Cricket could feel her blood pounding as his thumb began to move in slow circles on her neck. She tried to jerk her head from his grasp, even grabbed the wrist holding her chin with her free hand, but it was like struggling against stone. His hold tightened inexorably, then gentled the instant she stopped resisting it. The gun was the only thing that kept them apart, and Cricket could feel the muscles in Creed’s belly fighting back against the pressure she applied.
“I could blow a hole in you so big a horse could walk through it,” she hissed.
“Why waste a bullet? Why not let your wolf rip out my throat?”
Although she couldn’t move her head, Cricket’s eyes quickly searched left and right for Rogue. Where was he, anyway?
The Ranger whistled shrilly, and the wolf came bounding into sight. He loped over to Creed and Cricket and sat down expectantly between them, his tongue lolling from his mouth.
“Little trick I taught my first pup,” Creed said with a mischievous grin. “Works on wolves, too, I discovered.”
Cricket’s face flushed with chagrin. How dare he steal her wolf’s allegiance! She closed her eyes, since Creed’s grip wouldn’t allow her to turn her head away and she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing that she appreciated the almost impossible feat he’d accomplished. Rogue had been tolerant of others, but he’d obeyed no one but Cricket. That is, until Jarrett Creed had stuck his arrogant nose in where it didn’t belong.
When she recovered her composure Cricket opened her eyes. “I’m not going home,” she said between clenched teeth, “until I get back what was stolen from me.”
“I thought not.” He sighed heavily.
She felt him assessing the madly racing pulse under her ear for another moment before he abruptly released her and stepped back.
“All right. We’ll go together.”
Cricket stood for a moment with the gun aimed at Creed before it dawned on her what he’d said. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “If this is some kind of trick . . .”
“No tricks, Brava.” He held his hands up to show they were empty. “Let’s get this over with so we can go home. I’ll fetch the horses.” He turned from her and disappeared into the stand of cypress.
Cricket stuck her Paterson back in her belt, her brain searching madly for the reason Creed had agreed to let her go with him. Of course there was no way he could make her go home, and he must know that if he took her back she’d only steal away again. But why bother to ask her to join him. Why not just go on by himself?
Creed reappeared momentarily with both their horses. “Ready?”
“I thought you worked alone,” Cricket said as she mounted, still not trusting his easy capitulation.
“Who would want to work alone when he could work with a lovely creature like you?” he replied, smiling as he settled into the saddle leather. Creed kicked his chestnut and headed south, leaving Cricket to follow him or not, as she pleased.
Cricket wondered why she followed him, even as she did. She wasn’t sure what it meant to be a lovely creature. It didn’t sound like a compliment, but because it wasn’t exactly an insult, either, she decided not to make an issue of it. She could understand the Ranger’s need to be alone. Normally she would rather be alone, too. She could also understand why he didn’t want them to ride together, since they always seemed to end up arguing. Still, you never knew what would happen when you dealt with bandits. And two guns were better against two bandits than one.
They rode for several hours in silence and surprised each other with how well they got along. They both kept an eye on the trail, and it took no spoken word to change their course, only a meeting of their eyes, or a nod, or a simple gesture.
Cricket fought against the growing thread of admiration for Jarrett Creed which spun itself like a web around her. So what if he could track like a Comanche? So what if he rode as easy in the saddle as a Mexican vaquero? So what if he could spend the entire afternoon beside her, yet leave her free to enjoy the vast solitude that was untamed Texas? He was still a man who’d treated her like a woman. For that alone, he was to be despised.
So why didn’t she despise him? It was a mystery she thought she might unravel, if she could only find a place in the skein to start.
In the end, it was Creed who finally broke the silence between them.
“Did Rip always treat you the way he does now?”
At Cricket’s confused expression he explained, “I mean, did he always treat you like a boy, let you wear pants and ride mustangs and shoot a gun?”
“I don’t ever remember things being any other way,” Cricket said tentatively. “My mother died when I was born. I don’t remember her at all. If I ever needed anything, I went to Sloan, and if she couldn’t help, then to Rip.”
“So what do you think about the life you lead?”
“It satisfies me.”
“Does it?”
“Why wouldn’t it?” Cricket demanded.
“I don’t know. You tell me.”
“I have Rip’s approval, and that’s what matters to me. The rest of the world can go hang, for all I care.”
She bristled at Creed’s disapproving snort.
“Why do you call him Rip? Why not pa or father?” he asked.
Cricket shrugged. “I don’t know. I just always have.” She could see from his frown that Creed didn’t like that answer, either, but she didn’t have a better one. “What do you call your father?”
“Which one?”
Creed’s retort brought Cricket’s head around with a snap. “Which one? Do you have more than one?”
She could see Creed struggling to find an answer before he spoke.
“I called the man who sired me pa when I was a small boy,” he began. “Then I was captured by the Comanches and adopted by a mean sonofabitch named Crooked Trail. I called him ap’—that’s Comanche for father—to his face. Behind his back, I called him . . . other things. When I was seventeen and my natural father found me, he was only another White-eyes. Now they’re both dead, and the problem doesn’t arise anymore.”
“Did you hate them both so much?”
“Let’s just say I don’t have much use for fathers.”
Cricket heard the bitterness bared by the harsh edge in his voice. “I love Rip,” she said quietly. “I love him, and I respect him. He’s the most important person in my life.”
“And he plans to sell you to the highest bidder,” Creed shot back.
“What are you talking about?”
“Nothing. Just mouthing off when I shouldn’t be.”
“Hold on a minute. You can’t make a statement like that and pretend you didn’t. Rip would never do such a thing.”
“What does your father have planned for your future, Cricket? Sloan gets Three Oaks. Bay gets to be Sloan’s right-hand man. What about you, Cricket? What do you get? Has Rip told you what he’s got in mind for his youngest daughter? Are you ready to be a wife?”
“I already told you I’m never getting married.”
Creed barked a laugh. “Guess again. Rip’s busy arranging a marriage for you right now.”
“You’re lying!”
“I never . . . not about this. Rip is making arrangements right now for your marriage to Señor Guerrero’s elder son.”
“That doesn’t make sense. Marriage is the last thing Rip would suggest for me. He never said anything . . . we never talked about . . . about marriage. He’d never make me do something I truly didn’t want to do.” Cricket recognized the desperation in her voice, but added, “He wouldn’t.”
“Rip can and will do anything he pleases. Look at you. You’re manipulated by your father like a puppet. He pulls the right strings, and you respond. But he’s got the strings all tangled, Cricket, and he’s pulling in directions you just can’t go. You can never satisfy Rip, because no matter how hard you try, you can’t be his son . . . only his daughter. And daughters get married, Cricket, to rich hacendados who—”
“No! N
o! No!”
Cricket held her hands over her ears because what Creed said was too frightening to hear. She’d discounted Bay’s warning about Rip choosing husbands for his daughters because she’d been sure it wouldn’t apply to her. Her father was pleased with her. He loved her. She was his favorite, and he’d do anything for her. And she’d do anything for him except . . . He’d never ask her to marry some rich man he’d picked out for her, because he knew she’d never make a good wife. The whole idea of marriage was so . . . so wrong.
She wouldn’t let Creed’s bald-faced lie shatter her sense of well-being. She didn’t believe Jarrett Creed. She wouldn’t believe Jarrett Creed. She couldn’t believe Jarrett Creed.
But deep, deep down, she did believe him. How often had she cursed being female, because it robbed her of the ability to be the one thing she knew her father wanted most in life—a son. But hadn’t she done everything, everything Rip had asked her to do? Wasn’t she the next best thing to a son? How could Rip even think she would be willing to accept the role of wife to some man? Why, she didn’t know a thing about being a wife.
Cricket’s chin quivered, and she swallowed hard over the lump that had risen in her throat. When Rip made up his mind, the deed was as good as done.
But to be Cruz Guerrero’s wife? How could she ever . . . ? How would she know . . . ? She couldn’t do . . . !
Why hadn’t she talked to Rip sooner? Why hadn’t she confronted him the moment Bay had mentioned he planned to choose a husband for her? The answers to those questions told more about her relationship to Rip than Cricket cared to admit. She’d found excuses to avoid the confrontation with her father because she’d been so afraid he’d do what he’d threatened despite her feelings on the matter. Now her worst fears were coming true.
Cricket choked on a sob. She never cried. She used her rage to cover her fear, attacking Creed. “Just because you hated your father don’t expect me to hate mine. Because I won’t. No matter how black you try to paint him I won’t hate Rip. I won’t! I won’t! I won’t! I won’t!”
Each primal cry came closer to a sob of defeat, and Cricket wouldn’t allow Jarrett Creed that satisfaction. She whipped her horse into a gallop, leaving Creed standing in the choking dust raised by her precipitous escape.
Creed resisted the urge to chase after her. He would give her some room, keep his distance from her, until they’d each regained a measure of the peace the quiet wilderness could bring to the soul. In a while, Creed nudged the chestnut into a trot. Why had he bothered to argue with her? What business was it of his how Rip Stewart raised his kids? So what if Cricket adored the man? So what if she refused to admit she couldn’t be her father’s son? So what if Rip was going to marry her to some Spaniard who wouldn’t understand her? He didn’t care about her one way or the other.
He squinted up at the ruthless Texas sun, then out over the plains, shimmering with the relentless heat. He and Cricket might each find peace in the wilderness, he thought, but there was no comfort there.
For she was hiding from the truth.
And so was he.
Cricket rode hell-for-leather away from Creed, her thoughts racing as wildly as the powerful gelding beneath her. She’d never looked too deeply at her relationship with Rip because she’d always known he loved her best. Was there only one piece of candy left? She got it. Was there a special mustang among those recently captured? She got it. Was there anything new, special, the best? She got it. She’d never questioned the price she paid for that favoritism. She’d never had any reason to question it.
Creed’s arguments had raised terrifying doubts in her mind. Was she really a puppet on a string, dancing to Rip’s bidding? Was she being manipulated, reaching out for Rip’s approval, like a recalcitrant mule following a carrot held out before it on a long stick?
She’d always considered herself the soul of independence, blithely doing what she wanted to do.
But wasn’t everything she wanted to do also something Rip wanted her to do?
So what if it was? Was that so bad? Had he ever forced her to do anything that made her feel uncomfortable or unhappy?
What about Amber Kuykendall’s ninth birthday party?
Oh, God. No. Rip would never have let her become a . . .
The tiny seed planted on Amber Kuykendall’s birthday had grown over the years, watered by snide comments and sly glances. Despite that one insidious weed, she’d flowered into a happy, contented person because she was exactly what her father wanted her to be. She’d learned her lessons well, and she’d truly been her father’s son. Now, after seventeen years, he’d changed his mind. He wanted a daughter he could marry off to a rich hacendado . Cricket knew if she became Cruz Guerrero’s wife now, Felicia’s prophecy would very likely come true.
She would be a freak.
The gelding stumbled from fatigue and almost fell. Cricket reined the exhausted animal to a stop. The beast’s head hung low, his billowing nostrils causing tiny dust storms in the red dirt. His muscles trembled so he seemed almost to be shivering. A foamy lather lay in ridges along his neck and shoulders. The barrel chest heaved to bring air to tortured lungs.
Cricket’s own chest heaved just as mightily, as though she’d been the one running, and not the horse. The sharp aroma of hot sweat and leather rose almost like steam, so Cricket couldn’t help but breathe it. She slipped from the saddle and her legs buckled under her, sending her crumpling to her knees on the ground. Her face fell forward into her hands. How many times had she pleased Rip and denied herself, only to discover it wasn’t enough? It was never going to be enough. Now Rip planned to change all the rules and force her back into a role she’d rejected her whole life at his insistence.
She began to tremble all over. The trembling became a shiver, the shiver a tremor, until her whole body was like an earthquake, shifting and grating and tearing asunder all the beliefs she’d held in her heart. And from the yawning abyss the howling of furies threatened to erupt. She tried to strangle the sound, tried to keep it contained within flesh and bone, but the pain and pressure built and built until finally a keening wail tore loose from somewhere deep inside her and rose pitiably on the clear, clean air.
Agonized groans began deep in her belly and wrenched their way through her chest and out her contorted mouth. No cleansing tears came to blur reality and wash it away. Dry-eyed, she faced the past and feared the future. She thrust her fist into her mouth, biting down hard to stem the wails, damning her weakness, her inability to keep the truth at bay. She fought against the hysterical pressure in her chest, unable to choke back the sobs which exploded each time in gut-wrenching groans of pain. At last, tears began dripping in hot hellpaths down her cheeks.
She couldn’t stop the cries of anguish. Couldn’t stop the trembling of her body. Couldn’t stop the pain. She began to rock back and forth, back and forth, gripping herself across the belly with her arms as though her insides might fly out if she didn’t hold them tight.
A cold nose poked against her wet cheek, and she grabbed at the comfort Rogue offered, digging her hands deep into the wolf’s fur and smothering her sobs against his warm body.
The wolf lay down before her and raised his head to the big, blue Texas sky, wailing mournfully, unsure of the cause of Cricket’s distress but fully sharing it.
Creed heard the lone wolf’s ululating cry, a prairie song of grief, and wondered at its ability to move him. It was uncanny how the howl captured all the isolation a man felt in this land. The wolf’s lament spoke not of birth and hope, but of death and the inevitable end to dreams. He didn’t put much faith in dreams coming true, and it had saved him a load of heartache. Not Cricket, though. She’d let Rip’s dream become her own . . . and it was a dream doomed to failure.
Had there ever been a time in his life when he’d trusted his father with the same unequivocal certainty that Cricket trusted Rip? Maybe, once, a long time ago he had. Nobody should put his life that fully in another’s hands, Creed thought. It was to
o much of a temptation, too much of a burden for a mere mortal. And despite the way he acted, Rip was only human. Cricket was headed for a fall, all right. He wished to God there were some way he could save her all that pain. But he knew that wasn’t possible. Growing hurt. Nothing was ever going to change that.
The howl came again, a sad, solitary sound. And then its echo, equally lonesome.
Creed gave in to the feeling and mourned with the wolf.
Chapter 11
CRICKET SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER THAN TO start walking in her dazed state, with no thought to where she was or where she was going. And if she was going to wander around like that on foot, leading the exhausted gelding, she should at least have kept Rogue by her side. Of course, she thought as she registered the identity of the two men who’d suddenly appeared before her, it was useless to worry about should-haves now. But she hoped her blunder didn’t turn out to be a deadly mistake.
“We meet again, chiquita.”
“I get her first.”
Cricket looked from Clemencio to Oscar and back to Clemencio again, noting the equally lascivious grins on both faces. Seeing them on their Spanish ponies before her was a shock, but it was the sight of the dozen other grizzle-faced bandidos arrayed around them that stood her neck hairs on end. Still, there was nothing like a crisis to bring out the best in Cricket.
“The first person to touch me gets a bullet in the gut,” she said, a Paterson appearing miraculously in her hand. “So, come to me,” she taunted Oscar. “I’m waiting for you.”
A rumble of surprised expletives traveled through the motley group when her challenge was translated, but no one moved. After all, a puta and a pistola were a dangerous combination.
Cricket knew it was only a matter of time before they figured out there were fourteen of them and one of her, even if she did have a gun in her hand. They wouldn’t expect her to be an accurate shot, even though she was. From the looks of them, they’d run if she started shooting. But if they didn’t run . . .
“Alejandro, talk some sense into the bitch,” Oscar demanded.
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