Once Bitten: Twice Mad

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Utopia? Or just another crazy ass?

Colt frowned as he studied the eccentric old man. He was fairly damn certain that he'd never met him before.

"Do I know you?" Colt asked slowly and Jebidiah chuckled and shook his head.

"Not yet. But you will... Or do now, I reckon, since you know my name and I know yours." Colt nodded slowly.

"Riiight.... We're looking for Rachel..." Before Colt could finish, Jebidiah clapped happily and swept past him toward the cart where Evangeline still rode with Frankie.

Colt pulled his gun, fully prepared to shoot the old man in the back of the head if he so much as tipped a finger to a thread on Evangeline's wool skirt.

"Evangeline! You are just as beautiful as I thought you'd be! Just as beautiful as your aunt said you are!"

"Where is our aunt?" Ox questioned as he rode between Jebidiah and Evangeline and Colt slowly holstered his revolver, ignoring the knowing glance that Silas sent his way.

"Your aunt should be out in a moment." Jebidiah assured the huge man.

"She's okay?" Evangeline asked hopefully and Jebidiah nodded with a kind smile that creased the deep wrinkles in his leathery face.

"Of course she is!" he stated jovially. Colt shook his head. This was one weird damn man.

"Ox! Evangeline! Oh am I happy to see both of you looking so alive and twitch free!" A woman cried out from the porch and Colt glanced behind him slowly to see Rachel standing there with a big smile and that same damn buffalo rifle she'd nearly shot him with five years ago.

"Aunt Rachel!" Evangeline exclaimed and without warning she was leaping from the cart and rushing past her brother and Colt to jump onto the porch and throw her arms around the red-haired woman. While they didn't look anything alike, Colt could tell by looking at the two of them together that Evangeline had gotten her small stature from Rachel's side of the family.

"Hi, Aunt Rachel." Ox mumbled as he too walked to the porch with his hat in his hands. Rachel's eyes widened as she followed his huge body up to his face.

"You are even taller than I remember!"

"Yeah." Ox agreed with a nod. "Pa said I had about fifteen growth spurts in the last ten years."

Rachel's eyes passed over the group, pausing momentarily on Colt before moving on without recognition. Colt breathed a sigh of relief and scratched at his hairy chin. Thank God for beards. Then again she may not even recognize him without it since she hadn't gotten a real good look at him and had mostly just seen him from the back as he'd ridden for his life.

"Where is your mama and your pa?" Rachel asked and Colt saw tears fill Evangeline's green eyes though it was clear she was trying hard to blink them away.

"They're gone." Evangeline whispered. It was Rachel's turn to fight back tears as she covered her mouth with her hand and took a step back.

"My sister...."

"I'm sorry Aunt Rachel.... I didn't want to kill her...." Tears began to pour from Evangeline's eyes as she choked out the words. Colt didn't even have time to think about what he was doing. He didn't have time to even realize his legs were moving until he was already standing behind Evangeline with his hand resting on her shoulder.

Colt was about to jerk away, realizing that he was once again comforting her, until she leaned back against him and he froze in place. He couldn't have moved away from her then if God himself had ordered him to. Colt had never heard her open up about what had happened to her family and he could tell by the look on everyone else's face, including Ox's that she hadn't opened up much about to them either.