Wanted (18 page)

Beth Andrews knelt at the year-old grave, her head bowed before the simple wood cross. “I tried, Joshua. I tried to hang on to your land … but I can't. Not any longer.” She buried her head in her hands, letting the tears flow free for the first time since Joshua had died of blood poisoning.

A careless moment with the ax. A rare, careless moment, a deep cut he had not taken seriously. “It's nothing, sweetheart,” he had said. “Nothing for you to worry about” He'd never wanted to worry her, had always treated her like a princess, since the day he'd first come into her father's store in Independence. He'd been a big man, and her small stature seemed to frighten him. If so, it was the only thing that had ever frightened him.

He had also been the kindest man she'd ever met, his large size belying a heart that opened to everyone. Unlike so many westerners, he had no prejudice against the Indians, and when they'd settled in a Colorado valley, he had immediately befriended the Utes who grazed their horses here. And they had been left in peace as Joshua carved out a farm, growing wheat, vegetables, and breeding livestock, crossbreeding mustangs with the stallion that had been his pride and joy.

He'd taken such pleasure in the farm, rising before daylight and grinning as he watched the sunrise. “God has already given me paradise,” he used to say. “You and our daughter and this land.”

She'd always felt so safe with him, from the first moment he'd shyly taken his hat from his head and so hesitantly asked her to take dinner with him. He'd been so unlike others who'd tried to court her: the smooth-talking drummers or the rough cowboys. For him she'd tried to cling to the land. For him and for their Maggie.

But she didn't have his strength. She didn't have the strength to plow the often rock-hard ground, nor control the stallion enough to breed it to the mountain mares, nor the skill to break the mustangs that Joshua had rounded up. The fences were in disrepair. There wasn't enough firewood for winter. She didn't have money for a hired man, not enough to compete with the promise of silver and gold in these mountains. The few drifters that passed through seemed more interested in her person than the few coins she could offer, and she'd chased several off with a rifle.

There was another concern. Joshua's accident had made her only too aware of the scarcity of doctors. She lived in fear that something would happen to Maggie.

The final straw had been the visit of a group of Utes yesterday. They had decided she needed a man. She could have her choice of four braves, they told her. And they expected to hear her choice before the next full moon. One week.

She heard a noise behind her. Maggie—six-year-old Margaret Ann—stood there silently. All the joy had seemed to drain from her daughter when Joshua died. Her laughter had faded, the bright, eager smile so very rare.

“You're crying, Mama,” she said with a wondering voice.

“I miss your daddy,” Beth said.

Maggie's eyes opened wide, and Beth suddenly realized that by holding everything inside, she had failed Maggie. By not grieving with her, her daughter had somehow believed she hadn't grieved at all. Beth had thought she had to be strong for her child; instead, her daughter assumed she hadn't cared.

“We have to leave here,” Beth said gently.

“I don't want to.”

“I know, love,” Beth said. “But I can't take care of it any longer.”

Maggie's lip stuck out “I don't want to leave. Papa's here.”

“He would want us to go,” Beth said. “He would want us safe.”

Maggie thought about it. “What about Caroline? Can she go with us?”

Beth sighed. A pig. How would they take a pig with them? But Caroline was Joshua's last gift to Maggie. As a piglet, Caroline had immediately started following Maggie around. Her daughter's tears had prevented Caroline's destined slaughter, and Joshua had given Carolina to Maggie for her very own. Maggie had clung to her pet in the past year.

“We'll try,” Beth said. She wasn't sure whether the Utes were keeping a watch on the homestead, or whether they had just expected she would accede to their demands in a week's time. She would have to chance a wagon in any event; she couldn't leave everything. And a pig wouldn't slow them more than a wagon. They could always cut Caroline loose, if necessary.

They would leave at night. Tomorrow night. Five days before the Utes returned for their answer. She and Maggie would head for Denver.

Maggie continued to regard her solemnly, big blue eyes begging a promise.

“Yes,” Beth said with more surety. “We'll take Caroline with us.” She took Maggie's hand. “We'll bring some flowers here tomorrow.” She gave the small hand a squeeze. “And you can give Caroline a bath so she'll be ready to go.”

Beth knew what a disaster that would be. Maggie would end up twice as muddy as Caroline had ever been. But it would keep her daughter's mind off leaving. She'd never known anything but this homestead.

Beth swallowed. It would be hard for her to leave, too. There were so many rich memories here. Maggie was born here four months after they'd arrived. They'd had neighbors then, William and Carolyn Greene, and Carolyn had helped with the delivery. But then William got silver fever and they moved away, leaving Joshua and Beth alone in the rich valley.

It had been lonely at times. But the very beauty of the valley, of the mountains that ringed it, had more than compensated. There had been Joshua and Maggie, and the hot springs where they'd loved to swim, and until recently they'd had the friendship of the Utes. Beth realized now the friendship had been a dangerous one. The Utes felt responsible for her, and that, to them, meant marriage.

Beth took one last look at the grave before turning back to the cabin. There were decisions to be made. What to take, and what to leave. What do you save from seven years of marriage? What do you discard?

And how do you start to live again?

The days had blurred for Lori. Had it been four or five since they had left the cabin?

She slumped in the saddle, wishing that the Ranger's wound wasn't healing so quickly. Each day he kept them longer in the saddle, and now it was nearly dusk, and they hadn't come to a halt yet She was hungry and tired and dirty. They all were. They had so few changes of clothing. She had one—a shirt and the divided skirt—but both men had gone through their extra shirts, and thus far the Ranger hadn't allowed them time to wash what they had. He seemed possessed with moving.

He was possessed, period. He rode grim-faced, mindless to his pain, to any discomfort.

At least the weather had moderated, as it did so often in these fall months in the mountains. They had left the snow, and the sun shone bright. At noon the Ranger had unlocked Nick's handcuffs long enough for both men to discard their coats. Then they had stopped at a stream in late afternoon to water the horses, but he'd allowed neither of them down.

The sun should have been healing, but it wasn't If anything, the wounds between them were festering. They no longer had the storm to fight. They had only themselves. She was beginning to feel the edges of panic. She had promised another telegram to Jonathon. Her family would be waiting in Denver for word. If only she knew where the Ranger was heading; she saw him occasionally take a map from his saddlebags and study it, then refold carefully, as he did everything.

Lori was aware he was skirting the main trails, following less traveled ones, but doing it cautiously. Natural wariness, or did he suspect trouble? She remembered in Laramie he had tried to find out whether anyone had been asking for them. And each morning as they broke camp, he buried the ashes from the fire. There were still traces of riders, of course. There was no way of totally eliminating them, but he was obviously trying to keep them to a minimum.

She tried not to think now. Not about the Ranger. Not about her discomfort, her empty stomach. She wanted to stop, then as soon as they did, she wished they were back on the trail. Whenever they did stop, her proximity to the Ranger was even more uncomfortable than being handcuffed to the saddle. After she'd rebuffed several attempts, he had stopped offering his hand to help her down. She couldn't bear the touch of it, the heat it always seemed to generate inside her, the recollection it summoned of those two kisses.

She would look at the dark, shadowed coldness in his eyes and remember that too-brief warmth. And the pain would be more than she could bear.

Lori closed her eyes, trying to think of good times, carefree times, when the Medicine Show had done particularly well in a town, and the family was together. Laughing, teasing, except for her mother, who was the quiet one, the fey one. She always watched the exuberance of the others with an uneasiness that Lori had never understood.

The horses stopped, and she opened her eyes. The Ranger was finally dismounting near what appeared to be a spring of some kind. He tied his own horse securely; then, as had been his practice since the first, he told Nick to dismount and locked the leg irons around his ankles before releasing his wrist from the saddlehorn. He offered her brother his coat back and then closed the handcuffs on both wrists. He always left Lori's hands free until it was time to bed down, obviously assuming he could handle anything she might try while he was awake. It annoyed her, even though she knew he was right She had as much chance against him as a snowball had of lasting ten seconds in hell.

With the lowering of the sun behind the peaks, the temperature was dropping again. She had become responsible for gathering the firewood while the Ranger unsaddled the horses, and she started her search, stopping for a moment at the spring. She kneeled and tested it.

Hot. It was one of the warm springs that had so delighted her on the journey up to Wyoming. She put both hands in and rinsed her face with the slightly aromatic water. How she longed for a bath. To wash her clothes, and Nick's.

She left the spring and gathered up the firewood. It had evidently not snowed there. The wood was dry, and ignited into fire almost immediately. Nick had wandered over to the spring and had followed her lead in washing his face, then looked longingly at the spring. Lori knew how much he too wanted a bath. While not a dandy by any means, Nick had always had a certain fastidiousness about himself. He was usually clean shaven, always first to find a bathhouse in the towns they'd visited. Now his face was covered with bristle, as was the Ranger's, making their appearance even more strikingly similar.

But Nick would die before asking the Ranger a favor for himself. Lori knew that. She approached the Ranger. She still couldn't allow herself to think of him in any other way. Not as Morgan Davis. Not as a man she was irresistibly drawn to. Just the Ranger. That reminded her he was an enemy.

He looked up at her approach, a question in his eyes. Words had been sparse between them since that evening at the cabin.

“Lori?” His voice was curious. Not warm. Not cold. Just curious.

She stood awkwardly, then blurted out words. “That spring … it's a warm spring. It would be good for Nick's ankle.”

He hesitated.

“I'll wash your clothes,” she offered in exchange, not wanting to beg, but to make a simple bargain.

The blue in his eyes darkened, but his facial expression didn't change. “That's not necessary,” he said.

He rose, dug in his pocket for a key, and went over to where Nick was sitting. He leaned down and unlocked the leg irons, ignoring Nick's surprise. He then unlocked one of the handcuffs, allowing Nick to discard his coat and shirt.

“Don't make me regret this,” he said roughly, then moved back, standing against a tree, his hand resting easily on his pistol.

Nick grinned for the first time in four days. “I wouldn't think of it,” he said, pulling off his boots and rolling up his trouser legs as far they would go. His ankle was still slightly swollen, and he lowered both legs into the spring and stretched out his arms, sighing with relief as he did so.

Lori decided to dare more. “There's soap in my saddlebags,” she said.

The Ranger nodded.

Lori smiled. “Thank you,” she said, and she nearly danced over to the saddlebags, extracted the soap, and joined her brother at the end of the spring. She took off her own boots and dangled her legs in the water. Nick looked up at her, the old devil in his eyes, the devil that had been missing ever since the Ranger had appeared in the cabin, and he grinned with real pleasure as he took the soap and started scrubbing.

He bent over to wash his hair, and Lori pushed him in. His hand reached out to grab her for balance, and she went in beside him, her head going under. She resurfaced, laughing. For a moment she forgot where she was. She and Nick were together, teasing like old times. The water was warm and buoyant and felt wonderful, even with all her clothes on.

Then she saw the Ranger. He was frowning, and the momentary joy drained from her. But she was in the water now, and she wasn't going to get out until she'd washed her hair. Nick's grin was gone too as he lifted himself out of the spring, his trousers dripping wet His body shivered slightly as the cold air hit it. But he waited until she was done and then gave her a hand to help her out, the infernal handcuffs dangling from his left wrist Lori started shivering and headed to the fire, only too well aware of the Ranger's eyes on her.

He said nothing, however, as she hunched next to it. Nick had pulled on his dry shirt and was hunting in his bedroll for his other pair of trousers. Lori turned her head, allowing him that small piece of privacy, as she sensed the Ranger would give him none. Even from a distance of twelve feet she felt the alertness in the Ranger, like a rattlesnake ready to strike.

She heard several clicks and knew that Nick had finished dressing, that the Ranger had replaced the leg irons and handcuffs. She hated him then. For a moment she and Nick had been free, and now that loss of freedom was more poignant than before.