A Promise of Thunder

and your friends were going to rape her, but she fought you and spooked the horse. She was stomped and gravely hurt. But that’s not the worst part. The worst part is that you left her lying in the dirt, badly injured and about to lose her child. She died, Bull. Died from her injuries and loss of blood.”
    “Think what ya want, Renegade, that don’t change nothin’. Will ya take me up on my challenge?”
    “When and where?” Grady’s face was stark, his expression fierce. His lips were drawn so tightly against his teeth, he appeared to be snarling.
    “Sundown tomorrow, behind the livery at the edge of town.”
    “I’ll be there, of course,” Turner threw in. “Just to see that no one interferes, you understand.”
    “Say your prayers, Bull. At sundown you’ll meet your maker,” Grady vowed tersely.
    “Didn’t think you’d reformed.” Bull laughed nastily as he turned away. “You don’t look like no farm boy to me. Tomorrow at sundown, Renegade.”
    Storm stared at their departing backs with something akin to horror. She couldn’t believe Grady had accepted the challenge so calmly. Did his promise to her mean nothing? She had thought he’d given up his violent ways, yet here he was preparing for a shootout with a desperado. That the man was one of those responsible for Summer Sky’s death made little difference to Storm. A promise was a promise.
    “Why, Grady, why did you do it?” Her voice cracked with emotion.
    “Weren’t you listening?” Grady asked as he searched her face for some sign of understanding. “Bull is one of the men who accosted Summer Sky the day of her death. I knew their names and had their descriptions, but little else. But I prayed that one day I would meet up with them. Killing Bull will be a pleasure.”
    “Killing him will land you in jail,” Storm said bitterly.
    Grady withheld comment. Killing Bull could very well land him in jail, but it was a chance he had to take.
    “What about your promise, Grady? You said you wouldn’t knowingly court violence again, that you’d given up that kind of life for good. Think about your son. Do you want Tim to remember his father as a killer?”
    “Perhaps Bull
will
kill me,” Grady admitted softly. Storm paled visibly. Not once had she considered that possibility. “It’s better than having Tim remember me as a coward. I’m doing this for his sake as well as for mine. I can’t let his mother’s death go unavenged when one of the men responsible has handed me the opportunity I’ve been praying for.”
    “Is that your final word?” Storm asked, giving him every opportunity to recant.
    “That’s my final word.”
    “Then obviously I mean nothing to you. I thought—Never mind what I thought. It no longer matters. If you insist on this madness, then I won’t be here when you return—if you return.”
    A white line around his taut mouth was the only indication that Grady had heard her.
    “I’m not returning to the homestead with you, Grady. I’m moving to town. I’ll be at the Guthrie Hotel if you change your mind. I’ve lived through this once; I can’t bear it a second time.”
    “Storm, you don’t understand.”
    “No, Grady,
you
don’t understand.”

Chapter Fourteen
     
    “You’re going home with me and that’s final,” Grady said as he swept Storm off her feet and lifted her onto the seat of the wagon with enough force to jar her teeth.
    “Dammit, Grady, I don’t want to be made a widow again.”
    “You won’t be.” He swung onto the seat beside her and picked up the reins. Storm’s face was mutinous as they left Guthrie. By the time they reached their homestead she was so angry she could neither speak nor look at him.
    Laughing Brook knew something was amiss the moment Storm jumped from the wagon and stomped into the cabin. She lingered outside while Grady unhitched thehorses. The muscles of his face twitched and his motions were short and jerky as he struggled to keep his rage under tight rein.
    “What happened in town, Thunder?” Grady sent her an oblique look, then turned back to his task.
    “Why is Storm so angry?”
    “Dammit, Laughing Brook, it’s between me and Storm.”
    “I sense it goes beyond that,” Laughing Brook said quietly.
    Defeated, Grady turned to face her. “In a way it does concern you.”
    “Storm does not want me here.”
    “This has nothing to do with your presence in our home. It concerns your sister.”
    “Summer Sky?” Laughing Brook’s lovely