A Wanted Man (15 page)

But the men on the Silver Spur weren’t artists, she reminded herself. And likely hadn’t spent nearly as much time studying his face as she had.

“I’m going to need some things from the car—”

Surprise lightened his eyes. “You’re going to help me?”

“Of course.”

“Just like that?”

“Of course,” she said. “Now then—”

“Wait.” He captured her hand, drew it together with the one that was still entwined with hers. “It wasn’t all lies, you know. Not when I talked to you. Not when I kissed you.”

Hope lifted inside her, a heady, effervescent lightness that felt dangerously good.

“I did that because—” He paused, searching for the right words, settling on the simplest. “Because I wanted to. But I shouldn’t’ve,” he said. “You’re too young. Too—”

“I thought we covered that already,” she snapped.

“I know.” Offending her pride wouldn’t help. “How about too inexperienced? Is that better?”

Better, no. But true.

“I took advantage of your curiosity and your newfound freedom,” he went on. “I knew that you would be likely to read more into our friendship than was there, and yet I—”

“Well, now, don’t you think highly of your charms?” she said lightly, while her heart pounded so hard she
was afraid he would notice the evidence of her lie. “I was curious. No more, no less. Don’t make too much of it,” she advised him, determined to follow her own counsel.

He studied her thoughtfully, as if trying to find the truth behind her words. She forced a smile and returned his gaze as steadily as she could, making herself open, light.

Finally, he nodded. “I just wanted to make certain you understood that taking advantage of your natural warmth was not part of my plan. It was anything but part of my plan.”

She
was not part of his plan, Sam thought. Oh, Laura Hamilton, painter, rich man’s daughter, had certainly been central to his strategy. But this woman in front of him, who stirred him and challenged him and haunted his sleep, was not.

Though it likely would have been better for both their sakes to let her believe that he’d kissed her for no other reason than to blunt her defenses, deflect suspicion, and ensure that she would bring him along to the Silver Spur. Laura, furious and wary, would guarantee that nothing improper ever happened between them again.

But he knew he was the first man to kiss her—a thought that, surprisingly, he found wildly exciting. He’d never cared much one way or another about a woman’s past, her experience or lack thereof. What business was it of his? He supposed there was some elemental drive involved, the need of a man to stake his claim, an instinct that kicked in whether it made any real sense or not. Because the things he felt when he looked at her certainly didn’t make any sense.

“Speaking of plans…” She inspected his face, di
rect, impersonal, the same way she’d study a tree before she began to sketch. He should be grateful she was so reasonable about it all, not allowing emotion or hurt or residual attraction to get in the way of what needed to be done.

Except he wanted nothing more than to lean forward, kiss that detachment away, and make it all decidedly personal.

“I still need some things from the train.”

“You won’t be in any danger,” he promised. “Even if they tumble to me, there’s no reason to suspect anything of you. And if your father’s reputation is not protection enough, I’ll get you out of there the instant there seems to be any threat to you.” He said it earnestly, with the weight of a solemn vow.

She wanted, too much, to hear vows from him, and so she retreated to safer topics. “
Lots
of things from the train,” she warned him.

“I know you’re used to having your things,” he said, “but it’ll only be a few days.”

“No.” She gripped his chin—warm, gentle fingers; soft touch, firm hold—and turned his head from side to side through the fall of moonlight, studying the angles. “You’re
hoping
they don’t find you out. I, on the other hand, have every intention of
ensuring
it.”

“You do, do you?” he asked, amused.

“So there are several things—all right,
many
things—that I require from the car. We’re going to be explaining why we’re without entourage as it is. He’s going to expect me to have a full complement of luggage.”

“All right.” He stood and drew her up in one quick motion. She felt the lift of it, the lurch of her stomach, as if she weighed nothing, and he would pull her right off her feet. Then he released her, and she couldn’t help
but be sorry for it. It had been so pleasant simply to hold his hand, as if that’s what hands had been designed for in the first place, the comfort of another human’s touch.

“This way,” he said, heading off in…whatever direction he was heading off in; nothing around gave her a clue. But away from the horse that snuffled contently and patiently to her left.

“But—”

“To the train,” he said cheerfully, striding off so quickly she had to hurry to catch up, for she had little faith in her ability to track him through the darkened, unfamiliar landscape. “It’s barely two hundred yards.”

“Two hundred yards?”

“Yep. Didn’t think I’d stolen you off into the wilds, did you?”

He was true to his word. With only a few more steps she could see the low, blocky outline of the rail cars. And she wondered why being stolen off into the wilds by him didn’t sound outrageous at all.

T
he shriek yanked him from sleep, a banshee yell that ripped Hiram from a lovely dream—Christmas at home, and Ma’s apple pie, a whole one just for him—his heart knocking in panic before he even realized he was awake.

Indians
, he thought.
Has to be, nothing else makes that sound.
They’d told him a dozen times there was no danger out there, but what the hell did
they
know?

He groped for his pants, his thoughts a useless jumble, though part of him decided that, if he was going to get scalped, he wasn’t going to do it naked. A shirt, and then his brain cleared enough to recognize it didn’t matter.

Okay, gun. That was the only thing worth looking for.

He kept it close and loaded, on the tiny table that folded down from the wall. He cautiously pried aside the roller shade that covered his small window, squinting at the brilliant early-morning sunlight.
Nothing
.

He tiptoed out of his cabin and through the main part of the car, past the boxes and crates and trunks that
jammed the space to within six inches of the ceiling.
Not a bad place to hole up
, he thought;
there’s no way an arrow is getting through all of that
. Now if he could just get the ladies squirreled away before the war party arrived.

There was no sign of Erastus. Had they shot him already, then? Though, knowing Erastus, he could still be asleep.

Another shriek. An obviously female one this time, a blast of sound that curdled his blood.

No time to wait for Erastus. He braced himself in front of the door, took two deep breaths to steady himself, his gun at the ready, and kicked.

The door flew open, the jamb splintering.

Mrs. Bossidy stood there, openmouthed, eyes wide with terror. His gun pointed straight at her admittedly lovely, though he’d tried not to notice, bosom.

She didn’t move. Didn’t speak. He eased through the opening, scanning side to side for any signs of danger. Still nothing. Either someone had a weapon aimed at her from some hidden vantage point, or—

“For God’s sake,” she shouted, “don’t point that thing at me!”

He moved the barrel a fraction, keeping it shoulder high but aimed a foot to her left. “What’s goin’ on?” he asked, still unable to detect any signs of trouble.

She flapped a piece of paper she held clutched in her hand. Her mouth worked, open, shut, and he wondered if she thought there were words coming out or if she was too terrified to form them.

“Ma’am?”

She shoved the paper at him. He grabbed her instead, yanking her into the shelter of the train, safely behind him, then backed inside himself.

Nothing happened. Whoever, whatever, had spooked Mrs. Bossidy was long gone or uninterested in shooting…yet.

“What’s out there?”

“Nothing,” she gasped.

Then why was she screaming like somebody was peeling off her fingernails one by one?

“There’s gotta be something wrong. You haven’t insulted me once.” He couldn’t imagine what might have shaken her customary self-possession. It had to be something truly terrible.

She waved the paper, a flutter of white in the dim light leaking around the stacks of boxes that blocked most of the windows.

“Read it,” she croaked out, “if you can.”

“That’s my girl.”

My Dear Mrs. Bossidy,

I am truly sorry that you had to awaken to this. I would have chosen another way had I been able to see one, but pausing to wake you and explain in person would have been a delay we can ill afford. Also, I doubt you would have understood, though I shall try my best to explain it someday, and perhaps you will forgive me.

Please understand that I have not been abducted, nor am I in danger of any kind. You know me well enough to know that, were I writing this under coercion, I would find some way to encode a warning in this letter. I am perfectly safe and have every expectation of remaining that way.

I simply have some business to attend to. I will tell you that I am with Mr. Duncan. I know that
you do not trust him, but I have information that you’re not privy to. I tell you this not to worry you further but to perhaps allay those fears, for while you may have questions about his character personally, you can have no doubt about his abilities to protect me.

It won’t take us long. I am sorry that we had to take the horses, but I cannot have you attempting to follow us. Interference may well turn something that should be safe and simple into something else entirely. So please, enjoy your brief respite from duty. There are plenty of supplies and water. I’m sorry that we had to take the horses. I believe the next train is due in two more days.

There is absolutely no reason to trouble my parents with this event. It will only worry them, for by the time my father is able to take any action it will most assuredly be all over, and I will be back with you, safe and sound. Cabling him will only mean that I will be locked in a nunnery for the rest of my life, and the three of you will be without jobs.

I will meet you in Ogden in five days. That should be plenty of time. I suppose it is asking too much to ask you not to fret overly, but you have worried over me since I was eleven, and it is long past time you took a few days to yourself.

I must be off.

All my love,
Laura

P.S. I truly, truly am not eloping, so don’t worry about that. I promise. It really is merely a per
sonal concern of Mr. Duncan’s, and I am happy to be of assistance.

“Crap,” Hiram said.

He pressed the letter back in Mrs. Bossidy’s hands—she really had plump soft ones, he thought irrelevantly, and wondered why he’d noticed—and left her standing in the middle of the car.

Erastus was still in bed, curled up on his side with his fists tucked under his chin like he was all of five years old.

“Get up,” Hiram said, unceremoniously whacking the side of the bunk.

“Wha—”

“Miss Hamilton’s gone.”

“Gone?” He sat up, pushing aside a pretty, flowery quilt that some woman he’d never mentioned must have made for him. The broad pegs of his hairy legs stuck out beneath the drooping edge of his nightshirt. “How can she be gone?”

“Stole off with that damned Duncan.” He spun, leaving him to follow. “Or got stolen off
by
that damned Duncan.”

Mrs. Bossidy was right where he’d left her, standing lost and motionless between a pile of crates that held canvases and the tower of trunks stuffed with the tiny fraction of Miss Hamilton’s wardrobe she’d considered adequate to the trip. Or rather, he thought, Mrs. Bossidy thought necessary; Miss Hamilton never seemed to care that much about her clothes.

“Come on,” he snapped as he strode by.

“Come on?” Lucy Bossidy knew she was reacting slowly, as if moving through syrup, trying to make sense of it all with a sluggish brain.

Laura had been the center of her life for nearly fifteen years, filling a huge, gaping hole that she had thought forever destined to remain empty. Laura’s absence now set her adrift.

She blinked at Hiram, trying to make it all come into focus. “Excuse me?”

“I don’t know her things. You’ve got to go through them, tell me what they took with them. Maybe it’ll give me a few hints as to where they went.” He snapped his fingers in front of her face, trying to get her attention. “Come on, Mrs. Bossidy. I need you.”

For a big, bumbling boy who’d always seemed to have far more muscles than brains, he certainly knew how to take command when the situation warranted. “And then?”

“Then,” he said, “we go get Laura.”

“Well?” Sam asked. “What do you think?”

Laura stood back to approve her handiwork. She’d forbidden him to wear a hat and clipped his hair neat and short. It lightened his eyes, allowing the sunlight to reach them, warming the color to a rich, deep brown. She’d left a trim slash of sideburns that visually softened the sharp angles of his cheekbones and jaw, shaved the rest of his jaw ruthlessly and instructed him to keep it that way.

“You must shave twice a day,” she reminded him. “It should appear as if you can’t muster up a good crop of whiskers.”

He grimaced. “I don’t know what’s worse, the grooming or the clothes.”

The pants were his own; they’d had no choice there. But she’d had him buff his beat-up old boots until they’d gleamed like new; at least the leather was good.

The shirt she’d “borrowed” from Hiram because Sam didn’t own anything white. Even better, it hung loosely on him, like a boy playing dress-up in his father’s Sunday best, hiding the breadth of his shoulders, his power camouflaged beneath the loose, rippling swags of fabric.

“Okay, walk,” she ordered him.

He turned and clomped away.

“No, no! Hunch your shoulders a little. And take shorter steps. You look too much like someone used to being in charge.”

He tried. You had to give the man that. His shoulders rounded, and he turned his toes in, hobbling forward like a man on the far side of sixty.

“Oh, forget it. You’re trying too hard. It shows.”

He spun, frustration written clear across his face. “You, Miss Hamilton, are terribly bossy.”

She mock-scowled at him. “Yes, and don’t you forget it.”

“I’m ever obedient.”

“Mmm-hmm.” This was going to be more of a challenge than she’d thought. Tangible power surrounded him and she was having a hard time getting him to hide it. “You’d better be,” she warned him.

He strolled toward her.
Prowled
, in a way that made her breath catch in her chest.

“Smile,” she ordered.

“What?”

“
Smile.
”

He bared his teeth. “No, not like that. You look like a mad wolf. Give me something…benign.”

He stopped a foot from her. He was every bit as handsome like this, all buffed and polished. Citified. A man her father might have approved of. Though she
much preferred him the way she’d first seen him, real and rough and heart-poundingly compelling.

“Thank you,” he said softly. “For doing this for me. You didn’t have to.”

“Yes I did.” She tried to smile, but her lips trembled. Perhaps he would kiss her again. Maybe even a little bit more. It would be an appropriate token of his appreciation, wouldn’t it? Because she really did not think she could go through the rest of her life without, at least once, feeling again the way she’d felt when he kissed her: shivery, glorious,
alive
.

Except wanting it, so badly, should be a clear, blaring warning in itself. She obviously could not have a small snippet of him without longing for more. If he kissed her again, she would only want another, and another. His kisses were addictive, intoxicating, more dangerous than opium. Because she knew full well he was only grateful to her, and that when he’d discovered what happened to his friend he’d deposit her safely back with Mrs. Bossidy and go on his way. On to another job, another smitten woman, and never think of her again.

And she…she could hardly consider the men she might meet in the future as it was. She could not spend her life forever comparing other men to Sam. The more she knew of him, the more memories of him she had, the more likely she was to do so.

No, better she keep their relationship carefully bounded. She would assist with his current project and be glad that she was able to do so. And then she would neatly pack the memory away, a girl’s cherished keepsake and nothing more, and get on with the rest of her life.

“Will I do?” he asked, lifting his arms for her inspection, awaiting her judgment.

She tilted her head, considering.
She
would have recognized him in a heartbeat. But her eye was accustomed to seeing the angles beneath a beard, the line of a body cloaked by loose clothing. Most people were not. Few tried.

And the Silver Spur employees who’d attacked him previously were all men. That made a difference. Few women would forget Sam Duncan, but she doubted the men found him memorable, at least not in quite the same way.

“Wait.” She dashed to her valise, rummaged through to the bottom, and came up with a couple of small silver pots, two brushes. “Don’t move.”

“What the hell—”

He backed away as if she brandished a sword instead of a brush.

“Think of it as paint,” she said. “I’m very good with paint.”

“But you don’t use—” He squinted, peering closely at her face. “Do you?”

“Only when forced into it by my mother or Mrs. Bossidy. The rest of the time I don’t bother.” She approached him as if he were a nervous colt she expected to bolt. “Doesn’t mean I don’t know how.”

She brushed a waft of pale powder over his face and he coughed, waving away the drift of white that clouded the air before his face.

“Sorry,” she said. “But you simply look too…healthy.”

He caught her hand. She felt his thumb against the inside of her wrist. Knew he could feel the hammertrip
of her pulse there, that he would note the acceleration of her heart. “Why not?”

“Why not what?”

“Why don’t you bother?”

She shrugged. “There doesn’t seem much point in it.” It didn’t interest her. “There was never anybody to impress.” And even if there were, she knew the limitations of cosmetics. Even at approaching fifty, her mother retained a pure and classic beauty composed of excellent bones and lovely skin and vivid coloring. Laura, however, favored her father. Oh, she was not ugly; she was honest enough to realize that. But she also understood that all the cosmetics in the world would not make her something that she wasn’t.

“You’re right,” he said.

Her heart plummeted. Why had she, for even one second, thought it might be different? Oh, but she was allowing her fancies to run away with her sense. His thumb circled lightly, sending shivers of sensation down her arm.