaction in him.

To make some conversation, he said, “Frankie’s sort of an unusual name for a gal, isn’t it?”

“Never you mind about my name,” she said. “Just find those horses. My pa and my brothers are probably starting to get worried about me.”

“Sure. Four horses, right?”

“That’s right.” She took one arm from around his waist and used that hand to point. “I think that’s them over there, isn’t it?”

Matt saw the dark shapes grazing on the grass where Frankie was pointing and said, “Yeah, I reckon so.” He turned his mount in that direction.

As they came closer, Frankie said quietly in his ear, “Stop here and let me off. I’ll go round them up.”

“I could probably lasso one of them for you,” Matt offered.

Frankie gave a little snort. “Spook them and run them all off again, that’s what you’d be liable to do. Just stop, like I told you.”

Matt brought his mount to a halt, biting back a comment as he did so about how bossy she was. Bossy she might be, but that didn’t make her any less lovely.

Frankie slid down from the horse’s back with an agile grace and ran lightly toward the runaway team. They were still harnessed together, so they couldn’t move that well. Matt heard her call out softly to them as she approached. The horses danced around skittishly for a second and let out a few nervous nickers, but then they settled down and allowed her to come up to them. She got a firm grip on the harness of one of the leaders. When he responded, so did the others. They followed docilely as she led them back to Matt.

“Here,” she said as she handed him the trailing reins. “Can you hang on to them?”

“Of course I can.”

“Move your foot out of the stirrup so I can get back up there.”

Matt gritted his teeth a little as he moved his foot. She really liked to give orders.

Frankie climbed aboard the horse behind Matt and took the reins back from him. Then they started toward the spot where the buckboard had turned over.

When they got back to the vehicle, Sam reported, “I went over everything, and there’s no major damage to the undercarriage. Whoever built this buckboard did a good job of it.” He reached for the reins. “I’ll get the team hitched up.”

Frankie slid down from the horse’s back. “I’ll do it,” she said. “They’re used to me.”

Sam looked at Matt, who gave a little shrug in answer to the unasked question of who had put the proverbial burr under Frankie’s proverbial saddle.

Frankie was as good as her word. She hitched the team to the wagon in a matter of minutes and had the buckboard ready to roll again.

“Thanks for your help,” she said as she settled herself on the seat, although to Matt’s ears it sounded like she had to drag the expression of gratitude out of her. “I’ll be fine now. You two can go on about your business.”

“Forget it,” Matt said. “Tonight our business is seeing to it that you get home safely. We’re comin’ with you, Miss Harlow, in case those blasted special marshals decide to jump you again.”

“I told you—” she began angrily, then stopped short. “What did you say?”

“That we’re comin’ with you in case those special marshals—”

“Hold it right there. Is that who you think bushwhacked me tonight?”

“Well, who else could it have been?” Matt asked. “We ran into a bunch of ’em earlier in the day, and attack-in’ a young woman seems like just the sort of lowdown, no-good thing those skunks would pull. Why, they blew up a whole cabin with a bomb just because some fellas were inside it who’d been makin’ whiskey!”

Matt heard the sharp intake of breath between Frankie’s lips, and an awful possibility occurred to him. Maybe that cabin had belonged to her family.

“Where was this?” she asked in a voice pulled taut with strain.

“A ways further west from here,” Sam replied. “Probably another three or four miles.”

A held breath came out with a sigh from Frankie’s mouth. “That would be the Bourland place. They never brewed much ’shine, just enough for themselves and a few friends of theirs. I thought for a second…Well, it doesn’t matter, does it?”

“You thought it was your family’s place that got blown up,” Matt said. “Nobody could blame you for bein’ worried about that.”

“Were any of the Bourlands hurt? Or…killed?”

Sam said, “None of them appeared to be hurt badly. They got out of the cabin in time, although just barely. They were all arrested, though.” He looked over at Matt. “Come to think of it, I’m surprised the marshals didn’t bring their prisoners into Cottonwood so they could be locked up in the local jail for the time being.”

Frankie shook her head. “Those regulators who call themselves special marshals don’t need to use jails. They’ve got jail wagons of their own that they cram their prisoners into and tote them around. They take them back to Wichita when they get a full load.”

Matt heard the scorn and hatred in Frankie’s voice when she referred to the special marshals as “regulators.” Such men, who often were hired to support one side or the other in a range war, were regarded as no better than hired killers. Having met Bickford and Porter that afternoon and seen their handiwork, Matt thought they fit that description pretty well.

“You’re wrong about them, though,” Frankie went on. “They’re not the ones who bushwhacked me.”

“Who else would have done a thing like that?” Sam asked.

“The Kanes.”

Her voice was cold and flinty with hatred as she answered.

Matt said, “You mean Cimarron Kane and his bunch?”

“That’s right.” Suspicion suddenly entered Frankie’s tone again as she asked, “How do you know Cimarron Kane?”

“We don’t,” Sam said. “His name was only vaguely familiar to us, until Marshal Coleman in Cottonwood told us about him tonight.”

“Oh. You’re friends of the marshal, are you?”

“I reckon you could say that,” Matt replied. “We helped him round up and arrest three of Kane’s cousins who showed up in Cottonwood today and started causin’ trouble.”

“That’s right!” Frankie said. “I heard something about that in Loomis’s place. That was you two?”

Matt nodded. “Yep.”

Sam asked, “Why would Cimarron Kane and his family attack you?”

“Because they want to take over the whiskey business in these parts. They’ve got a good-sized still out there on that spread they call a ranch. They’d like nothing better than to wipe out all the Harlows so they wouldn’t have any competition.” Frankie laughed humorlessly. “They’ll have to kill us all, because they sure as hell can’t make ’shine as good as we can.”

“How do you know it was them and not the marshals who were lying in wait on that ridge?”

“Because I heard Cimarron himself yelling orders at the others just as the shooting started,” Frankie replied.

“We should go back into Cottonwood so you can report that to Marshal Coleman,” Sam suggested.

Frankie laughed again, but this time there was a trace of genuine amusement in the sound.

“What’s funny about that?” Sam asked with a frown.

“Coleman’s the town marshal. He’s got no jurisdiction out here. What am I gonna do? Go to the county sheriff or, better yet, those special marshals and tell them that I got ambushed while I was on my way home after delivering a load of illegal whiskey to Ike Loomis’s place?”

“You don’t have to tell them what you were doin’,” Matt pointed out, “just that you were attacked.”

Frankie shook her head. “I’m not going to do anything to draw the law’s attention to my family, Bodine. That would be a mighty stupid thing to do.”

She was probably right about that, considering her family’s line of work, Matt thought.

“I don’t like the idea of Kane and his bunch gettin’ away with such a thing,” he said.

“We’ll deal with the Kanes in our own way,” Frankie said in a flat, hard tone. “That’s a promise. In the meantime, the two of you can head back to town. They won’t bother me again tonight.”

Matt shook his head. “You can’t be sure of that. We’re comin’ with you.”

“I told you—” Frankie stopped and heaved a sigh. “You’re pretty stubborn, aren’t you, Bodine?”

Matt grinned at her. “I’ve been accused of it,” he admitted.

“Actually, he’s been accused of a lot worse,” Sam added.

“What about you, Two Wolves?” Frankie asked. “Do you have any sense?”

“I like to think so. But in this case, I happen to believe that Matt’s right. There’s no guarantee that Cimarron Kane and his relatives won’t double back and try to ambush you again.”

“All right. I’m tired of arguing with the two of you.” Frankie lifted the reins and slapped them against the backs of the team. “Do what you want to,” she went on as the buckboard started rolling. “Whatever happens, it’s your own damned fault.”

“That sounds a little worrisome,” Sam commented as he and Matt rode side by side behind the buckboard.

“Aw, she’s just blowin’ off steam,” Matt said. “You can’t blame her, after gettin’ ambushed like that. If we hadn’t come along, there’s no tellin’ what might’ve happened, and I’ll bet she knows it.”

They followed the buckboard as Frankie drove another quarter of a mile or so along the main road, then turned south on a smaller trail. It led through a range of low, rolling hills, then cut through a series of rocky ridges that thrust up from the prairie almost like waves from the sea. The trail ran between cut-banks that rose just above the height of a man’s head on horseback.

Matt and Sam were following Frankie’s wagon through one of those cuts when dark shapes suddenly sailed out from the banks on both sides with no warning. The blood brothers saw the figures leaping toward them but didn’t have time to avoid them. The attackers slammed into Matt and Sam and knocked them out of their saddles, sending them crashing to the hard ground.