He stood, legs shaking harder than he wanted to admit, and reloaded the Colt with fumbling fingers. The bearded man groaned, tried to sit up, and Cole walked over, standing above him. "You should have ridden away," Cole said quietly. The man spat blood. "Go to hell."
Cole didn't answer. He turned and walked back toward the creek, leaving the man where he lay. His horse was long gone, but he found the women's tracks easily enough, heading west, just like he'd said. He considered following, making sure they made it to the trading post, but his legs felt like lead, and his hands wouldn't stop shaking.
So he sat down on a flat rock, pulled out his canteen, and took a long drink. It was over. He'd killed two men today, maybe three, depending on how bad that side wound was. He'd stepped into someone else's fight, risked his neck for three strangers, and come out of it alive by sheer luck and stubbornness. Stupid.
Reckless. Exactly the kind of thing he'd sworn he'd never do again. Cole stared at the horizon, where the sun was starting to dip toward the western hills, and wondered what the hell was wrong with him. Three days later, Cole made it to the town of Redemption Flats with a new horse, traded for his saddle and most of his ammunition, and a splitting headache that wouldn't quit.
The town wasn't much, just a collection of wood-frame buildings clustered around a main street that turned to mud when it rained. But it had a saloon, a general store, and a sheriff who mostly stayed out of people's way, which made it better than most. Cole tied his horse outside the saloon, stepped through the swinging doors, and made straight for the bar. "Whiskey," he said. The bartender, a thin man with a nervous twitch, poured him a glass without comment.
Cole drank it in one swallow, set the glass down, and gestured for another. "Rough week?" the bartender asked. "Something like that." Cole was halfway through his second drink when the doors swung open, and three women walked in. He recognized them immediately.
The tall one, dark-skinned, sharp-eyed, moving with a confidence that hadn't been there in the canyon, led the way. The other two flanked her. One was smaller, wiry, with sun-bleached hair and a scar running down her jaw. The other was older, maybe 40, with gray streaking her black hair and a face that looked like it had seen every hard thing the world had to offer. They walked straight to Cole's table and stopped.
The tall one spoke first. "We've been looking for you." Cole set his glass down slowly. "You made it to the trading post." "We did."
She pulled out a chair and sat without asking. The other two followed. "Thanks to you." "You don't owe me anything." "That's where you're wrong."
Cole frowned. "I did what anybody would have done." The smaller woman laughed, a sharp, humorless sound. "No, you did what nobody else would have done, and now you're stuck with us." "I'm not stuck with anybody."
The tall woman leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table. "My name is Kaya. This is Lyra." She gestured to the smaller woman. "And Sani." The older woman nodded.
"We come from a place where debts aren't optional. You saved our lives. That means something." "It means I made a choice," Cole said. "Doesn't mean you owe me."