by Zoë Archer
But, really, how safe was she?
Pryce’s man was gone, but the brittle cage of society that had kept Will at bay was gone, too. He didn’t know if he could trust himself around her without it. He was out in rough country, as he’d longed to be ever since his arrival in London, and now that his wish had been granted, he’d damned himself.
“We have to get back,” Will said for the hundredth time.
Olivia, tired, hungry, and sore from her bustle not designed for bareback riding, tried not to sigh. They’d been riding around the dark woods for over an hour, and they were no closer to finding their way back to civilization then they had been at the beginning of their misadventure. Yet Will was determined to get them at least to the hops farmer’s home, if not back to the train station, that night.
“I’m tryin’ to track our way,” he muttered, “but I don’t know this land, and it’s blacker than the Devil’s coffee out here.”
“Maybe we should stop,” Olivia ventured.
She could have sworn she heard something akin to panic in his voice. “Can’t stop,” he insisted. “Have to get back.”
But Olivia’d had enough. “Please put me down,” she said. When he made no move to do so, she let go of his neck and painfully eased her way to the ground. Bracing her hands in the small of her back, she stretched. “I can’t go any farther, Will. Not on horseback.”
He also slid down and held the reins. “Then we’ll walk.”
“And wander around in the dark? That’s even more foolish than riding.”
“I don’t know what the hell do you expect me to do,” he snapped.
She frowned. He had a temper, but she didn’t quite understand why he was unleashing it on her. He must be as tired and hungry as she. “Let’s rest a while. We can wait for dawn and then find our way back.”
“You want to sit out here?” he asked, disbelief plain in his voice. “In the dust?”
“I didn’t realize cowboys were so circumspect about dirt.”
“It ain’t me I’m worried about.”
“Good, because I’m not worried about me, either.” When he didn’t answer, and she could feel rather than see his uncertainty, she continued, “I’ll be fine. In fact, it’s rather exciting. I’ve never camped out under the stars before.”
“Sleepin’ under a roof is better,” he said tensely. “Warmer.”
“Then we can build a fire.” She tried to smile encouragingly, even though she didn’t feel particularly encouraged herself. “Maybe we could think of this as an adventure,” she suggested, trying to convince herself as much as him.
“I was shot at and you were kidnapped,” he said dryly. “That’s enough adventure for one day.”
True. She had spent years reading about exciting chases, gun battles, and kidnappings, and she’d longed to one day have a life half as exciting as artless Lorna Jane. Yet when she’d read those stories, all danger was transitory, nonthreatening. Lorna Jane was the heroine. She could never be seriously hurt or killed. It was the implicit promise of every novel.
Olivia wasn’t living in a book. There was no guaranteed happy ending, no assurance that she would be safe and unhurt. God, she or Will could have died today. The thought made her stomach flip and her mouth dry.
But she was just too tired to go on. If she didn’t sit down and rest her bruised behind, she’d likely make a fool of herself by starting to cry. It had been one of the longest and most terrifying days she had ever known. “Please,” she said simply.
She heard his muttered curse. “All right,” he said at last. “But at first light, we’re headin’ out.”
As she prepared their campsite, she tried to recall what she could from the Buffalo Bill novels. While Will tethered the horse, she picked up leaves and twigs from a small clearing. Genteel ladies never slept outside, except, perhaps, on safari, but even then they were in tents, on cots or beds, attended by numerous servants, with as many civilized comforts as their bearers could carry.
And now, here she was, out in the wild, the noise and sights of London distant, breathing fresh air. She’d never spent this much time outdoors before. The idea was both exciting and frightening. The world she inhabited was so small, so limited, she’d experienced very little in her thirty-two years, including sleeping outside.
She took a bit of comfort knowing that Will was an experienced hand where outdoor life was concerned. He finished tying up the horse and prepared a fire. She watched as he gathered the kindling, stacking it, and produced a small box of matches from one of the numerous pockets of his waistcoat. She’d half-hoped he would light the fire by striking flints, or rubbing sticks together, but it made sense that a cowboy wouldn’t rely on such unpredictable techniques. With a scrape and hiss, the match caught, illuminating the lean planes of his face for a moment. He didn’t look as though he enjoyed the prospect of an al fresco evening as much as she. As the kindling caught and began to burn, turning him gold and hard, she supposed it was because he’d endured out-of-doors existence his whole life, and did not relish the idea of leaving behind his soft bed in London. Neither did she, come to think of it.
What would David make of this scene? His wife, gently reared and trained to a life of domestic ornamentation, about to sit on the uncovered earth across from a wild American. She doubted he could even imagine it, would laugh at the prospect’s impossibility. Yet, she reminded herself, he likely didn’t think she could run Greywell’s, either.
Gingerly, she tried to sit on the ground, but found that her bustle made it nearly impossible to get comfortable.
“Turn your back, please,” she said.
“What?” Will looked up from his crouched contemplation of the fire.
“I have to remove my bustle, and I can’t do it in the dark, nor can I with you staring at me.” No matter her attraction to him, she could not ignore years of etiquette training and strip off her bustle right in front of him.
Grumbling something about ridiculous females, Will scooted around. He even took his hat and lowered it over his eyes. “There. That make you happy?”
“Beyond words,” she said sardonically. Then she began the unenviable process of untying her bustle underneath layers and layers of skirts and petticoats, all without removing any other articles of clothing and without the assistance of her maid Sarah. She tried not to grunt and strain at the task, but it was impossible to do silently.
“Birthin’ cattle back there?” Will asked.
She shot his back a dark look. “Being a woman is not for the faint of heart.” She continued to work the bustle free. “I’d like to see the House of Lords try and conduct business while wearing corsets and bustles. They would surely enact a law banning the dreadful things. There!” At last, the contraption came free, sliding down to lay like an empty cage at her feet. Even this smaller bustle, designed for traveling, could not be endured for a long period of time, and she quickly placed it behind a tree to spare Will having to stare at it. The back of her dress now dragged, weighted down with loops of material ordinarily supported by the bustle’s frame, and she was sure she looked ridiculous, but she was so much more comfortable. If only she could remove her corset...
“You can turn around now,” she said, and he did so, appearing cross and ill-humored. She sat down again, tucking her legs off to one side, facing him across the fire. He continued to crouch, as though ready to flee at any moment.
“Pryce sent that driver,” Will said abruptly.
The cold feeling that had been threatening to overwhelm her took sudden possession of her bones. “I never believed he would go this far.”
“He’s gone, all right.” Will’s voice took an edge, like the blade of a knife. “It ain’t just about the brewery any more. Hirin’ that gun of his proves it.”
“What do we do now?”
“Stop playin’ nice.”
She shuddered, wondering just what that entailed. “Lord, I am completely out of my league,” she said quietly. “I went to finishing school.
I learned how to waltz and throw dinner parties. Taking on the brewery was the biggest challenge of my life. Now I have men trying to ruin and kidnap me. And shooting at you. I am completely at a loss.”
Will’s eyes met hers over the fire. His jaw was taut, and there was no softness about him at all. “No one’s going to hurt you.” There was no doubt in his voice, only simple statement of fact. Despite her fear, she felt that he would protect her even at the loss of his own life.
She couldn’t think about that now.
“You’re hurt!” she cried, spotting a black trail on the sleeve of his coat—the mark of a bullet.
He glanced down. “ Just a powder burn.”
“Oughtn’t we dress it?”
“Got no bandages,” he said with a shrug.
Scowling at his indifference to his injury, she pulled her skirt up slightly and tore a strip of fabric from her white cotton petticoat. “Let me,” she said, starting to rise, but he stopped her.
“I’ll do it,” he said gruffly, reaching across the fire and taking the makeshift bandage from her. It seemed that he went to great pains to keep from touching her. So she sat back and watched him push up the sleeve of his coat, then roll up his shirtsleeve to expose his forearm.
She didn’t know what was most striking—the sculpted muscle of his arm, dusted with golden hair, or the red welt that the mercenary’s bullet had left on Will’s skin. He wound the strip of fabric around his injury, deft and practiced.
“You’ve done that before,” she noted.
He didn’t look up at her as he continued to dress the abrasion. “Have to do your own doctorin’ on the trail. But we still lose men every time.”
She shuddered to think that Will could have been one of those accepted casualties. “From bullets?”
“Nope. Mostly gettin’ kicked and thrown by horses or stepped on by cattle. Sometimes floods or rivers wash ’em away. All kinds of other stuff. Bad water. Snake bite. Fevers.”
It sounded awful, precarious. “I wonder you needed guns at all.”
He looked up from under the brim of his hat. “We used ’em to scare off rustlers.”
“Just to scare them?”
His face grew distant, his expression inward. “Sometimes we got one.”
Softly, she asked, “What happened, Will?”
He stared into the fire, his arm forgotten. “I was takin’ watch one night and caught some men tryin’ to rustle our cattle. So I let off a few rounds, tryin’ to drive ’em away. They started to take off, but one thought he’d be a real bandito and shoot back. I fired at him, and he went down.” He frowned, then looked up at her, and she saw the pain he bore. “Takin’ a man’s life ain’t easy, Liv. It ain’t like they say in the books you read. It marks a man.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I ain’t,” he answered. “I did my job. Stealin’ cattle or horses is a killin’ offense. But that doesn’t make it feel good.”
“Could you...could you kill again?”
“If I had to.” As he stared at her, his gaze and voice were level. “If there was somethin’ worth protectin’.”
She was both chilled and reassured by the idea. She did not like the idea of Will ending someone’s life, yet she could always rely on him.
The night grew colder, as October was wont to do, and she found that her smart little traveling dress and matching jacket didn’t quite fit the bill for camping. Absently, she rubbed her arms.
In a swift motion, Will stood and came around the fire to drape his duster around her shoulders. He ignored her objections and stalked silently back to the other side of the fire. She felt engulfed by the lingering heat of his body and the rich scent of his skin permeating the fabric of the coat. Unconsciously, she closed her eyes and pressed her cheek into the collar of the duster, inhaling deeply, as she pulled the coat closer around her. It was wonderful, as though she was surrounded by Will, wrapped in him like a secret. A little sigh of pleasure escaped from her lips.
“Jesus, Liv,” Will growled, breaking her reverie. She opened her eyes to see him through the flames, his eyes sharp and piercing. “Don’t do that to a man.”
“I...” Her voice trailed off. What could she say? That she wanted him despite her best intentions? That no man had ever risked as much for her as he had? That she hadn’t realized how lonely her life had been before him, and she dreaded what it would be like once he’d gone?
He had awakened feelings in her that had lain dormant for many years, since even before David had died. She wasn’t oppressed with weariness when he was nearby—shouldering the burden of her business, her social obligations, the intimidation of George Pryce. All this became bearable because of Will. No, she couldn’t say any of these things, though they were all true.
“I wish you’d sit and make yourself comfortable,” she said instead. “You’re making me nervous.”
With obvious reluctance, he sat, cross-legged. He unrolled his shirtsleeve to cover his bandaged arm. Then he pulled out a knife, picked up a nearby stick, and began to whittle. She looked at the knife. It had a strange coffin-shaped handle.
“Is that—?”
He nodded tersely. “Yeah. The bowie knife Jake found with me.” He turned it over in his hand, considering. “I’ve had to replace the handle and the brass pins a few times, but I always kept it. The only thing my parents left me, besides the letter.”
“A whole legacy right in your palm,” Olivia breathed. “Amazing.”
He didn’t answer, but continued to work at the stick. It was clear that he didn’t have any purpose to his whittling besides giving his hands something to do. No sooner did he pare one stick down then he reached for another, and another, tossing his handiwork into the fire. She watched him for a long while, fascinated by his large, capable hands with their long, deft fingers, the square, blunt nails and the broad span of his palms, the hands of a man who worked his whole life. She pictured those hands on her, remembering the feel of them on her skin, rough and hot, and she barely stifled a moan. The five years she had spent without a man in her bed seemed like the beat of a hummingbird’s wings compared to the week she had known Will and desired him.
She had to distract herself; otherwise she would leap over the fire and force herself on him.
“Tell me about Colorado,” she said, breaking the stillness.
He looked up at her, the firelight turning his eyes aquamarine. “I miss it,” he said softly. “That was always the best part about finishing a drive—comin’ home to the mountains.”
“They must be so beautiful,” she said wistfully.
For the first time in what seemed like days, Will broke into a genuine smile, heartbreaking in its gorgeousness. “They sure are. Tall as giants, capped in snow. Ridin’ through ’em, you feel like you’re at the top of the world, everythin’ beneath you, and if you just reached high enough, you could shake hands with God.”
Warming to his topic, he continued, “In the winter, they’re like castles carved of ice, white and glittering like diamonds when the sun is out. And in the summer...” His voice trailed off as he turned to inner landscapes.
“In the summer?” she prompted, wanting to go there with him.
“In the summer, the valleys look like green velvet cups full of gems—every kind and color of flower you can think of, spillin’ over, climbin’ over anythin’ that’ll stand still. Blue penstemons, scarlet paintbrush, purple fringed gentians. Up on the mountains, there’s phlox, wild iris, harebell. You’d hardly believe that a few months earlier, everythin’ was covered in snow.”
“I’d love to see it,” she said quietly, and she meant it.
He stared at her for a long time, the only sounds coming from the pops of the fire and the rustling animals in the underbrush. She couldn’t read him, the firelight turning his face into something too handsome, too hard, to interpret. So strange, when moments earlier he’d been speaking of his home with such feeling, such transparency.
“Some folks th
ink it’s too tough,” he said finally. “Too rugged. A body’s got to be made of strong stuff to make it in Colorado.”
“I may take to sleeping outdoors, you know,” she said, half in jest as she gestured to the dark woods that surrounded them. “I’m beginning to think I’m strong enough.”
A ghost of a smile crept into the corner of his mouth. “I think you are, too, Liv. Stronger than you give yourself credit for.”
As compliments went, this one floored her. To have him, who’d endured the toughest life had to offer, consider her strong was simply amazing. For several moments, she couldn’t speak. “Maybe,” she said, regaining her voice, “I’ll come visit you someday in Colorado, and see those wildflowers.”
The smile remained, but it was rueful. “Yeah,” he said with a dip of his head, “maybe someday.”
But they both knew she would never make it. There was a great deal of distance, physical and otherwise, that separated Colorado from England, distance that she couldn’t navigate. A silence fell across them both as they contemplated this. She stared at the ashes forming in the fire, and he looked up towards the sky.
“I didn’t think there were stars in England,” he said, his head tipped back. “It’s good to see ’em again, like old friends waitin’ for you at the saloon.”
“I’m certain they’re glad to see you, too.” She took a stick and nudged some of the burnt kindling, sending a tiny cascade of sparks down to the ground.
Still gazing heavenward, Will asked, “How’d your husband die?”
The question caught her by surprise. He hadn’t asked much about David until now. “He collapsed at work and never regained consciousness.” She stared abstractedly at the stick in her hand, then snapped it in two and threw it into the fire. “The doctor said that his heart wasn’t very strong. It just...gave out. David’s death came so quickly, I didn’t really believe it until almost a month later.”
Finally, Will looked back down. “Do you miss him?”