Kate Wingo - Western Fire 01 (18 page)

Rawlings rubbed a hand over his crotch, a lurid grin on his face. “
Me and this gal have got some personal business to attend to. Isn’t that right, little sister?”

Mercy choked back a panic-stricken cry, frantically wondering if she could snatch
the pistol out of Rawlings’ gun holster.
Somehow
, she had to get her hands on a weapon. Any weapon.

Beames chortled, obviously amused by his leader’s crude gesture. “You gonna let me have a poke when you’re done?”

“Sure, why not? Hell, it might be good for morale to let everyone have a stab at her.”

Beames ambled
towards Mercy, his expression one of rabid expectation. “By golly, I’m gonna plow me a long, deep furrow,” he taunted before heading into the house.

Terrified, Mercy pushed herself upright. Her mother was still in
side the house. Unless she quickly did something, the house would be set ablaze. Not about to let that happen, she knew that she would do whatever was necessary to save her mother from such a fate.

“If I tell you what you want to know, will you leave us alone?”

“I might.” Rawlings spat out another stream of tobacco juice. “Depends on what you tell me.”

From inside the house, Mercy could hear loud crashing noises.
“I’ll tell you everything that I know,” she said hurriedly.

“For starters, how about telling me who the shirt belongs to?”

“It belongs to a Missouri bushwhacker.” Just then, a thick cloud of smoke wafted through the open front door. “Now,
please
, put out the fire.”

Rawlings’ gaze dropped to her breasts, his pupils dilating. “Oh, I’m going to put out the fire, all right. But it ain’t going to be the one in
side the house.”

“You beast!”

With a strength born of desperation, Mercy pushed aside his outstretched arm, heedless of the fact that her would-be assailant was heavily armed. Her mother was trapped inside the house – it was imperative that she get to her.

Lifting her skirts,
Mercy dashed toward the front porch.

She was only a few feet from the porch steps when Rawlings viciously grabbed hold of her upper arm, forcibly yanking
her backwards. Thrown off balance, Mercy fell against him. Jerking her around to face him, the jayhawker wrapped her in a smothering bear hug. He then slid one of his hands down her backside and painfully squeezed her buttocks.

Mercy tried to squirm free
.

“So you like it rough, do you?” He tightened his hold on her buttocks. “Me, too.”

Too late, Mercy realized that her ineffectual efforts had only aroused his base passions.

Dear G
od, please deliver me from this—

The knife!

She still had the little paring knife in her apron pocket. But with her arms pinned at her sides, she couldn’t get to it. Not without Rawlings becoming suspicious.

“Oh, that feels . . .
good
,” she panted, wriggling her hips in what she hoped was a suggestive manner.

Rawlings lewdly licked his lips. “Just give me a minute and it’ll feel even better.” Removing his hand from her buttocks, he began to unbutton his
trousers.

With one arm now free, Mercy was able to cautiously maneuver
her hand towards her apron pocket.

“Goodness, you’re so . . . um, manly,” she nervously
complimented, hoping to divert his attention. Easing her fingers into her apron pocket, Mercy snatched the knife by the hilt.

Pulling
the blade free, she jabbed it into Rawlings’ thigh.

“Goddamn bitch!” Enraged
, the jayhawker shoved her away from him.

Stunned by what she’d just done, Mercy stared at the knife lodged in
her assailant’s leg. Grunting with pain, Rawlings grabbed hold of the bone hilt and yanked the blade out of his thigh, angrily flinging the knife toward the porch.

Realizing that she’d gambled and lost,
Mercy turned to run.

B
ut Rawlings was quicker.

With one hand, he hit her across the face, while with the other he ripped open her bodice. Pushing her to the ground, he fell on top of her, pinning her with his body. Like an animal caught in a trap, Mercy thrashed and bucked, shrieking when he groped at her bare breasts.

“For the love of God! Will somebody please help me!” she cried out, hoping that one of the jayhawkers would take pity and come to her rescue.

Rawlings grinned. “Ain’t nobody gonna help you, little sister. Your God done forsaken you.”

Yanking Mercy’s skirts waist-high, Rawlings clamped a hand on each of her thighs. Terrified, Mercy raked her nails down the side of his face, drawing blood.

Howling with pain,
Rawlings backhanded her across the face. “You scratch me one more time, bitch, and I’m gonna kill—”

Just then, a
shot rang out.

In the next instant,
Rawlings collapsed against Mercy, blood pouring from a gaping wound in his forehead. Certain that her death was soon imminent, Mercy screamed as more shots were fired, the gun blasts near deafening. Beneath her, the ground reverberated with the charging pound of a galloping horse. Frantically she tried to shove Rawlings’ heavy weight off of her, unable to do so.

Just then, a
shadow fell across her as Rawlings’ lifeless corpse was yanked away from her body. To Mercy’s utter relief, a pair of strong masculine arms lifted her off the ground.

“God
Almighty! Are you all right?”

It was Spencer! Her c
ry for help had been answered.

“What are you doing here?” she gasped, her hands tugging at the ripped fabric of her bodice.

“I’ve been tracking these bastards for the last couple of days. They’re part of the same gang that ambushed us back in February.”

Raising her head, Mercy was horrorstruck to see streams of dark smoke pouring out of the house.

“My mother! She’s trapped upstairs. Please, Spencer! You have to save her!”

Still holding her in his arms, Spencer turned toward the house, wincing. Then, releasing her from his embrace, he retrieved the shirt that Rawlings had earlier flung to the ground.

“Here, put this on.”

Mercy held his shirt
against her breasts. “Be careful. There are more of them prowling about,” she warned, suddenly remembering the other five jayhawkers who’d ridden in with Rawlins.

“Not anymore.
Although a couple of them got away, I don’t expect them to return any time soon,” Spencer assured her before he rushed toward the house.

Numb with fear, Mercy shoved her arms into Spencer’s shirt, the garment hanging on her like an abbreviated nightdress. Too distraught to move, she stood on the lawn, her arms wrapped tight
ly around her midsection. To her horror, several window panes shattered from the heat, littering the yard with red-hot, razor-sharp shards of glass. When, in the next instant, another window shattered, Mercy choked back a terrified cry.

What if Spencer can’t save
Mother? What if she’s already dead?

It was too horrible a thought
for Mercy to even contemplate. She had to put her faith in God. He had, after all, answered her prayer and sent Spencer to save her. Surely, The Almighty would do no less for her mother.

A few moments later, deliriously happy,
Mercy watched as Spencer came charging through the open doorway with her mother held in his arms. Tears of joy streaming down her face, she rushed toward them.

Gently, Spencer laid Temperance
Hibbert on the lawn. Kneeling beside her mother’s prone body, Mercy’s breath caught in her throat, joy instantly turning to fear when her mother didn’t so much as blink an eye.

“She fainted while we were
coming down the stairs,” Spencer informed her.

“It’ll be all right, Mama. We’ll get the fire put out and then everything will be as it was
before,” Mercy whispered, smoothing a wayward lock of hair from her mother’s brow.

Spencer placed a hand on her
Mercy’s shoulder. “That’s what I need to talk to you about. The fire is too far gone. There’s no way we can put it out.”

Mercy stared at him, not quite believing what she
’d just heard.

“What do you mean it’s too far gone?”

“I mean the upstairs is almost completely engulfed in flames. I’m sorry, honey. I’m truly sorry.”

“
But what are we going to do?” The thought of losing their home was more than Mercy could bear.
Where would they sleep? How would they live?
All of their worldly possessions, everything that they owned, were inside the blazing house.

“Don’t you worry none. I’m g
onna take you to a safe place.”

Bewildered
, Mercy shook her head, unable to make sense of what Spencer just said.

“A safe place?” She gestured to the burning
farmhouse. “Where could you possibly take us that would be safe from such villainy?”

One side of
Spencer’s mouth curled in a rueful smile. “How about I take you to Missouri?”

“Missouri! How dare you even suggest such a thing!”

“I’m not suggesting,” Spencer countered. “I’m telling.”

Mercy
lunged to her feet. Before she had a chance to angrily storm away from him, Spencer grabbed her by the elbow and swung her around to face him.

“I won’t go!
” she vehemently exclaimed. “This is our home!”

“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you can’t stay here alone. And I can’t stay to protect you.”

“But the house, the farm—” Overcome with despair, Mercy peered at the surrounding fields as though seeing them for the first time.

“Corn grows in Missouri the same as it does in Kansas.
As for the house. . . .” Spencer’s voice trailed into silence. Evidently, he didn’t think that there was any point in stating the obvious. “Look, I don’t have time to argue with you, Mercy. It isn’t going to take long for the jayhawkers who got away to sound the alarm. When that happens, this whole place will be swarming with those bloodthirsty bastards.”

“
Do you mean that—”

“That you and your family might not fare so well the next time the jayhawkers come calling.
Yeah, that’s exactly what I mean.”

His blunt
pronouncement sent a shiver down Mercy’s spine. Until recently, everything had been so clear in her mind: the Missouri bushwhackers were the enemy; and the jayhawkers, avowed defenders of the Union, guarded and protected the citizens of Kansas from the dreaded southern menace.

“But we cherish the same cause,” she
murmured, grappling to make sense of it all, still stubbornly clinging to what she’d once thought was the truth. “And while you may despise them, the jayhawkers are leading the fight to abolish slavery in the border states.”

“Slavery be damned,” Spencer said disparagingly. “
They fight to line their pockets with silver and gold.”

Mercy
stared at him, uncomprehending. “Why are you doing this to me? Why are you trying to turn me against my own people?”

With a noticeably wry expression
, Spencer gestured to the burning house. “I would have thought that
your people
would have done a good enough job of that themselves. In case you haven’t noticed, this war isn’t being fought by reasonable men.”

“Nor honorable men,”
Mercy whispered. “All we ever wanted was to live a quiet, peaceful life.” She thought of her father, now joined in death by their beloved Ethan. “That’s all any of us ever wanted.”

Spencer
raised a hand, gently wiping Mercy’s tears with the tips of his fingers. “I know, honey. But you have to accept the fact that these damned jayhawkers
will
come looking for retribution. And unless you want to join your daddy in that hillside grave of his, you best not be here when they arrive.”

Mercy cast a sidelong glance at her would-be assailant Rawlings, the man’s forehead pockmarked with a bloody bullet hole.
Spencer is right
. Somehow, she and her family had gotten caught in a maelstrom so brutal, so all-consuming, they could no longer defend themselves against it.

“But why do we have to go to Missouri?” she
carped, still unwilling to consign her loved ones to such a fate. She’d heard many a tale about the vile, godless people who inhabited the neighboring state.

“
Do you have the money to go anywhere else?”

“No,”
Mercy answered despondently. “Everything we own is in that house.”

“Then I don’t see as how you
have much choice in the matter.” Spencer put a commiserating hand on her shoulder. “I have a farm in southwestern Missouri where you can stay. No doubt, the womenfolk will be grateful for the company.”

“The womenfolk?” Taken aback,
Mercy’s jaw slackened. “Are you telling me that . . . that you’re married?”

“Now, when would a ‘fiendish demon’ like me have time to get married?”
There was a ghost of a smile on Spencer’s lips. “I was referring to my sister Ginny and my sister-in-law Lydia. Since Dewey and I are gone most of the time, they mind the farm.”

“
I had no idea.” Not only had Mercy been unaware of Spencer McCabe’s extended family, but she’d also been in the dark about him owning a farm.

“Come on. Time’s a wasting
. We need to hitch the wagon and get moving if we’re going to cross the border before nightfall.”

“Merc
y! Thank God you’re all right!”

At hearing that anxious cry, Mercy turned
her head, her gaze following Prudence and Gabriel as they ran across the yard. Having remained hidden in the springhouse during the jayhawker raid, they had no idea that their home had been set ablaze. With a heavy heart, Mercy stood silent as the shock registered on both their faces.

“Mister McCabe! Whatever are you doing here?” Pru cried out, her voice laden with stunned disbelief. “And why aren’t you trying to put out the fire?”

“Not enough buckets and not enough men,” Spencer said matter-of-factly. He glanced at the burning house, his jaw clenched tight. “I’m sorry, Prudence. The blaze spread too fast. Those jayhawkers knew what they were doing, all right. Makes me think that this isn’t the first farmhouse they’ve torched.”

Prudence, her girlish face marred with terror, suddenly gestured to where their m
other lay reposed on the yard.

“Mama! Mama!”

“There’s no need to be alarmed, Pru. Mama fainted. But other than that, I believe that she’s all right,” Mercy hastily assured her sister.

Unable to voice himself amidst so much confusion, Gabriel tugged on Mercy’s sleeve
. Wordlessly, he pointed to the dead jayhawkers that littered the yard and front porch.

Prudence also turned to look at the dead bodies.
“They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

Put on the spot
, Mercy fingered the hem of Spencer’s oversized shirt. “I’m . . . I’m fine,” she assured her sister, thinking it best not to tell Pru about being accosted by Rawlings. Spencer rescued her in time; that was all that mattered.

“Thank goodness that
you weren’t harmed.” Pru’s shoulders visibly sagged with relief. A moment later, suddenly noticing that someone was conspicuously absent, she said, “Where’s Dewey?”

“He’s keeping a lookout.” Spencer gestured to
a knoll in the distance. “Although I should get him down here. I’ll need him to help hitch the horses to your wagon.”

“Hitch the horses?
” Prudence glanced at the saddled mounts bequeathed to them by the dead jayhawkers. “Are we going somewhere?”

Mercy
nervously glanced at her sister. In that instant, she knew that any qualms she might have about journeying to Missouri had to be put to the wayside.

“Spencer has kindly offered to take us to his farm in Missouri
,” she informed Prudence, forcing a smile onto her lips.

Clearly startled by the announcement, Pru
said, “But how can we make such a journey? We have no clothing or—”

“There are
several blankets hanging on the clothesline; as well as several carpets that I beat clean this morning,” Mercy interjected, refusing to bemoan their fate. “I want you and Gabriel to go and remove everything from the clothesline.”

Pru grabbed Gabriel by the hand, the two of them scurrying toward the back of the house.

“Is there any food left in the springhouse or root cellar?” Spencer inquired.

“Not much.”
Mercy curbed the impulse to mention that the scarcity of foodstuffs was due in large measure to Ned Sykes’ ravenous gang of freeloaders. “A few potatoes and carrots. Maybe some onions.”

“
That should be enough to feed us for a day or two.”

“And then what?”

“We’ll have to take it a day at a time. Do you think you can handle that?”

Giving
Spencer’s question a moment’s deliberation, Mercy wordlessly nodded. Perhaps it would prove a mistake, but for the time being, she was willing to put her trust in him.

“Then we best round up the horses and get them hitched to the buckboard.”

As she and Spencer made their way toward the barn, Mercy was assailed by one bittersweet memory after another. Nine years of her life had been spent on the farm. Nine years of love and laughter and fond remembrances. Craning her neck, she glanced at the house. Her heart in her throat, she watched as a fiery timber crashed to the ground, the entire second story engulfed in flames.

‘A day at a time.’

While it seemed a simple enough rule to live by, after the turmoil she’d been made to suffer, she feared that it might prove a daunting task.

“Care for some company?”

Clearly startled to hear his voice, Mercy skittishly scooted away from Spence.

“I’m afraid that . . . that I won’t be very good company,” she answered before
she resumed her preoccupied gaze of the Little Osage river.

Spence, worried about the forlorn expression
that Mercy had been wearing since they’d left the farmhouse, had decided that it was time to talk about what happened. They’d crossed the border into Missouri an hour ago; and while they weren’t out of the woods just yet, he figured it was safe enough to stop beside the grassy riverbank for a cold supper of jerked meat and dried apples.

“We’re not leaving
here until you finish your supper,” Spence said, worried that Mercy had refused to eat.

H
er eyes darted to the buckboard wagon where Dewey and the others were still supping. “I haven’t had much of an appetite lately,” she murmured, her voice barely audible.

“So I noticed
.” Cocking his head to one side, Spence gave her the once over. “If you ask me, you’re getting downright scrawny.”

Of course, it wasn’t true. He’d merely said it to get a rise out of
Mercy, hoping to see the spark return to her cornflower blue eyes.

To his
dismay, Mercy didn’t take the bait. Instead, she nervously fingered the rough fabric of her rolled up trousers. An extra pair of Dewey’s pants and his mended white shirt were the only garments that they could rustle up for her. While the britches were a good six inches too long, Spence had to admit that they did wonders for her bottom, the cinched belt emphasizing the womanly flare of her hips.

“Given our dire predicament, my recent weight loss
should be of little concern,” Mercy murmured.

“You need to keep
up your strength. The next few days might very well prove to be the hardest of your life. And that’s assuming that we don’t meet up with any Yankee patrols or trigger-happy jayhawkers.”

Mercy stopped fidgeting with her trousers, her pale face marred with
fear. Seeing that panic-stricken expression, Spence’s gut painfully clenched.

Yeah,
it’s going to be one helluva trip, no doubt about it.
While he and Dewey were used to sleeping on the ground and foraging for food, he suspected that Mercy and her family were unaccustomed to such hardships. And as much as he wished that he could lighten the load for them, there wasn’t a whole lot he could do. With the strike of a match, all of their earthly possessions had been reduced to two woolen carpets, a couple of clean blankets, and a buckboard wagon.

Spencer
placed a hand on Mercy’s shoulder. “Listen, I just want you to—

The moment
that he touched her, Mercy flinched, her hands protectively splayed over her bosom.

“Please don’t,” she whispered,
unable to look him in the eye.

Spence didn’t need anyone to tell him that the brutality
Mercy had been forced to endure earlier in the day was the impetus for her fearful reaction. Admittedly, it had enraged him when he caught sight of that filthy jayhawker pawing at her bare breasts.
What I wouldn’t give to be able to kill that piece of prairie trash all over again.