Ellen's Arc

Chapter 6 of 45

Ellen left the barn before Vincent's men could circle back. She had to reach Cade first. Vincent thought she was hunting Cade to betray him. She meant to find him to warn him. But the brush swallowed six women and one man, and she had no idea which way they ran. Every hour let Vincent's men close in. The tracks she followed were hers to read before they read them. She went low through the scrub, following broken stalks. The trail split. She chose the deepest prints and kept moving. The sun climbed. Her burned arm throbbed. She found a torn scrap of blanket on a thorn and knew she was close. Then a rifle barrel touched the back of her neck. "Turn slow," a man said. She turned. A man in a worn coat and low hat stood there. Cade. He had helped her stage the fake eviction, had walked the women out the back while she lied to Vincent's men. Now he counted the plain behind her before he looked at her face. "You alone?" Cade asked. "Yes." Ellen kept her hands open. "Vincent knows you helped me. He sent me to find where you went. His men are behind me." Cade lowered the rifle an inch. His jaw tightened. "How far?" "An hour. Maybe less. I came to warn you, not sell you." He studied her. She held still the way she had held still for Vincent. "The women?" she said. "Dug in." He tipped his head toward a low ridge of brush. "Waiting on me." Ellen's breath caught. They were safe. She had found them in time. Then Cade said something that stopped her cold. "There's men hunting me too. Eight of them. They burned my town." He said it flat, like a fact about weather. "Their tracks crossed this brush last night." Ellen looked where he pointed. Boot prints, more than one set, cutting through the scrub toward the ridge. Toward the women. "Vincent's men come from behind," Cade said. "These come from ahead." A voice carried across the flat. Low. Male. Close. "Cade." The word came again, from the ridge. A big man stepped from the brush, chest plated in gear, more guns on him than Cade carried. He did not raise them. He just looked, the way a hunter looks when the distance finally closes. "Been a long ride." Cade moved Ellen behind him with one hand. "Get to the women," he said. "Now." Ellen ran. She had done it. She had reached Cade and warned him before Vincent's men could. She had saved the day she came to save. But she ran toward six women hidden in the brush, with armed men closing from two sides and Cade alone between them. She had not bought their safety. She had gathered every hunter to one square of dirt.