Love’s Sweet Revenge(52)

Jake slowly rose.

“Hell, I was just joking.” Clem shrugged.

“Calling my wife a whore is no fucking joke.” The words came out in a deep menace as Jake walked closer. “Get up!”

The man slowly rose. “Jesus, Jake, you were a wanted man when that woman married you, if she married you at all. I mean, she’s a beautiful woman, but everybody knows you ran with whores. You trying to tell us that’s not how you met that woman?”

Men scattered when Jake landed a hard fist into Clem’s face just as he spoke the words “that woman.” Clem landed against a wheel of the cook wagon, and Jake jerked him up by the shirt, then slammed his fist into him again.

“I’m just sayin’ what the others are thinkin’!” Clem yelled.

Jake kept hold of the man’s shirt front and rammed him up against the side of the wagon. “You’re just goddamn lucky I’m not wearing my guns, you foul-mouthed bastard!” He landed a hard fist into Clem’s gut while one of the men ran to get Lloyd.

“Lloyd, come quick!” he hollered.

Clem doubled over, and Jake brought a knee up under his jaw, catching him hard in the teeth and sending him sprawling again. Jake leaned down and yanked him to his feet. “No man who works for me treats my wife with anything but respect!” he growled. On the word respect, he punched Clem hard against the cheekbone.

Clem went sprawling yet again, blood pouring from his mouth. “Goddamn it!” he choked. “You knocked my damn teeth out!”

Again Jake jerked him to his feet. “Be glad you aren’t dead!” he snarled.

“Pa!” Lloyd reached them by then. “Jesus, Pa, what’s going on?”

“He called your mother a whore!” he growled as he shoved Clem away and turned to Pepper. “Hand me your gun!”

“No, Pa! He’s not armed!” Lloyd objected.

Jake was already reaching for Pepper’s gun, but Lloyd stepped between them. He shoved at Jake. “Don’t do it!”

Jake raised a fist. Lloyd put up his arm to stop the blow and grabbed Jake’s shirt front. “Pa, it’s me! Get out of that dark place, damn it! You’re looking to kill the man!”

Jake froze, glaring at him. He shivered then. “I want to kill him! He even said maybe your mother and I never legally married! She doesn’t deserve that! I brought her along to celebrate our thirtieth anniversary, for God’s sake!”

Lloyd kept hold of his father’s shirt but closed his eyes. “She goddamn well doesn’t deserve this!” He looked at Jake again. “But you can’t kill him, Pa, because it would mean you not being there for Mom, and that’s worse than anything that could ever happen to her!”

The rest of the men remained backed away. Pepper kept a hand on his gun as Clem rolled to his knees, groaning and weeping with pain. Father and son glared at each other a moment longer. “Let me finish this, Pa,” Lloyd said calmly.

Jake saw that spark of his old self in his son’s eyes. “You remember the same thing you just told me. Katie needs you. She’s carrying another baby.”

Lloyd gave Jake a light shove. “Well, these beautiful women just keep interfering with our mean side, don’t they?”

Jake closed his eyes. “I don’t want you to have a mean side.”

“I have one, whether you like it or not, but I know when to check mine…most of the time. You don’t!”

Jake spoke through gritted teeth. “He tried to make it sound like I met her at a whorehouse! After all that woman has sacrificed for me, I can’t—”

“What on earth is going on here, Jake?” Randy stepped into the light of the campfire.

“Go away!” Jake ordered, still staring at Lloyd.

“Jake—”

“Get the hell away from here!” he roared. “I mean it!” He heard a little gasp from her lips, and it tore at his gut. Never in their marriage had he raised his voice to her. Randy quietly walked away, and Jake turned away from Lloyd. “Goddamn it!”

“Go get her, Pa. I’ll make sure Clem is gone before you come back here.”

“I can’t go anywhere!” the man protested, literally sobbing. “He knocked my goddamn teeth out!”

Jake turned dark eyes to Lloyd again. “Get rid of him, or I’ll kill him,” he said flatly. He ran a hand through his hair and turned away again.

“Jake—” Pepper called his name.

Jake stopped, his back to the men.

“You know damn well that was just a drunk man who’s only heard half-truths and made up the rest. There’s not a man among us who doesn’t realize what a fine woman your wife is. You remember that. If you hadn’t done what you did, we would have.”