Desert Moon Read online

  Desert Moon (previously titled Almost Arizona) ©2012 by Susan Page Davis

  Honor Bound ©1982 by Colleen L. Reece

  Print ISBN 978-1-68322-085-5

  eBook Editions:

  Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-68322-300-9

  Kindle and MobiPocket Edition (.prc) 978-1-68322-301-6

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted for commercial purposes, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without written permission of the publisher.

  All scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, and/or events is purely coincidental.

  Published by Barbour Books, an imprint of Barbour Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683, www.barbourbooks.com

  Our mission is to publish and distribute inspirational products offering exceptional value and biblical encouragement to the masses.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Table of Contents

  Desert Moon

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Epilogue

  Honor Bound

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 1

  September, 1911

  She couldn’t have Arizona unless she shared it with Adam Scott. That was horribly unfair.

  The stagecoach rolled out of Flagstaff, and Julia Newman leaned eagerly toward the window to see every landmark along the dusty road toward Ardell, the tiny mining town she thought of as home. Some would call this land bleak and unforgiving, but Julia loved Arizona. She’d longed for it during her two years away.

  She ignored the three male passengers for nearly an hour. She’d already appraised them and dismissed them, having pegged them as a businessman, a rancher, and a miner. Harmless, but uninteresting compared to the scenery rolling by.

  When they came within two miles of the town, the road climbed steadily. Not long now. Would her brother, Oliver, be waiting when she stepped down from the coach?

  Julia had come most of the way from Philadelphia on the railroad, but Ardell depended on the old-fashioned methods of transportation. She wasn’t sure the town had ever seen an automobile. Wagons and teams hauled ore to the railroad head, though Oliver said the president of High Desert Mine, where he worked, was seriously considering trying out a truck. They weren’t sure it could take the steep ascent to Ardell and the main mine. More dependable in these mountains was the stagecoach that toiled up the trail twice a week with mail, passengers, and once a month, the mine’s payroll.

  Julia drank in the cloudless sky, so perfect and so vibrantly blue in the dry, cool land. She anticipated each vista, watching for the huge rocks that stuck up out of the earth without warning and the low plants that managed to grow in the harsh climate of the high desert. This was home.

  Unfortunately, it was also Deputy Sheriff Adam Scott’s home—but she wouldn’t think about him until she was forced to.

  The wind tugged at her hair until she was afraid it would pull her hat right off and fling it across the chaparral. With reluctance, she withdrew her head from the open window and set about fixing her hatpins more firmly.

  The man sitting on the seat opposite her made no pretense of looking elsewhere. He had the mien of an investor going up to see Mr. Gerry at the mine. That or a banker, which she couldn’t imagine up here in the mountains, but he was too well dressed for most of the occupations common in Ardell. He watched her with a smile on his lips. Julia avoided making direct eye contact. Had he been staring at her the whole way? She oughtn’t to be grooming her hair in the presence of gentlemen, but she didn’t want to lose her hat, and she didn’t want to forgo the view, either.

  One of the two other men sat beside her—a rancher who must have come to the area since she’d been away to teach school in Philadelphia. The other sat in the far corner, on the seat with the banker type. Dressed in a flannel shirt and denim pants, the bearded man had slumped in the corner as soon as the coach door was closed, then shut his eyes, opened his mouth, and commenced snoring. Julia figured he worked at the High Desert Mine, where Oliver was employed as the bookkeeper.

  A shout from outside caught her attention.

  “Whoa, now! Whoa.”

  The stagecoach slowed, and the man across from her peered out the window. Julia tried to suppress her annoyance. She didn’t want to waste a minute getting home. But the driver, Chick Lundy, sounded as calm as ever, so she relaxed and finished pushing in a hatpin.

  A gunshot exploded, outside but a short distance away, and the well-dressed man jerked back from the window. Julia’s pulse caught and then raced. Another gunshot sounded, right over their heads. The rancher tensed and pulled out a revolver.

  The bearded miner sat up, blinking. “What’s going on?”

  A couple more muffled shouts reached them but Julia couldn’t make out the words. She didn’t think they came from Chick or his shotgun rider, Bub Hilliard. The voice sounded farther away than that. The coach came to a halt.

  She was about to ask the man opposite if he could see anything when someone outside yelled, “Throw down the guns!” The well-dressed passenger reached inside his jacket and pulled out a compact but lethal-looking pistol.

  Julia sucked in a breath as her heart galloped on at full speed. She grabbed her handbag. One thing she’d learned, living in a mining town: Don’t ride the stage unarmed. Still, she hadn’t expected this today. She’d imagined that Ardell was more civilized by now. It seemed she was mistaken. She drew out her weapon and tucked it discreetly in the folds of her skirt.

  “Take it easy, mister,” Chick called from the driver’s box above her. “You had no call to do that.”

  The unseen interloper shouted, “Throw down the box, or you’ll get the same!”

  The same? Julia caught her breath and clutched the butt of her pistol. She felt suddenly hot and a bit light-headed. Several thumps sounded on the roof of the stage. She expected the coach door to be thrown open any second, and a blackguard to order them out. But no one came to leer in at the passengers and demand they surrender their valuables.

  A whump outside drew her to peek warily out the window. The driver’s strongbox had hit the ground a few yards away.

  “Drive on now,” a man shouted. She thought it was the same voice she’d heard before.

  Chick cracked his whip and the coach lurched forward. The passengers braced themselves as the horses strained to start again on the upgrade. Julia clung to a leather strap that hung down from the roof.

  An eerie silence swept over them except for the rattle of the wheels, the creak of leather, and Chick’s urging to the team. Julia looked over at the professional man. He arched his eyebrows and shrugged. Her heart continued to thud.

  “So that’s it?” the rancher asked. He looked out the window warily.

  “See anything behind us?” the man in the suit asked.

  The rancher shook his head.

  They con
tinued on for a minute or two, then Chick called, “Whoa, now!” Again the coach stopped, on a flatter place this time.

  Two raps came on the roof of the stage. “Hey! You fellas in there. Come help me get Bub down.”

  The man opposite her opened the door and hopped out, leading with his pistol. The rancher shoved his revolver back in his holster and scrambled over Julia’s feet.

  “‘Scuse me, ma’am.”

  She drew back as much as possible and let him pass. The miner blinked at her but didn’t budge from his corner. Julia put her pistol back in her bag and leaned cautiously out the doorway. The coach rocked and swayed as one of the passengers climbed up to help Chick. Through the roof of the coach she heard one of the men swear.

  “Bad, ain’t it?”

  “Real bad,” Chick said.

  Julia held her breath. Everyone loved Bub Hilliard. He was sweet on Edna Somers, who worked at the ice-cream parlor, and they were both saving up to buy a house. Mama had told her about the romance in one of her last letters—before she took a turn for the worse.

  “You’ll need to make room, ma’am,” Chick called. He came into view as they carried Bub, with Chick supporting his head and shoulders. Beyond him, the rancher held up Bub’s feet and legs.

  Somehow they boosted the unconscious man into the stage. Julia huddled in the corner, holding her skirt as flat as she could while Chick clambered in and hauled Bub farther onto the floor.

  “Do you want to put him on the seat?” she asked.

  “Naw, you folks would just have to keep him from sliding off.” Chick looked toward the two men standing at the doorway. “Anybody got a neckerchief they can live without?”

  Julia noticed then that Chick’s own bandanna lay on Bub’s abdomen, soaked in blood. She sucked in a breath.

  “Here.” The miner on the other seat started to untie his grubby, twisted neckerchief, but the banker replica was already holding a clean, neat square of a handkerchief in through the door.

  “Thanks.” Chick took the clean one, undid one fold, tossed aside the bloody cloth, and pressed the fresh one to Bub’s wound. “Can one of you fellas hold this on here so I can drive?”

  “I’ll do it.” The man in the suit surprised her. He climbed in and knelt on the floor between Bub and Julia’s seat. Chick got out, and the rancher got in, climbing over Bub to get to his former seat.

  A moment later the coach lurched and began to roll slowly up the road.

  “What happened?” the miner asked.

  The rancher threw him a dirty look.

  The well-dressed man turned and eyed the miner as if he were a cockroach. “We were held up.”

  “Nobody took nothing offa me.”

  “Not unless you work for the mine,” the rancher said.

  The miner sat up straighter. “What about it?”

  “He got your pay.”

  The miner folded his arms and slumped down in his corner again, tipping his hat down over his eyes.

  Adam Scott leaned against a pillar on the porch of the grocery, waiting for the stage to come in. It was late today. Not much, but Chick Lundy almost never drove in late.

  As deputy to the county sheriff, Adam liked to make his presence known when the stage arrived in town. If strangers got off, it put them on notice that this town had a lawman, and he was watching out for the people. When all the passengers were acquaintances, which happened frequently, he got to catch up on the news outside the little mountain town.

  Sometimes Ardell’s humdrum days made Adam restless. They seemed like Sunday school compared to his days with the Arizona Rangers. Long hours in the saddle, occasional outbursts of violence, whether tracking rustlers or busting a mine strike—at least the Rangers always had something to do. Now and then they’d even taken a jaunt over the border to pummel the Mexicans. Since the Rangers had disbanded two years ago, a lot of the corps had drifted around, at loose ends. Adam was glad he had a job in his hometown, but sometimes life in Ardell was entirely too tame to suit him.

  “Mornin’, Sheriff.” Mrs. Whitaker smiled at him as she climbed the steps to the grocery.

  Adam touched his hat brim. “Mornin’, ma’am.”

  The sounds of Chick Lundy’s horn drifted up the mountain trail. The driver always blew it when he reached the bend in the road. Adam straightened and peered toward the sound. Seconds later, the stagecoach appeared.

  The stage was a relic of an era gone by—one of the last left in service. Up here in the mountains, the coaches met the need railroads and automobiles couldn’t.

  Chick was whipping up the horses, even though they were nearly to the stage station. The coach reached the crest of the hill, where the road flattened out along the main street. Instead of stopping in his usual spot, Chick drove on by, with the horses still galloping. Their manes tossed in the wind of their speed, and foam whitened their sides. That was odd, but it didn’t seem they were running away. The driver held the reins in perfect control. It took Adam a moment to realize that Chick sat alone on the box.

  He ran after the stage, half the length of Main. Something was wrong—so wrong that Chick Lundy pushed his horses beyond reasonable. Unheard of.

  The stage came to a halt in a flurry of dust before Adam’s office, a tiny building with board siding perched on the edge of the street. It housed one cell, an office big enough for two men to sit down in, and a back room the size of a wagon bed, with a bunk, a wall shelf, and three clothes hooks in it—Adam’s current home.

  “Sheriff,” Chick yelled as he threw the brake handle.

  Adam puffed across the street. “I’m here, Chick. What happened?”

  “We got held up, that’s what. The robber done shot Bub.”

  “Is he alive?” Adam asked.

  “He was when we put him inside. He’s gut shot, though. It don’t look good.”

  A small crowd was gathering, and Adam turned to see who was handy. He spotted Lionel Purdue, owner of the Gold Strike, one of the three saloons in town.

  “Lionel, run and fetch the doctor,” Adam said.

  The barkeep bustled off up the street as more people drifted toward the stagecoach.

  “Anyone else hurt?” Adam asked.

  “Nope,” Chick said. “He didn’t bother the passengers none. Just took the payroll.”

  “He?” Adam asked, squinting up at the driver.

  “Only one man,” Chick said. “I woulda tried to run right over him, but we was going up a real steep place. He fired first thing and hit Bub. Poor Bub let off a round, but he didn’t come close to hittin’ him.”

  “All right,” Adam said. “Just wait here for the doctor, and then you can take the stage back to the station and tend to the horses. I’ll come over and talk to you again after I see what the passengers can tell me.”

  The door of the coach opened, and a well-dressed man climbed out. Adam noted he had blood on his hands and shirtfront. “Sheriff, is it all right if we get out here?”

  “Yes. Are you injured, sir?”

  “No.” He looked down at his hands. “Just trying to help the shotgun messenger. My name’s Wallace Brink. I’m here to see Mr. Gerry, at the High Desert Mine, and I’ll be staying at the Placer.”

  Adam nodded. The Placer was the one modest hotel Ardell boasted. “All right. I won’t keep you long, Mr. Brink. I just want to get everyone’s story while it’s fresh in your minds.”

  A swirl of skirt and petticoats announced that a woman was disembarking next. Adam turned and held out a hand.

  “Can I help you, ma’am? I’m—” He stared into blue eyes that had flummoxed him before. He swallowed hard. “Hello, Julia.”

  Chapter 2

  Adam turned away after Julia’s brief greeting and peeked inside the stagecoach. Three more men were inside, one of them being Bub Hilliard, who lay bleeding on the floor. He recognized Ike Hinze, kneeling beside the wounded man. Ike had a ranch in the steep-sided valley beyond town. The sour-faced man who huddled in the corner was connected to the mine,
he was sure.

  “The doc’s here,” Chick called from above him.

  Adam turned and looked over the heads of the onlookers, but couldn’t spot his uncle. He frowned when his gaze lit instead on Dr. Clyde Browning. Why did Lionel have to fetch the new doc, anyway? He ought to have realized Adam meant his uncle, Dr. Royce Scott, who had served the town for many years. It was bad enough that a lot of folks had forsaken the older physician for the new one, but this was official business. His uncle shouldn’t be passed by.

  Dr. Browning nodded to him. “Patient inside the stage?”

  “Yeah.” Adam didn’t get any more out before the miner hopped out and Browning climbed inside.

  “What’s your name?” Adam asked the miner.

  “Joe Chesley.”

  “You work for High Desert, don’t you?”

  “Yup, I’m a driller.”

  “Come over here and tell me what happened,” Adam said.

  “I didn’t see nothing.”

  “Nothing?”

  “Nope.” Chesley shot a stream of tobacco juice to one side. “We was going along great guns and all of a sudden Chick stopped the team. Somebody hollered, and then a gun went off.”

  “Only one shot?”

  Chesley frowned. “Two. Mebbe three. I’m not sure. I’d been sleepin’.”

  “There were two shots,” Wallace Brink said, stepping closer. “I think our shotgun rider must have fired once, and of course the robber shot him.”

  Adam looked over at Julia, who had stood by quietly, listening to every word.

  She nodded. “This gentleman is correct. The first thing I noticed was a shout, but not from one of our party. It sounded faint, as though someone at a distance was trying to get Chick’s attention. Then the coach slowed down, and two shots were fired. One closer than the other.”

  She looked to Brink for confirmation, and he nodded. “That pretty well sums it up. The driver stopped the coach, and the robber yelled to throw the box down. They threw it to the ground—”

  “They?” Adam asked.

  Brink coughed slightly. “Well, I assume the driver did. But we didn’t know at the time that Mr. Hilliard was shot.”