Peacemaker (The Flash Gold Chronicles, #3) by Lindsay Buroker

quiet, she
advanced more slowly than she wanted.
    A shadow passed over her, and Kali glanced
up. The buildings on either side of her hid all but a slice of the
night sky, and she saw nothing but stars in the gap.
    “ Your imagination,” she
muttered under her breath.
    Kali picked her way through the sucking mud
as quickly as she could. She reached the back of the saloon and
peeked around the corner.
    A towering man with a torso as broad as a
grizzly’s was stalking toward her. That had to be Sparwood. A woman
thrashed in his arms, but he kept her crushed against his chest,
her feet dangling a foot above the ground. Her flailing was
useless.
    Kali tightened her hand around the smoke
nut, but hesitated before arming it. The shrapnel her weapon flung
would hit the woman, too, probably harming her more than the man,
since he was holding her before him like a shield.
    They were only five steps from her hiding
spot. There was no time to think of a better plan. The man would
take at least some of the shrapnel, and Kali could attack him under
the cover of the smoke.
    She armed the smoke nut and drew back her
hand to throw. Someone grabbed her wrist.
    Kali spun, her free hand reaching for the
man-stopper, but she thought it might be Cedar or Lockhart and
wasn’t as quick to draw as she might have been. She didn’t
recognize the dark figure before her, though, and a calloused hand
caught her other wrist before she could grab the gun. Someone else
appeared and ripped the smoke nut from her grasp, then hurled it
onto the roof. It went off, shards of metal pinging against stove
pipes and chimneys, but the building kept it from doing any good
down in the alley.
    Kali tried to twist free of her captor’s
grip, but he was strong and he wasn’t alone. Three other men had
come into view. Behind them a rope ladder dangled from the sky. Not
the sky. The pirate airship. Even with the limited view and the
night darkness, she recognized its black silhouette blotting out
the stars above.
    Mud squished behind her. “What we got here?”
a deep voice rumbled over the continuing struggles of his female
captive. “Two for the price of one?” He laughed, a dark, cruel
laugh that sent a chill down Kali’s spine. “She’s familiar too. You
the one what was skulking around in the woods?”
    The chill deepened. Had he been watching all
the time? While she and Cedar questioned the other pirate?
    “ Hurry up,” someone said,
already jumping for the ladder. “There’s a Pinkerton detective on
his way out, and Ralph can only keep him busy so long.”
    As the men backed toward the ladder, Kali
rallied for one more escape attempt. She tried to jam a knee into
her captor’s groin, but he saw the move coming and blocked her.
Someone grabbed her from behind and slipped a bag over her head.
Kali twisted her neck and tried to bite the man through the burlap.
She caught something—a hand?—between her teeth, but a fist slammed
into her temple. Pain ricocheted through her head. The bag made it
stuffy and hard to breathe, and she gasped for air.
    “ Feisty wench, ain’t she?”
Sparwood asked, predatory hunger in his voice.
    “ Just like you like ’em.”
The other men laughed.
    Idiot, Kali, she cursed herself. They never
should have believed that pirate’s story.
    She sucked in a deep breath to scream for
Cedar, but she’d barely gotten the “C” out when a hand clamped down
on her mouth. Someone hoisted her legs into the air and wound rope
about her wrists and ankles. In heartbeats she was tied tight. She
bit down on the hand gagging her, and a man cursed. Before she
could try to scream again, another fist collided with her head. Her
dazed body refused to comply with her brain’s orders to keep
fighting, and the men hauled her up the ladder.
    The shrapnel being flung from her smoke nut
had ceased, and only its smoke lingered in the air as they climbed.
Kali cursed Lockhart for being slow, but more, she cursed herself
for not sticking with