Clouding: Day 10

Word Count: 60,001

Summary of Events:

Asher was ordered by the Apache chief to take on sole care of Ashley, who was falling ill; Asher wasn't pleased with the idea, but acquiesced. Theresa and her mother watched with mild disdain as Mr. Peck — now officially sheriff of Tucson — led a larger posse in search of Asher. Asher and the Apache men were camped for the night when Asher got the sensation he was being watched; thankfully it was just Nizhoni . . . 

Excerpt of the Day:

Asher beckoned to her and stroked her soft chin. The idea of being watched — and watched from the west too — reminded him that there was the likelihood that it wasn't just all the fit and able men of Tucson that were after him.

Butler hadn't exactly sounded pleased when he'd taken off with Ashley, and he was pretty sure that Butler would've rallied his whole gang to go after them in an effort to get his son back, if not possibly kill Asher for having dared to take someone he hadn't offered for the taking — especially if Butler were to find him now, being down two of his fingers.

The fact that he'd heard nothing about Butler's men, especially at this point, was actually something Asher had forgotten about. He'd thought that Butler would have set out after them on the day that he'd taken Ashley, but when they'd not caught up with him, they'd slipped his mind. 

After all, Ashley was Butler's oldest son if he wasn't mistaken; therefore, Ashley was heir to Butler's entire fortune, and probably Butler's most beloved son — although Asher was pretty sure Butler had more than one son, he had something like six kids counting Ashley.

Although Butler was a crook, Asher could see him being dedicated to his children, or, at least, to his sons, whom he would want to carry on robbing banks after him and hopefully succeeding in evading capture.

Too, Butler might be suspicious that Asher would lead people bent on bringing in his outfit to their hideout and prevent him from ever robbing again — on top of taking all of his illicitly-acquired money from his possession.

It was something Asher planned on doing when he'd succeeded in catching Bullseye, especially if he were allowed by the people he brought to round up the Butler Whitney outfit to take the five thousand dollar reward Butler had promised to him out of the money they would likely return to banks across the west if they were able to.

Butler wasn't necessarily the best tracker, though, and the deluge of rain would have washed away any and all hope Butler might've had of tracking them down that way, not to mention Butler wasn't exactly going to walk right into a place like Tucson looking for people. He knew he was wanted, he'd likely go to Mesilla like any other crook would.

In fact, Butler could well be at Mesilla now, maybe even rallying up a posse of crooks and criminals to hunt Asher down and get Ashley back.

Asher sighed. It sure hadn't taken all that much for the Hunter to turn into the Hunted. He only hoped that he could evade all those hunting him and succeed in hunting down and catching his own prey, which he could then show to everyone and prompt them to back off — or, at least a man could hope, but with how convinced Peck was, he didn't know if that would work.

Pronunciation:

Mesilla: mehseeah