"To apologize to her would be so simple, but instead he cries 'I'll be damned if I crawl'. If he loses her he's lost his best friend and more than just a lover can provide. So he wrestles with emotions that defeat him. Chalk another love lost up to foolish pride." Travis Tritt 'Foolish Pride'

“Who’s watchin’ the lovers?” Joe asked Jonah as he joined her beside the tiny fire she had built away from the main camp that night.

“Reb’s got his eye on them.” Jonah assured her and then his gray eyes fixed her with a concerned stare. “Now we need to talk.”

Joe felt that familiar tremble wash over her as Jonah’s eyes looked into hers. Quickly she looked away and poked at the fire with a stick.

“What?”

“How about we start with you telling me what the hell is wrong with you?”

“Excuse me?” Joe snapped, glaring over at him.

“You haven’t acted right since Biggley Falls….”

“Yer just mad cuz we ain’t laid together since then.” Joe replied with a shrug. “I just ain’t been in the mood, Jonah…”

“No, it’s not just that.” Jonah argued. “You’ve barely spoken to me. Did I do something to piss you off?”

“I’m just fine, Jonah.” Joe assured him. Truth was she was far from okay. The end was coming for she and Jonah and Joe knew she was going to be powerless to stop it.

“So what are you going to do once this is over?” Jonah questioned and Joe shrugged.

“Head back to the cabin, I guess. Try to get some trappin’ done and get a bit of extra money. I’m hoping to travel up the northwest a ways. I’ve heard there’s some good furs to be got up there. I’d like to get enough money to not have to work too hard for a year or two.” she replied, though she made sure to not tell Jonah the real reason why she was hoping to not have to trap too much the next year.

“What about you?” Joe asked Jonah. He shrugged.

“Don’t know yet. Might see about gambling and putting some money back.”

Joe nodded. Jonah’s future didn’t include her, that much was obvious. Before she could say anything else, Jonah moved closer and pressed his lips to hers.

Joe wanted to give in. She wanted to let him make love to her, let herself be weak with him…. But she couldn’t.

All she kept seeing was the pity filled glances that Bart and Reb were always sending in her direction whenever Jonah denied loving her. All she kept hearing was a chant in her head repeating ‘Jonah’s fool’ so loudly that she could not drown it out.

She would not be his fool. This game had been her idea in the beginning but now the rules had changed and Joe no longer wanted to play…. Not while Jonah was holding all the cards and Joe was sitting there with a losing hand. A good gambler always knew when to fold.

Joe pulled away from him and Jonah suddenly looked angry.

“I don’t know what the hell your problem is but as soon as you’re done acting like some moody woman…”

“I am a woman, dammit!” Joe exclaimed as she stood up. “I’m a woman, not a whore, and I don’t wanna be treated like one anymore.”

Anger flared in Jonah’s gray eyes as he rose to his feet as well. “I have never treated you like a whore.” he argued.

“Yes ya have! Every damn time I’ve spread my legs fer you!” Joe stormed away toward the main camp but Jonah followed after her.

“That’ s a hell of a thing for you to say!” he bellowed, not seeming to care that they now had the attention of everyone else in camp.

“Go to hell, Jonah.” Joe spat as she kept her back to him and stared off into the darkness.

Jonah grabbed her arm and spun her around. “What is this about, Joe?”

“I want more, Jonah.” Joe replied, the words coming out of her before she had even realized they were going to. Here she went, setting herself up for that fall she had no idea she was going to take. But nothing good ever came for a coward, that was another of the lessons her pa had taught to her. Joe was no coward.

Jonah quickly released his hold on her arm and took a step back.

“More what?”

“More of you.”

“No.” he replied simply as he swallowed hard. “I won’t give you more. This was your idea, Joe. You and I agreed we wouldn’t attach strings to this. We wouldn’t ask for more.”

“Yeah well, I changed my mind.” Joe replied, trying to ignore the pain that his sharp edged words had caused. There was nothing worse than having your own words thrown back in your face. Especially once you realized just how foolish your words had been.

“So what do you want, Joe?”

“You.”

“I won’t love you, Joe.” Jonah warned her and Joe felt her heart crumbling. “I refuse to be another woman’s fool.”

“Dammit, Jonah!” Joe exclaimed as she punched him in the chest and he fell back several steps and stared at her with shock. “I ain’t Penny! And I ain’t her!” she screamed as she pointed at Scarlett, who was looking quite amused as she watched the confrontation.

“I know that!” Jonah yelled back, his face pained. “I know you’re not them, dammit! I know that better than anybody.”

“Obviously you don’t.” Joe countered as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“Joe, we’re friends, don’t do this. Don’t make me say goodbye to you.”

Joe felt a tear fill the corner of her eye and then she cursed that tear to the fiery pits of hell, blinked it away and squared her shoulders.

“I love you, Jonah Winchester, but I won’t be your fool anymore than you’ll be mine. But don’t worry, you aint’ gotta say goodbye as I ride off.”
Joe couldn’t read Jonah’s face. He was keeping it masked, though his hands were clenched tightly at his sides.

“That’s it? You’re just gonna leave? Thought you were in this ‘til we got them to Barbadine?”

“I can’t….” Joe’s voice broke and she cleared her throat and met his gaze full force, not allowing the tears she felt gathering fall from her eyes. “I can’t do that.”

She turned to Scarlett and then reached down and ripped the fancy necklace from around her neck.

“What the hell are you doing?!” Scarlett cried and Joe shrugged.

“I figure this’ll be worth enough to cover what you owe me.”

Joe walked around Jonah, who said nothing, and unhitched her horse from the tree branch she’d had the reins wrapped around. She could feel those damnable tears gathering more and more and she knew that soon they were going to fall.

A part of her was screaming out, begging for Jonah to say something, anything, to make her stay. But he didn’t as she jumped up into the saddle of her horse and he continued to stand there silent and still.

***

“What the hell are you doing, Jonah? Don’t let her leave!” Bart yelled angrily as he came around Jonah. Jonah didn’t know what to say, what to do or even how to move.

Why was Joe doing this? They’d had something good and she was throwing it all away.

“I won’t beg her to stay, Bart.” Jonah replied. “If she wants to go, she can go.”

“You fool! She loves you. You love her. Make her stay.”

“I don’t love her.” Jonah replied with a shake of his head. “I can’t give her what she wants so I guess she’s better off leaving.”

“Yer an idiot.” Reb spat.

Jonah watched Joe riding off and then he froze when he felt his gun be taken from it’s holster.

“Distractions get you killed.” Harmon whispered in his ear as he pressed the gun into Jonah’s back. Somehow the man had gotten his hands loose from the ropes and now Jonah could very well die because of it. “Don’t you move!” Harmon bellowed at Reb and Bart. “I’ll pull this trigger if you so much as….”

Before Harmon could finish his warning threat the sound of a gunshot filled the air and a hole appeared in Harmon’s forehead just before the man fell lifeless to the ground.

“Harmon!” Scarlett screamed as she threw her body over his. Reb and Bart focused their attention on making sure she didn’t get the gun while Jonah stared at Joe who was on her horse at the edge of the light with her gun in her hand.

Her green gray eyes were illuminated by the dancing flames and the golden highlights in her red hair were shining. Jonah didn’t want her to leave. She was his best friend. He needed her.

“Joe….”

“Will you ever love me, Jonah?” Joe asked quietly as she holstered her gun. Jonah sighed. The answer was no. He would never give that much of himself to another woman.

Joe nodded and sat up a little straighter.

“Then I gotta go. Sorry I broke the rules of the game. Please don’t come around. I don’t wanna see ya.”

With those parting words, Joe rode off into the darkness and Jonah knew he’d just seen her for the last time.

Jonah swallowed back the pain he felt and turned to face the screaming woman, the dead man and his two friends who looked as if they wanted nothing more than to pull their guns and kill him themselves.

“How the hell did he get his hands free?!” Jonah demanded, deciding that being angry was the best option he had at the moment.

“Looks like the ropes loosened just enough for him to slip his hands free.”

“She killed my Harmon!” Scarlett cried as she laid kisses to the dead mans cheeks.

“You don’t care. All you care about is yourself and now you’re worried about how you’ll ever get free with him dead.” Jonah spat.

Scarlett fixed him with an icy stare, her brown eyes full of pain. She pushed herself to her feet, her hands still secured behind her and tossed her hair over her shoulder.

“What do you know? Think what you want about me but I loved that man. I don’t care what you do to me now.” With that she turned her back on him and stared off into the night.

“Jonah, go after Joe.” Bart urged as he handed Jonah’s gun back to him. Jonah shook his head.

“No. I won’t chase her. She doesn’t want me to. You heard her.”

“You, her and all that stupid pride!! You’re going to lose a good thing if you don’t chase after that woman! You won’t find another one like her!”

Jonah felt a painful twist in his gut.

“I don’t want to. Just whores from me for now on. Any other kind of woman is more trouble than she’s worth.” Bart threw his hands up and stormed away with disgust.

“Most o’the time I’d agree with you, Jonah, but not now. Joe was good fer you. You were good fer her.” Reb cut in with his two cents on the situation.

“I won’t be her fool.”

“Who says she’d make you into a fool?” Reb asked.

“They all do.” Jonah replied with a shrug. “It’s over now. This whole affair was her idea and she said it would end once we had Scarlett. Least she kept her word about that.”

“Jonah…” Reb began and Jonah clenched his fist and turned on his friend.

“I won’t talk about it anymore! You either shut up and stand behind me or get the hell out of my way! I ain’t got no more use for any more of your damned lectures!”

Hurt filled Reb’s blue eye and the man nodded and raised his hands.

“Alright, Jonah… You got it.”

Jonah stomped to Copper and grabbed the tiny shovel he kept strapped to his saddlebags.

He had a grave to dig and some sleep to get if he was going to catch the train in the morning.

***

It took Jonah nearly a month to get to Barbadine and surprisingly enough Scarlett had not offered a single bit of resistance once her husband was dead.

She hadn’t begged, pleaded or tried to escape a single time. Hell what did Jonah know, maybe the woman had loved the man.

Jonah felt none of the satisfaction he had thought he would as he placed Scarlett into the lawmen’s custody. Jonah had stopped feeling much of anything the last few weeks.

That blackness, that darkness, that always seemed to be waiting to take him down now had a firm grip.

His boots kicked up dust as he made his way down the street under the hot summer sun.

He entered the first saloon he came to and ordered a whiskey, down it quickly and ordered another.

Jonah thought about ignoring Reb as the man sat beside him but Reb wasn’t going to allow that.

“What are you doing, Jonah?” he asked as he adjusted his eye patch.

“Drinking, Reb. Is your vision going?”

“Aint’ it a little early for that?” Reb asked. Jonah shook his head.

“Never too early.”

“I’m worried about you, Jonah….”

“Where’s Bart?” Jonah asked, not caring to hear what Reb had to say about his drinking or his mood.

Reb sighed. “Gone. He said to tell ya that he did his part and helped ya finish yer mission for vengeance but that he was tired of ya treating us all like shit. He said to tell ya that as soon as yer ready to pull yer head outta yer ass he’d be happy to be yer friend again.”

“Fuck him.” Jonah declared as he downed his second shot and tapped the bar for a third.

“Jonah, is this about Joe?” Reb asked and then Jonah shocked them both when he punched the man who had been his friend for most of his life in the mouth.

Reb fell off his stool and lay there on the ground staring up at Jonah with shock in his blue eye.

“Don’t you act like your better than me, Reb. I’m just being the man that you and Bart always wanted me to be. A whore loving, whisky drinking, roving and roaming man who don’t give a shit about anybody. Ain’t that what you wanted?”

Reb shook his head as he got back to his feet.

“No, Jonah. No it weren’t. Yer better’n that no matter what yer ma and pa might have been.”

“Get the hell out of here, Reb.” Jonah ordered and then he sat back down on the stool and downed his fourth shot of whiskey.

“We’ve lost ya ain’t we? I knew one day a whoopin’ would get laid on ya so big that ya wouldn’t be able to pull yerself back out the sadness it left ya in. I asked ‘round, Jonah, and it’s called depression. Drinkin’ won’t help it.”

“No, but putting a bullet in your head will and I’m getting’ damn close to doin’ it so why don’t you get outta here.” Jonah snapped, the fifth shot of whisky causing his words to slur.

Reb sighed and then nodded as he readjusted his hat on his head and left the saloon.

Jonah snorted as he turned back to the bar and tapped it for another whiskey.

Jonah didn’t need anybody. No Joe. No Bart. No Reb. He was gonna be the man his outlaw pa had been. The man his whore of a mama had wanted him to be. The man his uncle had tried to beat him into. The man that Reb and Bart had always told him to be.

He had outlaw blood flowing in his veins and he wasn’t about to try to fight that anymore. Anybody who didn’t like that could rot in hell for all he cared. Love and caring were for fools and he’d sure as hell never be one of those again.

The bartender tried to refill his shot glass and Jonah shook his head and jerked the bottle from his hand.

Jonah Winchester was finally putting those settling down with a family, a job, true love, and friendship dreams behind him. Foolish dreams is all they’d been to begin with.

He took a big swig from the whiskey bottle, deciding that that was something worth drinking to.

***

Joe stood on the cliff line and looked out over the valley that her new cabin was being built in. She had wanted a new home in a new place… Something in her life that wouldn’t have Jonah’s fingerprints all over it. It would take a while but with Bart helping it would get done.

It had been three months since she’d left Jonah and two months since Bart had tracked her down. They had agreed that he would help her build her cabin and then head back out but that had been before he’d noticed her condition. Now he insisted that he wasn’t going anywhere, least not for a while.

Truthfully, Joe was happy. She was entering territory that was completely unfamiliar and it would feel good to know that the man who had always been like an annoying older brother, would have her back.

Bart had tried to talk her into going to Jonah but Joe had threatened to kill him if he tried. Jonah didn’t deserve her. He was a foolish man who clearly no longer wanted to be happy. He just wanted to be miserable and lost in his drink. Bart had told her that he had become dark, moody and depressed as they’d traveled back to Barbadine. He’d said the man hated everyone and everything and rank from sun up ’til sundown. Not only that but Joe had already begged for him once and he had all but spit in her face. She wouldn’t beg for him again. And she wouldn’t use the life growing inside of her as a way to trap him and force him back. She wanted Jonah’s love and loyalty, she certainly didn’t want to be nothing more than his obligation.

Instead she would remember him the way he had been before she’d fallen in love and asked the same from him. And she would remember the times they’d had together. Full of laughter. Full or passion. Strong yet tender. Jonah had taught her the most important lesson that Joe had ever learned. He had taught her that it was okay to be a woman. It was okay to be soft sometimes and that didn’t mean you were weak. It was a lesson that Joe was going to need to know and remember, especially now that she was going to be starting on this new journey.

Thinking of Jonah always caused Joe’s heart to hurt and so she quickly pushed thoughts of him aside.

The whishing of a saw blade filled the quiet afternoon air and she could see Bart cutting logs for the cabin down below her. He raised his hand when he saw her watching him and she raised hers in response.

Then she laid her hand over her growing stomach and stuck out her chin. Joe Redding would be fine because she was tough. Her pa hadn’t raised her to be any other way.

A/N: And that is the end of 'Renegades and Pretty Women'.  Part two is completed and is called "Renegades and Stubborn Pride'