Only 05 - Autumn Lover

smile flashed again. “We’ll all be churchgoing, Bible-thumping sons of God from now on.”
    Hunter’s smile was rather grim.
    “You were the luckiest of all,” Elyssa said to Hunter. “I’m surprised those raiders let you through.”
    “They couldn’t see enough of me to shoot at. I was hanging on the side of a mule.”
    What Hunter didn’t say was that there had been no need for the Culpeppers to waste a good mule in order to kill him. They had the ranch surrounded, all ways out blocked, and all the time in the world.
    They could kill Hunter—and everyone else on the Ladder S—at their leisure.
    “Those Culpepper boys value their mules too much to kill one just to get at Hunter,” Morgan said. “If you were riding Bugle Boy, though…”
    “That’s what I thought,” Hunter said. “Bugle Boy is too good a stud to kill on a stunt like that, so I just stripped off his tack and turned him loose.”
    “How did you get a mule?” Elyssa asked.
    Hunter’s smile was as cold as a knife coming out of its sheath.
    “They were beating the brush for me,” he explained.
    A chill went over Elyssa as she thought of Hunter being pursued like an animal.
    “I came up out of cover,” Hunter said, “pulled off the mule’s rider, and sifted into the shadows. By the time the raiders figured out what had happened, it was too late to stop me.”
    “What now, suh?” Morgan asked.
    “Divide the men up. You know the drill.”
    “Yes, suh. I sure do.”

24
    “I see fire,” Case yelled.
    Then, moments later, Case called out the bad news.
    “Hunter, they’re going to burn us out! I’m going up on the roof!”
    “Mickey,” Hunter yelled. “Start opening water barrels. The rest of you, stop the men carrying torches!”
    The men moved to carry out Hunter’s orders, but not as quickly as he wished. Three days of battling the raiders had worn the Ladder S men down to the bone. Half of the raiders could sleep while half fired at the ranch house.
    It took every Ladder S man to defend the place.
    In the cellar dispensary, Elyssa went down the row of sleeping men, quickly waking the ones who were fit to fight.
    “Upstairs,” Elyssa said in a low, urgent voice. “The raiders are coming with torches.”
    The men rolled off the cots fully dressed. They grabbed the weapons they had stacked by the stairway and ran up the steps.
    Penny sat up on the last cot in the row. Her eyes were dazed with exhaustion.
    “What is it?” Penny asked.
    “Raiders.”
    “Again?”
    “Get into those pants I brought you,” Elyssa said. “We may have to leave. A skirt will just be in the way.”
    “Leave? But—”
    Penny was talking to empty air. Elyssa had turned and was running up the stairs, her carbine in her hand.
    When Elyssa stepped out into the first floor, she didn’t notice the crack of rifle fire and the sound of brass casings hitting the floor. The sounds of battle had become so familiar to her that they no longer registered.
    The first man Elyssa saw was Hunter. She ignored the kick of her heart and the shivery sensation in the pit of her stomach that came at seeing him. She had been very careful not to make any special claims on Hunter’s time and attention just because they were lovers.
    Hunter had slept little since the first attack. He barely sat down to eat. He spent most of his time on his feet, walking from man to man, checking on their needs. If he stopped to talk, it was about angles of fire and rationing ammunition and shifting watches to accommodate men whose stamina had given out.
    Elyssa knew that the demands on Hunter were so great he barely had time to breathe, much less to soothe the fears of a girl whose only claim was on his sexuality.
    A carefully shielded lantern provided the sole illumination in the kitchen, which had become Hunter’s command post. The red light gave a hellish tint to everything.
    In a single yearning look, Elyssa memorized Hunter’s face. His black hair was disheveled, as though he had just run his fingers through it. His skin was drawn tautly over his cheekbones and forehead. His jaw had a black shadow of beard. He had dark smudges beneath his eyes, yet the clarity of his glance was unchanged. He gave orders in a quick, calm tone.
    “Ma’am?” Sonny said. “Shouldn’t you be downstairs?”
    “I can shoot as well as most men here and considerably better than the men who are still downstairs.”
    Sonny started to argue. A curt order from Hunter sent the young man