The evil men do lives after them.
~~William Shakespeare
Chapter One
Town of Federal, Wyoming Territory, Mid October
The ride into town from the Heart Bar A had done precious little to cool Allison Adams’s temper. While she selected the items she needed to bake her husband’s favorite pie, she silently berated herself for even considering crafting the confection. It shouldn’t matter if it was for his birthday. How dare he accuse her of not taking his wishes into consideration? To the best of her knowledge, it still took two for a woman to find herself in a delicate condition.
No matter how much she tried to impress on A.J. that every pregnancy was different, he remained adamant. No more children. How could he be certain she would have the same problems this time as she had delivering Jamie? Unconsciously, she covered her abdomen with her forearm, as if she could shield this child from the hateful words she and A.J. had hurled at one another a few hours before.
“Are you Mrs. Allison Adams?”
The unfamiliar voice interrupted her angry thoughts. Allison stopped, shifted the burlap sack full of items she had purchased, and turned. The lowering sun behind the man’s shoulder hid his features. A little taller than she was, sturdily built even though his stomach appeared to be going to paunch, nothing about him lent itself to a sense of recognition. He stood deep enough in the shadows of the small alleyway between the milliner’s and the general store that she hadn’t noticed him. The hair on the nape of her neck lifted and she instinctively took a step back.
“I’m Mrs. Adams.”
“Ma’am, I’m Dale Thompson and I’ve been asked to deliver a message to you.” Thompson drew a long breath, then said, as if he was reciting a soliloquy from a stage play, “Mr. Gene Oakten requests the honor of your presence—”
If that vile man thought she was going to willingly see him ever again…
“Oakten can go straight to hell.” She didn’t even flinch with her own use of vulgarity.
Without even batting an eye, the man continued. “—to negotiate the return of your children, Pamela and James.”
Pammy. And Jamie. She clutched the burlap sack convulsively. Her stomach sank past the soles of her shoes. “Where are my children?”
“I have been instructed to take you directly to them. Please come with me. Quietly.”
Allison looked up and down the usually busy Federal Avenue, the main street of the town. Panic stole her ability to think. Several blocks away, the bell on St. Margaret’s Catholic Church tolled four times. Where was everyone? Surely the whole town wasn’t already at supper. Desperation tightened her throat. “I have to go to the livery to get my mare.”
A mocking smile twisted Thompson’s face. “Ma’am, your horse is hitched in front of the bakery. I’ll walk you to that flashy sorrel of yours.”
No matter how angry they had been with one another, as soon as A.J. realized she and the children were missing, he would turn the town upside down. That certainty did nothing to relieve the panic twisting her insides into knots. Her mind raced. How could she alert A.J. she had been abducted and even leave a marked path to follow? As inconspicuously as possible, she let one of her riding gloves slip from her fingers. If she pretended she didn’t notice it falling, hopefully Thompson wouldn’t either.
As she swung up into the saddle, Thompson handed Allison her thin leather glove. “I believe this is yours.” His hand dropped onto the hilt of a terrifying large knife at his waist .
“I didn’t realize I dropped it. Thank you for returning it to me.”
His mocking smile returned, more frigid than before. Allison gulped as if she could choke down her mounting fear. A.J. had accused her just that morning of being a terrible liar when she had tried to keep a secret. She ducked her head and blinked away frightened tears.
Table Mountain filled the horizon as Thompson led her higher into the mountains that rose between Federal and Laramie. She swallowed bitter tears. That flat mesa had meant safety and security. Now, it loomed dark and threatening. At one point, Thompson trailed a small tributary of the Lodgepole Creek. When he finally reined his horse to a halt, she knew they were on Lazy L land, and had been for nearly half an hour. The landscape in front of them was broken and desolate, the result of too many years of digging out the earth in an attempt to strike silver. Thompson had led her to an old, played-out mine that Rachel Taylor’s father had tried to blast shut more than two decades ago.
Thompson dismounted and gestured for her to do the same.
“My children are in there?” Her skin crawled with the thought of her babies within the depths of that dead place.
He didn’t respond. Instead, he started toward the boarded-up entrance to the mine. What appeared to be a solid, wood wall from a distance revealed itself on a closer approach to be a door. Thompson pulled the entry open, its hinges silent and well-oiled. He lifted a lantern off a hook just inside the disguised entrance, struck a match, and touched it to the wick. Yellow light flickered until he lowered the globe over the flame.
“They’re this way,” he said and began to walk away. Allison had no choice but to follow him into the darkness.
To her right, the desiccated hulk of a buckskin horse kept an eternal vigil. The back half of the animal, trapped under a massive pile of stone, gave the dead animal the appearance of attempting to crawl its way from the rocks. A few more steps into the blackness and another dead horse came into the pitiful small circle of illumination. Allison stumbled over the uneven flooring and caught herself on the animal’s remains. She recoiled, barely keeping a scream contained when the dried-out carcass collapsed into dust.
Thompson never even hesitated. She scrambled to catch up to him, the terror of being lost in the total darkness choking her. Thick timber beams she could barely see in the dim light groaned and falling stones clattered in the darkness. If Thompson used anything to help navigate his way into the depths of the mine, she couldn’t discern it. After what felt like an eternity, a soft luminosity began to fill the end of the tunnel and a few paces later, the passageway ended at an immense subterranean cave. Massive roughed out wood supports shored up the walls and ceiling of the hollowed out opening.
The light of a single lantern revealed her children held prisoner in a metal cage. For no more than a second, though it felt as if it was her whole life, Allison couldn’t move. Pamela’s frantic head tossing and James’s garbled cries broke her immobility. She leapt across the distance, tugging futilely against the padlocked opening.
“This might be of some help.” The heavy Georgia drawl was something she had hoped to never hear again. The last time she heard it, the owner of that voice was negotiating to keep his neck from being stretched.
Allison spun around and backed as far as she could, prevented from moving away any further by a wall of the cage. “Let my children out of there. Whatever it is you want, you don’t need them. Let them go.”
“Sadly, I need them. And you.”
Thinner than she remembered—to the point of skeletal—his hair now white with some grey, Gene Oakten stood a few feet from her, holding out a large key. He held a heavy revolver in his other hand. The smile stretching across his mouth gave his face a cadaverous appearance. Breathing became difficult with the fear clawing at her throat. All she could do was shake her head in mute denial.
“As I live and breathe, you haven’t changed one iota, Mrs. Adams. Married life and motherhood most certainly agrees with you.” His feigned pleasantry was all the more terrifying for its insincerity. His gaze skipped over her frame. “My, that is a very becoming outfit. Is that an ermine collar?”
He didn’t wait for her to answer, not that she could. She couldn’t force a single word past the block of ice damming her throat.
“You have become every inch the lady that you passed yourself off as. Velvet riding habit, wool cloak, leather gloves. And, what an adorable little confection of a hat. But, we both know you’re not a lady, are you? We both know what you let that boy do with you in Georgia. I’ve always wanted to ask what you were really teaching him.”
Anger melted the ice and she couldn’t stop from blurting out, “You are no more than filthy, white trash.”
His smile broadened, grew colder. “Ah, but money buys respectability. And the gold that went missing near Clayborne certainly bought you respectability at the cost of another woman’s life. I wonder if he compares you to her. Remind me to have you ask your husband just where that gold truly is hidden.”
Allison risked a glance at her children. Tears tracked Pamela’s face and she and James were ashen. “Is that what this about? There never was any gold hidden at Clayborne.”
“That’s not what your husband told me.” Oakten paused and his emotionless gaze turned on her children. “If you’ll step aside, I’ll open that for you and you can go take those gags and ropes off your children.” The patently false concern in his voice increased the terror clouding her brain and tightening her chest.
Allison managed to shake her head. “Just let them go. They’re only children. Let them go, please.” She didn’t even know why she pleaded with him. As if he had any compunction against harming children. He’d proven more than once killing children didn’t bother him. She wrapped her arms around her stomach.
Oakten’s voice hardened. “Move aside, Allison. Or—” he gestured with the muzzle of the revolver “—I’ll shoot that handsome little man who is the very image of his father. And, then, I’ll shoot that raven-headed little lass.”
The frightened cries from her children were audible through their gags. Her legs felt as if they were made of wood but she took several steps to the side. The loud clattering of the tumblers in the lock echoed in the chill of the cave. As with the door at the entrance to the mine, the hinges on this portal didn’t squeak or squeal.
Allison rushed in and dropped to her knees by Pamela and James, tugging the gag first off James and then Pamela. James flinched when the door clanged shut. The chattering metal as Oakten twisted the key made Allison pause, then with a resolution she didn’t feel, she continued to pull at the knots binding her son. She unsuccessfully kept her own tears at bay when Pamela whispered, “I’m scared, Momma.”
Allison rained kisses down on her daughter and son. “It’s going to be all right,” she said, not knowing what else to say. She pulled back from the children, staring at Pamela. Her long hair was gone and the shortened length curled. “What happened to your hair?”
The girl shoved a finger in their abductor’s direction. “He cut my braid off!”
“Pa’s going to save us,” James said. Allison wished she felt the same confidence. She had no doubts that A.J. would come to attempt to rescue them, but at this point, it was two against one when he did arrive.
Oakten laughed when James repeated, “Pa will save us, Momma.”
“He will try,” the man said. A chill crept over Allison with the unspoken but implicit threat in his words. She looked over her shoulder to see him rifling through the burlap sack Thompson had taken from her in town. She had no idea what he expected to discover in the depths of that bag. Her gaze was drawn to the other side of the large cave and locked onto what appeared to be shackles bolted into one of the thick ceiling braces. A new dread washed over her with crippling intensity. The hurtful words she had thrown at A.J. that morning rasped against her, sharper and more painful than when her anger seethed.
“It appears you were planning on a special pie, Allison.” The conversational tone of Oakten’s voice pulled her attention from the metal restraints and her self-recrimination. “I would even venture a guess that it’s a chess pie with pecans judging by what’s in this bag.”
“We were going to help Momma make it,” Pamela said, “for Pa’s birthday. It’s his favorite. Mister, I want to go home.”
Allison shushed her daughter and glared at Oakten. Her anger that this man was once more terrorizing children, and this time the children were hers temporarily quelled her dread.
“Pamela,” he said, as he walked closer to the cell, “I promise if your father does what I expect him to do, you will be able to go home and help your mother bake that pie.”
If A.J. did as Oakten expected, they wouldn’t be baking a pie for him. There was murder in this vile man’s plans of that much she was certain. “Why are you doing this? No one knew you were here. You could have just left and been able to live the rest of your life somewhere far from here.”
“The rest of my life.” His laugh held no amusement. “I’m dying, Allison. According to the doctor at that lovely prison in Laramie City I have six months left. But, before I die, I’m going to finish what I should have done decades ago. You and your husband ruined my life. I intend to destroy the both of you.”
****
Two whole days...He hadn’t slept, had been unable to force himself to eat, and he was fairly certain he’d worn an inch’s deep groove into the floor of the jail with his pacing. The last words he snapped at Allison two days before burned as intensely as acid on his conscience.
The bells over the door jangled and he turned, hope dying when only Harrison Taylor entered.
“Anything?” A.J. couldn’t keep the panic from his voice.
Harrison shook his head and held the door open for his new deputy, Colt Evans. “Just what we already know. Pammy and Jamie never got to school the other morning and the last person to have seen Alli was Thom when she left the general store, the same day they disappeared. He says she left a little before four and I’ve got no reason to doubt him.”
A.J. propped his cane against the wall, sank into the chair behind the marshal’s ancient desk and dropped his head into his hands. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me Oakten escaped?”
“That was nine months ago.” The sound of liquid pouring into a container filled the silence. “I didn’t know about it for almost a week after he escaped. We both know he’s got an axe to grind with you so when he didn’t show up here, I just figured he left the area. I’m not going to jump to the conclusion that he’s involved or that they were even abducted.”
“You think she took the children and left me?” A.J. raised his head, staring across the room at his friend. “I don’t believe you think that and I know she wouldn’t do that. So that leaves abduction, Harrison. Period.”
“I’m inclined to agree with the judge,” Evans said as he poured a cup of coffee. “Nothing is missing from the house and what she got at Burlington’s isn’t something a woman planning to light out with two kids would have bought.”
Taylor set a full mug in front of A.J. “Let’s assume Oakten’s involved.”
“You know as well as I do he is involved.” He should have killed the bastard ten years ago and just let the chips fall where they may.
“For the sake of the argument, hear me out.” Taylor sighed and made his way to the windows at the front of the jail. “If it’s Oakten and he does have them and they’re still around here, he would have to be within half a day’s ride, to allow for Pammy and Jamie to vanish on the way to school and still give him time to get back to town to take Allison later in the same day. Colt and I checked every abandoned homestead around here. Drake and Ben are checking all the line shacks.”
“You can’t convince me it’s not him.” A.J. shot from the chair, unable to sit still any longer. “Damn it, Harrison, if you didn’t think Oakten’s involved, you wouldn’t have insisted I stay in town to keep tabs on me.”
Taylor shifted his gaze across the room. A.J. said, repeating himself, “She didn’t take the children and leave me.”
A chair in the back corner of the room creaked, drawing A.J.’s attention to the deputy.
“I’m not discounting what you’re saying about your wife and kids or even this Oakten character, Judge.”
A.J. winced as the deputy emphasized his elected office, reminding him protocol demanded he be guarded in instances like this.
“From what I’ve been told about this sidewinder, you’re the one he wants. Not them.” Evans took a long drink from his mug. “If you stayed out at your ranch, you played right into his hand. From where I’m sitting, he’s got the deck stacked against you. You need to let the marshal and me take care of this.”
A.J. picked up his cane. He looked out the windows, noting the long shadows creeping across the street. Any other day, he’d be in the kitchen watching Allison finishing up supper preparation, or in the study with Pammy and Jamie while they did their homework. Frustration painfully tightened his throat and a sense of helplessness bordering on desperation made his vision swim. “I’m going to my hotel room.”
“I’ll walk with you,” the deputy said.
A.J. looked over his shoulder. The aura of “shootist” still clung to Taylor’s deputy. It wasn’t anything more than the way Colt Evans had of sizing up a room with a single, sweeping glance, a cagey tautness to his movements, and the easy manner he wore his heavy revolver low and loose. “No. I’d rather you didn’t.”
Taylor met his gaze across the room. “A.J., that’s not—”
“I’m aware it’s neither protocol nor a good idea.” He pulled the door open. “If you hear anything, you know where to find me.”
The walk from the marshal’s office to the Americana Hotel took him down Lincoln Avenue. He paused on the boardwalk when the bell on St. Margaret’s tolled six times. If he hurried, he could be in time for Vespers. A.J. shook his head. There was no point. He’d concluded a long time ago that the Almighty apparently had better things to do than listen to his prayers.
He walked up the stairs of the wide veranda of the Americana and into the vestibule of the hotel. A single nod acknowledged the clerk’s greeting. The thick carpeting underfoot muffled the thud of his cane. Deep in thought, he unlocked his room, stepped in and shut the door behind him.
He scanned the room and his heart lodged in his throat. On the small table under the window a massive knife had been stabbed deeply into the wood. The blade pinned a long length of braided black hair, one end tied with a familiar red satin bow. He had watched Allison tie that ribbon around the end of Pamela’s braid just days ago. A piece of paper was held in place with the knife and under the braid.
A.J. didn’t work the blade loose. Without dislodging the braid from the knife, he moved the length of his daughter’s hair off the page. Every word written on the paper felt as if that knife was slashing across his very soul. “In due time, we will negotiate my terms for the release of your little family. When that time arrives, you will come alone. If you do not, you will never see them alive again and I will return them to you in small pieces.” Oakten’s signature filled the bottom half of the paper.
He steadied himself on the edge of the table, light-headed and sick to his soul with the images flooding his mind. He forced those imaginings into a dark recess where other, older nightmares resided. With a grim determination, he straightened and made his way as quickly as he could to the desk clerk. “Noah, did you let anyone into my room?”
The boy shook his head. “No one’s been here all day. It’s been really boring.” He held up a book. “I’ve got most of this read today. Is there something wrong?”
“Send your brother to the marshal’s office and tell him to tell Taylor to come here.”
A.J. went back to his room. He didn’t bother shutting the door. Instead, he collapsed into the ladder-backed chair near the window and stared at the grotesque arrangement pinioned to the table. That he’d been followed and watched by Oakten returned the light-headedness. How long had that bastard watched Pamela and James and Allison before he had abducted them? Bile rose in the back of his throat with the thought of Oakten even touching them.
It wasn’t long before Taylor, Evans, and A.J.’s younger brother, Drake, arrived. He didn’t get up when they came into the room. “It’s Oakten.”
The three men stood just inside the door, their attention on the table. Drake moved first, but only to close the door. Evans reopened the door and dropped to a knee to study the jamb and latch. Taylor crossed the room and leaned over the table. “Sweet Jesus,” he said. “We searched everywhere.”
“Apparently not everywhere.” A.J. stood. “I’m going home. He’s been following me, so he’ll know I’m there. And none of you are going with me.”
“No, you’re not.” Taylor shook his head. “You’re staying right here.”
“Unless you plan on arresting me, you can’t make me stay in town.” A.J. walked to the door. “That son of a bitch has my wife and my children. I will not jeopardize them.”
Drake grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him against the wall. “You can’t go back to the ranch. Everyone in town becomes a de facto deputy, to let Harrison or Colt know if they see anyone new or anything that doesn’t seem right. That’s over one hundred pairs of eyes and ears that we won’t have if you’re at the ranch.”
“Someone got into this room without being seen.” A.J. flung his brother’s restraint off. “I intend to do exactly what he wants. I’m doing this alone, Drake.”
Drake shoved him backward again and pressed his forearm across A.J.’s chest, just below his throat. “Don’t make me hurt you. You’re not leaving town. If I have to help Harrison drag you to the jail, I will, and I’ll come up with any charge I can to keep you in a cell.”
“You can’t charge me with anything. You gave up being prosecutor a few years ago.”
“Doesn’t mean I can’t remember charges to have Harrison file against you. And, I’ll do it, if it means we keep you alive.”
“What would you be doing if some madman had Jessie?” A.J. asked, and shoved his brother, attempting to break Drake’s restraint. He ceased the struggle when Drake merely leaned more of his weight against his forearm.
Evans rose to his feet. “I know how whoever it was got in. There’s fresh gouge marks in the wood and scraping the metal on the latch.” He nodded his head at the upright, embedded blade. “Probably with that knife.”
Ben Hauser, foreman at the Lazy L and occasional deputy for Taylor, chose that moment to walk in. He glanced at A.J. and Drake, pausing to ask, “What did you do now, Johnny Reb?”
A.J. didn’t have a chance to answer before Harrison said, “Ben, I need you to go to the saloons and ask if there’s been anyone new in town. Chat with some of the doves, too. Talk to Rose, too. I swear that old dove knows more about what goes on in this town than I do.”
Ben nodded. “I can do that. Anything else? Like stop at Morris’s and have supper sent to the jail? It looks like you might be taking Johnny there into custody.”
Drake eased the pressure holding A.J. prisoner against the wall. He shoved his brother away and straightened, glaring at Drake the whole time. A.J. tugged on the front of his shirt, adjusted the fabric and ground out, “He’s not taking me to jail.”
“Don’t push me on that.” Harrison glanced over his shoulder at the table. “I know your proclivity to be a hero.”
“He has—”
“We got that, A.J.” Taylor gestured to the table. “Now let me do my job to keep you protected and get your wife and children back to you. Alive and in one piece.”
A.J. struggled to pull a breath in and couldn’t. All the fight drained from him. He nodded then dropped his head. Silence filled the hotel room until Taylor clamped a hand onto his shoulder and said, “We’ll find them and bring them back to you.”
He lifted his head and met the marshal’s gaze when Taylor added in an undertone, “If this was Rachel and my kids…”
“You’d be doing exactly what you won’t let me do.”
“Yeah, I would. And, I’d be going out of my mind.” Taylor’s voice firmed and he released A.J. “Colt, get about ten men together. We’re going to need two or three to work in shifts on the roof of the Cattleman’s Association building. I know we can put a couple in Doc’s office. Cole will probably be one of them. And, talk to Father O’Cleary. Ask him if we can put a man up in the bell tower at St. Margaret’s.”
Evans turned to leave. He paused when the marshal added, “And, do this very quietly.”
The deputy glanced over his shoulder, a large grin breaking. “I was planning on putting up posters all over town asking for volunteers.”
~~William Shakespeare
Chapter One
Town of Federal, Wyoming Territory, Mid October
The ride into town from the Heart Bar A had done precious little to cool Allison Adams’s temper. While she selected the items she needed to bake her husband’s favorite pie, she silently berated herself for even considering crafting the confection. It shouldn’t matter if it was for his birthday. How dare he accuse her of not taking his wishes into consideration? To the best of her knowledge, it still took two for a woman to find herself in a delicate condition.
No matter how much she tried to impress on A.J. that every pregnancy was different, he remained adamant. No more children. How could he be certain she would have the same problems this time as she had delivering Jamie? Unconsciously, she covered her abdomen with her forearm, as if she could shield this child from the hateful words she and A.J. had hurled at one another a few hours before.
“Are you Mrs. Allison Adams?”
The unfamiliar voice interrupted her angry thoughts. Allison stopped, shifted the burlap sack full of items she had purchased, and turned. The lowering sun behind the man’s shoulder hid his features. A little taller than she was, sturdily built even though his stomach appeared to be going to paunch, nothing about him lent itself to a sense of recognition. He stood deep enough in the shadows of the small alleyway between the milliner’s and the general store that she hadn’t noticed him. The hair on the nape of her neck lifted and she instinctively took a step back.
“I’m Mrs. Adams.”
“Ma’am, I’m Dale Thompson and I’ve been asked to deliver a message to you.” Thompson drew a long breath, then said, as if he was reciting a soliloquy from a stage play, “Mr. Gene Oakten requests the honor of your presence—”
If that vile man thought she was going to willingly see him ever again…
“Oakten can go straight to hell.” She didn’t even flinch with her own use of vulgarity.
Without even batting an eye, the man continued. “—to negotiate the return of your children, Pamela and James.”
Pammy. And Jamie. She clutched the burlap sack convulsively. Her stomach sank past the soles of her shoes. “Where are my children?”
“I have been instructed to take you directly to them. Please come with me. Quietly.”
Allison looked up and down the usually busy Federal Avenue, the main street of the town. Panic stole her ability to think. Several blocks away, the bell on St. Margaret’s Catholic Church tolled four times. Where was everyone? Surely the whole town wasn’t already at supper. Desperation tightened her throat. “I have to go to the livery to get my mare.”
A mocking smile twisted Thompson’s face. “Ma’am, your horse is hitched in front of the bakery. I’ll walk you to that flashy sorrel of yours.”
No matter how angry they had been with one another, as soon as A.J. realized she and the children were missing, he would turn the town upside down. That certainty did nothing to relieve the panic twisting her insides into knots. Her mind raced. How could she alert A.J. she had been abducted and even leave a marked path to follow? As inconspicuously as possible, she let one of her riding gloves slip from her fingers. If she pretended she didn’t notice it falling, hopefully Thompson wouldn’t either.
As she swung up into the saddle, Thompson handed Allison her thin leather glove. “I believe this is yours.” His hand dropped onto the hilt of a terrifying large knife at his waist .
“I didn’t realize I dropped it. Thank you for returning it to me.”
His mocking smile returned, more frigid than before. Allison gulped as if she could choke down her mounting fear. A.J. had accused her just that morning of being a terrible liar when she had tried to keep a secret. She ducked her head and blinked away frightened tears.
Table Mountain filled the horizon as Thompson led her higher into the mountains that rose between Federal and Laramie. She swallowed bitter tears. That flat mesa had meant safety and security. Now, it loomed dark and threatening. At one point, Thompson trailed a small tributary of the Lodgepole Creek. When he finally reined his horse to a halt, she knew they were on Lazy L land, and had been for nearly half an hour. The landscape in front of them was broken and desolate, the result of too many years of digging out the earth in an attempt to strike silver. Thompson had led her to an old, played-out mine that Rachel Taylor’s father had tried to blast shut more than two decades ago.
Thompson dismounted and gestured for her to do the same.
“My children are in there?” Her skin crawled with the thought of her babies within the depths of that dead place.
He didn’t respond. Instead, he started toward the boarded-up entrance to the mine. What appeared to be a solid, wood wall from a distance revealed itself on a closer approach to be a door. Thompson pulled the entry open, its hinges silent and well-oiled. He lifted a lantern off a hook just inside the disguised entrance, struck a match, and touched it to the wick. Yellow light flickered until he lowered the globe over the flame.
“They’re this way,” he said and began to walk away. Allison had no choice but to follow him into the darkness.
To her right, the desiccated hulk of a buckskin horse kept an eternal vigil. The back half of the animal, trapped under a massive pile of stone, gave the dead animal the appearance of attempting to crawl its way from the rocks. A few more steps into the blackness and another dead horse came into the pitiful small circle of illumination. Allison stumbled over the uneven flooring and caught herself on the animal’s remains. She recoiled, barely keeping a scream contained when the dried-out carcass collapsed into dust.
Thompson never even hesitated. She scrambled to catch up to him, the terror of being lost in the total darkness choking her. Thick timber beams she could barely see in the dim light groaned and falling stones clattered in the darkness. If Thompson used anything to help navigate his way into the depths of the mine, she couldn’t discern it. After what felt like an eternity, a soft luminosity began to fill the end of the tunnel and a few paces later, the passageway ended at an immense subterranean cave. Massive roughed out wood supports shored up the walls and ceiling of the hollowed out opening.
The light of a single lantern revealed her children held prisoner in a metal cage. For no more than a second, though it felt as if it was her whole life, Allison couldn’t move. Pamela’s frantic head tossing and James’s garbled cries broke her immobility. She leapt across the distance, tugging futilely against the padlocked opening.
“This might be of some help.” The heavy Georgia drawl was something she had hoped to never hear again. The last time she heard it, the owner of that voice was negotiating to keep his neck from being stretched.
Allison spun around and backed as far as she could, prevented from moving away any further by a wall of the cage. “Let my children out of there. Whatever it is you want, you don’t need them. Let them go.”
“Sadly, I need them. And you.”
Thinner than she remembered—to the point of skeletal—his hair now white with some grey, Gene Oakten stood a few feet from her, holding out a large key. He held a heavy revolver in his other hand. The smile stretching across his mouth gave his face a cadaverous appearance. Breathing became difficult with the fear clawing at her throat. All she could do was shake her head in mute denial.
“As I live and breathe, you haven’t changed one iota, Mrs. Adams. Married life and motherhood most certainly agrees with you.” His feigned pleasantry was all the more terrifying for its insincerity. His gaze skipped over her frame. “My, that is a very becoming outfit. Is that an ermine collar?”
He didn’t wait for her to answer, not that she could. She couldn’t force a single word past the block of ice damming her throat.
“You have become every inch the lady that you passed yourself off as. Velvet riding habit, wool cloak, leather gloves. And, what an adorable little confection of a hat. But, we both know you’re not a lady, are you? We both know what you let that boy do with you in Georgia. I’ve always wanted to ask what you were really teaching him.”
Anger melted the ice and she couldn’t stop from blurting out, “You are no more than filthy, white trash.”
His smile broadened, grew colder. “Ah, but money buys respectability. And the gold that went missing near Clayborne certainly bought you respectability at the cost of another woman’s life. I wonder if he compares you to her. Remind me to have you ask your husband just where that gold truly is hidden.”
Allison risked a glance at her children. Tears tracked Pamela’s face and she and James were ashen. “Is that what this about? There never was any gold hidden at Clayborne.”
“That’s not what your husband told me.” Oakten paused and his emotionless gaze turned on her children. “If you’ll step aside, I’ll open that for you and you can go take those gags and ropes off your children.” The patently false concern in his voice increased the terror clouding her brain and tightening her chest.
Allison managed to shake her head. “Just let them go. They’re only children. Let them go, please.” She didn’t even know why she pleaded with him. As if he had any compunction against harming children. He’d proven more than once killing children didn’t bother him. She wrapped her arms around her stomach.
Oakten’s voice hardened. “Move aside, Allison. Or—” he gestured with the muzzle of the revolver “—I’ll shoot that handsome little man who is the very image of his father. And, then, I’ll shoot that raven-headed little lass.”
The frightened cries from her children were audible through their gags. Her legs felt as if they were made of wood but she took several steps to the side. The loud clattering of the tumblers in the lock echoed in the chill of the cave. As with the door at the entrance to the mine, the hinges on this portal didn’t squeak or squeal.
Allison rushed in and dropped to her knees by Pamela and James, tugging the gag first off James and then Pamela. James flinched when the door clanged shut. The chattering metal as Oakten twisted the key made Allison pause, then with a resolution she didn’t feel, she continued to pull at the knots binding her son. She unsuccessfully kept her own tears at bay when Pamela whispered, “I’m scared, Momma.”
Allison rained kisses down on her daughter and son. “It’s going to be all right,” she said, not knowing what else to say. She pulled back from the children, staring at Pamela. Her long hair was gone and the shortened length curled. “What happened to your hair?”
The girl shoved a finger in their abductor’s direction. “He cut my braid off!”
“Pa’s going to save us,” James said. Allison wished she felt the same confidence. She had no doubts that A.J. would come to attempt to rescue them, but at this point, it was two against one when he did arrive.
Oakten laughed when James repeated, “Pa will save us, Momma.”
“He will try,” the man said. A chill crept over Allison with the unspoken but implicit threat in his words. She looked over her shoulder to see him rifling through the burlap sack Thompson had taken from her in town. She had no idea what he expected to discover in the depths of that bag. Her gaze was drawn to the other side of the large cave and locked onto what appeared to be shackles bolted into one of the thick ceiling braces. A new dread washed over her with crippling intensity. The hurtful words she had thrown at A.J. that morning rasped against her, sharper and more painful than when her anger seethed.
“It appears you were planning on a special pie, Allison.” The conversational tone of Oakten’s voice pulled her attention from the metal restraints and her self-recrimination. “I would even venture a guess that it’s a chess pie with pecans judging by what’s in this bag.”
“We were going to help Momma make it,” Pamela said, “for Pa’s birthday. It’s his favorite. Mister, I want to go home.”
Allison shushed her daughter and glared at Oakten. Her anger that this man was once more terrorizing children, and this time the children were hers temporarily quelled her dread.
“Pamela,” he said, as he walked closer to the cell, “I promise if your father does what I expect him to do, you will be able to go home and help your mother bake that pie.”
If A.J. did as Oakten expected, they wouldn’t be baking a pie for him. There was murder in this vile man’s plans of that much she was certain. “Why are you doing this? No one knew you were here. You could have just left and been able to live the rest of your life somewhere far from here.”
“The rest of my life.” His laugh held no amusement. “I’m dying, Allison. According to the doctor at that lovely prison in Laramie City I have six months left. But, before I die, I’m going to finish what I should have done decades ago. You and your husband ruined my life. I intend to destroy the both of you.”
****
Two whole days...He hadn’t slept, had been unable to force himself to eat, and he was fairly certain he’d worn an inch’s deep groove into the floor of the jail with his pacing. The last words he snapped at Allison two days before burned as intensely as acid on his conscience.
The bells over the door jangled and he turned, hope dying when only Harrison Taylor entered.
“Anything?” A.J. couldn’t keep the panic from his voice.
Harrison shook his head and held the door open for his new deputy, Colt Evans. “Just what we already know. Pammy and Jamie never got to school the other morning and the last person to have seen Alli was Thom when she left the general store, the same day they disappeared. He says she left a little before four and I’ve got no reason to doubt him.”
A.J. propped his cane against the wall, sank into the chair behind the marshal’s ancient desk and dropped his head into his hands. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me Oakten escaped?”
“That was nine months ago.” The sound of liquid pouring into a container filled the silence. “I didn’t know about it for almost a week after he escaped. We both know he’s got an axe to grind with you so when he didn’t show up here, I just figured he left the area. I’m not going to jump to the conclusion that he’s involved or that they were even abducted.”
“You think she took the children and left me?” A.J. raised his head, staring across the room at his friend. “I don’t believe you think that and I know she wouldn’t do that. So that leaves abduction, Harrison. Period.”
“I’m inclined to agree with the judge,” Evans said as he poured a cup of coffee. “Nothing is missing from the house and what she got at Burlington’s isn’t something a woman planning to light out with two kids would have bought.”
Taylor set a full mug in front of A.J. “Let’s assume Oakten’s involved.”
“You know as well as I do he is involved.” He should have killed the bastard ten years ago and just let the chips fall where they may.
“For the sake of the argument, hear me out.” Taylor sighed and made his way to the windows at the front of the jail. “If it’s Oakten and he does have them and they’re still around here, he would have to be within half a day’s ride, to allow for Pammy and Jamie to vanish on the way to school and still give him time to get back to town to take Allison later in the same day. Colt and I checked every abandoned homestead around here. Drake and Ben are checking all the line shacks.”
“You can’t convince me it’s not him.” A.J. shot from the chair, unable to sit still any longer. “Damn it, Harrison, if you didn’t think Oakten’s involved, you wouldn’t have insisted I stay in town to keep tabs on me.”
Taylor shifted his gaze across the room. A.J. said, repeating himself, “She didn’t take the children and leave me.”
A chair in the back corner of the room creaked, drawing A.J.’s attention to the deputy.
“I’m not discounting what you’re saying about your wife and kids or even this Oakten character, Judge.”
A.J. winced as the deputy emphasized his elected office, reminding him protocol demanded he be guarded in instances like this.
“From what I’ve been told about this sidewinder, you’re the one he wants. Not them.” Evans took a long drink from his mug. “If you stayed out at your ranch, you played right into his hand. From where I’m sitting, he’s got the deck stacked against you. You need to let the marshal and me take care of this.”
A.J. picked up his cane. He looked out the windows, noting the long shadows creeping across the street. Any other day, he’d be in the kitchen watching Allison finishing up supper preparation, or in the study with Pammy and Jamie while they did their homework. Frustration painfully tightened his throat and a sense of helplessness bordering on desperation made his vision swim. “I’m going to my hotel room.”
“I’ll walk with you,” the deputy said.
A.J. looked over his shoulder. The aura of “shootist” still clung to Taylor’s deputy. It wasn’t anything more than the way Colt Evans had of sizing up a room with a single, sweeping glance, a cagey tautness to his movements, and the easy manner he wore his heavy revolver low and loose. “No. I’d rather you didn’t.”
Taylor met his gaze across the room. “A.J., that’s not—”
“I’m aware it’s neither protocol nor a good idea.” He pulled the door open. “If you hear anything, you know where to find me.”
The walk from the marshal’s office to the Americana Hotel took him down Lincoln Avenue. He paused on the boardwalk when the bell on St. Margaret’s tolled six times. If he hurried, he could be in time for Vespers. A.J. shook his head. There was no point. He’d concluded a long time ago that the Almighty apparently had better things to do than listen to his prayers.
He walked up the stairs of the wide veranda of the Americana and into the vestibule of the hotel. A single nod acknowledged the clerk’s greeting. The thick carpeting underfoot muffled the thud of his cane. Deep in thought, he unlocked his room, stepped in and shut the door behind him.
He scanned the room and his heart lodged in his throat. On the small table under the window a massive knife had been stabbed deeply into the wood. The blade pinned a long length of braided black hair, one end tied with a familiar red satin bow. He had watched Allison tie that ribbon around the end of Pamela’s braid just days ago. A piece of paper was held in place with the knife and under the braid.
A.J. didn’t work the blade loose. Without dislodging the braid from the knife, he moved the length of his daughter’s hair off the page. Every word written on the paper felt as if that knife was slashing across his very soul. “In due time, we will negotiate my terms for the release of your little family. When that time arrives, you will come alone. If you do not, you will never see them alive again and I will return them to you in small pieces.” Oakten’s signature filled the bottom half of the paper.
He steadied himself on the edge of the table, light-headed and sick to his soul with the images flooding his mind. He forced those imaginings into a dark recess where other, older nightmares resided. With a grim determination, he straightened and made his way as quickly as he could to the desk clerk. “Noah, did you let anyone into my room?”
The boy shook his head. “No one’s been here all day. It’s been really boring.” He held up a book. “I’ve got most of this read today. Is there something wrong?”
“Send your brother to the marshal’s office and tell him to tell Taylor to come here.”
A.J. went back to his room. He didn’t bother shutting the door. Instead, he collapsed into the ladder-backed chair near the window and stared at the grotesque arrangement pinioned to the table. That he’d been followed and watched by Oakten returned the light-headedness. How long had that bastard watched Pamela and James and Allison before he had abducted them? Bile rose in the back of his throat with the thought of Oakten even touching them.
It wasn’t long before Taylor, Evans, and A.J.’s younger brother, Drake, arrived. He didn’t get up when they came into the room. “It’s Oakten.”
The three men stood just inside the door, their attention on the table. Drake moved first, but only to close the door. Evans reopened the door and dropped to a knee to study the jamb and latch. Taylor crossed the room and leaned over the table. “Sweet Jesus,” he said. “We searched everywhere.”
“Apparently not everywhere.” A.J. stood. “I’m going home. He’s been following me, so he’ll know I’m there. And none of you are going with me.”
“No, you’re not.” Taylor shook his head. “You’re staying right here.”
“Unless you plan on arresting me, you can’t make me stay in town.” A.J. walked to the door. “That son of a bitch has my wife and my children. I will not jeopardize them.”
Drake grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him against the wall. “You can’t go back to the ranch. Everyone in town becomes a de facto deputy, to let Harrison or Colt know if they see anyone new or anything that doesn’t seem right. That’s over one hundred pairs of eyes and ears that we won’t have if you’re at the ranch.”
“Someone got into this room without being seen.” A.J. flung his brother’s restraint off. “I intend to do exactly what he wants. I’m doing this alone, Drake.”
Drake shoved him backward again and pressed his forearm across A.J.’s chest, just below his throat. “Don’t make me hurt you. You’re not leaving town. If I have to help Harrison drag you to the jail, I will, and I’ll come up with any charge I can to keep you in a cell.”
“You can’t charge me with anything. You gave up being prosecutor a few years ago.”
“Doesn’t mean I can’t remember charges to have Harrison file against you. And, I’ll do it, if it means we keep you alive.”
“What would you be doing if some madman had Jessie?” A.J. asked, and shoved his brother, attempting to break Drake’s restraint. He ceased the struggle when Drake merely leaned more of his weight against his forearm.
Evans rose to his feet. “I know how whoever it was got in. There’s fresh gouge marks in the wood and scraping the metal on the latch.” He nodded his head at the upright, embedded blade. “Probably with that knife.”
Ben Hauser, foreman at the Lazy L and occasional deputy for Taylor, chose that moment to walk in. He glanced at A.J. and Drake, pausing to ask, “What did you do now, Johnny Reb?”
A.J. didn’t have a chance to answer before Harrison said, “Ben, I need you to go to the saloons and ask if there’s been anyone new in town. Chat with some of the doves, too. Talk to Rose, too. I swear that old dove knows more about what goes on in this town than I do.”
Ben nodded. “I can do that. Anything else? Like stop at Morris’s and have supper sent to the jail? It looks like you might be taking Johnny there into custody.”
Drake eased the pressure holding A.J. prisoner against the wall. He shoved his brother away and straightened, glaring at Drake the whole time. A.J. tugged on the front of his shirt, adjusted the fabric and ground out, “He’s not taking me to jail.”
“Don’t push me on that.” Harrison glanced over his shoulder at the table. “I know your proclivity to be a hero.”
“He has—”
“We got that, A.J.” Taylor gestured to the table. “Now let me do my job to keep you protected and get your wife and children back to you. Alive and in one piece.”
A.J. struggled to pull a breath in and couldn’t. All the fight drained from him. He nodded then dropped his head. Silence filled the hotel room until Taylor clamped a hand onto his shoulder and said, “We’ll find them and bring them back to you.”
He lifted his head and met the marshal’s gaze when Taylor added in an undertone, “If this was Rachel and my kids…”
“You’d be doing exactly what you won’t let me do.”
“Yeah, I would. And, I’d be going out of my mind.” Taylor’s voice firmed and he released A.J. “Colt, get about ten men together. We’re going to need two or three to work in shifts on the roof of the Cattleman’s Association building. I know we can put a couple in Doc’s office. Cole will probably be one of them. And, talk to Father O’Cleary. Ask him if we can put a man up in the bell tower at St. Margaret’s.”
Evans turned to leave. He paused when the marshal added, “And, do this very quietly.”
The deputy glanced over his shoulder, a large grin breaking. “I was planning on putting up posters all over town asking for volunteers.”