With narrowed eyes, Crane studied first Carmen, then the floor between his rough boots. “And supposin’ he don’t sell to me. Hell, I ain’t got no money anyhow.”
Carmen waved away his objection and watched his gaze devour her firm breasts beneath her thin chemise. “A mere detail. I’ll lend you the money, and you and I will be partners.” She tossed her gloves, jacket, and blouse to the dusty floor. “You can pay me back out of the gold you find.”
“Supposin’ he sells to that old man, the one the girl lived with?”
“You’ll just have to kill the old man, too. And while you’re at it,” she said, slipping the straps of her chemise down her shoulders, “you might as well get rid of that young one, the big dummy. They’d just be in our way.” The chemise slipped down and caught on her hardened nipples. She took a deep breath and felt them swell and point at and beg for the man who stood three feet away, obviously as ready as she was. “For a man like you, they should be easy enough to take care of.”
“Sure.” Crane’s eyes glazed over. “Ambush. But that won’t work with the girl. If she’s livin’ at the Triple C, I ain’t gonna be able to get near her.”
“Of course you can.” Carmen smiled and bared one nipple. “She likes the outdoors. She doesn’t stay in the house all the time. All you have to do is find a hiding place, watch, and wait. Sooner or later you’ll catch her alone, away from the house. It would be best, of course, if you kill her quickly and leave the body. That way there will be no question as to her fate, and Travis will accept her death and marry me that much sooner. And I don’t need to tell you, amigo—you have to kill the girl soon.”
No, she didn’t need to tell him, Crane thought. Gawdamighty! The slut really expected him to do murder! A shiver ran down his spine.
Hell, I ain’t no murderer, he thought. Especially not of a girl, an old man, or a dummy.
He conveniently forgot about locking Simon and the Apaches in the burning barn. Hell—Apaches didn’t count anyway. He wanted the valley, all right, and the gold he knew was there. But he’d damn sure never done murder before and didn’t intend to start now just because some bitch in heat had an itch she wanted scratched. And he intended to scratch it like it had never been scratched before.
But where did that leave him?
It left him with no access to the gold, that’s were it left him. And he wasn’t willing to give up that gold, dammit. In a moment he grinned. He’d get rid of the girl all right, but he’d do it his own way. Hell, he didn’t need Carmen to get at the gold, all he needed was to get the people out of the valley. He didn’t want to own the damned place, just mine it.
And what he had in mind for the new Mrs. Colton would serve his purposes just fine. He’d get even with her for the things she’d done to him. Make her pay. He’d take her up in the hills for a while and tie her up, enjoy her sweet little body. Then when he got tired of her, he’d take her down below the border. Might have to go over as far as Chihuahua, but maybe not. There were plenty of whorehouses in Mexico that’d pay top dollar for a looker like her. And he’d make sure she knew how to please a man in every way there was. He could get more for her that way.
It wasn’t like she was a virgin or nothin’. He’d heard the stories about her and the Apaches. He’d keep that to himself, though. Even the Mexican whorehouses wouldn’t want Apache leavings.
But Billy Joe Crane wasn’t so particular. No sirree, he wasn’t.
“The sooner you kill her,” Carmen went on, “the sooner I can marry Travis, and the sooner you can get what you…want.”
With a growl, Crane grabbed her and slammed her back against the wall. “I can get what I want right now. And what I want is them damned skirts of yours outa my way.”
“¡Sí! ¡Sí!” She tugged frantically at her skirts. “Yes.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
With Carmen having moved to Tucson, everyone—most especially Daniella—breathed easier.
As one week extended into two, Daniella realized with some amazement that not only had her morning sickness not returned in some time, but she was sleeping every night, with Travis, still without nightmares. Her overall health improved so much she almost didn’t recognize herself in the mirror. Gone were the bruised looking eyes with their dark circles. They went the same way as her pale, sunken cheeks and the lines of fatigue around her mouth.
Instead of the gaunt features she had almost become accustomed to, she now saw rosy cheeks and sparkling eyes in the mirror. Sometimes she even caught a glimpse of the old Daniella, the one who knew who she was and what she wanted, the one who liked herself and her life.
But it was, after all, only an illusion. She didn’t know or feel any of those things, and she never would unless she stopped behaving like a fool and tried to establish some sort of communication with Travis.
With that in mind, she decided it was time to stop avoiding his company. He had been true to his word and had made no move toward any type of intimate relationship. They slept together in the same bed each night and he’d done no more than put his arm around her and give her a peck on the cheek. She may not be able to please him the way he wanted, but surely there were other things she could do to create a little harmony between them and alleviate some of the tension whenever they were together.
It was this determination that sent her down the hall this morning toward his study, where she knew he was working. She intercepted Consuela as the girl carried a fresh pot of coffee to her employer. Daniella relieved her of the tray and took it in to Travis herself. It was as good a way to start as any.
Travis was so engrossed in his account books that he didn’t even look up when she placed the tray on the corner of his desk. He mumbled to himself over a column of figures as she walked behind him and peered over his shoulder. He muttered a curse and threw down his pencil in disgust. Leaning back in his chair, he began to massage the tight muscles of his neck.
“Here,” Daniella said softly, startling him. “Let me.”
He turned his head and looked at her in surprise. She forced his head back around and brushed his hands aside. Her nimble fingers began their work and she could feel the tenseness leaving his neck and shoulders. “You’ve been bending over these books too long. Why don’t you go get some air and let me finish for you?”
Travis looked around at her again in mild surprise. “Do you understand this sort of thing?” he asked, indicating the mess on his desk.
Daniella grinned. “Probably at least as well as you do.” This was finally something she could feel confident with. “I used to do all of my grandfather’s book work for him.”
Travis shouldn’t have been surprised. There probably wasn’t anything she couldn’t do, except love him. But it was too soon for that, he cautioned himself. Other women he’d known had said they loved him, and all they knew how to do was look pretty and demand all his attention. Dani was different. There were other things he wanted from her besides her body, and this was a start. She had come to him and offered her help. It was a good start.
“If you’re sure you don’t mind, I’ll be glad to let you do it.”
“I don’t mind at all. I would enjoy doing something useful around here for a change.”
Travis stood and gave her his chair. “I thought you’d been keeping fairly busy lately.”
“Oh, I have,” she answered, seating herself in the massive chair and tilting her head up to look at him. “But everything I do is for myself. I’d like to do something for you.”
Travis leaned over her with one hand on the arm of the chair and the other on the chair back. He gazed into her eyes and felt his heart slam against his rib cage. I don’t want you to do it just for me, he thought. He wanted her to do it for “them,” for herself.
Her nearness was intoxicating. The only time they even got close to each other was in bed, and then he spent so much energy trying to douse the fires ignited by her warm, soft body pressed against his side that he wasn’t even able to enjoy holding he
r in his arms. “There is something you can do for me.” His voice was low, their faces only a hand’s width apart.
“What is it?” Daniella felt captured by his eyes and could not look away. That fluttering feeling was back in her stomach, and she knew it wasn’t the babes she was feeling. Nor was it fear. Her legs and arms felt watery, and her pulse pounded in odd places in her body. She waited breathlessly for his reply.
“Kiss me,” he whispered. But he made no move toward her.
“I … I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” she whispered back, still unable to tear her eyes from his.
“I think it’s a very good idea.”
In spite of her protest, she waited breathlessly for him to lower his lips to hers. When he didn’t, she understood—it was her move. The decision was hers. Only it wasn’t hers at all. It was as though she had no will other than his. Her hand reached out on its own and pulled his head down until their lips met. The only kisses she’d ever received had been from Travis, therefore her experience was lacking. She merely pressed her lips softly to his, then released him.
But Travis was by no means disappointed. He was ecstatic. She did it! She actually kissed him, just because he asked her to. His knuckles whitened as he gripped the chair with all his strength to keep from grabbing her and pulling her completely into his arms. Slowly. He must go slowly. But holding back just then was probably the hardest thing he’d ever had to do.
He lowered his mouth slightly and returned the feathery kiss with one of his own. “Thank you,” he whispered roughly. He eased himself away and forced himself out of the room. Once outside, he sat down abruptly to still the trembling in his limbs.
Daniella shook herself from her daze and realized Travis had left. She collapsed back into the chair and covered her flaming cheeks with icy hands. My God! How scary; how frightening; how thrilling! Such a small thing, that kiss she’d just given him. But she felt like she’d just climbed the world’s highest mountain and now stood triumphantly at its peak.
It was some time before she came back down to earth and was able to concentrate on the account books. A little while later Travis returned to escort her to the noon meal, looking for all the world as if nothing earth–shattering had taken place that morning. Following his example, Daniella did her best to appear calm and casual.
It wasn’t easy. Every time she saw him, she remembered the thrilling rush of sensation when their lips had touched.
If she could have that feeling, and the sense of safety she felt when he held her, without those darker, violent passions he could so easily stir, those passions that so terrified her, life would be nearly perfect. And for the next several days, it was.
Then a friend of Travis’s named Lucien Renard came, and the two men plus Jason stayed up till near dawn arguing politics. Daniella didn’t like spending the night alone. She barely slept at all without Travis beside her.
Yet she understood the importance of Renard’s visit. There was a move on by many of the area residents to send a representative to the Confederate Congress to have a separate territory established—the Arizona Territory.
Anti–United States feelings had been running high for months because the requests to make a new territory had been all but ignored by the United States Congress. President Buchanan had been in favor of the idea, but he was considered pro–Southern. The northern states absolutely did not want, and would not allow, another territory sympathetic to the Southern cause to enter the Union. Now Lincoln had his hands too full to even consider it. Consequently, any time the resolution came up for a vote, which wasn’t often, it was defeated.
That left self–proclaimed Arizona as part of the Territory of New Mexico. The nearest seat of civil government or law and order was hundreds of miles to the east, and the citizens of Arizona, as they called themselves, were constantly plagued by Mexican banditos and American outlaws, fugitives from justice and the civilized world, not to mention the Apaches.
Now the Army had left them with no protection from banditos and Apaches—the troops had burned their forts and headed east to meet the rebels in Texas. The cry echoing across the territory was, “The Union deserted us!”
Since the U. S. government had moved the Butterfield Stage route in March and The Weekly Arizonian had ceased publication, the people in the area felt isolated. No stage, no Army, no telegraph, no newspaper, no railroad, no judge, no sheriff. Something had to be done!
Renard and a few others were going from ranch to ranch inviting everyone to the upcoming meeting, where they planned to elect a representative to send to the Confederate Congress in Richmond.
Daniella woke from a light sleep around dawn when Travis finally came to bed. She supposed he would take it wrong if she thanked him for staying up all night and giving her the pleasure of waking up in his arms. He usually got up before she woke.
She slept awhile longer, but woke to something tickling her nose. She smiled. It was the crisp, curly hair on Travis’s chest.
She sat up carefully so as not to wake him. That’s when she realized he’d kicked the covers off and lay next to her naked and exposed. She gasped at the sight of him. It was only the second time she’d seen her own husband completely naked. The first had been that morning in the wickiup, when she’d been too mortified over her own behavior of the previous night to notice anything other than his nakedness. But now she noticed. He was magnificent.
A quick glance at his face showed him still asleep, so she allowed her gaze to roam. His chest was broad, his stomach flat and ridged with muscles. Just below his waist, where she’d never really looked, his skin was whiter. His hips were lean and firm. Cradled in the bushy nest between his thighs—
Heat stung her cheeks. She gulped and jerked her eyes away to scan down his long, muscular legs dusted with dark gold hair to his feet. Then slowly, while her heart thudded painfully in her chest, her gaze traveled back up to that part of a man she’d learned to hate and fear.
She held her breath and forced herself to look. The breath eased out gently after a moment. His manhood lay limp and peaceful, harmless looking. After a moment she relaxed. There was nothing threatening about what she saw. It was a part of the man she most wanted to be close to. She wasn’t afraid of Travis, so how could she be afraid of his body?
She wasn’t, really. She only feared the things his body did to hers. Yet even as she watched, the thing seemed to grow. Daniella’s eyes widened. Was it her imagination? Her fear taking over? No! It was growing! Her mouth went dry. She tried to swallow. Her throat wouldn’t work.
It was time to leave. She had to get away before she did something stupid. The fear and the nightmarish memory of that huge black chasm that had tried to suck her in swarmed in her brain and made her angry. She wasn’t afraid of Travis! She wasn’t!
Besides, he was asleep. She intended to leave him that way. With an involuntary jerk, she started to scramble across the bed. A hard, calloused hand grasped her arm. She let out a startled squeak and whirled on her knees. She met deep brown eyes, wide awake and studying her closely. She tried again to swallow.
“You find my body so repulsive?” he asked softly.
Unable to speak past the dryness in her throat, she shook her head from side to side.
“Then come here.”
Travis pulled gently but firmly on her arm, sliding her across the sheet until her knees touched his bare hip. What was he doing? Did he mean to use that thing on her now? To go back on his word? Against her will, her gaze dropped. At the sheer size of his hardness her heart stopped beating altogether.
If she didn’t get away—and soon—her own body would start to shame her. Already she felt a hot throbbing down low and deep. Any minute her breasts would swell, her nipples would flush and harden. And he would know.
Her voice came out in a panicked rush of air. “No. Let me go.”
Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew she was making a mistake. She should talk with him calmly and rationally, explain how she fel
t. But she couldn’t think straight when he was in such an obvious state of arousal. She couldn’t simply sit next to him on the bed, knowing that at any moment she might…might what? Throw herself at him? Or scream?
“Let me go.”
Something inside Travis snapped. Weeks of lying next to her in bed, touching her, but not able to touch her, of watching her fear slowly slip away, watching her grow more comfortable with him day by day, and now, here she was, terrified at the sight of him!
“Goddamn.” He sat up and held her by both arms, facing her practically nose to nose. “What’s the matter with you? You act like I’m going to attack you. I’m not the one who raped you, and I’m damn sick and tired of being treated like a leper because of something someone else did. I’ve never hurt you, and I never would.” As he yelled at her he knew it was the wrong thing to do, but he couldn’t help himself. His frustrations got the better of him, and his anger rose even higher.
“What you’re staring at is called a hard–on, or an erection, in case you didn’t know. It’s what happens to a man when he wakes up in bed and finds a beautiful woman—his wife—with her eyes all over his naked body.”
Dani whimpered and tried to pull away, her chest heaving, her eyes wide with terror. With a low growl of frustration, Travis released her and climbed out of bed.
“I can’t believe you’re so naive you don’t understand this can happen to a man whether he wants it to or not. Grow up, Dani. My face isn’t the one in your nightmares. I’m not the villain in your dreams, so stop acting like you think I’m going to rape you any minute. Right now you couldn’t pay me to touch you. I prefer a woman in my bed, not a frightened, irrational child.”
He clenched his fists to keep from reaching to shake some sense into her. “I know I scared you the one time we were intimate. But you urged me on. I thought you were feeling the same things I felt, the things a man wants his woman to feel. I was wrong. I’m sorry. I said it wouldn’t happen again, and it won’t. Not until you’re writhing beneath me begging for it.”
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