Luke Jensen, Bounty Hunter (21 page)

There was nothing Luke could do to save his young partner. It was all up to Hobie's own instincts and quick reactions.

With both hands free, Hobie made a desperate grab for the harness on the horses on either side of him. His right hand caught and held, but his legs dropped toward the ground.

One foot hit the singletree. He scrambled for purchase on it and lunged, wrapping his left hand around the same harness. Holding on with two hands, he managed to get his other foot on the singletree. His position was still perilous, but better than it had been a few seconds earlier.

Up on the top of the stagecoach, Dietrich pushed himself to his knees and faced forward. He raised his arms, spread them as much as he could with his wrists tied, and brought them down around Jim Pierce's neck. Dietrich yanked back, choking the jehu.

The attack made Pierce drop the reins. They coiled around loosely on the floorboard like crazed snakes, allowing the team to run wild.

Luke couldn't risk a shot at Dietrich while the man was locked in such a close struggle with Pierce. He still had the rest of the gunmen to deal with, too. Seeing one man rise from his hiding place behind some brush on the slope, Luke snapped a shot at him and was rewarded by the sight of the would-be killer doubling over and then tumbling down the hillside.

Luke levered the Winchester and swung the rifle to the side as he triggered another shot, but couldn't tell if he hit anything.

Hobie carefully worked his way along the singletree back toward the coach as Pierce and Dietrich continued their battle. Pierce's whiskery face was turning bright red as Dietrich's brutal hold on his throat cut off his air. Pierce jammed an elbow into Dietrich's body, but the man's grip didn't loosen.

Luke realized he had underestimated how much of a threat Milton Dietrich really was. The man was fighting with the crazed strength of a lunatic.

Hobie reached up and grabbed the floorboard. He hooked a foot over it and hauled himself up as the coach careened along the trail. If it had hit a big bump just then, he would have been flung loose and fallen under the team, the fate he had narrowly avoided a moment earlier.

He managed to reach the floorboard and surged up to throw a punch over Pierce's shoulder that caught Dietrich in the face. Dietrich's head rocked back. Hobie caught hold of the businessman's arms and fought to wrench them free from Pierce's throat.

Somehow, they were past the bushwhackers. They had run that deadly gauntlet without anyone getting killed. The gunmen on horseback were still coming up quickly from behind, however. Luke twisted in the saddle to throw another shot at them, but the Winchester's hammer just clicked when it fell.

Empty.

He jammed the rifle back in its scabbard and hauled his mount around. He took the reins in his teeth and filled both hands with the Remingtons. Using his heels, he sent the horse charging straight at the group of gunmen.

It was a damned fool play, and he knew it. But he also knew that doing the unexpected was sometimes a man's most effective weapon, and charging into the face of such odds was certainly unexpected.

He bent low and cut loose with the revolvers, trading shots from hand to hand as he guided the horse with his knees. He had another small advantage in that he had plenty of targets to choose from, while his enemies had to concentrate their fire on him. The horse veered back and forth at slight angles in response to Luke's urging. Bullets sang past him, but failed to find the mark.

He saw two of the gunmen rock back as his slugs smashed into them, and another man threw up his arms and pitched out of the saddle in a limp sprawl that signified death.

That broke the nerve of two of the other gunmen. They whirled their horses to flee, ignoring the shouted curses of their companions. With that, the odds against Luke suddenly dropped to two to one.

He almost felt like he had them outnumbered.

The distance between Luke and his enemies had dwindled to almost nothing. He aimed for the gap between their horses and flashed through it, firing to both sides as he did so. They twisted in their saddles and tried to bring their guns to bear on him. The air around Luke's head buzzed like a hornet's nest as bullets fanned past his ears.

Still untouched, he leaned back and clamped his teeth down hard on the reins, slowing his horse. He dropped the reins and turned his head in time to see both gunmen topple off their mounts. He didn't know if he had hit them or if each had accidentally shot the other, but it didn't matter. He was still alive.

And the stagecoach was still a runaway. Luke holstered the left-hand Remington, grabbed his horse's reins, and wheeled the animal so he could race after the coach.

Up ahead, Hobie had succeeded in pulling Dietrich's arms away from Pierce. The jehu slumped on the seat, gasping for breath.

Dietrich clubbed his bound hands together and swung them at Hobie's head. Hobie ducked under the sweeping blow and hooked a punch into Dietrich's ribs. In the frenzy of hate that gripped him, Dietrich didn't even seem to notice the blow. He lunged at Hobie, rammed into him, and knocked the young man off the seat onto the floorboard. Dietrich fell on top of him, landing with his knees in Hobie's stomach. His fingers locked like iron bands around Hobie's throat.

From Luke's position galloping up behind the coach, he couldn't see the two of them anymore, only Jim Pierce's hunched form as the jehu tried to draw life-giving air through his bruised throat.

Hobie lifted a knee into Dietrich's groin. Even in his berserk state, Dietrich couldn't ignore that. His hands slipped a little on Hobie's throat as he curled his body around the pain.

Hobie got a flailing hand on Dietrich's face and clawed for the man's eyes. Dietrich flung his head back to get away. He let go of Hobie's throat and dived for the Colt still on the young man's hip. The thong over the hammer had held it in the holster despite Hobie's near-fall under the galloping team.

Dietrich got his hand on the gun and ripped it free. At the same time, Pierce, barely recovered, made a grab at Dietrich's shoulder. Dietrich twisted and swung the gun at Pierce's head. The barrel raked the jehu's jaw and made him fall back against the seat, momentarily stunned again.

Using both hands, Dietrich pointed the gun at Hobie and pulled back the hammer. “I told you you'd never have her!” he yelled triumphantly.

Almost even with the stagecoach again, Luke heard Dietrich's shout, and knew he had to act. The Remington in his right hand came up and blasted a shot. The .36 caliber slug struck Dietrich in the back of the head, bored through his brain, and exploded out between his eyes. Already dead, the man with the ruined face flopped forward, somersaulting over the horses and dropping among them.

The hooves did their gruesome work, followed by the wheels of the stagecoach. They chopped Milton Dietrich's body into something that barely resembled a human being.

Luke urged his horse alongside the team and leaned over to grab the harness. He hauled back on it, yelling, “Whoa! Whoa, damn it!”

Gradually the horses slowed, and after another hundred yards or so, the coach lurched to a halt. Before he did anything else, Luke yanked out the Winchester and reloaded as he scanned the trail behind them.

He saw several sprawled bodies and riderless horses, but nobody was coming after them. The rest of Dietrich's men appeared to have given up.

If they had seen what was left of their employer, they knew they wouldn't collect any more blood money from him. No one ever would. They must have decided to take their chances with the law coming after them for the killings at the way station. Men like that often had murder charges hanging over their heads to start with.

With the coach no longer moving, Hobie dropped to the ground and jerked the door open. “Jessica!” he cried. “Jess, are you all right?”

She practically threw herself out of the coach and into his arms. “Hobie! Oh, Hobie, I thought you must be dead!”

“It was pretty dang close,” he told her as he held her tightly. “But I was lucky, and then Luke saved my life.”

Luke rode over to the coach so he could look in one of the windows. Stephen and Edna Langston were huddled together on the rear seat, but appeared to be unhurt.

“Are you folks all right?” Luke asked.

Langston nodded. “We weren't hit. But I don't see how, with all that lead flying around!”

“Hitting a moving target is a lot more difficult than some people make it out to be,” Luke said with a faint smile. “And sometimes there's a great deal of luck involved, too. I'd say that luck was on our side today.”

“Ain't no denyin' that,” Pierce rasped from the driver's seat. “Dietrich damn near choked me to death, that no-good varmint.”

“He paid the price for that and all his other sins,” Luke said as he looked back at the ragged, bloody remains of Milton Dietrich. Sometimes all the money and power in the world didn't matter a damned bit, he thought.

Hobie was still holding Jessica. He saw where Luke was looking and asked, “Do we have to take what's left of him on to Moss City with us?”

“What, and cheat the buzzards out of a good meal?” Luke asked.

 

 

They all agreed. If anyone back in Boston wondered what had become of Milton Dietrich, it was best to let them wonder. After the scavengers were done with what was left of Dietrich, no one would ever be sure who he was or what had happened to him.

Dietrich's disappearance somewhere in the West would just be . . . a mystery.

When the stagecoach reached Moss City later that day, Jim Pierce reported to the local stationmaster that Banty Sinclair and Sinclair's two sons were dead, apparently murdered by unknown outlaws who had raided the way station and then tried to waylay the stagecoach. That was true enough, in its own way. No one knew who had pulled the triggers when the three men were gunned down.

Luke hoped the killers had met their own ends during the battles at the canyon or in the hills.

Pierce blamed his hoarse voice on an illness, and the stationmaster told him to see the doctor. Another driver and shotgun guard would be taking the coach on the next leg of its journey to California, starting bright and early the next morning.

Luke got a hotel room and cleaned up, glad for the chance to do so without anybody shooting at him. He had lost track of Hobie, but assumed the young man was with Jessica or somewhere close by her, wherever she was.

The hotel had a decent dining room, and that evening Luke was carving his way through a thick steak when Hobie came in, glanced around the room, and spotted him. The young man had cleaned up and changed clothes, too. He took his hat off and walked across the room toward Luke.

When he reached the table, Luke gestured toward one of the empty chairs. “Why don't you join me?”

“Sorry, Luke, but I, uh, can't. I'm supposed to meet Jessica in a little while and have supper with her. She's staying at the Sunset House.”

That was the other hotel in Moss City, a little nicer than the one where Luke had taken a room. He patted his lips with a napkin. “All right, but you look like you have something to tell me. You can sit down long enough to do that, anyway.”

“Yeah, I suppose so.” Hobie pulled out the chair and sank into it. “Jess and I have been talking about her plans now that Dietrich's dead.”

“Jess,” Luke repeated, smiling. “From the sound of that, the two of you have gotten pretty friendly in a hurry.”

“Yeah, bein' in the middle of a hell of a lot of trouble together will do that, I reckon.”

“Is she going back to Boston?”

Hobie shook his head. “No, she's decided she wants to go on to California, anyway. Her brother's still the only family she has left.”

“That makes sense,” Luke said with a nod. “I think it's a good decision.”

Hobie took a deep breath. “And I'm going with her.” He rushed the words out as if he were afraid he couldn't say them if he didn't.

Luke just sat there, still smiling slightly.

“Well?” Hobie demanded. “Aren't you going to try to talk me out of it?”

“Why would I do that?”

“Well . . . well, you and me are partners! We set out to bring in Gunner Kelly and Dog Eater!”

“If you remember correctly,” Luke said, “we didn't exactly set out to accomplish that goal together. You followed me from Rio Rojo.”

“Yeah, and it's a darned good thing I did, too, or those Rurales would've put you up in front of a firing squad in La Farva!”

“Possibly,” Luke admitted. “Our time together has had its benefits, I won't deny that. But I'm used to working alone, Hobie. I've been doing that for years and years.”

“You're sayin' you don't want me partnering up with you anymore.” Hobie sounded a little hurt.

“I'm saying that you're in love with a fine young woman who evidently returns that feeling, and you'd be a damned fool to turn your back on that. Think about it, Hobie. Fate brought you and Jessica Wheeler together, and something . . . some force . . . kept both of you alive until you came out on the other side of all the trouble. I don't believe you should fly in the face of what's obviously meant to be.”

“You really think so?” Hobie asked with a frown.

Luke nodded. “I really think so.”

Hobie heaved a sigh. “Well . . . I reckon you've got a point. It does seem like me and Jess were meant to be together.”

“There you go. Fate.”

“But you're going on after Kelly and Dog Eater?”

“They have my five thousand dollars,” Luke said, his voice hardening. “I intend to get it back.”