Page 17 of Rocky Ride

It would take half a day to get to the camp they were searching for and during the long boat ride, Mason had plenty of time to formulate a plan. The veteran of many, many swamp retrievals, Mason’s success rate was second to none. That’s why he’d been chosen by Mrs. Powell to find her step-daughter.

Having a rough idea which channel the outlaw camp was on, Mason stopped at a riverside settlement about two miles before he had to make the turn up the outlaw cut. Going into the camp alone would be foolish and Mason Swift had no intentions of doing that.

He tied his Jon boat to the dock, strolled up the berm and knocked on the door of a guy he’d known for most of his life. A guy who might give him a hand with the outlaws for a bit of cash money.

Tiny Leduc opened the door of his weathered wooden shack and grinned when he saw Mason standing on his doorstep with Clyde.

“Entre mon frere. Gabriella has coffee on the stove and dose biscuits you so fond of.” He laughed.

Mason gave his friend a hug and a pat on the back as he stepped into the friendly warm kitchen of the little house.

“What you doing way down here, Swifty? You hunting down some poor fucker who ain’t got but one prayer agin’ you?”

“A girl. She’s young, but a bad one. She’s a kidnapper and she shot a cop. Texas Ranger.”

Tiny nodded his big bushy head. “Oui. Heard about her. Not many secrets way down here near open water.”

“She’s in the outlaw camp?”

“Yep. Heard she was der. A wild one. When she first got der, da boys beat her up pretty good to tame her down to der liking. What I heard. Folks say dem guys pay a thousand to Carl Levron for her—she being so pretty, n’ young, n’all. Levron splits wid Bonaventure and right den, dat girl, she kills old Carl and Pierre takes off wid all dat thousand bucks for hisself. Dat’s da story Tiny hears from four different peoples on da river.”

“Huh. One of the best stories I’ve heard in a while.”

“How much bounty on her, Swifty?” asked Tiny.

“None. I’m being paid by the day by her mother to find her and bring her back to Texas. The mama knows the girl’s gotta go to jail, but she don’t want her with the outlaws or turning up dead in the swamp.”

“You need help wid da bad girl, Swifty?”

“Sure do. I can pay you and one other guy for a couple hours’ work, Tiny. Anybody else hanging around with a couple of hours of free time?”

“Beau will do it if you ask him. He’s always up for a good scrap and he hates them motherfuckers in the camp down river.”

Mason smiled. “Let’s go see if Beau is up for it.”

Tiny and Mason sauntered up the hill to the shack Beau Rivard lived in and had a couple beers with him.

“Best to hit them in the morning,” said Beau, “when dose boys are hung over and ain’t ready for us—be da perfect time.”

Mason said, “Sure. Good idea. We’ll wait and go after Tammy early in the morning.”

Chapter Five

Thursday, October 17th.

Outlaw Camp. Louisiana Bayou.

With Tiny Leduc and Beau Rivard along for the ride, Mason Swift powered his Jon boat up the weed-lined channel to the outlaw camp.

Over a pre-dawn cup of black coffee at Tiny’s place, the three of them formulated a rough plan. Not sure it would work with the number of variables that could come into play if one or more of the outlaws decided to play with guns.

Dawn broke pink on pewter over the cypress trees as they reached the dock belonging to the gang of nasties hiding from the law. Mason hopped out and tied his boat up alongside three others.

A single dog barked as they climbed the slope from the dock to the camp. The outlaw settlement consisted of three wooden shacks set back into the trees as well as a pair of rusty single-wide trailers barely visible in the morning mist.

It was a tossup where Tammy would be.

They planned to each take one of the shacks, locate the girl and get her out before any of the bad boys were fully awake and able to retaliate. Sleeping with guns and knives under their pillows would be a sure thing for the outlaws.

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