Arizona Embrace (32 page)

“How much do I owe you?” Trinity asked.

“Five dollars ought to do it.”

“You sure?”

“I don’t need to charge much. I’m the only doctor within a hundred miles. I get more business than I want. Now you be on your way. I’ll send the boy after you soon as he’s able to ride.”

That taken care of, Trinity turned his mind to weir situation. He asked Victoria If she’d like to spend the night at the Sunbonnet Hotel, the only hotel in the town of Gabel’s Stop. As it boasted the town’s only dining room, they’d eat there as well. Victoria nearly whooped with joy.

The first dung she did was take a bath. As she lay submerged in the water, she could almost feel the layers of dirt fall off, along with the fatigue and tension of the journey. By the time she stepped out of the tub, she felt almost like an ordinary human being again.

Going to dinner would make her feel like a young woman on a date. She’d never really had a date, and she fairly tingled with anticipation. This would be the first time Trinity saw her as anything other than a prisoner or a travel-worn companion.

What should she wear? She had never had a chance to dress for Trinity. Now that she did, she didn’t have anything to wear. The man was depressingly practical. He must have rifled through her entire wardrobe, but he hadn’t chosen to bring a single dress.

She settled on a cream shirt with a tan skirt and boots. She couldn’t put her hair up. The only pins she’d brought with her were the ones she was wearing the morning he kidnapped her.

She’d lost every one of them on the trail.

She had no jewelry. Who would have worn jewelry on a dawn ride into the mountains? Naturally Trinity didn’t bring any. If you couldn’t shoot it, eat it, or ride it, it was no use—clearly a man’s thinking.

Victoria combed her hair with her fingers. She’d have to go shopping for some essentials before they left town. She couldn’t arrive in Bandera looking like a vagabond. She’d have to buy at least one dress. She hoped they had something in her size. She didn’t know how to sew, and she didn’t imagine Trinity would wait around for her to find a seamstress.

Victoria smiled at herself. It had been years since she’d been so excited about dressing for dinner. Jeb had never cared what she wore even when she had dozens of gowns to choose from. Myra paid more attention to Victoria’s clothes than Jeb did, but then beautiful women always notice another woman’s clothes. Judge Blazer’s wife was the most beautiful woman Victoria had ever seen.

Buc and Uncle Grant never seemed to notice what she wore, either. They tended to take her for granted. She wondered If Trinity would be the same. But Trinity noticed. It was like they were seeing each other for the first time. No murder verdict hanging over her head, no kidnapping, no miserable trip across the desert. Just a man and a woman who liked each other very much having dinner.

Victoria felt oddly self-conscious. Even though a brief glance at the other occupants of the room told her her subdued dress was best, she would have felt much more confident “If she had been able to fix her hair and wear her best gown and her double rope of pearls. She felt very plain.

Trinity’s plain clothes created just the opposite effect. He wore all black: black hat, black shirt, and black pants. Even the buttons and belt buckle were black. He probably didn’t have any idea how his appearance affected Victoria, but there wasn’t a woman in the room who could take her eyes off him.

He looked mysterious. Victoria was not used to men wearing hats indoors, but every other man in the room wore one, too. Trinity had pulled his low over his eyes. His jaw and lips were set. No smile of greeting. His eyes found her; his gaze swept the room, then locked on her once more. Possessive and protective.

He looked powerful. His clothes fit him like a glove. He tolerated no loose folds that snagged or billowed in the breeze. The cloth stretched tightly over his lean, hard, muscled shoulders and arms.

He looked seductive. His pants hugged his powerful thighs in a way which made Victoria’s breath catch in her throat. She swallowed once. The ripple of muscle and tightly encased flesh as he walked toward her caused an uncomfortable feeling to well up in her middle. She swallowed again.

She wouldn’t allow her thoughts to settle on the bulge in his pants. She’d never had this problem with Jeb or Buc. She hadn’t had this peculiar feeling in her belly either.

“Feel better after your bath?” Trinity asked as he reached her side. She noted one difference in the way he looked at her. His eyes always smoldered when she caught him off guard, but now they smoldered despite the fact she was overtly watching him.

“Much better. I never knew I could miss a bath so much. Now if I just had some decent domes.”

Trinity guided her to a table nearly in the center of the room. All the others were taken. He seated her facing the outside door. He sat down facing a huge mirror over the bar.

“Judging by the reaction of the men in this room, they consider your clothes much more than decent. So do I.”

Victoria struggled to retain her composure. She hadn’t counted on him saying anything quite so personal. She was having enough trouble just keeping her reaction to him under control. She didn’t think she could handle his reaction to her at all.

“At least you’ve seen me looking better.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“Of course you have. I wore clean clothes every day until you kidnapped me. I had hair pins, too.”

“I still never saw you look better.”

Victoria felt herself turn pink. With her nearly white complexion, she knew everyone could tell she was blushing. She hated that. They had no right to know she was uncomfortable, or so dazed by this man that his glance had the power to cause her heart to beat double time.

“It’s too late to start flattering me now. We’ve seen each other at our worst. There’s nothing new to learn about each other.”

“I feel like I know nothing about you,” Trinity said. “I might as well have been traveling with a stranger.”

“It’s hunger,” Victoria said, smiling flippantly, looking for a way to release the pressure. The tension between them was too great for such a public place. People could practically read their thoughts on their faces. “It’s caused you to feel lightheaded.”

Trinity smiled. He nearly laughed. She liked it when he did that. He seemed more approachable. At times like this she could believe he had once been young. Usually he looked more unbending than vice, more knowing than evil itself. At those times she questioned whether he could ever feel such a human emotion as love.

Tonight she was sure he could.

“I’m keeping you from your dinner and giving all these men a chance to stare at you,” Trinity said.

The food was delivered hot and plentiful.

“They have only one thing on the menu” he explained. “That way you don’t have to wait.”

Victoria had looked forward to dinner all afternoon. After dozens of meals cooked over a six-inch fire, or eaten cold, or not eaten at all, she practically salivated at the thought of decently prepared food. Now she had no appetite at all. She had to force herself to eat.

“What will we do next?” she asked Trinity, in an effort to get her mind off his physical presence. Maybe “If she weren’t so intensely conscious of his body, she would feel more comfortable. And her appetite would return.

“I thought we might stay here a day or two, long enough to talk to Red. I don’t like leaving him without a word. Besides, it’s settled in to rain. Looks like it’ll rain all night.” Trinity continued to outline his plans for the rest of the journey. Victoria was relieved to find it now included stops at several towns rather than a continuous series of wilderness camps, but she noticed he seemed a little preoccupied. He seemed to be watching the occupants of one table out of the corner of his eye.

Victoria glanced in the direction of his gaze and found herself returning the stare of four men she would have instantly characterized as hard cases. They wore dirty clothes, apparently had no concept of personal hygiene, and leered at her openly. Furthermore, they didn’t think it necessary to make their remarks in a quiet voice. Victoria blushed at the publicly stated wish of a man with a rust-red beard.

She tried to concentrate on Trinity, on what he was saying, but the man’s voice continued to get louder.

“We shouldn’t have stopped,” Trinity said, laying down his fork. “A town like this is no place for a woman. Especially a beautiful woman.”

“He’s just crude,” Victoria said. “I’m sure he doesn’t mean anything.”

“They’re miners. They always mean something.”

Chapter Seventeen

The man in the red beard stood up and started toward their table. The others followed.

“Don’t respond to anything they say,” Trinity said under his breath. “No matter what happens, keep eating like you don’t see them.”

“Stop where you are,” Trinity commanded when the red beard was about six feet away. “That includes the rest of you,” he said when Red Beard’s companions started to drift to either side. “I can put a bullet through your earlobe” Trinity warned an eyesore of a man who kept moving. “Don’t force me to prove it.”

Trinity held his gun above the table, aimed directly at Red Beard. The message was unmistakable.

“We don’t want no trouble,” Red Beard said. “We just want to talk to the little lady. We ain’t seen nothing like her in some time.”

“We ain’t
never
seen nothing like her,” his young, blond companion corrected. “I never knew a woman could be that beautiful.”

“My wife and I would prefer not to be interrupted while we eat our dinner” Trinity said. “Now “If you would go back to your own table….”

“She ain’t your wife,” Red Beard contradicted.

“What makes you say that?” Trinity asked.

Victoria didn’t have to look up to know Trinity’s whole demeanor had changed. He was prepared to defend his chapter seventeen woman. It rang in his voice like the clarion call of a wild stallion.

“She ain’t wearing no wedding ring. A woman like that don’t get hitched without a ring.”

“Besides she wouldn’t hook up with a dude like you,” said the eyesore. “She’d go for somebody with money.”

“I saw the way you looked at each other when you came in here,” the blond said, “like you could eat each other up. Ain’t no man looks at his wife like that.”

“She’s your fancy piece,” Red Beard continued. “We don’t mind that. We just want a little of the action.”

The eyesore made the mistake of taking a step toward Victoria. The deafening report of a pistol rocked the room. The man screamed and his hand flew to his ear. It came away covered with blood.

“God Almighty!” he yelled. “You shot half my ear off”

“You moved too fast,” Trinity said nonchalantly. “It threw my aim off a little.”

“You can’t go shooting people’s ears off just like that” the blond said. This is a civilized country.”

“Then you can’t go around ordering a man to turn over his wife so you can have a little fun for the evening “Trinity replied. “Now go back to your table and I’ll try to forget the way you insulted my wife. If not, I have eleven bullets left. And I ought to warn you I can shoot equally well with either hand.”

“She ain’t your wife,” Red Beard insisted. “Why don’t you ask her what she would like? We got gold dust.”

“Then I suggest you send it home to
your
wife. I’m sure the children need new shoes.”

Red Beard flushed, a tacit admission that Trinity had correctly gauged his marital status, but the blond wasn’t so easily silenced.

“I ain’t got no wife, and I got the most dust.” He took a heavy pouch from his pocket. “You can have the whole sack If you’ll take me to your room for just an hour.”

“Shit. I’m going to kill him,” the eyesore swore as he dabbed ineffectually at his ear with a discolored handkerchief. “Him and his whore. He done shot off my ear.”

Trinity suddenly whirled and fired behind him. He spun back around and fired again. A man seated near the outside door sank back in his chair. His drawn gun slipped from his hand and fell to the floor with a clatter. The eyesore sank to me floor as well, his drawn gun still clutched in his hand.

“Anybody else who feels like trying his luck, go right ahead,” Trinity announced. “I can see the whole room with the aid of this mirror.”

No one moved; no one said a word.

“Get up and leave as quickly as you can,” Trinity spoke to Victoria in a quiet, controlled voice. “Go to your room and lock the door. I’ll be along in a minute.”

Victoria didn’t want to leave Trinity, but she knew an unarmed woman would be more of a liability than a help. No one stirred when she got up from the table and walked quickly from me room.

“I don’t want anybody following me,” Trinity said, rising to his feet. “I’d take it as downright unfriendly”

“You ain’t leaving here” Red Beard shouted, “not after killing Hobie.”

“Burns, too,” someone called from close to the other man.

“I’m calling the sheriff,” the blond said.

“Go right ahead If you think you can reach the door alive,” Trinity said. “I suggest you see to your friends. Unless my aim is really off today, they’re still alive.”