Lone Star 05 (8 page)

However, since he had seen the girl ride into town today and found out that she too was inquiring about Starbuck, Thad Hill had been less concerned with his quarry than with her.
Who is she?
he wondered as he lay back on the unwashed bed, ashes from his cheroot spilling onto his chest. The others retuned their attention to the game and left him to his solitary thoughts.

Hill had plenty to think about. His road to Skyler had been a long one, and now he traced his trail back to the source and wondered again, for the thousandth time, why he had chosen the path he had—and if there was any other route he could have taken.

Born in St. Joseph, Missouri, thirty-two years previously, Thad Hill was the son of a preacher who drank too much and a simple woman who feared the Lord and her husband's fists. It didn't take the boy Thad long to realize that he wouldn't be around much longer. At sixteen, after a final confrontation that left the father bloodied from the son's fists, he hitched a ride West with a wagon train and never looked back.

Then there followed years of drifting, of working odd jobs on various ranches, of avoiding sudden death, of gambling and drinking and whoring—all of which added up to a big fat zero, by his calculations. He had come on bounty-hunting almost by accident. He'd witnessed a killing in Caldwell, Kansas, at a saloon where he was losing at poker. Having known the victim slightly, he felt obligated to bring the murderer back to justice. He did. The reward was incidental but welcome. And it got him to thinking. He was good with a rifle, fast with a pistol, and a better-than-average tracker. Why not make those skills pay?

So for the last few years of his life he had worked as a bounty hunter. His work had taken him as far north as British Columbia and as far south as Mexico City. And he'd seen pretty much everything in between. It wasn't the best life a man could live, but it was better than starving. He thought about that for a minute. He was starving right now, goddamn it! And he needed a bath badly.

This Starbuck case had him thinking hard. There was something about it that didn't smell right. He wasn't quite sure what it was. The Starbuck kid was a terror, all right, with a string of killings that would turn William Bonney or John Wesley Hardin green with envy. The federal law was after him, as well as numerous territories and private businesses—thus the inconvenient presence of a deputy U.S. marshal, two private investigators, and Fagan and McKittrick. And the girl, whose strange Oriental companion shadowed her wherever she went. And then there was Mueller, the strutting German. He'd shown an extraordinary interest in the boy killer and had met a few times with Joshua Carpenter, the Mormon strongman. No, somehow there was a hell of a lot going on in Skyler that he didn't know about—too much. It made him skittish, uncomfortable.

He sat up, tossing the smoldering butt of the cigar onto the floor and stamping it out. He needed a change of scenery to think this matter through, to decide if it was worth sticking around to witness the bloody end that was sure to come.

Without a word to the others, he stalked out of the room. He stopped at the bar downstairs for a quick drink, and then stepped outside. The street was quiet, the sky gunmetal gray and heavy. He was headed in no direction in particular, but found himself walking toward the courthouse.

He rounded the corner just as Jessie Starbuck turned to make her way to the hotel. They collided, and each looked up, startled, at the other.

“Beg your pardon, ma‘am,” Thad said. It was her. The girl he had seen earlier. Damn, she was even more beautiful close up!

“My fault,” she said. “I wasn't watching where I was going.” Jessie brushed the red-gold hair out of her face. She loeked at the tall, rough-hewn man before her and could see that he was embarrassed, perhaps more than she was.

“You all right?” he asked.

“Yes.” Jessie had bumped into him hard and felt her muscles twinge. The man's body was rock-solid, and she had felt slightly bruised upon impact. “It was so stupid of me ...” was all she could think to say.

“Not at all.” Thad wondered what the hell to say next. He couldn't let her just walk away. He might never have this chance again.

“Well, sorry,” said Jessie. She, too, was drawn to the stranger. Something in his brown eyes spoke to her, and she moved away only reluctantly. She warned herself that she could not afford to get involved with a man right now; there was too much at stake here in Skyler.

“It might not be my place to ask,” Thad said, “but who are you, ma‘am? I haven't seen you around town before today.” He removed his hat as he addressed her, revealing his high forehead and long auburn hair. A shave might have helped, but he still cut a handsome figure.

“My name is Jessica Starbuck,” she replied without hesitation. “And what might yours be?”

“Thaddeus Hill, ma‘am. My friends call me Thad.”

“And my friends call me Jessie—not ‘ma'am.‘”

They both laughed. The ice was broken. They shook hands.

“I suppose the next question is obvious,” Thad said. “You kin to the Starbuck kid they're holding in jail?”

Jessie stepped back onto the plankwalk from the street. Hill followed, saying, “You don't have to tell me anything. I was out of line to ask.” He put a hand on her shoulder and she spun around to face him, anger building in her green eyes.

“I must return to my room, please. Thank you for your concern.”

“But Jessie,” he blurted. “You can tell me. Maybe I can do something about it.” As the words spilled out, he knew he was talking foolishly. He didn't even know her—or her problem.

“No, I really must go. I appreciate the thought.”

“Look, either we stand here and argue about it, or we can do it sitting down. But I'm not going to let you go until you tell me what's wrong. I know I can help you. I just don't know how—and won't until you tell me.”

“Thad, I—” She couldn't refuse him, she didn't know why. Maybe it was the tilt of those broad shoulders, or that deep mellowness in his brown eyes. Something about Thad Hill told her to trust him. And she had learned from Ki to follow her instincts. Rarely had they failed her.

Jessie nodded. “Sure. Let's talk. You know who I am and why I'm here, but I don't know about you.”

“Where shall we go?”

“I have a room at the Skyler Inn. It's quiet there.”

Thad suddenly felt uncomfortable. He knew he sorely needed a bath—it had been over a week. And he didn't want to go to the woman's room smelling like a buffalo hunter.

“I should get cleaned up some first,” he said. “I'll go back to my hotel.”

“You can use the facilities at my place,” she offered, guessing the cause of his discomfort.

“That's right kind of you, but—”

“No buts,” she insisted. “Come on. We can talk as you clean up. I have a feeling we can help each other some. What do you say?”

He grinned. “Why the hell not?”

Within the hour he was sitting in a steaming bathtub behind a flimsy screen in Jessie's room. She had smuggled a bottle of whiskey upstairs, against the rules of the house, and Thad Hill was enjoying a smoke and a drink as he soaked away the dust and grime of the past week. Jessie even sent his clothes out to be cleaned, so he could take his time in the tub. As he bathed, he learned her story. He listened closely to every word.

“So I had to find out,” she said. “He's absolutely no help, though. A smart-mouthed boy is what he is. I do believe he did all those killings. But he's not my brother. He sort of looks like my father, and he seems to know a lot about him. Still, his story isn't true.”

“Somebody could have told him those things about your family,” Thad suggested.

“But who? And who would gain by his posing as my half-brother?”

“You must have a better idea than me,” he prodded her. “Did your father have any enemies?”

“More than his share. He was a tough man, some said cruel. But I know he never deliberately harmed anyone, and neither did he cheat. He got what he wanted by honest means. Yet a lot of people hated him. In fact, they killed him. A group of foreign businessmen who wanted a share of his overseas profits. They're a powerful cartel, with influence in Washington and state and territorial capitals all over the West.” Then it struck her. “Mueller! Of course, if he‘s—” She broke off.

“Who? What?” Thad said from behind the screen. “You mean the Prussian fellow?”

Jessie retrieved her father's diary from her saddlebag. “Yes. You know him?” She flipped through the pages.

“No, but I've seen him around,” Thad answered. “I don't like his looks.”

“I'm not sure there's any connection,” she went on, scanning the columns of names and dates in the book, “but why would a man like Mueller be here in Skyler just when a Starbuck turns up? If he is with the cartel, it makes a lot of sense—if he isn‘t, maybe it's just coincidence. Somehow, though, I think there is a connection.”

“You know, Mueller has been spending a lot of time with that Joshua Carpenter, the Mormon bastard that runs this town.”

“I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Carpenter earlier today. He's pretty fanatical, but valuable to have on your side rather than against you, don't you think?”

“I suppose,” Thad allowed, drawing luxuriously on his cheroot. He felt the layers of grit fall away into the soapy water. And the sound of Jessie's voice lulled him into contentment. He also felt the first stirrings of an erection as they talked, but he fought it. That would come, if at all, later.

Her first cursory search through the diary did not yield Mueller's name or connection. She put it aside to look at again later. She turned her attention to the man on the other side of the screen.

“How long have you been in town, Thad?” she asked.

“About a week now,” he said. “And I wasn't the first. Two other men, Fagan and McKittrick, bounty hunters like me, were here first. And just the other day those two detectives showed up. I don't know when the marshal got here, but he didn't show his face on the street until a few days ago. Have you run into the detectives?”

“No, but Marshal Scott has told me about them.”

“Yeah. They could get themselves killed. Asking too many questions and offending the wrong people. I believe in keeping my bu—my head down in my work. That way I don't get my nose shot off before its time.”

“So tell me,” Jessie said, “how serious are you about collecting the rewards for the Starbuck boy? I mean, are you and the others thinking about breaking him out and carrying him back to the law in another territory?”

“We've talked about it. After we decided not to carve each other up. But the problem is he's wanted in so many places. It'd almost be better, from a bounty hunter's point of view, to kill him and then present proof of his death to all the folks who want him, dead or alive. And to do that, yeah, we need to bust him out, get our hands on him.”

Jessie was silent for a moment. “You said you've
talked
about it. But you haven't made any plans to do so?”

“Nope.” He took a sip of the whiskey, and it burned its way down his dry throat. He ran his hand over his stubbly chin and neck. After he was finished bathing, he'd shave. Then he would really feel like a new man.

“If the others decided to break him out and then kill him, would you go along, Thad?”

The question came at him like a bolt of lightning. He didn't know the answer—and that disturbed him. A man in his profession should be prepared to kill in a second if it meant his own life or a few extra dollars. Those were the hard facts. A man who wasn't willing to accept them was better off finding himself another business. Thad was unwilling to accept the fact that he would join the others in breaking out the kid, only to wind up killing him. Jessie must have sensed this weak point in him—which was why she was pressing him on it now.

“I don't know, Jessie,” he said frankly.

“Now that you know I want to prove he's not my brother—wouldn't that make a difference?”

“Hell yes, it would,” he replied, exasperated. “What do you want me to say, Jessie? I don't like doing what I do for a living, but what else is there for me? I've tried everything from punching cattle to gambling to law work. Did I tell you I was a deputy for a month once? It was down in New Mexico Territory. A little border town. I was just about as broke as I am now, so I couldn't turn it down. But when some tequila-mad
bandidos
blasted the marshal, my boss, to bits, I turned in my badge. They still owe me a month's pay.”