Shoot the rest of them? “Jake, why not just let them ride on?”
“Because it’s my cattle they’re stealing, and besides that, they’re already coming this way. Don’t touch the trigger on my .44 till you have to. They have a feather pull, and you’ll end up shooting me or yourself. Just set it aside for now, but be ready to use that shotgun.”
Randy carefully laid the six-gun on a flat rock, closing her eyes and praying she wouldn’t have to use it, worried that all the sweet and wonderful things she and Jake had shared the last few days could end in disaster here and now. Crouched on her knees, she peeked around the other side of the second boulder to see five men drawing closer, all very well armed. Two more were making their way around either side of the boulders where she and Jake were holed up. Her only consolation was that if any one man could take on seven or more against him, it was Jake Harkner.
Five
“Jake, two of them are trying to work their way behind us.”
“I know. You just stay low, understand? Keep an eye behind us, but you let me do the shooting unless something happens that I can’t.”
The whole time Jake spoke, he kept a keen eye on the five men cautiously approaching. Randy jumped when he suddenly fired his Winchester, then cocked and fired again before the crack of the first shot even finished echoing through the valley.
“Jesus Christ!” someone yelled.
Jake fired again. A man cried out. “My leg! I’m shot!”
“The other three are sneaking through the tall grass,” Jake told Randy. “Keep watching our backs.”
Randy struggled against tears, remembering another gunfight back in Guthrie, when she almost lost her husband to nearly unstoppable bleeding. Another gunfight, back in California years ago, when he took a bullet to the hip. Another huge gunfight when they both saved Lloyd from a gang of outlaws out to kill him. And when he rescued their daughter Evie from hell itself, he and Lloyd were both wounded.
“Who’s there?” one of the rustlers called out.
“Jake Harkner! And those are my cattle you’re stealing, you sonofabitch!”
Things got quiet for a moment.
“Shit!” someone swore. “The Jake Harkner?”
“I’ve never come across another man by the same name!”
“Goddamn it, Harkner, we didn’t know it was your cattle we were stealin’.”
“You do now!”
“You did your share of rustling once yourself, you damned outlaw!”
“Long time ago—and a different man!” Jake shouted. “I’ll give you one chance to ride off, long as you head north and you leave my cattle behind. Nobody has ever gotten away with rustling off the J&L, and I intend to keep it that way!”
“Jake, behind you!” Randy gasped.
Jake whirled, his six-gun out, and fired in the blink of an eye. It boomed much louder than the Winchester, and the man sneaking up on them flew into the air with a scream, a huge hole in his chest.
“Billy, there’s a woman with him!” a second man somewhere behind them called out.
“Lie down flat!” Jake ordered Miranda.
Randy did as he told her, just as a bullet pinged against the rock right where she’d been sitting. She felt Jake’s weight on her then when he laid himself over her. Randy squinted and covered her ears when he fired his .44 five more times.
Randy heard a man screaming. It sounded like he was running toward them. “That was my father, you bastard!” he was yelling. She felt Jake move, realized he was reaching for the six-gun she’d left lying on the flat rock. More shots rang out, pinging against the rocks and ricocheting in all directions.
She felt Jake’s body jerk. “Jesus!” he grunted. He fired the second .44 twice. Another man cried out.
“Jake, are you hit?” Randy screamed from under him.
“Just grazed. I think it was a bullet that ricocheted off a rock.”
“Come on out, Harkner!” one of the men in the grass yelled. “You can’t stay there forever. The minute you up and run, we’ve got you, on account of we’ll take your woman down first. If you don’t want her to suffer, you ought to come on out of there.”
“You two are all that’s left,” Jake shouted. He remained on top of Randy. “Do you really think I can’t take you both down, even out in the open? Let’s make it a fair gunfight! You two against me!”
“Jake, no! You’re hurt, aren’t you? You’re hurt!”
He moved off her, staying low. “Load my other six-gun, quick!” he told her. “And stay low like I told you.”
Staying on her belly, Randy reached out with a shaking hand and grabbed the empty gun he’d left near her. She grabbed the bag of cartridges nearby and dumped them on the ground, picking out the right ones for his .44s. She nervously began loading the gun while the man Jake had shot in the leg lay groaning and crying. “My leg! My leg!” he kept hollering. Suddenly, he raised up and pointed his gun at Jake.