The Marshal's Surrender (Holidays in Mountain Home Book 3) Read online

  Hunter sat taller. “Yes sir.”

  “Dollars to donuts, they’ve got one or more men layin’ low on the boulder, ready to take a shot at us riding in. I figure they don’t much care when they put a bullet between my eyes, nor who else they shoot in the mayhem.”

  Gerald cursed. “We’re dead men.”

  Phil hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Go home, son. No one’s forcing you to risk your life.”

  “I might do that.”

  Gerald’s wife and children waited back at the house. Chances were he’d never been in a gunfight. “If the wind doesn’t blow in our favor, the women and children will need protection—you can do that. Go on. No hard feelings.”

  The older man shifted, uncomfortable and indecisive.

  Gus couldn’t wait. He spoke to the rest of the posse. “It’s me Smythe wants. Noelle’s survival—” He choked on a heart so full it bobbed in his throat. How had he believed himself incapable of loving Noelle? Why had he clung to that mistaken identity, and allowed it to ruin his happiness and hers?

  He’d wasted so much time and a wealth of opportunities. Stupid.

  He held her father’s eye. “I love Noelle.” Agonized, he regretted not telling her himself. The words came easily. He could have. Should have. “She’s worth any price. You tell her that. For me.”

  Phil nodded, and didn’t make a condescending remark about Gus telling her himself. They both knew he wouldn’t survive.

  Gus recovered himself. “Deputies Murphy and Dillinger, take up firing positions on the downhill side.” No sense getting both green deputies killed if he could prevent it. Somebody needed to survive and see remaining Ruffians transported to Cañon City.

  “Ready to ride?” Gus asked.

  The space of two heartbeats passed.

  “You think she’s still alive?” Luke asked.

  “I know it. They need her for a bargaining chip. If this goes South, and this conflict doesn’t end tonight, they’ll need leverage.”

  Gus held Luke’s gaze then looked to Phil, the deputies, the rest of Noelle’s brothers. They’d all stand as witnesses. Someone would ensure she knew how much Gus had loved her. He locked on Gerald. “I meant what I said. I’ll ride into the fires of hell to reclaim her.”

  Gus expected trouble.

  If only he could double-guess Jed Smythe…

  As agreed, Gus led the posse hard and fast toward Dead Man’s Drop, praying the others were already in position. He strained to hear any indication of movement over the thunder of four horses’ hooves, but detected nothing.

  Until they rounded the bend, and the site came into view.

  He’d expected full dark, men hiding beyond the fallen granite boulder, not a sign of the bandits.

  Until they’d plowed through the narrow pass to the other side and every expectation sizzled and disappeared, water drops on a hot skillet.

  Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat.

  Torchbearers, one on each side of the narrow pass, shed more than enough light on the roadway for Gus to realize several vital details all at once.

  A single rider sat on a nervous horse, right in the middle of that pass. That rider was a woman—Noelle.

  The miscreants had bound her hands behind her back and strung a noose around her neck. The rope looped up and over downed telegraph pole.

  They intended to hang Noelle?

  Here. Now.

  Gus pulled back on the reins, halting Beau. Noelle’s brothers slowed and stopped. They waited four abreast, then five as Gerald caught up, across the road.

  Her eyes rounded, and if it weren’t for the gag in her mouth, she’d have yelled. Torchlight caught on tears streaming down her cheeks.

  Love and compassion for his woman were instantly elbowed aside by rougher, angrier emotions. Fury and shock warred for dominance. Both prevented him from solving the conundrum. He was supposed to trade his life for hers.

  Jedediah Smythe wanted Gus’s hide?

  He could have it—as long as Noelle went free.

  Behind him, he heard the unmistakable clatter of Hunter levering a bullet into the chamber.

  If only he could see beyond that broad circle of light, get a better glimpse of where the men were, how many guns were aimed at their hearts.

  Noelle’s frantic movement, shaking her head side to side in an obvious communication of no!, caught his attention and wouldn’t release him.

  How could he ensure her safety? His heart galloped rapidly in his chest, and the world around him slowed, stretched like warm molasses taffy…

  And he simply knew what he had to do. With his pistol in hand, it took a mere second to draw a bead on the unlucky bastard holding the far end of the hangman’s noose. Dead, he couldn’t hold the rope, and if his shot startled the horse beneath Noelle, she wouldn’t hang.

  They’d expected this, of course, for in the same long second, the guy holding the torch swung it in a long arc backward, shedding revealing light on Gus’s target—Noelle’s father held that rope, at gunpoint.

  In his gut, he knew Phil would rather drop the rope and take a close-range bullet than be party to his daughter’s hanging. But Jed wouldn’t have left anything like this to chance. There would be more men aiming at Phil, others prepared to take his place, to secure the rope.

  If only he could see!

  Gus spun his wrist, pointed his Colt at the heavens, and disengaged the hammer.

  Beau tossed his head, sidestepped, and Gus’s mind whirled. With sharp clarity, every sense on highest alert, he took note of Luke, Hunter, and Gerald, rifles aimed, their mounts moved into place flanking him on both sides.

  The odds had changed, and not in their favor. If Phil had been captured, then chances were, so had Timothy and Dallas. That meant no one watched the gang’s backs. With those three out of commission, their odds were terrible. He’d be lucky if a single Finlay came out of this altercation alive.

  It wasn’t supposed to have gone down like this.

  Gus made a show of tossing both beloved Colts into the muddy road. Moving slowly, as to not disturb the high-strung horse beneath Noelle, he dismounted. “Jedediah Smythe!”

  Silence. Saddle leather creaked. Gus’s heart raced, pounding in his ears, but he fancied he heard Noelle’s muffled cries behind her gag.

  Despite the silence, he knew he’d identified the correct man. Smythe no doubt toyed with him, refusing to answer, making him question himself.

  He met her gaze, tried his best to communicate his love for her, his reasons—only one, really—for putting an end to this. The only end that had a sliver of a chance of seeing her alive at sunrise. He prayed she’d not be witness to the murders of her father, brothers, and friends.

  Long seconds passed.

  The horse beneath Noelle shuffled, nervous, its reins trailing in the mud.

  Gus put up both hands, took two slow, easy steps closer to his death. The whole time, he held Noelle’s gaze with his.

  This woman held his heart. His worn out, hand-me-down, tattered heart had settled so fully on her, he had zero choice.

  He had to try and win her safety by sacrificing himself to Jed’s gang.

  He had no confidence the man would take him in her stead, and ultimately set her free. But one thing was clear. If Gus did nothing, she’d be lost forever. If not twisting and suffocating at the end of a poorly knotted noose, then by gunshot or worse.

  He would not let that happen.

  “Jed!” Gus held his breath, his gaze soaking up every detail of Noelle’s beautiful eyes, the love brimming in her tears. “It’s me you want. Take me, instead.”

  He swallowed hard, fought down the wobble that crept into his voice. “Let her go.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Noelle’s heart shuddered and threatened to stop completely. Had she ever been this furious at anyone? Were all men so dense?

  Gus held her gaze, the torch light illuminating his dear face, as he walked into hell to save her.

  What was he thinking?
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  It wouldn’t work—she figured he knew that much.

  He’d obviously figured out a thing or two, because he’d called one of the gang members by name—Jedediah Smythe. The name meant nothing to her, but it evidently meant a great deal to Gus. A man from his past. A man who knew him as U.S. Marshal Rose.

  She would die, and because he hadn’t the sense of a goose, he didn’t know when to cut his losses and run away.

  Thus, her death had no possibility of meaning anything.

  If she could save him, she’d do it.

  Gus deserved to live.

  Tears of anger—fury at her captors, frustration with Gus, love for this heroic, wonderful man swelling in her to the point she couldn’t hold the tears in any longer—ran down her cold cheeks in warm tracks.

  Her nose started to stuff up. With a gag shoved in her mouth and her hands bound behind her back, she panicked. Drawing enough air suddenly became a much bigger problem.

  She wanted to live.

  The twitchy horse didn’t like Gus’s approach. It bobbed its head, pinned its ears, and nickered a warning. The rope about her neck drew taut, scraped across her throat, and pulled her posture straight. She squeezed the horse between her knees and held on.

  Gus took another stride forward, his hands still up in that universal sign of surrender. Then another.

  “Good of you to join us, Marshal.” Boss’s voice. Coming from the safety of the darkness beyond the pass.

  “Just responding to your invitation, Jed.” Gus’s voice carried on the still air. He projected so all could hear.

  Did he really intend to give himself up?

  Her gaze darted back to where Luke, Gerald, and Hunter waited on their mounts, nearly beyond the reach of torchlight. Her heart pounded with growing anxiety—her brothers and brother-in-law needed to leave. They couldn’t save her. They had families to live for.

  Gus took her horse’s bridle in his big, solid hand and steadied the beast, even as he spoke. “What do you say you come on out so we can make an exchange. Me for the girl.”

  Her heart rolled all the way over. Love for him had her shouting no! before she remembered the gag. The muffled, unintelligible sound brought Gus’s attention back to her. Something in his luminous, storms-a-brewin’ eyes begged her to trust him.

  Trust? Trust?

  Sit here and do nothing while he gave himself up to certain and horrendous death? Not if she could do anything about it.

  A hint of a smile, so sad, so filled with an emotion she’d seen lingering in his eyes, touched Gus’s mouth. I love you. He formed each word softly, carefully, as if he’d prefer no one else read his lips.

  Love.

  He loved her.

  Now the idiot man realized what she’d known all along! Of course he loved her!

  He formed the words silently, but so slowly she had no difficulty understanding exactly what he communicated.

  His reason, then.

  His justification for forfeiting the life she valued more than her own. How was she supposed to live with that knowledge? Whether she lived two minutes or two years or one hundred years longer than him, how could she survive, knowing he’d saved her with the only currency the Ruffian Gang would accept? The price of his life.

  Noelle shook her head, vehemently determined to communicate. No, oh, no you don’t. You will live, August Rose. You’ll live and that’s final.

  He did smile then, a secret smile just for her. Yes, his mouth formed the words he did not speak aloud. I love you.

  Noelle groaned. Now he decided to admit such an important truth she’d known for days. Longer, maybe. Right when she needed him to understand her wishes. She couldn’t deny he loved her—he loved her!—but she also couldn’t let him walk to his death without trying to stop him.

  There had to be another way.

  But he’d already turned away from her, his grip on the horse’s halter still firm and walked the beast backward. The pressure on the rope stretching her neck eased.

  …still doing everything he could to protect her.

  She cast her attention over her shoulder, to see what the commotion was. How many men came through the narrow pass and into the light? Were guns drawn? Would she witness Gus’s death by shooting before she took a bullet in the back?

  She couldn’t turn far enough to see the action at her back, so she focused all of her attention on Gus. With his right hand holding the fidgeting horse’s bridle, and his left in the air, he seemed relaxed, at ease, as if he faced down life-or-death situations every single day.

  Maybe in New England, but not here. Not in calm, peaceable, law-abiding Mountain Home, where nothing like armed confrontations happened.

  Still, his calm seeped into her. His silent cue for her to trust him washed through her again.

  What plan did he have cooking?

  But as seconds ticked past and no one approached Gus, she had the sinking realization that Boss would’ve sent his men to subdue Gus. Tie him up, confiscate any remaining weapons.

  Wouldn’t he?

  If he intended to kill Gus, wouldn’t he have by now? Why not simply aim and fire?

  The waiting heightened her panic and had her blood surging in her ears at such a frantic pace she apparently hadn’t heard a man approach until he spoke.

  “We meet again.” Boss’s smooth voice. But yet it wasn’t the gruff edge she’d typically heard. All that faded away and revealed the polish and culture beneath.

  Noelle startled, turned to take in Boss’s position, his empty hands. What, no gun?

  She imagined every gang member at her back, their rifles targeting Gus’s chest and her back.

  Gus slowly lowered his free hand and as if in thoughtless, casual abandon, stroked the horse’s muzzle in a soothing way she’d seen him do plenty of times with Beau.

  Boss—Jed—didn’t seem to notice, much less object.

  “The honorable Jedediah Smythe, Esquire.”

  From the corner of her eye, she saw Boss bow, just a little, in recognition, with all the formality of a business meeting in a fine office in a big city. Not in the dark on a lonely road in the mountains of Colorado.

  “I see you recall why your life holds the relative value of a Confederate penny.”

  His voice may have remained level, but venom had slipped into the statement, and Noelle feared Gus would react. Heavens, she wanted him to fight.

  “I do recall. Your brother, Zachary Evans.”

  “His blood is on your hands, just as this young woman’s will be.”

  Noelle’s eyes filled with tears. Not because this whole mess had something to do with Gus’s past, his time as a U.S. Marshal, but because Gus’s honorable nature would burden him with guilt he didn’t deserve. Gus had turned himself over to his enemy, without a shadow of hope to save her. Boss just as good as said her death was coming.

  “A trade only seems just. I give myself up, unarmed and without resistance, and you let her walk away with her family.”

  “No, I don’t think so.” Jedediah—Boss—paused. “Very interesting, what you consider to be just. You showed no modicum of justice in the courtroom. You showed no measure of justice for my brother.”

  Was this true? It couldn’t be. She’d had a full year of watching nearly everything August Rose did. And if anything, the man was just to a fault. He’d no doubt been doing his job as a Marshal when Boss’s brother had his day in court. It obviously hadn’t ended the way Boss wanted it to.

  “Justice demands only the guilty are punished.” Gus’s voice iced over. “This woman is innocent. She had nothing to do with the proceedings in that courtroom, nor in the jail.”

  In the periphery of her vision, she saw Boss lift a shoulder in a negligent shrug. “An eye for an eye.”

  “That’s not justice.”

  “You took someone I loved from me, Marshal, and now,” Jed said, as calmly as if discussing the weather on a Sunday stroll in the park, “I take someone you love from you.”

  No
elle didn’t need eyes in the back of her head to know what Jed had done. He’d stepped back a pace or so, out of her peripheral vision, but the expression on Gus’s face, the tightness in his jaw and the set of his shoulders, the fierce clamp of his hands on the bridle of the horse told her everything she didn’t want to know.

  Jed had drawn his weapon, and most likely, had it pointed at her back.

  The breath seemed to jar in her lungs. She fell still, so still she may have been stone.

  “Once that bit of comeuppance has been dispensed,” Jed continued, “you will experience exactly what my brother did: a brawl with four larger, stronger men, to conclude with a shiv between your ribs. You will bleed into the mud at my feet. I will watch you die, slowly.”

  Jed’s threats against Gus, the hold he had over their very lives, brought her back to herself. She flinched. She might be at their mercy, a noose about her neck and her hands tied securely behind her back, but her feet were free.

  She knew that unseating herself from this animal would mean a slow, excruciating death. If she thought it difficult to breathe with a gag in her mouth, she’d soon know what it meant to dance at the end of a rope with her feet unable to find purchase.

  Maybe the distraction would prove adequate to allow her brothers to fire. Or Gus would have the chance to attack.

  If she jumped hard enough, she might have enough force to connect one of her remaining weapons—her feet—against her captor.

  The thought of striking back, kicking the man with all the bottled-up fury and anger she felt made the unknown future worth it.

  It seemed far better to die fighting than die a coward, his bullet in her back.

  Gus clamped tighter on the horse’s bridle. The animal wouldn’t much like what would happen next, and with Phil Finlay holding the other end of his daughter’s hanging rope—at gunpoint—this couldn’t end well if the twitchy animal bolted.

  His gaze remained locked with Jed’s. Insanity flickered there. With the torches at Jed’s back, his overgrown, sun-bleached hair glowed red like the fires of Hades.