by Lenore Wolfe
“That you do,” Kid agreed. “You definitely need taming.”
Hawk grabbed Mandy and hauled her to his side, a firm band of steel holding her in place. “And you’re just the man for the job,” he went on.
Kid adjusted his hands when Kat tried first to scratch his hands to free herself, then to buck him off.
“Definitely; I’m gonna tame you, wild-cat.”
“In a pig’s eye,” Mandy hollered, trying to dislodge the arm holding her.
“That’s why you’re going to marry her,” Hawk finished, and Mandy went still.
“Yeah, that’s why I’m gonna—what?!” Kid’s head jerked up, his gaze meeting Hawk’s. His mouth rounded in shock at the very idea.
“Marry her,” Hawk grinned unrepentantly, and Mandy wrapped her arms around his waist, settling to his side, seeing his intent.
Kid stared at him, then at Kat. She’d gone completely still and was watching him.
“Yeah,” Kid said softly “that’s why I’m gonna marry you. Will you have me?”
Kat bit her lip, tears running down her face. She nodded her head, and Kid gathered her into his arms.
“That’s it!” Jake roared. “Hawk, you’d better find a way to finish this war, ‘cause whatever disease is going on around here, it’s catching, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to get it.”
“Hee hee hee,” Charlie chuckled, coming up behind Jake, seeing another way to rib him. “Could just see you gett’n hitched, Jake.”
Jake glared at him with a fury that would have stopped most men in their tracks. But Charlie only grinned at him. “Gonna fall in love, Jake? Come to think of it, I know a pretty, little thing with red hair and the most vivid, green eyes you’ve ever seen,” he added, then shot out the door as fast as his old bones would take him, chuckling the whole way.
“I need a drink.” Jake stomped his way to the liquor cupboard.
Chapter Twenty-three
Kid and Kat took turns taking a shot, with a bow and arrow, at the target they had set up on some bales of hay. Kid’s landed in the bull’s eye, Kat’s right beside it. Mandy watched them shoot from where she stood, hanging the week’s laundry out in the sweet sunshine. When they invited her to try, she was unable to resist the temptation to show off a little. What could it hurt? Hawk was out on the range anyway.
Smiling at Kid, she took the bow from him. It was larger and stronger than what she was used to, but with some concentration, she managed to put the arrow right between Kid’s and Kat’s.
Hearing a familiar growl, she swung around like a mouse caught under a cat’s paw. He was coming across the yard, heading straight for her, and his eyes were flint-steel lethal.
She was tempted to use Kid as a shield but, unable to be that cowardly, she stayed right where she was. He came straight for her, with Mandy backing up a step with each one he took towards her, until she bumped up against the wall, her escape cut off.
He grabbed her wrist and turned to haul her into the house when, with a whistle and a thud, he found his arm pinned to the wall. He looked down, stunned to find Kat’s blade holding his shirt sleeve firmly in place.
“I would never hurt her, Kat,” he said softly. “You must know that.
Blushing, Kat removed the blade. “Yeah, I guess I do. Sorry about that.” She placed the knife in its sheath.
Kid was grinning. “Where did you learn to throw a blade like that, Kitten?”
Hawk had taken Mandy’s arm and started for the house again—when Kat’s answer brought them both up short.
“What did you say?” Mandy was the first to choke out.
“I said, I learned it growing up with my grandma’s people. They were Blackfoot,” she added. “I lived with them most of my life.” She looked at their faces. “Why?”
Stunned, Kid looked at Hawk. Hawk looked at Kat, and Mandy just concentrated on breathing evenly.
Mandy took a deep breath and let it out. “He really is insane.”
“Kid, Kat—and me,” Hawk’s golden eyes fastened on Mandy with an intensity that stripped her soul bare. “If that’s the connection. Then, that’s why—you too, Mandy.” He looked dumbstruck. “I thought it was because of the plantation...” He looked at Mandy. “Is there anything you know—that would explain this...?”
Mandy lowered her lashes before he saw all. “I only spent those few years with the Lakota, and you know all about that. Other than that, he needs my land. He wants control of the river—and the railroad.”
He laid a finger under her chin and slowly lifted it until she looked up at him. “Where did you learn to shoot a bow like that? Not from the Lakota, I can assure you of that. So where?”
With an effort, she drew in a ragged breath into her lungs. She licked her dry lips and caved. She just couldn’t lie to Hawk. “From a Cheyenne friend.” She glanced up. “We couldn’t let people know of our friendship. He and his mother lived with his white father. We learned early on how it would go if it were to become known that a white girl and an Indian boy were friends.”
Hawk’s gut clenched. Her friend was a man. “Apparently Ashley found out!”
Mandy opened her mouth to deny it and realized her mistake. “Yes, that must be it.”
Hawk gave her a smoldering look of intent. “Mandy!”
She nearly jumped. “How is Kid involved?” She tried to change the subject.
His look was measuring... searching. “He is my brother.”
Kid grinned when her eyes met his in shock. “Welcome to the family.”
“He was ten when our family died of cholera. Another family adopted him when I left. He was twelve when his small village was attacked by whites. I found him years later. They were working him like a dog at Fort Laramie.” Hawk’s lips quirked. “I took him to Doc, but after I left, someone started harassing them. So, Doc finally sent him back east to school. When Kid returned, he took to the cattle drives.”
“And Ashley wants you because you used to live with the Cheyenne?” She tilted her head to see his eyes in the sun.
Hawk opened his mouth to deny it. Then, his lips turned up in a smile. “Yeah, that must be it.”
Mandy glared at him. “But what does any of this have to do with Ashley? Why you? And why Kid? Why not someone else?”
Kat shook her head in thought. “And I can see no connection to me—other than my grandmother’s people. Why would he do this?”
Hawk mopped his brow with a red bandana. The heat was relentless. “Something else is bothering me, too.” He looked straight at Kid. “Someone beat me to inviting you here, when I was laid up.” He turned then, and went into the house.
Kid frowned at that. “You Mandy?”
“I didn’t even know of you until you arrived.”
“So you’re all saying Ashley has murdered my parents because of our connection to our people.” Kat’s eyes glowed with rage. “Has he done anything, I mean, specific, to you?” she directed the question at Kid.
Kid frowned. “He was the white man at the head of the slaughter of my village that day,” he quietly answered.
Mandy winced.
Kat stared intently at Kid, her large, yellow eyes unblinking. “Then, you know how I feel. Why I have to get him.”
“Yeah. I know.” Kid cocked his head. “We’ll both get him, okay.”
“But why? Why is Ashley doing all this?” Mandy asked, unseeing.
“Because, his father—our father, kept leaving his mother to come to my mother,” came a young woman’s voice from behind them.
Mandy spun around. “Star Flower!”
“Star Flower?” Kid frowned.
Ignoring him, Mandy rushed to her side. “Star Flower. If he finds out you were here, he’ll kill you.”
“I had to come.” She hugged Mandy. “I had to warn you.”
“Warn her? About what?” Hawk’s masculine voice broke in from the porch. He sipped a glass of lemonade, his golden eyes appraising the beautiful, Cheyenne maiden. “I thought you said yo
ur friend was a man?”
Star Flower stared, speechless, at Hawk.
“Well?”
As though shook out of a trance, she turned and clutched Mandy. “He knows!”
“Oh, no,” Mandy whispered, clutching her middle.
“Who knows?” Hawk frowned, then, noting Mandy’s chalky appearance, asked, “Knows what?”
Star Flower turned to plead with Hawk. “She’s in grave danger.” She grabbed Mandy’s arm. “He’s unhinged. You’ve ruined him, you know.”
Hawk’s consternation was like a dark thundercloud. He pinned Star Flower, then Mandy, with a look of pure fury. “What does he know?” he asked in a voice that was all the more deadly for the quiet way with which he spoke.
Without another a word, Mandy took her friend’s arm and led them all into the house. When they reached the den, she moved the painting and opened the safe. She removed a canvas bag and dumped the contents on the desk. Not once did she look at Hawk, too afraid of what she would see there.
He had told her not to lie to him. He’d even given her plenty of opportunities to tell him. But here she was, caught before she could finally tell all. He’d never believe her now. Worse, he’d hate her
She knew, without watching, that he was sifting through the different papers—heard him lay one down and pick up another. She never even noticed that Kid was doing the same. Her every nerve vibrated with each move Hawk made.
She noted, beneath lowered lashes, when he picked out what she knew to be several promissory notes, which held in ruin so many people and, finally, she noticed Kid doing the same. Kat caught on to which ones they wanted and was handing hers to Kid while he explained what they were. Only Star Flower stood by, quietly watching.
Turning, Hawk placed his in the fire, and it wasn’t long before Kid did the same. “I wonder,” he mused, “how many of them were, in some way, connected to our people?”
Mandy’s body vibrated with tension—and fear. When would he break this calm?
She didn’t have to wait long...
With a murderous look, he swung on her. “Where did you get these?”
“I stole them?” she tried.
He clamped his jaw down so hard it flexed several times before he could ask, “How?”
Mandy glanced frantically at Star Flower and, stepping forward, the young maiden laid her hand on Hawk’s arm.
He looked down at her hand, his gaze raking her. “Who are you?”
Mandy saw her take a deep breath before answering, “I am Ashley’s sister.”
Hawk went stone-cold still. He blinked, as though to clear his head, then blinked again. “Jason’s daughter?” he croaked.
“That’s right,” she replied, softly.
He turned and walked out.
Star Flower went after him, and Mandy stared after them, confused. Something didn’t fit here. Her heart slammed in pain, deep within her chest. Her shoulders dropped in grief. She didn’t understand why Star Flower would care what Hawk thought and... and Mandy had lied to him. He was never going to forgive her.
She had lost him.
Star Flower found him in the kitchen. She touched his shoulder, and he turned and folded her in his arms, hugging her so tightly that she protested her bones would pop.
“How?” his voice was thick with unshed tears.
“Our father searched for you for years.” She winced at the hate she saw in his eyes. Pulling away, she went to the window. “During one particular search, he—met my mother.”
“That son-of-a...”
She held up her hand. “Yeah, well, we both know he’s a cruel man. But at least I’m here.” She smiled. “I have waited so long...”
He put his hands on her shoulders. “I have a sister... A beautiful, charming sister.” His eyes turned dark. “And I’m going to kill Ashley.”
Star Flower smiled. “He hasn’t been too bad to me, Hawk.” She closed her eyes. “How I dreamed of you, when I was little...
“I heard all the stories about you, you know. And what I couldn’t get out of father, I searched every paper to find out.” She laughed at his surprise. “Yes, I taught myself to read just so I could find out all about my big brother.”
She easily read the pain, and regret, in Hawk’s golden eyes. “No, Hawk, I did not tell you this so you would feel guilt. I am happy they did not touch you with their evil.”
He touched her face as if to examine it for injury. “Did he hurt you?”
“Father wouldn’t let him.”
“So the old man was good for something after all.”
“He helped.” She headed for the door and glanced back. “I have to get back. Ashley cannot find me gone. He will know where I went.”
“Absolutely, not! You’re not going back there!”
She was half-way out the door, but she turned and smiled. “I always knew you’d be this way. That you’d be kind. That you’d ride in on a dark horse, and save me from our cruel brother. Like I said, I dreamed of you.” She looked into his eyes. “But I have to get back.”
He folded his arms. “I will not allow it.”
“You must.” She stepped back toward him, close now, placing her small, slender hand on his arm. “If we’re to catch him, and bring him down, I must stay—where I can help you—all of you.”
“It’s too dangerous!”
“I’ve been there since I was five years old,” she said in a quiet voice.
Hawk shook with the magnitude of his emotions. First, there had been nothing inside him but a burning need for vengeance. Then, a slip of a woman had brought him to his knees with the depth of his love for her. Now, he’d found he still had family--he would claim that is--and his beautiful sister, whom he’d only just found, was telling him he had to let her walk back into dangerous territory, and making him feel damn ridiculous because he wanted to protect her from the very family with whom she’d spent her entire life.
“Mandy knew you were there.” It wasn’t a question. “She left you in danger, without telling me.”
“I insisted on staying. And,” she quietly reminded him, “she doesn’t know I’m your sister, does she Hawk? Because she doesn’t know Jason’s—your father...?”
“How old are you?” Hawk asked, amazed.
“I thought so.” She smiled.
“At first, I was too full of hate to share it.” He swallowed. “Then, I was too afraid she wouldn’t understand. Afraid she’d never let me near her if she knew who she was trying to hire for a gun. That she was hiring the son of the very man she’d been trying to keep away from her ranch.”
He laughed harshly. “Can you beat the irony? She was being forced to marry Ashley. So to save her ranch, she unwittingly marries no other than his brother.” He turned to the window and slapped his hands on either side of it. “She’ll never forgive me when she learns what I’ve done.”
“You have to tell her Hawk. She has to hear it from you before it’s taken out of your hands by circumstance, such as by Ashley.” She touched his back, and he turned and hugged her.
“Tell her,” she whispered, “before it’s too late.”
“Mandy, how did you get these?” Kid asked in order to sidetrack her when she looked toward the door for the fifth time in the past ten minutes. He held up his hand. “And I know you stole them, so no sarcasm please,” he teased.
Mandy looked at what was left of the papers. “What do you think Ashley will do?”
He raised his brows in perfect imitation of Hawk, telling her he was having none of it. “Thing’s will just tighten up around here. Maybe it’ll be the thing that blows this whole business wide open.”
Kat smiled. “Purrrrfect,” she said, in great imitation of her name’s sake.
Mandy couldn’t help but grin.
“Women.” Kid threw up his hands. “Do you realize that the two of you, and now Star Flower,” he added pointedly, “have managed to stir up more trouble than all the cattle rustling combined?” Kat jabbed him in the ribs with he
r elbow. “Dang it, Kat,” he bellowed. “You’re gonna crack every rib I’ve got.”
Mandy grinned again. There was never a dull moment with these two. As a matter of fact, there was never a dull moment with this war—but she could really use an end to the war.
Kid sobered and pinned Mandy with a look, by far too unnerving for a man his age. “How did you get these, Mandy?”
Mandy sighed. She really was going to have to a find better way of keeping these men off-balance. “I broke into Ashley’s place. I’ve been breaking in, methodically looking for his safe combination, for the past several weeks. Star Flower has been searching too—and covering my tracks.”
“She found me the third time I broke in, and she wanted to help,” Mandy smiled, despite her fears. “She’d noticed the door kept getting unlocked, and things seemed different to her, I guess.” She sighed. “Looks as if she wasn’t the only one to notice.”
“Looks like,” Kid frowned.
“Either that, or he recognized my face before Star Flower knocked him out,” she mused to herself, not even aware that she’d spoken out-loud.
“Mandy!”
She jumped when three voices yelled her name simultaneously.
The only one she focused on—was Hawk’s. Damn the man. How did he always manage to do it? Once again, she found him coming straight for her, with lethal grace. And, once again, she found herself backing away. His growl sounded like a cougar as he strode to reach her. She jumped and placed a chair between them. With lithe ease, he threw the chair out of the way. She raced behind the desk. “Kat,” she yelled. But when she glanced up, Kat was leaving the room, upside- down, over Kid’s shoulder.
She took a cue from Kat’s battles and hurled her first missile at Hawk’s head. He ducked. And she actually breathed a sigh of relief when it crashed harmlessly against the door. In the next instant, he was upon her. “Oh, you arrogant, pig-headed…,” Mandy screeched when Hawk grabbed her. She found another missile and flung it at him.
He blocked her arm, and it crashed to the floor. He threw her over his shoulder and strolled to their room. When he reached the upper landing, he strolled into the room and tossed her onto the bed.