Native Gold (50 page)

In a movement surprisingly fluid for such a large man, he swung up atop Thunder. Coiling the loose end of the rope around his fist, he nudged the horse forward. The rope pulled taut, and Claire was forced to follow.

Caught off guard, she staggered and almost fell. What kind of abduction was this? Surely the man would want to flee as swiftly as possible to avoid capture. Why wasn’t he sweeping her up and tearing off across the countryside?

He rode slowly, but keeping up was difficult. Claire was no longer accustomed to walking barefoot. Her father had cured her of that uncivilized habit years ago. The ground was rocky and uneven. Every few steps, she winced as star thistles bristled against her ankles and sharp pebbles poked her heels. Burrs caught in what was left of her lace hem, and her petticoat grew sodden with its harvest of dew.

She twisted her ankle on a stone and nearly went down again. The pain as she hobbled forward made her eyes water, but she didn’t dare stop. She feared if she hesitated, he’d ride on anyway, dragging her through the thistles.

But despite her best efforts to be stoic, her eyes filled, and the stars and the moon and the ground blurred before her. A trickle wound its way down her cheek and was swallowed up by the cotton binding her mouth.

It wasn’t the pain that triggered her crying. And it wasn’t fear, not really. It was grief.

From the day that Yoema fell ill, Samuel Parker had insisted that Claire hide her sorrow. After all, no one knew the truth about Yoema's relationship to Claire. They assumed the native woman was a servant, no more. So for the sake of propriety and obedience to her father, Claire had kept a stiff upper lip and denied herself the catharsis of tears. When Yoema died, there had been no funeral, and Claire was expected to carry on as if nothing had happened.

But now she was removed from the eyes of society, stripped of everything that had kept her sailing on a shaky but even keel. Her emotions felt as raw as the soles of her feet. And her father wasn't around to witness her weeping, to be disappointed in her. So all the pain she’d bottled up inside, all the bittersweet memories she’d repressed, all the tears she’d been unable to shed, gushed forth in a torrent so powerful that before long, her chest heaved with wrenching sobs and the gag grew wet with her weeping.

She no longer cared about the stones cutting her feet, no longer wondered about her captor. All she could think about was the woman who’d cared for her since she was a little motherless girl, who’d taught her the names of the animals, who’d held her when she was sad and lonely, who’d told her stories and sang her songs, and whose voice was now silent. Forever.

This time, when Claire tripped on the edge of a rock, she landed hard on her knees. She expected to be dragged through the weeds, and frankly she didn’t care if he hauled her that way for ten miles. Now that the egg of her sorrow had been cracked, she realized that nothing could hurt her as much as the loss of the woman she’d called Mother.

The moment she struck the dirt, however, her captor halted, turning to see what delayed her.

Overcome with woe, she sank forward over her knees and buried her head. She didn’t care if he watched her. He was nobody. She didn’t have to keep a brave face for him like she did for her father. Her breath came in loud, wheezing gasps, filtered by the smothering cloth. Her throat ached with an agony of grief, and the sobs that racked her body felt as if they tore her soul asunder. Overwhelmed by heartache, she didn't notice that the Indian had dismounted and now loomed over her.

His fingers suddenly grazed the top of her head, startling her, and she almost choked on her tears as she glanced up at him. Though his face swam in her watery vision, he seemed shaken.

Of course he was shaken. Men never understood women’s weeping. But she didn’t care. She stared up at the frowning savage, openly defiant, tears streaming down her cheeks, silently daring him to ridicule her.

His scowl deepened, and he jutted out his chin. His mouth worked as if he were trying to decide whether to swallow or spit. Then, with a whispered expletive, he released her. Winding one arm around her waist, he hauled her to her feet and nodded sharply as if to tell her there would be no more falling down.

She wiped her wet cheek on her shoulder, staring coldly at him, but he refused to meet her eyes. He wrapped his end of the rope one more time around his hand, turned away, and remounted. His back expanded and released once with a deep breath before he clucked to the horse, urging it forward one step.

Claire stood her ground, refusing to move. Her grief was turning rapidly to anger. What kind of a brute abducted a woman by night, force her barefoot across rock-riddled hills, and ignored her tears of distress? In her novels, even the hero's worst nemesis possessed some shred of common decency. Damn his coal-black eyes! If he wanted her to move from this spot, he’d just have to drag her.

When he turned to peer at her, the corners of his mouth were drawn down. He tugged once more on the rope.

Raising her chin, she took a step backward.

His eyes widened. He tugged again, pulling her forward a step.

Incensed, she marshaled her strength and hauled back on the rope as hard as she could.

To her satisfaction, she managed to alter his look of annoyance to one of surprise, though for all her efforts, he didn’t budge more than a few inches.

His amazement was short-lived. He simply let up on the rope, and she sank with a plop onto her bottom. Before she could scramble upright, he slipped from Thunder, stalking toward her, muttering under his breath all the way.

Leaning forward, he upended her, slinging her over one ox-like shoulder. The air whooshed out of her, and she closed her eyes against the dizzying sensation of her precarious perch. Then he tossed her sidesaddle across the horse and swiftly mounted up behind her.

Flinging a possessive arm around her waist, he nudged Thunder forward, mumbling what sounded suspiciously like "damn fool Indian,” and rode stonily into the deepening night.

At first she sat upright, stiff, unwilling to even think about letting her body come into contact with his. But as they rode on, mile after mile, her strength flagged. The sleep that had evaded her for days finally caught up with her, lulling her muscles into complacency and urging her eyes closed.

She stirred once along the gently rocking ride, fluttering her eyes open long enough to note that the sky had taken on the purple cast of the far side of midnight. Then she settled back in surrender against the stranger’s chest. Her grief spent, she found curious comfort in dozing against the warm cotton shirt, safe from sorrow, safe from memories, safe from judgment.

Hours later, the sound of soft snoring woke her. Claire opened her eyes to a morning filled with apricot-colored light. Before her, the rolling hills lay silvered with dew and dotted with dark oaks, and the rising sun stretched fingers of gold across the emerald knolls. For one brief moment, she forgot where she was and simply enjoyed the glorious view.

Then the man—who was pressed far too intimately against her—snorted awake, and she remembered everything. Her captor had apparently slept for some time, for the horse had stopped to graze upon a patch of clover, and it looked like they were miles from anywhere.

"Shit!"

Claire flinched. So the savage did speak English…or at least knew one useful word. He shifted on Thunder’s back, and she realized, much to her chagrin, that unless the man wore a Colt down his trousers, her hands, bound behind her, had just brushed the most private part of his anatomy. She curled her fingers in horror, relieved when he finally dismounted.

The stallion neighed, and then returned to chomping at the sweet grass. Her captor circled into her view, hitching up his trousers and scrubbing the sleep from his eyes. Then he lowered his hands from his face, and Claire saw him by the light of day for the first time.

He was truly massive, larger than any man she’d ever seen, broad of shoulder and chest. The muscles of his arms strained the blue flannel of his shirt, and his hands looked big enough to hide a whole poker deck.

But it wasn’t his size that made her throat go suddenly dry.

The man was devilishly handsome. She could see now that he wasn’t a full-blooded native. His short black hair had a slight curl to it, and his chin was dark with stubble. His skin was as golden as wild honey, and his teeth were snowy white where his lips parted. Deep, brooding eyes, shadowed by fatigue, shone like marbles of obsidian as he scrutinized her. And again, something about him looked curiously familiar.

"Ah, hell."

She blinked, impressed by his command of English, if not his vocabulary.

But the third word she pretended she didn’t hear. He turned his back to her and kicked hard at the dirt, raking his hair back with both hands.

She wondered why he was upset. He had no reason to blacken the air with his cussing.
He
wasn’t the one trussed up like a steer for branding.
He
wasn’t the one stolen from a snug home and dragged across the hills half the night in his unmentionables.
His
throat wasn’t as dry as gunpowder, and his legs weren’t bloody with thistle scratches.

He spun back around, glaring at her as if she were somehow to blame. She tried to glare back at him. But Thunder chose that inopportune moment to amble forward, stretching his neck down for a choice bunch of clover. Claire’s eyes widened as she began to slide inexorably, helplessly from her perch toward the hard-packed earth.

The instant Chase saw the panic in those big, beautiful green eyes, he instinctively lunged forward and caught the woman before she could slide off. Unfortunately, his efforts trapped her awkwardly between the horse's shoulder and his own chest. Her eyes widened even more, and he cursed, realizing that with her hands tied behind her, she could lend him no assistance whatsoever.

She slipped down his body, inch by delicious inch. Her soft breasts were crushed against his hard ribs, and her flimsy petticoat rode halfway up her legs before he could disentangle himself from her. At last he managed to get her feet on the ground.

Now if he could only regain his
own
balance.

What the hell had he been thinking last night, stealing a white woman? Whatever was in that whiskey, it must have robbed him of his last bit of sense, making him believe he had a hunger for vengeance and the stomach for violence.

Chase wasn’t a killer. Or a kidnapper. Hell, he wouldn’t go out of his way to step on a spider. Cruelty didn’t come naturally to him.

Neither did embracing a beautiful woman. Women didn’t come close to Chase much. His size usually scared them off. And if that didn’t do it, his scowl would.

Not this one. The lady might be a tiny thing, as pale as a flower, as delicate as a fawn. But there was strength in her spirit, fire in her heart. Damn, even in his sleep, his body had gotten riled up over her.

A moment passed before Chase realized his arms were still wrapped around the woman. Outrage sparked in her eyes, and he released her like a white-hot poker.

She probably figured he meant to ravage her. He was sure white men did such things. But Chase would no sooner take a woman against her will than he’d brand an animal.

He stepped away, shaken, but managed to keep enough wits about him to gather the end of the rope in his fist so she wouldn’t run off and get herself into worse trouble. Then he sank down onto the trunk of a fallen tree to consider his predicament.

Shit! Why hadn’t he listened to Drew? Chase had had more whiskey than sense last night. And today, unlike the sweet flavor of revenge he’d imagined, the reality of holding a helpless woman captive left a bitter taste in his mouth.

He rubbed the back of his neck, glancing sideways at his hostage, who looked like some beautiful snow-white angel dropped out of heaven into the dirt. What the hell had he done?

A half-breed couldn’t kidnap a white woman, particularly the wife of a rich rancher, and not expect half the population to come after him with guns blazing.

Worse, the horse he’d borrowed was a fine-looking animal, probably breeding stock. Hell, Parker might mourn the loss of his stallion more than his wife. Chase didn’t know what they did to a man who took another man's woman, but they hanged you for horse thieving.

He scratched uneasily at his throat.

Vengeance had seemed like such a good idea last night. Now it felt like the biggest mistake of his life.

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