“There’s nothing wrong with your tongue, darlin’,” he said as he tugged the last shoe off. “It’s just a little well-oiled right now, that’s all. A little sleep, and it’ll be just fine.”
The minute he turned his back to set the shoes on the floor, she sprang up again and started dancing a jig on the bed.
“Dammit, Jessie, you’re gonna break your neck. Come on, sugar, come here and let me get that corset off you. Then you can lie down and take a nap.”
“Nap, nap, nap.” Giggle. Hiccup. “Only if you take a nap with me.”
“Jessie, dammit, be still.”
The desk clerk was polishing his spectacles when the two Mrs. Coltons returned from their outing. They did not, either of them, look pleased in the least. Their moods, he was certain, would not improve when they realized the condition of the young Miss Colton upstairs. Hector Barton sighed heavily. Oh, the trials of the hotel business.
As the two strikingly beautiful women passed his desk, he called out to the them. “Good afternoon, ladies.”
“Mr. Barton,” the older one said with a nod.
“Ma’am, you asked that I notify you when your other daughter arrived.”
“And has she?”
“Yes, ma’am. She…went up to her room about a quarter hour ago.” He gave her the room number and assured her it connected with her suite.
“Thank you, Mr. Barton.”
“My pleasure, ma’am.” He only hoped she didn’t come downstairs again until he was off duty. Those clear blue eyes of hers could freeze a man in his tracks. And she was not going to be happy when she saw her daughter.
He sighed again as Daniella Colton and her daughter Serena appeared to float up the stairs in their fashionable gowns.
Daniella held her peace until they reached the sitting room of the suite. Once the door was safely closed, she tugged off her gloves and threw them at the wall. “I can’t believe that pompous ass had the nerve to tell us Pace wasn’t there. Does he think I’d swallow such a lie? Wait ’til I get my hands on Nelson Miles. That man is going to pay for this, I swear.”
“Let’s tell Jessie we’re here,” Serena said tiredly.
“Good idea.”
A muffled thump and the low rumble of a man’s voice halted Daniella with her hand on the door knob to Jessie’s room.
“You can tickle my feet now, if you want,” came Jessie’s voice.
Daniella and Serena stared at each other in shock.
“Dammit, Jessie, I don’t want to tickle your feet. I’m trying to get you into bed. Will you hold still so I can get this damn corset off you?”
Daniella flung the door open so hard it crashed against the wall. Her youngest daughter, Jessica Ann Colton, stood on the bed, swaying left and right, kicking up first one leg, then the other. The jacket of her seersucker suit lay in a heap on the floor. At her back, an Army captain stood beside the bed and fumbled with the laces on her corset. The captain’s hat sat perched low over Jessie’s eyes. At the crash of the door, both Jessie and the captain jerked as if shot.
“What in the hell is going on in here? Sir! I’ll thank you to unhand my daughter!”
Jessie waved a foot in the air and giggled. Then hiccupped. “Hiya, Mama! Hi, Rena!”
Blake swore. For the first time since he was fourteen and Mary Sue ordered him to put his tongue in her mouth, he felt himself blush.
The two women before him, Jessie’s mother and sister, were as far from the ugly, mannish women he’d pictured in his mind as two women could be. They were both…stunning. Where Jessie was cool and golden, they were dark-haired and vibrant. Vivid. Gorgeous. Beautiful.
Their eyes, instead of Jessie’s calming, sparkling gray, were brilliant blue. And shooting flames straight at him.
“Serena, get my handbag, please.”
“Mother—”
“Just do it.”
Blake finally thought to remove his hands from Jessie’s corset. He cleared his throat. “Mrs. Colton, I assure you I can…” His words trailed off to stunned silence as the daughter, Serena, handed Mrs. Colton her handbag. The woman withdrew a small double-barreled derringer and pointed it straight at his chest.
“You were saying, Captain?”
“Mama, Mama.” Jessie clucked her tongue. “Don’t point that thing at Blake. Can’t you see you’re making him nervs…nevr…can’t you see you’re scaring him? You can’t do that, Mama. He found the best cure ever for my, well, you know…my female miseries.” The last two words came out in an overly loud stage whisper.
Then, to make matters worse, although Blake wasn’t sure things could get much worse, Jessie whirled and draped herself across his chest. “There.” With her nose practically touching his, she gave a sharp nod. The brim of his hat, which she still wore, hit his head. The hat fell to the floor. “I’ve saved you from Mama.”
The look in Jessie’s eyes turned tender. The yearning there nearly took Blake’s breath away. For a moment, he forgot about their hostile audience.
“We’re getting pretty good at this, aren’t we?” Jessie smiled. “I saved you from robbers, you saved me from kidnappers. You saved me from pain, and I saved you from Mama. Mama,” she said, still looking deeply into Blake’s eyes, “don’t hurt Blake.” She traced a delicate finger across Blake’s lips.
It was all he could do to keep from groaning at the fire she ignited in his belly.
“He’s the most wonderful kisser,” Jessie said softly. “When he kisses me, I go all hot and tingly and my knees get weak. Are you sure,” she said to Blake, “that we have to be on opposite sides? I do so enjoy kissing you.”
And then she passed out cold.
Blake caught her and swung her up in his arms.
“Oh, my.” Jessie’s sister rushed to the bed and turned down the covers. “Put her down here.”
Blake lowered her carefully, dismayed to realize how reluctant he was to put her down, regardless that her mother and sister were watching. But Mrs. Colton held a gun, after all, and looked perfectly capable of blasting a hole clean through him. He put Jessie down on the bed and made for the door.
“Captain.”
Blake stopped in the doorway and turned to face Mrs. Colton. “Yes, ma’am?”
“You will wait in the sitting room, won’t you? I believe you owe me an explanation.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Blake barely had time to pace back and forth across the sitting room of the suite one time before the door to Jessie’s room opened again.
“Your hat, Captain.” Jessie’s mother held the hat out to him, and he took it. At least she’d put her gun away.
“Thank you. Mrs. Colton, I assure you…”
His words trailed off to nothing as Mrs. Colton removed her own hat. Blake’s tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth as he stared at the streak of white in her black hair. Voices whirled in his mind, Jessie’s and others’. Captured by Apaches…adopted by Cochise…in thick with them heathens…streak in her hair…magic…
“You’re staring, Captain.”
Blake shook himself. “I’m…sorry. Jessie didn’t…” Blake stopped and cleared his throat, chagrinned to find himself tongue-tied before this woman. “That is, she didn’t tell me who you were.”
Mrs. Colton arched an eyebrow. “I beg your pardon?”
“Woman of Magic. You’re the one they call Woman of Magic, aren’t you?”
She touched her hand to the white streak. “Oh, that. Yes, I’ve been called that.”
Blake shook his head yet again. “I apologize for staring. It’s just that I’ve heard of you all my life. I just never thought you were real.”
She pursed her lips. “And about now, I’m sure you’re wishing I wasn’t. Would you care to explain the condition in which I find my daughter, Captain?”
Blake swallowed heavily. “Yes, ma’am.”
He found himself explaining to Daniella and Serena Colton just how Jessie had come to end up soused. He also told them, because they prodd
ed it out of him, everything—well, almost everything—that had happened since Jessie had decided to follow Pace.
“What about you, Captain?” Serena Colton asked. “What are you doing following Pace? Or are you following my sister?”
“No, ma’am. My orders are concerning the renegades.”
Daniella Colton tapped a long, elegant finger to her lips. “Renard. I used to know a man by that name, years ago. Lucien Renard. He was a friend of my husband’s. Are you by chance related?”
Blake felt his emotions automatically shut off at the mention of his father’s name. As much as he’d like to deny ever having heard of the bastard, he hadn’t stooped quite that low yet. “Yes, ma’am. Lucien Renard is my father.”
“What a small world it is.” Daniella offered him a warm smile. “We’ve wondered over the years what became of your family. Your parents left Arizona back in…sixty-two, I believe. Travis always thought highly of your father. He was disappointed that he never heard from him again. How is he, and tell me about your mother. I never had the chance to meet her, but your father, I know, worshipped her.”
“Yes, ma’am.” And he still does, Blake thought. Her memory, at least. “My mother was killed during one of Geronimo’s raids shortly after I was born. I was raised by an aunt and uncle in New Mexico.”
“I’m so sorry,” Daniella murmured with genuine sympathy. “And your father? Is he still living?”
Blake struggled to control a sneer. Funny, but he hadn’t had to work at control in years. He’d thought it was second nature by now. “In a manner of speaking,” he answered. “He…didn’t deal well with my mother’s death. I haven’t seen much of him over the years.”
“I see.” Daniella refilled his coffee cup from the service she’d had delivered. “Tell me, Captain. What did Jessie mean when she mentioned you and she were on opposite sides?”
Blake forced himself not to glance at Serena Colton. Jessie’s sister was every bit as beautiful as her mother. But Serena had to be Jessie’s half sister, the same as the breed was her half brother. Because with that golden copper tone to her skin, Serena Colton was surely half Apache. She must be the twin Jessie spoke of. Answering Mrs. Colton’s question made him feel like he was traipsing through a field of explosives.
He shrugged. By the look in those sharp blue eyes—both pairs of them—there was no fooling these women. “Let’s just say that your daughter and I have agreed to disagree on the subject of Apaches. No offense intended,” he added with a nod to Serena.
She raised a brow and gave him a half grin. “Since I assume you have no quarrel with me, personally, none taken.”
Serena closed the door behind Blake, then turned to her mother. “What do you think?”
Daniella gave a wry grin. “I think the young lady in the next room is going to be slightly more than embarrassed when she wakes up. If she even remembers anything.”
“I mean about him,” Serena said impatiently. “Did you notice the way his voice softened every time he said her name?”
Daniella smiled. “Why, Rena, I had no idea you were such a romantic. Lord, the look on his face when we opened that door.”
Mother and daughter allowed slow, matching grins. Then, finally, they did what they’d been dying to do from the minute they’d realized Jessie was drunk and that no real harm had come to her. They broke out laughing. After the morning’s frustration of not being able to find Pace, the laughter felt good.
When they calmed, Daniella shook her head.
“What is it?” Serena asked.
“I don’t know. Something about that story of Geronimo killing his mother bothers me.”
“I know what you mean. Even though he was only a baby at the time of her death, I could see the hatred in his eyes. Gave me the shivers.”
Daniella shook her head again. “I don’t mean that. The way I remember it, when the Renards left their ranch—you know the one, that abandoned place not far from Tubac—we heard they moved to Santa Fe.”
“Well, if Geronimo killed Mrs. Renard, then they must have moved somewhere else. There’s no way he ever got near Santa Fe.”
Daniella frowned as a memory haunted her. The vision she’d had of Sarah Renard all those years ago had been as clear and sharp as any she’d ever had. Daniella remembered staring into the flames of the cook fire in the kitchen, back before they’d had a cook stove. The flames had shifted and parted, until Daniella saw what happened at the Renard ranch so clearly she might just as well have been standing in front of their adobe house at the time.
Raiders, a dozen or more, had hit Tres Colinas, the ranch she would later learn belonged to the Renards. The Apaches had herded off a large number of cattle and horses. As they rode away, one circled back. In those days, he’d been more familiar to Daniella as Golthlay rather than Geronimo, and he hadn’t been nearly as famous. But for as long as she lived Daniella would never forget the sight of him forcing himself on young Sarah Renard.
Two days after that vision had tortured her, Daniella had learned the Renards had gone back to Santa Fe to live.
Holding back a shudder, Daniella pushed the memory to the back of her mind. She had never told anyone what she’d seen, although she knew half the territory had learned what had happened to Sarah Renard.
It was just too ironic to think that after that, the Renards had crossed paths with Geronimo yet again, that Geronimo had eventually ended up killing Sarah.
This time Daniella couldn’t hold back the shudder as she responded to Serena’s comment about the hate in the captain’s eyes. “If what he said about his mother is true, I can’t say I blame him.”
The next morning Jessie sat with her mother and sister in the hotel restaurant and tried her best not to turn green at the smell of bacon frying. She moaned in sheer misery as an off-key marching band played a rousing tune inside her head, heavy on the cymbals and drums. “I told you I shouldn’t have come.” She started to rise. “I think I’ll go back to my room.”
Daniella caught Jessie’s arm and tugged her down. “No you don’t, young lady. Drink some coffee. If you’re sick, it serves you right. Whatever possessed you to pull such a stunt? And why on earth did you even think about leaving home without your laudanum?”
Jessie sighed. Her mother was right. She should never have left home unprepared. “I guess I was too worried about getting to Bowie before it was too late. I never even thought…”
“Why were you worried?” Serena asked. “You weren’t afraid to go, were you?”
“Of course not. But I’ve never had much contact with The People. I was representing the rest of you. I…wanted to do it right. Instead, I botched things up royally, didn’t I?”
Daniella put down her napkin and stared at Jessie. “What in the world are you talking about? What was there to botch up?”
“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Jessie said with the bite of sarcasm in her voice, “but aren’t we all here in San Antonio precisely because I couldn’t keep Miles from arresting Pace?”
“Jessie, that’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”
“I’ve been trying to tell her that for days.”
The three women started at the sound of Blake’s voice from beside their table.
“Captain.” Daniella offered him a slight smile. “Good morning. Won’t you join us?”
Despite her fierce embarrassment over making a total fool of herself with him yesterday—at least as far as she could remember; she didn’t want to know about the parts she couldn’t remember—Jessie drank in the sight of him. She’d been with him so much over the past week or more that she’d missed not seeing him this morning. Still, she was surprised by her mother’s invitation. And relieved when Blake cautiously accepted.
“He’s right, you know,” Serena said. “You did all you could do.”
“Sure,” Jessie said with disgust. “But if you or Mama had been there, Pace wouldn’t be where he is right now, would he?”
Daniella pursed her lips
. “A miserable failure, are you?”
“And she’s a coward, to boot,” Blake added.
Jessie stared at him, stung clear to her heart.
“Who else but a coward would have tried to tackle the three guards hauling her brother onto that train? Or stood nose to nose with General Miles and told him off? Then, it really takes a failure and a coward to slug a train robber just as he was getting ready to put a bullet in my brain. And only a coward would have stolen a horse right out from under her kidnappers, even knowing she probably wouldn’t make good her escape.” He looked at Daniella and Serena, then at Jessie. “Should I go on?”
“You mean there’s more?” Serena demanded.
“Some,” Blake admitted.
“All right, all right.” Jessie shot them all a look. “If I’m so wonderful, why aren’t the three of you bowing and scraping in my presence? I still say—”
“You’ve said enough,” Daniella warned. “I’ll hear no more of how you failed the family. If that’s not the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, I don’t know what is.”
“All right,” Jessie relented. “So tell me how long you’ve been here. Have you seen Pace?”
Blake lowered his gaze to the food the waitress had brought him.
Daniella shot him a furtive glance, then looked pointedly at Jessie. “No, we haven’t seen him. We tried yesterday.”
“Tried?”
“They said he wasn’t there.”
“But that’s impossible!”
“I know,” Daniella said grimly. “He’s there, all right.”
“What are you going to do?” Blake asked.
“I don’t think you want to know, Captain.”
He gave Daniella a nod. “I’m sure you’re right.”
“You can do us a favor, though,” Daniella told him.
A look of caution crossed his face. “Ma’am, I—”
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