Autumn Sage

by Genevieve Turner

  Her insides knotted at his lack of reaction. Anyone else would have been a bilious green at this point, but not him. No doubt stories of abused and defiled women were quite unexceptional to him. She was simply another victim, one that had the luck of being alive, but in sum not so dissimilar from the rest.

  A burning caught hold of her, an urge to make him see her as she really was: not a victim, not a schoolmarm, not the ugly younger sister of the most beautiful woman in the county.

  No, she was a woman of intelligence, ambition, a woman who made plans. She was to be reckoned with.

  Her tongue raced to tell the rest. “He threw me down.”

  Her skull had bounced hard against the packed earth, making stars dance in her vision. Then McCade’s leer had filled her sight.

  “He held me down by the throat and told me in most lurid detail exactly what violations he meant to inflict on my person.” Lord, just the memory… Her stomach sent bile crawling up her throat. She swallowed and summoned the anger once more. “Shall I list them for you? For your investigation?”

  “That won’t be necessary.”

  The impassivity of his face had bolstered her at the beginning. Now, as she prepared to tell the worst, it enraged her. Or perhaps she wanted it to enrage her, wanted the fury to give her the strength to tell this most terrible bit. “Truly? But you said—at our first meeting—that I must tell you all.”

  Something sparked in his eyes, reminding her that he was well over a head taller than her and nearly twice as big. She told herself this was what he wanted, while a vicious delight bubbled under her anger. This was the reckoning he had called for—and not even he could remain unmoved under the stones she launched.

  “He pulled up my skirt.” She bit her lip and forced her muscles to hold as he took a step towards her. She couldn’t tell if he meant to halt her—or push her onward.

  No matter. She wouldn’t stop, not when she was so close to the end. She could see the outlaw’s hand—the one not wrapped around her neck—as it traveled downward, remembered the heavy sensation as it settled against her thighs.

  The vision passed and the marshal’s silver eyes and white face filled her sight, the large bulk of him casting her in shadow.

  “I flung out my hand, trying to ward him off…”

  A thing very like lightning jumped between them as the marshal took yet another step. One more and he would be close enough to snare her.

  She ought to be afraid, but…

  But he’d held her when the snake had come. If he’d wanted to harm her, he could have done it then. Which meant he was stalking her for some other reason.

  “When I flung out my hand, I felt it,” she said. “That hard, wooden stock.”

  She licked her lips, dragging in air as he simply stared, unmoving, his body tense with coiled energy.

  It sent shivers through her, to see such power so tightly controlled.

  “The rifle.” He spoke in a voice so harsh she barely recognized it.

  She nodded. “I shot him in the shoulder, just as he was unbuttoning his trousers. He’d had a hand on my neck the entire time, squeezing my life away with each second.”

  She paused, unable to look away from the endless storm of the marshal’s gaze, trying to gather her thoughts for this last. “He cursed me once more, then with his uninjured hand pulled his pistol free and sent it crashing into my temple.”

  A black buzzing had seized her brain then, a dizzying nausea she’d fought for only a few moments before it pulled her under to darkness.

  “You were lucky to survive,” he said.

  She could clearly see the rise and fall of his chest under the fine suit. He took that last step, the toe of his boot barely half an inch from the hem of her skirt.

  “I’m going after him,” he promised. “I will capture him.”

  His eyes were deeply sincere, sealing the two of them together in this vow he was making, as sacred as a sacrament. She could scarcely breathe at the intensity between them.

  She hadn’t sensed her anger and fear ebbing away as he stalked toward her, as his gaze had held her tight. But those sensations were gone, leaving only this strange thing between her and the marshal.

  It would be so easy to believe him, to think that because he swore to it, the outlaw’s capture was a certain thing.

  It would also be a lie. Only fate would decide what happened.

  Just as fate had decided her own encounter with McCade.

  The strike of hooves coming down the road unlocked their gazes, had them springing apart. He took two quick steps back, pivoting so that she was behind him, protected from whomever was coming.

  It was only Franny. “I’m supposed to escort Marshal Spencer to the herd when he’s done here,” she said.

  Isabel could see she was annoyed at being left behind from the drive. It was almost charming, her mulish expression. Franny seemed to have no notion of what this place was—or if she did, she wasn’t allowing it to put her off. Franny’s normalcy made Isabel feel almost normal herself.

  That and having given up her story in its entirety. She remained shaken and sick, but relief was coming up from behind.

  “We’re finished,” the marshal said. His voice was once again mellow, but his eyes remained the color of cold iron. “We can be off as soon as I’ve retrieved my horse and my things.”

  Soon. He was leaving soon. Isn’t that what she’d wanted from the beginning, the marshal gone and McCade along with him?

  “Wait,” Isabel called. “I’m coming with both of you.”

  Her surprise at herself was as strong as the shock on their faces.

  “But Isabel,” Franny said, “you hate riding.”

  It was true—she’d always despised long days spent in the saddle and sleeping out of doors. For half a moment, she thought to take her mad impulse back. Her gaze flicked away from the two of them—and landed on that spot, the space where her entire life had been shattered.

  No. No more hiding. It was time she left the house. And truly, what could happen to her, surrounded as she would be on the cattle drive? There would be her brother, Felipe, even Franny.

  And the marshal, of course.

  Foolish, perhaps, to think there was little risk. But as she’d learned, simply leaving her bed each morning carried risk.

  It was time she began risking things again. Braving risk was the only way to gain her desires.

  She deeply desired the capture of that outlaw. She would endure this one trip, solely to witness McCade brought to justice.

  Hadn’t she studied harder than any other girl at the teacher’s examinations—and placed first for her trouble? Wasn’t she a teacher now at the secondary school in the valley, as far from Cabrillo as she could flee? Hadn’t she shut down the saloon in this town and rid it of the scourge of liquor?

  When she returned, everyone would remember those accomplishments, and not the sad, shrinking thing they thought she’d transformed into.

  “A cattle drive is nothing to me,” she said, “if I can see this man brought low.”

  “No,” the marshal said slowly, “I’d imagine many things would be as nothing, to a lady like yourself.”

  There was a faint flicker of something like admiration in his expression.

  Heat flooded her cheeks. Silly, to be embarrassed by that mere hint of esteem.

  Fortunately, Marshal Spencer left off embarrassing her and went on: “It seems you and I will be traveling together to catch this outlaw.”

  Chapter Five

  The men—and Franny—were clustered in a circle around a map that Felipe was sketching for the marshal.

  Isabel was on the outside, looking in. She’d made such a grand declaration about accompanying them on this hunt… and she couldn’t even help with this first step.

  When she’d told her mother of her decision, the Señora had searched her face for a long time. Isabel wasn’t certain what in her expression had convinced her mother, but she’d given her blessing. And o
rdered Juan to be Isabel’s constant shadow.

  Franny was tagging along as usual—her little sister was never far from cattle or cowhands if she could help it.

  “From here to the valley is three days,” Franny was saying. “Of course, if you’re not driving an entire herd down the mountain, it’s much quicker.”

  The marshal studied the route she’d traced, raising a finger to his chin as he pondered it.

  Curious. She’d been watching the marshal most of the morning and he rarely made such small gestures. If a movement or a word was unnecessary, he didn’t indulge in it.

  “Where did the Whitman train notice the missing food?” he asked Felipe.

  “Here.” Felipe pointed to a place halfway between the first and second night’s camp.

  “We already searched there,” her older brother Juan said in exasperation. “We might not be professionals”—he gave the marshal a brief, sardonic look—“but we know enough to search along the road.”

  “No one suggested otherwise,” the marshal replied mildly. “Is there anything of interest near that spot? A spring, a cave—any reason for a fugitive to linger?”

  “There’s a ciénaga at the second night’s camp,” Felipe said.

  “A marsh. Fresh water then,” the marshal muttered to himself.

  “Yes, that’s why the second night’s camp is there.” Franny grinned at the marshal, but his mouth didn’t even twitch in response. Franny’s smile died. “There’s the creek for fresh water as well.”

  The marshal shook his head. “The road follows the creek too closely. If this ciénaga is as large as the map shows, it offers a better place to hide.”

  “So he came down the road and now he’s camping at the ciénaga?” The incredulousness in Juan’s voice came perilously close to petulance. “Of course. That explains why we never found him.”

  Really. Juan didn’t need to be quite that sarcastic.

  “Sometimes, when a man is unfamiliar with the terrain,” the marshal said, “he might take a meandering, uncertain course that would never occur to a native.”

  “Why come out now?” Felipe asked.

  “Food. Water. Shelter,” Marshal Spencer offered.

  “Why not head for the valley and the train station right away?” Juan demanded. “He’s only a day from it, if he’s hiding along the road.”

  Which meant he might be a day’s ride from where she was right now. Or perhaps even closer, creeping silently upon them—

  “A man wandering into town with a gunshot wound so soon after a sheriff has been attacked is going to raise quite the alarm,” the marshal said. “No, better to wait here until he’s healed, then escape by train.”

  “It’s quite a long time for him to be recovering,” she put in, not wanting to be entirely superfluous.

  Maybe he was dead. Maybe it was a simple fluke, the missing food stolen by some enterprising animal instead of a cold-blooded outlaw.

  “If we’re lucky,” Marshal Spencer mused, “he has wound fever.”

  If he did, he’d be suffering, his wound alight with pain. She liked the idea of that. It was un-Christian, but she liked it all the same.

  The marshal caught the expression on her face, and while he didn’t quite smile, his eyebrow quirked up in amusement. “Don’t worry—I’m hoping for that as well.”

  Amusement. He could well afford to be amused or unmoved as he planned his hunt—this was only duty for him.

  She pulled her mouth flat. “I was hoping he was dead.”

  The marshal looked back at the map, his expression smoothing. “Three days to the valley. Two to the ciénaga. Which is where he’s most likely to be. Although not guaranteed.”

  Three days on the trail. Three days surrounded by nothing but pines and open sky and chaparral… and possibly McCade’s gaze, trained on her from somewhere she couldn’t see, waiting, waiting…

  Waiting for what? If he did try to snatch her, every man here would be on him in a flash. McCade appearing before her was the best thing that could happen.

  That reassurance didn’t stop the fluttering of her pulse.

  “Señorita Moreno.” Not quite a command from the marshal, but a clear bid for her attention. “I’m taking one of the hunting trails Señor Ortega pointed out. Please stay close to someone at all times.”

  “Of course.” As if she’d be so foolish as to wander off.

  She told herself the marshal wandering away from her to search was all for the good—if he captured McCade without her ever coming across the man, so much the better—yet that stitch of unease wouldn’t go away.

  It lasted the entire morning, mixing with the high anxiety wrapped around her heart, as she searched every bit of brush, every stand of trees, looking for… well, not really anything.

  Juan rode on her left, Franny on her right, and the two kept up such a chatter about cattle and this year’s beef prices, Isabel had no need to contribute. She suspected they had planned it that way.

  But for all that she couldn’t stop staring at her surroundings—and for all the irritation Juan and Franny’s bickering caused her—she felt surprisingly… even. Not well—she hated riding down the mountain—but closer to it than she’d been in weeks. She was out of doors, exposed and in the open, searching for the man who’d attacked her… and she was still moving forward. There was no hint of a headache building.

  And if she couldn’t tear her gaze away from the brush… well, she was hunting McCade too.

  Although she prayed the marshal would find him first.

  Marshal Spencer reappeared just before lunch. Empty handed. An odd relief lightened her—she wouldn’t have to face McCade. Not yet.

  “I found his camp,” the marshal said in greeting.

  Her mood deflated. He’d found McCade’s camp—but did not have McCade in tow. Her pulse took off at double time, her breath racing to catch up. How could the marshal not have found him?

  “Where was it?” Juan demanded.

  “Three miles south of here. I found some old bandages, but nothing more.”

  “So he is still out there.” There was a grimness to Franny that Isabel had never heard before, her sister’s youthfulness deserting her.

  “Had you any doubts?” The marshal sent his question not to Franny, but to Isabel.

  A warning and a bolstering.

  You knew he was alive. Are you prepared to face him again? That’s what Marshal Spencer meant by directing the question to her. Have you any doubts?

  Before she could answer, even if only in her thoughts, the marshal spurred his horse forward, neatly cutting between Isabel and Juan. “I will remain here with Señorita Moreno. You keep watch at the front,” he ordered her brother.

  Juan’s face twisted for half a moment, but then Felipe called out to him and he went off without protest.

  Wonderful. Juan had taken a dislike to the marshal, and his temper was mercurial at best. Too bad Catarina wasn’t here to keep him in line—he never took Isabel’s admonishments seriously.

  Isabel found herself sandwiched between her sister and the marshal, all three of them scanning for any sign of what they’d come to find.

  The hunt went on.

  Sebastian disliked this landscape. It was too open, too wild—too much space for a man’s thoughts to expand. He hated being alone with his thoughts.

  Or rather, his emotions—those were not to be trusted.

  He scanned the hills yet again. The astringent scent of pines had lessened as they descended, replaced by something much more potent. Sage, perhaps? They did call it sagebrush country. The breeze was sharper here, the call of the birds more cacophonous than in Cabrillo. It all ran against his nerves in the most disconcerting fashion.

  He wasn’t normally so unnerved by a place. He’d traveled far and wide as he’d hunted men, and nothing had worked under his skin the way these mountains did.

  Or perhaps it wasn’t the mountains unsettling him. Perhaps it was her.

  He fixed his gaze on
the tall woman riding half a length ahead of him. Señorita Moreno rode with careful consideration, suggesting she’d not been born to ride, but rather mastered the skill against her natural inclinations.

  It would not have been so noticeable had her younger sister not been riding alongside. He had the distinct impression the girl was minding them—the two greenhorns pulling up the rear. Now there was a girl born to the saddle. He pondered how two such ladies had been born of the same mother—Señorita Moreno, with her close and controlled manners, and her younger sister, who could be best described as disheveled.

  When she’d been reciting her story, tossing it down before him like a gauntlet, Señorita Moreno hadn’t even come close to disheveled.

  He had been the one upended, watching that proud lady recite her trials, remembering another proud lady who had been bent, but not broken, under life’s travails.

  His base nature, the one he fought to repress, had roared in response to Señorita Moreno’s steely resolve. He’d reminded himself that she was a witness, that he must not touch her, that she and her family might be concealing something.

  But such reminders had been ineffective—only the rigid self-control he’d perfected over the years had kept the emotions she inspired from spilling forth.

  As it was, he’d been forced to hurriedly scrounge up pen and paper before the cattle drive left so he could set down the sins of that morning.

  Admired a lady I ought not to admire. Wanted to kiss that same lady. And find the man who harmed her and make him suffer.

  Not quite the same as writing it in his notebooks—he reserved that ritual for the end of the day, safe in the confines of his library in Los Angeles—but it would have to do. The paper had those emotions now.

  They would trouble him no more.

  Tempt him no more.

  He felt nothing more toward Señorita Moreno than his duty demanded. And duty demanded only that he apprehend McCade.

  He pulled his stereo field glasses from the pouch hanging from his saddle horn. If McCade had camped nearby, he must have come to the creek at some point for water. Perhaps some footprints or trampled brush remained.