After the Ashes
CHAPTER ONE
New Mexico Territory, 1872
Christopher Braddock crept across the dilapidated porch, his pistol cocked. He wrapped himself around the bleached adobe as silently as his shadow. To kill the man inside was not his goal. He needed information more than another bounty.
The battered door jerked open.
Every muscle in Braddock’s body tensed. It looked like he wasn’t going to get his wish. As usual.
A woman poked her head out the narrow gap between wood and adobe. “Can I help you?” Her strained smile wobbled at the cocked .44 Smith & Wesson shoved in her face.
Braddock’s heart thumped in his ears. He would beat the boy within an inch of his young life for sending a woman out to confront him. How quickly he could have shot her made his palms sweat. He eased his finger from the trigger, not trusting his wet grip, before he lowered his gun and straightened.
He nudged his hat back with his left hand. “Looking for Corey Sullivan.”
The woman glanced again at his pistol and swallowed. “He’s not here.”
She lied badly. Must not be accustomed to the outlaw life yet. He glanced over the top of her head and tried to peer inside the adobe. She kept herself carefully squeezed between door and frame. He reholstered his gun, hoping to relax anyone inside. He didn’t want a shoot-out with a woman in the middle. He didn’t want a shootout at all.
“You might want to open those windows. Catch a breeze.”
“I’m fine, thank you. I’m sensitive to the sun.”
“You’re a Southerner. Haven’t been out here long.”
“Two weeks. If there’s nothing else, I’ll say good-day. I have chores to attend.”
“A Southerner with no hospitality? If I didn’t know better, I might think you were hiding something.”
“Well, I’m not.” The woman slipped out past the door and shut it behind her. “I just don’t have anything to offer. I haven’t bought supplies yet.”
She wore a faded gray dress that stretched tight across her chest and hung loose around her waist. Her pale skin and lush dark hair attested to a better life. She looked to be one of those women who wore a bonnet all the time, who didn’t take to hard work, but the tired lines around her bright blue eyes told a different story. Still, she was a beauty. Way too good for an outlaw on the run. But who could figure women?
She shifted, growing more nervous under his scrutiny. He wasn’t beyond using that to his advantage. “Well, ma’am, I’d say you’ve plenty to offer a man.”
She played with the frayed lace on the high neckline of her gown, keeping her arm in front of herself in a protective gesture. Braddock didn’t like how her hand trembled, nor being the cause of it. He glanced over at the water pump. “Me and my horse could use a drink.”
She sagged in relief. “Of course.” She released her breath in a nervous bubble of laughter that sounded as sweet as it was unexpected.
Braddock stopped himself from smiling. This wasn’t a social call.
The woman veered around him to step off the low porch. Braddock hesitated. His path to the door cleared, but one quick glance at the woman let him know he wouldn’t get far without her.
She rushed back the moment he didn’t follow, gesturing for him to proceed her. “This way.”
A bumbling outlaw and a determined woman were a bad combination. With Braddock’s luck, both Sullivan and this woman would end up in a pool of their own blood. An imagined glimpse of red splattered across her white skin prompted him to step down into the yard.
He didn’t let his back turn completely toward the adobe, but the precaution was unnecessary. The woman shadowed his movements, making herself a shield against any bullets foolish enough to fly his way. He picked up Lucky’s reins and walked to the pump.
The woman glided across the red dirt of her barren front yard. She must have been something before the war. Unlike the rest of her people, she didn’t act broken. She held her shoulders high. When his gaze strayed to her hips, Braddock forced his attention back to the wanted man inside the house. “You forgot your bonnet, ma’am. Sun’s mighty strong this part of the day. If you want, I can go fetch it for you.”
“No.” She faltered in her step. “Please, I’m sure you’re thirsty and I don’t want to make you wait any longer.”
She raced to the pump and urgently worked the handle. Braddock took over the job, though she appeared to know what she was doing. She might have been used to a better life, but she seemed to have adjusted to her new situation.
He sipped the cool water from a ladle while Lucky drank from a shallow trough.