by Jill Gregory
“This isn’t a joking matter,” she exclaimed in frustration. “Don’t you understand that these people want to murder you? They’re not interested in any kind of a fair fight. I don’t see how ...”
“I’ll tell you how.”
He led her to the bed and pushed her down so that she was seated on the edge of it, then he sat beside her. Immediately he realized this was a mistake.
She was too close. And she looked too utterly lovely. And the bed was too softly inviting.
The concern in her wan face twisted at his heart as few things before ever had. She was worried, worried about him, as she had been that night in Silver Junction.
He wasn’t used to it. Hadn’t ever looked for it or wanted it, but now that he was here in this large quiet room with Annabel Brannigan looking so damned distraught because someone wanted to shoot him in the back, he had to admit that he didn’t exactly mind her caring about him.
But something about her was bothering him. He reached out, he couldn’t help it ...
“Cade McCallum,” she gasped, grabbing his hand. “Just what do you think you’re doing?”
“Your hair’s too pretty to be all wrapped up like that so tight. It’s not right to hide so much of it.”
He had tugged out one hairpin before she’d stopped him, and a thick taffy ringlet had sprung free to dangle saucily over her eye. His grin widened at the adorable expression of outrage and amazement on her face.
“How can you think about my hair at a time like this?”
Then, without conscious thought, some devil of mischief long dormant in him made him reach out with the other hand and like lightning he tugged a second pin out from the chignon, freeing still another curl.
“Stop this right now,” Annabel fairly screeched, and made a grab for his other hand. But he burst out laughing, and easily seized both of her hands in one of his.
“You spoil all my fun, Miss Brannigan.”
“Fun! I’ll give you fun. How about three men shooting you in the back? Is that enough fun for you?”
But as she tried to wrench her hands free, they both lost their balance and rolled sideways together onto the bed. His laughter rumbled deep from his chest. Cade didn’t remember the last time he’d laughed like that.
“Now we’re having fun, Miss Brannigan,” he chuckled, and before she even realized it he had pinned her beneath him, her hands caught above her head, and one of his powerful legs draped across both of hers.
“I’ve a good mind to pull out all those damned pins,” he threatened. “Such beautiful hair should be free, like the wildflowers, like the meadow larks, like the ...”
“Don’t you dare! Cade McCallum, if I didn’t know better I’d think you were drunk!”
He grinned down at her. But suddenly his expression grew sober, the black eyes hardening to marble. “Maybe I am ... but not on liquor,” he muttered. Damn. What was she doing to him? “I’m drunk on something else even more potent. More dangerous,” he continued, his gaze suddenly fiercely intent on her wide eyes, and parted lips, then shifting down to the ivory mounds of her breasts above the décolleté of her gown.
“Annabel,” he demanded tautly, “why do you have to be so damned beautiful?”
She stopped struggling to free herself and stared back at him, dumbfounded. “You ... think I’m beautiful?”
“Too damned beautiful.” Suddenly, he caught her mouth in a kiss that was so rough, it was almost savage. Her lips trembled beneath the heat and violence of that kiss and she released him reluctantly as he pulled away. “I’ve thought so from the first time I saw you in Justice.”
“You have ...?”
“When you told me that gentlemen don’t crash into ladies with whom they’re not acquainted. Annabel, if you only knew ...”
“Knew what, Cade?” she whispered, still dizzy from that bruising kiss, swept up in a wildfire of sensations that started somewhere deep between her thighs and raced upward to set her breasts aflame as they strained against her chemise. She hardly dared to breathe. His lean face was only inches from hers, his fingers had now released her hands and were tugging out additional pins from her hair. She gasped as he began to kiss her again, hot, deliberate kisses that scorched her cheeks, her lips, the fragile skin of her eyelids. And then he nipped at her throat.
“If you only knew the hell I went through when I thought you were betrothed to Brett. When I thought I was honor bound to stay away from you,” he muttered grimly. “And all the time I wanted you more than I’ve ever wanted anyone or anything in my life.” Suddenly he yanked her up, close and hard against his muscled chest, his mouth stilling her gasp as he kissed her with possessive ruthlessness.
Now she really couldn’t breathe. His tongue thrust into the softness of her mouth and awakened her own to battle. Liquid pleasure burst through her as she breathed in the sage and cedar scent of him, lost herself in the warm male taste of him, delighted in his sure overwhelming strength.
Her heart was racing so fast it would leave a train far behind. She was certain he must feel it pounding against his own, hammering along as if at any moment it would burst. His exploring hands were touching her in places no man had ever touched, setting fire to places that had never before even smoldered. Her arms encircled his neck and she pulled him closer with a little moaning sound of pleasure deep in her throat.
“Brett and I—” she tried to explain in a low, tremulous voice, but he cut her off, his hands gripping her arms like manacles, his eyes glinting into hers with fierce purpose.
“I don’t want to hear one word about you and my brother. I care about him, whether or not he believes it, but he’s not the man for you.”
Annabel had reached the same conclusion herself, out there by the corrals when Brett had kissed her. But incredulity filled her at the thought that Cade McCallum should say the same thing she’d been thinking ever since she’d pulled back from Brett’s kiss.
“Why ... do you say that?” she asked softly, wonderingly, gazing into his eyes as if searching for the secrets locked inside his soul.
“Because of this,” he told her, his fingers tightening on her hair, forcing her face close to his. He drew her to him and brought his lips down on hers once more in a fierce, demanding kiss that sent golden flames shooting through her. The world tilted and spun as he crushed her down upon the bed again, his powerful limbs imprisoning her.
“And this,” he growled, his hands touching her breasts, making her gasp with stunned delight. “Because of everything we feel when we’re together. Because you can’t deny it any more than I can, sweetheart.”
And then they were somehow entwined, and all the kisses they’d kept bottled up during their days on the trail together poured out, wild and pure and demanding, like a torrent of driving rain, washing away everything in its path. Cade buried his face in the luxuriant satin of her hair, as caught up as she in a frenzy of emotion, and his hand boldly cupped her breast as he’d yearned to do since the very first time he’d touched her.
“Cade,” she breathed, in pleasure and in shock as his fingers tore at the pearl buttons at the front of her gown.
“You’d better not be saying you want me to stop,” he warned softly, his mouth warm against hers.
“No,” she whispered back, writhing against him. “I want you to know that ... Cade!”
She panted as he sprang the last button free and with one smooth movement slid the gown off her shoulders, down her arms, and wriggled it toward her hips.
“Go on,” he said.
“That’s what I wanted to say to you ... go on.” A chuckle sounded deep in his throat.
“Oh, Cade, I have to confess to you ... I don’t know exactly what I’m doing ... Mr. Perkins and Mr. Reed and Mr. Connely never did anything like this ... or that ...”
“They better not have,” he growled against her ear.
A laugh bubbled from her, quickly stifled by a kiss so devouring and intense that she drank it in like wine. Such sweet heat was fl
owing through her, pulsing, building ...
Her dress was off and she was wearing only her chemise as she worked frantically at his shirt. Annabel had no thought of modesty, no hesitation. Tender feelings and blinding sensations were all stirred up inside her, filling her up with needs she hadn’t even known existed before, needs she’d never experienced with Brett or with anyone else.
Only with Cade McCallum. And Roy Steele.
Beneath her chemise her breasts tingled at the things his hands were doing to them, and her nipples hardened into taut rose peaks that ached beneath his stroking thumbs. She shivered as he held her still and rained down quick warm kisses across her throat. Then his mouth moved lower, and captured her tormented nipple, his tongue circling it, teasing it until Annabel clutched at his hair and willed herself not to scream.
Suddenly there was a knock upon the door.
Cade McCallum lifted his head from her breast. “Shit.”
“Is the door locked?” Annabel whispered in horror, unable to remember if she’d locked it or not. The notion of being discovered here—like this—brought reality back in a sharp breathless rush. She remembered the danger, the family downstairs waiting for their help, the tremendous odds Cade faced in this confrontation tonight, and she was afraid.
But Cade sprang off the bed and signaled for her to respond to the knock.
“Yes?” she squeaked, her voice so breathless it barely sounded like her.
“That you, Miss Brannigan?” To her relief, it was Adelaide Rivers’s voice on the other side of the door. “I’ve been looking for you all over.”
“Just a minute. I ... had a problem with my gown.”
Annabel flew back into her dress and struggled with the buttons. Cade tried to help her, but she waved his fingers away. He grinned, looking amazingly younger and more carefree than she’d ever seen him as he yanked on his shirt and then strode behind the oriental screen.
Annabel rushed to the door.
“What is it, Adelaide? What’s the matter?”
Heaven knew what the woman thought as she peered at Annabel in the doorway. Her rheumy eyes were nevertheless sharp with intelligence, and Annabel knew her face must be the color of a plum.
But Adelaide Rivers was too upset to be bothered wondering about her antics. That was apparent from her next words.
“Trouble,” the old woman snapped, her wrinkled skin the color of oatmeal beneath her weathered tan. “Conchita is beside herself. We don’t know where Mr. Steele went to. That danged supper is almost over, and we’re afraid something has happened to him. But that’s not the worst of it. Tomas is missing.”
Annabel stared at her with dread. “Missing?”
“Our nearest neighbor, Dan Miller, said he saw him right before supper scuffling with some older boys. One of ‘em is the son of Lowry’s foreman, Hank Ellis. I don’t like the sound of this, not one bit.”
“There is probably a reasonable explanation,” Annabel said quickly, wanting to comfort the woman, though her own anxiety was mounting by the moment. “Or,” she had to admit, meeting Adelaide’s crisp glance with a worried frown, “it could be part of Lowry’s strategy to distract us and then instigate his plan. I’ll meet you downstairs in just a moment, Adelaide, and we’ll look for Tomas together. Maybe we can find Hank Ellis—or his son—and ask him a few questions.”
“Hurry,” the old woman urged as she turned toward the stairs. “I’ve a strong feeling things are going to go from bad to worse real fast.”
So do I, Annabel thought as she closed the door. She ran into Cade’s arms as he stepped out from behind the screen.
“Oh, Cade, what do you think has happened to Tomas?”
“Damned if I know, but I don’t much like the sound of it. I’m going to hunt for him. Wait a minute or two, and then follow me downstairs.”
She nodded, her eyes huge and worried, and suddenly, Cade cupped her face between his hands. “I love you, Annabel.”
Even as he spoke, Cade was scarcely able to believe he was speaking those words, but he was unable to stop himself. Something inside of him, deep in his heart, had taken over, and he couldn’t slow it down or stop it. “I don’t know if or how things can work out between us, though,” he felt compelled to warn. “I’m a McCallum,” he said, as if that explained everything. “Seems to me if I let things ... continue between us ... I’ll only end up hurting you.”
“No, Cade, never that.” She touched gentle fingers to his lips. Love poured through her, as pure and warm as sweet wild honey. “I trust in you. I believe in you. Nothing you could ever do would hurt me.”
He held her close for one more moment, and then sighed against the fragrance of her hair. “We’ll see.”
It didn’t sound promising. She wanted to clutch him to her and tell him that things would work out between them, to make him pledge that he wouldn’t leave her, that he would at least try to ... what? Marry her? Build a life with her?
She ached for him to want that, but with a flash of despair she knew he was a long way from committing to any of those things.
He was already moving away from her. “I’d better get downstairs. Is that derringer in your reticule?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t think of setting out without it.”
She glanced over and saw her reticule still lying on the floor where she’d dropped it. “Don’t worry about me, just find Tomas—and take care of yourself.”
“If there’s one thing I’m good at,” he said grimly, “it’s taking care of myself.”
“When this is over, I’m going to take care of you,” she promised him, a smile trembling on her lips.
An unfamiliar emotion surged through him, one he was afraid to put a name to. He wanted to crush her in his arms, to kiss her until rose dawn painted the sky, to breathe in the luscious lilac scent of her, and tell her that he wanted to take care of her, but he instead forced himself to look at her with iron detachment. “Don’t count on that, Annabel.”
Then he was gone, and Annabel paced back and forth in an agony of trepidation. She picked up her reticule from the floor and opened it, checking for the derringer. It was inside, and loaded. She paused before the mirror and could only gulp in dismay as she realized that Adelaide Rivers had seen her looking like this, with her hair spilling wildly down her shoulders, and her dress—though buttoned—looking as sadly wrinkled and disheveled as a crumpled old washrag. She plopped the reticule on the bureau and began hastily searching for the hairpins Cade had so cavalierly plucked from her chignon. But as she knelt on the floor to retrieve one that was lying on the Aubusson carpet, a sound at the window made her freeze.
She jerked up, still on her knees, and gasped as Red Cobb swung his legs into the room.
“Don’t scream, or I’ll have to shoot you,” he warned, and before Annabel could even blink he had drawn his gun and pointed it at her.
She staggered to her feet, trying to control the terror pulsating through her.
“Don’t even think about reaching for that there reticule of yours,” he added as she glanced frantically toward the bureau, impossibly far away.
“What ... do you want?” she managed to ask in a voice that sounded far calmer than she felt.
“What happened to your southern accent, little Miss Investigator?”
She went still as stone. Red Cobb smiled mockingly, his crystal blue eyes colder than snow. “You must admit Miss Rainsford, that was a mean trick you played on me back in Silver Junction,” he remarked with a smirk. He moved forward into the room with easy, deliberate steps. “I didn’t much cotton to it. So now,” he said in a flat, pleasant tone, that chilled her blood, “I’m going to make you pay.”
Chapter 21
The shed was dark and stifling hot. Tomas couldn’t breathe. Coward, he accused himself hatefully. You are a fool and a coward. A disgrace to your father’s memory.
He had let himself be tricked. And now he could not help Señor Steele to kill Señor Lowry. Hot tears burned along his cheeks
as he pushed again, fruitlessly, at the bolted door of the shed. Why had he believed Jack Ellis and the other boys? Why had he let them lead him into this trap?
Señor Brett is right, he told himself as the tears fell faster and the air grew danker and he wondered with a gulp if he would die in here before anyone ever found him. I am too young and too stupid to be of any use.
* * *
Brett slipped out of the kitchen door, past Calvin Lowry’s Mexican cook and house servants. He could just make out the outline of the shed beyond the vegetable garden. He stalked toward it.
The boy who’d come and whispered in his ear that he would find Tomas Rivers in that shed had long since disappeared—Brett only hoped he was telling the truth. He needed a drink desperately. Whiskey. A whole bottle would do just fine. But something had kept him from consuming even a drop of Lowry’s red wine or champagne or any other spirits. Maybe it was the wish, after all, to survive. And maybe to be of help to someone else, be it his brother, Annabel, or the Rivers family. Maybe part of him was beginning to realize that it was time to stop running from his problems and just face them head on.
The shed was locked when he reached it, secured with a thick wooden bolt, which Brett threw back at once.
“Tomas, are you in here?” His stomach was knotted tight with fear for the boy as he swung the door open.
A small face with eyes that gleamed in the dimness stared back at him.
“Tomas, are you all right?”
Slowly Tomas walked out of the pitch black shed. “They tricked me, señor.” Tears throbbed in his voice. “First we had a fight, and then they said they wanted to be my friends, and they told me they would show me where a cat and her kittens were sleeping, but ... they lied.”
His voice broke as the sobs rushed out. Brett knelt down and enfolded the child in his arms.
“Hey, it’s all right, Tomas. Everyone gets tricked now and then. They’re the ones who should feel ashamed, not you.”
“But I believed them. I was a fool.”
“You’re not a fool. You just wanted to believe it, so you did. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to believe that people are good. Sometimes they really are, and you just need to give them a chance.”