Texas Tiger TH3

by Patricia Rice

  She nodded. The engine gave a mighty belch and heaved forward. Evie grabbed the nearest seat and glanced worriedly toward the door.

  Tyler sauntered from the next car just as the train rolled from the station. He took Evie's arm and led her down the aisle, not even bothering to glower at the poor benighted souls who could only look at Evie and drool. Even after their mad ride she was a picture of radiant loveliness.

  "They're carrying a private car at the rear. It was designed by Pullman, so there's an emergency hatch in the roof. There aren't any more stops between here and Indianapolis. How far do you want to go?"

  Tyler's whispered asides to Daniel took them through one car and into the next, steadily progressing toward the rear of the train.

  "Not any farther than I have to. We'll need to find out how many people are in the car. Most of them should be sleeping at this hour, though."

  Tyler nodded in understanding, found a seat for Evie, and set her in it. Then he took off his dusty coat, folded it over a seat, and started for the nearest card game. "Come on, we'll get what we need and break."

  Evie made a vile face at them as they left her, but since Tyler had dumped her satchel on the floor, she began rummaging in it and didn't make any other protest.

  There was room for only one more player, and Daniel stayed out of it, standing to the rear and listening as Tyler began his spiel. He had made his fortune at card tables and kept his hand in for practice upon occasion still. But it wasn't his talent with cards that he was employing now. Daniel listened with admiration as Tyler wished aloud that he had thought to bring his own private car as someone else evidently had, complaining the journey was taking much too long for his tastes. Tyler Monteigne dressed with the elegance of the wealthiest robber barons, and spoke with the authority of power. The men around him listened without a trace of doubt to his lies.

  It didn't take long or much persuasion to pump them for every bit of information they had. Daniel was edging for the far door before Tyler could unravel himself from the game.

  "You're not walking in there and carrying her out, you know," Tyler murmured as he caught up with Daniel. He made no comment on the name of the man who owned the private car they were heading toward. The problem between Daniel and the Mulloneys was an old one.

  "I trust you two didn't think you were doing this alone." Evie swished up behind them, carrying her satchel and Tyler's coat. "I might just make this easy for you if you'll tell me what's going on."

  Daniel had to smile at that. Evie was his elder by two years and had always been the one to march forward into the fray first in their younger days. Having children of her own now apparently hadn't changed her any. He wondered if Georgie would be like that after they'd been married ten years. Daniel couldn't believe he was thinking like that.

  He hugged Evie briefly as they came to the darkened dining car. He had always been taller than she, but now she actually felt small beside him. Not as small as Georgie, but small enough to protect. "I don't know how you'll lie us out of this one, Evie. I just wish I'd brought my guns."

  Evie slanted a warning gaze at her husband. Tyler always carried his weapons, but she wouldn't want him using them. Daniel understood it took something from the former soldier every time Tyler had to use violence. Besides, it probably wouldn't do to shoot Daniel's new family.

  "Tell me the story, and then I'll decide what we can do," she announced.

  Chapter 21

  "If there's only her parents and two guards in there, we shouldn't have any problem," Evie decided after Daniel and Tyler told her what they knew. "Everyone but the one guard will be asleep at this hour, I wager."

  "He's not likely to come to the door and hand Georgie over," Daniel pointed out unnecessarily. "I want Georgie in my hands before you two do anything."

  Tyler grinned and leaned against the door frame. "Why don't you two just go ahead and make the plans and wake me when you need my muscle?"

  Although it was a long-standing joke in the family that Tyler was too pretty to need brains, Daniel knew his brother-in-law better than that. Tyler thought fast and acted faster. He was just the man he needed with him now.

  "I'm going up on the roof. If they're all asleep, they won't hear me. I imagine the guards are posted at the doors, but they won't be at the hatch. I'll go in and find Georgie. You'll have to provide some distraction so I can get her out."

  Evie looked worried at this idea, and Daniel knew she was concerned about his ability to climb the train and maneuver across the roof with his bad leg. She hadn't worked herself up to the worst part of it yet, but he could see Tyler had. Daniel waited stoically for his decision. He couldn't do much to help Georgie on his own, but he couldn't see any other way out of this.

  Tyler glanced down at Evie in her elegant riding clothes, carrying her precious satchel of belongings, then back to Daniel. "You do know what you're doing, don't you?"

  "They can't do anything to you and Evie. I'm willing to take my chances with Georgie."

  Without saying what both men knew would happen even if they could carry Georgie out, they came to an unspoken agreement. Tyler nodded and looked out at the darkened car just a few steps away. "No time like the present, I suppose. We'll give you time to climb in there and look around."

  Without a look back, Daniel stepped out of the dining car, across the coupling, and over to the series of hooks leading to the roof of the attached private car. Placing one hand on the highest he could reach and the other hand on the next, he began pulling himself up until he was over the edge and out of sight.

  Evie turned to Tyler and murmured softly, "I don't suppose we can settle this amicably and stop at some decent station down the line for our return journey in some civil manner, can we?"

  Since that was precisely the point they had been trying to keep from her, Tyler grinned wryly and pushed his hat back on his head as he gazed down on his beautiful and too perceptive wife. "I don't think even you can talk that fast, my dear. We'll have to jump."

  Although Daniel was certain Tyler was right about the train's lack of speed, the wind rushing past him as he pulled across the roof did nothing to confirm his estimate. Maybe a trainman could walk across this blamed thing, but he wasn't about to try. He wanted to be all in one piece when he finally had Georgina in bed beside him again.

  That was the thought that kept him placing one hand in front of the other as he eased himself across the rocking, rolling train with little or nothing to grasp should they halt suddenly. Those nights with Georgina beside him had been a kind of hell, but it didn't take his vivid imagination to know what kind of heaven they could be.

  A bed could be a damned lonely place when there was no one to share it. It was even lonelier when he got up in the morning and knew there would be no other face at the table but his own. And he was finding it harder and harder to imagine any face but Georgina's across that table.

  Without any great difficulty, Daniel found the hatch door toward the center of the car. The only sound he could hear was the roar of the train as it raced across the fields. The night was clear, sparkling with stars and no moon as he flipped the latch and lifted the door. He didn't know what he would face when he got down there, but he reckoned it was worth whatever it took to have Georgie back.

  He'd read too many of those damned Pecos Martin books when he was young, he supposed. He was beginning to believe in them. If he ever wrote this adventure up, his publisher wouldn't believe it, though. Even Pecos Martin drew the line at climbing over rail cars. His fearless hero would have used guns.

  Grasping the sides of the hatch, Daniel lowered himself into the compartment below. A faint light at the far end of the car showed that he was in some kind of hall between the parlor and presumably, the bedchambers. Calculating that the front of the car would be the public rooms, he made his way toward the rear.

  He had two doors to choose from. The tiger or the lady, he muttered to himself as he contemplated this decision. Judging the tiger didn't have very shar
p teeth, he threw open the right-hand door.

  She was asleep. Hints of light caught in the silver-blond length of hair spilling across the pillow. She had always worn it in a braid when she had gone to bed with him. Daniel hovered a minute, just enjoying the sight. But when she moved with a restless moan, he sprang into action.

  Kneeling beside the bed, Daniel shook her slightly. "Miss Merry, you have to wake up. We need to get you dressed and out of here." Even as he said it, he was scanning the room for clothes. As much as he enjoyed seeing her in a chemise that appeared to be untied, he didn't mean for any other man's eyes to see her that way. He would wrap her in a sheet and carry her first.

  Georgina lay suddenly still. Daniel glanced down at her and saw that her eyes were open, but they didn't seem to be focusing on him. He handed her a wrapper he found on a nearby chair. "Sit up, Georgie, and put this on. It isn't much, but we don't have time for more."

  She continued staring at him in some confusion.

  She didn't resist when he pulled her up and put her arms in the sleeves of the wrapper. She allowed him to pull it into place and tie it firmly. Her quiescence made Daniel uneasy. Georgina was many things, but quiescent wasn't one of them.

  She stood obediently at his urging, then hesitated. He had his arm around her, guiding her, but she pulled slightly away, staring at him with a flicker of something in her eyes. Daniel wished he had more light to see by, then the one faint lamp on the far wall.

  "We're getting out of here, Georgina," he reminded her. "I won't let them take you away."

  She touched his face with her left hand as if uncertain of his reality. Then catching sight of her ring on the wrong finger, she set her mouth grimly, clenched the hand into a fist, and glanced around.

  Daniel breathed a sigh of relief when she caught up a pair of shoes and took his hand. He almost had her back.

  He couldn't take her out on the roof, however. He would have to take her right down the middle of the car and out, and to hell with everybody in it.

  The guard posted at the door had his chair tilted and his feet propped against the wall and across the opening as he dozed. Daniel kicked the chair's legs out from under him.

  The man yelped and reached for his gun while trying to untangle his feet from the chair, but the car door behind him swung open with more force than was necessary. It connected neatly with his elbow, sending the gun skittering down the hall toward Daniel.

  Daniel grabbed the weapon and gave Tyler a curt nod of thanks just as a bedroom door behind him burst open with a yell. Calmly palming the gun, Daniel jerked Georgie behind him, against the wall, and turned to meet the furious gaze of the bewhiskered, stout old man standing in his nightshirt.

  "You! What in hell are you doing here? Get away from my daughter, you animal, before I have the guards shoot you."

  A second guard staggered sleepily from the rear of the car and halted. Hanover stood between the gunman and Daniel. The narrow corridor wasn't made for athletic displays. The gunman glanced to where Tyler was neatly occupying his partner, and shrugged.

  Still holding the gun, Daniel nodded acknowledgment of the wisdom of the guard's decision not to interfere, then turned his attention back to Hanover. "Apparently someone failed to inform you that your daughter is now my wife. Killing me may temporarily solve Georgina's financial problems, but not yours. I'd recommend that you take a nice long vacation while we go back and straighten out whatever you've told Mulloney. I have a number of very unpleasant surprises for him, and you really don't want to be around when I spring them."

  Dolly Hanover crept quietly from the bedroom and clutched her husband's sleeve as she caught sight of Daniel's gun. Her gaze strayed worriedly to the strange man holding the guard in the doorway, then back to her daughter hovering in Daniel's protection.

  "Georgina?" she inquired anxiously.

  "Go back to bed, Dolly. I'm handling this." Hanover tried to push her away, but she clung more fiercely.

  "It's all right, Mama." Georgina touched Daniel's shoulder. "This is my husband. You remember Mr. Martin, don't you?"

  Dolly smiled and nodded. "Pleased to meet you again, Mr. Martin."

  Daniel could almost hear Tyler grinning behind him. It seemed perfectly natural that he was marrying into a family that was as mad as the one he had adopted. Daniel nodded a greeting. "Happy to see you again, ma'am. If you don't mind, I'm taking your daughter home now. I'll take real good care of her, so you just go on back to bed and rest."

  Hanover was ominously silent during this exchange. His gaze darted back and forth from the one disarmed guard to the one waiting patiently for orders. A shot fired in these close quarters could kill anyone. He grunted and glared at Daniel.

  "She doesn't come with a dime, I promise you. If that's what you're thinking, you're better off leaving her to Mulloney. He can support her the way she's used to."

  Daniel reached behind him to encompass Georgina's waist with his arm. "Sorry to disappoint you, but it's not money we're after. Merry's doing just fine without it. I hate to break up this fine party, but we need to be going. Good night."

  He gave a wry nod of his head and pushed Georgina ahead of him, out of reach of the only other man in here with a gun. Behind him, Daniel heard Hanover shout at the guard to go after him. Giving Georgie a shove toward Tyler, Daniel swung around to hold them off, continuing to back toward Tyler and freedom.

  Tyler caught Georgina and deftly handed her through the doorway into Evie's hands. When Daniel was close enough, Tyler shoved the first guard toward the second, sending them both into a sprawling heap on the floor.

  With a quiet yell of triumph, Tyler and Daniel slammed out of the private car and raced into the empty dining car after the women. Just as someone rattled the door behind them, they threw the bar across and ran.

  "They'll shoot it loose!" Evie yelled, just as a splatter of gunfire proved her words.

  "Hang on to your satchel, my dear, we're going for a ride." Tyler grabbed his wife by the waist and fled from the dining car.

  Daniel snatched Georgina in the same way, leaving her no time to question as they reached the platform between the cars. Without any further thought, he flung his arms protectively around her and leapt from the slowly moving train.

  Georgina screamed as they slid down the embankment and rolled to the ground, bits of dirt and pebbles flying around their heads. Although she felt Daniel trying to take the brunt of the fall, when they reached the grass at the foot of the embankment she was lying beneath him. Gasping for the breath knocked out of her, she felt Daniel's heavy weight pressing her into the ground and heard him panting as loudly as she. The arms braced on either side of her head reassured her, however, and she grasped them in a grateful daze. The laudanum was dissipating, but her head still seemed to be spinning.

  Against the backdrop of the night sky, Daniel's eyes gleamed like the stars in the heavens above. When her gaze met his, the connection was almost physical. Stunned, Georgina just lay there, looking up at him.

  "You came for me," she finally managed to whisper.

  "Of course." Without another word, he leaned down and kissed her.

  Georgina had never known a kiss like this in her life. Perhaps it was the aftereffect of drugs. She could feel the roughness of Daniel's lips as they pressed against her mouth. They sent a kind of magic spiraling through her middle that had been missing before. Her fingers gripped his arms tighter as she became aware of his masculine body pressing into her. But then her lips seemed to part of their own accord, and she felt his breath fill her mouth, and everything that was happening between them seemed perfectly natural. She didn't even notice the press of gravel and grass against her back or feel the heat of the night wind against her skin. Her entire universe consisted of this man above her.

  Georgina's hands flew to circle Daniel's neck and pull him closer. He came willingly, cradling her in his arms as he pressed his kisses deeper. She felt the rasp of his tongue, the heat of his passion, and she arched up
ward with a groan to experience more. It couldn't be like this. The fall from the train must have knocked something loose inside her. But she couldn't stop kissing him back. She couldn't stop anything he wanted to do to her. She moaned against his mouth as Daniel's hand circled her breast.

  The impact of two other bodies falling somewhere down the line didn't intrude upon their reverie. The scrambling sound as the other pair righted themselves didn't come to their attention. Even when two pairs of feet stopped almost on top of them, they were too engrossed in exploration to notice.

  The sound of a masculine voice right overhead brought Georgina abruptly to her senses.

  "I trust that isn't a pile of cow dung you found to wallow in. We'll have a hard enough time finding shelter for the night."

  Above her, Daniel choked and pulled partially away, but his arms kept her protectively surrounded. Georgina gradually became aware that she was wearing little or nothing and Daniel's legs seemed to be sprawled between hers, but she made no effort to move. Her gaze traveled with interest to the pair of boots standing beside them, then moved upward until she measured the source of this unwelcome invasion. She had never seen the man before, and in the darkness, she couldn't tell a lot about him, but he had the whitest grin she'd ever seen on a man.

  "You and Evie find shelter. We're fine just where we are," Daniel answered gruffly, keeping Georgina covered with his body.

  The stranger chuckled as a woman peered around him, and Georgina began to feel the first flush of embarrassment. She shifted slightly and released her grip on Daniel's neck.

  "Aren't you going to introduce us, Danny? After we came all this way, it's the least you can do.".

  There was laughter in the woman's voice, and Georgina closed her eyes in shame. It was obvious from the disorder of their clothes that these two had just jumped off the train with them, but despite their dishevelment, they were garbed elegantly, and they knew Daniel. She was about to meet his family while half dressed and making love in a cow pasture.