Ghosts of the Past [RDR2]

Chapter 17 - He was only 10.

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WORD COUNT - 1928

Arthur's notable jealousy made way for a pang of embarrassment as he gripped the reins of the wagon's horses, leading himself and Sadie neatly away from Rhodes, with Rosemary taking up the rear. It wasn't right, he knew it. But seeing Rosemary's smile directed at a man other than himself. Seeing another man able to make that joy-ice laugh rumble from her lips? It twisted Arthur's gut in an indescribable way. When Sean flirted he could accept that, knowing Rosemary showed no interest in the young Irish man. But this Jacob man? Well they clearly had history, however short.

Chancing a glance over his shoulder on the pretence of checking the goods in the back, he looked back at Rosemary. She seemed... unreadable. His eyes averted back to the front, the lazy conversation between the two women barely permeating Arthur's conscious thought.

In fact his whirling brain, focused purely on imagining scenarios where Rosemary's laugh was directed at him instead, or perhaps other sounds coming from her lips too, it took him a moment to register the sharp elbow in the ribs given by Sadie.

Glancing over her to see two men on horseback riding alongside the wagon. "You gotta pay a toll, this, here, is Lemoyne country."

Something, deep deep in the back of Arthur's brain prodded him to remember, this 'Lemoyne' gang was not so small as the state they occupied. As a matter of fact, this was the gang of which he, Dutch and the rest had run-ins with 10 years prior, when clearly Lemoyne Raiders were trying to make waves out west as well.

The same gang that, if his assumptions served him correctly, had burned down Rosemary's home, and in addition her family.

His knuckles went white on the reins "It's a free country." Arthur replied quietly, trying to withhold the burning anger within him, and the ever growing need to look back and check on Rosemary - to see if she knew what the Lemoyne's were in her own history books - but he held back on both accounts.

"Not here it ain't. This is our country." The raiders declared firmly.

Calculating the possibilities of removing himself, Sadie and Rosemary from this peacefully, Arthur didn't have a chance to talk his way out of it, before a shot went off, and Sadie was left with the smoking gun. "Ride!" Sadie demanded.

Arthur's eyes blew wide as he whipped the reins to start moving, then handed them off to Sadie, grabbing his cabernet repeater from his shoulder, and immediately twisting in his seat, both to ensure Rosemary was close behind, and to fire off a few bullets with shocking precision.

It seemed there were more Raiders than expected. Not just the initial two, as a large group of them came over the hill on horseback. Arthur aimed first for them. He had always been good with a gun, like he was born with a revolver in his hand instead of a bottle. Time seemed to slow for him when he took aim at the invaders.

Rosemary was pressed low to Sammy's neck, fear evident in her eyes as she rode expertly at speed alongside the wagon. Her only gun was a shotgun - useless at this range to unpractised hands.

"Rose, MOVE!" Arthur demanded strongly. He didn't particularly care where she moved. Just that she went there quickly.

But it wasn't to be. A rouge bullet fired off, missing Rosemary by inches, and instead embedded itself firmly into Sammy's shoulder blade. The horse went down with a racket, and Rosemary was flung hard from the saddle.

At the same time, Sadie's less than excellent driving was thrown yet more off course by Arthur's yelling and firing into the distance - causing her to nearly crash the wagon into a large rock protruding from the ground. The whole scene was chaotic. And as much as Arthur would have liked to have fully turned his attention to his Rose, whose foot was caught in the stirrup causing her to land on the ground with her leg trapped beneath Sammy, Arthur had to keep his focus on the immediate danger around them.