The Marshal's Rebellious Bride (29 page)

Morgan squinted, too, his heart thudding with dread at
the large mass of something pressing down the grass a dozen or so feet from the
river ahead of them. Too big to be Whiskey, he told himself. But what…

He couldn’t stand the not knowing and pressed his
horse forward. He pulled up sharply when he saw the horse lying dead on his
side.

All three of the men slid from their saddles and moved
closer, and then spread out to scan the area on foot for any signs of Whiskey. He
prayed he wouldn’t spot her lying equally dead nearby.

Finally he walked back to the horse just as Taos and
Keno also headed back. Something dangled across the horse’s neck; something
he’d first thought was simply the halter.

He hunkered down and his fingers shook as he picked up
what he now realized was a foot of her braided hair. He held it close, moaned
in protest, and then stood to face his friends. Holding it out so they could
see, he said, “It’s Whiskey’s hair.”

Taos reached for it and froze as he stared at it.
“There’s blood on the ends. Damn it, there’s blood!”

For a second Morgan thought he would be sick, but he
refused to think negatively. He couldn’t. “Marino is baiting us.
She’s
not
dead
,
you and I know it
. We all know it.”

He jammed the hair in his pocket and stomped back to
Demon where he’d left his horse ground hitched. “Let’s go!”

* * *

The sun had finally set and, to Whiskey’s relief,
Marino had decided to stop for the night. They’d run across an abandoned shack,
a building so near falling down that it couldn’t be called a cabin. It was
small, though, and they would be too close to one another for her comfort. But
then he didn’t care about her comfort. He didn’t care about her at all except
as a way to get even with Morgan.

“I need to…” She needed to relieve herself but it was
humiliating to ask for permission.

He’d tied her to a post holding up part of the
drooping porch roof while he took his bedroll into the shack. He glanced back
at her. “Rope’s long enough. Take yourself around side the building and do it.”

Having no other choice, she did so. When she walked
back around to the front, she found him staring off into the distance. The moon
was already out and nearly full. It would be difficult to see, certainly to
track them, yet she knew Morgan and her brothers would be doing so.
Especially if they’d found her horse and her hair.

“Tomorrow I figure everything will come to a head,”
Marino said, looking at her. “If not tonight.”

Her stomach rumbled. She hadn’t eaten since the night
before, had been too worried about Morgan not returning to eat breakfast. Being
hungry was the least of her problems. She’d taken care of one problem: the need
to relieve herself. Her biggest problem was getting free. With her hands tied
and being tethered to the post freedom seemed impossible. But she wouldn’t give
up.

His horse snorted and pawed the ground in a demand for
attention. Marino grumbled a curse but then went to pull the saddle off. After
that he poured a small amount of water from his canteen onto the grass in front
of the horse. Evidently the horse would have to lap up whatever he could manage
to quench his thirst.

At that moment she realized how thirsty she was as
well. It was difficult to beg for anything from this man, but she had to. “What
about me?”

He walked over to her, held the canteen out of her
reach, and taunted, “How about you earn it,
chica
?” He nodded down his body.

“I’m not that thirsty,” she snapped. The idea of doing
anything at all to his body or with him more than disgusted her.

His hand shot out and slapped her already bruised
cheek. “You will be.”

A whisper of sound somewhere close captured their
attention.

He sneered. “So it will be tonight. Good.”

She, too, was certain Morgan and her brothers were
nearby. Not on horseback any longer. No they’d have to be sneaking their way on
foot. She was truly scared now, not for herself but for them. She had to do
something. Had to keep Marino distracted long enough for them to take him down.

Another whisper of sound.

Deliberate? She didn’t know, but suspected so.

Marino went back into the shack and returned with his
rifle. He stopped next to her and tried to scan the area as best he could with
only the partial moonlight to aid him. She felt tension radiating from him and
he set the rifle against the building to pull out his handgun. Then he grabbed
her braid and tugged her against him, holding the barrel of the gun to her
head.

“I know you’re out there, Rydell. You’d best be
careful.”

He jerked on her braid and made her squeal in pain.
“Hear that? I’ve got your woman. There’s a gun to her head and I’ve no problem
at all killing her. You know that, don’t you?”

“You’re not leaving here alive,” Taos called out and
he didn’t sound all that far away, in her opinion.

“She ain’t either. I’m hoping to kill at least one of
you as well. Preferably Rydell.”

She thought she saw movement off to her right.
Then movement to her left.
They were trying to surround the
shack. What had Marino seen?

“Give me Rydell and I just might let this woman go,”
Marino taunted. The lie was in his tone.

“No, he won’t,” she yelled out only to have him knock
her upside the head with the gun. It wasn’t a hard enough hit to knock her out,
but it hurt like blazes.

They heard a growl and she knew it had come from
Morgan. Her brothers had cursed, but it was Morgan who appeared more
threatening at the moment.
Also in more danger.
She
couldn’t let anything happen to him.

Marino was peering as best he could into the area
around them when she was certain she spotted Morgan about to race in their
direction.

Her heart pounded. She silently screamed “No!” And
then she managed to dip her head down and away from the gun long enough to
shove her full body weight into Marino.

Knocked off balance, he managed to keep hold of her
braid and take her down with him. But his gun hand hit first and, amazingly,
the gun slipped from his grip.

Everything was a blur after that. Taos and Keno raced
out of the dark and were only a few feet away, guns leveled on Marino, but he
was using her as a shield and they couldn’t fire.

Morgan burst around from the side of the shack and
froze at the sight of Marino’s knife now held to her throat. Both she and
Marino had reached for his knife as they went down, but
she’d
been hampered by the rope
around her hands. He’d won, but she wasn’t
giving up yet.

“Let her go,” Morgan gritted out. “You can have me
instead.”

Marino snorted. “I am not stupid, marshal. And I am
not afraid to die.”

He moved the knife just enough that a small line of
blood trickled across her neck. “I will settle for seeing your misery as you
watch your woman die at my hand.”

She knew she’d be taking a huge risk and wasn’t even
sure she could do it. But she’d only been able to come up with one way to
possibly distract Marino long enough for Morgan or her brothers to shoot him.
If he did manage to slice her neck… Well, at least she would save the others.

As he glared at the man he hated so much, she reached
sideways and took fierce hold of his testicles with her tied-up hands. Her
brothers had long ago taught her the best way to hurt a man was to go for his
private parts.

The knife cut for only a second, not deeply, not
deadly. He yelped and looked down in shock.

Three shots rang out simultaneously.

Marino’s body jerked and then tilted over on top of her.

She shoved at his dead weight, cried out, “Get him off
me! Get him off me!”

Morgan was there in a flash. He picked up Marino’s
body as if it weighed nothing at all and flung the dead man a good six feet
away. Then he pulled her to her feet and crushed her against him. His whole
body seemed to shudder and she felt his heart pounding against her own.

“Don’t you
ever
scare me like this again! Ever!” His voice shook with the depth of his
emotions.

“Brandy? Tyler? Are they all right?” Whiskey asked,
tears of relief streaming down her face. She snuggled even closer to
him,
not wanting him to ever let her go.

Taos picked up the knife and looked pointedly at them.
“Let’s get her cut free. Then I need a hug of my own.”

Keno stepped over Marino and walked up next to them
too. As Morgan inched back so Taos could cut the rope tying her hands together,
Keno looked at her face. Fury threaded his voice as he snapped, “What the hell
did he do to you?”

Now that it was all over, she fully felt the pain of
her injuries. Her nose ached, as did her mouth. Her ribs still throbbed from
their abuse against the saddle. But it was her jaw that really throbbed. Then
there were her wrists with severe rope burns, and now her neck hurt, too.

To her dismay, she gave into weakness and whimpered,
“I want to go home.”

Morgan gently touched her jaw, thumbed her lip. At the
same time, he pulled a handkerchief from around his neck and then carefully
wiped at the thin line of blood. “If he wasn’t already dead, I’d kill the
sonofabitch
again.”

* * *

Whiskey sat up in bed as dawn’s light first crept
through the curtains. She had been in bed at doctor’s orders for over two days
now. Brandy had been ordered to bed as well until she could stand without
getting faint. So far that hadn’t happened, although she’d heard that her
sister kept trying to get up. Chase had taken it upon himself to make sure she
didn’t. He guarded her like a hawk, which confused and amused her brothers. But
while Morgan had stayed by Whiskey’s bedside immediately upon their return to
the ranch, she hadn’t seen him for over a day now.

She was frustrated, bored, and feeling neglected. He
was avoiding her, probably because she’d tried to get him to talk about that
whole marshal business. He’d admitted to her that he’d received a telegram
telling him to report back to work, but he’d refused to say any more about it.
They were not getting married until she was reassured once and for all that he
was giving up his badge.

Her brothers, too, had stopped babying her, probably
because she’d started pressing them about Morgan and why he was staying away
from the house now. Manuel had told her this morning that Taos had moved to
town, to live in the room above his law office. Keno was also settling
permanently in town in the room above his saloon. When she’d complained to
Manuel, he’d shrugged and reminded her that the ranch and house now belonged to
her and Morgan.
That fact that hadn’t made her happy, since he
was steering clear of her.

Even Tyler wasn’t around, which really depressed her.
He’d gone to stay with Taos for a few days, also according to Manuel. Evidently
he, too, wanted to give her and Morgan space to work their problems out.

Only that wasn’t happening.

Well she wasn’t going to stay in bed another minute
longer! The ranch hands had been taking reluctant care of her animals, but it
was time she took over those chores. She threw her legs over the side of the
bed and stood. She swayed on her feet.

The door to her bedroom opened and Morgan stood there
scowling. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m getting dressed, going to go check on my
animals.” She raised her chin and glared right back. He couldn’t stay away so
long and then prance in here and tell her what to do!

“No, you’re not. You’re pale as that damn sheet.” He
stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. “Get back in that bed
right now.”

She was feeling light-headed but refused to
acknowledge it. “No.”

A vein in the side of his neck pulsed. His eyes
narrowed dangerously. “Don’t push me on this, Angelina.”

She recognized the look in his eye, couldn’t believe
he was even thinking about spanking her. “I’m injured. You wouldn’t…”

“If you’re still so injured then get back in that
bed.” He walked steadily toward her. “Otherwise my hand is going to connect
with your bottom until you agree to stop this foolishness.”

To her disgust, tears filled her eyes. “You’ve been
avoiding me. Now suddenly you’re back and thinking you can tell me what to do.
No.”

His eyes mirrored wariness. “I’ve had things to take
care of. Quit acting like a brat and get in that bed.”

“No.”

He stepped to her even as she stood her ground. Then
he blindsided her by bending down to kiss her, cupping her head in his big
hands. His kiss sent heat searing through her, made her tremble. His tongue
slid along the crease of her mouth and uncertainly she opened it. Immediately
he pushed his tongue inside her mouth to dance with her own.

She purred and snaked her hands around his neck, up
into his shaggy hair. She pressed closer, feeling the hard ridge of his manhood
between them. Her lower body ached; she needed…