Cypress looks at me, frowns slightly, then looks to Aiden who is still ahead. “We make it a habit not to be seen together in the towns we visit.”
“Why?”
“Another precaution,” Cypress replies, his partner keeping his eyes forward this time while he continues. “Another worry, that Aiden’s presence will be a hazard rather than a help.”
I consider that, trying to imagine how Aiden’s sometimes intimidating appearance could be anythingbuta help in these types of situations. “Wouldn’t it be safer, if people knew you weren’t alone?”
“You would think.” Cypress rotates his right shoulder, grimacing slightly as if pained by it, and I remember the long scar I’d glimpsed there. “I suppose an advantage is that if I look to be on my own, then others are more likely to try to make themselves my company. Do you remember what I told you? About how people see what they want to see?”
“Yes.”
“So say a man comes to your town. He arrives alone and staysalone. Overspends on his accommodations, stumbles his way through hand after hand of cards, but seems not to care a bit about the impact to the sizable pocketbook he tucks back into his coat. What would you see? If you were a person inclined to place a wager?”
I mull it over, remembering the way Zeke had inexplicably described him as foolish. “You want them to see someone rich. Who can be taken advantage of,” I say slowly. “Because then they’ll bet more money…if they think it’s a sure thing.”
Cypress beams. “Exactly right, little bird.”
“Is that not cheating?” I suggest. “Since you’re purposefully deceiving them?”
He shrugs. “Not in the way I see it. A good bluff is one of the most essential parts of poker. Is it my fault they fail to realize the game is being played before they even sit down at the table?”
I shake my head at him, but I’m smiling. “I see now why Aiden thinks your personality will get you killed.”
Cypress grins again as if I’ve paid him a compliment, and I think I hear Aiden chuckle up ahead, too, even over the sound of the wagon and the horses.
“They do get a bit…upset,” Cypress admits with a dramatic sigh. “Unfortunate, because then I have no choice but to cut my stay short.”
“Very unfortunate,” I agree, though something tells me he’s never all that sad to go. “You said they don’t usually come after you. But they do sometimes?”
“Yes.”
“Doesn’t that scare you?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because mighty Cerberus has yet to be caught,” Cypress says with obvious pride. “And if he ever were, Aiden would be there.”
My chest pangs with that same longing curiosity over the trusthe has in his partner. “I thought you said you weren’t together in town.”
“I said we weren’tseentogether,” he counters. “Doesn’t mean he isn’t nearby. Waiting in the wings for calamity. Like an avenging angel.”
Up ahead, Aiden shakes his head again as I think through the explanation with the evidence I’ve seen with my own eyes. And at the end of it, I am certain I understand. Cypress’s job is to win. Aiden’s job is to make sure they don’t lose.
I must have been a real bastard in a past life. Not that I’m not in this one.
“All right, focus on breathing for me,” I hear Cypress murmur, lingering over Cora’s shoulder as she stands with a gun pointed at an old can set up about ten paces away. “Steady. In and out. In and out.”
She had been insulted at first by how close I’d placed the target, then she’d failed to mark it…not once, butfourtimes. Growing more and more frustrated each time until I thought she might turn the pistol and its only remaining bullet on me just so she could hit something. Honestly, part of me wishes she would have. It might have been kinder.
“Shoot again, Cora,” I’d told her when she attempted to shove the gun in my direction. “You’re not done.”
“Yes, I am,” she snapped back. “I can’t do it. I tried.”
I tried.God, I can still hear the way she sounded that night when we found her, two weeks ago now, and it still nearly breaksme every time I think of it.I did what you said. I tried.
Cypress is right. We should have found a way to protect her better. And while I’m damn certain I’ll never allow something like that to happen again, I’ll also be damned if I leave her any longer in this world without knowing how to defend herself.