by Jenna Kernan
He nodded, his brow tented and ears pinned back now, like a dog trying to comprehend.
“Nobody ever kissed me like that,” he admitted. “Maybe I shouldn’t have done what I done, but I didn’t know...” His words fell off.
“Didn’t know what? That I wouldn’t stop you?” Laurie gripped her hair at each side of her head, trying to keep from screaming. No wonder she couldn’t find a husband. It wasn’t her mother’s divorce, it was her. It was obvious to any man that she wasn’t a lady.
“I was going to say that I didn’t know no other way to comfort you. I ain’t been around ladies much, or at all, really.”
“Well, let me edify you, then. That is not the way you comfort a lady!” she shouted, further proving she was incapable of civil behavior. Laurie whirled away, took three steps and then covered her face with her dirty gloves and sobbed.
He didn’t approach her or try to comfort her. Finally when her sobs had turned into a racking, shuddering breath, he spoke, his voice low.
“Laurie, I’m sorry for what I done. I never meant to grieve you. But we gotta ride or Hammer will catch us.”
She turned to face him, her eyes burning and her chin trembling.
“If you can’t sit a saddle, we can ride double, but we gotta switch horses.”
She glared at him for forcing her to admit yet another shortcoming.
“I can ride astride.”
He pushed back the brim of his hat to stare at her, his face silvery in the moonlight. She wondered what he could see of her.
“I can!” she insisted. “And I can shoot and rope and tell the direction just by moonlight. North.” She pointed her gloved hand.
His brows rose as he considered her a moment. “All right then.”
He offered his hands as a mounting block. She stalked over to him.
“Give me your kerchief.” She held out her hand, demanding it.
He narrowed his eyes and then did as she asked, untying the wide strip of pale fabric.
She tied it about her neck and then tucked it into her camisole as if it were a lace collar. Having removed the sight of her décolletage from his sight, she buttoned up the shirt as best she could and tugged it straight.
“Ready?” he asked, offering his clasped hands again.
She refused his offered help, lifted a foot to the stirrup and swung into the saddle, then stared down her nose at him.
Boon reset his hat and stared a moment longer, then stalked away.
Laurie lifted the reins and remembered all her father had taught her. Why was it easier to remember than to forget?
Boon returned a moment later with a lead line that he fastened between her horse’s bridle and the rear rigging dee of his saddle. Clearly he did not believe she could ride or did not trust her to ride in the same direction as he did.
Did he think she’d run?
Once mounted, he twisted in the saddle to look back at her. “Don’t fall off. If you feel sleepy give a holler. We’ll be riding faster as the light comes up. With luck we’ll find another way out of these canyons.”
He didn’t have an escape route planned? Laurie felt the anxiety prickling in her belly like a stalk of nettles. She glanced back at the way they had come and could see their horses’ tracks in the sand. The shroud of darkness was dissolving like mist, retreating against the rising moon, and the outlaws were back there, coming for them.
Her father had hanged George Hammer’s little brother. That meant Hammer wouldn’t stop until he caught them.
Did Boon know who her father was?
Was he rescuing her, or perhaps her father had offered some bounty and he was trying to collect the ransom himself. She hoped he hadn’t taken her with something else in mind.
Laurie wondered if knowing that her father was John Bender, the Indian fighter and renowned Texas Ranger, would help her or hurt her. Boon was an outlaw. He might not want to save the daughter of a man sworn to hunt him down and kill him.
Laurie decided to keep silent until she knew more about this man and his intentions. Until then she’d look for a chance to escape.
“Hold on,” Boon called and then kicked them to a gallop.
Laurie gritted her teeth and lifted the reins. If they managed to escape, would her father even want her back?
Chapter Five
They’d ridden through the night past the silvery tufts of sage grass and squatty juniper that somehow survived growing in nothing but dry gravel. Boon followed the channel that had cut this canyon, up a wide dry wash that could fill in a moment with runoff from a storm upstream. When they veered off the main channel, he hoped he’d chosen wisely and that this finger would bring them back to the surface without having to abandon their horses. Boon had stopped only to brush away their tracks back as far as the last draw. Hammer knew this territory, but the steady wind eroded their tracks and only the fading quarter moon marked their passing, allowing them greater speed.
He glanced back at Laurie, motionless, her chin on her chest and her posture defeated. She’d stopped her sniffling, but her tears still tore into him worse than cat-claw thorns.
If there was any doubt in anyone’s mind about his suitability as a Texas Ranger, Boon’s actions had settled the matter. What he’d read as Laurie’s consent turned out to be only her inexperience. What he’d thought was a gift, a way to distract and comfort, ended up being neither. Paulette had told him this was what all women wanted. But then why did it make Laurie cry? She’d seemed to enjoy it at the time and it sickened him to think that he had taken advantage of her, when he’d only meant to give her pleasure.
Paulette, a new arrival to the Blue Belle, had taught him that this was how you gave a woman her release and that there was no danger of unwanted children this way. Then why was Laurie so grieved?
The truth settled heavy in his chest.
He’d taken advantage of a woman in his care, something he knew a Ranger would never do. He was no better than the animals on their trail, just another brutal outlaw who used women for sport. He thought of his mother and his shoulders sank another inch.
He glanced toward the sky again, certain this time that the stars had begun to vanish. Dawn was coming and with it the desert heat. Something rustled in the brush. Likely a porcupine or armadillo, he thought, continuing on. The cry from behind him brought him about in his saddle. Laurie gripped the saddle horn with both hands and was hauling herself back into the saddle seat.
He turned his mount.
“I fell asleep,” she admitted.
Boon nodded, reaching for her.
“What are you doing?”
He pulled her from the saddle and settled her in front of him.
“I’m awake now. No need to trouble yourself.”
“If you fall, you might bust something. You rest a bit.”
She wiggled her hips to settle before him and he gritted his teeth against the physical reaction of his body to hers. He’d not touch her again, he vowed. Laurie stilled, suddenly motionless as a rabbit before a fox.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked.
His first thought was Mexico, but he knew he couldn’t just ride off with her. That would be wrong. Then why did his mind fix on the notion like a feather caught in tar?
He wrapped one arm about her waist and nudged the horse to a fast walk.
“I’m bringing you home, Laurie.”
“You are?” Her voice echoed with astonishment. Could she not even conceive of someone like him doing the decent thing?
“That’s right.”
“To my father?”
He didn’t know her father or his connection to the captain.
“I suppose. I’m here on orders from the Texas Rangers under Captain John Bender. You heard of him?” He puffed up a little whe
n he said it, proud to be associated with Bender, even if the association was only temporary. He wondered again if he could make it permanent. Maybe the captain would see, when he brought Laurie home safe, that he’d be a welcome addition to Bender’s division.
Laurie turned and stared up at him, her expression confused.
She clarified. “Captain John Bender, famous lawman, legendary Indian fighter, that John Bender?”
“The same.”
Boon lifted his chin a notch, hoping she was impressed.
“He sent you?”
Uncertainty flickered down low in his belly, but he nodded.
“I just said so.” Had she heard of him or not?
“That John Bender is my father.”
Boon swayed, and had it not been for the saddle cantle behind him he’d have likely dropped over backward. He felt as if she’d punched him in the stomach, would have preferred it in fact. She still stared at him, half-turned in the saddle, one brow lifted in speculation.
“You didn’t know,” she said.
He shook his head in answer as the truth descended upon him like a cloud of locusts from a blue sky. She wasn’t Bender’s woman. This was his child and Boon had done things to Laurie to which a father would surely take offense. He’d made the captain’s daughter cry.
Boon’s little dream of joining the Rangers burst like a soap bubble in the sun, lost forever.
He’d never join that division of elite fighters, earn the respect of the captain or be anything other than what he was. Reality blinded him. Coats was right. Once a snake, always a snake.
If he was smart he’d drop her at the stage station and head in the opposite direction as fast as he could ride. If he were lucky he might make Mexico before the Rangers ran him to ground. Boon pulled to a halt and dismounted, dropping the reins and walking away from the horses. His stride was quick at first then slowed until he stood with both hands laced behind his neck, his elbows stretched wide as he looked to the heavens.
The captain’s words came back to him. I don’t care. I want her back.
His partner had told Bender it was a mistake. Now Boon understood what it was—it was him. He was the mistake. The captain hadn’t sent him because he was the best man for the job or even his first choice. Boon was his only choice and he hadn’t expected that the outlaw would treat his daughter honorably or he would have told him who Laurie was. Instead, the captain had kept it secret. Boon replayed the conversation he’d overheard in his mind. It all made sense now. Bender wanted his daughter back so badly he had been willing to do anything, even allow a known outlaw to defile his little girl. The captain loved Laurie enough to let it happen just to get her back alive.
The realization hit him right in the gut. Bender didn’t trust him. He’d sent Boon because he’d had no other choice.
Boon folded at the middle as his empty stomach pitched.
Bands of pink and orange light reached across the eastern sky. Morning had found them, still in the box canyon.
* * *
Laurie watched her rescuer with cautious eyes. Boon looked like a prisoner giving himself up and now he looked as if he were going to be sick.
His horse did not know what to make of this abandonment and so the chestnut gelding glanced toward Laurie, showing her the small white stripe down his face, and then took a few steps in Boon’s direction, snorting loudly. This caused Laurie’s bay to prick its ears, regarding the man who stood with his back to them all.
He did not turn, but remained still as the stone walls while the first rays of light painted the canyon rim a brilliant red.
Laurie felt as wrung out as damp laundry from her ordeal, and now this man, her rescuer, had made her feel things she did not know were possible. Surely what they had done must be sinful and wrong. It hurt to know that he had seen through her like glass. Had her fancy dresses and proper bonnets only made her a joke to everyone back in Fort Worth?
Boon seemed befuddled that she was the daughter of John Bender. His reaction worried her. Now that he knew, would he leave her?
“Boon?” she said, trying to keep the fear from creeping into her voice.
She untied the rope joining their horses and then glanced back to Boon.
He removed his gray felt hat and threw it with great force toward the ground. When it landed before him, he kicked it. His hair was not brown, she could see now in the breaking dawn that his highlights were very definitely a honey-blond and shaggy.
As she watched, his shoulders rose and fell in a heavy sigh. He retrieved his hat and dusted it off before returning it to his head.
He spun on her, turning like a gunslinger about to draw, but all he aimed at her was his cold stare.
“Your father?” he asked, the incredulity of his voice now settling to dismay.
She nodded.
“You’d think he would have mentioned that.” Boon returned to collect the reins of the gelding. “Might as well get you down. Have to switch horses anyway.”
His hands splayed her waist, lifting her up naturally as if she belonged to him. He held her easily, controlling her descent until she stood before him, gazing up into his troubled eyes, a clear cobalt-blue, she realized. His hair curled playfully at his neck beneath that wide-brimmed hat. The stiffness of her muscles, the bone weariness and the worry all dissolved like a shallow puddle in the summer sun as he held her with his gaze.
She felt a zap of energy. A little pop of attraction, one to the other. It was happening again, that need to move closer, to lift her hand to touch his face. Laurie could not look away.
He stared down at her, hands still holding her waist. His expression troubled.
“I’d have done differently had I known,” he whispered.
“Because you’re afraid of my father.” It wasn’t a question. Most men were afraid of John Bender, and Boon had more cause than many. Hammer said he was one of his gang, but Boon said he was sent by her father. What was the truth?
He shook his head in slow deliberation. “Because I respect him. Would have liked to earn his respect, as well. Now...” He shrugged hopelessly.
Laurie wanted to tell him that it would be easier to sprout wings and fly than earn her father’s respect. Hadn’t she tried and failed her entire adult life? As soon as she put away her britches, he had drifted away. What was it about John Bender that garnered the instant esteem of one and all? And why did he take such devotion completely for granted?
“I promised I’d bring you to him and I aim to do just that or die trying.”
Die...yes, Laurie realized, that was still a very real possibility. He had double-crossed a dangerous outlaw and that would make him a marked man. George Hammer would never forgive such a betrayal.
“What if they catch us?” she asked.
He regarded her with a long silent stare. “I’ll do all I can to protect you.”
“Don’t let them capture me again.”
His dark brows lifted in an unspoken question and she held his gaze. His expression told her he understood what she asked. Boon nodded his acceptance of this new burden, shouldering it with the rest.
“You promise?” she asked.
“They won’t take you alive.”
A flicker of relief danced inside her with the gratitude. “Thank you.”
His piercing blue eyes pinned her as his gaze traveled over her face.
“You got a shiner,” he said, lifting a finger to gently brush her left cheek.
Laurie absorbed the tingle of awareness caused by the feathery touch. She clasped a hand over the bruise that Hammer had given her, noting that her cheek felt puffy beneath her fingertips.
“Is it bad?” she asked, lowering her hand and angling her cheek to give him a better look.
He pursed his lips. “Seen worse.”
She was suddenly anxious to be gone. Laurie glanced back at the way they’d come, seeing nothing but the scrappy juniper and tuffs of broomweed that dotted the dry, rocky canyon floor. Boon’s hands slipped away, the spell between them broken once more.
He moved to her horse, lifting the rope that had connected their mounts and then staring at the end. He glanced back at her with a knowing look and a smile that showed a kind of begrudging respect. Then he dropped the line and retrieved a canteen from the saddlebags on the second horse and offered it to her. “Just warm water,” he said.
She drank greedily, then realized there might not be more anytime soon and forced herself to stop, returning the canteen. Boon poured some into his hat and offered it to his horse, then repeated the process for the bay who slurped it all up. Boon took no water himself.
He was studying their surroundings now. She watched him as he turned in a slow circle. The walls looked impossibly high, a prison, she realized. The sun rays crept down the rim of the canyon, sending light across the opposite bank of rock and painting it orange.
Boon motioned to her horse. “Up you go.”
He bent and offered his clasped hands to boost her into the saddle, then recalled his last attempt and straightened, lifting a hand toward the horse. Laurie grabbed the horn in two hands and swung up.
Boon gathered her reins and offered them to her. She collected them neatly in one hand, shortening the length to bring her horse’s head up.
“Seems you’ve ridden a fair piece.”
“My father taught me,” she said.
Boon lifted the lead rope from the ground and began coiling it, replacing the looped line to his saddle. His actions said he trusted her not to run. Their eyes met and she gave him a smile of gratitude.
“How did you meet my father?”
He glanced back the way they had come again and then to her. “Caught us robbing a string of horses. Bad timing on Hammer’s part. One of your father’s men shot my horse out from under me at two hundred yards. Hell of a shot.”
“That’d be my father’s partner.”