He peeked around the boulder, saw two horses tied beyond the waterfall on the other side. It was then he also heard the gunshot. He darted back again, unable to determine just where it had come from. When he looked around the boulder again, the woman was heading toward the other side of the fall. He quickly made his move, knowing the roaring water would keep her from hearing him.
Miranda gasped when an arm suddenly came around her chest and arms from behind. She felt a gun in her ribs. “Well, now, what do we have here?” came a man’s voice.
Never hesitate, Jake had told her so many times. It’s either you or them. She still held the shotgun, and her forearms were free. Quickly she turned the firearm in her hands and swung it backward, ramming it hard in the direction of the man’s face and hoping to hit her abductor with the barrel end. Her quick thinking worked. She felt the jolt, heard the man grunt as the end of the shotgun barrel landed into his eye.
He let go of Miranda, and she swung around, firing the shotgun without a moment’s hesitation. The jolt knocked her backward. She dropped the shotgun and landed on her back, then lay there a moment, struggling to get her breath. When she was able to get to her feet again, she saw her abductor lay sprawled on a rock under the waterfall, his middle a mass of blood.
Miranda gasped, vomit coming to her throat. In terror, she picked up the shotgun and ran, grabbing her doctor bag from her horse and heading out from under the waterfall. She followed the riverbank, searching for the two buttes Charlie had mentioned. “Help me, Jake,” she whimpered. “I’ve killed a man!” She stopped to get her breath, telling herself to calm down. She would be no help to her husband and son in a panicked condition. “Jake, Jake,” she whimpered, clinging to the shotgun. With shaking hands she hurriedly opened it and put another shell in the chamber she had emptied. They were both filled again. She closed the gun, then gasped when she heard more gunfire. She ran in the direction of the sound.
Jake was already heading straight into the ranch grounds. To his right he saw Hank running along the east fence. Two men were running toward Jake from a corral where horses were prancing about. A shot rang out, and one went down, shot in the back by Hank. Jake crouched in the saddle and shot the second man, trying to keep count. That was at least four down. On his way in he thought he’d heard the sound of his shotgun going off. The sound was so distant and muffled he couldn’t be sure, but it had startled him for a moment. He had to fight to stay alert to what was happening right in front of him. Had Miranda fired the shotgun? What the hell was she shooting at? Had there been someone back there they hadn’t seen?
He jumped off Bandit before the horse could even come to a halt. The horse kept running, and Jake ducked behind a large stump. He saw Hank moving closer to the shed across the wide ranch grounds to his right. To his left Charlie moved along the western fence line. Suddenly a man charged out of the shed and rode around the back side of the buildings. Hank fired at him and missed. At the same time three men came clamoring out of the bunkhouse several yards ahead of Jake and beyond the house. Everything was happening at once.
Jake raised up and shot at the three men, who were cursing and shouting and trying to get to the house. Two went down right away. The third cried out and rolled to hide behind a pump house. Jake got up and ran hard toward a wagon. The third man and the one riding around the west end fired at him, and he felt a sting across the top of his left shoulder. He jumped into the wagon and lay flat.
Charlie rose up then and shot at the man on horseback, hitting him in the leg. The man shot back, and Charlie felt a jolt to his left arm. He fell flat and the wounded man kept riding. The third man, who Jake had wounded and who had hid behind the pump house, got up and ran toward the wagon then, thinking Jake might be lying dead inside. When he peeked over the side, Jake’s revolver was drawn. He fired, opening a hole in the man’s face. The man made no sound as his head jerked fiercely. He slumped to his death.
Jake looked out of the wagon to see Charlie down. The man he had wounded was still riding. To Jake’s horror he saw Miranda running along the fence then. He started to fire at the rider, but more gunshots erupted, this time from the house. They splintered into the wagon, and Jake dove flat again into its bottom. He heard the shotgun explode again, looked through a crack in the wagon to see the fleeing rider’s horse go down, sending the man sprawling. Miranda was on her rump. She pulled her pistol from its holster and shot at the rider before he could get up again.
“Good shot, mi esposa,” Jake muttered.
Miranda looked toward the wagon then, and Jake could see she was in a kind of daze. “Jake!” she screamed. “Jake, where are you?”