Page 9 of The Outlaw and the Heir

"More than could be said of you," the sheriff said, and despite everything, he sounded amused. I didn't want to dare think maybe I’d finally managed to do more than irritate him, but in this life, you took what you could get, even if it came in small pieces that barely fed you.

Again, it was impossible to tell if James had a single thought about what was happening as he watched us. His son's expression soured slightly when I agreed to take the offer, but that didn't surprise me; he didn't seem happy about the deal in the first place. Then again, that could just be a dislike of me, which seemed to be pretty common around here. Then again, after years of honing my specific type of...charm, I’d found that people weren't all that fond of me, especially when they were supposed to be in positions of authority or power over me. And to think, those were the ones who accused me of having problems with authority and enjoying starting trouble.

Me? Never.

Yet right now, I had trouble in heaps, which meant it was time to show the brains I swore up and down I had and bite my tongue to let things play out. Knocked Stupid still seemed barely to understand what was happening, but if he did, he wasn't bothered by the change in his affairs. Broken Nose, however, was still fuming, and I wondered if I was about to watch him be even more stupid than I’d already seen and he was preparing to put up an even bigger fight that would inevitably turn ugly, or he was going to fume and save the stupidity for a later day.

"Ain't nothin' we can do," Knocked Stupid piped up, surprising me. His face was still pretty vacant, and his voice sounded distant, but his words were as clear as a bell. "Let it go, Jo. Ain't no point in fightin', we're cooked."

And it was damn good advice, so apparently, some parts of his brain were still functioning. To my surprise, it also managed to drain some of the color and anger out of Broken Nose's face as his shoulders slumped. That, more than anything, surprised me because he hadn't struck me as an understanding or patient man, and definitely not one that could be easily talked down when he was riled up. It seemed the two men were closer than I thought, far closer than two men who’d belonged to the same outlaw gang, that was for sure.

Interesting, at least that explained why they had tried to make an example of me without seeming to have exchanged words while I was in earshot. Of course, that also meant I now knew the two of them were close and willing to work together in the future. It wasn't guaranteed that that would be a problem for me, but I might need to keep an eye out for it in the future.

"Fine," Broken Nose grunted after a moment. "I better not be shovelin' shit for the rest of my life."

James watched him for a moment before adjusting his hat. “That'll do. Ambrose, go get the horses. I hope you boys are fit enough to ride."

"Not so sure about all of us," I said, eyeing Knocked Stupid to make my point.

"There's ways around it," James grunted, the first words he'd directed at me. "Get moving. And don't make me bring out the iron to bring you back either."

My nose wrinkled at the mention. I didn't particularly relish the idea of being slapped in irons again. It had happened a few too many times in my life, though anything above zero was too much as far as I was concerned. And I didn't particularly like how he looked at me when he said it.

"Don't worry about me," I assured him. "It's my mouth that runs freely, not my legs."

"Good," he grunted, and again, I had no idea if he believed me, disliked me, or simply saw me as a pair of hands he could use on his ranch and nothing beyond that. It was probably better that he didn't notice my existence often. I wasn't all that fond of dealing with people I couldn't anticipate, and he was definitely the worst I'd met...so far.

The sheriff walked off with James to talk to him out of earshot. I couldn't make out any snippets from how low they were talking, and they were turned away, so I couldn't make out their expressions either. Apparently, I was going to go into this blindly, so I’d have to stay on my toes.

"Alright," James said as he turned around at the sound of horses approaching, "here's how it's going to work. We're going to get you boys back to the ranch and get you set up. Ain't gonna be pretty, but it'll be somewhere to sleep and rest when you ain't workin'. If you think you can behave yourselves on the way there, we might even think about letting you get cleaned up and rested since I'm sure you ain't exactly been livin' good lately."

Which was an understatement of incredible proportions, but I wasn't going to point that out, especially since I was sure he already had an idea of what we’d gone through. Plus, he didn'tseem the type to care much about our problems. Still, he was at least going to give us a chance to get back on our feet a bit before throwing us into work. I wasn't going to mark that as Christian charity despite his religious words earlier, that seemed more like a practical decision than a moral one. What good was it to have three run-down people working for you if they were just going to drop in a week or two?

"Decide not to behave, and we'll find a way to keep you in one place," James told us with the same level of calm and disinterest as before. "And I feel I should point out that we don't have a jail on our ranch. So think about where you’ll find yourself chained up if you start any problems on the way there, understood?"

"Sure do," I said, flashing him a smile that I wasn't surprised he didn't bat an eye at.

"Here they are," Ambrose said, and I turned to find him standing with a group of horses and watching everyone with the same unhappy expression he'd left with. There were exactly enough horses, which meant they’d planned to grab three of us, or they’d been willing to make others walk if they found more. It was probably the first, as James didn't strike me as the type to set out for Rapture unless he knew exactly what he was getting.

"Think you can manage a horse?" James asked as he nodded toward the animals. All of them looked clean and well-fed and were calm despite being led up together amidst the noise of the town. They were probably used to the trips and the people, but even more so, they were used to each other and good treatment from their owners. That, at least, was a good thing. Anyone out here who didn't have the sense to treat their horses right wasn't someone you wanted anything to do with.

"Can't say it fills me with joy," I said, thinking of my aches and bruises. "But I won't complain."

"You just did," Ambrose said, and it was the first time I'd heard him speak clearly and not under his breath. If it wasn't forthe fact that he looked at me like I was manure he’d just stepped ankle-deep in, I might have called his voice nice. It lacked the chill of his father's but still had a timbre and resonance that could carry over a noisy saloon if he shouted.

"It was an observation," I told him with a smile. "Just in case you decided to take note."

"I wasn't," he said, steering a horse toward me, the only one without a saddle I noticed. "Here, you can ride him."

The horse, which was a mottled gray and white color, gave a soft snort and bowed his head to examine me. I was more than familiar with horses and reached up to let him decide if I could touch him. Warm air huffed over my knuckles as the horse snuffled and sniffed, his large eyes gazing up at me. Horses had always been funny creatures to me. Their eyes struck me as a mix of creatures who possessed a wisdom and knowledge mankind never could and beasts scared of their own shadows, shattering their ankles while running away.

This horse, however, was more than happy to bump my hand with his head rather than show any wariness or fear, and when I opened my hand, he shoved his nose into my palm. I laughed, which made him toss his gray mane as he stepped closer and let me stroke his neck. He was handsome, and after a moment, I realized he was a stallion rather than a gelding.

I glanced at Ambrose, who mimicked his father quite well now. He was watching the horse and me with an unreadable expression, and I wondered what was going on in that head of his. Interestingly, his father seemed to take just as much interest in him, considering he watched his son as intently as Ambrose was watching me.

"I think I'm going to call you Pushy," I said with a snort when the horse gave me another shove with his head, almost sending me to the ground, "because that's what you are."

"He's got a name already," Ambrose growled.

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