Something Borrowed, Something Blue

Sad Sights

wednesday still, come the storm. with the man she loves.

Dark falls early with a storm, and the weight in the air presses down on Jude's lungs like the smell of rain. The sky's rumbling, growling low and mean like a grizzly, but it don't rip or tear yet, and the wind can't strip away all the stink of fresh horseshit.

They're close. It's a taste on his tongue—a thought digging at the base of his skull like the tip of a knife—and he urges Hickory on. The outlaws are a mile out—maybe less. He could find their camp tonight, wait until one of them heads off by himself or falls asleep, and then catch them both by surprise.

He'll have his bounty, and Ms. Little will be safe. Then he'll bring her and the outlaws and Addison back to Richfield, where she and Addison will have their wedding, and Jude will get paid, and Bailey'll hang, but O'Malley might just end up doing time. She'll get married. She'll walk down that long aisle in a nice white dress, with a veil of lace, and she'll look like a piece of heaven plucked down and set pretty under an arch of ribbons and flowers.

The wind rises, and the trees and their mighty branches bend and shake in the thick of it, but Addison's horse lets out a sudden, sharp whinny, and Jude sits up real straight, pulls on Hickory's reins to turn him, and reaches for his pistol. His stare flies to the editor, and the younger man's horse is shuffling back and jerking its head, but Addison is hushing it, and there ain't no arrows or knives sticking out of him.

"The Hell was that all about?" Jude demands. His muscles are all bunched up tight, and he holds his finger off the trigger, but his eyes are narrowing to slits, and he glares firm at Addison and scowls.

Addison's fixing his hat and frowning at something on the ground, but he looks up at the sound of Jude's voice, and he glares back at the bounty hunter and says, real firm and tight, "There's fox trap on the ground there." He nods at the ferns, but Hickory had passed by them easy. "You nearly walked us right into it."

A fox trap? Jude furrows his brow, slides his pistol back into its holster, and gives Hickory a little nudge, and the stallion takes a few steps toward the ferns Addison had pointed out before stopping. Jude glares down and leans toward those feathered leaves, and the wind buffets and pulls and then tugs the ferns apart. The jaws of a shiny steel fox trap sit real snug, there on the ground, and the open mouth gleams plain as day and grins up at him like it's done something smart.

"Shit," he mutters the word under his breath and scowls at the fox trap, and then he tugs on Hickory's reins and backs the horse up—away from those sly bits of plates and springs. Whole thing slipped right past him. How in the Hell did he miss it?

Can't get caught up wondering after things what haven't happened yet.

"Might be walkin' into a fur trapper's haunt," Jude continues louder, frowning. He glares out at the trees and squints against the wind, and the breeze tugs at his jacket and hat. The light's getting awful dim. Might be safer to call it quits while they're ahead, before the sky splits in two, but them outlaws are close.

"Whatever gave you that idea?" Addison bites out. He's talking awful flat and sharp, and his snark gets old so quick it's already coughing dust by the time he finishes the thought.

The wuss is all bark and no bite, but Jude's patience is thinner than a strand of hair, and he glares sharp at Addison and snaps back, low and harsh-like, "You gotta problem, smartass?"

The wind gathers itself up and roars—curls its fingers around the trees and shakes them and their needles like its trying to snap them—but Jude doesn't bend any when it buffets his back, and his hat stays sat firm upon his head. Addison glares back at the bounty hunter, and there's that flash of fury again—that bit of something what might be a man in him, and he fires back, all loud and firm, like he's superior just by virtue of being born, "Yes, I do, in fact."