Desperate Hearts

by Alexis Harrington

  When she continued, her voice shook with the words. “I did everything I could to get away, but it was no use. He was so much bigger than me, so full of lust and hate, I couldn’t stop him. It wasn’t like he just—well—” She faltered and glanced up at face before plunging her gaze to the coffee again. “He didn’t just—want me. He wanted to break me, I guess.”

  He had nearly succeeded, too. She could still smell him, still feel his weight crushing her into the straw. All of it, every detail, was burned into her memory as if it had happened just last night. Her hands were tight fists in her lap, and hot tears scorched her eyes. She brushed at them angrily.

  She had washed and then washed again until her skin was raw—she lost count of the number of baths she took. None of them helped; she still felt dirty, contaminated. Nothing took away the humiliation and pain. She didn’t sleep, she didn’t eat, she didn’t work. She could barely leave the house.

  And it was her dirty little secret. She told no one what had happened, or why she crept around like a stricken animal, jumping at every noise, refusing to go to the barn to see the new filly. How could she talk about it? And to whom? But Hank was suspicious, and when at last she admitted what had happened, he strapped on his revolver to gun down Hardesty. Kyla stopped him, though, believing at the time that killing her rapist would be a breach of basic humanity.

  She took a sip of the now-cold coffee, and finally looked up at Jace. She could see the muscles working in his jaw. “I have regretted that every day since. I should have let Hank go after him. Then he said that short of killing him, if I were married I’d have some kind of legal protection for me and my land, especially with Luke Jory and the Vigilance Union running things. Tom Hardesty is just the kind of man Jory would like. I knew Hank was right, so we got married. And if we hadn’t he’d still be alive. I might as well have pointed the gun at Hank’s chest myself and pulled the trigger.”

  Imagining the scene in the barn—this small, scrappy woman overpowered by that son of a bitch Hardesty—Jace felt a familiar icy knot form in his stomach. He’d known men like that; he’d hunted men like that.

  He studied Kyla. Her eyes were as flat and hard as the colored stone they resembled. “You know you aren’t responsible for Hank’s murder. Nobody made him marry you—he wanted to.”

  She laced her fingers together on the table and clenched them until her knuckles turned white. “I’ve told myself that, but the truth of the matter is that being my husband got him killed. When I married Hank, I gave Tom a reason to shoot him: I made sure that he would never be able to claim half the ranch as his. And Hank got nothing from me for himself. What should have been his was stolen by Hardesty, and I couldn’t let him—couldn’t bear— He married me for nothing.” This last came out in a hoarse, angry whisper.

  Her meaning was clear enough. Frightened, trying to recover from a brutal assault, faced with a marriage of convenience—he understood why she shied away from being touched. But she didn’t need to shoulder the guilt for Hank’s murder.

  “Wait a minute,” he said. “Didn’t you tell me that Hank led that group—the Moonlighters, the Moonshiners?”

  “The Midnighters.”

  “Right. Isn’t it possible that if the Midnighters were a real threat to the vigilantes they would’ve wanted Hank out of the way?”

  Her head came up at this suggestion, as if she were drowning and he had thrown her a rope. “Well, maybe.”

  “Sure, no maybe about it. One of the best ways to weaken or even destroy a group is to take away its leader.”

  “I guess that could be true, couldn’t it?”

  He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “Hell, yes, it could.”

  She looked almost relieved. “I’ve relived that afternoon every single night in my dreams. It has always seemed like my fault.” Then her face clouded over again. “No—Tom killed Hank because of me.”

  “You said that Hardesty pestered you for years—why didn’t your old man do something about it?” he asked, sipping his own coffee.

  She glanced at the floor again. “I never told him. It wasn’t something I could talk about.”

  He put the cup down and put his elbows on the table. “God, girl, why not? If I were your father, I would have taken that mean son of a bitch out to the barn and strapped him until he learned some respect and decency.”

  Shaking her head, she kept her eyes lowered. “No. It wouldn’t have done any good to say anything.”

  “Why?”

  Kyla didn’t answer. She only shook her head again.

  Jace considered everything she’d told him and came to a single conclusion. Tom Hardesty had taken too much from her, all of it important—her freedom to be a woman, her right to choose the man she would give her virginity to, her husband, her home and security, and very nearly her life. Hell, he may have even intimidated her father. She was right. Jail wasn’t bad enough for someone like him. The ghost of a pale, frightened woman in the Bluebird Saloon rose in his mind.

  “What do you want me to do, Kyla?” he asked finally, already knowing what her answer would be.

  She looked at him dead on. “I want you to make him to pay.”

  He let his gaze rest on her set face. She had told him that more than once since they met in Silver City. But this time there was no mistaking her implication—he could not assume that she meant anything else.

  He nodded, once. “All right. I’ll do it.”

  * * *

  Revenge.

  The promise of revenge, it turned out, was powerful medicine. Over the next couple of days, Kyla’s memory of Many Braids chanting over her became more intangible. It had seemed so real, but maybe Jace was right: her fevered mind had provided her with an elaborate hallucination. She knew now that it must have been her need for retaliation that had brought her back from the brink of death.

  Now her strength flowed back into her. When she looked in the mirror, she saw a face with healthier color. The purplish circles under her eyes were fading. And thanks to Chloe McGuire’s embroidery scissors, even her hair looked a little better.

  Mrs. DeGroot continued to bring their food to them, but Kyla always made sure she was upstairs before Jace opened the door to the woman. He said that she had done everything short of walking in unannounced, so piqued was her curiosity, and Kyla did not want the woman to see her. Misfortune might be off the regular wagon roads and trails, but they were not out of danger. Tom Hardesty would keep looking for her, and she knew that Jace was right—the fewer who knew the truth of her identity the better.

  More than anything else, though, Kyla didn’t feel quite so alone in the world now. Jace grasped the core of her anger. He had an idea of the depth of her loss and violation, at least enough to understand her grudge.

  Her partnership with him was an unlikely one, she admitted to herself. They were not friends, but they had more than just a business agreement. He had saved her life. Although he was probably one of the most dangerous men in the territory, she didn’t fear him as much as before, and that was a relief.

  Now and then she wondered about the man behind the notoriety. He never talked about himself, so aside from his name and reputation, he was a mystery to her. Nothing seemed to matter to him, nothing much moved him from his cool detachment. She knew the reason for the shell around her own heart. But his?

  He revealed part of the answer on the afternoon following her haircut. She still wore her sling, but now she was well enough to dress in her new clothes and spend the whole day downstairs in the chilly kitchen. The shirt he’d bought her was too big, but it hid her curves better than her old one had. The day was cold, hinting at a hard winter to come. After Jace threw some firewood into the stove, they sat at the kitchen table, and she watched him clean and oil the Henry.

  He carefully polished every bit of the blued barrel, almost lovingly, Kyla thought. His shirtsleeves were rolled back to his elbows, revealing strong forearms dusted with dark hair. He had nice hands,
she noted, strong hands, broad and deep-shadowed across the knuckles, with long, dexterous fingers. The smell of gun grease wafted through the kitchen.

  “I’ve never seen a man so particular about his weapons,” she remarked, tucking her feet up on the chair seat. “I still think you’d want something newer, like a Winchester or a Remington.”

  He kept his eyes on the rifle. “This Henry and I go back a long way. It’s gotten me out of a number of scrapes.” He turned the flannel polishing cloth. “Besides, a man doesn’t trade a wife for a new model, why should he do it with his guns?”

  What a peculiar comparison, she thought. Was it possible that a man like Jace Rankin was married? Vague disappointment nudged her. “I guess your wife is glad to know that.”

  His face registered mild horror. “I’m not married. I’ve drifted too long to settle down.” He screwed the brass cap back on the grease tube. He looked up at her and Kyla felt a wave of heat roll through her. Those blue eyes . . . He added, “Anyway, this isn’t the kind of work that lets a man come home at sundown for a home-cooked dinner with the family, you know.”

  “No, I suppose not.” Oddly relieved, she felt sorry for him, too. Being alone in the world was too hard; she’d had a healthy taste of it herself. She rolled a cleaning rod to his side of the table. “How did you get started in bounty hunting?”

  He tipped a look at her, but kept to his polishing. “You’re full of questions this afternoon, aren’t you?”

  She hitched one shoulder. “I was just wondering. After all, I don’t imagine that many boys tell themselves, ‘I want to be a bounty hunter when I grow up.’ They’ll say a sheriff, maybe, or a marshal. Or they’ll follow in their father’s footsteps on family farms or businesses.”

  “I wasn’t about to do that,” he muttered, a shadow of profound bitterness coloring his words. “I wanted to get away from my old man.” After a pause he added, “And I guess I wanted a reputation that would make people think twice before they crossed me.”

  “Well, you’ve got that,” Kyla said, curious about the reason for that desire but afraid to ask. “I’ve envied it a little. Sometimes I wished that I could make people fear me just by walking down the street.”

  The flannel square froze a moment under his hand, then continued on. “It was all right. For a while, anyway.”

  Idly, she picked up the gun grease and turned it between her fingers. “No one is afraid of Kyle, but at least he gives me more independence than I have as a woman. It’s easier to fade into the background as a boy.”

  He eyed her shrewdly. “Be careful you don’t lose your true self to the disguise. It’s a dangerous game you’re playing.”

  She sighed and pushed the tube away. “I didn’t want to look like this but Pa— Oh, men can’t begin to understand what it’s like to be at the mercy of anyone who’s bigger.”

  He glanced up. “You don’t think so, huh?” The expression on his handsome face made her blink. His eyes reflected the jaded experience of an old man’s lifetime. “I know all about it.”

  “You do?”

  He held up the rifle barrel and peered down its length. “When I was young, taller kids always wanted to push me around. There are people who can’t resist tormenting someone smaller. I got the shit beat out of me more than a few times. I was an easy target for them.” His words trailed off to a mumble. “When I finally strapped on a gun belt, it didn’t matter that they were bigger.”

  That was a revelation. Jace Rankin seemed like the kind of man who had brimmed with self-confidence and authority even in childhood. Who would want to tangle with him? Kyla shook her head. “Children can be so cruel.”

  “My stepfather wasn’t any better. In fact, he was worse.”

  Kyla sat up in her chair. “God, why? How?”

  “It was a long time ago now. I don’t think about it anymore.”

  She pressed on. “Your stepfather beat you? Just because you were shor—because you weren’t tall?”

  He stood up suddenly, startling her with the abrupt anger that flashed in his ice blue gaze. “You’re asking too many questions that are none of your goddamned business,” he snapped and leaned toward her. Towering over her like that, he seemed enormous. It was like hearing a wolf snarl, warning her that she had come too close. A surge of fear flooded her, and her heart clenched in her chest. Then in a cooler tone, he continued tightly, “I’m going out to check the horses. If anyone knocks on the door, don’t answer it. Just go upstairs.” He pounded out the back door and down the steps, the Henry resting against his strong shoulder.

  Drawing a shaky breath, she went to the window and touched her hand to the cold glass, watching as he crossed the yard to the shop. He scanned the area once, his head up as if he sniffed the very air for danger.

  Unwittingly, Kyla had touched a raw nerve in him that made him rear. It was as though a door to his soul opened just briefly, giving her a glimpse of some private hell before it slammed shut again. Now she felt that she knew even less about him than before. But then a new suspicion rose in her mind.

  Maybe it wasn’t courage that made Jace seem so brave.

  Maybe it was fear.

  * * *

  In the chill musty gloom of the blacksmith shop, Jace leaned against a rough post and jammed a hand through his hair. From her roost in the corner, a cranky hen glared at him with malevolent beady eyes and squawked to shoo him away from her babies. The puffs of yellow down cheeped along excitedly, adding to the racket.

  “Oh, shut up!” he ordered, and took one menacing step toward the hen, bringing his boot down hard on the packed earth floor. “I don’t need your opinion.” The squawking subsided, but the dirty looks did not.

  Flopping on a nearby stool, he released a breath and leaned his rifle against the rough-sawn wall. He’d had to get out of the house before he said more than he intended.

  After all these years, he had thought the raging bitterness to be long dead, the hatred dulled to indifference. Yet it had come boiling to the surface, there in kitchen, prompted by Kyla’s questions. They were innocent enough but he should have stopped her sooner. And with less bite, he supposed, thinking of the way she had flinched. But years ago he had made it a point to avoid thinking about his youth and the events that ultimately led him to his place in life. In the process, he had learned to shut off nearly all of his emotions, and that suited him just fine.

  If Lyle Upton were alive, he would probably be pleased about it, too. Jace regretted that. It meant Lyle had succeeded. At least he’d stopped himself from telling Kyla about him.

  So she envied his ability to arouse fear in people on sight? It was a skill that he’d cultivated and honed to an art, thanks to Lyle. He couldn’t deny its usefulness. But he had begun to realize its drawbacks, too.

  He glanced around the abandoned shop, and his eyes touched briefly on its cold forge and dry water trough. The smell of rust and old metal were strong here. Of all places to seek refuge, he thought, appreciating the irony. He felt uneasy in any blacksmith shop—they all reminded him of his stepfather.

  He never spoke of the man, but in the kitchen he had been about to blab his whole sorry tale to Kyla, like some whining crybaby. The words had formed so quickly, so easily. Maybe because he’d felt comfortable sitting at the table with her, incredible as it was to believe.

  He found himself inexplicably drawn to her—she prowled his thoughts and dreams. He supposed it might be because he admired her courage; not every woman could do what she had done. And beneath her thorny surface he detected a rose, a core of simple goodness that attracted him like a fire on a cold night. Basic decency was not something he encountered very often.

  He liked talking to her. That was a true rarity for him. Few of the people he dealt with had much to say that he wanted to hear. But a man could get tired of the sound of his own voice in his head.

  He’d spent a lot of time over the years listening to himself think. Listening to the rain. Listening to the wind wear down the rocks. Th
ey were the sounds of being alone. Kyla’s smoky sweet voice was a welcome change.

  Then there were those other things about her, womanly things: the way she smelled, like new-cut grass, those big turquoise eyes, the soft curves of her that were no longer stifled by her clothes. Her boy’s rigging now seemed like flimsy camouflage, and he wondered how he’d ever been fooled.

  Jace wasn’t used to this. For him, women had never been more than an hour or a night that he’d paid for. Simple physical satisfaction was all he wanted, the illusion of tenderness. It had been good enough.

  But now, with only a few feet and a thin wall separating their beds, at night he could hear Kyla’s sheets rustle, and he lay awake with the image of her fevered body imprinted on his mind. Just now, in the cool kitchen her nipples had pressed against her shirt, catching his attention. Lately he had found himself imagining what she would feel like in his arms, what her lips would taste like, how soft she was to the touch . . .

  And he could just stop imagining right now, he concluded. He pushed himself to his feet and crossed the floor to collect the horses’ feed bags. On the way, he paused to look at the chicks pecking at tiny rocks embedded in the dirt. He could tell Kyla, and on good authority, that a life spent sealed off from human contact was a bleak one. But he knew the last thing she would want was another man getting close to her, regardless of his intentions. Jace wasn’t even sure what his intentions might be. He looked up, and through the shop’s side door, he saw her at the kitchen window, a solitary figure watching the open prairie beyond the house. He dropped his gaze to the chicks again.

  Maybe he wanted to prove to her that a man’s touch didn’t always inflict harm, that it could soothe and comfort. That it could be as tender as she needed it to be.

  Maybe he even wanted to prove it to himself.

  God, what the hell was he thinking, anyway? He strode to the sack of oats leaning against a stall and scooped the grains into the two feed bags. He was no one’s savior. He didn’t have anything to give to another person, and right now just getting them to Blakely was as far ahead as he could see. He glanced back at the dark, cold forge.