CHAPTER
5

He didn’t trust himself.

He was too filled with fury, too hungry for revenge.

Finding these men and punishing them threatened to take him over and send him galloping down the trail—the fork that led him away from home—with murder in his heart.

The men who did that to the wagon train were filthy, brutal murderers. They needed to die. Just as the men who’d done the same to his father’s wagon train needed to die.

Worse yet, from what he’d seen in that wagon circle, he knew these were the same men. The knife wounds, the scattered arrows made to look like the Paiutes had attacked. But the arrows weren’t right. And the little things they’d done wrong were the exact things the men who’d killed his father had done.

He could catch them. They had a few hours’ start, but driving a herd was slow and his horse would close the distance fast. Knowing they were within his reach added to Trace’s desire for revenge.

They needed to die for the multiple murders they’d committed today.

But of course he couldn’t go after them.

God had given over to him the care of four helpless people, and he had to get them home.

His throat felt thick with the two tearing needs—to chase these men and to protect this brood.

Seeing those women come running out of the grass, well, nothing had ever hit him that hard. Not since he’d been left completely alone, a fifteen-year-old who’d considered himself a full-grown man, until he had to be. The aloneness on this high mountain trail had threatened to break him.

There was never any question that he’d help four stranded travelers. Any decent man would help, and there were plenty of men who’d be described as less than decent who’d’ve helped them, too. Not the marauders who’d killed men and women in that wagon train, but most men in the West treated women with almost reverent respect. There were just too few women. They were rare and precious and to be protected above all.

But beyond that simple right and wrong—beyond what any man would do—came a blow to Trace’s gut at seeing that these folks had survived the same thing he had.

And God had allowed him to come along and help them. Trace considered that a great honor. Which didn’t mean that watching a baby get its diaper changed wasn’t enough to set off a deep panic in his gut. What if he was asked to help?

That alone gave him a powerful incentive to keep the women happy and healthy. But caring for all of them ran directly at odds with what he wanted to do, which was ignore the trail that led home and keep after those vicious outlaws.

Trace hadn’t been able to do anything when his wagon train was attacked. Survival took every ounce of his strength, and even then the winter in the High Sierra had almost killed him.

Things were different now. He was fully capable of fighting back. And the desire to do it was so strong, to take on three men by himself, that he had to call it bloodlust.

He was on his way home from his first cattle drive. He’d just run his cows to market in Sacramento. Because he’d never been away from his ranch, not in all these years. He’d sent his cowhands on home days ahead of him and then set out to wander. They were there now, he was sure, caring for the good-sized herd he had left, which were on rich winter grazing land so they needed only minimal care.

He had nothing but time.

The little boy giggled and pulled his thoughts back to the present.

He needed to get these folks to shelter. It was October in the peaks of the Sierra Nevada. October was a serious month up here in the thin chilled air of this stretch of the mountains. It was a man’s last chance to get everything ready for the long, hard months of cold. His ranch was at a lower elevation, but they had to ride a trail that climbed to the highlands, then wound down to get home.

Even at home, lower wasn’t low enough to stop winter from hitting hard. The snow came in feet instead of inches. The wind howled, and the trails locked up deep and tight.

This wagon train had been traveling dangerously late in the season. Though it could hold off for a month, Trace knew at any minute winter could land flat on their heads, and the twenty miles they needed to travel today would become impossible.

There’d be no vengeance today. He needed to tend babies and women and dodge diaper-changing duty with every ounce of his cunning. That’d keep him mighty busy for who could say how long.

Trace straightened from the tracks and turned to see Maddie Sue yanking on Wolf’s tail.

Swallowing a gasp, Trace fought down the reflex to shout a warning and sprint. At any second Wolf could revert to form. He was friendly to Trace, and he’d accepted the hired hands, but that had been slow in coming and the men were mighty careful.

They sure as certain hadn’t yanked on his tail on the first day.

For the most part Wolf was a bad-tempered critter who bared his teeth and growled at most anything new—and a lot that wasn’t new. He was the best protection Trace had at the ranch, and Trace loved him. But that didn’t mean he didn’t recognize the wolfish half of the beast and respect it.

Maddie Sue wasn’t showing one bit of respect.

Trace flinched when Maddie Sue dove at Wolf and tackled him to the ground. Wolf wagged his tail and panted while the child wriggled on top of him and stomped on his legs. Wolf licked the little girl’s face, and she giggled and hugged him tight.

It was just plain odd.

Trace got to the women and children and, acting as casual as a man could, he picked Maddie Sue up and held her against him. It was awkward because the little girl smiled at him and kicked him at the same time. She reached down and yelled, “Doggie!”

Trace figured he was holding her wrong somehow. Then he had an old memory from his pa and hefted the child higher and set her on his shoulders with her legs around his neck. Now he could hold her feet. And when his hat went flying and she used his hair as a handhold, well, it hurt, but it beat having her chewed up by the dog.

“The men I was tracking all followed the north trail. But we need to head south to reach my ranch. It’s the closest shelter.”

The pretty, dark-haired one, Deb, with those shining blue, intelligent eyes that made her seem smarter than Trace probably was, smiled. “So we’ll be putting some space between us and them?”

As if that were a good thing.

“Yep. Are you ready to move on? I’ve been going slow, holding us back, but now we need to push hard.”

“Let’s go.”

“It’s your turn to ride, Deb.” Gwen, the blonde, pretty as a picture and with a sweetness about her that seemed to draw the children, finished with the diaper and quickly dressed the little boy. She seemed to do more of the care of the children while Deb did everything else. And looking at Gwen and those young’uns, a body’d be excused for thinking she was their ma. They all had nearly white blond hair. The two little ones had blue eyes, and Gwen’s were a different shade, more greenish, yet the three looked like a matched set.

“I want to walk a little farther, Gwen.”

“You’ve been walking all morning.” Gwen scowled.

Deb smiled and slid an arm around Gwen’s waist. Sisters. For the first time Trace could see the resemblance when they stood close. The dark hair against the light fooled a man, but they had those same bright eyes and pretty oval faces.

“You know the children behave better for you, and they’ve just had a long nap. Ride with them for an hour or so more, then I’ll take a turn with them when they’re sleepy. You’ll be working harder on that horse than I will walking.”

Gwen’s eyes narrowed. “Deb, I’m not riding all day while you walk.”

Trace could tell these two had similar battles often as they tried to share the work.

Deb laughed and it was such a sweet sound, Trace found himself leaning closer to her. He straightened away as soon as he noticed what he was doing.

“I’ve walked all the way across this huge country, Gwen, and done it mostly carrying a chubby little boy. Walking all day isn’t much of a problem.”

“I know.” Gwen smiled.

Ronnie said, “Mama? Where Mama?”

The smiles on both sisters faded.

Ronnie started crying and clung to Gwen’s neck and repeated “Mama” against it in a muffled voice.

“Where Auntie Dee ’n Unca Abe?” Maddie Sue asked from her perch on Trace’s shoulders.

Trace’s big hands on those little-girl legs tightened slightly. He knew about a parent dying. Knew too much about it. He thought again of The voice of one crying in the wilderness. It reminded him of some crying he’d done years ago when he was alone in the wilderness.

Gwen held Ronnie tight and rocked him. Deb didn’t try to explain it.

Trace’s mom had died when he was about Maddie Sue’s age, and he had no memories of her at all. If no one ever spoke of the Scotts again, would these children soon forget they’d ever existed? Ronnie would for sure, while Maddie Sue might hold on to dim memories.

Gwen and Deb shared a somber, worried moment. None of them knew what to say. Try and explain death? Distract the young’uns and move on? Which was right?

Gwen said quietly, “I’ll ride with the children. At least for now.”

Nodding, Deb stepped up to Trace and reached for him in a way that made his heart start pounding. Deb reached on higher and lifted Maddie Sue off his shoulders.

He felt a little dizzy once he realized she hadn’t been reaching for him; his mind had just gone wild.

He helped transfer Maddie Sue and got everyone mounted up on Black, hunted up his hat, and they set out.

“I’m going to walk just as fast as we can, Deb. Let me know when you need to slow down, but by my figuring we’ve only come about five miles up that trail, and with my tracking we made mighty slow work of it. We have to cover a lot of ground. The temperature out here drops at night, and we’ll be walking well after dark even if we make good time and don’t stop very often. We’ll be sorry to be caught out.”

“As I said, Trace, I’ve walked across the bulk of this whole country. Let’s move fast and try to beat as much of the cold as we can.”