by Lisa Plumley
She had to find a way to make Mason leave her behind. Anything else was foolhardy. Even prison would surely be preferable to being abducted by an escaped outlaw—an escaped outlaw murderer.
Mason, a murderer? Amelia’s mind recoiled at the thought, but still their guard’s fear-filled admission of Mason’s crime echoed in her mind. Was it true? Had he really killed a woman?
Her knees quaked. If not for his arm holding her up, she felt sure she’d have fainted clean away already. No wonder he hadn’t wanted to admit who he really was!
His chin brushed against the top of her head as he looked around the station, probably seeking the best escape route. She couldn’t tell for certain what he was looking at, because his shoulder pinned her to the wall, making it impossible to see much beyond him. Amelia tried to remember what she’d seen of the stage station when they’d been brought in, but all she could recall were high, thick walls and a cluster of long, windowless adobe buildings.
Would anyone come to her aid if she screamed? All she needed was for Mason to loosen his hold on her throat just a little bit, and then…
“This way.”
He grabbed her arm and dragged her through the dusty square toward one of the buildings. Just outside it stood several buckboard wagons, a canvas-covered wagon with a yoke of oxen, and a single deserted Wells Fargo stagecoach. The passengers were probably all inside for the noon meal, along with the stage station hands. Mason couldn’t have timed his escape better if he’d planned it.
Or maybe he had—and used her to accomplish it.
He peered into each conveyance as they passed, then doubled back toward the canvas-covered wagon. They stopped at its rear, then he tossed his rifle and ammunition belt through the drawstring-tightened opening in the canvas.
“Get in,” he said, taking his hand from her throat to motion toward the steps at the wagon’s rear. He gave her a little shove forward.
Too surprised to move at first, Amelia hesitated at the back of the wagon. He’d released her! Her throat felt sore, and a bump was probably growing on the back of her head, but she was free. She started trembling harder. Should she run, or simply yell for help?
Run.
She turned, drew a big breath past her burning throat—and Mason caught her. Grabbing her around the waist, he growled and hefted her into the air. Amelia shrieked. A second later, she tumbled into the back of the wagon amidst barrels and blankets and farm tools.
She could only lay there, stunned and staring, as he climbed in after her. Only the haziest light penetrated the thick canvas, but Mason’s fearsome expression was plain even through the gloom. His lips curled back, baring his teeth, and his eyebrows angled sharply downward. His fists clenched, closing over empty air, but Amelia would’ve bet every last book in her J.G. O’Malley & Sons satchels that he wished it was her neck laid bare between his hands. She whimpered.
“Another sound from you,” he warned in a harsh whisper, “and it’s the last one you make.”
She scooted backward, burrowing deeper into the things piled beneath her in her haste to get away from him. He didn’t pursue her, though. With one last, snarling look, Mason turned away from her and started rummaging through the things that filled the wagon bed.
“I’m getting out of here,” he said as he cast aside a patchwork quilt and a barrel of something that rattled when it moved. “And you’re going to help.”
Help? Help him, and then likely be killed for her trouble? Amelia started to say so aloud, but a look from him silenced her. Suddenly Mason seemed twice as violent as he ever had. He’d probably break her arm just for fun if she disagreed with him. And this was the man she’d let kiss her, only a few short days ago!
Her father and brothers were right—Amelia Josephine O’Malley did not belong in the west, not in any capacity and certainly not as a book agent. She didn’t even have the first idea where her book satchels were.
Mason thrust a limp bit of calico toward her. “Put this on.”
Automatically, she took it. Beside her, Mason strapped on his gun belt while she examined the thing he’d given her. She turned it over in her hands.
A sunbonnet?
“But why would I—”
“Just do it.” He lifted his pistol to the shaft of light shining in through the opening in the canvas, opened the barrel, and peered inside. Pushing some bullets from his gun belt into his palm, Mason started to load the ammunition.
When she hesitated, he snapped the loaded chamber closed and leveled the weapon at her. “I said, put it on.”
“All right!” With trembling fingers, Amelia raised the worn sunbonnet over her head and smoothed it over her hair. She ran her fingers down the bonnet’s strings, trying to gather them into a knot beneath her chin. Her hands refused to cooperate. Clumsily, she dropped the strings and had to start over again.
Swearing, Mason pocketed his gun, then pushed her fingers aside and grabbed the ties himself. Amelia hardly dared breathe while he drew them taut, tugging the bonnet all the way onto her head. Frowning, he pulled the bonnet’s sides toward her cheeks, then took up the strings again.
Suddenly, he stopped, his gaze centered on her bare neck. The bonnet strings dangled from his still fingers, their soft frayed fabric ends brushing against her skin just above the bodice of her dress. Amelia felt one of them touch the hollow of her throat. Then, guided by his hands, it slid upward over the place that ached most from the bruising pressure of Mason’s fingers.
His knuckles caressed her throat, his touch soft as a warm breeze. “Swollen,” he whispered, his voice turned thick…with sadness?
Their eyes met, just for a moment. In the dark depths of his she saw regret, and compassion…and an overriding sense of desperation unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Whatever was driving Mason, it was something that mattered intensely to him, something he’d risk his life and soul to find. And in that moment Amelia knew, beyond all doubt, that he couldn’t have murdered anyone. How could he, when simply bruising a woman caused him such pain?
Mason closed his eyes briefly, ending their contact as though it had never begun. When he opened them again, his gaze was level and sure.
“I’m sorry, Amy,” he said.
“Mason, I—”
“There was no other way.”
I understand, she wanted to say. I forgive you. But the sound of masculine voices and shuffling footsteps outside cut short her words. Shaking his head to warn her into silence, Mason swiftly gathered up the bonnet strings again and tied them in a snug bow beneath her chin. That done, he laid his hand on her upper arm.
“Get up there,” he told her, indicating the front of the wagon with a curt motion of his head. Through the wider canvas opening there, Amelia just glimpsed the brown-haired heads and bulky bodies of the oxen team. They shifted restlessly in their traces, waiting for the wagon’s owner to return and set them on their journey again.
“Up…there?” Amelia shook her head, resisting the slight pressure of Mason’s hand against the small of her back.
“Keep your bonnet pulled forward to hide your face and drive straight out of here,” he said. “If they see me, we’ll never make it. You have to do it.”
“No! No, Mason—I’ve never driven a team of oxen! I’ve never even driven a wagon before,” Amelia protested in a frantic whisper. At the thought her heart beat faster, making her feel half-swooney. “I can’t do it! My brothers wouldn’t even let me drive their phaetons, and they were half the size of this. I—”
He caught her chin in his hand and turned her to face him.
“You can do it.”
Mutely, Amelia shook her head. She’d kill them both! If those two beasts took it into their animal heads to run away with the wagon, she’d never, never be able to stop them. Didn’t Mason understand that? Wide-eyed, she stared back at him.
He met her gaze unflinchingly. Mason understood what he was asking of her—and he meant to get it. Tenderly he brushed his thumb along her jaw, a silent d
emand that she listen—and accede to him.
“Please,” he said. “I need your help.”
A masculine voice rang out from the other side of the canvas, then more voices joined his. It sounded as though they came from one direction—the stage station, most likely. The afternoon meal must be finished.
She clenched her fists, meeting Mason’s gaze again. “If I kill us both with this fool plan of yours,” she whispered, “don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Mason’s smile flashed at her, briefly lighting all the murky depths of the wagon. “If you do kill the pair of us, I doubt I’ll have much to say about it from six feet under.”
“I can’t believe you’d joke about this!”
“Just go. Past these walls and a few miles south, and we’re safe. I’ll take over from there.”
“All right.” If he’d take over later, she could find the courage to get them started.
It took less time than Amelia expected to climb through the jumbled supplies piled inside the wagon bed, then lower herself onto the plank seat supplied for the driver. There, sunshine beat relentlessly, hard enough to have turned the seat gray and splintered. The heat, combined with a good dose of plain, bullhead fear, made perspiration trickle between Amelia’s shoulder blades, dampening the back of her borrowed dress.
Tugging her sunbonnet forward, she examined the wagon’s fittings as nonchalantly as she was able. No one would guess she didn’t belong with the rig, she vowed—at least not from her demeanor.
Something nudged her side. “Put these on.”
Amelia glanced down to see Mason’s hand tuck something between her elbow and waist, where she could grab it easily. A pair of men’s leather work gloves. She pulled out the stiff, mud-splotched gloves and put them on, grateful for the extra layer of protection and camouflage. Having the correct accouterments could only make her disguise more believable, she reasoned.
“It’s not a garden party!” Mason hissed from behind her. “Get moving.”
She realized she’d been staring at the gloves while she contemplated their escape plan, and stopped. Lowering her head, Amelia listened to the rest of Mason’s instructions. Doubtless he was better equipped to deal with such things as subterfuge and jail breaks than she was.
“The traces are right there,” he whispered to the small of her back. “Unwrap them from the foot brake, then slowly lower the lever.”
Sounds drifted nearer—men and horses milling near the wagon, then passing it by; men and a few women speaking to each other in both English and exotically melodic Spanish. From the corner of her eye, Amelia spied passengers climbing into the red lacquered stagecoach to her left. Their movements stirred up a cloud of dust that reminded her of exactly how different this Arizona Territory landscape was from her home.
If she was ever to return there again, see her father and brothers again, she had to take action now. They had to move soon, else be discovered and lose their chance to escape.
With a quick prayer for courage, Amelia bit her lip and carefully unwrapped the long braided-leather traces from the brake lever. As though sensing her presence, the oxen stepped forward, snorting eagerly.
“Ahhh!” Teetering atop her hard plank seat, she just managed to regain control of the animals. She couldn’t contain the smile that burst forth from her lips. She’d done it! She’d kept them from running willy-nilly into the desert! Maybe she and Mason could make it after all.
Somebody was going to be very unhappy when they finished eating and found their wagon missing. But that couldn’t be helped now. She’d just have to think about that later. Amelia arranged the traces in her gloved palms.
“Mason, I’m ready.”
“Good work, Curly Top,” came his voice from behind her. His use of the nickname he’d bestowed startled her, then warmed her a bit. A man who cared enough to give her a pet name couldn’t possibly be all bad.
Mason’s hand smoothed across her back, then settled lightly against her left hip. “Very good. Now just release the brake with your foot and let up a little on the traces. The oxen will take care of the rest.”
“Easy for you to say,” Amelia muttered over her shoulder. She wished mightily that he was the one driving. But there was nothing to be done about that now, either. With one final swipe at her damp forehead and a forceful tug on her sunbonnet, she propped her foot atop the brake.
Sunlight glinted from something on the seat just below her right elbow. Hesitating, Amelia looked down. It was the barrel of Mason’s rifle. She gasped.
“What do you need that thing for?”
Impatience added steel to Mason’s voice. “For as long as it takes to get us out of here,” he replied. “Now drive.”
At least the weapon wasn’t aimed at her. Taking comfort in that fact, she kicked down the brake lever. The wagon lurched forward, its iron-clad wheels creaking over stones and ruts in the stage station yard.
Ahead of them, the tan adobe walls of Maricopa Wells station stood tall against the brilliant blue sky. Keeping her gaze fastened on them, Amelia gave the oxen their head. They plodded forward, scattering chickens beneath their slowly advancing hooves.
Apparently, even unreined oxen were pitifully slow. She felt like screaming with frustration.
“Can’t they go any faster?” Amelia hissed toward Mason.
“This is it,” came his laconic reply.
Any second now, she’d be recognized as the impostor she was and dragged from the wagon, she felt sure of it. Her fingers tightened on the traces. Ahead, the opened gate promised freedom from an outlaw’s fate—and a chance to quit driving the wagon. Maybe she could hurry the oxen a bit, despite Mason’s pessimistic opinion of the animals’ capabilities.
What was it the driver called to oxen to make them go faster? Searching her memory for the times she’d seen local farmers driving into the market place back home in Big Pike Lake, finally Amelia remembered something.
She jerked the traces. “Haw!”
Both beasts turned to the left and plodded on. Darn! That wasn’t it.
She straightened her sunbonnet, getting ready to try something else. Glancing forward again, Amelia realized the oxen’s new path was taking them—and the wagon—smack into what appeared to be a wash house. Panicked, she tugged fruitlessly on the traces. The animals didn’t even slow. Now they felt like hurrying!
A cluster of dark-haired Mexican women glanced up from their washing. Their eyes widened as they realized Amelia and the oxen weren’t stopping.
“Ahh—ahh! What do I do?” she whispered frantically to Mason. But she couldn’t wait for him to reply—they were almost upon the women. A few more oxen-sized steps, and they’d smash right into the wash house.
“Whoa! Stop! Stop!”
The oxen kept going, just as though she hadn’t spoken.
Mason was saying something, but Amelia couldn’t hear him over the cries of the washer-women. Suddenly, an idea occurred to her.
“Haw!”
The oxen turned left again, narrowly missing the wash house.
“I’m so sorry!” Amelia called, then she remembered she was supposed to be in disguise and ducked her head again. When she looked up from between her hunched shoulders, she realized they were headed back in the direction they’d come from.
“No! No!” she cried. “I mean, haw!”
They turned, their movement spewing choking dust from beneath the wagon wheels, and headed straight for the nearest wall. “Haw!” Amelia yelled.
Mason jabbed her, none-too-gently, in the backside. “When you’re finished driving us in circles,” he said into her ear, “can we get the hell out of here?”
“I’m trying!”
Slapping the oxen with the traces, Amelia succeeded in getting the animals to speed up just enough. Hallelujah! They were facing the open gate again.
In the stage station yard below her, several faces turned upward as she passed. Most wore wide, indulgent smiles. Look at the lady drive in circles, they seemed
to be saying. Have you ever seen such a thing?
Amelia’s heart sank. She couldn’t have made their escape from Maricopa Wells more conspicuous if she’d set out to do it apurpose. Keeping her attention fixed on the open gate, she gritted her teeth and did her best to ignore the onlookers.
The stagecoach’s fast teams of horses came abreast of her wagon, then the coach itself rolled along beside her. From within came the sound of amused male voices, calling to her.
“Don’t them animals know how to walk straight?” yelled one. “How’d ya’ get this far, immigrant?”
Amelia stared straight ahead. Blessedly, the stagecoach’s horses picked up speed before any more catcalls reached her, and the vehicle passed through the open gate. Only a few more yards, and they’d be past it, too.
A station hand, swarthy-skinned and well-armed, stepped from the shadows of the adobe wall, directly into her path. Amelia gaped at him, trying hard not to beat the oxen into running faster. To do so—even if it worked—would only jeopardize their getaway plan. The man raised his hand, signaling her to stop the wagon.
Chapter Nine
“What do I do? What do I do?” Amelia whispered to Mason from the corner of her mouth. Her stomach turned over with nervousness. Had their former guard alerted the station hands to their escape? Were they about to be recaptured?
“Go along with him—for now,” Mason muttered back.
Something cool slid further along Amelia’s hip, then settled part way across the plank seat beside her. Mason’s rifle. With the outlaw himself at the business end of the weapon, ready to fire, she was sure. Her heartbeat, already frantic, soared.
“Hold up there a minute, ma’am,” called the station hand. “M—me?” Amelia croaked. She swallowed, vainly trying to moisten her parched throat.
He nodded, walking nearer. The shotgun propped casually against his shoulder was all she could see.
“Uh, ah…gee!” she called hoarsely to the oxen. The animals slowly turned to the right, and kept going.