Page 122 of The Rancher Who Swore Off Love
“Bring her home, Logan.”
“I intend to.” He made for the bunkhouse. “Mason! Thomas! Saddle up!”
***
The boarding house on Main Street operated out of a two-story clapboard with a crooked porch and a sign that read MRS. DULCY’S ROOMS, which leaned at an angle that made Logan’s teeth itch. A man who couldn’t paint a sign straight had no business charging for lodging.
Logan pounded on the front door at half past five. A woman in a housecoat opened it with the expression of someone who’d gladly commit murder if only the law allowed it.
“Jonah Linton. Which room?”
“Top of the stairs, second on the left, and if you break anything you’re payin’ for—”
He took the stairs three at a time. Mason and Thomas waited with the horses outside. Logan needed to do this part alone. Besides, if all three Foster brothers showed up at a man’s door at dawn, it stopped looking like a request and started looking like a posse.
He knocked once.
Jonah opened the door. He looked worse than yesterday; the bruising had spread from his eye socket down to his cheekbone, and the gash had crusted over.
He blinked at Logan with his one good eye. “Logan?”
“Grace is gone.”
“What?”
Logan held up the note.
Jonah’s face went white under the bruising, which turned the green–yellow into something closer to gray, like old meat left out too long.
“The prospector’s cabin.” Jonah grabbed his coat off the bedpost. “South of the property, about a mile past the creek. Collapsed roof, half the walls missin’. That’s where he’s been meetin’ me.”
“And you think he’s still there?”
“Ace don’t move unless he has to. He’s a spider, Logan. He picks a spot, and he sits in it.”
Logan stepped back from the door and turned to leave. “Thanks.”
“Wait.” Jonah grabbed his arm. “Ace’ll have men with him. Two, maybe three. They ain’t gunslingers, they’re street rats, but street rats with knives are still street rats with knives.”
“I’ve got my brothers and a Winchester.”
“And I’ve got two good fists and a grudge the size of Manhattan.” Jonah set his jaw. “I’m comin’ with you.”
“Like hell you are.”
“Logan—”
“You led a gang boss to my ranch. You helped him dig up my property. You put my wife on that man’s map. Give me one good reason I should let you within spittin’ distance of—”
“Because Iknowhim!”
“Yeah.” Logan pushed him back. “‘cause you worked for him.”
“Call it what you want.” Jonah pushed back. “I know how he moves, I know how he talks, I know which side he keeps his knife on—left hip, always the left hip—and I know—”
“That don’t help no one in a gunfight!”
“She’smysister!”
