By Starlight (26 page)

Every so often, Jeffers stopped and looked around them, watching to see if they had any unwanted company; Jack had to admit that while the man was stronger than an ox, he wasn’t as stupid as one. Once, while Jack was taking another look, he was nearly seen by Sumner. Jack ducked just in time, a breath trapped in his chest.

I need to find a better place to watch them.

Carefully, Jack maneuvered back down the alley, raced through the streets, and approached the mercantile from a different direction. This time, he was looking right at the truck; from where he stood, it would be much more difficult to be caught watching them. He watched as Jeffers once again berated Sumner for not working fast enough, and wondered how much time remained before they’d have everything loaded.

What am I going to do if they get in the truck and drive away? What if Maddy isn’t back yet with the sheriff? How can I stop them?

Before Jack could begin to consider his options, he heard a faint scuffling behind him, and then a second later, before he could even turn around, he was grabbed roughly by the arm as a hand clamped down on his mouth.

PANIC GRIPPED JACK
even tighter than his unknown assailant. Even as he struggled to get free, he knew he’d been a fool to think that Jeffers and Sumner had been acting alone in their smuggling operation. Jack didn’t know if it’d been someone watching just out of sight or if an overseer had been sent from the Mob to make sure nothing went wrong, but either way, he’d let his guard down. Now he just might pay for it with his life. If only he could—

“Quit fightin’, dang it!” a voice hissed in his ear. “It’s me! Clayton!”

Freed, Jack spun around in the darkness to find his friend grinning back at him. He was happy and relieved but more than a little angry, too.

“What in the hell do you think you’re doing sneaking up on me like that?” Jack swore. “You scared me half to death!”

“What choice did I have? Weren’t like I could call out your name,” Clayton explained. “ ’Sides, you done come up on me all sudden like. If I’d a tapped you on the shoulder, you’d a been so surprised you’d a yelled out. Coverin’ your mouth was the only way I could figure to keep you quiet.”

Even though his heart was still hammering in his chest, Jack knew that Clayton had a point; if he’d been startled enough, there was a good chance he might have made enough noise to attract Jeffers’s or Sumner’s attention, and then everything would have been lost. Still, Jack was surprised to find that he wasn’t the only person watching what was happening at the mercantile.

“What are you doing out here?” he asked.

“Same thing you are, I reckon.” Clayton smiled, nodding over to the rapidly filling truck. “Watchin’ them two.”

“But why?”

“ ’Cause I figured that after everythin’ that happened yesterday, from gettin’ shot at in the woods till Jeffers knocked you upside the head, someone needed to keep a close eye on what them two was up to. Since you wasn’t in too good a shape, that left me to do the job.”

“Messing with those two is dangerous,” Jack said. “You said it yourself.”

“It’s also kinda fun.”

“This isn’t a game.”

“Didn’t say it was,” Clayton replied. “When my father took me trappin’, he’d say that even though we was huntin’ critters that’d tear our throats out if’n they could, even if it was rainin’ or snowin’ somethin’ miserable, there was somethin’ ’bout the hunt that made it all worth doin’. Sounds an awful lot like dealin’ with Jeffers, you ask me. Hell,” he added. “I’d a thought you’d be happy I was doin’ this.”

“I am, but I don’t want you getting hurt on account of me.”

“I can take care a myself.”

Jack nodded. Clayton had already put his life in danger by helping him with Jeffers and Sumner. Once Maddy returned with the sheriff, maybe they’d be enough to stop Jeffers and Sumner.

“What’ve they been doing?” Jack asked, nodding at the truck.

“Been at it since shortly after closin’ the speakeasy,” Clayton replied. “This here’s the third time they loaded up. First time they drove ’way, I was panicked they was goin’ for good so I followed ’em with Roger all the way out to a ’bandoned house ’bout twenty minutes east. The old Perkins place. Stayed a ways back so they didn’t see me. Eventually, they come back for more. I figure this here’s the last load they’re haulin’. Can’t see there bein’ ’nough room for much else.”

“Then we don’t have much time.”

“So what’re we gonna do?”

Jack frowned. Without his gun or the sheriff, there was little chance he could survive a confrontation with the two criminals. To try would likely be suicide. Even if he followed them in Clayton’s truck, watched as they handed off the liquor to whomever they were holding it for, what then? He’d have no way of contacting Lieutenant Pluggett while surrounded by men who’d kill them without hesitation.

He had to stop them here and now.

But how? I could always—

“You’re a lawman, ain’t ya?” Clayton suddenly asked, his words striking Jack as hard as a hammer hitting a nail.

Jack turned slowly to find Clayton staring expectantly at him through the gloom. When they’d followed Jeffers and Sumner into the woods, he’d feared being asked for his reasons, but Clayton had only skirted the issue. Now, with everything the scraggly man had done, for all that he continued to risk, he deserved to know the truth.

“I am,” Jack answered. “I’m an agent of the Bureau of Prohibition.”

“I knew it!” Clayton said with a low chuckle. “Ever since we drove up into them woods, I been wonderin’ what reason you could have for knowin’ what shenanigans they was pullin’. Took me a while, but I guessed it.”

“Does it change your mind about doing this?”

“Hell, no!” he replied, looking a bit offended. “No matter what reason you’d a had for takin’ Jeffers Grimm down a peg, I’d want in. That fella’s been askin’ for it for years. ’Sides,” Clayton added with a grin, “I figure my helpin’ you out might shine a different light on my own drinkin’ of that liquor. Maybe I could earn me some a that, what’s it called, complacency—”

“Clemency,” Jack corrected him.

“That’s the stuff! Can I have some a that?”

But before Jack could explain that, according to the law, he’d done nothing wrong by buying a drink, the night was split by a sound that froze his blood, terrified him, and made him sick to his stomach, all at once.

It was a woman’s scream.

Maddy inched her way through the inky darkness of the same alleyway that she and Jack had originally come down to watch Jeffers and Sumner load their illegal contraband from the mercantile’s cellar. She’d run so fast after deciding not to get Sheriff Utley that her breathing was labored; she covered up her mouth for fear of making too much noise. As she neared the alleyway’s end, she wondered what Jack would say to her, how mad he’d be at her for having not done as he’d asked.

He’ll just have to get over it…I’m not leaving his side…

But when Maddy reached the mossy rain barrel behind which they’d hid, she was shocked to find that Jack was no longer there.

“Jack?” she whispered as loud as she dared. “Where are you?”

Seconds passed with no answer.

Fear grabbed Maddy at the thought that something had happened to Jack, that he’d been found out and was even now suffering at Jeffers’s hand. Rising up to take a look around, she accidentally knocked over an empty bottle she hadn’t seen, sending it clattering to the ground. In the otherwise still quiet of the night, it sounded as noisy to her ears as a wailing trumpet. Terrified, she ducked down behind the rain barrel, too scared to do anything but tremble.

Oh, no! Oh, no, oh, no, oh, no!

Time trickled slowly past. Maddy desperately wanted Jack to be by her side, to keep her safe, but she knew she was alone. At any moment she expected Jeffers to roar out her name, fling the rain barrel aside, and grab her by the arm. But nothing happened.

Slowly but steadily, Maddy began to believe that she’d somehow been lucky; maybe they hadn’t heard the bottle because they’d been too busy hauling crates of liquor, maybe they were too far away, or maybe it wasn’t quite as loud as she’d thought. Finally, confused and curious, Maddy took a deep breath and hazarded a look.

Jeffers was headed back to the truck with another large crate of bottles, just as he’d been doing when she and Jack had arrived. Relief flooded Maddy. Her hopes had been well-founded; Jeffers and Sumner hadn’t heard the bottle after all. It didn’t look as if they’d discovered Jack, either. Now all she had to do was find out where he’d gone and then—

Suddenly, she was grabbed by the arm and yanked violently to her feet. Maddy was so startled that she screamed, but it only lasted an instant before a hand clamped down on her mouth.

“Lookee what we got here!” Sumner shouted, pulling her out from behind the rain barrel and dragging her over toward the truck. No matter how hard Maddy struggled, it was pointless; he was far too strong for her to resist. “Now we got ourselves some company!”

Oh, Jack! Help me!

The sound of Maddy’s scream grabbed Jack by the heart and squeezed. He jumped to his feet, but from where he and Clayton were hidden he couldn’t see much of anything past the truck. He didn’t know what had happened, if Maddy had brought the sheriff with her as he’d asked or if something had gone wrong, but there was no doubt that she was in great danger.

I’ve got to rescue her!

But just as he was taking the first step to run to her aid, Clayton grabbed him by the arm and held him back.

“Now just hold on a second there, pardner,” he said.

“What in the hell are you doing?” Jack asked angrily, trying to shake himself free of the other man’s grasp. “We’ve got to help her!”

“I ain’t tryin’ to tell you otherwise, but this right here’s the sort of thing you can’t go into half-cocked,” Clayton explained. “You go runnin’ over there, intendin’ to do right, it’s gonna get us all killed. They’ll hear us clear as if we was a couple a hound dogs howlin’ at the moon. Sumner’ll be shootin’ ’fore he sees us. We don’t get the drop on ’em now, we ain’t gonna get ’nother chance.”

Though it pained him, Jack knew Clayton was right. “How else are we going to get her away from them?” he asked. “Those two are animals!”

Even in the dark, he could see Clayton’s thin smile. “I got me an idea.”

Maddy looked all around her for some sign of Jack, some avenue of escape, for anything that might help her, but there was nothing. Sumner’s grip was as painful as it was strong. Slowly but steadily, she was dragged toward the store Silas Aldridge had built with his own two hands, toward the crates of alcohol she’d unwittingly allowed to be stored in the cellar.

And toward Jeffers Grimm.

Leaning against the rear of the heavily laden truck, he had a thin smile on his rough face, making him appear even more intimidating; it was as if he was savoring what was about to happen. Maddy remembered the way he’d spoken to her the night they’d been alone together in the speakeasy, the way he’d leered at her, the way he’d
touched
her, and grew even more frightened.

“Why ain’t I surprised to find you here?” Jeffers growled.

“She was over by that barrel watchin’ us,” Sumner added; from the look that crossed Jeffers’s face, he wasn’t happy his flunky was talking. “I heard her rustlin’ round so I took a look and found her.”

“What’re you doin’ here, Maddy?” Jeffers pressed.

“I should ask you the same thing,” she said, turning the question around, unwilling to back down, even now that she’d been caught. Her mind swirled, wondering where Jack could be, why he wasn’t coming to rescue her. “What are all of these crates doing in my father’s cellar?”

Jeffers patted the barrel beside him, his large hand pounding hard on the wooden frame. “This here’s a lot of money.”

“You’re a smuggler! This is against the law!”

“So’s sellin’ drinks out of a speakeasy to half the damn town.”

“I didn’t agree to anything like this!”

Jeffers shook his head. “You got
exactly
what we agreed to. When I showed you that pile a money, your eyes lit up like a marquee. I promised you’d make enough that tough times’d be easier, and that’s what you got.”

“But you lied to me!”

To that, both Jeffers and Sumner laughed.

Maddy could barely contain her anger. “I never should’ve trusted you.”

“But you did,” Jeffers said, shrugging. “The mistake you made was underestimatin’ how bad I want outta this piece-of-shit town. All of this,” he explained, waving around at the crates, “is my ticket outta here.”

“
Our
ticket,” Sumner corrected him, but Jeffers kept on, ignoring him as if he hadn’t said a word.

“There ain’t a damn thing gonna stand in my way,” Jeffers snarled threateningly. “Not you, not the sheriff, nothin’ or no one! I’ve worked too damn hard to let it slide outta my grasp now. Hell, I woulda figured you’d be used to this by now, what with how Rucker ran out on you. Him and me ain’t that different…we both had our fun while you was handy, then tossed you away first chance we got.”

“Where is that son of a bitch, anyhow?” Sumner asked, tugging so hard on Maddy’s arm that she nearly flew off her feet. “He’s still got a beatin’ comin’ to him for what he done to me.”

Maddy looked back at Sumner; ever since he’d startled her, she’d been too preoccupied with Jeffers to give him more than a quick glance. What she saw startled her. His face, already a mess of bruising from having his nose broken in the alleyway, had worsened; swelling puffed at the corner of his mouth and cheek, and there was a trickle of dried blood that had seeped from a still-leaking cut above his eye. Jack had beaten him badly.

“He’s probably lurkin’ round, too,” Sumner said, looking around wildly, one hand fishing into his pant pocket.

“Jack’s still laid up in bed,” Maddy lied quickly, hoping it would give Jack more of a chance to come to her aid. “After what you did to him,” she added, looking directly at Jeffers, “he needs all the rest he can get.”

“He shouldn’t a stuck his nose in my business.”

“You must really be worried about him if you hit him when he wasn’t looking,” Maddy replied. “You’re nothing but a coward!”

Jeffers’s grin dropped. He moved a couple of steps closer, towering over Maddy as if she were a child. “You best watch that mouth a yours,” he said, trying to intimidate her.

“It must be hard to hear the truth,” she replied defiantly.

“I ain’t got much unfinished business ’fore I leave,” Jeffers smirked, leaning down, “but I been hankerin’ to slap that pretty mouth a yours, tear everythin’ off a you till you was stark naked, and then have my way while you screamed.” With obvious pleasure, he reached out and once again grabbed one of her breasts, squeezing until she yelped in pain; Sumner laughed at her discomfort. “Up till now, the only thing holdin’ me back was makin’ sure this booze was delivered safe and sound. With that ’bout to be taken care of, there ain’t no reason I can’t make you regret the way you been talkin’.”

Even as terror paralyzed Maddy, she became aware of something else, a sound…It was faint at first, distant, but it continued to tug at her, insistent, growing louder, closer; she knew she wasn’t imagining the noise because it seemed to have drawn Jeffers’s and Sumner’s attention, too.