Beloved Outcast

by Pat Tracy

  “What in the blazes are you trying to do?”

  His husky voice vibrated in her eardrum, causing a strange tingle to skip across her forearms. Her palms came up to push herself free. “I’m trying to right myself.”

  He gave her a look of disgust. “You could have fooled me.”

  “You may release me now.”

  His mauled countenance hovered a scant inch from her upturned face. She looked into his good eye. It was the darkest shade of brown, almost black. It was also penetratingly intent. She felt as if she were caught in a beam of lantern light shining from a lighthouse on a fogbound night-which made no sense, because his glare was as dark and forbidding as a moonless sky.

  “Are you ready to sit still?”

  It was the kind of question one would address to an unruly child, and she resented it.

  “I was trying to fetch my sunbonnet,” she informed him loftily as she struggled to extricate herself from his embrace. She didn’t want to trigger an all-out tug-of-war that would make him aware of how indelicately he held her.

  Her instincts warned it was essential she keep a safe distance from a man as unapologetically primitive as Youngblood.

  He eased his grip. “You should have warned me.”

  “I’ll remember to do so next time.” She sank back to her side of the seat.

  He pulled back on the reins. The oxen came to a dusty halt.

  “Thank you for stopping,” she said briskly, turning again to look inside the wagon’s interior. “Do you happen to remember picking up my sunbonnet?”

  She leaned more fully inside, scanning her dust-covered possessions for the green calico fabric. Her companion made no comment. Irritation nipped at her fragilely held patience.

  She glanced at him from her ungainly position of being half in and half out of her wagon. “I asked you if—”

  She broke off, disconcerted by how Mr. Youngblood’s gaze seemed affixed to that portion of her anatomy stuck outside the canvas opening. The indecorous upward thrust of her bottom was mere inches from that interested regard.

  What a rude rascal he was, not to avert his glance. She scooted onto the seat, trying to regain a more orthodox pose. She blew back the strands of hair that had fallen into her eyes.

  “Did you think to retrieve my bonnet as you loaded the wagon?” She refused to comment upon his impertinent inspection of her lower person. There was little point in trying to teach manners to a man who frequented military stockades.

  “I rolled it up in one of your blankets.”

  She let out a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I was afraid you had left it. Just give me a minute, and I’ll get it.”

  “Be quick about it.”

  Such a gracious fellow. She turned and entered the inside of her wagon feetfirst. It was still an awkward movement, but at least she wasn’t sticking out in all the wrong places for Mr. Youngblood’s entertainment.

  She found the blanket she’d used last night and located the sadly bedraggled hat. Before returning to her seat, she took the opportunity to carefully tuck away the books she’d reclaimed before boarding the wagon.

  “I’m all set now,” she announced as she climbed back next to him, shaking the winkles and dust from the muchabused bonnet.

  He said nothing, nor did he make any move to proceed.

  “Well, just don’t sit there and stare at me,” she muttered dourly. “According to you, time is of the essence.”

  “Are you going to put that thing on?”

  She looked at him in surprise. “Of course.”

  “Then do it.”

  “You know, Mr. Youngblood, you’re a downright irritating fellow.” She sought to untangle the snarled ribbon ties. “I wouldn’t be the least surprised to discover that’s why you were locked up—for being generally obnoxious.”

  “I’m waiting for you to put on your damned hat so we can get going without you tumbling onto your sweetly shaped behind.”

  He had been sneaking peeks at her posterior! A hot flush bathed her cheeks. Good grief, he was a barbarian.

  Naturally, she was somewhat mollified to learn that he approved of what he’d seen. Still, the man needed the most basic of lessons on how to conduct himself with a lady. But then, criminals of his sort probably didn’t often associate with ladies, not even ones with her own somewhat maligned reputation.

  “I think I can manage to put my bonnet on and remain seated,” she said sharply. “Provided, of course, that you can manage to avoid the larger holes pocking this charming road we’re obliged to follow.”

  “We’re not staying on the main road.”

  She stopped fiddling with the knot she’d been trying to unravel. He had her full attention now. “Why on earth not?”

  “It’s sixty miles to Trinity Falls on this route. That’s a sixday journey, with a fully loaded wagon pulled by oxen.”

  “So?”

  “That’s six days on flat terrain that will leave us exposed to attack from any roaming Indians.”

  “Which isn’t a good situation to be in,” she mused aloud.

  “A better choice for us would be to leave the main road and detour through those mountains.”

  Victoria looked toward the mountains in question. They loomed large and inhospitable—great granite crags stretching skyward. Caps of snow from the previous winter still covered the upper reaches. Even the tenacious pines and cedars hadn’t trespassed to those higher realms.

  “You are simpleminded to think my team and wagon can scale those rugged cliffs.”

  It wasn’t until the words popped out of her mouth that Victoria realized she’d spoken plainly enough for even a simpleton to realize he’d been insulted. She kept her gaze pinned resolutely on the jagged outcroppings.

  “Do you plan to insult me all the way to Trinity Falls?”

  There was no ignoring his tone’s stony timbre.

  She decided only a coward would refuse to look at him when she answered his question. Until this very moment, Victoria hadn’t realized she had a cowardly bone in her body. She drew in a breath and ceased her futile struggles with her ribbon ties. Turning slowly, she confronted her offended companion.

  “I apologize, Mr. Youngblood, for hurting your feelings.”

  He stared at her hard enough with that cyclopean eye of his to raise goose bumps on her skin.

  “And,” she continued gamely, “in the future, I will endeavor to control my tongue.”

  At her words, his harsh gaze swooped to her lips. Her goose bumps multiplied a hundredfold.

  His mouth curved. On someone else the gesture would have resembled a smile. On him, the action had a kind of carnivorous aspect. She suspected that the Big Bad Wolf had sized up Little Red Riding Hood in that exact predatory fashion.

  “It’s at this point that you’re supposed to accept my apology,” she instructed.

  “If it will get that damned bonnet on your head any quicker, I’ll accept your most humble apologies.”

  She bit back her objections to his profanity, his reference to her “most humble” apologies and his entirely offensive manner. Instead she concentrated on unknotting the damned snarl that had—

  Victoria winced. Goodness, the crude man was already proving to have a corrupting effect upon her moral character. She never swore. Not when being falsely accused of misconduct with her sister’s beau, not when an unsympathetic wagon master refused to wait for her, not when dealing with unrepentant criminals.

  She governed her life by a high set of principles. And it was especially important now that she adhere to that superior code of conduct. After all, when she reached Trinity Falls, she would be instructing a young woman in the elements of being a proper lady, as well as handling the girl’s general education. It wouldn’t do at all for Victoria to show up in her new environment contaminated by her association with Logan Youngblood.

  It was she who needed to exert a positive influence upon him. Surely, with a diligent effort upon her part, he could be dissuaded from
his wayward ways.

  The knot finally loosened enough for her to free the ribbons. She wasted no time in securing the hat to her head.

  “We’re not going over the mountains,” Youngblood said. “There are trails and passes I’m hoping to get this wagon through. Once we’re shielded by the forest, I’ll feel better.”

  “I suppose it does make sense for us to make ourselves less conspicuous,” she conceded reluctantly. The thought of entering the mysterious denseness of the wooded wilderness, however, was daunting to a city girl like herself. It seemed that it would be very easy to become lost among those pines that grew so astonishingly close to each other. It looked as if even the sunlight had to struggle to penetrate the lightly packed clusters of trees. “Are you sure you know the way to Trinity Falls?”

  It was clear to Logan that Victoria Amory did not have the slightest confidence in his abilities to get her safely to civilization. He probably shouldn’t have been surprised by her lack of trust. She had the lowest opinion of him of anyone he’d ever met, and that probably included Colonel Windham.

  She sat next to him with that pitiful scrap of mangled fabric on her head and still managed to appear as composed as a schoolmistress about to call her class to order. He supposed she was just naturally bossy.

  He limited himself to answering, “I’ve lived in the West for a while now.”

  “In these hills?” she asked, obviously still needing reassurance.

  He raised the whip to get the team moving again. “No, I’ve lived in town.”

  No doubt dividing his time between saloons and the city jail, Victoria thought.

  Logan maneuvered the wagon off the road, taking an upward strip of flattened grass that wound northward through the pines. Sharp-needled branches scraped their canvas-covered canopy. The ride became rougher. Miss Amory latched on to the side of her seat like a limpet stuck to a ship’s hull.

  “I’m not so sure this is a good idea,” she said, her voice a virtual squeak. “I don’t have a map we can refer to.”

  “I don’t need a map.”

  “Forgive me for not having more confidence in you,” she began, using that snippy tone of hers. “But I was warned most forcibly by the wagon master to remain on the main road.”

  “You can bet that if he was in our situation, he would try to make himself invisible to the Indians, too.”

  The wagon took another sharp lurch. Victoria almost bounced off her seat. He reached out and pulled her to him.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Keeping you from breaking your neck,” he answered grimly. She felt so small and fragile next, to him. Again a strong sense of protectiveness surged within him. It wasn’t a feeling he welcomed, but he seemed unable to fight it. “If we were going at a slower pace, I’d let you walk. It would mean less wear and tear on your.body. But for the rest of the day, at least, we need to put as much distance between us and the fort as we can.”

  She stopped struggling. One of her palms curled around his arm. Her other hand gripped his shoulder. “If we leave the river, how will we find water for the oxen?”

  “There’s quite a few streams that feed into the Ruby. Don’t worry, water won’t be a problem.”

  “But how will you know where to—”

  “Look, Miss Amory, this isn’t the time or place to have a discussion. I’ve got to concentrate on keeping these animals on a path that’s no bigger than a cat’s behind. We’ll talk later.”

  He ducked, pulling her down with him, when a lowhanging branch threatened to take their heads off. Dust and dead pine needles flew as the limb smacked the top of the lurching wagon.

  She buried her face in his sleeve. When she came up for air, she was coughing. “As long as you realize I’m in charge.”

  Little gasps kept time with each bump they experienced. He didn’t know whether to laugh or swear at the stubborn female. She had the most one-track mind of any woman he’d ever met.

  “Oh, yeah,” he growled, feeling the jarring in his tender ribs. “You’re definitely in charge.”

  He would let her think that all the way to Trinity Falls.

  It seemed to Victoria that her entire twenty-four years had shrunk to this jerky passage through the Idaho wilderness. They had been traveling for hours now. And there was no outward sign from Youngblood that he meant to stop anytime soon. Because the thickly timbered landscape blocked most of the sun’s rays, it was difficult to gauge the time of day. From her stomach’s not-so-discreet rumblings, though, she assumed it was well past noon.

  The grim-faced man beside her hadn’t spoken for the longest time. But then, their violent progress discouraged conversation. She had to admit he was good with her team. She doubted she could have bullied them along this wild stretch.

  Victoria marveled that he managed to keep to the narrow trail. There were instances when she thought they’d taken a blind alley and would have to turn around, but despite numerous twists and turns, Youngblood always moved forward.

  They came to a relatively smooth section of the path, and the sounds of the wagon’s creaking protests softened. She heard the excited chatter of darting squirrels and the lively calls of birds.

  “I can’t believe how close the trees are to each other,” she remarked, feeling disoriented by the thousands upon thousands of thin-trunked pines around them. Only inches separated the tall narrow-beamed trees from one another.

  Her taciturn companion looked from the trail and gazed into the immense forest that embraced them on all sides as far as the eye could see. “Lodgepole pines grow that way.”

  “It’s really quite beautiful, isn’t it?” she asked, succumbing to a need to share her appreciation of the untamed splendor in which she found herself.

  He turned toward her. At the sight of his rawly bruised face, just inches from hers, she flinched. His facial injuries spoke of unchecked violence and the often brutal nature of men.

  “Beautiful and deadly.”

  His matter-of-factness chilled her. It was as if he was deliberately trying to frighten her. His intent stare made her wonder again if she’d delivered herself into the hands of the devil. Was he waiting for the right place, away from any signs of civilization, to do away with her and steal her wagon?

  She fortified herself with a gulp of pine-scented air. “Deadly because of the Indians?”

  He nodded. “There’s that. But there’s also bears, rattlers, wolves and mountain lions.”

  Her stomach flipped. She wished he hadn’t bothered itemizing the various menacing creatures shielded by the forest.

  Before Victoria could comment, the smooth stretch they were traversing became steeper and more uneven. She held on tighter to the wagon’s side panel and gritted her teeth to keep from biting her tongue.

  Harness leather groaned as the oxen lowered their heads and plodded onward. The wild ride continued for several yards, and then Youngblood pulled back on the reins.

  “Whoa!” came his clearly exasperated shout.

  Three lodgepole pines had fallen across the faint trail. Youngblood handed her the reins. “It looks like we’re going to be here for a while.” He stepped down from the high bench seat, his face turned toward her. A look of pain flashed across his grimly set features. “I hope you’ve got an ax tucked away somewhere among all those books.”

  “It’s lashed to the side of the wagon. Are you going to try and chop a path through those trees?”

  He shot her an impatient glance. “I’m not going to try. I’m going to do it.”

  In light of his arrogance, her sympathy for the injured man diminished. “While you’re doing that, I’d like to stretch my legs.” She tossed the reins to him and scooted into position to descend. “If we’re going to be here for a while, I’ll build us a fire and fry us up some pan biscuits.”

  “There aren’t going to be any fires.”

  His harsh voice was surprisingly close. She stopped midway to the ground and glanced over her shoulder. She found hers
elf looking into the pinpoint focus of Youngblood’s cyclopean eyeball. She blinked, feeling strangely bound by his unexpected proximity. She swallowed; any words she’d been about to utter were forgotten.

  His strong hands came around her waist, and he lowered her to the pine-needled carpet that covered the forest floor. There was a buzzing in her ears. It took her a moment to realize that a fat black deerfly was responsible for the distracting hum.

  “We can’t afford to reveal our presence by building a fire,” he continued, his large palms still engulfing her. “Not for at least another day, anyway.”

  Victoria had nowhere to go. With Youngblood pressed up behind her and the wagon in front, she was his prisoner.

  “I still need to stretch my legs,” she told him. To her own ears, her voice sounded hoarse. She stepped to her right, assuming he would let her twist free. The next couple of seconds were the longest of her life. But when she pushed against his constraining hold, he moved back and released her.

  “I’ll get the ax.”

  It was the kind of statement that needed no response. She walked a few feet from the wagon and inhaled the rich mountain air. A strong hint of wild mint laced the cooling afternoon breeze.

  Victoria noticed several clusters of purplish berries growing in heaps of green foliage. She recognized them as a variety of wild chokecherries and decided to gather some. When she returned to the wagon to retrieve a pail, the sound of the falling ax echoed through their secluded stopping place.

  In response to the discordant thwack of the ax, raucous birds took to the sky in noisy protest. Pail in hand, Victoria circled the wagon. Youngblood stood in a shaft of pooling sunlight that managed to find its way through the cover of pine boughs. He had removed his shirt for his physical exertions, and he swung the long-handled blade with an economy of motion. Each strike of sharp metal bit deeply into the wood. Bits of bark and needles billowed from the steady blows.