Ace's Wild (Hqn)

by Sarah McCarty

  Fingers slid over his forearm. He didn’t need to look down to know who it was who touched him with such compassion and gentleness. Maddie. Poor abused Maddie. Born to a whore. Raised in a whorehouse. Used by men all her life until Tracker had brought her home after one of his failed searches for Ari. Maddie was as fleeting as sunshine, here one minute, gone the next, retreating into fantasy as fast as she snapped out of it. Her fingers tightened slightly on his arm. He smiled down at her automatically. Despite the harshness of her past, there was something about Maddie that remained untouched, that drew a man to smile. That enticing illusion of innocence probably had made her a damn good whore.

  Caden regretted the thought as soon as Maddie smiled back at him with complete trust, her dark green eyes picking up the deeper green of leaves of the pear tree, her wavy red hair dragging the sunlight with it as tendrils escaped her bun and blew across her cheeks. Freckles sprinkled like pale kisses across the bridge of her nose. And her smile...that sweet, gentle smile that captured the hope of the world added to his guilt. So trusting when she had no reason to trust anyone, least of all him. Fey, his da would have called Maddie. One of the special ones that bridged the space between this world and the magical one.

  “Tia looks like a queen, doesn’t she?” Maddie said in a soft voice that eased a man’s tension. For all her differences, Caden had always found Maddie a very restful soul.

  “Yeah, she does.” He was happy for Tia and Ed. It’d taken Ed seven years to convince Tia he wasn’t going anywhere. And Tia, well, she deserved the best of everything. Not just because she’d taken eight ragtag boys and raised them into men, but because of who she was. She stood next to her husband, petite and elegantly plump in her golden silk gown, her graying black hair pulled back into a sedate bun, her white, gold and black lace mantilla draped artfully around her face. He felt that familiar twinge of unease that came with the thought of settling.

  Voices rose and fell around him, taking on an unreal quality, and the moment froze with sudden clarity. They were all settling down. Caine had his Desi. Tucker had Sally Mae. Sam with his Bella. Tracker had Ari, and Shadow had his Fei. The wild boys of the plains were becoming the builders of the future. Hell’s Eight had been Caden’s focus for as long as he could remember, but looking around the ranch he’d helped build, Caden had that ever-increasing sense of “wrong.” His feet itched and his nerve endings crawled impatiently beneath his skin. He’d been a part of Hell’s Eight for twenty-two years, but he didn’t feel as if he belonged here anymore.

  “Are you worried Tia won’t love you anymore now that she has Ed?” Maddie teased, her fingers sliding between his and squeezing. It was a totally inappropriate gesture. Yet it completely soothed his unease. Caden tugged at his hand. Maddie didn’t let go.

  Shit. The woman made it easy to take advantage of her. Her sweet nature and the fact that more often than not she was in her make-believe world where nothing bad could touch her made her an easy target. Everyone wished she was stronger, but disappearing into her own mind was Maddie’s defense against what’d happened to her in her life. Caden thought they should just let her be. It was a hard world, harder if you were brought up in a whorehouse. Harder still if you had the sweet personality of a child. Too many men had taken advantage of the optimistic woman in Maddie. He didn’t want to be one of them. This time he tugged his hand free. “I’m not worried, Maddie mine.”

  The endearment just slipped out. She blinked up at him. “If I’m yours, why do you need to lie to me?”

  How was he supposed to answer that? Across the garden, he smiled at Tia and Ed before lifting his glass in a silent toast. Tia smiled back, but Caden could tell from the tension at the edge of her mouth that she knew he was leaving. He hated to ruin her day, but he was who he was. A Miller didn’t let grass grow under his feet. He pursued rather than settled. He took another sip of the champagne, wishing even more that it was whiskey. “Habit, I guess.”

  “You don’t lie to anyone else.”

  Everyone else could handle the truth. Maddie continued to stare up at him, her fingertips resting on his forearm, as if the pressure took his measure. The way she stared at him so steadily made him uneasy, as if she really was fey and really did see more than others.

  “I’m leaving, Maddie.”

  She blinked slowly. He had the oddest impression she’d just gasped.

  “When will you be back?”

  He traced his finger over the curl spilling down her temple. It was always too easy to touch Maddie. “I don’t know.”

  “Where will you go?”

  “So many questions.”

  “You don’t want to answer?”

  Maddie could be surprisingly blunt.

  With a sigh he admitted, “No.”

  Cocking her head to the side, her gaze never leaving his, she took another step in until the blue gingham skirts of her brand-new dress brushed his boots. She frowned as her fingers trailed down to his wrist. “You’re upset.”

  From across the garden, he saw Tia note the familiarity with a frown of her own. Caden shrugged. They could lecture Maddie all they wanted about proper behavior, but it wouldn’t make a difference. She listened, she truly did, but in the end Maddie was Maddie. Open sunshine and optimism covering a lifetime of hurt. Her conduct was as volatile as her grasp on reality. While he’d never seen Maddie actually proposition a man, she often gave the impression she was propositional. And that was a shame, because she had a heart of gold and deserved to be treasured.

  Faint strains of music blended with the hum of conversation. Four of Sam’s vaqueros strummed their guitars. The hum of conversation rose as everyone wandered to the grassy center where ribbons and bunches of cut flowers fluttered in the breeze, defining the dance area. Tia had declared May to be the perfect month for a wedding, and Caden had to agree. The day was beautiful, the weather perfect, and the bride and groom happy. There wasn’t a fly in the ointment. As Caden watched, Ed took Tia’s hand and brought it to his lips with a courtly bow Caden would have sworn the former cowhand could never have pulled off. When Tia smiled at her husband, her expression full of love, the last of Caden’s uncertainty slipped away. He could leave cleanly now. Tia was happy and safe. The last of his debts were paid. The sense of excitement he’d expected failed to come.

  “Don’t be sad,” Maddie said, her fingertips smoothing over the inside of his wrist.

  “Millers don’t get sad.”

  “I can feel—”

  “I think there’s some cake left, Maddie,” Caine interrupted, coming up beside them, a whiskey glass in each hand and a gentle tone to his normally hard drawl. Everyone at Hell’s Eight used a gentle note with Maddie. A body couldn’t help it. She had that way of wild things about her that made you think one wrong move and she’d either dart to the right or leave looking for a hiding spot. Plain and simple, harsh words shattered Maddie’s fragile hold on reality. “You might want to think about getting some before Tucker’s sweet tooth takes hold.”

  Maddie let go of his arm and turned toward the cake table. Sure enough, Tucker was moving toward it.

  “He’s like a horde of locusts devouring all in their path,” she muttered.

  The comparison made Caden smile. Tucker was a deliberate man, deadly when he chose to be, but he did like his sweets.

  As if hearing his thoughts, Caine offered, “He does like his cake.”

  So did Maddie. Brought up as she had been, she’d never had a sweet before
fourteen and only that one which she’d stolen. Since she’d come to Hell’s Eight, she’d been making up for lost time. Not content with just sampling what Tia baked, she was learning to create her own confections. When he’d asked her why, she’d said in a moment of total clarity that if she knew how to make what she needed, she’d never be needing again. He didn’t like to think of her being without. He’d asked Tia to up the monthly order of baking supplies. No one had complained after Maddie proved she could turn anything she baked to bliss. She never ate what she baked, though. That he couldn’t figure out. And she wouldn’t say why. Which just deepened the puzzle of what made the apparently simple Maddie so complex.

  Maddie glared at Caine, her eyes snapping with the knowledge that he was laughing at her. “That doesn’t mean it’s all his.”

  No, it didn’t. “Tia did declare the cake fair game after the first serving.”

  She bit her lip, revealing white teeth and the slight gap between the top front two. She always tried to hide that gap. Personally he thought it too appealing in a far too sexual way. Maddie wavered, clearly torn between the two things she wanted. Caden took pity on her. Maddie wanted that cake, and right now he needed to give her one last thing because it might be a while before he saw her again. By the time he came back, she might be more grounded in this world. Maybe even married. He resisted the urge to stroke his fingers over the freckles sprinkling across her cheekbones.

  Caden put his champagne glass on the potting table beside him. “Go get your cake, Maddie.”

  Still she hesitated, looking up at Caden with those leaf-green eyes, her fear in her gaze. “You won’t leave before I get back?”

  “No.” He’d be leaving tonight, though. It was time for him to go.

  “Best hurry,” Caine prodded.

  Maddie frowned at Caine. She looked like a kitten challenging a cougar as she ordered, “You won’t tell him bad stories? He doesn’t sleep well when you do, and he needs his rest.”

  Shit, she made him sound downright feeble. Something that wasn’t lost on Caine if the smile tugging at his lips was anything to go by.

  “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

  Caden turned Maddie toward the crowd gathered at the cake table. “Go, Maddie, before there’s none left.”

  She did, lifting her skirts and showing an indecent amount of ankle in her haste to beat Tucker to the cake. She had pretty ankles.

  “I’m not even going to ask how she knows how you sleep,” Caine stated with an arch of his brow.

  And he wasn’t going to tell. Caden folded his arms across his chest. “I haven’t been messing with her.”

  Caine dismissed the challenge with a wave of his hand. Whiskey sloshed in the cut-crystal glass he held. Caden remembered when they used to drink it straight out of the bottle. “Hell, I know that, but that woman has a powerful affection for you.”

  “She’s like a child.”

  “Maybe when she first got here. But have you noticed lately she’s more here than there?”

  “She’s healing.”

  “Desi says she’s forgetting.”

  Caden took one of the glasses from Caine. “How the hell does a woman forget being forced to serve men from childhood?”

  “A woman who knows how to escape into make-believe?” Caine made a slashing motion with his free hand. “How the hell do I know?”

  “Then, why are you bringing it up?”

  “Because Sally Mae told Desi that I should.”

  Of course she had. Caden sighed and swirled the whiskey in the glass. “Life was a hell of a lot easier before we had women cluttering up the place.”

  Caine’s whole expression softened as he looked over at his wife. Blonde and petite, her curly hair temporarily confined in a knot, Desi was the love of Caine’s hard life and he was hers. If ever two people fit together like pieces of a puzzle, it was Desi and Caine.

  “I happen to like the clutter,” Caine drawled.

  Caden bet he did, but the Miller men didn’t have that kind of heart luck. They were treasure hunters, adventurers, trailblazers. Caden took a sip of whiskey. The only thing the Millers brought women was loneliness and disappointment. “I know.”

  “You really going to try to salvage that gold mine of Fei’s?” Caine asked.

  Caden swallowed the whiskey, savoring the burn. That was more like it. Enough whiskey could cauterize any wound. “Yup.”

  “Sam said Fei blew it to hell and gone.”

  Caden shrugged. There were ways around that. “Just presents more of a challenge.”

  “A hell of a challenge for one man.”

  Caden smiled and took another sip. “Since when did Hell’s Eight shy away from a challenge?”

  “Never.” Caine swirled the whiskey in his glass. “Is that what has your feet itching? No more challenges for you here?”

  There were plenty of challenges at Hell’s Eight. Just because they’d staked their claim didn’t mean there wasn’t someone who was going to try to take it.

  His father’s face flashed into his mind. Frozen in time. Remember who you are...

  He’d done his duty by the Hell’s Eight and Tia. But now it was time to do right by his family.

  “More like a promise I’ve got to keep.”

  “What promise?” Caine asked.

  “Nothing that involves you.”

  “If it involves you,” Caine countered, “it involves Hell’s Eight.”

  Caine’s loyalty to those he considered family was all encompassing. Caden drained the glass and set it beside the delicate champagne flute. Such elegance where before there had been none. He turned away. “Not this time.”

  “The hell you say.”

  He met Caine’s gaze squarely. “I do.”

  “At least let Ace or Luke go with you.”

  Caden could see Maddie scooping up her piece of cake. Saw her smile at Tucker shyly as he pretended to grab for it. Inside, something twisted, revealing a touch of...anger? He pushed the feeling aside.

  “You can’t spare the hands.”

  “We can spare what you need,” Caine said.

  Caden knew the state of the ranch as well as anyone. Knew the threats against it. They’d just expanded. Every man was necessary. And now with the cavalry being pulled back East to deal with the discord there between North and South, they had to add the renewed threat of Indian attacks to the mix. “Too many people would draw attention.”

  “Two is hardly too many,” Sam cut in, coming up beside them, a whiskey glass in one hand and a bottle in the other. Behind him was Ace. “Hell, it won’t even get the job done. Remember, I saw the place after Fei blew it up. The woman is thorough.”

  Caden knew he’d eventually need help, a lot of it likely, but right now, he didn’t want it. “I need to do this on my own.”

  “Because of that promise you made your da?” Ace asked, his dark hair flopping over his brow, giving him the look of a devil-may-care no-account. Until you looked a little lower and saw his eyes. No one that had any ability to take a man’s measure could mistake the coldness and purpose that shadowed his light brown eyes. Ace could cut a man’s throat with the same aplomb with which he could perform those card tricks he liked to show off. And with a smile on his face. Not that Ace enjoyed killing, but if it was necessary, he didn’t have any qualms about settling a score. Caden sighed, noting Tracker and Shadow making their way over, too. This had all the makings of a well-intentioned ambush. Shit.

  “Did someone sen
d out an invite I missed?”

  Sam smiled. “Nah. This is more of an impromptu party.”

  “What promise did you make to your da?” Caine asked, with that tenacity that marked everything he did.

  “Nothing.” Caden glared at Ace. Of all the Hell’s Eight, he was closest to Ace, which had resulted in a drunken confession about his father many years ago that should never have been made. Ace merely shook his head.

  “Don’t get your tail in a twist. You’re a grown man. You get to be as foolish as you want.”

  “The hell he does.”

  “Let it go, Caine,” Caden ordered.

  “The hell I will.”

  Sam leaned in and poured more whiskey into Caine’s already quarter-full glass. “Drink that.”

  “Shit, if I drink that, I’ll be drunk.”

  Sam shrugged and offered Ace the bottle, before saying, “At least you’ll have an excuse for spouting nonsense.”

  “It’s not nonsense. That gold mine is in the middle of Indian country, and Culbart isn’t going to be any help if anything goes wrong out there.”

  That was true. The mine wasn’t the only thing Fei had blown to hell and gone. When Fei’s father had sold her cousin Lin to Culbart, Fei had taken matters into her own hands. A lot of dynamite had been blown to rescue Lin. Which meant the only white man close enough to come to Caden’s aid at the mine wasn’t going to be feeling that friendly toward a Hell’s Eight man. Caden mentally shrugged. He’d faced tougher odds.

  “Culbart’s a hard-ass, but no one has ever accused him of being stupid,” Ace said. “If Hell’s Eight calls for help, he’ll be there. He can’t afford to be that friendless with that ranch of his smack-dab in the middle of Indian country and tensions rising the way they are.”