The sheriff nods, but then turns again to Maddock. “Well, if you are heading out, then I suggest you get movin’.” He jerks hishead toward the door. “Now.”
“You got it, Sheriff.” Maddock holds up his hands, still smiling as he makes for the street out front with his entourage on his heels, including Cypress, who gives me one last once-over.
“You have a good evening,” he tells the sheriff before disappearing out the door.
In return, the sheriff tips his hat, then faces me once more. Fortunately, I need no further prodding, already digging a few coins out of my pocket to leave on the bartop for the trouble before exiting in the opposite direction out the back.
I don’t linger in the alley tonight once I’m out the door. Nor anywhere else for that matter. Not until the rain chases me back inside long after I’m sure everyone has either passed out in the street or in their beds.
While I never would have considered us to be on friendly terms, I still hadn’t expected Maddock to actually attempt to pull a gun on me. Even with liquor serving as his second, I’d thought he would know better, but my reputation must not be offering me the same protection it once did.
All the more reason to cut ties at the end of the week. If I make it that long. Christ, I might not have made it through the night if Cypress hadn’t gotten involved. And I have no doubt that’s exactly what he did.
What does he even want with me? What purpose is it serving him to try to gain my good graces? To risk his own safety in an attempt to protect mine? Is he really so desperate to have me in his debt? So worried I could thwart his plans?
How much is he planning to take?
The mustang greets me with a low whicker when he sees me coming down the stable aisle, his head bobbing up and down as if he’s excited to see me, and I have to admit, it’s kind of nice that someone is.
“Take it easy,” I say in reply, reaching out to give him a good scratch behind the ear before stripping off my drenched coat and hat and hanging them to dry outside the stall. “You been stayin’ clear of trouble?”
As if in answer, the dark stallion in the next stall also peeks his head over his door, bold enough to reach out his nose and inspect my pockets when I step closer. Chuckling, I take the intrusion more kindly than the mustang does, his ears immediately flattening as he glowers at his neighbor, but the fact that he doesn’t try to also bite a chunk out of him tells me that at least some progress is being made.
I give the mustang a nudge to get out of the way before I go for the knot securing his latch, my fingers moving to pull apart the rope before I have a chance to notice it’s once again not the same one I tied this morning.
“Damn it,” I mutter, trying to remember how I’m supposed to get the knot to slip apart. “Told him not to be messin’—”
“Pass the end through the loop first.”
As if the rope scalded me, I jump back with a curse, pulling my gun and aiming it high and to my right where the sound came from. In response, all I see is a grin. “Hello, wolf.”
“Fuck’ssake.” I reholster my gun, but keep my glare locked on Cypress where he’s just swung himself up on the back of his horse so he can be seen over the wall, looking so right up there that I can’t believe I ever let myself believe that the horse wasn’t his. “The hell are you doing in here?”
“Needed a change of scenery for a while,” he says, making himself comfortable by flopping down and resting his head onthe horse’s haunches. “Hotel was feeling a bit…confining.”
“Confining,” I mutter, taking a quick glance around our current close quarters to confirm we’re alone before I ask in a low voice, “Maddock happen to locate his gun?”
“In his room,” Cypress says easily while staring up at the rafters. “Where he appears to have left it.”
“Right,” I reply, knowing for a fact Maddock had it on him when he walked into the saloon, my tendency to count weapons coming in and out of a room a remnant from my old life that I haven’t bothered to shake. “You didn’t have to do that back there. That was…” I clear my throat once, twice. “Thank you.”
He turns his head to look at me, appearing amused by my struggle, though he doesn’t say so directly. “It was the least I could do.”
I roll my eyes. “You gonna tell me what it is that you want?”
“What I want?”
“What you’re after here? What’s your goal?”
“Is it not obvious?” he asks, frowning. “I feel like I’m making it obvious. Within the limits of my pride, of course. And general laws of decency.”
“Christ,” I say, huffing out a breath and choosing to ignore that last part before it can distract me like he wants. “I’m not going to tell him about the watch, if that’s what you’re so worried about. Or that you’re letting him win.”
He arches an eyebrow at me. “Am I?”
“Yes.”
“What makes you—”