Brianna spoke up. “This sounds as if it may be a scary story, Mr. Paxton.”
“Of course,” he said with a wave of his hand. “What good is a campfire story if it isn’t scary? Anyhow, the men finally left the horses behind and went up on foot. They were all brave fellows, and they knew the guys they were looking for were just as unflappable. So what they found in that camp made their hair stand on end. Every single man in that hunting party, with the exception of one, had apparently sat by the campfire, feeding it until they ran out of wood, terrified to leave. Their horses were gone. Each man held a gun at the ready, but every single one of them had stayed by that fire pit, long after their wood and food ran out. They were frozen in position, just as they’d died, staring off into the woods with expressions of stark terror on their faces, the forefingers of their right hands curled over the triggers of their rifles.”
Daphne gasped. Brianna curled a comforting arm around her shoulders. It was a silly, made-up story. Brianna had no doubt of that. “Mr. Paxton, perhaps we should—”
“Anyhow, for reasons nobody will ever know, those men were so afraid to leave their camp that they just sat there and died.” He sat up and chewed solemnly on the blade of grass. “The searchers meant to bury their bodies, but as they worked, they got spooked. Really spooked. Before the job was finished, they took off running the half mile to their horses, only to find that their mounts had gotten the hell out of there and raced for home. They had to walk all the way back, and when they arrived, the sole survivor of the hunting party had staggered into town. He was babbling mad and his hair had turned snow-white. He died shortly thereafter—the doc couldn’t figure out why—and that poor fellow, the only one to survive whatever was up there at Ten Mile Creek, was never able to tell anyone what happened. To this day, nobody can ride a horse up there. The animals buck and go crazy, sensing the evil in those woods.”
Just then a coyote wailed in the darkness and Daphne leaped to her feet. Instead of going around the fire, she took a flying jump over it at Paxton, who was unprepared for the impact of her weight. He went over backward and then caught her to his chest.
“Hey, now,” he said. “What’s this? It was only a silly story. Haven’t you ever sat around a fire at night and told scary tales?”
Daphne shuddered and pressed against him. Brianna, frozen in place on the opposite side of the fire, saw darkness seeping onto Paxton’s tan trousers and realized with mounting dismay that her daughter had just wet herself and the man holding her.
“Well, Jesus H. Christ,” he said.
So much for limiting himself to a few favorite bywords. Brianna struggled to gain her feet, fearful that the man would explode with temper. But instead of growing angry, he smiled with unmistakable chagrin, tightened his arms around the child, and rolled to sit up.
“Pumpkin,” he said huskily, “that was only a story, you know. I don’t think it ever really happened. Your uncle Matthew—”
“Who?” Daphne’s voice was muffled against his shirt.
“Your uncle Matthew. He’s married to your aunt Eden. That’s another long story, and you don’t even know who Aunt Eden is, but I guarantee that when you meet her you’ll love her on the spot, and she’ll love you.”
Daphne remained stiff in his arms. “I never want to meet her if she lives near Ten Mile Creek!”
David laughed. Brianna, no longer fearing his reaction, sank down again to brace her back against the saddle. Foolish man, telling a child such a hair-raising tale. Even so, she wanted to smile. It was just—well, so very like him to speak before he thought.
Brianna felt suddenly uncomfortable, not physically, but way deep down. This man confused her terribly, making her think he was a lowdown snake one second and then, as he was now, forcing her to wonder if he wasn’t the kindest, most caring person she’d ever met. Did he deserve to wear that badge? Did the family members he referred to so easily actually exist? Did he really have an older brother who’d raised him up never to hit women and a mother who’d taught him better than to use coarse language?
Brianna didn’t know. She no longer trusted her own instincts. This man had come into her life like a tornado. He even made her wonder if what Judge Afton had said had any merit—that the books she loved to read were filled with dated tripe.
After talking with Daphne, trying to soothe away her fear, David announced that it was time for them to wash. With a glance at Brianna, he said, “We’ll rinse her things to dry by the fire tonight. But for now she’ll need another dress and underclothes.”
Muscles protesting, Brianna scrambled to collect her daughter fresh clothing. She braced herself for the worst as she stumbled through the moon-silvery darkness to the stream, half expecting Paxton to be naked in the water with her child. But, no. He crouched fully clothed next to the stream, bathing Daphne. The prairie wind had an icy bite, so he made a quick job of it, and then wrapped the little girl in a blanket from his own bedroll. Clearly, he felt better able to withstand the damp than they could.
“We’ll dress you by the fire. It’s colder than hell out here, unfit for man or beast.”
At camp, Brianna helped dry off her child and stuff her into fresh garments. Then Paxton found sticks, which he drove into the ground to fashion a makeshift clothesline. Even after all that, Daphne still jerked every time a coyote howled.
Paxton announced that it was time to bring out his fiddle. Brianna had long since judged him to be “on the fiddle,” but it had never once occurred to her that he might know how to play one. He removed the fragile instrument from its case. In the flickering light, the wood gleamed red and gold, as reflective as polished glass.
“That’s a beautiful piece,” she said.
“The front is spruce, the back and sides maple. It was my father’s, and Ma passed it on to me. She claims I ruined her hearing as a boy while I was learning to play it.”
Brianna had cringed more than once herself when one of the children struck a sour note on the orphanage violin. “I’m surprised you bring it into the wild.”
“The case protects it, and music makes good company when I’m traveling alone.”
He sat by the fire, making the slender bow dance over the strings, creating music that drowned out the sounds of the night. Daphne forgot to be afraid of the evils lurking in the darkness and danced around the flames, singing songs at the top of her lungs. When she grew weary, Brianna tucked her in. The fire was dying by then, so she softly bade Mr. Paxton good night and joined her daughter on the pallet.
Exhaustion blanked out her mind the moment she closed her eyes. Her last thought was to wonder if Paxton would bathe in the creek before changing into fresh clothes.
When Brianna awakened the next morning—right at the break of dawn this time, the sky streaked with breathtaking hues of rose—she found her daughter once again missing from the bed. She sat up with a start to see David hunkered by his fire, pouring a cup of coffee. When their gazes met, he indicated his bedroll with a jerk of his head. She peered through the gloom and saw her daughter curled up in his blankets.
“Coyotes,” he called softly. “She got scared, I think.”
Brianna struggled to her feet—and it was indeed a struggle. From her waist down, she felt as stiff as an old woman. When she reached his fire, the only source of warmth, he poured her some coffee and laced it with sugar. She accepted the offering, relishing the warmth of the tin in her hands and the slide of hot pleasure as she took a first sip.
“You make wonderful coffee.”
“Ah.” He smiled slightly. “Secret ingredient, taught to me by a wily old cowpoke. When it rolls to a full boil, you toss in a dash of salt.”
She tasted no salt, but the brew was still superior to any she’d ever made. Studying him, she noted that his hair drifted in the breeze as if it were freshly washed, and the whiskers he’d sported last night had vanished to display a clean-shaven jaw just now sporting new nubs. He must have bathed last night after she fell asleep, she decided.<
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She yearned to sit on the grass and absorb the warmth of the fire, but when she glanced at the ground, her sore body discouraged her from making the attempt. Getting down there would hurt, and standing back up would be even worse.
He set aside his cup and left the fire. Moments later he returned with her blankets, folded to make a cushion, and relieved her of the coffee cup, which he set on the turf. Extending his hands, he said, “Grab hold and lean back. I promise a soft landing.”
Brianna extended her arms. His fingers enfolded hers, the breadth of his hands encompassing the whole of hers. As she leaned her weight against him, she felt the iron-like anchor of his strength and had no fear that she might fall. He lowered her gently onto the thick fold of blankets.
“Ah,” she said with a sigh. “This is lovely.”
He bent to retrieve her coffee. As she accepted it, he said, “No work for you this morning. You’re about played out. I’ll take care of everything. Before we ride, I strongly suggest you give that liniment a try. It’ll sting a bit right at first if you’re rubbed raw in places, but that goes away pretty quick, and then it works its magic.”
Brianna definitely needed a bit of magic before she could climb back on a horse. “I surrender, sir. At this point, I’m willing to try almost anything.”
He chuckled and resumed his former position at the opposite side of the fire. After taking a sip of coffee, he said, “That child was scared senseless when she crawled in bed with me. Next time I start to tell one of my campfire stories, tell me to shut my damn mouth.”
Brianna nearly choked on a mouthful of brew. She sputtered and waved a hand in front of her face. She saw that he was grinning—not sarcastically now, but with genuine humor.
“I’ve never been around a six-year-old as an adult,” he confessed. “Little Ace, my brother’s boy, is still only knee-high to a grasshopper. He can’t sit still long enough to listen to a story, so I honestly didn’t stop to think the one I told last night would frighten Daphne that bad.” He shrugged. “It’s a bunch of nonsense, that tale, with maybe a smidgen of truth tossed in. Us boys used to tell Eden spooky stories when she was still little, and she never reacted that way. I figured it’d add a touch of adventure to the evening.”
“It certainly did accomplish that, sir.”
“Yeah.” He shook his head. Then he angled her a serious look from under the brim of his hat. “I’m going to need some help to be a decent daddy. I checked while giving her a bath, and much to my dismay, there are no instructions printed on her butt.”
Brianna almost laughed. It wasn’t often that she got the urge. “Right after she was first born, I felt exactly the same way, wishing she had come with an instruction booklet.” In the early days, when Daphne had suffered with colic and cried incessantly, Brianna had been frantic more times than not. “Know-how comes with experience.”
“Kind of like cooking over an open fire?”
He’d done it again, made her want to laugh. “Precisely.”
“Well, I’ll teach you if you’ll return the favor.”
He spoke as if they’d be raising Daphne together for many years to come. Brianna knew that wouldn’t happen. He wasn’t the child’s father. But somehow, over the course of last night, she’d come to accept that he believed he was. “I still make my mistakes with her, but I’ll share what knowledge I have.”
“That’ll do.”
Just then, Daphne stirred awake. “Mama? Papa?”
Darling in her rumpled brown-and-gold dress, she scrambled up from bed, rubbing her eyes. Stumbling sleepily, she went to David. He held his coffee out to one side, sat cross-legged, and drew her onto his lap. “Good morning, Sunshine.”
“Morning.” Daphne snuggled against him, twisting her small fists in her eye sockets again. “I was scared last night. There were evil things out there in the dark, Mama.”
“Coyotes aren’t evil, pumpkin.” David pressed a kiss to her tousled hair. “They’re God’s creatures, same as us. They were only singing to the moon.”
“I didn’t like their songs.”
“Ah, well,” he said. “We can’t understand what they’re saying, but they do. They were probably trying to find a rabbit for supper, and they were powwowing back and forth about how best to catch one.”
Daphne yawned. “Do you think they got one?”
“I reckon so. Rabbits are plentiful here. Speaking of which, I need to go get us one for breakfast. Why don’t you cuddle with your mama while I go see what I can find?”
Daphne came to sit beside Brianna, huddling close within the circle of her arm. As they watched David walk away, the child whispered, “Papa makes me feel safe. Does he make you feel that way, too?”
Yesterday Brianna would have shuddered at the question. This morning, she nuzzled her daughter’s hair and softly replied, “Yes, I believe he does.”
Chapter Eleven
T
he second day on the trail went pretty much as the first one had except that Brianna used the liniment before mounting up, and after the first sting of it wore off, she felt considerably better. She declined to join Paxton and her daughter on their foraging expeditions, still too sore to get on and off her horse frequently, but from a distance she enjoyed their antics. Daphne squealed as if they’d just come across a priceless jewel when David pointed out a plant they might eat, and they returned from each jaunt with his hat partly filled with plunder from the prairie floor.
During their dinner stop, Brianna found that she was still wary of David, but not nearly so much as she had been. She gave up on building her own fire and instead helped cook over his. When their fingers accidentally touched, her heart did a funny little dance, and a tingling sensation shot up her arm. No man had ever elicited that reaction from her, and though she was at first puzzled by it, she soon came to accept that it was physical attraction. She’d heard women whisper and titter about how certain men made them feel, but for Brianna, it was a new experience.
Even so, her blood went cold when she caught David watching her with a gleam of interest in his eyes. During her short stint as a barmaid in Boston when Daphne was an infant, she’d learned firsthand how strong men were, and he was more muscular and solid than most. It made her intensely uneasy to think that he might go back on his word and decide to exercise his conjugal rights. She tried to stay close to Daphne during the rest break, convinced that only a completely unconscionable person would force his attentions upon a woman in the presence of a child.
She no longer considered escape to be an option. The farther they rode, the more harshly it was driven home to her that she lacked the know-how to survive out there. She and Daphne would wander in circles until they starved to death. When she thought back to that first night when she had tried to hire a horse, she was almost glad her plan had been foiled. Never mind that David had the look of a scoundrel. Thus far he’d proved himself to be a good man, and he’d been kindness itself to Daphne. Unless he suddenly showed her a different side to his nature, she had to gamble that she and the child were better off in his company than they would be on their own.
Shortly after they’d enjoyed their midday meal and gotten back on the horses, Brianna saw three riders on the horizon ahead of them. Paxton held up a hand to signal her to stop. Then he dismounted and carried Daphne back to her.
“She can sit with you for a spell. I’m going to ride out to meet them alone.”
After settling Daphne on the bay in front of her, Brianna cupped a hand over her eyes and squinted into the distance. “Who are they, do you think?”
David ruffled Daphne’s hair. “I have no idea, but when I’m out like this, I prefer to introduce myself to strangers when my favorite ladies are a safe distance back.”
For an instant, Brianna recalled her fear that Paxton meant to meet his cohorts out here and hand Daphne over to them. Panic bubbled into her throat, but then she met his steady, deep blue gaze. He’d seemed so sincere last night and again by the fire this morning,
projecting himself as a man who planned to deal fairly with her and wanted only to be a good father. She had been on an emotional seesaw since meeting him, thinking him to be a devil one moment, then questioning her own reasoning the next.
Calling upon her practical nature, which had always stood her in good stead, she elected to set her doubts aside. She had nothing to lose. If those men riding toward them were his partners, she and Daphne would be in terrible trouble no matter what she did. She needed to keep a clear head and put her faith in David. If he meant to betray her, then he might at least suffer a twinge of guilt afterward for breaking her trust.
David checked his Colts to be sure they were loaded, and then he drew his Henry rifle from the boot to do the same. He could feel the tension that rolled off Brianna. Well, he didn’t want to alarm her, but better that than to get caught with his guard down.
He almost mounted back up, but something, a feeling deep in his guts that defied explanation, suddenly made him decide against it. Brianna would have a far better chance of getting away and finding a town if she was on trusty old Blue.
Retracing his steps to the bay, he said. “Brianna, I want you to switch horses.” He pointed to a nearby rock. “Use that as your mounting block. Put Daphne on his back first, then you get on behind her.”
“But why? Blue is your mount.”
Again, David felt reluctant to frighten her or the child, but she needed to do as he said. “You’ll be better off on him if we get separated. Lucy’s tethered to his saddle, so you’ll have all the supplies with you.” He glanced at Daphne. “It’s just a precaution in case those fellows get any shady notions into their heads. Most likely, they won’t.”
He handed Brianna the Henry. Her lips went as white as sun-bleached bed linen. “I haven’t a clue how to use this.”
“You’ll figure it out right quick.” He smiled for Daphne’s sake. The child’s eyes had gone round with alarm. “I’m going to mosey ahead on foot to meet them. Keep an eye out. They’re probably friendly fellows, but if not—” He broke off without finishing, but he saw in Brianna’s eyes that she understood. “No worries,” he added. “I’ll be right back. If something happens, go and just keep going. Leave the bay behind, and I’ll catch up with you. Okay?”
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