To Tame the Wild: a Red Dead Redemption fan fiction

Chapter 18 - Carpe Diem

Chapter Track: "Will You Help Me?" – Hans Zimmer, The Village soundtrack

"You're not still mad at me, are you?"

Maddie glared at him out of the corner of her eye. She sighed through her nose as she looked back through the scope of her Carcano rifle and shifted her weight in the saddle. "Don't you think you should be concentrating on the current task at hand, princess?" she asked as she drew back the bolt.

Jack chortled as he loaded his repeater. "I suppose so, but you still haven't answered my question." He looked around them at the dense woodlands of Tall Trees; they were well-hidden within nature's bosom, and the advantages of stealth and surprise were at their disposal. It was still early morning, no later than seven o'clock, and the beautiful dawn held a majestic promise.

"And I'll keep ignorin' your question so long as you keep askin' it."

Jack smiled coyly at her. "This could go on all day, you know."

"Indeed." She scanned Tanner's Reach four-hundred yards ahead of her and grinned. "Yup. Just as I thought: they're all guardin' him. Wade Basset's inside. He knows we're after him." She shook her head. "What a coward."

"Hey, you'd be in the same mindset if you had two hundred and forty dollars on your head. How many men does he have?"

She looked through the scope. "Ten."

"I'm surprised he doesn't have more, with how much of a bounty he's got." Beneath him, Sundance shifted his weight from hoof to hoof; he muscles in his withers, legs, and rump rippled with the subtle movement. The palomino lowered his head, folded back his ears, and blew loudly in boredom. Beside the stallion, Maddie's black mare cocked a concerned ear to her herd-mate and side-stepped closer to him. The horses brushed noses as their riders sat silently atop them. Jack noticed the equines speaking to one another and grinned; he leaned forward and affectionately petted his horse's neck.

"Just wait 'til we get to the last four, Marston," Maddie said darkly as she lowered the gun and looked over at him. "This one will be a breeze compared to the last men we'll need to bring in. Then you have my permission to whine."

"I ain't whinin', miss. I'm just makin' an observation."

She gave him a sassy smirk and shook her head. "I don't hear the difference."

Jack rolled his eyes. "Very funny, miss. I'm practically fallin' outta the saddle laughin'."

"You ready?"

"Sure," he replied and gathered the reins in his left hand. He held the repeater in his right, keeping it in place as he rested it across his lap. "Same plan as always, then?"

She looked at him as if he were the dumbest man on earth.

"I'll take that as a yes," he chortled as he reined Sundance around and nudged his sides. As he rode away, he could feel her gaze on his back.

"You're an ass, Jack Marston," she affectionately called after him.

"And you're a bitch, Maddie Ross," he answered back over his shoulder as he and Sundance disappeared into the woods. He flinched inwardly as he said her last name, and once again, he felt his guilt rise from the grey ashes of his heart; the black phoenix rose once more, but he beat it back down into the dusty tomb and bade it stay there.

If I just keep on actin' the way I am, she'll never know, he reminded himself as he rode closer to his hiding spot, roughly two-hundred yards away from the rise that overlooked Tanner's Reach. He stopped his horse behind a thicket of dense brush and dismounted swiftly, his hands taking up the repeater and his feet moving silently forward. His body was in the now, but his mind was in the past. If there's a chance I can keep it all a secret...if there's a way for me to keep her happy and make her forget it all, then everything will be all right. He crouched down as he neared a tree adjacent to the overlook, and he slinked up to it and pressed his back against the rough bark.