Only 06 - Winter Fire

injury with the strength of his right arm and a sawed-off, lever-action rifle.
    Another man was called Whiskey Jim. He drank. When he was sober, he was a good hand with dynamite, a useful skill for former bank robbers.
    There were at least five others in the gang known as Moody’s Breeds, but Case hadn’t put names with the faces or voices yet. He had been too busy keeping track of Culpeppers.
    This time he was going to be certain that not one of them escaped. The Culpeppers’ long history of raiding, rape, and murder was going to end here, in the wilderness of red stone.
    No more men coming home to find their ranches ruined and their women tortured and killed , he thought.
    No more broken children thrown away like whiskey bottles along the trail .
    Case was going to see to it.
    Personally.
    Yet it wasn’t a hot, passionate need for vengeance that drove him. War had burned all emotion out of him, except for the bond with his older brother, Hunter—the brother Case had dragged off to join a futile war.
    After the war the brothers went home to Texas, expecting to create a better life. They found nothing left of their home but the sickening wreckage of a Culpepper raid.
    If Case felt anything at all these days, it was in his dreams, and he was careful not to remember them.
    All that moved him was a cold sense of justice. The way he saw it, God had been too busy to take care of all His children during the war. The devil, however, had looked after his own.
    Now Case was going to balance the scales.
    â€œShut up, all of you!”
    Ab’s cold voice cut through the heckling like a knife,gutting the argument, leaving silence welling up as thick as blood.
    Sarah fought against an urge to flee. At his very worst, Hal had sounded just like Ab. That was when she had grabbed Conner and escaped into the maze of red stone pillars and dry canyons. Only the birds of prey could find their way through the stone wilderness.
    She had watched the wild birds, and she had learned. She and her younger brother had survived the grim times when her husband went crazy with drink.
    But running right now will get you killed , she reminded herself fiercely. Then who would take care of Conner? Ute is loyal only to me and Lola is loyal only to Ute .
    Conner would be on his own .
    Just as Sarah had been on her own after her parents died in the flood. That was what had driven her at fourteen to marry a stranger three times her age.
    Thank God Hal is dead , she thought, not for the first time.
    Once she had felt guilty for being glad to be rid of her cruel husband. Once, but no more. She was simply grateful that she and her younger brother had survived Hal Kennedy.
    â€œWe agreed on no raiding close to Spring Canyon,” Ab said loudly. “Remember, Moody?”
    â€œDammit, I—”
    â€œYou remember or not?” Ab snarled.
    Case saw the hints of movement below as members of the Moody bunch squared off against the Culpeppers.
    Good , he thought. Maybe Moody will just kill the lot of them and spare me the trouble. Then I can get on with looking for a place to build a ranch of my own .
    But Case didn’t really think he would get that lucky. Ab Culpepper was too wily to be killed by the likes of Moody.
    â€œDammit!” Moody said.
    He repeated himself several times. There was more bluster than conviction in his voice.
    â€œThe Circle A is too close,” Ab said. “You want beef, you go farther. You want game, you hunt anywhere you please. Savvy?”
    â€œDammit, I still think—”
    â€œYou don’t think nothin’,” Ab interrupted impatiently. “That’s my job. If you was any good at thinking, you wouldn’t be dead broke in winter, chasing your own tail in this red hell.”
    â€œYou’re doin’ the same thing, dammit.”
    â€œI got twenty Yankee dollars, saddlebags full of bullets, and I ain’t chasing nothing.”
    â€œDammit! We go all the way to New Mexico Territory for our beef and, dammit, we don’t have no time to look for Spanish silver, dammit.”
    â€œYou can look after we get the meat we need so we ain’t eating roots like Injuns come spring.”
    â€œWhat about women, dammit?”
    â€œWhat about them, dammit?” Ab mocked.
    â€œA man can’t go all winter without a woman to warm his jeans and cook his beans.”
    â€œSteal or buy some down in Mexico. Or get a