Love a Dark Rider

by Shirlee Busbee

  Appalled at how quickly the gentle intimacy that had been growing between them these past weeks had vanished, Yancy was searching desperately for a way to recapture the happy moments that had been theirs before the topic of the affair between Hyrum and Ann had come up—particularly the topic of how he had known about it! Helplessly, he muttered, "Jesus! Sara, what happened to us? I never. . . I. . ."

  "Nothing happened that should have come as a surprise to either one of us. After all, we know why you forced me to marry you." Sara's voice thickened with unshed tears. "I just made the mistake of forgetting about it for a while!"

  Her words smote like a sword thrust in his heart, and he was on the point of stepping forward, the need to take her in his arms and convince her of the folly of what she

  was saying overriding every other thought in his head, when Bartholomew, utterly oblivious of the tense scene he was interrupting, strolled up and exclaimed happily, "Oh, hello! I didn't see you two arrive! We're about ready to start working on some of the bulls and we could certainly use your help, Yancy.'*

  Looking very different in his breeches and boots and dusty black hat, Bartholomew smiled teasingly at Sara and asked, "Did you come to watch your handsome husband work today, Sara?"

  Both Yancy and Sara turned to glare at him and simultaneously snapped, ''NoV

  Realizing that he had just stepped into a hornet's nest, Bartholomew muttered, "Uh, well, uh, sorry." And turned on his heel and walked rapidly toward one of the bigger pens, which was now filled with bellowing cattle.

  Still angry and hurt, Sara said spitefully to Yancy, "Please don't let me keep you! I'm sure that they could use your help, and as for me—I don't care if I ever see you again!"

  It was apparent that nothing could be settled between them now, and hoping that Sara's temper would cool as the day progressed, Yancy decided that perhaps the best thing for the present was to leave her alone. His face grim, he said tightly, "Fine! I'll do just that! Amuse yourself!"

  Through her tears Sara watched her husband stride off in the direction that Bartholomew had taken. She bit back a sob, wishing bitterly that she had not let her temper drive her to say such ugly things to him. Now that the damage was done, she would have given anything to call back her hurtful words, but it was too late. With a heavy heart and lagging steps, she began to follow Yancy.

  The cattle camp was almost deserted now, except for a few old men who acted as cooks. Everyone else was

  either at the pens or out gathering more cattle. She didn't, Sara told herself morosely, have much choice but to wander over to the working pens and watch the men work.

  Sara was hardly aware of the dangerous, bloody, dusty work that was taking place in the pen before her, the sudden angry rift with Yancy consuming most of her thoughts. With hindsight, she understood that she had overreacted to the news that he had set someone to watch over her. She should have been pleased by his concern for her, and while she would have preferred to know about the men watching her, she could appreciate Yancy's reasons for doing as he had—he was used to giving orders and running things without consulting with anyone! Flirting with Hyrum, she admitted glumly, hadn't helped matters, and she had known the moment she had smiled so winningly at Hyrum that Yancy would react very much as he had. She'd been deliberately baiting him and so she shouldn't have been at all surprised by his words. But his words had hurt, arousing all her old feelings of resentment and helplessness, and not unnaturally, she had struck out at him.

  One foot resting on the bottom rail of the corral, she stared blindly into space and sighed. She had certainly put herself on a very high horse, and she had the disturbing feeling that she was going to have to climb down all by herself. She sighed again. My wretched, wretched tongue! Will I ever learn to control it?

  It was a miserable day for both Yancy and Sara. Each one was feeling decidedly bruised and guilty at the same time. They avoided each other—which was precisely what neither one wanted. Surreptitiously, each kept an eye on the other, but neither made the first move to heal the breach, although both longed most desperately to do just that!

  It was late afternoon when Yancy decided to ride out

  and help flush several more longhoms from the chaparral, and he had all he could do not to stop his horse beside Sara and steal a kiss for luck. Watching him ride away, Sara swallowed back the urge to call out for him to be careful.

  She continued to observe the men working the bulls in the corrals for quite some time, but eventually, without Yancy's riveting presence to hold her attention, she grew bored and restless. She wandered dispiritedly through the nearly deserted camp, her thoughts on her absent husband, the knowledge that she would have to be the one to break the impasse between them uppermost in her mind. Her lips twisted wryly. Yancy certainly wouldn't retreat from his position, and since she had lost her temper and uttered those bitterly regretted, hurtful words, it was up to her to extend the olive branch—and hope that he didn't break it in two and throw it back in her face!

  She glanced at the sun hanging low on the horizon and realized that Yancy should be returning soon and that before too much more time had elapsed, she would have her chance to make amends. She smiled impishly. Tonight, alone in their room, she would show him just how very contrite she was! A little shiver of excitement went through her and she immediately decided to ride out and meet him. Quickly mounting Locuela, she rode out onto the prairie, halting her horse a short distance from the edge of the brush to wait for his appearance. She hadn't long to wait. Not five minutes later, she heard the whoops and cries of the men and the crashing of several heavy bodies through the brush, and her hands tightened nervously on Locuela's reins.

  Sara's breath caught in her throat a second later when more than a dozen unpredictable longhoms suddenly exploded from the brush not fifty feet from where she sat waiting on Locuela. They were huge, rangy, fierce-looking creatures, mostly dun-colored, but the occasional

  roan or black could be seen, the sunlight glinting on their long, curved, deadly homs as they thundered out onto the plains. Immediately, she urged Lx)cuela into motion, intending to help keep the cattle running toward the trap in the arroyo. She glanced around for Yancy and spied him riding hard on the heels of the herd, his lariat whirling through the air above the backs and homs of the rushing animals. Esteban and Bartholomew were ahead of him, on either side of the herd, but she spared them not a glance, all of her attention on the tall, dark rider astride the big black horse.

  For a second across the tossing homs and heaving backs, Sara's eyes met Yancy's and her heart swelled when he flashed her a heart-stopping grin. Her spirits lifted, and with a silly little smile on her face, she turned her concentration to the task at hand. She loved this part of the gathering, loved to race along at a breakneck speed across the prairies, the cattle bawling and plunging as they were mthlessly herded into the arroyo and the trap that awaited them.

  Suddenly a gigantic black bull with crazed eyes and wildly flaring nostrils broke away from the group and bolted back toward the bmsh. Yancy spun his horse around and, his lariat singing through the air, raced after the renegade, intent upon stopping the animal before it could disappear into the chaparral once more.

  Heart in her mouth, Sara jerked Lx)cuela to a stop and watched as the big black gelding and the black bull sped recklessly across the uneven ground. His body at one with his horse, Yancy looked like a centaur, his lariat whistling through the air when he loosed the rawhide rope. His aim was true, the rawhide landing right across the wide, curving homs.

  Instantly the black gelding slid to a halt, and the lariat sang taut. The escaping bull hit the end of the rope and hurtled to the ground in a cloud of dust and

  thrashing hooves and homs. Almost immediately the creature sprang up and, with a great earthshaking bellow, swung around and charged its tormentor. Yancy had already kicked his horse into motion and as the big gelding galloped away, the enraged bull gave chase, those terrible curving homs, in Sara's imagination, f
lashing malevolently.

  She had no rope, no clear idea of what she could do, but frantically she spurred Locuela forward. As the mare leaped into motion, Sara could see Yancy astride the racing horse swiftly working to untie the lariat from his saddle horn, the bull in swift, deadly pursuit. . ..

  Esteban and Bartholomew had become aware of the situation, but they were, as yet, too far away to distract the bull, and Sara urged Locuela into a mad pace. The big gelding was running cleanly, easily outdistancing the bull, but suddenly, above the pounding of her horse's hooves, she heard a high-pitched whine and then, before her horrified gaze, she saw Yancy's horse stumble and crash to the ground. Billowing dust erupted into the air, obscuring her view, and when it began to lift, her heart clenched at the sight that met her eyes. Yancy was helplessly trapped beneath the body of his fallen horse.

  One leg crushed by the weight of his mount, Yancy frantically spurred his gelding with his free leg, but inexplicably the horse remained still and unmoving. The bull, presented with a different-looking target, halted for a moment, pawing the ground and snorting fiercely a short distance away. Bartholomew and Esteban, on swifter, more powerful mounts than Sara's, intersected her path and, pulling ahead of her, pushed their horses to greater speed, closing swiftly on the bull. But they were too late.

  Even as a scream of denial erupted from her throat and she feverishly urged Locuela into a killing run, the bull lowered its massive head and charged. Sara wanted to

  look away, wanted not to see what was happening, but she could not tear her eyes away from Yancy's trapped form or the huge black beast that was bearing inexorably down on him. Oh, God! she prayed fervently as Locuela closed the distance between them. Oh, God, don't let him die!

  There was nothing Yancy could do, she thought frantically; pinned to the ground by his own horse, he was helpless to protect himself, unable to do anything but lie there and wait for the deadly horns of the bull to rip him apart. It will not happen, Sara vowed fiercely. Yancy cannot die this way

  But not even Sara's prayers or vows, or Locuela's desperate pace across the prairie, could stop the deadly charge of the bull. Yancy's pistol, however, could, the pistol he always wore strapped to his side.... With a choked cry of joy, Sara saw him suddenly reach down, as if he had just remembered the weapon at his hip, and with the gun firmly in his hand, he coolly took aim at the enraged bull. A shot rang out, and though obviously hit, the huge black beast merely shook its great head and still kept coming. Another shot. Another angry toss of its head. And then, when Sara was certain that the bull possessed magical powers, that nothing could stop it, with the animal less than six feet away, Yancy shot once again. The bull gave an angry roar and, with one last burst of life, drove its shuddering bulk onto the fallen horse and rider.

  Everything had happened so quickly—it had been only minutes since the bull had first broken from the herd—and it now seemed to Sara as she desperately spurred Locuela onward that time had stopped, that it took her hours to reach Yancy's side. Esteban and Bartholomew reached him first. They were already on the ground and bending over Yancy's still form when Sara pulled Locuela to a rearing stop. She leaped down

  from her horse and ran toward Yancy, but Esteban intercepted her. "Senora! No—wait!"

  The grief and pity in his eyes made her heart stand still, and then, with a cry of rage, she tore herself from his clasp. "No!" she shouted. "No! He is not dead!"

  Oblivious of the horns of the dead bull, Sara flung herself on the ground beside Yancy, tenderly cradling his head in her lap. Her shaking hands caressed his beloved features; her lips kissed his brow, but there was no response. Choking back tears, she looked into his dark face, staring numbly at the thin line of blood that trickled from his temple, where in its dying throes the bull had struck him.

  44 I A on't you dare die on me!" she burst out furi-JL/ ously, tears streaming down her cheeks, her hands frantically clutching him to her breast. Trembling lips pressed against his cheek, she exclaimed huskily, "You don't deserve it, you arrogant devil, but I love you! You have to live, you can't die!" But her words fell on deaf ears and Yancy remained terrifyingly still in her arms. Crazed by fear, she shook him violently and half tearfully, half wrathfully, she cried, "Oh, Yancy, you simply can't die! I love you! / love you Oh, God! Please, please don't let him be dead!" Oblivious of Bartholomew and Esteban standing helplessly beside her, she kissed Yancy's pale face. "Oh, Yancy, please, please don't be dead! I love you! I love you!" Those last words became a litany and she could not stop saying them. Over and over again the phrase rang out— "I love you! I love you!"—as if those words alone had the miraculous power to restore vibrancy and life to the motionless form in her arms. Neither Esteban nor Bartholomew made any move to intrude upon her pain, both of them standing by her side, both so stunned and shaken by what had happened so suddenly that neither could speak or move.

  It was Bartholomew, staring in grief-stricken disbelief at Yancy's pale face, who saw the first flutter of the long

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  black eyelashes. His breath caught and his fingers closed like steel talons around Esteban's arm. At Esteban's startled look, he pointed, hardly daring to believe what he saw. The lashes flickered again, the movement stronger this time.

  Trapped in some dark labyrinth of horror, Sara was completely unaware of what was happening. She continued to rock Yancy, her lips gently kissing his beloved features as she chanted her passionate invocation, "I love you! I love you! / love youV

  Sara was so wrapped up in her own anguish-filled world that she didn't notice Yancy's eyes opening and one hand slowly moving upward to touch a braid of honey-gold hair which had come loose from her usual neat comet and hung down her chest. It was only when he gave a soft tug on her braid that she stared down into his amber-gold gaze, to see the powerful emotion glittering brightly in their depths.

  He smiled crookedly and murmured, "Sweetheart, if I'd known that all it would take to get you to admit you loved me was to get half killed by a wild longhom, I'd have done it a hell of a lot sooner!"

  Irrationally, overriding the ecstatic joy that was flooding through her body, still deeply shaken by what had so nearly happened, Sara was suddenly furious with him. She thrust him away from her and sprang to her feet.

  Not expecting his soft, yielding pillow to disappear so precipitously, Yancy hit the ground with a decided thud—or rather, his head did. "Ouch!" he yelped, gingerly rubbing the offending spot as he half sat up. "What's the matter with you?"

  "You scared me to death!" she fairly shouted, her emerald eyes flashing, her hands clenched into fists as she glared down at him. "I thought you were dead! Don't you ever do that to me again! Do you hear me? Not ever!

  You do something like this again and I swear, I'll kill you!"

  Apparently not the least bit disturbed by this unlover-like tirade, Yancy nodded and said meekly, ''Si, querida, you have my word. I will never try to get myself killed again."

  Tears overcame Sara and she sank down onto the ground again. "Oh, Yancy," she wailed, kissing him frantically, "I was so frightened. I couldn't bear for anything to happen to you! / love you, you miserable beast!"

  A wave of dizziness hit Yancy, and sinking back down to the ground, he muttered, "And I you, sweetheart, more than you know. . . ." And having uttered that tantalizing statement, he promptly passed out.

  Sara gave a horrified shriek and grabbed him, but this time, as she anxiously cradled his body next to hers, she realized immediately that he was not dead, merely unconscious. But that was little comfort and she raised wide, worried eyes to the two men who stood beside her.

  Kneeling swiftly at her side, Bartholomew examined Yancy and then said softly, "Don't worry, my dear, I think it's only a mild concussion. The bull just struck him a glancing blow—he should be fine once we get him home and comfortable." He smiled into her anxious face. "He'll have a hellish headache, I have no doubt, but I don't think you'll become a widow any time soon."

  The me
n from the cattle camp had become aware that something serious had happened and began arriving, their faces anxious and worried. Coincidentally, the group of riders Hyrum had been with suddenly appeared, driving several longhoms from the chaparral. Seeing the small crowd gathered at the edge of the brush, they promptly abandoned the cattle and galloped over to join the others, expressions of concern on their faces. Hyrum

  rode out of the brush just a moment later and quickly joined the group clustered around Yancy and Sara, the expression on his face unreadable. Assured that the patron would recover without ill effect, the men set to work with a will to get Yancy free of the weight of the bull and of his downed horse, too. It was then that the reason for the fleet and sure-footed black's stumble was discovered.

  A thunderous scowl on his dark face, Bartholomew rose from where he had been squatting in front of the horse and growled, "This was no accident! The horse was shotl Someone put a bullet hole right in the middle of the black's head."

  Sara blanched and a horrified, outraged murmur swept through the gathered men. "Who would do such a thing? El Patron was beloved! No one would harm a hair on his head!"

  His scowl not lessening, Bartholomew muttered, "Beloved or not, someone damn sure wanted Yancy to have an accident! A fatal accident, from the look of things."

  Her features strained, Sara fixed her eyes on Bartholomew as she asked thickly, "But who? Who would want him dead, and why?"

  Bartholomew's gaze swept the faces nearest him, seeming to linger on Hyrum's handsome features. Then, shrugging his shoulders, he murmured, "Now's not the time to talk about it. Let's get him home."

  Sara didn't disagree. A crude travois was hastily assembled from the materials at hand and before long Yancy was gently placed on it and the journey to Paloma began. Sara was certain that the trip to the hacienda was the longest she had ever undertaken in her life, each yard traveled seeming a mile. Because no one wished to cause Yancy any more discomfort than necessary, the horse pulling the travois was held at a slow, plodding pace as the travois bumped and jerked across the uneven ground.