[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.“Addie,” he called.“Cuidado.Vuelva a mí.” He slapped his head.In English, you fool, he thought.“Be careful! Come back!”THIRTEENHE COULDN’T HAVE put a sequence to what happened next because it happened so fast.The noise was almost directly overhead, so he jerked open the trapdoor above him to stare into cat eyes, smell a cougar’s breath, hear a snarl, and feel a swipe that just caught the tip of his nose as he reared back.He yelled and put his hand to his bleeding nose.The puma, as startled as he was but much quicker, settled into a quivering crouch only seconds from launch when the door on that upper level slammed open.“No, Addie!” he screamed as the cougar sprang, her shotgun went off, and the animal collapsed on top of him, half in and half out of the trapdoor.He felt the heat of the cougar’s blood as it dripped onto his face.The cougar gave another half-hearted swipe that hooked into his neck.The claws flexed in and out, then the animal dangled there, dead.Ammon shook his head to clear it, wiping cougar blood from his eyes, fearful it was his at first.He felt no pain except for the sting on his neck and nose, which hurt less than the last time someone had aimed that shotgun his way.His ears rang with the close range percussion, and he yawned to relieve the unpleasant pressure.Addie.He leaped away from the dangling cougar and scrambled out of the coop, calling her name.She sat slumped in the doorway, the shotgun in her lap, her head down.Fearful, he touched her shoulder and she toppled over in a dead faint, probably as startled as the cougar had been.He cradled her in his arms, holding her until she regained consciousness.Her eyes fluttered open and she gasped.He had forgotten about the cougar’s blood all over his head.Her eyes started to roll back in her head again, so he patted her cheek, crooning to her, “ Sweetest little feller,’ ” because it was the only song he could think of, what with his pulse still racing and his ears ringing now.“Addie, I’m fine.That’s not my blood,” he told her.“You saved my life.”“Don’t shout so loud,” she protested, then burst into tears, clinging to him.He held her close.When her tears tapered off into a sniffle, he pulled up her skirt and commanded her to blow into it.She blew her nose, then just shivered in his arms.“I did what you said,” she told him finally, her voice still breathless.“I kept my eyes open and held my breath.”“Worked, didn’t it? Addie, let’s get out of here.”She made no protest as she stood up, staggered, and let him hold her close until she could stand on her own.She looked in the upper room again, her eyes huge, her mouth open, to see the cougar she had killed, probably while it was pouncing.“I did that?”He heard the amazement in her voice, mingled with something that sounded like pride, which made Ammon want to shout hooray.“No one else did it.You saved my life.”She leaned against him, her arm around his waist now.He could tell himself that maybe she was still having trouble standing; he could also think that she wanted him close.He decided to believe that.“I didn’t even think it was loaded.I was going to rush in there and bash him over the head, but I thought I should try the gun first.”He closed his eyes and thanked Heavenly Father she hadn’t done that.“Addie, you’d have died.”Her eyes filled with tears again.“But he was going to pounce on you!”What a woman, he told himself, amazed at her courage or foolhardiness or whatever it was that made a little greenhorn like Addie ferocious enough to take on a mountain lion.Maybe, just maybe, she still liked him a little.He kissed her cheek.“I loaded the shotgun yesterday morning.”“You might have told me,” she accused, giving him The Look, which pleased him more than he could say, because she sounded so wifely again.“Yeah, I might have.” He looked around, wondering just who might have heard that shotgun blast.“We’re going to get out of the area as soon as we can.No telling who that gunshot may have alerted.There might be other deserters around, or an army over the horizon, and we don’t need that.”She nodded, businesslike.She ripped off a section of her petticoat and went to the river, returning to wash his face, going gently around the gash on his nose, and frowning over the puncture marks in his neck.He let her, sitting on a rock in the sun, happy to be fussed over.When she finished, he went into the coop and came out with the saddlebags, blankets, potatoes, and his rifle.When he brought up Blanco from the river, the horse shied again.“You were certainly smarter than we were last night,” Ammon told the gelding, patting him into calm.Addie was inside the coop.He peered inside, amused now to see her, hands on her hips, looking at the dangling cougar.“You know what I wish, Am?”“That I could skin it and make you a rug?”“That would be nice, but no.Where would we put it? I wish I had my Kodak Brownie so you could take a picture of me standing by this monstrosity.Can you imagine what my friends in Utah would think?”Ammon shook his head, amazed.He had no plans to inform her that as cougars go, it was on the small side.Also, when he had taken a closer look while Addie was at the river, he noticed that although the claws were formidable, the cat’s teeth were worn down or missing.The old gent must have just wanted a refuge from the rain, same as they did.He hoped that as the years passed, if they lived to get out of Mexico, she would tell the story to their children and the mountain lion would get bigger and bigger.He took her by the hand.“You were going to beat that lion to death for me.”She matched him serious for serious.“I guess I was.”He kissed her forehead.“Let’s vámonos.That’s Spanglish for …”“I know.”As Ammon boosted her into his saddle, he turned around to see two young boys and a woman watching them, their eyes wide.They turned and stared into the shed.“My wife killed that cougar,” he told them.“Oh, Am!”Ammon took the reins.Not trusting the road or even the tree line right now, not after both noisy barrels, he led Blanco into the water, which only came up to his knees.He walked down the Rio Papigochic, wanting to leave no tracks.After a short distance, he stopped and looked back.Two paisanos with wicked-looking machetes were approaching the chicken coop now while the little boys danced around and pointed inside.Addie looked back too, her eyes troubled.“We don’t know who is friend or foe, do we?”“We don’t.That’s why we can’t trust anyone.” Except each other, he thought.Trust me always, Addie.He looked into her eyes and felt the gentleness of her gaze in a way that made him swallow and look away, suddenly shy around this woman he knew pretty well.She looked like she was thinking that exact thing [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]