Cursing, Josh jerked on the reins once more, guiding his mount to follow the path of the stampede. The roar of gunfire had now died away to an occasional shot. He quickly realized that the fight was all but over, the rustlers routed.
All that was left to do now was gather up the survivors.
But there was only one survivor Josh was interested in at the moment, a black man on a bay gelding who had vanished before the rampaging herd. Riding headlong into the cloud of dust churned by the frantic hooves of one hundred frightened animals, Josh squinted against the grit that stung his eyes. As the thunder from the herd faded, another sound swelled before him, the piercing scream of an injured animal.
The dust swirled around him like a reddish fog, and Josh slowed the Appaloosa, approaching carefully, his pistol aimed and cocked. Slowly, the bay materialized, thrashing and trying desperately to rise on his two ruined forelegs. Without thinking, Josh raised his Colt and put a bullet through the animal's brain, ending its misery. Only then did he recall the animal's rider and the danger he might have put himself in with this simple act of mercy.
But no answering shot rang out. No scramble of movement betrayed the rider's presence, and another, very unsettling thought crossed Josh's mind. In all his years of ranching, he had only once seen a man trampled to death. It was a sight he would never forget. Apprehension lifted the hairs on his neck as he nudged the Appaloosa into motion again and began to scan the area for the dusty red splotch that would mark the end of Candace's son.
His horse whinnied, warning him even before the dust cleared and he saw the body. Miraculously, the man was whole, his lean length sprawled on the dusty ground like a giant rag doll that had been discarded by an even more gargantuan child. But he was still. Too still.
Josh leaped from his saddle and raced to the body, searching for any sign of life. With practiced hand, he raised one dark eyelid and saw not the white of a rolled-back eyeball but the deep brown of a living iris.
Feeling foolish, he also felt relief. For reasons he could not define, he did not want to go back and tell Candace her son was dead, no matter what the man might have done both to him and to her.
Jeremiah groaned, reminding Josh that he might still pose a danger if he were to come around while still armed. Josh pulled the pearl-handled Colts from the hand-tooled leather holsters and then patted him down for other weapons. He retrieved a deringer from a vest pocket and a Bowie knife from a boot. He was stuffing the weapons into his saddlebag when Jeremiah groaned again and opened his eyes.
"Don't move," Josh warned, his own gun trained on his captive. "Your right arm's probably broken and you might have other injuries."
Jeremiah blinked several times, trying to focus on Josh's face, shook his head once, and then tried again. Automatically, he lifted his right arm to wipe the dust from his eyes, but the effort made him moan in agony. "You're right about that arm," he muttered, using his left hand to clear his vision. He glanced down at the injured arm and quickly averted his eyes at the sight of it lying at such a crazy angle.
"I took your guns," Josh said as he watched the dark gaze settle on him at last.
Jeremiah's eyes narrowed as he suddenly realized his predicament. His left hand swooped to his vest pocket.
"I found that one, too," Josh said. "And the knife in your boot."
Josh saw the tension of his captive settle into a cautious wariness. Brown eyes watched as Josh lifted his Stetson and wiped the moisture from his forehead with his sleeve.
"You're Logan, aren't you?" Jeremiah said.
Josh settled the hat back on his head, realizing that his silvered hair must have revealed his identity. "That's right."
"Do you know who I am?"
Josh nodded. "Candace told me. You're her son. That's why you're still alive."
The brown eyes narrowed speculatively. "Is that all she told you?" he asked skeptically.
Josh frowned, wondering what Jeremiah could be up to.
"She told me how you threatened to get back at her through me, if that's what you're wondering. Don't worry, I know enough about you that I'm not going to let you go."
But Jeremiah shook his head slowly. "There's one more thing that you might find interesting," he said, his lips curling back into a feral grin. "You see, she forgot to tell you who my father was." Ever so slowly, he raised his left hand and loosened the chin strap that had held his hat on through the violence of his fall. With equal slowness, he grasped the brim of that hat and lifted it from his head.
Josh gasped at the sight of hair as silver as his own glinting in the sunlight.
"Your mother used to tell me that I favored him," Jeremiah taunted. "She used to tell me lots of things, about how that black bitch stole him from her. About how she'd sneak into his bed at night and-"
"No!" Josh shouted in horror, hardly aware that he had even moved and startled to feel Jeremiah's throat beneath his hand. For one crazed moment he longed to choke the life out of him, to silence the ugly lies forever.
And they were lies. Oh, he had known about his father and Candace, known that he sometimes went to her cabin at night. The boy Josh had hated the thought, but the man Josh understood how something like that could happen. Now everything was confused in his mind. There were so many things he did not understand. Like why his father had allowed Candace to become his wife's maid when Candace had already borne him a child, and why that child had been left behind, and why…
Jeremiah's strangled cries and the pain of the fingernails of Jeremiah's good hand clawing at him brought Josh to his senses. Josh instantly released him, thrusting him away in disgust. "Get up," he said, no longer caring whether the man he now knew was his half-brother had any internal injuries or not. "I'm going to take you into town and lock you up for the circuit judge. I'll let him decide whether you hang or whether you just rot in prison."
"Do you see anything, Candace?" Felicity asked. The black woman stood at the front window, staring out into the darkness.
"No," Candace replied with a weary sigh. "It's foolish to watch for them. They might be gone a week or more. They might not even be able to find Ortega at all." But Felicity noticed that in spite of her words, Candace did not forsake her vigil.
Resisting the almost overwhelming urge to join her at the window, Felicity resolutely resumed her sewing. She would have preferred an activity that occupied her mind, but reading was out of the question. She had already tried it and found she could not concentrate on the words for worrying about Joshua. In desperation, she had picked up her latest sewing project, a violet-sprigged calico dress. Felicity was making it up in the wrapper style known as the "Mother Hubbard." Not only was that type of dress comfortable and practical, but it would easily expand to accommodate a growing pregnancy, as Candace had pointed out to her when making the original suggestion.
Felicity's hands stilled as she glanced down and tried to imagine her stomach rounded with Joshua's child. Joshua's child. Longing stabbed through her, piercing her heart. How very much she wanted his child. She might, in fact, already carry his seed. Instinctively, she laid a hand protectively over her imaginary babe. Whatever would she do if Joshua did not come back? The violet material in her lap blurred before her eyes.
"It's all right, honey," Candace assured her urgently, brushing the fabric onto the floor and taking Felicity into a comforting embrace. "Don't cry. Everything's fine."
Only then did Felicity realize that she was crying, shaking with silent sobs and blinded by a flood of tears. She smothered those sobs against Candace's shoulder, clinging tightly to the solace she offered.