“Everything is fine,” I insist.
I’ve aided Mother through enough labors to know that this is normal. The waves are predictable, growing more intense with each pass. Kate is sweaty and tired, but it’s called labor for a reason. All Jesse sees, however, is the blood on Kate’s nightgown and how she continually buckles over to breathe through a wave, as though it might split her in two. I finally shoo him from the bedroom so Kate can focus, telling him to keep Mutt outside, too. The dog is just as excitable as Jesse, and Kate does not need distractions.
But a few minutes later Kate waves me away as well, wanting a moment of true solitude, and I slip into the kitchen. Jesse and Reece are hovering at the table, looking spooked. They’re both wearing their pistol belts, ammunition crammed into every last hold.
“I can’t leave her like this,” Jesse says.
“I’ll be with her,” I say, “and we’ll be fine. It’s you two we ought to worry after.”
He must hear a truth in my argument because he plucks his hat from the table, claps Reece on the shoulder, and goes to saddle his horse. But Reece lingers, even after the door slaps shut behind Jesse.
“You have to get him, Reece. Rose and all the others.”
“That’s the plan.”
“I can’t bear to see bad men keep winning.”
He gazes at his boots, then back at me, bringing the brim of that ridiculous hat up so that I can see his eyes. They’re brown. I spent so much time scrutinizing their hollowness that I never noticed their color.
“So that’s why you came back?” he says. “’Cus you wanted to see how this all ends?”
“It also didn’t feel right to part without a proper farewell.”
“Well, don’t go saying no goodbyes,” he says with a smile. “I’ll be back by dusk.” He tips his hat at me like a gentleman.
“You return, and I’ll buy you a new hat,” I say. “That one is hideous.”
“If this goes well, I’ll buy my own hat. Hell, I’ll buy you a hat. What do you want? A fancy bonnet?”
“You don’t know me at all, do you? We might have to change that.”
“If you say so, Charlotte Vaughn.”
I watch him jog for the stable and wave him and Jesse off from the stoop. Reece looks back only once, and his eyes are nowhere near hollow or lifeless. I’m not sure if he’s changed or if the way I view him has.
The men disappear into the trees, and I return to Kate.
Chapter Forty-One
* * *
Reece
The train chugs into Banghart’s round high noon, and I’m shaking like a goddamn sinner at confession. Jesse said it were only visible in my hands, but I swear it’s gotten worse since we split on the way into town.
I scour the depot. Like we planned, Jesse’s boarding the third car. Could be a Rose Rider is in there too, but Jesse’s safe so long as I ain’t with him. Once the train departs, he’ll make his way back a car, where he’ll hide among some cargo, and then it’ll be my job to lead Rose to him. I’ll say I got Jesse handcuffed and bound, when really, Jesse’ll just be waiting for Rose’s head to come into view.
It ain’t a fair way to die—shot in the back and betrayed by yer own man—but no one ever said life were fair, certainly not ’mongst outlaws, and besides, it ain’t like Luther Rose has lived a life that demands fair treatment.
“All aboard!” someone shouts.
I tense in the saddle. The thought of having to chase this train and ditch my horse to pull myself aboard ain’t comforting. I’ve only stormed stationary locomotives, but Jesse and me agreed this was the safest approach. If’n Rose and his boys think I missed the departure, I can approach ’em on my own terms. And that’s what this is all about, staying in charge, keeping a firm hand on the reins. Soon as we lose control, everything’ll run away from us.
A whistle scream pierces the afternoon.
The train starts chugging.
“Don’t let me down, son,” Jesse had said when we split. “I ain’t in the habit of shooting kids, but I’ll do it if’n I got to.”
Even after all this, a part of him still doubts me, and that hurts worse than I care to admit. ’Cus I don’t much mind Jesse calling me son. Rose used that word to make me feel small and powerless, to remind me that I was indebted to him. But with Jesse, it feels like a declaration of respect.
I ain’t gonna let him down, and it’s time to prove it.
I kick the sorrel I been riding—the same mare Charlotte stole from her uncle—to action. Jesse loaned me a spare pistol belt so I could holster my piece properly, and for that I’m glad. I’m riding the sorrel fast as possible, and last thing I need to worry ’bout is a weapon slipping from my waistband.
Somewhere between Banghart’s and the tracks, my hands quit shaking. I bring the horse alongside the steadily quickening train. Cars drift by, rattling and rocking on the rough rail, which startles the mare some. I struggle to keep her steady, and as the handle of a door slips into view, I lean out and grab hold. My legs slip from the stirrups, and my shoulders ache in protest. I’m pulled away from the sorrel. Swinging and grunting, I wrestle myself onto the lip of the car. The mare immediately slows and veers away from the tracks. Perhaps she’ll go back to Banghart’s, where we left the bay Jesse rode into town, or maybe she’ll find her way back to the mountain trail, where Jesse left Rebel tethered. We’ll share her saddle back to the house if’n we make it outta this whole thing alive.
The sorrel grows smaller as the train speeds on, and I go to meet the devil.
The P&AC rails prove as rough as a washboard. I’m jostled and jolted as I make my way up the aisle, the bruises from my run-in with Diaz flaring with each step. This passenger car ain’t nothing like the refined ones we often rob on the Southern Pacific, but the local folk seem impressed nonetheless. I keep an eye peeled for any of the boys, but don’t see no one till I reach the dining car. I slide the door open, and there he is—Luther Rose, seated at a small table set for two.
He looks up when he sees me enter, and he smiles—the widest, brightest smile I’ve ever seen from him. He even plucks the cigar from his mouth to do so, making sure he shows me every last tooth. Then he motions at the place setting opposite him. There ain’t any food in sight, but whiskey has been poured to the brim of stout glasses, some of it sloshing free when the train rocks over a particularly harsh section of rail.
“Murphy,” Rose says, setting his glass down. “I were beginning to think you might not show.”
“It weren’t an easy con to pull off,” I say as I sit.
The few folk eating nearby are busy with their own meals and conversations and ain’t concerned ’bout us in the slightest. The only two men that appear to be listening, their heads tilted just so, sit directly behind Boss—Crawford and Barrera.
“Where’s Diaz?” I ask.
“Where’s Colton?”
“I asked first.”