Lone Star Lonely (14 page)

“His whore?” Kirsten finished softly.

Adam turned, blinking, a little of the rage
fading. “No. That’s not what I—”

“Why not? That’s exactly what I was. His
whore. He paid for my services by keeping quiet about what he knew.
And I lay there and took it just as often as he demanded it. I lay
there, and I felt nothing but revulsion. I thought about running. I
thought about suicide. And yes, I thought about murder. But hell,
Adam, you know me. You know how stubborn I am. I decided I’d beat
him. I’d get something just as damaging on him, and then I’d turn
the tables. But it never happened. The only thing that happened was
that I let him use me just the way you say I did. Night after
night, over and over, I lay in his bed, and the only thought in my
mind was that I wished it was you there with me. Your hands on me.
Your body…. But it wasn’t. It wasn’t. It never will be again.”

She lowered her fisted hands to her sides,
stubbornly refusing to cry anymore. She would not cry anymore.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” she said.

He put his hand on her shoulder. She shrugged
it off.

“I shouldn’t have said… Kirsten, the thought
of him touching you…”

“I was paid well. Hell, I inherited
everything the bastard owned. Or will, if I ever find proof I
didn’t murder him.”

Adam put a hand to the back of her head,
stroked her hair. “You don’t want his money. You never wanted
it.”

“You don’t know a thing about what I want.
Hell, Adam, you don’t even know what you want anymore.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I do.” But he took
his hand away. As soon as he did, Kirsten got to her feet and
walked away from him. And he let her go.

Great. Couldn’t he have waited at least
until she’d finished her meal to insult her, alienate her and take
his frustration out on her? What the hell kind of idiocy possessed
him with Kirsten, anyway? Jealousy, that was part of it. Plain old
jealousy, bigger and more powerful than anything he’d ever felt in
his life. And anger. Yes, anger at her for not coming to him with
all of this two years ago. For not trusting him with the truth. For
not letting him fix it for her. And at himself, for walking away.
For not seeing the truth behind her lies. For letting her go.

God, he never should have let her go.

She belonged with him. The very thought of
Cowan having touched her, much less….

No. He wouldn’t think about that now. He’d
let his anger come out all wrong, directed it at her when she’d
been as much a victim in all of this as anyone. He shouldn’t have
done that. His anger belonged to a dead man. And that made it all
the more frustrating. There was no target now. No use for the fury
raging like a cyclone inside him. He had to let it go. He had to
let it go.

But letting it go was harder than it sounded.
Because there was still that other fury swirling around in his
heart, feeding this one, empowering it. And that old anger had been
around for so long, he wasn’t sure he knew how to get rid of
it.

Kirsten lay bundled up in a blanket on the
ground, all the way on the other side of the fire. She was not
sleeping. There was nothing relaxed or restful about her. Still,
yes, but taut, rigid. He doubted she would close her eyes all
night.

He should have kept his mouth shut. There
would be time enough for the truth later. After Cowan’s murderer
was caught and put behind bars. After Kirsten’s name was cleared
and things got back to…normal.

Hell, things hadn’t been normal since his
would-be wedding day. He didn’t think his life would ever be normal
again.

And he had blown it with Kirsten tonight.
That was for sure. She would never open up to him if he kept
putting her on the defensive about Cowan. And they would never have
a chance if he couldn’t find a way to forget. To put it in the
past.

But right now, it was just a little too fresh
for that.

With a sigh, Adam gathered up the cooler,
tied a cord around it and carried it to the water hole to keep the
leftover food relatively cool for the night. Then he picketed the
horses near the grass and carefully doused the campfire. He did
every job he could think of to do, just to kill the time. To vent
his frustration. To ease the tension in his mind and his body. But
when he’d finished them all, Kirsten still hadn’t moved so much as
a muscle, and he was still as tense as a whip-cord. He didn’t know
what to say to her. What to do. How to fix this.

He chose a boulder with a good view of both
the surrounding night and of Kirsten, and he sat watch. It was
going to be, he thought, a very long night.

He was right. The minutes dragged by like
hours, and then became hours that seemed to last for days. His head
nodded. He snapped it upright. His eyelids drooped. He pried them
open. The moon rose high, lopsided and waxing toward full. Big and
yellow. Lonely. Cold. It got damned cold out here at night. Cacti
dotted the splitting desert ground, standing like bandits caught by
the law.
Hands up
. No colors out here at night. Shades of
gray. No black and white. Was there a message hidden in there
somewhere for him?

Soft footsteps made him swing his head
around. Kirsten stood behind him, her blanket wrapped around her
shoulders. A tin cup in her hand. She handed it to him. He just
looked at it.

“Coffee,” she said. “It’s still slightly
warm. I thought you could use a cup.”

“Thanks.” He took a drink, grimaced at the
taste, but drank some more.

“So, are you going to sit up here all
night?”

“Thought I might.”

She went silent, turned and leaned her back
against the rock. He sat atop the same hunk of stone, so she was
close to his legs. Not close enough.

Should he apologize again? Try to explain how
the image of a woman who should have been his wife in the bed of
another man could make a man crazy? Cause him to say mean, hurtful
things? He only knew Joe Cowan was one lucky son of a gun to be
dead right now. ‘Cause if he was alive, Adam would be out for
blood. And it would be slow. The bastard had forced Kirsten…he’d
forced her. God, Adam wanted to make that reality go away.

He looked at her. Moonlight gleamed in her
round wounded eyes. No makeup now. She wore the jeans and T-shirt
she’d found in the saddlebag, and her hair hung down long and
loose. She looked like the girl he’d fallen in love with. And the
years almost seemed to fall away.

“Kirsty, I, uh–”

“You ought to go meet with your brother,” she
said, interrupting him.

“What?” His brothers were the last thing on
Adam’s mind right now.

“Elliot. He said in his note to meet him at
Thompson Gorge at midnight. I think you should go.”

“Why?”

She tipped her head back to look up at him.
“Because he might have some kind of information for us. Maybe he’s
learned something—”

“He doesn’t know anything,” Adam assured
her.

She tilted her head. “You won’t know that
unless you meet him.” Adam pursed his lips. “I know you don’t want
to drag him into my mess, Adam,” Kirsten rushed on. “But he’s
already involved. He knows we’re out here, he gave us supplies, and
maybe he’s even been digging around on his own.”

“Damn fool kid’s liable to get himself
killed. At least get brought up on charges.”

Her brows creased. “You underestimate him,
you know. He’s not a kid anymore.” Crossing her arms over her
chest, she added, “And I don’t want him getting into trouble
because of me any more than you do. So don’t you think we ought to
see what he’s been up to? Find out just what he’s doing and tell
him to stay out of it?”

With a sigh, he nodded. “I suppose you’re
right.”

“Then let’s go. It’s eleven-thirty now.” She
straightened away from the boulder.

Adam slid to the ground, caught her shoulders
in his hands and turned her around.

“What?”

“Two things.” He pulled his lips tight.
“Maybe three.”

“Well?”

“One…I shouldn’t have said the crap I did
before. I didn’t mean it. It was foolish male pride and jealousy,
and I know damn good and well you’ve never been any man’s whore.
I’m sorry. I mean it.”

Licking her lips, she lowered her head.

“Two… I want you to stay behind while I go to
see Elliot.”

“No way in—”

“Suppose he was followed?”

“He’s smarter than that,” she argued.

“Maybe, and maybe not. The point is, why risk
it? If someone’s watching him and they see you, all three of us are
going to wind up in one of Garrett’s cells. So I want you to stay
here.”

She made a face, lifted her head, but didn’t
argue. “And three?” she prodded.

“Three?” Adam looked down at her. The round
dark wells of her eyes. Hair loose now, and tumbling. The spray had
worn off hours ago, so its smooth straightened look had given way
to its natural waves. His voice went coarse and gravelly. “Oh,
yeah. Three.” He bent down and touched her lips with his, kissed
her gently, slowly, as tenderly as he could manage. Tasting her
upper lip, her lower one, softly tracing their shape with his
tongue. He felt her tremble, heard her catch her breath. Then he
lifted his head away. “Three is just this. I still love you. And I
want you back.”

Every part of her went hard. Stiff. Her eyes
seemed rounder and wider than he’d ever seen them.

“When I make love to you again, Kirsty, I’ll
make you forget Cowan ever touched you. I’ll burn that memory away.
I’ll make it better, I swear it.”

Shaking her head hard from side to side, she
backed away. “No. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I do. And I’m not gonna
give up. I’m here for you, Kirsty, and no matter what you do, I’m
not gonna give up on you this time. I’m not gonna go running off to
lick my wounded pride. If I hadn’t done that before, you wouldn’t
be in this mess now. I might be stubborn, but I’m not stupid. I
learn from my mistakes.”

For a long moment she was quiet. Adam decided
he’d rendered her speechless. He was pretty surprised by his
declarations himself. He grabbed his hat off the boulder behind him
and dropped it on his head. “Guess I’ll go meet Elliot now.”

“Adam, wait.”

He paused, turned around.

“I want there to be no mistake about this,”
she said slowly. “The trouble I’m in is no one’s fault but my own.
Do you understand? No one’s. I brought this on myself, and I
probably deserve every bit of it. Whatever the outcome. Remember
that.”

“No, you don’t—”

“Yes, I do. You don’t know all the things
I’ve done, Adam.”

“But I will. Just as soon as you tell me.’’
He cupped her cheek. “When I get back, okay? We’ll talk when I get
back.”

She lowered her head, nodded once. Later,
Adam thought he should have seen the warning in her eyes, just
before she looked away from his. He should have seen it.

But he didn’t.

He just let go of her and headed back to
where he’d picketed the horses. Saddled Layla and rode away, off to
Thompson Gorge, where it was said the ground was soaked with
century-old blood and the spirits of the dead still lingered on
nights like tonight.

The way he shivered as the Appaloosa’s hooves
plodded slowly into the box canyon, Adam could believe it was
true.

He looked ahead, left and then right, but he
saw only the tall, jagged stone walls. The barren ground, dry and
splitting. The ghostlike movement of a tumbleweed rolling in slow
motion across the unforgiving earth. The occasional dust devil
swirling like a living thing in the moonlight.

And then other hoofbeats sounded. Soft. Slow.
Coming closer. A rider emerged from the darkness, a gun held in his
hand.

Kirsten was already dressed for the journey.
Not in the clothes of Mrs. Joseph Cowan, but in a pair of borrowed
jeans and a T-shirt, with a denim shirt from the saddlebags for
added warmth. Her uniform was gone. Her pretend face. Her
make-believe self, gone, leaving her stripped bare, at the mercy of
the elements. There would be no more hiding. No more
rich-man’s-wife routine, no more attitude. She was just Kirsten
Armstrong. She was just a liar and a murderer on the run from the
law. No makeup kit or closet full of clothing was going to change
that. Not even the love of a man like Adam Brand could change
that.

It was no good. No good staying here with
Adam and watching him fall for her all over again. No good feeling
those old feelings for him trying to pry their way out of the
prison where she’d kept them locked away all this time. None of
that was any good at all.

She crammed some of the supplies into one set
of saddlebags; then she saddled the remaining horse and mounted up.
This was her fight. Not Adam’s. She’d dragged herself into this
mess alone, and she would damned well get out of it alone. She’d
ruined enough lives.