In the Arms of a Cowboy

by Pam Crooks

  She swept off her beaded sombrero and tossed it onto the table top. With swift and dexterous fingers, she unplaited the midnight black braid hanging down her back and shook her hair free. She continued through the room and into a narrow hall.

  “Here is where you and Senor Landry will stay.” She opened a door and stepped inside. “Tomas and I will be across from you.”

  “There’s no need to give us Cortez’s room,” Hannah said, reiterating Quinn’s words, as wary of the repercussions as he. “We can stay somewhere else.”

  Sophia shrugged. “It is Tomas’ wish. Do not worry about Julio.”

  She returned to the main room and paused at the cast iron stove. Using a towel to protect her hand, she lifted the lid to the pot and inspected its contents.

  “Miguel has prepared jerky and rice soup, my favorite.” She smiled, her delight rare and unfettered. She bent over the pot and inhaled approvingly of the aromas wafting upward, then set the lid back onto the pot.

  Suddenly, she paled. The towel dropped, and she clutched her stomach. She moaned and swayed.

  Alarmed, Hannah rushed to her side. “Sophia, what is it?”

  “Por Dios! I think I’m going to be sick.”

  “Sit,” Hannah said and pushed her into the nearest chair. “Put your head between your knees. It’ll help.”

  Amazingly, Sophia obeyed and doubled over, her long silken hair falling over her head and pooling on the floor.

  Hannah removed the wool cloak from her shoulders and laid it aside. The first time she’d seen Sophia Huerta, she’d been a fierce outlaw leading an entire band of lawless men, determined to steal Fenwick’s rig for herself and taking Quinn and Hannah captive in the process.

  Now, the tiny innocent within her belly toppled her into the ageless role of motherhood and burdened her with the miseries of morning sickness.

  Hannah found a clean cloth and dipped it into a basin of cool water.

  “Feeling better?” she asked.

  “Si. Some.” Sophia’s voice sounded muffled.

  “I’ll help you to bed. Perhaps you should nap.”

  “No.” Sophia sat up again, groaned, and leaned back against the chair. Her eyes closed. “I am fine.”

  Her sun-bronzed skin remained ashen. Hannah touched her cheek and noted the clamminess of it.

  “When will the baby come?” she asked softly.

  Sophia’s eyes flew open. “You know of my baby?”

  Hannah met her gaze. “Yes.”

  Sophia’s mouth pursed, as if she puzzled over Hannah’s discovery and her own failure to prevent it. Pensive, she rubbed her abdomen. “He will come in the spring.”

  Soon, Hannah thought. Very soon. She pressed the damp cloth to Sophia’s forehead and smoothed away her hair. She thought of the years she’d lived with Pa, impressionable years when she’d longed for the normal life of a young girl growing into womanhood.

  She’d never wanted a life running form the law.

  “The baby will change everything, Sophia. You must realize that,” she said.

  The black eyes flashed with a touch of anger.

  “Of course, I do. Every day, I think of it.” She struggled to remove her serape, and Hannah helped her. “See?” Sophia patted her belly, too rounded to hide much longer. “I think of him always, and when he kicks inside me, I want to weep with happiness.”

  Her words touched Hannah’s heart. This woman, harsh and unyielding when she was with her men, possessed all the tender feelings of any expectant mother.

  “Twelve years, we try, Tomas and I,” Sophia said. “We wanted a baby, and I was sure I was barren. When I realized God had given me His gift, I fell to my knees in thanks.”

  “But you spend your life always on the move,” Hannah challenged. “Is that how you want to raise your child?”

  “Por Dios. No.”

  “You waited so long. Think of the risks. He is an innocent. He will be defenseless against the lawmen who chase you and Tomas.”

  Sophia leaned forward, her vexation returning the color to her cheeks.

  “Do you think I do not worry about all these things?” she demanded. “Do you think I do not want a real home? And land? And chickens and cows and pigs? Por Dios! I want them more than anything! And Tomas has promised me they will be mine!”

  “When, Sophia?” Hannah persisted, skeptical.

  Glory, how many times had she heard those same words from Pa? Promise after promise made but never kept.

  Until it had been too late.

  “For a long time, we have saved our pesos, Hannah.” Sophia sat back, calmer. “Tomas has enough cattle now to start his own herd. It is time for us to find a real home. Far away from here. We are ready now.”

  Hannah eyed her dubiously. “To be respectable citizens?”

  Sophia hesitated. “Si.”

  “Just like that.” She snapped her fingers.

  Impatience darkened Sophia’s features. “Si.”

  “And lawmen will never chase you again.”

  “Si.” Sophia’s toe tapped on the floor. All signs of her nausea seemed to have passed. “Except for one.”

  Hannah stilled. She could think of no other. “Frank Briggs?”

  “Bastardo!” Sophia spat. “He alone haunts Tomas. Too long!”

  Only then did the ragged pieces begin to fit--the bargain Sophia had been quick to suggest earlier. And enforce.

  “You’re using us, aren’t you?” Hannah said, her eyes widening in shock. “To get even with him!”

  Sophia stood abruptly and flung her hands upward. “Pah! I talk too much.”

  “How will you use us?” Hannah demanded. “What will you force us to do?”

  Sophia turned, took a step toward her bedroom. Clearly, she had no intent of answering.

  In a burst of temper, Hannah snatched Sophia’s arm and spun her around.

  “Tell me the terms of the bargain!” she commanded hoarsely.

  Sparks of fury shot from the obsidian depths of Sophia’s eyes. For a moment, she said nothing but glared at Hannah as hotly as Hannah glared at her.

  In the next, the fury began to cool. The tension eased from her.

  “We wait,” she said simply.

  Hannah blinked in a struggle to comprehend. “What?”

  “We will see what the warden will do to recapture you and Senor Landry.”

  “And you expect us to--to just sit around here until he finds us?” Hannah gaped at her.

  A smile curved Sophia’s lips. “It is a little more complicated than that, Hannah.”

  Hannah opened her mouth to argue and demand more information, but clamped it shut again. Sophia was too shrewd to reveal her plan until she was ready.

  Hannah thought of the deal she’d made with Quinn. She thought of the peace she’d left behind in Mother Superior’s convent.

  And she thought Sophia Huerta was a fool.

  She and Quinn would wait, Hannah knew. They had no choice but to comply with the terms of the Huertas’ bargain.

  But in the end, Hannah and Quinn would be the victors. The con game would be theirs. Hannah swore it. It was the next step on her long journey back to the security of the convent.

  Sophia strode toward the hallway leading to her bedroom. She paused and glanced at the damp cloth she held in her hand. Her gaze lifted and found Hannah’s.

  “I have known of the child I carry for more than six months,” she said softly. “In all that time, I could not tell my men of it. They would not give me sympathy when my stomach was twisted inside out with the morning sickness. Nor would I want them to.” Her expression turned wry. “They would not obey orders from a woman in such a delicate condition, eh?”

  Hannah said nothing. But she understood.

  “Except for Tomas, only you, Hannah, have showed me kindness.” She stood straighter, her chin hiked up a notch, as if the admission did not come easy. “Gracias. I will not forget.”

  Hannah could hardly wait to climb into the tub of bath
water sitting in the middle of Julio Cortez’s little room.

  Sophia had gifted her with privacy. Four walls and a roof proved to be a privilege Hannah hadn’t realized she missed. She hung her cloak on a peg behind the door and lighted a lantern. Then, for the first time since she’d left the convent, she took off her habit.

  Wearing only her chemise, she contemplated the brown garment with a twinge of regret. She had no need of it now. Not with the role she must play as Quinn’s wife, and she hoped Mother Superior would understand.

  Hannah folded the habit with care, making sure her rosary beads, wooden cross and the widdy were all safely ensconced in a pocket. She tucked her stockings and sandals inside and tied it into a neat bundle with the narrow length of rope she used for her belt. Finally, before she could change her mind, she stashed it all under Cortez’s bed, well out of sight.

  Sophia had been generous in lending her clothes and toiletries—a clean chemise, skirt and blouse, soap, a hairbrush, delicate combs to slide into her hair. She had even changed Cortez’s sheets and brought extra blankets to ward off the night’s chill.

  An impeccable hostess, Sophia Huerta. If Hannah hadn’t seen the change in the woman herself, she’d never have believed it.

  Hannah removed her chemise and stepped into the tub. The deliciously warm water tingled over her bare skin, and she sank into the depths with a sigh of delight.

  Within minutes, she scrubbed away the smells of campfire smoke, saddle leather and horse from her body. She washed trail dust from her hair and soaked the soreness from her limbs. Afterward, luxuriating in the feel of being clean again, she eased back against the side of the tub. A wonderful lethargy spread through her, and her eyes closed.

  She didn’t know how long she dozed, only that the water lapping against her breasts had turned cold, and gooseflesh had risen on her skin. Something awakened her--a sound in the hall outside the room, she realized--and her gaze instinctively darted to the door.

  The knob turned, and Quinn stepped inside.

  Chapter 9

  Hannah yelped and lunged for the towel lying next to the tub. She pressed the fabric to her bosom.

  Quinn closed the door. His gaze drifted over her. Heat flickered in his dark eyes, a banked heat smoldering to life.

  “I knocked,” he drawled. “You didn’t answer.”

  “I--I fell asleep.”

  “I see that.”

  He set a bowl brimming with jerky and rice on the rickety dresser and approached the tub.

  Hannah squeezed her knees together.

  “Quinn, please. I’m not dressed,’ she said, floundering with an acute sense of vulnerability she’d never experienced before.

  “I see that, too.”

  “Get out. Now.”

  He ignored her. “Stand up.”

  Her imagination went wild at what he intended, at what the hidden side to his savagery might do.

  “Not until you get out,” she said.

  “Your lips are blue with cold.” He reached for one of the blankets Sophia had left and shook free its folds. “Now, stand up.”

  She eyed the blanket, then him. “Why?”

  “Because your towel is soaked through, that’s why.”

  Indeed, most of it had fallen into the water in her haste to cover herself. She bit her lip.

  He gripped the edge of the blanket with both hands and spread his arms wide, holding it high. “C’mon, Hannah.”

  She hesitated. Then, assuring herself he had only her best interests in mind after all, she rose slowly, her fingers keeping the towel plastered against the front of her body.

  He swept the blanket snugly about her shoulders and lifted her from the tub. Bath water streamed down her legs and pooled at their feet.

  She tilted her head back and studied him. A day’s growth of stubble roughened his cheeks. Mingled smells of leather and smoke assailed her, the masculine scent of him she’d come to recognize.

  Their gazes met. Deep and dark, like rich sable, his eyes locked with hers. They held her entranced.

  “When you didn’t show up for supper, I got worried,” he murmured.

  “I’m sorry.” The words drifted between them on a husky whisper. “I lost track of time, I guess.”

  His hands slid from her shoulders down her arms and back again. Warming her. Drying her.

  “Sophia said you were taking your bath. I waited awhile, then decided to come after you.”

  “I’m fine. You needn’t have worried.”

  The beginnings of a frown turned those sable depths stormy.

  “There’s plenty to worry about here,” he said. “You’re at the top of the list.” He released her. “I don’t like it when I can’t see you. Anything could happen when I’m not around.”

  Beneath the blanket, Hannah’s spine straightened. She could take care of herself. Pa--and the men he’d chosen as friends--had seen to that.

  Yet she remembered the dismay she’d felt when Quinn left with Tomas shortly after their arrival into the bandeleros’ hideout. The dismay of being on her own. Without him.

  The reality of their situation left Hannah all too aware of her nakedness beneath the blanket. She clutched it tighter.

  Quinn went to the window, lifted aside the plain curtains with a lean finger and directed his attention to the night outside. She suspected it was his way of giving her privacy without leaving the room.

  “How was your time with Sophia?” he asked.

  Hannah reached for the clean chemise. “I discovered she was human.”

  Quinn grunted, clearly skeptical. Hannah dropped the blanket and towel with one hand and shimmied into her chemise with the other.

  “She’s going to have a baby,” Hannah added.

  “A baby?” He shot a surprised glance toward the closed door, as if to see for himself.

  “She’ll make a good mother, I think.” Hannah put on a white cotton blouse, embroidered around the neckline with bright, dainty flowers. “She already loves the child. Very much.”

  “No one knows?”

  Hannah shook her head. “Except for Tomas. And us.”

  He digested the news. “Poor kid will cut his teeth on rifle cartridges and learn to crawl on the back of a horse.”

  Hannah’s lips twitched. “Hardly.”

  “You have to admit the Huertas aren’t society’s version of perfect parents.”

  “Yes, but Sophia is ready to settle down.” She pulled a deep green skirt over her head, adjusted its fullness around her waist. The fabric had been rendered supple from many launderings and weighed far less than the heavy wool she was accustomed to. “She said as much.”

  “Neither she nor Tomas will do anything until this so-called bargain with us is settled.”

  “Ah, yes, the bargain. They want Briggs.”

  His gaze shot to hers.

  “She said that, too,” Hannah murmured.

  “Tomas escaped from Briggs’ prison and is afraid he’ll be recaptured. They think we’ll lead Briggs to them? So they can get rid of him?”

  Hannah marveled at his perception. “Very good, Mr. Landry.”

  “Christ,” he breathed, turning back to the window. “I can’t wait to get out of here.”

  “Just play the confidence game, and we will.”

  His dark head swiveled to her once more. He made a dark-lashed examination of her, the intensity of it leaving her feeling naked again.

  “And that means no more nun, doesn’t it?” he purred.

  She stilled. “Yes.”

  The curtain fell back into place. He stepped toward her, his presence overpowering in the little room. He circled her, studying the skirt and blouse as if he could see right through them.

  As if he liked what he saw.

  Hannah didn’t move. Her heart thumped within her breast. Suddenly, she wanted her habit back. She felt far safer in the thick, drab fabric that hid the shape of her body and whose coarse threads reminded her of the life she’d chosen, the peace she sou
ght.

  He trailed a lazy finger along the scooped neckline.

  “Embroidered flowers become you, Hannah. Brown wool doesn’t,” he said softly.

  “Quinn, don’t.”

  “How long has it been since you’ve worn ordinary clothes?”

  Her eyes flashed in defiance. “A year. Since the first day I entered the convent.”

  “Tsk. Tsk. Too bad.”

  She pressed her lips together.

  “You’re a fetching woman, Hannah Benning. Do you know that?”

  “Vanity has never been one of my strong suits,” she retorted.

  “I’ll bet it hasn’t.” He reached for a mirror, cracked in one corner. “Look at yourself.”

  “I don’t want to.” She angled her head away, refused to admit to him mirrors were forbidden at the convent for the selfish and vain thoughts they fostered.

  Or that she was gripped by a raw fear of what she might see, the changes that had occurred over the past twelve months.

  Or that were occurring now. This minute. Without her brown wool habit.

  “Look.” Determined, he gripped her chin.

  Because he would allow nothing else, she reluctantly obeyed.

  “Do you see?” he asked, stepping behind her, staring into the mirror with her.

  The top of her head reached his chin. The expanse of his chest enveloped the slender span of her shoulders. The column of her throat, the pale color of her skin, contrasted with the sun-browned maleness of his.

  His hand lifted, and he gently speared his fingers into the damp curls along her nape.

  “Your hair is silky,” he said. “Smooth like satin. The way a man likes a woman’s hair to be.”

  “It’s too short,” she protested, in spite of everything.

  “When it feels like this, he doesn’t care how long it is. Or how short.”

  She held her breath, not wanting to be affected by his compliment. He shifted the mirror’s position, letting her see the swell of her breasts below the blouse’s neckline. The white cotton tapered downward, where its hem disappeared into the waistband of her skirt. The green fabric laid against her flat belly and hugged the curve of her hips, then finally ended at her bare ankles.