The unknown sank new fear into her, but a thread of hope bloomed too. Please let it be Trey!
She pulled her torn blouse over her chemise and scrambled to her feet, putting distance between her and Ned. Only then did she turn around.
Not Trey. Not her hero.
Her gaze widened on the four riders who stood at the edge of their camp. Even in the dim light she could see all of them were armed, though none had drawn a weapon. But if looks could kill, Ned Durant would be a dead man.
She took a step backward, then another. These men weren’t here to rescue her. No, they were of the same ilk as Ned. Maybe worse. Good God ...
“Little lady, you’d best stop where you’re at,” said the man who sat tallest in the saddle, his wide-brimmed hat blocking out all firelight that would have let her see his face.
She froze in her tracks and swallowed hard.
“Run,” Ned told her.
She felt the calculating stare of four pairs of eyes daring her to try. She knew before she cleared camp she’d be shot. And maybe that would be for the best.
The leader of the men spoke up. “You got five seconds to holster that Colt or the man behind you is going to blow you to hell.”
She glanced back, seeing moonlight glint off a gun instead of the man holding it. Again, Ned was the target.
Ned didn’t bother turning. He just swore and shoved his revolver in the holster.
“You with him?” the man asked her.
Tell the truth or lie? Either could be the death of her.
“No,” she said and earned a ripe curse from Ned. “He forced me to ride with him.”
The leader of the riders chuckled, a rusty sound that scraped over her nerves. “What’s in it for you, Durant?”
So this man knew Ned. Still, she didn’t hold any hope that this would work out better for her. She was still in danger.
“Just a woman to warm my bed,” Ned said.
“You should’ve picked a more obliging one.” The man’s demeanor shifted like a winter wind, growing cold and biting. “You owe me, Durant.”
“Told you I’d make it good in a month or so.”
The man snorted and nodded to one of his men. “I’m tired of waiting.”
She caught the nervous tick along Ned’s jaw as the cowboy rode over to where Ned’s gelding and her mare were staked. “The mare is worth a pretty penny, but you won’t get much off that old plug I’m riding. Leave it so we can ride out of here.”
But the cowpoke led both horses away anyway. A sick feeling settled in her gut when she realized she’d be stranded here in the middle of the desert with Ned. They were miles from civilization with little to eat or drink. They surely wouldn’t live long.
“Damn you!” Ned said. “I said I’d pay you back.”
“You’ve been saying that for months. Your time has run out.”
Ned inched backward, his body coiled with tension like a snake ready to strike. But the riders were just as on edge, just as deadly looking.
“Take her,” Ned said. “She’ll fetch a pretty penny in Mexico.”
She felt their gazes on her again, assessing her worth. She hated Ned for drawing their attention to her, for suggesting that she be sold like a slave.
“Those golden-haired ones always did bring a good price,” the man said. “But I’m not about to tempt banditos and a revolution for a chance to peddle her to the highest bidder.”
“So it comes down to this,” Ned said, his tone flat.
“You reap what you sow. Get a rope,” the man said, still staring at Ned whose eyes were darting nervously around now.
A cowboy unfastened his lasso from the saddle and began whirling it over his head. It whistled in the deadly silence, a lonesome sough that left her trembling, left her wondering what would happen next. Nothing good, she was sure.
Was that how Trey had looked when Ned had cornered him? When he knew he’d be dragged to death behind a horse?
She saw the rope sailing through the air toward Ned. He stepped back, but instead of bolting, he drew his revolver. But he never got the chance to fire it.
Shots exploded in the air, leaving a cloud of gunsmoke that burned her nostrils. Ned’s body jolted three times, seeming suspended in midair.
He collapsed on the ground, shirtfront bloody, body limp. He’d chosen this way to die over being dragged to death. He’d left her alone with these men.
Her heart pounded so fast she was lightheaded. Her stomach roiled with dread of what was to come.
Nobody gave the order to bury Ned. She was too afraid to voice the suggestion.
“Saddle the mare and help the lady mount her horse,” the leader said.
The man in the shadows jumped to obey, leaving her standing in the wash of the campfire. Alone. Terrified.
“Please. Take my horse and his. Just leave me here,” she said. “There are people looking for me and—”
“Afraid I can’t do that, ma’am,” the leader drawled. “We’ve got a U.S. Marshal on our trail, and we can’t have you telling him you saw us in these parts.”
Outlaws. She’d known they must be, but hearing that they were wanted doused her in renewed fear.
“I don’t even know who you are,” she said. “Even if I did, I wouldn’t say anything.”
Though she couldn’t see his eyes, she felt his gaze bore into her—cold, hard, impatient. “Ma’am, if you want to live, you’ll set your mare and be quick about it.”
She stifled a hysterical sob and wiped the telling moisture from her eyes. No, she didn’t want to die, but surely going with these men would be the death of her if the law caught up to them and guns started blazing.
All because she was riding on the wrong side of the law. In the company of outlaws.
As always, that word scraped over a brief memory of three other outlaws, their faces lean and scraggly, their eyes cold and unforgiving. Wanted posters she’d seen once when a posse of Texas Rangers had paid Daddy a visit on the chance one of the gang was working for them.
She’d never understood why those posters had made her feel so sad. Why their faces and names had seemed familiar to her since Daddy told the rangers that the trio had never set foot on the JDB.
But as that memory of them flared in her mind again, she knew why. The Logan Gang. Three brothers who chose to live by their guns.
She knew in her soul that she was the daughter of one of them. Clete? Yes.
“You’re trying my patience, ma’am,” the outlaw said. “I ain’t a patient man.”
She could balk like Ned and end up shot to death here, or take her chances with the men. She surely wasn’t fooled by their manners toward her. But she wasn’t ready to die. There was still the chance she could escape. That she’d find her way back to Trey.
Find her way.
That seemed to be the sum of her life. Searching for what she couldn’t find in her lost memory. Stumbling across the truth when it wouldn’t do her any good.
Daisy crossed to the men without looking at them, refusing to give them the satisfaction of knowing she was terrified. She waved aside the cowboy’s help and gained her saddle alone, dismayed to realize they hadn’t put a bridle on her horse.
The dangers that Ned had described to her about traveling at night seemed inconsequential now. These men were used to moving in shadows. Evading the law.
“Let’s ride,” the leader said.
The others fell into place as well, riding in a loose group, setting a fast pace. Heading north.
Another chapter of her life began, this one threatening to be brutal if not short. Would she ever have a normal life?
The days of being a rancher’s pampered daughter seemed a lifetime away. But her memories of Trey sharpened with each mile that took her farther from him.
Because of Ned, he’d gone through hell, yet he had survived and returned to her. She had to be just that strong.
Trey rode as fast as he dared to push his gelding, but there were too many times he
had to stop and search for the trail. Too many times when memories of being dragged over this hard, arid ground tormented him. Too many when his fear damned near brought him to his knees.
He’d failed Daisy. Didn’t matter that she’d sneaked off to her daddy’s grave alone.
After seeing the ranch burnt to the ground, he should have expected more trouble. He should’ve suspected that Ned had done this to bring him here to finish what he’d failed to do six months ago.
But he’d gotten wrapped up in Daisy’s arms. That adoring glow in her eyes had muddled his mind. He’d gotten caught up in lust. He’d been sure that she’d accept his suit. But she wanted more. She wanted his heart, and he didn’t have that in him to give. At least not like she deserved.
He crouched and pressed his fingers into the tracks he’d been trailing. Ned was headed for Pope’s Crossing.
It didn’t seem possible that one week ago Trey had left El Paso and come through here on his way to the JDB. Now he was heading back. Or not.
Hard telling where Ned was taking her, but he suspected they were camped for the night somewhere before Pope’s Crossing, somewhere isolated. He recalled a place just a mile ahead.
Darkness had settled over West Texas hours ago and gave much needed relief from the punishing sun. He was riding on instinct now, taking a chance that Ned had camped this side of the Pecos River tonight.
His horse blew softly and tossed his head, begging for water. But the banks were too steep here. Up ahead there used to be a pole and bucket that settlers used to haul water from the river to the campground. That’s where he expected to find Ned and Daisy.
He shifted in the saddle, sniffing the air for smoke. The barest whiff of it drifted to him.
The last thing he wanted to do was alert Ned he was near. So he kept the pace slow, inching his way over the rugged terrain, using care so his horse didn’t stumble.
He reached his destination at last and stopped on the edge of the area. At first glance it looked deserted, leaving him to think they’d stopped here but moved on, riding into the night.
Then his gaze spied the form lying prone near a mesquite bush. The man wasn’t sleeping, not sprawled like that.
Trey dismounted and walked into the camp, heart thundering with fear of what he’d turn up. The prone cowboy was Ned, shot to death.
Had she gotten the jump on Ned? Or had someone else killed the bastard?
He hoped it was the first and she was simply hiding now. Hoped she wasn’t injured or worse.
“Daisy?”
Nothing answered him but a hot, dry wind that rattled the creosote bushes and his patience.
He broke off a branchy limb and stuck the splintered end into the campfire embers. The makeshift torch flared to life and cast a yellow glow over the sandy ground, the pungent scent masking that of death.
He found where two horses had been staked out, likely Ned’s gelding and her mare. Two sets of men’s boot prints churned up the sand. One headed back into the camp. The other skirted it.
Yet another set inched around the perimeter. They’d been surrounded by at least two men.
He held the torch overhead and followed the tracks, noting different boot prints. Spotting small footprints. Dainty ones mingling with the multitude of hooves. Daisy.
His blood ran cold. There were tracks of five more horses at the far perimeter. Only two men had dismounted.
Couldn’t have been lawmen, or they would’ve taken Ned’s body back toward Odessa or on to Pecos. Instead the tracks went north toward Pope’s Crossing.
There were two main roads beyond the Pecos River. The Texas Road leading north into New Mexico and the El Paso Road.
He doused the flame in the burned out fire pit and forked the saddle, fearing the worst. Any manner of men could’ve taken her. His only choice was to ride on and find their trail.
He wasn’t going to stop until he found her.
Chapter 16
Daisy was close to falling from the saddle when the first rays of sun shot pink and gold arcs into a cloudless sky. They’d ridden steadily all night with few stops.
The last time the leader—Egan Jarvis, she’d discovered, though the name meant nothing to her—had ordered her tied to the saddle when she’d refused to ride with him. He was a handsome man and not much older than Trey, but she didn’t want his hands on her. Having him watch her so closely was enough to make her skin crawl.
As for the others, they deferred to Jarvis with as much loyalty as her daddy had earned from his hands. At least most of the men.
She swallowed hard and tried not to relive that moment when Ned was gunned down. When she’d stood there frozen and terrified, wondering if a bullet would find her next.
“Welcome to the Lazy 8, Miss Daisy,” Jarvis said, his soft-spoken drawl drifting back to her.
She refused to comment, but she did stare in surprise at the ranch spread out in the valley ahead. All along she’d painted Egan Jarvis and his men as outlaws, wanted for God knew how many crimes.
But his show of good manners and educated speech was at odds with the swift way he’d killed Ned Durant and threatened to do the same to her unless she went with him. Ned must have owed him. But why did he feel he had to abduct her?
She doubted the answers would ease her mind. As she got closer, she could see that the adobe home was large and seemed well kept. So were the corral and barn.
The long, low bunkhouse where cowboys milled about was large enough to hold a small army. Judging by the well-armed men she saw everywhere, that’s exactly what Jarvis had here on his ranch.
Sun glinted off barbed wire that went on for miles to fence in an odd mix of Black Angus, white-faced Herefords, and horses of every description.
It wouldn’t be easy to get in or out of this ranch that sat in the middle of nowhere. The sense of being trapped crawled over her. She had no idea which direction would take her to a town and help and which would lead her out into the desert.
Except for the ridge of dark mountains that rose to the west, the land looked much the same as what she’d always known. Miles of mesquite and creosote bushes with sparse grass for cattle to graze.
Not that she or her mare had the strength to travel anymore this day. She needed sleep, but she wondered if that would even be afforded to her here.
Jarvis swung off his big stallion and strode back to her, looking no worse for wear after their grueling ride across New Mexico. “I’ll get you settled in the house and have your mare tended to. Ava will see that everything you need is provided for.”
So there was a woman here. That afforded her a bit of relief as his big hands made quick work of untying the rope that bound her to the saddle.
He lifted her off the horse and set her on her feet until she steadied herself. Though she wanted to protest his touch, she knew she couldn’t have done either without his help.
“Thank you,” she said when the numbness left her legs enough that she could move out of his hold.
A young woman stood on the porch with a little boy clinging to her skirts. “I didn’t expect company.”
“This wasn’t planned,” he told the woman.
The brittle silence told Daisy that the lady of the house wasn’t pleased that he’d brought another woman home. Well, she wasn’t happy about it either.
“Your wife and son?” Daisy asked him.
“Ava is my sister. The boy is hers.”
So this was a family compound. That still didn’t ease her mind a bit.
The big hand on her elbow signaled her to move. She did in silence, climbing the steps and giving Ava a tight smile. It wasn’t returned. Neither was the one she favored the child with.
“Uncle Egan!” The little boy ran into Jarvis’s arms.
He scooped the boy up, but not a bit of happiness or relief showed on his ruggedly handsome face. The face of a fallen angel, she thought.
“Miss Daisy will be our guest for a while,” he told his sister.
“Not for lon
g,” Daisy rushed to add when Ava frowned. “I’d like to return to Texas as soon as possible.”
Jarvis heaved a sigh. “It was unfortunate that you were in Ned Durant’s company when our paths finally crossed.”
“I won’t tell anyone that you shot him,” Daisy said. “After what he did to me”—and her daddy, Sam Weber, and Trey—“he deserved it.”
“Forgive me for being slow to trust,” Jarvis said, as he set his nephew down. “Please, go with Ava and get some rest. It’s been a trying journey for you.”
Daisy suspected life would get more trying as the days wore on. Though Jarvis appeared genteel now, she knew a killer lurked under that polished façade. But she knew there was no use pleading her case now, especially since she was too exhausted to think rationally with her emotions on edge.
Brother and sister shared an odd look before Ava led Daisy inside. A deep sadness wrapped icy arms around Daisy. She missed Trey so much. Missed her home.
“My brother means no harm,” Ava said as she led Daisy down a hall, the heels on her smart half boots clinking on the tiled floor. “He doesn’t trust you.”
“I don’t trust him either.”
Ava smiled as she opened the door to a room midway down the hall. It was large and airy with a beautiful woven spread on the four-poster bed. But to Daisy it was still a prison that she’d be hard-pressed to escape.
“I can draw a bath for you now if you’d like,” Ava said.
Daisy would have loved to soak in a tub, but it was an effort to keep her eyes open now. “I’ll wait until I’ve rested.”
“Do you need my help?” Ava asked.
A choked laugh, or maybe it was a sob, escaped her. “Convince your brother to let me go home.”
Ava didn’t answer, but Daisy hadn’t expected she would.
She was barely aware of the door closing, of being alone in the room. She managed to remove her boots and jacket, but that took the last of her strength.
She crawled onto the clean bed, too tired to be shamed that she’d dirty it with her clothes on. Too depressed to do more than curl in a ball and surrender to sleep.
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