Sera blushed prettily.
His loins stirred. He adored coy women. The more they protested, the more he relished the chase. He enjoyed teasing them, romancing them, playing their hero. But most of all, he enjoyed sharing pleasure with them. Despite Lynx's crude assessment of his affairs, Cass didn't fornicate. Cass only slept with women whom he loved. The trouble was, when morning came, he wasn't in love with the girl any more. He always hoped that the next time would be different, though.
He hoped that Sera would be different.
He inhaled deeply as she perched timidly beside him. He ached to sweep aside her curls, to plant suckling kisses along the smooth, swanlike column of her throat.
Patience, he told himself, stifling a predatory little growl.
She was stammering something about her feelings for Jesse. Something about a connection between souls.
Cass draped an arm around her waist and laced their fingers. Since she was facing away from him, he closed his eyes, enjoying her dream of romance. But he added a few key details of his own. He imagined her shy, white thighs trembling open for him. For him, the man who'd saved her life. The man who'd won her virginity as his prize.
"Tell me more," he breathed, moving their twined fingers, placing them on her abdomen, where he could enjoy the rising heat of her femininity.
She bowed her head. "Sometimes I think if I could just get through to him," she said in a small, tremulous voice, "if I could make him see that his past doesn't have to determine his future, then things could be different between us. Because he has the capacity to be so caring! And so kind! In spite of everything he suffered, he hasn't grown bitter with hate.
"I admire that about him," she said fervently. "I admire that he still finds the courage to care about people and... and to step forward when they need him. Like he did when the mayor asked him to fill Marshal Holcomb's shoes..."
So Sera's beau is a marshal, huh?
Cass was amused. An outlaw and a marshal, competing for the preacher's daughter? Who will she choose?
Cass's bet was on himself.
He rubbed his cheek against Sera's hair, enjoying the satiny softness. He longed for a peek at all the flounces and fripperies that padded her safely from his touch. He knew how to navigate petticoats, bloomers, and stockings while still keeping a woman modestly robed, if she so desired.
He wondered what Sera would desire...
"...because Blue Thunder is so isolated up in these hills. Isn't that odd?" she ventured.
She'd been speaking about her hillbilly town, so naturally, his mind had strayed to something interesting.
"What's odd, angel?" he piped up gamely.
"That Blue Thunder should see two Texicans inside of two months. But Allison's from Texas. And Jesse used to know her there. So maybe it's not so strange, after all."
Cass grew stone still.
"Allison?" he repeated incredulously.
Still, he refused to listen to the suspicion that was growing ever louder in his brain.
Sera nodded, half turning to face him. "Allison Cassidy and her daughter, Becky. A darling child. So polite and well-behaved."
Cass must have lost complete control of his Poker face, because Sera recoiled a bit. "Do... um... you know Widow Cassidy?"
'Widow Cassidy?' he wanted to shriek.
But his shock had robbed him completely of air. He struggled to breathe. To paste on a smile.
"Widow Cassidy." He was hard pressed not to spit out the name. "I can't say I've had that pleasure."
Sera's eyebrows knitted. "Billy, you look upset."
"Upset?" He laughed. The sound was harsh and brassy. "Why would I be upset?"
Lynx is in Blue Thunder?
Lynx is the marshal of Blue Thunder?!
As Cass's world started to implode, the same thought kept repeating over and over in his mind.
Lynx lied. To me! Cass! The fella who saved his life eight times!
And then the sickening truth sank in.
Lynx was trying to get rid of me. He sent me to Whiskey Bend to get shot at and snakebit!
What else was Cass supposed to think?
What a chump I've been! All these weeks, while I was tracking Taggart, trying to save my best friend's lying, Colored ass from a noose, Lynx was stealing my dream of becoming a lawman! He was strutting around Blue Thunder, pretending to be White so he could seduce my woman!
Sera was trying to ease from the circle of his arm. "Billy, are you all right?"
"Sure," he growled. "Just dandy."
When she tried to tug her hand free, he tightened his grip. Oh, no you don't. You aren't leaving me. Not for that double-crossing bastard.
He struggled to think. To form some sort of plan.
"So this Widow Cassidy. Is she a friend of yours?"
Sera fidgeted. "To tell the truth, no. I mean, we used to be. But I think she's after Jesse..."
Ya think!? If it wears britches, Allie chases it!
"This Allison's a regular Whampus Cat, eh?"
Sera blinked at the unfamiliar term. "A w-what?"
A whore. A bitch. A puta! "A woman of questionable morals."
Sera nodded uncertainly. "I don't like to spread gossip, but..."
"But what?"
Sera averted her eyes. "I keep quiet for Becky's sake."
Well, ain't that a kick in the pants! And from a preacher's daughter, too!
But hey. I understand. Wouldn't want to disrupt sweet little Becky's life with an inconvenience like the Truth, now would we? Wouldn't want her to know that her ma's a whore, and her grandpappy's a murderer, and her pa would be alive today, if he'd never had the misfortune of meeting either one of them!
Cass clamped his teeth over his tongue. He struggled to rein in the white-hot fury pounding through his veins. Allie's reckoning would have to come later.
As for Jesse's...
If there was one thing Cass knew that Sera didn't, it was that Jesse was a sucker for brunettes. White brunettes, Cass hastened to add, with peaches-and-cream skin, big blue eyes, and hearts as warm as the sun. Cass was willing to bet that Jesse had feelings for Sera. Hopeless feelings. Feelings that could get him hanged. The dog.
Remember that blood oath, Jess? The one that you made on your grandma's grave? Remember how you swore you would ride into hell itself if I ever needed your gun?
Payback time, pal.
"My darling," Cass crooned. "How you've suffered. How he made you suffer."
Sera's chin quivered. She looked away to wipe a tear off her cheek.
Gently, tenderly, he tilted her face up to his. "Don't cry, sweetheart. Not over him. You're killing me!
"I fell in love with you the day we met," he murmured fervently. As far as Cass was concerned, he was speaking Gospel truth. "I opened my eyes and saw you leaning over me. The sun was backlighting your hair, making it shine like a halo with midnight-blue stars. You looked like an angel, honey. An angel who'd come to earth. I knew God had sent you to heal me. My heart belongs to you, Sera. How can I convince you? What do I have to do? Tell me. Tell me now. I'll do anything you say."
He waited expectantly.
For a long time, Sera stared at the hands she was twisting in her lap. He heard her swallow a couple of times. He watched her frown.
Finally, she hiked her chin. She squared her shoulders. The eyes that met his weren't just decisive, they were defiant.
"Will you escort me to Founder's Day, Billy?"
Triumph exploded, sweet and delicious, in Cass's mouth.
"Sure, sweetheart," he drawled. "I'll take you anywhere you want to dance the night away."
Chapter 15
Jesse was chomping at the bit to get to that orphanage.
So at dawn on Wednesday morning, when the river current was finally fit for a safe passage, he was waiting for Luke on the bank, ready to transfer sacks of food, clothing, and toys from the sheriff's wagon onto a raft.
Doc Jones was no less eager to cross the river. His first priority was to assure hi
mself that his kid sister was unharmed. But the doc's grim expression wasn't due solely to his worries about Sera. Michael had loaded his surgical tools into his medical valise. Although Michael didn't say much, he knew as well as Jesse did that a bite from a venomous snake might mean an amputation for "Mister Somebody."
Jesse was worried. He had a pretty good idea who Mister Somebody was. In fact, he blamed himself for Cass's misadventure. Cass wouldn't have been risking amputation right now if Jesse hadn't sent him off, alone, through unfamiliar territory.
Cass had radically improved his tracking skills since the age of 13, but he possessed only rudimentary knowledge of medicinal plants. Unless flowers were in bloom, for instance, he couldn't tell the difference between pain-killing arnica and fever-calming tansy. When Jesse had tried to teach Cass to identify flora by their leaves, he'd claimed that he had no need to master herbal lore, since he had his own, private Medicine Man riding by his side. Cass had always been content to let Jesse be the responsible one, so he could cut his wolf loose.
Now Jesse regretted that he hadn't pounded the knowledge into Cass's brain when he'd been an adolescent, and still willing to listen to advice. But even if Jesse had forced Cass to heed him, what good would an understanding of flora have been this time? A snake bite—and especially the venom of a copperhead—would have made Cass too weak and feverish to scour the woods for echinacea or milk thistle.
Because Jesse had lied, sending his best friend alone and unprepared into the wilderness, he was willing to shoulder a piece of the blame for Cass's snake bite. But that wasn't the only guilt gnawing at Jesse's innards. Jesse was worried about Sera. She might have reached the orphanage safely, as Sammy had claimed, but a 14-year-old boy wasn't likely to perceive Sera's real danger.
Every time Jesse imagined her cooped up for three nights under the same roof with Cass, he tasted bile. It galled him to think that he'd exercised self-restraint, that he'd set her free to find a reliable, honorable husband... and all for what? So Coyote Cass could sniff her skirts, steal into her bed, and rob her of her virginity? The only reason Sera might possibly still be a maid today was because the "Rebel Rutter" had been in too much pain to live up to his reputation!
In either case, Jesse knew there'd be hell to pay the minute he and Cass went toe-to-toe in a showdown.
Rafting the river proved to be a more complex undertaking than merely poling a float across a current. Jesse anchored a chain to a tree trunk, and Luke fired an arrow to Sammy. The boy and his father dragged the attached rope (as well as its chain) all the way across the river, securing the links around a second tree. Then Michael clambered onto the raft.
Luke and Jesse walked their horses on either side of the crudely lashed, pinelog contraption in an effort to keep it on course. Michael alternately poled and clung to the chain to keep from getting swept off deck.
This harrowing journey took 12 minutes. However, it seemed like a lifetime, with the raft threatening to capsize, Michael muttering oaths, and Kavi wheezing valiantly as the waters crawled up her neck. The cheering of four-dozen orphans on the other bank only increased the stress that Jesse was feeling. God knew, if anything happened to those sacks of toys—or worse, to Doc Jones—in front of those innocent eyes, Jesse knew he would never forgive himself.
But in the end, all that got washed away was a bushel of corn and a few cans of beans, all of which would be replaced within a day or two by the wagon of supplies that Noel Paddington and his nephew had started driving 48 hours earlier toward the Mercerville bridge.
As the raft finally bumped against the river's far bank, the delight of the children was enough to warm Jesse's heart and make him forget the chill of the water that had saturated his boots and dungarees.
But nothing could make him forget the accusatory look in Sera's eyes or the cold glitter in Cass's.
Michael had no sooner leaped off the raft, than he was swarmed by enthusiastic toddlers bearing garlands. All of the children had to be hugged, of course, which meant that a blushing, grinning Michael emerged from the crowd wearing at least three flower chains around his neck, and one around his forehead. Jesse and Luke weren't quite able to escape this hero's welcome, although they did manage to convince the children that the horses had done the hard work, so the horses should be draped with flowers.
By that time, Sera was hugging Michael and introducing him to Cass, who was leaning lightly on a cane. The threesome eventually piled into Lydia's buggy for a ride up the hill, while Collie, Sammy, and some of the older boys helped Luke and Jesse transfer supplies from the raft to a wagon.
Another hour crawled by before Jesse was finally done hauling sacks of potatoes and baskets of toys from the wagon to the orphanage's kitchen. Turning down the buttermilk that Mamie offered him as reward, he strolled back into the yard. The sprawling compound, which was made of sturdy red brick, nestled at the heart of a hardwood forest. Oak, hickories, maples, and elms were among the trees that were shading the horseshoe pit, where he spied Cass. The Texican (who was little more than an overgrown kid himself,) was teaching a trio of 12-year-olds the various trick tosses that had to be mastered before they could use their pocket knives to compete in a "man's game" of mumblety peg.
Jesse walked toward the pit.
Cass ignored him.
Reining in his temper, Jesse tethered Kavi and steeled himself to patience. He knew better than to force a confrontation in front of three children—especially three children who worshipped Cass.
Cass's cane was leaning against his thigh as he stood at the edge of the circle that marked the boundaries for the mumblety-peg contest. Jesse wondered, fleetingly, where Cass's beloved Stetson was. Other than the missing hat, Cass was dressed in his usual ensemble of unrelenting black. Hell, even his cane was painted black.
Always the showboater.
Cass's white-as-snow hair gleamed like starfire in the sun. Demonstrating Trick Toss #10, he used his forefinger to balance the point of his pocket knife on his head. With a deft, downward push, he sent the blade tumbling toward the earth, where it struck with a thwack, its hilt quivering in a perfectly perpendicular position.
His adolescent audience oohed and awed.
Jesse's patience began to unravel.
"Cass."
"Busy."
"A word."
"I'll spare you two: 'Bug off.'"
Jesse's jaw twitched.
Collie chose that precise moment to stalk into the clearing. He was wearing Cass's Stetson and carrying Cass's Winchester. The boy strode past Jesse as if he were as noteworthy as a copper statue covered in bird lime.
Grunting a greeting to Cass, Collie tossed him a box of cartridges. "The doc ain't gonna let Sera ride the raft. He bought train tickets. They'll be leaving for the station in a quarter hour."
"Good." Cass started pushing cartridges into the loops on his belt, much to the wide-eyed curiosity of the mumblety-peg players. "You and I will be riding with them."
"What about him?" Collie jerked his thumb over his shoulder at Jesse.
Cass smiled pleasantly. "You mean Marshal Quaid?"
And so it begins, Jesse thought grimly.
"Why, I'm sure a distinguished gentleman like Marshal Quaid has more important things to do than escort a sweet little lady back home," Cass drawled. "After all, sheriff-bushwhackers are on the rampage, and bounty hunters are scouring the region for scalps."
Jesse tensed at this news. "Taggart?"
"Yep," Cass answered in an off-hand manner. He turned his attention to one of the mumblety-peg players. "Nice job, Paddy."
"When were you planning on telling me about Taggart?" Jesse demanded.
"Get your thumb outta the way, Jake, or else you're gonna slice it off when you throw," Cass called to another mumblety-peg player.
"Yessir, Mister Somebody."
"Mister Somebody," Cass drawled broadly, ignoring Jesse's question. "Has a nice ring to it, don't you think? Kinda mysterious and romantic, like a Pinkerton Agent. Not like
some poor slob you were setting up to get plugged by Tennessee road agents."
Well, that was the final straw.
"I set you up?" Jesse flared. "Maybe it's time you told me what really happened in Wichita!"
Cass's surprise looked genuine. His head snapped in Jesse's direction. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"What did Polly do to put the spurs to your temper, Cass? Choose a wealthier mark, or a better educated one?"
"What? You think that I—? " He sputtered into silence, aware of the innocent ears listening with such rapt attention. Then he chuckled, shaking his head and brushing imaginary dust off his shoulder. "I gotta hand it to you, Jess. You're some piece of work. Pointing the finger at me. Guilt must be eating you pretty bad under that shiny tin star."
"You got an alibi?"
"Lookie who turned all legal and righteous. I don't recollect the State of Kansas giving you authority to question me, runagate."
Jesse's eyes narrowed. "This isn't a game, Cass. People could get hurt."
"Are you threatening me, boy?"
Jesse's chest heaved. Between Texicans, calling a man "boy" was the purest slander. The insult usually preceded a round of fisticuffs or a gunfight.
"Eleven years, Cass," he ground out. "Eleven goddamned years. Is this how you want our friendship to end?"
"Well, it's like my mama always said: 'Son, you can't lose something you never had.'"
Collie's sharp whistle of warning made Jesse bite his tongue. Sera and Michael were emerging arm-in-arm from the orphanage. They were accompanied by Luke. Jesse's heart turned over when he saw her, dressed in the lavender damask that she'd worn on the day that he'd met her in Stanford. She was laughing at something Michael had said. He was grinning down at her and patting her pristinely white, matinee-length glove.
Jesse caught Cass watching him watch Sera. The younger man's lips had twisted in an unpleasant smile.
"Billy!" Sera called from the edge of the drive, some 20 yards distant. She beamed at him, careful to ignore Jesse in the process. "Sammy saddled Jellico for you."
"On my way, angel."
Cass used his cane to push himself away from the mumblety-peg line. Suddenly, he'd developed a limp. The big faker was clearly planning to wring every ounce of sympathy that he could out of Michael and Sera. Jesse had half a mind to kick Cass's cane out of his hand.
Seduced by an Angel (Velvet Lies, Book 3) Page 22