Patricia Potter by Lawless Page B

deny him his last wish than she could resist teaching him. Like Jake, she felt there had to be a way to keep peace in the valley.
    Now, after the dance, she wasn’t so sure. Some of her confidence had drained from her the next day when nothing had gone right: when her stranger didn’t appear, when Brady and Jupiter didn’t come home, when it didn’t rain and the garden grew more straggly.
    And nothing improved on Monday, when the town seemed on the edge of eruption.
    Was she doing more harm than good?
    She no longer knew.
    As she drove home with the twins, she scoured the hills, wanting desperately to see the person whom she had come to believe was their salvation. He had to be someplace. She wouldn’t allow herself to believe that he had been injured worse than she’d thought, or that he’d ridden away. There was a new empty feeling in her, and she knew that only he could fill it. So she looked at every hill and strained her eyes against the glare of the sun.
    But she didn’t see him. And she was alone.
    A S BEFORE, L OBO heard the horses long before they came into view.
    He had returned from town and doctored his hands before buckling his gunbelt back on. He had forced himself not to delay along the road, not to watch for her. He was no lovesick school kid, and it was time for him to stop acting like one.
    He practiced his draw, knowing it was important not to let his hands stiffen up. He tolerated the pain, even took satisfaction in it when his hand proved as quick as always.
    Canton was here! The stakes were growing higher.
    The last time he’d seen Canton was months before in Denver, where his fellow gunfighter also made his base. Unlike Lobo, Canton cultivated an image. He always wore black and kept his gun highly polished, the notches on its handle evident to all but the most casual of observers.
    Although Canton didn’t seek out challenges, neither did he try to avoid them. His presence was always highly visible, which invited trouble, and, once confronted, Canton made sure he finished whatever someone else started. Good for the reputation, he once told Lobo, and the deadlier the reputation the greater the money.
    So was the danger. But Canton seemed to care little about that. He was a man who enjoyed living on the edge, who cared not a whit whether he died doing it.
    Lobo felt differently. He never drew attention to himself, merely did the job. He dressed indifferently, casually—like any cowhand—for he did not fancy being challenged every time he entered a new town. His occupation was a business; he saw no reason for giving away his rather unique skills for free.
    He allowed the legends to grow because they benefited him. A man in fear was a man whose hand shook; terror was an ally in his business.
    Because of his background as an Apache warrior, everyone seemed to think he would have dark skin and hair, and he did nothing to dispel those beliefs. Even when a man saw him at work, the legend surrounding him survived. He grew taller, darker, fiercer. It was only when a victim faced him, and saw the light turquoise eyes as cold as death, that he realized who and what he was facing. Some of them ran then, and never talked of it. The ones who hadn’t were dead.
    It was a singularly lonely and empty existence, but it had been enough. Since he’d never known any kind of personal warmth, he hadn’t really believed it existed, not for him anyway. He didn’t need anyone, didn’t want anyone, a philosophy that had helped him survive. If he didn’t believe in soft emotions, he couldn’t miss them, couldn’t be seduced by them. Freedom had been his one goal, the only thing that gave him satisfaction. Gunfighting gave him that freedom, as well as the highly desirable benefit of being left alone.
    His thoughts were interrupted by two men riding up very cautiously.
    “Mr. Newton wants to see you,” one said.
    Lobo eyed them coldly.
    “I’ll be along.”
    “He said now,” the second man replied