Katherine
Jacob stood like a statue beside his lectern while the two men— Mulligan and Weston—scrambled to and fro in the cavernous space, peering out windows and barring doors. Both his followers had their pistols out, and nervous sweat left tracks in the mud and charcoal that coated their faces. Jacob did not sweat, and he did not waver. He was a picture of serenity, standing with one hand wrapped around the rifle and the other resting on top of the Bible that sat on the lectern.
Waiting.
Did he truly believe he was safe, or was he simply too deep in his lunacy to bother with such trifles as mortality?
Katherine fought to drag herself to her feet, silent tears of pain burning down her cheeks as her shoulders screamed and the rope around her ankles scraped at raw flesh.
"Jacob, let me go," she pleaded. "He's going to kill you all. Just let me go. You don't have to die."
Weston cast her a frantic look over his shoulder, but Jacob didn't so much as flinch. His back was to her, his shoulders straight beneath the pressed cotton of his shirt.
"I told you not to worry, Katherine," he said, his soft voice echoing about the empty hall. "My men will take care of Satan's footman and—"
"Sir, Johnny's been shot," Weston said from the side window, his face pressed to the glass. "Quint, too."
"Silence, Patrick," Jacob said, with the taut weariness of a beleaguered parent. "Nevermind them."
"Nevermind?" Patrick exclaimed, whirling around and throwing one arm out to gesture out the window behind him. "They're dying out there, you lunatic! He's picking 'em off like rats. I ain't stickin' around to—"
Katherine's brain seemed to stutter, or perhaps it was time that had hiccupped. Either way, the events seemed to occur out of order. From where she stood, strung up beneath the cross, it seemed that Patrick collapsed on the ground before the little red hole appeared in his neck and the splatter of blood erupted onto the faded red curtain behind him. It seemed that he fell and then was shot, and only when all of that had occurred did Jacob raise his rifle in one smooth motion and fire.
But of course, that was ridiculous. It must have all happened in order, and it had to have taken more than the space between one heartbeat and the next. Maybe it was the cold getting to her, compressing long moments down into flashes of awareness and stretching others out until she seemed to age decades in the time it took to blink.
She stared at Patrick Weston's body, which lay twitching on the ground, bloody froth gurgling from the hole in his neck, his eyes wide and frantic. Mulligan had turned from the window and for a moment Katherine shared a comradery with him as they stared in mutual horror at the dying man while the tang of blood and the metallic singe of gunsmoke filled the air.
Then Jacob lowered the rifle back to his side, turning to his remaining follower. "The devil speaks through the mouths of cowards, Mr. Mulligan," he said. "God protects his most faithful servants from evil. We are safe. The firing has stopped. Go check the front and see if any of our friends have survived."
Katherine saw the second of hesitation, as Mulligan's eyes flicked to the door, to her husband, and then to the body on the floor. She watched his throat bob as he came to the same conclusion she would have in his place—to comply meant mere danger. To refuse meant certain death. And to defy the preacher meant that, however death claimed him, his soul was bound to burn for all eternity.
Lies.
With a jerky nod, Mulligan staggered to the front door and opened it just a crack. A wedge of sunlight spread across the floor as he opened it wider and slipped out, and Jacob turned back to her. A serene smile graced his face as he stepped toward her.
"It's almost time, Katherine," he said softly. "You'll be free, soon. We both will be free. We are God's children, you and I. He has chosen us. He sent the spawn of Satan just to test us, see? But don't worry, my dear. We will prevail against the forces of evil."
An idea struck her, just then, that stuck like bitter honey in her throat. She cleared away the blockage and forced what she prayed was a loving smile onto her aching face.
"We will," she said, raising her voice an octave and dropping the volume down low the way he always preferred her. Timid and feminine, the way God intended. "You've always protected me, Jacob. You've always loved me. But now I'm frightened for you. You are strong, and I know that our souls will be together in heaven, but I'm not ready to die. I'm not ready to watch you die. Please. Please, untie me and let me help you fight."
Her trepidation and his consideration wrestled in the hazy air as his gaze probed her face, her body, before digging so deep she felt eviscerated—like her innards were torn from her and laid out on the polished pine floor for his perusal.
His eyes narrowed, crinkling at the corners the way they used to when he hoisted Isobel onto his leg and read her stories from the Bible. Somehow, for all the twistedness of his soul, he always managed to massage the uglier stories into something suitable for a child. Job was plagued, not with death and hideous lesions, but with lost toys and a toothache. Caine didn't kill Abel, he merely bloodied his nose.
He wasn't a very good preacher, and he wasn't a true man of God, but Katherine realized as she watched her husband's smile that he had, in spite of his flaws, taught her one very valuable lesson about life and humankind—that goodness and evil coexist within all of her brothers and sisters. Some possess more virtue, and some more wickedness, but only one man had ever truly spoken God's truth, and he'd been executed for the offense. It was useless for any man to pretend at knowing the value of another's soul.
"Oh, Katherine," Jacob said, hefting the rifle and tracing the curve of her cheek with the barrel—still warm from the shot that had killed Weston. "My love, do you think me a fool?"
In a flash, he swung the rifle around and slammed the butt into her belly. The blow crushed the air from her lungs and her knees buckled, curling instinctively around the nauseous pain. She wheezed and Jacob shook his head in consternation.
"You do," he sighed. "I am many things, Mrs. Peters, but I am no fool. Satan's spawn still holds you in his sway. You'll remain in your bindings until I have sent him back to Hell and you have proven with your body that your spirit belongs to the lord."
Bile rose in Katherine's throat, and she didn't know if it was the pain or his words that choked her.
A resounding crash had her gasping, choking on her own fear and jerking her attention to the small door in the wall beside the altar. That door went nowhere—to her father's old office.
To the cellar!
And in that instant, as she watched the door fly inward on its hinges, old, fragile wood shattering around the latch, she remembered the one time she had brought her childhood friend into her father's domain. He had been sad, that day, too old to cry but with a weariness in his eyes that made even her ten-year-old heart clench in her chest. She had brought him through the back entrance into the church's cellar, which was little more than a hole with wobby, unsecured boards for the floor and frayed roots protruding from the mud walls. She had known, even then, that he wasn't allowed in the sanctuary proper, but she thought he needed God so she had brought him to the one corner of hallowed ground where she thought he could hide him.
And he had remembered. Remembered the hidden entrance—nothing but a grass-covered slab of stone. Remembered to feel his way through the darkness for the splintery ladder up to the office. Remembered the secret she'd whispered to him all those years ago—that the padlock on the trap door looked secure, but it was old and her father had never bothered to replace it because who would rob a church? One had only to tug on the rusted medal and it would come loose.
From her place on the altar, neck straining, she twisted to watch as the door flew open and her avenging angel stepped into the church. Light from the office behind him reflected off the sweat on his face and the glossy disarray of his hair. He wore a polished wooden rifle on his back, the strap tight across his chest, and his hands were wrapped around a pistol.
Katherine heard herself screaming as Jacob brought the rifle up to bear in just the same moment as Mulligan burst through the front entrance, his own pistol waving in front of him. Gabe had defeated so many, had survived so much, and now he would die at the hands of a madman and a moron.
Her ears rang as a smattering of gunshots rang out and the room descended into chaos, but she had eyes only for the man she loved. In the periphery of her attention, she knew that Jacob had fired a wild shot. She knew that Mulligan had fired three, as he darted for the cover of the vestibule. Even so, all she saw was Gabe. She saw the firm set of his jaw as he brought the pistol up and fired two shots into her husband's chest. She saw him duck as Mulligan's shots struck the wall around him, showering him with chips of wood and plaster. She watched, rapt, as he dropped gracefully to one knee and shifted his aim to Mulligan before Jacob had even finished collapsing to the floor.
He fired three shots, and Robert Mulligan fell against the doorway, slumping to the ground with blood leaking from his thigh and shoulder.
Gabe's eyes barely brushed her. Perhaps he was afraid of what he might see if he looked too hard at her naked, bleeding body. Perhaps he was too consumed by the heat of battle to let the sight of her affect him. Either way, his glance at her was fleeting and distracted as he stood and strode purposefully onto the altar, picking up the rifle that lay by Jacob's hand and slinging it over his shoulder. Then he put his back to her and she watched in a fog as he walked to his second victim.
"Please," Mulligan rasped, holding one bloody hand up in surrender, the other pressed to the ragged wound in his thigh.
"Please what?" Gabe demanded harshly, kicking Robert's gun away from his side with the toe of his boot. Unlike every other noise, his voice didn't seem to bounce off the vaulted ceiling of the church. Instead, the plaster walls and wooden floors captured each syllable and absorbed them. He was a man without an echo, and the clip of his boots seemed to sink into the foundation so that worshipers two hundred years from now would bow their heads and pray, with his footsteps still pulsing in the wood beneath their knees.
"Don't kill me," Mulligan pleaded, a lone tear tracking down his cheek as he dissolved into sobs. "I have... I have a daughter. Please. My family. I didn't know—"
"Shut up," Gabe snapped. "Your belt. Off." The command only made Mulligan sob harder, but he fumbled one-handed with his belt and tossed it aside, spare bullets popping loose from the leather and rolling across the floor.
"Please, I—"
"Go."
"What?"
"Go." Gabe gestured at the open door with the barrel of his pistol. "Run. I don't kill helpless, sniveling morons. But if I see your face again, Mulligan? Near me? Near Katherine? The saloon? Near anything I love, I will consider it a threat and I will slice you open in front of your daughter and let her watch as I strangle you to death with your own entrails. Do you understand?"
With a whimper, the man nodded, his whole body shivering with fear and loss of blood.
"Go!" Gabe barked, and Mulligan flinched and nodded, dragging himself along the floor and disappearing out the open door, leaving a trail of blood behind him.
Gabe watched him leave, before pulling the massive double doors shut with a squeak of the hinges and slamming the bar into place.
Katherine's eyes blurred with tears as she watched her sweet, quiet boy spin on his heel and stride down the aisle between the empty pews, his eyes now locked on her as if nothing else existed. Jacob lay in a pool of blood, his eyes staring and a trickle of crimson leaking from the corner of his mouth. Mulligan was gone. She didn't know what had happened to the rest of the men, but she didn't care because he was here and he wouldn't let them touch her.
He didn't speak as he drew to a stop in front of her and crouched at her feet, yanking a knife from his boot and slicing through the ropes around her ankles. Then he pushed to his feet and sawed at the rope that bound her wrists. Her body jerked once, and then collapsed as the last fiber gave way, but she never hit the floor. He caught her with one arm around her back, the knife held safely to the side as he eased her to the floor.
Katherine opened her mouth to speak as he tucked the knife away and enclosed her in his arms, but her voice wouldn't come. All that came were tears. Tears of relief. Tears of fear. Tears of shock. Her body, previously numb, lit up with pain and began to shudder uncontrollably in his arms. None of it made sense. She peeled her eyes open and forced herself to look at Jacob's body. He was dead. It had been so quick. So...
"I wanted to kill him," she mumbled, her tongue thick and clumsy in her mouth, and she felt the rumble of quiet laughter in his chest.
"I know," he murmured into her hair, his breath warm and sacred. "I'm sorry, sweetheart."
"It's okay," she sighed, turning her face into his shirt and breathing in the scent of him. He smelled a little more like the woods than usual. A little more like blood. "Isobel?"
"She's fine, Katie. She's with the girls. The Tuckers will be there by the time we get back."
Pure, silvery relief oozed into her, and she felt the darkness creeping up in the edges of her consciousness. She wanted, not to celebrate, but to sleep.
"Hey, now. Not yet." A rough thumb rasped over her cheek, and she peeled her eyes open to gaze into the warmth of his eyes. He smiled, eyes warm as he bent to press a kiss to her forehead. "I know you're tired, but you need to stay awake. We need to get out of here."
She moaned in protest, but did her best to cooperate as he helped her ease up. She sat in the center of the altar, naked as sin, and stared at her husband's dead body.
"I'm a widow," she said emptily, watching the sunlight reflect off the glassy surface of Jacob's eyes.
"I know. I'm sorry, sweetheart. Do you think you can stand?"
With his help, she found her feet, though her knees felt watery and her legs were little more than undercooked noodles. Something scratchy brushed at her arms, and she looked down to see that Gabe had shed his jacket and wrapped it around her. It covered her to her thighs, leaving her lower legs bare, but she pushed her arms out into the sleeves and simply cherished the warmth of his body, seeping into her goose-pricked limbs. She didn't care much if anyone saw her bare legs. What the hell was a sin, anyway?
"Come on."
Instead of leading her, Gabe swept her up into his arms. She laid her head against his shoulder and blinked, and just that quickly he was setting her back on her feet by the open trapdoor down to the cellar.
"We can't leave through the front," he said. "Can you climb down? I'll go first to catch you if you fall."
She didn't think she could manage it, but she nodded anyway. He went first, urging her down after him. Her hands were numb and wouldn't close around the rungs of the ladder, but it didn't matter. He kept close behind her, one arm banded around her so that all she had to do was force her knees to lock as she stepped down one rung at a time.
They repeated the same agonizing process on the ladder back up to the overgrown yard behind the church, and she blinked as she emerged into the daylight, her nose filled with the smell of tilled earth and vegetation.
After that, her awareness began to splinter. She blinked and found herself in his arms, the clouds racing overhead and his breath hard and heavy above her as he carried her across a broad green field. She blinked again, and the clouds had been replaced by the dense, green interlocking of tree branches, shot through with bursts of sunlight.
"Where are we going?" she managed, squinting against the sun. Perhaps he would take her across the Bridge, where Isobel would be waiting, and they could make a home in the wilderness where nobody would bother them.
"Somewhere safe," he said, his voice raspy and rough with exertion.
"I can walk," she said, but she fell back into the darkness before she could hear his response.
The next thing she knew, she was on a horse. Not belly down this time, but side-saddle, and held in place by warm, strong arms. She heard voices. Not just Gabe. Male voices. Friendly voices.
"Is she alright?"
The wall against her ear vibrated with his response. "Mostly bruises, from what I can see. Mel's at the saloon?"
"Yeah, she's there. Wish you'd waited for us, though, Gabe. I could've protected you from—"
"It's fine." The words were blunt and hard, and she didn't blame him. Her Gabe didn't need protection from anything. He was as fierce and unstoppable as one of those great, blinding snowstorms that blew the roofs off barns and buried the whole world in white.
She dreamt of fresh-fallen snow in the sunshine, and when she woke it was to warm, soft sheets and the smell of soap and coffee and woodsmoke and...
"Isobel," she murmured, turning her face toward her daughter's presence, and blinked her eyes open. She lay in a bed in a familiar, plain room in which, not even a year ago, she'd awoken to the despairing discovery that she was still alive. It was dark beyond the curtains, but the room was awash in orange light. A small body with a cap of tangled black hair was curled against her side, head resting on her throbbing shoulder.
"She's been out like that since we brought you back."
Katherine jerked her gaze to the voice. Gabe sat in a hard wooden chair by the bed, leaning forward with his elbows braced on his knees. When their eyes met, he smiled and nodded toward Isobel. "She wore herself out, today. Herself and half the girls. She ran them ragged trying to find ways to entertain her."
"She's okay?" The words were a croak and Gabe frowned, pushing to his feet and retrieving a tin cup from the little table by the fire. He resettled on the mattress by her hip and, with a deft hand, cradled her head and pressed the rim of the cup to her lips. The water trickled over her parched tongue, and she swallowed gratefully until the water was gone, though only the very edge of her thirst was quenched.
Gabe eased her head back down to the pillow, and for a long moment they simply stared at each other as a thousand silent words passed between them. She didn't ask what had happened, because she already heard his answer. I brought you back to the saloon. He didn't ask how she felt, because he'd already seen the damage to her body. My wrists are on fire and my whole body throbs with each beat of my heart.
"What happens now?" she asked finally, her voice scarcely more than a whisper.
He grimaced and shrugged, and when he spoke she heard his determination in the hollow echo of the words. "Once you're feeling stronger, you'll ride to Ridgecreek like we planned and take the train. You'll have plenty of money. You can go wherever you want."
"You'll come with us," she stated, wishing her voice didn't crack around the dread in her throat and the words didn't lilt up at the end as if they, themselves, knew they formed a question.
"Katherine," he sighed, and the backs of his fingers brushed over her cheek. The hopeless anguish in his eyes struck her with more force than any physical blow she had endured at the hands of Jacob and his followers. "If I could—"
"You can!" she hissed, her arm tightening involuntarily around Isobel until the girl squirmed and huffed sleepily into her chest.
He grimaced and shook his head. "They found the bodies an hour ago. Sheriff will be on his way soon, if he isn't already. The town won't let murder go unpunished."
"Then run." Her heart fluttered in her chest, and her head felt liable to implode beneath the pressure of a future without him. "We'll go with you! I can ride." She wedged an elbow beneath her to push herself up and prove her point, but he placed a hand on her shoulder and shook his head with gentle resignation.
"There'll be a whole posse, Kat, and they'll want someone to punish. If I run, they'll come after you and Isobel. They'll arrest every one of the girls and string them up for conspiracy before the week is out. We have to give them someone to blame, or they'll burn the whole territory to the ground looking for justice."
"No they won't," she pleaded, wrapping her hand around his wrist and squeezing with all her might. Her own wrists were bandaged with clean white linen, and she smelled the harsh undertone of one of Mel's homemade balms, specially brewed to prevent festering. She locked her eyes with his and begged him with every ounce of her body and soul. "Gabe, please. The girls will be okay. Isobel and I will be okay. We're women. We'll be safe. They won't blame us. They can't. They don't hang women."
The corner of his mouth tipped up and his fingers combed a soothing rhythm through her hair. "No, they don't," he admitted, but before she could press him further he lifted his shoulder in a helpless shrug. "But Katie... they do hang whores."
She opened her mouth to respond, but the door swung open and Josh stepped in. He was dressed as Gabe was—for war—with a gun at each hip and a rifle slung across his back. He gave her a sympathetic smile, but otherwise kept his eyes on Gabe. "The scout just came back," he said, jerking his head toward the distant barroom. "Sheriff's on his way."
"Just the sheriff?" Gabe asked, his eyes still locked on Katherine's.
Josh's gaze flickered to Katherine, then to his friend, and he sighed. "He's got a crowd with him. Twenty, maybe thirty folks. Town's in an uproar."
"When'll he be here?"
"Ten minutes? Fifteen if we're lucky."
Gabe nodded, and Katherine watched Josh hesitate in the doorway, his face twisted in indecision. Gabe must have shared his idiotic plan with his friend while she was unconscious. Except... instead of arguing her side and expounding on the plan's lunacy, Josh simply turned to her with a blank look of unvarnished pity.
"I'm sorry, Katherine."
She stared after him, shocked into silence, as he turned and left the room, pulling the door shut behind him.
"He can't let you do this!" she whispered, tears trickling over her temples. Her nose was filled with the scent of Isobel's hair, but, in this dreadful moment, even her daughter's safety and proximity brought her no comfort. "I won't let you do this. They'll kill you, Gabe."
He didn't even bother to argue with her. His eyes were dry, his face expressionless, but she saw his anguish in the tight set of his shoulders. She knew he hurt as surely as she knew his pain wasn't for himself but for her and Isobel.
"They've wanted to kill me since the day that reverend started preaching," he said. "It was always going to end this way, Kat. If they don't have me to blame, they'll go after everyone they can touch. I can't let them punish the girls for crimes I committed. I can't let you live the rest of your life watching over your shoulder when I have it in my power to give you freedom."
"They'll come after us anyway," she pressed, reaching across her body and clasping his fingers in hers. His hand, usually warm, was deathly cold, as if his body already knew its fate.
"They won't," he said, giving her fingers a squeeze. "I'll tell 'em you and Isobel died. Dumped your bodies somewhere nobody will ever find them. Spawn of Satan, remember? No sin is beyond reason." He tried on a weak grin, but it was as tremulous as her own grip on her composure. The only thing stopping her from screaming was Isobel—safe and peaceful in her arms.
"Gabe, please. Please, don't." For all the years of her marriage, she'd tucked every little scrap of guilt and despair into a tiny corner of her heart. They were too ugly to look at it, and a part of her feared if she acknowledged just one, all the rest would come tumbling out, screaming for acknowledgement.
She was right.
"I'm sorry," she breathed, abandoning his hand to clasp his shirt in her swollen fingers. "I'm sorry I married him, Gabe. I'm sorry I chose him. I'm sorry I lied to you about Isobel. I'm sorry I stayed with him. I'm sorry I didn't trust you to build a life for us. I'm sorry I brought this to your doorstep. I'm sorry I didn't tell you I was leaving. I'm sorry I never chose you. I'm so, so sorry, but I'm choosing you now. Please, stay. I choose you. On my soul, Gabe, I choose you."
He met her hysterical pleading with the same carefully peaceful expression he'd worn since he rescued her. "Katherine, this isn't your choice," he said softly. "And I need you to promise me something."
"What?" she asked through her tears, her voice a choked rasp.
His thumb brushed the tears from her cheeks and he bent to kiss her—as hesitant as the first kiss and as passionate as she always thought the last kiss ought to be. He was gentle with her bruised, torn skin, but when she parted her lips the demand of his attention washed away the last lingering traces of Jacob's fetid ghost. When he pulled back, her whole body tingled with awareness, and her tears had dried in her eyes.
"Promise me," he said softly, his fingers combing gently through her hair, "that of everything we shared, you won't choose to remember words I spoke to you in anger."
Her breath stuttered in her chest, and she nodded. "I love you," she whispered, and he smiled—honest and at peace.
"I know, Katie. I love you too. Please don't forget that. And don't let Isobel forget I love her too."
"I won't."
How did her voice sound so calm? How was she resting so peacefully against the pillows? She felt as if her soul had separated from her body and was howling into the ether, flailing out to cling to him even as her eyes watched him stand and step away.
While she watched, paralyzed by grief, he unslung the rifle from his back and rested it against the wall by the bed. Then he unbuckled the gun-belt and set it quietly on top of the dresser, along with the knife from his boot. Then he simply stood in the center of the sparse little room, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides—the only visible manifestation of his torment.
"Gabe?" she said, her voice a reedy, distant whisper, and he sat once more on the edge of the bed. Swallowing hard, she reached up and cradled the curve of his jaw in her palm, brushing her thumb over his lower lip. When she spoke again, the single word held the weight of every moment they had ever shared--
"Tomorrow?"
For a moment his resignation faltered. She saw it clearly in the haze that fell over his eyes. She felt it in the tick of his jaw beneath her hand. She heard it in the hitch in his breathing.
Then, as quickly as it had come, the moment passed. He smiled and covered her hand with his, turning his face and pressing a kiss to the hollow of her palm.
"I'll have to think about it," he said, each word a drumbeat, echoing in the hollow cavern of her chest.
She forced her own smile as he bent and kissed Isobel's cheek. Then he kissed her one last time, a brush of his lips over her forehead as if he knew more passion would suck them both in and drown them in the days they would never have. Then he stood, and her hand dropped to the quilt.
"I'll wait by the bridge," she whispered while her soul screamed and scrabbled and sobbed.
His gaze passed over Isobel's sleeping form before settling on Katherine's face. Pulling in a breath that squared his shoulders and relaxed his clenched fists, he smiled, nodded, and walked out the door.
***
So.... one of my biggest pet peeves in romance is the perpetually distressed damsel. I hate it. I hate it so much that four years ago I said 'fuck it' and sat down to write my own gosh dang romance novel, with heroic heroines who stick up for themselves and vulnerable heroes who are just trying their best. It's my personal belief (and thereby the only proper way of thinking) that women are kickass and deserve a chance to save the day and get their vengeance. That's the story I want to read, so that's the story I try to write.
With that in mind, guys I really REALLY wanted Katherine to kill Jacob. That was one of few things that was always part of the plan (what little 'plan' I had) for this book. It was supposed to be epic and she was supposed to say something snarky while she watched him die. Gabe was just meant to serve as a distraction to give her the chance to free herself and reach the gun.
Buuuuut then I got to writing and I just couldn't make it make sense. Katherine isn't the star of an action movie. She's not like... squirreling away a secret knife in her vagina and she's not about to expertly dislocate her thumb to get out of the ropes or whatever. She's a strong character but she's not the particular brand of strong that knows martial arts and how to slip restraints and all those shenanigans. I hate distressed damsels, but there's no way around the fact that Katherine is kinda the quintessential distressed damsel, here. What chance has she had, in the past five years, to develop the skills needed to kick ass? Even emotionally, it didn't feel like she was in a place yet to do something so bold.
So yeah. Gabe to the rescue.
For now...
(dun dun dunnnnn)
I hope you're enjoying the chaos of these last few chapters! As always, thank you for reading.
Love
Liz
***