The Legend Of Love

by Nan Ryan

  “Grady, I know you’ve told me before, but could you refresh my memory about the route we’ll be taking?”

  Grady yanked off his battered Stetson, slapped it against his thigh, and fixed her with snapping blue eyes. “Thunderation, missy, what’s wrong with you young folks?”

  “Wrong?” Elizabeth repeated nervously, terrified the white-haired mountain man suspected something. “Why, nothing’s wrong.”

  “Well, then, how come you can’t remember a thing I tell you?” He jammed his hat back on his head. “You’re just like Sonny. Can’t remember your own name. I tell him he’s got his brains in his butt—beggin’ your pardon—but I don’t know what in the Sam Hill is the matter with you! If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a dozen times exactly the route we’re a-takin’.”

  “I’m sorry, Grady. You’re right, of course, I should have listened more closely. Never mind, I’ll—”

  “Well, now hold your horses, missy. I don’t mind going over it one more time.” His snapping blue eyes began to twinkle. Onto him, Elizabeth smiled, knowing he couldn’t wait to tell her again.

  “I’ll listen closely this time, Grady,” she said, and meant it.

  “Well, you better, ’cause this is the last time I’m a-tellin’ you.” He lifted a hand, pointed a forefinger toward the horizon. “We’ll be well up into the Sierra Caballos by sunset. Then down their gentle rise right into the hostile lands the Spanish conquistadors called Jornada del Muerto, Journey of the Dead. Ain’t nothin’ out there ’cept bone-dry deserts, snakes, scorpions, stinging ants, and savage Indians.

  “We’ll ride across them burning deserts and canyons, then up into the towering San Andres Range with peaks soaring nigh on to nine thousand feet.

  “No sooner do we get down the other side of the San Andres than we’re slap dab in the middle of El Malpais, the Badlands. We’ll have to ride through that big ol’ hell of black basalt and lava pits and on down the Tularosa Valley into the White Sands.” He looked at Elizabeth to be sure she was properly attentive. “Missy, I’m talking about a huge lake of sand as white as the virgin snow, as far as the eye can see. You ain’t never seen nothin’ like it in your life!

  “Out of the White Sands and into the Tularosa Basin till we hit the Sacramentos. Them mountains are some big ones. Hell, Alamo Peak is right at ten thousand foot, give or take a hundred feet.”

  “That tall?” said Elizabeth, letting him know she was listening closely and was appropriately impressed.

  “That’s what I said. Might be some snow still up on the summits, I wouldn’t doubt it. So we’ll likely skirt the Sacramentos, be in the foothills for a while, and then wind our way right on over into the Guadalupes. Then down into the cussed hot deserts again and keep on a-dropping southeast till we get to where we’re a-goin’.

  “There ain’t gonna be nothin’ easy about this part of the trip. We got endless deserts and mountains ahead to wind through and unending passes and mesas to cross. Ain’t no place for a lady, which is why Weston tried to get you to stay at Rancho Caballo. Why didn’t you do it, missy?”

  Elizabeth shook her head, didn’t answer. She drew a deep breath and said, “I take it West and Doña are … are—”

  “Have been for years,” Grady assured her, nodding. “Ever since she was in Santa Fe one spring morning and Sonny seen her sittin’ in her fine carriage right out there in front of the La Fonda Hotel. Prettiest thing you ever did see. That white-blond hair a-gleamin’ in the sunlight and a bright pink dress that looked like somebody had poured her right into it.” He chuckled and stroked his beard.

  “Go on,” Elizabeth softly prompted. “They were introduced that day?”

  “Introduced?” He hooted. “Sure, they was introduced, but it was Sonny who done the introducin’. You see, we was comin’ out the hotel dining room that mornin’, me an’ Sonny an’ Taos and we seen her sittin’ there. Well, wouldn’t you know it, without so much as a ‘by your leave’ Sonny went right over to her, opened the door of her carriage, stepped up into it, and dropped down into the seat beside her, big as you please. And there he didn’t have no idea who she was.” Remembering, Grady laughed, his whole body shaking.

  “Then what, Grady?” Elizabeth was mildly annoyed. She wanted him to complete the story.

  “Well, sir, Sonny picked up one of her small, gloved hands, looked into her eyes, and said, ‘Where would you like to take me?’ Can you imagine that? Just jumps right up in there and asks where she would like to take him!” Again Grady roared with laughter, wiping the tears from his eyes.

  Forcing herself to laugh along with him, Elizabeth waited for him to calm down a little, then continuing to smile easily, she said, “Such appalling impudence! What was the poor startled woman’s answer?”

  “This you gotta hear,” said Grady merrily. “Even if it ain’t real proper for me to be a-tellin’ it or you to be a-hearin’ it. Now, what do you suppose Doña Hope said?”

  All too certain she knew, Elizabeth replied, “I have no idea.”

  “You ain’t gonna believe it. That sweet smellin’, blond-haired, filthy rich widow woman looked right at Sonny and said, ‘Cowboy, I’d take you home with me, but the ranch is too far away. Let’s go upstairs to my La Fonda suite.’”

  And Grady laughed again, then added, “They been mighty close ever since.”

  “I see. Are they … in love?”

  “Love, naw, nothin’ like that. Leastways, Sonny’s not in love.” The wide smile abruptly left Grady’s weathered face. He turned almost somber. “West is not a man for no woman to be lovin’.” He looked off in the distance as if he were seeing things that she did not. “His way of life is pretty much what the Mexicans call the no le hace.”

  “Which means?”

  “It doesn’t matter after all.”

  Across the woolly patches of buffalo grass the expedition rode. Through rabbit brush and yucca spears, they crossed the high grasslands of southern New Mexico. By suppertime, they were well up onto the cedar-dotted slopes of the cool Sierra Caballos.

  They stopped in a rolling mountain meadow covered with thousands of purple mariposa lilies. Golden butterflies darted dizzily from blossom to blossom. A bluebird with sunlight glinting on its outstretched indigo wings flew gracefully to the meadow’s edge, where a tiny stream trickled with cold, clear water.

  The bluebird made a perfect landing atop a jutting boulder in midstream, tiptoed down the slippery rock, wet his beak several times, then was again airborne, soaring to the top of a fragrant cedar bordering the stream’s far side.

  Seated in the lengthening shade on a smooth overturned boulder, Elizabeth looked around. She was in a peaceful, beautiful glade and under different circumstances she would have been thoroughly enchanted. But not today. Not after last night.

  Warily she kept an eye on West as he and the rest of the men set up camp. It struck her that his physical movements were those of a caged but dangerous animal. And nobody knew better than she just how dangerous he was. Looking at him now, noticing the way the muscles pulled in his long legs as he crouched down to unpack a food hamper, she felt her throat grow dry. She vividly recalled the sight of those powerful muscles bunching under sweat-slick brown flesh as he crouched naked before her in the shadowy moonlight.

  Inwardly shuddering, Elizabeth told herself that what had happened last night must never happen again.

  Most likely West supposed that she was now his for the taking, anytime, anyplace. Well, he was mistaken. For reasons she herself couldn’t understand, she had totally lost her head last night. And she felt miserable about it today. Her guilt and remorse were devastating. She’d give anything if she could turn back the clock twenty-four hours.

  If only she could go back to yesterday afternoon, before they had reached Rancho Caballo. Or, if she could go back to twilight last evening, before she stepped out into a flower-scented courtyard where a dark man in evening clothes waited in the dusk.

  Dear God, if she could just go back t
o midnight when she looked up to see a dark, dangerous man coming for her from out of the night. Even then she could have stopped him. She could have hurried back inside and locked the doors against him.

  No. That wouldn’t have been necessary. Much as she hated to admit it, Elizabeth knew that West would not have forced her. If she hadn’t wanted him, he would have let her go. He was not like Colonel Frederick C. Dobbs, the rapacious officer back in Louisiana whom she had …

  Elizabeth’s troubled thoughts were interrupted when Taos handed her a filled plate. She smiled her thanks, took it, but was no hungrier now than she had been at breakfast or noon. Holding the plate on her knees, she forced herself to swallow a few bites. Moments later she sighed, set the plate aside, swiveled slowly about, and saw West. He stood directly across the narrow stream leaning against a rock upthrust, arms folded, face turned away, an untouched plate of food on a sandstone ledge at his elbow.

  He turned, caught her staring, and Elizabeth half expected him to toss her one of those teasing, predatory Quarternight grins and perhaps a conspiratorial wink.

  He didn’t.

  His steady gray gaze exerted an almost physical pull, but his was not a look of teasing warmth. A shadow of rapidly growing whiskers already darkening his face, he stared at her coldly, impersonally. Unintentionally, he projected a chilling air of dark, raw sexuality.

  Elizabeth quickly turned away, confused by the startling change in him. The entire trip he had seized every opportunity to torment her, to pester her, to get her off alone. Now he looked at her as if he had never seen her before. Suddenly cold in spite the day’s warmth, she was more afraid of him than ever.

  And more attracted.

  Elizabeth was not the only one to notice that something was bothering the lead guide. West Quarternight had not been himself all day and nobody knew the reason.

  “What’s botherin’ you, boy?” Grady walked over to where West sat alone and apart after supper that evening.

  West shrugged. “Who said anything’s bothering me?”

  “Hellfire, what do you take me for? A double-damned fool?” Grady hotly responded. “Sonny, I been a-knowin’ you now for nigh on to four years. I been with you night and day for months at a time. I seen you blind drunk. I seen you hopping mad. I seen you having a rip-roaring good time. I seen you when you was lazy, seen you when you pushed yourself too hard. Seen you go for weeks without a woman. Seen you hole up with a woman and refuse to get out of her bed. Seen you behave like a wise man, seen you act a derned fool. Seen you sick, seen you well. Seen you fight and win. Seen you fight and get knocked flat on your ass.” Grady paused, waiting.

  Never looking up, West said in level tones, “Guess that about sums me up.”

  “Not quite,” said Grady. “I ain’t never seen you actin’ like you have today. What’s stickin’ in your craw, Sonny? You and the doña have a fuss?”

  “No.”

  “Well, then what? You ain’t said two words all day and your face looks like a big ole’ black thundercloud. If I’ve done somethin’ to chap you, spit it out, son.”

  West finally lifted his eyes to Grady. “Partner, you haven’t done anything. Nobody has. I’ll see if I can’t be a little better company tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow, hell,” bellowed Grady. “The sun ain’t even completely down on this day yet! How about takin’ some of them sweet pills right now and comin’ on over to join the rest of us for a little jawin’ around the campfire.”

  West smiled. “You go on. Truth is, I’m a little tired this evening. Think I’ll just catch up on my shut-eye.”

  Grady’s frown slowly changed to a grin. “I get it, now. You ain’t mad. You’re just all tuckered out from Doña Hope. That there’s it, ain’t it? You and the doña romped around her bedroom all night and she drained the life right out of you, huh, Sonny?” Grady slapped his knee and guffawed loudly. “Hell, why didn’t you say so. Can’t find no fault with a man that spends his night makin’ a pretty young woman happy. No, sirree. Nothin’ wrong with that. You go on and turn in, I’ll tell the others you’re just a little tired is all.”

  West said nothing.

  But his smile swiftly disappeared when Grady stepped aside and West caught sight of a long-legged vision in tight rust pants. His gray eyes narrowed and his full mouth tightened as he watched the willowy young woman move about with an easy, upright posture and graceful fluid motion.

  His narrowed gaze lingered on the seductive swell of her lush, ripe breasts beneath her blue pullover shirt, then slid slowly down to the appealing arch of her hip, the rounded firmness of her bottom so well defined in the tight rust trousers.

  Elizabeth slowly circled the campfire. She stopped, stood for a long moment bending her head back to look up at the darkening sky. She lifted her arms, unpinned her hair, and it fell around her shoulders and down her back almost to her waist.

  Vivid, shimmering, that flaming red hair blazed in the campfire’s glow.

  And set West’s aching heart afire.

  35

  “CAPTAIN BROOKS! CAPTAIN BROOKS, where are you? Oh, my God, Brooks! No, No!”

  “Wake up, West. Wake up. You’re havin’ one of them nightmares again.”

  “What? What is it?” West bolted up from his bedroll, a hand clawing madly at the choking laces of his buckskin shirt. His breath was loud and labored, his dark face wet with sweat.

  “You were dreamin’, son,” Grady said, crouching down beside West, his long white hair gleaming in the starlight. “You was puttin’ up an awful racket.”

  West swallowed hard, raked a tanned hand through his damp hair, and shook his head. A deep shudder passed through his long, lean body. “Sorry, Grady. Didn’t mean to wake you.”

  Grady gently patted West’s shoulder. “No harm done. The others never heard you. They’re all sleepin’ like babies.”

  Grady was right. West’s recurring nightmare had not awakened the others. But someone else had heard West’s strangled cries of terror.

  Across the remote desert camp, Elizabeth had been lying on her back under the stars. Wide awake. She had been awake since bedtime, hours earlier. Troubled and confused, she had been unable to fall asleep despite her total exhaustion.

  When the deep nighttime silence was suddenly shattered with West’s panicked shouts, her heart leapt into her throat. She pushed herself up on her elbows, stared openmouthed across the moon-splashed camp, and saw West thrashing wildly about in his bedroll.

  Her immediate instinct was to go to him. Anxiously, she pushed down her blankets, her heart hammering against her ribs. By the time she was on her feet, she saw the white-haired Grady move to West, crouch down beside him, and shake him awake. A hand on her pounding heart, she sank weakly back down to her blankets, her eyes wide as she watched and listened.

  She heard the two men clearly; their voices, though soft and low, carried on the still, thin air. She heard every word that was said. When Grady made a move to return to his own bedroll a few feet from West’s, Elizabeth quickly lay back down, not wanting either man to know she was awake. She heard the pair say goodnight, watched Grady crawl back under his blanket, pull his long white beard on the outside of the covers, and carefully spread it out. He sighed and folded an arm under his head.

  Elizabeth knew that he had immediately fallen back to sleep by the sound of his soft snores. West did not lie back down. He waited until he, too, heard Grady’s snores. Then he rose to his feet, reached up behind his head, yanked off his buckskin shirt, and moved silently toward the low-burning campfire.

  In the dying firelight his bare brown torso glistened as if oiled and Elizabeth realized he was drenched with the sweat of fear from his dark, troubled nightmares. Staring at him, she bit her lip and wondered what those tortured dreams had been. What frightening monsters had his slumbering mind unearthed? What demons had been unleashed to stalk him? What did it take to scare a hard, virile man she thought of as being totally impervious and fearless?

  Shivering, s
he watched him. Unaware he was being observed, West dropped to the ground and sat cross-legged directly before the fire, staring into the flames. His gray eyes widened, caught the firelight, and glowed. Elizabeth saw the fear that remained in their silver depths. She noted the uncontrollable trembling of his powerful brown shoulders, the jerking of his flat belly.

  West Quarternight was afraid. Afraid to go back to sleep!

  Inexplicably touched to the depths of her soul, Elizabeth felt tears spring to her eyes. She clasped a hand over her mouth as her slender body trembled in empathy with his lean frame.

  He looked for all the world like a vulnerable, frightened little boy. Elizabeth felt the strong mothering instinct, so much a part of every woman God ever created, surface fully as she lay there watching him.

  It was all she could do to keep from tossing back the covers and going to him. She had an almost overwhelming desire to get up, go over, and drop to her knees beside him. To reach out, wrap her comforting arms around his trembling shoulders, and press his dark head to her breast. To hold him close and comfort him until his fears were all gone and forgotten.

  It was out of the question, of course. So she did nothing, continuing to lie unmoving, quietly watching, hoping he wouldn’t catch his death of cold sitting bare-chested in the chill desert night.

  At last, he rose to his feet but did not immediately leave. He thrust his hands, palms flat, down inside the waistband of his tight buckskin trousers. His eyes slowly lifting, he turned his dark head slightly and looked straight at her.

  The distance between them was too great for him to see that her eyes were open, so she stared unblinking at the tall, dark man looking at her from across the campfire. She caught the definite tensing of his muscles. Saw his hands come out of his waistband and ball into fists at his sides. Saw the tendons in his neck and long arms stand out in bold relief. Saw the handsome face change from appealing boyish vulnerability to intimidating masculine hardness.