Avoiding her gaze, he took the pullover. "Here. Let me help you with this."
She remained very still as he eased her injured arm into the sleeve, then pulled the neck open so she could slip it on. Recognizing the discomfort her shoulder was giving her, he went to pull the garment down, but she caught him completely off guard when she softly touched the long scar on his face.
Her voice was very soft when she spoke. "How did you get this?"
Still avoiding her gaze, he gave a mirthless smile. "You don't want to know."
She traced the length of it, her touch sending a current through his whole body, and it was all he could do not to snatch her hand away. Nobody had touched that scar since the stitches were taken out. Nobody.
She dropped her hand and stepped away, her tone even softer. "I can do it," she said.
Finn turned away from her, his heart laboring in his chest. She could do it. And he could do himself a big favor and keep away from her. A long way away.
He completed the rest of the preparations, speaking only when he absolutely had to, the tension getting to him. He kept telling himself that once they got moving, it would be okay. It was just the close quarters that were making him so edgy.
With the extra gear he was leaving behind properly stored and the fire extinguished, Finn cast one cursory glance around the cabin, satisfied that it was as it should be; then he pulled the door closed and latched it. His rifle in his hand, he turned toward the horses, experiencing another shot of aggravation. He had told her to get on Gus. He had been specific that she was to ride Gus. With the rough terrain they had to traverse, he wanted her on the horse with the saddle. But no. She was on Trouper, her long legs straddling the big packhorse.
The snow was falling heavily, and her tracks were already nearly covered, the branches of the spruce trees bowed with the weight. She had the black wool cap pulled down low over her forehead, the scarf wound around the upturned collar of his shearling coat, and her hands lost in a spare pair of his gloves. And already her clothing was dusted with snow. She looked at him, her chin stuck out and her eyes glinting with challenge.
The muscles in his jaw working, Finn stared at her. "I want you on the other horse," he ordered.
She stared at him, brazen in her defiance. "No."
He started toward her. "Yes."
As if realizing he intended to haul her off, she backed Trouper away from him. "Oh, for Pete's sake. Don't be so pigheaded, Donovan. I've done three-day eventing, so I'm sure I can manage to stick on this very docile, well-behaved horse for a few hours." When Finn kept coming toward her, she got very conciliatory. "And besides, I'll be much warmer riding bareback." She tried to charm him with a smile. "And you want me to stay warm, right?"
Finn stopped and glared at her, then turned and stomped back to where Gus was rubbing his head against the pole corral. Damn her. She was going to drive him crazy. But three-day eventing was the kind of riding that separated the men from the boys. Accomplished or not, if she didn't measure up in the first hundred yards, she was changing horses if he had to wrestle her to the ground to make her do it. He jammed the rifle in the scabbard, gathered up the reins, then swung into the saddle. If she argued with him every step of the way, he just might not get her back alive. He might strangle her first.
It was one hell of a ride. The wind picked up as they crested the first rise, the blowing snow cutting visibility down to feet instead of yards. And if that wasn't bad enough, snow cascaded down from the heavily laden fir boughs, dumping snow on them at every turn. The dampness in the air made the cold all the more penetrating, and Finn watched her like a hawk. She never complained once, toughing it out with an endurance that surprised him. And if he had any doubts about her ability on horseback, those disappeared when he watched her maneuver Trouper up the first narrow, rocky incline. It was obvious that she knew what she was doing, and Finn relaxed a bit. Turning up the collar on his mackinaw, he tipped his head into the wind. He would put up with cold miserable weather, the blowing snow and rotten vision. There wasn't a chance in hell that anyone could track them in this weather, and it also meant that air search would be definitely grounded. And every miserable step moved her that much further away from whoever she'd been running from.
It took a little over eight hours to make the torturous ride. And it was torturous. Cold. Wet. Hard going. Dangerous. And they wouldn't have made it in that kind of time if she hadn't been such a damned fine horsewoman. Under any other circumstances, Finn would have holed up somewhere and waited for the storm front to pass. But he'd pushed on, knowing that the snow was the best cover they had.
It was dark by the time they reached his spread, the snow piled up in drifts around the buildings. Winter always came earlier in the high country, and this year it had come even earlier than usual. It wasn't that often that there was this much snow before the end of October.
Reaching the barn, he sidestepped Gus over to the door, then reached down and slid it open, the heavy plank door rolling smoothly on the well-oiled track. Still mounted on Gus, he ducked down and hit the light switch, and the structure was immediately filled with gloomy light. There were eight box stalls in the structure, and Finn dismounted by the second stall, flipping the reins through the heavy metal ring bolted to the wall. He felt damned near drunk from exhaustion and cold. He waited for Mallory to clear the door; then he pulled it shut behind her, closing out the chilling wind.
Taking Trouper by the hackamore, he led him to the stall next to Gus's. When he glanced up he saw Mallory lying sprawled facedown on the horse's back, her arms and legs hanging down like a rag doll. Her voice was muffled when she spoke, doing a routine from a familiar car commercial. "Gee, Dad. When are we going to get to Grandma's house?"
He gave up a small smile. "So you get that one in Chicago, do you?"
As if she barely had the strength to move, she sat up, pulling off her scarf and hat, setting her hair free. "We get everything in Chicago. Fire. Flood. Plague. Pestilence." Dragging her leg over, she slid off Trouper, her legs nearly buckling beneath her as she hit the plank floor. She caught herself on the door of the box stall, a wry look appearing. "Oh, you're in great shape, Mallory. One lousy day in the saddle, and you turn to spaghetti."
Finn pulled the hackamore off Trouper, then dragged open the door to the box stall and slapped the horse's rump, cueing him to move. He had no idea why he wanted to give her a hard time, but he did. "Shame on you," he scolded, looping the hackamore through the bars on the stall.
She lifted her head and stared at him as if he'd done something unexpected, then she grinned, flashing him two perfect dimples and a perfect row of teeth. "Humor. My God, the man has humor." Stretching her arms over her head to try to limber up, she glanced at the heavy plastic feed barrels lined up against the wall. "Is this what you want me to feed them?"
Finn hooked the stirrup over the saddle horn, then began undoing Gus's cinch. "I don't want you to feed them anything. I want you to go to the house and get into a hot shower. "
She turned and looked at him, giving him that steady unwavering stare. "I don't think so," she stated evenly. "I'm going to look after my horse."
Finn stared at her, then let out a tired sigh. He didn't have the energy to argue with her. He just didn't. Flipping the cinch over the seat, he dragged the saddle off Gus and headed toward the tack room. Halfway there, it hit him that maybe she didn't want to go anywhere by herself. He resigned himself to a retraction. "You can give them each a scoop out of the blue barrel, and there are some old towels in here if you want to rub him down."
She didn't just want to rub Trouper down. She wanted to prepare him for the show ring. She went to such extremes he wouldn't have been surprised if she started putting show sheen on his hooves.
Shamed into it, he gave Gus a thorough rubbing, then broke off two flakes of hay from the bales stacked at the end of the barn, giving each horse his allotment. Closing Gus's stall, he draped the saddlebags over his shoulder, then snagged her by t
he collar and steered her toward the door.
"But I never closed Trouper's stall."
Finn pulled open the side door, then flipped off the light, leaving the barn in total darkness. "He's not going anywhere."
The high overhead yard light cast a broad halo of illumination, the falling snow sliding through its brightness, creating a sense of motion. Finn aimed her toward the path, and she tried to turn back, but he continued to march her ahead of him, the snow nearly to her knees. "We're done here, Red. And now we're going to the house. Then I'm going to phone the local RCMP detachment—"
She abruptly stopped in her tracks, then turned to face him, a stunned expression on her face. Thinking it was confusion over the term, he clarified. "RCMP. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police. It's our national police force."
She grabbed his arm, her eyes wide with fear. "No," she said. "No. You can't call them—not yet." She hauled in a deep, steadying breath. "Please don't call them."
Finn frowned and stared at her, her fear apparent. Something was going on here, and he didn't know what. But he knew fear when he saw it. He held her gaze. "Is there anyone you do want to call?"
She shook her head, and he thought maybe she was close to tears. "No. No, not now. Can't we leave it for tonight?" she whispered. Finn considered her, picking up on some very heavy dread. Normally he would have been on the phone immediately, but there was something about the look in her eyes that made him hesitate. And one more night wouldn't make much difference. It wasn't as if there was a rescue crew out there risking their necks trying to find her, not in this weather. He forced a smile and nudged her to get her walking. "Okay. Fine. But we're going to the house. And you're going to have a hot shower, and I'm going to make us something to eat."
At the mention of food, she quit balking and went willingly. "Food," she said with obvious longing. "I'll go anywhere for food." Rooney came bounding around an old wooden granary, his eyes gleaming in the dark. Assured that his human companions were indeed headed toward the house, he lunged ahead of them, rooting through the drifts with his nose.
Finn picked up the sound of a distant motor, and his gut dropped away. Old Joe lived a quarter mile down the road, and when Finn was gone, he checked the stock a couple of times a day. And it would just be his luck for the old guy to show up now, to make sure the automatic watering system in the stalls was working and the heaters were on in the outdoor watering troughs. The last thing Finn wanted was for anyone to stumble onto his redhead, at least not until he got the whole story. And he was going to get the whole story, one way or another.
He turned his head into the wind, his expression relaxing when he heard the sound retreating. At least that was one thing they didn't have to worry about.
The dark outline of the cabin appeared. The log structure squatted in the shelter of a little ravine, nearly hidden from view by trees, its location sheltered from the wind. Silently they plowed their way through the snow, Mallory walking ahead of him. Finn could tell by the sag of her shoulders that she didn't have a whole lot of energy left. And neither did he—he felt as if he had been plowing through snow for days.
They had just reached the flagstone pad leading to the back porch when the wind changed direction and started to gust, whipping her hair across his face. He caught her elbow to steady her, his head slanted against the blowing snow. "Watch your step. It might be icy."
They reached the landing and Finn opened the door, the wind nearly ripping it out of his hands. Sheltering her with the bulk of his body, he waited for her to enter, while Rooney scooted in ahead of them.
Out of the wind, he took off his Stetson, then reached past her and pushed open the inside door. Nudging her inside, he flipped on the switch over the boot rack, the brightness of the track lighting making him squint.
Finn closed the door, the cold draft eddying around his legs as he let the saddlebags slide to the hemp matting; then he dropped his hat on the row of hooks over the boot rack. He expected her to do the same, to start stripping off her outerwear, but she hesitated, scanning the interior of the stripped-log structure.
His home was very basic. The kitchen and living room were one large great room, the most dominant feature the huge stone fireplace that actually formed the bearing wall, which bisected the cabin. The walls on either side were lined with bookshelves, while the east wall was mostly windows. Beyond the fireplace and bookshelves, there was a short hall that led to the two bedrooms, with the bathroom at the end. There was a loft over the kitchen and the storage room, the area fenced in by varnished pole railings. In fact, the logs were stripped and varnished throughout, and over the years they had aged to a soft amber color.
There had been two major priorities when he had built the place. One was the view, and the second was big windows. There were times in prison when he had felt as if he was actually suffocating from being trapped in a windowless bunker. And when he got out, he needed to know that the freedom of outdoors was just a pane of glass away. He still felt that way.
Her head tipped to one side, Mallory began to slowly undo her buttons. "This is very nice," she said, sounding as if she meant it. She tapped her toe on the dark pine flooring. "All you need are some of those beautiful Navajo rugs on this floor."
Finn took off his mackinaw and hung it on the hook by his hat, just a little ticked at her forwardness. She'd been in his house maybe thirty seconds, and she was already redecorating—and he liked it just fine the way it was. And besides, the only thing he wanted laid on the floor was his saddle-sore, beat-up body, preferably with a good shot of whiskey in his hand.
As if tuned to what he was thinking, she turned and gave him a grin as she dragged off his sheepskin coat. "I should have known you'd be a minimalist, Donovan. I should have figured that out from your dearth of speech." She draped her coat over his, then looked back at him, a glint of impishness dancing in her eyes. She used her two pointer fingers to lift the corners of his mouth. "And a dearth of mirth as well. Your face won't fall off if you smile once in a while, you know."
He didn't want to do it. He did not. And he tried to hold it back, but a lopsided grin worked itself loose in spite of his efforts. "If I'd been smart, I would have dumped you in one of those big snowdrifts in the pass."
She grinned and patted his cheek, then bent over to pry the boots off over her multilayers of socks. "Ah. Now I get the tough talk. You can't fool me, Donovan. I can see just fine out of both my eyes."
His own rusty chuckle caught him totally by surprise. He hadn't done a whole lot of that over the past few years. And it wasn't as if her situation was any laughing matter. But the amusement lingered, and he turned to look at her, his mouth still wanting to smile.
He caught her watching him with a wide, steady gaze. And as soon as their gazes connected, she smiled the most beautiful, sweet smile. That smile sent such a rush of plain old human warmth through him that Finn didn't know what to do with it. Unnerved by the reaction, he turned and walked into the kitchen area. "Go have a shower," he commanded gruffly. "And I'll rustle us up something to eat."
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mallory hesitate, and he braced himself for another one of her arguments. She continued to watch him for a second longer, then turned toward the bathroom. "Thanks," she said softly, easing the polar fleece off over her head. Remembering her sore shoulder, he made a move to go help her, then used some common sense and kept his distance. In a strictly defensive move, he turned toward the storage room instead. His voice was abrupt when he spoke. "There's a cupboard in the hallway—you'll find clean towels and a pile of sweats. And there's a stash of new toothbrushes in the drawer by the sink. Help yourself."
Feeling oddly out of step with himself, Finn dumped three cans of soup in a pot, then made some man-sized ham sandwiches, his gut in knots. He wasn't used to having women around. Yeah, he'd had women on trail rides, and he'd even had some out big game hunting, but this was different. This made him feel exposed somehow.
He had a fire going in th
e fireplace by the time he heard the shower shut off. She hadn't taken as long as he had expected, and when she reappeared, she was barefoot with a towel wrapped around her head. She had on a set of his navy sweats, the sleeves shoved up, the waistband down around her hips. Her face was scrubbed clean and shining, but even in his clothes, there was a sense of style about her.
Feeling as if he was fourteen years old instead of forty-two, he motioned to the chair at the end of the table. "Have a seat."
It wasn't until she was seated under the light hanging over the table that he saw how exhausted she was—even her hands were trembling. Sobered by that reality, he set a steaming bowl of soup in front of her, followed by a spoon; then he slid the plate of sandwiches toward her. "Eat up."
Pulling one leg up so she was sitting in a half lotus, she gave him a wan smile. "I don't think I have the energy."
He brought his own bowl to the table and sat down, then reached for a sandwich. "Eat, Red. After the day you've had, you need the calories."
She gave him a long look, then picked up her spoon, her mouth quirking a little. "You never tell a woman she needs more calories, Donovan. Don't you know that?"
Finn almost smiled. He wondered if she ever quit, or ever let anything go. He suspected not. They ate in silence, more questions piling up in Finn's head. He had promised himself he wasn't going to hound her—he'd wait for her to start talking of her own free will. It wasn't really his business anyway. And be damned if he'd start poking around in someone else's business.
"Have you always lived in Chicago?"
There was brief silence; then she answered him, her voice strained. "Yes."
THE RENEGADE AND THE HEIRESS Page 6