The snow appeared to be thicker. Like most spring snows, the flakes were fat and wet, accumulating quickly. Right now it seemed an eon ago that Tanner had been soaking in a steamy tub. The same thought must have occurred to Fox, but she hadn't voiced a complaint.
"Why don't you go ahead and crawl into the tent? Get some sleep." Sleep was the best healing agent Tanner knew. Moreover, she'd planned to turn in early if he remembered correctly. "Fox? You were marvelous tonight." He knew that he hadn't shot both of the outlaws. She'd done her part. "Thank you for coming with me, and I'm sorry as hell that you got shot."
"No thanks necessary," she said, her voice sounding peculiar as it did every time he complimented her. "And it was only a nick. Well, all right, a small chunk that I'll never miss." Raising her cup, she swallowed the last of her coffee before she moved the pot away from the flames. "We'll save the rest for morning. Damn, it's cold." Standing, she pulled the blanket around her and stamped her feet, then she headed toward the tent. "Are you coming?"
"You take the tent. I'll sleep out here"as soon as he found his bedroll. He hadn't seen it since he took off the saddles.
"Don't be foolish. I put your blankets in the tent."
* * *
CHAPTER 8
Fox and Tanner quickly discovered the tent was too narrow for them both to lie on their backs. Fox rolled on her side, which brought her nose within two inches of the tent wall. The canvas smelled dank and musty, as if the tent had been put away wet.
Tanner shifted and hunched and finally spooned around her. When Fox gasped and went rigid, he said close to her ear, "This position gives us the most room and will probably be the warmest." After an awkward silence, he added, "But if you'd prefer, I can take my blankets outside and"
"I told you I'm a practical woman," Fox answered, staring at the tent wall inches from her face. This position was closer to comfortable than anything else they had tried, but
Layers of clothing and blankets bunched between them, nevertheless she could have sworn that she felt every muscle of Tanner's torso. She told herself that was impossible. Then Tanner's gloved hand slipped around the waist of her coat.
"I don't know where else to put it," he explained, sounding irritated.
Through her blankets and his, Fox could feel his knees curved up against hers. His arm was around her in a loose embrace. She licked her lips and swallowed. It had been a couple of years since she had been this intimate with a man.
"There's just no easy way to stuff two people into a one-man tent," she muttered. But he was right about this position being warm. The instant Tanner had curled around her, a wave of heat shot through her body.
"We wouldn't have this problem if I'd brought Hanratty with me."
Because one or both of the men would have slept out in the snow. "Now that I think about it, I just assumed I'd be the one to go. It's my job to get you and the gold to Denver."
"You have a habit of making assumptions."
His warm breath on the back of her neck made her feel dizzy. "I probably should have asked what you wanted before I sent Peaches off to fetch the horses."
"Actually, I was glad to have you along. Until now."
"I know what you mean." She assumed he meant having to share the tent. After a minute she asked, "Is my braid right in your face?"
"It must be off to the side."
His arm tightened around her, pulling her closer into his body, as if he were settling in for sleep. Her fanny cupped up tight against his privates and that was enough to widen Fox's eyes. Every nerve tingled and suddenly she couldn't stop talking.
"Have you ever noticed how everything gets silent when it snows, but even so you think you can hear it falling?" Lord she was babbling, but babble was better than wondering what might be going on with his privates.
"I've noticed," he said, the sound of a smile in his voice. "Is your ear hurting?"
"It smarts a bit," she admitted. "But it isn't too bad." That was also true. "Breaking a leg hurt a lot worse. Knife cuts and burns hurt, too. What's the worst injury you ever had?"
If something was stirring down there in his private region, she suspected Tanner would be embarrassed. If nothing was going on with his privates while they were pressed up against her fanny, then she would be humiliated. Unfortunately, the layer of blankets between them made it impossible to judge what was or was not going on with Tanner's privates.
"The worst injury? Some friends and I were racing gigs. We were young enough and had enough brandy in us to think racing at night wasn't stupid. My rig slid out on a curve, pulled the horse down, and we rolled into a ravine." He was silent a moment. "I broke my collarbone, an ankle, my arm. The worst of it was the horse had to be put down because of my foolishness."
"That's bad," Fox agreed. Putting down a horse was tragic. "Were you ever in a mine cave-in?" She didn't move, not an inch. If she so much as wiggled, he might interpret it as an invitation. Tanner was a gentleman, but in a circumstance like this, misunderstandings could ariseso to speak.
"I've been in a couple of cave-ins. They're heart-stopping events."
"Were you injured?"
"I was lucky both times. Do you want to turn the other direction?"
"This is fine. Unless you"
"I'm fine, too."
Actually, lying curled up in his arms was kind of nice. It occurred to Fox that there was no other place she wanted to be at this minute. They were protected from the wind and snow. Matthew Tanner's large hard body spooned around her, his breath flowed warm on her skin. If she cared to, she could pretend that he wanted to be in the tent with her, could imagine that he, too, was having heated thoughts.
"Did you tell me if you were married?" she asked, wondering exactly how compromising this situation was and if the tension she felt should be even worse.
"I've never been married. Damn it, I think my left arm is going to sleep." After he'd shifted and jostled and done something or other, he settled down again.
"So why haven't you married? Seems like you're about the right age. You appear to have money and a decent job." Wind buffeted the tent walls sending waves of musty odor toward Fox's nostrils. She would rather have had her nose pressed to Tanner's neck, inhaling his nice soapy bathhouse scent.
"The only woman I came close to considering was too flamboyant for my father to accept. I thought you were sleepy."
"I was, but now I'm wide awake." She shrugged and instantly regretted it hoping he wouldn't interpret the movement as a subtle hint that she might be open to more. Damn. She wished she knew the condition of his privates so she'd know where she stood. "What does that mean, she was flamboyant?"
"On another subject, why won't you tell me who called Hobbs Jennings a thieving son of a bitch?"
"Why is it important for your father to accept your wife? It's you who has to live with her, not him."
"You're not going to tell me, are you?" An exasperated sigh feathered warm air across Fox's cheek. "First, my father sacrificed a lot for me. I owe him. Second, if I married, my wife and I would probably live with my father."
"That's a terrible plan!" Fox pushed up and tried to glare over her shoulder, but couldn't turn far enough and it was too black inside the tent for him to have seen a scowl anyway. "Your wife married you, not you and your father. You should not make her live in your father's house!"
"Fox, I'm often in the field for months at a time. I won't worry about her if I know she's with my father and taken care of."
"So you'll make her miserable because you don't want to worry? You selfish bastard!" This time she did manage to sit up and stare down through the darkness.
"That's not it at all, and why do you assume she'd be miserable? She shouldn't have to live by herself for months on end."
"The hell. I'll wager that she prefers to live by herself. You ought to know that every woman deserves her own house and so does your poor wife! And she should not have to play nursemaid to your judgmental father!" God only knew what his father woul
d think about someone like her. Fox would horrify him right down to his toes.
"I didn't say my wife had to play nursemaid."
Tanner objected angrily. He managed to sit up, too. "But I don't think she should be expected to take on the responsibility of running a house by herself."
"Oh, so now you're saying this poor woman is too stupid to pay whatever vendors she uses? Or the household help? She can't manage her own house?"
"Damn it! I did not say she was stupid."
"Well, you certainly implied it." Furious on behalf of his wife, she jabbed him in the chest with a finger. "I don't know why she married you! You've denied her a home, foisted her off on your father, gone off and deserted her, and now you're calling her stupid! I'm not staying in this tent one more minute with someone as selfish and indifferent as you are!"
Flinging back her blankets, Fox crawled out of the tent into the snowstorm. Swearing, she realized she'd have to crawl back into the tent to retrieve her hat. Before the thought was fully formed, her hat came sailing out of the flap and landed near her boots. "Thank you," she shouted, jamming the hat on her head. This small act of consideration changed nothing. He was still mistreating his wife.
Except
"Fox?"
When she saw him striding toward her through the falling snow, Fox dropped her forehead into her hand and sucked in a long breath of cold damp air.
He stopped in front of her and planted his fists on his hips. Leaning forward, he glared at her through a veil of snowflakes. "What the hell is going on here? I don't have a wife. I am probably never going to have a wife. I for sure as hell don't want a wife."
"But if you did" she said weakly. There was no leg to stand on here. "Are you sure about not having a wife?" For a few crazy moments, his wife had seemed so real.
Tanner threw out his hands. "If I did have a wife, I'd want her and my father to like and enjoy each other. Now I don't see anything wrong or unusual about that. These two people would be the only family I have and it's important that they approve of each other and share a mutual respect." He leaned down until they were nearly nose to nose. "Now that's all I'm going to say on the subject of wives."
"There's still the problem of making her live with your father." Fox stared into his eyes, determined not to look away first.
"I am not going to argue about a nonexistent wife who I assure you would be delighted to live with my father." Tanner stared back at her, standing so close that she felt his breath flowing over her lips.
Later she couldn't remember who was first to make the muffled snorting sound of suppressed laughter, but it was contagious. In a moment, they were both laughing like loons, falling on each other, wiping their eyes and laughing until Fox's ribs ached.
"Never in my life have I had such an idiotic argument," Tanner said when he could speak.
"That makes two of us. Lord, my sides hurt from laughing." And she was cold without Tanner wrapped around her. Even so, she was glad to be out of the tent and away from the tension of lying in his arms. Pulling a stick from the pile of dead brush, Fox poked at the coals in the fire pit and fed in twigs and branches until she had the fire blazing again. "I apologize. I think I started that argument. Shall I put the coffeepot back on the fire?"
"Might as well," he said, stepping forward to warm his hands. "I don't think we're going to get much sleep tonight."
Good. She'd feared that he might want to give the tent another try.
They sat on the fallen log, wrapped in blankets with their shoulders pressed together, watching the flames struggle against the falling snow. Fox thought the storm was letting up some, but she couldn't be sure.
"You said your father made sacrifices for you what kind of sacrifices?"
"He wasn't always wealthy," Tanner said after a lengthy hesitation. "It must have been difficult for him to keep me in a private school during the years before he made his fortune. He's never explained exactly what sacrifices were necessary, but it's clear that he made some unpleasant compromises."
"If he did, then education must be important to him." Fox would have given anything to have a formal education. If she ever had a child, she guessed she'd do what Tanner's father had done. She'd make whatever sacrifices were necessary to give her child the best education possible. But of course she would never have children. Her future ended in Denver at the bottom of a rope.
"Absolutely." Tanner smiled at the coffeepot. "But my grades were never good enough. And I didn't appreciate the educational opportunity of touring Europe, not enough to please my father. I had an idea that he sometimes regretted those sacrifices."
Hearing a flatness in his voice, Fox slid him a sidelong glance. "What did he want you to do with all that education?"
"I think he expected me to become an influential and prosperous financier. If not that, then accept a position in the business end of his company."
"You didn't want a position in your father's company?" Fox asked, taking her arms out from under the blanket to reach for the coffeepot. "Why not?"
Tanner held out his cup and took his time answering. "I like working in the field. In fact, I'd rather do something that kept me outside all day. I detest office work. The business side is made up of meetings and paperwork."
"I guess I understand that," Fox said, nodding.
"Eventually I'll get out of engineering. Hunt fossils, maybe. How about you? Is scouting something you always wanted? Something you see yourself continuing to do?"
She almost laughed. What would Tanner think if she confided that she was going to Denver to kill a man? His boss, in fact. He'd be appalled and think she was crazy.
She held a swallow of coffee on her tongue, considering how to answer. "I'm good at scouting," she said finally, "but it's not something a person would want to do forever. This will be my last trip across these mountains and valleys."
"And then what? We talked about a wife for me, is there a future husband waiting in the wings for you?"
Startled, she turned her head to look at him and then laughed. "Now what kind of man would want to marry a woman like me? A man doesn't want a woman who can outshoot him, outdrink him, out-cuss him, and who hasn't worn a corset but twice in her life and who'd rather wear trousers than lady clothes."
"You're not doing yourself justice, Fox." His gaze slipped to her mouth and lingered. "You're a handsome woman, unique and admirable."
As always, compliments made her scowl and feel uncomfortable. She turned her face back to the wavering fire as the conversation dried up between them.
He was partly right, but mostly wrong in what he'd said. There might be a man out there who would marry a woman like her. But he'd be a man living on the fringe, like Cutter Hanratty maybe. He wouldn't be an educated upstanding man like Matthew Tanner. And there was the problem. She'd never been drawn to the men who could accept her as she was. No, the men who set her juices flowing were the men she might have attracted if she'd lived the life that Jennings stole from her. Men so far beyond reach that it hurt to think about.
They finished the coffee and then it was time to make a decision. Brew up another pot or climb back into the cramped tent.
"More coffee?" Fox shifted the choice to him.
Tanner hesitated then nodded.
And Fox wondered what that meant. Did he wish to avoid returning to the tent because his privates responded to her? And that made him uncomfortable? Or was the tent too small for him to find a comfortable position? Did her neck smell peculiar? Was she talking so much that he couldn't get to sleep? She sort of hoped the reason had to do with his privates.
On the other hand, she felt enormously relieved. Why torture herself when she didn't have to?
"It's going to be a long night," she remarked, building up the fire. Cold and uncomfortable. "So," she said, settling back on the log and leaning lightly against his shoulder. "Show me the constellations. Peaches says you know constellations he's never heard of."
"Excuse me?" A shine of amusement twinkled in hi
s eyes. "It's still snowing in case you haven't noticed."
"It's starting to thin out some." She let a smile twitch her lips. "Besides, Peaches claims you're good enough that you could point out constellations on a cloudy night."
He laughed then extended his arm through the falling snow, pointing at the sky. "The Big Dipper should be about there."
Fox leaned her head against his shoulder and sighted up his arm. "I know about the Big Dipper. Show me one I don't know."
"How about Cassiopeia?"
"That sounds sort of familiar, but if so I've forgotten. Show me where it is and tell me about it."
At some point before dawn, the snow stopped and Fox fell asleep sitting in front of the fire with her head on Tanner's wide shoulder, her head full of imagined stars and the very real man who slipped his arm around her waist.
Even if Tanner had found a shovel in the outlaws' camp, the ground was frozen and digging two graves would have been difficult and time consuming. Instead, he and Fox collected stones and covered the outlaws' bodies as best they could.
"Do you have any objection to turning their horses loose?" Fox asked him. "Or do you want to take them back to the mining camp?"
The animals were young and in good condition. They would probably fetch a decent price. But Tanner also knew Nevada was home to herds of wild horses. "Set them free."
Fox slapped the thieves' horses on the rump and watched them trot down the snowy valley. "Is there anything you want here?"
Tanner scanned the tent and the thieves' saddles and saddlebags. "Just my gold." He secured the bags on the mule's back, then swung up on the bay. Fox was already mounted and waiting, smothering a yawn.
They held the horses and mule to a steady pace, glad when the sun topped the mountains and climbed a clear sky. By early afternoon when they rode into their camp at the mining site, the sun had burned off all but the snow lying in shadowed patches.
Hanratty and Brown watched them ride in, relief easing their expressions when they spotted Jackie the mule.
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