“Most importantly, make sure you don’t squeal if you land on a pointed rock or cactus, or if a creature walks under your nose or over your hand. It’s slow going. You have to place your hands carefully, making sure the rocks beneath them won’t shift or crunch with your weight on them. Then, you lift your body, shift forward, and lower it; it’s like taking a tiny step at a time. If you rush, they’ll hear you. Retreating is worse, if you can’t get off your belly and have to inch backward. My worst moment was when I inched up to a rock where a rattler was snoozing and I had to remain still for nearly an hour.”
“That means you’ll have to teach me patience along with those skills. I must admit, it’s my worst weakness.”
“I’ll have to teach you how to endure pain without making a sound, but I haven’t come up with that lesson yet. Since you weren’t discovered in the Carsons’ attic, you might already possess lots of those survival skills. It’s late and we have a hard ride tomorrow. Which hotel do you choose, Miss Hollis?” he asked cheerfully.
Randee looked around and selected the sturdiest appearing quarters. “There, Mr. Logan. What about you?”
“I’ll take the old arsenal. I love the smell of gunpowder. Call out if you need anything,” he told her again tonight.
Randee thought, The only thing I need tonight is you, Marsh Logan, but I dare not disclose that fact so soon. Heavens, Mother, how would you feel if you knew what I was doing and thinking? Or would you even care about me at all, after your beloved Payton filled your ears with his lies about me? If only I could have found a way to enlighten you, to convince you of his evil, without endangering you and the baby. Somehow I’ll find a way to free you. I won’t let that bastard outsmart me or defeat me, and I’ll never let him hurt me again!
Marsh was careful not to look at her or to say another word, as things were feeling a little too cozy between them tonight. He promptly went to the crumbling arsenal and bedded down there. Stretched out on his back, with arms folded beneath his head, he gazed at the stars which were visible through the fallen roof. Even if he changed his mind about chasing Randee Hollis, they had known each other only a week, too soon for her to … Forget it, Marsh, a lady wouldn’t choose a notorious gunslinger over a respectable sheriff, or life on the trail over a cozy home and family.
In Wadesville late that night, Brody Wade was talking with Deputy Matthew Johnson. Matthew had just returned from his tracking assignment, but Brody had received his grim message earlier. Brody had been hoping that Randee had left the stage before reaching Red River, but Matthew told him she hadn’t.
“Damn it all, Matt! I wish I had stopped her from leaving town on Thursday. Hell, I can’t go searching for her in Indian Territory. I wouldn’t know where to look or how to find her. With those savages running loose, it’s too dangerous and I don’t have any authority there. I’ll have to depend on the Army to locate her and rescue her for me.”
The deputy’s eyes widened in shock. ‘You mean you’ll take her back after she’s been with them Injuns? Sakes alive, Brody, you know what they do with white women. She’ll be too dirty to touch or look at.”
Brody scowled. “I don’t care what’s happened to her. She’s mine and I want her back. I love her, Matt. One way or another, she’s going to marry me. I just had to make certain that cocky gunslinger didn’t try to join her after she left town. I didn’t like the way he was eyeing her. I don’t know who he is or what he had in mind, but he isn’t the Durango Kid. I’m doing some checking on him now, just in case he turns up here again after Dee’s return.”
More shock filled the man’s face. “I’ll be goldarn, Brody, you really want her bad. I shoulda knowed it when you made me trail her to the edge of Texas. She’s gone now, maybe for good.”
“Not Randee Hollis; she’s too smart and brave to die easily. She’ll be back. Hell, she’ll probably escape within a week! You wait and see, Matt; she’ll come back to me. She promised.”
After a quick breakfast and a search of the abandoned fort, Randee and Marsh continued their journey southward. Wednesday was spent checking out each raid location in their path and making notes on them. They questioned neighbors of past victims, but learned nothing new. The ranches in this area were large and mostly self-contained, with many miles between them. Over and over, they repeated their story of how their homes had been destroyed and they were trying to gather evidence to help the law capture the gang. Everyone wished them luck, but thought them foolishly brave to take on such a task. At each stop, Marsh gave a Fort Worth address to which anyone seeing or hearing anything strange could send the information for him to collect.
Shortly before dusk, they halted and camped beside a river. While she prepared the evening meal, he checked their surroundings to make certain no threat was lurking nearby. He was pleased to find no one around, not even squatters. After supper, Marsh located a safe and private spot for Randee to bathe. She was delighted, especially after not having had a bath last night at the old fort. When she returned to the campfire, Marsh went for a quick swim and bath.
Tonight, they both unrolled their sleeping bags near the fire. Since Marsh said the area was safe, Randee wore her comfortable nightgown. Marsh kept his pants on, but removed his shirt and boots. Both lay on their backs, as if afraid to look at each other.
Marsh’s body was tantalized by Randee’s proximity. No matter which way he turned or looked, he remained highly cognizant of her allure and their romantic solitude. He couldn’t help but wonder how she would react to intimate overtures from him, or if he dared to make any. The longer he lay there in silence, the more his tension mounted. To break it, he commented, “You’re doing wonderful, Randee. I’m proud of you. I like the way you never slow us down or complain. You’re more than holding up your end of our bargain.”
Randee was experiencing that same discomfort of rampant desires. She turned her head in his direction and said, “Thanks, Marsh. I just wish we had learned, something today.”
“Don’t get discouraged. We’re mostly on a cold trail right now. One thing I did notice, Marshal Foley Timms’s name wasn’t recognized. If he visited the area around the times of those attacks, the people who know that fact are dead or gone. If he comes around these parts soon, I hope no one mentions we were asking about him.”
She looked skyward again as she asked, “How can we discover who’s purchased those deserted spreads? There might be a clue there to a clever land grab.”
“While I was in Fort Worth, I asked a friend of mine to check out that angle for me. If he’s learned anything by the time we reach Brownwood, he’ll have a message waiting for us.”
Emotional strain steadily increased in the ensuing silence as each became more and more ensnared by the other’s tempting presence and their secluded camp. Each heard the other’s breathing and noticed it wasn’t normal respiration. For a time, neither spoke nor moved, but hearts throbbed furiously. They lay there tense and alert, and with mounting desires. It was as if each was waiting for the other to make the first move; yet, both were fearful of the other’s reaction.
Randee became so unsettled by Marsh Logan and her feelings that she forced her mind onto another man. She asked rashly, “Do you think Brody has tried to go after me? He was terribly worried.”
Marsh was annoyed by the mention of the man who wanted to marry Randee. He mistakenly believed she was breathing heavily because she was daydreaming about… his competition, if he wanted to challenge the sheriffs grip on her heart and life. Maybe he should roll over there next to her and show her who the real man was! No, he wasn’t one to forcefully or cunningly seduce a woman. And making love to a woman didn’t prove to her that you were a real man, or the right man for her. Once he revealed an interest in her, things might get complicated between them. He desired her like crazy, but, no, he couldn’t take her unless she wanted him as much as he wanted her. “I doubt it, Randee; it’s too soon, unless he lacks all masculine pride,” he answered, making sure he kept his voice level and calle
d her the right name to keep her from guessing the turmoil of his emotions. He knew Brody wouldn’t ride into Indian Territory to search for her; the lawman was too keen on his own survival. Maybe he should tell her the truth about the Indian attack on the stage. No, not yet …
“Does that mean you view worry over a loved one as a weakness? Are you less of a man if you expose your feelings?” she inquired.
“Men are trained to control their feelings, so it’s harder for us to reveal them than it is for you women. About the only emotions men are supposed to show are pride and anger, and they can get you into real trouble. I feel sorry for any man who reveals anguish; it’s like baring your soul to vultures. I’ve seen people pick a gentle man to pieces. Either you follow the rules, or you make your own. But if you do, you’d best be able to defend them.”
“What I meant, was to reveal your emotions to those involved, like to your family or to special people. My father didn’t go around displaying or declaring his love for me and Mother, but he made sure we knew how he felt about us. Most men won’t even show their families how they feel about them. Maybe because of pride, like you said. That was my father’s reason for playing the masterful man in public.”
Marsh jested mirthfully, “I’m glad your father wasn’t totally perfect, or he’d be a hard man for you to match in a husband. You sure Brody Wade can fill such large boots?”
“I don’t want to mislead you, Marsh. My father was a wonderful man, but he had his faults. All men do. It’s just that his many good traits overshadowed the few flaws he had. As for seeking a husband who’s like my father, I’m not. I don’t want to marry my father’s image, but I won’t mind if he has similar traits. Too many men view special emotions as weaknesses, and that causes problems for everyone involved. Brody isn’t like that. He’s a good man, a kind and generous one. He’s thoughtful and caring. He’s looked out for me since that raid.”
“And he loves you and wants to marry you,” Marsh added.
To get beyond this vexing point, which she had created, she teased, “Why shouldn’t he? Even you said I was wonderful, and you’re a hard man to impress or to make such admissions. Surely a strong and uncomplaining woman is worth her weight in gold.”
“And Brody made the first strike on your golden treasure.”
Randee didn’t reply, and her respiration altered noticeably. She remembered Payton Slade calling her his “little golden treasure.” Her stepfather had remarked often on her “golden skin” and “golden hair” and her “golden promise.” Heavens, how she loathed that vile man! How she longed for every memory of him to vanish! She was glad that the incident with her vile stepfather had not made her bitter and suspicious of all men. But she was more on the alert now than she had been before he entered her life. Randee was fairly confident that no man could fool her as deeply and quickly as Payton had duped her mother, but maybe she was mistaken. A person never knew how he would behave or feel until facing that situation. Sometimes the episode with Payton seemed excruciatingly real; other times, it seemed like a bad dream, something which had never, and could never, happen to her.
“I believe I’ve touched a sore spot,” Marsh remarked unhappily. “What do you say about calling it a night and getting some sleep before we destroy the progress we’ve made between us?”
“I think that’s an excellent suggestion. Good night, Marsh.” Randee turned onto her side, away from him, and closed her eyes. Heavens, how she wanted to cry. She blamed her distraught emotions on fatigue, vexation, and a gnawing hunger for the mysterious man nearby. Undemanding sleep was exactly what she needed!
Chapter Seven
Randee was not to enjoy mindless sleep that night. Wicked images and voices prevented peaceful slumber as she witnessed her evil stepfather plaguing her with his insidious advances behind her trusting mother’s back. She envisioned Dee Hollis Slade in grave peril if Dee learned of Payton’s lecherous behavior. Randee hated the inability to protect and to free her mother. Randall Hollis had taught his daughter to be strong and independent, to be brave and honest, but Payton Slade had stolen those valuable traits.
Caught up in the swirling maelstrom of the past, Randee’s slumbering mind waxed between scenes of Dee believing her and scenes of Dee doubting her claims against the man she had married in the fall of ‘69, and whose child she now carried.
Randee couldn’t blame her mother totally for that terrible mistake in judgment. Dee had been distraught by Randall Hollis’s unexpected death in ‘68, as those two had been madly in love and had wed when Dee was sixteen. Life and ranching had been hard on her after Randall’s murder, and she had been susceptible to Payton’s amorous attentions. Payton had helped Dee Carson Hollis with many problems while he had wooed her wildly. A woman who wanted and needed a strong man at her side, Dee had been swept off her feet by Payton’s romantic and persistent siege.
Problems had multiplied following the tragic event. The rustlers who had slain Randall Hollis continued to plague them. Dee felt that the work was too hard and dangerous for a woman with a young daughter. The hands were tense over having a female boss who was too distressed to think straight and who didn’t “know how to run a large ranch alone.” Suffering from loneliness, anguish, fears, and doubts, Dee had cried herself to sleep nearly every night for weeks.
Many hands and local ranchers started showing hot interest in the attractive Widow Hollis, who had a lot to offer a man in herself and with her ranch. Then, Payton Slade began to call on Dee every few days, offering and supplying help and advice. Things quickly got better, through deceit, Randee came to suspect. Soon, Payton was filling Dee’s emotional void and handling nearly everything for her, as if he owned or controlled her and the ranch. He had absorbed Dee as dry earth greedily consumed water and sucked it out of sight forever. Afraid of being alone and of losing the ranch, and in desperate need of love and assistance, Dee had yielded to the. man’s obsessive desire for her. She had seemed overjoyed to have him take away her decisions and worries. The old Dee Hollis vanished.
Randee had not liked or trusted Payton Slade from their first meeting, but she had been unable to put her finger on why she felt that way. The man was nice-looking and had a good build, but his smile and gaze had always made her nervous. She had tried to convince her mother to wait a while longer before marrying their neighbor, but Dee had been enchanted and duped by the powerful rancher, who had taken over the adjoining ranch only six months before her father’s death. In a deed dispute with heirs, Payton, who had powerful political connections, had won possession of the enviable ranch which his uncle had owned for many years. Although Payton had tried his best to become friends with her father, Randall Hollis had remained skeptical of the man and that legal decision. Payton had called on them frequently and had appeared at every social function in the area, always displaying exceptional charm. Even so, Randee knew her father never came to trust or to like the man.
Yet, Randee’s dark feelings stemmed from other troubles with her stepfather. The immoral beast had begun his wooing within two months of her father’s death in midwinter, a difficult time for anyone to care for a ranch. Dee had been frightened and confused, but instead of turning to Randee, she had leaned on Payton for help and solace. Within weeks, it seemed as if the man was spending as much time on the Hollis Ranch as he did on his own ranch. To protect his future interests, Randee had often thought to herself. By spring, Dee’s mourning period had disappeared, much to Randee’s dismay, and Dee had turned completely to the cunning devil. All summer the lovers played around like carefree, happy children— except for when they sneaked into bed together like passion-dazed adults. Randee knew her. mother would have married Payton during the spring or, summer, but the sly bastard had convinced Dee it wouldn’t appear right to wed so soon after Randall’s demise. He had made Dee wait until late fall, making less than a year of widowhood. Since life was hard on the “frontier,” no one had gossiped. “
At first, Payton Slade” had been too busy with his
cunning scheme to turn his wicked attentions on Randee. He had poured his false affection on Dee like a treacherous rain that caused flash floods and great damage. Every time Randee turned around, Payton was all over her mother, like the itch from a fall into a chiggerinfested weed patch! During those months before the wedding, Randy had accidentally witnessed and overheard bouts of lovemaking which had astonished and embarrassed her. With windows open and sex taken anytime and anywhere, Randee had worried over what others might see and think about her mother. But Dee Hollis didn’t seem to care about anything except pleasing herself and Payton. Randee could not imagine what Payton was doing to have such an effect on her mother. Had it been truelove? Feverish sex? A time of insanity? What tormented and disappointed Randee the most was her mother’s almost wanton behavior so soon after losing the man she had loved since the age of sixteen. How, she had wondered, was it possible to give your heart and body to another man so quickly, so passionately, so uninhibitedly?
As the Hollis home was much larger and nicer than Payton’s, the man had moved into her father’s house, his room, and his bed the day of the wedding. Immediately he had gone to work merging the two ranches to create a powerful and prosperous spread.
In the beginning, Randee had wondered if she merely disliked and mistrusted the man because he was taking over her father’s place and possessions, and because her dear mother had changed so drastically since her father’s death and since falling under Payton’s spell. Dee had been Randall’s partner in every area of their lives, but it wasn’t the same with Payton Slade. Dee seemed dazed by the man, dependent on him for everything, almost as if she were bewitched! Anything the man said or did was fine! It seemed as if Dee was no longer strong, confident, intelligent, proud, outgoing, or brave. Dee waited upon Payton hand and foot, eagerly and joyfully responding to his every whim and order. She never discussed matters with the man or asked questions or disagreed with him. It was as if Dee would make any sacrifice to keep her second husband, as if her survival was solely in his hands, as if she needed only him to make her happy, as if she actually enjoyed being ordered about day and night!
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