The Lady and the Outlaw

by Joyce Brandon

  Before Ward Cantrell could leave with Debra, Leslie allowed Tim to take her out into the moonlight. He kissed her and she clung to him, returning his kiss with ardor.

  “Leslie, my treasure, you take my breath away! I love you so…I want you so,” he groaned, holding her as if he couldn’t possibly let her go.

  “Do you really love me, Tim?”

  “I love you so much, my dearest jewel, that I am convinced I invented the emotion. I’m wild with despair one moment, elated the next. Awake or asleep I dream of you. Say you’ll marry me and end this tumult. Please, darling. Say that you love me…”

  It was nice to have a man who didn’t chase every female in town. Loyalty deserved to be rewarded. She wasn’t willing to marry him, though.

  “Where could we go?” she whispered.

  “Oh, my darling treasure. Do you mean it?”

  “Yes, but where?” she breathed, not daring to examine her impulse.

  “My house?”

  “Fine,” she said, elated that this time Ward Cantrell, womanizer extraordinaire, would watch her leave early, snuggled in a man’s protective embrace! She giggled her most sultry champagne giggle when they passed Ward and Debra; she waved fuzzily at her new friend and was rewarded with a flash of narrowed blue eyes from Mr. No Comment before Tim wrapped her shawl around her shoulders, brushed a kiss on her upturned lips, and led her out into the night. Let him look! He might have been the one to awaken her to the pleasures of sex, but she got to decide whom she shared them with!

  Leslie shivered at the crisp feel of the chilly night air. It smelled of sage. Night sounds were not audible over the trotting of the horse and the creak of Tim’s buggy. The moon had gone down, leaving the road dark except for what light the stars gave blazing down on them. The buggy rocked and swayed, jerked around by the deep ruts in the road.

  She didn’t have to guess—Tim lived on one of the lots Chane had made available. Two blocks from the Kincaid house and only one block from the house on Barton Street that Jennifer had pointed out as the current residence of Ward Cantrell.

  Tim’s house was one of those fashionable frame houses she had told Chane she had grown tired of—the clean white rectangular boxes with simple pitched roofs, crisp, painted, and made pompous with engraved cornices and curlicues around the porch and on the support posts. She was reminded of a story she had read in a Chicago newspaper about a firm, in business since 1867, that “is happy to furnish cottages and villas, schoolhouses, stores, taverns, churches, courthouses or towns—wholesale or retail—and to forward them, securely packed, to any part of the country.” Was that what Chane had done? Laid out his lots in a typical New England grid and then ordered himself a village? She would have laughed if she hadn’t already begun to regret her impulsiveness. Her hands felt cold and clammy, even when she pulled her shawl around her as tightly as she could.

  The interior was stark, sparsely furnished, and warm from the heat trapped in the wood. It smelled new, as if no one lived here really. The sound of their shoes on the hardwood floor echoed and bounced around the walls.

  “Needs a woman’s influence. I’m not here enough to make the place look lived in,” he apologized.

  “It’s no wonder. Mr. Kincaid relies on you for everything.”

  Tim glowed. “Isn’t he amazing? I can’t believe my good fortune. I would work twenty hours a day if it was needed.”

  “What do you do exactly?”

  “I’m in charge of the line all the way from San Diego to El Paso. Phoenix is the main office. This is where all the major problems get solved—right here. You need to ship anything at all, see me. I can fix it for you.”

  “I’m impressed.”

  He was busy while they chatted. He uncorked a bottle and poured wine into two glasses and led her to the couch in front of the fire.

  “You’re very efficient, Mr. Summers,” she said, feeling embarrassed now. “You must have done this before.”

  “None of the ‘befores’ ever mattered, though, Leslie. You feel like the first. There are so many things I want to say to you, so many things I want to do with you. I feel like a schoolboy.” He put his glass down and lifted her chin.

  Tim kissed her long and skillfully, whispering love words. Once, groaning at the effort it cost him to be gentle with her, he held her tightly, shuddering. His powerful reaction stirred something in her. Even if she didn’t like him, she would have responded emotionally to such ardor and extravagant praise; but in spite of both their efforts, her body remained wooden and unresponsive. The face that surfaced out of that welter of confusion in her head was the color of teak: an irresistible swell of smooth lower lip, and narrowed blue eyes that picked up the light and sent it stabbing into her heart. So singularly appealing…

  “Leslie, my darling, I’m going to make you forget everyone except me,” he whispered, his voice rough with feeling.

  What did he mean by that? Everyone? There hadn’t been that many! And besides, she didn’t need him to make her forget. She was going to forget Ward Cantrell because he was a hopeless womanizer who couldn’t be trusted any farther than a beaver in heat!

  Tim was kissing her again, this time insistently. She cursed the part of her that was always leaping into situations without any idea how she would get out. Had she needed so desperately to make a statement to Cantrell that she hadn’t thought once about the consequences of coming here with Tim?

  Now he was urging her up, no doubt to lead her into the bedroom. “Leslie, my treasure, you are so breathtaking.”

  Was that her voice, sounding so whiny? “Tim…I’m sorry…but my head hurts so…I think I drank too much champagne. I’m sorry,” she said miserably. “Please take me home…I don’t want the Kincaids to worry about me.”

  Tim, the eternal gentleman, stifled whatever response he felt. “Of course, Leslie. I forget how fragile you are, my sweet. It has been such a short time, really, since your ordeal. And…I’m a patient man,” he said ruefully, “as much as I hate it.” His voice, so urbane, took on a note of forced jocularity. “Take all the time you need. Argh!” He yelled like a man being tortured, startling her. “I can’t believe I said that!” He half groaned, half laughed, dropping his head in his hands in mock tragic despair that wrenched a nervous, grateful laugh from Leslie.

  The house was dark when she slipped in the front door with the key Jennifer had given her days before—the one she hadn’t needed until tonight. Her bed was cold and haunted. She shivered between the cold sheets, staring at the star-silvered balcony, watching the intricate, spidery leaves of the trees being whipped about by the chilling night winds. Tim was forgotten.

  In memory, she was back on the veranda, fighting for her very life. His mouth was set in grim purpose. He could have been facing Younger…except for the look in his eyes…That one fleeting moment…

  “Why did you kiss me?”

  “Because I wanted to. You keep turning up in my arms, Leslie. I want to know why.”

  Did he know now? Had he spent the night making love to one of his Trinkets and feeling empty?

  Damn! She should not let Ward kiss her. Just the memory of it, and she was throbbing with that strange weakness and lethargy his kisses and his presence awakened. That wild, impetuous feeling his touch caused was only an ache now—a long, sweet ache that didn’t stop. Suddenly she was remembering another time and she could hear her own words, half-strangled with the remnants of passion, half-dazed: “I never knew…I never knew…”

  In memory, he was a flash of blue eyes, warm teak skin, a certain musky male smell, his hands tangled in her hair. She could not forget the way he groaned and buried his face in the warmth of her throat, then pushed himself away from her.

  He was always pushing himself away from her. He might not be interested in her, but at least someone was. Tim wanted to marry her. Tim loved her.

  “Leslie, darling,” he had counseled, “it takes time and practice to learn to respond.” If only he were right about that. Her instinc
tive angry response was stifled by the gratitude she felt to Tim for graciously allowing her to renege on an implied consent. Thank goodness for Tim and his wonderful sense of humor, his consideration, his support. She would work harder in the future to deserve him.

  Without warning, a heavy thrill ran down her nerves—half pleasure, half pain, obliterating thoughts of Tim. Was the flower still in her quickly discarded gown, tucked between deep ruffles?

  It was there—small, wilted, and fragile—almost as fragile as the moment when she imagined that unbelievable look on Ward’s face—indescribable yet so reminiscent of sweet, innocent youth that she felt the melting sensation again. He had looked so open, so vibrant with feeling…like a young boy with his first crush.

  Was it that expression that had started in her this heavy, mindless will to connect with him, to be close to him? Was it the memory of that expression, once gone, erased as if it had never existed, that had wrought such a fury in her when he touched Marybelle Lewis in that smooth, suave, careless, entirely characteristic way?

  She wanted to toss the flower in the waste paper basket, but it was so delicate, so sweetly formed, so fragrant, that in the end, even though she chided herself for it, she pressed it between the pages of a book.

  I will not become one of those horrid spinsters who hoard books with pressed flowers, she thought savagely. Ohhh! That would be intolerable! She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. Damn you, Ward Cantrell. I hate you. I hate you!

  Kincaid watched his chance and finally caught Cantrell without one of the girls clinging to his arm.

  “I would ask you to step out on the veranda, but I’m afraid you wouldn’t respect me in the morning,” Chane said softly to Ward while they both gazed out across the sea of swaying bodies on the dance floor.

  “What the hell am I supposed to call you?”

  “Call me Chane.”

  “That seems a bit familiar for an outlaw and a railroad tycoon, don’t you think?”

  “Did Jennie tell you that your parents left each of you over a million dollars?”

  “She mentioned it but I still don’t understand.”

  “The letter about the bankruptcy was the fake—not the letter from me. I did write your mother a note thanking her for her proxies—standard courtesy letter—didn’t even remember it. The letter advising your father that loss of those proxies had resulted in financial disaster for them was written by Latitia Laurey after she killed them. It was supposed to provide the incentive for your father to have killed your mother and then himself.”

  “Christ! Twisted but cunning. We fell for it—especially me.”

  “Unfortunately, by the time the assets could be inventoried and their solidity verified, you were gone. Jennie placed ads in newspapers, wrote letters to every contact she could think of. She always expected to hear from you.”

  “I transferred money to the bank here. As soon as you give me the amount, I’ll make reimbursement for the money I stole.”

  Chane nodded and they fell silent, each lost in his own thoughts.

  Ward was remembering seeing Latitia Laurey that one time at the Palace Theater, through the one-way mirror. Recalling the way she had behaved in that room with Kincaid when she didn’t know she was being observed, it was easy to believe she was a woman driven by a powerful, twisted sexuality. After she had been arrested, Latitia had confessed that she had had an affair with Vivian Van Vleet. Ward cringed at the knowledge that his and Jennie’s mother had…

  He cut off those thoughts. Vivian had tried to break off the affair, Latitia fought with her, and Reginald Van Vleet had overheard enough to scare Latitia into thinking he would expose her. Unwilling to live with the fear of exposure, Latitia killed him and then Vivian. Commodore Laurey’s hatred—inspired by his fury at Kincaid for costing him millions of dollars in a business transaction, and fed by Latitia’s pain when Kincaid rejected her for Jennie—had grown into an obsession. When the truth came out, Laurey and Latitia had both been sentenced to life in prison.

  “I’ll call you Mr. Kincaid in public.”

  “How long do I have to stay in town to satisfy…Mrs. Kincaid?”

  “That depends on how you’re feeling. If I allow you to begin riding hard before you have fully recovered and something happens to you, my life won’t be worth a plugged nickel. Are you getting impatient to be on with it?”

  Ward expelled an angry breath. “Yeah.”

  “Sounds like you’ve already begun,” Chane said, slanting a look at the younger man, and not missing the simmering hostility evident in every line and angle of his lean frame. Not even fine clothes could hide the leashed tension he was controlling with an effort.

  Could Leslie’s leaving early with Summers be the cause of this? Chane wondered to himself. Had Cantrell fallen in love with the girl in the time they spent together? He didn’t probe, because it was apparent that Cantrell was not in a mood to answer personal questions.

  “Wilcox tells me you may have a lead on how our cattle are being rustled, and who is doing it,” Kincaid ventured.

  Ward sighed. “Not who. Though I suspect Dallas Younger and Powers. I’ve scouted a little. I’m convinced they’re using your spur line to move stolen cattle, and then shipping them like any other herd. I mentioned that I’ve sent telegrams to some friends and acquaintances of mine. The last one should be riding in any day now. Did you ask Stanton if his offer of amnesty could be stretched to include them if they’re willing to work?”

  “I think so. What are your plans?”

  “Nothing fancy. We’ll catch Younger with some stolen cattle if we can. If that doesn’t work, I’ll round up a herd and try to make contact with the person in your office who is being so accommodating.”

  Chane quirked his eyebrows in approval. “Sounds simple enough to work all right,” he mused, his mind tracing the steps and then projecting the various outcomes.

  “Dallas Younger and three of his ‘special force’ are mine,” Ward said, his voice hard, as if this point were not negotiable. “I have a score to settle with them. The rest of them—I’ll leave their fate to you. If you want them alive, we can scare billy hell out of them and let ’em run or bring ’em in. I don’t care either way.”

  “Doesn’t sound like that oath you took soaked in very deep,” Chane said, chuckling, then he sobered under Cantrell’s glowering look. “Use your instincts. There are some men who’ll run like a coyote until dark and then come back to kill you as soon as you go to sleep.”

  They watched the dancers in silence. Then Chane glanced at his young companion. “Be careful of Younger. He’s no four flush. He’s a real gunfighter—fast, fearless, and cool as the north side of a January gravestone. I saw him draw once in Tombstone. He can’t be rattled by talk or threats.”

  Ward stiffened, and the anger that had been seething under the surface since Leslie had left with Summers boiled up now, seeking release. “If I need my diaper changed, I’ll let you know,” he said furiously.

  The look and tone jarred Kincaid. Frowning, he sorted their conversation in his mind. Then realization hit him. This man who stood beside him as sturdy and solid as a young oak was the same kid who had hated him eight years ago. Peter hadn’t forgotten their old animosity and resented being treated like a child. Peter—Ward, he corrected himself—was a man now, with a man’s competence, strength, and scars. And he didn’t want anyone, especially his sister’s husband, to forget that. Pride surged in him. Peter was a man—one he grudgingly admired; but in his eagerness to protect Jennie from worry or pain he’d almost forgotten that.

  He cleared his throat. “I didn’t see the gunfight between you and Dodge Merril, but I heard about it,” he said, glancing at Cantrell’s fierce profile. “Dodge was rated with the best. I heard you gave him draw advantage and still put two slugs in him.” He paused for a second. “Younger’s probably not as fast as Dodge, but I can’t help worrying about you.” Chane moved so that Cantrell had to look at him. “I know you don’t want my ad
vice, but I need you to understand my position. My wife has been mourning your loss for eight years. Oh, it’s true we had a good life, because your sister has tremendous energy and heart, but there was always that cloud that I could see behind her eyes, that eternal waiting and hoping that would surface in little things, and then as time drew on and you didn’t show up, in bigger and bigger things. The only comfort I could offer her was that you were obviously alive because my people would have known if you weren’t. Now I won’t have that to help me. If something happens to you now, she will know it, and knowing it will kill something in your sister that won’t ever come alive again.”

  Chane expelled an angry breath. “And, dammit, I got you into this. It’s me Jennie will blame if something happens to you. It could destroy Jennie or our marriage or both if you are killed. You can get mad if you want to, dammit. But I have too much to lose. You will be careful of Younger, or by God I will assign a half-dozen men to your tail, and they will take care of you,” Kincaid threatened.

  Ward met that furious green gaze, and it was apparent his brother-in-law meant every word. There was fury and strength in those hazel green eyes and an equal amount of angry stubbornness. But that was not the deciding factor. Ward was moved by Kincaid’s description of his sister’s plight. Somehow he had thought that she grieved him for a week or two and then went about her life. Learning that she had carried his loss for the full eight years sobered him to the realization of what he had done to her.

  “Thanks for the tip about Younger,” Ward said.

  Chane dragged in a ragged breath and relaxed a little, knowing he was at least partially forgiven. “I only mentioned it because I’m not sure I could beat Younger, and I was considered pretty good in my prime.”

  “You were a ranger—Texas Rangers are noted for their short primes. If you lasted at all, you had to be damned good.”

  Chane grinned. “What is this, respect for the elderly or admiration for law and order?”